Guild Wars 2

Dragonfeu.4356:

Legit question. Is it because of noob bearbows?

If I put out a LFG, and a bearbow joins, I wait 10 seconds and if they don’t change weps and animal, I kick.

DaShi.1368:

If people have been using PBS to get it nerfed, then they’ve been trying since release. The poor use of PBS is not a new phenomenon.

Also, PBS does have a very short cooldown for its range than other knockbacks. The other knockbacks that have such a short cooldown also have some sort of drawback that makes them less appealing to spam. Overcharge shot has a much closer range and knocks the user back. Rifle Butt needs to be on top of the opponent to work, which is no place a rifle warrior should be to begin with. In their case, it makes sense to get opponents out of melee range. Rangers hit PBS from range when it is completely unhelpful for anyone.

I’ll agree, PBS is the best skill in the game. Because it is way too strong of a skill with no drawbacks. What’s worse is that it is so rarely needed that it’s more of a troll skill than anything else.

Please keep in mind your PvE woes mean nothing to those of us who enjoy playing against other players. Knockback is extremely useful in WvW and PvP. Any enemy worth stacking in PvE has defiance, and trash mobs…well….die so easily you couldn’t possibly be complaining about THAT! Come on!

:sigh: Rangers will reach for any defense to justify their op troll skill. Now it’s “PvE monsters getting knocked back aren’t worth complaining about.” Is this more ranger trolling? These are the very problems that people are complaining about it. Just because you claim to not think they are problem doesn’t mean that they are not.

Also you’ll find that many of the complaints about rangers come from WvW knockbacks. Some people even believe that rangers are agents for the other side because they use their knockbacks to rescue so many opponents.

There’s a growing population that is getting tired of PBS. Keep ignoring the problem, but it will only get worse.

Frankly, this is the flimsiest excuse for not adjusting PBS yet. So it looks like we are finally getting to end of the retorts and now we can start doing something about this skill.

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

Gotejjeken.1267:

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

No, it doesn’t.

Terkov.4138:

Gotejjeken.1267:

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

No, it doesn’t.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW1TL98xnac

Yep you nailed it. This is the real reason all these QQers hate it. They don’t like getting killed by it. The game is so much more enjoyable when you don’t need to think about your environment and can just run up to every foe and mash all you buttons.

Terkov.4138:

Gotejjeken.1267:

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

No, it doesn’t.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW1TL98xnac

Rampage as one for stability and wolf fear would have made those fights so much better.

But yeah.. why the hell should they change one of the best skills in the game because it makes it take 2 seconds longer to kill some braindead pve trash mob?

Don’t you like being killed by PBS in edge of the mist? Simple enough : Became a ranger so you can kill also this way!

Ah no. But you don’t like to play with an underpowered class.. you are happy with your warrior and you want the rest to be warriors also so every one is the same.

Sorry i play ranger because for its uniqueness. Period.

The only thing I really despise about the ranger is how unusable is the pet. But other than that is ok, missing more impeding condis with the weapon.

No one cares about being knocked off a ledge by PBS in PvP. It happens to everyone and can be done by any profession. This is another strawman set up by rangers so that they can keep their troll skill.

The actual problem is when PBS is used to reduce the effectiveness of your own teammates. This has been said over and over again. You’ll notice that most of the complainers are complaining about the rangers on their side. No one cares about rangers on the opponents side. In fact, most of us would rather they all be on the opponents side.

Gotejjeken.1267:

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

It’s the odd ball out on the knockbacks because it has no drawbacks to using it other than hurting other players.

I’d support keeping the knockback but reducing its range to 300 or less, and cannot be increased by traits. It’s called Point Blank Shot. Let’s have it function like that.

The actual problem is when PBS is used to reduce the effectiveness of your own teammates.

That’s a false assumption, used a lot to justify the hate. Actually any class with knockback/fear ability would hurt the team performance if used wrong.
It’s not the first time i’ve been chasing a foe with my GS because the warrior/guardian decided that smashing all the buttons it’s a good strategy.

I’d support keeping the knockback but reducing its range to 300 or less, and cannot be increased by traits. It’s called Point Blank Shot. Let’s have it function like that.

