First Impression of the Marksmanship Hunter Rework in The War Within - Guide Writer Feedback

The War Within Criado 08/7/2024 em 10:00 por TheAzortharion

Our Class Guide Writers share their expert opinions based on rigorous testing and theorycrafting in hopes to contextualize the various changes coming in the War Within. Check out all of our released editorials in our new Editorial Section.

Wowhead Editorials

The War Within Beta Development Notes

HUNTER(Hunter Feedback)

Many talents have moved locations or have had their pathing updated.
New Talent: Padded Armor – Survival of the Fittest gains an additional charge.
New Talent: Kodo Tranquilizer – Tranquilizing Shot removes up to 1 additional Magic effect from its target.
New Talent: Devilsaur Tranquilizer – If Tranquilizing Shot removes only an Enrage effect, its cooldown is reduced by 5 seconds.
New Talent: Scout’s Instincts – You cannot be slowed below 80% of your normal movement speed while Aspect of the Cheetah is active.
New Talent: Scrappy – Casting Aimed Shot reduces the cooldown of Intimidation and Binding Shot by 0.5 seconds.
New Talent: Kindling Flare – Stealthed enemies revealed by Flare remain revealed for 3 seconds after exiting the flare.
New Talent: Unnatural Causes – Your damage over time effects deal 10% increased damage. This effect is increased by 50% on targets below 20% health.
New Talent: Moment of Opportunity – When a trap triggers, you gain Aspect of the Cheetah for 3 seconds. Can only occur every 1 minute.
New Talent: No Hard Feelings – When Misdirection targets your pet, it reduces the damage they take by 50% for 5 seconds.
New Talent: Territorial Instincts – Intimidation summons a pet if you do not have one out and stuns two additional nearby enemies at 50% effectiveness.

Developer’s note: This talent is not fully implemented yet, but we wanted to give players access to it early for feedback. The intended vision for this spell is for Hunters to summon their pet, and then it Intimidates their target. We are not interested in circumventing a Hunter’s need for their pet to be out to access Intimidation.

New Talent: Tar-Coated Bindings – Binding Shot’s root duration is increased by 1 second.
New Talent: Serrated Tips – You gain 5% more critical strike from critical strike sources.
New Talent: Moment of Opportunity – When a trap triggers, you gain Aspect of the Cheetah for 3 seconds. This effect has a 60 second cooldown.
New Talent: Ghillie Suit – You take 20% reduced damage while in Camouflage. This bonus persists 3 seconds after leaving Camouflage.
New Talent: Specialized Arsenal – Kill Command, Aimed Shot, and Wildfire Bomb damage increased by 10%.
Lone Survivor now also reduces Counter Shot and Muzzle’s cooldown by 2 seconds.
Survival of the Fittest now reduces all damage you and your pet take by 30% (was 20%).
Improved Tranquilizing Shot now also grants 10 focus when you interrupt an effect with Counter Shot or Muzzle.
Quick Load now resets the cooldown of Scatter Shot and Bursting Shot.
Steel Trap damage reduced by 80%.
Born to be Wild now reduces Aspect of the Cheetah, Survival of the Fittest, and Aspect of the Turtle by 30 seconds (was 7/15%).
Explosive Shot now explodes early when applied to a target that already is affected by Explosive Shot.

Developer’s note: Survival has gotten substantially increased access to Explosive Shot, so we wanted to make Explosive Shot stacking feel more responsive and exciting.

Explosive Shot projectile and explosion visual effects have been updated.
Barrage, Kill Command, Improved Kill Command, Killer Instinct, and Alpha Predator have moved to the Beast Mastery talent tree.
Barrage, Master Marksman, and Hydra’s Bite have moved to the Marksmanship talent tree.
Kill Command and Alpha Predator have moved to the Survival talent tree.
Bursting Shot is now a choice node with Scatter Shot (was in Marksmanship tree).
The following talents are now 1 point:

Improved Traps
Pathfinding
Trailblazer
Wilderness Medicine
Natural Mending
Rejuvenating Wind

The following talents have been removed:

Sentinel Owl
Sentinel’s Perception
Sentinel’s Protection
Serpent Sting
Poison Injection
Stampede
Beast Master
Arctic Bola
Nature’s Endurance
Serrated Shots

