Feedback talk:User/Damysticreaper/Ranger skills

Melandru's Arrows doesn't really make much sense if you can use a melee weapon with it (in terms of skill name vs functionality) File:User Chieftain Alex Chieftain Signature.jpgChieftain Alex 17:52, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

And currently, your version of Revive Animal >>>> your version of Comfort Animal. Especially since expertise is going to reduce the energy cost, I'd bump the first to 15 energy, and the second to 10. (almost everyone is going to prefer +250health +250maximum compared to mending +150health.) --File:User Chieftain Alex Chieftain Signature.jpgChieftain Alex 17:59, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Yeah i know, i mentioned it myself in the summary and the reason. Well thinking of it Apply Poison shows an arrow can can be used with any attack, then again it's name allows for a wider range of use. Anyways i wanted to have an elite preperation that can be used by any weapon type and usable by secondary rangers i besides the name saw Melandru's Arrows as the best choise. It's also the preperation easiest to balance when used with other weapons. Still i know it doesn't make much sense. I'll rebalance the cost of Revive Animal since you have a good point there. Da Mystic Reaper 18:03, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm keeping the cost of Comfort Animal at 5 and increased the cost of Revive Animal to 10 since i still want them to be easily usable even with the cost decrease of Expertise. They also have to offer good competition with the self-healing ability of Companionship. Da Mystic Reaper 21:42, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

I would like the option of using bows for actual damage. It gets really annoying having to condition spam in PVP every single time, and to be forced to splinter barrage in PVE. Every argument I've seen against ranger spike can apply just as much to spears and air magic, if not more so (bows don't have cracked armor or deep wound).--152.20.181.251 20:21, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

With the ranger it isn't just damage alone but that the ranger can take damage combined with interrupt and self-support without compromising the others. An elementalist relies on pure damage and the paragon like the ranger has been nerfed plenty of times for PvP in the past due to a combination of high damage and survivability.

Like you said it would be nice if the ranger would be able to deal damage again with the bow so i changed several skills for that purpose. The Oath Shot, Melandru's Shot and Crippling Shot builds are designed to deal damage with the bow. I also increased the AoE damage options by changing Arcing Shot, Splinter Shot, Volley and Poison Arrow. Rapid Fire has been changed into a stance so the ranger has an IAS that can be combined with a preperation to increase it's offensive capabilities. The adrenaline allows them to be balanced much better and allow the ranger to deal damage without returning the ranger spike and PvP.

I made multiple changes to let the ranger deal damage, spread conditions and be able to use the attributes of other professions wich is quite limited atm, same goes for non-rangers being able to use ranger skills and primarily Wilderness Survival. With the adrenaline skills and management skills many skills in Tactics become much easier to use and the skills in it the ranger can use also increases, same goes for the paragon's Command attribute and the Dervish's Earth Prayers and Wind Prayers attributes. Since the adrenaline skills reduce the pressure on the energy bar of the ranger energy skills in those attributes are also easier to use.

Also like you said bows don't have cracked armor and deep wound but with these changes they can take Mark of Fury and "Find Their Weakness!". Da Mystic Reaper 13:05, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

A dynamically changing response

it would rape game balance harder than anything ever concieved. Imba pets, Imba bow attacks, Imba expertise and Imba survival. This suggestion smells of cheese. --Boro 21:47, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Knowing your exteme conservative view of game balance i doubt you would like any progressive skill suggestion that alters the play of a profession. Anyways this type of feedback isn't really useful to anyone Boro. You don't mention whats imba about it nor how it would rape game balance.

To prevent spiking builds i changed multiple bow and pet attacks into adrenaline skills. Interrupts still remain roughly the same, the only one that sees an improvement in power is Punishing Shot. Even Broadhead Arrow and Debilitating Shot requite more inteligent play to properly work. The level of damage of bow attacks isn't all that different from what they currently deal either. The adrenaline skills make it less heavy on the energy of the ranger. The main improvement would be that the ranger can deal better AoE damage and spread conditions more effectively.

The preperations have been changed in recharge and duration to make them more effective in PvE and only a few have received a change in function. Some bow attacks have been changed to give them better synergy with the current preperations.

