Guild Wars 2

If you don’t like pets then use them as shields to absorb conditions and take damage. If you don’t wanna press 2 extra keys (attack and pet ability) then just play the longbow warrior.

Rogues dont need to use steal to be effective. Neither do Guardians with their whatever F-Abilities.

The problem is that pets are required to keep up with other classes damage, but the REAL problem is that pets die far too easy unless you hurt yourself by taking points in beast master. Even then, you have the problem with PET AI…. like stopping to attack, special abilities not working when you press the button, so on and so forth.

Pets also take away from what this game is about. It gives you a bad hellfire missile that just blindly attacks its target relentlessly. How is that skill anyways?

You also cannot balance pets… not easily anyways. If you make them too strong and someone decides to take points in BM, you have a PVE farming machine or an unstoppable killer in PVP.

The simplest solutions are just to makes pets temporary or get rid of them all together.

Everyone really needs to realize what they’re saying are opinions and not fact and do not represent everyone else. I personally am against the adjusting of the class so it operates fine without a pet. Pets make this class unique it’s their identity. The name ranger maybe wrong however. The class isn’t intended to be an archer class. It is an adventurer class with alot of versatility and survival smarts and the pets are part of it. Now think of LOTR, the “ranger” Aragorn. Rangers can also mean a hunter, traveler, wanderer, not range as in long range… Dont get stuck in a specific misinterpretation only. In any case this is the way the class is designed to work, synergistically with a pet. Stowing a pet properly would be nice yes but the class is not going to be a class to work primarily solo without a pet. Pets can be fixed to Be better but how is it that bad in all honesty? My pets Have amazing ai and time their knock downs to interrupt skill casting by enemies.. They have great aoe, chill, fear and other useful skills. They attack powerfully and Telling them to come back or swapping pets and other tricks helps lure and Gives chances to Escape as well… Why is it bad? There shouldn’t be a separate long range class, because every class can use ranged weapons… There’s nothing unique to an archer class.This is my opinion

I would love using my ranger without the pet. I never liked the idea that a “ranger” traveled with a pet companion.

Takatsu, pets don’t make this class unique at all. Necros, guardians, thieves, engineers, and mesmers all have pets. Ours is just a pet that we can command and lose dps when it dies to one hit.

Besides, a ranger is someone who crosses terrain quickly… which we can do either with a 10% run buff.

They should just rename this class beastmaster and be done with it.

Edit: Left out Elementalist… who also have pets.

Hmmm. I see a lot of good points, but I am not going to read every single post.

I just want to point out that I think that the best things pets have to offer is tanking (in non-pvp) and various buffs (best for PvP). When my pet feels in the way I put them on passive, and I do not feel that a pet is detracting from my damage.

There are many pets that have buffs that simply improve defense, remove conditions, slow, etc). So while they may not be able to go in and attack, the fact that you have an f2 skill that negates 33% damage or removes a harsh bleeding is awesome. (For these skills I use brown bear and blue moa).

There are times when I am defending a keep that is burning down. I will spam warhorn and the blue-moa defense screech and run out and place some traps at gate. It makes a huge difference of making it out of there alive.

Besides…seriously…how many of you have been distracted trying to kill another player to have their pet come at you and you are so annoyed that you want to kill it first?

I get that you are just suggesting to give you the OPTION to stow it permantently, but I think it really does detract from what Anet has intended for the uniqueness of the ranger, and ultimately I get the feeling that maybe you should try some other pet-techniques. My best guess is that you are wanting to be very DPS oriented, and are being kinda short-sighted and taking pet skills for granted.

Again, thats my point. Pets dont make ranger unique. Spirits do. Being the longest range in the game does. Pet buffs are bad because they dont activate quick enough. In a split second decision I need that protection. I shouldnt have to worry about it dying to AoE or having it take 3 or 4 seconds to work.

Ranger was obviously not meant for you…
I guess you should roll Warrior.

If I figured it properly, not technical, but aesthetical aspect of pets makes OP mad. OP, you just don’t like how looks a nasty dirty animal, crawling near you, am I right? I can only repeat the advice that already was given: use birds, they almost unnoticable on screen.

Pet’s utility is so weak. I mean, the utility skills have casting time and looong recharge time.. If you encountered enemy thief or warrior, you need directly use sturn or silence skill them. Unfortunately, pet’s skill is too slow for take off them. you will dying
I dont understand why AN make pet skill delay. I hate that.

Just gonna say this.

The Ranger’s class symbol is a paw print.
The Ranger’s forum symbol is a paw print.
The Ranger is the only class that has a permanent pet (Making them unique over other classes who can use “pets”; Our pets do not eat up our utility slots)
The Ranger’s class question is about your first PET.
Every trait line has benefits for your pets.
You cannot perm stow your pets.
Our pets give us access to many boons and conditions
Nearly every image of a ranger includes their pets.

I’m just gonna say: Ranger is THE pet class. So giving The pet class the option to go petless just feels wrong from so many points. Don’t like pets? Don’t roll the class. No other class can get 1200 range? False. Rifle Warriors have decent damage and 1200 range. The whole point of the ranger class is their pet. Other classes don’t rely as much on their mechanics? Well, that’s what makes the ranger different. When you pick a ranger you are choosing to pick a two-unit character.

You want a master of ranged damage? Roll a warrior huntsman.

I read through this thread and saw that there are some valid points and some utter garbage as well.

First off, a tip of the hat to the folks that point out that ranger is more than an archer or someone that attack at range. Lots of people seem to confuse that and it’s pretty frustrating.
I really dislike how the concept of ranger seems to have moved out of its original form (a fighter skilled in survival, in woodslore. not necessarily an archer and not necessarily the owner of a pet shop). But I digress.

