Overview
The Hunter is known for their pets, their long-range, sustained DPS, and their traps.
The three trees of a Hunter are all viable for a hunter to choose for leveling, player versus player combat, or end game raids or instances, but since only two of the three trees allows for the complete use of talent points the player is forced to cross trees, hybridizing into other talent trees. The three trees all have options to offer for utility, open DPS, and survivability.
Beast Master
Most of these talents improve on your active pet and skills that pertain to them, such as Thick Hide, Improved Mend Pet, and Bestial Swiftness. Some of the other talent points improve your aspects (Improved Aspect of the Hawk or Improved Aspect of the Monkey). Beast Mastery is the one of the few trees out of any classes without a level 20 learnable skill from a talent (another example is Shaman's ability to use two-handed axes and maces). The talent attainable at level 30 is Spirit Bond and Intimidation, and the level 40 talent is Bestial Wrath. The level 50 talent is The Beast Within.
The Beast Mastery tree is excellent for grinding. The majority of hunters choose a Beast Mastery when leveling because of how much quicker an enemy mob will go down per mana used by the hunter, lack of downtime due to healing on both part of the hunter and pet, and the ability to still kill mobs while under the affects of Resurrection Sickness.
This tree can also be versatile for PVP. Since the majority of players would attempt to Crowd Control the hunter's pet, Bestial Wrath and The Beast Within enables the hunter and his pet to become immune to Fear, Polymorph, Stun and other sources of Crowd Control.
In addition, some hunters have found success with using a pet in high level raids. It takes diligence to keep your pet alive and active, and the pet can only be used for certain fights. During some boss fights, AOE attacks can kill the pet within a matter of seconds if not healed. With Serpent's Swiftness a Beast Master build can out damage a Marksmanship build during long fights.
* Note: As of 2.1 pets can now gain a 50 percent immunity to AOE spells.
* Note: As of 2.1 pets are no longer effected by shatter by Gruul in Gruul's Lair
Marksman
Most of the talents deal with specifically increasing the ranged damage you can cause. The level 20 learnable talent is the largest single damaging shot a hunter can perform: Aimed Shot. The talent attainable at level 30 is Scatter Shot, which many hunters also consider to be a pivotal talent because it is the only ability usable in the hunter's Dead Zone. The level 40 talent is Trueshot Aura which gives party members increased attack power. The level 50 talent is Silencing Shot which in most cases interrupts the target while silencing them for up to 3 seconds.
The Marksmanship tree is excellent for high-level instances and raiding. With such important talents like Improved Hunter's Mark and Rapid Killing, the Marksmanship tree scales well with gear and it appears that with no matter what gear one can obtain, this tree will still remain the best.
This tree can also be quite good for grinding. With the more damage you can do, the less time you have to spend fighting a mob. Enemies can be killed faster and, when combined with a Beast Mastery spec, grinding becomes incredibly fast and efficient.
Marksmanship is also an option PvP. The talents of Lethal Shots, Mortal Shots and Barrage add great burst damage for a hunter whilst Scatter Shot is a great tool to help deal with players that get in your Dead Zone.
Survivalist
Most of the talents deal with specifically increasing the melee survivability such as Deterrence. Some of the other talent points improve your traps (Trap Mastery) and burst damage (Killer Instinct). The level 20, 30 and 40 learnable talents are Deterrence, Counterattack and Wyvern Sting, respectively. At level 50 the Survivalist Hunter can learn Readiness
Also, the Survival tree is the most complete of any hunter tree with what many hunters consider to be fewer useless talents (although some argue over things like Improved Feign Death).
The Survival tree is excellent for PvPing. With such important talents like Improved Wing Clip and Counterattack hunters no longer have a deadzone. A hunter can choose to focus on improving his traps, his melee fighting skill or his ability to get back to ranged.
This tree can also be quite good for raiding. Although there are not many talents that increase your damage, Lightning Reflexes gets better with higher level gear. It is possible for a hunter to obtain over 700 agility with Naxxramas gear and Lightning Reflexes. Also, many hunters like the utility their characters have outside of the raid.
