Guild Wars 2

Samitan, have you kept up with recent patches? It seems you’ve been away from the forums for long stretches of time so I’m wondering if you know where ranger is TODAY.

I know everyone wants a drastic overhaul.. But I can’t really think of one where I still feel like the ranger which I have been playing since gw1, which for me is the most important thing

Also..

+1
The pet mechanic makes the Ranger the worst overall class in the game. The Ranger’s pet excels in only two areas: small scale pvp and overworld pve, so I guess it’s fine if those are the only things you play. However, they keel over in dungeons, wvw zergs, and any difficult content that requires dodging.

(1)They are perfectly fine in dungeons.. Adding damage/boons
(2)WVWzergs.. Right, it’s the same as thief/Mesmer. We are not the only profession that doesn’t add a lot inside a Zerg, don’t blame the pet for that

(3)The part about the crucial dodging part is the only thing we can’t protect our pets from, aside from swapping to a devourer for instance. Still the downtime of the pet is not that high, just don’t swap if you know the second pet is going to die right away. And besides.. Such fights won’t last trough the whole process wether it being an event or dungeon. (Unless your fighting a giant.. Then you are forced to use a foul, spitting spider or something)

So basically.. You want to remove pets just because you have to swap to a ranged pet for one type of mob/mechanic

Castaliea.3156:

Melandrus Flower.1206:

-1

Ps. I won’t let you guys separate me and my trusty Sir-Pawns-Alot !

I too don’t want the mechanic to go away, but it needs a major design overhaul.

There would be no reason to remove the mechanic if the mechanic worked well. I don’t think many rangers want the pet to go away completely. The problem with the pet mechanic is it looks like a half-finished thing. I mean there’s no depth at all, we have little control over our pets. It seems the devs implemented pets without enough testing. Passive play is not a big problem in pve i suppose, but it is in pvp, expecially in a competitive environment (which the devs are trying to promote). That’s why rangers are often considered an easymode class; for some ranger specs that’s not true at all, but bm regen bunkers were hated for a reason. Now it’s the same with spirit rangers.
I remember in warhammer online (just an example) the white lion (a pet class) could send the pet to the target and then pull the enemy towards him. That’s a good example of synergy between the pet and the player. Also the lion grew up as the player gained new levels, a thing like this is not really needed, but it’s a nice addition. And in that game the pet AI was far from perfect, but still better than in gw2.

+1

I don’t see the pet A.I ever being good enough to justify it punishing the rangers damage output all the time.

I don’t care how they do it, but we need a way to avoid using pets that can be killed. The ANet team is leaning toward content that doesn’t work well with AI companions of any kind (possible exception: short-lived, expendable ones). Let me just respond to this post to make my point:

Melandrus Flower.1206:

I know everyone wants a drastic overhaul.. But I can’t really think of one where I still feel like the ranger which I have been playing since gw1, which for me is the most important thing

Also..

+1
The pet mechanic makes the Ranger the worst overall class in the game. The Ranger’s pet excels in only two areas: small scale pvp and overworld pve, so I guess it’s fine if those are the only things you play. However, they keel over in dungeons, wvw zergs, and any difficult content that requires dodging.

(1)They are perfectly fine in dungeons.. Adding damage/boons
(2)WVWzergs.. Right, it’s the same as thief/Mesmer. We are not the only profession that doesn’t add a lot inside a Zerg, don’t blame the pet for that

(3)The part about the crucial dodging part is the only thing we can’t protect our pets from, aside from swapping to a devourer for instance. Still the downtime of the pet is not that high, just don’t swap if you know the second pet is going to die right away. And besides.. Such fights won’t last trough the whole process wether it being an event or dungeon. (Unless your fighting a giant.. Then you are forced to use a foul, spitting spider or something)

So basically.. You want to remove pets just because you have to swap to a ranged pet for one type of mob/mechanic

1. Not exactly. They are incapable of avoiding traps and sometimes aggro enemies at inconvenient times. Pets don’t position themselves as efficiently as human players do, so rangers have a distinct disadvantage in situations where positioning is crucial. Things like Aetherblade Retreat punish pet users, and only rangers are forced to use pets.
2. I’ll admit I don’t know too much about WvW; however, I do know that fighting without a pet is a significant (>25%) penalty to damage, as well as a penalty to support and cc. I honestly doubt that thieves and mesmers suffer that much in zergs.

