A Viable Variation of the Quad Shammy Gladiator Comp?

[Dominian]

I imagine a rogue would work better tbh, stun locking people in a spot and aoe slow,ms and cast speed reduction can put insane pressue on the enemy healers.

Remember that the first target will be the hunter and hes not exactly hard to kill, while focused by multiple players his damage will be very low. (hand of freedom is an option though)

MS class + 3 casters and a healer works pretty ok but they often rely on ccing one healer and locking down the other one. With all the imunities this setup got way harder in wotlk and is pretty rare but it works good if its played right.

Scenarios i see that is hard goes like this:

You wont be able to nuke like you do with 4 shamans, a hunters burst is not even close to it.
Mortal strike sounds nice on paper but it is removed by hand of protection, most 5v5 carries got a paladin, either ret or holy.
Mortal strike do not counter pain supression and PW:shield.

Pet interruption is not noticable for a healer and they all got counters for it, if you got a paladin with conc aura up you got 0 spell pushbacks. (if you specced 70% less spellpush back wich every above crap healer spec) Even without it a resto shaman counter it with earth shield,priests with PW:shield and paladins with sacred shield and conc aura. I belive barkskin makes druids immune to spellpush backs but im not sure and theyr hotting pretty much.

If this should in any case work the hunter most likley have to be played by another player, if not you wont get anything off with your hunter and he dies faster then a cloth user atm. Even if you kill one a meele team will pressure your hunter even harder then before and most likley kill him aka your left with 3 shamans+your healer while they have one down aswell. This is in 99% of the cases a loss to me since i cant take down anything since even one healer can outheal me if his team mates are decent with silencing and stunning.

Hunters got 2 tools to migate damage and that is a soul link look alike pet talent with 30 sec cooldown that absorbs 30% damage. A good enemy team knows this and gib 20k hp with 0 resillience before you can say "pet". The other is making you deflect all magic and meele damage infront of you(seems to work 360 degrees thought) You cant attack while this ability is active.

Im not saying its impossible but i dont see it as a good solution either as the point is to burst before healers apply pain supression,ns heals etc.

[asonimie]

Pondered this many times while I boxed shammies.
A hunter brings not only MS, but also 41 yard snare, which is immensely useful for shammies that lack the long range catching ability, and pretty good healer interruption with pet.


However I would recommend playing the hunter as main character, to fully utilize him. You probably know how to play shammies inside out, so it will be much easier to use the hunter as your new main, and let the shammies follow with appropriate spells.

This is an excellent point, I can play an ele with 1 hand & blindfolded, and I cant even begin to think how many LOSers I would have killed this season if I could range snare them for just ONE more second. I might start leveling a hunter for this next season. Much better trap control.

Rogue... tbh.... F that. I HATE the feel of controlling elementals with a Melee main char. Similar to boxing a heroic with tank+shamans. Range issues would be horrible... and you would find yourself doing one of 2 things...

1- Your rogue would just be standing there doing nothing while your shamans nuke
2- You would attempt to dps on your rogue and forget about your off-camera shammies... and they get destroyed.

Hunter it is, I'll let you guys when I have something to test.

[Ualaa]

I could see playing the Hunter as the main, and 3 shammies are the slaves.
You can already control your four shammies, which is one main and three slaves fine.

The hunter as a lead toon is not on follow.
The hunter as a slave is on follow.
Auto shot switches to melee attacks when your target gets to a close range.
Melee attacks break follow, which leaves the hunter sitting there while the rest of your team moves.
As a leader, you actively control the hunter and the casting slaves never suffer this fate.

I'm not sure you gain enough to justify the loss.
A fourth shammy is that much extra burst on demand.
It's an extra cleansing totem, grounding totem etc.
But the hunter does bring ranged snare, ranged MS, frost trap with ensnarement...

[gitcho]

I'm racing against 1 horde team for #1 on the server, therefore gladiator.

If I created 5 toons on your server, boxed them to 80, farmed 5k gold, and sent it to your main, would you post some videos?

[asonimie]

Lolz

I am actually limited because of hardware at the moment. I really really want to make some videos, but alas - I run 4 clients just fine, but I tried running fraps and it just KILLS my FPS on the main... so I can't. You could send me a second box tho, then I'll make videos all day. I'll even include my priest and I screamin at eachother on vent

[Ulta]

The only useful post in here was about the huntard being you’re main. Heh. Fact is you are right about everything looking good on paper. In actuality it’s not nearly what it seems. Unless someone here has boxed in arena with a hunter and shamans they are just speculating. So only way to know if it will work like you would want is to try it 8)
IMO, with my vast arena knowledge, with the right gear and a lot of practice at it if your competent (which obviously you are) you could prolly do better. Gives you more utility in exchange for burst. But that’s quite a reach for you man GL.

And btw grats on your success in 5s and GL on Gladiator man. How competitive is your BGs 5v5 bracket? Our BG has just started booming in 5s the last month or so.

[Mosg2]

I love the idea, but the tradeoff you're making is potentially not being able to burst someone down in 1 second by going from 4x LB to 3x. MS gives you much more ability to sustain DPS, but is that worth the gib everytime EM is off CD? It seems to me trading a Shaman for a Hunter is moving away from the insta-5v4 that 4x LB crits brings and more towards concerted DPS, which I don't think is going to be near as successful.

/shrug

[magwo]

I don't think it's that great of a tradeoff, as the hunter has reasonable burst, and in combination with arcane shot purge and mortal strike effect, it should be very deadly.
With some patience, I really see this setup working.

Think of it like this: The burst should be at least comparable to 3.6-3.7 shammies, which isn't bad.. and add mortal strike tho that -> death.


On a side note, I made 4 fairly ambitious level 19 twink hunters.. and they totally blew every other twink out of the water in WSG.. indeed boxed hunters are extremely lethal if you have sufficient healing.

[magwo]

I just see a BM hunter adding SO much to a shammy box.
Just looking at Intimidation - the sub-1-min-CD stun.. in combination with concussive shot.. that's a totally easy and free kill once every minute, from loooong range.

It might take a lot of practice, but in the end I see it as being much more deadly than the quad shammy box.. the hunter basically fills in the major weaknesses of the shammies, primarily catching targets at range before they go out of LOS, which was THE problem I had with my 5v5 shammies.

[merujo]

I'd rather wait for MS LB's.