So today its time to talk a bit about Hunter leveling glyphs… I’d personally be using this with a Beastmaster build for the volley grinding at level 40, but you could just as easily start in MM and swap to BM, or just stick with MM and take advantage of the barrage talent.

Also, on pet selection, get yourself a good tank like a monkey or turtle at level 40. Until then, use a dps pet like a cat.

Hunter Major Leveling Glyphs

1. Glyph of Hunter’s Mark
2. Glyph of Aimed Shot
3. Glyph of Volley (can be hard to get so keep an eye out for it every time you hit the AH)
4. Glyph of Mending

Hunter Minor Leveling Glyphs

1. Glyph of Mend Pet
2. Glyph of Feign Death
3. Glyph of Scare Beast

You get your major glyphs at level 15, 30, and 80.

You get your minor glyphs at level 15, 50, and 70.

The first major glyph I recommend taking is Glyph of Hunter’s Mark. It gives 20% extra attack power from your Hunter’s Mark, and will serve you well until 40 when you think about grabbing a tanking pet and using volley.

Your first minor glyph should definitely be Mend Pet. It helps keep your pet happy, and hence keeps his damage output at 125%

Second up, when you ding 30, I’d grab glyph of Aimed Shot. This reduces your 10 second cooldown to 8, and while that doesn’t sound like a lot, the leveling game is one by 20% speed ups and efficiency bonuses like this.

Don’t think short term, think long term.

Thirdly, once you hit 40 its time to go to Ungoro Crater and tame one of those chimps.

Monkey’s are great tanking pets, and once you get one, you can easily round up 3 or 4 mobs (or more when you get good at it), and then unleash with volley.

Hence my recommendation for the 3rd glyph you get…

Swap out Hunters Mark with Glyph of Volley (saves 20% mana). Team this up with Glyph of feign death (you’ll want to dump threat regularly using volley), and you can pummel mobs from afar very efficiently.

Another glyph you might consider swapping Aimed Shot for is glyph of Mending. You may need to heal up your pet while they’re getting beaten on, and this glyph gives you a pretty massive extra 40% healing.

Just remember, that extra healing comes with extra threat…

Glyph of scare beast was the only other minor glyph I could even consider writing about in relation to leveling. Its crumby, but it might save you once in a blue moon in a tight spot & save you a corpse run… I know… I probably just wasted 10 seconds of my life writing that!

So to recap:

Level 15: Glyph of Hunters Mark (major), Glyph of Mend Pet (minor)

Level 30: Glyph of Aimed Shot (major)

Level 40: You get the volley ability…

• Swap out Hunter’s Mark (major) for Volley (major).
• Get a monkey/tank pet in Ungoro Crater.
• Swap out Glyph of Mend Pet (minor) for Feign Death (minor).
• Also consider swapping out Aimed shot (major) for Glyph of Mending (major).

Level 50: Glyph of Mend Pet back in (minor)

Level 70: Glyph of  Scare Beast (minor)

Level 80: Find a different set of Glyphs. Until the next expansion arrives…!

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Despite such misguided remarks the Beast Master is often slightly misunderstood when it comes to casting rotations or shot rotations because  a lot of the powerful shots available to Mark hunters are not available to BMs.

So how do you max your DPS and lay down an efficient hail of fire as a Beast Master hunter? What rotation should you use?

As a mid level character (see the title — we’re not dealing with level 80 Hunters) your rotation looks like this:

Scorpid Sting – Multi Shot – Arcane Shot – Steady Shot – Steady Shot – Steady Shot / refresh Scorpid Sting at any point in the repeat of this rotation

Important Points:

1. Scorpid Sting

On raid targets and elites make sure you keep scorpid sting constantly active. Its you most efficient mana to damage spell available.

2. Multi shot

Can be mana intensive but good DPS/mana especially when compared to other casting classes

3. Arcane shot

A good staple ability – just use it as often as you can. I like the glyph that gives you a 20% mana refund on AS, too – especially if you’re leveling.

4. Steady Shot

Steady shot is an important one. The most questions I see about steady shot are, “shouldn’t I be using it with concussive shot?”

For leveling, raiding, dungeons, normal situations – “NO”.

Why? Because concussive shot doesn’t do any damage, and the extra damage you get for firing on dazed targets just isn’t worth it for the time you lose using concussive shot.

