Guild Wars 2

First off, I like to play Ranger myself. I’m also all for the “any class should be powerful if the player is skilled” system. But at the moment this is not the case for rangers, in my opinion.

If I play any other class, and I come across a ranger with the spirit-build, I almost automatically lose. They just CANNOT die, and if you magically manage to down them somehow, a.k.a. through the help of a teammate or trebuchets etc, they can summon their elite spirit right before going down just to get back up again before you can finish him.

I’m sure I’ll get a lot of hate for this since it’s the ranger forum. But I’d like this game to be as balanced as possible, so just letting myself (and potentially others) be heard.

The chances are very high that they might nerf ranger again in spvp, and not making those nerfs spvp only.

You do realize that those spirits have health, right? And since they have health, they can die, right? And when they die, you are now fighting a Ranger with 0 skills in his utility slots.

I don’t know….I’ve never seen what you’re talking about being used and I’ve never used it myself. I’ve actually only ever seen other rangers that were more or less fodder. I might just be matched with/against poor rangers but it just seems like they don’t accomplish much…

However I will say that I do my best with the ranger, but with a completely different set up that can usually drop people within 8-20 seconds best case scenario. Worst case scenario we have a bit of a scuffle that lasts a while. However 1v1 I’m happy to say I have never lost. Except for that one thief…stupid thief…oh and guardians. Just because they take too long and more people show up.

ANYWAY What i’m getting at here is I really don’t know. Nerfed? Yeah maybe. It wouldn’t be surprising based on the general feeling towards rangers the game gives off already. Of course it’s slightly confusing as I assumed the point of the spvp was taking a completely balanced playing field (based on available skills, weapon stats etc) and making a build that will let you do very well compared to other people while they try and do the same thing.

A game can never be truly balanced but…that’s a whole different discussion I’ll avoid as I kind of already rambled about more nonsense than I wanted to.

Viridi.5467:

First off, I like to play Ranger myself. I’m also all for the “any class should be powerful if the player is skilled” system. But at the moment this is not the case for rangers, in my opinion.

If I play any other class, and I come across a ranger with the spirit-build, I almost automatically lose. They just CANNOT die, and if you magically manage to down them somehow, a.k.a. through the help of a teammate or trebuchets etc, they can summon their elite spirit right before going down just to get back up again before you can finish him.

I’m sure I’ll get a lot of hate for this since it’s the ranger forum. But I’d like this game to be as balanced as possible, so just letting myself (and potentially others) be heard.

That elite spirit is on a 3 minute cooldown, so the likelihood of a ranger being able to use it every single time is very low, and if they are using it that way instead of in teamfights, than it is a poor decision.

Beyond that, other Spirit Rangers (lol I know), BM rangers (a spirit rangers literally cannot outdamage the healing on a BM ranger, as long as they are evading properly), stun lock warriors (spirit build only has 1 really long built in stun break, warrior can stun rangers to death, while cleaving the spirits into nothingness), and necros with their cooldowns available, are all counters to the build.

That being said, there is a general consensus across the board that the spirit build is much too rewarding for the amount of work it takes to make it functional at a high level. That doesn’t make the build OP in the sense that it is powerful and needs to be nerfed, but OP in the sense that it takes too little skill to be effective, and needs an increased skill ceiling to make the build better at a competitive level.

Again however, any changes really need to be split for PvE, and even WvW, as the spirit build just isn’t even remotely as strong outside of PvP.

ItIsFinished.9462:

You do realize that those spirits have health, right? And since they have health, they can die, right? And when they die, you are now fighting a Ranger with 0 skills in his utility slots.

Most Deff. True.

OP

It is the same as saying that Rangers are ’Hard to kill" with their pets, well.. it is obvious if so, is to kill their pets and prblem solved.

The Difference to Ranger pets who can take a little more hits before dying, whereas a Rangers Spirir can’t..

Kill their Spirits and as ItlsFinished had already stated “And when they die, you are now fighting a Ranger with 0 skills in his utility slots”

I Encourage you OP to try it out; you’ll get no issue with Ranger Spirits than after.

