Say It How It Is Balance Discussion

[Shagie.7612]

12 hours ago, Vinny.7260 said:

Renegade just received decent buffs and some people are playing some sort of bunker sidenode builds, it might have a chance if any of the revs are willing to cook with it.

It still has no blinds/blocks/evades/cleanses, Kalla is still a legend with zero situational utility and a godawful stunbreak, and Citadel Orders don't cover those weaknesses.

They changed how damage reduction works back in 2021 so it's not likely you can become the facetanking 2020 Renegod again with Jalis Hammers + Vindication either, simply because of how the formula works now. Nor should it, but they've seemingly given up on proper fixes that address what it's actually missing and instead will probably keep buffing sustain until it's dumb again.

Maybe something like Retri/Invo Jalis/Kalla with Zakiros relic (since Ren gets tons of free crit) trying to abuse the added lifesteal, but dropping Shiro sucks and then you can't ever chase to finish or escape when +1ed, you are literally stuck on a node with no ability to do anything but dps race.

The condi version isn't any better.

Vindication's super nice for shrugging off stray damage though.

[arazoth.7290]

As long we don't get the dh treatment, like aegis on it just to be tanky 😂

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

16 hours ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

You can reveal Jaguar

Buffing Jaguar in the way that they did was.. quite the buff. It isn't just "stealthing the ranger" that's the issue. Look at everything it does now: Stalk - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) +375 ferocity and +25% crit chance that stacks with fury for the Jaguar. This primes the pet to land a massive Bite (feline) - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) and then follow with very heavy autos.

This is such a heavy buff that it will make Core Ranger viable. You could now run any archetype based around wild/nature/beast, to make sure the Jaguar is getting all the buffs from the Ranger, like might & fury & quick, and the Ranger could just roll pure tanky and let that Jaguar deal overly heavy damage after it primes the F2 Stalk. All you'd need to do is run cheese & immob & CC to lock people down and that Jaguar is going to be dangerous, even on tanky archetypes.

Now when we are talking DPS oriented stuff involving marksmanship, than Jaguar buff is gonna reimplement fat oneshots again.

 

[Gotejjeken.1267]

1 hour ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Buffing Jaguar in the way that they did was.. quite the buff. It isn't just "stealthing the ranger" that's the issue. Look at everything it does now: Stalk - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) +375 ferocity and +25% crit chance that stacks with fury for the Jaguar. This primes the pet to land a massive Bite (feline) - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) and then follow with very heavy autos.

Pet got 15k HP--they haven't touched Stalk at all other than removing Stalking, which was huge as that meant the Jaguar couldn't be revealed.  Cats to big damage yes, but in competitive they die just as quick to random ground AoE.  

The buff was stealthing the ranger, that I can agree was quite a large one, for reasons mentioned earlier.  

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

23 minutes ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Pet got 15k HP--they haven't touched Stalk at all other than removing Stalking, which was huge as that meant the Jaguar couldn't be revealed.  Cats to big damage yes, but in competitive they die just as quick to random ground AoE.  

The buff was stealthing the ranger, that I can agree was quite a large one, for reasons mentioned earlier.  

The reason why the 15k health doesn't even matter, is because this pet will function the best off of variants that run nature magic so the pet is constantly getting every buff that the ranger is getting. Essentially it will constantly have prot/regen/fury/25 might/if not constant direct heals from the ranger. He aint gonna be squishy. It will at least be as tanky as a Mech, and able to be swapped before death every 15s.

I'm in-game testing it right now on a Core Ranger build and it is honestly OP dude. Go try it with axe/warhorn/courage sigil/potent ally in beast mastery so you can maintain 25 might on the Jaguar at all times, along with fury. Also bring quick zephyr so you can time it with stalk, so he pounds out a ton of damage over that 6s. Just toss on wild/nature/beast.

This honestly feels like you have a 2nd player +ing you on a node. Not even over hyping it, being serious.

I'm not saying this is the best possible way to utilize the Jaguar, but this is a good way to gauge what it's capable of now that's he's important and grants aoe stealth. Like kitten his f2 even allows you to stealth yourself when you're in downstate. That's some highly controversial debatable stuff going on there.