3. There are ranged skills that can target pets and deal significant damage to them, aren’t there? I’ve had spiders and devourers die on me because they can’t dodge. I’ve had them trip traps because they apparently aren’t even aware of such things. Melee pets have even more problems. They rarely hit moving targets, they use their skills with abysmal timing, they take several seconds to respond to an F2 command, and you can’t call them back out of an AoE if you melee (of course, they often don’t respond quickly enough anyway), among other things. They’re just so…clumsy.

Besides, pets should be close companions in whom you’ve invested time and care…right now I feel a far closer connection to my longbow. I change it out less often, and it doesn’t forget its name when I do. They made pets seem extremely impersonal, even expendable. Oh, it’s a giant we’re fighting? Better put river drake and jaguar back in their crates and get out jungle spider and lashtail devourer. I hate it when people say ‘you have to use the right tool for the job’ in regards to ranger pets. A ranger’s pet is supposed to be a close, trusted friend and companion; not a tool to be used and returned to storage.

The problem with Rangers is Structured PVP, Anet seems to balance around the LCD of this game, which is SPvP and its general awfulness. Until we separate that dumbed down system of point camping from the rest of the game, Rangers will not see improvements.

I mean christ, Spirit Rangers are the most overpowered thing ever seen in SPvP right now according to the forums.

Let that sink it…Spirit Rangers…Are absolutely so overpowered…That Rangers need to be gutted because of it.

This is what Anet has been balancing the game around…That should frighten everyone on this forum….as it doesn’t bold well for this game.

Xsorus.2507:

The problem with Rangers is Structured PVP, Anet seems to balance around the LCD of this game, which is SPvP and its general awfulness. Until we separate that dumbed down system of point camping from the rest of the game, Rangers will not see improvements.

I mean christ, Spirit Rangers are the most overpowered thing ever seen in SPvP right now according to the forums.

Let that sink it…Spirit Rangers…Are absolutely so overpowered…That Rangers need to be gutted because of it.

This is what Anet has been balancing the game around…That should frighten everyone on this forum….as it doesn’t bold well for this game.

Forums =/= fact, remember when 100 blades were OP? Yeah me neither, but the forums screamed to the high heavens it was, spirit rangers are in the same boat, stupid people think they’re OP, they really aren’t though and are easily countered.

Durzlla.6295:

Xsorus.2507:

The problem with Rangers is Structured PVP, Anet seems to balance around the LCD of this game, which is SPvP and its general awfulness. Until we separate that dumbed down system of point camping from the rest of the game, Rangers will not see improvements.

I mean christ, Spirit Rangers are the most overpowered thing ever seen in SPvP right now according to the forums.

Let that sink it…Spirit Rangers…Are absolutely so overpowered…That Rangers need to be gutted because of it.

This is what Anet has been balancing the game around…That should frighten everyone on this forum….as it doesn’t bold well for this game.

Forums =/= fact, remember when 100 blades were OP? Yeah me neither, but the forums screamed to the high heavens it was, spirit rangers are in the same boat, stupid people think they’re OP, they really aren’t though and are easily countered.

To be fair, they did nerf 100blades and the Ranger was a casualty of war. This was when they nerfed the attack speed buff on zephyr’s and frenzy.

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Xsorus.2507:

The problem with Rangers is Structured PVP, Anet seems to balance around the LCD of this game, which is SPvP and its general awfulness. Until we separate that dumbed down system of point camping from the rest of the game, Rangers will not see improvements.

I mean christ, Spirit Rangers are the most overpowered thing ever seen in SPvP right now according to the forums.

Let that sink it…Spirit Rangers…Are absolutely so overpowered…That Rangers need to be gutted because of it.

This is what Anet has been balancing the game around…That should frighten everyone on this forum….as it doesn’t bold well for this game.