Sorry if any of this may sound blunt. It’s not meant to be offensive or a rant, it’s just the way I write (english not being my first language) and I’ve been told it sounds a bit too harsh.

About pet as a class mechanic:
Yes, it’s the ranger’s class mechanic and yes, unfortunately we will have to live with that. I don’t like it, but I’m sure it will not change. Developers in general aren’t really known for admitting that something they did is bad and throwing it all out, so even if we managed to convince them that it’s crap, it would just stay crap forever. So yeah, change of class mechanic not happening.

Now, that doesn’t mean that just because pets are the ranger’s class mechanic, it’s what makes them unique. Well…. it doesn’t.
Pets are a completely generic mechanic found in every other MMO out there. Now just because you can switch between them and they each have a F2 skill that doesn’t make them or the ranger unique. Or even good. Much less unique. Every class out have mechanics that, at the very least, you can look at them and say: ok, they tried to create something here. Pet’s are just old MMOs recycled into this one, that should be “something new”, “something fresh”.

For good implementation of pet-centric classes, check out DAoC’s Cabalist and Bonedancer, and Aion’s Spiritmaster.
Those are solid pet classes. The ranger in GW2 is not nearly as well implemented as those at the moment.

The ranger seems to split a little bit too much between himself and his pet.
In my opinion, what could be done to help in that aspect is: give the ranger a choice on how to play with their pets. Right now, rangers swing a too little inside this spectrum. It could be open wide.
What I mean is: giving the rangers more option to go all the way to “pets deal the vast majority of damage, ranger supports pet” to “rangers deal the vast majority of damage, pets support ranger”
Right now, no matter how you are specced, it’s “ranger and pet split their damage”. Its not even, but it’s not 90-10 either.
Just like a previous poster said: rangers have low damage output because their pet is supposed to do the rest of the damage.
I propose we have a way to ajust this imaginary slider.

This way, I think even people like me who don’t like pets could finally be able to play the class they want.

This gets me to the final point and the main reason I’m wasting my time typing this: dont ever say: “ranger is not for you” or “go play another class”. I’ve had a dev say this to me. This is almost offensive.
Just because you share Anet’s vision that the ranger is someone who would love to work in a pet shop, it doesnt mean that there aren’t people out there that are very dissapointed that they didn’t find the class that they were expecting: a true ranger, a versatile fighter more at home in the wilderness than anyone else. And that doesn’t mean having a pet. Not at all. Usually it means pets are turning into BBQ to feed said ranger.

tl;dr: I hate how rangers turned out in GW2, but I know there’s no way to get rid of pets. Pet doesn’t make rangers unique. I propose letting rangers be more in control of how they wanna play with their pets (all the way from ranger-supports-pet to pet-supports-ranger). Also, I hate people that say “go play another class”.
thanks for reading.

This guy has successfully trolled every single one of you for 2 pages worth of posts, congrats.

TL;DR

He doesnt want the pet at all… quit trying to get around that fact. There should be an option to completely disguard your pet for a Stat Boost

I agree op, End Thread.

Tracker Wolf.2587:

This gets me to the final point and the main reason I’m wasting my time typing this: dont ever say: “ranger is not for you” or “go play another class”. I’ve had a dev say this to me. This is almost offensive.
Just because you share Anet’s vision that the ranger is someone who would love to work in a pet shop, it doesnt mean that there aren’t people out there that are very dissapointed that they didn’t find the class that they were expecting: a true ranger, a versatile fighter more at home in the wilderness than anyone else. And that doesn’t mean having a pet. Not at all. Usually it means pets are turning into BBQ to feed said ranger.

tl;dr: I hate how rangers turned out in GW2, but I know there’s no way to get rid of pets. Pet doesn’t make rangers unique. I propose letting rangers be more in control of how they wanna play with their pets (all the way from ranger-supports-pet to pet-supports-ranger). Also, I hate people that say “go play another class”.
thanks for reading.

Good point. Next time my hammer doesn’t work like a drill, I’ll just go complain until it does, because I’m always right, creator’s vision and intent be kittened.

riku.2091:

Good point. Next time my hammer doesn’t work like a drill, I’ll just go complain until it does, because I’m always right.

Well then it shouldn’t have been tagged “drill” then, shouldn’t it?
Maybe change class name to beastmaster and give us a real ranger in an expansion.

edit: trivia. did you know that the current ranger class is result of a mix between two planned classes: marksman and warden?
maybe they should just split them up again, because throwing the two into a mixer didn’t yielded good results for anyone.

Tracker Wolf.2587:

riku.2091:

Good point. Next time my hammer doesn’t work like a drill, I’ll just go complain until it does, because I’m always right.

Well then it shouldn’t have been tagged “drill” then, shouldn’t it?
Maybe change class name to beastmaster and give us a real ranger in an expansion.

edit: trivia. did you know that the current ranger class is result of a mix between two planned classes: marksman and warden?
maybe they should just split them up again, because throwing the two into a mixer didn’t yielded good results for anyone.

Then people will complain about how similar the two classes are. Making such a big deal just because it’s called Ranger and it doesn’t match up with your definition of Ranger is quite petty. Anyone who has spent a few minutes on the wiki would have clearly known what they were getting into.

And the split and merge happened so early in development I don’t think it really made that much of an impact on how the singular final product came out.

riku.2091:

Then people will complain about how similar the two classes are. Making such a big deal just because it’s called Ranger and it doesn’t match up with your definition of Ranger is quite petty. Anyone who has spent a few minutes on the wiki would have clearly known what they were getting into.

And the split and merge happened so early in development I don’t think it really made that much of an impact on how the singular final product came out.

