Season of Discovery Ranged DPS Survival Hunter

[positiv2 952]

This thread is for comments about our Season of Discovery Survival Hunter Ranged DPS guide.

[BestFurryNA 2]

On 11/10/2023 at 4:26 AM, positiv2 said:

This thread is for comments about our Season of Discovery Survival Hunter Ranged DPS guide.

EDIT: I believe the Melee Guide mistakenly links here. This is in reference to the Melee SoD Survival Hunter Guide.

Hiyo, couple of questions:

Gear and Best in Slot:

1) Going over 2h vs 1h would be nice. Would Deadly Strike of the Hydra off Aku'mai be better? What about Guardian's Trident off of Lady Sarevess? Fathomblade off of Aquanis? How would you compare them? What about other on-hit comparable Weapons? Having a ranking between them would be nice (and yes, I understand this can vary with certain racials, but at least a baseline would be nice).

 2) Why is the Epic Crossbow listed? It only gives Ranged AP. Aku'mai, in addition to that weapon, also can drop Bael Modan Blunderbuss, a Gun that gives +6 Agility. Lady Sarevess has a Bow that gives +5 Strength, which while (obviously) inferior to Aku'mai' Gun, is still going to do better for a Melee build than a Crossbow that gives 0 Melee stats

3) I feel there should be an "Honorable Mention" for Leggings of the Fang. Troll's Bane Leggings are incredible yes, but most players are not going to be able to realistically get those without insane luck, insane amounts of time farming gold, or the banable and dishonorable RMT (that should not be condoned, not saying that the Guide is of course). Instead of 14 Agility, you get 9 Agility and 5 Strength, which gives the same amount of Melee AP, at the cost of a small bit of Crit. It is inferior, but it's also still incredibly viable as a "2nd BiS" that players can more realistically attempt to obtain

Other Parts:

4) Rotation-wise, it is mentioned to "stay in Melee", however it doesn't go further than that. An explanation on whether or not Ranged-Weaving (going out to quickly Serpent Sting when you don't get a Flanking Strike reset and when Raptor Strike is on CD) is a DPS loss, neutral, or gain would be nice. 

5) It would also be nice to mention that Carve does not affect the Melee Swing Timer (to my knowledge; please dispute this if it does and I am incorrect)

6) Because Flanking Strike makes you and your pet both attack with a melee, it's worth it to use a slower attacking pet. Pets have been normalized to have the same DPS as each other (as in, all Cats, all Crabs, all Wind Serpents, etc, assuming equal Skill Ranks), even with varying Attack Speeds. What this means is that while faster AS is preferred in PvP (same DPS but more Spell Pushback), a slower AS would be preferred for Melee/Survival Hunter pet as it means that they have more base damage to compensate, meaning more Flanking Strike damage. A brief mention of certain pets (obviously not all) that might stand out, might be useful, or a reference to a site/place that would have such knowledge. 

7) Similarly,  mentioning in gearing that a slower weapon with more base damage can be preferential, and that weapon DPS is only part of the equation. Carve does 50% weapon damage, Flanking does 100%, so having a higher flat damage, slower weapon, is preferential to a fast attacking weapon. Since we don't start with BiS gear, having that knowledge can be very useful while obtaining more. 

8 ) Under Talents/Runes/etc, it suggests that "eventually Lone Wolf might overtake". ... If, and only if, we don't take Flanking Strike. What...

9) A brief mention of pet families would be beneficial as well. Scorpions are nice but only one can be used on a boss/mob, so if you have two Hunters you have to pick another pet (if you want to be optimal). Wind Serpents are generally seen as second best due to Lightning Breath, however, what about Wolves that add damage to the Hunter's and their Party's next Physical Attack? What about mentioning pets that just have two Focus Dumps (Cats for instance)? It doesn't have to be super in-depth as there's other resources for this, but at least a brief overview so that people can make more informed decisions would be nice. "Hey I can use a Scorpion for top dps, a Wind Serpent if contested, a Wolf in a melee-heavy group to buff us all, or if I just want a pet that looks really neat, maybe I should pick one of the families with two Focus dumps, and maybe one that has a slower Attack Speed to work with Flanking Strike better," would be a nice inclusion.

Thank you for your time ♥
 

Edited December 10, 2023 by BestFurryNA

[Impakt 25]

On 12/10/2023 at 12:13 AM, BestFurryNA said:

EDIT: I believe the Melee Guide mistakenly links here. This is in reference to the Melee SoD Survival Hunter Guide.

Hiyo, couple of questions:

Gear and Best in Slot:

1) Going over 2h vs 1h would be nice. Would Deadly Strike of the Hydra off Aku'mai be better? What about Guardian's Trident off of Lady Sarevess? Fathomblade off of Aquanis? How would you compare them? What about other on-hit comparable Weapons? Having a ranking between them would be nice (and yes, I understand this can vary with certain racials, but at least a baseline would be nice).

