Guild Wars 2

I can agree to disagree. Pets need some ai polishing, you don’t want to put in any time to get better at controlling them and would prefer nerfing the people who can actually play.

Also i rechecked, i wasn’t referencing your thread, it was the one requesting builds not using 30 Arcana. I checked out your staff ele thread though, saw someone telling you to l2p there too

stale.9785:

The problem with the pet is that a dead pet, or a pet who is being called back to the ranger, then sent out again, is a pet doing zero (0) damage.

0 damage. It’s 40% of our DPS, and half the time, it’s dealinkittenage. This is a major problem.

Its not half the time, you call it back to get it out of an AoE then send it back in, possibly after some re-positioning. Generally its for 2 seconds, 5 at most if you have to re-position, then you are back to doing full damage. Less time if you have a ranged pet. Its the same as any melee player getting out of an AoE

stale.9785:

PVersionP.7042:

I don’t understand why, if you have such a huge problem with the pet mechanic, you want Anet to get rid of the pet rather than just play a different class.

Because it offends me that somehow, between the last game and this one, rangers became entirely dependent upon our “companions” (who still can’t hit moving targets, die immediately in AoE, and generally are significantly worse than the GW1 pets) and forgot how to deal damage.

And, despite the comparison, the other classes don’t have to pay that much attention to their mechanic – none of them have a mechanic that’s actively damaging their ability to do damage – we’ve been blessed with one.

The Spvp build is a regen bunker build – one where the pet is actually fairly decent, because it’s melee. The second you try to fight from range, the pet becomes at best, dead, and at worst, a hindrance.

My other deep desire (aside from getting ele and ranger fixed) is for Anet to STOP balancing the game around 10% of the population. (That number is taken from GW1, not GW2, but I don’t expect it has changed.)

Pets dieing in AoE is a skill issue. I had a hard time with that, too. Try running CoE a bunch of times. Keeping your pet alive vs Alpha really forces you to get better with pulling your pet back at the right times.

Hitting moving targets was never really a problem for me in dungeons. My pets will miss an attack every once in a while, but most enemies don’t move fast enough, especially while CC’d, for that to really impact my dps. Though i think the pets should move while auto attacking.

I never used pets in GW1, mostly because you were either a full beastmaster or you might as well not have a pet. There was very little middle ground, mostly consisting of Rampage as One and Never Rampage Alone. Though, if i’m remembering correctly, those builds had the same problems you are pointing out for GW2 (pet dies too easy, damage not matching up to the current meta).

And the elementalist class mechanic is easily more damaging to your effectiveness if you don’t know how to use it properly (for example: i am a terrible elementalist). And from what i remember in GW1 most elementalist builds had to have some points in energy storage to really be effective.

Anet decided to make the pet an integral part of playing a ranger, which honestly im happy about, because instead of having some small fire-and-forget skill (warrior, necro, guardian, possibly mesmer and engi depending on build), rangers get a companion who requires a decent amount of skill to use properly.

stale.9785:

PVersionP.7042:

Also right now i’m testing the difference in pet dps for every pet type between 0 and 30 BM. I’ll post the results within an hour or 2

That’s actually been done – twice. The threads got deleted for being “unconstructive” probably because it highlights some of the issues we have. The testing in one thread was done in wvw, against a target who was side-stepping. Turns out that simple tactic – hitting a-d-a-d – can nullify almost 90% of pet damage.

Pretty sure the ele thread you’re talking about is also mine, PversionP.

True the pet ai is terrible agaisnt a moving opponent. I was just trying to point out that not fully speccing for your pet’s damage doesn’t hurt your overall dps as much as people say it does, mostly for PvE. I don’t s/tPvP, but i’ve been hearing that rangers are really good there.

