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Contents

Introduction

This page has been updated for the Cataclysm 4.3 patch.

Hunters are the fastest and easiest leveling class in the entire game, no contest.  Why would this be? Because they have an unbeatable and unmatched solo capability due to an unmatched rapport with their pets. As Blizzard says, in the character creation screen, "Good at leveling and soloing."

Of all the classes, the hunter alone can skip several levels of training and new abilities and continue to reach impressive levels of experience per hour. This is all tied to their massive and consistent DPS. In fact, Hunters are perhaps the least gear dependent of all classes. Of course, decent gear will make your leveling that much easier (not to mention heirlooms, buffs, etc.,) but it's not required.

In the dungeons Hunters can generate a lot of DPS (Damage per Second.) With good choices in gear and some practice they can easily top the damage charts.

In PvP, Hunters take a bit more work. Having an easy time leveling makes one relax a bit too much, perhaps, and PvP can be a wake up call. Hunters can do well in PvP, though, and there are a number of very highly ranked Arena Hunters.

With Patch 4.3 various hunter abilities were buffed. See the WoW patch notes page for details.

Two important Hunter changes with WoW 4.0, and beyond, are that you now use Focus instead of Mana and you also start with a level 1 pet. The exact starting pet varies from race to race and you have control over most of your pet's abilities, just like any other pet. At level 10 you will get the rest of the pet commands.

Another significant change is that can have up to five pets immediately summonable at any time and you will gain access to these as you level, though you can still only have one present at any given time. It works much the same way as the Warlock pets, you summon whichever one you want when you need it. The capacity of the Stables has also been greatly increased. While you might not be able to collect all possible Hunter pets, you will still be able to create a nice, full stable.

This page covers the basics of leveling your hunter, the KG Hunter Guide covers everything about your Hunter. PvP, raiding, goldmaking, gear, etc., it covers it all. Grab it here.

Brief Hunter Leveling Notes

This is the short version of the guide, just hitting the main points. More detail is below.

Best Race: It doesn't matter much, just pick the one the looks and feels right.

• Alliance Damage: Draenei , Worgen, Dwarf
• Horde Damage: Orc, Troll, Goblins.
• PVP: Humans and Undead have useful escapes.
• More about races

The spec: Beast Mastery

• If you need to blast to 85 as fast as possible then check out our favorite leveling guide.

Pets:

Ferocity pets do more damage, Tenacity pets are better tanks, Cunning pets have special abilities, such as webs.

• Pick a Ferocity pet, such as a Cat, below level 60. At higher levels they seem to have some problems holding the target's attentions.
• Tenacity pets, such as Bears, are better tanks and will allow you to gather groups and burn them down.
• More about pets

Gear and Stats

• Stamina - Get enough to survive.
• Agility is is far and away your best stat otherwise.
• Crit and Mastery (level 80+) are your best secondary stats.
• Get mail armor at 40 and stick with it.
• Weapon: Highest DPS available
• Relic - the more Agility the better.
• More stats

Gems and Enchants

Skip these if they're expensive. You'll level too fast to make most gems or enchants really worthwhile.

• Gem for Agility, period.
• Enchant for Ag., Attack Power, or Stam.
• More gems

Professions:

• Pick any two: Skinning, Mining, Herbalism
• Skip the crafting professions, they're expensive and will slow you down.
• More professions

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Hunter Races

With Catalclysm the Gnomes are the only race that cannot be hunters. Probably because they're too busy repairing their city or they're too short to use a bow (Gnomish X4500GT Zarkomatic blaster rifle?)

In Mists of Pandaria the Gnomes are still excluded, but Pandarens can become Hunters.

The best racial choice for a Hunter is one that you enjoy playing. It doesn't matter if one race has no special abilities if you like playing that race more than others. None of the racial abilities make that much of a difference and they are all overshadowed by your skill as a player.

