Guild Wars 2

SynfulChaot.3169:

Attacking faster but far weaker is not enough. Just FYI.

If the devs thought ranger DPS was bad, they would have buffed it last patch, not nerfed it. You didn’t notice the giant nerfs to pet DPS? Or do they only serve to convince you that Anet is in the business of nerfing a class that is underpowered? Because I’m pretty sure they don’t do that. Because that’d be, you know, stupid.

Devs have, as far as I know, acknowledged issues with pet AI and responsiveness, i.e. people being able to kite pets around and make them whiff entirely in earlier builds, or just straight-up break them into doing stupid stuff. You are welcome to point me to the dev post where they say that rangers have bad DPS or lack effective party support and I will take another look at my numbers. Otherwise, I have no reason to believe they are incorrect based on personal observation and the fact that I have generally been correct about this sort of thing in the past (DPS math honestly isn’t that hard).

As for ranger autos versus warrior DPS, keep in mind that warriors also only get DPS out of their auto attacks. That means you’re pretty much directly comparing ranger sword auto with warrior axe auto. Let me demonstrate this in a simplified way that doesn’t totally go over everyone’s head.

20/25/0/25/0 full ascended zerk ranger, ruby orbs:
Sword auto: 202, 202, 235 = 213 average per hit
Extra power = 1473 = ~161% extra damage.
Extra precision = 1062 = about 55% crit chance = about 81% extra damage with 99% crit damage
Traits: Steady Focus + Hunter’s Tactics + Bountiful Hunter = ~27% extra damage
213 * 2.61 * 1.81 * 1.27 = 1278 average per hit

30/0/0/10/30 warrior axe, same as ranger gear above:
252 + 538 + 858 over six hits = 275 average per hit
Extra power = 1515 = ~165% extra damage
Extra precision = 812 plus Heightened Focus = ~58% crit chance = about 95% extra damage with 114 crit damage
Traits: Berserker’s Power + Dual Wielding = 21% extra damage
275 * 2.65 * 1.95 * 1.21 = 1719 average per hit

Given that both sword and axe basically hit at the same speed, the warrior isn’t “far” outDPSing the ranger, unless those numbers lie somehow. He does, on a one-to-one comparison, not including the pet, about 35% more than the ranger.

Meanwhile, add in the ranger’s pet. The bird pet hits about 1200 damage per attack base, every 2,4 seconds, which means he hits once every four sword attacks. That means that the average DPS from the ranger’s sword is 1278 + 400 = 1678. That’s only 2.5% short of the warrior’s damage number.

In all seriousness, do people really think warrior DPS is so good? I’ve played a warrior. Quite extensively, in fact. It’s average at best.

That’s not how Metas work.
They’re not written in stone. You have to constantly re-evaluate, and people can come up with combinations months later that upsets them. Especially a racing meta, of all the crazy bassackwards things I’ve ever seen in an MMORPG. There is no middle tier in a racing meta to help stabilize it, it’s just a top and a bottom and difference between them is measured in seconds.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

SynfulChaot.3169:

Attacking faster but far weaker is not enough. Just FYI.

If the devs thought ranger DPS was bad, they would have buffed it last patch, not nerfed it. You didn’t notice the giant nerfs to pet DPS? Or do they only serve to convince you that Anet is in the business of nerfing a class that is underpowered? Because I’m pretty sure they don’t do that. Because that’d be, you know, stupid.

They nerfed it due to PvP only, where a ranger could bunker down and still do ‘too much damage’ for a bunker build as the damage was coming from the pet instead of the ranger and the other PvP players never thought to kill the pet. That was a PvP nerf that affected all rangers. At the time ranger was about average in PvP due to that one build that was useless outside of PvP as point control is not necessary in PvE and plays a much lesser role in WvW.

So yes, they nerfed a class that is underpowered everywhere else as they were balancing it strictly for another game mode in which it was not severely underpowered.

As for the rest of your response? I’ll do some actual testing in the Mists later instead of useless numbers theorycrafting. Though I can pretty much guarantee it will show rangers well below in damage output.

And birds as your example? They can’t hit opponents in WvW/PvP and die in half a hit in PvE. Bad pet choice.

SynfulChaot.3169:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

SynfulChaot.3169:

Attacking faster but far weaker is not enough. Just FYI.

If the devs thought ranger DPS was bad, they would have buffed it last patch, not nerfed it. You didn’t notice the giant nerfs to pet DPS? Or do they only serve to convince you that Anet is in the business of nerfing a class that is underpowered? Because I’m pretty sure they don’t do that. Because that’d be, you know, stupid.

They nerfed it due to PvP only, where a ranger could bunker down and still do ‘too much damage’ for a bunker build as the damage was coming from the pet instead of the ranger and the other PvP players never thought to kill the pet. That was a PvP nerf that affected all rangers. At the time ranger was about average in PvP due to that one build that was useless outside of PvP as point control is not necessary in PvE and plays a much lesser role in WvW.

So yes, they nerfed a class that is underpowered everywhere else as they were balancing it strictly for another game mode in which it was not severely underpowered.

As for the rest of your response? I’ll do some actual testing in the Mists later instead of useless numbers theorycrafting. Though I can pretty much guarantee it will show rangers well below in damage output.

And birds as your example? They can’t hit opponents in WvW/PvP and die in half a hit in PvE. Bad pet choice.

You are completely correct. They nerfed pet damage because of 1 build used mostly in Spvp. BM simply had far to much going for it, but instead of addressing and balancing out the traits that made it unbalanced they hit the entire class with a change that was simply not needed. This is whats known as a knee-jerk reaction. It also shows a serious lack of over all thought process on the part of the Dev’s.

Rangers over all are under powered. Yes LB got a tiny bit of love in the form of 1 additional attack every 5 seconds when using auto attack, but again this still puts the weapon below Warrior LB and Rifle.

The reason many people argue that rangers are fine is because of Spvp. A zerker Ranger can rain down damage on several targets at once and by doing this get a lot of points. So this must mean they are balanced out, but that is far from the case.

Short Bow. Solid over all damage, but the range reduction really hurt. Its also the only weapon with condition damage on Auto attack that requires you be behind or to the side of your target to add the condition damage.

Longbow. The increased rate of fire on the auto attack and the reduction of after cast (global cool down) helped a bit, but over all it is still the weakest ranged weapon in the game. It has no integrated condition damage. Damage on auto attack is reduced as the target gets closer. Over all when compared to Warrior Longbow and Rifle it comes in a solid 3rd place.

Sword auto attack can get you “Stuck”. The common response on how to fix this is turn off sword auto attack, but why should you have to? I don’t have to do this on my Thief, Guardian or Warrior. So why should I have to do this on my Ranger?

Great Sword is simply weak all around. It does have some nifty utility, but does less damage than Axe, Sword, SB or LB. This isn’t just over time. This is per hit. I have always been a fan of 2 handed weapons being a bit slower, but each hit being harder.

Torch is really fun till you play a Guardian with a torch and realize that your #4 and #5 attack are weaker than their #4 by its self.

Dagger is actually pretty OK, but the cool down on the abilities is a bit high.

Axe off hand is really good for the #4 attack and situational use of the #5, but most of the time I don’t really find being rooted to do the same damage as Auto attack really all that helpful. Yes there is the missile reflect, but mostly I use that to punk Spin to win Thieves.

Pets. Pet AI simply sucks. You can kite a ranger pet all day long and almost never actually get hit by it. But its not just PVP where this happens. In PVE if the target moves the pet just misses and takes time to seem to realize that the target has moved and start to chase it. But this is the case for all NPC’s in the game. They are slow to respond. Slow to react and the way they just stop in place to attack most of the time makes PVE kind of a joke. You can effectively kite mobs with melee weapons if you just move back or to the side at the right time.

So the long and short of it is that it seems Its OK for rangers to be penalized because we have pets, but the Pet AI gets them killed (even if you try and micromanage them) all the time and more than half the time they simply miss their attacks.

It would be really nice to see Anet man up and say they made mistakes with the class and are working on fixing them, but that doesn’t seem to be their style.

Back from testing in the Mists with both ranger and warrior … and the results are not too surprising.

I ran with neither my warrior or my ranger with a full DPS-only build as I wished for the ability to support as well. And if you’re running full DPS then you’re not being the support to you party that you could be. All are in still full zerker gear.

Ranger build A:
0/20/20/0/30 – Sk: V and X – WS: IV and X – BM: V, VII, and XI.

Ranger build B:
Your 30/25/0/25/0 ranger build, except not using Steady Focus. As a ranger we can’t rely on 100% uptime on this as we often need to reposition and dodge. Testing with that trait in a situation where we do have 100% uptime would artificially inflate the numbers.

