Hunter Class Racial Expansion - Feedback Appreciated!

[Whalemilk]

[Whalemilk]

Had these for a while, just gave them some nice pictures to go along with them. I have some of the other classes done, we'll see when I get around to doing another post like this.

[Kairion]

First of all, the balancing is all over the place. I overall really like the flavors presented and my critique is based on gameplay alone. This being said i am not sold on all of them

Summon hawk can be situationally useful, but its a pvp only talent. Also, it really is important how much spell pushback it causes. can be anywhere from a 5 second silence to absolutly irrelevant.

Black arrow is probably the best one for horde, i think its just serpent sting 2.0. so it doesnt really strike me as a big upside. For free maybe, with manacost no thanks

One with nature is straight up garbage. Its a nice convinience, but the opportunity cost of loosing an actual spell for it is massively detremental. Once you have 1-2 pets tamed and levelled this will rot away or at best save you the bagslot for food.

Troll once again is PvP only as mobs do not have significant stats to slash. Particulalry stamina and spirit are largely useless in PvE and and it actually doesnt really matter for pvp either.

Explosive Barrel seems kinda interesting for AoE situations, since hunter is not too good at dealing with these baseline that is a good and flavorful spell

Shotgun blast ist straight up broken in PvP. Scattershot or pet stun are required to play pvp. Getting a second stun for free is massive in any matchup. Allowing you a second chance to escape melee range. Considering dwarf is already the best choice for pvp, this isnt ideal

Blessing of Elune risks of being a better version of summon hawk because moonfires cause spell pushback too. But 10% chance for 10 seconds? In a 10 second window you maybe hit 6 gcds and 3 range attacks. So on average you dont even get a full procc per use of a 5 min cd

Oil Grenade is probably my favorite of the bunch. AoE slow and a massive fire when ignited with a dynamite? Yes please!

Shared Interests is a weird one, its a straight up damage increase that is always useful, but its minor with a major cd. So i think its boring and doesnt feel fun to use.

Id say Goblin and Gnome are fantastic, the extra damage and spellpushback from nightelf/orc has some potential. Dwarf is mandatory for PvP so it should be toned down.
Highelf and Undead just dont feel like they add to the game and Troll and Tauren get the short end of the stick.

But they all do fit the classic flavor in my opinion they were definitely worth thinking about

[Whalemilk]

First of all, the balancing is all over the place. I overall really like the flavors presented and my critique is based on gameplay alone. This being said i am not sold on all of them

Summon hawk can be situationally useful, but its a pvp only talent. Also, it really is important how much spell pushback it causes. can be anywhere from a 5 second silence to absolutly irrelevant.

Black arrow is probably the best one for horde, i think its just serpent sting 2.0. so it doesnt really strike me as a big upside. For free maybe, with manacost no thanks

One with nature is straight up garbage. Its a nice convinience, but the opportunity cost of loosing an actual spell for it is massively detremental. Once you have 1-2 pets tamed and levelled this will rot away or at best save you the bagslot for food.

Troll once again is PvP only as mobs do not have significant stats to slash. Particulalry stamina and spirit are largely useless in PvE and and it actually doesnt really matter for pvp either.

Explosive Barrel seems kinda interesting for AoE situations, since hunter is not too good at dealing with these baseline that is a good and flavorful spell

Shotgun blast ist straight up broken in PvP. Scattershot or pet stun are required to play pvp. Getting a second stun for free is massive in any matchup. Allowing you a second chance to escape melee range. Considering dwarf is already the best choice for pvp, this isnt ideal

Blessing of Elune risks of being a better version of summon hawk because moonfires cause spell pushback too. But 10% chance for 10 seconds? In a 10 second window you maybe hit 6 gcds and 3 range attacks. So on average you dont even get a full procc per use of a 5 min cd

Oil Grenade is probably my favorite of the bunch. AoE slow and a massive fire when ignited with a dynamite? Yes please!

