The issue of Focus starvation, if you are to continue with your full ST ‘rotation’ while also focusing on AoE, as BM, it isn’t a new one. Nor would the above make it any worse. Essentially, the idea is that if you focus on AoE, then you’d do well to skip 1 Cobra Shot inbetween Kill Commands, and instead use that Focus for Multi-Shot to maintain Beast Cleave.
In regards to the duration, you usually have time for 3 GCDs during each Beast Cleave-window. One of which is always taken up by casting Multi-Shot to activate it. Ofc the practical side varies depending on whether you’re running with Killer Cobra or not, specifically what abilities you get to press X amount of times. But either way, unless you’re in a BL window, most likely you won’t have time for 3 additional GCDs, aside from the one triggered when casting Multi-Shot.
As for a possible solution, I’ve posted versions of this several times before, incl in the main feedback topic. They can easily add a new effect to Multi-Shot, where if you cast Multi-Shot, this reduces the Focus cost of your next Kill Command by X. Or something along those lines.
I agree. Though the proposed changes wouldn’t result in the 4-set being solely focused on AoE.
4-Set - Killing Frenzy - Kill Command critical hits increase the damage and cooldown reduction of your next Cobra Shot by 40%. Kill Command now benefits from Beast Cleave, allowing Kill Command to strike all nearby enemies for the duration. Deals reduced damage beyond 5 targets.
I intended for the old 4-set to be kept, in addition to the new bit about Kill Command and Beast Cleave.
Just wondering as as it is so late to the table so to speak.
I do like the 2 Pce format suggested by Ghorak.
Specifically in regards to the 4 PCE a quick fix would be having the Empowered Cobra shot Also trigger Beast Cleave and the Kill Command cleave above without needing to cast MS right away
Would alleviate the focus issue a bit Only downside is its inherent lack of complexity.
Perhaps being as Beast Cleave has such a short window subsequently casting a Multi Shot could refresh or better yet extend the duration of the Kill Command Cleave as well as the regular Beast Cleave.
Assuming I’ve understood you correctly, the biggest issue with this would probably be how PvPers wouldn’t want a trigger for AoE baked into the ST ‘rotation’. We ofc have this issue already with Stomp, but at least that’s not as frequent of a trigger as something tied to casting Cobra Shot would be.
Wording is everything and this is what concerns me.
As I, and others, have stated many times, the lack of AoE damage is only part of the problem. Why is this the only issue being addressed?
The 4 pc bonus is the only thing being adjusted? The 2pc bonus is the one that makes Kyrian a non-choice. Are we just tossing Kyrian aside as a whole?
Of course, Kyrian isn’t the only thing affected. Crit is already a vitally important stat for BM Hunters, as we need more critical auto shots to keep three stacks of Frenzy up, so we tend to stack Crit. With new gear, 40% or higher crit will be common. That’s ~85% crit on Kill Command. Add in Thrill of the Hunt for another 9% and we’re at ~94%.
We are now limiting our options of soulbinds, trinkets, etc.
Fatal Flaw(Venthyr): When Euphoria ends, gain 10 sec of either 20% increased Crit or Vers, whichever is higher. That Overcaps our crit for Kill Command.
Optical Target Embiggener Scope: Overcaps.
Inscrutable Quantum Device: Overcap potential.
So many more examples could be given. Can these be worked around? Technically, yes, but it further limits options and punishes players that don’t get lucky on better drops. It is my opinion that any reduction in choices is a bad design.
There is no way there going to add 22.5% damage to kill command at the expense of 5% crit and add a cleave to it that would take us from bottom barrell to well into S tier and there is no time to test all that on PTR number wise. If this was early in PTR cycle and they could take that number and tune it I love this idea but realistically im thinking like 3% damage maybe 4% for a total of 9% or 12% not 22.5%
It would be 22.5% damage in exchange for 15% crit. Frenzy stacks 3 times.
22.5% extra damage wouldn’t be enough to push BM into S tier by any stretch of the imagination. Kill Command is maybe 10-12% of our overall damage, so adding 22.5% to that would only be a couple percentage points increase overall.
Current Killing Frenzy Tier Bonuses:
2-Set - Killing Frenzy - Your Kill Command critical strike chance is increased by 15% for each stack of Frenzy your pet has.
4-Set - Killing Frenzy - Kill Command critical hits increase the damage and cooldown reduction of your next Cobra Shot by 40%.
My proposed changes to integrate the current 2 set into a more aoe-minded 4-set:
Change 1:
Kill Command critical hits increase the damage and cooldown reduction of your next Cobra Shot by 40% or the damage of your next multi-shot by 500%.
This is the laziest and simplest change, making kill command feel better to press in an aoe scenario.
Note: multi-shot does very little damage normally, so 500% is just to make it feel worth spending on aoe.
Change 2:
Kill Command critical hits also stomp your pets.
This is a slight st nerf to the current set, but translates pretty well on aoe.
I think this one could be interesting but is probably the weakest of the three changes i’m proposing.
Change 3:
Kill Command critical hits spawn a dire beast.
This plays extremely well into the BM hunter class fantasy–having a herd of pets barraging your targets.
