[SURVIVAL]Legion Alpha Discussion

[Nefarious Tea]

Notice that those changes dont boost dmg much, they improve focus regen, mobility and survivability. Three weakest areas where surv should be buffed alot

There's still a lot of damage boosting in there, even after your edit.

Anyway.

I originally liked the idea of having a larger melee range than other melee classes because we wield a polearm but now I'm not so sure. I feel like having a 10 or even 8 yard melee range would open Survival up to get targeted by abilities which normally only affect ranged classes. It might be alright if we still had Disengage, but thus far no such luck. I'm going to miss jumping, spinning the camera, and disengaging mid-air in order to use Disengage as a speed boost

The trap refresh talent you proposed I think might find more usefulness in PvP, but it does seem fairly interesting were it a PvE talent; I'm sure somewhere there's a boss who could be cheesed because of it (remember the old rogue/hunter kills of Grobbulus back in WOTLK?)

[Nakauri]

I originally liked the idea of having a larger melee range than other melee classes because we wield a polearm but now I'm not so sure. I feel like having a 10 or even 8 yard melee range would open Survival up to get targeted by abilities which normally only affect ranged classes.

Survival already has an 8 yard range.
Outlaw rogues can also have an 8 yard range if they pick up the tier 30 talent Acrobatic Strikes. Neither of them will be subjected to ranged attacks, since those are designated by class in their code choice rather than distance.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) for rogues, Acrobatic Strikes is on the same tier as Into The Fray.

[Nefarious Tea]

Survival already has an 8 yard range.
Outlaw rogues can also have an 8 yard range if they pick up the tier 30 talent Acrobatic Strikes. Neither of them will be subjected to ranged attacks, since those are designated by class in their code choice rather than distance.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) for rogues, Acrobatic Strikes is on the same tier as Into The Fray.

This is not true (if an admittedly anecdotal rebuttal). I've seen countless times in boss fights over the past decade a melee DPS not being in melee for whatever reason and getting targeted by an ability that normally picks ranged. Conversely, I have seen ranged classes (especially healers, who can be targeted by ranged abilities) stand in melee and not be targeted. The most recent fight that comes to my mind is Oregorger in BRF; a healer standing in melee (to prevent LOS deaths) will never get targeted with Retched Blackrock, but a melee DPS standing outside melee range is fair game for it.

The only raid boss ability I've ever seen that only picks ranged based on class technically doesn't pick ranged at all. It's the Unchained Magic debuff on Sindragosa, and that picked any spellcasting class. Hunters didn't get targeted, and neither did Ret pallies, but everyone else with a mana bar, including Enhancement Shamasal, were fair game.

On topic, however, interesting that Survival already has an 8 yard melee range. Where did you find that out? I'm not seeing a passive that grants that in the alpha ability/talent lists.

[Nakauri]

This is true, there are several ranged mechanics that activate at a certain range. This allows melee to "run out" when ranged die in order to soak or activate them, like Festergut in ICC. These will generally activate at a farther range than they'd ever allow melee to be, of course, or at the very least be on a cast/timer. The raid design team is pretty good.

Range display is on ability tool tips. You can read it in game on alpha, or on WoWhead, or anywhere else SpellData is uploaded.

[Deleted]

I think they have to start from scratch again and to make it semi-range or something like this, throwing polearms etc or having a thrown weapons, something like this, there is already too much melee specs, if you dont do something rly good like a great burst, huge aoe, good steady dps, i dont know how someone will take it for a raid. Most of ppl dont even care to report feedback about the spec because there is too much stuff.

[Huggykaze]

This is not true (if an admittedly anecdotal rebuttal). I've seen countless times in boss fights over the past decade a melee DPS not being in melee for whatever reason and getting targeted by an ability that normally picks ranged. Conversely, I have seen ranged classes (especially healers, who can be targeted by ranged abilities) stand in melee and not be targeted. The most recent fight that comes to my mind is Oregorger in BRF; a healer standing in melee (to prevent LOS deaths) will never get targeted with Retched Blackrock, but a melee DPS standing outside melee range is fair game for it.

The only raid boss ability I've ever seen that only picks ranged based on class technically doesn't pick ranged at all. It's the Unchained Magic debuff on Sindragosa, and that picked any spellcasting class. Hunters didn't get targeted, and neither did Ret pallies, but everyone else with a mana bar, including Enhancement Shamasal, were fair game.

On topic, however, interesting that Survival already has an 8 yard melee range. Where did you find that out? I'm not seeing a passive that grants that in the alpha ability/talent lists.

That would mean there mechanics can be cheesed by stacking at the boss... Either you don't remember or it was just buggy as hell. Over last 11 years it never occurred to me. Some mechanics, in addition to melee/range check, may also check current distance from the source (boss), but it's just a a baseless suspicion :P

Your Oregoreger example just shows it's decided by spec, not distance, if I understood that correctly.

[Eapoe]

That would mean there mechanics can be cheesed by stacking at the boss... Either you don't remember or it was just buggy as hell. Over last 11 years it never occurred to me. Some mechanics, in addition to melee/range check, may also check current distance from the source (boss), but it's just a a baseless suspicion :P

Your Oregoreger example just shows it's decided by spec, not distance, if I understood that correctly.

