Beast Mastery Hunter DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — The War Within (11.2)
On this page, you will learn how to optimize the rotation of your Beast Mastery Hunter in both single-target and multiple-target situations. We also have advanced sections about cooldowns, procs, etc. in order to minmax your DPS. All our content is updated for World of Warcraft — The War Within (11.2).
If you were looking for WotLK Classic content, please refer to our WotLK Classic Beast Mastery Hunter rotation.
Beast Mastery Hunter Rotation Guide for The War Within
Welcome to our Rotation page for Beast Mastery Hunters. On this page, you will find everything you need to know about actually playing the spec in Raiding and Mythic+ scenarios.
How To Read A Priority List
The rotation here, aside from the more concrete Openers, is laid out in a conditional priority list. Essentially, for every single spell that you cast, you should cast the highest-priority spell you can, for which the conditions are met. After the spell is cast, you should start over from the top of the priority list, and repeat the process. Becoming competent at the rotation comes down to memorizing the priority list and its conditions, and always knowing what is the highest priority in any given situation. Mastering the rotation is being able to "see ahead" of the current global, and knowing what the best casts will be for the next 3-4 globals or beyond, based on your understanding of how the conditions will change as you move through the rotation and use different spells.
What is also worth knowing is that if something is not mentioned, it is not worth worrying about. What the priority guide doesn't say can be just as important as what it does say.
Beast Mastery Hunter Rotation
Tier Set Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter in The War Within Season 3
For Dark Ranger, the set bonus is entirely passive, reducing the cooldown of
Call of the Wild and boosting the effect of
Withering Fire. This has no rotational impact.
For Pack Leader, meanwhile, the 2PC Set Bonus is entirely passive, while the 4PC Tier Set Bonus has major rotational implications and things worth knowing.
Stampede
Whenever you summon a Beast during Lead From the Front, a buff that
you get for the first 12 seconds of any
Bestial Wrath, you summon a
Stampede of beasts that charge at your target in a a line, dealing heavy
damage. This line, once spawned, is static, which means that it is prone to
losing damage if the target moves. Sometimes, if the target is currently
moving, it can be best to hold a Beast-spawning
Kill Command to allow the target to stand still before you
send your Stampede. But remember, only Beasts spawned during
Lead From the Front spawn a Stampede.
The fact of this Set Bonus gives rise to a playstyle quirk called Double-Stampedeing. Performing this is explained in our rotation, and a detailed explanation of the logic behind it can be found here, if you are interested.
The buttons below can be used to select between curated Single-Target and AoE/Mythic+ loadouts. You can also use the switches below to add or remove individual talents you may also be using.
To see our recommended Talent Builds in detail, visit the Talent page:
Hero Talents | |
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Talent Selections, etc. | ||
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Single-Target Opener for
Pack Leader Beast Mastery Hunter
- Ensure
Hunter's Mark is active on the target from you or another Hunter in the group!
- Use
Bestial Wrath. It is extremely important that you do not precast this before boss combat begins. Wait until the boss has definitely been pulled, then you can press it, otherwise you will lose the
Howl of the Pack Leader proc it gives.
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Kill Command
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Bloodshed alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Use
Call of the Wild alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Proceed with your normal Rotation according to the priority list below.
Single-Target Rotation for
Pack Leader Beast Mastery Hunter
This priority list describes the optimal single-target Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter:
- Trinket Usage Try to maximize the number of uses of all on-use Trinkets as your first priority. We are not a bursty spec, but the closest we can get is
Howl of the Pack Leader Bear spawns during
Bestial Wrath, so if you are ever going to hold a Trinket for a bit, it should be for this.
- Activate
Bestial Wrath on cooldown. As a minmax worth ~1%, if
Howl of the Pack Leader's remaining cooldown is above ~16 seconds, you should hold
Bestial Wrath until the cooldown is below 16 seconds. The logic behind this is explained in detail here. This WeakAura can help you nail this window. When it says HOLD, do not press
Bestial Wrath yet!
- Prioritize using
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command under either of the following conditions:
- If
Barbed Shot is at, or close to, 2 charges.
- If
Barbed Shot is closer to reaching 2 charges than
Kill Command is.
- Alternatively, just prioritize
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command whenever this WeakAura tells you to.
- If
- Use
Call of the Wild whenever possible.
- Use
Bloodshed whenever possible.
