Guild Wars 2

I just want to start a quick discussion on how bad our traits are. First of all the worst line is the Skirmishing. Pre/Crit Damage, yet one of our Grandmaster traits is traps which are mainly condition damage, or would fit in with condition duration. The other Grandmaster trait is Moment of Clarity, Rangers have 1 daze I can think of off the top of my head and that’s GS 5. Technobauble if you’re an Asura.

I’m sure there are other traits just as bad but I was just looking at that line today and thinking it’s such a mess.

Your right about the skirmishing line.

Marksman should really be the crit line, as it’s all about crit with opening Strike and bow stuff.

Skirmish should be conditions duration and power. It’s the melee tree clearly. Basically swap the twos stats

All the signet stuff should be in bm. After all our signets are all to do with our pets. The gm trait would be great as the ultimate beast mode power

Traps should be spread between skirmish and wild survival or one or the other.

Nature magic is fine, but is fine

This has been the general consensus of this forum for a long time now. While I agree that some traits need a rework or get merged, traps isn’t one of them.

Wilderness Survival is a defensive tree by which I mean the traits are meant to keep you alive, trap traits can be consisered offensive as they allow us to use our traps more effectively by using them as pseudo grenades. I would hate to have to choose between trap potency and empathic bond.

Fair enough. They would still fit in skirmishing with power conditions duration.

I agree I like ws as is

If only ANet remembered they made a Ranger class perhaps some actual progress could be made with this class.

No trait line really makes sense. Marks is beyond ridiculous. Skirmishing as you mentioned. We have skills like Spirits that aren’t even worth considering unless you trait them. We have 3 trap skills that are effectively the same thing. Comparing lightning reflexes to roll for initiative is quite bad, let alone if you even want to consider withdraw.

I mean there is probably more actually wrong with this class than there is right… and ANet has visited this forum so many times you can count them on a single hand.

I don’t mind traps being in skirmishing if they would make traps scale more evenly with direct damage vs. condition damage. But yes, I think our traits could use some more consideration and rework.

Atherakhia.4086:

If only ANet remembered they made a Ranger class perhaps some actual progress could be made with this class.

No trait line really makes sense. Marks is beyond ridiculous. Skirmishing as you mentioned. We have skills like Spirits that aren’t even worth considering unless you trait them. We have 3 trap skills that are effectively the same thing. Comparing lightning reflexes to roll for initiative is quite bad, let alone if you even want to consider withdraw.

I mean there is probably more actually wrong with this class than there is right… and ANet has visited this forum so many times you can count them on a single hand.

There’s so many things that are questionable about this post. :/

First of all, didn’t you read the patch notes? Rangers got buffed a LOT on the july 23 patch.

Second, marks is much better now than what it was before. Yes, it could use some more work, but you’re making it look like the entire line is broken. Care to expound?

I already explained why I think traps is ok in skirmishing in a post above. Spirits, on the other I agree with. It needs to be traited to be useful.

There are 4 trap skills.

Who was comparing LR with roll for initiative? Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Withdraw a heal skill?

Wrong and right seems to be a matter of perspective. I found that majority of what the ranger has makes sense, but I will admit that there is still a lot of room for improvement.

Lastly, how do you know that ANet doesn’t visit t this forum? Do you have forum stats on hand? How do you know they don’t just lurk? Sorry, baseless claims like this can’t be taken seriously.

My problem is really I don’t see why traps belongs in Skirmishing at least not while Skirmishing is Precison/Crit Damage. The grandmaster trait itself doubles condition duration which has no synergy. Traits need a lot of love. Rangers got “buffed”, warhorn was the only actual buff, Greatsword is questionable, Longbow was just dumb. Giving 1200-1500 range weapon stealth is unnecessary. Rapid Fire stacking vuln isn’t great because it takes so long.

1) Traps are fine where they are; having to sacrifice our strongest defense trait line for traps would completely destroy current functional builds.
2) Lots of classes would LOVE to have their precision and crit damage in the same line. Rangers are one of the lucky few that get that consolidation.
3) Spirits aren’t being toned at all due to how strong they are in PvP. Expect bigger changes to them in the next coming months, as with ANet having their 10k tourney and Spirits being the meta build, it’s bound to be on the devs radar.

