Guild Wars 2

Rough idea I will be filling in more after bit. Remove the normal F2 skills from the ranger bar, place this under AI control adjust cool downs and activation times as needed. Replace the current F2 the ranger can use that is completely removed from the AI system.
So the Class Mechanic bar would be something like this:
F1 Attack My Target
F2 Pet Related Utility*
F3 Return To Me
F4 Pet Swap

*This would be a skill that the ranger would use that is based on the current pet active/out (incase of a dead pet) Note could have additional/improved functionality based on pet being alive or not.

I’d be okay with that Bran. Especially if we could use it despite the pet being dead.

CETheLucid.3964:

You came into the game knowing that.

Actually, I didn’t. I bought into the game based on two sources: my friends who played and the Angry Joe 30 minute review. I started the Ranger because of archery aspect. I had no idea until I started playing (and I mean that literally) that the pet was going to be there… Then I realized by lvl 15 that the pet wasn’t going anywhere. Depiste that I still played because I was hooked on the Ranger’s playstyle. And I didn’t mind the pet because S&R would rez defeated players within 4000 units made up for the massive shortfalls… it was that useful. Now, there’s nothing to make up for the massive shortfalls (read: broken mechanic). So, yeah, at any time the Devs could come to their senses and give us the option to not use the broken class mechanic. I will hold out hope, regardless of the nay sayers, that logic will prevail and we will get the option to perma-stow the broken mechanic in exchange for preparations or straight up damage buff or something that is not broken.

thefantasticg.3984:

CETheLucid.3964:

You came into the game knowing that.

Actually, I didn’t.

Okay, that’s a failure on your part. It was no shortage on Anet’s part to inform you that rangers would use pets.

CETheLucid.3964:

DeceiverX.8361:

All that jazz

TL;DR
buff bow, no pet is better, srs real life example and so that is why my fantasy video games shouldn’t let us use pets in most situations.

You’re entitled to your opinion there but the fact is, pet’s aren’t going anywhere. Bow has been getting buffed every balance update, due another this next one.

Marksmanship/archery is very important to the ranger class. They’re not ignoring it. There will also be something there for pets. Maybe.

It probably won’t be your “everything about pets is perfect now” fix though. That’s very likely going to happen over time. Unless suddenly awesome.

And even when that does happen eventually, Rangers will still have pets that need to be managed to be effective.

If that’s not for you, you should move on.

Again, it’s about how much they account for our play.

I don’t see warriors requiring maximum adrenaline management. Most of the adrenaline skills are kind of underwhelming, actually.

Nor do I see thieves building entirely steal-based. Most run stealth over stealing. Stealth to thief = bow to ranger. Not the class mechanic, but DEFINITELY has a huge presence in building and defining the class.

Eles run arcane just because it’s got the best traits which work for all styles. It’s got less to do with arcane magic and attunement cooldowns and more to do with the other traits just being pointless.

I could continue. Honestly, aside from like necro, I can see viable build options for every other class that totally ignores their class feature. The class feature definitely helps define the class and makes it different, but it shouldn’t be the end-all choice of playstyle.

Because ANet strives for build diversity. That’s a fact. To model their game this way would be to totally contradict their entire design perspective.

Again, there’s no alternative to the archer ranger… or any archer at all, really. Give us just an archer build, and the complaints will fizzle. They might as well just allow for pets to be stow-able, then.

I still don’t see why people fight this suggestion. All it does is make different ranger playstyles better in some areas but keeps them the same, otherwise. Pets will never be fixed. It’s been stated by ANet that response time will never increase, and will not be changed. So if the pet fails to work in certain environments, why not just be able to not use it and be compensated for it if you don’t?

If people are worried about non-pet builds being better at certain things, then that’s their issue in failing to recognize that some builds JUST WORK BETTER for some things than other. It’s like running a build that runs no condi removal with full berserker gear while trying to melee fight Subject Alpha. Whether or not you dodge the nukes is one thing, but you still end up burning to death because your heals will be too low and you won’t kill it fast enough.

