Untamed Feedback Thread

[Androuil.1963]

7 hours ago, Nabbis.8095 said:

The Unleash Mode should work mechanically much like a holo/shroud works on other classes.

Give the untamed a timed unleash mode where the Ranger and Pet both get Movement/Damage bonus and a different set of skills (similar how the current hammer changes skills now) and then make the normal state a defensive brawler waiting for the right moment to go RAWR.

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, THIS PLEASE!!!

[Shrapnel.7249]

It’s be great if ambush skill had an ammo indicator around the untamed skill to signal when it is ready. Would be a really big quality of life change that wouldn’t take more screen space.

[Natta.8905]

With Untamed I do not like that one must use hammer since with bow you do not have to be close to your enemies compare to with a hammer. Another is that the pet is "Out" no matter if it is connected to the player or not.

[Natta.8905]

Another sad thing is that if one have the Untamed then one will lose "wearing" its legendary bow (if one have one) since one have a hammer and may not be able to use or switch to its bow without losing Untamed skill.  

[Infusion.7149]

From a WvW standpoint (which I expect the spec is aimed toward as it is unlikely to replace soulbeast in PVE) the replacement of stow pet button to the UI is good. There is still the issue of stealth pushes as it doesn't have a way to counter them nor to do one (once the pet is out you can't stow it even if it is on Unleash Ranger). If you hit someone and they ran off and didn't die you might be in combat for longer than you want which is why stow pet V button should be locked or greyed in Unleash Pet rather than based on combat state (i.e. you can stow when Unleash Ranger even in combat). If you look at soulbeast this idea is similar: you are stowing when you merge.
Another alternative is stealth status is copied onto the pet while in unleash ranger but I don't think that is absolutely a positive for the game as it could present a burst issue in roaming/solo/PvP.

Proposal as from last beta remains the same: there should be an AoE reveal when traited. You would want the functionality of "Sic Em" in AoE as a stealth counter. This can be put onto Enveloping Haze or something tied to Untamed that has low value against the current melee centric superspeed meta.

Damage on hammer has only been improved in PVE but in competitive modes the changes to Vow of the Untamed , unleash state recharge (1s instead of 10s), ambushes, and the boon rips at least makes it semi-workable outside the stealth problem. Before the unleash state recharge improvement, the hammer situation was quite horrible due to being locked into lower damage for 10s (not just skills-wise but the Vow of the Untamed debuff of 15% less damage). Without the boon rip and hammer  CC/immob you're better off with stanceshare soulbeast.

I suspect Greatsword will be the best pairing with hammer in largescale due to the ambush's boon rip , block, and 1000 range mobility : I had a look into sword+axe but since the large damage on axe offhand roots you and the exploding spore on sword requires targets stacked tight (~1.2K damage per spore , <300 chatlink with 2556 power,  i.e. 0.44 coefficient while the ambush itself is ~1.0 coefficient with 984 damage in chatlink) it didn't seem as attractive.

The pet dying is also an issue so Vow of the Untamed could probably have a damage reduction on the pet when on Unleash Ranger. Forest's Fortification should probably affect the pet as well.

Edited December 3, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Soilder.3607]

1 hour ago, Infusion.7149 said:

...I suspect Greatsword will be the best pairing with hammer in largescale due to the ambush's boon rip , block, and 1000 range mobility...

I suspect this too, and the boonrip potential is decent at 8 boons every 15 seconds on paper when combined with Untameds other sources of boonrip. But some of that boonrip is tied into the F2 skill, which is tied into pets, which always die in zergs.

 

Talking on pure hypotheticals here, if the pet was somehow unable to die in zergs, and could function as effectively in zergs as a 1v1 encounter, Untamed might be a separate option over Immobbeast for its ability to combine boonrips with immobs and damage. But seeing as in any zerg vs zerg fight the pet almost always dies immediately, it's just not going to be viable. 

[Infusion.7149]

7 minutes ago, Soilder.3607 said:

I suspect this too, and the boonrip potential is decent at 8 boons every 15 seconds on paper when combined with Untameds other sources of boonrip. But some of that boonrip is tied into the F2 skill, which is tied into pets, which always die in zergs.

