Guild Wars 2

Honestly I think ANet is trying to push people into hybrid builds (which is what I play now) and I dont see a problem with that.

Hard counters like condition immunity and endure pain (and other classes equivalents) really shut down on people who just stack one stat to rediculous OP levels, but are balanced, good but not OP against people who play in a more rounded way.

I really dont see whats wrong with creating hard counters to people who play a 1-trick build.

jcbroe.4329:

Just my own thoughts on the matter. I think that each of the utility Grandmaster traits need to get a Spirits Unbound treatment and get a lower slot, then take an already strong trait, make it stronger, and then bump it up to grandmaster status.

Example: Move Signet of the Beastmaster down, and bump up Eagle Eye to Grandmaster, and on top of it’s current functionality, have it effect the shortbow’s range and damage as well.

Move Trap Potency down, bump Trappers Expertise up to Grandmaster tier and change the functionality to either transfer conditions to enemies on trap pulses, or to remove boons on enemies hit by traps, etc.

Just examples though, we could debate all day which traits need to be moved up and what their new possible functionality could be.

The problem I see with trying to fix it that way is that is doesnt really fix the problem, just lessen it.

Also shuffling traits around doesnt fix the other problems our traitlines have, such as the MS traitline being way too overloaded with very important traits for a LB ranger. Moving SoBM down wouldnt stop people still having to leave out very important traits because there are too many to choose from (Spotter, Piercing Arrows, Eagle Eye, SoBM, Remorsless). Swapping the trap traits wouldnt solve the problem that the Skirmishing traitline lacks decent power traits despite the stats it gives either.

They really need to compress traits into one, rather than shuffling them about. The 2 traps traits should just be as one in the master slot and then they can put a new power-based trait in the GM slot (or move an exsisting one from MS). Spirits should always walk.. was nice they moved that trait down but it shouldnt even exist, and neither should SoBM.

Compressing the trap traits, removing SoBM and moving the buffed Eagle-Eye to Skirmishing GM would instantly make traps more accessable and open up power/berserker builds a bit more.

Durzlla.6295:

Cufufalating.8479:

^What Prysin said

Most class utilties do their basic function well straight off the bat, and you trait to lower the cooldown and give them extra functions ontop of the basic ones.

We arent the only class with skills which require heavy investment, but we are certainly the class with the most. I think only our Survival skills are good “out of the box” with no traiting.

Who else requires heavy investment? The only one I can think of who can even invest as heavily into traits as we do would be eles for arcane skills, and engis, and even then NONE of those are needed to make the thing useable and bring it “up to par” they just make them into absolutely amazing utilities…

Most utilities you drop 20pts and you’re about out of stuff you can get for the utility, the rest just sorta combo off things traits do for utility IE glamour causes blinds, and Blinds cause confusion.

Guess it depends slightly on what you consider “nessesary” for a skill to be good.. For me though the only other classes I have to 80 are thief, guardian and (nearly) mesmer, and from those I would say thief Vemons are not very good without sharing, and mesmer mantras are not very good without at least traiting them to have 3 uses instead of 2.

^What Prysin said

Most class utilties do their basic function well straight off the bat, and you trait to lower the cooldown and give them extra functions ontop of the basic ones.

We arent the only class with skills which require heavy investment, but we are certainly the class with the most. I think only our Survival skills are good “out of the box” with no traiting.

Sorry to drag the convostion back a bit but I was in bed…

Te discussion about EB being a transfer not a straight condition removal really sums up one of the other big issues rangers have, and is why we have poor group support.

Most of the traits which on other classes would be group support, or buffs for the player themselves have just been shifted to work on our pet, all in the name of making the pet a key part of the ranger (which is a fine notion, just poor implimented).

EB and SoR are one great example.. where we dont cure conditions, we just kill our pet with them.

Shared Anguish is another great example.. every class has a simular trait, which in some way or another protects them from 1 CC, but instead of ours being a flat protections just moves the CC to our pet.. which is certainly better but for a BM build is still annoying.

The list goes of of traits which could/should/would effect us or allied players were they on another class, but have been moved to effect the pet instead, which to me, is the root of many of our problems.

