In the arena I have a few ideas. Hunters/Warlocks have a lot in common, so I feel compelled to comment.

Pillars should be smaller and harder to hide behind. Ideally, using a pillar would have only a limited advantage. I suggest traps be placed around such objects. Something like a spike trap, or gust of wind would appropriately limit their use.

Snares are the largest detriment to hunters. As it stands a rogue, warrior, deathknight, or mage can keep a hunter wherever they want. Snares should have similar diminishing returns as other forms of CC.

Resilience is one area where developers will have to give. A large portion of the item budget on PvP gear (resilience) does not benefit pets. So while pet damage is decreased through other players' resilience, pets themselves get zero benefit from their owners resilience. This is essentially a tax on PvP gear. A novice pet and a veteran pet have little to differentiate them.

Another issue that I see from my rogues perspective, is that disengage can be used against the hunter. You can point the hunter wherever you want. You could use this to put them in a corner or to have them risk disengaging out of LoS or range of their healer. Disengage should be improved.

I have a few concerns as a non hunter. I hear a lot of arguments for magic survivability. Outside of demon warlocks, which will be rare with demonology's current problems, casters have very little to save them from hunters. If it wasn't for LoS in the arena we would not be here right now. The lack of armor is at least as detrimental as a hunters "lack of magic survivability".

Edits: for readability. Was a bullet style list before.

No problems here.

MAYBE MAYBE MAYBE we might have arena problems. I don't know how that's going to play out though, I'm still trying to get my deadly gladiator set.

One of the largest advantages that hunters had against me was keeping a pet on me to put pushback on my spells, so I'd have to kill it first. Nowadays in a slugmatch, my spells vs. his arrows or bullets, my pet on him, his pet on me, I'm coming out on top far more often than not, and I can also screw him up with fears.

Only time this isn't happening is when he has a ton of levels on me, but I'm at 74, that won't last long.

Edit: Emphisized my larger success rate against hunters. Also I should note often I can LoS and let my succubus and dots tear them up. Line of sighting hunters is still a serious problem.

I would like to know the hunter arena issues as well.

/reserve

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Q u o t e:
I would like to know the hunter arena issues as well.

/reserve

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I never Arena'd, I really dislike them, but in Battlegrounds I'd often dot and hide from a hunter, and he'd have difficulty against my succubus since my DoTs are healing her, and the girl's a lot tougher now.

Too many keybinds. Too many things to keep track of. The new pet abilities are wonderful, but I can't get to them in a reasonable time. I feel as if we're perfectly balanced *if* I could only master every single ability I had, and had the physical capability to hotkey/macro everything I could possibly use in PvP.

Simplification of the class would be wonderful. Dragonhawk was a PERFECT example. Heck, even rapidfire seems kinda useless, since I'm not going to macro it in (GCD) and have to find it on my action bars to click. Taking my eyes off the playing field == death. :-(

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Q u o t e:
One of the largest advantages that hunters had against me was keeping a pet on me to put pushback on my spells, so I'd have to kill it first. Nowadays in a slugmatch, my spells vs. his arrows or bullets, my pet on him, his pet on me, I'm coming out on top far more often than not, and I can also screw him up with fears.

Only time this isn't happening is when he has a ton of levels on me, but I'm at 74, that won't last long.

Edit: Emphisized my larger success rate against hunters. Also I should note often I can LoS and let my succubus and dots tear them up. Line of sighting hunters is still a serious problem.

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I can see LOS being a big problem for hunters, but the new arenas don't really have pillars, so who knows? Also, with BW and intimidate I just shred everyone to pieces, except 25k health tanks. So I think we have to wait till the next arena season starts up to really shed light on problems classes are having, as it is now we are all just theorycrafting.

EDITED SHORT VERSIONS ( LONG VERSION BELOW THE LINE)

In no specific order

-Class complexity/Key binds/ability bloat
-Pet GCD messing up our ability to use utility spells when needed
-Unnecessary focus costs on pet utility
-Kill shot's minimum range
-Deterrence spell mitigation
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Ok It's very hard to determine how classes will perform in S5 but I'm going to adress a few things that could potentially cause problems.

1 complexity - The hunter class is arguably the MOST complex class in the game to play and has some of the highest if not the highest key bind requirements. The difficulty comes from having to use more abilities to accomplish the same ultimate goal. Here is an example:

When defending myself with a tenacity pet -
Ok I try to los, pop deterrence, Intervene myself, RoS myself, FD that incomming cast, Silence that incomming cast, scatter that incomming cast, master's call that snare so I can los, etc.

We have A LOT of options but were limited by the GCD AND the pet GCD being able to chain multiplte abilities together fast allows you to stack defensive means to keep yourself alive and this become complex when you're balancing 2 global CDs. If my pet is on global from an intervene and I RoS the RoS won't fire. Or if my pet just used claw my aiblity X won't fire.

