Survival Rework: “We want to destroy a long-standing spec that’s been here for several years to hype a rework and get player interest to up our subscription count and please our shareholders.”
Current Result: A spec that’s abandoned by Blizzard, existing hunter players, and failed to capture interest of other players.
Solution: Buckle down on it and refuse to change despite not knowing what to do with it. Because Blizzard knows best and what players want and enjoy, to imply otherwise is blasphemy.
They buffed it a whole lot during Uldir and several other times if I remember correctly. Nobody cared. It’s not about numbers with survival. They could make it a meta melee spec and people still wouldn’t take them. Melee slots are very limited. There better be a very good reason to bring a melee hunter over a ranged one or a melee dps that brings more utility to the table. One reason enhancement shaman aren’t really brought much either. Wish it weren’t like that, but that’s just how it is.
I think they play nicely as a spec; they just lack the kind of unique utility compared to either other melee or to ranged hunters that would warrant them a spot. Their damage profile, even if the damage is really good in a sim, isn’t going to make them a meta melee anytime soon unless they the damage is just head and shoulders above.
It’s not a mistake or a failure. They intended to create a niche spec that wasn’t going to be popular. They don’t care that it’s not popular because they didn’t intend for it to be popular.
They setup a spec that cannot fail it’s design goals because they didn’t design it to succeed. The only true failure would for it to become popular. But even then they probably wouldn’t care and just see it as a surprising success story.
The only way I see things changing is if the current design team changes.
It’s funny because people who actually try it with an open mind LOVE it. It’s just a few tweaks from being the most fun I’ve ever had playing WoW.
I used to think if people would just try it they’d understand. But honestly now I hope the haters never do. The only thing that would make Survival better than getting some talent/flow adjustments is doing that AND leaving it melee. So the MSV can be unique and have a blast.
It’s a pretty bad look to just change the metrics of success to match what most people would expect to be the metrics of failure. I would argue that driving away most of the playerbase of a spec is objectively a bad thing and can’t be argued to be a success from any standpoint.
Besides, they only argued that they intended it to be unpopular a year after they made the change. For all we know they may have expected it to be a popular spec beforehand. I know a lot of players did, which is pretty baffling considering common sense dictates most Hunters wouldn’t want to play a melee spec.
You act like no one who criticises the spec has tried it.
Miss me with this “open mind” talk. Most people come to this class to play with ranged weapons. That’s kind of the entire point. I’m not going to “open mind” my way into unconditionally accepting a spec that prides itself on lacking the most core feature of the class, just like how I would never accept a Rogue spec that lacks Stealth; because that would be stupid. You know what they say; have an open mind, but not so open that your brain falls out.
I mean. I have tried it with an open mind. And I think many other people have too. That doesn’t shield it from criticism however and many of us who did try it with an open mind still believe it was a mistake. Or, at least I believe how it was implemented was a mistake.
If you want you can check my achievements. I don’t claim to be good with it at the time or currently but I was at least proficient enough with the spec to beat the mage tower back in Legion. It was reworked again in BFA and you know, it still doesn’t really appeal to me man.
Even a lot of the current SV fans have gripes here and there. Single target needs buffs and the focus generator should not be tied to kill command, off the top of my head.
Edit: To be clear, I genuinely am glad for you and everyone else who enjoys the spec. But I think writing off criticism as people just being “haters” does a disservice to spec, and devalues the people who miss a playstyle that was lost because of how blizz chose to implement the new spec. I want to see it, and the rest of the hunter class, succeed. Which is part of the reason why I critique the spec and often post about it. I also don’t think it should be removed and that we should get a 4th spec to fix the mistakes made in Legion. So. Yes, I have tried it. No, I am not in love with it. No, I do not hate it. And yes, I think there are some legitimate problems that need to be addressed with the spec and with problems that are a direct result of how it was implemented.
Survival was just MM with black arrow, explosive shot, and better traps. BM felt like a distinct specialization while MM and surv were just slight variations of one another.
The spec was ripe for an overhaul and while you may disagree, many are happy with it.
I would wager many more are unhappy with it. But to your point, if you believe it was just MM (it wasn’t but let’s overlook that for a moment) with a few different spells, then why the change to melee, rather than updating the spec to actually fit within the class at the time? What stopped blizz from reworking it to a different ranged spec with a more clear thematic or gameplay focus (depending on what you think was exactly wrong with it)?
It is a terrible look. But I think it was likely their goal to push players away from hunters. Not as a whole, but rather just as a reduction. Hunter has been one of the most popular classes. I mean this happened around the same time they said they didn’t want you playing Demo lock.
The fact that they haven’t gone back and changed it, might speak to this as their actual intention and not merely a justification. I think it’s still wrong. I just mean I think this design team wanted this melee hunter and they knew it was probably never going to be popular and did it anyways.
There simply aren’t enough players loyal to a single spec for the design team to be screwed by such a decision. It sucks for the RSV fans. But I don’t think it’s getting better until changes are made as to who is designing things.
“Survival was just MM but <lists all the things that made it not MM>”
Every damn time with you people.
Is Assassination just Subtlety with Mutilate? Should they take away Stealth from Assassination to make it more unique?
Do you think it’s a good idea to make a spec unique by taking away core features?
Well, actually, the entire central point of this discussion going back to the start is the fact that not many are happy with it. Even Blizzard admits this.
I really don’t think so. The way they viewed it they probably thought Hunters would just be happy with BM and MM and new melee players would come in to play SV.
