Another CRYMORE Hunter thread.

[Ishilu]

Just took a look at these changes. There's some good stuff, but I really don't like what they did to wingclip.

I have mixed feelings about the survival tree. I understand that they've given som sugar to the "I want to play Rexxar" crowd but turning it into a pure melee tree just sucks. I'll miss my CC and survival artist tree. Different solutions have been discussed and - sadly - ignored here.

[Bigsmerf]

As an aspiring melee hunter, I'd rather not see the vast majority of hunter's hybrid/utility potential gutted in favor of making my meme dream a reality. Here's to hoping the devs tone things down, and I mean this in the context of more than just hunter specifically.

[Diablowjob]

As an aspiring melee hunter, I'd rather not see the vast majority of hunter's hybrid/utility potential gutted in favor of making my meme dream a reality. Here's to hoping the devs tone things down, and I mean this in the context of more than just hunter specifically.

Oh wow. I didn't expected even Melee enjoyers are going to say such a words. Like look. All the hunters who have at least some understanding of their class feels devastated right now...

[Ragetto]

It's very nice to see that people this time are sharing the same opinion. I remember the scatter/trap nerf. A lot of PvE crabs came and told it's deserved bla bla bla, that time opinion was kinda 50/50. Now even non-hunter players understand the devastating effect of these nerfs...

Most humans are like that... They need to be directly affected to start feeling empathy (which isn’t actual empathy, then but we’ll take it).

In any case, the main argument for the scatter/trap nerf was "it's a blizz-like fix" (which was a bit absurd in a game already quite different from Vanilla – but for some, that was a valid reason).

But now, it's harder to play the "blizz-like" card, since this has absolutely nothing to do with the original game anymore.

[Ragetto]

I take this opportunity to mention the post I made regarding the huge 1.17.2 nerf to the BM/MM spec, and more generally, the restructuring of the MM tree for all hybrid builds aiming for Scatter Shot (21 pts in the MM tree). On top of everything mentioned here...

viewtopic.php?t=15253

I won’t bump it up myself very often (since it's a bit more niche... just a little bit), so if the devs read your (more general) thread and the replies, they might come across mine as well

[Diablowjob]

I take this opportunity to mention the post I made regarding the huge 1.17.2 nerf to the BM/MM spec, and more generally, the restructuring of the MM tree for all hybrid builds aiming for Scatter Shot (21 pts in the MM tree). On top of everything mentioned here...

viewtopic.php?t=15253

I won’t bump it up myself very often (since it's a bit more niche... just a little bit), so if the devs read your (more general) thread and the replies, they might come across mine as well

BM basically need same as Lightning Reflexes but 100% scaling for the pet of your ranged AP. Then pet probably will start doing some decent damage. Still not having Scatter in cost of scaling pet... Im not sure...

[Dasitmane]

Scatter is borderline garbage and most of its utilty came from being able to chain it with a long icetrap.

[Arcanex Ota]

Scatter is borderline garbage and most of its utilty came from being able to chain it with a long icetrap.

[Eeeeeeeeeee]

I take this opportunity to mention the post I made regarding the huge 1.17.2 nerf to the BM/MM spec, and more generally, the restructuring of the MM tree for all hybrid builds aiming for Scatter Shot (21 pts in the MM tree). On top of everything mentioned here...

viewtopic.php?t=15253

I won’t bump it up myself very often (since it's a bit more niche... just a little bit), so if the devs read your (more general) thread and the replies, they might come across mine as well

Except the only thing that specifically happened to that build is you lost a little crit in exchange for pet scaling.

I get that people are upset generally about some of the places Hunter power was moved out of, but needing to take 2 points out of a crit damage talent wouldn't be a serious complaint even if it didn't come with a huge pet buff.

[Ragetto]

Except the only thing that specifically happened to that build is you lost a little crit in exchange for pet scaling.

'The only thing' Like going from a 30% to an 18% crit damage bonus is just a minor detail... Makes you wonder why this talent even exists, might as well remove it. But hey, why not just reduce my damage by 50% while boosting my pet's HP even more? After all, the only thing I'd really lose would be damage. But my pet would be ultra resistant, so it's all good... I can't wait to start killing enemies with my pet's HP.

Anyway, I already addressed this in the relevant thread (and in the original post, actually):

Why would I care if my pet’s armor/HP scales with mine in PvP? How is that going to help me in 98% of situations? How does that compensate for a loss in DPS or range?

