Guild Wars 2

Anyone else feel overall that the Ranger is relatively bland compared to the other Adventurer professions? Our pet is nice, and I like that it is a permanent fixture, but our class isn’t the only one with a pet. Four other classes have pets in some form. The major problems I think though are outside of our pet.

A lot of what we do do is relatively lacking and to use a lot of our utility skills the Ranger has to be fully dedicated to them. To use spirits, as an example, a ranger is basically required to put 30 points in Nature Magic. Another example is to use the traps effectively you need to trait 30 points in Skirmishing. This has really narrowed down the number of truly viable utility skills we can choose from for any other build. It also has basically made one of our elites completely worthless if we don’t spec 30 points in Nature Magic.

I am of the opinion that our weapons are kind of bland. It also seems we have a limited number of viable weapons with issues like the sword animation locking you and the longbow with extremely low dps. Our choices are basically shortbow and for our secondary weapon(s), a greatsword, if you want some AOE melee damage and an axe if you want the warhorn movement speed buff. I know some people like the other off-hand weapons, and they aren’t necessarily bad, but does anyone really want to give up the movement speed (fury and might)? And if the Ranger does, why would a Ranger not use the greatsword which is superior to the sword and axe?

Though honestly, the warhorn seems almost a must for the movement speed as we seem to lack the overall mobility of the other Adventurer professions with no movement speed trait and our best utility that adds movement speed is only 10%. Anyone else find it strange we have a basically useless trait that gives 30% movement speed to our pet?

On the topic of traits. We really do have some of the most useless traits. Evasive Purity is definitely up there on the worst traits of all time. A grandmaster trait that removes blind and poison on a dodge roll. Anyone can remove blind with a simple shot of their auto attack, and most likely will.

I know the Ranger is missing a lot of what it was originally designed with. Tracking is not in the game and neither is the permanent invisibility utility skill we originally had. I am not even sure adding those two back in would help the Ranger feel more complete, but it may help.

i feel like ranger would be one of the faster moving toons but honestly when im runing in a group of people i have a hard hard time keeping up even with the horn just seems everyone else has more movement bonuses or faster ones something.

I definitely notice how I lag behind most people in WvW. Warhorn is basically a necessity and that just seems wrong.

Having just played a warrior up to level cap and started a ranger, I tend to agree to a large extent. Love the pet capping and stuff in PvE and anything works there really, but will definitely stick to warrior in WvW. Think you are right about speed buffs – something that’s essential for a skirmishing class. Also condition removal & eliminating control effects is better for warrior – and those are essential for any PvP.

at the very least we should be able to walk backwards faster. i use a longbow and so i like ot keep as far away as possible. but that isnt possible hwne i have ot turn around and run because my opponent is charging me and my pet is walking like a old person…(+30% pet speed yeah right…)

I agree that the ranger should have some Movementspeed boost. 10% is a bit lacking compared to other classes that get 20-25% easy.

Movementspeed while backpaddling? not necessary. Smart players strafe to the side with 100% movementspeed and a chance to land flanking hits. You can run sidewards and still shooting the enemy if you make it right.

I do not think the Traits are useless. In fact there are many one might desire but cannot reach because there is so much useful stuff. Guardians or Elemages have much worse stuff to choose from.
In fact the traits allow different playstyles which i like. Focus on traps, spirits, petdamage, Bowdamage, support. Traits make your gameplay very different.

I do agree that the pet could be more durable. But not that much. I do not think that this game needs a offtank pet like Wow had. Some Aoe Mitigation would be nice though.

I have been saying since release that the class just feels unfinished. And I have been stating we are very lacking in movement speed options compared to the other adventure profs. Their are people on this board that will list all the squirrelly ways you can increase distance, but the reality is the other two Adventurer Profs totally outclass us with 33% and 25% permanent movement speed.

Signet of the hunt should be 20% movement speed considering the secondary effect is pretty bland also.

Quickshot is OK but it is buggy sometimes rooting you in place for a second when landing.

Pretty sad when I see a lot of Rangers using Rampage as One mostly for the movement speed bonus.

I want to play a skirmishing type class, and movement speed is premium in that regard.

I think Anet wants us to be a Turret though.

Anyone knows what the default speed is for the Ranger? It does seem very slow when you’re running with a group in WvW. Often times, I’d use the horn to buff everyone and do a 180 Lightning Reflex to shoot myself forward and people would still catch up and pass me.

The movement speed thing is really odd as I always thought of rangers as being quick movers in the countryside and generally very fit, and archers were always light, fast-moving troops in medieval times. It’s one of the things that’s always drawn me to the class in fantasy games.

Another thing that doesn’t feel right is the way rangers’ damage is balanced. They’re a ranged class so their melee is lower than a melee class, but their damage is ranged so it’s balanced down which makes sense. Thing is there’s no big hitting damage in the bow skills (and longbow doesn’t even apply condition damage), so every player’s self-heals take many seconds worth of DPS off your damage output – with nothing to balance it against.

I think the ranger is great in PvE, but in WvW I dunno. I’ve put in a lot of hours in the Eternal Battleground and I’m beginning to think that rangers aren’t suited for it outside of a zerg. Which is another oddity for me, as I always considered rangers to be more self-sufficient and solitary in nature, neither of which are particularly viable in WvW.

I dunno, maybe I’m missing something and just need to tweak my build and playstyle. Or maybe I should’ve made a straight up warrior instead.

The Ranger is the only profession that has a pet with a skill rotation.

You are not required to use any traits. This game requires aim and timing. If you neglect that it’s your own fault. Spirits work fine if you consider your surrounding and place them correctly according to your allies’ position. The point of traps is to lure people into them.

The swords 1 skill is a problem yes. Weapon choice is a personal option, though. If you believe some weapon to be bad, it just means you haven’t considered the options of it enough. Longbow is a great weapon if you use the right rotation. The sword, greatsword, axe, longbow, and torch all have AoE skills. You can get movement speed simply by using a bird, as long as there is someone near you to attack. But if you just want to move across terrain, then even the skill Swoop on greatsword is better than the warhorns swiftness, because it has such a short cooldown time. Plus, Swoop can help you cross gaps that you can’t jump over. The greatsword damage is inferior to the sword though, because it’s so slow.

Lack of overall mobility?
Swiftness:
Warhorn
Shortbow
Rampage As One (With a 120 second cooldown, this is viable to use in Worlds PvP)
Storm Spirit (With the “spirits can move and follow you” major trait)
Tail Wind (A minor trait that gives you swiftness on weapon swap, when in combat. But getting in combat is easy enough; just send your pet to attack a nearby mob)
Birds (Aim at a target that’s a great distance from you, and then call the pet back as soon as it gives you swiftness, if you don’t want to agro the mob. Use the major trait Concentration Training to make the swiftness last 15 seconds instead of 10. Practice makes perfect)
Other:
Signet of the Hunt (10% increased movement speed is great)
Shortbow (Use the ‘turn 180’ key to make the jump move you forward, instead of back)
Greatsword (Swoop makes you leap forward. This skill will actually move you forward faster then the warhorn, because of the short cooldown)

The 30% movement speed for the pet is perfect for PvP, where your opponents are constantly moving around, as it helps the pet to catch up and therefor deal more consistent damage.

