Guild Wars 2

Kaizoku.1298:

You need an elite skill equipped, just like your utility skills. Not so hard to understand

Wow, that’s a bit rude.

Sarpan, F5 gains functionality when you equip Elite Mortar Kit, Supply Crate Drop, Elixir X, or Sneak Gyro (if you’ve fully unlocked the Scrapper Elite Specialization). Like other Toolbelt abilities, what you get on the F5 button depends on what ability you have selected.

For Elite Mortar Kit, you get Orbital Strike, a friggin’ laser from space that does some damage and is a Blast Finisher. You can take a Grandmaster Trait in Explosives to make that laser hit twice in a row.

For Supply Crate Drop, you get Med Pack Drop, which tosses down 6 medpacks (similar to the one from the Healing Skill, Med Kit) in random locations within the area of effect.

For Elixir X, you get Toss Elixir X, which transforms enemies caught inside into Moas. Incredible crowd control.

Finally, for Sneak Gyro, you get Detection Pulse, which puts Reveal on any enemy within-… Well, the tooltip says 900 range, but last I heard, it’s only applying it within 300 range instead.

It’s only for Function Gyro, not the other Gyros.

It’d be wonderful if it gave Stability to any Gyro being used, especially that stinkin’ Shredder Gyro, but it’s not currently supposed to. So, not bugged, just-… Disappointing.

I thought it was supposed to be for all Gyros, too, when recalling Irenio’s comment about putting Stability on your Blast Gyro to make sure it reaches its target. But I guess he was talking about doing that via Toss Elixir B, our ONLY source of teammate Stability. As if we’d waste that to attempt a single ridiculously-predictable launch.

Traits are what really polish a lot of the Kits, sadly. X) I’d go for Bomb Kit instead of Grenade Kit, until you can get at least one trait line. It has a lot more raw power, and makes kiting multiple enemies a breeze, so you can stay alive. Most ranged enemies aren’t so bad in lower-level stuff, so it should get you through just fine. You can take Rifle for ranged things, the last three abilities all put out some decent damage.

With how horrid Engineer’s downed state abilities are, I’d certainly like the addition. :P

We finally broke free of the “Hobosacks”, and now we’ve been saddled with a floating shoulderapple. X)

I don’t particularly mind the Function Gyro, myself, but I sympathize with those for whom it clashes visually. Would be wonderful to get some kind of option, though if it’s not viable to let players toggle or dye it, I’d say the best route is removal.

…You can’t use Medkit and place bombs at the same time.

And 1800 Healing Power is a MASSIVE investment down that road that prohibits one from focusing on decent damage output. If you’ve aimed THAT much of your build towards healing, I’d say that those healing counts are perfectly acceptable, even underperforming.

Listing the healing-per-second as the total spread across five people is pretty misleading, too. If that’s the number used, damage needs to be considered the same way, and when they’re both looked at in such a fashion, the healing seems far less substantial.

Elixir-Infused Bombs used to be a Grandmaster in Inventions; were it to follow that same path, Bunker Down would be unusable.

Now, one thing: as much as I’d really, really love to see Elixir-Infused Bombs make a return… I’d like to see Medkit become a potent group healing kit far more. :P My reason for wanting EIB back is to play healer for my friends, and Medkit would likely be a much more interesting way to do that were it to have its healing increased to be non-negligible.

I don’t think any of the Utilities should be intentionally bad… X)

As far as vertical maps go, Deployable Turrets seems to me like it’d greatly help in keeping them relevant. :P Turrets as a Utility are largely about getting an immediate and versatile effect rather than actually leaving them out to persistently affect an area like any other games’ turrets. Returning the trait allows for both strategic placement of the immediate/versatile effect mentioned prior, and for more effective placement of the turret for utilizing it as an actual long-term sentry device.

