My Survival Guide to Surviving in PvP as a Survival Hunter: Part Two

Welcome to part two of my Survival Hunter PvP guide. The purpose of this two part post is to offer up some basic tips and suggestions for those new to Survival Huntering, a quick-start-guide if you will. After a lengthy career as primarily a BM PvP Hunter, I’ve made the transition to Survival pretty easily, and I’m here to help you do so as well.

In part one I covered my talent build, pet choice & pet spec, glyphs, enchants and gear itemization. The purpose of that post was to offer a brief overview of the spec and to help better optimize your toon for success in BGs or arena.

In part two, my goal is to provide you with a few tips and pointers on getting the most out of your new build and play style. This post will not be an all encompassing guide on “How to Own as a Survival Hunter”, but more of a primer to get you up and running. In this part of the guide, I’ll give you an overview of the basic PvP shot selection, Survival Hunter mechanics, as well as show you some useful addons and macros.

My Hunter UI

Offensive Attacks & Shot Priority for PvP

There is obviously no specific rotation for PvP, as encounters are ever changing and unpredictable, not to mention we’re almost never afforded the luxury to sit back and settle into a raid rotation. There are however a few basic things to note when it comes to knowing which shots to use and when.

Just as in PvE, Kill Shot is always going to be your highest priority shot in PvP. As soon as it’s available, use it. Now let’s move on.

Aimed Shot – This should be utilized at the beginning of every encounter. Maintaining uptime of the 50% healing debuff is extremely important when trying to take your target down, especially in arena. Use this shot each and every time the cooldown is up.

Properly glyphed, a Hunter will have this shot available every 8 seconds. You may wonder why we need to glyph it considering the effect and cooldown are both 10 seconds. The reason is, not only can Aimed Shot be dispelled, there are times where you may be CC’ed or LoS’ed and are unable to refresh it right away. The 2 second shorter CD helps to deal with those variables and allow for more uptime on the healing debuff.

Explosive Shot – Following the application of Aimed Shot, I’ll usually deliver some explosives. Explosive Shot is Survival’s highest damage shot, plus it has an incredibly high crit rate when properly talented and glyphed. If you get lucky with RNG, these two opening shots can take your target down to nearly 50% within seconds.

Depending upon what buffs my target has up, I’ll often switch to Tranquilizing Shot at this point to start knocking off buffs. If I have a Ret chasing after me with HoF up and/or Avenging Wrath, I’ll typically hit them with this even before Explosive Shot. Depending upon your target and what buffs are on them, Tranq Shot may need to be used right away.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always remove the buff you want it to, and sometimes it can be resisted. However, don’t hesitate to use it at the start in an attempt to dispel an enemy’s offensive or defensive buffs.

After the MS has been applied and I’ve hit them with Explosive and/or Tranq Shot, then I apply Black Arrow. Black Arrow not only adds a nice DoT and damage debuff to your target, but it also starts the proc timer running on Lock and Load.

I’d suggest applying Serpent Sting if no other cooldowns are up, or if your target is a Rogue. Since PvP is all about burst, Serpent Sting isn’t terribly important, especially since it can be cleansed pretty easily by many classes. Unless you’re a MM Hunter, Serpent Sting uptime need not be too high on the priority list.

Steady Shot is seldom used, but if you’re in a BG or arena and are unmolested, feel free to blow Rapid Fire and break off a few steadies if your other higher priority shots are on cooldown.

One shot I purposely left out is Arcane Shot. Arcane Shot is not used by Survival hunters at all because it shares a cooldown with Explosive Shot. This is a given for any experienced Hunters, but this guide isn’t necessarily intended for them. 😉

If you’re new to the class or the Survival spec, just pull Arcane Shot off of your action bar as soon as you spec SV, then stick Explosive Shot in its place. Now you’re good to go.

Lock and Load Procs

Lock and Load is an important part of Survival’s burst capability, so understanding how to effectively use it is critical. Lock and Load procs are pretty easy to obtain in PvP due to the frequent usage of traps. The beauty of Lock and Load is that your focus fire target need not be the snared target in order to trigger the proc. Firing a Freezing Arrow on top of a healer mid-cast is an excellent way to provide you with more burst damage while nuking down a DPS target, plus it’ll prevent that healer from topping off your target.

