Guild Wars 2

I never meet a ranger I couldn’t kill, until this past week. There have been a few rangers on SF that have completely embarrassed me. I was outplayed, out maneuvered, and out damaged. This was not only solo/small group fights but Zerg vs Zerg.

Some classes are easier to play and there for require less skill for similar results, but the classes with a higher skill ceiling are going to be the ones where a player become unstoppable.

Thief is a good example of this. Bad thieves can run away, good thieves can stay and fight, maybe pick off one or two, great thieves will wipe large groups running a two-shot build (meaning they can two-shot and will die in two shots as well). And, after a healthly helping of humble pie, ranger seems to be too.

I wouldn’t be making this argument in favor of ranger if I had not witnessed it first hand. Ranger seems to be one of those classes that when “mastered” has the potential to be “overpowered”! But I imagine the skill needed to do so is very rare, requires a very low ping, and a player who knows how to predict what the other player on x class will do.

Most ranger are just plain bad, just like most thieves. Easy to play does not mean easy to master. Rangers in general seem to be bad players and keyboard turners, who don’t have a second weapon equipped. I lost count of how many rangers I fought who didn’t equip a melee weapon. I can’t even guess the number of rangers who turned their back on my thief and ran away and did not use any utilities to try to escape or defend them selves, but ran blinding while I auto attack them down.

But I can say, a great ranger, now makes me think twice. My first encounter with a great ranger was a very eye opening experience. I died as fast or faster than it takes me to kill the full GC bad rangers I usually find everywhere in WvW.

I enjoyed the lesson in humility so much I went back again and again and again just to watch the “worse” class in game being masterfully played. I have yet to down that ranger on my Mesmer, Warrior, or Thief. And I have yet to see that Ranger downed by less than a 5v1 hit squad. And no, we are not bad players, quite the opposite, but this one ranger in particular, was just that much better. It could be the 30/30/30/30/30 unicorn build that no one has though of, but I would bet my gold stash the player was just that good.

The SF Ranger with the Guild Tag COSA, very well played. Come to these forums please and share your experience, build, and tactics. Especially with one of the poster here who is known as the thief communities biggest troll. Maybe then he could have the justice he is always demanding. Teach him to play, because you sure as hell know what your doing.

I enjoyed getting my kitten kicked so much by this guy i made a ranger my self. Pretty sure I can guess at the build/runes he was running. I can’t imagine I will reach that guys skill anytime soon, but I would love to be able to wipe a 4 or 5 man organized guild group who is using voice coms and builds/traits with synergy.

And I will repeat this one more time, just for the haters out there, yes, we got wiped by a Ranger, a few times, who was just that good. He was even skilled enough to make very good use of his pet, he did not fire and forget the kitten ed thing, all the while wrecking the crew I was running with.

I almost felt like a keyboard turning ranger with no melee weapon equipped running helplessly away from a thief… Yes, it was that bad. But I enjoyed it, and so did the group I was running with.

i could write pages why rangers bad in wvw. i played more than a year wvw with ranger, tryed every single build, made kudzu etc. after more than a year i changed to warrior. and just whooo! warrior tank build have more anything as a specced ranger. more survivibility as a tank ranger. more dmg as a power ranger. more cc as a cc ranger, more support as a support ranger. btw i have guardian thats better than ranger but too easy mode to me. staff, shouts, dodge and collect loot. when i roll necro i just press buttons! and do you know what? i must to sell in every 5 mins and evrybody cry from the happyness. soo much heal, soo much blind, fear etc…

My first main was a Ranger, and I have a Legendary equipped on it – but I only use it in PVE now due to 100% map completion.

Why I don’t play it in WvW anymore? Mainly the diminishing utility and ability to manage one’s pet as the size of engagements get larger. As others have pointed out, Rangers can shine in duels or very small engagements. But so can all other classes.

Rangers can apply 250% more fear then necromancers are able to.

That sounds awful.

Poor Necros. . .

warriorjrd.8695:

Ragnar.4257:

Prysin.8542:

-snip-

Your analysis is bad. You are not considering cooldowns. You are imagining that the warrior drops all his immobilise, and then doesn’t re-apply any ever again.

(With max condi duration) Flurry is an 8.75 sec immobilise on a 8.25 second cooldown (with 20 points in Discipline). Add in Bolas, Leg Specialist and Pin Down, and a warrior can easily, easily, maintain 100% uptime on immobilise.

Over a 120-second period, a warrior can apply 14x Flurry (8.75s), 20x Leg Specialist (2.25s), 7x Bolas (8.75s), 6x Pin Down (6s), for a total of 264.75 seconds of immobilise.

In that same 120-second period, your ranger can apply 7x Intimidating Howl (5.5s), 2x Quicksand (4.5s), 6x Muddy Terrain (4.5s), 1x Entangle (14x 2.25s), 3x Paralyzing Venom (8.25s), 6x Entangling Web (8.25s), for a total of 180.25s

Even if we say that the warrior can only drop the level-1-adrenaline Flurry each time it’s off cooldown, instead of the level-3, the warrior still beats the ranger with 205.25s total.

Finally, consider that sword/sword + longbow condition damage/duration warrior is a perfectly viable build, while your ranger looks like it would seriously struggle to survive with no defensive utility.

It’s touching that you’re so attached to your class, and I’d agree that rangers are often under-appreciated.

But you’re still wrong about this.

You’re thinking you will have 3 bars of adrenaline permanently, which you wont. Also the ranger would be able to keep perma immob too if the skills were cycled properly.

I addressed this point. Good job on reading.

So the ranger fears more and YOU seem to think they can immobalise more. Still i dont see how this helps prove your point rangers are good? Warriors and necro bring other stuff to the fight to that rangers wont be able to?

Reason I don’t like rangers is the lame playstyle of 9 of 10 rangers I come across. You can be deadly as a beast, yet most chose to stand in one spot, not move the whole fight and swapping weapons? Forget it.

Bunker ranger trying to kill me with direct dmg? The result is same as with any medium class, you can’t go tanky and still hit hard.

Thieves kill you all the time? You have the advantage of your channeled skills still hitting a thief that stealths up.

So until rangers learn to move and use their skills actively, it’s 9 free kills for me.

all i can see is QQ yes i main ranger yes they are not good in zergs. but if you are Fsp.
and you play wvw. my name should ring a bell i know all about that
that ranger are not good in wvw. do you think i care?? hell no. i command and play my ranger how i want. your care about other opion i surely don’t play whatever you want to play i have all eighth classes played all in zeg fights but i still love my ranger because of the crappy mech as you call it.

ArchonWing.9480:

ghtchill.7613:

To even play in WvW as a Ranger I had to sacrifice a lot of damage to be survivable enough and then there wasn’t much a point. In a large group I could be somewhat useful providing ranged pressure at a choke, but as many have said there are classes that do that better. Perhaps if they lowered the barrage cd and make it not root us to finish, it would be more useful. And of course, as many have said, the pet is absolutely useless in large group/zerg. I have never ever had an issue with Ranger’s pets while playing one of my other 80s. I don’t even notice them, or quickly kill them…but usually I barely see them.

