Pandaria [Guide] PvP Beast Mastery Hunter 5.4

HeadshoT Tz 5.4.2 Beast Mastery PvP Guide

In Mists of Pandaria Beast mastery has shown to be great in PvP too. I try to explain every important thing about PvP here. Things like general hunter movement, how to defend your pet, switch pet in combat, arena tips, crowd control and macros.

After the third topic you will see six videos that will help to understand what is on that section. This videos are from my Cata guide, but still usefull.

Beware of *Bugnotes. To make sure something still not fixed check the changelog or the bugtracker.

Feel free to reply in this guide or contact me on private message here.

Reading is not as fun as playing. But if you read all this guide and start using the things you see here, you will save yourself a lot of time and have more fun sooner.

If this guide help you, please comment!.

Table of Content

Spoiler: Show

1) Bursting - Combat introduction
2) Rotation - Dealing damage
3) Recovering - Regenerating Focus
4) Movement - General hunter movement
5) Kite - Avoiding being hit
6) Crowd Control - Handling multiple enemies
7) Staying Alive - Trick to stay alive
8) Keeping pet alive - Protecting your pet
9) Pets - The best pets
10) Important Skills - Skills overview
11) Key bindings - Binding keys to skills
12) Macros
14) Character Construction - Glyphs, Gems, Player and Pet talents
15) Addons

Spoiler: Show

This is the Burst macro, it will change depending of your race, professions and equipment but the idea is add all your buffs in one macro.

#showtooltip Trinket Name
/cast Spirit Beast Blessing
/cast Dash
/cast Rapid Fire
/cast Stampede
/use Trinket Name
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

*Bugnote: Stampede does not work at all right now.

Add /cast BloodFury if you are Orc and /cast Berserking if you are Troll. You can also add /use Virmens Bite or /use 10 that will use Synapse Springs, but both skills should be put as first lines in the macro and it will work on the second click. And remember to put the Trinket as the last line.
The /script line can be below it and it avoid that error messages show up on your screen.

Bestial Wrath is a Burst skill too, but it can be used to remove CC's from you and your pet. So you put BW on another keybind and use when you are CC'd. This is also good to avoid loose all your Burst skills if enemy Vanish or use Hand of Protection for example.

So using BW this way gives you two "CC Breakers" if you already have a Medallion, or if you are Human with the Every Man For Himself racial. Also gives you the option of use two DPS trinkets and using only BW to remove CC's.

To play any hunter spec you will need macros, so here is how you do it. The majority of the macros you will see in this guide are essential, there's just a few ones that are optionals.

Targeting Tip

Keep your enemy on Target all the time is important for your damage. Some classes can confuse you switching your target, like mages with Mirror Image, and Hunters with Feign Death. To make easier to target the enemy again you can bind the "Tab" key to "Target Nearest Enemy Player" on the Key Bindings menu (Press Esc in-game). This will avoid you to target pets, totens and random npc's while using tab, this way you will target only enemy players with "Tab".

Spoiler: Show

Widow Venom (for healers) -> Serpent Sting ->
Kill Shot -> Kill Command -> *Talent tier 6 -> Arcane Shots -> Kill Command -> Arcanes Shots ->
Focus Fire and Cobra Shot with low focuss -> (...)

Tier 6 - If you are using Glaive Toss use it on CD, If you are using Power Shot keep in mind that a knock back is not always usefull, so think if it will be good for you at that moment.

Is better keep Bestial Wrath to remove CC's. But if you are not under attack for example, use BW just after the Burst macro

Widow Venon is for healers or for targets being healed. Serpent Sting its recommended for medium to long fights, best time to use it is when Bestial Wrath effect is almoust over, so you will start do cobra shots soon to refresh it.

In MoP theres no crazy aspect swichitng, but some macros with Aspect of the Hawk still useful, but you dont really need it in all your damage skills anymore. Im using it only in Kill Command now.

