Guild Wars 2

yo guys,

all i do is reading ranger is nerfed yadiyada and blablabla.

we have always been the underdog and i made peace long ago.
but if that much of you complain about it.
how come no one made a petition???
if this works and few thousands playerwill maybe sign it.
and maybe you will get anet’s attention.
under one banner we might actually achieve more then complain 1by1.

p.s
the ranger is fine for me is fine though only couple fixes for me. but seems to me that people have more problems then i have with ranger and honestly i am tired of reading ’ ranger nerfed topic again’
i rather see a helpful ranger community then whinging one that’s what we are doing right now. whining, qqing i don’t read any good argument only QQ.
pls at least say why you think its wrong.
its like saying ‘the ice cream is not good.’ well why isn’t it good? constructive comment will help a lot more then saying it is not good.

so please make a petition sign it make your arguments.
so that forum can breathe a bit more. hopefully we can see more videos and builds this way.
sincerely yours Samanosuke

I don’t think you’ve been reading the threads very carefully. There’s been math posted, reasoning posted, full on discussions about stat changes and % changes…. builds listed…. testing for glitches.

These threads all give reasons why Ranger is in a bad spot right now.

It’s against Anet’s rules to make petitions. They’re aware of all the complaints both against and for rangers.

no i have been reading but after 10 topic same people same problems over and over again.
how many ranger are there and how many rangers complain here.
some scream ‘ranger nerf in their title doesn’t really appeal to read yet another nerf threat with same result or comment over and over again.
atm we are just arguing among our self. with no feedback of anet at all.
we don’t even if they take are suggestions or not.
that grouch post i am not even sure he made it he didn’t deny or acknowledge it.
if somebody had time he would make petition with all the problems and argument on it lets sign by ranger’s and send to anet.
those are the problems. those are the arguments. those people signed and agree.
just like you would in the irl

samanosuke asakura.6240:

>-<
how many ranger are there and how many rangers complain here.
>-<

Rangers that take the game & their class seriously & have not yet moved on to an other class (ele, warrior)? Not that many. I mean, to take the kind of abuse we take requires a special kind of stubborn person.

Sina.9208:

samanosuke asakura.6240:

>-<
how many ranger are there and how many rangers complain here.
>-<

Rangers that take the game & their class seriously & have not yet moved on to an other class (ele, warrior)? Not that many. I mean, to take the kind of abuse we take requires a special kind of stubborn person.

Stubborn, that must be me, only ever played one Ranger since being on beta.

Iv’e seen the ups (none) and downs (loads) of the Ranger.

Wouldn’t it be nice to play a Ranger that feels like he or she is adding something to a group/event or whatever.

I don’t think anybody at Arenanet plays a Ranger.

Us making a petition? Yeah, right. Most of us can’t even agree with each other. Remember the CDI? That went swell.

Wondrouswall.7169:

Us making a petition? Yeah, right. Most of us can’t even agree with each other. Remember the CDI? That went swell.

I think most people were pretty much 100% behind jcbroe’s suggestion thread.

The CDI thread was filled hundreds with people who didn’t main or even play ranger and everyone was just ‘suggesting’ to turn ranger into their own personal vision of a ninja/rouge/archer/etc. It had nothing to do with rangers at all.

Edit: It’s not a big list of things I think almost every ranger could get behind. 3 things off the top of my head:

1) Teleports. We’re supposed to be a roaming/side node class but we can’t move around the map well enough.
2) Access to important group buffs. Regen and swiftness are wonderful, but important boons like aegis, stealth, or stability are game changers. This did get noticeably better with our AoE de buffs from the BM line.
3) Damage. We can’t kill things in a timely manner. It works wonderfully for dueling where we can simply outlast, but lack of insta-casts and precasts and any spike skills at all really puts as at a disadvantage against things like mesmers when it comes to picking teams.

Fix those 3 and I think that pretty much covers everything we need. I mean there is the whole “stealth is redonkulously OP” thing, but that’s another topic.

group support might come with druid. at least i hope. yes i guess people with rangers as their main are stubborn people i got 3.7k hours on ranger :p. my point was all this QQ ain’t helping anet doesn’t react to our post its like talking to a wall. perfect example is the ranger increase on offhand weps. it was mentioned before patch and now after patch still no feedback at all.

They are some unfairness on anets part when it comes to ranger nerfs. I have only started feeling this way recently. When we get an icd because we can get quickness twice, yet warrior can swap bundles to get 25 stacks of might.

People focus to much on damage. Its not damage that makes one class more viable than another. It’s what else it brings. PVP isn’t about killing alone. If you cant stay alive you hurt your team. Ranger can not withstand focus attacks aleast not as well as every other class except necros.

Those that complain aways take about damage or the pet (which is also about damage mostly). Yes ranger can dance around for a while with lost of stamina and the right weapon sets, but unless your running condition your not dealing damage.

Other classes have so much passive and semi passive defense with at the same time bring other utilities. Yet, we keep looking at skills as it pertains to damage.

This is why we cant agree. Some of us are looking at one thing and not the bigger picture. Those that do look at the bigger picture cant agree on where we should be going and what needs to be improved to get there.

Aoe quickness and fury would have been nice for us yet Guardians go it on a 30 second cd untraited none the less.

So many classes got more passive and semi passive that even with the buffs we received we are not doing as well as we once were.

