Exotic pets are indeed better than their non-exotic counterparts (putting aside bugged or overtuned abilities from non-exotics), but they aren't designed to be so much better such that it's stupid not to use one if you've specced that far. They want to preserve the ability of 51-point BM hunters to use whatever pet they want, particularly since Blizzard has put so much work into redesigning them all.
Not to mention they are a monstrous bitch to level since of the 3 ferocity exotics 2 will have to be leveled a minimum of 5 levels (unless King Dred is tameable, which I doubt since he's a boss) and the other is a rare spawn on a long cooldown (spirit beast is on what a 14hour CD? I've only seen one tamed on Lich King). Oh and even better, there is an achievement for killing rare spawns in WotLK, including the spirit beast. So yeah, you'll not only get hunters going after him, but completionists as well. I'm sincerly hoping that they change the cats in Zul'drak to be flagged as spirit beasts.
King Dred is Tameable according to Wowhead. There's also King Krush (The green devilsaur) in Sholazar who I think is 77. They're both ugly colors though. =(
New Aimed Shot is identical to Multishot in Damage and Mana cost on single target. Not something I'd use in a rotation, but a great new instant for PVP and such.
Kill Shot got owned too, which is funny since it already did less damage than chimera shot. Not to mention it still has the somewhat excessive 35 second cooldown, which already makes it pretty much pointless in pve.
Also:
*New Spell* - Fires a Black Arrow at the target, slowing the target's movement speed by 70%. While the movement speed effect holds, the damage done by your ranged shots are increased by 15% on the target. Lasts for 6 sec. (6% of base mana, 5-35 yd range, Instant cast, 12 sec cooldown)
Concussive shot upgrade? Lol. For a +15% damage, I don't see it being worth the GCD. Except maybe for pvp if you're about to break a freeze trap, since they're back to breaking instantly on damage.
Hmm; possibly the Pet GCD is being affected by haste. If they are BM spec, that is 20% haste, which would drop the GCD from 1.5s to 1.2 if it is affecting it . . .
When I did some testing, I respec'd out of any haste (Serpent Swiftness, Cobra Reflexes) and didn't have points in Longevity and saw the same thing. It could be that once you've put points into SS, it somehow affects it - I'd have to test on a newly tamed pet.
Originally Posted by Skillstep
Why is it that other classes feel whole and simple and fluid yet hunter feels like directing a symphony as a paraplegic midget with tourettes?
Edit: Totally overlooked Focus Aimed. The +3% hit is now on it.
The +3% hit in Focus Aimed will make it that that talent will be almost a sure choice in every build. That is unless they drop tons of hit on our gear. I see it as a welcome change at least although I have to rethink my BM specc now once again. Dropping Carefull Aim for Focus Aimed is the only thing I can come up with that fast
I don't think it's worth taking over Careful Aim. Looking at the spreadsheets it's not *hard* to hit the hit cap and Careful Aim ends up being a good 500+ AP with gear and buffs at 80.
As an amusing side effect of this change, you now have to take either Hawk Eye or Surefooted, both almost entirely pvp talents, to get any further in SV. Without meaning to whine, SV is just getting weaker in PvE each patch. It just lost both 3% hit (there's no way to spec for Focused Aim without giving up GftT or Careful Aim or Imp. Stings etc.) and Readiness.
On the other hand, 11/53/7 looks like a serious contender now. You can pick up all the good early SV talents, you get 3% talented hit, and you can pick up Imp. Hawk and Aspect Mastery, the later of which helps with the pain of having to sit in Viper so much (especially if it stacks with the Viper Glyph).
Seems to be a new spell according to MMO-Champion.
* *New Spell* - Fires a Black Arrow at the target, slowing the target's movement speed by 70%. While the movement speed effect holds, the damage done by your ranged shots are increased by 15% on the target. Lasts for 6 sec. (6% of base mana, 5-35 yd range, Instant cast, 12 sec cooldown).
I don't get it. The last thing MM needed was more bloat.
On the plus side,
# Blade Twisting changed to : Increases the damage dealt by Sinister Strike and Backstab by 5/10%, and your damaging melee attacks have a 10% chance to Daze the target for 4 sec.
is among the rogue changes. At least now, we might have a use for that daze bonus to steady shot damage.
It makes me wonder if they have any plans for Concussive Barrage as well. But like I said, MM already needs some serious pruning.
Anyone checked if the 3% hit in focused aim goes to pets like it did with Surefoted? Its likely that Blizz slipped through that it doesnt just to be jerks.
And with Trap Mastery being the 41 point talent now, anyone have any ideas on what they might do to make it worthwhile? I know that they have said that it wont be fixed til after LK ships but hopefully they are gunna do something to make it worthwhile. As it stands its pretty darn lackluster compared to the other 41 point talents, particularly TBW....I mean woot! 30% more snakes!!!
