Marksmanship Hunter PvP Guide (Legion 7.2.5)

Table of Contents

• 1. Spec Overview / Place in the Current Meta
• 2. Gear
• +3. Artifact Traits
  • 3.1. First Golden Trait
  • 3.2. Second Golden Trait
  • 3.3. Remaining Traits
• 4. Relics
• +5. Talent Choices
  • 5.1. Regular Talents
    • 5.1.1. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents
    • 5.1.2. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents
    • 5.1.3. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents
    • 5.1.4. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents
    • 5.1.5. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents
    • 5.1.6. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents
    • 5.1.7. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents
  • 5.2. Honor Talents
    • 5.2.1. Tier 1 Talents
    • 5.2.2. Tier 2 Talents
    • 5.2.3. Tier 3 Talents
    • 5.2.4. Tier 4 Talents
    • 5.2.5. Tier 5 Talents
    • 5.2.6. Tier 6 Talents
• +6. Racial Bonuses
  • 6.1. Horde
  • 6.2. Alliance
• +7. Playstyle
  • 7.1. Before Gates Open
  • 7.2. The Opener
  • 7.3. Offensive Rotation
    • 7.3.1. Burst Damage
    • 7.3.2. Sustained damage
  • 7.4. Defensive Techniques
• 8. ChangeLog

Introduction

This guide will walk you through everything you need to know to play a Marksmanship Hunter in a PvP environment. The guide will cover everything from talent choices, artifacts, gameplay and rotation, and useful racial bonuses. It is most applicable to Arena content, but most talents and racial bonuses will work in Rated Battlegrounds and skirmishes.

About The Author

This guide has been written by Mysticall, a seasoned PvP player who has repeatedly achieved Arena Master and 2300 rating. You can watch his stream on Twitch, and you can also check out his YouTube channel.

1. Spec Overview / Place in the Current Meta

Marksmanship Hunters are probably the strongest Hunter specialization right now. They are unique because, depending on your playstyle, you can AoE a team down with spells like Windburst and Marked Shot, or you can have strong single-target damage with spells like Windburst and Aimed Shot. On top of all of this damage, they also have strong crowd control abilities.

2. Gear

With regards to gear, the biggest change in Legion is that there is no more PvP gear. Your strength in PvP will be determined based on the average item level of your gear (as displayed on your character sheet). For example, the base item level at level 110 is 800, so your stats in PvP will be adjusted accordingly. For every 10 item levels you gain, your stats are increased by 1%.

The implication is that it does not matter where your gear comes from, and all that matters is its item level. Gear from quests or PvE content is just as good as gear you get as a reward from PvP (which, in fact, will be very similar to PvE gear; there are no more PvP stats on gear).

Practically, you will simply look to collect gear with the highest item levels possible, and the stat distribution on the gear will not matter.

3. Artifact Traits

Below, we will explain what the recommended order for artifact traits is, if you wish to maximise your PvP potential. It is quite possible that your artifact path (at the time of reading this guide) differs from our suggestions. If this is the case, do not worry, and use the information below to help you understand your traits and guide your future choices.

If you have suddenly decided that you want to turn to PvP, the best thing to do in your artifact progression is continue to your closest Golden trait, and then follow the recommendations below. Picking up the most useful traits ( Healing Shell, Quick Shot, Survival of the Fittest and Rapid Killing) along the way is a great way to boost your potential.

3.1. First Golden Trait

The first Golden trait you want to reach is Call of the Hunter.

1. Take Wind Arrows.
2. Take Quick Shot. This reduces the cooldown of your strongest burst cooldown, Trueshot. Being able to burst more often is crucial for Marksmanship Hunters.
3. Take Critical Focus. This trait will help with Focus regeneration. Being able to consistently regenerate Focus will increase your sustained damage.
4. Take Survival of the Fittest. Disengage is crucial for getting away from enemies. This makes it so that even if you Disengage and cannot get away, you will be taking less damage.
5. Take Call of the Hunter. You will be using Marked Shot often, so this trait will increase your consistent damage.

3.2. Second Golden Trait

The second Golden trait to go for is Bullseye.

1. Take Precision. Increasing the Critical Strike of your Marked Shot increases your consistent damage.
2. Take Marked for Death. Once again, increasing the Critical Strike of a strong damaging ability, Aimed Shot, will increase your consistent damage.
3. Take Bullseye. This trait is great because you do not have a way to kill an opponent at low health. This will allow you to deal even more damage against low-health targets and help secure a kill.

3.3. Remaining Traits

After this, you should head for your last Golden trait, Legacy of the Windrunners, picking up any remaining traits after that. Healing Shell, Mark of the Windrunner, and Rapid Killing are the traits that should be taken before the final golden trait.

4. Relics

Relics are disabled in PvP, so they are not a concern to you.

5. Talent Choices

Regular talents work in both PvP and PvE content (although they may sometimes work differently in the two environments, which is indicated by their tooltips). In other words, they are always active.

On the other hand, Honor talents are inactive outside of a PvP environment.

5.1. Regular Talents

5.1.1. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents

Steady Focus is the best choice in this tier. This talent gives you a dependable way to regenerate Focus. Regenerating Focus results in more overall damage output.

5.1.2. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents

Black Arrow is the best choice in this tier. This applies a relatively strong DoT to the enemy that will increase your sustained damage.

5.1.3. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents

Posthaste is the best choice in this tier. This gives you even more mobility. It will allow you to run away from enemies if they are focusing you.

5.1.4. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents

Patient Sniper is the best choice in this tier. This talent is an overall increase to your consistent damage.