Forums =/= fact, remember when 100 blades were OP? Yeah me neither, but the forums screamed to the high heavens it was, spirit rangers are in the same boat, stupid people think they’re OP, they really aren’t though and are easily countered.

To be fair, they did nerf 100blades and the Ranger was a casualty of war. This was when they nerfed the attack speed buff on zephyr’s and frenzy.

That didn’t nerf 100blades in the slightest, the build still ran rampant until they move the damage for adrenaline level trait to a grandmaster which killed the original variation of the build.

All they killed with that was mass quickness burst being mandatory and OP, which was the goal. Because when every tPvP team except like 3 ran a Mesmer so they could all run to mid point pop Timewarp and burst something’s wrong

Quickness was pretty overpowered, on most classes except Ranger. But yea, if they hadn’t nerfed Quickness Warriors would be bloody stupid right now beyond belief

I don’t see why it’d be an issue to have the option to have pets instead of everyone forced into them.

-1 ( forgot my frost spirit gets a vote)

Oh and an extra -1 for my hyena ally

Chopps.5047:

Oh and an extra -1 for my hyena ally

-1, my parrot that gets summoned with pirate runes gets a vote too, right?
(I’m joking!)

+1

Preferred the optional pets of gw1

+1
move pets to utility as in gw1

Chrispy.5641:

Chopps.5047:

Oh and an extra -1 for my hyena ally

-1, my parrot that gets summoned with pirate runes gets a vote too, right?
(I’m joking!)

Lol thank you, almost forgot that one

McWolfy.5924:

+1
move pets to utility as in gw1

Pets could be damage in GW1, they were capable of hitting as hard as warriors quite easily.

Just fought the champion of the whirling blade in one of the baloon events.

Surprise surprise the best and most efficient way of beating her is to use guard to stick your pet as far away from the fight as possible as the mechanics of the fight are based around DODGING her whirl to get her exhausted and collapse.

Good luck getting your pet to her in the couple of seconds she is down so you can unload your damage on her even if your pet is by your side when it happens.

-1

I don’t understand why you would pick a Ranger in Guild Wars 2, if you don’t like the pet. It’s really not that bad, and ArenaNet will continue to balance it.

+1

With the increase of enviornmental focused hazards, pets just aren’t set up right to be anything but a liability. Something, or lots of somethings, need to be changed.

Kasama.8941:

-1

I don’t understand why you would pick a Ranger in Guild Wars 2, if you don’t like the pet. It’s really not that bad, and ArenaNet will continue to balance it.

People would pick a ranger in GW2 because they want to play a character that is at one with nature and has some cool abilities such as pet and traps. But the problem is the pet is so badly done that a lot of players would rather just not have it. The whole class needs to been looked at and some big changes. Even if arenanet sit down and decide that it’s going to be a Beast Master class, at least then the class will have a role and they can start making the ranger all about it’s pet.
Not what it currently is which is, ‘yeah, it can do a little bit of this and a little bit of that, we’ll make it have a pet while reduces it overall damage. There we go’

Ele’s can spawn in pets. I don’t think they reduce the damage output for the Ele and same with necro. :/

If the pet is meant to be our main mechanic then it shouldn’t punish the ranger, because then we just become a ranger doing 75% damage and a a.i pet doing what should be our 25%. but the pet is lucky to even get hits off now because of how broken it all is!!!!

cbrooksc.9358:

Kasama.8941:

-1

I don’t understand why you would pick a Ranger in Guild Wars 2, if you don’t like the pet. It’s really not that bad, and ArenaNet will continue to balance it.

People would pick a ranger in GW2 because they want to play a character that is at one with nature and has some cool abilities such as pet and traps. But the problem is the pet is so badly done that a lot of players would rather just not have it. The whole class needs to been looked at and some big changes. Even if arenanet sit down and decide that it’s going to be a Beast Master class, at least then the class will have a role and they can start making the ranger all about it’s pet.
Not what it currently is which is, ‘yeah, it can do a little bit of this and a little bit of that, we’ll make it have a pet while reduces it overall damage. There we go’

Ele’s can spawn in pets. I don’t think they reduce the damage output for the Ele and same with necro. :/

If the pet is meant to be our main mechanic then it shouldn’t punish the ranger, because then we just become a ranger doing 75% damage and a a.i pet doing what should be our 25%. but the pet is lucky to even get hits off now because of how broken it all is!!!!

