We should keep melee survival and instead take the old ranged survival and make it a fourth hunter spec. Maybe make it Ranger or Trapper or something.
I dunno, I just don’t wanna see more specs just being destroyed for the sake of change, and rather just see a new one added that brings back the old playstyle.
GLAD 
I AT OR
DPS with Sword n Board. It’s time.
The two classes I would add to the game are bard and artificer
Yep, this is basically what I’m suggesting. I don’t want to repeat the mistakes made in Legion.
To elaborate, the hunter section of the boards has multiple ideas on how to go about implementing an updated version of the old spec.
Ghorak has multiple good ideas in his thread for a spec. I have my own variation that focuses more on infusing shots with magic with an additional resource mechanic to help further differentiate it from the other specs.
There’s a lot of ways to go about it, there’s a lot of thematic space within the class that can be explored while satisfying players and returning something that has been missing without taking away from others again.
I really agree with this. Something about coming from a Beastlord in EQ to a ranged class that doesn’t even care about its companion really bothers me. It’s just a convenient meat shield to the spec and doesn’t do it justice (granted, now it’s more zookeeper than companion, but digress).
Or better yet, imagine MM/BM being overpowered and a Survival-only legendary weapon drops. That’s just spite to a good percentage of the class. Granted, in the current world, they just spit on the minority of hunters.
Ayy, maybe one day Blizzard will look through forums for good ideas and feedback. Until then, we’ll get Torghast iterations until your eyes bleed.
Feel free to specify how…
What exactly made them play too similarly to one another?
Others have already explained what RSV was about and how that was different from BM/MM. And…
…it’s not just about 1 single ability. It’s about all of them and what they all formed when combined. Abilities/passive effects. It’s about the theme of the intended fantasy as a Munitions Expert + Trapper, AND it’s also about the mechanical theme and functional design.
Having said that, Lazyguide provided a link to a concept of mine which I have posted with the intent of presenting a modern version of what RSV could be like if made for the game as it is today. Thanks @Lazyguide !
Whether you like the specifics of the concept itself, is up to you ofc. But feel free to compare it to modern day BM or MM, or current SV for that matter. It deff isn’t like either of those, neither in theme/fantasy, nor in function.
The point here is that it doesn’t matter whether anyone thinks RSV was too similar to BM/MM back in WoD. Because going forward, the intent was to double down on the design of all specs in the game. Making all specs focus even more on their individual identities.
Nothing stopped the devs from doing the same to SV as they did to all other specs at the time. But instead, they just deleted it in it’s entirety.
You can trade loot. The fact that Hunters are already the only ones using ranged weapons is already idiotic. Adding a spec-specific weapon on top of that is just another layer of idiocy.
And yes, Glaives for DH were a mistake too. Should’ve just classified them as swords or polearms or something and used the graphic.
They absolutely had a right to be different specs as they are totally different from a thematic standpoint. SV even had Lone Wolf available to it in WoD which should tell you its philosophy was drastically different to that of BM. They had major playstyle differences too; they could have been more distinct which is just an argument for further iterating on their respective playstyles, not declaring that they have no right to be distinct specs (just a bit of an overreaction there…) and turning Survival into effectively melee BM with bombs.
You’re posting from a class with 3 ranged specs; one of which is distinct through its use of demons (Demonology) and one through its use of curses and DoT effects (Affliction). You should know better than to pretend that a) such a distinction isn’t enough for two Hunter specs and b) defining a spec via tokenistic weakness v.s. the base class is a sensible and effective approach.
MM does not have Black Arrow, actually. It no longer exists at all. Its Explosive Shot is drastically different to that of the old one so that isn’t so much a barrier. There’s more to ranged Survival than just Explosive Shot (contrary to what you’re pretending to be the case here). You have Black Arrow, the Lock and Load interaction, Serpent Sting and all its interactions, and the baseline improvements to trapping. It’s a different thematic focus to MM because it focuses on special munitions and utility rather than the sniping approach. And it’s a hell of a lot more valuable to this class than the token melee spec.
This is true, but since the overwhelming majority of Hunters don’t want to be melee and the class is ranged at a baseline level this sort of thing should be an option within BM rather than the spec’s baseline, e.g. a talented melee stance that swaps ranged shots for melee attacks in exchange for a damage boost.
Hi. Goblin guy here. If my posts caused people like you to stop going to the Hunter forums as far as I’m concerned that’s a job well done. You’re wrong, anyway, because I can name at least 10 off the top of my head who frequently support ranged Survival on the forums, here goes:
The last one doesn’t exactly fit the definition but I wanted to include him anyway, because he was a very frequent poster for many years on the Hunter forums until he quit during BFA due to the direction of the class.
