Guild Wars 2

Only ranger good build is the condition one..but it sucks in wvw couse of lack of mobility..( where greatsword is a must )
Everyones here who say Ranger is strong..well..I have no words to describe them.
Or wait I’ ve found the words.. : You’ re thieves, warriors, mesmers, necros,Engineeres, who just love EASY KILLS..and the current ranger status is an easy kill. No way
Been playing warrior now..and it’ s 10 time stronger than ranger

you want to know what ranger are free kills?
bear-bow..sure they are.

but every ranger build that is not like..i´m a ranger i need range weapons, i need max dps, i need no defens..is hard to kill
everyone that played against a skilled and not creepy build know that.
and for mobility the greatsword is not a must, with sword i´m much faster than people with gs

ranger is not terrible, people that say that are bad with every class

Pegaasus.3280:

Only ranger good build is the condition one..but it sucks in wvw couse of lack of mobility..( where greatsword is a must )
Everyones here who say Ranger is strong..well..I have no words to describe them.
Or wait I’ ve found the words.. : You’ re thieves, warriors, mesmers, necros,Engineeres, who just love EASY KILLS..and the current ranger status is an easy kill. No way
Been playing warrior now..and it’ s 10 time stronger than ranger

Warroir current wvw roaming meta build loses to rabid ranger when that ranger equips muddy terrain, jungle spider, and drakehound. The reason is because warriors cannot deal with immobilization well. Take keen edge and sharpened edges along with a stun break/ invuln like a traited signet of stone. If you like protect me, you might take the shout and play this technique with 30 in skirmishing for trap potency and a spike trap. But really marks is a good line for the condition duration. You can get nearly 100% bleed uration with 4 krait and 2 afflicted runes.

There, I gave it up. That’s my build: 30/10/30/0/0. I’m sick of hearing the whining. Now go own warriors.

The issue I see with rangers is that you’re pushed into the condition pressure role. And if you don’t take the immobs, it’s very ineffective.

Now go hunt, be happy. my kill/death ratio against warriors since starting to use this build has gone way way up. You cannot beat warriors with the so-called OP spirit build.

One extremely strong combo is spider immob + muddy terrain + entangle + bonfire + sword auto -or- hornet’s sting back into shortbow. Take piercing arrows, signet mastery, signet of the beastmaster, wilderness knowledge, offhand training, and empathic bond with sharpened edges. GG

[quote=2982145;Chopps.5047:
Now go hunt, be happy. my kill/death ratio against warriors since starting to use this build has gone way way up. You cannot beat warriors with the so-called OP spirit build.

One extremely strong combo is spider immob + muddy terrain + entangle + bonfire + sword auto -or- hornet’s sting back into shortbow. Take piercing arrows, signet mastery, signet of the beastmaster, wilderness knowledge, offhand training, and empathic bond with sharpened edges. GG [/quote]

true :p

cause hammer or gs warris are a hard counter for the spirit ranger, they just destroy your spirits and you have not enaugh pressure to take them out in the time.

problem is with immo i know some warris that got 90% condi duration on immo,kripple and chille or break immo with movment spells, if they not spam or waste them, it still can be hard.
but most of them are so suprised and not very skillfull player so they get down easy as 1,2,3..:D

Dogged march + poultry soup + Rune of Melandru. And healing signet.

Bye bye Chopps. And way more warriors run this then you realize, so if you havent been wiped by them yet you are a very lucky ranger.

And guys..You blame me becouse I say ranger sukcs..Please go reading other professions forums and look what they think about Ranger…:D
Ofc I know there are some viable builds like the condition one..but In wvw..ranger simply suck and he doesn’ t make the difference.
I want to underline 2 other important points :
1)Ranger has Always troubles at getting party for dungeon.
2) Some pro WvW guild simply don’ t invite rangers in their guild
Ask yourself why..and if you re still happy for the ranger status after all the nerfs ( pets shortbow, spirits )..well play your game and be happy..becouse this is not my game anymore ^^

Phoebe Ascension.8437:

Dogged march + poultry soup + Rune of Melandru. And healing signet.