#showtooltip Kill Command
/cast !Aspect of the Hawk
/cast Kill Command
/petattack
/script UIErrorsFrame:Clear()

Spoiler: Show

Cobra Shot is the choice for a BM recover focus. If you have the 5 stacks to consume use Focus Fire when you are recovering to do it faster. If you have the herbalism proffesion add Lifeblood.

#Showtooltip Cobra Shot
/cast Rapid Fire
/cast Cobra Shot

But use Focus Fire only if you really need to recover focus, because Focus Fire remove the Frenzy stacks from your pet, and would not be good while bursting.

Spoiler: Show

I will show one way to move, i learned it a long time ago from other hunter guides.
I bind the Strafe Right and Strafe Left on the Keybings menu (Esc) to the keys "D" and "A". The Turn Right and Left options you already have when you Click and Drag Right Mouse Button.

Spoiler: Show

In my opinion this is the fun on Hunter class, in all specs. If you have enough CD's and you know the right time for using them, you can kite enemies for a long time.

Now you know how to move you must Slow your enemies, so they cant reach you. Concussive shot is the n?? 1 skill for this. Must be used in all enemies that come attack you on melee, or that are running away from you. You also have the following skills to kite:

Disengage - Best used when you have a lower terrain at your back. You can also jump down of a cliff and when you are near the ground use Disengage, you will not lose health.
Scatter shot - Scatter your enemy and take some distance to use Concussive Shot or put a Trap.
Explosive Trap - If you have the Glyph, good for Bgs, You can gain some distance or even throw someone down off a Cliff.
Power Shot - Good for Bg's too, get some distance or a insta kill if you have the oportunity.
Talents Tier 2 - Any of the three talents can be used to gain distance.
Master's Call - Set's you free from movement impairing for 8 seconds with glyph. Use it when enemy is near and its slowing you. This skill can be used on a friendly target or you.

Ice Trap

If you are kiting multiple enemies or when keeping Concussive shot effect all the time is hard, theres a tactic with Ice Trap thats its powerful and fun. This is also very good to fight Warriors and Rogues because its easier to keep the snare. Also Ferals can shapeshift to cancel your concussive shot, so this is very important to fight Feral druids.

Use Ice trap on the ground, and keep your enemies inside the trap. This seems simple and fool but its not really easy to master it. A video would be the easiest way to explain this. Use this tactic is not possible in a steep terrain .

Spoiler: Show

This is another way of kite, but where you can't hit your enemies. Freezing Trap and Wyvern sting are the main skills, but Scare Beast can be used against Feral players and hunter pets. This is a must for Arenas, and a useful tool in Bg's and open world Pvp.

In arena you CC one enemy and burst the other, In Bg's or Open World PVP you can CC healers too, or someone who's attacking you.

The Goal is, take someone out of the fight to get an advantage. You can put a Freezing Trap on the ground or you can throw it with Trap Launcher, in MoP i Just keep my Launcher on all the time, and remove it if i want to lay on the ground.

A technique that must be learned is the Scatter+Trap (or Web Wrap+Trap).

Focus and Mouseover

Is very important understand the use of Focus and Mouseover macros, with them you can cast spells in one enemy, while you keep other in your target. You can set Focus on the Interface menu of the game, or with Gladius, that is highly recommended for Arenas.

Crowd Control Macros

There's different ways of using CC macros. Find the best option for you.

Add /stopcasting and /cancelaura Deterrence can be very good to fast reaction on PvP, so you wont miss a silence or a good moment to CC because you are casting a Cobra Shot or under effect of Deterrence.

But add if it you feel good with it, i will give one example with Counter Shot, if you wish add on your Scatter Shot, Wyvern Sting and Scare Beast macros.

/stopcasting
/stopcasting
/cancelaura Deterrence
/cast Counter Shot

1 - Simple Focus macros:

Spoiler: Show

/cast [@focus] Scatter shot
Scatter the Focus target

/cast [@focus] Web Wrap
If you have a Shale spider.

/cast [@focus]Wyvern Sting

/cast [@focus] Scare Beast
To easy scare an Feral enemy.

