Feedback: Hunters

In Development Undermine(d) PTR Discussion
3178

New PTR build in the next 48 hours so reiterating:

-Trueshot is still extremely weak and needs help. This is the nicest way I can put it. It is the worst DPS cooldown in the game without question and there are 6 TALENT POINTS spent on BUFFING it.

-Aimed Shot still feels terrible because streamline having RNG factors as well as waiting game makes things very rigid and not smooth or “iconic” at all.

-Lock and Load is currently proccing an average of once every 1.5-2 minutes. That is just absurd. The lottery and gambling tier set is a failure waiting to happen for MM if it’s gonna be built around Lock and Load in its current state.

-The spec overall is way too RNG heavy and way too sluggish. Auto Shot has a tier set bonus and multiple talents built around it and I notice none of them having any impact.

-The amount of Haste that will be required to attempt to make things less rigid is going to be way too much than we can get next patch.

The talent tree itself is it’s own issue. A lot of bloat for no reason and a lot of things on there that shouldn’t be. Prime example

-Trueshot takes 6 talent points and you have to take all of them to make it feel like a real cooldown. Why not just throw some of that into Trueshot baseline? Bullseye (execute) used to be 2 talent points and people told you it felt bad so you made it 1 point. Now for some reason it’s back to 2 points just to remove talent points from play. This makes no sense with how bloated the tree really is. This also contributes to the below issue of talent bloat.

-There are multiple talents around explosive shot and auto shot that again, are just bloat and all do very similar things.

12 Likes
3179

Ebon bowstring and lock and load need to be PPM now that auto shot is slow.

Base streamline values need to be better for the first stack than the second. I.e. 40->60 instead of 30->60.

Tensile bowstring needs to be reworked and be a base effect of trueshot that takes streamline to 50->75. (see previous posts for problems caused by -90% aimed shot). Feathered frenzy also needs to be a base effect of trueshot.

Interactions with aimed shot velocity/travel time need to be hardened. Streamline needs to be consumed when aimed is done casting, not when it lands. Deathblow needs to proc when aimed is done casting, not when it lands. See previous explanations as to why this breaks core mechanics of the new spec.

Withering fire needs to be replaced with readiness wailing arrow.

Bugs need to be fixed. Windrunner quiver doesn’t proc spotter’s marks. Aspect of the hydra still has a handful of bugs. The aoe capstone cluster still has a handful of bugs.

Consider halving trueshot’s base cooldown and duration. It is more tenable for base trueshot to be weak-ish if you get to use its base effects + doubletap twice as often. This will make the spec flow exponentially better by removing the long dead time that occurs once you have put everything on cd post-trueshot. 8s duration trueshot on 1m cooldown (reduced down to 45 with cts) fits way better. You will also make the spec exponentially easier to tune because each trueshot window won’t need to make up for how dead current dead time gets. Some of its talents like tensile bowstring should be baked into it baseline. (the line down the middle of the talent tree is extremely bloated with talents you are forced to take).

Imp. SL, base SL, and tensile bowstring have to be retuned. Consider just removing imp SL. You actually need to use as little haste as possible because of how often you put yourself at 2 stacks, and 2 stacks puts you too far under the global floor (with much haste at all) to interact with explosive shot and other things properly. Stat management will be a very complicated set of breakpoints → dead stats until they’re changed. Bloodlust also doesn’t really help you as much as everyone else any more. You kinda just get more auto shot damage. Not sure what to do with that.

2 Likes
3180

I think the biggest problems you would invoke involve scaling and the need to provide whatever you call the instant replacement more resets than regular aimed shot. I don’t think you could just retrofit all of the aimed shot talents into an instant and call it a day. Instant version would need to be flat out worse in all content types to make up for the fact that you’re not contending with aimed shot cast times, streamline charges, etc. Aimed shot gets to do big boy damage and have big boy modifiers in part because all of these other mechanics are designed to feed into it with a long base cast time. Just my .02. Having something on one of the trees or hero trees that feels more like old ranged SV is a good idea in theory, I just don’t think you can do it with marks.