I dont hate pets like many rangers.. and if we’re going to have them of course they need to be incorperated into our play.. Just they way theyve done it is pretty bad.

In clerics? That certainly is… intereting.. Although I played vs a berserker ranger who must have been 20/20/0/0/30 (or something like that).

Berserker LB + fully traited pet (probably with the skirmishing pet traits too) really isnt funny, in any sense.

But nice post OP.. all very true I’d say.

Edit: Mistyped funny as fun.. completely changing the meaning of the sentance

I like Prysins suggestions^^

They probably dont change signets because 3 of them see a lot of play even without actives, and SoS (the one which isnt used much without SoB) would basicly just be a better version of Protect Me.. so then theyd have to rework that too, and thats just far to much work for ANet.

Personally I’d save both for when you need them but if you want to pick on them yeah, poison volley.

I tend to keep poison volley till either my opponent is healing/I think their about to heal or until I happen to be in melee range anyway, so I just make the most of it and hit with with all 5 arrows because I can.

Using it at max range for no reason does seem a bit of a waste tbh.

I play traps and find it very active, largely because trap builds cant (or is very difficult and uncommon) build in regen like most other meta builds (Spirits, BM, etc). Without that healing which most other ranger builds get you are left having to pay a lot more attention to positioning, knowing when and how to engage, etc, because you simply cant afford to be wasting HP like you can when you’re healing 200-500 a second passively. Its just a very movement based build, even for rangers who are always naturally very dependant on positioning in any build.

And to be fair, the fact that traps can either be used defensively on yourself, or thrown at a target, or even thrown to the side to deliberately put them out the way so you can lure and opponent into them once they are off CD again (meaning you can hit someone with 4-6 traps back to back) means you do get more play with them than you do with other utilities, whch usually only have 1 purpose.

Flame Trap is better by far.. although since you have a torch offhand it might be a little overkill.

I think I’d still be tempted to keep flame trap, since AoE burning is just so good, and theres no such thing as too much condition application :P

^ What Durzlla said.

On Average with AA:

Warriors stack 1 bleed for 8s every 0.8s
Rangers stack 1 bleed for 3s every 0.54s
Thieves 1 bleed for 4s every 0.82s
Necros stack 1 bleed for 2s every 1.5s
Engineers stack 1 bleed for 2s every 0.75s

Rangers clearly have the fastest application through AA, and the fast attack speed means Sigil of Earth and bleed on crit trait has much geater effect on us that other classes who attack much less often.

Warriors sword has an equally fast attack speed and logner bleed, but its balanced by only apply bleed on 2/3 hits and being a melee-range attack.

Its also true that high condition application is usualyl better than long duration, because a cleanses will cut through slow application long duration conditions, but fast application with short duration are hardly effected by cleasing.

I really dont see the problem for us.

I agree with the other replies.. SB is fine, and would be rediculous without the flanking req on the #1.

You must remember it fires very, very quickly.. unlike all the other weapons which you list which all have average-slow attack speeds, meaning they cant stack bleeds nearly as well as our SB can in the right hands.

Glad I saw this.. been training a mesmer hoping to play some sort of phantasm build.. was thinking about going PU but this actually looks like it suits me much better. Will definately be tryng this when I get to 80

Thanks!

That fact that what you came up with for rangers is “I want to name a pet” more or less sums up why so many rangers complain, lol.

I’ll check when I am next on^^

But JP are no excuse.. theres only like 50 in the game and 80% of those dont even have lethal falls

No you arent the only one, many (most) rangers dislike this aspect of the sword and we’ve asked for a fix many times, but apparently its working as intended.

The only work around is, as you say, turning auto-attack off, which as you know still isnt perfect but its all you can do really.

Nice GIF xD

Spirit do annoy me somewhat in PvP.. going up 1v1 vs a spirit ranger who is essentially just using S/D and spamming evades of cooldown for no real reason other than doing so gives you 40% evade uptime, with a pet, passives and insane (also passive) healing to keep you alive without really doing anything at all.

