With the recent patch notes for the beta we see very little, if anything, that effects marksman hunters, the spec that needed help the most. While beast mastery actually seemed to have gotten the best of the changes where it is near where it was before even with ability pruning and was not hurt with changes to how their abilities work and while survival took some serious hits from ability pruning leaving it with absolutely zero burst and no execute ability, they are both still playable whereas marksman was changed so much that it is just a clunky mess that has no clue what it wants to be and is mostly unplayable.
Everyone in the hunter community was asking for something to make survival feel more powerful at some moment, be it burst or execute, and to smooth out a rotation that either was horrible because you had no explosive shots due to low multi strike or filled with nothing but explosive shots due to high multi strike. Some changes were made, like returning explosive shot to a previous incarnation, which at least shows that blizzard was aware of the problem. Yet they still have their eyes closed when it comes to marksman.
Everyone, or at least everyone that wanted to play marksman was waiting for something to be done about that spec. Anything. Add a proc to spice up the rotation, add interaction between abilities, give some sort of instant focus dump, change the mastery to anything but what it is, or make what it is more functional and as some people suggested change the buff to 9 seconds, or change it so we always have 50% even without it and 100% with it, so many little things could be added or adjusted to give a little life to what is currently a lifeless spec.
So many ideas, so many people explaining what they dislike about the spec, so many people from world first raiders to little johnny solo player have said how horrible marksman played, how uncomfortable it was to play, and how boring it felt playing it. When you have everyone from the top players in the game to the bottom players who never even think about being the best all saying the same thing, that marksman felt uncomfortable, unenjoyable and over all unplayable you have to think they are on to something here and there is a real truth behind it. When all hunters for all types of game play can agree, you have a problem here, one that needs to be addressed. It is not one fringe of hunter players that don't like how it fits their particular play style, it is everyone no matter what their play style is that has a problem with it.
We had hoped that after Celestalon had a chance to play a marksman hunter he would understand what we were all talking about but he remains deliberately ignorant with the problem as proved with comments like "I was pleasantly surprised, actually. The Bombardment weaving, Thrill of the Hunt, and Kill Shots added more than I expected" which clearly shows he has no idea what it means to be a hunter, how it feels to be a hunter, and how these things he considers interesting and more fun than he expected are stuff we take for granted as being there and are, in fact, not fun but just all part of the rotation.
So we all were holding our breath that something would be done for marksman but a recent comment on twitter from Celestalon leaves me to believe nothing is going to happen. When asked "are you guys going to do another pass on talents..." he responded, "unlikely at this stage that talents will be redesigned..."
So does this means we are out of luck? It sure seems that way. After Celestalon played a marksman hunter a week later a bunch of changes come down the pipe that effect hunters but don't really help marksman at all. I guess he is standing by what he said and what he believes, that marksman is fine. The word unlikely means there is still a chance but I am not going to hang my hat on that one. I do not see it happening, at least not as long as Celestalon remains deliberately ignorant about the problem.
There are only two and a half months left before warlords is released, likely one and a half month, most likely, before 6.0 is released and any changes to talents are locked and will definitely not change because blizzard does not like to completely change specs mid expansion meaning we will be stuck with marksman as a clunky piece of garbage for all that time. Do you think there is still a chance we can see something done or have you given up?
After hearing Celestalon I have given up. He made me loose all faith I had in being deal a fair deal in this situation. As long as he has any say in the matter and he thinks we are fine, nothing will be done. At least that is how I see it.
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Ele Shaman (my main) are going through a similar experience at the moment.
ReplyDeleteWe've always had a simple 'rotation' but that was fine because of the incredible utility and off-heals we brought. Now much of that has been removed and we are just left with the shell of the spec, lacking any depth whatsoever.
All through Alpha and Beta testing we have been fobbed off with "We're looking into it" or "wait to see what we have planned" and now, as we enter the tuning phase, we are stuck with 3 or 4 essentially useless talent tiers.
The healing tier is still there in it's 'live' incarnation while off-healing has been completely gutted for all dps rendering all 3 talents virtually useless.
The real kicker is that recently Celestalon (I think) said that because the tiers "are not causing any problems" they aren't a priority.
Next will come the "Ele shaman are fine as they are" line as if they had planned it this way all along.
Sorry to hijack your hunter post, just wanted to empathise while we see locks and mages (admittedly needed) get all the attention as usual.
I hate that they took away lightning blot being able to be cast on the move. It is not just them that got the shaft, all classes did. I am against the change. I think all classes should have some sort of on the move filler.
DeleteYou are not hijacking, if anything you are just adding support to the idea that Celestalon does not know how to communicate. If he is going to use the blanket "you are fine" statement the least he can do is back it up by saying why he thinks you are fine.
If he can not give a decent reason why you are fine, then you are not fine.
