In the new TWW spec tree for Survival Hunter, Harpoon and Aspect of the Eagle have been moved to the second tier of talents from the first. In the Dragonflight talent tree, it was easy to grab one or the other, and in fact mandatory in order to access Mongoose Bite. Harpoon and AotE didn’t directly compete with any meaningful damage nodes in the first tier. As nodes that did not directly impact throughput, this was necessary in order to allow Survs to feel like they could grab these talents.
However, in the new spec tree, Harpoon and AotE have been moved to the second tier of talents and very directly compete with meaningful throughput talents. Harpoon gates Bloodseeker and Terms of Engagement, which are throughput talents, but without a consistent way to apply AoE bleeds and a much reduced emphasis on focus management, both of these talents are significantly less useful than in Dragonflight. This puts Survival Hunters into a position where taking either of two flavourful, fun talents reduces their output both in ST and AoE. I don’t expect to be able to take both Harpoon and AotE in every situation, nor that I would even want to, but feeling gated out of both is extremely rough. The flexible-range, high movement gameplay of Survival that I have come to love hinges on having at least one of these talents, and especially Harpoon is the crux of my enjoyment.
I would like to see these talents moved to the first tier of the spec talents moved to the first tier of the spec tree in positions where they do not compete directly with “mandatory” throughput nodes. Perhaps you have to path through one or the other to reach further in the tree, as was the case previously to reach Mongoose Bite? Or another option is to make one or both of these abilities baseline, which seems like a much easier way of handling this.
Harpoon and harpoon resets in M+ and Aspect of the Eagle in raid bring me and many Survival Hunters great joy, please do not make these abilities that seem fundamental to the spec feel inaccessible.