Feedback: Hunters

In Development Undermine(d) PTR Discussion
2646

So, created new hunter. Did not give heirlooms, went through Exile’s reach. I do have a 25% xp buff because I have… way too many level 80 alts.

Exile’s Reach was a joke, as expected - scaling still meant you basically are never challenged to do anything beyond Steady Shot/Arcane.

I had multiple quests telling me to tame beasts, and how taming beasts was important to a hunter, and even a mini storyline where I tamed my racial starter pet - a moth. Then 1m later, I dinged to 10, picked Marksman and the pet was deleted from reality. There was no warning, no indication, no discussion. Pet was out, then pet was gone. I can totally see a new player seeing this as a bug. Funny enough, there is a tutorial on stabling your pet - but no discussion of the new pet family mechanic, and a big new UI screen with way too much information on it and no explainers.

Did the starting of the Waking Shores and… well, the dumb bird was utterly useless, even when I did unlock it at 13. Scaling is still broken and you basically kill anything if you have a Precise Shots buff, and aimed shot one-shots everything else. I logged off at 14 having unlocked the inn at the Waking Shores - I’ll give it another whirl tomorrow.

14 Likes
2647

I think they should change the pre talent hunter kit. I think they should also have raptor strike by default. And start with a melee weapon in their bag. That way a newbie hunter can actually get a taste of the different hunter playstyles before things are drastically shaken up at 10. I mean, would a new hunter even have a melee weapon in their bag when they hit 10? Or know that melee is even going be an option before they get there? Also yes, if they’re going to lose their pet with MM there should be some more elegant lead in.

6 Likes
2648

Its one of the reasons wow cant get/retain new players, your entire game mentality is revolved around M+ and trying to be a e-sports/moba

The RPG part is left out the house, no wonder people keep going back to single player ones time and time again

7 Likes
2649

They do not get a melee weapon throughout Exile’s Reach, you wouldn’t get one until you start questing in the default expansion (currently DF) - which is also a huge oof. Effectively, new players are being taught to only play BM.

7 Likes
2650

Isn’t BM supposed to be the new player spec? I thought that was their intention for it since Legion.

2651

There shouldn’t be a designated new player spec. I dont think people need blizz holding the handlebars like that. Just let folks figure things out and play what feels good.

7 Likes
2652

I know, but I am asking about it because of Blizz is working with that in mind then that explains it, even if it is not good design. Is it still the basic easy entry design?

2 Likes
2653

I guess it is. And in terms of the things the different specs do it is the one that bridges the gap between them. Pets like Survival and ranged weapons like MM.

2 Likes
2654

If if it is, I didn’t see anything that indicated as such.

Now, that could be because I have an 80 on the PTR, or because I turned off tutorials. However there are other mechanics that Blizzard has explicitly disabled on Exile’s Reach that you cannot normally access. If BM is the ‘default spec’ you are to use, then it follows that you should not be able swap specs until there is reason you have a full grasp of the details that involves. That there doesn’t appear to be any guardrails in game is a failure to design, and another example of how Blizzard has stopped trying to teach players about core systems and mechanics.

6 Likes
2655

Hi with this weeks changes most of the bugs I mentioned in my original post are fixed while these are still active, to summarize and to add a few new discoveries:

  • Dark Ranger Issues:
    • Within the 11.1 development notes -
      “Withering Fire now triggers from casting Black Arrow during Bestial Wrath and no longer auto-fires Black Arrow instead of gaining Deathblow.” - This has not been updated on PTR other than making Black Arrow not auto-fire
    • Embrace the Shadows does not heal the hunter from Dark Hound damage dealt.
    • Shadow Hounds was not updated to reflect the new tooltip. It still does a physical Beast Cleave.
  • Pack Leader Issues:
    • Dire Frenzy is supposed to increase the duration of Dire Beasts by 1/2 seconds. Despite The Bear from Howl of the Pack Leader benefiting from other Dire Beast talents, it does not last 2 seconds longer when talented into Dire Frenzy.
    • Lead from the Front is supposed to increase the damage of your How of the Pack pets by 25%. This does not currently include the melee hits from The Bear pet. Bestial Wrath also does not increase the Melee attack damage of The Bear.
    • The Boar secondary target effect hits the main target.
    • Slicked Shoes will always reduce the cooldown of Disengage even if it does not remove a movement impairing effect.
    • Envenomed Fang and Shell Cover are still quite weak, No Mercy is a bit better now at least.
    • No Mercy, when Combined with Hunter’s Prey, will cause your pet to swap to and attack whatever target is FIRST hit by Kill Shot, rather than what you are targeting.
    • There’s still an issue with how the pre-pull setup looks, since the buff continuously cycles, maybe possibly look into either removing the duration of the pet buffs or have it reset at the start of boss combat?
  • The Season 2 Tier Set issues:
    • The Automatic Barbed Shot Jackpot! from Bestial Wrath does not trigger the 4-piece bonus.
    • The Automatic Barbed Shots cannot trigger Thrill of the Hunt or Poisoned Barbs.
    • The Bestial Wrath cooldown reduction does not function.
    • Your Pet turns full green when the 4-piece procs which a lot of people might not enjoy.
    • The automatic Barbed Shots uses up any existing Barbed Shot charges when it procs.
    • The 200% increased Barbed Shot can be overwritten by a normal Barbed Shot, which isn’t a bug but feels bad.
  • If you do not talent Beast Cleave but talent Dire Cleave, the Dire Beasts will cleave for 100% of their melee attacks rather than 90%.
11 Likes
2656

