While I can see some hunters giving a Raptor Strike rotation a shot, namely myself, I can't see the vast majority of hunters doing this. Mainly, because of the difference in play style this rotation would require. Like you mentioned. Currently, a hunter can achieve a nice shot rotation using a one-button macro and rolling his face on it (I'm told, I manually weave). Running in and out of melee cannot be achieved this way. A hunter would have to pay attention and move in and out at the right time.

And do you honestly think the majority of WoW hunters have that kind of attention span? I don't. (oh look! something shiney!)

I think the DZ removal is a good thing. It's a mistake left over from beta that should never have survived this long. It will help hunters a lot, but will not help us survive. That's a whole other can of worms.

I think our weaknesses are highlighted in the smaller brackets. We have less problems in 5vs5. This isn't because we have an abundance of utility, or even a single very useful thing we offer the group. It's simply because the needs of the group are fulfilled, and we happily fit into a 5th slot.

As the size of the groups go down, the teams need for utility remains the same. As we offer less, we are not an ideal partner.

Arcane shot as an offensive spell doesn't fix this, nor will better survival techniques or burst damage (if we were given that much burst, it would severely effect balance in other areas of the game).

A debuff akin to MS or CC on a very short CD is the only answer. We will never be given enough other utility to make us comparable to the viable hybrid DPS classes like spriest or ele sham.

Having beta pet abilities could change utility.
Crab with root, Spider with net, Wolf with party Agi/Str buff, Bear with HP shout, Owl with spell interrupt attack, Striders had heal... large amount of options but only 1 can be used. The one that fits your team the most.

Thottbot World of Warcraft: Enraged Howl

Pet customization is something I'm waiting for long time.

Although I've been a hunter-apologist most of my WoW career, I don't understand the continued gripe with LoS considering the deadzone removal. Doesn't this change put a hunter on par with basically any/every casting-class currently in the game regarding Line of Sight? LoS issues were a major boon before because our 3 yard additional deadzone prevented us from doing any damage while being kited around a Nagrand arena pole (by the time we had range, the target would be turning the corner). But now we've presumably closed the gap. If we aren't using a ranged weapon, we can use melee (e.g. you will have concussive shot -OR- wingclip available at all times barring cooldowns if you need to close distance/keep pace). And you can use a frost trap if you're continuously kited around the same pole.

Likewise in Blade's Edge, the ramps will be less of an annoyance because of the removal of the 3 yards to range.

After watching my 2v2 priest go back and forth with a mage in a 12 minute Nagrand match, I don't understand what else has to happen. LoS kiting occurs with all classes. The deadzone-"elimination" ought to remove much of the extra burden hunters were faced with.

Perhaps I'm missing something. Enlighten me.

The only change I could theoretically see would be to allow a shot with a brief hidden cast-time (multi-shot) to finish if it's cast when the target is within LoS but subsequently moves out before completion. This could get a bit hairy though.

Like current channeled spells do, you mean. Blizzard has admitted those spells (priests, warlocks, etc..) get leeway intentionally.

Probably due to the vulnerability of school lockout when you're stood channeling spells, with great big beams showing exactly where the damage is coming from if there was any doubt before.

I tested this last night on the PTR and arcane shot would not remove Divine Shield. I had the paladin remove all his buffs, then use DS. Arcane shot did no damage and did not remove the shield. After that, I had him try using Blessing of Protection on himself with no other buffs and arcane shot was able to remove that.

It's a known 'feature' caused by server lagged/sync. Blizzard has stated that it's intended unintentionally

This is where I presumed finishing a hidden-cast-time shot would get hairy. A disclaimer: I'm not defending the cast-time idea, I merely put it out there as an alternative gripe for LoS I've recently read. As Shandara pointed out, priests and locks have this for some of their channeled spells. The difference between auto and multi in my theoretical alternative lies in the fact that auto-shot is an automatic, continuous cast. Waiting for LoS while running after the target, all-the-while allowing your auto-cast weapon-speed CD to go into affect could make for a hairy situation considering you can thread other shots/stings within this period (i can hear the cries of Overpowered already). Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems you simply want to be able to autoshot while on the run. I'd jive with that, but I don't see it happening.