Why Nerf Ranger Spirit Build if their Spirits can be easily killed?

It is not as our Spirits are Spamable or Perma-Spirits.

Having 60 seconds cooldown, where is the base of outcry?

They already Nerfed our viable pets to the ground, now what, our spirits?

Than what?

Every mean to Ranger “support” Mechanism is being shred apart…

I won’t even go that far,

Somehow I’m getting the Feeling that Arena net class balance mechanism is to make every class non-support (like the theif class), selfishly dependy only to itself.

Was giving Ranger class Stealth the First step in Prophetising that Reality?

My staff ele, my own ranger, my engi, and my mesmer have no issue fighting a spirit ranger, simply kill the spirits, then kill the ranger, if they try to summon the elite interrupt them and laugh as they fall to the floor since most of them activate it near death anyway…

If they try to spawn the spirit BEFORE they’re almost dead, down the ranger and interrupt the spirit as it raises its hand.

PS: Don’t try to melee the entire group of spirits, 1 is “ok” try to take them out with ranged.

EDIT: A key weakness of the spirit ranger build (which i have exploited, and has been exploited on me numerous times) is a LOOOOONG fight, the second all their spirits die off just don’t let them get more out, save your rupts for when they start doing the blatantly obvious spirit cast and stop them from pulling them out again, there life will be over shortly afterwards since they have so much banking on the spirits being there.

ItIsFinished.9462:

You do realize that those spirits have health, right? And since they have health, they can die, right? And when they die, you are now fighting a Ranger with 0 skills in his utility slots.

Nah man that takes too much effort. /sarcasm

jcbroe.4329:

Again however, any changes really need to be split for PvE, and even WvW, as the spirit build just isn’t even remotely as strong outside of PvP.

This. If they can’t do this they they don’t need to nerf anything with the Ranger

Yeah. To be fair, I personally don’t think the build is overpowered. I would make the argument that it’s too easy, but I feel that way about every build for every class in the game, so that’s just bias lol.

If anything, I don’t think you should be able to put down a permanent boon for your entire team (any class) that is available on recharge if it isn’t killed, with no visible timer on its recharge. I mean, it would be different if you could see the spirits remaining lifespan when you targeted them or something, but the biggest issue the Spirit Build brings in pvp is if a person decides to kill/cleave the spirits, they can die, proc all of their actives (which usually results in 3k damage from storm spirit + 6s burning), and then be summoned almost immediately because their timer was almost up.

That’s really the only thing I take issue with, because in that situation, the person who chooses to use the proper tactic still sees no reward, and is even punished for it.

If anything gets nerfed, I hope it’s only a lifespan nerf, PvP only. If spirits were only up 45 seconds with a 60 second recharge, it would make people have to be more mindful of when they use spirits in a match and more careful with their positioning. They would have to weigh choices like “okay, my spirits are about to be down for 15s. Should I ask my team to drop back in case I get pushed and can’t handle it with my spirits on cooldown” or “should I summon my spirits and win this side node fight, and risk not having them available for my team when I get to midpoint to help them out?”

Of course I’d be just as happy with no nerfs lol. But I get the feeling sometimes that when a class has one really powerful build, the devs let it ride and avoid making any potentially necessary or useful changes to that class just because it has a different tool that already works. Meaning that I get paranoid that because our spirit build is so good, the devs aren’t going to give rangers any goodies for awhile to make other weaponsets or utilities any better,

or worse, our funky, obsolete since day 1 traits that still need reworking, as well as some grandmaster traits, and most pet related traits.

Compared to a class like mesmer, thief, ele. Spirit ranger could be called OP and i wouldn’t doubt it for a second if Anet said they were going to nerf it. I just love my ranger so much it’s nice to see some viability and I just hope they buff some other aspect of ranger so it’s not just a bad class. I like the warrior buffs now that they’re able to survive a bit more and stunlock warrior is quite unique and very strong :\ where’s my new ranger build.

first they need to remove root from sword #1. (its really OP in pvp but make it useless in other places) second we need other viable weapons and traits. AFTER that i will be totally OK with the nerf of the actual ranger meta.

