We Miss Old Survival hunter and Why it should be back

Classes Hunter
21

They can bring the old sv spec in as a 4th spec but no one is touching my melee hunter. Waited years for it.

7 Likes
22

They should have just given the melee survival as a 4th spec.

It baffles my mind why they just got rid of it instead of creating the 4th spec.

Imagine if the same would have happened to druids when they decided to separate cat and bear as their separate specs imagine if they would have just went and deleted either of the forms/specs.

7 Likes
23

I’m with you on this. Ever since patch 1.7 when surv was turned into a ranged oriented spec have I wanted it to go back to it roots and become melee again.

Now after 13 years they gave it to us and it feels gloriously good.

2 Likes
24

I very much miss my ranged survival hunter. As a player that prefers playing ranged characters I feel pretty much forced into BM spec now as I’ve never enjoyed playing MM spec. :disappointed:

6 Likes
25

Blizzard completely screwed up by making survival melee, when it was obvious that it should have been BM that should have been made melee.

You could make all of BM’s ranged abilities into melee ones right now and it would play perfectly well.

7 Likes
26

Glad you’re not in charge of the balance team.

27

I don’t think I can adress this enough, but Survival was once ( from the very start to patch 1.7 ) melee and the orignial name was outdoormanship. I don’t feel they have screwed it up and what is up with BM as melee spec anyway?

BM used to be about boosting your pet both dmg and health and the hunter had a more passive role. If anything I feel that BM should become more pet focused, MM can stay as it is and Surv should be a mix of both ranged and melee, but more focus on the melee/trap part.

28

Who cares if Survival was a melee spec for the first 6 months back when the game was released? The game was in a pretty shambolic state at the time, very unfinished. The spec was ranged for over 10 years after that. I dont know why you keep bringing this up, like its some grand argument for how the spec “is supposed to be melee”.

As far as BM goes, Rexxar is pretty much the definition of a beastmaster and he is melee. So lorewise it would have made sense to make BM a melee spec. Plus the way BM has played in legion and BFA you wouldnt have to change much other than a few new talents and make certain abilities melee and change their names and it would work perfectly well, instead of removing old ranged survival which many people had played for years and loved.

4 Likes
29

Yes the old argument of Rexxar, Champion of the Horde.
Yes his title is Beastmaster, but he is just as much survival due to my point above.

That discussion has been brought up several times beacuse Rexxar is dual wielding and do not carry a bow and by the look of it most people have agreed over the course of time that he is mostly BM, but also Survival due the original state of Survival as melee being able to dual wield.

I know, I know. All hunter specs could dual wield at some point in wow, but only old surv took advantage of this in their fightingstyle.
But i know you Beastmasters love to bring good old Rexxar up as an argument to your cause :slight_smile:

Thats why others like to think that Survival is closer to Rexxar than what BM currently is.
I guess it can be looked at both ways.

30

Who is this WE you speak off?

31

A handfull of people on the forum :rofl:

33

Considering sv is by far the least played hunter and second least played spec in the game i think theres quit alot more people asking for the old sv back

5 Likes
34

I hope you understand it was a joke, but I still think there are quite alot of happy Survivalist out there, atleast almost 3000 of them ( wow logs )

Survival didnt have the best rep back in Legion either, it became better as the exp went on, but from what I heard it was clunky and not many players bothered with it due to the requirement of mastering the spec.

Ok, so lets play with some numbers:
Currently there are about 43000 BM who have done Champion of Light HC
Almost 20000 Marksmanship and close to 3000 Survival.

There was over 93000 BM doing Garothi HC, over 73000 MM and about 3500 ( from what I could find ) Survival from checking wow logs.

Let’s just for the sake of fun say this is correct, about 500 Survival hunters were unhappy with Survival from how it was in legionto how it became in BfA.

35

Seems like the character I’m posting with is on 2 servers🤔.

36

I agree with this. BM would have been much better choice for melee spec instead of survival. Even the lore followed this concept (Rexxar). Survival could have been nice as ranged spec with better traps, utility and good pet damage also. BM could have some spells like Rexxar had in warcraft 3 like summon addition pets to fight beside him for limited time and dual wield, while MM would focus more on hunter’s damage alone and with better mobility please(for example like it was in before legion ) . I just don’t understand this decision in making survival a melee spec instead of BM and i think it’s a bad one. Well that’s just my opinion. Cheers

37

Here is my issue ( again ) Lore characters like Rexxar, Thrall, Anduin, Sylvanas, Tyrande etc etc is not just one spec.
Rexxar is a Beastmaster due to his conection with the animals, no where does it say that he’s BM spec. That is something the community have been speculating on since the dawn of time.

In WC3 his toolkit was to summon companions+ stampede.
In Legion he was your survival companion.
Again, before patch 1.7 Survival was melee and BM was heavly focused on your pet.

38

Eh, no. Its actually says that he is a beastmaster. Try google “rexxar wc3” and look at the pictures, it says “level X Beastmaster” below his name. Rexxar is the quintessential beastmaster.

The wow BM spec is obviously derived from this idea, but they decided to make it ranged for some reason.

Classes like Demon Hunter, Monk (brewmaster) and Death Knight in WOW are also derived from this WC3 incarnations.

1 Like
39

And what does a Beastmaster mean`?
A warrior Hero, able to call forth the creatures of the forest to serve him. These lone wandering forest dwellers come from all backgrounds and cultures, seeking the essence of combat through the mimicry of wild beasts. Attacks land units.

You beastmaster loves to bring up Rexxar as “your” guy even tho he is a Beastmaster, but not necessarily Beastmaster spec. If you bothered to read the latest post: No Major Lore character is one spec, Not Rexxar, Jaina or Thrall to mention some.

40

To a large degree. This is true.

To say that any lore character(playing a major role in the game’s story) in World of Warcraft is fighting in the style of a specific class specialization is essentially trying to simplify it a bit to much.

It is true that Rexxar is a Beastmaster. However…he is not a hunter utilizing the same tools regular hunters(players) get from playing the -Beast Mastery spec-.
The -Beast Mastery spec- that is available as a playable option for Hunters in WoW is essentially one version of what it means to be a Beastmaster.

If you look through the game, particularly at various types of NPCs/mobs you can see several types of Beastmasters out there. Many of them have nowhere near the same tools as us players have when choosing to play Beast Mastery.
Many have different styles of fighting. Some have specific types of pets/beasts they fight with. But they are different types of Beastmasters.

2 Likes
42

I absolutely loved the old SV and would gladly see it replacing MM if anything. Current SV still feels the most fluid out of all the specs at the moment to me, just a shame I’m standing with a boss in my face :'D