Hunter

For related articles, see Category:Hunters.

“

From an early age the call of the wild draws some adventurers from the comfort of their homes into the unforgiving primal world outside. Those who endure become hunters. Masters of their environment, they are able to slip like ghosts through the trees and lay traps in the paths of their enemies. - Official site

”

Hunters pull and use threat redirection, crowd control, and primarily ranged damage. Some hunters have pets that add to their DPS which also allow special spells such as Rebirth and Heroism, and help manage aggro. They can also track, tame, and train animals and beasts found in the wild. The well-trained pet, on countless occasions, has saved a hunter's life. They are the only class that can name, feed, and 'train' their pets to have one of three specializations: Ferocity for burst DPS, Cunning for utility, and Tenacity for tanking. This specialization can be switched at any time when not in combat or dead.

Hunters excel in outdoor survival skills, such as tracking and laying traps. They wear mail armor. They are unable to use shields or plate armor. Beast Master and Marksmanship hunters start with a gun, crossbow, or bow, depending on their race. They can use all other weapons except wands, maces, and two-handed maces. Survival hunters specifically use melee weapons and start with a polearm.

Hunters use many abilities that either deal damage or apply a status effect that costs focus to use. Food and drink does not replenish focus; instead, the only source is by using certain abilities or by having it replenish naturally over time. Most other abilities are free to use such as Mend Pet or their Trap (Survival-only) abilities. They can take on various Animal Aspects that grant special abilities, such as improved run speed or additional ranged attack power.

Background

A dwarven hunter takes aim.

Hunters are stalkers in the wild, living on their knowledge of survival and skill with a bow or rifle. They are deeply in tune with nature and some of its mightiest beasts are their allies. Of Azeroth's many creatures, few can resist the hunters' call, and fewer can survive their fury. Hunters are as varied as the world's many climates, but they are universally renowned for their amazing abilities to find their prey and bring it down. They come from any race (players are restricted to playable races, see below), though certain races naturally excel at the hunter's profession. Most hunters seek to aid the balance of nature along with their druidic allies.

Hunters are skilled in stealth, slipping through the woods like a ghost. Orcs of the Horde first learned the ways of the hunter from forest trolls on Lordaeron and tauren have been masters of the hunt since the dawn of the world. Like the shaman, hunters call upon the spirits of the land, wind, and fire to aid them in their hunts and tasks. Their spells focus on the elements and the land.

The hunter is one of the oldest classes in history. They represent a deep connection between man and beast, and the hunters of Warcraft are not merely individuals who track animals and slay them for food, but custodians of balance. They understand the natural circle of life and death and the part they must play in maintaining it, not simply as researchers, but as active participants. The "Hunt" is venerated, and the prey they choose to stalk is given as much respect as the predators hunters choose to learn from and embody.

All hunters create lifelong friendships with animal companions, who are also often their best and only friends, if the stereotype of the reclusive huntsman is to be believed. Hunters come in all shapes, forms, sizes, and specialties. Hunters are a curious mix of mysticism and rough wilderness know-how. They can learn to mystically align themselves with the aspects of various animals to assist them, such as the swiftness of a cheetah. Hunters use magically empowered traps to maim and snare their prey. They have various shots imbued with magic or explosives to slow, poison, handicap, and disorient their targets. They can even hold their breath and slow their heartbeat to a highly infrequent, inconsequential tap to give their pursuers the impression they are dead.

Weapons

A night elf hunter in art.

For Beast Mastery and Marksmanship hunters, ranged fighting requires a choice between a gun, bow, or a crossbow. When starting, this will depend on your race. Dwarves, worgen, and goblins are given guns; draenei, humans, pandaren and Forsaken start with crossbows; the other races get bows. However, all hunters can still use the ranged weapons that aren't inherent to their race. In general, crossbows are relatively slow, but hit harder and are favored for increasing burst damage, while guns are relatively fast and good for steady grinding. Bows have moderate attack speed and are favored for sustained DPS. Guns can be crafted by engineers, but there are no craftable bows or crossbows, so most ranged upgrades will come from mob drops and quest rewards.

Survival hunters forgo use of a ranged weapon, choosing instead to fight toe-to-toe in melee. All such hunters start with a polearm, regardless of race.

Combat pets

Main article: Hunter abilities/Pet specializations

Main article: Hunter abilities/Pet abilities

A troll hunter is crouching with his white wolf.

