Update 26.1 Hunter Changes reported on +Cord of the Rings

[Aeviternus]

You keep saying I need to work on my skill but I have practiced my rotation over and over; it is the same as most other end-game Hunters and I follow it near perfect as far as skill priority and DoTs/debuffs. I know for a fact is it not the problem, as far as using skills and priority anyway. I have been using fire oil (which seems like you don't) and I don't use a bow swap which it looks like you do, and that must be the huge difference as I'm missing the 34.8% damage from the Burn Hot legacy. Without bow swap, I get about 110k average DPS on dummy which is roughly 350k with full raid buffs.

For the record, I always open in camo with focus for the crit on first hit followed by Burn Hot and HS and Upshot. Quick Shots as damage and building focus. Then Pen shot every 9/10 seconds, Blood Arrow -> Exsanguinate, Barbed Arrow, Swift Bow when instant. Quick shot as filler and whenever full focus, I use HS and Upshot again (with Burn Hot first if it's up). Repeat.

As far as earlier, when I stated "I don't believe you", that was a little far. What I should have typed was "I don't see how." - I've possibly answered my own question regarding bow swap. I do want to point out that we should not have to bow swap in order to reach the same DPS as other classes. Hunters don't provide a group anything but damage, so why should they NOT be the highest ST DPS?

Alright, now at least we're getting somewhere. Not bowswapping is going to cost you a substantial amount of DPS, and I don't consider any rotation "perfect" if it doesn't include bowswapping. It's part of the class. You could argue it should not be. I'd support that. But currently, it is. You need at least 2 bows and swap between them for your rotation to be perfect.

In raids, you should not use Fire-oil. It puts extra unnecessary strain on your LM to use the Raven debuff. If you don't use Fire oil, your DPS will be higher, because no one takes Fire RKs anymore, and as such, physical mitigation is generally lower in raids.

Hunters do provide support in the form of -4% of each mitigation. Granted, it isn't much. Even so, they don't strictly need to be the highest DPS in the game to be considered viable. One hunter is desirable for this mitigation debuff, even if their DPS is around 5% lower than a burg's/champ's. Having said that, I'm not convinced that Hunters aren't the highest ST DPS in the game currently. I will do my own comparisons once I have the full Hunter set, but I haven't seen any reliable data posted on these forums. Nothing has been substantiated through screenshots.

I could pretty well understand that Giliodor wasnt comparing apples to oranges like y'all assume he was. He saw HyperInsane's dummy parse and said he does better; the implication is he does better in the same context (dummy parse)--apples to apples. I would have rather seen explicit numbers too rather than just scoffing, but the scoffing was warranted. Oranges/t3 raid parse introduced in the next paragraph, totally different thought. Less widely useful, frankly, since folks have less idea what a good t3b1 parse is supposed to look like--he really didnt read the room right--but distinct.

I'll suggest that there's a direct line between (A) willfully assuming a person just doesnt understand how basic comparisons work and (B) the sheer arrogance of thinking middling numbers are from near perfect play on a class that must therefore need more buffs. "It's not you; it's them" sort of thinking.

I never really took screenshots of my DPS on a dummy as a Hunter, because I did it for personal practice, but after engaging in this discussion, I went and did just that, so I'll present it here (the highlighted text in the chatbox shows 141.6k DPS):



As I said before, very mediocre gear, only 3 set pieces, and very limited experience. I would never claim that this is even close to what a seasoned Hunter is able to do.

[Strider5548]

Alright, now at least we're getting somewhere. Not bowswapping is going to cost you a substantial amount of DPS, and I don't consider any rotation "perfect" if it doesn't include bowswapping. It's part of the class. You could argue it should not be. I'd support that. But currently, it is. You need at least 2 bows and swap between them for your rotation to be perfect.

In raids, you should not use Fire-oil. It puts extra unnecessary strain on your LM to use the Raven debuff. If you don't use Fire oil, your DPS will be higher, because no one takes Fire RKs anymore, and as such, physical mitigation is generally lower in raids.