So then a build with proper regen/heals to mitigate the burning easily does better. Is this OP? Not really. They just had the better class for the occasion.

Distinction and diversity is important in class-based RPG’s if some builds just do not work conceptually for some fights. ANet has tried to avoid this, but has failed. Instead of fixing the entire game, they’d only need to address fewer smaller problems which create some necessary distinction and make everyone happy for once.

CETheLucid.3964:

thefantasticg.3984:

CETheLucid.3964:

You came into the game knowing that.

Actually, I didn’t.

Okay, that’s a failure on your part. It was no shortage on Anet’s part to inform you that rangers would use pets.

And failure on Anet’s part to make pets work and to represent how well they actually function in endgame content early on.

When you start the game the pet is the greatest thing ever. It tanks the enemy like it’s nothing, holds aggro and deals huge damage to the point that you don’t even realize the ranger is hitting for a fraction of the other classes around it.

Most of us who bought the game at launch didn’t have forums to tell us the pets was crap from the get go, we had to spend months learning the ins and outs of the game and find out on our own slowly. So slowly you probably wouldn’t even discover it until you get denied a party spot because of your class or get curious about another one, roll into pvp mode and get blown away by the much higher damage per sec you deal without even trying.

We all knew the ranger had a pet. It’s in the create a character screen. What we didn’t know was how kitten it makes the whole class in any situation where it actually matters and how little Anet seems to care.

Agreed OP but as others have said, the simplest solution is to not play ranger. The only two classes I refuse to play are rangers and mesmers because I hate having dumb AI assist me in my fights (no matter how well it’s done or how weak it’s damage is), unfortunately I decided to level a ranger for God knows why a few months back and now I don’t touch him. I’m guessing it’s because the idea of a “ranger” fits my play style far better than frilly mesmers and elementalists.

My only hope is that anet acknowledges that players like me exist and offer up some sort of pet that either latches on to the player and buffs them or some trait that forces your pet to be passive and traits that would affect him is partially applied to the player.

That or anet back tracks on their original stance and allows us to switch classes in which case I’d probably just roll an elementalist.

for anyone just now reading; the title of the thread very nicely sums up the conversation found inside.

so dont bother.

the whole situation would be infinitely better if pets did not take any damage but could not take agro either .

Substance E.4852:

CETheLucid.3964:

thefantasticg.3984:

CETheLucid.3964:

You came into the game knowing that.

Actually, I didn’t.

Okay, that’s a failure on your part. It was no shortage on Anet’s part to inform you that rangers would use pets.

We all knew the ranger had a pet. It’s in the create a character screen. What we didn’t know was how kitten it makes the whole class in any situation where it actually matters and how little Anet seems to care.

This. I didn’t know when I was playing that I would be stuck with the incompotent AI for the entire duration of gameplay. I figured there was a skill you could unlock to stow the pet for boosts or something like that. There was no indication during the character creation or in the Ranger description that I was permentantly stuck with a broken class mechanic.

thefantasticg.3984:

Substance E.4852:

We all knew the ranger had a pet. It’s in the create a character screen. What we didn’t know was how kitten it makes the whole class in any situation where it actually matters and how little Anet seems to care.

This. I didn’t know when I was playing that I would be stuck with the incompotent AI for the entire duration of gameplay. I figured there was a skill you could unlock to stow the pet for boosts or something like that. There was no indication during the character creation or in the Ranger description that I was permentantly stuck with a broken class mechanic.

It’s been a pet class from the beginning, from the very first skill videos pets were there. They were there in all the betas.

Blame your friends. Blame Angry Joe. You can’t blame Anet for that.

Rangers were, are, and will likely always be a class that works with an animal companion within the framework of how it works now.

There are legitimate concerns and issues concerning pets. There are things that need to be improved upon, kinks that need to be worked out.

However the mechanic isn’t broken. That’s hyperbole. Rangers are far from unplayable.