 

Talking on pure hypotheticals here, if the pet was somehow unable to die in zergs, and could function as effectively in zergs as a 1v1 encounter, Untamed might be a separate option over Immobbeast for its ability to combine boonrips with immobs and damage. But seeing as in any zerg vs zerg fight the pet almost always dies immediately, it's just not going to be viable. 

Pet seems to have roughly half health in WVW (~24K instead of 41K) even on untamed. That might be "balanced" for PVP but not WVW.

Edited December 3, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Soilder.3607]

21 minutes ago, Infusion.7149 said:

Pet seems to have roughly half health in WVW (~24K instead of 41K) even on untamed. That might be "balanced" for PVP but not WVW.

It's at most balanced for a 1v1. Once you add another player to the encounter, especially if they're running condi, the pet just melts. It's an issue that's been getting worse as the game has been gradually powercreeped, but ironically was overlooked due to the ability of the Druid to heal the pet and of the Soulbeast to revive it for free every 10 seconds. Pets at their core are weaker now than they've ever been, and this issue is glaring with the Untamed who doesn't provide the pet with any extra sustain.

[Arheundel.6451]

Finally managed to fully test untamed and...it's a 7 out 10 where sb is 8-9/10 , the condi clear on untamed is actually good and better than soulbeast with upfront cleansing so teamfight vs heavy condi specs won't feel bad at all ( especially in WvW when paired with cleansing sigils)

 

-The pet dieing fast is an important issue, which I can personally overlook as I am used to play around dead pets with druid in wvw zerg fight, I won't ask for pet reworks at this stage

-The addition of barrier to each cantrip use, it's possibly one of the best changes since beta 3 and it will be a vital part of Untamed sustain in WvW

-Hammer is fine for me, no complaint, I will go ahead and craft The Juggernaut now

 

So far Untamed offers enough for me to buy EoD finally, it may not be as strong as SB in 1v1(arguably at this point, seen Untamed downing SB with ease so...who knows); I'd prefer a more elegant solution for pets but..whatever I will swallow the bitter pill, I am mildly satisfied

[Eddy.7051]

Skills

• Profession Skills: Key binds should be limited up to 5 skills (not 7). It is too niche and inconvenient with only 2 out of 36 specializations to have F6 and F7 skills. Personally, I use F6 for Special Actions and F7-12 for drawing/stowing novelties.
• Remove F1 skills from the skill bar. They have short cooldowns, they are not game changing, and therefore players usually spam them on cooldown. Automate these skills to the pet AI so that pets can spam these skills on cooldown instead. This will be more user-friendly for players without removing impactful pet control. Automated pet combat is also currently dull with only having non-chaining auto attacks. It is more fun to watch pets use a second skill on their own every few seconds rather than infinitely spamming one skill.
• Move F2 skills to the F3 slot and move F3 skills to the F4 slot.
• Move "Attack My Target" to the F1 slot and move "Return to Me" to the F2 slot. This should be consistent across all Ranger specs and the Mechanist spec to reinforce intuitive positions and key binds for these two skills.
• Keep Unleash Pet/Ranger in the F5 slot. Merge "Swap pets" into the Unleash Pet skill so that unleashing the pet will simultaneously swap the pet.
• Condensing these skills should allow more space to have all profession skills in one row rather than two stacked rows.
• Venomous Outburst and Rending Vines: The Venomous Outburst animation looks like a similar but lesser version of Rending Vines. Please add another layer of animation or an entirely different animation to Venomous Outburst.
• Hammer 4 Savage Shock Wave: This animation looks awkward while moving. The character model is frozen midair while moving. Please do not float in the air during this animation to avoid these awkward physics (skill 5 is already an airborne smash anyways).
• Forest's Fortification: There are a lot of viny animations in this spec. To create some visual diversity, this skill animation could incorporate wood panels surrounding the pet and Untamed.
• Cantrips: This skill type seems random. Druid already has nature magic skills with an Elementalist skill type (glyphs). Why does the Untamed need another set of nature magic skills with an Elementalist skill type? Maybe this should be a unique skill type to Untamed instead of Cantrips. Untamed already steps on the thematic toes of Druid and Soulbeast too much.

