Is survival hunter the worst class revamp ever made?

[Nythiz]

You're the second person in this thread who seems to have the ability to read the minds of people from the past. I love being told "Blizzard gave us a melee dps tree, but they didn't intend us to be melee dps because I said so."

Well yes I can, because its my own mind !
I played survival hunter during Vanilla.

But hey, you keep believing that SV tree made you a melee hunter, more power to you.
If you think that SV tree was a melee dps tree, maybe you should take another hard look at the actual talents.
There were hardly any talents that directly boosted melee damage, instead they boosted survivability and gave you tools to kite/snare.

One of the main PvP lines was 21 points in MM for Scatter Shot and 30 points in SV for Lightning reflexes. It gave you strong ranged sustained damage and when in melee you could do 2-3 strong attacks which would snare/root the opponent so you could get back into ranged.
SV was still a ranged spec, just with respectable melee damage vs melee classes when they used their tools to get in your melee range.

NOTE: Unless you're of course talking about the first year of SV before the hunter patch, but I don't see how that was even a thing. The fact it was changed so fast after release shows that the developpers didn't like that branch of hunter.
There was a reason that was changed. Even more so than SV in Legion/BFA; nobody I know played SV in pre-1.7 and enjoyed it. I remember a ton of forum posts on how badly people wanted SV changed back then.

[Gurg]

It's been four years since Legion revamped survival hunters, and since then I've barely seen them. I played this new spec for a while and I found it quite boring and pointless.

What are your thoughts on this spec? Why do you think nobody plays it?

Let me touch on quoted parts and then ill go into reasons.
In advance, i dont think anything bad, trying to pick a fight here, trash someone or anything else. Im just trying to be constructive, but also add my opinion on two comments that poked my eye the most.

Ill start by saying - i really dont care about "ranged vs melee" thing that happens most often when Survival is mentioned, IT WAS ranged, NOW IS melee and i work with that. I see both sides and acknowledge the reasons for both sides, i just dont care much about them as i play what i enjoy.

Firstly, concept of "fun" is subjective differs from person to person and what they enjoy.
You, for example, maybe find fun smacking whole expansion 4 button rotation as Fury, DH or BM Hunter and doing "optimal damage," Dotting mobs and slowly burning them down as Warlock or sPriest or simply trashing them full on as Mage or Destro. You maybe have preferred playstyle between ranged and melee, i however, find fun specs with which i need to think in advance, out of the box, pay attention on whats going on with the boss and act accordingly.

When did you play it? What build? Content? Lack of information there.
Legion Survival quite differs from BfA version. Tho their core is similar, Legion Survival had way too many "spinning plates" in its rotation to make it fun or accessible for most people and my guildies used to tell me that im masochist for playing Survival trough Legion.
BfA version is more streamlined version.
Its also ONLY spec in the game which ATM has 3 valuable builds, all similar in core but revolve around different playstyle. I like having option of switching them around as i feel or its needed.

i wouldnt go that far and say "nobody plays it."
If your merit is warcraftlogs then there's even less Sub rogues than SV hunters and just barely more Feral druids.
People play it, usually in "friendly environment" of their guild or friends party since its hard (but not impossible) to find any PUG for M+ or Heroic/Mythic.
Ill touch bases on why below.

--snip--

Next, it was an underpower spec. Even when played completely correctly (and I literally lol'd at people saying there is a high skill cap for the spec...it is average at best), it fell short of so many other specs. It didn't help that it was done at a time that DH were released, which was a massively OP spec with an actually low skill cap (still is).

--snip--

Tho i agree with you of on being under-performing, falling short compared to other melee slots and being added with faceroll OP spec i wouldn't say its complexity is "average at best".
As with author, i have no ill intentions nor im picking fight.
Im not sure what your merit is, when have you played it or how much competitive it was but i (and people at Trueshot Lodge who play Survival) deffo dont think that its skill cap is laughable or "average at best."

Putting on side its under-performing due to lackluster number tuning one of the reasons behind its complexity (and mine fun actually) is that it has extremely selfish rotation, much like Breath DK or Assa Rogue, and you have to play it that way.
Your main rotation revolves around Mongoose Fury buff windows which increase damage of Mongoose Bite 15% per stack, 5 stacks total for 14sec.