 2) Why is the Epic Crossbow listed? It only gives Ranged AP. Aku'mai, in addition to that weapon, also can drop Bael Modan Blunderbuss, a Gun that gives +6 Agility. Lady Sarevess has a Bow that gives +5 Strength, which while (obviously) inferior to Aku'mai' Gun, is still going to do better for a Melee build than a Crossbow that gives 0 Melee stats

3) I feel there should be an "Honorable Mention" for Leggings of the Fang. Troll's Bane Leggings are incredible yes, but most players are not going to be able to realistically get those without insane luck, insane amounts of time farming gold, or the banable and dishonorable RMT (that should not be condoned, not saying that the Guide is of course). Instead of 14 Agility, you get 9 Agility and 5 Strength, which gives the same amount of Melee AP, at the cost of a small bit of Crit. It is inferior, but it's also still incredibly viable as a "2nd BiS" that players can more realistically attempt to obtain

Other Parts:

4) Rotation-wise, it is mentioned to "stay in Melee", however it doesn't go further than that. An explanation on whether or not Ranged-Weaving (going out to quickly Serpent Sting when you don't get a Flanking Strike reset and when Raptor Strike is on CD) is a DPS loss, neutral, or gain would be nice. 

5) It would also be nice to mention that Carve does not affect the Melee Swing Timer (to my knowledge; please dispute this if it does and I am incorrect)

6) Because Flanking Strike makes you and your pet both attack with a melee, it's worth it to use a slower attacking pet. Pets have been normalized to have the same DPS as each other (as in, all Cats, all Crabs, all Wind Serpents, etc, assuming equal Skill Ranks), even with varying Attack Speeds. What this means is that while faster AS is preferred in PvP (same DPS but more Spell Pushback), a slower AS would be preferred for Melee/Survival Hunter pet as it means that they have more base damage to compensate, meaning more Flanking Strike damage. A brief mention of certain pets (obviously not all) that might stand out, might be useful, or a reference to a site/place that would have such knowledge. 

7) Similarly,  mentioning in gearing that a slower weapon with more base damage can be preferential, and that weapon DPS is only part of the equation. Carve does 50% weapon damage, Flanking does 100%, so having a higher flat damage, slower weapon, is preferential to a fast attacking weapon. Since we don't start with BiS gear, having that knowledge can be very useful while obtaining more. 

8 ) Under Talents/Runes/etc, it suggests that "eventually Lone Wolf might overtake". ... If, and only if, we don't take Flanking Strike. What...

9) A brief mention of pet families would be beneficial as well. Scorpions are nice but only one can be used on a boss/mob, so if you have two Hunters you have to pick another pet (if you want to be optimal). Wind Serpents are generally seen as second best due to Lightning Breath, however, what about Wolves that add damage to the Hunter's and their Party's next Physical Attack? What about mentioning pets that just have two Focus Dumps (Cats for instance)? It doesn't have to be super in-depth as there's other resources for this, but at least a brief overview so that people can make more informed decisions would be nice. "Hey I can use a Scorpion for top dps, a Wind Serpent if contested, a Wolf in a melee-heavy group to buff us all, or if I just want a pet that looks really neat, maybe I should pick one of the families with two Focus dumps, and maybe one that has a slower Attack Speed to work with Flanking Strike better," would be a nice inclusion.

Thank you for your time ♥
 

Hi, thanks for leaving such detailed questions! I'll go through these point by point.

1. Ultimately, what I listed is just the "BiS" setup if you're wanting to maximize consistent melee damage. 2H melee weapons work better if you're wanting to do more of a melee-weaving style of play since you want single larger, more spaced out hits on a longer swing timer. This melee-hunter guide is ultimately written assuming that you're wanting to be a "melee" hunter, meaning that's what we're trying to maximize. You can absolutely use the other 2H and 1H weapons from BFD (or whatever you get to drop that has comparable weapon DPS) and you'll be fine, what I listed are "BiS" mostly because of their on-hit effects combined with high damage.

2. Yeah, I went back and forth on this and probably betrayed my own philosophy here. The +6 agility bow is your BiS ranged weapon for a pure melee style, you're correct. However, if you want to do ANY ranged weaving at all, this crossbow is better. I think I'll update the BiS list here since I should keep it consistent.

3. You're correct, Leggings of the Fang is the more realistic BiS for 99% of players.

4. The problem here is that there are two play styles that are fundamentally at odds with each other. If you want to be a melee hunter but then want to talk about ranged weaving, there is not jumping off point. Ranged auto attacks will do more damage. Ranged shots like serpent sting aren't particularly strong, but Aimed Shot and Multi-Shot are. If you start looking for places to ranged weave for optimal damage, you very quickly realize that the optimal strategy is to just be a ranged Hunter who sometimes melee weaves. That's totally fine, but if that's your goal then you should check out the other ranged Hunter guides. 