Shared Interests is a weird one, its a straight up damage increase that is always useful, but its minor with a major cd. So i think its boring and doesnt feel fun to use.

Id say Goblin and Gnome are fantastic, the extra damage and spellpushback from nightelf/orc has some potential. Dwarf is mandatory for PvP so it should be toned down.
Highelf and Undead just dont feel like they add to the game and Troll and Tauren get the short end of the stick.

But they all do fit the classic flavor in my opinion they were definitely worth thinking about

Thanks for the feedback.

I agree that the balancing is all over the place. While making them, I realized that they won't be perfect and I tried to make them a little underpowered. I am okay with some being better than others because just like with the existing racials, there are some better than others (Will of the Forsaken).

I personally don't like the Blessing of Elune, but I felt making it 10% should only proc maybe once or twice.

[Phoenixphire]

First off I want to say that race abilities for classes are an amazing idea and more should be added. There is some serious work put into this post so I wanna give you a good reply and say I would love to see the devs and more race specific class abilities like priest and shaman.

I love them all, dwarf is a little op, and tauren and troll are okay but just a lil boring, orc is useful but boring. But I love the effort. Keep it up!

[Snigery]

I think either the cooldown for Tauren's should be increased as it seem it would remove the need to feed pet at all, or change it to a passive that allows you to feed pet with any level food within pet diet at 100% effect (eg. 35 happiness/tick). I like making it a passive with this effect because it becomes a gameplay-integrated QoL feature without removing any gameplay mechanics. It's not hard or impossible to stock up on foods, this would just make it less of a hassle.

[Gantulga]

The dwarven racial is a daze, not a stun, and it's basically melee ranged. I don't really see how that's overpowered with its 2s duration or even useful at all in most scenarios when you have wing clip anyway.

[Snigery]

Again, with Orc, increase CD. If you couple that with Intimidation, or just any other BM spec end-tier skills, you can stagger their cast/cd to a greater effect than I believe racial abilities intend. So a 4 sec stun from Intimidation each minute, plus Hawk a 5 sec push back each minute, yeah annoying combo imo haha.

[Whalemilk]

The dwarven racial is a daze, not a stun, and it's basically melee ranged. I don't really see how that's overpowered with its 2s duration or even useful at all in most scenarios when you have wing clip anyway.

I tried to avoid adding any stuns because people would say its OP. I feel like the ability is on par with other racials.

[Kairion]

The dwarven racial is a daze, not a stun, and it's basically melee ranged. I don't really see how that's overpowered with its 2s duration or even useful at all in most scenarios when you have wing clip anyway.

In a PvP scenario scatter & beast stun sre mostly used to allow for kiting when someone gets to close. You wouldnt use the two second window to deal damage but rather to keep your distance in lost cases.

The only difference between a stun and a daze in this scenario is if it gets broken by serpent sting or pet attacks. You dont intend to damage the target in the 2 second window. To be fair, making it daze makes it share diminishing return with scattershot rather than petstun, but thats arguable if better or worse.

My only gripe is that it has to be on dwarf. They already do have a good racial for pvp in stoneskin. On a high elf it wouldnt be nearly as problematic - but then again, not nearly as flavorful

For PvE sure there is a difference, but i doubt its a problem there eitherway

[Akarui]

good PVP ability and solo PVE. Better than Scatter shot talent.

good PVE ability, but may a trouble in pvp, during this effect u cant use Scatter, Freeze trap or Wyvern sting (sleep)

good for PVE 10-59 but then meme

clone of Improved Scorpid Sting. CD 1 min, duration 5 min ??? i think its oop. Look on WC3 original troll hunters what they did.

Nice :)

significantly worse than Summon Hawk. Weak version of scatter shot.

meme. 10%chance for 10 sec and 5 min cooldown. Its a most useless dmg ability. +0.5dps in PVE and no using in pvp. During moonfire, 9 sec after successful proc u cant use freez trap, scatter or wyvern sting.

nice :) but why goblin racial 3min cd , and gnome 5min.

