Arena guide for Disc/Hunter vs War/Pala by Homerjay
Hello :)
Since there sadly is no specific Arena subforum i figured to just post it here since it technically is a gameplay guide that shall help the community.
This guide is predominantly for all the people that yet still keep asking me how to possibly beat War/Pala as Disc/Hunter. Especially when they are countergearing like mad which they do as often as they can (it's a game and they do what they have to do to win and that's fine). This is a guide for the 284 ilevel gear meta. It is not really an essential textbook of what to do specifically in certain situations to better your chances of winning. It's a post dedicated to ease your chances and give you a general and to some kind in depth idea of what to do vs. War/Pala as Disc/Hunt. It is mainly written from the Hunter's pov since I'm playing this class.
First things first: Specs, Glyphs, Gear
As the Priest:
Specc should look like this if possible (https://rpgworld.altervista.org/335/...00000000000000). You can obviously also play with the standard Disc/Hunt specc (https://rpgworld.altervista.org/335/...00000000000000).
As for the glyphs you can replace the Shield Glyph with Inner Fire Glyph since the Shield Glyph is not as effective when there is an MS-effect on the target and the 5% damage reduction from Inner Fire Glyph are warmly welcome. One of the great advantages of wearing 1300 resilience gear as a warrior while wearing a 2h vs Disc/Hunt is that you can stick to any target much longer.
The gear should be max MP5, low Haste and around 1350-1400 Resilence. There hardly ever is a chance to drink vs a decent aggressive War/Pala so having enough Mana at all times to go aggressive with two dots and dispeling is vital to achieve victory. This includes the common Spirit PvP offsets and one Solace HC. Whether you wanna go with Bauble or Solace non-HC as your second trinket is your personal preference. With the non-hc version you get additional spellpower and some more mp5 but Bauble can be neat as a life saver or simply being able to heal off GCD and keep being aggressive. You can make full use of Bauble when the Hunter is being attacked by the Warr and dodges or parries a Mortal Strike (38% Dodge + 5% Parry (+2% Nightelf Racial)) which lets MS drop for a short period of time which you can use to use Bauble.
As the Hunter:
You can choose from two specs which may vary due to a different gear set you are using. The best spec is adjusted to the gear that provides 3%+ Hit. This lets you spec into 2% Careful Aim which brings you to 5% Hit total and you don't have to spend any points on other lower tier talents like Improved Concussive Shot or Efficiency or Improved Arcane Shot to get to tier 5. Additionally, by not going 3/3 Careful Aim you can spend the one leftover point into Barrage which grants you 4% more Crit Chance on your Aimed Shot.
One specc looks like this (https://wotlkdb.com/?talent#cZMeVooh...ecbbo0b:h0fzM0). This is the offensive specc without pet rezz, improved mobility and damage in comparison to the following spec. This can be a good choice when you are surely not gonna lose your pet. This can come in handy when the enemy Warr is 1300 Resilience and doesn't do unhealable damage on your pet. Yet be aware that once your pet is dead it is most likely gonna stay dead for the rest of the match.
The other specc looks like this (https://wotlkdb.com/?talent#cV0MZMeV...VoIMbbo:0hfzM0). It is less versatile yet comes with a bit more HP on the Hunter and he can rezz his pet quickly after it dies.
I normaly only play with the offensive spec.
Glyphs are being left untouched. If you face a War/Pala that really only wants to go on the Priest and never or barely ever on the Hunter you can swap Disengage Glyph in favour of Trueshot Aura Glyph which grants a constant additional damage bonus. Sadly Snake Trap Glyph is useless since the snakes still die instantly to any AOE effect (buged).
The gear should be at around 900 Resilience. Due to its tanky nature regarding Warriors the Hunter doesn't need that much Resilience since u dodge half his attacks. Agi is the way to go as AGI grants you additional Dodge raiting and Armour vs Melees such as Warriors. A good way to get to that low Resilience is by swapping a PvP setpiece for a PvE one. A good option are the legs that drop from Lady in 25 man HC. I do not advise to use double pve trinket. Fearward is 3 minute cd and at some point you will get fully feared and lose all pressure. Having your own trinket can help sometimes if you really wanna kill (for example trinket an intercept stun). Also, your procs often go to waste because you are kiting and cant build any pressure. This way the priest can also use fearward on his fiend or himself. The extra steady agility gets me to around 38,50% dodge. 5% parry raiting and 2% from nightelf miss racial makes the warr miss nearly 50% of his attacks on you (except overpower ofc). Most War/Pala these days are using Frost Resistance Aura. This aura lets them resist 20.5% of your Freezing Traps. You can not counter this with Spell Penetration. It is a bug that existed even back in Retail and got fixed in Patch 4.2 (http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Patch_4.2.0 and proof that is indeed buged https://eu.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/1849932361) https://imgur.com/a/MxiRG5m. So do not try to use Spell Penetration to make your trap unresistable.
