Guild Wars 2

I really hope that one day that community will stop using the GvG term for those Blob vs Blob battles. This is a disgrace for what GvG once was.

I think Hunter’s Call would be a great place to put a “reveal” debuff active skill, for the duration of the hawk’s attack.

Firelysm.4967:

NOTE: i don’t talk about pvp, because pvp is not 1v1. It’s jack ****, because if you can’t optimize your build to its finest, then this is not pvp, it’s casually poking in the eye. WvW is the real 1v1 environment to test fights of capability. And also we are talking fair fights 900 starting range, no ganking, open world.

WvW builds are imbalanced as kitten. Trash builds are carried by imbalanced food and buffs, there’s no point even using that to discuss class balance.

And again, monthly bump for this, still blocking my access to ~200g of rewards.

“PU MESMER IS A NIGHTMARE”

In the meantime, dude uses so much stealth he can heal twice before getting attacked, (no counterplay), to reingage with a 4k crit, double proc with immob (still no counterplay).

kittenit thieves are so lazy now…

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

That is what it would take to make spirits decent.

I don’t agree. Utility skills shouls never rely on traits to be viable. Traits should enhance them, not make them “usable”.

For rangers, signets, survival skills and traps are “okay”. Spirits are borderline, Shouts are atrocious. Those skills still needs to be updated, their baseline abilities need to bring something useful for the class.

Sorry guys …

Water spirit is completely broken atm. It’s basically a full heal every 20s…

Sorry guys

So much condescension in one post, impressive.

I would have nerfed thief to the ground years ago for the sake of balance, if you want my opinion. But it has nothing to do with this thread.

Condi Birdmaster in PvP.

I like to see people melt from hybrid damage (15 stacks of bleeds, 6 of poison, and 3k crits from birds) and soft CC spam (blind, cripple, weakness, chill, …).

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=VKV-73;1FVu-q2JEF-0;9F-1;1Z_b;0057257036;4Vw07U;1fgm9fgm92K

Condi damage is already insane as is, 33% would be completely broken tbh.

Monthly bump of this very annoying bug.

sendaf.8375:

Obviously you didn’t try defending your base….

There is 0 need of killing players as a defender, unless they broke your two doors. And at this point it’s just a DPS race.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRjEq0waBLusQ1ag+ga9DEAjdvcg7/+BFspC-TpBFwACuAAIOCAEOEA62foaZAAPAAA

Full “in your face” Power Ranger in defense, with speed signet for mobility and spike on Maul, and Vampirism to get back in base safely when needed.

CETheLucid.3964:

You seem to know the OP better than they know themselves. You and OP good friends? I wish I had someone to expound on my opinions and stuff. Must be nice.

It is. On a more serious note, we have no relation of any kind.

Ehecatl.9172:

Likewise if you manage to kill the NPCs and have the opportunity you absolutely want to kill the enemy attacker so that they aren’t around to keep attacking you when the next wave of NPCs show up.

No. If you kill the attacking NPCs, you just reset in base your health and cooldowns, and wait for the next wave. There is no advantage to push in defense, it’s a stalemate game. Once the NPCs are down, the attacking players are powerless.

Defending is thus mostly PvE while dodging attacks. Until they get to the lord room, of course.

Draknar.5748:

Has anyone tried defending instead of simply rushing to their Lord?

And why would you care about killing other players in defense ?

I have played 90% defense during the 2 betas. Defense is NOT about killing players, just about killing bombers. You have nothing to protect against ennemy players, unless they are in your lord room. You just have to protect your doors, which are only vulnerable to NPCs.

My defense pattern ? Kill the first rush of bombers (read : pew pew them to death), hide in base, repeat. That’s not PvP, imo.

Eurantien.4632:

Traveler runes.

I guess, yes.
It has a cost though, that rune is bad overall, and comes with a sensible DPS drop compared to Vampirism, Scholars or Pack.

It’s probably a matter of preference at this point, some variations are possible and better/worse in some situations. Takes nothing off from the fact I agree that 6/5+/2+ with LR and SoS is the way to go for DPS rangers, for now.

I’m an avid PvP player (main game mode for 1 year now, but I’ve played everything), I was so hyped for Stronghold, but after 2 betas I’m already bored of Stronghold. Why :

There are not enough PvP interactions in this game mode.

