Survival Hunter DPS Gear and Best in Slot — The War Within (Season 1)

Welcome to our Gear and BiS Page for Survival Hunter for The War Within Season 1. Check this page to learn everything you need to know about gearing a Survival Hunter, including the BiS Gear from all sources, Raiding, and Mythic+, information on the best Trinkets, Tier Sets, and much more.

For discussion and information on Stats specifically, check out our Stats page below.

2.

BiS Gear for Survival Hunter

Overall BiS List for Season 1 Nerub-ar Palace Gear BiS List Mythic+ Gear BiS List

3.

Overall BiS List for Survival Hunter

This list contains the best gear in every slot for Season 1 of The War Within, from all sources.

In general, BiS Items for Survival are simply ones that have lots of Mastery on them.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Harvester's Interdiction (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes (626), or Great Vault
Helm	Lightless Scavenger's Skull (639)	Silken Court/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Neck	Trailspinner Pendant (639)	Mists of Tirna Scithe (626), or Great Vault
Shoulder	Lightless Scavenger's Taxidermy (639)	Rasha'nan/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Cloak	Consecrated Cloak (636)	Crafted by Tailoring
Chest	Goresplattered Membrane (639)	The Bloodbound Horror in Nerub-ar Palace
Bracers	Glyph-Etched Vambraces (636)	Crafted by Leatherworking
Gloves	Lightless Scavenger's Mitts (639)	Sikran/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Belt	Reinforced Anti-Intruder Chainmail (639)	The Stonevault (626), or Great Vault
Legs	Lightless Scavenger's Stalkings (639)	Nexus Princess Ky'veza/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Boots	Sure-Foot Sabatons (639)	Siege of Boralus (626), or Great Vault
Ring #1	Seal of the Poisoned Pact (639)	Queen Ansurek in Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #2	Writhing Ringworm (639)	Broodtwister Ovi'nax in Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #1	Skardyn's Grace (639)	Grim Batol (626), or Great Vault
Trinket #2 (Pure Single-Target)	Void Reaper's Contract (639)	Nexus Princess Ky'veza in Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #2 (General Use — Mythic+/AoE/Raid Cleave)	Ara-Kara Sacbrood (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes (626), or Great Vault

3.

Nerub-ar Palace Raid Gear BiS List for Survival Hunter

This list contains the Best in Slot Gear for Survival Hunter in The War Within Season 1 from the Nerub-ar Palace Raid.

Note that this BiS List is for items from the Raid. I am separating the BiS lists by gear sources. This is what you send to your Raid Leader/Loot Council when they ask you what your BiS gear is from the Raid.

Note that there is no such thing as a singular, all-encompassing "BiS". The best items vary per character and situation, and there are many items that are essentially equivalent in terms of DPS, namely when we are just shuffling secondary stats around. I will list one "BiS" item per slot, sometimes two if I feel there is a significant difference for Raiding and Mythic+, but ultimately, BiS lists are not very practically useful and you should be simming your character to find out what gear to equip next. Nonetheless, there is a huge demand for this list and thus, despite me not thinking you should really care much about it, it is here for your perusal.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Spire of Transfused Horrors (639)	Broodtwister Ovi'nax in Nerub-ar Palace
Helm	Lightless Scavenger's Skull (639)	Silken Court/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Neck	Sureki Zealot's Insignia (639)	Sikran in Nerub-ar Palace
Shoulder	Lightless Scavenger's Taxidermy (639)	Rasha'nan/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Cloak	Royal Emblem of Nerub-ar (639)	Ulgrax the Devourer in Nerub-ar Palace
Chest	Goresplattered Membrane (639)	The Bloodbound Horror in Nerub-ar Palace
Bracers	Throne Defender's Bangles (639)	Sikran in Nerub-ar Palace
Gloves	Lightless Scavenger's Mitts (639)	Sikran/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Belt	Lost Watcher's Remains (639)	The Bloodbound Horror in Nerub-ar Palace
Legs	Lightless Scavenger's Stalkings (639)	Nexus Princess Ky'veza/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Boots	Rasha'nan's Grotesque Talons (639)	Rasha'nan in Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #1	Seal of the Poisoned Pact (639)	Queen Ansurek in Nerub-ar Palace
Ring #2	Writhing Ringworm (639)	Broodtwister Ovi'nax in Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #1	Mad Queen's Mandate (639)	Queen Ansurek in Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #2 (Single-Target)	Void Reaper's Contract (639)	Nexus Princess Ky'veza in Nerub-ar Palace
Trinket #2 (Mythic+/AoE)	Ovi'nax's Mercurial Egg (639)	Broodtwister Ovi'nax in Nerub-ar Palace

