How is Survival playing?

[Krazzorx]

I'm assuming that talent tree row is designed for stuff to do outside of melee range. So I'm cool with those abilities. Though what in the world is Camo doing there? Shouldn't that be a pvp talent?

[Tehterokkar]

I'm assuming that talent tree row is designed for stuff to do outside of melee range. So I'm cool with those abilities. Though what in the world is Camo doing there? Shouldn't that be a pvp talent?

Well... They did say they want to get rid of themed rows(Eg. No more "Pick AoE 1, AoE 2 or AoE 3") as much as possible.

You can see this with Marksman T90 talents, you have Murder of Crows, Barrage and Volley. 1 Single-target, 1 Cleave/Burst AoE and 1 Consistent AoE.

[Krazzorx]

Ya I get that, it just seems to me that Camo has no place anywhere on the whole tree IMO. I don't see what pve value it adds anywhere.

[Vaelkyri]

Disclaimer: not currently in Alpha, this is just from watching and reading and applying some critical thought. (though I wouldnt complain if my account was flagged for it *cough*) Im also not a theory crafter by any measure.

Current state of Survival ie Weaving is unintended- dont get to attached to the idea. People are too busy looking at what they can do and not thinking about if they should be able to do it.

Devs have stated that the idea is to pool mongoose while dumping focus with fillers then regenerating focus while dumping mongoose back to back.

The current weaving that is going on is simply untenable, having 0.5 seconds of tolerance in buff maintenance simply wont fly with any degree of latency, movement or target switching.

To reinterate, maintaining 90% uptime on 6 stack mongoose is NOT how the spec is meant to be played. Hell, just look at the damage- chaining constant 100k non crits at 660ilvl should be an indicator that somethings fucky. 6 stack is popping burst CDs (snake hunter/aspect of the eagle).

I fully expect to see the buff duration dropped to 2.5 seconds to enforce the back to back spam in the next few builds.

[Deleted]

Disclaimer: not currently in Alpha, this is just from watching and reading and applying some critical thought. (though I wouldnt complain if my account was flagged for it *cough*) Im also not a theory crafter by any measure.

Current state of Survival ie Weaving is unintended- dont get to attached to the idea. People are too busy looking at what they can do and not thinking about if they should be able to do it.

Devs have stated that the idea is to pool mongoose while dumping focus with fillers then regenerating focus while dumping mongoose back to back.

The current weaving that is going on is simply untenable, having 0.5 seconds of tolerance in buff maintenance simply wont fly with any degree of latency, movement or target switching.

To reinterate, maintaining 90% uptime on 6 stack mongoose is NOT how the spec is meant to be played. Hell, just look at the damage- chaining constant 100k non crits at 660ilvl should be an indicator that somethings fucky. 6 stack is popping burst CDs (snake hunter/aspect of the eagle).

I fully expect to see the buff duration dropped to 2.5 seconds to enforce the back to back spam in the next few builds.

Seriously? Weaving is the first thing that came to mind for me about 10 seconds after reading the abilities, and an entire development team didn't see this coming? 0.5s is more than enough, I often time stuff by 0.1-0.2 seconds and haven't missed for as long as I can remember.

[Vaelkyri]

WarcraftDevs
‏@WarcraftDevs
@streetlightout Mongoose stacks aren't something you maintain. Their stacking encourages you to pool them, then use as many as you can.

https://twitter.com/warcraftdevs/sta...93828936024064

The problem atm is peoples issues with the spec are based around difficulty maintaining stacks with uptime on bosses, GCD locking as a result, hard set rotations etc when the reality is they arnt meant to be focused on maintaining stacks in the first place.

[Deleted]

Um yes, that doesn't go against what I'm saying at all, unless you currently can maintain them 100% of the time?

You pool them, then either weave or delay for as close to 3.5s as possible and keep that up until they fall off(And don't even spam to do bite - weave - bite but delay the second bite so that only ~0.1s of the buff is left).

If the first instinct of any sensible person is that you are meant to weave / delay with them for as long as possible then I find it very difficult to believe it's not intended.

[Vaelkyri]

As far as I can tell its meant to be fillers to dump focus, hammer off as many mongoose as you can while focus regens. Prob the best way to think of it is an inverted resource system, your finishers allows for focus regen while your fillers expend it to generate secondary resource (mongoose charges).

