Finally, we have a bit of action in the Beast Mastery talent tree! In today’s BfA alpha build, there is a brand new talent and one redesigned talent.
New Level 15 talent
Killer Instinct: Kill Command deals 50% increased damage against enemies below 35% health. (replaces Big Game Hunter)
BM has an execute again! This talent is so much better than the old Big Game Hunter (which was a “reverse execute”) — not only because executes are more desirable, but because it works for 35% of the target’s health.
The level 15 tier is looking a little more interesting now, but like I said in my earlier post, I think Dire Beast needs an interesting secondary effect to make up for the loss of Frenzy stacks. Animal Companion is still not working, but it looks like it’s just going to be a flat, passive single target buff, whereas the new Killer Instinct gives you a more Kill Command focused build (and will pair very well with Killer Cobra).
It’s no Kill Shot, but it’s something.
Aspect of the Beast changes
Aspect of the Beast: Increases the damage of your pet’s abilities by 30%. Increases the effectiveness of your pet’s Predator’s Thirst, Endurance Training, and Pathfinding passives by 50%.
This is pretty similar to the old Aspect of the Beast talent in theme, except now you get the DPS benefit regardless of pet spec.
The wording is a bit confusing when they say “pet abilities” since pets only have 1 possible ability that can be affected (their basic attack — Claw/Bite/Smack). So it should probably just say basic attacks instead. Yes, technically it could affect Froststorm Breath and Burrow Attack, but unless those are buffed to ridiculous numbers, it will never be viable to have your pet channeling those for 8 sec and not be able to do anything else. Those two abilities are more flavor than anything.
As for the 30% increase, that seems extremely low (considering that the Legion talent Blink Strikes increases this damage by 100%). It will all depend on the relative power of basic attacks in BfA. In Legion, basic attacks are only responsible for a few percent of your total damage in single target, so a 30% buff to that is almost nothing. However, if basic attacks are meant to be more powerful in BfA, then this could be a different story. It’s too early to say since all the numbers are in a weird state and haven’t been tuned whatsoever.
The second part of the talent will give you 15% leech when using a Ferocity pet (up from 10%), 12% more health (up from 8%) when using a Tenacity pet, and 12% run speed (up from 8%) when using a Cunning pet.
I do like this better than the old Aspect of the Beast, but I think there are more interesting passive options they could do here. What if they baked in the old Bestial Fury instead of the basic attack damage?
I still hope Blizzard has more plans for the BM talents, but these are positive changes overall.
I don’t know if this was a change in this update or a previous one (as far as I’m aware, it’s new), but Dire Frenzy has also been updated (at least the tooltip on mmo champion has) to fire a shot which causes the target to bleed and sends the Hunter’s pet into a frenzy. IIRC that was a change lifted almost directly from a suggestion you posted here, and was an extremely welcome sight.
Changing it to a “shot” is actually from the previous build, this is just a tooltip change. It’s mostly a visual adjustment to Dire Frenzy (the shot damage is pretty small). Now they need a projectile/effect of some kind for Kill Command!
I’ve seen the pointing animations and rather like them. Maybe a giant ghostly form of our pet rearing up to strike the enemy? Something along the lines of a Bear Form Druid’s attack.
Me likey Argents idea. A Kill Command to a pet shouldn’t need anything from its master than the order. Adding a visual to the pet though, would be awesome Dire Frenzy, now with its update tooltip, does make a lot of sense to have you fire and shot. It’s the smell of blood pouring that drives your pet into a frenzied state
Yeah I don’t mean an actual shot, but some kind of effect when you cast it.. like this (super fast photoshop job) http://eyesofthebeast.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/killcommandeffect.jpg
Glad to see they are at least working on BM now 🙂 Thank you for keeping us informed!
I miss my camuflouge and aspect of the Fox and my kill shot 🙁 they had the perfect thing for BM back then
“As for the 30% increase, that seems extremely low (considering that the Legion talent Blink Strikes increases this damage by 100%)”
I have seen quite a few classes that have a talent that increase dmg by a certain % haven been lowered do to the stat squish. So I’m sure this is just the same.
Blizzard need one easy spec for beginers and this is BM. In BFA BM will be low dps like was in legion(bottom AOE). All now talent change is passive and very easy (boring) to play.
Its also kinda nice for people that just want to chill out and not stress about some complicated, difficult to learn rotation.
Did they change the way leech works for hunters, or will 15% translate to around 5% effective leech (unless hunter/pets damage ration changes in BFA)? Although for pet tanking having KC heal the pet for 15% would be nice.
If animal companion obeys your kill command, that is always 200% kill comands the whole fight.
Killer insticts give 150% kill commands below 35%, so…. I dont think anyone would take killer instict or dire beast.
Second pet will do a small percentage of normal damage. This talent will mostly serve as a cosmetic choice for those who want 2 pets, along with a small dps increase that will be comparable to the other 2 choices.