Since core mechanic revolves around buffing your main spender trough itself and Survivals CD on top of that, burning as much resources as you can and generating them in between you have to think at least one step in advance when you will do what.
In one of the builds, Survivals CD can be extended up to 1min, maybe even more now, from 20sec of its base duration if you are attacking your target with primary spender. In other you have to play around Bombs with RNG debuffs and adjust your rotation accordingly.
Otherwise, when you have to get out of melee when you have opened Mongoose window, or your CD window - costs you a lot of DPS.
Its not extremely punishing, but its quite unforgiving compared to other melees as not only that you are wasting your buffed damage windows, but you have to start building them again most probably.

As with author, i guess its just down to what you want, what are you looking for in the spec that you play and how you see "fun" and "complexity."

------

Now, to reply to the topic.

• Main reason why Survival representation is low is because its melee spec that doesn't bring anything different to the table when compared with other two ranged counterparts on same class. Or even melees in general. And ranged is always preferred over melee.
• People refuse/or dont play it out of spite since its melee on ranged class which they play because its ranged.
• It requires more engagement and effort to perform close to, or on pair, with other classes. A lot of specs, melee or ranged, simply do better damage with far less engagement. Just look at Fury, Rogues, Retri, DKs. Almost all are few button specs that bring way more utility than Surival in same slot.
• Reputation of meme spec that goes around with it. Really pointless to say how may times was i kicked without a word seconds after joining Heroic/Mythic or M+ PUGs after they noticed im Survival. Or simply being asked to switch to BM since BM is "meta" now.

Personally i love Survival and its actually the reason why i kept playing WoW last two expansions and probably will in SL.
I like diversity of the builds that it has, rotational changes via talents, thinking in advance and paying extra attention on stuff around me and trying to find ways to benefit the raid without sacrificing my DPS a lot. And Pet soloing most stuff.
"Spec fantasy" has nothing to do with it honestly, its simply more fun for me than 3button rotation specs, which are now already majority of the specs.

[cparle87]

It wasn't a spec at all. Specs were introduced in Cataclysm. Anything we had before that was by design not meant to define our playstyle to any major degree. Anything we could get from talents was meant to be an addition to what the class was primarily designed to focus on by default. The default design elements, they promoted ranged gameplay over anything else and melee was only meant to be used situationally(for any case where it was harder to stay away from an enemy).

The talents that did somehow improve melee for us, did not change the primary purpose of the class, that was ranged gameplay. And if you actually look at the talents from the original SV tree(with Lacerate at the top), it was the same thing. They did not serve to replace the default ranged abilities that were classwide.

Should I have said "It was a melee talent tree" instead to prevent you from splitting hairs rather than address my point? And here we have yet another person who seems to have in depth knowledge of what Blizzard intended the class to be from nearly two decades ago.

- - - Updated - - -

Well yes I can, because its my own mind !
I played survival hunter during Vanilla.

But hey, you keep believing that SV tree made you a melee hunter, more power to you.
If you think that SV tree was a melee dps tree, maybe you should take another hard look at the actual talents.
There were hardly any talents that directly boosted melee damage, instead they boosted survivability and gave you tools to kite/snare.

One of the main PvP lines was 21 points in MM for Scatter Shot and 30 points in SV for Lightning reflexes. It gave you strong ranged sustained damage and when in melee you could do 2-3 strong attacks which would snare/root the opponent so you could get back into ranged.
SV was still a ranged spec, just with respectable melee damage vs melee classes when they used their tools to get in your melee range.

NOTE: Unless you're of course talking about the first year of SV before the hunter patch, but I don't see how that was even a thing. The fact it was changed so fast after release shows that the developpers didn't like that branch of hunter.
There was a reason that was changed. Even more so than SV in Legion/BFA; nobody I know played SV in pre-1.7 and enjoyed it. I remember a ton of forum posts on how badly people wanted SV changed back then.

I was. I had to clarify for someone else that I was referring to survival as it was at launch.