Pets are the most important tools in the hands of a hunter. They serve as aggro-management, additional DPS, and as tanks. The pet is essential to all specs, dealing anywhere from 10% of total damage for a Marksman and Survival, to 50% for a Beast Master. Formerly, pets had anemic damage potential and weak AI that often made them more of a danger to a raid than an asset. Improved AI - pets now always attack from the back of a monster - and an innate 90% damage avoidance has mitigated this concern.

Many beast-type mobs can be tamed, and each offer a set of unique active skills (there are special abilities just for wolves, just for cats, etc).

Hunters have a pet at level one. These pets are based on the user's race (night elves get a nightsaber, tauren get a plainstrider, goblins get a crab, etc.). They are able to control the pet through various commands at level 10. Hunters can have only one active pet at a time and 5 others out of the actual game accessible in the Call Pet UI. The stable can house up to 50 additional pets.

Traps

Note: This pertains to Survival hunters.

Hunters have five different types of traps available for use. Some traps are a type of Crowd Control; others are a source of damage, although they do not scale well to the hunter's level. Traps exist for 30 seconds, have separate 30-second cooldown categories, and a 2-second arming timer once placed. A hunter can have one trap of each category placed at one time.

Notable hunters

Rexxar   Sylvanas Windrunner   Halduron Brightwing   Nathanos Blightcaller

Vereesa Windrunner   Alleria Windrunner   Shandris Feathermoon   Tyrathan Khort

Hemet Nesingwary

Races

Main article: Hunter races

• Playable races
• Racial advantages
• TCG images

The hunter class can be chosen by any playable race:

Race		Strength	Agility	Stamina	Intellect	Spirit	Armor	Health
	Draenei	21	20	21	20	23	40	56
	Ironforge dwarf	25	19	22	19	20	38	66
	Human	20	23	21	20	21	33	56
	Gnome	15	22	20	23	20	??	??
	Night elf	16	27	21	20	21	54	56
	Pandaren	20	18	21	19	22	??	??
	Worgen	23	25	21	16	20	61	56
	Blood elf	17	25	21	23	19	50	56
	Forsaken	19	21	21	18	26	33	66
	Goblin	17	25	21	23	19	50	56
	Orc	23	20	22	17	23	40	66
	Tauren	25	19	22	16	23	38	67
	Troll	21	25	21	16	22	50	56

Alliance races

• Draenei: [Gift of the Naaru] heals 20% of the caster's health over 10 seconds, giving draenei hunters a healing ability. Extremely useful for high level PvP and PvE. [Heroic Presence] can help hunters perform better.

• Dwarves: [Stoneform] removes poison, disease, curse, magic, and bleed effects, and decreases damage taken by a short period of time. Both of these can be very useful in PvE and PvP fights.

• Humans: Humans gain the "racial PvP trinket" – [Every Man for Himself] – effectively freeing up a trinket slot which hunters might find more useful.

• Night elves: [Quickness] adds an extra layer of survivability to night elf hunters. [Shadowmeld] provides an interesting element to night elves, allowing them to stealth to avoid mob detection (more useful for solo play), or to get out of combat when about to die. Pairing this with a combat pet that can also stealth makes for a deadly combination. In PvP settings Shadowmeld can be devastating, for the night elf hunter can operate as a rogue, attacking from a stealthed position! An additional bonus to Shadowmeld is the ability to temporarily drop threat in combat.

• Worgen: The worgen's [Darkflight] is very useful in chasing down a fleeing opponent in PvP, to kite, and for just saving time moving when you cannot use a mount. The additional [shadow resistance] is a nice addition, as well as the small buff to [critical strike chance].

Neutral races (before faction choice)

• Pandaren: The pandaren [love of food] allows them to gain a larger benefit from well fed buffs. These versatile marksmen also take [less falling damage]. To add to their deadly hunter abilities, they also have a [natural stun] for when enemies get too close for comfort.

Horde races

• Blood elves: [Arcane Torrent] silences any spell caster within range. When enemies are not within range, it also serves as an additional way to regain focus.

• Forsaken: The increased [shadow resistance] is always useful, as is [Cannibalize], which can rapidly increase your health, thereby saving your healer's mana. [Will of the Forsaken] is one of the best racials in game, and can be the difference between life and death in both PvP and PvE settings; it removes charm, fear, and sleep effects. Forsaken also have a passive [damaging ability] that strips health from the enemy.

