Put your suggestions here not arguments just skills that you want to have for survival. this is to give blizzard a list not an argument to read no one is right or wrong just put what you would like them to look at. NO RANGED OR MELEE ARGUMENT this is not the thread for it.
My thoughts : Make mongoose bite baseline and get rid of kill command replace it with flanking strike. make Butchery base line and replace carve with another melee strike. have arcane shot be arcane slice. give the new Execute a focus cost so it will scale with our mastery. recap : Mongoose bite base line, kill command replace with Flanking strike, Arcane shot become arcane slice , Butchery base line. replace those 2 talents with something to buff our melee damage or allow us to fight with our pets. some kind of skill to attack with our pets at the same time.
my suggestion is to give us back the old pre-legion play style. i don’t mind if survival stays melee. it isn’t the name i’m attached to, it’s the play style. you could even make the play style melee instead of ranged as a compromise. as it is, survival right now is just a bm hunter and warrior mix with no identity.
While I agree on wanting pre-Legion RSV back as a playable option. It doesn’t have to replace current SV.
And as you said, the name isn’t important. It doesn’t cater to either style anyway.
A 4th spec option for the old RSV and we’re done. No need to opt for it as a replacement for current SV in this thread.
With the launch of the SL alpha, there was not much news presented for the hunter SV, which is very sad, because it always seems to be a spec forgotten by Blizzard. Blizz practically buffed existing skills only, and added some general hunter skills that won’t have much influence on rotation. In other words, it will continue the same thing as BfA.
I particularly love Eagle’s Fury, the special skill from the artifact. It was one of Hunter SV coolest skills in the Legion, and it gave a lot of personality to the spec! I would love return it to Shadowlands, even though it is a talent. As it reshapes, to combo with other abilities, use as a burst… Many classes got their legion’s artifact power back, so why not SV?
Throw Axe, Way of the Mok’Nathal and Sticky Bomb were nice abilities too!
They overhauled it for Legion and then did so once again for BfA. So not entirely true.
I do however agree on that it needs some cleaning up so to speak. If the intent is for it to be the melee spec they presented with Legion, then they should at least make it’s baseline toolkit focus mostly on such a theme.
As for current changes in the early stages of the SL alpha, I can’t imagine that they consider it to be done for SV. Abilities and effects are all over the place for that spec.
I always thought of that name as being the perfect opportunity to introduce a choice for those who want a dual-wield option for SV.
It is after all themed after Rexxar and his native clan.
Apart from this, I would suggest for either Flanking Strike to replace Kill Command baseline. With somewhat similar mechanics that is.
Or for Mongoose Bite to go baseline again. Or both?
Agree with Mongoose Bite baseline, totally disagree with replace Kill Command. I love Kill Command’s role as a focus generator and as player-actived pet damage. I think it fits this “persevere with my only trusted companion at my side” theme.
Instead I would say redesign the level 90 talent row with options to allow the player to prioritize Mongoose Bites window (getting stacks high quickly and getting as many Bites as possible within it) or prioritizing Kill Command and/or other abilities so that the window is less important.
I’m once again asking (like almost every other hunter main) DUAL WEAPONS!!!
Agree with the flank strike to remplace Kill command
Bring back fury of the eagle (Artifact skill) I’m not a big fan of the “range mangoose bite” so maybe another “burst” skill.
Talking about mangoose, the increased dmg per stack is quite idk borring (? specially with our low focus regen (seems to be even lower is SL) so maybe there is Another think to rework
Increase the duration of serpent sting
Make camouflage baseline
Allow us to use skills while we are in turtle Shell
Allow us to stun while we are on cc (the stun is tied to the Pet)
I love the melee survival and was fun and challenging during legion.
BFA survival just feels weird. Maybe it’s because of the pruning that did this, but half of the abilities just seem to get in the way rather then add anything to the class.
Focus regen should be a mechanic based on a rotation. Not some spam happy attack that doesn’t even feel good to throw in your rotation for the lack luster dmg it does. Kill shot should instead be kill command as an execute. Not your focus generator. Makes it actually what it sounds like… An execute.