Note, that in MIsts of Pandaria Hunters might finally get strings for their bows. =>

That said, if you're looking towards the end game... Orcs and Trolls are arguably the best Hunter races.

• Alliance, Damage: Draenei (hit rating,) Worgen (Crit chance & sprint,) Dwarf (gun crit)
• Horde Damage: Orc (Blood Fury) and +5% pet damage ; Troll gets Berserking and Bow crit. Goblins get a Haste effect and Rocket Jump (a useful escape ability.)
• PVP: Humans and Undead have useful escapes.

Pandarens (Mists of Pandaria) can be either Alliance or Horde, they choose when they leave their starting area.

• They can put enemies to sleep with a touch of the paw
• Rested XP (from Inns) lasts longer
• Increased benefits from food buffs
• Take less falling damage from being "bouncy."
• Skilled at cooking.

Alliance

Draenei

To begin with we’ll check out the Draenei, an all round good hunter race to choose a couple of reasons.  First would be the presence of a small HoT, Gift of the Naaru, giving you a viable method of reducing downtime and surviving tough battles.

Second, and far more useful for raiding at higher levels, is their +1% hit, a useful self-only ability for raiding hunters as every point of hit rating counts once you hit the endgame raids. Of course this also slightly improves your solo DPS capabilities. This ability was once an aura that effected the entire team/raid, but with 4.0 it's self-only.

They also have an increase to Jewelcrafting skill, which will get get a Draenei jeweler into those nice self-only gems that much sooner.

Night Elves

An Ok PvP race, the Shadowmeld racial coming in handy for ambushing unsuspecting players in both world PvP, Battlegrounds, and Arena.  Additionally, it can be used for hiding from higher levels/gank squads while leveling. It does not add to your level 85 Camouflage ability.

Night Elf hunters also gain the benefit of a 2% dodge chance increase, another bonus to stack with Aspect of the Monkey when forced into melee. More often times this’ll happen in PvP, as opposed to PvE.

None of the Night Elf specials apply to PvE content.

Dwarves

Dwarf hunters aren't too bad of a Hunter choice due to gun specialization, increasing the chance to critically strike with all guns by 1%, an increase on a level with a talent point.

Additionally the stone form ability is icing on the cake, highly useful against rogues (and various other classes) in PvP. Rogues are something of our mortal enemy in many battlegrounds. With the 4.06 patch this ability adds 10% damage reduction.

Archeology skills, mace expertise, and frost resistance have their uses, but there's nothing there specifically for the Hunter.

Human (Cataclysm)

With Cataclysm Humans will finally get to be hunters (it's never made sense that they couldn't be Hunters.) They have nothing that's specifically useful for Hunters, though their escape ability is quite nice for PvP and their diplomacy ability will help with the rep gains with the many factions of Azeroth and the Outlands.

The Human perception increase, useful for finding sneaky things, is gone with 4.0.

Worgen (Cataclysm)

It certainly makes sense that were-wolf type critters could be Hunters, what with their legendary sense of smell, not that said sense appears in-game. They have a general 1% increased chance to crit, which is nice, and they can "periodically move more quickly," which definitely has it's uses.

Their increased skinning skill and speed is a nice convenience, but of no special value to Hunters.

 

Horde Races

Blood Elves

Of the horde races we’ll begin with the Blood Elves, a rather "meh..." race, as far as Hunters are concerned. Their big ability is Arcane Torrent, which can be used as an AoE silence/interruption when forced into melee range with caster classes. Paladins and Death Knights, for example. Ideally Hunters want to avoid "melee range" like the plague and if you're never in melee range with anything that can be silenced the ability has little value.

Tauren

Tauren are yet another generally PvP viable Hunter race, gaining a 5% bonus to health that is always valuable in the realm of massive PvP burst damage, where every point counts. You’ll also gain the benefit of Warstomp, an AoE stun that may allow you to gain range from melee classes, but, like the Blood Elves, Hunters want to avoid "melee range" like the plague.