• Goblins: They use their rockets to not only [leap], but also to fire off a [barrage] into the faces of their enemies. And when they need to repair their equipment, they always get the [Best Deals Anywhere]. Their [Time is Money] ability increases attack speed, helpful for any hunter.

• Orcs: [Hardiness] reduces stun duration, which can save a hunter in PvP settings. [Blood Fury] increases attack power.

• Tauren: [War Stomp] is very important in providing an early stun to young hunters, especially useful against melee attackers that refuse to stay at range. [Endurance] provides tauren with extra health, meaning tauren hunters can have the highest possible HP of any hunter. The additional [nature resistance] is always a plus.

• Trolls: [Berserking] increases attack speed by 20% for 10 seconds, useful for all hunters. [Health regeneration] in combat can help keep you alive during PvP fights or boss battles, and the increased healing can reduce down time for soloing players. [Da Voodoo Shuffle] reduces the duration of movement impairing effects by 15%. [Beast Slaying] gives a small boost against beasts.

Draenei

Dwarf

Human

Night elf

Worgen

Blood elf

Goblin

Orc

Troll

Specializations/stats

• Beast Mastery
• Marksmanship
• Survival

“

A master of the wild who can tame a wide variety of beasts to assist him in combat. - Official description

”

Stat priority

• Agility
• Mastery
• Haste
• Critical Strike
• Versatility

Kill Command

Ability	Min Level
Kill Command	10
Dire Beast	12
Multi-Shot	16
Wild Call	20
Aspect of the Wild	26
Counter Shot	32
Bestial Wrath	40

Ability	Min Level
Misdirection	42
Kindred Spirits	44
Beast Cleave	50
Bestial Wrath (2)	54
Disengage (2)	65*
Mastery: Master of Beasts	78

*Only if the Disengage talent is chosen at level 45.

“

A master archer or sharpshooter who excels in bringing down enemies from afar. - Official description

”

Stat priority

• Agility
• Mastery
• Haste
• Critical Strike
• Versatility

Aimed Shot

Ability	Min Level
Arcane Shot	10
Aimed Shot	12
Multi-Shot	16
Marked Shot	20
Hunter's Mark	20
Bursting Shot	26
Counter Shot	32

Ability	Min Level
Trueshot	40
Misdirection	42
Marksman's Focus	44
Bombardment	50
Hunting Party	58
Disengage (2)	65*
Mastery: Sniper Training	78

*Only if the Disengage talent is chosen at 45.

“

A rugged tracker who favors using animal venom, explosives, and traps as deadly weapons. - Official description

”

Stat priority

• Agility
• Haste
• Critical Strike / Versatility
• Mastery

Ability	Min Level
Raptor Strike	10
Wing Clip	10
Harpoon	10
Explosive Trap	10
Flanking Strike	12
Hatchet Toss	14
Survivalist	16
Mongoose Bite	20
Lacerate	26

Ability	Min Level
Muzzle	32
Aspect of the Eagle	40
Carve	42
Waylay	44
Aspect of the Eagle (2)	54
Harpoon (2)	65
Mastery: Hunting Companion	78
Flanking Strike (2)	78

Skills/Glyphs

• Core abilities
• Talents
• Glyphs
• PvP talents

Note: Players technically start in Beast Mastery spec; if a player chooses another specialization at level 10, the following are removed: Cobra Shot and Concussive Shot (removed for Survival only).

Ability	Min Level
Call Pet	Starts with
Cobra Shot	Starts with
Mend Pet	Starts with
Revive Pet	Starts with
Concussive Shot	4
Dismiss Pet	10
Call Pet	13
Tame Beast	13
Feed Pet	13
Beast Lore	13
Eagle Eye	18

Ability	Min Level
Freezing Trap	18
Aspect of the Cheetah	22
Exhilaration	24
Feign Death	28
Call Pet	34
Tar Trap	36
Flare	38
Exhilaration (2)	48
Aspect of the Turtle	70
Call Pet	57
Call Pet	80

