so, no ranged survival :(

[Bepples]

Just to the first part of your post, I take issue with this as you keep making this faulty argument. Every time someone says the specs played the same (well, maybe not every time because people could make the same mistakes as you are for you topics) they are stating they played almost the exact same. As in, button press priority, resource management the exact same, and CDs.

If you dig further, you'll find that every DPS spec in the game uses an action bar to maintain abilities in a priority list to do damage. I guess every spec in the game is the same thing if you zoom out far enough!

People aren’t talking about identity.

No, they are. Blizzard especially. The most prominent argument from people arguing that SV was too similar to MM was that their identities were the same. You literally have @Orby on in this very thread arguing exactly that. When you read Blizzard's opinions on the matter in WoD and Legion they go on and on about identity and class fantasy. People legitimately believe that any spec that focuses on ranged weapons is identical but every spec that focuses on melee weapons is distinct. This double-standard is pervasive in the community.

Multiple posts of yours you state “SV is more fun.” You’re now trying to correct that by stating people like you, which is fine, but realize that Kaver is arguing a technicality, but even so he isn’t wrong to what you stated.

Hmm, no, it's still wrong because it's nonsense to assume that a spec being fun or not is a measurable, objective quantity. The only people I see doing that are the melee SV Hunters. All over the place they declare that melee SV is the most fun Hunter spec and I don't see a lot of "in my opinion" qualifiers with them.

BRF was released Feb 3rd. Going by Warcraftlogs, SV had 66k parses on for that ending week with MM only having just under 15k, and BM a whopping 2.1k. Judging from those parses it’s just as easy for anyone to say people played it because it was the better spec over how popular or liked it was, compared to your argument of it being good and fun.

What's with you, Doffen, and Kaver with your total lack of basic reading comprehension? I have to assume it's on purpose at this point. But let me repeat for the billionth time: I talked about Highmaul because Doffen did. He specifically and incorrectly claimed that SV had low representation in Highmaul so I proved him wrong. Every single point on the matter after that is just deflection.

The only one here making an objective, sweeping statement about how fun ranged Survival was for the Hunter community at large is Doffen, who claimed that everyone hated Survival and only played it for the damage. The burden of proof is on him, not me. I've already shown that plenty of people liked it at the time. Highmaul is not the only time SV was popular and people did express their thoughts on how the spec played, not just the damage it did. It's time for Doffen to back up his nonsense claim. The reason all three of you are instead trying your hardest to deflect to me on this issue is because you know full well he can't and it was an indefensibly ridiculous thing to say.

SV identity right now? Latent poison for a survivalist to bring down bigger prey, bombs and traps from using things found in the elements as well as just being resourceful, hunting with a pet (which actually has more to do with Hunter core identity in the link you always provide over the range weapon).

Let's see here:
- Two separate aspects of Survival that not only have nothing to do with each other but don't fit particularly well with one another at all (bombs on the target and therefore yourself and your pet, lul)
- Zero mention of melee or any sort of reason why melee fits this spec (again, doesn't even fit well)
- Absurd claim that the Hunter core identity is more based in the pet than the ranged weapon

Yep. Weak argument as per usual. Survival does not have a coherent core identity, period. Your post here only proves that. If it were resourceful it would be using everything it could to gain an edge in combat. Being a Hunter, this would include a ranged weapon. You cannot call a spec that arbitrarily decides not to use a ranged weapon like its counterparts "resourceful".

You can't really pretend it fits. The class starts off with a ranged weapon. Survival itself is using a ranged weapon for a few abilities. It used a ranged weapon in the past. You could maybe begin to pretend it counted as resourceful if it used both a melee and a ranged weapon in the same way it did before MoP, but it doesn't; it's a spec that's incapable of using the ranged weapon to its fullest potential like BM and MM. The "resourceful" spec is squandering it's most valuable resource. The "opportunist" spec is ignoring the class's most opportunistic aspect.

You never once admit those could be issues hurting it’s popularity and viability, but you jump on it losing popularity because of its damage in HFC.

I do agree these issues all count, but I just see them as more reasons SV shouldn't be melee. The stigma is entirely valid and exists for a good reason. Survival really is the most useless spec in PvE primarily due to being melee. It's actually not always behind in damage and its utility is the same as the other Hunter specs. That's not enough to carry a melee Hunter spec, I know. But that just means it shouldn't be melee in the first place. I don't think any ranged Hunter has much tolerance for Blizzard tuning SV up to high heaven or locking away crucial raid utility in the spec (yes, I've seen plenty of this sort of suggestion, including bringing back WoD's Aspect of the Fox but only for SV).

Earlier this expansion we had Uldir in which Survival was not only the strongest Hunter spec for single target situations (and pretty strong in AoE and add burst, too) but one of the strongest in the game. It didn't stop it from being an unpopular spec. It's also never faced a degree of total unviability like we saw with ranged SV in HFC.

I hope they keep melee survival. There is literally no point in having 3 specs doing the exact same type of gameplay with minor variations.
Like mage or rogue for instance. No major gameplay-differences other than they are switching whats better than the other for every other season.

There's a pretty big point to doing that actually; providing more depth and exploration into a particular archetype. The game is already overflowing with melee fighters. The three ranged Hunter specs are the entirety of exploration into ranged weapons in the game. So it makes sense to have a class devoted to that sort of thing and provide different takes on ranged weapons in each of the specs.