If you’re in PvP? Go for it! There’s nothing like slowing down an enemy like a warrior or rogue intent on getting into hand  to hand with you.

5. Pets

Just put all abilities on auto, and let them do their magic. There’s no need to micro their abilities if you simply want them operating at max dps.

That’s basically it for a good solid rotation.

In essence, you’re ensuring you keep scorpid sting, multi shot, and arcane shot firing as much as possible while using steady shot.

I personally priotize arcane over multi for the efficiency in leveling.

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Class Guide: Hunter Leveling Guide

High Level Hunter

How to Level Your Hunter Faster With The Right Talent Tree

How many times have you heard people say that the Hunter is the best class for leveling with?

And how many times have you heard that they’re the best solo class in the game?

I’d guess you’ve heard it a lot, and maybe you’re wondering how you can make your Hunter the fastest leveler you can.

Or perhaps you’ve been having trouble with really slow leveling times, and you’re wondering what you’re doing wrong?

Either way – whether you’re level 50 or level 10, noob or pro, my Hunter level guide will help you out.

The Hunter Leveling Build:

With all things in World of Warcraft related to leveling, its important you first check your talent selection for problems.

Have you spent every point you have to ensure you’re the most efficient killer you possibly can be? I’m not just talking generalities here, efficiency is the name of the game when you put together a good leveling build.

This is because while you’re leveling, one of the first things that will slow you down is lack of mana, and lack of (of course) health. Your pet’s focus as a Hunter is also a key contributor to fast leveling. Let your pets focus stay low, and you’re going to have a hard time leveling fast.

In order to respec your character, find your nearest Hunter trainer and pay them to reset your talents – I know this will cost you some hard earned gold, but you’ll find it worth it when you’re saving so much of your valuable time.

What Hunter build is the fastest leveler?

While any Hunter will level super fast regardless of the talent spec you give them, my personal findings (and the experience of many of my peers) shows that Beast Mastery will give you the edge in sustained leveling times.

Beast Mastery is also an excellent spec for occassional pick up games of PvP, and performs exceptionally in dungeons and raids. If you’re more than an occasional PvP player, you might find the Marksmanship Hunter build has similar leveling ability, but better burst DPS that PvP players love.

Key Early Game Leveling Talents:

Early Level Hunter Talents

• Improved Aspect of the Hawk
• Pathfinding
• Aspect Mastery, and
• Unleashed Fury

I start by maxing out the first line – Imp Aspect of the Hawk is an awesome talent and gets maxed, and while Endurance Training isn’t essential we need it for now to open up row 3′s awesome early game abilities.

So leave out row 2′s talents (we’re not interested in any for leveling speed), and then max out row three which contains rest of the key early game talents – Pathfinding, Aspect Mastery and Unleashed Fury.

Pathfinding is awesome because 1 to 60 leveling in the “old world” means lots and lots of running around. Speed up your running time and you’ll shave off many hours from your travel times over the levels.

Once you hit 20 or can afford a mount, consider dropping pathfinding, but you are still getting a buff to mounted travel with this active…

Aspect Mastery has a range of solid damage boosting effects, best of which helps out Aspect of the Hawk for another 30% bonus to ranged attack power.

Unleashed Fury is also essential to get your pet causing lots of damage, so don’t be shy and max it out.

That brings us up to level 27, and gives you a solid staple of high damage causing abilities and faster traveling. To keep yourself ticking along efficiently, I highly recommend using Aspect of the Viper whenever mana starts dropping.

You might kill slower, but as I said earlier, efficiency is the name of the game when leveling!

Key Mid Game Leveling Talents:

Mid Level Hunter Talents

• Bestial Discipline
• Spirit Bond
• Serpent’s Swiftness

In the mid game your leveling with Beast Mastery gets a big efficiency lift.

Both Bestial Discipline and Spirit bond are essential choices for levelers, as they provide long term sustained bonuses that keep you ticking along in your killing speed.

Bestial Discipline is great for your pet’s sustained DPS, increasing focus regeneration by 100%.

Spirit Bond is great for keeping down time to a minimum by healing you 2% of total every 10 seconds, and increasing your mend pet healing by 10%. Not mind blowing – but long term you’ll save big.