I agree that not all our traits are the best, but it’s a good thing we have a choice so we can pick the good ones then. Evasive Purity should really have been on Wilderness Survival, so it could take advantage of the minor traits; ‘increase endurance regeneration with 50%’ and ‘gain 2 second of protection on dodge roll’. The ‘remove poison on dodge roll’ effect still makes it great on it’s own, though.

ranger pets are only cannon fodder if your opponent move all time…. pets are ret
arded , you need to push f2 like 20 times and by the time your pet cast it, your enemy is out of range.
Obstructed or not in line of sight or not in range when you are facing a melee oponent is really frustrating too.
Spirits are really bad, too few hp, range .
Now, the ranger is only a wanabe class that need to be polished by Anet, a warrior or a thief can hit harder than ranger with their bows (6-7k with rogue bow skill, and they can spam skills all time)

As I said there are people on this board that will list every squirrely way we can get movement speed and claim the class is fine.

Signet of the hunt 10% movement speed is not great compare to Engineer and Thief.

While I won’t harp about the movement speed (never really bothered me too much and also, if you play tall classes like Norn or Charr, the animation seems to be slower, because they make bigger steps), but what really bothers me is the general straightforwardness of the the skills.
You don’t really notice it until you have played a few other classes for a few hours, but ranger skills are really….boring.

Take the shortbow for example. There is exactly 1 skill that benefits you, Quick Shot, giving you Swiftness ONLY if you actually hit your target with the spell. Every other skill is only affecting the enemy (and in some cases your pet).

The 1H-sword: if you actually chain three attacks of the first skill, you gain some might. Apart from that: evading and things that affect enemies.

The longbow: there’s not a single spell on there that affects you, the only thing that does not purely affect the enemy is Hunter’s Shot, giving Swiftness to your pet.

This goes on and on. Other classes have a lot of spells that incorporate a dual nature in their spells, affecting enemies while also granting benefits to you. Guardians block, get protection, build some kind of defensive abilities around them, while damaging foes. Mesmers almost constantly buff themselves in some kind of way while dealing damage and quite a few of their spells change throughout combat (Chaos Storm, Illusionary Leap, Blurred Frenzy etc. Necros depend on the clever use of spells that affect both them and the enemy.

But us rangers we…shoot things. Or we hit them in some kind of way. Most of our abilites only change, when we flank or shoot guys in the back, which doesn’t really happen all that often in a 1on1 and isn’t all that interesting in general (“Guys, look, I just put 2 stacks of Bleeding on that dude over there because for a short time, I could actually shoot him in the backs for two arrows!”). During fights, enemy players don’t really need to learn too much about us. Just don’t step into the red circles on the ground, mind the pet and don’t show the ranger your back and you are fine most of the time. If we start to glow red, we hit a little harder, but it’s pretty much a fire and forget thing. As are the roots. And the spirit just gets pummeled to death when ever you dare to put him up.

Utilities are also quite lame. Most of the pet shouts are either buggy or just not worth it, because pets still act to unreliable. And die too quickly. Why the frakk would I want to use one of my utility slots to tell my pet to defend a specific location? Or to send him to revive an ally for 200 HP per tick? Signets are freaking lame, even the good ones are more than boring. One third of our utilies are thus either absolutly useless or boring passive stuff.

To rant even further:
- all minor traits in the marksmanship tree are absolutly useless, horrible and barely noticed. Who ever came up with the idea of these opening strikes needs to…well…just…do something, seriously.
- Too many traits are too good, while others are too mediocre to actually allow for a variety of builds. Whoever uses a bow and does NOT pick up Piercing Arrows for example must really have a good explanation as to why he would choose so.
- There’s no trait in all of the trees that actually grants any !USEFUL! benefit on a dodge roll, something almost every other class has available to them. Don’t you dare say “Companion’s Defense”, because honestly, if you dodge, why would you need to be protected for 2(!) seconds after that? It’s just measly. You would need to spend !30! points in the Nature Magic tree to get a horrible “Dodging removes blind and poison from you (10s cooldown)”. You would also have to deny yourself the still at least decent “Spirits unbound” for that. How bad is that? Just some examples of what other classes can get on dodge: Guardian – Heal nearby allies, Mesmer – create a clone.

This post has gotten longer than I thought, but to return back to the topic and for all those tl;dr:

- Most of our skills are bland and way too straightforward
- A lot of traits are too *ç%+£, therefore not allowing for a great variety in builds

“They’re a ranged class so their melee is lower than a melee class, but their damage is ranged so it’s balanced down which makes sense.”

No it dosen’t, it’s frickin stupid( no offense ment to you)
If someone picks the ranger with the intent of dealing damage they should be able to choose if they wanto focus on ranged damage with a bow or melee with a sword without feeling they got the short end of a stick if you ask me.

It’s missing active skills, and survival stuff.

I mean like…. in its description, I expect pets to be stronger, Rangers to have a powerful Ration type heal, a net trap a desperado ability, Something.

I mean Warriors stole the bola and thief has more stealth than a class that’s suppose to have camouflage

“If someone picks the ranger with the intent of dealing damage they should be able to choose if they wanto focus on ranged damage with a bow or melee with a sword without feeling they got the short end of a stick if you ask me.”

I’m totally with you. I get the reasoning behind the down-balancing, but it’s done in such a way that everything feels weak when you go up against other classes in WvW. As a ranger it feels like you’re just playing a normal guy in with a bow and arrow, and a pet for company. There are no killer combos to pull off, no significant survivability skills, no tricks up the sleeve, nothing that other classes seem to be able to pull out of the bag when necessary.

I do like my ranger and he’s great in PvE, but in WvW it can be frustrating.

Honestly i share your opinion. The Ranger(Hunter) is the only class i play in MMOs but in GW2 after reaching 80 i feel i don’t have many choices. It feels pretty bland and stale and i find myself thinking about trying other classes.
I don’t want to play other classes i want to play my Ranger but it feels dull and the pet is somewhat useless

Ravel.8145:

-snip-

This goes on and on. Other classes have a lot of spells that incorporate a dual nature in their spells, affecting enemies while also granting benefits to you. Guardians block, get protection, build some kind of defensive abilities around them, while damaging foes. Mesmers almost constantly buff themselves in some kind of way while dealing damage and quite a few of their spells change throughout combat (Chaos Storm, Illusionary Leap, Blurred Frenzy etc. Necros depend on the clever use of spells that affect both them and the enemy.

