Guild Wars 2

Zeara.3870:

I run a bow as a crit/cond hybrid, works well with sword/sword or sword shield as second.

Run sigil of earth for 60% on crit (all the time ) to proc a stack of bleeding as well.

What utility skills do you slot?

Hi all,

I’m starting a warrior. I primarily WvW. Are there any bow centric builds out there? What secondary weapons do you suggest?

If this is a hopeless cause, let me know.

Thanks!

Solandri.9640:

Holland.9351:

Indoles.1467:

it didn’t get nerfed, just a tooltip error.

next update:
- Trap Potency now applies the proper amount of condition duration as implied by the tooltip.

That’s pretty much why I stopped submitting tooltip bug reports.

Every bug I submitted where the actual behavior was better than the tooltip, they adjusted the behavior down to match what the tooltip said, making the poorer value the “correct” value.

Almost every bug I submitted where the actual behavior was worse than the tooltip, they adjusted the tooltip down to make the poorer value the “correct” value. The lone exception was the jungle stalker’s mighty roar. Tooltip said 5 stacks of might, it gave 5 underwater, but only 2 on land. That one they (eventually) fixed to make it 5 stacks on land.

I’d bookmark this thread. There’s no reason for them to have touched the text on this tooltip. So the fact that it was changed probably means they’re at least considering nerfing it. It’d be a really odd thing to do though because the current meta (for most classes including ranger) is that power builds are better than condition builds. If anything they need to be making condition builds stronger to encourage build diversity.

It worries me too that the tooltip was changed at all.

So far, two people have tested it with two different conclusions. Has anyone else tested it? I’m out of town for a few more days and can’t.

Boxwin.2098:

unlikeyou.8452:

Phoebe Ascension.8437:

Traps were already useless without that old trait. With the new nerf, basically the chill/burn trap will only apply 1 sec of burn and not 2 sec (rounded down). Basically UTTERLY useless. And traps are already worse then necro wells.

Anet this patch was a disappointment, but another massively uncalled, undeserved stealth nerf really is the worst you did so far. I sincerely hope you come in here, apologizing and saying it’s a bug rather then stealth nerf, but my hopes are pretty low.

I’m trying to tell you that there has been no nerf from my own testing. Just a mistake on the trait description. The skill descriptions of the traps are showing and the actual effects continue to have a 100% increase of condition duration. I have now tested all 4 traps numerous times and they all are acting just as they did before this update.

Use Vipers Nest, the increase is only 50%, the problem with using a 1s duration timer is that 50% takes you to 1.5 which will be rounded upwards to 2s a tick. With all the other traps, the trait says 50%, the tool-tip says 50% and the applied condition is only there 50% longer.

Test everything before making an uninformed post please…

I wonder if this was a bug or intentional … it needs to be fixed.

Bumped

Don’t want this thread to get lost in the shuffle. A stealth nerf to trap build ….. if true, a dev response would be nice.

Chopps.5047:

Pendleton.6385:

Also, if you prefer sb or axe …. use it. Don’t let others define your play style. This game is not as hard as people like to pretend it is. You seem like a smart person …. you’ll do fine in a dungeon.

Ahem, I use mainhand axe (my dungeon loadout is sword/axe and axe/warhorn). I just don’t think it’s a wise choice to fight mobs in PvE with mainhand axe and a condition build. It just takes too long. And if it’s a single target, well, forget about it. You’ll be throwing axes all day.

Mainhand axe is only good against mobs. Besides, OP wants to use bows. I know it by reading his posts.

I said axe and sb because that’s what he wrote in his post. Don’t get so defensive. I didn’t even quote you.

That said …. my point stands.

Also, if you prefer sb or axe …. use it. Don’t let others define your play style. This game is not as hard as people like to pretend it is. You seem like a smart person …. you’ll do fine in a dungeon.

It increases your precision and others in range of you. It’s a group buff.

Sounds like a fun and exciting guild.

“You better be good …”
“You have to be better than good …”
“Convince me …”

What is this … America’s Next Great Guild Member.

Give me a break. Someone needs to go outside a little more.

Chopps.5047:

Kai.9182:

To be honest this is disgusting that an employee would go to such an effort to attempt to ruin what is obviously a GvG.
Whether or not GvG belongs in WvW is irrelevant, this is blatant aggression towards a certain part of the Guild Wars 2 community and should not be tolerated.

What did the dev do to ruin it? I saw nothing bad in those pictures, honestly. What did he do to impede your progress?

