Guild Wars 2

Given the recent discussion on pets and the pro’s and con’s(mostly con’s admittedly) of that mechanic, I thought I would throw out this very basic question.

If the pet AI attack issues were fixed, was it a good choice for ANet to tie so much of the ranger class to pets and pet mechanics?

And why or why not?

I’m not sure how much of the Ranger’s damage potential is tied up in the pet, but it makes sense from a “story” standpoint. The pet is your partner, so it makes sense that it’d contribute a lot to your efforts. But on the other hand, it’s obvious that people rail against it because they’d prefer to control as much of that potential as they can, without deal with AI that is, more often than not, not intelligent at all. Why should a dog that’s dumber than a bag of rocks embedded with nails keep that damage away from them?

I still like how they implemented pets, I like the weapon skills that benefit pets. I’m not a fan of the pet shouts, save for SnR, and I think the damage spread between pet and ranger could be made to lean more on the ranger. And of course make it so that pets aren’t so easily stymied by a meandering opponent.

I can’t think of any other profession that is so tied to there mechanic

I see it as a long term nightmare to balancing the game. If the pet AI is too good sPvP players will point fingers as the Ranger as “a skill-less” profession. If the AI is still bad then ranger players are balanced around the pet existence and then a 5v5 with on side being ranger could end up feeling like 2.5v5.

Slightly off-topic: Picture the ranger pets working as well as we would like, but all the improvement to that AI was also give to the creatures out in the world. Some how I could see a lot of backlash direct at the rangers for it.

A lot of rangers compare our ranged damage to warrior ranged damage and it in straight bow to bow/gun comparison, yes the warrior hits for more.

Yesterday, after the patch was released I was doing some PvE content with my warrior friend. He was using his gun and found out he would hit for 300-600, with myself hitting for 100-300. My crits were his minimum! Now that’s depressing! And I’m supposed to be the ranged rogue bow master.

But I overlooked my pet’s damage. My bear was hitting for 500-600, which then makes me the greater damage dealer. And that was my bear, the tough pet, if I had my crow or lynx out those numbers would be in the thousands. That’s quite a lot more damage than my friend now.

This idea of pets making up half, or even greater ratios, or our damage is great when it works and it does in pve, but most of the time it doesn’t in pvp. I don’t think rangers want our pets to be the greater damage dealers, which is a misunderstanding of our class. Or you could argue Anet didn’t explain this in the character creation class description.

So my answer is yes, if the pet AI issues were fixed it was a good choice to tie in our damage with an AI companion.

Personally, I think ANet had decided to make Rangers inseparable to their pets a long time ago and just haven’t worked out all the kinks yet. I kind of wish they had made this more clear at the beginning.

I get the feeling many players had the following thought in the first week: “Huh…I guess you can’t play this class without your pets. Wierd. Oh well, extra damage can’t hurt, right?”

I would like to stow my pet and not have it return (AND my armour) everytime I stub my toe.

It’s taking control away from me (Like the camera going vertical if I die) and I hate control being taken away from me.

We should have the option to fight without our pets, maybe there should be a buff to compensate for not using a pet.

The CHOICE should be there.

The pet mechanic is a bit convoluted, and brings great pain in larger fights such as WvW / Big events with champions in. They just don’t have the sustain to withstand AoE, and with the pet out of action, you lose an awful lot of DPS. In Guild Wars 1 you could spec to either have a pet, or to not have a pet, and each had it’s own pros and cons.

I would really like to see a system where we can stow pets and not be worse off damage-wise. I agree with the person above, the choice should be there for us. It’s not like the technology isn’t already there. Engineers use kits, which take away their weapons but boost certain stats. Pets should just detract from stats when you activate them instead.

I think if Anet did anything right, they’d give us a “Lone Ranger” option and let us stow our pets for a stat boost (IE: 15% more damage, 25% Movement speed increase). Then just have it so you can’t un-stow your pet while in combat, so it’s not abused in PVP. In addition, put a 1 minute cooldown (just an example) on stowing.