Bye bye Chopps. And way more warriors run this then you realize, so if you havent been wiped by them yet you are a very lucky ranger.

Lucky? Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe I’m just too slippery.

First of all, ranger is not a class where you hop into and think you can build easily. This is probably the most complicated class in the whole game and people have trouble seeing the potential that this class holds. People who play ranger thing that just because they can do some fancy tricks with sword and dagger, it means that the build they’re using is the only way rangers can be good. THIS IN FACT IS NOT THE CASE, AS EVEN ANET PUT IT TO YOU STRAIGHT FORWARD ON THE CLASS DESCRIPTION: “With traps, nature spirits, and a stable of loyal pets at their command, rangers can adapt to any situation.” KEY WORDS : ADAPT TO ANY SITUATION. Nobody ever said it was going to be easy to build a ranger, and on top of all that, this takes a lot of time to do. I personally have a warrior and thief along with my ranger, but unlike ranger, they are easy to build; I just put points here and there, and voila, I’m done. I play ranger and it gets more technical because the trees don’t give matching stats they way other classes do, let alone you have to find ways to connect different traits together.

Another thing is that people are crying about their pets no being strong enough to sustain your satisfaction. This is a really odd ideology for one thing that most rangers seem to disregard their pets. Your pets have to come from you as a connection; you have to make your pets able to work with you in a way you know that you can trust them to do something you want them to do. For me, I am nothing without my pet jaguar and jungle stalker. I simply have to love them for the amount of damage they do for me as i slowly devour my enemy using shortbow or axes. If your pet is dying constantly, then it’s a fact that you’re not into rangers. Again, this brings up the point about adapting to situations.

What is meant about adapting to situations? take zerk warrior or thief, no matter what, they’re not gonna stop trying to burst you, so what can you do to counter their burst? You see a condi necro and you know hes going to put a ton of conditions on you what are you going to do? These questions should come to mind a lot. Most of these can be answered by the use of your pet, the use quick wits, and the ability to adapt to whatever situation you’re presented with. This takes a lot of time and patience to work on, developing your play style, and making your pet useful are all very hard.

I wont go deep as to how I build my ranger because this is a build I’ve worked on for 2 months now, and of course, you shouldn’t look crouch over a build you see coming from other players in YouTube, you should find our own build and find ways to make it adaptable to any situation. It takes practice, patience, and above all, resilience.

take a look at this ranger, although he uses an apothecary build, he’s mastered situations rather well with sword and dagger:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cK4CaTy24ZA

I’m not saying to copy him I’m jsut pointing out the fact that hes prepared for whatever is thrown at him and if you looked closely at his video, HIS PET does a lo fo work from once he pops signets.

blutstein.2468:

NargofWoV.4267:

Now having played a Warrior at 80, I truly don’t understand how Barrage isn’t a fire and forget ability, that we have to stand still to fire it off, especially when the Warrior has as good of an ability that is fire and forget. >Baffled<

mainly because a ranger is a ranger and a warrior is a warrior. Pls stop compairing professions. Go play your warrior.
Or are you complaining about applejuice, that it doesn’t taste like orangejuice although both is juice?

Hell, i’m tired of such complaints, its so pathetic.

No, using a bow as a Warrior or using a Bow as a Ranger is like Orange Juice v. OrangeAid, but you don’t seem to see it. It is a bow, ranged weapon that should be comparable, but are vastly different. Why? Hey, yea, I’m now forced by Anet to play a class I didn’t want to, because the class I’m leaving is inept, and weak at the very abilities Anet said it was suppose to be the master of, FOR a class that actually out performs the very inept and weak abilities of my Ranger.

I don’t care to make this change, but it is what it is… sad.