In regards to Pistols being in a good place, they certainly are. But that’s not due to Fragmentation Shot and Poison Dart Volley, which are the only two affected by Coated Bullets. Regaining that trait wouldn’t really improve the sheer strength of Pistols; just the situations in which Pistols can be used. :P

There’s a LOT of opposition to this for reasons I simply don’t understand, but I’m not one of those sources of opposition. X) Would love, love, love to see it return, as well as other unique function-overhaul traits like Deployable Turrets and Coated Bullets.

It was such a cool, build-defining trait. We lost so many of those to the Specialization system. There was also Coated Bullets, and Elixir-Infused Bombs, and Packaged Stimulants arguably falls into that as well. And Grenadier, though that was nearly essential in the past and its new version still gives some decent upgrades to the kit.

Anyway! It’s just so sad to see such gamechangers be lost. I would love to see them all come back, somehow, and maybe get equivalent gamechangers for things that didn’t have them before, like Elixir Gun (though Alchemical Tinctures and HGH admittedly make a nice difference to it), and Tool Kit.

…While I’m spouting out all this other stuff that I’d like unnecessary utility buffs to, the Gadgeteer trait could use some tweaking to make it more reliable and impactful. X)

Alex.8630:

Ok and what race is the most sexy ? ^^ this is just to know ^^

That’s a pretty personal question. Normally speaking, it’d be humans. For people who love big hunks, Norn. For furries, Charr. For people who love rats and Napoleon Syndrome, Asura. And for those who are a little too fond of carrots and cucumbers, Sylvari.

Elder Dragon Bubbles is gonna have to come with a total underwater-combat overhaul if it’s gonna be even remotely enjoyable to deal with.

psizone.8437:

The thing can’t keep up with the 25% movement speed trait either.

It seems to keep up with me just fine when I’m using Runes of the Traveler. It’s a little bit of a hassle to get it at the right distance for me to be in its AoE without it catching up and pausing, but once I get it in that fairly-generous sweet spot, it works out.

Not saying it shouldn’t get a speed boost or tighter leash or larger AoE, just saying that it works for me with 25% speed. XD

I’m no meta player, but Function Gyro has been extremely useful for my group of three tackling Fractals and other such content. :P It’s maybe not a fantastic mechanic for people who accept nothing less than perfection from their teammates, but for people like me who don’t mind having allies that enjoy finding their own way to play… It’s quite effective.

THAT SAID, I most certainly would not be opposed to some change making it more convenient to target allies in need of a Gyro Revival. XD

Ignoring the juvenile bickering for a moment…

I ADORE the Sneak Gyro for PvE content. I don’t do much WvW or PvP, so I can’t comment there, but for PvE stuff, it’s a massive lifesaver and general convenience. I do find it to be frustrating at times to get it to follow me at an adequate pace to keep the stealth up perpetually, but once I get it working, it doesn’t give me too many problems.

The effectiveness of Sneak Gyro in PvE most certainly has me worried that they’re going to tweak it somehow, and I just pray that it isn’t an overtweak. But, I can’t in good conscience say that tweaking is unneeded; it really is the overwhelmingly-best answer to a great many situations. Though, it’s more of an asset towards saving botched fights than for any kind of “meta” stuff, I suppose.

I’m mostly okay with the kit as it is. The only thing I really don’t like is the perpendicular linear AoE on Napalm, which I find to be a hassle for all such abilities. I find most moves with that kind of AoE to be rather inconvenient, the exception being abilities that block people or projectiles such as Elixir U’s Toolbelt or Elementalist’s Earth Staff #4. Napalm, I’d much prefer to see as a circular or “straight out” linear AoE.

As for the trait, I’m okay with the boons it provides. However, I’m similarly unhappy with the way the boon application interval takes effect. As it is now, you really do need to sit in the kit to get its benefit, losing out on a large amount of the versatility that makes Engineers what they are.
I don’t know that they can make the timer start upon pulling out the Flamethrower rather than running constantly in the background. If they can, it’d be awesome to see that. If not, the next best thing that I’d love to see is for the interval to be shortened to 1 second, and the boons adjusted accordingly. 1 Stability for 1 second, and 1 Might for 5 seconds, every 1 second. Makes it less of an unreliable gamble for whipping it out when you see some kind of CC coming, and lets you reach its maximum amount of Might much faster so you can use it either with the Flamethrower, or for some kind of spike with another weapon or kit.