[Vancho.8750]

All the ranger builds I see are way too tanky without using their active defenses, even the 'glassier' ones feel like they don't even need to dodge my attacks. Ranger actually takes less damage than the heavy classes. Its mostly due to the boon access prot, stability whatnot, its boon beast all over again. Always though ranger should be the agile dexterity dodge based 'fighter" type while warrior was the one get punched shrug it off type, but for some reason that switched over and ranger uses more passive defensives while warrior uses more active ones.

Condi Reaper should have stayed dead and power way to go since you can double up on passive defenses along the active ones (corrupts, weakness, blinds) with condi. Condi should have been focused on scorge and harbinger and core, should have reworked scourge and harbinger skills to not be kitten OP to a point where they have to fudge their numbers.

Guardian QOL stuff should not have ruined the counter play we had against them, like removing the movement reduction on whirling wrath on gs. Anet should do something about their elite skills cause most are unpickable or too niche while renewed focus is the default pick cause its busted by comparison.

 Thief I think they managed to balance the damage on DD but it still has the issue of not being able to punish them for kittening up so its still unkillable. DE mechanics are kitten and it still does not use Kneel that is supposed to be big damage big vulnerability  phase but DE does kitten ton of damage without kneeling, huge range and huge mobility is terrible design, the steal traits that proc from the mark is also kitten since its free procs, while steal even though is non telegraphed kitten puts the thief in the melee danger zone.

All the kittening proc traits on Engi, every time that engi has big meta build its always explode someone with procs from its kitten.

Warrior staff should have been just support weapon that scales for support and not be better shield sword/mace for sidnoding.

Mesmer and Ele have the same issue of having timer to actually do damage to them. Mesmer less so these days but its still kitten to get insta AOE dazed 3 times in a row.
Ele weapons skills should be supposedly weaker then other profession skills since they have 4 bars to use, but sure as kitten don't feel like it.

Rev is constantly bugged, sometimes in a positive way sometimes in a negative way, Vindicator dodge is still stupid and the animation is still bugged and broken. All the specs are Shiro assassin and the tank elite that supports it. 

[Gotejjeken.1267]

12 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

The reason why the 15k health doesn't even matter, is because this pet will function the best off of variants that run nature magic so the pet is constantly getting every buff that the ranger is getting. Essentially it will constantly have prot/regen/fury/25 might/if not constant direct heals from the ranger. He aint gonna be squishy. It will at least be as tanky as a Mech, and able to be swapped before death every 15s.

This honestly feels like you have a 2nd player +ing you on a node. Not even over hyping it, being serious.

Again, they changed nothing with Jaguar (since 2013) other than removing Stalking and adding stealth to the ranger.  

What you speak of here has nothing to do with the stealth to the ranger, you are literally saying a cat pet with all modifiers untouched is now OP based on...traitlines we've had for years? Even the change from Stalking to stealth happened in November of 2023 and now it's OP? 

Cats are still super squishy.  I'm like 7-3 so far in solo 3v3 matches using nothing but cat and smokescale, and cat dies just as fast as it always did.  The stealth helps, yes, but you are definitely overhyping the pet based purely on the stealth aspect. 

I assure you top rangers didn't somehow miss how OP Jaguar is for almost 8 months.  

 

Edited June 28 by Gotejjeken.1267

[Sahne.6950]

16 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Buffing Jaguar in the way that they did was.. quite the buff. It isn't just "stealthing the ranger" that's the issue. Look at everything it does now: Stalk - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) +375 ferocity and +25% crit chance that stacks with fury for the Jaguar. This primes the pet to land a massive Bite (feline) - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) and then follow with very heavy autos.

This is such a heavy buff that it will make Core Ranger viable. You could now run any archetype based around wild/nature/beast, to make sure the Jaguar is getting all the buffs from the Ranger, like might & fury & quick, and the Ranger could just roll pure tanky and let that Jaguar deal overly heavy damage after it primes the F2 Stalk. All you'd need to do is run cheese & immob & CC to lock people down and that Jaguar is going to be dangerous, even on tanky archetypes.

