Guild Wars 2

source: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/profession-balance-goals-for-the-winter-2016-update/

Ranger
We’ll be looking into some of the ranger’s less used traits and increasing both defensive and offensive options while giving a few specialized traits a bit more allure. In the first quarterly update, we’ll also be improving the ranger’s shout utility category, giving them more unique utility. In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature. We’re still looking at the druid’s viability in group scenarios and will continue to monitor its overall effectiveness, making changes where necessary.

so for the text it seems Anet really read this forums, they will address the shouts at least, with future promises of review the pets, i guess it’s too much to overhaul all of it at once.

on the downside we lose the quick stomps, because Anet will normalize the speed to not to be affected by slow or quickness, a shame but if they can’t fix it i understand.

what do you think it will happen?

Sounds reasonable, no nerfs mentioned (for a change!!). And the broken PvP builds from other professions have nerfs mentioned. They made the thief buff sound scary.

it looks promising from the text plus the article highlights changes to other classes that will help rangers out a bit. it all depends on how it’s implemented tbh, i try not to get my hopes up about ranger anymore

Now that I wont be able to quick stomp or quick res I dont really see the point in taking Zephyr’s Speed. I used it mainly for these things and now its kinda useless. I would take Beastly Warden but the raduis of it is so low and doesnt work well at all with bristleback or smokescale. Hope they will take another look to this trait now that it got its “value” way down.
Regarding the other changes for ranger – I am a bit excited , though I want to save my final judgement untill the actual balance update.

Fluffball.8307:

Sounds reasonable, no nerfs mentioned (for a change!!). And the broken PvP builds from other professions have nerfs mentioned. They made the thief buff sound scary.

it’s going to be scary, really scary. I would expect thieves to get a huge dps boost to bring them inline with the current amount of burst around. what will be crazy is if they boost the base thief traits/skills/etc and then add DD on top, what will they come out with lol.

buffs to fresh air tempest are going to hurt a bit though unless they reduce their survivability some.

looks like i need to make a burnzerker for pve…..

Sounds like it will be a long and drawn out year for profession development.

More trait changes.

No fundamental weapon changes (looking at you sword, off hand axe, dagger, shortbow).

No meaningful pet changes in mind after 3 FULL years because they are STILL “exploring ways to improve”? Rangers will remain leashed by their gimmicky pets, not vice versa.

Druid/CA will end up being number tweaks (see trait “updates” over 3 years), not the necessary core changes to make this elite better. It will remain a subpar and mashed up and gated healer with aiming reticles design, that players still won’t know what it is supposed to be, and that will do nothing except promote the “super self healing and poor damage” bunker for years to come.

(I would have loved the super zerg and team healer as promised, but thanks at least for all the new self heals and thank goodness for elementalist staff/water/tempest to get that healing role urge satisfied… and it’s not even that great either, but way way better than Druid/CA)

long year. Lots of the same old. Little substance. More clunky healing. Pets on passive (because that’s the closest thing a player can do to get rid of them). LB,GS,Staff… “me me me” bunker… Load up another useful profession for that particular task… MORE waiting. MORE talk. More gimmicks coming to pass.

As someone that has been using shouts since the beggining of the game. A shout rework is SUPER exciting to me. If I can make it to diamond solo queing as a full 5 shout ranger(non druid). I wonder what ill be able to do when the utilities are better.

Looking forward to what they mean by making them more unique. Maybe having protect me be more than a less effective signet of stone? Or guard actually doing what it says it does? Or search and rescue being worth slotted as more than a trait?.

It looks like its gonna be a pretty fun time.

I’m willing to trade my mother for a shortbow buff and I will also trade one kidney for getting a blast finisher for GS #2 Maul.

anduriell.6280:

what do you think it will happen?

A lot of changes that won’t change anything, specially compared to the huge buffs other classes will get like always.
Examples:
Halve the Predator’s Instinct cd
Increase Light on your Feet condi duration to 20%
Increase Most Dangerous Game might duration to 4secs
Add pet stability to search and rescue
Add pet protection to Protect me
Add Extra condi dmg to sick them
Include off hand axe cd to Honed Axes
etc etc..

