Guild Wars 2

A way to give Ranger pets more sustainability, but not have to program to AI to try to dodge on its own.

Why not allow a Ranger’s pet to dodge an attack when the Ranger does. Obviously a Ranger’s pet would follow his commands, so when the Ranger dodges, it’s only fair that his pet also dodge the attack.

HUGE Bonus:

Smart Ranger’s won’t let their pets just take full damage from an attack while they have stamina. (Thereby INNATELY buffing the survive-ability of a pet who belongs to a good Ranger.)

You buff the survive-ability of pets, without dumping more HP on them and tie it to making Ranger’s more skilled at using dodges, instead of just letting their pets soak up huge attacks.

Ranger’s have heals that HEAL them and their pet as one. (Heal as One) Do more damage as one. (Rampage as One)

Why can’t they dodge as one? Why can’t a Ranger command his pet to try to avoid damage when he avoids it?

I love this idea! Somtimes i cant call my pet to me fast enough to save him, so dodge as one will be super helpful

This basic idea is the reasoning for Companion’s Defense getting revisions over time, first to make it on dodge roll instead of pet-swap, then getting reworked to adjust the timing on each to make it more useful.

That said, it’s a bit underwhelming, since you have to go 15pts into Wilderness Survival to get it, it only reduces the damage done to your pet instead of preventing it, and once you’ve dodge-rolled, you’ve probably avoided the attack, which makes protection on you afterwards a little redundant.

I don’t know how much an improvement this would be to rangers, or if this would screw with the pet AI/animation system (see: Why Pets Can’t F2 Immediately,) but it would make a certain amount of sense. A good ranger might be able to do a lot with F3 and F4 to avoid AoE, but it’s not particularly easy or intuitive like dodge rolling is.