Grogzor

Aspect of the Beast increasing Melee AP by 10%

Mongoose Bite having no prereq to use.

2 new abilities that have not been mentioned yet.

A newer and better Kill Command

WoW Forums -> Chimera Shot - Discussion

But when it comes time for me to remove your wings, and you, you must try to fly...

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Kaejin

I'm getting flashbacks of the original WoW release Survival tree. It's nice that AotB is getting another component added to it, though.

I won't argue that this isn't a good change, but at the same time it makes Mongoose seems a bit more boring than what it is currently.

Don't jump the gun. Better for PvP most likely, but overall, who's to say?


I'm more concerned about how Survivability and Mobility were more or less dismissed as something they were happy with as it stands in beta. They already said themselves that we already had it fairly good against casters, which is what the improved Deterrence adresses instead of melee. Also, Master's Call doesn't really mean anything as a snare break since melee can easily reapply them on us again. They seem to keep ignoring that fact. Not to mention those "solutions" are talent-based.

 

Kelidor

I'm glad to see Blizzard is thinking of some new way of hunter performing. While it was not the change I was expecting myself, Blizzard did find a way to make us possibly alot better and curing us of some of our problems.

For years we've been asking for something to avoid the base of the problem, we needed snare breaks, mobility, a way to escape others. I'm impressed at how Blizzard is trying to cure the base of the problem now. If they do make our melee somewhat ''ok'' then I can anticipate a good future for hunters. At the moment, we can do some big melee crits when we run into another to wingclip using our 140 DPS 2Handers. By removing the cooldown on raptor strike, or perhaps some good melee buffs, we'll have finnaly cured the base of our problems. We'll be a threat in ranged, and a ''somewhat'' threat in Melee ( for the time we'll stay in melee ).

 

Tyranna

Right now, MC also has a 4 sec immunity tacked onto it, though I do agree we need more baseline and less talent based stuff.

 

Kaejin

I take back what I said about MC, then. Well, more or less. You can only cover so much ground in four seconds before you're subject to an intercept or sprint/shadowstep and loaded up with snares again.

 

Catalept

TBH, I'm a little concerned about these changes. The base problem is the minimum range for most of our abilities, which is completely unique to our class. As I see it, buffing our melee performance (as opposed to giving us more/better melee-range escape abilities) is an indication that Blizzard has given up (if they were ever trying) on making us primarily a ranged class in arenas.

It's good so see that Blizzard is making a genuine effort to 'fix' hunter arena performance, but they're is bending over backwards to avoid removing the minimum range, and as a result we're getting some truly incongruous abilities (A melee AP boost? For a hunter?)... why not just bite the bullet and remove the minimum range? Would that be so bad? A the moment, it feels like we're being told "You're going to be spending another 2 years with a rogue/warrior in your face... here's slightly bigger foam stick to hit them with".

 

Grogzor

Blizzard thinks its ok for hunters to have to invest talent points to be good at Arena PvP. I can see myself agreeing with them if each tree had the means of getting what was needed. Right now, to get the tools they think we need, you have to put 11 points into BM, 21 into Marks, and 11 into Survival. Sigh, c'est la vie.

It also seems that the general populace on the Regular WoW Forums are getting upset over this...they don't seem to like the idea of them buffing melee as an adequate fix.

But until we know what these two hidden abilities are...we probably can't comment on any of the changes as beneficial to hunters or not, that part of the puzzle can change this donkey into a stud.

But when it comes time for me to remove your wings, and you, you must try to fly...

Click Here to see what makes me tic(k).

What Are You Going to Roll for Warhammer Online?

 

Tyranna

With the new revelation regarding AotB, I don't get what aspect the devs expect us to use in melee range. Aspect Mastery tacks on 10% damage reduction to AotM, but that doesn't jive with using AotB to dish out a little more melee damage.

I hate to pin our hopes on those two unannounced abilities, but as it stands now, I'm just confused.

 

Chul

I actually like the idea of hunters being better at melee, just not as a solution to our pvp issues. It'll be interesting to see what they actually come up with.

 

• Playered

MC is only 11 points in BM so hardly out of reach of any serious Hunter wanting PvP defenses.

SS should be a core ability or at worst an 11 pointer in MM for obvious reasons.

