Expanded Weapon Proficiencies: Dual-Wielding Mace Ranger

[Beddo.1907]

43 minutes ago, Silvoshipnos.2089 said:

I find it really weird that maces are coming into the game with its own nature's strength and force of nature, particularly considering that the force of nature seems like a remake of the active effects of signet of the wild. It would be nice if you could get traits that interacted with the mechanic, some of the ranger traits and lines could use a rework.

It's funny that the maces seem to have had more effort put into them than the entirety of the untamed did in the first place.

Untamed is 5 small especs in a trench coat.

So many ideas that never fully developed, turned into an amalgamated mass of mechanics glued together by one button.

Rather than "effort", I'd call it "clear vision".

[Nuldric.1239]

If you are true ranger/survivalist, you must improvise, adapt, overcome! Don't wait for Anet in a jungle to throw a rifle at you. This time we got maces, utilize their full potential! 😉

You, rifle gang, while you be waiting, I'll bonk you with my mace. 

Edited November 9, 2023 by Nuldric.1239

[Silvoshipnos.2089]

2 hours ago, Beddo.1907 said:

Untamed is 5 small especs in a trench coat.

So many ideas that never fully developed, turned into an amalgamated mass of mechanics glued together by one button.

Rather than "effort", I'd call it "clear vision".

Yeah well, planning the spec polishing it and putting together a coherent result would have required effort. I think that throwing kitten and seeing what sticks is the lazy option.

[Wulfhearth.7962]

A pretty good and exciting start for the new weapons. 

I'm actually positively surprised to see unique mechanics attached to the weapons and am curious what they'll come up with for the other classes. (Hopefully that won't make them all too impossible to balance compared to the other weapons)

 

As for the maces themselves, they sound pretty cool and exciting to play around with while fitting well into the rangers existing kit. 

For PvP both a power duelist build building up to a moment of strength and a support build sound like a lot of fun and i look forward to trying them out. 

 

(And hopefully this time they'll manage to preserve the unique playstyles the weapons were designed for better trough the betas and cries for QoL and compatibility with existing meta builds than the eod elite specs. Refining their ideas and trying to make them work first before they give up on them)

Edited November 9, 2023 by Wulfhearth.7962

[Elricht Kaltwind.8796]

9 hours ago, Nuldric.1239 said:

GW2 Rangers are nature tenders and rifle/pistol is the most unnatural weapon.

Think of a mace as a cavemen's club, cavemen were hunters, they used clubs to hunt millennia before bow or rifle were inveted. So I don't see why mace/club is so off for, as you said, "hunter" class? 

They may not fit your 17th century hunter role, but they'll surely fit my giant Norn savage/beastmaster/brawler Untamed ranger.

Sorry, the line you're drawing here is one that I don't agree exists. If a ranger is allowed to use a plasma sword, then there is literally no argument against them using a matchlock, technology that in the real world has existed since the middle ages. Any argument re: thematic or aesthetic appeal is gone out the window when rangers can already use jade bots and plasma swords in the same world. I mean do you have any idea how much engineering went into even making something like a real medieval sword out of Toledo steel, which existed in Europe from ancient times? Swords of that quality were arguably way more advanced than early firearms were (basically a thick tube loaded with powder). Black powder comes from nature and can be made from nature, probably a lot more easily than a sword of any quality can be

Edit: to the 5-6 people who say they are confused about my earlier contributions, please feel free to come forward and I'll be happy to clarify my arguments for you. Personally I feel they are extremely straightforward and simple arguments but if a number of people are confused by them I'm sure I can simplify them further.

Edited November 9, 2023 by Elricht Kaltwind.8796

[AlexndrTheGreat.8310]

Really excited about mace from what I’ve seen so far. Was speculating that these would be more support and defense focused so really happy that we are getting more weapons to support roles that Ranger has gaps in.

Obviously will be used for Druid in place of axe. Heal Untamed could see some use, mostly depending on how good the ambush ability will be and if it’s worth using over not having the super strong 2nd staff ambush. Can also definitely see a bruiser Soulbeast build for PvP/WvW and synergies a ton with the existing defensive capabilities.

Really curious how strong the Force of Nature affect will be. I wonder if it would lead to builds that forgo offhand axe for power dps builds, but it would likely have to be extremely powerful to replace it or used in the 2nd weapon set.

The one comment I’d make on wanting rifle though is that I can’t see it adding anything new to the class that we don’t already have. I have no issues against the idea of rangers using rifle, but it would just be another 2h ranged projectile weapon. We won’t end up doing anything new or cool or unique that we can’t already do. I don’t see rifle being anything beyond a Longbow 2.0 which doesn’t seem very exciting.

[CETheLucid.3964]

Didn't see the support angle coming for main hand. Or the weapon based Force of Nature mechanic. Kind of reminds me of engineer in that regard. Sounds equal parts DPS + support. I always assumed we'd get some manner of CC or defense for it on the off hand so it's neat that played out. Here's to hoping it has a blast finisher (x2). I also hope the main hand and off hand by themselves are generous enough to give sufficient stacks of Nature’s Strength to get Force of Nature without necessitating mace/mace. I won't knock it till I try it. Very interesting.

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

23 minutes ago, CETheLucid.3964 said:

I also hope the main hand and off hand by themselves are generous enough to give sufficient stacks of Nature’s Strength to get Force of Nature without necessitating mace/mace. 