I would be really interested if they buff base ranger enough that we can forget about druid. I mean, I only have druid on my ranger so I can get the movement buff.

Come on, moving spirit trait!

anduriell.6280:

what do you think it will happen?

Ranger
We’ll be looking into some of the ranger’s less used traits and increasing both defensive and offensive options while giving a few specialized traits a bit more allure.

Maybe a tweak to Predator’s Instinct. That’s about it. Other traits that are mediocre or are very weak competing with other traits in their respective tier will most likely be passed over without a change, such as: Vigorous Training, Instinctive Reaction, Honed Axes, Light on Your Feet, Most Dangerous Game, Strider’s Defense, Poison Master, Empathic Bond, etc.

In the first quarterly update, we’ll also be improving the ranger’s shout utility category, giving them more unique utility.

I’m betting the DH Trap treatment, meaning, some of these shouts will grant boons rather than doing something worthwhile to them.

In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature.

More skills that either make a plant spawn and more weapon/utility skills that either, 1) make the pet inflict more damage or a condition, or 2) will also apply to the pet when it only applied before to only the player. If Sharpening Stone remains the same… bleh.

We’re still looking at the druid’s viability in group scenarios and will continue to monitor its overall effectiveness, making changes where necessary.

“We still want to nerf the Druid, but if it’s less effective when competing with other professions after the update, we’ll leave it alone… for now.”

Excuse the pessimism, but I’ll believe a better balance when I see it.

#FooledMeSinceRelease

Edit: Mixed up Sharpened Edges for Sharpening Stone.

Ranger
In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature.

This is what I don’t like. It sounds like completely empty PR, telling me that it’s less likely they’ll actually address what’s broken with the core in the future, let alone in this patch…

I wish they would understand that to fix core ranger they have to address core weapons skills, no amount of search and rescue buffing is going to fix the clunkiness of sword, the lack of place for axe, sb, wh, the low sustain dps of gs/lb, the one dimensional torch and the lackluster dagger.

^ That, too.

Make some QoL changes to our weapons, like what has been mentioned for other classes in their post. Ele scepter/focus? Mesmer scepter? Why nothing about Ranger sword?

Heck, even Hornet’s Sting’s evade being instant or having a faster cast time would help. Reducing Path of Scars to 900 range so it doesn’t go balls wild off cliffs or disappearing into some walls. Shortbow? Cast and major after casts on main-hand Axe?

Comon’ Karl! What have you done with Irenio!!

In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature.

Inc nerf Smokescale and Bristleback so the vanilla pets will seem more desirable again?

Yikes.. sure glad i got a reaper to 80/fully unlocked a few days ago
seems like rangers are turning into buff bots with no game play out side a group
shame i played nothing but my ranger for the last 2 years and was my only 80 but now it’s shelved

we’ll also be improving the ranger’s shout utility category, giving them more unique utility.

Can I finally run around yelling and swinging around my Greatsword in blind rage while I throw pets at people? Finally a spec that reflects my true inner self.

apocalypso.4895:

anduriell.6280:

what do you think it will happen?

A lot of changes that won’t change anything, specially compared to the huge buffs other classes will get like always.
Examples:
Halve the Predator’s Instinct cd
Increase Light on your Feet condi duration to 20%
Increase Most Dangerous Game might duration to 4secs
Add pet stability to search and rescue
Add pet protection to Protect me
Add Extra condi dmg to sick them
Include off hand axe cd to Honed Axes
etc etc..

Lol, yeah this pretty much. A bunch of number tweaks, and nothing significant, thats what I guess we will see.

Ofir.2405:

Now that I wont be able to quick stomp or quick res I dont really see the point in taking Zephyr’s Speed. I used it mainly for these things and now its kinda useless. I would take Beastly Warden but the raduis of it is so low and doesnt work well at all with bristleback or smokescale. Hope they will take another look to this trait now that it got its “value” way down.
Regarding the other changes for ranger – I am a bit excited , though I want to save my final judgement untill the actual balance update.

Imo, Zepher’s Speed is mostly only useful with Longbow. It allows one to complete its channels much faster. But you’re right. Outside of that, it doesn’t see much use.

