Guild Wars 2

I did not think this would ever happen, but… for once I do agree with Karla. Ladders, seasons, rewards are all meaningless unless you have a good base design to work on. Talking about ladders, leagues and seasons for GW2 spvp is like building 3rd floor of the house with 1st and 2nd missing… Is it just me who finds that a little f…ing weird?

ColinJohanson.2394:

I will add a fun fact: When rewards were updated in December, PvP saw a 40% growth in player numbers that has stayed solid ever since, the largest single jump in player participation in any game content type as a result of an update we’ve ever seen. This growth was almost entirely players who didn’t play PvP before, who suddenly became interested once it was rewarding, and I’d argue it’s not even that rewarding yet. To discount rewards as meaningless might be true to you as a player, but we consistently hear very different feedback from other players, and they make this very clear in their actions. We need to make sure players who truly care about prestige and being the best are catered to, and we need a way for players who aren’t that yet can become excited and invested and someday potentially become part of the first.

The quoted post below answers your argument of numbers perfectly.

style.6173:

I will add a fun fact: When rewards were updated in December, PvP saw a 40% growth in player numbers that has stayed solid ever since, the largest single jump in player participation in any game content type as a result of an update we’ve ever seen. This growth was almost entirely players who didn’t play PvP before, who suddenly became interested once it was rewarding, and I’d argue it’s not even that rewarding yet. To discount rewards as meaningless might be true to you as a player, but we consistently hear very different feedback from other players, and they make this very clear in their actions. We need to make sure players who truly care about prestige and being the best are catered to, and we need a way for players who aren’t that yet can become excited and invested and someday potentially become part of the first.

First, I do think rewards are important, but I wouldn’t say that was the main reason for the increase. In December, it was a perfect storm of :

1. a lackluster holiday update (the one from a year ago was much more exciting given the newness and the multi day event)
2. WvW burnout. This was as a result of the league ending and people taking a break. I’d bet that if you reported the WvW numbers between the december update and the eotm launch, those numbers would show a big drop off
3. People trying to use their glory boosters

That said, I do think that rewards need to be increased. I’m actually VERY worried about removing glory in another 2+ weeks. I don’t think that is a very good idea to remove glory prior to the new rewards being ready.

I’ll just add in my 2 cents about the quality>quantity, especially in the long term.

ColinJohanson.2394:

If prestige/fame is what motivates you for example, tell us what kind of prestige and fame systems you’d like to see in a league?

Sleek move, I wonder how many will notice it!

All in all I can but recommend you don’t disregard the ‘first comes a good pvp then come rewards’ approach, which was also the whole point of my now already infracted and deleted post. Once you’ve got the right infrastructure set in place, you can start adding in gold capes, world-wide victory announcements, meaningful ranks, ladder rankings that show team/guild placements, not individual palyer placements…
People like to stand out, so perhaps reinvent (!) the commander head-mark as a pvp-exclusive symbol of prestige.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I will add a fun fact: When rewards were updated in December, PvP saw a 40% growth in player numbers that has stayed solid ever since, the largest single jump in player participation in any game content type as a result of an update we’ve ever seen. This growth was almost entirely players who didn’t play PvP before, who suddenly became interested once it was rewarding, and I’d argue it’s not even that rewarding yet. To discount rewards as meaningless might be true to you as a player, but we consistently hear very different feedback from other players, and they make this very clear in their actions. We need to make sure players who truly care about prestige and being the best are catered to, and we need a way for players who aren’t that yet can become excited and invested and someday potentially become part of the first.

First, I do think rewards are important, but I wouldn’t say that was the main reason for the increase. In December, it was a perfect storm of :

1. a lackluster holiday update (the one from a year ago was much more exciting given the newness and the multi day event)
2. WvW burnout. This was as a result of the league ending and people taking a break. I’d bet that if you reported the WvW numbers between the december update and the eotm launch, those numbers would show a big drop off
3. People trying to use their glory boosters

That said, I do think that rewards need to be increased. I’m actually VERY worried about removing glory in another 2+ weeks. I don’t think that is a very good idea to remove glory prior to the new rewards being ready.

Serious questions, but if you’re not going to give a real, genuine answer, please don’t answer at all:

1) Does this thread mean you (anet) are actually going to dedicate the appropriate resources towards spvp? Is it something that you (as a company) are going to actually focus on, or is it something that you’re going to talk about, and sorry for the language, but “half-kitten .” This type of pvp model can work, and this game is good enough to work. But it won’t if you don’t put more of an emphasis into it.

2) Are decisions that effect pvp, at all levels, going to be made by people that have actual competitive pvp experience? Completely hypothetical example, but the guy at the top might have a competitive background, but what about the people in the middle? People without this experience are not going to make good decisions, period. As players, we’ve seen some of our fellow competitive spvp players join the anet team. If they can’t make spvp great, then I’d be convinced it’s not possible. Use them.

Because realistically, if these 2 things aren’t happening, then stop. Stop leading people on. Stop giving false ‘proof’ that this type of model cannot work. This game had so much potential, it could have been SO good. But there are way too many important decisions that destroyed the spvp population because 1) As a company, you are not dedicated enough to spvp, and you are not willing to do certain things, and 2) incompetence in decisions that you are capable of making.