I’m just talking about how it has been developed over the last few expansions. I don’t know anything for a fact, that’s why I am inquiring instead of explaining. I was under the impression that Blizz made BM to be easy entry back in Legion for new players because it is such a popular class. Since people continue to say that BM is “easy mode” I assumed that continues to be the case. I don’t play BM so I honestly don’t know. I just know when I did try it the rotation and abilities were not satisfying to me.

Exile’s Reach has been a mess since day one. The whole game is so fragmented with all of the stuff they’ve done over the years. It’s just… Not good overall.

7 Likes
2657

1-10 are unchanged.

MM loses Call Pet the second you choose it as a specialization, at level 10.

Eyes in the Sky comes in at level 13. At that level, things die quickly enough that it’s extremely difficult to get value out of Spotter’s Mark.

I did not play my fresh PTR Hunter much past that.

One thing I did learn from this is that at level 13, there are no family or specialization abilities yet. So base Hunter pets at level 10 have basic attacks, growl, dash, and the spec passive.

Simply preventing MM from learning anything new relating to pets after this point seems the best solution to me. I didn’t forget how to whistle for my pet, I just got much better at fighting in other (non-pet-related) ways and choose to give my pet a break.

Making adjustments for MM that reduces damage with a pet active (maybe this is an aura nerf to pet damage for MM, maybe it’s an effect that nerfs all damage or auto shot damage by x% with a pet, maybe you do nothing because weapon damage scales with Mastery and pets don’t) would ensure that petless remains the optimal damage, and eliminates the issue for all but the most contrarians players.

Make a glyph of the stealth eagle or something where you can’t see it, then you have traditional pets, trad pet + eagle, just eagle, or just spell shinies, all available in the same spec, with no change to utility and zero change to damage for the intended (and optimal) playstyle.

3 Likes
2658

I’m a fan of MM being petless full-time, but why even have the eagle? What fantasy does it serve that traditional pets don’t? Surely the gameplay it provides could be baked into the spec without it?

Fans of Lone Wolf will still be stuck with a pet and fans of having pets now have one they can’t customize or interact with. :man_shrugging:

9 Likes
2659

Further Survival/Pack Leader Feedback

Hello! Just wanted to post some additional feedback following the new build this week.

Howl of the Pack Leader

The new set rotation is very nice, but is it possible for the beast spawn timer to be changed? The buff is continuously cycling outside of combat and this could be frustrating, especially in raid and setting up your pull. Two ideas: could raid combat always force a certain beast to start with, or could your next “beast” summon that you land on stay locked in/paused out of combat?

Ursine Fury/Envenomed Fangs Choice Node

Ursine Fury feels great in AoE but leaves a lot to desire with one target. The cooldown reduction to Flanking Strike just isn’t impactful enough and actually feels bad. Over 5 minutes, the CDR results in 1 extra Flanking Strike. We like to line up Flanking Strike with our cooldowns and this tiny amount of CDR just desyncs them, making each one weaker and the CDR actually worse.

Envenomed Fangs also does not feel great. It’s the only alternative for single target and it’s a VERY low amount of damage. This was sub-1% of my damage over a 5 minute fight.

Shell Cover

Still lacking compared to the alternatives provided by Sentinel and Dark Ranger. This is really weak and a 10% DR after we’ve already dropped below 40% hp is not valuable; we’ve already taken the big hit of damage that dropped us this low.

