Hunter = Ultimate Puller?

[Refrigerator]

While looking at today's 8bit-theatre comic, I noticed a news post by the author indicating that he played WoW. He went on further to link this, which I thought was rather interesting and hadn't heard much of before. Basically, he says that the Hunter is by far the best and safest puller.

So, if this is common knowledge, I apologize, but I thought it was fairly interesting.

[Treesh]

The hunter's ability to be able to pull so well is what allows my shaman and GG's hunter to be able to run instances with just the two of us. Granted, they're low-level instances right now (ragefire chasm and wailing caverns) and we do move more slowly than if we had more people, but we still manage without being many levels higher than what people normally run in those instances. GG puts down a trap, backs up while I stand by the trap (I'm more of a melee shaman), he pulls, I hit it with my DoT when it gets in range, wallop it with my weapon as it runs by me setting off the trap and usually the pet gets on it at the same time. If the critter calls for help, or if it picks up friends along the way to us (rarely happens unless the critters are linked because GG is a fantastic puller, patience is the key), I throw down totems depending upon what kinds of friends join the party. If things go really, really badly, that's what war stomp is for. ;) Since we're both tauren, we tell each other when we're stomping so we don't both use our stomp at the same time. Now, our setup varies when we add other people into the group and usually the other person(s) will stand behind the hunter instead of in my usual place of in front of the hunter, but when it's just the two of us, it works best if I'm up there with the pet. I can off-tank adequately, the pet can off-tank, and the hunter can off-tank, but none of us can truly tank so the pet and I alternate during the fight. Also, if I'm right by the pet, the V key will show his health. If I get too far away, I lose that health bar and have to rely on the hunter to yell at me to heal the pet. I'd rather have GG blasting away with his gun than spend time healing the pet and we can't afford to not heal the pet at all.

I think he does make a good point about how hunters came into beta after a lot of people have already worked on group tactics. Once you find something that works well enough, why change it? He also mentions the use of feign death, a level 30 skill. By level 30, a lot of people are already used to the standard deal of the warrior pulling and don't think about the use of feign death in those nasty situations. I know I didn't think about it, but that could be because GG's hunter doesn't have it yet so I haven't seen it in action. I've only seen hunters doing it in towns to confuse people. ;)

Thanks for the link. It is a really good article and makes a lot of very good points.

Edit: I also wanted to point out that if I'm in a group with a warrior and a hunter, if I know the warrior is a good player, but I don't know about the hunter, I'd much rather the warrior pulls rather than the hunter. Yes, hunters as a class can be excellent pullers, but if you've got a monkey behind the keyboard I'd rather not have them in charge of how the fight starts.

[ehertlein]

The hunter in our group is also our puller. His ability to track to see the layout of the enemy and the speed of his ranged attacks are his greatest asset to us now. I am not sure how FD works in WoW so I don't know if that will help us out when he reaches 30.

Just as anside I'd like to thank you for the idea of using the V key to see a hunter's pet's health. I hadn't thought of that until I read it in your post and I have a terrible time keeping track of those little guys sometimes. They are far too valuable to just let them die without dropping a heal their way from time to time.

[Tal]

While looking at today's 8bit-theatre comic, I noticed a news post by the author indicating that he played WoW.  He went on further to link this, which I thought was rather interesting and hadn't heard much of before.  Basically, he says that the Hunter is by far the best and safest puller.

So, if this is common knowledge, I apologize, but I thought it was fairly interesting.
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As a paladin I have no ranged abilities at my disposal. I therefore rely upon Ruvunal or Roane's hunters to pull in instances. I have no issues pulling aggro off either hunter but sometimes cannot pull it off their pet.

[Treesh]

Just as anside I'd like to thank you for the idea of using the V key to see a hunter's pet's health. I hadn't thought of that until I read it in your post and I have a terrible time keeping track of those little guys sometimes. They are far too valuable to just let them die without dropping a heal their way from time to time.
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No problem. I figure the more healers who know about that for pets, the happier everyone will be. :) I forgot to mention that you have to go under your interface options in the game and make sure "show pet nameplate" is checked. It's off by default so if you hit V without having that checked, you'll only see enemy bars and not the pet bar. Of all the other things they have on by default, it annoys me that that isn't on by default.

[DarkCrown]

No problem. I figure the more healers who know about that for pets, the happier everyone will be. :)  I forgot to mention that you have to go under your interface options in the game and make sure "show pet nameplate" is checked.  It's off by default so if you hit V without having that checked, you'll only see enemy bars and not the pet bar.  Of all the other things they have on by default, it annoys me that that isn't on by default.
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I think the game could really use a seperate icon and health bar for pets and minions, perhaps under the owner's. It is really hard when I'm healing to keep track of health bars that don't show up by default on the left of my screen--- I've even died once or twice because my own health bar wasn't amongst those I had my eyes glued to!

