Roughly half of the released classes have their specs’ versions of their Class trees differ by more than having swapped a single free/base node.
Paladin initially literally had baked in conditionals “If having taken X {from the Spec Trees}, does Y.”
Never mind that this presently isn’t even true between the two ranged specs…
I wouldn’t say that. For 4(?) expansions, its slowly been turning into a zoo spec where you command your pets not really bond with them. Could it be, sure, was it always, no.
** New 2-point passive talent: Arctic Bola - Aimed Shot/Cobra Shot/Raptor Strike/Mongoose Bite have a chance to fling a bola out at your target that bounces 2/4 times…*
Can we please not do more passive proc crap that will probably break cc…
I hear you, but:
So you might not have to take it (unlike Viper’s Venom, which I still think should be a leaf node, or at least not the sole gate for Wildfire Infusion), and there’s a chance that you’d want to take it for additional damage with no additional effort. Plus it snares, which is useful for pvp.
Actually peak spec design is meaningfully building on the base class rather than diverting from it.
I’m not talking about nodes that conditionally activate from different abilities based on spec like Latent Poison Injectors. I’m talking about the node itself being different between specs, which was intended to not happen at all but they had to do it for Survival with Muzzle instead of Counter Shot. There’s also Barrage not working for SV (stated to be intentional), and the comedic value of having to make a talent called “Master Marksman” work for melee. In this thread people discussed making Multi-Shot baseline and having it extended differently per spec, but of course Survival throws a wrench in that. They keep having to make exceptions for Survival because it isn’t a spec that sensibly builds on the base class like every other spec. All so it can keep a couple generic token physical melee abilities while otherwise being entirely ranged.
Yes, there’s the issue of the pet talents in the baseline tree while Marksmanship will usually ignore them and take Lone Wolf every time. That should also be addressed. I used to be in favour of Lone Wolf back in WoD but now I realise it normalised carving up and diluting the Hunter class identity and was probably a mistake.
N.B. To be fair: Mages do have a case where the node changes and that’s their barriers which are different per spec. That’s a far cry from Counter Shot/Muzzle, and really the biggest problem is having Barrage not work for SV. It worked for SV when they first added Barrage. It’s not the biggest problem facing Hunter spec design, of course, but it is a hint of the real biggest problem…
Typically a snare less then 50%, even a passive one, isn’t that useful. We already have a good snare with access to a ranged one. Frankly, I’d rather have the damage rolled into rs/mb directly.
Just adding random 2pt node passive proc dmg isn’t what surv needs. Now the 2pt ss/bleed dmg node is the type design that I think is well done and can get behind. Regency over my damage profile matters to me.
It was only really like that in Legion and even then you could opt out of Dire Beast and stick to your main pet + Hati. Then in the previous two expansions it was single bonded pet baseline and the ability to talent into either having another pet from your stable out or a random temporary pet for a few seconds. Next expansion gives the option to make a build around Dire Beast but it’s not like that’s the only build. So there’s not a consistently accelerating design trajectory towards BM being the zookeeper that doesn’t bond closely with its pets.
The only thing that make SV “bond” with its pets more is its mastery Spirit Bond, which is of course just taken from BM in the first place.
I have a few questions that I hope come across as genuinely as I mean them. As you can see from my post count, I haven’t been steeped in this MSV/RSV debate–frankly I think it’s a moot point and the RSV folks are wasting their breath–and I would consider it a waste of my breath as well to engage in the debate in the abstract. But since these points specifically relate to the trees, and I have been heavily invested in giving feedback related to the trees, I am genuinely curious about some of these points of the debate.
I agree with this point in the abstract. I am pretty sure that I don’t agree with your definition of the “base class” of Hunter. But definitions aside: how is having a different interrupt “diverting from the base class”?
I have not seen specific communication from Blizzard that this is their intention. Do you have a source that confirms Blizz’s intention was to never have nodes in the class tree that work differently for different specs?
What is the difference?
While I don’t think it’s the biggest problem–honestly, as you point out, the fact that MM ignores several pet-related talent nodes seems like a much bigger problem than the fact that one half of a choice node doesn’t work for SV–this would be pretty easily fixed by just allowing Barrage to be replaced by Chakrams for SV.
To be fair, there shouldn’t be more than 1-2 throughput-affecting nodes across the whole tree that would specifically require ranged-only, pet, melee, or no-pet.
One —the different barriers for Mage— have actually distinct mechanics. The other just trades range for recharge speed.
