Because dinosaurs.
1) BM bad = all talents is boring pile of ... old skills-talents that no one use like that "Stampede" shitiest skill in hunter kit.
2) BM OP, BM hunter designer is lazzy as hell - so they took all boring skills and add them crazzy amount of damage . (and ppl just dont care if they play boring-shity spec, they wona lazzy TOP dps /petattack and be afk).
BM was best at MOP times, since then its come to be boring as HELL.
Now just lets see talents in BFA for BM :
1)"Venomous Bite", "Killer Cobra","Spitting Cobra" - Does spec now snake centred???, 3 snake theme talents and NONE of them a poison?
2)"Animal Companion"+"Dire Beast" in same row HELL NO, Dire beast must be baselane skill already gosh.
3)"Trailblazer" - so boring that no one gona pick it, just make it bold +10% move speed increase.(at all times)
4)"Aspect of Beast" - is it realy powerful 100 lvl talent? +% passive boost ( no shiny new skills with cool animation?)BBBoring.
True, but remember the Winston Churchill quote:
"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others."
A more relevant version:
"Beast Mastery is the worst spec for Hunters, except for both the others".
BM design in Legion sucks but the other two suck even more. That's the real answer to this thread title.
I am not casual, nor hardcore. But i wanted from START to play a bow class with pets. Thats BM for me.
Don't think BM was ever bad...just boring...easy.
i play BM because MM has always been a clunky mess and survival hit some weird sweet spot towards the end of WotLK but was never fun again. I like having two pets but in BfA if that talent choice is not optimal i wont really care
In my opinion, it was played most in Legion because as much garbage as it was, it was less garbage than the other specs. When the choices are a stale bologna sandwich, a shit sandwich, and a maggoty pie, you pick the stale sandwich because it's the least awful of the options, not because you really want to eat a stale sandwich. Alas, as I was afraid would happen, Blizzard took the statistics of who was playing what not as an indictment of how awful MM and SV were, but as an endorsement of BM.
Neey, it's not bad. I'm pretty consistent with it (when I bother running current content). I find it more enjoyable that MM. I love using my Skoll-Hati combo and I love the mobility.
I'm not going to talk about Survival because obvious reasons lel
I play BM because MM hasn't been good as a whole since Wrath (RIP 100% ArP) except for that one time they teased us at the end of WoD with 4pc T18. Survival was good back when it had a buff Pre-Cata for the entire raid and was fun Cata/MoP/WoD because it played like Wrath MM. But now it's melee
I thought BM was excellent in BRF tier with the set bonus and thought the only changes it needed for legion was to make frenzy non rng related and make the 2 pets baseline, but i barely recognise the class now and couldn't touch it in legion, trying it out in the beta now that 2 pets is possible with talent (hati was always hati, not YOUR pet) but the whole pet family restrictions are really frustrating, i just want my mechanical or spirit beasts to be ferocity =/
Spirit Beasts are freakin awesome uber on the PTR atm. Guess you didn't check out the healing amount of spirit mend! Dmg wise it doesn't make a difference anymore what kind of pet you summon - they all do the same. I LOVE the way pets are now. Much MUCH more utility and flavour on em than in Legion. Funny thing tho: On the PTR mend pet also heals you for a small amount. Guessing it's a bug. Btw: You mentioned mechanical pets - they previously didn't have ANY individual skill at all. Now they have a dmg reduction shield. So they actually gained more than they lost.
Played some M+ on the PTR with my BM and right now (with our current secondary stats) ferocity pets are destroying anything with ease because of their insane leech heal. Did use mend pet maybe twice during a +3 M+ solo attempt.
because it's easier than the other 2 hunter specs
I knew about the massive heal that spirit mend does but i expect that to be nerfed and just something they forgot to adjust, the point of not being ferocity is they don't have bloodlust, there are times especially in m+ you will be the bloodlust guy and you can't use spirit beasts then. Defensive matrix is just shield wall for the pet, again doesn't have bloodlust. I just don't understand why we are forced into having set specs for pets.
Don't think it's a hassle to use any other ferocity pet just for the BL. In my opinion it made sense to make the only pet that heals you also in the spec that gives you the def cd. It kind of syncs well imo.
Anyway, think about it this way: you will only use your ferocity pet twice in an m+ highkey run, but you will definitely run with your spirit beast of choice for the whole rest of the dungeon for the 2 min def cd. So you will have plenty uptime of your favorite pet - definitely.
Edit: Regarding mechanical: my statement still stands - they gained more than they lost, even if it's just a dmg reduction shield. But I do understand you. If I'd be playing gnome bm I'd also wish they made mechanicals ferocity or even better tenacity (as tenacity will be our go to pet for the most part of the group / raid contet).
Last edited by mmoc157396e4a1; 2018-06-17 at 08:34 AM.
I've played various iterations of the hunter specs in various circumstances since I joined the game eight and a half years ago.
Some I'll always remember as particularly fun: MM in late Wrath, for instance, which along with SV for most of Cata was one of the few times that BM wasn't the default spec I played for questing and general overworld stuff. Aside from briefly playing MM again for raiding in WoD and experimenting with SV a bit in Legion on an alt, I've become a dedicated BM hunter on my main.
For me, the reason is largely because I can solo so many things on my BM hunter, even with crap gear, that I wouldn't be able to on another class. I generally run with a spirit beast with a simple Spirit Mend macro keybound and that, along with Exhileration, keeps us near invincible as long as I know my limits.
It's nasty man what more is there to it