Hopeful and excited… Yeah… Professions are completely subpar to put lightly, profession “roles” are just, well, can’t say without an infraction… and it’s 36 moths of talk and talk and talk… And it will be more talk into 2016 until we get the same “state of the union” profession address in 2017…

#beentherebefore

I’ll wait for the patch notes. I’ve heard this message repeated enough times to know I shouldn’t read too much into it, one way or another.

Bah, ranger/druid is just not acceptable compared to other classes.

I tried to love my druid and made it my main (after leveling and getting world completion before hot on my ranger for it) and played it fairly exclusively for over two monthes.

Some fixes and tweeks here or there won’t save the profession. I went back to my mesmer and even though alacrity will get hit by the nerf bat (hard), I see no point switching back to ranger/druid.

Too much is broken, druid gives too little benefit to general PvE that it would matter.

Maybe the next elite spec will be less of a disappointment.

I’ll withhold judgement before I comment, but the statement was pretty vague overall. Also, our history itself should tell everyone something already. But, again, I’ll reserve judgement until I see it either in testing or action.

Shadelang.3012:

As someone that has been using shouts since the beggining of the game. A shout rework is SUPER exciting to me. If I can make it to diamond solo queing as a full 5 shout ranger(non druid). I wonder what ill be able to do when the utilities are better.

Looking forward to what they mean by making them more unique. Maybe having protect me be more than a less effective signet of stone? Or guard actually doing what it says it does? Or search and rescue being worth slotted as more than a trait?.

It looks like its gonna be a pretty fun time.

Your amazing shouts thread actually was taken notice of. I think we can blame you for this one

lol OP is cute I felt like I saw myself 1 year ago

As a new player after HoT, I was excited after reading the article.
Now I just hope I won’t go through the frustration people in comments have.

As a new player after HoT, I was excited after reading the article.
Now I just hope I won’t go through the frustration people in comments have.

AgitatedFox.5287:

Shadelang.3012:

As someone that has been using shouts since the beggining of the game. A shout rework is SUPER exciting to me. If I can make it to diamond solo queing as a full 5 shout ranger(non druid). I wonder what ill be able to do when the utilities are better.

Looking forward to what they mean by making them more unique. Maybe having protect me be more than a less effective signet of stone? Or guard actually doing what it says it does? Or search and rescue being worth slotted as more than a trait?.

It looks like its gonna be a pretty fun time.

Your amazing shouts thread actually was taken notice of. I think we can blame you for this one

Hahaha I would like to think I had something to do with it :P but theres no way to tell. And I don’t know if I would say my shout threads were amazing >.< but ty. Was thanks to the other players involved as well as Gaile Gray that it took off as well as it did. We did come up with ALOT of ideas though.

I heard these promises before from Irenio and I simply do not believe that Anet has the will to do the class justice. With their plate so full of issues to fix the ususal suspects will fall of the board to be ignored, like it has been years ago.

Simply put, stick those promises where the sun doesn’t shine because I am very much done with all words and no action.

Ronorra.1530:

I heard these promises before from Irenio and I simply do not believe that Anet has the will to do the class justice. With their plate so full of issues to fix the ususal suspects will fall of the board to be ignored, like it has been years ago.

Simply put, stick those promises where the sun doesn’t shine because I am very much done with all words and no action.

Hmm well atleast as far as shouts go. He did keep his promise…a bit. Sic em was fixed to longer be canceled upon an order being received. Which was a pretty massive buff to shout rangers. Though I suppose people that don’t use the utilities much probably wouldn’t see how.

Whats got me excited is there actually talking about reworks to make them more UNIQUE. That has me most excited because many of the shouts lack purpose that stands out.

Guard and Protect Me for one and even Search and Rescue. Protect me is an inferior signet of stone with a stunk break that cuts our dps in half for the duration and potentially for far longer.