Traits

• Cleansing Unleash: Clarify that this does not remove conditions from the pet during Unleash Pet.
• Debilitating Blows, Enhancing Impact, and Fervent Force: These are functionally too similar. All three traits can involve a disabling playstyle, but only one of these traits should proc when disabling an enemy.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Eddy.7051
Added note about consistent UI with Mechanists

[DemonSeed.3528]

7 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Finally managed to fully test untamed and...it's a 7 out 10 where sb is 8-9/10 , the condi clear on untamed is actually good and better than soulbeast with upfront cleansing so teamfight vs heavy condi specs won't feel bad at all ( especially in WvW when paired with cleansing sigils)

 

-The pet dieing fast is an important issue, which I can personally overlook as I am used to play around dead pets with druid in wvw zerg fight, I won't ask for pet reworks at this stage

-The addition of barrier to each cantrip use, it's possibly one of the best changes since beta 3 and it will be a vital part of Untamed sustain in WvW

-Hammer is fine for me, no complaint, I will go ahead and craft The Juggernaut now

 

So far Untamed offers enough for me to buy EoD finally, it may not be as strong as SB in 1v1(arguably at this point, seen Untamed downing SB with ease so...who knows); I'd prefer a more elegant solution for pets but..whatever I will swallow the bitter pill, I am mildly satisfied

Whilst I can agree that some things need tweaks, I'm also more or less comfortable with untamed in wvw ATM. Just like people hated mainhand dagger, I made that work for me just like I'm going to do with the hammer. I'm doing the same thing with the other elites as well, but if things are changed, que sera sera. If anything gets changed though, I hope it's for the better and not the other way.

[Raven.8156]

First

Thank you for removing the green slime effect when ranger unleashes. I really appreciated that.

Ambush Skills

The ambush skills were a nice surprise. I generally enjoy them, and they help fill out the spec. I think the duration should be increased by one second, us old people need some time to click it. thanks 😄 

[Zehs.4037]

I really love the untamed! but one thing i would like to be a bit more visual aiding is some place to see the ambush skill cooldown. Played ranger since launch this is the my favorite elite spec for ranger sofar! soulbeast was fun but i prefer having my pet with me. and druid didnt fit my playstyle :)

[aikatara.3462]

While I didn't have the time to test the Untamed extensively I still want to leave some feedback, since I am a ranger main for many years now and are especially interested in the ranger specializations. From the perspective of a player who plays open world PVE for 90% of their time (rarely fractals, no raids) the ranger is the one class that has only one specialization available to choose from, since the druid doesn't do any damage.  So I am really, really hoping for the Untamed to be good or become good because I for once wanted to have a second specialization available for my main character. So while my feedback is mostly first impression and how I personally felt about the Untamed, I still want to provide it. So here a few random points that I noticed:

 

All in all I like the idea to have a specialization that tries to incorporate the ranger pet. And not by removing the pet - like the soulbeast does - but by finding new and interesting ways to make use of it.

 

I probably can't contribute much about damage and stability, since I don't compare numbers. It feels that the damage is somewhat on the middle ground compared to the other specs - not overwhelming, but also not weak. The heal skill feels somewhat underwhelming, the ranger has better. The teleport skill is fun.

 

All in all combat feels more on the slower side - at least when you're used to play a condi trapper soulbeast. At least at first impression. The hammer feels comparable to the greatsword, but unfortunately I don't really like the greatsword on the ranger, I find it uninteresting to play, since from my perspective it just bash on things and that's it. The hammer feels a bit similar, the character seems to remain relatively stationary and mostly bashes at things.  

The visual's are - weird. Some of them look quite nice, a bit like the Soulbeast's effects, but the effect of Enveloping Haze and the Elite skill is - something. This effect is probably one of the most annoying and ugly visual effects in the entire game, at least IMO. It almost looks unfinished. And very immersion breaking. It doesn't look "foresty" or "nature themed" at all IMO. The green is incredibly ugly and bright and for half a second or so you can't see anything on screen around your character and pet. Aren't combat skills mostly supposed to harm your enemy, not the player? I feel with the Enveloping Haze effect I mostly harm myself by blinding myself. I find the effect so annoying that I'd probably just not use those skil(s) if it stays like that. The exploding spore effect is not particularly pretty, but at least the effect is not distracting like the ugly green cloud and is over very fast. And it looks far more immersive, so I get to appreciate it for that reason alone.