Each to their own I guess though.. at least rangers have a competative build, even if it is possibly the most boring thing I have ever seen in this game.

Thats a bug, your pet does not share / benifit from your stats at all. Only BM traits (and some other traits) will improve your pets stats.

The more I play PvP the more different it seems to become from WvW roaming… builds like condition warriors and blind thieves which I dont even consider a real opponent in WvW are a big issue in PvP, and builds like the backstab thieves you see non-stop in WvW are nearly non-existant in PvP. Even rangers usually play complete different builds (spirits anyone?) in PvP.

So yeah.. not sure I consider them in the same way, making it awkward to answer the question.

My main advice is practice.. I know its a bit of a non-answer.. but go on YT, watch ranger videos, pick a build you like the look of and then play it. No amount of theory or advice will better your play without just getting out there

Somewhat offtopic.. but there is something amusing about warriors thinking that their sword is a low DPS weapon, even though its AA chain does more damage than the ranger sword chain, which is our absolute highest DPS weapon.

Oh ANet your balance is funny sometimes…

FYI Gorwalk trap can crit.

Real men play with ponies and unicorns.

I’ve had some success in the past with knights/cav/soldiers gear, using either signets or traps as utilities – GS/LB – 30/30/0/10/0

Wouldnt say I was as useful as a warrior ir guardian but if you want to use a ranger for that purpose its certainly possible and surprisingly enjoyable.

Edit: Was something like this, I cant remember exactly http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQJARTjEVF2JWSWs2Bi1DCt/B1KwJ2D+zoFVwqG-jkBBYgBisIQZnFRjtYqIasakYqXER1yAwsAA-w

I dont care what anyone says, ranger SB is my #1 favourite weapon in the game hands down. Its the key to how I play and no matter how many times I try other things, I always come back to SB in every build.

Sure, I wish the #2 wasnt a fan, and I do accept that some people might find it poor design that the damage all comes from the AA, but that doesnt mean the other skills are useless or that its an easy-mode weapon to use.

I love the LBs 2-5, but the #1 is just too slow and clunky for me. No matter how high they buff the damage at low range it wont change whats wrong with it for me.. It just doesnt suit my play at all, which is a shame.

Why pick a class because its the best… How boring

I can tell you it makes it all the more satisfying to stomp people in WvW, knowing that 2 minutes ago they looked at you are thought “ooh a free lootbag”.

Edit:

I see this has been necro’ed, nevermind really.

There are so many cool things they COULD do with it.. just looking at the name “Heal as One” gives ideas like…

“Heals the ranger and pet for a total of 10k HP, split evenly between them. If one reaches full health from the heal, the “overflowed” healing is transfered to the other." All it would mean is if your pet is full or near full HP you’d have an epic heal, but if you pet was weak you’d have a weak heal.

Or you could do the opposite and say “You and your heal both heal for 5k. For every HP healed on the pet or ranger, the other recieves an additional point of healing.” That would mean if your pet is low you’d have a great heal, but if you pet was full you’d have a weak heal.

They could do so many cool things with a heal that is tied to our pet.. but nope.. they just go for a fairly average very boring heal. Oh well, at least we have 2 other awesome heals.

Interesting theory.. but to be honest I think the underlying problem is noone plays Ranger seriously at ANet.

They dont really understand why we ask for certain things and why we dont use certain things.. They just have some vision of what rangers should be doing and stick with that, regardless of the reality of what playing a ranger actually involved.

Also theres a difference between admitting your class is OP and reporting a bug in the game, which we all know isnt meant to be there. Thats not unity thats just bug abusing.

TU or HS are both fine choices depending on your preference, playstyle or even opponent.

But as Fomby said.. Since you have no other condition removal I think you are kinda backed into taking HS.

Damage per attack.

SB does more at < 1000 range, LB does more at > 1000 (rumours of a SB nerf not withstanding).

I like this OP, he doesnt take any kitten :P

Now to reply to his thread so he doesnt turn on me… I like the idea of changing HS so there is a use for the active to be well.. activated.., but I dont think this is quite right.