You make valid points; though I think ranged pets survive a lot easier. They still are stupid and take 30 years to hit anyone though. They need a consistent ranged aoe pet.

But I’m curious at the “sacrifice damage to be survivable in wvw part” complaint that’s been floating around here. Most classes for zergplay have to do that too. 0/5/30/30/5 is pretty standard for zerg guardians even though it does terrible damage and is very selfish compared to other guardian builds but it makes them bricks that can give whatever support they can. I suppose that has a purpose though, being the brick. But in any case, pvt is generally stressed in large scale wvw and we generally call dps zerkers “rallybots”. Plus the standard is usually to stack anyways so you can be close for boons. (which also makes range pretty lacking in surviving, honestly).

From what I gather though, the main advantage of classes like the guardian is that their traits can be gained with minimal investment. For example 5 in virtues offers a lot more support by turning virtue activation into giving a lot more useful boons. 5 in honor gives vigor on crit and synergizes with the 15 honor minor which heals on dodge. These traits all work together.

Ranger adept traits are mostly, quite bad or selfish and you generally have to trait much higher into the tree to get anything done. The synergy between the minors is well… pretty meh. Well, wilderness survival is good, but it’s also all selfish stuff… In essence, these things are really good in small scale, but it doesn’t make that big of a difference the bigger the numbers are.

Well what I mean is that, to me, as a “Archer” class I should be bringing speed (mobility) and high damage to the field. Unfortunately it’s much much harder to do with the current Ranger builds and be survivable enough against the other classes. It’s not impossible, and some people are good at it, but they are few. Yes my Guardian is tanky, but brings a lot of support and is a must in the current zerg meta.

You bring up a good point however, one that has crossed my mind many times and seems to be one of the biggest examples of “imbalance” in the game; the fact that a heavy armor melee class, like a warrior, also has the highest (or second highest after maybe a thief) mobility in the game. It makes no sense. On top of that, they also give the Warrior a long bow and a RIFLE! Again, makes no sense.

The real reason that people “hate” Rangers is because they have been handi-capped in a lot of ways and haven’t been allowed to be what they should be by the developers, plus, are more difficult to play to be as effective (or more) than any other class. This lends to the perception that the Ranger is mostly “useless”. The fact that a Warrior is more mobile and can even do more damage and lend more help to a large group, even with ranged weapons, tells us that Anet have not currently designed the Ranger properly. We should be highly mobile and hard hitting. We can be, but as someone else said, Rangers with that level of skill are rare.

Personally, Anet can take the longbow and rifle (along with its skills), as well as the high mobility, away from my Warrior and give these things to the class that should have them – my Ranger. I don’t think my Warrior would mind.

Jayden Ennok.3687:

Reason I don’t like rangers is the lame playstyle of 9 of 10 rangers I come across. You can be deadly as a beast, yet most chose to stand in one spot, not move the whole fight and swapping weapons? Forget it.

Bunker ranger trying to kill me with direct dmg? The result is same as with any medium class, you can’t go tanky and still hit hard.

Thieves kill you all the time? You have the advantage of your channeled skills still hitting a thief that stealths up.

So until rangers learn to move and use their skills actively, it’s 9 free kills for me.

Agreed. I’d say your estimate off 9 out of 10 is way high, and a bit unfair, but I get your point. Personally I move a lot on my Ranger and also swap weapons (to GS or S/WH) and I have seen plenty of other Rangers do the same. It’s just harder to be that very skilled player on a Ranger, IMO, until Anet makes some changes to the class and allows the Ranger to be what it should be.

Khayoss.2019:

Prysin.8542:

Ragnar.4257:

Prysin.8542:

-snip-

-snip-

because in reality, the most reliable (flurry) and the greatest source, is dependent on a 3rd mechanic, adrenaline, which recharges on attacks. Unfortunately, the recharge rate will prolong your casts by a few seconds. Within that timeframe, you will most likely loose 40% of the flurry immob. putting you down to ranger levels by far.

Unfortunately, even a warrior without adrenaline building traits fighting in a crowd builds more than enough adrenaline to be waiting on the cooldown of the skill rather than waiting on the adrenaline to build. Adrenaline specced warriors can safely use the F1 on both of their weapon sets as often as they swap weapons.

And once again, my point stands firm. Because the warrior Immob is SINGLE TARGET. While all but the Spider pet’s immob is AOE.
And when discussing something, AOE effect > single target effect. This is why people prefer an elementalist over an ranger. Because both is ranged but Ele has more hard hitting AOE skills then ranger. making it more capable against many enemies at once.

That’s true. But again, we go back to the fact that to get there on that full immob spec you posted the ranger has sacrificed tremendously in order to make a contribution while others are doing it in standard viable builds.

Having said all that, what they can offer is not negligible, you can make a case for having a ranger running an AoE immob build and hunting the outskirts with the assassin party for downed/fleeing. But even then, your skill group now has a defined spot for a single Ranger filling one highly specialized role. Beyond that person, and possibly a 2nd if you have a large enough force to be running multiple assassin parties, the group is going to be better served by ranger 2 instead bringing a high damage ranged class, or another front line specialist that can get into the middle of it and punch people in the face.

Your next argument will be “pets are unreliable”. And that is 100% true, if you do not micromanage them properly.

And yes, i agree with the above. LB4 spam is annoying as hell.

Even when micromanaged, they still aren’t great… ANet could fix them VERY easily, they have the power, but they haven’t in 1.5 years so there’s little hope of that ever happening.
1) If a Mesmer casts moa morph on ranger pet, suddenly the pet has no problems hitting moving targets. Why? Moa morph animation adds some kind of leap at the end of the pets standard attacks that overcomes the pet handicap.
2) Vet worm mobs have the ability to turn and track moving targets between casting time and throwing their stones. Unless you have movement speed buffs or actively dodge the attack, their projectile WILL hit you. Yet ranger pets are restricted to the moa/drake AI that takes stock of target location at the beginning of cast and then casts/channels to that location only regardless of movement between the time they first decided to cast, cast time, and then execution of ability.
3) Pets use to be able to get up onto walls and attack things that could be targeted- just like Mesmer clones. But apparently that isn’t fair to things on walls, so even birds are now restricted to a 5 foot ceiling. Ranged pets are also restricted with a range/arc that prevents them from being able to attack up a wall and in most cases down a wall, making them 100% ineffective in any siege situation regardless of which side of the wall they are on.
It’s a sad state of affairs that the class is in.

actually, i looked over the traits i got at my disposal. In both my comparison, i specced both professions with 30 into whatever line that gave them condition duration. To show how the maximum output would be. However, this gives the ranger an advantage, as all my immobilize is tied to utilities/pet. Which allows me to freely use the strongest armor and weapon combination i want to, while the warrior, while it being a potent mix, are forced to use two specific weapons (Sword mainhand + Bow).

With the traits the way they are, the ranger can run full Valkyrie and trait for Remorseless. Allowing it to bind the enemy, and deliver a massive critical strike. The remorseless build is tried and tested. It works, even better so, it works really well in zergs as it gives you high damage and good tanking.