 

The name is unfortunate and a bit confusing though - at least in my opinion. Is it just "Untamed" or "The Untamed"? Also there is a chinese TV-Series with that name (Untamed) in english, that makes it a bit confusing for me 😉

 

 

Edited December 4, 2021 by aikatara.3462

[Silvoshipnos.2089]

The ambush skill for shortbow feels like rubbish.

 

It's ground targeted, which makes it so if you unleash your character will stop using auto attacks, forcing you to press 1 for it to cast or inadvertedly missing the window of opportunity to cast it while your character blankly stares at your enemies holding their bow until it goes away and going back to shooting. It should not be ground targeted and just throw it as an attack the same way the longbow ambush works.

 

I also think it's a missed opportunity to make it into a rapid fire-like skill that applies more condis if the previous shot hit. It would be a fun symmetry for the longbow to get something that looks a bit like the  poison volley and the shortbow getting something a bit like the rapid fire.

 

Also the secondary arrows are shot almost perpendicular to the primary one if the target is really close, it looks really weird. I understand this may be to prevent it from hitting multiple times the same target, but they already do less damage and it could be made so that only the first hit is counted, there are already skills that have that functionality.

 

I also don't like that Forest's Fortification is just a defensive Strength of the Pack. It is very unimaginative and dull. It makes it so you can have a brand new skill which is the same as the other one you already had.

[InspectorCaracal.2970]

Reading through the last couple pages after having some time to think more and I think I've pinpointed a big part of why it still just doesn't feel like it delivers, and why I kept just not bothering to Unleash myself.

tl;dr: the spec can't make up its mind if it wants to be condi or strike DPS

 

To be clear: I'm not talking about traits. A lot of the EoD specs have the traits lined up like "here are the condi traits", "here are the power traits", "here are the support traits" - sure, that's fine, go ahead I guess?

The thing I'm talking about is the Untamed skills.

The idea behind the Unleashed mechanic is that you do more damage in Unleashed mode, right? All your hammer skills convert their CCs to direct hits. You get a straight-up damage bonus.

But what about the Unleashed pet skills? They all do condi.

What about the new "Ambush" skills? They also do condi.

As for utilities, they don't really do damage at all - they're mostly boons. Exploding Spores is the only one that does damage - a bit of both (and the only one that has a decent chance of doing a CC but that's a different topic).

So we have one half of the mechanic giving us condi, and the other half of the mechanic giving us strike damage. What are we supposed to do with that?

If I'm running a condi build, why would I ever use the Unleashed hammer?

If I'm running a power build, why would I ever use the Ambush skills?

If I'm running Untamed, shouldn't I want to make good use of the whole spec mechanic?

 

I don't know how to fix that, but I think either focusing on one or the other or tying condi vs strike damage to a trait choice might help? I don't know.

 

I could also go on a lengthy speech about how it feels really bad for a CC-focused spec to have basically no utility CCs except one extremely tricky-to-pull-off combo that requires hitting your target with a different CC to begin with, but this post is already too long.

[Dante.6987]

Well, its better than it was, still lacking a lot. The changes so far are welcome, the ambush skills are a nice addition, but the 15 sec cooldown is too much make it more like 3-5seconds at least in pve, since the damage output of the class is absolute trash. For the love of God, just drop the whole wvw frontliner bruiser kitten, or at least stop focusing so kitten much on it. Its supposedly a pet focused spec, but we all know the pets die in 2 seconds in a teamfight,so its just wasted effort, in my opinion at least. A little bit more synergy with existing traitlines would be nice, like two handed training. Pet controls are good, just please add the option to put them on autocast. Some more group support would be nice, like at least quickness to make the spec somewhat relevant in pve. I mean catalyst can do 45k dps and perma quickness without boon duration gear. As of now its totally pointless from a pve perspective. Still much to be done, at least now we see that the devs listen to feedback, maybe by the time the expack hits we will have an enjoyable spec, in all game modes.

[Harc.2376]

Hello, I have some very specific feedback on untamed. Please note what I say only applies to PvE (mostly in the context of high-end PvE - Raids). Also I won't talk about "this does too much dps or too little dps", I believe the game has a big balancing issue in PvE that far transcends the new elite specs.