It half feels like they are trying to avoid having to build any new special effects when fixing our class. If actual build time is an issue, why not just bring back old abilities that worked the same way they did?
Agree with everything except “Alpha Predator / Killer Instinct should be available far sooner” if you mean that it should be above the 20-point gate, because all throughput should be contained in the bottom third.
So if I understand you correctly, they’re much more different than just two styles of interrupt, right? If anything, that seems to cut against what Bepples is arguing, because there’s a more significant change in the single node depending on the spec.
I do mean that, yes, largely because at present pet users simply have a larger node tax than none pet users, and I see no reason why MM would deserve that much more utility than BM and SV.
Killer Instinct / Alpha Predator is essentially a BM / SV class tree tax because it’s a hugely valuable function that was put on the class tree instead of remaining high in both spec trees individually. If Alpha is to remain obligatory and in the class tree, it should at least be accessible (and MM would likely have a similarly obligatory but accessible class tree talent for it alone).
Better still, though, would be to put it high in BM and SV, and MM to similarly have no obligatory unique throughput talents in the class tree.
I think Multi-Shot has a place in the trees, just not in the spec trees. This should be in the class trees and give survival carve. For MM and BM it’s functionally a button you press to activate the buff it provides and nothing more. There’s no reason, other than their trash throughput only under 20 design, for it to be in the spec trees.
Them hardlining throughput under 20 only is really REALLY bad design (adding steel trap to improved traps directly contradicts this concept). There’s a bunch of trees that prove how well it works when you put it in the entire tree, shaman and druid for example.
We could have gotten class wide access to KS resets if they weren’t so stubbornly stuck on throughput under 20.
I think KI/AP are far too expensive to get to, and that either the improved kill command or the the flat pet damage node should be removed, or failing that, they should both be 1 point, but I do think that KI/AP belongs in the bottom third.
So the issue is that putting it above the bottom third gives MM more utility because BM/SV would have to choose between throughput or utility instead of just choosing between utility options.
Throughput has to remain on its own tier and it makes sense to keep that all in the bottom third. But KI/AP are far too expensive to get to. A 2-point gate would be much more in line with the rest of the tree.
Why is that? If they don’t gate throughput under 20, what points are we going to spend on utility when we’re already hurting for utility as it is? How do you tune a class that could spend only 11 points on throughput, but could also spend 15 or 20 on throughput because damage talents are scattered through the tree?
I think it’s a pretty difficult comparison to put a pure dps class up against two classes that have very distinct specs. There are several nodes that are very obvious picks for each spec—in the Druid tree, for example, there’s physical damage increases for Feral and Guardian, magical damage and healing increases for Resto and Boomy.
Take a look at the Hunter tree: Would you pick a utility option that’s in the bottom third, when Death Chakram is still on the table, or Hydra’s Bite or Latent Poison Injectors? Let’s say they left the placeholder Agility node in the middle third of the tree, 2%/4% Agility: would you ever skip that talent? Simply having that in there, in the middle third as essentially a must-pick, is basically like Blizzard saying “here Hunters, you have two fewer talent points to spend than any other class.”
The way the Hunter tree is set up, you don’t have to choose between throughput or utility, and that, in my opinion, is really REALLY good design.
Because it’s one example of SV having to make changes to the base class as it largely diverts from it rather than builds on it. Barrage not working for SV is the other example; as is Kill Shot requiring a melee weapon. They keep having to make these strange exceptions because SV is still, at its heart, not built as a specialisation of the Hunter class. They tried to remedy this in BFA (it was a lot worse in Legion when the spec didn’t even have Misdirect or Disengage) but it’s still an evident problem.
People have noted that the entire class tree would make sense if the class were just BM and MM. They make it work for SV mostly on account of the sidearm crossbow, which is becoming increasingly overburdened. How come the weapon that carries most of the toolkit at this point isn’t even a real one but rather animation-only? It’s like they really want to keep SV melee but design pressures of the class keep making them rely more and more on the ranged weapon, so now we’re at this state where it’s almost a ranged weapon user again but has a couple tacked-on generic melee attacks keeping it using a spear/staff.
It’s from this post. The class tree talents are not meant to change between specs. They’re meant to be foundational class mechanics. They may trigger from different abilities e.g. Latent Poison Injector but they’re not meant to be making entire nodes conditional on spec.
Those barriers are much more minor variations on the same ability. They are all 1 minute CDs that give an absorb shield for the same amount. The only difference is the visual + a minor passive effect. Arcane’s one reduces magic debuff duration, Fire does damage to attackers, Frost slows attackers.