Actually i do agree with you. Most of the uses of PBS are for keeping the distance between me and the enemies. But if you reduce the distance of PBS (it’s already 900) the knockback effect should be incremented at least in 600 units to keep being useful.
It would hurt my ability to help others (like stop stomping, or pushing foes over the edge) But this solution if they increment substantially the knockback distance would be something i don’t think the ranger community would complain for.

Although i think it should be still affected for the trait Eagle Eye to increment distance to 600. This trait only affects LB, wouldn’t be fair to stablish that this trait wouldn’t affect only PBS.

using PBS in a zerg is just flat out selfish behavior. The mob is 99.9% way away from the ranger, so the only thing a knockback does is push the mob out of AoEs and melees range, at the price of the ranger not using an auto-attack filler.

I main a ranger, and what I would like to see is changing PBS to operate like the engineers #4 skill. Shorten the range down to 300, and knock both the target and the ranger back (ranger backwards away from target like the engineering skill of course).

DaShi.1368:

This is another strawman set up by rangers so that they can keep their troll skill.

Yeah, I’m sure the forum rangers that usually know how to properly play the class are interested in defending the moronic player base that can’t use a knock back skill properly, and that they are in fact the same rangers. That is undoubtedly the reason why they won’t agree with you.

Jeez.

I play ranger myself with berserker stats and sword/axe or lb/dps pet in open world from time to time. It’s fun to play and usually no one hurts.

But there is one certain skill that – OBVIOUSLY – many players don’t understand: it’s called Point Blank Shot and is extremely annoying, be cause every time a zerg arrives, one of the glorious bearbows WILL use this skill. Always. Knocking them out of melees and AoEs for NO kittenING REASON.

ya sure, but that is still not a reason to kitten over the players that use it correctly (aka use some brain) making it into other cc , or shorter range just cripples the CC of the LB as a weapon it needs that range on pbs and the KB.

the only other option i can think of is to
reduce the range of the KB at its maxium range so it does very little like 150-250 yards and keep the biggest KB the same so shooting it at max range will be much less effective , thust it will only KB on the spot and interrupt.

Solved your problem right there these max range newbie rangers using pbs on a spam it will now do nothing but a 150-250yard push back, is like one or two steps away rather than a 3secs run to catch up to the target. (this for PVE will solve the annoying kitten whiners)

for Pvp it will still serve its purpose for KB off node , though it will need to be used more rigorously, since its long range Kb will be very short but it will still interrupt.
to make up for the loss , increase the pet speed to 50% for 2secs on huntershot since pbs for pvp will loose its Long range pressure and having the pet to gain ground faster will keep the same amount of pressure .

example below.

Damage increases Closer you are to the target< important change
Knockback: 600 (for range less than 300) = 332 (0.8)
Knockback: 500 (for range between 300-600) = 282 (0.8)
Knockback: 250 (for range greater than 600) < important change = 102 (0.8)
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile
Range: 900

counter gain
Huntershot = pet speed 50% for 2secs (typicaly would be used an gap closer for the pet) pets without a leap struggle to keep up with kiting targets (drake, bird, canine(after leap) , MoA. e

Gotejjeken.1267:

PBS needs to be changed to knockdown, not knockback.

When there’s a problem with the playerbase skill level, you either adapt, or stay forever underperforming. You don’t tone the issue down to below average skill cap.

L2P.

If there are n00bs who don’t know how or when to use PBS, kick them from your party, leave yourself, or don’t invite them in the first place.

As a Necromancer main, I find playing Ranger fun and easy. Ranger has everything a noob wants: automatic pet dps and aggro capture, very high ranged dps, free dodges with blades, and good mobility. Good for farming and skipping content, too. It was the profession of choice for botting.

Dungeons are designed to hate rangers, Pet death is a big factor but also reflect, it’s hard for a ranger to not hurt their party sometimes.

People say that staying at range is the easy option but there is so much in GW2 that penalises you for range that people just don;t want rangers in their party. It’s nothing to do with player skill, you get noob rangers like any profession and you get expert ranger players; people don’t even let you start a dungeon if you bring ranger.

Until ANet fix some the critical issues with rangers they will always be excluded from dungeons. Tone down the pet death, tone down the range hate and do something about the terrible DPS and utility that rangers have.