I'd like to think that they would be fine generating the stacks without Mace/Mace simply because most Support Druids use Warhorn offhand for boons with Call of the Wild and it would be whack if they didn't provide Nature stacks on their own (pun intended). If it all works the way it sounds like it would, then Mace/Mace can potentially replace Staff and Warhorn will finally have a main hand that better compliments it instead of going for either Sword or Axe  

[Ehecatl.9172]

The maces look interesting. It'll be nice to have a second set for support builds. Might make staff more useful by proxy since now a support druid can maybe defend themselves in melee without giving up all their healing output. I'm also interested to try it on Untamed. Kind of funny, but this might work better on a bunker Untamed than the daggers they just nerfed. I wonder what their Ambush skill will be. It seems to be an AoE-focused weapon so I am hoping for a big, powerful blast!

Also as an aside, the first guns were invented before the first greatswords and both were contemporary weapons for literally hundreds of years. The technology to create a high-end greatsword is a lot more sophisticated than people think.

[draxynnic.3719]

20 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

>how many ranger builds did YOU see using rifle in GW1?
None because the weapon didn't exist as Guild Wars is high fantasy game, rather than Guild Wars 2 which is set on fantasy/steampunk setting.

Exactly, there's no need for ranger to have rifle to be faithful to the GW1 ranger. To be faithful to the GW1 ranger, it needs to have bows. Which it does. 

20 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

>melee rangers absolutely existed in GW1.
They did, however they were a small niche while 90%+ of the Rangers opted for bow. You could also pick bow on other classes, but you could never use it to an extent that Rangers could.

Let me go into the Wiki and check... oh, look! You can still opt for bow! Two versions therof, in fact!

A lot of primary rangers opted for bow, but the other options were there, as was the option to go the other way and play another profession with a ranger secondary for bow... or a ranger secondary to get a bit of ranger flavour on a more melee or magically inclined character. GW2 not having secondary professions means that all the options they want ranger to have need to actually be in ranger.

20 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

>D&D rangers didn't even have anything special to support ranged combat.
D&D Rangers are not Guild Wars Rangers.

It's a demonstration of what the 'ranger' concept in general fantasy entails. And perhaps some people playing GW2 want to explore ranger themed outside of "physical ranged".

20 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

>intention was to balance ranger with the pets.
What ever reason was, it was weird to force it on the physical ranged class as it started to drive the class further away from the original Ranger design. 
 

And yet pets were still specifically a ranger feature even in GW1. They just made them no longer optional. Unless you play soulbeast and perma-merge.

You're being driven away from being a physical ranged class? Bows clearly still exist according to the wiki, so clearly it's still an option. Could it be that, similar to what happened to elementalist for so long, the ranged options are just not viable and people are forced to play exclusively melee? Maybe I should go and check the build sites and see if bows have fallen out of the meta?

Hrrrmn. I'm seeing a lot of longbow and shortbow builds. Most of those that don't are running axe, which last I checked also counted as "physical ranged" for ranger. There are a couple of exclusively melee builds, but they're definitely in the minority. Looks to me as if "physical ranged" is definitely still on the menu!

Seriously, there's no need for rifle to be introduced to cater for the GW1 ranger style. You've got bows, you've got axe as an additional option, you've got traps, you've got spirits, if you really want the full GW1 ranger experience you really should be demanding more venom-style skills that reproduce GW1's "preparations". 

The playstyle you're asking for is already fairly well catered for. Bow rangers are not only an option, they're a mechanically good one. It's not the end of the world if the new weapon is catering to some other ranger theme this time.

18 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

If Ranger is supposed to avoid unnatural weapon, then what are we doing with Sword or Greatsword? Those are literally only designed to kill other humans, and have nothing to do with surviving in the wilderness. Same argument applies to Maces and Hammers too, cause undoubtedly they are not hunting weapons even for cavemen as spears would have been their weapon of choice.

Weapons that would be classified as "hammers" and "maces" are pretty easy to make from natural materials, including the classic "stick with a knob or a rock on the end".

Swords are a bit more advanced, to be sure (although a macuahuitl would probably qualify). I think there are two important distinctions, though.

The first is that swords have been things that have been around for thousands of years, both in the real world and in Tyria. Guns, meanwhile, are essentially symbolic of a society that is moving towards a more technological and even industrial society - which carries into GW2, considering that the first adopters and primary users of guns are the charr. Medieval societies might have cleared a bit of land for farming, but still had relatively light impacts on the land compared to the pollution of an unregulated industrial society: there's the odd reference even in GW2 about the effects that charr industry are having on the Ascalonian environment. While sylvari can be engineers, this is a bit like how charr can be any kind of spellcaster even though there's a cultural disdain towards it: it's not a common choice.

The second, as mentioned before, is the "if you find yourself having to survive in the wild for a long period" effect. Swords can continue to be useful for quite a while in this sort of situation. Firearms... there's likely to be some point at which replacing spent ammunition starts becoming awkward enough that a bow becomes far more practical. You might be able to mix powder if you happen to be in a location where the constituents are available, but you're not going to have much luck replacing the shot itself without a smeltery.

[Frozey.8513]

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Exactly, there's no need for ranger to have rifle to be faithful to the GW1 ranger. To be faithful to the GW1 ranger, it needs to have bows. Which it does. 

 

Rifle and pistols are the only other physical ranged weapons out there, yet Ranger has been denied both of them in favour of weapons that have outright nothing to do with being a Ranger. If you want to treat ranger as some sort of stick wielding shaman who loves animals and hates gun powder go ahead, but that factually has nothing to do with where Ranger as a class is coming from.

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Let me go into the Wiki and check... oh, look! You can still opt for bow! Two versions therof, in fact!

A lot of primary rangers opted for bow, but the other options were there, as was the option to go the other way and play another profession with a ranger secondary for bow... or a ranger secondary to get a bit of ranger flavour on a more melee or magically inclined character. GW2 not having secondary professions means that all the options they want ranger to have need to actually be in ranger.