You can also use macros with a Modifier. The macro will change depending on witch Modifier key you are pressing with the macro, Alt,Ctrl or Shift. Change the macro to the Modifier Key you prefer.

/cast [@target, nomod] scatter shot
/cast [@focus, mod:alt] scatter shot
Just pressing this macro will cast Scatter Shot on Target, if you press it while holding "Alt" will cast on your Focus. You can change the modifier to "Shift" or "Ctrl"

2 - Mouse-over + Target macros.

Spoiler: Show

/cast [@mouseover, harm] [@target] Scatter Shot
/stopattack
/stopattack
/petfollow
This use Scatter first on your Mouse-over IF you have one, or on Target.

/cast [@mouseover, harm] [@target] Web Wrap

/cast [@mouseover, harm] [@target] Wyvern Sting
/stopattack
/stopattack

/cast [@mouseover, harm] [@target] Scare Beast
/stopattack
/stopattack

Use Scare beast on your Target, or your mouse over target. Scare a feral druid, but if he shape shift out of beast form the cast is canceled. So its not useful against Ferals who know this. If the feral is not targeting you the scare have no chance to fail. You can scare pets from Hunters too, scare a Bm pet is very useful.

Useful macro for Freezing Trap:

#showtooltip Freezing trap
/stopattack
/stopattack
/cast freezing trap
Stop attack so you dont break the trap accidentally.

*Bugnote: Pets are always on Assist stance now, Passive is bugged. So add /stopattack and /petfollow lines on Scatter Shot, Wyvern Sting and Freezing trap is important.

Spoiler: Show

To heal yourself or avoid damage there's two skills a Hunter must use. For Cunning pets you get Roar of Sacrifice. And Spirit Beasts have Spirit Mend. This pet skills should never be on autocast.

Roar of sacrifice and is casted on YOUR target, so can be a friend, or you. Spirit Mend is the same thing, but can heal the pet too. So for this skills you need this to cast on YOU.

/cast [@player] Roar of Sacrifice
/cast [@player] Spirit Mend
You can use one macro to this two skills because if you switch pets you can use the same key, but to check if Spirit Mend is on cooldown add it to the pet's action bar, or to your action bar slots. Because the icon will always show the first skill. Or you can do two separated macros for this is skill if you wish.

Spirit Mend should be used as soon as you begin to lose health, since the healing takes 10 seconds to finish, you can use it again sooner.
Roar of Sacrifice can be used always that you are being hit, but is even better when the enemy is using Critical Strike buffs like trinkets and potions, so your damage mitigation will be bigger.

Know the right time to use this skills is important.

Pet Switching

This skills are from your pets, so if you have 2 spirit beats for example, you can use Spirit Mend from one, switch pets, and use it again. Or switch to a Shale Spider and use Web Wrap, plus RoS if the pet is on cunning. Thats Great! But how I do it in combat?

Under your Deterrence Effect.
During a Freeze trap or Wyvern Sting.
When the enemy is using spells like Ice Block and Dispersion, and during a enemy hunter Deterrence.

You just need a few macros and some practice, with the time will be very easy to do it. Macros for call/dismiss pets:

/cast [pet] Dismiss Pet
/cast [nopet] Call Pet 1
/petfollow
/cast dash

If you have any active pet this macro will dismiss him, if you have no active pet it will call pet 1. Make one macro for each pet you use.

/cast Deterrence
/cast [pet] Dismiss Pet
/petfollow
/cast dash

This macro makes easier the pet switching, but use only if you are confortable with it. You still need a maro to call but the dismiss will be faster.

*Bugnote: If you dismiss your pet under the Spirit Mend effect, you wont be healed for the seconds remaining. This tactics still very useful, just use Spirit Mend when you begin to lose health, and when you need to switch the pet the effect will be over. Its the best way to use this skill anyway.

Spoiler: Show

Soon you will notice that some enemies try to kill your pet first, but if you look out for him and use some tactics this will not be a problem. First thing you should do is use your pet in the Passive stance, and in your Kill Command and Burst macros you add the /petattack line.