You have a point. People will always complain.
That’s why I stated that we will just have to deal with it: pets are in to stay, as much as I dislike the concept.
I would like, yes, that the class would be called something other than ranger, because that would give me hope that in the future, a ranger class would make it into the game. (Maybe wanderer? roamer? pet-killer? one can only hope)
Now, that doesn’t mean we cannot argue and try to make the class more appealing to everyone, like I said.
I’m all in for a “remove pet, give buff” option, but I’m pretty sure Anet already stated that this is not happening. Ever.

So, why not try and improve the class by giving us options? I don’t think that is complaning a hammer isn’t a drill.
It’s more like: “hey, there’s this really cool concept called ranger, and this class could aim in that direction instead of the one it’s aiming at right now, how about that?”

Tracker Wolf.2587:

riku.2091:

Then people will complain about how similar the two classes are. Making such a big deal just because it’s called Ranger and it doesn’t match up with your definition of Ranger is quite petty. Anyone who has spent a few minutes on the wiki would have clearly known what they were getting into.

And the split and merge happened so early in development I don’t think it really made that much of an impact on how the singular final product came out.

You have a point. People will always complain.
That’s why I stated that we will just have to deal with it: pets are in to stay, as much as I dislike the concept.
I would like, yes, that the class would be called something other than ranger, because that would give me hope that in the future, a ranger class would make it into the game. (Maybe wanderer? roamer? pet-killer? one can only hope)
Now, that doesn’t mean we cannot argue and try to make the class more appealing to everyone, like I said.
I’m all in for a “remove pet, give buff” option, but I’m pretty sure Anet already stated that this is not happening. Ever.

So, why not try and improve the class by giving us options? I don’t think that is complaning a hammer isn’t a drill.
It’s more like: “hey, there’s this really cool concept called ranger, and this class could aim in that direction instead of the one it’s aiming at right now, how about that?”

But that’s just it. This IS a Ranger class, just not the kind you have pre-conceived in your head. This is ANet’s ranger. And ANet has made it quite clear that their ranger is going to use a pet, and not be a high damage singular unit.

I’m particularly against getting a buff for ditching your pet. This is the class’s mechanic. And while it may not make it unique in the wide spectrum of all MMORPGs, it gives the class a unique twist within its own universe. You can’t compare the ranger pet to minions or summoned weapons because the Ranger’s pet doesn’t eat up utility in order to be used and (this is debatable at the moment) be effective. It is our mechanic. No other class gets benefits for ignoring its mechanics. The warrior, for example, was once stated by someone to be rewarded for ignoring its mechanic. This is not true. The warrior’s real mechanic is adrenaline, not the “super” attack you get once you’ve stored up enough. So all traits that benefit you for not using this attack are not rewarding you for not using your mechanic – it’s rewarding you for using it(Though “using” is used loosely for this particular mechanic). We should not be any different.

And aiming in a new direction ties back into my first statement. “Aiming it in a new direction” means “Completely different from your intent and design”. Giving us “different options” in this way, much like giving us rifles, detracts from the spirit of the class, making it loose its definition. ANet Rangers are not pure bowmen. They never were. Am I saying we should never get a class that is more of a true bowman/marksman? No. I am not. What I am saying is that as they exist now, as far as what they are and how they are meant to work should not be changed.

The pet would be manageable if the AI wasn’t horrible. I can’t rely on my pet do hit anything that isn’t stunned or rooted. I want to get the speed boost just to see if it will allow my pet to do damage more often but I heard it’s bugged to be half as effective as the tooltip states.

I feel like the OP and several others would be better off in the thief or warrior forum asking for Ranger like abilities. I really feel that is closer to what is being asked for.

I agree with a lot of things that was said in the last several posts. Good points and opinions understood.

But I really don’t understand the hate of pets. My pets are working fine. I don’t trait beastmastery at all, my pet is simply support. I deal most of the damage, and deal a heck load of damage. I also from experience feel that this is a true ranger/survival type class because i’m the longest standing in any battle, dungeon boss, champs, or even rushing to melee swarms. Warriors, thieves, guardians around me dying left and right…. but ranger still going strong. My dps is lower than burst dps classes but it is enough to clear things steadily. My pet doesn’t always survive but it has proven quite durable so long as i don’t do stupid things like forget to pet swap or heal myself (healing the pet too). and sometimes i do stupid things. on that note, i do think it takes a bit more careful precision rather than skill spam to stay alive, which is the whole concept.

Other than that, the pet AI is great. times its auto skills very well… what is the problem? Why can’t people figure out how to work with the pets? I don’t think the problem is with the class now that i think about it. If you don’t have the skill to manage and work synergistically with a pet that is simply YOUR problem. I do agree things can be better of course. some buggy things, some clumsiness etc… but it’s not bad at all. I can do fine and be effective. I run pure melee and run pure range sometimes. Very versatile. My question is i can’t understand why can’t you use a ranger comfortably?

I will continue to say, roll another class. Like someone said this is ANet’s ranger, as bugged or messed up some things are, and some things can be fixed but the whole concept and package is still fine and the way it is.

riku.2091:

No other class can get 1200 range? False. Rifle Warriors have decent damage and 1200 range.

I said above 12ØØ range.
Eagle Eye and my mistaken belief that medium-armour would be far more suitable to my tastes than heavy-armour (don’t actually like either in this game) were the main reasons I went with Ranger.