Arcane Shot.. needed to be nerfed, it really shouldn't of had the dispel mechanic in the first place as a base function.. perhaps via the talent but not by itself.. I'm rather glad they are going back and utilizing Tranq Shot again instead of adding a(nother) new ability or function elsewhere...
Granted this leaves Arc Shot in a somewhat confused (and weak) state but throwing a PvP bone at it wasn't really the best way to enhance it I don't think.

KC right now is rather shit in terms of implementation, you must spam your assigned button endlessly (mouse wheel) or bind it to pretty much every other ability you use to get proper use out of it - that is more in line with what I expect to be changed about it, with an additional PvP benefit thrown in (Daze?).


Aspect switching should get a benefit somewhere as well... it seems rather odd that you are punished in both mana, GCD and even having the new aspect not applied if you attempt other actions before the 'spell' completes.
Thankfully they are removing the mana cost in WoTLK but having some talent enhancing switching would be interesting I think.

Take [Imp ..Monkey] consider if it also had "and an additional 5/10/15% dodge for 10 seconds after entering.." - you suddenly have an incentive to (take the talent at all) quickly switch to it while you use other abilities to help get out of melee range again. Providing a similar bonus to Viper would help allow it to remain viable without dominating other aspects too as it would just be a 10~ second use then you switch back unless you really love the sexy icon...


The MB thing is wierd... I thought they disliked Hunters having heavy hitting melee attacks hence the changes to their PvP 2Hers and the lack of one in S4 (granted the 2x 1Her was more beneficial on stats in PvP).
Raptor, Mongoose, and Wingclip need to be merged in some manner... ideally removing WC and merging it into Raptor or vise versa and adding a temporary dodge bonus after you land/crit Mongoose (follows the enchant theme).

Additionally changing Counterattack to being off Dodge would allow much better synergy to either Monkey, my version of Mongoose bite or a mixture of them both.. but Parry? that only works when you have Deterrence up and a 5 sec cooldown reliant on a 3 min cooldown is rather stupid.

Heck you could even make Mongoose bite have an additional effect depending on what aspect you are in.. honestly the whole aspect system feels rather poor right now and it could be (with the aid of synergy in talents and other abilities) really a powerful aspect (mind the pun..) of the Hunter class.


Traps... well they have potential but are rather too easy to get around and limiting after that happens.. unlinking the cooldowns (or having a nice talent lower the cooldown in general) would help allow them to remain more of a core function to be utilized as intended rather than their current limited state.. (granted Freezing might need a tweak to stop it being 'OP').

The two new abilities sound interesting and I wouldn't be shocked if one ended up as a Guided Arrow ala D2.

 

steamrice

The new chimera shot seems interesting if I were as a BM hunter threw up a serpent sting and it is refreshed by the MM hunter as well as scorpid sting from the SV hunter. I really hope so. But that is assuming the dps of the marks hunter is up there behind BMs with the new chimera shot doing significant damage otherwise the 2 extra serpent stings up won't be worth it to bring a Marksman hunter to raid.

 

TrevvyTrev

Keep in mind that it's only 10% reduction on paper. In practice, it will be 8% at most, because in order to get 5/5 aspect mastery you have to give up either Aimed Shot or Deterrence, which would be extremely stupid if you are serious about PvPing at all. And forget about using your exotic pet for PvP -- the sacrifice is monumental.

 

Terp

There's no reason to think AotB makes you immune to Imp Tracking, right? You are still a humanoid, even if you don't show up on track humanoids. That could be our anti-hunter aspect otherwise! Actually, making AotB turn you into an unclassified would be a rather decent innate damage reduction as almost every class has a +humans.

Seeing the developer go off and Deterrence and Master's Call is kinda disheartening, considering they are only both available for non-51 point builds. I know this topic gets drudged up far too often, but Master's Call is almost begging to be a learnt ability. It offers incredibly little synergy to the BM tree, in either pve or pvp, especially if the pet has to run away from it's target to use it. Even outside of BM builds, it's not particularly attractive. Scatter/Readiness simply kills any interest a wyvern build would have in it, and I can't imagine Call being more appealing than Chimera + trap talents + deterrence in Surv considering the trap talents alone are more helpful for peeling than Call would be.

And hey, Making Master's Call a base ability means all of a sudden BoF/Call based stuff like a 10 man Vashj isn't unfeasible.

 

Mirranda

Some fixes and thoughts about this. You make some good points, but make some good errors also.