Trailblazer and Pathfinding have swapped locations in the Hunter class tree.
Fixed an issue that was causing Posthaste to only grant 25% movement speed. It now grants 50% movement speed.
Fixed an issue that was causing Born to Be Wild to falsely claim to reduce the cooldown of Survival of the Fittest.
New Talent: Blackrock Munitions – The damage of Explosive Shot is increased by 8%.
New Talent: Implosive Trap – Hurls a fire trap to the target location that explodes when an enemy approaches, causing Fire damage and knocking all enemies up. Limit 1. Choice node with High Explosive Trap.
Territorial Instincts has been redesigned – Casting Intimidation without an active pet summons one from your stable.
Talent nodes in Gate 2 have been repositioned.
Concussive Shot and Wilderness Medicine now connect to Scare Beast and Scout’s Instinct respectively.
The following talents have been removed:

Steel Trap
Death Chakram

Developer’s note: One of the biggest complaints we’re seeing in the Hunter community is button bloat. Death Chakram was a relatively high-frequency button that you had to click before all of your damage abilities, creating something of a launch sequence for every Hunter specialization. Its removal will let us bake the lost power into each spec’s kit while also reducing the button-presses required before you can begin damage.

Marksmanship

New Talent: Rapid Fire Barrage – Your Barrage now instead shoots Rapid Fires at up to five nearby enemies at 30% effectiveness but has its cooldown increased to 60 seconds.
New Talent: Small Game Hunter – The damage of Multi-Shot is increased by 100% and the damage of Explosive Shot is increased by 25%.
New Talent: Penetrating Shots – Gain critical strike damage equal to 20% of your critical strike chance.
New Talent: Kill Zone – Your spells and attacks deal 8% more damage and ignore line of sight against any target in your Volley.
Legacy of the Windrunners has been redesigned – Each time Rapid Fire deals damage, there is a 5% chance to coalesce a Wind Arrow at your target.
Wind Arrows damage increased by 300%. Wind Arrows are longer affected by Aimed Shot modifiers. No longer grants Focus or Aimed Shot charges after firing 24 Wind Arrows.
Wailing Arrow has been redesigned and is now passive – Now replaces your Aimed Shot with a Wailing Arrow after generating 20 Wind Arrows.
Wailing Arrow only silences the primary target and it now benefits from bonuses to Aimed Shot such as Trick Shots.
Readiness now causes Trueshot to immediately grant you Wailing Arrow and you generate 2 additional Wind Arrows while in Trueshot. Wailing Arrow resets the cooldown of Rapid Fire and generates 2 charges of Aimed Shot.
Eagle Talon’s True Focus has been redesigned – Trueshot lasts an additional 3 seconds. During Trueshot, Aimed Shot’s Focus cost is reduced by 50% and Arcane Shot and Multi-Shot casts an additional time at 30% effectiveness.
Barrage, Master Marksman, and Hydra’s Bite are now Marksmanship talents (was Class).
Hydra’s Bite has been redesigned – When Aimed Shot strikes an enemy affected with your Serpent Sting, it spreads Serpent Sting to up to 2 nearby enemies. Serpent Sting’s damage over time is increased by 20%.
Killer Accuracy has been updated – Kill Shot’s critical strike chance and critical strike damage are increased by 20%.
Razor Fragments has been updated – Kill Shot damage increase to 75% (was 50%). Moved to Gate 3.
Lone Wolf reduced to 5% increased damage when you do not have an active pet (was 10%).

Developer’s note: The opportunity cost of having your pet out as a Marksmanship Hunter is so high that it can feel as though you’re locked out of all pet based utility, especially in AOE situations. Marksmanship is always going to be the Hunter spec that provides more throughput without a pet, but lowering this talent’s power should help to make those times where you’re the only lust or need an extra defensive feel a bit less bad.

Rapid Fire damage reduced by 8%.
Precise Shots now always grants 2 stacks and reduces the Focus cost of your next Multi-Shot or Arcane Shot by 50%.
Calling the Shots is no longer a choice node with Unerring Vision.
Surging Shots is no longer a choice node with In The Rhythm.
Many 2-point talents are now 1 point.
Bursting Shot has moved to the Class tree.
Arcane Shot damage increased by 3%.
Small Game Hunter’s Multi-Shot damage bonus reduced to 75% (was 100%).
Multi-Shot Focus cost increased to 30 (was 20).
Fixed a baseline passive bug that was causing Multi-Shot to deal 20% increased damage for Marksmanship only.
Wailing Arrow and Rapid Fire will now properly generate Wind Arrows when talented into Legacy of the Windrunners.

