These are just
some of my thoughts on the Hunter Preview, and what it could mean for
the future of the class. I hope you enjoy.

My words are emboldened, so skip right to them if you've already read the Blizzard preview.

New Hunter Abilities

Cobra Shot (level
81): A new shot that deals Nature damage instead of Physical
damage. This ability will share a cooldown with Steady Shot. This
will give hunters an alternative to Steady Shot on heavily-armored
targets, and we will have talent incentives in the Beast Mastery tree
to make this a signature shot."

This is going to be the big utility shot that BM is getting. 
With the removal of ArP from gear, this shot will likely become more
useful than steady shot against plate/shield wearers.  Having
the option to go to this instead of steady will become part of the
decision making platform that Blizzard is going for in the new
expansion:  should I use Steady or Cobra on this target? 
By making it BM's signature shot, it gives Blizzard a great way to
buff BM by itself without buffing the pet exclusively.  This
ability could possibly make BM raid viable again.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Trap Launcher (level 83): When used, the next trap can
be shot to a location within 40 yards. This provides the current
Freezing Arrow treatment to all traps and, as a result, we will be
removing the current ability Freezing Arrow. 1-minute cooldown. No
global cooldown.

This is an ability that hunters have been asking for, since
before freezing arrow.  I love the concept, and could put some
strategy in our trap placement, possibly in raid situations, since we
won't have to sacrifice our movement to put them down.  For pvp,
this is a slight nerf in my eyes.  With freezing arrow gone,
that puts any trap use on a 1 min CD at range.  It's only
slight, because freezing trap is still a 30 second CD and
scatter/freezing will still be effective.  I like the possible
uses for this in raids, and the badassery of throwing snakes at your
enemy.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Camouflage
(level 85): The hunter enters an obscured state that prevents him
or her from taking ranged damage. The character would still be
subject to melee or area-of-effect attacks, and dealing or taking
damage will break the Camouflage effect. The hunter can move and set
traps when under Camouflage, and will receive a damage bonus when
attacking while under Camouflage (which will then break the effect).

This is another ability that the hunter community was in love
with in Wrath Beta. However, I think this ability in it's current
form is fun but only marginally useful. The extra damage on breaking
could benefit raid situations slightly depending on it's cooldown,
and about as useful as Feign Death for PvP. Any AoE and any melee
break the effect, which leaves only ranged single target. It will be
very easy for almost any class to knock us out of it, with the
exception of maybe shadow priests. A way to improve it, without
changing what I see as it's core function, give it a AoE damage
thresh-hold. That way, one tick of AoE won't knock you out of it,
but more than 1 or 2 ticks, and it's gone. A question this asks,
does this mean I can't be charged from range if I'm camouflaged?

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Resource Mechanic Change

Here we come to
the meat of the upcoming hunter changes.

 

• Hunters will no longer use mana;
  instead the class will use Focus. Focus generates much like Energy,
  by building up. It will not be affected by Intellect at all. Haste
  will improve its generation. Hunters will generate roughly 6 Focus
  per second, slightly less than rogues' Energy generation rate of
  around 10 Energy per second. Below, we have listed some examples of
  how we intend Focus costs to operate:

   

  • Steady Shot/Cobra Shot: No cost.
    Generates 9 Focus per shot (or 12 per second instead of 6).

  • Arcane Shot/Chimera Shot
    /Explosive Shot: 45 Focus.

  • Aimed Shot/Multi-Shot: 60 Focus.

  • Concussive Shot/Tranquilizing
    Shot: 35 Focus.

  • Rapid Fire/Master’s Call/Disengage: 30 Focus.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Now onto the shots, and focus. I'm really excited for focus,
as it gives the hunter class some needed reduction in ability
cooldowns, while making our shot selection more interesting. My
views on Steady/Cobra is that it will still be our filler shot to get
to our next big hitting shot like Arcane/Chimera/Explosive.

