Where are the DH players?

General Discussion
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I mean, back a couple of seasons ago, when Barbs didn’t get the buffs they expected in a patch and were told that those changes would come in a later patch, every bard on the forums flooded General Discussion with topics and posts, spamming the boards with them for weeks.

When they got a response, it didn’t end. No, they posted even more, some of them even got private messages from Community Managers and the like and it still didn’t end.

When did they stop? They stopped when they got some changes in the patch that wasn’t intended for them.

So again, where are the DH’s? It worked for the Barbs, no reason to think that the same tactics won’t work for us.

Just sayin’.

Just starting with the Unhallowed Essence Set as that’s what we’ve been discussing the most.

Something the developers could do to make the set capable of a Greater Rift 130 with the parameter 5000 paragon as they set, is to give the Unhallowed Essence set the following change to the 4 piece bonus:

You gain 60% damage reduction and deal 700% increased damage for 8 seconds if no enemy is within 10 yards of you.

Here’s some links to some of our suggestions for Chakram and Elemental Arrow respectively.

One of the biggest problems with our class is that Dawn is required in almost every build. It limits what we can do in the area of build flexibility. We’re unsure how that should be addressed but it HAS to be addressed somehow.

We all want and need a similar amount of item flexibility that other classes have. This issue almost certainly needs to be addressed before almost everything else. If you improve some of our items, which we do not doubt that you’re looking into doing, it doesn’t help if we can’t work them into our builds because Dawn takes precedence.

We’ve got suggestions but most of them would require a rework of Vengeance itself, or a passive or some other way that we’re not sure is feasible at this point. So I think it is up to you, the devs, to come up with a cost effective way to do this. We hope you can and look forward to your solution.

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Funnily enough quite a few Barb fans have been saying to the “nerf Barbs” crowd, that maybe they should put as much energy into getting their favourite classes buffed.

DH is one of my favourites, and I’d get behind the cause for getting them buffed as well.

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Agreed.

I mean, I’m not really, really angry about not getting anything but I am perturbed enough that getting a bone thrown to us by performing some activism is starting to sound like a really good idea.

They wouldn’t even have to be huge changes. Something small like changing the damage multipliers that come the strafe crossbows to multiplicative, increasing them and adding them to legendary effect would be something I would accept and would be the equivalent of giving Barbs Mortick’s in the patch before the one they got the changes to the Wastes set.

Something, almost anything would do.

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Both Nat Strafe and UE multishot are super fun to play, but sadly I cant play them in high GRs in a 4 man group as DPS role, you can tell I do no damage and I get asked to leave game or get vote kicked. This isnt new news either, its taking forever to balance these weaker builds/sets.

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My personal stance that Blizz hates the DH remains unchanged, alongside my belief that they are/would be within the last set batch (and why I remain critical about them not releasing all sets at once). I’ve had no shortage of feedback over time regarding various issues, particularly within the PTR section, but it’s ultimately gotten nowhere.

We’ve probably got the biggest selection of powerless/useless legendaries, the class is far too reliant on full-time vengeance (which segues into resource and defense issues), I have never been a fan of the Nat’s set/RoV spam requirement, and there’s obviously still a good bit of useless skills/runes that not even LoN can save. All things that have existed for years now where any changes we have gotten have largely come with universal increases like set tweaks for everyone.

After a point, you just kind of get tired.

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At the very least they’ve acknowledged the classes that still need some help, it just didn’t happen this patch.

But yeah I’d like to see the weaker classes given some help sooner rather than later.

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I can’t speak for all the DH players, but I am kinda wearily now (I hope, this is a proper word for my feelings …). For quite some time now Blizzard makes it more and more clear, that we DHs don’t fit into their understanding of D3.

First, D3 is heavily based on Area Damage, for which you need to pull absurd amounts of monsters to one place. DHs have passive skills like Single Out or Steady Aim, and the iconical legendary gem (by its name) is Zeis Stone of Vengeance. It’s in the class design that you kill by ambush (another passive), not by hoarding. DHs are deadly ranged killers, not melee fighters. But that’s more or less useless in the general concept of D3 as we have it today.

Sure, we have Hellcat, but this item is just terrible designed, imho, as it adds so much RNG to the play style that I never got warm with it - and probably never will.

Also, D3 is clearly arranged around group play. Yes, I am aware that the most recent blog post says otherwise. But seriously - P5000 as a middle ground for solo players? On which planet do you live? We do not have a spot in the meta (another aspect of our class design: do you remember what we said when we first met Kormac in story mode?) for so many patches now - we are more or less out of the game. Unless you have an affair with other classes, you won’t get much Paragon as a pure DH player - as opposed to Barbs, for example.

Therefore, we make ourselves comfortable in our niche, taking advantage of our class-internal build diversity and having some fun on “low GRs” with noob-ish paragon levels and some nice speed builds for farming T16.