With things like spiked armor, come on what are we suppose to do retal on block or crit I mean really.

A recent example of how things have been: the change to healing spring. Now it doesnt trigger automatically any more, but behaves like a trap. Great thinking. What profession needs to wait for its heal to trigger? Dont fix what isn’t broken, fix what is broken. I have adapted all the time, but in the end it gets irritating. Btw 4.9 k hours on ranger since start.

They need to change.

Enlargement – at 25% Active Signet of Stone.

I feel like we are only class doesn’t get the option. Thief/Mes both have teleports/stealth, War/Engi have passive 25% + low CD utilities, you be surprised how big this would be for ranger. Sure it’s more passive play but it would bring our survival way up letting us run more risky builds.

Basically power ranger needs at least 4 things to be fixed (not talking about other builds)
- Remove the full cooldown stow on longbow skills
- Make the greatsword more powerful on the autoattack, imo slice and slash could be sped up that way increasing dps but also making us dodge more quickly.
- Counterattack needs to be sped up too, it’s way too easy too notice the animation and dodge away additionally Pommel Strike range is too short, I think it shouldnt root but be like maul, usable while moving
- Let us cast maul while in the air <3<3<3 plzplzplz anet
- Wilderness survival is mandatory for any ranger build, this is pretty dull they should fix it. aka put empathic bond in beastmastery where it belongs
- All classes have received baseline improvement on their F skills except ranger, we were supposed to get pet stats improvement but nope.
- The 3 minor traits of marksman and the first 2 of squirmishing should be combined and add 2 new ones seriously go look at any elementalist minor traits and tell me in the eyes it’s equal in value…
….

That’s just for power ranger, i’m not talking about traps, spirits, torch, axe…. etc.. which have way more issues than longbow greatsword tbh.

RevanCorana.8942:

Basically power ranger needs at least 4 things to be fixed (not talking about other builds)
- Remove the full cooldown stow on longbow skills
- Make the greatsword more powerful on the autoattack, imo slice and slash could be sped up that way increasing dps but also making us dodge more quickly.
- Counterattack needs to be sped up too, it’s way too easy too notice the animation and dodge away additionally Pommel Strike range is too short, I think it shouldnt root but be like maul, usable while moving
- Let us cast maul while in the air <3<3<3 plzplzplz anet
- Wilderness survival is mandatory for any ranger build, this is pretty dull they should fix it. aka put empathic bond in beastmastery where it belongs
- All classes have received baseline improvement on their F skills except ranger, we were supposed to get pet stats improvement but nope.
- The 3 minor traits of marksman and the first 2 of squirmishing should be combined and add 2 new ones seriously go look at any elementalist minor traits and tell me in the eyes it’s equal in value…
….

That’s just for power ranger, i’m not talking about traps, spirits, torch, axe…. etc.. which have way more issues than longbow greatsword tbh.

That’s just a start, Ranger’s have so many problems now more then they used to have. I felt stronger last patch as LB/GS ranger, I even felt stronger with my condition build.

There isn’t really single viable build for Ranger anymore. We got some alright builds but compared to other classes we got nothing.

These are all good suggestions but I honestly just wish we had access to more pet skills, that’s all. Engi got an extra f5 skill this patch, thief got an extra f2, and we are overlooked. There is no reason we should not have this. Realistically, our only profession mechanic is a 1-2 second cast time f2 skill while every other class has something really class defining and useful.

I understand your sentiment, but ANet does not allow petitions (with good reason).

Seraphim Storm hit the nail on the head about our number one drawback. We can’t survive/escape focus attacks as well as other classes. Our skills are well enough to output decent damage, but it is not quite enough. The Meta is still settling (maybe there is none atm) but we seem to still be lacking what matters.

A few things for sure:

1. Healing Spring was trashed
2. Signets and traps were weakened (cooldown too long now)
3. Enemy stability uptime is too high, squashing our CC.
4. Nerf to vigor hits us hardest because we primarily dodge to survive focus attacks. We don’t have fancy teleports, invisibility, and low cooldown blocks like other classes.

We will need to work to see if there are other effective builds. Or switch to another class, for a while, while things get fixed. It is kind of sad when you outplay a d/d elem or warrior and end up having them mash keys and kill you.

After a while you can see the button mashers…. And it just is kind of sad to loose to one.

didn’t know it wasn’t allowed tbh the petition thing.
but this situation is messed up too. no reply from anet etc.
their silence is what irritate some people.
and if druid is a flop i think the ranger forum will explode with rage. those frustrations are building up it seems i might exaggerate but some of those topic.nurn with anger

In regards to OP. We hear the people that yell the loudest.

Ranger is in a bad spot, but were not useless as people make us out to be. I play/focus mainly on WvW and PvE. We do have a lot of bugs and issues but aside from those people in general seem to have not figured out a way to meaningfully use the class yet.

I know there are a few other rangers have figured things out and have not posted anything because they want to enjoy what they have before it becomes meta/nerfed.

I will eventually post my builds in the ranger section, but I want to enjoy them first.

Photinous.4628:

These are all good suggestions but I honestly just wish we had access to more pet skills, that’s all. Engi got an extra f5 skill this patch, thief got an extra f2, and we are overlooked. There is no reason we should not have this. Realistically, our only profession mechanic is a 1-2 second cast time f2 skill while every other class has something really class defining and useful.