You want Warrior to be the de facto ranged martial-class? Give them the 15ØØ range trait instead, rather than forcing them to trait longbow just to catch up to what Rangers have by default (12ØØ range across 2 weapons).

riku.2091:

Removed the quote due to message size limit

I understand where you’re coming from, but I most respectfully disagree.
I’m not pre-conceiving anything on my head. I compare every ranger with the “original” definition of ranger. I don’t blame Anet for giving us their twist of the idea, not at all. But I can very well not like it. And I don’t. Me and many other people prefer GW1’s ranger over this one.
That said, we know pets won’t change.
That doesn’t mean they were a good idea in the first place, and it doesn’t mean the class is in a good state, cause it isn’t.
Ranger’s aren’t supposed to be true marksman/bowman neither in my conception nor in the “original” concept (I take it Tolkien’s is the original, I have searched far and wide and have not found any mention of rangers predating his works).
What the class doest suggest (I even have checked out GW2’s website, but they changed it…. but they still suggest rangers are marksmen. Even the character creation screen suggests rangers are marksman) is that it should be a skirmisher.
There is even a “skirmishing” trait line.

But at the moment, that isn’t true. The class is one of the less mobile around. Just from the top of my head I can say with experience that elementalists, thiefs and warriors are far more mobile and more capable of skirmishing than the ranger.

Another point is: pets are in a horrible state, and their AI doesn’t allow for efficient skirmishing. Their skills unreliability also prevents their use in skirmishing.

Things I would suggest for the class to be better, without moving away from the concept Anet has created:

• More mobility. Terrain negotiation, swiftness. Whatever it needs. Just more mobility. Rangers need to be able to skirmish effectivelly, not just act as turrets.
• More control over pets: remove the current F1-F4 controls and bind them to other keys. Make the rangers F1-F4 the pet’s skills. Let the rangers control every action of the pet.
• Different types of pet for different playstyles: pets that deal much less damage, but give the ranger a damage boost in form of buff, and their skills help the ranger with skirmishing (swiftness, condition removal, snares) ; pets that deal a lot of damage but require the ranger to support them in order to deliver said damage. That describes the current state of pets, but that is useless for skirmishing.
• Less utility skills that buff pets, more utility skills that buff both.
• More synergic attacks. Instead of the ranger’s attacks giving perks to their pets, make attacks like (Im just making up some example on the fly here): “flanking strike: ranger attacks for x damage, pet attacks for y damage. if both attacks hit, target is cripple for z duration”. That would actually make it feel like they’re fighting together.
• Preparations. preparations. preparations. written thrice for emphasis.
• Pretty much a return to GW1’s ranger (which is what most of us were expecting of Anet. Warriors “conversion” to GW2 turned out fine. Ranger’s were just botched.). Seriously, just check any list of GW1’s ranger skills and you’ll see how more interesting they were.

That’s it, hope it helps the discussion.

Perma-stow – sure. Low priority change though as you can just follow the advice of this thread and have a small pet (like a bird) set to passive in the meantime.

Boost your stats for not having pet – no. The reasons have been covered throughout this thread.

“I don’t feel like I should be punished for disliking one aspect of the class while enjoying everything else.”

It isn’t “one aspect”. It’s the core mechanic. It’s like a Guardian wanting more survivability for not using virtues, or an elementalist who wants a buff for never switching attunements, or a thief who wants to trade initiative for cooldowns.

Pets are more than damage. They are CC and support and an additional target for mobs. They affect most of your signets and traits.

You and a number of others here seem to think it’s just as easy as adding a permanent stow and increasing damage by 20%, but balancing professions involves a lot more than that. The devs would have to experiment with such a fundamental change and make sure that the ranger was not now overpowered or underpowered relative to other classes in both PvE and PvP. There would be a lot of dev time and effort required that would detract from all the other work that needs to be done. It’s not as simple as “Give us 20% extra damage in exchange for a pet.”

In the words of Michael Flynn, “No field of knowledge is so transparently simple as another’s.”

Tracker Wolf.2587:

Ranger’s aren’t supposed to be true marksman/bowman neither in my conception nor in the “original” concept (I take it Tolkien’s is the original, I have searched far and wide and have not found any mention of rangers predating his works).

You need to search farther and wider, then. Tolkien isn’t even close to being the original, although his conception of rangers has heavily influenced modern fantasy and gaming.

“Ranger”, according to the OED, goes back in English to at least 1455. It has quite a wide range of definitions there, with scads of quotations across the centuries before Tolkien. About half of the definitions do include some reference to managing wildlife and/or livestock.

In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s in England, the term could be a mildly derogatory term roughly equivalent to “vagabond”. It had less to do with any fighting style than with the fact that they “ranged”, i.e., wandered about. My own take is that Tolkien was thinking of this term when he called Aragorn and his companions “rangers”, given the way the rest of the humans in Middle-Earth seemed to look down on them at first. Since the term has lost its derogatory force in today’s English, that nuance of the book is lost on most readers.

But really, that is all irrelevant. “Thief” in GW2 is not really much like “thief” the way non-gamers use the word. Neither is “Guardian” or “Engineer”. “Necromancer”, prior to D&D, meant “a medium who speaks to the dead to divine the future”, which bears only a distant resemblance to what it means in gaming.

“Ranger”, as ArenaNet uses the term, apparently includes having a pet as its core mechanic. It’s all well and good to request that they change that core mechanic (although my own preference would be for them not to), but appeals to outside sources should carry no weight in the discussion.

Haha so In other words, forget your own interpretations of ranger or what you think they ought to be, or what gw1 was, this is the way they are and you’re going to play them else, roll another class xD yes they should improve pet AI and some bugs and whatnot but no pet less ranger

I loved rangers in GW.

There was a Thumper ( hammer knockdown build)
Trapper.
Interupt/lockdown.
Beastmaster.
DPS/spike.
Spirit master.

I have to agree with the original poster. It would be nice to see other options for the ranger other than the pet.