In other forms of GW play they are not such a problem but it’s no fun being a ranger wanting to do dungeons. That is ANet’s fault

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

for Pvp it will still serve its purpose for KB off node , though it will need to be used more rigorously, since its long range Kb will be very short but it will still interrupt.
to make up for the loss , increase the pet speed to 50% for 2secs on huntershot since pbs for pvp will loose its Long range pressure and having the pet to gain ground faster will keep the same amount of pressure .

example below.

Damage increases Closer you are to the target< important change
Knockback: 600 (for range less than 300) = 332 (0.8)
Knockback: 500 (for range between 300-600) = 282 (0.8)
Knockback: 250 (for range greater than 600) < important change = 102 (0.8)
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile
Range: 900

counter gain
Huntershot = pet speed 50% for 2secs (typicaly would be used an gap closer for the pet) pets without a leap struggle to keep up with kiting targets (drake, bird, canine(after leap) , MoA. e

My problem with this is there are so many spots in PvP and WvW where the pet just goes brain dead because there is a small ledge in the way and won’t even make it to your target. What they need to do is add a pet teleport to opening strikes as long as your pet is active.

Also I would never be happy with trading increased damage for a shorter knockback. A perfect example of why is last night my roaming group and I decided to upgrade the enemy servers hills. I went to check on hills while my group was capping SE tower and found about 10ish people using a cata on the north wall. I immediately knocked the person on the cata off the cliff and started free firing at them until the next person got on, by that point pbs was off cooldown and I sent him flying as well. The next person to get on popped stability but I was able to down him with barrage and rapid fire and then send 1 of the people trying to rez him flying. At this point my group showed up and we were able to wipe the rest.

PBS and positioning let me save hills and whittle down their numbers to something much easier for a 5 man group. Even when we are on open ground and there is no cliff, being able to separate 1 player from his group is huge in a fight. Longbow has plenty of damage, we shouldn’t nerf its best utility skill because open world PvE’ers don’t like it.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

for Pvp it will still serve its purpose for KB off node , though it will need to be used more rigorously, since its long range Kb will be very short but it will still interrupt.
to make up for the loss , increase the pet speed to 50% for 2secs on huntershot since pbs for pvp will loose its Long range pressure and having the pet to gain ground faster will keep the same amount of pressure .

example below.

Damage increases Closer you are to the target< important change
Knockback: 600 (for range less than 300) = 332 (0.8)
Knockback: 500 (for range between 300-600) = 282 (0.8)
Knockback: 250 (for range greater than 600) < important change = 102 (0.8)
Combo Finisher: Physical Projectile
Range: 900

counter gain
Huntershot = pet speed 50% for 2secs (typicaly would be used an gap closer for the pet) pets without a leap struggle to keep up with kiting targets (drake, bird, canine(after leap) , MoA. e

My problem with this is there are so many spots in PvP and WvW where the pet just goes brain dead because there is a small ledge in the way and won’t even make it to your target. What they need to do is add a pet teleport to opening strikes as long as your pet is active.

Also I would never be happy with trading increased damage for a shorter knockback. A perfect example of why is last night my roaming group and I decided to upgrade the enemy servers hills. I went to check on hills while my group was capping SE tower and found about 10ish people using a cata on the north wall. I immediately knocked the person on the cata off the cliff and started free firing at them until the next person got on, by that point pbs was off cooldown and I sent him flying as well. The next person to get on popped stability but I was able to down him with barrage and rapid fire and then send 1 of the people trying to rez him flying. At this point my group showed up and we were able to wipe the rest.

PBS and positioning let me save hills and whittle down their numbers to something much easier for a 5 man group. Even when we are on open ground and there is no cliff, being able to separate 1 player from his group is huge in a fight. Longbow has plenty of damage, we shouldn’t nerf its best utility skill because open world PvE’ers don’t like it.

ok read the example again.

the closer you are the more damage it does with a larger push back distance.
the further away you are , it does less damage and less push back distance.
that enforces the skill to be used properly as it was desgined for, using it at max range just as a spam it will be wasted.

in my example above the increase damage at very short range makes up for the really low damage at max range , it is the reverse of long range shot but as a hard cc.

also what you listed are situational events and have too much calculation included kbing off cliffs ect , will just mean you’ll have to.
1. get closer (normaly you already are close enough for the Maximum Push back)
2. stay at range , wait for a target to get withing 250yards of a cliff edge or force them towards the edge using fear > pbs (an fav combo for skyhammer) it can be done at short or long range as long as the wolf howl is in range.

