Guild Wars 2

Prysin.8542:

Durzlla.6295:

Prysin.8542:

Like Ather mentioned, it truly is a lack of seeing the “greater picture”. Most of all, condition cleansing and spirits should be looked at.
Personally, i feel the need to remove either the healthbar or timer on spirits in PvE/WvW, but keep the existing spirit system for PvP. The current spirits are pretty OK balanced in PvP but just a joke in WvW zergs, and even small scale fighting.

Another thing to mention is how others perceive us rangers. Some have great respect, others talk trash. Most of the trash talk derives from the infamous BearBow PvE build. Which is a pretty ok PvE build, but it is absolutely destroying the reputation of rangers outside PvE.

In all honesty it’s ok in PvP too so long as you are going GLASS and are using that bear as your walking meat shield, but that is almost never the case in PvP…. If I see another soldier geared ranger using a bear and. 2 bows I’m gonna have to throw someone off Skyhammer….

Two longbows i presume?

Want to know the worst part? I saw a Longbow + Bear ranger in CLERICS gear running Sick’Em, Spirit of Stone, sig of the wild, entangle and TU with like 15/25/0/0/30 or some abomination like that with only a longbow as a weapon (not 2 longbows with different sigils, literally one longbow, no other weapon set), I almost wanted to cry…

Prysin.8542:

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Honestly, Remorseless should be combined into the Grandmaster minor slot, and Eagle Eye should affect the shortbow and be moved up to the Grandmaster tier. Signet of the Beastmaster shouldn’t even exist, and signet actives should be affecting both the player and the pet inherently. This would open up another Grandmaster slot for x trait.

Probably the best way to move forward.

That’s what I was thinking, especially since they said they want SB range trait to be a grandmaster trait, and let’s be honest, if you’re using a LB and using piercing arrows you’re going to go the full 30 for EE too.

Exactly. Then with the Master tier, people only have to choose between Piercing Arrows or Spotter, which is a reasonable selection to have to make; more single target damage, or hitting more targets.

There’s also Beastmasters Might (an extremely good trait for some builds)and then whatever other one they add, but at least they wouldn’t be stepping on each other’s toes. And I’d consider Spotter more of a support trait than a damage boost (it’s both but you know what I mean).

The issue with multiple “good choices” isnt limited to Marks Master Tier, but also adept tier. Both Keen Edge, Steady Focus and Predators Instinct are good adept traits. Simply put, the whole line, in and of itself is riddled with too many good options, and none of them is better then the other.
It is good to have a decent selection, but opening up for some more interesting play would be very appreciated.

We could go as far as to combine all the current Minor traits into the adept minor. Then make Eagle Eye Grandmaster, Signet of the Beastmaster into Master Minor (proper place for it, if Anet doesnt want to get rid of it), Spotter into GM minor.

I also strongly believe that Skirmishing should have a minor or major trait that improves movement speed while wielding bows.

I think it’s a really good thing that there’s so many good choices, there should NOT be a “this trait is better than the rest” it should always be a difficult choice like it is in the marks (and with some builds skirmishing) that makes build diversity BETTER and makes playing the way you want ( to an extent) a lot more realistic approach and more interesting.

I mean seriously if they weren’t all relatively the same strength why even have traits when some would clearly be better than others?

Prysin.8542:

Like Ather mentioned, it truly is a lack of seeing the “greater picture”. Most of all, condition cleansing and spirits should be looked at.
Personally, i feel the need to remove either the healthbar or timer on spirits in PvE/WvW, but keep the existing spirit system for PvP. The current spirits are pretty OK balanced in PvP but just a joke in WvW zergs, and even small scale fighting.

Another thing to mention is how others perceive us rangers. Some have great respect, others talk trash. Most of the trash talk derives from the infamous BearBow PvE build. Which is a pretty ok PvE build, but it is absolutely destroying the reputation of rangers outside PvE.

In all honesty it’s ok in PvP too so long as you are going GLASS and are using that bear as your walking meat shield, but that is almost never the case in PvP…. If I see another soldier geared ranger using a bear and. 2 bows I’m gonna have to throw someone off Skyhammer….

I mean bro, Healing Spring is absolutely ridiculous it gives regen AND vigor AND condi removal all in one skill to all their allies and it’s a water field and it has a shorter CD than Healing Rain! Nerf!!

