Guild Wars 2

What Base Ranger needs: An Overview

The goal of these changes is to bring up the power level of all Ranger weapons other than Longbow, increase Pet survivability and utility while reducing their yolo damage potential, smooth out the Ranger traitlines by buffing the worst traits, and give Rangers more condi clear.

Marksmanship:

1. Predator’s Instinct: Added 3 stacks of torment in addition to the cripple, reduced ICD to 20 seconds.
2. Predator’s Onslaught: Added functionality: Your damaging conditions last 33% longer on foes affected by disabling conditions or stuns.
3. Remorseless: Interrupting a foe also recharges Opening strike

I try here to give Marksmanship some benefits of use as a condi build while buffing the rarely used Predator’s traits

Skirmishing:

1. Trapper’s Expertise: Traps now also remove boons when triggered
2. Strider’s Defense: Additional functionality: Evading an attack while wielding a sword grants you and your pet Might, 1 stack for 8 seconds
3. Hidden Barbs: Bleeding damage increased by 33%
4. Light on your Feet: Now also increases Shortbow range to 1200
5. Most Dangerous Game: Now drops a Spike trap when your health falls below 50% in addition to the might stacking, 45 second ICD on spike trap

These changes attempt to address Shortbow being outclassed by Longbow, Traps being horrendous compared to things like Necro Marks, Engineer Grenades/bombs, the additional functional to MDG would be very fun imo

Wilderness Survival:

1. Soften the Fall: Name changes to “Survivalist”: Added back in the old Sharpening Stone at 75% health trait in addition to the fall damage muddy terrain bonus. This trait is one of the worst in the game at the moment
2. Expertise Training: Duration increase of Pet condis was randomly reduced by 60%, let’s bring it back up to 33%.
3. Empathic Bond: Your pet removes 1 condition from you and nearby allies every 4 seconds. Moved into the Beastmastery tier/swapped with Honed Axes.
4. Poison Master: Poison damage increased by 33% instead of 25%

Empathic bond is moved to a traitline to where it belongs, and now the pet removes conditions instead of being destroyed by them, the new Survivalist trait becomes actually worth taking in a Survival condi build while still having the falling damage functionality that Arenanet loves

Nature Magic:

1. Bountiful Hunter: You and your pet deal more damage per boon that is on you AND your foe.
2. Instinctive Reaction: Increased power gained based on Healing power to 14% from 7% since healing power has no base stat.
3. Windborne Notes: Call of the Wild now also removes 2 conditions from affected allies.
4. Invigorating Bond: Now scales with the Ranger’s healing power and radius increased to 450.

Just some buffs to increase lesser used traits and give Ranger more support potential

Beastmastery:

1. Natural Healing: You and your pet gain health regeneration depending on how close you are to each other: <300 range: 150 healing, >300 range: 100 healing, >600 range: 50 healing
2. Honed Axes: Gain condition damage when wielding a Mainhand Axe and Power damage when wielding an Offhand Axe. Axe skills recharge 33% faster. Move 25% faster when wielding an Axe.

Tried to fix the abysmal Axe trait and make it worthwhile as a general mobility and cooldown reduction, since axes are rarely used together, I suggest splitting the bonus effects between offhand/mainhand, Natural Healing is now a positional play trait which would help melee rangers be tankier and fight along side their pets
Weaponset issues:

Shortbow:

1. Autoattack now attacks at 60% previous speed but with guaranteed bleeds and torment if attacking from 180 degree radius behind target (current it’s like a 270 or 300 radius for bleed application)
2. Shortbow #3 becomes a Leap finisher, for use with things like Healing Spring or Pet based combo fields
4. Shortbow 5 now applies 3 stacks of confusion

Axe Mainhand:

Auto attack reworked into a condition chain doing Bleed, Torment, then Chill on final hit

Axe Offhand:

Axe #5 now is mobile while channeling and does 50% more damage

Warhorn Offhand:

Warhorn 4 now is a multitarget attack which summons a bird for each enemy within a 600 radius causing Blind and 5 stacks of vulnerability (only hits once on each enemy, up to 5). Name is changed to “Call the Crows” or something similar

Torch:

Torch 4 now applies 3 stacks of burn for 5 seconds
Bonfire now applies two stacks of burn per hit.

