Guild Wars 2

I guess areanet has forgotten to nerf omnomberry pies/ghosts. They put a cooldown on sigils with lifeleech because it was far too powerful but they forgot that the food does exactly the same.
Around 330 health leeched with 66% of all crits. Some builds have 90+% critchance which makes them heal as much as heal rating builds as long as they have many targets to hit or high speed attacks.
Actually many builds are built around that food. It’s stupid and I was thinking about making a thread about it too. I use them all the time when I run a crit build and it makes a HUGE difference which it should not.
Putting a 5 sec CD like on the sigil (from what I have tested it is not 2 sec it’s 5 sec) would be a nice move and make berserker builds less good survivability wise.
I am wondering if it actually was something overseen or if they actually want these insanely powerful buff-foods.

It has been said already but I want to mention it once again so that it’s not forgotten. Signet’s are “actualized” every 10 seconds on the pet. So if the counter is at 10 sec and you switch the pet your pet won’t get any signet effect for 9-10 seconds.

That is horrible. Make it so that when the pet is created (switched) it takes over all the signets from the ranger immediately. That’s important.
If it takes 9 seconds until the pet gets the speed buff or the regeneration or whatever signet that is a real issue.

Yes it’s really time that they give some love to ranger pets. I reached lvl 29 fractal today and your pets simply die of agony all the time immediately. It’s pretty much a oneshot. If you are very fast you can switch them but then the newly spawned pet will be instant down from the next agony where you can’t switch anymore because pet swap is of course on cooldown.
While I understand that the high lvl dungeons are so hard that noone can survive it staying in melee range at least we need the ability to keep at least one pet type alive. As it is now it’s not possible in many fights.
Like ascalon endboss. He has an AoE agony range of 900 or something like that and if you send even the longest range pet to fight him it will be instant dead. So pet’s are simply useless there.
Devourers walk too close when they want to fight a target. They should stand still at 900 and not go to 450 or so range when you send them to attack. And Devoureres should have at least 1000-1100 range. 1200 would be perfect.

Agony resistance is the most important to make pets usable. Really – if pets get my agony res I can probably live with it. If they get another AoE resistance (50% less damage from AoE) that would be very decent. And if they would dodge for 1 sec if I press F3 that would also be pretty nice.
Then implement permanent stow and make pets attack more reliable from walls and we are fine with the pets I guess.

You have to copy paste it.
Today I did fractal 25 again with most of the time cleric gear and I was tanking most instances. Was real fun.
After our fighter dropped after the first fractal we had to handle the icy fractal with 4 people. If you don’t make mistakes you can really face tank some fractal bosses.
And it seems to me that the damage is OK. It’s not great but for what I can tank with the build it’s ok especially if you use the fire trap.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQJARTjEVJ2BW2Vs2BimCNZp3j0r+27UMK/fyre0K;TsAgzCmo6y0loLbXuukdtEZIy+DA
Thats what I usually run. For the weapon sets I really switch it all the time for all the bosses. Sometimes I also use knight set instead of cleric because you don’t need that much healing power for all bosses.
Since you have so much endurance regen + protection on dodge survivability is really nice.
I also don’t use Greatswort all the time. Sometimes I use both bows. Depends on situation.
What I like to use with the greatsword as 2nd weapon set is either longbow/axe+torch/axe+axe/1h-sword+torch/1h-sword+axe
I like the offhand axe for certain encounters when you want to throw back ranged attacks like in the volcano level endboss for these nasty adds. I use longbow + axe/axe there. Activate RaO, Barrage, then heal because barrage roots you and you take damage usually, then jump into the adds (but don’t be too close to boss) and activate axe 5. As soon as it’s over dodge away. Works pretty fine usually.
For traits I use whatever I like. the 25% speed signet of the hunt is active all the time and the reason why I don’t use a warhorn even though the warhorn 5 is nice.
Sometimes I switch the fire trap for the condition removal signet or the life reg signet for condition removal (signet of renewal).
In other encounters I use search and rescue and you can also use quickening zephyr. From what I heard quickening zephyr can also be used to dodge more with GS #1 but I haven’t tested that.
Thats my setup for fractals but it also works for WvW from what I have seen. And the good thing with this build is you have good survivability and for damage you switch to damage gear while still having protection and great endurance for dodging.
For WvW I would sometimes use the spike trap.