Lukyromero.6780:

First of all, ranger is not a class where you hop into and think you can build easily. This is probably the most complicated class in the whole game and people have trouble seeing the potential that this class holds. People who play ranger thing that just because they can do some fancy tricks with sword and dagger, it means that the build they’re using is the only way rangers can be good. THIS IN FACT IS NOT THE CASE, AS EVEN ANET PUT IT TO YOU STRAIGHT FORWARD ON THE CLASS DESCRIPTION: “With traps, nature spirits, and a stable of loyal pets at their command, rangers can adapt to any situation.” KEY WORDS : ADAPT TO ANY SITUATION. Nobody ever said it was going to be easy to build a ranger, and on top of all that, this takes a lot of time to do. I personally have a warrior and thief along with my ranger, but unlike ranger, they are easy to build; I just put points here and there, and voila, I’m done. I play ranger and it gets more technical because the trees don’t give matching stats they way other classes do, let alone you have to find ways to connect different traits together.

Another thing is that people are crying about their pets no being strong enough to sustain your satisfaction. This is a really odd ideology for one thing that most rangers seem to disregard their pets. Your pets have to come from you as a connection; you have to make your pets able to work with you in a way you know that you can trust them to do something you want them to do. For me, I am nothing without my pet jaguar and jungle stalker. I simply have to love them for the amount of damage they do for me as i slowly devour my enemy using shortbow or axes. If your pet is dying constantly, then it’s a fact that you’re not into rangers. Again, this brings up the point about adapting to situations.

What is meant about adapting to situations? take zerk warrior or thief, no matter what, they’re not gonna stop trying to burst you, so what can you do to counter their burst? You see a condi necro and you know hes going to put a ton of conditions on you what are you going to do? These questions should come to mind a lot. Most of these can be answered by the use of your pet, the use quick wits, and the ability to adapt to whatever situation you’re presented with. This takes a lot of time and patience to work on, developing your play style, and making your pet useful are all very hard.

I wont go deep as to how I build my ranger because this is a build I’ve worked on for 2 months now, and of course, you shouldn’t look crouch over a build you see coming from other players in YouTube, you should find our own build and find ways to make it adaptable to any situation. It takes practice, patience, and above all, resilience.

take a look at this ranger, although he uses an apothecary build, he’s mastered situations rather well with sword and dagger:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cK4CaTy24ZA

I’m not saying to copy him I’m jsut pointing out the fact that hes prepared for whatever is thrown at him and if you looked closely at his video, HIS PET does a lo fo work from once he pops signets.

Couple problems with your ideas in your post, first is you’re thinking adaptability on the fly is an easy thing to do, especially involving pets. I don’t have all their attributes memorized to know exactly what pet I should quickly put into my hot bar because the guy I see at clip range might be a condition Necro who may attack me so I need a condition removal…. was it Bear? Not to mention that the Bear is being enhanced in the next patch because its condition removal is deemed too weak, but glad you (ok not you but some here in general) think it has been exceptional up until now.

And If I am NOT a trap build, but one is needed, it isn’t so easy to say… Oh hang on, let me port to town, get my trap build purchased from a vendor, re gear, re signet… then be back to fight the fight in 15 min.

Adaptability comes from having a mechanic that is Adaptable on the fly, not one that is adaptable in 15 min and requires a few silver or a costly GEM purchase to make happen.

this class is terrible because they have no vision with it. main issues:

1. prof mechanic is fundamentally broken, unresponsive, boring
2. no burst damage
3. most conditions require melee-600 range to apply
4. disgustingly bad utility skills
5. few if any effective disengage abilities

other than having access to several aoe immobilizes and a water field, the ranger does nothing better or different compared to other profs.

mistsim.2748:

this class is terrible because they have no vision with it. main issues:

1. prof mechanic is fundamentally broken, unresponsive, boring
2. no burst damage
3. most conditions require melee-600 range to apply
4. disgustingly bad utility skills
5. few if any effective disengage abilities

other than having access to several aoe immobilizes and a water field, the ranger does nothing better or different compared to other profs.