Warrior A/A build:
30/0/0/20/20 – Str: V, X, and XI – Tactics: II and V – Discipline: VI and IX

Warrior GS build:
30/20/0/20/0 – Str: II, IX, and XI – Tactics: II and V – Arms – V and X

I tested with 10 seperate kills on a heavy target golem and eliminated the greatest outliers (normally the slowest), reducing the count to 8. I then averaged the result. And now to the results:

w/ Ranger build A
Ranger GS + Feline – 6.936 seconds average, 1.45 delta
Ranger GS + Canine – 8.54 seconds average, 1.79 delta
Ranger GS + Drake – 8.651 seconds average, 1.64 delta

Ranger S/D + Feline – 7.219 seconds average, 0.93 delta
- I stopped testing the S/D combo here as if the felines were slower than with the GS, it logically follows that the canines and drakes will be as well.

w/ Ranger build B
Ranger GS + Feline – 7.02 seconds average, 1.24 delta
- Stopped testing the build here as if it’s slower with felines, it logically follows that the canines and drakes will be slower as well.

Warrior A/A – 5.881 seconds average, 1.26 delta
Warrior GS – 6.136 seconds average, 0.95 delta

Conclusion?

Warrior’s DPS is greater, not even counting in the support you would gain if I actually used any banners that that build supports. Also … I did not once use Evicerate. That would have lowered the time-to-kill for the dual axes on warrior.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Warrior buffs don’t stack.

Warrior banners don’t stack. But warrior shouts do. Get 4 warriors, have each one bring a different banner, then have them each also bring “for great justice” and “on my mark”. See how that scenario compares to bringing one warrior and 3 rangers. Permanent fury, near 25 stacks of might, and 25 stacks of vulnerability.

A group of rangers cannot maintain permanent fury or stack might on allies. A group of rangers can maintain a decent level of vulnerability on a target through hunter’s shot and whirling defense, though whirling defense deals sub-par damage by itself, roots the ranger, and has a longer channel than hundred blades.

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Warrior buffs don’t stack.

Warrior banners don’t stack. But warrior shouts do. Get 4 warriors, have each one bring a different banner, then have them each also bring “for great justice” and “on my mark”. See how that scenario compares to bringing one warrior and 3 rangers. Permanent fury, near 25 stacks of might, and 25 stacks of vulnerability.

A group of rangers cannot maintain permanent fury or stack might on allies. A group of rangers can maintain a decent level of vulnerability on a target through hunter’s shot and whirling defense, though whirling defense deals sub-par damage by itself, roots the ranger, and has a longer channel than hundred blades.

A single ranger can maintain perma fury by using warhorn and a red Moa, which means 2 rangers could maintain perma fury and swiftness, so idk what you’re talking about, that also allows the warrior to free up a utility slot and leaves the rangers totally free to choose what ever utilities they want, not to mention multiple rangers, with multiple healing springs could maintain perma vigor and condi cleanse and healing allowing for more DPS faceroll.

Btw why do people assume GS is our DPS weapon? Everyone knows our DPS weapon is Sword + Torch (or hell maybe even axe now) for max dmgz sure as hell not S/D, and then if you’re in zerker gear you’d wanna take companions might giving your pet super might stacks.

SynfulChaot.3169:

Back from testing in the Mists with both ranger and warrior … and the results are not too surprising.

I ran with neither my warrior or my ranger with a full DPS-only build as I wished for the ability to support as well. And if you’re running full DPS then you’re not being the support to you party that you could be. All are in still full zerker gear.

Ranger build A:
0/20/20/0/30 – Sk: V and X – WS: IV and X – BM: V, VII, and XI.

Ranger build B:
Your 30/25/0/25/0 ranger build, except not using Steady Focus. As a ranger we can’t rely on 100% uptime on this as we often need to reposition and dodge. Testing with that trait in a situation where we do have 100% uptime would artificially inflate the numbers.

Warrior A/A build:
30/0/0/20/20 – Str: V, X, and XI – Tactics: II and V – Discipline: VI and IX

Warrior GS build:
30/20/0/20/0 – Str: II, IX, and XI – Tactics: II and V – Arms – V and X

I tested with 10 seperate kills on a heavy target golem and eliminated the greatest outliers (normally the slowest), reducing the count to 8. I then averaged the result. And now to the results:

w/ Ranger build A
Ranger GS + Feline – 6.936 seconds average, 1.45 delta
Ranger GS + Canine – 8.54 seconds average, 1.79 delta
Ranger GS + Drake – 8.651 seconds average, 1.64 delta

Ranger S/D + Feline – 7.219 seconds average, 0.93 delta
- I stopped testing the S/D combo here as if the felines were slower than with the GS, it logically follows that the canines and drakes will be as well.

w/ Ranger build B
Ranger GS + Feline – 7.02 seconds average, 1.24 delta
- Stopped testing the build here as if it’s slower with felines, it logically follows that the canines and drakes will be slower as well.

Warrior A/A – 5.881 seconds average, 1.26 delta
Warrior GS – 6.136 seconds average, 0.95 delta

Conclusion?

Warrior’s DPS is greater, not even counting in the support you would gain if I actually used any banners that that build supports. Also … I did not once use Evicerate. That would have lowered the time-to-kill for the dual axes on warrior.

Mists golems are a terrible way to test DPS, except as a way to see how much damage you do with a SINGLE skill. A rifle engie can kill a golem in less than three seconds. Doesn’t mean rifle engies are good DPS.

The traits you are using are also not remotely DPS traits, so there’s no real valid point of comparison. If you’re not using max damage specs for both classes, then anyone can just skew the results every which way. Want to make it look like necromancers can outdps thieves? Sure, just put the thief in sentinel’s gear and trait him 0/0/30/30/10, because you’re a support thief, dammit. That’s particularly true if you’re dropping traits that can increase your DPS just because you don’t like them, or whatever it is you’re doing.

Also, sPvP in general is not indicative of PvE damage, particularly because crit damage is so low in PvP. In fact, any DPS test based solely on PvP will invariably come out with engineers being the absolute best DPS of all, due solely to the fact that condition damage is the same in PvE and sPvP. That’s assuming you can even test it at all, since I’m pretty sure a rabid engie will kill any mob in the lobby before it can get to 25 stacks, including the Svanir and Chieftain test mobs.

Durzlla.6295:

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Warrior buffs don’t stack.

Warrior banners don’t stack. But warrior shouts do. Get 4 warriors, have each one bring a different banner, then have them each also bring “for great justice” and “on my mark”. See how that scenario compares to bringing one warrior and 3 rangers. Permanent fury, near 25 stacks of might, and 25 stacks of vulnerability.

A group of rangers cannot maintain permanent fury or stack might on allies. A group of rangers can maintain a decent level of vulnerability on a target through hunter’s shot and whirling defense, though whirling defense deals sub-par damage by itself, roots the ranger, and has a longer channel than hundred blades.

A single ranger can maintain perma fury by using warhorn and a red Moa, which means 2 rangers could maintain perma fury and swiftness, so idk what you’re talking about, that also allows the warrior to free up a utility slot and leaves the rangers totally free to choose what ever utilities they want, not to mention multiple rangers, with multiple healing springs could maintain perma vigor and condi cleanse and healing allowing for more DPS faceroll.

Btw why do people assume GS is our DPS weapon? Everyone knows our DPS weapon is Sword + Torch (or hell maybe even axe now) for max dmgz sure as hell not S/D, and then if you’re in zerker gear you’d wanna take companions might giving your pet super might stacks.

Rangers still cannot stack might on allies as effectively as a warrior. The sword may outdamage our greatsword, but have you ever tried to dodge while auto attacking? I know I know, “disable the auto attack and spam 1 manually.” It doesn’t do much to mitigate the problem if the attack you need to dodge happens to come down in the middle of the kick or the leap.

And yes, I overlooked the warhorn because it’s such a forgettable weapon.

Quarktastic.1027:

Chopps.5047:

Just from last swing? You know that’s a sum, right? Typical warrior attitude, no offense, but I’m at a loss to explain how many people think their channel isn’t a summation.

That doesn’t make him any less right. Warriors are the undisputed kings of PvE DPS. They also provide the best offensive support of any class.

When did I argue about the king of DPS? I just pointed out how to properly add up a channeled ability. It does make him less right. He’s wrong about how to add up damage. :P

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Warrior buffs don’t stack.

Warrior banners don’t stack. But warrior shouts do. Get 4 warriors, have each one bring a different banner, then have them each also bring “for great justice” and “on my mark”. See how that scenario compares to bringing one warrior and 3 rangers. Permanent fury, near 25 stacks of might, and 25 stacks of vulnerability.