It's fine to have other weapons too, but it's too much when most of the weapons we have are NOT physical ranged weapon anymore. To bring back Ranger as king of physical ranged combat we need to have rifle and pistols added to the class.

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

It's a demonstration of what the 'ranger' concept in general fantasy entails. And perhaps some people playing GW2 want to explore ranger themed outside of "physical ranged".

That is purely your interpretation of what Ranger is, and again factually has nothing to do with how Ranger was designed in would of Guild Wars. Even on Lord of the Rings Aragorn is called a 'Ranger', yet it's totally different role he is playing compared to Ranger we are supposed to have or even ended up with.

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

And yet pets were still specifically a ranger feature even in GW1. They just made them no longer optional. Unless you play soulbeast and perma-merge.

You're being driven away from being a physical ranged class? Bows clearly still exist according to the wiki, so clearly it's still an option. Could it be that, similar to what happened to elementalist for so long, the ranged options are just not viable and people are forced to play exclusively melee? Maybe I should go and check the build sites and see if bows have fallen out of the meta?

Hrrrmn. I'm seeing a lot of longbow and shortbow builds. Most of those that don't are running axe, which last I checked also counted as "physical ranged" for ranger. There are a couple of exclusively melee builds, but they're definitely in the minority. Looks to me as if "physical ranged" is definitely still on the menu!

Seriously, there's no need for rifle to be introduced to cater for the GW1 ranger style. You've got bows, you've got axe as an additional option, you've got traps, you've got spirits, if you really want the full GW1 ranger experience you really should be demanding more venom-style skills that reproduce GW1's "preparations". 

The playstyle you're asking for is already fairly well catered for. Bow rangers are not only an option, they're a mechanically good one. It's not the end of the world if the new weapon is

catering to some other ranger theme this time.

Ranger pets were designed as optional addition to being a ranger. And guess what? Every other class could also pick up pets due to the multi-class system! Thus you sir are outright factually incorrect in your statement. There are hardly any Ranger builds that focus on you solely playing physical ranged, and rather have you either purely on melee or switching between melee and ranged. Thus to bring more variety to pure ranged combat options rifle and pistols are mandatory addition to Rangers already thin physical ranged weapon arsenal.

Why are you so afraid to have people who want to play Ranger with rifle or pistols being catered to? It's something that people have been asking for over a decade now, and definitely something that should be addressed as soon as possible, rather than continuing to convert core Ranger into a Druid.

8 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Weapons that would be classified as "hammers" and "maces" are pretty easy to make from natural materials, including the classic "stick with a knob or a rock on the end".

Swords are a bit more advanced, to be sure (although a macuahuitl would probably qualify). I think there are two important distinctions, though.

The first is that swords have been things that have been around for thousands of years, both in the real world and in Tyria. Guns, meanwhile, are essentially symbolic of a society that is moving towards a more technological and even industrial society - which carries into GW2, considering that the first adopters and primary users of guns are the charr. Medieval societies might have cleared a bit of land for farming, but still had relatively light impacts on the land compared to the pollution of an unregulated industrial society: there's the odd reference even in GW2 about the effects that charr industry are having on the Ascalonian environment. While sylvari can be engineers, this is a bit like how charr can be any kind of spellcaster even though there's a cultural disdain towards it: it's not a common choice.

The second, as mentioned before, is the "if you find yourself having to survive in the wild for a long period" effect. Swords can continue to be useful for quite a while in this sort of situation. Firearms... there's likely to be some point at which replacing spent ammunition starts becoming awkward enough that a bow becomes far more practical. You might be able to mix powder if you happen to be in a location where the constituents are available, but you're not going to have much luck replacing the shot itself without a smeltery.

There is no reason to point out that Salad people choosing to become an Engineer is a rare choice, or that Charr wanting to be spell caster being an odd choice, as neither of those doesn't invalidate at all Ranger needing to get rifle and pistols. You can even be Charr Ranger already and get access to perhaps the biggest gun in the game, Charrzooka, so there is no lore reason at all to deny gunpowder weapons from Ranger.

Also yet again there is little to no use in having swords while being in the wilderness at all. Guns however provide tremendous advantage when it comes to hunting or personal safety, even if their ammunition is harder to produce, yet still totally possible. Just look up how musket balls were made. It's fully reasonable choice of weapon for the wild, and one which suits Ranger way better compared to sword, greatsword, mace or hammer.

Edited November 10, 2023 by Frozey.8513

[psizone.8437]

Can you guys just stick with saying "I would love 'x' weapon next time, I think it would be great" and not flame each others preferences.

Arguing the semantics of the term 'ranger' in a high fantasy made up video game for multiple pages and derailing the topic isn't a great look for anyone.

[Beddo.1907]

9 minutes ago, psizone.8437 said:

Can you guys just stick with saying "I would love 'x' weapon next time, I think it would be great" and not flame each others preferences.

Arguing the semantics of the term 'ranger' in a high fantasy made up video game for multiple pages and derailing the topic isn't a great look for anyone.

Or just, you know, not talk about another weapon in a thread about Maces.
The "I want X weapon." based on someones preference and head cannon is just pointless. We will get those weapons someday and just because you want it, doesn't mean everyone wants it. Not to mention, the rifle imagined by "I want" people, is just longbow 2.0 most of the time.

[Frozey.8513]

26 minutes ago, Beddo.1907 said:

Or just, you know, not talk about another weapon in a thread about Maces.
The "I want X weapon." based on someones preference and head cannon is just pointless. We will get those weapons someday and just because you want it, doesn't mean everyone wants it. Not to mention, the rifle imagined by "I want" people, is just longbow 2.0 most of the time.