1b. The focus generation should probably be like the Memory of lucid dream trait. Where you have a chance to return focus to yourself from using attacks based on our mastery so mastery is actually worth something. Or Bring back Aspect of the fox and use it to regenerate focus and we can work on stance dancing around mongoose bite. Good name would thrill of the hunt.
Get rid of the bombs. They’re useless. They just clunk up the spec… Instead, maybe change wildfire infusion into a poison laced weapon ability like old ranged survival use to. We could change our poison based on what we’re trying to achieve. We could have Latent poison for nature dmg per hit. Serrated teeth for a physical bleed.
2b. Make Butchery core or severely buff carve because it’s useless. It does no dmg at all. Only worth it for the cooldown on wildfire bomb. You can also have it apply the affects of your weapon lace.
2c. If you do insist on keeping the bombs. Do the same as old survival and choose which bomb you want but make it more of a pvp based ability. Bolas for a snare, Flare exposes stealth, or blind regular target, frost grenade slows enemy and if he doesn’t get out of it after 2 seconds they freeze.
Aspect of the eagle should just switch you to a range weapon skills at reduced damage. It should probably get a name change to Ranger’s inspiration or something like that Would fit the theme of being melee but still knowing how to use a bow if needed.
Remove our traps as bombs can easily replace them for the same thing.
Serpent sting needs to go. It’s really pointless. If it’s just a filler dot than make go for the throat it’s new name and have that as your pet ability that does bleed dmg instead, or make the dot change based on your pet choice. This also makes having a pet useful as it currently doesn’t do much other than intimidate. They have way more use in PVP.
5b. Maybe give them the option to have no pet? Or make calling your pet a cooldown and call it “Ambush” and make that your cooldown instead of coordinated assault.
If they keep insisting on chakrams. Make them an aimed ability. Buff the dmg for being aimed and we’re good. They really need something to make them feel worth it.
Give dual wield choice. Because Rexxar. You did this to yourself blizz…
I’ve been enjoying the heck out of Melee SV this expansion but I do acknowledge that it can be better than it is right now. At the moment I can only think of three suggestions to improve it’s current incarnation moving into Shadowlands.
Alpha Predator baseline. This talent seems like it’s mandatory in all situations because it helps smooth out our focus generation. Also, it opens up the opportunity of running Viper’s Venom in ST encounters.
Mongoose Bite being baseline once more. Seriously, why was this made into a talent? It should have remained a baseline ability going into BFA.
Primeval Intuition (Azerite Trait) baseline. This one’s self explanatory, more focus for mongoose bites. The added crit would be nice to have as well.
Bonus request: As others have suggested, giving SV hunters the option to dual wield would be great for those who want to be more like Rexxar. PersonalIy I like using Thogar’s Control Rod as my mogged weapon but the option to dual wield should be there for those who want it.
Dual wielding would be fun and fit the fantasy of the trapper ranger. Although apparently they are having trouble with it on FrostDK, something like 3 to 4 times the procs with dual wield as opposed to 2h. It’s not as important but dual wielding would conflict with the animations for Serpent Sting and presumably Kill Shot.
I like Mongoose Bite in theory but I don’t always enjoy the focus dump windows it creates where you optimally don’t wanna use any other focus spender like your DoT or Chakrams if talented. So I’d instead push for more balance in the Mongoose Bite talent row to create multiple viable builds for those that prefer whichever gameplay loop.
I truly wish Flanking Strike was the baseline focus builder. It’s much more flavorful and unique to Survival. A previous commenter suggested making Kill Command our version of Kill Shot which is an elegant idea. Another bonus to this would be freeing up the talent slot to create a new spender-modifying talent to compete with Mongoose Bite.
The other two specs received increases to their passive focus generation which Survival DESPERATELY needs if we want any hope of diversifying talent choice on the 15 row and any sort of justification for taking Chakrams with Mongoose Bite regardless of damage tuning.