This way the pet will attack with you always, but remember to send him first always you can. Why dont add /petattack to the Arcane Shot too? Because soon as you notice that a Melee enemy is attacking your pet you will call him with the call pet macro below:

/cast dash
/petfollow
Dash should not be in Autocast.

So you call him, heal with Mend Pet, and keep Concussive and Arcane Shots, dont use Kill Command. The pet is passive so he will not attack, but if he does for some reason you call him again. If the enemy "slows" your pet use Master's Call, so you will keep kiting, healing your pet and attacking. If you succeed in this tactic the enemy will probably start attacking you, so you begin to use Kill Command again and the pet will attack too, be ready to protect or attack with your pet a lot of times.

If is a Ranged class attacking your pet is different, call your pet is not worth so what you should do is attack, heal him and try to burst as harder as you can, before he dies you dismiss him and call another pet, or you can let him die and ressurect him if you have a Ferocity pet with Hearth of the phoenix, and after that you dismiss the pet. You can have 5 pets, so if you take care they will never die, unless in unfair circunstances.

Another option is use the macro below, and let the pet dies, then CC the enemy and ress. Since in MoP the ressurection is faster, this is possible.

Here is a macro to defend and ress your pet, it will ress if hes dead, and ifs alive will use all defensive skills on him. Set the best tooltip for you.

#showtooltip
/cast [@pet, dead] Heart of the Phoenix
/cast [@pet, dead] Revive Pet
/cast [@pet] Spirit mend
/cast cower
/cast dash
/cast mend pet

Spoiler: Show

The best options for pets in 5.4.2 still Spirit Beasts , Shale Spiders, and Devilsaurs.

The Spirit beasts gives you more damage because of the Mastery Buff and a bit healing with Spirit Mend in a 30 seconds CD.
The Shale Spider gives you a ranged stun of 3 seconds with a 1,5 min CD, and a 5% agility buff. But it does a bit less damage than Spirit Beasts.
The Devilsaur is good to use when you dont need defensive skills, it will give you 5% critical and a healing debuff on your enemy.

Pet Talents

Cunning is the best option for PvP. Roar of Sacrifice is a great damage mitigation skill. Also Bullheaded is a second CC breaker after Bestial Wrath for your pet.

But you can take the Ferocity talent if you dont need defensive skills, if you are behind a good BG team for example.

Secondary Pets

Spoiler: Show

Birds of Prey (Cunning) and Scorpids (Tenacity) can be used when you know that your enemy dont have Pyrium Weapon Chain, that reduces disarm effects by 50%. So is good at 1x1 duels, where you can check the enemy gear, besides that will be hard to know for shure. Try to disarm after the enemy waste hes Trinket, so you will have a 10 seconds disarm.
Chimera are viable to fight mostly melee classes. Not useful against rangeds.

The Shale Spider, and the Secondary Pets are Common and easily found, but Spirit beasts are Rare and the spawn time can be very long (several hours). Check Wowhead for spawn points.
Download NPC scan, and Npcscan Overlay addon to find pets, or make a macro like /tar loque and spam it while you fly over the spawm points, this macro will target the pet when he's near.

If the pet is not there when you search for him dont give up! You can camp there if you want and always that you log in you search for the pet. Or wait for a server restart/crash and rush to tame when the realm come back online, usualy they spawm after that.

Spoiler: Show

Some other skills are explained through the guide.

Counter Shot - Wait until your enemy cast some important skill and use it before the casting is done. You can silence healings or even a hunter that is trying to Scare beast your pet.

Pet buffs - No matter the pet you use, you should have a Devilsaur and a Spirit Beast with you. You can use the Devilsaur and SBs buffs, and switch to the pet you want before a fight begins, only on Bgs or open world pvp.

Bestial Wrath - Hunter "I WIN" button. Increase damage and removes CC, so can be used as a trinket.

Serpent Sting - Its a DoT (damage over time) and can be refreshed with cobra shot. Good to use on medium to long battles.