In the case of expertise the energy reduction remains unchanged and the 2 new effects don't have much impact on the attacks of the ranger either. The reduction of activation time for traps and nature rituals is to make them usable again and primarily for PvE. Right now the long activation time of nature rituals prevents them from being used and the long activation time of traps combined with the easily interrupted doesn't improve their play either. The pet armor buff only affects PvE to let it last longer, primarily in HM and the level of foes in GWB. And the pet attacks and that system, well that just needs an overhaul to work properly.

In terms of defense i only changed Dodge/Zojun's Haste and Dryders Defenses. Dodge/Zojun's are mostly heald back due to their high energy cost and have a drawback in PvP preventing them from being used offensively. Dryder's Defenses gives a strong defense but isn't exactly spammable either since i designed it's duration vs recharge to be 1/3 like Lightning Reflexes and Whirling Defense.

For healing Troll Unguent has been buffed wich is needed since it's the worst self-heal skill in the game and not to mention the only viable self-heal skill the ranger has. I changed Healing Spring to give the ranger an alternate healing and Melandru's Resilience as an elite bar compression healing skill.

Now please for once adjust you view of balance to the level of balance the live-team has set for the professions and properly awnser me this: whats imba in in beast mastery, whats imba in expertise, whats in marksmanship and whats imba in wilderness survival, so i can balance properly. And don't give me some useless half-assed feedback like you did above. Da Mystic Reaper 23:10, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I can hardly begin anywhere without writing a lot, but the current circumstances I'm in require me to be concise. The reason rangers are in only a few roles that aren't inferior to another class is that EVERY single build requires 8-12 ranks in expertise. Either because of certain skills such as escape, Lightning Reflexes, or Magebane Shot(? not sure), or to handle the sheer energy intensity the build requires. Originally the ranger skills were balanced around this attribute - by gaining metric fucktons of energy cost. The idea of either reducing the activation time or the recharge of some ranger skills (or both but I'd prefer recharge only, conservativism all the way) is good, but you just stack that and the nonsensical beast mastery pet armor to it further reducing the amount of variation rangers can have. The pet abilities are just plain bad to have. Stun Immunity is reserved for giants and the like who don't even feel if they are hit by a big hammer, not birds who are swatted aside. You'd give scythes to tigers and stalkers, and make some pets either autocripple, or deal huge damage+kd<50%. And this is something our enemies get. 1.5 activation time for virtually every preparation (and not preperation as you spell every time) is a very big global buff. I understand why some traps could get it, but with trapper's speed it's veering into the overpowered 'cheese' category, which you erroneously mistake with viable.

So the best thing rangers can get would be the removal of Expertise-high cost bow attack redundancy, the rework of expertise to improve ranger skills such as traps, preps and rituals, but doesn't exclude other professions from taking ranger skills for secondary support as a viable option. Note that you could transfer some of your current expertise's functionality to Wilderness survival without problems. As for the War in Kryta and Hard mode: you don't make something broken balanced by introducing more broken stuff. ps: I strongly suggest that you check your spelling. --Boro 13:19, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

OK starting with expertise and the energy cost of bow attacks. Because of the energy costs i decided to go adrenaline with the bow attacks to reduce the pressure on th ranger's energy and opening up the ability to invest into other attributes. Adrenaline also opens up the ability to balance attack skills better without messing to much with the cost, recharge and effect.

I'l be honest about the pet skills i had doubts about it, atm i'm not planning on changing the skills in beast mastery.

About the 1.5 activation time of the preparation it's because 2 seconds is just annoyingly long and 1 second to short. The increase in duration and recharge for PvE is to prevent you from reactivating them during combat and offer you some time to prepare them before engaging the enemy. The only ones that have been changed significantly in function are Disrupting Accuracy, Marksman's Wager and Melandru's Arrows. And i'll fix the spelling.

About Trapper's Focus it's easy thinking actually. Since the decrease of activation timme expertise brings it's current activation time reduction has become redundant, leaving the recharge reduction. With the current drawback the 25% recharge reduction is simply too short, the reason is Serpent's Quickness. Since wilderness survival has a very large investment when using traps it only has a downtime not much larger than the recharge of the traps. To let Trapper's Speed still see play and leaving it's function true to it's name i went for a scaling recharge reduction wich leaves traps with a recharge of 10-15 seconds at rank 15 expertise.