This is specifically about untamed trait: Fervent Force. (Reduces your CD's by 4s when you cc an enemy, internal cooldown of 1/4s)

I understand this internal cooldown exists to avoid it proccing on multiple enemies at once. If possible, I'd like this to change to "it cannot proc from multiple enemies at once" instead, and have no internal CD on a single target. I don't know how feasible this is or easy to implement, but if it is, it'd be incredibly good because even if it may seem not much, 1/4s is enough of a window in which when figuring out a rotation for this class, I had to purposefully delay a CC skill because it lined up with another one in that time window, this happened in multiple and different parts of the rotation! Specially when dealing with a class that has many delayed CC, such as the spores or spike trap, this becomes an issue.

[Raven.8156]

Unleashed Pet Skills

I do believe that each pet arch-type should have 1 unique unleashed pet skill. As of now, all three unleashed skills feel very similar.

Flow

The hammer and yin/yang balance with the pet is really fun.... but the cantrip skills don't compliment very well, shouldn't they be cc focused? give us a float or a knock down that we can followup with some thump'n.

[InsaneQR.7412]

New input for ambushes.

 

The window is to narrow and a 10s window to use the ambush once would be cool. This way its a more tactical decision to ambush.

Also the second hammer form is unnecessary. Make one form with best of both worlds (good CC on some skills and bonus damage against CC foes on others)

Lastly: nstad of giving spores on melee ambushes i would change the trait debilitating blows. Let it cast lesser exploding spores when you disable a foe. This would posion an enemy when you disable them and deal some bonus damage plus it could give some small amounts of might when unleashed and a small duration protection when not unleashed. Thsi would be about the same effect as previously but it wont apply conditions. On the other side exploding spores could apply vuln or weakness depending on your state.

[Auron.5709]

Here are some more feedback after more testing with Untamed.

The Good:

1) Better now when compared to the previous beta. Felt good in open world PVE with hammer (both with dmg and cc though skills 5 knockdown for 2 sec felt just barely ok for unleash hammer 4).

2) Pet attack and return are available to use.

3) Unleash mode change has only 1 sec recharge. This made the whole hammer and unleash pet skill situation way better. Now you can flow between the modes easily. You do not lose the normal pet skills for a long time anymore and you can utilize the hammer's skills between the modes so that you do not need to rely on other weapon set or utility side cc skills. I really like the current flow with the modes and hammer.

4) Additions to utility skills like stun break and boons were good.

5) Trait changes went to a better direction.

 

What needs improvement / change / fixes:

1) We need an auto attack tick box choise for pet skills for Untamed (different between pets due to skill differences). Currently certain pet skill are very much busy work that is really difficult to keep up with the rest of the utility skill, weapon skill, unleash mode change and unleash skill use. We need the possibility of enabling auto attack behaviour for skills so that the pets can use simple attack skills. For example a player wants to personally use a bird pets swiftness aoe buff skill for movement but the 6 sec recharge attack skill would be in that auto attack choice as it's just some extra damage and does not really give more benefits for player use. Currently it is more of a damage loss as the player may not be able to keep up with all of these skills.

2) I would really like to have some differences for unleash skills for pet families. If not all then maybe like the F3 unleash slot could change based on pet family to give some more flavour for pet choises. As the teleport and boon rip skills are quite needed in pvp side. Or maybe give different kind of dmg / condi / boon focus on the skills even if they stay the same behaviour wise (teleport, boon rip, bubble).

3) Pet and unleash version skills that will have direct attack hit behaviour towards enemies need to activate only when the pet is at range of the skill description to the enemy. Rending vines only next to the enemy (so pet will move in range), teleport should need a target and will should move close enough to reach the enemy.

4) Pet pathing needs improvements as sometimes the pet will try to come back after the unleash teleport.

5) Pet attack and return should not change their placement in keybinds when changing between elite specialications. One idea would be to give all ranger specs and core the same ui that Untamed has but lock out the use of F1 and F3 from them. The other spec users could then see the pet skill recharge situation at least but not have any control over those skills. This way the ui would stay consistent and also the skill placement.