Hi Chopps. I’m not a GvG’er. I normally solo roam. I watched the video. I think the issue is more his standing in the middle of the fight for a decent amount of time and not moving. Then, popping his Anet tag and so forth.

I don’t really have a horse in this race … but it did seem at the very least unprofessional.

As with any business, your perception and image to your customer base is very important.

Durzlla.6295:

Serraphin Storm.2369:

The issue isn’t that they can’t do it the issue is that it would make pets (rangers) Op.
Pets would hit with every attack you couldn’t use positioning avoid hits. Without a block or use of evade they would hit you every time. You wouldn’t be able to out run or juke them.

Think back to before the lowered pet leashing to all the times the a player out ran or lose you but you pet was on their butt. The difference would be they would continue to take damage every set of the way.

Oh no, the horrors, our pets would actually land attacks, you know, sorta like how were balanced around 100% uptime, you know that mythical thing that happens like once in PvP if you have immobs…

And pet leashing was an issue because you could use your pet in a way that you were contributing to a fight (and when you’re on TS with friends who are calling out the target that needs to die and tell you when you need to fear etc) while you’re able to cap a totally different point with no draw backs really.

+100

Completely agree. Seems the pet fix isn’t as hard after all.

thefantasticg.3984:

Not seeing this as a bug, still. Haven’t seen a change what-so-ever. Working as intended. Get use to be a 2nd class citizen in this game if you’re a ranger. Our kitten -poor pet should be proof enough of that.

Do you mean you’re not seeing it as a bug because you think it’s intentional?

I certainly hope it’s a bug and not intentional.

I’ve been playing ranger since launch so I totally get the 2nd class citizen argument.

ChillyChinaman.6057:

Setun.4368:

Pendleton.6385:

Has anyone posted this in the official bug forum?

MT, poison trap, torch 5, and spirits only hitting 3 has to be a bug. This makes me wonder even more about the randomness of the spotter trait.

How can something like this pass QA?

I wonder if this is a stealth nerf to the aoe cap / cleave cap, as my ranger, guardian, and warrior cleave moves only hit 3 people instead of 5

Cleave only hits 3 people to begin with.

MT, poison trap, spirits, and torch 5 aren’t cleaves. They should be hitting up to 5 people.

Has anyone posted this in the official bug forum?

MT, poison trap, torch 5, and spirits only hitting 3 has to be a bug. This makes me wonder even more about the randomness of the spotter trait.

How can something like this pass QA?

noobftw.9654:

Pendleton.6385:

I’m biased to ranger … I won’t go over all the differences because others have already done it.

For me, the best part of playing a ranger is being considered an easy target. If you’re a decent player, it will work to your advantage.

A typical scenario:

Player will see a ranger and think of him as an easy kill or a quick bag. I find they run at you in a half hazard manner without the caution they would give another class. When you survive their assault and stack bleeds, conditions, and other steady damage … they usually panic and this leads to their death.

Personally, I find delight in this. It’s like debating a topic and using someone’s point against them.

This isn’t always the case but I find it happens a lot.

Some players seem to attach a stigma to being downed by a ranger (like embarrassed or something) … use it to your advantage : )

My two cents about roaming with a ranger and why it’s fun.

^ Ranger is and was the top tier PVP class now and before the patch. Only difference is the skill cap is lowered even more (I am looking at you, spirit ranger). As long as you have the right build and can master sword #2 as gap opener/closer or apply leap on healing spring if you ever use em ,you are a good ranger.

I am talking about WvW not s/tPVP. WvW is a completely different animal. Rangers are looked at as free loot in WvW by most players. It’s a sad fact. However, I don’t agree with it but they do.

Also … off topic but in WvW, a spirit ranger’s spirits are easily destroyed with barely 8k health points.

I’m biased to ranger … I won’t go over all the differences because others have already done it.

For me, the best part of playing a ranger is being considered an easy target. If you’re a decent player, it will work to your advantage.

A typical scenario:

Player will see a ranger and think of him as an easy kill or a quick bag. I find they run at you in a half hazard manner without the caution they would give another class. When you survive their assault and stack bleeds, conditions, and other steady damage … they usually panic and this leads to their death.

Personally, I find delight in this. It’s like debating a topic and using someone’s point against them.

This isn’t always the case but I find it happens a lot.

Some players seem to attach a stigma to being downed by a ranger (like embarrassed or something) … use it to your advantage : )

My two cents about roaming with a ranger and why it’s fun.

WhiteAndMilky.2514:

I joined SoR because everyone said they were rp server in wvw. And now they yell at me anytime they see me harvesting or wearing my pirate costume on the boats inside bay!

