Level 60: Tier 4 of Warlords of Draenor contains talents that offer choices of enhancing performance. One of the talents of this tier, Dire Beast, will stop being a talent altogether and become an ability of Beast Mastery Hunters as well as part of their core rotation. As BM hunters will have Arcane Shot replaced with new, non-focus giving version of Cobra shot, two other talents in same row become irrelevant. Let’s take a look at new talents:
Stomp!* - When your Dire Beasts charge in, they will stomp the ground, causing 400% Physical damage to all nearby enemies.
Exotic Munitions - Allows you to modify your ranged weapon to use exotic munitions: Incendiary Ammo, Poisoned Ammo or Frozen Ammo. Only one exotic munition can be active at one time.
This talent currently exists in Warlords of Draenor and is present in level 100 as a possible choice. It remains unchanged in Legion, except for being present in different tier.
Chimaera Shot* - A two-headed shot that hits your primary target and another nearby target, dealing 660% Nature or Frost damage to each target. Generates 10 Focus for every target hit.
As of Warlords of Draenor specific to Marksmanship specialization of Hunters
Level 75: Tier 5 of WoD offered a choice of talents improving performance. Blink Strikes remains a part of this tier, being added two brand new talents, while A Murder of Crows was moved up a tier, to level 90.
Big Game Hunter* - Increases the critical strike chance of your Auto-Attacks and Cobra Shots by 50% on targets who are above 80% health.
Bestial Fury* - Increase the damage bonus of Bestial Wrath by 20%.
Blink Strikes - Your pet's Basic Attacks deal 50% increased damage, can now be used from 30 yards away, and will instantly teleport them behind their target.
Level 90: Tier 6 retains one of its talents from WoD, Barrage, with the other two being removed.
A Murder of Crows - Summons a flock of crows to attack your target over the next 15 sec. If the target dies while under attack, A Murder of Crows' cooldown is reset.
Barrage - Rapidly fires a spray of shots for 3 sec, dealing Physical damage to each other enemy target in front of you. Usable while moving.
Volley* - Continuously fire a volley of ammo at the target area, causing 50 Arcane damage to enemy targets within 8 yards every second for 6 sec.
Level 100: Tier 7 contains a talent that was originally in WoD in tier 5, Stampede, with 2 brand new talents:
Stampede - Summon forth a herd of stampeding animals from the wilds around you that deal damage to your enemies.
Killer Cobra* - While Bestial Wrath is active, Cobra Shot has a 25% chance to reset the cooldown of Kill Command.
Aspect of the Beast* - Kill Command is improved based on the Talent choice of your pet.
Besides choosing a talent what will seriously affect your game style is your specialization-specific artifact and its traits. Beast Masters receive a gun (which I personally am still salty about), named Titan Spark. You can read more about it on the site. Through the course of the expansion you will be able to upgrade it and unlock different traits - resulting in opening them all at some point. Check out what traits your new shiny artifact will give to your hunter.
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Unlike previous expansions, Legion will also have a variety of world-drop legendaries. While those that were datamined by our friends at WoWHead and MMO-Champion did not have any specific modifications for hunters, here is an example of such an item that my Affliction Warlock would be very excited to get and immediately put to good (or not so good) use:
You can find the rest of datamined so far legendaries on MMO-Champion. Be warned, there might be spoilers out there!
What class and specialization do you currently play? Did any artifact in particular interest you enough to try out a new class or different spec? Let us know in the comments below!