3 Likes
3181

I am probably just one of those hopeless romantics reaching for the moon, but they have already done their redesign so it wouldn’t happen anyway. I personally think there is room for the minor dot playstyle and the big boom, front loaded playstyle, and with some tinkering with talents like Streamline like I mentioned it could still be pretty innovative. Having to build and spent streamlines to maximize your rolling dots. I think the biggest thing would be what you mentioned. The rotation is built around the cast time of aimed shot. Without the cast time of aimed shot we would be spamming a lot more Arcanes/Multis to fill the void. And obviously Explosive Shot would hit considerably less than Aimed Shot does. It would be closer to a Kill Command in damage with a similar recharge rate. Someone mentioned Trick Shots but it would just work the exact same as it does with Aimed Shot, except with fire damage and a dot (no explosion, obviously).

But I think you are right. They couldn’t actually balance that because if they were similar overall, why would anyone want to go with a talent that anchors you to a spot? Eh, I still like the idea even if it will never happen. I appreciate both of your feedbacks on the idea, too. :sweat_smile:

2 Likes
3182

I don’t disagree, and I think that a lot of people would love to see a ranged SV option return. I personally think that it would make more sense for the talent to be on the actual SV tree. Reptar strike gets devoker range and behaves like old sv explosive shot as your primary spender. Butchery, fote, and flanking strike can behave the same and be your retained hybridization into some melee abilities that justify you still having harpoon. Throwing bombs from devoker range also makes more sense than throwing bombs at something in your face. Maybe this version’s mobility cooldowns get demon hunter esque damage added in as you have an actual rotational interest in going in and out of melee.

Would love to see something like this between an expansion when they could rewrite it properly.

1 Like
3183

Assuming that this is an intended interaction, but I want to draw attention to it because I haven’t seen it brought up yet.

Roar of sac with the eagle makes it unable to mark something for 20s. Trueshot is supposed to guarantee you a mark. This is a major drawback of the new functionality, in that you effectively cannot press your burst button for 20s after using roar of sac. Roar of sac from regular pets has no real output drawback other than you may have to press mend to keep it alive (or rez it), depending on what’s hitting you and/or it. I understand that that’s probably the reason that there’s a negative associated with it in the first place, this is just a lot more extreme than the negative associated with the pet.

Good job making it usable while the hunter is cc’ed. It was not doing this in the first iteration of PTR.

2 Likes
3184

This exists already, it’s called Glyph of Lesser Proportion.

1 Like
3185

That will also reduce the size of your pets when animal companion is used, so you won’t be able to just have normal sized pets with each node option. You’d have to trade one oversized pet for two undersized ones. So it’s technically possible, just not ideal or specific to the talent size boost.

Edit: it actually appears it doesn’t even alter the size of the second pet, making it even less ideal.

3186

Opinions based on ptr raid and messing around trying to make numbers work in sims. Overall a lot of consistent throughput talents were taken away in exchange for weird underwhelming options. Losing multiple high uptime haste buffs (steady focus, in the rhythm) for… passive auto shot buff talents? Lost consistent aimed shot amps like careful aim for a very underwhelming rng target debuff, a lot of passive damage from wind arrow family and serpent sting talents yet nothing new really seems to making up for the losses.

The only part of the kit giving me the feel that its making an impact and needs to be minmaxed as a priority is the same old precise shots and the new moving target, which doesn’t necessarily introduce much new gameplay, just incentivizes not munching precise shots, which does improve things. Maybe worst of all is our major cooldown now which is a shadow of its past self, and investing into it takes a lot of points that adds no real excitement.

A lot of the other little random spice talents add bad feeling mechanics that would then conflict with the already existing ones. Trying to fit a proper aimed shot/explosive shot combo in for precision detonation in without sitting on explosive shot since the exact placement of aimed shot casts is going to matter feel bad. Why would I want 2 precise shot stacks with windrunners quiver when I still have to consume as many now weaker 1 stacks as possible to maximize chances at spotters mark and moving target? What does a precise shots from rapid fire get me other than trying to then fit in more precise shot consumer cast at risk of having to decide to go back to munching precise shots or a moving target?

Tightening the spec up around precise shots, moving target and making trueshot feel good and just throwing out some of the fluff interactions and instead making those core elements feel stronger when executed properly to add bit of skill expression would leave the spec much better off.

3 Likes
3187

Great feedback 1000% agree with you! Hopefully they pay attention to this feedback as much as they did the pet/no pet issue and dont ingnore us thinking that`s all MM hunters needed.

  • Devs, I kindly ask you that would consider removing the auto shot talents cause they are bland and lacklust, bullseye going back to being a 2 point node is very upseting just as it is seeing 6 points alocated to make true shot feel good. its literally a retrocession/step back in quality to what we currently have in live servers.

