Guild Wars 2

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-the-first-year/

If you haven’t read it yet, I advise you click the link and go look at the info graphic posted in there. Ranger is the 2nd most picked profession. What I can’t understand is that if the Ranger is so popular, why does it seem like we are given the least priority? I mean, the pet to me is proof enough that we aren’t a priority given the major flaws (coughf2cough) that are still present in the pet AI and mechanic in general.

Back in beta just before launch, Rangers where a very strong and popular; especially for botting. Then they where hit with several nerfs to counter the botting. As you can see from their chart, the 2 most heavy botted professions are on top of the list.

Could be one of the reason ANET “thinks” that Rangers are in good standing is that it’s the 2nd most created class? (which we all know is inflated — nearly every bot we met in the early stages were exclusively rangers with bear pets).

made a ranger at launch havent touched it in over a year but don’t want to delete it.

I’m sure others feel the same way

That is just one of the statistic they can show us, I’m sure they have other datas like “time played per class”, “average level per class”, among others, those really inform the situation of a class.
I have 1 of each class, ranger, guardian, warrior, necro and mesmer are lvl 80 and the rest are lvl 30~40, but 50% of my play time is on my ranger, but I’m sure I’m among the few that really like to play as a ranger.

I was wondering how those stats were generated. For example I have five characters each of a different race and profession. So how would my stats fit into the overall stats? Hopefully it is based on hours played per character and not just toons created.

It would have been much better if they put the play time of these professions, not the number created. This would have created a much more accurate figure of what people are actually playing.

Yeah. Ranger is 14 percent because it is one of the best PvE/PvP classes, if you know what you are doing. Anet can see this from statistics which is why they have tweaked it quite a bit. Even with all the tweaks, I still feel sorry for opponents in PvP and WvW as they get continue to get steamrolled. Too many people use beserkanoob charts to analyse class viability in PvE as well. They forget about the important things like combo field options, power/condition pairing, group traits, etc.

Bots.

Archon.6480:

Yeah. Ranger is 14 percent because it is one of the best PvE/PvP classes, if you know what you are doing. Anet can see this from statistics which is why they have tweaked it quite a bit. Even with all the tweaks, I still feel sorry for opponents in PvP and WvW as they get continue to get steamrolled. Too many people use beserkanoob charts to analyse class viability in PvE as well. They forget about the important things like combo field options, power/condition pairing, group traits, etc.

Are dungeons considered PvE? cause if they are, Rangers aren’t too welcomed. They’re like the kid that gets picked last to join a team lol. WvW? besides roaming and 1v1 or ocassional 1v2s….Rangers are not the popular choice. I would say WvW consists of many many thieves and mesmers. PvP is about the only place a ranger is welcomed or favored.

Botting has inflated the Ranger figure considerably…

Also, I have all 8 classes, so players like me boost them all.

I ‘give up’ on Ranger when they nerfed shortbow range by 25% and after 2 major pet patches made them even worse than they were originally.

My Ranger is just parked in low level areas now to help me quickly do my daily.

Ranger is good at spvp ( I have a 70% win record with mine) but I am so disheartened with Ranger in other parts of the game, I can’t even bring myself to play sPvP with my Ranger anymore.

half of the rangers i think bots

Someone may have said this already but I think they’re counting character slots. Myself and a few dozen regular posters on this forum are about the only ‘main’ rangers in the entire game. Last night in wvw, myself and Dewolfe were the only two rangers I saw playing for JQ on JQBL.

Noobie.1073:

Archon.6480:

Yeah. Ranger is 14 percent because it is one of the best PvE/PvP classes, if you know what you are doing. Anet can see this from statistics which is why they have tweaked it quite a bit. Even with all the tweaks, I still feel sorry for opponents in PvP and WvW as they get continue to get steamrolled. Too many people use beserkanoob charts to analyse class viability in PvE as well. They forget about the important things like combo field options, power/condition pairing, group traits, etc.

Are dungeons considered PvE? cause if they are, Rangers aren’t too welcomed. They’re like the kid that gets picked last to join a team lol. WvW? besides roaming and 1v1 or ocassional 1v2s….Rangers are not the popular choice. I would say WvW consists of many many thieves and mesmers. PvP is about the only place a ranger is welcomed or favored.

Dungeons are Considered PvE, and are no problem with a ranger. At least, at this point, I am 38 in fractals and have Dungeon Master title. Beat everything first time as well. Passed every queens guantlet challenge as well (except Liadre). Rangers aren’t too welcomed in beginner groups for sure, but that is more due to some pretty popular beserkanoob folklore perpetuated by people (strife) who have an interesting, non teamwork based team philosophy on class viability. I sometimes think people post garbage to fool beginners into having a tough time. Rangers are walking arrow carts in WvW and are very welcomed in JQ. 1v1 in WvW? That’s like when 1 person tries to storm a castle by himself? I would argue against 1v1 ranger builds in WvW, but i am sure that’s debatable.