Survival can’t use a ranged interrupt; one it used to have. In fact, as pointed out on Liquid Max’s stream: it’s effectively locked out of most of its design iterations pre-Legion. That’s a big part of why they have such a difficult time making a compelling SV tree. On top of that we have Barrage which they plan to strictly require a ranged weapon. It seems the comedy of a sidearm crossbow being used for that ability in particular was too much even for Blizzard.
No, they shouldn’t make more nodes conditional on spec. Going back to this model of class design where there’s a strong foundation that specs build on exposes how weak the Hunter class foundation is and it’s mostly a result of Legion’s changes. This class was defined around ranged weapons and pets but now both of those things are conditional depending on spec. That limits things when coming up with a class tree.
Lone Wolf is a tricky subject. I used to like it a lot because there are often times where having dependence on a pet is a weakness, not a strength. When they first made Lone Wolf in WoD the context was a number of raid bosses throughout MoP that were punishing for pet classes. So it seemed like a good choice to give us an option to be independent of a pet. I still think it can be good, but I don’t like how it’s effectively mandatory due to MM’s design (in particular its AoE). I think Lone Wolf ultimately normalised the carving up and compartmentalising of the Hunter class identity that led to Legion’s changes (where they also wanted traps specific to SV) and that’s been the single most negative influence on this class since the start of WoW. “Hunter” is a very broad concept that needs a narrowed-down definition. We had that for a while but Blizzard went and actively deconstructed it.
I would rather they either change Lone wolf to make it baseline for MM (and a hypothetical ranged SV) and design it so it isn’t mandatory but rather a “catch-up” for when you can’t rely on a pet, or just remove it outright. And I would rather we stop having to tread on eggshells around melee Survival; especially if it’s hardly melee at all these days. What’s the point?
Lol? It’s effectively 3 minor variations on the same ability. An interrupt being melee or ranged is a more significant difference.
It’s much more comparable to Multi-Shot before Legion: All the specs had it but they each buffed it in different ways: Beast Cleave for BM, Bombardment for MM, Serpent Spread for SV. Class design made sense like that back then.
This was unproductive so let me get more detailed. These new separated trees offer a great opportunity to unprune utility and share spec-specific utility classwide, as seen in some trees (namely shaman). The spec tree can be left for the power increases and changes to the way you deal damage/heal.
What are some things that hunters would like to see in the class tree?
Old glyph effects-
Glyph of black ice & glyph of ice trap: tar trap’s radius is increased by 4 yards and while the hunter is within tar trap their movement speed is increased by 50%.
Glyph of disengage: increase the distance you travel when you disengage.
Glyph of liberation: disengage heals your for 5% of your max health.
Glyph of mirrored blades: when attacked by a spell while in turtle, you reflect it back at the attacker.
Unpruned abilities & the restoration of previous functionalities-
Node that allows camouflage to be active until cancelled
Hi-explosive trap should not deal damage so it can be used on targets that have been freezing trapped or scattered (like glyph of explosive trap which it replaced).
Node that gives tranquilizing shot a focus cost but removes the cooldown
Node that makes binding shot stun instead of root
Entrapment + snake trap
Deterrence
Narrow escape
Spirit bond
Pet CC
Pet intervene
Utility from other specs-
Intimidate is on the tree, but it competes with hi-explosive trap. SV and BM could have both before so this is effectively a prune.
Bursting shot with its damage removed and another node that increases its range by 30 yards, basically turning it into powershot.
Mending bandage. Mostly for PvP and world content, a way to sustain between fights or while opponent is CC’d.
Exotic pets.
Scatter shot is on the tree but it competes with binding, good for BM and SV but MM could have them both before so this is effectively a prune.
Then look at rogue and warlock. Two pure DPS classes that don’t gate throughput behind the 2nd gate and are unquestionably better designed.
idk about that, rogues have far less horizontal mobility than us in both class and spec tree.
EXACTLY!
Thank you for saying this. There is this stupid notion in the hunter community that for some reason hunters MUST have NOTHING but utility in the first two parts of their class tree. This is highly inaccurate if we are following the trees:
Death Knights
Druids
Evokers
Mages
Monks
Paladins
Priests
Rogues
Shamans
Warlocks
Warriors
In fact, after just now looking through ALL the generic trees, ALL of them have throughput in the middle sections of their trees.
So, the question we must ask, is who’s head is up whose butt around here going around saying this crap?