-Skirmishing, more than anything, just needs some trait changes to make it more “power friendly.”
-There are many traits spread out across the trait lines that aren’t even considered in 90% of peoples builds. Before any of the current effective traits are changed, those traits need to be reworked/replaced/consolidated in order to create some more function, interactive, build bolstering, and useful traits, that don’t seem like they just came out of meta.

That being said, those are just opinions. But Traps REALLY don’t need to be in Wilderness Survival, because WS already suffers enough as it is with lots of strong defensive traits and already having a tough time between picking strong traits. In the future, if the condition removal gets spread out a bit better, then maybe the traps into Wilderness Survival would be a good choice. Until then though, 30 Wilderness Survival is a necessity to any build that doesn’t want to melt to other classes (unless people want to fight extremely uphill battles), and just throwing traps into it as is would basically just kill the trap build for most people.

Oh no I’m not complaining about precision/crit damage being in the same line, it’s fantastic. Just the traits in that line are really bad. If you’re not running traps there are no good grandmaster traits to take.

NinjaSonic.1392:

Oh no I’m not complaining about precision/crit damage being in the same line, it’s fantastic. Just the traits in that line are really bad. If you’re not running traps there are no good grandmaster traits to take.

I completely agree. There really aren’t any good adept tier, or master tier traits for power builds to take either, except for maybe niche builds that use Honed Axe (10% more crit damage with axe in mainhand). Skirmishing is heavily bogged down by traits that affect pets, and the Beastmastery line is filled with mostly useless (more useless than the pet traits in Skirmishing) pet traits.

I’d say, in a list form, these are the traits that need to be reworked/moved:

-Pet’s Prowess (could easily be Master/Grandmaster in beastmastery)
-Trappers Defense (one of the least useful “on revive” effects. Guardians get Sanctuary… -.-)
-Companions Might (this one is iffy, as it actually functions with rangers having crit chance, so it kind of makes sense here)
-Agility Training (this could easily replace Instinctual Bond without breaking anything)
-Carnivorous Appetite (perfect for Beastmastery line, since only the pets own crits heal them, and BM increases pet precision)

Traits to remove entirely:
Moment of Clarity (put the +50% stun/daze on a minor grandmaster somewhere, maybe the attack of Opportunity for the pet on pet swap in Beastmastery, and then open up this grandmaster trait for a new, more useful to power builds option)

That would probably be the most ideal rework I can foresee. It would leave a lot of options for things that could be beneficial to power builds, without killing any current builds, or making anything OP.

jubskie.3152:

Atherakhia.4086:

If only ANet remembered they made a Ranger class perhaps some actual progress could be made with this class.

No trait line really makes sense. Marks is beyond ridiculous. Skirmishing as you mentioned. We have skills like Spirits that aren’t even worth considering unless you trait them. We have 3 trap skills that are effectively the same thing. Comparing lightning reflexes to roll for initiative is quite bad, let alone if you even want to consider withdraw.

I mean there is probably more actually wrong with this class than there is right… and ANet has visited this forum so many times you can count them on a single hand.

There’s so many things that are questionable about this post. :/

First of all, didn’t you read the patch notes? Rangers got buffed a LOT on the july 23 patch.

Second, marks is much better now than what it was before. Yes, it could use some more work, but you’re making it look like the entire line is broken. Care to expound?

I already explained why I think traps is ok in skirmishing in a post above. Spirits, on the other I agree with. It needs to be traited to be useful.

There are 4 trap skills.

Who was comparing LR with roll for initiative? Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Withdraw a heal skill?

Wrong and right seems to be a matter of perspective. I found that majority of what the ranger has makes sense, but I will admit that there is still a lot of room for improvement.

Lastly, how do you know that ANet doesn’t visit t this forum? Do you have forum stats on hand? How do you know they don’t just lurk? Sorry, baseless claims like this can’t be taken seriously.

Do you feel the patch accomplished much? It was the first sign of life from ANet in ages.
Marks is bloated.
Mud, Spike, Frost are too similar.
I was simply stating LR sucks in comparison to most other stun breaks.
Who cares if they lurk and don’t post? Nothing is getting done despite thousands of posts on the same topics for 9 months. If they’re reading the forum, there’s no proof of it.

I think I covered all your points?

I’m not trying to be intentionally obtuse. This class has a lot of problems. I’d argue more than any other class in the game. If you don’t agree, that’s fine… neither of us will convince the other of something they don’t want to believe. There was a time I would have spent hours detailing every minute issue with this class. That day has come and gone. It was attempted. Nothing has come of it.

