Is it high time for Rangers to receive a support class as an e-spec for them to be valuable in WvW zerging?

[Kovu.7560]

50 minutes ago, nerva.7940 said:

Scrapper is entirely busted. If it's toned down significantly, Druids and Ventari would be used more. There are enough supports, just one of them is too busted OP. 

You're certainly correct that there are a couple of professions that support too well, but simply nerfing them wouldn't be enough to jump Druid close to or above Ventari or Tempest. Druid heals are burst-oriented and gated behind an energy mechanic in addition to their cooldowns. They could remove the astral force element to allow Druids to cycle into and out of CA on a whim and I doubt they'd out heal/cleanse/boon (certainly not the latter two) any of the above. They would need to rework the spec to turn it into a proper support rather than an immobilize spamming roaming spec (which is arguably is outclassed by Soulbeast even in that regard). Druid cleansing is clunky, they don't provide stability and whatever little grou boon generation they do provide is already covered by other supports (or even damage) specs that to it better.

Things (for example) such as changing Druidic Clarity to remove conditions from allies rather than just one's self, making glyph of the stars more viable in some way, reinstating the unique buff provided by the grace of the land trait and making some of the Avatar abilities such as the 2 skill reliable for movement-oriented engagements would be a decent start.

Then there's the whole pet immediately biting it aspect. In a group fight (even small scale) the pet just croaks. Anet should have well just removed the pet from Druids for all the good it does, and in its place granted them something else (such as moving spirits or by attaching CA abilities or the glyphs to F1-5.)

-------------

But is the goal here to make more numerous viable support specs, or should the goal be to spread out the individual supporting elements across the professions that a group needs to actually consider its composition rather than firebrand/scrapper/x/x/x?

Perhaps: 
One spec does really well at providing superspeed and quickness.
One cleanses well.
One spams stability.
One provides a lot of AoE stealth.
One spams reflects and provides some damage negation.
One does what mesmers do.

I'm all for numerous (most?) professions being able to stab themselves, cleanse themselves, anti-projectile themselves etc, but we honestly need to cut back on how much of this stuff is AoE because that is basically what defines a support spec. Of course the same argument could be made for damage specs, but I feel there (at least) more viable options for damage then they are for support.

Make people actually think about which kinds of compositions they want to run, what style of play they want to perform, and what they're willing to sacrifice.

~ Kovu

[Aeolus.3615]

I have  an ideia  for this i would call it  a Druid :

 

A medium redesign on Druid would solve this issue, the elite spec  is a mess!

Edited September 30, 2021 by Aeolus.3615

[Sylosi.6503]

16 hours ago, nerva.7940 said:

Scrapper is entirely busted. If it's toned down significantly, Druids and Ventari would be used more. There are enough supports, just one of them is too busted OP. 

 

The most busted support is the one that has been the irreplaceable God tier support class the entire game and the reason all the other supports over that time have been referred to as 'secondary support' and that ain't engy.

 

[Xenesis.6389]

8 minutes ago, Sylosi.6503 said:

 

The most busted support is the one that has been the irreplaceable God tier support class the entire game and the reason all the other supports over that time have been referred to as 'secondary support' and that ain't engy.

 

 

Now there's 'two' most busted irreplaceable God tier support classes since 2018, and the reason all the other supports over that time have been referred to as 'secondary support' of druid tempest ventari, aren't needed, at all.

[Sylosi.6503]

1 hour ago, Xenesis.6389 said:

 

Now there's 'two' most busted irreplaceable God tier support classes since 2018, and the reason all the other supports over that time have been referred to as 'secondary support' of druid tempest ventari, aren't needed, at all.

 

Druid & Ventari weren't needed before Scrapper, so nothing changed in that respect. All that basically happened is the busted Tempest got replaced by the more busted Scrapper. Maybe one day they will invent something so busted it will replace Firebrand (that hopefully is not yet another Guardian elite).

Just think some silly PvP games that are actually successful do things like keeping the meta fresh to retain players, but Anet are big brain they save on server bills.

Edited September 30, 2021 by Sylosi.6503

[Xenesis.6389]

33 minutes ago, Sylosi.6503 said:

 

Druid & Ventari weren't needed before Scrapper, so nothing changed in that respect. All that basically happened is the busted Tempest got replaced by the more busted Scrapper. Maybe one day they will invent something so busted it will replace Firebrand (that hopefully is not yet another Guardian elite).

Just think some silly PvP games that are actually successful do things like keeping the meta fresh to retain players.

 

All the more reason they should have spread the love around and not dump everything on scrapper.