But us rangers we…shoot things. Or we hit them in some kind of way. Most of our abilites only change, when we flank or shoot guys in the back, which doesn’t really happen all that often in a 1on1 and isn’t all that interesting in general (“Guys, look, I just put 2 stacks of Bleeding on that dude over there because for a short time, I could actually shoot him in the backs for two arrows!”). During fights, enemy players don’t really need to learn too much about us. Just don’t step into the red circles on the ground, mind the pet and don’t show the ranger your back and you are fine most of the time. If we start to glow red, we hit a little harder, but it’s pretty much a fire and forget thing. As are the roots. And the spirit just gets pummeled to death when ever you dare to put him up.

Mixing profession playstyles together and saying it means one profession is worse then another, doesn’t make a lot of sense. Each profession has its own strengths, that’s what creates dynamic gameplay. The only reason why the Ranger seems so limited to you is because you’re forgetting the pet. The Ranger can get heals and protection from the pet, just like the Guardian can with weapon skills. But the Guardian gets better protective boons because he is the “support profession”. The Necromancers skills are really not that exciting. You get one skill that ‘moves conditions to foes’ on the staff, and ‘Siphon Health’ on the dagger. But unlike the Ranger, the Necromancer doesn’t have any might or fury boons, and hardly any interrupts or mobility skills. Mesmers adding boons to allies is part of the signature playstyle of the Mesmer. No other profession can buff allies with so many different boons, as easily the Mesmer does it.

No matter which profession you are fighting, you have to be aware of their position, keep an eye on how their character changes, and look for red circles on the ground. That’s pretty much sums up the combat of Guild Wars 2. If you think it’s boring to play with the Ranger, then that’s a personal thing. A lot of people are having fun playing the Ranger, including myself. I think the Warrior is really boring to play, because you don’t have to do anything ells other then buff your own damage. But a lot of other people love that playstyle. It’s simply about personal taste.

(had to split this reply in two because of the annoying forum border restriction)

Ravel.8145:

Utilities are also quite lame. Most of the pet shouts are either buggy or just not worth it, because pets still act to unreliable. And die too quickly. Why the frakk would I want to use one of my utility slots to tell my pet to defend a specific location? Or to send him to revive an ally for 200 HP per tick? Signets are freaking lame, even the good ones are more than boring. One third of our utilies are thus either absolutly useless or boring passive stuff.

I think the pets are very reliable right now. Sure they could be better, but so could plenty of other things in this game. They only die quickly if you don’t care to keep them alive, if you equip the wrong pet for a situation (birds aren’t tanks), or you put them in situations they were never meant to survive (like sending the pet to attack two players on its own). The pet shouts work about 9 our of 10 times for me. Setting the pet to Guard a specific location means that you can be in two places at once, without having to worry about giving orders to your pet. This is great if you want to keep a node in check while chasing a player in sPvP, or you need to defend two positions in a PvE situation. The skill has a duration of 180 seconds and also gives the pet stealth (until it attacks) and protection, so as long as the pet doesn’t die, it can be really annoying for your opponents.

Ravel.8145:

To rant even further:
- all minor traits in the marksmanship tree are absolutly useless, horrible and barely noticed. Who ever came up with the idea of these opening strikes needs to…well…just…do something, seriously.
- Too many traits are too good, while others are too mediocre to actually allow for a variety of builds. Whoever uses a bow and does NOT pick up Piercing Arrows for example must really have a good explanation as to why he would choose so.
- There’s no trait in all of the trees that actually grants any !USEFUL! benefit on a dodge roll, something almost every other class has available to them. Don’t you dare say “Companion’s Defense”, because honestly, if you dodge, why would you need to be protected for 2(!) seconds after that? It’s just measly. You would need to spend !30! points in the Nature Magic tree to get a horrible “Dodging removes blind and poison from you (10s cooldown)”. You would also have to deny yourself the still at least decent “Spirits unbound” for that. How bad is that? Just some examples of what other classes can get on dodge: Guardian – Heal nearby allies, Mesmer – create a clone.

- 5 stacks of vulnerability is a nice bonus, 10 stacks is even better, but getting double critical on your first attack is great, when you consider the bonuses your pet can get from a critical hit (30% more damage, bleeding, might, or health), or the bonuses you can get from sigils with a critical hit effect.
- Well I can think of two reason why you wouldn’t use Piercing Arrow. If you’re playing a signet build it makes a lot more sense to pick Signet Mastery and Beastmaster’s Might, or if you want extra condition damage it makes more sense to go with Malicious Training and Keen Edge.
- Your are mixing profession playstyle together again here. The Guardian is the “support profession”, so of curse he adds heals. The Mesmer creating clones on dodge roll is actually slightly overpowered if you ask me (this should at least be a Master major trait), but it makes sense. The Ranger buffs his pet as well as himself, so this also makes sense. The 2 second protection is great when you consider that you also have 50% faster endurance regeneration. Something that only the Engineer has as well, except he has to spend 30 trait points to get it, while the Ranger only has to spend 5.

Kasama.8941:

Ravel.8145:

-snip-

This goes on and on. Other classes have a lot of spells that incorporate a dual nature in their spells, affecting enemies while also granting benefits to you. Guardians block, get protection, build some kind of defensive abilities around them, while damaging foes. Mesmers almost constantly buff themselves in some kind of way while dealing damage and quite a few of their spells change throughout combat (Chaos Storm, Illusionary Leap, Blurred Frenzy etc. Necros depend on the clever use of spells that affect both them and the enemy.

But us rangers we…shoot things. Or we hit them in some kind of way. Most of our abilites only change, when we flank or shoot guys in the back, which doesn’t really happen all that often in a 1on1 and isn’t all that interesting in general (“Guys, look, I just put 2 stacks of Bleeding on that dude over there because for a short time, I could actually shoot him in the backs for two arrows!”). During fights, enemy players don’t really need to learn too much about us. Just don’t step into the red circles on the ground, mind the pet and don’t show the ranger your back and you are fine most of the time. If we start to glow red, we hit a little harder, but it’s pretty much a fire and forget thing. As are the roots. And the spirit just gets pummeled to death when ever you dare to put him up.

Mixing profession playstyles together and saying it means one profession is worse then another, doesn’t make a lot of sense. Each profession has its own strengths, that’s what creates dynamic gameplay. The only reason why the Ranger seems so limited to you is because you’re forgetting the pet. The Ranger can get heals and protection from the pet, just like the Guardian can with weapon skills. But the Guardian gets better protective boons because he is the “support profession”. The Necromancers skills are really not that exciting. You get one skill that ‘moves conditions to foes’ on the staff, and ‘Siphon Health’ on the dagger. But unlike the Ranger, the Necromancer doesn’t have any might or fury boons, and hardly any interrupts or mobility skills. Mesmers adding boons to allies is part of the signature playstyle of the Mesmer. No other profession can buff allies with so many different boons, as easily the Mesmer does it.