For all these concerns, issues, and kinks, rangers are still a very strong and prominent class.

We’ve been told many times it’s being worked on. You can accept that or not. But you will deal with pets regardless in the interim and likely after.

Accept that or move on.
_

Your billy kitten third option is to continue these incessant useless whining tirades about it, ignoring any reason (“idontcarewhatanyonesayslol”), and pretending it all amounts to little more then nothing.

All the while you continue to make fools of yourselves for the later, playing a class that you don’t especially like/suck at, with a mechanic that isn’t likely to change, for which improvement will come gradually.

Take your pick.

I don’t know what first skill videos you are talking about and I didn’t play in the beta weekends.

And yes, the class mechanic is not functioning correctly. That’s been owned up to by the lead game designer. Not to mention no one said that the Ranger is unplayable. I, myself, have said that I love playing the Ranger I just hate the pet. The band aid approach that the lead game designer said they have used to date is just that, a band aid approach. They know that it is band aiding a broken mechanic whether you admit it or not is irrelevent. He knows it’s going to take up many resources to fix it and that is why they haven’t done it. In the mean time there is no reason not to get a work around such a perma-stowing pets in exchange for something else that IS NOT BROKEN.

It is your opinion that the class is very strong and prominent and in my opinion you are very wrong. Accepting a not properly functioning class mechanic is the pure meaning of stupidity, in my opinion. Why you settle for stupidity is beyond me. I want a properly working pet mechanic (like on my guardian, warrior, or thief) or give me the option not to use it in lieu of something else that does.

Just because you don’t like a large portion of the Ranger player base’s stance on this subject, Snowflake, doesn’t make it any less valid… and when it comes to the pet it is very valid.

All classes need to deal with their class mechanism. How effectively one uses them is up to each person. No class can drop their mechanism. Lets be clear what these are.

Mesmer’s = illusions (clones, phantasm) and shattering

Ranger’s = Pets

Guardian’s = Virtue (justice, courage, Resolve)

Necromancer’s = Life force and death shroud

Elemental’s = Attunements (fire, earth, water, air)

Warrior’s = Adrenaline

Thief’s = Initiative Steal and dual wield. and (not stealth)

Engineer’s = kits and turrets.

Some of these give extra life or damage even if you aren’t aware of them you are using them.

If you play any of these classes and dislike or refuse to use these mechanics then you are probably playing the wrong class.

What is wrong with allowing a pet stow option until they fix some of the issues is that people will regard it as a nerf when they fix the issue. The has been skills that were bugged and then fixed and some still consider it a nerf.

Pets not scaling is a big issue. It’s not that you want to stow your pet its that you want a boost to compensate. Honestly if they gave a 30% damage it couldn’t replace the utilizes that pets bring ( kd, cripples, blind, fury, regen).

Ranger are able to rally unlike any other class with the exception of warriors all they are doing is just delaying death Ranger can actually rally.

Some of you find ranger really boring its probably because you aren’t using your pets. With of pet the ranger class will just auto attack to no end.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

All classes need to deal with their class mechanism. How effectively one uses them is up to each person. No class can drop their mechanism. Lets be clear what these are.

Mesmer’s = illusions (clones, phantasm) and shattering

Ranger’s = Pets

Guardian’s = Virtue (justice, courage, Resolve)

Necromancer’s = Life force and death shroud

Elemental’s = Attunements (fire, earth, water, air)

Warrior’s = Adrenaline

Thief’s = Initiative Steal and dual wield. and (not stealth)

Engineer’s = kits and turrets.

Some of these give extra life or damage even if you aren’t aware of them you are using them.

If you play any of these classes and dislike or refuse to use these mechanics then you are probably playing the wrong class.

No one is disputing this.

The issue is that none of those other classes have been told by a developer that their mechanic is broken and they aren’t working on fixing it. The 12/10 thread has thrown the whole class in disarray and has given justification to the players who are upset with the way ANet has handled this class.