[nerva.7940]

5 hours ago, Sylosi.6503 said:

 

The most busted support is the one that has been the irreplaceable God tier support class the entire game and the reason all the other supports over that time have been referred to as 'secondary support' and that ain't engy.

 

It's both really. Scrappers provide a ton of utility that FB doesn't, and they're absolutely meta. So yeah, both are busted. But if Scrapper and FB had everything except their healing output, then Druids, Tempest, and Ventari could at least be used for raw heals. FBs for the boons, Scrappers for cleanses, stealth and bubbles, Druid, Tempest & Ventari for heals and a few other minor things. For instance, a Minstrel Immob Druid is fairly good and it would be used if it wasn't so badly overshadowed by the Scrapper. 

Edited September 30, 2021 by nerva.7940

[Infusion.7149]

I'd just like to point out scrapper's med kit did not receive the Feb 2020 competitive nerf across the board. Med blaster did not have the scaling portion capped off or split whatsoever and none of the other med kit skills were split.  It's 11+0.0125* healing power per boon regardless of mode for med blaster with 70+0.1*healing power per pulse regardless.
To top it off , quickness output did not have any split whatsoever on gyros so you have gyros doing 2-3 powerful non-trivial effects at a time (i.e. purge /bulwark/medic/sneak). With firebrands if you try to run quickness in WVW you are disadvantaged because mantra of solace is pretty much gutted in PVP/WVW so you only get 2s base quickness on aegis/stab with 7s cooldown (Liberator's Vow) ; mantra of potence is only 1s of base quickness in WVW as opposed to 2.5s.

[Gotejjeken.1267]

Doubt a pure support spec will happen, as anet is sold on the hybrid idea for ranger.  So Druid is 'support' in that it has immob, and soulbeast is 'support' in that it has stance share.  

 

So I expect this to have hammer and lot of close range CC with something pet related half baked in.  The problem is, I'm not sure why anyone would use it at all.  

[Lazze.9870]

They already have the support spec. It is however high time for them to do some work on druid so that it at least can act as a respectable support. Replacing scrapper won't happen anyway, it's too busted.

Whatever the new spec is could have zerg potential, but it shouldn't be as a support. Not pure support anyway.

[nerva.7940]

On 9/29/2021 at 9:30 PM, Kovu.7560 said:

I'm all for numerous (most?) professions being able to stab themselves, cleanse themselves, anti-projectile themselves

it's actually the same reason spvp in a derelict state. problems with the spvp meta are the same as wvw meta - overdesign and a handful of powercreeped builds/classes doing too many jobs too well. lowkey i just feel ANet devs badly struggle at the design stage of all these classes, and as a result we're stuck with years of them attempting to roll back the power creep.

Edited October 2, 2021 by nerva.7940

[RisenHowl.2419]

we've been running 1-2 rangers consistently since january for large scale zerging, set up and used well they're very high value. Set up wrong and/or used poorly, they're completely worthless. It's not a class someone who's new to playing that format will use well because it requires good knowledge of positioning and group movements. If I had to compare it difficulty-wise to another class it's about as hard as learning to play chrono well

[nerva.7940]

11 hours ago, RisenHowl.2419 said:

we've been running 1-2 rangers consistently since january for large scale zerging, set up and used well they're very high value. Set up wrong and/or used poorly, they're completely worthless. It's not a class someone who's new to playing that format will use well because it requires good knowledge of positioning and group movements. If I had to compare it difficulty-wise to another class it's about as hard as learning to play chrono well

But is a Minstrel Immob Druid, or Immobeast really worth a slot over another Scrapper, Hammer Rev, Scourge? Don't get me wrong, I have a couple of hundred hours on my Immobeast and it can work especially in GvGs, but I am still not convinced it's part of any meta comp. A few good Scrappers will render their zerg ball immune to immobilize. 

[Zikory.6871]

26 minutes ago, nerva.7940 said:

But is a Minstrel Immob Druid, or Immobeast really worth a slot over another Scrapper, Hammer Rev, Scourge? Don't get me wrong, I have a couple of hundred hours on my Immobeast and it can work especially in GvGs, but I am still not convinced it's part of any meta comp. A few good Scrappers will render their zerg ball immune to immobilize. 

Guildwars uses the word meta pretty loosely. For most groups, "meta" is playability. Firebrand Scrapper Scourge Herald spellbreaker, almost every group wants a lot of these. Players of different skill levels can still be useful, classes that the player base can easily have the masses play and build viable comps. Ranger isn't much different then Weaver. You don't want a bad one, you don't need 10+ of them and a Cele Sword weaver is the wrong build. 