Yup, and I’m glad that Anet has decided to nerf Water Field, oh they call it a change, but in reality it is deemed to powerful in one segment of the game and has to be changed to even the playing field. >shrugs<

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

Babysitting an AI is never fun, don’t like escorts? Well here’s a class who’s entire mechanic is based around it. I like how more recent mmos figured it out that AI pet classes can be a pain for some so they always offered specs without one. Going full Marksman/Sniper/Gunner, instead of a forest loving beastmaster.

Ranger was my main class in GW1, I enjoyed it because I didn’t need a pet at all. Now here in GW2 I would’ve been ok with the change to the fundamental direction to rangers, but there was no replacement for it.

There was no where for a marksman/sniper player to go to fulfill that desire. Thieves with Pistols come close with the guntoting, engineers as well to an extent, even warriors, though you’d be just gimping yourself. There’s no real class that can full out that hole that was made when rangers were changed.

You should be able to eat a backstab and then proceed to faceroll a thief if you are good at ranger.

Then again… you should be able to dodge the backstab if you were a good player.

Phoebe Ascension.8437:

Dogged march + poultry soup + Rune of Melandru. And healing signet.

Bye bye Chopps. And way more warriors run this then you realize, so if you havent been wiped by them yet you are a very lucky ranger.

Pheobe, stahp. First off, warriors like the one you just described are extremely easy if you can avoid the cc and keep distance, very easy for a ranger. As for weapons in zerg, I’d have expected you to know this, you’ve let me down. Sword in a zerg is extremely useful, zerg weapons don’t have to be like a ele or necro staff with 4/5 skills AOE. Ranger can wreck enemy ranged units like ele’s necros, and mes. They can be very squishy, and with the right build you can blow them up very quick.

Pet’s are another issue, but if you’re trying to use a pet for damage in wvw zerg, you’re using it wrong. Every single ranger who has ever played wvw and run in a zerg knows your pet gets insta nuked. So why would you rely on its damage? The best way to utilize a pet atm is use it purely for buffs, or conditons. Red moa= 15s fury. Sylvan hound=11 regen, blue moa=4s protection. Those are all AOE capped @ 5 players. I could continue but unfortunately this has a character limit.

Piercing arrows is heavily reliant on who and how you target. Say you have 10 people in a line behind each other facing you. If you target the first person in line your arrow won’t travel as far as you haven’t targeted a far target. IF however you target the final player, the arrow will travel through them all until it reaches the target so long as it’s within range. Takes a bit of practice but I’m sure you’ll get there

Ranger has a pet. Majority of rangers seem to be unable to micro manage their pet. Sure we only have attack command, retreat and the special ability. However if you want your pet to stay alive try passive mode, you’ll find its beautiful.

warriorjrd.8695:

Pet’s are another issue, but if you’re trying to use a pet for damage in wvw zerg, you’re using it wrong. Every single ranger who has ever played wvw and run in a zerg knows your pet gets insta nuked. So why would you rely on its damage? The best way to utilize a pet atm is use it purely for buffs, or conditons. Red moa= 15s fury. Sylvan hound=11 regen, blue moa=4s protection. Those are all AOE capped @ 5 players. I could continue but unfortunately this has a character limit.

I think this right here confirms why many people are frustrated with pets, as a lot of rangers would love to use their pets as an extra DPS source, yet this is currently either very difficult or near impossible to accomplish.

Just a quick question, how did WoW handle hunter pets in Alterac Valley? Please note, I only got a warlock to level 30 when that game originally came out, so I have no idea.

Decklan.7540:

Just a quick question, how did WoW handle hunter pets in Alterac Valley? Please note, I only got a warlock to level 30 when that game originally came out, so I have no idea.

I don’t remember when exactly, but player pets eventually became virtually immune to AE attacks in WoW. Something like 80-90% DR against AE.

A hunter/warlock wasn’t anywhere near as tied to their pets as rangers are in gw2 either way. Even if you were full Beastmastery/Demonology, you still weren’t as attached to your pet as a GW2 Ranger.

