I thought that it was in BC when Stutter Stepping went away. You may be thinking about a bug fix.
wowwiki fandom com/wiki/Patch_4.0.6a
Thatâs not accurate. Arcane Shot becoming resource-limited instead of cooldown-limited is itself a pretty big change. The thing about mana is it promoted static rotations since you had a large resource pool with long spend phases and short regen phases with Aspect of the Viper. Focus effectively merged those phases: resource management was ALWAYS important, especially once you add CD phases which rewards pooling resources when it counts. This made Hunters feel way more dynamic as we were constantly alternating between spending and gaining focus.
The only thing poorly done about it was the focus regen was originally too slow, and when it was made faster by the T3 set bonus Survival totally dominated the Hunter raiding scene to a ridiculous extreme. It was pretty much fixed by MoP with Steady Shot giving 14 focus per cast (was 9 at the start of Cata, 18 with the T3 Bonus).
See below.
What changed in BC was the deadzone was removed. There was still a minimum range of 5 yards up until 5.0 but before 2.3 the minimum range was still 8 yards.
4.0.6a was a bug fix for the 4.0.6 change that made auto-shot mobile.
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/news/2166872
Go to the Hunter section. The auto-shot change is there.
As were a bunch of SV nerfs because SV came out of the focus change really well off and was dominant at the start of Cata. Like I said earlier it would return to dominance in Dragon Soul.
I remember threads at the time discussing it, with some people complaining and saying stutter-stepping made the class interesting. I never bought that argument, and not many people back then did either. Most were very happy with that change, and the loss of ammo as well.
2 Likes
I believe Bepples is right on this.
Official patch notes for 4.0.6
Edit:
Damn it Bepples, youâre too fast!
While you are telling me things that I disagree with, you should remember Counter Attack in Cata, which still cost Mana the entire expansion.
Yup, youâre right.
There were very few cases where I actually liked having mana as a resource.
I mean sure, with mana, you set the pace yourself during fights. Up until the point when you didnât. When you ran out of it. You could ofc do stuff to manage how you spend your mana. But that often resulted in several small windows when you had to delay doing stuff or when you had to skip certain things.
With focus, especially for BM nowadays, you have a few small windows as well when you have to wait for it to come back. But at least they are much shorter now compared to Legion(early stages).
In general, a spec that allows for higher focus generating capabilities but also tends to spend more focus on a per-cast basis, a spec like that tends to have faster pacing.
Granted BM might not be very complex, nor does it have a lot of buttons to push. But it still feels faster as a result of the increased focus regen.
I have said this before, but, I donât like casting and I like the original fantasy of Hunters where you can interact with(and rely on) your pet when needed.
This, for me, excludes MM as a spec option.
I donât fancy melee combat. Which means that the current MSV is not an option either.
This leaves me with BM. Now, I do like that BM has more focus on pets.
I donât like that so many of itâs talents are basic stand-alone, press-on-cd, abilities with little to no ties to the core of the spec.
I also donât like that several of the passive talents have effects that, IMO, have so little impact when playing that they should not even be talents at all.
Includes: Killer Instinct, Scent of Blood, One with the Pack, Venomous Bite, Thrill of the Hunt, Stomp, as well as Aspect of the Beast.
I included One with the Pack as itâs a RNG within RNG mechanic. Thatâs just awful IMO. The Wild Call proc mechanic felt much better in Legion(especially during Nighthold, with the T19 set bonus).
I still remember when, with some luck, I kept Bestial Wrath up for entire fights(and I played with the Killer Cobra-talent). That was so much fun.
My point is that Blizzard wanted to give each Hunters spec a distinction; howevere, all they have done is given us a spec that has been built from borrowing abilities and game-play from other specs.
Legionâs version of MSV had more variety but it seems that version was not a winner, so Blizzard thought by giving players a rehased version of another spec, with some abilities taken from BM, they would have something players would want.
However, it just continues to show how out of touch the development team is. Players liked Legion MSV it just needed a little clean up, and WotM removed, but they just heard âBM should been meleeâ or âthere is too many buttonsâ, so they revamped it again to dumb it down for everyone.
Still though, MSV is one of the bottom specs that this could lead to another revamp. Either we could see more range abilities added or just a revert to RSV. If Blizzard was willing to remove a spec after 12 years of being apart of hunters there is no safety in believing they could not do the same again.
2 Likes
Personally, Iâm not against this. I like that the core of specs(and talents), have a distinction. I like that they are focusing in the respective fantasies.
Does this mean that I fully agree with how they are designed atm? No, I donât.
There are things that I would like to see change for each of the specs.