[RisenHowl.2419]

1 hour ago, nerva.7940 said:

But is a Minstrel Immob Druid, or Immobeast really worth a slot over another Scrapper, Hammer Rev, Scourge? Don't get me wrong, I have a couple of hundred hours on my Immobeast and it can work especially in GvGs, but I am still not convinced it's part of any meta comp. A few good Scrappers will render their zerg ball immune to immobilize. 

Absolutely, having a couple in the squad potentiates bombs hard and allows you to string a group out so your dps is more effective. There's 3 strong ranger setups i know of for zerging and none of them are minstrel, focusing more on the immob aspect of the class gets better results than using it as a pure healer. It's similar to chrono in this way, you could build a chrono that can heal but it's mediocre at it and taking the traits to heal gimps your CC and strip output.

 

41 minutes ago, Zikory.6871 said:

Ranger isn't much different then Weaver. You don't want a bad one, you don't need 10+ of them and a Cele Sword weaver is the wrong build. 

well put lol

[Downstate.4697]

Frontline dps soulbeast is viable, just not meta 

[nerva.7940]

12 hours ago, Zikory.6871 said:

For most groups, "meta" is playability

We're not using it like that here. Meta here means "most efficient at killing things in X context". Meaning, if a group is trying to minmax their comp, other specs bring more to the table. All that being said, I do believe Immobeast is fantastic. 

Edited October 3, 2021 by nerva.7940

[Dawdler.8521]

52 minutes ago, nerva.7940 said:

We're not using it like that here. Meta here means "most efficient at killing things in X context". Meaning, if a group is trying to minmax their comp, other specs bring more to the table. All that being said, I do believe Immobeast is fantastic. 

Well you mentioned GvGs. The topic was WvW zerging. Meta there definetly does not mean most efficient at killing things anywhere. Its just who can stack the most support and boons on the 50-man commander while still having enough AoE circles to cover the area in front.

[anduriell.6280]

On 9/23/2021 at 10:51 PM, Infusion.7149 said:

People on rangers won't even run stanceshare soulbeast when mechanically it is most similar to PVE meta.

That is because sharing a 3 seconds stance effect is not worth it. When a trait which sometimes increases the damage in a 10% is better than a sharing trait there is something wrong with the trait desing. In general Soulbeast traits are a mess of non-functional traits and a ridiculous amount of random multipliers. 

 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 9:45 PM, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

I have high hopes for the remaining medium classes for a firebrand-caliber support spec. If they are not gonna come up with another support spec and there's no reason for us support mains to buy the xpac. 

Maybe thief and engie mains aren't in the same boat but most rangers are looking forward into a heavy support spec. A reason to have an spot in squads. 

Druid is just healing for raids which is sad i know, but it is what it is. 

 

On 9/29/2021 at 4:21 PM, nerva.7940 said:

Immobeast doesn't work outside of 15v15. A good 20+ player ball with lots of Scrappers completely nullifies all conditions. 

Doesn't work outside of 5v5. Entangle can only immobilise 5 targets. The rest of the skills are inconsecuential. That build is the same or more useless than a sicem soulbeast, it was just picked as petty build so it could be said "every class has a build". Nobody would say the DD zerg build is a real build either. 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 10:16 PM, kash.9213 said:

How much of the rangers signature aspects are you willing to scrap to balance into a full support Elite? How long would you actually stick with it void of what brought and held you to the Ranger profession? 

This is a very good question. It won't be easy but something like i propose here would get the work done. The tank part is done by the elite mechanic to transform in a juggernaut and the support part is done by the elite new pets and the consecration like utilities. 

It would not overlap with longbow rangers and it would bring an actual shift in the profession. 

 

 

 

 

[anduriell.6280]

On 9/23/2021 at 10:51 PM, Infusion.7149 said:

People on rangers won't even run stanceshare soulbeast when mechanically it is most similar to PVE meta.

That is because sharing a 3 seconds stance effect is not worth it. When a trait which sometimes increases the damage in a 10% is better than a sharing trait there is something wrong with the trait desing. In general Soulbeast traits are a mess of non-functional traits and a ridiculous amount of random multipliers. 

 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 9:45 PM, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

I have high hopes for the remaining medium classes for a firebrand-caliber support spec. If they are not gonna come up with another support spec and there's no reason for us support mains to buy the xpac. 

Maybe thief and engie mains aren't in the same boat but most rangers are looking forward into a heavy support spec. A reason to have an spot in squads. 

