Guild Wars 2

i dont know why you whan to change things on the only working build
spirit ranger Oo

the sun spirit blind is really useful and there is for sure active play with it.
for example you can blind your enemy if you whant finish a enemy player
or you can blind a hambow warrior when he is on hammer.

the stone spirit active is also really strong and useful.
you can combinate it with your spider immobilize.

sometimes i dont understand why everybody think spirit ranger is full passive gameplay.
you can play it passive, but if you also play it active its much better and it shows who is a main ranger player and who not sometimes.

at least i can use my spirits to bodyblock projectiles, sometimes i even dont notice a spirit bodyblocked a pindown or something like that.
i like how the spirits work atm,
also because the spirit ranger is not the ai spammer.
the real ai spammer is mesmer and minion master necro, this ones deal damage and mesmer clones bring much more chaos into a teamfight then spirits.
the spirits give passive effects make team mates and yourself stronger, have
nice active skills to use and they dont look like the player at least.

i think the 3 builds anet should focus hard next in order is
trapper ranger, power ranger and then a beastmaster ranger or shout ranger

this by change trapper traits, improve power based weapons and rework all shouts and some signets, like much peoples allready wrote here.

but i dont know why you focus on spirit ranger, maybe for wvw?
because im just fine with it in pvp.
i just think the frost spirit need a improve, like give chill to the passive effect and give it a new active

Body blocking is advantageous to the Ranger, but it’s pretty overpowered when it comes to PvP. Screen clutter is the other issue and is something ANet has said they want to improve on. The easiest way to do this is to simply remove the spirits and make them passive effects on the pet.

There are advantages to making them centered on the pet too.

For starters, the Spirits will move on their own at that point which makes them valuable to the class as a whole whether you invest traits into them or not.

It will also give the Ranger more control over them and how you deploy them because they’ll follow your pet instead. It will allow you to decide if maybe your spirits would be more valuable on the boss in melee range on a cat or a safe distance away from the boss in a scorpion. They’ll also be easy to relocate without dying because of your pet controls.

The only real downfall to the change is the fact that they’ll be attached to a pet that for all intents and purposes, simply doesn’t work. But ANet has assured us (lol, I know…) that the pet is a priority for them. Removing their ability to body block and all the clutter they cause was likely going to be nerfed anyway.

Right now the body blocking on moving spirits is an absolutely skill-less advantage. Yes, it is an advantage and part of what makes the build strong currently. But it relies on basically standing in a group of near constantly moving AI and mitigating damage which is pretty mindless, and I would wager that most rangers aren’t even aware when they are running spirits of whether or not there spirits are essentially “clutching” situations by absorbing damage for them.

Body blocking in the game should be much more positioning based than just summoning and sitting in a group of AI creatures.

But then on top of that, you have all of the advantages covered by Atherakhia of the change, and you just end up with a much more robust system that is capable of an array of strategies that just aren’t currently available. Right now, it’s just a pack of AI with a bunch of passive procs and actives that are only strong because they proc each other.

From a PvP perspective, Spirits in their current iteration are a training wheels build that is much more effective than it ever should have been. It’s part of the hambow/pistol whip/decap engi/etc cheese trash garbage builds that are currently devaluing the competitive play in the game and keeping the “high level” play from getting any higher because all of the training wheels easy builds are more effective than the ones that require more active play, actions per minute, skill, and knowledge to play.

Keep in mind that this isn’t necessarily a “buff rangers” thread everybody, it’s a thread made with the objective of addressing any issues that the ranger has and how ultimately to make changes to the class that overall would be the most healthy changes for the game/metagame.

The proposed change is a good idea though.

You’re allowed to disagree with me and more than entitled to your opinions! I just enjoy the constructive conversation and it’s nice for everything to be able to talk about things from multiple perspectives and viewpoints until we’ve painted a picture of all the different angles on the subject.

Durzlla.6295:

So, me and Jcbroe were talking with some people about spirits, and my idea (based off of Battosais idea) for spirits is that you “summon” then for 60s (like now), but instead of an actual spirit a wisp floats around your pet (blue for water, purple for storm, orange for sun, yellowish brown for stone, white/almost white blue for frost, very large green wisp for elite) each one would give a passive effect, this effect would be “every 5th hit X effect occurs.” This passive would NOT be very powerful and would provide a very mediocre buff for everyone effected.

However, activating the spirit would “kill” the spirit and make your pet radiate with an aura, this aura would provide a pulsing benefit to allies near your pet as well as make your pets every 3rd attack apply a stronger effect than the passive.

EX: Sun Spirit: Summon a spirit to aid your allies in battle, causing every 5th attack for allies in range to Burn for 1s. Duration: 60s

Suns Might: The Spirit uses it’s remaining energy to imbue your pet with strength, causing every 3rd attack to blind and burn the target for 2s, and to give allies within X radius 1stack of might for 5s every second. Duration: 5s

The traits would OBVIOUSLY have to change as well, I’d like to see them become something like this:

Vigorous Spirit: renamed to Invigorating Spirits, is now the Grand Master trait, effect changed to: Your pet gains increased stacks for each spirit and aura attached to it.

Spirits Unbound: now an Adept Trait, your spirits CD is reduced by 20%

Natures Vengeance: The active effects of the spirits are increased, additionally effects of the spirits occur a hit earlier (IE passive effect is now 4 hits, not 5).

This would 1) remove cluttering 2) make spirits more fun to use and less mindless 3) allow MORE counter play to how spirits are, now killing the pet would end ALL spirit effects as well as the pet dying, this makes loading up 5 spirits into your pet very risky, but at the same time VERY powerful 4) this would allow tankier pets (such as bears and pigs) to be stronger in more aspects of the game 5) this doesn’t necisarily hell PETS in WvW, but it makes spirits less easy to pick off and die to AoE and 6) it makes spirits less point demanding to be good, but still rewards (and encourages) dumping points into spirits.

I don’t like the idea, even if it might be good. (side note, I never played spirits build)
1) A ranger using spirits as a damage sponge, is loosing out (need to use their active at the good time to be effective). Since spirits don’t really attack, spirits are just somewhat helpful against ranged foes (melee get at us – don’t mind the spirits. Beaten quite a few spirits ranger, and have yet to be beaten by one… cheese builds are usually skilless play that makes almost sure wins… not sure it applies to spirits rangers)

2) Screen clutter.
And what is a minion master necro?
I know they have their own issues, but I sure don’t find 4 passive spirits to “clutter the screen” that much.