3.

The War Within Season 1 Mythic+ Gear BiS List for Survival Hunter

This list contains the Best in Slot Gear for Survival Hunter from The War Within Season 1 Mythic+.

Note that this BiS List is for items from Mythic+. I am separating the BiS lists by gear sources. This is the list you can chase when you want to improve your gear by farming Mythic+ dungeons.

Note that there is no such thing as a singular, all-encompassing "BiS". The best items vary per character and situation, and there are many items that are essentially equivalent in terms of DPS, namely when we are just shuffling secondary stats around. I will list one "BiS" item per slot, sometimes two if I feel there is a significant difference for Raiding and Mythic+, but ultimately, BiS lists are not very practically useful and you should be simming your character to find out what gear to equip next. Nonetheless, there is a huge demand for this list and thus, despite me not thinking you should really care much about it, it is here for your perusal.

Slot	Item	Source/Note
Weapon	Harvester's Interdiction (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes (626), or Great Vault
Helm	Lightless Scavenger's Skull (639)	Silken Court/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Neck	Trailspinner Pendant (639)	Mists of Tirna Scithe (626), or Great Vault
Shoulder	Lightless Scavenger's Taxidermy (639)	Rasha'nan/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Cloak	Anvilhide Cape (639)	The Stonevault (626), or Great Vault
Chest	Coagulum Cuirass (639)	City of Threads (626), or Great Vault
Bracers	Hiveswarm Bracers (636)	Mists of Tirna Scithe (626), or Great Vault
Gloves	Lightless Scavenger's Mitts (639)	Sikran/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Belt	Reinforced Anti-Intruder Chainmail (639)	The Stonevault (626), or Great Vault
Legs	Lightless Scavenger's Stalkings (639)	Nexus Princess Ky'veza/Matrix Catalyst/Great Vault
Boots	Sure-Foot Sabatons (639)	City of Threads (626), or Great Vault
Ring #1	Seal of the City Watch (639)	Siege of Boralus (626), or Great Vault
Ring #2	High Nerubian Signet (639)	The Dawnbreaker (626), or Great Vault
Trinket #1	Skardyn's Grace (639)	Grim Batol (626), or Great Vault
Trinket #2	Ara-Kara Sacbrood (639)	Ara-Kara, City of Echoes (626), or Great Vault

Throughout this page, we regularly refer to the importance of simming yourself on Raidbots, as it is an indispensable aspect of optimizing your character.

While we do offer generic sim charts for Trinkets, this should not be a replacement for simming yourself, at least not if you want to minmax sub-1%!

If you are new to simming and Raidbots, check out our detailed guide below.

Our BiS Crafts are pretty straightforward. We want 2x Dawnthread Lining on some sensible slots. While Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension and its Writhing Armor Banding can perform similarly for some characters, it takes 80 seconds to stack up Ascension to full power while in combat, and it will regularly drop off between packs in Mythic+.

For players coming right into the Season from its beginning, the choice is very different as we are not just concerned about the best Crafted Slots and Embellishments, but also potentially short-term Item Level gains. While the 2x Dawnthread Lining setup is optimal in the longer run, in the short-to-medium-term, crafting a Weapon with a Darkmoon Sigil is preferable because of the immediate, short-term value of a weapon upgrade, and because we start the Season with 2 Spark of Omens.

