Beast Mastery Hunter DPS Spec, Builds, Talents, and Pet Talents — 12.1

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Beast Mastery plays Pack Leader in all content. Dark Ranger is tankier, but it is far behind on damage in all situations, and it is also a lot more effort to play optimally. We provide Dark Ranger builds below for those who prefer the playstyle, but we do not recommend you playing it.

• Single Target - For anything pure single-target, Pack Leader is our choice.
• AoE - Pack Leader again. It has the best damage across the board, and while Dark Ranger is notably tankier, it is not enough to justify the DPS cost and rotational complexity it adds.

Quick Start Import Codes:

The builds listed above are popular recommendations, covering various different loadouts suited to each style of endgame content. Each Talent Build will have its own rotation, and can also be manipulated further for specific types of content and to better benefit your group.

Combat Information

Rotations and Mythic+

Want to dive deeper? These guides will teach you how to utilize our Talent Builds in endgame content!

RotationMythic+

The Omnium Folio is the "borrowed power" system introduced in Midnight's Patch 12.0.7, and offers some moderately strong customization options after a short questline. Some of these bonuses affect your damage output, but there are also defensive and mobility options to choose from.

Your Folio progress carries over into Season 2. Take these bonuses:

• Rune of Unleashed Fire
• Rune of Void-Tainted Shell
• Rune of Lingering
• Rune of Masterful Cunning. This one is the most flexible and may change as your gear's stat demands do, just like your Flask or Weapon Enchant. Mastery is a safe "never bad" pick.
• Rune of Overload

Midnight introduces new Apex Talents, unlocked between Level 80 and 90. Beast Mastery gets:

1. Nature's Ally
2. Nature's Ally
3. Nature's Ally

These make Bestial Wrath deal a significant chunk of damage, instead of just being a passive damage buff. The last point also incentivizes never using Kill Command twice in a row; you should always use a filler ability like Barbed Shot or Cobra Shot in between.

Available at level 71, Hero talents are mutually exclusive trees you can choose to slightly alter gameplay and visuals. Beast Mastery Hunter can choose between Dark Ranger and Pack Leader.

Dark Ranger gives you Black Arrow, which deals heavy damage. You will regularly get procs from it from Kill Command and Barbed Shot that allow it to be used on any target at any time. These procs are not an especially high priority, falling between Kill Command and Barbed Shot for the most part. Dark Ranger can be thought of as "Beast Mastery with an extra button" for the most part. When you activate Bestial Wrath, the button itself will turn into Wailing Arrow, which does heavy damage and gives you a Black Arrow proc.

Defensively, Dark Ranger offers Smoke Screen, which is simply amazing, as it gives us extremely easy access to Survival of the Fittest nearly all the time.

Pack Leader is our simplest Hero Talent, adding almost nothing in terms of gameplay intrigue. Occasionally, your Kill Command will trigger a Beast via Howl of the Pack Leader. These Beasts simply do damage, or increase your damage done. In addition, your first Kill Command after Bestial Wrath will summon a Stampede, a line of pets that do heavy AoE damage to all targets caught within. We detail its usage more on our rotation page.

Defensively, Pack Leader gives us Shell Cover, which buffs the effectiveness of our Survival of the Fittest. Not great.

These picks are for open world PvE content with War Mode enabled, not for actual PvP.

War Mode offers several benefits for you in the open world.

• PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world.
• At least 10% increase in World Quest rewards at maximum level.
• 10% more experience gained while leveling.
• Earn Conquest Points, which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended to enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will be flagged for open-world PvP, and the possibility of being "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

• The Beast Within makes you and your pet immune to Fear and Horror effects while Bestial Wrath is active, and nearby allied pets gain 10% attack speed.
• Hunting Pack is a valuable speed increase for leveling and open world content.
• Wild Kingdom swaps in one of your stabled Tenacity or Cunning pets and sends your current pet away to heal 30% of its maximum health, which saves it when a pull goes badly.

Azortharion

Guide Author

Follow Azortharion

This guide has been written by Azortharion, a full-timer Hunter Guidewriter, Theorycrafter, Content Creator, 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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