Survival Hunter Suggestion

[Phieryphugg-azjolnerub]

Hi! I stumbled across an idea while flipping through the Hunter spells/abilities in the Spellbook.

Almost every single Survival Hunter damaging ability is ranged -range, except Mongoose Bite and some of the other most powerful abilities.
I suggest a choice node to be added in the Survival talent tree, where the “Aspect of the Eagle” Talent lies.

The new choice-talent would Boost the damage and reduce the focus cost of the Arcane Shot.

This way it would be possible to create more cool build options for the Survival Hunter.
Flanking Strike, Spearhead, Coordinated Assault and Fury of the Eagle (for example), would still require Survival to approach the target for the vibes and balance.

My idea includes:
-Talent choices which buff the damage of the Mongoose Bite would still potentially also increase the damage of Arcane Shot (depending on the AS dmg)
-With Mongoose Bite you would still reach a higher dps than with Arcane Shot build, thus making the Mongoose Bite build still viable and likely better, depending on the situation (stacking damage increase bonus of successive Mongoose Bite hits). With Arcane Shot build you would gain more Ranged impact
-I believe this could potentially even more embrace the Survival(note the word “survival”) Hunter’s class fantasy to move in and out of the battle, Kiting and Striking when appropriate

Just a thought of mine, which I thought would be really cool.

What do you think?
Thank you for reading.

[Avelai-kazzak]

I love your idea of being given a choice to fight with a ranged weapon, as a replacement for Mongoose Bite

However I think we sort of already have your idea in-game?

If we wanna use Arcane Shot, we can just equip a ranged weapon and do so… but I will give you that it would be nice to have the option of not talenting into Mongoose, but rather something different which might actually benefit Arcane Shot instead.

Another problem, lies in the fact that even with the current Mongoose bite play style, we are still mostly fighting ranged… So stylistically, I don’t think using Arcane Shot will be different enough to make it feel all that different from the mongoose bite build. And Survival Hunter is meant the be “the melee alternative” to the Hunter class, so by allowing a 100% ranged version of the spec, then we are merging into just becoming a “different MM Hunter”.

Now that I have typed and had time to process this idea, I can see myself disliking a “ranged SV Hunter” more and more.

SV Hunter is my favourite spec in the game, and one of the coolest things about it, is juggling when to get into melee range, and when to stay ranged. It’s a play style that feels awkward and intuitive… until it finally clicks… then it feels extremely rewarding and I think the essence of what the spec is, might get “reverted” back into “just another ranged Hunter spec”, if it was allowed a ranged option in the talent tree.

And again, I know the Hunter community is VERY divided on whether or not they like the new SV Hunter play style we got in Legion, but I am a big fan of it.

Just my thoughts on the matter (at 4:20 in the morning ). But I love seeing ideas like this.

[Phieryphugg-azjolnerub]

Thanks for the answer!

Well, one could that argue all Rogue specs are just another melee specs.

To be precise, I main survival hunter atm and I (obviously) really like the spec as it is. Except the lack of variety for builds in the talent tree. I’m kind of a casual player who enjoys freedom in everything in-game. Dragonflight’s talent system is what brought me back to the game after being sure I would never come back to the grind. But there’s no really grind so I love it (I’m a PvP’er).

And what I really like about the new talent system is the options of what to choose. Sure, Arcane Shot COULD be played even atm, but the damage for the focus cost is just not good dps.

I agree the melee-fantasy of survival hunter is good and cool, but still, the build options for the current iteration of survival really are very limited, and thats where my idea came from. AS -build would be something completely different and would be a cool alternative for pvp especially.

One could maintain some dps from afar (still no autoattack dmg, depending if ranged wep is required or not), but STILL would be required to approach the target for any sort of serious damage (atleast now, with the current meta with FoTE, flanking strike, etc.).

I mean, idk how this idea spesifically, would work out, but I believe there could be potential in making Survival MORE or LESS ranged, depending on the build. This kind of gameplay alternating variations would make the talent tree super interesting. Ofcourse, atleast for PvP, there should be a tiny bit of a penalty for going AS.

