I like the idea of this mastery, I would change things a little though;
Remove #3, and move #4 and #5 down to 3 & 4.
5th level mastery would grant invulnerability inside the friendly structure while the gate and/or doors are in tact. This doesn’t mean siege is invulnerable, but this now means you can stand on top of the wall and blast away, both damage and CC free.
I’ve only seen them in silver and gold league. One thing though, I’ve never seen them play rangers lol
I find it funny they make fractal lvl’s account bound which seems to me most people don’t like.. yet they won’t make WvW levels account bound which the vast majority wants..
very strange.
+1, I like it. It still doesn’t solve the problem of the pet dying instantly. I don’t think people fully understand the handicap the pet brings this unless they mainly play a ranger.
I think it could use a little more buffing, but perhaps making the pet emit an aura that effects say 5 people around you (with said buffs) as well will make the class more desirable for people.
Currently, I rarely use the pet for attacking. It sits on passive because the runes I have grant +5% damage with the pet. Not sure if this works while they’re dead, but i don’t take chances lol. I just keep them by my side for the extra 5%.
I think the pet dying too quickly problem is simply solved by making the pet immune to damage and un-targetable. It would simply be an extension of the ranger as per a % of it’s dps.
They keep beating around the bush instead of putting in raids. Ten man instanced raids would be perfect for this game yet they claim it would split the community when it’s already split between hardcore and casual players.
It’s also split between WvW and PvE’ers. I personally don’t see the problem in putting a 10 man raid in; i’d certainly find it more interesting than a 5 man dungeon.
Usually standing at the top of a rangers healing ring will negate the fear.
On the other hand, the continuous fear is an annoyance. It adds nothing to the battle other than dragging things out and annoying people.
One fear is enough.. maybe followed by the incoming ice golems. Continuous "run in, fear out, run in fear out.. for several cycles really isn’t needed.
I don’t think anyone would argue a roaming build ranger was nerfed. Everyone likes to play a certain way but if your looking to be effective in WvW, playing a roaming ranger isn’t the way to do it. You will almost always get run over by the bigger group.
On lower ranked servers.. it may not be much of a problem; higher ranked servers however.
I like the idea, but I think it could further use some work, because even if the pet was made un-targetable and given perfect accuracy, that would make us on par with every other class.
How about this, a stacking Killer Instinct buff that stacks up to 25×. With each stack, your pet gains 10% increase in damage, defense, accuracy, quickness, swiftness, crit strike, and evade. So if you can manage to keep your pet alive during a skirmish to the point it has 25 stacks.. it could literally be a zerg killer; the one shot wonder.
This could provide an additional element for players to think twice before they drop AoE in a battle.
I mean, we constantly hear that retaliation isn’t OP, and we just simply shouldn’t drop AoE on a zerg.. ok, well don’t drop AoE on a zerg if there is a pet in the fray.. simple. Or do it and suffer the consequences if the Ranger keeps them alive..
The only way to make pets so they aren’t a liability to the ranger is to make them an extension to us. Meaning they cannot be attacked or targeted; they cant put us into combat, and they are given an 100% hit rate.
If we are to rely on them for a good chunk our dps, then that dps needs to be constant. I don’t see other classes losing 40% of their dps for a good chunk of any battle.
Then there is the issue of hit rate. Even if the ranger is given a 100% hit rate, our pets are still missing a certain % of their attacks which still puts us at a dps disadvantage.
I’m all fine for having the pet as a core mechanic, but it needs to be done in such a way that we don’t lose a significant portion of our dps; and not be kept in combat.
So unless Anet figures out a way around us not losing a portion of our dps half the time, we’ll always be at a disadvantage.
I wouldn’t called this overpowered.. I’d call it even more of a liability than anything with pets in their current state.
We’re already handicapped now from them dying too quickly; we don’t need even more of our dps taken away or another pet out there keeping us in combat.
(edited by DeadlySynz.3471)
I’ve seen a few Anet players across a few servers, but I’ve never seen them play a ranger. It’s always been a warrior or thief.
I agree, better to make it tradeable. Case and point, I’m not a collector, and these minis don’t mean anything to me, and I got this the 1st time I opened the chest. I’d rather trade it.
