Shots on the Chopping Block?

A few days ago @Celestalon tweeted a simple question while he was waiting for his lunch. Name an ability you love, but are afraid will be cut? I should’ve replied by asking him what he was having for lunch. My guess is a sausage sandwich, with peppers. It must have peppers. Oh, and onions too. Grilled.

Alas, instead I told him that I feared Concussive Shot could be on the block. Here’s the thing about solving the button bloat problem, you have to get rid of something that people actually use. An ability that just lives in the spell book, is used infrequently, or not at all in combat, isn’t contributing to the issue.

Out of all of the utility shots that Hunters have, Concussive Shot is probably the one I use more than any other, and I don’t mean for PvP. I’m talking PvE. Kiting things is a signature skill of Hunters, and Concussive Shot is the key to our being able to do that successfully.

For instance, Degu, Hutia, and Gumi are taming challenges that that rely on Concussive Shot, because the beasts need to be kited. It’s utility goes way beyond taming sub-standard spirit beasts though.

The Siege of Orgrimmar is rife with opportunities to utilize Concussive Shot. Slowing the Assassins on General Nazgrim, the oozes on the Dark Shaman, the blobs on Imerseus, and crawler mines on Siegecrafter are just a few instances where I pop Concussive Shot. Remember Frostheim pet tanking Rotface and kiting the slimes in ICC? I’m pretty sure Concussive Shot was key in that history making event.

As you see this is an extremely useful, Hunter defining ability. So why worry about it going away? Well, as The Grumpy Elf pointed out in this post, and as I alluded to in my tweet, Concussive Shot has had a storied history and there have been attempts to remove it. I felt it necessary to remind @Celestalon that they’d gone down this path before, and it wasn’t a good journey.

Just because Blizzard saw the light and brought Concussive Shot back, doesn’t mean what they didn’t like about it doesn’t exist, and it doesn’t mean they won’t take another crack at solving that problem.

My gut says Concussive Shot is safe, but other abilities are likely on the chopping block. I’ll have more thoughts on that down the road, but for now, as I wait for my next batch of Darkbrew Lager to finish brewing, what Hunter ability do you love that you think Blizzard will cut due to button bloat?

The floor is yours.

10 Comments on “Shots on the Chopping Block?”

  1. Honestly? Get rid of Steady Shot. Amend rotations to compensate. Nobody would be any the worse off and we lose one thing to do.

    I can also see them removing Serpent Sting altogether and combining it with Arcane so that the one shot has different abilities depending on your spec.

    /sits back and waits to be flame grilled 😀

    1. I’m right with you on doing something with Serpent Sting. I’m not sure they’ll get rid of steady/cobra shot. In fact I was thinking that maybe Steady/Cobra would apply Serpent Sting on the target.

  2. Any ideas of what shots we could do without? Which ones SHOULD be scared to get the chop, and ones we can say good riddance to?

    1. As was discussed above, I think Serpent Sting could be taken away and/or made into a passive feature. Another ability that I think could be on the chopping block is Rapid Fire. This too could be made a proc of some kind.

    1. I did read that. I guess you know my thoughts on Concussive Shot. Camo is one that could go, but honestly, it looks cool, and doesn’t get in the way of things. If it’s gone it doesn’t free up any of the bloat.

      Same thing with Aspects, which I think will be removed. Doesn’t save us from hitting buttons. Traps are another one to watch. It would seem weird not to have them in the tool kit, because they are very unique to Hunters, but I could see them go.

      1. Good points. I guess for me (maybe because I’m survival) I don’t feel like our rotation is bloated. But the total number of abilities we have could be really overwhelming for a new 90 hunter, so I looked for things to trim overall. I know my screen is crammed with abilities, aspects, and traps. I don’t think I should need so many modifiers with a full size keyboard to map most of my abilities.
        I hear you on SS. Stings were cool back when we used a variety of them-just like Aspects. But traps? Say it ain’t so! Traps are a hunter signature and I’d be bummed to see them go. It will be a strange future if hunters don’t have traps and a third aren’t even using a pet (Lone Wolf talent). I actually see traps as an opportunity to differentiate spcs a little more as the devs have said they want to do.
        Thanks a lot for reading that post!

  3. And sorry for the late replies everyone. My office is now blocking my blog so I can’t check on day I’m in the office 🙂

  4. Greetings! I came across this website on Facebook.
    I am making this comment to find out which theme you are using on your page, I would like
    to use the theme that you are using so I can put it on
    my website (gta 5 cheats ps3).

    Thanks!

  5. Gaz,What you describe is toltlay normal behavior. Games are destined to be boring, even big games with many avenues. Given enough time, you will tread them all. I’ve been experiencing the same kind of thing for years, and recently it’s gotten much, much worse. Right now I’m splitting my time between six games that I play for a few hours each week instead of one game I play a lot. I play at least 1 game a day on Magic the Gathering Online, win at least 1 BG on my rogue in WoW, rotate my duty officer missions on Star Trek Online, rotate my crew missions on Star Wars, play Skyrim for an hour now and then, and play a few turns of Civ from day to day. I’ve developed game attention deficient disorder.I think it comes from playing so much for so long. With nothing really new available, we get tired of the same transposed games that can’t keep our attention, so we dabble.Your second question I think comes down to Participation Bandwidth, a term I picked up from McGonigal’s Reality is Broken. Essentially, there is a finite amount of time, energy, and money people will invest in game activities, and with more and more games, each one starves a little more. Eventually, one might appear that’s powerful enough to consolidate a lot of those resources in one place (like WoW did), but it becomes harder and harder the more options players have. End game may be flawed, but more so the entire concept of MMOs. How many worlds can you split your time between while still being engaged? Sincerely,StubbornStubborn recently posted..

Comments are closed.