Wintel.4873:

Non-condition classes: Ele wasted 30 points in a useless trait-line
Condition classes using Carrion amulet: Ele is borderline unkillable
All group fights: Ele will always be below 90% hp and wasted 30 points in a useless trait-line
Ele builds: There is basically only 1 build that makes Diamond Skin work, D/D 0/0/30/20/20 or similar. It’s extremely difficult to make it work because zero points are spent in offensive trees (Fire/Air), it’s mostly defensive.

I hear there’s these builds out there called bunkers that are designed to be defensive and have almost no damage, I know it’s weird that someone would wanna go with “not dying” instead of blowing everything up, but supposedly it’s this thing called a “staple” in a PvP team, it’s weird isn’kitten

@OP: If you try to min/max you’re gonna have a bad time.

ChillyChinaman.6057:

Durzlla.6295:

ChillyChinaman.6057:

Durz, I think that’s because of the better scaling of Moa-fied skills compared to base skills.

The pet hits for roughly the same damage as when it’s a Moa as when it’s not, the only difference is that it lands all the attacks it uses.

Really? I was going off the wiki numbers since I’ve never gotten the chance to test it personally.

The wiki uses numbers with player stats, me and a friend tested it a whole night to see how it was, unless it radically changed (totally plausible this was done months ago) the damage should be about equal, I tried it with a variety of pets, I believe at least one of each species.

ChillyChinaman.6057:

Durz, I think that’s because of the better scaling of Moa-fied skills compared to base skills.

The pet hits for roughly the same damage as when it’s a Moa as when it’s not, the only difference is that it lands all the attacks it uses.

jcbroe.4329:

Durzlla.6295:

jcbroe.4329:

Honestly, Remorseless should be combined into the Grandmaster minor slot, and Eagle Eye should affect the shortbow and be moved up to the Grandmaster tier. Signet of the Beastmaster shouldn’t even exist, and signet actives should be affecting both the player and the pet inherently. This would open up another Grandmaster slot for x trait.

Probably the best way to move forward.

That’s what I was thinking, especially since they said they want SB range trait to be a grandmaster trait, and let’s be honest, if you’re using a LB and using piercing arrows you’re going to go the full 30 for EE too.

Exactly. Then with the Master tier, people only have to choose between Piercing Arrows or Spotter, which is a reasonable selection to have to make; more single target damage, or hitting more targets.

There’s also Beastmasters Might (an extremely good trait for some builds)and then whatever other one they add, but at least they wouldn’t be stepping on each other’s toes. And I’d consider Spotter more of a support trait than a damage boost (it’s both but you know what I mean).

Liyu.8591:

Serraphin Storm.2369:

No other class can use two bows that would be unparalled. Niether thieve or warriors can do that.

LOL This is your argument for “unparalleled archers”?

Well me and a zerker warrior had a 1200 range shoot off that I stomped him in while my fernhound was just sitting by my side watching, so I’d say yeah , we are unparalleled at range.

I feel like ranger is in a solid place, power builds are becoming more viable (they just need one final nudge imo, seeing as how perma fury made them extremely good).

Spirits, traps, and Bm are still all viable, power based builds are doing pretty good for roaming LB builds, but overall not a whole lot is different.

jcbroe.4329:

Honestly, Remorseless should be combined into the Grandmaster minor slot, and Eagle Eye should affect the shortbow and be moved up to the Grandmaster tier. Signet of the Beastmaster shouldn’t even exist, and signet actives should be affecting both the player and the pet inherently. This would open up another Grandmaster slot for x trait.

Probably the best way to move forward.

That’s what I was thinking, especially since they said they want SB range trait to be a grandmaster trait, and let’s be honest, if you’re using a LB and using piercing arrows you’re going to go the full 30 for EE too.

It’s actually a “whose spirit buffs who first” sorta thing, you can’t have 2 sun spirit buffs and I’m pretty sure it’s first come first serve so if someone has the 70% trait and the other ranger doesn’t they should just bow out their spirits for the sake of the group.

Piercing arrows isn’t really baseline material, it’s a really strong trait, and I think it’s a good thing that so many marksman traits are good , the point of traits is to have tough, but meaningful choices to make for your build, if only 3 traits were good they’ve failed with their traits….

