An Update: On Upcoming Changes to Hunters

[Leonide]

a new hunter skill? how about update BotR. after press onward update, BotR is quite ignored. and also take this time to change strong draw (putting the current strong draw bonus into BotR), since strong draw is more of a MUST-HAVE than any 3 other traits combined. this would free up a trait for something new. (like maybe pen shot crit resets ISB? we'll lose the desire to use the helegrod set by 75, for sure) and updating BotR could add some melee love without forcing anyone to melee.

BotR ignored? My God, it's probably my favorite leg trait. Used with IFS, it's a life saver.
Lets compare both traits in group situation:

BotR
+Gives more power than press onward in the same time lap (5 minutes) (90% of the time)
+Passive
+No induction

Press onward:
-Long. Long. Induction
-Can be interrupted by a whisper
-5 min CD
-Not enough power/morale

Pres onward needs a total revamp so we can have more leg trait to swap. Actually, 4/3r or 4/3b is not as viable as 5/2 because the only DPS leg traits are from a capstone, CB or IFS. Press onward is totally useless in almost every group situation and BotR in the hands of a skillful hunter will restore tons of power for ''free''.

Press onward must become a real leg CD with DPS components: +morale + power + buffs.

[Forgotten_Legend]

oh believe me... i know how powerful the power return is on BOTR... the reason i say it's "ignored" is due to how many times in hunter forum discussions i've had to point out the math. i also can't tell you how many hunters i've inspected since the PO update, and many of them don't have BOTR slotted. granted, some of them might not have completed the class quest chain to obtain it. but most time of the time i see a capstone and both CC legendaries. sometimes a capstone, a CC and PO. BOTR is a lot less common now. and i'd say its not common at all anymore. people like having that big heal and the CC more than they like 10 power per ranged skill.

[NameAlreadyTaken]

I didn't read it. I am not supposed to know these things yet since I'm not in the Beta. I bet if I had read it though I'd feel pretty good about not buying a pre-order for Isengard.

[Creslin07]

If those really are the changes, then they are horrible, horrible, horrible. These make me want to cancel my pre-order and just wait for SWTOR sadly.

[CWood]

That's one way to solve the "Deadly Precision and Strong Draw are must-have traits". Remove them from the game.

Why am I not surprised?

[Kheld_GB]

Why are they changing the Hunter (for the worse it looks) AGAIN!?

[Thentix]

I think turbines first mistake is listening to the forums only or making changes based ont he forums. 95% of the time, the forums are only about 10% or maybe 20% of the player base. Most people(like myself as u can tell from my post count) tend to stay off the forums and just play the game.

I for one would LOVE a melee trait line. I find myself in melee range about 40% of the time. I also love being able to hit from range(no I wont play a champ,I mean damaging range skills) and finish stuff off with melee skills. Like one of the players said(or I think it was a dev) Legolas was not only skilled with a bow, but also a formidable melee combatant with swords. I think it would only be right to have a dps bow line, melee/bow dps line and CC line. So I hope they stick with what they had planned originally. Just what I think anyways.

[IceMaster]

I really like this game but it's sad to see that a very very very small vocal minority has so much sway over a game. Most people have absolutely no clue what they are talking about and only think things as far as "hey, what do I WANT personally", not what makes the game fun for everyone else or what's needed. What's really funny is how easily people's lack of understanding shows. I've read the forums every day, most every post on anything important and the community shows the same general lack of understanding. They come in droves, complaining about how this is overpowered, or unfair or whatever. But do you want to know where they are coming from? They are taking the changes as if NO OTHER CHANGE IN THE ENTIRE GAME WAS BEING MADE!!! That we weren't getting 10 more levels. That we weren't getting new level 75 gear (People were like, well, what about this level 60 armor set bonus??? what am i going to wear now? Or the burglars... I geared for might and now that agility is our prime stat, my gear is all screwed. They aren't even thinking that we are REPLACING THE DANG GEAR as we level). And I can't leave out the hunter posts: NO, you can't change blue line, I USE THAT TO RAID QQ. Like they can't raid if red was made competitive and the raid trait line. As if raiding was the only thing that mattered. As you can see, taking a very small sample, these ideas are radical. It seems as if Turbine constantly is listening and taking ideas from a very small uneducated group of individuals. I really wish Turbine picked up some Ex-blizzard employees. This company could really use the pointers.

