As some of you know, I've been dinking around with the Shandara's DPS spreadsheet, and have found some interresting numbers, to which I engaged a couple nights of testing.  The first night of testing went well, and I'm seeing very positive practical numbers, so I'll post what I found in the spread sheet here.

For most hunters, Survival is hands down the best spec.  It out performs BM by a long shot, and for most gear levels as well.  However, MM was getting closer all the while, and with the 3.1.3 change to Hunter's Mark (300 Ranged AP -> 500 Ranged AP),  it has become a solid contender.

I had originally made the switch to MM to test out the Imp Hunter's Mark (IHM from now on) talents to add an extra 150 AP to the mark, which affects all three of us hunters, as well as a select few melee abilities that count as ranged.  What I found next was the most interesting part:  For my gear level, Marksman beats Survival.  Not just by a couple DPS, but by up to 127.6 DPS higher.  Not to mention the gains the other hunters are getting from my IHM.  If I toss in the Glyph of Hunter's Mark (GoHM from now on), I lose about 42.26 DPS because I'd have to drop Glyph of Steady Shot, but Lumi gains 54 DPS more with it.  Grasen's gain will be at least 45 DPS more.  The increase in Raid DPS by swapping my spec over to Marksman is an estimated total of 184.34 DPS.  Now that we're getting into more and more hardmodes that are focused on high DPS, every last drop counts.

So from now on I'm going to be mostly running Marks, except for a few select fights where Survival simply handles better. (Vezax, Yogg, etc.)

So, is MM better than SV?  Completely depends on your gear level, and you can only find out if its a gain by consulting Shandara's Spreadsheet.