Guild Wars 2

Dual Daggers “works”. Focus is just better damage, while Warhorn offers superior control and mobility. All-in-all, you won’t feel a big loss if you decide to go D/D, the Condi transfer can be especially helpful in certain situations and having an AoE weakness is somewhat helpful as well. But the way you can rack up Vulnerability while stacking Regen with Focus is kinda unmatched.

As for wether you need minions or not… you don’t. They will be a boon early on because Necros lack a good cleave, meaning that you’ll often have to take enemies out 1 by 1 Until you unlock your 4th DS skill and/or 3rd Axe skill, at which point you’re just going to wreck whatever comes your way in general PvE solo-content. Getting Well of Suffering early on will help as well.

Just build for Power/Prec/Crit damage (You generally don’t have to worry about HP since you have 2 health bars with DS) and use Dagger/x + Axe/x til you reach 80, then you can start worrying about your build for reals.

We all know that farming for mats is something extremely time-consuming or costly, however most of the time that’s because of the RNG standard of drops left from NPC’s. What I suggest is a new tool which lets you Harvest a specific Materials from fallen enemies, gauranteeing you some sort of substantial reward for each defeated enemy.

Skinning Knife would be used to harvest materials from enemies, such as Leather, blood, claws, bones, totems, gemstones etc. Different kinds of enemies would obviously offer different kinds of rewards:

Organic Enemies

• 30% chance of Leather scrap, tier appropriate to level.
• 30% chance of Common Material (Blood, bone etc), tier appropriate to level.
• 20% chance of Both Leather and Common Material, tier appropriate to level.
• 10% chance of Leather scrap, one tier above appropriate level.
• 7% chance of Common Material, one tier above appropriate level.
• 3% chance of Both Leather scrap and Common Material, one tier above appropriate level.

Non-organic Enemies

• 30% chance of Gemstones, tier appropriate to level.
• 30% chance of Dust, tier appropriate to level.
• 20% chance of Both Gemstones and Dust, tier appropriate to level.
• 10% chance of Rare materials, tier appropriate to level.
• 7% chance of either Rare material, Gemstones or Dust, one tier above appropriate level.
• 3% chance of a combination of Rare material, Gemstones or Dust, one tier above appropriate level.

Here’s my thief, Kris Anzu. (She kinda reminds me of someone…)

For engineers, I think it’s the following setup:

Traits:
Explosives 30 (IV, VII and XI)
Firearms 20 (III and VII if you’re using Pistol, IX if you’re using Rifle)
Inventions 0
Alchemy 10 (I)
Tools 10 (VI)

Healing/Utility:
Healing Turret
Grenade Kit
Bomb Kit
Elixir Gun/Elixir B (For when you need Stability)

Most of your time will be spent using Kits. If you’re running Pistol/Shield, you’ll mostly swift to this for the Blind, Projectile reflect and Block. If you’re using Rifle, it’s for the 3rd and 5th attacks, the latter hitting like a truck in melee range. 2nd and 4th are good for control. Pistol/Shield lets you use 2 Sigils though, which may be the deciding factor for some players.

For Warrior, I’m fairly certain the Meta is 30/25/0/0/15, using Axe+Mace or Sword/GS. Utility skills are always “For great justice!”, a banner of sorts (Discipline -> Strength -> “On my Mark!” shout -> Tactics/defense?) and usually a flexible utility slot depending on situation (Balanced stance when Stability’s needed, Signet of Fury when things just have to die, Signet of Stamina in Condi-heavy fights etc). However, there’s also the 30/0/0/10/30 build with the same weapons and utilities. Think the personal DPS is lower, however I find myself preferring it because of the flexibility that 10 into Tactics offer, such as more frequent fgj/On my mark shouts or Perma-banners. 25s downtime on Banners when most Zerk encounter are over in 9 seconds or so is almost three whole encounters without a banner boost (Le gasp!) /sarcasm. It’s also more Pug-friendly, and the extra 100 Vit helps if you’re still learning the Zerking.

