1.0 - The Marksman Hunter
Marksmanship was once king of hunter DPS, that era is no longer with us however as Beast Mastery has surpassed Marksmanship by leaps and bounds what with the addition of 20% haste talents and a variety of other buffs.
Instead Marksman now takes priority as the premier PvP spec for any battleground or arena hopeful hunters, leading with CC and burst damage in arena combined with a silence shot that no other build gains.
Also see our Hunter Leveling Guide and our Hunter Class Guide for more Hunter info.
This guide is simply intended to provide a general overview of the Marksman Hunter. For a far more in-depth and highly detailed resource on this class, check out this guide (updated for Wrath of the Lich King content.)
2.0 - Talents
- 3/58/0 Marksman Raid DPS Build
This is a build that only becomes effective at the highest possible gear levels, Tier 6 and so on, as such I'd recommend that if you're really bent on DPS'ing in raids you check out the beast mastery build instead - it'll go much higher.
2.1 - Attack Rotation
- Auto Shot - Steady Shot - Kill Command(If avaliable)
In Macro Form: High mana efficiency/consistent DPS
#showtooltip Steady Shot
/castsequence reset=3 steady shot,!auto shot
/cast [target=pettarget,exists] kill command
*/cast [target=pettarget,exists] lightning breath*
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()
*Note: This macro accounts for having the wind serpent pet, a pet chosen for hunters with over 30% critical rating, if you don't have this pet (yet) simply remove the line.
2.2 - Leveling Marksmanship Build
- 7/45/9 Marksman Leveling Build
Check out the Hunter Leveling Guide for more info
10 – 14 Lethal Shots
15 – 19 Efficiency
20 – Aimed Shot
21 – 23 Hawk Eye
24 – 25 Go for the Throat
26 – 27 Rapid Killing
28 – 32 Mortal Shots
33 – Scatter Shot
34 – 36 Barrage
37 – Improve Arcane Shot (1/5)
38 – 42 Ranged Weapon Specialization
43 – Trueshot Aura
44 – 46 Careful Aim
47 – 48 Combat Experience
49 – 53 Master Marksman
54 – Silencing Shot
55+ - Branch out, possibly put a few points into the beast mastery tree, also a couple of survival and marksmanship talents are still quite useful.
Leveling as marksmanship is undoubtedly about the burst damage, as in repeated usage of both aimed shot and every other special attack. Unlike beast mastery hunters you’ll find that the pet begins to lose its threat holding capabilities somewhere around level 30 – your damage has to make up for this.
In essence you’ll be playing a mixture of kiting and blowing away the target mob, obviously you could skip the kiting part if you don’t mind being beat on, but that’s generally not a good strategy for consistent and efficient killing.
Each fight can be opened with either aimed shot or an arcane should the former be on cooldown, likely your pet will burst out and pull aggro temporarily, however expect the mob to be coming your way within a short period of time.
Generally you’ll get a good feeling for exactly how long you have before a mob detaches from the pets growl and comes to kill the master instead, in time you’ll be instinctively firing off a concussive shot at the same time.
The basics would just be blast away at them until they die, not much more to it than that.
This is a video of a 72 MM Hunter in Northrend. Pretty basic, but it shows some of the basics and some kiting.
3.0 - PvP Marksmanship Build
This is simply the best Marksman arena build, giving you the best parts of marksman combined with improved range and snare/roots and traps from survival backed up by the beast mastery health increase.
4.0 - Skills and Stats
Agility – 1 = 2 Armor, 1 Ranged Attack Power/0.025% Critical Rating/0.04 Dodge
Attack Power - 10 = 1.0 DPS
Hit Rating – 15.8 rating = 1% Increase
Critical Rating – 22.1 rating = 1% Increase
Weapon Expertise – 1 point = .25% lower chance for enemy to dodge/parry
Haste –15.7 = 1%
Resilience – 39.4 = 1%
The Hit cap for PvP is reached at 5% or 79 hit rating, this is all you need for arena, battlegrounds, etc.
PvP priorities change somewhat from that of PvE, resilience and stamina coming into higher rankings than damage in some cases, although often PvP gear will provide some combination of all the viable statistics.
Pet wise the scorpid poison is the most useful in PvP and basically any good hunter requires the scorpion pet to live up to his/her full potential, anything else is simply going to weaken your effectiveness.
4.1 - Consumables
Superior Healing Potion
Elixir of Mastery
Elixir of Major Fortitude
Elixir of Major Agility
Food:
Spicy Hot Talbuk - +20 Hit Rating & Spirit
Warp Burger - +20 Agility & Spirit
4.2 - Enchants
Head: Glyph of Ferocity
Shoulder: Aldor/Scryer Inscription
Cloak: Greater Agility
Chest: Exceptional Stats
Bracers: Assault
Gloves: Superior Agility
Legs: Cobrahide OR Nethercobra Leg Armor(Epic Version)
Boots: Dexterity
Melee Weapon: Major Agility
Ranged Weapon: Stabilized Eternium Scope
4.3 - Gems
Honestly most of the PvP gems are fairly worthless intiially, and given the fact that you'll need all the honor you can get to pick up any gear in a reasonable period of time I'd recommend skipping them entirely unless you absolutely have to buy one.
