World of Warcraft Insights takes a look at the hunter class. The hunter class has been said to be a leveling demon, grinding master, and also one of the top three major sustained dps dealers. All of which are true. When I was playing my hunter I leveled faster than any of my guild mates. I was killing mobs that were red to me. As well as being the least geared in my guild I was still keeping up with people that were wearing Tier gear and had high end gems and chants.

The reason they are so fast at leveling is due to the fact that it's always a two person group once you get your pet. Only you don't get the 50 percent exp cut. Also you kill faster due to the higher dps and the small boost from your pet.

Level cap dps has changed a bit due to the previous expansion and new talents. In the original and in BC if you wanted high dps you had to be a marksman hunter and you were an idiot if you were a survival hunter.

After WotLK it's vice versa, now you don't seem many marksman hunters due to the long cast time on your staple dps shot (Aimed Shot). I was shocked when my guild was telling me to change to survival. Now I'm doing 1800+ dps and I'm not even geared this is due to the instant cast survival talent, Explosive Shot, and the added dot of black arrow. Something that pushes a hunter's burst dps up to that of a mage is the talent of Lock and Load which prots off of your traps and your dots which gives you three explosive shots in a row. That does up to 27k damage over a 4.5 second time period.

One thing people don't really tell you is that even though all these are true it's also true that hunters have got to be the most boring class to play because it is "too safe" all you do is sit there and go through your attack rotation without worrying about much of anything. If your pet starts getting close to dying you just mend it and if you pull agro you just Feign. It makes it really easy to get burnt out.