Guild Wars 2

Hey guys, I am gonna make a list of my top 5 changes for the ranger and reasons behind each point on the list.

5) Making all of the AOE and range upgrades baseline. There is not much to say about this other then it makes sense, that it has been done for every profession and that it makes many weapons viable in situations that were never really possible before. For example not having to go into MM if you want to use the LB. You can, but you do not have to

4) Allies aid trait. This has to be one of the things that I have been wanting for ages, for a way to positively interact with the pet. This makes it possible to do various things, even go full tank with a stupid tank pet and make an impact in the middle of a team fight.

3) Bark skin. Yes, having an innate ability to survive the first burst from a thief without losing more then half of your HP is a god send for that annoying LB zerker.

2) Zephyr superspeed. WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

1) Whole of BM tree. I think that the Ranger has benefited the most with the changes to the way stats are distributed. To top it off Resounding Timbre, GFTE, companions might, wilting strike, GS trait, Natural healing, Beastly warden and Zephyr swap are all amazing. Honed axes is bleh, but who cares. There are real choices to be made here.
Furthermore, 10% damage increase while your health is above 90%, pet ability CD reduction, 20% extra critical damage and 30% more speed for your pets is a crazy good buff. If anyone ever used the 30% buff, then they know how it actually makes your pets connect on moving enemies. O M G!!

My 2c. Thoughts?

I like all the changes to the Longbow.

• must-have traits will become baseline
• other Longbow traits are combined into a single trait
• access to more traits for less trait points (Piercing arrows + Eagle Eye + Read the Wind wasn’t possible, now you can even add Spotter)

I also like the heals getting a skill category and therefore traits. Troll Unguent and Heal as One are going to be great when traited.

The beastmastery line definitely deserves a mention, even if I don’t expect to be using it. Lots of pet traits combined and moved here. I’m still a bit sceptical about the pet traits, because they might still require the pet to be in combat.

All trait lines seem to have a strength and are worth considering. Although Nature Magic might be completely leaning on Protective Ward (and Fortifying Bond). The Druid trait line will have some competition.

I’m not sold on Allies’ Aid. I expect it to be buggy. The tooltip says “… cast search and rescue on them”, which isn’t possible since the skill doesn’t use a target and can’t be cast on anything. Lick Wounds still often doesn’t work. Also, let’s not forget that Search and Rescue only works on downed characters, not dead ones.

Maybe they should still make all cooldown reduction traits baseline.

I like your list.

I also love how they cleaned up the marks tree, buffed baseline longbow, and consolidated LTW.

Hidden barbs is huge. QuickDraw and BW specifically are huge additions. Protective ward as well, especially with barkskin, neutralizes any burst.

The other really big thing is spike trap.

Beastmaster will be a solid PVP trait line.
But I will more likely run the first 3 trait lines in WvW due to the nature of how frail pets are in WvW in general.

I mentioned elsewhere you should be able to zerg with bears, as long as u have bark skin. They have innate endure pain so if ure running BW for the utility , you will be able to get it off every time before they die.

This will be especially useful for tanky GS builds. Go clarion call and remorseless, swap pets, do the taunt + maul. This would be especially effective with SoW to give u both stab. Rinse and repeat. I will need to test it but I think we should be able to pull it off even in the thickest zergs.