Note: this is an outdated Wrath guide — hunters no longer have Aspect of the Viper.
I’ve gotten some questions on Aspect of the Viper, so I thought it would be a good idea to go into detail about exactly how Aspect of the Viper works to regen our mana, and what is the best weapon speed to maximize our mana regen while in Aspect of the Viper.
Here is the formula for Apect of the Viper mana regen:
| Aspect of the Viper regens 4% of your maximum mana every 3 seconds. |
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| Aspect of the Viper regens a percentage of your maximum mana equal to your base weapon speed with every shot. |
So for example, if you have a base weapon speed of 3.0, Aspect of the Viper will regen 3% of your max mana with every shot. What do we mean by every shot? That includes auto shot, steady shot, arcane shot, explosive shot, multi-shot (for each target), Explosive Shot (for each tick) etc. The only thing is doesn’t seem to include is Serpent Sting ticks and Volley. (Note that it also regens on melee, but we’re hunters – if we’re meleeing something has gone horribly wrong).
How Does Haste Affect Aspect of the Viper?
Haste is good. Since our mana regen is based on our base weapon speed, shooting faster means we’ll regen mana faster! A faster rate of fire doesn’t change the base amount of mana regen (equal to our base weapons speed, as a percentage of max mana pool) it just increases how often we get that base regen.
Keep in mind that haste only improves how frequently we can cast Steady Shot up to the haste cap, but even after the cap, it keeps helping our autoshot.
So is a Slower Weapon Better?
Great question! A slower weapon is indeed better for our Viper mana regen. Let’s take a look at some numbers and find out why:
Let’s say we have 10,000 max mana, and a base weapon speed of 3.0. For the sake of convenience let’s say we fire off 10 Steady Shots. We’re a BM hunter in this example, so our modified autoshot speed is about 2.17, and we’re already at the haste cap. Thus in the 15 seconds it takes to fire 10 steady shots we get about 7 auto shots. That’s a total of 17 shots.
In those 17 shots we regen 5,100 mana, at 300 mana per shot. (we’re ignoring the base mana regen that viper also gives us for now, which doesn’t change). Note however that we’re spending mana for those steady shots, specifically 5% of our base mana (lvl 80 hunter has a base mana of 5046) which is 252 per shot, or 2,520 mana. Thus our total mana gain from shots is 2,580 with a 3.0 speed ranged weapon.
Now let’s try with a 2.5 speed ranged weapon, giving us a modified weapon speed of about 1.81. We fire 10 steady shots over 15 seconds. We also get 8 autoshots. Each shot regens 2.5% of our max mana, or 250 per shot, over 18 shots.
In those 18 shots we regen 4,500 mana. Our steady shot still costs us 252 mana per shot, so we still spend 2,580 mana on shooting. Thus our total mana gain from shots is 1,920 with a 2.5 attack speed weapon.
So here we’re looking at a 3.0 speed ranged weapon is about 25% better mana regen than a 2.5 speed ranged weapon. That’s a big difference!
Will My Mana Regen Faster if I Just Auto Shot?
As the numbers above show, not really, no. It depends on what shots you’re doing and your weapon speed, but even with a 2.5 speed weapon you’re gaining almost the same mana that you spend on steady shot, so you might as well keep shooting.
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Finally! I have found some solid information on AotV! Thanks for all the great work you do for the Hunter community. I have a few questions: For mana regen in AotV, do you just shoot a series of steady shots like you described in this post? Is combining Rapid Fire with AotV a waste of an awesome cooldown ability? What about Arcane shot? For some reason, I’ve found some decent mana returns using it in mana regen-mode. Thanks again!
Juf, I’m a MM hunter on Stormrage and as anyone who’s ever seen a MM hunter knows, I can be a leaky sieve when it comes to mana. My SoP (standard operating procedure) that I’ve found best (since I’m not haste capped) is to burn down to about 1/4 of my mana, pop my Rapid Fire (b/c I have definitely noticed better mana returns by using RF than by not), switch back to Dragonhawk and then wait to have the boss down enough to use Kill Shot. I’ll then pop Readiness, Kill Shot again, and blow Rapid Fire a second time. If he’s still up, then by that time I’ll go Viper again until Kill Shot’s available, hit the non-GCD Dragonhawk and unload on him again.
MM sounds much more complex than it is, lol… the key thing I’ve learned about AotV is to watch it very closely. A 40% nerf to damage (due to 11 points spent in BM) is a terrible thing. And I NEVER use any of my heavy hitters w/o popping over to Dragonhawk, even if that means AotD, Kill Shot, Chimera Shot, Aimed Shot, AotV, Autoshot for a bit…
Hi there..
My Wolf “Woofums” (actually the Vargul Blighthound) only has 16 points to spend at level 80.. Is there a reason your tree shows 20? Thanks for the help and you super cool site!
Crap posted this on the wrong page. will go to correct page..
DISREGARD
Errr, maybe you interchanged two digits by mistake within your Mana regen calc:
18 * 300 = 5,400, not 4,500.
Makes a huge differrence, now a fast weapon seems to be better
Dunkoro: we are not multiplying 18*300 anywhere in here.
With the slower weapon it is 17*300 and with the faster weapon it is 18*250 (because with a faster weapon speed, you regen less mana per shot).
Ahhhh, ok sorry. Of course you are right
So my question is then, regarding BM bow choice a faster Rate of Fire Bow (ROF) is aactually better for dps but worse for mana regen am I tracking correctly?