There is literally no point in having a melee Hunter. It is going to be less useful by default in almost every situation, and in the few times it isn't, it's in spite of being melee rather than because of it. There is a very good reason Survival hasn't seen a world first kill since Blackhand (when it was still ranged).

The same goes for mage and rogue. You might love the thought of snatching people's specs away to fulfil your arbitrary standard of spec differentiation, but some people really like the idea of having a class that fully explores a particular damage-dealing archetype. The gameplay and identity differences are, in fact, major. There is zero reason to be deleting and replacing these specs and shoehorning them into different roles.

I would enjoy if a class had different specs like druid for instance. Where you can actively choose to be melee, ranged or healer/tank.

Based on some of your earlier posts in this forum, you'd also enjoy it if traps were still exclusive to Survival. Yes, I do remember you complaining when they returned traps to the baseline in Legion. So actually I think staying far away from your demented tastes is what would be better for the game.

Yes? It's explored further below but hunter specs had two buttons difference in their priority, for comparison in the same expansion dks had every button different.

Everything they shared either came as part of being a Hunter or came via the talents, which at the time were the same for every spec in the Hunter class just as it was for every class. This is not a bad thing, you know. It's so not-bad that people have been clamouring for this model of class design back for years and Blizzard is caving in to much of the demand in the very next expansion. See Hunter's Mark and Kill Shot in all of your lists? You can add those back in for next expansion because people specifically liked these baseline Hunter abilities and now Blizzard agrees all three should be using them. This idea that each spec needed to be a completely different toolkit is a terrible Legion construct that poisoned class design.

Never mind that, for a second: I do actually agree that there should be meaningful gameplay distinctions between the specs. I think there were in MoP, you think there weren't, you're wrong about that and that's fine. There was a time when there were zero unique abilities between the specs; aside from cooldowns like Bestial Wrath and utilities like Silencing Shot, of course. There was no Chimera Shot or Explosive Shot or things like that. Each expansion added on unique elements and over time the specs diverged. This was healthy for the game. What isn't healthy is spastic pruning of important and fun core abilities and deleting of entire specs just to satisfy some unreasonably high standard of spec differentiation. Survival did not need to be melee to be different. It already felt very different and there were still plenty of unique things for both MM and SV that could have been added. Go look at F Rm's suggestion for ranged Survival; it would play nothing like any iteration of MM.

But when it wasn't better how many people were playing Survival? And how much worse than the other specs was SV at that given time? You need to include questions like this when you analyze the data. Otherwise you cannot claim that based on the data the majority of hunters found SV most fun.

As we can see from tiers like ToT, SoO, and BrF, even when ranged SV was not the best spec it still had plenty of people playing it. In those tiers there was no pressure to play SV and nothing else because BM was better in all those instances. Given that there was no meaningful differences in difficulty between the specs at that point, it's pretty safe to assume that people were sticking to SV because they liked it more.

I've never claimed that SV was more fun for every Hunter or even most Hunters. I am going to claim it was more fun for some Hunters, though; enough to keep the spec lively until Blizzard killed it off.

But what was your point of showing that graph then? All you did was showing that SV was the most played spec at a time where it was also the best performing spec. I don't think that is a surprise to most people. What did you try to prove with that data?

I was responding to the specific claim that its representation was low in Highmaul.

I'm sorry that you feel that way. But all I'm doing is calling you out for twisting the data to fit your agenda. Now, I understand that you don't like being called out. It's never fun to be exposed in a lie. but you have to understand that you're the one not arguing in good faith when you try to trick people in here with a wrongful presentation of the data.

My above two parts directed at you will sound familiar to others in the thread. Probably not to you, though. This is because they are copy-pasted straight from my last post; specifically the parts in that post addressed to you. They're the parts you flat-out ignored so you could repeat the same dishonest, manipulative crap you're doing here. So think twice before trying to call me dishonest.

P.S. If you continue to try to push these points I'll just go copy-pasting again. I'm not going to waste my time and effort writing up the same argument to you every time you pretend I said something different.

I think it's interesting that you didn't answer this. You're calling the current SV out for being similar to BM but at the same time you say that there was a huge difference in gameplay between SV and MM in WoD. It doesn't really make sense. You are once again twisting things to fit your agenda.

Or, maybe, I just didn't see it? Especially since you tacked it on to a different post for no apparent reason?

The issue is that SV is heavily infringing on BM's identity with its excessive pet focus. It keeps being branded as a companion of beasts and it has multiple mechanical aspects that are copied either partially or totally from BM. Spirit Bond, the spec's mastery, is outright stolen from BM. Kill Command and Coordinated Assault are signature BM moves (of course, in BM we call it Bestial Wrath but it is for all intents and purposes the same thing with the same animation). The spec might play differently when you take everything into account but the things it takes from BM are problematic. It's exceptionally hypocritical for you melee SV zealots to pretend to care so much about spec differentiation only to turn around and defend this.

Go look at the list @Saltysquidoon wrote up. Look at the abilities that the specs shared in MoP. In every single case it's either something that came with the baseline class for many expansions or a generalised talent. The signature abilities were all distinct. SV, right now, has BM's signature abilities as part of its toolkit. It would be like SV continuing to use Aimed Shot into MoP and WoD.