3) Pathing issue. Hate how the pet always goes the long way around when I jump over something. If I want an active, might want it here and now, not whenever my pet feels like being by my side. (Especially when going in a keep’s lord room to summon the elite and rez the lord… the pet won’t make it to the lord… and given it does not stay close to me, even on passive, pet keeps wandering somewhat at 600 around me…)(can add to it the elite spirit summoning for self-rez that requires great timing and quite some skills while having spirits on unreliable wandering pet would make it impossible to self-rez)

4) The pet is way too unreliable.
Right now, it’s pretty easier for a ranged ranger to “save it’s pet” (with F3 “come back to me” to get it out of AoE, for instance), but then the ranger would not get the buffs.
But, when meleeing, the only way to get the pet elsewhere is guard (given there are no other foes in range), which has a too long cast time, with a not fast enough pet reaction time to be really effective in allowing for pet repositionning. (and once every 15 seconds is not much for pet repositionning through a fight)
With the inability to direct the pet, comes the fact it’s harder to keep it alive, thus the necessity to swap it, this lose the effect for too long.
Possible solution : Change F1 to trigger “attack”/“come back to me”, and F3 becomes a targetting repositionning tool (which would also help all ranger builds). (Don’t think a CD is warranted, the counterpart of using the repositionning is a loss in DPS, and used to late would not allow the pet to have time to walk out of AoE).

(followed from previous)

If the idea would carry on, nevertheless;
Regarding pet swap : I think a trait should allow for spirits to transfer to swapped pet.
A way I see traits could be changes :
Adept : Vigorous Spirit : your pet and up to 5 allies get (random number) +10 (random number) vitality per active spirit; (adept because vitality is not considered a must in most setting)
Master : Spirits Unbound : active spirits are transferred on pet swap (shouldn’t be free, nor inaccessible)
GM : Natures Vengeance : spirits effects trigger on pet death or pet swap (would be strong, so hard to get, and in concurrence with the new master, so have to chose between a cleanse that doesn’t hurt the pet (compared to the wilderness tree one) and more active effects for spirits).

I find it would help with keeping pet alive and make synergy with the spirits being on the pet.

I’m wondering if this patch is going to be the Ranger’s time to shine. I’m certainly not putting the slightest bit of hope into that. Just seems that from the CDIs and whatnot that the Ranger was going to be at the forefront of this balance patch.

thefantasticg.3984:

I’m wondering if this patch is going to be the Ranger’s time to shine. I’m certainly not putting the slightest bit of hope into that. Just seems that from the CDIs and whatnot that the Ranger was going to be at the forefront of this balance patch.

I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if the pet F2 fix, viper trap getting a poison field, the healing spirit nerf “fix” and the new traits were the only things we get out of this.

Anytime the devs say Rangers are going to get “amazing” things, it’s always bad mojo…

I’m actually expecting this update to be severely lacking in balance changes across the board.

Akisame.9508:

OGDeadHead.8326:

If warrior damage is 100, what is ranger damage compared to that?

1. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every fourth/fifth attack = ? damage
2. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every second attack = ? damage
3. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every attack = ? damage

I would think that ranger total damage was calculated from the beginning to be ranger+pet hit all of their attacks, just like any other class.

That is the way they are doing the math, problem is pet hits less then 25% of the time and is normally dead (in WvW at least) through 3/4 of the battle on a 60 second timer is it? Leaving us with 30% less damage for a full minute during a battle. Not only that but we don’t even hit all the time with ranged weapons because of the constant sidestepping to evade our arrows and if they are standing on a pebble we get a obstruction message or out of range message even if they are not obstructed or out of range. I love it when I can’t hit someone below me from the fort wall with a bow and arrow because they are out of range but if I could spit, I’d nail them in the forehead! They need to give ranger’s 100% of the damage control, pet’s do not work, they stated this already, and they also stated that they do not plan on fixing it any time soon. We’ve waited a year already, it’s time for us to receive our full damage and screw the pet!

This is why the ranger should be more like in first GW. I havn’t played GW2 for a year now and yes maybe the biggest reason is that no one of my friends play any more but one of the reasons is that I was so dissapointed by my favorit GW profession, the ranger.
It is so obvious. The ranger is dependant of a stupid AI creature, and yes this has been taken up before. But I realy can not figure out why Anet are so perverse about this, almost childish. It is as simple as 1+1. I hear ranger is not welcome in some parties because it so bad. Rangers damage is dependant on a usualy dead AI. Humans will always be better at situation awarenes than an AI! The answer should be simple. Make pet optional with beastmaster like in GW. That way you can skip pet in sertain situations, like WvW.
So pitty that a game I waited for five years was such a huge dissapointment only because this small thing.
Anet stop being so perverse and see the truth, the ranger need some care!!

Stalkarn.1329:

Akisame.9508:

OGDeadHead.8326:

If warrior damage is 100, what is ranger damage compared to that?

1. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every fourth/fifth attack = ? damage
2. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every second attack = ? damage
3. Ranger hits every attack, pet hits every attack = ? damage

I would think that ranger total damage was calculated from the beginning to be ranger+pet hit all of their attacks, just like any other class.

That is the way they are doing the math, problem is pet hits less then 25% of the time and is normally dead (in WvW at least) through 3/4 of the battle on a 60 second timer is it? Leaving us with 30% less damage for a full minute during a battle. Not only that but we don’t even hit all the time with ranged weapons because of the constant sidestepping to evade our arrows and if they are standing on a pebble we get a obstruction message or out of range message even if they are not obstructed or out of range. I love it when I can’t hit someone below me from the fort wall with a bow and arrow because they are out of range but if I could spit, I’d nail them in the forehead! They need to give ranger’s 100% of the damage control, pet’s do not work, they stated this already, and they also stated that they do not plan on fixing it any time soon. We’ve waited a year already, it’s time for us to receive our full damage and screw the pet!

This is why the ranger should be more like in first GW. I havn’t played GW2 for a year now and yes maybe the biggest reason is that no one of my friends play any more but one of the reasons is that I was so dissapointed by my favorit GW profession, the ranger.
It is so obvious. The ranger is dependant of a stupid AI creature, and yes this has been taken up before. But I realy can not figure out why Anet are so perverse about this, almost childish. It is as simple as 1+1. I hear ranger is not welcome in some parties because it so bad. Rangers damage is dependant on a usualy dead AI. Humans will always be better at situation awarenes than an AI! The answer should be simple. Make pet optional with beastmaster like in GW. That way you can skip pet in sertain situations, like WvW.
So pitty that a game I waited for five years was such a huge dissapointment only because this small thing.
Anet stop being so perverse and see the truth, the ranger need some care!!

Amen brother!

Different pet options were discussed during the Ranger CDI though, so as much as the contribution to the discussion and the thread is appreciated, I do feel that the pet has been discussed to death and acknowledged by the devs at this point (speaking about turning the pets into an aspects idea that grant buffs and such instead of having them be an active AI, etc).

Not to be rude at all, I really do appreciate the input for the thread I’m just trying to push for conversations that haven’t been covered by the CDI is all, so that we can attempt to grasp at anything that the CDI may not have covered.

Off topic. I got a noob question. Im trying to run power spirit build with frost and storm. Im just wondering if storm spirit active damage increases with player stats damage?

AEFA.9035:

Off topic. I got a noob question. Im trying to run power spirit build with frost and storm. Im just wondering if storm spirit active damage increases with player stats damage?