I also wish there were a way to forgo the pet. I love the idea of a dedicated “archer” play-style, the 5-skill ‘Barrage’ on the long-bow is exactly the sort of thing I want.
But the prospect of managing a pet puts me off from trying.

For those of you who can’t wrap your head around why we don’t want the pet

• It’s because it feels like our character isn’t independent.
  We want to feel independent and able to hold our own without the help of some beast. We want that lone-archer feeling as if we’re the Green Arrow and epic —-- like that.
• We’re used to playing without a pet on classes like Thief, Warrior, etc.. Why shouldn’t we be allowed to play as a pet-less Ranger?
  Being allowed to do so wouldn’t make the class any less unique. It would simply be adding variety to the profession.

And for those of you who think we just like long-ranged mechanics.

You can’t be more wrong.

We want the aesthetics of an ‘Archer’.
The sensation and sound of bowstring being pulled back while aiming at a far off target. The sound an arrow flying out. The sound of ‘Barrage’ with all the arrows falling onto our enemy.
And all that is stuck on the Ranger class, . So please don’t tell us roll something else, there is nothing else. (The warrior’s long bow skills are not nearly as close to what we’re seeking)

And for the people arguing that having a pet is unique to the Ranger.
There are dozens of examples of Ranger-classes in other games without pets.

Please calm your ego down.

DreamOfACure.4382:

I also wish there were a way to forgo the pet. I love the idea of a dedicated “archer” play-style, the 5-skill ‘Barrage’ on the long-bow is exactly the sort of thing I want.
But the prospect of managing a pet puts me off from trying.

For those of you who can’t wrap your head around why we don’t want the pet

• It’s because it feels like our character isn’t independent.
  We want to feel independent and able to hold our own without the help of some beast. We want that lone-archer feeling as if we’re the Green Arrow and epic —-- like that.
• We’re used to playing without a pet on classes like Thief, Warrior, etc.. Why shouldn’t we be allowed to play as a pet-less Ranger?
  Being allowed to do so wouldn’t make the class any less unique. It would simply be adding variety to the profession.

And for those of you who think we just like long-ranged mechanics.

You can’t be more wrong.

We want the aesthetics of an ‘Archer’.
The sensation and sound of bowstring being pulled back while aiming at a far off target. The sound an arrow flying out. The sound of ‘Barrage’ with all the arrows falling onto our enemy.
And all that is stuck on the Ranger class, . So please don’t tell us roll something else, there is nothing else. (The warrior’s long bow skills are not nearly as close to what we’re seeking)

---

And for the people arguing that having a pet is unique to the Ranger.
There are dozens of examples of Ranger-classes in other games without pets.

Please calm your ego down.

You’re not stopped from doing this.

Various suggestions are in this thread, ignore your pet and let it die, select a bird pet and set it to passive, etc.

Tracker Wolf.2587:

edit: trivia. did you know that the current ranger class is result of a mix between two planned classes: marksman and warden?
maybe they should just split them up again, because throwing the two into a mixer didn’t yielded good results for anyone.

Hi. I’m a member of anyone, and you don’t speak for me.

Munrock.3092:

Tracker Wolf.2587:

edit: trivia. did you know that the current ranger class is result of a mix between two planned classes: marksman and warden?
maybe they should just split them up again, because throwing the two into a mixer didn’t yielded good results for anyone.

Hi. I’m a member of anyone, and you don’t speak for me.

Ditto, I’m perfectly happy with pets & bows.

Jestunhi.7429:

You’re not stopped from doing this.

Various suggestions are in this thread, ignore your pet and let it die, select a bird pet and set it to passive, etc.

Actually, we are.

Your advice is like telling a Mesmer player who doesn’t like illusions to never cast or use clone/phantasm skills/traits.

As gamers, we CANNOT do that – It would mean giving ourselves a handicap and no one wants to do that. We can’t simply ignore a mechanic that is integral to the profession’s gameplay.

Letting the pet die is NOT a solution. It’s a statement of apathy.

We want an pet-less Ranger who can play at optimal levels comparatively to the current Ranger with a pet.
Letting the pet die would not achieve this.

DreamOfACure.4382:

Actually, we are.

Your advice is like telling a Mesmer player who doesn’t like illusions to never cast or use clone/phantasm skills/traits.

As gamers, we CANNOT do that – It would mean giving ourselves a handicap and no one wants to do that. We can’t simply ignore a mechanic that is integral to the profession’s gameplay.

Letting the pet die is NOT a solution. It’s a statement of apathy.

We want an pet-less Ranger who can play at optimal levels comparatively to the current Ranger with a pet.
Letting the pet die would not achieve this.

Of course you would be handicapping yourself.

You want to play part of a class. Your choice.

If I liked Warriors but wanted only weapon skills and never to use utilities, should my weapon skill damage be boosted to compensate?

Lets take it even further, if I only wanted to use some kind of from-stealth attack, should it be boosted excessively to account for the other 9 ability slots which I am not using?

Jestunhi.7429:

Of course you would be handicapping yourself.

You want to play part of a class. Your choice.

And there’s the fallacy.

We do not want to play “a part” of a class. We recognize it’s only a part right now. That’s why most of us talking about it are not playing Rangers.
This topic is asking for Rangers to be changed so it’s NOT just ‘a part’.

You ASSUMED we were already playing the class, and just wanted the pet removed (or some half kitten change like that).
You’re just a stick-in-the-mud whose bringing nothing to this discussion but negativity and stagnation.

This discussion isn’t about the current state of the Ranger. It’s about the future, and the future ain’t set in stone like your posts seem to imply.

To add another point to the argument.

Do Ranger NPCs always have pets fighting by their side?