Guard doesn’t do anything “significant” for shout rangers aside from enabling us to set up stealth bristle back bursts (stealth pet while running up to a dragonhunter kite around the dragonhunter without stepping on point confusing the kitten out of him while bristleback f2 is charging have him facing you when it fires so his defense cone f3 doesn’t block it) Infact non full shout rangers tend to benefit more from it (its a great source of swiftness and regen… two boons a shout ranger will have permanent access to even without guard). Due to its buggy nature. Its effectiveness as a posititioning skill for the pet is very lacking (the pet will flat out ignore the order to move to a specific location if your already fighting something. It will also cancel if you leave the leash range. Meaning you can’t use it to set up ambushes except in very niche locations.)

Search and rescue is an inferior rez skill. The only thing that makes this skill even remotely viable is that its accessible through an adept tier trait. This skill should NEVER be slotted on the actual bar.

Any change to these that actually push shouts towards a cohesive direction can only be an improvement at this point. As it will cause them to have there own specific places instead of constantly being compared to there alternatives…most of which are generally superior.

I just hope some of the ridiculous elite specializations get scaled way back .

Hearing stuff like “make more unique” in regards to shouts is also interesting and is a better way to make changes to the profession than just increasing or decreasing metrics.

Ronorra.1530:

I heard these promises before from Irenio and I simply do not believe that Anet has the will to do the class justice. With their plate so full of issues to fix the ususal suspects will fall of the board to be ignored, like it has been years ago.

Simply put, stick those promises where the sun doesn’t shine because I am very much done with all words and no action.

Irenio seems to be an all right guy with ideas. Other than Irenio and Robert Gee, the rest of the balancing team needs to get their heads out of their kitten . Probably change their entire process on how and what ideas get approved or not, because whoever it is some of these developers have to keep going through for approval is a kitten .

Still no SB, WH, Axe buffs still?

That Axe GM.. Horrendous…

Lets disect this shall we? I play two Rangers, Trulee Scruptious, a zerker and Robin Hoods Mum, a Condi Ranger.

We’ll be looking into some of the ranger’s less used traits and increasing both defensive and offensive options while giving a few specialized traits a bit more allure.

Looks good. I took a look at other classes traits to compare and the Ranger ones just feel so weak, with no real competition within the trait lines. Our 33% bleed was nerfed to 20% with no mention during the new trait update last year, and yes I am going to bang on about losing the Sharpening stone trait that RHM used. To be fair, Trulee’s build is quite ok (Marksmanship 3-2-3, Skirmishing 1-1-1, Beastmastery 2-2-1) She gets Call of the Wild of Pet Swap, and Piercing Arrows with increase to damage through Markmanship, Skirmishing gives bleed on crit, party Ferocity, and reduced cooldown on weapon swap (primarily for Greatsword maul). Beastmastery gives might to pet on crit, reduced cooldown and damage increase for greatsword and taunt for the pet. Overall, a build I am happy with. Markmanship Major is my only trait that I ‘just pick one’.

I would like a few tweaks to them obviously – Call of the Wild dropped to 15 second recharge so it can proc off every pet on cooldown would be very nice rather than the 30 – dont forget it went from zero to 30, remove the ‘from behind or the side’ from the Grandmaster Minor in Skirmishing so its a constant +10% crit chance, and change the the taunt recharge to something more realistic – again it went from 0 to 15, meaning you can swap pets and taunt when you want to. I understand there was abuse to this (skill cancelling?) if so, make it 2 seconds…or better still remove the skill cancelling and return these back to 0. If something is tied to a swap (weapon or pet) then it should proc when you do the action otherwise you get the weird situation where you have 4 traits selected that at times do nothing as they are on cooldown.

I was going to make a comparison between classes and traits, then I wished I had not. The Ranger and Warrior both have a similar Grandmaster trait for the Greatsword – we get a 50% chance to proc Fury for 3 seconds on a 10 second cooldwon with +5% damage. They get 5 seconds of might on a critical with no cooldown and +10% damage. We both also get 20% recharge reduction. I know which one I prefer….