Druid is just healing for raids which is sad i know, but it is what it is. 

 

On 9/29/2021 at 4:21 PM, nerva.7940 said:

Immobeast doesn't work outside of 15v15. A good 20+ player ball with lots of Scrappers completely nullifies all conditions. 

Doesn't work outside of 5v5. Entangle can only immobilise 5 targets. The rest of the skills are inconsecuential. That build is the same or more useless than a sicem soulbeast, it was just picked as petty build so it could be said "every class has a build". Nobody would say the DD zerg build is a real build either. 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 10:16 PM, kash.9213 said:

How much of the rangers signature aspects are you willing to scrap to balance into a full support Elite? How long would you actually stick with it void of what brought and held you to the Ranger profession? 

This is a very good question. It won't be easy but something like i propose here would get the work done. The tank part is done by the elite mechanic to transform in a juggernaut and the support part is done by the elite new pets and the consecration like utilities. 

It would not overlap with longbow rangers and it would bring an actual shift in the profession. 

 

 

 

 

[anduriell.6280]

On 9/23/2021 at 10:51 PM, Infusion.7149 said:

People on rangers won't even run stanceshare soulbeast when mechanically it is most similar to PVE meta.

 That is because sharing a 3 seconds stance effect is not worth it. When a trait which sometimes increases the damage in a 10% is better than a sharing trait there is something wrong with the trait desing. In general Soulbeast traits are a mess of non-functional traits and a ridiculous amount of random multipliers. 

 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 9:45 PM, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

I have high hopes for the remaining medium classes for a firebrand-caliber support spec. If they are not gonna come up with another support spec and there's no reason for us support mains to buy the xpac. 

Maybe thief and engie mains aren't in the same boat but most rangers are looking forward into a heavy support spec. A reason to have an spot in squads. 

Druid is just healing for raids which is sad i know, but it is what it is. 

 

On 9/29/2021 at 4:21 PM, nerva.7940 said:

Immobeast doesn't work outside of 15v15. A good 20+ player ball with lots of Scrappers completely nullifies all conditions. 

Doesn't work outside of 5v5. Entangle can only immobilise 5 targets. The rest of the skills are inconsecuential. That build is the same or more useless than a sicem soulbeast, it was just picked as petty build so it could be said "every class has a build". Nobody would say the DD zerg build is a real build either. 

 

On 9/23/2021 at 10:16 PM, kash.9213 said:

How much of the rangers signature aspects are you willing to scrap to balance into a full support Elite? How long would you actually stick with it void of what brought and held you to the Ranger profession? 

This is a very good question. It won't be easy but something like i propose here would get the work done. The tank part is done by the elite mechanic to transform in a juggernaut and the support part is done by the elite new pets and the consecration like utilities. 

It would not overlap with longbow rangers and it would bring an actual shift in the profession. 

 

 

 

 

[anduriell.6280]

 

On 9/23/2021 at 10:51 PM, Infusion.7149 said:

People on rangers won't even run stanceshare soulbeast when mechanically it is most similar to PVE meta.

That is because sharing a 3 seconds stance effect is not worth it. When a trait which sometimes increases the damage in a 10% is better than a sharing trait there is something wrong with the trait desing. In general Soulbeast traits are a mess of non-functional traits and a ridiculous amount of random multipliers. 

On 9/23/2021 at 9:45 PM, PrinceValentine.9320 said:

I have high hopes for the remaining medium classes for a firebrand-caliber support spec. If they are not gonna come up with another support spec and there's no reason for us support mains to buy the xpac. 

Maybe thief and engie mains aren't in the same boat but most rangers are looking forward into a heavy support spec. A reason to have an spot in squads. 

Druid is just healing for raids which is sad i know, but it is what it is. 

On 9/29/2021 at 4:21 PM, nerva.7940 said:

Immobeast doesn't work outside of 15v15. A good 20+ player ball with lots of Scrappers completely nullifies all conditions. 

Doesn't work outside of 5v5. Entangle can only immobilise 5 targets. The rest of the skills are inconsecuential. That build is the same or more useless than a sicem soulbeast, it was just picked as petty build so it could be said "every class has a build". Nobody would say the DD zerg build is a real build either. 

On 9/23/2021 at 10:16 PM, kash.9213 said:

How much of the rangers signature aspects are you willing to scrap to balance into a full support Elite? How long would you actually stick with it void of what brought and held you to the Ranger profession? 

