First and foremost, i do enjoy the current Survival Hunter as it is, being melee that is.
However, i am aware that many people want the old SV back. I’m neither against nor for a revert, i like both of iterations.
But i was wondering though, since SV is already quite a unique specc as it is, being a melee/ranged hybrid (sort of?). Why not make it a true Hybrid in some shape or form?
Obviously thinking of Rexxar here, from WC3. SV used to have a Talent called Throw Axe, after all, so that Theme was indeed a fantasy for Blizz. Even if shortlived.
https://www.wowhead.com/spell=200163/throw-axe
I mean Honestly, we can pull out a Crossbow from God knows where, that existing Crossbow (or a throwing axes glyph someday??) can be used for our Ranged Attack.
So it could just be a passive we gain, or even just our “Mastery” and thus let it scale in Damage with our Mastery. The Animation is there after all, and it could literally just be a hidden thrown Weapon in our Character Sheet that pulls it’s Damage Numbers from our Main hand weapon’s Stats.
After all, we were able to use thrown Weapons when they still had a seperate Slot pre MoP.
Make Mongoose Bite Baseline (to keep an incentive to go into Melee, but also have the option to stay at Range).
Change Mongoose Bite Talent into, lets say… hmm… what option do we have maybe another dot? could be ranged even… hmm… how about…uh you know, crossbows are quite handy in that their bolts can be modified right? uh… let me think… how about we just strap on some TNT onto one of those bolts… and call it, hm, how about Explosive Shot?
An example:
https://imgur.com/a/mT6zPsi
Basically just a “minor rework”. To bring back old SV, but also keep the current SV iteration and help it’s current weaknesses. SV is neither a Hunter nor a Warrior and thus suffers from both Weaknesses IN MY OPINION.
Explosive Shot
60 focus, X(6-15?) sec cd deals X dmg after 3 sec
Counterattack
45 focus, 15-30(?) sec cd receiving a crit in melee makes this attack active, disarm target for x sec, deals x dmg
Expose Weakness
passive: your “mastery ranged attacks/crossbow attacks” have x Chance to but a debuff on enemy, expose weakness - increases your attack power by x% of your agility for 7 sec against that target/increase dmg against target by x% for 7sec.
I believe those Abilities, were what made Survival what it was back then, i was also hoping to give both sides an option to decide if they want to focus more on ranged or melee combat.
Counter Attack has been altered abit, cause parry doesn’t really exist anymore as a stat and fighting to to toe against some Melee’s in PVP hurts a ton as SV, it could even be a PVP talent tbh.
And i also believe, Expose Weakness could be an interesting “range/melee hybrid” play style, where both melee and range are very important aspects of SV both in pve and pvp. It gives you an incentive/timing to jump into melee or go into range, where flanking Strike could even be a viable option to immediately make use of the procc for example.
Explosive Shot, fan favourite, will help hunters stay at Range if they want to.
The Order of these Talents could obviously be different, just a quick few thoughts i had.
To have bring back both SV and keep the current one as it is, by combining both and bringing back some Abilities, that in my opinion were vital to SV’s play style back then (Pvp and Pve)
Any thoughts?