Nice :) good for BM.

on my opinion.
Effects and CD or too small ot too much
Orcs - as true BM should have "Shared interests" ability.
NE - should have "Summon Owl" with similar effect as summon hawk. 2-3 sec duration , 2-3 min CD
Or another owl implementation. Launch owl in front on 50y. Owl marked all targets for 5 sec debuff which increases against marked targets ranged crit chance by X%
Tauren - instantly finishes CD of all Traps, trap placed in next 15 sec couldnt be resisted, missed, etc.
Or "Moo dash" next 4 sec +50% run speed but cant attack or use spells, abilities
HE - Channeling shoot 4 arrow in ((autoshot time)x1.5) sec . For example with 2.50 attack speed - it will 3.75 sec channeling . CD 2min
Gnome - 3 min cd
dwarf - or 3 sec daze or 2 sec disorient effect. CD 2 min
Undead - 2 min CD, and probsbly doesnt remove trap, disorient, sleep effect
Troll - 3 min CD, 30 sec duration. Doesnt stack with improved Scorpid sting
OR "Squish" - throwing a spear agains target under any sting - spreads this sting in nearby enemies in 5y.
Goblin - 5-8y AOE

[Mac]

The dwarven racial is a daze, not a stun, and it's basically melee ranged. I don't really see how that's overpowered with its 2s duration or even useful at all in most scenarios when you have wing clip anyway.

Wing Clip can be removed. You can also make yourself immune to Wing Clip. The same isn't true of Daze: for instance, Blessing of Freedom can get you out of/prevent a Wing Clip, but it won't help you against Daze. Players typically can't Daze others because it is inherently sort of overpowered since there are very few counters to it.

[Mativh]

Excellent presentation and good ideas, the concepts presented are well thought through and lore adequate. Regarding the balancing, the values can be tweaked, may the fear of balance not dether us from the de-standardization of classes.

Definitely a yes to all classes having racials.
I hope though that it could be a more impactful difference, something that makes the playstyle unique depending on race of choice, rather than one flavorful ability on a long cooldown.
For example the same slots in the talent tree could be something different based on race, and racial abilities that would be used as one of the main ones. Maybe the current abilities could be altered to fit more the race of choice, instead of adding new ones.

Some suggestions:

Orc:
I like the concept of an orc hunter having more than one pet and attacking in melee, like the W3 beastmaster.
The hawk is a good idea. In W3 it was good especially to finish off enemies because of the high speed. It could be an ability with a 1 min cooldown, that is usable against targets with less than 35% health kind of like execute or shadow word death, but it would send a hawk to finish that enemy. In all cases, I think the the hawk would have to be tamed first, and the ability would require an item (the hawk or a whistle) in the inventory to be usable, in wow the pets are more tangible compared to W3.

Another way to go is adding a passive beastmaster talent for orcs only that would allow 2 active pets at the same time, to balance it out both pets could have a debuff that decreases their health and damage so it's the equivalent of one pet, or both have turned off all special abilities.

And a melee-enhancing racial for the orcs, something like an axe mastery talent where your axe attacks have a chance to enrage the pet/s, encouraging to wield dual axes for beastmasters.

[Mac]

Another way to go is adding a passive beastmaster talent for orcs only that would allow 2 active pets at the same time, to balance it out both pets could have a debuff that decreases their health and damage so it's the equivalent of one pet, or both have turned off all special abilities.

You could do an ability like the Shaman's Spirit Wolves in-game where it summons two/three/four thunder lizards that fight for you for a minute or thirty seconds or so. Call the ability Stampede.

[Markuis]

For trolls I'd go with some berserker thing.
"Enrage: your next 3 ranged attacks (in a maxium lapse of 10 secs) cause increased aggro and increase your attack speed by 3% each (effect that stacks and lasts 12 secs)."
It would require to balance the attack speed increase and the buff duration. The increased aggro somehow compensates the dps increase and forces the player to use it carefully.
I do know trolls already have one enrage tho.