Sword:
Sword autoattack no long roots the ranger in place and also no longer tracks targets.
Sword 3 now applies 3 stacks of vulnerability
Sword 2 stuns the target for 1 second on the second half of the chain.

General pet changes:

Pet damage is reduced (by something like 40-50%) and substantially increased power scaling is added to Greatsword, Sword, Mainhand Axe, Shortbow, Offhand Dagger. Note the lack of longbow damage scaling increases, please.

Overall pet survivability is doubled in return for the large pet damage nerfs. Pets now do far less damage and are used more for their utility skills rather than untelegraphed burst.
Devourer’s receive a large base damage buff.
Dog cooldowns other than Wolf and Drakehound are reduced substantially.
Bears with physical f2 attacks receive a very hefty damage buff.
Spiders other than Jungle Spider/Black Widow receive f2 cooldown reductions
Pig f2s now function like Thief steal: the item found is slotted in the F2 space.
Cats receive F2 cooldown reductions.
Moas receive increased damage and F2 buffs

General Utility changes:

Spirits now are indestructible, providing their passive buffs at target location until their active is used, destroying the spirit. (Spirits still die after 60 seconds if no active is used) OR Spirits can move again but still have health.

Protect Me: Your and your pet gain 4 seconds of protection and resistance, breaks stun, and your pet takes 50% of the damage you would take for the next 6 seconds.

Guard: Your pet patrols the target area, revealing stealthed targets.

Sic Em: Now still works if Pet is commanded to use F2 skill during the duration (a bug fix which has been needed for literally years.

The biggest thing the core ranger needs is a total pet overhaul. 30% of our dps is trapped in the pet. A mechanic that isn’t reliable with hitting people in pvp, surviving in pve and very clunky to design. Until the pet is fixed the class will always be below average.

Kitty.1502:

The biggest thing the core ranger needs is a total pet overhaul. 30% of our dps is trapped in the pet. A mechanic that isn’t reliable with hitting people in pvp, surviving in pve and very clunky to design. Until the pet is fixed the class will always be below average.

Could not have said it better, thank you Kitty.

Kitty.1502:

The biggest thing the core ranger needs is a total pet overhaul. 30% of our dps is trapped in the pet. A mechanic that isn’t reliable with hitting people in pvp, surviving in pve and very clunky to design. Until the pet is fixed the class will always be below average.

A cookie for Kitty. Well said. Here you go.
o/°

I hear what you guys are saying, but at this point…good luck getting a comprehensive pet overhaul, which is why I suggested giving most of the pets damage back to the Ranger on weapon skills other than longbow

infantrydiv.1620:

I hear what you guys are saying, but at this point…good luck getting a comprehensive pet overhaul, which is why I suggested giving most of the pets damage back to the Ranger on weapon skills other than longbow

Not against that idea totally, but you’d also need to give the damage back to the longbow whether in the form of a flat 30% damage increase, or redoing the skills to give the bow more burst. Either case would need a flat 30% damage increase to all weapons and skills.

The pet system (more lack of system) was rushed and due to the “low hanging fruit” focus of fixing things has seen nothing but band-aid fixes along with a lack of transparency on what exactly they (the designers) want ranger to do/be.

Bran.7425:

The pet system (more lack of system) was rushed and due to the “low hanging fruit” focus of fixing things has seen nothing but band-aid fixes along with a lack of transparency on what exactly they (the designers) want ranger to do/be.

This is true, the designers lack of vision on how the Ranger should work in PvP is a huge part of the reason why we’ve gotten very little useful support skills as well: their “vision” was Ranger was “a skirmishing/dueling class, so it shouldn’t have useful support or utility…” which is silly, because every viable build we’ve seen in PvP has brought some type of support or utility while maintaining a role apart from that, such as roaming, bunkering or cleaving, etc.

Kitty.1502:

infantrydiv.1620:

I hear what you guys are saying, but at this point…good luck getting a comprehensive pet overhaul, which is why I suggested giving most of the pets damage back to the Ranger on weapon skills other than longbow

Not against that idea totally, but you’d also need to give the damage back to the longbow whether in the form of a flat 30% damage increase, or redoing the skills to give the bow more burst. Either case would need a flat 30% damage increase to all weapons and skills.

