That’s the problem with rangers: anything they can do GWEN can do better. Let’s list it off:
Melee DPS: Warriors and Guardians can do more dps while not having to specifically spec for it. Rangers who want to spec for melee dps have to do 30 into power and 30 into toughness lines to get necessary traits to be tanky as a warrior. You’re not surviving melee without stun breakers and a non-elite stability. Thats why the 30 into power to get the trait that makes signet activates affect you and thus giving you the stability from the signet that makes your pet bigger. You don’t see warriors having to trait to get stability off their utilities.
Water fields: you get 1 water field. Engies get 1, eles get 2. Eles get 2. On their weapon. They don’t sacrifice a heal for it. You do. Eles also have stronger ranged AOE than you.
Traps: You have no self survival utilities if you go traps and no DPS otherwise. “But necros go full wells, why dont they get written off as kitten?” It’s because they have death shroud and plague form. You have a pet that dies if the enemy zerg farts in its general direction and rampage as one, which doesn’t do AOE blindness and chill.
Ranged DPS: To be perfectly honest you’re too much single target. You don’t have enough AOE to make a difference and to get some of that back you end up speccing into the power line again for the piercing arrow trait. The eles don’t have to do that. The necros don’t have to do that. You’re squishy when you should be able to be strong.
Spirits: First… 5 target cap. Second… die by fart in general direction.
That elite spirit that rezzes guys: See above. It won’t live long enough for you to get use out of it.
I’ve got CCs! No you don’t. Not anything useful anyway. That warrior next to you whips out a hammer and kittens 5 guys with a chain of hammer attacks. 4 attacks. What do you have? CC tied to your pet who died because someone farted at it, a single target hilt bash, single target shortbow daze, single target longbow knockback, nothing on axe or sword, nothing on warhorn or torch, and nothing in your utilities except maybe some immobilizes that get Dogged March Melandru’d into nothingness.
I’ve been looking for things rangers can do that other classes don’t outclass them on and nothing exists. I even ask new recruits for TB if they have a GWEN character because that’s what we need most. It’s not for lack of creativity, it’s that a character from the GWEN metagame is a BEST IN SLOT character for a raid while a ranger is simply WORST IN SLOT. We need more hammers , more symbols of swiftness ,more water fields, more necro wells. We don’t need more pets and single target damage. If ANET reworks the ranger into something better, say let them put away the pet for 50% increased DPS and AOE CC utilities/utility stability then they would win a slot in a raid. Till then… go reroll a warrior. You’ll thank yourself.