Mastery vs. crit for MM pvp.

[4fa]

I can't find a definitive answer, half people say mastery the other half I ask say crit, nobody ever gives a reason why. Looking at the highest rated hunters, some are going for crit others mastery. Which do you think is better and why do you think it's better?

[Deleted]

I also would like to know that because i play mm in pvp ^^

[Weezing]

http://www.noxxic.com/wow/pvp/hunter.../stat-priority

[4fa]

snip

...lol. Noxxic. Can I have a serious answer now please?

[Frozired]

So, some of the reason that you see top hunters going for different stats is that the desired damage output differentiate from combo to combo.
To elaborate on that, let’s take two quick examples;

Bob is a hunter, he plays Hunter, Warrior and Priest – their combo is about having constant pressure – not necessarily damage pressure – but pressure that forces the enemy team to be at their toes the entire game. They rely on having a warrior run around with huge damage potential waiting for his inner clock to say ding and blow something up.

And then there is John, he plays Hunter, Feral and Priest – their combo is about delivering burst damage – not necessarily the biggest possible burst – but burst damage that they can control and deliver at a given moment within a small time spectrum. They rely on having the feral doing heavy pressure and waiting for an opportunity to interrupt a cc, catch someone off-guard or in general deliver a punch when most vulnerable. The constant damage does not matter as much as it is only the small spikes that will grant them the opportunity to create a weak state in the enemy team and then punish them for letting that happen.

Both teams have a hunter, so this is not a heavy constant cc team, these are both teams that want to catch you in a certain position and then throw all their instant cc to get the kill.

But as you might have noticed there is a fundamental difference in the way that these combos play up until the point where they deliver their damage and how they want their damage delivered. The warrior team want the damage to be high at all times – so the enemy team is constantly pressured and forced to make mistake/use cc for peeling etc. Here a stat like mastery comes in well, as mastery does perform better and does give a higher damage output through the entire fight.

But the other team, with the feral relies on the burst, catching someone who fell behind, interrupted a CC for an opening etc. That constant damage does not matter nearly as much as with the warrior so we much rather have a bigger chance of doing the damage in the burst period, which crit delivers the possibility for. The mastery offers a proc for something that only matters for 20% of our burst damage, meaning if it procs the damage will be far less superior to getting a crit.

I hope this clarifies for you just a little why you see top hunters going different stat priority, and helps you decide what you need to take.