Atherakhia.4086:

Prysin.8542:

would make pets extremely OP.

If you do a BM Bunker spec, with a pet doing constant 1-2k AA’s in addition to Ranger Direct/Condition damage, the BM Bunker spec alone would surpass and or match the DPS done by many non-bunker builds on other professions

Back to this logic? That if Ranger pets actually hit when they were supposed to we’d be overpowered? Tell you what… lets actually get pets into a position where they actually work and then we’ll worry about how overpowered they’d be.

Actually, it’s true, in 10s of a pet being a Moa with 0 in BM they can 100% to 10% you while you’re running for your life in rabid gear, it’s quite kittening horrifying….

Granted I do think that they should make it so that all pet attacks “lunge” at the target (clearly makes NPCs able to land attacks regularly) but they tone down the damage a little to make up for it, otherwise the overwhelming screams of QQ will block out the sun and even the mighty warriors would weep in the shade.

DeadlySynz.3471:

Durzlla.6295:

DeadlySynz.3471:

Until they make it an actual “Pet” profession, where the pet is an integral part of the class rather than a liability, the Ranger in fact will remain primarily a ranged profession, meaning that is where they are most effective.

I have to admit though, It would be kind of cool to have a pet that was useful.. you know, doing damage, not dying, special skills that re-act when you want them to, proper pathing, etc.. all without completely handicapping yourself in the process.

You clearly aren’t using your pet properly…

I’m probably not, but I don’t need them, I won’t put faith into something that’s a liability. If you clearly have a solution to make the pets path correctly, hit their targets, and not eat dirt after a few seconds, I’m all ears. I’m not talking about sPvP either, I have no interest in it, and that is one aspect where the pets need the least amount of work for effectiveness.

If your going to try and lay skills out from the BM tree, then stop, as you will have effectively killed off the one thing the Rangers are good at.

I personally suck at sPvP, but 2 builds I have no problem killing consistently are BM bunker rangers and trap/condition rangers, and this is running in full berserker gear with LB/SB and axe/wh. Pets are just too easy to avoid and my build just overpowers the other 2 in sheer damage.

Again, if you have a magic solution that allows pets to stay alive in WvW zerg fights, and do decent damage without handicapping power build, by all means, I’ll change it in a heart beat.

Only 2 pets can survive WvW zerg fights when you’re not running a zerg of 25 rangers with hyenas (i’ve done it, it was the most glorious thing ever, sending all our Hyenas down a hill to kill the enemy zerg looked something like this ) … Drakes, and Bears, and even then they don’t live too ridiculously long…

DeadlySynz.3471:

The good thing about bears is they survive longer, so theoretically, they should get more hits in before eating dirt. They aren’t known for their dps, and I always have to laugh when they are chasing after someone hitting them fro 200-400 damage, and the enemy player continues to run as if it’s a threat lol.

Some people like to criticize rangers for running around with our beloved brown bear.. lol, but the amount of time it takes 1 or 2 players to kill it off is just ridiculous. Now the bear isn’t a threat dps wise, not by a long shot, but they make a great harassment tool for Rangers that hit like a truck.

I don’t always run a bear, but when I do, i hide behind him at range because he’s a very good meat shield…. and then i generally have “Protect Me!” as well because bears tend to use thier “LAWLZ wut dmgz?” ability when i use Protect Me so they just don’t even take a hit lol.

Erro.2784:

Think ANet should make active signets apply to player and pet by default. Signet of beastmaster should apply passive effects to nearyby allies.

I personally would love this, or make Signet of the Beastmaster cause an AoE boon depending on the signet, Wild = Fury, Hunt = Swiftness, Renewal = Regen, Stone = Protection, the boon would for the most part be more of a “help the party” sorta thing rather than a “buff the ranger!” sorta thing but still…

That or add “Antidote Signet” as a Grandmaster trait ( i think NM would be a good place for it but that’s just me…) that makes it so using a signet removes 1 or 2 conditions

Prysin.8542:

The ranger is actually very strong, however it may not feel like it due to several reasons i will not bother to repeat.