[Mativh]

The Forsaken:
Were human hunters in life, and continued to be hunters in undeath.
The hunter class has a naturalistic aspect to it, almost like a touch of druidism.
That is something I see being amplified in Tauren Hunters, and diminished in the Forsaken Hunters, who would to a degree replace it with the shadowy/necromantic aspect that they'd learn from the Dark Rangers of Undercity, who have gained these abilities by being raised as banshees, because of having in life stronger affinity to magic, for being high elves. The suggestion inspired by W3 Dark Rangers makes sense. Perhaps instead of a new ability it could be more extended, giving the basic hunter abilities for the forsaken that dark ranger influence.

High Elf Hunters;
they have retained the affinity to nature and the hunter class for being descendants of the Night Elves, they even retain some moon-based attacks. A high elven hunter is very similar to the Tolkienish archetype of a wood elf ranger. I like the suggested racial but there could be things added related to the elven hightened senses and attention to detail.

Night Elf Hunters;
on the other hand were (together with the priests) originally female only in the warcraft lore (and druids were male only), and the huntresses as well as priestesses are closely related to Elune, in WoW it is the Balance Druid (for Taurens as well, which should be de-standardized too) who has incorporated the Night Elf Elune based attacks, so it makes sense to give night elf hunters some of them back.

The Troll Hunters,
more exactly headhunters, axe throwers and shadow hunters, have their own unique flavor, the touch of druidism is replaced with voodoo (although those I'd rather assign to troll shamans) and savagery, it'd make sense for them to have a racial/talents that allows axe-throwing playstyle apart from archer, a passive bonus gaining in strength depending on how many humanoid skulls/scalps the troll hunter collected, and an enrage from drinking the blood of the hunted prey.

Taurens:
have been hunters since forever and it's an integral part of their culture, similarly to the native americans, becoming a good hunter is part of the initiation into the adulthood ritual in the Tauren society. Their affinity with druidism amplifies the naturalistic aspect of the hunter class, as well as herb lore and survival. The suggestion is good however it should be I think a passive that increases the rate of happiness gain for the pet, and part of a broader racial impact if one chooses to be a Tauren Hunter.

[Mativh]

a passive beastmaster talent for orcs only that would allow 2 active pets at the same time, to balance it out both pets could have a debuff that decreases their health and damage so it's the equivalent of one pet, or both have turned off all special abilities.

You could do an ability like the Shaman's Spirit Wolves in-game where it summons two/three/four thunder lizards that fight for you for a minute or thirty seconds or so. Call the ability Stampede.

It would match but we should be cautious with how these kind of racial abilities are implemented, they should be not only lore adequate but also adhere to the vanilla wow design philosophy.

The beastmaster had these pet summoning abilities in the W3 campaign which made sense because, even though they were summons it was not literal conjuring, but it was supposed to be interpeted as him calling these animals to his aid from the environement where he was and where they can be found.

A shaman calls to his aid spirits of wolves that manifest at his location.

In WoW, it wouldn't feel very grounded for the hunter to be able to conjure living animals out of thin air.

Staying grounded, things somewhat making sense, that is often overlooked yet it is one of the main reasons I think newer versions of WoW feel so dead and non-immersive, many new RPGs in general took that turn. The Hunter doesn't even need arrows/bullets in retail WoW, the ammo appears out of nowhere when a ranged ability is used. Doesn't run out, doesn't require to be stored, doesn't exist. That mentality should be avoided.

I think there could be perhaps a racial that allows temporarily the taming of the animals in the environment, the orc beastmaster could be able to call to his aid an animal that he encounters for X time (when the time runs out the animal returns to it's original position instead of turning on the hunter).

[Mac]

It would match but we should be cautious with how these kind of racial abilities are implemented, they should be not only lore adequate but also adhere to the vanilla wow design philosophy.

