Class Update - Hunters

[siipperi]

The smartest way to make Rain Of Arrows stay legit for hunter's if they so choose is not nerf the damage but lower max targets of he skill to 3 and if you have 2/2 in rank from trai tree's get it max 6 targets, with unimbued book + 10 max targets is the sole reason why dps is hat high, once again ppl who arent hunter's are giving thoughts on the class and why is unfair without knowing the mechanics of the class risking such a class to get nerfed after getting a proper nerf/buff which put the traditional redline back as highest single target DPS,


Do you research no off a cheap spam skill which will do nothing in getting a boss down but on trash pulls which half the server skips anyway......



Just my 4 cent

No.. That's not the reason why AoE DPS is high. Reason is because they increased damage a lot while having same mechanics in place. Hunter even prior to update was doing over 100k parses on certain trash and they essentially almost tripled the damage on the skill (I frequently critted over 100k hits for example on level targets). Either it needs internal CD for reset or damage and targets reduced. On 4 target dummies I can do between 250-300k DPS till I hit no crits. With all buffing in raids you can hit not so far off from those mitigations while having significantly more targets to pull resets from. That's the problem on the class. Infinite resets on 10 targets skill essentially. Easiest applied AoE with no effort and it's strongest hitting one. I mentioned this several days ago in different thread.

I wouldn't be surprised if they end up nerffing targets and putting in place internal cooldown. Reducing AoE targets seems to be how they are doing it now. I just hope they look into champions targets while they do this. There are several broken AoE skills on their rotation. I think this is way to go since classes like captain and burglar really suffer because some classes had 10+ targets on their AOE, making playing single target class very bad in instances for example as DPS (mainly burg).

[canyouaddcolour]

I main Hunter. Hunter Rain of Arrows has 10 targets without the un-imbued swap weapon. With swapping it goes up to a max of 15 targets.

Even at 6 targets the damage would still be far too high for an AOE skill that is likely to constantly be refreshing in a 3-4 mob scenario. It would be perfectly viable at 1/3 of it's current damage in multi-mob scenarios.

There's nothing wrong with adjusting broken mechanics down.

---

I would be fine with halving the Crit Chance from Pen Shot debuff. Doesn't bother me a ton either way -- I'm more concerned with the broken things like Camo + Burn Hot + Focus + Heartseeker, Bleeds and the current broken Rain of Arrows.

[Vastin]

Currently looking at two changes to RoA, as that skill is definitely too spammy for its damage right now - I totally did overlook that crit cooldown.

1) 30 sec internal cooldown to the proc chance of Hail of Arrows, essentially letting you 'double tap' the AoE every 3rd shot, if you crit.

2) Reduction of RoA damage by about 20%. I still want it to hit reasonably hard - just not with the spam effect.

If that doesn't cut it, I may have to increase the base cool-down of the skill a bit, or look at its target numbers.

-Vastin

[Oelle]

@Vastin: are the different barrage cooldowns and the tiering as is with barrage meant to stay or do you plan to change something there?
Many players have asked to put the same CD on all barrage tiers. And I see no reason, why barrage shouldnt stay on Barrage3 over a fight. As long as that B3 is actually B3 and not B6. Which was the whole issue before the change.

What would be wrong with the old kind of barrage and 3s CD? spamability and damage would be down. But it could be used in a rotation.

[siipperi]

30s internal CD just labels skill not worth traiting for. Reason why it's so powerful at the moment is when you can use it 10-15 times in row. That produces good AoE. AoE skill produces every 10s is irrelevant for the fight. At that point you just want to trait full single target.

[Oelle]

30s internal CD just labels skill not worth traiting for. Reason why it's so powerful at the moment is when you can use it 10-15 times in row. That produces good AoE. AoE skill produces every 10s is irrelevant for the fight. At that point you just want to trait full single target.

This.
with internal CD, RoA isnt worth using at all. Hunters dont have enough AoE skills to get any kind of AoE rotation. They either can spam RoA for AoE or nothing. Therefore, if RoA gets an internal CD, it can be deleted. Better just get the damage down.