I completely agree. My main toon is a level 67 ranger and I am surprised that my PvE skills work pretty well but when it comes to PvP, I’m screwed. You need to fox pets and DPS PLEAZ!

I’ve played the ranger class as my main in every game I could.
From GW1 > GW2, Anet changed the way the ranger functions almost completely.

Rangers are still a good class but players are trying to play as if they are the same as they were in GW1, which they are not.

Main aspects – Anet made it so that you CANNOT ignore your pet, like it or not, one of the reasons for playing a ranger IS the pet. Yes the pets F2 skill can sometimes lack response but it doesnt defeat the fact that they are a good resource and source of dps.

They made the ranger less of a power house than they were in GW1 and turned them into what they should be; A SURVIOUR. Decent armor, Crazy heal speed, condition removal, supporting and crowd control along with interupts.

In GW1 a skilled ranger could down pretty much anything, broadhead arrow to shut down any caster, speed and intellect to kill melee.

In GW2 they are the annoying, time consuming enemy that you should be thinking omg die or omg stay still.

Alot of players are still working out how the ranger handles in GW2 because It has become a complicated class that actually needs skill to play. Also everyone playstyle is different so some skills work for you some don’t.

Example my ranger hits for 1,000-3,000 my pets hit for 2,000-3,000. My vitality is low, high toughness and I heal at about a rate of 900 p/s.

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Amlin.6041:

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

It wasn’t until WoW that the “woodsman/archer with his/her trusty <insert animal> companion” trope came into popularity. So I guess it’s Blizzard’s fault.

Renn.8241:

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Answer: Guardian

SynfulChaot.3169:

Renn.8241:

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Answer: Guardian

This is the correct answer.

Quarktastic.1027:

Amlin.6041:

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

It wasn’t until WoW that the “woodsman/archer with his/her trusty <insert animal> companion” trope came into popularity. So I guess it’s Blizzard’s fault.

No. Sorry. Pets for rangers has far predated WoW. It is a major point on the D&D 3.0/3.5 ranger and a minor point on the AD&D ranger. Don’t blame that on WoW. There is plenty of better thing to blame on WoW that are actually accurate.

SynfulChaot.3169:

Quarktastic.1027:

Amlin.6041:

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

It wasn’t until WoW that the “woodsman/archer with his/her trusty <insert animal> companion” trope came into popularity. So I guess it’s Blizzard’s fault.

No. Sorry. Pets for rangers has far predated WoW. It is a major point on the D&D 3.0/3.5 ranger and a minor point on the AD&D ranger. Don’t blame that on WoW. There is plenty of better thing to blame on WoW that are actually accurate.

Blizzard brought the trope to the MMO scene. I believe I said “popularity,” which may have been a bit vague. Before WoW, the aforementioned trope was practically nonexistent in MMOs. Now virtually every MMO in production uses it to some degree.

Quarktastic.1027:

SynfulChaot.3169:

Renn.8241:

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Answer: Guardian

This is the correct answer.

I fail to see how a skilled guardian who can charge into a full mob and come out fine isn’t broken. They heal too much and have too many roles in the game, I think they need more of a fix than thieves do. (Love it how people complain that thieves are OP when in fact they are an assassin class, they are meant to be able to come out of no-where a screw you over.)

I think many of you are way, way overstating the problems with Rangers. I recently re-tooled my lvl 50 ranger (I have 3 other 80s, this was just a side-thing) as a melee-ranger, and I’ve suddenly been shining in small group WvW. That’s up-levelled, without many traits, and still learning the buttons. Sure, I’m not much in a zerg, but I can go yak-tipping and play in the ruins far better than my staff-elementalist.

The one thing I’d like to see is the pets re-tooled for WvW (leaving PvE abilities untouched). Let the birds fly up and down a keep wall and attack; make the drakes resistant to AoEs so they can fight zergs; let the moas carry supply. Stuff like that, so the pets have major, distinct roles in WvW.