So i finished the tests. I used a heavy practice golem. Melee pets started at melee range, spider and devourer started at about 600 range. Tests were done at 0 BM and 30 BM, with no major traits and no F2 skills. I tested almost every type of pet. I also tested felines and birds with the 30% extra pet damage on critical trait (skirmishing 1), pets deal extra condition damage trait (Wilderness Survival 5), and feline crits cause bleeding (Beastmastery 7)

Canine
0 BM 29.02 25.96 26.04 27.31 29.00
30 BM 24.26 23.33 23.28 22.87 21.78

Boar
0 BM 32.76 32.75 31.91 31.94 32.79
30 BM 27.17 28.67 25.49 25.72 27.24

Devourer
0 BM 37.91 38.10 36.29 38.09 37.98
30 BM 30.66 30.53 28.58 30.40 28.73

Spider
0 BM 41.54 40.12 41.96 42.06 41.88
30 BM 37.29 35.25 34.87 36.03 35.93

Feline
0 BM 19.72 18.43 19.41 18.35 18.29
30 BM 14.76 15.89 14.47 14.50 14.16
30 BM+traits 10.99 10.97 12.11 10.83 12.33

Bird
0 BM 30.80 31.15 32.70 29.07 33.97
30 BM 28.19 26.16 23.19 25.79 23.62
30 BM+traits 23.60 20.76 22.80 18.15 20.57

So overall the difference between full beastmaster and no beastmaster is at worst the pet loses about 40-50% of its damage (felines and birds).

But something that never comes up in these discussions: why wouldn’t a ranger want to put some points into BM if we are trying for high damage dealing and BM increases damage? You don’t have to go full beastmaster, and just 15 points increases your pet’s damage and survivability while giving you 2 seconds of quickness on pet swap (quickness nerf made this 1/2 as useful). Going back to my ele comparison from a few posts ago, a quick trip to the ele forum and i find a thread talking about how most builds use 30 Arcana (ele attunement based trait), and all builds benefit from at least 10 points in Arcana. Rangers are the same way. Our class mechanic is very intrusive, so we have to learn to use it to our advantage, even if we aren’t speccing for it

Vox Hollow.2736:

You’d think this whole thing would go down like;

Support Ranger + Glass Cannon Pet = Glass Cannon on other classes
Glass Cannon Ranger + Support Pet = Glass Cannon on other classes

But it’s more like;

Glass Cannon Ranger + Glass Cannon Pet = Glass Cannon on other classes

So if you’re into direct damage, you don’t get to choose what your ratio is.
And if playing glass cannon for two wasn’t hard enough, one of those cannons self-immobilizes every x seconds and the other one is incapable of dodging. Is it really any surprise glass cannon rangers react they way they do, when that’s the kind of thing they have to put up with?

No that kind of makes sense. Switching to a pet with less damage and more support is like any glass cannon switching some of their gear or traits or utility skills to give more support. Its a tactical choice to lower damage in favor of more support.

Also right now i’m testing the difference in pet dps for every pet type between 0 and 30 BM. I’ll post the results within an hour or 2

stale.9785:

PVersionP.7042:

No i get that, what i’m saying is that our overall dps for a glass cannon build isn’t as bad as many people on this forum make it out to be. We aren’t going to match warriors, right now for PvE no one is. And even with no points in BM our pet is still doing damage, 1374 power vs 1674 power isn’t taking away most of the pet’s damage. So overall between the pet and the ranger the total dps is still pretty good.

And in PvE getting all the barrage hits on one target isn’t that difficult with some practice placing the skill right.

You’re missing (or ignoring) that many of us want the pet removed from the damage calculation because the pet is so unreliable.

My ideal pet would be one that does virtually no damage, and simply provides utility.

I lied there, actually. My true ideal would be to roll a ranger and not be forced to take a pet along, but that’s not going to happen. What we may get is a significant change to the damage ratio between ranger and pet, so we’re not dependent upon them for so much of our DPS.

Warriors don’t have to use burst skills to maintain their DPS – necros don’t have to use death shroud. Ele’s aren’t required to spec into Arcana, Guardians can ignore virtues, thieves can roll without depending upon stealth. Rangers are the one class whose core mechanic actually hurts our potential.

EDIT: I don’t play engineer or mesmer, so I can’t make claims for them. Possibly they’re as linked to their profession mechanic as we are, but I doubt it.

Elementalist is the best example. They aren’t required to spec into Arcana, but they are required to make extensive use of their class mechanic. And just like ranger, the ele class mechanic takes some skill to use properly, it isn’t just constant attunement switching and skill spamming, a good ele has to know what all their skills are and when the to switch to each attunement. And since they are always actively using their class mechanic, speccing into Arcana is very useful.

