Everything said in the title.
For me as I play PvP and PvE, mostly Assassination and Sub, while I tried a little Outlaw aswell, have to say, that leaving the general talent trees and playstyle aside, don’t really like a single of the Hero talent trees. I can just categorize them by “which one is the least unfun to play”, which in my opinion is a sad thing to say.
Deathstalker is fine I’d say but not particularly interesting either visually or playstylewise. Having some issues and Bugs in PvE, but doesn’t add too much inconsistency with the rotation, but favors alot having an additional vanish like nightelves for some reason which is dumb. At least you can play around Darkest Night quite consistently for bigger crits and bursts and get a little black visual which looks ok.
Trickster, mostly boring and dumb random procs. Especially as Sub feels odd to mostly buff combo builders. Having CDR on Secret technique which doesn’t do alot since you mostly need to stall for bust windows anyways and Coup de Grace just working for Eviscerate, coming randomly since its proc dependant and bugs alot (though mostly visual I think). Can be played as Outlaw aswell but mostly I see Fatebound is better because at least less pain in the butt. Kinda boring visuals, only interesting is Coup de Grace if you use it at range I suppose.
Fatebound, I mean the spec is based on random procs you ignore and you play your normal rotation. Probably aids to min-max, I didn’t bother to just think about playing around rng more while at the same time Rolling the Dice. Visual is boring, you toss coins around your model.
TLDR: Deathstalker > Trickster >= Fatebound (Though i feel they both are similarly bad and Deathstalker isn’t particularly interesting either and should’ve been the lower bar designwise, not the top end)
This post turned out longer than I wanted, sorry for anyone who comitted to reading it!
What are your thoughts on the Hero Talents? Don’t be too toxic, just a little 
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No they have almost zero creativity just compare them to DK and a few others.
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Deathstalker is…okay, though it just adds to the burden of having more combat stealth, which is already very high for Assa (and is a core ability for Sub so they don’t care). Trickster just does its own thing whenever, I can’t say much about it. Fatebound is stupid through and through, the idea, the design, everything. Since you can’t really control the RNG, it also just does its thing passively for the most part.
In short, I agree on your TLDR summary. Deathstalker is the lowest bar of 'acceptable" and the rest are just…lame.
Combined with the continued lack of support for Rogues (11.0.5 adjustments should’ve been 1) on TWW release 2) thought out better because they are basically bandaids on open wounds), I’m not sure what the class dev is doing. Hopefully it’s a proper full-scale rework (because the DF rework was not good enough and was not stable enough to properly survive moving into TWW).
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No.
And not just the rogue all classes the hero talents really do not bring anything exciting into the mix.
The hero talents in general to me seem like someone at Blizzard heard about elite specializations in GW2 and tried to designt something “similar” by hearsay from broken phone model and the end result is as exciting as watching paint dry and as fun as wet ****.
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I don’t exactly agree. I liked:
- Mountain Thane (cool special effects, and it brings attention to one of less used abilities in a good way) and Slayer (very simple, kind of like Warrior, but somehow satisfying because you get to spin-2-win even more) on Warrior.
- Sunfury on Mage, and I can at least grasp the idea behind Frostfire mage (this is one of those rare hero talent specs that enable a thematic playstyle normally unavailable).
- Rider of the Apocalypse is also very good for class fantasy, and while Deathbringer isn’t anything special, there’s something very satisfying about rapidly ramping up Reaper’s Mark to have it explode for a huge number, at least for me.
However, not every hero spec is born equal.
- In particular, I find that Hunter hero specs are dull as hell, because they are literally “just pick a famous lore hunter to cosplay poorly - Tyrande, Rexxar, or Sylvanas?” with very little thought given to Hunters who might perhaps enjoy the trap/gun aspects of the class (in fact, I think guns in general are currently not even a “secondary theme” for any spec other than Outlaw).
- Priest hero specs are just “more of the same” thematically, but in a way that isn’t really as seamlessly built into the core of the class as Slayer would be for Warrior.
