Guild Wars 2

looking forward to the upcoming cdi

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve (profession: voting is currently underway) balance?- Owner- Allie Murdock

Legendary Food of course.

PVP: more solo rewards. Not all of us know dedicated team players or have the time to establish one. That does not mean we do not play pvp frequently. It just means we don’t have a way to have an established, dedicated team.

I hope Ms. Murdock gets a lot of information from the AI programmers before she starts the thread on Monday, and sets as clear ground rules on it as possible.

Rangers are certain to win the vote, and I’d hate for the thread to waste time on Pet AI complaints/suggestions that have zero technical feasibility of ever being fixed/implemented.

EverythingXen.1835:

I hope Ms. Murdock gets a lot of information from the AI programmers before she starts the thread on Monday, and sets as clear ground rules on it as possible.

Rangers are certain to win the vote, and I’d hate for the thread to waste time on Pet AI complaints/suggestions that have zero technical feasibility of ever being fixed/implemented.

If that is the case, if rangers win, maybe make 2 CDI threads, one for technical/bug issues,
The 2nd for actually balance stuff.

Hell that would work on most professions right? Engineers and their turrets could work for this.

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve (profession: voting is currently underway) balance?- Owner- Allie Murdock

Warrior is in the best shape. In offensive and defensive way! Powerful traits in the right trait line. Highest Health. Powerful support skills and elite skills (eg signet, banner). Good damage mitigation etc.

How would i evolve it. I would give every profession the highest health since i do not see a reason why it should be profession based. After that i would create offensive and defensive skills in the way the warrior has them but in that particular definition fitting the targeted profession (eg mesmer).

Example:
Warrior (benchmark): Signet of Wrath 30s fury, 30s 5^ might, 30s swiftness
Guardian (target): Signet of the holy fire: 30s fury, 30s fire damage on crit, 30s swiftness
Thief (target): Signet of tormention: 30s fury, 30s 1^ torment on crit, 30s swiftness

Every profession should have the same potential in regards of mobility, damage, offensive and defensive support but also tied to their unique profession. So they have to be the same but different.

I think it’s safe to say that, whatever profession you are going to work on (I hope ele), you’d want to rework the useless traits they have. I heard there are a lot of those (especially on ele).

I can’t speak to many of the other aspects of the game but, I enjoy WvW. So my question is, where is our incentive to do it? Is there going to be another season? At the moment it seems like a champ train zone with no incentive to actually be there other than collecting bags.

That being said, there is no incentive to not be in the giant zerg ball when you are there. I’d like to see some incentive to forming smaller groups or even solo play. I’m not saying the rewards need to be as big as running with the group, but as it stands there is no reward for small group and solo play at all.

I want to share some thoughts over the first topic, connected with Fractals since is one of my favorite places, and I’ve spend most of my time there so far.
A lot was changed during the last fract update, and all for the better.
1. The new way different fractals are rolled looks wrong for me:
a. I can’t compare either of the tiers by time required and difficulty, but what I know is before the change it was completely random – you can get a super fast line up with Swamp-Aquatic-Urban, while now u don’t have that chance, but instead the option to get Uncategorized+Cliffside+Underground. Result: no option for a relatively fast run, many options for a long long long run.

b. Second and third tier looks well balanced, but first tier seems wrong, and since everybody are rolling swamp as first, its kind of in vain.

2. There is a bid of restrictions about what is useful there. I personally, having over 250 runs done(not 250 fractals from the achievement, which add to 50 full runs) I find most classes kind of falling off inside. My favorite class – Ranger – has nothing to offer – pet dies instantly to bosses because of no dodging abilities, pure dmg is lower than guards or warriors or even mesmers, spirits are useful but again, instant death to boss hits rendering them useless. And its not the only class falling off in there.

3. The Mistlock Instabilities that were presented are something superb by my standards – make stuffs super fun. But why made them predetermined, when u could have made for instance 10 random that circulate from tier 31-40 and s.o. That would make things even better. Some of them look untested – lvl 43 Bloodlust – is the best example that requires a particular builds and lineups in order to be done successfully especially in some fractals with lots and lots of mobs like Cliffside, dredge, that is pure nightmare.

4. The loot – the big problem everywhere… I will post a chart of mine from all the runs I have done in a month after the big Fract update to compare my “luck”. My biggest problems there are:

a. I get the same skin drop over and over and over. Its not on the chart but I got 7 harpoons 5 rifles and 4 pistols… what is that RNG that has no anti-repetitive mechanism embedded.

b. Same rings keep dropping … every third ring is knight(or the same stats with precision as main). For all the time I’ve doing fract I have seen ~3 zerker rings and ~2 soldier ones… not cool not at all…

c. Why lvl 30 gives me sooo much drops in that bonus chest, lvl 49 gives relatively nice, but compared to the way too easy one to run lvl 30 this is madness. Not even to mention lvl 40 which gives me nothing, nothing at all…

d. Fix LFG tool – Tier range there is still the same and about 80% of the ppl still have no idea that tiers are changed to 21-30 31-40 41-50, and that is frustrating when u want to run the top lvl for the tier.

e. Also only 1 armor box so far.. that’s weird, considering the weapon boxes dropping.