Alright, so when Lock and Load procs, how do you handle it? Just as in PvE, the trick to handling Lock and Load procs is to allow enough time in between Explosive Shots so that you get the full damage from the initial blast, plus the two subsequent ticks. If you fire off your second and third explosives immediately, you will actually do less damage to your target than if you had fired off an alternative shot in between cooldowns, or just simply waited. What’s more important, is that each tick of Explosive Shot can crit, so it’s crucial that you allow the shot to run its full course before firing off another Explosive Shot.

To get the full benefit from L’n’L, either continue to kite in between Explosive Shots, stopping only to fire off an auto shot, or fire off a Concussive or Aimed Shot in between if needed. Of course, if your opponent is low on health and Kill Shot becomes available, then by all means fire it off immediately.

Crowd Control Abilities

Scatter Shot is not only a great spell interrupt and distance creator, but most important is its use as a setup for trapping. Since traps possess an arming time of 2 seconds, it is often necessary to set your target up beforehand. Experienced PvPers can pretty easily avoid a trap unless they’re cc’ed in some way. If you’re lucky, your target may trinket the Scatter Shot only to find themselves in deep freeze immediately there after.

Wyvern Sting is nice for a long ranged sleep, or to pre-emptively interrupt a heal or offensive spellcast. Since Wyvern Sting has a posion DoT immediately following its sleep effect, one trick is to follow it with a Scorpid Sting in order to re-trap the target in a Freezing Trap or Freezing Arrow. The Scorpid Sting debuff will overwrite the nature DoT, thus allowing for a freeze trap.

With Scatter Shot available every 30 seconds, Wyvern Sting every minute, traps as quickly as every 22 seconds (w/ 4 pc PvP set bonus), along with pet stuns or snares, Survival has a lot of CC at its disposal. The trick is to use the cooldowns wisely. This is more easily said than done, but one thing I try to do is utilize an ice trap of some sort every single time the cooldown is up.

Because BGs are often chaotic and sometimes lacking in coordinated team efforts, I often use frost traps to try and keep melee targets under control, as well as enabling my melee teammates to lock down casters. I use Freezing Traps mainly for self-defense purposes if I see a melee target coming after me. If I see a healer or caster DPS all alone and in mid-cast, then I’ll go for a Freezing Arrow. Unless you know your Freeze trap target will be left alone, Frost Trap is almost always a better option, especially if you’re specced into Entrapment.

Apart from the obvious benefit of CC’ing your target(s), another reason to heavily utilize your freezy traps is for Lock and Load procs. When used with 3/3 Resourcefulness and the 4 pc PvP set bonus, trap cooldowns exactly match the 22 second internal cooldown on Lock and Load. Isn’t that convenient..? 🙂

Although Snake Trap can be pretty quickly neutralized through even the weakest AoE, they can be pretty handy at times. They are especially useful vs casters who are susceptible to interrupts, along with the chance that the snakes might apply Mind Numbing poison. Another good tactic can be to drop one and then feign death after the snakes release. This will cause a lot of problems for tab targeters. Snake Traps can also proc entrapment

Useful Addons for Survival Hunters

One addon that I find very handy for Survival spec is Power Auras. This addon is one of my absolute favorites, and one I highly recommend for all Hunters, not just Survival Hunters. When properly configured, Power Auras can be a powerful tool for both PvE and PvP.

Power Auras can literally do just about anything, but here’s a quick look at what I use it for.

Power Auras Addon

This looks like a bit of a mess, but the reason is I have all of my Power Auras activated for demonstration purposes. Typically only a handful will be visible at one time.

Starting from the top…

The green maple leaf with the timer above it is my Mend Pet spell. The pulsing green leaf and timer show me how many ticks are left on the heal so that I don’t overwrite it.

The yellow puss-cat just below the leaf is a warning telling me that my pet is taking damage and his health is below 60%.