Ignoring other players is just the best strategy overall.

• In defense, as long as you kill bombers other players can’t do anything to your base, so why would you even care about them ?
• Supplies, just run two of those unkillable mobile specs like DD eles and run them in loops ignoring attackers.
• Offense is the only place where you fight players, as it’s part of protecting your NPCs. But it’s still only useful in this context, when you have no NPC you should just ignore them and go back tu running supplies again. This leads to situations where attackers attack defenders, but the defenders try to kill the NPCs and never fight back. Once the NPCs are down, defenders reset in their base and attackers leave.

This needs to change ASAP. I have multiple suggestions to make fighting players the center of the game mode.

1. Make killing players MANDATORY, by changing channels on supply, by making killing attackers mandatory (for whatever reason).
2. Make killing players REWARDING, by enhancing the killer’s stats for a time for example. Or give a player the possibility to summon a hero after 5 kills.
3. Make dying PENALIZING, like GW1’s death penalty, and steadily increase rez time each time you die.

There are multiple references to MOBA when talking about this mode, but those 3 points above are incredibly important design aspects in MOBAs. There, you CANNOT push a lane if you do not kill ennemy players, and killing them is an immense swing in a game. This is what makes the game exciting, those PvP interactions in the lane. There is nothing like this in Stronghold at the moment.

As long as it this isn’t fixed, I fear the worst for this game mode when PvP players will realize this is just a NPC farmfest.

Eurantien.4632:

I consider zerker with 6 in MM “glassbow”. Granted I think 6/6 > 6/x/x/6 but that’s cause I think every “glassbow” should run LR, SoS (or prot me), and SoR.

My very small and humble experience (compared to yours), is that I think that it’s pretty hard to keep up the pace of the game without a speed boost on a glass build. Rangers, and especially glassbows, really suffer from lack of TP ability. This is why, after many games, I’ve swapped out SoR for SotH (and why I play 6/5/3 with signet recharge instead of the traditional 6/6/2, and it allows me to Vampirism runes which are awesome for us).

SotH provides mobility between the fights, and the on-demand attack of opportunity is fantastic for Mauls when you’re using GS.

It leaves me very weak to condis, yes. Not more than mesmers though. And condis are why god invented shoutbows anyway.

vlad.4871:

You can t create succesful competitive PvP in a game that has pve.

Starcraft.
Even Mobas are full of PvE aspects.

I update this post, I’ve found another problem with my collections. I have unlocked the Occultist Flame skin (I got the Torch from a Champ Bag), and again it hasn’t counted it in the collection tab. Highlighted in red.

OP : full zerk fresh air ele complaining about getting rekt by random crit spikes. Well played !

Laraley.7695:

That’s not the point. The point is you can do this as a ranger while sitting on the other side of map.

Your “point” is a lie. Even if you would say things that would be worth reading, like :

“The point is you can do this as a ranger while sitting at 1500 range.”

This would still almost only be true on Foefire. GG whining on a spec hard countered by … maps. There’s a reason this spec isn’t rocking the meta guys, get over it.

Beastmastery
Minor traits

• Instinctual Bond 0/5 I still have no clue what this trait is meant to do.
• Loud Whistle 1/5 I’ll give it one more point than before as pet swapping seems to be a thing that might have some uses in the future, but then why not a 50% reduction as warrior gets on their weapons ?
• Pet’s Prowess 3/5 Obviously a Beastmaster line should buff the pets, and I would say this is a pretty good way to do it. Moving faster means the pet will stick to the target better, and much better crits is a nice way to improve the overall DPS of the class. But it all depends on the pets efficiency …

Adept

• Companion’s Might 1/5 Still not that impressive as long as it only goes one way imo.
• Rending Attacks 1/5 With the attack rate of most pets, this trait is almost irrelevant.
• Resounding Timbre 4/5 That’s a very solid trait now. Let’s hope shout will be reworked to be usable in the future, and that will open up many possibilities for a Ranger bunker/beastmaster build.

