Ranys.4028

Druid has the potential to be a very strong and adaptable support, but the math just doesn't work out right now. If the team takes too little damage we will hardly be able to get back into CA on time to keep up alac, but even if that wasn't a problem, we have to do a very precise rotation in CA to even get good alac stacking. We will hardly even be able to react to mechanics in the fight without dropping alac. We're forced to have 100% boon duration to get anywhere. If we had just half a second more baseline, it would already relax the situation a lot. Or if our glyphs in CA form also applied GotL. Anything at all to make it less sweaty. We'll be forced to go into CA a lot for alac, even if we want to keep it available for something a few moments later. I was looking forward to dropping some boon-duration this patch, but instead I actually had to increase it to make sure I'm on 100% and I still don't know if it will be enough. Bugs: New Invigorating Bond is Great, but it's buggy, not every pet gets it. Jacaranda + Rock Gazelle + Iboga: tooltip doesn't show it, but it actually applies here. Siege Turtle: Doesn't apply, doesn't show on tooltip. I assume this ability is different on some level because of instant cast, but especially this ability not working together with this trait is extremely sad for protection up-time. I didn't test every pet, but the core pets seem fine.

Thanks for catching that. Fixed.

I know Anet, I'm opening up an old and very big can of worms here, but if you want to stand by the philosophy that you posted, now is the time to start working on this. I started playing ranger since I like pet classes. Some pets make noticeable impact. Most don't. Quite a few are depressingly underwhelming. I'm not asking for a full pet rebalanced in the near future. I know this is going to take time and effort that is better spent elsewhere in many cases. It's not like we don't have good pet-choices right now. Rather, I'd like you to consider updating the older or underwhelming pets one at a time so that our choices expand. The newer pets, from HoT onwards, often find some kind of niche in the major game modes, but even then there are exceptions. I'll start of with the pets that are more unique and then tackle the rest mostly by category. Any of the unique ones that I don't mention are the ones I obviously think have found a place in one of the game-modes. Also, I will sometimes be referring to Mukluk's recent testing on ranger-pet DPS for some of my points. So let's get this started: The unique cases: Phoenix, Fire Wyvern: These two are totally different pets, but they have a common problem: They're too kitten clunky to use. They are visually pleasing and I wish it was also a joy to use them in game-play, so I could look at them and their awesome animations more often. Gale Breath and Consuming Flame are both very long animations that make the pet somewhat stationary. Often, the payoff for using these abilities will be lacking, because it takes so long to use them, often the target will already be dead or have moved. Adding to that, Consuming Flames fire field shows, against a normal players intuition, not there when you start to see the skills flames, but only when the animation has run it's full course(about 8 seconds). If these skills fit in better with GW2s typical flow of combat where things happen very quickly, their potential cleave damage would probably be justified from the Power Budget viewpoint. Adding to that, their Wing Buffets are on ability slots that are not controllable by the player(unless playing untamed this is the one time I'll mention it in this post but it is relevant for other cases too), and also seem slow and clunky. Wing Buffet also have a bug when it's used as the merged Soulbeast version, putting the other class mechanic (F1-5, yes, even Eternal Bond) on a 1 second cool-down after cast. I don't think the Wing Buffets(apart from the merged version bug) even need work. It's just that together with their F2s, it makes these pets feel so clunky that they're not fun to play with. Wallow: (I'm sorry, do you belong to the Hog category? No. No you don't. And I'm glad for that. I'll elaborate when we get to the hogs later.) There isn't much bad things I have to say about the Wallow, but please tell me Wallow, what is your purpose?, so much condi in your kit, but you're supportive? I just don't know how to find a place for you in my menagerie. It is also one of the worst offenders for underwhelming Soulbeast F1 abilities. So lets have this short intermission: It feels like one of those buttons you might press when everything else is on cooldown and even then you wonder if it was damage efficient? Should you just have used 2 auto-attacks instead? The answer is probably yes. How to fix it? 3x the damage, 3 Times the cool-down? That's what I'd do to at least make these low-effort fodder abilities feel like they have an impact. Anyway, back to the pets: Moa Category: Apart from the Red Moa being used in power builds, these grounded birds are just wholly underwhelming, and like many core pets, their F2 effects are just horribly outdated. Moa damage, according to Mukluks tests, is at the very low end of the spectrum. That could be acceptable, if their F2 abilities had impact. Intermission, Pet Concentration & Expertise: The problem is, Condi and Boon duration from pets can hardly be buffed by player choice. We have hardly any ways to give pets concentration. 