Widow Venon - Used on healers or in targets that are being healed, reduce heal by 25%. You can use it before start bursting to a better use, or anytime in a fight.

Tranquilizing Shot - Remove buffs from enemies. Its a must to fight paladins, it can remove Hand of freedom, Hand of protection and Wings. Tanquilize until you remove this effects from paladins. Can be used against any other enemy to remove buffs, if you have some time for this. The skill will be removed is a matter of lucky, so if you wanna dispel a specific Buff you can remove it at the first shot, or can take a few shots.

Feign Death - This makes the enemy lose your target, he will target your pet or any other target around. This also interrupt casts, so its very useful against casters.

Hunters Mark - Mark Rogues all the time. You can also mark an enemy when hes far and its not in stealth yet.

Camouflage - Use it always you can, while in camo you can send your pet near the target, and he gets near him, BANG !

Track Humanoids - Very useful anywhere, but more in Bgs. You can choose where and when you fight (most of the times). Thats a real war tactic, its even on Sun Tzu The Art of War classic. Many BM hunters rush to some fights that if they had watched the surroundings before, they would avoid.

Track Hidden - You can see hidden players when they come too close of you! If a rogue or feral dont know this, and he gets too near, you will be able to target him, but be fast because they soon hide again.

Flare - Put flare on the ground and use camouflage inside the light, this is the best way to protect from ferals and rogues. Also if a rogue try to Vanish, use flare in the direction he is going, not where he was. If you can put the light on the right place the rogue is all yours to kill. Also flare inside a smoke bomb allow you to shoot who's inside it.

Mend Pet - Heals your pet, and with Improved Mend Pet talent it haves a 50% chance to remove 1 curse, disease, magic or poison effect from your pet. This is very important to fight smart enemies who like to CC your pet.

Spoiler: Show

Key bind is give your action bars slots a key to use it. If you click some skills with your mouse while in combat its a bad sign. All of your combat skills should have a key to easy use.

If you are new to Keybinds, start slow. First bind the main skills, and with time you add more keys.

The easier way to do this is organizing your interface, and the keys you use. Try to get offensive skills near each other on your action bars, the same with defensive skills and CCs. I will post here my interface, but it changes from person to person.

*Note: This picture is from Cata, but still usefull.

You must find the best options for you. The skills you use more put on easy keys for you. Heres some tips to use as keybinds:

E,Q,R,T,F,Z,X,C,V,B,N,1,2,3,4,5
Shift Q, E,R,F,Z,X,C,V,B
CTRL E,R,F
ALT 1,2,3,4
CTRL+SPACE, SHIFT+SPACE, Middle mouse button, etc...

If you have a mouse with additional buttons you can bind them too. Like gaming mouses.

I use Dominos to customize my action bars, I think it helps a lot, but if you keep your normal iterface organized you are fine too. Shadowed Unit Frames can customize your interface like Health Bars and Target positions.

Spoiler: Show

Some macros not written before in this guide:
/calcelaura Trap Launcher
/cast Ice Trap
This is used when you wanna lay your Ice trap on the ground. This makes shure that, if Launcher is on, it will cancel it and lay the trap on the ground. Can be used on Snake Trap too if you have Entrapment talent.

#showtooltip Kill shot
/cancelaura Deterrence
/cancelaura Hand of protection
/cast Aspect of the Hawk
/cast kill shot
You dont wanna miss a Kill Shot because you are in deterrence, or hand of protection? This is what you need, if you click will cancel this two effects and cast kill shot. But dont click it in any other case.

/cast [@partnername] Roar of sacrifice
/cast [@partnername] Spirit Mend
Put your Arena Partner's or anyone's name inside, will use RoS and Spirit Mend on him, but beware he must not be too far from your pet.

/cast [@mouseover, help] [@target, help] [@focus, help] Roar of Sacrifice
/cast [@mouseover, help] [@target, help] [@focus, help] Spirit Mend
/cast [@mouseover, help] [@target, help] [@focus, help] Master's Call
Good for helping your team on Bg's and open world pvp. It will first cast on your mouseover, then target, then focus. Set the tooltip good for you.

