Poll: Undead Hunters — yes or not?

[Bayanni]

I know it's basically a meme at this point, but Tauren really do need another class.
They're the only race with four class options while all of the rest have at least five.
Mage/Warlock is of course right out for tauren, which just leaves priest, rogue, and paladin, all of which I'd be ok with but totally understand the implications of tauren paladins and imbalancing pvp like that.
Honestly, cow priest is the most likely to work lore-wise but also the most work for the devs with the custom spells and balancing and whatnot. I'd much rather tauren get something new because they need it gameplay-wise.

All that said, yes to dwarf mages, and I'd be good with dwarf shamans too.

[Merikkinon]

I agree that even existing class / race combos are not perfect. Lore consistency is a good thing but in this case it makes no sense to think what's possible and what's not. We have Undead Holy Priests already, you know.

And bingo...

Anyhow, I am in support of undead hunters.

Mainly because other than 'paladin', I can't see Tauren being rogues, warlocks, mages or priests. Doesn't fit. Neither does Paladin, and there is the Vanilla shaman/pally split (which is fine).

Hence, I just don't know another Horde balancing race/class that wouldn't be kinda offensive to lore.

So Undead Hunter it is (best option).

[Velite]

I know it's basically a meme at this point, but Tauren really do need another class.
They're the only race with four class options while all of the rest have at least five.
Mage/Warlock is of course right out for tauren, which just leaves priest, rogue, and paladin, all of which I'd be ok with but totally understand the implications of tauren paladins and imbalancing pvp like that.
Honestly, cow priest is the most likely to work lore-wise but also the most work for the devs with the custom spells and balancing and whatnot. I'd much rather tauren get something new because they need it gameplay-wise.

All that said, yes to dwarf mages, and I'd be good with dwarf shamans too.

A tauren priest would be a good candidate to get fear ward on the horde actually.

[Tortuga]

I continue to vouch for the complete opening of all classes for all races. Blizzard didn't care about the lore when deciding them, and neither should we.

This is really a good point. And had it be like just "all classes for all races", I'd be full heart for Yes. (At least, no-one is forced to play a combo they don't like)
But the question was "we need to compensate Horde for Dwarf mages, should it be Undead hunters?", so I oppose. There are other combos that would be really appreciated on Horde (already mentioned it the thread), esp. Taurens need some ❤

[Valadorn]

I would like to mention that if Undeads have Hunters, Humans should also have them, but I sadly understand that there can not be more than 6 classes / race, which is pretty sad.

[Exizefra]

Undead hunters as for me is more logical and lore-friendly than undead priests. Hunter is the absolutely materialistic class without any divine/magic/spirit presence - so i don't see any logical restriction for the undeads to be hunters. Neither the humans (yes, i know about game restriction - and it's sad).

[Tortuga]

i don't see any logical restriction for the undeads to be hunters

Except that they don't need to hunt, and that animals do not obey rotting corpses

[Mrkrissatan]

Except that they don't need to hunt, and that animals do not obey rotting corpses

They hunt man, the most deadly game of all!

As for animals not obeying, well that's just an excuse to add undead versions of more pet families for them to tame or have a racial for undead hunters that reskins their pets to a zombified version if it's really that game breaking for you.

[Balake]

Why the pets would not obey. Is it because Undead smell very bad?

For the not needing to eat argument, the hunters we play are combatants, not people who's job it is to hunt for food. The Forsaken army logically would employ archer units, they would be valuable against the Scarlet Crusade for example.

[Sandtusk]

Id say there are quite a few pets that would match an undead aesthetic: spiders, bats, demon hounds, carrion, fel bears/wolves from felwood.

Go for it

[Tortuga]

more pet families

Will not happen

[Augustfenix85]

Lorewise there are Forsaken who were once High Elves.

[Pfwg]

I continue to vouch for the complete opening of all classes for all races. Blizzard didn't care about the lore when deciding them, and neither should we. So, yes, undead hunters would be great. For those saying it makes no sense, gnomes can be warriors and hold back the blows of dragons, orcs can be in tune with the elements of a world they tried to destroy, and undead can already be priests. It's a fantasy game. Stop being hypocritical about when sense matters.

What engie said

[Jimmicz]

Undead hunters only if they can build their pets from limbs, skins, and bones!

