Hunter vs ANY healer? Got any strategies?

[Deleted]

Just as the title says, been wondering how the heck are we supposed to down healers in PVP? In particular I've had trouble with holy paladins/priests/rdruids. My problem is not that they are difficult to kill, the problem is that hunter survivability is so crap (inb4 someone mentions deterrence) that in 2v2 brackets if you encounter any healer + self healing cakewalk class like DK = you're doomed. In the earlier days we had an attack that would sting and drain mana, but NOW, from what i've experience at least.. HEALERS HAVE INFINITE MANA.

I tried duelling multiple priests and healers outside of arena and bgs. Noticed that I can burst down and do a lot of damage in the first few seconds, but that doesn't matter much, as later on he will heal through it easily. I can battle a healer for 10min and he will still be alive. Now I know the game isn't balanced around 2v2 1v1 blabla, but cmon guys. I'm pretty sure I just suck a lot and don't know what I'm doing. They've changed the hunter class way too much (some of the changes i love, but the rest idk).

ps. I was playing MM for a while, better damage but survivability and entrapment is definitely the way to go with arena (survival). You got any strategies for downing healers guys?

[Romeo83x]

You don't kill healers in 2v2s until you're at least 50% into dampening. CC healer while you kill the other guy, if you can't do it, get a better team composition that can.

[Rucati]

Spec BM and spam Tranq Shot every global while your partner kills the person if you're playing double DPS.

Spec Survival and kite for 15 minutes until 70%+ dampening and then kill whatever if you're playing Hunter/Healer.

Those are basically your two options. If you're Survival focus the DPS and just CC the healer forever. If you're playing MM/BM then leave the arena, respec to Survival, and then focus the DPS while you CC the healer.

In 2s Survival is really the only choice imo, and it's absurdly strong. Survival Hunter/Resto Druid really shouldn't lose to anything if played correctly.

[Terahertz]

You don't. Not in arena at least without a second DPS, but even then it's better to go on the DPS while chain-CCing the healer.

[Random Word]

You never go for healers in arena. You cc the healer and go ham on the dps. The healer is far more tanky than the dps, any dps save blood dk. If you go for healers in 2s you're doing it terribly wrong.

And more to your point, the hunter is not an anti-healer class. MM has the burst but it's slow to apply it, surv has no burst, and BM is somewhere in between. You should not be able to kill healers as a hunter, if you want a class that can do that you should try a shadow priest.

PS: Survival is shit in arena. You may kite whatever melee but your dps is really low and you don't even have an Execute. In a double dps team, the opposing team would be made up of idiots if they try to focus down the hunter while his dps partner is melting their faces off. Only times a hunter gets focused in arenas is when there is a double hunter comp (so one MUST be focused ) or it's a hunter/healer comp and the hunter is the only option obviously.

[Deleted]

PS: Survival is shit in arena. You may kite whatever melee but your dps is really low and you don't even have an Execute. In a double dps team, the opposing team would be made up of idiots if they try to focus down the hunter while his dps partner is melting their faces off. Only times a hunter gets focused in arenas is when there is a double hunter comp (so one MUST be focused ) or it's a hunter/healer comp and the hunter is the only option obviously.

See, but this is the thing. I went survival and I love it for arena, but in terms of damage I never see myself beating any healer+dps team in 2v2 brackets, unless of course the healer is retarded. You can cc the healer like crazy, but even with the ice trap glyph that removes dots, wyvern sting etc there is just not enough burst in survival to take down a dps (especially freaking dks or ferals) in that 5 second window. I was considering trying BM with an enhancement shammy/rogue for burst, maybe that will work better?

What does tranquilizing shot take off from the enemy (apart from warriors enrage, hunters BW?)

And yeah, the only thing bringing survival down atm is the lack of kill shot/execute (which I loved in MM and BM... best finishing move ever).

inb4 someone tells me to faction change to alliance to have that second trinket for extra burst (lulz)

[Deleted]

@random word, thats false, you can kill healers in some situations, you just need to manage your focus well so you can use tranq(purge). Also saying survival is sh*t in arena just proves that you got no clue of what youre talking about, survival is broken as f**k, dmg wise aint the best choice idd, but control wise is insane with 12 sec traps. Anyway, OT id suggest you find a resto druid and ask him to play rly agressive(5 cp FB with heart up can do a lot of dmg, rly good execute). I find priests pretty easy to kill as any spec with some help, just make sure you purge shields. Playing with a resto druid also provides insane amounts of control, you can control melees extremly well, most diffucult thing to win against is ret/disc, the game last forever, ret has to many things to get healers out of CC, sac/freedom, and 1-2 clones aint enough to kill stuff. Another difficult team can be rog/disc or druid, if they play well you will never kill them, rog is tanky as f**k and he can peel a lot when the priest is in trouble, you just need perfect CC against them to win, and again you hit the healer, not the rog, unless the rog has no defensive cds, but that might never happen.

