WoW Classic Beast Mastery Hunter Leveling Guide 1-60

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Your first talent unlocks at Level 10.

Improved Aspect of the Hawk is a huge damage gain when it procs, making it a solid choice for both leveling and at Level 60, regardless of spec. Improved Revive Pet is hugely important for if your pet ever dies during combat and just to make it easier to cast. Thick Hide will reduce the damage your pet takes. Endurance Training is a mediocre alternative, but max health is worse than reducing damage taken.

Pathfinding will improve your travel time, which will make your life much easier until you get a mount. Bestial Swiftness will improve your pet's ability to engage enemies and run to new enemies as you need it to, reducing the amount of time you need to wait before you can attack new enemies. Unleashed Fury and Ferocity are solid damage increases for your pet, which will also increase its threat generation.

Intimidation is a great ability to have for threat generation, crowd control, and as a survival tool. You should talent it before finishing Ferocity, or as soon as you hit Level 30. Bestial Discipline is more of a personal preference for where you want to put this point, but is an average option, letting your pet do more damage through its Focus spending abilities. Frenzy is one of the most powerful talents you will pick up, and will help your pet's damage and threat immensely. It is also worth noting that once you pick up this talent, pets with faster attack speeds become much stronger, due to the higher uptime they will have from this talent.

Bestial Wrath is an incredible damage cooldown that you should use whenever possible. This ability is what makes this spec viable at low gear levels at Level 60. After you pick up Bestial Wrath, go into the Marksmanship tree. For the first talent, this is a personal preference choice based on what type of server you are playing on. If you plan on doing no PvP at all, take Efficiency. If there is any chance you might encounter some PvP, take Improved Concussive Shot. Improved Concussive Shot is one of the best PvP talents that Hunters have, and is essential for any PvP build. This talent is one of the reasons you will be the bane of any melee opponent. Lastly, Lethal Shots is a strong damage increase.

After finishing off Lethal Shots, pick up Aimed Shot. This will be your hardest hitting ability, and should be used as an opener on any enemy you fight. It is worth nothing that Aimed Shot shares a cooldown with Arcane Shot, so once you pick up Aimed Shot, you will rarely, if ever, Arcane Shot. The extra range from Hawk Eye is a nice quality of life increase, and will also make PvP much easier. The next point is personal preference just to unlock Mortal Shots, which, again, is a solid damage increase.

1. Command your pet to attack the target;
2. Hunter's Mark;
3. Intimidation;
4. Bestial Wrath;
5. Aimed Shot;
6. Auto Shot;
7. Serpent Sting;
8. Auto Shot;
9. Aimed Shot if you are fine on Mana;
10. Arcane Shot if you are fine on Mana;
11. Multi-Shot if you are fine on Mana;
12. Auto Shot until the enemy is dead.

The key from 1-10 is getting as many auto shots off as possible before the target reaches you. The best way to accomplish this is by kiting backwards, moving in between each shot. At level 8 Concussive Shot can help with this.

Do your class quest to get your pet. Once you have your pet, your kill speed and efficiency should become much better. Make sure you are careful with your threat, and try to let your pet tank whenever possible.

Multi-Shot is a powerful attack, but can cause you to pull aggro off your pet if you use it on multiple enemies. It is incredibly powerful, but losing auto shots from enemies running into your dead zone will be a bigger damage loss.

Feign Death is a great way to drop threat while fighting enemies. You can combine this with Aimed Shot or Multi-Shot to deal a burst of damage right before dropping threat to ensure your pet keeps aggro.

Aimed Shot is a powerful attack, but faces the same issue as Multi-Shot. Use it for bursts of damage, but be careful with your threat.

While leveling, Hunters gain a huge power spike when they complete their Level 10 class quest and get a pet. This is incredibly important for leveling, and outlined in the following guide.

Leveling Information

Hunter Quests

Check out how to gain access to powerful upgrades for your Hunter by completing their class-specific questline!

Go to Guide

All Hunter specs benefit from upgrading the same skills, so our list of skills to buy from trainers is the same, regardless of the spec. For this reason, you will find that list in our general Hunter leveling page.

Endgame Information

Hunter Guides

Finished Leveling? Check out the rest of our Hunter Guide to learn how to maximize your gameplay!

Hunter Endgame Guides

Impakt

Guide Author

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This guide has been written by Impakt, an Officer in BDGG, the #2 North American guild on retail. In addition to live WoW, he has also been a classic theorycrafter and enthusiast for many years. You can watch him stream on Twitch, or follow him on Twitter.

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