Hey everyone, I was inspired by this post on SV tier feedback to write up a list of things that would be cool/fun for hunters (specifically MM, but applied elsewhere too I’m sure). This post is limited in scope to mostly aesthetic/gameplay enhancements and isn’t a numerical assessment or “viability” assessment.
I think A lot of classes could use design overhauls to make them unique and fun (interesting) to play, I’m just focused on Hunter (MM) because it’s the class/spec I love, and I think alongside other ranged classes Hunters struggle with having some incomplete / not unique identities.
Here’s a magic wand wish list:
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Dark Ranger: Rewatching the Sylvanas intro cinematic for BFA provides a lot of inspiration here. If we keep Dark Ranger into Midnight (I hope so), I’d love to see that AOE wailing shriek thing she does, maybe some more agility and stuff like Sylvanas as well. But we currently have spells in game like Wailing Arrow that look cool, feel great, and provide awesome utility but because of their placement on the tree are often not viable to take. It would feel awful if we become Dark Rangers and can’t take Wailing Arrow. Consider buffing Wailing Arrow for Dark Rangers, and (in a perfect world) reskin spells like frost trap to be more… well, dark! It’d do a ton for a class fantasy people are excited about.
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Quivers: I feel like the removal of quivers threw the “baby out with the bath water”. Quivers could be hunter-specific drops that replace the cape. Hunters with capes rarely look cool compared to quiver/ammo pouches. Allowing for (even simple) reskins of capes to be quivers for Hunters would do a lot to help appearances.
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Arrows: Probably more controversial, but there is a way to make “ammo/arrows” work and provide a unique class design. It could be just buying infinite arrows if we really want to try it mechanically, but we could just be allowed to transmog our arrows to be dark/normal/flaming etc. “Arcane” arrows (as in D&D) is an arrow forged out of thin air, but in game it feels like a throwaway shot like any other. I think there is a creative solution that could have unique arrow mechanics that improve the class and avoids making it a chore/annoyance. Something to consider, even if just aesthetically.
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Steady Focus: The SF talent is not fun. Even world-first raiders have in the past opted to not use the talent because of how awful it makes single-target MM gameplay. it’s like doing a really fun DPS rotation but then having to keep an annoying beach ball up in the air at the same time. I’d just remove this or adjust it to be far easier to manage like doing one Steady Shot instead of two or something.
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Sniper Shot: Sniper shot is insanely fun in PvP, it allows us to shoot for sometimes like 100+ yards away. I feel incredibly powerful and sneaky and it rules. Is there a way we can incorporate that fun into PvE?
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MM Pets: MM famously doesn’t use pets for the Lone Wolf buff. Yet, in PvP the utility is often so great that we forgo having the buff. Is there a way to keep some of the pet utility, maybe even have the pet out (maybe the pet is shrunk a bit or something, or only “small pets”) to keep some of the utility out without having to manage pet DPS? I’d like it for PvE for like Intimidate, Lust, Roar, etc. The calling/dismissing pet utility cycle doesn’t feel fun.
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AOE Cap: The Light Ammo/Heavy Ammo are rarely worth taking to increase AOE cap. I love MM being the spec that does the best AOE Burst, but we’re so limited by the AOE cap that sometimes it feels awful.
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Sentinel Owl: This is a cool holdover from Shadowlands (kinda), but it’s not super useful. Could this be improved to make it more interesting/useful. Maybe some sort of raid utility on this would be neat. Members of the Hunter Discord had suggested making this an AOE silence, shoot through walls longer, or something. Maybe that’d work? Along a similar vein of Dark Ranger, it’d be weird to be a “Sentinal” in War Within and not have Sentinal Owl provide some added benefits.
That’s it off the top of my head from playing the spec over the last 7ish years. Something to consider. This isn’t to say other classes need X,Y,Z, just talking about MM Hunter specifically.