The best suggestion I have to "dumb down" the hunter class (at lets be honest increasing skill cap on arguably the hardest class to play isn't the best option of making the class more represented)

Dragonhawk took this idea and ran with it in regards to turning 2 binds into 1.

Mongoose Bite/Raptor strike is another set of abilities that should be merged just off the top of my head, and there are many others that can go this route with a little digging.

Basically fewer stronger abilities is > more weaker abilities even though the total benefit adds up to relatively the same amount of defense. If one class has an ability that does 50% dmg mitigation for 5 seconds and another class has 2 abilities that do 25% mitigation each having to acivated two abilities to get the same effect nets you the same gain but at the cost of 2 globals making it weaker in terms of APM.

Just from my personal experience and trying to see into the future I'm fairly satisfied with the class as a whole but I'm also extremely experience and used to using a ton of key binds, and by satisfied I mean I'm content with the current feel of the class for now with one exception. That exception is magic based FF defense which you (GC) said you guys were looking into regarding the situation (deterrence). That basically covers all our bases in regards to having something to use in differing situations. If we're still too weak during S5 more changes would be warranted.

Some things to "fix" to get hunters ready for S5.

DETERRENCE - This ability needs to have some anti magic protection. We don't want another separate ability were already extremely bloated on abilities. You said you guys were looking into it and I know you've ready my posts on the subject hopefully we can get this change if deemed reasonable in some framework for s5.

PET GCD - THIS IS A BIG ONE
Pet damage abilities need to be the only pet abilities on the GCD. The pet GCD should be used to control the pets DPS not hinder the pets use of its utility. Sometimes we have to spam an ability to try to fit it in between the pets spam dps claw for example. We shouldn't have to spam an ability to try to slip it in between pet GCDs its clucky, annoying, and well broken.
If pet utility was off the pet GCD it would help remedy this situation.

PET FOCUS - This is a lesser problem but I still feel its a problem
Focus requirements on damage abilities fine. Focus should and Is a means to control pet DPS but it should not be a means to control when we use the pet utility. This problem was addressed somewhat in regards to the end tier pet abilities not having a focus cost so they can be used on demand, but the change should also apply to things like dash/charge/intervene etc. Those abilities power is controlled by the cool down and shouldn't be affected by our pet using his auto cast damage abilities.

Hunters right now are just flat out turning off our pets damage abilities and sacrificing damage to be able to use the utility w/o having to spam the button to get an ability to fire. This is a problem. This is a problem that needs addressed. We shouldn't have to sac our pets damage to overcome a design flaw in how pet GCD interacts with the hunters need to use non damage pet abilities. If at a future time when the pet management system goes in to allow ability priorities etc this could change but for now something "quick" needs done in regards to pet gcd and focus costs to alleviate these problems for S5, and they won't have any meaningful impact on PvE dps which is a concern.

Thanks for reading.


Edit

I am going to copy/paste something I posted in another thread about autoshot on the run since it is bound to come up in here.

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Q u o t e:
First I don't think it would be the change hunters need. I think it would work out like getting rid of the dead zone did. Nice but it did not fix out problems.

This would actually complicate the hunter even more IMO. Think of how many times you have used movement to stop yourself from firing on a target that just got cc'ed or stepped in your trap. If you put autoshot on the run you would no longer have that option and would have to quickly hit the autoshot button to stop yourself. Now think about the new auto targeting that was put in and think about all the accidental pulls and stuff. If you were to do something like this I think it would be much better to give it some control. Somebody else had the idea of making steady instant cast with a 2 second CD. That sound like a better idea to me than autoshot on the run.

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Also an idea I had instead of the freezing arrow was an arrow that worked with the same targeting that you use for freezing arrow but instead of launching a freeze trap there instead it would pull your current target or whatever you had used hunters mark on to that location kinda like the DK's deathgrip but instead of pulling them to us we would be able to direct where they were pulled. This would help with LOS issues in arena as well. I am not sure if it would be to much or to little but was just an idea.

Large post INC:

Hunters in the past 4 seasons have been... Difficult. The most popular hunter setup, druid hunter was surprise! carried by the druid 99% of the time.

CURRENT HUNTER ISSUES:

We have alot of bugs:
1. Kill shot has a massive deadzone. very difficult to get off on melee classes.
2. Chim shot is not returning mana on shots where the target dies.

