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WoW Forever Hunter Leveling Guide 1-60 by Sanctum

Hunter

Beast Mastery

Creator

Leveling

PvE

By Sanctum

Updated on Nov 4, 2026

Nov 4, 2026

Overview

Beast Mastery Hunter has always been one of the strongest levelers in the entire game and has gotten buffed even further in Forever, as Pets now do 50% more dps.

If you want to play a strong, self-sufficient class that levels fast, will deal great damage in the endgame and be one of the best gold farmers, this is the class for you.

Why Beast Mastery?

Marksmanship could possibly be more DPS in a dungeon while leveling, thanks to talents such as Careful Aim, but there are many benefits Beast Mastery provides that make it much stronger overall:

Making your pet stronger allows it to generate more threat, which means you get to be more liberal with your ability usage without the fear of pulling aggro.
Bestial Swiftness doesn't seem like much, but it makes your pet able to pull mobs a lot quicker, leading to much more fluid gameplay and faster leveling pace.
- Dash or Dive on Pets don't have 100% uptime.
Pathfinding is non-negotiable, as most of your time spent leveling is traveling.

Buffing your pet matters more than buffing yourself while leveling.

Arcane Shot has been buffed right before launch meaning it's now better than Summon Hawk. Beast Mastery is still worth it, but Summon Hawk is not.

Strengths And Weaknesses

Strongest Leveler 10-60
Low Skill Floor
High Skill Cap

Weak 1-9
Pet Management

Alternatives

There is only one real path to level with Beast Mastery. No respecs are needed either.

Talents

Points spent51

31/20/0

Leveling Path

Beast Mastery

5/5

1/5

2/2

0/3

2/2

1/1

5/5

0/2

5/5

0/1

0/2

1/1

2/2

4/5

1/1

Marksmanship

0/3

0/5

5/5

3/3

0/5

5/5

2/2

0/5

0/1

1/1

4/5

0/2

0/3

0/1

0/5

0/1

Survival

0/5

0/2

0/5

0/3

0/2

0/3

0/1

0/2

0/5

0/1

0/2

0/2

0/1

0/5

0/1

Leveling Path

10
Deadly Aspects
11
Deadly Aspects
12
Deadly Aspects
13
Deadly Aspects
14
Deadly Aspects
15
Focused Fire
16
Focused Fire
17
Improved Revive Pet
18
Improved Revive Pet
19
Endurance Training
20
Bestial Swiftness
21
Pathfinding
22
Pathfinding
23
Unleashed Fury
24
Unleashed Fury
25
Unleashed Fury
26
Unleashed Fury
27
Unleashed Fury
28
Ferocity
29
Ferocity
30
Bestial Discipline
31
Bestial Discipline
32
Ferocity
33
Ferocity
34
Ferocity
35
Frenzy
36
Frenzy
37
Frenzy
38
Frenzy
39
Intimidation
40
Bestial Wrath
41
Lethal Attacks
42
Lethal Attacks
43
Lethal Attacks
44
Lethal Attacks
45
Lethal Attacks
46
Careful Aim
47
Careful Aim
48
Careful Aim
49
Careful Aim
50
Careful Aim
51
Improved Stings
52
Improved Stings
53
Improved Stings
54
Rapid Killing
55
Rapid Killing
56
Trueshot Aura
57
Mortal Shots
58
Mortal Shots
59
Mortal Shots
60
Mortal Shots