Fortifying bond Baseline and Permanent Stow option would do all the tricks.
It would probably band-aid most of problems without much coding.

If I want to deal damage in PvP – I pick the spider. No pathing issues or on-the-move attack misses.
And it has an immobilize.
It narrows down the pet choices but well. I won’t even dream they’d take the effort to fix this moving target issue.

Tragic Positive.9356:

Kitty.1502:

infantrydiv.1620:

I hear what you guys are saying, but at this point…good luck getting a comprehensive pet overhaul, which is why I suggested giving most of the pets damage back to the Ranger on weapon skills other than longbow

Not against that idea totally, but you’d also need to give the damage back to the longbow whether in the form of a flat 30% damage increase, or redoing the skills to give the bow more burst. Either case would need a flat 30% damage increase to all weapons and skills.

Fortifying bond Baseline and Permanent Stow option would do all the tricks.
It would probably band-aid most of problems without much coding.

If I want to deal damage in PvP – I pick the spider. No pathing issues or on-the-move attack misses.
And it has an immobilize.
It narrows down the pet choices but well. I won’t even dream they’d take the effort to fix this moving target issue.

A better solution as a temp band aid would to increase the pets hit range from 130 to 260, and increase the angel to 180 degrees. Also give pets a static buff that reduces damage from AOE and Cleaves by 80%.

Kitty.1502:

Tragic Positive.9356:

Kitty.1502:

infantrydiv.1620:

I hear what you guys are saying, but at this point…good luck getting a comprehensive pet overhaul, which is why I suggested giving most of the pets damage back to the Ranger on weapon skills other than longbow

Not against that idea totally, but you’d also need to give the damage back to the longbow whether in the form of a flat 30% damage increase, or redoing the skills to give the bow more burst. Either case would need a flat 30% damage increase to all weapons and skills.

Fortifying bond Baseline and Permanent Stow option would do all the tricks.
It would probably band-aid most of problems without much coding.

If I want to deal damage in PvP – I pick the spider. No pathing issues or on-the-move attack misses.
And it has an immobilize.
It narrows down the pet choices but well. I won’t even dream they’d take the effort to fix this moving target issue.

A better solution as a temp band aid would to increase the pets hit range from 130 to 260, and increase the angel to 180 degrees. Also give pets a static buff that reduces damage from AOE and Cleaves by 80%.

Yup, that suggestion has been here for quite some time and is valid.
The angle is new, though. That is a nice solution. Haven’t thought about that one.

Kitty.1502:

The biggest thing the core ranger needs is a total pet overhaul. 30% of our dps is trapped in the pet. A mechanic that isn’t reliable with hitting people in pvp, surviving in pve and very clunky to design. Until the pet is fixed the class will always be below average.

Really hope they tone down that 30%(to 20% 15% maybe?) and give it to the ranger, across all weapons.

Kitty.1502:

A better solution as a temp band aid would to increase the pets hit range from 130 to 260, and increase the angel to 180 degrees. Also give pets a static buff that reduces damage from AOE and Cleaves by 80%.

I think the solution is already in the game. A pet transformed into a moa seems to be able to land attacks far better than regular pets. So the devs could take a look at what moa transform actually changes, compared to our normal pets.

Just look at drakes tail swipe attack for example – almost two (2!) seconds wind up time – what the hell?

As for the ranged pets, increasing the velocity of their projectiles would solve their issues, especially the slow as hell special attacks from spiders.

I don’t think it would be that hard, but for some reason Anet are fine with the very low hit rate of pets (in pvp), which is very, very strange indeed, considering the fact that rangers supposedly are balanced with pet damage included.

Axe #1 could use a bit higher damage. Also, the first hit should hit harder, this would allow the weapon to work even vs a single enemy. Either that, or allow the axe to bounce on allies as well (could be a nice druid synergy if the axe were allowed to bounce on allies, healing them for a small amount).

wouldnt that idea for Warhorn be a nerf?
I dont like it. I rather it have a blind on it, or weakness, or something that can be used for support and defense.