The signets should affect us AND pet. Shouldn’t have to trait for it to work one way or the other. Ranger Signets is a massive joke.
Spotter or Piercing arrows should be made Master Minor. Pets should automatically gain the ability to apply Opening Strike. Spotter, Piercing Arrows and Eagle Eye are all VERY good traits, all situated in the SAME tier. This ruins the whole traitline.

I can’t agree more with this, although i don’t think it should be Piercing Arrows as the master minor since that’d make the trait only useful for 2 of our weapons instead of all of them.

Our signets are just so….lame… without beast masters signet…

Poison Volley, crip shot should be used more “defensively” (if that makes sense), not to mention the quickness wont benefit it as well as poison volley seeing as how poison volley has a cast time and crip shot technically doesn’t.

Prysin.8542:

The most reliable pet AA’s are in the following order;
Birds
Spiders
Devourers
Canines/Bears
Cats/Moa’s
Pigs

I think the most ironic thing about this is that moas are the worst, yet if your pet gets moad by a mesmer it will land every single one of its attacks…. and bears are not among the worst of pets, it’s one of the best MELEE pets, which we already know hit less than ranged ones because it’s easier for the AI to lead a target than to chase and auto (as shown in PvE)

And also Prysin i’m not saying that bears are going to be better than other pets at DPS, i said that like 25 times, i just said that the kill speeds for bears is inaccurate because they are not using their highest damage move (by a fairly significant portion) because they aren’t taking damage.

@Rym, Yeah i was pretty sure it was something like that, I didn’t think they actually did.

Rym.1469:

One thing I like about bears is same thing I like about Canine species too in general : Bears can actually hit with their autoattack. They don’t have that freaking useless animation and aftercast on it, so they’re able to hit moving targets better. Felines for example are terrible in that matter. And this thing alone can increase bear overall dps
So many bearbow Rangers use them, so they had time to learn something lol. Their AI may be better than real one of some Rangers pricking around ^^

This is true, and i’m probably totally wrong with this but to me it looks like my bear attacks faster than my canines and other pets.

Valentin.2073:

why are you even using celestial amulet? you clearly are talking about wvw. noone in pvp uses celestial amulet. i’m done here. too much BS from this thread for me to take.

Because I’m not a min maxer and like to cover all my bases? And Celestial in PvE takes too kitten long, no way I run celestial in WvW that’s Cleric or Zerker.

Valentin.2073:

lets discuss ranger builds that take skill to play:

BM – leave the pet on a node and kite from afar
Power Ranger – spam longbow skills while standing on top of a ledge

guys, running a squishy build doesnt make you a better player at all. you think you’re good because you killed a lot using a power build? if it werent for the bunkers on your team, you could have died before even getting those kills. believe me, i did run those builds you were talking about. this hate towards spirit rangers is completely insubstantial.

if it makes you feel better running a non-spirit build then go ahead. you wanna feel good about yourselves by calling spirit rangers thrash? just keep doing it. it does make you all happy.

Well BM builds ARE bunker builds, a lot more so than a spirit build (which is a support build and should be in a team fight not off on their own defending a point), and then you totally oversimplified the power builds, not to mention they aren’t restricted to LB. Personally I prefer running a Celestial build and using a mix of offense, control, and support, but that’s just me, and my build changes quite rapidly so who knows what I’ll have….

There’s also trapper builds, I’d say they require skill too tbh, and then signet builds (i used to think otherwise but then I encountered a really good signet ranger who proved me wrong).

Also, I’m not saying spirit builds are bad by any means, do I think they’re boring to play? Yes, but bad? Hell no. They are however not a DUELING build, they are significantly better for support, granted there are still better options out there for pure support but everything has its pros and cons.

Valentin.2073:

Durzlla.6295:

Valentin.2073:

so what if i’m not on the leaderboard now? i was there before the leaderboard reset (teamq). your posts are merely based in wvw. as pve’rs your opinions about pvp are all invalid.

That’s cute, you think I WvW and give a kitten about PvE…. Still don’t have full exotics on my ranger in PvE, because it’s so useless…

whats your rank? if you think you’re running a build that is far more useful than a spirit ranger in tpvp just because you’ve beaten some noobs in hotjoin. go… this thread is getting pointless anyway. BM, trap and power ranger? funny…

I’m rank 30, but since when does rank mean anything? Hell, most people who are high rank are just hot join heroes.

vashio.6297:

Durzlla.6295:

Sevans.4619:

Natural Healing is a 30 point investment for a very small heal. It’s really good at keeping your pet alive, because they heal more with it, but I don’t like taking it just for us unless the whole point of your build is regen.

