I believe thieves will be spending a lot more time out of stealth come the 26th. Theyre losing 2 secs of culling upon each unstealth (huge nerf), and they will no longer be able to zerg surf with cnd. Thats all I felt thieves needed, as I can already dispatch most skilled ones with a bit of effort.
You may want to go back and read up on the changes. The only thing that is going to make them be in stealth less is the (presumed) change to the revealed condition where it won’t matter if they broke stealth or it wore off. This will simply prevent them from waiting 3-4 sec for stealth to wear off before re-stealthing. Now they have to keep stealth up or wait 3 seconds after stealth breaks for any reason before they can re-stealth.
What this did was prevent the near 100% stealthing abuse where a thief was hardly visible unless they broke stealth to hit you.
All thieves can get rid of conditions easy, cause almost all of them take 30 shadow arts because it not only removes conditions every 3 seconds in stealth (so if you wait the 4 seconds in stealth, it’ll remove 2 conditions every time you do it) It also heals for more then a Ranger in a full Healing Power Set automatically without the investment in a signet or in gear.
Yep … Shadow’s Rejuvenation is 293 hp per sec while stealthed. Granted, it’s a 30 point trait so it should be good … but then take a look at Ranger’s stuff:
- 30 pt trait, Natural Healing : 125 per second for pet, 133 every 2 seconds for player. (player alone gets less than 25% of what the thief gets)
- Utility, Signet of the Wild : 62 per second for pet, 125 per second for the player
So let’s look at this combined.
- If a thief takes a 30 pt trait, they get 293 hp per sec while stealthed (which that build spends 50+%).
- If a ranger only takes a 30 pt trait, they get 66.5 hp per sec (133/2)
- If a ranger only takes a utility, they get 125 per sec
- If a ranger takes a 30pt trait and a utility they get 191.5 hp per sec ((133/2) + 125)
Granted, the thief has to stealth to gain theirs, but stealth comes with several other benefits for Thieves and is a decent portion of their gameplay. Does it really warrant them getting twice as much as a ranger who invests the same number of trait points AND 1/3 of their utility slots?
Now, before anyone tells me “but Ranger gets tons of evasion!” …
- Not on all weapons
- So does thief … and look at this http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ofdu0ltKmTk
My personal favorite is the 5 Seconds of Regen they get every time they stealth..
I abuse it with my healing power thief, I have only 800 hp with the gear right now, but i’m doing over 600 HPS while in stealth..
Yeah, regen on top of that brings it to 130/sec + 293/sec = 423/sec every time they stealth.
I hadn’t brought that up because Ranger can take several skills/traits/pets/runes to gain regen. Can’t spam a single way to gain it, but we have ways to achieve near (if not complete) 100% up-time on regeneration.
The biggest issue was that gc thieves could unload 10-14k damage on you before rendering. Culling lasts 2.5 secs and the debuff 3 secs, giving you about half a sec to burst the thief down. It’s easy killing a gc in 2-3 secs if u have a daze. This is the major nerf, and the rest is just sugar on top.
The biggest issue was that gc thieves could unload 10-14k damage on you before rendering. Culling lasts 2.5 secs and the debuff 3 secs, giving you about half a sec to burst the thief down. It’s easy killing a gc in 2-3 secs if u have a daze. This is the major nerf, and the rest is just sugar on top.
I agree that culling being fixed will fix one issue.
I was simply disagreeing about it affecting how much time they spend actually stealthed since that is what affects how much they receive the healing that was being discussed.
The biggest issue was that gc thieves could unload 10-14k damage on you before rendering. Culling lasts 2.5 secs and the debuff 3 secs, giving you about half a sec to burst the thief down. It’s easy killing a gc in 2-3 secs if u have a daze. This is the major nerf, and the rest is just sugar on top.
I agree that culling being fixed will fix one issue.
I was simply disagreeing about it affecting how much time they spend actually stealthed since that is what affects how much they receive the healing that was being discussed.
Well seeing as how every thief I know is kitten they can’t just CnD back up to full health (use skill, wait for stealth to drop use it again) I’m guessing that, yes, they are going to be in stealth a lot less because every time stealth expires they’re forced to play with us for 3 seconds before vanishing again.
Granted they’re still gonna be stealthed a lot, just not as much, ESPECIALLY in WvW.
Lol. I agree with your whole statement Druzlla.
However, the bad thieves aren’t what bother me. They are just flies.
Take a look at what the good sword thieves can do. Shadow Return on a weapon.
Come in stealth, jump out 1,200 range (stunbreaker and condition removal to boot), rinse and repeat. Good thieves are mean unless you’re a trap ranger. Then you’re stuck on your traps and they are off finding a new target.