Master

• Wilting Strike 1/5 A very weird new trait, and something not really sexy on the first view. I mean yes, weakness is a powerful debuff, but on most pets who have 30+ seconds of recharge on their F2 skills, it’s pretty bad to invest a trait just for this.
• Two-handed Training 3/5 The trait itself is good, but what a weird place for a power weapon trait, it makes almost no sense to me.
• Natural Healing 1/5 This now combines two traits (Compassion Training + Natural Healing), but two bad ones. Is pet healing really a thing?

Grandmaster

• Beastly Warden 4/5 This trait is pretty good and might let Rangers get rid of the Alpine Wolf that is almost always used for its powerful Howl ability. This will both help the pet to get its damage down, while protecting the ranger AND CC’ing the opponents AoE.
• Zephyr’s Speed 2/5 This got merged with Mighty Swap, but I still have my doubts about DPS builds based on pets. We’ll see.
• Honed Axes 1/5 Like Two-handed Training I find this spot to be very bizarre for a weapon spot, especially in Grand Master where all it does is a bit of cooldown reduction and a negligible stat increase. Still not worth it imo.

Overall
Average : 1.63/5 (+0.77).

Beastmastery got out of the “super trash” zone by merging or removing some atrocious traits, but I still don’t get it. You still get really weird traits in this line that in my opionion have nothing to do there (like the GS/Spear trait). The Master slot is weak, Adept also if you’re not using Shouts.
BUT like Nature Magic it’s really hard to give a good evaluation as this trait line is heavily dependent on the pets performances overall. We don’t know how much those traits will be rolled into baseline, nor do we know if pets will get an overall boost in efficiency or not.
THERE MIGHT BE a spot for bunker rangers with the new Nature magic line, and it could be combined with the Beastmastery line, using the ranger for defense and support and the pet as a DPS/pressure tool, but we’ll have to see in practice if the pets will get the love they need to become viable.

Nature Magic
Minor traits

• Rejuvenation 2/5 Same, the cooldown is too big.
• Fortifying Bond 1/5 Same, pretty interesting in theory, not so much in practice.
• Lingering Magic 4/5 This trait provides a massive Boon Duration increase, which is a pretty interesting feat of Rangers now. We’ll have to see what Druids will bring to the table, but Rangers might actually have access to massive boon applications now, and if that is the case, this trait will become very good.

Adept

• Bountiful Hunter 4/5 Went from Minor 5 to Adept which is interesting as you might not have the usage to damage boosts if you play this line. But it fits the theme of the line and with the appropriate build, getting 5+ boons should not be that hard.
• Nature’s Wrath 1/5 Went here from Minor 5 in Beastmastery, and I still don’t think it’s great. Getting Power from Healing Power is rarely useful, especially compared to Bountiful Hunter.
• Healer’s Celerity 0/5 Still not worth traiting into at all, imo.

Master

• Vigorous Training 1/5 Got here from Beastmastery and it’s still not worth it, imo.
• Evasive Purity 3/5 Still good and even got buffed a bit (it removes cripple now), and the only non-Survival condi removal trait left for Rangers.
• Windborne Notes 3/5 This trait is okay I think and might open up some plays with the warhorn, but Ranger’s warhorn still suffer from trying to do both damage on #4 and support on #5, and by that not being good at neither. The regen is massive though.

Grandmaster

• Nature’s Vengeance 4/5 They combined the Spirit traits into this one (and baseline buffs), so it’s obviously good, but no one knows what spirits will become now.
• Protective Ward 5/5 This skill, as presented now, is really over the top I think. 6s AoE weakness and 8s protection on a 12s cooldown looks insane. I have a hard time seeing a power build taking you down when you use this trait combined with overall defensive traits and utilities. With a bit of Wilderness Survival and boon duration, this trait will easily give you perma protection + damage reduction. Will this create a new era of bunker rangers ?
• Invigorating Bond 1/5 Still bad imo, the heal is still low and the range is so small your pet might not even heal you (as its position is still very unreliable in the heat of battle).

Overall
Average : 2.41/5 (+0.11)
This line is very hard to evaluate at the moment. Protective Ward looks really OP in PvP circumstances, and Spirits will be reworked so hard it’s impossible to know if they will be used in the future again. This line might also fit the Druid specialization very well.
The loss of Survival of the Fittest still hurts this line, and it also got a collection of pretty bad traits from other lines (especially Beastmastery). But if support rangers or druids can be a thing in the future, then no doubt this trait line will be used as a massive support boost.