I kind of tend to agree with the OP.. I’ve run this area in both berserker gear and defensive/regen spec. It actually amazes me say on Warlock how I was the only one that remained standing when I was sitting in berserker spec.
It’s far easier to run with the zerg; every zerg i’ve gone with kills everything along the way. Trying to run solo however (on level 3) I find next to impossible.. even with a toughness, vitality, regen spec. This is where I think the tower could use some work. Even though the game is basically built around team work, not everybody wants to group up or run with a zerg.
Lets ask ourselves this:
Anet claims that Rangers cannot have their Longbow range extended over 1500 because it will in fact “Break the game”
Well.. lets assume that Anet allows 2000 range for Rangers in WvW only (like I think they should)
Now, who wins that fight? A 2000 LB ranger vs a half ways decent stealth thief..? What mechanic is really game breaking here..
Edit – I’ve always said thieves need much more at their disposal to be useful in group fights. This is where I think stealth effectiveness should be reduced while group effectiveness should be increased.
Made a topic over in the Crafting section, but Im thinking it probably belongs here…
Here is the link: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/crafting/New-Crafting-Profession-Idea/first#post3215142
The gist is having a sub crafting profession that allows us to craft particle effects for our weapons and armor. As much as I like and dislike some of the skins in the game; I think they could be made that much cooler if we had customizable particle effects to choose from.
Not sure if this belongs here or under suggestions, but this is something I would like to see. A new sub-crafting profession that allows us to craft particle effects for our weapons and armor. Have it so everyone can do it in addition to our 2 crafting professions, and it simply uses whatever mats are available in the game now. These same mats that seem to be in such abundance that it’s cheaper to sell them to an in-game vendor rather than the trading post.
I love a lot of the skins and dislike a lot of skins in the game. Either way, I think adding customizable particle effects to these skins would make them that much cooler and would offer us a good “material sink”. This would inevitably probably drive the price of materials back up.
We could see seasonal or holiday effects released with each holiday event that would additionally use whatever materials are released for that. For example, I think it’d be neat to see a few wintersday particle effect options to place on our items if we wanted to craft them.
We have customizable finishers, so why not particle effects for our items? What do you think?
I thought about maybe having them purchased in the gem store, but I think it’d be much better to have them craft in game as it gives players something to strive for.
I never quite understood what people expect INSTEAD of zerging.
I mean everyone always expresses their disdain for it, but what else are 150 players on such a tiny map supposed to get up to? Roleplaying?
That said, yes removing the AoE cap would be nice. But the cap exists for a reason….because ANets netcode is easily overwhelmed by having to calculate damage against many targets at once.
That said, I honestly think Zerg vs. Zerg battles are the best thing about GW2 WvW. Everything else is rather generic and forgettable.
When I move on to a different MMO it’s those zerg clashes that will make the most lasting memories.
Very good point.
I think simply removing the AoE cap, making the AoE ignore defense, and then making the damage fixed would completely eliminate any skill lag. Have say between 2000-2500 power, your barrage does 1500 damage per pulse. If your power is between 2500-3000, you do 2000 damage per pulse. Always the same number, and it basically ignores defense..
Done, no more skill calculations..
You bring up a very good point though.. forget 150 players.. what are 300 players expected to do on a small map? Now if the maps were say 10x bigger than they are now, well now we have a reason to split up a zerg.
Wxp not being account bound is the reason I don’t generally bring in any alts. I only bring in an Alt if it’s required for a specific mission.. aside from that, my main is the only one who will ever step in WvW until this is changed.
Ive said this before, and I’ll say it again, eliminate WvW and leagues as we know it. Create factions, and have players join a certain faction whenever they want to join WvW.
Put up the numbers each map and factions have at once so you can either choose to join an even numbered (or outnumbered fight).
You’d eliminate population imbalance, you’d eliminate que times, and you (could) avoid skill lag if you wanted to play on a smaller numbers map.
I hate the shortbow personally but I carry it anyway because it’s the weapon I create bloodlust stacks with. The longbow isn’t any better in my opinion, and the only reason I carry that is because I like barrage (even despite the big damage nerf).