Prysin.8542:

actually, i looked over the traits i got at my disposal. In both my comparison, i specced both professions with 30 into whatever line that gave them condition duration. To show how the maximum output would be. However, this gives the ranger an advantage, as all my immobilize is tied to utilities/pet. Which allows me to freely use the strongest armor and weapon combination i want to, while the warrior, while it being a potent mix, are forced to use two specific weapons (Sword mainhand + Bow).

With the traits the way they are, the ranger can run full Valkyrie and trait for Remorseless. Allowing it to bind the enemy, and deliver a massive critical strike. The remorseless build is tried and tested. It works, even better so, it works really well in zergs as it gives you high damage and good tanking.

And there is your problem. Anything tied to pet makes it unreliable and a flat out disadvantage. Between pet being dead, not in range, F2 dely, cc’d, or just recently swapped to making the F2 not fire but still go on cooldown, does not help your case. Crappy AI is crappy AI, and the Ranger class is built on it.

And you really think Remorseless is good? Really? You give up Beastmasters might for it. If you go 30 into that tree (and don’t take BM might) you are already going power build, and no amount of armor/trinkets are going to give you build diversity.

You are trying to justify a build that is still subpar, on a class that is subpar. You really think that much immob makes this class good? Beyond the fact that the circumstances to apply that much immob is rare in a real fight, it still does not do jack in the main scheme of things.

Ranger fear. Again uses a near useless porcine pet to do. So you have to swap to the porcine pet….use its F2 skills (forage)….wait for it to sniff the ground….move your character to where the pet used the skill….pick up the item……now you can use the fear. Of course your skills are blocked now because you have a skull in your hand. So you have to use it before you can do ANYTHING else. Brilliant. ….

As much as I like the Ranger, and would love to see it excel beyond SPvP and roaming, I can at least accept the fact in larger WvW battles its at the bottom. At least I don’t try to make up ridiculous situations and silly builds to try and justify its place. The class needs a revamp. A tweak here and there wont do it.

@Cain, i don’t know who in CoSA it might have been, but I’ll ask around.

Vaxx.3178:

Prysin.8542:

actually, i looked over the traits i got at my disposal. In both my comparison, i specced both professions with 30 into whatever line that gave them condition duration. To show how the maximum output would be. However, this gives the ranger an advantage, as all my immobilize is tied to utilities/pet. Which allows me to freely use the strongest armor and weapon combination i want to, while the warrior, while it being a potent mix, are forced to use two specific weapons (Sword mainhand + Bow).

With the traits the way they are, the ranger can run full Valkyrie and trait for Remorseless. Allowing it to bind the enemy, and deliver a massive critical strike. The remorseless build is tried and tested. It works, even better so, it works really well in zergs as it gives you high damage and good tanking.

And there is your problem. Anything tied to pet makes it unreliable and a flat out disadvantage. Between pet being dead, not in range, F2 dely, cc’d, or just recently swapped to making the F2 not fire but still go on cooldown, does not help your case. Crappy AI is crappy AI, and the Ranger class is built on it.

And you really think Remorseless is good? Really? You give up Beastmasters might for it. If you go 30 into that tree (and don’t take BM might) you are already going power build, and no amount of armor/trinkets are going to give you build diversity.

You are trying to justify a build that is still subpar, on a class that is subpar. You really think that much immob makes this class good? Beyond the fact that the circumstances to apply that much immob is rare in a real fight, it still does not do jack in the main scheme of things.

Ranger fear. Again uses a near useless porcine pet to do. So you have to swap to the porcine pet….use its F2 skills (forage)….wait for it to sniff the ground….move your character to where the pet used the skill….pick up the item……now you can use the fear. Of course your skills are blocked now because you have a skull in your hand. So you have to use it before you can do ANYTHING else. Brilliant. ….

As much as I like the Ranger, and would love to see it excel beyond SPvP and roaming, I can at least accept the fact in larger WvW battles its at the bottom. At least I don’t try to make up ridiculous situations and silly builds to try and justify its place. The class needs a revamp. A tweak here and there wont do it.

Now, rangers do fine in zergs. Nothing out of the ordinary in their contribution to the zerg. It is not that good, but not too bad either.
If you spec properly and play accordingly, you will not die any more then any other front-liner. Oh, and yes, that is how i play. I run on the frontline alongside the commander and the melee train. It is NOT something super hard to do when you run a ranger.

Any class can run in a melee train, lol, that doesn’t mean they are equally useful.

Blix.8021:

Any class can run in a melee train, lol, that doesn’t mean they are equally useful.

Yes and that is my point. Aslong as you do damage, don’t die, cleanse conditions and provide some sort of boons, you are doing your job.
Now, rangers can only provide Swiftness, Regeneration, Fury and Vigor reliably. That means you get 1 more dodgeroll, potentially saving you from a hammerstun. And about 10% more damage for the duration of the fury buff. Add in a Sun Spirit or Stone Spirit and suddenly the DPS/Damage Mitigation gets added to the whole mix too.

However, that “isn’t good enough”. It seems it doesn’t matter what the ranger brings because no matter what it is, it got to be terrible and useless. However if a warrior applies the same boons, and they last pretty much just as long, or shorter in the case of Regeneration and Swiftness, it is good. Because a warrior applied it. This mentality makes no sense.

Because warriors do more damage, have more cc, remove more conditions, have more stability/invulnerabilty/block, and have more innate tankiness? Why would anyone want a melee ranger in a group over a guardian or warrior? Why would anyone want a range using ranger over an ele, necro, or memser? They wouldn’t. Just because you can put on tanky gear, swing your sword, and tag enemies in a zerg doesn’t mean you’re helping out as much as other classes.

also lol @ spirits in wvw group play

Blix.8021:

Because warriors do more damage, have more cc, remove more conditions, have more stability/invulnerabilty/block, and have more innate tankiness? Why would anyone want a melee ranger in a group over a guardian or warrior? Why would anyone want a range using ranger over an ele, necro, or memser? They wouldn’t. Just because you can put on tanky gear, swing your sword, and tag enemies in a zerg doesn’t mean you’re helping out as much as other classes.

also lol @ spirits in wvw group play

two questions;
1 – when did you last run a regen ranger whith spirits in WvW?
2 – No the warrior won’t bring more CC then me, because my build(s) allows me to bring more then the warrior, without speccing specifically for CC at all. it is simply part of the package. Also, in zerg v zerg, long duration chill/cripple is almost as effective as immobilize due to the amount of cleansing around. Either way, you are slowed down by a split second or two.

I played ranger for many, many hours and I still don’t know any way to apply fear except with the wolf pet and that has a long recharge. What am I missing?

Rezz.8019:

I played ranger for many, many hours and I still don’t know any way to apply fear except with the wolf pet and that has a long recharge. What am I missing?

Juvenile Boar, “Become the Wolf”, Shark etc…

The guild I am in consistently wipes T1 zergs and organized guilds using heavy ranged, high dps setups. We dont’ have a single hammer warrior. Rangers are OK with our strats, and if there was a strat where rangers should work well, it should be the way we play.