Wilderness Survival
Minor traits

• Natural Vigor 4/5
• Companion’s Defense 4/5
• Bark Skin 4/5 This trait went from a Grandmaster to a Minor and it makes it even better.

Adept

• Soften the Fall 2/5 Certainly not the best fall damage trait, but at least it’s there.
• Ambidextry 4/5 I expect this trait to find its usage in the currect double wield condi ranger (S/T + A/D), where it will be very powerful. So, even if it is not spectacular, an adept trait that fits a role deserves points.
• Expertise Training 1/5 This is a bit better with the condition duration addition (from Beastmastery). And, if there are no caps on certain conditions now, and poison stacks, you will be less afraid about your pet conditions overriding yours. So… it is better overall… but still not fantastic.

Master

• Oakheart Salve 4/5 This was good before and got buffed on top, so a really solid trait overall. Fits the theme of the line perfectly.
• Peak Strength 3/5 Considering the theme of the line (defense) it’s a bit bizarre to find here a good damage boost, but it rewards cautious play and dodge, so it kinda fits. Pretty good trait for power builds imo, certainly in PvE.
• Shared Anguish 3/5 This trait is still pretty cool, as CC is still a problem for Rangers in PvP/WvW overall. It will suffer from the competition though.

Grandmaster

• Empathic Bond 3/5 Still good, as before, but with the Wilderness Knowledge in Wilderness Survival now, there is a high chance this trait will only be taken when no Survival skills are used. This might need to be put somewhere else, and many people would appreciate a more frequent but less powerful clean (like 1 condition removed every 4 seconds or so).
• Wilderness Knowledge 5/5 This trait combines three previous traits that had scores of 2/5, 4/5 and 5/5. This trait would probably deserve a 6/5 imo, it makes survival skills VERY good with only one trait slot, fantastic..
• Poison Master 3/5 Poor Poison Master. Competing with all the condi removal traits for Rangers, it will not be used frequently. Not a bad trait though !

Overall
Average : 3.33 (+0.89)
This trait line was good before, and it got even better. This is the perfect “side” line bringing good survivability to the ranger overall. Only the Adept part is a bit meh, but the rest of the line is so powerful that you can afford to have one ‘meh’ trait.

Skirmishing
Minor traits

• Tail Wind 1/5
• Furious Grip 4/5 This imo got even better when used with Remorseless from Marksmanship !
• Hunter’s Tactics 4/5
  Overall few changes.

Adept

• Sharpening Edges 4/5 This got buffed from what I can see (it triggers on pets and the numbers might get buffed), so it will be a definite Yes in rabid condi builds.
• Most Dangerous Game 4/5 If this stays Adept, I think this trait will be fantastic for power builds.
• Trapper’s Defense 0/5 Still a no-no.

Master

• Primal Reflexes 2/5 I undervalued this trait in my previous evaluation, but it’s still nothing fantastic, more like a default choice.
• Spotter 4/5 Still a great trait, and it fits this line much better I would say.
• Trapper’s Expertise 4/5 All Trapper traits combined in one is fantastic. Let’s hope traps will be a thing after the balance patch.

Grandmaster

• Quick Draw 4/5 This trait might be one of the coolest trait to play with after the patch. Very interesting mechanic, but I still reserve my judgement before giving it a 5/5.
• Light on Your Feet 5/5 A build defining trait for shortbow users, giving access to AoE condition application (with piercing arrows), damage boost, and cooldown reductions. It seems almost too good to be true to be honest.
• Strider’s Defense 2/5 This trait got massively buffed by combining multiple traits from various lines and buffing the numbers overall, but I’m still on the fence about what it really brings to rangers. Is this really build defining ? Maybe in PvE where sword is the best single target DPS weapon for rangers.

Overall
Average : 3.16/5 (+1.35)
Skirmishing is the second trait line that needed the most help and good god it has received what it needed. The two Grandmaster Quick Draw and Light on Your Feet traits are particularly impressive and will bring many utility to both power and condi builds.
But let’s not forget the adept, master and even minor traits who are great additions to many builds too. I expect Skirmish to be used very often due to its overall usefulness.