Whether this is a troll post or not …. this is by far one of the funniest posts I’ve read in a while.

It made me laugh at work when I read it. Then, it made me laugh just thinking about it throughout the day (including a meeting where I just randomly laughed to everyone else’s befuddlement).

I keep picturing some character dressed like a pirate roleplaying with other NPCs while other players run by in zergs wondering what the heck he’s doing. Commanders yelling at him. He is telling them that he’s fixing the ships in the bay or something ridiculous.

Meanwhile, he’s walking the bay saying Arrrrgh and stuff … while listening to the soundtrack to Pirates of Caribbean (or for those of you old enough to remember … the theme song to Goonies —-> which is very close to the Pirates of the Caribbean theme).

Maybe I’m not getting enough sleep …. but I find this hilarious.

Xsorus.2507:

It makes sense Pendleton, the way Barrage works is its 12 hits on 5 targets each.

The first hit will drain all the sharpening stones on the 5 targets.

Just like split blade will drain off 5 charges on all 5 of its hits.

Even if it hits 1 target or a bunch (since its pierces)

Just sucks, because I was using that combo for a Bleeder build.

Ah, I see. Sorry … it’s been a long day : )

Durzlla.6295:

So, i had an idea for two elite traps now that Torment is out and about, the first idk what i’d name, but it’d allow you to place 3 traps, however if you try to place them within X distance of each other it’d destroy the previous trap so you need to spread them out to utilize the multiple placement. What the trap would do is trigger once apply Torment and Cripple.

The second idea i had (which would likely be more useful in more than just PvP) would be Smoke Trap, which would explode causing a fairly large amount of confusion and torment upon triggering and then leave a smoke field behind (them standing in the field would do nothing). It’d be very powerful and worthy of the elite slot due to the 2 conditions it applies and then it’d give us access to a smoke field which we could use with the large amount of finishers we have to cause blindness, or stealth giving us an edge.

Thoughts?

Smoke trap sounds awesome and would add fantastic group utility.

Aside from the ranger debate …. one of the problems is that if you run with zergs most players have no idea who is buffing them. So, your contribution is lost to the masses.

I run with a small group of about six or seven …. sort of a havoc squad. You can alleviate some bad ranger perception that way. I use nature`s voice, healing spring, warhorn, wolf fear, s hound heals, muddy terrain, spotter or piercing arrows, and frost trap. Players notice your benefits using these in small groups.

I’m not saying other classes don’t do it better …. just my two cents to helping the OP.

If this is the case …. why did they make splitblade give ten bleeds with SS. Doesn’t make sense.

I blame Queen Jennah.

I have had it with four people in a party and no one had the buff at all … in combat and no one else around. It’s a super random buff.

Paz Shadow.9715:

I think Anet’s answer to this a while back is having a bunch of rangers naming their pets and storing the names (data) on the server creates lag? shrugs

I can somewhat see their point for a different name for every individual pet for all rangers … however ….

If this is the case, I would settle for them just letting us have one name that stays for all pets. We could change (overwrite) it whenever we want but the name is assigned to all pets. This wouldn’t take up too much space.

At least this way we get one name that stays between all the pets.

Spears could be a one handed weapon. In history, there were one handed spears.

However, I’m basing this off of book lore … and not real life … sense GW2 is hardly real life. We don’t have large cats walking around in suits of armor.

Fantasy/ lore example: Tolkien had rangers/ wardens with spears and shields that roamed the wilderness.

Heck, there’s a loading screen in this game that shows a guy with a one handed spear and shield.

I want a ranger with a spear and shield. My only worry is that if it happened I would play this game way too much.

stale.9785:

ShadowLordX.5148:

I’m certain players have priority over npcs, and I believe party members have priority, but I could be wrong on that.

From what I can tell in wvwvw, your own party members have no priority. It’s rare to see the icon for spotter EVER be up on my party members when we’re bopping about wvwvw. This implies that it’s being applied to other nearby allies.

The truly spooky bit? I’m not entirely sure that the ranger with the trait himself has any priority. I’ve had the icon missing from my own boon bar while in combat, then come back at the next engagement.

It wasn’t on me as a buff at all last night or the night before.

ShadowLordX.5148:

I’m certain players have priority over npcs, and I believe party members have priority, but I could be wrong on that.

I was in a party of four players and none of them had the buff … even during combat. I used it before the recent patch and it worked. I’ll check it again tonight.