No it doesn’t, dunno why Anet simply nerfed it rather than giving it a coefficient.

jcbroe.4329:

I’m just trying to push for conversations that haven’t been covered by the CDI is all, so that we can attempt to grasp at anything that the CDI may not have covered.

sorry to say it again, because i think that the devs dont noticed anything about power ranger issues…
i really think they have no idea about how bad the longsword and longbow feel to play right now.
to use this two weapons with a offensive build is totaly frustrating, its not even worth to create a ranger if you want to run this weapons.

every other profession can survive much better and deal much more aoe/target damage then any kind of power ranger

for example every ele have more survive and mobility + more aoe dmg then a power ranger with this two weapons.
every thief have more survive, mobility and stealth + much more target dmg then a power ranger.
every offensive guardian heave more survive by heal and block and perma vigor dodge + much more aoe and target dmg.
every warrior, ok i dont need to say anything here.
every mesmer have more survive by stealth, port and clone spam + much more aoe damage then a joke ranger with longbow or longsword…
i can keep this with every professions…
every one of them free kill a power ranger build if they dont played totaly bad.

if anet dont want a ranger to “burst” and to make him a sustain profession.
i just wonder why the hell a ranger with this two weapon sets have like zero survive mechanics…
i also dont understand the vigor regeneration nerf in the past, because much other professions can dodge nearly same much like a ranger by heaving perma vigor.
even the ele get on dagger now a dodge, i mean wtf.
i was think ranger should be the survive and damage over time profession.
its like a bad joke to give a ele a dodge attack with huge aoe dmg and the same cooldown as my sword 3 dodge (15secs)…

actually, i think the next patch will change zero for ranger.
it will be the old spirit ranger build or another kind of condi ranger to play, for sure.

edit: so i think there need not as much discussion about spirit ranger as about all of the other builds (trapper, longbow/longsword, bm ranger, “shouts?!?!?!”)

Oidmetala.8426:

jcbroe.4329:

I’m just trying to push for conversations that haven’t been covered by the CDI is all, so that we can attempt to grasp at anything that the CDI may not have covered.

sorry to say it again, because i think that the devs dont noticed anything about power ranger issues…
i really think they have no idea about how bad the longsword and longbow feel to play right now.
to use this two weapons with a offensive build is totaly frustrating, its not even worth to create a ranger if you want to run this weapons.

every other profession can survive much better and deal much more aoe/target damage then any kind of power ranger

for example every ele have more survive and mobility + more aoe dmg then a power ranger with this two weapons.
every thief have more survive, mobility and stealth + much more target dmg then a power ranger.
every offensive guardian heave more survive by heal and block and perma vigor dodge + much more aoe and target dmg.
every warrior, ok i dont need to say anything here.
every mesmer have more survive by stealth, port and clone spam + much more aoe damage then a joke ranger with longbow or longsword…
i can keep this with every professions…
every one of them free kill a power ranger build if they dont played totaly bad.

if anet dont want a ranger to “burst” and to make him a sustain profession.
i just wonder why the hell a ranger with this two weapon sets have like zero survive mechanics…
i also dont understand the vigor regeneration nerf in the past, because much other professions can dodge nearly same much like a ranger by heaving perma vigor.
even the ele get on dagger now a dodge, i mean wtf.
i was think ranger should be the survive and damage over time profession.
its like a bad joke to give a ele a dodge attack with huge aoe dmg and the same cooldown as my sword 3 dodge (15secs)…

actually, i think the next patch will change zero for ranger.
it will be the old spirit ranger build or another kind of condi ranger to play, for sure.

edit: so i think there need not as much discussion about spirit ranger as about all of the other builds (trapper, longbow/longsword, bm ranger, “shouts?!?!?!”)

I am very much in agreement that the CDI did not cover the actual issues that any of the power builds have.

The patch coming up, as far as we know at this point, really fails to reflect any significant changes for power builds either, at least directly. My assumption is that we can theorycraft some sort of rune and trait combination that will be better off for our power builds than at this moment, but none of the inherent issues look to be actually addressed at this point, which I know is the source of a lot of us PvP players less than excitement, since it doesn’t seem to be shaking up our Apex Predator build diversity issues in PvP.

Durzlla.6295:

So, me and Jcbroe were talking with some people about spirits, and my idea (based off of Battosais idea) for spirits is that you “summon” then for 60s (like now), but instead of an actual spirit a wisp floats around your pet (blue for water, purple for storm, orange for sun, yellowish brown for stone, white/almost white blue for frost, very large green wisp for elite) each one would give a passive effect, this effect would be “every 5th hit X effect occurs.” This passive would NOT be very powerful and would provide a very mediocre buff for everyone effected.

However, activating the spirit would “kill” the spirit and make your pet radiate with an aura, this aura would provide a pulsing benefit to allies near your pet as well as make your pets every 3rd attack apply a stronger effect than the passive.

EX: Sun Spirit: Summon a spirit to aid your allies in battle, causing every 5th attack for allies in range to Burn for 1s. Duration: 60s

Suns Might: The Spirit uses it’s remaining energy to imbue your pet with strength, causing every 3rd attack to blind and burn the target for 2s, and to give allies within X radius 1stack of might for 5s every second. Duration: 5s

The traits would OBVIOUSLY have to change as well, I’d like to see them become something like this:

Vigorous Spirit: renamed to Invigorating Spirits, is now the Grand Master trait, effect changed to: Your pet gains increased stacks for each spirit and aura attached to it.

Spirits Unbound: now an Adept Trait, your spirits CD is reduced by 20%

Natures Vengeance: The active effects of the spirits are increased, additionally effects of the spirits occur a hit earlier (IE passive effect is now 4 hits, not 5).

This would 1) remove cluttering 2) make spirits more fun to use and less mindless 3) allow MORE counter play to how spirits are, now killing the pet would end ALL spirit effects as well as the pet dying, this makes loading up 5 spirits into your pet very risky, but at the same time VERY powerful 4) this would allow tankier pets (such as bears and pigs) to be stronger in more aspects of the game 5) this doesn’t necisarily hell PETS in WvW, but it makes spirits less easy to pick off and die to AoE and 6) it makes spirits less point demanding to be good, but still rewards (and encourages) dumping points into spirits.

Although an interesting concept with spirits changed to pet auras, (that someone else already mentioned on the cdi btw), that type of change raises some questions:

Things that would be worse compared to how they work now:
- using their actives makes them go away
- no more body blocking
- easier to target the ranger because there are no spirits around
- if you send your pet away too far from you, you won’t benefit from their passives (correct me if I’m wrong here – spirit passive = 1000?)

Things that would be better compared to how they work now:
- you can send your ‘spirits’ to locations not in your immediate vicinity, allowing their buffs to land on ppl not close to you

Question:
What happens when you swap pets?
The active in you example, every third pet hit, and a duration of only five seconds, just how many attacks do you think the pets would be able to land in that amount of time? Should it be the first attack and then every three after that or?

For a change like this, I think the range needs to be extended for the players that likes to use the longbow at max range, so that they also can benefit from the passive. Either that, or exclude the range limitation from the ranger himself, so that the ranger is always buffed by the spirits.

I would like to get some clarification about the upcoming Pet Fix, is it just limited to pet responsiveness or does it also fix the WvW HP of all pets? I mean that alone renders the pets unable to contribute 30% of our damage, Wolf pets have 14k HP, what’s up with that?

