Beast Mastery Hunter PvP Best Arena Compositions — The War Within (11.0.5)

Last updated on Oct 27, 2024 at 13:01 by Slo 33 comments

Team composition in 2v2 or 3v3 Arena is very important, because not all classes work well together. Here, we give you the best compositions you can have for your Beast Mastery Hunter (i.e., the best classes to pair with it).

This page is part of our Beast Mastery Hunter PvP Guide.

1.

Things to look for in partners as Beast Mastery

  • Ability to crowd control on the "Disorient" Diminishing return
    Examples: Psychic Scream Icon Psychic Scream, Cyclone Icon Cyclone, Blind Icon Blind, Blinding Light Icon Blinding Light, Blinding Sleet Icon Blinding Sleet, Intimidating Shout Icon Intimidating Shout, Sleep Walk Icon Sleep Walk
  • Ability to stun a kill target every 30 seconds when there is a Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap on healer
    Examples: Kidney Shot Icon Kidney Shot, Storm Bolt Icon Storm Bolt, Hammer of Justice Icon Hammer of Justice
  • Ability to do high single-target burst damage, preferably every 30 or 60 seconds
    Examples: Feral Frenzy Icon Feral Frenzy, Symbols of Death Icon Symbols of Death, Avenging Wrath Icon Avenging Wrath, Pillar of Frost Icon Pillar of Frost
  • Ability to apply a short stun on healers to set up Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Traps every 60 seconds when Intimidation Icon Intimidation is not available
    Examples: Cheap Shot Icon Cheap Shot, Mighty Bash Icon Mighty Bash, Rake Icon Rake (with Shadowmeld Icon Shadowmeld), Holy Word: Chastise Icon Holy Word: Chastise
  • Ability to peel when you are stunned, either with damage reductions or crowd control breaks
    Examples: Intervene Icon Intervene, Blessing of Protection Icon Blessing of Protection, Blessing of Freedom Icon Blessing of Freedom, Blessing of Sanctuary Icon Blessing of Sanctuary, Cyclone Icon Cyclone, Ursol's Vortex Icon Ursol's Vortex, Disarm Icon Disarm, Dismantle Icon Dismantle
2.

Things to avoid in partners as Beast Mastery

  • Specs that have their main crowd control abilities on the incapacitate diminishing returns category (this is the category of your Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap and Scatter Shot Icon Scatter Shot)
    Examples: Polymorph Icon Polymorph, Hex Icon Hex, Paralysis Icon Paralysis, Repentance Icon Repentance, Imprison Icon Imprison
  • Healers that require you to stand still or stack in order to heal efficiently
    Examples: Earthen Wall Totem Icon Earthen Wall Totem, Mastery: Lightbringer Icon Mastery: Lightbringer
  • Specs that are unable to stun or lock down your kill target at least once every 30 seconds
    Examples: All Mage specs, Windwalker
  • DPS specs with low survivability when focused
    Examples: Windwalker, Enhancement Shaman

You might have noticed a running theme from the list above. All of the DPS specs that work best with Beast Mastery Hunter are melee specializations.

And all of the healing specializations that work best with Beast Mastery Hunters are ones that have access to the Disorient diminishing return category (Discipline Priest) and ideally, the stun diminishing return category as well (Holy Priest, Restoration Druid).

3.

2v2 Arena (Beast Mastery + Healer)

It is recommended that if you are playing Beast Mastery in 2v2, then you play with a healer.

3.1.

Gameplan

The gameplan will almost always be:

  1. Ramp your damage
    (by building two Frenzy Icon Frenzy stacks from Barbed Shot Icon Barbed Shot, using Bloodshed Icon Bloodshed and Bestial Wrath Icon Bestial Wrath)

  2. Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap Healer
    (out of Intimidation Icon Intimidation, Holy Word: Chastise Icon Holy Word: Chastise, Mighty Bash Icon Mighty Bash or Rake Icon Rake if needed)

  3. Burst DPS
    (stun them with Holy Word: Chastise Icon Holy Word: Chastise, Mighty Bash Icon Mighty Bash, Rake Icon Rake or Maim Icon Maim if possible)

  4. Use your disorient diminishing return out of the Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap
    (Psychic Scream Icon Psychic Scream, Mind Control Icon Mind Control, Cyclone Icon Cyclone or Sleep Walk Icon Sleep Walk)

The Beast Mastery Hunter PvP Rotation and Playstyle page of this guide goes into more detail about your opening damage rotation.

