Guild Wars 2

HI,

my name Is TaKo and i am a Ranger Player since the release of GW2 for more than 2K+ h of game time.

I am Frustrated and i feel a bit lost.

GW2 has 3 Game Modes and so i want to share my experience for each one.

Lets Start with PVP: In sPVP i am playing a Spirit Ranger.
It works quiet good, makes a lot of fun but the problem is, that i can only play a spirit Ranger. Other builds are not welcome in any team that wants to play competitive, and not just for the fun.

Next Game Mode is PVE (Dungeons World Bosses etc.):

In PVE Rangers are not needed, not welcome and are getting kicked out of a lfg group faster than u can write in a Hi in the group chat. The argumentation is always the same. No dmg burst no power build, useless perma dead Pets. It is frustrating and providing sad feelings, but still i don’t care much, because my main focus is not on PVE nor is it on PVP. My main focus is on WvWvW.

WvWvW:
In WvWvW i feel lost. I have a ok working Frontline / Midline Ranger Build using a GS / LB combination. I have 2 cc (Muddy terain + the Elite skill ) and a healing spring. Sounds good on the Paper but reality is something completely different.
Every Public commander and all of the competition focused Guilds have no interest in a ranger joining the Squad. The sad thing is, there is no more explanation why they don’t want you in their Guild or in their Squad.
If you say that you are playing a Ranger, all you get back as a feedback is
“Delete your Ranger and start Playing a useful class”.
Rangers are getting so much hate from the WvW community that it is not fun anymore.
The most extreme experience i made was when i delivered a commander all the healing springs he needed. Whenever he asked for water fields i could deliver because i was sticky i had no issues surviving in the front line and i threw out all the cc i have. I was the Nr. 1 reason why the Front line could survive hard times because i was there when water was needed. I was doing a great job there but all i got as feedback when i asked for it was: “Delete your ranger and start playing an Staff-Ele, then u will be a useful player for the Squad” . No one disagreed, everyone started laughing in TS and i was sad and angry.
I gave the best i could, but still i was and am USELESS as a Ranger.

I hope that the dev team and class designers can change this by Fixing some of the main issues the Ranger class has. The issues have been mentioned so many times in various Subjects. There was a Ranger CDI etc. etc.

The hate shown by some players against the Ranger class in GW2, could easily be described as Racism in real life.

I am sure that i am not the only one who made this kind of exp. in WvW. or other game modes in GW2.

PLease Anet i am begging you, show some LOVE for the Rangers out there.

Start listening or let us die and let us R.I.P.
Its your choice.

At least you are usefull at 1 game mod. Still better then be utility bot

Quit trying to seek their approval. All a zerg needs is warm bodies that aren’t really bait. A well played ranger makes a kick kitten roamer, go try that.

there’s 3 things I’ve read a lot about the Ranger on Forums:
1) when played right, Rangers is very good and dangerous
2) Ranger has little room for error unlike other profession
3) Ranger are not bad, just a lot of Bad player play Rangers

I like the Ranger Profession as much as any other Ranger players, but there’s lot that I would like to see changed.

1)give back 30% (or whatever it is) of damage from the pet to the Ranger, we are inherently weaker than other profession because of this. if you want the 30% damage boost or more from the pet, put it was a trait in the GrandMaster of Beastmaster line.

2) make the Pet more survivable, increase their effects a bit also. Again, add this to the Traits in the Beastmaster line, 50%( or w/e %) increase to there F2 ability, Pets no longer die in battle, add these in the Grandmaster line so not to be overly OP being able to pick all 3 that I mentioned.

3)add better traits, so Spotter/Frost Spirit isn’t the only reason to bring a Ranger to the Party,

4) Spirits die to quickly for something that acts like an Banner, if they attacked fine, otherwise I don’t see why they should die.

5) Lower the CD on the Elites, they have too long of a cooldown imo.

these are just 5 suggestions that come to my mind, and are imo of how they should improve. Again, I like the Ranger just like the OP, and get tired of getting hated on for being one, not that it really effects me,

when people ask “your guild/server allows Rangers in WvW lol” I say " I don’t ask permission from anyone to play this game" and then they normally back off.

like Jim said don’t seek approval, but I do agree, Rangers need a lot of Love from the Devs.

