Guild Wars 2

While certainly not the only class with problems, the Ranger really has had quite a poor showing in WvW in the past 2 years.

Part of the problem is the pets and spirits are literally useless in WvW due to all the AE spam that exists. Pets and spirits account for the overwhelming majority of utility available on the class. That said, even if they weren’t useless, the utility is provided in such an awkward way it’s really of limited value anyway.

In the upcoming patch we’re really not seeing much improve for the class. A slight burst increase on a weapon that is still quite poor and completely ineffective without fully traiting it. Pet traits are no longer going to be species specific, but pets are useless in anything but roaming.

So I ask… what could ANet possibly do to make commanders want to include Rangers in their groups? What could they do for the class to earn them at least 1 spot on a 20v20 GvG?

Speaking in the most general terms, the ranger can only be included in GvG if a compelling reason is given for the ranger to participate as a backline assist. There is no way that ranger can be made to work near frontline the way necro can be, due to what you’ve already pointed out.

The difficulty in slotting ranger for GvG is simply in the trade-off of the class utility that you lose vs. what you gain. It’s the same reasons that engineer isn’t used yet.

I suppose it’s worth noting also that the GvG meta-game may appear in PvP on the day that a deathmatch map is introduced.

Give us a staff with all AOE skills that offer support and CC. plz

I just join the zerg or pew pew from the walls with my Longbow or Arrow Cart. XD

Virtute.8251:

There is no way that ranger can be made to work near frontline the way necro can be, due to what you’ve already pointed out.

The difficulty in slotting ranger for GvG is simply in the trade-off of the class utility that you lose vs. what you gain. It’s the same reasons that engineer isn’t used yet.

I won’t bother saying Ranger is an ideal front liner for a GvG of any size, but I will argue that it can be viable. GS is getting buffed and Maul’s cleave will hit 5 enemies now. MH axe will stack might and OH axe is a solid option. Warhorn still has a blast finisher if your team is short on them. Entangle is about to have a much shorter cool down. Signets will now affect Rangers by default so we can run stability or invulnerability (or both) without traiting/using an elite/relying on our team. (The stability signet also grants +25% damage for the 8-second active duration.) Muddy Terrain and Healing Spring are welcome additions. Spotter is a nice little perk and Bark Skin will keep you in the fight longer. Add in a little protection on dodge roll and we’re set.

I won’t bother beating the dead horse that we don’t exactly bring what other classes bring, but don’t completely count us out as front liners. There is more to the Ranger class than full zerk pew pew.

We’ll see if we can come up with viable builds for groups in the update. But for roaming zerk rangers are good, and the cheese condi regen rangers are op.

Zanzer.6450:

So I ask… what could ANet possibly do to make commanders want to include Rangers in their groups? What could they do for the class to earn them at least 1 spot on a 20v20 GvG?

By restricting the most common build so that the players who happens to be rank or over 500 are able to use bow and bear combo (Ideally at that point no one even wants to run that one anymore as they are smart enough to know how useless it is).

felixdacat.3804:

I won’t bother saying Ranger is an ideal front liner for a GvG of any size

That’s why it hasn’t happened outside of “for a lark” situations. It falls squarely upon “anything you can do, I can do better” when considering what class+build you are removing from the group composition in favor of a ranger.

felixdacat.3804:

but I will argue that it can be viable.

If “viable” is taken as “we can get away with it”, then yes. Otherwise, no (at least not yet).

None of what can be offered for argument toward ranger viability will remove the fact that ranger is balanced in consideration of its pet’s presence in play. That pet is an actor which must contribute and be controlled. It’s a bad idea to put the pet in the frontline, the same as you wouldn’t put ranger spirits there: they’d lose their utility too quickly.

As an ally actor involved in the GvG, is the pet AI going to follow correctly through a veil? Is the pet going to soak up boons intended for the group? Is the pet going to be on-point with shadowing the driver, or will it constantly be chasing your tail? Can the pet cast skills during it’s movement animations, or will it spend most of it’s life being an expensive damage sink?

Please note that 15v15 and 20v20 are both divisible by 5 because 5 is a full party, and 5 is used in composition building for things like boon up-times. The normal exception to that rule is the periphery “gank squad” of a 15, which can often total 1 to 3 players. However, if you’re noting that staff elementalists are also on the periphery, then that brings it back to about 5.

