by Dawn Moore

Benediction is an epic staff once sought by level 60 priests during vanilla WoW. You can see it in the picture above, shining like a beacon of holy healing. The staff also has a special use ability which transforms it into Anathema, the then shadowy counterpart of the staff.

While the stats on either version of the staff don’t hold a Devout Candle to the gear we have today, I encourage priests to seek out this staff for the sake of completing the quest that accompanies it. Even if you’re not a big lore nerd, this is just one of those quests. You know, the ones you remember. As a priest I felt really in touch with my healing roots after completing it, and the task of the quest is one of the more unique experiences I’ve ever encountered in the game. Lore is one reason to get it done, the other is that you might not be able to complete the quest once Cataclysm comes out. I can’t confirm anything granted, but running Molten Core is a significant part of starting the quest. If Molten Core changes, it’s possible the Benediction quest will as well. And though they could update the quests for level 85 priests, I’m doubtful since class specific quests or items don’t exactly fit with Bizzard’s current agenda of letting everyone see the content they create. So with that all said, let me tell you about how to start your journey toward Benediction.

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by caleb @ Ensidia

When people whisper me in-game and I don’t answer there is usually a good reason for it. Please take no offense if it happens to you. I’m probably afk, or just busy with something else. I’ll try to answer questions on the forums (at least the ones that haven’t been answered already).

Some parts of this guide are taken from the previous guides, obviously the ones that apply for marksman as well in Icecrown Citadel. These are in italic, so you can just skip over it if you read the previous guide and got a general understanding of the appropriate section. This should make it easier if you are only interested in marksman specific information for the Icecrown Citadel dungeon. .

Hunter Guide for Icecrown Citadel

Introduction:

Welcome to the Hunter guide of Icecrown Citadel’s pre heroic mode stage. The guide will only cover raiding related concepts, such as:

-{ I } stats
-{ II } gems, enchants
-{ III } talents, glyphs
-{ IV } shot rotations
• { IV/1 } Kill Shot
• { IV/2 } Serpent Sting
• { IV/3 } Chimera Shot
• { IV/4 } Aimed Shot
• { IV/5 } Silencing Shot
• { IV/6 } Steady Shot
-{ V } a bit of gear selection
-{ VI } buffs, debuffs, consumables
-{ VII } macros
-{ VII } addon recommendation

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by Zach Yonzon

1A hunter’s basic repertoire of attacks consists of shots and stings, the former doing a variety of damaging effects and the latter applying a debuff. Although you only have to worry about one kind of sting being applied to you at any time, hunters have a sting for every kind of opponent. Serpent Sting is the most common, damaging sting, although they can also opt to use Viper Sting on mana-users or even Scorpid Sting against melee classes or other hunters. Stings are nature-based poison debuffs that can be removed by spells such as Cleansing Totems, Cleanse, and Cure Poison.

Most good hunters will try to keep a sting applied on a target, as it can confer benefits to the hunter beyond the basic debuff. Even with abilities to remove the debuff, stings can be reapplied almost immediately, so it can sometimes be a mana-intensive effort for both parties. Out of all the stings, hunters will protect and re-apply Viper Sting the most. On top of their sting, hunters also have a wide selection of ranged attacks. You can expect to be the target of their version of Mortal Strike, the marksmanship talent, Aimed Shot, or the Execute-like ability, Kill Shot, so always watch your health.

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by Zach Yonzon

Hunters have long been a force to reckon with in the Battlegrounds, an environment where they thrive. Also, as strong as they were back in vanilla WoW, they’re even more powerful in Wrath of the Lich King, gaining new tricks, losing old limitations (e.g., traps can be deployed in combat), and having access to diversity of pets that make PvP encounters more interesting than ever.

Hunters are the game’s premier pet class. More than even warlocks, hunters rely on their pet to accomplish their goals, with the best hunters mastering the art of micromanaging their pets and its varied abilities. Recognizing a hunter’s spec is only aspect of identifying a hunter’s strength and weaknesses. Part of learning how to deal with hunters involves recognizing a hunter’s pet type who now even have their own talent trees. Let’s take a closer look at this master of beasts after the jump.

Long range combat
Hunters are the masters of long range combat, dealing most of their damage from far away. It used to be that hunters had a monumental Achilles’ heel, a range between 5 to 8 yards where hunters could do almost nothing because their melee strikes couldn’t go beyond 5 yards and most of their shots couldn’t be fired under 8 yards. This was called the ‘dead zone’. Effectively removed in Patch 2.3 where the minimum range for their shots was brought down to five, the change broke one of the oldest and most reliable strategies to use against a hunter.