Although perhaps I'm not addressing the point you're trying to make. If you're simply suggesting our mana-efficient (zero), default, automatic attack can't be used efficiently on the run, then I will agree with you. Perhaps reducing the hidden cast-time would help in that regard, while still making use of some non-movement requirement. For now, lag still plays it part however.

As far as doing damage while kiting/getting kited, we will still have arcane shot, stings, pets on the assumption that they haven't been torn apart yet, and melee (depending on range). Not great compared to what we can do at range, but much more manageable than with a deadzone hindering us. Aside from the melee-oriented classes, the limited options to output damage during a kite will be, in my opinion, much more in line with other casting classes after the deadzone removal.

Maybe a happy medium would be to reduce autoshot to 0 cast time and able to be fired while running, but say that your chance to hit with autoshot is lowered by a percentage while running. Then they can adjust that percentage to a point where it's balanced.

Well, the argument regarding the deadzone would be that it allows a hunter to do more or less their ranged dps (minus steady), plus their melee dps at all times, so long as they can bob in and out of the 5 yard radius of melee range. Due to the fact that only one class, rogues, has a more powerful snare than wingclip/frost trap, this "dancing" becomes a very real possibility. Given the "slush" added to melee range in pvp, it is unclear exactly how things will play out. It's entirely possible that hunters may be able to melee and attack from range at the same time at the 6 yard range.

A further point is that a hunter has two casts (auto, multi) with only a 0.5 second casting time. Given that the base run speed with boot enchant is 7.5 yards per second, and wing clip slows to 40%, a hunter need only generate 1.5 yards outside of melee range to be able to cast these on a target moving at them. If haste actually effects multishot and auto (not sure myself), that becomes an even smaller amount of room needed to fire these abilities.

The argument regarding arcane shot being overpowered begins by noting that Offensive Dispels have, throughout WoW's history, been given only to a select group of classes (shaman, priest, warlock). The only class to get an offensive dispel after release, mages, got it only at a prohibitive mana cost.

In the context of a hunter, the arcane shot change could be perceived as overpowering in two regards:

First, it gives the hunter a powerful counter to buff based healers, such as priests and resto shaman. Losing a renew/PoM/Earth Shield every 6 seconds is a tremendous loss in either mana efficiency or healing per second. It also allows the hunter to remove a number of abilities that counter the class, such as BoF, BoP, Inner Fire, Blessed Resilience, Blazing Speed, Nature's Grasp, etc.

Second, similar to that of the felhunter's devour magic, the arcane shot change allows a hunter to slowly remove all long duration buffs from a target at zero effective GCD cost (assuming she would have used arcane shot anyways). This can add up to a significant reduction in overall opponent performance, as buffs cumulatively make a big difference, and erases the buffer against offensive dispels when one does get a vital buff (e.g., bloodlust, BoP, innervate, etc.).

And I think a final reason why some intelligent people might complain is that these buffs all seem to be coming very quickly, without much thought to their interaction and synergy.

Recall that when the PTR opened with the revised arcane shot and Kalgan made his post about the dead zone and a potential MS effect on aimed shot, datamined information also pointed to a disarming shot with no minimum range and potentially powerful new pet abilities. If these all happened, it would represent a more dramatic change than some classes received gong from WoW1.0 to TBC -- in other words, people may have written some alarmist posts because they feared an overreaction in the re-balancing process akin to what warlocks seem to have received, where they moved from a relatively unpopular class to an incredibly dominant force in solo and small bracket pvp.



Well, that's the argument as I see it. Personally? I think that complaining before changes have even hit the PTR is very premature. That's the WoW forums for you.