5.1.5. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents

If you are playing with partners that do not have many stuns, Binding Shot is the best choice in this tier. This will help you get away from enemy melee or land crowd control on the enemy healer. If your team does have multiple stuns, Wyvern Sting will be the choice.

5.1.6. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents

A Murder of Crows is the best choice in this tier. This ability is a very strong offensive cooldown that should be used when trying to secure a kill.

5.1.7. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents

Sidewinders is the best choice in this tier. This talent deals a large amount of damage and is very important for strong consistent damage.

5.2. Honor Talents

5.2.1. Tier 1 Talents

If you are playing against a team with multiple stuns, Relentless is the best choice in this tier. Marksmanship Hunters are weak to stuns, so reducing their duration greatly improves survivability.

If you are not and want an on-demand trinket, Gladiator's Medallion is the best choice in this tier. It is the standard PvP trinket effect with a 2-minute cooldown.

5.2.2. Tier 2 Talents

Quickshots is the best choice in this tier. The Haste gained from this talent will increase your overall damage output.

5.2.3. Tier 3 Talents

If you are playing against a team with a melee on it, Catlike Reflexes is the best choice in this tier. This grants dodge when you score a Critical Strike, which can help avoid enemy damage, greatly improving survivability.

If you are playing against a team with two casters, you should take Survival Tactics in this tier. This makes Feign Death a very important cooldown. It can be used to avoid incoming crowd control and, with this talent, you can remove all magical debuffs.

5.2.4. Tier 4 Talents

The best choice in this tier is Spider Sting. This allows more control when playing against casters, and it can be used to stop incoming crowd control.

5.2.5. Tier 5 Talents

Scatter Shot is the best choice in this tier. This ability will make it easier for you to get crowd control on the enemy healer.

5.2.6. Tier 6 Talents

Ranger's Finesse is the best choice in this tier. This talent is incredibly important for having access to your strong cooldowns faster.

6. Racial Bonuses

Racial bonuses can provide interesting PvP benefits. Here are the best races to choose for each faction.

6.1. Horde

The passive Orc racial bonus ( Hardiness) is great if you find yourself being stunned a lot and having a hard time against melee classes.

The Blood Elf Silence ( Arcane Torrent) is really strong as well. This adds to the crowd control you can bring to the table.

6.2. Alliance

The Human racial bonus ( Every Man for Himself) is a great way to get out of stuns.

7. Playstyle

The main role for a Marksmanship Hunter is simple: use your mobility to land Freezing Traps on the enemy healer and use your strong single-target cooldowns to burst your enemies down. Make sure you pay attention to applying Vulnerable to the enemy team, and also to the Marking Targets buff you gain. Tracking these will help you deal the maximum amount of damage that a Marksmanship Hunter can do.

7.1. Before Gates Open

If you are playing against a team with stealth, make sure to use Flare to try to reveal them.

7.2. The Opener

The opener refers to your team's opening crowd control chain and damage done as soon as you get out of the gates. The main goal in the opener is to force your enemies to use their cooldowns. If the enemy healer uses their trinket in the opener, they are in trouble. Marksmanship Hunters have Freezing Trap, Scatter Shot, and Spider Sting, which can help to this end.

This is the rotation you should use on your target at the beginning of the game.

1. Use Black Arrow on your kill target.
2. Use Sidewinders to apply Vulnerable.
3. Cast Aimed Shot if the enemy team is not focusing you.
4. Use Marking Targets procs to be able to use Marked Shot.
5. Use A Murder of Crows if your teammate needs time to burst.
6. Use your burst rotation.
7. After your burst, perform your sustained damage rotation until your burst cooldowns are available.

7.3. Offensive Rotation

7.3.1. Burst Damage

When you have the enemy healer in crowd control and you are trying to kill an enemy, you use your burst damage. You can use your own crowd control, such as Scatter Shot and Freezing Trap.

1. Use Black Arrow.
2. Use Trueshot.
3. Use A Murder of Crows.
4. Use Sidewinders.
5. Use Marked Shot.
6. Cast Aimed Shot.
7. Use Sidewinders.
8. Use Marked Shot.
9. Cast Aimed Shot.
10. Use Sidewinders.
11. Use Marked Shot.
12. Use Windburst if you are not being focused.

7.3.2. Sustained damage

Sustained damage is damage you do when your burst cooldowns are not available.

1. Maintain Vulnerable on the kill target at all times.
   • If you cannot maintain it on all targets, have it active on your kill target.
2. Use Black Arrow.
3. Use Sidewinders to refresh Vulnerable.
4. Use Marked Shot.
5. Cast Aimed Shot if the enemy team is not focusing you.
6. Cast Windburst for strong single-target damage.
7. Use A Murder of Crows for pressure.

7.4. Defensive Techniques

Aspect of the Turtle is our main defensive cooldown. Use this when the enemy team is focusing you down and your healer can not heal you through the damage or is stuck in crowd control. Although you can not attack with this cooldown active, you still have the ability to trap. Using this to ignore incoming attacks and using Freezing Trap on an enemy healer could be crucial.

Exhilaration is a very strong instant heal. Try to stagger Aspect of the Turtle and Exhilaration and you will be very hard to kill.

Roar of Sacrifice is a great utility ability for you or your teammates. This makes the teammate you use this on immune to being Critical Strikes by spells and transfers 20% of the damage they are taking to your pet. Use this when the enemy team is using their cooldowns on a teammate or yourself and not many defensive cooldowns are available.

8. ChangeLog

+ show all entries - show only 10 entries

• 17 Jul. 2017: Changed recommended tier 6 honor talent.
• 26 Apr. 2017: Marksmanship Hunter PvP guide created.