The beastmaster had these pet summoning abilities in the W3 campaign which made sense because, even though they were summons it was not literal conjuring, but it was supposed to be interpeted as him calling these animals to his aid from the environement where he was and where they can be found.

A shaman calls to his aid spirits of wolves that manifest at his location.

In WoW, it wouldn't feel very grounded for the hunter to be able to conjure living animals out of thin air.

Staying grounded, things somewhat making sense, that is often overlooked yet it is one of the main reasons I think newer versions of WoW feel so dead and non-immersive, many new RPGs in general took that turn. The Hunter doesn't even need arrows/bullets in retail WoW, the ammo appears out of nowhere when a ranged ability is used. Doesn't run out, doesn't require to be stored, doesn't exist. That mentality should be avoided.

I think there could be perhaps a racial that allows temporarily the taming of the animals in the environment, the orc beastmaster could be able to call to his aid an animal that he encounters for X time (when the time runs out the animal returns to it's original position instead of turning on the hunter).

Perhaps it'd make more sense if the animals you called forth to stampede varied depending on the zone, but hunters are already a class that can "conjure living animals out of thin air" if that's the perspective you want to take. To take it even further, they conjure traps out of thin air, as they need no materials to make their traps. And if you really want to get nitpicky, crossbows don't use the same arrows a bow would use, they'd use a crossbow arrow also known as a bolt that are significantly shorter. Ultimately, it's a video game that's in no way a reality simulator even in vanilla.

[Whalemilk]

My intention for these abilities would be available for the class immediately. They do not level in strength just like regular racials

[Ishilu]

Clearly a lot of work gone into these, so I'm not too happy about giving them a thumbs down.

As posted above, balancing is all over the place.

Some thoughts on this:
orc: PvP only, but don't minmaxers farm that cat for this effect, anyway?
undead: undead hunters ... also, does this stack with serpent sting or should it replace serpent sting? Also brings back memories from that bad expansion after TBC.
tauren: sorry, this one's useless past loyalty level 3 or so, since feeding becomes very easy then.
troll: PvP only? But then why debuff for 5 minutes?
goblin: looks like a fun addition to explo trap, great when we look at race flavour.
dwarf: too poweful, sepecially when paired with scatter shot
nelf: might need some tweaking powerwise, just a dps buff
gnome: like the goblin one, great flavourwise, also pretty mean with explo trap. However, giving this to gnome (great escape racial) hunters (more good escapes) is too powerful for PvP.

Also, the addition of further racial abilities (there we threads about those a while ago for other classes) on top of the already existing ones opens up new possibilities of minmaxing (which many people will jump to) and I personally think we have more than enough of that already. Some kind of flavour-only racial abilities would be nice, though.

[Whalemilk]

Clearly a lot of work gone into these, so I'm not too happy about giving them a thumbs down.

As posted above, balancing is all over the place.

Some thoughts on this:
orc: PvP only, but don't minmaxers farm that cat for this effect, anyway?
undead: undead hunters ... also, does this stack with serpent sting or should it replace serpent sting? Also brings back memories from that bad expansion after TBC.
tauren: sorry, this one's useless past loyalty level 3 or so, since feeding becomes very easy then.
troll: PvP only? But then why debuff for 5 minutes?
goblin: looks like a fun addition to explo trap, great when we look at race flavour.
dwarf: too poweful, sepecially when paired with scatter shot
nelf: might need some tweaking powerwise, just a dps buff
gnome: like the goblin one, great flavourwise, also pretty mean with explo trap. However, giving this to gnome (great escape racial) hunters (more good escapes) is too powerful for PvP.

Also, the addition of further racial abilities (there we threads about those a while ago for other classes) on top of the already existing ones opens up new possibilities of minmaxing (which many people will jump to) and I personally think we have more than enough of that already. Some kind of flavour-only racial abilities would be nice, though.