As well as things I would want to bring back that we used to have. Distracting Shot, Tranq Shot, Wyvern Sting, to mention a few. MSV could ofc get itâs own abilities that essentially does the same things as these ranged ones.
Abilities such as these, I wouldnât want back through utility talents or through PvP talents. They should be there, baseline for all specs. Why? Partially, each one of them does itâs part to enhance the fantasy of the class. Not just for singular specs.
Like I said above, the core abilities + talents + some passive effects, keep those unique for each spec. Let them speak for the identity of that single spec.
But as far as Class fantasy goes, we need stuff back outside of the actual core mechanics.
I admit that when we saw the MSV 2.0 version with BfA, it didnât exactly make the fact that we lost our previous SV spec for a melee design feel better. What it did was making me feel that:
They in the end, did not scrap our SV for a proper melee spec. They scrapped it for some hybrid spec that speaks to neither ranged combat nor melee combat. A spec that even has part of itâs core mechanics taken straight from another spec tied to the same class.
In that case I hope they steer back towards the previous focus on actual melee combat. That they finish what they started with Legion.
I mean, sure, ofc I would want the old ranged SV spec back. But if they(and we as players) continue with the either/or -situation, there will always be that one side who feels neglected. And this problem will never go awayâŚ
As far as bringing back more focus on melee for the current SV spec, my suggestions can be found in the link below.
I believe that these changes would make for a proper melee spec that still holds the fantasy of you being a Hunter: We need range Survival Hunters back - #596 by Ghorak-laughing-skull
It also happens to contain a suggestion for how we can bring in the dual wield-fightstyle for those that want this. A way that fits the fantasy of the class as a whole as well as the origins of it. Is it perfect? Maybe not. Would it require work to get right? Yep. Would it be worth it? I think so.
As for my suggestions on the return of our old ranged SV spec. Many here have probably seen them before: We need range Survival Hunters back - #457 by Ghorak-laughing-skull
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4 spec options for the class allows us to have all the previously suggested and liked playstyles the class has seen in the past.
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This way, the devs wont have to try to incorporate the old SV spec into MM, which I believe, would be a mistake as the two styles are to different to work together.
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The same goes for MSV. They can let MSV be just that. A melee spec.
1 Like
MSV is too mobile to be similar to other Specs. Blizzard has been sharing the ability love in all classes. MSV got hit with too much pruning. Add the rather horrible community we have now here and it makes it worse. Now add that itâs our PvP Spec and itâs actually doing well enough.
That ainât anywhere near what your post looks like.
Didnât it just not have a resource cost?
No, it was unusable because it cost Mana. We used it to point out how unfinished we were.
1 Like
Well isnât this grand, all the MSV and RSV People coming together on solidarity!
BTW Iâm planning on rolling a Hunter on Classic named Boopples.
Planning on going full melee with Nightfall, it will be grand.
I hope youâre not expecting to succeed with that.
I mean, sure you could get Nightfall and you could utilize any melee abilities the class had access to back then(the Survival talent tree did give us more).
But if you are to only fight with what melee attacks/abilities that the class had access to, you wonât get very far.
The class back then wasnât meant to be melee-based. Anything that was meant for melee-use back then was just there so that we werenât completely helpless when the enemy was in melee-range.
This, was because back then, the class had the restriction of attack range.
1-8 yards, within this distance from the enemy, we simply could not use our ranged weapon.
5-8 yards, was the deadzone. Within this distance range, we could neither attack with melee-abilities, nor could we use the ranged weapon in an effective way.
8 yards and up, was the distance from which we could use most ranged attacks.
1 Like
Nah man Boopples will be Tauren! So with Leeway Iâll get 15 yard melee range.
Classic melee Hunter Boopples!
2 Likes
By all means. Go for it!
Edit:
Just finished my dinner while watching the WFR.
They were talking about the Hunter class and what benefits/disadvantages it has.
It was so nice to hear, or well, actually itâs sad to hear as well that, due to encounters are designed nowadays, they said:
Hunters survive fairly well. Especially BM. They do good damage. They can burst.
But hunters donât have DoTs.
This rings so much truth.
When it comes down to splitting damage. Funneling damage. Or overall dealing with several targets(especially when they are spread out). Hunters just arenât in a good place to be considered.
Spec identity, design and fantasy aside. Considering the way most encounters are made today, as soon as it becomes about one of the above situations, this becomes an argument for why we should have the old SV back.
Now, I will always prio the uniqueness and the fantasy above numbers and performance. But it just felt so good hearing that. And why itâs more motivation to bring the spec back.
3 Likes
MSV has at least 3 dots!!
1 Like
Marks has one available as well. Ghorak should remember that MSV is still a Hunter Spec and itâs intellectually dishonest to say otherwise.