- Use
Kill Command whenever possible, if none of the
Barbed Shot conditions above are true. During
Lead From the Front, if
Howl of the Pack Leader is coming up imminently, hold a
Kill Command charge to be able to send it immediately. You do not want
Lead From the Front to expire while you have a Howl charge ready, as that is a lost
Stampede from your 4PC!
- Use
Barbed Shot whenever possible, as a low-priority fallback if none of the higher
Barbed Shot conditions are true.
- Use
Cobra Shot when you have nothing else to do.
Single-Target Opener for
Dark Ranger Beast Mastery Hunter in The War Within
- Ensure
Hunter's Mark is active on the target from you or another Hunter in the group!
- Use
Bestial Wrath. It is extremely important that you do not precast this before boss combat begins. Wait until the boss has definitely been pulled, then you can press it, otherwise you will lose the
Howl of the Pack Leader proc it gives.
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Kill Command
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Bloodshed alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Use
Call of the Wild alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Proceed with your normal Rotation according to the priority list below.
Single-Target Rotation for
Dark Ranger Beast Mastery Hunter
This priority list describes the optimal single-target Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter:
- Trinket Usage Try to maximize the number of uses of all on-use Trinkets as your first priority. We are not a bursty spec, but the closest we can get is
Howl of the Pack Leader Bear spawns during
Bestial Wrath, so if you are ever going to hold a Trinket for a bit, it should be for this.
- Cast
Black Arrow whenever possible.
- Activate
Bestial Wrath on cooldown. Hold it for up to 20 seconds for
Call of the Wild.
- Use
Barbed Shot if it is about to reach 2 charges.
- Use
Bloodshed whenever possible.
- Use
Call of the Wild whenever possible.
- Use
Kill Command on cooldown.
- Use
Barbed Shot on cooldown.
- Use
Cobra Shot when you have nothing else to do.
AoE Opener for Beast Mastery Hunter in The War Within
- Ensure
Hunter's Mark is active on the target from you or another Hunter in the group!
- Use
Bestial Wrath. It is extremely important that you do not precast this before raid boss combat begins. Wait until the boss has definitely been pulled, then you can press it, otherwise you will lose the
Howl of the Pack Leader proc it gives. Outside of raid, it is generally fine to send it a little early.
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Call of the Wild alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Activate
Beast Cleave with
Multi-Shot. If specced
Bloody Frenzy, simply activate
Call of the Wild to activate
Beast Cleave for 20 seconds.
- Use
Kill Command
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Bloodshed alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Proceed with your normal Rotation according to the priority list below.
AoE Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter
This priority list describes the optimal AoE Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter:
- Trinket Usage Try to maximize the number of uses of all on-use Trinkets as your first priority. We are not a bursty spec, but the closest we can get is
Howl of the Pack Leader Bear spawns during
Bestial Wrath, so if you are ever going to hold a Trinket for a bit, it should be for this.
- Activate
Bestial Wrath on cooldown. Note that holding
Bestial Wrath is not worth it on AoE, even if your WeakAura suggests to.
- Prioritize using
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command under either of the following conditions:
- If
Barbed Shot is at, or close to, 2 charges.
- If
Barbed Shot is closer to reaching 2 charges than
Kill Command is.
- If your next
Kill Command has a
Howl of the Pack Leader proc, and
Barbed Shot is within 8 seconds of reaching 2 charges.
- Alternatively, just prioritize
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command whenever this WeakAura tells you to.
- If
- Apply and maintain
Beast Cleave using
Multi-Shot. It is not absolutely imperative that you refresh it before it falls off if higher-priority abilities are available, but this is the priority that applying it falls under. In any case, you should never refresh it any earlier than ~0.4s remaining. This WeakAura can help you with this. Note that
Black Arrow also applies
Beast Cleave, and is a much better way of doing so than casting Multi-Shot, but you need
Deathblow procs to do so.
- Use
Call of the Wild whenever possible. This activates
Beast Cleave for 20 seconds.
- Use
Bloodshed whenever possible.
- Use
Kill Command whenever possible, if none of the
Barbed Shot conditions above are true. During
Lead From the Front, if
Howl of the Pack Leader is coming up imminently, hold a
Kill Command charge to be able to send it immediately. You do not want
Lead From the Front to expire while you have a Howl charge ready, as that is a lost
Stampede from your 4PC!
- Use
Cobra Shot when you have nothing else to do.