I don’t find this class has a real functional purpose for existing in this game as it is right now. Traits would be a great way to start, but there’s so very much more wrong with it at this point. If you don’t agree, that’s fine.

I think one problem is its just a clunky class. Longbow is really goofy, I’d honestly take a bow set similar to Southsun Survival. Make Longbow automatically 1500 range and replace that trait that gave it and harpoon gun 1500 with splinter weapon. Splintering auto attacks on the harpoon gun are fantastic, I’d prefer damage over a bleed though. It’d work great with barrage and piercing arrow. I’d love to see a disabling shot, it either cripples or snares for a second and makes the enemy unable to use skills for x seconds. A charge shot that deals more damage the longer you hold the button would be awesome.

Axe is the other weird weapon. I see them used occasionally but it really isn’t a great main or offhand. I’d be happy if we lost both Axe MH/OH for either Dagger MH or Sword OH, or even give us staff. I mean we’re already shamany support with spirits and healing spring so I don’t see why staff would see too off.

Atherakhia.4086:

Do you feel the patch accomplished much? It was the first sign of life from ANet in ages.
Marks is bloated.
Mud, Spike, Frost are too similar.
I was simply stating LR sucks in comparison to most other stun breaks.
Who cares if they lurk and don’t post? Nothing is getting done despite thousands of posts on the same topics for 9 months. If they’re reading the forum, there’s no proof of it.

I think I covered all your points?

I’m not trying to be intentionally obtuse. This class has a lot of problems. I’d argue more than any other class in the game. If you don’t agree, that’s fine… neither of us will convince the other of something they don’t want to believe. There was a time I would have spent hours detailing every minute issue with this class. That day has come and gone. It was attempted. Nothing has come of it.

I don’t find this class has a real functional purpose for existing in this game as it is right now. Traits would be a great way to start, but there’s so very much more wrong with it at this point. If you don’t agree, that’s fine.

Yes, I think the patch accomplished much.

First off, the main issue with the Longbow was that once the enemy has closed in on the ranger with it, he had only PBS to rely on. After it, the ranger was defenseless. Stealth solves that problem.

And then we get player controlled Blast Finisher. This alone made rangers more group friendly. Stacking might with fire fields? AoE healing? Those are possible now and everyone wants to have that.

Offhand Axe now has retaliation, a boon that rangers have no access to before. While it is still suicide when against zergs, it is much more useful now when in small skirmishes like in havoc groups because opponents have to use melee attacks because ranged attacks are refelcted (as jcbroe pointed out in the podcast).

I could go on, but my point was to contest your statement that “If only ANet remembered
they made a Ranger class
perhaps some actual progress
could be made with this
class.” Because they have made progress, but you just don’t want to see it.

Yes, muddy terrain, spike trap and frost trap are are all similar in that they are all snares, but thats where their similiarities end. Muddy terrain is area denial, Spike trap is a snare and offensive skill in that it bleeds, and frost trap is an ice field. They all serve different purposes. And whats wrong with being able to choose which snare you’d bring? Variety is the spice of life.

Anyway, it looks like this class isn’t working for you and I can understand that. But you’re making claims that I don’t agree with based on the success that I and others are having with the class.

I have to disagree, 3s of stealth isn’t going to save you if your longbow is out. Stealth may belong on Shortbow, or replace Moment of Clarity with when ever you interrupt/daze someone gain 3-5s of stealth would be much more useful. I wouldn’t mind seeing stealth on GS, Sword, Shortbow but it’s really awkward on Longbow.

cracks knuckles

Alrighty! Let’s break it down:

Shortbow’s defensive capabilities:

1. Evade on SB#3
2. Cripple on SB#4
3. Stun/Daze on SB#5

Sword’s defensive capabilities:

1. Dodge + backward leap on sword#2
2. Leap + leap finisher on sword#2 chain
3. Dodge on sword#3

Greatsword’s defensive capabilities:

1. Dodge on every third auto attack
2. 1100 range leap on GS#3
3. Block on GS#4
4. Possible cripple chain from GS#4
5. Possible knockdown while GS#4 block is up
6. Stun on GS#5

Longbow’s defensive capabilities:

1. Knockdown on LB#4
2. Cripple on LB#5 which most would argue isn’t a defensive skill at all since it roots you.

Longbows terribly needed a defensive skill and got it with the addition of stealth. Those other weapons already have atleast 3 defensive moves, while the longbow has 2, and the second one is still debatable.