If only it was possible to get such an awesome summary and feedback from red posts in the Rangers CDI…. as it stands it has soo many pages of useful feedback from players and hardly anything coming from the development side… rangers deserve better love than this… its been over 10 pages since the last red post in there

Lordrosicky.5813:

Zuik.7158:

silvermember.8941:

Zuik.7158:

Iason Evan.3806:

These CDI’s are starting to feel more and more like an appeasement process on your guy’s end than something that is actually happening.

Ding ding ding. We have a winner.

The CDI have had some effect mainly in PvE. The way scarlet has improve and certain additions like her hideou and the players interaction with Majory with the investigation are the result of player complaints about the player’s role.

If you are doing CDI expecting immediate changes then you are missing the point of them and the reality of developing an MMORPG.
1. Just because a CDI exist doesn’t mean it will be implemented, they are simply asking for ideas.
2. Assuming there is a good idea, the time it takes to design and implement the idea will take a few months. You probably wont see major changes to the game because the developer is lagging by a few months. You will probably see it later.

With that said, if you are not too happy about the results, you don’t have to participate. It doesn’t hurt to participate and if you are on the forums you are probably doing something less significant than contributing to a CDI.

They are asking for ideas under circumstances that will result in a mass response of mostly non-implementable (excuse my english) but strong ideas simply because people do not know what major changes are already upcoming for sPvP.

So yes, I believe this CDI thread is just another way of giving players hope. As for the other CDI threads, they are very far from this hole and probably contribute to the game a lot more.

3, The cdi’s will attract “newbie” pvp players mainly, who might have opinions but their opinions are based on less experience and so are often misleading. The result of this CDI will be negative for the community therefore. Even the people suggesting stuff will be QQing about the stuff they suggest further down the road when they understand the game and its flaws.

Did you consider that was the point of this? Why would they be removing breaking all the ways around PvP and PvE if it wasn’t to attract a lot of potential PvPers that are avoiding PvP since it has no rewards.

This seems less about bringing back Old PvPs and more about attracting new ones.

How would you encourage players of all skill levels to participate?

Profession based ranks for accounts. Every profession on an account gets ranked separately. This way, when Johnny is trying out his Guardian for the first time, he is ranked differently than his 90% ranked Thief. When he deletes his Guardian and makes a new one 2 months later, he doesn’t get to start over because it’s per profession on the account.

The https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/player-vs-player-rewards-roadmap/ was almost 3 months ago. Has work already started on this “long term” stuff? To be frank, asking us about it now when you could have asked us 3 months ago seems like a long time to wait. These CDI’s are starting to feel more and more like an appeasement process on your guy’s end than something that is actually happening. Does it make sense where we would think that a 3 month gap in the announcement of something, and then asking our opinion on what should be in it is kind of a long time to wait?

I hope this isn’t the case, but if it is, it’s super frustrating for those of us that keep playing PvP. I play it because I love it, but this whole time I was thinking that you guys were working on that “long term” stuff you said you were working on. Now it seems you aren’t. What the heck is going on?

Writetyper.1985:

…because even PU mesmers are better than dealing with Decap.

Quote of the season.

If ladders/leagues are brought into PvP with conquest mode still being the only gam choice, and with builds like decap engi still being highly effective with little to no risk, this is going to be too painful for anyone who still enjoys the combat in this game to bother sticking around.

Oh! Let’s start making bets on how long it will take them to give us another pity post that states nothing but the obvious, gives no additional information on which things they are looking at in particular and how they are thinking about going about it(so we can discuss and fine tune), or actual information that gives anything more then the fact they did little more then skim the entire thread.

SkiTz.4590:

Paulie.6215:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Also, you guys can’t see this due to the limitations of formatting on our forums, but a lot of these points were made by many of you guys. As such, they are much more emphasized in the email threads and discussions we have internally.

First, thank you for your summary. What I think got missed in the pile was the idea that pet damage should be rebalanced so that they no longer draw 30% of our damage from us in the first place. All other classes core mechanics add to base damage where as rangers loose almost a third of our player damage in order to have an AI run around with us. If our pets hit every time and are never dead, we just get to 100% base damage of every other class capping us at 100% a warrior hits 115% with his/her core mechanic.

This does not take into account the loss of gear stats on the pet which is significant.

I’m not saying this isn’t possible, but I want you to understand exactly what that suggestion means. It would mean completely rebalancing the Ranger.

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

The only reason Rangers lose damage is because the AI is not currently what it ought to be. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we should completely redesign the Ranger and get rid of the pet.

Think of it this way: You’re building a house and a 2×4 breaks while you’re trying to screw it in to something. Do you scrap the house and completely rebuild it because that one piece broke, or do you grab a new 2×4 and use that instead? Which do you think would be more efficient?

What I’ve been seeing a lot of is that you guys don’t necessarily dislike pets. What you dislike is how they act and how they are controlled. It seems to me that these are feelings that have been built up over time, and have culminated into “pets have to go” because you guys haven’t seen the improvements that should be made to pets to make them desirable. I certainly don’t blame you for getting to this point, but I do want to know the core of the problem before we start talking about rebalancing an entire class.

