Guild Wars 2

Been gone a long time, came back to see new trait system. Whats up with spirits? Most of their traits are gone and the one to have them follow you seems to be entirely removed

Yes it was removed, spirits really are only useful in pve, and only then when you are going to be in one place for long enough to benefit such as dungeons.

Basically yea. They blow more now than they ever did. Whats funny is the patch that made them immobile happen months and months ago but some of the spirits have not had their effect range increased to compensate. Nature spirit for example still has the same 240 effect range it always had but now its immobile . . .

Indeed – I’ve been trying to give spirits a go the past few days but they really are just too weak right now. To make them worth slotting they need something added – maybe one (or more?) of the following:

• Follow the player
• Immune to damage
• Much larger effect range
• Affect more players simultaneously
• Lower cool down
• Don’t die upon activation

They removed the follow-trait, that the engineer has a total cool specialization -.-

Kitty.1502:

Yes it was removed, spirits really are only useful in pve, and only then when you are going to be in one place for long enough to benefit such as dungeons.

and only then when the boss doesn’t have an aoe which will wipe them out…

Most of the traits are gone but

• + Base 70% chance on hit
• + More damaging stacks
• + ‘Bigger’ burst skill

But but

• - Can’t move.
• - Die on skill use
• - Die if someone sneezes on them even when traited

The ONE trait

• Doubles their health – they still die withing seconds. I feel developpers forgot that now BURNING stacks, POISON stacks, BLEEDS stack much higher so conditions wipe them instantly)
• Makes them grant a pulsing boon that they FINALLY balanced a bit… it was 1s of the specific boon every 3s… How useless is that… Now some of the boons are 3s every 3s. Still crap. 1 stack might is barely noticeable.
• Larger AoE for active skill. – but they still die. And no CD reduction.

Yeah, Spirits Unbound is gone

Scrapper got gyros that follow it around.
Herald got pulsing boons around itself.

This is exactly what has happened to Ranger before GW2 was released, they took all the great skills and functionality of it from GW1 and gave it to other classes, we are playing the leftovers.

Actually spirit is better for team fight now. Running nature will passively keep your pet at 15-20 might stacks all the time and also perma/near perma protection. Team gets 10% dmg buff and bosses get almost 100% uptime 25 stacks invul. It losed mobility but it def got something else.

It is a spirit and I would love anet to change it into a special effect like aura cast on self by ranger and when alliez are nearby will get the bonus effect so that spirit dont die and now mobile because it is part of you.

lxghostxl.5097:

It is a spirit and I would love anet to change it into a special effect like aura cast on self by ranger and when alliez are nearby will get the bonus effect so that spirit dont die and now mobile because it is part of you.

They could just make them wisps like the Druid ones. They could even remove the active effects for balance and I wouldn’t care in the slightest.

Terra.8571:

Kitty.1502:

Yes it was removed, spirits really are only useful in pve, and only then when you are going to be in one place for long enough to benefit such as dungeons.

and only then when the boss doesn’t have an aoe which will wipe them out…

I wanted to mention this: spirits proc their effects until their corpse disappears. In the case of Frost Spirit, for instance, the buff doesn’t actually go away until 15 seconds have elapsed after the spirit dies and the skill goes on cooldown. We can summon another spirit five seconds later. I usually find that spirits last “long enough” in dungeons.

To give it a special touch, put the “spirit-wisps” on our pets!

Spirits are pretty lackluster at the moment, even more due to these two bugs.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Ranger-spirits-do-not-prioritize-characters/

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Ranger-spirits-not-affected-by-boon-duration/

MrSmiley.1543:

Been gone a long time, came back to see new trait system. Whats up with spirits? Most of their traits are gone and the one to have them follow you seems to be entirely removed

Yep spirits are now totally useless, nothing interesting and very boring, they took away every thing that made spirits pleasant same with traps, no longer throw-able… TWO major ranger mechanics gone BAM.

They die too easily, and are only useful in a handful of bosses, I’ll be using Hunter Signet instead until they either make them unkillable or rework Nature’s Vengeance to actually make them useful.

Sun Spirit is still good if you’re a sinister ranger, though.

It’s funny how druid can help spirits to stay alive longer. Also, it’s a shame that Anet gutted the Guild Wars 1 ranger to make the Guild Wars 2 ranger.