+1 I have wanted that for a long time since all the creatures that U cant tame has a lot more abilitys then U unlock for instance the jungle stalker has stealth

And then there’s THIS GUY! Seriously, who the heck let the OP in here? Stay out of the Ranger forums and don’t come back. Go back to praising Robert Gee for buffing Mesmers to God tier, or thanking devs for cooldown reductions for shield skills. You’ve probably never played as a Ranger a day in your life.

Nicknobreak.7543:

And then there’s THIS GUY! Seriously, who the heck let the OP in here? Stay out of the Ranger forums and don’t come back. Go back to praising Robert Gee for buffing Mesmers to God tier, or thanking devs for cooldown reductions for shield skills. You’ve probably never played as a Ranger a day in your life.

I think what you’re trying to say is the OP uses Google Translate. I can barely understand what he is trying to say.

Nicknobreak.7543:

And then there’s THIS GUY! Seriously, who the heck let the OP in here? Stay out of the Ranger forums and don’t come back. Go back to praising Robert Gee for buffing Mesmers to God tier, or thanking devs for cooldown reductions for shield skills. You’ve probably never played as a Ranger a day in your life.

how do expected to keep reading the forum when you got a skritt like this around.
i you wanna flame go do it against a barque grill . if you read the post i stated that i have played ranger over 3.7k hours. proof that you didn’t bother reading and are here just to flame. just clicking on your name and reading first 10 comments says enough.

Nicknobreak.7543:

And then there’s THIS GUY! Seriously, who the heck let the OP in here? Stay out of the Ranger forums and don’t come back. Go back to praising Robert Gee for buffing Mesmers to God tier, or thanking devs for cooldown reductions for shield skills. You’ve probably never played as a Ranger a day in your life.

So the only persons who are legit around are those who share your views?

Yup, because if you’re convinced that Rangers are in a good spot, you’d be mistaken. Name for me three Professional players who competed in the World Tournament Series who played predominately as ranger.

Are there ANY WvW guilds worth there salt that actively recruit rangers over any other class?

Are there or are there not common or regular instances where the Ranger is removed from a dungeon party or told NOT to join because their damage is not on par with others in a PvE environment?

The answers to these questions are very obvious without having to explain why.

Nicknobreak.7543:

Yup, because if you’re convinced that Rangers are in a good spot, you’d be mistaken. Name for me three Professional players who competed in the World Tournament Series who played predominately as ranger.

Are there ANY WvW guilds worth there salt that actively recruit rangers over any other class?

Are there or are there not common or regular instances where the Ranger is removed from a dungeon party or told NOT to join because their damage is not on par with others in a PvE environment?

The answers to these questions are very obvious without having to explain why.

WvW guilds that still dont Recruit Rangers , there isnt a cap limit on amount of players only group size and boons get passed over it does not exceed the target limit,

in WvW it shouldnt be a problem , ranger can now go Mobility bomb take immobilse up the walls so much so I’ve done it wiped 15 people just by LR’ing into a Thinly Spread Zerg line Popped by Mobility CC and those 15/40 got hammered so hard by the train i paid my dues as Ranger and the commander even vouched Wow i did not see that comming on ts since i broke formation and performed what seemed like the Impossible .

i even make it my role in guild WvW events using Heal as one for Aoe regen+swiftness at the back lines helping with movement for other zerk eles or thiefs and even last night those Reverants are very grateful i moved back and forth from front line to back using sword+LR to provide any Stragglers with Swiftness.

I was a sheep dog in a sense keeping the pack together. group or not keeping formation is much more important than Balling up using the Old Gwen system.

those Elitist WvW guilds need to live with the times.

Nicknobreak.7543:

Yup, because if you’re convinced that Rangers are in a good spot, you’d be mistaken. Name for me three Professional players who competed in the World Tournament Series who played predominately as ranger.

Are there ANY WvW guilds worth there salt that actively recruit rangers over any other class?

Are there or are there not common or regular instances where the Ranger is removed from a dungeon party or told NOT to join because their damage is not on par with others in a PvE environment?

The answers to these questions are very obvious without having to explain why.

Ranger carries a long history of being hated that went full kitten for waaay too long. People are sooo used to hate rangers they even forgot why.

Most of my guild hate rangers but that doesn’t change the fact they can be extremely good. Answering your questions proves nothing. Use facts, not circumstantial argumentation. Yes, there are areas of the game where they don’t do as well and others where they excel. But to me at least they don’t lack dps at all at the moment far from it.

Ranger doesn’t really have any problems dealing damage or avoiding damage that I’m aware of.

As a matter of fact, the class itself was buffed, and only when you start to make cross-class comparisons does anything seem imbalanced….

….which brings me to the point that this was not a balance patch. AT ALL. This was ANet updating their system for the new system and mechanics that are going to be introduced in the expansion. It was a REVAMP. Balancing will happen with the expansion.

So that’s my first point.

My second point is this: comparing ranger to things that were broken with the patch like Grenadier and mesmer burst or guardian burn combos and then saying “we’re weak because we didn’t get that” isn’t the way to balance a game. All of the these things that people are comparing the ranger to are going to change. Grenadier was already fixed, and Mesmer will not be retaining its current status. Making balance arguments and comparing to the MOST broken, obviously going to be changed mechanics in the game is just…. I don’t have words to describe how incompetent you would be at balancing anything.

So, now that all of that is out of the way, yes, agreed with the sentiment of the OP.