The biggest issue was that gc thieves could unload 10-14k damage on you before rendering. Culling lasts 2.5 secs and the debuff 3 secs, giving you about half a sec to burst the thief down. It’s easy killing a gc in 2-3 secs if u have a daze. This is the major nerf, and the rest is just sugar on top.
I agree that culling being fixed will fix one issue.
I was simply disagreeing about it affecting how much time they spend actually stealthed since that is what affects how much they receive the healing that was being discussed.
my biggest worry for this change, and do not misunderstand me, the change is needed, however my worry is that without culling, weaker spec’d computers will have a harder time, I myself have a $3000 gaming rig, so i dont worry on my own behalf, but the fact that more or less every ranger/engineer out there will have to be played on high end gaming rigs just to take advantage of the change…
And while most people say “oh, but who cares”, there is those that will suffer from this. Although, they suffer alot already with even slower culling then the rest of us (culling + lag from crowds)
Actually rangers are quite overpowered in spvp and pve and even pvp in some fights.
Rangers are probably one of the best classes in the game right now, it just has a higher skill ceiling.
Actually rangers are quite overpowered in spvp and pve and even pvp in some fights.
Rangers are probably one of the best classes in the game right now, it just has a higher skill ceiling.
Make that “trap ranger” and you’re somewhat right, though overpowered is an exaggeration. They can tear up anyone that relies largely on melee range. The tanky beastmaster can do well, but it’s not on the same tier as trap ranger.
The main issues with the Ranger are the lack of viable utilities and bad pet AI. Look at the number of utilities that are actual useful. Look at the viable builds people are touting for Ranger. Then go over to the Mesmer subforum and compare. Mesmer isn’t a low skill floor class and that community is quite positive. There are several reasons why.
Ranger also has trouble in large battles with the pet dying quite quickly to random AOE.
Ranger also has trouble in sieges since the pet can’t do crap from the walls (900 range at best) and can no longer be sent outside the walls with Guard.
Actually rangers are quite overpowered in spvp and pve and even pvp in some fights.
Rangers are probably one of the best classes in the game right now, it just has a higher skill ceiling.
Make that “trap ranger” and you’re somewhat right, though overpowered is an exaggeration. They can tear up anyone that relies largely on melee range. The tanky beastmaster can do well, but it’s not on the same tier as trap ranger.
The main issues with the Ranger are the lack of viable utilities and bad pet AI. Look at the number of utilities that are actual useful. Look at the viable builds people are touting for Ranger. Then go over to the Mesmer subforum and compare. Mesmer isn’t a low skill floor class and that community is quite positive. There are several reasons why.
Ranger also has trouble in large battles with the pet dying quite quickly to random AOE.
Ranger also has trouble in sieges since the pet can’t do crap from the walls (900 range at best) and can no longer be sent outside the walls with Guard.
All classes have there little problems, that is also describing the problem that mesmers/necromancers face, except Ranger is a little more reliable because they can switch there pets if the going gets tough.
Pets are a lot more tanky then most other things though, and a lot of people just ignore them, even in large zergs.
All classes have there little problems, that is also describing the problem that mesmers/necromancers face, except Ranger is a little more reliable because they can switch there pets if the going gets tough.
But Rangers can’t swap their spirits out when the going gets tough … they die just like Necro pets and Engineer turrets.
Pets are a lot more tanky then most other things though, and a lot of people just ignore them, even in large zergs.
This is dependent on the pet.
Even bears/devourers die in large zergs (30+ per side) rather quickly.
There are so many sources of damage, the pet can’t dodge, takes 100% of it, and doesn’t get exotic/ascended gear stat improvements.
" Ranger is a little more reliable because they can switch there pets if the going gets tough."
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet, by the way. A couple aoe hits to our pet, they’re dead, there is no gray area there, it just IS what it is no matter how much crying you do about it. If you’re on any point in spvp/tpvp , guaranteed your pet will most likely perish (as mine does almost every long term node battle in tpvp due to the aoe laid down). People seem to forget this aspect alot and just think the pet is just ‘there’…. No, it’s part of our dmg and because of it’s horrible ai, lack of f2 usability (hit it 4-5 times before it even does anything) and in-efficient resistance to aoe dmg we suffer for it.
Before you say a class is op , actually play it in various situations and you’ll quickly realize that when everyone comes into the ranger forums saying they rolled a new class and realize how underpowered the ranger is that they have to express is in a forum , then you’ll understand.
I like the ranger even in it’s current state because of the challenge, I’ve played all the classes and have 4 level 80s currently: thief, mesmer, elementalist , ranger. I’m working on guardian and engineer. None of those classes even compares to the learning curve you have to do with ranger and none of those classes are you not able to make a mistake and live to tell it and not one of these classes is relegated to having one viable build. It’s simple, as a ranger, you make a mistake, you’re done, end of story. That’s not due to a high skill ceiling, that’s due to inefficient class mechanics.