And between that:

  • Scatter Shot Icon Scatter Shot DPS to peel when they are dealing high damage and you have run out of mobility to escape them
  • (Cyclone Icon Cyclone out of the Scatter Shot Icon Scatter Shot if playing with a Druid)
  • Kite with Concussive Shot Icon Concussive Shot, Tar Trap Icon Tar Trap, Binding Shot Icon Binding Shot, Ursol's Vortex Icon Ursol's Vortex
  • Swap to the enemy healer if the kill target uses defensives or moves out of your line of sight (do not sacrifice your good positioning chasing a melee DPS around pillars!)

Remember that your goal is to do the most damage whilst taking the least damage possible. Crowd control the enemy healer only when it is safe for you to do so, and do not let the other team bait you into a poor position.

Here is a ranked list of Beast Mastery + healer compositions for 2v2:

Disclaimer: during the first weeks of an expansion, any tier list is subject to change as the meta develops and Blizzard make balancing adjusments. This page will be regularly updated as the meta develops for The War Within Season 1.

3.2.

S tier:

3.3.

A tier:

3.4.

B tier:

3.5.

C tier:

4.

2v2 Arena (Beast Mastery + DPS)

It is possible to play Beast Mastery with DPS specializations in 2v2, but it is not recommended. Beast Mastery needs to ramp its damage before it can do meaningful burst, and has limited healing/recovery options when health has been lost so requires a hybrid that is able to "reset" the fight (e.g. with an ability like Lay on Hands Icon Lay on Hands or by locking down the enemy DPS with Cyclone Icon Cyclone and applying offheals to recover).

Here is a ranked list of Beast Mastery double DPS compositions for 2v2:

4.1.

A tier:

4.2.

B tier:

5.

3v3 Arena

There are many comps available to Beast Mastery Hunter in 3v3. The best generally be Beast Mastery + melee + healer. The ranged DPS specs that are usually playable with Beast Mastery are Balance Druid and Shadow Priest because they have so many diminishing return categories that do not overlap with the incapacitate diminishing return and generally have high damage output.

The best healer for your comp will usually be either be Holy Priest or Discipline Priest. Restoration Druid will sometimes work if your comp has very high damage and doesn't need a healer that can apply the disorient diminishing return category (Restoration Druids struggle to cast cyclone or use stuns in 3v3 as they need to stay at a long distance to heal effectively). Restoration Druid + Beast Mastery 3v3 comps tend to win by having great damage and efficiency rather than through crowd-control setups.

Preservation Evoker can be good as it is able to apply the disorient diminishing return category with Sleep Walk Icon Sleep Walk, as well as being able to do significant burst damage and apply pressure with Scouring Flame Icon Scouring Flame. This is particularly powerful in The War Within as many magic buffs have been added to the game, and magic buffs such as Power Word: Shield Icon Power Word: Shield are more powerful than they were in previous expansions.

Sometimes, other healers can be competitive with Beast Mastery Hunter if their healing is highly overtuned. Currently, in Season 1 of The War Within, Holy Priest is considered to be undertuned and Discipline Priest or Holy Paladin will be the best healers for most Beast Mastery Hunter comps.

5.1.