-DarkCrown

[Treesh]

I think the game could really use a seperate icon and health bar for pets and minions, perhaps under the owner's. It is really hard when I'm healing to keep track of health bars that don't show up by default on the left of my screen--- I've even died once or twice because my own health bar wasn't amongst those I had my eyes glued to!

-DarkCrown
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Yes, and it's been suggested to Blizzard many times. Let's hope they finally work out how to do and implement it soon. It'd be easier on the healers by far, but this way is a good workaround until it does get fixed.

[Kevin]

As a paladin I have no ranged abilities at my disposal. I therefore rely upon Ruvunal or Roane's hunters to pull in instances. I have no issues pulling aggro off either hunter but sometimes cannot pull it off their pet.
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My thought on this is does it really matter if you can't pull it off the pet as long as the pet doesn't die? Pet's regen HP really fast after the battle so if they make it through great, you used your free HP effectively.

And of course you won't get aggro off a pet if the auto abilities are turned on and cower is turned off and the pet still has focus left. Growl works quite well. It is designed to keep aggro off a hunter who is smacking things for hundreds of damage a shot with a ranged weapon that fires faster than most swords swing. Heck if the pet has focus growl and the other specials can take aggro back from a shaman using rockbiter who did a critical hit and had earthshocked, anyone who has seen how much aggro that creates should appreciate the pets ability to take aggro when you want it to.

If the hunter micro's though and manually uses the pets skills for growls and claws and bites and cowers, and bothers to learn a higher level cower from taming other creatures, the pet should be able to lose aggro fast, if you want it to. I've had to learn to do that better as a hunter. When you play solo or with just one other person you generally have no need to micro the pet at all. It's taken me time to get better at it and I'm still not good at it yet, but when I do things right the pet can lose aggro quickly. But then again does it really matter sometimes if it does? Pallies don't need aggro do to their special abilities. Hunters can heal pets without generating any real aggro as well. Warriors can still generate good rage without getting hit as well, even if it is a bit harder. Of course I still don't think a warrior needs all the aggro on him as long as the priest isn't wasting mana or generating aggro it doesn't need (flash heals). If the pet dies because you couldn't get aggro, oh well, if you hit the critter, then you get aggro when the pet goes down and then you have a little more down time while the pet gets revived by the hunter.

[Quark]

I read this today but was disappointed in one thing. His tactic is quite useful, and my 2 hunters that are usually pulling, but we don't back up. We honestly hadn't thought of using it that was before, but now how am I going to fit Sap into the game? If I use sap (even with the 90% Improved Sap talent I have), it's now 2/5 risking death. Obviously better than the alternative, but Vanish doesn't work so well when 5 people are targetting you.

[Treesh]

I read this today but was disappointed in one thing.  His tactic is quite useful, and my 2 hunters that are usually pulling, but we don't back up.  We honestly hadn't thought of using it that was before, but now how am I going to fit Sap into the game?  If I use sap (even with the 90% Improved Sap talent I have), it's now 2/5 risking death.  Obviously better than the alternative, but Vanish doesn't work so well when 5 people are targetting you.
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Excellent point you've brought up. I viewed the article as a starting point for tactics and for deciding if you want your tank or your hunter in the group to pull, not a "use this all the time in every situation". Really, every single strat and tactic guide out there needs to take into account what to do with various makeups of groups and point out that the tactic may not work all the time in every situation. The different classes there are in a group, the different tactics you're going to have to use. You have to look at how your group is made up, what all the strengths are, what the weaknesses are and pick and choose what tactics are going to work best in those situations against the certain monsters. Flexibility is the key. When it's just GG's hunter and my shaman in a group, we don't use his Perfect Zone of Ultimate Safety because it doesn't make sense to do so in those cases. When we added a random mage in Wailing Caverns, we did set things up that way because now we had a definite non-tank in a group of only off-tanks. We couldn't rely on any of us to truly keep the mage safe if a bad pull happened without using that Zone. It's a good tactic to know about, but as you pointed out, it shouldn't be used as an "I win!" button for every situation.

[Xanthix]

That was an interesting read, and it may be true that hunters are great pullers, but I'm not seeing how they are absolutely the best.