The Hunter class and all three Hunter specializations received a significant rework in the Beta for The War Within. Marksmanship's core mechanics remain the same, with the redesigned Talent Tree focusing on reshuffling talent orders, combinations, and build opportunities while adding some new talents.

Mechanical Changes

Below is a list of the core changes with the most significant impact on gameplay and building a Marksmanship Hunter.

The pathing for the whole Talent Tree has been completely redone, with significant downstream effects on possible builds.
Tiros Precisos now always grants 2 stacks of its effect. It used to randomly provide either 1 or 2 stacks.
Lobo Solitário now grants a 5% damage increase, instead of 10%.
Tiros em Sequência (Trueshot CD Reduction) and Visão Infalível (increased crit chance and damage in Trueshot) are no longer in a choice node together, meaning you can pick both.
Legado dos Correventos has been redesigned - It now causes all Tiro Certo to fire Wind Arrows, and gives Tiro Rápido a chance to fire them.
Seta Plangente has been redesigned - once 20 Wind Arrows have been fired from Legado dos Correventos, your Tiro Certo button becomes Seta Plangente for one cast.
Prontidão has been changed - Tiro Certeiro now grants Seta Plangente immediately, and adds +2 Wind Arrows every time you shoot a Wind Arrow for Tiro Certeiro's duration.
Concentração Real da Garra da Águia has been redesigned - Tiro Certeiro still lasts an additional 3 sec and the Focus cost of Tiro Certo is reduced by 50% during it. Now also causes your Tiro Múltiplo/Tiro Quimérico/Tiro Arcano to hit a second time for 30% damage. This means that you only need one cast to consume both Tiros Precisos stacks during Tiro Certeiro.
Barragem is now a Class Tree Talent. Just below it is a new Talent, Barragem de Tiros Rápidos, which fires 5 Tiro Rápidos. One on your primary target for 100% damage, and four on other targets for 30% of normal damage. These Tiro Rápidos are affected by Tiros de Mestre. This also increases the cooldown of Barragem to 1 minute.

There are also some non-Marksmanship-specific changes that nonetheless have a significant impact on how Marksmanship feels to play:

Chakram has been removed.
Armadilha de Aço has been removed.
Tiro Explosivo is now essentially a mandatory pick in the Class Tree.

There are new talents, too, but they are either passive, rarely picked, or both. These include things like Mãos Velozes, Zona de Abate.

Gameplay Impact

Marksmanship is going to play essentially the same in The War Within. Remember that we are losing our much-beloved Dragonflight S3/S4 Tier Set, which caused us to not have to cast Tiro Múltiplo to activate Tiros de Mestre in our cooldowns. On AoE, a new button in Barragem de Tiros Rápidos may be used occasionally, though it is currently a pretty expensive talent point investment with dubious power behind it.

If you liked the core of Marksmanship before, you will continue to like it, and vice versa.

Positive Changes

Alright, that covers the background. It's time to get opinionated.

Marksmanship Talent Tree Changes

Tiros Precisos granting 2 stacks of its effect flattens out some of Marksmanship's RNG and is a subtle, but good change.
I personally like having the option of both Tiros em Sequência and Visão Infalível, ensuring no trade-off on Tiro Certeiro's power with a shorter cooldown. Opinions are divided on this one in the community, however, with many feeling that it makes the Talent Tree too expensive. More on that in the "Concerns & Feedback" section.
Lobo Solitário being a smaller gain (or rather, a smaller loss when you inevitably have to drop it just to use basic utility) is a step in the right direction, but one of the most pervasive bits of feedback in the community is that Lobo Solitário isn't where we'd like it yet.
Barragem de Tiros Rápidos is cool and powerful, but expensive.
While opinions are a tad divided, the removal of Chakram is probably a good thing if its power can be put into Marksmanship's own kit.
The removal of Armadilha de Aço is good, as almost nobody enjoyed that filler button.

There is not a ton more to say here. These changes are good, but they're not fantastic. There's nothing to be extremely hyped about, with none of Marksmanship's pervasive core issues addressed. Which brings us to..

