Guild Wars 2

Greetings,
Innkwell here, I play on Dragonbrand Server as a level 80 ranger and I just wanted to address some issues that i’ve seen as of late with the class. I understand everyone has a gripe and I’ll probably find some of mine somewhere else in these forums, I just thought I’d consolidate my ideas into something I could get some feedback on.

I’ll start with the pet.

- Pet should ALWAYS stay behind or at level with the owner, it creates some serious issues with agro.

- Different pets seem to have different cast times for their abilities, but considering the pet is not controlled by you it does not strafe and keep the mob targeted during cast time. This leads to an almost 100% miss rate on some of the strongest aoe/bounce pet spells in the game ( IE drakes).

-Birds( not Moa’s) might as well have 2 abilities when they take 3 seconds to cast “swiftness”, which by the way is completely useless when its not insta-cast because everything in this game seems to be based on quick decision making and split second support.

- if a pet is interrupted during casting one of its extremely long abilities, its set on an ICD, for a players offensive spells I totally understand this, but the mechanics of the pets in this game are marginal at best and if there’s not gonna be a complete overhaul of them then they NEED to do this as to become more viable.

- Pets need indirect aoe damage reduction or something akin to this, I understand if they have agro they should take damage, but I have specced full pet mastery w/ survivability and they still get obliterated if you don’t call them back at a moments notice.

-By at a moments notice I mean whenever the Pet recall button decides to actually force my pet to come back to me, Granted that they ALWAYS stop attacking… they frequently will just stand at melee range for over a second before returning.

- The pet system should be, in my opinion, a mixture of all classes in the game. Clearly arena-net has attempted this by giving us Bears (tanks), Felines( melee Dmg. over time), Canines ( CC and melee), Moas ( support and melee), spiders (ranged dps), etc.
My problem with this is that it doesn’t matter what you are TRYING to do when the only 3 pets viable for any hard content are the Bear cause its tanky, the Moas for support ( but they melee and get trucked !?!? ) and the spider cause its ranged. ( choose something else if you like reviving your pet in combat, oh wait u cant do that anymore….).
my solution would be to either make more ranged pets, Make the melee pets that aren’t tanky have indirect aoe immunity, or tone down the damage dealt by mobs ( which I don’t think is the real issue)

-anyone who replies with “just use 2 bears” I wish you the best, but you miss the point.

- The ability in the beast master line ( I think its 20 pts.) that grants stacks to pet stats per kill needs to stay when you switch pets (drops if it dies). Anyone who plays a good ranger should be trying to maximize their dps, and you just can’t do that without using the 5 pt. quickness buff from that same tree. I just find it kind of ironic to include this ability that actually lets your buff pet stats ( since you cant do that another way), but anyone who knows how to play would constantly be switching pets…. right? especially since they get hit so hard you have to switch them out for that too.

and last but not least, my personal favorite.
-Why do my cats take less damage and die slower then my drakes when they have the same defense stat but close to 400 less vitality… they don’t have any stuns….

This game is in my opinion Much more based on split second decisions and shorter ability durations. I do not have a problem with this, as I enjoy the change and the challenge but what I think is totally ridiculous is how some developers seem to have completeley forgotten that in formulating cast times for abilities.
( Potent other class example : guardian 3 seconds of immunity takes 2 seconds to cast,what kind of an emergency is that when u can die in 1 second from extremely strong hitting mobs.)

I Think I’ll stop writing now, maybe I’’ll post another rant about the ranger as a class and how I feel they could use some love.
I don’t think anything I posted in here could be misconstrued as Overpowered ( except maybe the indirect aoe immunity if you don’t understand the context in which i’m using it.)
I just want this class to be more fun to play and less buggy, all criticisms are welcomed and any trolls who wanna post… please be original and or hilarious.

that is all.

Just curious what you think of the rest pf the Beastmastery line. I keep considering it, because I want to boost my pets and the Minor Traits seem juicy, but the Major Traits look like a complete waste of points.

