Cataclysm Classic Survival Hunter Talent Builds

Like most classes in Cataclysm, Survival Hunter has a straightforward talent setup with very little variance. This is because of the requirement to take 31 points in your main tree combined with the limited number of total talents. Even though we only take exactly 31 points in Survival, we are only skipping 11 talent points in the tree total, where 10 points are in utility talents that do not increase our damage at all. Survival does have more points available than the other hunter specs, but that does not equate to more choice.

This is your standard PvE spec that is built around maximizing damage done. There are only a couple of points that have any variance, which is just the points in Point of No Escape. This talent is incredibly good if you are ever going to get to AoE large groups of adds that could be affected by Ice Trap. However, for bosses, this is worthless. If you choose to drop this talent, you can pick up Hunter vs. Wild instead of the Stamina increase. While Stamina is not a DPS increase, it is an absolutely vital durability stat, which can help you out in heroic raids when it comes to just living. Having a larger total health bar is always a good thing.

In this section we will go over some of the key talents you will use when you are playing a Survival Hunter. Be sure to understand your most important talents as they are vital to play the build to its fullest strength.

• Lock and Load — this is the core of Survival and is where the most variance in your rotation will come from, when combined with T.N.T.. This gives you procs that make your Explosive Shot free with no cooldown. Survival's rotation is all about maximizing your Explosive Shot uses, so learning how to play with these procs is critical to not waste the damage.

• Serpent Spread — even though we only take a single point in this talent, this is one of your most important talent points. This will put Serpent Sting on all targets hit by your Multi-Shot, which is absolutely incredible for AOE. This talent is a massive single point. The second point is unnecessary since you will always be using Multi-Shot more than once every 6 seconds on AOE.

• Hunting Party — this is your raid buff, increasing everyone's attack speed by 10%.

• Sniper Training — this is another critical mechanic for maximing your DPS as a Survival Hunter. You will need to ensure that you always keep this buff active during combat. Once every 15 seconds, you need to stand still for 6 seconds to get this buff, which gives you a ton of crit and other damage on some of your shots.

• Black Arrow — this is another core shot for Survival. Basically you just use it on cooldown for single target encounters. However, for AoE, you will always want to use Explosive Trap instead since they share a cooldown.

Prime glyphs are new to Cataclysm, giving you a third "row" of glyphs you can use on your character. For Survival, there are only three options that make sense, which are the three gylphs that will buff your standard rotational abilities.

• Glyph of Explosive Shot — increases the crit chance of your Explosive Shot by 6%. This is your most important damaging ability.
• Glyph of Serpent Sting — increases the crit chance of your Serpent Sting by 6%. This is slightly worse than the Arcane Shot glyph on single target, but this is significantly stronger on AoE, so it should be the default choice.
• Glyph of Kill Shot — basically gives you a second instant use of Kill Shot every time you use it if the target does not die. This is an absolutely amazing option as Kill Shot is an incredibly powerful shot.

Major glyphs typically offer utility-based options and can be highly situational. For Survival there are a wide variety of Glyphs but we have highlighted what are typically the most useful. None of these are actually required; this is all personal preference.

• Glyph of Disengage — reduces the cooldown of Disengage by 5 seconds. This is our most important movement ability, so having it on a lower cooldown is generally a good idea.
• Glyph of Ice Trap — increases the radius of your Ice Trap by 2 yards. These are purely personal preference, but this is one of the only remaining options that has a chance of being useful in a raid or dungeon if you need to slow down a group of adds.
• Glyph of Trap Launcher — reduces the focus cost of Trap Launcher by 10. It is very likely that you'll need to use trap launcher during a raid at some point, so the reduced focus cost is somewhat of a damage increase.

Minor glyphs typically provide very minor benefits. Your choices will typically depend on what quality of life increase is the most meaningful for you.

• Glyph of Feign Death — reduces the cooldown of Feign Death by 5 seconds.
• Glyph of Revive Pet — removes any pushback from damage while casting Revive Pet, which can be important if you ever need to revive a pet during a fight.
• Glyph of Aspect of the Pack — increases the range of your Aspect of the Pack by 15 yards. If you ever do need to use Aspect of the Pack, this is an incredibly strong bonus to ensure your whole raid is covered.