Now, do I agree with the choice ANet has made to essentially revamp everything then leave the game in shambles and make slow, ineffectual shave balances up until the expansion release? Not particularly, but I understand the decision. It hurts the community, especially the already small competitive community the most when the game is left imbalanced, but with the expansion and the time schedule people are working with, it would be seriously difficult to make sure the expansion launch goes smoothly AND smooth out the issues that the “expansion prep” patch created.

It’s easier as a dev thing to make sure the game is stable, albeit imbalanced, after the core patch, then work any big fixes into the expansion release, while slowly shaving the game as time allows to make those changes up until the expansion drop. It avoids making ALL of the changes at once and having twice as many variables to balance. This way, the devs can drop the balance patch for the core system at expansion time, then shave what needs to be shaved with the elite specializations afterwards without having to worry about the rest of the balance.

BUT, being on here and seeing so many people just bawling their eyes out is super frustrating to me because it’s extremely premature to be doing so. We’re literally playing less than 5/6 of the intended final product of the game’s classes right now.

tl;dr: Just…. wait until the expansion drops, people who are insistent on making a million threads about how imbalanced the game is…. because ANet knows the game is imbalanced right now; this was a REVAMP, not a balance patch.

samanosuke asakura.6240:

yo guys,

all i do is reading ranger is nerfed yadiyada and blablabla.

we have always been the underdog and i made peace long ago.
but if that much of you complain about it.
how come no one made a petition???
if this works and few thousands playerwill maybe sign it.
and maybe you will get anet’s attention.
under one banner we might actually achieve more then complain 1by1.

p.s
the ranger is fine for me is fine though only couple fixes for me. but seems to me that people have more problems then i have with ranger and honestly i am tired of reading ’ ranger nerfed topic again’
i rather see a helpful ranger community then whinging one that’s what we are doing right now. whining, qqing i don’t read any good argument only QQ.
pls at least say why you think its wrong.
its like saying ‘the ice cream is not good.’ well why isn’t it good? constructive comment will help a lot more then saying it is not good.

so please make a petition sign it make your arguments.
so that forum can breathe a bit more. hopefully we can see more videos and builds this way.
sincerely yours Samanosuke

there was a petition, 2 years ago…and a 2nd a year ago

anyway, my problems with current ranger are the skills not working correctly
as i said here
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/Issue-with-Ranger-skills/first#post5271878

Fluffball.8307:

It’s against Anet’s rules to make petitions. They’re aware of all the complaints both against and for rangers.

Yeah, I stopped reading at petitions for that reason.

Photinous.4628:

These are all good suggestions but I honestly just wish we had access to more pet skills, that’s all. Engi got an extra f5 skill this patch, thief got an extra f2, and we are overlooked. There is no reason we should not have this. Realistically, our only profession mechanic is a 1-2 second cast time f2 skill while every other class has something really class defining and useful.

and dont forget that if the theif uses steal on you he even get a better version of healing spring

I run ranger as my main and I dont see a problem with it. Sure we arnt as strong as a warrior but as long as you run power precision ferocity you pack a pretty powerful punch. Then add all the conditions from your your weapons,, your animal and your sigils. They will just melt now use your beastmastery to add more condition damage then throw on superior rune of the krait and people pretty much die. You just have to sit there and play around to find your ranger build. I run zergs, I roam, do pvp, dungeons, even command as my ranger.

Then sic em makes theifs and mesmers useless for a short period of time.

jcbroe.4329:

Ranger doesn’t really have any problems dealing damage or avoiding damage that I’m aware of.

As a matter of fact, the class itself was buffed, and only when you start to make cross-class comparisons does anything seem imbalanced….

….which brings me to the point that this was not a balance patch. AT ALL. This was ANet updating their system for the new system and mechanics that are going to be introduced in the expansion. It was a REVAMP. Balancing will happen with the expansion.

So that’s my first point.

My second point is this: comparing ranger to things that were broken with the patch like Grenadier and mesmer burst or guardian burn combos and then saying “we’re weak because we didn’t get that” isn’t the way to balance a game. All of the these things that people are comparing the ranger to are going to change. Grenadier was already fixed, and Mesmer will not be retaining its current status. Making balance arguments and comparing to the MOST broken, obviously going to be changed mechanics in the game is just…. I don’t have words to describe how incompetent you would be at balancing anything.

So, now that all of that is out of the way, yes, agreed with the sentiment of the OP.

Now, do I agree with the choice ANet has made to essentially revamp everything then leave the game in shambles and make slow, ineffectual shave balances up until the expansion release? Not particularly, but I understand the decision. It hurts the community, especially the already small competitive community the most when the game is left imbalanced, but with the expansion and the time schedule people are working with, it would be seriously difficult to make sure the expansion launch goes smoothly AND smooth out the issues that the “expansion prep” patch created.

It’s easier as a dev thing to make sure the game is stable, albeit imbalanced, after the core patch, then work any big fixes into the expansion release, while slowly shaving the game as time allows to make those changes up until the expansion drop. It avoids making ALL of the changes at once and having twice as many variables to balance. This way, the devs can drop the balance patch for the core system at expansion time, then shave what needs to be shaved with the elite specializations afterwards without having to worry about the rest of the balance.