Level	Abilities (choose one)
15	Big Game Hunter Lone Wolf Animal Instincts	Way of the Cobra Steady Focus Throwing Axes	Dire Stable Careful Aim Way of the Mok'Nathal
30	Stomp Lock and Load A Murder of Crows	Dire Frenzy Black Arrow Mortal Wounds	Chimaera Shot True Aim Snake Hunter
45	Posthaste	Farstrider	Dash
60	One with the Pack Explosive Shot Caltrops	Bestial Fury Sentinel Hunter Improved Traps	Blink Strikes Patient Sniper Steel Trap
75	Binding Shot Sticky Bomb	Wyvern Sting Ranger's Net	Intimidation Camouflage
90	A Murder of Crows Butchery	Barrage Dragonsfire Grenade	Volley Serpent Sting
100	Stampede Sidewinders Spitting Cobra	Killer Cobra Piercing Shot Expert Trapper	Aspect of the Beast Trick Shot

Name	Specialization
Glyph of Arachnophobia	Beast Mastery
Glyph of Lesser Proportion	All
Glyph of Nesingwary's Nemeses	Beast Mastery
Glyph of Stellar Flare	All
Glyph of the Bullseye	Marksmanship
Glyph of the Dire Stable	Beast Mastery
Glyph of the Goblin Anti-Grav Flare	All
Glyph of the Headhunter	Survival
Glyph of the Hook	Survival
Glyph of the Skullseye	Marksmanship
Glyph of the Trident	Survival

Honor Level	Talent
1	Gladiator's Medallion
2	Quickshots
4	Dragonscale Armor
6	Viper Sting
8	The Beast Within, T.N.T., Hunting Pack
10	Go for the Throat, Trueshot Mastery, Sticky Tar
13	Adaptation
16	Initiation
19	Catlike Reflexes
22	Scorpid Sting
25	Separation Anxiety, Scatter Shot, Mending Bandage
28	Dire Beast: Hawk, Spray and Pray, Diamond Ice
31	Relentless
34	Focused Fire
37	Survival Tactics
40	Spider Sting
43	Wild Protector, Freezing Arrow, Master's Call
46	Dire Beast: Basilisk, Sniper Shot, Tracker's Net

Suggested professions

Note: This is a generic section stub. You can help expand it by clicking  Edit to the right of the section title.

•  [Leatherworking] and  [Skinning] are logical choices for any mail armor wearing class (or leather armor wearing as well). This allows crafting decent armor as one levels and various augments.
•  [Alchemy] and  [Herbalism] can be useful for hunters who need quick potion heals and various buffs from elixirs and flasks. These professions are also good all around for making money and supplying guild runs.
•  [Cooking] is good for non-combat health regeneration and provides good buff foods.
•  [First Aid] is good for for in-combat health regeneration and low downtime regeneration.
•  [Fishing] is good for leveling cooking and for feeding pets that eat fish or can generally eat meat that includes fish.
• Engineering is good for kiting with parachutes, engineering can be useful for hunters who want to master the art of kiting.

In RPG

This section concerns content exclusive to the Warcraft RPG, and thus unlikely to be canon.

The hunter (prestige class) was replaced with the hunter (core class) in the World of Warcraft RPG.

End-game expectations

A hunter's primary responsibility in nearly all raid encounters is to sustainably generate high DPS. They should know when to use Feign Death to get rid of aggro before they gain more aggro than the raid's primary tank and then continue dealing damage.

Hunters will almost never be asked to trap during raids, but might be asked during 5-man groups and heroics. Trapping is a form of Crowd Control. This is typically done by laying down a Freezing Trap before the pull, then using Distracting Shot to steal aggro after the tank pulls, thus making the mob run at and into the Freezing Trap. Hitting the mob with a Concussive Shot as it comes to the trap is a good way to buy cooldown time, making it easier to re-trap. The generally accepted raid symbol for this is a blue square, although it is very important to confirm this beforehand. The tank or off-tank will usually be responsible for taking aggro off of the hunter when the group is ready to deal with the mob. A skilled hunter of any spec should be able to keep at least one target controlled indefinitely.

It is possible to lay a trap before the pull, wait 30 seconds for the cooldown, trap a mob, and then move away a small distance and lay another trap. Whenever the first trap's effect wears off, the mob will usually run to the hunter and right into the other trap. This is called chain-trapping a mob.

In some cases a hunter will be asked to kite one or more creatures that either cannot or should not be killed during a specific encounter, allowing the rest of the raid to focus on other needs in order defeat the objective. Kiting is a skill that is best accomplished by hunters because of their Aspect of the Cheetah, pets, and armor rating; it requires a lot of practice. While kiting, the target is shot with instant and slowing abilities while the hunter uses speed boosts to stay ahead of it. Kiting for most hunters is the hardest skill to learn, yet is considered by many to be the most important.