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by Brian Wood

Okay, maybe it’s not all hunter loot — certainly there are some useless plate pieces and decorative maces in there — but our ICC loot shopping list is delightful and vast, and even impacts the balance of hunter specs. This is the end game loot folks. The last major raid instance with the coolest and shiniest and bestest toys we’re gonna get (and some bows).
In fact, there’s just so darned much hunter loot delight that it won’t all fit into one post! So join me after the cut as we start to plan our ICC loot lists with a look at our itemization, tier 10 armor, Emblem of Frost options, and craftable loot.

Itemization

When we talk about itemization, we’re not just talking about having more of each stat, but also how our itemization budget is spent. ICC is the best itemized hunter look of any tier. This means that we’re seeing more of the stats we like — more red sockets, more crit, more armor penetration — and less of the stats we don’t like, such as blue sockets and haste.

The biggest impact we’re going to see from this fantastic itemization is the greatly increased amount of ArP we’ll be seeing on our gear. ArP is all over the place in ICC, in large amounts, and it’s not something you’re going to be able to avoid. MM gains far more benefit from ArP than SV, and the ease with which tons of ArP is now available will shift the balance of best dps spec strongly in the MM direction. MM will no longer have to give up nearly as much to pursue the badass ArP builds. In fact we’re going to see a lot of MM hunters hardcapping their ArP, rather than pursuing a softcap with a trinket like Mjolnir Runestone or Needle-Encrusted Scorpion.

In the ICC endgame of best hunter dps benchmarks, I think we’ll see the gap between SV and MM widen substantially.

A Note on “Best” Gear

I’m going to make an effort to identify some of the best and most desirable hunter loot in ICC. But we need to realize that what gear is the best depends not just on your spec, not just on your specific talents, but also on what other gear you have, and exactly how you play.

So rather than try to identify a Best in Slot, we’re going to look at what gear is generally on the top of the lists.

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by Euripides of OutDPS

Lady Deathwhisper is the second boss in ICC, and while this fight was recently nerfed, it is still a challenge. Especially on 25 man. Hunters have a few unique roles in it too, so today we’ll go over what it takes to take down Deathwhisper.

The fight

There are two phases in the fight- during one, you have to take out adds and focus down the boss’s mana shield, and as soon as you get the shield down, the adds stop spawning and you can burn the boss down.

Phase one, add management

The ultimate goal of this fight is to take down that mana shield I mentioned. Since all damage done drains it, don’t use viper sting, use serpent sting. Unless you’re about to go onto some adds and you need a convenient mana battery. The DPS on the boss while you’re 100% focused on adds is great, but not better than finishing the adds without going into aspect of the viper.

There are two types of adds that spawn- casters (cult adherents) and melee (cult fanatics). When they first spawn, they are not immune to any types of damage, however the casters will reflect spells back at players. You should always single target casters when you can, allowing your mages and locks to focus on the melee adds.

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So if u see, these Wild Turkeys are in beast category.

You can make this achievement easier:

1. Switch to Track Beasts

2. make a macro: /tar Wild Turkey
/cast Hunter’s Mark

3. Follow this route:

Alliance version
Horde version

Credit for Alli route: AwF
Credit for Horde route: jerry_teps

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What is this?

This is a Glitch I found that I would like to share, what it does is, lets you ride your mount AND have your pet out.

How to do it-

Mount up and enter a Battleground.
Do the BG and before you exit, make sure your pet is out/alive.

When you spawn back out you will be mounted AS well as having your pet out!

I know this is nothing amazing, but I wanted to share.

Prof -

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i will tell you have to get the Feats of Strength Achivement Onyxia’s Lair (Level 60) as a hunter in 3.2.2.

Step 1. The Molten Core
Venture into the molten core and kill Flamewaker Healer and Flamewaker Elite. What we are after is this Ancient Petrified Leaf. I don’t know the droprate of it but i think it’s very low. (can drop from any of the bosses aswell?)

Step 2. The Ancient Leaf
Accept the quest and make your way to felwood and find Vartrus the Ancient Cords: 48.24 and turn in the quest. Accept the quest An Introduction and complete it. When it’s done pick up the quest Stave of the Ancients from Vartrus the Ancient and the quest A Proper String from Stoma the Ancient

Step 3. Stave of the Ancients – Artorius’s Head
Venture to Winterspring and find Artorius the Doombringer His name is Artorius the Amiable when hes in his tauren form use this macro to find him

Quote:
/Target Artorius the Amiable

when you have found him talk to him and then kill him but don’t use your pet you must kill him solo that means no help from anyone.

Step 4. Stave of the Ancients – Simone’s Head
Fly down to Un’Goro Crater and find Simone the Seductress Her name in troll form is Simone the Inconspicuous use this macro to find her
Quote:
/Target Simone the Inconspicuous

Talk to her and then kill her, don’t use your pet.

Step 5. Stave of the Ancients – Solenor’s Head
Take the flight to Silithus and find Solenor the Slayer name in gnome form is Nelson the Nice use this macro to find him

Quote:
/Target Nelson the Nice

Talk to him and kill him, don’t use your pet.

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