Hunter does not play or feel like a hunter even hunter lore does not synch with it

[Appelgren]

MoP survival hunter, oh how I miss you

Fixed it for you!

BfA Survival is the most complete spec ive played in years.
Survival is great in it's current form.

The only "issue" I have with it is that I would like a pet-free option. That would make it perfect imo

[Muajin76]

My main issue is the missing connection to my pet. Back in the days you had to care for it. The higher your bond the less you had to feed. You had to teach it the abilities you liked, there even was buff food for your pet later on. I miss stuff like that. I don't even care to give new pets a name these days, because it's just a random meatshield. And I would also like to craft my own ammunition again !

However the class identity issue does not concern hunter only and starting this discussion would just seperate the players between Vanilla-lovers and Retail-lovers.

Ah yes...the joy of farming different types of food, based on the pet you had at the time. If your pet had a low happy meter...it's dmg would be lower and had a chance to abandon you. *I lost a pet or two due to not feeding my pet*

[Ashrynn]

Funny, because I feel the exact opposite. As much as I enjoyed the Dire Beast Cannon build in legion, I feel like BM is RP wise at it's strongest when it's just you and 1 or possibly 2 pets.
Rather than throwing a lot of beasts at it like you're some animal trainer in a circus; I feel like the spec has more feeling to it when it's you and your most trusted companion. Throwing a lot of wild animals (or even stabled pets) at your opponents make me feel too much like a warlock or necromancer that just quasi discards it's minions.

I guess there are multiple ways to look at it though, to each their own I'd say.
It's also why I'm glad that things like Dire Beasts and Animal Companion are options through talents.

Sorry! I mean I'd like more interactions with your stable as a whole, not random beasts from the wild. AMoC is fun imo, but about the one exception for me.

[Sesto]

Fixed it for you!

BfA Survival is the most complete spec ive played in years.
Survival is great in it's current form.

The only "issue" I have with it is that I would like a pet-free option. That would make it perfect imo

so you want a melee hunter spec without a pet

why did you even start playing hunter in the first place?

[Appelgren]

so you want a melee hunter spec without a pet

why did you even start playing hunter in the first place?

Ever heard of Lone Wolf?

[Sesto]

Ever heard of Lone Wolf?

Which some people complain about being against the identity of a Hunter. I don't agree, but I do believe that a Hunter without his pet + without his bow/gun/crossbow is just not a Hunter. You might as well play a fucking warrior or something.

[Highelf]

Lmao imagine liking Hunters for all the garbage pointless mechanics they removed.

It's a great thing that ammo is gone. Literally added nothing substantial other than a penalty no one else had to deal with. Same goes for the deadzone. Ranged weapons were the most unique and interesting part of the class; why should we muddy that focus with any generic melee shit at all?

Plus, you're dead wrong about pets. Hunter pets still have more depth than others. We choose and name the pets, they have families with unique abilities and specs with powerful bonuses.

Rofl imagine liking a class for the rpg feel of it back when the game was an MMORPG instead of a fast paced, hurry to the plane before it takes off, action mmo it is today.

That's why a lot of people picked a Hunter, that and they were easy and fun to level, which again was a huge part of the game back then. I for one am looking forward to leveling a Hunter in Classic for all those fun little things that you call garbage and i'm not alone.

Pets at this point are just glorified water elementals or earth elementals.

[VanishingAct]

MM has been a cluster fuck for a long time. It hasn't been fun since MoP. Though imo most classes haven't felt fun since MoP.

[Appelgren]

Which some people complain about being against the identity of a Hunter. I don't agree, but I do believe that a Hunter without his pet + without his bow/gun/crossbow is just not a Hunter. You might as well play a fucking warrior or something.

Agree to disagree

[andreasels]

Fixed it for you!

BfA Survival is the most complete spec ive played in years.
Survival is great in it's current form.

The only "issue" I have with it is that I would like a pet-free option. That would make it perfect imo

What makes a hunter a hunter to you, if you want a melee hunter without pet?

While I agree that a pet isn't mandatory for a hunter, I think that a hunter at least needs either a pet or a ranged weapon to qualify as one. Maybe you could argue that traps are the defining factor, but that's not really enough imo.

[Psygon]

Nice wall of text!

[Nythiz]

Sorry! I mean I'd like more interactions with your stable as a whole, not random beasts from the wild. AMoC is fun imo, but about the one exception for me.

Oh ok in that case we are more on the same line.