[Warwarlock]

A lot of people mess around between the mechanics and lore. Lore-wise, many things seem to have their logic; nothing prevents one to become something known as a paradox or a freethinker that defies his own culture. The problem with this, however, is making the writing appealing. Then the mechanics follow with their implies in the game. Humans already have 6 classes, and each side has its class balance - no paladins for the Horde and no shamans for the Alliance.
Speaking in general about the undead, there is nothing that would prevent them to become hunters. Some people sought to claim that to be a hunter, one must have an affinity for nature and beasts.
According to Ranger Sallina in TBC, being a hunter means:
1) to be a master over the beasts;
2) to be perceptive and focused in marksmanship;
3) to be able to survive using the opportunities in situations.
That's one of the perceptions told by an NPC. Mastery over the beasts doesn't exactly incline that now to be a hunter, you must know every inch of Petopia - from a worm to a silithid colossus. It's enough to have some proficiency in the field, and the Forsaken (just as the humans) aren't outside that aspect. In life, the undead had the knowledge on how to tame beasts like horses to their service. As explained in "War Crimes" and skeletal horse manuals, it's told that the aspect of the beast doesn't nearly change in undeath; they continue to follow their routine while being completely oblivious to their nature. We know from real-life stories that loyal pets remain with their owners even if they have passed away. Spiders have no feature that would make them repulsed by the undead as most of the spider population was altered by magic the way the dark hounds were. Plus, cockroaches, anyone?
In life, humans wielded (and still wield) ranged weapons like bows and crossbows, having the proficiency on using them, and in undeath that proficiency would remain. Hemet Nesingwary is a famous hunter who hunts for sports and has the knowledge about the "big games" that would bring inspiration to many bounty hunters, and he's just a dwarf armed with a gun!
The last hunter aspect about the survival would also apply; human trappers that are experienced in tracking certain creatures and use trapping methods to disable them? A hunter who uses a camouflage, a moment of surprise and venoms to overpower their stunned prey?
In conclusion, to be a hunter, you don't necessarily need the magic to become a proficient tamer, skilled shooter, witty trapper lore-wise. Those 3 tree hunter builds just represent one of the hunter aspects. The magic can be applied like in DnD to eventually amplify skills and become something like a spellbow that shoots conjured bolts of magic. The only barrier is the mechanics, and if this server can bypass such, I say 'let them do so'.

[Aerdaer]

I would have to say no, even if I like the idea of playing one.

It just does not fit the lore well enough with what the class hunter can do. Hunter is quite nature oriented in-game and it just does not feel right.. For me, It would have to be a completely different subclass like the dark ranger, not the hunter we know from vanilla wow.

Mage dwarf seems fine, you do not have to add anything to the Horde side when it is not suitable - I play Horde.

Best,
PV

[Merikkinon]

Idk... while there is this 'nature' theme to hunters, there have historically also been a lot of poachers and people who are flat out into slaying stuff. I think undead fits well there with their desire to destroy the living.

[Tortuga]

there have historically also been a lot of poachers and people who are flat out into slaying stuff

And those people were called thieves and assassins historically, not marksmen, beastmasters, or survivalists

[Mooncake]

I NEED dwarf shaman)

[Velite]

piggybacking on thread to vote for dwarf shaman

[Mrkrissatan]

piggybacking on thread to vote for dwarf shaman

Then there should be undead paladins, if it's lore breaking somehow for someone's head cannon then just give them a passive ability that changes all holy magic into shadow or something

[Balake]

I think the point of disagreement here on whether the hunter class in WoW is inherently naturalist or just a generic bow/crossbow/gun user that can train pets. The character creation screen describes it as follows: "Hunters know the uncharted places of the world. Gifted with a deep empathy for all life, they have an uncanny knack for befriending wild animals and taming them as pets. In addition, hunters can use their finely honed senses to become master trackers. Wherever hunters go, they fight back the ravages of sickness, exploitation, and industrialization."

The description seems to single them out. Undead obviously don't have a deep sympathy for life, quite the opposite in fact. And humans in WoW just don't seem like outdoorsy people to be honest.

There are definitely proficient sharpshooters in Stormwind's and Undercity's military forces, and humans (dead or alive) surely can tame wild animals if they wanted to, but that still doesn't make them connected to nature in the same way Night Elves, Tauren, Trolls, Orcs, and Dwarves are.

To be fair, Gnomes hunters don't fit either but that's already been added, so what does this mean? Blizzard not adding Human, Forsaken, and Gnome hunters was a deliberate decision because they didn't fit what Blizzard had in mind for the hunter class. It has nothing to do with the 6 class limit. I personally believe Turtle WoW shouldn't stringently restrict themselves to Blizzard's vision. It's fine to broaden the identity of hunters a little bit and allow races without an affinity to nature to play the class. Editing the creation screen description to cement this change would be a nice touch if that's possible, if not then it's not a big deal.

No undead paladins though

[Qixel]

The issue most people seem to have is deciding that each race is a hivemind who can't possibly have members that go against cultural norms. So, going off the character creation screen, 'a typical warrior is strong, tough, and exceptionally violent'.* Gnomes warriors cannot exist because they trend toward friendly. Warlocks are 'feared above all else for their singular wickedness and cruelty'. Again, guess we can't have gnome warlocks, putting aside for the moment that everyone except the token evil forsaken would have you killed on sight for fel magic. For paladins, they make mention of how it's lorewise human-only but they decided to let some dwarfs in. No mention of high elves, gotta get rid of them, too. On the hunter topic, 'Wherever hunters go, they fight back the ravages of sickness, exploitation, and industrialization. Guess the industrial themed dwarves gotta go.

