Guild Wars 2

The Problem:
Power Builds lack the Power to be usefull in sPvP content.
The problem is, that the Pet makes up ~40% of our damage (if able to hit, other topic).
Therefore. Power scales a lot worse than on other classes, so Rangers dont deal the same amount of damage + the Pets damage ( would be like 140% of what other clases with Powerbuilds could do)
Somehow, ANet didn’t see this Problem with Condition damage. Because of that, we are cornered into Tanky Condition based builds.

Solution
1) Nerf Pets, Buff BM traits
OMG, he said nerf pets! Stupid Pug!
Yes, I did. Here is why:

1.1) If we nerf pets in general a little further, we have room to buff the BM traitlines.
Double the Attributes gained by invesing into BM, add usefull grand traits, etc.
Let’s say if you nerf the pet 50%, the BM traits should get it back to 100% with 30 Points spend.
1.2) Move the Pet Traits of other trait lines to the BM tree, merge some traits, remove useless traits.
This will take some Pet Power of other builds and make the BM tree more viable at the same time. Also, by going full Power full BM you can’t make an uber-pet while yourself hitting like a truck aswell.
1.3) Increase the power scaling for Weapons
Here finally comes the Power Buffing part.
Since we transfered Pet power from base stats to BM traits, there is room for buffing power builds.
An untraited pet now is an utility, like it should be on a Powerbuild.
This makes room for exotic pets to be used aswell.
The general DPS should not be bigger than before these changes, the difference is just that the Ranger now deals 80-90% of the damage.
This will make the Power Ranger in sPvP alot more viable while keeping the same overall damage. The ability to controll the whole damage and dont let the miserable Pet AI decide win or defeat finally brings Ranger Power to the level of condi-bunkers (in terms of viability)

If you want increased Power, tuning down pets is a must have.
Just increasing Power would lead to extreme damage spikes once a pet actually hits.
We don’t want that. We want to be viable, but balanced.
For those concerned about BM Bunker: as explained above: nothing changes.
The Pet nerf gets compensated 100% by buffing the BM tree.

Opinions?
And keep in mind:
if you don’t agree, say why.
Keep the discussion clean and try to be as constructive as possible.

I agree with the thinking in general, yes. I think it would be a hard balancing act to get right though.

I think the problem with this suggestion is that the Ranger can to a greater extend abandon his pet, his profession mechanic. I dont think Anet wants rangers to do that, your pet is there and using him poorly should should be a drawback, and to play to full potential would involve mastering your pet aswell.

If pets for non-BM builds play an even smaller role, those who disregard their profession mechanic will be punished less for doing so. Probably less then ANet wants them too.

Aeri.5738:

The Problem:
we are cornered into Tanky Condition based builds.

Solution

An untraited pet now is an utility, like it should be on a Powerbuild.
This makes room for exotic pets to be used aswell.
The general DPS should not be bigger than before these changes, the difference is just that the Ranger now deals 80-90% of the damage.
This will make the Power Ranger in sPvP alot more viable while keeping the same overall damage. The ability to controll the whole damage and dont let the miserable Pet AI decide win or defeat finally brings Ranger Power to the level of condi-bunkers (in terms of viability)

If you want increased Power, tuning down pets is a must have.
Just increasing Power would lead to extreme damage spikes once a pet actually hits.

These are spot on. I don’t think this change would be too difficult to implement if anet really wanted to do it. I’d rather not be forced to deal condition damage simply because I am forced to use this class mechanic. I’d rather deal power and use my pet for its F2 ability, as stated above. Fixing the trait lines is something that needs done anyway, as there are pet traits in lines that have NOTHING to do with pets. Again, I don’t want to have to be forced to use a pet… maybe I just like shooting things with a bow and arrow.

Terrahero.9358:

I think the problem with this suggestion is that the Ranger can to a greater extend abandon his pet, his profession mechanic. I dont think Anet wants rangers to do that, your pet is there and using him poorly should should be a drawback, and to play to full potential would involve mastering your pet aswell.

If pets for non-BM builds play an even smaller role, those who disregard their profession mechanic will be punished less for doing so. Probably less then ANet wants them too.

I don’t think that’s a fair assessment. Have you every tried to roam with a GS/LB Build? In order to land your hits you really need to have some CC and using pets for that helps. You have to control your pets perfectly however to pull this off. Some of that comes from the responsiveness of the pets but it still requires skill and an active engagement with your pets. You act like I can just press one button and afk while the pet does all the work. Hardly the truth when you are using your pets even as extra utility.

The OP’s remedy is a very good near term fix that I would support to help bring power builds up the same level currently enjoyed by our condition brothers and sisters.

Buffing raw damage of the ranger isn’t going to solve as much as you think. Sustained damage doesn’t win fights. It doesn’t apply pressure.

This class has 2 main failings: No burst, No AE. These are the areas that need work more than just increasing raw damage at the expense of reducing pet damage.

If I were to adjust things, I’d approach it as such:

Fortifying Bonds changed so any boon your pet gains, you gain as well. This simple reversal will allow the Ranger to stack might like many of the other classes in the game. This will synergize with Companion’s Might as well as Sword and several pet abilities.

I would remove Frost Trap from the game. While it is a powerful snare, we don’t need it, spike, and mud trap all doing effectively the same thing. One of them needs to go.

Make Barrage a skill. Now that it’s a skill it can be made more powerful. Change it to chilling arrows if you’re really missing frost trap. Up its damage slightly. Reduce the channel time. You get the idea… anything can be done to it at this point with an independent cooldown.

Replace the longbow barrage skill with an Aimed Shot type skill that does very high damage on a longish charge time like 1.5 – 1.75 seconds maybe.