[F Rm]

Yes? It's explored further below but hunter specs had two buttons difference in their priority, for comparison in the same expansion dks had every button different.



Bro I get that this is some sore of crusade for you (based on your lengthy posts and your sig). But denying basic truths is not going to help your cause, nor is lashing out at people who are quite clearly memeing.

In MoP hunter specs had incredibly similar rotations, like the hunter dev blog for WoD specifically addresses it as a core issue;

For reference the mop st priority was

BM
Mark
Sting
Focus fire
Kill shot
Kill command
Glaive toss
Arcane shot
Cobra shot

Surv
Mark
Sting
Explosive shot
Kill shot
Glaive toss
Black arrow
Arcane shot
Cobra shot

MM
Mark
Sting
Steady shot
Chimera shot
Kill shot
Glaive toss
Aimed shot
Arcane shot

As you can clearly see every single spec is almost identical except for 2 good boy buttons (MM technically has 3, but it's rude to talk about in polite company). Even their CDs were identical (crows, rabid, rapid-fire, stampede).

I haven't touched a DK since late Wrath so I can't comment on specific parts of the design and what differences there were between each spec. But either way, isn't DK a hybrid-class? Why do you compare a hybrid to a pure-dmg class?

On another note. Why are you mentioning talents, or baseline abilities, in your spec comparison of the hunter class?
Talents in MoP(and WoD) had nothing to do with the Core Specializations we had, nor were most of them designed to be different depending on which spec you opted for. Same with baseline abilities. Excluding Serpent Sting which was actually different for SV, in terms of how you utilized the ability.

Also, talents are optional choices. You list some specific talents in your comparison yet it's entirely up to the individual whether they pick that talent or not.

And either way, they did some things to change this going into WoD as well.
Note that I have no clue why they decided to remove Kill Shot from SV going into WoD while keeping it for BM. That made no sense really...

But yeah, as for these…

Mark
Sting
Kill Shot
Arcane Shot

These were specifically designed to be baseline abilities used by all specs during MoP.

In WoD, Mark was removed. Sting was removed as an ability and it's mechanical design was added into Arcane Shot(and Multi-Shot) as a passive, available only to SV hunters, meaning no longer available to MM/BM hunters. Arcane Shot itself was no longer available to MM hunters.

---

And throughout all of this, you completely ignore the gameplay tied to individual abilities along with what it all amounted to for a spec as a whole.

Not going to type it all down here but, feel free to check the link and look at what each spec brought in terms of active abilities as well as passives, during MoP.
Like I said above, it was a lot more than just 1 or 2 different elements. And it certainly allowed for you to make distinct choices during combat depending on which spec you opted for playing.

https://mop-shoot.tauri.hu/?talent#Ya!

What is that even supposed to mean?

Really?

Ok, I agree that the way in which he built that sentence could've been done better to highlight what part of it was his own opinion and what part was the one tied to what Ion said.

But it is blatantly obvious what point he was actually making with said sentence, despite of how it was presented.

Thank you @Saltysquidoon for presenting this. It's so funny that FpicEail calls the current version SV for "melee BM" but at the same time claims that there was a huge difference between the specs in MoP/WoD.

Well, first off, yes there was a difference between individual specs during MoP/WoD. Was it the equivalent of hybrid classes? Was it on the intended levels of what we can see today?
No, ofc not. It wasn't supposed to be like that…

Secondly, the biggest problem with your arguments, is that the similarities between current BM and current MSV, they are there despite the fact that we're now past the philosophy changes we went through going into Legion where they decided that all specs should be completely unique. That they shouldn't really share much of anything.

And despite that, current MSV still shares multiple core functions and features with that of BM. Those being taken from BM specifically.

So...yeah. It is quite funny how they(devs) utterly failed to make MSV live up to these new philosophies which they opted for so heavily.
Especially since they blamed SV for having too many similarities to that of MM during WoD, to the point of completely removing RSV altogether as a result. Even though the specs, at the time, did not really share much at all besides the core theme of being hunter specs that relied on ranged weapons first and foremost.

[Kelthos]

I like Melee Survival though I miss its hella-broken and disjointed plate spinning act that it was in Legion. The absolute absurdity of its design is what made it so fun.

[Saltysquidoon]

F Rm and FpicEail Please can you just take off the battle gear and listen to me in good faith for a minute (I promise you can go back to slugging it out with the other hunters after this).
My first post in this thread was a joke, the only reason we're having this exchange now is because, instead of replying like "Yeah lol and remember the one-button macro in TBC". You both decided to respond with deadpan straightfaced seriousness, to my joke. Do you know what the kicker is? My joke doesn't even matter to ranged v melee survival, MoP was 4 expansions ago now, irrespective of who's right game design in MoP is irrelevant to shadowlands.

I dearly hope in future you can read joke posts and not see them as 100% serious attacks on your position... That said if you want to die on this irrelevant hill lets go.

Never mind that, for a second: I do actually agree that there should be meaningful gameplay distinctions between the specs. I think there were in MoP, you think there weren't, you're wrong about that and that's fine.

