Scattered Shots: So you want to be a Hunter - Part 5 Levels 31-40
by Eddie Carrington 
Sep 25th 2009 at 3:00PM
Welcome back to the Scattered Shots, So you want to be a Hunter series. This guide is intended to help new Hunters better understand how to play the best class in the game. So join me, Eddie "Brigwyn" Carrington from the Hunting Lodge as we explore the ins and out of how to be a Hunter.
Welcome back to the fifth installment of the So You Want to Be a Hunter leveling guide. This week we'll take a journey from 31 through 40. As you journey through these 10 levels you'll have the opportunity to see many of the great vibrant landscapes that will be changed in Cataclysm. Also, if you want you can quest in Dustwallow Marsh and see brave adventurers tackle the revamped Onyxia courtesy of Patch 3.2.2.As every week we'll recap what we have covered up to now.
Part 1: We reviewed racials and their impact on the hunter class. Reviewed each of the current races and what the benefits were of each racial.
Part 2: We quickly talked about the first nine levels. We also went on to talk about each of the three hunter talent trees and their basic play style.
Part 3: Last week we discussed what happened from levels 10 through 20. We also went over the quests to learn how to tame your first pet.
Part 4: We covered some of the covered attacks, buffs and spells. We also began looking at how to teach your pet new skills by applying pet talents.
With that out of the way, let's mount up and head on out of here.
As a reminder, here are some guidelines for using this guide.
- So you want to be a Hunter is for the new player and/or a new hunter.
- This guide is not a "How-to get to 80 in less than 3 days" leveling guide. It's more of a "What to expect as you level" guide.
- Except where highlighted, this guide does not take into account Recruit a Friend or heirloom bonuses.
- Since most players tend to level by themselves, all talent build suggestions will focus on a solo leveling/grinding build.
- Since this guide is about leveling, pet talent point allocations will be using a tenacity pet.
- This guide focuses on the leveling the PvE hunter. We will discuss PvP and raiding in other guides
When you get to level 32 you learn another new tracking spell. You can now learn Track Demons. No longer are those dreaded Satyrs or warlocks with their demons going to be able to hide behind corners or out of site. Now you can see them on your map and plan their explosive demise.
Of course Tracking Demons is pretty cool and all, but the star of this level has to be Flare. Finally, we have a way to smoke out all those despicably treacherous rogues as they try to hide in the shadows.
New hunter Skills
Hunter Talent Allocations
Pet Talent Allocations
Quest Chains to Consider
- Centaur Bounty (Horde, Desolace)
- The Thandol Span (Alliance, Wetlands)
- Morbent Fel (Alliance, Duskwood)
- Never Again! (Alliance/Horde, Ashenvale)
- The Legend of Stalvan (Alliance, Duskwood)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Graveyard (Tirisfal Glade)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Library (Tirisfal Glade)
- Ursol'ok (Ashenvale)
- Crusty (Desolace)
- Razormaw Matriarch (Wetlands)
- Canky Benj (Alterac Mountains)
The main thing you learn at level 34 is the Explosive Trap. While your pet is tanking the mob you can lay this trap down to help add a bit extra damage and then move back to finish them off. It's also good to know that if you decide to raid Survival, your Explosive Trap can be used to trigger Lock and Load.
New Hunter Skills
Hunter Talent Allocations
Quest Chains to Consider
- Alliance Relations (Horde, Orgrimmar)
- Return to Vahlarriel (Alliance, Desolace)
- Vorrel's Revenge (Horde, Scarlet Monastery)
- Bad Medicine (Alliance, Stranglethorn Vale)
- Bartolo's Yeti Fur Cloak (Alliance, Hillsbrad Foothills)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Graveyard (Tirisfal Glade)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Library (Tirisfal Glade)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Armory (Tirisfal Glade)
- Razorfen Downs (Barrens)
- Giggler (Desolace)
At level 36 you learn Viper Sting. Now this is a good spell to learn for a couple of reasons. One it will help you drain the mana from any casters.
Second, it will give back to you 300% of the mana you've drained. So if you find you need an extra boost of mana as you switch from Aspect of the Hawk to Aspect of the Viper, this is an acceptable way to accomplish just that.