* Abomination's Might range has been increased from 20 to 45 yards.
* Unleashed Rage now increases both melee and ranged attack power and works within 45 yards. (Old - Affected only melee AP, 20 yards)
And what is with the 2AP nerf:
* Battle Shout attack power increase has been lowered from 550 to 548
Originally Posted by Skillstep
Why is it that other classes feel whole and simple and fluid yet hunter feels like directing a symphony as a paraplegic midget with tourettes?
As an amusing side effect of this change, you now have to take either Hawk Eye or Surefooted, both almost entirely pvp talents, to get any further in SV. Without meaning to whine, SV is just getting weaker in PvE each patch. It just lost both 3% hit (there's no way to spec for Focused Aim without giving up GftT or Careful Aim or Imp. Stings etc.) and Readiness.
Well, it looks like SV is right back to being a small number of very good talents surrounded by filler... only this time, the very good talents don't even buff the raid. At my current gear level, for instance, 3/3 HvW confers about 180 AP, and costs 8 talent points (compared with 3 points in CA for 300+ AP) ... I believe that it is without hyperbole to declare that "Pathetic".
Originally Posted by Rhoi
And with Trap Mastery being the 41 point talent now, anyone have any ideas on what they might do to make it worthwhile? I know that they have said that it wont be fixed til after LK ships but hopefully they are gunna do something to make it worthwhile. As it stands its pretty darn lackluster comepared to the other 41 point talents, particularly TBW....I mean woot! 30% more snakes!!!
... the very fact that they're deliberately shipping a broken SV tree indicates that:
a) After almost two years to come up with a solid re-implementation of the SV tree, it's still so broken that it'll take more than just a few pre-release tweaks to fix.
b) They're happy with that.
I have to admit, Im pretty amazed that they still took a scalpel to SV again in this build. Its already going to ship incomplete. The LnL nerf and stripping Surefooted and handing it over to MM was a real real shocker. They seem to almost be intentionally dismantling the tree.
OTOH MM didn't make it away unscathed either. A pretty flat 5% damage loss to pets and the hunter on the marked for death nerf. Basically consuming everything gained when a hunter specs into Improved tracking and some. Thats certainly not going to help MM's chances when it comes to equaling or besting BM as the high dps PVE spec.
Also the wording in the patch is odd, I really want to know if any change at all was made to viper. Is it back down to 1x weapon speed? Or perhaps did they increase it? If MM can get some decent mana regen....oh man.
... for instance, 3/3 HvW confers about 180 AP, and costs 8 talent points (compared with 3 points in CA for 300+ AP) ... I believe that it is without hyperbole to declare that "Pathetic".
Please someone point this out to them in beta on the forums or via in game ticketing. That just seems plain ridiculous to me.
I've loved Survival from the moment I hit 600 Agi, and when the first trees came out I was happy that they didnt screw around with SV much. I mean I knew there would be changes but at the moment it seems like its completly out of whack. Obviously Blizz didnt like the idea that we were using SV for raiding and they want it to be a purely PVP tree, so they've swapped and nurfed to their little hearts content so that we dont want to raid with it. At least thats the only plausible explanation I can come up with.
Just one quick question to help me decide whether to stick to SV... Does Mortal Shots work with Explosive Shot? Currently I was thinking of going something like this With the talents in Efficiency thrown around elsewhere depending on what mood im in >< I'd love to be able to put a point into trap mastery but until I see what they are gunna do to it (if anything) it can stay over in the corner with the other naughty talents.
As for PVP, remember this new Freezing Trap nerf; it's back to breaking on a damage now. Perhaps the rationale is that we can rotate Black Arrow and Concussive shot (for PVP anyway). Maybe they will reimplement bear trap now that freezing breaks on damage, although I was under the impression they added Bear to make up for that deficiency in the first place...
Well, it looks like SV is right back to being a small number of very good talents surrounded by filler... only this time, the very good talents don't even buff the raid. At my current gear level, for instance, 3/3 HvW confers about 180 AP, and costs 8 talent points (compared with 3 points in CA for 300+ AP) ... I believe that it is without hyperbole to declare that "Pathetic".
No, it's definitely hyperbole. The additional five points you're tacking on to HvW actually confer a benefit (more stamina), and stamina is already the cheapest itemization stat so turning some of it into AP is inherently more efficient than converting other stats. It's not like CA both increases your INT and converts it to AP for a mere three points. Additionally, HvW applies the same bonus to your pet, which is unlike most other AP talents (TSA is the only other one) that only benefit the pet to the extent of the pet scaling coefficient. HvW gives the "double dipping" effect referred to elsewhere in this thread to the pet. Using your example it is 180 RAP for the hunter and 234 for the pet (I'm using 30% as the scaling number, but feel free to correct that if it's wrong), which is a total of 414 AP, compared to CA which gives 300 AP to the hunter and 90 to the pet, for a total of 390.
