Guild Wars 2

MH Axe feels like a really strange weapon type. I think its meant to be more focused on being the mid-ranged AoE/Condi weapon more than anything else, but does a so-so job at that role.
As for changes:

-The AA is fine
-Splitblade could probably use a slightly faster animation
-Winter’s Bite imo should be an AoE without traiting. Maybe remove the pet weakness and give it a slightly longer Chill?

Honed Axes trait could be changed to something like:

-Increase Might duration so long as you’re holding a MH Axe or something similar (Axe skills have a chance at giving additional stack(s) of Might)

-Condi duration increased while holding a MH Axe (similar to Light on your Feet).

A Daze seems like a good alternative. It would work well with our other Daze skill effects too.

It has some spike potential with Maul and a bit of CC with its daze on Bash, but I think its more defensive thanks to its ability to guard and the evade on Auto 3 and Swoop’s leap

Bri.8354:

Druid seems to be the only thing ranger has to make it competitive in PvE.

This. Core Ranger doesn’t cut it anymore as we’re mostly wanted for buffs/heals as Druids for most things, if even that. I really hope that someday this profession gets some adjustments in the future to be more than buff/heal support in parties.

Even in full Zerker gear, I find it difficult to die in one hit.

Not a big fan of Shortbow, especially without Druid for Ancient Seeds after Concussion Shot. I’d still use Longbow for RF, Barrage and Knockback/Stealth in general PvE, but occasionally use GS too since it cleaves with a free evade and has a guard skill which can prove useful while surrounded by stuff (even if the damage isn’t great). There’s also a number of monsters who will shield against or evade ranged attacks, so you have to be wary of them either way.

I’d also swap Sick ’Em and Sharpnel Mine for a Stun Break like Lightning Reflexes or Signet of Stone in case you end up getting overwhelmed or immobilized.

Range and pets, while still having modest damage overall.
I do severely dislike Druid and the fact that it’s become a necessity for groups, though.

In a way, I can understand the thieve’s plight regarding Steal. It had way too much OoC utility to be changed the way it was. As for us, I expect little else but more and more nerfs and adjustments.

8 weeks is more than enough time to work on an alt to play until things are changed again.

I love playing my Ranger, but between Druid being a Spec that doesn’t mesh well with core Ranger and the constant waves of nerfs, changes, and neglect, I’m strongly considering either Tempest Ele or DragonHunter while chilling on my Herald.

Maybe things will get better once the dust settles, but even that feels like wishful thinking.

Why?
That’s like, a blind every 4 seconds or so assuming the attack hits.
There was nothing gamebreaking about that.
Now its effectively worthless.

Well, that’s one thing to be thankful for.

>Rangers must sacrifice most of their damaging skills to heal others in CA
>We’ll (further) balance it by preventing them from even getting any of the heals they put out

If they listened to you, I’d never use that Spec again and just play core Ranger. Why should I not get any of the benefits that I’m already giving to my party?

I really think they should merge CA 1 and 2 into a single skill, and turn CA 1 into something offensive. Maybe an attack that inflicts Weakness to your target (and maybe nearby enemies) while dealing damage

Aside from that…maybe Black Hole can be made into a ground targeting skill so that you dont have to pin yourself in place to drop the gravity well.

There’s a strange disconnect between being a group’s Burst Healer when things are beginning to go south and being “the last one standing” after the fact.

>What stands out for Ranger?
Pets. They have their own issues, but its something, I guess.
We’re more of a middle line of being capable of doing lots of things, but not being amazing at any one particular aspect of gameplay. The next thing that comes to mind is traiting for 1500 range on a Longbow for the longest attack range ever, but there’s not many situations where one would do that now.

Adamsdjr.1350:

I’m playing the druid, because I’ve gotten all classes to level 80 and the Ranger is my by far my favorite. I’m confused on what armor I should be getting or what I should be aiming to do in a party.

I hear druid healing is pretty average, especially considering Tempest is sort of god-tier atm.