Longbow autoshot does not do enough damage; Rapid fire does even worse damage than auto shot (this should at least be doubled. I like the stealth skill of 3. I think the cooldown is too long on 4. Barrage needs it’s damage returned to normal; and we should be able to move while casting it.. or at least make it instantaneous and lower the cool down.
In my perfect world, the shortbow would be eliminated and the Longbow would take on the speed and characteristics of the Shortbow.
Skill 1 – same damage except its the speed of the shortbow and causes vulnerability
Skill 2 – would be a rapid fire spread shot that (like sb) but causes poison
Skill 3 – I think it should stay as is, it’s fine
Skill 4 – The knockback also causes cripple once they get up
Skill 5 – Barrage now interrupts every 3rd pulse and cripples every pulse.
Give that to the Ranger, and they will be in much better shape than they are now.
I think numerous things would naturally even out the population imbalance
- Points on capture (as you mentioned)
- Points for kills (extra points for stomping)
- Points for upgrading and/or defending
- Points for winning fights with smaller numbers
As someone earlier said, WvW is about coverage, not skill.
A server can win open field fights till the cows come home with similar numbers, but it won’t matter in the end if there is a 6-8 hour gap where their numbers are inferior.
It would be nice if they extended the LB (or had a compound bow) that extended the range past 1500.
I understand Anet’s thoughts on it that it would break the game.. that’s fine, just don’t allow that range in PvE, just increase the range in WvW instead.
I think it’s time that other classes in WvW should have to deal with a broken OP mechanic in the Ranger’s kitten nal, rather than us having to deal with theirs.
I’d be more than happy to let the thieves stealth go, or the Warriors ability to out Dps with a rifle, if we actually had the ability to nail people from 2500 range.
Someone brought up a good point, if you can craft yourself to 80… now what? If you don’t have any wp’s open, your pretty much screwed. You mine as well just play and open up Wp’s as you go and get gold in the process. If you follow the heart quests, it doesn’t take a lot of time to complete a map.
If your end goal is WvW, just level up in there, it doesn’t take a tremendous amount of time to do this either.
I don’t know, I just can’t see the efficiency in being level 80 and having no Wp’s open in the game.
If your an achievement hunter, a collector, or you happen to like the look of the skins, craft ascended gear.
If you could care less about any of the above and stats are your thing; the bang for the buck really isn’t there with crafting ascended. If they did make ascended have considerably better stats, we’d be working with a gear treadmill which I think many people are against.
I decided to hit 500 crafting (and craft a longbow) because I happen to like the longbow skin better than the one I have now.
That is a beautiful blue orb
Aside from that, I wonder exactly how many people spend money to transfer. It takes maybe a week or 2 of solid farming to get enough gold to convert enough gems to transfer.
Everybody I know that’s hopped servers never spent any money, only exchanged gold.
I have points in cannon mastery.. it’s great for collecting bags.
Hop on cannon.. watch your zerg track enemy down.. smash enemy zerg with cannon.. your zerg mops them up.. proceed to collect oodles of bags
I do agree though.. guards are useless.. I’d like to see them upgraded to legendary.. and I’d like to see about 5x as many outside each tower. That and let them revive and heal each other.. that should throw a wrench into the offense’s plans lol.
The stat difference might be noticeable on a lower ranked server where smaller battles may take place, or more 1v1 battles.
On a higher ranked server where it’s essentially “join the zerg” or “get run over by the zerg”, I don’t think those extra stats make much of a difference.
Maybe if your in a full scale battle.. it may make a difference of you dying in 2.5 seconds instead of 2. IMO, it’s just not worth it where zerg battles are king.
You see, barrage used to be effective before they nerfed it’s damage. I could easily close in on 3000 damage per tick (in full berserker) before they nerfed it. Even then it isn’t really that deadly because it’s easy to avoid. Much like an arrowcart, they are extremely easy to avoid; see red circle, dodge out, simple as that.
What I don’t get is, if someone is in full Berserker gear.. why is it not doing more damage? Shouldn’t the armor to damage ratio be similar between the 2 between those who choose to go full berserker vs those who go full tank? A full zerker ranger will not take down a fully tanked target in 1v1.
Maybe it’s time either berserker gear gained a massive damage boost or tanky classes have their damage nerfed by like 90%.
