BM Hunter Talents Overview: Tier 1

Improved Aspect of the Hawk

5 Point talent

Description: While Aspect of the Hawk or Dragonhawk is active, all normal ranged attacks have a 10% chance of increasing ranged attack speed by 3/6/9/12/15% for 12 sec.

Overview

A stepping stone to other talents in the Beast Mastery Tree, but a very decent and cheap DPS boost nonetheless. It has a 10% proc rate from Auto-Shots and it lasts for 12 seconds. I can tell you from experience, it procs a lot and will often overwrite itself keeping the buff up for much longer than 12 seconds straight. Usually it will be active more often than not. In short, a lot of bang for the buck, or DPS for the points as it were.

Why needs it?

Raiding BM & MM Hunters will want this talent. MM will see more benefit from this talent than BM due to the BM Hunter’s inherent haste from Serpent’s Swiftness, but it still makes a big difference for BM DPS. Auto-Shot accounts for a large portion of a BM Hunter’s damage, so cranking out more of these is always a good thing.

SV may be able to drop a point or two in here, but probably won’t have enough points left over from the SV and MM trees to max it. Still, even 1 point (3% IAS) in here is going to make a noticeable difference to your DPS.

Who doesn’t need it?

PvP Hunters will not enjoy the benefits of this talent nearly as much as PvE Hunters will. There will seldom be opportunities to stand and shoot long enough to benefit from this proc.

Endurance Training

5 Point Talent

Description: Increases the Health of your pet by 2/4/6/8/10% and your total health by 1/2/3/4/5%.

Overview

10% more HPs for your pet, and 5% more for you. This is a basic meat and potatoes talent for PvP and leveling Hunters. Anytime survivability is important, grabbing more health is always a good option. That was my Captain Obvious statement for the month.

Who needs it?

BM PvP Hunters. MM and SV PvP Hunters will delve into each others’ trees most likely before they would head over to the BM tree. SV might be inclined to take a couple of points in here for added pet survivability and the synergy with Survivalist, but most likely not.

Since pets are still not gaining any resilience from the Hunter, an added 10% more health to the pet is a welcome buff. The extra 1k+ it tosses your way at level 80 is nothing to sneeze at either.

BM Hunters will want this if they plan to invest in a tanking pet for chewing through old content, or to solo group quests. In fact, it’s a pretty damn good talent for all BM Hunters, unless you plan on raiding as BM.

Leveling Hunters should grab this talent as well. The added health is important for keeping your pet up while you solo quest and do lower level instances.

Raiding MM Hunters heading down the BM tree may want to put a token point in here in order to reach the third tier for Aspect Mastery.

Who doesn’t need it?

Anyone looking to maximize their DPS. If PvE DPS is your thing, look to the left of this talent and grab IAotH. You can throw a point in here to advance down the BM tree, but that’s about it.