The problem is that HS and Troll Ugent are simular in the sense that they are pre-emptive heals. You dont use TU when you need a sudden heal instantly (well you would because you have no other choice if its what you have equipped, but you know what I mean), and the same goes for the HS passive.

I dont think people would give up their passive for 30-35s just to gain 3-4k HP over the next 10 seconds (6-7k minus the 3k they would have gotten anyway).

Kinda lost on how to explain this and I am going on a bit.. but essentially people will only use the HS active as a last resort, because using it basicly means that for the next 30s you are a sitting duck, and people wont want a “last restort” heal which takes 10s to take effect. It would need to be like it is now, with the active being an instant burst of health.. they just need to tone down the passive and buff the active, but not change how the active work.

What was far to long for such a small point, sorry.

I would be very careful about dropping Flame Trap.. burning is the most damaging condition, and with the Flame Traps low CD it adds so much to your DPS, it really is a must have unless you’re taking a torch offhand (and since you’ve said you want GS+SB thats not an option).

In answer to your qustions about his build.. Dwayna Runes should give enough regen, especially if you went 10 into NM. Without that I am not sure if the runes are enough on their own.

Healing is an odd thing to take with traps, I’ve tried it myself a while ago and didnt really like it because it just felt like trying to get too many things into one build, so in that sense the normal thing to do is full rabid and drop the healing power, but I wouldnt let that disuade you from trying it.

Idk.. I like the setting you had before (with the changes I suggested :P) more than Chulla’s, but I guess its up to you.

I was going to use vipers for the poison to cut down on the enemys heal capabilities, though I guess only really bad players would heal while poisoned and poison volley would do the same job.

Is the gear allocation fine as it is? or could I be more efficient swapping the stat allocation on the pieces about?

Poison is important.. Usually rangers get near perma-poison from S/D so its not something I pay much attention to… I guess vipers nest would help since you have neither a sword nor dagger, but I would still not pick it over LR or SoW.

Gear allocation is fine. That kind of thing only really comes into effect when dealing when dealing with Critial Damage, because depending on the armour piece its given a different “value” compared to other stats.. but in builds which dont use crit damage (or celestial gear) it doesnt matter how/where you distibute the armour.

Too be honest it looks pretty solid as it is.

You may want to consider taking SoW or LR instead of Vipers Nest, since it doesnt add too much to your build and the extra regen or stunbreaker I’d think is more valuable, but thats up to you. EDIT: If you really do want a 3 trap build, Frost Trap > Vipers Nest.

Also, try Sigil of Tormenting on the GS, the reason being it doesnt (apparently) share an ICD with Sigil of Earth like Geomancy does. Just means tormenting should always trigger when you swap to it, not jsut sometimes.

The only other thing is I think you give up too much by not taking the condition duration food. I understand you wanted to get a bit more stats but.. I think the +40% duration is more important.

But generally it looks fine to me.

I must say it does take the fun out of updates, knowing whats coming beforehand.

Oh well.. nothing that really effects me (except the endurance nerf)… Maybe I’ll try LB for the sake of it, but its not the damage which put me off it in the past so.

-shrugs-

Honestly they should jsut rework the LB #1.. they’ve fiddled with it endlessly, making arrows move faster, tweaking the damage, tweaking it again this patch.. but the underlying issue is it is a really really slow and clunky auto-attack for anything other than picking people off at range, which might work in zergs and some team fights but not vs a decent opponent.

The rest of its skills are pretty cool.. its a shame really.

Would even work on D/P thieves.. HS then go for a BS with +50% damage.. oh hell no.

Great trait on the wrong class. Would be OP on warriors.. but on Rangers with no real burst skill and minimal stuns? Meh.

jcbroe.4329:

I wish people would stop suggesting putting Traps into Wilderness Survival.

Not because it doesn’t make sense, but because the last thing we need is an entire build whose offensive traits directly compete with all of it’s defensive traits. Our absolute best defensive traits are all in Wilderness Survival.

It would literally outright kill the trap build since in order to use traps you would have to sacrifice the little defensive trait options the build currently has in order to make traps usable.