The issue now is why should the players be penalized for a system ANet has no intention of fixing? At what point should players look at this class as a realistic option in Guild Wars 2?

Atherakhia.4086:

The issue is that none of those other classes have been told by a developer that their mechanic is broken and they aren’t working on fixing it. The 12/10 thread has thrown the whole class in disarray and has given justification to the players who are upset with the way ANet has handled this class.

The issue now is why should the players be penalized for a system ANet has no intention of fixing? At what point should players look at this class as a realistic option in Guild Wars 2?

Quoted for truth. When I play on my guardian, warrior, thief, or mesmser (which I do much more now-a-days when I do play — more than my ranger now in fact) when I hit the function keys the class mechanic does exactly what I expected and worked flawlessly. I haven’t come across a situation where I was cursing the class mechanic for not working as it was expected to when playing my other characters.

As a matter of fact, now that my gathering tools are now account bound (they’re going on my guardian) I have no reason to log back onto my Ranger until the pets are fixed or we are given the option not to use the broken class mechanic…. well, I’m lying. I will still long onto it to throw stuff into the forge. It’s the only toon I have pulled 7 precursors from the forge with. The good juju is in my Ranger. Not to mention I want to play my Ranger again and not deal with a frustrating class mechanic that only works when it wants to. Said it once and I will say it again: I love playing the Ranger I just hate the pet.

I’m not sure if anyone has but I read on a previous thread where someone made a good point about our mechanic. Ranger’s are the only class who’s class mechanic can die completely reducing our dps by what they were supposed to offer in their up time. Keep aside the fact that mesmer clones can die/shatter but their mechanic even benefits from that via conditions/direct damage. No experience with engineers but at least if their turrets are gone they still have kits. What do rangers have when their pets die? Nothing but a long cool down and even less damage/utility then they didn’t really have to begin with.

Really enjoy the ranger class as it was my main from launch but as people mentioned many people came into the game not knowing that pets would be broken. I enjoyed them for a long time until I noticed, like many others, that the pets had quirky f2 skills and the like with targeting.

To appease both sides of keeping the pet vs perma-stow and the fact that there is a known broken mechanic that will be bandaid-ed for the longest time, Anet should give the option to perma-stow with its added benefits whatever they may be. If they can’t fix it for a long time there is no reason to make a class suffer for their mistake IF, and its a big if, they can easily implement a substitute solution although that would bring up more balance issues etc.

thefantasticg.3984:

I don’t know what first skill videos you are talking about and I didn’t play in the beta weekends.

Then you failed to inform yourself. The information was provided.

thefantasticg.3984:

It is your opinion that the class is very strong and prominent.

The first is a point of contention, half full/half empty argument. No other class in the game is two characters in one.

This is a strength and a weakness, depending on the situation.

In PvE it is simply awesome and if it’s anything less, you need to work on your ranger game plain and simple.

(Not to say that pets are perfect in PvE. But in PvE pet’s have been getting love and it is noticeable. The HP buff was a good start, a good thing.)

In WvW/PvP it borders between useless and OP. That’s where pets really need attention.

The AI in general needs to be fine tuned, but in no other area are pets in need of a looking to than in WvW/PvP. Basically any situation that involves your pet on a PC.

It’s a fine line there between useless and OP with regards to an AI companion. On the later point regarding prominence, it is a fact.

Rangers are prominent characters in this game. Rangers are right behind warriors in class popularity.

That’s a hard statistic.

thefantasticg.3984:

Accepting a not properly functioning class mechanic is the pure meaning of stupidity, in my opinion.

Continuing with something you do not like is stupidity. Masochism and/or addiction, maybe.

Pet’s work. The controls all make them do what you tell them to do. I’m pretty sure that’s not what you’re trying to say.

If you hit F1, your pet doesn’t turn into a grass object and fly off into the air. That’s broken. The ranger class isn’t objectively broken.

Your argument is in the quality of the mechanics, how they handle. Not their function.