6) Ambush skills need a clear indicator that they are available for use. For this add for example a edge glow to skill 1 when it is available. It is then clear and up to the player on how they want to use it properly.

7) Ambush skills may have a too short window to utilize. Currently it felt too short but this might not be a problem if the point number 6 improvement is done as then you know that the skill is available to use.

8 )Untamed is lacking some flavor when compared to core ranger. Druid is distinct due to astral form and Soulbeast due to the effect and losing of the pet. Untamed's effect is now only those few seconds which is understandable for fashion reasons etc but now we are lacking distinct features about the spec as a results. Only way to notice unleash modes is the pet skills or if you start to remeber the very small icon change in F5 slot. This need a good compromise for release.

8.5) Some have suggested a holoforge / reaper / rambage etc mode all together in place of the current unleashed implementation. This could be one way to make Untamed unique feel wise and also be releated to the untamed description. Depending on how this is done it could be direction to take the Untamed but it would need massive rework as hammer skills and pet unleash / normal skill use might not work as they are now.

 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Auron.5709

[xXdevilhunterXx.3940]

It‘s time for my second feedback on the Untamed. (Again I mainly play instanced PvE and open world)

First of all I want to say that I am aware that the time between the last beta and this one was very low so I did not expect this specialization to get much better. And that is exactly what it feels like.

We got more changes than I expected but they had little impact in my eyes

But lets go into detail.

 

I. The unleash mechanic

1. The cooldown decrease on unleash was necessary and is a good change

2. It has been stated by official sources that the Untamed is supposed to be a „push and pull“ play style between you and your pet. The unleash mechanic still does not have any real impact that wold encourage this.

I have already given some suggestions for this in my last post but I will again elaborate a little bit in section IV.

3. The unleashed pet skills still feel off.

As stated in my last feedback it would be nice to incorporate the pet archetypes that were introduced with the Soulbeast into at least one of the skills. All the skills currently feel like one a versatile/deadly pet would have and don‘t fit other archetypes.

 

II. New ambush skills

1. A bit weird that hammer has 5 skills and all other weapons get one ambush but I guess it would be wasted dev time to scrap the unleashed hammer skills.

2. The unleash skills are nice but too weak.

A) The cooldown should be lower (max 10s) so it can be used on both weapon set when doing a two weapon rotation

B) And/Or the damage/impact of the skills is too low. for example the hammer ambush deals less dps than the normal hammer auto attack due to the long windup

 

III. „Attack target“ and „come back“ button

Well needed BUT:

It very inconvenient to have these two buttons on different keys for different specs.

It is hard to fix this since we have so many F skills on the untamed.

I only have one suggestion how this may be fixed:

1. Move these 2 buttons to generic keys that can be bound in the keybind settings as is the case for „Ranger Pet Combat Toggle“

this would make all ranger specs and the new mechanist spec consistent in button use for the same action.

2. Let all ranger specs use the pet skills like the untamed can since core ranger otherwise won‘t have any F skills anymore

 

IV. The Pet

The ranger pet has always been kind of a neglected child in the game so I was exited to hear a „pet focussed“ elite spec being announced. However to make the untamed actually pet focussed there is a long way to go.

Since the untamed does not have any way to support the group with unique buffs (other than spirits that are usually already provided by a druid) or boons (5 man quickness/ 10 man alac) the only roll the untamed could potentially fill in PvE is DPS.

I will explain this point with some numbers. Bare in mind these are rough and not exact numbers but are in the right range.

The current balancing point for DPS is around 40k.

The untamed can currently reach about 30k dps as a condi class under realistic conditions.

Out of those 30k the ranger pet deals a grand total of 1.5k-2k DPS.

A pet focussed spec deals 5-6% of it‘s damage with the pet.

Under unrealistic conditions (meaning the pet is provided with boons which will never happen due to target priority) the pet can reach a whopping 3.5k DPS. (11% of the current benchmark).

In the meantime the mechanist jade golem deals about 7k DPS under realistic conditions.

So what‘s the problem here if the ranger pet can not even reach close to the jade golem even if it is given the unrealistic advantage of full boons?

Well the jade golem passively inherits stat‘s from the player while the ranger pet flops around in it‘s weak core state.