[F Rm]

Should I have said "It was a melee talent tree" instead to prevent you from splitting hairs rather than address my point?

Yeah, sure...

You said "Survival was the melee spec". You can move the goalpost all you want, but the way in which you forumalted your previous posts, points towards you saying that Survival made you a "melee-hunter" in Vanilla, which is wrong.

Here's some of what you said again:

Because they had an entire tree dedicated to melee dps?

- - - Updated - - -


You're the second person in this thread who seems to have the ability to read the minds of people from the past. I love being told "Blizzard gave us a melee dps tree, but they didn't intend us to be melee dps because I said so."

I'm talking about the original vanilla talent tree, the one the game was released with. It was a melee spec.

And to repeat, no, it wasn't a melee spec. It was a talent category which contained talents that improved your melee capabilities, as well as your defensives/utility like traps, and more.
(Yes, I'm talking about the original tree/category which included Lacerate).

And here we have yet another person who seems to have in depth knowledge of what Blizzard intended the class to be from nearly two decades ago.

Where or when did I ever claim that I know what they(the devs)intended for the class?

I've only talked about the actual design itself. I've talked about what type of gameplay it promoted for us, being a dmg-dealing class.

I talked about the default class mechanics and how they promoted ranged combat over anything else. That it was the intended priority whenever possible(not always due to the min attack range on ranged weapons), and how, no matter what talents we picked, the primary focus of us being a ranged class, did not change. Again, by intent of the design.

Whether the devs wanted exactly this, we don't know. And I did not say otherwise.

[Laytnor]

I REALLY love the concept of a melee hunter, I really do. I wanted this since I first remembered playing rexxar on wc3, however, that IS the issue.
Beast mastery thematically would be a much superior choice. It just feels right, fighting alongside your pets. Exactly, ALONGSIDE, not sending them in and shooting from afar like a coward. BM hunters are supposed to have a deep bond with their pets, and nothing would show it more than fighting alongside them, with melee weapons. BM would've been perfect pick for that. Both MM and SV had pretty strong flavor already. BM always has been just "that one spec people use for easy leveling and having their pets do bigger numbers". Turning BM hunters melee really wouldn't impact much, it'd still be the same thing, but melee, and if anything, finally give the spec a proper identity, fantasy and gimmick. Turning SV melee needed a complete rework of the spec, and it still doesn't feel right, I really loved the good ol' explosive shot and dot shenanigans.

God, I'm still so sad about this. What a wasted opportunity.

Also, before someone brings up the old false claim of "sv used to be melee in vanilla!", i'd just say it in advance. No. False. SV was not a melee spec. It had some melee utility, true, but keep in mind that melee was still part of the game for hunters back then. It wasn't a "melee" spec. You'd still try to be in range as much as possible even if for some obscure reason you decided to go balls deep into that spec. It's was never a melee spec. It was "I'm not as screwed as other specs if I get caught in melee" spec.

[Michael Jackson]

Survival was the best revamp ever made alongside what they did for Fire and Arcane mages as well as Enhancement shaman back in Cata I think.

Surval ranged "revamp" had one thing going for it: Explosive shot, a glorified dot that hit like a meteor and you basically relied on for everything.

Melee revamp in Legion was the best: you had a ton of cool traps and abilities to customize your playstyle around.
Ever since they keep making it dumber and dumber for some reason with less buttons to press, but it's still fun as fuck.

I love having some melee bitch take me on and get fucked while I simultaneously smash him in close range, kite him at range and pursue hit down like the dog he is. The versatility of having ranged + melee abilities is fantastic.

I've played Survival ever since end of Legion and it's the best spec you could wish for on a Hunter if you want to have fun. If you want to top the charts and stroke your penis that's another story.

[s0ul]

it's the least played spec and the one they spent the most time on LOL

Absolute trash.

[Dald]

It's not bad really. I think it would be cool if Mongoose was baseline and Raptor Strike was a finisher style based on Mongoose stacks. Hit 5 stacks, or coming to the end of your current stack and pop a fat Raptor Strike.