We all know about muddy terrain and healing spring. We know that the ranger has boon sources. Entangle would be awesome to have.

lost of discussions end up in what can ranger do better than any other class can’t already do and fulfill multiple roles at the same time?
Given a 3v3 fight vs ranger, thief, warrior – which will you target first? 3v3 vs mesmer, guardian, ranger – which will you target first? yup, ranger. Ranger is always prime target because they are the “easiest” target. So you might be a wonderful player, but you’re always going to be #1 target if you play ranger and thus be viewed as a liability to your group.

20v20 ranger needs
1) At least 2 more AoE fears
2) Barrage shorter CD with torment rather than cripple or up the damage to be close to ele meteor shower
3) Rampage as one should apply to 5 allies (same as call of the wild)
4) Call of the Wild should apply 5 stacks of might
5) Spike trap should be active for 5s with bleeding increased to 10s

Even that won’t remove the pet issue. I’d rather see a turret engineer in play.

Also, 3v3 is an apple where 15v15 is an orange and 20v20 is a tomato. GvG situations are completely different. 3v3, roaming, and s/tPvP, all do not normally need to follow frontline/backline rules. In GvG, that is an absolute requirement.

Rangers were designed for small-scale/1v1 fights. Deal with it.

This thread again

^ true

Some pets to have AoE attacks/effects on auto attacks then? Canines to spawn clones like npc wolves? dunno…
Elite skill that summons a champ pet? Summon wurm would be helpful? AoE knockdown on summon and throws chill bombs…

The issue with pets in a GvG is not what they do or don’t contribute to the ally team. The issues are their mostly uncontrollable behavior, their counting as an ally target, and the ranger class being balanced so that it isn’t overpowered when the pet is in play.

not again pls. (the message lenght must be at least 15). not again pls.

pets smell bad

Swamurabi.7890:

pets smell bad

But only after underwater combat (to offset ranger underwater OP)

Zord.6130:

This thread again

Dancing Face.4695:

not again pls. (the message lenght must be at least 15). not again pls.

My thoughts exactly. How many more times will this thread need to be discussed until real change can happen? The Ranger is outclassed in every role of value in WvW. Even Yak Slapping!

The game has been out for nearly 2 years now. Has the class ever had a reason to exist in all that time other than to soak up AE damage? The point of this thread isn’t to troll or try and convince the WvW community the class is useful. It’s not!

But what do players out there feel that WvW or the Ranger is missing that could be added to the class and keep it balanced and stay within the theme of the class?

Zanzer.6450:

The point of this thread isn’t to troll or try and convince the WvW community the class is useful. It’s not!

But what do players out there feel that WvW or the Ranger is missing that could be added to the class and keep it balanced and stay within the theme of the class?

Ranger can be annoying during large fights. It can get kills. It is not GvG ready, though.

What it needs is rebalance that negates all of those reasons that have been given for two years. Those are the things that this thread has also not given solutions for, yet.

But, ANet doesn’t balance for GvG, and apparently they don’t balance for Zerg v Zerg, either.

Basically, as was said all the way back at Beta, ranger needs to be able to completely remove its pet from play, and it needs to receive some balancing stats when it is in no-pet-mode.

A summary of the previous 100 ranger discussions.

Large groups (~15+) – Rangers have absolutely nothing another class can’t do better or more often.

Small groups – Put it this way. Let’s rank player skill from 0-10, with 0 being the worst, and 10 being the top 1% of players. Rangers need to be, let’s say, 1-5 ranks higher than most classes / builds to be as effective and useful. So for instance, compared to a mediocre shout heal warrior at a 5, a ranger needs to be like a 9 to be as useful to the group.

Solo – Well, you’re own own, so it doesn’t really matter what you’re playing. Points for bravery for sure, and if you ever get a rage whisper solo roaming on a ranger, you’ve pretty much won WvW solo roaming.

Thanks for that breakdown Zen. Would it then be safe to say that the reason the Ranger must ‘outskill’ their opponent is because the class simply wasn’t given the same tools and advantages other classes have? Or are you implying there’s something inherently more difficult about shooting a bow at 1200+ range or needing to control the pet?

Condi bunker ranger handles a 3v3 far better than a longbow zerker. Basically after PBS is on cooldown a longbow ranger has to swap to a more sensible weapon or die because it has no other defense.