5. There is a trand with LFG tool, its not a big deal but a lot of new players tend to join runs announced for lvls 40+, because they think it’s the hero lvl, not the fract lvl. Something like the restrictions for dungeons must be implemented – when a Character is below the lvl for a dungeon u cant even click on the tab in LFG. Same must be done in fractals tab.

6. Mechanics:

a. Mossman invis time was greatly improved after last patch, but I still find it into some episodes of long or many short invisibilities which make it so annoying because of all the waiting needed. New attacks that were added did improve the battle a lot, but waiting for him to get out of invi is just boring.

b. Urban Battleground NPCs that follow you have very poor AI, and they keep rushing into the middle area if you are not careful resulting into bad things.

c. Uncategorized – BUG: At last boss, if 1 party member remains outside when the cage falls and locks the entrance for the room boss never resets. So 4 man can wipe, ress and go in, boss will be with the HP they felt it.(not sure if that is fixed)

d. Jade – If ranger/mesmers/Pupet master necros ect. Present there, the time for finishing is practically doubled for every body count presented. While I can understand mesmers and necros have a control over the spawning of their copies/puppets, rangers have no such option. So 2-3-4 ranger have no option to hide their pets and jade constantly targets them even if they have no HP.

7. Add the possibility to buy Mist essence with relics (doesn’t matter which relics).

p.s. Keep UP the good work u do!

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve (profession: voting is currently underway) balance?- Owner- Allie Murdock

Rather than following the recent trend of bringing Warrior’s down to other classes’ level of mediocrity, it would seem healthier to bring them up to Warrior’s level. Before the most recent balance changes Warriors had arguably the highest number of viable builds. Now several of those builds were destroyed or at least were brought down to the point where they’re no longer worth using such as the Mace/Shield + Greatsword Skullcracker build. What bothers me the most is that the builds that got destroyed in some cases weren’t even the main target. Hambow was the build on the chopping board but it’s still the best option in TPvP. I don’t think that removing build options is the healthiest thing for the game.

Anyways, I consider Warrior the most well designed class in the game. They are viable in every game mode, and have decent amount of variation in terms of what roles they can play. If every class were in that situation then the game would be in a pretty good spot. I assume Warriors received the focus they did because they were considered the weakest class in terms of PvP.

That laser focus approach seemed to work pretty well and I think Ele or Ranger are the most deserving right now of that same treatment. Now this has the unfortunate side effect of other professions feeling neglected but going class-by-class let’s you also have the power to make the class strong by allowing them to counter whatever the current meta is.

Right now Condis are very strong but are held in check by control like Hammer, so let Ele/Ranger be paper to this whole Rock-Paper-Scissors game we have going on here. That way you can avoid power creep because you’re buffing against a specific spec rather than just increasing stats.

Hopefully this would lead to a more player-driven rotating meta and that would be enough to placate people while other improvements are made.

WvW: What aspects of Edge of The Mists do you think could carry over to the rest of WvW and how?

I am loving that the sentries are A LOT tougher. I like that AI fix walls and such if damaged though maybe make it so they use the supply for the current upgrade first.

Everything else…Nah, i dont like. Just like all other Parts of WvW it has the same issue: Zergging beats everything. You really need to come up with a solution to this as getting attacked by several 20+ zergs is simply not fun, mostly due to the insane lag you get but the AoE damage spam and the Warrior Hammer CC spam is simply out of control.

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve (profession: voting is currently underway) balance?

Change up condition builds. It is fine classes having them but do they ALL need to play the same way with the exact same goal of spamming as many conditions as possible as quickly as possible. This would though mean each class deals a certain amount of damage per a condition and not all classes would be the same.

For example. Engineer wouldnt be able to do same damage using Bleeds as Necromancer would but a Necromancer wouldnt be able to do the same Burning Damage as a Ele and an Ele wouldnt be able to do the same Bleeding damage as a Necro

I think that each class should have its “niche” when it comes to condition builds.

Necromancer for example, it should be the master of bursting conditions but at the same time the conditions should deal less damage and rather it be the number of them that are the worry not the fact that are mostly cover for Burning and Bleeding.

