Beast Mastery Hunter Guide for WoW Forever: Talents, Rotation and Leveling

Beast Mastery is the best hunter leveling spec. Your pet holds aggro, does a big share of the damage and forgives mistakes. In Forever it inherits 100% of your crit chance and 10% of your attack power, and Summon Hawk adds a second damage source on top. BM is rated A for raids and even S for level-30 dungeons.

Talents and builds

The links open the talent calculator with the finished build, including why the points go where they go.

• Leveling: Beast Mastery leveling (points 31/16/4). Beast Mastery is the best hunter leveling spec: your pet carries much of the damage and holds aggro more easily, which forgives mistakes. The calculator shows the point-by-point order below the tree.
• Raid: Beast Mastery PvE (raid & dungeons) (points 31/20/0). Beast Mastery with a Marksmanship splash: Bestial Wrath and Frenzy for the pet, Improved Arcane Shot and Mortal Shots for your own shots.
• PvP: Beast Mastery PvP (points 31/16/4). Keeps the big damage talents and adds Improved Concussive Shot for the occasional stun and Improved Aspect of the Monkey against melee.

Where it ranks

• PvE DPS (raid): The newest simulation lifts Beast Mastery to A: since 10 November the Hawk deals about 80% more melee damage. Most lists say A; one rates the weaving build only D.
• PvP (battleground/open world): Rises from B to A: five of six lists say A. Intimidation stuns, Bestial Wrath opens a burst window.
• Leveling: All three lists say S: the pet holds the mobs, you fight with almost no downtime and move on to the next pull quickly.

The tiers combine several tier lists and level-60 simulations. Raid logs only exist from 9 December, so treat this as a snapshot. Every spec side by side: rankings.

Single-target rotation

First things first: Auto Shot has a 0.5-second cast again. Stand still when it is due and weave your abilities in between.

1. Hunter's Mark on the target, then send the pet in and let it build threat.
2. Keep Serpent Sting up.
3. Summon Hawk so two hawks are always attacking. A hawk lasts 18 seconds and shares its cooldown with Arcane Shot (since 10 November both cost 11% of your base mana at every rank), which gives you the rhythm: two hawks, then an Arcane Shot, then hawk again. Don't refresh a hawk that still has plenty of time left.
4. Aimed Shot on cooldown. It is a baseline ability from level 20 in Forever, shares its cooldown with Multi-Shot and had its damage roughly doubled on 3 November.
5. Immolation Trap when a mob is in melee with you. All traps share a 30-second cooldown.

On packs: Multi-Shot, Explosive Trap, then Volley.

Cooldowns

Bestial Wrath gives your pet 50% more damage and crowd-control immunity for 18 seconds. On a 2-minute cooldown, press it whenever it is ready. Rapid Fire speeds up your attacks a lot for 15 seconds. Stack it with trinkets, racials and Bestial Wrath. Intimidation stuns the target for 3 seconds, perfect for casters and anything running at your healer.

Stats and mana

Ranged weapon damage first, then hit rating, crit rating, Agility, Intellect and attack power. Crit counts twice: your pet gets your full crit chance, and its crits keep Frenzy going, which is 30% more attack speed for 8 seconds. Intellect beats raw attack power, because 5/5 Careful Aim turns every point of Intellect into a point of attack power. 10 hit rating gives 1%, and 1% crit takes 14. Bestial Discipline keeps 50% of your mana regeneration running while you cast.

What the talents change

The build goes 31 deep to Bestial Wrath, then takes Lethal Attacks, Careful Aim and Trueshot Aura from Marksmanship, which also boost your pet through stat transfer. Focused Fire gives you and the pet 2% more damage, and Unleashed Fury and Ferocity now buff your hawks too. The four points in Improved Tracking only pay off with the right tracking active: they add 5% damage against the tracked creature type.

Common mistakes

• Moving while Auto Shot is due.
• Refreshing hawks too early, or pressing Arcane Shot when a hawk is about to drop.
• Losing track of your pet: wrong target, a second pack pulled, dead pet.
• Standing in the dead zone. Ranged attacks need at least 8 yards and melee only reaches 5.
• Aspect of the Cheetah or the Pack in combat, where one hit dazes you.

Leveling

Fill Beast Mastery top to bottom, then Marksmanship. You tame your first pet at level 10, and Summon Hawk unlocks at 25. Always let the pet hit first and build threat, then Mark, Serpent Sting, hawks, Arcane Shot and Aimed Shot. For damage, a cat or raptor is the pick. Blizzard announced a pet stat increase for 10 November, because pets held up worse as tanks than intended. Feign Death wipes your threat, but not your pet's.

In raids

BM is rated A for raids, and both simulations now agree. Since 10 November the Hawk deals about 80% more melee damage. How much you do depends heavily on the pet, so keep it on the right target and out of AoE. Alongside Trueshot Aura, which now only gives ranged attack power, you get Tranquilizing Shot at level 60 to remove boss frenzy effects.

Further reading

• Hunter class guide: races, new abilities and every build of the class
• The other specs: Marksmanship Hunter, Survival Hunter
• Raid comp planner: put your raid together and see which buffs are still missing
• Hunter talent calculator: plan your own build and share it as a link