Overall, we probably do better with more ele’s or engineers then rangers. Both have better survivability and utility with glass builds, which most of our dps classes run.

My biggest complaint is survivability. A glass ele with mist form/lightning flash can get themselves out of tough spots, ditto for engi with rocket boots/elixir S. Ranger? Not so much.

snacktime.1082:

The guild I am in consistently wipes T1 zergs and organized guilds using heavy ranged, high dps setups. We dont’ have a single hammer warrior. Rangers are OK with our strats, and if there was a strat where rangers should work well, it should be the way we play.

Overall, we probably do better with more ele’s or engineers then rangers. Both have better survivability and utility with glass builds, which most of our dps classes run.

My biggest complaint is survivability. A glass ele with mist form/lightning flash can get themselves out of tough spots, ditto for engi with rocket boots/elixir S. Ranger? Not so much.

What secondary weapon does your rangers use?
Why are you not using Lightning Reflexes?
If using signets, the Signet of Stone should provide you more then enough survivability.

Cain.6507:

I never meet a ranger I couldn’t kill, until this past week. There have been a few rangers on SF that have completely embarrassed me. I was outplayed, out maneuvered, and out damaged. This was not only solo/small group fights but Zerg vs Zerg.

Some classes are easier to play and there for require less skill for similar results, but the classes with a higher skill ceiling are going to be the ones where a player become unstoppable.

Thief is a good example of this. Bad thieves can run away, good thieves can stay and fight, maybe pick off one or two, great thieves will wipe large groups running a two-shot build (meaning they can two-shot and will die in two shots as well). And, after a healthly helping of humble pie, ranger seems to be too.

I wouldn’t be making this argument in favor of ranger if I had not witnessed it first hand. Ranger seems to be one of those classes that when “mastered” has the potential to be “overpowered”! But I imagine the skill needed to do so is very rare, requires a very low ping, and a player who knows how to predict what the other player on x class will do.

Most ranger are just plain bad, just like most thieves. Easy to play does not mean easy to master. Rangers in general seem to be bad players and keyboard turners, who don’t have a second weapon equipped. I lost count of how many rangers I fought who didn’t equip a melee weapon. I can’t even guess the number of rangers who turned their back on my thief and ran away and did not use any utilities to try to escape or defend them selves, but ran blinding while I auto attack them down.

But I can say, a great ranger, now makes me think twice. My first encounter with a great ranger was a very eye opening experience. I died as fast or faster than it takes me to kill the full GC bad rangers I usually find everywhere in WvW.

I enjoyed the lesson in humility so much I went back again and again and again just to watch the “worse” class in game being masterfully played. I have yet to down that ranger on my Mesmer, Warrior, or Thief. And I have yet to see that Ranger downed by less than a 5v1 hit squad. And no, we are not bad players, quite the opposite, but this one ranger in particular, was just that much better. It could be the 30/30/30/30/30 unicorn build that no one has though of, but I would bet my gold stash the player was just that good.

The SF Ranger with the Guild Tag COSA, very well played. Come to these forums please and share your experience, build, and tactics. Especially with one of the poster here who is known as the thief communities biggest troll. Maybe then he could have the justice he is always demanding. Teach him to play, because you sure as hell know what your doing.

I enjoyed getting my kitten kicked so much by this guy i made a ranger my self. Pretty sure I can guess at the build/runes he was running. I can’t imagine I will reach that guys skill anytime soon, but I would love to be able to wipe a 4 or 5 man organized guild group who is using voice coms and builds/traits with synergy.

And I will repeat this one more time, just for the haters out there, yes, we got wiped by a Ranger, a few times, who was just that good. He was even skilled enough to make very good use of his pet, he did not fire and forget the kitten ed thing, all the while wrecking the crew I was running with.

I almost felt like a keyboard turning ranger with no melee weapon equipped running helplessly away from a thief… Yes, it was that bad. But I enjoyed it, and so did the group I was running with.

Most Ranger you see are GC Bearbow rangers, The ones you see without bows are the ones you should fear.

Terravos.4059:

Most Ranger you see are GC Bearbow rangers, The ones you see without bows are the ones you should fear.

/thread

People hate rangers because they run with or fight against bads, aka bearbows.

Ranger is THE pve carebearbow profession. Everyone wants to be Legolas!

The class is just a poor fit against the heavy AoE and condition damage that dominates WvW. Lacking quality stability and condition removal leaves the class open to the currently powerful immobilization stacking going on. Sure Rampage as One is very good but it has such a dead giveaway and long cool down it is easily mitigated.

A player that is dangerous playing a Ranger in WvW would be doubly so or more in the Thief class. A Ranger has to work significantly harder for less damage and less survivability than any number of other classes.

The class works well in sPvP though.

Rangers really also need better aoes, their traps really should be at bow range, hell they should be skills on the bows, that could put them in the league of well necros. Their utility slots are already reserved for the defense skills they need to survive. The class is just too mis-mashed with melee because of how good their damage is with some melee and the close range of their utility skills.

When you look at a warrior, you know ok it’s good with melee weapons and can specialize in rifle or bow if need be. Rangers need to be the same, it’s good with bows and can specialize in melee weapons, that isn’t the case right now. Already enough melee classes out there, need another good ranged dps class to compete with necros.

Covis.6037:

Every other class does things better. Ranger’s pet is close to useless during zergs. Ranger doesnt deal good AoE dmg(or actually damage overall in zergs.). Ranger doesnt bring good enough support. Ranger cant tank (yes u got ur signet but its not enough.).
Only thing that can be useful is your water heal / binding roots. But then again other more useful classes provide these already.

List probably could continue pages but heres the reason why i dont like rangers. I used to main ranger for over 1000 hours so i know what i talk about. And i assume you talk about zerging and not small scale roaming.

i feel u. i main a mesmer and at least i am accepted because i have veil and tw, but like the rangers we got the same ai problem. rangers got some terrible nerfs due to spvp and mes got some massive nerfs too that turned us into veilbots. the GWEN meta is making it hard for both of us to be part of the meta.to be honest. i enjoyed wvw more before anet decided to balance spvp and wvw the same way.
rangers need heavy rework so they can choose a build that works in large groupfights, same with mesmers, anet u can have my clones and phantasms if i get somet viable non ai based aoes!make ranger pets optional and give rangers something else to be part of the wvw large groupfight meta…and probably thieves will need some love in that area too.

Prysin, you’re fighting a losing battle mate. Every class excels in different areas. For a ranger that is roaming and small scale. Rangers don’t show their true potential in zergs and even the best they bring to the table can be beaten by another class in a zerg. A lot of your arguments are based on things the pet does, which don’t lie, dies on the first push.

You have to play a class to it’s strengths and zerging isn’t rangers. That’s not to say they can’t be of use TO a zerg. On my ranger I usually try and harass their backline, focus eles, necros etc, and with considerable effectiveness. I’m not right in the middle of the action so my pet doesn’t die straight away meaning i’m not horribly kitten.