Server's down, but I'll continue. Undead priests should be unable to call upon holy magic, given they're damned. Better scrap them. Druids are a male night elf only thing, lorewise. Scrap all female night elf druids, and all tauren druids - Cenarius only trained night elf men. Male night elves are not able to be priests - in night elf society, only women can become priestesses of Elune.

Blizzard did not care. Stop pretending they did. If you can't, just do what Blizzard did and change things until they work like dwarf paladins and non-male-night-elf druids.

[Torta]

Thanks everyone for contributing to this poll. Based on the feedback, we've made a decision to add both new class/race combos: Dwarf Mages and Undead Hunters in the upcoming client update.

[Netbeck]

I am just wondering what took so long to think about playable undead hunters.
Go for it.

[Allwynd01]

I would like to mention that if Undeads have Hunters, Humans should also have them, but I sadly understand that there can not be more than 6 classes / race, which is pretty sad.

I agree on this - Humans should also have a Hunter, in fact almost every race should have it as they need to eat and not everyone is a farmer.

Also I think that Hunters' Survival talent tree should get more attention with more attention on melee - like 1-2 more active melee abilities, as well as ones like Wing Clip and Raptor Strike, as well as melee auto attack dealing improved damage.

Of course, certainly not to the point where Survival becomes OP, but to a point where it's actually fun and different and somewhat viable.

So I vote YES on Forsaken Hunters as long as Humans get Hunters as well.

[Torta]

So I vote YES on Forsaken Hunters as long as Humans get Hunters as well.

As much as I personally would like it, we don't really have space in the client UI for it. Human already has 6 classes.

[Allwynd01]

So I vote YES on Forsaken Hunters as long as Humans get Hunters as well.

As much as I personally would like it, we don't really have space in the client UI for it. Human already has 6 classes.

Can't that limitation be bypassed in some way? Like class buttons made smaller or replaced with a drop down menu.

You already expanded the UI to feature two more buttons for additional races.

I don't know how possible it is, but there can be implemented some system in the game where each character can talk to an NPC in the game and change their class to a different one, of course with some lore limitations.

For example you want to be a Human Hunter, you talk to some NPC in some city like Booty Bay and tell them you don't want to be a Human Mage anymore, but a Human Hunter instead. So the NPC gives you a short set of kill and fetch quests related to the class you are switching to:

- Hunter is about killing deadly beats, collecting trophies or taming pets
- Mage is about killing aggressive elementals, collecting rare artifacts
- Warlock is about taming demons, killing demons, collecting demonic artifacts
- Warrior is about killing soldiers, bandits, collecting some weapons or whatever..

you get the idea...

[Gheor]

So I vote YES on Forsaken Hunters as long as Humans get Hunters as well.

As much as I personally would like it, we don't really have space in the client UI for it. Human already has 6 classes.

Can't that limitation be bypassed in some way? Like class buttons made smaller or replaced with a drop down menu.

You already expanded the UI to feature two more buttons for additional races.

I don't know how possible it is, but there can be implemented some system in the game where each character can talk to an NPC in the game and change their class to a different one, of course with some lore limitations.

For example you want to be a Human Hunter, you talk to some NPC in some city like Booty Bay and tell them you don't want to be a Human Mage anymore, but a Human Hunter instead. So the NPC gives you a short set of kill and fetch quests related to the class you are switching to:

- Hunter is about killing deadly beats, collecting trophies or taming pets
- Mage is about killing aggressive elementals, collecting rare artifacts
- Warlock is about taming demons, killing demons, collecting demonic artifacts
- Warrior is about killing soldiers, bandits, collecting some weapons or whatever..

you get the idea...

We didn't figure out how to do it yet.
Human Hunters will definitely come in the future as soon as break the barrier.

[Allwynd01]

We didn't figure out how to do it yet.
Human Hunters will definitely come in the future as soon as break the barrier.

That is certainly good to know.

[Tortuga]

Great idea with class change via a NPC!
But it would be better to place these NPCs right in the starting zone, and allow class change at level 1 only, to avoid complications like: char buys the initial class spells, armor..., then it's necessary to clean all the stuff from DB. Less headache is not to let the initial class evolve a lot.

Besides this opens the gates of hell, as if this succeeds, people will start suggest to implement custom classes (dark rangers, demon hunters...) and that's a helluva work I think (though they can be TP-only)

[Unangwata]

I voted YES.
I don't see problem with lore since many humans were hunters before plague. So they could just pick up old profession.

[Zhohan]

Undead hunters are fine if human hunters are added as well.

[Gheor]

Undead hunters are fine if human hunters are added as well.

As soon as we break the limit for just 6 classes in the character creation panel.

[Annales]

I'm afraid this will change the vanilla experience to some disney world/ fan club service server.