It’s been discussed a lot lately: there are problems with the Ranger. There are bugs that haven’t been fixed, the AI on pets is poor, many of the traits and skills are lackluster. The complaints go on-and-on.
Ranger has a special place in my heart — I’ve always loved the ranger archetype in fantasy, and seeing Ranger get so little attention made me just as sad as when we saw Necromancer suffering.
It’s not much, but here are a few suggestions I had for Ranger Shout changes. I’d love to hear all of your suggestions as well, and any feedback on the ideas I’m tossing out. Hopefully, if Anet sees the community putting some work into it, it’ll make them realize that we’re not just whining because we’re spoiled — we really want to see this class make a come back!
So, here I go:
The inherent problem with Ranger shouts, as they are is:
A They offer no team support, in the way that Guardian, Warrior, and Tempest Shouts do.*
All but one of the shouts only affect the ranger, the pet, or a single enemy, and the one shout that does affect allies, “Search & Rescue!” Only affects a single ally, can be interrupted by CCing or killing the pet, and has far too long of a cooldown (Currently longer than the Elite Shout). The only thing seriously useful about it is actually a bug that causes pet’s using “Search & Rescue!” To continue resurrecting an ally that is in the Defeated state, if they began resurrecting them while the ally was in the Downed state.
B They offer little to no damage increase or sustain, in the way that Reaper shouts do.
“Sic ’Em!” Only increases your pet’s damage and speed, and the 6 second Reveal can only affect a single target, and can only affect a target BEFORE they have entered stealth, as they must be targeted for the skill to affect them.
“Guard!” Is an incredibly useless skill that does not support you, your allies, or your pet’s damage or sustain. It’s only current use is as a short cooldown proc for Runes of the Trooper, or the Shout Trait, and for pet placement, which should be something you can do on your Profession mechanic bar, not something you have to allocate a slot on your Skill Bar for.
“Protect Me!” Is a powerful but flawed skill. First off, Rangers have Signet of Stone, another six second duration invulnerability skill. From a balancing standpoint, Rangers don’t need another. Not even Warriors, the tanks of Guild Wars 2, have invulnerability skills that last that long. Other classes that have shorter duration invulnerability skills cannot even attack while invulnerable. Balancing aside, however, this skill is flawed, as it rarely even reaches its six second duration, as only the bears can generally take the large amount of damage that the Ranger takes. You have to partner it with “Guard!” To get the pet out of range of cleave and AoEs, or with “Troll Ungent” To keep them alive — a skill should never rely on two other skills to function properly.
“We Heal As One!” Is a decent heal, in terms of cooldown and raw numbers, but frankly it’s boring. It’s the most simple and generic heal in the entire game. You cast it and heal yourself and your pet. That’s it.
“Strength to the Pack!” Is probably the best of the shouts, and this is definitely seen in the fact that it is one of the few shouts that is consistently used by players in all game modes. All-in-all, my only complaint about this one is that its cooldown is actually shorter than “Protect Me!” and “Search & Rescue!” The Elite skill in a set of Utilities should never be more accessible than other utility skills, which I think, speaks more to the other skills, than to “Strength to the Pack!” Itself.
So, now that I’ve explained the issues with the current shouts, I’ve made a few possible changes. Please note that these suggestions were made with the idea that Ranger Shouts should be more in-line with “A.” That is, that they should be more support oriented, aiding the Ranger and their allies. Some of you may feel that Ranger shouts should be more like “B,” and in some ways, I agree. Maybe, at some point, I’ll make a set of counter suggestions that fall in-line with that concept. For now, however, since we don’t know what Druid will bring to the table, what Ranger needs badly is better team support.
As always, the numbers are not final, and will need tweaking. Just a starting point.
Without further ado: Ranger Shouts
“Heal As One!”