Spirits are bad for zergs. Sure the buffs are nice, but that’s only if the spirits live long enough to provide them. Spirits need to be within range of the team meaning you are going to have to run pretty close to everybody, which will be in aoe damage. Spirits can also take stability from a guardian shout, or any other boons from shouts counting as one of the 5 the shout affects. Now a spirit that stole stability from a party member or fury from you is a spirit that is more nuisance than help.

Yes, rangers can immobolize, and that is very usefull given that it stacks now. However to try and fully spec immob you are losing out on alot of other usefull things meaning literally ALL you will do is immobilize.

In summary, Ranger have their strengths and weaknesses, like every class. Rangers excel at roaming and small scale, not zerging and large scale. A thief is the same, they preform much better roaming than in zergs, but thieves aren’t bad as a result. Guardians aren’t the best roamers, but the shine in zergs, guardians aren’t bad at all.

Don’t judge a class by it’s weakness while ignoring it’s strength.

Blix.8021:

Because warriors do more damage, have more cc, remove more conditions, have more stability/invulnerabilty/block, and have more innate tankiness? Why would anyone want a melee ranger in a group over a guardian or warrior? Why would anyone want a range using ranger over an ele, necro, or memser? They wouldn’t. Just because you can put on tanky gear, swing your sword, and tag enemies in a zerg doesn’t mean you’re helping out as much as other classes.

also lol @ spirits in wvw group play

Well now hold on a second. I have a long standing Ranger and have my issues with the current design, however, the guy you are responding to clearly says he enjoys doing what he does as a Ranger in a zerg.

Aside from the the obvious question of why you would have an issue with that, you seem to also disregard his contribution to the fight. So, based on that notion you proceed to tell him nobody wants him in a zerg. So to you his contribution, snidely putting his enjoyment aside, means nothing. Sad attitude, and not helpful. I could use several words to describe that attitude but my post would be deleted.

First, last time I checked there are no map chat calls specifying classes for a WvW zerg, as there are for dungeons for instance. Anybody can join a zerg, and do, and should continue to do so.

Second, the topic is why WvW players hate Rangers specifically. In your own post you acknowledge this poster is producing a result, yet it seems you hate his class because he’s not producing the result you think he should be. Again, that’s not the fault of the player. He enjoys his class regardless…you don’t, but he isn’t at fault for the class flaws.

In a way I agree with you in principal , apart for your dismissal of this posters stated enjoyment. Rangers are not what they should be. In reality, they aren’t “as advertised”. I think they easily could be, and easily could bring the benefits you and I think they should bring, but to blame the player is the wrong tactic. Put the criticism where it belongs, contribute to the overall benefit…blame Anet. Tell Anet you want your Rangers as advertised.

ArchonWing.9480:

Because it is inferior for zerging, although I’m just going to say there’s much more in wvw to do than to follow a zerg and press 1.

I have like 70 hours on my ranger to find out what the QQ was about and it’s not THAT bad really. After hearing all the QQ about how bad they’re on in PvE when they’re really not (“I tried a bearbow and it was terrible, reroll”) and the amount of bads that still can’t use the sword properly even allegedly having played the class as a main and the general tendency of forum posts to hyperbolize grievances into atrocities , I’m just not inclined to take people’s anecdotes seriously. Sure, sure I main guardian but a blind monkey can play a tanky wvw guardian and that’s a problem with the mode itself. The nature of the game greatly favors melee due to the AOE cap and being in range for boons. Ranged weapons are also frequently underpowered compared to their melee counterparts; of which becomes blatantly clear in PvE…

What is true though is a few things:

- Ranged Aoe damage is balls. What’s the use of 1500 range when it’s all single target unless you take leeching, whoops I meant piercing arrows and then you have to sacrifice either spotter or kitten , 1500 range? In addition, barrage is pretty bad. Yea, I’m gonna just root myself here and leave myself totally vulnerable to classes that can close the distance in a single swoop.

- Stability (and thus ping ponged). We have the elite skill, but I think it’s pretty dumb that your source of stability has such a long cast time that it leads to you getting CC’s anyways. There’s also Signet of the Beastmaster + Wild but that requires another trait in marksmanship and ugh and that’s a long cooldown. My necromancer in WvW has access to stability every 10 seconds and that’s considered one of the worst classes handling CC.

- The only way to have a pet in a situation involving more than 10 people is to use a ranged bug pet and spam f3 when you see red circles. The response of most pet skills is a terrible joke. Rangers and Necros have the same problem— they are revolved around a mechanic that increases survivability and damage, thus it gives an excuse to make them terrible in all other aspects when it comes to survivability. Rangers have pets, necros have Death Shroud, but Death Shroud is actually useful + necros have real aoe damage.

But in reality, even in large fights wolves are still nice for the fear before it kicks the bucket and by f3 spam I may do crap dps but I can usually swap pets in time every 20 seconds— it’s usually just enough. The spider is actually great for the immobilized, but more for small scale. There’s really no zerg pet though besides maybe that silly bear for condi removal.

— Lack of on demand condition removal, which makes immobilized completely destroy ranger. Signet of Renewal and Empathetic Bond are nice at removing conditions but only Renewal is on demand and is reliant on having a pet… and then we have healing spring which arguably is where all a ranger’s worth revolves around, almost. Oh and there’s also that bear, but yea.

And the waterfield/vigor/fury/swiftness/ combo is great support for situations where you have to stack anyways and since this is blob wars 2 we’re talking about this happens a lot. And since I usually play guardian/necro being able to actually escape from fights seems pretty awesome, honestly.

In any cases there are a number of issues that makes it clear that this class isn’t “working as intended” and that the conceptualization is flawed— which is a bigger issue than whether or not the class is the best way for you to pick up loot bags. And honestly, zerging is about having more numbers anyways…

All true. Of course the main thing is that the game is balanced around PvP. People need to stop expecting WvW to be balanced, unless ANet officially comes out and says that they will try to balance it.

warriorjrd.8695:

Prysin, you’re fighting a losing battle mate. Every class excels in different areas. For a ranger that is roaming and small scale. Rangers don’t show their true potential in zergs and even the best they bring to the table can be beaten by another class in a zerg. A lot of your arguments are based on things the pet does, which don’t lie, dies on the first push.

They don’t excel at roaming either. I am not sure where this idea got started but most ranger builds lack the best roaming attributes. They don’t have an easy to use quality escape mechanism which IMO is paramount to quality roaming. Due to the heavy burst and conditioning in roaming they also do not have adequate defense. The first decent condi-bunker they run into will get them killed quick.

For them to excel they would at least need to be in the top three of classes best used for roaming. I can make a pretty strong case (thanks to Travelers runes) they aren’t even in the top half. The best classes are those that have 25% or higher speed all the time, escape very well and have excellent performance in WvW duels. The ranger only meets one of those three.

@Straegen

They excel at roaming, because if you know how to play a ranger properly, with the proper spec. there is litterally no way in hell you will ever die unless you are jumped by 5+ enemies at once.
By speccing for maximum healing power, vitality and condition damage, you really only meet your match in the warrior, in terms of passive healing. While retaining the condition pressure of a necromancer.
The only downside is that while you may be incredibly effective 1vX. You become incredibly ineffective in groups above 10-15 players. Simply due to AOE caps, and the limitation of your condition spreading.

