Guild Wars 2

Ive been playing war and guard since launch and this week decided to change that up by playing ranger.

I’ve been having a lot of fun. But the sword auto attack is so awful, I honestly can’t believe it’s been this bad since launch.

From what I’ve noticed, animations are broken up between upper and lower body, which is why we can use skills while on the move. But sword auto uses both upper and lower, making it more like a channel skill instead of a chain. When used you get rooted in place and can’t move or dodge.

This game relies heavily on positioning and dodging and I’ve nearly died many times in dungeons because I literally can’t move out of the way of a telegraphed boss skill. Please oh please anet, fix this skill

TL;DR

Why does the auto attack root you in place, making it impossible to dodge or strafe out of the way of big dmg skills? Am I the only one annoyed by this?

Everyone is annoyed by this. If you’re gonna use the sword then you want to turn off auto-attack and manually trigger each separate attack. You won’t really be able to strafe and attack like you can with any other weapon, but you’ll have a larger ability to dodge so long as you’re not just mashing 1.

It takes practice to get used to using the sword and you’ll still occasionally kitten up and not be able to dodge due to the root, but the massively increased DPS capability will make it worth it. Most of the time.

Welcome to the joys of being a ranger we excel at using gimmicky skills.

But yea, turn off the autoattack button so you can dodge or strafe. There will still be a bit of a lag period when hitting the dodge button tho.

The other way would be to save your number 2 and 3 skill for dodges. These skills can be gimmicky as well tho. Sometimes you don’t leap properly with #2 skill and sometimes you dont come all the way around the back, missing your attack with #3 skill.

Hi welcome!
15 chars length

yeah welcome and we are sorry for you

I think my favorite kitten moments when using my Ranger was using my sword auto attack on an enemy by a cliff, and after its killed my sword chain would continue moving me forward, throwing me off the cliff to my death… funny stuff xD (That’s happened to me on more than one occasion)

People will tell you to turn off auto attack. But turning off auto attack is not a permanent fix. It’s like putting a plaster on a wound that is in putrefaction.

Lévis.5489:

People will tell you to turn off auto attack. But turning off auto attack is not a permanent fix. It’s like putting a plaster on a wound that is in putrefaction.

It’s permanent untill Anet will fix it, but i tend to believe the animation works as intended. Anyway, i really hated the skill chain too until i turned autoattack off. Now I am getting better, just use 2 and 3 to evade the biggest attacks, the dodge will have a delay in any case, but it works. And under any circumstance use the sword on or near a cliffside XD

This issue will not be fixed because there is nothing wrong with it. I believe it was in a video where Anet said it was working as intended. The auto attacks allows you to stay on target. As mentioned you can evade with 2 and 3. One can also switch weapons and then dodge. Once you get more proficient at this weapon you wont need to turn off auto attack and you will be able to dodge if you time it right (in between the animation except one.)

Those of you having trouble with falling off cliffs and ledges turn off target assist will help greatly. In fact removing target assist will allow you to get more utility out of the weapon.

some of us have been using it for 6 months and still get killed by it.

It’s NOT YOU

All they need to do is remove the root and the complaints will stop. We don’t mind the jump. We just mind not being able to dodge as necessary unless we purposefully cut our DPS, something no other class needs to do.

Sword auto roots you because the other two skills are basically free evades on top of the evades you get with offhand and your dodge button. If you run Sw/D and GS you can basically straight evade/block for something like nine seconds straight every 20 seconds or so.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Sword auto roots you because the other two skills are basically free evades on top of the evades you get with offhand and your dodge button. If you run Sw/D and GS you can basically straight evade/block for something like nine seconds straight every 20 seconds or so.

While you may feel that the root is well deserved in PvP, I can tell you from personal experience that in dungeons it is a major liability. One that no other class needs to deal with. Yes we have evades. We have evades because we’d die without them. We survive in melee because of the evades. But the root should go as it has no place in an auto-attack. Were the roots on any other attack it’d be more acceptable. But it’s on our max damage weapon’s auto. And that’s just bad design.

GS is also an option if circle-strafing is something that needs to be done on a specific boss, you know. You lose about 30% of your personal DPS but that is a small price to pay for having a class that is basically a warrior except with better defense and additional offensive support. And everyone already loves warriors, I don’t see why you’re complaining about rangers when they fill basically exactly the same niche.