They work, just not as well as we want them to. This is something that needs to be improved upon, we would agree on this.

thefantasticg.3984:

Why you settle for stupidity is beyond me.

I’m not. I can agree and can certainly see that there are issues that need to be worked on. I don’t do exaggerated hyperbole and BS though.

The reason you see little dev interaction, Pumpkin, is because the majority of the users here only operate in these two modes of conversation.

Mine is an effort at bringing a little understanding and maybe pointing that out for you, as the case may be.

You expect miracles overnight or in lieu of that, your own special band-aid fix (that you just otherwise finished deriding them for providing you because it wasn’t your way) that isn’t necessarily right for the game or the class that you play.

On that note…

Atherakhia.4086:

The issue is that none of those other classes have been told by a developer that their mechanic is broken and they aren’t working on fixing it.

Enlighten me. Please tell me where Anet says the ranger class is broken and that they’re not going to fix it. Can I get a direct quote on that tidbit?

Atherakhia.4086:

The 12/10 thread has thrown the whole class in disarray and has given justification to the players who are upset with the way ANet has handled this class.

You mean the one that’s almost all buffs with exception to the endurance regen trait, a nerf that’s similarly hitting just about every other class?

The issue people have with pets is that they die . They are integral to the class to such a level that the rangers dps suffers for having it . Ok , fine , I can live with that . It raises the skill floor in theory .
But , then we have the added problem of the pet not hitting moving targets or being able to die , depriving us of that damage and utlity we give so much for . That is the major problem number 1.
Number 2 is not having complete control over our pets abilities . We give up our own utility and damage to have a companion , but then we cant control it properly . Srsly , wtf?

On the notion the ranger is broken , it is not broken really , it does what the developers want it to do . The problem is , the ranger is badly designed !!

CETheLucid:

JonPeters.5630:

As I stated, this change is a lot about low hanging fruit. The problem with ranger is things that are good we don’t want to overpower and the things that are not as good are difficult to change. For example:

• Skirmish and Wilderness line could probably swap half of their traits.
• Beastmastery has basically one generic trait per tier and just needs to be more generalized.
• both primary ranged weapons are a mix of single target and AoE.
• Both marksmanship and skirmish lines lack traits to enable power rangers.

Despite those problems rangers have some great builds in PvE, PvP, and WvW. The core problem is diversity but it just so happens that rangers are not setup in a way that makes it easy to improve that diversity problem.

Too much typing for the bus, I’ll try and discuss more when I’m in.

Jon

P.S. I tried some stuff on MH sword but it was a marginal improvement at best. I’ll ping some programmers today about one other way we might handle it, but don’t hold your breath.

JonPeters.5630:

Summoned creature AI is a different can of worms that we aren’t opening for the same reason. Pets that delay F2 use isn’t some wait script we put into their skills it has to do with core AI behavior shared by all pets and creatures and how they decide tasks. Rewriting that has the risks of breaking millions of unknown things so we have up until now band aided the solution. It is something that needs addressing but won’t be addressed until we can kitten how and when we will test it.

Now as for the 12/10 patch, that specifically mentions power based Rangers as a focal point of the patch and yet the only changes that will directly impact power based Rangers are the longbow changes (which show only helps to normalize the weapon’s damage with shortbow). There’s also last patch where the focal point of that patch was to improve classes with a lack of group utility and again the Ranger got nothing.

There’s nothing wrong with trying to be optimistic with this class. I personally stopped being patient about 6 months ago when I saw nothing was changing to help the core problems with the class. But if you want to hang tough and be ignorant to the problems this class has with some kind of blind faith in ANet getting things done, don’t get in the way of those who want to voice their concerns in hopes ANet can’t continue to be ignorant. Don’t agree, that’s your right… but don’t sit there trying to tell us ANet will fix it when a year has gone by and problems from beta still exist today.

