Guild Wars 2

I really love the idea of the melee ranger, especially with the incredibly evasiveness and mobility of sword/dagger. The only problem is that the 2 of the 3 sword skills don’t work right most of the time.

The sword’s 3 skill, Serpent Strike, is supposed to evade in a semi circle to get behind your target. It worked perfectly in all of the the BWEs, but now it will sometimes send you straight out to the right and put you out of range of your target instead of behind them. This also happens for the Thief’s sword/dagger 3 skill.

The worst part is the sword’s 1 skill chain. At first I thought this skill was worthless. The first attack is a normal melee range attack, then the next attack is a small ranged leap that cripples the opponent, putting you even closer in melee range because they are slowed. Finally, the last attack is a slightly longer ranged leap that gives your pet might. However, the leap is completely worthless because you are already in melee range AND they are slowed.

Later, I found out that this skill chain is much worse than that, because it is also very bugged. Because the second and third skills in the chain are short range leaps, and the first attack is just a basic attack that goes pretty quick, if a target is running away from you, your character will repeatedly leap after them. Since you can’t move or do any other actions while your character is leaping you get stuck leaping at them over and over, unable to move, loot, or revive teammates.

I think the Ranger’s 1 skill for the one-handed sword needs to be changed to something like:
Pounce (430 range leap (or farther :O), without the pet might. gives a much needed gap closer)
-> Kick (still cripples target, but normal melee range instead of a leap)
-> Slash (a normal melee ranged attack that grants your pet might)

Reorganizing the skill like this will give the melee ranger a much needed gap closer without messing any of their other really fun skills, and it also eliminates the annoying leap loop bug.

TL;DR: Ranger 1 skill on the sword is not only worthless, but also broken and gets you stuck in a loop of leaping at your target over and over and should be changed.

I have noticed the ‘jump around and turn away from your foe’ bug on the Thief (sword/knive) nr3. skill as well last night…

I do want to mention that having pounce as a nr.1 skill may well be annoying, while the gap opener is nice as a first choice skill, do be aware that the automatic cycling can kick in the moment you sellect a target, giving you no time to actually decide if it is the course of action you want to take at that moment. I can emagine numerous occations where it’s ‘not’ the thing you want to do, and while i know you can turn this functionality off in the option, it may well be alot confusing to new users.

While i do not entirely understand how the jump cycle works (i may test this tonight on my ranger), it may be enough to use the following order to stop the cycle?
1. slash
2. pounce
3. kick

Arghore.8340:

I have noticed the ‘jump around and turn away from your foe’ bug on the Thief (sword/knive) nr3. skill as well last night…

I do want to mention that having pounce as a nr.1 skill may well be annoying, while the gap opener is nice as a first choice skill, do be aware that the automatic cycling can kick in the moment you sellect a target, giving you no time to actually decide if it is the course of action you want to take at that moment. I can emagine numerous occations where it’s ‘not’ the thing you want to do, and while i know you can turn this functionality off in the option, it may well be alot confusing to new users.

While i do not entirely understand how the jump cycle works (i may test this tonight on my ranger), it may be enough to use the following order to stop the cycle?
1. slash
2. pounce
3. kick

I think the leap should be the first attack in the chain because it is their only gap closer. So if you want to leap to someone the only way to do so is to hit them with the first skill in the chain, but if you hit them with that you don’t need the gap closer anymore. Yes, you will have to make sure where you leap won’t get you killed, but that is true for most melee classes.

There is also an option to stop auto attacking on target swap. But even if you have that off, when you swap targets you keep auto attacking your previous target until you use another skill on the new target.

Something just don’t feel right with the 1-hand sword skills to ranger.
I do like the mobility with the skills but the first skill just feels backwards or something.
And I hate that I can’t move around when I do the kick attack and the launch attack.
It makes you feel so “locked”, That in my opinion is the opposite what you should feel
with 1-hand sword on ranger. Would be much better with a leap first,
then 2 more attacks after it in the chain, but you should be able to move around wile they are active.

@Libix, i think i know why it feels so ‘static’, in the original skillset for the sword, the ‘kick’ had a knockback, which in turn made the Pounce realy usefull. So the sword would work:
1. Slash your foe.
2. Kick your foe backwards.
3. Jump after your foe.

And that would just cycle, it was great fun but realy overpowered, as you could basically neutralize any target with just the nr.1 skill… but removing this knockback makes the first 2 skills ‘static’ and the pounce somewhat questionable in usefullness…

After giving it some more thought and looking at the sword in total, perhaps a solution lies in totally mixing the skills around. I am thinking about the following:

1. Slash (slash at your foe)
→ Kick (kick at your foe, apply cripple)
→> Serpent Strike. (circle around your foe, poison)
2. Hornet Sting (evade backwards, apply cripple)
→ Matriach leap (jump at your foe, strike them)
3. Pounce (jump at your foe, give your pet might, (knock foe down 2sec, if hit from behind?))

This puts all the truely ‘melee’ range skills on 1, and even though you stay in close proximity of the foe, serpent strike gives a very mobile feel. Hornet sting gives a way to back out quickly, and then gives you 2 options: either just to strike them and get a leap combofinisher, or to strike&knockdown&might (which is on a longer cooldown now).

Now if you combine this with a knife, which has a throw and a evade backwards, you also have a way to get back into the fight with the pounce, and pounce also gives a gapcloser.

1. Prevents/hinders movement during the chain, start an attack sequence and you frequently get stuck in place for a few seconds, it is almost impossible to strafe as well due to the jump components on attacks 2 and 3.

2. Prevents dodge going off 90% of the time, this basically kills 1hand sword dead, the attack chain kills dodge input and when it does go off you often end up back next to the target because of the jump pulling you back in.

3. Serpents Strike is not working properly a good portion of the time. It often moves me too far from the target during the dodge roll and the subsequent poison attack misses.

Arghore.8340:

After giving it some more thought and looking at the sword in total, perhaps a solution lies in totally mixing the skills around. I am thinking about the following:

1. Slash (slash at your foe)
-> Kick (kick at your foe, apply cripple)
->> Serpent Strike. (circle around your foe, poison)
2. Hornet Sting (evade backwards, apply cripple)
-> Matriach leap (jump at your foe, strike them)
3. Pounce (jump at your foe, give your pet might, (knock foe down 2sec, if hit from behind?))

That seems like a good fix as well, but Pounce on 3 would have to give multiple stacks of might to make up for it not being spammable

@Onoz, that or a longer duration, or it could be compensated by adding another effect, like the knockdown f/e… but i do agree a new setup would have to be balanced a bit in regards to the new cooldowns etc…

Same basically goes for ‘Serpent Strike’ the skill that originally had a long cooldown and is now on a spam sequence. It would have to have it’s damaged reduced, and the poison duration reduced aswell. A 2 second poison (similar to the cripple on kick) would likely already mean that the chain itself can keep a constant cripple&poison on the target.