Is Melee Hunter going to be removed?

[Bepples-barthilas]

@Asana-moon-guard

No it’s not and I don’t think Blizz will ever revert it. Survival was changed for that exact reason, because it wasn’t really unique. It was just the third of three ranged bow specs with slightly different types of shot abilities. It was kind of redundant. They changed it to melee so it become the fantasy of a different type of hunter and to stand out as a more unique playstyle.

While we’re at it let’s remove Stealth from Outlaw. Because after all it’s just the third of three stealthy dual-wielders with slightly different types of stabbing. It’s kind of redundant.

Apparently handicapping specs is a good way to make them unique in a class. Melee brain class design takes in a nutshell.

@Asana-moon-guard

The forums are also a tiny tiny fraction of players. Majority opinion over here doesn’t mean anything, I’m sure there’s many hunters in game who are enjoying and prefer melee survival.3

It depends on your definition of “many” because we do actually have some insight into how many people play it from things like warcraftlogs and wowranks. While it’s obviously not zero, it’s the very least played spec in the game and it has been in an extremely unpopular state since it was made melee, and this is constant regardless of tuning.

@Archspire-scarlet-crusade

I think it would be really cool if they removed survival as a melee dps spec (there’s FAR too many already) and made it a tanking spec. So still the same general playstyle and abilities but just make it tanky instead of high damage

If they ever put me in charge you can count on that happening, but seriously doubt it otherwise

Thankfully you will never be in charge because this is a terrible idea. Please keep your bad ideas to yourself.

@Beaupeep-dentarg

Making it a more melee-focused spec made it a little more unique, and regardless of what people think of it now, it needed to happen that way. Marksman and Survival were very similar specs “bac in the day”, and it was hard to distinguish the two (Beast Master was always similar to what it is now).

Just an FYI to all readers Beaupeep is infamous on dropping terrible takes on Hunters all the time and this is absolutely wrong. Survival had a separate identity of utilitarianism and exotic munitions while Marksmanship always focused on sharpshooting and sniping. Those are as different fantasies as Affliction and Destruction or, since melee brains evidently have a hard time telling ranged specs apart, Assassination and Subtlety or Arms and Fury.

Question to Beaupeep: If Survival had exactly the same gameplay as it did now, except it used a ranged weapon and Raptor Strike were a ranged shot instead, would it suddenly be an MM clone again?

Also, do you sincerely believe handicapping specs within a class is a good way to make them unique? Would you agree to taking Stealth away from a Rogue spec?

@Beaupeep-dentarg

I know people hate it, but I think that’s partially due to the fact that it’s still not unique enough. They need to lean further into it being a full melee spec.

This might come as a shock, so make sure you’re sitting down before reading this: specs should share some aspects from their baseline class. Believing that specs need to be entirely separate and distinct entities is a bad habit and you should work on that. Your own spec shares a lot with Elemental; do you whine endlessly about that, too?

@Kazghani-wyrmrest-accord

It’s doubtful they’ll revert Survival spec. Most of the “haters” of the spec, especially among hunters, are people who almost never specced survival when it was ranged. As others have pointed out, it was a redundant spec the other 2 performed better in, and while it still may not be a super popular spec to play, it’s more so now than it was when it was the neglected hunter tree.

Also, inb4 “but I played ranged survival” responses. I acknowledge there will always be exceptions, but it was objectively one of the least played specs of all classes since the game released.

I’ll oblige: here’s me playing Survival back in WoD in a time when it was objectively the most popular spec in the game:

Saga (Silvermoon-US) vs. Brackenspore (M-Highmaul)

I’m in good company, too. Here’s Preach Gaming talking about how great Survival is in WoD. Here’s him in Shadowlands talking about how he wishes they kept it ranged.

Here’s the same sentiment from Limit Maximum and Izen Hart.

I know you’re probably used to Survival being the abandoned circus freak of class design, but that doesn’t mean you can project it’s pitiful current state into the past. Ranged SV was demonstrably a consistently popular spec.

As for pretending that none of us played ranged Survival, well that’s just plain delusional, but don’t feel too bad: melee brains aren’t expected to give anything more than delusional and incorrect takes on ranged classes.

Proof of ranged Surival’s population:

• Worldofwargraphs (2013-2019)
• Warcraftlogs (Highmaul)
• Cynwise Blog (2011-2014)
• Armory Datamining (2010)

In comparison, melee SV is usually dead last.

P.S. I have to love how apparently a third ranged spec would be redundant on account of the other two ranged specs yet apparently having it be restricted to melee range instead would make it strong and valuable. Because I guess when we were all playing Survival back in WotLK to WoD we were all thinking “Gee, being able to do full DPS anywhere from 0-40 yard range really sucks; if only I were limited to 5 yards!”.

@Feronar-warsong

I’d rather survival hunter be converted to a tank spec.

I’d rather all melee mains are banned from giving takes on the Hunter class but we can’t always get what we want.

@Dendritus-moon-guard

Anyway, melee hunter should exist, but it should be Beastmaster spec as Rexxar is a Beastmaster and he’s melee, and Survival Hunter should return to what it used to be, elemental ranged dps.

I’d rather not hot-potato this unwanted concept between Hunter specs. No Hunter spec should be melee in its baseline form. It’s just a fundamentally bad idea. Hunters in WoW have been thoroughly rooted in and framed around ranged weapon combat and we start with a ranged weapon at level 1. It never make sense and never will to ask any one of the specs to throw away that ranged weapon at level 10. At most they should have a talent within BM that swaps out its ranged shots for melee strikes in exchange for a damage boost. That way when it inevitably appeals to only the tiniest of niches it doesn’t take an entire spec with it.

@Dendritus-moon-guard

i haven’t forgotten, nor will i forgive.

I mean you just defended them doing a similar thing to Survival so it can’t be that hard to forgive and forget.