Guild Wars 2

“Go for the Eyes: Fixed an issue that allowed this ability to trigger blindness at an incredibly fast rate. This trait now has a 12-second internal cooldown.”

Like…the only reason to use this trait really was using it with Birds…

and that’s pretty much out the window now.

They sure do love placing 12-second ICDs on Ranger traits. Shocked that they didn’t place an ICD on Wilting Strike, too. Ah, who am I kidding. They’ll add the ICD on that for us for X-mas. Will be our gift =3

I think it should also be locked out behind CAF, just to be sure.

No changes to staff #1, or AF regen, NOT EVEN ADRESSED.

Can this company become even more of a joke?

Some rangers with godly APM used to F2+F3 with dogs and were able to spam the blinds.
Might be the reason.

LughLongArm.5460:

Some rangers with godly APM used to F2+F3 with dogs and were able to spam the blinds.
Might be the reason.

Typical that rather than fix the bug they slap an ICD for the rest of us. Same as Clarion Bond being abused through tonics…

I’m not even surprised anymore.

Traps & Shouts go unaddressed.
Staff 1 & AF generation don’t get looked at.

But a useful trait gets nerfed.

Again.

I assumed there will be nerfs. So I’m not disappointed. Another quality balance patch by anet that didn’t balance any other professions(except reducing visual noise and updating skill facts) except only Rangers with 1 nerf and 2 bug fix.

Not to say that I’m not thankful for this, but it’s just that they left everything else left in the dust that are completely in ruins like spirits and AF generation.

Coupled with their silence, this only gives the ranger community and others to think of the worst case scenarios and theories like :
Anet has kittened up sense of priority with balancing
Can Anet show any less contempt and hatred against Rangers
Anet loves to throw stuff and leave it as it is see if it sticks

And all of this while they focus, invest time in and spend resources for this ESL bullkitten that is just a complete failure(2k views? in twitch vs 100k that other e-sport games pull) and balance the whole kittening game to this ESL spotlight including PvE that has absolutely no relevance to anything PvP related.

Everything is a mess. But hey, I didn’t have to change any of my Ranger/Druid build after this patch so I guess I should be so thankful.

oshilator.4681:

I’m not even surprised anymore.

FriendlyInvader.3126:

oshilator.4681:

I’m not even surprised anymore.

Man not only that but they fixed the “bug” with Bristleback health but didnt even look at its problem with landing any of its attacks.

I remeber coming on here the day of the Druid beta weekend. For the most part everyone was happy, enjoying Druid, some weren’t but that’s to be expected. Now all I see is a land of salt and tears, as rangers are huddled in their trenches, trying to survive the merciless onslaught that is the ANET nerf machine….how did it come to this?

Why?
That’s like, a blind every 4 seconds or so assuming the attack hits.
There was nothing gamebreaking about that.
Now its effectively worthless.

I told you then the winter was coming… And you didn’t listen.
Now you must face the white walkers.

hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahaha
the only thing that keeps me playing ranger is kudzu and the dreamer , if only i knew what to do with my legendary shortbow , thieves are even in worse case

TheLastNobody.8319:

I remeber coming on here the day of the Druid beta weekend. For the most part everyone was happy, enjoying Druid, some weren’t but that’s to be expected. Now all I see is a land of salt and tears, as rangers are huddled in their trenches, trying to survive the merciless onslaught that is the ANET nerf machine….how did it come to this?

How did it come to this? Come to this… It’s been here for about 3 years, we’re trying to get rid of it.

Go for the Eyes: Fixed an issue that allowed this ability to trigger blindness at an incredibly fast rate. This trait now has a 12-second internal cooldown.

“Incredibly Fast Rate” – TIL Incredibly fast is once every 4s

It was obvious when they revealed the druid spec that it would be a long road of nerf incoming :
- Anet fear heal in GW2, they even fear the potential effectiveness of a necro life siphon
- Transform are either overpowered or just a bad choice in GW2, still they released the “avatar”.
- Transform skill are always clunky to use but they don’t care since all that matter is potential.

So based on the fact that the avatar is a transform, that mainly heal, it’s was bound to be considered as overpowered and a first priority target for nerf. But, since it’s bad to directly nerf the potential threat they just nerf what’s around the threat (aka : the traits).

Let’s be frank, if they only removed the stupid cool down on Invigorating bond the ranger with the druid staff would have been a capable healer on par with what the druid do right now. (maybe even better since we would have probably focused on giving regeneration and healing with Invigorating bond.

Ryan.9387:

Go for the Eyes: Fixed an issue that allowed this ability to trigger blindness at an incredibly fast rate. This trait now has a 12-second internal cooldown.

“Incredibly Fast Rate” – TIL Incredibly fast is once every 4s

There was an actual issue with it. Sol was showing it off on his last stream. A certain trait and pet combination with this trait made the pet blind with every attack.

Regardless, I feel like we all should have been anticipating this change since the Core Spec patch, and it was mentioned numerous times in passing that an ICD would be added to this trait.

