Guild Wars 2

The purpose of this thread is for all of us to come together and think of changes that are well needed to help improve the class. We all know that the forums mods don’t ever steer near the Ranger forums, so the main purpose is to collect ideas that we all can agree on and then put them up on a separate post in a section that the forum mods actually view. I do hope that all of our constructive criticism that we all will give will lead to an agreement amongst us all.

1. I believe that Fortifying Bond should be made baseline. Reason why I believe this should be made baseline is because our pets are an extension of us, so any benefits we receive from buffs should be also transmitted to them. Restricting this trait to a single specialization requires too much investment to properly maintain both offensive and defensive buffs for our pets. I also believe that Fortifying Bond shouldn’t just be limited to boons; it should also apply buffs from traits such as Spotter and Empower Allies or other sources of group buffs like spirits, banners, and auras. These should also be applied through Fortifying Bond due to the limit these group utilities give; restricted to a max of 5 players, so the buffs will always and only be applied to the players in a group due to the buff application prioritizing players over the pet.

2. Increase the attack range of all pets’ attacks to an fair amount so they won’t be easily kiteable as they are in both PvP and WvW. In this video, it demonstrates how the Moa form applied from the Elite skill Polymorph Moa has a better attack range since the form given through the Elite skill is based on a player transformation rather than a pet AI relayed through a PvE mob. If possible, would prefer have the pet AI be remodeled entirely due to changes to the pet AI could possibly break the mobs in PvE. Sadly, we can’t expect for that to happen at all or any time soon, so we can possibly settle on an attack range increase. The movement speed from Pet’s Prowess should also be made baseline to help against kiting our pet in PvP situations. Our pets are our class mechanic, they should feel like a true extension of us, not just there to be used for utility.

3. Better control of our pets should be implemented so we can better control through a skill factor. Relying on the Pet AI in all situations is rather tedious due to how limited they are with their relayed PvE mob AI. Our F abilities should be changed so we may gain better control through their skill usages. F1 should be changed so if we issue the attack command, we can then toggle it to return. This way, we still have control over our pets actions if we want to have them engage or not. F2 will remain the same as it is with the addition of F3 and F4 being used as hotkeys for their other two skills. F5 will then be implemented as the new pet swap, since Anet has shown that they have added F5 to other classes for more control over their class mechanic.

There are obviously alot more things that would need to be addressed that I did not cover. I look forward to all of your replies and critisim.

I really agree with you for the pet attack range. They really need a small leap attack on their auto attacks.

1. I have seen some wanting Fortifying Bond to become baseline, while others are fine with it as a trait but want it moved to Beastmastery. I fall into the latter where it would be nice to have it in Beastmastery, but I would not mind the former either.

2. Yes to increasing the attack range and baseline pet speed improvements. Not sure what the “sweet spot” would be. If Anet ever increases either or both; would be interesting to see the values they decide on.

3. Another function key would be nice, but I would rather have more keybind options for more pet control so, as you suggested, can have more of a pet’s skills available to us as profession mechanic function keys.

To me, commands such as “Attack My Target” and “Return To Me” should have been keybind options specifically available for the Ranger class, while F1-F3 represent the three unique skill sets of a pet.

Lévis.5489:

I really agree with you for the pet attack range. They really need a small leap attack on their auto attacks.

They don’t need a leap, they just need to increase the melee range from 130 to 250/300 like moa morph/birds have.

GW1 pets had +20% base run speed. I think they should have the same here. Meaning, pets with Pet’s Prowess would run 50% faster than players with no speed boosts. Then choosing BM would give maximum efficiency and power to the pet, but you could still buff your pet with swiftness to move 53% faster if you do not have BM traited. The maximum speed a pet would get then is 60% faster with Sic Em, not including super speed.

If you combined those two, pets would hit all the time and be hard to kite.

Check out the moa morph skill when used on a pet, it suddenly can hit its attacks.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJ4b4uvJ8tY
Moa Morph AA skill: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Claw_

Not only can a pet transformed with Moa Morph hit a lot more often than a normal pet, but they cleave too… Sad when our pet is less effective than a skill you cast on people to make them less effective.

I’m fairly new to ranger, but I have my own thoughts.

#1: Our Pets need innate condition damage. When conditions were changed, this had the unfortunate result of making all conditions inflicted by the pet severely kitten and utterly useless.

#2: Our pets need a dodge command that we control somehow. Easiest method would to just make it so when we dodge (not skill dodge, but just regular ole dodge), our pet dodges along with us.

Ranger changes?
See signature.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

I’m fairly new to ranger, but I have my own thoughts.

#1: Our Pets need innate condition damage. When conditions were changed, this had the unfortunate result of making all conditions inflicted by the pet severely kitten and utterly useless.

#2: Our pets need a dodge command that we control somehow. Easiest method would to just make it so when we dodge (not skill dodge, but just regular ole dodge), our pet dodges along with us.

Ding! Ding! Ding! 10 points!

Even with Expertise Training, which was nerfed for some reason, pets still do pointless condi damage, the only reasonable one they do is Poison and not for the damage.

2) should have been implemented years ago and would solve a majority of the issues of pet survivability.

The biggest problem i find with pets is they are far too easy to kill without even being focused on, we can dodge out of AoE’s but the pet can’t and with empathic bond as it is it’s an instant dead pet so i wanted to add these two changes as they have been mentioned before and would force players to treat pets as more of a threat than being mobs that’ll die anyway when they just focus the ranger,

1. Empathic bond should convert the conditions taken from the ranger into boons for the pet, it would help them survive longer as it does for us except when the pet is focused on, even with empathic bond we are still susceptible to high output condi builds but atleast our pets won’t just melt in 2sec.

2.Another issue is physical AoE attacks (as almost every class has some sort of AoE cleave/targeted blast) they just kill pets by staying on top of the ranger (except in the case of ranged pets but even ranged pets won’t move to avoid AoE’s) so i propose that Mistlock Instability: Playing Favorites be added to Beastly Warden,
Beastly Warden: Your pet taunts foes near them when executing a command [F2] abilty, Pets take 50% less damage from untargeted attacks.
this way pets will survive longer in heavy AoE attacks and will be focused anyway when they use taunt or by the other players choice and take full damage.

I think these changes would make rangers more viable in large group content such as wvw or even in dungeons as the tankier pets will still get focused more often but can handle it better than the squishy ones whereas in wvw the squishy ones that do more damage would get focused more by players as they are a bigger threat.