New Hunter Skills
Hunter Talent Allocations
Pet Talent Allocations
Quest Chains to Consider
- Bloodscalp Ears (Both, Stranglethorn Vale)
- Bodyguard for Hire (Both Desolace)
- Clam Bait (Horde, Desolace)
- Stealing Supplies (Both, Desolace)
- Rig Wars (Horde, Gnomeregan)
- The Grand Betrayal (Alliance, Gnomeregan)
- Cleansing Witch Hill (Both, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Power Stones (Both, Uldaman)
- Take Down Tethyr! (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Armory (Tirisfal Glade)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Cathedral (Tirisfal Glade)
- Razorfen Downs (Barrens)
- Araga (Alterac Mountains)
- Vile Sting (Thousand Needles)
- Silithid Ravager (Thousand Needles)
Level 37-38
At levels 37 and 38 you don't learn really any new spells. And nothing really new happens. Depending on what you're doing and how close you are to having enough gold for your mount. This is a good time to take a break from the rapid pace of leveling and maybe consider bringing up your gathering professions to help offset some of the expense of learning new abilities as well as preparing for your epic mount at level 40.
Hunter Talent Allocations
Quest Chains to Consider
- Guile of the Raptor (Horde, Arathi Highlands)
- Hints of a New Plague? (Alliance, Hillsbrad Foothills)
- More than Coincidence (Horde, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Pearl Diving (Both, Badlands)
- Questioning Reethe (Horde, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Recover the Cargo! (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Return to Jaina (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Survey Alcaz Island (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- The End of the Deserters (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Twilight of the Dawn Runner (Horde, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Bring the Light (Alliance, Razorfen Downs)
- Agmond's Fate (Alliance, Uldaman)
- Arms of the Grimtotems (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Book of the Ancients (Both Desolace)
- Gizelton Caravan (Both, Desolace)
- Return to Krog (Horde, Dustwallow Marsh)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Armory (Tirisfal Glade)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Cathedral (Tirisfal Glade)
- Razorfen Downs (Barrens)
- Uldaman (Badlands)
- Broken Tooth (Badlands)
- Ripscale (Dustwallow Marsh)
- Dart (Dustwallow Marsh)
- Darkmist Widow (Dustwallow Marsh)
- Barnabus (Badlands)
A few things happen at Level 40. The most exciting is the ability to get your epic land mount. Unless you've managed to become exalted with another Alliance race, you'll have to head back to your own mount trainer and purchase the Journeyman Riding (150) skill. Then you can get your epic mount and improve your speed to 100%!
Though this overshadows anything else at level 40, you also get some pretty cool hunter skills like Track Giants. This is useful when questing around Tanaris or Arathi Highlands and later on in Northrend. Add to that Aspect of the Pact for helping your run back through cleared instances or areas.
The final sill is Volley, our area attack. What's great about Volley is now you can have your pet agro a lot of mobs and you can sit back and just Volley them down. However, be careful, you will probably pull one or more of the mobs off your pet so make sure you have a Freeze Trap down.
New Hunter Skills
Hunter Talent Allocations
Pet Talent Allocations
Quest Chains to Consider
- Justice Dispensed (Horde, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Peace at Last (Alliance, Dustwallow Marsh)
- The Reagent Thief (Both, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Wanted: Goreclaw the Ravenous (Both, Dustwallow Marsh)
- Call to Arms (Horde, Arathi Highlands)
- Colonel Kurzen (Alliance, Stranglethorn Vale)
- Panther Mastery (Both, Stranglethorn Vale)
- Wanted: Otto and Falconcrest (Alliance, Arathi Highlands)
- The Scarlet Monastery: Cathedral (Tirisfal Glade)
- Razorfen Downs (Barrens)
- Uldaman (Badlands)
- Hayoc (Dustwallow Marsh)
You want to be a Hunter, eh? Well then you came to the right place. Scattered Shots is the one column dedicated to helping you learn everything it takes to be a Hunter. Each week Scattered Shots will cover topics to help you Fix Your DPS, Choosing the Right Spec, Gear Selection, Macros and Pet Selection, Pet Specs and Management. Filed under: Hunter, Analysis / Opinion, Tips, Leveling, Guides, Talents, (Hunter) Scattered Shots
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Kondin Sep 25th 2009 3:22PM
I've been reading this series of articles and the comments putting it down for a while. I didn't really play my hunter that much, so I couldn't really take any sides. It was all latin to me. But now that I'm playing my hunter a bit more, I can start to see the commentators points. This guide isn't particularly helpful, and at some points, misleading. Why bother linking slithids that are your level if you can't even tame them until 60? You didn't mention hunters get mail at 40, you don't recommend the Hemet quests until 40, at which point all the prereqs will be all grey or green. And you seem to be ignoring all the commentators mentioning these things, because the column isn't getting any better
Boz Sep 25th 2009 4:07PM
The last leveling guide entry, 29-30, was actually pretty good, though there is still too little explanation for the allocation of talent points. For example, why one tree is "traditional;" I have never known a Hunter that used the particular build you are labeling traditional.