A group of rangers cannot maintain permanent fury or stack might on allies. A group of rangers can maintain a decent level of vulnerability on a target through hunter’s shot and whirling defense, though whirling defense deals sub-par damage by itself, roots the ranger, and has a longer channel than hundred blades.

Banners and Empower Allies are the only warrior buffs that you need to concern yourself with. Otherwise, regular buff like might, fury, and vulnerability are easily capped by different team compositions; in fact, warriors aren’t even that good at maintaining any of said buffs.

Fury is easily maxed out, as Durzilla has pointed out, simply by having a warhorn ranger. A single ranger with a warhorn and a Red Moa maxes it out; even if you don’t want to take the Red Moa, you’re still getting 50% uptime pretty easily.

Might stacking isn’t really the ranger’s strong point but it isn’t the warrior’s, either. A warrior maintains 3 stacks of might from For Great Justice; a guardian can maintain 5-6 pretty easily using Empowering Might and Purging Flames. An engineer can maintain anywhere between 9-15 stacks, depending on how motivated he is to actually stack might.

Vulnerability isn’t really the warrior’s job either. A ranger with a longbow maintains about 10-13 stacks depending on his condition duration, and the feline pet maintains about 3. Engineers can maintain 25+ stacks without too much effort, just by attacking. Warriors, on the other hand, gets maybe 8 depending on his stats or utilities, which isn’t terrible, but it isn’t particularly great either. Don’t forget that vuln effectively caps at 50 on bosses, so it’s not good enough to say that warriors “get enough vuln”, because they don’t. Not on their own.

The so-called dungeon “meta” right now seems to be based around taking a subpar composition (4 warriors 1 mesmer usually) that isn’t even capable of maxing out all the relevant buffs, and coming up with convoluted and inefficient ways to circumvent this deficiency, like trying to burst a boss down in a single Time Warp because you can’t maintain might or vulnerability for any longer than that. That works on some bosses but I see a lot of so-called “speed run” groups that are heavily kitten because they have almost no might or vulnerability and sometimes don’t even have fury.

Guang. I know you’re a smart guy. Compare these for me:

0/25/0/15/30

30/25/0/15/0

From what I can tell, the second one will give better vulnerability stacking but the first one will give better damage due to pet attributes, master’s bond, as well as what the first build has: companion’s might, fortifying bond, and sigil of strength.

What else is there to say about it? Because I want to know your opinion.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Mists golems are a terrible way to test DPS, except as a way to see how much damage you do with a SINGLE skill. A rifle engie can kill a golem in less than three seconds. Doesn’t mean rifle engies are good DPS.

Pure theorycrafting is a worse way. You show numbers that are not empirically verified. I show numbers that are.

Also, note that the traits that I chose supplied me with a faster time-to-kill tested over multiple times than the build and traits you suggested. And both were slower than either non-pure-DPS warrior build.

Please use logic in your arguments next time instead of trying to invalidate my empirically-proven findings through nothing but personal opinion. If you want to prove me wrong, show me actual proof.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

The so-called dungeon “meta” right now seems to be based around taking a subpar composition (4 warriors 1 mesmer usually) that isn’t even capable of maxing out all the relevant buffs, and coming up with convoluted and inefficient ways to circumvent this deficiency, like trying to burst a boss down in a single Time Warp because you can’t maintain might or vulnerability for any longer than that. That works on some bosses but I see a lot of so-called “speed run” groups that are heavily kitten because they have almost no might or vulnerability and sometimes don’t even have fury.

I don’t see what you mean. If the Meta is subpar (as you have just said), then why can they clear CoF1 faster than any other composition, assuming equal gear and skill in the class(es) they play?

Maybe it’s because they (warriors) can throw out more damage than other classes. I mean, why else would they be in the meta, if not for that fact?

Quarktastic.1027:

Durzlla.6295:

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Warrior buffs don’t stack.

Warrior banners don’t stack. But warrior shouts do. Get 4 warriors, have each one bring a different banner, then have them each also bring “for great justice” and “on my mark”. See how that scenario compares to bringing one warrior and 3 rangers. Permanent fury, near 25 stacks of might, and 25 stacks of vulnerability.

A group of rangers cannot maintain permanent fury or stack might on allies. A group of rangers can maintain a decent level of vulnerability on a target through hunter’s shot and whirling defense, though whirling defense deals sub-par damage by itself, roots the ranger, and has a longer channel than hundred blades.

A single ranger can maintain perma fury by using warhorn and a red Moa, which means 2 rangers could maintain perma fury and swiftness, so idk what you’re talking about, that also allows the warrior to free up a utility slot and leaves the rangers totally free to choose what ever utilities they want, not to mention multiple rangers, with multiple healing springs could maintain perma vigor and condi cleanse and healing allowing for more DPS faceroll.

Btw why do people assume GS is our DPS weapon? Everyone knows our DPS weapon is Sword + Torch (or hell maybe even axe now) for max dmgz sure as hell not S/D, and then if you’re in zerker gear you’d wanna take companions might giving your pet super might stacks.

Rangers still cannot stack might on allies as effectively as a warrior. The sword may outdamage our greatsword, but have you ever tried to dodge while auto attacking? I know I know, “disable the auto attack and spam 1 manually.” It doesn’t do much to mitigate the problem if the attack you need to dodge happens to come down in the middle of the kick or the leap.

And yes, I overlooked the warhorn because it’s such a forgettable weapon.

5 rangers + 5 Melandru Stalkers = 25 might for everyone, and I literally mean EVERYONE…

And complaining about dodging with a sword is like complaining about having to manage your pet, it’s a Learn to Play problem, not a game play problem, I’m actually MORE survivable with that sword than I am at range due to all those evades so don’t even give me that BS. And warhorn is only forgettable because most people just wanna see big numbers, which the warhorn as a weapon doesn’t do, unless you’re a power build and use Hunters Call, then you’ll see a really big number at the end.

Keyce.8137:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

The so-called dungeon “meta” right now seems to be based around taking a subpar composition (4 warriors 1 mesmer usually) that isn’t even capable of maxing out all the relevant buffs, and coming up with convoluted and inefficient ways to circumvent this deficiency, like trying to burst a boss down in a single Time Warp because you can’t maintain might or vulnerability for any longer than that. That works on some bosses but I see a lot of so-called “speed run” groups that are heavily kitten because they have almost no might or vulnerability and sometimes don’t even have fury.

I don’t see what you mean. If the Meta is subpar (as you have just said), then why can they clear CoF1 faster than any other composition, assuming equal gear and skill in the class(es) they play?

Maybe it’s because they (warriors) can throw out more damage than other classes. I mean, why else would they be in the meta, if not for that fact?

It’s because most people who could shatter the meta (like me) don’t even give a rats kitten about the PvE “meta” to begin with, oh boy, if I skip every kittening encounter in an instance I can get those worthless pixels faster, wooooooo. Or, I can do what Anet wanted, and clear it for FUN, which completely goes against the meta.

Chopps.5047:

Guang. I know you’re a smart guy. Compare these for me:

0/25/0/15/30

30/25/0/15/0

From what I can tell, the second one will give better vulnerability stacking but the first one will give better damage due to pet attributes, master’s bond, as well as what the first build has: companion’s might, fortifying bond, and sigil of strength.

What else is there to say about it? Because I want to know your opinion.

I thought I already answered this? Boosts to the ranger rather than the pet are always better.

Keyce.8137:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

The so-called dungeon “meta” right now seems to be based around taking a subpar composition (4 warriors 1 mesmer usually) that isn’t even capable of maxing out all the relevant buffs, and coming up with convoluted and inefficient ways to circumvent this deficiency, like trying to burst a boss down in a single Time Warp because you can’t maintain might or vulnerability for any longer than that. That works on some bosses but I see a lot of so-called “speed run” groups that are heavily kitten because they have almost no might or vulnerability and sometimes don’t even have fury.

I don’t see what you mean. If the Meta is subpar (as you have just said), then why can they clear CoF1 faster than any other composition, assuming equal gear and skill in the class(es) they play?

Maybe it’s because they (warriors) can throw out more damage than other classes. I mean, why else would they be in the meta, if not for that fact?

The CoF farm comp is based around getting a group that can clear the content reasonably quickly with minimal effort required in organizing the group. Get 4 warriors and a mesmer, go right in. By comparison, if you take a ranger, you have to check his traits, weapons, utilities, etc. Not worth the hassle if it only shaves 5-10 seconds off the total run time.

Unfortunately, too many people have taken convenience in one limited farming instance to mean general superiority in all PvE content.