And throughout all of this, you completely ignore the gameplay tied to individual abilities along with what it all amounted to for a spec as a whole.
Not going to type it all down here but, feel free to check the link and look at what each spec brought in terms of active abilities as well as passives, during MoP

This quote (that you both managed to sidestep last time) is from the hunter 6.0 patch notes

Hunters have lacked a strong distinction between the different specializations. What we mean by that is that the Hunter specializations all had rotations that felt similar, with Marksmanship and Survival having the most blurred identities (Beast Mastery felt well rooted in the pet). Hunters were also some of the most afflicted by button bloat. To address these problems, we opted to make changes to each specialization's rotation.

This is Blizzard literally saying hunters in mop played too similarly, it's the developers of the game saying it, there is no need to die on this hill. We could have all had a laugh and moved on pages ago. Denying reality because it doesn't support (or deny for that matter) your position is not going to help you.

Everything they shared either came as part of being a Hunter or came via the talents, which at the time were the same for every spec in the Hunter class just as it was for every class. This is not a bad thing, you know

I haven't touched a DK since late Wrath so I can't comment on specific parts of the design and what differences there were between each spec. But either way, isn't DK a hybrid-class? Why do you compare a hybrid to a pure-dmg class?

I picked DKs as an example for two reasons
1. I know them so I didn't have to look anything up
2. I know you would counter with the inevitable argument of 'but all classes shared skills in mop'. The point is if Frost and Unholy can both be dps specs and share 0 baseline skills in their rotation during mop, then it follows the argument of 'I...its not similar every other class did it' holds no water.
(Also, what's with this weird comment about dks being hybrids? what does that have to do with dps specs rotational abilities?)
3. What about for example mages? Arcane and fire didn't share 80% of their rotational abilities? Is that a valid example for you?


TLDR; Hunters were too similar in mop, whether they were or not is irrelevant to RvM survival, Don't try and twist yourself up in mental pretzels defending an untenable position simply because you assume every comment not directly supporting you is against you.

[Vorality]

F Rm and FpicEail Please can you just take off the battle gear and listen to me in good faith for a minute (I promise you can go back to slugging it out with the other hunters after this).
My first post in this thread was a joke, the only reason we're having this exchange now is because, instead of replying like "Yeah lol and remember the one-button macro in TBC". You both decided to respond with deadpan straightfaced seriousness, to my joke. Do you know what the kicker is? My joke doesn't even matter to ranged v melee survival, MoP was 4 expansions ago now, irrespective of who's right game design in MoP is irrelevant to shadowlands.

I dearly hope in future you can read joke posts and not see them as 100% serious attacks on your position... That said if you want to die on this irrelevant hill lets go.



This quote (that you both managed to sidestep last time) is from the hunter 6.0 patch notes

This is Blizzard literally saying hunters in mop played too similarly, it's the developers of the game saying it, there is no need to die on this hill. We could have all had a laugh and moved on pages ago. Denying reality because it doesn't support (or deny for that matter) your position is not going to help you.




I picked DKs as an example for two reasons
1. I know them so I didn't have to look anything up
2. I know you would counter with the inevitable argument of 'but all classes shared skills in mop'. The point is if Frost and Unholy can both be dps specs and share 0 baseline skills in their rotation during mop, then it follows the argument of 'I...its not similar every other class did it' holds no water.
(Also, what's with this weird comment about dks being hybrids? what does that have to do with dps specs rotational abilities?)
3. What about for example mages? Arcane and fire didn't share 80% of their rotational abilities? Is that a valid example for you?


TLDR; Hunters were too similar in mop, whether they were or not is irrelevant to RvM survival, Don't try and twist yourself up in mental pretzels defending an untenable position simply because you assume every comment not directly supporting you is against you.

You share a quote from Blizzard about Hunters in MoP playing too similarly. This is the same Blizzard that said Azerite was going to be fine. The same Blizzard that gave us 6.1 as a major game update in WoD. The same Blizzard that has had broken systems like Titanforging in the game for a long time. The same Blizzard that gave us corruption to "fix" titanforging and to "fix" a players need of wondering if a 25 ilvl upgrade is actually an upgrade.

Blizzard is wrong. ALL.THE.TIME. Same with thinking they needed to change Hunters because they "played to similarly". This couldn't be more wrong - and you're now seeing that with the changes in Shadowlands where they're giving back a ton of baseline abilities across all specs. So you're argument couldn't be more invalid by the changes they're making now.

I wonder if you even played hunter in MoP and WoD. By far the best iteration of hunter - of course this is my opinion, though. I like how BM is played now, it should always be the spec that utilizes the pet to it's fullest extent. However, in MoP/WoD...yes, they shared a high amount of spells and that's FINE. Survival was your dot/proc spec. Have you played enhancement shaman this expansion? It plays the literal same as survival did. Keep up black arrow/serpent sting (Flame tongue/Frost brand), build with cobra shot (rockbiter), use explosive shot on CD (stormstrike), use crows on CD (wolves) and you generate a ton of explosive shot procs/arcane shot procs throughout the fight (stormstrike procs).

This spec was so good. It played quick with the perfect amount of RNG/Proc play. Melee survival doesn't even compare to how good this spec was...again, my opinion.