Dire beast summons a beast that attacks the target for 8 seconds and provides a 5% haste buff during its duration.
This creates two scenarios, one where we could spawn infinite dire beasts if we get a lot of crits or they could make it so that there is a max of one dire beast.
Let’s cap it at one dire beast at a time for the sake of this example.
Future dire beast spawns in this scenario should refresh the duration of the current dire beast that’s out (with a pandemic window this would be at a max of 12 seconds).
This tier set rewards proper gameplay of always having 3 stack frenzy to make sure your kill commands crit, while also min/maxing your kill command casts to have proper uptime of the dire beast haste buff. The haste buff would propel the cdr reduction of your next bestial wrath as well, creating a fun yet interactive gameplay loop.
Edit:
Alternatively, we could dive into the version where there are no caps on the number of dire beasts.
This means you’d generally have 1-2 dire beasts out at once (5-10% haste).
With killer cobra, you’d have up to 4 dire beasts (20% haste) out at once in your bestial window.
This is a lot stronger than the other version and more in-line with other class 4 piece set bonuses. It also feels cooler to have a few dire beasts out on top of your two animal companions. All four covenants can benefit greatly from the extra haste and extra damage, opening up more options for bm hunters. The current tier set is very limiting when it comes to covenant choice.
It’s good to see that there is finally some attention given to Beast Mastery. However, while AoE is part of the problem, it’s not the entire problem with the set bonuses. As many others have stated, 3 of the Covenants are unplayable because of the two set bonuses. In addition, it forces you into the Killer Cobra play style, which a set bonus shouldn’t be doing. Set bonuses shouldn’t force the player to select certain talents.
To reiterate what people have already said about Venthyr (my main covenant): the set bonus forces you to either play with the set bonus and use Cobra Shot during Bestial Wrath, or to ignore that and use Flayed Shot and Kill Shot during Bestial Wrath. Due to the limited window BW is, there is no way you can do both, and choosing one over the other is a DPS loss. There is no win for this set as Venthyr.
Also as mentioned before every set piece gives crit, and if you run with Nadjia the Mistblade as your soulbind (or really anything that gives you bonus crit) you will be over the cap in no time. Meaning there is a ton of wasted stat potential on all the items.
It might be far too late to do a sweeping rework to the set bonus, but we had all PTR for you to implement changes, and for us to test them. But we had 0 feedback except some bugfixes for the other specs the entire PTR. That is unacceptable considering other classes got reworks and blue responses quite a few times during the PTR. The fact that we are now getting a dev response is honestly ridiculous. That patch is already out, and the raid is coming out next week. We have no way of testing if the new set bonuses will be any good save from acquiring the set bonuses from the raid.
So, while I appreciate we are getting some attention now, it’s almost feels too little too late.
It might be far too late to do a sweeping rework to the set bonus, but we had all PTR for you to implement changes, and for us to test them. But we had 0 feedback except some bugfixes for the other specs the entire PTR.
This is really what gets me. The evening these set bonuses were revealed, the issues were pointed out immediately. We’re only now just hearing that they’re working on it with no details available just a few days before the raid tier opens. Like… what the hell.
Like Cognizant already mentioned, it wouldn’t be 22.5% total damage to Kill Command in exchange for 5% crit. It would be 22.5% damage instead of 15% crit.
Currently, sims on bloodmallet show that the 2p bonus effect amounts to roughly an 8.5% boost to overall damage. Taking away 15% crit chance on Kill Command in exchange for 22.5% additional damage would most likely only add a percent or two to the total, in pure ST scenarios. Probably on the lower end of that, due to how the lowered crit chance will also impact the 4-set for those that aren’t able to reach above 100% crit. Basically, for them, 15% less crit on Kill Command will mean fewer procs on the 4-set ST portion.
Our cleaving/AoE capabilities would obviously be further increased, but by no means would it equate to BM reaching “S tier” levels.
Very few bonuses are additive (none are subtractive). Those bonuses used to exist and caused no end of headaches for scaling. Most bonuses (the vast majority) have been converted to multiplicative for that reason. They try very hard to not do anything except multiplicative.
No worries, additive bonuses mean something completely different than what you intended. It’s a pretty important distinction especially in a thread about bonuses. As an example:
Before set bonuses, let’s say an ability has 150% increased damage (let’s say that an ability increases the base damage of another). A set bonus increases that 15%.
As long as modifiers are at or less than 1, additive bonuses are better. But, if any modifer increases an ability above a baseline of 1, multiplicative bonuses gain significantly and scale better. (The context here would be bonuses that bring an ability UP to baseline damage of 1 - which is why multiplicative is always better.)
A lot of things affect an ability’s damage (or healing in the case of healing spells) multiplier (before set bonuses). Talents, hidden spells by spec (these are used to “tune” all of a spec’s spells or abilities without modifying any of them directly), player cast buffs and debuffs, and zone-wide buffs and debuffs. There’s more stuff that modifies these abilities at all times (and I haven’t even touched on soulbinds or conduits).
That’s why I responded to you the way I did about it: The context of additive and multiplicative is very important here.