Guild Wars 2

0.

The only class not represented?

Ranger.

Further evidence ranger is overpowered?

Clearly.

I wonder if anet has noticed.

In their defense, there are currently no rangers even trying to compete at top tier NA at the moment.

That being said, ranger is definitely the weakest class at top tier PvP… from my experience anyway. This is supported off of the numbers i’ve presented both here and for the past two WTS where there was only 1 ranger out of 40 players.

I believe necros are in the same pool.

The overwhelmingly best NA team has a necro. They use it they same way eura’s team did, in that they sort of base their build around him.

Fluffball.8307:

The overwhelmingly best NA team has a necro. They use it they same way eura’s team did, in that they sort of base their build around him.

Because it is more rewarding, dps-wise and group fight wise, to take a power necro than a power ranger.
Then you see those silly posts about nerfing rangers even more.. Ah…

Ya anet is in a weird place where the vocal minority of idiots think LB rangers are auto win, and in reality they are autolose.

At any rate, the trait changes are really going to shake things up.

Must keep this link so we can cut/paste it in all the QQ threads. Sucky statistic though…

Yeah, HoT will change a lot.

Well I’m participating as a ranger in a german community 1v1 event and I’m already in the top 5 – today are the finals, wish me luck to take the first place.

Ya the 1v1 and 2v2 events are solid for rangers, it’s the 5v5s that aren’t. But yes, goodluck, we’ll be routing for you.

Shirk.6421:

Well I’m participating as a ranger in a german community 1v1 event and I’m already in the top 5 – today are the finals, wish me luck to take the first place.

Very nice! Congrats so far and good luck!

Shirk.6421:

Well I’m participating as a ranger in a german community 1v1 event and I’m already in the top 5 – today are the finals, wish me luck to take the first place.

Man, you could’ve told me bout that q.q
Or did you fear the competition xP

@topic
yeah it’s been like that since the spirit nerf, the only thing we can hope for is that Anet manages to shift the balance so every class can compete top tier.

Tyvm guys. Hepa, the date was already overdue last week – I heard about it in the last second and luckily got accepted. Would’ve been alot of fun with you

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Fluffball.8307:

Ya the 1v1 and 2v2 events are solid for rangers, it’s the 5v5s that aren’t. But yes, goodluck, we’ll be routing for you.

Rangers really aren’t bad in 5v5 fights, they just don’t have a place in sPvP because rotating and capping is more important than fighting. We’d be plenty strong in a deathmatch game mode and we will be a solid choice for stronghold.

SotF is always better than EB. Even if they don’t have condi damage a chill or an immob that you have to wait 9 seconds for EB to clear means you are dead. Rangers ARE bad in 5v5 fights… Why do you think Rangers so often like to play side nodes and push small engagements? When in.a 5v5 the other professions being more to the table than the ranger, otherwise ranger would be used. One can also look at WvW to see what large death match fights are like, no Rangers wanted.

Eurantien.4632:

SotF is always better than EB. Even if they don’t have condi damage a chill or an immob that you have to wait 9 seconds for EB to clear means you are dead. Rangers ARE bad in 5v5 fights… Why do you think Rangers so often like to play side nodes and push small engagements? When in.a 5v5 the other professions being more to the table than the ranger, otherwise ranger would be used. One can also look at WvW to see what large death match fights are like, no Rangers wanted.

In large fights they aren’t wanted because condi damage gets cleared too easily and their power damage is mostly single target. Other classes have better synergy. But in small group fights like 5v5’s both power and condi rangers are very strong. Look at roaming and havok groups, there are a ton of rangers.

In 5v5 Rangers aren’t wanted because condi damage gets cleared too easily and forces ranger to be melee range to provide significant enough damage. Their power damage is mostly single target which makes it impossible for ranger to cleave sucxesfully and means that the enemy under fire can just LoS and get covered by his teammates not being pressured. Other classes just have better synergy. In large fights, like 4v4 or higher ranger starts to drop off dramatically compared to other classes. Even in small fights currently ranger gets out performed. Ranger cannot win 1v1s fast enough and if it does win the 1v1 it is on a build that can’t help the team fight. There are no builds that help the team as much as another profession would.

