Class Talents
The Class tree Talents contains essential spells and passives that are mandatory for any situation as a MM hunter, other talents that are situational, and some others that are just not good enough to be picked.
Mandatory Talent:
- Kill Shot : core spells of the spec
- Improved Kill Shot: a talent that gives you more damage on Kill Shot's critical strikes. There's just no reason not to take it because most of the upper tree's talents don't increase DPS
- Posthaste and Pathfinding: two talents that give you movement speed, which is needed for pretty much every situation. Posthaste can also dispel you from some movement-impairing debuffs
- Counter Shot: Hunter's kick is needed for pretty much every situation
- Survival of the Fittest paired with Lone Survivor or Nature's Endurance (fight dependent), Born To Be Wild, and Hunter's Avoidance: talents that give the Hunter mandatory decent survival skills.
- Serrated Shots: more damage on bleeds and strongexecute. It can be even better if paired with Steel Trap.
- Keen Eyesigh and Death Chakram: flat critical strike chances and a strong cooldown that is good in pretty much every situation.
- Arctic Bola: This gains more value as MM than BM hunters because Aimed Shot triggers it, and we cast it a lot. A solid choice overall, even more for AoE situations.
- Master Marksman, Serpent Sting, Hydra’s Bite, and Poison Injection: This branch is pretty solid for a Marksmanship hunter. You want to pick Poison Injection for ST and Hydra’s Bite for AoE.
We don’t have that much choice at the bottom of the tree, considering that we don’t play with Kill Command and a Pet at all as MM, so we can completely ignore the branch at the bottom left of the tree.
Situational Talents:
- Misdirection, Camouflage, Tar Trap, Tranquilizing Shot, and Binding Shot: most likely used in Mythic + content or, if needed, on some boss encounters. They provide you with a threat redirection, a stealth, AoE slow, offensive magic and enrage dispel, and a 3s AoE stun (Binding Shot does not root anymore).
- Steel Trap and Improved Traps: strong in ST situations, they lose a lot of value in AoE situations. It's pretty much always better to pair them together.
- Explosive Shot: this can be a good pick instead of Steel Trap in AoE or Cleave situations
- Sentinel Owl and Sentinel's Protection: fight dependent, the leech can also be good for your party members.
Bad Talents:
- Trailblazer: we already have enough move speed, and it works only after 3s after being out of combat, so kinda useless (maybe while farming old content or leveling)
- Intimidation and Wilderness Medicine: We don't use pets as MM because of the Lone Wolf passive
- Entrapment, Scare Beast, High Explosive Trap, and Improved Tranquilizing Shot are super niche talents that will probably never be used
- Barrage: Explosive Shot is better now in AoE/cleave situations
- Beast Master, Improved Kill Command, Killer Instinct, and Alpha Predator: this branch is completely useless since we don't play with a Pet and with Kill Command
Talent Builds
Single Target
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This build focuses mainly on Kill Shot by taking the talents Killer Accuracy, Deathblow, Razor Fragments, Deadeye, and Bullseye. It will increase the damage of Kill Shot, allow you to cast it outside of the execute window, and buff the Hunter when the target is below 20% remaining health. So overall a nice build with a strong execute phase.
We will also aim to take Rapid Fire to the left, which is one of your core spells, then we will also take Streamline and Surging Shots, 2 strong talents that will buff our Rapid Fire and Aimed Shot.
We will then follow the middle line to be able to take Trueshot by taking Improved Steady Shot, which will give us more focus, so overall gameplay with a bit less downtime. Follow up with Lone Wolf, which will allow us to do more damage if we don't have an active pet, Hunter's Knowledge which also buffs our Aimed Shot and Rapid Fire, Target Practice to buff our Arcane Shots; and Steady Focus to have more haste.
To the right, we will take Precise Shots, a talent that will significantly increase the damage of our Arcane Shots, and Careful Aim, a powerful talent that buffs Aimed Shot when the target is above 70% health (even stronger on fights where you lust on pull).
Focused Aim is also a go-to talent that buffs our main spells, the same goes for Double Tap, which synergizes well with Careful Aim.
To finish with, Serpentstalker's Trickery will allow us to completely ignore refreshing manually Serpent Sting, and Lock and Load will give us procs on your Aimed Shot.
AoE/Cleave for Raid & Mythic+
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This build has a lot of differences compared to the ST one. We will completely ignore every talent related to Kill Shot, for example.
We still take Rapid Fire (that forces us to also pick Crack Shot that is completely useless in AoE, but it's still worth it), Streamline, and Surging Shots. We will then continue down to the right to pick Multi-Shot, a core spell for AoE damage, especially when linked with Trick Shots, Bulletstorm and Salvo. Depending on the number of targets, you will pick Heavy Ammo or Light Ammo.
We will also pick Volley, a strong cooldown that will do AoE damage and give us the Trick Shots effect during its duration.
Like the ST build, we still follow the main middle line until we get Trueshot.
We also still get Precise Shots, Careful Aim, Focused Aim, Serpentstalker's Trickery, and Lock and Load.
The very last change is by taking Wailing Arrow, a cooldown that will do AoE damage (basically the old Sylvanas bow ability).