Being a ranger takes more skill. We are not another class. No other class has 3 evades on a weapon set. Once you sit down and think about what is possible you begin to see why it is as it is. We have a lot of regen and are able to apply protection on dodge 3 evades on sword dagger weapon set. Plus you can learn to use your normal dodge with this set.

There are so many other ways to mitigate damage on a ranger it makes me wonder why so many rangers are afraid to go melee. Yes it take practice and time. After a year there are still things I’m learning and improving upon. Even now sitting here writing this I realize there is so much more I could be doing, Learning and mastering.

Some of the issue with rangers is we as ranger tend to only look at things compared to other classes and see them as a weakness, but many times they are strengths and just need to be use properly.

I’m sorry. There is no excuse for locking us out of dodges on an auto-attack. If there is a fight where split-second dodging is required, I swap to GS as it allows me to actually survive whereas the sword would get me killed.

And I sit back and look at the game objectively on a daily basis. Trying to figure out why some design decisions were made. I can understand many of them. But, as far as PvE is concerned, the root is both unnecessary and unnecessarily dangerous. It may be a fair counter for the weapon in PvP and roaming WvW, but it has no place in PvE.

Split second dodging in pve really. In PvE there is more than enough time to perceive the danger and then react to it. Perception and reaction should be instantaneous in pve there is more than enough time.

The average reaction time is 215 milliseconds. Nothing in guildwars 2 requires that kind of reaction time. If you happed to be bless with a reaction of half that then pretty much you have all the time in the world (time being relative). In PvE Mobs have over blown animation red circles appear 2 to 3 seconds before you need to dodge them.

The argument against root is more valid in PvP then PvE. While you may say mobs can down you in one shot but, your less likely to ralley in PvP.

The 1h sword is our best weapon: Anet made it root for a reason agree or disagree for them to change. Then their postion on the root would of had to change which is doubtful. Or they will give into what some of the players want and the removal of the root will most likely happen with a nerf.

So which aspect of the 1h sword do you want nerfed so you can use an evade that you have access to in another form: cripple, damage Oh I see the might for our pets since you guys cant seem to keep them alive.

Funny how most ranger that do melee keep their pets alive a lot better. They will be the ones that actually use this weapon to the fullest that will suffer the most for those who barely understand what this weapon bring into play for the ranger.

Its always the design it’s never the player.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Split second dodging in pve really. In PvE there is more than enough time to perceive the danger and then react to it. Perception and reaction should be instantaneous in pve there is more than enough time.

The average reaction time is 215 milliseconds. Nothing in guildwars 2 requires that kind of reaction time. If you happed to be bless with a reaction of half that then pretty much you have all the time in the world (time being relative). In PvE Mobs have over blown animation red circles appear 2 to 3 seconds before you need to dodge them.

The argument against root is more valid in PvP then PvE. While you may say mobs can down you in one shot but, your less likely to ralley in PvP.

The 1h sword is our best weapon: Anet made it root for a reason agree or disagree for them to change. Then their postion on the root would of had to change which is doubtful. Or they will give into what some of the players want and the removal of the root will most likely happen with a nerf.

So which aspect of the 1h sword do you want nerfed so you can use an evade that you have access to in another form: cripple, damage Oh I see the might for our pets since you guys cant seem to keep them alive.

Funny how most ranger that do melee keep their pets alive a lot better. They will be the ones that actually use this weapon to the fullest that will suffer the most for those who barely understand what this weapon bring into play for the ranger.

Its always the design it’s never the player.

It’s both, actually. Both problematic design and players not adapting to it.

You don’t need to remove any aspect of the sword attack to make up for the root that comes with it. The problem isn’t the jump itself. The problem is that we’re rooted both during the jump and for a non-insignificant period after the jump. This may not be an issue in PvP as the jump is a boon to you there. In PvE the jump is completely mechanically unnecessary due to PvE combat and not only disallows dodging but also strafing while attacking to avoid damage. This highly limits your damage mitigation to just your dodges and evades, both of which are delayed due to the root. Please tell me what part of design necessitates that we should be rooted after the motion. Because I can’t see one.

Please don’t assume I’m one of those rangers that can’t use the weapon and can’t ever keep the pet alive. It was a lovely allusion of me as a bad player. I’m not and it doesn’t help your argument. I actually know what I’m doing, thankyouverymuch.