Archon.6480:

Noobie.1073:

Archon.6480:

Yeah. Ranger is 14 percent because it is one of the best PvE/PvP classes, if you know what you are doing. Anet can see this from statistics which is why they have tweaked it quite a bit. Even with all the tweaks, I still feel sorry for opponents in PvP and WvW as they get continue to get steamrolled. Too many people use beserkanoob charts to analyse class viability in PvE as well. They forget about the important things like combo field options, power/condition pairing, group traits, etc.

Are dungeons considered PvE? cause if they are, Rangers aren’t too welcomed. They’re like the kid that gets picked last to join a team lol. WvW? besides roaming and 1v1 or ocassional 1v2s….Rangers are not the popular choice. I would say WvW consists of many many thieves and mesmers. PvP is about the only place a ranger is welcomed or favored.

Dungeons are Considered PvE, and are no problem with a ranger. At least, at this point, I am 38 in fractals and have Dungeon Master title. Beat everything first time as well. Passed every queens guantlet challenge as well (except Liadre). Rangers aren’t too welcomed in beginner groups for sure, but that is more due to some pretty popular beserkanoob folklore perpetuated by people (strife) who have an interesting, non teamwork based team philosophy on class viability. I sometimes think people post garbage to fool beginners into having a tough time. Rangers are walking arrow carts in WvW and are very welcomed in JQ. 1v1 in WvW? That’s like when 1 person tries to storm a castle by himself? I would argue against 1v1 ranger builds in WvW, but i am sure that’s debatable.

Strife has a Non-Teamwork based build philosophy? What

Chopps.5047:

Someone may have said this already but I think they’re counting character slots. Myself and a few dozen regular posters on this forum are about the only ‘main’ rangers in the entire game. Last night in wvw, myself and Dewolfe were the only two rangers I saw playing for JQ on JQBL.

I’ve been PvPing in the mists for ~1-2hours every night this week, i’ve seen 5, count them, 5 rangers in the entire duration, 2 of them were spirit rangers who rage quit saying something along the lines of, “God even rangers OP build sucks.” after i curb stomped them on my ele/mesmer, the other 3 were obviously not very good and were just trying to do FoTM build #46, and didn’t stick around for very long either (weren’t vocal so i just assume they ran out of time to play).

It’s sad really… i’d play my ranger more but after i’ve started playing my other profs (who i don’t understand NEARLY as well as my ranger) and doing significantly better than my ranger… i just don’t feel right…

Saaaaaaaad Salade =(

Durzlla.6295:

It’s sad really… i’d play my ranger more but after i’ve started playing my other profs (who i don’t understand NEARLY as well as my ranger) and doing significantly better than my ranger… i just don’t feel right…

Yea its true.
I was kinda bored with my Ranger and tried running a Mesmer in sPvp months ago.
O boy lol! I was shock at how easy and fun it is to pvp as a Mes.
Mesmers in the hands of a highly skill Rangers are infact more deadly.

ah here’s the screenshot when i was running my mes in sPvp. The greyish Mes

Chopps.5047:

Someone may have said this already but I think they’re counting character slots. Myself and a few dozen regular posters on this forum are about the only ‘main’ rangers in the entire game. Last night in wvw, myself and Dewolfe were the only two rangers I saw playing for JQ on JQBL.

You only really see rangers on EB and late at night when the zerg train guilds are transitioning from West/Central players to Oceanic.

I can go for hours at a time on a BL and be the only ranger that I ever see.

I still see tons in PvE though. It’s still a very popular class amongst newbies and casual players.

swiftpaw.6397:

Strife has a Non-Teamwork based build philosophy? What

Yes, you bet. He, and many others, promoted a selfish play style. Don’t get me wrong, he and his sPve team were very talented and I am sure he could of trounced most players. What he and many others are promoting is simply maximum damage == good. It’s very one dimensional. Equip beserker, do a lot of damage, don’t die, presto! You are good! Not. How about, here’s how to carry newer players through a hard dungeon. Or this is what you can do to help your team/squad survive. Alas, such novel concepts are lost on the elite beserkanoobs. So the beserkanoob is someone who equips beserker (or some other max damage) configuration, and pays no regard for their team/squad and thinks: As long as I am doing great damage, I am good. If my team dies, they suck, because I do a lot of damage….and am good. :-)

Strife quit GW2 before majority of the Ranger buffs. Brazil also from DnT guild played ranger with faster clear times, compared to Strife.

Thing is I have 80 warrior/guardian/ranger/mesmer/thief, and Ranger is very easy mode while leveling and most daily farming. It doesn’t require much skill or awareness and breeds some bad playing habits AND still be successful.

Just to add to this, I pwn with a wellomancer and I know NOTHING about necros. Sick of people saying spirit ranger is “soo easy” when their favorite profession is the exact same way.

Substance E.4852:

Chopps.5047:

Someone may have said this already but I think they’re counting character slots. Myself and a few dozen regular posters on this forum are about the only ‘main’ rangers in the entire game. Last night in wvw, myself and Dewolfe were the only two rangers I saw playing for JQ on JQBL.