For Rangers, the most useful build I’ve found is 25/25/10/10/0 (30/25/5/10/0 is also useful, but I find tossing up Quickness/Breaking stun more often helps more than 50 extra points in Power), with Sword+Warhorn/Sword+Axe (Keep something for Ranged and GS for Skipping ,Swoop/Counterattack are great tools for that.) and Red Moa/Jungle Stalker pets (Fury/Might respectively). Sometimes it’s better to bring a Ranged pet though, as sometimes you don’t want pets rushing into melee range. Healing skill is Always Healing Spring, cause it’s a friggin’ water field. Utility skills are Frost Spirit, Quickening Zephyr and either “Sic ’em!” or “Search and Rescue!”. Pets don’t last long against some Bosses’ AoE’s, might as well make their damage count when they can do it or have them do other things to be useful.

The problem lies in the fact that there makes no sense for those particular traits to be there. Greatsword benefits absolutely nil from Condition damage, Traps gain absolutely nothing from Critical Damage.

Not to mention that thematically, I would figure Wilderness survival would center around survival and traps skills, while skirmishing would mostly be about weapons. But maybe that’s just me.

It’s just so strange to me that the Trait tree with Precision and Critical Damage supports Traps, which all focus their damage on conditions, while the Tougness and Condition damage tree is all about Fighting up close with melee weapons such as Sword, Spear and greatsword, which are all Power-focused weapons.

Somewhere along the line, it feels like the Traits somehow got mixed up. I’d suggest moving and switching out a few traits as a quick hotfix:

Martial Mastery Moved to Skirmishing. Trapper’s Expertise moved to Wilderness Survival.

Empathic Bond made into the Grandmaster Minor Trait. Peak Strength made into a Grandmaster Major trait and moved to Skirmishing. Trap Potency moved to Wilderness Survival.

Trapper’s Defense moved to Wilderness Survival. Off-hand Training moved to Skirmishing.

9/10

I love the title “Quickspring”, that’s like taken from a good Fantasy novel, and it fits with the elementalist theme so well. Only reason it does’t get 10/10 is because “Yama” doesn’t quite sit right with me. It keeps the 9 because of how easily it flows off the tongue though.

I have three Salads in total:

Maehlwari, female Ranger
Churáin, male Guardian
Laénden, male Thief

Time attack
Explorable mode, but with a twist. In time attack, the final reward is dependant on clear time rather than set to a specific number. Higher rewards for those who’re quick, however dally too much and the reward will be less than regular mode. This is for all those who wish to speedrun or challenge themselves to a personal best.

Possibly, this could be a Guild Unlock and the High Scores would be kept within the guild to promote friendly competition and bragging rights. (Friendly competition in an MMO, pfff… who am I kidding?)

Gauntlet
Essentially a “Hard mode”, Gauntlet would give all enemies in the dungeon Invulnerability at set intervals for a specific amount of time (Numbers subject to change, of course):

*Trash mobs: 1s Invulnerability every 15s
*Veterans: 1s Invulnerability every 10s
*Elites: 2s Invulnerability every 12s
*Champions: 3s Invulnerability every 15s + Quickness for the duration.
*Bosses/Legendary: 6s Invulnerability every 18s + Quickness for the duration.

This would force players to rethink the tried and trusted “Stacking” techniques because of the simple fact that they’d merely be sitting ducks while it happens. That’s not to say that can’t stack, but mobility and right choice of utility skills would suddenly take a lot more priority than regular runs. Of course, the reward for clearing a dungeon run like this would obviously be substantial, to accomodate for the increased difficulty.

Survival
No Waypoints. Constant Maximum Health debuff (I.e the red arrow on your health bar that says “you go down, you’re defeated”). Oh, and enemies all are Frenzied (I.e deals more damage with a buff that can’t be removed or stolen). Best of luck.

8/10 – Eria Silverburgh sounds very befitting of a noblewoman from Ascalon. A good mix of anglosaxon and germanic, and it doesn’t feel like a clunky mess to say out loud.

I have…
Landon Blake – Thief, scoundrel and trickster.
Dante Silverio – Necromancer, teenager with a snarky attitude.
Lyhnda Allefeur – Elementalist, Krytan nobility turned Vigil Knight.
Sayoran Farstride – Ranger, carefree wayfarer and adventurer.

There’s always Bovine pets, such as cows, bulls and Dolyaks too. They’re everywhere in-game and would be great defensive alternatives to Drakes and Bears.

