3.1 Info IncomingFollow

1. Is ammo SERIOUSLY that big of a problem? (On a side note: /2 WTB 20 slot bag, PST!)

2. Cool. Wonder if they'll only be accessible by BM Hunters, or if other Hunters can still use them.

3. Seems nice, I wonder if the passive bonus will make SV Hunters want to max it out. Assuming it restores back mana to the Hunter, I don't see the bonus being all that gamebreaking.

4. Looks like a tremendous buff to MM. I wonder if they'll stack. (IE: You can have a bleed from Chimera, Aimed, and Steady Shot up all at the same time. Or even multiple Steadies!?)

5. This sounds really nice. From what I'm thinking, you'll want to fire off an ES, run in and drop a trap, run back out, wait 6 seconds, and then fire off your LnL shots. (IE: You WANT to have ES on cooldown when LnL procs)

6.I've honestly liked how they integrated traps into PvE DPS. Before, traps were next to useless. Sure, you'd sometimes trap a stray add, but other than that, useless! I liked how Blizzard kind made SV the "up close and personal" spec for Hunters.

All in all, these changes seem pretty cool!

Edit: Might want to put your source. I've double checked it, but had there been a source I wouldn't have had to!

Edited, Feb 6th 2009 12:09am by Zeromatter

~50g worth of crafted ammo shot per night of Naxx.
That's 50g more than other classes have to spend, so yeah it's not balanced.

As for the rest, yay!
Although sniper training still looks kind of lame it's miles ahead of what it is now :)

Now that we wont have to equip a quiver to hold ammo i wonder where our 15% haste will come from maybe they will just add it to the ammo itself.

Sniper training will be able to be combined with trap dancing now. I probably still won't bother though.

This sounds like we're really really close to having three viable specs. I want to play them all. wtb dual spec imo.

Edited, Feb 6th 2009 10:38am by Xsarus

I haven't had a chance to check this post out yet, but it is interesting that they only mention a buff to the 51 point talent. I thought at some point they were going to address the other issues with BM and maybe re-look at kindrid spirits and such. Hopefully they will decide to do so again with this patch, unless they do something dramatic to the pet trees I can't see it increasing BM to a point to become on par with MM or SV.

It is interesting that Blizzard has seemed to wash out the talent trees to a point where to do raid-type DPS you need to fully spec into one. The days of the old hybrid seem to be gone (but hopefully the duo-spec will hit soon).

The change to the sniper training mechanics seem just.. wrong. At least give it another name. AFAIK a sniper isn't someone ~5 yds away standing still blasting your butt full of arrows. Now there is NO reason to NOT trapdance- take away AP from Explosive, but still buff it's mechanics... hrm.

You have to balance realism with actual use though, and the fact that we miss out on buffs made the talent meh at best. A point for realism is that a huge part of snipers in reality is a very steady place to shoot from, and so not moving really makes sense. Sure the distance isn't there, but to be honest, we never achieve sniper distance in this game anyway.

A trained sniper is as deadly at 100 yards as he is at 2000. The steady aim is the important part, as someone else said, so in my opinion this change makes it 'more real' than it was before.

True.. you will probably only get a shot or 2 benefit from this each time.. if at all

If I want reality, I'll play reality. I want WoW.

Ammo in instances...I would use vendor ammo on trash mobs, and better ammo (either rep items or player-made) on bosses. I don't mind the cost of ammo. There are certain classes which cost more to have gear, and that is the result of choosing that class.

However, it's true, freeing up that 18-20 slot bag would be nice for loot.

At the same time, if it's done even a little differently, it could also mean that hunters can now have relic items.

Here are the blue posts regarding ammo and bags.

http://blue.mmo-champion.com/3/14990912861-hunter-ammo-changes.html

Sounds like they haven't quite figured that out as there hasn't been an update on this subject since that announcement.