Super fast SV feedback for improvements. Generally speaking though super happy re: this update
I really feel like Raptor Strike should be made baseline to the spec. It’s going to be very confusing for new players when they don’t have a melee ability till level 13 at the earliest
Bloody Claws still feels really unnecessary in the tree, especially now with all the extra kill commands available.
Sweeping Spear / Killer Companion are still both kind of boring and dont feel exciting to invest 2 points in, especially within the bottom gate of the talent tree
Suuper minor but no serpent sting means we don’t have a consistent way to tag at range. not the end of the world, it’s just going to feel a bit different
Although how damage of Wailing arrow can be affected (Aimed shot unbuffed hits 20% harder than the single target Wailing Arrow, and that is before any talents/Tiers buffs that buff Aimed but not affect Wailing Arrow, and there is a cap for armor reduction) the point of it being a random proc after 20 random procs is what make this very clunky.
The AoE, interrupt and Silence part of the effect cannot be planned in advance, nor cannot be saved for when they are needed as you will be restraining yourself from casting your main damage ability.
Even worse, with the synergy with Dark Ranger waiting for the good moment to expend your Wailing Arrow proc will cause you to skip Black Arrow resets for Aimed Shot and that affects the proc of Whitering Fire.
Anyway that you see it, this is an ability that has to be used as soon as it procs, eliminating the strategy in using it and therefore its flavor. It will only feel bad when you click it on proc and 5 seconds later a perfect oportunity for using it comes.
One way to fix it would be for it to affect Arcane Shot, or Kill Shot, which are abilities that can be on cooldown for brief periods without affecting our main rotation. Just a change of “Your next Arcane Shot becomes a Wailling Arrow” would do wonders to give us more time to use it when needed instead of on proc
LOVE your first idea a lot! more help with trickshots during the Trueshot window would still be huge.
from hitting dummies for the last 30 mins or so, it seems like if you use both AS charges on pull before you TS, you’ll probably have fired ~20 wind arrows worth of Aimed Shots by the end of your TS window. Which is great for these exact pieces of gear I’m wearing right now on beta, but won’t help later in the expansion. I think you’re on the money here, Wailing Arrow coming out of TS might feel better than it does going in.
The first gate has a high number of talents that you will seemingly always want to take, resulting in spending 10 points within it just to unlock the 2nd gate area, even in pure Single Target.
After selecting Go For the Throat, it unlocks the choice between Improved Kill Command, which increased KC dmg by 5%, and Alpha Predator, which Increases KC dmg by 15% AND gives it 2 charges. Feels weird to have 2 talents right next to each other that do the same thing except one is strictly superior to the other. Clone talents are weird.
Beastial Wrath feels hard to acquire. It requires pathing through one of Option A- Kindred Spirits (a 2 point talent which I dont forsee ever being compelling to take, as it is effectively useless), Option B- Kill Cleave, Useless and will be unpicked on Single Target, or Option C- Training Expert, which is an albeit boring and low impact talent, is at least pickable. but its only pickable after choosing one of Beast Cleave or Hunter’s Prey. Beast Cleave again would be useless and unpicked on ST, and Hunters Prey is a talent I’m skeptical would be worth the point on its own, but now is effectively required on Single Target raid builds.
Kindred Spirits can probably just get replaced as a talent for something else, this would open up beastial Wrath better to the leftside pathing too.
Having to spend 2 points on Training Expert or 2 points where Kindred Spirits is feels steep, might be required for limiting capstone accessibility and whatnot.
Savagery is a third talent in 3 rows which Increases Kill Command damage by a percentage. 3 clone talents.
Barrage focus cost and channel time for BM feels REALLY expensive in both time and resources. This should also probably trigger stomp, and trigger a kill command + Kill Cleave or something if it’s cost is going to be this extreme. With Explosive Venom, Barrage should also apply Serpent Sting to targets.
This “Wind Arrows” thing that we’ve been convinced is a good thing always seems like more than it is. When said, “you have a 5% chance to proc a wind arrow” what I hear is, “95% of the time, nothing happens.”
To build a spec around something that has a 95% chance of not happening always seems odd. I understand we’re marksmen and need to wait for the right moment, but 95% of the time we’re just doing that…waiting…
The “wind” arrow you hear, is just the arrow not firing at all.
IMO the best way to handle it would be to keep classes fixed into their current weapon roles and make a few classes/specs have “relaxed” rules, such as Fury being allowed to mog 2h weapons into 1h weapons, or Survival toggling their 2h slot into 2 1h slots in the mog window.