Where are all the great stances we had?
Where are all the spirits that used to have a near infinite range?
Where are all the preparations?

They’re basically terrible gimmicks of banners

Boy do I wanna run Spirit Druid… But the current state of spirits is very sad… A few tweaks could make them viable.

Base Changes

• Rework player priority (will often apply effects to NPCs, Other Spirits, Pets, etc before player characters)
• -33% Condition Damage reduction – Poison and burning now stack, and bleeds stack much higher, so conditions are more potent
• -20% Direct Damage reduction – they get killed by the wind, and there are more and more AoE skills
• Mobility – Come’on. A profession focused on mobility? Make it traitable like before but please bring back mobility.
• Make most boons last 3s per pulse. They die quick, and they die on active. see details below
• Make them activate their active effect on death – perhaps traited
• Make most of them create a field on active use/death – details below

Water Spirit

• Make the active/death create a Water Field 3s
• Tweak the healing coefficient
• Add a small 5% healing efficiency passive bonus? – this healing skill feels very lackluster

Frost Spirit

• Make the active/death create an Ice Field 3s
• Add a damage component to the active
• Change traited Boon to Fury

Stone Spirit

• Lower passive effect recharge from 10s to 8s
• Change traited Boon to a 1 stack, 3s stability -protection + traited protection feels a bit redundant despite the boon’s utility

Sun Spirit

• Make the active/death create a Fire Field 3s
• Change traited Boon to a 2 stacks, 3s Might

Storm Spirit

• Make the active/death create a Lightning Field 3s
• If spirits become mobile, swiftness is good. Good alternatives are also 3s Vigor or 1s Quickness (only Boon not to pulse for 3s base)

Spirit of the Wild

• Make the active/death create a Light Field 3s
• Change the traited Boon to Resistance, 1s every 3s
• Lower cooldown to 90s – since it now dies on active like other spirits. 120s is darn long

Did anyone try spirit druid during the beta?

They might be better now since all the Druid’s aoe heals will help keep them alive.

Can stack all those boons on yourself with whao as well.

Maybe spirit bunker will be a thing again.

In terms of comparison,

• Engie turrets can also grant boons, are ranged, have 2 ‘active’ skills (F1-F5 skills), have 4 different traits, and for the longest time were immune to condis
• Scrappers are getting Gyros, mobile turrets. Again 2 ‘active’ skills and 3 different traits
• Warriors have Banners, indestructible summons that can be wielded (mobility), grant direct attribute bonuses, can be traited for perma regen.
• Heralds can grant perma Swiftness, Fury, Might, Regen up to 5 allies (and of course are mobile)

Lévis.5489:

It’s funny how druid can help spirits to stay alive longer. Also, it’s a shame that Anet gutted the Guild Wars 1 ranger to make the Guild Wars 2 ranger.

Where are all the great stances we had?
Where are all the spirits that used to have a near infinite range?
Where are all the preparations?

I miss preparations, in current game conditions are just kitten. I did love preparations so much! Wish GW2 was more like GW1, if i had chance to go back there to pvp i would! No doubt!

Sube Dai.8496:

Did anyone try spirit druid during the beta?

They might be better now since all the Druid’s aoe heals will help keep them alive.

Can stack all those boons on yourself with whao as well.

Maybe spirit bunker will be a thing again.

You’re never going to outheal cleave and condi on spirits in a teamfight even though I like your idea.

Spirits are fine in raids so far. They’re actually pretty optimal.

Pets don’t get hurt by AOE in raid fights (thank you Anet) and, while it probably isn’t intended, pets/minions/etc. count as bodies needed for the lightning circle on the Guardian boss – A Druid can handle the mechanic by him or herself sometimes. lol

Take that, banners.

spirits have their place, and they give interesting effect, but my problem right now with them is that you can’t manually place them in order to ensure they live.

To sum up

Spirits needs in order to be viable in pvp:
1) to be ground targeted
2) to create appropriate combo field on their active
3) the elite one need 600 radius just like the others
4) to have the same animation speed than sun spirit which is faster for a mysterious reason
5) to scale with ranger’s stats (which again only sun spirit does for some mysterious reason)
6) rework the trait to be really worth taking compared to protective ward

Speed up the cast time while we’re at it, to match with speed they have underwater.