I know why they’re considered Oped in SPvP

Because of all SPvP are designed, you standing in a small point to capture it.

Which means you’re fighting a Spirit Ranger who can pop all his Spirits actives, have them die to some cleave attack, and have it go off again. I mean thats 6k damage just from the Storm Spirit alone..

Take that same spec, and put it in something like World vs World, where if you have a bunch of spirits I can pick them off 1 by 1 and you have no chance of landing all 3 of them on me.

But yea, its that reason they’re overpowered as the SPvP folks like to say, Because You get say 3 Minion Master Necro’s who’s pets all die and explode doing damage and you have 2 spirit rangers who do the same thing, Of course if you’re fighting on a small kitten point that might be difficult for most people.

As for how Easy a Spirit Ranger is to play, having played a couple other classes, I can safely say it doesn’t take less skill then most other’s…If you think a D/P thief takes skill or a Necro or an Ele.. you’re fooling yourself.

If they want to make it so 30 points weren’t required to make signets useful and 30 points in nature weren’t required to make spirits useful, I’d be fine with them toning spirits down slightly.

The root of the problem is conditions though and not really specific to rangers. The classes that have strong bunker options and condition specs are ruling sPvP. Why wouldn’t they so long as conditions require one stat leaving players the ability to collect toughness/vitality/healing power without concern for anything else?

Tone down burn so it’s a utility as opposed to a DPS condition and you’ll probably resolve the ranger problem and make them useless again just as ANet wants. Perhaps at some point they’ll realize what a giant pile of [censored] this class is and get around to changing things.

You’re asking if the worst company when it comes to nerfs will nerf X class in the near future? i let you guess… Every time there’s something decent happening on any class its instantly nerfed to joke level instead of upping other classes and make every1 viable, that’s anet for you

McWolfy.5924:

first they need to remove root from sword #1. (its really OP in pvp but make it useless in other places) second we need other viable weapons and traits. AFTER that i will be totally OK with the nerf of the actual ranger meta.

But you want to know what will happen instead? The “after” part is all there will be.

Personally, I do not think they need a nerf. Here’s why.
1. No Stun Breaker
2. Weak Condition Removal
3. No Boon Stripping
4. Moderate Damage
5. Elite on 4min cd

But I do think they will receive a couple nerfs.
1. I think they will make the strongest spirit buff override (70% chance overrides 35% chance) instead of stack.
2. I think they will change some spirit values (less damage off of lightning burst, less duration on protection and burning) and possibly some other ranger skill condition durations.

The biggest issue right now is that if you go in to punish the ranger, the ranger bombs you with all three spirits, usually blinding, immobilizing, crippling, and heavily damaging you followed by all those actions repeated because you killed one or more of them all the while the ranger gets to apply all the conditions they want to you. Conditions are the meta for a reason.

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I hope they kill spirits, please god I hate this being dependent on things that can be 1 shot by a warrior and guard?

I think spirit buffs and trap buffs and what not should be divided into different talent tree’s like 1 tree has fire trap and a different spirit, the next has spike trap and stone spirit. I think we will always be limited if we have to go mostly traps and spirits with our utilities. having a build that has a trap a spirit and a signet woud be pretty cool if we could spec for it.

Our utilities are pretty bad in general, the shouts are gross it’d be nice to see some work done there.

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Least common denominator in this game does need a buff; in every aspect pretty much. That much I am sure of.

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Go ask on the Warrior forum what they feel is the most trollish build they know. They’ll tell you the 40k HP, 1.5khp/sec build that can still dish out high sustained damage. Ask them what their worst match up is. They’ll all say Condi Ranger. Why the Ranger over the necro or engineer? Because of the regen.

It’s not too much to ask for power builds to have a place in the current meta. I’d much rather they fix the root problem (condis) than try and tackle class issues individually.

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Go ask on the Warrior forum what they feel is the most trollish build they know. They’ll tell you the 40k HP, 1.5khp/sec build that can still dish out high sustained damage. Ask them what their worst match up is. They’ll all say Condi Ranger. Why the Ranger over the necro or engineer? Because of the regen.