So, with the future balance patch we’ll get a massive trait rework, so after my “old Ranger Trait evaluation”: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/Ranger-traits-evaluation/first#post4997689 , it’s time to see what the new ones will bring us.

Marksmanship
Minor traits

• Opening Strike 3/5
• Alpha Training 2/5
• Precise Strike 4/5
  Minors are almost unchanged, but the new traits open new possibilities to play with Opening Strikes. So I’ve decided to up the scores a bit, as they might become something noticeable.

Adept

• Enlargement 3/5 Was previously rated 1/5, but it was a master in the wrong trait line. Here, it can actually synergize well in a power build using signets and Beastmaster’s Might (Master trait).
• Predator’s Instinct 1/5 Still very underwhelming in my opinion, for one cripple with a 30s cooldown. 0/5 was maybe a bit harsh in the previous evaluation though.
• Beastmaster’s Bond 3/5 This trait got buffed significantly by halving its cooldown, adding Swiftness AND making it an active proc (pet swap instead of pet health). With Windborne Notes in Nature Magic it could even give Regen on top of this. Might be usable in a warhorn spec.

Master

• Beastmaster’s Might 4/5 By merging the already excellent Signet Mastery with the Might on Signet usage, this become a very powerful trait for signet users. If signets remain as good as they are now, I expect this trait to be used for the great utility purposes.
• Steady Focus 3/5 Unchanged for the most part, and does not really suffer from going to Master (from Adept). I expect this trait to be a PvE favorite where damage is the be-all and end-all, but also useful for glass canon fans in the other modes.
• Moment of Clarity 1/5 I’m still not a fan of this, even if this is a better place for such a trait than Grandmaster Skirmish. Its usage is still very limited imo, probably only good in Zerk GS builds where interrupt, Dazes and raw damage are a thing.

Grandmaster

• Predator’s Onslaught 2/5 Unchanged for the most part, probably better in PvE than anything else.
• Remorseless 3/5 Complete rework and a MASSIVE boost. You actually have a way to actively refresh your opening strikes now, and deal MASSIVE spikes. Still a bit obscure, but might very well lead to interesting builds, especially with the Furious Grip minor in Skirmishing.
• Lead the wind 4/5 Small change of name and decrease of overall necessity for longbow rangers as the most important factor is now made baseline (arrow velocity). But it got the piercing arrows and the bow recharge in exchange, which are both very useful traits. Still an excellent trait.

Overall
Average : 2,75/5 (+0.57).
Marksmanship got overall better even when some good traits were made baseline. The fact that Opening Strikes are a thing now might lead to interesting builds and choices.
Marksmanship is in pretty good shape now I would say, there are only 2 traits that might still be underwhelming to see much use. This is almost a mandatory trait line for power builds.

It is a good post, but I don’t see anything extraordinary in it, many similar have been made (I did a similar post, see my signature, weeks ago) and multiple posts on this forum have been discussing those various issues extensively.

But at least OP got some attentions from the dev which is a good thing.

Thanks for the effort Josh.

Justine.6351:

Well someone likes their signet builds. Sadden you much that you cannot go 5 signet warrior on ranger?

I would rather like to enjoy good, meaningful utilities on rangers.

Did some research (I am no WvW expert, am only lvl 210 in that game mode), it’s that build right ? http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Ranger_-_Shout_Heal

Then I think my evaluation isn’t that far off, but I should maybe put 3/5 when traited as it’s used in a niche build. Doesn’t change much in the end to the overall evaluation, shouts are trash which is sad because there would be opportunities to good shout builds.

Then I need your lights. What is “Guard” good at ?

Signets Overall : 3.75/5 (4/5 with traits)
Signets got a massive boost some months ago by making them affect the Ranger also. This made signets a staple in many rangers builds in almost all game modes. They are in a pretty good shape at the moment and do not need traits to be effective (the 20% cooldown reduction trait is still very strong considering the cooldowns on most actives).

