I have played around with SV on my main but wanted to really understand the feeling of being a melee hunter, so have decided to level one. The issue is I have looked for a guide for what talents I should use or pet suggestions, but icyviens inly gives 110 to 120 tips, so I wanted to ask some pros on dome tips they have learned from maining SV, talents, pets, and opening rotation. For you understanding I will be playing a Mag’har that way I can start at level 20 and not wait until level 10 to suddenly learn how to use a polearm, not using WM like to play pve, and have a full set of heirlooms to make everthing smoother.
I would say that until you’ve reaches ilvl 120 you should just play around with all of the talents and go with what is most fun and interesting for you. Virtually any talents you choose will be more than effective for levelling. If you’re levelling with hierlooms you will likely just be breezing through content anyways. There are only a few talents that go unused at 110-120 and it’s because people read the guides and never even bother trying something that isn’t considers optimal. It’s unfortunate too because some of the neglected talents are quite fun.
I’m not expert by any means, but those are my 2 cents.
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Obviously I don’t play Survival but I did get server first 100, 110, and 120. The important thing to remember when leveling is that the overwhelming majority of things you will fight will be very easy and die in mere seconds. So the most important talents are the ones that let you a) move faster, b) pull lots of mobs quickly, and c) burst them all down quickly. This means you might take things that would ordinarily never be taken for raiding. For example, as BM you would never go without Barrage while leveling as it’s the ultimate pull-everything tool (and what makes BM the best solo leveling spec in the game in my opinion).
With that philosophy in mind I did look at SV talents. Take this with a grain of salt since I obviously don’t play it.
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15: Terms of Engagement seems like the obvious choice. This is one of those examples where you would normally never take it in end game content but it would be hugely valuable in leveling. Harpoon will essentially always be up.
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30: Toss-up. I’m leaning towards Guerilla Tactics for more burst AoE, but Butchery could be good there too (the long cooldown makes it less desirable IMO). I think Hydra’s Bite is less powerful since fights are short, but it might be good in situations where you’re trying to pull a lot of mobs indoors (normally you would face-pull them all while mounted) because Serpent Sting would be your primary tool to do that.
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45: Trailblazer. In some situations Camouflage might be good but Trailblazer is usually the clear choice here. I used it for 110-120.
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60: Another toss-up, but I think Steel Trap is less valuable (cooldown is too long). I actually think Murder of Crows might be good here because it will essentially always be up.
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75: Posthaste. Don’t think either of the other ones are good for leveling… maybe Binding Shot but only for ranged Hunters
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90: Tough choice. Mongoose Bite might provide huge single-target burst. Tip of the Spear is probably too much management for short fights. Flanking Strike actually sounds appealing at first, but if you have Harpoon up all the time due to Terms of Engagement it’s probably less valuable. Probably Mongoose Bite for this one.
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100: Another tough choice. It’s probably not worth adding another ability to the rotation in the form of Chakrams (even for pulling, Serpent Sting is always available and costs less focus). Birds of Prey is probably good enough. Wildfire Bomb seems situationally good as well but it seems a little involved for simple leveling fights. It seems more geared towards longer AoE fights than what you’ll see in leveling. Leaning towards Birds of Prey for this one.
Pet choice: Ferocity. It heals itself with damage and can bloodlust. I think a Scalehide is the best choice (E.g. a Kodo or Thunder Lizard). It’s ferocity and has a defensive CD.
Nothing I say about opening rotation will be valuable. I know you said you wouldn’t play Warmode, but just in case anyone does I think Hunting Pack and Mending Bandage are the two must-haves.
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This guy lol - does nothing but complain about Survival then writes a multi-paragraph post on how to play one. Comedy gold.
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I’m actually quite impressed with Bepple’s take on the matter. Suddenly I feel a bit guilty about my blasé response.
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I know what you mean, but he’s not really wrong.
I basically went with Icy Veins suggestions for open world on this SV hunter, then tuned to my personal tasted for fun. If you’re in looms, you will be cruising through pretty fast, and most talents you pick will be negligible, other than for you’re personal taste, between 1-100 (well, 20-100 for this toon.)
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hey don’t knock him lol. as much as im one of his biggest opponents of his view on SV going range again, Bepples is a godsend in terms of abilities explaining and critical thought for the hunter class. I just hate he wants to take away melee SV.
@Bepples congrats on the world firsts. I didn’t know that. good on you bro… ok now back to despising you. you also are spot on for the leveling talents though I would go with chakrams if you just want the extra dmg from range or go with infusion because learning the bomb types and what you need to do with each is critical to end game plus they allow you do to a lot more damage
Naw Bepples is right on about Survival. I agree with him that ranged Surv was amazingly fun, it was my main in Vanilla and I miss the 0/21/30 terribly. Lightning Reflexes was so great.
/nostalgia
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No, he’s not a Godsend. I would rather not get into it, but there has been times where his lack of playing SV has shown, and even more when his personal bias stood out in his posts. If he’s posting about something outside of SV I might pay attention, otherwise nope.
I agree. Good on you @Bepples! I hope that you get it next expansion as well. (I’m being serious here.)
I also disagree with him on Trailblazer and Terms of Engagement, both of which are personal choice. GT is also the best choice of that tier. Butchery is limited by CD and Hydra’s Bite by Focus. Once MD comes into play, Bombx2+Cleave and the Pet will have enough AoE threat. WFB is also the best choice, especially with GT taken. You don’t really get a choice in what bombs comes up but you can make more out of it.
I agree with him on just about everything else in that post. The trick to MB is having enough haste, but when leveling, TotS might be a better option because of it’s range.