[Antophant]

Currently looking at two changes to RoA, as that skill is definitely too spammy for its damage right now - I totally did overlook that crit cooldown.

1) 30 sec internal cooldown to the proc chance of Hail of Arrows, essentially letting you 'double tap' the AoE every 3rd shot, if you crit.

2) Reduction of RoA damage by about 20%. I still want it to hit reasonably hard - just not with the spam effect.

-Vastin

You admit you overlooked the cooldown reset proc when increasing RoAs base damage so instead of just undoing the damage increase you want to make the skill a once per 10sec aoe hit(2+ trait points for 1 reset per 30secs) AND nerf it's damage?

If that doesn't cut it, I may have to increase the base cool-down of the skill a bit, or look at its target numbers.
-Vastin

We're talking a over 90% DPS nerf on RoA AOEing with just these proposed changes I think it more than cuts it.


Might be a little harsh to say but I think this is just a case of reading the forums, seeing "x skill is insanely OP now" and panicking to try and fix it.

[Wolf2x]

Its so funny how there is absolutely no middle ground when it comes to skill changes... Either OP, or destroyed.

Like seriously isn't it common sense that the aoe dps would be 1/3 of what it is right now (Which is pretty much what is needed) if they just gave the skill 4-5 second cooldown or something like that?

Also got a chuckle out of 20% damage nerf, as if 30 second cooldown on proc isn't more than enough to not ever trait for it..

[Kazabooboo]

This.
with internal CD, RoA isnt worth using at all. Hunters dont have enough AoE skills to get any kind of AoE rotation. They either can spam RoA for AoE or nothing. Therefore, if RoA gets an internal CD, it can be deleted. Better just get the damage down.

Agreed 100% , this is way too harsh and uneeded nerf i believe.

[siipperi]

Might be a little harsh to say but I think this is just a case of reading the forums, seeing "x skill is insanely OP now" and panicking to try and fix it.

It's insanely OP. No rotation needed, just press one skill over and over again. And you never really run out of focus since if you crit you can continue using skill and if you crit you gain focus... At least champs have to do some kind of DPS rotation to do good AoE. Meanwhile hunter does same with one button.

Problem of the skill is all of hunter AoE comes from one skill that has mechanic of reseting itself, if it doesn't reset AoE DPS takes big hit. So either big damage nerf (20% is not enough) with reduced targets or put on like 5s CD on the skill without ability to reset it. Even with 5s CD you would want to use it every time its off CD on trash fights.

[Vastin]

@Vastin: are the different barrage cooldowns and the tiering as is with barrage meant to stay or do you plan to change something there?
Many players have asked to put the same CD on all barrage tiers. And I see no reason, why barrage shouldnt stay on Barrage3 over a fight. As long as that B3 is actually B3 and not B6. Which was the whole issue before the change.

What would be wrong with the old kind of barrage and 3s CD? spamability and damage would be down. But it could be used in a rotation.

The problem is rather straightforward and has to do with the focus economy of the Hunter.

All focus skills essentially 'compete' with each other for focus. As a rule of thumb at any given moment in your play cycle you should be looking for the highest 'bang for buck' for your current focus spend - and if Barrage exists with short cooldown and high focus conversion efficiency, it will basically always be that skill because its focus efficiency at T3 is sufficiently high, or it will never be that skill, because it isn't.

The current design allowed me to make Barrage a very hard hitting skill, well worth having in your rotation - without having it completely dominating the rotation. If I allowed barrage to remain at T3 once you achieved it, the per-shot cooldown would have to be quite long in order to make space for other focus-spending skills in your rotation (presuming you need to throw in a focus builder semi-regularly as well), AND I would have to reduce its focus damage efficiency substantially.

Believe me - I tried those options first, and they sucked.

The skill felt too weak, like it was just a slightly better pen-shot that you had to ramp up before it became effective at all. It had no 'boom'. No payoff for the ramp up, and it still tended to suck up a large chunk of your skill activation time and focus.

