39 specs in the game, 2 of them uses bow. (Tho only 1 is actually specialized in archery).
No wonder why hunter is one of the most played class. lots of people play it because of pets, and lots of people play it because it’s the only Archer in the game.
The game hungers for a new type of archer.
We could have a new Class: Archer, Marksman or Ranger
The specs could be divided around:
Marksman: Bow/ Crossbow / Gun
Ranger: Nature / Death (dark ranger)
Or, we could have new specs added to classes like Warrior and Rogue.
Like on D&D, Archer is a type of warrior, and I see no reason why a rogue can’t use a ranged weapon, you’ve been wasting this archetype for too long.
If implemented as a spec for warrior, I think it would be nice to bring back the dead zone, if enemies get close you automatically change to a melee weapon. Less effective, but still, a downside of the spec.
To create an archer class on top of the 3-spec Hunter class? That could be a bit invasive for class balancing and all the realpolitik about that.
You’d have to think about the entire toolkit too: utilities and such. What particular role it might serve.
It’s good. D&D had a thing about ensuring that any class can be an archer. You look at Baldur’s Gate 3: I’ve come to actually rely on Karlach, a BARBARIAN, to use a certain bow that uses Strength modifiers. Even a Wizard can use a light crossbow, and races do get racial weapon proficiencies for free.
No that’s ridiculous. We don’t need another hunter class. Everything a hunter could be is covered by the 3 specs we have already. One focus on pure range, the other on pets and one focuses on melee. It would be ridiculous to make another hunter class with a new name that does the same thing. People play hunter cus they like the idea of taming pets and also because it’s the easiest class to play. World of warcraft isn’t baldurs gate or any other game. That’s what set’s w.o.w apart from these other games. Otherwise all these games would be the same game with just different names. That’s like saying we need another priest class but melee instead, oh wait, we already do its called a paladin. Hunter is fine being the only range class of its kind. as it already covers every kind of archer. Not to mentioned we got hero talents called dark ranger that has black arrow. And elves got the dark ranger customizations too. Which, by the way, not many people use those customizations.
Either Sub Rogue could have been redesigned into a range spec that used shadow magic and stealth. However, now that Hunters have Dark Ranger abilities, it’s a mute idea.
So, the next option is to have a Tinkerer class with a range spec. Explosive, turrets, and mines.
A whole class that focuses on range weapons would be a stretch, but another spec is highly more likely.
Dawg what? So because we have warrior we shouldnt have any other melee? Thats basically your logic. If they can figure out how to do multiple melee classes they can do the same with physical ranged classes.
Just off the top of my head for themes. Magic Archer like in Dragon’s Dogma, An alchemist type class that uses bows and guns, like Tempest in Dragon Age, Engineer with turrets and ranged weapons, Spirit Archer that fires ghostly arrows and do weird spirit stuff. Just being imaginative can go a long way.
It would of work for MM/SV, but not BM. They gave Sentinel to MM/SV and Dark Ranger to MM/BM, so they needed a Hero tree for SV/BM. Pack Leader is all they could come up with regrettably.
We need one handed guns in this game. Rogue gets one for a couple of abilities. We need actual guns to use.
THEN, imo, we should have a gun spec for every class.
Gun Mage - Shoots Fire, Frost or Arcane bullets.
Gunlock - Fel Bullets that curse enemies.
Gun Priest - Shadow bullets that leech HP to heal their team.
Gun Paladin - Holystrike bullets. Bullets blessed by the light that burn enemies.
Gun Shaman - Lightning Bullets that chain damage to nearby targets.
Gun Monk - John Wick.
Gun Rogue - Should replace Outlaw, imo.
Gun Hunter… Gunter - IMO, bombs and crap from Survival should move to this spec. Current Survival should be changed to something with fewer gadgets and can build to either switch back and forth between melee and ranged, or focus on one or the other. Including giving them the ability to dual wield. Maybe call it Ranger and let the Gunter be called Survival.
Should have been thinkerer/machine speaker. It’s even part of the story of TWW. It could have been focused around turret buffing/gadget shooting as a dps spec, tank bot spec around guns/bows/ranged, and healing spec based around heal bots.
Missed opportunity, especially considering how much gadgets there are around the races already.
BfA brought Mecha Gnomes, yet ignored how perfectly they could have introduced a Tinkerer class. My belief is that Blizzard is holding out until they have no more ideas, or subs crash hard and they try using Tinkerer to pull players back.
I would say that the emphasis shoudln’t be on the weapon type, but the damage type.
We need another physical Ranged class. It could be Spears, Glaives, Boomerangs, Slingshots, whatever.
It’s more akin to “because we have a variably crafty and naturalistic outworlder class that specializes in unique armaments (access to ranged weapons), physical explosives, consumable enchanted munitions, toxins, and beast companions we should not have another job that focuses any more than half of those things.”
Which would be akin to "If you already have a plate-wearing, anger-fueled class that specializes in one-hander-and-shield, two-handers, or dual-wield and iconically packaged with unique physical-seeming gap-closers, yells, and the ability to turn especially large, strong, and resistant, we would not need, say…
a plate-wearing, angst-fueled class that specializes in howls and leaping upon its enemies to tear its flesh from its limbs, as that is simply a Worgon Fury Warrior with especially poor hygiene,
a mail-wearing anger-fueled class that runs around with a sword and hammer, yells frequently, and makes lightning smashes with said hammer, as that basically just a Dwarven Protection Warrior race-larp-maxing a “Viking” aesthetic, nor
a plate-wearing, primarily physical combatant with the ability to evoke their tormented soul or perform powerful weapon attacks by activating runes on said weapons, as that would just be a wonky hybrid of Warrior, DK, and Paladins.
They’re confused as to their name, choice of weapon, or where they put the thing they primarily trained with.
We already do this. We just don’t arcanize the ammo ourselves.
This is better solved by offering joke transmogs.
See above.
See above, possibly as part of a weird unofficial “FFVIII crossover”.
Gun tonfas transmog atop Jab glyph.
How about we don’t randomly scrap a fairly popular spec just for your mog-jimmies?
It’s… just a Hunter. Who uses a gun. Doing so does not change their place in lore, their relationship to magic, nor their tactics.
If you want to make Rapid Fire uniquely available to bows while a musket would instead supply, say, a massive nuke that then requires a 5-second reload (that inevitably has to be nerfed to hell for PvP), by all means, ask for weapon differentiation (though I’d recommend basing the available action on transmog rather than on the actual base weapon), but there is no point in making a unique(?) “Gun Hunter”.
No, the OP clearly said we he wanted another bow using class, and this guy said every possible playstyle using a bow, could be, is covered; it’s not, they are just being unimaginative. Hunter is a ranger and fills that fantasy. There is plenty of other fantasies you could attach a ranged weapon too.
Yes, the OP’s suggestion was unimaginative and would butcher hunter; but they guy I responded too is still wrong in saying all possible physical ranged weapon options are covered.
I don’t even want any new classes, I want to see new hero specs come in so we can get some sideways progression going. But if there was going to be a new class, a physical ranged class is pretty ripe for the picking since we only have one.