No matter which profession you are fighting, you have to be aware of their position, keep an eye on how their character changes, and look for red circles on the ground. That’s pretty much sums up the combat of Guild Wars 2. If you think it’s boring to play with the Ranger, then that’s a personal thing. A lot of people are having fun playing the Ranger, including myself. I think the Warrior is really boring to play, because you don’t have to do anything ells other then buff your own damage. But a lot of other people love that playstyle. It’s simply about personal taste.

Engineers have more support options than Guardian (3 water combo fields, 2 on 1 weapon with a regenerating mist, a support kit, Toss elixirs, etc, etc, the list goes on and on). Guardian is tanky DPS

Tigger.8035:

Guardians are far from the “support” profession. That’s engineers job. Guardian is tanky DPS

I meant support as in giving protective boons and healing, which the Guardian does better then any other profession. Virtues, symbols, shouts all does this. The Guardian is like an opposite to the Warrior. The Warrior loves damage boons, the Guardian loves protective boons. That’s not to say that the Warrior can give protective boons, or vice versa, just that it’s what they each have an easy time doing. The Engineer is more on pair with the Mesmer, in that they both can create a lot of confusion and mayhem.

Tigger.8035:

Engineers have more support options than Guardian (3 water combo fields, 2 on 1 weapon with a regenerating mist, a support kit, Toss elixirs, etc, etc, the list goes on and on).

That is nothing to the Guardians virtues, all the consecration skills, all the shout skills, two elite skills, two of the signet skills, two meditation skills, and so on. Even one of the Guardians downed skills is a healing skill. The only time the Guardian really becomes at tank, is when you play it solo.

I completely agree with you on paragraph four. Movement speed. We get a passive skill that let’s us move 10% faster. Meanwhile, the other medium armor wearing classes get a 25% and 33% movement speed boost. As important as it is for us to be able to STAY AWAY from what we’re shooting, you’d think we’d be able to move just a little bit faster. I think a 15-20% boost would be reasonable.

Ways to improve the ranger: Tweak traits, change pet abilities, give rangers PREPARATIONS.

Traits – More traits affect the ranger, instead of pure pet.
— Agility training: You move 10% faster, your pet moves 25% faster.
—Expertise training: You and your pet deal extra condition damage.
—Natural healing: You and your pet have natural health regeneration.
—Combine some spirit traits and some trap traits. And make some of the buffs the default value instead.

-Pet abilities – Put the pet f2 ability into the auto skill rotation for a pet. Instead have Guard, Protect Me, and Sick’ Em abilities on a pet bar. Tweak for balance.

With the three pet slot abilities shifted to permanent pet skills, add three new utilities for rangers called Preparations.
-Read the Wind – Arrows move twice as fast for 30 seconds. 45 sec CD.
-Ignite Arrows – Your next 5 attacks cause burning. 30 sec CD.
-Apply Poison – Your next 5 attacks cause poison. 30 sec CD

Also, since we combined some spirit/trap traits, and after weeding out useless others. Add Traits which affect the three preparations.
-Practiced Stance – Preparations recharge 20% faster.
-Serpent’s Quickness – Gain swiftness upon activating a preparation.
-Melandru’s Resilience – Cure a condition from you and allies near you upon activating a preparation.

This is coming from someone who mained a rangers in gw 1 since release.

Mixing profession playstyles together and saying it means one profession is worse then another, doesn’t make a lot of sense. Each profession has its own strengths, that’s what creates dynamic gameplay. The only reason why the Ranger seems so limited to you is because you’re forgetting the pet.

I think you misunderstood me there. I wasn’t asking for the guardian or mesmer skills or those of any other profession really. What I was getting at is that our spells are way too onesided and straightforwarded in comparison, since most of the time, they do not affect us at all, but only the enemy. Mesmer and Guardian were only used for an example. I just would like to have more depth added to our spells, similar to how other classes spells work.

I am not forgetting the pet, in fact, I rolled this class because of the pet. But, not talking about pve here, since in pve, the ranger is frakking kitten, in pvp, the pet is still to unreliable. There are a lot of situations where the F2-skill still doesn’t work. Often, the casting delay is horribly long. They are slow, even when traited, and their AI is easily fooled by every semi-decent player. Also, giving my pet swiftness with my longbow just isn’t really that much fun. If I actually had control over more of my pets skills, I would totally agree with you that the pet makes up for the boring weapon skills, but this is hardly the case.

If you think it’s boring to play with the Ranger, then that’s a personal thing. A lot of people are having fun playing the Ranger, including myself. I think the Warrior is really boring to play, because you don’t have to do anything ells other then buff your own damage. But a lot of other people love that playstyle. It’s simply about personal taste.

Don’t worry, I still love the ranger! I still think the concept is great and I love the playstyle. But I just think a lot of things aren’t really were they should be right now and that some basics should be improved.

- 5 stacks of vulnerability is a nice bonus, 10 stacks is even better, but getting double critical on your first attack is great, when you consider the bonuses your pet can get from a critical hit (30% more damage, bleeding, might, or health), or the bonuses you can get from sigils with a critical hit effect.

1. Does only work within 900 range.
2. If your pet hits before you, your own opening strike is gone.
3. Can be avoided in numerous ways.
4. It’s still boring, considering EVERY minor trait in Marksmanship is about opening strike

I do not understand why so many people are deny the obvious … Maybe they are too like ranger class theme. Fanatically.. I’ve had good play almost all classes. Tried to choose the weakest, according to friends and players in forum. I started with the necromancer, engineer. Tried elementalist. Mesmer. Warrior. I tried to carefully study all abilities and traits to compare.
Well… And I can say with full confidence that the ranger comprehensively WORST and weakest class in the game.
Let’s just think about it. Ranger have weakest signets, the worst social abilities in the form of spirits, miserable class abilities ala “buff pet” or “order pet to guard area” (face-palm), worst traps, most poor set of avoid bilities. Terrible weapon abilities. Do not agree? Almost with all weapons should be used exceptionally “1” abiliti. Other weapons should not be used at all. Seriously, if u not believe me – just compare with necromancer. Even in comparison with his abilities – ranger pathetic!
In addition to this, ranger has lowest damage in the game! Huge proportion of damage is shifted toward the pet. This is the worst idea that could be implemented in this game. If you regularly participate in any form of PvP pet is useless 3/4 of time.
And do not tell me that i just don’t know how to play this class. I’m far from the first time I play so-called “pet-class”. And so i can tell u: in GW2 such class is not sustainable.

The influence of class mechanics on this class is TOO large. Most classes have a minor trait upgraids for class mechanics. Like invisibility after the steal, or movement speed in death shroud. However, the majority required ranger’s traits somehow associated with the pet. For example, 30% critical damage. No matter HOW would you like to play, you have to (and yes, it’s bad) pay most of attention to your pet, not for ranger itself.
Ranger in its current form not sustainable as a class in the game. At any rate, in comparison to other classes. In solo PvE do what you want to do. The only option to correct it – is remove from the pet half of class damage and return it to the character. Change abilities and traits in favor of the ranger, not pet. Otherwise ranger own only veterans in Orr.

i dont use alot of spirits because they die rly fast because they get agro from the mobs
and the passive ability is not very viable because of the very short range

I think you misunderstood me there. I wasn’t asking for the guardian or mesmer skills or those of any other profession really. What I was getting at is that our spells are way too onesided and straightforwarded in comparison, since most of the time, they do not affect us at all, but only the enemy. Mesmer and Guardian were only used for an example. I just would like to have more depth added to our spells, similar to how other classes spells work.