Here is where I noticed an interesting thing: Aimed/Multi Shot
costs more than our specialty shots. I'm wondering if that means our
Aimed/Multi's damage will change. Blizzard implied that hunters will
no longer have an MS effect on Aimed Shot in the Warrior preview, so
why make Aimed/Multi more expensive than our Big-hitting shots?
Perhaps Aimed Shot will become our new big-hitting shot, that we only
want to use situationally as a last second focus drop, possibly
setting up a Kill Shot. We have yet to see what they plan Kill Shot
to cost, and perhaps it will now function more like Execute, who
know.

Defensive cooldowns seem like they cost too much. I haven't
played with focus yet, so I can't say for certain, but based on the
shot costs, it seems like a hefty price. If Desengage and Master's
Call both required 30 focus, that means that in pvp I could not drop
below 30 focus or I'd be in trouble. Most hunter defensive abilities
are needed right away, not 5 seconds later. I think a 30 focus Rapid
Fire cost would be acceptable, especially if the increased attack
speed boosted focus regen enough to compensate. Which brings us
to... focus regen:

Haste, Talents, and Focus:
So Blizzard has made it pretty
clear that haste will help us regen focus, and there is little doubt
that some of our talents will help with either shot cost reduction,
or increased regen rates.(Efficiency, Thrill of the Hunt, etc) What
really isn't clear, is how haste will actually affect our regen of
focus. I think this is the most accurate guess, taken from WHU by
Haerich:

“Actually, I think the most likely situation on Haste is that it
will increase Focus generation exactly enough to match the reduction
that it provides to the GCD. Lets say that haste did not scale with
the GCD at all. Then as our haste improves, we’d still get no
benefit, as we would still be waiting on our focus to regen — it
would provide no throughput. If focus regen is scaled in the same
line that the GCD is reduced, then haste will operate in a 100%
understandable way… we can operate exactly the same as we do
without haste, but faster. We’d get more actions within one minute.
Instead of 40 GCDs of rotation we’d get 42, for example.

I think it’s far less likely that we’ll gain a greater amount
of focus from haste than what we need to support our standard
non-hasted rotation at the higher GCD rate. If it does, how will they
balance the value of haste to a non-hunter?

I’m currently planning that haste will make us “shoot more”
and “do more” but not that it will change what we do or how we do
it. Ignoring our talents for a moment (silly, but this is a quick
estimate) than using the current level 80 ratios if we have 192 haste
on gear, we’ll do everything 6% faster, with a shorter GCD. We’d
also gain 6.36 focus per second, or 12.72 focus per second from
steady. Our basic rotation will be exactly the same.

Again, this is just reading the tea leaves. But it makes sense,
it’s intuitive, it scales exactly alike for all classes. Seems
pretty likely.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Changes
to Abilities and Mechanics

 

• A major change coming for the hunter is the removal of
  ammunition. Guns, bows, and crossbows will now do damage without
  consuming ammunition at all. There will be no more ammo slot on the
  hunter’s character display. Any ammunition that a hunter has at
  the time of the change will become gray sellable items. Existing
  quivers will be converted into large bags -- though each hunter can
  only have one and non-hunters will not benefit from this change --
  and we will not be making any additional quivers.

I think they've made a huge mistake. There was so much
potential for what ammunition could bring to the hunter class from a
diversity perspective. You could have made ammunition a relic-like
slot with particular buffs to shots. They would be purchasable from
emblem vendors. You could have had ammunition that made Chimera Shot
physical damage, reduced focus cost of a particular shot, or possibly
even just as simple as cosmetic shot graphics. Lots of
possibilities, but they are throwing it all away for simplicity in
class balance. It's easier to make dps adjustments when you don't
have to worry about an extra source of possibly scaling dps. I think
an unforseen consequence of this, is that hunters will likely be more
dependent on a good ranged weapon than ever before, or at least until
the hunter can snag an entry level ranged weapon in the first
Cataclysm raid. Oh well, at least we get a large bag to use.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

• Pet management will also change. Hunters will now have two
  types of attainable pets: active pets and stored pets. Hunters will
  be able to have up to three active pets (perhaps five for Beast
  Mastery specialized players) and will have the ability to switch
  among these pets any time they are out of combat, without going to
  town. They will also be able to have a large number of pets in
  storage at the stables. In order to swap a pet from active to
  passive, a hunter will still need to visit their local Stable
  Master. However, this should afford ample storage for the many
  Spirit Beasts wandering the lands of Azeroth.

