Guild Wars 2

I don’t play a ranger, but I dislike the whole class mechanic of being “required” to use a pet.

Maybe it’s just me, but I liked in Guild Wars 1 how you could spec entirely without a pet, to work with a pet, or entirely relying on a pet(ok so my gale+bestial mauling build was a bit silly, but it worked in RA).

I know you can stow the pet, and I know you can spec without the pet in mind. I just feel that the Ranger deserves a mechanic that allows for complete abandonment of the pet.

Again, maybe it’s just me, ‘cause I don’t really play a ranger. How do people who actually play Rangers, feel about pets?(quirky pet mechanics aside)

Thing is though, after the huge PvE update for the ranger in GW1 it was pretty clear (or at least, very strongly encouraged) for you to bring your pet with you. I played GW1 since the summer it was released and I can count the number of people who had points in beastmastery on one hand, including myself and my brother.
What happened was everyone shoved the pet away without a second though and decided to be a dedicated archer.

I’ll save the arguments about build validity in GW1 for another day; the point is, GW2’s ranger is specifically designed to work with the pet. If you can dump the pet then many people will, and suddenly all you have is a wanna-be-warrior that can’t match them, because (surprise surprise) the warrior is supposed to be the best in a simple 1v1 punchup.
The whole ‘I don’t want to use my pet’ thing always strieks me as really dumb. Even before the beta, Anet were making a big deal about the pets being an important part of the ranger’s class, and many of the weapon skills ‘prep’ the target for their pet (eg, longsword’s autoattack chain gives the pet Might). Why the massive hangup for this? It’s like a mesmer deciding they’d rather not use phantasms of illusions or clones? Or engineers deciding they’d rather not bother with toolkits and their toolbelt. People were told going in the pet was going to be Very Important, and then start wanting to ignore it?

Rant aside, the pets themselves are (ignoring the ‘quirks’) pretty kitten powerful. They also give you playstyles, in the sense depending on what pet you take, you yourself end up playing quite differently. The Jungle/canyon Spider lets you snare and dot a target. The dogs give good crowd control. Grabbing a sword or greatsword and wading in with a drake lets you belt out alarming amounts of damage in melee.

All accurate points loki, but I think rangers should be given the option to remove pets. The main reason I think rangers don’t want to use their pet in the current state is because of their functionality, or lack of. Some quick examples being the pets inability to revive you 50% of the time when you hit “3” while downed (give me something else if I don’t have my pet out that work 100% of the time). Pet AI running past the enemy player and then backtracking toward them to never land a blow because the player is constantly changing directions (pets can hit moving targets fairly well, they simple cannot hit targets that change direction rapidly). Pets do almost nothing but die in most dungeons. I could keep going on, but you get the point.

If given the option, I’m sure some player will remove pets entirely from their build, but I think that pets should still be a crucial part of the ranger profession. I see it more as a “hotfix” than anything. I would forgo my pet for all dungeons because of how they are more of a detriment than anything else. In other words, I don’t want player to be rewarded for not using their pets, but I still want to see the option at least until pet reliability is improved.

I realize that was more of a talk about the quirks than anything, but I honestly feel like that is the rangers main complaint about having to use the pet at this point.

Playing, or trying to play a longbow build, the only use I see for my pet, is as a distraction. I run in a very organized guildteam doing wvw, and most of the time, pet s on passive, to avoid it training me. Id gladly let go of the pet. Maybe make that an option for the ones whos silly enough to go marksman. For those playing more melee oriented, i can see the benefits clearer, but thats not me. I have a gurdian when I wanna melee.

Indoles.1467:

All accurate points loki, but I think rangers should be given the option to remove pets. The main reason I think rangers don’t want to use their pet in the current state is because of their functionality, or lack of..

So don’t do a Bioware and just throw the thing out entirely because it’s got some problems. Get it fixed. I’m not stupid, I know the pets have problems but that’s hardly justification for removing them entirely.

Loki.4871:

Indoles.1467:

All accurate points loki, but I think rangers should be given the option to remove pets. The main reason I think rangers don’t want to use their pet in the current state is because of their functionality, or lack of..

So don’t do a Bioware and just throw the thing out entirely because it’s got some problems. Get it fixed. I’m not stupid, I know the pets have problems but that’s hardly justification for removing them entirely.

Agreed. I’ve personally had a beef with people who suggest a permanent stow with a stat increase, because it seems to just fly in the face of the class design. Pets are meant to be integral to the ranger, so why should you get rewarded for ignoring them completely?

Now, this doesn’t mean I think pets are perfect now, far from it. You’re right, Loki, you gotta work on them rather than hiding them behind the boxes in the garage and hope people don’t bring it up again. Increase responsiveness, reduce the amount of rooting they have on attack. Hell, I think damage redistribution might work too; Maybe give like 15-25% of the pet’s damage back to the ranger. But don’t try to lop off your arm.