Arlette.9684:

I would like to get some clarification about the upcoming Pet Fix, is it just limited to pet responsiveness or does it also fix the WvW HP of all pets? I mean that alone renders the pets unable to contribute 30% of our damage, Wolf pets have 14k HP, what’s up with that?

It should just be responsiveness, pets are pretty survivable in WvW (as much so as any player), the only flaw with them is that unless you’re running ranged/Melee pet your pets become significantly less useful while at a stand off.

However, so does any pure Melee build or profession lacking in long range (thief for example)

Since we still feel the need to discuss pets, here’s my thoughts on it. At this point, pet survivability is actually very good across the entire rest of the game, and only suffers during certain PvE mechanics and large scale battles in WvW (mostly melee pets on this end).

Now in PvE, 99.9% of the issues are caused by development oversight on the mechanics that are harmful to a pet class is the effort to create as epic or memorable of an encounter as possible. It is something that gets fixed by reworking/creating content in the future that is more mindful towards classes that have to rely on their AI features to achieve their maximum output.

In WvW, survivability isn’t the issue. Everything not being supported directly by their group and that doesn’t have the capability to dodge through the millions of red rings and stuns is going to die, and there aren’t many fixes to that issue that don’t break the rest of the game.

Instead, pets should be as efficient as possible so that their existence actually matters more than it currently does at times. Now, these statements are mostly geared at melee pets. Melee pets don’t have the inherent ability within their tracking algorithm combined with the constant swiftness that opponents can maintain to be able to reliably damage opponents enough to be considered a valuable input to certain scenarios. The fix to this would be do pull a guild wars 1 balance trick and take agility training, integrate into how the pets perform on a basic level, and by doing so, open up another trait slot in the skirmishing line.

All in all, we’ll have to wait and see. What I’m suggesting is really just a bandaid fix assuming AI pathing is actually good enough to track moving targets reliably, but if ANet has no intention of continuing to work on that aspect of the pets, than agility training definitely needs to be made into a baseline feature of ranger pets.

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

We just need to get something from their death for the duration of the swap timer… or have their health and toughness scale with the content (eg: AoE heavy boss or the presence of ennemy zerg(as in PvE scaling).

I did try to micro-manage pets in WvW zergs (shouts/BM build, with the infamous bears that should be able to hold with defy pain and other mechanism). In open fights, it was not too bad, but in any towers/keep fights, there was nothing to be done.

I know some people state they have no difficulty keeping their pet in WvW zergs, but I never saw a video of it. Most just use their pet special ability and wait the 60 seconds penalty to call the new pet if they need it…

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

Arlette.9684:

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

Jocksy.3415:

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

Your point is? All pets, minions, etc. got an Hp buff in PvE only content. WvW is not PvE. Buffing pet health by 70% there would not solve a single problem, especially in smaller group/solo fights.

Also, your pet has 2061 toughness, about as much armor as you would have in a full zerker set up, however, if you ever bother to take the effort to use beastmastery (and master’s bond), that same pet would have 2,561 toughness. Its also not that hard to give it perma protection, making it extremely hard to kill.

Its actually not that hard for me to build up a pet and have even cats and birds standing up to those fabled 1 shot boss mechanics. Your pet IS GOING TO DIE if you don’t bother to invest in it though, which is mostly the point.

NEXT!

Chrispy.5641:

Arlette.9684:

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

Jocksy.3415:

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

Your point is? All pets, minions, etc. got an Hp buff in PvE only content. WvW is not PvE. Buffing pet health by 70% there would not solve a single problem, especially in smaller group/solo fights.

Also, your pet has 2061 toughness, about as much armor as you would have in a full zerker set up, however, if you ever bother to take the effort to use beastmastery (and master’s bond), that same pet would have 2,561 toughness. Its also not that hard to give it perma protection, making it extremely hard to kill.

Its actually not that hard for me to build up a pet and have even cats and birds standing up to those fabled 1 shot boss mechanics. Your pet IS GOING TO DIE if you don’t bother to invest in it though, which is mostly the point.

NEXT!

Some faith in the community has been restored…

Chrispy.5641:

Arlette.9684:

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

Jocksy.3415:

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

Your point is? All pets, minions, etc. got an Hp buff in PvE only content. WvW is not PvE. Buffing pet health by 70% there would not solve a single problem, especially in smaller group/solo fights.

Also, your pet has 2061 toughness, about as much armor as you would have in a full zerker set up, however, if you ever bother to take the effort to use beastmastery (and master’s bond), that same pet would have 2,561 toughness. Its also not that hard to give it perma protection, making it extremely hard to kill.

Its actually not that hard for me to build up a pet and have even cats and birds standing up to those fabled 1 shot boss mechanics. Your pet IS GOING TO DIE if you don’t bother to invest in it though, which is mostly the point.

NEXT!

You shouldn’t have to trait and use your utility skills so your pet can function properly. In wvw pets are a joke because they don’t dodge AOE. Even in 1v1s a veteran player can kite the pet easily because the pathing for pets is still to this day horrible.

The pet is an extension of the ranger, like an extra arm. We shouldn’t have to trait so that that arm has armour and doesn’t die too quick, they should be able to survive a bit on their own without the beast master traits.

Chrispy.5641:

Arlette.9684:

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

Jocksy.3415:

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

Your point is? All pets, minions, etc. got an Hp buff in PvE only content. WvW is not PvE. Buffing pet health by 70% there would not solve a single problem, especially in smaller group/solo fights.

Also, your pet has 2061 toughness, about as much armor as you would have in a full zerker set up, however, if you ever bother to take the effort to use beastmastery (and master’s bond), that same pet would have 2,561 toughness. Its also not that hard to give it perma protection, making it extremely hard to kill.

Its actually not that hard for me to build up a pet and have even cats and birds standing up to those fabled 1 shot boss mechanics. Your pet IS GOING TO DIE if you don’t bother to invest in it though, which is mostly the point.

NEXT!

And once again you have described perfectly why the pet is broken.
The pet is forced. It takes away our damage. And we get punished for that. So we are supposed to spend 30 points into a traitline just to ensure that 30% of our damage isn’t dead instant? That’s as stupid as it can get. Other classes invest points to increase their damage or to get tankier. We have to spend points just to ensure to not start with a disadvantage.

Don’t get me wrong: If you want to play with your pet, you have to take care about it. But if you don’t want it, your pet will be a burden in every single meaning.

Rangers aren’t the only class that has to trait to make their mechanic useful.

Thieves get a pretty much useless item on steal for about half of the profession that does no damage without traiting. Arguably, thieves require 40 trait points (10/x/x/x/30) to make steal even remotely worthwhile.

Warriors with no burst mastery are barely ever going to be able to use their mechanic, and because Warriors best cleansing comes in the form of cleansing Ire, every single viable Warrior build at top level competitive play runs (x/x/20/x/30) at the bare minimum.

Also, engineers toolbelt mechanic is fairly lacking on most of the options you gain from the slot skills, traited or not. Traited creates 1 build, static discharge, but even then, 50%+ of engineer toolbelt skills really aren’t all that “meaningful.”