First thing is, they're removing the mana cost of aspects in WotLK.
Second, in relation to combining RS + MB, that idea seems odd to me since either you could only Raptor Strike after a Dodge, or your Raptor Strike would hit like a wet noodle. Neither sounds like a good idea. Making MB apply Wing Clip however, would be a neat idea, as you could use your melee dmg global to also apply (refresh?) your snare, or even an improved version of Wing Clip giving a 70% snare (equal to Crippling Poison)?

In relation to Counterattack, 10% parry (assuming you take Deflection) actually occurs quite a bit. Enough anyway that it's rarely not active again once the CD comes back up, or shortly after. It really is a skill that I miss having due to needing other more pressing talents.

Traps could EASILY be fixed though by removing the "arming delay" that was implemented after they allowed in-combat trapping. I honestly miss the days when we had to FD to chain trap, because the lack of arming delay you could effectively trap and know exactly what you were trapping. Maybe reducing the arming delay (to 1sec from 3sec) would fix this?

And I think the AotB change is for the hunter's who DON'T spec Aspect Mastery? I mean, I don't know a whole lot of BM pvp hunters, let alone people who are going to change to BM for a 50 point talent and in turn giving up their utility. Basically the AotM change from the talent I "think" is suppose to be more of a PvE talent that has a PvP application (i.e. I don't have to respec to do BGs or some rare world pvp and have a chance).

Maybe I'm seeing this as a "half-full" thing rather than "just half o' glass".

And I know you didn't say it, but I saw in a post earlier, something about Shamans getting an AoE Knock-back, and that Hunter's should have gotten it instead. To that person I say roll an elemental shaman before you talk trash about it. I play an Elemental Shaman (for PvE and PvP now, though originally only the latter) and if you think Hunter's get shut down bad in Melee, try being a shaman.

----

(e1) @ the post above me that got added while I posted this, Master's Call is 11 points, we have 71 points, you can get it and 51 point talents, it just means giving up 5/5 Mortal Shots (which is a sin). It is possible to do, just not a smart thing to do. I'm not sure if you were saying the former or the latter, so maybe I just misinterpreted what you were saying.

Pretend I typed something witty.

 

Terp

Yea, I went ahead and assumed feasible builds.

Edit: Actually I hadn't thought about an Intimidation/Silence build... It actually looks incredibly interesting, and although I have no idea how it'd actually play out, Master's Call actually seems to have a place in it.

 

Korlash

Shamans can be good in arena as enhance and resto. Complaining that a shaman's one spec is weak in arena is like a prot warrior complaining that he sucks in arena. Hunters don't really have a spec when it comes to Arena. We may have Marks which is better then the other two in arena but it is still lacking something to be a viable 'PvP' spec. I'm not saying elemental shamans should lose their AoE knockback though nor am I the person who originally said that. I don't see it solving any of our problems in PvP even if they gave it to us, since inevitably the other person will just charge, shadow step, blink, etc. and we're back where we started except with a 45s CD ticking away.

With the consolidation of stats (i.e. just spell dmg on gear and no +healing) I see elemental shamans being better in arena's already since their dps gear effectively doubles as healing gear and they just lose talented bonuses.

Edit: Think I answered my own question in a backwards way, so removed it.

 

Trifle

The whole arming delay thing was because people bitched and whined about the instant, unavoidable freeze trap which they couldn't trinket out of back then. Well, that and the "traps are meant to require forethought, not thrown at people during combat" rationalisation. Things have changed alot since then, though:

* You can trinket out of freeze trap.
* It's still dispellable.
* Arming time makes it easily avoidable if you aren't retarded.

By comparison:
* Blind is now a 1 min 30 sec cooldown for pvp rogues, instant, not dispellable anymore, and completely unavoidable. I don't think it can be resisted unlike traps, and they removed the dodge/parry checks from it.
* Cyclone has a cast time at least, but not dispellable and no cooldown, albeit a shorter duration.

The trap changes made sense at the time, but in light of current day CC abilities, I really think trap mechanics deserve to be revisited.

 

KraxisSingular

Oh I so hope it is only the comment itself, not the actual implementation. I'd hate to to have my fear confirmed.

 

Kaejin

The original blue post is unchanged and says nothing about excluding hunter pets from the buff. I'm not really sure where the post you're talking about is from.