I think it would be impossible to balance any of these without seeing them in game. I tried to make them mediocre in strength but I think the concepts of the abilities are what’s important.

[Mativh]

It would match but we should be cautious with how these kind of racial abilities are implemented, they should be not only lore adequate but also adhere to the vanilla wow design philosophy.

The beastmaster had these pet summoning abilities in the W3 campaign which made sense because, even though they were summons it was not literal conjuring, but it was supposed to be interpeted as him calling these animals to his aid from the environement where he was and where they can be found.

A shaman calls to his aid spirits of wolves that manifest at his location.

In WoW, it wouldn't feel very grounded for the hunter to be able to conjure living animals out of thin air.

Staying grounded, things somewhat making sense, that is often overlooked yet it is one of the main reasons I think newer versions of WoW feel so dead and non-immersive, many new RPGs in general took that turn. The Hunter doesn't even need arrows/bullets in retail WoW, the ammo appears out of nowhere when a ranged ability is used. Doesn't run out, doesn't require to be stored, doesn't exist. That mentality should be avoided.

I think there could be perhaps a racial that allows temporarily the taming of the animals in the environment, the orc beastmaster could be able to call to his aid an animal that he encounters for X time (when the time runs out the animal returns to it's original position instead of turning on the hunter).

Perhaps it'd make more sense if the animals you called forth to stampede varied depending on the zone, but hunters are already a class that can "conjure living animals out of thin air" if that's the perspective you want to take. To take it even further, they conjure traps out of thin air, as they need no materials to make their traps. And if you really want to get nitpicky, crossbows don't use the same arrows a bow would use, they'd use a crossbow arrow also known as a bolt that are significantly shorter. Ultimately, it's a video game that's in no way a reality simulator even in vanilla.

You'd agree that being able to buy/sell/make arrows/bullets/pouches, and having specific amount of it carried on you, that gets spent depending how many times you've shot, is a lot more immersive/grounded compared to you not requiring any arrows/bullets when shooting.
The argument that the current level of realism shouldn't matter because in WoW you shoot arrows instead of bolts with crossbows is a little disingenuous.
WoW obviously isn't simulating reality to every detail, but early WoW has a certain level of realism, that is more detailed and immersive than newer WoW.

A warlock summons a demon "from thin air" because it is supposed to come the Twisting Nether, and the lock can also enslave demons that exist in the game.
A shaman summons spirits of animals, there it makes sense.
A Hunter tames animals that are specific animals who exist in the environment in the first place, then he stores them at the stables or his inventory, and has the ability you linked, with which he calls on them or dismisses them.
They were in the world and after taming still ocupy space among his possesions.
It isn't obviously 100% real, but it is more grounded and coherent than an ability that summons a brand new animal from nowhere, that disappears after a while.
So I think the current level of detail/immersion should be maintained.
Regarding traps; the rogues poisons are made by a rogue profession and stored in the inventory, they stopped being in newer WoW.
Right now the traps are on the level of retail WoW, as you've pointed out.
So should Turtle WoW (if anything) elevate the traps to the immersion level of early WoW? Or instead downgrade the rogues poisons to the immersion level of retail WoW?
I think the rogue having all the things related to poisons is more in line with early WoWs design philosophy, than the traps being just simple abilities as they are.
I'd prefer the hunter pets remaining to be on the immersive level of rogues poisons, instead of downgraded to the immersive level of hunter traps.
Your stampede suggestion; calling on an animal type that is in the environment where its used, is a step in the right direction.

[Mativh]

I think it would be impossible to balance any of these without seeing them in game. I tried to make them mediocre in strength but I think the concepts of the abilities are what’s important.

My thoughts as well.
The concepts are what matter and that is what should be discussed first of all.
Then things like cooldown, duration, damage etc. can be easily adjusted, utility can be changed, first with intuition based on our understanding of class balancing, then even better so once it has been tested.
Definitely a mistake to disregard a good concept because the values/utility might seem too much when first presented.