3) Ranger are not bad, just a lot of Bad player play Rangers

This describes the whole Ranger Forum in one sentence.

2) Ranger has little room for error unlike other Profession

This describes the whole game Play of a ranger in one sentence.

Ranger were useless in old times. but the WvW veterans put ranger Utility in the trash since then they dont care about the updates ranger recieved.
Ranger can do more useful stuff then the most think, not just “i can give dat to you”. Experienced Rangers know how to help the zerg.

And to dungeons, just dont care. Experienced dungeon runner dont care about classes, just bad Player think that kitten of weak ranger and are the first who wipe hard at Kholer.

Let me tell that to u as a ranger with 3400h

Hmmmm… here we even have some commanders being Rangers.

As you said, you probably were more helpful to the zerg than many of the other players there. So the main problem here is probably that some people are meeeooooooowww. And some others just don’t have the guts to speak up, even if they disagree.

Rangers have less utility overall to contribute to a large group in WvW, but I wouldn’t say they’re completely useless. That said, the fact that people tend to dislike rangers in large-scale WvW is less about WvWers being elitist and more about the ranger class just seriously needing some buffs.

The ranger class needs some love. There’s no doubt about it, and I would be surprised if anyone said rangers are well-balanced for (zerg) WvW at this point. Most groups won’t care if you bring a ranger, though they’d likely prefer you to bring something else, but if it’s what you have fun playing, why care?

I don’t play one, but I do see the “Oh, you’re asking for a ranger build? Yeah, best build is…switch to another character” quite a lot. Most of the time, it’s said jokingly, though. At least on my server.

Hopefully, ANet will find a way to get the ranger balanced for large-scale engagements in WvW soon-ish. Frankly, I’m surprised after they made such a big deal out of the Ranger CDI that they did nothing to fix their underpowered-ness in WvW. :s

I don’t buy into the whole ‘Rangers are great, they just have a bad rep because every Ranger is bad’. A complete moron can play a Warrior and still contribute tons of stuff to a group. The game has been out 2 years and I’ve never once heard a commander or seen a post on the WvW forum praising or complaining about a Ranger’s perceived strengths. Ever.

Is it as bad as people claim? Obviously not. But it’s not a group class. It’s a dueler. As the numbers go up the worth goes down. The issue is the decline seems to be exponential instead of linear.

I would rather have a mediocre warrior than the best ranger in the world in my wvw zerg. Let the best ranger in the world go gank people.

I think half of the problem is that it’s widely accepted that ranger is a bad class. Of course I’m going to get downed first if every single thief on the other side decides to burst me down, for example.

And I would say a quarter of the problem is in fact, bad players. some of the suggested buffs for the ranger is extremely op, and I don’t want to become an op class (not to mention that I’ve only lost to another ranger once while roaming, and that was me being an idiot because they had a meta build and kited me into a very closed quarters area where my build sucks :s)

and the last quarter is indeed just the genuine need for revamping. Perhaps not buffing, but definitely revamping.

at least that’s my opinion on this matter.

50% Hate
25% L2P
25% Needs Reworking

p.s. and yes, feeling unwelcomed or not allowed in wvw guilds period because of the hate rangers receive, even though you’re doing just as good/better than others, can be painful sometimes.

Rangers are bad is a self-fulfilling prophecy in wvw. Of course you die quickly if the enemy team and their mother targets you first wasting all their hard CC on you just to bring the kitten ranger down.

Few weeks ago me and my friends were roaming in a 5 man group. I was playing a ranger. We got a fight against a seven strong team. I went down first after killing their ele and finally we won. I logged to my 74 D/D ele to get some XP. After a while we met this group again. They focused our mesmer and then our warrior. They didn’t even bother to attack me. We won this one too. I was in the frontline with an uplevelled melee ele and they didn’t care (before you say that I meant no danger you are wrong. Level 71-74 Green-yellow gear with superior sigils and runes and guard stacks can hurt.) When I was on my ranger they chased me around the south ruin twice

Two things to fix Ranger:

1. Change the profession’s class mechanic; then lose the silly mechanic that says X% of ranger DPS is in the pet and buff ranger skills accordingly; to replace the profession mechanic, give rangers <anything else>.
2. Make pet skills (like Engineer Turrets and Necro Minions for those who like to play with AI).