I really would like to see some new stuff for DH, but I doubt that there will be anything really nice. I have lost hope somehow … just waiting for a nice ranged class in D4, which actually fits into the general concept of the game.

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Well said, Hebalon.

I mean, we could do well with a real trap set that would group mobs from a distance.

You’ve probably seen my idea about a FoK/Spike Trap/Caltrops set. But even if they just took part of the idea and gave us an item that gives caltrops the same ability the Leonine Bow gives bolas as in a pull mechanic when it’s triggered, then at least we would get a way to use area damage without having to lose our identity as a ranged class.

Setting a trap that pulls enemies into it (think injured soldiers on the battlefield drawing their allies in to rescue them) and then sniping the lot of them would fit right in with the concept of our class without turning us into melee fighters.

And it would fit in with the mechanics the game is built around, namely Area damage being the end all be all.

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Yes, this would be a good start, and Spike Traps is iirc one of very few skills that could be the base for a new set, as most other skills are already used by other sets. (I would also like a pure EA set with “gains the effect of every rune (or at least Immolation Arrow)”, but that would include too much lags, probably).

But in it’s current state Spike Traps are terrible to use, imho. Maybe (fingers crossed!) we have to wait for another patch because they are planning to rework this skill from the scratch, so it becomes actually playable …

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If I were more creative and liked more than the Multishot build I’d be chiming in with tons of ideas but I’m honestly just jumping from wow, d3, and ff14 until the ff7 remake is released in april…

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I know one of the things I did in the past was at least try to propose legendary ideas that were interesting beyond simple number bloat. Unfortunately, with the old forums gone, I can’t exactly point back to them as a quick reference. Finding strict numbers to adhere to has also never personally been my mission, as it’s also something I’m not being paid to do. In fact, I’m more keen on proposing an idea in an OP fashion simply because if people actually do think it’s OP (and not just stupid), it means something could be tweaked to bring it more in line.

Nonetheless, let’s just look at the ranged weapons for the class:

  • 8 Items without powers: Unbound Bolt, Syduru Crust, Venomhusk, Longshot, Bakkan Caster, Starspine, Arcane Barb, Deadeye, Blitzbolter
  • 3 Items that only augment elemental damage: Uskang, Balefire Caster, Etrayu
  • 15 items that have a lackluster power: Cluckeye, Kridershot, Leonine Bow of Hashir, Odyssey’s End, Windforce, The Raven’s Wing, Demon Machine, Pus Spitter, Hellrack, Chanon Bolter, Helltrapper, Valla’s Bequest, K’mar Tenclip, Calamity, The Demon’s Demise
  • 7 Items commonly used in some manner: Yang’s Recurve, Buriza Do-Kyanon, Manticore, Wojahnni Assaulter, Dawn, Fortress Ballista, Lianna’s Wings

That’s 7 weapons out of 26 that anyone sane would consider for endgame, and of those 7, some are cube only or further niche in builds that have fallen off over time.

Quivers have a relatively similar issue even if there might be some obvious weapon pairing ideas.

  • 6 Pretty much never used: Fletcher’s Pride, Emimei’s Duffel, The Ninth Cirri Satchel, Augustine’s Panacea, Black Bone Arrows, Archfiend Arrows
  • 5 Used somewhere: Spines of Seething Hatred, Sin Seekers, Holy Point Shot, Bombardier’s Rucksack, Dead Man’s Legacy

Using pending and prior updates, we can probably hope for 3 item tweaks at most, and it’s further likely that those 3 tweaks will correlate to the new set. That’s 3 out of 27 arguably useless main/off-hand drops in our pool.

However, we also can’t ignore some of the class-specific armor pieces. At best, they’re LoN fodder, maybe, but I’m just going to list the ones that aren’t really practical under current build conditions.

  • The Cloak of the Garwulf
  • Beckon Sail
  • Cape of the Dark Night
  • Cloak of Deception
  • Blackfeather

Note I just literally listed all of our cloaks. There’s also honorable mention to the age old request of UE’s body always rolling +Discipline as a secondary that hasn’t happened.

When it comes to other slots directly or tangentially related to DH skills, Visage of Gunes is used a fair bit. Death Watch Mantle is pretty much garbage, but I’d at least point to it as a candidate for LoN/FoK tweaking. Mantle of Channeling is pretty much solely RF/LoN. Wraps of Clarity are good, but not for every build. We have no real DH specific gloves unless you want to consider Tasker and Theo, but the appeal there died with the M6v1 change. Waists have some decent options among Hellcat Waistguard, Chain of Shadows, Hunter’s Wrath, and Crashing Rain, but things like Omryn’s Chain, Sash of Knives, and probably Zoey’s Secret need work (My choice being Sentries now follow the DH). Leg slots have nothing DH specific, with Depth Diggers probably being the most used in conjunction with UE while Yan’s is an item I’ve never liked and presently contradicts the expressed belief that stutter stepping shouldn’t be a thing (or at least required). Nothing DH specific in feet, with Illusory Boots probably being the go to choice for LoN if anything. Amulets also don’t really boast anything targeted to DHs, as well. When it comes to DH rings, all we have is Elusive for Shadow builds, but I’ll also forever groan at our relative reliance on CoE.

