On another note, I find it hard to dislike a career as a whole in this game, be that before or after WoM, mostly I find it’s certain talents that need addressing. My thoughts on Slayer I gave above.
Although! I almost forgot! Slayer should really have Crunch! back, either as a 2nd part of another talent (eg the gimmicky 150% damage while airborne during leap one) or its own talent again (I guess to replace the gimmicky one).
On Merc the only one I can criticise is the ult talent where you lose THP in exchange for CDR. It’s not worth it when you can have a WHC with 40% CDR and an ult that not only staggers (or should in theory, bugs notwithstanding) but also gives everyone much higher crit chance. Either give it THP back (but maybe half the amount per ult or so) or change it into a talent more like the other two, which provide either utility or another boon. Oh, also Helborg’s Tutelage has negative synergy with his passive +5% crit!
On WS my biggest complaint is now that ammo on health regen is gone it feels like you’re pushed toward taking ult CDR in that tier (as health regen is pretty meh since a long time after it got nerfed ages back and the two regen-oriented talents in that tier aren’t that great, maybe if they were merged and health regen got you to full again it’d be a good choice?), ult CD in the next tier and then ammo back on ult. Also Ricochet while a new mechanic feels a bit too gimmicky with how it interacts with terrain and the fact you don’t really want to miss anyway. Maybe if it also made your arrows cleave one more target on direct hits (for the non-hagbane bows) it’d be worth considering.
On Shade my main complaint is HM can now run +25% AS at all times with properties and the AS on dodge talent, 45% Crit Chance during ult if you take the third ult talent AND is way more survivable than Shade (can take increased HP from 150 to 180 or 30% BCR, which when paired with 30% BCR on necklace turns eg the glaive from a 2 stamina weapon into effectively a 5 stamina one). Also the HM talent that lets you dodge through enemies would make so much sense and be so perfect on Shade too!
Shade’s 2nd highest tier gives you a choice of DR on crit, MS on crit or flat MS. I don’t like how there are two MS talents in one tier, one or the other should really be replaced with something else.
Shade’s CDR talent for the ult also feels like a loss, much like Merc’s one. Why take it if you lose the damage boost? I’d rather see a return of the not breaking stealth while firing one or something new if FS don’t want her to overlap with Huntsman/RV in that regard.
On RV my main complaint is that bomb drop/potion drop got merged and bomb drop got replaced with basically a weaker, more selfish, more lazy version of Grungni’s Cunning. Either replace Share and Share Alike with something unique/interesting, eg a talent that makes Ingenious Improvisation (RV’s 10% chance not to consume an item on use) become a partywide boon, or split up bomb drop/pot drop again but reduce the chance on bomb drop to make the other two more competitive.
WHC is great but the talent that gives his witch hunt tag passive 5% more damage is underwhelming. Most of all I’d love the THP on taggable enemy kill back, but if FS won’t do that why not introduce another talent that benefits the whole party? Either bring back the 5% AS for all party members on tag or perhaps make it tagged enemies are more vulnerable to CC. Something like that.
Oh! I almost forgot: On BH ammo based on clip size, on top of being useless on most weapons, has another major drawback vs 20% more damage against enemies you crit: the talent that gives you 20% more damage to enemies you crit also applies to the crit itself, and as it’s 20% more total damage not 20% more crit damage it’s flat out better (especially on weapons with low clip sizes for which power based on clip size is obviously useless).
Which reminds me, both BH and RV didn’t lose their stupid +25% power when out of ammo talents. On BH this is especially egregious as he now has a talent that gives him back 30% ammo on elite/special kill when he’s out, but on RV too if played properly the class never runs out of ammunition. Yes, I know it works well for throwing axes as you can toss the last axe, get the power, then return them when needed, but I don’t think the playstyle these two talents encourage is a good one - it encourages players to actively gimp themselves by being wasteful with ammo (this is not a problem on the throwing axes) and potentially not have ammo on hand when it’s needed (this is a problem on all ranged weapons, inc. throwing axes). If you want lots of melee damage like that play IB with the new talents (power based on proximity, power on ult), Slayer (at least 30% power from trophy hunter), WHC (OHKO on crit HS, crit chance on ult) or Zealot (6 Fiery Faith stacks), they all lose nothing of their kit/passives while letting you keep your ammo ready for when/where it’s needed.
On Zealot the 5% more power talent is a missed opportunity. If it instead gave you an additional stack of Fiery Faith (ie you start with one at full green hp) people might actually think ‘that sounds cool’ and that’d allow it to interact with his other talents that are based on how many Fiery Faith stacks you have.
On HM Focused Spirit is like a lamer version of what we had with Eldrazor’s Precision (trading AS for power). Asrai Grace is also a bit weird as her ult already has very low CD (and it’s bugged so it anyway doesn’t work atm ), but once it gets fixed it might have a niche with the aforementioned 25% AS 45% Crit Chance build by trading 5% crit from the one talent to increase uptime of the +25% crit contributed by her ult.
On IB I’ve yet to uncover a breakpoint that makes Drakki Wrath worthwhile (if anyone knows one please let me know) for the heat it generates, and believe me I’m trying. You end up better of taking a ranged weapon with high single target damage if you want that. Either increase the power given by much much more or reduce the additional heat generated by a lot and it could have a niche. The talent that gives a 50% chance to get all stamina back when block is broken is also bad as it is too unreliable to be appealing. Zealot has a talent that gives a 100% chance to get all stamina back whenever he takes damage which is much better.
On BW Whoosh! remains a weaker version of Burnout, as Burnout lets you adjust your direction with your 2 ults and Whoosh doesn’t. Burnout is flat out better in terms of both fun and utility, you can Flamewalk in and out of danger, CC an enemy harder or travel the distance of two ults in one direction. Whoosh! needs to be replaced with another effect (but not CDR, Burnout is 2 ults every CD).
The talent Centered is afaik as underwhelming as it always was, especially now that we have a talent that puts Tranquility on a 3s CD, Centered either needs to vent harder or be replaced with a defensive alternative again (like the old BCR when Tranquility is up talent).
On Pyro I’d like to see Ride the Fire Wind be more interactive, either base it on her spellcasting or give it another effect, as it is now it just makes your damage inconsistent and for people who are basing breakpoints upon it, it’ll just annoy them when some of their shots meet the breakpoint they’ve built for and others don’t - I imagine most will just ignore this talent altogether.
Also please remove Exhaust and replace it with Burning Twins (the old WoM beta talent that made your ult fire off two Burning Skulls at once), the latter was way more interesting and for people wanting to vent it’s much more effective (and always had been) to take THP on ult and use the THP to vent. Exhaust vents your OC once, 35 THP allows for multiple vents, like 4 or even 5 (assuming you use all that THP to vent, which you likely won’t need to).
On UC Burning Dregs is contrary to the way the class plays, focusing on heat management, as it takes control away from you. It’s a bad talent and needs to be replaced entirely.
Other than that I’m happy with the talent changes overall.
Edit: I completely forgot the Huntsman talent which reduces damage taken by 3% until a monster is killed, after which it is 30% until the mission ends or death. This talent is the poorest of all his new ones, 3% is useless and even if you get the 30% it is straight up inferior to eg RV’s damage reduction on HS/Pyro’s damage reduction on elite/special kill as it is way harder to activate than either of those, even more RNG-dependent and lost upon death. I’d much rather it worked like BH’s new damage reduction talent, 1% damage reduction per elite/special killed stacking up to 30%, which is functionally similar. If it worked like that it’d be much cooler and actually useful. Boss dependent talents were always bad so I was glad to see the removal of those. This one should’ve never made it in with WoM.