Responding to Chopps since there is a valid point on variables, DPS should not be taken over a time frame larger than 1s. It should be done on a consistent target with a steady weapon so that there is no damage range produced.
This could also be done be measuring the total damage output over the same time spans then dividing down to get a DPS measurement. It doesn’t matter what time frame as long as the time frames are equal in both tests, because we are talking about damage per second, not damage per duration. The time duration selected also doesn’t matter because as long as the times are equal and a steady weapon is used, there should be a consistent ratio.
Good work.
DPS isn’t why I used quickness at all though (stomp/rez took priority).
Keep dangling that carrot Jon. Hope I don’t get an infraction for that, it is definitely NOT an analogy.
So I’ll follow up, nice Honey Badger attitude sir.
Yeah I don’t mean to nitpick the video too much… but why is there QZ on a bunker/heal build? That is choosing to negate one of the main concepts the build is built around. Also, there is no stun breaker on the bar, and basilisk venom-backstab is the most basic combo that eats a stun breaker lacking build alive.
Instead, I see protect me, which, with the Empathic Nerf update, means your pet is essentially dead as soon as something tries to burst you down using a stun (which they all do). That is basically choosing to disable the class mechanic that our class heavily relies on (the pet switch trick doesn’t always work unless you are absolutely dedicating your pet switches to when you use Protect Me, which before the patch went live, would not be the best way to maximize pet usage because you could use the switch to recharge pet skills and predict which skill would be used, making things like dogs chaining knockdowns very effective).
I don’t mean to sound rude at all, those are just very clear things I see the moment I saw the video.
Sorry if I trail off, I only attempt to explain my thought processes because I find that explaining every single step I take when I come to a conclusion is the only way to keep people with malicious intent to not bother me.
Anyhow, ontopic:
—The quickness nerf will turn out to be a good thing for the ranger in pvp. Top tier builds didn’t really rely on quickness for damage, so it won’t affect ranger gameplay much other than lack of speed stomping (which affects everyone). That is a very strong step towards balancing downstates, and it is a shame we didn’t see a nerf for invulnerability stomps in the same patch as this.
—Maul damages better now on the GS, which should help keep damage up on a bunker style build which is one of the stronger ranger builds, meaning that it potentially increased the damage output of a viable build, which is good.
—HoM pets aren’t kitten statwise anymore compared to particular counterparts, which means I can finally show off all my earnings and not kitten my build for it, so good.
—Lastly, how the quickness nerf affects OTHER classes will improve certain things the ranger are good at. Lots of instagib builds took hard hits in pvp, and most ranger builds didn’t depend on DPS for damage. Meaning that a lot of current meta builds got hit while ranger builds stay the same for the most part, without changing anything in the ranger gameplay that significantly other than maybe speed stomps/rezzes.
So overall the class outlook will eventually be positive again. I agree with the balances on quickness, and it didn’t take this patch for me to make any opinions I have mentioned previously. More like the lack thereof. There wasn’t enough. I don’t want to sound like I expect the world from them, but I do expect them to maintain the standard they set it the first Guild Wars (for half the price of this game).
But just because it wasn’t enough for me doesn’t mean there isn’t anything positive. There just isn’t anything new. Metagame wise, the crying has only just begun in the community, and for once, the rangers might be the ones who are doing the least amount of crying because in the grand scheme of things, it affects our meta/viable builds the least.
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I definitely understand, and sorry, literally half of that stuff wasn’t directed at you directly but really just branches off of what I started to respond with, and how I feel about general threads that try to discourage people from using a feedback system.
The issue comes from that even if people are successful with a class, if those people happen to be a small minority, the class SHOULD be considered an overall failure in terms of community reception and enjoyment.
Don’t get me wrong though, I’m not saying that the community doesn’t need to compromise on how they want to play. But there have been no concessions from the devs either to make the class feel any different or more versatile in the grand scheme of what it can accomplish since launch. It actually got worse over beta with the nerf to spirits.
On a more general, on an as it stands basis, people aren’t going to play ranger when they can play a thief or mesmer or warrior and instagib stuff, or play other classes defensively and reach a high DPS with survival that doesn’t depend on poor AI to do so much of its damage.
When there is a higher skill cap, playing at a higher level should result in more rewarding gameplay, like doing more damage than other classes. Other classes can do the same damage we do with much more reliable access to damage and CC to land that damage.
I think ranger might be the only class with no immobilize on any of the weapon skills, and when paired with having to have our pet hit people to maximize our damage output, it just doesn’t make any sense at all why ranger players have such poor access to CC (not pets, I’m talking specifically the player).
(again not directed at Durz)Yes, there are a lot of people that just want this to be another faceroll class. But there are people out there, including myself, who just see lots of places where things (not just ranger) are lacking, and could easily be fixed to make sense without breaking the game.
Simply put (and restated by me from time to time), ANet has dropped the ball on this game. If I could have my guild wars 1 ranger and the way it functions placed into guild wars 2, nobody would hear a thing out of me. But it is hard to comprehend how pets and pet synergy and skills and bow gameplay got worse with a sequel.
You mean that boring live story that nobody cares? Yes, they release new crappy content every month and dont forget to add smthing to the TP. The grave becomes just deeper.
Sorry, my whole post wasn’t directed entirely at you, I tend to go off on tangents the more I talk about guild wars 2 (imagine that) lol.
But responding entirely to this quote, YES, EXACTLY what the problem is. There are issues with the game, but instead of fixing them, ANet keeps trying to go “hey, look over here, shiny object, shiny object” and then when it doesn’t work on some people and its effects wear off on the rest, THEY TRY TO DO IT AGAIN.
It baffles me that so many people are letting ANet slip casually by with trying to bribe us into enjoying the game instead of fixing the game to let people actually enjoy it. It doesn’t matter what monster gets killed if the mechanic doing it is always broken.
According to Durzlla they are just fine with LB
According to the dev team they’re fine with LB…. go watch the state of the game video… They say that “Longbow is in a good place, but the utilities aren’t defending the builds like it should.”
Watched it “rangers are our long range masters MASTERS and potent skirmishers” then they humm and haw thru a few greatsword cooldown reductions and agony resist for pets.
Did you watch the whole video? How they go into great depth in disecting how the warrior needs a buff because if hes glass connon build condition damage hurts him too much so he needs a buff?
Or how they laughed off and didnt answer the team paradigm guys question about helping/fixing the OP thieves when it came to pvp?
This class is on the bottom of the list when it comes to fixing and they could care less what any of us say.Yes, i did watch the whole thing, why are you telling me that we’re on the bottom of the list for fixing? Am i saying we need fixes right now? No, i’m just saying that the devs said longbow is fine and that the thing we are lacking is our utilities… You know… like they said kittening 6 months ago.