As for reaction times? Not all attacks are highly telegraphed. Some are barely telegraphed at all. And that is if you can see the telegraph through effects on the boss. Even those attacks that are telegraphed cause us to need to halt our attacks much earlier so as to not be caught unable to dodge.

Basically after looking at all classes weapons and attacks, I find that the root on the attack is unnecessary and unfairly punishes us for using our most powerful weapon. No other weapon in the game do you need to turn off auto attack and cut DPS just to survive. No other. I’m sorry, but that’s just bad design.

@ SynfulChaot you don’t need to turn it off to survive you just choose to. No other class has 3 evades on a weapon set either. When I said you in my post before I didn’t mean you SynfulChaot specifically. I meant Ranger that complain about this issue in general. Like If I said when you learned to ride a bike you used training wheels at first you probably thought you would never learn to do without out it until you did. Not everyone has learned to ride a bike and those that did not all used training wheels. Specially I don’t know your skill level but one can see how that would apply in a general sense.

We Rangers constantly complain that we are not unique enough and yet we compare what we do with other classes. That in itself isn’t a bad thing, but having 3 evades on a weapon set is not a bad thing either.

Why do I think that to stop the root you will have to give up something because it was a choice to root the ranger and block the dodge and anet track record tells me that to get something you have to give up something. Because once you spec into endurance regen plus and 20% skill recharge that is a lot of evade not including the ability to add invulnerability in more than one form. This doesn’t include evades on other weapon set. That is way to much. So they limited your normal dodge just a bit.

I may be wrong but in the event they make the sword easier to work with it will be help I’m not in need of and I would hate to receive another nerf because of it.

Yes there may not be a nerf but my question to you all is if there is what are you prepared to give up.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

@ SynfulChaot you don’t need to turn it off to survive you just choose to. No other class has 3 evades on a weapon set either. When I said you in my post before I didn’t mean you SynfulChaot specifically. I meant Ranger that complain about this issue in general. Like If I said when you learned to ride a bike you used training wheels at first you probably thought you would never learn to do without out it until you did. Not everyone has learned to ride a bike and those that did not all used training wheels. Specially I don’t know your skill level but one can see how that would apply in a general sense.

We Rangers constantly complain that we are not unique enough and yet we compare what we do with other classes. That in itself isn’t a bad thing, but having 3 evades on a weapon set is not a bad thing either.

Why do I think that to stop the root you will have to give up something because it was a choice to root the ranger and block the dodge and anet track record tells me that to get something you have to give up something. Because once you spec into endurance regen plus and 20% skill recharge that is a lot of evade not including the ability to add invulnerability in more than one form. This doesn’t include evades on other weapon set. That is way to much. So they limited your normal dodge just a bit.

I may be wrong but in the event they make the sword easier to work with it will be help I’m not in need of and I would hate to receive another nerf because of it.

Yes there may not be a nerf but my question to you all is if there is what are you prepared to give up.

If you have that weapon on auto-attack, then you will die in dungeons. Period. There is simply too much damage that must be avoided and sword on auto prevents you from avoiding it.

You keep speaking of 3 evades on a weapon set. Yes, we have that on one particular set. One that is not always used. You don’t balance one weapon (sword) based solely on a single weapon it can be paired with. You balance it on it’s own merits. And on it’s own merits it only has two evades. Yes we are unique in not only having multiple evades on a weapon, but also in having an evade on one of our auto-attacks (on GS). But again, as I have said previously, we have those evades so we can survive. We are dependent upon them for survivability in ways that other classes are not.

Yes, we have other damage mitigation in the form two invulns, both of with notable requirements/drawbacks (necessitating a specific grandmaster trait and sacrificing a non-insignificant portion of your DPS), endurance regen boosting, and cooldown lowering for our weapon evades. And most of these require specifically traiting for them. They are not automatic and endemic to all rangers. Again, you don’t balance one weapon alone against everything. Especially against a couple particular builds when all other builds may not have the additional anything.

So why is it that only the sword has the drawbacks that it does. Why is it that only the sword is punished? For having more than one evade/mitigation skill? GS, you might recall, has evade on autoattack, a pretty fast cooldown block, and a daze/stun.