It's not about wanting longbow 2.0. It's about wanting a weapon to compliment either longbow or shortbow on purely ranged playstyle. For example longbow lacks sustainable AoE, so some kind of shotgun variant could be really fun while allowing you to cycle between the two. Sadly even after waiting a decade neither of those has happened. And as the game almost always relies on cycling between weapons for optimal dps rotation, it makes chances for meaningful physical ranged combat very limited.   

[Beddo.1907]

24 minutes ago, Frozey.8513 said:

It's not about wanting longbow 2.0. It's about wanting a weapon to compliment either longbow or shortbow on purely ranged playstyle. For example longbow lacks sustainable AoE, so some kind of shotgun variant could be really fun while allowing you to cycle between the two. Sadly even after waiting a decade neither of those has happened. And as the game almost always relies on cycling between weapons for optimal dps rotation, it makes chances for meaningful physical ranged combat very limited.   

The chances of a rifle getting a non projectile skill set on a nature magic class like ranger is low. For something like ranged AoE, we'd probably need Mh Scepter and Oh Focus.
Either way, there is no point in arguing about not getting rifle from a logical point of view, since Mace skills are on the checklist of stuff we lack.

[Frozey.8513]

1 hour ago, Beddo.1907 said:

The chances of a rifle getting a non projectile skill set on a nature magic class like ranger is low. For something like ranged AoE, we'd probably need Mh Scepter and Oh Focus.
Either way, there is no point in arguing about not getting rifle from a logical point of view, since Mace skills are on the checklist of stuff we lack.

Ranger has been always a physical ranged class with a little bit of nature magic as an extra option on their kit, but I suppose that really emphasizes the whole issue of Ranger having been drifting away from core Ranger more and more in favour of Druid and melee weapons.

[Tom.8029]

That leap toward the enemy in the video is literally weaver fire sword 2. 

[TwistedAlga.4235]

Oh look, another bunch of copy+paste skill animations, how original and great idea, ANet. It feels very lazy and rushed with those copied animations.

[draxynnic.3719]

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

Rifle and pistols are the only other physical ranged weapons out there, yet Ranger has been denied both of them in favour of weapons that have outright nothing to do with being a Ranger. If you want to treat ranger as some sort of stick wielding shaman who loves animals and hates gun powder go ahead, but that factually has nothing to do with where Ranger as a class is coming from.

Because there are already three weapons that cater for a physical ranged playstyle (and one magic). Half of the other professions don't even HAVE more than two ranged weapons at the moment!

The GW1 ranger has been catered for: it used bows, GW2 ranger is the only profession that uses both types of bows. 

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

It's fine to have other weapons too, but it's too much when most of the weapons we have are NOT physical ranged weapon anymore. To bring back Ranger as king of physical ranged combat we need to have rifle and pistols added to the class.

And who, precisely, is competing with it? Warrior certainly isn't. Engineer has decent physical ranged capabilities, but you'd expect it to, and in practice engineer builds are more likely to end up being melee due to how their elite specialisations work. Thief has deadeye, but in practice you don't often see ranged deadeye outside of open world casual play nowadays (I suspect that thief was also intended to be the 'home' for the petless ranger playstyle, incidentally). While ranger ranged builds are meta everywhere except WvW zergs (and all physical ranged suffers there, because physical ranged typically means projectiles).

Ranger is already king of physical ranged combat. You don't need five physical ranged weapons to get there. You just need the ones you do have to be good. And they are.

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

That is purely your interpretation of what Ranger is, and again factually has nothing to do with how Ranger was designed in would of Guild Wars. Even on Lord of the Rings Aragorn is called a 'Ranger', yet it's totally different role he is playing compared to Ranger we are supposed to have or even ended up with.

No, it demonstrates what the overall perception in the wider fantasy community of what a 'ranger' is, as opposed to your specific definition that pigeonholes it into being a "ranged physical combatant". There are multiple interpretations of what a ranger can be, and in the GW2 context of broader professions, there's nothing wrong with exploring other interpretations, especially since even most interpretations that DO focus on ranged combat often have melee weapons as a backup. As long as the archer theme is covered, which it is, there's nothing wrong with exploring other themes.

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

Ranger pets were designed as optional addition to being a ranger. And guess what? Every other class could also pick up pets due to the multi-class system! Thus you sir are outright factually incorrect in your statement. There are hardly any Ranger builds that focus on you solely playing physical ranged, and rather have you either purely on melee or switching between melee and ranged. Thus to bring more variety to pure ranged combat options rifle and pistols are mandatory addition to Rangers already thin physical ranged weapon arsenal.

And which profession did other professions have to take to pick up pets! That's right, ranger! But in GW1, there was a problem in that they never really were able to get pets to a point where they were worth using but not overpowered. Making them an inherent part of the kit meant that the profession as a whole could be balanced on the basis that the pet will always be present (even if merged).

Switching between melee and ranged weapons is typical for GW2's design - while it didn't always work out that way, it was pretty much presented as what the primary purpose of weaponswapping would be. Again, as I commented above, most archers, both in fantasy and history, had some sort of melee weapon as a backup. Switching between bow and rifle (or whatever) isn't exactly something I'd have in mind as a default loadout for a ranged character. But while I was going through the ranger builds, I did see a few longbow/axe or shortbow/axe builds, so it doesn't seem to be that far out of the realm of possibility. Heck, I use a shortbow/axe build myself. 

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

Why are you so afraid to have people who want to play Ranger with rifle or pistols being catered to? It's something that people have been asking for over a decade now, and definitely something that should be addressed as soon as possible, rather than continuing to convert core Ranger into a Druid.