Single-Target Opener for
Dark Ranger Beast Mastery Hunter in The War Within
- Ensure
Hunter's Mark is active on the target from you or another Hunter in the group!
- Use
Bestial Wrath. It is extremely important that you do not precast this before boss combat begins. Wait until the boss has definitely been pulled, then you can press it, otherwise you will lose the
Howl of the Pack Leader proc it gives.
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Kill Command
- Use
Barbed Shot.
- Use
Bloodshed alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Use
Call of the Wild alongside your Potion and stat-granting on-use Trinkets.
- Proceed with your normal Rotation according to the priority list below.
Single-Target Rotation for
Dark Ranger Beast Mastery Hunter
This priority list describes the optimal single-target Rotation for Beast Mastery Hunter:
- Trinket Usage Stat-granting on-use Trinkets should be used with
Call of the Wild whenever possible, while still maximizing their total number of uses.
- Cast
Black Arrow whenever possible.
- Activate
Bestial Wrath on cooldown. Hold it for up to 20 seconds for
Call of the Wild.
- Prioritize using
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command under either of the following conditions:
- If
Barbed Shot is at, or close to, 2 charges.
- If
Barbed Shot is closer to reaching 2 charges than
Kill Command is.
- Alternatively, just prioritize
Barbed Shot over
Kill Command whenever this WeakAura tells you to.
- If
- Apply and maintain
Beast Cleave using
Multi-Shot. It is not absolutely imperative that you refresh it before it falls off if higher-priority abilities are available, but this is the priority that applying it falls under. In any case, you should never refresh it any earlier than ~0.4s remaining. This WeakAura can help you with this. Note that
Black Arrow also applies
Beast Cleave, and is a much better way of doing so than casting Multi-Shot, but you need
Deathblow procs to do so.
- Use
Bloodshed whenever possible.
- Use
Call of the Wild whenever possible.
- Use
Barbed Shot on cooldown.
- Use
Kill Command on cooldown.
- Use
Cobra Shot if you are above 90 Focus. Do not overcast this, as it will limit your ability to
Multi-Shot for
Beast Cleave.
Single-Target Rotation Goals for Beast Mastery Hunter
- Juggling your
Barbed Shot and
Kill Commands in accordance with the latest theorycrafting. This WeakAura takes care of much of it for you.
- Maximize
Bestial Wrath uptime by using it on cooldown and maximizing the number of
Barbed Shots we are firing, as each Barbed Shot is worth 12 seconds of Bestial Wrath cooldown reduction.
- As with every spec, maximizing actions cast per minute above all. Quantity always beats quality for a DPS rotation. You should never stop pressing buttons unless you are forced to due to resources, no matter what mechanics are happening. With how simple the spec is in general, how often you press your buttons will often be your primary form of skill expression.
AoE Rotation Goals for Beast Mastery Hunter
- All the same goals as the single-target Rotation.
- Maintaining
Beast Cleave (by using
Multi-Shot) at close to 100% uptime, ensuring that all your pet abilities are constantly dealing AoE damage.
- Being extra careful with Focus management to ensure that you can always refresh
Beast Cleave as late as possible while simultaneously casting all your
Kill Commands whenever possible.
Important Note: Because the in-game "auto-cast" system for Hunter pets is very slow, it is recommended to put these 3 lines into macros for all of your offensive spells.
- /cast [@pettarget]Claw
- /cast [@pettarget]Bite
- /cast [@pettarget]Smack
We recommend adding these 3 lines to the end of your macros.
This ensures that you will always cast your pet's Basic Attack whenever possible since Blizzard's automatic cast will delay each cast by up to 0.1 seconds. It is a very small but real DPS increase. There is no reason not to do this, even if Blizzard eventually fixes it. For more macros, please refer to our Beast Mastery Hunter macro page.
Rotation WeakAuras for Beast Mastery Hunter
I recommend that you
grab my Barbed Shot Helper WeakAura. It
will pop up when it is time to cast Barbed Shot automatically, and it
lets you focus on the rest of the Rotation.
In the Single-Target and AoE sections, you will find a highly detailed priority list breakdown of the Rotation, as well as optimal openers.
Combat Assistant & One-Button Mode for Beast Mastery Hunter
The game offers the option of an in-game "Combat Assistant", which has two modes; A Rotation Helper that will suggest spells to cast next, and a "One-Button Mode", that automatically performs this rotation for you if you simply press one button repeatedly.
