Guild Wars 2

Hi there,

just wanted to suggest solutions.
Since the Pet is intended as an important source of the rangers damage, this is what needs to be done to make that concept work.

1.) Ranger Pet-AI:

Just use the mechanics WoW uses. Pet can attak sucsessful while moving.
Pet problem solved, right? I mean if u played a Hunter in WoW u know what i mean, the AI is superior compared to GW2`s.

2.) Pets dying to often in PVE:

90% AoE dmg Reduction like in WoW would solve that issue RIGHT AWAY!!!

3.) Lupicus…

Dont play PvE anymore but back then the Pet triggered maggots to spawn at their position in the lupicus fight, why i had to keep my pet passive near me = lots of dmg loss….
Solution: Make sure pets dont trigger the maggots to spawn at their position.

4.) Decrease the pets aggro range.

I think this solves the biggest problems out there.

If u agree pls let the devs know by write a comment of agreement. And fyi if we fight each other with stupid comments nothing will happen. So keep it on a low and be gentle to each other, were all humans and we all bleed the same blood.

<3 n peace

Shin Killuminati 80 Ranger
Elonas Reach [DE]

Did you even bother to search forum for such suggestions? Most of it was posted more than once or twice… also, Devs answered to some of it (like why no AoE reduction or problems with hitting when moving).

phew i feel much better now that op solved all pet issues for us!
inb4close

The great thing about all these threads is that A-Net ignores them all equally. They are too kind.

Terkov.4138:

Did you even bother to search forum for such suggestions? Most of it was posted more than once or twice… also, Devs answered to some of it (like why no AoE reduction or problems with hitting when moving).

hey bro mind linking those / this one for me i would like to read what the devs think about it

greets

id like to see them too. when pets are a main part of damage its not right that their f2 ability misses atleast 75% of the time. and they cant hit a moving target.

The pet aoe redution is not good due to pets tanking bosses.

I would like them to make pet leash 10.000(well maybe thats a bit over the top). But instead of pets being split dps you have to manage how to land I would like them to be more utility.

You know that being two places a the same time also pets moving in “Z” like something good about using birds is they are able to swoop down and attack from high places or spiders too by climbing.

Pets taking capture points(maybe), for wvw a skill that allows you to send your pet for scouting.

Pet like felines and canines are able to track enemines on stealth, maybe not damaging them but just following then like “hey the kitten is here master be careful”.

Yeah implement those in BM traitline right now the tree is all about relying your damage to the AI not about pets being more versatile IMO.

As for hitting moving targets I run trap build and shortbow. 900 range only in shortbow allows for easier flanking and I keep the enemy locked for my pet with forst trap, shortbow 4, 5. Is quite more easy for them to escape now since I cant bleed them 1200 range, you can say that but if they ran away I did my task of holding the point.

I’m too lazy to search for them now. In short: AoE reduction isn’t an option, coz rangers would solo dungs too easy. Hitting moving targets isn’t problem because they don’t want us to, but because of way it works or sth (don’t remember good now).

Bawzdawg.2839:

Terkov.4138:

Did you even bother to search forum for such suggestions? Most of it was posted more than once or twice… also, Devs answered to some of it (like why no AoE reduction or problems with hitting when moving).

hey bro mind linking those / this one for me i would like to read what the devs think about it

greets

Got ya covered. I actually posted this in the compilation thread, but people seem to miss it because it’s at the very bottom XD

Robert Hrouda on blanket AoE Reduction:

We tried giving them reduced damage from AOE/attacks, and it opened up other problems – mainly that a team of 2 rangers could take on almost any boss in a dungeon by smart swapping of pets and letting the pet take aggro. It’s unfortunate, but we can’t just increase and decrease numbers until pets are perfect – we’ve tried really hard, but numbers are not going to fix pets without letting them break everything. We have to look deeper into mechanics, AI, player actions, and skills.

They could just make the pets invulnerable and un-targetable. That way the pets don’t draw aggro and thus the bosses leave them alone. It’s not like their damage is game breaking, at the moment, especially with the damage reduction they just received. Other classes are allowed to have their 100% dps, yet Rangers fight to keep 40% of their dps alive.

They can just be an extension of the rangers attack.. kinda like an additional arrow every 1-2 seconds

DeadlySynz.3471:

They could just make the pets invulnerable and un-targetable. That way the pets don’t draw aggro and thus the bosses leave them alone. It’s not like their damage is game breaking, at the moment, especially with the damage reduction they just received. Other classes are allowed to have their 100% dps, yet Rangers fight to keep 40% of their dps alive.

They can just be an extension of the rangers attack.. kinda like an additional arrow every 1-2 seconds

This, exactly.