Even though I still don't particularly need to have more interaction with the stable, to me the stable in game is more of a means to an end (Holding pets I might need due to game mechanics) + holding on to rare pets that are nice to collect. But when it comes to the pets I see as my real companions there's maybe 3-5 of them at most. My most used ones being Loque; Gara and my 'main pet since vanilla' Snarler (black wolf from feralas).

I think murder of crows is an excellent addition to a beastmaster hunter, but as you say it should be the limit when it comes to wild animals.

so you want a melee hunter spec without a pet

why did you even start playing hunter in the first place?

Hunter is not just the hunter and/or beastmaster archetype. It's also the ranger archetype, and it's also the archer archetype; and neither of those are really pet based at all.

In fact ranger (as in DnD or as in Aragorn from the LotR series) is primarily just a tracker/melee fighter.

[Sesto]

Hunter is not just the hunter and/or beastmaster archetype. It's also the ranger archetype, and it's also the archer archetype; and neither of those are really pet based at all.

In fact ranger (as in DnD or as in Aragorn from the LotR series) is primarily just a tracker/melee fighter.

I think you're missing the "melee" part of my post. I agree a pet isn't the sole defining aspect of a Hunter. But if you take BOTH a pet and ranged weapons away, whatever is left is not a Hunter. It's a warrior with engineering.

And I'm not sure what you're talking about with DnD Rangers. DnD Rangers have a long history of recruiting non-human companions, even in first edition.

[Nythiz]

I think you're missing the "melee" part of my post. I agree a pet isn't the sole defining aspect of a Hunter. But if you take BOTH a pet and ranged weapons away, whatever is left is not a Hunter. It's a warrior with engineering.

And I'm not sure what you're talking about with DnD Rangers. DnD Rangers have a long history of recruiting non-human companions, even in first edition.

Well take for example Aragorn from LotR; he is a petless melee ranger.

As for the DnD Rangers. In the default 5e ruleset you can specialize in Beast Master, which gives you a companion or you can specialize as Hunter, which makes you proficient at (melee) combat, which doesn't include a companion by definition.

I think saying that a hunter without pet and bow is simply a warrior is way oversimplifying it.
There is much more to the class from an RP point of view: Traps, tracking, use of nature and spells, solid defenses and outwitting opponents are all part of "hunter/ranger-RP" that a warrior does not possess.
WoW doesn't apply all those parts (maybe unfortunately); or rather doesn't apply them any longer. They used to, for example when hunters had a huge dodge chance and increased parry chance compared to most other classes in melee

In a sense Vanilla survival's talent tree was the embodiment of a non-pet, non-ranged hunter where the talents increased your melee attacks, increased your survivability (through dodge and parry), increased opportunity attacks (mongoose bite and counterattack), increased trap efficiency and kill specializations (humanoid slaying / beast slaying / dragon slaying / etc). I mean that's straight out of the DnD handbook for rangers/hunters.

Note that I don't think that survival should get a petless option just for that reason; but saying that a hunter without ranged weapon and pet is not a hunter by definition cuts short a lot of what it means to be a hunter and sets quite a large section of ranger/hunter/tracker RP out of play.

[Sesto]

you can specialize as Hunter, which makes you proficient at (melee) combat, which doesn't include a companion by definition.

Except there is nothing specific about melee combat in the Hunter Ranger archetype. Ranged Ranger is in general superior to Melee Ranger for 5e, as well. You're also ignoring the history of the Ranger in DnD. The WoW Hunter's identity was clearly not built on a ruleset which came out in 2014.

It's true the original Survival fit more along the lines of the "survival" aspect of a Hunter. The current Survival (without a pet) barely qualifies. I don't see any "rangers" running around with a large polearm and throwing bombs everywhere.

[Dragtox]

i can see survival be a mix meele and ranged but then it need to duel wield ranged weapon and meele weapon but the way survival plays now is
bombs, spear and bear form attack animation its a spearman not a hunter it may have a pet but its not a hunter right now

survival should be more trap and venom, mobilty and fast phased! talants needs to be adjusted becus right now they are really boring i dont mind to see a talant that makes you pick between meele and ranged for survival but dont forget hunter is not a ranger..... its not lotr!

marksman needs to be the slow sniper prefer WoD ability rotation to return atleast the passive buff that increase damage when you dont move!
if marksman were to be build around fast phase mobilty spec then it wont be marksman anymore... it be a ranger i know people want ranger but i dont want to see a spec be remove like rouges combat spec
abilitys i wuld like to see with marksman is hawk/falcon to be the hunter mark maby a attack ability but it should still stay lone wolf!