I don’t see why you need your pet to do condi damage. It’s already really good power based, you know ? You don’t HAVE to deal the same kind of damage as your pet. Will you be condi based, your pet power based, it will do the same damages as if you were both power based. You still stack might for him when you crit.
Crit as a condi ranger is still immensely useful, because you apply bleed on crits.

1. Fortifying bond yes baseline , without it pets just Melt when its more than 2vs1 because they are not a boon Target priority , pets like Saimoth (plasma need a update its missing quickness , resistance ) spotter ect effects pets.
Disagree that auras ect ect should be shared also we can trigger them ourselfs with f2>leap combos no need to share thats part of the player skill needed to manage the pet giving them access to Auras makes them even more passive play not having to manualy leap them.

2. yes 20% pet movement speed base , some attacks increased melee range.
it would be nice for a change to have the pet Run faster than a 33% , it will allow a ranger to attack on the move with the pet rather than having to keep applying Cc to get it to hit , atleast with the 20% base speed every time you use huntershot or Sick um or a different kind of speed boost you can guarantee knowing your pet will cause damage.

3. pet control All they have to do is add a button which Acts like the Gw1 hero system flag you can keybind a button on your mouse and Aim + click pet goes to that location, they can code it using Guard mechanics Removing all the bonuses.

then to stop any code bugs , Redesgin Guard into somthing else a new shout Furious Assualt (or aka “KILL” shouts the ranger)

Furious Assualt duration 8secs ( cooldown 32seconds)
Pet crits apply one stack of Furious on the pet
Furious , pets crit chance 3% per stack to a maximum of 5 stacks (stacks wear off after 30secs)(15% crit chance increase)
Pet crits apply Cripple(8seconds) , Torment(3secs) for the duration of the skill (8secs)
Pet attacks also heal the pet for x amount per attack (this will make great pet health sustain for the Felines and make hounds more sustained) could be used with Empathic bond to recover Hp quickly to weaken any condi damage on the pet .

Furious Assualt+quickness= Hp gain , migrates EB transfer condi damage.

Kehlian.4380:

I don’t see why you need your pet to do condi damage.

Because there are a dozen of pet attacks that apply condi. They obviously have to do something about it.

Would it be feasible to have like a 3-5 seconds reveal on LB3 or maybe SB4? Or both? The only reveal skill we have is Sic ’em. Just a thought.

Why is noone talking about Signet of the hunt ? It’s a good one, and it gives +25% base speed to you and your pet

Kehlian.4380:

Why is noone talking about Signet of the hunt ? It’s a good one, and it gives +25% base speed to you and your pet

because its pretty perfect , its there if you need it and its there if you don’t need the Speed boost only the damage boost.

or both overall its a good Utility skill so need to Discuss it.

Wuselknusel.4082:

Ranger changes?
See signature.

That’s why I said for us to decide on the decisions and then once we all come to an agreement, put them up on the Discussion page since we all know Anet never looks at the Ranger forums.

Oh I was talking about all those people needing pet speed. This utility is there for them.

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

1. Fortifying bond yes baseline , without it pets just Melt when its more than 2vs1 because they are not a boon Target priority , pets like Saimoth (plasma need a update its missing quickness , resistance ) spotter ect effects pets.
Disagree that auras ect ect should be shared also we can trigger them ourselfs with f2>leap combos no need to share thats part of the player skill needed to manage the pet giving them access to Auras makes them even more passive play not having to manualy leap them.

We can trigger an aura through the skill usage of pets, if it is implemented, but what about all the other buffs that our pets are losing out on? Due to the restrictions on these buffs, they will only be applied to 5 total entities, with the buffs prioritizing the players over the pet. Due to this, our pets are always losing out on these buffs and not benefiting from them, which hurts us alot since they count for 30% of our damage. You can argue that increasing the number of affected allies would resolve this issue, yes for content that is capped at 5 players like dungeons/fractals and PvP they would benefit from it. However in situations like open world PvE like world bosses and WvW, our pets will still continue to lose out on these buffs due to the restrictions of the amount of affected entities. Okay, that leaves is with removing the restrictions entirely, but that would break the game entirely. For organized content like Tequatl, Triple Trouble, and events in Silverwastes; so long as one person has it equipped, the majority of players who aren’t can run full DPS builds without having to sacrifice for group utility, making this type of content even easier and more laughable than it currently is. That is why I believe other buffs such as auras, banners, and spirits should also be applied through Fortifying Bond.

fortifying bond combined with a minor BM trait

Zatoichi.1049:

fortifying bond combined with a minor BM trait

Would be easier to combine Pack Alpha and Pet’s Prowess and then having Fortifying Bond being the new Minor Grandmaster trait in Beast Mastery.

1. Fortifying Bond shouldn’t be baseline, but merging it with a minor BM trait would be best. I think it would be too good of a free handout especially when using the main-hand axe and with all the boon spam that may come from another ally. I agree that all/most buffs should extend to pets; including auras, traits (Empower Allies, Strength in Numbers, etc.), maybe even venoms; without being charged as an ally. So 5 players + 2 pets = 7 total beings with auras, traits, etc.
2. Yes, pets need to be able to stick to their targets and land hits. Adding a small gap closer, such as the second chain in Sword AA, to damage-oriented pets would suffice. Increasing their range from 130 to 300 across the board would need to happen, too.
3. Tricky, but I support having more hotkeys for pet control.

Marksmanship

• Predator’s Instinct – Reduce cooldown by 10s. Too weak.
• Enlargement – Change the trait to proc to Signet of Stone to be more in line with other professions’ traits (Defy Pain, Self-Regulating Defenses).
• Brutish Signets – Signets now give fury (<4s) in addition to might. Synergy with Remorseless and more support for signet builds.

Skirmishing

• Sharpened Edges – Significantly increase the duration by at least 300% (maybe add 1 stack). Traits like this, (and Duelist’s Discipline) need to be updated. Bleeding does highly underwhelming damage. Multiple stacks of burning are far more accessible than bleeding is. Skills that apply multiple stacks of burning need to be reduced across the board. Bleeding stacks need to be increased across the board.
• Light on Your Feet – I think this trait needs to be more focused. Remove the +10% damage. Modify to: Gain 5% endurance whenever you successfully evade an attack (1s cooldown per attacker. Max 5 attackers) Reduce the condition duration bonus from +10% to +5%. Allow the trait to stack up to four times. Increase duration to 6 seconds. Consider adding +5% condition damage to each stack.
• Most Dangerous Game – Underwelming. Increase Might stacks to 3. Increase interval to 3s. Increase duration to 9s. Add 1s fury? May be overpowered if the Burtish Signets change is implemented. (Add 3s stability on kitten interval when below 25% health. Might be too good with the stability change lol.)