Talent Point Order

5/5 Deadly Aspects - Attack speed is great.
2/2 Focused Fire - Strong damage talent.
2/2 Improved Revive Pet or 2/5 Endurance Training - Personal preference depending on which you feel is more valuable to you. I find Improved Revive Pet ends up mattering more overall.
1/5 Endurance Training - Need one point to reach the following tier of talents.
1/1 Bestial Swiftness - Absolutely mandatory despite not granting any DPS. Your pet feels like he's stuck in mud without it.
2/2 Pathfinding - Another absolutely mandatory talent. Most of your time leveling is spent travelling, so the value of this talent is immense.
5/5 Unleashed Fury - Best pet damage talent.
2/5 Ferocity - Best damage talent available, unlocks next tier of talents.
2/2 Bestial Discipline - Mana regeneration is incredibly underrated for leveling. Focus regeneration improves your pet DPS. Prioritize this over Intimidation.
5/5 Ferocity - needed to unlock Frenzy.
1/5 Frenzy - Incredibly strong talent, specially the first rank as it allows it to proc at all. Every rank is worse than the previous one, as it has much less of an impact on uptime %.
1/5 Unleashed Fury
4/5 Frenzy
1/1 Intimidation - Needed to unlock Bestial Wrath, can help you get out of a tricky situation or stop a cast.
1/1 Bestial Wrath - Amazing damage cooldown that turns your pet into a killing machine.
5/5 Lethal Attacks - Crit is very good, your pet scales with 100% of your crit.
5/5 Careful Aim - One of the strongest damage talents in the entire tree as it also counts your base Intellect.
2/2 Rapid Killing - This buff will constantly be up while leveling. Also, because not that many abilities are cast per monster kill its impact is very high.
3/3 Improved Stings - Highest damage talent to unlock Trueshot Aura and Mortal Shots. Efficiency is also a consideration.
1/1 Trueshot Aura - Free attack power.
4/5 Mortal Shots - Crit damage is good. 4/5 Improved Tracking is also an alternative but that requires swapping what you're tracking while fighting and swapping it is on the GCD.

If you expect to PvP while you level, trade 1 point in Frenzy for Summon Hawk. Summon Hawk is incredibly powerful there because of spell pushback.

Important Abilities

Level 6 Arcane Shot, Hunter's Mark
Level 10 Tame Beast
Level 12 Arcane Shot Rank 2
Level 18 Multi-Shot
Level 20 Aspect of the Cheetah, Freezing Trap, Arcane Shot Rank 3
Level 26 Rapid Fire
Level 28 Frost Trap, Arcane Shot Rank 4
Level 30 Feign Death
Level 34 Explosive Trap
Level 36 Arcane Shot Rank 5
Level 40 Aspect of the Pack, Volley, Mail Specialization
Level 44 Explosive Trap Rank 2, Arcane Shot Rank 6
Level 50 Volley Rank 2
Level 52 Explosive Trap Rank 3, Arcane Shot Rank 7
Level 58 Volley Rank 3

Gameplay & Rotation

There are many ways to play Hunter depending on your level of expertise and mechanical prowess, which makes Hunter a low skill floor, high skill cap class. You can play it as a ranged turret with a pet, or by melee weaving and juggling your focus on many different targets.

You get to play the way you want to and no matter what it will be effective.

Mana Management

Damage per Mana is a very important thing to consider, as you will go oom if you cast every single ability on cooldown.

You want to prioritize what spell to cast based on how efficient it is and try to use as few spells as possible. Your goal is to never be at 0 or 100% mana.

Volley 4+ targets.
Hunter's Mark Main target.
Explosive Trap 2+ targets if the enemies will survive for most of its duration.
Multi-Shot 3 targets.
Immolation Trap If the enemy will survive for most of its duration.
Multi-Shot 2 targets.
Mongoose Bite
Serpent Sting If the enemy will survive for most of its duration.
Arcane Shot
Raptor Strike
Aimed Shot If you don't need to move for the next 2 seconds. Scales well with ranks.
Multi-Shot 1 target.

If you ever have to drink, you can send in your pet to attack and keep drinking while it fights.

Before you get Bestial Discipline, it is important to understand that mana only really regenerates in combat if you stop casting abilities for 5 seconds.

Ranged

Aspect of the Hawk Make sure you swap from Aspect of the Cheetah when fighting.
Hunter's Mark Don't cast on enemies that will die soon.
Attack with Pet Send in pet before you Auto Shot as it has to travel to the mob.
Auto Shot
Serpent Sting Only use on enemies that will survive for most of its duration.
Arcane Shot
Multi-Shot Always cast on 2+ targets.
Raptor Strike When the mob is going to die soon, walk in and end it with melee.

When your Pet has established enough threat on the primary target, you can send it to pull another mob. This enables Multi-Shot to hit two targets and Serpent Sting to tick for the full duration on the primary target.

Ideally, you want to move in between Auto Shot casts in the direction you have to go towards. For information on how, check out Auto Shot Mechanics.