I second this. If they cant get pets working properly they should just remove them. Make rangers an “archer” just give us more stats on whats taken away for the pet. yeah pets function fine in pve. but guild wars has always been about pvp hasnt it?

Taking pets off the ranger would remove a lot of utility that the pets bring. Playing rangers simply as a archer is a bad idea. We now that range damage is inferior to melee. Some of you complain about the dps of the ranger yet you are willing to confine yourself to utilizing low dps weapon sets. Dps is not the measure of all things.

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Taking pets off the ranger would remove a lot of utility that the pets bring. Playing rangers simply as a archer is a bad idea. We now that range damage is inferior to melee. Some of you complain about the dps of the ranger yet you are willing to confine yourself to utilizing low dps weapon sets. Dps is not the measure of all things.

Pets account for 40% (according to what people are saying) of the Ranger profession’s total damage. If they ever go with removing the pets as a class mechanic by either replacing it with something else or providing an alternative solution, it would only make sense that in return they would have to transfer the damage provided by the pet into the ranger himself. That would technically render your point invalid as weapon sets will need to get buffed overall to account for the lost pet damage (damage transfer to ranger). I won’t even bring up Utility skill tweeks cuz that’s assuming a new mechanic will replace the pet utilities.

I gree with Xukavi, come on anet reply to this thread!

cassius.5809:

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Alright, bottom line: STOP TELLING US TO PICK ANOTHER CLASS WHEN NO OTHER ARCHER THEMED CLASS EXISTS. I played ranger in GW1. I enjoyed ranger in GW1. Therefore, I decided to try it in GW2…huge disappointment. Pets weren’t amazing in the first game, but they weren’t nearly this bad. I still want a marksmanship/expertise/survival style character in GW2, and there isn’t one to be found.

Edit: Oh, and they got rid of dervishes as well, so my second favorite GW1 class is also missing.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

cassius.5809:

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Alright, bottom line: STOP TELLING US TO PICK ANOTHER CLASS WHEN NO OTHER ARCHER THEMED CLASS EXISTS. I played ranger in GW1. I enjoyed ranger in GW1. Therefore, I decided to try it in GW2…huge disappointment. Pets weren’t amazing in the first game, but they weren’t nearly this bad. I still want a marksmanship/expertise/survival style character in GW2, and there isn’t one to be found.

Edit: Oh, and they got rid of dervishes as well, so my second favorite GW1 class is also missing.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Longbow
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shortbow

Thieves and Warriors can use bows.

runeblade.7514:

Unholy Pillager.3791:

cassius.5809:

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Alright, bottom line: STOP TELLING US TO PICK ANOTHER CLASS WHEN NO OTHER ARCHER THEMED CLASS EXISTS. I played ranger in GW1. I enjoyed ranger in GW1. Therefore, I decided to try it in GW2…huge disappointment. Pets weren’t amazing in the first game, but they weren’t nearly this bad. I still want a marksmanship/expertise/survival style character in GW2, and there isn’t one to be found.

Edit: Oh, and they got rid of dervishes as well, so my second favorite GW1 class is also missing.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Longbow
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shortbow

Thieves and Warriors can use bows.

So we have a heavy tank that shoots fireballs, or a short-ranged character that puts bombs on his arrows. Compare these to archers in real life and in GW1.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

cassius.5809:

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Alright, bottom line: STOP TELLING US TO PICK ANOTHER CLASS WHEN NO OTHER ARCHER THEMED CLASS EXISTS. I played ranger in GW1. I enjoyed ranger in GW1. Therefore, I decided to try it in GW2…huge disappointment. Pets weren’t amazing in the first game, but they weren’t nearly this bad. I still want a marksmanship/expertise/survival style character in GW2, and there isn’t one to be found.