Been playing since Beta, as well, and I must say that turrets have NEVER been viable as area denial defense. X) They’ve got some neat functionality available to them, but it’s never been lucrative to keep them up more than 4-5 seconds. The closest I’ve ever come to passable area denial is a Ranger with Guard, and maybe some traps. But Engineer turrets are less of sentry guns and more of disposable explosive gadgetry.

Ederyn.3107:

Voramoz.6790:

There needs to be a half second pr quarter second after cast on gyros before detonate. It is too easy to hammer a button and summon then detonate a gyro prematurely.

agree

Hm, I don’t agree, myself. In fact, I’d like to see the cast time for detonation go away, too. It’s helpful to be able to immediately throw down a Superspeed-granting Lightning Field when traited for it.
Are Gyros not being placed when pressing the button once, for you guys? I’d say that patience and calmness need to be utilized so that you don’t hammer the button repeatedly, but I suppose if the button’s being just plain unresponsive, that is indeed a problem.

I mostly want to see them implement the cooldown change they had originally been talking about, where the Gyros start their cooldown immediately upon being summoned. Just like Turrets, having the cooldown start upon death means that you have little incentive to keep them alive. It’s admittedly a little less of an issue with Gyros only because they aren’t frontloaded with their best functionality being applied immediately upon creation like Turrets, but you’re still not really encouraged to keep them alive as long as possible.

That aside, I mostly agree on what you’ve said. X)

Blast needs to act faster, maybe receive Superspeed or have its attack change to incorporate a Shadowstep just to ensure that it actually reaches the target (or maybe just a larger AoE).

I don’t think Shredder necessarily needs more AoE or damage, but the massively random nature of Whirl Finishers in general makes it pretty unreliable; it could do with an increase in Whirl frequency so you can actually count on it to get something done. That, or change Whirl Finishers in general to be less bonkers.

Sneak mostly needs to notice when you’re gone more quickly. As it stands, if it gets up next to you, it’ll sit still for two or three seconds, at which point it has no hope of ever catching up again unless you stop and wait for it. It needs to rush after you at all times, or at least pause for a much shorter period upon catching up. It may need a minor speed boost, as well, to keep up when you have Swiftness. It does fine when you only have a 25% speed boost, though.
Alternatively, it could just get the same AoE as Bulwark Gyro. The Bulwark seems to keep you in its effect pretty reliably.
Another thing I’d like to see is making the Toolblet ability actually have a friggin’ effect on PvE enemies. XD But that’s a problem with the Revealed debuff as a whole, not just Sneak Gyro.

I don’t use Purge much myself, but its basic functionality seems okay. It’s the Toolbelt ability that’s disappointing. One suggestion I like is making that Poison cloud also whittle away at an enemy’s Boons. X)

I agree on Bulwark. The large AoE makes it catch you in the effect quite reliably, and the reflection dome is awesome.

wolfyrik.2017:

I don’t know if the Dev’s were naive or just didn’t care. Either way, morale in the engi community is slipping to ranger levels. Unsurprisingly.

Having flopped about between the two classes for years now, I think I can say that no class will ever drop to the level of morale that Rangers have. :P

Alone.1784:

Overall I’d say it’s just above Beserker for least usable elite spec.

Methinks you’ve not seen Druid. :P

To be fair, Ventari and Druid both have to make substantially larger trait sacrifices to get their healing potency. Water Elementalist, not quite so much, but Elementalists do have more traits available to them for really focusing on healing in Water. Engineer only really has one trait that focuses on Med Kit, and that doesn’t do a heck of a lot for it.