Aggrostemma.1703:

Of course you die quickly if the enemy team and their mother targets you first wasting all their hard CC on you just to bring the kitten ranger down.

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

I usually avoid zerg fights because I find roaming/small scale to be much more fun, but when I am in a zerg I basically play a sniper. Pick out their eles and other back line zerkers and take them out. Look for opportunities to grab a group of 3 or 4 and entangle them, barrage, and wail on them with the great sword. When you see them preparing to stack send your wolf to fear a few of them out and kill them. If the commander needs bodies to make a push use GS 4 to block ranged attacks while pushing with them.

If you are taking out 10+ people without dying you are being useful, just ignore the haters.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Two things to fix Ranger:

1. Change the profession’s class mechanic; then lose the silly mechanic that says X% of ranger DPS is in the pet and buff ranger skills accordingly; to replace the profession mechanic, give rangers <anything else>.
2. Make pet skills (like Engineer Turrets and Necro Minions for those who like to play with AI).

This has been suggested sooo many times. Sadly I think it’s too late for something so drastic to happen. Plus the whole profession and its traits are way too connected to the pet. In order to make the pet an option they would have to redesign the whole class (I know I know the term “redesign” doesn’t really apply well here since the ranger class in gw2 can’t be called “fully designed” to begin with). But the main hindrance is a bit shadier imo. The devs will never ever do something like that cos of their pigheadedness. In their heads they know exactly how this terribly designed class should turn out to be. It doesn’t matter if their view of the ranger doesn’t apply to this game or simply doesn’t work or isn’t fun to play or play against. I mean really look at skyhammer map in pvp…everyone hates that stupid map, ppl even stay afk in order to avoid playing on that crap…still after one year or even more the devs have done nothing to fix or modify it. The same thing applies to the ranger or everything else in this game. With probably only one exception: if a decision is not lucrative enough they will probably change it in order to increase their profit. Sadly this is not true for the ranger…who cares if the class is subpar in pve or w/e gamemode you are playing in, the ranger player has already purchased the game (so who cares if he stops playing) and:

-already switched to a diff profession (or probably will);
-he does like the class…I know this sounds impossible to believe but the world is filled with this kind of ppl who accept everything they are given without protest or even a sign of disapprovement.

In the meantime, after 2 YEARS, we can still watch karl mclain declare that pets have “some issues”. Thanks karl I didn’t realise that.

Jim Hunter.6821:

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

tell that to the 2 thieves and a warrior that chased me around a zerg fight for at least 30s-1m earlier today.

regardless of your escapability or tankiness or even class, if a group of 5+ immediately targets you, and you can’t run, you’re basically dead, which is a problem i’ve experienced as a ranger.

ITheNormalPerson.9275:

Jim Hunter.6821:

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

tell that to the 2 thieves and a warrior that chased me around a zerg fight for at least 30s-1m earlier today.

regardless of your escapability or tankiness or even class, if a group of 5+ immediately targets you, and you can’t run, you’re basically dead, which is a problem i’ve experienced as a ranger.

I don’t see why they would, honestly. If they did that, when other backliners were still alive, they weren’t very smart. People generally tend to ignore rangers, thinking they don’t pose much of a threat. They usually head right for the eles/necros. Rangers would be an afterthought.

Not saying rangers can’t be dangerous, as they’re good for picking people off, but typically you’d want to get rid of the wells/marks and ele AoEs/water fields first, as well as any mesmers if you’re in a tower/keep.

I love when my ranger gets focused in a zerg fight… hes tankier then the guradian commander I’m following. While the other team tries to burst me down the whole hammer train is sitting in my water field keeping me alive… 3.2k armor (no stacks) and over 1k healing power. I would never bring anything less to WvW as a ranger unless I am specifically roaming for 1 v1

ITheNormalPerson.9275:

Jim Hunter.6821:

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

tell that to the 2 thieves and a warrior that chased me around a zerg fight for at least 30s-1m earlier today.

regardless of your escapability or tankiness or even class, if a group of 5+ immediately targets you, and you can’t run, you’re basically dead, which is a problem i’ve experienced as a ranger.