Just make them unable to attack anything outside of a certain radius of the ranger, take no aggro, and have infinite health (but can be CC’d, so that cripple and such work to keep them away). Then it essentially becomes rangers have 2/3 “weapons” equipped at any given time (So you could have Greatsword/Canine, for instance, using Fern Wolf for the regeneration/water field on F2).

Making pets essentially auto-firing gear or something would solve the issues faced by players at the endgame nicely, I think.

The loss of beartanks for leveling is a separate issue, but I don’t think its insurmountable when pets don’t go down.

Ideally, there’d be a way to manually fire pet skills, but that’s a problem for another day (I think it would be cool if there was a weapon that could manually trigger pet skills, or an elite that basically had the ranger possess their pet – making 1-5 the pet’s auto-abilities, the F2, and a new skill. Possibly keep utilities open? I dunno)

Best way to resolve the issues with pets…

Allow rangers to put them away and get a damage bonus equal to what the pet is supposed to provide.

Problem solved.

Laiboch.4380:

Best way to resolve the issues with pets…

Allow rangers to put them away and get a damage bonus equal to what the pet is supposed to provide.

Problem solved.

Perma-stow for damage buff, you say!? Sign me the phark up!!!!

Best way to resolve the issues with pets…
Allow rangers to put them away and get a damage bonus equal to what the pet is supposed to provide.
Problem solved.

This is neither a solution nor resolution to the problems at hand. All it would serve to do is sweep the issue of pets under the rug without addressing or solving the problems perceived to plague the companion mechanic and instead further supports the idea that a direct damage increase will solve all of our woes.

This proposed direct damage buff will do nothing to increase utility, support, or condition pressure and will further limit the availability of build choices because of the way power and critical damage can be affected by such an unbalanced change of allowing a flat damage bonus because of being able to ignore the pet.

I understand that you feel your pet is dead weight and that this change could greatly improve certain aspects of the classes damage output, it would be a monumental disaster to diversity and capabilities the class currently possesses. In other words, the cure would be worse than the disease.

While it is nice to see people continuing to suggest changes to the class, I wish people would suggest changes to the pet that are for the pet and the Ranger, instead of only the Ranger.

It’s so nice to see an objective post here.

+1 to everything Lunchbox said.

Nice post lunchbox +1’ed.

I have to agree fixing the pet to make it work should be Anet focus, and form my point of view I can see numerous things that can be done not just to improve dungeon survivability but also general quality of life. What I’ve doe is listed these first as changes/bug fixes to current abilities, the upgrades.

1) F1 – currently telling your pet to attack a target can be over-ridden by you changing target in active mode. Personally I would change this behaviour to always have the F1 command take priority, currently to achieve this the pet must be in passive all the time which while very doable in SPvP is not very doable in WvW and PvE due to mob/player density.

The reason I suggest this is it will lower the skill floor of the profession in a sensible way (which is currently remarkably high) by allowing player to more easily take advantage of the fact there is two of you and can attack separate targets. I also believe it would make the function more intuative.

2) F2 – This has been done to death so I’ll be quick in saying that F2 is not responsive enough and skill cast time are too high.

3) F3 – This is one of my biggest annoyances that when I press F3 the pet doesn’t always leash properly. If I’m in a fight and I’m being skilful by trying to micro my pet out of an AoE you can get my annoyance that the pet decides to stand not at my heel but far away, often still within the AoE I was trying to remove it from. Sorting this would be a surprisingly large help in dungeons so I can at least micro properly.

As an addition this problem seems to occur most when I press F3 and the pet is in front of me or I’m standing still. If the pet is behind me or I’m moving its less bad, but this really needs sorting soon, the pet should always return to less than 100 from the ranger.

The first few were thing that I think needed sorting with the currently implemented stuff the next is upgrades.

4) Pet moves and attacks. This I see would be more helpful to PvP and WvW people but it would sort all issues of pets landing attacks instantly if this was sorted.

5) Pet endurance bar and dodge. What it says on the tin, to make the pet viable and interesting without making it invulnerable this would probably make pet survivability about right as you would set up the AI to activate a dodge when in a red circle getting the pet out of the first two AoEs its hit by in a short period. Would also mean vigour received through the nature magic 15 point minor trait would be useful.

6) Pet pathing. Simply put if I jump down ledges or jump up stuff the pet should follow me directly even if there is a path along the ground that could be used.

Right now that all I can think of except to say that as a community we need to stop trying to push major class rebuilt as it isn’t happening instead we should focus on crying out with one voice for things that Anet will implement, which is improvements to the current system and in my mind to make the system work it has to come from AI improvements which is what most of the above pretty much is apart from point 2.