What is very important if you want to tank is dodging alot. Use GS #4 for blocking while endurace is low, dodge alot and heal when needed. Of course sometimes you have to retreat but it works pretty well.

Bump. This is important. pet needs agony resistance for fractals. The attribute is there but you cannot enhance it. Give the pet the same agony resistance as the ranger has.

Yes the pet damage is the same no matter what gear you wear. But that is also nice for bunker builds. You go full bunker and still have good damage from pet.

I found out about the regeneration when I was testing the fern hound regen. And I am glad that I now know that the leap finisher only helps myself. I always hoped I would heal the others and was wondering why it didn’t work. I thought the number might be too small to see but now I know why I didn’t see it.
What I like about tank rangers is you can dodge/block so much with a melee specc.
On high level fractals (I’m at 24 atm) thats decent. Hits are so big that you don’t want them to hit you but I can still facetank bosses sometimes for the full duration by evading their attacks + block with greatsword + massive heal if I get hit.
If as 2nd set you take the 1h-sword you have evades too.
It’s fun to play and it helps the team if someone is able to keep the boss away from them. Somehow I have aggro pretty often.

For the regen boon: Put a healing spring at your feet and you get regeneration every few sec. If you stay in it for the full duration with a 0/0/20/20/30 build and Water runes you have perma regeneration.
The regeneration from your fern hound is weaker if you have huge heal rating because his heal rating is taken into consideration and not yours.
So your regeneration (only from the boon) is around 300 at 1400 heal rating while fern hounds was like 130-140 if I remember it well.

But the game is kinda intelligent. The stronger regeneration is always used first. If your 300hps regen ran out the others come into effect.
That is also why a ranger with decent heal rating is a good team supporter. Most have 0-400 healrating which leads to around 130-180 regeneration while if you give them regen you augment the regeneration to around 300+ with decent heal rating.
And with the water field theres funny things to do. Like Greatsword leap (#3) or 1h-Sword leap (#2 + again #2) activate another splash heal or offhand axe #5 whirl can be used to apply regeneration to team mates.
Also the Rune of Water is decent in my opinion because it offers like 1390 heal twice in the duration of a healing spring at 1400 heal rating .

So if you go Greatsword or Sword you give the team a ~300 regeneration + 2×2000 heal (2xLeap in waterfield = 1300+0.5*1400 heal rating = 2000) and 2×1390 from Rune of water.
All that per 30 sec. So thats 6780 heal + 9000 from regen which is 15.780 heal per 30 sec instead of 4500 (30×150 regen with weak heal rating) from others weaker regeneration.
Most of that requires them to be close to you of course but if they do thats really decent healing power.
There might be even more healing potential if you use both swords for example. Use greatsword leap then switch to 1h sword make 2nd leap wait til CD is over make another 1h leap and switch back to 2h + make another leap.
I’m not sure if it can be timed that you get all 4 leaps into the 15 sec duration of the water field but I’m sure that 3 of them are possible.
If anyone knows even more healing sources let me know. I want to know what is really possible with a support ranger.

/edit: Like some people here mentioned the leap heal will only work for yourself. That’s sad I was really hoping to heal the team with it
So you can bring 9000 (regen) + 2780(water Runes) to the team which is 11.780 heal per 30 seconds. That’s still nice but it really seems that the water runes are the only thing the ranger can do to heal the group.
Thanks for clearing it up Agadar.

I’m using a 0/0/20/20/30 build too and reached frac lvl 22 today. I switch weapons/gear really alot and also the active skills.
I was using cleric set too until yesterday. I found out that my survivability is really good even with knight’s set and some berserk accessoires but the cleric set is nice for powerful healing, especially powerful regeneration. If your heal rating is higher than the others your more powerful regeneration is favored by the game. So they will have your stronger regeneration and only if that one runs out the weaker ones from the other players comes into effect.
The weapons I use most are Greatsword and Longbow. Sometimes I use Axes and Shortbow.
For JadeMaw I use both bows. I switch weapons really often.
I lately tried to go to a full damage specc (berserker and only ranged) and two runs simply failed. I was pretty frustrated and went back to my 0/0/20/20/30 spec and it works fine.
The point is: With my actual specc I think I can really change the outcome of the run because I tank the mobs/bosses most of the time while still dealing OK damage and helping with heal and fire fields. The problem in random groups you rarely have a decent guardian or warrior who can keep the group alive by keeping the boss away from others.

