New BIG changes for hunter

[Hoping-kiljaeden]

These changes honestly scare me for PvP, I found survival and marksman to be quite good in pvp, this feels like it’ll be too much, hoping they don’t destroy us with the nerf bat

[Devcom-sargeras (Devcom)]

@Druwuîd-wild-growth

Previously, AC reduced damage of your two pets by 35%, which means that combined your pets were doing 130% more damage. If a single pet is doing 100% of its damage and you subtract 35% from it you get 65%. If you have two pets doing 65% of normal damage then combined they’re performing 130% more damage. With the removal of the -35% from AC, you have two pets doing 100% for a total of what is basically 200% damage. All they’re doing is reducing the damage of abilities by 35% instead of doing it via an aura, which is huge. An aura nerf is always going to hurt more than a simple ability nerf, this is just how the game works. The 35% aura nerf also affected stuff like Dire Beast and Huntsmaster’s call, because its an aura. That aura affected everything that could be considered a pet.

Notably, this is a pretty big buff for Beast Cleave, and BM’s AoE has always been on the weaker side. Since AC is no longer nerfing pet auto attack damage, this is a buff to Beast Cleave, a buff Laceration (since there is no more aura reducing damage by 35%), a buff to Huntsmaster’s Call (since there is no aura reducing pet damage), a buff to the Bloodshed + Venomous Bite choice node combo (since Bloodshed increases pet damage by 15% and Venomous increases this by another 15%, even if Bloodshed is now doing 35% less instant damage), and its a buff to Bestial Wrath because there is no more aura reducing damage by 35%.

Trust me, this is a pretty huge deal and is going to go a long way towards improving BM, especially their AoE.

I apologize for quoting this again but this is 10000000000000% correct BM is actually buffed here and when this goes live imo BM is back on the menu for Mythic plus. Might even be back on the menu for pvp too but not sure BM needed way more help in pvp than in mythic plus. For those saying this is not going to help it will trust me. Beast cleave being buffed by 35% is bigger than you those saying it won’t realize and that is just one change.

The thing is I am sad I am probably going to have to wait until November for this patch to hit.

@Hoping-kiljaeden

These changes honestly scare me for PvP, I found survival and marksman to be quite good in pvp, this feels like it’ll be too much, hoping they don’t destroy us with the nerf bat

I don’t think it will be as scary as you think while these changes are awesome for mythic plus for example in pvp they needed buffs specifically to things like Kill command for example. The barbed shot damage buff is going to help it in pvp though. In pvp the basic pet damage is not what does it for BM unless it is insanely overtuned which I do not see here. Kill command is still reduced by 35% and so is stomp. Barbed shot is the only thing I see that will help it. I could be wrong though too it would need to be tested on ptr but in my experience its hard to test pvp on ptr compared to beta unless I was just on at wrong times.

[Hulkbow-living-flame]

@Deathisyou-azgalor

A little concerned about losing Overshadow. Aimed shot and rapid fire got a 20 percent damage increase from this. I don’t see the damage being made up on rapid fire and aimed shot anywhere. Maybe the other skills offset this?

Actually this is a VERY good point. Didn’t even think about the dps loss from that

Also, why does Black Arrow have a much lower %attack power than kill shot? It’s shadow damage, but is that enough to compensate losing that much damage?

[Thorgrund-moon-guard]

@Trunic-proudmoore

I am worried about the survival changes though. The move away to a less frequent, more heavy hitting butchery sounds like it could really slow down the AOE rotation. The current bomb focused rotation is a ton of a fun and it really would feel awful to have it axed so early on in the expansion before it could even played in relevant content.

I am going to miss the bombs, but they said we are getting a heavy bleed and I am a fan of aoe dots, so I guess it depends on how much damage the bleed does. I feel like the change wasnt warranted, but I am willing to see how it plays out.

[Maila-dawnbringer]

black arrow will be replacing kill shot, not kill command. from the sounds of it, it’ll basically improve kill shot’s damage and availability

[Vichunt-stormrage]

Is sentinel viable in both pve and pvp ? The only change i see its on visual effects…i only tested DR so far.

[Snozay-area-52]

@Vichunt-stormrage

Is sentinel viable in both pve

Sentinel is currently default for MM but that’s before these changes.

[Minikyu-proudmoore]

Why not just delete pack leader if they don’t want players to choose…

[Frànkiepie-emerald-dream]

Next big change us hunters need is better Tier set xmogs!!!

[Brocade-benediction]

As a BM, I will take it.

When you are starving, there is no such thing as “dry bread”.

[Ogdenir-alleria (Ogdenir)]

Cause they’re only two fantasies that fit with Hunter’s lore. However, each class has three Hero talent trees, so Blizzard just used some BM passive buffs and called them Hero talents. Then to just make sure that nobody would catch on they made sure it was the weakest choice.

[Raená-zuljin]

Right off the bat i want to see the barbed shot change gone, the idea that they want us spamming cobra shot feels awful. I hope that gets dumped in the trash. I like alot of the other changes though, especially the reworks to Dark Ranger, but I think literally no one was asking for cobra spam

[Druwuîd-wild-growth]

Honestly spamming Cobra Shot is no different than the current Kill Command spam. You cast Cobra Shot so seldomly that you might as well not even have it on your bars. Truthfully I don’t think we’ll be casting Cobra Shot as often as you might be thinking, since our auto attacks will also have a chance to fire a Cobra Shot. I’m always up for more things interacting with Hunter auto attacks considering how many of them we’ll get off during a fight.

[Kirapandora-dalaran (Kirapandora)]

Can’t say for damage yet, but just using the practice dummies Dark Ranger is way more visually interesting and fun. So big kudos for the changes on the visual front.

My only concern off the bat is that Dark Arrow and Kill shot when in Packleader when you have the options to have it strike additional targets can really have a very wide cone.

I rather like that but we are def going to have to be mindful of not pulling mobs accidentally with a stray shot.

I hope that Pack Leader gets another look over, because it’s still not very visually remarkable. It definitely does seem to summon more beasts than Dark Ranger, but it still is missing the excitement that Dark Ranger is now bringing to the table.

Also Dracthyr hunter is awesome! I cannot wait to level a new main.

[Shaleraz-emerald-dream]

Glad to see Dark Ranger redesigned. It was pretty terrible.

[Thalanas-stormrage (Thalanas)]

yeah I was wondering so do we get black arrow every time we get a deathblow kill shot or just on the above 80% below 20% hp window?

[Myk-hydraxis]

Thanks for the copy and paste, fits your ability level perfectly

[Huntresluna-grizzly-hills]

Looking forward to MM/Sent being very successful this XP. All changes thus far seem good; the changes going forward seem even better.

[Snozay-area-52]

@Myk-hydraxis

Thanks for the copy and paste, fits your ability level perfectly

You really want to throw stones with a 15.1 overall in heroic?

[Myk-hydraxis]

Thanks for proving my point perfectly.