Pets have trouble surviving in large scale encounters, everyone knows this. This shout provide the basic, large heal for the Ranger and their pet, while also providing a ten second buff to the pet that causes their next five attacks to steal health. This increases their damage in the next five attacks, while giving them continuous sustain in a fight while the effect lasts. It may not compete with Troll Ungent in terms of long-term sustain, but it allows for a different gameplay, as the skill is a burst heal, and of course, can be traited with “Nature’s Voice” and Runes of the Trooper to have more utility.
“Sic ’Em!”
This may be my opinion, but I find it odd that Stealth is a counter play for Rangers, from a lore perspective. Rangers are meant to be hunters who are skilled at spotting hidden prey. The original “Sic ’Em” ‘s main issue was that it had to be activated before an opponent stealthed to be effective. With this, it allows a Ranger to reveal enemies that are already stealthed, but for a much shorter time. This means, most importantly, that timing is seriously important. If you panic and use “Sic ’Em!” At the start of a Thief’s “Shadow Refuge,” then the Refuge will outlast the Reveal, and you will still have a stealthed Thief on your hands. It also means that enemy’s like Mossman can be Revealed after their stealth is active, instead of having to predict when he might be about to stealth and using it before.
Protect Us!"
This skill acts as a combination of “Protect Me!” and “Guard!” Bringing the best aspects of both skills to the table. It gives the Ranger access to “Guards!” ’s pet control, allowing you to send your pet to a specific location, and its pet sustain, while providing “Protect Me!” ’s self-sustain. This skill applies Protection in the area that the Pet is ordered to guard, pulsing two seconds of Protection every three seconds (One second of Protection downtime, unless traited to increase pet boon duration!). This means that it can be easily countered by AoE Boon corruption and rip skills, like “Null Field” and “Well of Corruption.”
“On The Hunt!”
Similarly to “Sic ’Em!” I always found it strange that Rangers, the hunters, had such little access to stealth in their kitten nal. I always thought that, like “Hunter’s Shot,” Rangers should have access to a variety of short stealth skills, rather than access to longer stealth like Thieves and Mesmers. This skill reflects that, applying a short, AoE stealth to your allies. Any amount of stealth helps in dungeons, and the short cooldown means it can be quickly swapped in and out between running sections, making it a good partner to Engineer’s and Mesmers, if a party doesn’t have a thief. In WvW and PvP, it allows for quick stealth for resurrecting, stomping, and switch plays.
“Search & Rescue!”
I’m particularly proud of this one, as it keeps to the original design, while borrowing some recent tech used in the Specialization Feature Patch. Essentially, rather than resurrecting a single ally, this skill functions the same as the Necromancer, Blood Magic Specialization Grandmaster Trait “Transfusion.” It pulls nearby downed allies to the pet’s position (Only 3, instead of five, like the Necromancer Trait) and resurrects them, in much the same way as the original “Search & Rescue!” It has plenty of fun counter play, as stacking all those dead bodies has a chance to make things much worse, but if played properly, can change the course of a fight. Some of the issues of the original “Search & Rescue!” Remain, like being able to kill the pet, but I think, considering the rather short Cooldown, that’s fair.
“Strength to the Pack!”
I still think this skill is in a good place as it is, but keeping with the idea of a support themed set of shouts, I realized that one aspect of the skill could be tweaked to make the Ranger far more viable in team-play. Currently, when you and your pet hit an enemy, you grant each other a stack of might for about eight to ten seconds. In this rendition, you now grant might for six seconds to allies in an area around you. This gives the Ranger a brief, ten second, Phalanx Strength-esque support style, which will seriously help their party viability in high-level Fractals and hard-core dungeon running.
That’s all of the ideas I had, for now. I’m actually working with a friend on a set of “selfish” shout suggestions, to go along with the way the Reaper’s Shouts work.
I love hearing suggestions from all of you, on how to make things more balanced or more streamlined. The more of us that pitch in, the more likely Anet is to take notice of some of the issues that we are bringing up.
(edited by SimpleCrow.5309)