Engineer – Remove Confusion from the class, this condition should be specific to Mesmer in my opinion and Perplexity runes should become a new generation of class specific condition Rune sets to Mesmer only. Engineer should be the king of Poison or something

Warrior – I don’t play them but will say they need Torment removed.

Ele – Ele should be the king of Burning. Fire attunement (and its trait line) should be condition focused. Water can still keeps its support conditions. Change Fire grab so that when used it deals say 50% of the total burning in one hit but then removes it.

For example:
Target has Burning for 10 seconds, each second the burning does 1000damage
Ele uses Fire Grab.
It deals damage + 25% of total Burning duration damage (in this case 2,500)
The burning duration is then cut by 50% so you lose 25% of the burning damage but you got a quick burst of burning damage

I am sure others could think of ways to make the other classes fresh/niche with conditions that don’t revolve around spam, spam, spam

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve (profession: voting is currently underway) balance?- Owner- Allie Murdock

As this is the only question I could offer decent input on at the moment I’ll single it out. I would like to see balance evolve into focused, unique philosophy for each class, in other words, development. We’re so focused on “Balance this, balance that” I feel we’ve given up on development and just resigned ourselves to quick fixes or as I call them, “Band-aids”. I see a lot of larger issues being ignored in favor of simple quick band-aids. GW2 professions are still in development and you can’t balance something that still needs to be developed.

I’ll use two examples of this the current (and by far) two leading classes in the polls. First I’ll use the Elementalist. This class was based on attunment swapping and chaining skills together across the elements. This very concept becomes a problem with how the traits and weapons are designed. Traits force a focus on a specific element instead of the original concept of swapping and combos and weapons don’t naturally encourage swapping other than to have more skills. How can you have a streamlined , balanced class when three core aspects of development (not balance) directly conflict with each other? Just as a quick example here, why not encourage such actions by redesigning traits to give added effects while using other elements as well? For example, an Earth magic trait that adds rocks to the center of projectile spells thus allowing them to have mass and therefore also act as finishers and a Water magic trait that turns earth into mud causing cripple, fire into steam that blinds, or adds a % of damage done as AoE to Lightning attacks. Couple that with skill re-design to encourage skill flow (akin to Warrior weapon flow) and attun swapping and you got a streamlined, complete class.

The next example I’ll use is the Ranger. This was my GWAMM in GW and at first I was ecstatic to lean pets were going to be a major focus of design as I loved having one in GW, even if I had to opt out of it when I needed to play a specific role. I thought, “Hey, with pets now being a major focus of the entire profession they’ll get all the attention they deserve.” I couldn’t have been more wrong! Once again they were designed using standard mob AI and limitations instead of having their own, actually competent design. What’s more is that now they weren’t something I could opt out of if they were going to be a burden in a specific instance (as any AI eventually becomes as a game moves towards skilled play). Couple the broken profession mechanic with a complete lack of weapon skill focus or flow and mandatory hefty investments in trait lines and utility skills (many of which don’t actually provide any utility) and you’ve got the modern Ranger. This class needs major overhauls with the following focuses;

• Weapon flow and purpose
• Utility skill redesigns focusing on removing the almost mandatory trait investments
• - Then follow-up trait redesign aimed at increasing player abilities instead of directly maximizing select skills.
• Profession mechanic overhaul aimed at either making pets more reliable or providing an alternate mechanic allowing either one to be opt’d out of at the player’s discretion.

I’ve seen and made MANY posts in the past year with great input aimed at the above bullet points.

raubvogel.5071:

…
Warrior is in the best shape. In offensive and defensive way! Powerful traits in the right trait line. Highest Health. Powerful support skills and elite skills (eg signet, banner). Good damage mitigation etc.
…

problem is the most powerful traits are concentraited in ONE line.

remove adrenalin from cleansing ire so warrior need berserkers might to constantly remove condis. that way they are forced to decide how they want to trait.

hooma.9642:

raubvogel.5071:

…
Warrior is in the best shape. In offensive and defensive way! Powerful traits in the right trait line. Highest Health. Powerful support skills and elite skills (eg signet, banner). Good damage mitigation etc.
…

problem is the most powerful traits are concentraited in ONE line.

remove adrenalin from cleansing ire so warrior need berserkers might to constantly remove condis. that way they are forced to decide how they want to trait.

They won’t get it though. They’ll just go 30 disc for burst mastery.

Warrior doesn’t gain enough damage for investing in arms or strength and that’s part of the problem. Invest in DPS trees and gain nothing, but lose a TON of defense. Spec in defense and gain a TON of defense and lose no real damage.

Castaliea.3156:

…

• Weapon flow and purpose
• Utility skill redesigns focusing on removing the almost mandatory trait investments
• - Then follow-up trait redesign aimed at increasing player abilities instead of directly maximizing select skills.
• Profession mechanic overhaul aimed at either making pets more reliable or providing an alternate mechanic allowing either one to be opt’d out of at the player’s discretion.