It’s not too much to ask for power builds to have a place in the current meta. I’d much rather they fix the root problem (condis) than try and tackle class issues individually.

I’ve fought that warrior build a few times and I can’t find a way to break it, it just has so much HP, Armor, and regen it’s ridiculous, I’ve yet to see a good player say the ranger one is OP though, perma poison is simple enough of a counter to it, not to mention it takes them forever and a half to kill ANYTHING that’s not made of tissue paper. The warrior build does not have that flaw either…

Spirits OP? Ranger’s able to do “insane” damage? Hell, I think the world just came to an end.

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Go ask on the Warrior forum what they feel is the most trollish build they know. They’ll tell you the 40k HP, 1.5khp/sec build that can still dish out high sustained damage. Ask them what their worst match up is. They’ll all say Condi Ranger. Why the Ranger over the necro or engineer? Because of the regen.

It’s not too much to ask for power builds to have a place in the current meta. I’d much rather they fix the root problem (condis) than try and tackle class issues individually.

I’ve fought that warrior build a few times and I can’t find a way to break it, it just has so much HP, Armor, and regen it’s ridiculous, I’ve yet to see a good player say the ranger one is OP though, perma poison is simple enough of a counter to it, not to mention it takes them forever and a half to kill ANYTHING that’s not made of tissue paper. The warrior build does not have that flaw either…

Well there are 2 builds involved.

One is a condi build for damage the other is pure tank for survivability (ie. Troll Spec) that is there for the utility the hammer brings (hammer, mace, shield).

But yea, their condi pressure is more than a Rangers and it’s difficult maintaining poison on them when you also can’t get in melee range (I run sb/gs for escape in WvW anyway, not sword).

I’m sure SoR will be nerfed in the future. That or they’ll get around to removing the abillity for various classes to stack 25might on their own. Alternatively, I’d be just fine with them changing Fortifying Bond to work where if our pet gets a boon, it’s shared with us and we can then too stack 25might.

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Go ask on the Warrior forum what they feel is the most trollish build they know. They’ll tell you the 40k HP, 1.5khp/sec build that can still dish out high sustained damage. Ask them what their worst match up is. They’ll all say Condi Ranger. Why the Ranger over the necro or engineer? Because of the regen.

It’s not too much to ask for power builds to have a place in the current meta. I’d much rather they fix the root problem (condis) than try and tackle class issues individually.

I’ve fought that warrior build a few times and I can’t find a way to break it, it just has so much HP, Armor, and regen it’s ridiculous, I’ve yet to see a good player say the ranger one is OP though, perma poison is simple enough of a counter to it, not to mention it takes them forever and a half to kill ANYTHING that’s not made of tissue paper. The warrior build does not have that flaw either…

Well there are 2 builds involved.

One is a condi build for damage the other is pure tank for survivability (ie. Troll Spec) that is there for the utility the hammer brings (hammer, mace, shield).

But yea, their condi pressure is more than a Rangers and it’s difficult maintaining poison on them when you also can’t get in melee range (I run sb/gs for escape in WvW anyway, not sword).

I’m sure SoR will be nerfed in the future. That or they’ll get around to removing the abillity for various classes to stack 25might on their own. Alternatively, I’d be just fine with them changing Fortifying Bond to work where if our pet gets a boon, it’s shared with us and we can then too stack 25might.

I really wish fortifying bond would go both ways and just be capped at one transfer IE: 1 boon couldn’t be bounced back and forth infinitely. It’d also cause a lot of synergy among a few of our traits.

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

Nuka Cola.8520:

You’re asking if the worst company when it comes to nerfs will nerf X class in the near future? i let you guess… Every time there’s something decent happening on any class its instantly nerfed to joke level instead of upping other classes and make every1 viable, that’s anet for you

Amen to that! i don’t know why they love changing the ranger every damm time! and now we have 1 viable build and “we are so OP we need another nerf” common people if you know our weakness it should not be a problem! we have so many weakness plus pets they do not always do what we expect them to do…

Apparently every class is meant as a counter to ranger, or so others want us to believe.

