I play World of Warcraft. My goofy little casual guild is doing fairly well. Some coworkers and friends were in an adequate 40 man raid guild at the time BC came out and seeing the writing on the wall, as well as being tired of all the immature just-past-puberty teens in that guild, we decided to break off and go our own way. We slowly built up a truly casual raid guild from scratch and now have a solid core of adult raiders. We’re almost done with TK and are half-way through with SSC.

Not bad.

Although I had spent most of my early WoW career as horde in a hardcore PvP server raid guild, this time around I was running as alliance because my coworkers started there. After BC released I levelled an enhancement shaman to 70. I enjoy PvP quite a bit, have participated in arenas, and work into a number of premades throughout the week. I have come to the sad realization that enhancement shamans are fairly badly suited towards arena combat, unless I can get into a very low bracket where my 300+ resilience allows me enough play to actually do some good. I’m OK with that. In large group PvP I am able to kick some serious ass and that makes up for the crappy arena performance.

The only reason I mention this is that I am trying to provide sufficient background so that my arguments don’t come across as simply another whiny inexperienced rant. I have been PvPing since the honor system was released, before there were honor points… when PvP meant gigantic Tarren Mill and Crossroads fights. Then lots of WSG when that was released… and AV not long after. AB too when it finally came out… and now EoTS.

And now, the rant. Hunters always were a very powerful PvP class. I can remember the extreme frustration at being ganked by night elf hunters doing aimed shots from shadowmeld. In large group PvP only the complete morons who expose themselves to unnecessary risk and aggro suck. But, they complained to high heaven about their arena representation. It was true, hunters of all specs were underrepresented in arenas. Even though enhancement shamans are almost non-existant in arenas… there are a good number of elemental and especially resto shamans so the lack isn’t near as obvious.So, hunters received a buff. A significant buff. Huge in fact. They can now use their ranged weapons just outside of melee range, effectively cutting their “dead zone” to nothing. Honestly this was a long time coming. It’s a good change for the game. The problem I have is that Blizzard didn’t adequately consider the other talents and abilities which were designed because of that gigantic “dead zone” they used to have. Specifically their frost trap (even non-talented) and wingclip (also even non-talented) need to be re-addressed. Under the old design both of these provided the hunter a fighting chance of getting back out to bow/gun range. It was an acceptable ability given that big “dead zone” constraint.

Now however the hunters still have the most powerful slowing abilities in the game and no longer have the “dead zone” limitation. A hunter now barely needs to move before he can start shooting again… and since auto shot and most of their shot abilities (outside of aimed & steady) are instant they are completely viable on the move. What that results in is a new completely overpowered method for killing.

1. Fire for effect until distance is closed by enemy.
2. Wingclip (or rarely frost trap… I personally thin the snake trap/FD trick is much more hunter like, graceful, and bearable)
3. Move through, but only just outside of melee range.
4. Begin kiting, while moving backwards… firing auto shot and instant abilities the entire time.

That slow ability needs to be examined. It should have a much higher chance to break on damage. Hunters shouldn’t be able to auto-shot on the move. I don’t know exactly what should happen, but leaving it the same way it was when they had a “dead zone” which mitigated and made that manageable needs to be resolved.