The general strategy:
When the warrior is counter gearing it's really hard to kill him really since you need cc on the paladin. Landing a trap on the paladin is a difficult thing to do since the warr can intervene it (hunter can pet charge the intervene to still land the trap), charge the hunter so he can't throw the trap (could use deterrence to prevent that), sac the scatter since it always has a flight path, aura mastery right before it (not doubling the chance to resistance due to the formular behind it [url(https://wow.gamepedia.com/Resistance)[/url]) and increasing the chance to resist it, or simply resisting it. Also, sometimes you have to use the scatter defensively to peel the warr off your priest. Hence you wont be able to land a trap for the next 30 seconds since a good paladin will just freedom your concussive shot/pet charge when you try to throw a trap at him when he is slowed/rooted. And even if it lands the warrior can just use shield block for the most part and be totally fine or the paladin can trinket. Even if you force all cds in the world the warr can just charge/intercept you and then disarm you let your aimed shot drop off. Then the pala just has to cast 2-3 heals and the warrior is full again and you essentially lost all the pressure. If you want to win war pala by killing the warrior you must be able to outplay his charges on your with deterrences n disengages to retain your aimed shot on him.
Game control:
It depends a lot on the map how the matchup is played. Generally speaking you want to kite away from the paladin either way to force the warrior to switch on your partner. The idea behind this is that you want him to use his charges and switch on a target that already has a pre shield running. Shields are extremely effective against MS-classes as their value doesn't get halved like regular healing does. This way the player who the warr just switched off can now push on the paladin for cc/dispels/mana burns. The problem with this is that you might be stranded really far away from the paladin after the warr switches off you. It might sometimes also provide benefitial to kite towards the paladin if u are able to counter the warrior's charges accordingly. It's generally speaking ALWAYS good if the warr and pala stack on top of each other. You can then double entrapment root them, double explosive and slow trap them. Double fear them. All the good stuff.
How to survive a Warrior as a Priest:
You don't. At least not for ever due to the possibility of Overpower every six seconds and Pummel every ten. Circling your CDs as a team is the corner stone of every good game vs War/Pala. Master's Call, ROS, Intervene should primarily used on the Priest. Only use ROS on the Hunter when the Warrior is about to charge him and he is expected to drop low from that. Same goes for Intervene which can also be used to get Disarm which Warriors like to use when dropping low themselves and Aimed Shot is about to drop. Master's Call can be used on the Priest to allow him reaching the Pala for a fear. ROS should be used on Bladestorm or when the Priest is exposed open field and the Warrior has trinket procs. Try not to overlap ROS and PS! ROS negates roughly 30% of the Warrior's damage as well! A neat trick is to use ros on your disc and then immediately tranq shot the warrior. This way you dispel his Wrecking Crew talent which grants him 10% more damage for 12 seconds after every critical strike. Due to ros he cant get that buff back any time soon and you lessen his damage by 10%! Besides that make sure to be 100% and have a shield up when going open field since you can expect to get swaped on asap. If possible only really use Shield and Penance as your main spells to save mana. Renew when the Warr is on you only and Holy Nova as a gap filler when really needed. Shield and Penance simply grant you the most benefit per Mana spent (heal, absorb, buffs). When the Warrior uses Bladestorm the Hunter should leave his pet at him and just use Cower. The Priest should then use POM which quickly bounces five times between him and the pet and keeps them both alive. Only make use of one Penance tick unless u are confident to fake him or won't get hurt too much if u get pummeled.
Swapping:
Swapping on a Hpala as a Hunt/Disc sadly is really hard to do. You surely can't just randomly swap on him since he is just gonna dispel your Serpent Sting or spam Flash and will be fine. If you wanna swap you either have to do it when they are under immense pressure and the Warrior just used Shield Block (even then the Paladin should already be at 60-70% HP due to sacs if you want it to be successful) or out of a Freezing Trap. The latter option is my recommended choice. Swapping can be beneficial since the Paladin will most likely be using countergear as well, thus having only 900 Resilience. This allows you to actually unload a massive burst. Setup is key though and don't forget the Warrior!