Are there DPS builds that involve the druid spec?
Are there hybrid healing/dps builds that are VIABLE for higher end pve? if so, what are they?
Is full healing druid a good idea? why or why not?

Go with Zerker.
You’ll want to heal/have active regen as often as possible to recharge AF, and having strong healing, while useful once you reach CA, will actually slow down how long it takes to fill your bar. Lower heals from Zerker builds, in addition to your own DPS being stronger, will mean that there are more opportunities to charge AF since you/your allies might not always be topped off in terms of health.

Tavastia.6527:

I have no regrets.

I regret reading this.

Aidenwolf.5964:

The Druid DPS boosts to the party are good but none of them are better than what the Ranger already had. Spotter and spirits are still the best and the Druid ones aren’t raid wide or always on like Spotter.

:shrug: I never said that they were. Its just additional spike damage potential to add on to what we have (spirits and spotter) for those close by to go with our burst healing.

I still think Tempest/Ventari are better in the long run overall because they can have their heals on demand without having to deal with AF’s nonsensical bar of entry or even cutting out their own damage while playing the healing role.

Oh My God.8423:

Actually how much damage buff (average over time) do Glyph of Empowerment, Spotter, Frost Spirit and Grace of the Land combined?

It seems that one of the “Druid is the best healer” arguments is that it provides the above buffs. I am interested to see how much a percentage an increase do all those buffs bring…

Please, is someone good with math?

I’m not that good at calculating, so maybe someone else will help. From what I can tell, though:

Frost Spirit and Glyph are both 10% bonuses to outgoing damage for about 6sec (20% party-wide boost)

GotL is an 8% partywide boost (if you’re able to reach everyone with Lunar Impact or Tides.)

Glyph has to be used right before entering CA to heal and trigger GotL of course, but if a pulse from Frost Spirit works in tandem with it, then its about 4~5-ish seconds of 28% raw damage boosting (with a little extra for outgoing conditions) before factoring Might and other boons or Vul and other conditions.
…
Only issue now is that Frost Spirit isn’t working right to make that sort of boost consistent, and depending on the situation, you may not be able to boost everyone that way (be it because you’re made to scatter or any difficulties around using CA depending on the encounter.

Mcrocha.3891:

Ranger is in the best state it has ever had since launch. Fine in all three game modes. Can’t ask for much more than that. Obviously there are some things that could be improved, but overall the class is working well atm.

See:

Morwath.9817:

Ranger still has many old issues, like e.g. not good enough traps, crappy shouts, overnerfed Spirits, pseudo leap on sword AA, overnerfed shortbow and list goes on…

Druid is okay-ish, but core Ranger still needs work. Pet issues can also be added to that list as something that really needs addressing. I also still dont feel like Druid meshes as well with base Ranger as an Elite spec as Herald, Reaper, and Tempest do, especially without its signature weapon (staff, which is kinda underwhelming) while the others can roll without theirs just fine.

They’re probably still making tweaks, but that’s how I feel about it anyway. Druid is usable if you want to support, but I’d really like to see changes made to what we had before the Druid, at least before they overtune or run the Spec further into the ground.

Aidenwolf.5964:

I have been healing for my guild raid group on my Tempest running Apothecary for added condis. Today I swapped out my Ele for my Druid and… wow, not great.

This is my review, both are full ascended.

1. Tempests have constant AOE regen and very decent burst heals compared to Druids who lack the AOE of Tempest but have a significant big heal.

2. Tempests (while running Apoth) have very good burning damage while not losing the ability to shout heal, something a Druid cannot match as they’re in staff almost always trying to fill the CF bar just to access their heals.

3. Druid mobility is very good and spotter is incredible but spirits are bugged and if another ranger is providing spotter the need for a Druid is greatly lessened. Tempest is very mobile as well and while they don’t provide the buffs a Druid can, spamming fury, might, protection, regen and swiftness is a breeze.