Just below that is my Mirror of Truth buff, complete with timer. I don’t use Mirror for PvP, but if you have a PvP trinket such as Anvil of Titans for example, Power Auras can be used to notify you of the proc and time remaining.

The purplish outer ring tells me that Black Arrow is available, but not up on my target. It stays there until I cast it, then it disappears until the cooldown comes back.

The green ring is for Serpent Sting. It notifies me that my target doesn’t have any of my poison on it.

The gold symbols on the inside left and right of the Serpent Sting aura notify me when Lock and Load procs. That aura comes on and pulses until I’ve cast my first Explosive Shot.

Those six little red candy corn looking thingies flash when my health goes below 50%, letting me know I’m in a bit of trouble.

The blue circular aura around my toon shows when I am in Aspect of the Viper, and the bright star-like aura dead-center tells me that I am not in Dragonhawk.

Lastly, the red jolly roger at the bottom signals that my target is below 20% and ready to die. That aura displays when Kill Shot is available.

Basically, if I’m on top of my game, I should only have a few auras visible at one time. Most of them are notifications or warnings, which go away once a certain action is taken.

As I said, Power Auras is one of the top addons worth having, especially as a Survival Hunter. If you’re interested in playing around with it, you can download it here.

It can be a little tricky if you’re a first-time user, so if you want to try out some of my auras and tailor them to your needs, then here ya go…

After copying the Power Auras strings below, just simply open the Power Auras interface by typing /powa into chat, then import the codes and start tinkering. Here’s a quick visual reference…

Power Auras Import

Update: 07/07/2010 – To see my most recent Power Auras strings, please visit this page. The strings listed here were for an earlier version of Power Auras, so they may or may not work as intended. See my Hunter Power Auras page for up-to-date aura strings.

Kill Shot

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:stLEVELUP; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0; anim1:nu1; duration:nu0; g:nu0.007843137254902; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_Assassinate2; size:nu0.19999998807907; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu1; optunitn:bofalse; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu0; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:bofalse; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:bofalse; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu1; y:nu-105; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu7; r:nu1; aurastextfont:nu1; stacks:nu0; opt1:nu82; focus:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu10; anim2:nu0; buffname:stKill Shot; isenchant:bofalse; party:bofalse; threshold:nu50; exact:bofalse; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:bofalse; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Aspect of the Viper

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu1; anim1:nu1; duration:nu0; g:nu0.058823529411765; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_AspectoftheViper; size:nu0.39999997615814; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu0; optunitn:bofalse; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu0; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:bofalse; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:botrue; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu0; y:nu-30; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; r:nu0; aurastextfont:nu1; stacks:nu0; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu13; anim2:nu0; buffname:stAspect of the Viper; isenchant:bofalse; party:bofalse; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:botrue; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Get in Dragonhawk You Fool!

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu1; anim1:nu1; duration:nu0; g:nu1; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_Pet_DragonHawk; size:nu0.29999998211861; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu0; optunitn:bofalse; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu0; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:bofalse; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:botrue; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu0; y:nu-30; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; r:nu1; aurastextfont:nu1; stacks:nu0; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu44; anim2:nu0; buffname:stAspect of the Dragonhawk; isenchant:bofalse; party:bofalse; threshold:nu50; exact:botrue; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:botrue; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:botrue; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Pet Low-Health Warning

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0; anim1:nu4; duration:nu0; g:nu0.64705882352941; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\icons\Spell_fire_meteorstorm; size:nu0.29999998211861; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu0; optunitn:botrue; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu2; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:bofalse; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:botrue; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu0; y:nu150; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stpet; bufftype:nu8; r:nu1; aurastextfont:nu1; stacks:nu0; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu35; anim2:nu0; buffname:st???; isenchant:bofalse; party:bofalse; threshold:nu60; exact:bofalse; alpha:nu0.75000005960464; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:bofalse; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Mend Pet

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0.26666666666667; anim1:nu4; duration:nu0; g:nu1; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_MendPet; size:nu0.19999998807907; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu0; optunitn:botrue; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu0; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:botrue; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:botrue; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu0; y:nu210; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stpet; bufftype:nu1; r:nu0.29411764705882; aurastextfont:nu1; party:bofalse; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; isenchant:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu23; anim2:nu0; buffname:stMend Pet; customtex:bofalse; stacks:nu0; threshold:nu50; exact:bofalse; alpha:nu0.75000005960464; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:bofalse; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Player Low-Health Warning