Melee weaving as a ranged Hunter works because of the long swing timers between auto shots, combined with using a 2H weapon for maximum melee damage in those intervals. It just does not work the same way with fast 1H weapons.

5. I think you're correct, but both Flanking Strike and Raptor Strike do, meaning it doesn't have any fundamental difference to your gameplay.

6. This is correct if pets were perfectly normalized, but they're not. Season of Discovery massively changed how pet scaling works. Currently Scorpids are just the best by far due to insane AP scaling on their poison ability, but Wind Serpents have also been exceptional choices. Differences in Auto-Attack pet damage mean very little compared to the differences in their core ability damage. However, pets were massively rebalanced literally last night, so we need to see how they shape out before giving new recommendations.

7. Flanking was changed to work on your next melee swing. The additional weapon damage for carve is correct, but the extra on-hit effects mean more for your overall damage (and single target) compared to the additional carve damage. That being said, strong 2H weapons are absolutely a great choice pre-bis.

8. Flanking strike was pretty weak until they just changed it yesterday. Right now pet damage is high, but pet damage (without the new SoD scaling) would have faded into VERY minimal amounts later on at 60. It would have been perfectly reasonable for a 15% multiplier to be stronger than both a pet + flanking strike at 60.

9. I'll add some more information about pets soon, there are just a rebalance last night so we need to see how it shapes out. The tl;dr is that Scorpions > Wind Serpents > Cats previously. The wolf added damage bonus is negligible. Pet's new AP scaling was just very high, and it turns out it was massively higher than intended for pet AP damage (scorpion poison and lightning breath).

Thanks again for all the great questions, let us know if you have more!

[BestFurryNA 2]

7 hours ago, Impakt said:

Hi, thanks for leaving such detailed questions! I'll go through these point by point.

1. Ultimately, what I listed is just the "BiS" setup if you're wanting to maximize consistent melee damage. 2H melee weapons work better if you're wanting to do more of a melee-weaving style of play since you want single larger, more spaced out hits on a longer swing timer. This melee-hunter guide is ultimately written assuming that you're wanting to be a "melee" hunter, meaning that's what we're trying to maximize. You can absolutely use the other 2H and 1H weapons from BFD (or whatever you get to drop that has comparable weapon DPS) and you'll be fine, what I listed are "BiS" mostly because of their on-hit effects combined with high damage.

2. Yeah, I went back and forth on this and probably betrayed my own philosophy here. The +6 agility bow is your BiS ranged weapon for a pure melee style, you're correct. However, if you want to do ANY ranged weaving at all, this crossbow is better. I think I'll update the BiS list here since I should keep it consistent.

3. You're correct, Leggings of the Fang is the more realistic BiS for 99% of players.

4. The problem here is that there are two play styles that are fundamentally at odds with each other. If you want to be a melee hunter but then want to talk about ranged weaving, there is not jumping off point. Ranged auto attacks will do more damage. Ranged shots like serpent sting aren't particularly strong, but Aimed Shot and Multi-Shot are. If you start looking for places to ranged weave for optimal damage, you very quickly realize that the optimal strategy is to just be a ranged Hunter who sometimes melee weaves. That's totally fine, but if that's your goal then you should check out the other ranged Hunter guides. 

Melee weaving as a ranged Hunter works because of the long swing timers between auto shots, combined with using a 2H weapon for maximum melee damage in those intervals. It just does not work the same way with fast 1H weapons.

5. I think you're correct, but both Flanking Strike and Raptor Strike do, meaning it doesn't have any fundamental difference to your gameplay.

6. This is correct if pets were perfectly normalized, but they're not. Season of Discovery massively changed how pet scaling works. Currently Scorpids are just the best by far due to insane AP scaling on their poison ability, but Wind Serpents have also been exceptional choices. Differences in Auto-Attack pet damage mean very little compared to the differences in their core ability damage. However, pets were massively rebalanced literally last night, so we need to see how they shape out before giving new recommendations.

7. Flanking was changed to work on your next melee swing. The additional weapon damage for carve is correct, but the extra on-hit effects mean more for your overall damage (and single target) compared to the additional carve damage. That being said, strong 2H weapons are absolutely a great choice pre-bis.

8. Flanking strike was pretty weak until they just changed it yesterday. Right now pet damage is high, but pet damage (without the new SoD scaling) would have faded into VERY minimal amounts later on at 60. It would have been perfectly reasonable for a 15% multiplier to be stronger than both a pet + flanking strike at 60.

9. I'll add some more information about pets soon, there are just a rebalance last night so we need to see how it shapes out. The tl;dr is that Scorpions > Wind Serpents > Cats previously. The wolf added damage bonus is negligible. Pet's new AP scaling was just very high, and it turns out it was massively higher than intended for pet AP damage (scorpion poison and lightning breath).

Thanks again for all the great questions, let us know if you have more!

I appreciate all of this; just wanted to say thank you for you going through my comments/questions and your time. Looking forward to all the updates with the new additional info!