-Jeff

NargofWoV.4267:

Lukyromero.6780:

First of all, ranger is not a class where you hop into and think you can build easily. This is probably the most complicated class in the whole game and people have trouble seeing the potential that this class holds. People who play ranger thing that just because they can do some fancy tricks with sword and dagger, it means that the build they’re using is the only way rangers can be good. THIS IN FACT IS NOT THE CASE, AS EVEN ANET PUT IT TO YOU STRAIGHT FORWARD ON THE CLASS DESCRIPTION: “With traps, nature spirits, and a stable of loyal pets at their command, rangers can adapt to any situation.” KEY WORDS : ADAPT TO ANY SITUATION. Nobody ever said it was going to be easy to build a ranger, and on top of all that, this takes a lot of time to do. I personally have a warrior and thief along with my ranger, but unlike ranger, they are easy to build; I just put points here and there, and voila, I’m done. I play ranger and it gets more technical because the trees don’t give matching stats they way other classes do, let alone you have to find ways to connect different traits together.

Another thing is that people are crying about their pets no being strong enough to sustain your satisfaction. This is a really odd ideology for one thing that most rangers seem to disregard their pets. Your pets have to come from you as a connection; you have to make your pets able to work with you in a way you know that you can trust them to do something you want them to do. For me, I am nothing without my pet jaguar and jungle stalker. I simply have to love them for the amount of damage they do for me as i slowly devour my enemy using shortbow or axes. If your pet is dying constantly, then it’s a fact that you’re not into rangers. Again, this brings up the point about adapting to situations.

What is meant about adapting to situations? take zerk warrior or thief, no matter what, they’re not gonna stop trying to burst you, so what can you do to counter their burst? You see a condi necro and you know hes going to put a ton of conditions on you what are you going to do? These questions should come to mind a lot. Most of these can be answered by the use of your pet, the use quick wits, and the ability to adapt to whatever situation you’re presented with. This takes a lot of time and patience to work on, developing your play style, and making your pet useful are all very hard.

I wont go deep as to how I build my ranger because this is a build I’ve worked on for 2 months now, and of course, you shouldn’t look crouch over a build you see coming from other players in YouTube, you should find our own build and find ways to make it adaptable to any situation. It takes practice, patience, and above all, resilience.

take a look at this ranger, although he uses an apothecary build, he’s mastered situations rather well with sword and dagger:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=cK4CaTy24ZA

I’m not saying to copy him I’m jsut pointing out the fact that hes prepared for whatever is thrown at him and if you looked closely at his video, HIS PET does a lo fo work from once he pops signets.

Couple problems with your ideas in your post, first is you’re thinking adaptability on the fly is an easy thing to do, especially involving pets. I don’t have all their attributes memorized to know exactly what pet I should quickly put into my hot bar because the guy I see at clip range might be a condition Necro who may attack me so I need a condition removal…. was it Bear? Not to mention that the Bear is being enhanced in the next patch because its condition removal is deemed too weak, but glad you (ok not you but some here in general) think it has been exceptional up until now.

And If I am NOT a trap build, but one is needed, it isn’t so easy to say… Oh hang on, let me port to town, get my trap build purchased from a vendor, re gear, re signet… then be back to fight the fight in 15 min.

Adaptability comes from having a mechanic that is Adaptable on the fly, not one that is adaptable in 15 min and requires a few silver or a costly GEM purchase to make happen.

I completely agree with you, and thanks for clearing that out; I’m not trying to imply that that becoming adaptable is easy, I was trying to say that it’s something that takes time and patience to learn how to do. Also, what I was saying about being adaptable, pertains only to a situation you might be presented with, not that your build should be adaptable. As far as what I said about pets, I was referring to those people who say pets are useless; I was trying to point out that they can be used to your advantage, not that it has to be; I apologize if i went on several different tangents, I was typing this on they fly xD

SynfulChaot.3169:

Renn.8241:

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Answer: Guardian

Guardian, while not OP, brings every important team utility (besides portal) and also does more damage than warrior in a group (that’s a fact).