Yeah, I get that the talent is linked and all, so you "have" to spend eight points to get it, but by that logic Master Tactician "costs" 40 points to max (because you're required to spend 35 points before picking it) and therefore is "pathetic" compared to Lethal Shots which only costs five points to max for only slightly less benefit.
As for PVP, remember this new Freezing Trap nerf; it's back to breaking on a damage now. Perhaps the rationale is that we can rotate Black Arrow and Concussive shot (for PVP anyway). Maybe they will reimplement bear trap now that freezing breaks on damage, although I was under the impression they added Bear to make up for that deficiency in the first place...
Honestly, they're chopping and changing so much now, things are becoming incoherent. With trap-based stuns, damage boosts and LnL procs, melee-only talents and the various ability tweaks (e.g. Noxious Stings), coupled with repeated nerfs of PvE synergies, SV looks very much like its becoming a PvP-only tree. In its current state, with Hunting Party still being useful, speccing into SV to sacrifice personal DPS for raid utility looks well and truly re-established.
Ironically, I was soloing Scholomance yesterday and thinking "Damn, Frost-procced LnL and Explosive Shot would rip this place apart". I need some blue text telling me it'll be alright
Originally Posted by TrevvyTrev
No, it's definitely hyperbole. The additional five points you're tacking on to HvW actually confer a benefit (more stamina), and stamina is already the cheapest itemization stat so turning some of it into AP is inherently more efficient than converting other stats. It's not like CA both increases your INT and converts it to AP for a mere three points. Additionally, HvW applies the same bonus to your pet, which is unlike most other AP talents (TSA is the only other one) that only benefit the pet to the extent of the pet scaling coefficient. HvW gives the "double dipping" effect referred to elsewhere in this thread to the pet. Using your example it is 180 RAP for the hunter and 234 for the pet (I'm using 30% as the scaling number, but feel free to correct that if it's wrong), which is a total of 414 AP, compared to CA which gives 300 AP to the hunter and 90 to the pet, for a total of 390.
Yes, but pet AP scales differently to hunter AP. You're right, though, it could be a net gain, but only if pet AP continues to scale more strongly than hunter AP (which seems like a good idea... but then, so was Readiness as a 41-point SV talent).
Yeah, I get that the talent is linked and all, so you "have" to spend eight points to get it, but by that logic Master Tactician "costs" 40 points to max (because you're required to spend 35 points before picking it) and therefore is "pathetic" compared to Lethal Shots which only costs five points to max for only slightly less benefit.
Except that MT doesn't have a 5-point prerequisite. From a raiding perspective, all 5/5 Surv. does is boost the return of 3/3 HvW from 0.3 to 0.33 AP per stam... making it an 8-point talent. Out of the first 20 points in SV, 8 yield little to no DPS benefit. That's a little underwhelming.
They have gone and gutted everything in the Survival tree. It is like they're trying to turn it into a Prot tree only without the protection aspect of it. Our old tier 3 talent is now our 41 point talent, we traded a very good survival skill with Scatter Shot because they failed to properly tune the mana issues of the MM tree, and every passive offensive talent is predicated on an event. I don't want to sound like I'm whining (don't need the mods to deduct points again ) but they continuously fail at figuring out what is going on with this tree. The only real survivability talents that exist in the tree are Survivalist and Survival Instincts. Everything else just enhances a bad gimmic.
Seriously, I feel like quoting Pacino in "The Devil's Advocate": Look but don't touch. Touch but don't taste. Taste but don't enjoy.
Yes, but pet AP scales differently to hunter AP. You're right, though, it could be a net gain, but only if pet AP continues to scale more strongly than hunter AP (which seems like a good idea... but then, so was Readiness as a 41-point SV talent).
It's not very different. It does the same thing for white damage, with the only exception being that it can be dodged and parried, unlike hunter damage. Still, pet specials scale comparably (a bit better, maybe to compensate for dodge/parry) to hunter specials, so it's basically the same. Even if pets scaled worse with AP, we still can't ignore it, which is what your example did at first.
Except that MT doesn't have a 5-point prerequisite. From a raiding perspective, all 5/5 Surv. does is boost the return of 3/3 HvW from 0.3 to 0.33 AP per stam... making it an 8-point talent. Out of the first 20 points in SV, 8 yield little to no DPS benefit. That's a little underwhelming.