Herbalism provides a nice little heal and a Haste effect, both of which are nice for Hunters and the Tauren's increased Herbalism skill will get you into that heal just that much faster.

Trolls

are probably the best of all the races for Hunters. Trolls possess the Berserking racial, a potent DPS increase for sustained DPS.

Trolls get Bow Specialization, a 1% increase to critical chance with all bows, which is nice, and they also get +5% damage bonus Vs. beasts. Given the number of beasts in the game this makes a nice increase to killing efficiency while leveling and in some raiding situations.

A somewhat useful PvP ability is the reduced duration Trolls get from movement reducing effects.

Orcs

Orcs, on the other hand gain, are also a contender for "best Hunter race." They get the benefit of Blood Fury, another great DPS increaser, as well as 5% more pet damage via Command, and a 15% resistance to all stuns with Hardiness, useful in PvP situations.

Undead (Cataclysm)

Naturally the Undead start with a giant spider as a pet. They have no special Hunter abilities, but their "Will of the Forsaken" can wipe off sleeps, charms, etc., a nice abilitiy to have, especially in PvP.

Goblin (Cataclysm)

Rocket Jump has definite uses at times, especially as "gain range" ability in PvP. An increase to Haste is generaly useful and an increase in Alchemy skill, along with a greater effect from your own healing potions, is also nice.

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Server Types

PvP: On a PvP server players from Horde and Alliance can freely attack each other in most areas. With Cataclysm, world PvP generally (not always) consists of level 80+ characters flying around the old world, dropping down, killing someone, and flying away. In short, more than it is now, PvP will be gankage. If that's your game (either as ganker or gankee) then go for it.

Seriously, though, there is the opportunity for world PvP, between more or less evenly matched characters, here and there and esp. in the high level zones. Tol Barad, especially. Sometimes it exists in lower lovel zones.

PvE: There is no world PvP so you can level in safety from high level (or any) gankage. Of course, you can't do it to them, either. You can still do Duels, Battlegrounds, and Arenas. Horde and alliance wave at each other and the most violent thing is the occasional duel challenge or rude gesture.

If you accept the duel challenge then you will be PvP flagged for a few minutes. This means that any other character from the other faction can attack you immediately.

RP: In theory, these are the servers for the Role-Players. You aren't required to role-play there and most don't, but there are a fair number who do and there are more role-playing guilds on these servers than elsewhere. RP realms can be either PvP or PvE.

WarcraftRealms.com maintains stats on server population and other things. If you want to find a server with more Horde/Alliance, more or fewer people, or whatever, then check there before you create your Hunter.

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Hunter Talents for Cataclysm

• Beastmastery
• Marksmanship
• You can certainly level with Survival, it just might be a bit slower or harder than the other specs (which doesn't mean that it's at all hard.) If you're interested in trying that then just use the build from the Survival PvE page.

For hunters the Beast Mastery tree is quite obviously the best for straight leveling speed. It gives few buffs to the hunter himself, although they are there, but mainly it turns his/her pet into a war machine and allows that pet, alone, to solo multiple monsters at a time. The pet gathers the mobs and the Hunter "guns" them down.

However, the primary way which this aids leveling is not entirely on how much damage the pet deals, but rather that the pet holds aggro well enough to act as a reliable and durable tank. This is why the Hunter needs little in the way of gear, though obviously better gear always helps. In fact, there are a few Hunters who tank 5 man dungeons with their pets.

This combined aspect of both Hunter and pet dealing high damage and the hunter being capable of healing the pet quite easily makes the Hunter the fastest leveling machine of them all.

Note: While the Beastmastery Specialization is the fastest leveling tree this doen't mean that you can't have a satisfying experience with any other build. If you really want to level fast then check out a good leveling guide.

Talents

When you pick your first talen from the any tree you are locked into that tree until you spend 31 talent points (at level 69.) Past that point you can move out to the other trees. At level 85 you will have 41 total talent points. All this will change with Mists of Pandaria.

