How to Win Friends and Influence Priests

[Thawwing Light]

Though I agree with some of what that article talked about, I feel the thing about a hunter pulling is that although the actual pull will be better (less wipes to bad pulls) you might lose the benefit of additional CC.

In a LBRS group last night (priest, mage, paladin, rogue, hunter) the safety zone idea was still applied but the intial rogue sap made a huge difference.  I played the rogue (no improved sap) and when I immediately side strafed after sapping a mob, I was not hit by any melee attacks.  The mage would poly as the mobs approached the group and the hunter's preplaced freeze trap at the edge of the group camp spot would incapacitate another mob.  In a pull of 4 (sometimes can't be avoided) with these tactics you would be fighting mostly one mob at a time.  The mage ends up casting poly (very low mana cost) 2-3 times during the entire fight. 

The rogue's skill "Vanish" functions similar to fein death.  However, as far as I've seen, the "drop agro" portion of the skill cannot be resisted.  As long as you use the vanish while outside the agro range of where the mobs were when they were pulled, they will drop agro and return to their original pre-pull location.  A missile in flight can cause the rogue to become visible again but the monsters will have returned after vanish is used.

Now, if a hunter were to pull you would lose the benefit of sap.  The puller (hunter) would be at additional risk due to fein death resists.  Lastly, having to re-apply traps (near the safety zone) while waiting for roamers adds to pull time.
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Doing SM last night in a group of four leads me to agree with this, largely. Between our rogue's sap and our mage's sheep, we could usually deal with just one in a fight. Strangly, our mage was the best puller, sheeping one mob of a pair and (improved) counterspelling the other, causing him to rush the group, at which point I would taunt and sunder the rusher to pull hate.

I say largely because I think the best way to handle multipulls is to CC the adds down to a manageable fight of one, using the various methods available to classes (Sheep, Hibernate, Shackle Undead, Banish, Seduce, Sap, and Freeze Traps. Did I miss any?). If this doesn't cover it, having the warrior pull with a quick thrown dagger and CCing prechosen monsters as they rush the group also works.