Serpent’s Swiftness, amongst the other talents I’ve chosen for the mid game is a great efficiency and damage booster which gives you and your pet a 20% increased attack speed for no mana cost.

We’re now getting efficient in our killing after following the tree to the right, and while you’ll obviously still have down time, it should be significantly reduced if you employ Aspect of the Viper occassionally.

Late Game Leveling Talents:

Late Game Hunter Talents

• Beast Within
• Kindred Spirits
• Beast Mastery

More leveling love is found at the end of the BM talent tree – Beast Within is awesome for conserving mana, reducing your mana usage by 20% whenever Bestial Wrath is cast for 15 seconds.

Given BW costs 10% of base mana in the first place, the 20% conservation pretty much “pays for” the extra damage your pet does while BM is active. Cast, cast, cast away!

Kindred Spirits is another good efficient damage dealer, for no extra mana your pet gets another 20% increase to damage – a good way to keep your sustained DPS going at all times.

Beast Mastery is the last key talent in the BeastMaster leveling spec, and gives your pet 4 free talent points.

Given you usually only get one every 4 levels this skill is gold for upping your pets DPS and abilities even further.

Follow this leveling spec and you’ll find that even if you weren’t interested in a Beast Master build to begin with, it really is the fastest way to get to 60 and beyond – and by that stage you’ll start raiding, and you’ll find a “place” for yourself in the game that may just require a new build.

But until that time… you need to level, fast!

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5/11/55 Survival Build

Survival is one of those Hunter builds that seems to have become labelled over time as that build that is just there to help other builds out.

At least, that’s what the label has been, and labels tend to lag even though there have been changes to make the build much better.

Survival Hunters get some really unique and cool abilities, and a lot of players find the build highly entertaining… not to mention effective.

So if you’re into raiding, PvP, or just leveling, you’ll find this a very flexible build, but one that can be tailored by you should you need to.

Read on and find my detailed explanation and comments on this build — and you can find the talent sheet already done for you if you like it by clicking the image to the right.

The Survival Hunter Build:

Row 1 (Improved Tracking, Hawk Eye, Savage Strikes)

We start off with Improved tracking, not a fancy skill but good for general leveling with a 5% damage bonus to the tracked creature. 5 points out of 5 here.

Hawk Eye is also another taker, 3/3 for 6 yards extra shooting range – the further your opponent has to run towards you, the more damage you can deal – simple. Also good for PvP when you want to slightly out range a caster or another hunter.

Savage Strikes makes your hand to hand worthwhile and actually surprising to your opponent in PvP. At 20% crit chance, and using a big slow 2H weapon you’ll find you get off a lot of big hits. While you’re not exactly aiming to be in hand to hand with your Hunter, it’ll happen plenty (again especially in PvP), and SS is great for a big finishing strike.

Row 2 (Surefooted, Entrapment, Trap Mastery, Survival Instincts)

Surefooted, giving off a 30% reduction in movement impairing effects is a nice skill, but I’m on the fence if you never PvP. Take it or leave it, but I wanted this build to cater to a wide audience, so I’ve got 3/3 points in it – feel free to drop this one!

Entrapment is a bread and butter Survival build talent – snare your opponent whenever they run into a trap for 4 seconds. 3/3 points here.

Another sure thing for this build, and on the same line as Entrapment, is Trap Mastery. Increase the effect of your Frost, Freezing, Immo, Explosive, Black Arrow by 30%, or your snake trap by 9 snakes.

Survival instincts is nice too – while not huge, a 4% reduction in damage is useful, and you increase crit strike chance of your Arcane, Steady and Explosive shots by 4%… which is handy no matter where you play this build.

Row 3 (Survivalist, Scatter Shot, Deflection, Survival Tactics)

Survalist – 5/5 here is an easy choice to get a 10% stamina boost.

Scatter Shot is a staple stun shot and is also and easy choice – 1/1 here.

Deflection is another of those “melee maybe’s” a lot of Hunters wonder about. Again, while you don’t generally intend to be in hand to hand, talents like deflection are great as back up especially in PvP. Combine it with row 5′s Counter attack and you’ve got an awesome escape and shoot opportunity.