That is what I don’t understand. You can pick a sylvari Warrior, and be “one with nature” without having a pet. There are also light and heavy armor types that can make you look like a Ranger.

But the Ranger is all about the pet. That’s why it takes a chuck out of your base damage. You’re meant to use the pet, regardless of which skills you decide to use. Even if you play a signet Ranger, you are still a “beastmaster” simply because you’re a Ranger. It’s a pet class.

That’s because their pets are tied to their skills. The Ranger has a permanent pet. And if the pet didn’t do anything significant, there would be no reason to have it. If it only dealt 2% of your damage output, or you could stow it and still have 100% damage, what would be the point of having the pet?

There are different pets for different uses. If you don’t have enough snare skills to make your melee pet hit, then pick a ranged pet. If you want burst damage, then pick a drake. If you want boons, then pick a moa. If you want it to survive for longer, then pick a bear. You need to play into the mechanic, instead of just expecting it to always work for you. No, the pet system isn’t perfect, but the biggest problem is honestly that Ranger players simply don’t care about utilising the mechanic.

+1
Pets can stay, but only as small utility (like guardians virtues), not as big part of class. They are useful, and I wouldn’t want to totally get ride of them, but they are too limiting in group play.

@up
Pets should be utilities, not dmg. Other classes can ignore ‘F’ skills and still deal most of their dps. Also, they don’t lose their class mechanic in first melee train hit.

They also don’t absorb up to 5 targets, terkov. If your pet dies in aoe, it prevented someone else from taking damage. Aoe target limit is 5 people, don’t forget that.

Kasama.8941:

cbrooksc.9358:

Kasama.8941:

-1

I don’t understand why you would pick a Ranger in Guild Wars 2, if you don’t like the pet. It’s really not that bad, and ArenaNet will continue to balance it.

People would pick a ranger in GW2 because they want to play a character that is at one with nature and has some cool abilities such as pet and traps. But the problem is the pet is so badly done that a lot of players would rather just not have it. The whole class needs to been looked at and some big changes. Even if arenanet sit down and decide that it’s going to be a Beast Master class, at least then the class will have a role and they can start making the ranger all about it’s pet.
Not what it currently is which is, ‘yeah, it can do a little bit of this and a little bit of that, we’ll make it have a pet while reduces it overall damage. There we go’

Ele’s can spawn in pets. I don’t think they reduce the damage output for the Ele and same with necro. :/

If the pet is meant to be our main mechanic then it shouldn’t punish the ranger, because then we just become a ranger doing 75% damage and a a.i pet doing what should be our 25%. but the pet is lucky to even get hits off now because of how broken it all is!!!!

That is what I don’t understand. You can pick a sylvari Warrior, and be “one with nature” without having a pet. There are also light and heavy armor types that can make you look like a Ranger.

But the Ranger is all about the pet. That’s why it takes a chuck out of your base damage. You’re meant to use the pet, regardless of which skills you decide to use. Even if you play a signet Ranger, you are still a “beastmaster” simply because you’re a Ranger. It’s a pet class.

That’s because their pets are tied to their skills. The Ranger has a permanent pet. And if the pet didn’t do anything significant, there would be no reason to have it. If it only dealt 2% of your damage output, or you could stow it and still have 100% damage, what would be the point of having the pet?

There are different pets for different uses. If you don’t have enough snare skills to make your melee pet hit, then pick a ranged pet. If you want burst damage, then pick a drake. If you want boons, then pick a moa. If you want it to survive for longer, then pick a bear. You need to play into the mechanic, instead of just expecting it to always work for you. No, the pet system isn’t perfect, but the biggest problem is honestly that Ranger players simply don’t care about utilising the mechanic.