Our utilities have been kitten compared to every other profs since Beta where we were running around at a kitten 16 skills instead of 20 like everyone else, not to mention all of ours were flat out worse than everyone elses.
You don’t need to tell -me- we’re not getting fixes anytime soon, i know this, make do with what you have and stop kittening about it.
I mean, I agree, but I would have to say I am honestly afraid of how the game would be if there wasn’t a vocal community. The alternative could be a whole lot worse than what we have now.
ANet not having a consistent PR representative with the community is a bold move, I will give them that. They must all think of themselves as honey badgers.
As for telling the community to stop complaining, I wholeheartedly disagree given that this is a forum and one of a forums prime functions is provide players a place to give feedback.
Everybody is entitled to their opinion, and everybody paid $60 to be able to express that opinion. Nobody has a right to suppress anybody’s opinion except for possibly a forum mod on a code of conduct infringement.
Other than that, nobody is going to ever stop expressing themselves. Instead (and I realize I am asking the internet to be mature LOL) what we need to do is just simply agree to disagree on issues, stop trying to force our opinions on each others feedback, and do whatever it is we need to do to enjoy the product we paid for.
It’s just a game.
Free game? No. Period.
Not only did Xsorus spend money, he spent time. A great deal of which he used to help others with builds and such for a class that has now let him down enough he feels he has to quit it. Sure it’s just a game, but it’s also time and money.
Having spent 2331 hours playing myself, my main being a guardian (1498 hours) with a legendary.. if this (what happened to ranger) is what became of my class, I’d be pretty kitten annoyed too.
Annoyed is a pretty mild term compared to what most rangers feel, which is pretty much overwhelming disappointment and lack of any hope for their future enjoyment of the game.
It isn’t just rangers right now though, the entire community seems pretty disappointed. I mean, you don’t make a major mechanic change 7 months into a game. You do that type of thing prelaunch, or beta at the latest. It screams unfinished product.
What ANet did is essentially this: they sold us a car with a lawnmower engine, that we thought was going to be a finished car. Then, they acknowledged we needed a real engine and began sending it to us 1 part at a time, and every time we receive a part, they take away a different feature of the car, like the axles or the wheels or the steering wheel, etc. By the time we finally get the engine, there will no longer be a car left.
I mean, it’s pretty bad when I want a pre-empathic bond nerf ranger back, because that doesn’t even mean I get more build diversity, it means that we would be better off in the stagnant position we were in 2 months ago than the position we are in now, which doesn’t say much for the future of the game.
Plain and simple, things cannot keep getting gutted without adding anything significant. The equation is not balancing. The player base is not increasing, the interest of current players is not being renewed.
The game dug its own grave the moment it was released and devs decided that instead of fixing bugs and issues people had, they would release new content instead.
PVP should be about killing people.
Because you say so?
If PvP was only about killing the enemy, why would holding and capturing locations ever give you points? Why do these points exist at all? They exist because the win condition of GW2 PvP is earning those 500 points, not killing enemies.
There’s no such thing as an “artificial meta” (whatever that means lol.) There are only the rules of the game, and the strategies built around those rules to improve the chances of winning by those rules. And just because you choose not to like the rules of the game, does not mean everyone else (including the game designers) needs to bend over backwards to make your opinion the correct one.
While you have a difference of opinion and a fair point to make, that was quite a bit taken out of context.
To summarize what was actually said, it would be something like: if classes aren’t balanced in fighting each other, then they won’t be balanced in fighting each other over an objective.
Just because that persons opinion on what creates fun gameplay is different doesn’t mean that they didn’t make a very good overall point, which is that if something can be balanced by fighting mechanics, then that balance would transfer almost directly into objective play in most scenarios.
However, if it is balanced around capturing and controlling a point, then skirmishes happening off point don’t equate to their being any sort of class balance at anything other than capturing/holding a very particular objective in a very specific gametype.
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I don’t disagree, I was just commenting on the only thing ANet has the tools to accomplish. In Guild Wars 1, if you never played, it was balanced greatly around Guild vs Guild, an 8v8 team mode where teams faced off on very symmetrical maps about the size of sPvP maps in this game, in an attempt to infiltrate each others bases and kill an NPC guild lord (protected by numerous other NPCs with various levels of importance).
Respawning naturally only occurred every 2 minutes (or so I thought, it’s been awhile) unless somebody used a revival signet, which could only be recharged after use by taking a flag from your own base and capturing a flag stand in the middle which would provide a morale boost (a 2% increase in health and mana pool) and recharge the revival signet.
Rereading my own description, it is clear the level of refinement of skill based gameplay has been reduced in guild ways 2, to simple facerolling skills at people while dodging until something dies, while defending or trying to capture a node. ANet dropped the ball the moment they thought that rolling around on capture points until a score limit was reached was better than GvG was, was the very moment that any sort of entertaining PvP failed by design in terms of replay ability and long term enjoyment.
As for me personally, I keep wanting to get into League of Legends and never look back at Guild Wars 2, but I don’t know the first thing about League of Legends; like whether it is entirely free to play or how easy it is to pick up and play without knowing anybody (I read lots of things about it being super team oriented and that it incites a lot of elitist attitudes towards newcomers).
Edit: Got my quote and end quotes all types of screwed up haha
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Signet of the Wild provides passive healing for your pet that is much higher than it is for the player. That is really the most helpful (and not repetitive) thing I can suggest trying to get early on.
I play pure PvE. But from watching the State of the Game rangers are actually really well off coming from the top players so I think you just need to L2P.
No I don’t just kill rats, I actually do Arah, CoF, CoE, HotW, AC, and CM with my Ranger perfectly fine and am even the last man surviving most of the time. So, if Aridia, Gottejjeken, and Lyndis need proof pm me in game I’ll take you on a run with me and show you up.
I pve just fine thanks. I play well enough that I run GC in fractals. But I don’t really care about pve because bots are stupid.
I really wish they would stop saying things like in SoTG to confuse people because they’re mainly talking about spvp, not wvw or pve. The top build right now in spvp involves the ranger spamming 3 traps while circle strafing with an auto attacking SB over a node. The only reason why that works it’s because it’s a node cap game (enemies are forced to walk into it to prevent caps and due to match time contraints) which no one cares about regardless of how badly Anet wants it to matter. It is artificial, and it has zero skill involved and it’s not at all indicative in how well you can actually kill other players.