Kondin said, "Why bother linking silithids that are your level if you can't even tame them until 60"
This is a rare skin, and while they cannot tame the pet now, the Hunter may be questing in that area, and can make a mental note to head back when they hit 60 and can take Beast Mastery.
Kondin said, "You didn't mention hunters get mail at 40"
Agreed; not to mention that, because pet armor scales with hunter armor equipping mail makes your pet a better tank while soloing.
In addition to the above comments, Flare is primarily a PvP ability, and a great one, but still a PvP ability more useful in BG and Arenas than for leveling.
Imp Revive Pet is relatively useless while leveling. Odds are that if your pet dies, you are not going to revive it until you are either dead yourself or the mob has been killed. Those two points would be better spent in Thick Hide to help prevent your pet from dying in the first place. One point can also come out of Imp Mend pet; the chance to proc is high enough without the second point, and you can keep Imp Hawk and still get a point in Aspect Mastery (then everyone is happy).
At level 40 every class gains access to their first potentially game-changing talent point allocation assuming every point is spent in a single tree. For Beast Mastery this is Bestial Wrath, for MM it's Trueshot Aura, and for Survival it's Wyvern Sting.
Personal opinion: I like Pathfinding for leveling. You do a LOT of running around while leveling, and getting from point A to point B faster can make the leveling experience significantly faster over the long-term. Totally personal, though.
Otherwise I like the quest chains to consider and descriptions of new abilities. I like the rare pet lists all handy in one spot in the areas you'll be leveling in. The only thing I don't like is that - despite tons of great (though sometimes rude) feedback from the community - there have been no revisions to any of these articles.
Watermist Sep 25th 2009 3:26PM
I've been enjoying your Hunter guide, but I want to point this out:
At level 40, Hunters could start wearing mail gear.
(Why not point out the Tough Scorpid Armor set? I wore several pieces of that all the way to Outland!)
NUMBERONESTUNNA Sep 25th 2009 3:28PM
good article. some of your links need adjusting tho, like Exsplosive Shot linking Exsplosive Trap.
Eli Sep 25th 2009 4:56PM
nah, it's just the text that needs adjusting. It should be "Explosive Trap" linking to explosive trap, cause you can't even spec into explosive shot until level 60 i think.
Watermist Sep 25th 2009 3:27PM
Well, there ARE a few mistakes, but I still enjoyed the guide because it was fairly upbeat and straightforward.
Killrah Sep 25th 2009 4:05PM
5 easy steps to write a hunter column:
1) Point browser to www.wowhead.com
2) Navigate to Database->Spells->Class Skills->Hunter. Left click to view all skills. Sort list by level. List which skills are available at each level. Note any skills which are new for that level and write a sentence or two about them.
3) Navigate to Database->Quests. Apply a level filter (31-40) to the quests. Pick some quests from the list and add them to the list of quest chains to do at that level. Also can get list of appropriate dungeons for the level range by noticing which dungeons have quests for these levels.
4) Navigate to Database->NPCs. Apply a level filter (31-40), a classification filter (Rare or Rare Elite) and a type filter (beast). Add these rare beasts to list of rare pets.
