As some of you know I've played hunter for nearly 2 years, have raided with it and pvp'ed with it, and with over 400k lifetime pvp kills I've quite some experience.
Like Warlocks, Hunters are a formidable class in PvP but not unbeatable. Hunters are easy to play, but not easy to play well, and I'm giving you some tricks and tips to beating them.
Here is some general tips on how to beat hunters in pvp:
* Try to figure out the hunters talent spec. Knowing your opponents talents helps you counter them. Knowledge is power. If the hunter is a beast master, expect a stun by intimidation and expect bestial wrath: watch out for the pet. If he is marksman, scattershot is his singlemost powerfull pvp move followed closely by silencing shot, if he is survival, he can sleep before he gets in combat.
* Never let the hunter attack you on his terms. Hunters like to choose their ground and getting the jump, so don't let them. Make sure you attack first or get away if you feel you can't. Try getting him in a spot where it is hard for the hunter to move around and get range to you. Buildings are especially nice for this.
* Exploit their deadzone. If you are a mage try freezing the hunter in place and get in his deadzone. Only thing he can do is scattershot if he has it.
* Stay close to the hunter. If you can't fear the hunter stay close to him, so he can't use ranged attacks. Watch out for traps. Traps have a 30 second cooldown and if it the fight takes longer you will probably lose anyway.
* Hunters are cooldown heavy. Their pvp tricks like scatter shot and traps have 30 second cooldown, beast mastery's intimidation has 1 minute cooldown and bestial wrath 2-minutes cooldown.
Class specific tips:
Mages: If the hunter is beast mastery and you are frost you're in luck. Stay close to the hunter, abuse his deadzone, blink out of intimidation and wait till he uses bestial wrath then iceblock. If he is of another spec, stay close and use instant aoe spells. If you are fire, try getting the jump with 1 or 2 big spells, then blink in and aoe again. Make sure you have the blazing speed talent. Run around him like a madman, try staying behind him so he can't trap.
Warlocks: If you have difficulties getting the jump use succubus to seduce in the start, else use a felhunter or Felguard if you are demonology). Mass DoTs (put everything on him that you got: Curse of Agony, Corruption, Immolate, Siphon Life if you are affliction) on the hunter and fear his pet. If the pet is immune to fear because the hunter popped bestial wrath hope you kill the hunter before he kills you. When the hunters landed like 2 shots on you, deathcoil. He should die before you die, else he dies after you die thanks to the dots.
Warriors: Hunters are really hard for warriors. If you are arms get a huge 2-handed weapon, charge the hunter and do as much hurt as you can, also use hamstring. He will trap you or scatter you and walk away to get an aimed shot off or something, and he will kite you to death if you don't have a care, so replace hamstring every couple of seconds (his pet will give you plenty of rage). Use intercept to get close again, hammstring and more hurt! If you are fury it's the same thing but you bleed him to death, I suggest taking a 2-hander even if you are fury. If you are protection, use 1-hander and shield, improved revenge, hamstring and try keeping the hunter stunned. Shield slam to kill him.
Paladins: Hunters are ezmode for paladins unless the hunters are like 4 or more levels higher. Blessing of freedom makes you immune to his slows so you can stay close pretty easy, if he traps and you are low on health, bubble and heal. If the hunter is smart he will probably bandages when you are in your bubble so save your hammer of justice for that. Keep hitting the hunter and keep yourself up with flash of light. Once you bubbled you will get trapped again 30 secs later, so keep enough health. Keep removing viper sting, but if he does another sting let it stick.
Rogues: There's 2 ways depending on what talents you have. First is keeping the hunter stunlocked, but at lvl 60 and higher hunters tend to have more health than you can bring them down for in your stunlock. Second is use your big damage moves get him below half health using vanish and blind to regain energy and strike again. Dwarf hunters have a huge advantage against you if you plan on using blind. Stoneform removes it. What you do as a hunter when you're stunlocked is spam scattershot, or trap if you don't have scattershot, so be ready for it when your stunlock breaks. If he does get out of the stunlock and you already used vanish and blind, use sprint either to get close, or out of combat so you can stealth again.
Shamans: If you're enhancement use grounding totem, not earthbind, you don't want to get trapped. If you're enhancement, frost shock to prevent de hunter from kiting you and use chain lightning to nuke him down. Don't get too close to the hunter because if you get trapped you're doomed. If you're restoration it becomes very hard to win from a hunter.
Priests: If you are holy or discipline, run, run as hard as you can. If you are shadow, go in shadowform, vamp embrace and put sw pain on. Spam mindflay till you get a blackout proc and you win. Psychic scream the pet if the hunter isn't beast mastery. Beast mastery hunters are nearly impossible for all priests.
Druids: Restoration druids keep yourself up with HoTs and go bear. Feral charge to stay close. This will be an endurance fight. Feral druids go in in stealth. Balance druids entangle, nuke, don't be afraid to heal yourself with a hot or 2 if you're not in moonkin form.
Hunter: Hunter vs Hunter is just a shootout. Usually the one with best gear wins. Beast mastery hunters should beat all other hunters without much problem since their pet can get out of the trap with bestial wrath.
Comments:
If you get jumped by a hunter you nearly always lose. You play on a pvp server so you should always keep an eye out for enemy players.
FeniX said rogue vs hunter is easy, but it was at lvl 55. Hunters are pretty low powered from the lvl 50 to 59 range compared to other classes, and there's not much good gear available for them in this range.
If the hunter doesn't feel like fighting he will probably trap, feign death, mount and ride away into the sunset, unless you can keep him in combat with a pet. If you're warlock and he does this, he probably dies from your dots.
At level 70, especially classes wearing cloth should get a decent amount of resilience gear for pvp purposes. Resilience helps a lot against hunters.
Subject: Nerf Hunters!! 
Mon May 14, 2007 7:04 pm
