WRITTEN ARTICLE · HUNTER LEVELING
WoW Forever Hunter leveling guide: pets, Aimed Shot and talents to 30
How to level a Hunter in WoW Forever: taming your first pet, what changed for pets and traps, a Beast Mastery talent order to level 30 and when Aimed Shot and the milestone talents arrive.
How do you level a Hunter in WoW Forever?
Tame a pet at level 10 and let it hold enemies while you shoot. Our suggested plan to level 30, the highest level the beta allowed, is Beast Mastery, which spends its early points on pet health and armour and then on pet damage.
Blizzard made Aimed Shot a baseline ability at level 20, let traps work in combat and made pets scale with your gear. Blizzard also says Hunters cannot stun or interrupt, and your ranged abilities become unavailable within 8 yards of an enemy, so keeping the pet in front matters.
In this article
Diagram: ForeverWisp Editorial.
Hunter milestones from level 10 to 30
Talent points start at level 10 and you gain one per level, so talent point 11 arrives at level 20, point 16 at level 25 and point 21 at level 30. Blizzard added a new 16-point milestone talent alongside the familiar 11, 21 and 31-point milestones.
| Level | What changes | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | Talents unlock, and your trainer offers Taming the Beast. Tame Beast no longer works on beasts above your level. | Wowhead quest records and September 24 notes |
| 20 | Aimed Shot becomes a baseline ability. This is also the earliest level for an 11-point talent, such as Lone Wolf in Marksmanship. | Blizzard deep dive |
| 25 | The earliest level for a 16-point talent: Summon Hawk in Beast Mastery or Counterattack in Survival, if every point is in that tree. | Blizzard deep dive |
| 30 | The earliest level for a 21-point talent, such as Trueshot Aura or Strider Kick. | Blizzard deep dive |
| 40 | Dual Specialization unlocks. | Blizzard deep dive |
What changed for Hunter pets
Pets now gain stats from your gear, but they no longer take player buffs that raise their stats. Every family can learn Bite or Claw and Dive or Dash, and each family has one ability of its own. For example, boars Charge, bears Swipe up to three targets, turtles have Shell Shield, cats can Prowl and wolves have Furious Howl. Foxes are a new family with Trickster’s Dance, which raises dodge chance and attack speed for 12 seconds.
The beta notes changed pets further. On September 24 Blizzard cut Furious Howl’s Attack Power bonus by 40%. Aggressive Mode returned on October 1 and is in the pet tab of your spellbook. On October 8 Blizzard fixed a bug that made pets regain health repeatedly at low health.
The October 15 notes made pets benefit from Expertise and inherit whichever of your melee or ranged critical strike chance is higher. The same notes weakened three family abilities, shown below.
| Ability | Family | October 15 change |
|---|---|---|
| Dismember | Crocolisk | Healing reduction 25% (was 50%), duration 6 seconds (was 10), cooldown 15 seconds (was 6) |
| Sonic Blast | Bat | Cast speed reduction 30% (was 60%), duration 20 seconds (was 30), cooldown 60 seconds (was 30) |
| Mine! | Bird of Prey | Duration 3 seconds (was 4), cooldown 90 seconds (was 60) |
Which talents to take while leveling
Our Hunter talent guide uses a Beast Mastery plan that finishes at 31 Beast Mastery and 20 Marksmanship at level 60. Up to level 30 every point goes into Beast Mastery. The plan is our own theorycraft and has not been tested in the beta.
| Levels | Talent | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 10 to 14 | Endurance Training | 5 |
| 15 to 16 | Focused Fire | 2 |
| 17 to 18 | Pathfinding | 2 |
| 19 | Improved Revive Pet | 1 |
| 20 | Bestial Swiftness | 1 |
| 21 to 25 | Unleashed Fury | 5 |
| 26 | Summon Hawk | 1 |
| 27 to 29 | Ferocity | 3 |
| 30 | Intimidation | 1 |
How the talent changes affect that plan
Endurance Training now includes the old Thick Hide talent, so it gives your pet both health and armour. Focused Fire is new and increases all damage you and your pet deal while the pet is active. Summon Hawk, the Beast Mastery 16-point talent, deals instant damage and summons a Hawk for 18 seconds. You can have two Hawks at once, and the ability shares a cooldown with Arcane Shot. Unleashed Fury and Ferocity now also affect your Hawks. Intimidation now requires Bestial Swiftness and also gives your pet 100% increased critical strike chance on its next attack.