Even if my pet had 100 million HP, it wouldn’t compensate for 0.001% of the nerf I’m talking about.

The only thing that could compensate would be a massive pet DPS increase (through scaling), but that’s too deep in the tree (and I don't think it'll be "massive" enough). If I want it (which is way less useful in PvP than range/critical damage), I can’t have Frenzy 5/5 (another nerf, then).

In the end, I lost much more than I gain, no matter the scenario.

[Ragetto]

BM basically need same as Lightning Reflexes but 100% scaling for the pet of your ranged AP. Then pet probably will start doing some decent damage. Still not having Scatter in cost of scaling pet... I'm not sure...

Scatter Shot is a non-negotiable must-have anyway. The whole point of this spec is to have both the pet stun and Scatter Shot, but to keep it viable, you still need decent burst (through crits). In PvP, even with this spec it’s the hunter who deals most of the damage, not the pet (by far - anyone with a decent experience in this area knows that).

This spec is super fun but only 'reasonably viable' for most hunters, which is why few play it. Without 5/5 Mortal Shots, this nerf pretty much kills the spec for 'serious' players. Of course, this doesn’t matter to those who don’t mind playing meme specs and don't realize how changes that seem minor to them can actually shift the balance of power in real situations... Those players are indifferent to any PvP nerf anyway.

[Dyco]

I've seen several comments complaining about the changes announced for the hunter in patch 1.17.2, specificlly those related to survival tree. People seems to forget that survival tree was originally designed to be melee (https://web.archive.org/web/20041210202 ... lect_id=11).
I must say that I agree with most of the changes announced, but disagree with some others.
Specifically regarding the performance that the hunter could have in pvp, there would be things that I would consider reversing.

My suggestions are as follows:

keep Counterattack
keep Wing Clip as it is right now (no weapon scaling, no 6sec cooldown).
Reeplace 1.17.2 announced Wing Clip with a new melee strike, old pre-1.12.1 hunter's Lacerate (no bleeding, just weapon scaling and 6 sec cooldown).
Add an a Tranquilizing Shot equivalent strike for melee hunters (no weapon damage, same cooldown).
Merge all actual Trap talents into one.

That been said, my suggestion for survival tree would be this:

--1st row--

* IMPROVED SLAYING: (3 points) (just as it's right now).
* RESOURCEFULNESS: (5 points) (just as announced in 1.17.2).
* DEFLECTION: (2 points) (just as announced in 1.17.2).

--2nd row--

* TRAP MASTERY: (3 points) Increases the duration of Freezing and Frost Trap by 10/20/30% and the damage of Inmolation and Explosive Trap by 10/20/30%. Also gives your traps a 8/16/25% chance to entrap the target preventing them to move for 5 sec and decreases the chance enemies will resist trap effects by 5/10/15%.
* SAVAGE STRIKES: (2 points) (as announced in 1.17.2).
* IMPROVED WING CLIP: (3 points) (as announced in 1.17.2).
* SURVIVAL INSTINCTS: (2 points) (merge of old pre-1.12.1 Improved Disengage and actual Improved Feign Death) Reduces the chance your Feign Death ability will be resisted by 2/4%. Increases the amount of threat reduced by your Disengange ability by 10/20%.

--3rd row--

* PLANNING AHEAD: (2 points) (requires 3 points in Trap Mastery) (juast as announced in 1.17.2).
* SURVIVALIST: (5 points) (just as it's right now).
* CARVE: (1 point) (just as announced in 1.17.2).
* DETERRANCE: (1 point) (just as it's right now).

--4th row--

* STINGING NETTLE LACING: (2 points) (just as announced in 1.17.2).
* SUREFOOTED: (3 points) (just as it's right now).
* COUNTERATTACK: (1 point) (requires 1 point in Deterrance) (just as it's right now).

--5th row--

* KILLER INSTINCT: (3 points) (just as announced in 1.17.2).
* MELEE SPECIALIZATION: (5 points) (old pre-1.12.1 talent) Increases the damage you deal with melee weapons by 1/2/3/4/5%.
* RAPID STRIKES: (1 point) (requires 1 talent point in Carve) (just as announced in 1.17.2).

--6th row--

* LACERATE: (1 point) (requires 3 points in Killer Instinct) (old pre-1.12.1 talent without bleeding effect) An instant strike that deals 40% weapon damage increased by 45% of your Attack Power.
* LIGHTING REFLEXES: (3 points) (as announced in 1.17.2, but with 3 talent points) Increases your Agility by 3/6/10% and increases your attack power by an amount equal to 30/65/100% of your agility.
* VICIOUS BITE: (2 points) (just as announced in 1.17.2).

