Guild Wars 2

As I’ve been reading over this forum as well as playing in game and talking with others, and forming my own opinions along the way I’ve come across a few interesting ways to change and diversify the ranger.

The ranger currently lacks any focus. We can DPS, but not as good as other classes. We can support but not as good as other classes (though this is improving slightly in the coming patch). We can condition damage, which is currently our only strength but on the whole, condition is vastly ignored at current in favor of berzerker status.

In line with these points, there are a few changes that can be made.

Firstly, changing PvE content as a whole. Bosses at current have high HP pools and not much toughness. If the HP pools were lowered and toughness raised so the EHP was the same, Condition builds on the whole will get more focus and it will loosen the grip Berzerkers have on this game.

I would highly hope Anet disapproves that 70% of their players are full berzerker gear and pigeonholed completely.

Secondly, if Rangers are to be more support based, which seems to be the current trend, spirits need a complete reworking. At current they are a neat idea, but useful in very few circumstances. They are far to brittle and die to many things, especially any AoE in dungeons.

Through Traits, or innately from the get go spirits will need some or all of these changes:

1. AoE immunity.
2. The buff procs on both on hit, and on attack.
3. If two is used, on hit stays the same, but on attack changes to might/cripple/freeze, and so on. Based on the spirit and its element.

This would greatly improve the support options of the ranger.

Thirdly, if DPS is to be our pigeonhole and we are to be stuck with the pet taking 30-40% of our damage make it so that through trait or innately, all boons are shared equally between pet and player. I cannot count the times I’ve given my pet over 25 stacks of might while I’m sitting here feeling like I have a pea-shooter. Almost all ranger skills favor in buffing the pet and ignoring ourselves.

If sharing all boons is considered too strong, then the trait can include sharing all conditions as well.

These are just my thoughts, but I feel they would make nice steps in diversifying the ranger, making them more viable and as a whole stopping the berzerker mindset from ruining all of the PvE content.