That's why I went with this variation. This version of Barrage has a massive payoff for its build up and cost, and it can be used cleverly in a number of different patterns and situations. The trade off is a cool-down after the payoff. In order for it to feel powerful, it has to have a limit.

I found that in practice Barrage is a remarkably effective skill for quickly eliminating a pair of mobs in a pull near the start of a fight to mitigate incoming threat, and then I'll change over my rotation use the rest of my skills to burn down the remaining mobs during its cooldown. Then depending on the length of the fight it might come up as a finisher to close out the fight, or to deal with an unexpected add, or I'll just quickly open the next pull with it.

I can say with a great deal of confidence that it is a major component of blue DPS and if you aren't tiering it up and firing it, you're crippling yourself very badly. It hits harder than virtually any other hunter skill for its focus cost - but the cool-down is the trade off for that.

In any case, I can assure you that there is no version of Barrage that will 'feel' like the old one, because the old one was dramatically overpowered. The fact that I buffed almost every blue hunter skill and limited a single one - and that's all anyone noticed - confirms that unfortunately it was quite necessary.

- Vastin

[siipperi]

I found that in practice Barrage is a remarkably effective skill for quickly eliminating a pair of mobs in a pull near the start of a fight to mitigate incoming threat, and then I'll change over my rotation use the rest of my skills to burn down the remaining mobs during its cooldown. Then depending on the length of the fight it might come up as a finisher to close out the fight, or to deal with an unexpected add, or I'll just quickly open the next pull with it.

I can say with a great deal of confidence that it is a major component of blue DPS and if you aren't tiering it up and firing it, you're crippling yourself very badly. It hits harder than virtually any other hunter skill for its focus cost - but the cool-down is the trade off for that.

In any case, I can assure you that there is no version of Barrage that will 'feel' like the old one, because the old one was dramatically overpowered. The fact that I buffed almost every blue hunter skill and limited a single one - and that's all anyone noticed - confirms that unfortunately it was quite necessary.

- Vastin

During cooldown on long term I have been using 2x blood arrows, exsanguinate, upshot (cross traiting heavily, cooldown hits very nicely in middle of waiting period), mercshot and the usual building and consuming with more common skills. Rotation is still a bit too penetrating shot heavy so if you could mix it somehow:

One thing I requested on other thread was could there be way to reduce cooldown of Merciful shot while in blue. Little bit lower CD would supplement cooldown of longer barrage really well. For example if barrage is on tier 3 and used merciful shot has just 10s cooldown. Or weaker versio of red lines marksman just for merciful shot.

Because at the moment merciful shot is not worth using in red line imo so to make it more integral in blue would be nice. Would be mainly instance thing since mobs don't really live long if they bellow half of morale in landscape..

[Antophant]

It's insanely OP. No rotation needed, just press one skill over and over again. And you never really run out of focus since if you crit you can continue using skill and if you crit you gain focus... At least champs have to do some kind of DPS rotation to do good AoE. Meanwhile hunter does same with one button.

Problem of the skill is all of hunter AoE comes from one skill that has mechanic of reseting itself, if it doesn't reset AoE DPS takes big hit. So either big damage nerf (20% is not enough) with reduced targets or put on like 5s CD on the skill without ability to reset it. Even with 5s CD you would want to use it every time its off CD on trash fights.

Don't get me wrong I agree Rain of Arrows needs a nerf also upwards of 40%, my point was just that instead stepping back and thinking of how to fix the skill first we instead get a knee jerk proposed fix that would ruin the skill for AOEing.
Now if the proposed fix is so that Hunters are no longer a viable AOE class so be it but that just means Champs are again uncontested in AOE.


The problem with rotation is we have no other AOE skills besides Split Shot (a weak induction AOE with 10sec cooldown in blueline) so a AOE rotation could never really exist unless we got new ones or moved Split Shot to Redline and changed it.

[Wolf2x]

Now if the proposed fix is so that Hunters are no longer a viable AOE class so be it but that just means Champs are again uncontested in AOE.