Guardian, while not OP

While not OP

Not OP

OP

warriorjrd.8695:

The best way to utilize a pet atm is use it purely for buffs, or conditons. Red moa= 15s fury. Sylvan hound=11 regen, blue moa=4s protection. Those are all AOE capped @ 5 players.

For zerg warfare, absolutely.

The canines and drakes are pretty useful in small-man for their CC’s though.

For solo roamer, anything will do really.

I don’t RP…like at all. But I really hate having to choose a pink ostrich or a rainbow-colored hound if I want group buffs. They’re so darn ridiculous looking. Why can’t we choose the F2’s for each pet again?

Obsidian.1328:

warriorjrd.8695:

The best way to utilize a pet atm is use it purely for buffs, or conditons. Red moa= 15s fury. Sylvan hound=11 regen, blue moa=4s protection. Those are all AOE capped @ 5 players.

For zerg warfare, absolutely.

The canines and drakes are pretty useful in small-man for their CC’s though.

For solo roamer, anything will do really.

I don’t RP…like at all. But I really hate having to choose a pink ostrich or a rainbow-colored hound if I want group buffs. They’re so darn ridiculous looking. Why can’t we choose the F2’s for each pet again?

Lol, yeah when I run red moa I feel a little foolish, but I try and laugh it off by naming is dumb chicken But they don’t look down on it after they get that 15s fury

Amlin.6041:

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

Babysitting an AI is never fun, don’t like escorts? Well here’s a class who’s entire mechanic is based around it. I like how more recent mmos figured it out that AI pet classes can be a pain for some so they always offered specs without one. Going full Marksman/Sniper/Gunner, instead of a forest loving beastmaster.

Ranger was my main class in GW1, I enjoyed it because I didn’t need a pet at all. Now here in GW2 I would’ve been ok with the change to the fundamental direction to rangers, but there was no replacement for it.

There was no where for a marksman/sniper player to go to fulfill that desire. Thieves with Pistols come close with the guntoting, engineers as well to an extent, even warriors, though you’d be just gimping yourself. There’s no real class that can full out that hole that was made when rangers were changed.

Exactly, and why I love the ranger class from R:BF so much. It’s high-mobility with no CC removal with no hard CC and no close-range alternative. You let your opponent get close, and you die. Period. Fail to position yourself properly, or fail to recognize AOE radii (there are no circles) you are dead in one or two hits – before one stun even finishes. Your mobility and range is your defense.

It takes the typical “ranger” ideology and completely turns it on its head. And it’s a blast to play.

But they can pump huge damage due to their insane skill cap. It’s a game-changing class that can shred tanks to pieces and completely annihilate squishier targets.

Even other games like PWI demonstrate a good understanding of the range archer by punishing close-quarters combat. It’s this dynamic that’s really, really, fun to play, and something a LOT of users want to see more of.

Simply put, I have no objections to a beastmaster class, but there needs to be a real ranged class. Rifle engi/bow warrior are not alternatives. Those play totally differently.

ANet keeps pushing WvW, but is balancing their classes for SPvP. Yea, the sword/axe ranger is fine, but there’s no alternative of the whole playstyle in WvW, and for those that come close, they’re also wildly underpowered and just as useless. ANet simply needs to recognize the fact that bow ranger is inadequate as a build. This thread isn’t so much about ranger but BOW RANGER. Bow rangers are simply bad. And that’s something ANet needs to realize and make changes for.

Quarktastic.1027:

Amlin.6041:

Because Anet for all their talk about being different decided to follow the well-worn path of the fantasy archer trope. They always have to have some beast companion, well that’s great and all all but it’s always a pain in videogames.

It wasn’t until WoW that the “woodsman/archer with his/her trusty <insert animal> companion” trope came into popularity. So I guess it’s Blizzard’s fault.

The idea of a Ranger with an animal companion goes back to DnD and they are just about as marginally useful there as well. They have the same problem we have in that it’s supposed to be a class that can kind of do a little bit of everything but ends up not really offering anything substantial.