As for MM...it's always been the "glass cannon" spec. High damage with aimed shot and chimera shot. Popping rapid fire and dumping a bunch of aimed shots into a target was fun as hell. The mastery during WoD, not sure how it was in MoP, also added so much flavor and skill cap to the class with a damage buff while standing still, which last a few seconds after you moved. Maximizing uptime on this whilst managing movement mechanics was PERFECT. A marksman that finds a spot, sets up and unloads damage fits the spec perfectly, feel free to argue with me there...but that's what a marksman does.

So sure, they had similar toolkits, but the way they played weren't similar at all. Just another thing Blizzard was wrong with.

Lastly, if you could, please name a clunkier spec in the game right now other than Survival Hunter. Talk about a mindless mashing of buttons. It's so empty and slow with how it plays.

Even a feral druid, which people literally laugh at for not having any changes and feeling horrible in PvE still has nice cool down options, setup based game play and talent differentiation based on what you're doing in game.

https://www.worldofwargraphs.com/pve-stats/classes

If they didn't gouge sub rogues in the beginning of BfA, survival would be at the bottom of specs played. There is a reason for this. Bring back Ranged Survival.

[Exorzon]

Good! Melee survival is one of the most fun specs ever in world of warcraft. Play MM or BM if you want ranged!

Play Rogue or Demon Hunter if you want melee!

[Kithelle]

Play Rogue or Demon Hunter if you want melee!

Rogues and Demon Hunters don't have pets...

[Saltysquidoon]

hunter in MoP and WoD. By far the best iteration of hunter - of course this is my opinion, though. I like how BM is played now, it should always be the spec that utilizes the pet to it's fullest extent. However, in MoP/WoD...yes, they shared a high amount of spells and that's FINE. Survival was your dot/proc spec.

Why is it every time I provide a source that the prevailing sentiment at the time was that hunter specs were too samey the counter-argument is always "You're wrong. Source? I said you're wrong".
Don't believe blizzard? Here's Preach noted WoW content creator, Mythic raider and ex-world first player staying he feels they play exactly the same at 8:00. But hey he's not a hunter player so I'm sure he's commentary is wrong, maybe only your subjective opinion is right.

[Arararagi]

Why is it every time I provide a source that the prevailing sentiment at the time was that hunter specs were too samey the counter-argument is always "You're wrong. Source? I said you're wrong".
Don't believe blizzard? Here's Preach noted WoW content creator, Mythic raider and ex-world first player staying he feels they play exactly the same at 8:00. But hey he's not a hunter player so I'm sure he's commentary is wrong, maybe only your subjective opinion is right.

Every single hunter I've ever played with have felt the same way. And he isnt a hunter player so I wouldnt expect him to feel the nuances between the specs. I cant believe people in this thread are seriously saying that hunters in general like melee survival more than they did ranged survival, it is very obvious that they dont. Have you just not been around to see hunters opinions on this? The only reason survival wasnt played much at the end of WoD was because MM was in the best state its ever been so it was far more enjoyable than any other spec in the game. Melee survival has been played way less in general over its entire lifespan as a spec, its abysmal. And this is coming from someone who loves to pvp as the new melee survival, its just objectively a way worse feeling spec in general.

[Saltysquidoon]

And he isnt a hunter player so I wouldnt expect him to feel the nuances between the specs. I cant believe people in this thread are seriously saying that hunters in general like melee survival more than they did ranged survival, it is very obvious that they dont.

1. I'm sure he can't understand the complex differences between "Use explosive shot on cd (except when loc and load procs) if not use Black arrow on CD" and "use Kill command on cd if not use focus fire at 5 stacks". Truly the subtle differences are beyond any but the most ardent hunter players.
2. I've never mentioned or commented on M v R survival, at all, in a single post I've made in this thread. I struggle to see how you could have drawn the conclusion that anything in the post you quoted was even tangentially related to that topic.

[F Rm]

F Rm and FpicEail Please can you just take off the battle gear and listen to me in good faith for a minute (I promise you can go back to slugging it out with the other hunters after this).
My first post in this thread was a joke, the only reason we're having this exchange now is because, instead of replying like "Yeah lol and remember the one-button macro in TBC". You both decided to respond with deadpan straightfaced seriousness, to my joke. Do you know what the kicker is? My joke doesn't even matter to ranged v melee survival, MoP was 4 expansions ago now, irrespective of who's right game design in MoP is irrelevant to shadowlands.

I dearly hope in future you can read joke posts and not see them as 100% serious attacks on your position... That said if you want to die on this irrelevant hill lets go.

Are you referring to this quote?

Hey, guys remember when every hunter spec was functionally identical except for when they got to press their one special 'spec' button? Yeah those were the days, let's go back to that.

It was the earliest one from you that I could find.
Anyway, if you didn't notice, I did not actually respond to it at all. I actually thought of it as a joke so I left it at that.

But then you quoted me in my reply to Eapoe and his/her argument about button count.

Yes? It's explored further below but hunter specs had two buttons difference in their priority, for comparison in the same expansion dks had every button different.

This also happens to be the time where I decided to reply to you as well…

---

This quote (that you both managed to sidestep last time) is from the hunter 6.0 patch notes

This is Blizzard literally saying hunters in mop played too similarly, it's the developers of the game saying it, there is no need to die on this hill. We could have all had a laugh and moved on pages ago. Denying reality because it doesn't support (or deny for that matter) your position is not going to help you.

When did I sidestep it?