Ah, that does sound better, because I really loathe the 2 pet thing. So dire beast it is 🙂
Like Hati, second pet from animal companion won’t do 100% damage of main pet
Like sae said above, the game needs certain specs to be easier than others and BM is one of them. I feel this has been true for a while now and it’s fine and it makes sense.
It’s fine because different levels of complexity between specs within their specific roles (Tank, Healer, DPS) gives players options and ensures that WoW’s class selection caters to all kinds of players. See, for example, also a Blood DK compared to a Protection Paladin or — maybe even more appropriate as they fall under the same class — a Discipline Priest compared to a Holy Priest.
And it makes sense because BM is easily the most visuals-oriented of the Hunter specs, and that’s what most new / casual players will care about. Running around with a giant gun, taming T-Rexes, lava dogs, and sparkly spirit bears / cats / gryphons / porcupines (…?) is, visually, a very cool hook for new players, making BM the logical choice as a low entry barrier for class mechanics.
I understand that this is not necessarily what more experienced players want out of BM if it’s their favorite spec but, then again, I feel most experienced players realize that, by stubbornly sticking to a single spec in a game that has 36 specs, you might be limiting yourself just a bit.
Sorry to go on a bit of a rant here, but this is something that has frustrated me about BM players in the Hunter community at large — and is something that was all too prevalent on the Hunting Party Podcast throughout Legion — this stubborn, disrespectful dismissal of Survival in particular and, to a lesser extend, MM as well.
As a “hardcore” player (or at least one serious enough to do organized raiding, write / comment on blogs and forums, and / or participate in podcasts about your class) shouldn’t it be a given that you familiarize yourself with *all* aspects of your class instead of going “lolol melee Hunter = not a real Hunter!” or “no pet = no play, sorry MM!”?
You were not among the crowd that were flat out mocking the other specs, Bendak, I’ll give you that. You were just dryly sticking to your preference, which is fine I guess, but some of your co-hosts’ behavior was very frustrating. Even after, halfway through the expansion, Delirium really got into Survival and started to represent it more on the podcast and his blog, some of the others kept up this forum troll-like behavior. IMO the Hunter community at large can use some positive examples when it comes to embracing variety and being more open to getting excited about and exploring new play styles, and the HPP, as community representatives, have a unique opportunity to be just that.
That was eye-opening. I think we’ve gotten so used to the specs being so similar for so long that a drastic change has divided what was once one of the more united wow communities. What you’re saying makes sense, and the emphasis on spec “fantasy” in legion set a terrible precedent. We had to give up far too much to flit between abilities so we went from “hunter first” to “spec first” because our artefacts felt like we had to commit to our spec as much as to our class. BfA is changing that, but we need to change our mindset to accommodate it as well. That being said BM does need some love and refinement. Things like Aspect of the Wild feel incongruous and out of place (especially considering base focus regen), but we should see it as an addition to the class as a whole rather than a single spec.
I’m not sure what about my post triggered your little rant considering I didn’t complain about the complexity of BM anywhere. In fact I was positive about both of these talent changes.
If you look at this post where I make suggestions for BM ( http://eyesofthebeast.com/2018/04/bfa-ideas-to-improve-beast-mastery-hunters-in-8-0/ ) you also won’t see me complaining about complexity. I’m mainly complaining about the lack of interesting talents, and my replacement suggestions are not more complex, just more fun and interesting (from my perspective). I do want less downtime, but that alone adding complexity to the spec is debatable (look at frost mage which has no downtime but is silly easy). I also have some issues with BM’s lack of hunter/pet synergy, but that’s not so much a gameplay complaint.
Furthermore, if you’ve been reading my BFA posts you would have seen me singing Survival’s praises throughout most of it. BFA Survival is very fun, and it has a nice set of talents. I dislike Legion Survival and I’m not going to apologize for that, or play it just because I write a blog or talk about hunters on a podcast. The moment WoW becomes a job for me is the moment I’ll lose interest.
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“shouldn’t it be a given that you familiarize yourself with *all* aspects of your class instead of going “lolol melee Hunter = not a real Hunter!” or “no pet = no play, sorry MM!”?”
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And that’s not fair at all, to me or to anyone else from the HPP. We don’t have a responsibilty to become completely neutral paragons of the Hunter class, forgoing our own opinions in the process. I am familiar with all aspects of the class. I just don’t like Legion Survival, and I like Legion MM less than BM. Simple as that. In fact I played MM quite a bit in both M+ and some AOE raid fights. I probably would have played both of those specs more if I not been locked out via artifacts and legendaries for the first half or two-thirds of the expansion. That’s one of the things I am most looking forward to in BFA, the fact that I should be able to swap between at least BM and MM with relative ease, just like it was before Legion. Survival has the weapon barrier, but that’s much less of a barrier than everything in Legion.
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“I feel most experienced players realize that, by stubbornly sticking to a single spec in a game that has 36 specs, you might be limiting yourself just a bit.”
