Thanks for the clarification, much appreciated.
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They really were though. The only thing that really stopped paladins from being able to tank in Vanilla was that they lacked a taunt of any kind. I actually ran dungeons in Vanilla with paladin tanks, and they were just as good as warrior tanks as long as you allowed them time to establish aggro 1st. This was rectified in BC, which allowed paladins to be a much more reliable tank in group situations.
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But besides the topic , what if SV hunter had better gameplay as melee?
Let’s say to give both mongoose and Raptor Strike , but mongoose has a CD same as Barbed shot has and its focus free.
Mastery redesign to give chance to reset the CD of Mongoose bite+focus spender damage buff.
That talent that that replaces raptor strike with mongoose could just give extra stack of MB
It would fix the problem and it would be competitive definitely
This is why I bring up the precedent often that was made in Legion. I think the current SV should stay. And so far, Ion says it will.
My problem is, for how long? Until Ion changes his mind? Until a new lead dev takes over?
I don’t want to take away yours, or anyone else’s, fun away. My concern is exactly that will happen down the line though until there’s a proper resolution to what happened with old SV.
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What?? I ALWAYS play MM. I ALWAYS use my pet. Why? Because I know HOW.
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Not really no.
DoT-management, yes! And with an increased focus on traps/improvements.
But Dark Ranger? No thx. Dark Rangers aren’t hunters. They are casters who use unholy magic and engages in necromancy, they just happen to be wearing a bow as well. They are no longer what they used to be before becoming Dark Rangers.
Can’t speak for everyone else, but for me, I want the old playstyle of RSV with as much resemblance as possible, though with more focus on further depth to it’s intended theme and playstyle. Because that’s what is needed for it to fit into modern WoW.
More or less this:
It’s not just about 1 single ability. It’s about all of it put together.
Besides, like I said above, in order for RSV to fit into modern WoW they would have to add more to the spec beyond what it used to be about.
Any abilities/effects currently within the Hunter class that references old RSV in some way, they do so in name only. They no longer promote the same playstyle/gameplay loop which you could get from playing RSV.
See above.
If there are people who actually played and enjoyed RSV, if those people continue to counter your argument of how “MM is basically RSV anyway”, probably best to take the hint.
Obviously people don’t agree with your assessment, and in the debate of bringing RSV back, it’s better to listen to those who want it back and who points towards it’s actual design and playstyle, rather than listening to someone who apparently couldn’t care less.
And yes, this with the basis of returning it as a 4th spec option.
Uhm…what?
…
Not going to bother, @Kaedys said it well enough.
Right there, under Class Abilities.
They open with:
“The hunter is a combat class, like the rogue and warrior, but whereas those classes rely on melee attacks, the hunter relies on ranged power.”
The following lines talk about supportive elements and complementing features.
In addition to the opening paragraph of the class description ofc.
There’s a big difference between what’s called “method of playing” vs. “intent of design”.
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Go survival put a bow on and replace raptor strike with arcane shot.
Kinda how they took the spec from vanilla/bc and gave it unique ranged attacks then brought it back to what it was pre wrath.
People only played rsv when it was fotm. Not the unique playstyle.
People are entitled to their opinions. I also love the argument that its better to listen to people who don’t agree with you cause I agree with them.
Neat! Back then survival was nothing like how you want it to be! Your point?
Yeah like back then their intended design had abilities like counterstrike and survivability talents not explosive shot or black arrow.
Half of the quotes you put you didn’t respond with anything productive. gg
It gets brought up specifically and only when people try to assert that hunters have “always” had melee elements, and thus a melee spec makes perfect sense. It’s enduring proof that even the devs saw hunters as a ranged class back in vanilla. The melee abilities were there because of the minimum range on ranged shots, not because the devs intended for hunters to get scrappy in melee range as a dominant playstyle.
I mean, Arcane Shot existed in vanilla. But it’s not even really spellcasting, it could just as easily be imbued arrows purchased off of a mage. That’s like arguing that Hawkeye’s explosive arrows make him a fire mage.
Mend Pet is probably the closest to “casting” that we get at the moment.
Where do you see melee described at all? “Movement-restricting spells” != melee abilities, given that we had Concussive Shot and Frost Trap that could be applied even with us not being there in melee range, and a number of CC abilities (which also impair the target) that were ranged. In fact, the only melee-range snare we had was Wing Clip. One ability. And you’re trying to base an entire spec off that, despite us having quite a number of other non-melee movement-restricting spells that just as thoroughly fulfill that portion of the description.