I’ve seen and made MANY posts in the past year with great input aimed at the above bullet points.

This is a really good summary of the Problems a Ranger has.

I was not surprised to see the Ranger becoming the first (and obviously most important) class to discuss. There is discussions on the forums about the problems with the ranger for a long time and there were many good threads collectiong input about how the class can be fixed.

This excellent thread is worth reading:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Ranger-Balance-PvP-WvW-PvE-PvX/first

Is it possible to work on more than one class at a time?

Dynnen.6405:

Guardian has much of the same problems, where was this voting taking place?

Heh, it’s already over, Guardians lost.
Ranger has been chosen as that first to be looked at and discussed, likely followed by the ele.
There will probably be more voting in the future.

Yoh.8469:

Dynnen.6405:

Guardian has much of the same problems, where was this voting taking place?

Heh, it’s already over, Guardians lost.
Ranger has been chosen as that first to be looked at and discussed, likely followed by the ele.
There will probably be more voting in the future.

Yea, I went back to look at the forums and found it. A lot of Ranger’s problems exist not within the class itself, but the rest of the game. This game has a LOT of gap closers and ranger don’t have many devices to kite that well. LB has 1 knockback on a decently long timer, SB has an evade on a decently long timer. Their melee weapons are pretty kitten good with lots of evade/leaps built into them that works well with their water field.

I basically wrote a thesis on how Guard weapons seriously need improvements to what they do as well as CD issues…but these issues have been in the game since launch and instead of fixing them we get things like 6.5 months of buffs/reworks/improvements to 1 class that hardly needed some slight tweaking. Its…an interesting production schedule they have there

Guardian is fine. Sorry to disappoint you.

2 useless trait lines, trait lines without any clear direction to them, weapons being jacked up on all but 2, low hp, lack luster class mechanic, constant pigeon holing.

Just because they can focus shield/JI burst into someone thats not paying attention, and hang with the hammer warriors on the hammer train when they run full PVT doesn’t mean they don’t have a lot of kitten wrong with them.

Dalanor.5387:

Guardian is fine. Sorry to disappoint you.

And you play a necro? LOL, necro is fine…Guardian is not

ANNNNYway, back to ranger talk!

Allie Murdock.8152:

Hey everyone,

We tallied your votes, and Ranger came out on top. As such, we will have our first profession CDI focused on areas you would like to see the Ranger evolve in.

Thanks for voting!

please look at here for some CDI brain strom
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Ranger-Balance-PvP-WvW-PvE-PvX/page/8#post3625223

Dos.7052:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Hey everyone,

We tallied your votes, and Ranger came out on top. As such, we will have our first profession CDI focused on areas you would like to see the Ranger evolve in.

Thanks for voting!

please look at here for some CDI brain strom
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Ranger-Balance-PvP-WvW-PvE-PvX/page/8#post3625223

That’s where I would start. However, this thread contains 426 posts atm. It might be a little bit too much to read, espacially if someone new wants to join the discussion.
Anyhow, if someone wants to sum up the suggestions, he’s free to do that.

[Professions: Global]
[Professions: Ranger]

This post will contain a Top 3 for both global proffession evolution, and the ranger in specific.

Global:
1. Greater distinctiveness for each each class.
-Each class should have some area that everybody KNOWS it’s good at. For example, Thief and Single Target dps. Every class needs to fill multiple roles, but their areas of expertise should become more clearly defined.

2. Enhance the Move / Countermove style of gameplay.
-With more specialization, there is more room for building and playing to counter your foe. A complete overview of Utility skills (more focused, lower cooldown) is a large part of this.

3. Keep an eye on Gameplay Style
-Each class should feel very different while playing it. Some classes are good at this already, some blur the line into other classes. Keep them unique.

Ranger:
1. Re-prioritize the pet.
-It’s well known that the Ranger is balanced around the pet. It’s also been stated by Anet that pet AI can’t be truly fixed because it’s linked to mob AI. If we accept this, then the pet must be separated from a Ranger’s total DPS potential. Decrease pet DPS, increase Ranger DPS, and re-work the pet into a utility ability. Give pets passives (like spotter), or utility (like spawning fields), or control (like knocking down a target that Stuns the Ranger), or burst AOE (like having the pet do a mighty leap to a targeted position). Have a pet that teleports to swap positions with the ranger. Be creative; make mechanics that are specially suited to working with two entities at once. It should still be closely tied to the Ranger, but the core functions of the class (DPS, Sustain) must not rely on the AI.