Try a trap build in wvw when people are not forced to walk into your traps. It is worthless unless you happen to find a stubborn player that insists in 1 vs 1 you.
You’re not even on the same page as what the forum is talking about.
They actually balance based primarily on sPvP (I remember it but I don’t feel like looking it up to quote it). I believe there is some underlying use of inductive reasoning to balance like that, but they don’t and will not balance skills directly towards WvW ever because of the variables that are always in effect, such as how many people are in fights, the level people are, and the gear mountain (what I mean is that it is gear based more than skill based in a lot of small ways that add up).
Node capping has existed since the dawn of competitive play in videogames, so just because you have a gripe with it doesn’t mean that your opinion is fact. My opinion isn’t fact either, don’t get me wrong. But you are trying to compare large scale battles (like Battlefield) to small scale battles (like Call of Duty).
Both require skill, just different kinds of skill, and ideally the game should be balanced on both fronts.
Nobody is disagreeing with you on the idea that the game needs balance changes. NOBODY. Everybody is going to have a different opinion on what needs fixing, but as long as everybody is agreement that something needs fixing, there is really no point in getting worked up or argumentative, just because people believe in different severity levels of what needs to be changed.
I completely agree with you jcbroe, except with trait choice because I think we are fine there if they fixed are utilities more traits would usable.
As of now they just need to work on fixing the bigger problems like the things I mentioned and then fine tune the traits later on. Just by fixing the utilities build diversity would expand so much more.
I understand that, but there is a particular thing I think of when I make that mention, which is grandmaster trait choices. Certain ones like reattaining opening strikes on kill or dodge rolling on removing 2 very specific conditions for an entire 30 points definitely pigeonholes peoples options when it comes to trait selection.
Some of them can be left untouched by buffing the utilities they affect (like Spirits), while others could be changed or replaced to be a whole lot more useful (Evasive Purity and Instinctual Bond, for example).
I would agree though that trait changes are not the priority, and they definitely don’t affect ranger alone. The whole game needs a trait cleanup and polishing, because a lot of classes are pigeonholed into certain selections just because lack of better or more useful options.
But it would be better to get the things that more actively affect gameplay changed first.
I’m just curious, isn’t feedback exactly what one of the main functions of this forum are? Especially since it is a profession subforum. There are still build threads and video threads and equipment threads peppered in, but I just thought that feedback was also a function of the forum.
I could be wrong about that, so check me if I’m wrong.I understand there is a debate of how useful doing such a thing on the forums actually is right now, but people paid $60 for this game, and part of that is buying the right to complain on the forums as long as it doesn’t break the code of conduct, or so I think.
As long as you are not posting the truth your feed back is welcome on the forum seems to be the motto.
I mean, everybody has an opinion, and everybody has the right to state their opinion. If peoples opinions weren’t true in their own eyes, then they probably wouldn’t have those opinions. People paid for the right to state their opinion on these forums, and need other people to see them and agree with them so that they can feel better about themselves, whether it provides empowerment or satisfaction or whatever (just look at the success of Facebook and Twitter).
A blanket truth though, looking across all of the forums, is that ANet must have dropped the ball SOMEWHERE for so many people to not be satisfied with the game. Regardless if nobody agrees with each other on what things they should be dissatisfied with, it is pretty apparent that something was either done wrong or didn’t meet expectations somewhere.
I agree that if it hasn’t set off a red alarm for the devs yet, than it probably never will. But for a lot of people, the only way to vent their frustrations is to get vocal about said frustrations.
Yeah rangers are pretty top tier in PvP, or were until people figure out a new metagame (because of the quickness nerf) that could potentially counter the common ranger builds (by this I mean that people could decidedly go more defensive and make it harder to be killed in general, or add more condition washing to their builds, etc).
The BIGGEST issue since launch has remained that the biggest thing rangers suffer from is lack of competitive choices in terms of utility choice, weapon choice, and trait choice.
On whatever planet it seemed like a good idea to let the shortbow out-dps the longbow in almost every scenario, nobody will ever know. Just like x amount of other trait or utility choices I could list (that have been listed now for months and months and months).
Overall (outside of just the ranger, it isn’t a ranger specific issue) that is the biggest place the game is suffering, build diversity and the lack thereof. Stagnant metagames that do not promote across the board balance are killing this game.
I’m just curious, isn’t feedback exactly what one of the main functions of this forum are? Especially since it is a profession subforum. There are still build threads and video threads and equipment threads peppered in, but I just thought that feedback was also a function of the forum.
I could be wrong about that, so check me if I’m wrong.
I understand there is a debate of how useful doing such a thing on the forums actually is right now, but people paid $60 for this game, and part of that is buying the right to complain on the forums as long as it doesn’t break the code of conduct, or so I think.
- Fix Spirits
– I think the best fix would be to give them more damage resistance and remove the inner cooldown or increase the buff. (At least make it so in PvE only)
- Reduce some of the recharges of signets to at least 90
– Specifically SotW and SoS because they are not worth activating with those ridiculous cool downs
- Buff longbow damage or fire rate
I’ve been saying this has needed to be done since like late October of last year in terms of major function in the way the ranger plays.
Some more utilities need some tweaking than just those to make the competitively viable though, and ALL classes need trait polishing and reworking.
It would also be nice if pets were as good as they were in Guild Wars 1 at doing things, like hitting enemies…
Sorry to hear you’re going. I became inactive sometime January headed into February myself, but I still watched all your videos.
To my general statement, it is time to call this game exactly what it is; a complete and total design failure in comparison to the first Guild Wars. However we went to having pets be worse in GW2 than in GW1 absolutely astonishes me, along with the levels of balance that were maintained across the metagame.
7 months in and you are still adjusting MECHANICS (quickness says hi)? You know, the things that the game run and function on? What was the point of even having the beta if we are still having the same exact blanket issues that were there SINCE beta?
I could have done so much better with my $60 than this game, and it really is a shame. One day ANet might apologize to the rest of us for making us pay to playtest a product for them. But by that time I doubt I will even be checking the website anymore.
The double nerf to Empathetic Bond nerfed us pretty hard…
It also killed any hope that the developers actually know how to fix the Ranger class.
Far as i’m concerned, this game is dead and buried and is just a stepping stone till another game comes along (ESO/CU).
Agreed. Some had suggested for a choice to be a Pure Ranger Class instead of the current Beastmaster where its too dependant on pets to do the other 30% of the Ranger’s dps.
But it wont happen cause in this game…
Rangers = Beastmasters (with broken pet A.I. unless the target is the Practice Golem lol)…
Actually, I remember reading notes from the game development where they were two separate classes to begin with, but they were later fused together to create our current version of the ranger as well as certain concepts transferring into the warrior longbow.
