Thread: Feedback: New Player Tips for Hunters

Normally, I might suggest that you start a new thread for a question. It will normally get you a better response. However, since I am here, and it is a crucial thing for a hunter to know, I will explain.

First, you want to turn on the assist target box. Go to your options (Ctrl+O is default), click on the Combat Options tab on the right, scroll down until you see Show Assist Window, and check it. Also, check Show Vitals Of Your Selection's Target. This will allow you to target an enemy and see who it's target is. Which means if your name is on it, you have pulled aggro and need to back off until the tank is the target of your enemy. Or you can see exactly who is attacking your healer and pull them off. While you are here, uncheck Allow Skill Buttons To Target Nearest Enemy. Too many wipes have been caused by the group not being ready to start and the hunter accidentally pulling an entire mob.

Second, lets talk about what an assist is. As most know, the raid assist is usually the tank. However, sometimes there are multiple raid assists, usually in situations where the dps needs to focus on a particular target that is not the boss. Be sure to pay attention to your leader to know what to shoot, and even more importantly, what not to shoot.

If you are the leader, then you might have to set the fellowship assist. The fellowship leader has to select the chosen member and make him the fellowship assist (or raid assist, if you have a larger group). He does this by right clicking on the assists' portrait and going down to Fellowship, then Make Fellowship Assist.

Third, you should now have a window somewhere on your UI that has a list of the assists and their targets, if any. Now all you have to do is click the assist's name and start dpsing.

I just read through the whole thread and theres some good advice here...i've used a couple of these ideas from the first page when i started playing this game and it has helped me alot in group play and in other parts of the game. I might have some great advice as well since i've experienced the whole beginner stage recently and made through it to all the way to 46. First of all before i start i think 3 full pages of group advice is more than enough so stop it already!

Ok heres my advice:

- the weapons and armour that you can buy at a auction house got way better damage and other stats than what you can buy at npc stores and most of them are really affordable! Theres aslo lots of other great stuff you can buy from auction house like morale(hp) and power(mp) pots, hunter oils,jewelery,etc.

- morale pots might be a bit expensive when starting out but when you get to lvl 20 you can do skirmish/grand barrows and buy morale and power pots with the skirmish marks you earn from doing those! Also a good soldier to pick for a ranged class like us hunters would be a melee soldier since it'll tank the mob while you pick them one by one from a distance. I would suggest beginning with the protector(TANKER) and move on to warriors if you want faster skirms...and seige of gondamon is a great map choice for starting out!

- someone already mentioned about picking the historian vocation for the scholar profesion but i like to add on that its a good idea to level up scholar while you're leveling your character since you'll find lots of vases that contain scholar materials while you are questing.

Don't assume that what worked great at low levels, and/or solo, will work great at high levels, and/or in groups. Try your various stances out from time to time, dust them off and give them a go, even if you're already settled on your "favourite" one.

Set up and use target forwarding in groups; ask who the Main Assist is, and if it isn't you, then select that person and attack through them until you need to select their target to contribute to an FM.

Don't overlook your yellow line traits; contrary to popular belief, Hunters can do more than deal ranged damage.

I have only been playing for a month and my best advice to any class, is to keep your skill slots organized.

I haven't been playing that long either, but I would say Woodsman is the best crafting vocation for hunters. You can harvest wood and make it into decent weapons, including high-quality bows. Hunters need good bows. Also, the Swift Bow->Quick Shot->Penatrating Shot sequence is very good against single enemies

for hunters that can do this i suggest that to begin they actual fighting part of a fight use ur swift bow then barbed arrow and now if u have the time use quick shot then i like to use blindside by now u should have about 6+ focus and u can finish them off with mercifull shot. this works best with one enemy and im only 42 so there may be better attacks out there that i havnt seen yet.

i also forgot to mention that this is best on meelee

and also i forgot to mention that between mercilfful shat and blind side its best to use a fast mele strike

When soloing it is best to prepare before every battle (use the focus skill, set traps ect.). Also don't count out the precision stance when soloing as it will make you less likely to miss and when traited it will slowly increase your focus letting you keep using skills like penetrating shot and mercy shot.

Originally Posted by Snoman73

While levelling, Desperate Flight can be your best friend, not only to get out of bad situations, but as a short-cut back to camp to turn in quests

Hi, I'm aware this is a little off thread but while I'm here may i ask you a question I am having trouble finding any answer to?! I'm a Lvl 28 Hunter class Man, i can't find out what to put in my 'class slot' in my character inventory! Believe me when I say I have tried everything from weapons to cakes and pies !! Am I just too low a level or what ?
Help me Kind Sir your my only Hope!!