I see very little reason to go past 20 in the BM line, those extra points are better spent getting Fortifying Bond in the Nature Magic tree, because that trait is better for your pet than anything in the Beast Mastery tree. Go figure.

If you PvP having the 30 in BM can be invaluable for the faster stomps, not to mention it does increase your pets overall usefulness by quite a bit.

The quickness gained from zephyr’s speed is useless for the pet because pets don’t activate until 2 seconds after pet swap while in combat. Least it does this for my on my ranger while in spvp. You can test this out for yourself, reply back if you do i would like to see if this is happening to other people other then myself.

The zephyrs speed is ONLY effective on the pet if you swap and quickly use the F2, I tend to use canines so swapping them in and quickly howling is always beneficial even with the herpa kitten period they get if you try to command them to use F1 first.

Valentin.2073:

so what if i’m not on the leaderboard now? i was there before the leaderboard reset (teamq). your posts are merely based in wvw. as pve’rs your opinions about pvp are all invalid.

That’s cute, you think I WvW and give a kitten about PvE…. Still don’t have full exotics on my ranger in PvE, because it’s so useless…

Valentin.2073:

do you guys even read the pvp subforums? eles good in pvp? lol

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Just-had-3-Ele-s-on-my-team/first#post3389456

No, because it so full of idiots posting wrong information it makes me want to punch a small child, I’ll browse it occasionally, but the entire forum is a contradiction….

3 days ago half the posts were saying eles suck, the other half were saying eles were completely 100% OP.

Valentin.2073:

Durzlla.6295:

Valentin.2073:

Prysin.8542:

Bambula.3649:

lol..hammerbow warri destroys spirit ranger, his aoe kills your spirits so fast ><

anything with strong AOE or poison will rip through any spirit build ASAP.

Venom-thief or hambow-warrior or s/d bunker ele.

thief and ele? lol are you talking about wvw or pvp?

sorry to disappoint you guys but it’s still spirit rangers or gtfo in tourneys.

Now it’s apparent that you have no idea what you’re talking about… Spirit rangers are the rangers I LOVE to find on my ele because in about 3 skills I can wipe out their entire utility bar and focus on the now naked ranger.

you must be talking about wvw not pvp. no decent team will bring an ele in tpvp. pls be educated.

You serious? Ele provides better group utility to the group than a spirit ranger just by grabbing a staff, not to mention eles recently got quite a few tools to completely kitten block a few of the meta condi builds…

What does a spirit ranger bring? Nearly constant burning on one target? Eles bring nearly perma burning on an AoE, a blind? Hah I got those in spades! AoE healing on an elite? I provide that, and AoE condi cleanse on a 13s CD, not to mention I’ve got burst healing with geyser and healing rain, prot? Again, I’ve got AoE protection and it’s not only on demand but lasts a hell of a lot longer than yours, swiftness? kitten please!!

I also bring AoE chill, frost armor, might, immob, cripple, stun, more area denial then you can kittening fathom, and I’m a hell of a lot tankier than you are, oh yeah, my support doesn’t implode when an AoE shows up and I also have a stun break.

So, how are you better? Oh that’s right…. You’re not.

Aeri.5738:

Traps are very active, since you dont put them down and wait for anybody to trigger them. You use them as ground AOE and try to throw them underneath your enemy so they deal their damage when YOU decide it.
Unfortunately, you can forgett about trapper since you dont have any stunbreak / condi removal

Not entirerly true, the condi meta is faltering now that anti condi builds are arising, and as such not having condi removal (other than healing spring or EB) is totally ok now, not to mention rangers as a whole have kittenty condi removal, and spirit rangers (our “meta” build) has the same hinderances as the trapper build, it’s still in a good spot.

@OP to answer your question, it’s absolutely an active build.

Valentin.2073:

Prysin.8542:

Bambula.3649:

lol..hammerbow warri destroys spirit ranger, his aoe kills your spirits so fast ><

anything with strong AOE or poison will rip through any spirit build ASAP.

