The Current State of Hunters

[makarios68]

I am dismayed at the current state of the hunter class. I know of several people who have quit the class before the latest update, and this update has made the class even worse.

Evasion is totally broken (I've tested it). Hunters previously relied heavily on it, but since it was removed there has been nothing to replace it. Without evasion, or something in its place to help keep us alive, hunters die far too easily.

Hunters also have weak defence, and this is another reason we die too easily.

Despite some attempts by NGD to improve hunter attack power (head of the pack, the new camo attack bonus) hunters remain weak in attack. Weak defence and weak attack = weak class.

The new pet commands are a nice idea but they need to be fixed ASAP. The most commonly used command "assist" switches itself off unexpectedly. Usually, the first you know about this is in the middle of a fight when your pet doesn't attack the target. The commands also get obscured by the chat log in some resolution modes, including the one i use.

Pets now don't keep up with their owner. We now frequently get a message that the pet is falling behind, which means that we have to stop or slow down for them to catch up. This effectively means that the fastest class in the game has now become the slowest because we are forever waiting for the pet to catch up. With all the weaknesses of the hunter class, speed was one of the things that helped us stay alive. But now we lose half of our attack when we maintain speed, because we lose our pet.

I realise that other classes have problems that need to be ironed out. But as things are i believe that hunter is the underclass of the game.

[-Edge-]

First off I will say right off the back im not grinding my hunter anymore because there are alot of problems with my pet. These past days ive been out into war (which I enjoyed) Evasion has sucked for awhile, I never used it, because imho the only decent spell is Acrobatic, but what is the point of leveling a tree only for one spell?

I play now in supportive, hunting with friends is currently the only thing I can still do (petless of course, if I go with a pet I get my screen spammed with messages)

However I disagree with you Wudy when you say hunters are weak, the problem to me isn't that they are weak, other classes simply deduce their damage too much. Tricks is still an amazing category, especially for annoying your target with lots of negative effects. Recently I tried a setup with the 2 passives for Concentration on 4, and using point shot. Obvious results are alot of critical hits, in the case of Hunters NGD is doing something wrong, they nerf classes instead of making others stronger, which is the wrong approach to balance imo. Because both classes fail then.

Its hard for me to say anything on this topic, but I am tired of seeing updates on Hunters. These updates for the past year have done nothing as you can see besides either making hunters immortal or by making them utterly weak. Its time for a different approach. Imo the whole evasion tree fails, it needs real defensive spells, how about Strength actually useful for archers? Giving Constitution more value? And for the record Hunter armor is like tissue paper.

[Mellion]

Wudy's post reflects my opinion a 100%.

The hunter after 1.0.5 + pet setup is broken as evasion was broken before.

I can't even see the pet commands, because I see only a white box without content.

While I am fighting my pet stands around doing nothing.
When I am moving my pet dies.

[UmarilsStillHere]

Twice since the update I have faught a hunter (one in wz one in the arena) one on one, each time the pet was behaveing eraticaly at some point in the fight,

No boubt my new setup/armour plays a part but the adverage hunter hit on me with a normal lvl 50 bow is in the low 200's with out me or the hunter buffed on my barb, On my knight with deflect projectiles and caution I can near as ignore most hunter normals.

Hunters do also have pretty low defence, no one ill argue that they dont I wouldent think.

A hunter in my eyes is still a sneaking class that should mostly be takieng out targets that are allready on low hp, or that the hunter has a good lvl advantage over, as well as the element of suprise. Speed should be "fixed" camo should work as expected and I think atk should be increased slightly, I wouldent like a hunter to be able to take on say a barb or knight in a one on one situation without the element of suprise or waiting for the taerget to be "vulnurable" if that happened it would take a lot of the thaught out of hunters and encourage more to forsake stelth and create a brawler setup

[makarios68]

Originally Posted by 210paul

I wouldent like a hunter to be able to take on say a barb or knight in a one on one situation without the element of suprise

I agree with this. Hunters should only be able to kill a full hp, same lvl opponent with the use of surprise. But to do this properly i believe we need the following:

- Pets that don't fall behind and die.
- Pets controls that work properly.
- A better out-of-camo attack bonus: one that works for skills and not just normal hit.
- Better defence: something along the lines of stragegic position.

Implementing all of these wouldn't overpower hunters; it would merely bring them up to speed with other classes.

(I was going to suggest having pets with skills, but that may tip the balance too much in favour of the hunter )

[-Edge-]

Originally Posted by makarios68

(I was going to suggest having pets with skills, but that may tip the balance too much in favour of the hunter )

Well if you noticed in the HUD the pets have a mana bar and an experience bar too. *hint hint*

[Angelwinged_Devil]

Originally Posted by makarios68

(I was going to suggest having pets with skills, but that may tip the balance too much in favour of the hunter )

good that someone knows how it would tip the favor too much

Originally Posted by edge

NGD is doing something wrong, they nerf classes instead of making others stronger, which is the wrong approach to balance imo. Because both classes fail then.

the right approach to balance is not to make everyone stronger all the time because then battles would last no time at all
the right balance is not to nerf all the time either because then no one would be able to hit 50 within the following year.

The right approach is to chose some sort of point in which class is pretty well balance and then nerf/make the others stronger so they fit the strength of this particular class.

But it's hard considering the possible number of setups you can use against each other and thinking that each class has their possible roles to play in war.

[_dracus_]

I kinda agree on the matter. Hunters to me are the guerrilla warfare class. Moving fast, ambushing, and letting their pet finish the work. It's generally what you do in group fights. However now you have to watch for your distance to your pet, well sorry It's not possible.

Hunters have weak defense, don't know if it's ok or not but it pushs them to be exclusively played as guerrilla class. However I totally disagree with improving defense of hunters by making evasion tree better (it's shared with marksman).

[Seher]

Originally Posted by Edge

First off I will say right off the back im not grinding my hunter anymore because there are alot of problems with my pet. These past days ive been out into war (which I enjoyed) Evasion has sucked for awhile, I never used it, because imho the only decent spell is Acrobatic, but what is the point of leveling a tree only for one spell?

try evasive tactics I level that tree only for these 2 spells (19), and I'm happy with it.


Hunters work pretty well, there's only one thing I don't understand: Marksman is the offensive discipline, and has got a better defence than hunters?

Move that odd defence spell of marks to scouting, someone who's scouting needs more defence


Another idea would be to make the marks be the defensive discipline, and hunters the offensive, the main thing is that there's one defensive and one offensive subclass.

[-Edge-]

Originally Posted by Seher

Move that odd defence spell of marks to scouting, someone who's scouting needs more defence

Of course, but then what would we lose in Scouting? There is of course the epic (overpowered) spell known as Track Monster, so of course we won't move that. Hmmm, guess we'll need a useless spell.