The current “meta” for CoF is just plain terrible. I’ve run it with a Rabid Engie, a Hybrid BM Bunker ranger in Knight armor and a Longbow Zerker Ranger. Most of those runs don’t take more than 15-20 mins. I don’t have to ping gear or deal with wipes…and I can play whatever class I feel like.

So I can’t run it in 7 minutes. Big whoop de la freakin’ do. It’s a dungeon…those should be runs that take an hour. I don’t mind speedrunning it…but the best meta for that should be the exception not the norm.

Also…there is a difference between viable and optimal. There will always be ONE and ONLY ONE optimal build. Rangers are VERY viable (outside of AR bosses). Do I hit as hard as a warrior with one ability? No. Can I stand at 1200+ range with my channel ability that allows me to move around without losing DPS and avoiding damage? Yes

I also had no idea that the channel number at the end was the summation. Good to know!

@Quark
Warhorn a forgettable weapon…what the…I love all our offhands

@Durz
I like faster digital pixels

@Guang
Did you account for zephyrs speed though?

I gotta’ share the ‘do not use TTK golems’ sentiment.
Their HP is so low it starts to undermine the whole cooldown balancing mechanism. If you need a field test subject, go prod an open world champion thirty times.

SynfulChaot.3169:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Mists golems are a terrible way to test DPS, except as a way to see how much damage you do with a SINGLE skill. A rifle engie can kill a golem in less than three seconds. Doesn’t mean rifle engies are good DPS.

Pure theorycrafting is a worse way. You show numbers that are not empirically verified. I show numbers that are.

Also, note that the traits that I chose supplied me with a faster time-to-kill tested over multiple times than the build and traits you suggested. And both were slower than either non-pure-DPS warrior build.

Please use logic in your arguments next time instead of trying to invalidate my empirically-proven findings through nothing but personal opinion. If you want to prove me wrong, show me actual proof.

When you used my build, did you make sure you had full adrenaline? Flanked the target? Full zerker Pv*E* gear? Avoided using any burst skills, i.e. pet swapping for QZ? Control for boon application, i.e. no might, fury, vuln?

Until your test tells me something relevant besides “of these two arbitrary builds I chose for these classes, one may or may not do more burst damage on a low-HP target in an different format other than the one we are currently discussing” then I have nothing to disprove. Literally, nothing to disprove. For all I know what you proved is entirely correct and honestly I don’t give a kitten , because it’s totally irrelevant to a DPS discussion.

Durzlla.6295:

It’s because most people who could shatter the meta (like me) don’t even give a rats kitten about the PvE “meta” to begin with, oh boy, if I skip every kittening encounter in an instance I can get those worthless pixels faster, wooooooo. Or, I can do what Anet wanted, and clear it for FUN, which completely goes against the meta.

The meta is for pure efficiency and speed. Designed for completion of the content in excessively low times. If rangers were really that high DPS, they’d be welcome. I prefer fun, myself.

And it does amuze me how everyone that thinks they can ‘shatter the meta’ just can’t be bothered. Sorry. You’re not the visionary you think you are and the greater community is not as stupid as you think they are.

Fade.1743:

The current “meta” for CoF is just plain terrible. I’ve run it with a Rabid Engie, a Hybrid BM Bunker ranger in Knight armor and a Longbow Zerker Ranger. Most of those runs don’t take more than 15-20 mins. I don’t have to ping gear or deal with wipes…and I can play whatever class I feel like.

So I can’t run it in 7 minutes. Big whoop de la freakin’ do. It’s a dungeon…those should be runs that take an hour. I don’t mind speedrunning it…but the best meta for that should be the exception not the norm.

The meta is not for enjoyment. Again, the meta is for pure efficiency and speed. I prefer my ranger. I do enough damage on my ranger that I am rarely kicked. Neither my preference nor my feeling of doing enough damage to be useful mean that the class is on par with the others, though.

Vox Hollow.2736:

I gotta’ share the ‘do not use TTK golems’ sentiment.
Their HP is so low it starts to undermine the whole cooldown balancing mechanism. If you need a field test subject, go prod an open world champion thirty times.

Sorry. If you want full PvE field testing you’ll need to provide me with the dosh to gear my charas as such. I’m kinda poor in-game as I have 9 charas and gear them all for stats and appearance. And I’m not going to waste my money just to prove a point to someone that won’t even consider actual testing over pure theorycrafting.

Don’t get me wrong. Theorycrafting is good. As a starting point. After that point you need to actually test your theory instead of insisting it is good. Scientific method, you know. Form hypothesis and predict. That you have all done. But you’re skipping the most important part. The testing. You’re skipping straight to analysis before you gather any empirical data. And that undermines you entire argument.

Also, if you’re worried about cooldown balancing then you’re worried of the wrong thing. When testing I used the heaviest damage skills for each class’s weapons. Auto-attack and Maul for ranger GS. Auto-attack and Dual Strike for warrior dual axes. Auto-attack and HB for warrior GS. All have short enough cooldowns to either be used twice or be ready again as soon as the golem was killed. If you’re talking of cooldown balancing for utilities with long cooldowns then you can’t rely on them always being at the ready, either.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

When you used my build, did you make sure you had full adrenaline? Flanked the target? Full zerker Pv*E* gear? Avoided using any burst skills, i.e. pet swapping for QZ? Control for boon application, i.e. no might, fury, vuln?

Yes. Yes. Impossible, but both classes were equivalently geared so it’s still a flat comparison. Yes. Self-applied boons that the class itself could apply were used.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Until your test tells me something relevant besides “of these two arbitrary builds I chose for these classes, one may or may not do more burst damage on a low-HP target in an different format other than the one we are currently discussing” then I have nothing to disprove. Literally, nothing to disprove. For all I know what you proved is entirely correct and honestly I don’t give a kitten , because it’s totally irrelevant to a DPS discussion.

Don’t forget that one of the ‘arbitrary builds’ chosen was yours and it was the weakest. And the targets may be low health, but that is irrelevant. Extend how much health they have and the builds that killed them faster before will kill them faster after.

It sounds like you are not the one considering DPS. You only considering D. Damage. I’m considering DPS. Damage Per Second. Which the warrior does apply more of than a ranger.

I’m sorry. You’re not the only one in the entire community that has ‘figured it out’. We, as a community, are not all dumb-kittens. So please stop acting like that is true.

One thing I think people often miss about the scientific method is that our models are simplifications of the experiment.

In other words, what you choose to neglect (these are the assumptions of the mathematical or theorycrafting model) ultimately determines the model’s prediction, Synful. I believe this is how DnT and Define arrive to different “optimal” team comps and also why the true ideal team comp for any given situation is still unknown. How can I say it’s unknown? Easy: we’re still having debates like this. It’s a testament to the richness of the combat mechanics of GW2.

I believe analysis should be done prior to any experiments. I’m a career engineer; I’ve built experimental apparatus for scientists before. This is real advice to young engineers out there doing R&D: what I’ve found is the strength of their experiment is usually determined by the strength of the analysis that went into defining, structuring, and forming the experiment. Without in depth analysis, how can you properly begin to understand the effects of the boundary conditions (aka environmental stimulus) or assumptions (aka what you neglect in your theorycrafting)?

Guang is making informed hypothesis. I have many sets of gear and too much time on my hands. I’d love to test some of his ideas if only I could get a team around me. At the end of the day, I’ve always believed that player skill/teamwork makes a much bigger difference than team comp. How many groups are realistically trying to run like DnT or Define? Probably not many because it’s a lot of effort to shorten those times like that.

Why would anyone play the meta if they didn’t enjoy it? This is a game. You should have fun. If you’re not having fun, then kitten the meta.

But yes, I do understand that sentiment. As much as I like Ranger, for my preferred spec (the longbow zerker) I don’t feel like I have a lot of group utility outside being able to kite like a baws and hold Gaheron out of the room in P2. I do think Anet knows this (hence the buff to Spotter last patch) and could be planning something more. (Maybe explaining the pet nerf?)

But also, I do have to agree that Golems make poor dummies in this game. sPvP and PvE have different rule sets. Therefore…data from them for pure PvE purposes is useless. Anet should look into giving us some actual in-game testing dummies that are in a PvE environment.

Chopps.5047:

One thing I think people often miss about the scientific method is that our models are simplifications of the experiment.

In other words, what you choose to neglect (these are the assumptions of the mathematical or theorycrafting model) ultimately determines the model’s prediction, Synful.

I believe analysis should be done prior to any experiments. I’m a career engineer; I’ve built experimental apparatus for scientists before. This is real advice to young engineers out there doing R&D: what I’ve found is the strength of their experiment is usually determined by the strength of the analysis that went into defining, structuring, and forming the experiment. Without in depth analysis, how can you properly begin to understand the effects of the boundary conditions (aka environmental stimulus) or assumptions (aka what you neglect in your theorycrafting)?