If you would rather play without a pet, Lone Wolf is the new Marksmanship 11-point talent. It gives 20% more damage with all attacks while you have no active pet. Survival supports trap and melee builds, with Counterattack at 16 points and Strider Kick at 21.
Since October 15, Summon Hawk spawns the Hawk at the target you cast it on and keeps it on that target. Improved Mend Pet now lowers the Mana cost of Mend Pet instead of raising it.
How to play a leveling Hunter
These habits follow from the changes Blizzard has published. They are suggestions to try, not measured results.
- Send your pet in first and let it build threat before you shoot. Your ranged abilities are unavailable within 8 yards.
- Disengage now reduces twice as much threat. The October 8 notes say this change is now in the game.
- Arcane Shot no longer shares a cooldown with Aimed Shot, but Multi-Shot does, so choose between Aimed Shot and Multi-Shot on each pull.
- Traps work in combat with a 30-second cooldown, and Frost and Fire traps have separate cooldowns. Since October 15 you can have one Fire trap and one Ice trap active at once, and Fire traps scale with Attack Power. You still place them at your own feet, so step back towards the trap before the enemy reaches you.
- Aspect of the Beast now also gives melee Attack Power, which helps if an enemy reaches you before your pet does.
- Scorpid Sting now lowers the target’s chance to hit by 2% instead of reducing its Strength and Agility.
- Auto Shot now needs you to stand still for half a second before it fires. Blizzard says it still fires while you cast Aimed Shot.
- Turn on the new Auto Attack/Auto Shot setting and your Hunter switches between melee auto attacks and Auto Shot automatically.
Taming the Beast at level 10
Wowhead’s Forever quest database lists Taming the Beast as a level 10 quest from your Hunter trainer. Dwarf Hunters get it from Grif Wildheart in Kharanos and tame a Large Crag Boar first. Horde Hunters in Durotar get it from Thotar in Razor Hill, and the first beast is a Dire Mottled Boar.
Wowhead also lists a version added for Forever, given by Josephine Carson to Alliance Hunters in Elwynn Forest, which asks for a Rockhide Boar. Since September 24 you cannot tame a beast above your own level, so check the level of any pet you want to keep.
What is still changing
Hunter fixes arrived every week of the beta. The October 8 notes fixed Unleashed Fury, increased Expose Prey from 5 to 10 seconds and gave Entrapment diminishing returns. The October 15 notes added the pet and trap changes above and fixed several Marksmanship and Survival talents.
The October 8 notes also listed a known visual bug: Ferocity does not show your pet’s higher critical strike chance on the character sheet, although the talent works. Dual Specialization unlocks at level 40. ForeverWisp has not playtested a Hunter, so treat this guide as a plan built from Blizzard’s notes.
Related reading and guides
Sources and review notes
- Blizzard: Hunter and Druid class deep dive, September 30
- Blizzard: September 24 beta development notes
- Blizzard: October 1 beta development notes
- Blizzard: October 8 beta development notes
- Blizzard: October 15 beta development notes
- Forever quest record: Taming the Beast (Grif Wildheart)
- Forever quest record: Taming the Beast (Thotar)
- Forever quest record: Taming the Beast (Josephine Carson)
Written October 20 from Blizzard’s September 30 Hunter and Druid class deep dive, the September 24, October 1, October 8 and October 15 beta development notes and Wowhead’s Forever quest records. The talent order comes from our own untested plan. ForeverWisp has not playtested a Hunter in the beta.