They can sort of roam if everything goes their way but any half-decent thief will have them on the deck without recourse. Ranger really needs all the evades and blocks provided by the sword variants, and you also have to understand what you’re fighting against so you avoid the most important ones. So it has a high skill cap.

The ranger isn’t good enough for two pretty simple reasons:
1) the pet is too much of a liability. Not only is the ranger incurring a damage penalty for the pet being kitten, it also can hurt some utility as well. For instance with a dead pet, which is very likely in large grp play, skills such as signet of renewal or protect me won’t work .

2) The group utility a ranger can provide is not good enough. Spirits may be something that could be viable, but not with the way they are now and dying way too easily when aoe breathes on them. Shouts provide what? Regeneration? Wow that’s hard to come by. Traps are decent I suppose, but make you extremely reliant on allies for things like condi removal or stab. Also to add to that stab is very hard to come by on ranger in general.

When it comes down to it, it’s very obvious ranger is more geared towards small grp/solo play.

Allow Rangers to have a self buff that relates to the pet instead on having to have the pet out

The Ranger was weak at release and nerfs have made it the worst WvW class in the game hands down. It is not best at anything productive and doesn’t crack the top three in pretty much anything useful. Playing the class means a player has to be significantly more skilled than the enemy just to break even.

My fix to the class would be to honor the actual heritage of the Ranger and make it the fastest class in the game. It should also be a natural counter to stealth. Basically the class should be built for wrecking thieves and mesmers as well as running down anything in the game. Without doubt the Ranger should be a fearsome 1v1 opponent rather than being a punchline to an unfunny joke.

Rangers are fine until the group gets larger than 5. After that they become a liability. The best wvw builds for rangers are based on condi and regen. Condi’s are better applied by necros, and regen doesn’t really help the group, unless you are a shout regen healer, which means you have a bunch of god-awful shouts as utilities. Add to that, rangers lack speed and stability. IMO, anet needs to give rangers a whole new set of shouts that actually buff allies. Then they might get some wvw love.

Straegen.2938:

The Ranger was weak at release and nerfs have made it the worst WvW class in the game hands down. It is not best at anything productive and doesn’t crack the top three in pretty much anything useful. Playing the class means a player has to be significantly more skilled than the enemy just to break even.

My fix to the class would be to honor the actual heritage of the Ranger and make it the fastest class in the game. It should also be a natural counter to stealth. Basically the class should be built for wrecking thieves and mesmers as well as running down anything in the game. Without doubt the Ranger should be a fearsome 1v1 opponent rather than being a punchline to an unfunny joke.

Well played rangers are already fearsome 1v1 opponents, and yes I say well played because you can’t judge a class by the bad players that play it. If we did that all warriors use GS+S/X and run when they are low. We aren’t useful in zergs, but then again, thieves only have a very small role in zergs as well. These rouge type classes don’t excel in the great big fights that nearly crash the servers, but they do excel in smaller scale.

Rangers should be kinda a jack of all trade but have the superior range advantages. In keeping with tradition they should have 4 basic builds

1. Ranged master. Highest ranged dps in the game or great ranged cc

2. Melee. Kinda like the the dervish in gw1 that relied on nature powers to make it strong in contrast to just base toughness and strength

3. Beast master. Rather than being the main spec this should simple be an option. Perhaps a ranger in this spec could even have the ability to have a self buff the reflects their pet instead of actually having the pet active

4. Bard. Or at least something along those lines. Using nature’s power to buff and heal themselfs and allies.

Commander assassin is always a fun role to play for Ranger. Go full glass, zerg surf backline and tab target until you find the enemy commander, then harass him/her until they die. I’ve actually been in groups of all glass Rangers more than a few times doing this where we all focus down the commander. Kill the tag and things usually crumble pretty quickly after that.

warriorjrd.8695:

Well played rangers are already fearsome 1v1 opponents, and yes I say well played because you can’t judge a class by the bad players that play it.

I haven’t been beat in a WvW duel or any fair fight by a Ranger in over a year and there are plenty of players in every other class that can whip my kitten . I used to run a Ranger (over 1k WvW hours on one) prior to the nerfs… even then it was an under performing class. Now it is just diluted beyond compare and simply doesn’t measure up against the best builds in other classes. It isn’t even a top roaming class any longer.