Glinting Flame Spessarite
Glinting Noble Topaz
Delicate Living Ruby
5.0 - Gear Guide
This is a primarily pre-karazhan gear guide, allowing you to pick up the optimal gear required to begin the starting raid dungeons with at the very least adequate if not quite good gear. Although not exhaustive, this does include most easily avaliable and high quality pieces.
Here are some figures to aim for once you've geared yourself out fully and gemmed every piece of armor possible, however this is without any outside buffs.
Note: If you're looking for PvP gear you can start gathering simply from the battlegrounds honor gear or the Arena gear. The Gladiator's Gear awarded by the vendors is the best PvP gear you'll find.
Raiding Requirements:
Attack Power: 2000+
Critical: 20%+
Hit Rating: 90+
Helm:
[Malefactor's Eyepatch] - Quest Reward
[Mok'Nathal Mask of Battle] - Drop(Heroic Hillsbrad)
[Beast Lord Helm] - Drop(Mechanar)
[Stalker's Helmet of Second Sight] - Quest Reward
Neck:
[Bone Chain Necklace] - Drop(Heroic Underbog)
[Jagged Bark Pendant] - Drop(Botanica)
[Traitor's Noose] - Drop(Heroic Slavepens)
Back:
[Cloak of Malice] - Drop(Shattered Halls)
[Auchenai Death Shroud] - Drop(Heroic Auchenai Crypts)
[Cloak of Impulsiveness] - Drop(Old Hillsbrad)
Shoulders:
[Wyrmfury Pauldrons] - Drop(Heroic Old Hillsbrad)
[Towering Mantle of the Hunt] - Drop(Botanica)
[Scorpid-Sting Mantle] - Drop(Slave Pens)
Chest:
[Shard Encrusted Breastplate] - Drop(Heroic Mana Tombs)
[Salvager's Hauberk] - Reputation Reward(Lower City Revered)
[Laughing Skull Battle-Harness] - Drop(Black Morass)
Wrist:
[Bracers of the Hunt] - Drop(Heroic Sethekk Halls)
[Oronok's Old Bracers] - Quest Reward
[Lykul Bloodbands] - Underbog
Hands:
[Hungarhide Gauntlets] - Drop(Heroic Underbog)
[Beast Lord Handguards] - Drop(Shattered Halls)
[Gauntlets of the Redeemed Vindicator] - Quest Reward
Belt:
[Girdle of Ferocity] - Drop(Heroic Shadow Laybrinth)
[Archery Belt of the Broken] - Drop(Heroic Slave Pens)
[Girdle of the Blasted Reaches] - Drop(Heroic Hellfire Ramparts)
[Tracker's Belt] - Drop(Normal Slave Pens)
Legs:
[Mag'hari Huntsman's Leggings] - Quest Reward
[Greaves of Desolation] - Drop(Sethekk Halls)
[Scales of the Beast] - World Drop BoE
Boots:
[Outland Striders] - Drop(Arcatraz)
[Sky-Hunter Swift Boots] - Drop(Sethekk Halls)
[Boots of the Outlander] - Drop(Mana Tombs)
Rings:
[Averinn's Ring of Slaying] - Drop(Heroic Hellfire Ramparts)
[Ring of the Exarchs] - Drop(Normal Auchenai Crypts)
[Ravenclaw Band] - Drop(Sethekk Halls)
[Ring of Umbral Doom] - Drop(Botanica)
[Band of the Exorcist] - Vendor(50 Spirit Shards)
[Lightwarden's Band] - Vendor(Aldor Revered)
Trinkets:
[Bloodlust Brooch] - Vendor(41 Badges of Justice)
[Abacus of Violent Odds] - Drop(Mechanar)
[Hourglass of the Unraveller] - Drop(Black Morass)
[Core of Ar'kelos] - Quest Reward
Two-handed Weapons:
[Sonic Spear] - Drop(Shadow Laybrinth)
[Terokk's Quill] - Quest Reward
[Hellforged Halberd/ Blackened Spear]- Reputation Reward(Honor Hold/Thrallmar)
Ranged Weapon:
[Wrathtide Longbow] - Drop(Heroic Steamvault)
[Ornate Khorium Rifle] - Crafted
[Telescopic Sharprifle] - Drop(Mechanar)
[Melmorta's Twilight Longbow] - Drop(Black Morass)
6.0 -- 1-80 Hunter Leveling Guide
For years Joana's Horde Guide and Brian's Alliance guide were the standards for Hunter leveling, simply because Hunters were the class of choice for both those guides. Other classes had to make due as best they could.
I argue that Zygor's in-game Guide is better than either because all the "looking up of stuff" is done away with. No more switching from game to guide, no more manually setting waypoints, no more browsing Thottbot for tips. It's all contained within Zygor's guide and it's all automated. |