• Signet of Stone 4/5 (5/5) Signet of Stone received the most spectatular improvement with the Signet changes, giving Rangers an Endure Pain. Both the passive and active are very useful in many builds. This signet benefits a lot from the cooldown reduction trait.
• Signet of the Hunt 5/5 (5/5) This trait is a staple for many months now as the passive gives the Ranger a passive 25% speed boost, which is great in all game modes. The active isn’t as game changing as the Signet of Stone, but on a Greatsword Zerk Ranger it can give you access to insane spikes “on demand” with Maul (like 9k+ hits on Thieves or Mesmers).
• Signet of Renewal 3/5 (4/5) The only condition removal utility (untraited) is still very useful in condition heavy environments. The active can be a life saver but the fact that it can fail if your pet is too far makes it sometimes unreliable. The breakstun is also very good.
• Signet of the Wild 3/5 (4/5) This Signet will find most of its uses in PvP/WvW environments where 8s of insane damage (+25%) and 8s of stability are insane utilities. The big cooldown makes it a bit hard to use, but the trait recharge is still pretty useful. It will often compete with Signet of the Hunt though, which is in general easier to use.

Survival Overall : 2.75/5 (3.5/5 with traits)
Survival Skills are hit-and-miss, one is fantastic but the others are “okay” to “meh”. But they benefit from traits a lot, which is good.

• Muddy Terrain 2/5 (4/5) Muddy Terrain is pretty hard to use effectively as its hard to pin down a moving opponent with a ground targeted skill that takes 3/4s to cast. But with the appropriate traits it provides the survival skill with the lowest cooldown, making it a powerfull condition removal / fury application tool.
• Quickening Zephyr 3/5 (4/5) This skill could have been buffed after the Quickness nerf years ago, but can still be useful for powerful bursts. The cooldown is a bit high though.
• Lightning Reflexes 5/5 (5/5) One of the best utilities overall in the rangers kitten nal, this skill is a life saver. Stun break, Immob break, 10s of Vigor, damage, immense dodge…
• Sharpening Stone 1/5 (1/5) This skill … I don’t know. kitten cooldown for 5s stacks of 6s bleed ? I don’t get it.

Shouts Overall : 0.5/5 (1.25/5 with traits)
Shouts are atrocious. No build uses them. There was once a use for Protect Me, not anymore now since the rise of Signet of Stone. The others have unique mechanics yes, but are still horrendous. Too bad, because there would be opportunities for a traited Shout Ranger build (with Nature’s Voice + Rune of the Soldier).

• Sick ‘Em 1/5 (1/5) At least this skill has a unique mechanic in the sense that it’s the only skill at the moment which applies the Reveal debuff, but it’s still so pointless otherwise that I’ve never seen it used.
• Protect Me 1/5 (1/5) As said above, not interesting anymore compared to Signet of Stone. But at least this skill does something useful.
• Guard 0/5 (3/5) There is nothing in the game that pets could guard while being useful. EDIT : The skill can be used to proc Nature’s Voice on cooldown in a bunker/support build. Fun thing is, the skill effects are mostly ignored.
• Search and Rescue 0/5 (0/5) Why would I waste a utility slot to ask my Pet to rez someone, on a 85s cooldown ?

Personal note : I would like to have access to Anet’s statistics to see how many times those 2 last skills have been used since launch. I might be able to count that on my hands. Those are amongst the worst skills in the entire game I would say.

After my Ranger Trait Evaluation , I’ve decided to do the same regarding our utilities, which in my opinion is the next spot where the Ranger needs the most help.
The scores are always given “untraited”, with the score in brackets with the relevant traits. Comments are welcome.
Note: I think many good things will happen with the trait rework making some old traits “baseline”. As you will see, one of my main problems with current Ranger utilities is that they are average/bad without the appropriate traits.

Spirits Overall : 1/5 (2.5/5 with traits).
Spirits are the best example of ranger utilities that are unplayable without the appropriate traits, with the exception of the Frost Spirit in PvE (which leads me giving it 1 point, would otherwise be a clear 0 untraited). I think utilities should never rely on traits to be “just playable”.
Note that Anet tends to agree with this as it was announced spirits will get a total revamp soon with the revision of their related traits, reworking their utilities and making them immobile.