Wilderness Survival

• Refined Toxins – Either remove the ICD, or reduce the threshold to 66%, increase the duration slightly, and have an ICD of at most 1s.

Nature Magic

• Lingering Magic – Currently ineffective
• Bountiful Hunter – Nature Spirits can now move freely. PLEASE. Nature spirits are a painfully useless. I don’t care if all skill type-specific traits are supposed to be combined into one singular trait, but I can confidently say that it won’t be a problem for spirit rangers.
• Windborne Notes – WH4 now reveals. Warhorn skills convert conditions on nearby allies (or self & pet).

Beastmastery

• Natural Healing – You and your pet… maybe?
• Hones Axes – Move to skirmishing, merge with “Sharpened Edges”. Replace with “Placeholder Trait Name”
• Placeholder Trait Name – Pets have significantly increased condition damage. Pets also inherit % condition damage from you.

The only real concern I have with Ranger weapons is that they don’t have enough condition damage support in the bleeding department. SB AA should apply at least 2 stacks, and increase the duration slightly. Also, there isn’t a dedicated condition main-hand. I think that Axe AA should be able to apply bleeding. Only one stack, but for a relatively long duration.

ALSO. Beastly Warden shouldn’t work through dodges. I don’t think it should work on blocks either, but I’m not too sure how good the trait would be considering pet ai.

I look forward to constructive criticism!

Arricson Krei.9560:

Marksmanship

• Predator’s Instinct – Reduce cooldown by 10s. Too weak.
• Enlargement – Change the trait to proc to Signet of Stone to be more in line with other professions’ traits (Defy Pain, Self-Regulating Defenses).
• Brutish Signets – Signets now give fury (<4s) in addition to might. Synergy with Remorseless and more support for signet builds.

I like the idea of Predator’s Instinct, but even with the reduced cooldown, I don’t really see this trait being used too often as well. A single movement debuff can easily be cleansed through utilities, traits, and weapons. Having Enlargement proccing Signet of Stone instead would be more useful, having a reliable trait for damage negation would be very appreciated; although, I do like the stun break and damage given through Signet of the Wild. I do very much like the idea of Brutish Signets, it would give us access to more burst damage by being able to proc Opening Strike more.

Arricson Krei.9560:

Skirmishing

• Sharpened Edges – Significantly increase the duration by at least 300% (maybe add 1 stack). Traits like this, (and Duelist’s Discipline) need to be updated. Bleeding does highly underwhelming damage. Multiple stacks of burning are far more accessible than bleeding is. Skills that apply multiple stacks of burning need to be reduced across the board. Bleeding stacks need to be increased across the board.
• Light on Your Feet – I think this trait needs to be more focused. Remove the +10% damage. Modify to: Gain 5% endurance whenever you successfully evade an attack (1s cooldown per attacker. Max 5 attackers) Reduce the condition duration bonus from +10% to +5%. Allow the trait to stack up to four times. Increase duration to 6 seconds. Consider adding +5% condition damage to each stack.
• Most Dangerous Game – Underwelming. Increase Might stacks to 3. Increase interval to 3s. Increase duration to 9s. Add 1s fury? May be overpowered if the Burtish Signets change is implemented. (Add 3s stability on kitten interval when below 25% health. Might be too good with the stability change lol.)

300% duration increase might be a little too much, the duration increase would make Hidden Barbs a very strong trait, but I do agree the duration for the bleeding stacks should be increased to a fair amount. Don’t really have much of an opinion for Light on your Feet due to lack of experience with the trait, although the changes you added would benefit it compared to its current state. We already have good access to fury, so the fury pulses from Most Dangerous Game would seem to be overkill, same with the stability. The trait does need to be revamped though, I will agree that it is underwhelming.

Wilderness Survival

• Refined Toxins – Either remove the ICD, or reduce the threshold to 66%, increase the duration slightly, and have an ICD of at most 1s.

Wasn’t aware that this trait had an ICD on it, so reducing the threshold would be helpful due to sustaining more than 90% health in PvP and WvW being difficult due to the high amount of burst in this meta.

Nature Magic

• Lingering Magic – Currently ineffective
• Bountiful Hunter – Nature Spirits can now move freely. PLEASE. Nature spirits are a painfully useless. I don’t care if all skill type-specific traits are supposed to be combined into one singular trait, but I can confidently say that it won’t be a problem for spirit rangers.
• Windborne Notes – WH4 now reveals. Warhorn skills convert conditions on nearby allies (or self & pet).

Would say keep Bountiful Hunter the same, but merge the mobility for Spirits into Nature’s Vengeance, giving it more of a reason to bring the trait due to the poor boon application through this trait. If we could get in a word for the boon application, would suggest that Water Spirit apply resistance, Lightning Spirit apply quickness, and Frost Spirit apply fury instead. Like the idea for improving Windborne Notes, warhorn doesn’t offer much, even with Windborne Notes; we already have a good access to regeneration as it is.

Beastmastery

• Natural Healing – You and your pet… maybe?
• Hones Axes – Move to skirmishing, merge with “Sharpened Edges”. Replace with “Placeholder Trait Name”
• Placeholder Trait Name – Pets have significantly increased condition damage. Pets also inherit % condition damage from you.

The placement for Honed Axes if pretty irregular inside Beast Mastery, would rather have something that benefited the pet instead, hence the name of the specialization. The condi damage for pets does definitely need to be addressed, very underwhelming as it is currently with the rework for condition damage.

Arricson Krei.9560:

The only real concern I have with Ranger weapons is that they don’t have enough condition damage support in the bleeding department. SB AA should apply at least 2 stacks, and increase the duration slightly. Also, there isn’t a dedicated condition main-hand. I think that Axe AA should be able to apply bleeding. Only one stack, but for a relatively long duration.

ALSO. Beastly Warden shouldn’t work through dodges. I don’t think it should work on blocks either, but I’m not too sure how good the trait would be considering pet ai.