Now when we are talking DPS oriented stuff involving marksmanship, than Jaguar buff is gonna reimplement fat oneshots again.

 

This is a refreshingly objective observation right there.

Take my upvotes, i couldnt have said it better.

Edited June 28 by Sahne.6950

[arazoth.7290]

7 hours ago, Vancho.8750 said:

 

Rev is constantly bugged, sometimes in a positive way sometimes in a negative way, Vindicator dodge is still stupid and the animation is still bugged and broken. All the specs are Shiro assassin and the tank elite that supports it. 

bugs taking forever to fix 😂. And tank elite, you mean urn? Because Urn was pretty hard nerfed.

Edited June 28 by arazoth.7290

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

8 hours ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Again, they changed nothing with Jaguar (since 2013) other than removing Stalking and adding stealth to the ranger.  

What you speak of here has nothing to do with the stealth to the ranger, you are literally saying a cat pet with all modifiers untouched is now OP based on...traitlines we've had for years? Even the change from Stalking to stealth happened in November of 2023 and now it's OP?

I think you're misreading into what I'm saying here. I'm trying to say something in few words instead of writing a text-wall.

What I'm saying is that adding "stealths the ranger" is comboing an effect that is making the Jaguar overly important for how powerful its consistent dps pressure is. It isn't like other pets such as Drake, that have 1x attack worth trying to land. Everything the Jaguar does is very high consistent dps that requires little to no skill coordination to benefit from. It doesn't need to align the stars for a moment to combo a good maul with marks mod enhanced tail swipe. You simply only need to let the Jaguar auto attack.

In the past, Jaguar wasn't important because it lacked utility, and utility has always been more important to bring over pet AI dps. Smokescale & Gazelle & Ibolga ect ect. These are all testimony to what I'm saying. The smoke, the mobility, the CCs, these have always been more important, but things are changing. They are adding so much boon creep to the game in weird places. In the case of Ranger, I'm not so sure you've identified yet how monstrous something like a Jaguar can be when it's following a wild/nature/beast Ranger that's just spamming boons on it 100% of the time, and then you buff stalk. Yes, the Jaguar always had damage mods, but the difference between then and now is that you couldn't just casually maintain 25 might, fury, quickness, and a bunch of defensive buffs on it with nearly 100% uptime. And now that Ranger Spear is a kit entirely designed around opening these Untamed ambush-like skills from stealth that all hit as hard as maul and are unblockable or land CCs, Jaguar toting this kind of casual dps output while also bringing the stealth utility to allow the Ranger instant access to the ambush side of the spear skills + a quick detarget, is very very strong, considering the stealth Ranger already has in other places.

I've just been mostly testing this on Core Ranger, which is already viable, telling you right now. But when you begin crossing this spear/cat thing into Untamed with normal ambush skills mixed with spear ambush skills, on top of the blast it gets with unleash on top of smoke fields and w/e other leaps it has, it starts getting crazy. Then we're also talking about Druid variants which also have easy access to stealth on demand due to celestial shadow and CA#3 blast. Now we're looking a situation where, by running Untamed or Druid + Smokescale + Jaguar + LB#3 or anything with leaps "which is almost every weapon it has including spear" the stealth detarget potential and abillity to access spear ambush skills that all hit as hard as maul, starts making Ranger play look as stealth heavy as a Thief. The only difference is the Ranger hits twice as hard and is 4x tankier.

All of this ^ aside, whether any of it ends up actually being good or not, all I'm trying to point out is that Jaguar is capable of insanely high damage output that is now actually practical to use due to all the aforementioned points.

Watch this video of what it can do by itself during a 10s burst. I was not exaggerating when I said it feels like an actual player showed up to help + with you. Imagine the possibilities here, if the Ranger joined in with mace/mace/hammer to lock down for the Jaguar, or w/e other setups could be used with this. Imagine what's going to happen in the lower tiers when every casual player figures out they can play 100% passive-defense and just let the cat dish the damage.