That isn’t to say Med Kit shouldn’t be reworked and improved. I would very, very, VERY much like to see Healer Engineer become a thing. X) And I suppose Elementalist and Ventari can continue putting out damage and other kinds of support while healing, and Druid is (or should be) untouchable as far as pure healing goes, whereas an Engineer using Medkit has ONLY healing available, and at a relatively low range. So, it’s not really TOO out-of-the-question for it to put out similar healing numbers to the other healer-capable classes. :P

I saw someone suggest changing 2-5 to change the #1 ability to apply extra effects and such, kinda like a supportive version of a Thief’s Venoms. Would certainly love to see that, and it’d help with the huge lack of genuine team support present in the current single-pack-on-the-ground setup of the existing 2-5 skills.

At this point, I’m thinking Irenio has been bound and gagged and thrown in a ditch somewhere for daring to give Rangers any sort of meta-viability, even if incredibly situational, via Druid. Engineers are simply a side-casualty of the attack. Don’t be fooled by the few posts he’s made since launch; that’s an imposter.

Dahkeus.8243:

My suggestion: Move the stunbreak from Blast Gyro’s toolbelt to Purge Gyro’s toolbelt.

I was actually wondering, what if Purge Gyro’s toolbelt skill removed one or two boons from enemies with each pulse? Could be neat. X)

I really hope the changes aren’t seriously going to be reverted this slowly. There were no qualms about obliterating Celestial Avatar in one massive sucker punch, can’t it be restored to the state that darn near everyone was happy with in the same instantaneous-and-out-of-kittening-nowhere fashion?

Galbedir.9178:

Please god no! The only thing keeping my druid doing any dps is the great burst from Smoke Assault. Im currently actually owning in pvp. What I cant understand what they haven’t done yet, is give us 2-3 pet ability keys, or allow us to switch out pets skills into our F2 bar. That would bring a crap ton of build diversity and awesomeness to Ranger.

Your Smokescale will continue to use Smoke Assault off cooldown exactly as you would be if it were placed back into the AI-controlled ability set. We need control over that Smoke Field, not just for using it properly, but for NOT using it IMproperly.

I agree that full control over the pet’s abilities would be fantastic, though.

But with the burst as its F2, what does Smokescale really bring to the table that a bunch of the other pets don’t? The smoke field being an uncontrolled ability makes it unreliable and even detrimental at times. As an F2, it was most certainly not an ability you wanted to use immediately off cooldown.

With Smoke Assault as an F2, you get… Damage. Same as many Felines, same as many Birds, same as Bristleback, etc. And when would you use this F2? Immediately off cooldown, just as the pet would do on its own. Instances where you truly need to hold off on using the burst are relatively rare, compared to instances where you need to hold off on laying the smoke field.

Is it good to have control over the Smokescale’s burst damage? Absolutely. But when the cost is losing control over the high-utility smoke field, it’s far less of a good thing. Especially when it turns the Smokescale into just another DPS pet with disruptive time-wasting abilities wedged into its AI. Pet utility abilities being in the wrong place is what makes Birds a rough choice, as their Swiftness ability throws a wrench into their primary role. Don’t encourage the same to happen with another pet that could potentially have fantastic utility.

Not to mention, when do you use the new F2, Smoke Assault? The answer: immediately upon coming off of cooldown, always, because it’s just a DPS increase. There’s NO tactical value there, versus the Smoke Field. (Unless it makes the Smokescale evade for its duration? I’m not sure. Still pathetically simple-minded by comparison.)

vespers.1759:

They benefit by getting your money. preorder bonuses to get you to give them your money before you get to see the final product… Events to let you try the builds before they are finalized… The goal is to put out false advertising to move units and it is happening like never before in gaming. Look at all the major game companies, they’re all doing it because they have zero respect for their customers and I don’t blame them because the gaming community has brought it on themselves.