Loki.4871:

Even before the beta, Anet were making a big deal about the pets being an important part of the ranger’s class, and many of the weapon skills ‘prep’ the target for their pet (eg, longsword’s autoattack chain gives the pet Might). Why the massive hangup for this? It’s like a mesmer deciding they’d rather not use phantasms of illusions or clones? Or engineers deciding they’d rather not bother with toolkits and their toolbelt. People were told going in the pet was going to be Very Important, and then start wanting to ignore it?

For me at least, the ability to completely negate this setup is frustrating. In order to make the skill chain attractive, the pet’s damage has to be sufficiently high enough to make these skills non-ignorable. Of course, if you make a mistake or your pet’s AI doesn’t allow it to use your perfectly timed set up, it’s prohibitively costly on gameplay.

The other mechanics you mentioned are more ‘fire and forget’ which, I would personally like more. I enjoy the thought of symbiotic dps, but to manage a small pet in the midst of a crowded DE proves difficult trying to see where the little red circles are for aoe.

I feel like I’m probably restating what you said, but I’d like to see them more as a DoT with art (able to consistently stay on target and survive), or maybe represent less overal dps (say 10%), so skillful players would get that extra 10% out of high pet uptime on the current frail pets.

Zotiko.3740:

Loki.4871:

Even before the beta, Anet were making a big deal about the pets being an important part of the ranger’s class, and many of the weapon skills ‘prep’ the target for their pet (eg, longsword’s autoattack chain gives the pet Might). Why the massive hangup for this? It’s like a mesmer deciding they’d rather not use phantasms of illusions or clones? Or engineers deciding they’d rather not bother with toolkits and their toolbelt. People were told going in the pet was going to be Very Important, and then start wanting to ignore it?

For me at least, the ability to completely negate this setup is frustrating. In order to make the skill chain attractive, the pet’s damage has to be sufficiently high enough to make these skills non-ignorable. Of course, if you make a mistake or your pet’s AI doesn’t allow it to use your perfectly timed set up, it’s prohibitively costly on gameplay.

The other mechanics you mentioned are more ‘fire and forget’ which, I would personally like more. I enjoy the thought of symbiotic dps, but to manage a small pet in the midst of a crowded DE proves difficult trying to see where the little red circles are for aoe.

I feel like I’m probably restating what you said, but I’d like to see them more as a DoT with art (able to consistently stay on target and survive), or maybe represent less overal dps (say 10%), so skillful players would get that extra 10% out of high pet uptime on the current frail pets.

I would rather them make the pets more sturdy and deal more damage and not worry about the whole lack of hitting moving targets, it allows for good pet rangers to punish the enemy by snaring and rooting them, which is pretty much how it works currently…

Durzlla.6295:

I would rather them make the pets more sturdy and deal more damage and not worry about the whole lack of hitting moving targets, it allows for good pet rangers to punish the enemy by snaring and rooting them, which is pretty much how it works currently…

Option A works for me too. Here’s to hoping the Devs are reading.

I hope they do fix the pets. It just reminds me of how a beastmaster was never really viable in GW1 because of clunky pet mechanics.

I didn’t really mean my post as a knock to the idea of pets, I just hate to see a class that suffers because of an NPC that your sort of forced to drag around.

Glad to see people like their pets and just want them to work.

I would never give up my pets. Despite the current clunkiness of them, they are so useful. I would die for my pet! And my pet would do the same for me XD

Angriff.1935:

I hope they do fix the pets. It just reminds me of how a beastmaster was never really viable in GW1 because of clunky pet mechanics.

Oh, you’re sooo wrong with that statement!

Angriff.1935:

I didn’t really mean my post as a knock to the idea of pets, I just hate to see a class that suffers because of an NPC that your sort of forced to drag around.

Agree here though, but the fix isn’t the removal of our pets, the fix is to fix pet issues. Impossible? Hardly!

Angriff.1935:

I hope they do fix the pets. It just reminds me of how a beastmaster was never really viable in GW1 because of clunky pet mechanics.

I didn’t really mean my post as a knock to the idea of pets, I just hate to see a class that suffers because of an NPC that your sort of forced to drag around.

Glad to see people like their pets and just want them to work.

Cause you know…. great dwarf weapon + call of haste + melandrus assault wasn’t OP in the slightest… or you know….Enraged Lunge and QZ… Ah… how i miss that…

Really, I don’t care about a stat increase or whatever to make me viable without a pet. Just give me a permanent stow option so that I’m not FORCED to use the pet the moment I enter combat. Let ME control when I want to use a pet or not.

agnostAnts.7065:

Loki.4871:

Indoles.1467:

All accurate points loki, but I think rangers should be given the option to remove pets. The main reason I think rangers don’t want to use their pet in the current state is because of their functionality, or lack of..

So don’t do a Bioware and just throw the thing out entirely because it’s got some problems. Get it fixed. I’m not stupid, I know the pets have problems but that’s hardly justification for removing them entirely.

Agreed. I’ve personally had a beef with people who suggest a permanent stow with a stat increase, because it seems to just fly in the face of the class design. Pets are meant to be integral to the ranger, so why should you get rewarded for ignoring them completely?