[Razorice]

I loved Survival pre-melee.
MoP survival was so much fun, so for me Survival was the worst class revamp.

[Twen]

^ What they said.

I'm so sad because I always loved SV and haven't really had much fun on my hunter since the revamp. (Yes I did give the new MSV a fair shake but just nope, while MM doesn't quite sit with me and BM feels boring.) I don't want to give up on my hunter, but I might have to in order to have fun if nothing changes enough now. I really miss RSV.
#stillsalty

[Hinastorm]

Probably already said somewhere in here, but I feel that alot of it has to do with how much of an "abandoned" spec it is, along with demo locks and ww monks.

I find it odd that a company as big as blizzard can't seem to overhaul a handful of specs that need it in 2 full years. It's why i'm so glad they didn't add another class. They can't seem to figure out the ones they already have.

The "idea" of melee survival can work, it just needs attention. It's not getting enough.

[Subrias]

Because the class has two other ranged specs.
Because the skillcap of playing SV properly is higher than with BM and MM.
Because people are tryhards and mostly go for the fotm spec.
Because the spec even though it is fun had issues at the start and a bad image. And once a class has a stigma
it sticks for longer than it is actually true.
Class perception does not really matter tho, because if SV wasnt the dominant ranged spec nobody would play it anyways
or take ranged SV to m+ etc.

New sv is much more fun than the old ranged version imo.

so, no.. this is wrong. the reason i dont play MM is because i hate hard casting.. if i wanted to, i would play a caster. I dont like BM because it felt like my pet was doing the damage not me. i would play survival even if it was sub optimal just because it was the most fun dps to play between cata and wod. I played the new survival after they changed it, it was fun i wont lie, but it was melee and im either a tank or a bow user exclusively in every game i play. i have the mage tower looks, i have rhok delar, i have thori'dal, i have the frenzyheart striker, all because i loved to play hunter. however, i havent touched my hunter since i did the mage tower achieves because i just dont enjoy the class at all any more. now i exclusively play tanks.

[deenman]

Melee survival is superior in every way, ppl just want to faceroll on BM and dont like a spec that takes some form of actual critical thinking to play.

there are 2 issues with survival: one,it took away a playstyle and identity that many enjoyed,and secondly,yeah...its not faceroll and takes some skill and effort compared to most other classes/specs,and what you get in return for that?LESS PERFORMANCE THAN THE FACEROLL SPECS.....who in their right mind would play a spec that is harder to play and performs crappy compared to much easier specs?it just doesnt feel right,so ofc its unpopular as only the most diehard fans of the playstyle stick with it

[Schizoide]

Well some people enjoy more complicated gameplay, that's why feral druid exists. I really think it's just that the vast majority of people didn't roll a hunter to play in melee.

[Beatman]

Well some people enjoy more complicated gameplay, that's why feral druid exists. I really think it's just that the vast majority of people didn't roll a hunter to play in melee.

I think many players would have enjoyed a melee hunter spec inspired by Rexxar. However, instead of giving players a 4th spec they took away a spec people had been playing for years. Of course they got mad.

[Schizoide]

If it was an additional spec people wouldn't be upset about it, agreed. I still don't think it would be popular though.

[Charo]

No. Survival Rules.

[CID-77]

Just stopped by to say I love current Survival. For me it really rounds out the class. It's definitely not a real melee class. It really only has 1 melee range ability and even that can be used at ranged for short periods. It's also incredibly strong in PvP so no complaints here.

Only sidenote is that I don't think the whack-a-mole rotation is very interesting for a PvE main but that's about it.

[Amenethor]

Nope. Legion and BFA shadow priest was the worst.

[Dristereau]

I enjoy it, it's pretty fun, especially with Wildfire Infusion and it's because the default Hunter spec for PVP in 2's, but that could be because BM and MM suck. I don't think it helps that Hunter is still considered Ranged DPS when invited to groups, and that BM is a simple spec to play and does the most damage. I prefer it to the Legion version and I don't remember Survival particularly well from MoP/WoD era.

I used to really like MM but that was before Rapid Fire existed as a rotational ability and you could muder people with Aimed Shot/Chimera Shot combos.