Here is what I said for Spirits
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/Spirits-need-buff-developers-req/first#post5553431

Sword need a change to its leap evade skill. Also the auto attack is just bad. makes you lose control of character. Need better burst damage if its going to have that risky element. Sword 2 need need an additional effect and increased defense on chain.
Sword three should get a secondary attack at end of roll and apply confusion.

I would like some kind of defensive/Support Main Hand to go with Warhorn.

Healing Spring need to be changed from a trap and make the Water Field instant on skill use.

“Sic ’Em!” need to be made into AoE reveal.

“Protect Me!” need to apply extra toughness and condition damage reduction to Pet while active.

Lightning Reflexes should have a chain effect that rolls back to target similar to Sword 2.

Troll Unguent to get a random proc of Protection each proc would be nice.

Hilt Bash slightly increased range, and stun to 2 seconds.

Counterattack changed into a longer block and chain does knock back cripple.

Just to say, OP, some of your change are totally illogic and would just nerf the ranger a bit more :

Pet damage is reduced (by something like 40-50%)

Sic Em: Now still works if Pet is commanded to use F2 skill during the duration (a bug fix which has been needed for literally years.

How do you even want the pet to do anything with Sic em if the pet do already no damage? The less base damage the pet do, the less effective Sic em is.

Overall, even if it’s hard to accept it, the ranger is balanced in regard of damage. The only thing the ranger need is a lot of work on the pet and maybe an upgrade on the shortbow.

Dadnir.5038:

Just to say, OP, some of your change are totally illogic and would just nerf the ranger a bit more :

Pet damage is reduced (by something like 40-50%)

Sic Em: Now still works if Pet is commanded to use F2 skill during the duration (a bug fix which has been needed for literally years.

How do you even want the pet to do anything with Sic em if the pet do already no damage? The less base damage the pet do, the less effective Sic em is.

Overall, even if it’s hard to accept it, the ranger is balanced in regard of damage. The only thing the ranger need is a lot of work on the pet and maybe an upgrade on the shortbow.

Umm you really don’t main as a Ranger do you ?

If Rangers were “Balanced” in the dmg department, i would be able to get highend Fractal groups without having to buy them. Let alone other aspects of this game.

don’t touch warhorn 4 >:O

best skill in the game

Hilt Bash slightly increased range, and stun to 2 seconds.

it does need more range – you can’t hit a crippled player moving away from you reliably. however, 2 s stun would necessitate nerfing Moment of Clarity, nothx.

///

Opening strike should recharge when you switch weapons andor pets. major trait?

would like to see a crit ranger build with ferocity but not much precision be more viable

Dradiin.8935:

Just to say, OP, some of your change are totally illogic and would just nerf the ranger a bit more :

Pet damage is reduced (by something like 40-50%)

Sic Em: Now still works if Pet is commanded to use F2 skill during the duration (a bug fix which has been needed for literally years.

How do you even want the pet to do anything with Sic em if the pet do already no damage? The less base damage the pet do, the less effective Sic em is.

Overall, even if it’s hard to accept it, the ranger is balanced in regard of damage. The only thing the ranger need is a lot of work on the pet and maybe an upgrade on the shortbow.

I do main Ranger and I get high-end fractal groups. It’s about making a name.
It’s always the people. Always have been.

But am I skeptical about inviting rangers into groups when I’m not playing one? Hell yes I am! Rangers are hated because the vast majority plays role-playing ineffective builds, can’t control their pets, ruin skips, ruin pulls, have no idea what is Ranger’s job in high-end fractals.

That being said – yes, I always curse to myself when I see the ranger join my group. But that’s because I know that the ranger’s most probably going to play 3 signets, Longbow and play support with his brown bear.
That has nothing to do with efficiency as Rangers are on the higher ground of DPS in terms of unique-DPS boosts and personal DPS.

Dradiin.8935:

Umm you really don’t main as a Ranger do you ?

If Rangers were “Balanced” in the dmg department, i would be able to get highend Fractal groups without having to buy them. Let alone other aspects of this game.

Well, I play all profession equally and even no, the ranger don’t lag behind as much as you seem to think when it come to damage.
Rangers are only held down in pve by their bad reputation.

Dradiin.8935:

Dadnir.5038:

Just to say, OP, some of your change are totally illogic and would just nerf the ranger a bit more :

Pet damage is reduced (by something like 40-50%)

Sic Em: Now still works if Pet is commanded to use F2 skill during the duration (a bug fix which has been needed for literally years.