Gameplan

Your gameplan will almost always be:

  1. Ramp your damage
    (by building two Frenzy Icon Frenzy stacks from Barbed Shot Icon Barbed Shot using Bloodshed Icon Bloodshed and Bestial Wrath Icon Bestial Wrath)

  2. Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap Healer
    (out of Intimidation Icon Intimidation, Mighty Bash Icon Mighty Bash, Cheap Shot Icon Cheap Shot or Holy Word: Chastise Icon Holy Word: Chastise if needed)

  3. Stun your kill target and use burst cooldowns
    (stun them with Cheap Shot Icon Cheap Shot, Kidney Shot Icon Kidney Shot, Storm Bolt Icon Storm Bolt, Maim Icon Maim or Hammer of Justice Icon Hammer of Justice when the healer is in a Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap)

  4. Use your disorient diminishing return out of the Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap
    (Psychic Scream Icon Psychic Scream, Mind Control Icon Mind Control, Cyclone Icon Cyclone or Blind Icon Blind)

Note that the final step is crucial to your success playing any setup Hunter comp, and this is why Holy and Discipline Priests are so good with Beast Mastery. If you aren't able to achieve long crowd control chains by using a disorient category crowd control out of Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap, you will find it difficult to kill your target unless your comp has enough damage to kill enemies without crowd control on the healer.

Usually as Beast Mastery you will save your Scatter Shot Icon Scatter Shot to crowd control an enemy DPS when your partner is in a stun, or to set up Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Traps if you aren't able to get one using Intimidation Icon Intimidation or Binding Shot Icon Binding Shot, although you can also use it to cross crowd control the off-target to prevent them from using utility (e.g. Grounding Totem Icon Grounding Totem, Blessing of Sanctuary Icon Blessing of Sanctuary, Intervene Icon Intervene).

The Beast Mastery Hunter PvP Rotation and Playstyle page of this guide goes into more detail about your opening damage rotation.

5.2.

Troubleshooting

The most common issues that cause teams to struggle to climb with a Beast Mastery Hunter's composition is that either:

  • Your team is not lining up their stun on kill target with your Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap
  • Your team is not using their disorient (Psychic Scream Icon Psychic Scream on the healer immediately before or after Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap)
  • You are missing Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Traps on the enemy healer or not landing Freezing Trap Icon Freezing Trap regularly.
  • You are positioning too aggressively and taking more damage than you need to.
  • You are not saving your partner from enemy cooldowns using your utility Scatter Shot Icon Scatter Shot, Master's Call Icon Master's Call, Roar of Sacrifice Icon Roar of Sacrifice.
  • Your team are not rotating defensive cooldowns or kiting the enemy DPS players when they have damage cooldowns or crowd control active.

It doesn't matter what comp you play; if you are not solving the above issues, your team will struggle to climb (and if you are able to solve those issues, your team will climb very quickly).

Here is a list of the best team compositions for 3v3:

Disclaimer: during the first weeks of an expansion, any tier list is subject to change as the meta develops and Blizzard make balancing adjusments. This page will be regularly updated as the meta develops for The War Within Season 1.

5.3.

S tier:

5.4.

A tier:

5.5.

B tier:

6.

Changelog

  • 27 Oct. 2024: Updated tier lists.
  • 21 Oct. 2024: Updated for 11.0.5 rework.
  • 09 Sep. 2024: Updated comp tier lists based on current meta.
  • 21 Aug. 2024: Reviewed for The War Within Launch.
  • 26 Jul. 2024: Re-written for The War Within Pre-Patch.
  • 07 May 2024: Reviewed for 10.2.7.
  • 22 Apr. 2024: Reviewed for Season 4.
  • 15 Jan. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.5.
  • 06 Nov. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.2
  • 04 Sep. 2023: Updated for Patch 10.1.7
  • 10 Jul. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.5
  • 09 May 2023: Updated for Dragonflight Patch 10.1.
  • 30 Jan. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
  • 11 Dec. 2022: Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
  • 22 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
  • 29 Jul. 2022: Reviewed and updated for Shadowlands Season 4.
  • 31 May 2022: Reviewed for Patch 9.2.5.
  • 28 Feb. 2022: Page updated for Patch 9.2.
  • 10 Nov. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.1.5.
  • 06 Jul. 2021: Updated Best 2v2 Team Compositions.
  • 23 Mar. 2021: Reviewed for Patch 9.0.5.
  • 14 Oct. 2020: Updated for Shadowlands pre-patch.
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