The perfect swap would be out of a Freezing Trap and having Silencing Shot and fear ready. Hunter's Mark the Pala, Serpent Sting (it is very important that the Priest dots here as well but NEVER before the Serpent Sting landed. Elsewise the Priest's dots tick before the Serpent Sting and the swap is ruined), re target the Paladin to stop your automatic Auto Shot, Rapid Fire, Steady Shot (You can only use the Steady Shot as a setup when having Rapid Fire ready. If you don't use Rapid Fire the Steady Shot won't be cast fast enough and the Serpent Sting will break the trap too early), Auto Shot, Chimera Shot, Silencing Shot, Aimed Shot (run towards the Pala while doing so to trigger a 2H melee hit by your weapon). If the Priest casts Holy Fire and SW:D and your Wild Quiver talent proccs, the Paladin takes (increased due to Hunter's Mark) damage from 12 sources simultaniously, possibly bursting for 20k damage if not more with the first 1,5 seconds window. Follow it up with an Aimed Shot while the silence still lasts and fear him at the end of the silence. This way he still has five dots (Serpent, Holy Fire, Piercing Shots, two Priest dots) ticking on him during it. At the end of the fear you can Aimed and Chimera Shot him again to seal the deal. This is the optimal case of a swap which rarely ever occures due to the Warrior. When the Warrior comes to help his Paladin communication is everything. If the Hunter won't be able to silence the Pala in a sec the Priest has to fear early so the dots don't break the trap and the Paladin can dispel, freedom and heal himself. Since the Warrior will often Disarm the Hunter after the Charge-stun the fear Glyph by the Priest is especially useful. An example of an in general well executed swap on a Pala that actually does NOT countergear can be found here (https://www.twitch.tv/videos/132307515). Before firing the Serpent Sting I adivse you to lay a Snake Trap in the path of the Paladin which he most likely is gonna use after he is out of the Freezing Trap. You should only really swap when there is no possibility to quickly reach the Warrior and build up pressure on him. As you can see in the clip the Warrior was 100% hp, shield equiped, already retreating and out of LOS from the Hunter. You can use Readiness or fiend to force bubble. Then the other cooldown to kill him. There is an alternative and way more reliable way to setup on the paladin. This can be executed when the warr is on either hunter or pet. Land fear on paladin. Hunter marks, stings (if possible) pala while priest is throwing one dot on him and then using mc. Hunter traps the warrior as soon as the mc landed so the frost aura doesn't affect the warrior anymore. Hunter disengage and runs towards the pala who is still in mc. Drops explosive and snake trap below the pala. Priest releases the pala. Hunter and priest collectively nuke the pala in a silencing shot. This should kill or force bubble/big sac every time. Warrior is still trapped so he cant peel his pala. Important is that you clearly communicate this with your priest before you do the go so there are no dots on the warrior and the hunter is okay with kiting the warrior for a while while priest is busy with the pala. as a hunter u can safely squeeze in hunter's mark between scatter and trap on the warrior as trap trigger timer is only 1 seconds. when dropping the paladin out of mc the priest should make sure that he is not close to a pillar, out of range to instantly hoj the priest after mc, and not able to instantly dispel the warrior out of trap. once the mc drops it goes as follows: hunter does aimed shot, silence before the next gcd of the pala, serpent, chimera, and weaves in an auto hit inbetween after auto shot. the priest does mind blast, penance, sw:d. dont bother trying to dispel freedom or sacred shield if the paladin buffs it. it takes too long. the hunter breaks the sacred shield proc instantly anyway and the freedom is useless at the start. if hunter gets decent crit rng you get him to 10k or lower by the end of the silencing shot. if you can keep on nuking after this to kill or force bubble go right ahead. elsewise the priest should then go back to burning.
Things to do when the Warrior is on you:
As the Priest your main goal is to stay alive. Use the above mentioned strategy not to die too quickly and throw in some dispels on the Warrior when you can. Kite him to the closest pillar and try to make him LOS his Paladin. Don't try to kite him so your Hunter can shoot him. The Hunter has tools himself to reach his desired target. You build up pressure quickest by making the Paladin not reach the Warrior. This works marvelously when the Paladin is slowed by the Hunter. Have a look on the Hunter and his pet whether they are okay with HP and focus on kiting the Warrior away from the Paladin. In rare situations it's good to actually push on the Paladin even when the Warrior is on you but make sure that you actually have pressure going and are able to keep it up for the entire move.