Now, this doesn’t mean I think pets are perfect now, far from it. You’re right, Loki, you gotta work on them rather than hiding them behind the boxes in the garage and hope people don’t bring it up again. Increase responsiveness, reduce the amount of rooting they have on attack. Hell, I think damage redistribution might work too; Maybe give like 15-25% of the pet’s damage back to the ranger. But don’t try to lop off your arm.

That was my suggestion in a thread a bit back actually. I actually like my pet at times, but there are times that are inconvenient to have one, and the perma stow option with damage increase would be amazing for tactical play. I mean, its not like pets live forever, killing a pet is almost a sure way to kill a ranger most of the time, and when that happens you lose 50% of your damage and utility, especially if you use signets of any kind. I wanted to be a archer and snipe, having a pet doesnt always allow for that. Being able to pick and choose when to send him out without kittening my damage is the entire reason for that idea.

An example, sometimes pets cant path, so my pet just sits by me and my damage drops by insane amounts, other times my pet dies so fast I cant pull him out fast enough, or if I manage too I cant send my new pet in for fear of insta gibbing, therefor, my damage gets lowered, alot. No other class has this issue, mesmers can use clones without problem, they even go through terrain, and teleport. Engineers can use toolkits even up on ledges. An example, I unfortunately got snagged in a 3v1 fight, a 2 thieves and a warrior, well I killed 1 thief before he reached me, I figured I was going to die so I tried to pump out as much dps as I could on the downed thief so when I go down my pet and I could kill him and rally, I switched pets, and ran in bow range to attack the downed thief, pet trailing a bit behind me, warrior and thief rush/teleport to me and pistol start backstabing/100blading me, my pet passing by them to get to the downed thief died in .5 seconds from 100b aoe…even if I managed to survive that with say lightning reflexes I couldnt have done anything, pet died, my damage without him isnt enough to kill anyone worth their salt.

Pve has its own sets of issues, having a perma stow option would help tremendously in dungeons, close packed areas, and WvW, while even with the option the skilled rangers can still choose when to send pet out, it gives them a even playing field with other classes by not having killable dps all the kitten time. Id personally send my pet out when Im stunned, or being CCed, or when the target is starting to flee, send pet out and flank him in a pincer attack. Other times when I wanna snipe, Ill hide pet depending on the situation and become a deadly ranged fighter without fear of pet dying from a random aoe. Hell I use troll unguent to pre regen pet before he goes into combat, and that leaves me massively vulnerable to any1 attacking me.

Point is, the suggestion and idea most likely wont ever happen sadly, but it wasnt because I or most people hate pets, but because pets are broken, die easily, and are overall a burden in most situations. Sure they have amazing potential and perks, I love my ravens and love it when they kill people but when they die in 1-2 seconds from 1 enemy, it becomes a burden, when they cant fly down a kitten wall to attack a target, it becomes a burden. Why should we be the only 1 with easily killed dps and weakened dps because of a AI we cant fully control.

Just Roll a Warrior with a Longbow.

Aylpse.6280:

Just Roll a Warrior with a Longbow.

If you are speaking to me, its obvious you didnt read the post, I personally want an archer sniper, warrior longbow has that medieval longbowman feel where they lobbed arrows in volleys but with 900 range, and I dont feel like having beefy armor while shooting me bow. The OP has a right to want no pet, if any1 rolls a warrior for its ranged aspects Id suggest rifle, however longbow is bad kitten so I would use it as a secondary for its aoe.

I support the idea of the lone ranger.
I don’t see why people wont support it.
nobody is forcing you to play whiteout your pet, but i am forced to play with it.

yeah.. i think i’d be better with out the pets, given that there’s an option to perma stow it and get the bonus stats from the pet.. if we are forced to work with a pet, then let the pet work properly, i can’t even count how many times my pet ran pass the enemy, with how the pet’s ai is now a ranger should have an option to play with or without their pets

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

@Shilian.5873
People won’t support it because the ranger is a pet class. A ranger is not called a sniper for good reasons. You want a ranged class with no pets, roll a warrior. They can use rifles and snipe.

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

IF it gets fixed… IF not, im stuck with a pet that gives me trouble,i wanted a ranger not a tamer, i hafta constantly look at its hp heal if its low and swap if its about to die and press f2 for its skill, its like taking care of a baby lol

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Go ahead and make your own topic. I’ll keep count of how many people laugh at your ridiculous suggestion.

Swagger.1372:

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

IF it gets fixed… IF not, im stuck with a pet that gives me trouble,i wanted a ranger not a tamer, i hafta constantly look at its hp heal if its low and swap if its about to die and press f2 for its skill, its like taking care of a baby lol

Try using a ranged pet like a spider or devourer, they don’t require as much attention since they aren’t in the front line taking heat. Or get a tanky pet like a bear. It doesn’t require that much attention anyway…heal when its low, swap when its dying, etc etc…If I didn’t have a pet to manage it’ll be quite boring, tbh

Well think about it this way….the damage the pet is taking is the damage you would otherwise be eating—-so its actually helping you out a lot. When your pet is defeated and you have to go ‘solo’, you’d notice its a lot harder.

