Hunters have been mocked as being one of the "easiest" classes to play in WoW by many people. So much so, that they gained a nickname to demonstrate this lack of skill: Huntard. What these people don't realize, is all of the thought processing that a good hunter has to go through in order to maximize DPS.

The naturally built in damage that a hunter gets is Autoshot. Autoshot takes .5 seconds to fire, but has a cooldown based on weapon speed. Hunter's have several shots in their spell book, that are used regularly, that do damage besides the naturally built in Autoshot. These include Aimed Shot, Arcane Shot, Multishot, and Steady Shot. While Aimed Shot does the most damage of the three, it has the longest cast time with 3 seconds as well as restarting the autoshot timer. This means that its really only good for an opening shot with Misdirection, or a fight where you REALLY need the Mortal Strike debuff that it brings to the table. Arcane Shot is an instant shot that deals decent damage, and Multishot is essentially an instant cast as well, that does damage to three targets and is about on par in damage with Arcane shot. Steady Shot is a 1.5 second cast shot that does decent damage, but it is your most mana/damage efficient shot. The biggest problem with Steady Shot, is that while casting that 1.5 second shot, your autoshot cannot fire, and thus, cannot start its cooldown time. You will want to use this shot as often as you reasonably can.

Now, your ranged weapon speed will determine which shots you can use and when, due to the autoshot cooldown. The trick, is to fire as many Steady Shots and special shots as possible without slowing down the speed of your autoshot by trapping it inside Steady Shot's cast time. This practice is called Shot Weaving, and it is very important, otherwise the hunter will lose quite a bit of the DPS he or she is capable of. Beast Mastery Hunters have talents that reduce your weapon speed, which allow you to fire more frequently, but it limits the amount of special shots you can use, as the Autoshot cooldown may be delayed, also known as a clipped shot. These types of hunters should stick to a 1:1 shot rotation, which consists of Steady Shot, Autoshot, Steady Shot, Autoshot, etc. Other Hunters such as Marksmanship and Survival have a little more time on their Autoshot cooldown, and can fit in more special shots. This gets a little more complicated, as these hunters can run either a 1.5:1 shot rotation, or a 3:2 shot rotation depending on gear. A 1.5:1 rotation consists of Steady Shot, Autoshot, Arcane Shot, Steady Shot, Autoshot, Steady Shot, Multishot, etc.  You cannot fit in any more specials between the Autoshot and Steady Shot, as the Global Cooldown will prevent you from starting your next Steady Shot on time.  Only properly weaved shots will be able to make up or attempt to make up for the increased speed that the Beast Mastery tree brings. A 3:2 Shot rotation still focuses on just Steady Shot and Autoshot with no specials. This is similar to the 1:1 rotation, but it intentionally clips a shot to squeeze in an additional Steady Shot. This rotation is rarely used, and really only should be used if you have a set bonus that would make it worth while (IE: Increased Steady Shot damage from the T6 4pc bonus). In order to put out the maximum damage a hunter is capable of, he needs to execute his or her rotation to perfection, as just one clipped shot can force you start your rotation over.

Some people think that hunters are easy because they can just spam one button and DPS. While it is true that shot rotations CAN be put into a macro and spammed, it is the good hunter that can pick up on the fly if he gets extra haste buffs, or push back on Steady Shot, and switch his rotation accordingly. Now that I've gone over How Hunter DPS works in BC, Wrath of the Lich King will change things up. A lot.

In WotLK, Steady Shot will no longer be able to "clip" Autoshot. This means that hunters will no longer have to worry about being trapped by Steady Shot's 1.5 second cast time, as the shot will be fired on time anyway. That means hunters will be able to fit in more shots and have even LESS down time (or time that we aren't actually firing a shot). This will no doubt be an increase in overall DPS for every hunter every where, but what worries some people is that it will reduce the distance between a good hunter and a bad hunter, and actually make us out to be the "Easy mode hunter" that people already think we are.

Will it be easier to do damage as a Hunter? Yessir.
Will hunters do more damage based on rotations? Yessir.

My prediction about Hunters in WotlK, is that the Bad hunters will DPS more than they used to, but a Good hunter will still get a raid spot over a bad hunter because of raid survivability, and generally being able to stay alive in encounters, and still being able to out put slightly more DPS than the Bad hunters.