Why can’t you run? Why not draw them into your zerg or at least into a position where they are cut off from theirs and laugh when they die? I get focused all the time and I just dance around them or reset the fight if I need to.

Jim Hunter.6821:

ITheNormalPerson.9275:

Jim Hunter.6821:

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

tell that to the 2 thieves and a warrior that chased me around a zerg fight for at least 30s-1m earlier today.

regardless of your escapability or tankiness or even class, if a group of 5+ immediately targets you, and you can’t run, you’re basically dead, which is a problem i’ve experienced as a ranger.

Why can’t you run? Why not draw them into your zerg or at least into a position where they are cut off from theirs and laugh when they die? I get focused all the time and I just dance around them or reset the fight if I need to.

as I said, I lasted probably a good minute. I literally ran through the middle of the clashing zergs twice to get rid of them (once with stealth + lightning reflex, then against with stealth + swoop)

granted this zerg had a ton of thieves, but i’m not lying when I say that everytime I joined the fight, at least 2, most of the time 3+ immediately targeted me. there’s only so much you can do against chained basilisk venom and hammer warriors. (maybe it’s the trail of flowers that attracts them :P)

and by run I mean I can’t leave the fight. e.g. in that scenario I was in smc, with our zerg and an enemy zerg clashing in the lord room. not to mention thief shadowstepping makes it pretty hard to escape in confined spaces (3s stealth isn’t enough to avoid a thief pistol #3)

Even the best rangers I know will tell you that the class needs buffing. There might be a lot of rangers out there bad at playing the class, but theres a reason rangers are often reffered to as a “re-roll”.

torukmakto.3412:

there’s 3 things I’ve read a lot about the Ranger on Forums:
1) when played right, Rangers is very good and dangerous
2) Ranger has little room for error unlike other profession
3) Ranger are not bad, just a lot of Bad player play Rangers

Even for really good players… the bugs make you do incredibly stupid things like hurl yourself off cliffs after a Launched enemy. My teammates used to specifically do this to me and then laugh b/c they knew my attack rotations were complicated by a lower frame rate meaning I’d be locked in the attack cycle for a whole second or more.

Most of the weapons and traits are like that come to think of it. But especially the Pet. It’s really so bad that good Ranger players aren’t actually “Playing the Game”, they’re playing this Mini-game of “work-around-the-bullCrap” while everyone else gets to play the real deal. Even though I regularly got compliments on mine … it felt pretty hollow b/c I knew I wasn’t a good “player”, I was just being a good Debugger.

let’s “believe” anet is undergoing some decent improvement for rangers after that CDI topic, well, only question is when they will carry out these changes… next patch or next expansion pack?

Dos.7052:

let’s “believe” anet is undergoing some decent improvement for rangers after that CDI topic, well, only question is when they will carry out these changes… next patch or next expansion pack?

Next balance patch is more than likely not going to be until after the All-Star tournament in August, and I would imagine that based on the way content and balance is handled in the game, that an expansion wouldn’t really add any balance at all, just content.

I mean, ever since Allie, the community manager running the CDI, left ANet and we haven’t heard an official status on whether or not they at least took the work she did on the CDI into consideration for things to add to the pipeline of changes, I haven’t had any sort of hope or seen any signs that the class will be anywhere close to what people want by Christmas (December) this year.

My advice to everybody is to play this game like you would a Call of Duty game. It’s definitely as casual as Call of Duty, and even though it tricks you into making you think you have a whole lot to do, at the end of the day, all you are doing is killing and leveling, so if anybody expects anything more out of the game (a true competitive experience, a hardcore PvE experience), my advice is to find a nice Korean MMO (I hear Dragon Nest is good enough at this point an F2P and not too B2W eight now) where the developers take hardcore players seriously and not as a joke.

tl;dr: Enjoy this game for what it is, and stop getting disappointed for what you know it could be because of things that are out of your hands and find something better to do with your time. I know that what I’ve been doing, I’ve only been logging in for LW updates and dailies.