You only really see rangers on EB and late at night when the zerg train guilds are transitioning from West/Central players to Oceanic.

I can go for hours at a time on a BL and be the only ranger that I ever see.

I still see tons in PvE though. It’s still a very popular class amongst newbies and casual players.

Yep, I’m seeing more and more rangers in dungeons these days. Dungeons were always my favorite part about the game so I’m glad for that. Makes me happy

Experienced players will pwn with any profession. They already have awareness and good understanding of team synergy and mechanics.

There are players that never learned combo fields and never use the dodge button. A good friend of mine is mainly a Ranger and he’s full Zerker gear in WvW. His philosophy is to do as much DPS as possible and die, why bother dodging?

The tanking pet while leveling is a powerful crutch. Also, you do more damage with full stamina. lolz ranger dodge.

Last night me and 4 other rangers (stars aligned and we found one another lol) and we were going around wrecking anything and everything we found, minus the enemy Zerg, but that’s expected. It was interesting, was surprised to actually see another ranger in WvW let alone 4…

Also, current WvW meta favors zerg balls with Guardians/Warriors/Necros/Ele. Hopefully, that will change with the borderland updates in 2 weeks.

Prime.8792:

Also, current WvW meta favors zerg balls with Guardians/Warriors/Necros/Ele. Hopefully, that will change with the borderland updates in 2 weeks.

Maybe, but note that there is a difference between what the meta says and what really is. I don’t see enough experimentation in the field to truly believe rangers are as bad as l33t players think.

Chopps.5047:

Prime.8792:

Also, current WvW meta favors zerg balls with Guardians/Warriors/Necros/Ele. Hopefully, that will change with the borderland updates in 2 weeks.

Maybe, but note that there is a difference between what the meta says and what really is. I don’t see enough experimentation in the field to truly believe rangers are as bad as l33t players think.

Yeah, we’re the worst in WvW (Zerg wars not solo) but were not USELESS, a lot of people blow it out of proportion, if our pet were fixed in WvW to not blow up instantly than we’d probably be in a happy medium which is fine because we make up for that in how good we are at roaming.

We are however REALLY good at defense because we can use traps, and we can command our pets while we’re on a siege machine, you know how much fun it is to immob people with a drake hound as a ballista bolt is hurtling towards their face? It’s amazing.

Ya I am a big believer in ranger being one of if not the best siege profession for reasons like that.

Yeah rangers were awesome during beta. I mained a ranger in gw1 and i made one during headstart and had to stop playing the game shortly after beause of life reasons. I come back and rangers is one of the most hated professions and pets suck. Traits arent that good. But i still main ranger.

Chopps.5047:

Someone may have said this already but I think they’re counting character slots. Myself and a few dozen regular posters on this forum are about the only ‘main’ rangers in the entire game. Last night in wvw, myself and Dewolfe were the only two rangers I saw playing for JQ on JQBL.

LOL! Wait, there is one more who mains Ranger in JQ. That makes 3 of us!

Durzlla.6295:

Chopps.5047:

Prime.8792:

Also, current WvW meta favors zerg balls with Guardians/Warriors/Necros/Ele. Hopefully, that will change with the borderland updates in 2 weeks.

Maybe, but note that there is a difference between what the meta says and what really is. I don’t see enough experimentation in the field to truly believe rangers are as bad as l33t players think.

Yeah, we’re the worst in WvW (Zerg wars not solo) but were not USELESS, a lot of people blow it out of proportion, if our pet were fixed in WvW to not blow up instantly than we’d probably be in a happy medium which is fine because we make up for that in how good we are at roaming.

We are however REALLY good at defense because we can use traps, and we can command our pets while we’re on a siege machine, you know how much fun it is to immob people with a drake hound as a ballista bolt is hurtling towards their face? It’s amazing.

Combining eagle eye and piercing arrows would go a long way for very little effort on their part. It’s especially satisfying to blast through 10-15 glasscannon backliners for 1400+ damage every second or so. I just wish I didn’t need to go 30 deep into marks to do it at 1500 range.

Archon.6480:

Yeah. Ranger is 14 percent because it is one of the best PvE/PvP classes, if you know what you are doing. Anet can see this from statistics which is why they have tweaked it quite a bit.

What you meant to say, is that it got Nerfed … in PvP for only the sake of Coquest PvP. Just like everything else that’s ever been nerfed across the board. Any nerfs for PvE were purely justified through Solo’ing in easier/lowerlevel. …And if that’s what you meant by PvE, then that’s not real PvE either, sorry.

@ Everyone else…
Wanna have fun and see where Ranger’s real open world potential is even with bots that are supposed to be super efficient?… follow one of them around Cursed Shore and pull Vet Giants & stuff to them. Always a barrel of laughs to be had. Infact good luck even finding any as they’re quickly being replaced by MM Necros.