Guild Wars 2

I’m so glad they fixed this. With 30 beastmastery, does about 1900 non-crit, has huge aoe range, and is a blast finisher. Trying it right now on the AOE golems in PVP, amazing.

EDIT: Numbers are wrong. he does anywhere from 1950- 2800 WITHOUT critting with 30 beastmaster.

Insanity. Traiting 30% more damage on critical with pets, gonna see what he crits for.

lolwut 3590 to all AOE targets on crit so far. Getting more numbers.

Thanks for the update; good news. Please keep us updated.

Makes me wonder if there are other pets they are looking at adjusting.

Dude! I was so happy to get the aoe might from a fire field. yay! xD

I like the drakes, personally. I used to use a river and ice drake during my levelling. Might have to switch to them again.

Will have to try this out, might go back to a trap build for PvE.

Drakes finally working, yaaay. I can finally use my favorite (visually, anyway) pet class without feeling like I’m using a gimp.

Did they fix Chomp as well, or just Tail Swipe? Tail Swipe sounds awesome certainly, but I’d like for both to work and I’m fairly certain neither did before.

Certain bite attacks he was doing did more damage, but I was testing it on enemies that didn’t do damage, so it was hard to tell.

But I’m pretty sure both work now.

Try it on an enemy that knows how to move out of the range of tail swipe, and report its effectiveness.

jkctmc.8754:

Try it on an enemy that knows how to move out of the range of tail swipe, and report its effectiveness.

it has huge range.

And I will, if you so desire.

Oh someone hails a ranger pet.
Now try it on moving targets and hail again.

Ryoki Hokishami.2756:

I’m so glad they fixed this. With 30 beastmastery, does about 1900 non-crit, has huge aoe range, and is a blast finisher. Trying it right now on the AOE golems in PVP, amazing.

EDIT: Numbers are wrong. he does anywhere from 1950- 2800 WITHOUT critting with 30 beastmaster.

Insanity. Traiting 30% more damage on critical with pets, gonna see what he crits for.

lolwut 3590 to all AOE targets on crit so far. Getting more numbers.

Out of curiosity, what pet were you using before this patch? Because the Black Raven and White Owl put up those kinds of numbers every hit. And that’s without traiting 30 in BM.

Auto attack is doing more than cat auto attack. By roughly 80 damage for me. Tailswipe crits are around 2500. NonBM build.

ItIsFinished.9462:

Ryoki Hokishami.2756:

I’m so glad they fixed this. With 30 beastmastery, does about 1900 non-crit, has huge aoe range, and is a blast finisher. Trying it right now on the AOE golems in PVP, amazing.

EDIT: Numbers are wrong. he does anywhere from 1950- 2800 WITHOUT critting with 30 beastmaster.

Insanity. Traiting 30% more damage on critical with pets, gonna see what he crits for.

lolwut 3590 to all AOE targets on crit so far. Getting more numbers.

Out of curiosity, what pet were you using before this patch? Because the Black Raven and White Owl put up those kinds of numbers every hit. And that’s without traiting 30 in BM.

it’s aoe damage, so no birds cant put out those kinds of numbers.

So excited for this… I’ve wanted to use drake pets for awhile now. Can’t wait to get in game!!

nerva.7940:

ItIsFinished.9462:

Ryoki Hokishami.2756:

I’m so glad they fixed this. With 30 beastmastery, does about 1900 non-crit, has huge aoe range, and is a blast finisher. Trying it right now on the AOE golems in PVP, amazing.

EDIT: Numbers are wrong. he does anywhere from 1950- 2800 WITHOUT critting with 30 beastmaster.

Insanity. Traiting 30% more damage on critical with pets, gonna see what he crits for.

lolwut 3590 to all AOE targets on crit so far. Getting more numbers.

Out of curiosity, what pet were you using before this patch? Because the Black Raven and White Owl put up those kinds of numbers every hit. And that’s without traiting 30 in BM.

it’s aoe damage, so no birds cant put out those kinds of numbers.

Not only that, but birds take longer to autoattack than drakes do.

I watched mine crit a mob for 5k

pretty hilarious

Bird F2 attacks are about 1,000,000 times more likely to actually land. The drake F2 skill is probably the worst implemented attack in the game. It is useless against trash (the river drake one should be good against trash because it’s a kind of AoE, but by the time it activates the original target is dead and the skill does nothing) and more than any other skill in the game, the position of the pet and it’s target needs to be so precise for it to actually hit (especially with it’s long kitten charge/animation) that any slight change in your target’s position (or your pet was facing the wrong when when receiving the command) and the skill is wasted.