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I play a mage as much as I play my Hunter (actually more in the last few months). But this is a Hunter blog and HPP is a Hunter podcast. Assuming we only play 1 spec out of 36 because we don’t like one of the Hunter specs is a bit of a stretch. 😛
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“Even after, halfway through the expansion, Delirium really got into Survival and started to represent it more on the podcast and his blog, some of the others kept up this forum troll-like behavior. IMO the Hunter community at large can use some positive examples when it comes to embracing variety and being more open to getting excited about and exploring new play styles, and the HPP, as community representatives, have a unique opportunity to be just that.”
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We’ll do that when its what we believe. I’ve already been doing it by speaking positively about both MM and SV changes in BFA. All I’ve done is express my disappointment in the lack of BM changes and make suggestions on how to improve it. I do not want BM to become some ultra complex spec, I just want it to be more fun and have some talent choice. If I wasn’t passionate about the class, I wouldn’t care.
As for the comment about us acting like forum trolls, if you’re referring to us making jokes about Survival’s lack of players, then I guess we’re guilty. I know there’s a few hardcore Survival players who read this blog, listen to the podcast, interact with us on twitter, etc. and I think they know we’re only joking. We love all 4 of them. They are Hunters as much as we are!
Mostly taking into account the Hunter forums are plagued with trolls who don’t play them class. You check their armories, and they barely reached lvl max; no raiding, no arenas, no m+, not even lfr in many cases, yet claimed ownership over the forums, driving away anyone who actually plays the class. This community representatives and direct feedback to gms is the only way for actual feedback from actual hunters to reach the staff
What a curious response… I’m not sure why you’d call out Bendak for enjoying a spec and playing it, apart from his view of playing a hunter being different then yours. You feel BM should be simple. You prefer a different spec. That’s fine. WoW is definitely big enough for more than one “right” way to play. It is a game, something most of us play for fun. Even those that blog about it. There’s nothing requiring all blogs to give equal time to every spec.
Really? “Serious enough to do organized raiding” (ie. time & no kids) and “comment on blogs and forums” (ie. an opinion & again, time) qualifies you as “hardcore” and eligible to tell me it is OK that the class that brought me into WoW when it launched has been stripped down to a pale imitation of it’s original self, and that I am doing the class, as a whole, a disservice by being frustrated with that? Really?
From your post I’m gathering you like the Legion Survival spec, possibly because it feels a tiny bit more complex to play. I didn’t. What you might perceive as complex I percieve as clunky, unfinished, and an odd amalgamation of other melee classes that simply wasn’t necessary (but it did create another spec that didn’t have pet pathing and survivability issues to design raid and dungeon encounters around.) From what I hear it’s getting better in BfA and I’ll give it a shot, I always give each spec a shot in new expansions, but that is not the point here. The point here is about you feeling comfortable “othering” players you disagree with and trying to sound authoritative when, in truth, it really boils down to you being butt hurt about “this stubborn, disrespectful dismissal of Survival in particular and, to a lesser extend, MM as well.” You probably meant “extent” as opposed to “extend” but hey, “hardcore” players don’t really have time to proofread, do they?
How about this? They take Survival, and dumb it down to a 3 button spec and raise BM back to where it used to be. You’d be just fine with that I’m sure, as the game needs certain specs to be easier and Survival would be one of them. It’s been that way for a while now and it’s fine and it makes sense.
The rant was a bit extreme but I get where he’s coming from. I mained MM and SV during Legion and as a more casual player, with the forums being what they are, I often look to community podcasts, blogs, etc. for my in-depth class info. I do so for all the classes I play. And the attitude towards SV in particular was kind of disheartening at times.
I agree that the HPP crew doesn’t necessarily have a responsibility to be neutral or play each Hunter spec equally, but the jokes became a bit much for my tastes, too. Just because you don’t hear from SV players a lot, that doesn’t mean we’re are not there, watching and listening [insert SV spec icon] 😉
Argent has a good point re. the artifacts and focus on spec identity causing a divide. I think the former definitely did and, as cool as those weapons were and as much as I enjoyed the collection aspect, I’ll be glad to see them go in BfA. The latter, however, was a highlight of Legion IMO. Specs feel more unique than ever and that’s great! Hunters were hit super hard though, with one of their specs turning melee and another losing its pet, so that was bound to shake up the community. Hopefully the changes BfA brings will smoothen things out a bit and bring the community closer together again.
I think Blizz would have been better off making a melee hunter a 4th spec instead of changing an existing one. Making a significant change to an existing spec is going to alienate at least a few people. Imagine if they made Affliction warlocks healers? Drain enemy health to heal allies. Could be fun and some folks would likely try it. But there would be a lot of players pissed about the changes. The WoW player base doesn’t seem to deal with change very well…
Agreed that I hope BfA brings the specs closer together. Really getting tired of the MM vs. BM vs. Survival mentality that seems to be out there right now. I really miss the old community feeling we had as hunters.
I was able to use frenzy from line of side in pvp arenas. Now I wonder how it is gonna work …
You need LOS now. You also need LOS for Kill Command unfortunately.