Maybe they could find a way to add more fun options, like Prot Warriors being able to mog their 1h weapon into a Polearm, Enhancement Shaman mogging to a single 2h, Resto Shaman and Holy Paladins mogging their shields into off-hands, etc.
I’d imagine it would probably be complicated to manage such specific cases without breaking something though.
I’ve been hitting dummies in Org for a while now and I’ve got some initial thoughts.
I really like the MM tree. I feel like I can reach everything I would want for a ST build without having to pass on anything I find critical to the gameplay engine or my enjoyment.
Running Dark Ranger for a lot of this testing, I felt like I had very little time to ever spend my precise shots procs. Between Black Arrow AS resets and the Wailing Arrow procs I rarely had a chance to slow down and press arcane shot or keep up my steady focus buff. If Black arrow reset AS half as often but gave us a free & instant cast like Lock & Load, I would welcome the change. I think a talent branching off of Trueshot that stores all the uncast Precise Shots procs and casts them as a giant arrow or as a bunch of wind arrows when TS ends would be neat. Even, when I first read Eagletalon’s True Focus I thought that Aimed Shots you cast during TS would automatically cast an Arcane Shot alongside as the cast finished. I think that’d be great and go a long way towards minimizing the feeling of having a bunch of wasted procs I can’t/shouldn’t use.
Finally, I personally would like to see some more design around MM’s execute. Since the addition of Bullseye in DF I’ve really enjoyed the idea of this class just cranking once the boss gets low, and I’m excited to have Penetrating Shots and Eagletalon’s True Focus feeding into that fantasy. Some more talents around execute would be cool though? Maybe something that increases the execute range to 35%, maybe something like every X Aimed Shots or Rapid Fires casts a Kill Shot, or KS does the aoe bleed that it had from the Venthyr ability. Idk! I think it’s a cool niche I’d like to see explored
Crack Shot and Improved Steady Shot feel like talents that should be baseline.
Lone Wolf being nerfed might result in higher Single Target damage by using a pet. Losing a talent point to be able to cast lust sucks and is a cost no other spec has to incur or a choice they have to make. Losing a defensive to cast lust sucks and is a cost no other spec has to incur or a choice they have to make.
Losing a defensive to cast freedom sucks and is a cost no other spec has to incur or a choice they have to make.
We already lose max HP for not having a pet compared to BM and Surv, which is a factor that should not be the case when choosing between DPS specs in endgame PvE content where survivability is a key factor.
MM seemingly has no real choices in talents on pure Single Target, the build is virtually always the same 28-30 points.
Kill Zone feels very limited by Volley’s Duration being so short (and 1/4th eaten by its own GCD). It also potentially causes Volley to be picked for ST for the effect which feels possibly unintended?
Kill Zone is also weird because you need line of sight in order to case Volley in the first place, and only grants you an extremely short 3 GCD’s of line of sight ignoring. Feels like the line of sight ignoring should be tied to something else, like Hunter’s Mark.
Crack Shot being optional might result in intentionally not selecting the talent and high cost Arcane Shots being used intentionally to maximize Trueshot cooldown reduction via Calling the Shots, which also seems not intended and degenerate gameplay i’d prefer to avoid. (further reinforcing that Crack Shot should just be made baseline).
many of the talents which benefit 2 target throughput are still tied to Multi Shot and Trick Shots exclusively, not Chimera Shot.
Misdirection still feels bad to use as MM when we are target Hardcapped via trickshots.
In summary: You’ve fixed most of the core problems with MM as a spec, but it lacks the fleshing out of a full talent tree of additional gameplay choices or modifications. Most of our tree is spent fixing core issues the spec has been historically dealing with, and it does accomplish those mostly successfully.
These are SO COOL. This is my positive feedback post. I need to play it in the beta to get more critical feedback but for right now - thank you so much Blizzard <3 <3 <3
Maybe nerf steel trap more? I’m concerned with it being so easy to take that it’ll be a part of the ST rotation (which is not what we want).
My worry with Steel Trap is even if it’s nerfed into the ground, it might be desirable for the single target rotation due to buffing the new Basilisk Collar talent. I haven’t played around with it enough yet to know if this is already a thing, but maybe there could be a cap on the BC stacks to let it cap out without needing ST at all?
Territorial Instincts needs to be an uncapped AOE but with a shorter duration.
New Talent: Territorial Instincts – Intimidation summons a pet if you do not have one out and stuns all additional nearby enemies at 10% effectiveness.
Fantasy-wise, I always preferred just having one pet. Feels like you’re running around with a beast that you bonded with and can control. Having more than 1 starts to feel less cool to me