Would prefer main-hand axe be reworked into a condi specific weapon instead of its questionable hybrid form. Even with the ferocity given from Honed Axes, it is still pretty underwhelming in my opinion. Would rather have taunt remain as it is since it is one of the few good things going for us and punishes players for disregarding our pets.

Damage, damage that is all most you are talking about. Some want more condi clear and pet defense. The rest are talking mostly about damage. You could get everything that has been said and it wouldn’t change anything for the ranger overall.

Arricson suggestion about changing Enlargement to signet of stone proc is solid

Bark skin needs to be reverted. Give us damage reduction when we are in danger. If that happen maybe someone would actually take MDG.

Where is our when you apply x boon share it with near by allies. Dexterity and accuracy and swiftness are key Ranger characteristics. We already are able to give swiftness so unless we can give out super speed that isn’t needed.

Quickness or fury but a some classes don’t need it they can get a 50% or 100% chance to proc crit with no investment in precision.

In short we need defense procs and desirable (usually offensive in nature) group support.

Asking for more damage when every class out there is going to throw it back in your face with reflect, retal or block or just ignore it with some sort of immunity (this is just the passives this isn’t the active defenses).

Between a fear/taunt and a k9 kd its not hard to land a rapidfire path of scar combo capable of doing 18k. Catch a ranger of guard and he’ll eat the whole thing any other class and you’ll only get half except a thief unless he’s using vampiric runes.

Thanks for responding.
What if Predator’s Instinct amplified the effects of Cripple by 33%, bumping up the movement speed reduction to 66% movement speed? I want to keep the cripple duration long so that condition duration modifiers will have a significant effect. The trait also has synergy with Predator’s Onslaught, which I think should be increased to +15% damage to targets or something more interesting like “Increases the durations of cripple, fear, immobilize, and chill on your target by 2 seconds” (in addition to the +10 damage) ICD: something reasonable >10s.

You’re right about 300% duration increase. At 1200 condition damage (and taking Hidden Barbs), each bleeding tick will deal 113 damage and with all the fury spam that a ranger may choose to take, Sharpened Edges+Hidden Barbs will deal too much damage. I can’t imagine that anything short of 6 seconds will be good enough. Sharpened Edges can not have an ICD.

I like your idea for improving the boons that Spirits share when traited, but I think the problem lies with the boon duration and application interval. All durations should be increased to 3s at the minimum, and the duration of might far beyond 3s. This shouldn’t be implemented if the Spirit Range was increased because that would be too powerful. However, I think the boons would be fine if the Spirits’ radii were increased to, say 2400.

DoogySnowStalker.2069:

Would prefer main-hand axe be reworked into a condi specific weapon instead of its questionable hybrid form. Even with the ferocity given from Honed Axes, it is still pretty underwhelming in my opinion. Would rather have taunt remain as it is since it is one of the few good things going for us and punishes players for disregarding our pets.

I don’t think it’s fair for enemy players to be interrupted mid-evade. It only makes sense that barriers (Line of Warding, Static Field) should interrupt evades. It doesn’t make sense for something like Beastly Warden/Taunt, which is not an AoE spell that persists and allows counterplay, because there is no counterplay. Melee pets are programmed to get in distance of their F2 which is also when Beastly Warden triggers. If a Bird gets in range of its F2, it’s inescapable unless you are invulnerable. Even if players do regard the Bird and kite/dodge away, that Bird will continue following it’s target until it F2s (or dies, etc.). It’s like an immobilize that will trigger once you don’t have anymore defensive options left, and when it does trigger, you will be immobilized. Stuff like that is game-breaking, and even if Rangers are in a tough spot, they shouldn’t be excused from game-breaking bugs such as taunting through evades.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Damage, damage that is all most you are talking about. Some want more condi clear and pet defense. The rest are talking mostly about damage. You could get everything that has been said and it wouldn’t change anything for the ranger overall.

Arricson suggestion about changing Enlargement to signet of stone proc is solid

Bark skin needs to be reverted. Give us damage reduction when we are in danger. If that happen maybe someone would actually take MDG.

Where is our when you apply x boon share it with near by allies. Dexterity and accuracy and swiftness are key Ranger characteristics. We already are able to give swiftness so unless we can give out super speed that isn’t needed.

Quickness or fury but a some classes don’t need it they can get a 50% or 100% chance to proc crit with no investment in precision.

In short we need defense procs and desirable (usually offensive in nature) group support.

Asking for more damage when every class out there is going to throw it back in your face with reflect, retal or block or just ignore it with some sort of immunity (this is just the passives this isn’t the active defenses).

Between a fear/taunt and a k9 kd its not hard to land a rapidfire path of scar combo capable of doing 18k. Catch a ranger of guard and he’ll eat the whole thing any other class and you’ll only get half except a thief unless he’s using vampiric runes.

I think everyone is asking for better damage options because that’s all we can do. I’m generalizing, yeah, but we can’t generate a steady amount of offensive support (OS) because the only offensive support we offer are so spread out. All that our weapons are good for in OS is a single CC on SB, GS, LB. Traps: Chill, Immob/Launch. Shouts: Revealed. Signets: None. Spirits: Gimmicky one-time use immob/chill/blind. Survival seems to be the only consistent source of OS. I don’t mean to dredge up the past, but why were bunker guards outclassed by cele shoutbow warrior in sPvP? Shoutbow did heaps more damage with equal, if not better, OS and sustain. Damage matters a whole lot in Gw2 which is why I want to push more options for damage dealing.

You raise an interesting point with boon-share. I think it would have a grand place when given to the Ranger.

If you’re looking for more defense or more OS with the Ranger’s given skills/traits, I think you’d find yourself at a dead end without having to rework a plethora of traits and utility skills. I’m hoping that with the Druid elite spec, we will find ourselves exactly what you (and I and many others) are looking for.

Arricson Krei.9560:

I don’t think it’s fair for enemy players to be interrupted mid-evade. It only makes sense that barriers (Line of Warding, Static Field) should interrupt evades. It doesn’t make sense for something like Beastly Warden/Taunt, which is not an AoE spell that persists and allows counterplay, because there is no counterplay. Melee pets are programmed to get in distance of their F2 which is also when Beastly Warden triggers. If a Bird gets in range of its F2, it’s inescapable unless you are invulnerable. Even if players do regard the Bird and kite/dodge away, that Bird will continue following it’s target until it F2s (or dies, etc.). It’s like an immobilize that will trigger once you don’t have anymore defensive options left, and when it does trigger, you will be immobilized. Stuff like that is game-breaking, and even if Rangers are in a tough spot, they shouldn’t be excused from game-breaking bugs such as taunting through evades.

