Thursday, July 31, 2014

Survival Beta Analysis

I can't give you any first hand analysis of the beta, but others can! Delirium at Thrill of the Wild has several great posts about SV. One on PvE and another on PvP. You should really check them both out. He also has some analysis on Lock and Load in WoD.

Speaking of Survival PvP, Bendak at Eyes of the Beast has an opinion on how the WoD changes will impact SV PvP. It's incredibly well thought out and worth a read.

One of these days I'll get in there..

Tuesday, July 22, 2014

You Can't Measure Much With a Target Dummy

I'm not in the beta. It's fine. I'm getting my fix as best I can through the amazing hunter community's blogs and podcasts. With all of the ability pruning and whatnot, I'm paying most of my attention to how hunters are experiencing the new versions of our specs, with my obvious bias toward Survival. While there are a lot of different interpretations of how the individual specs feel in their new incarnations, there does seem to be an overall theme that things are "missing" or a certain spec feels "simple and hollow." This may be true. The hunters I'm paying attention to generally have a much better understanding of the class than I do, and again I can't get any firsthand experience myself, but I have to say these opinions seem like they were formed prematurely.

I have to assume a lot of people are judging the specs as they level. Most of us level as fast as we can  for obvious reasons, but is leveling a good way to experience the depth of a class and spec? I usually use very few of the tools available to me when leveling. Maybe some testers are running 5-mans, which is a  much better gauge of the state of a class, but they are still just regular 5-mans. Even at the beginning of Cataclysm I don't remember needing Deterrence or Gift of the Naaru in regular dungeons. Maybe once I got to max level and into heroics. Maybe. And everything I have read analyzing the new state of  hunters was written before ANY raid testing had begun. I don't know about you, but a raid environment is what I care about. That is where you will learn if your newly-pruned spec really is boring. Many beta testers are deciding how the specs feel by going to the worst place on Azeroth to gauge such a thing : A target dummy.

Target dummies are great. I love them. They are an amazing way to practice and compare rotations. But a target dummy can never tell you how fun a spec or class is. There is no strategic use of AoE on a dummy. You don't use traps on a dummy. You don't use utility abilities like Distracting Shot, Misdirection, or Deterrence on a dummy. I think it's safe to assume most testers are not working a regular Camouflage into their target dummy practice, but you can be damn sure you'll be doing it in a raid environment as Survival just for the heal.  One of the most fun encounters for me was Spiderling duty on Bethilac, and I wasn't doing anything close to my target dummy rotation until the last 20% of her health. Running around the lair flinging traps and then burning down spiders with Multi Shot was a ton of fun, but it was absolutely nothing like hitting a dummy for 5 minutes. When you factor encounter mechanics and the new healing model, a hunter's single-target rotation may be a much lower priority than positioning and damage avoidance/mitigation.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe ability pruning has gone too far and hunters need to get something more to feel fun again. But until I get to play WoD myself I'm going to keep the faith. And I'm going to be skeptical of anyone who went to a target dummy to determine if a spec or class is fun to play.

Friday, July 11, 2014

The Blog Is Not Dead!

I just don't have anything hunter related to write about right now. I'm not in the beta, and I'm not very comfortable writing about things I have no first hand experience with. For beta hunter info Bendak, Darkbrew, Delirium, and Solar are all doing amazing work. I'm reading them every day. Should I get a beta invite, posts will start rolling out. Until then, I'm just trying to get better at PvP and learning BM so I have some flexibility in WoD. I'm also using the lull to enjoy summer here in the Pacific Northwest.
I may do a few gold related posts in the meantime, but if you only want hunter and WoD info, I got nothing until I can play it in some form. Please stay tuned and read the blogs linked in the margin.