Guang is making informed hypothesis. I have many sets of gear and too much time on my hands. I’d love to test some of his ideas if only I could get a team around me.

Yes. You should analyze before and after. That is true. But you should not use your before analysis to rebut someone’s after analysis. Which is what he is attempting … and failing. That’s just bad science

Yes, his hypothesis is good. But after testing and analysis, it appears a bit weaker than he had expected.

Fade.1743:

Why would anyone play the meta if they didn’t enjoy it? This is a game. You should have fun. If you’re not having fun, then kitten the meta.

I’m working on gearing my mes for the meta CoF grind not because I enjoy it but because I need the monies for my uber-expensive legendary and Foefire weaps. And the meta team build is the fastest team-clear.

Fade.1743:

But yes, I do understand that sentiment. As much as I like Ranger, for my preferred spec (the longbow zerker) I don’t feel like I have a lot of group utility outside being able to kite like a baws and hold Gaheron out of the room in P2. I do think Anet knows this (hence the buff to Spotter last patch) and could be planning something more. (Maybe explaining the pet nerf?)

ANet knows that the ranger is not as strong as it should be. We got nerfed this time in a knee-jerk reaction to a single PvP build, but the focus of the update was on necromancers and warriors. They are planning on more as we heard on the sPvP SotG. Now all we need to do is wait until we get the update that finally focuses on the ranger.

Fade.1743:

But also, I do have to agree that Golems make poor dummies in this game. sPvP and PvE have different rule sets. Therefore…data from them for pure PvE purposes is useless. Anet should look into giving us some actual in-game testing dummies that are in a PvE environment.

The data is not useless. The base systems are not that different. Damage is damage and the skills are not yet split. Crits work the same, as does condition damage.

I do hope they give us PvEers a place that we can test builds as well. It would make these arguments a bit more moot and make it so we can test our stuff without costing many, many gold. And without people trying to invalidate our findings as they don’t match their predictions.

It’s not so much the damage (well..it is but I’ll explain) that’s different. It’s the gearing system. There are no orbs to put into PvP gear so you do lose the ability to test them out.(And yes there are some cases where orbs are ahead of runes, except scholar…but I would never run that since it’s not my preferred playstyle). Also you can’t mix and match item sets. And even the item sets there do not match with the ones in PvE (points to berserker). And Crit damage has a much lower cap in sPvP.

In terms of mathematics, yes, it is lacking and the data isn’t…well..I wouldn’t say useless…but shouldn’t be the cold hard fact since there are many more limitations. It does, however, give you a feel for performance. Kinda like using zequals in a calculation. You get a heavily rounded answer, but you get a better feel for where the numbers are.

Fade.1743:

It’s not so much the damage (well..it is but I’ll explain) that’s different. It’s the gearing system. There are no orbs to put into PvP gear so you do lose the ability to test them out.(And yes there are some cases where orbs are ahead of runes, except scholar…but I would never run that since it’s not my preferred playstyle). Also you can’t mix and match item sets. And even the item sets there do not match with the ones in PvE (points to berserker). And Crit damage has a much lower cap in sPvP.

In terms of mathematics, yes, it is lacking and the data isn’t…well..I wouldn’t say useless…but shouldn’t be the cold hard fact since there are many more limitations. It does, however, give you a feel for performance. Kinda like using zequals in a calculation. You get a heavily rounded answer, but you get a better feel for where the numbers are.

I understand that gearing is different. It’s why I need to gear through pure theorycrafting alone as I do run mixes. But this was a test of comparison. So if both sides are equally affected by the change then the testing is still valid.

Btw, I’m not saying I’m some visionary, I’m just saying that the current meta is stupid and lacking in a ton of areas and it wouldn’t be all that difficult to find a more optimal method, especially if I had my friend make spread sheets for this thing, crazy math majors -_-’.

And if I’ve learned anything from PvPing it’s that teams where every build synergies together are significantly better than a bunch of builds that don’t synergies, which in all fairness the meta provides no synergy between the warriors so there’s tons of room, now finding out which is most optimal is the trick, but as other have said its not worth it to shave off a few seconds.

Sorry. If you want full PvE field testing you’ll need to provide me with the dosh to gear my charas as such…

If you don’t already have two characters of different classes in comparable circumstances, then do you really feel comfortable comparing them?

Durzlla.6295:

Btw, I’m not saying I’m some visionary, I’m just saying that the current meta is stupid and lacking in a ton of areas and it wouldn’t be all that difficult to find a more optimal method, especially if I had my friend make spread sheets for this thing, crazy math majors -_-’.

Sorry ‘bout that. Current meta is good for what it does and nothing else. It’s just that what it does is maximize DPS, which is kinda what we’ve been talking about.

And sorry ‘bout the strong reply as well. It was kinda more focused at someone else rather than you. Someone else who won’t actually have a discussion, but instead tells us how we’re all wrong. You know who I’m talking about.

Vox Hollow.2736:

If you don’t already have two characters of different classes in comparable circumstances, then do you really feel comfortable comparing them?

Just because I don’t gear all my charas in pure-DPS gear does not mean that my experiences in playing the classes are invalid. I purposefully chose against pure DPS gear for my war as I can achieve heavier damage than most classes (esp. my ranger main) while still having both more support and more survivability. My ranger, as well, is not in zerker gear as I have personally found that rampager gear has, in the past, suited me better for SB/GS in PvE as I focused more on conditions than pure power, but didn’t want to sacrifice all my conditions for zerker or all my power for rabid.

Right now I’m holding off from regearing my ranger main as I’m waiting for more ranger updates so I don’t need to regear again after another balance patch that will be coming.

So yes, I feel I’ve played the classes enough to make a comparison as my more supporty warrior (who I’ve spent less time on) out-damages my near glass cannon ranger (who I’ve sunk over 2k hours into).

No worries Synful, and the meta does it’s job for “max” DPS for lowest effort, that I agree with. (Max is in quotes because it -could- be higher, but it’s probably not by too much to really matter).

And Rampagers gear is amazing, especially if you pair it with a condi pet (I use lash tail devourer and a lynx) + sun spirit + companions might, the damage that can deal in PvP is ridiculously high, I’d assume it’d carry over quite well into PvE.

SynfulChaot.3169:

Chopps.5047:

One thing I think people often miss about the scientific method is that our models are simplifications of the experiment.

In other words, what you choose to neglect (these are the assumptions of the mathematical or theorycrafting model) ultimately determines the model’s prediction, Synful.

I believe analysis should be done prior to any experiments. I’m a career engineer; I’ve built experimental apparatus for scientists before. This is real advice to young engineers out there doing R&D: what I’ve found is the strength of their experiment is usually determined by the strength of the analysis that went into defining, structuring, and forming the experiment. Without in depth analysis, how can you properly begin to understand the effects of the boundary conditions (aka environmental stimulus) or assumptions (aka what you neglect in your theorycrafting)?

Guang is making informed hypothesis. I have many sets of gear and too much time on my hands. I’d love to test some of his ideas if only I could get a team around me.

Yes. You should analyze before and after. That is true. But you should not use your before analysis to rebut someone’s after analysis. Which is what he is attempting … and failing. That’s just bad science

Yes, his hypothesis is good. But after testing and analysis, it appears a bit weaker than he had expected.

I’m going to put this harshly because it needs to be said. Not that your effort isn’t commendable, but honestly? Your data is useless. It proves nothing, and it provides nothing for me to rebut. I’ve already stated the reasons why it tells me nothing. No one’s going to be running a 30/20/0/20/0 warrior in PvE, nor is anyone going to run a 0/20/20/0/30 build on a ranger, because those builds suck. I don’t even know where you’re trying to go with them. If you went up to me and said “I run a 30/20/0/20/0 warrior in dungeons”, totally outside of the context of a DPS discussion, I’d probably laugh then kick you from the party.

Also, PvP doesn’t affect classes equally:

1) Classes with higher crit damage from traits benefit comparatively more. Getting 30 crit damage from your traits makes a lot bigger difference when you only have 20 from your gear to begin with.

2) Classes with higher precision from traits benefit comparatively less. Their crit damage is lower so they’re getting less from their crits.

3) Classes with condition damage come out way ahead. Condition damage isn’t nerfed in PvP, so it’s comparatively way better.

4) You can’t even test the potential gear sets. No Ruby Orbs, no post-release runes or prefixes, etc. Rampager and Berserker untestable due to differences in stats combined with #1-3 above, etc.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I’m going to put this harshly because it needs to be said. Not that your effort isn’t commendable, but honestly? Your data is useless. It proves nothing, and it provides nothing for me to rebut. I’ve already stated the reasons why it tells me nothing. No one’s going to be running a 30/20/0/20/0 warrior in PvE, nor is anyone going to run a 0/20/20/0/30 build on a ranger, because those builds suck. I don’t even know where you’re trying to go with them. If you went up to me and said “I run a 30/20/0/20/0 warrior in dungeons”, totally outside of the context of a DPS discussion, I’d probably laugh then kick you from the party.