And come on, if you can’t see the advantages of having stealth, you have to use your imagination more. A LOT of options suddenly opened to rangers because of it was added to our arsenal.

The longbow change was inconsequential in my view of things. Do you think ANet came up with the idea of stealth first or the remorseless trait first? I think remorseless came first honestly. The stealth is simply too clunky to use effectively because it’s so unreliable. The vulnerability on Rapid Shot makes sense logically, but it doesn’t really work out practically. And we’re still left with a Rapid Shot that needs a second trimmed off its duration.

The shortbow nerf I find the largest insult to this class because a lot of people out there use shortbow #4 and #5 to help kite. While the intended purpose of #5 is an interrupt, the travel time and unrelaible nature of shots can be a detriment on those clutch heals, fears, stuns, etc you’re trying to interrupt. When they reduced Shortbow’s range to 900 to match the axe, you left the 2 weapon sets being almost identical. A ranged snare, an AE condition, and an auto attack. With the changes, they should have removed the facing requirement for Shortbow’s bleeds and even with this, Axe is still probably a stronger overall option.

Now you’re right, a lot of the weapons have strong defensive options, but not every weapon for every class is split along these lines. There’s nothing wrong with expecting a class to switch to another weapon set when things are looking bad. Especially when one of those weapons is a Ranger’s greatsword which would probably be the most overpowered weapon in the game if it were given to any other class.

As to the traps, you’re right… some variety is nice to have… but the 3 traps are excessive. There’s no reason to have all 3 and Frost is the least used of the bunch (by me). When this class has such an obscene lack of AE and burst damage, having skills that are all functionally the same are among the first things that should be dropped to add it.

Wow, an insightful post that doesn’t complain, thoroughly explains the issue, and doesn’t arrogantly offer up proposals for fixes? +1 aetherakhia

Atherakhia.4086:

The longbow change was inconsequential in my view of things. Do you think ANet came up with the idea of stealth first or the remorseless trait first? I think remorseless came first honestly. The stealth is simply too clunky to use effectively because it’s so unreliable. The vulnerability on Rapid Shot makes sense logically, but it doesn’t really work out practically. And we’re still left with a Rapid Shot that needs a second trimmed off its duration.

The shortbow nerf I find the largest insult to this class because a lot of people out there use shortbow #4 and #5 to help kite. While the intended purpose of #5 is an interrupt, the travel time and unrelaible nature of shots can be a detriment on those clutch heals, fears, stuns, etc you’re trying to interrupt. When they reduced Shortbow’s range to 900 to match the axe, you left the 2 weapon sets being almost identical. A ranged snare, an AE condition, and an auto attack. With the changes, they should have removed the facing requirement for Shortbow’s bleeds and even with this, Axe is still probably a stronger overall option.

Now you’re right, a lot of the weapons have strong defensive options, but not every weapon for every class is split along these lines. There’s nothing wrong with expecting a class to switch to another weapon set when things are looking bad. Especially when one of those weapons is a Ranger’s greatsword which would probably be the most overpowered weapon in the game if it were given to any other class.

As to the traps, you’re right… some variety is nice to have… but the 3 traps are excessive. There’s no reason to have all 3 and Frost is the least used of the bunch (by me). When this class has such an obscene lack of AE and burst damage, having skills that are all functionally the same are among the first things that should be dropped to add it.

I had to echo this, again, wonderful post, thx.

Atherakhia.4086:

The longbow change was inconsequential in my view of things. Do you think ANet came up with the idea of stealth first or the remorseless trait first? I think remorseless came first honestly. The stealth is simply too clunky to use effectively because it’s so unreliable. The vulnerability on Rapid Shot makes sense logically, but it doesn’t really work out practically. And we’re still left with a Rapid Shot that needs a second trimmed off its duration.

The shortbow nerf I find the largest insult to this class because a lot of people out there use shortbow #4 and #5 to help kite. While the intended purpose of #5 is an interrupt, the travel time and unrelaible nature of shots can be a detriment on those clutch heals, fears, stuns, etc you’re trying to interrupt. When they reduced Shortbow’s range to 900 to match the axe, you left the 2 weapon sets being almost identical. A ranged snare, an AE condition, and an auto attack. With the changes, they should have removed the facing requirement for Shortbow’s bleeds and even with this, Axe is still probably a stronger overall option.