--7th row--

* UNTAMED TRAPPER: (1 point) (as announced in 1.17.2 but without being linked to Trap Mastery).

Total points: 51

This is how it would look like:

[Metavy]

There is a screenshot of notes taken from the stream of Vrograg which includes changes to the patch note.



Wing Clip getting a 3 sec CD rather than 6 is far better. We lose 1 Wing Clip with the GCD compared to spamming, but Improved Clip now go to 40% change to root the target ! To be fair, for the old playstyle of ranged hunters, I find it rather balanced (and necessary with the loss of Counter Attack and the need to be able to root enough against rogues or warriors). I just fear it will be nerfed because for an offensive melee hunter, 40% chance to root your target is quiiiiite violent.

With that change, compared to vanilla, we still have the nerf of Scatter Shot/Freeze Trap DR, Trap Mastery is too far so 4-5% chance the target resist our traps, no Counter Attack, Raptor Strike burst much less happening. But we get more damage in BM or MM.

I don't know if it's enough, as I prefer (and the hunter needs it) many mobility/abilities to kite. We still lost some. But the increase in damage could maybe compensate the need to kite so much. I'm not sure. Seems a little better than before, hope it's enough.

As for Shadowmeld, in Night Elf, continuing to cry. Usually, you could open with an Aimed Shot without problem, so it's just a bigger CD and I don't care for the 2 sec of stealth. But I'm still curious to see how it could work.

[Diablowjob]

No its not enough. If Wing Clip get a prefix cannot be dodged/parried then fine, leave it 3s CD with same talent. I take that.

[Ishilu]

That whole melee hunter tree comes at the expense of ranged kiting and trapping builds. Not saying that both cannot coexist but the tree as announced is a pure melee dps tree, no more no less.

[Diablowjob]

That whole melee hunter tree comes at the expense of ranged kiting and trapping builds. Not saying that both cannot coexist but the tree as announced is a pure melee dps tree, no more no less.

They just removed whole utility in favor of melee build thats it.

[Ragetto]

That whole melee hunter tree comes at the expense of ranged kiting and trapping builds. Not saying that both cannot coexist but the tree as announced is a pure melee dps tree, no more no less.

They just removed whole utility in favor of melee build thats it.

The funny thing is, melee hunter could actually be really fun to play... and I think I’ll give it a try. Who knows, it might turn out to be amazing and add some diversity to the class. The problem is, it kills the vibe of classic PvP hunter gameplay, and the skill cap for ranged gameplay might be drastically reduced (which will be frustrating for experienced PvP players - it won’t matter much for backpedalers, though).

We would need a fourth talent tree to do this properly, because for a hunter, survival and melee are not supposed to be the same thing at all.

[Ishilu]

We would need a fourth talent tree to do this properly, because for a hunter, survival and melee are not supposed to be the same thing at all.

Exactly. I might try out the melee thing if they fix this mess like you're proposing. Otherwise I'll just check out other classic or tbc servers.

[Borefficz]

Hijacking this thread but it has been confirmed Improved Steady Shot will only increase only the BONUS damage by 25% (the added +50), not all of its damage.

Discuss :)

[Metavy]

So a +12.5 damage on Steady Shot for 2 talent points ? I guess it will be in concurrence with Improved Hunter's Mark (+16.5 Power Attack for Ranged for 3 talent points, if I remember right). :p

[Steakhouse]

FYI Wing Clip CD has been reduced from 6 to 3 and proc chance of improved wing clip has been increased to 40% according to this changelog update, which makes up for the disappearance of Counterattack imo:

So a +12.5 damage on Steady Shot for 2 talent points ? I guess it will be in concurrence with Improved Hunter's Mark (+16.5 Power Attack for Ranged for 3 talent points, if I remember right). :p

12.5% per point. So 2 points increase your second damage source behind autoshots by 25%. It's extremely powerful.

We would need a fourth talent tree to do this properly, because for a hunter, survival and melee are not supposed to be the same thing at all.

I don't think a fourth talent tree is necessary, could just be a dual purpose talent tree like Druid's Feral Combat.

A few changes to Hunter changes have been brought to the Surv tree which goes in just that direction btw, see the changelog above. 40% immobilize on a 3 second CD seems incredibly powerful and about as reliable as hoping to get a Parry, even when factoring in Deterrence (it has a CD !)

