modifying abandoned hunter's branches

[Abi 113]

-ever since the new talent branches been introduced most hunter players had only one obvious choice to go for whether it was PvE ,PvP or group skirmishes and that would be    Branch “Self-propelled Artillery” not because the branch is "too good" or "superior" but rather because the other two options are so inferior or rather they offer so much less that it doesn't matter what's your playstyle have it being auto-attack focused or group damage focused the other two branches ( Skillful shooting & ancestor spirits ) aren't going to be you go to choices because they simply don't grant you the necessary kit to support that playstyle

 

-so I would like to suggest a change to those two branches to make them more interesting and actually "useful" to an extend

 

 Branch “Skillful Shooting”

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There is no hiding from the attacks of Hunters of the “Skillful Shooting” branch - they always reach the target. Even the strongest armor will be broken, because with each new attack, the Hunter hits the most vulnerable places more accurately.

 

Lesser talents

 

 Combat Stance+

Increases the effect of a skill that increases a character's physical strength by 0.5 \ 1 \ 1.5%.

 Mountain Instincts+

Increases the effect of a skill that increases a character's “Attack Speed” by 2%.

 Hunters Mark+

Increases skill effect power by 0.5%.

 Hunter's Agility+

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 0.5 \ 1 \ 1.5 sec.

 

Key class talents

 

 Sniper training

Now the skill "Hunters Mark" imposes a negative effect on the enemy only during auto-attacks, and critical auto-attacks apply two effects at once. The effect now increases the damage taken from the character's basic attacks. The maximum number of effects is 8.

 Absolute Accuracy

Decreases the "Accuracy" character’s parameter by 40%. The character's auto-attacks cannot be dodged.

 

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-this branch is clearly PvE auto-attacked focused and most of the talents here are really good and they support the idea of playing auto-attack however there are two problems with this branch

 

 Hunter's Agility+

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 0.5 \ 1 \ 1.5 sec.

 

-this talent is completely out of tone in this branch as having extra dodge duration serves nothing in PvE most mobs have a really high accuracy percentage and on top of that no one builds dodge in the first place in PvE players want to have as much damage as possible and wouldn't care about leveling up a dodge skill

-thus I want to suggest the change of this talent to something that would benefit players in PvE something like the increase of

  Poisoned Arrow + 

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 2 \ 4 \ 6 sec.

-this change would mean the increase of poison ticks to 2 more ticks which would be good addition to auto-attack damage

 

-my second problem with this branch would be the key class talent which is

 Absolute Accuracy

Decreases the "Accuracy" character’s parameter by 40%. The character's auto-attacks cannot be dodged.

 

-this talent offers absolutely nothing whatsoever to the branch most people in PvE already have a high accuracy percentage and the concept of mobs dodging attacks is non-existing across the table whether its low level or high end levels ( including people having max accuracy with light merman armor ) 

-on top of that compared to other branches whether its hunter branches or other damage classes PvE focused branches this talent makes the hunter falls behind when it comes to dealing damage

 

-thus I'm suggest for this talent to be completely reworked to have it grant extra damage for PvE and I suggest two options 

 

-1st is to give the hunter chance based on their attack strength or every 4th auto-attack to do double the damage attack against mobs ONLY ( values and numbers can differ based on balance )

 

-the 2nd option would be to make this talent increase the hunter's attack strength parameter OR increases the hunter's Critical hit damage parameter based on the hunter's current attack speed parameter ( it can be a 1 to 0.45 ratio ) meaning a hunter with 50% attack speed will gain 22.5% attack strength OR critical hit damage ( the ratio and values can differ based on balance )

 

-in my opinion I think these changes for the  Branch “Skillful Shooting” would make people more interested in trying it out and even playing it without being too broken.

 

 

 Branch “Spirit of ancestors”

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For their long-standing adherence to the traditions of the ancient ancestors of the Mountain clans, warriors are rewarded with wisdom. Hunters of the "Spirit of ancestors" branch are capable of using ritual magic that purifies their body and suppresses the will to live in their enemies.

 

Lesser talents

 

 Stunning Shot+

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 0.5 sec.

 Sapping Shot+

Increases skill power gain from character's physical damage by 3 \ 6 \ 9%.

 Arrow of Silence+

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 0.7 sec.

 Blessing of the Mountains+

Increases the effect of a skill that increases a character's “Dodge” parameter by 1 \ 2 \ 3%.

 

Key class talents

 

 Suppression

Increases the duration of all debuffs, including DOT-effects, from character skills by 25% when used on an enemy under the effect of “Arrow of Silence”.

 Self-cleaning

With a 25% chance removes 1 debuff from the character when dodging an attack, but no more than once every 4 sec.

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-this branch is a complete mess, some of the lesser talents upgrades aren't in sync with the branch idea, this branch is clearly based to be for PvP content whether its arena or group fights however it has few problems

 

 Blessing of the Mountains+

Increases the effect of a skill that increases a character's “Dodge” parameter by 1 \ 2 \ 3%.

-this talent is not useful in any way because having blessing of the mountains skilled 4/4 and hunter's agility at 1/5 is more than enough to max the hunter's dodge parameter so leveling this talent serves no purpose

 

-so I want to suggest to either increase the dodge parameter limit to 75% to give value to leveling up dodge skills or talents and also to not fall far behind against classes that has accuracy increasing skills ( most PvP classes can get near 40% accuracy from skills or party aura) or to make this talent increase the duration ( numbers and values can differ based on balance )

 Blessing of the Mountains+

Increases the duration of the skill's effect by 2 \ 3 \ 4 sec.

 

-my second problem with this branch is also the key class talent which is

 Self-cleaning

With a 25% chance removes 1 debuff from the character when dodging an attack, but no more than once every 4 sec.

 

-first of all the current meta of the game don't support dodge builds since most classes gain a lot of accuracy from skills talents or even buffs and on top of that the talent has only a 25% chance for it to work in first place making this talent has 2 conditions it you need to first dodge an attack only then it would have a 25% chance of it working making this talent extremely rare to work 

 

-so i want to suggest modifying the talent to make it more visible or active, the change would also come from increasing dodge parameter limit to make dodge build viable again OR i would also suggest to increase the chance of it working to 75% but the chance will decrease by 25% every time the talent works but no less than 25% ( 75 > 55 > 25%) and it resets back to 75% after 16 sec or if the player goes out of combat for 7.5 sec or it can be the other way around where the chance for the talent to work is increased by 20% every time the player dodge an attack but the talent don't get activated but no more than 85% ( 25 > 45 > 65 > 85% ) and the chance would reset back to 25% every time the talent do get activated ( numbers and values can differ based on balance )

 

in the end i feel like these changes can be really useful for hunter and make the other 2 branches more viable and encourage people to test them out and come out with new build or playstyles without making them too broken, and i hope any of them get implemented 

 

thank you 

 

Edited November 10, 2023 by Abi

[hiku 1]

I played left branch hunter with upgraded mark, It felt really underwhelming gameplay and for a single target. I prob dealt less dmg than middle branch hunters in PVE despite the fact I had full +10 weapon 2 mm gear light and rage with attack strength accessories.

 

Totally agreed that in hunter's branch "skillful shooting'' require major change for last talent "absolute accuracy" at this point it's probably better that you don't unlock it.

As the original poster wrote above, It would be really interesting if hunter got more parameters with attack strength/crit dmg whether it's flat % or it's based on other stats.

 

Vouch.