MT doesn't have a specific prerequisite, but it still has prerequisites. 35 of them, to be exact. The only difference is you get to choose what they are. My point is that it's too blase to call a 3 point talent with a 5 point prereq "an 8-point talent" as a means of arguing that its benefit is somehow diluted, particularly when you have to flat out ignore the benefit of the 5-point prerequisite as if it somehow didn't exist outside of making you spend points. Note that you had to add "from a raiding perspective" in order to make the argument that Survivalist doesn't add anything. It's not entirely clear that having more stamina than the next hunter isn't useful during raiding, unless it is somehow impossible for hunters to to ever take enough damage to where they might actually die during a raid. Keep in mind that we aren't discussing whether other talents may be more dps -- they very well may be -- but we're discussing whether it's hyperbole to say that the talents in question are "pathetic."
Additionally, while it's certainly true that the first 20 points in SV require people to spend at least 8 on talents that don't increase dps, the ones later on in the tree are weighted toward dps. What this does is make it so that people who go deep into SV get dps talents, while people who only dabble in it don't get as much. This keeps MM and BM hunters from being able to cherry pick most of the benefits of speccing SV, while rewarding those who are dedicated to SV with dps that Blizzard intends to be comparable to the other specs (they've said as much). It also lessens the pain of BM hunters not being able to use SV as a support tree, because if there were a ton of dps talents at low tier SV, that would put them at a disadvantage to MM hunters, who would be able to get all of the talents that every hunter needs in MM while still being able to afford SV damage boosts. BM hunters have to ignore most of SV unless they are trying a survivability PvP spec and are willing to give up dps for it.
Finally, the problem of spending points on non-dps talents to get to where you want to be isn't unique to SV. BM hunters have to spend at least 8 points in non-dps talents to get to the end of the tree also, which is pretty close to what SV hunters spend (SV hunters can spec to explosive shot while spending only 9 points in talents that don't directly increase dps, although it's probably not advisable given that the mana regen talents indirectly increase damage via sustainability). If you count the BM 51-pointer as a "little to no dps" talent (because it doesn't really add any) then it's equal.
Last edited by TrevvyTrev : 10/01/08 at 12:05 AM.
Reason: typos
With these latest changes I really don't know what to think about survival. I was really glad to see they were making survival into a proper dps spec in WotLK, but these latest nerfs make the tree look incredibly lackluster. I just did some experimentation with the talent calculator and I really am not liking what I'm seeing. Marks is way overbloated, I'm guessing the talent to drop now is imp hunter's mark since it's only a 90 AP contribution compared to the other talents which should be far more damage, although I'm not sure what dps contribution a survival hunter gets from go for the throat, so that may be another candidate.
Meanwhile I'm looking at picking up noxious stings now because lock n load is starting to look really weak with the new changes. Being able to get hawk eye without giving up something else is nice, but at the same time I feel like I'm forced to put some points in the new lock n load just because my options at the top of the tree are so grim. I could get scattershot but I don't even really want it since I already have wyvern sting, I'm disappointed to have readiness taken away and replaced with another non-dps talent given that the tree already has so many.
My other frustration still exists- 2 of the big dps talents in the tree require a lot of micromanagement. Improved tracking is already becoming a nuisance as it's hard to remember to constantly swap tracks. Sniper training is a problem on a lot of fights when you're encouraged to stand close to the group or you're in an area you don't have a lot of space to work with.
I guess I could go with BM or marks, but I just really don't understand why survival is getting nerfed again and why Blizz seems to want to force hunters to spend every spare point in marks.
My sentiments have been spoken already. I was really looking forward to Survival, but they've put almost everything I initially liked about the changed tree out to pasture, with the sole exception of Hunting Party.
L&L is once again a PvP talent with slight PvE funtionality.
Explosive Shot was severely neutered.
Trap Mastery is extremely weak for it's position and only a promise of improvement was made for some time in the future (my, how vague they were).
Surefooted relegated to a pure PvP talent and moved to a spot where it competes with another pure PvP talent in order to progress down the tree, even in PvE specs. (I thought this switch was supposed to be good news.)
Readiness outright removed from the tree, just as it became somewhat useful for what it was.
Sniper Training STILL BAD.
Freezing Trap's reverted state is stupid beyond stupid. I honestly feel like we're just being bullied at this point.
My heart goes out to all the raiding hunters who hate BM spec. I myself like the spec, so this doesn't hurt me as much, but I was still looking forward to trying something new.
I just don't like Marks that much. Mana consumption is far too high.
09/30/08, 8:24 PM
) but they continuously fail at figuring out what is going on with this tree. The only real survivability talents that exist in the tree are Survivalist and Survival Instincts. Everything else just enhances a bad gimmic.
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