The choice should be there. I think if they did this, I’d start playing my Ranger again, despite all of it’s bugs because it would make me less kittened for having a bad pet AI / mechanic. Getting a stat boost might also fix the kittened Longbow damage and compensate for the Shortbow auto attack nerf, among other lower damaged weapons.

PS: I also don’t think it’d be too difficult to code since they recently added this mechanic to Conjured Weapons for Elementalists. In addition, pet AI wasn’t great in GW1 so don’t event bet on it being any good here, let alone fixed for a very long time.

Yes they should be tied. This is why fixing the pets should be one of, if not THE top priority for anet to fix. I’m personally against the idea of stowing your pet and having your over all damage increased. If this is what you want then change to an engineer or something.

@Krojack
So, because you don’t like something, there shouldn’t even be an option for the people who hate it? Listen, they’re not going to fix the pet AI for a very long time because

1) They only have 2 people working on class balance, God knows how many people they have working on Core issues. Pet AI is a core fix, not a simple “Ranger only” fix. All pets / minions are that silly.
2) There hasn’t even been attempts at pet AI fixes since Beta (I believe?). Do you really think you’re going to start seeing them anytime soon? Probably within the same patch that they buff Signets and Spirits. Oh wait…
3) In situations like WvWvW when you’re guarding a keep, your pet is worthless and will die to simple AOES. Having a Stow option for DPS boost (for example) will help you.

^ Honestly though, I hope Anet proves me wrong.

Also, I can’t roll an Engineer. I love bows, they don’t even use one. I did however roll a Thief, but I liked the general idea of a Ranger more (I believe they were described as “unparalleled archers” – which ironically is missing the word “bad” inbetween “unparalleled” and “archers”)

It’s a key part of the class. Why would you level a Ranger and not use the pet? It just doesn’t add up.

Also begging to fix a problem by hiding it isn’t the answer. It needs to be fixed the correct way.

Yes, they should be tied to the ranger. Otherwise we’d be a warrior in medium armor. What makes a ranger a ranger is his/her partnership with its pets. Most of our skills and utilities would be useless without it or greatly kittened. And NO, I am not saying change up skills. I love my skills and how they all boost my pet.

The pet is a huge advantage if it is utilized and even invested in slightly. Yes it takes some extra micro managing, if you don’t want that run a warrior, like every other one of the winers want to do. We are like the Necro who gets caught with his pants down without any LF when our pets go down. Focus on keeping them up. Sometimes that involves using your heal for your pet, advantage is all your heals benefit both.

CC goes a long way towards boosting your pets targeting. Stop treating it as a curse and using it as an advantage and you will see your effectiveness go up with it.

They are working on the AI, no one in their right mind would purposefully screw over a client (seriously, it is ridiculous reading this over and over). When they get the fix fully tested rangers will rock the damage like everyone else and people will actually have to decide between hitting the pet that can be swapped fairly regularly (as fast as any heal and faster than most), or yourself which leaves your pet open to smack. Just wait.

krojack.4920:

Yes they should be tied. This is why fixing the pets should be one of, if not THE top priority for anet to fix. I’m personally against the idea of stowing your pet and having your over all damage increased. If this is what you want then change to an engineer or something.

Why? What are you afraid of? If you want the utility of a pet, you can have it, if you want to be in sole control of your damage output, aggro, and presence, you can stow the thing. If it was done in a balanced way, you would just be open to more build diversity but hey who wants that when we can just go play engineers right?

Well the engineer’s regular weapons are actually rather lacking, the ranger certainly outpaces them in that regard, as well as not being able to weapon swap, and they’re pretty reliant on utility kits/weapon kits/elixirs, they’re closer to an elementalist than a “ranger without pets”.

Pets were never a necessity for rangers in guild wars 1, and they have made them an intrinsic part of the design in guild wars 2 as some sort of poorly conceived gimmick that is a nod to the original, just like necromancer minions, but that’s another argument.

They do too much damage for a sidekick, which means you need them alive to compete with other professions in terms of damage output. They are too fragile, so while they act as a big part of your overall dps, that comes crashing down fairly quick. Yes I can tank champions with my bear and murellow, but what about when they die? Which they will, because they turn to wet paper at the slightest sign of an AoE attack.

