BHG Articles

This World of Warcraft Hunter Guide will give you an overview of the Hunter class, what its capabilities are, what drawbacks you should expect, and how to function in the class.

1.) About the Class

Hunter’s can excel in both groups and solo game play in WoW. One thing you should remember when using the Hunter, is that even though they are decked out with heavy chain armor and have a Survival skill tree, they are not indestructible. They have long range weapons and a pet for a reason so use them. Without your pet you won’t generate anywhere near as much damage so make sure you use this to your advantage.

2.) What Race Should I Pick?

If you’re on the Alliance side I recommend using Night Elves or Dwarves as Hunters. For Horde, Orc’s Troll’s, Tauren, and Blood Elves work well. Each race has its own unique set of strengths and each has the potential to be a great Hunter.

First you’ll need to choose your faction, either Alliance or Horde. I then suggest you spend some time looking at the different races and finding out what their perks are before making your decision. Regardless of what race you choose however, in the end game it will come down to the knowledge you have of your class and the game in general.

3.) Leveling Up

Leveling as a Hunter is easy. In fact in my opinion leveling a Hunter is easier than any other class. When running quests be sure that you make the best use of your pet by letting it take the damage. You have the ability to heal and resurrect your pet and in the end it is only mana. Your pet dying is far better than you dying. When circumstances get dire simply toss your pet at the mob and run in the other direction.

Make the most of your broad range of abilities. Hunters are equipped with a wide range of abilities including being able to resurrect and heal pets, engage numerous targets and use traps. If you take the time to learn what you’re capable of you will do much better in the long run.

4.) Selecting a Pet

As a Hunter you have the ability to tame animals. When choosing your pet you should be aware that they have skill trees just like you do. When they level they acquire points that you can spend to enhance their abilities. You should also pay special attention to what type of food your pet eats and make sure that you have an ample supply on hand. This can be discovered by looking at the pet’s character sheet. Mouse over the happiness symbol and it will tell you exactly what it eats.

Happiness is another thing that you need to monitor closely. Happy well fed pets do more damage so when you see the icon on your pet window change from green to yellow you need to feed it.

5.) Talents

Hunters have three different talent trees.

Beast Mastery - This talent tree is focused on your pet. Use it to make you pet stronger and harder to kill.

Marksmanship - Focusing on this tree will help with your DPS output. You can significantly increase your DPS output if you work at this tree.

Survival - This tree will help you with crowd control more than anything else.

Choose a tree that’s going to suit your playing style. If you think you’re most likely going to go it alone, then Beast Mastery will work best. Marksmanship might be the correct choice for PvP. Survival is in my opinion the least important tree unless you are planning to go in hand to hand combatbut then if you are planning on this then maybe a different class would work better.

The Hunter is a great all around class but they are in my humble opinion the masters of solo play. They make excellent characters to use as gatherers but if equipped, specced, and played well they can function quite well in any situation.