 

TrevvyTrev

Sure there is. The wording of both AotB and improved tracking suggests it. Imp. tracking says in increases damage against "targets that are being tracked." (emphasis added.) When you have aspect of the beast on, you are untrackable (even with hunter's mark on). If your target is untrackable, then your target isn't being tracked, and it's possible that the damage bonus doesn't apply. If the talent was just meant to apply to an entire family regardless of whether you could actually track them on the minimap, then it would say something like, "when a hunter activates a tracking ability, all damage against targets of that type is increased by x%". I'm not saying that the talent isn't awkwardly worded, but there's certainly reason to think that AotB and Elixir of Camouflage could nullify the bonus, because you aren't "being tracked" when you have those things on.

This also is why it has no impact on other class talents. Aspect of the Beast doesn't "turn" you into an unclassified type. It just prevents you from being tracked by any means. So other abilities that say they work against humanoids, without any reference to whether they are being tracked, won't be affected.

I'm not sure I understand the point about synergy. It's most likely going to have an intervene-style mechanic where the pet zooms to the target (and back?) and activated pet abilities fit just fine in the BM tree (there are two of them there now). It also gives BM builds something to use to build points for higher tier talents without using as many "throwaway" points on maxing Frenzy and the like.

The problem with making master's call trainable is that BM hunters will still need 11 points in MM and 11 points in SV. This makes it impossible to PvP with the BM 51 pointer, or more specifically, with an exotic pet. It's kind of a unique problem, as people undoubtedly will become attached to their exotics and will constantly have to abandon them if they want to PvP at all. BM already has the problem of its high-tier PvP talent (aspect mastery) being impossible to max in a sensible build, and defaulting MC doesn't help that.

What makes more sense is to make Deterrence trainable. This allows people to pick up MC in any PvP build and still afford their 51-pointers if they are so inclined. But you still can't get everything you'd want in PvP so the designers will be happy that people have to make hard choices. They just won't be impossible ones.

 

Spiry

I believe that it's been mentioned by a Blue via this thread that you wont abandon your exotic pet once you spec out of BMT, but it will despawn and you will have to place it in your (expanded) stable and get either a new pet out of go tame a new one. The exotic pet will then stay in the stable until you respec BMT and are able to get him back out.

 

bimmian

Bloodthirsty is definitely the cause. I can pull several mobs, have my dino only attack one, multishot, and the second bloodthirsty procs, they are all on him and I can't do anything to pull them off. On a single mob, once Bloodthirsty procs, I can chain crit and never pull. Not to mention my pet is still 3 levels lower than me (71, I'm 74), and 3-4 levels below the mob as well. I'm enjoying rarely pulling off my pet while questing, but it is a burden while doing 5mans.

 

orinaccio

I must confess that reading the beta forums, I'm left a little speechless and confused. Perhaps there is a method to Blizz's madness but the early comments have me concerned. I wholeheartedly agree with Catalept that the melee buffs feels like theyre giving up on hunters' pvp problems. As I posted in the beta forums, it feels like they are saying "So youre constantly stuck in melee while in arena? Here, now you can do some dps now while youre stuck in there." It really feels like theyre throwing in the towel and resigning themselves to hunters remaining melee punching bags.

I think the overwhelming majority of hunters do not want more melee abilities to add onto their already numerous ranged, aspect, trapping, etc etc abilities. We just want a reasonable fighting change to escape to range in the face of a melee train.

It also feels like the 800 lb elephant in the room is Camoflauge. With a PvP version of "Feign Death", they could save themselves all that grief and address our core mobility problems directly. Maybe they feel its OP, but heck, how is that more OP than shadowstep/intercept/Death Grip spam? If invisibility is deemed overkill, then perhaps a backwards jump to 20 yards would be a reasonable measure.

I also have a sneaking suspicion that our LOS "solutions" will also involve pets.

 

Aerynlore

Maybe you're on to something here, actually. Something to the effect of a Blink, only it can only be away from our [hostile] target. That way we can't use it as a 'forward' blink (ala.. just turn around, 'Retreat' and face forward again). Put it on a short, but not too short, cooldown - perhaps 20s. Then we can use it more often than Intercept, but we aren't using it in liu of actual running.

Alternatively, what if Scatter Shot got the added bonus of having a 20 yard knockback. Maybe change it to "Shotgun Blast", but I think the theme is still there, that SS is a short-range hard, heavy hit. Now, it wouldn't do much for non-MM specs, but at least it may be a step in the right direction.

 

Terp

Where is this notion that BM desperately needs Deterrence coming from? If anything scattershot would be *much* more useful for burst setups.