Nerf to Hunter self-healing

[Gimlion]

While looking at the armored Moonkin forms, I also looked at the spells section, and it appears hunters are losing some of their self-healing power.

Spirit Bond has been reduced to 1% again, down from the 3% it was buffed to earlier in beta. Also, Exhilaration, When you Disengage, you are instantly healed for 5% of your total health, down from 15%.

Now, idk how strong these abilities were in the current stage of beta, but I'm kind of disappointed that they're getting nerfed, I was greatly looking forward to them in live for PvP. If Spirit bond remains at 1%, I may end up picking Hidden Tiger or Ironhawk over it. Oh well /shrug

[Kalliope]

Hee, yeah, I noticed that too. I also noticed that we had a LOT of mostly passive healing from both prior to that. So we'll see if that's an overnerf or just right.

[Sesamee]

Grr! Nerf'd already! The disengage heal we have to use judiciously not just willy nilly. Being tied into our major counter to things like a warrior's charge makes it a self heal with a big caveat. And with the Spirit Bond nerf no way it can compete against Iron Hawk now.

Blizz, pls don't take away all our nice things...now that we finally have them!!!

[SpiritBinder]

Grr! Nerf'd already! The disengage heal we have to use judiciously not just willy nilly. Being tied into our major counter to things like a warrior's charge makes it a self heal with a big caveat. And with the Spirit Bond nerf no way it can compete against Iron Hawk now.

Blizz, pls don't take away all our nice things...now that we finally have them!!!

Our healing did need a nerf, but I'm inclined to think that "easy does it" did not come to mind this time.

10% for Invigoration would have been a nice testing ground as for the reasons mention, it's tied to another skill that must be off cooldown or not unusable to activate the heal. And yeah AOTIH looks very much the preference atm, again maybe make it 2% and extent to every 3 secs or something... Oh well, time will tell

[Sasrei]

Ahh not surprised Bliiz seems to have this thing with making us OP for a bit then overnerfing the heck out of us. Happens all the time.. but hopefully they can adjust it just right. I am holding out hope... steady shot is up to 14 focus now... hope cobra shot will be the same cause I havent used steady shot in a looooong time

[Ellaran]

It's beta, you can't really nerf on beta XD Our self-healing was probably a bit too strong, better to balance it now than wait till live and have everyone screaming about hunters being OP and having something like the massive BeastCleave arena nerfs that we still haven't recovered from.

[Andine]

They should be careful with nerfing talents to the point they're useless. Nerfing usual abilities till they're useless is pretty standard, because people will just stop using them (and then Blizzard will wonder why people don't use those). Nerfing optional talents like those... will just make people ignore the talent and bring the new system that bit closer to cookie cutters again. Choices like those should matter and taking 1% Spirit Bond just sounds like a waste.

[Kalliope]

taking 1% Spirit Bond just sounds like a waste.

Now this is a valid point. When a number is really small like that, to a non-number cruncher, it seems like a waste, just on principle. I know it's just a matter of perception, but that's 9/10s of the law, isn't it? (Spoiler alert: no, I just made that up.)

I'm not totally sure there's a practical way of making small numbers sound sexy, though, aside from having them prove themselves useful in practice.

[Sesamee]

It's beta, you can't really nerf on beta XD Our self-healing was probably a bit too strong, better to balance it now than wait till live and have everyone screaming about hunters being OP and having something like the massive BeastCleave arena nerfs that we still haven't recovered from.

Whatever the semantics, we had reasonable self healing for a split second. Enough to compete with classes who have the same or more. It got taken away. Hopefully temporarily. 3% Spirit Bond and a 15% DE weren't OP. The 3% spirit bond was particularly important because AOTIH was competing with it. Now they just went and made a useless talent and a "right choice"....the very thing they were trying to get away from. I suppose, you know, instead of actually making us good they could just nerf the hell out of AOTIH and BOOM a choice again!

I'm just not OK with hunters finally having the self healing capabilities other classes have enjoyed all along yet somehow when we get competitive its all, "Oh God, can't have that...but here have some porcupine pets!" (not that I don't adore mine!!) One of the things I am looking forward to most is pvp in MoP. I want to get into it more and if they tease us with finally being viable then take it all way it will be very disappointing.

[Makoes]

Well this IS beta, and things are in a state of flux. But the Beta forums are there for people to leave feedback on the changes. Its always a good idea to keep an open mind in beta, and test out the changes first (for what they are, not for what they were) and then go from there.

If they are scaling back the hunters self heals, its probably because some aspect or combination was proving to have greater results then they wanted, and they are attempting to fix it or scale it in a more balanced manner. Not to say they will get it right in the first go, but thats why we are here to test the changes and leave feedback.

[Kalliope]

Well this IS beta, and things are in a state of flux. But the Beta forums are there for people to leave feedback on the changes. Its always a good idea to keep an open mind in beta, and test out the changes first (for what they are, not for what they were) and then go from there.

If they are scaling back the hunters self heals, its probably because some aspect or combination was proving to have greater results then they wanted, and they are attempting to fix it or scale it in a more balanced manner. Not to say they will get it right in the first go, but thats why we are here to test the changes and leave feedback.

*nods in agreement*

Also, giving hunters too much self-healing is silly (from a PvE perspective) because in many, MANY situations where another class would be taking damage, we don't. Our pets are doing it. So if we get overbuffed, other classes would have every right to call foul.

So really, I'm personally inclined to trust that the devs know what they're doing.