I specifically commented on it by also going into what they then did for WoD.

I actually agree that the specs as they were during MoP especially, but even WoD, were lackluster to some degree(IMO ofc). Mostly because, beyond the very base core specialization, you had no way to further explore what a spec meant for you.

In Cata, the base spec had even less in it than it did in MoP, although several of the talent choices we had in Cata were baked in as passives for MoP so, the specifics are less of an issue here. It was more the fact that you did not have any options to delve deeper into your desired playstyle/theme. Due to most talents in MoP being themed around beasts or hard hitting shots inspired by MM along with some other utility.

But again, the point here is that they did fix some of those "problems" during WoD.
And for what was intended with hunter spec design at the time, the hunter specs were perfectly fine on that end. Continuing this below…

I picked DKs as an example for two reasons
1. I know them so I didn't have to look anything up
2. I know you would counter with the inevitable argument of 'but all classes shared skills in mop'. The point is if Frost and Unholy can both be dps specs and share 0 baseline skills in their rotation during mop, then it follows the argument of 'I...its not similar every other class did it' holds no water.
(Also, what's with this weird comment about dks being hybrids? what does that have to do with dps specs rotational abilities?)
3. What about for example mages? Arcane and fire didn't share 80% of their rotational abilities? Is that a valid example for you?

1. Okay, fair enough.
2. Whether Frost and Unholy were more unique and relied on different core mechanics(to a higher degree than other specs did), is irrelevant. At the time, specs were not meant to be perfectly unique. That's a philosophy that came with Legion.
Or I mean, it was supposed to do so(current SV being an exception there I guess…).
3. Can't comment much on Mages either. Last time I played one was during mid TBC. But like you said earlier, this was about MoP and many things were fixed going into WoD. Whether I agreed with all those changes, is a different story ofc.

Example 1 - I like that they made Serpent Sting even more of a focus for RSV. I just wish that they would've kept it as a separate ability instead of baking it into Arcane Shot.
Example 2 - Removing Kill Shot from SV but keeping it for BM? Makes no sense.

---

And on a final note...

This is Blizzard literally saying hunters in mop played too similarly, it's the developers of the game saying it

I'm not sure if you've seen the interview for Legion with the lead class dev and senior producer at the time?

This one: https://www.gameaxis.com/interviews/...nior-producer/

In that interview, they said things like:

Q: You guys also oversee all the other classes. Are there any particular changes that you’re most excited about?

Adam: And then Survival Hunter…

Travis: It was another one that was missing its niche. It’s kind of like Marksman except more traps? Or different arrows? So it was kind of missing that “what is the core fantasy?”

Having it move into the melee space and actually return to its roots that was the vanilla Survival experience. You got your Raptor Strike and all that and having those come back and play a role, moving into melee, giving mobility like the Harpoon to draw you in – it’s like it finally gave them a unique identity. If this is the beast companion guy that you’ve always wanted to play then you’re going to have that role.

You get more flavor both visually and also as a player. That feeling of “What is that experience that I wanted?” and it delivers a little bit more for every class now.

That was also the devs you refer to.

---

"SV missing it's niche?" "What was it's core fantasy?"

That niche/fantasy was perfectly clear. The spec was themed around being a Munitions Expert and a Trapper. Mechanical interactions and effects promoted a playstyle that revolved around DoTs and trap enhancements. Something neither of the other hunter specs focused on that much at all really.


"Having it move into the melee space and actually return to it's roots that was the vanilla Survival experience."

Yeah, no. The Vanilla experience revolved around the base functions of the class. Most of those were ranged abilities or traps or pet-related. You ofc had certain melee-elements as well but those were entirely situational.

Going deep into the SV talent category/tree during Vanilla did not change this.


"it’s like it finally gave them a unique identity. If this is the beast companion guy that you’ve always wanted to play then you’re going to have that role."

Again, SV already had it's unique identity.

The "beast companion guy"-fantasy was already covered by Beast Mastery…
BM already had that niche.


"You get more flavor both visually and also as a player. That feeling of “What is that experience that I wanted?” and it delivers a little bit more for every class now."

Well, bummer…

All those hunters who prefer ranged combat focusing on a weapon got less flavor.

What is that experience that I wanted? That was the experience of RSV - the munitions expert and trapper. Who contrary to MM, does not focus on aiming the weapon: but focuses on enhancing ammunition/arrows and traps.

Where's that experience now? I'm still waiting for us to get more of that...

---

Edit:

Why is it every time I provide a source that the prevailing sentiment at the time was that hunter specs were too samey the counter-argument is always "You're wrong. Source? I said you're wrong".
Don't believe blizzard? Here's Preach noted WoW content creator, Mythic raider and ex-world first player staying he feels they play exactly the same at 8:00. But hey he's not a hunter player so I'm sure he's commentary is wrong, maybe only your subjective opinion is right.

Yeah, Preach was also the guy during Cata who said that RSV was one of the specs he had the most fun with when playing. You got his Spec Review-video(s) on Youtube if you want to hear that for yourself.

Also worth noting in the video you linked is Preach's opening sentences. About how "Blizzard are more than happy with class and spec design".
He also pointed out how hunters are "average-to-low on performance but are still being highly represented in raids" etc.

Some negatives he mentioned:

-Pets on certain fights.