Btw: I did not click on the link that was in the quote because I don't click on random website links. And I know my post is a bit of a rant but I'm sick of reading post after post every day of fools that don't know even know what 1 + 1 equals and the fact that their lack of thought is ruining this game's development. And it's like 4 in morn so a bit more touchy.

[DorianFalkenmond]

"Epic Conclusion – Damage increase"


did anyone expect the lorebreaker dev to do anything else than damage hunters?

[CWood]

And I can't leave out the hunter posts: NO, you can't change blue line, I USE THAT TO RAID QQ. Like they can't raid if red was made competitive and the raid trait line.

There's a reason people are concerned, and it isn't because they're too stupid to understand a level cap increase. The hunter paradigm has, with almost every update, shifted away from sustainable DPS in a controlled environment towards unsustainable spike damage, and the little information we have on the upcoming changes strongly suggests that this update will just be more of the same. The people who enjoy the former approach to the class have good reason to be concerned.

[Ixinix]

"Epic Conclusion – Damage increase"
did anyone expect the lorebreaker dev to do anything else than damage hunters?

Selective quoting ftw!

I have both an endgame RK and Hunter and when reading the RK changes it feels more like a nerf than a boost overall. I also get the impression that RK's are being forced into the fire trait line again.

For Precision hunters I see a lot of unwanted changes and nerfs where Strength is getting considerable buffs from the looks of it.

[Elrantiri]

Well, if these changes are real (I assume they are, but since I'm not in the beta I cannot confirm it), hopefully there is still time for some fixes and rebalancing.

I would not mind if the traits were made a bit more insignificant, that's how they're like on many other classes, some minor upgrades to make your toon those 5-10% better, a hunter nowadays without Deadly Precision + Strong Draw is crippled hard IMO.

Strong Draw is there now, just a minor upgrade to make your hunter a bit better. Deadly Precision had never been further away though, that will be our best focus generator by far. I'd remove the trait and make the extra focus on crit a passive skill for hunters, especially now that Hunters will need to generate more focus than ever before.

Btw. is it normal practice in here to just remove posts on this forum without letting the poster know about it?

[Fin.]

The minstrel and champion changes were heavily discussed with the playerbase. I would argue that the changes coming our way are as major as minstrel ones. The dev in charge of our changes is on a 3 month holiday. Not much to add.

[DorianFalkenmond]

Well, if these changes are real (I assume they are, but since I'm not in the beta I cannot confirm it), hopefully there is still time for some fixes and rebalancing.

from experience with several updates in the past, not much will change. and with ZC being in stealth for a long time now, there is no hint that Turbine wants to talk to players about these changes anyway

we will have to see how it plays out. there were some goodies, too. these changes plus the way they were _not_ announced and discusses are a slap in the face. great customer service, Turbine!

[Elrantiri]

True, but I dont think there is need for big changes, and as you say, there are some goodies in there

I can easily see the epic AoE that may be possible with the new Arrow Storm trait, start with full focus, 3x Rain of Thorns (with 25% crit chance + 5-7% dev change and 7-10 targets the chance of critting is quite high) Intent Concentration, another 3x Rain of Thorns, hunter potion, another 2x Rain of Thorns + the extra focus you may get from critting for even more Rain of Thorns
This does require of a lot of targets of course, but I'd love to see it ^^ (imagine owning the "Terra Cottas" at BG with this)

[WhimsicalPacifist]

Ok, I now see why ZC didn't want to post the changes- many really look bad on paper. I'll give him the benefit of alot of doubt for now but I would really like to see how this works out in actual gameplay. If it doesn't pan out there's other games coming on the market.

EDIT: The more I look, the more it looks like my Huntsman might become a castrato.