Hell no. Thus – The pet is not a fundamental part of the Ranger profession.
This confirms that pets being mandatory is merely an oversight on ANet’s part, and something for them to work on in the future.

Or, they can go adding pets to every single Ranger NPC… Pffft.

DreamOfACure.4382:

And there’s the fallacy.

We do not want to play “a part” of a class. We recognize it’s only a part right now.

So it’s not part of a class, it’s part of the current class? Right…

That’s why most of us talking about it are not playing Rangers.
This topic is asking for Rangers to be changed so it’s NOT just ‘a part’.

You ASSUMED we were already playing the class, and just wanted the pet removed (or some half kitten change like that).

I accused you of currently playing a ranger? Where?

You’re just a stick-in-the-mud whose bringing nothing to this discussion but negativity and stagnation.

Ah, it’s a thread for only people who agree with you then? Not a balanced discussion, but a propaganda piece. My bad.

This discussion isn’t about the current state of the Ranger. It’s about the future, and the future ain’t set in stone like your posts seem to imply.

It’s not a discussion. It’s an advert. No one can disagree, or they are being “negative”.

---

To add another point to the argument.

Do Ranger NPCs always have pets fighting by their side?

Hell no. Thus – The pet is not a fundamental part of the Ranger profession.
This confirms that pets being mandatory is merely an oversight on ANet’s part, and something for them to work on in the future.

Or, they can go adding pets to every single Ranger NPC… Pffft.

Do ranger NPCs get a damage boost for not having pets? Can you prove this? If not, what’s your point?

tl;dr, but wouldnt it seem a bit… un-ballanced if they just gave you a button to put away your pet?
think about it, as an elementalist, you have to constantly be swapping elements on your F1,F2 etc etc just to keep yourself going, because thats what makes them unique. If your going to make it so the ranger can simply “put away” the pet, even for a buff, youd probably have to go, “well right elementalists can only pick one or two elements and have them buffed to compensate” or something along those lines. Pets are difficult to handle yes but I was under the impression that was the idea behind the class specific skils. Its just something you have to adjust to utilising properly between classes. I’m probably wrong but thats what I tend to get when I voice my opinion.

Lol ppl aren’t giving others the option to disagree. This is the design of the ranger for this game you aren’t the one who goes around changing the original class design anet has given us. Join their dev team next time if you want to ensure you have your way. People only want their way and ignore everything else… Having a bird is a solution… Why can’t a ranger have a nice bird to help them scout terrain or something as the “aesthetic”. Why do you have to be perfectly independent? Archers can work in teams can’t they? Snipers have spotters. I don’t get why not? Unless this is suppose to portray and represent the type of people were speaking to… Only wanting to think about themselves and ignore anyone or anything else lol. Nevertheless, why would you get buff for ignoring and not using a special feature of the class? It IS unique. No other class do you run around witha gorgeous or deadly looking animal, a sidekick, a partner, or a cute pet at times. I don’t completely disagree with perma stowing but other that I think that’s as far as it should go.

DreamOfACure.4382:

Your advice is like telling a Mesmer player who doesn’t like illusions to never cast or use clone/phantasm skills/traits.

As gamers, we CANNOT do that – It would mean giving ourselves a handicap and no one wants to do that. We can’t simply ignore a mechanic that is integral to the profession’s gameplay.

Letting the pet die is NOT a solution. It’s a statement of apathy.

We want an pet-less Ranger who can play at optimal levels comparatively to the current Ranger with a pet.
Letting the pet die would not achieve this.

What you (and others) do not understand is this is what you are asking for. You want to play a mesmer that in no way uses what is their “class mechanic” and instead gains the damage / utility of that mechanic directly into their skills.

I understand that people have a “vision” in their heads of what the perfect ranger is to them, and because they do not want to use pets it is different from what they want. I get it I REALLY do. Does not change the fact that the way that the GW2 ranger was developed, tested, and put into THIS game was as a class that is pet centric.

I have made my stance clear, I am totally against giving any sort of buff or compensation for dismissing your pet. Am I against having the OPTION to do so? No, it IS something that needs adjusting, either a perma-stow or at the LEAST a manner in which pets are put away and stay there when you take slight damage from falling etc.

Asking for a petless ranger to play at optimal levels in comparison to the current ranger with a pet is asking for a mesmer without clone/phantasm skills to be just as good as one that uses them properly. I just can not see that happening.

Tell you what.

If rangers get something to compensate for not having a pet I want to have my pet boosted to compensate for me not using any skills.

That way I can just run around with an OP pet spamming F1 & F2.

riku.2091:

Just gonna say this.

The Ranger’s class symbol is a paw print.
The Ranger’s forum symbol is a paw print.
The Ranger is the only class that has a permanent pet (Making them unique over other classes who can use “pets”; Our pets do not eat up our utility slots)
The Ranger’s class question is about your first PET.
Every trait line has benefits for your pets.
You cannot perm stow your pets.
Our pets give us access to many boons and conditions
Nearly every image of a ranger includes their pets.

I’m just gonna say: Ranger is THE pet class. So giving The pet class the option to go petless just feels wrong from so many points. Don’t like pets? Don’t roll the class. No other class can get 1200 range? False. Rifle Warriors have decent damage and 1200 range. The whole point of the ranger class is their pet. Other classes don’t rely as much on their mechanics? Well, that’s what makes the ranger different. When you pick a ranger you are choosing to pick a two-unit character.

You want a master of ranged damage? Roll a warrior huntsman.

About 47.93% correct.

And irregardless of all your points, as a Master of Animal Control, I would like to stow my pet for NON-COMBAT reasons.