I know this would never happen, but I’d like them to just scrap the shortbow all together and just combine both bows together:
- Give the Longbow the shortbow’s firing speed
- Longbow 1 would cause bleeding on flank
- Longbow 2 would cause a spread rapid fire shot that poisons
- Longbow 3 I actually like what it does now
- Longbow 4 Pushes them back and cripples them
- Longbow 5 Make it an AoE damaging interrupt with each pulse
That would make for a useful longbow.
I like how they say Pets account for 40% of the Rangers dps, but this simply isn’t true. When you take into account that all classes will have a % of their hits miss, blocked, glance, or interrupted, the Ranger suffers from this two-fold.
You don’t just have the ranger missing a % of their attacks, but now their 40% dps pet is missing a % of their attacks too. Basically, even Anet gave the Ranger a 100% hit chance that cannot be blocked, interrupted, or glanced, we’d still be in the rears compared to other classes, because of our pets fumbling their attacks.
I like the idea of a pet, but they need to make the pet an extension of the Ranger. One that cannot be targeted or damaged. Make it so it never misses.
You don’t ever want something to be impossible though. That creates a whole different set of problems.
Catapults are the answer then. It may be difficult to get 3 coordinated people together to even pull it off, but if they do, whip out the catapults then, no longer impossible.
Remember, were not likely to have 3 people sitting in a tower to begin with as sentries.
Just replace the arrowcart’s final mastery with something like this:
- 300% extra damage to siege
- Blocks all healing temporarily
Have the cooldown reflect that if 3 AC’s are grouped together with 3 people with AC mastery and are coordinated, it would be impossible to take the keep with rams.
Maybe they are doing this because they felt the endurance duration to was too good for sPvP. Considering that rangers have some big disadvantages in WvW itself, this nerf hurts the class even more.
Why balance around a game mode people simply don’t want to play?
Wilderness 5 Natural Vigor. Reduced the increased endurance regeneration from 50% to 25%.
This really ruins it for me. Again a big nerf out of nowhere.
Let me add it to the list:
- endurance regen nerfed from 50% to 25%
- Healing Spring no longer gives vigor each tick and water field duration reduced
- shortbow nerfed from 1200 to 900 range
- damage skills from many pets reduced by 50%
- pet leash range reduced drastically
- “Search & Rescue” can’t revive dead players anymore
- quickness on pet swap moved from Minor Adept to Major Grandmaster (swapped with worthless trait)
- “Guard” no longer works up or down ledges
- “Signet of the Beastmaster” moved from Adept to Grandmaster.I probably missed some.
Other unsesolved issues:
- Guard is a shout, but has a 1 second cast time
- Nearly all AoE attacks hit 3 targets instead of 5
- Require grandmaster traits to make signets, shouts, traps and spirits useful.
- Require grandmaster trait to have relatively useful condition removal.
- “Sic ’em” gets cancelled if the pet is told to activate another skill or told to change target.
- Signet of Renewal fails if pet is out of range.
- a healing skill (Healing Spring) is the only reliable on-demand condition removal rangers have.
- pets f2 often doesn’t activate or very late.
- sword auto-attack has too many leaps and makes the character feel out of control and prevents dodging.
- shortbow auto-attack bleed requires a flank.
- longbow Barrage too long cooldown.
- longbow requires to spend 50 trait points to get its basic traits (20% cooldown, piercing arrows, 1500 range)
- skirmishing has too many bad traits.If these were fixed/changed we might actually be getting somewhere with this class.
I missed this post… looking at all of these ridiculous nerfs in one spot really illustrates the disconnect between players and developers. It’s kind of sad to see such drastic changes to a class that’s always under performed compared to other classes. I cannot even begin to grasp their thought process with some of these changes.
You pretty much nailed it. But I do not expect them to address any of this.
I agree with everything you said, you did miss 1 nerf however.. the one that bothered me the most.
They cut barrage damage in half (or possibly more) from what it used to be. For me, it went from doing 1800-2600 damage per hit down to 800-1300. To get those damage numbers, one has to be in full berserker gear which obviously is a disadvantage in itself. This is why I felt the nerf was completely unnecessary, as I’m basically rooting myself for this attack with the possibility of getting killed in 1-3 hits.
