Guild Wars 2

While most of the ranger utility skills are in a good place right now (I‘m maining ranger and I‘m luving it) I think that we should have an option to build ourselves around shouts as well.

We have builds based upon spirits and variations around it.
We have people using signets with regen builds.
But no build available and based around shouts although this is supposed to be one of our communication mechanics with our pet. And pet is what makes rangers unique.

I think that introducing a trait that gives healing, switness plus invisibility and protection to your pet when using a shout was a good step. It relaxed a beastmastery trait making our pets viable even if we chose another trait line. However, more often than not most of the players use only one shout in their build.

In short. „Sick‘em“ is very useful with berserker builds. „Protect me“ finds its uses in PVE and PVP/WvW as well. „Guard“ with a regen upgrade became popular with a lot of bunker/regen/healer builds. But search and rescue is not used even with builds which are there to support the party.

The proposal is to change Search and rescue to….

Shapeshifter.

First click – assign your pet to run and stay at a chosen location.
Second click – switch places with your pet.

and

Double click – switch places with your pet immediately.

Cooldown: 20 sec.

Of course working range has to be considered, so it does not become a case of who is able to hide their pets better. But it adds a lot more tactical decisions and maybe, just maybe… it will make people understand that pet is an asset not a liability.

1. Bluffing – while fighting melee send your pet away so the opponent will be guessing whether or not you are planning to shape shift.
2. Pet save – save your pet from AOEs (as it happens we don‘t have reliable tools to quickly withdraw our pet from the hell that are AOEs except to switch them. And pet switching IMO, when it is designed to give you peripheral buffs, should not be a panic button.)
3. Strategic planning – I will not be able to list all the available moves it would allow us to do but this alone, I think, could revamp how rangers manage their pets. Because what I see now is a very common pet neglect.

I like my pets even if ppl say they are nor responsive enough… Well, my work is closely related to cynology and from my experience I can say that sometime pets are not that responvise. You just have to find your way with them. But this change would make experienced players to play with their pets on another level and new players to experiment and find usefulness in their companions.

I really like it the way it is, I just wish the cooldown was a tad shorter. It’s an extremely powerful skill but utilities are so completely jam packed for PvP it’s hard to fit in.

For PvE, player rezzes usually aren’t helpful because so much of the content you can just WP rally if you fail. That’s why S&R has seen so much use for the Marionette fight. If we continue to see more relatively challenging content, I think S&R will find a home. Unlike PvP, PvE utlities have plenty of room to fit stuff in.

No, I dont like the shapeshifting idea…. I’m no mesmer switching Place with clones…

I dont like the idea either. It sounds more mesmer or ele like than ranger.

Thank you for your replies guys it is very interesting to investigate another perspective. Shapeshifting was not chosen randomly, a lot of shapeshifters in mythology and common art transform from human shape to animal and vice versa. Besides, many ranger weapon skills already use semi-form of shapeshifting: serpent strike transforms you into a snake, swoop into an eagle, others to a bear and so on. This skill would take it to the extreme though.

You can say that it feels mesmer like, but unlike the Pink Galore you would not create a third party form which could be destroyed. Instead you take the form of your pet and the pet takes yours.

Initially this idea spurred from the fact that pet AI is not at the level players would like it to be. Pet skills are sort of random and basic attacks are a challenge to predict. However, while attacks are difficult for the AI to perform, movement is not, so instead of boosting the AI (which is shy of impossible to do) an option to manipulate pet’s movement would counter it.

And it fits. It is easier to make real animals to go somewhere than it is to make them hop on someone, knockback, fear and grant might…

But what u mention is not shapeshifting to me… its rather “place-swapping”…. What Norns do is shapeshifting to me.

I do like the idea of a certain teleport effect with the pet but it could be “teleport to your pet and heal/cleanse/get boon/etc” or something similar.
Shapeshifting is more of a druidic feature rather than a ranger feature. Or at least that’s the way I see it.
Overall you’re in a good direction, keep up the suggestions.

Shapeshifter … hmm … It would be nice if you switch place with your pet for a few seconds, this would be funny