INSTEAD, traps should do better direct damage so that they can be used by power builds as well. It doesn’t help that Skirmishing really has zero useful trait options for power builds, but Marksmanship is overloaded with too many to use at once.

So really, the better question would be: why are ranger traitlines all so bad?

^THIS

I mean seriously.. If they move traps to WS what then? Would trap rangers need to choose between EB and our GM trap trait? Because that sure as hell would screw us over…

Or maybe EB would be moved to Skirmishing, meaning trap rangers would not change because we’d still trait into both lines, except every other condition/bunker ranger would be ruined.

Good plan, well thought out.

I’m a ranger so.. cant really give Mesmer-specific advice… but Necros rely on their insane health pool for their defence, meaning bursting them down is hard – coupled with their potential for one hell of a condition bomb makes going head on at them risky for almost any class/build.

They have poor healing and mobility though, so you can quite happily wear them down as long as you can avoid being hit by all their conditions at once, something mesmers should be good at with plenty of access to longrange attacks, mobility skills and phantasms/shatters to go in and do the damage whilst you stay in relative safety.

It can work just fine where it is.. I’ve been playing almost exclusively trap builds for the last 4 months, from full rabid, full dire, dire apothecary mix to now a hybrid build (using every armour type under the sun to get the stats I want :P) and I can honestly say the hybrid build is the best. I have no concerns with where traps are in relation to trait lines.

I am pretty sure thats not the case with LR, but I know it is definately the case with sword #2 evade… so now I am unsure.. maybe I subconciously deselect targets when using it O_O . I’ll do try later unless someone else can confirm

Sounds like a bug, or a mistake on your part, but we’ll go with bug.

LR will indeed make you evade in the opposite direction to fears, I use it often vs necros, especially when stomping and they use their down-state fear (what I am lazy).

I’m pretty sure one of the necro wells is a stunbreaker.

I might go get a recording next time I am on, but we all know its all about the trap ranger luring all the mobs behind the rock by the entrance and then entangling and trapping the hell out of them.

Blind and confusion, twice the size of ordinary traps, 90s CD. Be so awesome

It is OP.

In 1v1 its fine, infact its pretty bad, because people can see and dodge attacks.
In small scale team fights its fine, because people can see and dodge attacks.

In zerg fights its insane, because all you need to do it spam more warriors to get perma-stun, huge damage, endless blast finishers, and that is pretty much all thats involved.

Both frost trap and spike trap should have a decent DD component.. they are the 2 most likely to be used with power builds. Flame trap I think is fine as it is, with such a low CD buffing it might be a bit excessive. Vipers nest needs a lot of work.. I personally favour giving it weakness and vulnerability (maybe 3 stacks per tick), which would make it more useful in many situations.

And I agree with the previous suggestion that the 2 trap traits should swap places… I’d still use both, but it kinda sucks that the one that is REALLY important is the GM, meaning you kinda have to trait all the way or not bother at all.

Just watched the video of them demonstrating the new heals… Couldnt have looked more underwhelming. If you want to heal you have a 1.5s casttime to summon the spirit, and 1s cast time to use the active, and then the AoE part of the active doesnt actually activate till 1.5s after that.

So if I need to heal thats a 4s delay with 2 seperate interupt intervals for my opponent, all for a relatively underwhelming heal.

I’d rather has HS for group support… a few blasts and the healing is better, plus the regen and condition removal and no need for traits.

Amusing tactic they have… giant mesmer with loads of clones with the tiny lil asura hiding in there so well I didnt even notice him for the first little while :P

With mesmers I find it best to constantly engage and disengage. That doesnt mean you need to completely run away, just take a step bad once in a while to keep your bearings. If you just charge in head down you can get confused with whos what and where, even if its such for a few seconds.. so keep your head up and like the others said, spotting the real mesmer is just a matter of practice.

Its obviously designed to be a group-orientated heal choice, so clearly its not the best for solo play.

Sadly though since spirits still suffer the same fundiment issue they always have (that being that they are designed to be our group utilities, but scale horrifically badly in team fights because the more team, the more AoE, the more dead your spirits making your “group utility” bad in group environments), I am sceptical about the use of the water spirit.