ItIsFinished.9462:

You do realize that those spirits have health, right? And since they have health, they can die, right? And when they die, you are now fighting a Ranger with 0 skills in his utility slots.

Spirits have decent survivability. By the time you destroy them all, the ranger can resummon them(cooldown starts even when the spirit is up), that is if you aren’t downed.

If you are attacking spirits, you aren’t attacking the ranger.

Sorry I find it not kewl to nerf ranger.

Eurantien.4632:

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

I would not mind a storm spirit nerf I wouldn’t mind taking something different and running 2 spirits. However in the end I just don’t want to play spirits, I’d love a viable build that is not pet or spirit required.

For sPvP only? Nerf away; and bring back my old bm ranger while they are at it.

Eurantien.4632:

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

3k+ on a crit hit… and its 3k damage per 20sec, how is this OP? On BM you had tones of dps on jags constantly with condis. here we only have condis.

Nuka Cola.8520:

Eurantien.4632:

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

3k+ on a crit hit… and its 3k damage per 20sec, how is this OP? On BM you had tones of dps on jags constantly with condis. here we only have condis.

This… and not to mention it’s also on a ~1.5s cast time, if you don’t notice it winding up, AND you’re in melee range you deserve to be hit by it, it’s so stupidly easy to avoid it’s ridiculous. Not to mention my engi can crit people for 5K in a Soldiers Amulet + Afflicted gear with a kittening RANGED 15s CD, PIERCING CRIPPLE skill with a 1/4 cast time, but oh god no!! That storm spirit man… Actually the CD is probably more like 12s with traits… but still… you get the point…

Eurantien.4632:

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

I know it’s already been commented on but…egads, buddy. An attack with a long cooldown, long activation time, short range and unwieldy targeting cast by a fragile pet whose positioning you cannot directly control isn’t allowed to hit for all of 3k? Are you serious? Really?

Stice.5204:

Eurantien.4632:

Storm spirit should scale with power. That might be nerf enough. It is the same reason BM was nerfed, 3k+ damage on a bunker is not ok.

I know it’s already been commented on but…egads, buddy. An attack with a long cooldown, long activation time, short range and unwieldy targeting cast by a fragile pet whose positioning you cannot directly control isn’t allowed to hit for all of 3k? Are you serious? Really?

This is not in response just to Stice.

With a bit of time played it is easy to position the spirits where they need to be to land. If an enemy player decides to attack your spirits in a 1 v 1 situation they will be even more doomed than they were before.

The spirit hits for roughly 3k base in pvp. It crits upwards of 5k+ (I’ve had it land for 8k+). There seems to be some confusion here. The issue with BM was the fact that bunker’s had access to high damage. This is essentially the same thing.

Sure, it has a 1.5s cast time but there is no player in this game that is able to watch this spirit, the other 2 spirits, the ranger’s pet, the ranger, and dodge everything he needs to. Moreover, this 20 second cooldown can actually be a 0s cooldown when the spirit dies. With the damage layed out in the previous paragraph that is roughly 6k base power damage possible 10k or 12k if they both miraculously were crits in a time span of 3s.

Allowing this spirit to scale with power will stop condi spirit rangers from using it but may encourage the use of more power spirit rangers. Granted, this won’t fix the problem entirely but it would be a small nerf to the current spirit ranger meta and would force the current spirit ranger spec to remove that spirit from their arsenal while keeping the spec 100% viable. However, the condi spirit ranger will still win out over the power spirit ranger because the power spirit ranger would either lack condi removal without a empathic bond or would be losing out on damage due to the inefficiency of wasting that 300 condi damage they traited in to. That being said would be nice if this spirit scaled with power and we got condi removal in a line other than WS.

I hope this clarifies things.

Don’t care what they do to it as long as it is a spvp ONLY nerf because us PVE and WvW players are tired of y’all screwing things up for us.

If people are crying about the Storm spirits damage they’re just being a big baby, it’s a 20s CD, and is so easy to avoid by just NOT BEING NEAR THE SPIRIT it’s ridiculous, the BM pets were entirerly different because they were able to do the damage constantly and netted a large amount of constant DPS.