As the Hunter you are quite limited in your doings. Kite the Warrior away from the Paladin, keep Wing Clip up and wait for an opportunity to land CC on the Paladin. This can be done out of a fear or a Mind Control by just throwing it. Yet since your Priest will most likely not be able to land any of that out of the blue you will have to land some CC first. The common way with roots --> silence Paladin to prevent dispel --> Scatter --> Freezing Arrow works nicely but be aware that Paladins can use Divine Sacrifice through Silence and they are often too far away or close to a pillar so they just run away while roots fade from the war naturally! Besides that you can slow the Paladin via Concussive Shot, throw the trap and fix the Paladin for a second with your pet Charge ability but good palas will freedom themselves out of that. so at best just have your priest chase him with a concussive shot or even chimera shot slow. Make sure not to have the Viper Aspect activated since it costs you a lot of Dodge Raiting. When not being able to shoot the Warrior at all use Tranq Shot and Viper Sting on the Paladin to make him use globals dispelling and buffing which all costs Mana. a common mistake that i myself have done for many years is disengaging away from the warrior in an angle that would lead him super far away from his paladin. good warriors wont take the bait and instead charge your priest who is chasing the paladin. now you are out of range from the warrior, are probably still slowed and dont have disengage. hence, i advice not to use disengage to simply kite and get away from the warrior. you can do that just by slowly walking there. also kiting away from the pala might not always be the best choice. on a map like dalaran which is really small it is benefitial to kite towards the pala at the box as it forces him to run open field and into you and your priest.
Things to do when the Warrior is not on you:
As the Priest you should obviously look that no one (including the pet) is in concrete danger. That doesn't mean that everyone has to be at 100% HP. The Hunter should be fine even at 50-60% when he has a Renew and an Inspiration procc running and you shield him again in a few seconds. Try to be at atleast 90% and have a shield on you if possible when pushing towards the Paladin again. As soon as you are in range try to burn the Paladin and dispel his buffs. Only dispel the Warrior when he still babysits the Hunter and you scared the Paladin so far off that you now sit between him and the Warrior and he cant re buff Sacred Shield. This is the moment where you should dispel, the Hunter should use a root (Pin from pet or Entrapment) and throw in a dot or two. When the Warrior goes back on you just kite away immediately. This moment can easily be used to turn the pressure around. Normally you should already have a shield running when running open field and can follow it up with a second one as soon as the first one breaks. Two reflective Shields do solid damage on the Warrior and in combination with the Hunter finally having the possibility again to do some damage you can create sublime pressure.
As the Hunter you can actually do some damage when the Warrior is not on you. Try to keep your signature damage spells on CD and cover your Serpent Sting with Silencing Shot on the Paladin to prevent it from getting dispelled. Try to keep Wing Clip up on both of them but especially the Paladin. Try to always use a GCD, even if it's just a Viper Sting on the Paladin. Communicate with your Priest regarding peels. Disarm a Bladestorm only when it's absolutely necessary or you currently don't have any pressure going anyway. An addon that tells you specifically the remaining duration of the MS-effect is useful to properly intervene the next MS. Rooting the Warrior while Silencing the Paladin and using freedom on the Priest is a very effective way of peeling him off your Priest. When the Warrior uses Shield Block try to shoot him in the back to not get your damage blocked. when warrior and paladin are free and on your priest dont bother trying to serpent sting + chimera the warrior if the warr is fully buffed. the paladin has nothing to do but spam dispel and he has faster gcds. so your sting would have to resist twice in a row for chimera to land with it. rather just chimera instantly.
Mana:
As previously mentioned in the gear section it is very important to wach your Mana. This goes for the Hunter and the Priest. As a Hunter you always wanna have a few thousand Mana as a reserve to not having to swap to Viper Aspect during a pressure phase and being able to sit in Dragonhawk Aspect while the Warrior sits on you.
As the Priest it's essentially game over once you are completely tapped. You can't go offensive at all anymore, the War/Pala gets all its CDs back while you try to get some Mana back. So use Hymn and Fiend early in the game to have them back later in time even if that means to use Fiend on the Paladin since the Warrior has fear or Shield Block.
All that fuss about making the Paladin use his GCDs and to get pressure going leads to the very core of your goal in this matchup: Ooming the Paladin. Even with double Solace, 900 Resilience and a high amount of MP5 gear the Paladin will oom if he doesn't use Divine Plea as often as possible. Get yourself a timer to track this CD and dispel it at nearly all costs. That's why the Hunter should use Tranq Shot on the Paladin as often as possible. Once he actually uses Plea you can actually dispell it easily since he doesn't have any other buffs. After facing this comb for a while you will get a feeling for when the Pala is about to use it. Hunter and Priest should instantly try to get it. The Priest should use MD as well to get it (unless tha pala has like four trash buffs).
Miscellaneous:
I use the addon Interruptbar to track the following CDs of them: Divine Plea, Shield Block, Charge, Intercept, Hand of Sacrifice, Divine Sacrifice.
I have a macro which fires a Distracting Shot at your focus target. This is useful when wanting to take the Intervene buff off the Paladin after the Warrior intervened.
When the Warrior uses Shield Block stop hitting him in most cases (unless you already have mad pressure and your Priest says he is fine either way) since he can elsewise just spam Revenge. An exception is Aimed Shot. You always wanna keep that buff up.