beast master is 1 of the spec i am really fine with a meele spec may even tank spec but thats becus rexxar showed in warcraft 3 how a meele hunter culd work
still no hope here but atleast if it was meele it can have more pet and player combo attacks wuld prefer to see it ride a pet while attacking becus it fit the theme!

sadly talants are just bad for hunter the choice that can make the class shine are almost never used becus passives and the boring ones are better for dps
we really should have trailblazer and camuflage back as normal hunter abilitys instead of talants since they dont do anything combat wise

machine pets may need to be a 4th spec... where bombs and rapid fire may really work well with... the question there is it still a hunter...

i wuld go as far to say the spearman survival spec is more a pirat then a hunter may been better if it was a pirat class with outlaw..

but we all know how big problem blizzard have created this year... i am starting to wonder if they should ad a vote poll to current WoW abut changes..

[Bepples]

Rofl imagine liking a class for the rpg feel of it back when the game was an MMORPG instead of a fast paced, hurry to the plane before it takes off, action mmo it is today.

That's why a lot of people picked a Hunter, that and they were easy and fun to level, which again was a huge part of the game back then. I for one am looking forward to leveling a Hunter in Classic for all those fun little things that you call garbage and i'm not alone.

Pets at this point are just glorified water elementals or earth elementals.

"RPG Feel" is one of the most ill-defined and ultimately meangingless blanket-arguments I've ever seen. People always moan about modern RPGs not being "real RPGs" with no real substance or any detail about what this fabled list of RPG rules actually contains and they can never produce any tangible benefit of keeping obnoxious mechanics like reagents, permadeath, or whatever other timewaster they can come up with.

How is having to go to a vendor and buy out a bunch of reagents/ammo "fun"? It's literally a fucking chore. It was especially egregious for Hunters because we had to actively pay for our DPS in all situations and it also cost us a bag slot. So it's not just a minor annoyance, it was actually a major penalty for playing a Hunter. There is absolutely no reason for such a mechanic to exist and there never was. And don't talk to me about "immersion". There are far, far more important factors in an RPG delivering immersion than mindless busywork like this.

You're not "alone" on your nostalgia trip, but that doesn't make you right. I'm not alone on my stance either.

And no, pets more than that. Being able to choose your pet and having that actually provide a mechanical difference is significantly more depth than the pets of other classes. The only things we've lost from Vanilla are happiness and talents. The first is just another pointless chore. The second? Meh, the most interesting spells were still limited by pet family back then so the old system really didn't provide that much depth in the grand scheme of things. More busywork that doesn't actually end in interesting gameplay.

[aimmachine]

as a hutner who plays this class for 10 years i'll say that other classes feels like boring shit too

[Highelf]

"RPG Feel" is one of the most ill-defined and ultimately meangingless blanket-arguments I've ever seen. People always moan about modern RPGs not being "real RPGs" with no real substance or any detail about what this fabled list of RPG rules actually contains and they can never produce any tangible benefit of keeping obnoxious mechanics like reagents, permadeath, or whatever other timewaster they can come up with.

How is having to go to a vendor and buy out a bunch of reagents/ammo "fun"? It's literally a fucking chore. It was especially egregious for Hunters because we had to actively pay for our DPS in all situations and it also cost us a bag slot. So it's not just a minor annoyance, it was actually a major penalty for playing a Hunter. There is absolutely no reason for such a mechanic to exist and there never was. And don't talk to me about "immersion". There are far, far more important factors in an RPG delivering immersion than mindless busywork like this.

You're not "alone" on your nostalgia trip, but that doesn't make you right. I'm not alone on my stance either.

And no, pets more than that. Being able to choose your pet and having that actually provide a mechanical difference is significantly more depth than the pets of other classes. The only things we've lost from Vanilla are happiness and talents. The first is just another pointless chore. The second? Meh, the most interesting spells were still limited by pet family back then so the old system really didn't provide that much depth in the grand scheme of things. More busywork that doesn't actually end in interesting gameplay.

In my mind it makes me right because that's what I enjoy and to say otherwise and then laugh at people with the same stance is not a good way to "defend" your stance.

[The Stormbringer]

Fixed it for you!

BfA Survival is the most complete spec ive played in years.
Survival is great in it's current form.

The only "issue" I have with it is that I would like a pet-free option. That would make it perfect imo

I was personally pretty fond of MoP and WoD Hunter. Beast Mastery was very fun, since I could do my entire rotation (and anything situational) while moving. It made for staying out of the fire much easier!