I am not forgetting the pet, in fact, I rolled this class because of the pet. But, not talking about pve here, since in pve, the ranger is frakking kitten, in pvp, the pet is still to unreliable. There are a lot of situations where the F2-skill still doesn’t work. Often, the casting delay is horribly long. They are slow, even when traited, and their AI is easily fooled by every semi-decent player. Also, giving my pet swiftness with my longbow just isn’t really that much fun. If I actually had control over more of my pets skills, I would totally agree with you that the pet makes up for the boring weapon skills, but this is hardly the case.

I think you have misunderstood the Ranger. When playing a Ranger you are going to largely be a damage dealer, that’s what the Ranger is primarily build to be, just like the Guardian is primarily build to be a support profession. The majority of other professions weapon skills only has one skill that effect themselves too. I don’t know where you see all these fantastic weapon skills that are so amazingly different from the Rangers. The depth of the Ranger primarily comes from the pet.

Yes, the pet AI is still not perfect. There are still times that the F2 skill needs to be pressed twice before activating, and the channel time on some of the pet skills are horribly long. But a lot of it you can play around. The Owl or Snow Leopard give chill that slows your opponents movement, meaning your pet then has a higher chance of hitting. Other pets like the Murellow casts an AoE effect on the ground that you can shoot trough to get bonus damage. There is also the Jaguar who has stealth, so your opponents can’t see it attacking. Or birds pets that are smaller, meaning that opponents often choose to ignore it, because it seems less dangerous. Increased movement speed helps to make the pet hit more often, while Frost Trap, Spike Trap, Muddy Terrain, and Entangle helps to slow your opponent down.

Don’t worry, I still love the ranger! I still think the concept is great and I love the playstyle. But I just think a lot of things aren’t really were they should be right now and that some basics should be improved.

Does only work within 900 range.
If your pet hits before you, your own opening strike is gone.
Can be avoided in numerous ways.
It’s still boring, considering EVERY minor trait in Marksmanship is about opening strike.

It really doesn’t sound like you like the playstyle at all. Some of the posts in this topic (not just yours) makes it sound as if the Ranger is largely bad, when it really only needs some tweaks. The profession is completely viable, it’s just not the most reliable profession right now. But it’s a pet class, so that is to be expected. I have faith that the Ranger will be improved over time, though.

The 900 range limit and losing your Opening Strike when your pet hits first, both sound like bugs to me. All skills can be avoided in a number of ways. Every profession has its own made up “opening strike” that players use to get a headstart on the opponent. Opening Strike on the Ranger just allows you to have two opening strikes. For instance, if you play with a longbow, you can start by using a 1 skill to get the Opening Strike trait effect, and if your opponent blocks that, you still have Hunter’s Shot that can add the vulnerability anyway. So you have a double chance to get the vulnerability on your opponent. I don’t think it’s boring to get more vulnerability, it’s one of my favorite conditions, and critical hits are always fun. Besides, even when spending 30 trait points in Marksmanship, you still have your major traits and 40 points left to make the most out of the Opening Strike bonuses. Even an Adept major trait like Steady Focus (increase your damage by 10% as long as your endurance is full) will make the vulnerability from Opening Strike better. Or how about Spotter that increases precision of nearby allies by 70.

Even with steady focus and 2 procks of opening strike, with full damage gear with 30-45% crit bonus you can’t crit more than 3.5k. This is max longbow damage. This is max ranger crit. your pet can do ~2.5k. Rogue can do 6k crit with shortbow in rather balanced gear, but it’s chain AoE(!). Ranger is damage dealer? Don’t make me laugh. Ranger with pet difficulty overtakes other class damage. But in pvp u can just think that u have no pet at all. So… do you really realize what you’re talking about?

Personally, I find pets are just too weak. I played as hunter during my times with WOW. But pets can tank and DPS well. But ranger in GW2 is simply too weak for the pets. If pets are not meant to be part of rangers, why bother to give rangers pets at all?

It will not solve WvW problem. Pets can’t attack on walls and from walls, they must stand still to have normal atack and most of F2 abilities casts with 1-2 sec delay. Pet class in an action-oriented game is a failure concept. Damage must be shifted to ranger.

Solution to people complaining about Pets in PvP

30 Skirmish Line get the 30% crit Talent/30% movement Speed talent (you can then decide what ya want after that, I choose Health on Crit talent for Pet)

10 Wilderness – 50% fall damage reduction, If you WvW at all, this is mandatory.

30 Beast – Master’s bond/Increase Pet Heal (you can change this really, I just tend to use this)/ Pet Health Regen.

Pet – Use Jaguar

Skills – Really up to you, But one of them has to be Quickening Zypher

Now whenever you fight anyone in PvP, pop stealth on Jag, then QZ.. Watch as your pet kills pretty much everyone in under 5 Seconds.

Also put your pet on Passive while you pvp, It’s on your bar, If ya don’t, you constantly have to call them back as random crap hits ya, With this you have to command them to attack but it gives you a bit more control over your pet.

You can use your Jaguar to snipe people doing this as well, They’re on siege during a stand off and everyone is fighting? Send your pet in, soon as he gets to target pop stealth/QZ, watch as he craps on that person..

Your pet will die sometimes, however more often then not, If you manage your pet properly it shouldn’t be a problem..

edit

Wanted to add this, If you’re not going up beast mastery all the way, and you’re not picking up pet related talents in the other tree’s, you’re not actually a “Ranger Pet User” Going 30 in the first tree and 30 in the second tree doesn’t make you a pet user, It means you have a pet, but you’re damage is going to come from you mainly. To make the ranger pet actually work you have to spec in the actual beast mastery line…and you really have two options on how ya do it, Either go Skirmishing, or go Nature’s with it and run a boon build with your pet.

Man Ive been having this issue with rangers since bwe1.. They are SO vanilla. There is absolutely no flash to the class.. I think its just an inherent problem with bows.. The skill animations are so boring.. They should really tone up the particle effects on arrows. The skills themselves I think are fine and have flavour, it’s just the execution of them puts me off. This is probably why I’m attracted to 1h sword and GS.. The skill animations have some meat to them, otherwise ranger just feels dull.

Xsorus.2507:

Solution to people complaining about Pets in PvP

30 Skirmish Line get the 30% crit Talent/30% movement Speed talent (you can then decide what ya want after that, I choose Health on Crit talent for Pet)

10 Wilderness – 50% fall damage reduction, If you WvW at all, this is mandatory.

30 Beast – Master’s bond/Increase Pet Heal (you can change this really, I just tend to use this)/ Pet Health Regen.

Pet – Use Jaguar

Skills – Really up to you, But one of them has to be Quickening Zypher

Now whenever you fight anyone in PvP, pop stealth on Jag, then QZ.. Watch as your pet kills pretty much everyone in under 5 Seconds.

