What I think of Hunters since the patch.

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Jadein92
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What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Jadein92 »

Over the week since Patch 7.0 launched I, of course along with everyone else. Tried out the different specs and the new changes to classes. I had played a Survival hunter heavily on the Beta and was excited for the changes. So I talented up my hunters with their new specs, my 3 hunters each being different specs. I brought them all to Tanaan, specifically to see if I could function at least relatively the same as I did before the patch. And of course I know that during a prepatch to any expansion some classes may seem a little weaker due to changes that will be upcoming in the new content. And I took that into account. Ill put a breakdown of each spec, and my thoughts on them. A small note before I go further, I did before taking the different specs out for a run of dallies in Tanaan. I researched and practiced the rotation/talents. As for the skill level, I would not consider myself the best player in the world, but able to run current Heroic raid content.

Survival
With the many hours played on beta with survival I figured that out of all of them this would be the easiest to complete my dailies with. Which was true, out of the 3 specs Survival seems to be the least, empty?

Pros
-Fluid rotation
-Decent Survivabillity
-Generally fun to play
-Great Utility

Cons
-Damage output could seriously use a boost
-Weak AoE

It was hard to find cons for this spec because I genuinely love the new Survival, the only thing I could find wrong with it being the damage is a little low and I know that having the extra abilities from the artifact would help immensely. But the spec is most defiantly playable in current content (with practice) and you wont have too much trouble with it.

Marksman
I....dont even know what to say about Marksman, its...just so wierd. Different yes, and different isnt bad. But the way the rotation is, what spells marksman has at its disposal just seems lacking.

Pros
-Great AoE
-Good single target burst

Cons
-Clunky!!!
-Survivability
-Heavily RNG based

My main problem with Marksman is (I played with lone wolf and without) Is that you and your pet are soooo squish. With not that much to make up for it. Normal mobs tear through my pets like paper, and due to Marksman cleave being a constant thing, you end up pulling so much more *cough* Barrage, and with the removal of traps its so much harder to survive. Killing a rare was difficult, like...too difficult for most casual/lower end of the skill level to achieve. I was forced to use my one healing spell (Exhilaration) on CD, I believe I used it at least 3 times before the rare was dead. And a ridiculous amount of kiting. Without a pet there was far more kiting needed just to be able to survive long enough until my Exhilaration was off cooldown.

Beast Mastery
*sigh* Not sure where to begin with beast mastery.

Pros
-Exotic pets? Yay?
-Strong AoE
-Good burst

Cons
-Spirit Mend is almost necessary
-Survivability (You and your pet)
-Damage between cooldowns is very weak

I am quite disappointed with Beast Mastery, with the removal of pet buffs/most abilities, the pets seem lackluster. It only seems to make a minor difference between Tenacity/Feroicity/Cunning. Other than the added effect that each of the specs apply every time you hit Kill Command (If you have aspect of the beast talent) With the removal of the Misdirection glyph (it allowed your Misdirection to reset its cooldown every time you cast it on your pet) and Glyph of Mending (Heals the pet for 5% of it's total HP every 1 second for 10 seconds - total of 50% pet hp healed) compared to without the glyph its 25% of the pets health. That is a major nerf to pet healing. And sadly where that is concerned, beast masters wont get back with the artifact (at this point in time). Added with the removal of traps, beast mastery hunters (and I had this problem with marksman) is kiting is much much harder, and if you pull too many, either you feign death (30s cd), Aspect of the turtle (3min cd) binding shot/whatever talent you choose. I will agree that pets randomly dropping aggro seems to happen less frequently since before the patch and that helps immensely. But with a long cd on Misdirection it makes it difficult to take on more than a small handful of mobs.


P.S. If I did not state before I shall say so here, All of this is my opinion, I dont claim this as to be fact, just my experience playing the specs. Thanks :) and sorry for TLDR :lol:

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Quiv
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Quiv »

Jadein92 wrote:Marksman
I....dont even know what to say about Marksman, its...just so wierd.
Marks was weird enough until I took the Sidewinders talent. Holy sheet its super weird.
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Valnaaros »

Icy Veins, as some of you may know, does extensive testing and reviewing of all specs. Here is what they had to say for each of the Hunter specs.

Survival:

Strengths

High single-target burst damage
Powerful utility
High single-target damage in general

Weaknesses

Fairly complex spec
Weak AoE capabilities

Viability in the Current Patch

The role Survival Hunters will play in Legion remains to be seen, as it is no longer competing for ranged DPS spots, but must rather compete in the melee camp, which has received another new member in the form of Havoc Demon Hunters in the new expansion. Survival Hunters currently bring strong damage, but numbers are likely to change before the expansion releases. Strong single-target burst damage is generally considered to be one of the most important traits a spec can have, now and in the future, so it is possible that Survival will be a desirable spec.