The article seems to say that hunters are good pullers because they have:
1) Long range attacks
2) Mob tracking
3) Pulling strategy where hunter solo-pulls, then returns to far-away group
4) Pet with taunt/disengage/feign death for bad pulls

I can see the validity of these points, but anyone with a gun can do 1, and any group could do 3. For 2, priests have Mind Vision, and a little patience and care will show you where all the mobs are anyway.

The de-aggro abilities are very nice, and I can see how they would help with the solo pull strategy (hunter feigning is better than a warrior just dying :)

So maybe hunters are very good pullers, but I think other good players could achieve similar successes. I may be wrong though as I have never played one or played with a very good one.

[Olon97]

Interesting read, and a good starter guide for hunters who want to pull (as opposed to those who insist on starting with Aimed shot and concussive). It would have been nice to see some discussion of pet pulling (posess pet, nip one mob, return to tank's side, and unposess/go passive - apparently works like a charm).

However, it doesn't address the issue of warrior rage. Warrior's don't just want the initial aggro because of the slight aggro advantage it gives throughout combat (supposedly), they also want to be beat upon by every non-sapped / non-sheeped melee monster in the pull initially so they can build rage to lock in as many of the monsters as possible. Each initial hit that is taken by a hunter, or a hunter's pet, or anyone besides a primary tank warrior, is rage that the warrior has lost the opportunity to use. If you had the choice between two pullers, but with one you consistently had half as much mana to use during combat, which puller would you prefer?

In the example given in that article, the rage issue doesn't particularly come into play. It's a 2 pull with a potential mess up, and 2 pulls are not generally not be a problem for a warrior to hold aggro on. As the game progresses, the minimum number of mobs per pull often is much higher than 2, typically 4-6. Such pulls require much more skill (and rage) to manage well.

I'm more than happy to let Hunters pull if they are considerate about aggro management and the rest of the group is OK with it, but as far as I'm concerned I'm often "losing mana" by going along with it.

One more thing - in the diagram example, a proximity pull is most likely to assure the 2 pull rather than the 5 pull, IMO. Too bad very few groups have the patience or understanding to let a warrior do a proper proximity pull (random groups often crowd too close regardless of instructions).

[Tal]

My thought on this is does it really matter if you can't pull it off the pet as long as the pet doesn't die?  Pet's regen HP really fast after the battle so if they make it through great, you used your free HP effectively.
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*shrugs* Its mostly due to how fragile the Hunter pets were in Beta and I reflexivly try to pull aggro off it.

[Artega]

I think someone played too much FF11.

Being the TANK, I much prefer to be the puller. If there's a Hunter in our group, he'll usually Mark the primary target so everyone is certain to attack it unmercilessly (I wish Warriors could put a big red target on things), and wait until I have the mob in melee before unloading. Maybe we're pulling incorrectly, but we've never been wiped or lost a party member by pulling this way.

[Ruvanal]

*shrugs*  Its mostly due to how fragile the Hunter pets were in Beta and I reflexivly try to pull aggro off it.
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I am guessing that was from hunters that picked bad choices of pets during the frist phase that hunters were out. With the choice I had made at that time (first a deviate raptor and then Humar the Pridelord), I was able to have a pet that could tank two mobs simultaneously and live through it at about 30% life remaining. A major eye opener to many that Chaku had partied with at that time.

As for your pulling the aggro off of Taunshu's pets; that usually happened when I had turned off Growl and sometimes hit a Cower to pass the aggro onto another (myself or a tank) that still had plenty of hit points to absorb damage. From playing certain tactical board games in the past, it was mor important in them to have all units damaged but surviving than it was to have say 5 undamaged units and one destroyed one. The repairs were far easier than a replacement (often there was no replacement possible). so in my opinion have anyone that serves as an expected off tank not ever getting hurt in encounters is a waste of abilities; similar to seeing say a paladin die with a full mana bar. so it does not bother me to have one of the lesser mobs beating on me for a bit if it allows better safety overall and concentrated firepower on the main target at the moment.

[Thecla]

Basically, he says that the Hunter is by far the best and safest puller.
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I really don't buy this thesis -- there isn't much that the hunter can do when it comes to pulling that a warrior, say, can't do just as well in a group. Abilities like Feign Death are much more useful for dealing with bad situations in solo or duo play than in the kind of situations he talks about (a warrior could always do the same thing he suggests that hunters do and eat dirt if the situation looks like it's beyond what the group can handle). About the one concrete thing the hunter can get as far as pulling goes is some extra range from his talents, but that's hardly useful in instances.

I don't mean to say that hunter's aren't good. I think they are a very strong class, and -- at least in the lower level instances -- they can pull well, damage well (at least once they are are able to get enough range -- the main annoyance I find in dungeons), use a pet to tank well (especially with a healer that pays attention to the pet, and I bless the ones that do), and so on.