Now to Robin Hoods Mum. Hers is a little messy now and doesnt quite have the synergy that Trulee has. Her build (she is exclusively used for PVP) is Wilderness 2-1-2, Skirmishing 3-3-2 and beastmastery 1-1-1. She gets regen on burning and 5% reduced damage, Condition damage increase from weilding a torch, amd Survival skills grant Fury and remove conditions. Skirmishing aids traps, +20% bleed and makes Shortbow pierce and rechage quicker and also adds some condition damage on dodge. Beastmastery traits all make the pet stronger and taunt weakness blind and taunt.

Oakheart would be good if its cooldown was reduced to 5 rather than 10 – the rest is ok. For skirmishing, Sharpened Edges returned to its old ways would be nice but would need some tweaking as it was procing a survival skill which then proc’d Condi cleanse. Hidden Barbs back to 33% and Light on your feet to remove the ridiculous dodge requirements would be nice – a flat bonus to damage and duration. Beastmastery is ok.

There you go, not asking too much am I? No seriously, I am not. Devs should know how many builds classes have to an extent. Rangers are Power or Condi – my Condi is SB/Axe+Torch compared to the meta A+?/?+T but its still condi at heart. I have not looked at the Druid traits as I am simply not interested.

In the first quarterly update, we’ll also be improving the ranger’s shout utility category, giving them more unique utility

Trulee uses two Shouts, We Heal as One and Strength of the Pack. The others are all garbage so will need to have something pretty special done to them to make them viable. However, look at We Heal as One. That was a suprise (a nice one!) and has been greatfully recieved by all (eventually!) works better in a group naturally as boons picked up by your pet copy back. Strength of the pack needs something done to it – 60 second CD for 3 seconds of stability, Fury and Swiftness? 10 seconds of might that is not exactly defined on the tooltip – it says we grant might to each other, but then says it grants might to your pet….which is it? Even the wiki does not show how many stacks, but indicates its last 8 seconds. Again lets look at the Warior – A signet that has the same 60 seconds of cooldown. That gives 5 stacks of might for 25 seconds, along with Fury and Switftmess for 25 seconds. Thats not including the passive effect of increasing Adrenaline.

Sick em – I never got this one. If you suspect someones in the area – how can you target them (unless its an AOE, sorry, this is typed up during lunch at work) to reveal them? Why does it say on the tooltip that I cannot stealth? Protect me is straight forward, but with a CD of 60 means it probably is unused in favour of Signet of Stone that has a passive ability. Guard apparently used to work properly, but the leash distance was shortened and it became not so good. I would imagine most shouts are actually used to proc Resounding Timbre to do PvE runs for map completion or something.

Robin Hoods Mum uses no shouts, so wont see any benefit from this update I doubt.

In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature.

This jut outright annoys the hell out of me. This is our ENTIRE class ‘thing’ – having a pet. And the single thing that people want updated/looked at/fixed over all else, and its to be done in the future? Amend the pet UI to group pets. Someone has done this for you – credit them and implement it. Make F2 a skill we can pick from the creatures abilities. Update the useless pets to make them viable – or just make the pets skins and select the abilities we want – some Roleplayers will have a pig no matter what you do.

We’re still looking at the druid’s viability in group scenarios and will continue to monitor its overall effectiveness, making changes where necessary.

This means we dont have a clue. We buggered up your elite spec, thought that no one could be unhappy with a healer, then realised in a game that defied the trinity and does not seperate PVP from PvX means that everyone thinks the Druids are brokeh, while the Druids are shoehorned into healing and no-one wants them, much like their Ranger cousins.

Well I said it before and i will say it again, imho theres an easy way of partial fixing pets, that is to make their AI behave like the AI of WoW pets, they can attach while moving.

If the damage would be too high nerf it, but what predator does stand still while chasing its prey in order to launch an attack? and then misses it b/c the prey keeps running while the predator stops to attack?
I understand that u cant implement a lion like behavior where they just drag their prey down to the ground and such but JUST MAKE PETS ATTACK ON THE MOVE just like the pets in wow do, you should not be able to outrun a pet w/o swiftness anyways, its a freaking wolf/hyena/tiger/w/e almost any animal is faster than a human being.

or remove the damage from the pets entirely make em cc/buff bots and contribute the dmg back to the ranger, idk i just dont like the fact that you must lock down a target in order to make ur pet deal damage, im not talking about the average player whos does dodgeroll for no reason and then dies due to having no dodge available when it matters, im talking about the players that actually know how to play around that mechanic.