As it is now the rotation is pretty hard set, mongoose-filler-mongoose-filler-mongoose-filler and blizz has been moving away from hard rotations for a very long time now towards priority systems.

[Huggykaze]

Doesn't the buff only last 3.5 seconds like originally revealed? Hopefully they tweak it, because a .5 second window is ridiculous. I agree that the MB mechanic needs spicing up or reworking. It also feels like none of the abilities interact with eachother. Maybe Raptor Strike could add 3 seconds to Laceration or something at least.

Yeah, 0.5s is funny, that's why people ask for 1s GCD, it'll give us 1.5s window to reapply MB. I think talents bring some synergy, not to mention that everything is or can be built to generate MB stacks, except for Raptor Strike which is focus dump. On that note:

Mongoose:
http://cdn-img.people.com/emstag/i/2...ngoose-600.jpg

Raptor:
http://www.dinocreta.com/wp-content/...or-700x727.jpg

Why our hardest hitting ability's name comes from a raccoon and our focus dump from fuckin' dinosaur is beyond me...

- - - Updated - - -

As far as I can tell its meant to be fillers to dump focus, hammer off as many mongoose as you can while focus regens. Prob the best way to think of it is an inverted resource system, your finishers allows for focus regen while your fillers expend it to generate secondary resource (mongoose charges).

As it is now the rotation is pretty hard set, mongoose-filler-mongoose-filler-mongoose-filler and blizz has been moving away from hard rotations for a very long time now towards priority systems.

A bit like Arcane Mage right now. Burn half of your mana, regen, be quiet until Evo's off CD and burst again. SV seems to be supposed to be similar with smaller interval between phases and more dynamic gameplay. Not sure how it's going to work, but idea is pretty cool.

Problem which I see, as a dev, is surefire way to prevent people from spamming Mongoose. Right now it has to be perfectly tuned, to allow max 5 (estimate) stacks without some crazy RNG or CD usage. It's not very safe tbh, 'cos if I decide to spec into stacks generation and stack a lot of mastery ('typical gear' probably means normal T19, so 35-40% should be obtainable by the end of expansion) they'll either nerf the spec to the ground or it'll be severly OP.

I think, increasing the recharge time for MB charges would be a good first step to making this less under player's control, which is good in this case :P

[Phookah]

Yeah, 0.5s is funny, that's why people ask for 1s GCD, it'll give us 1.5s window to reapply MB. I think talents bring some synergy, not to mention that everything is or can be built to generate MB stacks, except for Raptor Strike which is focus dump. On that note:

Mongoose:
http://cdn-img.people.com/emstag/i/2...ngoose-600.jpg

Raptor:
http://www.dinocreta.com/wp-content/...or-700x727.jpg

Why our hardest hitting ability's name comes from a raccoon and our focus dump from fuckin' dinosaur is beyond me...

- - - Updated - - -



A bit like Arcane Mage right now. Burn half of your mana, regen, be quiet until Evo's off CD and burst again. SV seems to be supposed to be similar with smaller interval between phases and more dynamic gameplay. Not sure how it's going to work, but idea is pretty cool.

Problem which I see, as a dev, is surefire way to prevent people from spamming Mongoose. Right now it has to be perfectly tuned, to allow max 5 (estimate) stacks without some crazy RNG or CD usage. It's not very safe tbh, 'cos if I decide to spec into stacks generation and stack a lot of mastery ('typical gear' probably means normal T19, so 35-40% should be obtainable by the end of expansion) they'll either nerf the spec to the ground or it'll be severly OP.

I think, increasing the recharge time for MB charges would be a good first step to making this less under player's control, which is good in this case :P

A mongoose can regularly fight and kill all kinds of snakes 3 times their size, they will scream at lions just to tell them to fuck off.
Mongoose don't give a fuck.
Also raptor strike is referring to a bird of prey, like an eagle/hawk/etc... not a dinosaur :P lol

[Huggykaze]

A mongoose can regularly fight and kill all kinds of snakes 3 times their size, they will scream at lions just to tell them to fuck off.
Mongoose don't give a fuck.
Also raptor strike is referring to a bird of prey, like an eagle/hawk/etc... not a dinosaur :P lol

But there are raptors in WoW, so it can as well refer to dinosaur.