I’ll start by saying WUT! The Ranger mechanic is the pet, the Mechanic.
a the mechanic is how your class functions and what is meant to give it a distinct difference in how to play that class. The pet isn’t unique to ranger, eles and necro can both get pets and with no penalty to overall damage.

The pet is just pulling ranger down, the ranger has soo much more potential than it has at the moment because of the poor design choices and forcing pets into the ranger play.

The pet doesn’t make it powerful. It doesn’t even bring it up to par with other classes it actually reduces our potential damage output if not having a pet.
There is no way to utilize a broken mechanic.

There is no need to control the pet because all you can do is call it back or send it to attack. with a f2 skill that has such a long cast that the enemy has either moved or interrupted it, the pet will then just follow the enemy player around kittening their leg until either you die or, well. they wont die will they.

The pet doesn’t work. I know that the A.I for the Pet will never be able to compete with players unless it’s stats are a lot higher than they are now to make up for the kitten A.I that controls the pets.

Also an added note I just forgot, the pets stats are also not effected by your Armour stats, so in fact that 25% of your total damage would never be possible to reach even if the enemy player was just standing still and letting him attack them.

+1
I finally gave up on my beloved Ranger who I played through the game with from the first day of release, and rerolled a warrior.
I can’t make money because rangers suck at farming things like Dunwell, or doing enough AoE damage to tag multiple mobs in huge zergs. I can’t WvW with my guild because I’m the sole ranger in our numbers and we all know that all I can really do is scout and carry supply. I can’t do PvE content because when someone has the choice between a ranger or a warrior in their pub, its bye bye to the ranger.

I’m sick and tired of being the only person who can’t do whatever strategies there are to do living story because I’m a ranger and I might as well just sell everything I have on me and use it to hit 80 on another class.

I’d like to see it go, but I know this will never happen unless down the road (expansion) they add a new profession that is similar to ranger (like they had planned in the beta) but doesn’t utilize a pet.
So +/- 0

Chopps.5047:

Samitan, have you kept up with recent patches? It seems you’ve been away from the forums for long stretches of time so I’m wondering if you know where ranger is TODAY.

Hi Chopps, the reason i go away from the forums and the game for that matter is me hoping that when i come back, A-net will have fixed something of the rangers and i do always read the patch notes of every large patch. In terms of knowing where rangers are today compared to other classes i wouldn’t say i’m too knowledgeable in that area, but then that’s why i’m not making a complaint about the ranger class as a whole just the pet mechanic which is a large part of the class and is clearly broken. Personally i’d be happy with just better pathing, i don’t tend to have many problems in terms of keeping my dogs alive. However, with the new content as others have suggested our i am finding it a lot harder to keep them alive such as with the aetherblade dungeon with the spinning lasers.

A note to others i will write up the results and main arguments probably around thursday/friday coming as well as alternative suggestions and general opinions.

To me, it feels like the pet class is messing with the game and the game that Anet needs to develop. When they start making boss fights that nullify a classes ability to participate effectively, you loose the class. Anet is pushing that way. I think it will become more and more difficult to make fun dungeon fights that are inclusive to all classes in all armor types when you have un improvable pets, that run in and die aimlessly and that the pets don’t scale as armor/weapons scale with other classes. Anet is stuck with limited player development because of 1 class with pets.

Saw this in an MMO a few years back when realms had the exact same characters with the exception of 2 unique types one to each side… One side had “shaman” class the other side a different class. It became apparent that one side in certain dungeons had an advantage due to their “unique” class. It hindered development and lead to both Unique classes being made available to the each side. Sad, but if this game continues to try to develop, the Ranger class with its lack of scaling damage could be that one set that hinders development.

-1

The thread’s title implies improvement to the Ranger class. If you want to improve it; fix the pet.

Just deleting the whole class mechanic is by no means constructive. If you want a different class mechanic, suggest the creation of a different profession to suit your prefered playstyle. I would not be happy with my Ranger Beastmaster being changed into something I did not pick at the character creation screen a year ago. I knew the Ranger would have a pet as its’ class mechanic and I decided to deal with it. I suggest you do the same.

JorneMormel.9850:

-1
I would not be happy with my Ranger Beastmaster being changed into something I did not pick at the character creation screen a year ago.