Warriors do not have the same abilities that a Ranger does. Stop with your completely trolling comment of “roll a longbow warrior”. Even if you (think you) are right, you’re missing the point of the discussion which is about problems with the Ranger class. Not (your opinion) that people should roll a different class.

Before you spit your milk all over I’ll clarify MY standpoint on the perma-stow ability:

I SIMPLY WANT THE ABILITY TO PUT THE PET AWAY FOR NON-COMBAT PURPOSES.

Any moron with a dog can put it in a cage. Why can’t I ??

Joey.3928:

You have to just learn to control your pet better.

I’m okay with this argument except when it relates to WvW.

In WvW you’re almost always fighting in group battles and there is too much AoE for me to control my pet. A lot of classes and burst damage a person down, many from range. As a ranger my pet is a good portion of my DPS and when there’s so much AoE that it dies instantly I am severely disadvantaged.

Then when you factor in defending a tower/keep it’s even worse. If I’m on top of a wall it’s hard to get my pet to go out an attack. If it does start to attack it has to deal with everyone outside AoEing the door so again the pet dies instantly.

If I try and go with one of the few ranged pets it’s still an issue. When defending a wall against any half decent opponent they will be AoEing the walls near the gate. As a player you have to try and pick a few enemies off then run back to heal up. Since the pet AI is so poor I have to run halfway into the tower before the pet starts to get out of the AoE, even when using F3. So my only option is to try and swap pets and then deal with a 20 second cool down.

Yes, controlling your pet is an important skill as a ranger for PvE and sPvP. It seems like no matter how skilled you are at managing your pet it doesn’t matter much in WvW.

The ‘Pet-Less’ Ranger should really be an option.

Many individuals want the medium armor fighter without having to use a pet. Many considered a ‘thief or rogue’ individual who steals or uses poisons, etc as that class…. but again, we don’t want the stigma of poisons, stealth, stealing, etc.

So there is this ‘want’ for this type of class…one that medium armored, mobile, quick, etc but doesn’t use pets, doesn’t steal, doesn’t use posions, etc.

I don’t see why they couldn’t ‘work’ this into the class. They have a ‘petless/no minion’ necromancer. They could build the Ranger the same way and work that into a few abilities and skirmisher/marksmen lines.

There has been plenty of history throughout books, games, comics, D&D, etc with ‘Rangers’ who are skirmishers that don’t have pets.

Like many of said, you can have BOTH types of Rangers…with pets and without…just like you can have Necros that don’t use minions and Necros that do.

In terms of unique to each..like Death Shroud for Necros, Belt for Engineer, etc…they can ‘re-work’ something for rangers to be unique for pet rangers (which is the pet) and something else for the pet-less one.

I’d prefer seeing both options, just like you had in GW1.

It’s doable. And maybe we’ll see it happen.

Jestunhi.7429:

Perma-stow – sure. Low priority change though as you can just follow the advice of this thread and have a small pet (like a bird) set to passive in the meantime.

Boost your stats for not having pet – no. The reasons have been covered throughout this thread.

Not really an option when you start investigating some of the bugs the pet mechanics have.

You have two “active pets”. We’ll call them AP1 and AP2. When you have AP1 out and hit F4 (swap) your AP2 pet becomes active; and vice versa. You also have two aquatic based pet slots. For purposes of this discussion we don’t have to go into too much details about this. But everything else is basically the same; you have two aquatic slots for these also.

Scenario 1:

AP1 is set to Brown Bear and AP2 is set to Raven.

Since I can’t perma-stow my pet, I’ll keep the Raven active because it causes the least amount of rage when not doing combat related tasks.

I’m walking along just trying to get from point A to point B. The path I take is along a road for the most part, only deviating where I need to avoid combat because I just want to get to that next waypoint so I can easily return later or spawn after a death.

Up ahead is a town. Currently it’s controlled by “the enemy” and there is a short bridge over a small stream of water. So I turn off the main road to avoid the enemies. While crossing the stream, there is one spot just deep enough to trigger me going into the aquatic mode. My Raven “turns into” my Shark pet (because that is the pet I have set to Aquatic AP1) for a few seconds and then I dip back out of the water.

Now my Brown Bear is out and active.

Wait… Didn’t I have my Raven as active pet? I thought I did. Weird. Well, let’s just swap back to the Raven because the Brown Bear is just annoying when not in combat. Oh, what’s this?! There is a countdown timer on the swap pet (and stow pet!) abilities. Hmmm…

Scenario 2:

AP1 = Brown Bear; AP2 = Blue Moa.

I’m wandering around trying to do some map completion stuff. Currently, the Blue Moa is active pet (slot AP2). I am about to do a jumping puzzle. The last one I did taught me that it is best to stow my pet because he ends up just getting in the way. So, I stow my pet and start the jumping. A few jumps in I fall off and hit the ground taking a few points of health.

And my pet pops out. But not the Blue Moa, which is the pet I had set to active before I stowed it. No. The Brown Bear in slot AP1.

Well, I’ll just stow the pet and get back to the jumping puzzle. Oh wait… There is a countdown timer on the stow command. And the swap command. And I can’t switch the Active Pets to other animals (like a Raven) because the timer is also active for this ability. Great.

Scenario 3:

This is just going to be me stating that you can’t check your pet stats and abilities and other characteristics using the management screen without swapping pets. Which triggers the shared countdown timer for stow, swap, and changing the AP1/AP2 slots.

This makes it frustrating to do anything with the pet management screen.

===

Look, guys. We all know it’s just a “few seconds” (it’s actually 30 or 45 seconds; depending on… well, I’m not sure what it depends on) and it shouldn’t be that big of a deal. But, during the 5th “30 second countdown timer” while trying to read and figure out “pet stuff”, one starts to wonder: How in the name of all that is Holy did this happen?