I’m glad we have a pet with blast finishers that are reliably used (the ranger himself has access to none). Pets are most useful and interesting to use when they have access to things the ranger can’t normally do himself. River drake feedback (reliable cast time and positioning too) is a good example, the AoE fear howl and knockdowns from the wolf is another example. Adding powerful and useful things like blast finishers onto some of our pets auto attacks at a consistent pace (considering some classes can spam them on weapon sets and the more powerful combo fields become in the meta, the less useful classes which have weak finishers will become more obvious) is a step in the right direction of making pets a meaningful contribution to the class and really helping to round out what a ranger can contribute to the group without making it OP.

Shiren.9532:

Bird F2 attacks are about 1,000,000 times more likely to actually land. The drake F2 skill is probably the worst implemented attack in the game. It is useless against trash (the river drake one should be good against trash because it’s a kind of AoE, but by the time it activates the original target is dead and the skill does nothing) and more than any other skill in the game, the position of the pet and it’s target needs to be so precise for it to actually hit (especially with it’s long kitten charge/animation) that any slight change in your target’s position (or your pet was facing the wrong when when receiving the command) and the skill is wasted.

I’m glad we have a pet with blast finishers that are reliably used (the ranger himself has access to none). Pets are most useful and interesting to use when they have access to things the ranger can’t normally do himself. River drake feedback (reliable cast time and positioning too) is a good example, the AoE fear howl and knockdowns from the wolf is another example. Adding powerful and useful things like blast finishers onto some of our pets auto attacks at a consistent pace (considering some classes can spam them on weapon sets and the more powerful combo fields become in the meta, the less useful classes which have weak finishers will become more obvious) is a step in the right direction of making pets a meaningful contribution to the class and really helping to round out what a ranger can contribute to the group without making it OP.

You’re kind of right. F2 drake is pretty crappy against trash, but it’s great on bosses, which is what I use it for.

Also, I’ve said I’ve been testing this, and I have some more results:

-Drakes generally appear to use tailswipe near the start of combat on normal enemies, and use it almost right on cooldown. Which means you can use a tailswipe pretty much right after a tailswipe if you switch, giving you +6 stacks of might from a fire field or reliable healing from Healing spring.

I’m really liking this patch.

And yes, I’m aware of the “nerfs” we got too, but the entangle and drake fix are turning out to be substantial, at least for my build.

Any pet with a cooldown higher than 20 seconds is now pretty much useless.

I bet we’ll be seeing a lot less wolves and a lot more fern hounds.

But we’ll probably be seeing quite some drakes as well due to the blast finisher fix, despite their F2 attack still being useless for PvP.

The blast effect on Tail Swipe appears to trigger at the start of the animation as well, which makes it a little more responsive than I’d expected.

Edit: Actually, I just looked a little closer – the blast notification flashes at the beginning of the swipe, but buff doesn’t appear until the end. Not a huge lag, but it at least makes it easier to see when he’s doing it in a combo field

Cavernshark.8957:

The blast effect on Tail Swipe appears to trigger at the start of the animation as well, which makes it a little more responsive than I’d expected.

Edit: Actually, I just looked a little closer – the blast notification flashes at the beginning of the swipe, but buff doesn’t appear until the end. Not a huge lag, but it at least makes it easier to see when he’s doing it in a combo field

Many blast finishers work that way. Elementalist’s offhand Dagger #5 in Earth Attunement, for instance.

The attack “absorbs” the attribute of the field on activation, but doesn’t actually apply the effects until the attack fires.

Besides getting interrupted mid-cast, it works pretty well. Means that having a field disappear in the middle of the animation doesn’t make you lose the combo field effect, because the effect has already been que’d up.

I just dueled another Ranger five times, him using Drake, me my Wolf/Panther, and the Drakes never hit me once.

Still a worthless pet in WvW against a player who doesn’t stand there to take a hit.

thread should be renamed to “Drake Tailswipe is Ridiculous in PVE Where Mobs Stand Still”

Ooooo goodie my Drakes just got better. Can’t wait to use them.

When switching pets I always wait a bit for the Pet to actually engage the target (and take some damage) before hitting F2 – it seems a little more reliable on the targeting that way. Hopefully I won’t notice the F2 cool down nerf much.

Entangle + Drake F2 might work for a nice gimmicky kill in pvp.

Valroth.7138:

Entangle + Drake F2 might work for a nice gimmicky kill in pvp.