Omg this cracked me up. I like you.

nobody say remove the pets from the game. just move to utility slot.

McWolfy.5924:

nobody say remove the pets from the game. just move to utility slot.

Samitan.6192:

This is not a discussion on what it will be, that can be discussed in another discussion this is merely to get an idea of how many are for and how many are against getting rid of the pet mechanic.

Really now? I must have misread then…

I am all for improving the current pet mechanic, but I am not in favor of removing it.

-1
I like pets, butt they are broken in PvE.

-1
The pet mechanic works really good in pvp they just need to make the mechanic better for pve and wvw but to remove it that would be crazy.

Verow.6904:

The pet mechanic works really good in pvp they just need to make the mechanic better for pve and wvw but to remove it that would be crazy.

Mmm pet mechanic doesn’t work that well in pvp tbh, has no depth at all, you have little control over your pet and it promotes passive play. But yea in pvp at least is decent.

I’m surprised ANet doesn’t go for a quick-fix:
Namely, alter the 15-pointer Trait that grants Protection to your pet upon you dodging, by way of swapping Protection for Aegis. It’d at least allow you to escape Big Bad Deeps, and save your pet from being 1-shot. This would then allow ANet some time to tweak and fix the actual mechanics behind pets. Then, they could adjust things after having done so.

+1
The AI is the problem, and since pets use the same AI as mobs I find it very hard to believe that ANet is capable of overhauling pets without breaking the entire game. The pet AI, interface and function in general is worse than any other MMO I have played in 15 years. Add that to the fact that combat in this game is extremely active and involved, not fire-and-forget of the traditional MMO’s where an AI this poor would stand a chance, and it adds up to the AI making pets a liability in many cases. A class mechanic should NEVER be a liability, it should only ever be a benefit.

If I thought for one second that they could actually fix pets and make them as smart and responsive as any other game I’ve played a pet class in then it would be a solid -1 to the idea… but I don’t.

solrik.6028:

Yeeeeeeeeeeah right, just postpone the problem, instead of fixing, right?
Everyone is like “FIX THIS NAO B-CUSS IT SUCKZ!” But doesn’t try to come up with a fix.

It is probably easier for Anet to fix the pet pathfinding so that it is smoother rather than to remove the mechanic, come up with a new one and recreate a lot of traits.

Removing pet mechanic is a huge change and would take at least a year to balance all the new things.

ALSO A FUN-FACT:
Statistics show that a majority of people who are active on the forums are there because they have a problem with the product. Which leads us to me saying; this is partially stupid because you will obviously have a much greater amount of ‘+1’ than ‘-1’

lol right on the mark!

I would have liked to keep the pet mechanic but seeing the devs have no ability or professional pride i’m stuck still with the poorest pet class implementation i’ve seen in a game in the last decade. The beta has lasted a year already.

+1 Remove the pet.Or better yet,hire some competent developers and fix the pets.

Xsorus.2507:

I mean christ, Spirit Rangers are the most overpowered thing ever seen in SPvP right now according to the forums.

Let that sink it…Spirit Rangers…Are absolutely so overpowered…That Rangers need to be gutted because of it.

This is what Anet has been balancing the game around…That should frighten everyone on this forum….as it doesn’t bold well for this game.

Amen!

op in pvp up in wvw. i hope they will notice changing 1-2 numbers in stats wont solve the problem

Hey guys,
thanks for all the posts, from what i’ve gathered so far there are a lot of people like myself who do like the pet mechanic in terms of the concept, but the fact that the game has been out a year now and their AI has not improved much at all as far as i can tell has caused skepticism as to whether A-Net can deliver pets with decent AI, and rightly so.
From these it seems there are those who want to hold out in the hopes that the pet AI will eventually be fixed and others who feel that A-Net should go for broke with the pets and think up something else for us. An example of this someone mentioned was preparations which were one of the ranger’s defining abilities in GW1.
However, discussing alternatives is for another thread, so keep posting those pros and cons. At the end of the day it’s up to A-Net what happens anyway but it’s trying to give them something to think about.
You never know.