Venom-thief or hambow-warrior or s/d bunker ele.

thief and ele? lol are you talking about wvw or pvp?

sorry to disappoint you guys but it’s still spirit rangers or gtfo in tourneys.

Now it’s apparent that you have no idea what you’re talking about… Spirit rangers are the rangers I LOVE to find on my ele because in about 3 skills I can wipe out their entire utility bar and focus on the now naked ranger.

PolarLights.4825:

On a realistic not I do not see how it would make a real world difference.
Everyone from players to mobs poop out aoe so dat bear will be damaged and start spamming its other skills..

That’s the point, in a real scenario the bear is more useful than the tests show because the tests are always against target dummies which are just that, target dummies, they won’t use their heal skill because nothing is hurting them…

Miflett.3472:

Some top notch AI.

It really is because it means the bear isn’t wasting it’s heal skill and it’s invuln to damage skill when it’s not being hit by things…

Ok, so I know there are tests on all pet kill speeds and bears just sucked it up big time, however I found out recently while testing out a really whacky build in sPvP that the bear will not use anything other than their auto unless they’re taking damage. This could drastically change their kill speed seeing as how their regen move provides significantly more damage than their auto does!!

If someone with more time on their hands could construct a method for testing a true DPS for bears that’d be awesome!

PS: I’m not saying bears are gonna be pumping out super leet damage just that their damage is likely a lot higher than the current charts show in realistic environments.

gamerjon.6271:

thank you very much for you help guys i appreciate it..i wasn’t sure if i would get one during the course of a quest or anything like that

You will get the option between a short bow, longbow and greatsword after your lv 10 personal story quest if you have not gotten one by then.

Also, as nagmybear pointed out you can’t just stand still and pew pew in real combat so I’d suggest not getting used to it and not using a bear as much as possible (they trivialize PvE content), also if you are using ranged you will deal less damage than Melee, end of story, you are however more safer due to the range, and as such if highly recommend learning to kite!

Valentin.2073:

you guys hating on the build doesnt make you better 1v1. lol.

spirit ranger is still the king duelist in tpvp. if it’s true that you actually beaten a spirit ranger 1v1, it’s just because you fought a really bad spirit ranger.

people will always hate something they cannot understand or beat.

Do you even know what a duelist is? It’s sure as hell not a spirit ranger, and as has been said multiple times in this thread there is almost no difference between a good and bad spirit ranger, hell the only way you could be a better spirit ranger is by simply being a better ranger as a whole because spirits are such a shallow mechanic all the depth and such to make the spirit ranger better is from stuff ALL rangers have access to.

Chokolata.1870:

SB only needs eagle eye affecting it

Gotta say, I’m in agreement with this.

Warriors can stack it the highest, then ranger, then necro if they have the scepter trait I think they the with warrior, but again, they don’t deal any real direct damage with it, then the thief, and engi comes screeching in the back being able to stack a measily 4 stacks of bleed.

My friend plays sword warrior, he stacks bleeds like a mofo, I’ve played the others and they’re not even close to SB ranger if you can flank them for like 1-2s

In sPvP (tPvP) I’m currently running a celestial build, using axe/dagger for the “condi” set and longbow for the “power” set and pairing it with LR MT and FT, with HS as heal and Entangle as my elite, has been going extremely well so far….

But as for how -I- play ranger, I am almost always a roamer, my job is to flank your squishies, cap any undefended/1 man defended points, harass people off points, snag objectives, and help out pretty much wherever I’m needed.

Rangers excell at 1v1s and 2v2s so I’d suggest you play to your strengths.

Atherakhia.4086:

Cufufalating.8479:

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.

Most other attacks also have a longer lasting bleed to compensate for the slower attack speed. They also deal more damage, pierce, or AE by default in many situations. I see no reason to keep the flanking mechanic on the shortbow personally. The ‘skill’ required to flank isn’t even worth discussing.