They did this because, and I’m paraphrasing, but that each class separated on its own felt lacking in certain areas, and the combination of them seemed the best solution. This all happened before beta even came around, so only the devs would know what the original two classes were like on standalone terms.
As far as condition removal goes, MOST (not all) classes could use access to a little more on demand condition removal (from a pvp standpoint). Rangers biggest gimping feature is that they do transfer to the pet, and it creates a masochistic playstyle that doesn’t ideologically promote working with the pet when you are essentially using them as a glorified meatshield (or in this case a condi sponge).
I’m not sure why people think rangers are OP. Yes, there is a build or two that is strong in skirmishes. But overall rangers suffer from the same thing every other class does; lack of build versatility.
Just because the metagame favors a particular ranger build in certain situations doesn’t make the class OP. The metagame has 2 components; strategic mindset and build efficiency.
The issue is then player mentality coupled with lack of build versatility across every class that, when implemented, could show more classes having better viable hard counters to things they currently experience trouble with.
Summary: Just because a class is good at something (not just ranger), that doesn’t imply that the class is OP. it implies that it is good at something. There’s really 3 options, either you got outplayed, your build is at a disadvantage, or a combination. The only current solutions are to get better, build differently, or wait for future updates when class polishing incorporates more build diversity in the metagame.
They need to make the longbow’s #1 fire rate faster or increase its damage or something. Honestly, the Mesmer’s greatsword is a better ranged weapon, and they’re not even advertised as a ranged class. That very fact alone should be a big, flashing sign saying, “Something about this is seriously kittened up.” Really, ANet? Really?
….the mesmer has only one melee weapon. The ranger has two.
The only reason mesmer greatsword works is because of the phantasm that does 6-7k damage after 0.25 seconds of being summoned and mesmer stealth allowing him to recreate distance.
Other than that, the mesmer’s greatsword autoattack is just as bad. It’s equally ranged cap, and it’s a long channel relative to other autoattacks like thief shortbow or warrior rifle.
The ranger longbow simply put has no attack that in the same short time windows of the warrior and mesmer does the kind of damage that a phantasmal berserker or Kill Shot does.
Rapid Fire is BAD. It’s bad damage for such a long channel.
Rapid fire can deal over 10k damage… So idk what you’re talking about with bad damage seeing as how you can pump that out from 2k range…
Then longbow #1 can crit for up to ~3.5k dmg, again from 2k distance, it’s a STRONG weapon, it just lacks in ways to reopen the gap/keep the gap open, sure there’s KB shot, but by the time you can use that it’s already lost a ton of damage from the range being closed…
Oh, you also reminded me that KB shot doesn’t put them out to 1000 range where the auto attack is most effective, which doesn’t synergize well. Could be a slight improvement, though admittedly knocking somebody 1000 range might look…humorous.
Lol as much as I’d LOVE to throw someone from point blank —> 1k that’d be a tad OP xD doesn’t it only put them to 600? Which is still in our “hit like a noodle” range? Effectively making the KB kitten once they close the gap?
I mean I could KB and then LR, but that’s hardly a good use of CDs…
Yeah exactly lol. What could be done is add a cripple to the KB when they stand up. It would kind of make sense logically since you probably shouldn’t be so superhuman as to get up from an arrow that knocked you backwards off your feet and then be fine. Seems a tad strange to me haha.
Honestly though the issue with combating gap closers and creating distance through use of conditions could be more easily fixed through trait effects than skillbar changes. Things as simple as crits immobilizing/crippling with an internal cooldown would be amazing. If nothing about the damage was changed, but this trait was implemented, I would probably switch and use longbow more just for a trait like that.
Hunters Shot is the only skill functionality I see being able to be tweaked to do more on the longbow (people asking for more functionality changes are being a bit impractical at this point in time). The only other thing I see being changed is damage numbers, because that is easy to play around with in code without too much time investment.
They need to make the longbow’s #1 fire rate faster or increase its damage or something. Honestly, the Mesmer’s greatsword is a better ranged weapon, and they’re not even advertised as a ranged class. That very fact alone should be a big, flashing sign saying, “Something about this is seriously kittened up.” Really, ANet? Really?
….the mesmer has only one melee weapon. The ranger has two.
The only reason mesmer greatsword works is because of the phantasm that does 6-7k damage after 0.25 seconds of being summoned and mesmer stealth allowing him to recreate distance.
Other than that, the mesmer’s greatsword autoattack is just as bad. It’s equally ranged cap, and it’s a long channel relative to other autoattacks like thief shortbow or warrior rifle.
The ranger longbow simply put has no attack that in the same short time windows of the warrior and mesmer does the kind of damage that a phantasmal berserker or Kill Shot does.
Rapid Fire is BAD. It’s bad damage for such a long channel.
Rapid fire can deal over 10k damage… So idk what you’re talking about with bad damage seeing as how you can pump that out from 2k range…
Then longbow #1 can crit for up to ~3.5k dmg, again from 2k distance, it’s a STRONG weapon, it just lacks in ways to reopen the gap/keep the gap open, sure there’s KB shot, but by the time you can use that it’s already lost a ton of damage from the range being closed…
Oh, you also reminded me that KB shot doesn’t put them out to 1000 range where the auto attack is most effective, which doesn’t synergize well. Could be a slight improvement, though admittedly knocking somebody 1000 range might look…humorous.
I expect this:
We made some ranger changes this patch, but had to go back on them because of risk factor. There are some bugs being fixed and quality of life improvements coming in the next patch, as well as some other significant ranger improvements. I would Literally tell you but I think it would be considered a bit of a spoiler so you will have to be patient.
While we work hard to keep updates going on all professions, not very build us going to contain fixes for everyone due to the nature of software development. One problem with rangers is the lack of build diversity created by a number of sub par utility skills. Many signets, a shout or two, and spirits are all a bit lackluster. That is the first place to expect improvements. Second is trying to improve the feel/ pacing on some weapons.
I was going to add my own humorous post… and then you reminded me that a dev posted this and it literally killed any joking around I could have done.
On an actual serious note, my speculation is that it is going to be an update that is parallel to the updates the ranger received in previous updates. Aka there will be changes that affect the ranger that don’t change a single thing in the metagame.
On my humorous note:
-Ranger bows have had all damage removed from them. In addition, every time a ranger hits a target with an arrow, every bow skill goes on a 10 hour recharge while the 10 hour trololl guy plays loudly on both the attacker and the attack recipients screen. This effect lasts until both users have logged off the game entirely.