Basically, this means hunters have become Pokemon Masters. We
will now carry three pets in Pokeballs with us wherever we go. We
will also have 2 or more other Pokemon... I mean pets... in our
stable that we can trade around, but only have 3 available outside of
a Professor Oak's computer... I mean stable masters. Spirit Beast
collectors rejoice! You now have room to keep them all.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

• Additionally, hunters will now
  start with a race-appropriate pet at level 1 and will be able to
  tame a different pet at level 10. We are also changing many pet
  family abilities to provide important buffs and debuffs. The
  intention is to allow the hunter to be able to swap pets and fill a
  position if a certain role is missing from the group. The goal is to
  have all pets provide a damage increase that is very similar and no
  greater than any other pet. Some examples of the changes we are
  making to the pet families are listed below:

   

  • Wind Serpents: Will provide a
    debuff that increases the amount of spell damage taken by an enemy
    (similar to a weaker version of the warlock ability Curse of
    Elements).

  • Ravagers: Will provide a debuff
    that will increase an enemy's Physical damage vulnerability
    (similar to a weaker version of the warrior ability Blood Frenzy).

  • Hyenas: Will provide bleed damage
    (similar to a weaker version of the druid ability Mangle).

Pets at level 1 is okay. I
personally found it interesting to learn my class without a pet,
before “earning” the right have one. Now it is inherent. Not
really a harm to the process, but most current hunters will never
have to deal with this.

I like the idea of having the pets
fill in the missing important buffs and debuffs in a raid. Sort of
how they made fortitude scrolls, and drums of kings and the wild. If
you don't have the particular class to provide the buff, the hunter
can whip out the appropriate pet for the most additional raid need
that is not present.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

• Stings and other periodic effects will now benefit from haste
  and critical strike ratings. Hasted damage-over-time abilities do
  not lose duration, but instead add additional damage ticks.

Very nice change here. It should help us scale better.

• Viper Sting will now restore 9 Focus every 3 seconds.

There is some speculation here. First of all, this shot would
be worth about 27 focus over 9 seconds of Viper Sting duration. That
is nice, but minimal. This may be a shot that we want to put up at
all times in pvp, just to maintain a solid focus flow. The
speculation is whether or not this will now be able to be applied to
non-mana using classes. My thoughts, are that it will still be
restricted to mana users and will maintain its mana draining
component. Still mostly speculation.

• We are reinforcing hunters as a ranged class. To this end,
  the class will now start with ranged abilities at level 1, and we
  will be removing some melee abilities, such as Mongoose Bite.

So, we're still a ranged class. That's good news. Mongoose
Bite going away isn't going to make many hunters sad. What is
curious about this announcement, is what it could mean for abilities
like Counter Attack. Will they remove it? Will they combine it with
wing clip or raptor strike? Or will they just get rid of all of
those? I'm very anxious to see how they will implement the
removal/redesign of hunter melee options.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

New Talents and Talent Changes

 

• Beast Mastery hunters will have a new talent called Careful
  Aim, which increases the damage of the next Steady Shot or Cobra
  Shot, but also increases the cast time of these abilities. The
  intention is to make the combination of spells into a decent damage
  opener, especially in conjunction with the new ability Camouflage.

This seems like a way to give hunters more options for initial
burst, especially BM hunters. Plus, what else were you going to do
with a talent that relied on intellect? Seems like this ability
turns Steady/Cobra into old school Aimed Shots. I'd really like to
know how much damage Camouflage can add to shots when broken, before
I can pass judgment on this talent. So far, sounds like a decent
talent.

• Beast Mastery hunters will also have talents that make Cobra
  Shot superior to Steady Shot, such as Longevity reducing the cast
  time of Cobra Shot to 1.5 seconds.

Again, reinforcing the idea that Cobra Shot will be the shot
used to hand adjust dps for BM hunters. This talent will very likely
be the very thing they will use to tweak the dps numbers of BM just
right.