Uh…. No they don’t? Sword on warrior is Melee, so of course it’ll cleave, and of course it’ll do more damage, that’s how Melee works. Scepter auto does have a longer bleed for roughly the same speed but that direct damage is absolute crap. Pistol on engi is a small little AoE blast, that’s really slow, does poor damage, and can only maintain 4 bleeds. Mesmers staff has a 1/3 chance of doing no damage due to vuln, does about as much DD as a clone, and the condis it applied are very short in duration. Thief pistol applies 5 bleeds very quickly and does a good amount of damage, this is however a stealth move and thus has a 3s CD at the lowest, not to mention it requires a means of getting into stealth instead, it’s essentially equivalent to SB, good DD and bleed but has a catch.

@Rym you’d be right about him being more effective in a team fight, but in a small skirmishy fight or you defending/attacking a point in a 1v1 you will significantly out preform him.

Sevans.4619:

Natural Healing is a 30 point investment for a very small heal. It’s really good at keeping your pet alive, because they heal more with it, but I don’t like taking it just for us unless the whole point of your build is regen.

I see very little reason to go past 20 in the BM line, those extra points are better spent getting Fortifying Bond in the Nature Magic tree, because that trait is better for your pet than anything in the Beast Mastery tree. Go figure.

If you PvP having the 30 in BM can be invaluable for the faster stomps, not to mention it does increase your pets overall usefulness by quite a bit.

I am 100% against both of those changes, as said above positioning was, and still is (for good rangers) key to playing ranger in the Guild Wars games, that should not change. Also, #4 makes your pet apply the condis, so why should it scale off you? As much as I’d love torment on the ranger, that is not the way to add it, especially since SB is one of THE most used weapons for ranger because of how easy it is to play.

IE: Skill Ceiling is just barely above the Skill Floor (certainly not insulting SB or SB users, just pointing out a fact).

Serraphin Storm.2369:

When using the 1h sword you need to consider your weapon evade as your primary dodge and your normal dodge as secondary.

Its funny how many rangers move very little when using a bow and want to move all the time when in melee. I think a small part of it they want what they cant have (mind you I said small part).

If you’re not always moving with your bow you’re gonna have a bad time.

Bambula.3649:

Dhunis.9072:

3.5k+ hours is just sick. You know its almost playing 5 months nonstop ><.

Anyway 4.8k deaths during 1790 hours.

first 3/4 year i was about 24/7 on, but not on pc ^^

My friend did this too lol, he’s got a ridiculous amount of time played but I would be surprised if he even legitimately played 1k hours lol

Lol personally I’d like to keep my damage because it actually does a fair amount of damage… But I wouldn’t be sad in the slightest if it was taken away for the condi removal.

DeadlySynz.3471:

Until they make it an actual “Pet” profession, where the pet is an integral part of the class rather than a liability, the Ranger in fact will remain primarily a ranged profession, meaning that is where they are most effective.

I have to admit though, It would be kind of cool to have a pet that was useful.. you know, doing damage, not dying, special skills that re-act when you want them to, proper pathing, etc.. all without completely handicapping yourself in the process.

You clearly aren’t using your pet properly…

Mine is 1,813… Kinda surprising since i’ve been playing a year and sPvP, WvW, and do jumping puzzles quite a bit…

Stooperdale.3560:

Yeah it’s rubbish for a #1 skill but there’s plenty of PvP rangers who swear by it since they can leap onto targets that they can’t follow with wasd.

I am one of said PvP rangers, however I’d also very much love to be able to circle around my target… I’d love it if they add kick and pounce added as progression skills to the end of serpent strike so sword doesn’t really lose much mobility and then we could get a more mobile (flexible would probably be a better term) #1 skill , but more importantly so we would have a kittening move we can use near ledges without the constant fear of throwing yourself to your kittening demise.

felixdacat.3804:

Durzlla.6295:

3 random condis or 3 specific condis? I know I’d rather be able to use it to drop immob cripple chill EVERY time rather than a grab bag of 3, would also make it a lot more amazing for my great escape ability lol.

I’d take it either way. But since the skill is called Lightning Reflexes, it probably should cleanse those three specifically. And then it would have a welcome spot on my utility bar where Signet of Renewal sits now.

I know it’s on my bar atm but that’s more of a “I use LB and wanna be able to get back to range” sorta thing.

I’ve hit for 8-9k with a single jungle stalker hit, attack of opportunity + 19 might + crit + he used bite (or w/e that big hitting cat move is), I COULD get more if I wanted to… But that’s too gimmicky