Also put your pet on Passive while you pvp, It’s on your bar, If ya don’t, you constantly have to call them back as random crap hits ya, With this you have to command them to attack but it gives you a bit more control over your pet.

You can use your Jaguar to snipe people doing this as well, They’re on siege during a stand off and everyone is fighting? Send your pet in, soon as he gets to target pop stealth/QZ, watch as he craps on that person..

Your pet will die sometimes, however more often then not, If you manage your pet properly it shouldn’t be a problem..

edit

Wanted to add this, If you’re not going up beast mastery all the way, and you’re not picking up pet related talents in the other tree’s, you’re not actually a “Ranger Pet User” Going 30 in the first tree and 30 in the second tree doesn’t make you a pet user, It means you have a pet, but you’re damage is going to come from you mainly. To make the ranger pet actually work you have to spec in the actual beast mastery line…and you really have two options on how ya do it, Either go Skirmishing, or go Nature’s with it and run a boon build with your pet.

I tried it and it doesnt’t do all that dmg + most of the times pet doesn’t atk)

I think you have misunderstood the Ranger. When playing a Ranger you are going to largely be a damage dealer, that’s what the Ranger is primarily build to be, just like the Guardian is primarily build to be a support profession. The majority of other professions weapon skills only has one skill that effect themselves too. I don’t know where you see all these fantastic weapon skills that are so amazingly different from the Rangers. The depth of the Ranger primarily comes from the pet.

At this point, I don’t believe we’ll ever be on the same page in this thread I never denied that the pet is a one of the defining mechanics for our class, but since I only get to activate 1 ability, that’s not really all that interesting. I hoped I wouldn’t have to bring this up, but compare it to a warlock in WoW: his pets had at least 2 abilites, apart from sending it to attack, sending it to a specific location and calling it back to your position. There was way more depth in using your pet than the ranger has in GW2.

And have you played other classes? I really can’t understand how you cannot see the difference in weapon skills between the ranger and most of the other classes. They are just more interesting. Again, I repeat myself, it’s not really so much about WHAT exactly a skill does, as long as it is a little more than 1 – “shoot”, 2 – “shoot faster”, 3 – “shot for low damage, but make more damage with future shots”, 4 – “pushback with your shot” ( at least that’s an interesting one), 5 – “shoot everything in a certain radius”. I simplify here, but you should get the idea. Most classes just do more with their spells. And saying “this is because we are, after all, a damage class” is not a valid arguement. The holy trinity doesn’t exist in this game, every class can do damage and every class should be able to do so in a certain style. Sure, we might be more suited for a roaming kind of style than a guardian, but after all, if you wanna go DPS as a guardian, you can. It’s not okay to deny us an interesting way of playing just because we are mainly supposed to be doing damage.

Yes, the pet AI is still not perfect. There are still times that the F2 skill needs to be pressed twice before activating, and the channel time on some of the pet skills are horribly long. But a lot of it you can play around. The Owl or Snow Leopard give chill that slows your opponents movement, meaning your pet then has a higher chance of hitting. Other pets like the Murellow casts an AoE effect on the ground that you can shoot trough to get bonus damage. There is also the Jaguar who has stealth, so your opponents can’t see it attacking. Or birds pets that are smaller, meaning that opponents often choose to ignore it, because it seems less dangerous. Increased movement speed helps to make the pet hit more often, while Frost Trap, Spike Trap, Muddy Terrain, and Entangle helps to slow your opponent down.

Maybe I burst a bubble here, but:
- You got to actually land the chill to be able to benefit from it.
- It takes forever for the murellow to cast his poison field, he can’t move while doing it and you actually got to be able to stand correctly to benefit from the field. No easy tasks during a team fight.
- By now, somewhat decent players have learned not to judge the damage of the pet by its size. And will kill birds just as easily as other pets.
I could go on. It’s not about “omg, all pet abilites are bad!”. It’s about “Pets are freaking unreliable, but we desperatly need them, because they define our class, yet they are clumsy and miss as often as they hit with their abilites.”

It really doesn’t sound like you like the playstyle at all. Some of the posts in this topic (not just yours) makes it sound as if the Ranger is largely bad, when it really only needs some tweaks. The profession is completely viable, it’s just not the most reliable profession right now. But it’s a pet class, so that is to be expected. I have faith that the Ranger will be improved over time, though.

You misjudge. It’s exactly BECAUSE I like the playstyle that I wish for a smoother and better ranger with more depth. It’s not a bad class, it is viable, it’s just not the best at what it does. In no scenario.

-split-

-split-

For instance, if you play with a longbow, you can start by using a 1 skill to get the Opening Strike trait effect, and if your opponent blocks that, you still have Hunter’s Shot that can add the vulnerability anyway.

I’m pretty sure it’s a bug too. Still, it’s bad how it is. And just because we can inflict the vulnerability through a weapon spell – that should make up for the fact that it’s way too easy to NOT benefit from ALL three minor traits in the Marksmanship tree? No, just no. I would be fine if at least one of the three would do something different, I wouldn’t even dare asking for more. But no, all three of them. If you spend 25 points in the Marksmanship tree, traitwise you might not even be seeing a benefit from this if you for some reason miss your first shot in a fight. I won’t even start about how bad these traits actually are if you’re in for a full 3 minute midfight during tourneys in Foefire or similar scenarios.

Personally, I think the weapon skills are fairly interesting. The sword and shortbow skills in particular are very fun with a high emphasis on mobility and positioning. The only weapon I think is really bland is the longbow. Every time I convince myself to use a Longbow I come back disappointed after pushing 3-2-1-2-3-2-1-1 for 2 hours.

That said, the grass is always greener. Other professions’ weapon skills are about as entertaining mechanic-wise, but just have flashier effects. Just go look at the Thief, Warrior, Necromancer, or Elementalist skills for a while, they’re fundamentally similar, but just look cooler. The Engineer, Guardian, and Mesmer just tend to have more interesting weapon skills overall IMHO, but then again, they have more unique concepts.

The only place I feel Rangers really got gibbed is Off-Hands and Utility skills. Compared to the level of polish on the Main-Hand weapons, the Off Hands just feel very…. vanilla. Just compare the Ranger Torch to either of the other torch users. Ignoring the generally pretty graphics associated with Mesmers and Guardians, it’s just no contest. 1 Condition and a fire field as opposed to AoE burn/Cleanse and Stealth/Retaliation just feels weak, especially when I get the same effect from flame trap. The axe is just as bad, while the dagger is a bit better. The Warhorn is the only real option IMHO. Just take a look through most of the OH (Focus, torch, etc.) skills and it’s easy to see who got the short end of the stick.

