A lot of great ideas in here so far. Love it. It’s vitally important, in my opinion, to have a well thought out consensus to present either to the Community Council so they can bring it up directly, or that blue posts may see naturally, as hopefully they give this thread the look that it deserves.
I see two main issues voiced by the chorus of this and the many other threads currently popping up on the Hunter forums and in the Hunter Discord: 3 point nodes, and Coordinated Assault.
ISSUE 1: THREE POINT NODES
This really is the biggest problem that the tree faces. It has so many more 3 point investments than any other spec, and that severely limits the amount of choice and flexibility we have in navigating the tree.
Example
Let’s say you want to make a build that focuses on Wildfire Bombs. If you are following the Bomb path of the tree, you’ll have to take:
- Improved Wildfire Bomb for increased Bomb damage (and because it gates Wildfire Infusion), which leads directly to…
- Explosives Expert immediately after that, because again it gates Wildfire Infusion, and now it has introduced a synergy with Kill Shot. To get any synergy with Kill Shot, you’ll need to take…
- Deadly Duo, which gives Kill Command resets a (paltry) chance to proc a Kill Shot. This in turn requires…
- Predator, a 3 talent point sink that just gets Kill Command back to where it is baseline today in terms of reset chance.
Just to get Wildfire Infusion for your Wildfire Bombs, you need to sink 6 points into 3 point nodes. Then to make those 3 point nodes make any sense (specifically regarding Explosives Expert), you’ll need to sink 6 more points into 3 point nodes. 12 points for 4 nodes. Nearly half of the talent points you get to spend are sunk into just 4 talents.
Comparison
Compare this with Feral, which has the next highest number of 3 point nodes. The 3 point nodes are split on either side of the tree, and only 1 is required to progress through the tree, not a chain of 2 in a row, and certainly not 4 separate ones that are required just to make good on the synergies they introduce.
It is the most glaring deficiency in the Survival tree. We not only have the most 3 point nodes, we have the highest cost to fill out our tree, and we have the fewest total nodes. For reference, see:
Conclusion
This is inexcusable. It simply means we have significantly less choice and flexibility than other specs. This must be fixed, and it must be iterated on quickly if there is any hope to have this tree in a position of parity when Dragonflight launches.
Drastically reduce the number of 3 point nodes, and introduce more 1 and 2 point nodes to allow equal choice and flexibility to other specs.
ISSUE 2: COORDINATED ASSAULT
I think that Coordinated Assault is a potentially interesting aoe cooldown now. But, as you point out in a later comment, without Deadly Duo, the Kill Shot part of the cooldown is only active in execute range.
Additionally, Birds of Prey seems like it was not changed with Coordinated Assault, since it still seems to envision the Mongoose Bite/Raptor Strike playstyle of extending the window. This is not to mention that Coordinated Kill does not have any synergy at all with Coordinated Assault, and is just a weird damage buff that would devalue any crit % we have.
I think there is a relatively simple three-part solution:
FIRST, move Deadly Duo up to where Lunge or Sharp Edges are generally. Deadly Duo clearly plays into Coordinated Assault because of the Kill Shot functionality, it should be above the ability, not below it and off to the side.
SECOND, add more functionality to Coordinated Assault and Birds of Prey to stop them from being at odds with one another. Birds of Prey still hearkens to the single target Mongoose Bite spam playstyle, and Coordinated Assault is now tied into Bombs, Carve, Kill Command, and Kill Shot.
I propose that Coordinated Assault be changed to have some interaction with Mongoose Bite/Raptor Strike. Perhaps our pet’s basic attacks empower our next Mongoose Bite/Raptor Strike to either give it an extra Tip of the Spear stack or Mongoose Fury stack.
I propose that Birds of Prey be changed to a choice node, where it is either affected by Mongoose Bite/Raptor Strike for the single target wing, or Kill Command for the aoe wing.
THIRD, Coordinated Kill has to go. It simply should not be a 3 point talent, and it has no meaningful interaction with Coordinated Assault. Instead I propose another choice node, where during Coordinated Assault, Kill Command either extends your Mongoose Fury stack duration or Kill Command resets have an increased chance to proc a Kill Shot from 15% to XX%.
Conclusion
If these three changes were made, Coordinated Assault and the talents following it would give a nice, middle-of-the-tree path that can benefit both the left/aoe side of the tree and the right/single target side of the tree.