You deal 125% weapon damage, refreshing the current Sting on your target and triggering an effect:
Serpent Sting - Instantly deals 40% of the damage done by your Serpent Sting.
You deal 125% weapon damage, refreshing the current Sting on your target and triggering an effect:
Serpent Sting - Instantly deals 40% of the damage done by your Serpent Sting.
"And now, to add that special finishing touch..." —Levander of the Sanguine Shot[1]
Chimera Shot is an instant shot available to Marksmanshiphunters that deals 125% of ranged weapon damage, refreshes the current sting on the target and triggers an additional effect based on the sting. There is no limit to the number of times that you can refresh a sting, meaning that you can keep Serpent Sting up indefinitely by using Chimera Shot. When used with Serpent Sting, Chimera Shot is a Marksmanship hunter's highest damage ability on a single target.
Lethal Shots increases the critical strike chance by 5%. Master Marksman increases the chance by another 5%.
Mortal Shots increases the critical strike damage bonus by 30%. Marked for Death increases the critical strike damage bonus by a further 10%. Piercing Shots causes the target to bleed for 30% of the critical strike damage.
Improved Stings increases the triggered damage with Serpent Sting by 30%.
Use: Increases the duration of your Serpent Sting by 6 sec.
Sell Price: 37 50
Glyph of Serpent Sting adds two ticks to Serpent Sting without reducing the damage done per tick, thus increasing the total damage done by the sting. Since Chimera Shot's triggered effect is based on the damage done by your Serpent Sting, this will increase the damage done by the triggered effect by 40%.
The Serpent Sting triggered effect is based on the total damage your Serpent Sting would have done over its full duration, had you not refreshed it. It will do the same damage regardless of whether you use Chimera Shot right after applying Serpent Sting or at the end of the sting's duration. Anything that increases Serpent Sting's total damage done will also increase the damage of the triggered effect. The effect shows up in combat logs as a separate attack called "Chimera Shot - Serpent" and can critically strike, using the hunter's critical strike chance. It will not trigger if the initial hit from Chimera Shot kills the target.
The Scorpid Sting triggered effect from Chimera Shot does not disarm ranged weapons, unlike Dismantle, Disarm and Fiery Payback.
Chimera Shot's damage is based on your ranged weapon damage. As a result, slow ranged weapons will do slightly more damage due to their higher damage per shot.
Chimera Shot can be used to effectively double the length of Viper Sting. Use Chimera Shot as Viper Sting wears out to reapply the effect, causing it to drain mana longer before its cooldown refreshes.
With Chimera Shot, a Marksmanship hunter has four high-damage instant cast shots on different cooldowns (Aimed Shot, Arcane Shot, Chimera Shot and Silencing Shot), and five if you include Kill Shot, which only works when the enemy is below 20% health. With all these instant shots, a hunter can deal a decent amount of burst damage without ever standing still. This gives Marksman hunters an edge in PvP where they generally do not have the opportunity to stand still for long periods of time.
Edit
2020
Patch 3.0.8 (2009-01-20): The secondary effects of this shot will now still be triggered even when the target dies from the ability's damage. 
