I don’t really understand why it’s not meta. It has insane defensives, pumps damage and you don’t sacrifice a ton of single target for aoe builds, tranq shot on a short cd, lust and decent cc/mob control. What am I missing here?
What are you talking about? Do you mean Dark Ranger vs Pack Leader? Or do you mean overall desirability in groups?
In raiding, Pack Leader outperforms Dark Ranger on almost every fight (archon.gg). Even so, BM only placed at 22 out of 26 dps specs in the last 2 weeks (warcraftlogs.com), not factoring hero specialization. Interestingly MM is placed at number 1 currently.
In M+ Dark Ranger is used by 90.8% of all BM hunters but ranked as C-Tier (archon.gg). According to warcraftlogs.com BM placed at 37 out of 39 overall specs for points earned in M+ in the last 2 weeks. Interestingly MM is placed at number 39.
In PvP I don’t know where to find similar rankings but wowmeta.com places BM as 1 of 2 top ranged specs in the game (along with Demo warlock). I am certain that Dark Ranger is already the meta spec in pvp because I looked all that up before trying my first bg this season a few hours ago. In mediocre pve gear with no experience, I certainly felt quite meta (at least vs unrated bg opponents).
No I’m asking why is Dark Ranger BM not a meta spec? When you compare it to say a frost DK which is meta I don’t see what makes a DK so much better than a bm hunter. I see tier lists where BM hunter is at the bottom of mythic + tiers and it makes no sense why
sim it yourself and find out why, from what i can tell is that packleader provides consistent damage where dark ranger does piss poor cleave/aoe
I’m talking about the META though, not Dark Ranger vs Pack Leader. Why is BM ranked so low on tier lists vs other specs is what I am trying to understand.
because its the easy baby spec for grandmas, next caller please
BM hasn’t been ranked very high for a hot minute. BM usually ranks ok but to have to be Meta would mean that its dps out shines hunter’s horrible survivability. BM is an ok DPS but asking for it to be Meta is a bit much.
I gave you the stats. Those are from actual logs over the last 2 weeks.
In Raids, BM dps is in 22nd place out of 26 dps specs. That’s their actual performance, not someone placing them on a tier list.
In M+ they are 37th on points out of 39 overall specs. I have to check but I don’t think I’ve done higher than +8s on my hunter. I feel really good in keys, really enjoy my hunter and feel strong but that doesn’t change the fact that statistically they are scoring lower than almost every other spec in the game. When I’m on my other toons and we need to fill a spot, we never look for a hunter in particular, usually we are either chasing a key buff or particular ability (like being able to dispel other people) but generally we take someone we know over any particular class.
In PVP they seem to be meta in both larger (bg) and smaller (arena) content. I can’t comment much about it but I see lots of calls for BM to be nerfed.
BM is not topping raid and m+ tier lists because it is performing lower than other specs in actual data. However BM is at the top of pvp tier lists (for ranged dps) because all those utility things you mentioned are consistently more important than damage output (while in pve they are situational).
It pumps less damage than a lot of other specs that are meta. It also has wonky cd sync issues.
See thats what I dont understand, hunters, especially DR BM has so much survivability, 3 shield walls, all of them have self heals baked in and an immunity. Not to mention the added tenacity pet cd. And then you factor in the mobility, what has better survivability?
So I went to murlok io and simmed the top rated frost DK against the top rated DR BM hunter and the results may surprise you
raidbots com/simbot/report/vmrNnEKgTD7GWLVdN1ygQc
raidbots com/simbot/report/n6uepyQ6pyhJZ8zMPqhKiX
Also I know Frost DK is better at AoE not ST so I did a major adds slice to compare
I mean, they don’t ?
This is from your sims
You can see that DK bursts significantly higher than BM
There are also issues with withering fire in a lot of dungeons.
You can compare it in a bit more realistic scenario :
Got to agree. Hunter survivability is trash. I have my BM hunter with 10% verse getting one shot by AOEs and boss mechanics (first boss spit in NW) that dont phase my ret with almost 0 vers.
They have trashed hunters for years now. They need a ground up redesign.