Beast Mastery Hunter DPS Guide — Dragonflight 10.0.7

Beast Mastery Hunter is a highly mobile ranged DPS spec. It is the only Ranged spec in the game that is able to fully execute its rotation while moving. This makes it incredibly useful for dealing with mechanics in raids and dungeons, as it can do these things with no damage penalty.

We are maintaining a list of changes for Hunters, so you can see what changes with every patch of Dragonflight.

The Epic Bow from Raszageth has been redesigned and is now significantly weaker. Instead of increasing auto-attack speeds, including that of your pet, it now increases auto-attack damage, and only affects your own shots. Instead of being worth 12% DPS, it is now worth 1-2%. We have been buffed to compensate.

• Stomp damage increased by 25%.
• Cobra Shot damage increased by 50%.
• Kill Command damage increased by 10%.
• Barbed Shot damage increased by 12%.
• Kill Cleave now transfers 60% of Kill Command damage (was 50%).
• Serpent Sting damage increased by 25%.
• Death Chakram damage increased by 100%.

These buffs are a net 2% single-target and 5% AoE DPS increase for Neltharax users, and far larger for those who do not have it yet.

Rejuvenating Wind (Class Talent) now also increases maximum HP by 4% per rank (up to 8% at two ranks).

This is a significant buff to our passive survivability, especially when it comes to negating oneshot mechanics from full HP.

Beast Mastery is simply the strongest single-target spec in the game, dominating the boss DPS charts on nearly every boss. The price it pays for this is mediocre AoE and little to no on-demand burst.

It is a bit worse in Mythic+ where its relatively low burst AoE damage holds it back. It is far better on Tyrannical weeks than Fortified weeks of Mythic+.

Burst damage is also rather low for Beast Mastery, meaning it cannot be relied on to push through chokepoints and damage phases in raid and Mythic+ encounters. The trade-off is that the average damage is rather high, and you will almost never find yourself without decent damage for an important moment.

This section aims to give you a quick overview of where each Hunter spec is strongest, and where Beast Mastery Hunter fits into the hierarchy of Hunter specs for different situations. This is based on simulations, and could differ slightly from real life observations.

1. Survival Hunter
2. Beast Mastery Hunter (3% behind)
3. Marksmanship Hunter (4% behind)

1. Survival Hunter
2. Marksmanship Hunter (4% behind)
3. Beast Mastery Hunter (10% behind)

1. Beast Mastery Hunter
2. Marksmanship Hunter (4% behind)
3. Survival Hunter (17% behind)

1. Beast Mastery Hunter
2. Marksmanship Hunter (20% behind)
3. Survival Hunter (28% behind)

If you want to play a Beast Mastery Hunter, but currently do not have one at max level, you can check out our leveling guide for tips on your journey.

Once you reach max level, it can be somewhat overwhelming to completely change the way you play by suddenly implementing a large number of addons in a short space of time, especially if they have a heavy visual impact on your UI. We recommend using some of the more basic addons recommended on our Addons page below while leveling, so that you have more time to get used to them during the easier phases of playing your class.

Beast Mastery Hunter is a spec about buff, cooldown, and pet management all at the same time. The fundamental rotation is simple, focused on spending Focus exclusively, since you have no active Focus generators.

Most of your time will be spent casting Cobra Shot and Kill Command, with Barbed Shot being used to maintain your pet's Frenzy buff, another big part of the spec. You will also regularly be using your main cooldown, Bestial Wrath.

If you are an absolute beginner to the spec, but would like to learn the basic fundamentals of the class, recommend looking through the Spell Summary first, as well as the Easy Mode page linked below.

If you are already somewhat familiar with Hunters, you can head straight to the Talents and Rotation pages to jump right into the more complex, detailed information.

Despite the fact that gearing has become more challenging, due to the huge number of variables that depend on your character, you can find information on how best to gear as Beast Mastery on our dedicated gearing page, which includes the current Best in Slot from this tier.

Once you have started to gear, you will need to make sure that you have the appropriate consumables, gems, enchants, and more. We have a dedicated page for exactly this, as shown below, as well as the stats page, where you can find more information on the possibility of a changing stat priority and the necessary changes you may need to make for consumables.

Starting off as Beast Mastery can look very different from the absolute end-game raiding and progression as one. Our Mythic+, Raiding, and PvP guides can guide you to performing as well as possible, regardless of your focus in end-game content.

If you are finding your performance lackluster, but are not sure where you are going wrong, you can check out the pages below for potential tips, or answers to questions you may have.