Explosive shot...

"Wait, I will be able to set things on fire...for multiple seconds?? That seems very....interesting...and wtfpwnage-like"

So, as we all know...survival hunters can set people on fire now. Woot?...meh. I have to say, I was quite excited to set a few horde on fire as soon as I built my Survival talent line up. Much to my dismay, the climax was as eventful as a presidential debate.

Here is the low down. I have 2300 ranged attack power in my Survival build. Here are my hit results:

Non-crit:
300-500 damage per hit
900-1500 total damage

Crits:
775-925 damage per hit
2,325-2,775 total damage

In essence, I was doing from 900 to 2,800 damage per 6 seconds of cooldown. I was actually hoping for a bit higher number. I mean, 2300 attack power is hard to achieve...but what can you do.

Some important things about explosive shot:

- The AOE effect hits soft AND DOES break crowd control
- Each fire hit has its own critical strike chance, meaning:
You can hit for: 400 - 800 (crit) - 400. All on one shot
- If you can find a condensed group, the AOE does make for some impressive burst
- Explosive shot can easily replace arcane shot in your rotation

Some interesting things about my survival build (0/10/51 - 10 for the 10 crit points in Marksman)
- My crit rating was 35%
- My damage meter said I was criting 58% of the time!!
- The build seems focused on critical strikes and...well...that seems to be it. Decent trapping and cc ability with wyvern sting...but really all about critical strikes. That is gonna make those points to improve your feign death seem so much better in raids now without blessing of salvation!

The last item is kind of peculiar. I essentially could not find a chance to use steady shot in most instances. When I add Aimed Shot in wrath, I doubt I will ever need steady shot. It's personal, but between Multi-shot, serpent sting and explosive shot...I never had down time.

My tips:
- Watch the cooldown and use the shot every time
- In instances and raiding, make sure you actually wont break cc; this skill if used wrong will lead to a severe case of huntarditus, that will be detrimental to your raid livelihood

Though I was not impressed with the number, it is still doing more damage than everything else. So...I like the shot, but not enough to say survival is my end all spec in Wrath. I am intrigued by the Marksman tree and that will be tried next. Also, BM had such a great fun factor...I can see BM getting some miles in Wrath as well.

Don't fret though, survival will get it's fair chance in wrath! I will raid, instance and quest with it to try it out fully. Also, explosive shot was designed as a level 80 skill....so maybe I will like seeing 3 crits over 1k in wrath! :)

Edited after further research - 11/10