I agree with other posters that Carve is pretty bland. The damage is extremely low. Either bake some of the Bomb damage back into Carve and adjust the cdr accordingly or figure out some other way to make AoE interesting. Perhaps a low damage, ST bleed that will cleave burst damage onto nearby enemies when the bleeding target is hit with a Bomb. You could tie it into the pet even, call it Embed Shrapnel or something. shrug
Please for the love of Vereesa make Kill Shot cost focus for us. To tag onto that I really think our mastery could use some attention. Baseline we only have 3 focus spending abilities, 4 if you count the pet one, and we only use Carve at a certain number of grouped up mobs. Depending on the build, it can vary from an alright stat to a downright useless one. There’s other neat ideas in this thread, but perhaps if they implemented another DoT like I came up with our Mastery could affect our damage over time? And somehow funnel back into focus regen? Increases Serpent Sting damage over time, Bomb damage over time, and “Shrapnel” damage over time, and gives X amount of additional focus regen while a DoT is active, scaling with each of your three DoTs. This would make AoE pulls engaging and focused on multi dotting. Idk. Rambling 3am Survival thoughts here.
Please consider changing how Serpent Sting functions! Right now its base duration is decreased the more haste you have. This is unique to any DoT I’m aware of (certainly could be forgetting something) and is mildly counterintuitive if you’ve played any other class with a DoT. Doing large pulls is a total pain if you don’t take Hydra’s Bite, and it’s plainly not fun to be tab targeting to refresh a <10 second DoT.
Culling - When there are 3 or more enemies affected by your damage over time effects within 8 yards of your pet, Kill Command strikes all enemies within 8 yards of your pet.
Master Trapper - The triggering radius and area of effect of your traps are increased by 50% and your single target traps affect all enemies within the triggering radius.
Reinforced Traps - Damage will not break your traps for 2 seconds after triggering.
Do Not Go Gentle - You and your pet’s Leech is increased by 2%. This effect is increased by 2% for every 10% health you are missing.
Latent Poison - Would like to see this baked into Hydra’s Bite, as a sort of skill(ish) AoE talent. A Competitor to a baked Hellcarver+Butchery, and one other talent.
Ranged sub-spec of Survival, replacing Raptor with Arcane Shot in rotation. Make slight adjustments to Raptor/Mongoose row to also have influence on AS. Does not need to be optimal, but perhaps playable with sufficient Mastery stacking?
I agree to changes like this for SV. They’ve seen SV’s AOE weaknesses over the past two expansions and it takes this long to come up with something or implement anything, like seriously? And there’s still no answer thus far… It’s obvious they monitor statistics, I just don’t understand why it takes soo long to change anything…
Like what? Kill command and traps? Intimidate? Surv has some of the crappiest AOE out of the 3 specs and your reason for no is because we share too much with BM?
Then you go off about aspect of the eagle which isn’t even part of the the original conversation…
I’d rather share some aspects of the other specs and make survival viable rather than say no just because someone wants cry about how the skills overlapping…
That’s what makes BM so useful in M+
Survival is challenging and pushing +15 is awesome, but it doesn’t matter how good I am or how good my gear is. We have no good AOE other than Butchery but its a dead pick because of the guerilla tactics, and that is chosen only because butchery is useless for ST. So why kill your ST when you could be average at both?
Also, stance dancing aspect of the eagle like that would make us broken and they’d have to either reduce our dmg or increase cool downs. Specifically in PVP
Yeah. They wanted it to be nothing like the other 2 specs but never accounted for how the kit would work in practice.
Mongoose bite window for 5 stacks is way too low. Forces everyone to stack haste just to get as much in that window as possible but as soon as you have to do mechanics or have responsibillity, your dmg sinks to the floor.
I like the legion mechanic that extended the window to help us out.
Why even take something from BM, when they literally pruned Fury of the Eagle and could just bring it back and tune whatever needs to be tuned about the ability to make it a useful AOE?