Marksmanship Hunter DPS Spec, Builds, Talents, and Pet Talents — Dragonflight 10.0.7
On this page, you will find out the best talents for each tier for your Marksmanship Hunter in World of Warcraft — Dragonflight 10.0.7. We also have default talent lists for various types of content, such as raiding or Mythic+. If you play with Warmode on, we have your PvP talents covered as well.
If you were looking for WotLK Classic content, please refer to our WotLK Classic Marksmanship Hunter talents.
Dragonflight Talent Explanations for Marksmanship Hunter
On our Spells page below, you can see a full explanation of every ability and Talent for Marksmanship Hunter. We recommend checking it out to familiarize yourself before studying the build below!
Best Dragonflight Single-Target Talent Build for Marksmanship Hunter
This talent setup is almost entirely single-target focused, with very little active cleave to speak of. We explain the details of the build further below.
Be sure to make use of the 'Copy Export String' button to import the best build directly into your game!
Best Mythic+ Talents for Marksmanship Hunter
This is our recommended build for Mythic+, and will also work well for the majority of AoE situations in the Raid. There are variations of this build for specific situations described below. You can also find specific builds for every raid boss on our Vault of the Incarnates page, and more specific Mythic+ Talent Choice notes on our Mythic+ Page.
Be sure to make use of the 'Copy Export String' button to import the best build directly into your game!
AoE Build Notes
The optimal build can change depending on the target count you are facing. The build above is optimal for most forms of AoE content, including most Raid Fights with AoE elements, and practically all Mythic+. For completion, here are some notes that are worth keeping in mind when building your MM Hunter for AoE.
- We choose
Wailing Arrow despite it being slightly inferior for DPS. This is because the silence is hugely useful in Mythic+. If you are Raiding, or simply do not need the silence, pick
Hunter's Knowledge instead.
-
On 4 targets only, replace
Poison Injection with
Hydra's Bite, and
Wailing Arrow/
Hunter's Knowledge for
Heavy Ammo This applies to the Primal Council Fight in the Vault of the Incarnates.
-
On 7+ targets only, do the same as above, but go for
Light Ammo instead.
Alternative Viable Builds
If you hate Steel Trap, you can drop it and a point of
Serrated Shots to chase
Arctic Bola/
Explosive Shot
instead, for a ~2% DPS loss.
Best Talent Build Explanations for Marksmanship Hunters
Note that we do not explain EVERY talent in the tree on this page. We only explain ones that are part of our optimal builds for single-target and AoE. For full details and explanations of every Talent, please visit our Spells page via the button below.
Marksmanship Hunter Class Tree Rationale and Explanations
Row 1-4
Kill Shot is a strong DPS button and a mandatory pick.
Posthaste is essential as one of our strongest mobility talents.
Improved Kill Shot is a passive, powerful increase to our
Kill Shot's damage.
Counter Shot is our main interrupt.
Natural Mending provides incredible CDR to
Exhilaration and is a must-pick for survivability. If you are not using
Exhilaration very liberally, you can get away with dropping a point here for other utility.
Tar Trap is not great, but it leads us on a path to better talents, as we need to get to the left side of the tree later on.
Survival of the Fittest is a strong defensive for both one-shots and powerful DoTs.
Row 5-7
Tranquilizing Shot is useful for many scenarios and leads us to better talents on the left side of the tree.
Nature's Endurance is a must-pick if you can get it, as it doubles the damage reduction of
Survival of the Fittest.
Born To Be Wild is a solid pick for lower Turtle and Cheetah cooldowns, making it strong for both survivability and mobility.
Improved Tranquilizing Shot is a bit of an incentive to
Tranquilizing Shot when we can, and leads us nicely to the left side of the tree, which becomes important.
High Explosive Trap is situationally useful to move mobs around, such as Sanguine weeks in Mythic+.
Binding Shot/
Scatter Shot are both viable options in this choice node and are necessary to pick up other essential Talents. For most Mythic+, we recommend
Binding Shot, but
Scatter Shot can be used as a single-target cast stopper, similar to
Intimidation.