[Valkyrielady]

hunters have been a tier 2 DPSer since Mirkwood came out. Early in the beta of Mirkwood, the hunter was drastically changed, then after an outcry, changed back. Some of those changes may have been better in the long term, and now, hunters are sliding further away from the top DPS group. If you want a fun, easy, but 2nd tier class, go with hunter anymore. If you want DPS, go tactical. Turbine loves the tactical classes it seems lately. Think about the Ettenmoors, look at how much tactical owns out there, then consider how freep-bias Turbine is. Hence, no strong tactical creep classes. Sure, WL and defiler are tactical, but no one has ever been scared by a WL's DPS or defilers. Its a stark and sad truth: Tactical is Turbine's baby, and hunters have to suck it up and deal with poor DPS for now.

[VincentVanPort]

Did I miss something this morning? Was there some information put out absentmindedly? By the looks of it people are not happy at all. Great. As suspected.

[FyreBrand]

It's always fun to watch the pre-release drama surrounding xpacs.

[ANewMachine]

hunters have been a tier 2 DPSer since Mirkwood came out. Early in the beta of Mirkwood, the hunter was drastically changed, then after an outcry, changed back. Some of those changes may have been better in the long term, and now, hunters are sliding further away from the top DPS group. If you want a fun, easy, but 2nd tier class, go with hunter anymore. If you want DPS, go tactical. Turbine loves the tactical classes it seems lately. Think about the Ettenmoors, look at how much tactical owns out there, then consider how freep-bias Turbine is. Hence, no strong tactical creep classes. Sure, WL and defiler are tactical, but no one has ever been scared by a WL's DPS or defilers. Its a stark and sad truth: Tactical is Turbine's baby, and hunters have to suck it up and deal with poor DPS for now.

Seriously, look at the RK patch notes, and you'll see this just isn't true. Every aspect is being hit, and hit hard. We're left with *maybe* some OK DPS from Fire (which will only be any good on bosses, and then only if it's buffed about where it is now, which the notes I saw didn't indicate), but the days of massive EC crits and sustained lightning DPS in groups/raids are gone.

[WhimsicalPacifist]

It's always fun to watch the pre-release drama surrounding xpacs.

Well I do mean to be melodramatic, so I already feel my ample Huntsman package melting like the Wicked Witch of the West. On the plus side this much of a revision probably means a skirmish reset, maybe an LI reset because we are going to need both. :-s

[CWood]

Btw. is it normal practice in here to just remove posts on this forum without letting the poster know about it?

It's not unusual. If the link was leaked beta info (and it certainly sounded like it to me, but I didn't look), they chop those up pretty quick.

It's always fun to watch the pre-release drama surrounding xpacs.

There's a reason I'm still active on the boards even though I haven't logged into the game in like 6 months.

[Elrantiri]

It's not unusual. If the link was leaked beta info (and it certainly sounded like it to me, but I didn't look), they chop those up pretty quick.

I guess that's one way to confirm that the link did contain beta info

[FyreBrand]

It's not unusual. If the link was leaked beta info (and it certainly sounded like it to me, but I didn't look), they chop those up pretty quick.



There's a reason I'm still active on the boards even though I haven't logged into the game in like 6 months.

For the love of all that is good please tell me you're not playing 14.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The link could have contained some possible leaked info, or it could have contained utter rubbish just to incite the giddy masses. The link could have been of questionable quality as well - ie: post questionable material on a site that has keyloggers or malware. Not only could that have only been part of the story, there could also be a lot of tweaking going on between now and open beta. They don't put beta info out for a reason and posting links to it is unacceptable and not only probably exclude the poster from beta participation, but could result in bans or infractions.

[CWood]

For the love of all that is good please tell me you're not playing 14.

Nope. Back home in XI where I belong. Working on getting a second character up to playable levels, because with the changes to the game it's probably faster than redoing all my merits on my main. In the Tree skilling up on crabs before I try Genkai 5 as I type this.

I really tried really hard to like XIV. I did. Unfortunately it's such a steaming pile of **** that I couldn't pull it off.