I'm actually not, I can just recognise that it's not necessarily the top priority. Based on ArenaNet's model going forward, this isn't going to be the last weapon ranger gets. If anything, it's you that's railing against catering to any other interpretation. You've now progressed beyond demanding rifle ASAP to demanding rifle and pistol ASAP - that would mean at least two cycles before anything other than your early modern (or even just outright modern) hunter theme gets catered to.

Personally, I think it would actually be something that's better done as part of an elite specialisation - that way they can have more than just the weapon to really explore what a more technology-focused ranger might look like.

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

There is no reason to point out that Salad people choosing to become an Engineer is a rare choice, or that Charr wanting to be spell caster being an odd choice, as neither of those doesn't invalidate at all Ranger needing to get rifle and pistols. You can even be Charr Ranger already and get access to perhaps the biggest gun in the game, Charrzooka, so there is no lore reason at all to deny gunpowder weapons from Ranger.

It points out that, just because the game doesn't restrict professions to races, it doesn't mean that there aren't preferences. And one of those is that the race most attuned to nature tend to have less engineers, while the races most associated with technology tend to have a poor relationship with nature. You can play against type, but "sylvari can be engineers" isn't the knockout argument you seemed to think it was when sylvari engineer is a case of playing against type.

Now, I don't think gunpowder ranger is impossible. There are absolutely concepts where that would work, especially if combined with another elite specialisation that's a bit less treehuggery than some of the existing ones. I suspect that as long as GW2 doesn't shut down first, rifle will eventually come to ranger. But I just don't think it's the top priority right now.

14 hours ago, Frozey.8513 said:

Also yet again there is little to no use in having swords while being in the wilderness at all. Guns however provide tremendous advantage when it comes to hunting or personal safety, even if their ammunition is harder to produce, yet still totally possible. Just look up how musket balls were made. It's fully reasonable choice of weapon for the wild, and one which suits Ranger way better compared to sword, greatsword, mace or hammer.

Machetes, swords still being better than nothing against animals even if spears are better, or just the whole "hey, Tyria's wilds are full of humanoid and near-humanoid dangers too" thing. Sword, two-handed sword*, and mace also fit into the category of being sidearms - you can fairly conveniently carry them as a backup weapon for situations when using a bow or other primary weapon. A spear might be a better hunting weapon than a greatsword, but you can carry a hand-and-a-half at your belt while using a bow as your primary weapon, and with halfswording it can be used as an ersatz spear in a pinch (especially if the blade is designed for it).

I know how musket balls are typically produced. You still need a source of metal (typically lead), which usually requires means of extracting it from ore if starting from scratch, the means to melt that metal down, moulds, the means to pour molten metal into those moulds, and the means to clean up the balls afterwards (while not as precise as modern bullets, muskets are still less forgiving than bows when it comes to their ammunition). You also need sources of sulphur and saltpetre. This is possible, if the ranger is operating from a home base in a region with suitable resources... but if you know what you're doing, you can fashion arrows or even entirely new bows out of materials present in pretty much any forest, without any equipment beyond what you're probably carrying anyway. Probably won't be as good as what could be made with metal arrowheads and professional tools, but it'd work. So in a universe where guns are not clearly superior to bows, it'd make sense for rangers to prefer the weapon where they can fashion new ammunition even if they find themselves in a forest weeks away from civilisation and with only basic survival equipment.

*Using this term because while ArenaNet uses 'greatsword' for any two-handed sword, a lot of them are technically longswords, just like some of the 'mace' skins are technically one-handed hammers. From a historical perspective, 'longsword' means a two-handed sword that is nevertheless still short enough that it's otherwise still worn and used like a sword. Greatswords are... almost polearms in sword form in how they can be carried and used. Ranger "greatsword" skills, however, are absolutely closer to longsword forms.

[Frozey.8513]

5 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Because there are already three weapons that cater for a physical ranged playstyle (and one magic). Half of the other professions don't even HAVE more than two ranged weapons at the moment!

The GW1 ranger has been catered for: it used bows, GW2 ranger is the only profession that uses both types of bows. 

And who, precisely, is competing with it? Warrior certainly isn't. Engineer has decent physical ranged capabilities, but you'd expect it to, and in practice engineer builds are more likely to end up being melee due to how their elite specialisations work. Thief has deadeye, but in practice you don't often see ranged deadeye outside of open world casual play nowadays (I suspect that thief was also intended to be the 'home' for the petless ranger playstyle, incidentally). While ranger ranged builds are meta everywhere except WvW zergs (and all physical ranged suffers there, because physical ranged typically means projectiles).

Ranger is already king of physical ranged combat. You don't need five physical ranged weapons to get there. You just need the ones you do have to be good. And they are.

No, it demonstrates what the overall perception in the wider fantasy community of what a 'ranger' is, as opposed to your specific definition that pigeonholes it into being a "ranged physical combatant". There are multiple interpretations of what a ranger can be, and in the GW2 context of broader professions, there's nothing wrong with exploring other interpretations, especially since even most interpretations that DO focus on ranged combat often have melee weapons as a backup. As long as the archer theme is covered, which it is, there's nothing wrong with exploring other themes.

And which profession did other professions have to take to pick up pets! That's right, ranger! But in GW1, there was a problem in that they never really were able to get pets to a point where they were worth using but not overpowered. Making them an inherent part of the kit meant that the profession as a whole could be balanced on the basis that the pet will always be present (even if merged).

Switching between melee and ranged weapons is typical for GW2's design - while it didn't always work out that way, it was pretty much presented as what the primary purpose of weaponswapping would be. Again, as I commented above, most archers, both in fantasy and history, had some sort of melee weapon as a backup. Switching between bow and rifle (or whatever) isn't exactly something I'd have in mind as a default loadout for a ranged character. But while I was going through the ranger builds, I did see a few longbow/axe or shortbow/axe builds, so it doesn't seem to be that far out of the realm of possibility. Heck, I use a shortbow/axe build myself. 