I would also like to know if it’s worth using rapid fire to regen mana.
Thanks Frost, you’re uber!
No, don’t use rapid fire for your mana regen. Use a mana potion. Generally you want to use rapid fire to stack with all your other cooldowns (trinkets, call of the wild, furious howl), greatness, etc.) The multiplicitive effect is worth way more than a tiny little bit faster mana regen.
So let me see if i have this straight. Doing more “damage” while in AotV does not give you more mana return (like i thought it did, hello misconception.) Volley shot does not give you any mana return. Stings give you no mana return at all (or do they?) Explosive shot will give you up to 3 times the mana of a normal shot, and multishot will give you up to 3 times the mana.
And just to clarify it’s the BOW speed you’re talking about for ranged shots. Yes?
Good post and great website. But as a MM hunter that wants to start raiding, is there a guide on here (or anywhere else) that details the generally accepted specifics for using AotV. Specifically:
1. Should I always use a mana potion in lieu of AotV when I can? If so, I assume I use the mana potion when it would put me just back to 100% (or just under–never over)?
2. At what mana percentage should should I switch to AotV? At what mana percentage should I switch back to AotDH?
3. Should I keep firing my normal shot rotation while in it, or only use certain shots? If my weapon speed is 3.00, firing an Arcane Shot will get me back 3% of my mana. But if that same Arcane Shot costs 5% of my mana, I’m still losing mana by casting it. On the other hand, the Arcane Shot does more damage (albeit 40% of its normal damage) than auto shot. So what’s better, medium paced mana regen with some damage, or faster paced mana regen with minimal damage? Or if certain shots become available (e.g. Kill Shot, Chimera Shot), should I switch to AotDH to fire them, then switch back to AotV?
4. Should I avoid all offensive buffs (Rapid Fire, Blood Fury, trinkets) while in AotV?
Thanks!
1.) Yes, always use a mana pot instead of viper.
2.) There is no set percentage. You only want to switch to viper if you have to, and only for as long as you need to. In general you don’t want to be in viper when the boss is at 20% or lower, so try to plan as best you can.
3.) Use your normal rotation.
4.) Correct, do not use dps boosting cooldowns while in viper!
Thanks for the reply. You seem to know what you’re talking about, and most of your answers I would concur with intuitively, so I trust you (I’d follow you to hell and back). But regarding the 3rd question, have you (or anyone else) done any theorycraft into this? Doesn’t continuing with my normal rotation slow down my mana regen slightly? (I don’t have my WoW in front of me so I don’t know exactly how much mana each shot uses) If so, how do we know what is better for overall dps: slower mana regen with higher damage, or faster mana regen with lower damage.
And I assume if Kill Shot comes up when in AotV, I should switch to AotDH? What about Chimera? One can envision some sort of Aspect Dancing where we switch to AotDH on “big” shots and stay in AotV of smaller shots. If you haven’t tested this, then no one has.
You should still gain mana (or basically be a wash) on arcane, steady shots, and explosive shot. Other shots it’s a slight loss, but still better to be dpsing as much as you can.
Indeed you should switch to Dragonhawk for Kill Shots — or better yet, make sure you have plenty of mana for the last 20% of the boss health (in general you don’t want to have to go into viper for that last 20%). If you’re MM, you definitely want to swap to Dragonhawk just for your Chimera Shot. Not only is it a big damage dealing shot, but it will affect the damage of the serpent sting re-application.
In general I don’t have a lot of mana problems with raid buffs; however, when I do I usually just go to viper right after Chimera and my mana is mostly filled up by the time Chimera comes up again.
Right, I meant to mention that the goal is to avoid going into Viper when you might need Kill Shot soon. Good to know about Dragonhawk for Chimera though. Thanks for the prompt replies. Love the site and I just downloaded the recent podcast.
While my Aspect of the Viper was up i used a EZ-Thro Dynamite and received mana for every mob it hit. I tested this a few times and it works each time. I was wondering if you could test it yourself and see how it might or might not be useful. I have not tried it with any other type of explosive except for the Flash Bundle quest reward in Duskwood which did work as well.
Michael, I’ve noticed this as well, though I used Saronite Bombs, but its only worth it if you are fighting a large mob or fighting a Boss that always has Adds up, like in VoA with the Air Boss (never remember his name) if you run low on mana and do not have any pots (heaven forbid) pop into Viper, multi shot the adds and throw a bomb, you should get a good amount of mana for just a few short seconds. Though how long Blizz will be allow us to use bombs in this fasion is unknown. I haven’t used Bombs in a while but when I did that was the process I went through.
I’m surprised that nobody mentioned viper sting. I use this all the time on mobs/bosses with mana (Lady Deathwhisper in ICC?) It won’t return more mana than you burn, but it definitely slows your mana leak to a crawl. I only try to use Viper between pulls or for very brief periods during a boss fight, like popping it just long enough to give me mana to finish out the fight, no longer. Potions are definitely better because they don’t give the AP debuff. As long as you drink/viper between mob pulls and only use viper sparingly during a fight, your dps won’t suffer too much.
On bosses that have mana I use viper sting followed by a Chimera shot and when the sting runs out its back to serpent sting, couple this with the regen in RF when its up (used separately) and if I have to I go to viper for long enough to get back to 80% or so. In raids I usually dont have mana problems.