5) Starting at level 31, make decent a leveling talent build for hunter and pet using wowhead talent calculator. Save snapshot. Add 1-2 levels worth of skills, save snapshot. Repeat until up to level 40.
Voila!
Bullseyed Sep 25th 2009 4:54PM
This is probably the best of them so far. At least he is marginally improving between each article. That being said, I still had a number of LOLNO moments in this article too.
The first one was: Of course Tracking Demons is pretty cool and all, but the star of this level has to be Flare. Finally, we have a way to smoke out all those despicably treacherous rogues as they try to hide in the shadows.
Flare was good back before TBC launched, but nowadays it is a (pretty bad) RNG skill. You can flare the ground, stand in the middle of it and still be sapped by a rogue. The rogue can still open from stealth on you. You can even drop a trap under your feet, only to have the rogue resist it or disarm it. Or worse yet, dance right on top of it while it fails to go off or do anything useful. Those 1 in 20 times when you do flare a rogue out of stealth though... those are good times.
The second LOLNO moment came from this gem:
The main thing you learn at level 34 is the Explosive Trap. While your pet is tanking the mob you can lay this trap down to help add a bit extra damage and then move back to finish them off. It's also good to know that if you decide to raid Survival, your Explosive Trap can be used to trigger Lock and Load.
Ok, at this point you don't have volley. So I'll forgive melee range to drop the trap. How about mentioning to drop the trap BEFORE you pull and pull the mobs to the trap with your pet? That couldn't hurt, could it?
But then we have the recurring criticism of this series. Is this a leveling noob guide or a raid readiness guide? Why does LnL only become useful with raiding? It is low enough in the tree for leveling players to get and can be lethal against elites while leveling.
The viper sting comment was good and unexpected. I don't think you had mentioned aspect of the viper really before that, even though it was trainable at level 20 (according to WoWhead).
formercutomer Sep 25th 2009 5:19PM
For those considering the hunter class for PvP, arena purposes, I submit the follwing numbers courtesy realmhistories.com
classes specced for ranged DPS with +2,000 arena ratings in the 3 vs 3 bracket:
warlock; 1,337
mage; 1,212
hunter; 951
elemental shaman; 579
shadow priest; 144
balance druid: balance is not one of the the 5 most popular arena specs in druids above 2,000 ratings so data is not available.
*data only includes the 5 most popular talent specs among the +2,000 rated arena players from each class in the 3 vs 3 bracket.
Scien Sep 25th 2009 11:41PM
Personally, I don't care if this is column is "helpful".
These are all things I could read about on WoWwiki and Wowhead! Compared to Rossi and Belt, this severely pales in comparison.
I'd expect actual Hunter discussion from a column. Nothing on Armor Pen. nerf? Not even a generic "TotC loot guide" post?
If you dearly feel the need to have this column, at least add some more personality to it; IMO, the druid leveling guide is fun to read. But this is just bland.
KT Oct 12th 2009 4:14AM
I hate to pile-on, because I always feel bad when writers get criticized here for trivial things, but unfortunately after reading these guides they do seem to be fairly bare bones and don't add much to information that's easily searchable on your own.
If I were writing a hunter guide here's what I would do. I would roll a hunter alt and actually play through these levels using the existing guides as an outline. I'd make note of things I noticed, especially pointers for difficult quests or maybe specific situations to remember to use often-neglected abilities. Also, gear ... what gear do you want to roll on if you do certain instances? What quests have good rewards for hunters? Any special tips for the instances listed? Basically just a little bit of info to flesh out what's already there. Some people may actually be doing this for the first time or be starting a hunter alt for the first time and sometimes the smallest bit of practical advice can shave hours off of your leveling time.
I would also include something more about the specs. One of the hardest thing as a new player is to understand how to spec as you level because most info about specs is for people at level cap, unless you are looking at twinks. I think a guide that includes one PvP, one PvE (for people who want to level through instances) and one solo leveling spec with a short explanation of each would be invaluable and make the whole guide worthwhile. It would also help newer players learn how to build a spec from the ground up so we might actually understand it when we get to level cap instead of just having to copy someone else's.