[Ragetto]

12.5% per point. So 2 points increase your second damage source behind autoshots by 25%. It's extremely powerful.

The talent description might be misleading, because...

It has been confirmed that Improved Steady Shot will only increase the bonus damage by 25% (the added +50), not the total damage.

[Steakhouse]

In that case it will be really bad lol. Either way this kind of discussion doesn't matter, numbers tweaking is likely to happen before and even after patch is released. IMO discussing fundamental issues is more important than "this talent is a little too weak right now"

[Diablowjob]

That whole melee hunter tree comes at the expense of ranged kiting and trapping builds. Not saying that both cannot coexist but the tree as announced is a pure melee dps tree, no more no less.

They just removed whole utility in favor of melee build thats it.

The funny thing is, melee hunter could actually be really fun to play... and I think I’ll give it a try. Who knows, it might turn out to be amazing and add some diversity to the class. The problem is, it kills the vibe of classic PvP hunter gameplay, and the skill cap for ranged gameplay might be drastically reduced (which will be frustrating for experienced PvP players - it won’t matter much for backpedalers, though).

We would need a fourth talent tree to do this properly, because for a hunter, survival and melee are not supposed to be the same thing at all.

I dont mind melee hunter. I just want trap mastery easier to obtain by hybrid spec, and counterattack back. And nobody will complain even.

[Ishilu]

I dont mind melee hunter. I just want trap mastery easier to obtain by hybrid spec, and counterattack back. And nobody will complain even.

That plus Wyvern Sting and not forcing people to pick up melee talents if they go deep survival.

[Diablowjob]

Guys. We need Viper Sting 3 sec cd as well. I just realised that we lost the whole layer of suppress for a healers in enemy team completely. I just fought as usuall a t3 pala and the only way to kill this shit for us two was me spamming sting so he lose gcd on it. Other way we just couldnt kill it -_- Thoughts?

[Ragetto]

Guys. We need Viper Sting 3 sec cd as well. I just realised that we lost the whole layer of suppress for a healers in enemy team completely. I just fought as usuall a t3 pala and the only way to kill this shit for us two was me spamming sting so he lose gcd on it. Other way we just couldnt kill it -_- Thoughts?

Yeah, most people don’t seem to realize how significant this double nerf (amount drained + cooldown) really is. Viper Sting can be dispelled so easily that not being able to spam it creates a real issue.

I’m not sure what motivated this change, since generally only noobs complain about Viper Sting (95% of the time)…

[Diablowjob]

Can we make Viper Sting get some love back too? For example making it undispellable phys debuff. But make it sort of trueshot cast, or instant mana burn. With like 4-6 sec cd. Because for now it looks throwaway skill from panel. It lost whole suppression point, since we lose gcd for a 6 sec cooldown mana burn which can be instantly dispelled by anything.

[Diablowjob]

Also since magnitude of viper sting was nerfed i think some mana cost reduction on viper sting is good decision.
i don't believe the cost was changed at all. Since we have low mana pool and dispell usually cost like nothing...

[metahunt]

Also, we are discouraged to take the bleeding crits talent Piercing Shots in PvP. Imagine if a warrior, or a rogue, or anything run on you. You crit his face with your Steady Shot just before he reaches you. Good for you, huh ?

But no, with the talent, he bleeds, and you are out of the option of using a freezing trap to get away, as the bleeding would immediately breaks the trap, so you couldn't even run away. I'm not even sure if it breaks Scatter Shot too, making it almost impossible to get away is your unique Wing Clip fails.

I thought to this immediately when I read that talent.
Its pure PVE, to get more damage without doing anything.
One of the many reasons that makes me think that all this was never developed with the PVP aspect in mind and that the people who redesigned dont know what a PVP hunter is.

[Ishilu]

One of the many reasons that makes me think that the people who redesigned dont know what a hunter is.

Fixed ;-)

[Dasitmane]

Also, we are discouraged to take the bleeding crits talent Piercing Shots in PvP. Imagine if a warrior, or a rogue, or anything run on you. You crit his face with your Steady Shot just before he reaches you. Good for you, huh ?

But no, with the talent, he bleeds, and you are out of the option of using a freezing trap to get away, as the bleeding would immediately breaks the trap, so you couldn't even run away. I'm not even sure if it breaks Scatter Shot too, making it almost impossible to get away is your unique Wing Clip fails.