• Rapid Recuperation will cause Rapid Fire to give 20/40/60
  Focus immediately and will cause Rapid Killing to generate 3 Focus
  per second.

This is awesome. Rapid Recuperation will maintain a strong
position in resource regen for hunters in combination with Rapid
Fire. The 3 focus per second from Rapid Killing will be nice in
Battlegrounds, and for leveling. If the cost of Rapid Fire stays the
same, Rapid Recuperation will GENERATE 10-30 focus instantly, while
simultaneously increasing ranged attack speed. This could be very
fun.

• Efficiency will reduce the Focus cost of Chimera Shot, Aimed
  Shot, and Arcane Shot.

The exclusion of Explosive Shot is telling. That either means
Survival hunters can't pick up both Explosive Shot AND efficiency, or
it's a way to discourage Survival Hunters from feeling like they have
to go into the Marksmanship tree. Hopefully full points in this
talent make them more than just 15% cheaper, but I won't hold my
breath.

• Thrill of the Hunt grants Focus when you land a critical
  strike.

I think most people saw that coming. The focus granted
probably won't be very significant, but enough to be worth the
points.

• Hunter vs. Wild increases the hunter’s Focus generation
  when his or her pet is snared, stunned, or rooted.

This means we probably won't have a Stamina to AP conversion
anymore. I can understand that, since Blizzard is trying to increase
the amount of health, and to keep a Stamina conversion would mean
they would have to cut back on other Survival tree damage talents or
abilities. The practical use of this new description is troubling.
Most people don't bother snaring, stunning or rooting pets, they
rather just focus dps them down if anything. If this talent implies
that other players will WANT to do those things to our pets, that
could be very indicative of how Arena/BG play in Cataclysm will go
down.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses

Beast
Mastery
Ranged Damage
Haste

Pet Damage

This was pretty easy to guess. You knew they were going to
remove some pet focused damage abilities, and put them into Mastery
in such a way as you didn't feel like you NEEDED to get them. This
way, they're already incorporated into the Mastery
system.

Marksmanship
Ranged Damage
Armor
Penetration
Double Shot

I'm concerned about the inclusion of Armor Penetration as our
second Mastery level in the Marksmanship tree. The only reason ArP
was attractive on gear in late Wrath was because we could reach the
hard cap, significantly increasing our physical damage. Hopefully
they give us enough to make our physical shots do plenty extra
damage.

Double Shot sounds like the Hunter version of Shaman's
Lightning Overload(now Elemental Overload). That could be really
useful, but how will the Mastery stat affect this? Will it increase
the damage of the extra shot? Will it increase the chance to launch
the free attack? Most likely the later. If this is an interactive
Mastery proc, Marksmanship could become a very reaction based dps
tree.

Survival
Ranged Damage
Ranged
Critical Damage
Elemental Damage

Survival has always been about higher crit rates, so increased
Ranged Critical Damage is not surprising. This will likely be
replacing the Mortal Shots talent if it isn't simply in addition to
it. If it replaces Mortal Shots, then it will likely make all
hunters want to put spare points somewhere in the Survival tree to
pick up some crit damage.

Elemental Damage sounded confusing at first, but then it made
more sense. No, Explosive shot will not now do damage of every magic
school. What it means is that Explosive Shot, Immolation Trap, and
Explosive Trap will do more Fire Damage; Arcane Shot will do more
Arcane Damage, Black Arrow will do more Shadow Damage, and Snake
Trap will do more Nature Damage. I doubt this applies to stings, as
they were not included in the description. What is interesting is
the indication of Frost damage. Hunters currently have no frost
damage abilities, will the Survival tree pick up one?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Official descriptions of the three Masteries are below:
 

Pet Damage: Many of the passive benefits to pet damage will no longer
be available in the Beast Mastery talent tree. However, these will be
provided through the new Mastery mechanic.

Double Shot:
The hunter will have a chance to launch a free attack off of the
global cooldown for 50% damage.

Elemental Damage:
Hunter abilities such as traps, Black Arrow, and Explosive Shot will
do elemental damage of the following types: Improves the Arcane,
Fire, Frost, Nature or Shadow damage of abilities like traps, Black
Arrow and Explosive Shot.