Showing Highly Rated Posts By Castaliea.3156:
The ANet that made GW is not the ANet that currently makes GW2.
Hell, you can even spot the difference of design philosophies between when they marketed GW2 and now. Such a 180 they did.
I main’d Ranger for something like 6 years in GW and loved it. One year into GW2 and as hard as I try to love the Ranger I just can’t. I think about Ranger when I’m on my Mesmer. I think about Ranger when I’m on my Thief. Despite all thought however I just cannot bring myself to log into it anymore. I’ll list my major problems with the class best I can and how I’d personally like to see them fixed. Most of these issues go very deep into the profession’s design so there is no real easy fix for them but I’ll start with the easy ones.
My first problem is one of the most simple. Rapid Fire. Rapid Fire as a skill makes no sense. A Longbow is a slow firing, and powerful weapon that specializes in accurate and deadly strikes from a long distance. Why then is there a skill on the Longbow that literally exactly emulates a Shortbow? There shouldn’t be. Many times I’ve suggested changing this skill to something like Triple Shot from GW1.
Triple Shot: Charge up an attack that simultaneously fires 3 arrows at your target. The longer the charge the more damage.
Max charge time – 2 1/2s
Max Base Damage – Full charge = 125% RF damage. Half charge = 75% RF damage. Lowest = 50% RF damage.
Why this? I feel this change would go a long way to increasing bow DPS via reduced channel and slightly increased overall damage while it also very nicely combos with the recent Hunter’s Shot update as well. It also adds in that flare to the Longbow it’s currently lacking. There isn’t that skill you’re excited to use, everything is very normal and nonchalant or in RF’s case, worrisome. The skill icon doesn’t even need to be changed as it’s already 3 arrows.
Next up on my list of things that keep me alienated from my beloved class is the Sword.
I dislike almost everything about this weapon. Why? Every skill on this weapon is about auto controlling your character. Main attack roots and actually prevents dodging, Hornet’s is too slow to be used as a real evade and Serpent’s Strike misses anything that moves. I think while designing this weapon we got too fancy and sacrificed actual practicality. What I’d like to see instead of these skills are ones more like these;
Slot 1-
Slash: Slash your foe. (Current)
Reverse Slash: Quickly slash your foe in the opposite direction crippling them. (Very fast activation time.)
Debilitating Stab: Powerfully stab your foe dealing more damage per condition on your foe. (Slower, just like thief’s sword final strike.)
Slot 2-
Hornet’s Sting: Parry incoming attacks. If an attack in melee range is blocked strike your foe inciting Hornets to attack them inflicting multiple stacks of Torment.
Slot 3-
Serpent’s Strike: Evade attacks while quickly dashing along the ground at your target to strike with a poisoning blow.
Leap Finisher.
These changes address the major issues with sword rooting and ineffective evades in a couple of ways. First, redoing the entire first weapon chain which honestly should have been done when the skills were changed in development. Second it addresses the intended use for Hornet’s by removing the clunky, slow evade in favor of a strait block. (Many people like the dual leap of the skill but bear with me.) Finally Serpent’s strike becomes more of a quick slide & stab greatly increasing its reliability and keeping the leap finisher from Monarch’s Leap. The weapon as a whole becomes more of a condition damage melee weapon with great survivability via blocks and evades.
Third up on my list is the Axe. I originally loved the idea of throwing axes but after a year of it I honestly can’t stand them, especially with the recent Shortbow nerf. To me the axe is rather weak and serves no purpose. I’d like to see it switched back to a proper melee weapon to compliment the sword but making sure it still has the unique ranger feel.
Slot 1-
Hack: Hack at your foe inflicting vulnerability.
Chop: Chop your foe, again inflicting vulnerability.
Splitblade: Attack your foe dealing additional damage for each boon on them.
Slot 2-
Pure Strike: Strike your foe dealing damage and removing a boon. If you’re foe still has a boon deal 50% more damage.
Slot 3-
Winter’s Bite: Attack and chill your foe. If you’re foe has 2 or more boons Chill lasts twice as long.
Chill: 3s
These changes, when applied to the complete lack of any boon hate on the Ranger, stand out very well to class as a whole. It also brings back the missing classic enchantment hate effects of skills from the original GW helping to give the Ranger some more purpose. Boons are currently very powerful but there is not a lot of ways to counter them, especially for a Ranger. As a class we never specialized in removing them but we sure made life hell for anyone with them.
You can hate SoR all you want, but this server’s undeniable resilience and method of growth commands respect. It didn’t buy its way to the top. It didn’t receive a sudden influx of hundreds of people overnight. It remained in the shadow of JQ and others for months. The only thing SoR bought was time.
If you’re to loathe SoR, at least do so on the merits it deserves rather than the ones others rationalize out of thin air to make themselves feel better.
The only thing I hate SoR for, and me make this abundantly clear, is the blatant obliviousness of seemingly your entire server to it’s sheer numbers of WvW’ers. I constantly hear SoR say they don’t zerg when you guys have without doubt the largest zergs of any of the 3 servers. Nothing about any SoR post here “commands respect” when all you’ve done is come in here show what complete air-head ignorant players you are. You can’t even admit you have larger WvW numbers now because I’m sure that’d just detract from your egos. I’ve seen a few nice moves on your server’s part but I’ve aslo seen a massive increase in players which I still haven’t even come close to seeing from JQ recently. You guys deserve #1, as a JQ player I admit that, but not for any of the reasons I’ve heard from this post. No one here is saying “You bought players, you suck, you don’t deserve it” except for who? You.
Did you guys(SoR) come on here and say “OMG, geat job SoR! It was hard and long awaited but we finally did it with the help of all our WvW’ers!!”? No. That would’ve been respectful. You came on here, called out 2 other servers who you very obviously have a very deep-seeded hatred for, not for what they did to you, but because you were simply losing a numbers game to them. When you finally did win the numbers game and got your long awaited “#1” the first thing you do is brag about how godly you are, call out 2 other servers, and dogmatically deny anything on your server could’ve possibly changed, and even if it had it was obviously due to what is frankly, a very poor, youtube video. That’s not only insulting to all other servers, but also every single SoR invader who you completely and arrogantly did not thank for their contribution to your new rank and you “command respect”? That’s a joke.