One of my players and I ran a 4 encounter playtest of a level 7 human hunter last night.
The Hunter was a Human built with the popular 20 pt buy sunk into a high strength, dexterity and a moderate wisdom. This hunter had no stats below a 10 and was equipped with standard WBL for his level. His most relevant pieces of gear were a +1 Composite (+4) Flaming Longbow, a +2 Chain Shirt and a Belt of Incredible Dexterity +2. The animal companion was the popular large cat equipped with +1 Studded Leather Barding. The hunters relevant feats were deadly aim, point blank shot, coordinated strike, distracting charge, improved initiative, weapon focus (Longbow) and rapid shot. The cats relevant feats were power attack, improved natural armor and armor proficiency (Lt) and multiattack. Working together as a team without any spells or class abilities to buff him the Hunter could attain a +16 attack total on the opening round. Pretty impressive for a 3/4 BAB class with only a +5 BAB at this level.
The encounters were run as stand alone encounters with the Hunter & Cat allowed to completely heal and recover between each encounter because all the encounters were conducted solo.
The first encounter was in wooded terrain versus a CR 7 Hill Giant. The hill giant was handily defeated in only three rounds with the expenditure of only a single cure moderate wounds spell. Twice during this encounter the hunter was forced to attack at a penalty due to his companion giving the giant cover.
The second encounter occurred in a campsite when the hunter and cat were surprise attacked by a CR 7 invisible stalker. The stalker was defeated in four rounds after the surprise round and only a single casting of Barkskin was expended by the hunter. The Animal Focus- Aspect of the Wolf proved quite useful in this encounter by providing the cat with the scent ability.
The third encounter occurred in a tomb when the hunter freed a CR 8 morgh from its burial chamber. The morgh was defeated in in just three rounds. The cat was paralyzed in round two. The Animal Focus-Aspect of the Bull was quite useful in this encounter enabling the cat to successfully grapple the Morgh with a grab attempt that would have missed otherwise.
The fourth encounter was another campsite encounter with a CR 9 young blue dragon. The dragon swooped into the campsite, used its dazzling display feat to debuff the pair and promptly got grappled by the cat. Once again the Animal Focus-Aspect of the bull being the difference between failure and success of the grapple as well as three more attacks during this battle. The hunter was once again forced to heal his cat with a cure moderate wounds spell mid-battle, but the dragon was handily defeated in only three rounds. Other than the cure spell the only resources expended during the battle was when the hunter cast barkskin on the cat during the opening round.
Over the course of the playtest the hunter took exactly zero points of damage and, when attacking averaged 16 points of damage per attack. The Cat averaged 28 points of damage per round (my player was not rolling that well). The cats damage output on a good round (when it landed all three attacks) was usually about 40 points.