Eurantien.4632:

In 5v5 Rangers aren’t wanted because condi damage gets cleared too easily and forces ranger to be melee range to provide significant enough damage. Their power damage is mostly single target which makes it impossible for ranger to cleave sucxesfully and means that the enemy under fire can just LoS and get covered by his teammates not being pressured. Other classes just have better synergy. In large fights, like 4v4 or higher ranger starts to drop off dramatically compared to other classes. Even in small fights currently ranger gets out performed. Ranger cannot win 1v1s fast enough and if it does win the 1v1 it is on a build that can’t help the team fight. There are no builds that help the team as much as another profession would.

You are talking about sPvP, which is not a real 5v5 fight to the death. I’m talking about a fight in obsidean sanctum where there is nowhere for them to LoS, and a power ranger can run piercing over EE because no one is running from the fight.

In a 5v5 you want to focus down 1 target at a time, a ranger makes it impossible for the focused player to kite outside of the damage.

If it was courtyard, ranger would still be ineffective. Walls > ranger.

Eurantien.4632:

If it was courtyard, ranger would still be ineffective. Walls > ranger.

Courtyard is a garbage map that at the very least needs to be put in it’s own rotation. You throw a bunch of people built for conquest into a cluttered fishbowl for a pseudo deathmatch…. what the hell were they thinking?

Dueling, 5v5’s, GvG’s all take place in open spots like near the windmill in the BL’s or in OS to show that whoever won did so because of skill and not because they could kite around a pole until they full heal.

Foefire would have been a much better map for deathmatch.

Torunament is over, took the second place The only one I lost against was a s/d thief who los’d me 90% of the time at Niflhel. Was a very, very close thing, tho.

I think using LOS is a sign of a skilled player, because a fight with no opportunities for LOS doesn’t favour “skilled play” it just favours kiting. If there was a 1v1 tournament with absolutely no where to LOS you can guarantee that the top positions would be filled with Longbow rangers.

I honestly think it’s because we lack the amount of AOE and cleave options compared to the other classes.

Maybe it not the class but the play style may rangers choose to use. The ranger suffer more from an image problem rather than an ability or lack there of. Yes we could use more cleave and aoe.

Dual melee any one. The concept is so foreign to 99% of ranger, yet it is very effective.
More than weapon choice it’s many ranger believe you can’t be in the heart of the battle but must perch or a rock or ledge really not help your team. Not stomping the enemy you have downed (many times saving an ally). Not helping capture the node.

Many of the selfish play styles that ranger would use in dungeon runs if they could.
Mainly just loitering around points and one of the first to cut out (after thieve and mes) when things go bad.

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Being survival doesn’t mean it’s good for team fight just so you know. Condition is generally stronger than Longbow ranger in 1 v 1, but when it comes to team fight, their contribution is somewhat limited due to all the single target nature or lack of AOE compare to other classes.

Eurantien.4632:

In 5v5 Rangers aren’t wanted because condi damage gets cleared too easily and forces ranger to be melee range to provide significant enough damage. Their power damage is mostly single target which makes it impossible for ranger to cleave sucxesfully and means that the enemy under fire can just LoS and get covered by his teammates not being pressured. Other classes just have better synergy. In large fights, like 4v4 or higher ranger starts to drop off dramatically compared to other classes. Even in small fights currently ranger gets out performed. Ranger cannot win 1v1s fast enough and if it does win the 1v1 it is on a build that can’t help the team fight. There are no builds that help the team as much as another profession would.

As expected from a top player like you.
I knew and experienced everything that you talked about, and felt it to my heart. We have trouble against veteran thieves, takes too long to manage any Shoutbow, Engi, and celestial Ele (sometimes it’d take forever, and mostly ended up being decaped to white anyway), and only good for sniping crucial target in team fight. (like mesmer, power necro, another power ranger, thief and such) Even then, a competent team can easily hard-rev the down because ranger’s lack AOE and cleave. (Even if you change to GS, the pressure and dps is still too low to cause any harm)

Nothing wrong with single target if you can end your foe rather quickly like Good thieves. Bleeder build once could end target quick with the draw back of the positional consideration. The nature of the short bow also meant you were in position to finish. Unlike so many long bow rangers.

I was in the top 16 before losing against Tron Jeremy’s team (that was a battle for top 8.)