How about replace the boring auto shot talents with cool options we had like light amo, serpent stakers trickery or wailing arrow? Talents that were fun to play, had a visual impact and enhenced meaningfully our game play. Wailing arrow would be a super fun addition and could even interact with Withering fire for exemple or just being a solid single target option to help MM in boss fights.

  • The new version of in the rhythim, the obsidian arrow head talent and the 2 piece tier set seem like a lot of investment for a very boring passive and visual lackluster outcome meeraly buffing auto shots. Sure they eventually impact on bleak arrows and lock and load procs happening more often but thats only because you slowed down their frenquency to start with.

The end result is needing a tier set plus a point in in the rhythim plus a point in obsidian arrow head just to have a similar feel to what we already have in live servers. Feels like artificial change creating a boring situation to improve with with 2 talent points and a 2 piece tier set. Please consider changing it.

-Ohnahran winds feels very RNG depended - 25% chance on a 30% chance to have SM on more targets is RGN on top of RNG that just feels bad and barely noticeble- making it 100% chance to proc on a reduced % of spotters mark damage would feel much better not only visually - which helps in immersion and fun - but also numerically becaue you know you have a talent thats actually impacting and changing your game play often not once in a blue moon on a % of a % proc.

  • Two target cleave has been a plea of MM hunters since the changes after Legion. A lot has been done in what seems an attempt of the devs to listen but not comprimise with the notion that MM should only have 3+target cleave for some reason.

Chymera shot was brought back- which never felt good because the damage was subpar making it never a good option to be picked - volley added the trick shot bonus which is good although on a 45s CD so every time its not up and we dont have 3 targets we simple CANNOT cleave - then a tier set in shadow lands baked a cleave on aimed shot which felt great but was short lived - then the tier set in Dragon Flight season 4 I believe happened -which was much loved but the feed back given by the hunter community asking to keep it was ignored.

Now we get aspect of the Hydra which is two target cleave with the added cost of not hitting anything else and for only 40% of the original damage. Not all specs excell at the same thing and MM is not a multi dot spec or a 80% ice lance cleave spec like frost mage but that number feels like a slap on the face or a half hearted gift.

Why? Why no simply allow trick shots to work like beast cleave as a buff for 6 or 8 seconds? We have been asking for this for years but for some reason most of blizzard response to the community regarding this aspect has been silence or nah we rather you dont have two target cleave

There is also the issue with how trick shots is activated - casting multi shot after ever single aimed shot or rapid fire doesnt feel good which is the reason why the season 4 Dragonflight tier was so much fun becuse it removed that need giving a window of time where trick shots was active. Now if feels even worse because you have added a super cool talent allowing kill shot to benfit from trick shots but in an AOE situation we have the not so good choice of either cleaving or hitting one target with a stronger kill shot at the cost of precise shots.

If damage pattern is the concern then I am ok with reducing the 75% trick shot damage to 65% or even 60% if it becomes a buff on the hunter for 6 or 8 seconds cleaving up to 8 or 9 additional targets and having its 3 target outdated and unfun restriction removed.

Please consider the feedback given about how bloated the talent tree feels meaning that a telent tree is fun when you feel like the points spent augment your character`s power in a fun way but with auto shot talents, RNG on RNG mechanics, another restrictive pass on trick shots, and multiple points to make our main cool down decent doesnt feel fun feels like we are chosing which debts to pay or which problems to solve.

There are great changes like spotters mark bringing back the feel of vulnerability window - would be nice if precise shots or crits extended it for exemple, or stream line coming from precise shots and explosive shot, or using aimed shot to detonate explosive shots for more damage - the up time on ES should be increased considering how slower the spec feels now - are all super cool additions hopefully and we arte grateful for them but please take another look at the tree and tier set feedback we need much more than the option to run with a pet. Thank you

7 Likes
3188

sorry I dont recall interacting with you or saying you said such thing

3189

This was you, yes?

I was just making sure you weren’t lumping me into the “some people” you were painting with a wide brush.