So quit spouting bullkitten and actually play the class instead of getting owned in a situation by a ranger and then coming in here to say the ONE viable build we have that even poses a challenge to any other class is OP.
(edited by Ryan.8367)
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet
So quit spouting bullkitten.
Interesting that you’d put both of those comments in one post.
Evidence that pets are 50% of our damage?
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet
So quit spouting bullkitten.
Interesting that you’d put both of those comments in one post.
Evidence that pets are 50% of our damage?
There is none, no one has done the calculations to actually see how much % of the damage we do is our pet, which is why people constantly switch the %, it was 20, now it’s 50, in other posts there were claims of 70, 60, 80, and i’ve seen a lot of 40’s too.
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet
So quit spouting bullkitten.
Interesting that you’d put both of those comments in one post.
Evidence that pets are 50% of our damage?
There is none, no one has done the calculations to actually see how much % of the damage we do is our pet, which is why people constantly switch the %, it was 20, now it’s 50, in other posts there were claims of 70, 60, 80, and i’ve seen a lot of 40’s too.
It depends on the build. A Beastmaster bunker build is going to have most its damage done through the pet, less so if they go heavy into conditions, but still over 50% of its damage.
The more points you pull from Beastmastery, and put it above, the less the pet actually does for you. I’m not sure what percentage a pet does with zero into Beastmastery though.
And I believe it was a developer who stated they expect the pet to be HALF of the Ranger, therefore people started using 50% religiously.
I still can’t get my parser to work correctly, and have given up on it for now so I can’t get exact numbers.
Actually rangers are quite overpowered in spvp and pve and even pvp in some fights.
Rangers are probably one of the best classes in the game right now, it just has a higher skill ceiling.
The Ranger isn’t overpowered in sPvP, they are quite balanced. If you ask the sPvP community, most put them in the third, or fourth slot for sPvP class. Keep in mind this is only the case because a lot of classes have some major nerfs in sPvP, while the Ranger has few. Remember this when I make a point later.
The Ranger is not balanced in PvE though, and not up to par with the better PvE classes. However, they are still playable in PvE if you listen to Chopps, and he can be believed. I know a PvE only guild who runs Fractals faster than anyone else, and they refuse to take Rangers. In fact, no one in thier guild will play their Rangers anymore. You would have to ask them why.
The Ranger is slightly underpowered in WvW. There are a lot of reasons why, and I’ve covered these in previous posts. If you don’t believe me, read the thread in the WvW forums about the worst classes in WvW. Virtually everyone agrees the Ranger, and Engineer are the weakest. These players, like myself destroy Rangers in WvW when we fight them. The nerfs other classes experience in sPvP do not carry over to WvW.
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet
So quit spouting bullkitten.
Interesting that you’d put both of those comments in one post.
Evidence that pets are 50% of our damage?
There is none, no one has done the calculations to actually see how much % of the damage we do is our pet, which is why people constantly switch the %, it was 20, now it’s 50, in other posts there were claims of 70, 60, 80, and i’ve seen a lot of 40’s too.
It depends on the build. A Beastmaster bunker build is going to have most its damage done through the pet, less so if they go heavy into conditions, but still over 50% of its damage.
The more points you pull from Beastmastery, and put it above, the less the pet actually does for you. I’m not sure what percentage a pet does with zero into Beastmastery though.
And I believe it was a developer who stated they expect the pet to be HALF of the Ranger, therefore people started using 50% religiously.
I still can’t get my parser to work correctly, and have given up on it for now so I can’t get exact numbers.
Any idea how recent the dev post was? If its fairly recent ill look for it to see, otherwise I’ll just take your word for it!
I know I personally run a BM build and I’d say my pets probably close to 60 or 70%, don’t know how my h it’d be with my non BM build though.
Keep in mind is supposed to be 50% of our dmg is our pet
So quit spouting bullkitten.
Interesting that you’d put both of those comments in one post.
Evidence that pets are 50% of our damage?
There is none, no one has done the calculations to actually see how much % of the damage we do is our pet, which is why people constantly switch the %, it was 20, now it’s 50, in other posts there were claims of 70, 60, 80, and i’ve seen a lot of 40’s too.
It depends on the build. A Beastmaster bunker build is going to have most its damage done through the pet, less so if they go heavy into conditions, but still over 50% of its damage.
The more points you pull from Beastmastery, and put it above, the less the pet actually does for you. I’m not sure what percentage a pet does with zero into Beastmastery though.
And I believe it was a developer who stated they expect the pet to be HALF of the Ranger, therefore people started using 50% religiously.
I still can’t get my parser to work correctly, and have given up on it for now so I can’t get exact numbers.