Practical Use

Level 1-3
- Auto Shot
- Raptor Strike to finish them off
Level 4-5:
- Auto Shot + Serpent Sting
- Raptor Strike to finish them off
Level 6-17:
- Auto Shot + Hunter's Mark + Arcane Shot
- Serpent Sting when you have excess mana or killing mobs that will survive the duration
- Raptor Strike to finish them off
- Concussive Shot is useful level 8-9 to kite before you get Tame Beast.
Level 18+:
- Auto Shot + Hunter's Mark + Arcane Shot
- Serpent Sting when you have excess mana or killing mobs that will survive the duration
- Multi-Shot when you have excess mana or hitting 2+ targets
- Raptor Strike to finish them off

Melee Weaving

The ranged and melee swing timers don't affect each other. This was bugged when the beta ended, but is supposed to be fixed by launch. If it is still bugged, you will have to pay attention to your ranged timer and only melee after your Auto Shot goes off. If you melee too early, you will reset your entire Auto Shot timer.

Melee weaving allows you to kill two mobs at once, one with your melee swings and abilities and the other with your ranged autos and abilities. It will practically double your kill speed.

Hunter's Mark Cast on the target your Pet will tank.
Attack with Pet The goal is to always tank a mob far away from you with your Pet.
Auto Shot To help pull the mob to your Pet or start pulling a different mob to you.
Raptor Strike/Melee When the second mob gets to you.
Immolation Trap This is your strongest DPM ability.
Mongoose Bite If it procs off a Dodge/Parry.
Auto Shot/Melee Alternate between melee and ranged when their swing timers are up.
Follow the previously stated ranged skill priority.

When skilled, you can kill three mobs at once by having your Pet also pull another mob once it has established enough threat.

Pet Management

You can micro pet Attack, Growl and Bite casts all the time, but I feel that adds unnecessary cognitive load while leveling.

For simplicity, Growl and Bite should always be toggled on auto in different scenarios.

While in the open world, keep Growl on and Bite off. The dps increase you get for micromanaging Bite + Growl is tiny.
While in a dungeon group, keep Growl off and Bite on. This will give you maximum dps.

Pet behavior changes when you alternate between having it on Aggressive, Assist and Passive.

Aggressive: your pet automatically seeks hostile enemies near you.
- Use this when you really want to turn your brain off or can safely use it to chain pull.
Assist: your pet automatically attacks whatever you are attacking.
- Use this as your default mode if there's almost no risk of pulling unwanted mobs.
Defensive: your pet automatically attacks whatever is attacking you or your pet.
- Use this as your default mode.
Passive: your pet only attacks if you command it to.
- Use this mode inside dungeons, small caves, etc. Basically, anywhere where accidental overpulling can be catastrophic.
- You will have to /petattack every single time a mob dies. Even if it died while it was already on its way to a new target.

Use the pet mode that suits you best, Assist/Defensive mode should probably be your default.

Use Mend Pet proactively, it takes time to heal your pet back up. If you wait until your pet is too low, he might die from an unlucky crit or spell cast before you get the chance to heal him back up.

Mend Pet is a channeled spell it will not let you Auto Shot while channeling. If you have spare mana, you can cancel it when your Auto Shot is up, to weave it in, and then re-cast Mend Pet.

Gear

Ranged Weapon Progression

Keeping your ranged weapon upgraded is very important to level as fast as possible.