Same thing with ranger, in order to fully realize the potential of the ranger, you have to learn to use the pet properly, even if you aren’t speccing Beastmastery. Using the right pets and knowing when to use F3 to pull them out of combat is a core part of knowing how to play a ranger. Having the pet gives us one of the most difficult learning curves.

I don’t understand why, if you have such a huge problem with the pet mechanic, you want Anet to get rid of the pet rather than just play a different class.

stale.9785:

PVersionP.7042:

Im not really sure what you are talking about, i used to run a glass cannon ranger when i did arah with my guild, and i did plenty of damage. Yes, maybe we arent as effective as some other classes glass cannons, but its still a viable build

It’s the skill coefficients – ours are deliberately lower than the other classes on our weapons, the pet is supposed to make up the difference.

Damage is done by a formula:

Damage done = (weapon damage) * Power * (skill-specific coefficient) / (target’s Armor)

For example – Warrior skill coefficients are 0.7-2.2; Guardian skill coefficients are .55-1.75; Thief have a wide range of .38-3.75 Ranger skill coefficients are .55-.75

So, without a pet, we are always doing less damage – significantly less – than other classes with the same gear/traits/weapons.

EDIT: The coefficients for hunter’s call and barrage are higher, but they’re divided by 16 and 12, respectively. The upshot is if we could get every single arrow of barrage to hit one target, we’d have a nifty damage skill.

The argument about damage skew being 60:40, where I keep asking it to be raised to 90:10 by default, is so that a ranger who ignores his BM trait stills does damage comparable to the other classes. A ranger who specs heavily into his BM trait is giving up his own potential damage, which makes it a fair trade-off.

No i get that, what i’m saying is that our overall dps for a glass cannon build isn’t as bad as many people on this forum make it out to be. We aren’t going to match warriors, right now for PvE no one is. And even with no points in BM our pet is still doing damage, 1374 power vs 1674 power isn’t taking away most of the pet’s damage. So overall between the pet and the ranger the total dps is still pretty good.

And in PvE getting all the barrage hits on one target isn’t that difficult with some practice placing the skill right.

stale.9785:

PVersionP.7042:

So then why is there a problem? Not investing in BM and instead focusing on your own damage would bring the ratio closer to 90:10, where the pet does some damage but is more a source of CC or boons

In this case its all about choosing the right pet:
Blue Moa—AoE protection, AoE heal
Red Moa—AoE fury, AoE heal
Cave Spider—immobilize, weakness, vulnerability
Jungle Spider—2 immobilize
Wolf—fear, cripple, kd
Hyena—2 cripples, 2 kd
Carrion Devourer—with RaO, can easily get up to 20 stacks of might on you

Not how the damage calculations work. If you don’t focus on your pet, instead focusing on yourself, right now you’re doing 60% of your potential damage. It’s why in our glass cannon build, we hit for substantially less than other classes with the same build. The damage on our weapons just isn’t there, because we were balanced around pets.

Im not really sure what you are talking about, i used to run a glass cannon ranger when i did arah with my guild, and i did plenty of damage. Yes, maybe we arent as effective as some other classes glass cannons, but its still a viable build

So then why is there a problem? Not investing in BM and instead focusing on your own damage would bring the ratio closer to 90:10, where the pet does some damage but is more a source of CC or boons

In this case its all about choosing the right pet:
Blue Moa—AoE protection, AoE heal
Red Moa—AoE fury, AoE heal
Cave Spider—immobilize, weakness, vulnerability
Jungle Spider—2 immobilize
Wolf—fear, cripple, kd
Hyena—2 cripples, 2 kd
Carrion Devourer—with RaO, can easily get up to 20 stacks of might on you

I have a question: where is everyone getting this 60:40 damage ratio? Does anyone actually have proof of this or is this just a number we are pulling out of our kitten

Use a carrion devourer and a jungle or cave spider. The devourer works great with RaO: its F2 give might on every tick, and its auto attack gives 2 stacks. The spiders have immobilize and a poison field, and either another immobilize or weakness/vulnerability. And they are both ranged so its easier to keep them out of AoE’s

Kreaven.3172:

solrik.6028:

Devs said they will not change it…

Why did you make a ranger?

Many (not all) but many make rangers because they like the idea of using SB/LB.

why don’t you just ignore the pet?