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:stRaidWarning; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0.015686274509804; anim1:nu4; duration:nu0; g:nu0; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu2; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\icons\Spell_fire_meteorstorm; size:nu0.39999997615814; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu11; optunitn:bofalse; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu2; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; textaura:bofalse; timer:bofalse; target:bofalse; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:bofalse; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu0; y:nu5; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu8; r:nu1; aurastextfont:nu1; party:bofalse; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; isenchant:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu7; anim2:nu0; buffname:st???; customtex:bofalse; stacks:nu0; threshold:nu30; exact:bofalse; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; customname:st; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:bofalse; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:bofalse; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Black Arrow

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu1; anim1:nu1; duration:nu0; g:nu0; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1.5; stance:nu10; icon:stInterface\Icons\Spell_Shadow_PainSpike; size:nu1; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; mine:bofalse; optunitn:bofalse; x:nu0; inverse:bofalse; begin:nu2; off:bofalse; isdebuff:bofalse; timer:bofalse; customname:st; target:bofalse; combat:nu1; wowtex:bofalse; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; timerduration:nu0; exact:bofalse; threshold:nu50; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu7; stacks:nu0; aurastextfont:nu1; party:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; focus:bofalse; isenchant:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu28; buffname:stBlack Arrow; anim2:nu0; opt1:nu0; r:nu0.50196078431373; randomcolor:bofalse; y:nu-25; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; textaura:bofalse; texmode:nu1; symetrie:nu0; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; sound:nu0; isinraid:bofalse; finish:nu1

Lock and Load

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:stReadyCheck; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0; anim1:nu4; duration:nu0; g:nu0.54117647058824; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu2; stance:nu10; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_LockAndLoad; size:nu0.60000002384186; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; mine:bofalse; optunitn:bofalse; x:nu0; inverse:bofalse; begin:nu2; off:bofalse; isdebuff:bofalse; timer:bofalse; customname:st; target:bofalse; combat:nu0; wowtex:bofalse; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; timerduration:nu0; exact:bofalse; threshold:nu50; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu1; stacks:nu0; aurastextfont:nu8; party:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; focus:bofalse; isenchant:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu5; buffname:stLock and Load; anim2:nu0; opt1:nu0; r:nu1; randomcolor:bofalse; y:nu-30; alpha:nu1; aurastext:stLock 'n' Load Bitch; textaura:bofalse; texmode:nu1; symetrie:nu0; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; sound:nu10; isinraid:bofalse; finish:nu1

Serpent Sting

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0; anim1:nu1; duration:nu0; g:nu1; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; finish:nu1; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_Quickshot; size:nu0.89999997615814; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; sound:nu0; optunitn:bofalse; off:bofalse; symetrie:nu0; begin:nu0; x:nu0; texmode:nu1; customname:st; textaura:bofalse; target:botrue; timerduration:nu0; wowtex:bofalse; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; combat:nu1; y:nu-25; randomcolor:bofalse; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu2; r:nu0.094117647058824; aurastextfont:nu1; stacks:nu0; opt1:nu0; focus:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu28; anim2:nu0; buffname:stSerpent Sting; isenchant:bofalse; party:bofalse; threshold:nu50; exact:bofalse; alpha:nu1; aurastext:stSerpent Sting; timer:bofalse; isdebuff:bofalse; inverse:botrue; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; mine:botrue; isinraid:bofalse; stance:nu10