Prysin.8542:

@Straegen

They excel at roaming, because if you know how to play a ranger properly, with the proper spec. there is litterally no way in hell you will ever die unless you are jumped by 5+ enemies at once.
By speccing for maximum healing power, vitality and condition damage, you really only meet your match in the warrior, in terms of passive healing. While retaining the condition pressure of a necromancer.
The only downside is that while you may be incredibly effective 1vX. You become incredibly ineffective in groups above 10-15 players. Simply due to AOE caps, and the limitation of your condition spreading.

I believe you are a very good Ranger and probably very good player in general. However your statements are completely out of step with almost every other skilled players experience.

The ranger absolutely cannot apply the condition pressure of a necro. If you think that you have never played a condi necro at least not enough to understand its power. One signet applies more condition pressure than a Ranger can muster in the best scenario. The necro also comes to the party with boon management something that few other classes do and none as well. The Ranger’s conditioning isn’t even as good as an engi IMO.

The passive healing on a Ranger can indeed be great, but passive healing is useless against spike damage which is currently pervasive in WvW. sPvP doesn’t suffer this problem because crits have a soft cap unlike WvW. The warrior comes to the fight with multiple invulns, more armor, bigger HP pool, tons of control and vastly superior condition management which is how it survives damage spikes on a regen class. Almost every other class has a gimmick to avoid the big spikes (block, stealth, decoys, etc). The ranger also has horribad condition removal. How does a ranger even fight a condi-bunker necro aside from running away?

Conditions, immobilization, spike damage and AoE pressure are the dominant forces in WvW right now. The ranger has few defensive answers to any of these. I am not knocking you as a player. I am just at a loss for why you think the Ranger is actually a good WvW class in its current state. Viable sure… excels compared to other classes no.

You know, If i hadnt embraced a trapper build recently, i would have been inclined to agree with you. However the trapper build (been same as always, since beta apparently) Still works to this day. And the number of conditions you can apply, if you use the right pets, are crazy.

My drake alone can kill a enemy with low HP in 3 seconds. It’s ridiculous.

Prysin.8542:

2 – No the warrior won’t bring more CC then me, because my build(s) allows me to bring more then the warrior, without speccing specifically for CC at all. it is simply part of the package. Also, in zerg v zerg, long duration chill/cripple is almost as effective as immobilize due to the amount of cleansing around. Either way, you are slowed down by a split second or two.

Warrior has an AoE knockback, AoE cripple, knockdown, and AoE stun, on one weapon. Throw on s/s and you have immob, and another stun , or s/m and add immob, another AoE knockdown. All while using active condi clears on much, much lower cooldowns, and more stability (again on a shorter cooldown) than the Rangers, and NOT having to have a live pet close by to clear those condi’s.

Again, Warrior > Ranger in group fights at CC.

And again, no Rangers cannot do as much condi pressure as a Necro or Engi…..let alone survive better against another condi build, if both are of equal skill.

I find it funny how you cannot see this. Rose colored glasses maybe?

I have played with some excellent rangers, however I have a high preference to take up any class over a ranger if available.

My main reason is that they don’t bring enough group support as compared with other professions. Yes they have some nice individual abilities but most are “self” not group.

Rangers are mostly ineffective vs hammertrains when going point-blank vs point-blank, their only group functions that I see as useful from commander point of view are the water field and binding roots.

Ranger builds have to give up too much in DPS and/or healing support in order to retain enough survivability to be as effective as other classes. yes you can bunker up, mad regen etc, but then your DPS is nothing, while other classes do this without giving up the DPS on multiple builds and still provide versatile group support.

Add to that the wide plethora of pet issues and traits, skills, tied to the pets.

So basically, the good rangers are just a “sympathy carry” for me that I would rather replace with a different class, because I don’t want to be rude to them, while the bad rangers I wish would just go away altogether.

Vaxx.3178:

Prysin.8542:

2 – No the warrior won’t bring more CC then me, because my build(s) allows me to bring more then the warrior, without speccing specifically for CC at all. it is simply part of the package. Also, in zerg v zerg, long duration chill/cripple is almost as effective as immobilize due to the amount of cleansing around. Either way, you are slowed down by a split second or two.

Warrior has an AoE knockback, AoE cripple, knockdown, and AoE stun, on one weapon. Throw on s/s and you have immob, and another stun , or s/m and add immob, another AoE knockdown. All while using active condi clears on much, much lower cooldowns, and more stability (again on a shorter cooldown) than the Rangers, and NOT having to have a live pet close by to clear those condi’s.

Again, Warrior > Ranger in group fights at CC.

And again, no Rangers cannot do as much condi pressure as a Necro or Engi…..let alone survive better against another condi build, if both are of equal skill.

I find it funny how you cannot see this. Rose colored glasses maybe?

I will not deny that warriors survive better against condi classes, mostly because warrior or rather the cleansing on the heavy professions are a bit over the top/too easy to access as it currently stand. But that is another discussion.

And you need to face condi rangers some more. No we cannot apply the massive variety (we lack effective torment, blind and confusion application) but they can spam as much, as often, as easily, as effortlessly. And the damage we do, is more then comparable. The pet alone can dish out a condition burst comparable to the most bursty condi-necromancer build iv’e encountered yet. And that says a LOT.

Edit: we are getting off topic again. So to set things straight.

Rangers – universally underestimated, misunderstood and trivialized by the wast wast majority . Seems like there needs to be made some kick kitten videos.

Straegen.2938:

Prysin.8542:

@Straegen

They excel at roaming, because if you know how to play a ranger properly, with the proper spec. there is litterally no way in hell you will ever die unless you are jumped by 5+ enemies at once.
By speccing for maximum healing power, vitality and condition damage, you really only meet your match in the warrior, in terms of passive healing. While retaining the condition pressure of a necromancer.
The only downside is that while you may be incredibly effective 1vX. You become incredibly ineffective in groups above 10-15 players. Simply due to AOE caps, and the limitation of your condition spreading.

I believe you are a very good Ranger and probably very good player in general. However your statements are completely out of step with almost every other skilled players experience.

The ranger absolutely cannot apply the condition pressure of a necro. If you think that you have never played a condi necro at least not enough to understand its power. One signet applies more condition pressure than a Ranger can muster in the best scenario. The necro also comes to the party with boon management something that few other classes do and none as well. The Ranger’s conditioning isn’t even as good as an engi IMO.

The passive healing on a Ranger can indeed be great, but passive healing is useless against spike damage which is currently pervasive in WvW. sPvP doesn’t suffer this problem because crits have a soft cap unlike WvW. The warrior comes to the fight with multiple invulns, more armor, bigger HP pool, tons of control and vastly superior condition management which is how it survives damage spikes on a regen class. Almost every other class has a gimmick to avoid the big spikes (block, stealth, decoys, etc). The ranger also has horribad condition removal. How does a ranger even fight a condi-bunker necro aside from running away?