You are both correct. Some abilities are targeted at a range class itself, some are targeted by distance from the boss. Examples in current raid, Fel Burst on Archie targeting range classes, and Xhul chains/black hole on targets at a certain range distance. Well, preferring targets at a certain range, if no one is out there it will go in melee.

[kunah]

Looking forward to the Legion hunter,,, all specs.

Have you alpha SVs hunter testers noticed if the pet can still hold aggro as well as the current hunters? Hunters damage mitigation has always relied on not being hit. Is this still the case with legion SV hunters? Just from the perspective of solo leveling and questing.

[Thumbtacks]

Do you think we'll get a glyph for the spitting sperpent talent or whatever the fuck it's called so we can have it as a turret again? I liked the turret model a lot.

[jSewell]

Trap changes were in this new build. Wonder what the CDs are now

[Xemik]

Trap changes were in this new build. Wonder what the CDs are now

You've probably already seen it by now, but looks to be 30 seconds.

[Deleted]

Another build closer to release with no significant improvements. Starting to a) worry and b) eye other, more interesting, melee specs like Subtlety and Unholy.

[Huggykaze]

Another build closer to release with no significant improvements. Starting to a) worry and b) eye other, more interesting, melee specs like Subtlety and Unholy.

And we had improvements promised. I think traps shouldn't share their cooldown anymore, effectively adding 1 more button to the rotation, once every 30 seconds. Well, more utility in raids is never bad, but this mostly affects dungeons, PvP and outdoor content.

[Nefarious Tea]

Guys, guys. The new trap damages, CD's, and not sharing a CD! Survival has some more flavor now! By increasing the use of traps (beyond using Freezing trap to CC once in a blue moon), Survival now - to me, at least - has a bit of a "crazy person in the wild booby trapping stuff" vibe. I rather like it, and it gives us some extra ranged goodness when we either can't get to, or are getting to, a boss.

That would mean there mechanics can be cheesed by stacking at the boss... Either you don't remember or it was just buggy as hell. Over last 11 years it never occurred to me. Some mechanics, in addition to melee/range check, may also check current distance from the source (boss), but it's just a a baseless suspicion :P

Your Oregoreger example just shows it's decided by spec, not distance, if I understood that correctly.

It's distance on Oregorger, for a particular reason I forgot to mention a lot of mechanics have. That is, ranged abilities that target players at range will start to target melee if there aren't enough people outside melee range. Usually, this just hastens what was probably already an inevitable wipe.

[c000]

I wish survival didn't have so many slow abilities. why couldn't they come up with some differences?

caltrops: 70% movement reduction
dragonfire grenade: 20% movement reduction
tar trap: 50% movement reduction

how about something *besides* movement reduction

[Huggykaze]

Guys, guys. The new trap damages, CD's, and not sharing a CD! Survival has some more flavor now! By increasing the use of traps (beyond using Freezing trap to CC once in a blue moon), Survival now - to me, at least - has a bit of a "crazy person in the wild booby trapping stuff" vibe. I rather like it, and it gives us some extra ranged goodness when we either can't get to, or are getting to, a boss.

As long as traps are usable as micro cooldowns, I'm quite happy. Would love to see some more interesting talent choices tho'. And Spitting Cobra gone... It's so fuckin' bland... If I wanted to use Dire Beast I'd play BM...

[Taeldorian]

Do you think we'll get a glyph for the spitting sperpent talent or whatever the fuck it's called so we can have it as a turret again? I liked the turret model a lot.

Beat me to it. I seriously hope we do, the turret felt so unique I loved it. Try asking warcraftdevs on Twitter (I've asked twice already and once to celestalon, just ask in a constructive way). I really hope we do get a glyph for it though.

[Azortharion]

Rotationally the spec has too many buttons to press on cooldown and things to keep up if you pick the current "best" talents for DPS, so there's not enough focus to cast all of this stuff off cooldown. With a long-GCD spec this doesn't feel very good.

[Huggykaze]

Rotationally the spec has too many buttons to press on cooldown and things to keep up if you pick the current "best" talents for DPS, so there's not enough focus to cast all of this stuff off cooldown. With a long-GCD spec this doesn't feel very good.

Thanks for that man, been wondering how's Focus management for SV right now. Feels bit like live Enh, but it has no resource, so at worst you will lose 2-3 LL procs, some Maelstorm charges or 1 Stormstrike/LL. Nothing that bad, contrary to how you describe SV ;o

[Nefarious Tea]

Rotationally the spec has too many buttons to press on cooldown and things to keep up if you pick the current "best" talents for DPS, so there's not enough focus to cast all of this stuff off cooldown. With a long-GCD spec this doesn't feel very good.

I kind of feel like this with MM right now, although my hunter is an alt currently and I'm kind of mediocre at it. Is Survival's rotation really that clunky because of resource starvation? How bad is it? Would some cost tuning fix it, or are we looking at a systemic problem?