You’ve officially made me realize that you have zero intention of fixing the pet or the ranger. Thanks for that moving onto my thief and warrior.

Also what an awful example…you’re comparing something as integral to the ranger as the pet to a 2×4???? You do realize that it can take MANY 2×4s to build a house don’t you? 2×4s are a dime a dozen – not something as integral as, say, an I-beam?

Please oh please stick to other examples. The example you used says there is little to no value in the pet…which I agree with but I don’t think you were trying to say that.

Poor Allie, anything she says is pretty much met with backlash…. unfortunately its kinda warranted when statements like "we are supposed to be excellent skirmishers because of our allegedly awesome sustain DPS (lol, we have no sustain, no dps and defintely not the combination) or making terrible comparisions (pet to a 2×4 in the house known as ranger…. facepalm)

I’m starting to wonder if anyone at anet even plays this class?

Honest to god suggestion, scrap this class, and make a new one

If the past 1.5 years of bandaid fixed have not worked , what on earth makes you think this upcoming batch of bandaids are going to work????

Anything short of an overhaul will not help the ranger, we all know thats how badly in a spot ranger is in every aspect of the game.

Go big or go home. If anet actually believes that we currently have good sustain DPS like Allie stated, I’m afraid theres very little hope.

The past 1.5 years of incompetence speaks for itself.

I honestly still believe that after this 50+ page CDI, Anet still thinks they are right (that rangers somehow have good sustainability, dps, pets are OK, just need some minor tweaks, etc) – That is what I have gotten out of all the red posts in this CDI. It’s amazing how little they seem to care.

Just to add do your closing statements – especially on the “Go big or go home” statement.

I’m personally confused about ANet’s bipolar nature:

• - “Our Game Design philosophy has changed….. but…. This is what the philosophy of the ranger should have always been …so it should stay that way”
• - “Yeah, we burnt LA to the ground and if we think dungeons aren’t good enough, we scrap them and start over. Who says we don’t take risks? ….but…. we’re not going to look into an overhaul of a class that needs it…”*

Surely, if something needs an overhaul it should be given?
(Revamped dungeons, Magic Find, and WvW progression says hello….and they’re all asking why the ranger isn’t invited to the overhaul party.)

Muzical.1396:

Berk.8561:

A general observation:

“It’s extremely important that we stay true to our philosophy that you should be able to play Guild Wars 2 the way you want to play the game in order to reach the most powerful rewards.” – Colin Johanson on Guild Wars 2 in the Months Ahead

(https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/colin-johanson-on-guild-wars-2-in-the-months-ahead/)

Allie Murdock has, throughout this thread, stated that the design philosophy of the Ranger is slow and steady damage rather than burst damage and that the pet is integral to the class concept. I just want to make sure it’s not lost that based on the player comments, this clearly clashes with the way many people want to play their Ranger. So this should raise the question of why the game won’t let people play their Rangers the way many clearly want to. Specifically (these have been mentioned again and again in this thread)
(Snipped for post size)

^THIS. I cannot +1 this enough.

I’d argue that, before ANet should be allowed to change a class, especially substantially, spend four months, yes, months, maining that class, and I mean at least 10 hours a week. Spend a month on PvE, and I mean Living Story (reload Canach’s dungeon and play a ranger; have fun!) explorable paths of Arah, CM, CoE, Teq, Wurm, Fire ele, map clearing, etc. Spend a month in sPvP, and find out how fun that is under the mess its “roadmap” is for those of us who just did it for kicks. Then spend a month in WvW, and I mean on a T1 server, SoR, JQ, TC, etc. And, on and off during this time, also spend time in mapchat in a huge place like LA, pop your ANet tag, and talk to players about how we play the game.
Snip for length

That is an extremely important observation that Berk made. And I do hope that future changes to Profession Balance and new stuff added to Professions, will continue to let us play the way we want.

You mentioned that you want someone at Anet to only play Ranger for like 4 months straight. That would be awesome, since that’s what I’ve been doing since launch, and there are things I understand about the Ranger that has made me able to sucessfully play with almost any set of gear or trait combination. But, there are things about the Profession that I have noticed that cannot be ignored by people who have played the Ranger long enough, such as the lack of reliable condition removal, the general lack of support from pets due to AI, and….the fact that we aren’t actually that good at sustaining (except for Ally support through spotter, spirits, and healing spring).

Anet wants the Ranger to be a sustain class, but it is much easier to just do what other profession do, and burst someone or something down as fast as humanly possible. The way our traits are set up make this possible, such as Sharpened Edges and Companion’s Might.

Now, there is some, but very little sustain that comes into play. I can utterly destroy someone in WvW by stacking bleeds and conditions, burst style, using Rabid gear. The whole point is to throw down as many traps as possible, use the bleed stacking from axe, and use the immobilize from my spider to make sure that the enemy stays inside the traps. The sheer amount of conditions I can inflict alone makes sure than the enemy’s condition removals are all wasted while I continue to stack bleeds, cripples, burns, and poison whith no worry. (I’ve dropped more enemies with Throw Torch lately than any other skill because of the long burn duration. That sustain is secondary to my burst though, because I use it only after Burst fails (which is rare), where it should be coming first!)