Hunter’s Mark

gcd:bofalse; soundfile:st; owntex:bofalse; b:nu0.023529411764706; anim1:nu4; duration:nu0; g:nu0; thresholdinvert:bofalse; ignoremaj:botrue; opt2:nu0; speed:nu1; stance:nu10; icon:stInterface\Icons\Ability_Hunter_SniperShot; size:nu0.39999997615814; torsion:nu1; multiids:st; stacksOperator:st=; realaura:nu1; mine:bofalse; optunitn:bofalse; x:nu0; inverse:botrue; begin:nu2; off:bofalse; isdebuff:bofalse; customname:st; textaura:bofalse; target:botrue; combat:nu0; wowtex:botrue; groupany:bofalse; customsound:st; timerduration:nu0; exact:bofalse; threshold:nu50; unitn:stOnly for raid/group.; bufftype:nu2; stacks:nu0; aurastextfont:nu1; party:bofalse; customtex:bofalse; focus:bofalse; isenchant:bofalse; raid:bofalse; isdebufftype:bofalse; texture:nu43; buffname:stHunter's Mark; anim2:nu0; opt1:nu0; r:nu1; randomcolor:bofalse; y:nu250; alpha:nu1; aurastext:st; timer:bofalse; texmode:nu1; symetrie:nu0; ismounted:bofalse; targetfriend:bofalse; sound:nu0; isinraid:bofalse; finish:nu1

Those are a few I find useful for PvP. There are many other beneficial uses for Power Auras, so I suggest playing around with it some to find what works best for you.

Here’s another gratuitous shot of my UI, err… I mean, an example of Power Auras doing its thing in a live setting…

Power Auras

Other addons that I like for PvP are MikScrollingBattleText, AZ Cast Bar, Satrina Buff Frames and Gladius.

MSBT is a replacement combat text addon which is highly configurable. You can set all sorts of filters for it so that your screen isn’t so spammy, plus you can configure triggers that will notify you of certain hostile spellcasts or enemy heals. For more info on it, I suggest you watch Daniel Moy’s video tutorial for MSBT.

AZ Cast Bar is a modular cast bar that I use to show my target’s and focus target’s cast timers, along with my cast bar and swing timer. This addon, or similar ones such as Quartz, are helpful in allowing you to customize how you want enemy cast bars, buff and debuff timers to display. These aren’t critical for success, but I find them to be useful.

Satrina Buff Frames is a fantastic addon, and another of my new favorites. This highly configurable addon allows for a myriad of customization. It can be setup to display both bars and icons, with or without timers. As a Survival Hunter, I find the addon very useful for displaying a modular debuff timer for Explosive Shot. In the screenshot below you will see two bars just above my unit frames. Those give me a quick reference timer for Explosive Shot and Serpent Sting. This makes it quite easy for me to time my Explosive Shots.

Satrina Debuff Bars and Timers

If you want to arena, then you’re probably going to need Gladius. For those unfamiliar, Gladius is a unit frame addon for showing specifically your opponents in arena. It’s highly customizable and can display all sorts of things including, health, mana, enemy cast bars, and even pvp trinket cooldowns.

That’s about it for recommended addons. I could go on and discuss a few more, but then we’d be getting into a discussion more about my UI, and I know you don’t want to be bored to tears over that. 😉

Macros

I find macros to be invaluable for PvP. With the amount of split decision making that goes on in PvP, anytime you can combine multiple spells or commands into one keybind, the better off you’ll be. Hunters have quite a bit to worry about due to the abundance of abilities at our disposal, in addition to a pet to control and look after.

Rather than list all of the useful Hunter macros I can think of, instead I’ll just refer you to my macros page. There are however a couple of Survival specific macros that I’ve yet to include on that page. They are…

Wyvern Sting

#showtooltip Wyvern Sting
/cast [target=mouseover, harm] Wyvern Sting

Scatter Shot

#showtooltip Scatter Shot
/cast [target=mouseover, harm] Scatter Shot

These are pretty simple macros which allow you to CC another target without deselecting your current target. If no other target is highlighted, it will cast the shot at your current target.

You can also switch the “mouseover, harm” to “focus” if you arena, and set your CC targets as your focus.

Ideally, I’d like to be able to combine the above features into one macro, but I’ve not been able to get it working properly with a modifier key. If anyone has one that they use, please post it in a comment.

In Closing…

Well hopefully some of the things I’ve covered in this two part series helps a few of you out there. As I said, I didn’t write these posts to teach players the art of owning in PvP as a Hunter. In fact, if someone has a guide like that, I’d love to read it. 😉 My intention was to cover some quick tips and suggestions that will help less experienced players who want to give the Survival spec a whirl for BGs or arena.