For a better example, look at the Healing skills. Ours boil down to instant heal, Heal over Time, and, well, Healing Spring is just plain amazing. Whereas other professions healing skills have other effects incorporated into them (e.g. gain a boon, cure conditions, block, stealth, minion, etc.), we’re stuck with 2 flavors of pure-healing. Healing Spring is the saving grace, incorporating the best combo-field in game with good overall healing and regeneration.

Utility skills suffer from a similar issue. Spirits just cannot compete with Banners/Wells even with the mandatory 30 Nature Magic, and have the added handicap of being able to be killed. Traps are decent, but require too many high tier traits to be usable, and only then they are just AoE conditions. Signets suffer from a similar issue, they need 30 points in Marksmanship to be useful, and then still feel sub-par compared to other professions’ signets. Survival utilities are just plain better right now. They require no traits, unless you want the CD reduction. That leaves shouts, which are just plain awful. I honestly cannot think of a reason why you would want one of these, they are just so far below sup-bar atm.

Pets themselves aren’t bad, and I actually quite enjoy them. My only issue is they seem to be compensating for a lack of depth in other areas. I LOVE pets, but let’s be honest, they really don’t add that much depth. You pick 2 and swap between them for a different skill, not that much depth. It’s nifty, but its just another mechanic, no different than Steal or the Tool belt. We’re not a full-on pet class like some MMOs have, we just have a pet as a mechanic. Trying to play Rangers up as “the” pet class is like trying to argue Thieves are an stealing class.

the weapons and pets (along with most shouts) are in a really good shape. i find pets to be really deadly. i roll with SB, skirmishing and pet mastery traits.

signets, spirits, and traps i find really bland; traps seem ok. i wish there were more druidic/nature magic abilities. the ranger seems to be a survivalist type prof.

in other words, most utility abilities are bland, while weapons and pet-related traits and skills are really cool.

Ceois.5072:

Xsorus.2507:

Solution to people complaining about Pets in PvP

30 Skirmish Line get the 30% crit Talent/30% movement Speed talent (you can then decide what ya want after that, I choose Health on Crit talent for Pet)

10 Wilderness – 50% fall damage reduction, If you WvW at all, this is mandatory.

30 Beast – Master’s bond/Increase Pet Heal (you can change this really, I just tend to use this)/ Pet Health Regen.

Pet – Use Jaguar

Skills – Really up to you, But one of them has to be Quickening Zypher

Now whenever you fight anyone in PvP, pop stealth on Jag, then QZ.. Watch as your pet kills pretty much everyone in under 5 Seconds.

Also put your pet on Passive while you pvp, It’s on your bar, If ya don’t, you constantly have to call them back as random crap hits ya, With this you have to command them to attack but it gives you a bit more control over your pet.

You can use your Jaguar to snipe people doing this as well, They’re on siege during a stand off and everyone is fighting? Send your pet in, soon as he gets to target pop stealth/QZ, watch as he craps on that person..

Your pet will die sometimes, however more often then not, If you manage your pet properly it shouldn’t be a problem..

edit

Wanted to add this, If you’re not going up beast mastery all the way, and you’re not picking up pet related talents in the other tree’s, you’re not actually a “Ranger Pet User” Going 30 in the first tree and 30 in the second tree doesn’t make you a pet user, It means you have a pet, but you’re damage is going to come from you mainly. To make the ranger pet actually work you have to spec in the actual beast mastery line…and you really have two options on how ya do it, Either go Skirmishing, or go Nature’s with it and run a boon build with your pet.

I tried it and it doesnt’t do all that dmg + most of the times pet doesn’t atk)

If your pet isn’t attacking, it’s because you’re not telling your pet to attack..

Ravel.8145:

-snip-

I have played all the professions. I never said there wasn’t a difference, just that the difference in weapon skills aren’t as huge as you make it sound. Take greatsword as an example. The Rangers greatsword has an evade effect, the Warriors greatsword has a fury (burst) boon, the Mesmers greatsword has a might boon, and the Guardians greatsword has a might and a blind boon. So only the Guardian gets one more boon then the rest. Next to that comes to profession related skills. The Ranger greatsword has a skill that gives 50% more damage to the pet, the Warriors greatsword just adds passive adrenaline, the Mesmers greatsword has a clone and a phatasm skill, and the Guardian has a symbol skill that gives retaliation. Again, only one of the professions gets one more skill effect. Besides that, all the other greatsword skills affect the enemy, just like the Rangers greatsword skills. It’s the same with the longbow. Both the Rangers and Warriors longbow skills has no boons. The Warriors skills also just 1 – “shot”, 2 – “shot three flaming arrows”, 3 – “shot an exploding arrow”, 4 – “shot another exploding arrow”, 5 – “immobilize a foe”. And the shortbow skills are pretty much the same for the Ranger and the Thief as well. They both have bleed, poison, cripple, and an evasion skill. The only difference between weapons are the skill effects that are related to each professions specific playstyle. Other then that, weapon skills are pretty much the same. So no, I don’t see how you can think other professions weapon skills are so much different from the Rangers. It reads like you’re saying that you like the Ranger, but you wish it had skills like an Elementalist. But what you’re describing as uninteresting is not a fault with the Ranger, but with your view of it. I don’t feel like it’s uninteresting, and neither does a lot of other players.

It’s pretty easy to categorize professions in Guild Wars 2, even though there is no holy trinity anymore. Each profession still does one thing better then another, which is rather easy to see simply by looking at each professions skills. The Ranger is primarily a damage dealer because, like the Warrior and the Thief, there is more of an opotunity to be one. Or said in a different way; it’s easier to make a Ranger damage dealer build, then a Ranger support build. That’s not to say it’s all you can do, though, just that it’s the most obvious playstyle, since most of the Rangers skills are build around improving damage, or improve positioning so you can deal damage more easily. Just make a list, and it becomes obvious. Skills that are related to damage: two shout skills, two signet skills, three spirit skills, all four survival skills, all four traps, and two elite skills. Skills that aren’t related to damage: two shout skills, two signet skills, one spirit skill, and one elite skill. That pretty much primarily makes the Ranger a damage dealer.

Ravel.8145:

Maybe I burst a bubble here, but:
- You got to actually land the chill to be able to benefit from it.
- It takes forever for the murellow to cast his poison field, he can’t move while doing it and you actually got to be able to stand correctly to benefit from the field. No easy tasks during a team fight.
- By now, somewhat decent players have learned not to judge the damage of the pet by its size. And will kill birds just as easily as other pets.
I could go on. It’s not about “omg, all pet abilites are bad!”. It’s about “Pets are freaking unreliable, but we desperatly need them, because they define our class, yet they are clumsy and miss as often as they hit with their abilites.”