Now you’re right, a lot of the weapons have strong defensive options, but not every weapon for every class is split along these lines. There’s nothing wrong with expecting a class to switch to another weapon set when things are looking bad. Especially when one of those weapons is a Ranger’s greatsword which would probably be the most overpowered weapon in the game if it were given to any other class.

As to the traps, you’re right… some variety is nice to have… but the 3 traps are excessive. There’s no reason to have all 3 and Frost is the least used of the bunch (by me). When this class has such an obscene lack of AE and burst damage, having skills that are all functionally the same are among the first things that should be dropped to add it.

I’m going to derive one of the very good points you made, because I think it really needs to be said, rangers have a real lack of meaningful AoE damage outside of traps (and most classes don’t have to resort to their utilities for their AoE damage).

The ranger is one of the few classes that (imo) doesn’t bring anything in place of that lack of AoE. Other classes (particularly thief, who is extremely single target oriented with most of their attacks) bring high burst damage or control abilities for offensive compensation, which is something that the ranger class just hasn’t quite managed to tweak out yet. That means, that when looking to be in a group, all things equal, the group will choose the class with the better AoE capability.

Since ranger lacks (or has extremely niche) group support, they get thrown into the mix with other damage dealers (who can also support at the same time, but that’s besides the point), and those other damage dealers almost all bring better AoE to the table, and when they don’t, they bring higher burst. It really leaves the ranger unable to compete for a role in a group at times.

It’s even prominent in PvP; there’s a reason why rangers are choosing to go Spirits (it isn’t just strong for them, but for their whole team), and why that even then, they are backpoint holders/roamer/far point assaulters, only participating in teamfights when necessary. Rangers are amazing duelists, and one of the better PvP classes, but that in itself is because of the specific role they can perform, which doesn’t really translate at all into other gametypes other than WvW roaming.

Precision isn’t useless for Traps, however I do feel Beastmastery needs a rework, its got a lot of kittenty traits.

I’d second the beastmastery overhaul back when I was using a beastmaster build I never invested in the beastmastery line for the major traits, just the pet stats, which says a lot.

It’d be nice if they sorted out the master level majors, from the look of them they wanted to encourage more specialised attack, support or control pets, but they’re all lacklustre. Maybe trying a system where there are no pet type restrictions along with really useful perks would be the way to go.

I have been holding off from playing my ranger hoping that in the next patch we will see some improvement.

But imo the worst trait line is marksmanship. I am pretty sure its the only trait line in the game where 3 minor traits revolve around the same relatively useless thing because the 10 seconds of vulnerability become very useless very quickly in a long fight, and if you have a high crit chance then one guaranteed crit a fight doesn’t help either. Remorseless is now a lot better because it synergizes with the longbow, but if you want a signet build with a greatsword then opening strikes stays useless.

Maybe remorseless should be tied to some in game mechanic. Don’t get me wrong having it work with longbow stealth is very cool, but now I feel restricted to a specific weapon and build because if I will spend most my time using a longbow for this I might as well go into skirmishing for the 20% cd reduction as well.

Also like some people were saying the signet traits should be moved to BM because the traits already there are very kitten, and signets are mostly for your pet until you get the grandmaster trait.

Marksmanship could use some trait consolidation, especially on the minor traits. The 5 point minor should be opening strike and alpha strike combined. The 15 point minor should do what precise strike does, plus add 1 stack of vulnerability for 5 seconds on a critical. The 25 point trait could be something like +5-10% damage against vulnerable enemies. That would be a good set of minor traits, in my opinion.

The grandmaster traits in marksmanship don’t seem very good either. Remorseless should have been tied to cripple and possibly chill. That would have made it usable on every weapon we have. It fits the name of the trait better too. Signet of the beastmaster is good, but I feel like signet actives shouldn’t need a grandmaster trait to have an effect on the ranger.

Beast Mastery could use help too. Those traits that apply to specific pet families are a waste of space. I’d like a trait that would have my pet swap summon the pet at my target. Traits for 3 seconds of invulnerability for the pet on swap and a blast finisher at the pet’s location on swap would be cool too. Recharging pet swap on kill would be great too, now that I think about.

Traps in skirmishing wouldn’t be so bad if we had a few direct damage traps like dust trap in GW1.

We also have way too many utility skills that are just bad if you don’t invest traits into them (traps, spirits, signets).