Major ARENA Issues:
1. Mana. Our shots have greatly increased in mana cost but our pools have no scaled with it. Im using viper alot atm, and being fisted for it.
2. Wheres our base dodge? Soon as we swap to viper its time for us to eat cds. Poorly implemented dragonhawk should simply be 10% dodge and give us our pre bc dodge back
3. Our glove bonus is beyond garbage on the arena set. Tranq shot not only costs an insane part of our mana pool, the cd is outrageous and has such a large % of failure its not even worth having on our bars.
4. Pet health is once again weak. Pets should have 100% of the hunters res and health.
5. Pet AI is horrible. Our pets are idiots that dont follow targets when needed. jumping off blades edge should NOT result in you drinking just because our pet has pathing issues. if my pet is chasing you, you should stay in combat.
6. Flare is currently a pos. 9/10 times it does NOT prevent a rogue opening on me. Flare should in addition to what it does provide friendly targets in the area of effect a buff that will not allow them to be opened on by stealth moves.
7. Mana drains and viper: What bothers me greatly are resto druids shifting out of mana drains. when i hit them with a viper, they will los in bear and actually gain mana. druids shouldnt be able to avoid an important part of arena draining due to the fact that we have to stand still to do damage and be a certain range from our targets. If we apply a sting to a target it should drain the FULL amount even if they shift. if they are in bear form and we try to viper nothing should happen thus preventing a feral nerf.

8. LOS: Huge issue for some, doesnt bother me as much but i am aware of it at times. Because of our deadzone (5 meters or less) we are often forced to move away from pillars to do damage and take the shot. in the process however we dont get the shot off due to the other player continuing to los us. a target close to the object will always have a faster rotation around it then a target further away aka the hunter.

9. Most important: WE HAVE 0 SPELL DEFENSE. Thats right, 0. FD and our TRAINABLE talents do not count. At best they only hold off death for a few seconds.

MORE INC SOON

Quite simply, it's one of the easiest classes to play in PvE but one of the hardest to master in PvP.

Hunters have a LOT of tools but you HAVE to time them and use them appropriately instead of just spam like so many other classes.

I'd have to say biggest problem is survivability. As a hunter, if I get snared I'm pretty much dead, even with disengage. It's either kite or die. As a Ret paladin or warrior I don't have any problems with hunters. They are just too easy to shut down the bulk of their damage by staying in melee range. I haven't tried with the 18% AotM or really much at all with the Disengage change but once "caught" there's very little a hunter can do to survive an onslaught. FD should wipe debuffs or something.

Isn't this sort of topic a bit premature? Hunter's obviously have a history of problems and thus are natural pessimists. Combine that with the fact that the arena season hasn't actually started and I'm left honestly questioning whether or not you can hope to get any useful feedback from this sort of thread. Don't Hunters need to . . . you know . . . actually do some arena at level 80 first?

Issues, in order of importance:

Magic damage mitigation

Pet Survivability

Too many defensive cooldowns to manage.

LoS

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Q u o t e:
Isn't this sort of topic a bit premature? Hunter's obviously have a history of problems and thus are natural pessimists. Combine that with the fact that the arena season hasn't actually started and I'm left honestly questioning whether or not you can hope to get any useful feedback from this sort of thread. Don't Hunters need to . . . you know . . . actually do some arena at level 80 first?

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That is exactly what GC has been suggesting, and many people are complaining that "it can wait" or "we've had 4 seasons of this bullcrap." I think GC merely wants these people to post all their output in this thread, rather than in 5 trillion different threads.


That being said, I personally think hunters need better CC. Maybe bring back the old traps, 15 sec CD, no arming time, out of combat to use.

Also, agree with this guy:

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Q u o t e:
Issues, in order of importance:

Magic damage mitigation

Pet Survivability

Too many defensive cooldowns to manage.

LoS

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Would just like to state that literally every baseline hunter ability is instant cast, so I don't see bring up line of sight issues as a good use of this thread, especially considering other classes that are hit much harder by the impact of pillar-humping. Hunters have a pet, as well, which is extremely useful for preventing folks from running and drinking provided it's kept alive.

On the subject of pets, I can't say that I know how they scale at 80 but in level 70 arenas they were certainly harder to kill than Warlock pets at the very least. Beast mastery makes them very difficult to kill in a heated battle. Non-BM pets are somewhat squishy, but some certainly provide more than enough utility to justify their physical weakness. Some pet types could use some ability tweaks to make them more desirable (though this has probably always been the case).

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Q u o t e:
Isn't this sort of topic a bit premature? Hunter's obviously have a history of problems and thus are natural pessimists. Combine that with the fact that the arena season hasn't actually started and I'm left honestly questioning whether or not you can hope to get any useful feedback from this sort of thread. Don't Hunters need to . . . you know . . . actually do some arena at level 80 first?

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Plops, Megatf, Levidian,, on the beta, in the beta arenas at 80.

Draw conclusions.

Oh... I also like the theory that you can fix arena representation for any class by buffing them/nerfing them against someone on the other end of the spectrum. For example, if rogues are #1 and hunters are #10... buff hunter anti-rogue abilities.