Survivability

These changes are not Marksmanship-specific as they affect our Class Talent Tree. Still, Marksmanship has long been known as the least survivable Hunter spec, so I'd say that these benefits are especially good for Marksmanship.

Here is a breakdown of Marksmanship's survivability tools in The War Within.

NEW: 2 charges of Lei da Selva, which gives 30% DR for 8 seconds on a 90-second cooldown.
NEW: Fingir de Morto now removes all Poison and Disease effects.
Aspecto da Tartaruga which deflects most initial hits of attacks (not DoTs) and provides 30% DR for 8 seconds.
8% max health from Vento Rejuvenescedor, and 5% Avoidance from Evasão do Caçador.
Exaltação heals you for 30% of your maximum health (and 38% with Vento Rejuvenescedor) on a variable, but short cooldown.
Fortitude do Urso increases current and maximum HP by 20%.

Hunters have historically hit a limit on high Mythic+ keys long before most classes, and this should be significantly improved by having much more access to our strongest defensive. Being able to cover more oneshot mechanics on our own means much less handholding required by the team, and an increase in Marksmanship's stock for Mythic+.

Concerns & Feedback

This section will be longer, and a tad more complicated. "Concerns & Feedback" encompasses not just what the rework did, but also what it didn't do.

Lone Wolf & Utility

Lobo Solitário is now a must-have talent for DPS, with significant and unnecessary drawbacks in terms of utility. This seems unwarranted, as Marksmanship has nothing unique going for it in terms of utility or survivability. The reworked Intimidação now allows us to use our pet stun without having a pet active. Steps are being made in the right direction and there is still time to implement another, big one.

The most egregious example in actual gameplay is having to Bloodlust in Mythic+, which predominantly consists of AoE. Since pets deal no AoE damage, this is exactly where Lobo Solitário shines, and having a pet out is the weakest. Unfortunately, because Lobo Solitário has a significant ramp-up time after you dismiss your pet, even if you manage to perfectly summon a pet, and pre-cast its dismissal, you are still losing damage during your most powerful and exciting part of a pull - particularly as Marksmanship - the burst window.

And that's if you perfectly manage a cheesy precast without losing uptime on the pull. Dispensar Ajudante is a 3-second cast that does not scale with Haste.

If 'clunky' was ever a term with real meaning and substance, it is when used to describe the slog it is to try and bring what should be baseline Hunter utility to your Mythic+ party in Bloodlust. Despite their "nerf" to Lobo Solitário, it is still 3-4% DPS loss to have a pet out on AoE, which is most of Mythic+. If the goal was to make it less painful or even numerically tolerable to run a pet and have your utility, this change does not do enough for Mythic+ where the lack of utility is felt the most. In raid, having a pet out to get some Leech is far more acceptable - provided of course that it is a pure single-target fight.

My favourite solution to this is the ability to swap between different pet-related bonuses via "stances". Perhaps Lobo Solitário could be a 3-way choice node, perhaps you just get a stance bar that lets you pick the pet utility you want at a similar cost to Beast Mastery and Survival. There is no reason that Marksmanship's utility should be locked behind such clunky gameplay as: Summon Pet > Activate Bloodlust/Master's Call > Dismiss Pet > Wait for Lobo Solitário to reach full power > Repeat in 10 minutes' time if you're unfortunate enough to be the group's only Lust.

Expensive Talent Builds

The Marksmanship Talent Tree is expensive, particularly if you want AoE options. Previously, we've talked about how Hunter specs tend to incur a huge single-target DPS loss in order to do acceptable AoE damage. This remains the case in The War Within, but it gets worse. No matter how many single-target talents we sacrifice, we cannot create a build with every AoE mechanic.