[Sarevoc]

I think the first sentence everyone should post is his current arena rating, or else a 2000 rated player who asks for help gets help from 1500 rated players. That's just not gonna work. Not accusing anyone here, just saying... that it would make a lot of sense.

I only tried my MM hunter for a few games in arena, and DPS didn't feel good at all, but I will try again, as survival, not for the DPS but for the CC. As a Frost DK + Healer I can kill other healers at 1800 rating, however I cannot kill Disc Priests, even if my partner dispels them (probably not hard enough).

[Malgru]

you won't kill a healer as a hunter. end of story. if you want to play healer hunter in 2s, you have to run with a disc. they have purge. its op. rsham wont work because you can't peel for rsham when you queue into double dps.

[Deleted]

you won't kill a healer as a hunter. end of story. if you want to play healer hunter in 2s, you have to run with a disc. they have purge. its op. rsham wont work because you can't peel for rsham when you queue into double dps.

Tried a few games today with a disc priest. Worked pretty damn well until we ran into:

dk+ANY healer (useless even fighting this one)
rogue +disc/rshaman (won a few just cause of luck)
warrior + disc (not op but pretty damn hard)

/sigh

I have the glyph of solace, yet my traps don't always keep the healer frozen. Any idea why? Even if done 3 times...

It's frustrating when you can't win games against similar teams (dps+healer). I won't even bother complaining about dks or ret paladins. Guess I'll stick to 3vs3 mainly, as that bracket in arena seems more balanced atm to me. Playing 2vs2, and depending on freaking traps to go off and fearing seeing any of those comps ain't fun.

[germonik]

2v2 is not balanced in the slightest, and no one should pretend it is.

You are still going to be extremely reliant on traps going off to ever score kills in 3v3. I'm not sure why you would expect otherwise. CC-chains to score kills have been the design of WoW pvp for quite some time now. Endless cleaving until you get a kill is not good game design and generally indicative of imbalance issues.

[Random Word]

I have the glyph of solace, yet my traps don't always keep the healer frozen. Any idea why? Even if done 3 times...

If you team up with a rogue or something, it may be that your cc share DR so the healer went immune to your cc really fast. Same happened to me last night, was capping cp with a rogue and healers never remained trapped. Ofcourse long time after that I noted that it was because having traps on 12 sec cd and using them on cd means I'm crossing diminishing returns and the targets becomes immune.

[asb]

I have the glyph of solace, yet my traps don't always keep the healer frozen. Any idea why? Even if done 3 times...

You're playing survival with wyvern sting. If I had to guess, you're DRing it. CCs are subject to diminishing returns, which means similar/same CCs get reduced durations when applied repeatedly:

• Your freezing trap lasts 8 seconds naturally.
• If you re-trap or wyvern sting the same target within 15 seconds of the first trap's end, that second effect only lasts half its natural duration.
• If one of those effects is applied to the same target with 15 seconds of the second effect's end, that third effect lasts 1/4 its natural duration.
• From that point on, the target is completely immune to your trap and wyvern sting for another 15 seconds.

It's not bad to chain a half wyvern off your traps or vice-versa, but you'll almost always want to let DR reset before throwing a new trap. It'll be easiest to have an addon track it for you (Gladius is basically the staple arena addon), since many teammates' CCs also DR with traps: polymorph, ring of frost, sap, gouge, paralyse, hex, repentance, and likely some others I'm forgetting.

There are a lot of abilties that can dispel, break, or prevent traps in the first place, but while you're learning the main things to watch for will be DR, trinkets, and ret paladins' hand of sacrifice (2 charges with 2 min recharge; primary use is dispelling traps).

[Deleted]

No offence but your playing one of the strongest 2v2 classes and comps in the game, right now SV hunter is number 1 spot in 2's and theres at least 10 in the first page alone, balance issues are not why your losing.