Are there some things I missed. Definitely.

Could I have expanded on certain areas. Sure.

Is this post over 3500 words and probably adequate for giving the newbie a jump-start in Survival PvP? I’d assume so.

If anyone has any other tips or suggestions, please send ’em my way in the form of comments.

Also, please forgive me for not getting all WoWHead on this post with the tooltips. I didn’t foresee part two being this labor intensive, so when I got to the end and thought about linking all of the info to WoWHead, I said f**k it. 😉

Well now that I’m done with this, I suppose it’s probably a good time to start talking about my user interface. 😀 I’ll get to that as soon as I can, but don’t hold your breath. 😉 While my intention is to roll out post after post and cover all of the topics I have stored in my brain, life doesn’t always allow me the time for such things. Plus, I gotta play WoW sometimes..! 😉

33 thoughts on “My Survival Guide to Surviving in PvP as a Survival Hunter: Part Two”

  1. Hi Garwulf

    As a just turned lvl 80 hunter who wants to do PvP this was really useful; thanks for the time and effort you put in, it’s helped me enormously.

    Somebody asked earlier in the thread about PvP tactics against different classes. Do you have a thread on that or do you have a link to one elsewhere?

    Once again thanks very much, great article.

    Reply
    • I don’t have any class-specific posts up yet, but it’s been a thought of mine. I was hoping to find a hotshot Gladiator to share some wisdom, but you may have to settle for me. 😉

      I’m planning on starting some sort of basic PvP guide this week, so I’ll look to that as an addition to this theme. More than likely what it will be is a conversation starter where I give my advice and tactics, then others chime in with their experiences. I could then update the guide with the additional tactics; creating a comprehensive post on how to deal with other classes. I like where this is going…

      Off to organize thoughts… bbl.

      Reply
  2. Thanks so much for this info! Quite a few things have helped me make the jump from MM to surv. Also, thanks again for taking time out to create such an awesome source of information about our class. Great work!

    Reply
  3. This is awesome Gar! I recently decided to give SV pvp a try and this guide is perfect for me. I’ve got my crab and spec, a few of the furious set so far, and I’m looking forward to getting out there. Thanks!

    Reply
  4. I have issues with the hunters mark aura, it will show up no matter if mark is up on target or not (read: i cant make it go away with marking the target).
    Tried sifting through options but couldn’t find anything that I thought would cause this.
    Anyone else got this, and preferably know how to solve it? 😛

    OT: Awesome site, really really good info for me as I just dinged 80 on my hunter and plan to mainly do BGs and Arena on him. Thanks for spending the time sharing Garwulf!

    Reply
  5. As ussually you doing a super jobb for us begginers 🙂 read your stuff when started as hunter again when went Survival and now i just started PvP 🙂

    Reply
  6. Good guide, but there’s one thing id like to add. you say to use tranquilizing shot early on, but tranq isnt on the global cd and has no cooldown. This means that you can just macro trang shot into your other shots so that every time you use a shot other than auto, it also shoots a tranq shot.

    -thanks

    Reply
    • Hmmm… I think you’re referring to Silencing Shot. Tranq Shot has an 8 sec cooldown and is in fact on the GCD. Silencing Shot is not.

      However, if you are confusing Silencing Shot with Tranq Shot, make sure you’re not macro’ing it for PvP. It’s a good idea for raiding, but never for PvP. Last thing you want to do is waste it on a Rogue, just because you have it macroed.

      Reply
  7. Awesome guide! Great work on the power auras…saved a lot of time for me. I always take forever getting it just right.

    Thanks!

    ~serf

    Reply
  8. Hey, thanks for the guide and especially for the power auras templates! that thing was pretty confusing for me so you saved me a lot of time 🙂

    Reply
    • @ Dano

      Cool. Glad you liked it! One thing I should mention real quick though… I need to update my Power Auras string for Serpent Sting (which I’ll do today).

