I agree, I hate the Unpruning. I’ve been playing Paladin since BC and I honestly thought Ret Paladin has been very fun to play over the last few expansions.
The unpruning doesn’t really seem to add anything but bloat. Auras are useless and I was glad when they removed them. Two of the ones they added back (Crusader/Retribution) are just passives we had in Legion/BFA and are now being removed and turned into auras. Concentration Aura is very niche. Devotion seems to be the one most paladins will just turn on by default and rarely change.
Consecration just tickles the mobs and is barely worth even using. Shield of the Righteous requires a shield (why make this baseline instead of put it in prot/holy?)
I don’t really get all the “It’s just for flavor, don’t use them if they are useless” arguments. Imagine these were brand new abilities they were adding, would anyone be happy that a new ability for their class was useless and barely worth using?
Unpruning is just adding bloat and I hope they reverse it down the line.
this aint it chief. Ironic comin from a demon hunter.
Were there any buttons that they gave back that are actually useful for their class? I can’t think of that many on my own. DnD on Frost is only good because Death’s Due. Sac is kinda nice but it’s sort of whatever I’m not gonna be using it rotationally. Death Coil on Blood is sort of neat I guess if there are a lot of bosses that go out of range.
There’s a huge difference between utility “buttons” and rotational “buttons”. It can be annoying to always need to manage tons of keybinds, i.e. when your rotation requires tons and tons of skills.
A lot of what I see being “unpruned” are utilities, like Curse Of Tongues that was mentioned, and hunter’s mark. You’re not applying these things on every single fight, and you’re probably not applying them a hundred times in a fight.
What’s funny is, when i went from playing classic then back to retail after a long break, I noticed two things.
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Some classes are downright boring because of the lack of interesting skills to use. This is an opinion, but Demon Hunters with their 4 buttons are very “regular” to play without much flavor.
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Some classes have a million active combat buttons, but don’t do much else - that utility that brings some flavor is missing.
A class which is pretty balanced as far as utility and rotation are unholy DKs. Their “rotation” is fairly complicated, relies somewhat on procs depending on your talents. There’s a lot of active attacks you need to use based on the situation you’re in. but I don’t have to use every single attack on every single fight.
Likewise, unholy DKs have some utility, that doesn’t increase DPS directly and is only used in special circumstances. Death grip is one, just makes life for the tank a little easier if they don’t snag a caster. We have a few ways to interrupt casts, and have some emergency skills if we have to tank in a punch, plus self-healing which happens out of rotation. Those are all extra buttons to push that don’t directly affect our DPS, but are great utilities to have for the class in general.
Also, many classes have talent choices which eliminate some keybinds in favor of passives - you can always choose to do that if you’re bothered by having a 5th button to press.
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Bad take, there’s already too few pvp talent slots. It should be baseline, you don’t HAVE to bind it, but if you choose not to use it, you shouldn’t perform as well as people who know how to manage all of their abilities.
Because arcane mage’s 3 button rotation in Uldir was a ton of fun. Any fire mages think that fire mage is fun outside of combustion? The fact is that rotations in this game for the most part aren’t complicated in the slightest, and classes would benefit from having a few more things to press. Gonna say something controversial, but look at ff14’s jobs, there are simpler jobs and more complex jobs with rotations that vary from Dancer’s “Hit 2 buttons regularly, 2 buttons that have 30 and 60 sec cds, and hit the glowing buttons.” To Ninja’s resource management, buff uptime, and raid window buffing. When I’m playing my fire mage looking at my bar makes me want to cry at how little I actually have to do.
I can because I have the brain capacity to do so.
Ironically, most people who main this class almost always come back saying it’s too simple or it’s lacking in rotation which I tend to agree.
Was one of those people myself. Once you see passed the double jump and the gap closures there’s nothing remotely interesting about this class.
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Unprunning unique class abilities is a good idea.
Having ever added boring copy and paste abilities so ever class is the same was the mistake and the bloat that needs to be removed.
Warriors/Rogues/Hunters should not get/need heal… just as every spec should not have a stun.
I can tell you don’t pvp on a hunter. That one skill is awesome against rogues.
Pop that on him and watch him scurry away from trying to ninja the flag.
From what I heard, DH’s are still babies first dps class in terms of abilities in SL. So i think you’ll be fine.
As someone who mains a Warlock, I am STOKED to have my curses back. Give me back all my buttons! 
I bet you’re a good player, don’t sell yourself short. Just wanted to point out that DH is Demon Hunter and DK is Death Knight.
You guys are getting unpruned??
unpruning is a GREAT IDEA, for me, it is the biggest improvement in SL
if Marksman and RDruid are any indication on the PTR, its just fine with me.
I guess I have an unpopular opinion here, but I miss all the random abilities I had as a paladin that had very situational use-cases. I feel like that was a big area of growth for players in PVP to find new and creative ways to use mechanics…
IE taunting hunter pets to break CC, HoS to break CC, taunting to get into combat and avoid saps, etc.
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Git gud. I like having tools for situations and having the skill to know what and when to use it.
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This community has once again proven that it is unpleasable.
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Then… don’t put them on your bar? People with skill will be glad to use them while you can tunnel vision like always. Both sides win.
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You’ll never be able to please everyone honestly.
As for the unpruning; Eh. I’m on OP’s side a little bit I guess, I think a lot of what they unpruned were minor abilities, and the people who say they like ‘situational’ options may not even see those situations pop up in Shadowlands.
I promise you if you’re an arms warrior and you slap on a shield to tank the boss for even a hit or two, you will be gibbed. The game isn’t designed for these types of abilities anymore, like hunter’s mark costing a GCD and doing so little in a pve environment? That’s a waste of a gcd, but not pressing it feels almost as bad as pressing it.
I really do think this is going to be a ‘You think you do, but you don’t’ moment.