-Spec variety, as you said above.
Although when he actually got into it, he started talking about talent options? As I've already pointed out earlier, the intent was for hunter talents to be shared across all specs. Talents during MoP for Hunters had nothing to do with the respective Core Specs we had. So...that's a moot point.

And btw, Preach literally in that video said that Chimaera Shot for MM was the same as Black Arrow for SV...
He said, and I quote:

Marksman has Chimaera Shot, which is essentially the same as Black Arrow. Another DoT that gets put on it(the target).

How was Chimaera Shot the same as Black Arrow again?

So yeah, by definition, his commentary was wrong...

[Appelgren]

Play Rogue or Demon Hunter if you want melee!

Nah. Survival is fine

[Bepples]

Why is it every time I provide a source that the prevailing sentiment at the time was that hunter specs were too samey the counter-argument is always "You're wrong. Source? I said you're wrong".
Don't believe blizzard? Here's Preach noted WoW content creator, Mythic raider and ex-world first player staying he feels they play exactly the same at 8:00. But hey he's not a hunter player so I'm sure he's commentary is wrong, maybe only your subjective opinion is right.

Going to make a more general response later but I just had to note that I watched about 20 seconds into that and he claimed, out of all specs, that there was a world of difference between Subtlety and Combat.

Now I respect the fact that Rogues found value in those two specs and felt they were unique choices. I don't doubt it. However, it is absolutely fucking absurd to try to use those specs in particular as a contrast to Hunters. If you love and respect what the Blizzard class designers say and do about the specs -- despite being so routinely dreadful at their jobs -- they literally renamed and remade Combat from the ground up specifically because they felt it wasn't distinct.

Oh, goodness, and while watching more of the video he claims that Chimera Shot is essentially the same thing as.... Black Arrow!? Now I could respect a comparison to Explosive Shot, but this?


Look, I don't necessarily disagree that they could have done better than what they had in MoP. But the point is that you already had a solid gameplay and thematic difference between the specs in MoP, and at that point it was actually a huge improvement over what Hunters used to have. If you think it was bad in MoP, you should turn it back to Classic and BC when there were legitimately next to no differences between the specs; not even a couple abilities. Yes, they could have used more unique cooldowns. They could have used additional unique mechanics. These sorts of things were actually slated for WoD before Blizzard got tired of them and canned them, falling back on the lazy pruning they went with for the released expansion. What they didn't need was one of the options to be completely gutted and turned into something completely antithetical to what most Hunters wanted.

I can respect the goal of spec differentiation. But if the result is what we have now, I'd rather not do it. Their efforts to make the class more "varied" made it worse.

[Saltysquidoon]

Anyway, if you didn't notice, I did not actually respond to it at all. I actually thought of it as a joke so I left it at that.

If that's that case I apologise for lumping you in with the other guy.

2. Whether Frost and Unholy were more unique and relied on different core mechanics(to a higher degree than other specs did), is irrelevant. At the time, specs were not meant to be perfectly unique. That's a philosophy that came with Legion.

You're right before legion specs weren't supposed to be unique to the weird needless degree they were in legion (like fire mages not even being able to use frost utility spells because "fire"). The point of my example was that under the mop paradigm it was still possible to have specs of the same class that weren't just superficial but functionally entirely different it was merely an example by contrast the specifics were irrelevant.

-Spec variety, as you said above.
Although when he actually got into it, he started talking about talent options? As I've already pointed out earlier, the intent was for hunter talents to be shared across all specs. Talents during MoP for Hunters had nothing to do with the respective Core Specs we had. So...that's a moot point.

And btw, Preach literally in that video said that Chimaera Shot for MM was the same as Black Arrow for SV...

How was Chimaera Shot the same as Black Arrow again?

Yes, he worded it weirdly when he said 'talent specializations' (although it is still clear he's talking about specs), I suppose that was just a holdover of the old talent style.

As for chimaera shot, it's obviously wrong. We all know chimaera shot was knock off cobra shot. I'm guessing he meant it was a spell just mindlessly pressed on CD.
EDIT: The more I think about it the more the comparison makes sense. Chimaera shot and Black arrow both cost focus and you press both on CD, whereas cobra shot (while having the sting extending effect) is a focus gen and MM's focus gen is steady shot.

[F Rm]

If that's that case I apologise for lumping you in with the other guy.


You're right before legion specs weren't supposed to be unique to the weird needless degree they were in legion (like fire mages not even being able to use frost utility spells because "fire"). The point of my example was that under the mop paradigm it was still possible to have specs of the same class that weren't just superficial but functionally entirely different it was merely an example by contrast the specifics were irrelevant.


Yes, he worded it weirdly when he said 'talent specializations' (although it is still clear he's talking about specs), I suppose that was just a holdover of the old talent style.

As for chimaera shot, it's obviously wrong. We all know chimaera shot was knock off cobra shot. I'm guessing he meant it was a spell just mindlessly pressed on CD.
EDIT: The more I think about it the more the comparison makes sense. Chimaera shot and Black arrow both cost focus and you press both on CD, whereas cobra shot (while having the sting extending effect) is a focus gen and MM's focus gen is steady shot.