-1 hand sword: damage is removed entirely. Skills have been reduced to 1 slot for bar compression. The skill allows you to begin river dancing while evading all attacks, at the cost of being rooted.
-Offhand axe-The ability to block projectiles was a little overpowered, so we removed the constant effect from the skill and it now has to be traited for to block/reflect projectiles. This will be a grandmaster trait in the Nature Magic line.
Torch-We felt the torch was too strong, so we replaced the throw torch skill with a jab. Your character now jabs while yelling “back, get back”. Attack radius 120, burn duration 2s.
Greatsword-Maul will be receiving a buff. To compensate for the increased damage so that the weapon isn’t too powerful, we removed the ability to move on greatsword 4 as well as the leap on greatsword 3, and reduced the damage on autoattack because we found it wasn’t fun gameplay.
1h Axe-We felt the autoattack was too powerful, so we made it where even if you have something targeted, the axe won’t necessarily hit it, but any enemy randomly in front of you. This is to reduce rangers ability to skirmish since they are so powerful in 1v1 skirmishing, and needed to be toned down to the level of other classes like thief, who can only damage 1 target at a time.
Signets-We felt the passives were too strong, so we removed them entirely. To compensate, we removed the signet of the beastmaster requirement for them to affect the player.
Spirits-We reskinned and recolored them to make them look more distinct on the battlefield.
New Shout-“There can be only one” either the ranger gets killed or the pet gets killed instantly upon use. Which one isn’t killed gets a 200% damage boost and 100% movement speed boost, but only has the skill “There can be only one” and can only shout it with no effect unless both parties affected are alive.
Not noticed it, ever. I’ll take a look tonight when I get home, are you sure you not just seeing it for your own crits and your pet just happens to be critting at the same time?
That’s what I’m assuming. I was testing out a new build at the time and didn’t think to actually check to see if the pet was proccing just because it was late at night for me and I had some online homework open in a second window I was doing at the same time. So the thought didn’t occur to me until today during class while I was spacing out lol.
Again, I’m going to test this immediately (and probably be wrong) when I can, I doubt it is actually happening, but think it would be very useful (and sensible, and awesome) if it was occuring. Thinking about it though, our DPS pets would probably break the game if this were true, unless the proc was somehow occuring when the pet was hitting but based off of the players crit chance and power rating (which would imply some crazy coding for weapon sigils).
Hhhhhheeeeeyyyyyy.
Now that we’re talking longbow buff and survivability increase, can we rehash the wintersday scout conversation? I still really think Snowblind and Snipershot would just make Ranger Longbow.Longbow skills are fine, but the weapon itself is very weak. Maybe a slight increase in dmg or/and fire rate?
I’ve been wanting this for awhile(specifically fire rate). To help elaborate the issue, even if people would argue the damage and DPS is fine (against a stationary target I would agree with that), it is impractical due to how the skills function.
Opponents in the game have lots of gap closers, and the longbow doesn’t have many skills, or skills on a short enough cooldown, to keep the enemy away and firing at them. Once the enemy gets close enough, the damage drop off on the autoattack combined with how channeling cancels if the target is able to break a skills LoS makes the longbow very inefficient up close (it makes sense in that LONG bow is better at longer ranges, but the same “realism” type argument can be made that if somebody took an arrow from a longbow up close, it would do much more damage that at range, so the ideas are contradicting).
That is why there is a tendency even for power builds to gravitate towards the shortbow. The shortbow is effective out to the same range as an untraited longbow, while carrying the same or better DPS within 2/3s of the longbows range (longbow only out DPSs the shortbow at 1000+ range, and upon multiple tests it is only ever a difference of about 200(about meaning more or less, but averaging at 200) or so damage total). Also, the shortbow has more spammable control options which are easier to land on targets(thinking specifically Barrage AoE cripple to single target cripple).
Something needs to be done to make the longbow competitive with the shortbow as a power weapon. A damage increase on the longbow from 0-1000 range on the autoattack, and a more slight damage increase to rapid fire to make it outDPS/burst the shortbow as a power weapon would work(I say this because the shortbow burst still outdamages the longbow because of the the shortbows refire rate vs the longbows, coupled with the longbows damage comparatively).
The other option is to leave the damage as is but bring up the speed so that the damage on the burst at the very least can be done faster and the longbow applies more competitive DPS.
Personally I would like to see a mixture of these two tweaks, and maybe a single target cripple/immobilize added to the longbows attacks.
Nerva (or anybody), I’m curious about Sigil of Fire. Have I been noticing it proc on our pets attacks, or am I just seeing things? I am not on my cpu that has gw2 installed right now or I would test it myself instead of asking. It would just seem important to note on any crit based build if it happens to be true that sigils proc on pet attacks (it would make sense if they did/do).
Exactly, I only mentioned the realism because scrolling through a few pages of the ranger forum that deal with the longbow topic, people make the “it isn’t realistic so I don’t like it” argument quite a bit, which just logically makes no sense considering the game they are playing. While I have an appreciation for realism myself, its on a game to game basis (as in, is it a realistic function within the atmosphere and universe that the game takes place in).
That being said, after watching the state of the game, I am hoping on March 26 rangers seem some utility love.
….
I think the point that he was to make was that even tho WoW has been out for a long time, it still has balance issues. Indeed, if you head over to their forums, the QQing that goes on there with classes is far beyond what we see here.
and i can tell you that while gw1 flux was meant to give a fresh look on the pvp meta game, each balance update they did was not, while i haven’t been on there for a while, they still had problems with classes being over/under powered, and complaints about that was just as harsh as we see here. All he was saying was that things aren’t all gloom and doom and people need to chill out.
I agree people need to relax. People always need to relax. Also, guild wars 1 balance team was actually never trying to create equal balance across the board. If I remember correctly, the whole idea conceptually behind the updates (they claim) was to implement entirely new concepts to see how they would pan out, even if they created a knee jerk reaction. That way the could log the effect that it would have on the metagame and adjust accordingly in future updates after that.
What that hints at is the actual truth, that just because classes can be balanced doesn’t necessarily imply that the metagame is balanced. There are two many variables for there to be a direct correlation, like having 2+ of the same profession on a team, or balancing for team play but not for solo play and then encounter solo situations where classes aren’t balanced against each other making balance issues still exist.
The point I was only ever trying to hint at was that no matter what the devs do, the game will never please everybody or meet everybody’s expectations because there is a fundamental difference in why we all enjoy games. It is unfair of people who have a positive opinion to say the people with negative opinions are wrong, just as it is the negative opinions to say peoples positive opinions are wrong.