2. Specialize the weapon sets.
Ranger weapons are not very well defined. Axe, for example, does both DD and Condition damage, but neither very well. Longbow does damage at long range, but lacks the tools to maintain that range. Identify the role for each weapon, then make sure that weapon is suited to that role.

3. Rework Utility skills.
-Ranger’s have the worst selection of utilities in the game. There are 4-5 that are in an acceptable place (mostly traps and spirits), and the majority are totally useless. Examine every single one and rebalance it.

ANIMAL CRUELTY
Please change all the skills that revolve around ‘kitten our pet’. At present time the GW2 Ranger is some kind of sadistic being who revels in animal cruelty for the sake of his own selfish needs. If anything we need changes to the skills that sacrifice/torment our pet.

The Ranger is a class that has to rely on his pet companion for ~30% damage. One of the main things I find odd about that is that the Ranger is also the only class that actively tries to kill his own pet all the time through his own utilities and traits.

Some quick suggestions:

• Shared Anquish – Change to “Incoming disabling conditions are transferred to your Foe instead.”
  Alternate suggestion: “Incoming disabling conditions Entangle your Foe.”
• Empathic Bond – Change to “Periodically cure conditions from you and your pet.”
• “Protect Me” – Change this to also grant Aegis, Protection, Retaliation, Swiftness and Regeneration to the pet for the duration
• Signet of Renewal Active – Change to “Cure conditions from pet and nearby allies”

PETS
This might be another wild idea here, but has anyone at ANet ever considered separating Ranger pets from their npc animal versions?

The way I see it, the ‘juvenile’ pets and their npc versions are all linked. So a change to the pet would currently also result to a change in their npc counterpart. However, if they would all be added to a new separate ‘juvenile’ sub-class, they could then be reworked separately. This would allow ANet to fix the unresponsive F2 as well as allow you to fix the ability to reliably hit targets etc. etc.

I mean, it’s the same way that Nightmare Court or Krait and Toxic Alliance npc’s are each part of a separate subsection. Yet both have different setups and abilities even though their base models are similar. And a change to one would not affect the other.

I mean, we have a select number of pets to choose from (all with the ‘Juvenile’ header) so why not create a new group for them and move them there. Much easier to fix issues from entities in a separate group without having to worry about causing global issues to the whole animal kingdom of Tyria.

GENERAL SUGGESTIONS I MADE OVER A YEAR AGO

• A Camouflage utility (be it as an opener or escape) – 3s Stealth + 10s Swiftness (similar to the Wintersday Scout ability). Could replace the active effect on Signet of the Hunt because currently that active effect is pretty pointless.
• Point Blank Shot: Change name to Sniper Shot and add a secondary effect. If you tap it once it will function as it currently does, but if you choose to press and hold the ability, it will channel and fire one shot dealing massive damage (as per the Wintersday Scout ability).
• Signets should apply their active component to Pet and Ranger by default without requiring you to use Signet of the Beastmaster.
• A utility or effect that allows Rangers to see stealthed targets. At present time stealth has no counter and is not fun to play against. The Ranger would be most befitting to provide that counter (being a tracker and having pets). See the video on Counterplay: http://youtu.be/BRBcjsOt0_g
• for the above, if signets would apply their active effects to Pet+Ranger without the need for Signet of the Beastmaster, that Grandmaster trait could be changed to Sight of the Beastmaster, allowing stealth detection as a passive ability and make stealthed targets appear in a similar fashion as we now see stealthed allies (that Predator like camouflage) if players spend 30 points in Marksmanship and choose the trait. In my humble opinion the Ranger should be the direct counter to a Thief.
• Some signet active effects need a rework because some of them are pointless (even dangerous) to use (try Signet of Renewal with Signet of the Beastmaster active).
• Some shouts need a rework as they mostly revolve around sacrificing your pet (~30% of your damage potential) at present time.
• A ‘fix’ for all the OBSTRUCTED messages when firing arrows when there’s absolutely no reason for them to become obstructed.
• More reliable AI and pathfinding for our pets and being able to hit moving targets (maybe increase their effective attack radius and cleave?).
• 75% resistance to AoE damage for our pets (with the option to trait it to 95%).
• F2 abilities that fire near-instantly. The pet just has to cancel any current action and immediately go through the F2 command.
• Some traits need to switch position as it makes no sense in having Trap traits in Skirmishing when they should be in Wilderness Survival. Same with traits like Martial Mastery which should have been in Skirmishing instead of Wilderness Survival. Trait lines are just one gigantic mess at the moment and make no sense nor offer any form of synergy.

Thank you for your time. Let’s hope that Rangers finally get what was promised them more than a year ago.