Conditions, immobilization, spike damage and AoE pressure are the dominant forces in WvW right now. The ranger has few defensive answers to any of these. I am not knocking you as a player. I am just at a loss for why you think the Ranger is actually a good WvW class in its current state. Viable sure… excels compared to other classes no.

Rangers are probably only beaten my necros in terms of conditions. You should check out trapper builds. BM bunker is very good for roaming too.

Prysin.8542:

Rangers – universally underestimated, misunderstood and trivialized by the wast wast majority . Seems like there needs to be made some kick kitten videos.

The problem is WvW skilled players are not seeing these great rangers. Almost nobody who is a great fighter is running this class in WvW and there is a reason for it. They are rare in GvG, few want them in skill groups and it is unusual to find one that lasts in a roaming fight more than a few seconds. Very few can survive my thief burst and none have ever bested my warrior solo. When my warrior runs into a condi-bunker Ranger it is a free meal thanks to Cleansing Ire, heavy condition reduction and tons of control output. Only necros and engis are able to apply conditions fast enough that last long enough to matter against that build.

warriorjrd.8695:

Rangers are probably only beaten my necros in terms of conditions. You should check out trapper builds. BM bunker is very good for roaming too.

No ranger build I have ever seen can out condition a conditioning necro or engi. I ran a Ranger BM condition build for hundreds of hours in WvW pre-pet nerf. I still run one in PvE since that is the toon that has map completion. My necro even with the nerfed Dhuumfire build is a much stronger condition spiker than my Ranger. Signet of Spite, Corrupt Boon, Epidemic, Plague Form, etc as well as the vast array of traits that proc conditions make the necro condition disgusting. The Tor/Fear condi builds are evil.

I was looking for a bow class when I joined this game, day 1. I thought that class was the ranger, unfortunately for my play style the better bow class was the Warrior. Now that I’ve switched I won’t go back. I’ve played my Ranger 2/3’s longer in wvw than my Warrior but my warrior is way more effective in wvw and has far surpassed the rank of my Ranger.

Now, solo roaming, I like the Ranger melee play better, but alas, this isn’t the game for that.

Prysin.8542:

snacktime.1082:

The guild I am in consistently wipes T1 zergs and organized guilds using heavy ranged, high dps setups. We dont’ have a single hammer warrior. Rangers are OK with our strats, and if there was a strat where rangers should work well, it should be the way we play.

Overall, we probably do better with more ele’s or engineers then rangers. Both have better survivability and utility with glass builds, which most of our dps classes run.

My biggest complaint is survivability. A glass ele with mist form/lightning flash can get themselves out of tough spots, ditto for engi with rocket boots/elixir S. Ranger? Not so much.

What secondary weapon does your rangers use?
Why are you not using Lightning Reflexes?
If using signets, the Signet of Stone should provide you more then enough survivability.

Right now we are using GS secondary, and we do slot Lightning reflexes. GS is a great defensive weapon, it just takes more practice to use a defensive skill that you have to swap to effectively.

We are not using the signet traits with signet of stone because we would have to give up range or piercing for it, although that might change. One of our core strats is that we have a MA and we focus target. If you have good single target dps, and your aoe’s are on CD, then you are burning down the target not just some random person. This helps a lot with downing people consistently.

Straegen.2938:

Prysin.8542:

Rangers – universally underestimated, misunderstood and trivialized by the wast wast majority . Seems like there needs to be made some kick kitten videos.

The problem is WvW skilled players are not seeing these great rangers. Almost nobody who is a great fighter is running this class in WvW and there is a reason for it. They are rare in GvG, few want them in skill groups and it is unusual to find one that lasts in a roaming fight more than a few seconds. Very few can survive my thief burst and none have ever bested my warrior solo. When my warrior runs into a condi-bunker Ranger it is a free meal thanks to Cleansing Ire, heavy condition reduction and tons of control output. Only necros and engis are able to apply conditions fast enough that last long enough to matter against that build.

warriorjrd.8695:

Rangers are probably only beaten my necros in terms of conditions. You should check out trapper builds. BM bunker is very good for roaming too.

No ranger build I have ever seen can out condition a conditioning necro or engi. I ran a Ranger BM condition build for hundreds of hours in WvW pre-pet nerf. I still run one in PvE since that is the toon that has map completion. My necro even with the nerfed Dhuumfire build is a much stronger condition spiker than my Ranger. Signet of Spite, Corrupt Boon, Epidemic, Plague Form, etc as well as the vast array of traits that proc conditions make the necro condition disgusting. The Tor/Fear condi builds are evil.

BM Condi bunker doesnt cut close to trapper in condition damage and pressure. I bet my drake pet’s burst alone could make your warrior wet it’s pants. Not to mention the lynx pet which gives you heavy bleed damage.
Last time i checked. within 3 seconds, i can apply 900 damage/second burn (lasts around 9 seconds), 900 damage/second poison (lasts about 1 minute or so), (23 stacks) 1600 damage/second bleed, cripple, immobilize (25~ish seconds), chill.
Within 16~20 seconds i can apply almost everything again. and again, and again, and again. Also, sword + dagger and a shred of timing = your hammer will probably never hit me unless i stop paying attention.

EDIT: Bear in mind that the necro is supposed to be the king of conditions. So if it couldnt do it better then rangers, the whole profession would be utterly broken. As for condition pressure. Necro is undoubtedly at top, with ranger/engineer tied for second place. Followed by Perplexity users.

Prysin.8542:

BM Condi bunker doesnt cut close to trapper in condition damage and pressure. I bet my drake pet’s burst alone could make your warrior wet it’s pants. Not to mention the lynx pet which gives you heavy bleed damage.
Last time i checked. within 3 seconds, i can apply 900 damage/second burn (lasts around 9 seconds), 900 damage/second poison (lasts about 1 minute or so), (23 stacks) 1600 damage/second bleed, cripple, immobilize (25~ish seconds), chill.
Within 16~20 seconds i can apply almost everything again. and again, and again, and again. Also, sword + dagger and a shred of timing = your hammer will probably never hit me unless i stop paying attention.

EDIT: Bear in mind that the necro is supposed to be the king of conditions. So if it couldnt do it better then rangers, the whole profession would be utterly broken. As for condition pressure. Necro is undoubtedly at top, with ranger/engineer tied for second place. Followed by Perplexity users.

To get good condition duration Rangers have to go down the Marksmanship line which has one trait that is condition based. Trap Potency is a fantastic trait but it is on the Skirmishing Line which is Precision/CD neither of which helps overall trap DPS. Trap Potency would be MUCH better if it was down a Condition Damage/Duration trait line.

It is also hard to create a solid condi-bunker on a Ranger. If they want an escape system, they get locked into the GS which is condition light. At almost every turn a Ranger build has to compromise in ways practically no other classes can.

Oh and no your Drake cannot drop enough conditions on my warrior that I would have a problem. I run way too many condition duration reduction buffs, Cleansing Ire, Mobile Strikes, Dogged March to worry about a single condi class killing me. Warrior is top of the line condition removal so not a fair comparison though. My thief most certainly does struggle with conditions, but I can reset a fight at will so in most condition fights I keep rolling the dice until I get what I want.