Level	Faction / Race	Name	DPS	Source
3		Hornwood Recurve Bow	2.38	Vendor
4	Alliance Dwarf	Ornate Blunderbuss	2.95	Vendor (Dun Morogh – Hegnar Rumbleshot)
5	Horde Orc/Troll	Kolkar Bow	2.68	Quest – Durotar (Lost in the Shadows)
6–8	Skyborne	Windswept Shortbow	3.41	Quest – Zephras Isle (Among the Faithful)
8–10	Alliance Human	Junior’s Hunting Bow	3.53	Quest – Elwynn Forest (Bounty on Murlocs)
9–12	Alliance Skyborne	Bow of Hours	5.22	Quest – Zephras Isle (Catching Wind)
10–11	Alliance	Ashwood Bow	3.81	Quest – Teldrassil (Crown of the Earth)
11		Laminated Recurve Bow	5.77	Vendor
11–13	Alliance Dwarf	Daryl's Hunting Rifle	6.40	Quest – Loch Modan (A Hunter’s Boast)
13–15	Alliance	Harvester's Pestslayer	6.04	Quest – Westfall (The Killing Fields)
14	Horde	Orcish Battle Bow	5.53	Quest – The Barrens (Centaur Bracers)
16		Reinforced Bow	7.50	Vendor
17–18	Alliance	Calibrated Blunderbuss	9.57	Quest – The Hall of Thanes (Old Ironforge Incursion)
18–20	Horde	Privateer Musket	7.83	Quest – The Barrens (The Guns of Northwatch)
20		Heavy Recurve Bow	9.17	Vendor
23-25	Alliance	Raptor's End	12.07	Quest – Wetlands (Ormer’s Revenge)
25-28	Horde	Bow of Plunder	11.35	Quest – Hillsbrad Foothills (Dangerous!)
28-30	Horde	Cliffrunner's Aim	11.96	Quest – Thousand Needles (The Sacred Flame)
30		Dense Shortbow	14.21	Vendor
30-31		Quilboar Blaster	18.57	Quest - Razorfen Kraul (The Crone of the Kraul / A Vengeful Fate)
36-38	Alliance	Shrapnel Blaster	17.37	Quest – Stranglethorn Vale (Colonel Kurzen)
42		Massive Longbow	21.96	Vendor
45-51		Verdant Keeper's Aim	27.32	Quest – Maraudon (Corruption of Earth and Seed)

Mail Specialization

At level 40, you unlock the ability to wear Mail. Your pet inherits 30% of your armor; improving your gear from leather to mail will make it much more durable. If you melee weave, it will also allow you to take more hits, lowering your downtime.

Swap to Mail as fast as possible, as long as the gear change doesn't represent a major damage loss.

Ammo Progression

Always use the best ammo available. It is worth the increased cost.

Arrows / Bullets

Level	Item	DPS	Source
1	Rough Arrow / Light Shot	1.5	Vendor
10	Sharp Arrow / Heavy Shot	3.5	Vendor
25	Razor Arrow / Solid Shot	7.5	Vendor
40	Jagged Arrow / Accurate Slugs	13	Vendor
51	Ice Threaded Arrow / Bullet	16.5	Alterac Valley Quartermaster
52	Thorium Headed Arrow / Thorium Shells	17.5	Crafted (Engineering)
60	Swiftfeather Arrow / Swiftstrike Shot	24.5	Crafted (Engineering)

Quivers / Ammo Pouches

Level	Item	Slots	Attack Speed	Notes
10	Medium Quiver / Medium Shot Pouch	10	10%
18	Quiver of the Night Watch / Bandolier of the Night Watch	12	11%	Alliance
30	Heavy Quiver / Heavy Leather Ammo Pouch	14	12%
40	Quickdraw Quiver / Thick Leather Ammo Pouch	16	13%
55	Harpy Hide Quiver / Gnoll Skin Bandolier	16	15%

Scopes

Scopes are generally the strongest enchants you have available. Any time you are going to keep a ranged weapon for any appreciable amount of time, it is worth applying a Scope.

Apply a scope to all important bow upgrades, the longer the upgrade lasts the better the scope you should use.

Level	Item	Stat Bonus
5	Crude Scope	1 Weapon Damage
10	Standard Scope	2 Weapon Damage
20	Accurate Scope	3 Weapon Damage
30	Deadly Scope	5 Weapon Damage
40	Sniper Scope	7 Weapon Damage
60	SAF-T Ultra Precision Scope	2% Critical Strike Chance

Stat Priority

% Hit until 8% - Very rare while leveling.
% Crit - Very rare while leveling.
Agility - Strongest DPS stat by far. 14 AP = 1 DPS.
1. 1 Agi = 2 Ranged AP
2. 1 Agi = 1 Melee AP
3. 1 Agi = 2 Armor
4. 53 Agi = 2% Crit (Level 60)
5. 26.5 Agi = 1% Dodge (Level 60)
Intellect with 5/5 Careful Aim.
1. 1 Int = 1 AP
2. 1 Int = 15 Mana
Spirit - more health and mana regeneration means higher uptime.
1. 2 Spirit = 1 Mp5 when a spell hasn't been cast in the previous 5 seconds
2. 4 Spirit = 1 Mp5 in combat with Bestial Discipline
Strength if you melee weave.
1. 1 Str = 1 Melee AP
Stamina - more health points means less deaths, which reduces downtime.
1. 1 Stam = 10 HP
2. 1 Stam = 2 pet HP
Intellect without Careful Aim.
Strength if you don't melee weave.