Leave out Survival tactics — reducing the Disengage cooldown is nice, and maybe a choice to take for PvP, but outside of PvP the normal cooldown should serve you well. The Trap resistance lowering is also “ok”, but not ok enough. Pass here.

Row 4 (T.N.T., Lock and Load)

Pass on this whole row… PvE levelers using this build might consider swapping out a few melee choices though and replacing it with this for the extra trap damage.

Lock and Load also doesn’t pass water with me on this build. Unless you find yourself constantly low on mana for some reason, I’d pass and invest more wisely elsewhere.

Row 5 (Hunter vs. Wild, Killer Instinct, Counter attack)

One of my favorite lines, row 5 has the awesome counter attack immobilize for you PvP nuts out there, as well as Killer Instint which adds 3% crit chance with all attacks. Hunter vs. Wild is also great when its combined with Improved Hunter’s Mark and you’ll get a decent increase in attack power here which will translate well into DPS.

Row 6 (Lightning Reflexes, Resourcefulness)

For Hunters, agility is very important as it increases ranged attack power, increases armor, increases critical chance, and increases chance to dodge attacks. So with that known, an extra (HUGE) bonus of 15% agility is something you can’t miss, 5 points here.

Resourcefulness is quite a good mana conserver for the heavy trap using Hunter, but I just couldn’t find points for it here. If you’re leveling, again you might try and find points for it by dropping hand to hand talents. For this build, 0/3.

Row 7 (Expose Weakness, Wyvern Sting, Thrill of the Hunt)

A sparse row, the only talent we’re taking here is Wyvern Sting. Wyvern Sting is a difficult topic for Hunters – a lot people seem to (rightly so) suggest Scatter shot is all you need, however Wyvern Sting can be really handy in PvP as an annoyance attack on a lone target, or as an escape button in PvP or anywhere else for that matter.

Thrill of the Hunt with its mana savings is a so-so talent, I don’t recommend it unless all you’re doing is leveling fast… and if you are, you should probably be using my Beast Mastery build anyway. But hey, personal prefernce and enjoyment is important – so fill up Thrill if you’re a leveling Survivalist.

Expose weakness is also ok, but again I just couldn’t find the points for it in this build for the pay off it gives (ranged crits have 100% chance when the talent is full to increase attack power by 25% for 7 sec).

Row 8 (Master Tactician, Noxious Stings)

Master Tactician is an easy one – 10% chance to increase your crit chance 10% after successful ranged attacks will come off regularly for you with the volume of fire Hunters put out. 5/5 here.

Noxious Stings is a PvP only talent for me – leave it unless that’s pretty much all you’re doing. 0/3 points here, or 3/3 for PvP.

Row 9 (Point of No Escape, Black Arrow, Sniper Training)

This is a cool row with some unique effects. My fave is Sniper training, and besides having an interesting mechanic of activating after 6 seconds of remaining still, as soon as you do stay still that long, you’ll increase the damage of your Steady, Aimed, black and Explosive shots by 6% for 15 secs. You also get a very hand +15% crit chance on your Kill Shot ability. Nice… 3/3 here.

Black arrow is a great instant cast spell which hammers your target with huge shadow damage over 15 seconds, and increases all damage you do to the target by 6%, 1/1 here.

Since we’re big trap users in the Survival tree, we’ll also be placing 2 points of 2 into Point of No Escape to gain an increased crit strike of 6% after your opponent runs through your traps.

Row 10 (Hunting Party)

Nothing to see here, move along! Seriously, while the skill would be almost ok for the 3% extra agility, unfortunately you’d still have to spend another 3 points on Thrill of the Hunt to get it, and its just not worth it for the other party based effects.

Row 11 (Explosive Shot)

Another great end move for the Hunter is Explosive Shot, an instant cast ranged spell which blasts your opponent, then again twice more for its 2 second duration. Exp shot also benefits from a variety of talents on this tree so you’ll end up doing lots of DPS and crits with this one.

Rounding off the Survival Tree:

Now that we’ve finished up the Survival tree, we’ve got 16 points left to get what I call helper talents from the other trees which back our Survival talents.

While these are presented after the Survival tree, I’d look at getting Improved Aspect of the Hawk early, around level 20 or earlier, and get 5 points.

Lethal shots is another good talent but can wait until the survival tree is maxed – 5/5 here to get 5% extra critical strike chance.