Blizzard needs to learn that just because the numbers look good it does not mean you are fine. They have to learn sooner or later they will have to learn that how a class plays is as important as how well it does.
If marksmen was buffed to be the top DPS in the game, 20% better than every single class out there, all hunters would play it, and all hunters would still hate it because it is clunky. They would do it because it was the best, but they would not like it because the spec is a horrible mess right now. But they would take it to mean "the class is fine" because everyone is playing it. They do not know how to interpret data. You can see my last post as proof of that, removing dailies because people hate dailies. No, people did not hate dailies, you are just bad at interpreting data.
I'm sure the cast while moving change is to remedy the melee/ranged imbalance we are seeing at the moment but I agree, a better solution could have been found.
DeleteBut yeah, all casters got shafted on that one to a certain extent. Most have better tools than the shaman for overcoming it though.
(Tangent - I'm intrigued to see how they will balance hunters against other classes now, given that they can still 'cast' on the move.)
It's the removal of the hybrid utility that most annoys me. Not that they removed it, but that they removed it accross the board without really considering and adapting what was left.
It now feels like we are half a spec, no resource to manage, just a dot to track and a proc to react to.
As much fun as throwing massive balls of lava can be, there is just no depth there any more.
Dailies - Blizzard needed to look beyond the "OMG dailies are bad!!!11!!" forum posts and see that it was a combination of issues...gear gating, removal of tabards, rep behind rep etc. that led to the revolt.
We often see Blizzard in this situation, they don't seem able to find a middle ground and instead, swing constantly from one extreme to the other.
I think a better solution would be to decrease the damage of the ability and increase something else with a cast time. It is still nice to do "something" while being forced to move. It makes all classes feel better, at least in my opinion. My opinion might be a little bias however as I play a hunter and love the play style that we are always doing something.
DeleteI would love if marksman had a dot to track and a proc to react to. Now it has nothing. Just hit aimed shot. That is it. :(
I've been saying for years that blizzard does not know how to do anything in moderation. They always swing so far one way or the other. They need to figure out how to at least attempt to balance things. Such as dailies. They went from adding hundreds because people said they liked them and then gated stuff behind them to adding none because people did not like them because stuff was gated behind them. How about just add dailies for some reputation and some gold to be made and let that be that. But no, that would make too much sense. They always go to extremes.
makes one want to give Celestalon a (dare he say it) (dare, dare) a "blanket party". oh he dared it
Deletelol You are so bad sometimes, but in a good way.
DeleteI am saddened that Marks isn't as interesting as it used to be. But we hunters got pretty spoiled having 3 viable specs for most of Cata and MoP. (well, marks was lower dps).
ReplyDeleteI remember at start of Wrath you had to be BM. Then they made SV better and you had to be SV.
Marks sounds like it got on the nostalgia train back to vanilla when it was 1. hit SS 2. cast aimed shot 3. hit arcane shot until Aimed shot is off CD 4. repeat
Maybe they did it so Molten Core will feel more like the original 60 raid, haha
I am planning a post about hunters in mists and yes I believe that hunters in mists got spoiled. So spoiled that not matter how much we want it we will never see it as good as we have had it this expansion.
DeleteI loved loved loved ArP capping as marks at the end of wrath.
Then when the prepatch came for cataclysm and the new MM mastery when we pulled both packs of whelps before sindragosa and I did a multi shot with Zods, I had so many procs from mastery, plus the new multi, plus the zods extra shots, plus procs from my procs on top of procs from my procs my entire screen lit up with numbers and I crashed. I came back to a broken bow which was at 100% before I fired that 1 single multi shot that crashed it. It was freaking awesome. Someone told me I did 1.6M DPS on that one shot. Back in wrath that was, without a doubt, unheard of.
But MM with ArP capping was insane and I fell in love with MM then and have wanted that feeling back ever since, even without the ArP capping.
Good God! A 1.6 mil shot would have been crazy. I think I was doing 11k and top hunters were doing like 25k.
DeleteThats awesome.
It was because of the mastery being added to MM that proced an extra shot sometimes. Then reforging being added and the way stats work. I was over 80% mastery. That all added with multi shot hitting everything at the same time and the fact that even the shots fired by the mastery could fire shots. You had the multi shot, the procs, the zod procs, the procs from procs, the procs from procs procing zods again. Basically it was like I ended up firing thousands of shots all at once. It was so funny seeing my entire screen light up with numbers. I saw nothing on the screen but numbers before wow blew up on it.
DeleteIt was awesome.
MM and SS has always been lackluster to me, even when MM was top-dawg.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find amazing is that Blizzard can't make them all the same but with slight differences - BM has access to a very slightly better pet survialability ability, MM has access to a slightly better hitting ability and SS has access to a slighty better trapping ability. Instead of this screwed up mess we got.