I'm actually not, I can just recognise that it's not necessarily the top priority. Based on ArenaNet's model going forward, this isn't going to be the last weapon ranger gets. If anything, it's you that's railing against catering to any other interpretation. You've now progressed beyond demanding rifle ASAP to demanding rifle and pistol ASAP - that would mean at least two cycles before anything other than your early modern (or even just outright modern) hunter theme gets catered to.

Personally, I think it would actually be something that's better done as part of an elite specialisation - that way they can have more than just the weapon to really explore what a more technology-focused ranger might look like.

It points out that, just because the game doesn't restrict professions to races, it doesn't mean that there aren't preferences. And one of those is that the race most attuned to nature tend to have less engineers, while the races most associated with technology tend to have a poor relationship with nature. You can play against type, but "sylvari can be engineers" isn't the knockout argument you seemed to think it was when sylvari engineer is a case of playing against type.

Now, I don't think gunpowder ranger is impossible. There are absolutely concepts where that would work, especially if combined with another elite specialisation that's a bit less treehuggery than some of the existing ones. I suspect that as long as GW2 doesn't shut down first, rifle will eventually come to ranger. But I just don't think it's the top priority right now.

Machetes, swords still being better than nothing against animals even if spears are better, or just the whole "hey, Tyria's wilds are full of humanoid and near-humanoid dangers too" thing. Sword, two-handed sword*, and mace also fit into the category of being sidearms - you can fairly conveniently carry them as a backup weapon for situations when using a bow or other primary weapon. A spear might be a better hunting weapon than a greatsword, but you can carry a hand-and-a-half at your belt while using a bow as your primary weapon, and with halfswording it can be used as an ersatz spear in a pinch (especially if the blade is designed for it).

I know how musket balls are typically produced. You still need a source of metal (typically lead), which usually requires means of extracting it from ore if starting from scratch, the means to melt that metal down, moulds, the means to pour molten metal into those moulds, and the means to clean up the balls afterwards (while not as precise as modern bullets, muskets are still less forgiving than bows when it comes to their ammunition). You also need sources of sulphur and saltpetre. This is possible, if the ranger is operating from a home base in a region with suitable resources... but if you know what you're doing, you can fashion arrows or even entirely new bows out of materials present in pretty much any forest, without any equipment beyond what you're probably carrying anyway. Probably won't be as good as what could be made with metal arrowheads and professional tools, but it'd work. So in a universe where guns are not clearly superior to bows, it'd make sense for rangers to prefer the weapon where they can fashion new ammunition even if they find themselves in a forest weeks away from civilisation and with only basic survival equipment.

*Using this term because while ArenaNet uses 'greatsword' for any two-handed sword, a lot of them are technically longswords, just like some of the 'mace' skins are technically one-handed hammers. From a historical perspective, 'longsword' means a two-handed sword that is nevertheless still short enough that it's otherwise still worn and used like a sword. Greatswords are... almost polearms in sword form in how they can be carried and used. Ranger "greatsword" skills, however, are absolutely closer to longsword forms.

> Half of the other professions don't even HAVE more than two ranged weapons at the moment!

Factually incorrect statement:
                - Ele: Staff, scepter, (pistol soon)
                - Necro: Staff, scepter, axe, pistol
                - Mesmer: Staff, scepter, dagger, greatsword, pistol, (rifle soon)
                - Thief: Scepter, shortbow, rifle, pistol
                - Engi: Rifle, pistol, (shortbow soon)
                - War: Rifle, longbow, pistol
                - Guardian: Staff, scepter, longbow, (pistol soon)
                - Rev: Axe, hammer, shortbow, (scepter soon)

Clearly every class has access to at least 3 ranged weapons if we are counting the upcoming ones, and even if we disregard those it’s only Ele and Engi who are falling short with only 2 ranged choices. Meanwhile Mesmer is soon to have whopping 6 ranged weapon choices.  

>The GW1 ranger has been catered for: it used bows, GW2 ranger is the only profession that uses both types of bows.

GW1 Ranger used 4 types of bows, while on GW2 there are only 2. Also, while it is true Ranger is so far the only class with access to both of GW2 bows, the weapons do not complement each other’s at all, as one is power and other one is condition based.

>And who, precisely, is competing with it?

Engi is the only class in the game who caters to purely physical ranged playstyle, mainly due to them not having weaponswap. Ranger however doesn’t have the luxury to camp on longbow or shortbow alone. Axe is really the only awkward option on ranger’s kit to complement shortbow’s ranged playstyle, yet it doesn’t do anything for longbow.   

>Ranger is already king of physical ranged combat. You don't need five physical ranged weapons to get there. You just need the ones you do have to be good. And they are.

Incorrect, as no matter how good you are with either of the bows you can’t camp on them alone. Especially longbow is suffering from this with no real ranged complementary option.

>there's nothing wrong with exploring other interpretations, especially since even most interpretations that DO focus on ranged combat often have melee weapons as a backup.

I’m glad we agree! Let’s add rifle and pistols to rangers arsenal to explore interpretations of Ranger with gunpowder!

>GW1, there was a problem in that they never really were able to get pets to a point where they were worth using

There were plenty of good beastmaster builds, and even the very classic IWAY-group composition utilized pets on the original Guild Wars.

>most archers, both in fantasy and history, had some sort of melee weapon as a backup

Yes, and those were used when ranged combat was not possible anymore. We, however, are talking about catering to purely ranged playstyle to which those backup weapons do nothing for.

>I can just recognise that it's not necessarily the top priority

Yes, clearly the top priority seems to be changing core Ranger into Druid with lot of access to melee weapons.