Any idea how recent the dev post was? If its fairly recent ill look for it to see, otherwise I’ll just take your word for it!
I know I personally run a BM build and I’d say my pets probably close to 60 or 70%, don’t know how my h it’d be with my non BM build though.
I don’t recall. I just remember it being said. I almost want to say it was in an interview, but I’m probably wrong.
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Builds are hardly stagnate and what the Nero guy wanted was for it to be stats that compliment each other in every line, IE prec/crit dmg condi dmg/condi duration, toughness/vitality etc. that would make piling lines a no brainier in most scenarios and limit builds more.
The reason the Meta isn’t shifting around very much (and thus what builds are “good”) is because we don’t have very many innovative people making builds because humans as a whole would rather copy something successful to be successful instead of create something themselves.
PS: WS is awful for dmg unless you’re a condi ranger, I’m not a condi ranger so I tend to avoid that tree pretty religiously unless there’s a major trait I want
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Builds are hardly stagnate and what the Nero guy wanted was for it to be stats that compliment each other in every line, IE prec/crit dmg condi dmg/condi duration, toughness/vitality etc. that would make piling lines a no brainier in most scenarios and limit builds more.
The reason the Meta isn’t shifting around very much (and thus what builds are “good”) is because we don’t have very many innovative people making builds because humans as a whole would rather copy something successful to be successful instead of create something themselves.
PS: WS is awful for dmg unless you’re a condi ranger, I’m not a condi ranger so I tend to avoid that tree pretty religiously unless there’s a major trait I want
You can drink the koolaid all you want. But the facts speak for itself. As pointed out by numerous posters on here, you cannot run a GC on ranger and expect to do well because of those reasons I’ve stated. There’s trap/hybrid BM. Everything else is garbage. That’s hardly diverse.
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Builds are hardly stagnate and what the Nero guy wanted was for it to be stats that compliment each other in every line, IE prec/crit dmg condi dmg/condi duration, toughness/vitality etc. that would make piling lines a no brainier in most scenarios and limit builds more.
The reason the Meta isn’t shifting around very much (and thus what builds are “good”) is because we don’t have very many innovative people making builds because humans as a whole would rather copy something successful to be successful instead of create something themselves.
PS: WS is awful for dmg unless you’re a condi ranger, I’m not a condi ranger so I tend to avoid that tree pretty religiously unless there’s a major trait I want
You can drink the koolaid all you want. But the facts speak for itself. As pointed out by numerous posters on here, you cannot run a GC on ranger and expect to do well because of those reasons I’ve stated. There’s trap/hybrid BM. Everything else is garbage. That’s hardly diverse.
False, you can’t run a 30/30/x/x/x GC build because we get too much damage from our pet, you CAN however, run a 30/x/x/x/30 GC build with 2 ravens or a jaguar/raven or any bird/cat combo really and pump out significantly more damage than a 30/30 build.
Granted the only difference is if you want LB damage you should be running a 30/30 but that’s hardly a GC because ATM there are no true range GC builds.
Honestly, if you’re not condi, 0-30-30-5-5 is kinda boss.
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Builds are hardly stagnate and what the Nero guy wanted was for it to be stats that compliment each other in every line, IE prec/crit dmg condi dmg/condi duration, toughness/vitality etc. that would make piling lines a no brainier in most scenarios and limit builds more.
The reason the Meta isn’t shifting around very much (and thus what builds are “good”) is because we don’t have very many innovative people making builds because humans as a whole would rather copy something successful to be successful instead of create something themselves.
PS: WS is awful for dmg unless you’re a condi ranger, I’m not a condi ranger so I tend to avoid that tree pretty religiously unless there’s a major trait I want
You can drink the koolaid all you want. But the facts speak for itself. As pointed out by numerous posters on here, you cannot run a GC on ranger and expect to do well because of those reasons I’ve stated. There’s trap/hybrid BM. Everything else is garbage. That’s hardly diverse.
False, you can’t run a 30/30/x/x/x GC build because we get too much damage from our pet, you CAN however, run a 30/x/x/x/30 GC build with 2 ravens or a jaguar/raven or any bird/cat combo really and pump out significantly more damage than a 30/30 build.
Granted the only difference is if you want LB damage you should be running a 30/30 but that’s hardly a GC because ATM there are no true range GC builds.
Vids please.
Otherwise is pointless. You say a lot of things, doesn’t mean they’re true. If everything could be solved by doing 30 BM, there wouldn’t be so many threads on the ranger forum.
Anet have stated that the beauty of this game is that any profession can ‘roll any role’ (I just came up with that – pretty catchy, huh?) but I’m yet to see a ranger roll a decent burst or at least good-damage-output build.