Paulie.6215:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Also, you guys can’t see this due to the limitations of formatting on our forums, but a lot of these points were made by many of you guys. As such, they are much more emphasized in the email threads and discussions we have internally.

First, thank you for your summary. What I think got missed in the pile was the idea that pet damage should be rebalanced so that they no longer draw 30% of our damage from us in the first place. All other classes core mechanics add to base damage where as rangers loose almost a third of our player damage in order to have an AI run around with us. If our pets hit every time and are never dead, we just get to 100% base damage of every other class capping us at 100% a warrior hits 115% with his/her core mechanic.

This does not take into account the loss of gear stats on the pet which is significant.

I’m not saying this isn’t possible, but I want you to understand exactly what that suggestion means. It would mean completely rebalancing the Ranger.

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

The only reason Rangers lose damage is because the AI is not currently what it ought to be. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we should completely redesign the Ranger and get rid of the pet.

Think of it this way: You’re building a house and a 2×4 breaks while you’re trying to screw it in to something. Do you scrap the house and completely rebuild it because that one piece broke, or do you grab a new 2×4 and use that instead? Which do you think would be more efficient?

What I’ve been seeing a lot of is that you guys don’t necessarily dislike pets. What you dislike is how they act and how they are controlled. It seems to me that these are feelings that have been built up over time, and have culminated into “pets have to go” because you guys haven’t seen the improvements that should be made to pets to make them desirable. I certainly don’t blame you for getting to this point, but I do want to know the core of the problem before we start talking about rebalancing an entire class.

You’ve officially made me realize that you have zero intention of fixing the pet or the ranger. Thanks for that moving onto my thief and warrior.

Also what an awful example…you’re comparing something as integral to the ranger as the pet to a 2×4???? You do realize that it can take MANY 2×4s to build a house don’t you? 2×4s are a dime a dozen – not something as integral as, say, an I-beam?

Please oh please stick to other examples. The example you used says there is little to no value in the pet…which I agree with but I don’t think you were trying to say that.

Poor Allie, anything she says is pretty much met with backlash…. unfortunately its kinda warranted when statements like "we are supposed to be excellent skirmishers because of our allegedly awesome sustain DPS (lol, we have no sustain, no dps and defintely not the combination) or making terrible comparisions (pet to a 2×4 in the house known as ranger…. facepalm)

I’m starting to wonder if anyone at anet even plays this class?

Honest to god suggestion, scrap this class, and make a new one

If the past 1.5 years of bandaid fixed have not worked , what on earth makes you think this upcoming batch of bandaids are going to work????

Anything short of an overhaul will not help the ranger, we all know thats how badly in a spot ranger is in every aspect of the game.

Go big or go home. If anet actually believes that we currently have good sustain DPS like Allie stated, I’m afraid theres very little hope.

The past 1.5 years of incompetence speaks for itself.

I honestly still believe that after this 50+ page CDI, Anet still thinks they are right (that rangers somehow have good sustainability, dps, pets are OK, just need some minor tweaks, etc) – That is what I have gotten out of all the red posts in this CDI. It’s amazing how little they seem to care.

Allie Murdock.8152:

Aidenwolf.5964:

Allie Murdock.8152:

Also, you guys can’t see this due to the limitations of formatting on our forums, but a lot of these points were made by many of you guys. As such, they are much more emphasized in the email threads and discussions we have internally.

First, thank you for your summary. What I think got missed in the pile was the idea that pet damage should be rebalanced so that they no longer draw 30% of our damage from us in the first place. All other classes core mechanics add to base damage where as rangers loose almost a third of our player damage in order to have an AI run around with us. If our pets hit every time and are never dead, we just get to 100% base damage of every other class capping us at 100% a warrior hits 115% with his/her core mechanic.

This does not take into account the loss of gear stats on the pet which is significant.

I’m not saying this isn’t possible, but I want you to understand exactly what that suggestion means. It would mean completely rebalancing the Ranger.

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

The only reason Rangers lose damage is because the AI is not currently what it ought to be. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we should completely redesign the Ranger and get rid of the pet.

Think of it this way: You’re building a house and a 2×4 breaks while you’re trying to screw it in to something. Do you scrap the house and completely rebuild it because that one piece broke, or do you grab a new 2×4 and use that instead? Which do you think would be more efficient?

What I’ve been seeing a lot of is that you guys don’t necessarily dislike pets. What you dislike is how they act and how they are controlled. It seems to me that these are feelings that have been built up over time, and have culminated into “pets have to go” because you guys haven’t seen the improvements that should be made to pets to make them desirable. I certainly don’t blame you for getting to this point, but I do want to know the core of the problem before we start talking about rebalancing an entire class.

You’ve officially made me realize that you have zero intention of fixing the pet or the ranger. Thanks for that moving onto my thief and warrior.

Also what an awful example…you’re comparing something as integral to the ranger as the pet to a 2×4???? You do realize that it can take MANY 2×4s to build a house don’t you? 2×4s are a dime a dozen – not something as integral as, say, an I-beam?