Pets need to do less damage but take more damage, and act more as utility units rather than another weapon.

@Krojack
On the contrary, “stowing” it is actually helping us and fixing a lot of issues that fixing the Pet AI won’t fix. For example, it’d help against multiple AOE/PVE Boss fights in addition to it helping in WVWVW. There’s so many situations where a pet is just a nuisance regardless of it’s broken AI that having a “Stow” mechanic would fix those problems.

I agree that the Pet AI needs fixing no matter what, but again, it won’t solve our other problems.

And to answer your question, you can always use your pet. If you want to use a pet, use it. If I don’t want to use a pet, give me the option. No one’s trying to take your pet away from you. I don’t even know how you came to that conclusion. =\

They should not be tied to the ranger IMO. There are to many things for Anet to screw up ( as they obviously have ) in regards to how rangers do damage. They should have rated the ranger separately then tuned both until it made sense. Since pets are such worthless sacks of you know what, they hold us back as they are calculated into our output on a target that doesn’t move and has no armor I’m sure. Rangers in general are lackluster and rather boring to play.

Anyways IMO they dropped the ball big time with rangers and I feel bad for the people still dealing with it. I love my ranger but I made alts I enjoy playing more these days.

Oh well, eventually when everyone quits this game it wont matter, and A-net sure seems to be expediting that.

IMO, they don’t adhere to what most people would consider a ranger. I think the name is what threw so many people off with this profession. People thought…awesome archer with decent melee skills, a few sneak & trap skills, and some pet following you around if you want. What they got was a broken beastmaster class that can’t do much of anything without the pet around.

Just change the name.

I am personally against pets. I’m old school and all of the old school games, a ranger never had a pet. We are ranger’s, not beast masters. The oldest game I can think of that started having ranger’s with pets, that I have played or can remember, is WoW.

I am against being the only class where half of my damage is reliant on a crappy AI.

I am against being forced to use a pet that is constantly running away from me to pick a fight with mobs that I do not want to fight with.

I want to play ranger’s as what they are suppose to be, woodsmen/hunter’s. unmatched with their abilities with a bow, rain down massive damage from range with their bows.

You have a warrior, who is suppose to be a meat shield, can take and mitigate a ton of damage but is not suppose to dish out a ton of damage.

Then you have Rogue’s/theifs, who are suppose to dish out massive damage up close and in stealth but can’t take much damage.

Then you have Ranger’s, who are suppose to dish out massive damage from a distance but can’t take much damage like rogues/thiefs

Then you have beast master’s who can’t deal much damage themselves but their pets are suppose to deal massive damage. The beast master’s job is to keep the pet alive and to support the pet.

Sorry, but this game has it backwards…badly.

^ Hmm.

And I’m just playing devils advocate here(I would agree with some of what you say), but should those conventions/expectations be something ANet should adhere to? Or should game company’s not feel any restraint about redesigning classes to suit their particular game’s mechanics?

Obsidian.1328:

^ Hmm.

And I’m just playing devils advocate here(I would agree with some of what you say), but should those conventions/expectations be something ANet should adhere to? Or should game company’s not feel any restraint about redesigning classes to suit their particular game’s mechanics?

Any game can choose to redesign the classes to suit their vision, however, when they where sitting around the table saying what should the vision for ranger be…I’m sure they didn’t say clown. From my understanding, since I wasn’t able to get into beta, ranger’s where good in beta. Then a couple of weeks before release, they changed ranger’s around completely, creating the pathetic class we have now. So they spent years with ranger’s correctly, and tested it thoroughly to just change it to an untested state just before game release? That’s not redesigning, that’s stupidity.

You can redesign all you want, but you must keep the core foundation, which is balance. For example, warriors. You want warriors to do more damage then in previous MMO’s. OK, that’s fine, but there has to be a balance, you can’t make them meatshields and give them insane damage, then no one can take them down. If you give them damage then you have to take away from HP, Armor, and Mitigation. There has to be a balance and there is no balance at all currently in this game.