Not at all, you are just giving up before even trying:
- You land the chill by comboing it with your own control skills. For instance, you use the longbow knockback skill, or a trap, and then you use the pets chill skill.
- Knowing your surroundings and knowing how to positioning yourself, is a part of the learning curve of Guild Wars 2 combat. You can’t blame the pet because you don’t know how to position youself for the skill. It’s you that controls the skill, after all.
- One thing is seeing a bird fly around on it’s own, another thing is being mindful of the bird while you’re fighting another player. A bear gets in your way of hitting a Ranger, a bird just flies around you. Obviously the bird is going to seem as less of a threat.

I feel that too many of the traits in other trees affect the pet.
This should really stay in the domain of beast mastery with some spill-over into nature magic and wilderness survival for survivability.

Why does Marksmanship and Skirmishing have traits that have an affect primarily on pets? It doesn’t really seem to fit.

Meanwhile the Utility Skills do seem boring. It is hard to justify using spirits with how quickly they die and a lot of the other stuff just feels weak on it’s own. I understand they can get overpowered pretty quickly if you have a group of rangers synergizing, yet I feel that they get overly penalized in exploration mode because of this.

I think there is not enough ranger in ranger skills/traits
4 spirits
4 shouts
4 signets (only passive works on ranger)
4 traps (or 5 if we count muddy terrain)
4 (3) skills that let ranger do something.
2 of them are selfbuffs (shoot faster or shoot and bleed)
We have 1.. Yes single one skill that makes our character do something. And this is additional dodge…
Thief have additional dodge too. He can also stealth, blind, stealth, teleport, pull.
His traps hit harder, Signets are better (10% speedbuff vs 25% speedbuff), selbuffs have multiple effects that allows different tactics.
Don’t get me wrong. I love this class and I learned to like my pet. But shouts have to go. They are too weak and much too situational to be considered useful.
We need some ranger action.

And kind of BTW, I have 5 alts. Opening strike line is the weakest minor trait line I have played in this game.

Ravel.8145:

While I won’t harp about the movement speed (never really bothered me too much and also, if you play tall classes like Norn or Charr, the animation seems to be slower, because they make bigger steps), but what really bothers me is the general straightforwardness of the the skills.
You don’t really notice it until you have played a few other classes for a few hours, but ranger skills are really….boring.

Take the shortbow for example. There is exactly 1 skill that benefits you, Quick Shot, giving you Swiftness ONLY if you actually hit your target with the spell. Every other skill is only affecting the enemy (and in some cases your pet).

The 1H-sword: if you actually chain three attacks of the first skill, you gain some might. Apart from that: evading and things that affect enemies.

The longbow: there’s not a single spell on there that affects you, the only thing that does not purely affect the enemy is Hunter’s Shot, giving Swiftness to your pet.

This goes on and on. Other classes have a lot of spells that incorporate a dual nature in their spells, affecting enemies while also granting benefits to you. Guardians block, get protection, build some kind of defensive abilities around them, while damaging foes. Mesmers almost constantly buff themselves in some kind of way while dealing damage and quite a few of their spells change throughout combat (Chaos Storm, Illusionary Leap, Blurred Frenzy etc. Necros depend on the clever use of spells that affect both them and the enemy.

But us rangers we…shoot things. Or we hit them in some kind of way. Most of our abilites only change, when we flank or shoot guys in the back, which doesn’t really happen all that often in a 1on1 and isn’t all that interesting in general (“Guys, look, I just put 2 stacks of Bleeding on that dude over there because for a short time, I could actually shoot him in the backs for two arrows!”). During fights, enemy players don’t really need to learn too much about us. Just don’t step into the red circles on the ground, mind the pet and don’t show the ranger your back and you are fine most of the time. If we start to glow red, we hit a little harder, but it’s pretty much a fire and forget thing. As are the roots. And the spirit just gets pummeled to death when ever you dare to put him up.

Utilities are also quite lame. Most of the pet shouts are either buggy or just not worth it, because pets still act to unreliable. And die too quickly. Why the frakk would I want to use one of my utility slots to tell my pet to defend a specific location? Or to send him to revive an ally for 200 HP per tick? Signets are freaking lame, even the good ones are more than boring. One third of our utilies are thus either absolutly useless or boring passive stuff.

To rant even further:
- all minor traits in the marksmanship tree are absolutly useless, horrible and barely noticed. Who ever came up with the idea of these opening strikes needs to…well…just…do something, seriously.
- Too many traits are too good, while others are too mediocre to actually allow for a variety of builds. Whoever uses a bow and does NOT pick up Piercing Arrows for example must really have a good explanation as to why he would choose so.
- There’s no trait in all of the trees that actually grants any !USEFUL! benefit on a dodge roll, something almost every other class has available to them. Don’t you dare say “Companion’s Defense”, because honestly, if you dodge, why would you need to be protected for 2(!) seconds after that? It’s just measly. You would need to spend !30! points in the Nature Magic tree to get a horrible “Dodging removes blind and poison from you (10s cooldown)”. You would also have to deny yourself the still at least decent “Spirits unbound” for that. How bad is that? Just some examples of what other classes can get on dodge: Guardian – Heal nearby allies, Mesmer – create a clone.

This post has gotten longer than I thought, but to return back to the topic and for all those tl;dr:

- Most of our skills are bland and way too straightforward
- A lot of traits are too *ç%+£, therefore not allowing for a great variety in builds

I agree. I have played other classes and we feel flat. Like little to no effort went into making our synergy. Our ability’s are lackluster at best and feel like they were quickly put together at the last min. Don’t get me wrong, I love my ranger – its just very underwhelming and honestly boring. We don’t have much control and our arrows are easy to juke and avoid if your not short-bus. Axe is fun but common… really?

I really hope they fix some of these issue’s. Its sad really.

i like how the ranger synergizes with the pet. makes for some really cool dynamics.

I find myself “wasting spells” or aimlessly swapping weapons just to gain that extra speed boost during combat and roaming. I thought at first it was a race related thing (I am a norn, so I figured the brute was sluggish.) however I guess its a general issue with the class :/

im lvl 55 now and still trying to find the right… connection… to my ranger.
most of the time im asking myself what i should try next (weapon, skill, weapon combination, etc.) i just dont know if i should use traps or elementals or just seals to buff my pet

in dungeons, i always change my abilities, weapons and skills to fit the right strategy but most of the time it feels like im just a support class
and this is why i started to use mainly healing and support abilities
i like to keep some distance between me and the boss so i use a shortbow and a longbow awell
i use the fern hound as my main pet (in group/dungeons of course) and keep it on passiv (dont know the exact english term on this “skill”) so i can send it to revive someone or just heal the group a bit

this way, as a support it is pretty much fun doing some dungeons or group events

but honestly, this is not how i imagined the ranger to be

nerva.7940:

i like how the ranger synergizes with the pet. makes for some really cool dynamics.

From this all I get is you don’t know what synergy means. Our ability’s are clunky and do very little to compliment each other.

Also Dynamics with pet? Are you just saying words to see your name on a forum post? Pets die way to easy even being fully controlled. Ranged pets survive but are touch and go.