Please oh please stick to other examples. The example you used says there is little to no value in the pet…which I agree with but I don’t think you were trying to say that.

Ision.3207:

The first mistake you made in your post was that you praised Ranger play and mechanics… just so you know, that is a giant NO NO … when it comes to Rangers, the ONLY thing you are allowed to say is, “pets sux, rangers need more dps” (jk) ;-)

For the record, I have no real complaints about my Ranger in PvE play because the NPCs obediently behave the way I expect or even want them to (such as going after the pet instead of me). I even do fine against the NPCs in WvW and can reliably solo capture supply camps, if given the time and not jumped by other players. The “whittle down” approach that ANet intends for Rangers works just fine in such situations, especially when the NPCs won’t pursue you beyond a given area so you can peel off a few to kill at a time and withdraw if they do too much damage to you. Against other players in WvW or against a clock in a boos fight or speed dungeon, it’s a different story.

Ision.3207:

Engineers are a very nuanced class, and they require greater micro and twitch reflexes than many other classes. Perhaps what you are running into is simply the steeper learning curve of the class.

From what I’ve seen playing alongside Engineers and listening to them discuss builds, weapon and armor choices and play style seem to make a huge different in effectiveness and I’ve seen a player go from being frustrated to being quite effective just by changing their gear and traits and building on a theme (e.g., Perplexity Runes on top of interrupt skills). For players frustrated with Engineers, I would recommend reading through Engineering build thread and spend some time with a build calculator (e.g., http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/) to see what the various build choices mean for the character’s stats. If you’ve already done that, I would recommend keep trying different combinations.

But, yes, some classes are more work than others. Part of the reason I picked a Ranger as my first class (this is the first MMO I’ve played) is that people said it was easy to play in PvE (though they aren’t so easy in WvW). Engineers were not on any easy list I looked at.

One other suggestion is to seek out Engineers and run with them and watch how they play, especially in WvW, boss fights, and dungeons. I’ve learned quite a bit watching other people play certain classes.

Muzical.1396:

Then spend a month in WvW, and I mean on a T1 server, SoR, JQ, TC, etc.

They actually need to spend time at the top, in the middle, and at the bottom because the play in each is different and fixing a problem at one tier can create problems with others. For example, Edge of the Mists solves the queue problem in T1 WvW (though that was supposed to be one of the incentives to spread out and not ball up on the T1 servers but, whatever) but it just creates another map to suck players out of the main WvW maps on lower-tiered servers making their population problem even worse. Similarly, balancing dungeons for elite speed runners playing highly optimized characters makes for a quite frustrating experience for causal players running less optimal builds. I used to enjoy doing the old fairly easy Taquatl every day. Now, if I want to get a laugh out of my friends on voice chat on Eredon Terrace, where the Taquatl event is almost never done and only succeeded with outside help, I’ll mention that Taquatl is up on the event timer. If an event happens and nobody shows up to do it, what good is it?

So, please, consider casual play as well as elite play when making decisions about the direction of the game.

Just a couple of things I don’t think I’ve seen.

Firstly, I want to be able to see what conditions and buffs my pet has without having to target it. Same as the player, just some added UI so it’s easy to tell when my pet has a lengthy cripple and I can make the choice to swap it out so I can actually be hitting the enemy (among other reasons).

Secondly, the pet is AI, anywhere else in the game when AI faces a large number of enemies it is scaled up, do this for the pet (don’t make them hit any harder, just boost survivability) and zerg warfare is no longer a problem in wvw for rangers.

Since the devs did a pretty good job in avoiding this thread, I just want to remind you all that this thread is probably going to get closed on monday.

Chrispy.5641:

Allie Murdock.8152:

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

Why do pets have to deal damage at all for the Ranger to be considered a Ranger?

Would the Nature Loving Ranger really not be considered a Ranger if for example, you introduced new pets like :: (examples Op slightly to show Utility)

Some more suggestions:

Eagle F2: Marks an enemy – The enemy can’t stealth for the duration and all arrows shot at the marked enemy will hit (if not obscured or out of range).

Raven F2: Cripples an enemy for 3/4 seconds every 1/2 second for the duration of the skill.

Krytan Drakehound: Passive: Tracker – The drakehound can attack and use abilities on stealthed targets without breaking their stealth.
F2: Reveals all enemies in a small cone around the drakehound.

Bear AA: Knocks the target down
Spider AA: Removes 1 stack from stackable boons or removes 3 seconds of the duration of non-stacking boons.

Some more fleshed out thoughts behind Ranger Sub Classes.

An advanced Hunter with his damage dealing Pets could receive as Class Specialisation improved Traps, which can be manually activated, have bigger arena effects, can be used as ground target skills by throwing them basically .

As advanced Druids on the other side the Ranger could receive the mentioned Animal Aspects as new feature and my suggested Symbiosis Skills.