In PvE, people generally see no point in running Control-centric or CC-builds, simply because of the way bosses stacks Defiance, and others are just outright immune to it in every sense of the word. Furthermore, controlling trash mobs aren’t often very useful, as most of them are obliterated long before the need for Control becomes viable. Because of this, choosing weapons that rely on Control (Such as Warrior’s mace/hammer) is generally frowned upon in PvE.

So then, what is it that I propose?

The solution to Control is easy: Make it so that one can still interrupt a boss affected by Defiance, while not outright being able to Stun them. This means a well-timed stun can interrupt a boss’ attacks without leaving them vulnerable or permitting perma-locking them in Stun.

Now you’re probably thinking of World bosses and the like, where zergs of players rush them from all directions. Well, I have a solution to that as well: Give them their own immunity buffs. It’s quite clear that Champions and Dungeon Bosses aren’t designed in the same manner as world bosses, so they really shouldn’t have to share the exact same buff for stopping CC abilities.

Additional Idea
Aside from the previous idea, I’d like to propose that one splits CC abilities into two different Tiers. This is to further balance even more, and to add it into my first idea would be that only tier 2 level CC’s would be able to bypass Defiance stacks.

Tier 1 Stuns
Daze
Pull
Knockback

Tier 2 Stuns
Stun
Knockdown
Launch

Here’s an idea for how such a profession’s Unique mechanic could work:

Tha martial artist Only has One weapon slot, however it Has a bar not unlike Warrior’s Burst or Necromancer’s Death Shroud, however it fills differently.
This bar is filled when Energy is spent or recovered in battle, and it’s called Focus. The idea is that the Martial artist grows more ferocious the further he’s pushed, a crouching Tiger so to speak.

It’d use three of the Profession keys: F1, F2 and F3 by default.

F1 would Unleash, and would have a slightly larger icon on the toolbar. In this mode, the Martial artists stows his weapon and gains access to 5 Hand-to-hand combat abilities that Does not have Cooldowns, instead they consume a chunk of the meter each time they’re used, save for the Auto-attack.

F2 Would be called Form of Ferocity and would, when activated, consume about 20% of your Endurance to gain 20% Focus. Less loss but also less gain than actually dodging, however -this- would be the core way of gaining Focus, whereas the dodging is just extra cake.

F3 Would be called Form of Tranquility and would basically be the opposite, consuming about 50% Focus to gain 50% Energy. The high Treshold means that the Player would lose a lot of offense, but make sure the gained energy always mattered.

Focus To Energy isn’t of course a 100% trade-off. Instead, you gain about 25% focus every time you dodge, and 1% Focus for every 5% Energy recovered while in battle.
The Martial artist I’d imagine has light armor and medium Health, making it a high-risk, high-reward profession that relies on Mobility and Endurance to both keep themselves going as well as tossing down DPS on enemies.

Furthermore, I’d imagine the Unarmed combat would differ. With melee weapons, it’d be highly offensive and damage-oriented, whereas with ranged weapons it’d instead focus on defensive maneuvers and CC.

One-handed weapons: Single target High DPS
Two-handed Melee weapons: AoE damage
Ranged weapons: Defense and CC

I could see them use swords (M/O), axes (M only), warhorn, greatswords, hammers, Longbows and shortbows.

Magi’s Amulet
+798 Healing Power
+569 Precision
+10% Boon Duration
+298 Vitality

Jewel
+125 Vitality
+75 Healing Power
+5% Boon Duration
+25 Precision

Giver’s Amulet
+798 Toughness
+569 Power
+10% Boon Duration
+298 Healing Power

Jewel
+125 Healing Power
+75 Toughness
+5% Boon Duration
+25 Power

(Adding in some Boon duration amulets for those who like that.)