Problem is the way stats are set up. If you’ve watched SotG last week, Nero, one of the guests, brought this up indirectly. It’s about min/maxing. He asked the devs do they think the current framework hampered diversity in builds and the Devs shot down that argument as saying, well, if you want precision, so you’re likely going to take crit anyway so it made sense to them to roll two stats into most trait column lines.
That statement completely missed the point.
If you can increase your defense and offense at the same time, why wouldn’t you? Which is why all decent and viable builds are heavily into WS trait line because you get to boost your cond dmg along with defence in one line.
But you can’t do the same with crit/power builds because if you max out crit/power, you have no defence. What’s more problematic, is that your damage is capped on your weapon side due to the pet, so every bit of stats you pump into being power/crit offensive gets you less and less returns. (i.e. getting less than if you were to pump into WS which nets you offense and defense)
They should’ve never mixed 2 stats into one trait line. Nor should they have let the pet account for more than 10% of the ranger damage. These two things have effectively made builds stagnate. Until they up weapon damage and/or nerf pet damage, this class will be in the state that it’s currently in for a long time.
Builds are hardly stagnate and what the Nero guy wanted was for it to be stats that compliment each other in every line, IE prec/crit dmg condi dmg/condi duration, toughness/vitality etc. that would make piling lines a no brainier in most scenarios and limit builds more.
The reason the Meta isn’t shifting around very much (and thus what builds are “good”) is because we don’t have very many innovative people making builds because humans as a whole would rather copy something successful to be successful instead of create something themselves.
PS: WS is awful for dmg unless you’re a condi ranger, I’m not a condi ranger so I tend to avoid that tree pretty religiously unless there’s a major trait I want
You can drink the koolaid all you want. But the facts speak for itself. As pointed out by numerous posters on here, you cannot run a GC on ranger and expect to do well because of those reasons I’ve stated. There’s trap/hybrid BM. Everything else is garbage. That’s hardly diverse.
False, you can’t run a 30/30/x/x/x GC build because we get too much damage from our pet, you CAN however, run a 30/x/x/x/30 GC build with 2 ravens or a jaguar/raven or any bird/cat combo really and pump out significantly more damage than a 30/30 build.
Granted the only difference is if you want LB damage you should be running a 30/30 but that’s hardly a GC because ATM there are no true range GC builds.
Vids please.
Otherwise is pointless. You say a lot of things, doesn’t mean they’re true. If everything could be solved by doing 30 BM, there wouldn’t be so many threads on the ranger forum.
Well for starters I don’t like GC builds they’re boring, and as pretty much this entire forum has decided, 50% of our damage is via pets, and our bunker builds are able to shred things due to 30 BM + jaguar. It’s pretty much common sense that if you want to be a GC as a ranger you should buff you DPS pet as much as possible, use a melee weapon (because they will ALWAYS hit harder than a ranged weapon under equal circumstances), and then use the obvious berserker jewel.
Well for starters I don’t like GC builds they’re boring, and as pretty much this entire forum has decided, 50% of our damage is via pets, and our bunker builds are able to shred things due to 30 BM + jaguar. It’s pretty much common sense that if you want to be a GC as a ranger you should buff you DPS pet as much as possible, use a melee weapon (because they will ALWAYS hit harder than a ranged weapon under equal circumstances), and then use the obvious berserker jewel.
My original comment relates to lack of build diversity due to poor design choices. I don’t really care that you don’t like GC builds as you don’t play the game for the whole community. You made a statement that claimed the lack of diversity stems from lack of originality. Well, you just admitted there’s no true GC build for rangers. That means there’s at least one less build than another class that could run GC already. How does that help your argument? What’s even more amusing is, trap is actually crap outside of 1 vs 1 and node caps so really we have 1 good build archetype for wvw. Where are these other supposed good builds that the Devs don’t even know about?
You seem to have a different idea as to what viable means than myself and a lot of other people. If you think the ranger meta is that diverse, put some builds up like others have done and let the community critique them.
Better yet, like I said, vids please. Otherwise is just a circle jerk and trying to argue for the sake of arguing.
Well for starters I don’t like GC builds they’re boring, and as pretty much this entire forum has decided, 50% of our damage is via pets, and our bunker builds are able to shred things due to 30 BM + jaguar. It’s pretty much common sense that if you want to be a GC as a ranger you should buff you DPS pet as much as possible, use a melee weapon (because they will ALWAYS hit harder than a ranged weapon under equal circumstances), and then use the obvious berserker jewel.
My original comment relates to lack of build diversity due to poor design choices. I don’t really care that you don’t like GC builds as you don’t play the game for the whole community. You made a statement that claimed the lack of diversity stems from lack of originality. Well, you just admitted there’s no true GC build for rangers. That means there’s at least one less build than another class that could run GC already. How does that help your argument? What’s even more amusing is, trap is actually crap outside of 1 vs 1 and node caps so really we have 1 good build archetype for wvw. Where are these other supposed good builds that the Devs don’t even know about?