It’s just that, in typical ANet fashion, the trait finally got the nerf treatment we expected so far in the future that it’s both inconsequential to the metagame (PvP) AND painful to witness because it’s one of those “why now” sort of changes.

So, basically, they slapped a 12s ICD on a trait because they couldn’t be bothered to program it so it would proc a bit after to prevent exploits. Awesome.

Yea, this really only was an issue with people exploiting a bug and people using the f2 cancel to get more blinds off, which isn’t intended so it’s not a bad nerf. It’s just now you can’t get more blinds with eagle f2 now with a 12 sec ICD which was rather nice.

Oh well

Wondrouswall.7169:

So, basically, they slapped a 12s ICD on a trait because they couldn’t be bothered to program it so it would proc a bit after to prevent exploits. Awesome.

Why fix what you can just lazily nerf?

oshilator.4681:

Wondrouswall.7169:

So, basically, they slapped a 12s ICD on a trait because they couldn’t be bothered to program it so it would proc a bit after to prevent exploits. Awesome.

Why fix what you can just lazily nerf?

This.

They can’t fix the core issue, so taking the easy way out is the way to do it @ Anet.

OGDeadHead.8326:

oshilator.4681:

Wondrouswall.7169:

So, basically, they slapped a 12s ICD on a trait because they couldn’t be bothered to program it so it would proc a bit after to prevent exploits. Awesome.

Why fix what you can just lazily nerf?

This.

They can’t fix the core issue, so taking the easy way out is the way to do it @ Anet.

Meanwhile, Staff still needs a LOT of work. AF is, well, you know.
Shouts are near worthless.
Traps aren’t much better.

But hey, how about them e-sports?

oshilator.4681:

I’m not even surprised anymore.

It should have been 8 seconds, not 12. Same with lingering light but what ever, just another nerf.

Fed up of this, time to change profession.

This adds another layer of unreliability to rangers skills, don’t you devs think we have to deal with enough crap? AI positioning vs extremely mobile classes with huge aoe cleave, soft and hard cc everywhere/ slow animations and aftercasts/ terrain/ very limited ways to active controlling pet behaviour/ huge death penaly/ add to that player mistakes and theres a abysmal difference to every other class. I wonder how are these design decisions made, and if they even consider these aspects…

Birds can’t cast their f2 every 4 secs, there’s a huge aftercast and animation delay, but sure it’s less than 12 seconds… This nerfs petswap and was completely uncalled for.

Ryan.9387:

Go for the Eyes: Fixed an issue that allowed this ability to trigger blindness at an incredibly fast rate. This trait now has a 12-second internal cooldown.

“Incredibly Fast Rate” – TIL Incredibly fast is once every 4s

And dont let us forget. Ele can spam blinds with sandstorm faster than 4 seconds. And ranger could not spam it every 4 seconds, its was 4.5 seconds + 0,5 s casttime, strong, but not broken. Hmm did i forgot the thief with pistol 5? I have no problem with balancing, but just shaving one class is not called balancing. Is our dev the only one who should nerf things? Maybe 12 is our devs favorite number.

Finally they fixed this bug, 12 second ICD doesn’t affect much if anything.

Bristleback bug fix might become a problem, will have to wait and see.

Sol.4310:

Finally they fixed this bug, 12 second ICD doesn’t affect much if anything.

Cool. Then we can agree they should reverse it, since it doesn’t affect much if anything.

Playing other profession more, one patch at a time…

If we’re counting bugs:

1. Bristleback HP nerfed.
2. Go for the Eyes nerfed.
3. Ancestral Grace bugged.
4. Sublime Conversion bugged.

That’s four out of seven ‘fixes’ jacked or nerfed. Not good odds. Even for the ranger/druid NERF IT patch updates, it’s a bit extreme.

Curring.9752:

It should have been 8 seconds, not 12. Same with lingering light but what ever, just another nerf.

Fed up of this, time to change profession.

Should have been nothing just the same as it was because it wasn’t an issue.

Are there any builds that can spam blind quicker than 4s? Just thinking about “balance”.

(Any class)

Could have just made it 4sec cd I would think.

But it really doesn’t matter cause not that many using birds atm right or no?

“We strongly believe that regular balance updates are one of the key pillars of building a successful competitive game. As such, prior to each season, there will be a balance update. League play will generally begin about two weeks after a balance update to ensure that the metagame has stabilized in an appropriate manner. Balance will be closely monitored throughout the season with the goal of having solid balance going into the postseason tournaments.”

Did… did I finally manage to travel through time?

Sicarius.4639:

Are there any builds that can spam blind quicker than 4s? Just thinking about “balance”.

(Any class)

You can’t even spam it on cooldown in most situations anyway.

Players move around too much and birds have such low life pools that they either die or get swapped out frequently when a lot of aoe’s get thrown around.

Like I said above, there is no “balance issue”. Rangers were nearly non-existent in serious pvp prior to the druid while having months and months of the old GFtE.

Substance E.4852:

Sicarius.4639:

Are there any builds that can spam blind quicker than 4s? Just thinking about “balance”.

(Any class)

You can’t even spam it on cooldown in most situations anyway.