I agree on this strategy’s effectiveness. It wouldn’t be gimpy though, just smart. Trying drakes out I realized the f2 and tailswipe are both slow, but some improvisation could help this. River drake still hits the hardest I believe, and tailswipe still gets that blast finisher. Hmm it’s tough to leave my cats though, they still hit harder with their precision. Hard to choose, maybe one of each lol.

Eh, the 30 second cooldown keeps it from being anything I’d call “ridiculous”, but it does put drakes in a good spot for PvE AoE situations.

However, I don’t think you’d want to try to build around a drake for PvP, even if you tried using it with Entangle. You’ll get much better burst from a raven easily along with better overall dps.

I rock the river drake on my ranger, love that dude. I use the ice drake in the water. Those are the only two drakes I have atm, but am planning on excursions to get more as I level.

All I’d be content with now is the pet following, pathing ai thing, where they don’t run 2 miles ahead of you when you stop; whichs makes them agro the heck out of anything it runs into. Fix that, and I’ll be content.

I find that the Drake pets are generally pretty bad in PvP, the F2 just takes to long to cast.

However i can see them being pretty good for comboing in groups now.

Dahkeus.8243:

Eh, the 30 second cooldown keeps it from being anything I’d call “ridiculous”, but it does put drakes in a good spot for PvE AoE situations.

However, I don’t think you’d want to try to build around a drake for PvP, even if you tried using it with Entangle. You’ll get much better burst from a raven easily along with better overall dps.

I would personally love to see em turf our pets in WVW PvP and just give us one of the useful f2 abilities on the same pet cooldown. I sincerely hope the OP was talkign about PvE with his ridiculous statement. I play in WvW almost exclusively and the Only thing my pets are good for and I really do mean Only is tanking NPC’s there are completely useless pieces of junk against other players. Most 1v1 fights they are completely ignored unless you send in a pet capable of some dps and then its dead faster than a thief on an afk ranger. In any large group situation they dont even make it to your target. They say they shortened the casting time of a single pets ability. Well how about the F2 abilities? I can be going 1v1 with no lag and it takes about 5 seconds to fire off an F2 ability an almost every pet and that prolly why many just ignore them. There may be one or two that actually cast their F2 ability before it is redundant but I personally do not find forage all that useful in pvp fights.

Oh i guess i should correct myself. The Red Moa can be useful for the fury buff but having that huge thing following me around is a beacon for every thief in the neighbourhood. Hence why i said just give me the buff on the same timer and cooldown and get rid of the “Come kill me” beacon. The Drake is almost as bad. Could they have possibly made it any bigger of a target. Enemy can see us coming from so far away they could prolly build a ballista out of supplies brought in from the other side of map.

Well that last sentence is a bit of an exaggeration but instead of lowering the cast time of a SINGLE pets ability make it so we can stable pets if we choose? I have almost rage quit more than once because of having pets pop out right after i stowed em while doing a jumping puzzle and having to do it repeatedly in a new JP. Whoever thought that a drop of five feet should auto out your pet? Prolly the single most annoying thing about this class IMO.

Anyway I am happy the OP is happy. Please let us know how “rediculous” the pet is in WVW skirmishes, 1v1’s 2v2’s 5v5’s eceterra. Who knows maybe I am just soo bad of a player that i cant find the F2 button and have been hitting F12 instead.

anyone try LB, traps, zerker gear and 2x drakes? the damage is ludicrous.

jkctmc.8754:

I just dueled another Ranger five times, him using Drake, me my Wolf/Panther, and the Drakes never hit me once.

Still a worthless pet in WvW against a player who doesn’t stand there to take a hit.

Why don’t more Rangers use Guard? Is it because it doesn’t state on the tooltip “Stealths your pet for 10 seconds.” ? It does SO much to help alleviate the problem of pets always missing the target and the cooldown is 24 seconds, I think. Short.
It’s one of the best abilities around for 1v1s, especially if you’re beastmaster spec.

Tell your friend to make his drake invisible before he tries to burst you with it, see if those duel results change. I haven’t tried the new drake, probably won’t (have moved on from this broken mess), but if it’s as strong as people are reporting, how much stronger would it be undetected until it’s too late?

side note.. who else is seriously disappointed in anet for guardian changes? I don’t play that class, but we asked for them to make spirits like spirit weapons, not spirit weapons like spirits. some dev has got the biggest trollface right now

yeea that was hilarious. the weapons went from less than useful to troll. spirits (of any kind) need to be invulnerable, period.

who knows, maybe with aoe nerf it wil be ok

after testing drakes in Orr and TA last night ive come to the conclusion that their aoe damage is overkill with my build (LB, piercing arrows and traps). on the otherhand, single target damage sucks compared to cat. so i will likely be sticking with my jag/red moa for dungeons.