Adjust the channel time of rapid shot down to 3-3.5 seconds but keep damage the same.

Give the longbow the same damage from 0-900. 900+ will do +30% crit damage instead of the added damage.

Now the longbow has some value and synergy within itself. It can knock players back to the crit damage range, It can stealth to gain 100% crit chance with remorseless, it can aimed shot to deal damage.

The pet now makes more sense because boons it gains affect the ranger. It of course invalidates the need for Signet of the Beastmaster because signet boons will now hit the pet and bounce to the ranger via 15 in nature.

You could then give the marks line a 20% damage on foes below 50% type trait. You could make it so your critical hits grant your pet might with some internal cooldown so the ranger doesn’t just insta stack 25might and 25 bleeding instantly.

Now this is all longbow focused simply because that’s my favorite weapon. But the main point I’m trying to make is the raw damage really isn’t the issue. It’s the lack of burst, ae, and boons imo.

As you said, this is mainly LB changes and only secondary effecting the power build issues.
While weapon skills ARE important for this, it’s not the core of the problem.
we dont want to buff Rangers Power in general, just the Power focused builds.
Buy buffing weapons in general you dont accomplish this goal.

I also disagree on the “no burst no AE” complain.
GS has a wide cleaving attack, Barrage IS AE, GS2 and LB2 are high burst skills, GS5 opens up pet burst. Sword 1 + QZ is pretty kitten bursty etc. etc.

We have the mechanics needed, and Imho all we lack is some power behind our blows.
If we were to add traits buffing certain skills in the power or skirmishing lines, that would be a competely different story.

PS: barrage as a utility skill is bad. competely. Watch a Sword/dagger Ranger shoot arrows from the sky…

Aeri.5738:

As you said, this is mainly LB changes and only secondary effecting the power build issues.
While weapon skills ARE important for this, it’s not the core of the problem.
we dont want to buff Rangers Power in general, just the Power focused builds.
Buy buffing weapons in general you dont accomplish this goal.

I also disagree on the “no burst no AE” complain.
GS has a wide cleaving attack, Barrage IS AE, GS2 and LB2 are high burst skills, GS5 opens up pet burst. Sword 1 + QZ is pretty kitten bursty etc. etc.

We have the mechanics needed, and Imho all we lack is some power behind our blows.
If we were to add traits buffing certain skills in the power or skirmishing lines, that would be a competely different story.

PS: barrage as a utility skill is bad. competely. Watch a Sword/dagger Ranger shoot arrows from the sky…

Well to be fair, Longbow is kind of seen as ‘the’ power weapon for this class. While rapid shot can apply bleeds via crits and it paired with a warhorn can stack them insanely high, most don’t use it for that purpose. Longbow really is only used for power builds so I see changing it as a good first step.

Now as for AE, the only true AE on greatsword is Maul. greatsword base damage is very low, it’s also a melee weapon which means it of course has the frontal arc just like sword and evrtything but daggers. That’s not real AE though and it certainly isn’t applying pressure with the low damage. Sword on the other hand does competetive damaeg (still sustained and attacking 50% faster for 4 seconds isn’t burst), but using it effectively as an AE tool is near impossible since the auto attack can’t be controlled.

Dealing 10k in 5 seconds isn’t burst for Rapid Shot either.

As for barrage looking bad on a melee ranger? Charzooka does the same thing… The ranger could grow a giant spirit tree in the field and the leaves could rain down for all I care really. I’m not concerned with the ‘sense’ of the attack, just that it fills a purpose. All of the skills for this class are more utility in nature. We need some real damaging ones imo.

Now as for power behind the attacks etc etc. We’re not really gaining much with your change. We’re just offsetting it from the pet. Those of us who do control the pet properly and make good use of it in PvP/PvE would therefor not gain any real benefit from your change and we’d still not have any real burst or AE to bring forward. I’m fine with making the pet have less of an impact on the class, don’t get me wrong. I’ve said from the very beginning that if they want the pet to be more than a DOT for this class, they need to make it work. 9 months later we’re still without it working. But the pet isn’t the only (or main) problem with this class imo.

I experiment with different builds/weapon sets every couple of weeks. So far, imo, the best weapon sets for a power/crit burst build is GS/A+A

Axe 4 is our hardest hitting skill…and it’s at 1200 range and it pulls enemy to you. Combined with doggie knockdown you get an enemy at your feet on his back with 50% health all lined up for the GS chain.

They don’t really need to do anything complicated. Simply buffing the auto-attack damage on the longbow, greatsword, and main hand axe would go a long way.

One problem i can see with changes like this is that it would cause builds that do not utilize pets or power/crit to become even less viable. Purely condition based builds such as using traps would end up being harmed by the nerf to pets while not gaining anything from the power scaling increases.

I dont think condi builds would suffer as they usw pets mainly for utility. The Main damage Coles from the rangers conditions.
If then still needed, condi builds can geht a balance update too

2:50 – just lol

Or you could improve the pets. Have clear methods for increasing their run speed and allow them to close and attack mobile players and mobs better. Also have them ignore AOE, or at least not be affected by it. OR have a user selectable option for how they handle it, either stand in it, run, or maybe run if < half health i don’t know. But those two issues seem to be major issues with Rangers, since our entire class depends on pets so much.

I don’t know, though, if the game is actually balanced around the assumption that the pet is going to miss a lot of the time.

Pets in gw1 were useless, unless you had many of them and a necro in the party. They are just as useless in pve and wvw.
I would like to see a dev play with a ranger in lets say wvw on a busy server.
It just needs a lot of damage reduction to stay alive, it’s a hard thing to do without making the pet too strong. :/