Btw, something I forgot to mention in the previous reply. Although in my defense, I have brought it up before…

IF, as per what they said in that interview which I linked, they actually felt that MM and SV were too similar to one another then...why the H** didn't they just do the same to SV as they did to all other specs going into Legion?
We can continue to debate/argue about similarities and differences to the end of days but...it all really comes down to the above.

If SV was "almost like Marksman, except with more traps? Or different arrows?" then why didn't they focus on doubling down on it's intended niche/fantasy then?
That being a DoT-based spec with a theme surrounding augmented shots(ammo/arrows) along with enhanced traps.

Why didn't they double down on it's identity?

I could actually accept them changing it the way they did if they at first had made serious attempts to actually further develop RSV to fit Legion-philosophies and still it wouldn't have been enough.

---
And as you've probably seen before, here I usually refer to the linked concept you can find in my signature below. That's a version of RSV suitable for the modern game with modern philosophies in mind.

That's a concept that would play very differently from both BM/MM and MSV.

[Saltysquidoon]

I should probably say that WoD survival was my favourite hunter spec (lock and load isn't deep but it's a great feeling) followed by BM (although I admit I prefer post legion BM to both).
I think that the post-legion version of survival is a confused mess (not necessarily because its melee) of half executed competing ideas.

[Eapoe]

1. I'm sure he can't understand the complex differences between "Use explosive shot on cd (except when loc and load procs) if not use Black arrow on CD" and "use Kill command on cd if not use focus fire at 5 stacks". Truly the subtle differences are beyond any but the most ardent hunter players.
2. I've never mentioned or commented on M v R survival, at all, in a single post I've made in this thread. I struggle to see how you could have drawn the conclusion that anything in the post you quoted was even tangentially related to that topic.

The issue is you can not argue with stupid or willful ignorance. Their posts are usually intelligent (even if wrong at times) so I’d put money on ignorance.
That stated, I’ve said it and you said it (probably better than I did), when people talk about played the same, even the devs, they are talking about button rotation and not their argument of “but SV has ES and MM has AiS so they’re completely different!” Never mind the fact rotationally they are the same ability and same priority but with a different appearance and name to them. They are turning a blind eye to that to get stuck on a theme to recognize people are talking about keybinds, rotation, and priority usage. They were the same in every spec.

[F Rm]

The issue is you can not argue with stupid or willful ignorance. Their posts are usually intelligent (even if wrong at times) so I’d put money on ignorance.
That stated, I’ve said it and you said it (probably better than I did), when people talk about played the same, even the devs, they are talking about button rotation and not their argument of “but SV has ES and MM has AiS so they’re completely different!” Never mind the fact rotationally they are the same ability and same priority but with a different appearance and name to them. They are turning a blind eye to that to get stuck on a theme to recognize people are talking about keybinds, rotation, and priority usage. They were the same in every spec.

Just gonna copy-paste my previous reply to Saltysquidoon here.

Btw, something I forgot to mention in the previous reply. Although in my defense, I have brought it up before…

IF, as per what they said in that interview which I linked, they actually felt that MM and SV were too similar to one another then...why the H** didn't they just do the same to SV as they did to all other specs going into Legion?
We can continue to debate/argue about similarities and differences to the end of days but...it all really comes down to the above.

If SV was "almost like Marksman, except with more traps? Or different arrows?" then why didn't they focus on doubling down on it's intended niche/fantasy then?
That being a DoT-based spec with a theme surrounding augmented shots(ammo/arrows) along with enhanced traps.

Why didn't they double down on it's identity?

I could actually accept them changing it the way they did if they at first had made serious attempts to actually further develop RSV to fit Legion-philosophies and still it wouldn't have been enough.

---
And as you've probably seen before, here I usually refer to the linked concept you can find in my signature below. That's a version of RSV suitable for the modern game with modern philosophies in mind.

That's a concept that would play very differently from both BM/MM and MSV.

If it in their minds was such a problem back prior to Legion then...why didn't they do the above?

I mean...they did it with all other specs going into Legion. Why not SV?

[Easyclassictopkeklel]

Stop whining pls. We dont need range survival.

MM is fun in alpha so far, BM is the usual and SV is a choice I dont want to miss if I wanna go melee. SV has been one of the specs
which I had the most fun with in BFA and it is a blast in PVP. WAY more fun than ranged SV ever was.

[Eapoe]

Just gonna copy-paste my previous reply to Saltysquidoon here.



If it in their minds was such a problem back prior to Legion then...why didn't they do the above?

I mean...they did it with all other specs going into Legion. Why not SV?

Obviously I can’t answer that. I can only speculate. For an actual answer you would have to get that straight from Blizzard if you ever could.
Speculating, maybe Blizzard felt they didn’t want another dot spec for some reason. We have 3 at this point and they are already pretty close to playstyle and I’m sure separating them is difficult enough for Blizzards mentality about spec difference. Maybe they are creatively bankrupt for another rdps spec.
Before you use that with “but how could they do a melee spec when they already have X amount?” Most melee classes play differently. Yeah, they have builders and spenders (rogue and Feral) as well as Rage and Chaos (warrior and DH), and those are also really close; however, not all of them match up to all the others. Warrior and DH might play close to each other, but they don’t play close to a Rogue or Feral, or even Paladin.
Maybe Blizz is able to make concessions that not every single spec will be completely different than others but try to limit how many.
As stated, all I can do is speculate.