FFXIV is in a Prime Position to Make Some Drastic Changes

[RiceisNice]

That said, while I don't remember hunter very well as it was a long time ago, I remember most classes had very very different feels depending on your main tree--and often fulfilled completely different party rolls (like shadow priests being DPS). So picking a marksman hunter was basically like playing a different, but related, class, compared to Beastmaster/Survival. And that's completely understandable.

However, I have to ask, did you pick your talents in the marksman tree based on which would be most effective?

My point was in regards to picking the specialization and the talents in general (which means I'm referring to playing a hunter post-cataclysm expansion, where they had already done away with the old talent trees). Even I agree that something like their pre-catacylsm talent trees were a bit outdated, because everyone always went for the same build. However, you still had some horizontal character progression and choices in the form of specializations (cataclysm and onward), and somewhat more limited in the talents themselves (which have undergone tremendous change) and glyph.

Had I played a hunter during WoD release, I would have taken something like exotic munitions to add as secondary effect to my ranged auto attacks. On the other hand, I believe that lone wolf was a better dps increase for marksman hunter, since EA didn't benefit from their mastery.

Also, for the record, when I played a WoW hunter last (aaaaaages ago, around the release of BC I think? Maybe?), a Marksman/survival hybrid was best if I remember right.

Like right here, we probably have two completely different perspectives. As I mentioned above, I was playing a marksman hunter during MoP, at that point they had done away with talent trees and specializations were more-or-less a "job route" for each class. Marksman has always been behind BM and SV as far as dps was concerned, but I still prefered using physical shots as my source of damage. Not enough of a difference to prevent htem from being able to clear the top tier content, mind you, just comparatively lower.

They've done away with a lot of fluff and pointless numbers (like 0/5 rank talents that give % damage increase), but still give some resembelence of horizontal progression. Sure there's going to be some that's better for the extra 2-5% dps, but I could always mess around with my talent points if I wanted to change my pacing for a dungeon, raid or dailies. I can't necessarily say that I have the same luxury on FFXIV when it comes to raiding due to gear being job specific...and the fact that my role is the "support dps" of MCH/BRD, the two having gameplay that's been homogenized as hell.