HM broken? No HM is outdated not broken. If you want to call HM broken because it's easy when it's supposed to be hard then yes you could say it's broken. For WiK, the foes offered a good challenge in the beginning but even WiK has become easy so whats wrong with making some of the foes stronger? Anyways that just depents on the level of the player if WiK is broken or not.

Now you also mention that some of the expertise skills can be moved to wilderness survival, i would like to know wich ones that would be.

I would also like to know wich bow attacks would need a fix in your view and what needs to be fixed about them. Da Mystic Reaper 14:57, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

My mobile is <13% power, so can't help you atm. But tomorrow evening I'll give you a proper list when i get home from the goddamn farm and find me an adapter. --Boro 20:35, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

What I mean under some of expertise under Wilderness Survival is not the skills (the skills that are trap-based are actually excellent examples of expertise), but some of the attribute functionality (the passive effect. I love having inherent effects.)

As for fixes, well I wouldn't give Crippling Shot a damage. It's a PvP staple, and the last few times it got buffs, things went to hell. Also interrupting Crippling Shot is (or at least was) an important tactic in ranger skirmishes previously, as a D-shotted Cripshot - while almost korean hard to pull off sometimes - can mean a skirmisher/split character going unimpeded towards the opponent's base. So I'd remove the 1s activation time, and possibly (unless you go for yet another Pve/PvP split) remove the two arrows. Rangers spiking have already been a problem before, and simply shooting two arrows for full damage would give it the functionality of an old Forked Arrow or Dual Shot without the drawback. Dual Shot without any drawbacks could possibly deserve an elite status alone I guess.

With the introduction of adrenaline-based skills, and reducing some energy costs (Concussion Shot) you effectively negated most of the pressure on the Ranger's skill bar, effectively rendering Expertise's inherent bonus unnecessary as it is a lot easier now to get a bar balancing energy-pressuring 5-10 energy bow attacks to cheap adrenaline attacks. Also I'd rather add active energy management skills as opposed to passive ones, since it improves gameplay and tactics on the battlefield, while reduces the "build wars" aspect of the game

Strike as One is a tad bit overpowered in my opinion. An instant KD without any sort of drawback in PvP, unavoidable, without an activation time is WAY too powerful to be balanced. Especially at 10 seconds of recharge. Now I see that the notes section explains that the KD is the result of a pet attack, but I think it should be conditional on the struck opponent activating a skill or casting a spell, and/or should gain an 1 second activation time and the skill type changed to skill, so it can't be used on the move without any drawback on the mobility of the ranger. That way it would be more dependent on situational usage (potentially interrupting a Troll Unguent or another healing spell, while making positioning more important before activating the skill, and making it possible for the other ranger to interrupt it!)

A minor gripe is Arcing Shot, as I think if anything, it should deal Lighting damage as it has arcing in the name. However I love Splinter Shot. That's the way I'd like it being made.

Still the current way expertise just gives rangers a MAJOR passive energy bonus without exterting any effort at using both theirs and other professions' skills, a considerable improvement in some ranger skills and even some pet armor (which already has more tanking capacity than a regular warrior with shield and defensive/shelter-warding set) and in this way it's too powerful. Critical Strikes, Strength, Energy Storage, buffed Fast Casting, buffed Mysticism, hell even Spawning Power looks tame by comparison. Just tone down the passive effects and make energy management more active (skills returning energy) on the Ranger's part.

