Marks tree is really bad now

Classes Hunter
1

Nobody is happy with how the marks tree works for PvP or PvE now.

LnL being gated behind steady focus or deadeye->serpentstalker feels terrible. Steady focus is now the best simming talent in that slot and it is a universally hated playstyle.

The new tactical reload talent is skipped in all builds. You took away an iconic ability that has been with this spec since its inception in BfA and replaced it with another dead talent.

Hunter’s knowledge has to be skipped to make a pvp build work. Hunter’s knowledge is also skipped in a lot of PvE builds. It is the type of throughput talent that you really want to take but can’t, and I cannot find another spec that mandatorily has to skip basic throughput talents high up in their trees to gain basic function of their spec. You have to take lone wolf to get to it, and you use a pet in PvP, which makes that lone wolf talent a dead point slot.

Bullseye gating the right side of the tree effectively prevents pvp builds that seek interaction between windrunner’s guidance and unnerring/calling the shots or even windrunner’s barrage and guidance without just flat out skipping trueshot.

The general lack of connections on the tree leave very little room for variation in builds as a whole. And the builds that work the best are not the best because they work the way that players want them to.

It just feels like everything else that had tree changes got something positive out of it and at least developers interacted with the people playing those specs while their changes were in-flight. These recent changes only make the marks tree more frustrating and the way you play the spec less satisfying. M+ damage tuning can be fine and the spec still feel awful to play. Doubletap going away in PvP is the equivalent to fire mage losing combust or windwalker losing SEF.

13 Likes
2

Very well articulated. These talent trees have such potential, a lot of specs have really cool options and various flavors to choose from. I feel MM and Outlaw rogue (the two things I play) have the least variety in terms of talent choices (Outlaw is even worse tbh, you basically have 1 build for pvp with not a single adjustable point).

I loved Wind arrows in legion, but even if I could access it now, it wouldn’t even be worth it.

In legion, aimed shots were much faster casts so you’d proc it a lot and it would matter, with how slow Aimed Shots are nowadays, and how few you actually get to cast in PvP, at 25% you barely ever see the wind arrows, and when you do, they’re very weak anyway and don’t contribute much at all. Blocked by Bullseye (pve talent) too so it’ll never be accessible in PvP, as much as I’d love an Aimed Shot centric pvp build (latent poison/arctic bola/wind arrows/etc).

Furthermore, if you Aimed Shot → Arcane Shot, and the Arcane shot crits, activating the 2 set bonus of tier, the wind arrows will EAT THE 2-set proc and do a bleed for like 200 dmg. So you actually get punished by instantly Arcane Shotting after an Aimed Shot anyway…no way that’s intended, the wind arrows count as mini aimed shots in the code for some reason, since the 2-set specifies Aimed Shot.

Salvo was kinda fun in pvp at the very start when people weren’t all fully geared, farming honor in bgs it would truck, now since the crits aren’t even that juicy and pets soak the charges often, I don’t even find it useful in 90% of arena matches. Windrunner’s talents are inaccessible in pvp, we waste a talent on Lone Wolf if we want 10% crit as you said.

Steady Focus and Consecutive Concussion are cool and I would love to reliably use them in PvP, but steady shot is so slow for the pacing of PvP, and often your concussive shot gets removed by snare-removal/freedoms by the time you’d get 3rd shot for Consecutive. Unlike in PvE, you basically never need to steady shot with Imp SS for focus, because we spend so much time chasing/LoS/using non damage abilities/being CC’d, that our focus is plentiful passively 99% of the time, so we have to go out of our way to steady shot for 7k dmg if we want to utilize these.

Wailing Arrow is incredibly weak for the cooldown/cast time. Even if the silence worked in PvP it still wouldn’t be very good. Readiness (and the laughable wind arrow talent option) are not very impactful.

So much potential with the spec and tree, just a few key problems.

However, the removal of DT, to me, signifies they want to shift the way it plays in a more significant way. Might be huffing copium but I’m hoping to see some serious improvements in the near future crosses fingers

4 Likes
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This is what scares me.

4

Double Tap was a great pre-opener. I understand that it’s GCD was an overall DPS loss in long battles, but Double Tap represented a choice. Player Agency is fun, having it stripped away in favor of a dull 10% cool down reduction feels terrible. WoW is a game, it should be fun.

5 Likes
5

Thank you for listening and updating the tree a little. The swap of steady focus and tactical reload makes PvE builds better.

Please look at lone wolf and hunter’s knowledge

Hunter’s knowledge is a basic throughput talent that modifies your two biggest primary rotational abilities. It is gated behind lone wolf, and you use a pet in pvp. This makes lone wolf a completely dead talent. Look at the arms tree, for example. Imagine if martial prowess, improved execute, improved overpower, impale etc. were gated behind a completely dead talent that provides no use to you in a pvp build. Look at any other tree. Nothing else has to just flat out skip these kinds of high-value, basic throughput talents at high tree just to avoid taking dead talents.

Please consider swapping hunter’s knowledge and steady focus (where steady focus is now as of 10.0.7 ptr). This gives non-lw builds access to hunter’s knowledge and makes a lot more sense, imo.

2 Likes
6

Yes pls. I hate dropping a point into LW for PvP when I never utilize it.

2 Likes
7

Man, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. So many weird position choices in the MM tree.

8

Same. Impossible to pvp without a pet as mm and impossible to build a semi cohesive build without that talent.