So yes, ANet built certain classes in the game with the intent that you have to invest trait points into the mechanic to actually make that mechanic useful in combat.

But one more time, in bold so I can really drive the point home that we no longer need to discuss pets:

ANet acknowledged during the ranger CDI that ranger pets are not where they should be at the moment and that many fixes are being discussed and tested internally. It was explicitly stated that any changes we see in the upcoming patch will not be the last time that ranger pets ever receive work.

So, because this is a post CDI discussion now, I have to request that because ANet has made an official acknowledgement of pets during the CDI that unless it is an improvement suggestion regarding pets, that the argument that “pets are broken” no longer be used as justification to argue the merits of a constructive idea or be dismissive, because posts after the CDI suggesting ideas should just be assumed that “in a perfect world pets would be balanced by ANet accordingly for this change.”

Any discussion that involves just explicitly complaining about the negatives about pets is beating a dead horse and is no longer constructive at this point. However, if you actually have anything positive or constructive to say regarding pets, please feel free to continue discussing them, as that’s what this thread is for

For the positive motivation aspect; Mission Accomplished. ANet has acknowledged and is now more than well aware of the issues regarding out pets. It’s time to move the discussion along.

So I’ll ask again: Is there anything anybody can think of that was not addressed by the ranger CDI?

Maybe it’s just me, but the more I recall the CDI thread, the less I feel as though ANet acknowledged our dependency on 30 trait point investments. Maybe that’s just me though.

My point was that the HP they have in WvW doesn’t match their Vitality. I mean regardless of pet toughness, a wolf with 14k HP instead of the 22k that it should have and does have anywhere outside of WvW. A warrior AoE’s for more than the HP of that pet.

But Jcbroe, every other class is at least functional before you invest traits. They have completely viable weapon sets and utility skills to pull from. Where other classes would use their traits to specialize their weapon skills and utilities into a specific play style, the Ranger must invest traits before their weapons or utility skills are even worth considering.

I also disagree with you that any other class in this game other than Engineers have a truly underwhelming class mechanic, and even engineers are much better than the state Ranger pets are in.

Your Warrior example is bunk right off the bat since the other meta build most choose is 0/0/30/30/10 in WvW. I personally run 0/25/30/0/15. I have no problem with fury generation.

Take the thief dagger build of 0/30/30/10/0. Nothing there to improve steal other than stealth on steal which most don’t take. Yet this is the most common build for WvW.

And cleansing ire? The simple fact is that condis in this game are completely out of control and nearly every class that has a trait to clear condis is considering it mandatory these days. Thieves with Shadow Embrace and Rangers with Empathic Bond. I honeslty wouldn’t be surprised to see Rangers running //30/30/* builds with Empathic Bond, the new Nature trait, signet of renewel and 2 survival skills come next patch.

Now as for a topic that wasn’t covered in the CDI? While it was touched on, I don’t feel it was sufficiently discussed… why does no one want anything to do with the Ranger class in WvW?

The Ranger is a duelist class. Nearly all their utility and weapon skills have 1v1 in mind and the class brings very little actual worth to a group. No one wants a Ranger anywhere near them in a zerg. Guilds don’t actively recruit them for GvG. Most guilds go out of their way to specifically mention no Rangers within 100miles of them in fact. Why? And why has this issue been around for a year now?

And just to get ahead of the debate I know that’s coming… I don’t buy into the whole thing being a conspiracy perpetuated by the GW2 player culture. It’s not a reasonable thing to say the Ranger community has the most baddies. Even the greatest PvP guilds can’t theorycraft a functional use for the class before you even factor in player skill.

Okay -

Couple points I think didn’t get hit hard enough in the CDI.

Skrimishing traitline is BAD……Full of traps and pet traits. There is NOTHING in this traitline worth taking unless you are traps but the stat combo is GREAT for power builds. There needs to be more POWER based traits in skrimish. (Ex/ Why would anybody want to take something like carniverous appetite when I can just swap the pet if it gets low)

2. This class is REALLY hit hard by traits that affect only 1 weapon. By default, traits that affect only one weapon really need to be looked at and should be stronger than those affecting multiple
(Looking at you RtW and Axe Mastery)

There is more – but I think those are my two strongest so lets start there.

Chrispy.5641:

Arlette.9684:

Ranger pets are as survivable as it gets? Alright, I invite you to look at these two SS I just took and tell me what’s the difference.

http://imageshack.com/a/img703/8910/4x5o.jpg

and

http://imageshack.com/a/img856/5782/dup9.jpg

Jocksy.3415:

Pet got scaled up in PvE, which makes them almost no-brainer in most content, but still don’t save them from one-shot mechanisms, and if we have the trait, they gain protection at the beginning of our dodge-roll, which still makes them long-standing in most content (where I didn’t have problem keeping them alive to begin with), but still don’t make a meaningful difference for the encounters where I couldn’t keep it alive…

WvW is not PvE. Buffing pet health by 70% there would not solve a single problem, especially in smaller group/solo fights.

Except that it is. PVE balance has always been put into WvW, except for this instance.

And adding HP to pets will not solve everything but it certainly is a good start especially given that mode was not meant to have balanced 1 vs 1.

That’s a cop out response to justify bad choices. This is a prime example of the type of “balancing” that makes people question the balance devs.

People have also missed another point from the pics. The pet is not getting any kind of increased stats from the bloodlust buffs, which further compounds the problem of this class getting short changed, just like pets not getting their stats bumped up to account for ascended equipment.

#DoMoreGetLess

Arlette.9684:

My point was that the HP they have in WvW doesn’t match their Vitality. I mean regardless of pet toughness, a wolf with 14k HP instead of the 22k that it should have and does have anywhere outside of WvW. A warrior AoE’s for more than the HP of that pet.

You’re right, it is a silly change to only have that effect PvE. I didn’t mean to seem like I was arguing directly with you, but I am glad that you came out and said this point directly, because I completely agree. Pets should definitely have the same stats across all game modes anyhow, ESPECIALLY with the April 15th update trying to integrate the game modes better. It’s just another unnecessary barrier between game modes without even considering the effect it has on gameplay.

So yes, I totally agree with out on this.

jcbroe.4329:

Arlette.9684:

My point was that the HP they have in WvW doesn’t match their Vitality. I mean regardless of pet toughness, a wolf with 14k HP instead of the 22k that it should have and does have anywhere outside of WvW. A warrior AoE’s for more than the HP of that pet.

You’re right, it is a silly change to only have that effect PvE. I didn’t mean to seem like I was arguing directly with you, but I am glad that you came out and said this point directly, because I completely agree. Pets should definitely have the same stats across all game modes anyhow, ESPECIALLY with the April 15th update trying to integrate the game modes better. It’s just another unnecessary barrier between game modes without even considering the effect it has on gameplay.

So yes, I totally agree with out on this.

ALL pets have increased stats in PvE, including minions, spirits, phantasms, turrets etc etc. This is because in PvE there are mechanics that made bad rangers VERY VERY VERY bad because they wouldn’t micro their pets and they would die horribly. A good ranger didn’t normally have these issues because they’d ensure the pet wasn’t in harms way.