Literally every single role in this game besides Tanking are uncontested in a certain classes favour. I thought we were used to that

And to be honest, If I would have to be ok with a class being uncontested for a role it would be Champ, given how raid unfriendly they are

[Vastin]

Now if the proposed fix is so that Hunters are no longer a viable AOE class so be it but that just means Champs are again uncontested in AOE.

No way is hunter going to be a 'Viable AoE class' with a single AoE skill. You don't even have a multi-target focus builder. RoA is there to soften up larger pulls when playing solo, or to work in concert with other more dedicated AoE Damage dealers. In this regard, having the double tap on your open is perfect for softening up that 5-pull so you can burn the individual mobs down faster.

I may skip the damage nerf. Have to think about whether it's really necessary. I prefer to make skills harder hitting as long as their other limits are sufficient to keep them from getting out of hand.

As it stands, RoA is the generally the highest efficiency damage skill in the hunter arsenal if you're hitting 3+ targets. Everything after that is basically bonus DPS above and beyond what you'd be doing otherwise. Now in a solo situation that might or might not be worth it because you often have to focus on burning a single target down quickly to reduce incoming DPS - but in team situations with larger pulls or when dealing with slightly lower level mobs where you don't have to worry as much about being overrun quickly, it's a solid choice to put in regular rotation. Whether you chose to use it or not is up to you.

As for the trait value - it's about a 25% skill DPS bonus for 2 trait points - pretty good value compared to many traits, so I'm not worried about that part. I don't expect it to be part of every build certainly. You might be able to build towards some kind of more dedicated AoE build by comboing with split arrow and traps - but not on RoA alone.

-Vastin

[HaVai]

Hey Vastin, I have a question to ask but I'm unsure if the topic has been brought up again (the discussion after U22.2 makes it hard to keep track of things, with all the fighting going on).

It's about Press Onward. Why did you decide to nerf it so hard? I did not mind the cooldown increase or the switch to blue, but the healing now is too low. I know that we're the top DPS class atm and it's easy to burn the mobs pretty quick, but even then it was the only significant enough skill for sustain (along with Cry of the Hunter, but that animation...) and self heal. Especially in landscape, I considered it to be vital for survivability.

Was that intentional? If yes, what was it that led you to this action? If not, are you planning to somehow fix/reverse it in future updates?

[DKenny]

Literally every single role in this game besides Tanking are uncontested in a certain classes favour. I thought we were used to that

And to be honest, If I would have to be ok with a class being uncontested for a role it would be Champ, given how raid unfriendly they are

I thought part of the objective for the class revamp was to end that role-class exclusivity? However, ST ranged dps was contested between RKs and hunters prior to this update. With the buff to red hunter and the nerf to RK relics that may no longer be the case though.

[siipperi]

Hey Vastin, I have a question to ask but I'm unsure if the topic has been brought up again (the discussion after U22.2 makes it hard to keep track of things, with all the fighting going on).

It's about Press Onward. Why did you decide to nerf it so hard? I did not mind the cooldown increase or the switch to blue, but the healing now is too low. I know that we're the top DPS class atm and it's easy to burn the mobs pretty quick, but even then it was the only significant enough skill for sustain (along with Cry of the Hunter, but that animation...) and self heal. Especially in landscape, I considered it to be vital for survivability.

Was that intentional? If yes, what was it that led you to this action? If not, are you planning to somehow fix/reverse it in future updates?

You are low level? If so you might have seen small nerf on the self heal since press onward was broken, just like bubble on low levels. HD messed up magnitude of these skills essentially giving out full morale pool heals on both skills. However on cap level these skills were totally useless. 4k heal on 70k morale pool. Now healing is tied % of your max morale. So it's same magnitude heal for everyone and it's better this way.

[DKenny]

You are low level? If so you might have seen small nerf on the self heal since press onward was broken, just like bubble on low levels. HD messed up magnitude of these skills essentially giving out full morale pool heals on both skills. However on cap level these skills were totally useless. 4k heal on 70k morale pool. Now healing is tied % of your max morale. So it's same magnitude heal for everyone and it's better this way.

Weren't you previously against percentage based heals?