Not off-thread at all! There are books like this available from your trainer, also there are upgrades every 10 levels, so when you get to level 30, go to the auction house and look under the Class Items tab, then look under Hunter Items. You want the Tome of the Wind-Rider. Whenever you upgrade, go for the Tomes, they are the Critical Success of the recipes that the scholars make.

Hope this helps! Post if you need more help!

If you see your tank getting hammered by several mobs and he looks like he's gonna die, don't be afraid to use rain of arrows, even if you grab all the aggro, you'll be surprised at how survivable you can be when you pour on the dps. I did this on the Retaking Weathertop instance, and I can't tell you how many times I kept the tank from wiping because he had 6 mobs on him.

By the way, How do I get my main character to appear under my post?

Originally Posted by Cappyman

If you see your tank getting hammered by several mobs and he looks like he's gonna die, don't be afraid to use rain of arrows, even if you grab all the aggro, you'll be surprised at how survivable you can be when you pour on the dps. I did this on the Retaking Weathertop instance, and I can't tell you how many times I kept the tank from wiping because he had 6 mobs on him.

By the way, How do I get my main character to appear under my post?

Sounds to me like your healer wasns't keeping up with the tank, or was busy having to heal others besides the tank. The hunter shouldn't have to grab aggro from the tank, and if he did to keep the tank from dying, then something was going wrong with the healing, but that may not have been the healer's fault.

RoA from a hunter in a group setting should almost never happen. It's been the cause of many a group wipe and some of the bad names hunters are called.

As for your siggie, look under "My Preferences/ My Forum Settings" and look for the signature link on the left.

Thank you!

As far as healers are concerned, we didn't have one, so with 6 mobs on a tank, concidering i had the ability to dps all of them when my guard was at 500 morale from 1,500 I only grabbed aggro from 4, and we were more than able to handle them. My point is, though it isn't always (and by isn't always I mean almost never) a good idea to use RoA, you can contribute to the suvivability of a group through your dps, cuz I guarantee a mob will do less damage dead, but, AS ALWAYS, discretion is needed on where you dump damage onto. I guess that would be my "1" tip

Learn to use Triple Traps! They're wonderful for managing group pulls, and can mean easy control and take-downs of higher level mobs (ie: pull the mob into the first trap, step away, hit hard to pull into the second, and repeat for the third). Used in co-ordination with Bard's Arrow, Rain of Thorns, and Cry of the Predator, you will be a master of the solo questing world.

Originally Posted by Cappyman

Thank you!

As far as healers are concerned, we didn't have one, so with 6 mobs on a tank, concidering i had the ability to dps all of them when my guard was at 500 morale from 1,500 I only grabbed aggro from 4, and we were more than able to handle them. My point is, though it isn't always (and by isn't always I mean almost never) a good idea to use RoA, you can contribute to the suvivability of a group through your dps, cuz I guarantee a mob will do less damage dead, but, AS ALWAYS, discretion is needed on where you dump damage onto. I guess that would be my "1" tip

What is RoA?

Btw i've missed using the traps skills until lvl 45. What is the fastest way to gain lvl on this skills?

Originally Posted by christianh

What is RoA?

Btw i've missed using the traps skills until lvl 45. What is the fastest way to gain lvl on this skills?

RoA is Rain of Arrows, the 3-focus area of affect damage shot. To level your trap skills... you have to use them. No other way around it. Just keep using them every cooldown until you're done for the day. Although I think the store has some buff you can buy to allow each use to count as two, and to go over the daily limit.

This is just a simple trick ive learned but when soloing against a tough boss use triple traps but set them up so that the traps are 1 behind the other facing the enemy thisll give you more time to dish out the ranged damage as they get caught in first 1 trap and then the next also you can add doing rain of thorns to this for just that much more time but be carefull as you may draw aggro from unwanted sources when using RoA

I've figured a quick way to take care of harder mobs for you mid-high levels out there.

1.Gather Focus
2.Heart Seeker
3.Hunter's Art*
4.Improved Swift Bow
5.Merciful Shot**

This works well for taking down one mob at a time, there are some modifications you can make like putting a trap or using RoT or Distracting Shot when taking on multiple mobs.


*I like to use this while in Precision Stance so it's harder for them to block my swift bow, but if you need that +5% ranged damage, go right ahead and use it in Strength Stance
**Use this only if needed, because you might need it in a second if you accidentally pull another mob.