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Go ahead and make your own topic. I’ll keep count of how many people laugh at your ridiculous suggestion.

i didn’t say anything about making a new topic… why don’t you make one, you thought of it first…

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Go ahead and make your own topic. I’ll keep count of how many people laugh at your ridiculous suggestion.

i didn’t say anything about making a new topic… why don’t you make one, you thought of it first…

Are you twelve years old or something? You’re the one who came with the ridiculous notion that rangers should be renamed to ‘tamers’. If you want them to be renamed that badly, go over to the suggestions forum and make a new topic. If not, then stop wasting my time.

monepipi.5160:

Swagger.1372:

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

IF it gets fixed… IF not, im stuck with a pet that gives me trouble,i wanted a ranger not a tamer, i hafta constantly look at its hp heal if its low and swap if its about to die and press f2 for its skill, its like taking care of a baby lol

Try using a ranged pet like a spider or devourer, they don’t require as much attention since they aren’t in the front line taking heat. Or get a tanky pet like a bear. It doesn’t require that much attention anyway…heal when its low, swap when its dying, etc etc…If I didn’t have a pet to manage it’ll be quite boring, tbh

Well think about it this way….the damage the pet is taking is the damage you would otherwise be eating—-so its actually helping you out a lot. When your pet is defeated and you have to go ‘solo’, you’d notice its a lot harder.

hmmm not really that hard to solo.. cuz its mostly DE’s so there are many people around… what im try to say is they made rangers to pair with their pets, its like the pets is roughly 30-40% of your pairs output damage? (correct me if im wrong ) but it wouldn’t matter much if the pets them selves don’t work properly..

i see a monster press f1 the pet runs pass the monster the monster comes to me i end up bein the damage taker so id dodge/roll while attacking, so the monster would follow me hence the pet would have a hard time following and hitting the monster maybe get 2-3 hits in

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Go ahead and make your own topic. I’ll keep count of how many people laugh at your ridiculous suggestion.

i didn’t say anything about making a new topic… why don’t you make one, you thought of it first…

Are you twelve years old or something? You’re the one who came with the ridiculous notion that rangers should be renamed to ‘tamers’. If you want them to be renamed that badly, go over to the suggestions forum and make a new topic. If not, then stop wasting my time.

well if i meant it that seriously i would have suggested it in the suggestion forums.. im 13 by the way, whats your excuse ?

Swagger.1372:

monepipi.5160:

Swagger.1372:

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

IF it gets fixed… IF not, im stuck with a pet that gives me trouble,i wanted a ranger not a tamer, i hafta constantly look at its hp heal if its low and swap if its about to die and press f2 for its skill, its like taking care of a baby lol

Try using a ranged pet like a spider or devourer, they don’t require as much attention since they aren’t in the front line taking heat. Or get a tanky pet like a bear. It doesn’t require that much attention anyway…heal when its low, swap when its dying, etc etc…If I didn’t have a pet to manage it’ll be quite boring, tbh

Well think about it this way….the damage the pet is taking is the damage you would otherwise be eating—-so its actually helping you out a lot. When your pet is defeated and you have to go ‘solo’, you’d notice its a lot harder.

hmmm not really that hard to solo.. cuz its mostly DE’s so there are many people around… what im try to say is they made rangers to pair with their pets, its like the pets is roughly 30-40% of your pairs output damage? (correct me if im wrong ) but it wouldn’t matter much if the pets them selves don’t work properly..

i see a monster press f1 the pet runs pass the monster the monster comes to me i end up bein the damage taker so id dodge/roll while attacking, so the monster would follow me hence the pet would have a hard time following and hitting the monster maybe get 2-3 hits in

Let the pet hit the monster 1st. If you shoot it before the pet hits the monster will most likely go after you instead. This could also happen if you deal too much damage relative to your pet, thereby drawing aggro to yourself. Do you have any points in beastmastery?

@ monepipi..

sorry don’t wanna make this to a long quote, i will always do more damage than my pet.. yes i have one major trait “master’s bond” i think that’s the only useful trait in bm

Angriff.1935:

I hope they do fix the pets. It just reminds me of how a beastmaster was never really viable in GW1 because of clunky pet mechanics.

OgMU8ELfzcS4G0GyS/G8GrM8gcGA

Above is the code for what is probably one of the most broken builds in Guildwars 1. The pets had corner-tanking issues, but the above was almost always powerful enough for you to just punch through it, and once you learned how the pet AI worked it became stupidly easy to compensate for it (much like the hench/hero AI).

By the same extent, you can compensate for the pet AI.

The pet will:
1. Attack what you’ve got targeted. Not what you’re attacking, but you’ve clicked on and who’s portrait and health bar is in the top middle. The only exception to this, is if you’ve F1’d a target, then selected something else. This is one of the most common things rangers do (or let happen) from what I’ve discovered chatting to others; they target something off in the distance, then start a fight with something nearby, without changing their target, so off the pet goes across the map, aggro’ing stuff to attack what you’ve targeted.
2. The pet’s F2 can be interrupted/cancelled with F1. Useful for a Drake, when the target’s moved out of it’s breath attack.
3. The pet will (if you’re just standing there like a ninny) try to attack what’s hurting you.
4.The pet will drop what it’s doing and come to you if you press F3. I won’t lie, I’m not sure if they’ll stay idle if you keep attacking the same target and only join in if you change target, or if they attack after returning to your side. Point is, they’ll drop what they’re doing and come to your asap so remember that when you see something winding up a telegraphekittenel-u attack.