Even IF the storm spirit hit for 8k every time that’s only 400dps added onto the rangers damage, and if they’re a bunker… well that 400dps is kittening nothing, if you can’t outlive that + w/e they are actually bringing your build is just glass.

Durzlla.6295:

If people are crying about the Storm spirits damage they’re just being a big baby, it’s a 20s CD, and is so easy to avoid by just NOT BEING NEAR THE SPIRIT it’s ridiculous, the BM pets were entirerly different because they were able to do the damage constantly and netted a large amount of constant DPS.

Even IF the storm spirit hit for 8k every time that’s only 400dps added onto the rangers damage, and if they’re a bunker… well that 400dps is kittening nothing, if you can’t outlive that + w/e they are actually bringing your build is just glass.

I would be more agreeable to this if the game mode didn’t have such a high demand on throwing yourself on a small point to contest, and if it wasn’t so hard to push through damage onto a ranger or one of the specific spirits from range because of how the ranger can kite and force the spirits to body block anything other than AoE cleave.

Which is why, as people said, any change made should really be a pvp only change (or revamp crosses fingers)

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

If people are crying about the Storm spirits damage they’re just being a big baby, it’s a 20s CD, and is so easy to avoid by just NOT BEING NEAR THE SPIRIT it’s ridiculous, the BM pets were entirerly different because they were able to do the damage constantly and netted a large amount of constant DPS.

Even IF the storm spirit hit for 8k every time that’s only 400dps added onto the rangers damage, and if they’re a bunker… well that 400dps is kittening nothing, if you can’t outlive that + w/e they are actually bringing your build is just glass.

I would be more agreeable to this if the game mode didn’t have such a high demand on throwing yourself on a small point to contest, and if it wasn’t so hard to push through damage onto a ranger or one of the specific spirits from range because of how the ranger can kite and force the spirits to body block anything other than AoE cleave.

Which is why, as people said, any change made should really be a pvp only change (or revamp crosses fingers)

Well i play a single target Engi (rifle CC) and a Condi mesmer (mainly single target) and i’ve never had an issue against a spirit ranger, ESPECIALLY that silly little storm spirit, the things will fold under one good 4 clone Mind Wrack (especially since most spirit rangers will send the poor little devil into the grave by making it cast its skill with all that confusion =( poor guy), and then the engi i just don’t even let the ranger get close to me.

The engi has done his job of keeping range on the ranger so well i’ve had a lot of them screaming at me, and once those spirits go down, lets just say they NEVER come back up while i’m fighting them >=D

Viridi.5467:

If I play any other class, and I come across a ranger with the spirit-build, I almost automatically lose. They just CANNOT die, and if you magically manage to down them somehow, a.k.a. through the help of a teammate or trebuchets etc, they can summon their elite spirit right before going down just to get back up again before you can finish him.

I agree at some point. Spirits need a nerf imo – as a Spirit Build needs only a very low amount of Skill or attention to be effective. Condition / Burst Ranger Builds are pretty effective too, with a much higher Skill level needed to really change the outcome of a game.
I’d suggest lowering the range for the Ghosts effect a little with maybe some downgrades on the chance of triggering effects.

stolzi.3471:

Viridi.5467:

If I play any other class, and I come across a ranger with the spirit-build, I almost automatically lose. They just CANNOT die, and if you magically manage to down them somehow, a.k.a. through the help of a teammate or trebuchets etc, they can summon their elite spirit right before going down just to get back up again before you can finish him.

I agree at some point. Spirits need a nerf imo – as a Spirit Build needs only a very low amount of Skill or attention to be effective. Condition / Burst Ranger Builds are pretty effective too, with a much higher Skill level needed to really change the outcome of a game.
I’d suggest lowering the range for the Ghosts effect a little with maybe some downgrades on the chance of triggering effects.

Skill level doesn’t mean it needs to be a better build, look at half the warrior builds out there, it’s literally “hit 1 button to stun them, then 100blades, if that fails spam all your defensive skills until you can hit that 1 button to stun them again, rinse and repeat.” yet i don’t see very many people crying that those warrior builds should be nerfed.

