Soon I found myself fighting alongside my new found companions and I grew very excited as we came upon a group of flying creatures called stirges. I of course tamed one since they where the first animals we had come across and I wanted a pet dang it! Finally, I had my own animal companion. For those who haven't played Dungeons and Dragons, let me point out a stirge is a giant mosquito. That's right, my ranger had a pet mosquito. I was mocked, laughed at, and had eyes rolled at me, but I loved my blood sucking buddy. I think when I tell this story, my present Hunter's pet firefly Serenity laughs at me. A lot.
I tell this story, because the hunters we play in World of Warcraft are very much evolved from the ranger class in Dungeons and Dragons. Of course that is not the only place you find your hunters. If you look through different stories you have Robin Hood, Aragorn/Strider, and Davey Crockett whom could all be considered different versions of Hunters. Your classic Hunter would have been one of the folks who were more comfortable outside the cities and villages, communing with the animals and avoiding most society. They were your trackers, your guides. They could at times provide food for the community or furs to make clothing and keep folks warm. Most are not obsessed with worldly riches wanting nothing more then to challenge the wild world around them. These are the Hunters that have always been my obsession.
Now, I will admit my first main character in World of Warcraft was not a Hunter, I originally played a mage named Pyreknight until the end of Vanilla Wow, and my hunter Lazyeye was born about half way through the Burning Crusade. It was at the end of the Burning Crusade, when I first started raiding, I took my hunter into Karazhan and never looked back. From that moment on, I was interested in raiding and moving through end game content and would work on making that one of my biggest in game focuses.
My hunter took a hit half way through Wrath of the Lich King however. We ended up needing a tank after our main tank on the raid team called it quits. I quickly power leveled a Death Knight, and started tanking to take up the slack. Then I power leveled a Paladin (Lag) who would be my main character from the end of Wrath up until recently in Pandaria. Recent events however have made me pick my neglected hunter back up. I only call him neglected because he wasn't my main raider. Lazyeye still managed to see raids all the way through Wrath until now, he just wasn't the character I was spending most of my time on. I am now excited to have him re-introduced as my main as far as raiding goes. I feel I have taken too much time off of DPS (Damage per second) classes and it is nice to get reacquainted.
I love the feeling of playing a character who has ties with beasts who obey him. I love sitting back and watching battles from a ranged perspective, being able to increase my field of vision and call out fights better then I could while tanking in a bosses crotch. I love shooting bosses in the face, putting up competitive DPS numbers and contributing in a new way to my raid team. So here is my list of things you should look at if you are thinking of rolling a hunter.
Do you want to contribute to your raid? Hunters have it all. If we select the right pets we can fill in for any buffs our raid might be missing. No attack speed boost? No problem, magic serpent here we come. No battle rezzer? Get a Quillen pet. No Blood lust/Heroism? That's cool, bring a Core Hound to raid. While some of these are Spec specific, you can fill in for whatever your raid is missing if you plan ahead.
Do you like soloing content? With a hunter/pet duo you will find that you can fight your way through some fights that other classes may have a hard time with. When it comes to leveling you have great survival skills and you are less likely to find yourself getting killed or over run by mobs.
Do you like challenges and switching things up? There is always another pet to find, or new pets being introduced into game. Some of these pets have unique challenges that make them not only rare, but hard to tame. Plus, you can switch out your pet to whichever one you would like to run with you at the moment. You can keep five pets on you, and up to fifty pets in your bank. That is a lot of options to switch through if you want to take the time
Do you like being competitive DPS? While hunters are not always the top class for blowing up charts in raids and other game play, they are very rarely near the bottom. We have enjoyed at the worst being steady, consistent DPS, and at best dominating charts while other classes fight to keep up with us. Oh, and lets not forget that unlike yonder days of mana bars, we can now DPS on the run as most of our shots can be fired while moving.
Now, there are reasons you might not want to roll a hunter.
Hunters are not tanks. We have mad kiting skills. We have pets that can take a pounding and hold aggro for a bit. We do not have the skill set to mitigate damage for an insanely long amount of time and keep the raid alive through a boss fight. While there are a couple people who may be able to pull something like this off on a hunter, most of us will just get our raids killed if we try.
Hunters are not healers. We have bandages, we can mend our pets, and sometimes our Spirit Beasts can cast a heal that helps out our raid. We can not keep you alive, we would much rather be shooting something big and ugly in the face.
Hunters are not Melee. O.k., we no longer have a minimum range and can fight up in a bosses crotch without much penalty. Trust me on this, you are much happier fighting further away from the boss where you can see what is going on and can feign death and watch your raid die stay far enough away from bosses to avoid some damage or avoid repair bills during a wipe.
So, if being a hunter appeals to you, go roll a character and see how you like it. Others of the hunter class will welcome you with open arms. If not, that's alright too.
Someone needs to play the inferior classes.
Lazyeye.
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