I think the immortal words of Blade are appropriate here:

“Some M-Fs always trying to ice skate uphill”

Being that Ranger has always been my favorite class I have to agree with Straegen. If you’re going to make the Ranger a viable option in well, anything then it needs to be more like a Ranger should be. Ranger 1v1 is pretty hard to contend with but Anet needs to wake up and fix the class. Rangers are supposed to be super agile, super quick and stealthy. The MH sword comes semi-close to what the Ranger should feel like. Quick, bouncy, precise. Anet should focus on that aspect of it and at least re-work the class so that it is responsive and useful (even if they just make them faster and more evasive.) I don’t see it happening anytime soon.

zen.6091:

and if you ever get a rage whisper solo roaming on a ranger, you’ve pretty much won WvW solo roaming.

*
(: All those poor souls who don’t know how to CC a trapper Ranger with no stunbreaks are so funny when they call me cheesy. GG, L2Stun/daze/fear/knockback/knockdown/launch

Condi regen ranger takes forever to kill, but they don’t deal much damage either, as all my WvW builds are aimed at removing condi :p

Reverence.6915:

Condi regen ranger takes forever to kill, but they don’t deal much damage either, as all my WvW builds are aimed at removing condi :p

Because of their relatively low condition removal and lack of consistent stability, no Ranger takes a long time to kill most of the time. The hardest to kill are the evasion variety built to run IMO.

Longbow Ranger vs D/P thief.

Who wins? I know.

Deli.1302:

Rangers were designed for small-scale/1v1 fights. Deal with it.

So where mesmers and thieves and they still have incredibly powerful WvW utility.

Our pets would need to be able to climb walls again to even come close to the usefulness of thief scouting/yakkilling and mesmer portaling.

Substance E.4852:

Deli.1302:

Rangers were designed for small-scale/1v1 fights. Deal with it.

So where mesmers and thieves and they still have incredibly powerful WvW utility.

Mesmers yes but thieves not so much. Thieves are certainly a premier roaming class though.

Straegen.2938:

Substance E.4852:

Deli.1302:

Rangers were designed for small-scale/1v1 fights. Deal with it.

So where mesmers and thieves and they still have incredibly powerful WvW utility.

Mesmers yes but thieves not so much. Thieves are certainly a premier roaming class though.

A good thief will need a whole party to hunt him down to keep him from killing a yak along the road to Garrison over and over and I’ve seen several tail enemy zergs for nearly an hour with his tag on letting us know where they were.

Some ideas for ranger to be viable in a GvG:

Longbow automatically pierces up to 3 targets, #3 also leaps backwards by 600, #4 hits 3 targets in an arc, #5 buff damage
Separate the heal burst and the water field effects of Healing Spring, so a ranger can cast HS for their team to blast and use the burst heal 10sec later. Reduce duration/ recharge by 50%, tone down regen.
Spike trap should be a pulsing effect, 3-5 seconds. Increase radius of traps.
Buff the leap portion of greatsword #5 by 300, increase the daze to 3 sec stun to 2 sec, hits 3 targets
Axe auto should be buffed for power specs, #3 is an aoe hits 3 targets
Reduce recharge of warhorn #5 by 10sec, boon duration by 5 sec, #4 hits 3 targets

Basically I’m trying to make rangers the kings of aoe soft cc (cripple, chill) while giving them a damage boost, as well as more utility.

remove the pets, it’s a dead weight pulling down the whole class.

• can’t dps properly because of movement.
• ranger dps lower because of pet.
• it’s hard to burst damage always because you have to time your and your pet attack (never).
• we have new stat acquisition with the ascended gear while pet stat remain the same. let’s imagine a duel vs a full ascended ranger vs a full ascendend opponent. the opponent can sit and laugh at pet damage with it’s purple gear and if condition based the pet will just die with emphatic bond traited.

remove the pet.

Ranger = Expert Mode in WvW…simple as that.

We need to play smarter, react faster, and pay attention more acutely in order to be successful.

…and our Pets are absolutely USELESS in large fights.

This game doesn’t have GvG. It has ZergVSZerg and GlobVSGlob.

ANET has no interest in making a competitive game mode.

Pray For Kosmos.5849:

This game doesn’t have GvG. It has ZergVSZerg and GlobVSGlob.

ANET has no interest in making a competitive game mode.

15 people is quite the zerg, I love when s/tpvpers think they are better than GvG guilds because they do 5v5 as opposed to 15v15. You can try and make it sound as skill less as you want, but there’s no explaining the gap between the top GvG guilds and the lower ones if it’s just mindless game play.