3,2,1 Trap!

     As a whole we've been spoiled lately, easily plowing through content and tearing up dungeons one after another on speed runs.  Little attention was paid to mob types, why would we, they were usually dead before they could finish a cast bar.  Well CC is alive and well in Cataclysm. As hunters we're more support and utility than ever in some cases.  Personally, although there was the fun of bragging rights with stand and shoot and top the meter, it was getting boring.  I like challenge, and I like the fact that our class changes have made us more valuable.  We first started to see the move towards utility at the end of Wrath with the final Lich King dungeons and ICC. Blood beasts anyone?  The Saurfang fight is a perfect example.  Just before the blood beasts spawned our strat was to run up drop a slowing frost trap, disengage back and wait for the spawn.   Distracting shot, the spider goes in for the web, then burn him down mixing in concussive to slow and kite if necessary.  I was so happy when we first got to this fight and realized the mechanics involved, I was like, sweet, we have to use our brains again.  Later on when you got to the Lich King there was a little more of this with bringing the right pet.  Web wasn’t working on the Valks so I went out and trained a hyena for the tendon rip slow.  It worked like a charm and all in my group were happy.  It’s was a really fun time in the game for me.  I spent many times on the phone and in vent with my friend Andy (Daewin) as we worked out these strats for ourselves and went over the best pet choices.  Nowadays our pet choice is more important than ever, as I explained in the last post “Holy Crit!”

     Ok so what else do we have going on?  Concussive shot is one of the best slowing/kiting abilities in our arsenal. For those of you who didn't know, the cool down is practically equal to the duration.  So basically you could keep concussive up and kite something all day long.  Now I think the obvious benefits of this are clear and don't need much explanation. 

      Used to be our traps were a very defensive and reactive mechanic. But with the addition of trap launcher our cc abilities just before a pull are better than ever.  Freezing a caster or healer in a mob and saving him for the last kill has been one of my main jobs in my group.  And let’s not forget tossing in an explosive trap on a boss for an extra dps burst.  Trap launcher is a bit of a clunky mechanic and not exactly a quick ability to get off in the thick of things, but good timing on your part will make it worthwhile.  After the tank goes in and you’re waiting those few seconds for him to build up aggro, get that launcher ready, aim, and before you attack with your regular rotation let it fly.   Now imo the other duty for us is to help protect our casters and healers.  We’re all ranged classes but we hunters have much more flexibility to get out of shit than they do for the most part. Getting our fellow dpsers and especially our healers out of trouble should always be a main concern.  A well-placed explosive trap will cause enough damage and threat to mobs going after our teammates to pull them onto us.  Toss in a distracting shot if you need to and get your ass moving.  If they’re easy kills, kite em and burn em.  Switch to aspect of the fox in this situation unless they’re fast movers then you may have to pop into cheetah.  Drop a slowing ice trap to help keep em at bay.  If you can wipe em out without too much trouble by all means do so, if it’s going to be you kiting all day long on something that should be with the main or off tank, drag em over there misdirect and feign. 

     Like I said we’ve really been spoiled with a lot of stand in once spot and watch the ridiculous numbers on recount for quite awhile.  Utility is back baby, dust off your brains and get back to thinking on your feet.