I disagree with the " good ranger are dangerous". Because why the good ranger so rare? Because good rangers are usually far more skilled than you if they are able to beat you usually. If they meet their equal in term of skill vs any other profession they have lower chance to win except when considerably outplaying their opponent because of the surprise.

The problem of the ranger is it’s Pet. Useless in wvsw, a problem in PvE and good only in 1vs1 fights in sPvP.
But you can’t kick away your pet. Ranger class is a mix of Archer and Summoner. You need the pet to deal all your damage but the pet is your great weakness.
That’s why in pvp the best Ranger is a Ranger whit a Condition Damage build. Whit conditions you don’t need the pet because you deal all your damage by yourself. You can only use the linx, to give 8 stack of bleed to your enemy, plus 3 whit skill 3 of the SB, then you can forgot about your pet, it’s useless.
If you use a direct damage build and you lost your pet you lost 20-30% of your damage. In wvsw or pve all the rangers play a direct damage class. That’s why no one want a ranger in wvsw. No one want a class that lose 30% of it’s damage after 5 sec of fight. You can pay attention to your pet and swap it, but for 20 sec you can’t swap it anymore and when you swap your pet is dead and you need 40 sec to swap it.
Ranger is not a Archer class but everyone want to change the ranger into a archer class.

You can’t ask for a trait that make your pet unkillable, you can’t ask for unkillable spirits (the same that guardian asks from a while about they’re spirit weapons) and you can’t ask for remove the pet.

You can’t change the mechanic of a class. ANet will never do something like that. That’s why we can cry but nothing can change.

(P.s. sorry for my bad english)

the ranger cummunity is just to small maybe.
there was a “state of the ranger” topic in the spvp forum and no anet dev cares,
they even prefered to ban this guy instead of starting to fix the ranger problems
(power ranger, trapper ranger… ah just every ranger build atm is trash)

ITheNormalPerson.9275:

Jim Hunter.6821:

ITheNormalPerson.9275:

Jim Hunter.6821:

I have to disagree with this. Ranger makes an amazing escape artist. If you are focused in a zerg fight just stealth and reposition. No one is going to waste time trying to find you when there are plenty of other targets.

tell that to the 2 thieves and a warrior that chased me around a zerg fight for at least 30s-1m earlier today.

regardless of your escapability or tankiness or even class, if a group of 5+ immediately targets you, and you can’t run, you’re basically dead, which is a problem i’ve experienced as a ranger.

Why can’t you run? Why not draw them into your zerg or at least into a position where they are cut off from theirs and laugh when they die? I get focused all the time and I just dance around them or reset the fight if I need to.

as I said, I lasted probably a good minute. I literally ran through the middle of the clashing zergs twice to get rid of them (once with stealth + lightning reflex, then against with stealth + swoop)

granted this zerg had a ton of thieves, but i’m not lying when I say that everytime I joined the fight, at least 2, most of the time 3+ immediately targeted me. there’s only so much you can do against chained basilisk venom and hammer warriors. (maybe it’s the trail of flowers that attracts them :P)

and by run I mean I can’t leave the fight. e.g. in that scenario I was in smc, with our zerg and an enemy zerg clashing in the lord room. not to mention thief shadowstepping makes it pretty hard to escape in confined spaces (3s stealth isn’t enough to avoid a thief pistol #3)

Yeah I quit playing my Ranger in WvW because of this exact reason. I would always get focused more on my Ranger than when on any other class – even my Ele.

Its a shame because I really like my Ranger and I only play WvW.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Quit trying to seek their approval. All a zerg needs is warm bodies that aren’t really bait. A well played ranger makes a kick kitten roamer, go try that.

well, yes ranger can sort of roam, but what about all the rangers that would like to raid? they can’t cause there is no real role for them. GWEN dominates and only engi and thief can keep up with it but ranger and mes are left behind. pets are terribad in wvw raids! there was a moment when i saw rangers being played a lot in wvw and it was after bm buff.
a war is better with a longbow than the ranger…c’mon!ranger lacks a clear role in groupplay thats why its left out and the pet being useless in such encounters, making things worse.

rangers need a clear role, options to spec for wvw raids, traits that are less focused on the pet and pet improvements. this class has great potential and im sure many suggestions are out there that would put this class in a way better position, but only if it does receive rework.