Edit: Oh, and they got rid of dervishes as well, so my second favorite GW1 class is also missing.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

runeblade.7514:

Unholy Pillager.3791:

cassius.5809:

Doesn’t care what anyone says / posts on forums and waits for replies

It’s a unique class mechanic it’s fine. As others have said pick another class. Your pets aren’t breaking anything (apart from they may themselves be broken at times)

Alright, bottom line: STOP TELLING US TO PICK ANOTHER CLASS WHEN NO OTHER ARCHER THEMED CLASS EXISTS. I played ranger in GW1. I enjoyed ranger in GW1. Therefore, I decided to try it in GW2…huge disappointment. Pets weren’t amazing in the first game, but they weren’t nearly this bad. I still want a marksmanship/expertise/survival style character in GW2, and there isn’t one to be found.

Edit: Oh, and they got rid of dervishes as well, so my second favorite GW1 class is also missing.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Longbow
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shortbow

Thieves and Warriors can use bows.

So we have a heavy tank that shoots fireballs, or a short-ranged character that puts bombs on his arrows. Compare these to archers in real life and in GW1.

Warrior:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Arcing_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Arcing_Arrow
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Pin_Down
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pin_Down

Thief:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ignite_Arrows
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cluster_Bomb
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Apply_Poison
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spider_Venom

Compares pretty well actually. You can build a very powerful marksman out of warrior and a preparations n’ traps oriented thief.

If you hate the pet mechanic so much, quit playing the ranger class.

If you hate the pet mechanic so much, quit playing the ranger class.

You buy a car for 50.000$, the salesman promises you it will hit the 140mp/h, has electric windows and a high-end stereo system. But It doesn’t, it only hits the 100mp/h, you have to crank to open the windows and the high-end stereo system is a cassette player. You come back to tell him either that something is wrong with the car or he scamed you. He just tells you everything is right and if you’re not satisfied just buy a new one.

CETheLucid.3964:

\http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Longbow
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shortbow

Thieves and Warriors can use bows.

So we have a heavy tank that shoots fireballs, or a short-ranged character that puts bombs on his arrows. Compare these to archers in real life and in GW1.[/quote]

Warrior:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Arcing_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Arcing_Arrow
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Pin_Down
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pin_Down

Thief:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ignite_Arrows
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cluster_Bomb
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Apply_Poison
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spider_Venom

Compares pretty well actually. You can build a very powerful marksman out of warrior and a preparations n’ traps oriented thief.

If you hate the pet mechanic so much, quit playing the ranger class.[/quote]

Ok, I might not have experience with warriors or bows on a warrior so I can’t comment on it. As for the Thief, I’m sorry but any thief will tell you that shortbow is not a dps weapon it’s used for either utility and mobility or stacking might with the arguably easiest spammable blast finisher. Closest to DPS would be tagging in zergs. Shortbow on Thief is by far no where close to being a marksman.

the ranger without the pet is like a warrior without the armour

Stalima, the ranger without a pet is more like a warrior with axe/mace and greatsword. Useful in all situations and not a hindrance to their team.

Pet mechanic is fail. There’s a reason the most requesting thing on the forums is to have the pet be optional.

Stalima.5490:

the ranger without the pet is like a warrior without the armour

My GW1 ranger rarely used a pet; never in PvP.

Stalima.5490:

the ranger without the pet is like a warrior without the armour

Like a camel without the desert

Like Willy Wonka without a chocolate factory

Like Devon Carver without the bad decisions

Unlike some snowflakes in this thread I can’t settle for, AT BEST, a failed class mechanic when I have four other toons with class mechanics that work.

I have a thief and a warrior. Niether of which play like the Ranger (which I love the play style of). If you tell me that they you just made it painfully obvious you have never played a thief or warrior. If you did you wouldn’t make such an incredibly stupid statement such as that. The closest that comes to the Ranger play style is a d/d or d/p – SB thief, and it is still a far cry. So much so it is to insult the intelligence of any rational being to suggest that the ranger is similar in play style to the thief or warrior.

And there’s no defending a broken class mechanic that the lead game designer said they’ve been band-aiding since launch. You can try but you might as well just be kitten ing in the wind with your mouth open and save us all from your wasted hot air.