If anything the more vocal everybody is (not emotionally vocal, but explanatory) about both positive and negative things they encounter in the game, the more the dev team can cater content in the future to appeal to their whole audience. The only thing that needs to be done is to encourage constructive conversations and debates to remain constructive. Debates can be heated but ultimately it shouldn’t turn into a flame thread because then the ultimate point that the difference of opinion/experience makes gets lost in people attacking each other just to prove their own, usually fairly anecdotal opinion/experience.
Well I didn’t read all of the posts so I don’t know if I am reiterating something that was already brought up.
But Ranger didn’t see a lot of representation or a lot of discussion, while other class balance discussions and future/possible updates approached the 15 and 20 minute marks.
It would be nice to see every class get an equal amount of discussion so that every professions community can get insight, and not 15 minutes of mesmer/ele insight versus 1 minute of ranger insight (as an example).
If there really is nothing else that could possibly be discussed about a current class, then saying so in a direct manner instead of transitioning poorly with a “moving along” demeanor is all that is needed.
Guys and gals, just look at the patch notes for WoW 5.2.
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/8226552/Patch_52_PTR_and_Patch_Notes_-_February_25-2_25_2013
Take a look at how much they are changing for every class there. How old is WoW now? This is not what I want happening in GW2. It’s very annoying when classes keep changing drastically. Be patient and understand that it’s an iterative process.
Is it frustrating? Yes.
Is it hopeless? Only if you give up easily.
Actually that’s just a difference of opinion, because those notes look extremely fun to me and I’ve never played WoW in my life. So honestly I have no idea how they translate into affecting balance, but it looks to me like there is a fresh and ever changing metagame because of updates that keeps things from getting too stagnant or repetitive.
That to me seems extremely fun, and changes that drastic in GW2 would actually incite me to play the game more.
Guild Wars 1 actually had something to a similar effect on top of balance changes called the monthly “flux” http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Flux which had the potential to make the game fun by changing the metagame a bit every month.
This is just a difference of opinion though, I’m not saying you’re wrong in wanting less changes to be made.
I just personally feel like a game loses all replay value when it becomes a constant grind with predictable stat distributions (that’s a build versatility issue coupled with metagame stagnation), and in pvp a small map rotation. Then on top of that progression rewards in PvP are purely aesthetic and PvP rewards are currently separated from progress in other game modes, adding very little to the experience itself.
Regardless of what game genre I bring up, look at more successful games with larger and more sustained audiences. Call of Duty for example, why do so many people buy and play it? The feeling of meaningful and rewarding progression with multiple gametypes to choose from creates a high replay value. I would assume its similar in WoW.
There’s only so many times you can do the same thing over and over again without any aspect of it changing before either there is no more progression to be made, or the progression was never really intuitive or meaningful. Then boredom sets in and the audience starts to move on to the next best thing.
The people that continue to play are the people who never experience that feeling of boredom with that game. No issues, no complaints, its just a difference of perspective and is to be expected with any game.
(edited by jcbroe.4329)
I mean, I’m cautiously optimistic as well. But based on previous updates (in terms of how much is implemented versus how many more issues and polishing tweaks that need to be done across the board) it seems like the next-gen consoles are going to be released before this game is enjoyable.
With Gears of War Judgement dropping next week the only thing that might occur is me checking the March 26 update notes while I’m doing something on the computer to see if I’m going to actually enjoy investing my time into the game or if its going to be that game where I kitten around in it every once in awhile when I need some game variance.
I don’t blame ANet for that though. I realize there is only so much the programming team can do and that my expectations coming from guild wars 1 to 2 were high (and subsequently I was let down even more than if it were my first experience with a guild wars title). I don’t feel ANet will ever meet my personal expectations with PvP at this point, but at the same time I’m not going to let my opinion ruin other peoples gameplay experience or tell other people that they shouldn’t enjoy the game because I don’t.
Overall PvE is very well done and I have no qualms with it other than it simply isn’t an enticing gameplay experience to me because I enjoy competition. That pigeonholes me into PvP and WvW and with WvW being so gear dependent I have no desire to ever play it.
Maybe if the PvP gets as polished as it was in GW1, I will put in the time investment that I did in GW1. But until then, all I can do is reiterate what I’ve already said; that I am happy that the balance team at least is vocally aware of the things that I feel are the issues with the ranger class, and that I have the highest hopes something good is in the works, so that when all my other shiny new toys lose their luster, I still have something to potentially sink my time into enjoying.
If the patch doesn’t deliver though it will probably become like almost every MMO I’ve ever played; I will periodically check the website just as I do my facebook, see if anything catches my eye, then continue about my day upon finding nothing (if there is of course nothing).
Sorry to be so cynical, though the tone doesn’t change the truth value.
Summary: I am optimistic about the patch and the ranger class as a whole. Just not the time frame.
Can anyone provide a time frame of when they speak about ranger? The OP seems too biased to be accurate and I don’t wanna listen to the whole thing =(
I seem to remember it being in the 50 minute range. I can’t check right now, I’m in class. But they talked about the professions in forum order (so ranger would be 6th, if they are talking thieves or warriors its too far).
As for the OP, yes the lack of time spent discussing rangers was abysmally disappointing, but the content wasn’t. From what I heard they are aware of our lack of useful utilities, and from listening to overall discussion outside of the ranger section, it sounds like ANet is aware of needed trait reform.
I can’t be optimistic about the time frame that they expect to complete this in versus my enjoyment of the game, but it is nice to see that everything I feel is an issue with the class was addressed in some way. Also, I am never optimistic about discussion versus implementation.
Then again, those are just opinions and feelings I have, which are by no means fact.
To add to this I would have to say that idealistically if any of these concepts could be intertwined into the current functionality of pets I would personally feel it to be amazing.
I like a lot of the discussions going on in Hrouda’s dungeon suggestion post, but the only real thing that seems like a solid suggestion is adding yet another button to make the pets dodge.
While that would be an improvement, it seems like just a band-aid fix that affects only dungeons (which is to be expected since he is a dungeon dev) which is why even if my ideas in this thread seem impossible or they are not agreeable concepts, it is still a conversation worth having about potential improvements for the pet system that doesn’t involve people arguing back and forth about perma-stow and/or balance changes that would break the game in the rangers favor.
For the longbow all I really think needs to be done is an increased attack pace across the board, with a bump up in damage to change the damage coefficients on the wiki for long range shot by about +50 to +70 each. I feel that the pacing is the majority of the problem because the shots are so slow to refire and the attack animations and channeling on almost every attack slow, so it makes the attacks easier to predict and dodge, or easier to close the gap and then strafe a ranger so the longbow stops attacking people completely. This issue could also be helped by having a cripple or immobilize as well somewhere on one of the skills, or even on a trait for longbow crits to apply either of those conditions.