That description references ranged attacks three times ("[hunters are] primarily a ranged attacker", “even though other classes can learn to use ranged weapons, non of them is as proficient in their deadly us as a hunter”, and “to support the hunter’s ranged attacks”). It references melee zero times.
Hunters also never spent much time in melee, ever, even in vanilla when we had talents for it. So your argument defeats itself.
Again, warlocks had a stone that buffed melee damage. Are they now a melee class?
They added those abilities baseline because they were baselining a lot of abilities, for every class, that the devs considered centrally thematic to the class. Paladins got Crusader Strike, Shield of the Righteous, and Word of Glory. Mages got Frostbolt, Fire Blast, and Arcane Explosion. Shamans got Chain Heal and Flametongue Weapon. Rogues got Shiv and poisons.
What did they add for hunters? Arcane Shot and Steady Shot. Those are the abilities they consider so centrally thematic to the hunter class, equivalent to Crusader Strike for paladins, Arcane Explosion for mages, and poisons for rogues.
But ya, the class is definitely intended to be a ranged/melee hybrid. Definitely.
Clearly an effective strategy.
You say “without WoG” as if it’s not a baseline ability available to every spec. Fact is, paladins are unusually durable in all 3 specs, compared to many other specs and classes out there.
Y’all were the ones that brought up the whole “hunters had melee abilities originally, clearly they were intended to be melee!” If you don’t want to play ball on that field, don’t bring it up.
That’s literally what y’all just did in this thread. Y’all brought up the melee abilities, we showed the manual, and now y’all have swapped to “times change, those devs don’t work at Blizz anymore, why are y’all talking about the vanilla manual?!”
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I mean, the context was NOW. The argument I was countering is that paladins no longer fit the fantasy in the vanilla manual, so why should hunters need to? Except paladins do fit that fantasy even to this day.
Also note that there’s a difference between “able to main tank” and “being tanky and difficult to kill”. Paladins have always been uncommonly durable, even when they lacked the fundamental tools to effectively main-tank.
If that’s the case, why do MSV proponents always try to bring up the smattering of melee abilities in vanilla as iron-clad evidence that hunters have always been intended to be able to melee DPS? I mean, if times change and the game changes, what does vanilla have to do with it at all?
You can’t have your cake and eat it here. Either those original melee abilities are meaningless because vanilla isn’t relevant to the conversation, or vanilla is relevant and thus the original vanilla manual’s extreme emphasis on the ranged combat aspect of hunters is far more meaningful than a smattering of melee abilities (especially since warlocks also had a melee ability in vanilla).
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So hunters never had any melee aspects? Do me a favor. Download classic. Open your spell book and also look a the talent tree named SURVIVAL.
Don’t know if you know this but arcane shot used to scale off of spellpower. But I don’t even what youre trying to argue on this one.
Frost trap was dropped at your feet.
Your brain is focus meta and builds if you even played Vanilla(not classic) you would probably remember people trying to do innovative builds with different specs. Enhance shammies tried to tank along with hunters trying to melee. There were even fights where warlocks tanked and they scrapped that.
…you showed a manual from a time when survival had melee abilities. I’ve already addressed multiple other things that were said in your purist manual that have been changed.
Because you guys keep bringing up the smattering of the ranged abilities that were changed when legion came out! Your cake is just as awful as everyone else’s.
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The people complain that they miss the old way RSV felt fail to realize that there are 3 specs with 21 talents, 4 covenants, and multiple different legendaries. This expansion has so many ways you can customize your character to feel the way you want it to feel. But nah you gotta follow the meta and complain that your build isn’t there.
I do follow the meta I like to dps I play survival knowing I wont do as much some fights but I’m having a blast. When I’m serious about pushing something I’ll play Marks or the build that offers me the most dps.
You guys can’t say the build that feels the best to you is not there when more than half of you probably haven’t tried anything not outlined on icy viens or wowhead.
You’re sitting there saying RSV still exists when it clearly does not. Over simplifying why people liked the old spec and sticking to the idea that people only played it when it was meta rings hollow.
I understand you view MM and SV as the same. A lot of players do not share that view with you. Why not take the pragmatic approach and argue for a 4th spec (or at least, let people argue for one rather than shoot it down)? Blizz might feel fine with the current iteration of SV, but there is nothing that guarantees it will stay. We can have our cake and it eat it too by satisfying a sizeable portion of the hunter community with a 4th spec while also at the same time removing any reason / excuse that might be given to remove current SV down the line.
Everyone wins in this scenario at zero cost to you.