Manekk.6981:

If I could really have my way though I’d make it just 1 hit instead of 16 and replace the hawks with a pterodactyl that flies up with my enemy in it’s talons and drops them from a certain death height it would also have a splat animation with twisted broken legs and blood as result

Or replace the birds with frogs … make it rain 16 frogs from the sky … thus, making the ground slippery and slowing target.

Thanks all. It was driving me crazy last night.

it only applies when the user who has the trait, is IN combat

Thanks. This is probably part of the reason why I wasn’t seeing it.

Deathspike.1870:

Like most buff sharing, even party members get no priority at all. You’ll be hitting 5 randoms (not necessarily including yourself either).

Crazy that my own party members don’t get some type of priority for the buff. Can a NPC steal it as well?

Is spotter bugged? The buff seems to randomly disappear …. especially in WvW. This happens even when they’re right beside me.

The elitism in pve (and from some in this thread) is laughable.

@op If someone kicks you from a group …. you wouldn’t want to be in that group anyway. Start your own group.

Both of those are nice. I like your daggers ideas the best.

Personally, I want a main hand spear and off hand shield. It would fit the ranger/ warden lore …

Are you saying to hold down one of the directional keys and hit the dodge button? I’m not following you. I usually have AA turned off but would turn it back on if this works.

Chopps.5047:

I dropped greatsword in wvw for the first time last night. It felt great. I chose sword/warhorn and axe/axe with valkryie build. Then I went with sword/warhorn and LB. Then I got anxious: all the tools are so good, it’s hard to pick just one. That’s a little scary but very good for gw2

I was wrecking roamers with axe 5 last night in WvW. The new retaliation with it is lots of fun. I found it really helps with thief stealth and reduces their burst if you can time it right … and gives a little of it back to them. Also, stealthing into a group + entangle + axe 5 was fun. Even if you die, you’ll get a rally.

I don’t play a thief so I don’t know much about the profession. I had a d/p thief trying to gank me last night. The new axe retaliation on axe 5 was awesome. At one point I think I used axe 4 for the pull and then LB 4 for the throw … it was actually quite hilarious. I wish I could have recorded it. LB #3 really helped to gain an edge. Eventually, he just left because he couldn’t kill me. I count that as a win.

Thanks for posting this build, Wiseman. It may not be 100% new but what build is …..

Keep it up : )

Mr Pin.6728:

Interesting from a balance standpoint. My first thoughts were:

The pet damage nerf did nothing to accomplish its goal. It seems in small skirmish fights the ranger can still regenerate more damage then can be dealt by a single player. Thus, while their healings go into cool down the ranger has a nearly infinite source of regeneration. The ranger wins or at least escapes every time. Its a war of attrition that the ranger wins. So the bunker build is untouched by the nerf. The power builds however…

Maybe the rangers regeneration needs to be looked at and hit. Its the troll ugent, (I think) the evasion in the melee attacks and the boon duration armor combo that’s unbalancing this build. (at least in a small team spvp type setting) Well that and players were doing stupid things.

Let’s nerf TU and then regen needs to take a hit … what??
So tired of hearing about nerfs because someone doing good with a ranger.

This post actually made me use my crappy cell phone to respond. Nerf? Reeeaally.?

This whole thread is hilarious. Thank you all for making my incredibly boring work day slightly more bearable.

The secret plan is this:

Once a player can use a Ranger to successfully beat an experienced and excellently played Thief, Mesmer, Elementalist, and Necro in WvW…… the player will be requisitioned by the UN to take part in “battle simulations” against a growing alien threat.

Hi all,

This is relative to WvW.

I was a BM/bunker build before the patch. However, I’m finding my pets too squishy for their damage output (even with 25 stacks of might).

So … now, I’ve been trying out the Nature Magic traits, primarily guard/ nature’s voice.

I’ve been running:

Roam/ Small Group
10/0/10/30/20 – Cleric’s gear with runes of Altruism – Sword/horn and SB or GS

Zerg
20/10/10/30/0 – Cleric’s gear with runes of Altruism – LB or SB or Axe/Horn

The problem is that I can’t find my rhythm with this new grandmaster trait and shouts (guard). It doesn’t seem very synergistic. It’s a long cast and very rarely do I want my pet standing in a small pre-defined area. Combat (especially roaming and small groups) is very fluid. So, I find myself casting shout, enemy moves out of zone, so I order my pet to attack him via f1 or f2. Guard resets, I hit it and do the same thing over again. In zergs, I hit guard and then return (f3 I think) immediately to keep the pet with me.