What is really really annoying is the pets. Since frac lvl 20 pets die in one single agony (for example colossus end fight). I can manage to keep my pets alive even there but it is not really fun. I have to keep my pets on passive all the time and send them to fight the boss as long as it is safe. As soon as he starts to put his agony fields I call them back. If it works I dodge the agonly fields ranged attacking the boss and my pet usually stays with me. If it gets hit it dies in 2 sec. You have to swap the pet 1/2 sec before it dies. I wait so long because otherwise if you are unlucky your newly called pet will also die because of agony and you really don’t want the 45 sec CD.
They absolutely have to fix the agony resistance on the pets. Pets need the rangers agony resistance. Once that is done the ranger is fine for me. Some AoE damage mitigation would be decent but I usually keep the pet alive by puttin him behind the boss and always dodge to give him protection when there is a big hit from the boss. Usually that tactic (if you have the trait) + often switching pets keep them alive. I use one melee pet (river drake or jaguar) and one ranged (devourer) usually. If there is no instant death AoE I use river drake and jaguar.
They also need to give us a stow pet function. It’s there already they simply have to change it so that the pet doesn’t come out if you get attacked or attack.

Pet agony resistance and AoE survivability (kinda the same)

I feel about the same most of the time. The ranger is a great class but what is really difficult is the pet in dungeons, especially fractals.
Until they implement agony resistance for the pet (should have the same agony resistance as the ranger) pet’s die simply too fast.

Then there are the ranged pets. They deal extremely bad damage compared to a jaguar/lynx or birds.
Why is there no pure damage ranged pet. It should do like 70% of the damage of the melee damage pets without having any CC’s or any other useful buffs.
That way it wouldn’t be too powerful.
We need such an option since melee pets die just too fast in many situations.
Stowing pets is very important. The mechanic is there already. Just change it so that we can stow it and it stays stowed even if we enter a fight.

While I can understand that they might not want that pets survive everything we need the tools to make it survive if we do good micromanagement.
But as it is now even that doesn’t work because of AoE damage.
Pets should get max 50% damage from pure AoE sources which are not directly aimed at the pet. Even 50% is alot but that would probably at least stop all these onehits. If it can survive these huge AoE hits even with only 20-30% life thats already alot better than it is now. We at least have the time then to react.
And again – the agony resistance is very important. Without agony resistance pets are not useful in fractals. You even implemented that attribute for the pets. The problem is it is always at zero.

The Ranger is a really nice class. I also like the idea of having an important pet. But like the OP said we need options to control the pet for certain situations.

Thanks for the info. Forgot about the healing food. I use that food with regeneration instead of the 100 heal rating. I guess both are nice.

For the 25×10 healing on the weapon runes. I’m not sure If I like the idea. Hm would have to test it. Can you usually keep it running even in dungeons? When do these stacks disappear? When you are downed or only if you die? I guess weapon switch won’t make it disappear right?
When I move from one fractal to the other the buffs probably also disappear right?

I have almost the same build for PvE – 20/20/30 using greatsword and whatever fits as 2nd set (shortbow/longbow/sword+horn/axe+horn) and with full cleric set + rune of water on all armor pieces + cleric weapon + cleric accessoirces (except back) I reach around 1420 healing. How do you reach 1800 healing?

It’s pretty tanky in dungeons and the pet does nice damage which helps alot since my damage in full heal gear is not the best^^

That is true. Also necro pets and whatever other summons also need this resist or they will be obsolete.

Today I was again in fractals lvl 13 and 14. I had 15 agony resistance while my pet still shows zero.
When there was agony damage I took very low damage while my pet seemed to get the full damage like I would with zero agony resistance.
Thats a major problem and in even higher levels it will be even worse.

I hope you take a look at this since it seems very easy to fix. Simply give them the same agony resistance as the ranger.

Is pet agony resistance working?
In the pet screen I see pet agony resistance is at zero all the time even if I have 10 in there. It also feels like pet is dying really fast because of agony.

Anyone has an idea if it is actually working?
And if not I hope Areanet will grant our pets the same agony resistance as we have it.

This is pretty important for fractals

I want to mention again the agony resistance. Is anything planned on this issue?
Pets even have an agony resistance attribute. But it’s at zero. They should have the same agony resistance as the ranger.

I have to agree with that. Pet agony resistance is very important. Please implement this as soon as possible.