BUT, being on here and seeing so many people just bawling their eyes out is super frustrating to me because it’s extremely premature to be doing so. We’re literally playing less than 5/6 of the intended final product of the game’s classes right now.

tl;dr: Just…. wait until the expansion drops, people who are insistent on making a million threads about how imbalanced the game is…. because ANet knows the game is imbalanced right now; this was a REVAMP, not a balance patch.

I agree that this wasnt a balance patch and that we are not playing a finished product right now. But with that in mind do you really think our trait’s are fine or in the right position? I seriously doubt that they are gonna rearrange traits or fundamentally change how they work at HoT release.

To name a few:

Empathic Bond/Wilderness Knowledge in the same line, makes WS mandatory for all pvp/www specs and makes the 3rd choice in this line obsolete.

Honed Axe’s, what were they thinking?

Natural Healing should be switched with Empathic Bond and made usefull?

MDG? Just no

LOYF? I actually like the idea behind this trait, though the duration should be abit longer (6 sec?) and higher %dmg/duration. But shortbow is underwhelming atm, should be made into a true hybrid weapon. Higher base dmg/scaling and skill 2-5 should be buffed, dont mind the position req on AA if that happens.

The entire Nature Magic line? Might just be me, but i find this line underwhelming.

There are others and also QoL changes like more options for ooc swiftness etc. And ofc pet pathing issues. I just dont think these issues will disappear with HoT, but like you said we might have to wait for balance/fixes 2-3 months into HoT anyway.

We are also getting the staff and new elite skills with HOT so they may do a over hall then. OR the traits may work with a combination of the skills and weapons we have now and the new ones we will get.

xikira.3264:

I run ranger as my main and I dont see a problem with it. Sure we arnt as strong as a warrior but as long as you run power precision ferocity you pack a pretty powerful punch. Then add all the conditions from your your weapons,, your animal and your sigils. They will just melt now use your beastmastery to add more condition damage then throw on superior rune of the krait and people pretty much die. You just have to sit there and play around to find your ranger build. I run zergs, I roam, do pvp, dungeons, even command as my ranger.

Please tell me you aren’t running full zerk with krait runes…

jcbroe.4329:

Ranger doesn’t really have any problems dealing damage or avoiding damage that I’m aware of.

As a matter of fact, the class itself was buffed, and only when you start to make cross-class comparisons does anything seem imbalanced….

….which brings me to the point that this was not a balance patch. AT ALL. This was ANet updating their system for the new system and mechanics that are going to be introduced in the expansion. It was a REVAMP. Balancing will happen with the expansion.

So that’s my first point.

My second point is this: comparing ranger to things that were broken with the patch like Grenadier and mesmer burst or guardian burn combos and then saying “we’re weak because we didn’t get that” isn’t the way to balance a game. All of the these things that people are comparing the ranger to are going to change. Grenadier was already fixed, and Mesmer will not be retaining its current status. Making balance arguments and comparing to the MOST broken, obviously going to be changed mechanics in the game is just…. I don’t have words to describe how incompetent you would be at balancing anything.

So, now that all of that is out of the way, yes, agreed with the sentiment of the OP.

Now, do I agree with the choice ANet has made to essentially revamp everything then leave the game in shambles and make slow, ineffectual shave balances up until the expansion release? Not particularly, but I understand the decision. It hurts the community, especially the already small competitive community the most when the game is left imbalanced, but with the expansion and the time schedule people are working with, it would be seriously difficult to make sure the expansion launch goes smoothly AND smooth out the issues that the “expansion prep” patch created.

It’s easier as a dev thing to make sure the game is stable, albeit imbalanced, after the core patch, then work any big fixes into the expansion release, while slowly shaving the game as time allows to make those changes up until the expansion drop. It avoids making ALL of the changes at once and having twice as many variables to balance. This way, the devs can drop the balance patch for the core system at expansion time, then shave what needs to be shaved with the elite specializations afterwards without having to worry about the rest of the balance.

BUT, being on here and seeing so many people just bawling their eyes out is super frustrating to me because it’s extremely premature to be doing so. We’re literally playing less than 5/6 of the intended final product of the game’s classes right now.

tl;dr: Just…. wait until the expansion drops, people who are insistent on making a million threads about how imbalanced the game is…. because ANet knows the game is imbalanced right now; this was a REVAMP, not a balance patch.

Unless I missed an announcement they still haven’t given a release date yet, so there is no reason they shouldn’t be focusing on balancing the game right now.

I don’t blame anyone for getting upset about the changes and flooding the forums to try and get something done. Anet has shown us on multiple occasions that they only respond when people start getting hostile.

All it would take to calm people down would be a red name popping in here and discussing some of the bugs/problems.

They wanted to nerf Ice Bow but people complained and it got reverted. Imagine the poo storm if they really nerfed Elementalist, seeing how there are 2 of them on every high end PvP team.

Funny part is how they actually butchered Healing Spring. It went from being one of the best healing abilities in the game to absolute garbage.

Mohagi.2738:

jcbroe.4329:

Ranger doesn’t really have any problems dealing damage or avoiding damage that I’m aware of.

As a matter of fact, the class itself was buffed, and only when you start to make cross-class comparisons does anything seem imbalanced….

….which brings me to the point that this was not a balance patch. AT ALL. This was ANet updating their system for the new system and mechanics that are going to be introduced in the expansion. It was a REVAMP. Balancing will happen with the expansion.

So that’s my first point.