Good points, going to play Devil’s Advocate for a moment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D44YUfi92ls

• 1) The f1 command is finicky. I’ve found you can get your pet to lock onto a target providing it and you are in combat. Basically, if I want my pet to focus on target B, I have to engage it as well, lock him on it, and then switch targets. A good place to try this is in CoE versus the common-boss of the golem and five support cannons. (Sidebar, if you target the Cleansing Turret and stand between the boss and the Protection Turret, GS will cleave to hit both the boss and Protection Turret. But that’s a story for another day.) It’s times like this I wish they kept the hero control panel from GW to help control out pets. A quality of life upgrade for pet control would be nice down the pipeline.

• 2) I used to think f2 skills were fine, I would take advantage of quickness on pet-swap to get off the high cast times, however with the changes to the BM tree, the f2 skills need to be re-balanced around the loss of quickness during the pet-swap being unavailable in most builds. This could also encourage people to spend the 30 points to have faster activating pet skills to get that trait.

• 3) I rely on swap or heal instead of movement to keep my pet alive in those AoE’s. It is also a good idea to understand when and where you can break aggro to stow-revive the pet. It would be nice if I could flag my pet to run to a specific area (much like “Guard,” except without wasting a utility slot.)

• 4) Another quality of life upgrade that could help players move away from needing to use snares to make their pet have the chance to hit. At least we have decent access to snares to overcome this problem in the mean time. If you’re really having trouble, try to get more chills and immobilizes to help.

• 5) A pet dodge would be nice, I’d just prefer a nice simple change to our minor BM trait – your pet evades for 1 second when you dodge. Alternatively, the implementation of a better version of “Guard” that would reduce damage taken by a large percentage (example, 50%) but would reduce the damage the pet is able to do for its duration (again, let’s say 50%). Give it 2s duration, 8-10s cooldown. Of course, just thinking out loud here, it has got to have some major problems I’ve not considered. And it would have to be on the pet command bar, not in a utility slot.

• 6) Pathing can only be solved by swapping right now, so, getting used to stowing the pet out of combat before traversing ledges and falls is a good idea. When not possible, save the swap until you’re at the bottom. If the pet is going to aggro, lock him on a target so you won’t have him drag them back to you (hint: really helpful in dungeons when running by things), then either stow it when it dies and you break aggro, or swap it when you think you’re far enough to break aggro. I’d like to say #6 could be fixed, but I think that one is a case of player skill < skills.

Of course, that’s just me trying to suggest tools we have right now to help alleviate these issues until something from the developers is introduced that either helps or exacerbates it further. Hopefully the former.

Uh, OP, our pets (and all other summons) no longer agro ANYTHING unless we have already agroed it, i mean hell, my drake ran through 4 raptors yesterday to hit a pig (i was aiming for the raptors but am very bad at targeting things…) and he didn’t agro ANY of them, but my god once i put an arrow into the side of a raptors skull were they kitten ed at my drake….

That being said, as others have said, pet AoE reduction, NO, that’s now how you fix that, now they should make them immune to -some- AoEs cough cough Molten Berserker cough Electric Walls cough cough but not all.

Lunchbox.9543:

Good points, going to play Devil’s Advocate for a moment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D44YUfi92ls

• 1) The f1 command is finicky. I’ve found you can get your pet to lock onto a target providing it and you are in combat. Basically, if I want my pet to focus on target B, I have to engage it as well, lock him on it, and then switch targets. A good place to try this is in CoE versus the common-boss of the golem and five support cannons. (Sidebar, if you target the Cleansing Turret and stand between the boss and the Protection Turret, GS will cleave to hit both the boss and Protection Turret. But that’s a story for another day.) It’s times like this I wish they kept the hero control panel from GW to help control out pets. A quality of life upgrade for pet control would be nice down the pipeline.

• 2) I used to think f2 skills were fine, I would take advantage of quickness on pet-swap to get off the high cast times, however with the changes to the BM tree, the f2 skills need to be re-balanced around the loss of quickness during the pet-swap being unavailable in most builds. This could also encourage people to spend the 30 points to have faster activating pet skills to get that trait.

• 3) I rely on swap or heal instead of movement to keep my pet alive in those AoE’s. It is also a good idea to understand when and where you can break aggro to stow-revive the pet. It would be nice if I could flag my pet to run to a specific area (much like “Guard,” except without wasting a utility slot.)

• 4) Another quality of life upgrade that could help players move away from needing to use snares to make their pet have the chance to hit. At least we have decent access to snares to overcome this problem in the mean time. If you’re really having trouble, try to get more chills and immobilizes to help.

• 5) A pet dodge would be nice, I’d just prefer a nice simple change to our minor BM trait – your pet evades for 1 second when you dodge. Alternatively, the implementation of a better version of “Guard” that would reduce damage taken by a large percentage (example, 50%) but would reduce the damage the pet is able to do for its duration (again, let’s say 50%). Give it 2s duration, 8-10s cooldown. Of course, just thinking out loud here, it has got to have some major problems I’ve not considered. And it would have to be on the pet command bar, not in a utility slot.