Split up your skills into groups, Melee attacks, ranged attacks and attacks that attack more than one enemy at a time (nothing worse than using this by accedent and gaining another enemy attacking you)

Don't use strength in a fellowship, even if the players are much higher level i have always get so much threat with this that i become a meat shield.

begin the attack as far away as it allows you to, your best attacks are obviously ranged, so the further away you are the more attacks you can get in until they manage to get close enough to use melee

If you have to chose between attacking the archer or melee enemy i would recommend always choosing the archer, your attacks aren't interrupted for as long as a little ####### using melee.

Always use your traps - for the deed and a little extra help in attacks

Never run in for the obvious kill, I tend to attack every enemy who is on his own from a distance before killing the ones i need or the ones in a group. You don't want anyone running in to your current fight or your attacks are going to keep being interrupted by a mass attack and you will just be butchered.

Originally Posted by Sifgred

This is just a simple trick ive learned but when soloing against a tough boss use triple traps but set them up so that the traps are 1 behind the other facing the enemy thisll give you more time to dish out the ranged damage as they get caught in first 1 trap and then the next also you can add doing rain of thorns to this for just that much more time but be carefull as you may draw aggro from unwanted sources when using RoA

You can't set up more than one trap in one go can you? :S

Originally Posted by RachelSophia

You can't set up more than one trap in one go can you? :S

Yes, if you can if you have the one's that are crafted.

Originally Posted by RachelSophia

You can't set up more than one trap in one go can you? :S

It is one crafted trap that sets three traps simultaneously. They are advising one to do this so the victim walks through all three traps rather than perpendicular in which they only walk through one or two.

Hi.
Is there some sort of optional setting you need to use to be able to fire whilst moving??

Hi.
Is there some sort of optional setting you need to set to be able to fire whilst moving??

Originally Posted by beast168

Hi.
Is there some sort of optional setting you need to set to be able to fire whilst moving??

Most of the hunter's skills and shots have inductions on them. That means that they take a certain amount of time to fire (i.e. it takes about a second or two for a swift bow to fire). During that induction time you can not move from the spot you started the skill on, though you can turn in place. Additionally if you are hit during that time it will delay the skill even more. If you move, the skill is stopped entirely and will act like you never hit the button to start it.

There are a couple of skills that do not have inductions (e.g. Power Shot), but they will require focus to use, meaning you had to use inductions skills or other skills to build the focus first. When you move you will start to lose focus. In other words for a hunter there usually isn't going to be much kiting. If you are, you will get the base auto attack that will shoot, but it will usually miss.

There are ways to kite though. Many of your skills have slows on them (e.g. Barbed Arrow, Hamstring, and if you're in Strength Stance then Quick Shot will). You also have traps to hold mobs. This will allow you to hit htem with a slow, then retreat to a distance from the mob where you can use the induction skills safely.

In all honesty though, most of the time it's easier to just hold your ground and finish the mob off. You can still use bow skills up close and personal, though they might get delayed a little bit from getting hit (don't try if you've got several mobs on you). For a hunter at least, unless you're trying to solo an elite or something like that, it's going to usually be quicker to stay your ground and kill them rather than slow them/ run, and lose your focus and ability to build it while running.

Originally Posted by sirwillow

Most of the hunter's skills and shots have inductions on them. That means that they take a certain amount of time to fire (i.e. it takes about a second or two for a swift bow to fire). During that induction time you can not move from the spot you started the skill on, though you can turn in place. Additionally if you are hit during that time it will delay the skill even more. If you move, the skill is stopped entirely and will act like you never hit the button to start it.

There are a couple of skills that do not have inductions (e.g. Power Shot), but they will require focus to use, meaning you had to use inductions skills or other skills to build the focus first. When you move you will start to lose focus. In other words for a hunter there usually isn't going to be much kiting. If you are, you will get the base auto attack that will shoot, but it will usually miss.

There are ways to kite though. Many of your skills have slows on them (e.g. Barbed Arrow, Hamstring, and if you're in Strength Stance then Quick Shot will). You also have traps to hold mobs. This will allow you to hit htem with a slow, then retreat to a distance from the mob where you can use the induction skills safely.

In all honesty though, most of the time it's easier to just hold your ground and finish the mob off. You can still use bow skills up close and personal, though they might get delayed a little bit from getting hit (don't try if you've got several mobs on you). For a hunter at least, unless you're trying to solo an elite or something like that, it's going to usually be quicker to stay your ground and kill them rather than slow them/ run, and lose your focus and ability to build it while running.

Good explanation! To the originator of the question, slows and traps are certainly the way to start fights, but if the mob actually makes it to you, you will need a way to take care of him. I would advise using the Resolute Aim trait, which is in the Huntsman traitline. The trait is earned by using Needful Haste a certain number of times. The trait makes Needful Haste give you a buff that prevents knockback of your inductions, i.e. you will smoothly fire off your induction skills without damage making it take longer.