Stalwart’s Amulet
+798 Power
+569 Toughness
-20% Stun Duration
+298 Precision

Jewel
+125 Power
+75 Toughness
-10% Stun Duration
+25 Precision

Despot’s Amulet
+798 Vitality
+569 Condition Damage
-20% Stun Duration
+298 Healing Power

Jewel
+125 Vitality
+75 Condition Damage
-10% Stun Duration
+25 Healing Power

(Anti-stun, sorely lacking currently)

Crusader’s Amulet
+798 Precision
+569 Power
-20% Condition Duration
+298 Toughness

Jewel
+125 Power
+75 Precision
-10% Condition Duration
+25 Toughness

Monk’s Amulet
+798 Healing Power
+569 Vitality
-20% Condition Duration
+298 Power

Jewel
+125 Vitality
+75 Healing Power
-10% Condition Duration
+25 Power

(Anti-Conditions)

I run a similar build, all focused on Healing Power and Water element, however with some slight differences. Mine is a bit more defensive when it comes to Utility skills and it splits focus between buffing and healing, rather than focusing on either.

Signet of Restoration Instead of Glyph of Elemental Harmony – I’ve found that the Heal-on-cast HPS by far outclasses most other heals available to me (338 hp per cast). It’s also because of my runes being different, and I never activate it since just casting 10-11 spells outweighs the activated Heal (Which is ~3600 hp or so). And Since I can already use Geyser in a pinch, followed by blasts or dodge rolls, I’m not exactly starving for emergency heals anyway.

2 Superior runes of the Monk, 2 Superior runes of the Water and 2 Major runes of the Monk instead of 6 Superior runes of Dwayna Puts my Boon duration up to 70%, and since that also affects my teammates it means my Regen and Might buffs last much longer, therefor making for more of an impact (3 stacks of might for 30s per blast finisher in a firefield).

10 trait points into Earth instead of Air This is to get Armor of Earth on autoactivate, so I won’t have to put that into my Utility skill bar. The increased tougness in Earth also helps. I also don’t use Cantrips a lot, neither do I use Frost Bow outside of AC, so my Water traits are a bit different: Aquamancer’s Alacrity (Trust me, 4 seconds off of Geyser and 9 seconds off of Healing Rain is noticable) and Cleansing Wave (More condi. removal on attunement).

Burning Retreat should actually be your main fire field, rather than eruption. It lasts longer, so if you attune to earth while rolling you can actually manage to catch it with Eruption’s abyssmal cast time, meaning you can start the battle with several stacks of might for your party.
My Usual chain goes like this: Burning retreat > Attunement: Earth > Eruption > Dodge roll for Churning Earth > Arcane wave While rolling

That’s 9 stacks of Might for 30 seconds on the team, and I can stack another 4 when my Fire attunement comes off cooldown (Eruption + Lava Font). And in perfect conditions I can keep this chain going without ever touching Water, which I save for emergencies.

My Utility skills are also different, I use Arcane Wave, Arcane Shield and Glyph of Renewal, though I might pick up Mist form instead of Arcane Shield and I generally exchange Glyph of Renewal for whatever the situation calls for (Such as Ice bow) but I generally run with it as it has really helped me out a few times (Especially the multi-revival of Earth).

Overall, I’m in perfect agreement that Staff Elementalists should be more supportive, however after having tested other classes I can only sadly add that currently, they’re not the best at that either. In most instances, Guardian simply do a better job than they, and they come with heavy armor and won’t need to throw loads of HP into the pan to be good at it. They stack Might faster, remove Condis faster, heal the team for more and has greater access to defensive buffs. Sad but true.

Changed the OP after some Consideration, just a minor relocation to BM trait suggestions.

Marksmanship

Signet Mastery – Merge with Beastmaster’s Might
Adept Trait: Activating a Signet grants you 3 stacks of Might (10s). Reduces Signet Recharge rate by 20%.

Remorseless – Moved from a Grandmaster Major trait to a Grandmaster Minor trait.
Grandmaster trait: Regain Opening Strike when you kill an enemy or gain stealth.

Precise Strike – Moved from a Grandmaster Minor trait to a Master Major Trait.
Master trait: Opening Strike always critically hits.

New: Vengeful Hunter
Grandmaster Major trait: Deal 10% more damage and take 10% less damage while your pet is defeated.

Skirmishing

Pet’s prowess – Merged with Carnivorous Appetite and moved to a Master Major Trait.
Master trait: Your pet deals 30% more critical damage and gains health on critical hits.

Honed Axes – Moved from a Master Major trait to an Adept Major trait.
Adept trait: You deal an extra 10% critical damage while wielding an Axe in your main hand.