@Ghorak, this is the second thread where you have ignored MSV.
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No Whim, Iâm not ignoring MSV. I never said that itâs not a hunter specâŚI dno why you even say that this is what Iâm doing.
You have read several of my previous posts. Posts that actually speak for MSV. Posts that make it obvious that I want the spec to remain as a part of the classâ toolkit.
Itâs true that the quote stated that âHunterâs donât have DoTsâ. And while you might interpret this as them saying that, we have no DoTâs at all.
They are obviously talking about our capabilities to multi-DoT. Or overall capability to deal with spread targets.
Sure, MM has 1 DoT + 1 CD(AMoC).
Serpent Sting. But that wonât exactly make MM very attractive for fights where this(having many DoTs) is a big advantage to be able to bring.
MSV, has a bit more in terms of DoT-capabilities yes. You have Serpent Sting that you can talent for multi-target applications, as well as Wildfire Bomb baseline which can help for multiple stacked targets.
You can also get A Murder of Crows, but as with MM, itâs a CD.
None of the above screams that the Hunter class has specs you can consider to be very useful for such encounters.
Sry if I did not make this clear, to be what the intent with that post was.
1 Like
When someone in this thread said that Hunters donât have dots your response was:
Like I said in the other thread, the only way for it to ring true is to ignore MSV, which has more than one DOT and can be talented into even more DOTs and Az Armor makes it even more fascinating. There is a loud few who separate MSV from the Class. Itâs 100*F today and I posted that outside. I might have been too cranky. Sorry if I was.
MSV can do this with more than one DOT baseline, and you covered it well with:
Now AMoC is weird in that itâs both a CD and and a DOT.
I disagree but this is a thread that those of us who RP should do as it could be excellent.
It wasnât someone in this thread. It was quoted from a stream for the WFR where they were talking about the Hunter class and itâs viability in raids so far.
They said more than what Iâm writing now ofc.
But in response to your reply above:
Quote(from the discussion on stream): âHunterâs donât have DoTsâ
Iâm very well aware that all of our current specs have some kind of abilities that deal periodic damage.
Iâm sure those on the stream are as well.
To put in context, they were talking about raid encounters and how so many of them have situations where you would want to focus on multi-dotting or focus on dealing with spread out targets.
Yes, if you look at the statement alone. Itâs false. Hunterâs do have DoTs.
But if you put it in context with the overall discussion on raid encounters and how the class isnât very good at dealing with multiple spread targets. It becomes more true.
Now, I did in my first post on this subject, bring up the topic of multi-dotting as well as using multiple targets to funnel damage into ST.
I did this in order to expand on that specific statement. And why I chose to include it/talk about it.
MSV essentially only has Serpent Sting which you can reliably apply to multiple targets at once.
That one ability on itâs own, will not make you very attractive for fights where this way of dealing damage is required.
Keep in mind that Iâm mostly talking about fights where enemies tend to be spread out. And not being stacked together for very long.
As for fights where stacked AoE is favorable, all hunter specs have ways to deal with this. Some better than others ofc. This is always the case, with every spec in the game.
Itâs a DoT, though not one that you can apply to multiple targets at once.
Iâm sorry, I canât figure out what this means ![:confused:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/confused.png?v=6" ":confused:")
Did your phone decide words on itâs own again? ^^
Edit:
MSV is afaik, the only hunter spec who has a way to âfunnelâ damage dealt to several targets, and make you deal more damage against a single main target.
(thanks to the Bloodseeker talent).
Now, I havenât played MSV since the alpha/beta of BfA, but I dno how much that talents would actually give you in terms of ST dmg.
But as it applies to all bleeds on all targets within 12 yards, and not just bleeds youâve applied yourself, it has the potential to be really good.
1 Like
That one ability on itâs own, will not make you very attractive for fights where this way of dealing damage is required.
[/quote]
This is one of those statements that lets those of us who main MSV know that one doesnât play it. The Bomb/s should never be ignored, and with WFI the bomb gets more powerful as a DOT. The trick is positioning. Get in the right spot and it covers quite a bit more. Heck, the cone has even widened with 8.2. For the spread to be an issue, we have to be talking about a large enough distance that once should focus on ST damage, even if one has to swap to another boss arcoss a room.
Like I said, itâs weird.
I think that I got my posts/threads mixed up. I mean Class Fantasy with SV using itâs DOTs.
A large part of that funnel it WFBâs cone.
Hereâs the build I run with:
Viperâs Venom
Guerilla Tactics
Camouflage
Blood Seeker
Post Haste
Mongoose Bite
Wild Fire Infusion
What I like the most about Blood Seeker is the Attack Speed bonus.
Also wife aggro 
so Iâm distracted.