The same scenario takes place in WvW, people who micro the pet have little issue, those who don’t, have a dead pet. Instead of learning how to use the pet people are just asking for buffers, which wont work in WvW because a buffer in WvW gives us too big of an advantage due to it being vs other players.

@Atherakhia.4086;

I have to ask, do either of those actively use their class mechanic in a fight? I don’t know the warrior build, I’ve never seen nor played it because I mainly PvP, but I can imagine it isn’t using both of it’s burst skills on cooldown the way a HamBow warrior does. I know the thief in that build basically never uses steal unless it’s as a gap closer, but the build I was referring to uses Steal almost on cooldown for a damage rotation every ~20 seconds.

Now, maybe I’m inferring here, but I think the point you’re trying to drive home isn’t necessarily that those classes don’t have to invest into their mechanic to have a useful mechanic, but that those classes don’t have to invest into their mechanic to have a viable build.

If that is the case, I completely agree with you, and the sentiment that rangers are much, much more reliant on their class mechanic than every other classes except maybe necros for sustain through Death Shroud, and even then, rangers are probably still the winners.

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Arlette.9684:

My point was that the HP they have in WvW doesn’t match their Vitality. I mean regardless of pet toughness, a wolf with 14k HP instead of the 22k that it should have and does have anywhere outside of WvW. A warrior AoE’s for more than the HP of that pet.

You’re right, it is a silly change to only have that effect PvE. I didn’t mean to seem like I was arguing directly with you, but I am glad that you came out and said this point directly, because I completely agree. Pets should definitely have the same stats across all game modes anyhow, ESPECIALLY with the April 15th update trying to integrate the game modes better. It’s just another unnecessary barrier between game modes without even considering the effect it has on gameplay.

So yes, I totally agree with out on this.

ALL pets have increased stats in PvE, including minions, spirits, phantasms, turrets etc etc. This is because in PvE there are mechanics that made bad rangers VERY VERY VERY bad because they wouldn’t micro their pets and they would die horribly. A good ranger didn’t normally have these issues because they’d ensure the pet wasn’t in harms way.

The same scenario takes place in WvW, people who micro the pet have little issue, those who don’t, have a dead pet. Instead of learning how to use the pet people are just asking for buffers, which wont work in WvW because a buffer in WvW gives us too big of an advantage due to it being vs other players.

You know that I’m just agreeing in the general sense the the health values should match the tooltip and that there shouldn’t be the barrier of entry where you go to a different game mode and all of a sudden your pets survival stats are completely different when the April 15th update is trying to remove those barriers between game modes.

It should be a static value as to avoid confusion is all.

Arlette.9684:

My point was that the HP they have in WvW doesn’t match their Vitality. I mean regardless of pet toughness, a wolf with 14k HP instead of the 22k that it should have and does have anywhere outside of WvW. A warrior AoE’s for more than the HP of that pet.

Our Hp doesn’t match our Vitality either, otherwise, we would have 9,160 health instead of 15,082. We have Base health, before any vitality is applied. Pets are the same way.

You should also understand that Hp does not scale the same way on pets as it does on Players. In PvE, it seems like 1 point of vitality is equal to 9.35 health at level 80, instead of 10 health. In WvW and PvP, 1 point of Vitality is equal to 5.5 health.

When pets recieved a 70% hp buff, their Vitality scaling also recieved the same buff (5.5 × 1.7 = 9.35)

Using my Wolf, which in WvW has 2061 vitality and 14,593 health, we can figure out its base health.

2061 × 5.5 = 11355.5
14,593 – 11,355.5 = 3,237.5

In PvE, the scaling is a little different. Vitality is the same, but the wolf now has 25,016 health.

2061 × 9.35 = 19270
25,016 – 19270 = 5746 base health.

We can almost confirm this by adding 70% to the WvW base health.

3,237.5 + 70% (2266.25) = 5,503.75

Those numbers are slightly off because Anet said the health buff would be about 70%, not a straight 70% increase. That or the Robust buff from WvW is affecting the numbers. (in PvE, I found that the actual health increase is a tiny bit higher than 9.35, which is enough to offset the numbers.)

I’m going to keep this summary short since we can’t talk about half of our class in this thread apparently, but….Pets have base health the same way as players do, but pet Vitality does not scale in the same way…which is something I would like Anet to comment on, especially if their Precision scales differently or their Toughness scales differently (a fully buffed Stalker with beastmastery, Masters bond, and Spotter has 2711 precision, theres no way it has an 89% crit chance. I don’t believe it!)

I’m going to keep this summary short since we can’t talk about half of our class in this thread apparently.

To clarify, I am not saying to not discuss the pet. I’m saying that shooting down ideas, or dismissing constructive thought processes, on the basis that “the pet is broken” is redundant at this point. We all know it and ANet has acknowledged it.

So when we try to talk about attaching spirits to the pets as a sample idea, and the idea gets dismissed because the “pets are broken,” it derails a discussion because it’s the restatement of an acknowledged piece of information.

All I’m asking is that going forward, if people are going to be dismissive due to this statement, then it isn’t constructive because at this point, it should be assumed that anybody suggesting a change is doing so under the impression that the final product would be an ideal system with any improvements to pets incorporated in.

But, if we would like to continue to attempt to discuss solutions to the pet situation, while I personally find it to be a waste of energy simply because we are all going to have a different idea of some sort and never be able to agree other than on the fundamental idea that pets need improvements, that’s actually fine. That’s what the thread is for.

But the thread was starting to approach a toxic place where the restatement of “pets are broken” was being used over and over again as a justification for the dismissal of some peoples ideas while the basis of other peoples ideas that didn’t lend themselves to being constructive (aka, pet is broken, remove it and buff rangers).

The main point I was trying to drive home is that we aren’t ever going to have another constructive conversation if we keep beating the dead horse over and over about the pet situation and how bad it is.

Don’t talk about how bad it is, talk about how good you want to make it and why it would be better that way than this way, with actual reasoning, so that we can all have a conversation about it.

I admittedly haven’t been monitoring the Ranger CDI that closely, but I was wondering if we have been given any time frame for these changes.

There was a dev post awhile back that said the Changes talked about in any CDI depend on the changes themselves. Some changes like fixes to pets, we’re already getting on the 15th, but since those issues are the same ones that Anet’s been tracking, (since atleast the Ranger thread talking about the Dec. 10th changes last year)(and probably for a year before that…), its hard to tell if it was a direct result of the CDI or not.

I say….just be happy we’re getting changes and fixes, and not worry about where the original idea came from.

