SV Lone Wolf

[Bisque]

Eh I would argue that even in the vanilla days whilst SV had the most "melee" out of all 3 specs, you still did not want to melee as a SV hunter. Now granted vanilla balance was all over the place, nonexistent for many specs but I still never wanted to melee as a SV hunter in vanilla.

But yes without question blizzard drew some inspiration from ye old vanilla days when they made SV melee in Legion.

[Bepples]

I dont understand why people keep saying they changed a ranged spec to melee without reason.

All the skills in survival now were part of the hunter class back in classic. Raptor strike, mongoose etc. It used to be a hybrid spec even back then.

Don't even try to appeal to history on this one. In classic WoW Survival had a ranged weapon and preferred to use it over melee as much as possible.

[Makaloff]

I dont understand why people keep saying they changed a ranged spec to melee without reason.

All the skills in survival now were part of the hunter class back in classic. Raptor strike, mongoose etc. It used to be a hybrid spec even back then.

The issue with the hunter class is that its called Hunter, but is associated with various other "classes" from other games/lore. BM spec as an example is a ranged spec with pets. BMs in other games, and even warcraft, are usually shown as melee with pets (Rexxar). Marksman is the spec associated with archers/ranged physical and survival is similar to a ranger.

With the new talents i would have liked the flexibility the hunter concept creates.

What i would like to see in dragon:
1. All melee and ranged skills given to all specs.
2. The common hunter tree separated in beast, weapons and utility lines. Weapons allows you specilization in mellee or ranged.
3. Hunters can one again equip both a ranged and melee weapon.
4. BM tree focuses more on your pet and dealing dmg both yourself and the pet. You may either be in melee or ranged.
5. Surv tree focuses more an being a ranger type. You are a hybrid of melee and ranged focusing on buffing your attacks with animal afinities and the pet if active acts as a companion providing utility and a secondary role to your dps.
6. Marksman tree is the tree focusing on ranged attacks.

With the above change most people enjoying the theme will find a playstsyle. BM melle or ranged, archer or ranger

This concept can be further expanded with ranged including axe throwing not only bows/guns but it might be too much work.

it was never really a hybrid, sure it had more tools for meele but that was to get you out of meele range. a hunter stuck in meele range for any prolonged time in TBC is a dead hunter. i play surv myself in current TBC and like i mentioned, unless im forced into meele, i stay at range and if i get into meele i use the tools to get to ranged again. the biggest issue with survivals rework was that instead of adding (like a 4th specc), they took away the whole ranged survival in favor for a extremly niche specc that less than 5% played untill S3 in SL where blizzard buffed them too the moon with uncapped aoe. Still less people play surv currently than BM/MM even in M+.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I don't see why petless survival hunter would be so controversial. GW2 did it with the Soulbeast spec, where the ranger merges with its pet and gains a stat boost and the abilities of the pet. So the pet collecting gameplay is still present in that equipping different pet grants you different abilities, which differentiates the spec from other melee classes. And for people who only main a single character, it gives them more playstyle variety.

[Bepples]

I don't see why petless survival hunter would be so controversial. GW2 did it with the Soulbeast spec, where the ranger merges with its pet and gains a stat boost and the abilities of the pet. So the pet collecting gameplay is still present in that equipping different pet grants you different abilities, which differentiates the spec from other melee classes. And for people who only main a single character, it gives them more playstyle variety.

It's controversial because the most important and identifiable elements of the Hunter class are the ranged weapon and the pet. It doesn't make sense to demand a spec with neither of those. At that point you're asking for something other than a Hunter.

Honestly it was a bad idea from the beginning to start carving up and compartmentalising the Hunter class identity. I liked Lone Wolf when it was first added but I think it set a really bad precedent. Then of course there's the ongoing dumpster fire that is melee Survival. I don't care for talk about "variety". That's not an excuse to dilute a class's identity to meaningless status. Variety is important but so is a focused and clear identity.

[Voidling]

I definitely would like Lone wolf on SV but i dont think the devs have a way to make it work. MM has 0 abilities that use the pet because Lone wolf exists, and survival has more abilities that use the pet than BM.

They would need to neuter SV, or rework all the abilities to be flexible for Lone Wolf. If they neuter SV then they upset some to make some happy. Second option benefits everyone but is a large amount work especially since the hunter community would more than likely ask for the same features be applied to MM.

[Ashana Darkmoon]

It's controversial because the most important and identifiable elements of the Hunter class are the ranged weapon and the pet. It doesn't make sense to demand a spec with neither of those. At that point you're asking for something other than a Hunter.

Honestly it was a bad idea from the beginning to start carving up and compartmentalising the Hunter class identity. I liked Lone Wolf when it was first added but I think it set a really bad precedent. Then of course there's the ongoing dumpster fire that is melee Survival. I don't care for talk about "variety". That's not an excuse to dilute a class's identity to meaningless status. Variety is important but so is a focused and clear identity.

There's no other bow spec in the game (despite the bow being the most powerful weapon in humanity's arsenal for thousands of years lmao) so having one spec without a pet seems fine and good.

[Kithelle]

I don't play hunter at all (so this might be cringe) but I've got a very simple idea that would make me personally a bit more interested in playing a survival hunter.

Replace the 45 talent Tip of the Spear with Lone Wolf. It would retain the effect of the Marksmanship version, granting a damage buff and Survival of the Fittest. However for Survival it would also replace Kill Command with Killing Blow (shit placeholder name) a melee ability that does the same thing as Kill Command, only the hunter does the attack animation obviously since there is no pet to do it. The Kill Command-related talents Alpha Predator and Bloodseeker could be left the same.

Doing it like this, the survival hunter would be incentivized to use their pet for the majority of levelling, which I think is good gameplay-wise and thematically. Instead of allowing a brand new hunter to get Lone Wolf at a low level and ignore one of the core aspects of the class, they will use their pet until the talent becomes available at 45, at which point they can choose. Also, it makes sense that an inexperienced hunter would rely on their pets to help them survive until they become capable enough on their own.

Is this dumb or what? You tell me.

So basically you just want to play a arms warrior with lighter armor who occasionally tosses a bomb?

[Kehego]

Eh.

SV is living proof that blizzard listens to feedback, no matter how stupid it is.
I don't think SV with lone wolf makes a lick of sense but, hey, neither does melee sv.

Lone wolf, too.
Bad hunters without the sense to pet micro lobbied for that talent xd

[Octania]

SV is living proof that blizzard listens to feedback, no matter how stupid it is.
I don't think SV with lone wolf makes a lick of sense but, hey, neither does melee sv.

The second Rexxar was retconned from THE beastmaster into being SV all hunter lore/class design went out the window.
Yet they keep doubling down expansion after expansion because of the 5 people that occasionally "have so much fun!!!" on their SV alt that they log into once every other week.
If anything BM shouldve been turned into what SV is now, that actually wouldve made so much sense.