Funny. That build you proposed? It did less than the 0/20/20/0/30. So wouldn’t that follow that your proposed build sucks more?

As far as I’ve seen, people go for the more useful builds. If you looked into why I chose those traits and traiting, you’d understand that as well if you actually cared to do anything rather than blindly try, and fail, to disprove my findings.

And I don’t ping my build to avoid kittens. If you can’t trust me to manage my own build, then I can’t trust you to know what you’re doing either.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Also, PvP doesn’t affect classes equally:

1) Classes with higher crit damage from traits benefit comparatively more. Getting 30 crit damage from your traits makes a lot bigger difference when you only have 20 from your gear to begin with.

We’re doing flat comparisons of straight damage output. Both classes are geared the same. Crit damage and percentage itself is identical between PvP and PvE. As we’re attacking stationary targets that are not crit or condition immune, then your argument is invalid.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

2) Classes with higher precision from traits benefit comparatively less. Their crit damage is lower so they’re getting less from their crits.

Incorrect. It does not matter how one gets the precision and crit damage, but how it is used. If you have high prec but nothing to trigger off of it and low crit damage, then it is a waste. But that is not occuring here.

Also, yes, we are comparing two seperate classes. You cannot make them perfectly equal. I’m really not sure what this part of the statement has to do with anything.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

3) Classes with condition damage come out way ahead. Condition damage isn’t nerfed in PvP, so it’s comparatively way better.

Again, we’re testing against stationary targets that are not condition immune. Condition damage does the same in both PvP and PvE.

Also, FYI, the ranger does more condition damage than the warrior (outside of warrior S/S, which I did not test). So that would lower the damage output of the ranger and leave the warrior results relatively intact.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

4) You can’t even test the potential gear sets. No Ruby Orbs, no post-release runes or prefixes, etc. Rampager and Berserker untestable due to differences in stats combined with #1-3 above, etc.

Again, both were geared the same. Yes, it’s not as much as full. But we’re comparing against each other. So if one is weaker, then the other will be equivalently weaker.

Actually, that’s not quite true. Rangers take more of a hit as they have much lower stat scaling due to having a pet. And that extra that gets removed from the ranger does not get added to the pet. So if we did indeed add that extra power to both, the warrior would benefit more from it and the ranger would, once again, be even weaker in DPS.

SynfulChaot.3169:

snip

I don’t think you get it. Let me use an extreme example to illustrate. I’m going to use round numbers to make this easier.

Class A has 100% crit chance. In PvE, his gear gives him an extra 50% crit damage on top of the base 50%, so he gets double on a crit. That means, on average, he does double base damage on every hit. In PvP, he gets NO crit damage bonus from gear, so he only deals 50% more than base damage on average, so now he’s lost 25% of his total damage just going from PvE to PvE, nothing else changed.

Class B has 0% crit chance. In PvE, he ALWAYS does base damage. In PvP, he also deals the same damage, because he isn’t getting crits anyway so he doesn’t care about crit damage.

Now let’s say that B does twice the base damage of A. In PvE, their damage output is identical. In PvP, B will do considerably more. The same principle applies to crit damage (the more you have, the less losing a fixed amount of it will hurt you) which I could illustrate in a similar example, but I think you get it.

Also, I will bet you good money that your tests are flawed if you are somehow getting a faster kill from 0/20/20/0/30 than from 20/25/0/25/0. It’s simply impossible, unless you’re bursting with QZ, which I’m also willing to bet is the case. Otherwise, you have less power, less crit damage, fewer traits that boost damage, etc. I don’t think I need to explain why getting 3s of quickness on a kill that takes 7 seconds is going to heavily skew the results.

Edit: I just tried it myself. Kill time: 3.6s. Using your build, one extra swing, so about 4.2s.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I don’t think you get it. Let me use an extreme example to illustrate. I’m going to use round numbers to make this easier.

Class A has 100% crit chance. In PvE, his gear gives him an extra 50% crit damage on top of the base 50%, so he gets double on a crit. That means, on average, he does double base damage on every hit. In PvP, he gets NO crit damage bonus from gear, so he only deals 50% more than base damage on average, so now he’s lost 25% of his total damage just going from PvE to PvE, nothing else changed.

Class B has 0% crit chance. In PvE, he ALWAYS does base damage. In PvP, he also deals the same damage, because he isn’t getting crits anyway so he doesn’t care about crit damage.

Now let’s say that B does twice the base damage of A. In PvE, their damage output is identical. In PvP, B will do considerably more. The same principle applies to crit damage (the more you have, the less losing a fixed amount of it will hurt you) which I could illustrate in a similar example, but I think you get it.

True. The problem is that in your above example is invalid for the situation. Both the ranger and warrior builds I tested have high prec/crit chance and crit damage. Both were receiving a high crit rate throughout and well over half of both class’kittens were crits.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Also, I will bet you good money that your tests are flawed if you are somehow getting a faster kill from 0/20/20/0/30 than from 20/25/0/25/0. It’s simply impossible, unless you’re bursting with QZ, which I’m also willing to bet is the case. Otherwise, you have less power, less crit damage, fewer traits that boost damage, etc. I don’t think I need to explain why getting 3s of quickness on a kill that takes 7 seconds is going to heavily skew the results.

Interesting. I test and you assume I’m trying to skew the results by invalid testing to prove you wrong. No. That is not how I operate and I’m not trying to do anything other than empirically test. I was honestly a bit surprised that your build did less than my build as well. I was not, however, surprised that the warrior out-DPSed both, which was what I was testing.

As for how I got the damage? QZ bursting? No. I was testing sustainable DPS, not spike only DPS. Once every minute is not sustainable. The reasons for the DPS difference are fivefold:

1 – More points in beastmastery means higher pet stats and higher pet DPS. This is the biggest one.
2 – Zephyr’s Speed grandmaster major Beastmastery trait. 3s of quickness of pet swap up to every 16 seconds. That is much more sustainable than once every 60 seconds and yes, I did use it. Though not every time. So it was averaged out among my 8 test cases, some with a pet swap (when it was off cooldown) and some without.
3 – Rending Attacks master major Beastmaster trait. Drake and feline pets bleed on crits. Again, more pet damage.
4 – Speed Training adept major Beastmastery trait. Pets recharge their skills 10% faster so they can use their useful skills more often. Yet again, more pet damage.
5 – Nature’s Wrath grandmaster minor Beastmastery trait. 10% of healing being added to power. Easily the smallest boost as it is only a boost of 30 to power, but every little bit does help.

You seem to have forgotten to count the pet’s contribution to your damage output. The 0/20/20/0/30 build is designed for decently high damage output from the ranger and very high damage output from the pet. I’m sure I could eke out more damage with a 20/20/0/0/30 build, but I don’t know if I could live without at least 10 in WS, if not it’s current 20. Personal preference for the support gained by it.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

nor is anyone going to run a 0/20/20/0/30 build on a ranger, because those builds suck.

I run this build. Enlighten me oh great paragon of ranger wisdom, why does it suck?

My damage build on my ranger is 10/20/10/0/30, I fail to see how 0/20/20/0/30 would be a bad build, can you enlighten me oh wise one why this build is bad?

SynfulChaot.3169:

True. The problem is that in your above example is invalid for the situation. Both the ranger and warrior builds I tested have high prec/crit chance and crit damage. Both were receiving a high crit rate throughout and well over half of both class’kittens were crits.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Also, I will bet you good money that your tests are flawed if you are somehow getting a faster kill from 0/20/20/0/30 than from 20/25/0/25/0. It’s simply impossible, unless you’re bursting with QZ, which I’m also willing to bet is the case. Otherwise, you have less power, less crit damage, fewer traits that boost damage, etc. I don’t think I need to explain why getting 3s of quickness on a kill that takes 7 seconds is going to heavily skew the results.

Interesting. I test and you assume I’m trying to skew the results by invalid testing to prove you wrong. No. That is not how I operate and I’m not trying to do anything other than empirically test. I was honestly a bit surprised that your build did less than my build as well. I was not, however, surprised that the warrior out-DPSed both, which was what I was testing.