That said, there will be mobs where being ranged is better. Popping that gimmick on a rare Turtle in Tirasgard Sound will be needed, but being BM or MM with a pet (cause LW while leveling is sub-optimal) would be a better choice for it.
Server 1st (100 and 110 on Silvermoon, 120 on Khaz’Goroth). I’m not good enough for world 1st.
Not sure if I can get it for 130. I’m on a much higher pop server now. I did get 110 by like 5 mins, but that’s cause I never got beta access (2nd place was someone in my guild). In WoD I didn’t have any competition (beat 2nd place by 4 hours) and in BfA there was only one person close to me and even then it was only due to lag issues at the start; he gave up once I got to 119 about 30 mins ahead of him after he was ahead of me for 111-114. Can’t beat a BM Hunter at solo-levelling period. I did check the times: my 120 time on Khaz’Goroth was better than the server first for my new server (Barthilas), but for the first hour of BFA I was stuck on the exceptionally overpopulated, and more importantly, laggy Barthilas shard until I joined a guild member’s group. I don’t have faith in their current server technology. Their sharding seems mega-broken, getting people stuck on high-pop shards while other ones are abandoned.
Proof:
https://www.wowprogress.com/char_level/us/connected-khaz-goroth/
Clearly not 100% accurate because it has my boosted Mage alt right behind me for some reason, but Respectwomen was the 2nd place.
Can’t find proof for WoD and Legion. In WoD Guildox tracked it but they’re down now. It’s a shame because that was my best one; got in the top 40 for US realms.
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So? you can hate a design choice but still be a helpful person in the community.
He’s pretty much on point and said what i would’ve recommended for leveling
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I kind of equate him to that last scene in Quigley Down Under, When Selleck shoots Rickman:
“Said I had no use for em (SV), never said I didn’t know how to use one.”
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He’s got academic answers, never any true experience on the subject. I can read poetry, I can write a couple of styles in it, but I’ll never try to pass it off as good, nor myself as an expert. He has a tendency to act like minor familiarization in Alpha is all he needs to start posting about it. A lot of my disagreement on his recommendations came from leveling as SV on more than one character. About the only thing I did not mention was using a Cunning Pet if you turn on Warmode and using gathering professions for gold and more importantly, free XP.
Another tip, keeping food for Feed Pet between combat speeds up the grind/farming time. It’s an instant OoC massive heal for your meatshield.
I thought about using Cunning for the run speed, but I think the Ferocity pet is too valuable. The pocket Bloodlust is a must (think about how many lusts you get off if it’s one every 10 minutes for several hours of leveling) and the leech is a must-have for mass pulling as the pet just won’t survive without it. As SV you probably won’t be mass-pulling as much as BM just because of the lack of Barrage so that might not be so important.
Cunning could indeed be good if you get attacked just for the Master’s Call (although Bloodlust would also be extremely good for PvP situations if it were available), but the OP is not doing Warmode. If you are going to go with a Cunning pet at least bring plenty of LW drums. Tenacity might be just as good just for the HP increase. Even if you get snared you have all the SV ranged attacks to help out.
For gathering: I think it’s not optimal for XP/hr but at this point that doesn’t matter, so sure: take a gathering profession for extra gold (unless it means dropping your crafting professions).
Cunning for MC, the speed boost is nice, but MC, RoS, and the MS debuff let me stand toe to toe with a Warrior 3 levels higher than me and hold out until his help zerged me. All 3 types of pets have their pluses and minuses, but typically it’s a Hyena in Cities and Warmode and Scale Hide or Cat otherwise.
Mining does offer decent XP, Herbalism does until MoP or so. Both can be sold with Mats from Scrapping on the AH. Also Fishing can get you some Gold as well as help level Cooking as well. My alt Hunter is a LW so drums are easy to get. Crafting Professions tend to be a level capped thing now.
This is exactly why I like the new pet system so much (despite the fact you can’t respec pets); there’s legitimate, meaningful choice behind each of the three pet specs and there’s not a clear, indisputable best.
I actually don’t remember how much XP they give. I do know I got a substantial amount of my Mage 110-120 experience from it but it’s hard to tell what the time efficiency of that was. Gathering is the way to go nowadays while leveling; it’s just not a good idea for rushing to max at the start of an expansion (for the interested: gaining ground ahead of the questing curve on launch is maximum priority when speed leveling at launch and stopping to pick up nodes takes away from that). Fishing? When it comes to the crafting professions it depends on whether you’re willing to lose prior expansion recipes. I know I would never drop Engineering for that reason. I actually did temporarily drop Alchemy for BFA speed leveling for JC so I could pick up the gem from the teasure chest quest in Vol’dun and craft a +5% XP gem as early as possible.
Not being able to swap Specs is my only Criticism.
As for Profs, it’s about as much XP as killing a mob. A lot of the time you can get mats from mobs like you can from skinning. Fishing is mostly for gold and just a little break from it all and look up a few things, like quest locations, AP, and where you are on certain goals. There in a fish that is fished in Boralus that vendors for something like 50g a pop and sells for more. I don’t like having to rely on my main supplying gold as little as possible. I did not know about the xp gem. I have a shaman that has JC at the moment, I’ll look into it.
In the docks area in the south of Vol’dun (the one with all the skeletons) after the first couple of quests there’s a map near the middle that starts a quest to find a treasure; there are 3 quest points but the treasure is at the westernmost one. You get an uncut red gem that you can cut into a +5% exp gem if you have BFA Jewelcrafting (any level). These days you can find one on the auction house too.
At launch it was a big deal to get there and get that gem as soon as possible for speed leveling.
Thanks. 10 characters…