Aveneo.2068:

[…]

This is not the CDI thread dealing with rangers. This is the CDI thread announcing the ranger CDI. Therefore your suggestions will be unheard.
tl;dr:
Please hold your suggestions back until the proper CDI starts.

xXxOrcaxXx.9328:

Aveneo.2068:

[…]

This is not the CDI thread dealing with rangers. This is the CDI thread announcing the ranger CDI. Therefore your suggestions will be unheard.
tl;dr:
Please hold your suggestions back until the proper CDI starts.

Whoops, sorry about that. I merely noticed that everyone was posting their suggestions and linking to threads all of a sudden so I figured it to be best to post my own compilation of recollections and suggestions. :P

Thanks for the heads-up.

Hello, about the bonus and profession balance, i would like to speak about a important aspect of thoses class. And i really hope its going to be took into consideration.
I will try to explain that correctly in english

My point is that GW2 allow to switch the character gameplay style very easyly since we can switch weapons like we want, change traits, reset stat to restat our character as many time as we want. ( we should be able like in gw1 to reset stat anywhere we want without having to use gems or a npc, but well )
And its a very good thing !

BUT, the gear ( armor – weapons stats + runes + sigils ) is most of the time way more important than the “build” itself. And that’s the problem !
Gear itself ask many time to get ( dungeons runs, mcm insignia, material gathering.. ), or ask quite a lot of gold ( around 20-30po just for a full exotic set, and i only count armor + jewels. so no runes no weapons, no sigils )

So if i want to play dps, i will need a particular set, if i want to play condition i will need another set, another set for support, another one for tanking.. etc
Same for somes particular expensive runes, that will ask me a special set just for them.
It finaly end up that i’am going to spend 99% of my time running after the stuff rather than really enjoying doing test builds

I’am playing 6 differents class only 2 of them have somes ascended jewels. 2 of thems have 2 times the exact same armor set because of expensive runes, the 4 others class only one set, one build.
And even if i really would love to try many other builds ( like i made with GW1 during 6years ), i just dont have any pleasure to spend weeks – a lot of money to get all the necessary stuff, its more a plague for me than anything else.
So i just gave up… :/ and it just kill my pleasure and desire to play this game who was supposed to be like GW1 for that.

The actual way to obtain gear is totaly opposing the way we can in few clic change our class gameplay style and build.
It tend more players to stuck their character into one build ad vitam aeternam, when i guess its not supposed to be like that

So i have a suggestion for the gear ( exotic ) :
( note i speak about armor but it should be the same for weapons and jewels )

1. Separate armor skin and insignia
2. Make all merchant ( karma – dungeons – WvW ) have ALL existing stats ( insignia ) , ofc make ALL stats craftable. With a correct cost balance between all thoses way to get stuff, any player is going to be able to choose the way he prefer to obtain his stuff. Of course, all merchant will still sell the particular skins type ( like karma armor skin – dungeons skins.. etc )
3. Make insignia cheap ( E.G let’s say one actual armor cost 3po, the skin will cost 2.5gold and the insignia 50 silver ) or for craft (_e.g make ecto necessary for the armor skin, and not for the insignia anymore )
4. We should be able to save any insignia we want on one armor piece, like that, via a menu we are going to be able to change stats like we want. Runes, and Sigils should be saved like that too. Ofc we would still need one insignia per armor piece / weapons / jewels
5. Why not, like GW1 sell for a very cheap price a lvl 80 exotic version of the starting armor – weapons skin to have a first recipe to collect insignia – runes – sigils ( ofc soul bounded ). Then like GW1 spend more work to get like actualy the well knowed exotic skins.

Like that, it offer a cheap and fast way to have the end game stats, while keeping the hardest work needed ( like actualy ) to get the skin you want. so transmutation, or why not armor skins like jades weapons skins you just have to apply, so it would always requier the “starting armor skin” to collect many other skins ( ofc you need to do over again the insignia – rune collection )

About Ascended… i dont really know what to say.. maybe use the same system ?
Do not soul bound ascended jewel, like that we could use old unused jewel with another class ? which would be excelent considering how painfull it is to get them with only 1 character ? :/ Or just make all ascended items like legendary and already have all stats ?

Also please… do not consider the usage of any new cash shop item for a such thing except the existing ones :s

Aveneo.2068:

xXxOrcaxXx.9328:

Aveneo.2068:

[…]

This is not the CDI thread dealing with rangers. This is the CDI thread announcing the ranger CDI. Therefore your suggestions will be unheard.
tl;dr:
Please hold your suggestions back until the proper CDI starts.

Whoops, sorry about that. I merely noticed that everyone was posting their suggestions and linking to threads all of a sudden so I figured it to be best to post my own compilation of recollections and suggestions. :P

Thanks for the heads-up.

Don’t worry, that’s what Ctrl-V is for.

I figure the more times it’s posted, the more likely it is to get read.