That involves allot of fixing and actual control of actual attacks, possibly “stay” and “go here” commands.
At least that’s the only way I’d find maining a pet for dmg more than just “go AI go I’m here lol kiting waiting for you to bring me home!”

Even my human character knows something’s wrong. I quote: “My pet needs help!”

If pets functioned properly then yes, current state no. You know full well when you create a Ranger that pets are involved so its not a surprise, but pathing issues, missing moving targets, running ahead X yards (also part of pathing), dying if anyone so much as looks in their direction, delayed special abilities. The list goes on, if the pets were fixed then yes we should be tied to them, its just unfortunate that they are poorly designed/coded.

If you don’t want the pet roll a warrior or thief.

Yes, Rangers should be reliant on their pets. Thats the way Rangers are designed and presented within THIS game. This isn’t GW1, its not DnD / old school fantasy, its Guild Wars 2 . Comparing the Ranger profession in this game to other games (even its predecessor) and saying “Well Rangers didn’t need pets in that game” means little, this game is its own thing and doesn’t need to adhere to what others do. In this game, Rangers are designed with a heavy reliance on their pets as partners. Thats how they’re designed and how they’re promoted.

I didn’t play Beta, so I don’t know if Rangers used to be something else early on, but from launch onward pets have been paramount to the Ranger, and thats enough time that radically changing the profession now should be avoided.

I agree that a permanent pet stow should be possible because at some times you just don’t want a pet around and taking the control out of the hands of the player is bad, but giving bonuses based on not using a pet, not so much. If you don’t want to use your profession mechanic, fine, but you shouldn’t expect to be rewarded for it and should expect the exact opposite, to be worse off for it (most of the time). Elementalists are free to ignore attune swapping, but will be at a disadvantage for doing so. Mesmers can largely ignore clones and shatters, but will be weaker for it. The only class that can really ignore their profession mechanic entirely and not be largely disadvantaged are Guardians, and thats only because virtues are passively buffing you anyway (and its still a disadvantage to ignore them completely, just not a huge one). They’re “profession” mechanics for a reason, because they define the profession and are a central core to it.

I know this is probably going to sound rude and thats not my intention, but if you don’t like the pet mechanic then you shouldn’t be playing a Ranger. And don’t say “But I want to play a Ranger, I just don’t want a pet”. If you don’t want a pet, you probably don’t actually want to play a GW2 Ranger, you want to play the “idea” of a Ranger, what you think a Ranger should be based on other media. Because in GW2 the Ranger goes hand-in-hand with the pet, in a way the pet is the class. If you just want to play a huntsman, then… well, really, play any class. We’re all running around the wilderness surviving outdoors and hunting animals.

As far as the general question of “Was it a good idea for the devs to design the class this way”…. eh, doesn’t really matter how anyone feels about it at this point, its done. Though personally I love the decision, I love pets and the Ranger class being reliant on them is fantastic in my own opinion. I love the co-depenency between Ranger and pet, its relatively unique and a step beyond how most other games I’ve played handle pets.

@Electro

I think you are correct about how it’s not our prerogative as players to determine the nature of the professions we are playing. We didn’t design the game after all, ANet did and they can do what the bloody well please I suppose.

However, I would still counter that there is something called “common expectations.” It would be strange, for instance, if Elementalists could wear heavy armor and use hammers(extreme case). And there was some chatter about how Warriors have good ranged abilities in this game. They aren’t complaining, or course, because it provides much larger adaptability for that class.

As to your break-down of class mechanics: if you took away every classes’ special mechanic, all of them, except the ranger, would still deal good damage. Ele’s, War’s, Thieves, etc would still hit hard and be comparable on a dps level. Rangers wouldn’t. That the pet damage is unreliable in 2 specific areas of the game(WvW and dungeons) I think is the main issue here. Especially since those are considered 2 of the major end-content areas. Leveling to 80 through PvE only you wouldn’t notice this difference in dps very much.

Am I wrong on that?