New Kill Shot/Bleed Talents

It’s really cool getting the bleeds but the Kill Shot damage amp on Born to Kill feels like it not only goes against the design of Cull the Herd, but is rarely possible to take advantage of.

If we’re trying to cast Kill Shot to apply Cull the Herd when we put our other bleeds up, we are never able to take advantage of the KS damage amp portion of Born to Kill. If we’re trying to spam Kill Command to land more Kill Shots in the Born to Kill window, we risk not having Cull the Herd up for the bleed synergy. Even playing normally, Kill Shot is getting cast around every 10-12 seconds barring lucky back-to-back procs and Kill Shot amp gets no use.

Could this get changed to something like “Your Kill Shot now deals X percent of it’s damage as a bleed” like the old Cull the Herd? It would fit nicely with the new bleed package and feel more rewarding/less punishing for lining Cull the Herd up with the rest of our bleeds.

Tier Set Concerns

I have posted this in the tier set feedback thread as well but just want to reiterate here.

For Survival, the 4pc proc on Kill Command feels very unrewarding and lackluster. Kill Command is primarily our focus generator, is strictly single target, and does not hit hard at all. The tier proc buffing it by 200% STILL does not hit hard and the extra Tip of the Spear stacks generated are often hard to utilize without overcapping/wasting Tip stacks.

What if this was something like an enhanced Deathblow proc instead, to buff Kill Shot?

Kill Shot has both ST and AoE uses and fits nicely with the new bleed talents given to Survival this tier. It also feels great to press and would alleviate the Tip stacks being wasted.

New Bug

Closing out with a new bug this week: Spearhead/Deadly Duo are supposed to be buffing your pet as well but does not seem to be working currently.

8 Likes
2660

Ferocity is overrated, tenacity is where it’s at if you don’t need bloodlust.

2661

But that’s why I’d like it to be baseline for hunters. So that in 11.1 BM and Surv can still use lust while actually making use of their new pet spec choices. It would be a huge boon for people who do solo delves.

7 Likes
2662

The “problem” with making Hero/Lust baseline for all hunters is what you replace it with for Ferocity pets.

That’s an interesting discussion. Would love to see what people can come up with. It must be an active skill that makes Ferocity pets desirable.

2 Likes
2663

No idea. I guess just some other kind of active damage boost. But a lesser one that’s just for the hunter. Primal rage has always just been miles beyond fortitude of the bear and master’s call. In theory it’s situational whether you want more damage, defense or mobility. But in practice, when it’s that kind of damage with that wide an effect, there’s just no comparison. So it should just stand on its own. But yes, the ferocity pet should then have some smaller damage boost. Hell maybe even something as simple as a crit boost. Or maybe a buff that makes your auto attacks apply a dot. Something that if you are opting for the extra defense or the extra mobility you aren’t costing yourself quite so big.

3 Likes
2664

I don’t think it’s a great idea to go that far in terms of separating cunning/tenacity into primarily defense and mobility vs extra damage from ferocity. I think you’d move the pendulum too far in the other direction and force bm/sv players to play it for optimal output. Esp. If you get an extra bleed effect scaling into their talents.

Feels like this is also invoking a lot of the scope creep situation I was trying to describe further up in the thread. Lots of these things might be possible but talking about it on the forums is not the same as understanding how much work it is to rewrite everyone’s pets.

Ferocity also currently gives you a leech passive, which rounds out a little bit of the difference between speed/mc/fort from the others. I even use ferocity pet in select 2v2 matchups as bm/sv where I know I won’t need masters call because it’s actually really good.

1 Like
2665

One of the reasons I brought up leveling is because in all the discussion on soloing/delves, people keep citing their well-geared hunter as being able to handle things easily without pets.

I recently helped a RL friend level her first toon and the TWW content was hard for her because she was undergeared.

People who don’t have heirlooms, and people who missed out on the anniversary event (along with the pre-patch event) are entering Khaz Algar undergeared! Like, we’re talking ilvl 230ish to 350ish here. Heck, I have alts in this range! But the difference is that I, generally, know how to survive as a long-time player.

It’s a world of difference from having a hunter in ilvl 610+ gear. It’s a massive difference.

Pets are incredibly important during this period! That’s what frustrates me about the argument over the feasibility of soloing rares and delves without pets. People here are OVER-GEARED. Take that into account, folks…

EDIT: yes, my RL friend’s toon was a Hunter. After I taught her general pet management tricks, her ability to handle quests improved. It still upholds my point — she was only able to do that because she had a pet.

12 Likes