doing this also keeps its current Use effective for decapping or Kb>interrupting a finisher.

though yes pets pathing is always a issue that is linked to monsters pathing paths also as they share the same routing as wild creature pets. since anet still haven’t solved this problem , just giving the pet some super speed for a few seconds might get it there that bit faster.

the cata problem yes you can hold them off untill the cata is dead by pbsing the target off it , thust killing a few of the group trying to break in, though you could just Dps the cata and rotate still to pbs the person manning the cata still every cooldown , the only thing you won’t gain is a few easy kills from casual wvw players for placing the cata too far away from the wall or too close. so i don’t see it making much difference here.

end result the cata is still dead(unless they build a Superior one you’ll need a little help 1vs10 is some heavy odds)

/15charrrrrrrrs

At the end:
The skill is ok as it is now. This skill is so useful (not powerful) that can be and it is used in the wrong way.
I think it should stay like it is, the ranger has more important problems than a ranger pushed me off the cliff with a PBS from miles away.

Before meddling with the only ranger’s skill that is actually useful in other ways than a pew-pew i would complain about the pets… They are the biggest handicap of this class and they should be fixed (not get rid off) to make the ranger class enjoyable to play.

Sandpit.3467:

Until ANet fix some the critical issues with rangers they will always be excluded from dungeons. Tone down the pet death, tone down the range hate and do something about the terrible DPS and utility that rangers have.

I can’t wrap my head around why people with seemingly no knowledge about how to play the ranger in dungeons keep making comments about its usefullness. Neither their utilities nor their dps is “terrible”. You’re doing it wrong if you think otherwise.

“Hard for the ranger not to hurt the party sometimes”. Yeah, if you have no clue about what you should be doing it. Like all other classes.

There is currently one class that is not concidered a part of the dungeon meta and keeps getting excluded from it. That’s the necromancer, not the ranger. The ranger simply suffers from having a large amount of its player base not following the meta build or anything close to it, staying at range, using the wrong pets and managing them terribly, choosing selfish utilities and traits instead of buffing the party etc. etc. etc. which ultimately lead to its bad reputation.

As someone who loves the underdog class I came to start playing the ranger about 18 months ago… And I was that guy that used lb in spvp before read the wind or the lb changes and I loved it. I was perfectly content with being overlooked and underestimated while I hit for 3-5k auto attacks from a mile away and then swooping in with my friendly gs and finishing em off with a good ol maul….

Ranger has changed a lot since those days and I’ve recently come back to the game after a short break. I’m glad the class got some attention it finally deserves, but they’re way too predictable. Everyone runs the same build and tries to spike ppl with rabid fire. I use focus on my ele and shield on my war (with reflect trait) just for giggles to watch it backfire in their face.

On the other hand watching a skillful ranger play is a beautiful thing. One of the best Rangers I know( shoutout to link from fabl) i sow that guy win a 1v5 in north camp in wvw against the other server. It was just beautiful to watch. No longbows or rapid fire was used.

I’m not one of those people who hates on rangers (altrough I’m rooting for the thieves, may the lords finally give them some buffs instead of nerfs) but let me share with you something, that might explain why other people do.

For about two year I play thief now and I got pretty decent in it, but I decided to give ranger a go. I went for classic burst lb/gs cause I thought it will be the best to learn the ropes. But what I saw quite surprised me.

Out of 20 games I played I won 18 (usually it’s like 15 with thief if I’m lucky) and in all of those games I had the highest score and had no real trouble with killing pretty much anything.

I never played ranger and I was learning the skills for like 10 minutes beforehead, so tell me how is this possible?

In my opinion with ranger (At least the lb one) there is just really high power level for really low skill needed. And even tho it can be countered by higher skilled players, it’s still not something easy to do and I would say that is the source of all this hatred.

So that’s that I don’t even want to imagine what is really possible to do when actually good at ranger. Even tho my thief probably does, since he looks like a hedgehog atm.

Everyone claiming the hate is at fault of PBS meanwhile greatsword Mesmers and staff Ele’s are loling their as_es off using Gust and Illusionary Wave. More often than not, it is the Ranger that’s knocking mobs out of reach of the zerg.. But I’ve seen plenty of Mesmers and Ele’s do it too and the knockback animation is the exact same on the receiving end.