My second point is this: comparing ranger to things that were broken with the patch like Grenadier and mesmer burst or guardian burn combos and then saying “we’re weak because we didn’t get that” isn’t the way to balance a game. All of the these things that people are comparing the ranger to are going to change. Grenadier was already fixed, and Mesmer will not be retaining its current status. Making balance arguments and comparing to the MOST broken, obviously going to be changed mechanics in the game is just…. I don’t have words to describe how incompetent you would be at balancing anything.

So, now that all of that is out of the way, yes, agreed with the sentiment of the OP.

Now, do I agree with the choice ANet has made to essentially revamp everything then leave the game in shambles and make slow, ineffectual shave balances up until the expansion release? Not particularly, but I understand the decision. It hurts the community, especially the already small competitive community the most when the game is left imbalanced, but with the expansion and the time schedule people are working with, it would be seriously difficult to make sure the expansion launch goes smoothly AND smooth out the issues that the “expansion prep” patch created.

It’s easier as a dev thing to make sure the game is stable, albeit imbalanced, after the core patch, then work any big fixes into the expansion release, while slowly shaving the game as time allows to make those changes up until the expansion drop. It avoids making ALL of the changes at once and having twice as many variables to balance. This way, the devs can drop the balance patch for the core system at expansion time, then shave what needs to be shaved with the elite specializations afterwards without having to worry about the rest of the balance.

BUT, being on here and seeing so many people just bawling their eyes out is super frustrating to me because it’s extremely premature to be doing so. We’re literally playing less than 5/6 of the intended final product of the game’s classes right now.

tl;dr: Just…. wait until the expansion drops, people who are insistent on making a million threads about how imbalanced the game is…. because ANet knows the game is imbalanced right now; this was a REVAMP, not a balance patch.

I agree that this wasnt a balance patch and that we are not playing a finished product right now. But with that in mind do you really think our trait’s are fine or in the right position? I seriously doubt that they are gonna rearrange traits or fundamentally change how they work at HoT release.

To name a few:

Empathic Bond/Wilderness Knowledge in the same line, makes WS mandatory for all pvp/www specs and makes the 3rd choice in this line obsolete.

Honed Axe’s, what were they thinking?

Natural Healing should be switched with Empathic Bond and made usefull?

MDG? Just no

LOYF? I actually like the idea behind this trait, though the duration should be abit longer (6 sec?) and higher %dmg/duration. But shortbow is underwhelming atm, should be made into a true hybrid weapon. Higher base dmg/scaling and skill 2-5 should be buffed, dont mind the position req on AA if that happens.

The entire Nature Magic line? Might just be me, but i find this line underwhelming.

There are others and also QoL changes like more options for ooc swiftness etc. And ofc pet pathing issues. I just dont think these issues will disappear with HoT, but like you said we might have to wait for balance/fixes 2-3 months into HoT anyway.

and with bark skin wilderness is pretty much as must in pve aswell so your pet doesnt melt

Chokolata.1870:

They wanted to nerf Ice Bow but people complained and it got reverted. Imagine the poo storm if they really nerfed Elementalist, seeing how there are 2 of them on every high end PvP team.

I have a feeling they did that because of all those who play Ele and its a very popular class thatnks to their dmg and theyre team support

what’s really disappointing, besides some of the badly thought out or badly placed traits, is that if you go to the thief forum a dev took notice of all the “Q.Q. thief isn’t the best anymore!” threads. They combined them into a single thread and are possibly taking a look at the communities complaints. That just doesn’t seem to happen on the ranger forum.

I need to see what Druid brings tbh, i’ve played ranger almost every hour that i have on this game since beta and I’ve weathered the changes as we’ve always been decent if not the best. If, like jcbroe said, they tone down the mesmer and guardian we’ll be back where we started at least. If not and Druid is lacking in support or damage I’ll be utterly disappointed in anet for not paying the slightest attention to what this class actually needs.

Ranger was buffed considerably, but there are a few key skills that are bugged ATM. Namely Healing Spring and Light on Your Feet.

Healing Spring is very buggy, chief among them is that it isn’t healing the pet. We’re not getting the complete duration of LOYF, we’re missing a second.

Most Dangerous Game didn’t deliver on the hype, needs a buff. Otherwise? We got some love this last patch.

It’s a step in the right direction.

I don’t know if you can say ranger was OMGWTFBBQ SUPER BUFF NEW RANGER META 2015 compared to everyone else, but we weren’t nerfed by any means.

People saying we were nerfed are silly.

CETheLucid.3964:

Ranger was buffed considerably, but there are a few key skills that are bugged ATM. Namely Healing Spring and Light on Your Feet.

Healing Spring is very buggy, chief among them is that it isn’t healing the pet. We’re not getting the complete duration of LOYF, we’re missing a second.

Most Dangerous Game didn’t deliver on the hype, needs a buff. Otherwise? We got some love this last patch.

It’s a step in the right direction.

I don’t know if you can say ranger was OMGWTFBBQ SUPER BUFF NEW RANGER META 2015 compared to everyone else, but we weren’t nerfed by any means.

People saying we were nerfed are silly.

I’m always baffled by these “Rangers were nerfed!” threads. My power build’s one real weakness (lack of condi cleanse) was completely removed with the patch (now all of my survival skills remove 2 conditions!). The fact that Quickening Zephyr now gives you superspeed instead of gimping your healing was just icing on the cake for me.