>this isn't going to be the last weapon ranger gets

Hopefully not, however GW2 has already outlived GW1 so talks about GW3 approaching are out there. Also we have been waiting for pure physical ranged playstyle to be catered for over a decade now, and we are infuriated of having to keep waiting even longer for something that may not even happen until the next game.

>And one of those is that the race most attuned to nature tend to have less engineers, while the races most associated with technology tend to have a poor relationship with nature.

Do you have any sources on this, or is it just something you argue for based on your own feelings? Even if what you said would be true, it just shows that Rangers from those technologically inclined races would have already good basis to pick up gunpowder weapon to complement their physical ranged playstyle.

>Machetes, swords still being better than nothing against animals.

And guns are much better than either of those against animals. Machete is also a type of knife with other uses for survival.

>A spear might be a better hunting weapon than a greatsword, but you can carry a hand-and-a-half at your belt while using a bow as your primary weapon, and with halfswording it can be used as an ersatz spear in a pinch (especially if the blade is designed for it).

A spear would be much better yes, but the stretch you are painting to make greatsword fit into that category is pure copium.

[Fueki.4753]

59 minutes ago, Frozey.8513 said:

- War: pistol

Didn't you know that Warrior's pistol, for all intents and purposes, is a melee weapon?

With "ranges" of 300 and 240, it barely is further away than melee and doesn't quality as ranged.

Edited November 11, 2023 by Fueki.4753

[Frozey.8513]

2 minutes ago, Fueki.4753 said:

Didn't you know that Warrior's pistol, for all intents and purposes, is a melee weapon?

With "ranges" of 300 and 240, it barely is above melee ranged and doesn't quality as ranged.

While it's true War's pistol is indeed very short range, I did after some consideration choose to include it among the ranged weapons category for the fact that the pistol itself is still used to shoot, rather than to use it as a melee weapon in form of striking opponents with it.

[draxynnic.3719]

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

> Half of the other professions don't even HAVE more than two ranged weapons at the moment!

Factually incorrect statement:
                - Ele: Staff, scepter, (pistol soon)
                - Necro: Staff, scepter, axe, pistol
                - Mesmer: Staff, scepter, dagger, greatsword, pistol, (rifle soon)
                - Thief: Scepter, shortbow, rifle, pistol
                - Engi: Rifle, pistol, (shortbow soon)
                - War: Rifle, longbow, pistol
                - Guardian: Staff, scepter, longbow, (pistol soon)
                - Rev: Axe, hammer, shortbow, (scepter soon)

Clearly every class has access to at least 3 ranged weapons if we are counting the upcoming ones, and even if we disregard those it’s only Ele and Engi who are falling short with only 2 ranged choices. Meanwhile Mesmer is soon to have whopping 6 ranged weapon choices.  

First, I said "at the moment", so you can clear out all of those 'soons' (if anything, that just demonstrates why half of the new ranged weapons are on the professions they are, although thief axe being ranged did surprise me). In this sort of discussion, I also think in terms of mainhands and two-handed weapons, not offhands, since to have a ranged playstyle an offhand needs to be combined with a ranged mainhand weapon. Apparently I forgot to specify that in the specific post, but I think I at least strongly implied it earlier in the thread. So ele, engi, warrior, and rev count, and that's half. If one is going to be picky over the details, engi also has kits that can functionally act as additional weapon options.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>The GW1 ranger has been catered for: it used bows, GW2 ranger is the only profession that uses both types of bows.

GW1 Ranger used 4 types of bows, while on GW2 there are only 2. Also, while it is true Ranger is so far the only class with access to both of GW2 bows, the weapons do not complement each other’s at all, as one is power and other one is condition based.

The flatbow/longbow/hornbow/shortbow distinction, while not completely insignificant, isn't even a patch on the differences between weapons in GW2.

(Addendum: And let's be real here, ArenaNet wanting to give ranger two sets of bow skills is probably the only reason we have "longbow" and "shortbow" instead of just "bow" to begin with. Every other profession only has one or the other, if not for ranger they could very easily have just gone with "bow" and saved themselves a skin every time they introduce a new set of weapons.)

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>And who, precisely, is competing with it?

Engi is the only class in the game who caters to purely physical ranged playstyle, mainly due to them not having weaponswap. Ranger however doesn’t have the luxury to camp on longbow or shortbow alone. Axe is really the only awkward option on ranger’s kit to complement shortbow’s ranged playstyle, yet it doesn’t do anything for longbow.  

Axe is a hybrid weapon - it works perfectly fine on power builds with longbow. Skills 2 and 3 have a bit of condition damage, but still have decent coefficients, and it combines well with warhorn. It's generally not considered the optimal choice since you usually get a bit more damage and/or survivability by having a melee weapon on one of your swaps, but this is 1) how weaponswapping was supposed to work and 2) far more realistic than swapping between two bows. However, there are builds that run a power melee weapon like greatsword and axe on the other swap, so axe is clearly a practical power option.

And if your competition is just engineer then, well, what do you expect? The tech profession is naturally going to have guns and such! Except... scrapper utilities are made to primarily cater for a melee playstyle, the only popular scrapper build I know of that isn't at least partially melee if a flamethrower WvW roaming build and I'm not sure if that's actually "popular". Holosmith practically demands it - there's a trait that gives a short range autoattack in holoforge, but apart from the holopistols the other skills are still melee-oriented. While mechanist is going to be pulled into melee for Mechanical Genius unless they're using Spark Revolver (not to mention that offhand pistol is optimised for point-blank range). In practice, ranger is still the monarch of pewpew.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

 >Ranger is already king of physical ranged combat. You don't need five physical ranged weapons to get there. You just need the ones you do have to be good. And they are.