[Phototropic]

I personally see Raptor Strike meant as a nimble and quick-flitted attack that could easily fit into both a raptor- and a bird-esque description... especially considering birds and some smaller raptor-like dinosaurs are related to one another :P

[wonderlust]

Well I've seen a lot of videos and considering how fast preach is killing things with his survival toon compared to his shadow priest, it seems to be doing fine.

Not that this necessarily says anything about the performance of Survival, but please keep in mind that Preach was playing his shadow priest completely wrong on his intro video; not doing "Void Bolt on CD -> Mind Blast spam" during Insanity, and dropping out of it really fast.

[Phookah]

But there are raptors in WoW, so it can as well refer to dinosaur.

It "could" but it doesn't. Hence why a bunch of hunter things are named after birds. Aspect of the Eagle/Fury of the Eagle/Eagle Eye/Call of the Eagle/Wing Clip etc...

[Varaben]

It's total trash at all gear levels.

Tanks do more DPS than Survival.

Are you seriously worried about balance when it's still in alpha? Relax brother, take a breather. They haven't even begun to do balance changes if I had to guess.

[Deleted]

I'm actually happy about hearing of Weaving MS being unintended. Playstyle sounded super clunky. Nice idea, nifty in PvP, but with 1,5s GCD and Harpoon on it + 0.5s window? Nah.

[kaid]

A mongoose can regularly fight and kill all kinds of snakes 3 times their size, they will scream at lions just to tell them to fuck off.
Mongoose don't give a fuck.
Also raptor strike is referring to a bird of prey, like an eagle/hawk/etc... not a dinosaur :P lol

Mongoose are in the mustelide family aka ferrets, badgers and wolverines not raccoons. The whole family tree is a pile of animals that don't give a single flip about how big their opponents are and won't back down from anything. All tend to be extremely adept hunters even though most tend to be small.

As for raptor don't think dinosaur think hawk/falcon/eagle aka raptors.

[jSewell]

There will be plenty of changes. Currently all you do is use dragons fire trap with the trap enhancing / CD reducing talents and you can basically perma CC someone. Dragons fire trap isn't even trinketable(or emfh) on alpha atm either and it interrupts blade storm, etc. Most blatantly unintentionally OP ability atm, hopefully it doesn't get nerfed into oblivion

[Hatexon]

It has potential, but it lacks no structure. It is fun, to me atleast but it is impossible to play at any level. Not just cause it is alpha, but just cause of how little time you get to do anything. I'll try to explain my experience with it (as someone who really wants to play one too.)


Mongoose Bite stacks last way, way to short. Not just cause of movement issues, but also cause you get an attack called Fury of the Eagle. This does more damage based off Mongoose Bite stacks. Fury of the Eagle is a long channel, 8 seconds I think? Maybe 6. Since the ticks proc every 1.5 seconds, you get 2 ticks of it and the buff is gone. So while there is synergy there, it is impossible to use. You often got to refresh dots mid mongoose spam, so you don't get full advantage of fury of the eagle. I usually get a max of 3 stacks before it falls off after the initial burst of six.

The talent Way of the Mok'Nathal is also in the same boat as above. You are global cooldown locked, and not with spamming raptor strike. Most of my fights against bosses look like this - Pop DPS cooldowns - Engage - Raptor Strike (for Serpent Sting, another talent that puts a dot on them), Laceration, Mongoose Bite, Flanking Strike, mongoose bite spam, Snake Hunter, mongoose bite spam more (refreshing dots when needed), and flanking strike.

There is little time to use Raptor Strike to stack the damage buff, or even Fury of the Eagle. With that also said, cause of how it plays right now, all the talents are bad in PvE. I ended up taking the improved traps/steel traps/snake hunter/serpent sting/expert trapper. Aspect of the beast doesn't work with flanking strikes. Sentry turret hits for 150-200 (lol), but the bleed from steel trap works on monsters/bosses so it is worth it to an extent.

It just feels like it has no structure. There is no time to think at all or play smart cause of how little time you get to do anything. I will say it is fun as a orc critting for 200k on the sixth mongoose bite stack though. :P

Hope this helps anyone who is wondering. Also, I could be playing it completely wrong too. Just remember that, it is brand new.

[FLANOFETT]

A mongoose can regularly fight and kill all kinds of snakes 3 times their size, they will scream at lions just to tell them to fuck off.
Mongoose don't give a fuck.
Also raptor strike is referring to a bird of prey, like an eagle/hawk/etc... not a dinosaur :P lol

I want Honey badger Aura! because Honey badger don't care!