Rejuvenating Wind increases our maximum health and gives our
Exhilaration some extra power, which can be useful or weak depending on how liberal you are with
Exhilaration usage. This is mandatory for the maximum HP.
Camouflage is useful for skips and out-of-combat self-healing in Mythic+. Still, practically useless for Raiding.
Hunter's Avoidance is a much-needed boost to our survivability on unavoidable mechanics.
Pathfinding is a solid boost to movement speed, but you can drop a point here to pick up other utility as needed.
Row 8-10
-
Keen Eyesight is a strong DPS increase and is a mandatory pick.
-
Master Marksman is a strong DPS increase and is a mandatory pick.
-
Serrated Shots is a decent DPS talent, and importantly leads us to
Steel Trap for single-target, while for AoE it is just a bit of extra DPS.
-
Arctic Bola is a bit of a DPS increase, and we pick it at the lack of other options.
-
Serpent Sting is rarely actually used as an ability, but we need it to get to the hugely important talent below.
Steel Trap is a strong single-target DPS option.
-
Death Chakram introduces a mini-cooldown to our rotation, enhancing our burst a little and focuses on amplifying other damage, even though it does not do a ton of damage on its own.
-
Poison Injection has incredible synergy with our
Serpentstalker's Trickery Talent that we talk about later, and is a free, high DPS increase.
-
Hydra's Bite is useful for 3-4 target situations only. It is the same DPS as
Poison Injection for AoE scenarios, but has less single-target, so we skip it for Mythic+.
Marksmanship Hunter Spec Tree Rationale and Explanations
Row 1-4
-
Aimed Shot,
Crack Shot, and
Precise Shots are mandatory to get started with the build. There is not much to say about them.
Improved Steady Shot is not as necessary as it may seem, and you can omit it for a point of
Hunter's Knowledge if you prefer. Still, we do recommend it as a default.
-
Rapid Fire is another core ability that will also generate Focus for us in the absence of
Improved Steady Shot.
-
Lone Wolf requires us to not use a pet in all situations for optimal DPS.
-
Streamline is a solid, passive DPS increase and leads us to multiple important talents.
-
Hunter's Knowledge has strong per-point DPS value for all situations.
Row 5-7
-
Surging Shots is a huge DPS increase and also has some impact on the feel of the rotation.
-
Deathblow turns
Kill Shot into a heavily featured button in the regular rotation, and is a large DPS increase.
Target Practice is mandatory and a large DPS increase.
-
Focused Aim is similar to
Hunter's Knowledge, providing a little more DPS per point.
-
Multi-Shot is what enables our entire AoE kit and is mandatory when you need to AoE, even a little.
-
Pouch of Razor Fragments makes
Kill Shot a powerful cleave ability, but is also powerful enough on single-target.
-
Steady Focus is a strong maintenance buff with a high passive DPS increase. We steer clear of it for Mythic+ as it is a hassle to maintain, however.
Deadeye competes with
Steady Focus and is a simpler option with no maintenance, but the damage loss is too great to go for it.
Trick Shots is the second mandatory node for our AoE damage.
-
Volley is a strong button in all situations, but especially on large amounts of AoE targets. It is worth using and pressing even in single-target situations and provides our single-target build with some on-demand AoE as well.
-
Tactical Reload will give us more of our heavy-hitters, particularly in AoE situations.
-
Serpentstalker's Trickery pairs with
Poison Injection for a substantial DPS increase.
Aimed Shot can be cycled between multiple targets to essentially multidot
Serpent Sting this way.
Row 8-10
-
Light Ammo/
Heavy Ammo are used for specifically for 7+ target situations, and 4-target situations respectively. We replace
Bullseye/
Wailing Arrow in these scenarios.
-
Trueshot is our main cooldown and mandatory, enabling our extremely powerful burst damage.
-
Lock and Load introduces a bit of powerful RNG to our rotation, but is a solid DPS increase.
a
-
Bullseye enables amazing execute damage, especially paired with another talent talked about below
-
Bulletstorm is an immensely powerful AoE talent and is chosen for all such situations.