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You and I have both agreed before that it should have been a fourth spec. I’m mostly arguing against people that are screaming to delete msv because its a minority spec. The name Survival isn’t synonymous with only range attacks. Suppose they added a 4th spec when they made survival melee tweaked some abilities from rsv and made it that new spec. Would people still complain if explosive shot was 30s in that spec? Would they be mad if they had to individually apply SS to each target? What if LnL only worked on that specs hard hitting ability?
Many classes have undergone changes that changed their core abilities. Sucks that MM got some of rsvs but it honestly fits better.
The thing about opinions is that everyone has them and everyone’s is different. I love survival hunter. I love the “Rexxar” style fantasy, I love being melee and standing right side by side with my pet, and I love the flexibility (I can pop out and be ranged for a minimal or no damage loss for a limited time) and mobility of the class.
How does that give us what people here have mentioned?
Some examples of abilities/effects are: Explosive Shot, Black Arrow, Serpent Sting, Serpent Spread, Lock&Load, and more.
How does speccing into current SV, putting on a bow and using Arcane Shot instead of Raptor Strike give us the above?
You do know that the era you’re referring to, during this time it wasn’t a spec at all, do you?
It wasn’t designed to provide a unique playstyle that made it almost entirely different from anything else you could do within the class.
Survival back then was a talent category containing various talents that focused on increasing our survivability as hunters. Some talents increased damage dealt, some provided improvements to utility and traps(and more), while others provided options for better defensive capabilities.
All of these, applied to what the class was as a whole, that being by design, a combative playstyle focusing on ranged gameplay. Nothing you picked in the SV talent category made you want to stray from that core gameplay, gameplay that was the same no matter which category you specced into.
Does Siege of Orgrimmar ring any bells? Just an example ofc. But during this time, RSV was not fotm, and still it was the most played hunter spec of all.
Either way, what does this have to do with what you quoted there?
People can have opinions ofc, but in terms of design, why should opinions about a specific playstyle, from players who have no investment nor any real interest in that particular playstyle, why should these matter?
Follow the conversation…
That wasn’t in response to something you said.
In the beginning, the design of the entire class was focusing on ranged gameplay above anything else, so when they decided to add more distinguishing abilities in preparation for the era of actual Core Specializations with dedicated playstyles, is it really that strange that they went with adding…ranged abilities?
You’re one to talk…
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ranged javelin spear throwing spec ez clap
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I was laughing not at the idea but when I imagined how would my character look like if abilities where based on throwing spear 
Imagine with heroism active and high haste, which SV needs 
My character would flap like hummingbird
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Before WotLK the spec was still primarily ranged.
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We’ve already been over this in another thread and you just chose to ignore it and try the same flawed argument again. Pitiful.
This comparison doesn’t work. The design intent from the start was that Paladins should be able to tank. They failed to meet that design intent due to incredibly poorly-thought-out design decisions before and within Classic that meant Paladins had no reliable way of generating threat (e.g. Paladins were originally meant to have Crusader Strike but the developers panicked and removed it at the last second with no replacement because they thought it might be too similar to Heroic Strike). Later on they had capabilities added to help them meet that design intent.
This is not remotely the same as Survival. Hunters originally had the design intent of primarily being a ranged attacker and using a ranged weapon; this is how the class functioned from the very beginning and it fit that description all the way until 7.0 when that capability was removed from Survival.
So I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t just sweep this argument under the rug and then pipe up with this same flawed point in another thread some time in the future, thanks.
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Since the distinction between ranged weapons and melee weapons no longer exists outside some ability gating for hunters, and auto-attack range, I would say the “ranged weapon” core pillar has changed to “ranged abilities”; and in that arena even SV is far from lacking. Current SV still feels very much a hunter.
But I’m weird, I think the msv/rsv argument is based a little on a false premise at this point, in part because of the Legion iteration of SV. I think that in reworking SV with a larger mechanical focus on ranged abilities, Blizzard did admit that Legion SV was a failure.
I think that (in the absence of a fourth spec) SV needs to continue to reintroduce thematic elements that were lost, in order to regain the fandom of estranged hunters, and that could happen if the community can offer constructive feedback instead of partisan bickering.
I personally think SV would benefit from reintroducing ranged weapons as a viable build option, in a number of ways. Considering that the core of SV is sting dot maintenance, bomb aoe and associated dots, and bomb cooldown reduction with pet generated focus- and we already have baseline hunter abilities that are gated behind weapon choice- it doesnt seem absurd to me for them to simply design some SV ranged avilities to take the place of carve and raptor strike, gate them behind having a ranged weapon equipped, and you wouldnt even need to take up a talent slot to make RSV a thing.
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