The pets have trouble with AoE, yes. I find it’s generally limited, however I’m using 30BM with Natural Healing and Compassion Training and a Signet of the Wild, so the pets have pretty ferocious durability; I can reasonably expect them to solo most groups on the surface of PvE, and it’s usually only really nasty stuff like being mobbed or hit with the high powered boss attacks in dungeons that down the pet. Keep the AI limitations in mind, pay attention to the pet’s health bar and just accept that when it’s health is low you either need to heal it or switch it.

Could the pet do with more durability/damage when you don’t have 30 BM points in it? No comment. Beastmaster was the first traitline I put points into and the first I maxed, so it’s a non-issue for me. I’d prefer to see the minor traits for tier 1 and 2 swapped though, to reinforce the pet switching and for the tier 1 and 2 major traits to be reasonably useful though. (eg: cripple for pets that cripple/chill/immobilize? Greaaaaat…)

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Swagger.1372:

Agadar.4931:

Pets are part of the ranger class. If you want to play an archer, then roll a longbow warrior. If you don’t want to roll a longbow warrior, then find yourself another game.

if pets are part of this class then this class shouldn’t be called a ranger then… tamer as a name would fit this class properly

Go ahead and make your own topic. I’ll keep count of how many people laugh at your ridiculous suggestion.

i didn’t say anything about making a new topic… why don’t you make one, you thought of it first…

Are you twelve years old or something? You’re the one who came with the ridiculous notion that rangers should be renamed to ‘tamers’. If you want them to be renamed that badly, go over to the suggestions forum and make a new topic. If not, then stop wasting my time.

well if i meant it that seriously i would have suggested it in the suggestion forums.. im 13 by the way, whats your excuse ?

I admit, that reply made me chuckle. But we digress. Back to the topic at hand.

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

@Shilian.5873
People won’t support it because the ranger is a pet class. A ranger is not called a sniper for good reasons. You want a ranged class with no pets, roll a warrior. They can use rifles and snipe.

Yea except no other class has to lower their damage in pve or pvp to avoid letting it die. We put pets on passive because in dungeons it dies in 1-2 hits, if it dies we are pretty much screwed since mobs take a bit to kill. Phrase it however you want but being weaker than everyone gets old. The idea was we get to stow pets forever if we want but when they are stowed since we lose their damage we gain a damage buff. Its logical, and smart, saying its not is naive. As I said, it wont happen, anet wants us to be all pets all the time but as someone else said, I wanted a ranger, not a tamer. I wont be pigeon holed into BM.

indeed as dante said… putting too much trait points to BM just to make the pets survive longer ? perform better? that’s absurd, and not to mention minor & major pet traits are everywhere, you can find 2 pet major traits in skirmishing, wilderness and nature .. why didn’t they just put it all in BM… sigh

Swagger.1372:

indeed as dante said… putting too much trait points to BM just to make the pets survive longer ? perform better? that’s absurd, and not to mention minor & major pet traits are everywhere, you can find 2 pet major traits in skirmishing, wilderness, nature and beastmastery .. why didn’t they just put it all in BM… sigh

Because no one in Anet actually plays a Ranger and they assumed that we would just scatter points all over the place and try to do a little bit of everything like idiots instead of trying to streamline our builds like intelligent people.

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

@Shilian.5873
People won’t support it because the ranger is a pet class. A ranger is not called a sniper for good reasons. You want a ranged class with no pets, roll a warrior. They can use rifles and snipe.

No, it would be like a mesmer saying “No i don’t want to use shatters”, because that’s the mesmers class mechanic. Shatters. Clones and phantasms are summoning skills.

Someone on this forum said it the best i think. We are the only class so heavily reliant on our class mechanic. A warrior can still be good without adrenaline. An engineer can still work without his tool belt. A mesmer has builds that don’t shatter. An ele can work by staying in one attunement. A guardian works perfectly fine without touching his virtues outside of the small passives. The only thing death shroud does for a necromancer is gives them a quick second HP bar and they don’t need to rely on it constantly.

That leaves us and thieves. Thieves get a steal mechanic that they don’t really need to use, an initiative system that makes them OP and allows great versatility, and different skills for dual wielding which is awesome.

We get a clunky AI partner that’s barely effective, hard to control, dies quickly unless we micromanage him constantly, has numerous pathing issues, and is supposed to deal 45% of our damage making us horribly weak if we lose them.

Also, telling other people that if they don’t like pets they should play another class would be fine if pets were the only thing attractive about the ranger class. There are far more reasons to play a ranger. It’s simply an awesome class with great ideas behind it. It’s unique from the other classes and gives off a feeling of agility that thieves don’t have. Right now there are plenty of people out there who love the feel of the class and can’t find it in any of the other classes, but think that the pet is annoying.