As a general rule, value Agility above everything until you have 5/5 Careful Aim; the value of it is much higher than the rest of the stats.

Pet Mechanics

What Pet to Use

Pet Unique Skills

Different pet families get access to different unique skills.

Cats have access to Prowl
Carrion Birds have access to Demoralizing Screech
- Doesn't stack with Demoralizing Shout
Plainstriders have access to Dust Cloud
- Doesn't stack with Curse of Recklessness or Faerie Fire
Wolves have access to Furious Howl
- Doesn't stack with Battle Shout
Boars have access to Charge

Pet Family Stats

Different pet families get different stat profiles. Some are more offensive, while others are more defensive. While leveling, everything else being equal, damage matters most.

The pet families with the highest damage multiplier are Cats and Raptors, they do 110% damage.
The pet families with the lowest damage multipliers are Turtles and Boars, they do 90% damage.
Every other family is somewhere in the middle.

Although there are exceptions to the rule, attack speed generally also follows trends between pet families. For example, Cats have very high attack speeds, while Raptors have very slow ones.
Attack speed in WoW Forever is normalized. That means that as long as two pets have the same family damage bonus, their base DPS will be the same, no matter the attack speed: a pet with 2.0 attack speed will have 2x the damage of one with 1.0 attack speed.

Higher attack speed is generally still better because it means higher Frenzy uptime and more spell pushback.

Best Pets for Leveling

In my opinion, there are only two possible choices for leveling: Cats or Carrion Birds.

Cats
- 110% dmg / 100% armor / 98% life.
- They do the most DPS.
- They have the fastest attack speed.
- Prowl isn't very useful.
- Access to Bite and Claw.
Carrion Birds
- 100% dmg / 105% Armor / 100% life.
- Their DPS is a lot lower.
- Demoralizing Screech reduces melee damage taken by up to 30%.
- Demoralizing Screech is great at generating threat and AoE threat.
- Demoralizing Screech ranks are unlocked at 10 / 32 / 54. This means that for large periods of time your Demoralizing Screech will be underleveled and barely a factor.

My recommendation: Cats for most people, Carrion Birds if you value safety higher.

Starting Pet

You want your starting pet to come with Claw R2.

Race	Pet	Location
Orc/Troll	Venomtail Scorpid / Encrusted Surf Crawler	Durotar
Tauren	Taloned Swoop (doesn't have Claw R2)	Mulgore
Night Elf	Strigid Hunter	Teldrassil
Dwarf	Mangleclaw	Dun Morogh
Human	Young Forest Bear	Elwynn Forest
Skyborne	Shadowgale Ursera	Zephras Isle

Cat Progression

You want to progress to faster and faster Cats.

Faction	Cat	Attack Speed	Lvl	Location
Tauren	Flatland Prowler	2.0	9	Mulgore
Dwarf	Elder Snow Leopard	2.0	9-10	Dun Morogh
Night Elf	Nightsaber	1.5	10	Teldrassil
Orc/Troll	Savannah Huntress	1.5	11-12	The Barrens
Alliance	Moonstalker	1.3	11-20	Darkshore
Horde	Savannah Patriarch	1.3	15-16	The Barrens
Both	Starving Mountain Lion	1.2	23-24	Hillsbrad Foothills
Both	Broken Tooth (Rare)	1.0	37	Badlands

Pet Abilities Unlocks

To train a new ability on your pet you have to learn it first. To learn it you have to Tame Beast and use a pet that has the ability, until you unlock it and can train it to other eligible pets.

Stable your pet.
Tame Beast with desired ability.
Use the new pet until you unlock the desired ability.
Release/stable the new pet.
Get your old pet and train it.

You should always keep Claw leveled up as each rank is a big dps increase.