You seem to have a different idea as to what viable means than myself and a lot of other people. If you think the ranger meta is that diverse, put some builds up like others have done and let the community critique them.
Better yet, like I said, vids please. Otherwise is just a circle jerk and trying to argue for the sake of arguing.
I’ve been thinking of just throwing a bunch of builds up, then again most people on this forum use the logic of “I don’t like it so its bad” (look at spirits and shout builds).
And as much as I’d love to upload a ton of videos I don’t have the time required to make the videos watchable (edit them) so they’d be pretty horrible, but if I suddenly contour a lot of spare time I will upload some tPvP footage.
And for me viable = build fills the intended Niche well, most people want viable to = better than every other build in that niche.
Well for starters I don’t like GC builds they’re boring, and as pretty much this entire forum has decided, 50% of our damage is via pets, and our bunker builds are able to shred things due to 30 BM + jaguar. It’s pretty much common sense that if you want to be a GC as a ranger you should buff you DPS pet as much as possible, use a melee weapon (because they will ALWAYS hit harder than a ranged weapon under equal circumstances), and then use the obvious berserker jewel.
My original comment relates to lack of build diversity due to poor design choices. I don’t really care that you don’t like GC builds as you don’t play the game for the whole community. You made a statement that claimed the lack of diversity stems from lack of originality. Well, you just admitted there’s no true GC build for rangers. That means there’s at least one less build than another class that could run GC already. How does that help your argument? What’s even more amusing is, trap is actually crap outside of 1 vs 1 and node caps so really we have 1 good build archetype for wvw. Where are these other supposed good builds that the Devs don’t even know about?
You seem to have a different idea as to what viable means than myself and a lot of other people. If you think the ranger meta is that diverse, put some builds up like others have done and let the community critique them.
Better yet, like I said, vids please. Otherwise is just a circle jerk and trying to argue for the sake of arguing.
I’ve been thinking of just throwing a bunch of builds up, then again most people on this forum use the logic of “I don’t like it so its bad” (look at spirits and shout builds).
And as much as I’d love to upload a ton of videos I don’t have the time required to make the videos watchable (edit them) so they’d be pretty horrible, but if I suddenly contour a lot of spare time I will upload some tPvP footage.
And for me viable = build fills the intended Niche well, most people want viable to = better than every other build in that niche.
lol… More like any build should meet expectations, and match similar builds from other classes.
People need to start labeling where they think the Ranger does good at, or poor at. sPvP/tPvP is not WvW. In sPvP they have nerfed a lot of what the other classes can do, with very little changes to the Ranger so there is the perception that the Ranger is fine, by those players. They would be correct in regards to that style of gameplay, but they need to understand the Ranger suffers issues in other aspects of the game, namely WvW to a great extent, and PvE at a lesser extent. I do find it ironic though that the Trap Ranger is potent in sPvP because the traps deny you the opportunity to stand in a circle, when in WvW, we just walk around them.
All three aspects of the game are so different from each other, you can not use a blanket statement in regards to the Ranger.
Well for starters I don’t like GC builds they’re boring, and as pretty much this entire forum has decided, 50% of our damage is via pets, and our bunker builds are able to shred things due to 30 BM + jaguar. It’s pretty much common sense that if you want to be a GC as a ranger you should buff you DPS pet as much as possible, use a melee weapon (because they will ALWAYS hit harder than a ranged weapon under equal circumstances), and then use the obvious berserker jewel.
My original comment relates to lack of build diversity due to poor design choices. I don’t really care that you don’t like GC builds as you don’t play the game for the whole community. You made a statement that claimed the lack of diversity stems from lack of originality. Well, you just admitted there’s no true GC build for rangers. That means there’s at least one less build than another class that could run GC already. How does that help your argument? What’s even more amusing is, trap is actually crap outside of 1 vs 1 and node caps so really we have 1 good build archetype for wvw. Where are these other supposed good builds that the Devs don’t even know about?
You seem to have a different idea as to what viable means than myself and a lot of other people. If you think the ranger meta is that diverse, put some builds up like others have done and let the community critique them.
Better yet, like I said, vids please. Otherwise is just a circle jerk and trying to argue for the sake of arguing.
I’ve been thinking of just throwing a bunch of builds up, then again most people on this forum use the logic of “I don’t like it so its bad” (look at spirits and shout builds).
And as much as I’d love to upload a ton of videos I don’t have the time required to make the videos watchable (edit them) so they’d be pretty horrible, but if I suddenly contour a lot of spare time I will upload some tPvP footage.
And for me viable = build fills the intended Niche well, most people want viable to = better than every other build in that niche.
lol… More like any build should meet expectations, and match similar builds from other classes.
