Just a reminder that Patch 5.3 will be applied on Tuesday, May 21th. Listed below are the hunter changes that will take place, from the official patch notes:

General

• Hunters now have 50 pet stable slots, up from 20.
• Cooldown on crowd control abilities for several Hunter pet families have changed.
  • Basilisk pet family’s Petrifying Gaze cooldown is now 2 minutes (up from 1 minute).
  • Bat pet family’s Sonic Blast cooldown is now 2 minutes (up from 1 minute).
  • Crane pet family’s Lullaby cooldown is now 2 minutes (up from 1 minute).
  • Porcupine pet family’s Paralyzing Quill cooldown is now 2 minutes (up from 1 minute).
  • Shale Spider pet family’s Web Wrap cooldown is now 90 seconds (up from 45 seconds).
  • Worm pet family’s Burrow Attack has had its cooldown reduced to 14 seconds (down from 20 seconds).
• Aspect of the Hawk now increases ranged attack power by 25%, up from 15%.
• Revive Pet now has a cast time of 4 seconds, down from 6 seconds.

Talents

• Aspect of the Iron Hawk now increases ranged attack power by 25%, up from 15%.
• Binding Shot is no longer a talent and learned by Marksmanship Hunters at level 30.
• Blink Strike has been renamed Blink Strikes and turned into a passive ability. The pet’s Basic Attacks deal 50% increased damage, can now be used from 30 yards away, and will instantly cause the pet to teleport behind their target.
• Intimidation is now a level-30 talent available to all Hunter specializations and no longer learned by Beast Mastery Hunters at level 20.

Beast Mastery

• Beast Cleave now deals 75% of the original damage, up from 50%.
• Exotic Beasts no longer reduces the cooldown of pet special abilities by 30%.

Marksmanship

• Bombardment now increases the damage of Multi-Shot by 60%, up from 30%.

Item Sets

• PvP 2-piece set bonus has been redesigned. Using Arcane Shot now causes the Hunter’s PvP Power to increase by 800 for 6 seconds.

For a complete list of changes taking effect in Patch 5.3 see the 5.3 Official Patch Notes. For a summary of all the new features see 5.3 Escalation Round-up at the official Warcraft blog.

Twistedtoons shared his “Hunting in Style” transmog on Reddit:

Item list

CaribaLd: Finally killed Lei Shen on 10 heroic. The kill was 5 days prior to the upload of this video, didn’t have time to do it earlier.

Music:
Two Steps From Hell – Exodus
Two Steps From Hell – Freedom Fighters
Two Steps From Hell – Disappear

Includes Danish TeamSpeak in the end of phase 3 with nerdscreams.

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For hunter Throne of Thunder raid guides and more hunter PoV videos see Throne of Thunder: Strategy Guides and Videos for Hunters.

In this narrated video guide, Cinnamohn demonstrates how to solo Sunwell Plateau as a level 90 hunter.

Cinnamohn: Armory – http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character…

As of this video:
Gear – ilv506 overall (ilv483 sha weapon, ilv522/502 trinkets, 2p T14)
Consumables used – 400 Agi Flask, 4k Agi Potion, 4% Kings Drums
Spec – Survival
Talents – 3/1/3/3/1/1
Glyphs – Misdirection, Mending, Animal Bond
Pet – Kitty Dps

Music:
Fracx – Thoughts
Feint – Sky Dance
Blackmill – The Drift

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Visit Cinnamohn’s Youtube Channel.

For more hunter soloing guides and videos see Hunter Soloing, from Classic to Pandaria: Tips, Guides, Strategies, and Videos

Perculia at The Wowhead Blog: Blizzard just confirmed on twitter that Patch 5.3 is hitting on Tuesday, May 21st! Players can look forward to the new Battlefield Barrens World Event, more Brawler’s Guild bosses and vanity items, legendary questline developments, huge PvP changes and more. Check out the 5.3 Patch Notes for a full list of additions and changes.

World of Warcraft Patch 5.3: #Escalation is releasing Tuesday, May 21. bit.ly/16flrlG

— World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) May 18, 2013

Blizzard then linked to their Prepping for 5.3 Blog, which covers the essentials to keep in mind this weekend as you plan things out:

• Experience required to level from 85-90 will be reduced by 33%.
• Item Upgrades are returning, but the costs are greatly reduced and you can’t upgrade Season 13 PvP gear.
• The cost of heirlooms is reduced by 60%.
• Lesser Charms of Good Fortune will now drop from some rare mobs.
• PvP gear is getting some huge changes–resilience is being removed and all characters get 65% base resilience instead.

. . . read full article

Every other Friday, Kalliope features the highlights of the Petopia forum discussions from those two weeks, ranging from new pet discoveries to theorycrafting to stunning transmog sets, also providing links to the full threads.

• Pet Discussion
  • New pet challenges (discussion) (5/16/13)
• General Hunter Topics
  • Featured Transmogrifications of the Week (5/17/13)

New pet challenges (discussion) (5/16/13)

New poster Takanuka kicked off a theoretical discussion about what new pet families should be added to the game, each with its own special challenge.

Read full thread here

Featured Transmogrification of the Week (5/17/13)

This week’s featured transmogrification was created by Tårnfalk.

View on Petopia

A full index of all Petopia Forum posts recapped at the Wow Hunter’s Hall is maintained in the Index of Petopia Forum Posts.

The video shows the Ra-Den 10 encounter (with Spanish vent) from the PoV of Caith (Dun Modr – EU), playing Survival Hunter. This was the first Spanish Ra-Den kill.

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For hunter Throne of Thunder raid guides and more hunter PoV videos see Throne of Thunder: Strategy Guides and Videos for Hunters.

The video shows the Council of Elders heroic 25 raid encounter from the PoV of Puertó (Skullcrusher – US), playing Survival hunter.

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For hunter Throne of Thunder raid guides and more hunter PoV videos see Throne of Thunder: Strategy Guides and Videos for Hunters.

The Grumpy Elf: When I first started playing my idea of an alt was a character I had on another server.  I had an alliance side hunter, a horde side hunter, a hunter on a role play realm, a hunter on a PvP realm.  They were alts.

When one hunter took the lead as my “main” it was an alliance hunter on a PvE server and the others just disappeared, so to speak.  Logged on to one of them last week and it still has arrows in its bag.  Have to love that.  I don’t think I will ever sell them.  Put them in my bank.

As I started to level and look forward to the future I noticed there were things I would need.  Gems, enchants, etc.  So I started to make some alts to level some other professions.  That was when alts, to me, entered their second incarnation.  The profession alt.  They exist just to serve my main. . . . read full article

Frostheim at Warcraft Hunters Union: As some of you know (those of you who follow me on Twitter), I’m in the midst of planning a move. For my day job, I accepted an awesome new position at a company in Boston (currently in Minnesota) and I’ve been frantically doing all the stuff you need to do to move across the country — well as much of it as I can get done while still working at my current job.

Today is my last day at BestBuy.com, and I arrived in the office to see this waiting for me. Yes, not only do all my co-workers know I play WoW, they also know enough to do a Google image search for “Frostheim’s Cloak” to include the Recovered Cloak of Frostheim on the cupcake tribute.

So even in the midst of corporate America, I’m known as a hunter blogger! . . . read full article