CETheLucid.3964:

Ranger was buffed considerably, but there are a few key skills that are bugged ATM. Namely Healing Spring and Light on Your Feet.

Healing Spring is very buggy, chief among them is that it isn’t healing the pet. We’re not getting the complete duration of LOYF, we’re missing a second.

Most Dangerous Game didn’t deliver on the hype, needs a buff. Otherwise? We got some love this last patch.

It’s a step in the right direction.

I don’t know if you can say ranger was OMGWTFBBQ SUPER BUFF NEW RANGER META 2015 compared to everyone else, but we weren’t nerfed by any means.

People saying we were nerfed are silly.

basically yeah

fix the bugged stuff (add in lightning reflexes + Wilderness knowledge there)

but at the same time, since pet drags you into combat, it either needs to be mroe durable to survive mass combat, or have better AI (or. let use stow the useless thing during stealth missions)

=/

arenta.2953:

CETheLucid.3964:

Ranger was buffed considerably, but there are a few key skills that are bugged ATM. Namely Healing Spring and Light on Your Feet.

Healing Spring is very buggy, chief among them is that it isn’t healing the pet. We’re not getting the complete duration of LOYF, we’re missing a second.

Most Dangerous Game didn’t deliver on the hype, needs a buff. Otherwise? We got some love this last patch.

It’s a step in the right direction.

I don’t know if you can say ranger was OMGWTFBBQ SUPER BUFF NEW RANGER META 2015 compared to everyone else, but we weren’t nerfed by any means.

People saying we were nerfed are silly.

basically yeah

fix the bugged stuff (add in lightning reflexes + Wilderness knowledge there)

but at the same time, since pet drags you into combat, it either needs to be mroe durable to survive mass combat, or have better AI (or. let use stow the useless thing during stealth missions)

=/

I love stowing my pet during pvp. Especially in Foe Fire. But that is mainly so I can set up ambushes.

Oh my god, you people just do not understand. The Ranger is better when you compare it to the Ranger from a month ago. The problem is how it compares to other classes.

In PvP we are bottom tier and then some.
In PvE there is no longer any room for us anymore, FrostSpotter is no longer needed.
In WvW, bleh

Chokolata.1870:

Oh my god, you people just do not understand. The Ranger is better when you compare it to the Ranger from a month ago. The problem is how it compares to other classes.

In PvP we are bottom tier and then some.
In PvE there is no longer any room for us anymore, FrostSpotter is no longer needed.
In WvW, bleh

thats a bit overkill…

rangers still good, its just got some bugs that need to be fixed

i run a LB.GS build, with troll ungent, lightning reflexes, quickening zephyr, spike trap, and entanglement.
as well as marksmanship (Clarion Bond, Steady Focus, Lead the Wind)
skirmishing( Sharpened Edges, Hidden Barbs, Quick Draw)
wilderness survival( Oakheart Salve, Refined Toxins, Wilderness Knowledge)

using this build, i’m extremely durable in WvW and dungeons. more so than all but guardian.
with 2 stun breaks, alot of condition removals and fury givers, plus CC.

the build has worked great except for the fact that lightnign reflexes’s “remove 2 conditions” doesnt activate till after the roll, when it needs to be before the roll.
or pet attracting attention….

you might say ranger is worthless, but i haven’t had any trouble getting into dungeon parties, and even when party wipes, have been able to carry on and win.

in WvW, i rely less on GS and more on LB, for that knockback and stealth. and have found myself becoming difficult to hold down to kill (due to stun breaks, stealth, and ccs)

i’ve never had this much fun on ranger before. .nor have i killed so many warriors before (mesmers are a kitten kitten, but other than them and stealth spam theifs, everything else is fair game.)

you can’t just look at dps for what class is best
cause ranger’s appeal is the number of condition removals, the speed of condition cooldowns, the mobility(though stun breaks and rolls +evades) and the fast it works well in combo with all other classes

rangers are still ok in WVW, not to rain on anyone’s skills as a ranger but it doesn’t take a whole lot to roll with a zerg when everyone’s targeting the same target.

WvW roaming, i can personally feel a big difference here. The big buffs to some classes and the lack of positive ranger changes hurts.

PVE dungeons have been run thousands of times by most every player by now, there’s nothing new here. unless your trying to join a speedrun group anyone can complete a dungeon. pre-patch i’ve had 2 necro’s, a pre patch mesmer, myself on ranger and a guard finish a few together. it’s still not impossible, we just don’t add anything great to the group except spotter and now our damage isn’t as high as the classes who’s meta spot we could take.

some of the people who say ranger is bad want 100b numbers to pop up on screen while some of us want ranger to be a part of the meta, even in a smaller way.

@arenta: head into pvp for a bit and 1v1 a halfway decent mesmer and you’ll see how much we lack condi removal, speed, mobility and damage in comparison to that class. and yes mesmers are a bit broken right now but i have my doubts that this is going to change much.

@Mohagi;

It’s pretty indisputable that most of of could probably design better overall traits and a better trait system.
I blame the design devs more than the balance devs though. Coming from my long history of playing GW1, ranger for me in GW2 is dumbed down, lacks most of its original nuance and playstyle customization, and is unrecognizable in the worst kind of way.

I simply had to accept that GW2 at this point is probaby the only suitable game in its genre/sub-genre, and that this ANet team is better at marketing than designing fun, intuitive, and meaningful gameplay.