So, yeah… a lot to look at. And that’s before actually touching DH skills/passives. There might be some fun builds to play here and there, but efficacy is something obviously in the dumpster. The class has otherwise been on the receiving end of some of the game’s most heavyhanded nerfs and redesigns over time, with the aforementioned M6v1, Prep loop, proc tweaks/removals, smokescreen tweaks, DEX conversion issues, and more I’m likely forgetting off the top of my head. Saying Blizz hates the class may be harsh and hyperbole, but it’s also hard to feel like they care about it when we’ve either not been meta or reacted at with the nerf sledgehammer when we dare.

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This right here. I’ve also touched on this and pointed this out several times.

Currently, over 90% of high end successful builds in the game are melee/face tank builds and it’s been that way for a long time. Even builds that were designed/intended to be used at range are practically melee builds. A lot of this has to do with how the core of the game is played, which is centered around density+AD.

The problem is that there’s simply not enough incentive to play designed ranged builds at a distance, and for a class that is initially designed around ranged attacks and capabilities to keep at a distance, this really puts a damper on things as a lot of our skills don’t necessarily synergize with being up close. This forces us to rely on the very few skills that do well up close (grenades, impale) for higher clears which is sorta ironic. Nothing wrong with said builds. It would be nice to also see DH’s do what they were intended to do, which is lay carnage from all angles of the map afar.

Incentives such as steady aim, single out, UE4, squirts, zei’s and many more, don’t do nearly enough based on how GR’s have to be played. This is also compounded with the fact that ranged builds are also typically harder to play and execute. There’s also much more emphasis on our hatred resource. The only time we really value discipline is when it rolls on gear necessary for UE builds.

If the dev team can figure out ways to make range play significantly more rewarding, then by class design we’ll have more ways to reach high end GR’s along with standard buffs.

Simply doing a numbers tuning isn’t enough, but it could also be the reason why DH’s are last in this new balancing philosophy. I want to be optimistic, but I guess we’ll see.

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I dislike when people say this. We’ve done this on the DH forums for years and on PTR feedback. Dmkt made several well written and well backed by the community threads. Very little has come of it (so far).

We even complained and made multiple threads about not having a sticky in the new forum and it took months before they pinned one. This does not put forth confidence that our voices are being heard.

What more can we do when there’s nothing exciting to pull people to the class to even continue to discuss stuff as they have no new toys to play with? Even this current season when a few of us tried to have “skill change discussions” and they mostly fell on depth ears because people are occupied with the fun new toys from crusader/barb/monk.

I’m not saying we’re being completely ignored, but the motivation/drive to continue productive feedback requiring significant time investment from the community has been down spiraling.

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Well, i’m not really a pitchfork and molotov cocktail personality, but I wrote a post in the class forum because Nev said they read them:

Last minute buff requests, 5-7 GRs so nobody is frustrated when they see the DH icon in a group.

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Separate legendary items that does the same thing as Zei’s, but requiring MfD would make the class feel like a ranger.

Targets Marked for Death take 5% more damage for every yard between you and the marked enemy. Maximum 50 yards.

That’s 250% damage. Stick that on an Amulet!

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i don’t have much to add to this discussion. Most the points about DH issues, lack of group synergy etc have already been brought up here and many other times in other places, but as a returning long time DH player, I’m here to show support.

DH needs help. There are so many possibilities with sentries, strafe etc. I know that this is late game in d3’s life cycle, but giving Barb a new set after buffing them like crazy in s19 seems a bit unnecessary when DH has been completely neglected. Lets hope Blizz reads this and at least throws us a bone in S20

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Playing the classes that got the new sets, and rolling a DH again in S21 when she gets her new set.
I don’t understand why people limit themselves to one class in a game that has 7.

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Maybe it’s because despite the class falling behind others, they…I mean we like the class concept and none of the other classes or their sets match up with the concept of the class.

That’s just reason. If I wanted to spend more time explaining it to you, I’m sure I could come up with others.

Point is, I don’t criticize your choices and under no circumstances should you find it necessary to criticize ours.

Just sayin’.

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DH is one of my favorite classes. I just like others too, and appreciate new content for them. I accept they can’t do all changes at once and look forward to playing DH again once she gets her turn.

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Just adding my voice in support of the comments made by many posters here.

The Demon Hunter, in its current state, needs serious rework in many aspects to make it a viable and enjoyable choice of character class to play.

Are you listening Kevin Martens?

(Martens is lead designer at Blizzard Entertainment since 2009 and co-creator of Diablo III)

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