Blizzard at least seemed like they tried to make the archer/pet system work where as anet just taped the pieces of failed classes together and called it a day.

Which is doubly rediculous since they got the class exactly right in the first game. I will never understand why they felt it was necessary to retool the whole class into 2-3 separate classes that failed in design when every other core class got an almost direct port (monks excluded for obvious reasons). Hell, even assassins came back in all their facerolly glory.

Because change!

As I keep iterating: Let people be allowed to play the way they want to. ANet took a big stance on this during their marketing campaign/hype-generation period, and promised to make the change where there were no healer/dps/tank roles as to promote change and diversity in the gaming environment.

Fact of the matter is that they’re neglecting to consider other playstyles and in order to abide by their claims, they need to take action to accommodate for different ways of play. As it stands we have a clear meta and some classes are clearly lackluster or uninviting. Change is great, but forcible change, especially when stripping away what people liked, is only detrimental.

fix the pets, go from there.

Chopps.5047:

SynfulChaot.3169:

Renn.8241:

To conclude – Ranger IS a good class, YES it does need work but name a class that doesn’t.

Answer: Guardian

Guardian, while not OP, brings every important team utility (besides portal) and also does more damage than warrior in a group (that’s a fact).

Guardian, while not OP

While not OP

Not OP

OP

Guardians aren’t even remotely good. They are easy to play and manage AOE well but mesmers can do basically everything better, with the exception of group Aegis and AOE cleaving. This is coming from someone who rolled a guardian first thing in the very first BWE and has two legendaries on his guard.

Feedback + Wardens + Curtain > WoR + SotA + SoA
Null Field + MoR + Disenchanter > Purging Flames + SY + PoV
MoC > SYG
Defender > Hold the Line
Mesmer DPS rotaiton > Guardian DPS rotation

Right now the big sell on Guardian is the hammer symbol giving perma-protection but other than that I almost never use my guardian anymore.

lmaogg.7325:

Seriously I don’t get why are there so many kittens trying to defend something thats really bad… especially those who say things like “I have never encounter problems against xxx class, you are just bad.”. These people seem to be just waiting for praises to shower on them, “oh wow you own with a underpowered class, you must be a pro”.

I played every single class myself, pvp and wvw, if ranger isn’t “underpowered” like those tards who said so, it must really be a high skill cap class that majority can’t get use to then.

It’s pretty much in the same boat as Ele right now….. only with a lower final potential.
soo…. yes those people actually do deserve * some * praise for not dying and failing constantly on a class that is still riddled with bad AI bugs, worse control, and the lowest overall DPS of any class in the game… on the other hand, they’re also lying a lot when they say they don’t have “issues”. Everyone has issues. No one wins every single fight the first time they do it. Not even the O^P pve classes in this game like Guard & Warrior. ….. I learned more about getting good on ranger by failing on my guardian than any of these people who constantly whiteknight ranger’s potential.

Replace shouts/signets with preparations.
Allow pets to attack while moving.
Rework all weapons skills… or just axe/sword.

Pretty stupid that rangers have 4 off-hand weapons and two horribly situational (BAD) main-hand weapons.

I like the game and I’m pretty new but it’s overly pet reliant at times and hard to pull it back. Someone mentioned some of the skills to retreat etc, I click those but at times the pet will not stop attacking or just freezes. I like ranger but it has no real direction and no hammers!

So new patch does nothing to address the inherent problem with bows.
All I got out of the patch was making the ranger even MORE dependent on its pet.

I left my ranger in stasis, and started playing it again in anticipation for “upcoming changes to ranger weapons.” Yea, none of that.

Busted class is busted, and will seemingly continue to be busted.
The archer playstyle won’t exist for another six months or so, now (which is unlikely to think of considering the clear lack of involvement regarding this playstyle).

I’ll be deleting my archer I think and making a gs Mesmer. At least that can function at range.

The only good thing my pretty does is rez me when I’m down.