16% each from Nature Magic(baseline: Lingering Magic) and Wilderness Survival (choose: Taste for Danger, let's just pretend it's 16%, I don't want to get into that mess right now.) In both cases, the base duration of pet condis and boons are so small that the fraction gained through these traits feels like literally nothing. Back to the moas. Tell me, Anet, when would I ever use a blue Moa? Give me a reason to use it. Please! If I want protection up-time. Turtle is actually better for that. Even though Turtle's main use-case is projectile blocking. Which makes the turtle infinitely more fun to play then the blue Moa will ever be in it's current form. Pink Moa was once used as a second CC-pet together with Electric Wyvern, but those times have been over since Rock Gazelle came with PoF. White Moa, refer to my opinion about pet-Expertise. What do Moa's bring to the table in exchange for being so underwhelming? Harmonic Cry? That actually kinda powerful heal ability that will be cast at the mercy of pet-AI at some point? Hopefully? Maybe this could actually find a niche with Heal Untamed (no, I'm not joking), but there is like four if cases before that could work: If Fervent Force actually worked on the regular pet F1-F3 abilities, not just their unleashed versions. If there were less barriers to the usage. Like the abilities range (240), the fact that it doesn't have any range indicators. The fact that heal-untamed relies on Fervent Force actually properly triggering, which I think it still doesn't on many bosses? Anyway, just one idea for something that is currently outside of the meta, but could be a very fun legitimate use case for Moas, if the kinks are worked out a little. Bears: Black and Brown bear find some niches. Handkite and condi-clear. Though I'm sometimes asked if I still live in 2015 if I use a brown-bear for condi clear. It's still viable 🙂 The other bears suffer from the same problems I've already talked about in the Moa section. + F1 Section from Wallow, boring 0-impact fodder ability. Cats: We all know Anet loves cats. I guess that's reflected in the Wildcats (at least now after the age-old quickness bug has been fixed on them), since they have some of the highest damage. But it's really only the Sand Lion and White Tiger that find uses these days. Normal Tiger was once the group's Fury Provider, but that boon is so ubiquitous these days, we'll never have a need for the Tiger to provide it, and even though it's called "Furious Pounce", unlike the other cat pounces, it has no leap-finisher? Why? Even the Cheetahs Savannah Strike has one. But since we're here, why the hell is it 2x4seconds swiftness? I get that it likely has to do with being applied when the 2 different strikes from the ability happen, but couldn't it just be 1x8 seconds? It would be much clearer that way, It's the only time I've seen one ability applies 2 stacks of swiftness. Anyway, the other cats? Just absolutely lame and outdated. Go back to where I talked about condi and boon duration in the moa section. + F1 Section from Wallow, boring 0-impact fodder ability. Dogs: I really wish dogs were better. The Wolf can be annoying in PvP/WvW in the hands of an expert, but usually the same can be done better by another pet, and sometimes they can find some use with Soulbeast merge. Having 2 leap-finishers does have uses. I still feel like they could use some love. Same as in the moa section about condies and boons. The Hyena especially makes me sad, because I feel like Hyena + Allie should be the max damage pet-option, or at least somewhere close to it? Drakes: They have a blast finisher... that's kinda cool and could be useful, if it was generally under the rangers control. They are otherwise outdated in the same way that I have already mentioned. Slow cast times feel clunky, applying one simple condition... there is just nothing special here. Devourers: Oh, my heart weeps. This species is so kitten, cool... and so kitten useless. 4 second cast-time on rending barbs? What's this joke? Barely do any damage. Devourer Retreat is an ability that is absolutely useless on pets, and using it's merged version also feels so bad it makes me cringe. Birds: They have a bit of a niche for WvW roamers and maybe in PvP, their dash for merged Soulbeasts is incredibly good, but unmerged, you need to keep a good eye on their health. They're quite snappy when it comes to cast-time and their damage isn't too bad, but we again have the problem of very underwhelming F2 abilities. Spiders: There is nothing uniquely bad here, all the problems have already been mentioned. Low damage, they're underwhelming and boring. Hogs: Ok, first, why don't I consider the Wallow a hog, even though it's slabdab in the middle of the category? No Forage, different Slb-Merged abilities. The hogs, arn't bad... if you're playing Soulbeast. In fact they have phenomenal CC and I have seen them used to great effect for locking down enemies. Warthog has been used in Condi Builds for quite a while. But oh my god, they're also a sign for just how little attention is being paid to ranger-pets. In the games lifetime, their F2 ability(Forage) has been updated exactly once, to reduce cooldown from 40 to 30 seconds. Not like that helped it anything, because forage is so random, that in all my time of playing this game, I've only found a use for it once. Back when boon-share Chrono was a thing, I'd sometimes use the time before fights to dig for plasma to give it to the Chrono. Even then, it was rarely ever helpful, since they can only be held for about 30 seconds, before the item de-spawns, even if you're currently holding it in your hands. Usually, the party just wants to go in when they're ready and not wait for some funny ranger to dig up a ball of magical goop on random chance. Oh, by the way, want to know something funny: Egg! There you go dear ranger. Gain some initiative. I have some vague memories, that might well be wrong, of all classes having initiative sometime during the games beta. Even if that is really true, half of this eggs use has been irrelevant for the ranger for at least 10 years, or maybe since forever. Don't get me wrong. Forage could be fun with some dev-work, even using it as more of a silly gimmik. If the F2 flipped after using forage into the item that the hog-pet found, so that the ranger can use it a second time to activate, without having to pick anything up, it would already fix the biggest problem that Forage presents: It's currently an item-bundle and so when picking it up, it keeps you from using your weapon skills. Forage represents just how neglected the original ranger-pets are. This ability will never fit into the flow of combat. There is absolutely no clarity of purpose to it. Thank you for listening to my TED talk.