I still think it would be cool to build a ranger without a pet. Ranger’s would be the only class with 2 different class mechanics if it were to become a reality. Versatility is a Ranger’s game.

And to clarify this:

Angriff.1935:

It just reminds me of how a beastmaster was never really viable in GW1 because of clunky pet mechanics.

I never touched a ranger outside of PvP in GW1.

PS: Bunny Thumpers anyone? I vote hammers for Rangers.

remove pets, give us more damage… and add rifle and pistols

I would love to not be forced to use a pet. I don’t actually mind the idea of pets, but they are just too unreliable. I definitely don’t like the fact that they make up 45% of our damage, that’s way too much to rely on the AI.

Like others have said, Ranger HEAVILY relies on it’s class mechanic. The thing is the mechanic is holding us back. I would be much happier if they gave Rangers the 45% damage back, made pets do little to no damage and instead were only used for their utility, but could not be killed.

Or remove them all together. I know some people really like them (and it’s not like I hate them) but I highly doubt Anet is going to improve the AI at all. Put the power back in the players hands, don’t tie it down to something we can’t control.

sadly i don’t think they’l ever fix this or remake rangers… its all just wishful thinking

Profession Mechanics aren’t created in a vacuum.
Mesmer gets Shatter because it’s skills summon a ton of functional cannonfodder meatshields. Necromancer gets more HP because it’s skills are attrition-based. If you wanted to remove the pet from Ranger, the skills you’re so fond of would have to become different in order to compensate for the new mechanic.

I like the idea of the lone ranger. It really isn’t hard to see how it would work, while the ranger as a whole would still remain pet friendly.

Allow for pet stowing to be fully player controlled. Stowed pets stay stowed until you recall them… manually… yourself. This should be added no matter what else they do anyway, as is the auto summon is frustrating and annoying.

Then add a trait, likely in marksman, that gives a minor damage bonus if the ranger doesn’t have an active pet. Tuned to be less of a boost than a pet. Then it’d always make sense in most situations to use a pet… but still have the option to go petless without fully kittened mode in those situations pets do you no good at all.

The side effect of this, besides just making sense in general? It allows people who otherwise really love the Ranger, but hate the pet… to play the way they would like to play the game. And while being slightly less effective than they otherwise could be if they embraced pets… at least still functional on a more relative scale. It would be an option, even if not a great one.

We wouldn’t see millions of new lone rangers everywhere. But there would be some. And what would be the harm in that? O_o You could still have your pets, hell, you’d still be highly encouraged to have your pets… but at least you have options.

There are traits in the other professions that actively or passively benefit you for not activating your F keys. For not using your class mechanic.

Mesmers get damage% increases, damage taken reduction %s… speed % increases. I know warriors can get damage %s, crit %s…for not using their class mechanic. Waros have a heal that heals more if they don’t use their class mechanic too! Wait… so do mesmers… hrm.

Thieves don’t have anything that benefits from not using steal directly, but some of their builds don’t really use it anyway…with little/no penalties. And their other mechanic, initiative… there are traits that benefit you for using less of it.

Then there is Guardians.. their class mechanic passively gives benefits for not using it… by default. And they can trait for improving that significantly on top of it, even giving their passive effects aoe potential so it benefits others.

This isn’t a foreign concept in this game at all. Just isn’t something they thought the ranger… who is arguably in most need of… should have. Maybe it is because they mix n matched two separate profession to make this class? Maybe because none of the dev team really plays it or knows which direction to take it? Who knows.

One thing I do know though… more options are always better for the players, more enjoyable, more playable. It makes the game better if someone can find the right class/spec to suit their play style of choice, instead of being forced into a style that is sorta close… except all this kitten stupid kitten that comes with it. Allowing players to be able to opt out at a minor cost is always a better choice than to not let them opt out at all ever.

Not only are we forced, literally, to use our class mechanic. Unable to not ever choose to not have a pet running around. Always… active. But it is the only profession that is.

Could you imagine if mesmer illusions we forced to auto shatter every time they created them. Or if warriors attacks were interrupted mid strike to instead burst because they got enough adrenaline. Of if a fleeing thief was auto teleported to an enemy because steal came off CD??

Maybe it wouldn’t be so horrible if toolbet skills activated when the regular utility was activated then, huh? Or if Necros we put into deathshrowd whenever their lifeforce went up…. or how about elementalists just cycling through the elements in order every few seconds…. how fun would that be??

That is what they did for the Ranger.

Division.9618:

monepipi.5160:

@Swagger.1372

Stowing pets and it giving you a stat increase??

No, just no. Why would you undermine the whole class mechanic? that would be like a mesmer saying “no I don’t want clones or phantasms…just give me all the raw damage”

Have your pet on passive and only send it out smartly/ redraw it using swap/F3. I’ve not ran into aggro problems of any kind even when doing dungeons, you just have to play/control smart and not treat the pet like some automatic robot. I do agree the pet’s animation(inability to attack on the go) needs a little work, but once that gets fixed rangers will be perfectly fine.