Quoting someone else for this, because everything I would say, Tragic Positive.9356 has already said.

Taunt has horrible radius, is glued to a tiny amount of pets (misses on all the rest), you cannot track the cooldown, is glued to an ability you’d otherwise want for other uses, requires your pet to live, requires your pet to be in range and you can break from it.

Saying you don’t see the pet is laughable. You don’t see the instant cast Ring/Line/Static either (but you see the pet at all times). It just lasts for X more seconds (See the difference? That’s why the CD) and doesn’t force you down a Grandmaster trait, specific heal and specific pet.

Ring and others will knock you countless times while active, can be activated on will without a single kitten restriction and can deny a whole point entrance on specific maps and locations all while a class offers a huge variety of other much more powerful fire-power and utility unlike the Ranger.
See the glorious difference?

DoogySnowStalker.2069:

Quoting someone else for this, because everything I would say, Tragic Positive.9356 has already said.

Now it seems like you’re arguing Beastly Warden’s issues under Realiability, rather than “Ranger is underperforming so a strong, but seemingly bugged, trait is fine”. The latter is what I thought you were arguing earlier. Either way, I agree with what you’ve quoted.

Quickening Zephyr should give the group quickness.
It really irks me that they gave this to Guardians, they already had fantastic group suport why give them even more and on a ridiculisly low CD?
This is what the skill looked like in GW1 http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Quickening_Zephyr
Why can’t the current skill have the same functionality?

Then there’s spirits, why is something that can easily be killed be weaker than something that will last for the entire duration, can give the group swiftness among other buffs, can act as a gap closer and a blast finisher. Where’s the balance here?
I think it would be more interesting if Frost Spirit had a 50% chance(or something) to give the group the enhanced version of Opening strike.

Would this really break us in PvP?

Spirits: Since Spirits no longer have the ability to use their actives upon death, I strongly suggest to increase the channeling speed. because they it is right now is utterly useless in PvP since they leterally die on-hit from weapon sweap effects such as sigil of hydromancy. I’m talking about the Utility spirits NOT the elite one.

I was going to write a longish essay on this topic and i was halfway done, but probably nobody will read it anyway so this is a summary.

Some points of interest in things I’d like to see happen. Some of these things are long time thorns in our side, I might add. Like, since release.

1.) Pets need to dodge when we do. No need for further explanation.
2.) Pets need to stealth when we do. Trapper runes, etc. This has been a major problem for Trapper rangers. As any intelligent player opponent can, and will, follow your pet and know your approximate location when in stealth. Which completely nullifies the entire point of having stealth in the first place. This and number 1 have been problems since the game was released, and are well beyond the point of needing to be addressed.
3.) Stowed pets need to stay stowed when taking falling damage. The bane of ranger JP runs, because they’re ALWAYS right in your camera, and take a few seconds to be able to be stowed again.
4.) Spirits need their mobility back. This is a big one. Spirit rangers as of right now, are dead. I called them dead the moment the Devs announced they were becoming like turrets in that overhaul podcast ages ago (and got banned from commenting as a result I might add). They take a full second to cast, there’s four of them (four seconds overall cast time for a full spirit build), and the cooldown is 20 seconds. No ranger in PvP or WvW has the time to do all that casting, running, and casting again to have ANY hope of survival. If spirits are not given their mobility back, that’s four useless utility skills we now have that need to be scrapped for something else. Cause spirit rangers again as of right now, are no longer a thing outside of PvE.
5.) Might just be my opinion here, but Nature Magic is utterly useless now as well. The entire trait line, is just… blargh. Below mediocre.
6.) Bark Skin needs it’s original stats back. The current above 90% thing is just asinine, and it wasn’t even overpowered before. It was a great thing to have back in the day, now relegated to a less than 1-2 hit boon.
7.) Spirits no longer use their skills upon death, and are killed far too easily to be of any worth outside of PvE.
8.) We STILL have significantly less condi clears than most classes. Again, been that way since launch. Which considering the new mege-condi-meta means there’s a whole lot of us rangers out there dying in seconds to overwhelming condition damage and not a thing we can do about it but dodge and pray for the best.
9.) Would also be nice if ambient creatures (rabbits, owls, etc) no longer set off traps. This however isn’t a huge deal.

Petrol.9086:

Quickening Zephyr should give the group quickness.
It really irks me that they gave this to Guardians, they already had fantastic group suport why give them even more and on a ridiculisly low CD?
This is what the skill looked like in GW1 http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Quickening_Zephyr
Why can’t the current skill have the same functionality?

Then there’s spirits, why is something that can easily be killed be weaker than something that will last for the entire duration, can give the group swiftness among other buffs, can act as a gap closer and a blast finisher. Where’s the balance here?
I think it would be more interesting if Frost Spirit had a 50% chance(or something) to give the group the enhanced version of Opening strike.

Would this really break us in PvP?

I would like too see Quickening Zephyr be reworked to apply quickness to the group, alot, so we would have more group utility to bring. Not sure if it would be implemented though, since Survival skills are personal utilities and add nothing to the group. If it was changed to a spirit like how it was in Guild Wars 1 or as a shout, then it would be easier to implement into the game; although I don’t see Anet reworking the utility into another type of utility though. Spirits definitely need an overhaul, give them mobility back or vastly increase their ranges because as it is, they are pretty useless outside of PvE. That would be pretty cool to see Frost Spirit apply a form of Opening Strike to the group, would enhance the group damage it would apply and keep vulnerbility up for the duration. They would have to rehaul the other spirits as well though with their own unique buffs however.

sleight.9638:

Spirits: Since Spirits no longer have the ability to use their actives upon death, I strongly suggest to increase the channeling speed. because they it is right now is utterly useless in PvP since they leterally die on-hit from weapon sweap effects such as sigil of hydromancy. I’m talking about the Utility spirits NOT the elite one.

I was going to write a longish essay on this topic and i was halfway done, but probably nobody will read it anyway so this is a summary.

That would help with using their actives, although, that wouldn’t really help their case overall. As they are now, they need a complete overhaul.