Please note that double- Dawnthread Lining has a tendency to not work outside of combat in some scenarios. If you have two of them equipped, but are only getting Crit from one of them, try to intentionally drop below 80% HP and then heal yourself back up. this WeakAura can help alert you when it is not working so you can fix it.

You should ideally sim the optimal stats to craft for your particular character, but Mastery/Crit or Mastery/Haste are generally safe "overall" choices.

1. Charged Halberd (Early Season, costs 2 Sparks) — This item is not our long-term BiS, but if you are coming fresh into the Season with Mythic0 606 iLvl gear or below, then the sheer Item Level value of a Weapon is going to exceed the value of the best Embellishments. For reference, the value of upgrading a Weapon by 30 iLvl is around 8% before even considering an Embellishment, while the value of upgrading some other slots (as below) with Embellishment by 30 iLvl is only around 4-5%. That said, if you wait until your first Great Vault and it has a Weapon, then you may wish to craft something else instead. As for Embellishments, I recommend Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension for Raiding and Darkmoon Sigil: Vivacity for Mythic+.
2. Consecrated Cloak with Dawnthread Lining (1 Spark) — Cloaks, alongside Bracers, have the lowest Item Level Budget of all Armor items. This makes them ideal BiS candidates when considering Crafts, because Crafted items are capped at 636, while other items cap at 639. The idea is to lose the least possible DPS by picking the lowest-budget slots to drop 3 iLvl on.
3. Glyph-Etched Vambraces with Dawnthread Lining (1 Spark) — Similarly to the Cloak, we get Bracers here as it is the best long-term play.
4. Next, chase Item Level where needed, preferring Weapon > Helm/Chest/Legs (though these are likely occupied by tier) > Boots/Belt > Rings/Necks > Cloaks.
5. At this point, you are mostly done crafting. You can spend future Sparks on off-spec items, alternatively statted crafts for different situations, and so on.

These are two weapon-only Embellishments with different secondary stat effects. On sustained encounters, ones that keep you in combat for several minutes, Darkmoon Sigil: Ascension is about 0.5% better. However, because Ascension takes a whole 80 seconds to reach full power, if you are primarily doing non-Raiding content, Darkmoon Sigil: Vivacity is better as it does not have this problem.

You will be able to upgrade your items via Crests such as Gilded Harbinger Crest. Once you have upgraded a slot to a certain item level, upgrading other items of that slot to that item level is free.

When you upgrade with Crests, you should think of it as upgrading slots and not items.

Additionally, since Crests are a limited resource, you will want to obtain the highest item-level possible before upgrading a given slot, as this means you will spend fewer Crests on that slot in total. If you are at all capable of doing a +9 Dungeon, for example, it would be a VERY bad idea to upgrade an item from a +8 Dungeon, as those are wasted Crests you may not get back for a very long time.

We see a ton of players, even at a high level, mess up their upgrade priorities, and upgrading prematurely. Getting this right will put you far ahead of most players.

Below is the slot priority you should upgrade your items in. If you ever want to deviate from this, you should have a very good reason.

1. Weapons
2. Trinkets
3. Helm/Chest/Legs
4. Shoulders/Gloves/Belt/Boots
5. Rings and Necks
6. Cloaks and Bracers

Note that exceptions are possible, such as special items that have more Item Level scaling than their slot would imply.

The Tier Set is comprised of 5 items, all carrying the Lightless Scavenger moniker. Unique DPS bonuses are unlocked when wearing 2, and 4 pieces from the set:

• Hunter Survival Season 1 2pc — Wildfire Bomb damage increased by 5%. It is hard to provide any commentary on this.
• Hunter Survival Season 1 4pc — Mongoose Bite/ Raptor Strike deals 10% increased damage to targets affected by Wildfire Bomb. With Bombs being so plentiful, this will be up for the vast majority of the time.

The Tier Set Bonus is absolutely mandatory for competitive play, and you should prioritize obtaining it. You can use the Matrix Catalyst to convert regular items (from Mythic+, for example) into Tier Items.

You only need 4 pieces out of 5 to get both set bonuses. We recommend you get all items except for the Chest, due to its lack of Mastery. Check out the BiS List for more information.