[sahanto]

Currently looking at two changes to RoA, as that skill is definitely too spammy for its damage right now - I totally did overlook that crit cooldown.

1) 30 sec internal cooldown to the proc chance of Hail of Arrows, essentially letting you 'double tap' the AoE every 3rd shot, if you crit.

2) Reduction of RoA damage by about 20%. I still want it to hit reasonably hard - just not with the spam effect.

If that doesn't cut it, I may have to increase the base cool-down of the skill a bit, or look at its target numbers.

-Vastin

The problem is rather straightforward and has to do with the focus economy of the Hunter.

All focus skills essentially 'compete' with each other for focus. As a rule of thumb at any given moment in your play cycle you should be looking for the highest 'bang for buck' for your current focus spend - and if Barrage exists with short cooldown and high focus conversion efficiency, it will basically always be that skill because its focus efficiency at T3 is sufficiently high, or it will never be that skill, because it isn't.

The current design allowed me to make Barrage a very hard hitting skill, well worth having in your rotation - without having it completely dominating the rotation. If I allowed barrage to remain at T3 once you achieved it, the per-shot cooldown would have to be quite long in order to make space for other focus-spending skills in your rotation (presuming you need to throw in a focus builder semi-regularly as well), AND I would have to reduce its focus damage efficiency substantially.

Believe me - I tried those options first, and they sucked.

The skill felt too weak, like it was just a slightly better pen-shot that you had to ramp up before it became effective at all. It had no 'boom'. No payoff for the ramp up, and it still tended to suck up a large chunk of your skill activation time and focus.

That's why I went with this variation. This version of Barrage has a massive payoff for its build up and cost, and it can be used cleverly in a number of different patterns and situations. The trade off is a cool-down after the payoff. In order for it to feel powerful, it has to have a limit.

I found that in practice Barrage is a remarkably effective skill for quickly eliminating a pair of mobs in a pull near the start of a fight to mitigate incoming threat, and then I'll change over my rotation use the rest of my skills to burn down the remaining mobs during its cooldown. Then depending on the length of the fight it might come up as a finisher to close out the fight, or to deal with an unexpected add, or I'll just quickly open the next pull with it.

I can say with a great deal of confidence that it is a major component of blue DPS and if you aren't tiering it up and firing it, you're crippling yourself very badly. It hits harder than virtually any other hunter skill for its focus cost - but the cool-down is the trade off for that.

In any case, I can assure you that there is no version of Barrage that will 'feel' like the old one, because the old one was dramatically overpowered. The fact that I buffed almost every blue hunter skill and limited a single one - and that's all anyone noticed - confirms that unfortunately it was quite necessary.

- Vastin

No way is hunter going to be a 'Viable AoE class' with a single AoE skill. You don't even have a multi-target focus builder. RoA is there to soften up larger pulls when playing solo, or to work in concert with other more dedicated AoE Damage dealers. In this regard, having the double tap on your open is perfect for softening up that 5-pull so you can burn the individual mobs down faster.

I may skip the damage nerf. Have to think about whether it's really necessary. I prefer to make skills harder hitting as long as their other limits are sufficient to keep them from getting out of hand.

As it stands, RoA is the generally the highest efficiency damage skill in the hunter arsenal if you're hitting 3+ targets. Everything after that is basically bonus DPS above and beyond what you'd be doing otherwise. Now in a solo situation that might or might not be worth it because you often have to focus on burning a single target down quickly to reduce incoming DPS - but in team situations with larger pulls or when dealing with slightly lower level mobs where you don't have to worry as much about being overrun quickly, it's a solid choice to put in regular rotation. Whether you chose to use it or not is up to you.

As for the trait value - it's about a 25% skill DPS bonus for 2 trait points - pretty good value compared to many traits, so I'm not worried about that part. I don't expect it to be part of every build certainly. You might be able to build towards some kind of more dedicated AoE build by comboing with split arrow and traps - but not on RoA alone.