People need to start labeling where they think the Ranger does good at, or poor at. sPvP/tPvP is not WvW. In sPvP they have nerfed a lot of what the other classes can do, with very little changes to the Ranger so there is the perception that the Ranger is fine, by those players. They would be correct in regards to that style of gameplay, but they need to understand the Ranger suffers issues in other aspects of the game, namely WvW to a great extent, and PvE at a lesser extent. I do find it ironic though that the Trap Ranger is potent in sPvP because the traps deny you the opportunity to stand in a circle, when in WvW, we just walk around them.
All three aspects of the game are so different from each other, you can not use a blanket statement in regards to the Ranger.
I always refer to sPvP/tPvP unless I specifically say otherwise, whenever I do WvW I just get frustrated because my pet(or turrets, or minions, or elementals) always die like instantly, they should just incorporate a buff in WvW alone that makes pets take like 80% less AoE damage (excluding siege weapons) so that they don’t just get rocked there.
PS: every prof I play I play as the pet variation of it, which is 100% doable on everything with the exception of Warrior, who has no pets.
In my mind, a Ranger build should be able to provide at least 2 things:
(1) Constant pressure through respectable non-burst damage
(2) Survivability to enable them to maintain that constant pressure long enough to get the kill
Once a build has both of those, it’s at least solid (in my mind) and we can then talk about any bells and whistles it has in addition to those.
In my mind, a Ranger build should be able to provide at least 2 things:
(1) Constant pressure through respectable non-burst damage
(2) Survivability to enable them to maintain that constant pressure long enough to get the killOnce a build has both of those, it’s at least solid (in my mind) and we can then talk about any bells and whistles it has in addition to those.
Agree with that, it’s where I aim for any of my builds.
In my mind, a Ranger build should be able to provide at least 2 things:
(1) Constant pressure through respectable non-burst damage
(2) Survivability to enable them to maintain that constant pressure long enough to get the killOnce a build has both of those, it’s at least solid (in my mind) and we can then talk about any bells and whistles it has in addition to those.
That’s all well and good, but one of the original points of this thread was that there are few viable ranger builds (particularly for WvW, spvp, tpvp), and the power of a ranger severely lacks diversity when it comes to playing different builds.
Some people don’t want to just play a build that outputs average, constant damage with high survivability. Reason being it’s just not exciting to play. I would love to be able to play a burst or cond ranger without it being terrible, and only finding this out AFTER spending a lot of gold on maxing out its gear.
This relates back to Arenanet’s notion of getting rid of the ‘Holy Trinity’ of RPGs i.e. – DPS/Tank/Heal. As it currently stands, if a player wants to play a DPS/burst build, they’ll generally go for a Thief, or if not, a warrior. If they want a Tank (or heal) build, they’ll go for a guardian. If they want a condition build, they’ll go for a necro. Therefore to some extent, the ‘Holy Trinity’ mechanic is STILL THERE, only to a slightly lesser extent than in, say, warcraft.
I fail to see how what I posted (and you quoted) contradicts what has been said about the ranger having few viable builds.
I’m not sure what you’re doing as a Condition Ranger that is so horrible. What other class has as much access to bleeds, burns, and poisons as the Ranger?
Elementalist only has bleeds and burns
Engineer has bleeds, burns, poison, and confusion (yeah, awesome condition class)
Guardian has burns
Mesmer has bleeds, burns, and confusion
Necromancer has bleeds and poison … except with one signet.
Thief has bleeds and poison
Warrior has bleeds and burns
… only the Mesmer and Engineer have 3+.
Only the engineer has all 3 damage per sec conditions.
Ranger has a pet that can do solid direct damage to aid them against condition removal heavy opponents … Engineer can’t.
That’s all well and good, but one of the original points of this thread was that there are few viable ranger builds (particularly for WvW, spvp, tpvp), and the power of a ranger severely lacks diversity when it comes to playing different builds.
Yup.
But we’re far from the only class with that issue.
That’s all well and good, but one of the original points of this thread was that there are few viable ranger builds (particularly for WvW, spvp, tpvp), and the power of a ranger severely lacks diversity when it comes to playing different builds.
Yup.
But we’re far from the only class with that issue.
As ridiculous as Elementalist is … it has forced them into a specific spec (some w/ slight variations of it) else they are considered weaker Elementalists.
Rangers really have 2 builds that work and work rather well. First is of course the trapper-build for PVP. It doesnt really matter how much condition remove anybody has if traps apply conditions per pulse and weapons+pet+traits apply additional conditions with every hit. Its basicly the GW1 condition overload. This build has the huge advantage of only needing the condition damage stat which leaves you with tons of HP and toughness.