      In the meantime, go to /powa and open up the edit area for Serpent Sting. Tick Cast By Me. I had forgotten to check that for some reason. I have a separate SBF bar for my poison, so I still knew when to reapply, but I had thought the power aura was acting up or something. Later I realized I was being a bonehead. Anyhow, just make sure that it’s set to read only the Sting that’s cast by you and you’re all set.

      Reply
  9. @ Hamlet

    I moved my DK over to my new UI last night. It occurred to me that I have a couple of slight tweaks to perform, but once that’s done it’s getting posted. I just have to make sure all of my profiles are saved properly, etc.

    Reply
  10. @ Hamlet

    I’m hoping to get to the UI stuff by Thursday. I probably won’t go all out on the post, but since it’s been so long, I just really would like to get the thing zipped up and available for download.

    I’ll most likely just post a few screenshots, along with a detailed list of addons used and why.

    Reply
  11. Hey Gar,

    Sorry to bother you so much with this but I just started an arena team with some friends and have been doing some BGs for honor and I am in need of a good UI. I’m not good with setting up add-ons and tweaking them so I’m running a pretty much WoW default setup save for POWA and some others. I know that setting up a whole UI post its time consuming, so I wanted to ask if it would be possible to post your UI on a site like WoW Interface. I’ve seen people post their WTF and Interface folders along with a premade profile on each add-on so that one can recreate their UI. It’s just a thought that might make things easier. Hope all is well.

    -Hamlet

    Reply
  12. Dear Garwulf,

    Thank you very much!!! This is very helpful for a less experience player such as myself. Can you share some of your strategies against various classes, e.g. how to deal with pally/rogue/dk… ?

    npast

    Reply
  13. @ Garwulf

    my fault, read it too fast :). I switched to SV from BM and I love it. I moved up with damage, I am killing faster and all that thanks to you. I hope that with your last post I will enjoy it even more. Thanks for that! Time to enjoy new feature of the game 🙂
    Munterino

    Reply
  14. @ Raybeez

    That’s the plan. I’ll zip it up so that it won’t require so much bandwidth. I’ll try to start working on description of the included addons and then load up the file(s).

    I actually did this several months back with a previous UI.

    Reply
  15. I had/have an idea if you like to share your UI.Copy your Interface folder and WTF folder and post it on your Blog/site then we can all have a nice UI like yours.Then others can do a little tweaking to thier style.Don’t know if we would be able to download your 2 files.But hey it’s worth a shot if you’d like to share your UI.
    Anyways happy hunting.

    Reply
  16. @ Munterino

    Those are my Power Auras strings. I put them there so visitors could try them out if they have the addon. 🙂

    @ Kazador

    Funny you should mention this…

    @ Zhire

    I have Power Auras configured to play sounds as well. The auras can be difficult to see in some fights, so I have an audio alert configured along with the visual. You can configure Power Auras to only use a sound notification I believe, but I’m curious… what is the addon you’re using?

    @ Dave

    Glad you liked it. 🙂

    Reply
  17. I forget the AddOn name just now but I use an AddOn for Lock’n’Load procs that is purely sound…as in, it makes this cheery sound when LNL procs. it’s great because I don’t have to look everywhere on my screen to see if I’ve gotten one. It’s an interesting concept, using sound instead of a visual for alerts. (I think some AddOns do this, such as Omen and DMB, but still…)

    Reply
  18. Garwulf, thanks for this awesome post! I’m glad you got off into UI stuff for a bit, and I’m psyched to try your powerauras since they look prettier than mine…

    Looking forward to the full UI post when you get to it!

    On a side note, I continue to PVP as BM, and I’m doing remarkably well. Yes, the 18sec -> 10sec reduction on BW sucks, but the change that made this equivalent to trinketing out of anything affecting you is a huge bonus. BW and a trinket together with a Disengage macro make it extremely difficult for anyone to CC me. I’m hoping you’ll come back to BM when they improve it a little more for PVP in 3.3.

    Kazador

    Reply
  19. Hi Garwulf,
    got some strange text on the web. Not sure if its only my browser. In the middle of your text (kill shot, black arrow, etc …)
    Munte

    Reply

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