As an advanced Scout, the Ranger Player could receive the old Preparation-System from GW1 Rangers with that a Scout could have more influence on his Weapon Skills.
The Preparation System would be based litarally on the used Arrow Types and Oils/Extracts for non bow weapons

As an advanced Strider, the Ranger-Player would receive Strings for more controls in combat and improved moveability while using Instruments also, like Whistles for slihgtly improved support as a kind of jack of all trades that does in everythign a bit better, but isn’t in no area super specialized, like the other 3 sub classes.
Striders are somethign alike like this.
http://dragonsdogma.wikia.com/wiki/Strider
At least that was part of my inspiration

In general I’d love it, if ranged classes, especially here the Ranger as an advanced Strider would get more of the action RPG gameplay feeling like this:
http://dragonsdogma.wikia.com/wiki/Strider?file=All_Strider_Skills

The game also in general does alot of things right, that I’d love to see in general GW’s combat sysstem getting improved with to make it a much more fun and full of action combat system. But thats an other topic I know, just wanted to mention it.

PS, if you want to see a real epic battle, watch the video to the end, then you will see the potential, into which GW2 combat could get improved

A QoL thing about yellow targets.

There are some yelow targets that we cannot hit (using bows) – miasma canisters for example can only be hit with AoE oe melee. I keep getting “out of range” (even if its not) or “obstructed” (even if its not) in these cases. I know I have met othert targets like those… plz fix that. Same goes for our pets that cannot/refuses to attack some yellow targets.

Is this intended or simply a design flaw?

Chinese release is arround the corner (Tuesday).
In about 6 months they’ll have the same complains about ranger and will probably check western forums (if not already) to see why it’s still so awful after 2 years of release.
This CDI needs to succeed.

By giving us permastow.

xXxOrcaxXx.9328:

Yoh.8469:

I believe that the core problem with pets is that they are design to be Always On.

The greatest underlying problem of the problem you’ve described is that the pet is reponsible for 30% of our damage. It has to be always on. Otherwise we would lose damage. Ofcourse, there should also be a stow option, so you don’t run into problems like we do with scarlets hologram. But the biggest problem for me is the mindset behind the current pet. It is designed as damagedealer, as huge part of our damage. This implies that the pet is always on. I think I don’t have to give examples where this becomes an issue.

If the pet would only offer additional stuff to the ranger, he wouldn’t have such a huge loss if he has to turn the pet off for a while.

The Ranger pet is no more damage potential for the Ranger as Illusions are for the Mesmer. The only real difference, besides being always on, is that pet’s can’t deal their damage reliably where illusions can.
And part of the reason they can’t deal damage reliably is because they are designed to be always on.

You can’t have something like a Phantasmal Beserker if it’s expected to hang around forever, follow you and take a lot of damage. It would deal far too much damage.
But if it is temporary, has a cooldown and is fragile, then that’s not a problem.

And so pets are made to be generic, and thus predicable. And predicable things are easy to avoid.

phys.7689:

but see, the mesmers illusions are not pets, they are manifestations of their skill use. And while you could build a rng like mesmer, it would not be a pet really.

You only completely missed the point.
Their functionality and AI is almost identical, except you have even greater control over your pet. They are things that exist, that can take and deal damage and are controlled by AI, and serve a similar purpose.

My point isn’t to make Rangers like Mesmers, but rather to contrast two very similar game mechanics, one which works as intended and one that clearly doesn’t.

Nothing that I suggest would change how the pet and Ranger interact, if anything it would improve it by giving you more ways in which you could interact.
What you fail grasp is what do you even gain out of having the pet out at all times besides flavor? Is there any mechanical advantage to that?

Because I can write a laundry list of problems it causes. (which I have)

Specific Game Mode
PvX

Proposal Overview
Change pet’s from being Always On to Summons.
This means having individual durations, cast time and cooldown.

Goal of Proposal
To circumvent several problems inherit to being always on.

• Generic skills and functionality. (You can’t have powerful pets if they are then expected to deal consistent damage)
• Generic functionality leads to very predictable attacks which are easily avoidable, thus reducing the pets damage potential.
• Limitation on the number of pets you can have equipped at any given time.
• Subsequent long recharge times on pet death and swap. (Thus making unavoidable pet deaths much more frustrating and punishing.)
• Having both low number of available pets in addition to being easily killed, leads them the have further reduced damage potential. (And for the Ranger as a result.)
• Are forced to navigate terrain, often times poorly.
• AI faults become more pronounced.
• Player interaction with pets is limited, controls are basic.
• Traits effecting pets are limited in scope as pet functionally is also limited.

While also introducing several benefits.

• Having variable cooldowns and duration time would allow for much great balancing control.
• This would also allow for greater diversity in pet functionality. (You could have high damage AOE with short duration for example)
• You could increase the number of equippable pets up to 4, one for each of the F1-F4 keys. (And swap back to the current UI once the pet is summoned)
• More pets would increase build diversity, and make pet deaths less punishing.
• Travelling wouldn’t accidentally pull unwanted mobs, nor have them get stuck on terrain. (They would be stored away/recharging while on the move.)
• Summoning and pet death can be traited for, thus increasing build diversity.