Why is there a countdown timer for these abilities?
Ok, maybe it’s combat. Then, why does the timer trigger when not in combat?
Why does going into water trigger my pet to become active when I have manually selected to have my pet stowed?
And, why does it trigger the AP1 even though I had AP2 set to the active pet?
Why does the pet ignore my Command (capitalized for emphasis) to “stay in the cage” when I am in combat?
Why does taking Fall Damage trigger my pet like combat does?
Why is there no key bind preset for Stow/Activate? Why is there no manual option to set a key bind for this in options?
Why was it programmed this way?

These are just some of the things bouncing around in our heads during the 309th time we have to wait for the timer to run down.

===

Pet’s should be able to be permanently stowed. Period. And I do NOT wish for a “buff” when stowed. In fact, I am AGAINST that opinion outright.

I firmly believe that the pet should be a part of the DPS for the class.
I am firmly against the idea of a “pet-less ranger” in regards to COMBAT.
Rangers should lose DPS without their pet out. Period.

And this should be our OPTION. Our CHOICE.

These are not “low priority changes” like you tried to state. The pet “is a big part of our class” and should be a very high priority. Very high. Like, Tommy Chong high.

Please fix these issues with the pet mechanics.

Firstly, I agree with the addition of perma-stow, no need to try to sell it to me any further.

Secondly, if you are constantly using the pet in slot 2 did you ever consider putting it in slot 1 instead? It wouldn’t stop it unstowing from fall damage, etc but at least the pet that you actually use would come out instead of the bear.

:edit:

To be clear, I am in no way claiming that there are no issues with pets or rangers in general. I agree that it should remember which pet you had out, I agree that out of combat pet switching should have no cooldown (especially until they add a way to check pet stats / abilities without changing the active pet), and pretty much all the other issues which you have brought up.

Lvl 80 Ranger like some of us here. I feel that a perma-stow is needed, even for some of us who like pets (like me), secondly one of the reasons i feel everyone is saying pets are stupid and id rather just rely on me, is the fact that rangers get 1 pet out at a time that is decent in pve, but as soon as you switch to pvp you will notice a big difference in your damage capabilities, pets can’t take enemy aggro from other players they usually miss attacks (generally making the special attacks absurdly pointless). also i miss the elite in beta where you could spawn 3 of your pets at once, so anyone who wants to go like a beastmaster spec and play with pets a lot more seems to be nonexhistant. TLDR – Pets need to be better in some way and need perma-stow, ranger utillity and elites are boring.

Saying you like the Ranger but not the pet is like saying you don’t like the Ranger. Pets are part of the class so my advice to you would be to not play a Ranger.

Ebs.6280:

Saying you like the Ranger but not the pet is like saying you don’t like the Ranger. Pets are part of the class so my advice to you would be to not play a Ranger.

No. Saying you like the ranger but not the pets is like saying you like the elementalist but you don’t like fire spells, or you like the thief but don’t like stealth.

Pets are just one aspect of ranger gameplay. Maybe I like the ranger because of all his ranged abilities, his spirits (which are also weak), or his traps. It is entirely valid to like most of a given profession without liking their entire profession.

I’m fine with keeping the pets but they need to be seriously reworked for them to be viable in PvP and especially WvW.

Hell do something simple, the longer I have my pet on passive standing next to me the higher a mutual buff we get.

Szin.1250:

You need to search farther and wider, then. Tolkien isn’t even close to being the original, although his conception of rangers has heavily influenced modern fantasy and gaming.

“Ranger”, according to the OED, goes back in English to at least 1455. It has quite a wide range of definitions there, with scads of quotations across the centuries before Tolkien. About half of the definitions do include some reference to managing wildlife and/or livestock.

In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s in England, the term could be a mildly derogatory term roughly equivalent to “vagabond”. It had less to do with any fighting style than with the fact that they “ranged”, i.e., wandered about. My own take is that Tolkien was thinking of this term when he called Aragorn and his companions “rangers”, given the way the rest of the humans in Middle-Earth seemed to look down on them at first. Since the term has lost its derogatory force in today’s English, that nuance of the book is lost on most readers.

But really, that is all irrelevant. “Thief” in GW2 is not really much like “thief” the way non-gamers use the word. Neither is “Guardian” or “Engineer”. “Necromancer”, prior to D&D, meant “a medium who speaks to the dead to divine the future”, which bears only a distant resemblance to what it means in gaming.

“Ranger”, as ArenaNet uses the term, apparently includes having a pet as its core mechanic. It’s all well and good to request that they change that core mechanic (although my own preference would be for them not to), but appeals to outside sources should carry no weight in the discussion.

Well that is a bunch of good info right there, thank you.
I understand what you mean. I’m not sure outside sources shouldn’t carry weight in the discussion. I think that we can learn by example either in concept or in execution (inspiration and other games, respectively). Analyzing an outside should could make someone have an idea or inspiration, in my opinion.

Jestunhi.7429:

Munrock.3092:

Hi. I’m a member of anyone, and you don’t speak for me.

Ditto, I’m perfectly happy with pets & bows.

I guess I wasn’t clear on what I meant. I mean that pets or no pets, the ranger class isn’t in a good place at the moment, and I think it might have been because they tried to merge two different concepts. Whether you guys like the result or not, we can still argue that the class isn’t as good as it could be in relation with other classes.

The bottom line is this… if the class were working as intended, this thread wouldn’t exist. However with how much the pet sucks, it makes the ranger pointless. What other class unique options are bugged as hard as the ranger’s pet?

Add on the “40 millisecond” band-aid fix and well… the ranger is pretty useless.