PS: Not saying warriors are easy mode, i’m just saying they have A LOT of builds that are.

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Durzlla.6295:

Atherakhia.4086:

Viridi.5467:

Although I agree with the argument of spirits being able to die, not ALL classes have powerful AoE, nor do they have the time to actually kill all these spirits (or even 1) while the ranger does insane damage. You’re basically always “in a pinch” against a spirit ranger if you have to go about killing atleast his Sun Spirit first, then perhaps (if the ranger chooses to use it) the elite spirit so he can’t revive himself.

This also means the ranger always has full control of the fight, considering he can just bash away on the target while the target is desperately struggling to keep up with the spirits (that follow the ranger at 300% speed or something).

I’m not sure any class in this game has less AE than a ranger. And also keep in mind that the insane damage you speak of is still condition damag which leads us back to the issue being predominately a condition problem (as every condition class right now is overpowered beyond belief) and not a ranger specific one.

Condi builds are not OP, they’re just really good against Direct Damage builds, you know those things that -were- the meta? And you know what’s really good against every condi build that uses rabid or shamans gear? Condi builds that have a lot of vitality, or condi removal(or better yet transfer). But you know what has little issue against those sorts of condi builds? Direct Damage….

See where this is going? The only problem is the vast majority of players are too lame to actual figure anything out for themselves and need to follow everyone else.

Oh did I mention there’s bunker builds that make condi builds useless? Yeah those are fun to play atm.

Go ask on the Warrior forum what they feel is the most trollish build they know. They’ll tell you the 40k HP, 1.5khp/sec build that can still dish out high sustained damage. Ask them what their worst match up is. They’ll all say Condi Ranger. Why the Ranger over the necro or engineer? Because of the regen.

It’s not too much to ask for power builds to have a place in the current meta. I’d much rather they fix the root problem (condis) than try and tackle class issues individually.

I’ve fought that warrior build a few times and I can’t find a way to break it, it just has so much HP, Armor, and regen it’s ridiculous, I’ve yet to see a good player say the ranger one is OP though, perma poison is simple enough of a counter to it, not to mention it takes them forever and a half to kill ANYTHING that’s not made of tissue paper. The warrior build does not have that flaw either…

I’ve recently leveled one of them warriors up and by cheer accident more or less this is the build I ended up with cause I always build my characters to survive first, it’s ridiculously strong and if I come across a ranger on my warrior as noobish as I am with it they are basically free kills, I would say if one does cause some trouble it would be one that is very good with a longbow because the stealth combined with knockback is really the only thing that can keep me from stunning him to death.

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

If people are crying about the Storm spirits damage they’re just being a big baby, it’s a 20s CD, and is so easy to avoid by just NOT BEING NEAR THE SPIRIT it’s ridiculous, the BM pets were entirerly different because they were able to do the damage constantly and netted a large amount of constant DPS.

Even IF the storm spirit hit for 8k every time that’s only 400dps added onto the rangers damage, and if they’re a bunker… well that 400dps is kittening nothing, if you can’t outlive that + w/e they are actually bringing your build is just glass.

I would be more agreeable to this if the game mode didn’t have such a high demand on throwing yourself on a small point to contest, and if it wasn’t so hard to push through damage onto a ranger or one of the specific spirits from range because of how the ranger can kite and force the spirits to body block anything other than AoE cleave.

Which is why, as people said, any change made should really be a pvp only change (or revamp crosses fingers)

Well i play a single target Engi (rifle CC) and a Condi mesmer (mainly single target) and i’ve never had an issue against a spirit ranger, ESPECIALLY that silly little storm spirit, the things will fold under one good 4 clone Mind Wrack (especially since most spirit rangers will send the poor little devil into the grave by making it cast its skill with all that confusion =( poor guy), and then the engi i just don’t even let the ranger get close to me.