There are several reasons for this, and I think re-evaluating this list should be a high priority for Blizzard before launch, second only to Lobo Solitário's utility woes:

Barragem is a useless Talent and only serves to lead us to Barragem de Tiros Rápidos, but Barragem de Tiros Rápidos is seldom worth picking precisely because it's a 2-point investment. It is also puzzlingly locked behind Mira Cuidadosa which has dubious value for the Mythic+ scenarios where Barragem/Barragem de Tiros Rápidos are supposed to be enticing options. Suggestion: Remove Barragem, replace it with Barragem de Tiros Rápidos, and swap the positions of Mira Cuidadosa and Mãos Velozes in the Talent Tree.
Tiro Firme Aprimorado and Tiro Certeiro are fundamental passives to Marksmanship's design, and them being talents only serves to make the tree needlessly more expensive, while robbing the tree of cooler and more interesting options. Suggestion: Make them baseline.
Zona de Abate is a neat talent for enhancing the short-term burst that Marksmanship is known for, partly making up for the loss of Chakram's 45-second burst, but is too expensive for its modest power. Suggestion: Merge it into Salva.
Legado dos Correventos and Mira Focalizada are needless and weak 2-pointers with powerful, borderline-mandatory options locked behind them in Seta Plangente and Saraivada. Suggestion: Make them 1-pointers.
While Marksmanship loves Tiro Certeiro, 4 points of talents to bring it to full power seems needlessly expensive. Having to spec into our main cooldown is bad enough (relatively common, so fair enough), but all of its juice, including the part that enables our tier set to not be a complete joke during it (though, it's still a joke), requires a talent point investment: Concentração Real da Garra da Águia, Tiros em Sequência, and Visão Infalível. Tiros em Sequência is an example of a good talent - we do not always care for a lower Tiro Certeiro cooldown, depending on the fight. But Concentração Real da Garra da Águia and Visão Infalível are not just mandatory for power, but also gameplay reasons. Suggestion: Tiros em Sequência would be a more interesting capstone, with Visão Infalível and Concentração Real da Garra da Águia made baseline.
Tiro Múltiplo is useless without Tiros de Mestre, and anything that makes Tiro Múltiplo more powerful is locked behind Tiros de Mestre anyway. A 2-point investment just to obtain the most fundamental AoE mechanic of the spec seems needlessly steep. Suggestion: Merge Tiros de Mestre into Tiro Múltiplo.

The Loss of the Dragonflight Season 3/4 Tier Set Gameplay

The Dragonflight Tier Set of Season 3 (and then 4) has been one of the most successful and popular tier sets in recent memory.

A quick reminder of the relevant things it did:

Trick Shots causes Rapid Fire to launch a Volley for 6 sec, dealing 100% of normal damage.

It fixed two of Marksmanship's most significant drawbacks, rotationally and numerically:

It enabled unhampered 2-target cleave during cooldowns, and decent 2-target cleave outside of them.
It made the AoE Tiro Certeiro Rotation far more satisfying by eliminating the need for constant Tiro Múltiplo weaving that caused constant resource capping.

It is probably too late to hope for a redesign of the War Within Season 1 Tier Set, nor can Blizzard be expected to do the same great set bonus every season, but there are several ways in which the practical effects of the Tier Set could be made baseline, or part of our talent tree. If the suggestions above are implemented and AoE builds become more flexible, the tier set - or a similar effect - could be implemented. For instance, Visão Infalível could have a choice node alternative that activates Tiros de Mestre for the duration of Tiro Certeiro. This would be very similar to the much-liked Instintos Selvagens/Frenesi Sangrento choice node for Beast Mastery, which offers an increasingly powerful cooldown on one hand, or a passively AoE'ing one on the other.

Final Thoughts

Most of the significant, positive changes for Marksmanship in The War Within are related to survivability, and not Marksmanship-specific. The Talent Tree Rework for Marksmanship did do some good, but seemed to miss the mark on the most important issues plaguing Marksmanship, and introduced a new one by making the Talent Tree extremely expensive.

But, I think these problems can be addressed with relatively little work on Blizzard's end, save perhaps for a redesign to Lobo Solitário. I have focused on feedback and suggestions that I think are reasonable to expect/want at this stage in the Beta cycle.

I'm Azortharion, hailing from the cold north of Denmark. I have been theorycrafting, writing guides, and streaming for Hunters since 2014, as well as playing the game on a high level, with hundreds of rank 1 parses and dozens of World #1 Mythic+ runs on all 3 Hunter specs over the game's history. I also founded and run Trueshot Lodge, the official Discord for the Hunter Community, where I always solicit and address feedback, suggestions, and comments for this guide. Most importantly, I wrote the Wowhead Marksmanship Hunter Guide that you are reading now! You can also find me on my Personal Hunter Discord Server, where I offer more direct coaching and advice to thousands of Hunters. You may also find me on Twitter and YouTube.

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