/cast !aspect of the hawk
A macro to use hawk, if you click twice wont cancel the effect because of the "!". Use this for cheetah too.

/cast [nomod] !aspect of the hawk
/cast [mod:shift] !aspect of the cheetah
This is a Aspect macro with a Modifier. Change the Modifier key to the best for you, Alt, Ctrl or Shift.

#showtooltip [nomod] Dense embersilk bandage; [mod:shift] Feed Pet
/use [@player, nomod] dense embersilk bandage
/use [@pet, mod:shift] dense embersilk bandage
/petfollow
Cast bandage on you, and with a Modifier will cast bandage on your pet.

Spoiler: Show

Race

Spoiler: Show

Human or Orc are your best options for BM but is not a rule. Human because of Every man or himself, so you can use 2 DPS trinkets, and Orcs for Bloodfury. Of course you can play with any race you like, what really matter is have fun.

Stats

Spoiler: Show

Hit Rating 3% > Expertise 3% > Agility > Mastery > Critical > Haste

Talents

Spoiler: Show

Tier 1 - Narrow Escape can be useful in Arenas to stuck someone in a desired place. In Bgs useful to run away from people. But breaks on damage, so take Crouching Tiget if you dont want that.
Tier 2 - Wyvern Sting is the choice for Arena. Can be very useful anywhere else too, but get Binding shot if you want a Stun.
Tier 3 - Spirit Bond for the healing, but if you dont need it go Iron Hawk.
Tier 4 - Thrill of the Hunt is a slower recover, but on the long run will be the best choice.
Tier 5 - Blink Strinkes to keep your pet always pawning your enemy.
Tier 6 - Glaive Toss for the faster cooldown, but Power Shot can be fun and useful on Bgs.

*Bugnote: Glaive toss is doin low damage now, Power shot Best option.

Remember to configure you pet skills! Make shure that you put the Basic Attack and Buffs on Autocast. You can set Autocast on pet action bars or in the spell book, on the Pet's tab.
Skills like Web Wrap, Roar of Sacrifice, Spirit Mend, should not be in Autocast. They are best used on the right moment, so add it to a macro.

Glyphs

Spoiler: Show

Essential Arena Glyphs: Solace, Animal Bond (if you have healer)
Optional Glyphs: Deterrence, Mirrored Blades, Mending

Battlegrounds Glyphs: Animal bond, Camouflage and Explosive trap.
Other options: Liberation (if you have crouching tiger), Master's Call

Enchants

Spoiler: Show

Tailoring can provide Swordguard Embroidery and is the best enchant if you can have it. All other proffeions can be good besides that. The list below is without any proffesions.

Shoulders: Greater Tiger Claw Inscription
Cloak: Accuracy – Accuracy / Superior Critical Strike (depending if you need hit or not)
Chest: Super Resilience
Bracers: Greater Agility
Gloves: Superior Mastery
Belt: Living Steel Belt Buckle
Legs: Shadowleather Leg Armor
Boots: Blurred Speed
Weapon : Lord Blastington’s Scope of Doom

Gems

Spoiler: Show

Meta Socket : Agile Primal Diamond or Tyrannical Primal Diamond
Prismatic Socket : Delicate Primordial Ruby
Blue Socket : Assassins Imperial Amethyst
Red Socket : Delicate Primordial Ruby
Yellow Socket : Adept Vermillion Onyx

Spoiler: Show

The only necessary addon is Gladius, if you play Arenas. I use Dominos to customize my action bars, I think it helps a lot, but if you keep your normal iterface organized you are fine too. Shadowed Unit Framescan customize your interface like Health Bars and Target positions.
Lose control is very good to see more clearly when you, your target, your focus or your pet is under a CC effect, also when they are imune to damage. Power auras is good to track important buffs on you or your enemy.

This Story will inspire you on the Hunter's Path, Good luck !

Entering the life of a hunter

Tools

Posting Permissions