By the way, to clarify the previous post (which was good!), the skills' names Power Shot is actually Penetrating Shot and Hamstring is actually Low Cut. Hamstring is the equivalent of Low Cut for Champions, (except Low Cut is a few targets in front of you), which is probably where the poster got it.

Both Penetrating Shot and Blood Arrow can be used on the run, btw.

Originally Posted by rewrando5

Good explanation! To the originator of the question, slows and traps are certainly the way to start fights, but if the mob actually makes it to you, you will need a way to take care of him. I would advise using the Resolute Aim trait, which is in the Huntsman traitline. The trait is earned by using Needful Haste a certain number of times. The trait makes Needful Haste give you a buff that prevents knockback of your inductions, i.e. you will smoothly fire off your induction skills without damage making it take longer.

By the way, to clarify the previous post (which was good!), the skills' names Power Shot is actually Penetrating Shot and Hamstring is actually Low Cut. Hamstring is the equivalent of Low Cut for Champions, (except Low Cut is a few targets in front of you), which is probably where the poster got it.

Both Penetrating Shot and Blood Arrow can be used on the run, btw.

Thanks for the corrections. I hate when I forget the proper names of skills. Penetrating Shot I absolutely should know, and always forget the right name (I just call is PS or #4 since that's the quickslot it's in. hehe) And yes, I had been playing my champ, hence the confusion over Low Cut/ Hamstring. Even the icon is very similar for the skills.

Good point about the trait as well. I don't have that trait slotted, which is why I didn't remember that point. Thanks for filling in a couple of those blanks I left.

My honest best tip for playing hunter i lead raids.. there is no better class for doing so in my opinion .
learn all the other classes strengths and weaknesses and show them who is boss.
WE can stand back and see all on an apparently simple class and see how each instance works if we get it right who is the tardXD. my one piece of advice .

Good post!

From one beginner to another (beginner being new to the game in general, let alone this class):
Set trap is your best friend. Period. Well at least for solo play, not sure about fellowship, as I haven't made up my mind about if or who to join.
I forgot about it until I started reading this through, I even had it set as one of the first in my main line of skills. But using it, most targets don't have a chance to get to you especially if you set the trap, then move back a little bit before you engage the target. This is at low levels, I'm only level 11, but it works wonders. It especially helps hold off one target, when you want to pick off multiple targets, or you have no choice but to do so.
I have things set up in a line, and usually forget about the stances, but my line is trap>quick shot (I think that's the name)>swift shot>penetrating shot. I haven't had much chance so far to worry about melee, and tend not to even bother with it even when I should.

As far as I've seen in this thread though, most of it's been geared toward fellowship play, rather than solo, so just thought I'd toss this in there.

I was really surprised to notice that nobody really commented on power issues which are a well known problem of hunters. Class item Tome of windrider (-12% power cost) and legendary trait Bow of Righteousness (I spelled that wrong didn't I?) are great help, but are not enough on their own. Personally I find slotting almost any will quite useless. It's more efficient to get reasonable amount of straight +power, however even that shouldn't be your main concern. What you should be trying to get is Fate and straight ICPR. I run pretty high fate on my hunter (if I remember correctly it's 450 at level 75). As a result of this I rarely run into power problems if I do there are still potions, cool burn, beneath care, strength of earth and endurance stance which you can pop in a nasty situation. Of course some people might favor different tactic but I like my fate.

Noticed I wasn't the only one doing this, but there are many who don't... personally I love it though


~slot Arrow storm (blue line) and the other red line trait for RoA crits/crit dmg (and deadly precision)
~grab the increased AoE legacy, upgrade to maybe +3
~join raid, AoE the mobs of 4+ or so atleast (3 is nice too)
~get 5 or so crits, a million focus +more focus off of Fleetness/Prec stance
~Who needs Faron? focus shots and redo RoA! Arrow storm lol


But I'd rather not encourage any noobiness, be aware some target you CANT AoE or your group will wipe, and make sure not to pull any adds and uhm, well I keep my other traits/stuff aimed so that my single target doesnt completely noob out (ive already sacrificed 2 class traits lol =/)


edit: ah wrong thread... oh well, guess ill just leave this here

Originally Posted by Doronlas

Keep your port and Desperate Flight skills away from your damage skills so you don't click them by accident.

2nd tip: If you have a problem with dragging skills off the quickslots by accident, there is a hot key to lock/unlock your quickslots to keep that from happening. (I think "Y" is the default)

Yes please make sure you keep the desperate flight skills away from all your damage skills. During boss fights and some other stuff I've accidently pressed it and had to start over (especially when your clicking everything at a fast rate).