Just allow all current legendary skins to be purchased on the BL for say $20 and leave it at that. Those who want to waste their money on them for a skin.. so be it.. those who have too much time on their hands to grind for it.. so be it.
Everyone is happy
I’d skip the skill if I were you (if you havn’t got it yet). It doesn’t heal enough, the toxic debuff isn’t dangerous, and the skill itself has far to long of a cool down.
I personally don’t like it in PvE. If it’s going to be anywhere.. PvP or WvW is suited for it.
Even then, from what I’ve seen, most people don’t even like the “downed” state to begin with in PvP and WvW and it should be removed from the game entirely. There are some that like it, and generally these are the people that get beat down easily and need their buddies to revive them.
That is something I also agree with. I think it’s a big waste of time in general; when you add up all that additional time it takes to either stomp or beat down enemies, it’s a lot of time wasted IMO.
Edit – If the stomping stays, I’d much prefer to make it an AoE stomp that takes out a bunch of targets at once.
(edited by DeadlySynz.3471)
Came across this today.. for whatever reason, one of mine in the Bloodtide coast didn’t register. Had to use it 3 times in order to get the achievement
Why not introduce a new type of mobile siege.. kind of like a golem. Call it a titan or destroyer or something. Anyways make this mobile siege’s purpose to both smash down walls and doors, but also to zerg bust. Make it both offensively and defensively strong.
Give it 3 attacks that are strong against groups, and 1 attack capable of knocking down doors and walls, and the last button having it propel forward like a teleport. Make it so the attacks scale in damage with the more people clumped together. Have it so it’s like an HP sponge (like that legendary candy corn boss), so it could take a zerg quite some time to kill it off, but to do so safely, they’d have to do it from range.
Anyone can buy and build it, though it shouldn’t be cheap to buy or build. Have it so it can’t be traded on the AH. Allow no more than 2 per server, per map at at time.
As for when/how it can be activated? Perhaps when the population differential is at least 1.5 to 1. At least 10 people have to be on the server to activate it. If more people come onto the map evening out the ratio, the siege deactivates and auto-teleports back to the main base.
This could work in both evening out the population and creating a more fair match. I’d also allow free transfers as well, because it really should be in players best interest to find a server where the matches are even so they don’t have to deal with this siege on the map.
It probably would have been better doing this discussion in it’s own forum, instead of a thread.
Mercenaries
Mercenaries open up when a specific server is extremely outgunned. What mercenaries does is allow guilds from other servers to temporarily join the outmanned server to help balance the odds. Only guilds from servers that are winning their matchup may become mercenaries. Mercenaries get a bonus in wxp and money, however are unable to interact with supply in towers and keeps to avoid griefing.
As a stretch goal, mercenaries is a permanent flag and the guild becomes “serverless” in wvw. Losing servers are able to offer up some method of payment to entice good mercenary groups to help their server.
Like I said before, I don’t think NPC’s are the solutions.
Did you ever see a zerg avoid a supply camp because the NPC orges are in it?
Even a solo player can take a supply camp with the NPC’s in it, it just takes longer.
If you send lots of NPC’s to towers and keeps will only mean maybe a small delay for the zerg (probably not). I don’t think a zerg in a zone with only NPC enemies will every be stopped by the NPC’s
Oh this could work quite well.. it’s just a case of the community on agreeing on it for a server that is outgunned gets this advantage.
Simply, make all the NPC’s legendary, make them heal and revive each other, and use mass CC’s. Throw 10-50 of those in any given tower or keep.. and it won’t be as easy to take as some people think.
Lets face it, it’d probably be a lot more interesting fighting that then a handful of veterans and a champion. Then again, this would also drastically hinder any objectives the dominating server has.
No matter what you do, some people (probably many) just have absolutely no interest in PvP or WvW. No incentive will ever get them to transfer over. Given this, there isn’t much that can be done to even out the population in it’s current state, outside of Anet just forcefully spreading people across servers.
I’ve suggested this before and I think it would work, but it’d require a complete re-structure on how WvW operates. In effect in wouldn’t be called WvW anymore.. more like FvF (Faction vs Faction). We have 3 borderlands and 3 factions in the game currently (how convenient).