• 6) Pathing can only be solved by swapping right now, so, getting used to stowing the pet out of combat before traversing ledges and falls is a good idea. When not possible, save the swap until you’re at the bottom. If the pet is going to aggro, lock him on a target so you won’t have him drag them back to you (hint: really helpful in dungeons when running by things), then either stow it when it dies and you break aggro, or swap it when you think you’re far enough to break aggro. I’d like to say #6 could be fixed, but I think that one is a case of player skill < skills.

Of course, that’s just me trying to suggest tools we have right now to help alleviate these issues until something from the developers is introduced that either helps or exacerbates it further. Hopefully the former.

I have to say I do most of the stuff you suggested at the moment and it was very much a braindump on how to make our quality of life better and like I said to lower what is currently a very high skill floor for the class.

I would point out that I’ve been using guard a lot recently as I started using nature’s voice and I have to say the perma protection my drakes end up with mean they haven’t died for ages in dungeons especially combined with the regen and sig of the wild.

I have to say I do most of the stuff you suggested at the moment and it was very much a braindump on how to make our quality of life better and like I said to lower what is currently a very high skill floor for the class.
I would point out that I’ve been using guard a lot recently as I started using nature’s voice and I have to say the perma protection my drakes end up with mean they haven’t died for ages in dungeons especially combined with the regen and sig of the wild.

Yeah, pets aren’t really for the faint of heart. I’m still not sure if they’re like cats; do we own them or do they own us?

And drakes are just good all-around pet, I can’t say a bad thing about them – even their waddle makes having them worthwhile.

This thread will happen again and again. Btw I’m with lunchbox

There is one thing that makes me really sad:
Ranger is the pet class but still the mesmer has the better pets (except survivability). Mesmer phantasms always hit except if you dodge. The pistol ones have a projectile speed that is so fast that the only way to avoid it is dodging or blocking/invuln. On top of that one pistol phantasm does three times the damage of our ranged pets.
Why is that? Give our pets the same projectile speed as pistol phantasms. Their damage is mediocre anyways and with such an attack speed at least they would not miss. And make them attack while moving. We need our pets damage. If it doesn’t hit the ranger has a huge disadvantage.

Then the melee phantasms. They all hit. Make our pets also do such incredibly fast attack leaps that cannot be strafed. If you want to ignore pets damage use a dodge. That is how it should be. Another solution is make pets attack while moving or give pets a flat +30% movement speed which is not capped at 33% from swiftness.
This is fair now since pets cannot move further than 2000 range.

In my opinion the ranger lost almost every unique ability he had. We had pets that had a huge leash range. That was awesome to let us destroy siege from far away. And it wasn’t OP. They could simply kill the pet and it would run back. It also let us do two things at the same time.
Another huge nerf came with the shortbow 900 range. How are we supposed to stop anyone from running away? Honestly. If a mesmer wants to run away we cannot stop him any more. Before I was able to. If he uses his teleport he is out of shortbow range. Before I was able to cripple him and daze him to keep up. Now I can just watch him run away. If I switch to Greatsword I might close up to him again but it then it takes 9 seconds until I can switch back to shortbow. 9 Seconds for him to regenerate. And our pet will never reach him. It is so freaking slow. Make our pets faster! I have yet to see my pet attacking anyone who was running away. It just won’t happen if the opponent uses any charge/teleport abilities.

Quickness on pet swap was another unique utility of the ranger. That was also taken away from us since noone will use a grandmaster trait for it. It was great for rezzing/stomping.

Overall I can say that the ranger lost most of its uniqueness but didn’t get anything in return. I played my ranger for more than 1800 hours and it’s the first time that I am really trying to find a role. Almost everything that made us unique and that was fun is gone. In our WvW guild if we make a raid they tell us to play any class but ranger. We had 30 people but not a single ranger because ranger was simply the worst class for zerging.
Make us useful finally in WvW. We need blast finishers on demand. I cannot tell my pet to use its blast finisher in a fire field for might stacking. It needs a target.
Give us more AoE. Lower the Barrage CD to 20 sec / 16 sec traited and make it only return one single retaliation damage per tick (12 ticks overall not 60). You could make shortbow 1 fire 3 arrows by default for more AoE. All these changes wouldn’t change much in 1v1 but help alot in WvW.
Then give us traps that remove boons. You could add that to one of the existing traps like the chill trap.
If you really want to give the ranger a unique ability: Give us a trap that reveals stealthed players or give our pets an ability to make them visible at least for the ranger.

These are useful buffs that would finally make the ranger useful for WvW fights. Please do something for us rangers and don’t look at the ranger only from the sPvP or tPvP point of view.