As for how I got the damage? QZ bursting? No. I was testing sustainable DPS, not spike only DPS. Once every minute is not sustainable. The reasons for the DPS difference are fivefold:

1 – More points in beastmastery means higher pet stats and higher pet DPS. This is the biggest one.
2 – Zephyr’s Speed grandmaster major Beastmastery trait. 3s of quickness of pet swap up to every 16 seconds. That is much more sustainable than once every 60 seconds and yes, I did use it. Though not every time. So it was averaged out among my 8 test cases, some with a pet swap (when it was off cooldown) and some without.
3 – Rending Attacks master major Beastmaster trait. Drake and feline pets bleed on crits. Again, more pet damage.
4 – Speed Training adept major Beastmastery trait. Pets recharge their skills 10% faster so they can use their useful skills more often. Yet again, more pet damage.
5 – Nature’s Wrath grandmaster minor Beastmastery trait. 10% of healing being added to power. Easily the smallest boost as it is only a boost of 30 to power, but every little bit does help.

You seem to have forgotten to count the pet’s contribution to your damage output. The 0/20/20/0/30 build is designed for decently high damage output from the ranger and very high damage output from the pet. I’m sure I could eke out more damage with a 20/20/0/0/30 build, but I don’t know if I could live without at least 10 in WS, if not it’s current 20. Personal preference for the support gained by it.

Well, that’s obviously your problem, you’re using Zephyr’s Speed. 3 seconds of quickness for a 7s kill. That’s the equivalent of the trait giving you 7 seconds of quickness over the actual cooldown of the skill. Your so-called “empirical” tests are stacked to more than double the DPS contribution of Zephyr’s Speed Since your apparent results (which I still suspect are skewed since getting a kill in half the time using your own method) have my build being virtually the same in sustained DPS as yours does in burst DPS, I think it’s pretty fair to say mine hits considerably more.

Also, boosting pet damage is generally bad because pet damage is so low. That 300 point boost to power and precision is, at best, worth about 25% extra damage on the pet, which translates to about a 5% boost in overall DPS. Not very much at all and certainly not worth the 20-25% overall DPS loss from not having Steady Focus, Spotter, and Hunter’s Tactics. Moreover, you don’t even have Fortifying Bond, so there’s no guarantee that your pet will even do any more DPS once you count the extra fury and might that Fortifying Bond will give it.

Oh, and warriors have more crit damage from traits (30% from 30 in Discpline + 10% from Arms) while Rangers have a higher crit chance (7% from Spotter). You can control for the precision by just not taking Spotter, which is fine since both will have the buff in a dungeon environment anyway, but there’s no way to equalize the crit damage without intentionally gimping the warrior in the process. So either warrior comes out as too strong or too weak.

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

nor is anyone going to run a 0/20/20/0/30 build on a ranger, because those builds suck.

I run this build. Enlighten me oh great paragon of ranger wisdom, why does it suck?

No Steady Focus, no Spotter, no Hunter’s Tactics, no Vigorous Spirits, and what is the 20 in Wilderness Survival even for? There’s nothing good in that line, except for maybe Natural Vigor, which only costs 5 points.

You can’t complain about rangers not having DPS until you actually try to DPS with them first.

I just think this is funny. comparing a Warrior Vs Ranger in over all DPS is like Professional gymnast Vs Special Olympics.

Warriors are better condi damage, better burst damage, better over all sustained damage. The only thing Rangers really are better at than a warrior is bunkering.

I really like that people are trying to bring to light just how much the Ranger class needs help, but seeing people argue about things being a L2P are simply sabotaging the class as a whole. Rangers need help. Our traits are jacked up and lackluster when you compare them side by side with other classes. Anet forces way to many pet related traits down our throat to be even semi viable. I would rather see the pet go away and have a class that can compete evenly with other classes than have that broken AI death magnet depict how I have to play.

I love my Ranger, and I play it all the time, but In all honestly I think I play it and try and nickle and dime every ounce of damage I can out of it in total defiance of Anet’s inability to balance the class. I also refuse to waste 30 points into BM and conform to this BS about being so pet dependent, and If I could just put my pet up and not use it at all I would.

Syn,
I’m not trying to “call you out” or question your “cred” or anything like that. I’m actually seriously positing this. The apples vs apples comparison isn’t because I have any doubts about your capabilities, I’m asking because character building is bonkers and no sane man could model this in their head. But I guess it wasn’t right of me to say that without some kind of an explanation.

This game feels like it’s balanced on a spreadsheet.
It’s as if somebody worked backwards with about six different major playstyles per class and then thought about what pieces they should cleave off and turn into traits. I’m sure it’s clever way to ensure character building was never overpowered, as it would be if you were happy with where things were as a baseline and then added traits on top of that. But it’s odd in that things only really ‘click’ together at their extremes, and it makes so much of this game’s traits and balancing seem downright aazy crass.

Like, 7% reduction on Moa peck.
If you tried to logic that out as a standalone nerf, you’d only end up scratching your head. Why 7%? Why a nerf? It just doesn’t make any sense all by itself. But if you look at from the perspective of a designer trying to get all pets to hit a (or various) invisible lines on a spreadsheet somewhere suddenly it doesn’t seem quite so random.

/edit: eh, I was getting a bit wordy. trimmed.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

—snip—

I’m not going to even bother continuing this conversation with you as you refuse to acknowledge any input you have gotten from anyone about anything. You’re convinced you’re right. Good for you. But no further positive dialogue can come from this with how you’re approaching it.

Laiboch.4380:

I really like that people are trying to bring to light just how much the Ranger class needs help, but seeing people argue about things being a L2P are simply sabotaging the class as a whole. Rangers need help. Our traits are jacked up and lackluster when you compare them side by side with other classes. Anet forces way to many pet related traits down our throat to be even semi viable. I would rather see the pet go away and have a class that can compete evenly with other classes than have that broken AI death magnet depict how I have to play.

I love my Ranger, and I play it all the time, but In all honestly I think I play it and try and nickle and dime every ounce of damage I can out of it in total defiance of Anet’s inability to balance the class. I also refuse to waste 30 points into BM and conform to this BS about being so pet dependent, and If I could just put my pet up and not use it at all I would.

^ This ^

All of this. You’ve hit the nail on the head, Laiboch. As you can see from my post of a week ago, this is exactly what the problem is.

We’re not terribad. We’re not as bad as many other classes think we are. But we are in need of serious balancing as there is a reason that a vast majority of skilled players consider rangers the worst in PvE and WvW.

I, too, prefer my ranger above my other classes. But I have found no other class that is so incredibly dependent on their class mechanic. A class mechanic that is very unreliable and required, unlike half of the other classes.

But seriously. We need to work together to agree on what the class does well and point out where the class needs work. Because despite what some insist time and time again, the ranger does need some serious work.

Vox Hollow.2736:

Syn,
I’m not trying to “call you out” or question your “cred” or anything like that. I’m actually seriously positing this. The apples vs apples comparison isn’t because I have any doubts about your capabilities, I’m asking because character building is bonkers and no sane man could model this in their head. But I guess it wasn’t right of me to say that without some kind of an explanation.

This game feels like it’s balanced on a spreadsheet.
It’s as if somebody worked backwards with about six different major playstyles per class and then thought about what pieces they should cleave off and turn into traits. I’m sure it’s clever way to ensure character building was never overpowered, as it would be if you were happy with where things were as a baseline and then added traits on top of that. But it’s odd in that things only really ‘click’ together at their extremes, and it makes so much of this game’s traits and balancing seem downright aazy crass.

Like, 7% reduction on Moa peck.
If you tried to logic that out as a standalone nerf, you’d only end up scratching your head. Why 7%? Why a nerf? It just doesn’t make any sense all by itself. But if you look at from the perspective of a designer trying to get all pets to hit a (or various) invisible lines on a spreadsheet somewhere suddenly it doesn’t seem quite so random.

Oh. I know what you mean. But I feel that the class needs buffs/rebalances before it needs nerfs. When we’re already struggling in two modes of play (PvE/WvW) and only middle-of-the-road in the last (PvP), that is not the time for nerfs. Especially the SB one. We use the SB as it’s our most powerful ranged weapon. Nerfing the range exclusively to force LB use is just bonkers with where the ranger is in the game right now. And before you jump on me for that statement, yes that is the reason. They openly admitted it in the sPvP SotG.

While it may have been with the best of intentions, their timing of the pet nerfs was a bit … early, shall we say.

There are substantive mechanical changes and there are quality of life changes.

The problem is that spreadsheet balances are the only real way to balance a class. Just like with fighting games, there are classes that dominate everything even if the player is only average, and there are classes that are going to require a lot of work just to get a slight marginal advantage over the former. Rangers are pretty much the latter, since their DPS is basically split across three sources at the moment (self, pet, spirit) and they need to be able to keep them all alive, or their damage becomes rather lackluster. However, if you buff the damage to compensate, then you’re left with a class that is good for an average player, and extremely overpowered for a good one. That’s too much. Even the warrior is only good for an average player and not that much better for a good one.