Players move around too much and birds have such low life pools that they either die or get swapped out frequently when a lot of aoe’s get thrown around.

Like I said above, there is no “balance issue”. Rangers were nearly non-existent in serious pvp prior to the druid while having months and months of the old GFtE.

I was asking more about other classes, my friend mentioned Thieves have (maybe had) something similar that may be a perma-blind build although he doesn’t run Thief very often and was wondering if anyone had more info on similar builds. Would be a bit of a kick in the proverbial chestnuts if this was the case.

I was going thru the patchnotes, when I noticed that it has changes to classes, I got happy. Scrolled down with a smile on my face and thinking, this is it. This is when I come back to my Ranger and feel…goood! Then I actually start laughing, I mean out loud laughing, when I noticed its mostly some nerfs.

It was actually changed because if you used F2 F3 F1 virtually at the same time you could PERMA blind. Like in the second the pet got in range nearby enemies would have 45 seconds of blind and would never be able to attack. Not even like quickness rapid fire could land a hit through the blinds.

Wondrouswall.7169:

So, basically, they slapped a 12s ICD on a trait because they couldn’t be bothered to program it so it would proc a bit after to prevent exploits. Awesome.

You my Friend are 100% correct.

Justine.6351:

Could have just made it 4sec cd I would think.

But it really doesn’t matter cause not that many using birds atm right or no?

It probably has to do with birds as I would trait this and keep almost 100% blindness on targets which is kinda OP.

I will miss it.

But then again I gave up all hope on my druid shortly after it came out and put it into the closet of " Nerfed to death ". It is highly unlikely that my druid will ever see the light of day again.

Merrex.5384:

It probably has to do with birds as I would trait this and keep almost 100% blindness on targets which is kinda OP.

Doubtful as it wasn’t OP for the months and months it’s existed.

No one’s complained about Ranger pets since they fixed the glitch with BW that let it bypass virtually every defense mechanism.

Literally the only change the trait/pet combo ever needed was maybe some kind of visual distinction between the birds’ auto attacks and the F2 attack so an enemy could know when to dodge.

This one hurts my Ranger a lot. I used birds solely because of this in PVE and now it’s over. I know this was 100% a fix for PVP and I completely understand why it was need FOR PVP but kitten why don’t you split your wanna be e-sport builds from PvE again?

Druid needs to be balanced for PVP so it can’t be a heal spammer in PvE which is what it’s for. Fix your kitten.

It didn’t need a 12s cooldown though. 4-5 would have prevented the exploit spam while keeping it viable with birds.

This is just another hamfisted, lunchbreak ‘hotfix’ akin to the butchering of WHaO before it got punched back up or with what they did to Lingering Light.

They could have made it on like 6sec icd with the eagle and for the rest of the pets have something like a 12 sec ICD and it would be perfect, they just do things across the board without thinking of individual scenarios.

I understand why they did it , just the way they did it was not great.

Aidenwolf.5964:

This one hurts my Ranger a lot. I used birds solely because of this in PVE and now it’s over. I know this was 100% a fix for PVP and I completely understand why it was need FOR PVP but kitten why don’t you split your wanna be e-sport builds from PvE again?

Druid needs to be balanced for PVP so it can’t be a heal spammer in PvE which is what it’s for. Fix your kitten.

This is actually really important and a great point, because of druid’s style of play. If it was any other way it wouldn’t matter as much but for the druid’s purpose of team/group support and healing sustain.

If you nerf these aspects more than they already have been, then you ruin it’s use in PvE as well.

This is why as they move closer to a “trinity” based class environment without truly being a trinity , you’ll only run into this issue more and more and it will only get worse.

12 sec ICD is very wrong. It’s not dependable or in any way reliable. No one is going to use a blind trait that only works every 12 seconds. The whole point of this trait was to allow us to occasionally blind trash mobs in PvE. It was still less effective than Thief’s blinds but still made it viable and usable.
If those PVP’ers were exploiting it with canines that somehow were able to spam it non-stop, then address that or make the ICD at 4 seconds because that was around the F2 CD that birds have with their F2 skill(4.75s traited) and hence made them most effective with this trait.

It’s very obvious that Anet was fine with using this trait with traited bird’s short F2 skills otherwise they would’ve increased the F2 CD or placed an ICD much earlier. Now after this patch they made it not workable even with birds.

Again, knee jerk reaction that led to a huge unjustified nerf, Anet.

Ofir.2405:

Man not only that but they fixed the “bug” with Bristleback health but didnt even look at its problem with landing any of its attacks.

So much this.

Let’s be brutally honest: ANet doesn’t know how to fix certain bugs or issues. Instead, they’ll make the ability in question moot . . . or ignore it.

They’ve even admitted it.

For example, the forum search engine and top page bug is ongoing. Why? Because the guy who made the forum quit. So, instead of creating a new forum and hiring a new guy, they let this issue sit for over three years now.

That is the reason many of the issues we see still exist.

They have no idea how to fix them. And previous attempts to ‘fix’ issues created even more bugs.

But God forbid someone dies in PvP to a ranger or druid . . . that’ll get ‘fixed’ in record time.