It may not be effective in higher tiered AT play, but I guarantee you this will create Rifle Mech like QQ within the lower tiers. It drops the indestructible golem to 68% health in a 10s burst, by itself:

 

Edited June 28 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[Gotejjeken.1267]

1 hour ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

It may not be effective in higher tiered AT play, but I guarantee you this will create Rifle Mech like QQ within the lower tiers. It drops the indestructible golem to 68% health in a 10s burst, by itself:

 

A 10s burst?

Ok, I read through it, understand the points about it wrecking silvers, but really don't think 10s bursts are a solid point to be trying to already ask for nerfs about.  

Cats have always been high DPS, squishy, and nature magic has always made pets tankier with the boon share.  Going to have to agree to disagree that more people are going to care about the pet now that it reveals itself when attacking instead of attacking in pure stealth for 6s like it has for the past 10 years.  

[Endo.1652]

Say it how it is Trevie Boi!

Say. It. How. It. Is.

[Vancho.8750]

8 hours ago, arazoth.7290 said:

bugs taking forever to fix 😂. And tank elite, you mean urn? Because Urn was pretty hard nerfed.

Tank elite as in tank elite spec, as in all 3 elite specs are taken for their defensives and are not the main thing(at one point in time), while taking a backseat to Shiro. Basically the specs don't matter what they do, cause only Shiro defines it and you change them to whichever tanks better at this time. Rev is the worst designed profession in the game even though the core idea is great, because of the restrictions on it lets Anet do whatever they want to make with it, but don't do kitten with the concept.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

23 minutes ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

A 10s burst?

Yup. The point is that it isn't something like a Tail Swipe that if you avoid it, all damage is negated for the next 16-20s until it tries it again. When you have consistent fast paced autos pumping damage like that, it turns into a situation where (A) there isn't a telegraph of any one skill you can watch to avoid because it's all pumping large damage, leading to (B) needing to just avoid the Jaguar in general, which sounds a lot easier to do than it actually is, when you're trying to hold a cap on a side vs. ranger and he's locking you down with CCs & immobs.

The thing is, that's just the 10s burst. It still maintains about 60% of that paced damage in between Sic Em/Stalk procs. The other thing to consider, is what happens when the Ranger also starts attacking? Do I really need to make a video after the first, to show how an Unga Bunga with this pet could kill the indestructible golem in about 3 seconds with quickness? After viewing that DPS output from the Jaguar, then imagining that paired with mace/mace/hammer, we both know 3s is not far off from what would be happening there.

If you add up the numbers in that video, the Jaguar is dealing 25,646 damage in 10s by itself with autos, no marks-mods included. This is 2,564 damage per second. This is A LOT of pressure coming off a pet. That's comparable to if you fought a Vindicator that was firing Spear of Archemorus - Guild Wars 2 Wiki (GW2W) at you every 1 second for 10 seconds and he didn't have to use energy to do it.

Now if we start incorporating marks-mods & GS into this, it gets silly. The largest strike in the 10s video comes off the Jaguar's "bite" and it lands a 4,727 strike. So if we run Untamed "which can push and use bite exactly when it wants to trigger it" and run the old gimmick of "hit with the interrupt to trigger MOC, do w/e it is you do to trigger fury for Remorseless, and then begin your Maul to trigger AOO at the same time you push for Jag to use Bite" Then we're looking at that 4,727 strike turning into 4,727 + 25% = 5,908, then the next modifier 5,908 + 25% = 7385, then the next modifier 7385 + 25% = 9231. That bite is on an 8s CD btw. So you get to use it once with all mods active, then a 2nd time with no Stalk/Sic Em, and when it rolls around for 3rd use, you have all your mods to pop again. And again, he aint a Drake. This thing's autos are super dangerous. Even if you whiff on the marks-mod bite, this thing is slapping around 2564 damage per second with autos.

Thing is, you don't even need the big Untamed marks-mod strikes. Like I said before, you could run some cheesy 100% over-defensive build designed to spam CCs & immobs at opponents, and that Jaguar alone would chew their *** down when they couldn't move with that kind of DPS output.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Ok, I read through it, understand the points about it wrecking silvers, but really don't think 10s bursts are a solid point to be trying to already ask for nerfs about.