Second is longbow glass-cannon. comparing rapid-fire to 100 blades is of course pointless as its a ranged skill that also doesnt root you while getting tons of damage in melee. getting a constant supply of those 10k+ crits and 12k+ damage+snares with huge AOE through barrage is very beneficial for every team in pve and its pretty effective in small teams in wvw. 2 Rangers can burst everyone but the tankiest of builds to death in rather short time. Sadly this really requires power+precision+crit damage to work so really nothing left for hp/toughness and since the longbow is the only ranger-weapon that doesnt use condition damage (seriously why?) this also means less effective secondary weapon-set.
Without a doubt ranger needs a lot of work (its basicly half-finished, most traits/trait-lines make no sense, pets are usually dead, a lot of skills do stupid things like applying 1 stack of might or 1 stack of vulnerability) but they arent complete trash.
Dont know about dungeons since i only have done one,
but in Tpvp we are very viable. Atleast two good build the trapper spec and bm bunker, only d/d ele is at another level of power.
Inn WvW i think we are some what underpowered mainly as pet die too fast/respond to slow .
I agree the ranger weapon attacks could use a buff of some description. I dont think the ranger weapons should play second fiddle damage to their pet. The pet should support their damage. I would even go as far to say the ranger in general could do with a huge overhaul, but what I have in mind after all the time the game has been in circulation is probably very unreasonable. I think the ranger could have done with some utilities much like the engineer. That when the util is activated it changes the first 5 skills on your weapon. I could see this for traps. The ranger now has use of 5 different traps. Not all of them have to be overt damage dealing traps, a few could simply be debuffs. I think this idea could also apply to bows. One util could be focused around interrupts on the shortbow and conditions on the longbow. Perhaps the dev studio could keep this in mind for any other guild wars series releases.
I also think the ranger should have the option of forgoing pets if they choose. The pet has long been part of the ranger package, but if your gonna remove the trinity, why not redefine every else as well. When i play mesmer, necro, engineer they have all had some very sophisticated play mechanics, and the ranger by comparison just seems very linear.
I use ranger in spvp (Spirit build+great sword) and honestly I have little trouble being viable against most classes,. (Maybe not 100% effective) But encounters with thieves are reasonable for me to handle. High mobility ele’s I can manage and as for mesmers, I have simply learned to keep a close eye on which ones are the clones and if I get lost in the clones, generally my pet will attack the right one provided I targeted on the mesmer correctly on the outset. Generally these 3 classes are considered fairly difficult to manage when played well, so a ranger that can effectively manage them using a fairly linear play style shows the ranger isn’t kitten, just perhaps some things could use some love, as opposed to them being broken entirely.
Agree that traps should be on the weapon side of the bar. When you spec for traps they are your weapons…you shouldn’t have to give up your signets just to use them.
“Rangers really have 2 builds that work and work rather well. First is of course the trapper-build for PVP.”
I’m so sick and tired of PVP gameplay styles dictating ALL styles of the ranger in every aspect of the game. Try trapper build against GOOD players (not kittenty roamers) in WvW:
1. Bunker phantasm in wvw – kill you or stalemate
2. Bunker thief in wvw, GC Thief with s/d , any p/d thief – they laugh at that kitten and will widdle you down and end up killing you or stalemate
3. Bunker Ret Guardian with anything over 1000 healing – kill you or stalemate
4. Bunker ele with more than 5 condi removal and full precision / crit dmg gear, perma burning. – kill you or stalemate
Anybody who is good at the above 4 , you will have no chance of winning against as a ranger and you will either die OR stalemate BUT those very 4 classes in PVP are actually much less powerful and will be toe to toe with a ranger and you will have a chance, it’s the gameplay style. You’re forced to contest a spot , you have much less stat options, and half of the classes i mentioned have nerfs in pvp.
I duel top-tier players of their class from FA when I test ranger builds and some of the kitten I see on these forums is hilariously ridiculous because I know for a FACT half of the kitten doesn’t work against great players, it just DOESN’T.
So when people say ‘YEA RANGERS HAVE A GREAT BUILD ITS TRAPPER AND IN PVP’ you already lose credibility from me in the context of anything WvW related because it simply doesn’t slide like that for rangers in wvw in 1on1 situations. We are very shafted in wvw compared to those classes yet in PVP I can manhandle those very same classes with ease.
It’s bullkitten and it’s the main reason why we’re probably going to see a pet damage nerf across all areas of the game instead of just PVP, because people like you.
(edited by Ryan.8367)
Hi, I’m OP.
/15 char
Not affiliated with ArenaNet or NCSOFT. No support is provided.
All assets, page layout, visual style belong to ArenaNet and are used solely to replicate the original design and preserve the original look and feel.
Contact /u/e-scrape-artist on reddit if you encounter a bug.