Some hunters have found success with being Survival and grinding. The trap talents make kiting a much easier task, and skills like Clever Traps and Wyvern Sting allow a hunter to crowd control multiple targets at a time.
Summary
The most important thing to realize about hunters is that you can choose any build and find success with it. Even the seemingly useless builds like a Survival/Beast Mastery spec can be very good for people who solely want to PvP. The idea is to find the build that you like and which best fits your playing style.
Whose the best for ___
Heroics
In heroic instances a hunter is required to CC targets, forcing them into a build with clever traps and the reliance that those traps will work. Heroic CC This build leaves 40 points open for whichever route the hunter wishes to take, either Beast Mastery, Marksman, or continuing Survival.
Raiding
Right now raiding DPS is split fairly evenly between all three trees. Hunters on the World of Warcraft Forums have given numerous examples of a Beast Mastery hunter leading the DPS charts on end game fights such as Void Reaver. But Beast Mastery hunters only give a buff to players in their party, a 3 percent increase in damage after your pet scores a critical strike.
Even though this buff is almost always up, it does not compare to a deep Survival hunter with over 800 agility (The required amount for deep survival). With expose weakness the entire raid can gain upwards of 200 attack power.
Also, Marksman has improved hunter's mark, that gives a permanent increase of 110 attack power to all melee and ranged attackers.
So all three hunters bring something to the raid, either it be for their party or for the entire raid, but bring at least one or you won't be bringing anything home with you that night.
PVP
Once again split evenly between all three trees.
Beast Master builds
With the expansion of The Burning Crusade the talent tree has no longer been looked at singly as a method for the hunter to level easily. Talents that used to benefit just the pet now benefit the hunter to a large degree. Beast Mastery builds are now highly looked upon for Player versus Player combat and end game raiding for sustained DPS, especially because of Serpent's Swiftness
Recommended talents
* Endurance Training
* Thick Hide
* Improved Revive Pet
* Unleashed Fury
* Ferocity
* Improved Mend Pet
* Intimidation
* Bestial Discipline
* Frenzy
* Bestial Wrath
* Serpent's Swiftness
* The Beast Within
The key elements in this build are Intimidation, which provides you with a quick 3 second stun and a large amount of threat against the mob you are fighting, and Bestial Wrath, which is then used to apply a substantial amount of damage to the target.
Examples
* Boonman's Build
* Rapid Fire
* Sharlin's Build
Marksmanship Build
With the expansion of The Burning Crusade and the elaboration of the Marksmanship Build, hunters have received quite a bit of flak for being "overpowered." Hunters were given a silencing spell, along with several talents that directly increase their attack power. But almost since it's conception Marksmanship has been the end game/raid tree. Recommended talents
* Lethal Shots
* Efficiency
* Improved Hunter's Mark
* Aimed Shot
* Rapid Killing
* Mortal Shots
* Scatter shot
* Barrage
* Ranged Weapon Specialization
* Improved Barrage
* Careful Aim
* Trueshot Aura
* Master Marksman
* Silencing shot
This list may seem intimidating, since there are more talent options to take than a player might want to, but that is because the Marksmanship tree has been given almost no "junk talents." Try what works, respec if need be, and have fun.
Examples
* Innerdemons Hemo Build
* Innerdemons Raid Build
* Rifkind's Build
* Ithar's Build
* Clubsoda's Build
* Biron's Build
* Luckymarlin's build
* Beck's build
* Whiteminn's build
Survival builds
Survival tree is about keeping the target out of the hunter's dead zone and keeping them there. With the Burning Crusade expansion the tree has seen a major refurbishing with the addition of Readiness, Hawk Eye, and Master Tactician. Survival tree has been easily turned to for putting a player's extra talent points or for a Player versus Player oriented Hunter.
Recommended talents
* Monster Slaying
* Humanoid Slayer
* Hawk Eye
* Savage Strikes
* Deflection
* Improved Wing Clip
* Clever Traps
* Survivalist
* Deterrence
* Survival Instincts
* Killer Instinct
* Lightning Reflexes
* Wyvern Sting
* Master Tactician
* Readiness
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