Lastly engis can drop more condis faster than just about anything outside of a necro and arguably faster since they have several kits that apply numerous conditions. Now that perplexity has been nerfed plexity builds aren’t nearly as powerful in WvW anymore.

Use Sword/Dagger /GS and spec into avoid and evade…use throwable traps. It is just hilarious at the roaming ability of an evasion ranger. It even gives a theif a run for their money in evasion. With the combo of back stabs and stuns all with traps constantly being thrown at their feet. IMO the ranger is the single most valuable havoc class next to the warrior.
They can’t be hit by anything if you play it right. You just work your way to the back of the battle lines in a skirmish and just troll the kitten out of the lights. Throw traps everywhere. Let the heavies deal with the damage and big guys.

Rangers are so miss played in this game is saddens me. Rangers have other weapons besides the bow. Use them. They are amazing when used right. This is just my 2 cents though. Dont deny it try it for yourself.

I had a long talk with my friend about her ranger the other day. She finally listened to me when I said rangers are never designed for “Spike” or " Condi bleed spam" as she was saying. She needed to nit pick at the enemy until they gave up or they died from the slow ticking of poison and bleed from the dagger.

Because rangers aren’t good at anything besides maybe 1v1’s in spvp.

Their utilities are GARBAGE for pve and wvw.

All the weapon skills are lacklustre, #2-5 on all of their weapons don’t do anything outstanding, or anything for team support.

They require a 30 point POWER trait just to use their signets, no other class needs to trait to use ANY of their utilities.

Simply put, every other class is 1000% better at the game.

skyz.7321:

Because rangers aren’t good at anything besides maybe 1v1’s in spvp.

Their utilities are GARBAGE for pve and wvw.

All the weapon skills are lacklustre, #2-5 on all of their weapons don’t do anything outstanding, or anything for team support.

They require a 30 point POWER trait just to use their signets, no other class needs to trait to use ANY of their utilities.

Simply put, every other class is 1000% better at the game.

And again, this is incorrect, untrue and blatantly ignorant yelling. Obviously you have next to zero experience with the profession.
40-60 hours may be enough to become decent with a warrior or guardian, but that is only peanuts in comparison to rangers. I got over 900 hours on my ranger in WvW, and i am still learning new things, new moves, combinations, builds and other technical info. There is only so much you can know about how good or bad a profession is if you only do, what i would call, a small field test. Sure some of you may not have many hours to play, some may be quick learners, others are horribly slow. But judging a professions performance on how well the people YOU have fought or fought with is not the way to go.
In that case, i can tell you that necromancers are the weakest profession ever, that they are absolutely useless and completely suck, because to this date, i have only lost to a necromancer in a 1v1, TWICE. And i knew that the player i fought at that time were better then me skill wise, as i had dueled him on his other characters before.
Now, i think most of us CAN agree that necromancers are useful, they aren’t weak, and they do not suck. However if we go by your line of thought, they should be. Because you have yet to face a good ranger (or most likely, fail to admit how badly you got beaten. Seeing as 99% of WvW players would never ever admit dieing to a ranger in a 1v1, i do not blame you), and i have yet to face a seriously good necromancer.

Personal experience =/= actual potential performance

A player can do horrible with a full zerker bearbow build, or, you can steamroll anyone you see. It depends on skill and how you utilize your utilities to the max, or not.

Now, as for ranger utilities, i will not deny that some of them need more work, and i absolutely HATE that i need to waste 30 points into marksman to get the signet active effect. If anything that trait, if Anet is unwilling to remove it and make signet work properly, should be moved to master minor tier, and master minor should be applied by default when taking 5 in marksman. But i ain’t seeing that happening ever. Because power builds are actually not in a bad spot right now. They need some fine tuning, trait and skill coefficient wise. but all in all they are actually quite good.

Ranger fans can say what they like but there is a reason nobody posts about OP rangers. The fact is when a well played one comes around it is rare and even then they are still quite beatable. I applaud players who want to master something so difficult to excel with but at least be honest about it. Almost nobody in WvW believes you because almost nobody has ever seen one of these “I just got blown up” Rangers.

Straegen.2938:

Ranger fans can say what they like but there is a reason nobody posts about OP rangers. The fact is when a well played one comes around it is rare and even then they are still quite beatable. I applaud players who want to master something so difficult to excel with but at least be honest about it. Almost nobody in WvW believes you because almost nobody has ever seen one of these “I just got blown up” Rangers.

Point is that they have most likely met a ranger a long time ago, or even recently, that wiped them effortlessly. However like you said, out of 100 rangers, 95 are going to be absolutely terrible, 4 will be average/decent and 1 will be an unstoppable force.
However, since you can respawn as quick as you can, that 1 unstoppable ranger just drowns in a sea of lootbags dropped by the 95 terrible rangers.
In short, people are so used to seeing bad rangers, that when they face off with a good one and lose, they simply refuse to admit defeat.
8/10 of my duels or 1vX ends up with the same group returning to get revenge. Even if i kill them 5 times in a row. They want to kill that ranger, not because they are mad, but because if it cannot be killed then that means their delusions about rangers are just that, delusions.
Being defeated by a ranger would mean that they would have to redefine their entire way their entire perception of the profession, and maybe, just maybe, they would have to swallow their pride and try play one to learn how it works?!

Instead, thanks to a massive playerbase, that is absolutely terrible, almost noone bothers to set up a ranger or even learn what it does, because 95/100 times, you will never ever have the slightest issue killing a ranger.
Hell, i love hunting for rangers on my ranger. Because i know that the vast majority of rangers i meet will be cannon-fodder and die. Giving me easy WXP and loot.

Prysin.8542:

Point is that they have most likely met a ranger a long time ago, or even recently, that wiped them effortlessly. However like you said, out of 100 rangers, 95 are going to be absolutely terrible, 4 will be average/decent and 1 will be an unstoppable force.
However, since you can respawn as quick as you can, that 1 unstoppable ranger just drowns in a sea of lootbags dropped by the 95 terrible rangers.
In short, people are so used to seeing bad rangers, that when they face off with a good one and lose, they simply refuse to admit defeat.

Here is the problem with that theory… I have never seen an unstoppable Ranger and I play WvW almost exclusively usually for several hours per day roaming/skirmishing. Nobody I run with has seen one of these unstoppable killers. I even have extensive Ranger WvW play and don’t even know how to build one that falls into this category.

Almost every Ranger has just been a loot bag. Sure there are very rare occasions I run into one that hits hard, evades a lot or applies a lot of condi pressure, but I constantly square off against classes that hit harder, apply more condi pressure, evade better, run faster or are far more bunker so it has been easy to adjust.

The only time a Ranger has been dangerous was pre-BM nerf when some pets hit like a truck. When I do run into a well played Ranger, the only thought that crosses my mind is how much more dangerous that player would be in another class.

ranger is not the problem, bear bows it is.

being serious, I love my ranger but this days is for pve only, in wvw they don’t bring anything that other classes can bring to the group better, they are mostly a self class that can do damage to 1 enemy because of the lack of aoe and if you want to go with greatsword you need high vit/armor which will drop your damage a lot.