For Professions, I would like to see a focus on more regularly required good.
I’m not willing to put armour/weapon repairs (like in DAoC) up there yet, but it’d certainly be interesting if my gear required regular maintenance. If nothing else, it adds a very “in lore”-feeling to it.

To balance this, one could have Exotic-level gear which doesn’t need maintenance, and Ascended-level gear which does. (obviously this wouldn’t work with the current Exotic/Ascended balance)

Dynnen.6405:

Dalanor.5387:

Guardian is fine. Sorry to disappoint you.

And you play a necro? LOL, necro is fine…Guardian is not

Every class has it’s issues, but guardian is the most stable and balanced since beta. I didn’t say it’s perfect, without any bug / problem, it’s just fine, which isn’t true for 6 of 8 classes.
At least they have a very definied role and are viable without cheesy builds.
Appreciate what you have.

Oh, I have been so waiting for this!!!! This made my day!!! Ranger finally get to be looked over!

I’d like to just re-direct Chris W. as its already a very comprehensive discussion about one fractal level being discussed. Leaving a few words about it would mean a lot us fellow fractal people.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Dredge-Fractal-discussion/first

Ele’s? What about Ele’s???

Wintel.4873:

Ele’s? What about Ele’s???

Wait for your turn after they done with rangers.

It is rangers’ turn . other class have to wait till they really fix the class (since ranger vote to 1st fix class

Dalanor.5387:

Wintel.4873:

Ele’s? What about Ele’s???

Wait for your turn after they done with rangers.

They wont be done with Rangers for a long time..Baby steps and adding 3% more dmg on some weapons it will take forever to even consider Rangers a good class to play..The Rangers are doomed to be the biggest failure cause they have a monster AI as their core mechanic..As long as this mechanic exist Rangers are gonna be one dimentional and weak.

So i wouldnt hold my breath either for Ranger either for Eles..We will all probably move on another game…

Frostfang.5109:

Oh, I have been so waiting for this!!!! This made my day!!! Ranger finally get to be looked over!

Let us just hope it won’t turn out to be Aquaman part 2

Is that what people voted for? To talk about a league system???

I don’t think asking the players for help with the game you’ve made is a good idea. There will be a few good ideas, but you’ll have to pick through countless posts of people telling you what they want, not what the game needs. It’s a bad sign people, is anyone else unnerved that there was a vote for class they’re going to work on? Shouldn’t they know this? Anyway, congrats rangers, you won the “we’re going to do our jobs” election.

Dalanor.5387:

Wintel.4873:

Ele’s? What about Ele’s???

Wait for your turn after they done with rangers.

Icarus.3689:

It is rangers’ turn . other class have to wait till they really fix the class (since ranger vote to 1st fix class

Why the hell can’t they do both classes at once?

Ele’s have been godawful in SPvP for almost 1 year now.

My Ranger Wishlist;
1. Sword MH Auto-attack no longer roots.
2. Pet AI magically has been fixed

Allie Murdock.8152:

Hey everyone,

We tallied your votes, and Ranger came out on top. As such, we will have our first profession CDI focused on areas you would like to see the Ranger evolve in.

Thanks for voting!

I’m sure everyone is tired of it being harped about, but the key point you’re going to see just about every ranger going on about is the pet. The reason that this happens despite the frustrations of constantly seeing the same complaints is that we’ve been dealing with problematic AI and pets that are not equipped the utilities they need to succeed for over a year now. The time for drastic change has come.

Suggestions:

1)Major Pet Changes: Reducing forced Pet dependency:

First and foremost, until a ranger pet AI overhaul enables pets to attack while moving simultaneously and fire f2s properly and effectively at all times (Unless otherwise interrupted by a skill or forcefully by the ranger himself), then we need options to hold us over until that becomes a reality. Let’s be honest, I know in the past ArenaNet has been dead set on the pet being an integral part of the ranger class. However, that mechanic is simply not working. Asking us too endure with it for over a year is simply unfair treatment. This must get attention ASAP.

Why are pets a problem?

a)They cannot attack and move simultaneously, therefore melee pets cannot land upwards of 50-70% of their auto attacks against a quickly moving target. This is a huge problem in PvP and WvW when you’re fighting kiting players.

b)F2 cast times, inefficient execution on some f2s(Porcine), lack of control of heal and buff skills that certain pets have. (Moas)

Popular suggestions to help rangers out in the pets department include:

a) Making ranger pet optional; enabling rangers to have petless builds where weapon damage is scaled to normal standards

b) Reducing the pet damage ratio and enabling the use of pets as more of a utility. (Ie. for their stuns or additional pressure/buffs/healing.). Anywhere between Ranger 85%/Pet 15% to Ranger 95%/Pet 5% could see rangers no longer being held back by their pet. This could be introduced in a number of ways, as a ratio you effect by traiting into beastmaster, as a choice you get to make and change any time with a ranger specific npc like the skill book holders, something you choose during character creation (and are able to change throughout the game).

