Beast Mastery Hunter Best Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits — Dragonflight 10.2.5
Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits are the most important character customization options in Shadowlands. They have a substantial impact on your toolkit and performance as Beast Mastery Hunter. This page's purpose is to help you pick the right options according to the content you intend to do in Shadowlands.
Dragonflight Disclaimer
Please be aware that as of the Dragonflight Pre-Patch and Dragonflight expansion, all Covenant abilities, Soulbinds, and Conduits will only function while within the Shadowlands. This page will temporarily remain as a reference.
Introduction: Prerequisites
This page assumes that you are already familiar with Covenants, Soulbinds, and Conduits. If that is not the case, we have a number of pages that can help you get up to speed:
- Covenants Guide, which explains what Covenants are, what perks they bring, and how you can join one;
- Hunter Covenant Abilities, which lists all the abilities that Hunters gain by joining each Covenant;
- How To Change Covenant?, which tells you how you can switch Covenant (rejoining a former Covenant will require you to perform a number of tasks to regain their trusts);
- General Soulbind Guide, which explains what Soulbinds are and how you can pledge yourself to them to open up their Soulbind tree;
- Hunter Conduits, which lists all of the Conduits available to Hunters.
Best Covenant for Beast Mastery Hunter
- Kyrian with Pelagos/Forgelite Prime Mikanikos is the best general setup for Beast Mastery Hunters. Its damage is better than Night Fae on single-target, and superior on large AoE and in Mythic+ where it also buffs your teammates significantly. It is weaker than Night Fae on 2-4 target burst, but stronger pretty much everywhere else.
- Night Fae with Dreamweaver is a strong setup for Beast Mastery Hunters for pretty much all situations, with strong single-target and extremely powerful AoE burst damage on 2-4 targets via the Fragments of the Elder Antlers Legendary Power. The Dreamweaver Soulbind grants Podtender, which is a "cheat death"-style ability every 10 minutes. It is very important to stand in the Field of Blossoms circle for the full duration of Wild Spirits when using this Soulbind, to enhance your burst.
- Venthyr with Theotar the Mad Duke is the best Venthyr setup for Beast Mastery Hunters. It is generally weaker than Night Fae in all situations, especially AoE and burst, but it has a high-speed, reactive playstyle that many enjoy. Standing in the Parasol provided by Soothing Shade is important.
- Necrolord with Marileth is the best Necrolord setup for Beast Mastery Hunters. It is weak for all situations and should never be played in an optimal setup, but many enjoy the burst damage provided by the Bag of Munitions Legendary Power for Mythic+ especially.
Best Soulbind for Beast Mastery Hunter
- Kyrian always runs Pelagos for pure single-target with the 3 Potency Conduits Enfeebled Mark, One With the Beast, and Bloodletting. For Mythic+ and add fights where you can benefit from Hammer of Genesis, you swap to Forgelite Prime Mikanikos with the same Conduits, except Bloodletting is replaced by Hammer of Genesis. It is mandatory to pick the left side at the bottom of the tree for both Soulbinds to pick up the DPS Soulbind Abilities Soulglow Spectrometer/ Better Together.
- Night Fae always runs Dreamweaver with the 3 Potency Conduits Spirit Attunement, One With the Beast, and Bloodletting. We recommend the right path at the bottom of the Tree, allowing you 2 Endurance and 1 Finesse Conduits.
- Venthyr always runs Theotar the Mad Duke with the 3 Potency Conduits Empowered Release, One With the Beast, and Bloodletting. We recommend going for any path that allows 2 Endurance Conduits, but the path you choose to get there is up to your personal preference and situation.
- Necrolord always runs Plague Deviser Marileth with the 3 Potency Conduits Bloodletting, One With the Beast, and Necrotic Barrage. We recommend picking up 2 Endurance Conduits, and then going for the right path at the bottom of the tree to pick up Undulating Maneuvers.
Best Conduits for Beast Mastery Hunter
Best Potency Conduits for Beast Mastery Hunter
We have mentioned the Potency Conduits in our Soulbind recommendations above. In short, One With the Beast and Bloodletting are always your strongest choices. In all cases except Necrolord, the Covenant-specific Conduit (for example Spirit Attunement) is always picked.
Best Endurance Conduits for Beast Mastery Hunter
- Marksman's Advantage
- Resilience of the Hunter
- Condensed Anima Sphere
- Rejuvenating Wind
- Harmony of the Tortollan
Best Finesse Conduits for Beast Mastery Hunter
- Reversal of Fortune (provided you can Interrupt)
- Cheetah's Vigor
- Ambuscade/ Tactical Retreat
Changelog
- 04 Nov. 2022: Updated the optimal Conduits back again, due to APL updates and the Alpha Predator bugfix.
- 03 Nov. 2022: Updated the optimal Conduits.
- 27 Oct. 2022: Updated the general Covenant recommendation.
- 26 Oct. 2022: Updated Kyrian's description and competitiveness level.
- 24 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
More Hunter Guides
Guides from Other Classes
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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