Bullseye: A quick and easy guide to hit rating

Scenario: You've fought your way through to the heart of Naxxramas, the vile Kel'Thuzad stands before you, unaware of your entrance into his lair. Your weapons are at the ready, and you have nothing in between you and victory over the Lich. You ready your spell, arrow, or dagger and begin the assault!

ATTACK!

(You miss Kel'Thuzad)

(You miss Kel'Thuzad)

(You miss Kel'Thuzad)

Kel'Thuzad has been alerted to your presence. He turns and freezes you before throwing you into the abomination pits.

This Scenario is just one example of how hit rating is a vital and important stat for Damage Dealers. You can have an instant-kill attack at the ready for every single fight, but if it can't find its target, you're virtually useless! If you can hit with small attacks, you're doing better than not hitting with big attacks!

Hit is a stat that is usually overlooked by most new players as they don't understand its impact on combat. Hit rating, actually, will usually yield a greater overall DPS increase. That is, until you reach the hit cap.

What's the Hit cap?

The Hit cap is the point where hit rating will not benefit you anymore. Your DPS will not increase anymore from taking hit, and most of your important abilities will hit their target without fail.
There is actually TWO hit caps, a soft and a hard one. the soft hit cap is the usual hit cap, as it is relatively easy to reach and allows all your special abilities to always hit their target.
The hard hit cap is usually never met, as it requires a vast amount more hit rating for relatively little reward (having all of your normal attacks hit as well).
The hard hit cap should never be a player's goal, as to reach it, it requires the player to forsake all other stats for hit, which will reduce their DPS incredibly.



Okay, should I focus on getting hit rating on everything I can?

Not exactly. You see, while Hit rating will in most cases lead to more DPS, there's two things to keep in mind when considering hit as a stat. The first being the hit cap we already covered. If you have reached your hit cap, then any further hit rating will not do anything much for you.
The second, more important thing, is the other stats and a stat balance on your gear.
Your hit rating should be climbing until you get to the hit cap. being hit capped is a general requirement for most endgame content, and for all else it gives a big boost to your damage. However, if you focus all of your stats onto hit, then the rest of your stats will suffer.
Here's an example of what I mean:

You have a choice between two helmets:

[Helm of Iron]
200 armor
+20 hit
+20 agility
+30 stamina
+25 intellect


[Helm of Steel]
200 armor
+60 hit
+9 agility
+18 stamina
+5 intellect

Between these two helmets, the Steel helmet would have more hit on it. However, it has dramatically less agility, stamina, and intellect. Taking the Steel helm would reduce your overall DPS because your stats would drop so quickly.
The Helm of Iron would be the sensible choice, as it still upgrades your basic stats along with hit.

You should actually try to beef your hit rating up with some enchants or gems, since those don't sacrifice too much stats depending on the other enchants or gems available to you.

Keep my stats balanced, and don't go over the hit cap. Got it...er...what's the number for the hit cap?

It varies, actually. there's a lot of stuff to take into account. What you're using (Spells and physical attacks have different equations for calculating the cap), if it's ranged weapons or melee weapons, talents, gems, enchants, etc.

Don't despair though! I have an easy and simple to use chart that you can look at to get your hit cap in. I'll put it right down here for you!

Wait, Spell hit rating and Physical hit rating? But there's only one Hit rating stat!

Don't worry! Hit rating on gear will affect both physical and spell hit. The stats themselves are the same, but like I said, they're calculated differently, so if you're an elemental shaman, your hit cap will be different from an enhancement shaman.

I don't plan to raid, I heard one of my friends say that I don't need as much hit rating as he does then!

That's true. The Hit rating equations are based off of your enemy's level. As it stands, the most common enemies you'll fight are level 80-82. Raid bosses are level which is considered to be three levels above the player's level (83). The rating needed to hit a level 83 mob is drastically higher than an 82. If you don't plan to raid, you shouldn't worry as much about your hit rating, as you should naturally get it up high enough.

There's percentages on my hit rating too! What's this all mean?

Percentages aren't something to worry much about, but if you'd rather look at that than the number, the amount of hit RATING needed to get 1% of physical hit is 32.79.
the amount of hit RATING needed to get 1% of spell hit is 26.23.

HIT RATING CHARTS

PHYSICAL HIT RATING

Increased Hit Chance	Hit Rating Needed	Needed By
1%	32.79	Draenei (Heroic Presence) Enhancement Shaman dual wielding with 3/3 Dual Wield Specialization
2%	65.58	Any other Enhancement Shaman dual wielding with 3/3 Dual Wield Specialization
3%	98.37	Rogues with 5/5 Precision
4%	131.16
5%	163.95	Death Knights dual-wielding one handed weapons and 3/3 Nerves of Cold Steel Hunters with 3/3 Focused Aim Warriors with 3/3 Precision
6%	196.74
7%	229.53
8%	262.32	All special attacks not affected by talents which modify chance to hit

SPELL HIT RATING

Bonus hit %	Hit Rating needed	Needed by
0%	446	No talent bonuses or buffs
1%	420	Draenei Heroic Presence
2%	394
3%	368	Death Knight class with Virulence Mage class with Precision; arcane mages with Arcane Focus Priest class: Shadow-spec with Shadow Focus Shaman class with Elemental Precision Warlock class with Suppression
4%	342	Druids with Balance of Power Draenei death knight class with Virulence Draenei mage class with Heroic Presence and Precision; arcane-spec with Heroic Presence and Arcane Focus Draenei priest class: shadow-spec with Shadow Focus or Misery, and Heroic Presence Draenei shaman class with Elemental Precision and Heroic Presence Warlock class with Suppression and Heroic Presence
5%	315	Balance druids with Balance of Power and Heroic Presence
6%	289	Priest class: Shadow-spec with Shadow Focus and Misery Mage class: Arcane-spec with Arcane Focus and Precision Warlock class with Suppression and Improved Faerie Fire/Misery
7%	263	Druid class: Balance-spec with Balance of Power and Improved Faerie Fire Draenei mage class: Arcane-spec with Arcane Focus, Heroic Presence and Precision Draenei priest class: Shadow-spec with Shadow Focus, Misery and Heroic Presence Draenei shaman class with Elemental Precision, Improved Faerie Fire/Misery and Heroic Presence Warlock class with Suppression, Improved Faerie Fire/Misery and Heroic Presence
8%	237	Balance druids with Balance of Power, Improved Faerie Fire and Heroic Presence
9%	210	Arcane mage with Arcane Focus, Improved Faerie Fire/Misery and Precision
10%	184	Draenei Arcane mage with Arcane Focus, Heroic Presence, Improved Faerie Fire/Misery and Precision

Wow me and Mack read this and are amazed at the research! A quick question...I see the DK with dual one hander cap what about a DK with 1 2hander?

There are no special talents that modify the hit cap for 2-handed death knights. as such, their hit cap will be the full hit cap. that is to say, 8% hit rating, and a requirement of 263 hit rating.

HOWEVER

If you are a DRAENEI death knight, you already have a built-in 1% hit rating boost from heroic presence. If you are a Draenei death knight using 2-handed weapons, you need 7% hit rating to get to the hit cap, a requirement of 230 hit rating

In case you think this is something you can forget about Tatti's DPS soared when I upped her hit rating. Not to mention Blackie misses cyclone all the time in PVP because of lack of hit rating