3190

Talent tree in general is too bloated. Everything from imp. spotters mark down in a straight line is mandatory. Five trueshot talent points is too many. At least two of them need to be removed and baked in. I recommend feathered frenzy and tensile bowstring. You could also make bullseye and eagle’s accuracy 1 point talents. With these 3-4 extra slots, you still don’t have enough talent points to take all of the best ST and cleave talents at the same time, so I think it’s doable. It feels like you need to be able to take approximately that many more talents to make logical builds work properly anyway.

Also want to reiterate that trueshot would work a lot better with this version of the spec on half the cooldown, for half the duration. The amount of deadtime that you currently have in this setup makes the damage you have to do in the next trueshot way too much in order for this spec to make sense when it comes time for tuning. At 45/8, it’s more okay that trueshot isn’t a super impactful button up front, because the majority of its use is coming from the cdr. The talents you’d then be spending are on things like doubletap that make sense for a small burst modifier on that cooldown.

8 Likes
3191

Thank you so much for posting the found buggs!

2 Likes
3192

Wow I am sorry I don`t even know who you are and I believe you are assuming I specifically mentioned or addresst this comment to you? I think you are over thinking or maybe reading too much into what maybe people said? If you like to run with a pet as MM thats is your preferred game play dont feel belittled if its not what most people or other people dont like. There were some people and I remember their characters who said MM would be ruined without a pet, was over and other exagerations that to me felt like over reactions because clearly as stated for those of us who tested it in solo content it isnt - but I was not especifically addressing you - so here is hoping we have a great MM in 11.1. Cheers

3193

Your belief is wrong.
You claimed “some people” said it would be impossible to do something.
I clarified that was not my position, and implying I was excluding myself from your wide brush of “some people”.

That was as far as it needed to go.

Never felt belittled. Are you going to continue throwing false accusations?

Never said you were, but you were playing the pronoun game and included me in your claim of ‘some people’ by implication, whether you intended to or not. I was removing myself from that implication.

Agreed, it’s certainly better now than when the PTR launched. I am looking forward to more testing once I get home.

3194

Yes, because it’s applied to an individual pet.

3195

Tested some of my theories with a console timer in the milliseconds. Streamline and deathblow consume/proc as they should, and the cause of both bugs has nothing to do with the trajectory/travel time of aimed shot. They are just bugs.

1 Like
3196

Right, so I would suggest that they add some way to completely remove the 10% size increase for solitary companion only, and at some point rework the existing Glyph of Lesser Proportions so the pet stabled in the special slot scales to the size of whatever primary pet is active, if possible.

In general I feel like inscription and the glyph system is a bit undercooked so it would be nice if someday they expand on it more.

1 Like
3197

Re-posting recommended changes (with adjustments).

Now back to the talent tree feedback -

  1. Swap positions of Penetrating Shots and Ammo Conservation. The theme surrounding Rapid Fire would make better sense if these were oposite their current position.
  2. Swap positions of Trick Shots/Aspect of the Hydra with the newly announced Improved Spotter’s Mark/Unbreakable Bond. This would allow those that choose to use a pet to access these sooner (level 15) then later (level 17). The wait for Trick Shots/AotH would have minimal impact for leveling.
  3. Remove the left and right directional arrows from the Tenacious/Cunning (T&C) choice node and place them on the neighboring talents of Surging Shots and Master Marksman. This would remove the T&C pre-requirement before Trueshot and allow a choice to use T&C for content for which it would be necessary (Solo or maybe PvP). The T&C talent is not as necessary for group content (Dungeons, Raids) due to buffs given by other classes, such as Fortitude (Priest), or a Paladin’s Aura, a Warrior’s shouts, or the movement buff from a Shaman or Druid. Additionally, this should not be a requirement for Trueshot as it has no direct impact.
  4. Reduce Eagle’s Accuracy and Bullseye to single-point talents. There is no reason to gatekeep the successor talents for minimal gains. Just have Eagle’s Accuracy give a 4% (reduced from 5%) increase to Aimed Shot & Rapid Fire damage (possibly increase the damage percentage but for targets with an active Spotter’s Mark?), and change Bullseye to what it is on Live with the stacking to 30.
  5. Increase the chance for Lock and Load to 15%. The current duration, even with the Tier-Set, only causes Lock and Load to be active about once every two minutes on average.

Spotter’s Mark, being RNG in nature and having little interaction from the Player, is underwhelming for a signature item. Recommend review of effects. Others have brought up issues with how Spotter’s Mark is activated, how it is consumed, and how it applies to more than 0ne target.

Thank you!

4 Likes