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!

Is Leveling Taking Forever and Your Toon is Poor?

If so, give the ever popular Zygor Guides a try. Zygor's 1-80 leveling & events guides are the most established and professional on the market, and comply with Blizzard's new addon policy.

Click here to check it out now.

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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.

Is Leveling Taking Forever and Your Toon is Poor?

If so, give the ever popular Zygor Guides a try. Zygor's 1-80 leveling & events guides are the most established and professional on the market, and comply with Blizzard's new addon policy.

Click here to check it out now.

Related posts:

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2. Hunter Talent Builds: The Beast Master Spec How should you construct your Beast Master build? Find my...
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