4. The clunky mechanics and bugs that plague the Druid I could live with if they out healed my Tempest but in my mind it isn’t even close, my Tempest is better. Constant regen uptime and big (enough) heals, (by the way test out arcane brilliance on a water field when you’ve got over +1200 healing it’s ridiculously big) make the Tempest My choice of healer.

It’s a shame Druid is so gated behind CF as I would be running around in CA all the time. Since it’s gated so heavily I’ll run on a healing class that can heal all the time. I’m not dumping my ranger, I’ll run Condi but I’m out of the Druid game for good. Not a very ELITE spec.

…
Honestly, you’re quite right. While Druid healing does have its merits in a pinch, other builds like Tempest or Ventari Revs can sustain just as easily and not sacrifice th.eir own damage.

Beyond Spotter/(broken) Spirits, though…I think Grace of the Land and Empowerment Glyph are also pretty good dealbreakers for carrying a Druid.

Regen+WHaO is definitely what I roll with it up while in battle with a power build, especially for extra innate swiftness and regen (traited) and its low cooldown. While Staff has some utilities, I really dislike using it myself. I can sitll build up AF okay while fighting, but losing it on getting downed and building it up OoC is bothersome.

Blackhat.4016:

Removing the positioning part completely is against the design guideline Anet tried to follow to make the short bow a unique weapon. That’s why I wrote the long first part explaining everything before posting any suggestions.

An auto attack with just bleeds would be pretty boring. Instead we should try to keep the skill the way it was designed and balance the numbers to make the short bow a viable weapon again.

I think it either needs to be sped up if the restriction’s kept, or just made so that you get more/stronger bleeds while flanking and less if you’re not. Either way, Auto attack is improved and flanking still has some value with it.

lmaogg.7325:

Isnt spike trap bug currently? Its knockdown doesn’t even proc the ancient seed with an additional attack.

It wont trigger Seeds, but its still an unblockable Knockdown and Bleed stack I guess.
(Really hope it gets fixed sometime, but I’m not holding my breath on that)

This is an interesting comparison.
On one hand, our Bleed condi can almost always be around so long as we score crits (Sharpened Edges) and can even be guaranteed if using the same skill in utility form on a Survival build for additional condi clear and Fury, but while it stacks more, it doesnt hurt quite as much as Poison does. Can easily generate bleed stacks with Staff/Shortbow AA or off of any rapid attack scoring criticals (and even Spike Trap).

On the other hand, Poison can be applied constantly for more DoT and eats up heal effectiveness, but only at 90% or greater HP for non-poison attacks, and we can only apply it with Dagger 3, Sword 3, and Viper’s Nest otherwise.

I feel that Bleed’s much more accessible, but poison isn’t something to be overlooked. The additional Condi damage from Thorns may also be undermined if getting hit takes you over the HP threshold of steady poison damage.

Condi/Trap use is fairly viable, but its better with Axe/Sword/Torch/Dagger than Shortbow (though it has some uses). Also, while Ancient Seeds can affect opponents who are under certain CCs, Spike Trap’s knockdown doesn’t work with it for some reason.

Pets provide a fair amount of utility and safety in PvE (when they’re not obstructed or having pathing issues, anyway), but they’re not all that great in PvP since they’ll die to AoE and players can chase you instead of them. The lack of control over their three other skills also make things like knockdown attacks chance related.

Druid is another story, what with their constant changes and how difficult it can be to charge AF without Staff now. All in all, I’d say to just play the first 45~60 levels and see how you feel about (base) Ranger, and if you like it, mess with the Druid at 80 and decide what style you enjoy the most.

Wondrouswall.7169:

I’m probably within the minority. Simple and elegant solution (for me) would just be a bump for Astral Force on damage to 1% and on heal to 2%.

This is much more reasonable.
Personally, I believe that both should be 1~2% at most, though…if only because whether you decide to dish out damage or be a party supporter, both should be able to charge up AF at a reasonable rate. Maybe even a time based system could work where it gathers over a period of seconds.