But how does nerfing Rangers benefit them at all? If it was just about getting money, the could have just as easily put out the Beta version of Druid with no changes, and the effect on their pocketbook would have been the same, or even better. You’re just being paranoid and anti-business for the sake of being anti-business. This has nothing to do with the money, it has to do with developer detachment and poor game balance decisions.

vespers.1759:

You know what? This is YOUR fault. I made a post about this on the general forums that was quickly deleted and I got a ban but I’ll repeat it again.

preordering never ever ever benefits the consumer. If you were smart you would have waited for release and actual reviews. Game companies screwing over their players is hardly a new thing in the industry. You preorderers are kittening us all over with your desperation to throw money at game companies. If we all refused to do it maybe we’d get some quality.

So whatever, I’ve heard this sob story too many times. You bought into the hype, gambled, and lost. Cry me a river.

How do they benefit from pulling a bait-and-switch on Ranger players? I highly doubt it’s some sort of scam versus plain ol’ developer detachment.

Nothing to add, just throwing in my agreement that the ability should be switched back.

I’m half-wondering if some developer at ArenaNet was just giggling with a coworker going “wanna watch the Ranger players flip their lids? Watch this”.

So now we have to put the Smokescale into combat and be at the mercy of its AI in regards to when it places the Smoke Field (which is most useful being used outside of combat)?

…I’m not big on the negativity of the Ranger forums, I think the doomsaying is massively exaggerated a lot of the time, but-… What…?

Patch notes: Gliding now activates the pet swap timer upon landing. Nothing else.

I’m wondering if it was a lazy way to bring truth to the claim that Druid is for spike healing whereas Revenants are for sustained healing. It sure is NOW, with 10% uptime on any of the worthwhile heals available.

I’m not gonna jump on the doomsayer wagon just yet, because I’m naive and feel that they’ll bring it much closer to what it was at beta, but for now, I absolutely encourage continuing to complain about it so that it’s nice and clear. X)

I think Moment of Clarity is and will be fine, myself, but I’m not liking the way people are responding, here. Khael is indeed simply being objective, and accusing them of not being a Ranger main or somehow wanting to see Rangers fail is horribly flippant and dismissive.

I know it’s only barely related, but people keep freaking out about the “no more dodge” thing, particularly Thieves whose entire Elite mechanic is based on dodging… But has ArenaNet given SPECIFICS on how exactly they’re reducing the effectiveness of dodging for newer content? It could very well just be that large attacks will come more frequently than one can normally dodge, rather than just outright ignoring dodges altogether.

As for enemies aggroing onto Healing Power/Toughness in tandem, I imagine that’d actually make such gear effective for those who really want to play up the Tank corner of the holy trinity.

Gotejjeken.1267:

Hate to be the cynic..but here goes.

This isn’t a change to make ranger better, as it includes all player minions. Even worse, this change is not helpful in the least for WvW where pets get instagibbed in zerg vs zerg.

General question for the devs, do you guys really fear pet’s this much? What I mean is, truly if they were changed to be 95% reduction in all game modes unless specifically targeted…you think that would be game breaking?

Note, not ALL minions. Ranger pets. Specifically ranger pets. Which saddens me to be lumped in the ‘minion’ category as they are a vital part of the Ranger. It’s not like we can spec out of them like necros or insta kill them for massive damage / conditions like mesmer.

The problems plaguing Ranger pets are largely the same problems plaguing any other minion type. Aside from Mesmer illusions and the occasional place-and-detonate approach to Engineer turrets, minion builds of any kind suffer in current content. If the fix is available, it’d be foolish to apply it to only one instance of minion inadequacy. Fixing the minion builds of other classes doesn’t invalidate the value it has for Rangers.

I agree that it’d be nice to get such changes for WvW and PvP as well, but it’s at least been made clear that they are now paying attention to pet and minion failings.

Rizo.9534:

It’s ONLY for pve.
In pvp and WvW they will die same way.

But it’s a fantastic start.