A final gripe is Archer's Signet, because it can potentially make any bow attack an instant attack, making ranger spikes a lot less predictable, and more powerful when you can queue up to 3 attack skills in a row. Maybe remove Bow Attacks from the list of affected skills to prevent it's abuse. --Boro 09:26, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I must say i expected a bigger list but summing it up it's the aditional armor the pet receives, the activation time of Crippling Shot, Strike as One and Archer's Signet. Well Arcing Shot i don't plan on changing sine the name comes from the long arc it makes rather than the effect of arcing lightning like the name of Arc Lightning implies to. Crippling Shot i plan on letting it have 2 arrows but i'll remove the fast activation time and the arc reduction, like you said a 2 arrows in one deserves elite status. I got a general idea of how to fix Strike as One but just need to work it out. For Archer's Signet changing the bow attack activation time reduction into a arrow flight time reduction should be enough. Now the main problem is the cost reduction of expertise with the adrenaline attacks and new costs of the energy attacks. You mentioned that it would be better if the ranger has active energy managment instead of passive energy managment, i myself currently have no idea of how to make that happen with Expertise or any skills. For active energy managment you already have Archer's Signet, Markman's Wager and Prepared Shot, what others skills would you suggest that can work as active energy managment? But i must say i'm suprised you only mentioned Crippling Shot as bow attack that needs to be adjusted, besides the personal view of Arcing Shot i expected a whole lot more of them, you even liked Splinter Shot. Da Mystic Reaper 11:34, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I kinda like what you did with Archer's Signet. As for energy management, I think we can get Precision Shot or Focused shot to give back some energy after a condition is met, but overall I'm fine with the elite energy management options. They really make energy heavy rangers interesting and varied, while without those strong energy management elites the ranger would have to rely on either Beast Mastery, a possibly reworked focused shot (adrenaline based that returns energy when the enemy is suffering from a condition), and/or a Disrupting shot that could return energy upon a successful interrupt, the possibility of Archer's Focus being used is good. I'm concerned about the damage of Marksman's Wager however, as it could be brutally abused against block based defenses (old and new dodge, natty, guardian, etc.) so some damage reduction (to 35 max) would be nice. And guess what I did some more thorough reading of the suggestion and it looks better than on first skim... --Boro 13:31, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Well i just gave Marauder's Shot a rework for damage (wich still needs some balancing) and increased the cost of Dual Shot back to 10, Poison Arrow has also been reworked. When it comes to non-elite energy managment attack skills it could make attacks that cost more be used much more easier and often. In case of the dervish it's because it's build rely on Flash Enchantments to fully work wich in skill chains can drain energy quite fast, such a thing is not the case with the ranger. The only other thing the ranger has to use energy for are preparations and stances not much else than that. The warrior also has very few skills that return energy because it relies on adrenaline and the assassin and the paragon as well because they have a primary attribute that returns energy. Another cause of concern would be the ability of how easy rangers can use Savage Shot and Concussion Shot, 2 powerful interrupts. With the adrenaline attacks replacing many of the high energy attacks and multiple elites that offer energy managment as well as the cost reduction of expertise i don't feel that it's really that needed to give the ranger an non-elite energy managment. Besides if they want a non-elite energy managment they can use Expert's Focus. ADDED: i think i got an idea for Storm's Embrace, the energy managment of Storm Chaser gave me an idea. Da Mystic Reaper 14:10, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

It's all right as a suggestion now. This is about as far as I can go with theorycrafting, the rest need to be refined through actual gameplay testing. With the adrenaline and elite energy management skills the rangers have a fine selection of builds to chose from, and that's fine. Let us hope it'll get implemented. Also title change since the old one became redundant as the suggestion became better in leaps and bounds. I LOVE poison arrow. The perfect mix of AoE damage and poison without being gimmicky like old barrage with the inherent weakness against empathy(ouch) --Boro 20:29, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

TY for the assistance and i'm glad i managed to see you now like the suggestion! It has been quite a turn around indeed, from should not be implemented EVER! to A dynamically changing response. Now let's hope indeed the the suggestion is as like by others as it is liked by you. Da Mystic Reaper 21:02, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

I didn't take the fact that you are so eager to discuss and improve the suggestion into account when I came from somewhere else filled with rage just waiting to be vented. The sheer level over which this suggestion did improve and that you found interesting ways to improve it clearly helped a lot. Seeing your suggestions are sometimes a bit on the OP side, I think it is better giving you feedback and help make your suggestions into a somewhat balanced shape than writing up mine from scratch. --Boro 20:38, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Ranged attack?