Finish up by ramping your attack power even higher by getting Careful aim and Improved Hunter’s Mark.

Remember, this build is a flexible one for players who enjoy playing the Survival tree. If you’re leveling, raiding or PvP inclined, this build will work great for you if you want to do all three, and can withstand a few minor modifications if you don’t want to raid, or don’t want to do any PvP, etc.

Have fun and let us know how you go!

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The Marksmanship Hunter build, or “MM build” is one of the most popular, and hated, builds around.

11/53/7 Marksmanship Build

As you might have guessed, its loved by hunters for its huge burst damage and overall high DPS, and loathed by its enemies in PvP.

The first time I got my aimed shot out and was causing big chunks of burst damage in PvP, I was sold.

But PvP isn’t the only arena MM Hunters shine, they’re also great in raids with high DPS, high survivability, and a range of helpful talents like Improved Hunter’s Mark.

Today I’d like to show you a 3.1 ready Marksmanship build that will allow you a lot of flexibility, and lets you easily tailor it to your needs.

The Marksmanship Build Explained:

Row 1 (Improved Concussive Shot, Focused Aim, Lethal shots)

ICS is a good starter talent, an extra 2 seconds of daze is always handy and stays useful – 2/2 here.

Focused Aim is one I just don’t use, you might consider 1 point here, but if you’re managing your hunter well you shouldn’t need this talent often enough for it to matter.

Lethal Shots is an obvious take, 5/5 points here for 5% extra crit chance from ranged weapons — this is great for all uses but especially in PvP when you want to max out your chance to crit for huge burst damage.

Row 2 (Careful Aim, Improved Hunter’s Mark, Mortal Shots)

Is Careful Aim worth it? That’s a question I asked a lot when I began my hunter, and boy did I change my mind as I leveled. Once you hit 60 and upwards, a lot of good hunter gear you find will have +int stats, and even without a great gear load out, the increase in attack power will be hugely noticeable for you. All 3 points here, sooner or later.

Improved Hunter’s Mark is a great skill merely for the mana reduction by 100%, and the extra attack power stacked with the above mentioned Careful Aim is pure gold. 3/3 here too.

Mortal Strike is an easy one, an extra 30% damage from crits and the unlock of Aimed shot for the next row is a no brainer – 5 points.

Row 3 (Go for the Throat, Improved Arcane Shot, Aimed Shot, Rapid Killing)

You could almost max out this entire row, all the abilities here are decent – especially Improved Arcane shot which gives a solid +15% damage from Arcane Shot.

Aimed Shot is the highlight though — burst damage of 408 and reducing healing on that target for 10 seconds is awesome for any situation, but especially PvP!

Row 4 (Improved Stings, Efficiency)

An awesome mana boosting line, Improved Stings also adds a solid 30% extra damage to Serpent and Wyvern Sting. Max out this line.

Row 5 (Concussive Barrage, Readiness, Barrage)

Welcome to the multishot line, I max this one as well to gain a powerful 4 second daze ability from Concussive Barrage, a cooldown timer reset from Readiness, and more solid damage increases for Multishot, Aimed shot and Volley spells.

Row 6 (Combat Experience, Ranged Weapon Specialization)

Just when you thought I was going to have you max out every line in the tree, we only plant two points in this row. Combat experience is another “should I bother?” skill that is deceptively powerful. 4 extra intellect, stacking with gear, and our already high increases in attack power make this a must. Pass on Ranged Weapon Spec, 3% extra damage is ok, but better spent elsewhere. Feel free to argue with me!

Row 7 (Piercing Shots, Trueshot Aura, Improved Barrage)

3/3 for Piercing shots to get 30% bleed damage when you crit for 8 seconds is an easy choice, but even easier is Trueshot Aura, especially for anyone who does any kind of grouping, whether it be level 80 raiding or level 19 PvPing (is there any other level? ). Put 1/1 point here for a party wide attack power buff of 10% that lasts until cancelled!

Improved Barrage is a nice crit buff for your Multi and Aimed shot abilities and 3 points go here for everyone.

Row 8 (Master Marksman, Rapid Recuperation)

Another big crit buff follows on from our last choice with Master Marksman offering another handy 5% buff, plus a reduction in mana cost for steady shot which can come in handy. 5/5 here.