The stab is applied at the beginning of the cast and lasts if you interrupt the casting. I would actually like if it applied stabi to the group in the same way it applied to yourself. If you think "oh ok, I only need CA5 for group-stab" you could cast and immidiately interrupt it to do something else. I'd love for Spirit of Nature to get it's stab back, but it isn't really a reliable cast for longer fights. If you use your spirit to rescue downed people and then it dies, 1 minute later you might need stab but it's on cooldown. I'd rather have spirit stab then none at all, but it was always clunky to have stab on the elite.

I'm aware of protect me as a stun break, but I find stabi is a much more reliable way to deal with the fear. More often when I play in pug groups I play with brown-bear pet f2, so I can take search and rescue along for people who get downed in poisons. These days there is usually a stabi source for it anyway in most groups I play in when not pugging. Sometimes there are situations where you just get caught in the ground-pound-spread thingy. Really, I was just pointing out slothasor as an example, there are better examples where just a stun-break doesn't deal with the mechanic very well. The 2nd/right largos Twin with the knockback. Quite often a firebrand in my group takes advance along for it. Gorseval Ground slam. (If you're good maybe you can aegis it with white tiger, but 1 second cast time and current unreliability makes it clunky) Cairn 3rd auto attack and greek-skipping, having stab in this fight, even just one more stack of it, is a godsend. How about something more recent? Before this update I played condi-soulbeast on Kaineng Overlook CM, taking along dolly stance to help the group out. Now I'm on druid, because I actually like playing that class much better, but all I can do is white-tiger aegis and hope something else doesn't proc it before Li does his pushing slashes, or that someone else got the stabi out on everyone. I've seen 100% more people flying around in my static on that fight yesterday then I did in the last few weeks. I'm honestly considering weather a specialized Alac-Heal soulbeast build so I have access to Dolly might actually be better for this fight specifically, but I doubt it would really work out. It has a lot less healing available. Probably less might stacking too.