Incorrect, as no matter how good you are with either of the bows you can’t camp on them alone. Especially longbow is suffering from this with no real ranged complementary option.

See above.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>there's nothing wrong with exploring other interpretations, especially since even most interpretations that DO focus on ranged combat often have melee weapons as a backup.

I’m glad we agree! Let’s add rifle and pistols to rangers arsenal to explore interpretations of Ranger with gunpowder!

But in the meantime, there are other, equally valid interpretations that fit roles and playstyles that are not already covered by existing weapons.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>GW1, there was a problem in that they never really were able to get pets to a point where they were worth using

There were plenty of good beastmaster builds, and even the very classic IWAY-group composition utilized pets on the original Guild Wars.

I note you cut out the "and not overpowered" part. They were always a bit niche and gimmicky, only entering the mainstream when something came out that was overpowered. (Also, IWAY hardly counts since the whole point of IWAY was to let the pets die in order to "avenge" them.)

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>most archers, both in fantasy and history, had some sort of melee weapon as a backup

Yes, and those were used when ranged combat was not possible anymore. We, however, are talking about catering to purely ranged playstyle to which those backup weapons do nothing for.

And as it turns out, meta ranger builds tend to also use the historically sensible option of having a ranged set and a melee set, in part so they can use one when the other is not practical, and in part because ranger's defensive tools tend to be on melee weapons. Running shortbow/axe or longbow/axe is still viable, though. It's just not generally optimal.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>I can just recognise that it's not necessarily the top priority

Yes, clearly the top priority seems to be changing core Ranger into Druid with lot of access to melee weapons.

And, as previously discussed, a nature-powered melee fighter (or ranged fighter with a melee backup) is a perfectly valid interpretation. The maces also provide sustain, healing, and defensive options, which are things people have been asking for, while rifle or pistol will probably just be another pewpew damage option.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>this isn't going to be the last weapon ranger gets

Hopefully not, however GW2 has already outlived GW1 so talks about GW3 approaching are out there. Also we have been waiting for pure physical ranged playstyle to be catered for over a decade now, and we are infuriated of having to keep waiting even longer for something that may not even happen until the next game.

They're just starting off with a new business model that's intended to be sustainable in the long term, so unless SotO was a complete flop (I don't think it was...), I don't think we need to be concerned about GW2 going in maintenance mode for GW3 any time soon.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>And one of those is that the race most attuned to nature tend to have less engineers, while the races most associated with technology tend to have a poor relationship with nature.

Do you have any sources on this, or is it just something you argue for based on your own feelings? Even if what you said would be true, it just shows that Rangers from those technologically inclined races would have already good basis to pick up gunpowder weapon to complement their physical ranged playstyle.

A few:

Around release, ArenaNet talked about how, while all professions were available to all races for PCs, they had their own table on how common the combinations were that was used as a guide for creating NPCs. They never actually released this, but necromancer and engineer being rare for sylvari were cited as examples. You can see this in the world, however - very few sylvari NPCs are engineers, and very few necromancers outside of the Nightmare Court (I think they're all named special NPCs in both cases).

The Pale Tree comments about charr a couple of times, such as describing them as 'causing devastation' in the Dream and Nightmare story - while the worst of it that we see is Flame Legion deliberate poisoning, Iron Legion industry is not always nature-friendly either. Asura in both games have a tendency to show contempt for nature to the point of seeking to actively remove it when it's inconvenient, and not especially caring when their experiments have harmful effects on their surroundings (particularly, but not exclusively, the Inquest). Rangers of both races might well be exceptions to that general rule. There's nothing lorewise that says that rangers of any race can't pick up a gun and use it (apart from general statements ArenaNet has made about rangers being more close to nature and therefore conservative about their weapons), but the same can be said about melee weapons too, and mace-using rangers may well be more common overall than gun-using rangers. This is, after all, a setting where bows are competitive against guns, so a competent bow-user who is aided by nature spirits might not feel the need to use guns outside of functions that a bow absolutely cannot match (which would explain charr racial skills for charr rangers).

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>Machetes, swords still being better than nothing against animals.

And guns are much better than either of those against animals. Machete is also a type of knife with other uses for survival.

A sword is still better than a gun with no ammo. Machetes have a variety of uses, but clearing foliage in order to make a path is a common one, and a sword or greatsword would also be effective at that.

On 11/11/2023 at 6:46 PM, Frozey.8513 said:

>A spear might be a better hunting weapon than a greatsword, but you can carry a hand-and-a-half at your belt while using a bow as your primary weapon, and with halfswording it can be used as an ersatz spear in a pinch (especially if the blade is designed for it).

A spear would be much better yes, but the stretch you are painting to make greatsword fit into that category is pure copium.

Halfswording is a historical technique for longer swords that involve pretty much, well, using it as a spear with one hand on the blade (some historical swords even had unsharpened portions of the blade specifically for this, although holding a sharp blade with the hand is possible to do without cutting yourself if you know what you're doing). Even a one-handed sword held point-first would still be pretty effective against most animals apart from charging boars. And I can think of some threats in the wild where a sword or certain designs of what GW2 calls a mace would actually be the most effective weapon, such as venomous snakes.

Edited November 12, 2023 by draxynnic.3719

[anduriell.6280]

I see the animations very clunky and I get the feeling the weapon will feel pretty garbage. the growing mechanic sounds so convoluted already I see it not working at all. 

I hope to be wrong thou, if the weapon works and doesn’t get nerfed in an week that could be a reason to buy the expansion. 
 

they should have gone for a full defensive/support weapon for teams but that’s just me. 

[Acyk.9671]

it looks like it provides everything that was needed (support, defense and CC). i am eager to be able to test it