It just doesn’t have a fluid feel to it like a regular self/ group buff you cast when playing another profession. It feels slightly gimmicky or something. Also, I find that guard is buggy. I will use ground targeting and sometimes the pet will simply guard where I’m standing rather than the target area. Does this happen to anyone else?

This isn’t a QQ post about the patch. I’m wondering if anyone else is having a better experience using the new grandmaster trait than I am. Perhaps, I’m using it wrong in WvW. It’s much easier in PvE to use. However, it still has that gimmicky feel to it … like it’s not a straight forward group buff since I’m always reordering my pet to do something else the moment I hit guard.

Any advice?

Shiren.9532:

The ranger is a running joke in the dungeon subforum (we do more damage by auto-attack with banners than we do by using our own weapons) and this subforum is full of despair.

I completely agree and it’s embarrassing. I’ve read what you’re talking about and other ones joking about rangers contributing to groups by holding a warrior’s banner.

I like the ranger. I like the general lore behind the idea of the ranger/ warden in books and movies. This is why I chose the profession. This is why I’ll play the ranger whenever I log in to the game.

I’ve always been very positive about devs coming to the forums and tried to have a balanced mind about the profession. However, we really need to not get our hopes up that changes will come any time soon. Little nuggets here and there … but the big changes we want like AI improvement (hitting moving targets and sustainability) I don’t see coming anytime soon.

IMO, our profession simply isn’t on the forefront of their overall planning.

My best advice … feel free to catch it or throw it back R. Burgundy style … is to try and make the best of what we have because I don’t see major change coming our way. Another option is to just ride it out until other alternatives are released.

The ranger isn’t a horrible profession … I’m not whining. It is what it is.

Battosai.5620:

Hey there fellow rangers!

The State of the Game discussion is coming on Tuesday the 2nd July at 4:30 pm PST.
I will be joining Grouch, Zombify, Supcutie and the developer Jonathan Sharp discussing the recent patch and the effects it had on PvP in Guildwars 2!
Obviously i will not let this chance slip by and I’ll try to fit in as much ranger talk as possible!

The purpose of this thread is to gather suggestions, questions or feedback you guys want me/us to talk about during the State of the Game discussion.

Looking forward to your input guys!

Cheers!

I don’t know if this was already mentioned but I would like to know their thoughts on rangers being denied spots in dungeons. Whether warranted or not …. Rangers are the least wanted class in group content.

I would love to hear their comments in a group setting like sotg.

I think we can all safely say that they have no idea where to take the ranger. There is no overall vision for the profession. You can simply juxtapose the last balance changes to the current ones to see the glaring differences. They are not building to anything. The profession changes are all over the place … not much continuity at all.

If you read the “leaked” patch notes for the thief, some of their changes got walked back a little prior to release. So, yes, they do read the forums. We happen to have ridiculous extremes in this forum… the sky is falling or the emperor’s new clothes.

We had people posting about how awesome the “leaked” notes were when it was obvious they were too flat fisted in many areas. They used a scalpel for mesmers (PvE vs WvW) and other classes and a meat clever for rangers.

Pigs were clearly OP. So glad this patch barbecued them back down to size.

Perhaps now we won’t see so many PvP rangers with pigs. Everyone ran with a pig before this patch.

Same thing with moas …

It’s obvious that they have no defining vision for this profession. These balance changes juxtaposed to the last balance changes have no continuity. The ranger isn’t building to anything.

Anet`s silence on this makes think they are real and intentionally “leaked” … purely my opinion though.

Any word from anet about the validity of these “leaked” patched notes?

I’m wondering if this is just a trial balloon by them to gauge player reaction.

They are so concerned about balance and take baby steps when raising dps levels… but seem to have no worries with throwing around large nerf percentages.

If these notes are real …. this is much more than balancing pets. It’s a massive pet nerf that will break some builds. The jaguar f2 reduced to 25 percent …. 50 percent to most basic attacks …. 50 percent!

JonPeters.5630:

I’ll spare the math but It would take our company about a year, with everyone dedicated to testing 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, 50 weeks a year to get as much testing time as happens in about an hour in the live environment.

Perhaps, I am reading this wrong. Does mean they are testing it in the live environment or we are testing it in the live environment?

So, they do some QA but rely mostly on live environment testing? This quote doesn’t make sense to me …. especially coming from a compliance background (not tech related).

A statement like that would never fly where I work … maybe I’m reading this incorrectly.

Let’s not forget the issue with cat’s maul ability. They kept messing with that as well behind the scenes …. Sebrent made a post about it about two months back when cat’s burst suddenly lowered.