Something like sword auto being interruptible with dodges and other skills would be a quality of life change that would be very nice. On the other hand a DPS increase to the sword (or any weapon) would probably straight-up break the class.

I do agree that the greatsword needs a slight buff to DPS, and that axe is total garbage, but otherwise the ranger is actually in pretty good shape short of some quality of life changes.

There are so many of you that cry SO much, and I’m truly astonished by the lack of foresight the majority of the ranger community seems to have. So now I’m going to explain what the most likely course of action is, so that at least maybe somebody might choose to dry those tears up.

Prepatch, rangers had always had their pets kept at the same level, while the player was balanced around that pet. However, rangers have a very low skill floor (meaning there is no complexity in how skills perform and interact to master, for the most part), and the fact that the pet was not being changed at all is what was holding the class back.

Step forward to before the update. Yes, pets were too strong in bunker builds, and ANet was able to accumulate numbers over time and adjust the pet damage to where they wanted it to be. However, at this point, they have little idea on how to reallocate that lost damage potential to the player. How could they know? They have a small test team and there’s a chance they aren’t even sure on the current numbers and could change them even more, so it would be an extremely hard thing to test.

So what to do? They let the community gather data for them from playing with the updated pets, so that we can create data for them to be analyzed, and have the class further adjusted in a future patch. It’s a small team of developers and it’s the best way to handle the situation because it allows mass quantities of data to be gathered at a time.

Most likely, they will be able to see the total amount of damage lost, and with not implementing everything at once like they could have (and then possibly gone back on it like they’re going to have to do with Dhuumfire for necros), it allows them to get more accurate readings and analysis, and gives the dev team enough time to figure out what numbers to change, where to change them, and how exactly they want them reallocated.

But no, community members can’t see that, because they are too busy crying and cutting themselves because something they like got changed in a game that’s still in it’s infancy, and then they all group up and say warriors have it so good, while warriors are too busy crying about how they are so bad at pvp and complaining about how good they have it, while guardians are too busy crying that their utility is too good and nobody wants them for their damage while they complain about how good mesmers/thieves have it etc etc etc…

The game is young, it’s time to stop going full kitten every time ANet changes something and you don’t like it. There is life away from this keyboard and this game. Go do something else, and come back, especially if you aren’t liking the game in its current implementation.
Just like I can foresee lots of people crying about their legendary choices down the road, because I can’t believe anybody is looking at this game right now as a finished product, as though nothing is going to change, or as if that weapon will remain as good as they felt is was when they got it.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I do agree that the greatsword needs a slight buff to DPS, and that axe is total garbage, but otherwise the ranger is actually in pretty good shape short of some quality of life changes.

You forgot about our ranged options. SB is decent, but needs a way of increasing the range again, perhaps through a trait. If you’re going condition ranger than that SB nerf really messes with your 900+ range DPS. And LB is still a mess.

jcbroe.4329:

There are so many of you that cry SO much, and I’m truly astonished by the lack of foresight the majority of the ranger community seems to have. So now I’m going to explain what the most likely course of action is, so that at least maybe somebody might choose to dry those tears up.

— snip —

So what to do? They let the community gather data for them from playing with the updated pets, so that we can create data for them to be analyzed, and have the class further adjusted in a future patch. It’s a small team of developers and it’s the best way to handle the situation because it allows mass quantities of data to be gathered at a time.

— snip —

But no, community members can’t see that, because they are too busy crying and cutting themselves because something they like got changed in a game that’s still in it’s infancy, and then they all group up and say warriors have it so good, while warriors are too busy crying about how they are so bad at pvp and complaining about how good they have it, while guardians are too busy crying that their utility is too good and nobody wants them for their damage while they complain about how good mesmers/thieves have it etc etc etc…

The game is young, it’s time to stop going full kitten every time ANet changes something and you don’t like it. There is life away from this keyboard and this game. Go do something else, and come back, especially if you aren’t liking the game in its current implementation.
Just like I can foresee lots of people crying about their legendary choices down the road, because I can’t believe anybody is looking at this game right now as a finished product, as though nothing is going to change, or as if that weapon will remain as good as they felt is was when they got it.

Umm … jc? We’re not crying, here. We’re openly discussing the class and it’s flaws. I’ve not heard one person crying or seriously saying the class is useless. So … I think you’re in the wrong thread?

SynfulChaot.3169:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I do agree that the greatsword needs a slight buff to DPS, and that axe is total garbage, but otherwise the ranger is actually in pretty good shape short of some quality of life changes.

You forgot about our ranged options. SB is decent, but needs a way of increasing the range again, perhaps through a trait. If you’re going condition ranger than that SB nerf really messes with your 900+ range DPS. And LB is still a mess.

jcbroe.4329:

There are so many of you that cry SO much, and I’m truly astonished by the lack of foresight the majority of the ranger community seems to have. So now I’m going to explain what the most likely course of action is, so that at least maybe somebody might choose to dry those tears up.

— snip —

So what to do? They let the community gather data for them from playing with the updated pets, so that we can create data for them to be analyzed, and have the class further adjusted in a future patch. It’s a small team of developers and it’s the best way to handle the situation because it allows mass quantities of data to be gathered at a time.

— snip —

But no, community members can’t see that, because they are too busy crying and cutting themselves because something they like got changed in a game that’s still in it’s infancy, and then they all group up and say warriors have it so good, while warriors are too busy crying about how they are so bad at pvp and complaining about how good they have it, while guardians are too busy crying that their utility is too good and nobody wants them for their damage while they complain about how good mesmers/thieves have it etc etc etc…

The game is young, it’s time to stop going full kitten every time ANet changes something and you don’t like it. There is life away from this keyboard and this game. Go do something else, and come back, especially if you aren’t liking the game in its current implementation.
Just like I can foresee lots of people crying about their legendary choices down the road, because I can’t believe anybody is looking at this game right now as a finished product, as though nothing is going to change, or as if that weapon will remain as good as they felt is was when they got it.

Umm … jc? We’re not crying, here. We’re openly discussing the class and it’s flaws. I’ve not heard one person crying or seriously saying the class is useless. So … I think you’re in the wrong thread?

I didn’t single you out, did I?

But throughout this thread there has been a lot of useless, not constructive “cry” responses.

You on the other hand have been having a very good discussion about DPS outputs with the class, which is the exact type of conversations that need to be happening within the community.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

No Steady Focus, no Spotter, no Hunter’s Tactics, no Vigorous Spirits, and what is the 20 in Wilderness Survival even for? There’s nothing good in that line, except for maybe Natural Vigor, which only costs 5 points..

So if it isn’t a 20/25/x/20/x build it sucks. Glad we cleared that up.

You write your posts as though you are knowledgeable about the ranger class, but statements like “this build sucks” really makes you come across as whiny and childish. “I don’t like it, therefore it must suck”

jcbroe.4329:

I didn’t single you out, did I?

But throughout this thread there has been a lot of useless, not constructive “cry” responses.

You on the other hand have been having a very good discussion about DPS outputs with the class, which is the exact type of conversations that need to be happening within the community.

I try. ^.^

I want to see the ranger be used more, esp in PvE. I want to see more viable builds and build types. I want the class to not be auto-kicked from most dungeon PUGs. I want to see the ranger where it should be, a balanced class that you don’t feel punishes you for playing.

Instead of complaining, I try to discuss with others on exactly where the weaknesses are. And I try to keep the threads civil and informative enough that ANet doesn’t skip over them due to tone and stuff. Because too many good threads will get ignored due to language and tone. And that’s just a shame.

Quarktastic.1027:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

No Steady Focus, no Spotter, no Hunter’s Tactics, no Vigorous Spirits, and what is the 20 in Wilderness Survival even for? There’s nothing good in that line, except for maybe Natural Vigor, which only costs 5 points..

So if it isn’t a 20/25/x/20/x build it sucks. Glad we cleared that up.

You write your posts as though you are knowledgeable about the ranger class, but statements like “this build sucks” really makes you come across as whiny and childish. “I don’t like it, therefore it must suck”

That actually wasn’t what he said at all. He said if you aren’t going to be taking damage traits to maximize damage output, then people shouldn’t complain about not having enough damage.

jcbroe.4329:

That actually wasn’t what he said at all. He said if you aren’t going to be taking damage traits to maximize damage output, then people shouldn’t complain about not having enough damage.

He said: “nor is anyone going to run a 0/20/20/0/30 build on a ranger, because those builds suck.”

When I asked him why, he compiled a neat list of reasons. So I gave him a build that incorporates everything he considers to be optimal.

Seems to me like that’s exactly what he meant.