First of all the more geneal view: Less might upkeep, this will hopefully even out with generally more might upkeep spread to all classes this patch, but our compromise for that is the alacrity option on spirits, something that is not only accessible to Druid, but to all Ranger-Specs. I can't say yet how viable an Alac-Damage build will be, but keep in mind that not playing Druid makes it harder to keep the spirits alive, you would a healer teammate to keep an eye on them in longer fights. I played my druid for strike-CMs today, and while the patch hit my regular group quite a bit, we were mostly successful today and I personally had fun playing my Druid. The good: Alacrity on Ranger enables role-compression, specifically on druid. Spirits feel very responsive when it comes to alacrity. 2 Spirits are just barely not enough to get 100% uptime, 3 spirits overcaps very comfortably so it won't instantly drop if you make a mistake. All together Spotter, Stone-Water-Frost spirit and Warhorn 5 give you 100% uptime on alac, fury, regen, protection, swiftness(if you also do the Quickdraw procs correctly) and a might floor of 9, up to 20-25(if you play extremely well and take might stacking traits). Hopefully the other classes buffed might generation will make up for what we lost and maybe even enable us to take Lingering-Light. I'm honestly kind of tired of Grace of the Land being the only viable raid-trait after all these years, but that might just me. Another upside to spirits getting the boot it that it actually enables us to take other utilities along without always feeling like we could have taken a more useful spirit along. (Yes, I know that this will make people say "but if they had just not taken out our unique spirit buffs at all? Then we still could!" - deal with it, that's part of balancing out all the power-creep of the last few years, sun and frost spirit were overvalued by a large part of the community anyway.) The bad: I foresee people blaming druids for bad might upkeep. Feel free to defend yourself appropriately, because the way I see it, it is no longer solely our job. If a party stresses out their druid over might upkeep, they might sabotage them actually fulfilling all the other jobs they are there for. Remember that your first priority is keeping the party alive and doing raid mechanics, then come buffs, where alacrity is now our priority, might comes in 3rd place on the priority list of a druid, at most. Maybe not even that high up the list, depending on how you count. It was not mentioned specifically in the patch-notes, but Spirit of Nature no longer gives stability in any way, which means as a druid we have zero access to group stability. Compared to Guardians and Mechanist, this really hurts. With EoD we might have gotten the white tiger giving us group aegis every 30 seconds, and if you know how to use it it can help out quite a bit, but there is a debilitating bug that I'll go more into later. (see: The Ugly). The argument for this situation might be that druids higher/better healing capacity, but adding to this we have the problem that druid will no typically have a stun-break in it's kit. Take for example Slothasor, where messing up can have you stunned on the ground for 4 to 5 seconds, or feared away from the group into poison. If this happened to the druid, it likely happened to the rest of the group too. So in exactly the moment that your group needs you, you are out of commission with no way to recover. Take along Glyph of Equality as a stun break? The fact that it is also a stun dealing 200 defiance damage incentivise you to use it on the break-bar instead, so it will be on cool-down. As things are now, there is no stabi and the druid is disincentivised for having a stun break along, or keeping it for themself. My suggestion? Anet, please rework glyphs. For example: Glyph of Alignment could give aegis or stability. Or A pet could give stab. Or the ranger shout "Guard" could be reworked, because I still don't see a reason to use it in any content. Condi clear? Before this patch taking Healing spring was viable in a few fights, but now this will sabotage alacrity, meaning an extra spirit is needed, that one free utility slot goes bye bye. Same for heal glyph actually? Can we get some relevant Glyph game-play again? The Ugly: Bugs galore & Weird Behaviour all over. There is a lot of buggy pets, the most egregious a bug that can be quite debilitating for a very important buff/mechanic: Aegis (see this post I made a few days ago.) There are a lot of pets that are bugged in this way apparently. I don't currently have the time to test them all out for a full write up. Seeing a polar bear fix on patch-notes when this exists is a bit of a slap in the face really. Spirits have an extremely weird behaviour right now, where they only apply their buffs if you stand in their range. If you leave your spirits range they become useless target dummies. Why? I leave my group for some mechanic and they don't get my spirit buffs in the meantime. Edit: I tried testing this a bit (can't join a friend in Special Forces Training Area, by the way?) but apparently it is no enough for another party member to be in spirit range, if I, as the casting Druid, am not in my spirits range they won't apply buffs. The healer moving away from the group is already punishing enough without this quirk. The ability descriptions and trait descriptions don't point this out, and I honestly think it's bad design. Further testing shows that the boons are casted from the player while the spirits are active, which makes much more sense and might actually be fine this way, still confusing and not intuitive behaviour. Glyph of the Stars and Verdant Etching synergy is scuffed. The Seed of life will spawn after the full cast is through. If I even take this ability, rarely will I ever use the full case. Often I'll interrupt it in favour of getting back to other actions sooner, and it feels almost like I'm getting punished if I keep the supposed interaction with Glyph of Stars. Verdant Etching and Grace of the Land in mind. Edit: Some people who are very familiar with druid might have noticed that we had a problem with quickdraw after letting CA run out, this has been stealth fixed with the last update. I didn't list this here before because I was doubting myself thinking I was the one doing something wrong. Conclusion: Please stop letting our buggy pets rot in the corner. Look at the mechanic behind spirit-buff application. Glyphs are a sad remnant of the past. Stabi pls? 😭 Druid is still fun to play if it's your kind of play-style. It's not dead, it can bring a lot of utility to the group. Except Stab. (have you noticed I'm salty about that?) Edit: I would also be fine with not having group stabi access at all, but only if I wouldn't feel so neglected as a healer when I look at mechanist reliable access to stab/aegis and Firebrand's phenomenal coverage of these same boons. I don't need that phenomenal kind of coverage as a druid, but having none at all now after the patch is sad.

Thank you for pointing that out. I only noticed it on tiger. Tested it a bit more and I encounter it on the Wallow and Phoenix too. It doesn't happen on Siege Turtle for me, that one reacts immediately, though that might have to do with the fact that it is instant cast.

Right after switching pets, the white tiger sleeps about 5 seconds before it accepts the your command to start it's aegis roar. This pet was exciting for ranger players, but together with 1 second cast time and this bug, it's pretty much unusable.