Cataclysm Beast Mastery Leveling Spec

• Intimidation - Your pet intimidates the target, causing a great deal of threat and stunning it for 3 seconds. This is a very nice tanking ability. Intimidation makes it extremely easy for you to go all out as your pet will likely be capable of pulling aggro once more in short order once you have used this ability. 
• Animal Handler - Increases your damage by 30%
• Mastery: Master of Beasts - (gained from your trainer at level 80) increases the damage done by your pets. Stacking more Mastery Rating will increase this damage.

(View this build)

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Cataclysm Marksmanship Leveling Spec

MM is more about personal damage and less about your pet. You will be doing more kiting (running and gunning) than sitting back and letting your pet eat the target(s.) You will also be doing more personal damage. MM is also an excellent damage spec for instances and, eventually, raids.

• Aimed Shot - A powerful shot with a long cast time.
• Artisan Quiver - More samage with your auto shots.
• Mastery: Wild Quiver - There's a chance to fire an additional shot.

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Pets & Pet Talents

There are, at least, 23 families of pets for Hunters to tame, some of which are exclusive to the various expansions. Families are groups of similar pets, such as Bat, Bear, Gorilla, Serpent, etc. All pets of a class share the same stats and the same skill tree. Each pet family has one special skill.

Pet families are grouped as Ferocity (DPS,) Tenacity (Tanks,) and Cunning (special abilities.)

Ferocity pets are good for continuous damage, tenacity pets make good tanks, and cunning pets have unique abilities which can be very useful in certain situations. All the pets within any given tree will have access to the same talents. It seems that the special characteristics that some rare pets used to have were removed in 4.0.

For leveling try the Tenacity pets, since you do want your pet to be a tank. For dungeoning you should generally use a Ferocity pet. Make sure you have Growl turned off or the tank will yell at you.

What to feed that beastie:

Feeding your pet isn't what it used to be. Now they just stay healthy, but if they're hurth then feeding them will restore some health. The higher the level food you feed them, the more health is restored.

• Meat is the easiest food type to obtain, so pets that will only eat meat are not difficult to feed.
• Fish is not too much trouble either, as long as you are willing to catch them. You can also hunt coastal humanoids, like murlocs and naga, for their fish drops.
• Pets that will eat neither of these take a little more effort and planning.
• Dumpster pets, such as boars and bears, that eat just about anything, are really nice from an inventory management standpoint. You can toss any odd food drops at them.
• Abilities can also generate other effects, such as Guard Dog and Carrion Feeder.

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Gear, Stats, Etc.

Hunters are somewhat less gear dependent than some other classes (Rogues, Warriors...,) but a nice bow/gun will help you kill things faster as will good stats on the rest of your gear. That said, you'll still level quickly without the best gear.

Ultimately, when you start the gear race, what you want is to generate massive amounts of damage, which requires stacking Agility.  Due to your numerous tools of survivability including feign death, traps, dodge, etc. you’ll find stamina a largely low priority stat, being Beast Mastery specced makes it even more so.

Stats:

One point of agility equals an increase in attack power, critical chance, and dodge, making it essentially the wonder-stat for hunters in that it increases everything required at once.  However, individual items possessing significant amounts of straight up +attack power or +critical rating are valued as well.

The short version, for leveling, regardless of your spec: Agility & Crit.

1. Agility - Your #1 stat over all else, by far.
2. Stamina - Stack this at low level, stop when you feel like your survival is not in question.
3. Hit Rating is always a good idea, for any class, and especially when raiding. 8% hit is the "cap" so anything past that is useless.
4. Crit rating - the more the merrier.
5. Attack Power - You can never have enough, but in Cataclysm you'll only find it with certain enchants. It's pretty much gone from most gear.
6. Mastery - Mastery (trainable at level 80.) A decent stat, but not as good as Haste or Crit.
7. Haste - Good stuff to get, but Agility still comes first.
8. Intellect - Hunters no longer use mana so Int is now a useless stat.
9. Stength and Spirit: Useless
   