So I think we are ranked 9th in our bracket when we lost that match. If we had more practice like as individuals I felt that We couldve won that match or fought on par with them.

I was running Celestial Ranger (Believe it or not)

What build were you using, Sticker?

I’m horrible at pvp, but I’m interested in Stronghold. I love playing a trapper ranger in WvW, but I haven’t found a build that I think I’ll like for Stronghold.

A lot of the time vs D/P thieves a good ranger will win (talking about Zerker) because of rapid fires into stealthing ( mid hs through blackpowder then use gs leap because of the auto targeting vs stealth players ( l2exploit people) so the thief either doesn’t stealth or loses 50% + hp and A good condi ranger will beat a s/d thief the majority of the time. The problem is ranger does not have the immobilize of a panic strike thief, the survivability of a mediguard, or the AoE / support of many other classes. That said rangers excel in wvw due to large open fields where they can basically free kills builds with few closers from 2k range and have peeling/ stealth from their havoc squad and high terrain to stand on.

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Shouts are bad in SPvP mate, so lets not talk of this again.

Edit, figured I should also say don’t get me right there not completely bad just if your going to use it as team support its rather worthless, current meta builds almost all have great access to swiftness/mobility or regen. Now not to say won’t work as side point build it does have chance only problem you will run into is killing some of side point builds 1v1 is going to take month of sundays, damage output is allot lower than most beastmaster builds.

Sol.4310:

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Shouts are bad in SPvP mate, so lets not talk of this again.

I agree, I tried it before, it’s really a terrible build. Way too telegraphic, and most of the time when you try to cast Guard, you will be interrupted and CCed to death.
I seriously think the cast time SHOULD BE REMOVED for it to be viable.

Toxsa.2701:

Sol.4310:

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Shouts are bad in SPvP mate, so lets not talk of this again.

I agree, I tried it before, it’s really a terrible build. Way too telegraphic, and most of the time when you try to cast Guard, you will be interrupted and CCed to death.
I seriously think the cast time SHOULD BE REMOVED for it to be viable.

I was about to say that. Cast time is a killer.

if you’re interested, here’s the fight I lost: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkA0BB-HErI&feature=youtu.be&t=49m29s

My wins against cele ele and cele engi should be somewhere there, too.

Sol.4310:

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Shouts are bad in SPvP mate, so lets not talk of this again.

Edit, figured I should also say don’t get me right there not completely bad just if your going to use it as team support its rather worthless, current meta builds almost all have great access to swiftness/mobility or regen. Now not to say won’t work as side point build it does have chance only problem you will run into is killing some of side point builds 1v1 is going to take month of sundays, damage output is allot lower than most beastmaster builds.

Oh I agree it takes a while to kill the other brawler specs. I run it with the cele amulet so my condi bomb is a little lower in damage, but you really don’t have to kill them to be successful. You just draw out their dodges and use bonfire and wolf fear to force them off point and entangle them. All you have to do is force them off long enough to decap. 1v1 you will simply out sustain the other brawler specs and you will eat the roamers alive.

I do hate the cast time on Guard though, it’s ridiculous considering how weak our shouts are.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Maybe it not the class but the play style may rangers choose to use. The ranger suffer more from an image problem rather than an ability or lack there of. Yes we could use more cleave and aoe.

Dual melee any one. The concept is so foreign to 99% of ranger, yet it is very effective.
More than weapon choice it’s many ranger believe you can’t be in the heart of the battle but must perch or a rock or ledge really not help your team. Not stomping the enemy you have downed (many times saving an ally). Not helping capture the node.

Many of the selfish play styles that ranger would use in dungeon runs if they could.
Mainly just loitering around points and one of the first to cut out (after thieve and mes) when things go bad.

Arrow Slanger created a very nice Dual Sword build I’ve been using with much success. I only changed it by swapping EB for spotter in the trait lines. Works great on point, good team support, can go head to head with most classes. Good AoE, and cleave. Maybe not good enough for top tier, I don’t know? Seems to me it is strongest in current Meta.

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Puck.9612:

Sol.4310:

Once trait change hits we might become useful in team fights.

We are decent side point, but we have no swiftness in bunker builds. So we become less effective.

Shout regen ranger with EB has plenty of swiftness and more than enough condi clear and regen to out heal cele players. Full condi players are pretty rare these days so SotF isn’t necessary.