I, personally, think it is an unfortunate artifact of the way that gap-closer skills work as all have this period where you cannot dodge. We are just both fortunate and unfortunate enough to have one in our auto-attack. Fortunate as it allows us to stick to our targets (boon in PvP; useless in PvE) and unfortunate that it roots us when we use it (downside for all, but especially in PvE). Basically the weapon’s design is great for PvP due to the gap-closer but a major liability in PvE as the gap-closer is useless and we still have to pay for it.

Why is it that only the PvE players need to pay the price without gaining the true benefits of it?

We are not punished for using the sword you just have to rethink your evade. In truth you have 4 evades. Your two normal evades become back-ups and the second and Third skill become your primary.

One thing The Queens Gauntlet should of taught us is that weapon skill evade are very valuable. While running is circle may have seem the thing to do. Evading with weapon skill allow you to be anywhere you wanted to be.

You will only die in dungeon due to a failure to evade with the sword if you don’t know how to properly use skills 2 and 3. You may die with the sword due to too much damage intake but that’s another issue.

Rangers can have 7 evades in one build the only other class that can have that many are thieves with 8. If you only use dodge as a means to evade then you’re missing so much of what we can do.

You don’t need to stack toughness to tank. Rangers in Gw1 were good because of all the evades we had. We didn’t attack fast with our bows. If you think so log-on to gw1 and see how slow we attacked

Serraphin Storm.2369:

We are not punished for using the sword you just have to rethink your evade. In truth you have 4 evades. Your two normal evades become back-ups and the second and Third skill become your primary.

One thing The Queens Gauntlet should of taught us is that weapon skill evade are very valuable. While running is circle may have seem the thing to do. Evading with weapon skill allow you to be anywhere you wanted to be.

You will only die in dungeon due to a failure to evade with the sword if you don’t know how to properly use skills 2 and 3. You may die with the sword due to too much damage intake but that’s another issue.

Rangers can have 7 evades in one build the only other class that can have that many are thieves with 8. If you only use dodge as a means to evade then you’re missing so much of what we can do.

You don’t need to stack toughness to tank. Rangers in Gw1 were good because of all the evades we had. We didn’t attack fast with our bows. If you think so log-on to gw1 and see how slow we attacked.

We are punished as it makes it more difficult to use the evades and dodges we have access to. The ranger sword is, bar none, the most difficult weapon in the game to properly use and has the highest skill floor by a large margin. Despite what you perceive to be it’s power, I don’t feel that it deserves the drawback that it does.

Yes, it is a strong weapon, relatively speaking of course. Yes, it has good evades. But the much higher skill level required to use it properly makes it hard to use, or even impossible to some. With that I am speaking of players with high ping/latency, of course, which is something completely outside of their control. For those players that weapon is just not an option. And even for the players with good ping where it is an option, it takes significantly more skill to use. More skill than any other weapon in the game requires.

That being said, I have been using the sword myself in dungeons. It is our highest DPS weapon by a decent margin. I only swap to GS when the higher mobility is a necessity and the sword drawbacks outweigh it’s benefits. When the GS’s defensiveness is more important than the sword’s offensiveness.

And you’re completely right that we don’t need to stack toughness to tank (in PvE; PvP is a different story). We survive based on our evasion and not getting hit in the first place. That’s always been the Guild Wars ranger, in both 1 and 2, and to that I’ve never disagreed.

I was debating with someone about whether a telegraphed 11-frame high/low mixup in P4A was blockable on reaction, and here people are talking about not able to dodge the long-kitten tells in GW2.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Sword auto roots you because the other two skills are basically free evades on top of the evades you get with offhand and your dodge button. If you run Sw/D and GS you can basically straight evade/block for something like nine seconds straight every 20 seconds or so.

I still take full damage from every single thing that attacks me in PvE while swording
I don’t know where you’re getting this Evade crap from.
Are you confusing it with the dagger offhand?

ilr.9675:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Sword auto roots you because the other two skills are basically free evades on top of the evades you get with offhand and your dodge button. If you run Sw/D and GS you can basically straight evade/block for something like nine seconds straight every 20 seconds or so.

I still take full damage from every single thing that attacks me in PvE while swording
I don’t know where you’re getting this Evade crap from.
Are you confusing it with the dagger offhand?

Sword 2 and 3 are both evades. Their evade windows are a bit odd, but you can still evade attacks if you time them correctly.