@Shilian.5873
People won’t support it because the ranger is a pet class. A ranger is not called a sniper for good reasons. You want a ranged class with no pets, roll a warrior. They can use rifles and snipe.

No, it would be like a mesmer saying “No i don’t want to use shatters”, because that’s the mesmers class mechanic. Shatters. Clones and phantasms are summoning skills.

Someone on this forum said it the best i think. We are the only class so heavily reliant on our class mechanic. A warrior can still be good without adrenaline. An engineer can still work without his tool belt. A mesmer has builds that don’t shatter. An ele can work by staying in one attunement. A guardian works perfectly fine without touching his virtues outside of the small passives. The only thing death shroud does for a necromancer is gives them a quick second HP bar and they don’t need to rely on it constantly.

That leaves us and thieves. Thieves get a steal mechanic that they don’t really need to use, an initiative system that makes them OP and allows great versatility, and different skills for dual wielding which is awesome.

We get a clunky AI partner that’s barely effective, hard to control, dies quickly unless we micromanage him constantly, has numerous pathing issues, and is supposed to deal 45% of our damage making us horribly weak if we lose them.

Also, telling other people that if they don’t like pets they should play another class would be fine if pets were the only thing attractive about the ranger class. There are far more reasons to play a ranger. It’s simply an awesome class with great ideas behind it. It’s unique from the other classes and gives off a feeling of agility that thieves don’t have. Right now there are plenty of people out there who love the feel of the class and can’t find it in any of the other classes, but think that the pet is annoying.

Pretty much sums it up in a nutt shell. I cant bring myself to play any other class for long periods of a time. Sure other classes are fun but ranger is where the heart is.

Ravnodaus.5130:

I like the idea of the lone ranger. It really isn’t hard to see how it would work, while the ranger as a whole would still remain pet friendly.

Allow for pet stowing to be fully player controlled. Stowed pets stay stowed until you recall them… manually… yourself. This should be added no matter what else they do anyway, as is the auto summon is frustrating and annoying.

Then add a trait, likely in marksman, that gives a minor damage bonus if the ranger doesn’t have an active pet. Tuned to be less of a boost than a pet. Then it’d always make sense in most situations to use a pet… but still have the option to go petless without fully kittened mode in those situations pets do you no good at all.

The side effect of this, besides just making sense in general? It allows people who otherwise really love the Ranger, but hate the pet… to play the way they would like to play the game. And while being slightly less effective than they otherwise could be if they embraced pets… at least still functional on a more relative scale. It would be an option, even if not a great one.

We wouldn’t see millions of new lone rangers everywhere. But there would be some. And what would be the harm in that? O_o You could still have your pets, hell, you’d still be highly encouraged to have your pets… but at least you have options.

There are traits in the other professions that actively or passively benefit you for not activating your F keys. For not using your class mechanic.

Mesmers get damage% increases, damage taken reduction %s… speed % increases. I know warriors can get damage %s, crit %s…for not using their class mechanic. Waros have a heal that heals more if they don’t use their class mechanic too! Wait… so do mesmers… hrm.

Thieves don’t have anything that benefits from not using steal directly, but some of their builds don’t really use it anyway…with little/no penalties. And their other mechanic, initiative… there are traits that benefit you for using less of it.

Then there is Guardians.. their class mechanic passively gives benefits for not using it… by default. And they can trait for improving that significantly on top of it, even giving their passive effects aoe potential so it benefits others.

This isn’t a foreign concept in this game at all. Just isn’t something they thought the ranger… who is arguably in most need of… should have. Maybe it is because they mix n matched two separate profession to make this class? Maybe because none of the dev team really plays it or knows which direction to take it? Who knows.

One thing I do know though… more options are always better for the players, more enjoyable, more playable. It makes the game better if someone can find the right class/spec to suit their play style of choice, instead of being forced into a style that is sorta close… except all this kitten stupid kitten that comes with it. Allowing players to be able to opt out at a minor cost is always a better choice than to not let them opt out at all ever.

Not only are we forced, literally, to use our class mechanic. Unable to not ever choose to not have a pet running around. Always… active. But it is the only profession that is.

Could you imagine if mesmer illusions we forced to auto shatter every time they created them. Or if warriors attacks were interrupted mid strike to instead burst because they got enough adrenaline. Of if a fleeing thief was auto teleported to an enemy because steal came off CD??

Maybe it wouldn’t be so horrible if toolbet skills activated when the regular utility was activated then, huh? Or if Necros we put into deathshrowd whenever their lifeforce went up…. or how about elementalists just cycling through the elements in order every few seconds…. how fun would that be??

That is what they did for the Ranger.

I dont quite think it should be a minor buff to damage if we stow our pets. I know when my pet dies I lose insane damage, my raven when it works does 50%+ of my damage and when it dies I become depressed. Its like morphing into a skritt.