But thats just my 2 cents

FrouFrou.4958:

In the future, we’ll continue to explore ways to improve on the ranger’s ties to both their pets and nature.

Inc nerf Smokescale and Bristleback so the vanilla pets will seem more desirable again?

How else will they sell more expansions if everything in it isn’t a direct upgrade to vanilla?

Sicarius.4639:

How else will they sell more expansions if everything in it isn’t a direct upgrade to vanilla?

This has been a thing with every expansion since Factions, and it’s a natural way for these companies to sell their products, in addition to all the other reasons you may want to get an expansion.

Inb4 everything is nerfed, thieves+warriors are overbuffed and everything is still a mess.

I cannot say the same for the excitement level. Shouts are actually my least enjoyed mechanic. Protect me and search and rescue are quite forgetful, and sic’em and strength of the pack do not offer good synergy to get us into groups more often. I was really looking for sword, short bow and great sword changes. Hands down my favorites weapons are short bow and greatsword. The two could not be more different so they do not work well together, but a chance to at least one of them would be nice. I will wait for the patch notes, as I should, but this does not look promising. I do not want to be closer to my pet, until they overhaul pets (stats being adjusted with the ranger, more control, to allow build options. Nature is great to be closer to as a ranger, but this sounded like a PR vague statement. I hope they consider both ranger and Druid for two possible play styles competitive for raids. Honestly, the one thing I want is more presence in this forum for people’s suggestions on QoL changes and proposed balance changes. They seem to be not very active in discussion. Rangers are great in solo play even outside of the best and long how. Which I do not partake in. My damage does not feel great, my weapon mechanics are very clunky, utility feels like a banner with passive affects for others. If we want to dodge, we should be able to. Most encounters give little time to dodge, we should not have to wait for clunky monarch leap, sword no evade time, or greatsword reduced frame dodge. Evades with a cast time feel very awkward. We should be able to hit a button and evade starting from that time. Most abilities: sword 2, 3, dagger dodge, greatsword buggy double leap, are horrible. The best one is on our short bow, but the damage on it is conditioned off being positioned correctly which cannot always be ideal. For such awkward mechanics, we should be rewarded moreso for being behind a target of this is the case they really feel is good. Either that or offer better ways to position quickly behind a target. That feels more their like though

Swagger.1459:

Sounds like it will be a long and drawn out year for profession development.

More trait changes.

No fundamental weapon changes (looking at you sword, off hand axe, dagger, shortbow).

No meaningful pet changes in mind after 3 FULL years because they are STILL “exploring ways to improve”? Rangers will remain leashed by their gimmicky pets, not vice versa.

Druid/CA will end up being number tweaks (see trait “updates” over 3 years), not the necessary core changes to make this elite better. It will remain a subpar and mashed up and gated healer with aiming reticles design, that players still won’t know what it is supposed to be, and that will do nothing except promote the “super self healing and poor damage” bunker for years to come.

(I would have loved the super zerg and team healer as promised, but thanks at least for all the new self heals and thank goodness for elementalist staff/water/tempest to get that healing role urge satisfied… and it’s not even that great either, but way way better than Druid/CA)

long year. Lots of the same old. Little substance. More clunky healing. Pets on passive (because that’s the closest thing a player can do to get rid of them). LB,GS,Staff… “me me me” bunker… Load up another useful profession for that particular task… MORE waiting. MORE talk. More gimmicks coming to pass.

Ill will agree with you to the point that many of their adjustments are weak or straight up weaken us further. However i would give credit when it is due. Its took 3 years but the made pets viable in highend content when before they would die. That was a meaningful improvement. They are planning to make shouts a useful and desirable utility, this is nice. I can only hope they will boost up our sustained ranged dps with longbow and make sword AA a nonsuicidal option.

Pretty excited to see the shouts changes. I’d love to be a beastmaster style druid shouting commands at my animal companions to fight for me as I support them with control and healing.

That’s pretty much the playstyle I intended to use when I made my second ranger.