That’s just the WoW forums and just the ones most memorable to me. You have plenty of discussion on the topic on Reddit, Mmo-champion, and Youtube as well… You also have famous WoW personalities in favour of ranged Survival. Bellular, Preach, Limit Maximum, and Bendak (maker of the old Hunter podcasts) are all in favour of ranged Survival. Asmongold is in favour of melee Survival, but that’s to be expected from a Warrior main. He also never plays it when he’s on his Hunter, so like 90% of melee SV support it doesn’t have any weight to it.
You’re not going to convince anyone that ranged Survival is an issue only a handful of diehards on the forums want. It’s been a major issue since Legion’s announcement and a lot of people would be interested in seeing a ranged Survival; certainly far more than people who wanted melee Survival before they went and did that.
P.S. I never make the topics about Survival on the Hunter forums; I only reply to existing topics.
Are you assuming that everyone else who plays the game and doesn’t post is just fine with melee Survival? Because that certainly isn’t true. I’ve met plenty of people over the years who don’t post on the forums and hate melee Survival, wishing it were ranged again. In fact every single Hunter I’ve raided with since Legion’s launch has preferred ranged Survival.
Most of the theorycrafters and common posters in there are also in favour of ranged Survival, you know, so you aren’t exactly helping your argument with this.
Good grief. “Is Survival a bad spec? No! It’s the entire rest of the game that’s wrong”. You have to know how delusional this seems, right? Survival Hunter fans always engage in this obnoxious coping mechanism where the spec is God’s gift to class design but the playerbase is just not capable of appreciating it. Maybe the spec just isn’t that good after all if next to no one wants to play it?
Ah yes, let’s just bail it out with an essential utility! This totally isn’t a lazy bandaid…
People played SV at the top level when it was ranged and it didn’t need a super special raid spot guarantee for that. Well, that was their gambit for one expansion (TBC Expose Weakness) but they ditched that bandaid in WotLK in favour of a spec design and philosophy that actually made sense.
Yes, good point. Mixing melee and ranged DPS in the same class is generally not a good idea and we should limit it to the classes that started that way (Druid, Shaman). Knowing that this is a problematic situation which requires a lot of care and balance to keep the melee spec relevant, why would we deliberately put another spec in that situation? We knew it was a bad idea before they even tried it.
You think new players are browsing forum threads like these?
New players aren’t shying away from the spec just because of player perception and that player perception isn’t unfounded in any case. When coming to the class a player is presented with a class heavily themed around a ranged weapon; the only class that uses them, in fact. We have one on the character creation screen, we start with one, and we get abilities that use it. At level 10 you’re then given the option of three different specs. Two of them use the ranged weapon and build on that core identity. The third arbitrarily eschews the ranged weapon and pursues a melee based identity just like the 12 other melee specs in the game. This is a very easy choice for the overwhelming majority of people who come to that point, and they aren’t avoiding SV just because people on the forums told them to.
It’s not possible anymore, too much content has melee survival as baseline now for all the abilities in the expansions. Legion, BFA and SL.
If blizz wanted to, they absolutely could. Old content isn’t going to be what stops them from adding new stuff. It’s something they are going to have to address anyway at some point with Legion, and BFA / SL are not nearly as intrusive as Legion was concerning loot drops and what not.
Beyond that, I don’t think that really matters anyway as I’m not asking to remove current SV but add a 4th spec (per the topic)
hmm id like to see Demon hunters get a Third spec where a Naru replaces the Fel energies in them with Light … and they still Melee attack to build “resource name here” but all there abilities splash Holy energy that damages enemy’s and heals allys… so its a Dps Healing spec.
I’m into it, ranged Pally is also acceptable.
Like a Ranger? I’m in.
Sure why not, rocks are hard. Shammys like rocks. makes sense to me.
I’m sure this has been mentioned many time, but I thought the tanking spec will be cool for Shaman. Mixed bags of earth and water based abilities.
Survival is a fine melee spec for PvP and mythic +. We lack in single target dps. Probably the worst in the game for that. That’s literally all that has to be fixed. And even with that being said I still top in keys
I’m not asking to remove it.
I’d add a solid dev spec so they stop screwing up our game.
shamelessly rewords OP’s ideas
Melee DPS/Healer priest: Holy Paladin’s angrier little brother. Give us shield profs too so that we won’t be as squishy up close.
2h tank shammies: Earthly DK’s with more CC/Utility than sustain.
2h rogues: We’re still kind of missing that ninja fantasy sub’s supposed to (kind of) give. Would be nice to see something similar.
I don’t know if I’d consider these new specs or some kind of content that would change the appearance of a spec (fully cosmetic with new animations and names). Maybe some are only available to specific races.
Shadow Priest converted to Tide Sage (Kul Tiran and Human?)
Demonology Warlock converted to Necromancer
Feral Druid converted to Worgen (Keeps player in Worgen form and uses your claws)
a ranged dual wielder sounds cool. 2 guns… or 2 wands o,O (though I think wands are pretty obsolete in retail? Haven’t seen one drop yet for any of my cloth ppl) yes please