In Legion

This section concerns content exclusive to Legion.

Survival specialization returned to using melee-only weapons and also has a Harpoon ability akin to [Death Grip]. Survival are also the only hunters able to utilize traps, but an announcement at BlizzCon 2016 indicated this speciality would again be returned to the entire class.

Gnomes finally are able to play Hunter in Legion. Not only that, there is a new Pet family called Mechanical. Mechanical pet can be "fed" Engineering supplies such as Handful of Copper Bolts. Gnomes and Goblins can naturally tame Mechanical pets but other races must learn how to tame Mechanical pets through an Engineering-made item.

Notes

• The "OMG HUNTER LOOT" / "That's a hunter weapon!" jokes exist for a reason. Don't forget you share your gear class with many other classes. It's very unlikely you're the only person who needs any given drop.
• While the hunter is an easy class to play at a superficial level, it can be a highly challenging class to play well. People will consistently tell you that damage is the only reason for a hunter's existence; in raids, and possibly in soloing, that might be true, but in five-man instances and battleground pvp in particular it isn't. You can use traps as a form of crowd control, and you need to monitor your pet to ensure that it does not cause problems.
• In most MMORPGs, the hunter or ranger class variant is usually recognized as the ideal ranged puller in a group, and this was indeed the case in the early years of World of Warcraft. With the inclusion of additional abilities for tanking classes, ranged pulling is generally not considered a hunter's responsibility anymore, to the point where hunters in groups will actually be expressly forbidden from doing so. This is true despite the fact that, as with other games, in WoW Blizzard has equipped the hunter with numerous unique abilities (Disengage, Feign Death, Tracking) to assist them in the accomplishment of that task. The advent of Misdirection has changed this a bit, with tanks often requesting that a hunter "MD that mob to me."
• In combat, hunters have the ability to quickly remove all threat they have generated on a target via Feign Death.
• Pets in instances should be controlled carefully and watched closely; one wrong click can very well get you, the party, or even raid killed. You should set your pet on passive or defensive mode, and disable autocast for Growl and any other AoE abilities to be sure.
• As for pure PvP play the hunter is a great class to roll. The hunter pet should be on passive most of the time, if not all, in order to track and control its cooldowns. The hunter's role no matter what it does is damage and when fully PvP geared the hunter does a lot of it. With high damage and numerous crowd control moves the hunter excels when played correctly. Some of the things that beginner level PvP players should work on are strafing (running sideways) and stray from backstepping, Macroing some of the hunter abilities, and also staying out of the main fight at a decent range for escape. 

Videos

Hunter PVP - Mists of Pandaria - BM Hunter Talents Guide

► Mists of Pandaria - BM Hunter Macros Guide - 1 Shot Macro Included

Crash Course - Hunter

Crash Course

Patch changes

Main article: Changes by Patch

• Patch 7.0.3 (19-Jul-2016): Hunters and Shaman can now equip Mail armor from level 1 (down from level 40).; Survival use melee weapons instead of ranged weapons and are the only Hunters that make use of traps.
  
• / Patch 4.0.1 (12-Oct-2010): Hunters now have a Focus bar instead of the Mana bar.
  
• Patch 1.6.0 (12-Jul-2005): Fixed race condition allowing hunters to control a charmed unit and a pet at the same time.
  

External Links

Wowhead Hunter

WoWDB Hunter

Official

WoW Official Game Site (US) Hunter

WoW Official Game Site (EU) Hunter

General

WoW Insider Scattered Shots — non-raid hunter weekly feature at WoW Insider

WoW Insider Hunter guides at WoW Insider

Guides

Icy Veins Beast Mastery, Marksmanship, and Survival Hunter Raiding Guides (Mists of Pandaria)

Pets

Petopia Hunter Pet Information

Tools

Hunter DPS Analyzer Web-based Hunter DPS spreadsheet

Hunter Loot Loot listings for all Hunter specs

β News

WoW Insider A closer look at the Hunter rare tames in Mists of Pandaria by Brian Wood Aug 1st 2012 at 7:00PM

WoW Insider Mists of Pandaria Beta: Hunters get new challenges for rare pets by Anne Stickney Jul 31st 2012 at 2:00PM