It is just an excuse they are fishing for any nerf they can get thrown at rangers (the elementalists are kind of dominate again in sPvP so they all know the Axe is coming down).

So instead of ‘how can I improve my chosen profession’ it is ‘how can I get the other professions nerfed’.

There have already be a few threads that get taken over/started by that agenda and I think that threads that are basically ‘attack’ another profession have no place in this community.

Easy answer, it’s because Ranger is most easy to play braindead class in the game. There’s nothing hard about spamming evades while having protection on dodge and then spam your attacks until your enemy runs out of dodges.

Braindead easy class, that’s why people hate it. If Ranger was as hard to play as Naga Siren macro managing then no one would be hating on this braindead class.

But do you mean that ranger as a class is braindead or just how most people play it?

Hattoni.8597:

But do you mean that ranger as a class is braindead or just how most people play it?

The pew pew baddies in yolo pvp, makes the class look bad. No weapon swaps no cleanses, just snipe with LB, rinse and repeat.

Anyway, I haven’t fought any good LB zerk ranger for a looooong time in pvp, or good rangers for that matter. My last good one was Sevans. and shadow.

Lets face it, EVERY single class has noobs that play that build that is braindead to play. (PU mesmer, Eviscerate or hambow warrior, P/D condi thieves, cele ele, turret engi, minion master necro). Every single class has these. But ranger seems to have the most irritating one with the LB glass canon. I remember not so long ago it was condi regen ranger that was braindead to play and before that beastmaster build…

Ranger always been a noob friendly class. But it is one that is a hell to master. Pet stupidity along with no real mechanism makes it hard to find an appropriate playstyle.

So the best playstyle are:
-Sniper : easy to play (boring to play)
-Condition regen: evade bot with high survivability but low dmg.

And those 2 are among the easiest to be effective with along with warrior builds.

Amir.1570:

Easy answer, it’s because Ranger is most easy to play braindead class in the game. There’s nothing hard about spamming evades while having protection on dodge and then spam your attacks until your enemy runs out of dodges.

Braindead easy class, that’s why people hate it. If Ranger was as hard to play as Naga Siren macro managing then no one would be hating on this braindead class.

Tone down your bitterness and stop making a fool of yourself.

Amir.1570:

Easy answer, it’s because Ranger is most easy to play braindead class in the game. There’s nothing hard about spamming evades while having protection on dodge and then spam your attacks until your enemy runs out of dodges.

Braindead easy class, that’s why people hate it. If Ranger was as hard to play as Naga Siren macro managing then no one would be hating on this braindead class.

I really don’t think this is true. I find all flavors of ranger (beastmaster, Zerkbow, valk, celestial, rabid, etc) to be extremely difficult to play. 1 mistake and you and/or your allies are toast.

Ranger group support skills are so limited, we need to make them all count. Our meta opponents have seemingly unlimited health pools (hambow, shoutbow, celestial elem, celestial engie) or devastating spike damage (shatter mesmers, thief meta) and superb utility. Look at all the condition removal, healing, stunning, etc these meta builds bring to the field.

A really good ranger can burst opponents down quickly with either conditions or raw power, but the loss in utility is, most times, not worth the benefit. This may cause some animosity in tPvP from time to time. Most of the hate is unrelated to the game and just related to the character of the players who are filled with rage. Has nothing to do with ranger class, or guild wars. This is a problem with society and the heart of man, child, or woman.

Look at all the condition removal, healing, stunning, etc these meta builds bring to the field.

yep, i have to agree with that. The only utility skills that the ranger can offer are the spirits , but they are so nerfed that are impraticable.
So you end up with a class that has no utilities for the group (the pets die almost instantly), that actually has not a good constant DPS neither a good survivability. so Ranger players end up being the last to die (if they are very good) just to die alone at the end. Understable that other players preffer a guardian/warrior/ele in a group of limited spots.
Would be nice to Anet to actually put someone to work in fixing this class once for all. Right now it seems they have just one employee to do all the work.

I think its a combination of pb shot and rapid fire. Increase the cd on pb shot by 5seconds. Decrease the cd of hunter’s shot by 2-3 seconds to compensate.

FrownyClown.8402:

I think its a combination of pb shot and rapid fire. Increase the cd on pb shot by 5seconds. Decrease the cd of hunter’s shot by 2-3 seconds to compensate.

gladly it’ll work well with remorseless.