Claw Rank	Animal	Lvl	Location
II	Various	10-12	Starting Zones
III	Alliance: Den Mother Horde: Gray Bear	Alliance: 18 Horde: 21	Alliance: Darkshore Horde: Hillsbrad Foothills
IV	Elder Ashenvale Bear	25	Ashenvale
V	Scorpashi Lasher	34	Desolace
VI	Scorpid Hunter	40	Tanaris
VII	Ironfur Patriarch	48	Feralas
VIII	Elder Shardtooth	57	Winterspring

Ability	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	R6	R7	R8
Dust Cloud	12-14	30	N/A	N/A	N/A	-	-	-
Demoralizing Screech	10-16	32-39	50-52	-	-	-	-	-
Furious Howl	10-12	25-28	40-41	56-57	-	-	-	-
Bite	10-12	10-12	16-20	24-25	32-35	38-40	48-50	56-57
Dive / Dash	30-32	40-42	50-51	-	-	-	-	-

To find more information on pet ability unlocks, check out this website.

Pet Damage Scaling

There are many changes made to pet functionality in WoW Forever.

Pet focus now regenerates around twice as fast at 10/s.
Pet base damage is around 50% higher.
Pet attack speed is normalized.
- Attack speed doesn't affect pet dps.
Pet auto attack damage now scales with 10% of your highest attack power stat.
Pet scales with 100% of your crit chance.
Pet scales with 100% of your hit chance.
Pet scales with 30% of your armor.
Pet HP scales with your stamina.
- 1 Stam = 2 HP.
Pets can't be buffed anymore.

Overall, pets are much stronger while leveling and slightly stronger than before in a raid setting, with better scaling.

Races

All races are very close in DPS, with the difference between best and worst being around 2%. Choose the one that resonates most with you.

That being said, here are my recommendations:

Alliance

PvE: Night Elf > High Order Skyborne > Human > Dwarf
PvP: Night Elf / Human > Dwarf > High Order Skyborne

Night Elf
Elune's Light Shadowmeld Quickness Wisp Spirit
Grants the highest DPS, while also providing invaluable utility with Shadowmeld, which can even be used to cancel incoming spell casts. Quickness provides permanent movement and as we all know, movement speed is invaluable. Best pick overall.

Human
Will to Survive Perception Ruthless The Human Spirit
Strong PvP alternative due to the immense power of Will to Survive. Perception is also a direct counter to Rogues.

High Order Skyborne
Wind Blessed Read Leyline Elemental Insight Walk on Air
Wind Blessed is one of the strongest DPS racials. Elemental Insight will let you be the king of the raid on Elemental bosses. Walk on Air has utility in battlegrounds.

Dwarf
Stoneform Big Game Hunter Artisan's PrecisionFind Treasure
Stoneform is great to counter Rogues as Blind is still a poison, but Human simply does it better while doing more DPS and being more versatile. Big Game Hunter will let you be the king of the raid on Beast bosses.

Horde

PvE: Orc / Windshaper Skyborne > Troll > Tauren
PvP: Orc > Troll / Tauren > Windshaper Skyborne

Orc
Blood Fury Command Hardiness Shatter Curse
Stronger than Windshaper Skyborne in terms of DPS only when a pet is being used, but Lone Wolf creates the possibility of a dead racial. Overall, a great PvP and PvE option due to having 4 useful combat racials.

Troll
Berserking Rapid Regeneration Regeneration Beast Slaying
By far the strongest leveler, as Rapid Regeneration and Regeneration are straight up overpowered for leveling. Berserking is a middle-of-the-pack offensive racial. Rapid Regeneration has a lot of utility in duels and 1v1s. Beast Slaying will let you be the king of the raid on Beast bosses.

Windshaper Skyborne
Wind Blessed Skysight Elemental Insight Walk on Air
Wind Blessed is one of the strongest DPS racials. Elemental Insight will let you be the king of the raid on Elemental bosses. Walk on Air has utility in battlegrounds.

Tauren
Plainsrunning War Stomp Endurance Cultivation
Plainsrunning is incredibly fun and got buffed to 60%. War Stomp is a strong PvP racial ability. Sadly, there is no DPS racial.

Consumables

Consumables can make you a lot stronger in combat, but you should only use them if they are relatively inexpensive. Buying the strongest version of every consumable and then not being able to afford to train up your skills doesn't make sense.

Food and Water

Always buy updated stacks of food and water. The boost in mana/health regeneration will increase your leveling pace.
You can buy new food and water from Innkeepers at lvl 5, 15, 25, 35 and 45.
You should keep lower level food and water for when you don't need to regenerate as much or as quickly.