   
10. Stamina - Your pet is taking the mob's attack, so you don't need a lot of Stam.
    1. If you're solo leveling via quests or grinding, then you want some. How much depends on how often you're getting hit. Get enough to be comfortable with your survival chances.
    2. If you're dungeon leveling then you don't need much. Your tank should be taking pretty much all of the damage.
    3. If you PvP then you will want a lot more.
11. Resilience - This is strictly a PvP stat. If you don't PvP then you don't need any, if you do then you will want as much as you can get without gimping your damage. Generally Resilience only appears on higher level "PvP gear."

At level 77 you will be able to equip Cataclysm gear. The stats are way better than anything else up to and including most level 80 gear. If you're getting the Cata gear then you can send most of your heirlooms to other characters. Keep the guild cloak and helm, you'll put them back on at 81.

If you can get a group and hit the instances appropriate for your level you will get some nice XP and some nice gear. Otherwise your quest rewards will keep you in fine shape.

See our Dungeon Leveling Guide for tips on leveling via the various instances and our recommended leveling guide for blasting to 85.

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Gems and Enchants

So how rich are you? Eventually you will get gear with gem sockets. If you have some cash then pop in the best gems you can afford. Go for Agility with any gems you pick up.

Enchants can be much more expensive. You will also be leveling quickly enough that you will outgrow your gear before the enchant is of too much use. Still, if you want them and have the cash, then go for it. They're pretty much required (as are gems) for PvP and raiding.

You can find a list of high end gems and enchants on our Hunter Class Guide page. Note that the Mists of Pandaria gems/enchants are much better than the Cataclysm variety.

While leveling you can often find very inexpensive enchants, such as Stamina, which will be worth applying to your stuff.

Glyphs are nice. For the end-game they're very important. Here's a tip: sometimes the price on glyphs varies wildly. One glyph may be 40 gold one day and 5 the next. If you can plan your glyph (or any) buying ahead of time then you might get lucky and get the bargains. At least you might get a much better price.

Rule of thumbs: Your enhancements should provide Agilty first and second, then crit rating and Attack Power after Agility.

Scrolls and potions can boost a variety of stats but don't stack with each other. Scrolls of Agility are generally dirt cheap, so buy a bunch. They're also considered to be Potions for stacking purposes, meaning you can't have a potion and a scroll up at the same time.

Leveling Tips

Learn to Kite

Previously you didn't get your pet until level 10, so you would be "running and gunning" (AKA: Kiting) until then. It's useful to learn to be moving forward and then jump, half turn, fire Arcane Shot or Viper Sting, and land facing the original direction. Some jump and do a 360 degree turn, others half and back. Practice, it will become easy. Just run around and jump and spin.

When you get Concussive Shot it becomes easier, since you can now slow the mob and more easily stay ahead of it.

Kiting is also occasionally useful later on, such as when fighting tough mobs that might squish your pet. Turn off your pet's "Growl" ability, to make sure that you have 100% of the mob's attention, and then kite. The pet is added damage, but is safe enough. Skilled Hunters can take Elite mobs a few levels higher than they are. Of course, they need enough room to run around safely.

Other Tips

You can use a variety of melee weapons and you should choose the one with the best stats. You shouldn't be in melee very often and melee weapon damage isn't important.

When training new pets set up a freezing trap first. That way the "soon to be new pet" will spend a little less time trying to eat you while you tame it.

Always stay at range. Let your pet take the heat and you support the pet. Most of your melee skill are designed to slow the opponent for a reason: to let you get distance.

As you pet gets tougher, and your skills better, you can have you pet attack more than one mob, one after the other. It will be able to hold aggro, if you're a bit careful, while the two of you burn them down. Simply have the pet attack the first, what it once, then run to and attack the second.

Hunters do have it too easy, which is why they're often called "Huntards." As your skills increase try to make things harder. Practice fighitng multiple mobs at once, higher level mobs, and so on. Practice your kiting skills. The end result is you'll be a much better player at high level.

