Originally Posted by
Nythiz
I mostly do mythic+ as well on my hunter. So I can tell you my point of view.
There are some things that are certainly up for debate though, as you can see in this topic as well.
Furious Swipes is far out the best trait for anything with a lot of AoE, which M+ tends to be. Getting 3 of these relics is generally the best option.
Going by Icy Veins (which is generally pretty solid info) you'd get 9 weapon ilvls worth of damage from a relic with this trait if you cleave 3 opponents. In most cases you'll be fighting more than 3 targets, so this trait only gets better and better. Depending on the affixes and the level of the M+ you can do anywhere between small sized AoE pulls and big AoE pulls, but generally getting these relics with these traits will always be better no matter the item level.
For single target fights this a relic with this trait is practically worthless though since you don't cleave in those situations, so I personally (since I do some raiding as well) value high ilvl relics with Pack Leader / Jaw of Thunder / Unleash the beast pretty highly as well. They are not completely useless in AoE and don't make you fall too far behind on single target either.
At times this can be a hard call. If you do raids as well, or you find that there is plenty of AoE in your group than going for the traits that also affect single target might be a solid choice as well. Problem with relics is that you don't just swap them around like you do talents. That makes the choice more impactful.
T15: I think that Dire Stable is your go to talent here in most cases.
Dire Stables provides you with extra focus which is really helpful since AoE rotations can be pretty focus intensive if you plan to have a 100% uptime on both Kill Command and Beast Cleave.
Way of the Cobra is the secondary choice, it's mostly a single target talent since you don't use Cobra Shot a lot if you're fighting packs of 5+ mobs. Multishot will do comparable damage and triggers Surge of the Stormgod (golden trait) which is a very large contributor to your AoE dps.
Way of the Cobra can be good with certain affixes and at higher M+ levels though. Tyrannical affixes, or ones where you are forced to do much smaller pulls might require you to have have solid single target dps.
In doubt: Dire Stables
T30:
This one is a bit tricker, the choice here is between Stomp and Dire Frenzy.
Now Dire Frenzy is kind of superior in most cases these days. The attack speed increase it gives also increases your beast cleave damage.
Stomp however can be better if the AoE fights are quite short, since it gives you instant bursty AoE damage. And there are a lot of mythic+ situations where that might just be the case (generally on the lower difficulty ones).
So use at your own discretion here, can't really go wrong with either. I mean if I'm running a M+5 with my DH and frost DK buddy, I know mobs are going to melt in a flash, so I generally roll with stomp for the instant burst. But on 10+ fortified I know that I can generally get Dire Frenzy rolling good enough that it probably overtakes Stomp
T45: Preference. I think Posthaste is best here though. It offers solid on demand mobility. Farstrider is generally not so good, you don't need to disengage often anyway and when you do you'd rather have that Posthaste speed boost. Trailblazer can be OK, but I would go with Posthaste, it's the best choice 99% of the time.
T60: Blink strikes isn't bad. But Bestial Fury is generally best since it gives you a lot of extra AoE damage when you pop Bestial Wrath. Since BW is up so often it's a very noticeable increase.
T75: Preference. Binding Shot is best 99% of the time. Really solid for various situations. Intimidation can be a decent alternative since it's easier to use, but it's single target which for M+ isn't as useful.
T90: Volley is extremely good for M+. It's damage is very high overall.
AMOC could be considered in those cases where you REALLY need that single target damage. But 9/10 times you'd probably want to take Volley.
T100:
Tossup between Stampede and Killer Cobra really.
I like Stampede, it gives really good Burst AoE damage every 3 minutes. As eschatological said, Stampede comes at the cost of a lot of single target dps provided by Killer Cobra. But then again, M+ is 90% AoE. And some of the boss fights end in like 30-40 seconds as well, making stampede valuable on those fights as well as it has a very high uptime. Plus stampede can be really strong on certain tricky packs; a lot of M+ dungeons have 2-3 packs that can be a dangerous pull.
Biggest downsides are that it's a relative long cooldown (3 minutes ain't too bad, but if you use it on trash you often won't have it up for the boss and vice versa) and more importantly that it's very static. If the tank has to move the mobs (e.g. Sanguine patch) than your Stampede will lost most of it's damage.
Killer Cobra has very solid potential for single target. It's downside being that it's useless on a lot of the trash fights (you'd rather spam multi shot than cobra shot) and on boss fights it's mostly good if the fights last long enough that stampede doesn't out damage it on short fights.
On higher difficulty levels, especially on Tyrannical I would probably take Killer Cobra.