-Vastin

Vastin this is why your the best, even tho I may not agree with everything you wrote, it is greatly appreciated that you came on this forum to explain your thinking giving the players more of a reason then simply here’s how it is...take it. Lots of hearts<3

[HaVai]

You are low level? If so you might have seen small nerf on the self heal since press onward was broken, just like bubble on low levels. HD messed up magnitude of these skills essentially giving out full morale pool heals on both skills. However on cap level these skills were totally useless. 4k heal on 70k morale pool. Now healing is tied % of your max morale. So it's same magnitude heal for everyone and it's better this way.

Yes, I'm level 52 atm. I understand the need for converting it to a % value and I agree it is a step towards the right direction, but why this low? Since it is the only heal and cannot be used so often, would it be too much to raise the percentage to a significant number, for example 80%? Again, a longer cooldown (even a 1 minute, with the legacy equipped) shouldn't be an issue, but this magnitude is too small to make it a viable skill.

[Wolf2x]

I thought part of the objective for the class revamp was to end that role-class exclusivity? However, ST ranged dps was contested between RKs and hunters prior to this update. With the buff to red hunter and the nerf to RK relics that may no longer be the case though.

Hmm, If that was the objective then I'd say they did a poor job on it so far. Single target DPS not contested anymore as you pointed out, Healing is still Minstrel heavy despite the changes, and LM still best debuff obviously

At least tanking is somewhat balanced, with Champs possibly getting in the mix once its all said and done

[keztryl]

The problem is rather straightforward and has to do with the focus economy of the Hunter.

All focus skills essentially 'compete' with each other for focus. As a rule of thumb at any given moment in your play cycle you should be looking for the highest 'bang for buck' for your current focus spend - and if Barrage exists with short cooldown and high focus conversion efficiency, it will basically always be that skill because its focus efficiency at T3 is sufficiently high, or it will never be that skill, because it isn't.

The current design allowed me to make Barrage a very hard hitting skill, well worth having in your rotation - without having it completely dominating the rotation. If I allowed barrage to remain at T3 once you achieved it, the per-shot cooldown would have to be quite long in order to make space for other focus-spending skills in your rotation (presuming you need to throw in a focus builder semi-regularly as well), AND I would have to reduce its focus damage efficiency substantially.


- Vastin

@Vastin,

One thing I really liked about the 6+ tier version of barrage was that maintaining focus at the higher tiers was both more difficult and more rewarding. Although it is 1 skill, it felt like it had many layers, and that maintaining the higher tiers required a very efficient rotation in order to ensure there was always enough focus to execute the skill before it tiered down. Alternating between different skills would allow me to improve my sustained damage (via barbed arrrow, penshot and other bleeds), but the fun came from trying to maintain those high tiers of barrage. Currently, for me, it feels there isn't any escalation to barrage. For single target DPS, I click on barrage and other high damage focus skills (whichever tier is up, whenever the skill comes up) and only click on focus builders when I'm running low and the immediate execution of said skill is in jeopardy (otherwise I am spamming pen shot). I find I don't even need to worry about skills like rapid fire, or procs like (i.e., exsanguinate, volley, swift and true), to ensure that I have enough focus to execute my focus skills. When I'm low, I have the faster quick shot. Did you (or would you) consider creating more tiers to barrage with greater focus cost and power cost (or shorter windows for execution)?

I feel like part of the issue here is that in order to make Hunters competitive in comparison to DoT based DPS classes like Wardens are RKs (where there is a build up to higher DPS) who do have complex rotations, there needs to be some way to "unlock" the harder hitting skills (or bleeds) in longer fights, but in a way that is less advantageous or OP on the landscape (say, for example, in the same way that smoldering wrath does not make RKs too OP on landscape). I think the long induction of heart-seeker use to play this role in red (I'm not convinced it does to the same extent now), but distributing the damage across several skills (or making the induction skills faster) makes each individual skill execution feel less important. Right now, I feel like I can mess up my rotation, but there isn't any surplus benefit that comes from doing my rotation perfectly. I guess I could always play a different class (as hunters were designed for simplicity), but after 11 years (and the considerable time it takes to bring up a new character) I can't be alone in thinking there could be a little more complexity to hunter DPS given the interest by hunters to do challenging content and the mature state of the game (in the sense that there are many hunters who have been playing this class a long time).