I’ve seen arguments thrown left and right about “it wouldn’t look right, bows don’t shoot like that.” These are the same people the wake up in the morning in real life and have to protect their farms from bandits and then level up and fight dragons apparently, since they are nitpicking about which aspects of the game to apply realism to.
I didn’t feel as if we were at each others throats lol. Just having a friendly debate.
Even if perma-vigor is better, it could be argued that it is harder to obtain and the class has to be built a certain way to maintain vigor. That is a playstyle choice that not everybody wants to make is all I was getting at. I’m not disagreeing in the slightest.
I honestly never noticed vigor was +100%. I have energy sigils on my weapons along with 5 points in WS, so even if I do have vigor applied, I never really directly noticed its exact effect on the builds I run. So I learned something.
Somebody should definitely stream themselves doing this.
I’d say it a personal thing really, but I’d still take NV over just about all our traits for rank of our best. FAR more than Trap Potency, you’re not accounting for the fact that NV is a 5 point trait which means that in theory just about any build could take it.
I’d even say the same for Zephyr’s Speed.
Yeah true, I wasn’t factoring in how far down you had to trait to pick up certain things, and was just looking at them as individual trait effects.
I can see how very good 5-15 point options can add up and create a less pigeonholed build in terms of roles it can perform.
Personally I do play a lot of trap ranger in Spvp though so I admittedly have some sort of bias towards things I tend to use more.
Isn’t perma-vigor without 5 WS the same effect as having 5 WS? Basically it is just an interchangeable concept.
What I personally prefer is the 5 in WS, just because I usually trait into it since I believe some of better trait effects are in that line for spvp purposes, so it’s going to get picked up anyways.
I don’t feel that anybody in the game could argue that more quickness (aka 5 BM) is a bad effect, since quickness is so useful for quick revives and stomps and potential burst and everything else.
Also, if I had enough points I would take 10 in skirmishing for 30% more pet crit damage on every trait setup. That trait alone improves rangers damage potential by quite a bit, even if not everybody in the ranger community appreciates the source of that damage.
This is just a reformatting of a response I made in a different post the I feel probably deserves its own merit.
Note that I am not saying this is the direction the game needs to go, it is more of just a “bring ideas to the table” type philosophy, where even my own opinion does not entirely reflect ideas I am going to mention. But suggestion have to start somewhere, and I would hope that it sparks a good constructive debate and maybe something a dev can take to the table about pets as a whole for rangers.
I understand and am prepared for an immediate boo/hiss kneejerk response from people in the community, which is totally understandable. But just be aware that I am only making the suggestions to put ideas on the table that concepts can be derived from and potentially discussed.
Idea:
-make ranger pets entirely passive and untargetable
-Change the F1, F2, F3 utilities into Attack(with long but fair cooldown), Utility, Passive, and F4 can remain switch.
-F1, pet does some sort of attack for some sort of damage. Whether it is attack from stealth, basic burst, boon removal, a channeled attack, a condition, AoE, etc. With an appropriate cooldown time.
-F2, just a rehashing of the random abilities pets already used randomly in their attack cycle, mixed in with the utility F2s pets currently have. Moa heal, gain might, regen, condition removal, etc
-F3, some sort of passive, like certain pets already have, that happens on an internal cooldown that should occur less frequently the more powerful the effect is. The best example I can give here is the bird swiftness, or even the pigs forage skill could be this passive (although with the pig thing I am aware of other issues that could cause if the pig is foraging when you want it to do something else, but it is just an idea up for discussion).
Now I realize this goes against a lot of what the ranger community likes about the pet in the class, including some of the things I enjoy. But at the same time, it would seem that this concise implementation would remove a lot of the variables that have to be considered when balancing that would make balancing across the multiple game types (PVE, pvp, WvW, dungeons, etc) easier to manage while not overall changing the intention of how the ranger interacts with the pet.
The only thing that would really change is the pets ability to draw and hold aggro. Admittedly that is one of the things I enjoy, and it isn’t a small change. However, the class philosophy of the ranger and pet working together is still in place, as well as the utility the pet provides and the necessity to micromanage a pet, similar to what is currently implemented.
Now, I don’t expect this to happen or anything. I just feel that it is a starting point that might head discussions about pets in a potentially positive direction.
So, thoughts/feelings?
(edited by jcbroe.4329)
Well I wanted to stray away from criticizing as far as I could, because as Mr. Hrouda so aptly pointed out; even if it isn’t a feasible implementation, it could be the starting point to get ideas flowing that lead to a possible implementation.
However, my own opinion would be this in terms of the pet damage reduction, in situations where pets can get continually 1-shotted, it seems like a bandaid solution that wouldn’t hurt the dungeon game much. There are people that will argue all day that you need better micromanagement skills to get a better result.
These people aren’t wrong, but when a balance team is willing to nerf an autoattack speed on the grounds that it wasn’t fun (regardless of my stance on that, that’s done and over with), then the discussion of how intently you have to micromanage your pet and how that affects a persons gameplay experience deserves some merit.
However, adding this level of pet damage reduction would absolutely break spvp. With how good the consistent healing options are for pets, especially when traited, your pet would literally be able to bunker entire teams of people. It would end up being like a 55 monk from gw1. The same could be said for any situation in the game, but I primarily play pvp so I don’t feel my opinion would have much validity speaking on other things.
The issue with pets is that there is no fix for them that doesn’t break them in a different game mode. PvP requires pets to have much better pathing, or potentially having cleave attacks, or attacks to stick to targets better. But then PvE would be even easier for rangers to afk in while the pet solos everything in sight.
Suggesting an entire remake of the ranger pet, while it does present solutions to issues people are having, requires lots of time and effort and testing on a programmers part. So we really are stuck in the design. However, for the sake of anything it could add for Hrouda/another dev to take to a meeting, here is a thought I had for a complete redesign:
Pets are now untargetable and do not autoattack. Instead, they each have 3 options: 1 attack, 1 utility, 1 passive.
Obviously the effects of the passives and utilities can’t be too strong. I was thinking a direct correlation with what the game has with random attacks on specific pets, like birds giving swiftness for the passive, on an internal cooldown, and for the utilities, things like the cats might howl or the moas heal, with those respective cooldowns.
Then, each of those pets attacks is a pet specific attack, it could be a strike from stealth for damage, or a channeled ranged attack, or an AoE field at target location. These would be the F1s, F2s, and F3s respectively.