The biggest difference will be that when a damage build reaches CA to use it, their heals will be /notably/ weaker than someone using a healing build, but they can still draw on it for some degree of party healing if its needed.

I just feel like CA access should be equally accessible no matter how you go about gathering it, with benefits and drawbacks for different styles. Healing builds wont have much personal damage but can help their party pull stronger comebacks from near-death, while Power/Condition users only get minor heals but can still chug out damage between CA use.

Both can still buff their parties with GotL, too.

Edit: It slipped my mind, but the Druid Rune already is a bit specific seeing that the 500 healing comes from a glyph. Still, I dont think a mechanic that works off of both damage and healing should be embedded into a rune.

Pooka.3420:

The Final Solution -

Simple and Elegant

Superior Rune Of The Druid -

Remove
500+ Healing Power for 3 Seconds

Add
Generates AF x per second

That way, for non-traditional builds to utilize the CA at the same equivalency of a healer build, they would effectively nerf the point of the DPS Builds, and be forced back into meta.

And let’s us healers have access.

Your Welcome.. send me 50K Gems.

….
That would be a bit ridiculous to make a rune specifically affect one particular profession’s elite spec. What if a Ventari Revanant wanted to use it for additional healing power? They’d get nothing from that stat.
I’d rather that they keep tweaking AF gain than to force us to choose between sticking a Staff to one of our hands or using those (hypothetical) runes for AF generation on non-healer builds.

(To be honest, my only real gripe with how things are is that its near impossible to generate AF out of battle, and that a weapon that I dislike using is effectively the most reliable one for charging AF now. I wouldn’t mind not having the healing power of a “dedicated” healer if I could still reasonably charge AF with a weapon I actually like playing, like it was before this patch, but a little less extreme than easy CA within 15 seconds.)

Jasper Defthand.3018:

Shortbow doesnt really need to much work other than modifying how #1 applies bleed, you have pets to assist you, ex: Smokescale has a 0.25 sec AA that applies bleed, a knockdown, a high burst attack, and a smokefield. Yes you can make the argument that 3 out of 4 of the pets abilities are AI controlled but they are none the less 4 abilities available to you without weapon/kit/transformation/attuement swapping or clone building and shattering. Thus meaning that at anygiven time you technically have 3 more abilities active over all the other professions.

Yeah, assuming a pet doesn’t have issues tracking, keeping up with a target or dealing with terrain/obstruction differences. Either way, our pets abilities have nothing to do with Shortbows being kinda lacking.

If I’m fighting at range and my pet is closer to the boss, CS will allow my heals to reach allies close to me and those close to my pet. Using that with TU and such can help regen energy for Celestial form.

The daze is only really useful if you want another way to trigger of Ancient Seeds imo.

>Crossfire
Needs to be sped up a little or apply bleeding on frontal shots (with additional if flanking)

>Poison Volley
Should be something like Rapid Fire imo. 5 straight piercing shots that can help stack poison against one target and any additional ones behind them.

>Quickshot
I like the idea of torment/super speed on use. Another alternative would be +50% maximum endurance recovery.

>Crippling shot
Just needs a longer duration.

>Concussion shot
A second or two shorter in terms of CD.

That was pretty nice to see it in action like that.
Is your second pet the Electric Wyvern? Ive yet to get it, so I dont know how good it is in PvP compared to Smokescale or a Wolf. The Fire one was a little too slow for my liking, though…

[I also notice that this was before the nerf to Tides, where you could have kept its effect going even after dropping out of CA. Shame that we cant do anything without interrupting it now =/ ]

Bold.9301:

I feel CA is becoming more and more useless…it takes such a long time to recharge. In 1v1 fights, it takes you a few minutes to recharge it. The only way to it works well,its when using staff on group fights, only. Is Druid suppose to be an actual burst healer? I want someone from anet to give me an answer. I have spent enough money on HoT and the game itself and i feel alot of us do as well. We deserve an answer. Anyone agrees?