And getting read the wind! Wohoo!

i bet the new patch bring nothing to rangers!
only the 5 new grandmaster crap traits and a spirit nerf AGAIN…
soon spirits will be more weak then before the spirit buff patch,
where everybody was think “oh they are not viable”, love you anet.

what’s with a necro nerf maybe. i can’t kill a necromancer if he’s running the carrion amulet aswell, like most rangers.
i only can kill this op condi spam if he’s on a rabit amulet and i’m on a carrion amulet and then also only if i dodge random/perfect… good balance!
i’m single target and necro is aoe condi op damage spam on point…

lets go to the usefull new traits,

read the wind, yes totaly useless trait again for power ranger builds

strider’s defense, is a good joke, because as kittening power ranger im allready death if i go to melee.
im death before i can go anywhere with this build!

poison master, just wow they picked THIS idea out of the cdi and its a grandmaster trait…-.-
empathic bond is anyway more useful and important.

the nature magic and beastmaster grandmaster trait is MAYBE usefull…

but i have no idea why the hell the read the wind, strider’s defense and POISON MASTER is a kittening grandmaster trait..

if they don’t bring new traits for the adept and master tier i’m done with this profession…
at least the longbow still feels like the most crap weapon in the game…
this weapon is supposed to be a ranger weapon… but my warrior is using it much more effective.

its not easy to play a ranger,
its much more easy to run around with a warrior, s/p thief, guardian or necro at the moment…

jcbroe.4329:

@Atherakhia.4086;

I have to ask, do either of those actively use their class mechanic in a fight? I don’t know the warrior build, I’ve never seen nor played it because I mainly PvP, but I can imagine it isn’t using both of it’s burst skills on cooldown the way a HamBow warrior does. I know the thief in that build basically never uses steal unless it’s as a gap closer, but the build I was referring to uses Steal almost on cooldown for a damage rotation every ~20 seconds.

Now, maybe I’m inferring here, but I think the point you’re trying to drive home isn’t necessarily that those classes don’t have to invest into their mechanic to have a useful mechanic, but that those classes don’t have to invest into their mechanic to have a viable build.

If that is the case, I completely agree with you, and the sentiment that rangers are much, much more reliant on their class mechanic than every other classes except maybe necros for sustain through Death Shroud, and even then, rangers are probably still the winners.

In the same sense as HamBow, by allowing you to swap between weapons and use each burst skill back to back, no. But that’s the specialization I’m talking about. Without burst mastery, the burst skills still work exceptionally well. The above 2 builds I mentioned work great with the typical Hammer+GS or Hammer+Sw/Horn.

Thief build is the same thing. Steal is functionally useful as a gap closer, but the utility skills you receive are also exceptionally strong without any trait investment. That build I mentioned is what a lot of D/D Thieves run. It’s also what Yishis runs I do believe. Chances are any Thief is going to use steal every cooldown regardless of spec. Especially if they’re against something like a Guardian, Ranger, Warrior, or Necro.

Can the same be said about the Rangers pet? That without investment it provides equally useful utility/value to the class as any other mechanic (save engineers)? That’s the point I think the other posters were trying to make… it really doesn’t. And that’s the point I was trying to drive home as well. Chrispy was implying that a Ranger shouldn’t be asking for a viable pet if they don’t invest in it. I’m asking why not? Every other class has a viable mechanic before they’ve invested in it.

And I also want to appologize for extending this pet debate further. I honestly consider the pet to be the least of this class’ problems when it comes to WvW.

What you guys are talking about is absolutely fine. You’re isolating things that don’t work well and suggesting they need changes. That isn’t derailing, that’s constructive haha. Stating over and over that pets are bad and that because pets are bad we should dismiss all other changes and not be able to constructively talk about anything else because “the class will never be balanced until the pet is fixed” is just the most absolutely toxic thing we can possibly do.

We have taken this entire thread alone and spent more than 50% of it talking about balancing the pet before the CDI even started lol. I might as well just come out and say “if you’re going to be constructive, then you can talk about whatever, but if all you’re going to do is and complain and not offer anything to a conversation other complaints, than this isn’t the thread for that.”

So, @Atherakhia.4086, I do agree. I think that the first step is making the F2 skill is reliable as possible, like I hope they accomplish with this patch like they are claiming to, and I also still think that agility training needs to be baseline for pets and removed as a trait.

Those two things alone would probably help the pet a lot at their core functionality. Whether or not that would be good enough? Well, other people I’m sure are bound to discuss that with me lol.

And @Chrispy.5641, I think that ANet is aiming for trying to only have major balance patches every 3-4 months like back in Guild Wars 1. So if anything, we won’t see any sort of changes that may have come from the CDI until 3-4 months after April 15th. So I’d say around July or August is when to expect the next major round of balances. Unless ANet actually listens to the community when we expressed that we’d like to see more frequent balance patches.

Also guys, I’m going to edit that other post for clarity. I can see where in it’s own way, it was just kind of stupid sounding lol. I’m just really hoping we haven’t come full circle and are doomed to repeat the same exact conversations now that we were having in the thread I started in the ranger forum that collected the information I put into making this thread.

But I plan on some point making a bullet-ed list of everything we’ve discussed up to now including the discussions that occurred in the CDI. It just might take awhile, but I think it will be amazingly helpful going forward.

rpfohr.7048:

Okay -

Couple points I think didn’t get hit hard enough in the CDI.

Skrimishing traitline is BAD……Full of traps and pet traits. There is NOTHING in this traitline worth taking unless you are traps but the stat combo is GREAT for power builds. There needs to be more POWER based traits in skrimish. (Ex/ Why would anybody want to take something like carniverous appetite when I can just swap the pet if it gets low)

2. This class is REALLY hit hard by traits that affect only 1 weapon. By default, traits that affect only one weapon really need to be looked at and should be stronger than those affecting multiple
(Looking at you RtW and Axe Mastery)

There is more – but I think those are my two strongest so lets start there.

I agree. It was reinforced last night for me when I was at my trainer attempting to try out a new power spec. I couldn’t pull the trigger on anything in Skirmishing. Likely the worst traitline I have encountered based on my 3 other characters.

rpfohr.7048:

Okay -

Couple points I think didn’t get hit hard enough in the CDI.

Skrimishing traitline is BAD……Full of traps and pet traits. There is NOTHING in this traitline worth taking unless you are traps but the stat combo is GREAT for power builds. There needs to be more POWER based traits in skrimish. (Ex/ Why would anybody want to take something like carniverous appetite when I can just swap the pet if it gets low)

2. This class is REALLY hit hard by traits that affect only 1 weapon. By default, traits that affect only one weapon really need to be looked at and should be stronger than those affecting multiple
(Looking at you RtW and Axe Mastery)

There is more – but I think those are my two strongest so lets start there.

I agree with this as well. Skirmishing is so bad it hurts trying to theorycraft builds in the line and being pigeonholed into picking the best worst trait available.

Atherakhia.4086:

Thief build is the same thing. Steal is functionally useful as a gap closer, but the utility skills you receive are also exceptionally strong without any trait investment. That build I mentioned is what a lot of D/D Thieves run. It’s also what Yishis runs I do believe. Chances are any Thief is going to use steal every cooldown regardless of spec. Especially if they’re against something like a Guardian, Ranger, Warrior, or Necro.

Can the same be said about the Rangers pet? That without investment it provides equally useful utility/value to the class as any other mechanic (save engineers)? That’s the point I think the other posters were trying to make… it really doesn’t. And that’s the point I was trying to drive home as well. Chrispy was implying that a Ranger shouldn’t be asking for a viable pet if they don’t invest in it. I’m asking why not? Every other class has a viable mechanic before they’ve invested in it.