How do you even want the pet to do anything with Sic em if the pet do already no damage? The less base damage the pet do, the less effective Sic em is.

Overall, even if it’s hard to accept it, the ranger is balanced in regard of damage. The only thing the ranger need is a lot of work on the pet and maybe an upgrade on the shortbow.

Umm you really don’t main as a Ranger do you ?

If Rangers were “Balanced” in the dmg department, i would be able to get highend Fractal groups without having to buy them. Let alone other aspects of this game.

Ranger is balanced, the meta classes and groups are OP and need to be toned down.

Tragic Positive.9356:

Rangers are hated because the vast majority plays role-playing ineffective builds, can’t control their pets, ruin skips, ruin pulls, have no idea what is Ranger’s job in high-end fractals.

That being said – yes, I always curse to myself when I see the ranger join my group. But that’s because I know that the ranger’s most probably going to play 3 signets, Longbow and play support with his brown bear.

Honestly, is this really still the case? Sure I see the typical bearbow archetype from time to time, but I also see a fair amount of decent rangers that knows how to use their pets properly.

The most annoying thing about other rangers in pve that I see are the ones that can’t keep their fingers away from longbow #4…

This is NOT what the ranger needs. Some of the trait changes would just make it more of a mess. Marksmanship as an example needs to be properly streamlined, and that isn’t done by adding some poor condition options to it.

“Windborne Notes: Call of the Wild now also removes 2 conditions from affected allies.”

This is lazy copying. Stuff like this works on Warrior because they have a warhorn with two low cooldown skills. It’d be inneffective as an addition to Call of the Wild.

OGDeadHead.8326:

Tragic Positive.9356:

Rangers are hated because the vast majority plays role-playing ineffective builds, can’t control their pets, ruin skips, ruin pulls, have no idea what is Ranger’s job in high-end fractals.

That being said – yes, I always curse to myself when I see the ranger join my group. But that’s because I know that the ranger’s most probably going to play 3 signets, Longbow and play support with his brown bear.

Honestly, is this really still the case? Sure I see the typical bearbow archetype from time to time, but I also see a fair amount of decent rangers that knows how to use their pets properly.

The most annoying thing about other rangers in pve that I see are the ones that can’t keep their fingers away from longbow #4…

It’s easier to gain a bad reputation than undo it. As long as you’ll still see mobs being knockback in PvE from afar (even if it’s not done by a ranger) this will remind to people that the bad rep of the ranger.

OGDeadHead.8326:

Honestly, is this really still the case? Sure I see the typical bearbow archetype from time to time, but I also see a fair amount of decent rangers that knows how to use their pets properly.

The most annoying thing about other rangers in pve that I see are the ones that can’t keep their fingers away from longbow #4…

Knowing how to use your pet properly is not all it takes. Knowing which Pets are useful for which situations is crucial as well.
For some reason, people keep playing Cats at Mai Trin. Instead of Fern Hound or Brown Bear (even the skilled players)
I have seen only 3 Rangers for all those years (yep, I’m mostly running Ranger myself so having 2 rangers is rare but I did meet a lot of them while playing Mesmer).

Using the right rotation involving Jungle Stalker’s F2 > barrage > Swap > SotP > jaguar’s F2 > blah blah…
It’s extremely rare. Of course, I don’t even see Rangers running Nature Magic while it provides higher amount of DPS. They wouldn’t even need pet swapping for the rotation, yet most are using BM (because thank you metabattle) without knowing their stuff.
But are they aware? Of course not. Using longbow (which includes pressing #4) is their role-play and that’s all what majority is all about.

Of course it’s okay for them to play whatever they feel like, it’s a game after all. But claiming that Ranger is weak in DPS just due to their lack of knowledge is absurd.
Ranger has other flaws, Mostly Pet oriented (baseline boons from Ranger; better control and responsiveness; damage on move) and some that keep being mentioned in circles like Opening Strikes changes or MDG/Invig.Bond…

In the current content – I don’t lose my pet much when it comes to PvE. And there are very few bosses when movement is needed.
DPS is not the issue with Rangers.