• Storm Spirit 0/5 (2/5) The damage coming from the active skill is pretty good, but the small radius, long cast time and unpredictable position in PvP/WvW makes it unreliable in fights. I still wonder why the passive requires the player to hit something, it would otherwise be a great team utility.
• Sun Spirit 1/5 (3/5) Probably one of the best spirit in PvP/WvW when traited, as its effects are both useful and easier to control. If burning stacks are a thing in HoT, I expect this spirit to get a MASSIVE boost in efficiency.
• Stone Spirit 1/5 (3/5) It gets one point untraited because 3 seconds of protection is good, but fully traited it almost gives a 30% protection coverage on the ranger when it’s up, which is a significant effect. The active though is pretty bad (for the same reasons than Storm Spirit, on top of a BIG cooldown).
• Frost Spirit 2/5 (2/5) In pure PvE only, this is probably 4/5, where it doesn’t even need to be traited. The very good passive is a stackable party-wide damage boost which is the be-all and end-all in that game mode. It’s much harder to exploit in other modes, and the active is pretty bad overall (for the same reasons as Stone Spirit).

Traps Overall : 1/5 (2.25/5 with traits, probablu up to 3/5 with traits AND Trapper runes)
Traps at the moment are not really traps, they’re like Wells of conditions you drop under the target’s feets. They lack severely in utility, efficiency AND flavor, and are in the same boat as spirits : being unplayable without the appropriate traits (and even runes, in this case).
Note that again Anet seems to agree with this as they’ll get a big revamp in the next balance update.

• Spike Trap 1/5 (2/5) Spike Trap is unimpressive regarding its cooldown, 2s of cripple and 3 stacks of bleeds is simply not enough for a 25s cooldown.
• Poison Trap 0/5 (1/5) Unimpressive condition application and no utility. Rangers already have tons of Poison application sources. If Poison stacks are a thing in HoT, this might get a lot better as-is.
• Flame Trap 2/5 (3/5) Two things plead in favor of this trap: one, its low cooldown. Two, its fire field which can be combo-ed. But the damage is still too low on an intelligent target.
• Frost Trap 1/5 (3/5) If you can bring a target in this trap you can apply immense Chill durations with its effect + combos, which can really screw some classes like Eles. The problem is its big recharge time.

Honestly I can’t remember. Glad I’m not the only one with a similar problem.

I’m glad someone else stepped in because I was giving up. Path of Scars and Muddy Terrain are other examples of skills that have low success rates in terms of actual CC. Heck, even canine’s F2s aren’t reliable, because very dependent from the pet’s position.

Unless we’re talking PvE ofc, where everything is viable.

Again I repeat, I don’t say we don’t have access to CC at all. I’m just saying there’s a reason nobody think about rangers when thinking about CC.

Honestly guys, get over it : you will not find in this game your typical MMO based on challenging instances REQUIRING gear & builds min-maxing.

This game is BAD at dungeons. They tried multiple times, and I’m fairly confident that they got really bad RoI on those game updates. The bad community response to the Aetherpath was probably the nail in the coffin, I’m fairly confident that only a tiny portion of the playerbase even finished it.
The Fractured patch “fiasco” (not a real fiasco but still very underwhelming) was just the confirmation of what they were already suspecting at that point.

I think they have enough experience now to say that this game does not benefit from new dungeons, and that a substantial part of the community has NO interest in difficult, instanced PvE content aside from what is already in game.

At one point it is good management to stop investing in areas where you failed multiple times, and try something else.

I sincerely hope (for you, I’m mostly done with PvE now) that HoT will bring its own way of providing PvE challenges for PvE fans, but be ready to get into it with an open mind, as I’m fairly sure you are running into massive disappointment if you expect traditional dungeons and raids in the expansion.

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

Engi= hard CC, low Soft CC
Ranger= lots of soft CC limited hard CC and 1 pet type for KD.

Again, I’m sorry, but not “lots”. Understand me well, I think we have a fair share, but rangers are FAR from being a potent CC class, soft or hard.

Yes, we have Entangle and easy access to Cripples. But that’s about it. Just to give you a small example : we are the only profession without a single weapon skill Immobilisation.

Tragic Positive.9356:

But I sincerely believe that as the ranger already has the most CC in the game, so far, this is a bad idea.

Man, have you ever played engineer ? Or Warrior ? Ranger’s CC are average at best.

I’ll just bump this, my collection is still blocked.