These tools can be worthwhile for beginners, as they provide a reasonable "minimum" level of performance. For Beast Mastery Hunter, using just the Rotation Helper is a ~1-15% DPS loss compared to playing perfectly (which almost nobody does), the lower bound being single-target and the upper bound being AoE. Using the one-button mode adds another ~15-18% to this DPS loss, with the lower bound being for single-target and the upper bound being on AoE.
Obviously, peak performance cannot be obtained using these tools, but it is something worth considering if you are happy to take the DPS losses above for the sake of ease of play. Do not let anyone in-game or on a forum or Discord tell you that there is something inherently wrong with using these tools! Blizzard created them for a reason, and the game is about having fun, whatever that means for you.
WeakAuras for Beast Mastery Hunters in The War Within
WeakAuras can have a tremendously positive effect on your performance. Since this is a broad topic, we made a page dedicated to it.
Simplified Beast Mastery Hunter Rotation for Beginners
If the rotations above seem overwhelming to you, you might benefit from visiting our Easy Mode page, which outlines a close-to-optimal rotation in simpler terms.
Mythic+ Tips and Tricks for Beast Mastery Hunter
For information about Mythic+ as a Beast Mastery Hunter, please refer to our Mythic+ page.
PvP
The content on this page is purely PvE-related. If you are looking for PvP Rotation Tips, please visit our PvP page below.
Addons and Macros for Beast Mastery Hunter Rotation
Check out our Addons/Macros page below for some recommended Addons and Macros to get the most out of your Beast Mastery Hunter!
Questions for the Author
Thanks for reading my Rotation Guide for Beast Mastery Hunter If you have any questions about it that you would like to ask me directly, feel free to drop into my Discord Server and drop me (Azortharion) a ping at any time.
Changelog
- 17 Aug. 2025: Rotational updates and clarifications.
- 16 Aug. 2025: Added info on DPS gain from holding Bestial Wrath.
- 08 Aug. 2025: Added a note on Kill Command-holding for Howl during Lead from the Front with 4PC.
- 05 Aug. 2025: AoE Rotation and opener changes.
- 04 Aug. 2025: Updated for Patch 11.2.
- 15 Jun. 2025: Updated for Patch 11.1.7.
- 20 May 2025: Added a small rotational minmax to the single-target rotation worth ~+0.3% DPS.
- 29 Apr. 2025: Put the Barbed Shot Helper in a more obvious place.
- 21 Apr. 2025: Reviewed for Patch 11.1.5.
- 25 Mar. 2025: Updated for March 25 Updates.
- 18 Mar. 2025: Updated the rotation defaults for new Talents.
- 14 Mar. 2025: Single-Target opener change.
- 09 Mar. 2025: Rewrote and simplified the Rotation significantly.
- 24 Feb. 2025: Updated for Patch 11.1.0.
- 15 Dec. 2024: Updated for Patch 11.0.7.
- 04 Nov. 2024: Removed Withering Fire holding for Bestial Wrath.
- 30 Oct. 2024: Small Barbed Shot AoE Priority change.
- 25 Oct. 2024: Updated both rotations slightly.
- 22 Oct. 2024: Updated for Patch 11.0.5.
- 08 Oct. 2024: Updated default talent selections.
- 02 Oct. 2024: Added more specific Trinket usage information.
- 10 Sep. 2024: Updated the Dark Ranger Single-Target Opener slightly.
- 09 Sep. 2024: Single-Target Opener update.
- 30 Aug. 2024: Preliminary update pass in preparation for Season 1.
- 26 Aug. 2024: Updated the Kill Shot priorities in the Single-Target Rotation based on APL updates by Yanix, +0.5% DPS.
- 22 Aug. 2024: Updated for The War Within.
- 01 Aug. 2024: Simplified Dire Beast rotation use. Small opener changes.
- 24 Jul. 2024: Updated the rotation and openers based on the latest APL updates.
- 23 Jul. 2024: Updated for The War Within Pre-Patch.
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This guide has been written by Azortharion, a Hunter Guidewriter, Theorycrafter, and top player since 2014, who is widely considered one of the best PvE Hunters in the world. He is an accomplished player with hundreds of top parses across all Hunter specs. He is the Head Admin of Trueshot Lodge, the official Hunter Class Discord. You can find him on his stream on Twitch and his channel on YouTube. He also has his own, personal Discord server where you can freely ask him any Hunter questions you may have!
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