In 3s your trapping is even more important, in 2's you have more time to retrap as games go so long missing the odd trap doesnt matter, in 3's games will be quicker so you need to sort that out, if your struggling to hit traps concuss shot them first, if its just breaking its probably your teammate breaking it with some spell or you are dr ing it.
Dont run wyvern its terrible, run binding shot, helps with kiting and you can explosive shot into binding for the stun on healers for extra cc.
You also dont seem to understand tranquilising shot is an offensive dispel which is likely a big part of your losing start learning to spam it when needed, your disc should be doing it but you take over when he cant or when your going for kills agains druid teams etc.
Im guessing you dont use interrupt as well as you could, make sure you have a focus interrupt set up, best use against healer/dps is interrupt cc casts till dampening then heals when close for kills.
Learn to use explosive trap if your not, use it to knock healers to stop casts, knock healers and dps out of los of each other, knock them off bridges, knock into binding shot etc, its basically a cc by itself if used correctly.

Other than that its a straightforward comp, turret dmg into dps and chain cc healers, traps into fear + silence + explosive shot, keep dispells going in between cc whenever healer gets loose, interrupt casts if dps is low otherwise interrupt ccs and keep your priest free.

Your priest should be aggresive with dispells and dps because as hunt/healer you should never have to play defensive until late dampening.
Its hard to get into specifics but war + pri should be easier as you have double dispell to insat remove any shields, interupt casts and just maintain cc on priest war will flop eventually its just down to your priest to survive (make sure you help your priest get fearward off enemy priest).

DK version is harder as dk can survive better and can kill you or your priest but the dk is far easier to kite and avoid, just make sure you use defensives when the dk connects (roar and freedoms for your priest especially, your preist can spec body and soul also to help prevent dispells from dk and helps with kiting) and make sure you maintain cc on healers, druid healer make sure you interrupt clones and you both need to spam dispel to keep all the hots off you need to keep druid behind on healing so he cant clone or do his own cc, priest should vanish every time he comes in for bash, try and save explosive for the bash/strang > clone if druid manages to get it you have to be very offensive against druid healer teams because if they ever get time to cc unpunished your going to lose.

Rogue healer can really only kill you with big cds + 8 sec kidney, your priest has to hold trinket, give roar to priest during red buff + cds, rogue is squishy and should die pretty easy, if they are good he will just kite in between cds so you can go healer to force him back you can even trap rog if they are dumb enough to waste dispel. Rog version could be difficult though especially with shaman, but get to a decent rating and rog teams are very rare.

[Deleted]

In 2s you pretty much never go for the healer as survi. Also anyone saying survi damage is shit isnt using toth & lnl procs properly.

[jrojason]

As many others have said, 90% of the time you'll be on the DPS and CC'ing the healer in 2's. However, in my opinion, a lot of other misinformation is floating around on this thread.

Firstly, Survival damage isn't bad. Survival burst is just a bit bad. The thing is, I think a lot of people misplay the spec. You absolutely have to line up dps procs and trinkets with aMoC and hopefully some explosive shot procs near the end of a black arrow duration. If you manage your energy and keep solid uptime on dots and damage, at the end of the match you can absolutely be top damage. I actually think Survival in a lot of cases does MORE damage than MM in 2's at least, because a) You'll barely ever be able to stand around to activate the mm mastery, and b) Good players will negate your rapid fire cooldowns by playing defensive and kiting.

Seen some people here saying DK + Healer is impossible as Hunter + healer, and from my experience that's not true at all. It's a tough matchup, but it's certainly not impossible. You have to play against this comp differently from others. Play the first part of the match sort of like you normally would, focus the DK and try to keep him slowed and kite for your healer as much as possible. Throw out some traps just to cause some pressure. Unlike other matches though, you're really unlikely to ever land a kill on the DK (at least as survival, killing a good DK seems impossible due to AMS). What I tend to do is wait for dampening to kick in to 50%+, find the healer in a less than ideal spot and start popping damage into him. It's a less than ideal strategy, but I've personally found it to work out a lot better than just trying to kill a DK while CC'ing the healer like most other comps you'll play.

@Bolognese your traps could be breaking due to things like paladin sac or maybe auto shots (even though they cancel when you trap, if you reselect the target and haven't turned off auto attack in interface options reselecting that target may auto attack right away). Also Ret paladin/Healer should honestly not be that hard of a team as Hunter/healer, you just have to learn to have energy available for when he is going to use hand of freedom/hand of protection, and then play super defensive when wings is up. Kiting should be really easy w/ frozen munition against a ret (though they still do a bunch of damage from range).

[Malgru]

are you spamming purge? because you should be spamming purge