Exp Food

The only mandatory buff is the 5% Exp, 15 minute one you get from buff food.
Buying better food to improve the stat buff you get is nice if you can afford it. However, even the lowest level food is worth using because we mostly care about the Exp buff.

Food Progression

Lvl Req	Food	Buff
5	Longjaw Mud Snapper	10 AP
15	Seasoned Wolf Kabob / Crocolisk Gumbo / Lean Wolf Steak / Hot Lion Chops	5 Agi
25	Hot Wolf Ribs / Heavy Crocolisk Stew	10 Agi
35	Tender Wolf Steak / Jungle Stew	15 Agi
45	Swiftstrike Steak / Flank au Poivre	20 Agi

Other Consumables

The most important consumables are the ones that give Agility and Mp5, prioritize those.

Elixir of Agility / Scroll of Agility
Lesser Mageblood Elixir
Elixir of Wisdom / Scroll of Intellect
- Only if you have Careful Aim
Elixir of Ogre Strength / Scroll of Strength
- Only if melee weaving
The best available / Coarse Weightstone for your level
- Only if melee weaving

Campfire Buffs

All Campfire buffs are a weaker version of another existing buff, except for the Camp Tent.

Mana Well (Alchemy) = Blessing of Wisdom
Fish Bowl (Fishing) = Blessing of Kings
Camp Chair (Skinning) = Moonkin Form / Leader of the Pack
Lodestone (Mining) = Blessing of Might
Incense Candle (Herbalism) = Arcane Intellect
Faction Banner (Tailoring) = Divine Spirit
Sharpening Wheel (Blacksmithing) = Strength of Earth Totem
First Aid Kit (First Aid) = Power Word: Fortitude
Enchanted Lute (Enchanting) = Mark of the Wild

Camp Tent Lvl 40+ > Mana Well > Camp Tent Lvl 30+ > Camp Chair/ Fish Bowl > Enchanted Lute > Camp Tent Lvl 20+ > Rest

Mp5 is by far the strongest stat while leveling, bar none. That is why Mana Well is the most important buff. Although Blessing of Wisdom is stronger, Mana Well guarantees you get Mp5 and you can get buffed with Blessing of Kings instead. If you know you will group with a Paladin at all times, you can drop the Mana Well priority. It's important to note that Moonkin Form / Leader of the Pack is only available at 40+, making the Camp Chair an attractive option early.

The Camp Tent from Leatherworking gives you 5% Rested XP, which has to be used up before you can get the full benefit of the next Camp Tent. 5% Rested XP is equivalent to 2.5% more XP.
The faster you level, the less Rested XP you get per level because it can only be used once per hour. As you progress through your leveling journey, time to level will naturally get longer and longer, giving you more and more uses per level.

The Camp Tent gets better and better the close you get to 60.

Level	Average Time per Level	Uses per Level	XP Gain
1-10	~10m	0.17	0.42%
11-20	~1h30m	1.5	3.75%
21-30	~2h	2	5%
31-40	~2h30m	2.5	6.25%
41-50	~3h30m	3.5	8.75%
51-60	~4h30m	4.5	11.25%

Professions

First Aid is always a very useful profession that lets you create and use bandages, which function as in-combat food. You are also able to craft your own potions, but that is less important, as they can be bought and don't require you to level up First Aid to use.

Always level First Aid for safety and to reduce downtime by being able to heal yourself quickly. Keep your Bandages upgraded.

Leveling

Generally, for leveling, you want a synergistic gathering + crafting profession combo.

Skinning + Leatherworking
- Most useful one for Hunter by allowing you to passively get gold without going out of your way and craft upgrades for yourself.
Mining + Blacksmithing
- Not very useful on a Hunter while leveling.
Herbalism + Alchemy
- A strong option because of Mana Well being the best Campfire Buff until 30-40+.

Endgame

In the endgame, although a lot is unknown, we will very likely want Engineering to get access to Goblin Sapper Charge, Thorium Grenade, Swiftfeather Arrow / Swiftstrike Shot and more.

The second profession will probably be between Blacksmithing, if Legionite Glaive is pre-bis, or Leatherworking.