I realize my idea guts a lot of what I like about the pets, and what a lot of the community likes (or has learned to enjoy in their own way). However, it is just a starting point, and I suggest it because it still provides the feel of ranger working with pet and would still, idealistically, be a lot of the same gameplay (without a pet to draw aggro though). Basically, what my idea does is turn everything into more solid and constant variables that can be tweaked to be balanced easier across game modes, which is what the dev team appears to have the most problem with when making any sort of balance change at all.
Sorry, but killing trash mobs and rolling in a few hotjoins isn’t enough experience to have an opinion on this with any weight.
Granted, their are people in the ranger community who counterbalance the negativity by showing some of the things ranger can do well.
But overall, jumping in, gaining a few levels and enjoying yourself then saying the class is fine is just unhealthy for the future development of the game. Developers need feedback on both ends of the spectrum to provide future content for the game, and that feedback doesn’t need to get convoluted with casual anecdotal experiences that could possibly over power the actual feedback being given, resulting in no progress ever being made.
It isn’t that I personally am not happy you enjoy your gameplay experience. But all you are doing by saying “I have fun playing it and I seem to do okay, so everybody else needs to be quiet because they are doing it wrong” is the last thing the ranger forum needs, because all it will do is start yet another endless argument that results in no constructive feedback whatsoever, bogging down any potential progress even further than it really already is going on 7 months after release not counting the beta.
Natural Vigor is an amazing trait, probably our best.
Ehh, I’d say it depends which aspect you are looking at. Defensively it is one of our better traits.
But offensively I’d say Trap Potency is our best trait as it makes one of damage sources literally 100% more effective than untraited. The only thing that make that any less true is for people that don’t want to run traps, but overall it is a very strong trait in general for how effective it is.
^Agreeing with Xsorus, and it really is a simple thing. We can list hardcounters to everything else in the game really.
Conditions -> condition removal, removal balanced with cooldowns
Boons -> boon removal, removal balanced with cooldowns
Damage -> dodge/mitigation, balanced with cooldowns
Healing -> poison, balanced with condition removal
Stealth -> …
Nothing hard counters stealth. Stealth is invisibility, which guarantees damage, because damage is hard countered by dodging/mitigation, and you can’t do this on reaction against an invisible opponent… so it offsets the balance of a few of the other mechanics.
Unless you can somehow see and react to an invisible opponent. In which case I believe your talents are being wasted on videogames.
Stealth should be toned down a little by making people destealth if they are hit while in stealth, or if they attack and hit nothing while in stealth. That way it doesn’t affect the gameplay of the UBER LEET OMG BACKSTAB BACKSTAB BACKSTAB HEARTSEEKER HEARTSEEKER HEARTSEEKER thieves who are obviously better at the game than the rest of us. It just makes them play with a bit more strategic thinking and lets them “prove their skill” a bit more than mindless zerg jumping and stealth spamming with 1 hit instagibs with no drawback other than they might eventually run low on initiative or somebody gets lucky and a random attack hits the invisible thief before they die.
I think, regardless of any criticisms that are made, the idea still stands that adding more inter-connectivity to the game modes would be healthy for the progress of the game as a whole, while individually helping to expand the Spvp community.
So many of the gw1 pvp veterans seem to have either left or they don’t post on the forums (or I just don’t recognize them), but personally all I played was pvp in gw1 and that was really the only redeeming quality because it provided the level of competition I desired while allowing me a way to earn money towards more PvE style content (level grind wasn’t nearly as exhausting and mindnumbing as it is in gw2).
Coming to gw2, I really have zero desire to faceroll through countless hours of PvE content that is only slightly more directed by different silly characters I could care less about just to get to level 80. For WvW, it is so gear dependent that it completely shuts my desire down to participate longer than 5 minutes at a time. When I do participate, all I do is run around aimlessly until a big group randomly appears from the blue and 100 man crit instagibs me. Summarized: I don’t like running around forever just to find some action in which I have no choice other than to instantly die. It isn’t fun or competitive, and the necessity to gear grind to WvW makes me never want to ever do it.
Spvp is the only option I have left for enjoying the game. So now all I’m doing to play gw2 is getting on, grinding about half a rank, solo queing some tournies, and getting some aesthetic and meaningless gear (outside of appearance). It doesn’t make the other content more appealing. Maybe if a I was able to gain levels in SPvP and/or get some gear I could use in WvW, I would do them more (I would DEFINITELY be more into WvW if it were an even playing field and not gear dependent with no way within how I play the game to get said gear).
So I 100% support this general idea. It’s what made gw1 pvp so addictive for me, and it would definitely make me log more hours and enjoy the game more.
I don’t see why certain people have to respond basically being anti-constructive. It’s a mindset the gives a game extremely stagnant gameplay and makes it much less fun, especially when people are already struggling to keep themselves involved with the game (which a lot of the community as a whole is, one way or the other).
Anyhow, to the list of things. A lot of them are different than what I think. A lot of them have to do with more than just rangers, like a trait and utility overhaul on the underused or near useless things in those categories.
But overall good detail and a lot of the stuff is agreeable without overly changing the gameplay too much from the style that the ranger currently has (except your suggestion about elites and cooldowns. It would completely destroy the pacing of PvP. If anything, current cooldowns on skills like Rampage as One need reductions to compensate for what they are actually providing, especially in comparison to other similar options on other classes like the Warrior elite signet with a 60s cooldown).
A piece of criticism though, the activation rate on the spirits should be universal and not just on crit. Having it on crit pigeonholes build diversity incredibly, and if anything build diversity is what every class in the game struggles with.
I’d make an argument for 15 into BM for loud whistle to compliment the 5 trait. 5 seconds off of a 20s pet swap means 25% more quickness. Sadly I don’t have enough points in my trap spec left to reach 15 BM.
But yes, they are probably 2 of the best minor traits rangers have.
However their programming team is structured is mostly up to speculation on details like that.
However, I’d wager that even if the teams are separated, the graphics team is too busy with working on new content to worry about polishing old content.
After all, content over quality and all that.
It is a life saver. Coupled with Shared Anguish it tends to be the difference between between winning and losing duals against many classes that rely on stuns to setup their spike/burst (more so if those classes catch you off guard. Most ranger builds in general, once engaged, have enough dodge potential for make the need for such traits less glaringly obvious).
It’s probably one of our more obvious (as well as better) combination of traits (the other being trap traits).
It’s not that I don’t think that this should be implemented… I just don’t see how it can be a priority over any other number of actual mechanic fixes or balance tweaks that need doing.
You put the icing on the cake you know, not the half completed, yet-to-be-baked bowl of mix.
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