 

So here is what we need for the pet to be actually meaningful:

1. Maybe general pet buffs?

2. Stats inherited from the player and vice versa.

This can easily be bound to unleash make it more impactful

A) Unleash your pet: your pet gains x% of the players stats.

B) Unleash yourself: you gain x% of the pet‘s stats

3. Boon coverage for our pet

There is no viable way to provide your pet with proper boons.

Again this can be bound to unleash so whenever you unleash your pet boons are copied to the pet and vice versa.

Great side effect of this: if the boon duration of copied boons is capped at say 20s this would actually encourage a push and pull between unleashing your pet and yourself in order to keep boons up permanently on your pet.

In my opinion these effects should be what unleash does by default since the current effect of unleash is lacking to say the least.

 

V. Traits

Thank you for removing the -15% dmg modifier on the minor grandmaster trait.

I already talked in depth about this in my last post so I will not elaborate. Some of my points have been pointed out again in other sections as general suggestions instead of trait suggestions.

 

Conclusion:

I would have wished for the untamed to be able to fill a supportive roll like 10 man alac, which would not have been far off lore wise. GW1 players may remember quickening zephyr. Since that is not possible we will be stuck with druid as the main healer permanently due to the worth of ranger spirits.

But since the Untamed is supposed to represent the GW1 bunny thumper I guess the goal is to make this viable in a sole dps/skirmish role.

The unleash mechanic feels like it has low impact and does not encourage a „push and pull“ play style, which it supposedly was meant to do.

The pet is waaay to weak to consider the Untamed to be a pet focussed specialization.

Fun math: Assuming „Sic em“ can be permanently kept on an enemy thanks to Fervent Force it would need to be buffed to a  ~470% dmg increase (currently 40%) to bring the pet to similar dps as the jade golem.

 

The choice of making pet focused elite specializations is highly debatable due to issues with pet control but since this is a done decision please make this pet focussed spec actually have a pet that does something.

 

Apologies for this wall of text. I know the last beta has not been long ago so maybe some of my points are already on the radar. Thanks for considering the community feedback!

Edited December 5, 2021 by xXdevilhunterXx.3940

[Zenith.7301]

For PvE only the Unleashed pet bonus needs to be closer to 100-150% bonus damage.

 

Either way you cut it, Untamed is seriously underperforming as a DPS class in  PvE.

[Zyreva.1078]

First and foremost – as it seems, new specs use the same balance in sPvP and WvW. While in general this makes sense, it does not apply to existing specs, which are for the most part more powerful in WvW. This inevitably leaves the new specs in a weaker position in WvW. Any plans on adressing that issue?

Untamed has been improved a lot since the first beta. It is fun to play and hammer is finally usable. The shorter cd on unleashed state swap in particular was a much needed change. But overall the spec is still not good enough to do … what exactly? What is Untamed actually supposed to be good at?

Cantrips: The boons are a nice bonus, but don't make or break a skill. The heal seems like a weaker version of A.E.D. Since core ranger has pretty decent heals, why bother using it? The stun break on Mutate Conditions was a great addition. Nature's Binding is just a worse version of other wall skills, because unlike those unblockable undodgeable obstacles it can be nullified by any random aegis, blind, dodge and so on. Exploding spores is still pretty useless in PvP combat. Forest's Fortification provides very powerful defensive buffs, but the long cast time means it often can't be used under pressure. I ended up using it primarily for superspeed which does not feel great for a 90s cd elite skill.

Hammer: Still too slow and short ranged. 1, 2, and 5 are fine, but 3 and 4 are bad in either state. Overbearing Smash is strong on paper, but it is way too hard to land against players. The first hit needs some sort of gap closer and the second hit a larger radius or it needs to be faster (maybe even both). Savage Shockwave feels awful to use. It does nothing if you don't sit right on top of the enemy and even then it doesn't do enough to justify the long cast time. I just stopped using that skill altogether, never felt worth using. Not having a skill that interacts with the pet – unlike every single other ranger main hand weapon – is disappointing.

Since hammer does not offer much in terms of defense or mobility it pretty much has to be combined with another melee weapon that covers those shortcomings, which only amplifies the other issues issues, because it means having zero ranged dmg and getting kited easily (pets are just as easily kited, or deal negligible dmg in case they are ranged). Builds with decent mobility, blinds/aegis or aoe field spam (so pretty much anything meta) feel nearly impossible to fight against as melee untamed, because you either can't land any hits and/or take too much dmg in return.