Always log out in an Inn, to get the 100% bonus rest XP.

Questing is much better than grinding for XP, as long as you group your quests. If you grab all the quests in an area you'll find that several are in almost the same place. Do all of those at the same time. Plan ahead a bit, know where you have to go, and try not to do quests that take you way out of your way, unless you're hitting more quests along the way. Turn in a bunch of quests at one time and feel the power.

Dungeons are great XP and you get to practice your group skills. Obviously you'll be a damage dealer (DPS) and if you're new to dungeoning you might want to do your first few with friends. Guilds can be great for this.

PvP (battleground) leveling is more "interesting." It's great experience if your side wins and so-so otherwise. Battleground "Holidays" are even better.

Gear - You're not as gear dependent as most other classes, so don't feel you always have to have the best gear, all the time. Gear found by completing quests will keep you going all the way to the end. Save the gear grinding for PvP and Raiding.

You get to wear Mail armor starting at level 40, but since you're hardly ever in melee it's not such a big thing.

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Professions and Gold

Make an alt that you will park at the Auction House. As you level just mail all the sellable stuff you collect to your alt (to sell) and then get back to the leveling. Log into your alt when you're done and put the stuff up on the AH. See our gold guide for other tips.

Get the biggest bags you can afford and loot everything, always, unless you already have enough gold. Also, everything white or better, that you're not keeping, gets shipped to your alt. Vendor the gray stuff.

If you have a ton of gold then leatherworking will provide some solid gear, both leather and mail, at the expense of that ton of gold and the time to level the skill up. If you're not so rich then skip all of the crafting skills. Skinning will provide some of the raw material for your Leatherworking.

Q: How do you make a small fortune in WoW?

A: Start with a large fortune and then level up a crafting profession. There are craftable items from most professions that do sell nicely and for a nice profit, but it takes some research to find them. Most of the gold making benefit from crafting profs is at the high end.

Our suggestion is to skip the crafting professions while leveling, since they're expensive and somewhat time consuming. If you just have to grab one then Leatherworking is perfect for Hunters and can make some pretty fine gear.

• Alchemy can make a number of very useful concoctions to consume when needed. Take Herbalism with this, you'll save a ton of gold. You get an enhanced effect from your own potions as compared to the other guy's.
• Enchanting can put some pretty nice buffs on things and disenchant other things. You can then sell or use the disenchanted bits. This skill can also put an enchant on your own rings, but not the other guy's.
• Engineering - If you're rich and want to ride on of those Mechano Hog Motorbike things eventually. There are a lot of interesting gadgets in this profession so it's worth a look. One useful gadget is Synapse Springs whish adds a massive amount of Agility for a short time.
• Inscription - Used to be that it was a really nice money maker. Take Herbalism with this, you'll save a ton of gold. At the high end this skill provides a Shoulder enchants which is much nicer than any other.
• Jewelcrafting - Can be a good money-maker. Take Mining to go with it. The self-only gems will provide more agility than the normal gems.
• Blacksmithing - Provides an extra socket for nice gems on your gloves and bracers, otherwise the prof is of little hunter-specific use.
• Tailoring - Not much there other that a cloak enchant which adds attack power.
• Cooking can make interesting foods, some of which buff Agility, as well as other stats.
• Fishing can provide mats for cooking and food for meat eating pets (not crabs and birds.)
• Archeology can create, eventually, some rare pets and interesting items.
• First Aid is a very handy skill to have as it's your only heal, outside of potions and Herbalism.
• Mining, skinning, and herbalism are your create gold on demand skills. Take any two, but we suggest that Skinning be one of them, especially since it also provide the much desired Crit Rating . Also, mining provide a health bonus, and herbalism a heal with Haste.

With the synergy of both your DPS as well as the pets, you should find your hunter becoming an unbeatable grinding speed demon, enjoy it.