Those traits may alter how many times you physically click the F key buttons, but the profession mechanic is far from abandoned because it’s resources are still being monitored and timing it’s use is still a part of the decision making processes Upstairs. The reasons those traits exist is because your desire for the effect is supposed to come into conflict with your desire to use the profession mechanic making the choice of when to press those F buttons more deep, interesting, and meaningful. Not to circumvent the profession mechanic entirely because there’s a few quality of life concerns and/or you just plain don’t like it.

It’s not that I don’t get the desire to have pets work more fluidly without the need for excessive micromanagement and heavy investment into beastmastery and pet related skills. What I don’t get is people taking this somewhat reasonable desire off onto a tangent and desiring pets or effects that work without the need for management – period.

This sentiment isn’t asking for something that adds more to our profession mechanic, it’s asking for the option to not have a profession mechanic at all.

/edit: blah. rewrote to be less confrontational.

I don’t agree with any of the arguments brought forward, and even if I did, it would not change the fact that Anet will NEVER allow rangers to be viable without a pet or remove pets entirely. It’s the very centerpiece of this class, the one thing which distinguishes it from all other classes. You’ll sooner win the lottery while surfing on a meteor shower. It’s a futile battle.

Vox Hollow.2736:

Those traits may alter how many times you physically click the F key buttons, but the profession mechanic is far from abandoned because it’s resources are still being monitored and timing it’s use is still a part of the decision making processes Upstairs. The reasons those traits exist is because your desire for the effect is supposed to come into conflict with your desire to use the profession mechanic making the choice of when to press those F buttons more deep, interesting, and meaningful. ~snip~

That is exactly what giving rangers the ability to stow their pet would do! Add a trait for a minor buff while petless, and wabam…. when you have your pet out and when you stow it is now a part of your descision making process! Making choosing to have your pet out more “deep, interesting, and meaningful”.

Right now there is nothing anything but automatic about it. Your pet is out. You can try to stow him, but he will just keep automatically popping back out whenever the hell he wants to. The ranger’s mechanic is entirely AI driven. You have some influence, but not control. And imo, you should have control over your character.

Depth is when you come across these moments while you’re playing where you have to choose between two or more equally appealing options, it’s not just being presented with any two options at all that have associated pros and cons which rationally dictates their situational usefulness. It’s in the act of making Choices, it’s not just granted by virtue of Options existing.

And that still doesn’t address that a stow-buff is a Non-mechanic. You’re not managing a resource, you don’t have overarching circumstances that frame the combat experience specific to your class, your not constantly actively thinking of something in particular in the middle of a fight. There’s no actual gameplay in this mode, it’s just a blank numbers increase.

Loki.4871:

Thing is though, after the huge PvE update for the ranger in GW1 it was pretty clear (or at least, very strongly encouraged) for you to bring your pet with you. I played GW1 since the summer it was released and I can count the number of people who had points in beastmastery on one hand, including myself and my brother.
What happened was everyone shoved the pet away without a second though and decided to be a dedicated archer.

I’ll save the arguments about build validity in GW1 for another day; the point is, GW2’s ranger is specifically designed to work with the pet. If you can dump the pet then many people will, and suddenly all you have is a wanna-be-warrior that can’t match them, because (surprise surprise) the warrior is supposed to be the best in a simple 1v1 punchup.
The whole ‘I don’t want to use my pet’ thing always strieks me as really dumb. Even before the beta, Anet were making a big deal about the pets being an important part of the ranger’s class, and many of the weapon skills ‘prep’ the target for their pet (eg, longsword’s autoattack chain gives the pet Might). Why the massive hangup for this? It’s like a mesmer deciding they’d rather not use phantasms of illusions or clones? Or engineers deciding they’d rather not bother with toolkits and their toolbelt. People were told going in the pet was going to be Very Important, and then start wanting to ignore it?

Rant aside, the pets themselves are (ignoring the ‘quirks’) pretty kitten powerful. They also give you playstyles, in the sense depending on what pet you take, you yourself end up playing quite differently. The Jungle/canyon Spider lets you snare and dot a target. The dogs give good crowd control. Grabbing a sword or greatsword and wading in with a drake lets you belt out alarming amounts of damage in melee.

What? Really a wanna be warrior? You obviously don’t know what a ranger really is. Rangers in a since are really no different than warriors. What skills separate them from warriors were trapping and tracking and the ability to tame animals to fight along side them. And they spent most of their time in the wilds. And their primary weapon was not just a bow..They mainly used a bow for hunting and fighting when needed. They could use a wide range of weapons including the sword just as well as a darn warrior. How many times did you see Aragorn in Lord of the Rings use a bow? Most mmos just take a ranger and make them to what they want.. GW2 is about the only game that comes close to making the ranger what they really are, but there still a lot of work to go. If they made the ranger as they should be then they can go toe to toe with a warrior. Rangers would just be a leather wearing counterpart to a warrior. They just wouldn’t be able to take as much damage, but they still could kick your warrior butt in melee. And they got the name Rangers from roving… Cause they roved around a x distance patrolling large areas. Some of these mmos had really done the ranger a lot of injustice and making them seem like a weak class when in fact they can be just as deadly as any class. And stop mistaking them to being just bow users cause they are not.