New: Swift Fangs
Master Major trait: Your Pet gains 1s of Evasion on Critical hits. Can only occur once every 6 seconds.

Wilderness Survival

Healer’s Celerity – Removed
Adept trait: Grants Swiftness to you and your ally when reviving someone. Increases revive speed by 10%.

Oakheart Salve – Moved from a Master major trait to an Adept major trait, now also triggers on Torment.
Adept trait: Grants Regeneration for 5 seconds when you suffer from Bleeding, Burning, Torment or Poison. Can only occur once every 20 seconds.

Martial Mastery – Merged with Two-handed strength. Remains in Wilderness Survival.
Master trait: Damage with Greatswords, Swords and Spears is increased by 5% and Cooldown is decreased by 20%.

New: Primal Retaliation
Master Major trait: Your pet gains Protection (5s), Regeneration (10s) and Stability (5s) when taking damage equal to or more than 10% of its Max Health in a single strike. Can only trigger once every 20 seconds.

Nature Magic

New: Circle of Life – Reworked entirely
(Former) Adept trait: Create a Healing Spring on death.
(Changed) Adept trait: Rally your Pet when you kill an enemy.

Two-handed Training – Moved to Wilderness Survival and merged with Martial Mastery

New: Merciful Invigoration
Master Major trait: Whenever you gain Regeneration, you also gain Vigor (5s). This cannot trigger more than once every 5 seconds.

Beastmastery

Instinctual Bond – Removed
Adept Minor trait: When you are downed, your pet gains Quickness for 5 seconds. 50 seconds cooldown.

New: Primal Defiance
Adept Minor trait: Your pet takes 25% less damage from Area of Effect attacks, and further 25% less damage if they’re not the target of an attack.

So, the basic idea behind these trait changes was to make the pet a viable addition to -any- kind of ranger build, rather than forcing them into one trait-line if they wanted anything else than a messy lump of stupid to follow behind them. Here, no matter what traitline you decide to focus into, there’s always the option of bolstering your pet’s prowess to make it a more helpful companion in-game.

EDIT: Changed Primal Defiance Suggestion to be an Adept minor trait, seeing as it should be avilable rather cheap to all Rangers. Also cut the resistance part in 2, one part coming active if they’re not the target of an attack which means they won’t suffer as much under Bosses who Cleave with their attacks (I.e hits more than one enemy in front of them)

Why would fire cause Torment?
If Arcane Shield is made into an Elite, what would replace it?
Why would I want to have to gamble with a Blast finisher, when it’s a core aspect of gameplay? (3x 20% chance vs 1x 100% chance? Latter, please)
I see you’re trying to make them work like Mantras. Not as useful as it may look, as you will have to stop DPSing to charge them everytime they come of CD’s. There’s a reason Mantras aren’t popular on Mesmers.
Why does a range factor play in on Arcane Blast, if it’s only an addition to Weapon Skills? And how would it act as a Projectile finisher if it was triggered with say Flame Burst or Blinding Flash?

The idea of buffing Arcane Skills is one I’m all for, but I wouldn’t use them if they looked like this in the end.

Earth Shield needs a Cone wave on its autoattack, much like the Staff Autoattack on Guardians. Could be something like a magnetic wave that cripples enemies but deals more damage closer to them. Would make it so much more user-friendly.

Problem is, ANet is trying too hard to steer clear of the typical “Holy trinity” of MMO. This include Healers. So, they’re kinda shooting themselves in the foot by crippling Healing Power as a stat (The same could be said about Vitality and Toughness, it’s generally considered that the best approach anywhere is just going Ultra offense and rely on dodge for personal survival). It’s a middle ground they haven’t found yet, and we can only hope for a more interesting change in the future.

That said, they -have- expressed interest in making the Staff a primarily supportive weapon fpr Eles, so we’ll just have to cross our fingers.

Dunno if this will actually help much but I’d think it’d help some at least.
The idea is that you add an Activated Skill if the player presses the Attunement Key while already attuned to that element. Like by pressing F1 when attuned to Fire, for instance. This would have an internal CD of their own, therefor simply acting as an additional 6th Weapon skill much like Warrior’s Burst, however unlike theirs it wouldn’t be affected by the weapon equipped. The idea is that they should add something specific to the Element rather than weapon, so as to compliment builds who lack certain skills and strengthen those that already have them.