KStudios.2850:

Some points of interest in things I’d like to see happen. Some of these things are long time thorns in our side, I might add. Like, since release.

1.) Pets need to dodge when we do. No need for further explanation.
2.) Pets need to stealth when we do. Trapper runes, etc. This has been a major problem for Trapper rangers. As any intelligent player opponent can, and will, follow your pet and know your approximate location when in stealth. Which completely nullifies the entire point of having stealth in the first place. This and number 1 have been problems since the game was released, and are well beyond the point of needing to be addressed.
3.) Stowed pets need to stay stowed when taking falling damage. The bane of ranger JP runs, because they’re ALWAYS right in your camera, and take a few seconds to be able to be stowed again.
4.) Spirits need their mobility back. This is a big one. Spirit rangers as of right now, are dead. I called them dead the moment the Devs announced they were becoming like turrets in that overhaul podcast ages ago (and got banned from commenting as a result I might add). They take a full second to cast, there’s four of them (four seconds overall cast time for a full spirit build), and the cooldown is 20 seconds. No ranger in PvP or WvW has the time to do all that casting, running, and casting again to have ANY hope of survival. If spirits are not given their mobility back, that’s four useless utility skills we now have that need to be scrapped for something else. Cause spirit rangers again as of right now, are no longer a thing outside of PvE.
5.) Might just be my opinion here, but Nature Magic is utterly useless now as well. The entire trait line, is just… blargh. Below mediocre.
6.) Bark Skin needs it’s original stats back. The current above 90% thing is just asinine, and it wasn’t even overpowered before. It was a great thing to have back in the day, now relegated to a less than 1-2 hit boon.
7.) Spirits no longer use their skills upon death, and are killed far too easily to be of any worth outside of PvE.
8.) We STILL have significantly less condi clears than most classes. Again, been that way since launch. Which considering the new mege-condi-meta means there’s a whole lot of us rangers out there dying in seconds to overwhelming condition damage and not a thing we can do about it but dodge and pray for the best.
9.) Would also be nice if ambient creatures (rabbits, owls, etc) no longer set off traps. This however isn’t a huge deal.

1. Having an evade frame on our pets would be appreciated to help them survive in cases that involve alot of AoE damage. Kinda pointless that Fortifying Bond applies Vigor to the pet when the boon is literally useless on pets since they don’t evade.
2. If they rework Fortifying Bond to share all buffs through the trait, then cases where it will prioritize the players over the pet when you apply said buffs, that would resolve the issue to the restrictions when applying these buffs.
3. This would be helpful for these situations, but I don’t think Anet would go with this since it would encourage the idea for perma stowing the pet. Alot of Rangers wish for this, and this idea would help push that idea, when pets are our class mechanic.
4. Yes, spirits need their mobility factor back. They can tie it into the trait Nature’s Vengeance.
5. Nature Magic seems fine as it is, could use some working on, would like to see your and other’s opinions on this.
6. Bark Skins does need to be rolled back. It is very easy to take anyone down below a 90% threshold.
7. Actually like how you can forcekill the spirit, helps managing it in PvE, actually suggested the idea. For PvP and WvW though, this really restricts us for using their actives effectively.
8. Was a pretty hard hitting blow when they moved Wilderness Knowledge into Wilderness Survival. Would help us alot if we could put it back into Nature Magic, would made it more viable to bring since you believe Nature Magic could be improved.
9. Was not aware that ambients triggered our traps. Would help out if they didn’t since we have to set our traps now, and not being able to throw them any more.

Petrol.9086:

Quickening Zephyr should give the group quickness.
It really irks me that they gave this to Guardians, they already had fantastic group suport why give them even more and on a ridiculisly low CD?

This. I get that they just converted one of the tome skills, but party wide quickness is something that makes a lot more sense if it was given to the ranger instead.

Like, they had the chance to make Windborn Notes grant quickness to allies, but no, they went with the overused and underwhelming regen instead.

What I really want to see for ranger LB build is a way for you to stay in Lb longer for example something like a portal. Put it down and when you press it break stun and teleport back to it. Or we would also be served with haveing an on command stealth. Hunters shot is a great skill but it is literally the only way a pew ranger can stay alive. If find in my fights I get 3-4 or so hunters shots and if I miss it even once it makes its almost impossible to keep my opponent off of me.

Padra.1678:

What I really want to see for ranger LB build is a way for you to stay in Lb longer for example something like a portal. Put it down and when you press it break stun and teleport back to it. Or we would also be served with haveing an on command stealth. Hunters shot is a great skill but it is literally the only way a pew ranger can stay alive. If find in my fights I get 3-4 or so hunters shots and if I miss it even once it makes its almost impossible to keep my opponent off of me.

Don’t really think that is needed, sounds more like that you’re staying on Longbow when you should be using something else for these encounters. We have alot more means of survival such the block and evade frames from greatsword or utilities like Signet of Stone, Signet of Renewal, and Lightning Reflexes. You can also use the means of cc to help stay alive like Entangle or Canine F2 skills. Constantly remaining on longbow for the entire duration of your fights is rather ineffective to be honest.

Keep the ideas coming (‘-’)b

Part of me thinks that proposed Ranger (mostly Ranger Pet) changes should be postponed until we know what the Druid does. I’m sure the developers have a good idea in mind, and that idea could clash with our changes to Pets or Pet traits.

I’m hoping that with whatever they decide to do, the profession mechanic will inherit something similar to, but more complex than, the Reaper/Necromancer, where certain Reaper shroud abilities inherit traits that would otherwise affect the Death shroud equivalents. Like “DS1 gives might” would result in RS1 generating might.

Seeing that with all the things we could envision with the current pet system, it might be completely ineffective or terribly broken. However, idea generation is always good and who knows… maybe the developers are searching the fora for Druid springboard ideas

I just want 5 stacks of stability for 6s on Protect Me.