- Rogue, I already said my part on.
- The rest, I haven’t played and likely won’t play much.
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Yes, I agree to both points you brought up.
I think there are some hero specs, that actually work.
- Warlock is enjoyable
- Disc I actually like both though I’ve to admit that the Oracle one is kinda uncomfortable at start (but i just tried them in PVP)
- Mountain Thane with Thunder Clap for Whirlwind is fun too
- Shaman I think Farseer is a dull passive and I dont like the Spirits Visuals, whereas totemic is ok. But i think shaman suffers similarly to rogue. Just dull talents.
- DK in general has some nice playstyle altering ones too with good visuals.
But to agree with @Fydron too, they could’ve put alot more thought into the whole system and its somewhat half cooked.
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The thing is why i dislike the “hero” talents is that to me they didn’t really go for it full on with them. What i would had liked is something like GW2 where the elite specializations change the whole way how you play the class but i guess the flat mostly graphical change thing is the prize we have to pay in WoW because they already have problems balancing normal classes let alone turning normal classes to hero classes by making something like ranged rogue or turning rogue into healer by hero talents and things like that.
For example as someone who doesn’t raid the hero talents really didn’t change how i play my class at all really no matter what class i play. Compare that to GW2 Necromancer for example where basic necromancer is like night and day from Scourge/Reaper/Harbinger that all play and feel differently.
Yes the hero specs do work but do they really change how you actually play the class because to me most classes play exactly the same as they did before just with different graphics but that might be because i do not raid so nothing really changed except with my rogue a coin falls on the ground that i barely see or care and for my mage frost bolt has now fire effect.
Personally i wish raid scene was more fun as to me it is the main thing that seems to be the thing that prevents more fun and more imaginitive specs and builds that would actually be fun.
I actually kind of wish raiding as whole was a complete different mode like plunderstorm so open world had more fun and diverse playstyles like in GW2 where WvW/PvP/raids have their own builds that work there but open world you can go crazy fun builds that wow really REALLY lacks.
There is really no excuse how we could not have for open world something like completely ranged rogue for example or ranged palading that uses rifles/pistols and keep these in open world only if it for some reason “ruins” the raiding or pvp scene.
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While I do understand the desire for that (honestly, the only reason I ever played a Necro is GW2 was Reaper, I wouldn’t touch it otherwise), I think it’d be borderline impossible to fit all those things into one expac. GW2 did one hero talent tree per expansion, and it has only nine classes, so that’s 27 trees in ten years. Here, we got 39 of them in a single expansion, which is likely why half of them are so lacking.
Furthermore, GW2 is kind of unique in lacking any sort of vertical progression, so anything new they introduce after level 80 is a sidegrade/option rather than a power boost. WoW hero talents had to be a power boost, at least from Blizz’ point of view, so they are designed to be that rather than options.
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I play Deathstalker on my assa rogue and can’t say I have even the slightest clue what my talents do. So incredible boring and passive.
It’s like ‘‘Okay I have a set of hero talents, but whatever’’
For Rogue, I’m fairly indifferent. My issues are with the actual class design across all three specs at the moment, and I would rather see fresh design work go into the core specs as opposed to the more passive Hero Talents at this time.
Fatebound is very passive but unobtrusive to the playstyle.
Trickster is underwhelming, particularly coup de grace.
Deathstalker is the one I have the least experience with but I feel similarly about it as I do Fatebound.
On other classes I play:
Sentinel’s Lunar Storms are a nice visual at least.
Pack Leader Post rework is decent.
Shado-Pan is passive but has a fun animation and sound effect tied to it which is satisfying when it triggers.
Templar is simple but satisfying with big hammers raining down.
Mountain Thane makes Thunder Clap more satisfying - I enjoy it.
Reaver on DH is fun to me - getting a big boost on back to back Chaos Strike and Blade Dance is satisfying.
Fel-Scarred performs better for Vengeance but I find it more boring.
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