Marksmenship:

Strengths

High burst damage
Efficient cleave on stacked targets
Strong single-target damage
Unlimited mobility with the tier 18 4-piece set bonus
Scales well with gear

Weaknesses

Cleave is automatic, making damage stops on stacked targets difficult
Bad RNG can have a huge negative impact at any gear level

Viability in the Current Patch

Marksmanship is currently considered the strongest raiding spec in the Legion pre-patch, as well as Legion itself. This may very well change between the pre-patch and release of the expansion, but for the time being it looks like Marksmanship with its amazing cleave and AoE ability at no expense of single-target damage and generally high damage, powerful gear scaling and strong artifact traits will be the raiding spec of choice in Legion. Managing the sometimes extremely punishing RNG of the spec will reward clever play, but can occasionally be extremely annoying.

Beast Mastery:

Strengths

High burst AoE damage (in Legion)
High AoE damage in general
Strong single-target burst damage
Unlimited mobility

Weaknesses

Cannot deal well with spread targets
Single-target DPS outside cooldowns is fairly weak

Viability in the Current Patch

Beast Mastery is considered to be worse than Marksmanship for raiding in the Legion pre-patch, and most likely in the Legion expansion as well. Keep in mind that things can easily change between now and the release of the expansion. Beast Mastery can be attractive to new players, as it is the easier Hunter spec to play, though there is still plenty of opportunity for excellent players to excel.
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Jadein92
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Jadein92 »

Quiv wrote:
Jadein92 wrote:Marksman
I....dont even know what to say about Marksman, its...just so wierd.
Marks was weird enough until I took the Sidewinders talent. Holy sheet its super weird.
Yeah I have no idea what is up with Sidewinders, and with the spells marksman has now, it would seem like their artifact would be a gun instead of a bow. Through me through a loop :lol:


Most of my talent information and rotation came from Icy Veins, I did read each section about how they think each spec is in the current patch. Icy veins is amazing to help with raiding, and beings not everyone raids I figured I would run a completely normal scenario that any player of any caliber would go and do, our beloved dailies! Their information currently seems only thinking of when we will get our artifacts in legion, it still doesnt change that doing content right now, and possibly when the legion invasion event comes out might feel how I described.

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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Teigan »

I think that's a fair review, and actually you and Icy Veins agree on several points. But I think a real world, not raiding with tanks and healers, perspective is valuable. Icy Veins is always a good resource, but even tho they have a "general" section, their main focus is end-game raiding. Since I'm a filthy casual, I don't really see end game raiding. LFR, yeah, but that doesn't count.
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Valnaaros »

Actually, Jadein, their current guides are most aimed at 100 and HFC. Once Legion officially launches, they'll change it to reflect the changes that Artifacts bring.

The problem with trying to make guides for world content is that it varies so much. In Legion, World Quests will be the main thing to do outside of raiding and pvping. These World Quests vary greatly in their objectives and how to get them done. I'm not even talking about the World Quests that involve proffs, pet battles, or pvp. There is just so much variety that they can't really write a guide that'll guarantee you an easy time with them all.

But what Icy Veins does offer is a build for lvling, world quests, dungeons, etc. Honestly, that is the most that any website can do. After that, it comes down to players giving help for individual specs for individual quests and dungeons.
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Jadein92
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Jadein92 »

Hmm, well by how they word most of their descriptions about each class they more talk about legion content instead of what is current
But that could just be me. I don't claim to be better than icy veins or anything, but they had not mentioned how playing just out in the world is. And I totally understand why, icy veins is more directed towards the raiding scene. It seems unnecessary to provide guides for that. I was just offering my personal experience. And honestly many of the problems would be so easily fixed with 2 simple things. Make mend pet heal for how much the glyphed version did. And make Misdirection reset it's cool down when cast on the pet. But alas time will tell.

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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Valnaaros »

Yeah, they do talk about Legion content a lot (since it is coming up), but a lot of the rotations (not just for hunters) refer to changes to the guides once Legion launches :)
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Jadein92
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Jadein92 »

Yeah, I totally get that. I guess this was to show how it is right now, I guess. I figured it would be helpful to someone... :oops:

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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Valnaaros »

I understand, Jadein :)

Hopefully, Blizz will implement those changes or something like that in 7.1. I highly doubt they'll do anything like that at this point, but I can easily see it happening later :)
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Jadein92
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Re: What I think of Hunters since the patch.

Unread post by Jadein92 »

We can only hope I suppose.

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