I thought to this immediately when I read that talent.
Its pure PVE, to get more damage without doing anything.
One of the many reasons that makes me think that all this was never developed with the PVP aspect in mind and that the people who redesigned dont know what a PVP hunter is.

You know you're simply free to not take the talent right? There's tons of good options in MM anyways. It's the survival tree thats busted.

[metahunt]

Also, we are discouraged to take the bleeding crits talent Piercing Shots in PvP. Imagine if a warrior, or a rogue, or anything run on you. You crit his face with your Steady Shot just before he reaches you. Good for you, huh ?

But no, with the talent, he bleeds, and you are out of the option of using a freezing trap to get away, as the bleeding would immediately breaks the trap, so you couldn't even run away. I'm not even sure if it breaks Scatter Shot too, making it almost impossible to get away is your unique Wing Clip fails.

I thought to this immediately when I read that talent.
Its pure PVE, to get more damage without doing anything.
One of the many reasons that makes me think that all this was never developed with the PVP aspect in mind and that the people who redesigned dont know what a PVP hunter is.

You know you're simply free to not take the talent right? There's tons of good options in MM anyways. It's the survival tree thats busted.

Let me explain you something because you obviously hardly understand anything to the hunter gameplay in a whole.

FD/Freeze trap is essential.
* Its your life-guarantee in case something goes wrong or is totally unexpected
* Its mostly always in your rotation plans for long hard fights against very powerful elite(s).
* Its the base in soloing hard PVE (with pet control)
* Its the BASE in PVP.

If you weren't in a situation where you knew you didn't need to trap, then you could add extra dot dps with your serpent sting and that was fine. Because it was totally under your control.

Having a talent that does this RANDOMLY is an heresy. Because its makes all your plans above unreliable, and it breaks your class. It only benefits the RAIDERS who don't care about playing solo or to CONTROL in 5-man dungeons groups (whom are bad hunters btw), they will gain extra dps without doing any effort for it .

So no I will never take that talent.
But my whole point above, was that a passive talent like this shows how much the council were ignorant about the whole of their class and especially the CC aspect of it as it is inexistent in the whole raid contain.
You can also feel this seeing that the Trap Mastery talent was pushed further in the Survival tree making no longer possible to reliably control non-stop any trappable mob with a MM/survival build.
The only hunters who will take this talent are bad/ignorant or raiders that have a goblin washing device to swap to something serious when they end the raid. And its another terrible aspect of things.

[Dasitmane]

Thats a whole lot of text saying nothing. Yes I know dots break Freezing, that's why I told you not to take the talent. Not all talents are supposed to be for PVP.

[Snakeman]

Sorry to say but these changes weren't made with pvp in mind at all. And it shows.

I'm pretty sure the main guy they had to "validate" the hunter changes is a retail survival main who didn't even know surv is a PvP spec in vanilla. Which is pretty easy to evidence even without him saying so himself, because for some reason they added doubled agility scaling to melee attack power to Lightning Reflexes to give melee hunters more AP, not giving any consideration to hunters being able to equip both a two-handed melee weapon and a ranged weapon in vanilla and what that means for PvP...

--

Largely agree with OP though. I'm not going to lie to myself, we were definitely already strong in PvP, but gutting the surv tree to make way for melee-only talents that just spread DoTs everywhere just takes all of the fun out of it. You have to flat out avoid several valuable DPS talents in the MM tree to preserve your ability to actually CC people. They didn't even TRY to make Wyvern Sting work, they just removed it from the game entirely. Moving Trap Mastery up to the top of the tree makes it impossible to take all of the same talents in 30 points that I was able to before patch, forcing me to drop a point somewhere so I can keep using Scatter Shot - but as I understand it forced overinvestment into your main tree is a major problem with several specs. There's not really any rhyme or reason to where they've placed some of the talents or the number of points in each of them. Why is TM three? Why do I have to dump an extra point into the top of the surv tree just to max out essential perks?

The "flavour texts" in the changelog post were the icing on the cake. It's abundantly clear that none of the devs knew where they were even starting with vanilla hunter and didn't care to find anyone who did. MM had no valuable talents above Mortal Shots and TSA was only good because it buffed warriors? BM was a spec with a strong identity? Are you fucking joking?

Sincerely,
The guy who's been making calculated suggestions for years to improve the gameplay feel of my favourite class that all went completely ignored in favour of whatever the hell went live last week