On that theme, what do you think of the lay out of our traits in general? Again, I feel they are a little confused in places (eg Traps in Skirmishing when Malice is in Wilderness Survival).

I don’t agree with your chice of Pets at all, since what you are focusing on is only a mediocre DPS build that everyone is currently running.

Pets should run a bit infront of you as it is now, because it help Beastmaster build to draw aggro to their pet.

I run a 30 beastmastery tanky build and my pet rarely dies in PvE and can tank lower tier bosses in Dungeons.

I posted this elsewhere I’ll paste it here…

Close-combat Ranger

Weapon Set 1 : Sword/Axe
Weapon Set 2 : Axe/Warhorn

Preferred pets : Wolf/Cave Spider

Traits : 0/5/20/15/30
PvE Skills : Troll Unguent, Sic’ Em (optional), Quickening of Zephyr (optional), Signet of Renewal, Rampage as One
Dungeon Skills : Healing Spring, 2x Spirits, Search and Rescue, Spirit of Nature

Armor and Accessories : Cleric’s and 6/6 Superior Runes of Lyssa
Weapons : Knight’s

My build is rather tanky and my dps unbuffed is rather low, but I’ve seen my Wolf crit for 3500 on a level 80 group event boss with 25 stacks of Might on it and 12x Vulnerability on the Boss, which is kinda funny.

This build revolves around supporting and buffing my pet while being somewhat tanky. I rarely take more than 700 damage from levle 80 mobs and common group event bosses rarely hit me for more than 1800, which is good enough when I have 15k hp. I deal consistent but average damage.

I’m having mighty fun with Fortifying Bound, as it is AWESOME with might stacking from Rampage as One and Protection one dodge roll. Whirling Defense and Hunter’s Call are awesome for stacking Might, because every hit counts towards Rampage as One, so it takes ~3 seconds for my pet to reach and maintain 25 Might. you want to know how this trait works go to the GW2 wiki I’ve updated this trait page and have even added a table with condition durations.

I take Wolf and Cave Spider along with the Trait that makes their F2 Cripple.

I love the Wolf, it’s F2 is the best disengage ever and is awesome in dungeons. 30 points in Beastmastery make it hit like a truck even if slow. I like the Fear + Cripple rather than only Fear, because it gives you more control and makes chasing mobs less annoying.

The Cave Spider is ranged which is very good for event boss battles. I take Cave spider over any other spider because it has a very short recharge on it’s F2 and inflicts weakness which makes me and my pet more tanky and coupled with Protection on Dodge and Troll Unguent is rather insane. I’m usually tanking champions in PvE and lesser bosses. Well not exactly tanking, but once me and my pet take aggro its very hard for the mob to kill me with so much toughness and protection. Rune of Lyssa is awesome here, getting random boons on heal is a no brainer when you already have so many boons in your kit. Fortifying Bound makes this even better, as it transfers the buffs to your pet.

I am stacking about 1200 healing power which most people think is a waste but I really like as when you DPS is low, but you are tanky it more than makes up for itself in the long run.
I’m taking Troll Unguent for the same reason, as it has 25% longer cooldown than Heal as One, but heals roughly 33% more and when you are tanky that snowballs really well.

I know my build isn’t really good, but I find it really fun to play and this build is one reason I’ve bought and play GW2.

My English might be bad, but hey we are not all that perfect.

Cheers and have fun, gotta’ tame em all !

I totally agree, my drakes has terrrriibblleee accuracy with it’s skill. We need a more permanent damage reduction for pets…. “Call of Protection.”

I’ve been playing Ranger since GW1 and frankly the new pet system, in terms of combat, wasnt much of an improvement.

Some things I feel could be improved upon with rangers include

-increased vitality and or toughness of all pets so as not to die so easily by aoe’s/dmg absorbtion
-instant cast on pets f2 skills
-reduce cycle time when swapping out pets in combat
-reduced cooldown on concussion shot with a 1second stun from the front and a 2second stun from the back/side
-more condition removal either through skills or traits

Note: i’m not suggesting all of this be implemented at once, these are just a few ideas I had