haven't played my Hunter since vanilla, I don't get steady shot...

[Saverem]

So steady shot says it does bow + ammo damage plus X amount more. Yet your auto attacks have a higher end damage than it, how come?

Also, I've noticed that it's affected by haste but its GCD isn't, making haste completely useless for it since you still have to wait 1.5s to use another command. Why doesn't it work like the caster spells where haste also reduces the GCD of the 1.5s cast spells?

[Herecius]

The haste on ICC gear places its cast time just over the GCD, so it doesn't make a difference that its GCD isn't effected by haste anyhow. I don't actually know if it is or not anyways, shouldn't be stacking haste so the issue is moot. As for its damage, steady shot is concerned with the bow's average normalized damage, whereas your white shots can hit the top-end damage of whatever ranged weapon you are using.

[Chrysia]

Hunters do not benefit from the GCD reduction of haste, just like rogues and warriors do not. That is a blizzard decision. As to steady shot's damage, it's based off weapon damage, NOT your base damage. Your base damage is already highly affected by AP. Steady shots AP coefficient is lower than your normal white attack.

[Herecius]

Also, since you haven't touched the hunter since vanilla, the following might not be that obvious really: casting steady shot will not interrupt your auto shots. You will continue to freely fire your auto shots and do not have to 'weave' your steady shots with your auto shots like hunters once did.

[Saverem]

Also, since you haven't touched the hunter since vanilla, the following might not be that obvious really: casting steady shot will not interrupt your auto shots. You will continue to freely fire your auto shots and do not have to 'weave' your steady shots with your auto shots like hunters once did.

Steady Shot didn't exist last time I played my Hunter. Think it was introduced in BC. Does Multi-Shot interrupt auto attacks still?

[Lilcheeks]

Moving is the only thing that interrupts autoshots these days

[Daginni]

Auto Attack and Steady Shot fire together. It is basically something to fire while waiting for better shots.

[Cyph3r]

Just to clarify, the way hunters currently work is:

Autoshot always continues to fire as long as you're standing still, the only thing that will interrupt it is movement and volleys.

Steady shot is just our filler shot, it's what we fire when everything else is on cooldown.

We now have more of a shot priority than a strict rotation. You fire your best shot as soon as it's off CD, and steady is on the bottom of the list. The exception to this is certain gear levels for MM hunters, there reaches a point where you stop using arcane shot, because steady does more damage.

Some shots share cooldowns with others, thus removing them from the priority system. 2 notable examples are aimed and multi (thus multi will rarely ever get used) and arcane and explosive (which means never use arcane, since explosive is stronger, this only applies to SV hunters).

Oh yeah, SV is a viable spec these days, and was top DPS spec for a while.

As for haste, don't stack it, but you'll end up getting enough off your gear anyway to bring it's cast time down to match the GCD (which you can't change). Once you're at that point, haste no longer provides any benefit and you'll want to take pretty much anything over it.

[Gotjuice]

Nice posts and no one is flaming him or anything. Good job hunter community! lol

[fuzzylizard]

Just to clarify something here, moving does not cancel your auto shots. You can move in between each auto shot as much as you want. You just need to be standing still when it comes time to auto shoot. This is called stagger stepping and is a must to master for MM hunters (as auto shot is their biggest dps shot). Get an addon with a swing timer (quartz, azCastBars) that will show you when your auto shot is about to fire so you can stop moving.

If you are moving when your auto shot is supposed to fire, you simply loose that shot. Once you stop moving, auto shot will fire again.

[ASO]

Just to clarify something here, moving does not cancel your auto shots. You can move in between each auto shot as much as you want. You just need to be standing still when it comes time to auto shoot. This is called stagger stepping and is a must to master for MM hunters (as auto shot is their biggest dps shot). Get an addon with a swing timer (quartz, azCastBars) that will show you when your auto shot is about to fire so you can stop moving.

If you are moving when your auto shot is supposed to fire, you simply loose that shot. Once you stop moving, auto shot will fire again.

It's a must for all specs, but MM and SV really need to learn it. BM is spamming SS so even staggerstepping will be a pretty big dps hit.

[Saverem]

Cool, good to know. Thanks for all the tips.