It apparently exists to limit our access to that form as much as possible.
You’re even more limited if you don’t have a staff glued to one of your hands now.
If you’re dealing with 1v1, you might be better off with not banking on having CA ready as things currently are, unless you want to eat a fug-ton of damage first.

Mercurias.1826:

The nerfs aren’t the developers attacking your class of choice out of some form of maliciousness, negligence, or apathy. Their jobs are to make the class fun to play. Thinking it is a little bit…Not so bright. Shouting it on the official forums where they can see it makes you look like a dim headed, self-entitled, whiny dingbat.

Seriously, why keep playing if you’re so salty?

>Their job is to make the class fun to play
I’m having fun with base Ranger, but not the Druid spec after the most recent update. If their job is to make the Druid fun, then they’re failing at it….because I can almost never access Celestial Avatar unless I bind one of my weapon choices to one that I dont want to use (Staff). That’s compared to how it was very recently , where I could choose to use it or any other weapon combination and still have reasonable access to Druid’s Avatar.

That was fun. Being able to use my core build with the Elite one in sync with each other and the various weapon choices was fun. Locking myself to a staff and hindering CA usage to such an extreme otherwise is /not/ fun.

>Why are you still playing?
Personally, I want to see where this wild ride stops (and pray that it will stop at Druids actually being fun again) and I can always fall back on another profession/stay as a regular ranger if it just doesn’t work out.

Kodama.6453:

This was not a nerf, it was a bug fix.
I know you guys are angry about it, but it makes some sense in a logical way.

You gain AF by healing people. If these people have full health, do you really heal them? You don’t, Easiest proof is that you don’t see any green numbers on your screen. Why should a heal skill used on a player with full health count as heal?

It is like I would go to a random guy and ask him “Do you have cancer?”. If he is answering “No.” I would be able to say “Wow, I just cured cancer, I’m amazing!”

While it was a bug fix, it was something the Devs could have examined closely and learned from. While it was in play, CA was a lot more readily accessible and worked a lot better with the regenerative traits of a Ranger’s core build. Druids didn’t have to be dependent on the staff for AF generation through sustained Solar Beam and could run GS, S+A/T or anything else. It encouraged diversity.

Now, its arguable that Celestial Avatar was TOO accessible. Thats fair – Druid and CA were meant for burst healing instead of being a sustainable med kit. That could have easily been answered by leaving the mechanics as it were and just adding a lengthier cooldown post-transformation. Even if the Astral Force charged from regen or healing, there would still be some downtime where CA is unusable. You would still have to time its use properly, because if kitten hit the fan afterwards, you/that individual/the party could be in for a bad time.

…but instead, they just implemented this fix and left us high and dry with a difficult to access elite. You absolutely NEED the staff now if you want to have CA ready in a relatively timely manner, and there’s no reasonable way to prep CA before a fight like how one could stack Might or other buffs.

If it weren’t for glyphs still being decent, I’d just drop the Spec altogether tbh.

Assuming the Cooldown starts after exiting and not on activation, 25~30 seconds seems reasonable.

Celestial Avatar, by its very nature of lasting for 15 seconds at most and needing some prep-work, was fine for Burst Healing. You only entered this state if you needed to throw out some quick heal/GotL boosts in exchange for damage and a degree of utility. This recent update just made it harder to have CA ready for a situation where you need to call upon those burst heals.

Ventari/Tempest can always fall back on their other Legend and/or skills when they don’t have to heal and dont lose much for it, but we have to dedicate ourselves to making use of CA once we enter that mode, as we have some cooldown and lose AF even if we leave early. There’s also the issue of how well Druid specs fit into core Ranger builds now…

I’d really rather they just revert this change (and tweak how regen affects AF buildup or lengthen the cooldown somewhat) instead of trying to split hairs on further compromises that still will leave us worse off than needed.

I think I’ll just stop bothering with the Druid spec after this. change. Anet doesn’t seem to know what they want to do with us, so until they figure out how difficult they want to make AF generation or how much they want to nerf our heals, I’ll just go back to the Nature Mag/Wilderness specs in my third slot.