The engi has done his job of keeping range on the ranger so well i’ve had a lot of them screaming at me, and once those spirits go down, lets just say they NEVER come back up while i’m fighting them >=D

Lol

And true, I don’t personally find them to be a problem either, unless I’m actually on my ranger with no cleave weapons. Particularly, my weaponset isn’t suited for going up against spirit rangers (axe/dagger and sword/torch).

BUT, I would also argue that we both know the build we’re playing against really well too. I’m starting to think that there are people that go “oh no, so many enemies, ranger OP, they can summon a family to fight against me! I’ll just go in and burst him like I do everything else. Rawr, backstab hundred blades glass cannon completely obvious rush in to burst! What? Ranger killed me? So OP, all it was was 11111 spam and OP spirits. NERF!”

And… that basically described 90% of the people I beat when I’m running the spirit build lol.

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

If people are crying about the Storm spirits damage they’re just being a big baby, it’s a 20s CD, and is so easy to avoid by just NOT BEING NEAR THE SPIRIT it’s ridiculous, the BM pets were entirerly different because they were able to do the damage constantly and netted a large amount of constant DPS.

Even IF the storm spirit hit for 8k every time that’s only 400dps added onto the rangers damage, and if they’re a bunker… well that 400dps is kittening nothing, if you can’t outlive that + w/e they are actually bringing your build is just glass.

I would be more agreeable to this if the game mode didn’t have such a high demand on throwing yourself on a small point to contest, and if it wasn’t so hard to push through damage onto a ranger or one of the specific spirits from range because of how the ranger can kite and force the spirits to body block anything other than AoE cleave.

Which is why, as people said, any change made should really be a pvp only change (or revamp crosses fingers)

Well i play a single target Engi (rifle CC) and a Condi mesmer (mainly single target) and i’ve never had an issue against a spirit ranger, ESPECIALLY that silly little storm spirit, the things will fold under one good 4 clone Mind Wrack (especially since most spirit rangers will send the poor little devil into the grave by making it cast its skill with all that confusion =( poor guy), and then the engi i just don’t even let the ranger get close to me.

The engi has done his job of keeping range on the ranger so well i’ve had a lot of them screaming at me, and once those spirits go down, lets just say they NEVER come back up while i’m fighting them >=D

Lol

And true, I don’t personally find them to be a problem either, unless I’m actually on my ranger with no cleave weapons. Particularly, my weaponset isn’t suited for going up against spirit rangers (axe/dagger and sword/torch).

BUT, I would also argue that we both know the build we’re playing against really well too. I’m starting to think that there are people that go “oh no, so many enemies, ranger OP, they can summon a family to fight against me! I’ll just go in and burst him like I do everything else. Rawr, backstab hundred blades glass cannon completely obvious rush in to burst! What? Ranger killed me? So OP, all it was was 11111 spam and OP spirits. NERF!”

And… that basically described 90% of the people I beat when I’m running the spirit build lol.

That description is so accurate it hurts… It reminds me when a thief tried to back stab my ranger with what I’m assuming was all his burst, took me to 75% health (I’m built like a kittening tank in PvE lol) and he tried to run…. Tried… Idiot had 20s of cripple from barrage + spirit, never heard so much kitten QQ from one person in my life…

Lévis.5489:

The chances are very high that they might nerf ranger again in spvp, and not making those nerfs spvp only.

Unlike the pet nerf, a spirit nerf for PvP reasons wouldn’t change spirits in PvE. The sPvP build simply doesn’t work in PvE. Any boss mob with AoE will nuke down most of your spirits instantly if you use Spirits Unbound. The only way to use a spirit in PvE atm is to place it out of the way ala GW1 style and hope that your party is in range. An issue warriors don’t have with banners (which often provide more powerful buffs than the Frost Spirit under optimal conditions). Also note that the spirit actives usually result in you choosing between using them over the spirit’s death.

It’s unfortunate that spirits became viable in PvP because their design works really well there (the actives are what really make that build as powerful as it is). The build is simply not viable in PvE so it’s a poor cross over. The game is balanced around PvP and seeing as spirits have found a niche there, it’s unlikely we will ever see the complete redesign of spirits that is needed for PvE.