What if some of the several of the Bow Attack, Spear Attack and No Attribute skills without Arrow/Spear/Throw in their name be used as plain Ranged attack? Every martial profession has a few Melee attacks, and a paragon having access to your versions of Dual Shot or Volley would expand its limited options. --Falconeye 20:26, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Volley would be a candidate for it but Dual Shot not. But the No Attribute of the ranger has other skills that work better for other marital professions, mainly Antidote Signet and in this suggestion Storm's Embrace. But the Melee Attack originating from the warrior comes from the fact that they are attack skills that can be used on axe, sword and hammer and are not limited to just one of them, primarily those that are not tied to those 3 attributes. Those attacks have been designed to work with those 3 weapons and most are located in Strength rather than Tactics and No Attribute. For the assassin Malicious Strike is to give the assassin a critical hit that does not rely on it's chain system and for the dervish i truly have no idea why some of the scythe attacks are labeled as melee attacks since it has no practical use outside the scythe. Bow and spear attacks have been balanced around their weapons and that includes the No Attribute skills and none of them have a reason to have pure ranged attacks, balancing them around two completely different weapons would also be rather difficult. But mentioning the plain ranged attack gives me the feeling you have been looking at my Smiting Prayers suggestion wich has some pure attack skills and Spear of Light as pure ranged attack. Da Mystic Reaper 21:38, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Pet Synergies

GW2 has quite a few non-pet Ranger skills that buff pets, yet only 1 Pet (skill type) that buffs the Ranger. This means they are all functionally identical to "...as One" skills. ^_^ --Falconeye (talk) 22:40, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Examples

Hows this for a guild wars version them?

• Quick Shot

4 ½ Elite Bow attack Stance. Shadow Step to a nearby location directly away from your target. Initial effect: Moves 3 times faster than normal. You and your pet move 33% faster 5...13...15 if the shot hits.

• Hunter's Shot

5 1 10 Bow Attack. Inflicts Bleeding condition (3...21...25 seconds) if your target is hit. Initial effect: Your pet moves 33% faster (5...13...15 seconds).

• Crippling Shot

5 5 Elite Bow attack. Unblockable. Shoot 2 arrows at target foe that inflict bleeding condition (3...13...15 seconds) and cripple condition (3...13...15 seconds). Your an pet's next 1...3...3 attack skill(s) inflict bleeding condition (3...13...15 seconds) and cripple condition (3...13...15 seconds). Your non-pet skills are disabled (5 seconds).

• Quickening Zephyr

15 1 60 Nature ritual (15...39...45 seconds). Creates a level 1...10...12 spirit. Spells recharge 25% faster for creatures in range. You and your pet gain quickness. Reduces healing on you by 50%.

• Rampage as One

10 10 Elite Skill (3...13...15 seconds). You and your pet attack 33% faster, gain adrenaline 33% faster, and cannot be knockdown or crippled. No effect unless your pet is alive.

I don't plan on changing any of the bow attacks in my ranger suggestion since I'm satisfied with the current suggestion, including the optionals (even the conservative Boro is happy with a progressive suggestion). I know you take a lot of inspiration from GW2 but I personally don't want GW1 skills to become an imitation of GW2 skills.

But following the idea, I think the pet attacks are better candidates for such changes than the normal bow attacks. If I come up with some ideas I will work it out in my sandbox like I usually do. Da Mystic Reaper (talk) 13:23, 16 September 2014 (UTC)

Attack skills

With the removal of Expertise attack skills, are melee weapons still viable? I frequently run daggers/hammers in PvE solo/heroes when not in a high-level party; precisely because rangers lack an effective non-pet frontline option. --Falconeye (talk) 00:56, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

I chose balance for Marksmanship over variety with secondary profession attack skills like escape daggers but the new effect of Expertise no longer allows that variety. However the changes to Beast Mastery that include master attack skills and unison attack skills that can be used with a martial weapon allows the ranger to invest in them and use them combined with a pet. It won't be the same as the current builds but the ranger still has options to equip martial weapons other than a bow. And don't forget that Wilderness Survival has new typeless skills that buff attacks and work well with martial weapons. The new function of Scavenger's Focus should also allow the use of other martial weapons for a primary ranger. Melee weapons should still viable but no longer trough the effect of Expertise. Da Mystic Reaper (talk) 11:32, 24 June 2015 (UTC)