So far, I've found that all kinds of groups can do very well in instances, and that the canonical tank/healer/mage type predjudice for a viable party is way overdone. Maybe it's different in the high-level instances (which is where I see most hunter complaint's about grouping), but I don't have any experience in that respect, not having got there.

Despite the article, and despite what Bliz tries to say, pulling is just not a unique defining ability that hunter's have, unlike - say - a mage's ability to sheep.

[vor_lord]

I think someone played too much FF11.

Being the TANK, I much prefer to be the puller.  If there's a Hunter in our group, he'll usually Mark the primary target so everyone is certain to attack it unmercilessly (I wish Warriors could put a big red target on things), and wait until I have the mob in melee before unloading.  Maybe we're pulling incorrectly, but we've never been wiped or lost a party member by pulling this way.
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You've never had a bad pull? Never lost a party member? :o

I'm not sure I'm reading this right. I have to think everyone gets bad pulls sometimes, this guy just seems to think the Hunter can deal better with a bad pull due to feign death, and do just as well as the warrior in the event of a normal successful pull. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing, but I find it hard to believe that you have never been wiped when you are the puller.

[Artega]

You've never had a bad pull?  Never lost a party member?  :o

I'm not sure I'm reading this right.  I have to think everyone gets bad pulls sometimes, this guy just seems to think the Hunter can deal better with a bad pull due to feign death, and do just as well as the warrior in the event of a normal successful pull.  I'm not agreeing or disagreeing, but I find it hard to believe that you have never been wiped when you are the puller.
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We've never lost a party member on the actual pull. Sometimes we'll get roamers halfway through the battle, or even a respawn, that will cause the death of a squishy if they aren't sheeped or taunted quickly enough, but I've never had someone die during the actual pull and aggro-grabbing stages of combat.

[lemekim]

As Olon said above, warriors NEED the initial beatdown to get rage to effectively crowd control the mobs. This is why often warriors prefer to charge into mobs if situation permits; they get both initial aggro and extra rage. If the hunter pulls 3 mobs, how the warrior is going to get them all off him without rage? He can use bloodrage for a shout, but that costs life, which costs mana to priest, which also means more aggro generated, etc.

The Big Red Arrow ™ is not enough to make hunter the best puller. It will take either an ability to transfer aggro to tank, or an ability to pull single mobs even when the mobs are within bring-a-friend range of each other. As it stands now, hunters really have no other role then a filler in high-end instances.

Interesting read, but it seems the author needs to play a tank or priest to understand their point of view. Oh, and doesn't feint death cause rez sickness? I would rather prefer to resurrect the puller and deal with durability loss then have to deal with half-able group member.

[Kevin]

As Olon said above, warriors NEED the initial beatdown to get rage to effectively crowd control the mobs. This is why often warriors prefer to charge into mobs if situation permits; they get both initial aggro and extra rage. If the hunter pulls 3 mobs, how the warrior is going to get them all off him without rage? He can use bloodrage for a shout, but that costs life, which costs mana to priest, which also means more aggro generated, etc.

The Big Red Arrow ™ is not enough to make hunter the best puller. It will take either an ability to transfer aggro to tank, or an ability to pull single mobs even when the mobs are within bring-a-friend range of each other. As it stands now, hunters really have no other role then a filler in high-end instances.

Interesting read, but it seems the author needs to play a tank or priest to understand their point of view. Oh, and doesn't feint death cause rez sickness? I would rather prefer to resurrect the puller and deal with durability loss then have to deal with half-able group member.
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Disengage means that the hunter loses his target and a regular swing from the warrior should pull and hold aggro.

Feign Death does not cause res sickness from what I have read (I'll have it in a few more levels to verify).

Blood rage is so overwhelmed by the passive heal (the HoT spells) that it really doesn't count because the warrior is going to get that spell cast on him anyway, and the HoT's are low aggro generators anyway. I haven't played a warrior in a high level instance but I don't buy the "I have to have the rage to pull aggro" from what I have seen. Taunt doesn't take rage, and it will pull aggro. Bloodrage, taunt the monster that was hit, demorilize shout and they are all on you, because the hunter lost aggro with his skills. Warriors have more options for pulling group aggro than thunderclap and sunder armor. So up to the mid levels I see no issue with the warrior getting aggro back from a hunter pull at all. That was part of the point of the article is that some warriors don't seem to know how to change their stripes and be flexible.

Edit: Fixed that first sentence so you could read it and cleared a few more typos.