Shouts are bad in SPvP mate, so lets not talk of this again.

Edit, figured I should also say don’t get me right there not completely bad just if your going to use it as team support its rather worthless, current meta builds almost all have great access to swiftness/mobility or regen. Now not to say won’t work as side point build it does have chance only problem you will run into is killing some of side point builds 1v1 is going to take month of sundays, damage output is allot lower than most beastmaster builds.

Oh I agree it takes a while to kill the other brawler specs. I run it with the cele amulet so my condi bomb is a little lower in damage, but you really don’t have to kill them to be successful. You just draw out their dodges and use bonfire and wolf fear to force them off point and entangle them. All you have to do is force them off long enough to decap. 1v1 you will simply out sustain the other brawler specs and you will eat the roamers alive.

I do hate the cast time on Guard though, it’s ridiculous considering how weak our shouts are.

The new trait line moves that Shout Grand master to minor just shows has bad shouts are atm.

Like I said before Swiftness/Regen are minor things when comes to SPvP, they help but in long run they aren’t going to change out come of the fight.

http://challonge.com/tournament_of_legends_3_na__pool_4/standings
I was representing Team Clutch
We won the first match by default (Even if they showed up I am sure we would’ve rekt them, since we also beat the 2nd Team who were ESL frequenters)
We won the 2nd match (2-1 close matches)
We lost the 3rd Match against Tron Jeremy’s Team (They were better and skilled individually than us, but if we were all at the same level, I am pretty sure we would’ve won or put up a more decent fight)
Fight link:
http://www.twitch.tv/bigheart_gamer/v/5614819 3:34:20 Mark
Unfortunately, this was from our guardian’s perspective.
I was the ranger in all 3 matches, I ran a celestial/Wh/Might stack/trap build

Very nice mate, congratulations! Can we take a look at the actual build please?

My typical pvp experience.
[IMG]http://i59.tinypic.com/21o1wco.jpg[/IMG]
Every.
Single.
Time.
I finished top on my team…

We’ve honestly discussed this to death by now lol. It’s actually a huge reason why I haven’t been around, the game has essentially forced me on hiatus until more information gets revealed about the druid and finalized trait setups, and that’s at the very least.

Rangers, at least, pure condi builds, aren’t even necessarily weak right now, they are just “meta weak” with shoutbow on every team. I can pretty safely speculate that the situation won’t even change post expansion, since there seems to be no sign of the main offender builds that hold condition builds out of the metagame right now getting any worse, and even more classes will be getting tools they don’t have now through specs and integrated mechanics and new features like resistance to deal with conditions.

Power builds will always suffer the same stigma unless something significantly changes, which is that it isn’t necessarily that power builds are bad or ineffective, there are just other team options you can take that are more effective.

The fact is, from everything we know so far, neither of those positions will change. That doesn’t mean that good players are incapable of succeeding or doing well, but it does mean that they would be contributing more by playing something else, and that’s honestly been more of a power creep issue up until now.

One of the few things I can already see happening with the new trait systems is ranger having the ability to run tankier through traits without sacrificing damage and being able to provide perma-AoE fury/swiftness/regen which is more than what we have now and could see some niche use.

Outside of that, staff, druid, and the traps and spirit reworks need to be significant in order for rangers to be worth slotting over any of the other classes in PvP.

I do at least want to drive home the point that I am not saying ranger is bad or that we should all switch or that playing one isn’t worthwhile. Clearly it is my main and this is the community I choose to be a part of, and I will continue to push my own abilities and bring ideas to the table and push the class to its limits, along with everybody else here.

I just think that from a top tier competitive aspect, we don’t have the tools to compete for a slot versus other classes and from what we’ve been shown, we more than likely won’t. Not without some sort of major, significant addition in boon support (providing or removing) and AoE capability (revised traps, staff, new utility family).

All that being said, with those last few ideas, ANet has enough opportunity to provide those few missing keys to once again make ranger a driving, top tier competitive force, so don’t let my own pessism on their ability to do just that be the sole takeway lol.

UnitedChaos.8364:

My typical pvp experience.
[IMG]http://i59.tinypic.com/21o1wco.jpg[/IMG]
Every.
Single.
Time.
I finished top on my team…

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