[Mativh]

Dwarf:
It's good but should for sure require a gun to use. It could also instead of daze be a gun attack that ignores x% of the armor, with 30 second cooldown. An attack against high armor enemied. Guns pierce better plate armor than bows, and dwarves are the best at them.
Another suggestion, Fragmentation Shards;
Requires a gun, an attack that deals extra damage to low armor enemies. Inspired by mortar team unit from W3.

Goblin:
The racial fits them, only thing is that it should require ingredients bought first in order to be used.
Goblins destroy and exploit nature, so maybe some things regarding that could alter the hunter class when playing as a goblin.

Gnome:
A good ability. Gnomes use their intellect to understand natural systems, both flora and fauna, and to come up with ingenious means to survive, but it is done in a childish and more innocent way compared to the goblins.
They could have an ability that creates compound bows/crossbows from regular ones, enhancing speed and strength at the expense of lower durability and potential to break any moment as it happens with unpredictable gnomish inventions.
The gnomes are friendly and curious, which could help them tame pets.

[Mac]

You'd agree that being able to buy/sell/make arrows/bullets/pouches, and having specific amount of it carried on you, that gets spent depending how many times you've shot, is a lot more immersive/grounded compared to you not requiring any arrows/bullets when shooting.
The argument that the current level of realism shouldn't matter because in WoW you shoot arrows instead of bolts with crossbows is a little disingenuous.
WoW obviously isn't simulating reality to every detail, but early WoW has a certain level of realism, that is more detailed and immersive than newer WoW.

A warlock summons a demon "from thin air" because it is supposed to come the Twisting Nether, and the lock can also enslave demons that exist in the game.
A shaman summons spirits of animals, there it makes sense.
A Hunter tames animals that are specific animals who exist in the environment in the first place, then he stores them at the stables or his inventory, and has the ability you linked, with which he calls on them or dismisses them.
They were in the world and after taming still ocupy space among his possesions.
It isn't obviously 100% real, but it is more grounded and coherent than an ability that summons a brand new animal from nowhere, that disappears after a while.
So I think the current level of detail/immersion should be maintained.
Regarding traps; the rogues poisons are made by a rogue profession and stored in the inventory, they stopped being in newer WoW.
Right now the traps are on the level of retail WoW, as you've pointed out.
So should Turtle WoW (if anything) elevate the traps to the immersion level of early WoW? Or instead downgrade the rogues poisons to the immersion level of retail WoW?
I think the rogue having all the things related to poisons is more in line with early WoWs design philosophy, than the traps being just simple abilities as they are.
I'd prefer the hunter pets remaining to be on the immersive level of rogues poisons, instead of downgraded to the immersive level of hunter traps.
Your stampede suggestion; calling on an animal type that is in the environment where its used, is a step in the right direction.

When a hunter uses Call Pet, their pet appears "from thin air." Does that break immersion? No, because it's a video game. Certain concessions can be afforded to the game because it's a game. If it's okay for hunter's to have their pets appear "from thin air," if it's okay for their traps to appear "from thin air," if it's okay that crossbows use normal arrows that would be too long for them, then it's okay for for a hunter to be able to call a stampede and have it appear "from thin air." The level of immersion of a Stampede ability is on par with other things in Vanilla.

[Kairion]

Totally agree that if a decision has to be made between gameplay and immersion, gameplay wins. I wouldnt have to carry around 3600 bullets with realistic weight in my ammo pouch..

But i see a problem with stampede

Stampede if we stick to a version that resembles wc3 and the one built for modern wow at least, fills pretty much the exact same niche as salvo. Its a aoe channel spell that deals periodic damage.

I think this it to close in design. Similar to the black arrow op suggested, it offers little uniquenes.

And if we stick in the realm of practicality, spell animations generall dont handle rough terrain well. A bunch of animals funning trough the air if the spell is casted on an incline or on a doodad is actually not too immersive.