Auto Shot Mechanics

Auto Shot has three components: cooldown, cast time and retry timer.

Cooldown

Auto Shot cooldown depends on your ranged weapon speed and haste.
- Sources of haste are multiplicative. For example, Rapid Fire + Deadly Aspects would make your shot 82% faster, not 70%.
- While your Auto Shot is on cooldown and before the cast time starts, you can move freely without delaying your Auto Shot.

Cast Time

Auto Shot has a 0.5 second cast time at the end of the cooldown.
- Like the cooldown, this is also affected by haste.
You must stand still for the entirety of the cast time.
Movement during the Auto Shot cast time window triggers the retry timer.
It is important to stand still a bit early to avoid triggering the retry timer.

Retry Timer

The retry timer is a check that can trigger and reset your Auto Shot cast time back to 0.
Casting Arcane Shot, Serpent Sting, etc triggers the retry timer unless you have autoRangedCombat enabled.
Going from melee into ranged triggers the retry timer.
If you spam !Auto Shot when it's about to cast it generally fixes most retry timer issue.

Swing Timer Addons will show the cooldown and the cast time that way you can move as efficiently as possible.

A good Swing Timer Addon is mandatory for good Hunter play. You can check out the addons HERE.

Deadzone

The deadzone is the range that is too far for melee and too close for ranged. Avoid it like the plague.

Minimum melee range is 5 yards.
Minimum ranged range is 8 yards (usually more like 11 yards).
Between 5-8(11), you won't be able to damage an enemy outside of casting Summon Hawk.

Use range indicator addons to help you navigate the deadzone.

Melee Weaving

Your ranged and melee swing timers are independent. This allows you to weave in melee attacks in between Auto Shot casts.
In the beta this was bugged and melee was still resetting Auto Shot. Even then, it is still worth it to swing with melee following an Auto Shot.

To melee weave effectively, use a good Swing Timer Addon.

AutoRangedCombat

AutoRangedCombat is a setting that changes the behavior of your Auto Shot / melee attacks.

With AutoRangedCombat enabled/1, going from ranged to melee will automatically change your swing from an Auto Shot to a melee attack. Essentially, /startattack is dynamic.

With AutoRangedCombat disabled/0, going from ranged to melee nothing will happen until you /startattack or cast a melee ability like Raptor Strike. Essentially, /startattack is only melee.

ARC 1 fixes the issue of spells starting the ranged retry timer.
ARC 0 fixes the problem of going from ranged into melee not letting you Raptor Strike unless you time it perfectly.

If you don't want to bother with complicated mechanics:

If you will only level with ranged: enable AutoRangedCombat and forget about it.
If you will melee weave: disable AutoRangedCombat and use the macro below.

Macros

Freezing Trap

#showtooltip
/petfollow
/stopattack
/stopcasting
/use Freezing Trap

Feign Death

#showtooltip
/stopattack
/petfollow
/use Feign Death

Mouseover Pet Attack

/petattack [@mouseover,harm][]
/use Dash
/use Dive

Pet Return

/petpassive
/petfollow

Intimidation

#showtooltip
/use [@mouseover,harm,nodead][]Intimidation

Hunter's Mark

#showtooltip
/cleartarget [dead,nomod][help]
/targetenemy [noexists]
/use [@mouseover,harm,nodead][]Hunter's Mark

Serpent Sting

#showtooltip
/use [@mouseover,harm,nodead][]Serpent Sting

Concussive Shot

#showtooltip
/use [@mouseover,harm,nodead][]Concussive Shot

All-in-One Auto Shot + Raptor Strike
Only works in ARC 0.
Press it right after Auto Shot to automatically Raptor Strike.

#showtooltip
/targetenemy [dead][help]
/tar [@mouseover,harm]
/use Raptor Strike
/use Mongoose Bite
/targetlasttarget
/use !Auto Shot
/targetlasttarget [help][dead]

Useful Addons

AppelSwingsForever
- Swing Timer
- Range Check
Nock
- Cooldown bar
- Buff tracker
- Swing timer
- Range Check
- Weave helper
Opie
- Allows to keybind rings of spells to cut down on keybind usage.
- Great for Revive Pet, Call Pet, Dismiss Pet, etc.
- Great for Track Beasts, Track Demons, Track Elementals, etc.