• makes it useful even with a dead pet
• gives Rangers access to on-demand stability without a 1s cast time
• fits the theme of it being a stun breaker
• helps it compete with Signet of Stone

Quick up-to-date summary of changes:

1. Fortifying bond needs to either be moved into Beast Mastery by merging Pack Alpha and Pet’s Prowess into the Minor Adept trait and then moving Fortifying Bond into the now opened Minor Grandmaster trait, or making Fortifying Bond baseline.
2. Fortifying Bond also needs to be made so it shares group buffs such as Spotter and Empower Allies as well as stealth, spirits, banners, and auras so the pets receive these benefits as well. Our pets constantly lose out on these buffs during fights or skipping mobs with stealth due to the restrictions on these buffs only being given to 5 in-game entities. Due to the restrictions, players will be prioritized over the pet, so our pets will not receive these buffs unless they change Fortifying Bond.
3. Pets need their attack ranges increased to 250-300 for their auto attacks so they can compete with Polymorph Moa, Mesmer’s Elite skill, as demonstrated through this video. Our pets are meant to be an actual threat since they are an extension of us, not used entirely for utility and cc purposes. Possible cleave for their auto attacks would be a nice addition as well.
4. Better control of our pets through more hotkeys given to control their skills for more of a skill factor when playing Ranger. Relying on the pet AI for all situations is terrible, especially for PvP and WvW.
5. Pets need their condition attributes increased either baseline or more stats given through Expertise Training due to the reworked condition damage formulas.
6. Pets need an evade frame when we dodge to help with their survivalbility factor. They don’t need to add in an animation, just make them evade when we dodge. A secondary bar could be placed under their health so we can view their energy through their dodge meter so we can tell when they are able to dodge. With the addition of an energy bar for dodging would give an actual use for vigor being given to the pet through Fortifying Bond.
7. Empathic Bond should be changed to where conditions pulled from the player are converted into boons onto the pet. This will vastly help with the sustainability for the pet due to conditions melting pets when conditions are pulled to the pet.
8. Due to the limit AI of the pet, pets will sit in AoEs and end up dying in a quick time span. A buff should be given to them similar to Playing Favorites to help them survive in these cases such as WvW and PvE.
9. Trait changes: Predator’s Instinct, reduced cooldown; Enlargement changed from proccing Signet of the Wild to Signet of Stone; Brutish Seals to also apply fury to help synergize with Remorseless; increase the bleeding duration for Sharpened Edges by 200% max; reworks for Light on Your Feet and Most Dangerous Game; Refined Toxins to have a lower threshold or no ICD; Nature’s Vengeance to allow spirits to follow you around; Windborne Notese to apply more useful utilities such as converting conditions and allow warhorn 4 to apply reveal; move Honed Axes into a more fitting traitline instead of Beast Mastery; revert Bark Skin to its former state.
10. Quickening Zephyr to apply group buff rather than self buff to add more group utility to Ranger. Make it act more similar to GW1’s Quickening Zephyr since it was a group utility back then.
11. Spirits need an overhaul; give them back their mobility and change their pulsing boons to more useful boons and possible boon duration increase. Example; Water Spirit pulses Resistance, Lightning Spirit pulses quickness, and Frost Spirit pulses fury. Increase channeling speed for spirit actives as well due to their slow cast time.
12. Possibly move Wilderness Knowledge back into Nature Magic for more condi clear.
13. Prevent ambient creatures from activating our traps.

Any more suggestions or revising on current listed desired changes?

OK I have to admit its sad to see that a Rangers pet is more dangerous when turned into a freaking moa by a mesmer then it is in normal cases

Redemer.2601:

OK I have to admit its sad to see that a Rangers pet is more dangerous when turned into a freaking moa by a mesmer then it is in normal cases

don’t worry a guild mate turned a champ reef drake into a MoA and that was Stupidly powerful nearly one shotting everything.

Redemer.2601:

OK I have to admit its sad to see that a Rangers pet is more dangerous when turned into a freaking moa by a mesmer then it is in normal cases

Yeah, pretty disheartening to see that a skill that is supposed to hinders you can make our pet shadow in comparison.

DoogySnowStalker.2069:

4. Better control of our pets through more hotkeys given to control their skills for more of a skill factor when playing Ranger. Relying on the pet AI for all situations is terrible, especially for PvP and WvW.

This is my favorite out of the suggestions so far. I’m thinking the stow (F5) could change into the pet’s defense skill while in combat, since it’s unusable during combat anyway. We can then have some options for what kind of defense we want for the pet- a bubble that retaliates for a few seconds perhaps, or something of the like (not enough coffee in my system, so can’t think of more, sorry). I can just imagine this working really well for our pet’s survivability. When you see your pet’s health going down, pop the skill and it helps keep them alive rather than just doing pet swaps or worse, having to use your own heal then it’s later in the middle of cooldown when you need it -_- It’s not OP, and it adds to the ranger being able to interact more with their pets as well.

I would like to add the ability to stow pet while in combat for those cases where you stand in a safe spot but your pet just keeps standing in the aoe (im thinking about bosses like Mai Trin)
And I realla want a f for pet stow along with pet stow until I wanna drag it back out so I dont have to keep it on passiv all the time

And for the whole bark sking remake I have said this before it should affect your pet while you are above 90% and you while you are bellow 25% make it useful for everyone since its basicly a must in pve so your pet wont die during world bosses and it would synergise with the bellow 50% traits like “most dangerous game”

With the new condition formula, and mainly because of burning, Signet of Renewal may as well be a ‘Kill my Pet’ button. Should apply a small amount of resistance towards our pet when we activate our signet so our pet actually has a chance at surviving rather than melting towards the condi overload. Greatsword 4 should also be adjusted so we can decide to counter-attack or not, similar to the Revenant sword 4 block.