Proposal Functionality
You start with your F1-F4 keys, each that can be bound to one of the pets in your collection.
Press the key and the corresponding pet is summoned, changing the UI to what we have now. F4 retrieves the pet, putting it on cooldown. (At a reduced CD, like picking up Turrets as an Engineer.)
The location of the summon is at default next to you, but this can be traited to be done at range. In addition you are locked out of you commands for 1 second to avoid accidentally using an unwanted command should the player double tab to summon them.

Pet’s have a set duration and cooldown relative to each pet.
If the pet is killed or runs out of time it unsummons allowing you to select a new pet.
(Perhaps after a brief delay.)
Thus each pet can vary wildly. Some can be for high damage over a short duration, while others are designed for more drawn out fights.
Pets could also use special attacks right after summoning, such as a Boar charging through the enemy ranks. This would increase build diversity and open up new tactics.
(This is in addition to their F2 skill.)

Traits could largely remain as is, but they could be increased to take advantage of the several new mechanics listed above.
Utility skills that only effect pets would have to be redesigned to effect both the Ranger and the pet. (Since your not guaranteed to have one out at the time.)

Associated Risks
Would require fairly heavy re-balancing, esp when it comes to sPvP. May not entirely fix associated problems, such as pets dying to AOE, but rather just elevate the problem.
May become too complicated for new players to get their head around.
(Namely with the UI switching after summoning.)

phys.7689:

but see, the mesmers illusions are not pets, they are manifestations of their skill use. And while you could build a rng like mesmer, it would not be a pet really.

Also the class is built to have the pet and the ranger playing off each other. A big part of the mechanic is supposed to be actively keeping your pet alive. the F1 and F3 skills arent on the Fbar by mistake, its actually supposed to be an important part of keeping the pet alive, telling it who, and what to attack and when to retreat.
(return to me should get retreat functionality in battle aka get away from the target, running behind me because return to me sucks in melee for defending the pet)
this is why ranger gets heals that heal both, access to regeneration, skills like vulnerability, etc.
swap is a defensive measure, this is why the cooldown is long if the pet dies, but not if it is swapped.
a lot of the high level play of ranger is supposed to happen at the pet management level, the problem is some of the tools arent refined, and that a lot of people never learned how to use their pet properly.

a great many rangers dont know you can lock a pet to a target with f1, or make it switch targets with f1, they dont know how the pet acts differently in passive mode. They dont know how to use return to me to avoid dmg.

Ranger IS a pet class, utterly and completely, its defense and offense at a high level is based on mastering control of the pet. I strongly suggest anet make another class for the people who dont want a pet but what long ranged DPS, because that class is completely different than what rng is about. They want long range burst damage preparation/strategy class, soloist, whereas ranger is a skirmishing pressure damage mix up focused team duo (pet and ranger) oriented class.

Essentially they want hawkeye ( http://atomicanxiety.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/hawkeye-widescreen.jpg )from the avengers movie, whereas ranger is beastmaster ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeastMaster_%28TV_series%29 )

there is very little in common with these two archetypes other than the fact they both can use bows.

Except there is no “duo team” with the pet. We have absolutely no advantage that other classes don’t by our use of a pet and allocation of our damage onto it. We used to atleast be able to spread our damage out but then they nerfed the kitten out of our leash range so that is no more. The very fact that we have to melee to get maximum dps makes the pet even more pointless. What advantage is there to have a pet and ranger working at 70/30 in melee, so close that they are clipping into one another, over simply having a single player with 100% of the damage attacking the same target? There isn’t one, certainly not when the pet can’t dodge red rings of death nor function in WvW zergs at all. I don’t even target people with the pet and it still gets instagibed by aoe spam.

As long as we only equal 100% when working with the pet and it can’t body block enemies like pets can in other games, the pet is absolutely superfluous. A good player will always perform better than one of equal skill that has to share a portion of their damage with an unreliable AI.

We’ve had 1.5 years to roleplay Dar the Beastmaster and it has been a headache for anyone that cares about efficiency and respect in pve/wvw. We just want a class that isn’t a joke and works correctly. Flavor ALWAYS takes a backseat to functionality.

Allie Murdock.8152:

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

Why do pets have to deal damage at all for the Ranger to be considered a Ranger?

Would the Nature Loving Ranger really not be considered a Ranger if for example, you introduced new pets like :: (examples Op slightly to show Utility)

Lunar Moth – The Luna Moth is a Pet that Buffs Allies and Removes Boons from Foes.
F2 – Lunar Cadence – Fly in the Target Area, Transferring Boons from Foes to Allies.
(1 boon every 2 seconds for 10 seconds)(5 targets max.)(50 second cooldown)

Solar Moth – The Solar Moth is a Pet that transfer Conditions from Allies to Foes.
F2 – Solar Cadence – Fly in Target Area, Transferring Conditions from Allies to Foes.
(1 Condition every 2 seconds for 10 seconds)(5 targets max.)(50 second cooldown)

common attacks
Auto Attack – very low damage, steals health twice. (1s activation)(steal health for pet, and steal health for Master)
Skill 2 – Sacrifice 25% of your health to break stun on a nearby ally. (breaks stun)(on ally and pet)(5 second cooldown)(Is not used when below 50% health)
Skill 3 – Heal allies when your Master falls below the health threshold. (90%)(same heal as the Moa’s Harmonic Cry)
Stats – Very low attack stats like Power and Precision. Low Toughness. High Vitality, and has Healing Power.
…..