Ideas:

Fire:
Nova – Release a powerful explosion that sears enemies and sends them flying

- Deals Heavy Damage and Launches nearby enemies
- Burns all nearby enemies for 5s
- Is a Blast Finisher
- 3/4th sec. activation time and CD of 45 Seconds. Radius 240

(Fire is all about damage, so adding a CC to this skill might not sit right with some, however this will create some breathing room for the Elementalist without locking them out of their primary damage Attunement. It being a Blast finisher causes it to synergate with the many fields Elementalists have access to.)

Water:
Haze – Create thick haze at the target location. Enemies entering the haze stacks Chill and Vulnerability, while allies are rejuvenated and cleansed of conditions

- Duration: 10 seconds.
- Allies within the area are healed once every second and cures a condition once every third second, plus an additional tick on creation. Total Healing should be around 2000-2.200 at 80, scaling slightly better than other Water Heal skills.
- Enemies gain Chill (1s) and 1 stack of Vulnerability (10s) every second they remain in the area.
- Combo Field: Ice
- 1 sec. Activation time and a CD of 50 sec. Range 1200, radius 360.

(Adding another Heal to the water attunement might seem redundant, but fact of the matter is that Elementalists depend on Healing to survive, it’s always been like that. Furthermore, it works in synergy both with offensive and supportive builds. Offensive will find a much needed refuge for when things turn dire, while supportive builds will see their repertoire increase both for helping the team and hindering the enemy. As a combo field: Ice, it can be used to stack Frost Aura which reduces incoming damage, further upping survivability for the Elementalist and their allies.)

Wind:
Gigabolt – Send a lightning arc ripping through the air at your target, dealing massive damage and stunning them.

- High Single target damage
- Stuns (2s), Blinds (5s) and Weakens (8s) the target
- 1/4th sec. activation time and CD of 35 sec. Range 1200

(The CD might seem like much, however the trade-off would be the nigh-instant Damage spike that also severely disables the target. The crippling effects can possibly turn the tide of battle in PvP or 1v1 scenarios, whereas the high burst damage alone makes it useful in PvE against stronger enemies, such as silvers in dungeons.)

Earth:
Gravity Well – Destroy projectiles and grant Stability to allies around yourself, while stacking Cripple and Torment on nearby enemies.

- Duration: 6 seconds.
- Grants Stability (2s) to all allies within the area every 2 seconds.
- Grants Cripple (2s) and 4 stacks of Torment (2s) to up to 5 enemies within the area every 2 seconds.
- Blocks Projectiles.
- Breaks Stun
- Instant activation time and CD of 45 sec. Radius 360.

(Ok, some thematic explenation: A gravity well, where allies are given sure footing, while enemies find it downright painful to try and remain in there. Furthermore, the gravity would cause projectiles to just plummet down. Mechanics-wise, Earth has always been an attunement meant for defense and Damage-over-time. Here, you can protect your allies exceptionally, as well as dealing damage to enemies coming too close. It would also add Torment to the Elementa-List of Condis, which it sorely needs.)

For humans, it’s actually:

Balthazar: Fire
Dwayna: Air
Melandru: Earth
Grenth: Ice
Lyssa (Formerly Abbadon): Water

But I agree that I think of humans when Elementalists come up, sylvari coming in second. Their magic is flashy and wondrous, definitely something I can see humans and Sylvari appreciating

Eh, Necros use the same dagger animation as thieves, so yes they do stabby-stab with them. At least for the Autoattack.

I for one do not want to see GS on Necros. We already have that on half the professions already, and I’d rather save it for the rumoured third Soldier profession (Don’t quote me on that) and hope that would be some sort of Dark Knight class. I’d like to see Hammer or Rifle, mostly because those are under-represented at the moment (Only two professions can use either) and there’s currently no use for Hammers with Condi Damage stats, like Carrion or Dire.

I could also consider a ranged 1H weapon with a 1200 Units reach, such as Scepter works for Guardians. It’d most likely be Sword then (Also overused) or Pistol (This I’d also like to see).

