Hit Hit refers to physical damage that occurs as a result of an attack made with melee or ranged weapons . Rating . Hit rating is a value that represents the increased reduction of the chance to miss with your attack ( see below ) . Patch 4 . 0 . 1 decreased the required rating per 1 % slightly . The chance to hit now increases by 1 % per 30 . 7548 hit rating points at level 80 , 14 . 7905 hit rating points at level 70 , and 9 . 3793 hit rating points at level 60 . The base chance to miss against an opponent of equal level is 5 % for single wield and 24 % for dual wield . With Patch 3 . 0 , both hit and spell hit use the same basic hit rating attribute within the combat rating system , although the similarity largely ends there — they are effectively distinct attributes derived from the same rating . Removal with Warlords of Draenor . Hit remains as a game mechanic for hit mitigation , but was removed as a stat bonus for items with the Warlords of Draenor expansion . Calculating miss rate . If the difference between the mob ' s level and your level is less than or equal to 2 , then the formula for calculating your base miss rate against that mob is : If the difference between the mob ' s level and your level is greater than 2 , then the formula for calculating your base miss rate against that mob is : Applying these formulas gives the following base miss rate for a Level 80 character : Thus , if you are a Level 80 character with no talents increasing your chance to hit , you need a Hit Rating of 247 ( 8 . 03 % ) to never miss a shot against a Level 83 boss ( or skull mob ) with a special attack or single - wield auto - attack ( see hit rating cap below ) . Melee attacks divide into two categories : auto - attacks ( white attack / damage ) and special attacks ( yellow attack / damage ) . Attacking a mob from behind removes parry and block from both tables , provided the attack is more than 0 . 5 yards away . Hit rating cap . In the context of stats , the term " cap " refers to the point at which equipping more of a particular stat will have no additional value . For hit rating the cap usually discussed is in regards to raid bosses . For example , once you reach or surpass the hit cap , you will " never miss an attack " against a raid boss unless you are under the effect of some debuff that reduces your hit chance ( for example , Archavon the Stone Watcher ' s gas cloud ) . As shown above , your base chance to miss a raid boss while dual wielding is 27 % with auto - attack on both hands . Your base chance to miss a special attack is 8 % . For each 14 . 79 hit rating at level 70 or 32 . 78 hit rating at level 80 , you reduce your chance to miss by 1 % . Thus we can calculate hit caps for auto - attack and special attacks : A " soft " cap is the point at which your yellow attacks will always hit and more hit rating has no effect on them . A " hard " cap is the point at which your autoattacks will always hit and more hit rating does absolutely nothing for you . Hit rating chart . Note : for practical purpose , since hit rating is always integer , you need to round up the above numbers to ensure true hit - cap . 960 = 7 . 999 % 961 = 8 . 00 % . Heroic Presence . is a draenei passive ability that give draenei a 1 % reduction in hit rating requirement . When raiding , remember to take it into account : Hit results . Auto attacks . Each melee auto attack made by characters against mobs will result in one of the following ( in order of precedence ) : Hit chance doesn ' t work by increasing the amount of " Hit " on these tables . Instead , it works by decreasing the amount of miss . Critical strike chance " fills in " the hit chance portion of this table . Crit is " capped " when the crit chance exceeds the amount of hit chance on the table . Until we reach that cap , hit chance has NO effect on crit chance . For example : maximum dual wielding weapon skill , chance to hit 0 % and chance to critical strike 50 % . Dual wield auto - attacking a raid boss from behind results in a loss of 8 . 6 % critical strike : Increase chance to hit to 10 % and decrease chance to critical strike to 45 % results in no loss of critical strike : It is actually quite difficult to be crit capped without trying . This is one reason why it ' s important to maintain a balance of stats , and not to " stack " any one stat indiscriminately . Special attacks . Each melee special attack made by characters against mobs will result in one of the following in order of precedence : The system is exactly the same as normal attacks , except the miss chance is reduced to 8 % , whether dual - wielding or not . Enhancers . Cooking . adds 20 Hit for 30 minutes . Common misunderstandings . Some players ignore hit , when hit rating is the most valuable stat for most DPS classes . This is because for the same amount of item points , hit rating usually gives a higher increase in overall damage output than other stats . Therefore , it is advisable for most DPS to stack hit rating until hit - capped . It is also common to see people over - value the benefit of hit rating . Some players stack hit rating indiscriminately without realizing that their hit is over - capped by a large amount . Any hit rating above the hit cap is useless . One should adjust the hit rating so that they are not over the cap by too much . Another common misconception is that some people over value hit rating , to such an extent that they choose gear of a lower quality with hit rating over other gear that has a higher quality but no hit rating . They forget why one wants hit rating : to maximize the damage output . For example , imagine there are two helms with similar stats except that one has 20 more hit rating , while the other has 40 more critical strike rating ( or other stats for classes that value crit less ) . Although 1 hit rating is better than 1 critical strike rating usually , 40 critical strike rating can be better than 20 hit rating . Therefore , one should still choose the second helm even this means he / she will be further away from being hit - capped . In general , we should choose the piece of gear that provides higher improvement in damage output , regardless of whether it has hit rating or not . Another point some raiders do not consider is that many fights in ICC are ' adds ' fights . The spell hit rating requirement for a level 83 raid boss is 17 % . For a level 82 add , it is 6 % . Assuming the Gunship adds , Saurfang blood beasts , and Dreamwalker adds are level 82s , it can be said that many casters are over hit for those fights . Each raider should decide if killing the adds is more important than dpsing a raid boss , and what amount of hit rating gives the raid the most benefit . Gear can be swapped on a boss by boss basis . One set can have 17 % hit , and the other set can drop hit for something contributing to higher dps . Maghia ' s Misguided Quill can be used for bosses but swapped out for ' adds ' fights .