[Vastin]

Hey Vastin, I have a question to ask but I'm unsure if the topic has been brought up again...

It's about Press Onward. Why did you decide to nerf it so hard? I did not mind the cooldown increase or the switch to blue, but the healing now is too low.?

Two points:

1) The cooldown was reduced from 120->90 seconds. The LI cooldown bonus was reduced, so if you had a full LI that change came out in the wash - otherwise you benefitted. There may have been some set bonus that fell out along the way - but most gearing bonuses are ultimately temporary, not part of a class's permanent build. They are meant to last a few updates or an expansion and then everyone moves on.

2) As for the heal, it probably really depends on how you are spec'd and geared. I tested PO with a number of different builds, and for the most part it was more powerful after the update than before - and it scales far better with gearing than it used to, especially if you stack a bit of vitality for added survivability. If you are running pure glass cannon... well, that's a choice you make regarding survivability vs. DPS.

Regarding the induction, I'm making that inductible while moving. Kind of stupid that a skill named 'Press Onward' can't be used while moving.

-Vastin

[wispsong]

The problem is rather straightforward and has to do with the focus economy of the Hunter.

All focus skills essentially 'compete' with each other for focus. As a rule of thumb at any given moment in your play cycle you should be looking for the highest 'bang for buck' for your current focus spend - and if Barrage exists with short cooldown and high focus conversion efficiency, it will basically always be that skill because its focus efficiency at T3 is sufficiently high, or it will never be that skill, because it isn't.

The current design allowed me to make Barrage a very hard hitting skill, well worth having in your rotation - without having it completely dominating the rotation. If I allowed barrage to remain at T3 once you achieved it, the per-shot cooldown would have to be quite long in order to make space for other focus-spending skills in your rotation (presuming you need to throw in a focus builder semi-regularly as well), AND I would have to reduce its focus damage efficiency substantially.

Believe me - I tried those options first, and they sucked.

The skill felt too weak, like it was just a slightly better pen-shot that you had to ramp up before it became effective at all. It had no 'boom'. No payoff for the ramp up, and it still tended to suck up a large chunk of your skill activation time and focus.

That's why I went with this variation. This version of Barrage has a massive payoff for its build up and cost, and it can be used cleverly in a number of different patterns and situations. The trade off is a cool-down after the payoff. In order for it to feel powerful, it has to have a limit.

I found that in practice Barrage is a remarkably effective skill for quickly eliminating a pair of mobs in a pull near the start of a fight to mitigate incoming threat, and then I'll change over my rotation use the rest of my skills to burn down the remaining mobs during its cooldown. Then depending on the length of the fight it might come up as a finisher to close out the fight, or to deal with an unexpected add, or I'll just quickly open the next pull with it.

I can say with a great deal of confidence that it is a major component of blue DPS and if you aren't tiering it up and firing it, you're crippling yourself very badly. It hits harder than virtually any other hunter skill for its focus cost - but the cool-down is the trade off for that.

In any case, I can assure you that there is no version of Barrage that will 'feel' like the old one, because the old one was dramatically overpowered. The fact that I buffed almost every blue hunter skill and limited a single one - and that's all anyone noticed - confirms that unfortunately it was quite necessary.

- Vastin

I'm not a high end player and honestly I don't care how high Barrage damage is. Focus generation is down, That means my best way of action is to start with a focus skill, then use induction to build focus back up. I rather start with induction, then do several focus skill. It just makes more sense to use a long induction spell first because after the attack the foes come toward me. RP wise I have more time to get a big induction shot out before I have to run. I understand where you are coming from but the low focus generation just messes with the flow of the play.


If you are not going to change any of this maybe you could at least fix the problem with Volley. I have it traited but I never see when I get that "free" induction skill. Maybe something bigger closer to the action bar. It would be perfect if it would indicate the skills it makes instant. That would help a lot with the feeling of what blue hunter should be.

It would also be great if Blood Arrow and exsanguinate had the same cd.