Rapid Recuperation is great for mana intensive fights and is another max out with 2/2 points being placed here.

Row 9 (Wild Quiver, Silencing Shot, Improved Steady Shot)

1 point only for Wild Quiver – while I’d like more here I need it elsewhere and can’t really find something I personally want to sacrifice for this flexi-build… if you like the chance to shoot another shot with Auto shot then feel free to get creative.

Silencing Shot on the other hand is an easy choice – 1 point here to get an anti-caster ability great for all kinds of situations.

Leave out Improved Steady shot, I just don’t see the benefit per talent point here.

Row 10 (Marked for Death)

Marked for Death, like ISS above just doesn’t add up as a worthwhile pick for me. I leave it completely for this build.

Row 11 (Chimera Shot)

Chimera Shot like most end tree skills is an easy choice. An instant cast, 16% base mana cost spell, CS deals 125% ranged weapon damage while refreshing the current Sting on the target with varying effects also applies based on the kind of sting present.

My favorite is Scorpid which attempts a disarm, but unfortunately this can’t occur more than once per minute.

Rounding off your MM Build:

This build will do you well for general leveling all the way up to 80, though I (and most of the people I speak with) will prefer a Beast Master build for leveling. Once you hit 70 or 80 you’ll likely want to to specialize a bit further depending on what you find yourself doing, but until that time, use this build as a baseline and you’ll do fine!

You’ll notice if you click through to WoW armory on the pic at the top that I’ve also got 5 points in BM for Improved Aspect of the Hawk. This is a great talent for MM Hunters, and can actually probably be taken very early, ala level 20 onwards.

I’ve also put 7 points in survival — 2 in Improved tracking (just to open up row 2), 3 points in Hawk Eye for a handy 6 yards extra range, and 2 points in row 2′s Survival Instincts for even more critical chance on Arcane, Steady and Explosive shot.

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How to Use The Beast Mastery Build to its Best – A Hunter’s Guide

Hunter Beast Mastery Build

The Hunter is one of the most popular classes in WoW, and not just because they’re easy to solo and level fast, but because of the huge array of pets that come with them.

My other half plays a Hunter, and she loves all the different options she has as she levels up, from cats and wolves to raptors and owls.

So what are the advantages to having a strong pet build?

To me, higher survivability and less deaths are big points, and rank up there if you’re trying to level quickly.

Great flexibility in pets is another big plus, and with the correct selection of pets (cats are great), a very high DPS.

Combine high DPS and excellent survivability and you have an awesome class.

And so with all this talk of cool pets, here’s a quick run down on how to maximize your Hunter’s killing power through making the most of their pets.

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Beast Mastery Hunter Build:

Row 1: (Improved Aspect of the Hawk, Endurance Training)

IAotH is passed over, but consider putting a few points in it AFTER you’ve maxed this tree out. I put 1 point here after I max the line.

Endurance training gets 5/5 points – this is important to take especially if you’re after a DPS pet (which I feel is a must if you go beast mastery), because DPS pets are pretty flimsy and easily killed if you’re not careful.

Row 2: (Focused Fire, Improved Aspect of the Monkey, Thick Hide, Improved Revive Pet)

2/2 if Focused fire for an extra 2% damage for you, and more importantly, your pet gets an extra TWENTY percent chance to score crits while Kill command is active.

Imp Aspect of the Monkey and Improved Revive Pet are passed over, too many points needed here for too little DPS. When choosing build, choose a theme, and ensure all your points overlap, leverage and back each other up until you have a big stack of bonuses all working together.

Take 3/3 Thick Hide, again giving your DPS pet more armor is pretty much mandatory to keep them in one piece in hairy situations, and if your pet dies, your pet heavy build is useless.

Row 3: (Pathfinding, Aspect Mastery, Unleashed Fury)

Max out every skill on this line, Pathfinding is “only” a utility skill, but given the beast mastery spec is a good choice for leveling, running speed is prioritized in this build. Aspect Mastery for only 1 point gives a raft of handy bonuses, so take that, and Unleashed Fury is a no brainer with 5/5 points giving your pet a monster 15% damage bonus.