This is a very good question. It won't be easy but something like i propose here would get the work done. The tank part is done by the elite mechanic to transform in a juggernaut and the support part is done by the elite new pets and the consecration like utilities. 

It would not overlap with longbow rangers and it would bring an actual shift in the profession. 

 

 

 

Edited October 3, 2021 by anduriell.6280

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

On 9/30/2021 at 3:30 AM, Kovu.7560 said:

You're certainly correct that there are a couple of professions that support too well, but simply nerfing them wouldn't be enough to jump Druid close to or above Ventari or Tempest. Druid heals are burst-oriented and gated behind an energy mechanic in addition to their cooldowns. They could remove the astral force element to allow Druids to cycle into and out of CA on a whim and I doubt they'd out heal/cleanse/boon (certainly not the latter two) any of the above. They would need to rework the spec to turn it into a proper support rather than an immobilize spamming roaming spec (which is arguably is outclassed by Soulbeast even in that regard). Druid cleansing is clunky, they don't provide stability and whatever little grou boon generation they do provide is already covered by other supports (or even damage) specs that to it better.

Things (for example) such as changing Druidic Clarity to remove conditions from allies rather than just one's self, making glyph of the stars more viable in some way, reinstating the unique buff provided by the grace of the land trait and making some of the Avatar abilities such as the 2 skill reliable for movement-oriented engagements would be a decent start.

Then there's the whole pet immediately biting it aspect. In a group fight (even small scale) the pet just croaks. Anet should have well just removed the pet from Druids for all the good it does, and in its place granted them something else (such as moving spirits or by attaching CA abilities or the glyphs to F1-5.)

-------------

But is the goal here to make more numerous viable support specs, or should the goal be to spread out the individual supporting elements across the professions that a group needs to actually consider its composition rather than firebrand/scrapper/x/x/x?

Perhaps: 
One spec does really well at providing superspeed and quickness.
One cleanses well.
One spams stability.
One provides a lot of AoE stealth.
One spams reflects and provides some damage negation.
One does what mesmers do.

I'm all for numerous (most?) professions being able to stab themselves, cleanse themselves, anti-projectile themselves etc, but we honestly need to cut back on how much of this stuff is AoE because that is basically what defines a support spec. Of course the same argument could be made for damage specs, but I feel there (at least) more viable options for damage then they are for support.

Make people actually think about which kinds of compositions they want to run, what style of play they want to perform, and what they're willing to sacrifice.

~ Kovu

Why not just replace the pet itself with Celestial Avatar skills and work similar way to Scourge? I was always kitten curious about why they haven't done that long ago...
A-net being A-net doing everything beside what should be done.

[anduriell.6280]

1 minute ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

Why not just replace the pet itself with Celestial Avatar skills and work similar way to Scourge? I was always kitten curious about why they haven't done that long ago...
A-net being A-net doing everything beside what should be done.

Druid needs much more rework than just "more healing". Doing what you are suggesting will bring back the bunker druid, and that is not fun. 

The avatar skills need to be reworked to not do healing, the traits need to be reworked to delete the gimmicky ones, Avatar needs to be reworked so is less clunky to use. Glyphs need to be reworked so they aren't "more of the same healing" and mechanically aren't simply shouts. Staff needs to be reworked so it does a better job at whatever it's intended use it. 

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

Realistically, Ranger brings some of the best support in the game to the table. The reason their support isn't used in WvW, and why they aren't taken in squads, is mobility, which is ironic since mobility was supposed to be the specialty of Ranger and Thief.

 

The nerf to Spirits early on to remove their movement destroyed support Ranger in competitive. Spirits are the most unique and useful part of the Ranger in groups, and their original implementations with movement and passive boon generation were very strong, especially in Core, but thanks to PvE that got completely ruined.

 

And don't even get me started on Celestial Avatar energy generation for Druid.

 

Now that skill and trait splits exist the devs need to go back and look at all the things they nerfed on Ranger which made them unviable in groups, and in particular Druid and Spirits (Stanceshare is already in a good place).

 

Also, one thing that would help Druid immensely is to make their pets ethereal (Celestial Avatars themselves), leaving them unable to attack or be killed at all and have all the normal Command skills usable (like Search & Rescue) while replacing the pet bar F1-F5 with Celestial Avatar abilities 1-5 directly, while being affected by all Beast skill traits. This would ensure the pet mechanic is always available, and useful to Druid.

 

Then Astral Force could instead be used to enter a type of Celestial Shroud for allies in which they rapidly gain barrier, regenerate health and lose conditions periodically for a short time.

Edited October 3, 2021 by Hannelore.8153