There is one attack total in that idea that deals any damage at all, and I did make the pet a little self sacrificing, but the Utility value of a pet like that would be massive.

I don’t want my pets to be there just to deal damage. I want them there to be able to support me in a fight, especially if I am running a full glass cannon build with no survivability. I would like for my pet to be able to provide me with some amount of survival and utility, not just be a mindless NPC drone that only deals damage.

zenleto.6179:

I only just found about this CDI from a post in General. As someone with 3 rangers at 80 I’d like to think I have something to offer here but after 52 pages and 12 days it doesn’t look like it now. I’ll just have to see what happens in game.

I agree that the CDI turned out very big. It should be closed and divided into the main aspects, the pet, the weapons and the utility and traits. And those threads need more collaborative development.

Yoh.8469:

I believe that the core problem with pets is that they are design to be Always On.

The greatest underlying problem of the problem you’ve described is that the pet is reponsible for 30% of our damage. It has to be always on. Otherwise we would lose damage. Ofcourse, there should also be a stow option, so you don’t run into problems like we do with scarlets hologram. But the biggest problem for me is the mindset behind the current pet. It is designed as damagedealer, as huge part of our damage. This implies that the pet is always on. I think I don’t have to give examples where this becomes an issue.

If the pet would only offer additional stuff to the ranger, he wouldn’t have such a huge loss if he has to turn the pet off for a while.

Allie Murdock.8152:

The Ranger is designed to have a pet. If the pet was taken away or didn’t do damage, then it wouldn’t be a Ranger anymore. Does that make sense?

The only reason Rangers lose damage is because the AI is not currently what it ought to be. That doesn’t necessarily mean that we should completely redesign the Ranger and get rid of the pet.

Think of it this way: You’re building a house and a 2×4 breaks while you’re trying to screw it in to something. Do you scrap the house and completely rebuild it because that one piece broke, or do you grab a new 2×4 and use that instead? Which do you think would be more efficient?

I understand your point, but I’m not convinced that AI is the actual problem, but rather like most of the problems with Ranger pets, it’s a symptom of the problem.

To use your analogy, the 2×4 breaking is a problem, but what if the reason it broke because your doing it wrong or that the material was faulty to begin with?
Replacing that 2×4 doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t encounter the same problem or other new problems down the line, because you haven’t addressed the core underlying problem that caused these problems to begin with.

I believe that the core problem with pets is that they are design to be Always On.

-
For example, pet’s dying because of AOE. Part is there inability to mitigate damage, and their AI not knowing how to avoid said damage, and Players not having the commands to tell them otherwise.

But Mesmer Illusions have the exact same problems (only worse), and they are no less damage potential for the Mesmer as pets are for Rangers as their core mechanic. So why are Mesmers not crying bloody murder?

It’s because Illusions aren’t expected to survive. They are designed around being rapidly created and destroyed. So if they die, often times you can just replace them, maybe not with the Illusions that were destroyed, but others in your kit.
So it’s no big deal if they go down, you can even trait for it and make it an advantage.

-
If you were to go issue by issue, most of the problems can be linked back to the pets requirement to be always on.
Which begs the question, is it worth it?
It causes a whole host of problems, but what possible benefit do you gain from having pets always on vs summoning when you need them?

I think you could summon pets and have them function largely the same for the Ranger as a class mechanic, keeping traits mostly intact, circumvent a lot of these problems while also making pets easier to balance and diversify. (because of now having cooldowns and duration to work with)

I’ll type this up as a formal proposal, but I just want to stress that the underlying reason that causes these problem might not just be faulty AI or questionable design decisions, but rather something more fundamental as to how you went around designing pets in the first place.
And I suspect that if that problem isn’t addressed, it may just continue to create more problems for you down the line.

Fancy Fool.1743:

Aggrostemma.1703:

Hi Allie!

Can you do me a favor? Take your ranger to the lvl80 content please! (If you don’t have any you can ask one of the programmers to"cheat" you one)
Equip full ascended with legendary weapon. No-no, gear does not matter, it’s a choice of you!

Done? Great!

Now take this ranger to the new LA event! Do you know what’s going to happen?
1st second: entering combat
2nd second: your pet goes into combat
3th second: your pet dies
4th second: swap pet
5th second: set pet on passive
6th second: pew-pew
7th second: AOE incoming
8th second you dodge
9th second: your pet dies

Great, isnt’ it?

Now head to a random wvw map!

1, pew-pew
2, zerg incoming
3 your pet dies
4, you swap pet
5, your pet dies

Even if you keep your pet full passive on the ENTIRE content it dies.

Try this and tell us the story about your experience. Until you did not try our shoes you have no kittening idea how frustrating this bullkitten is.

What exactly does your post accomplish?

That Pets die too easily, and the AoE damage nerfs to Pets in Allie’s post a few days ago would go a very long way to reducing that problem (otherwise, yeah, there’s a rather trolly post there.)