Pet Changes
1. Pets need their attack ranges increased to 250-300 for their auto attacks so they can compete with Polymorph Moa, Mesmer’s Elite skill, as demonstrated through this video. Our pets are meant to be an actual threat since they are an extension of us; however, as they are now at the moment, they are used mainly for utility and crowd control purposes. Possible cleave for our pets’ auto attacks would be appreciated as shown for the Polymorph Moa’s auto attack due to the lack of cleave for pet species outside of drakes.
2. Better control of our pets through more hotkeys given to control their skills for more of a skill factor when playing Ranger. Having to rely on the pet AI for all situations is rather terrible, especially for PvP and WvW. Ways for this to be implemented is to add two more hotkeys being F5 and F6, allowing us to have control over the other two pet skills: F1 Attack My Target, F2 already existing pet skill tied to the hotkey, F3 Return to Me, F4 secondary pet sill, F5 third pet skill, and F6 Swap Pets. Obviously reaching for F5 or F6 would be tedious, but if they were implemented we can switch the hotkey towards our personal binds. Having better control over our pets would vastly improve the gameplay for Ranger since we have actual control over our pet rather than leaving it up to the AI to decide to use their extra skills off of cooldown.
3. Pets should also receive an evade frame when we dodge to help with their survivalbility factor. They wouldn’t need to add in an animation, just make them receive the evade frame that we do when we dodge. A secondary bar could be placed under their health bar so we can view their current energy through the dodge meter, allowing us to tell when they are and not able to dodge. With the addition of the energy bar for dodging towards our pets would give an actual reason for vigor being given to the pet through Fortifying Bond. Having a dodge given towards the pet will help them survive in environments with alot of AoE pressure such as WvW and some situations in PvP and PvE.
4. Due to the limit of the pet AI, pets will sit in AoEs and end up dying in a quick time span. A buff should be given to them similar to Playing Favorites to help them survive in these cases such as WvW and PvE. This buff shouldn’t be applied to pets for PvP because they will then actually be considered ‘OP’.
5. A unique buff for Ranger needs to be given to the pet that shares group buffs such as Spotter and Empower Allies as well as stealth, spirits, banners, and auras so the pets receive these benefits as well. Our pets constantly lose out on these buffs during fights or skipping mobs with stealth due to the restrictions on these buffs only being given to 5 in-game entities. Due to the restrictions, players will be prioritized over the pet, so our pets will not receive these buffs in situations that have 5 or more players in a setting. You could increase the amount of entities that receive this buff, which would resolve the issue for dungeon parties and PvP. However, large scaling groups like world event bosses and WvW, our pets will continue to miss out on these buffs. That leaves removing the cap entirely, although that would break the game in for some situations. In organized world events like Triple Trouble, Silverwastes, and Tequatl; so long as someone is running these group utilities, everyone else can run personal DPS builds, making this already existing content easier than before.

Trait Changes
1. Fortifying Bond needs to either be moved into the Beast Mastery specialization by merging Pack Alpha and Pet’s Prowess and then moving Fortifying Bond into the now opened Minor Grandmaster trait, or making Fortifying Bond baseline.
2. Condition stats given through Expertise Training needs to be buffed to a reasonable amount. With the reworked condition formulas, the amount of damage our pet can give through conditions is rather weak.
3. Empathic Bond should be changed to where conditions pulled from the player are converted into boons onto the pet. This will vastly help the sustainability of the pet due to conditions melting pets when conditions are pulled to the pet.
4. Predator’s Instinct either needs a reduced cooldown, this trait underwhelming as it is in comparison to the other Major Adept traits.
5. Enlargment should be changed from proccing Signet of Stone instead of Signet of the Wild. This would help correlate with other traits such as Defy Pain.
6. Brutish Seals to also apply fury when activated. This would help synergize with Remorseless, giving us more self fury procs for Opening Strike.
7. Increase the bleeding duration for Sharpened Edges by 200% maximum, bleeding damage feigns in comparison to burning in both damage and accessibility. This shouldn’t also be just restricted to Ranger, Duelist’s Discipline for Mesmer as an example should also be buffed due to the low accessibility towards this condition.
8. The On Dodge buff given through Light on your Feet needs to be reworked, this buff sounds very nice on paper, but is pretty underwhelming.
9. Refined Toxins needs to have a lower threshold or no ICD, bringing a player below 90% health is no task at all outside of PvE.
10. Bark Skin needs to have its affect be reverted to its previous state. Again, bringing a player below 90% health is no task, and having it proc at a lower threshold would synergise with Most Dangerous Game.
11. Possibly move Wilderness Knowledge back into Nature Magic, we have very limited condition removal that doesn’t require sacrificing our utilities or our pet.
12. Nature’s Vengeance to allow spirits to move again and granting mobility towards our spirits, giving more of a reason to bring this trait for PvP and WvW, since the lack of mobility killed the Spirit Ranger build to be honest.
13. Windborne Notes to apply more useful utilities, such as condi removal and reveal on the warhorn 4 ability.
14. Move Honed Axes into a more fitting specialization line. Beast Mastery is meant to improve our pet’s abilities and performance, this trait doesn’t make sense belonging here.

Utility Changes
1. Quickening Zephyr to apply group quickness rather than a self buff, giving more group utility to Ranger. This would make it act more similar to GW1’s Quickening Zephyr as it was a group utility back then.
2. Spirits need an overhaul; give them back their mobility and change their pulsing boons to more useful boons. Example; Water Spirit pulses Resistance, Lightning Spirit pulses quickness, and Frost Spirit pulses fury. Change the duration and intervals of the boons so the pulsing fury from Frost Spirit won’t proc Remorseless as much as it would now with a 1 second interval; 3 second duration boon, 5 second interval. Increase channeling speed for spirit actives as well due to their slow cast time.
3. Signet of Renewal to apply a small amount of resistance towards the pet when this signet is activated. As it is, this may as well be a ‘Kill Pet’ Button due to the condi overload. Having a few seconds of resistance would allow the pet to possibly live through the conditions they are pulling to them.
4. Make it so that traps aren’t activated by ambient creatures. Due to the lack of AoE targeting on our traps now, we have to rely on set areas, that ambient creatures can disrupt.

Weapon Changes
1. The greatsword 4 skill Counterattack to act similar to Revenant’s Duelist’s Preparation so we are able to choose when to counterattack, rather than having it proc when something enters the range of the skill.

Refined version before I post in the Discussion part of the forums so hopefully Anet will see the proposed changes. Any thing that needs reviewing or mentioning?

A minimum to pet controll changes would be a F5 to controll their last skill. On demand drake blast, on demand bird swiftness, on demand canine knockdown. And so on and so on AND SO ON.

I can’t believe Anet doesn’t see how stupid it is not let us control these abilities ourself.

DoogySnowStalker.2069:

5.Enlargment should be changed from proccing Signet of Stone instead of Signet of the Wild. This would help correlate with other traits such as Defy Pain

These kinds of autoproc traits shouldn’t have been in the game in the first place. But that’s neither here nor there at this point.

That being said, if they change Bark Skin back to its old version, Enlargement would synergize a lot better in its current state than what it would do if you were to cast Signet of Stone instead.

If they want to have a thing were Rangers can be potentially dangerous when brought on low health with things like Most Dangerous Game, Instinctive Reaction and so forth, Enlargement should stay as it is while Bark Skin could have its old version back.