-
Eagletalon's True Focus enhances our
Trueshot and improves our burst damage even further.
Wailing Arrow is excellent utility for Mythic+, and a decent DPS pick, although technically inferior to
Bullseye for pure DPS.
-
Salvo can be macro'd to
Volley for a massive, passive damage boost. The macro can be found in the Macros section of this guide.
-
Unerring Vision enhances our burst by boosting our main cooldown. A must-pick in all situations.
Mythic+
Mythic+ can potentially require a mix of certain AoE and Single-Target talents, depending on affixes and other variables. If you want advice that is specific to Mythic+, you should check out our page below.
How To Use Marksmanship Hunter Talents
Some talents will require you to play in a particular way to get the most out of them. You can find more information on how your rotation will look after selecting your talents on our rotation page below.
Best Pet for Marksmanship Hunter in Dragonflight
Firstly, it is important to note that all pets do the same damage. They only differ in their utility and occasionally defensive capabilities.
Marksmanship
does not use a pet unless it is absolutely required in order to have
Bloodlust (in our case,
Primal Rage) available within the
group.
Given this, when we do use a pet, it will always be a
Ferocity one, as they
provide Primal Rage. Since all pets do identical damage, you can use
whichever Ferocity pet you want. In certain edge cases, a Mortal Wounds Pet
can provide an effective DPS increase by reducing enemy healing done to
itself.
You can see a list of all pet families and their special abilities on the Spells Summary page of this guide.
Marksmanship Hunter Dragonflight PvP Talents
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 make yourself available for open world PvP, and the possibility to be "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.
PvP Talents (War Mode) for Marksmanship Hunter
In this section, we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking of all PvP Talents for Marksmanship Hunter
Best PvP Talents for Marksmanship Hunter
-
Ranger's Finesse will give you far more
Exhilarations, saving you time and deaths in rough situations.
-
Sniper Shot lets you attack mobs from farther away, saving time in the process.
-
Hunting Pack is a valuable speed increase for leveling and open world content.
You can consider the other options to be essentially down to preference.
For details on how to play Marksmanship Hunter in PvP, please visit our Marksmanship Hunter PvP page.
Pet Talents
Pets do not have talent trees. Instead, different types of pet belong to one of three difference specs: Ferocity, Tenacity, and Cunning.
Each specialisation grants your pet a few specific abilities. Currently, there is no DPS difference between the different pet specs. The only differences are in utility.
Changelog
- 21 Mar. 2023: Updated the talents for the 10.0.7 talent reshuffle.
- 15 Feb. 2023: Updated the utility talents in the M+ Build.
- 30 Jan. 2023: Small updates to talent swaps.
- 25 Jan. 2023: Updated the Talent Builds again after the discovery of a sim bug. Added alternative to Steady Focus. Changed the "swap" talent for Wailing Arrow to Bullseye.
- 24 Jan. 2023: Updated the page for relevant changes in Patch 10.0.5.
- 21 Jan. 2023: Fixed a wrong note about which talent to swap for Ammo Talents.
- 17 Jan. 2023: Updated the recommended Single-Target Talent Build.
- 23 Dec. 2022: Updated the recommended builds to reflect that Unerring Vision is fixed and worth using again.
- 18 Dec. 2022: Updated the recommended talent builds to reflect that Unerring Vision is bugged.
- 16 Dec. 2022: Added note that you do not need to use Serpent Sting manually with Hydra's Bite.
- 11 Dec. 2022: Updated the recommended single-target talent build in light of recent buffs.
- 28 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 24 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
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This guide has been written by Azortharion, a Hunter Theorycrafter and Guidewriter since 2014, and considered one of the best Hunters in the world. He is an accomplished player with dozen of top parses for all specs throughout the game's history. He is also the Admin of Trueshot Lodge, the Hunter Class Discord, and you can watch his stream on Twitch. He even has his own personal Discord channel where you can get notifications about when the guides get updated and have direct communications with him.
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