Row 4: (Improved Mend Pet, Ferocity)

Leave Improved Mend Pet, with the DPS you’re doing and armor built in you should just be focusing on causing damage, and basic mend pet will serve you just fine. On the other hand, if you’re doing a lot of raiding mend pet CAN come in extremely useful for ridding your pet of some nasty debuffs which sharply decrease your dps… so keep this one in mind for later if you’re not already raiding.

Ferocity on the other hand is another core choice in this build, an amazing 10% improved critical strike chance for your pet equals win! Take this with cobra reflexes for another 30% increase to attack speed, and all those extra (but slightly lower damage hits) will mean a LOT more crits.

Row 5: (Spirit Bond, Intimidation, Bestial Discipline)

Another skill that helps the pair of you stay alive longer is Spirit Bond – for only 2 points you regenerate 2% of total health every 10 seconds and gives you a small bonus when someone else heals you.

Intimidation for 1 point gives your pet the ability to taunt your enemy and stun it for a lengthy 3 seconds, which is great to use as a panic button, or just as an every other fight bonus.

Bestial Discipline also gets 2/2 points to give your pet 100% faster focus regeneration to ensure you keep ticking along quickly with your mob killing. If you’ve ever sat around waiting for your pet’s focus bar to rise you’re wasting precious leveling time.

Row 6: (Animal Handler, Frenzy)

Animal Handler is a take it or leave it skill for me, put 2 points into it if you like, but it just doesn’t have enough benefit there for me. PvP’ers might find the ability to get out of snares handy though so if you’re in battlegrounds a lot, go for it.

Frenzy – dump 5 points into this, no question – who wouldn’t want a 100% chance to gain 30% attack speed increase for 8 seconds after dealing a critical strike? Combine this with the aforementioned cobra reflexes and you’ve got a mighty fast attacking DPS pet.

Row 7: (Ferocious Inspiration, Bestial Wrath, Catlike Reflexes)

This is a great row, max out all skills in it — Ferocious Inspiration is great for players in groups, or if not, the 9% Arcane shot bonus aint bad, Bestial Wrath is awesome for tough mobs giving a 50% additional damage bonus for 18 seconds, and only has a 2 minute cooldown. Catlike reflexes is another goody for keeping kitty alive with an extra pet dodge bonus of 9%.

Row 8: (Invigoration, Serpent’s Swiftness)

Give Invigoration a miss – 2% mana per crit doesn’t get me excited, as it just doesn’t regenerate our mana fast enough.

Serpent’s Swiftness however is another solid gold must have – 5 points here to get 20% increase in ranged attack speed for you, and 20% for melee on your pet.

Row 9: (Longevity, The Beast Within, Cobra Strikes)

Another maxed out line in row 9 – some great cooldown reductions here, mana saving when your pet is under the effects of Bestial Wrath, and a kick ass bonus of 2 critical strikes for your pet when you crit using Arcane shot, Steady shot, or Kill shot.

Row 10: (Kindred Spirits)

More DPS magic in row 10 comes from Kindred Spirits, put all 5 points here for 20% extra damage from your pet and 10% faster movement for you.

Row 11: (Beast Mastery)

Given Beast Skill points only come around every 4 levels, this is one talent every Beast Master specced Hunter looks forward to — gain 4 pet talent skill points immediately.

So what is this BM Hunter build best at?

While it will serve you well where ever you are, definitely solo leveling — your pet is in the line of fire most of the time (use that to your advantage and die less often), and your stock ranged fire and spells are awesome.

After making this build up to Row 11, I drop 5 points into the Marksmanship tree to get 5% bonus to critical strikes with ranged fire, and then another 7 points into Survival to get Hawk Eye (6 yards extra shooting range), Savage Strikes (massive crit chance in hand to hand), and Survival instincts to increase crit chance even further with ranged fire, and reduce all damage taken by 4%.

This build will also serve you well in pick up games for PvP, but if PvP is where you live, then you can definitely tweak this build to make your killing more efficient.

Beast Mastery is also a good raid spec – you put out a good consistent level of damage with average criticals that rival every class in the game.

So to sum up, if you’re an up and coming Beast Master, this spec will do well for you in any area of the game. If you ever decide to specialize your talent build in raiding, PvP or leveling, some minor tweaks of this build is all you’ll need! Good luck!

Look out for my accompanying cat talent build for an accompanying high DPS pet, any day now.

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