Ultravalefor.5038:

jkctmc.8754:

I just dueled another Ranger five times, him using Drake, me my Wolf/Panther, and the Drakes never hit me once.

Still a worthless pet in WvW against a player who doesn’t stand there to take a hit.

Why don’t more Rangers use Guard? Is it because it doesn’t state on the tooltip “Stealths your pet for 10 seconds.” ? It does SO much to help alleviate the problem of pets always missing the target and the cooldown is 24 seconds, I think. Short.
It’s one of the best abilities around for 1v1s, especially if you’re beastmaster spec.

Tell your friend to make his drake invisible before he tries to burst you with it, see if those duel results change. I haven’t tried the new drake, probably won’t (have moved on from this broken mess), but if it’s as strong as people are reporting, how much stronger would it be undetected until it’s too late?

side note.. who else is seriously disappointed in anet for guardian changes? I don’t play that class, but we asked for them to make spirits like spirit weapons, not spirit weapons like spirits. some dev has got the biggest trollface right now

It won’t change anything. One trap, and the pet can not catch me to even have a chance to hit me.

jkctmc.8754:

Ultravalefor.5038:

jkctmc.8754:

I just dueled another Ranger five times, him using Drake, me my Wolf/Panther, and the Drakes never hit me once.

Still a worthless pet in WvW against a player who doesn’t stand there to take a hit.

Why don’t more Rangers use Guard? Is it because it doesn’t state on the tooltip “Stealths your pet for 10 seconds.” ? It does SO much to help alleviate the problem of pets always missing the target and the cooldown is 24 seconds, I think. Short.
It’s one of the best abilities around for 1v1s, especially if you’re beastmaster spec.

Tell your friend to make his drake invisible before he tries to burst you with it, see if those duel results change. I haven’t tried the new drake, probably won’t (have moved on from this broken mess), but if it’s as strong as people are reporting, how much stronger would it be undetected until it’s too late?

side note.. who else is seriously disappointed in anet for guardian changes? I don’t play that class, but we asked for them to make spirits like spirit weapons, not spirit weapons like spirits. some dev has got the biggest trollface right now

It won’t change anything. One trap, and the pet can not catch me to even have a chance to hit me.

why you always pair with CC and force your opponent to move towards your pet (obviously easiest with melee).

DaisyRogers.6837:

jkctmc.8754:

Ultravalefor.5038:

jkctmc.8754:

I just dueled another Ranger five times, him using Drake, me my Wolf/Panther, and the Drakes never hit me once.

Still a worthless pet in WvW against a player who doesn’t stand there to take a hit.

Why don’t more Rangers use Guard? Is it because it doesn’t state on the tooltip “Stealths your pet for 10 seconds.” ? It does SO much to help alleviate the problem of pets always missing the target and the cooldown is 24 seconds, I think. Short.
It’s one of the best abilities around for 1v1s, especially if you’re beastmaster spec.

Tell your friend to make his drake invisible before he tries to burst you with it, see if those duel results change. I haven’t tried the new drake, probably won’t (have moved on from this broken mess), but if it’s as strong as people are reporting, how much stronger would it be undetected until it’s too late?

side note.. who else is seriously disappointed in anet for guardian changes? I don’t play that class, but we asked for them to make spirits like spirit weapons, not spirit weapons like spirits. some dev has got the biggest trollface right now

It won’t change anything. One trap, and the pet can not catch me to even have a chance to hit me.

why you always pair with CC and force your opponent to move towards your pet (obviously easiest with melee).

Fought a Mesmer yesterday that has done something no other player has ever done, that I’ve fought.

HE KILLED MY PET!! With 30 in Beastmastery, he shredded my pet(s), before I could do much damage to him, and because I’m defense/BM spec, I had to run, and it’s a good thing I’m a Norn who uses Snow Leopard religiously in WvW now.

Our pets are as weak as ever, and it kind of sucks people are ok with how bad they are. Those vocal few might prevent us from getting the buffs to our pets that we deserve, and need.

As for why I always pair everything with CC, well PvP isn’t done against dummies, but instead against players who you know, think rather than PvE mobs that are predictable. Crowd Control is a major factor in WvW, and people need to realize that.