Stalima.5490:

the ranger without the pet is like a warrior without the armour

I don’t recall warriors ever having problems with their armor being so heavy it weighed them down and made combat a chore.

CETheLucid.3964:

Warrior:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dual_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Arcing_Shot
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Arcing_Arrow
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Pin_Down
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pin_Down

Thief:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ignite_Arrows
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cluster_Bomb
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Choking_Gas
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Tripwire
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Apply_Poison
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spider_Venom

Compares pretty well actually. You can build a very powerful marksman out of warrior and a preparations n’ traps oriented thief.

If you hate the pet mechanic so much, quit playing the ranger class.

You’re so incredibly misinformed it’s kind of sad, really.

You’re effectively telling someone who likes Greatswords and melee DPS but doesn’t like the way Guardian plays that “Well, mesmers can use the greatsword, so you should play that instead,” with the obvious pointed aside that Warrior fulfills that role.

If you’re going to make class/build recommendations for play styles, at least play what you suggest lol. As someone who’s run two level 80 thieves (I like keeping two different builds), an 80 bow warrior attempting to replicate ranger, and an 80 ranger, as well as maining ranged-based characters in MMO’s for over a decade on sixteen MMO’s, I can assure you that pointing to thief and warrior as “alternatives” for the style is simply incorrect.

Thief SB fails on two fronts:

1.) Lack of support for SB builds:
As it stands, there is only one trait in the Thief class which affects the shortbow. It’s on the toughness (SA line) and is a Master Trait. 20 Points into toughness for a power archer is absurd for an investment for just one trait.

Shortbow damage is fairly low and has very limited range.

Thief’s SB is a utility/tagging weapon. Its DPS is sub-par, and it’s based entirely around AOE damage. AOE’s are great, but forcing a player into AOE’ing is poor design for a ranged class. Why? Because it means you can’t properly kite/lure. The best available means of attacking a single monster is with using the tip of Cluster Bomb. With the nerf to thieve’s SB range, however, CB is no longer very viable for pulling/plinking due to the fact in most cases aggro will get you when you get close enough to use it.

In PvP/WvW, SB is used as a tag/escape weapon or to generate a combo field. Most caster classes out-range you, and rifles/pistols at times also can.

Pertaining to longbow warrior:

I don’t need to say much. The DoT playstyle and heavy reliance on AOE’s yet again demonstrates this class as not being quite right for the archer role. This of course discludes the obvious issues pertaining to again having shorter range than most casters, being 20% slower than almost every other class (Warrior’s runspeed increase only works with melee weapons), and the obvious thematic problems which make this class definitely not an archer.

Last I checked, archers don’t run around in plate mail shooting fireballs and burning their foes to death. When showing this class/build off to my friends, I’ve had them actually laughing out loud because it seems so wildly out-of-place and contextually poor. It’s cool that this style exists, but come on, it in no way encompasses the archer role. If anything, I’d argue that ele plays closer to an archer aside from the critical aspect of not having a bow.

It boils down to giving players either an alternative with a whole new class, giving the longbow/single-target DPS to another one and reworking that class so it works, or simply just giving the option for rangers to stow their pets for a damage bonus.

Anyone stating that pets shouldn’t be the class mechanic is being silly and unreasonable. Fact is, people just want options and diversity, and as it stands, there is none for the archer players out there.

No class should have a mechanic completely reliant on AI. That stance is neither silly nor unreasonable.

Linkisdead.9647:

Disagree here, its a pet class the only problem is that the pets are unreliable in terms of timing. Can’t tell you how many times my pet has canceled his f2 skill because I had to dodge roll two feet away, then it’s on CD and I’m SOL.

Hahaha…forget about dodge rolling, heck, if I’m moving or my pet is moving, the F2 skill usually doesn’t work when I’m fighting in WvW. And, yes, the CD kicks off regardless. It’s like my pet gives me the finger and then kicks me in the kitten for even thinking about pressing the F2 button. What an insult!