Basically, when a player wants to join a WvW like battle, they pick a faction they’d like to fight for at that particular time. They choose what map they want to fight on. Have several instances of each map open at once. Each map would show the current amount of players fighting for each side. This way players know if they are either getting into an uneven or a fair fight.
Give each faction a whole new set of achievements, siege, and rewards.
Yes this would require probably quite a bit of restructuring, but at least this should eliminate the ques, as well as, even out the fights considerably more.
I think the best way to at least kitten (and continue to monitor) the WvW population, is to add in some sort of ticker or tracker to each players profile.
This could tell you, and Anet:
- How many days per week, what days, & how many times per day you log on
- How long (on average) do you spend in WvW per session
- Most importantly, what time frame do you spend most of your time in
Given these, if Anet doesn’t already have them, they now have a tool to continually gauge where the population sits. I think it’d also be interesting for the players to see if they are at all curious just how much time they spend in WvW, vs the kills/achievements they’ve accumulated.
Other perks which I think would help lure people into WvW would be to give extra rewards for the servers who are lower in ranking. For instance, rank 3 would get a bonus in loot when capturing ranked 2’s objectives or killing their players. Likewise, they get even a bigger bonus when attacking rank 1. Vice versa, if your server’s a higher rank, you get reduced rewards.
Now in the lucky event where there is an “uneven” match like a rank 14 taking on a rank 4.. well the rewards are considerably more due to the big difference in rank. This could lure more people into WvW for those rewards.. and to even the odds of course. This could also greatly help given the big costs to crafting ascended weapons now (and soon to be armor sets).
The ranger has always been very viable in my experience in WvW.. sure they could be better, but I have no problem playing in small groups or big zergs and killing quite easily.
I do run full glass.. about as glassy as you can get, so I’m useless in 1v1 and a thieves dream lol. I run the 30/30/0/0/10.
For those who say, it’s as simple as just busting through the front line to get to the rangers in the back.. it’s not that easy, unless your playing against those who didn’t know how to play. There are a few skills to take them completely out of harms way, while a few other skills are capable melting even those with the tankiest gear. I’ll easily go days without dying while maintaining a 150-200 badges per hour.
I’m built for group play, but not for roaming. Unless it’s changed, if you want to roam, the BM bunker build is the way to go. Rangers also have plenty of CC with traps but that build just isn’t as effective as going full damage in small/large groups.
Depends on your play style.
I’ve been away for awhile and only came back today. Paid TQ a visit and the place was empty to my surprise. I understand he has been buffed considerably, but are his rewards just that bad compared to the effort putting in to killing him?
What’s the point of having guilds specifically to kill TQ now.. that is unless he does drop something specific.
I agree with this as well.
The continuous living story content burned me out so I ended up leaving the game for 2-3 months just so I could get back into it for Halloween. It just doesn’t really make it seems special anymore when so much comes out. When you look at holiday events like halloween and xmas, to me, those deserve living story events. The rest of it however.. once in a blue moon if that.
Easily fixable, once a keep, tower, or garrison is taken over, all enemies are immediately ported out back to their home base.
Though some like the idea on thinking it’s a strategy and that’s what’s sweeping is for.. realistically it’s just a complete waste of time. Time cannot be replaced, don’t waste it, just send the enemies out of the structure back to their own base and allow them to regroup from there.
I havn’t logged on to Gw2 in a few weeks here (burned out and not happy with the direction it’s going). With that said, I run a full berserker build… and though I can’t remember my toughness offhand.. I don’t think it was far off your numbers OP. Thieves easily 2-4 shot me quickly, you should expect the same with that toughness.
While I agree it is a problem and up-voted it myself.. honestly, can Anet really do anything about it?
I mean, it’s the whole “play how you want to play” scenario, so whose to tell these people that are doing that, that they simply can’t? Same as guild vs guild.. those players can hinder the servers progress in the same sort of way, but does Anet do anything about them? Can they? Suppose players want to just enter WvW to run around and kill rabbits.. does Anet have any business telling them they can’t do that?
Then when we look at trolls dropping siege to hit the siege cap.. perhaps that’s just how they find enjoyment in the game. Anet really can’t tell them otherwise..
A problem yes.. but realistically, WvW has to be made more interesting so those players find enjoyment elsewhere.