Dmg output is decent when combined with Marksmanship/Remorseless - which the weapon synergizes nicely with. However this means the dmg is all about burst and not very „brawlery“. Sustained dmg output is low

Ambush skills: I like the hammer one. Greatsword ambush looks good on paper, but is pretty buggy and cancels itself/goes on cd without casting, making it hardly usable in combat. Sword ambush is too slow. Didn't play arround much with the other's. The whole „summon spore“ thingy is useless vs players.

Overall i'd say that Untamed needed more interaction with its class mechanic outside of hammer and pet skills, however the ambush skills aren't a very elegant solution. The window to use them feels a bit too short, tho i also wouldn't increase it much, because it locks you out of the autoattack. The cd is hard to keep track off and also a bit too long. The life steal portion being mostly single target is also weird. Being able to hit multiple enemies in melee range inherits a risky position, so why not reward the player properly by scaling the effects equal for each player hit? Numbers can always be adjusted.

Traits: Not much has changed here. The cc traits are still strong, tho the icd once again pushes the spec more towards single target focus. Could a removal of the icd potentially be op? Absolutely, but balance changes need to happen anyway, so why not try something more risky and reward players for going into the fray? If it turns out to be too much, stuff can be reverted/adjusted. The dmg bonus on Blinding Outburst is pointless, because those skills don't deal noteworthy dmg anyway. Corrupting Vines suffers from Rending Vines and ambush skills being underwhelming, otherwise the trait would be decent. Cleansing Unleash goes on cd even when no condis are cleansed. Heal grandmaster is bad, because it doesn't work with condition dmg and power untamed has low sustained dmg output. Instead of increasing the number i'd rather like something else in addition, to make the trait more interesting and worth using. The stacking dmg and speed buff is too unreliable, because that's exactly what pets are.

Unleashed pet skills: The additional effects against cc'd targets are underwhelming. Enveloping Haze is ok. Venomous Outburst sometimes bugs out and causes the pet to port back right after using the skill. Rending Vines has too low radius. Players can walk out of it, even when it is used right after porting the pet on top of the enemy. Even as blast finisher it is unreliable, because pets don't like to stand still and can move out of the field you are intending to blast before the skill goes off. With all the excessive boon spam, boon removal needs to be reliable and on demand, so a player can capitalize on it, otherwise it is useless. But pets just don't stick to targets very well.

And they also don't survive very well. Which brings me to what is probably the biggest issue of untamed and ranger in general – pets die too fast and the players has no way to prevent that from happening other than not engaging in many fights. Especially in WvW. As long there is no solution, it will forever pigeon-hole the class into a pure duelist role – a role that has not much use in WvW nor in competitive PvP right now. And untamed can't even fill that one role very well. And it shouldn't just replace other ranger specs. The fact that pets have been ignored for so long, even now with a spec that is supposed to "improve the power and utility of your pet" and after very clear feedback in this regard from the first beta is ridiculous. It needs to be adressed if the spec is supposed to have any future in PvP enviroments.

Edited December 5, 2021 by UmbraNoctis.1907

[Bealis.6023]

Hello here are few suggestions on the Untamed.

1. Make the option to have pet skills set to an autoattack (like with the wepon skills with ctrl+right click)

2. Make the pet skills + pet command skills key bindable.

With these two changes, this pet UI could even be added to core ranger/druid/SB independent on the Untamed.

3. Make the special unleashed pet skills (at least Venomous Outburst) to have a proper sight and range checks. It happens often, in the heat of battle, that they trigger when the pet is not at the enemy, wasting them. (for instance I have a proper target, but the pet is located somewhere else and attacks a tree or something).

4. Even though I like the new Ambush skills, 2 seconds window is just too short. We allready need to think about 3 triggers-weapon swap, pets swap and Unleash+CC skills to have an opening for pet skills, utilities etc. And in all that we need to be aware of that 2 secs window is just too much, since we need to first unleash. Maybe making it 4 seconds or so, or some trait to make it stay longer would be better.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Bealis.6023