And I also want to appologize for extending this pet debate further. I honestly consider the pet to be the least of this class’ problems when it comes to WvW.

I’d like to point out that in terms of “functionality” without any form of direct of indirect boost from traits, the pet functions equally to other professions mechanics. It may seem like i’m just being a “fanboy” but rangers have perhaps some of the better default mechanics in game.

Let’s take a warrior, without any direct or indirect traiting, wait, what is a indirect trait you say? Cleansing ire, merciless hammer and andrenal health is a type of indirect trait. It is not necessary for the mechanics core functionality, but greatly enhances the results.
If you take no such boost on a warrior, it’s functionality is severely crippled, mainly because without merciless hammer, earthshaker is a lot weaker then normal. The damage boost you get from disabling (stunning) enemies with earthshaker is a indirect trait benefit gained from the class mechanic. The hammer is still not a bad weapon, but it gains immense benefit from just one trait tied to just one mechanical function. Similarily, the longbow burst skill is simply worthless for anything other then tagging stuff unless you take cleansing Ire. Cleansing Ire also affect other weapons, such as sword, which has a very spammable cleave burst.
The warrior has reached a point, where not taking indirect traits or traitlines that directly benefit their mechanic, cripples them severely.

The elementalist, apart from the fact that any 5 point investment in any of the lines will give you a indirect bonus from the mechanic, can simply NOT trait to make the mechanic usable. Not dropping any points into arcana is simply not a good idea. Not only does the line directly benefit the mechanic, but it also have some of the more powerful traits, forcing them to improve their mechanic as if it was intended for the basic function of the mechanic to rely on some trait investment in the first place.

A mesmer without clones or phantasms is toast, their entire survival relies 100% on mitigating damage by deploying feints.

Interestingly enough, we enhance our pet’s performance simply by attacking an enemy. On each weapon/weapon set there is one or several bonuses that are being granted to the pet upon attack/triggering the skill. In this way, we need not invest in the pet, for it to benefit, it does so automatically.
The pet does appear to be quite unreliable, and the lack of a solid function for the command system where the pet prioritizes commands over anything else is what have been hindering us the most. The upcoming patch aims to fix that to an extent. Apart from that, the pet(s) provide multiple boosts, damage and defense even from basic level.
A brown bear’s condi cleanse does not get much better with traiting, the radius stays the same, only the cooldown changes slightly, therefore, it’s perfomance is almost equal with or without traits.
One thing is certain, some pets benefit/rely more on booster investment then others, some pets are almost completely reliant on it. Be it direct or indirect, the pets in and of themselves, depending on family or specific pet, will perform equally or in some cases, better, then other professions basic mechanical functions.

You can certainly look at the mechanics with that kid in a candy store feeling of ‘and this one’s a fear, and this one’s an immobilize, and this one’s a heal’ and rationalize to yourself how surely that’s all so much better than a little bit of deeps.

But when you get right down to it neither PvE nor PvP make the most of that variety, and there really isn’t much a pet is doing to deliver those skills to the playingfeild that an AOE couldn’t do without half the fuss. So even though something like your bow popping down a fire field seems limited and simple; it’s also very relevant, flexible and consistent.

My straight-out-of-the-box Ranger Pet sounds so powerful in writing, but in practice, I’d easily consider the profession mechanics of other classes I’ve played more sincerely useful.

pets only got a health boost outside of pvp.

in general they need a stat boost outside of pvp on all stats to match the powercreep introduced with ascended gear in wvw and in pve and therefore rebalanced mobs.

Vox Hollow.2736:

You can certainly look at the mechanics with that kid in a candy store feeling of ‘and this one’s a fear, and this one’s an immobilize, and this one’s a heal’ and rationalize to yourself how surely that’s all so much better than a little bit of deeps.

But when you get right down to it neither PvE nor PvP make the most of that variety, and there really isn’t much a pet is doing to deliver those skills to the playingfeild that an AOE couldn’t do without half the fuss. So even though something like your bow popping down a fire field seems limited and simple; it’s also very relevant, flexible and consistent.

My straight-out-of-the-box Ranger Pet sounds so powerful in writing, but in practice, I’d easily consider the profession mechanics of other classes I’ve played more sincerely useful.

The only reason those fears and immobilizes are not powerful right out of the box is due to the F2 being unresponsive. And unlike most other profs our mechanic is not only 3 other skills (excluding auto attack) but is also a DPS split and an Agro split, which is a major strength. If we get stunned, or weakened or chilled etc part of our damage is unaffected, not to mention the pet can intercept attacks like bolas, and bulls rush etc etc.

I’d argue we have the strongest mechanic in the game apart from maybe necromancers second health bar + 5 skills

Durzlla.6295:

Vox Hollow.2736:

You can certainly look at the mechanics with that kid in a candy store feeling of ‘and this one’s a fear, and this one’s an immobilize, and this one’s a heal’ and rationalize to yourself how surely that’s all so much better than a little bit of deeps.

But when you get right down to it neither PvE nor PvP make the most of that variety, and there really isn’t much a pet is doing to deliver those skills to the playingfeild that an AOE couldn’t do without half the fuss. So even though something like your bow popping down a fire field seems limited and simple; it’s also very relevant, flexible and consistent.

My straight-out-of-the-box Ranger Pet sounds so powerful in writing, but in practice, I’d easily consider the profession mechanics of other classes I’ve played more sincerely useful.

The only reason those fears and immobilizes are not powerful right out of the box is due to the F2 being unresponsive. And unlike most other profs our mechanic is not only 3 other skills (excluding auto attack) but is also a DPS split and an Agro split, which is a major strength. If we get stunned, or weakened or chilled etc part of our damage is unaffected, not to mention the pet can intercept attacks like bolas, and bulls rush etc etc.

I’d argue we have the strongest mechanic in the game apart from maybe necromancers second health bar + 5 skills

If the pet provided a DPS increase I’d agree. But we have a handicap in place to account for the pets DPS that is only balanced when using a pure DPS pet with 100% uptime. In every other scenario it’s a DPS loss. And those other scenarios (anything but PvP) account for a sizeable part of the game.

Pet responsiveness in WvW only gets the pets to the point where we can ignore them completely and expect their F2 ability to go off when pressed while the pet is sitting idle at our side. A mechanic that truly compliments the Ranger’s playstyle that is dependable and effective? Long ways off from that unless you stick to dueling, roaming, and PvP.

Yet another reminder that ANet teased “amazing changes” for Ranger a few months ago yet said amazingness is still MIA.

Flytrap.8075:

Yet another reminder that ANet teased “amazing changes” for Ranger a few months ago yet said amazingness is still MIA.

Keep in mind that ANet only performs balance changes every 3-4 months, and we’re actually right on schedule since the last balance was December 10th. Not justifying the speed that balance rolls out or anything.

Meaning that, because this thread was started a few months back, in between those dates, the reality is that between this thread and the CDI, the earliest we would see any progress coming from either thread would be around July or August even, at the earliest.