If blizzard could just silently buff the damage and reduce the focus cost of AS for survival for me, I would be totally contempt for now.

Peace
-Paul

[Avelai-kazzak]

@Phieryphugg-azjolnerub

Well, one could that argue all Rogue specs are just another melee specs.

Well not quite. When making a paralleled comparison like that, you need to adjust the issue to fit the other class.

Your problem statement is about “giving SV Hunter the choice of being ranged”, which is what we already have in the two other specs. So if we were to take Rogue, then a more correct comparison, would be like saying that “SIN Rogue should have the choice of not dealing dmg through DoTs”, which is what the playstyle is for the other two Rogue specs.

But it doesn’t really matter…

The point is that although I also think it would be cool, if SV Hunter could be given some more choices when it came to “talent builds”. Because yes… SV Hunter is VERY limited in the ways you can build it in the right talent tree… BLIZZARD!

It’s either “do we buff bombs or mongoose?”, and that’s it hehe.

I’m just afraid that by making Arcane Shot (or any other ranged spell) into a build choice, the spec completely looses it’s “thing” that makes SV Hunter a SV Hunter.

• BM is the “pet spec”.
• MM is the “ranged spec”.
• And SV is the “melee/DoT spec”.

So in the same way as we wouldn’t give BM Hunter the option of “not using pets”… Or MM Hunter the option of “using melee”… SV Hunter still needs to maintain it’s current spec design, when introduced to a new talent build. Otherwise we are talking about a complete spec rework here…

However, I think I have a different “ranged solution”.

If a spec were to be given new build options, the best way to go about it is to make sure it stays within it’s spec design, and by utilizing it’s existing abilities. Which in this case here, SV Hunter is 3 things:

• It’s a melee spec.
• Most of it’s dmg is through DoTs (Serpent Sting, Kill Command, Wildfire Bomb).
• It uses wildfire bomb to buff Serpent Sting, Kill Command, and Mongoose Bite.

So instead of thinking “Arcane Shot”, I think that “Serpent Sting” should be the main focus here… So by creating build options around Serpent Sting and enhancing the DoT damage of our Serpent Sting, Kill Command, and Wildfire Bombs, we will get a ranged playstyle that focuses on dealing dmg through DoTs, since SV Hunter already has that as part of it’s current spec design.

By doing that, you would then get your “ranged playstyle”, but without sacrificing the fact that SV at it’s core, is a melee spec… but with the ability to do all it’s dmg from ranged using DoTs.

I think that would be a cool way of giving SV Hunter some cool build varieties. If it was given the option of “not using mongoose bite”, then all of a sudden we are basically saying “we wanna play MM Hunter”, and I think we have better workarounds than that.

The whole point of “liking SV Hunter”, is that players enjoy that it’s melee or that it uses DoTs for it’s playstyle. So builds should focus on those aspects.

[Phieryphugg-azjolnerub]

Hmm well I kind of see survival more as a “survival” spec than melee/dots. I feel it is so much more.

I really dig the big crits, which are also possible atm. The main thing and the main principle why I made the post in the first place is, that it could use more possibilities in the talent tree to vary the play style. I agree that buffed serpent thing and bombs, for example, would be one kind of a solution.

I feel that with a possible AS build, no survival hunter would lose anything. It would just add to the already awesome possibilities and playstyle of the spec. But thats just my opinion.
I really would dig it and I feel like it wouldnt take anything off anyone. Nobody’s good night sleep wouldnt be ruined. MM, BM and would still be okay, along with the mongoose survivalists.

Furthermore, I think the playstyle variations should be deeply explored with all other classes and specs too. So everyone could build their own flavor of the playstyle. Just my 2 cents how the game would have a bit of the same freedom that classic players enjoy.

Also, ive seen quite a lot of posts in the US of players wanting back “the old survival hunter”. My previously mentioned philosophy, while applied, would most likely satisfy them too.