The huge representation of rangers in top tournaments in the last 6 months tends to discredit you quite bit.

iTB.1428:

going even more tanky for shoutbow is useless, you need more DPS

Now that you don’t even need to go Discipline for shouts recharge, why not even going into something else ? Like Arms, to get massive amounts of Fury and bleeds on crits.

Thanks for the build.

The fast fire rate on the SB is the best part about the AA! The flanking requirement is not all that bad, check the actual angle you need, its under 45 degrees.

I keep thinking the flanking part is terrible though. 1v1 against a good player, he will not give you his flank often, condi rangers are slow as kitten.

I would LOVE to get a GW2 equivalent to the GW1 Cripshot ranger that would be using the shortbow for range pressure.

The problem is that there are heavy limitations on the shortbow skills which makes pretty difficult its usage as a “build defining” weapon, unlike longbow for DPS rangers. The shortbow is crippled at the moment by :

• 900 range. The ranger can push longbows to 1500 range, they should be able to push shortbows to 1200.
• #1 : I would both nerf the fire rate and make it a 100% bleed application, this would make the weapon so much better in 1v1.
• #2 : poison volley should have been a reliable poison application skill, but is bad from range and OP in close combat. This is counter intuitive for a bow imo.
• #4 : the duration of the cripple is way too short (3s every 12s ?), or the cooldown way too big. Good application of cripples was one of the best defensive tools of rangers in GW1 and that made them really fun to play. Also people were running much less condi removal in GW1 than in actual GW2, so it’s even more unreliable.
• #5 : the CD is really high. You could spam 2 different interrupt skills in GW1, and the ennemy skill would still both consume mana and go full reload. The GW2 interrupts are a joke compared to what you could do in GW1.

I do think the shortbow needs to be reworked a bit to be that specific ranged pressure weapon it should have been. The ideas are there, but it is too limitated.

Slick shoes – no KD when you don’t move.
Gear shield – +10s recharge
Healing turret – either no water field or no blast finisher.

That’s it, tyvm.

Turret Mesmer got nuked yes. L2P now.

I have hope that we will get PvE content more in line of what a Mesmer is made to be : a pressure class. GW2 current PvE is all about trashing ret0rd3d creatures as fast as possible by maxing direct DPS, which simply does not fit with the design of the class.

If the extension brings some sort of PvE content where confusion (take this as a general term, including effects, hexes and all) and interrupts are good to have, then Mesmer will be fun to play. As long as it’s a BORING DPS race, other classes will, be design, be better.

SCore : 246
Time : 41.7s
Coins : 21/24

And Nothing is Off the Table !

Thanx for the replies. This list is obviously subjective and biased and I welcome any thoughts or disagreements, just please leave sarcasms and personal attacks out of this. I welcome any list of scores which gives another opinion than mine.

For example yes, I find that a master trait just to lower cooldowns on weapon skills pretty average, if not bad. Most professions get utility from their weapon traits, like warrior horns which turn conditions into boons when traited, or mesmer focus which reflect projectiles when traited.

In my eyes (opinion) bow define ranger builds more than swords (eg power ranger in pvp and wvw), so the cooldowns are naturally more important than those on swords. Also the trait is placed in a trait line that seems more natural than the one for swords.

I am a main Mesmer player and I used to be a enthusiast phantasm player. Why do I think it’s bad :

1. It’s the only “AI” build where the AI damage is actually bound to your stats. You either have weak AI, or you are pretty squishy yourself. And you are certainly more squishy than a zerk engie or necro …
2. The phantasms are easily destroyed by random AoEs. The most unfun matchup is against a GS mediguard, he just destroys you and all your phantasms by just going ham on you.
3. Playing a build that goes completely AGAINST your class mechanic is a weird feeling. It would be like playing an ele build that would lose all its DPS if it changes attunement.

On condi mesmers : I like the idea of playing a condi mesmer, but unfortunately most of the condi mesmer builds are atrocious to play with & against. There’s no skill involved in random procs and drowning people under pixels that generate conditions. Those builds are spamfests that do not promote skilled play, like someone said before.

With all that, there’s no wonder power shatter is the only viable build. The others simply can not be pushed forward or they will promote a bad gameplay.