Sankofa Jimiyu.1567:

6 out of 10
I like it and wonder if it referenced or just a fun and creative.

I have a female Necro named Kappow.

Kappow kinda sounds male. And Dredge. The use of hard vowels serve to make it even more masculine, but that’s nothing faulty I guess. 7/10.

My own Asura is an engineer and named Zakkyz, and he’s kinda like the Asura equivalent to a class clown with temper issues. And an unhealthy love for explosives.

I want RIFLE. Think of the classical play by Geothe, Die Freishütz, where a hunter sells his soul to a devil for magical bullets that never misses. Or Rip van Winkle from Hellsing. All-in-all, haunting and ricocheting magic in the form of bullets, which would open up for a wide variety of skills, and we’d also see the first light armor class with a rifle.

Obviously, it’d be focused more on direct damage than the staff, with a few conditions there to make life difficult for the enemy. Aestethically, the bullets wouldn’t “Fire” in the same sense as for warriors, but instead they’d be pale white and followedby a ghastly trail, and possibly some wailing voices as icing on the scarecake.

1. Ghastly Shot – Fire a shot that bounces between enemies (3 times) and causes vulnerability (5s). 1200 Units range. (Similar to Thief’s trick Shot)

2. Banshee’s Wail – Fire a spread cone of spectral bullets (5 shots), chilling all enemies hit (1 1/4s per shot) and gaining Life force (2%) per bullet that hits. 900 Units Range. (This is to keep enemies away from you by chilling them)

3. Poltergeist – Fire a barrage of spectral bullets that ricochets across a target area, damaging all enemies within the area (x12). Range 1200 units. (Similar to a Guardian’s Smite power).

4. Mark of the Hunter – Mark. Inscribe a mark in the ground that Immobilises (2s) and Cripples (6s) nearby enemies when triggered. Range 1200 units. (Again, to keep enemies away from you and to weaken them if they’re actually close)

5. Accursed Shot – Fire a shot that removes boons (Max 3) and Weakens (5-15s) an enemy. Weakness duration is dependant on Boons removed. Range 1200 units. (Consider this the spike of the group, with the added flair of weakening heavily buffed players.)

I’m not gonna go on and on about how Rangers get no love or how they’re neglected and forgotten. It’s all been said before.
With that said, let’s move on to the actual ideas I had:

Basically, Rangers feels very much like a Solo profession, its Utility skills save for Spirits are all mostly meant to keep the Ranger herself up an running, while providing little to no actual team support like the other professions can. This needs to be remedied, else people will stop wanting to work together with Rangers at all.
All in all, Rangers have 5 Distinct categories of Utility skills:

Signets
Traps (Limited Team Support, what with the combofields it provides)
Spirits
Survival
Shouts

Now, what I want to focus on are the shouts. The Ranger share this archetype with Warriors and Guardians, but where they focus on supporting the team with their shouts, Rangers only support themselves with Pet commands. This doesn’t necesserily have to be the case, which could simply be done by adding a few actual Party-wide buffs to the shouts. Here are my suggestions for a few changes to each shout:

Sic ’em!: Grant Fury (10s) and Swiftness (10s) to allies within 600 units. Your pet deals increased damage for a short duration (10s). Lower CD to 30s.

Protect Me (Us)!: Grant Protection (6s) and Regeneration (6s) to your Pet. Instead of attacking, your pet will redirect half the damage done to all allies within 600 units to itself for a short duration (6s). Reduce CD to 50s.

Guard!: Order your pet to Aggressively guard an area. Your pet gains Stability (15s) and Allies within the Area gain Protection (3s) once every 5s for as long as this is active. Duration 15s. CD increased to 30s. Cast time reduced to 1/2s. Obviously ends if you order your pet to attack or retreat, or if the pet loses all health.

Seek and Rescue!: Command your pet to seek out and resurrect downed allies instead of attacking. Your pet will also remove conditions from nearby allies once every 4s for as long as this mode is in effect. Duration 12s. Obviously ends if you order your pet to attack or retreat, or if the pet loses all health.

With these changes, a Ranger will be able to buff their team with both offensive and defensive boons, as well as gaining a lot more team-oriented Utility, making for a good middle ground between Warriors and Guardians.