Hunters do provide support in the form of -4% of each mitigation. Granted, it isn't much. Even so, they don't strictly need to be the highest DPS in the game to be considered viable. One hunter is desirable for this mitigation debuff, even if their DPS is around 5% lower than a burg's/champ's. Having said that, I'm not convinced that Hunters aren't the highest ST DPS in the game currently. I will do my own comparisons once I have the full Hunter set, but I haven't seen any reliable data posted on these forums. Nothing has been substantiated through screenshots.



I never really took screenshots of my DPS on a dummy as a Hunter, because I did it for personal practice, but after engaging in this discussion, I went and did just that, so I'll present it here (the highlighted text in the chatbox shows 141.6k DPS):



As I said before, very mediocre gear, only 3 set pieces, and very limited experience. I would never claim that this is even close to what a seasoned Hunter is able to do.

This is a very constructive post. Thank you for changing the tone of the last several comments to something more positive.

I completely agree on bow swapping, HyperInsane, if you max out a second LI and swap for Swift Bow, DoTs, HS, and Burn Hot you will immediately see a 10% increase in DPS, and even more when you get good at it.

I'm mixed on fire oils, supposedly they work now on our pen shot debuff now so it makes sense to have them up during solo play, but in my limited dummy testing I actually saw less DPS using fire oil. As for raid, I still use it all the time, I expect LM's to rotate pets and get the fire debuff on target. It's hard to test in raid scenarios since you don't get a large sample size, but I'll try to monitor whether LM is using raven going forward and see how DPS compares with and without.

Regarding the dummy parse, I think your #'s are very solid esp considering your phys mastery is a little low. I'm surprised to see HS contributing so much to damage without set bonus, but I reckon it's because you have really high crit rating so you are lowering the CD quite a bit.

Again, 140k on dummy is really good, and with capped phys mastery you will be doing even more, nice work!

[MaxHunter]

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I never really took screenshots of my DPS on a dummy as a Hunter, because I did it for personal practice, but after engaging in this discussion, I went and did just that, so I'll present it here (the highlighted text in the chatbox shows 141.6k DPS):



As I said before, very mediocre gear, only 3 set pieces, and very limited experience. I would never claim that this is even close to what a seasoned Hunter is able to do.

A picture is worth a thousand words!. You did it dude, thx so much!!!

[Aeviternus]

I just want to clarify that the number I shared is by no means the top end of the spectrum (for obvious reasons). If you work to improve your character and rotation, given the proper gear, you should be able to reach 150k+ consistently, and I've seen evidence of a 170k parse.

[Gabli]

f you work to improve your character and rotation, given the proper gear, you should be able to reach 150k+ consistently, and I've seen evidence of a 170k parse.

Would you mind specifying what buffs and consumables were used ?

[Aeviternus]

Would you mind specifying what buffs and consumables were used ?

I was told about this parse in confidentiality, so I will not share anything beyond this, but this was with Hope/Veteran Strength/Normal scrolls in the 170k parse. No special food/scrolls. Regardless, when testing DPS on Champ, I found that these make a ~5% difference, at most.

[GriffX]

I just asked in another thread if bow-swapping is a necessity for doing good DPS. Not very happy to find out here, that it actually IS a necessity. Haha

I miss my hunter, but not enough to go farm for yet another LI. Perhaps when they are finally gonna do a revamp of the system I will revisit my HNT!

Thanks for these posts here!

[Khluzainn]

This probably isnt the place to talk about this, but could someone please put a screen shot or list the ideal legacy set up for both bows. Is on bow for focus damage and the other for swift bow and bleeds? Hunter is one of the only classes I am not up to speed on. Was going to dust mine off finally.

[Arandour]

My hunter is alt but i made second bow some time ago for add extra two legacies and swap to use when i can.For heart seeker and burn hot.All the other useful legacies to other bow.Probably main hunters have more deep changes i have only those but its much better than with out those two.

[Pashtick]

What you describe sounds quite accurate.
Since your raid grp already uploaded a few videos maybe it would be possible for you to record a bit of hunter gameplay in remmochant t3?
I think that could be very helpful for a lot of people here
If no,not a big deal but i just wanted to ask kin case.

A little bit late, but here is a pov from t3 id4 from hunter and warden, Id2 and 3 will follow.