[Tsuki]

Still, it's a huge improvement over the current spirit bond. I personally found 3%/2sec a bit op for a passive

[Sesamee]

It was my understanding that they were moving away from "PvP" vs "PvE" specs and the talents are what would add the utility for what a given situation demands. I guess I'm speaking more from a pvp perspective when I say I just don't see why other classes like Ret Paladins, Spriests, Warriors even, can have amazing self heals but we can't. Clearly self heals are less of a concern in pve content but they are extremely important in pvp. Lack of self heals has been a huge detriment to our pvp ability for a long time. One that hasn't been fixed, even though the opportunities to do so were there, until now. They fixed our dead zone (great!!) so I just don't want them to half ass it and leave the other component, an extremely important one, lacking.

I realize that the beta is a time of testing and changes will be made. I just don't want hunters to go down the crap to mediocre for pvp path we've been on for so long. Everything was looking so good for a while. This nerf, or whatever you want to call it, raises all kinds of alarm bells in my head, that's all.

[Equeon]

Um, why not make it 2%? 2.5%? 1.5%? I love Spirit Bond so much at its current state, and it seemed even better in beta... why?!

[Gimlion]

It was my understanding that they were moving away from "PvP" vs "PvE" specs and the talents are what would add the utility for what a given situation demands. I guess I'm speaking more from a pvp perspective when I say I just don't see why other classes like Ret Paladins, Spriests, Warriors even, can have amazing self heals but we can't. Clearly self heals are less of a concern in pve content but they are extremely important in pvp. Lack of self heals has been a huge detriment to our pvp ability for a long time. One that hasn't been fixed, even though the opportunities to do so were there, until now. They fixed our dead zone (great!!) so I just don't want them to half ass it and leave the other component, an extremely important one, lacking.

I realize that the beta is a time of testing and changes will be made. I just don't want hunters to go down the crap to mediocre for pvp path we've been on for so long. Everything was looking so good for a while. This nerf, or whatever you want to call it, raises all kinds of alarm bells in my head, that's all.

Don't forget DKs... I've fought DK's that I could not get past 50% because they'd always be in melee range of someone else for their self-heal attack, and blood worms. Or Warlocks that consistently life drain me as I I'm being hammered by other players as well.

[Galaxy]

I look at this from a PVE stand point.. Sure, the DE heal would have been an obnoxious curve to deal with:

*jumps out of the clumped group to help out on big bursty damage fight, runs back*

But I could have gotten accustomed to it and learned when to do it vs when there's a cliff nearby. *DE's right off the LK's platform- WOOPS!*

I had planned on using spirit bond, since raids ARE seeing more damage directed to the ranged classes. The biggest problem (even in live) I have is during major damage fights, I can stop and heal myself up on my shadow priest or druid. That takes a little pressure off the healer. I see our lock do the healing channeling thing, and I won't even start over frenzied regen. However, as a hunter, a poor healer has to focus heal me. Theoretically, I see that because the other classes can help out, they should be free to focus me from death. I don't find it as easy to say in practice. I use bandages. A lot. Mid boss encounter. Yup.

I have to agree, it seems like all the other classes have a solid healing ability somehow.

(of course, this is puuuuuurely IMO, with lack of math)

[Sesamee]

Don't forget DKs... I've fought DK's that I could not get past 50% because they'd always be in melee range of someone else for their self-heal attack, and blood worms. Or Warlocks that consistently life drain me as I I'm being hammered by other players as well.

Yes, both these classes have excellent self heals as well. I could pretty much have listed all other nine classes as ones that have more self healing than we do. I have a warlock and as my former main (so a bit biased), I don't begrudge them their self heals because they need it. As much as we do or maybe even more. In a good 3's comp they are power house fear bots and cc machines but otherwise they suck in pvp like we do. I pretty much wreck warlocks one on one. And DK's? I can't ever seem to get away from those guys. I realize I'm not the greatest pvp'er by far and am still learning but the whole "all you huntards have to do is kite" attitude assumes that every melee class doesn't have a ton of tools to deal with our kiting.

I had planned on using spirit bond, since raids ARE seeing more damage directed to the ranged classes. The biggest problem (even in live) I have is during major damage fights, I can stop and heal myself up on my shadow priest or druid. That takes a little pressure off the healer. I see our lock do the healing channeling thing, and I won't even start over frenzied regen. However, as a hunter, a poor healer has to focus heal me. Theoretically, I see that because the other classes can help out, they should be free to focus me from death. I don't find it as easy to say in practice. I use bandages. A lot. Mid boss encounter. Yup.

If you're using bandages mid boss fight then something is going wrong. It could be the strat, tanks not properly rotating cd's, healers not doing their job, dps taking avoidable damage, etc. Bandaging mid fight is a huge dps loss with a poor healing return. Of course if you're dead you do no dps but I've not once had to bandage during a fight ever.

But yes, I do have a much easier time on my lock, esp as destro. Soul link, Nether Ward plus drain life, plus soulstone then healthstone pretty much means I'm always the last to die in pve on my lock.

[Gimlion]

Eh, I don't think Hunters are any worse off in PvP than anyone else, you just have to know that 1v1 it'll usually be harder to win b/c of the deadszone. Once that gets eliminated I think we'll even out with the rest of the classes very well. I do think a way for hunters to self heal is an important thing to add. Especially since with the removal of a deadzone that we'll almost explicitly save the ability for a heal.

[Sesamee]

Well if you go by the stats hunters are very underrepresented in top pvp. I disagree that we aren't any worse off than others. There are clear pvp powerhouse classes and those that aren't. Precisely because of the dead zone and a distinct lack of self heals. Add in a few clunky mechanics that make us easy to lock down, for the most part we can't cc and do damage at the same time, and I think a strong case can be made that we are not great in pvp right now. I do agree it's looking better in MoP, although not if they end up taking away all the good things they gave us. I hope that doesn't end up happening.

[Slickrock]

Still, with the nerf, AOTIH is a no-brainer to pick as a talent now. I hope they don't nerf that.