2) Enabling the pet.

a) Distance closer skill added to melee pets.

Even if there are difficulties making pets work as intended, we can better equip them to do the job. All melee builds and classes have some manner of distance closer skill to catch moving targets. All melee pets should be given a fifth skill similar to Rush, Pounce, Swoop on a relatively low cooldown (10 seconds or so) to enable them to keep up.

b) Make at least one ranged pet that is viable as a damage option.

Currently, devourers have nothing to make them appealing over spiders. They have around the same damage overall. One skill slot is wasted on an evade that is honestly a waste of precious pet dps time when executed, the F2s are too weak in contrast to melee pet f2s. (Compare Lashtail devourer F2 to drake f2, and look at the cast time. 4 seconds? It’s a joke.)

c) All critical pet buff/heals skills need to be made player controlled. In other words, the Moa heal, and similar pet skills that affect the player. The pet AI just uses them too haphazardly. We need to be in control of these types of skills to make the pets that have them viable.

3) Utility Skill Improvements:

a) Signets

Some signets are lacking, in passive effect and active effect. At the same time let us address the problem with Signet of the beastmaster, and that namely it has the order wrong in terms of what’s viable.

Trait: Signet of the Beastmaster to be changed to include pet. All pet actives changed to effect ranger by default instead.

Signet of the Wild

Passive: I feel like the starting point of the healing is just too low. 58-60 is not enough to make the skill justifiable for most builds. The starting should be about 100 hp/second. The healing power scaling is fine however given its passive nature, assuming the starting point were to be buffed.

Active: In accordance with signet of beastmaster tweaks: changed to buff ranger by default. Pet inclusion to be traited for with the same trait.

Signet of Stone

Active: In accordance with signet of beastmaster tweaks: changed to buff ranger by default. Pet inclusion to be traited for with the same trait.

Signet of the Hunt: In accordance with signet of beastmaster tweaks: changed to buff ranger by default. Pet inclusion to be traited for with the same trait.

Shouts

Currently, shouts are super lackluster unless you trait for Nature’s Voice and roll with 2 shouts minimum with soldier runes on your gear for condi removal. This needs to change. Shouts need to see changes include that also offer some amount of buffing to the ranger from the get-go. Maybe a small amount of might, fury vigor or whatever depending on the shout.

Search and Rescue Out of all shouts, I feel this one falls the farthest behind. It still seems to have a cooldown reflecting the days when pets could revive dead players. With it only working on downed, I feel like 20 seconds need to be shaved off for this to be viable in any circumstance, and for some additional functions to be added for it to help protect the pet when it is attempting to heal a downed player. Also the fact that it will effectively only do it for one player makes it a moot skill in most settings where you get plenty of actual players healing downed party members.

Traps

As I recall, certain ArenaNet community members already hinted at the possibility of new combo fields to certain traps that lack them. I feel that this is a good direction for traps, and is the right venue to explore for these utilities.

Survival

Sharpening stones

With such over-saturation in condition, and the presence on traps and traits and certain weapon skills, I think it’d be nice if Sharpening Stones was changed to add a physical damage buff to the next 5 attacks instead of bleed.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Bonus: Global: Professions: How would you like to see us evolve Ranger balance?- Owner- Allie Murdock

Awesome! Looking forward towards this a lot!

But why is the Necromancers’ PvE situation never addressed or commented on by you, the developers? They’re overall sub-par; Anything helpful that they bring, other professions can do better and easier.

4) Healing Skills

Currently ranger healing skills desperately lack added procs/and effects/traitable added affects that other classes have access to. Pretty much all but one of our heals is merely raw healing with a different delivery method. Please consider adding such perks to our heals as well. Things like Might, Aegis, “Evades next received attack”, active condi removal(Ie. cures poison and burn), Swiftness provided upon heal execution.

5) Traits Many ranger traits are functioning counter-productively due awkward placement or lack of benefits. Most of these you already will have heard about in the ranger suggestion thread you flagged, but here are some of my key suggestions:

Signet of the Beastmaster. As I mentioned earlier, affecting the ranger should be the basic necessity and affecting the pet should be the “traited icing on the cake”, not the opposite as it currently is.

Hide in Plain Sight This trait has lost its way, its purpose. If you are unable to move to receive its benefit, then you are simply liable to be killed by warriors mindlessly swinging at the air where they know you are anyways.

Detharos.3157:

snip

I hope you saved those posts somewhere, because this isn’t the thread they’re going to read.