…What new targeting system? I wanna see!

When the forum’s filter censors a Developer trying to give simple information, you know it’s imbecilically oversensitive and desperately needs to be reworked. Or, they could just recognize that the forum users aren’t a bunch of preschoolers and kill the filter outright, either one.

Most Drakes: Automated Tablesaw
River Drake: Assault Battery (Because it has the lightning breath.)

Felines: Pneumatic Holepunch

Devourers: Motorized Staplegun

Spiders: Nailgun Autoturret

Bears: Wheeled Anvil

Wolf: Rickety Woodchipper (Because of the Fear effect. Who wouldn’t run from a woodchipper that seems like it’s about to explode?)
Hyena: Blueprint Dispenser

Pigs: Metal Detector

Birds: Blimp Mounted Drill

Most Moas: Walking Jackhammer
Blue Moa: Shield Generator

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Hyena: Chuckles

This one made me… Chuckle. XD

My personal favorite approach to a baseline Fortifying Bond isn’t the fixed-duration boon-copying approach the actual trait uses, but a new system entirely for handling Ranger and pet boons. I can’t remember where I saw it, but I’ve mentioned it myself in other topics. X)

Essentially, any boons applied to the Ranger or the pet goes to a pool that they both share. If the Ranger gets a boon, the pet gets exactly the same boon themselves, and if the pet gets a boon, it similarly goes to the Ranger. If both are caught in one boon application, it’s only applied once. Such an approach lets the Ranger send their pet into a boon-stacking group while staying back themselves if need be, or lets the pet stay back for whatever reason while the Ranger fights with the group.

Just seems like a much more straightforward and reliable system.

“You and your pet take less damage while your health is above the threshold. "

Does the trait function as written? Your pet will get the damage resistance at any level of health so long as YOUR health is above 90%?

Simply find or form a raid group that isn’t comprised of elitist kittenheads, and you’ve got your viability.

Does that mean that every single other elite is bad, too?

The best way to set up a viable Ranger build for raids is to drop the perfectionism and accept that an extra two or three minutes in a raid from suboptimal damage output really isn’t that big a deal. I most certainly appreciate that you’re aiming to let everyone participate, so my comment really isn’t directed at you so much as the types who see the “meta” as the only thing that exists. X) I’d say that, so long as they’re pulling their own weight, they’re as viable as they need to be.

I hate to potentially bring about a bugfix/nerf on something beneficial, but I’m sure it’ll be changed eventually if it’s not intentional, anyway.

Basically, once Overload Earth is complete and it lays down the dust cyclone at your final position, the Protection given seems to be a combination of Overload Earth’s normal 1 second pulse, and Hardy Conduit’s 3 seconds of Protection normally applied only at the start of an Overload. The result is a rather high duration of Protection if you stay in the dust cyclone after the Overload has finished, surpassing 100% Protection uptime even with no Boon Duration bonuses at all.

Now, I’m not saying this should be nerfed. I love it, myself, it gives some nice heftiness to an otherwise rather-squishy profession. But I’m going to guess that it is not the intended behavior, and I’d rather see it brought down before HoT’s release rather than after people have based a build around it. X)

Jump puzzles.

I’m coming from Engineer, Elementalist, and a pet-heavy Ranger, so no, I’m fairly used to the Mozart-style keyboard shenanigans. :P It’ll take some time to really commit everything to muscle memory, but all in all, it’s just another song.

It might be something computer-specific. I tend to run at 40-45 FPS in “relaxed” situations, and around 25-30 FPS in combat. The skill doesn’t hit my FPS at all. I’m definitely not in the super-high-end-computer crowd, so I don’t think it’s a simple matter of how good one’s video card is. X)

Synosius.9876:

med kit was nvr meant to be competitive. its great at low lvl and dont have access to good traits which later replace all the boons this kit provides.

Great at low levels? Does the 4-healing-per-tick make that big a difference when just starting out?