I just wish my main class wasn’t a shadow of its former self, and as you highlighted, that that people working on the class were more competent at comprehending how the class plays, or even the concept of what a good trait is.

@Puck;

You’re right, I mean, all I can do is speculate. I just prefer to think of it as the industry standards of higher up business decision red tape nonsense dictating patch release periods and how much the dev team is actually allowed to change (aka the balance team could probably make the game entirely different within a single week given free reign) over the assumption that the team is lazy/incompetent/dragging their heels for no reason.

I personally am a CompSci major and prospective hire in the programming industry, but am already jaded by situations like what this one potentially is where you could be the hardest working, most devoted, passionate dev and have massive amounts of changes you could easily make right at your fingertips that would improve the player experience a ton, but your boss tells you that you can’t make any of them because “it doesn’t fit with the current vision of the game to make those changes” or “we aren’t ready to see things like that be changed in the game just yet” or etc.

BUT, because you are the dev and not the shot caller, not only are you thrown into limbo with all of your ideas, but you have to take the blunt force of a community of players calling you lazy and incompetent, and even though you agree with them and want to make those changes, you literally have no way to.

Rambling aside and ultimate point being; I totally agree that someone or some people somewhere are being inefficient and incompetent and the game is suffering lol. I just personally don’t want to place blame on who it is. My general opinion of most programmers I come across and including myself is that left to our own devices, we would probably over-do the amount of things we touch and program because its a love/addiction that carries with it “just one more thing” driving feeling, so I don’t generally throw them under the bus first lol.

jcbroe.4329:

@Mohagi;

It’s pretty indisputable that most of of could probably design better overall traits and a better trait system.
I blame the design devs more than the balance devs though. Coming from my long history of playing GW1, ranger for me in GW2 is dumbed down, lacks most of its original nuance and playstyle customization, and is unrecognizable in the worst kind of way.

I simply had to accept that GW2 at this point is probaby the only suitable game in its genre/sub-genre, and that this ANet team is better at marketing than designing fun, intuitive, and meaningful gameplay.

I just wish my main class wasn’t a shadow of its former self, and as you highlighted, that that people working on the class were more competent at comprehending how the class plays, or even the concept of what a good trait is.

@Puck;

You’re right, I mean, all I can do is speculate. I just prefer to think of it as the industry standards of higher up business decision red tape nonsense dictating patch release periods and how much the dev team is actually allowed to change (aka the balance team could probably make the game entirely different within a single week given free reign) over the assumption that the team is lazy/incompetent/dragging their heels for no reason.

I personally am a CompSci major and prospective hire in the programming industry, but am already jaded by situations like what this one potentially is where you could be the hardest working, most devoted, passionate dev and have massive amounts of changes you could easily make right at your fingertips that would improve the player experience a ton, but your boss tells you that you can’t make any of them because “it doesn’t fit with the current vision of the game to make those changes” or “we aren’t ready to see things like that be changed in the game just yet” or etc.

BUT, because you are the dev and not the shot caller, not only are you thrown into limbo with all of your ideas, but you have to take the blunt force of a community of players calling you lazy and incompetent, and even though you agree with them and want to make those changes, you literally have no way to.

Rambling aside and ultimate point being; I totally agree that someone or some people somewhere are being inefficient and incompetent and the game is suffering lol. I just personally don’t want to place blame on who it is. My general opinion of most programmers I come across and including myself is that left to our own devices, we would probably over-do the amount of things we touch and program because its a love/addiction that carries with it “just one more thing” driving feeling, so I don’t generally throw them under the bus first lol.

LOL, this made my day. In real life they are called stakeholders, and they make you do strange things from time to time. Stick with the compsci major, though. The work is MUCH more enjoyable than school and if you are hardworking and dedicated it is a wonderful field to be in. Always changing and always interesting.

@jcbroe:

What you have said about the inability to implement ideas goes for pretty much any business or company. Having said that, I do not think that it can apply in this scenario however.

As we have seen, A-net is not adverse to making rather big changes as far as specialization and balance changes go. Mesmer, Engineer, Guardian, Necromancer and even Elementalist changes can be called anything but conservative. However, in the case of Ranger they just did not bother.

I am of the opinion that in the case of Ranger something else is afoot. It is not a conspiracy or anything like that, it is just that no one really wants to bother fixing something that can not be fixed. And many things that really could be fixed are brushed off by the standard it is not in our design philosophy for class XYZ, and in this case Ranger

Prime examples:

We need more F abilities to better control the pet – Said it was to complicated for new players, but with the latest patch Thieves and Engineers got another F button. Mesmers will get a new one with the Chronomancer

Permanent stow – Said that the pet was meant to always be out even if it completely ruins the experience for an entire team, ex. skipping in TA and pets activating blossoms. Just having the ability to force stow it even if its at a damage loss for the ranger would go a long way in increasing the reliability of the mechanic.

Single target sustained damage – Anyone remember this golden sentence? How Ranger is designed to be a sustained single target damage class? In a game that absolutely does not support it, with very poor innate defenses and zero bunker busting capacity or boon removal.

Ranger + pet = total other class damage – Damage tied to an AI that even got nerfed a while back for doing too much damage, even though it simply can not hit moving targets.

Think of the whole situation like this, it has fallen to the Ranger to be that one piece of the game that no one actually bothers with. It is sad for us Ranger players but it is what it is.