Dream Hunter Abilities: Awesome Aspects

One of the defining features of the hunter skill set is our collection of aspects, each of which covey a different bonus to our abilities. Hawk, Monkey, Cheetah, Pack, Beast, Dragonhawk, and the Wild. One a player reaches level 80 he abandons Hawk and Monkey, for Dragonhawk which combines the two. Pack replaces Cheetah in most instances as it effect the party, Beast is used predominantly while leveling pets or in world pvp, while the Wild has situational utility on high nature damage fights. Interestingly only Hawk, Monkey, Viper, and Dragonhawk are affected by the BM 11-point talent Aspect Mastery. As far as we know Viper is going away with the switch over to Focus. There is also an Aspect of the Wolf animation hidden in the game files. This leaves two unused aspect animations. Developers also discusses using aspect of the beast in interesting ways for BM hunters. Being the person I am I don't like seeing animations go unused which got me thinking on how to salvage aspect of the Viper. Which got me thinking even more.

Aspect of the Viper as a Cooldown

I know it sounds wierd but their already doing something like this with Tree of Life form. There taking a stance and making it a cooldown ability. The same could be done with Viper, but what Viper currently does is obsolete. We have no real need of increased Focus regeneration the same way we did mana. However we still have a viper ability to go off of, Viper Sting. Turn it into a PvP utiity.

Aspect of the Viper - 30 Focus - The hunter takes on the aspect of the viper, reducing damage dealt by 20% and causing auto-shots drain your targets resources. In addition your auto-shot critical hits have a chance to refresh the duration of your Viper Sting on the target. Amount drained based on weapon Speed. Lasts 6-10 seconds. 5 Minute cooldown.

The drain would be balanced as a great supplement to Viper Sting but no super over powering. While the Aspect Mastery bonus would stay the same. The 5 min cooldown would keep it from being used more than once in a PvP fight (sans Readiness) and the duration depends on what would be best for balance. Off the global cooldown it would be great to macro to Rapid Fire for a massive mana drain. And if nessecary the focus cost could be increased making it a more critical decision to use it. So it could be akin to chaining Mana Burns in cost.

Aspect of the Beast, for real.

Aspect of the Beast as the name for this ability is meh. originally it only made you untrackable, then a 10% increase to you and your pets melee attack power was added which made it great for leveling a pet, but still sorta meh. But this is a spell with a lot of potential, especailly for BM hunters. There are a few ways to do it. First is to scrap the old model and make it a whole new spell.

Aspect of the Beast - The hunter takes on the aspect of the Beast, drawing power from his/her animal companion. Deals (an additional) 1% of the damage dealt as fire, nature, frost, shadow, arcane, or bleed damage, healing to the pet, or transferring 5% threat to the hunter's pet. Effect based on pet.

For this ability default is a bleed effect for most hunter pets, or threat transfer for tenacity. Other wise the bonus matches the damage type of the hunter pet's ability. Aspect Mastery could increase the bonus to 2% on damage and 7% on threat. Depending on power it could be an additional 1% or a conversion of 1%. In this scenario A deep BM talent could grant BM hunter the Bonuses of both Dragonhawk and Beast at the same time, either by rolling them into a new aspect or just letting them both be active, like this.

One Soul - Requires 5 points in Kindred Spirits. Requires 45 points in Beast Mastery - The bond between hunter and pet is like no other, bonded as if two parts of the same soul. Because of this you are able to take on the Aspect of the Beast in addition to another aspect.

But we shouldn't waste the old Aspect of the Beast. Instead that becomes this, using that unused aspect of the Wolf animation

Apsect of the Predator -The hunter takes on the aspect of the predator, becoming untrackable and increasing the melee attack power of the hunter and the hunters pet by 10%.

But one thing about this spell is its made to be used with the incoming Camouflage ability. Aspect Master bonus for this could Increase your Critical hit chance in Aspect of the Predator while Camouflage is active. Of course the other option is to simply add the camouflage bonus to the normal aspect of the beast and combine that with the One Soul talent increasing the hunters power through Dragonhawk and increasing pet damage by 10%.

Aspect Glyphs of Awesome.

Pathfinding is cool but i always though it would be better as part of aspect master. Aspect of the Pack/Cheetah increase by 8% and increases your mounted speed by 8-10% giving us the same bonus other classes get for free. Or we could add the 8% and make the mounted bonus a Glyph.

Glyph of the Herd - Minor Glyph - Your Aspect of the Pack ability also grants 10% speed increased while mounted.

This one would be great with the new water fights and a great addtional for possible future expansions.

Glyph of the School - Minor Glyph - Your Aspect of the Pack/Cheetah also affects swim speed.

This would add great utility to Aspect of the wild.

Glyph of Changing Seasons - Major Glyph - When your struck by a magical attack the resistance bonus of your aspect of the wild changes to that type, only Fire, Frost, or Nature.