Reread. I never said anything about nerfing it. I simply pointed out the damage/utility potential of what we got going on here, because it will need to be watched.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Cats have always been high DPS, squishy, and nature magic has always made pets tankier with the boon share.  Going to have to agree to disagree that more people are going to care about the pet now that it reveals itself when attacking instead of attacking in pure stealth for 6s like it has for the past 10 years. 

I already explained this.

The cat now also stealthing the Ranger, is why it's viable now. Because this grants a fast detarget/reposition for the Ranger, on top of all the other stealths it already has, which when compounded, starts to breach into "Thief level stealth capabilities" which is just not something that should be happening on Ranger. And if that spear ends up being good, that extra stealth is just another stealth to help it keep gaining access to those special ambush skills. IMO it's looking like spear might be the first thing we've seen that actually replaces longbow in its purpose and is a straight upgrade. The only thing longbow will be better at is its range, and maybe specifically on Soulbeast for use of OWP for many procs on Rapid Fire/Barrage. But on Ranger / Druid / Untamed, that spear is really strong so far. It even grants a ground target leap like jump shot. This new jump with GS3 allows for a loooooot of kiting & positiong & rotational power if you well know map tricks.

 

[Vancho.8750]

Kinda forgot to add that Snap Pull on Staff warrior should work like Grasping Darkness on Necro GS, cause changing the direction of the telegraph when you want kind makes the whole point of the telegraph pointless.

Telegraphing IN the game is quite kitten ngl.

Edited June 28 by Vancho.8750

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

50 minutes ago, Vancho.8750 said:

Kinda forgot to add that Snap Pull on Staff warrior should work like Grasping Darkness on Necro GS, cause changing the direction of the telegraph when you want kind makes the whole point of the telegraph pointless.

Telegraphing IN the game is quite kitten ngl.

No thanks. 

If you see the indicator expect it to be under you if you're the only one around.

The last thing we need is more handholding shackle kitten

[Flowki.7194]

8 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

I think you're misreading into what I'm saying here. I'm trying to say something in few words instead of writing a text-wall.

What I'm saying is that adding "stealths the ranger" is comboing an effect that is making the Jaguar overly important for how powerful its consistent dps pressure is. It isn't like other pets such as Drake, that have 1x attack worth trying to land. Everything the Jaguar does is very high consistent dps that requires little to no skill coordination to benefit from. It doesn't need to align the stars for a moment to combo a good maul with marks mod enhanced tail swipe. You simply only need to let the Jaguar auto attack.

In the past, Jaguar wasn't important because it lacked utility, and utility has always been more important to bring over pet AI dps. Smokescale & Gazelle & Ibolga ect ect. These are all testimony to what I'm saying. The smoke, the mobility, the CCs, these have always been more important, but things are changing. They are adding so much boon creep to the game in weird places. In the case of Ranger, I'm not so sure you've identified yet how monstrous something like a Jaguar can be when it's following a wild/nature/beast Ranger that's just spamming boons on it 100% of the time, and then you buff stalk. Yes, the Jaguar always had damage mods, but the difference between then and now is that you couldn't just casually maintain 25 might, fury, quickness, and a bunch of defensive buffs on it with nearly 100% uptime. And now that Ranger Spear is a kit entirely designed around opening these Untamed ambush-like skills from stealth that all hit as hard as maul and are unblockable or land CCs, Jaguar toting this kind of casual dps output while also bringing the stealth utility to allow the Ranger instant access to the ambush side of the spear skills + a quick detarget, is very very strong, considering the stealth Ranger already has in other places.

I've just been mostly testing this on Core Ranger, which is already viable, telling you right now. But when you begin crossing this spear/cat thing into Untamed with normal ambush skills mixed with spear ambush skills, on top of the blast it gets with unleash on top of smoke fields and w/e other leaps it has, it starts getting crazy. Then we're also talking about Druid variants which also have easy access to stealth on demand due to celestial shadow and CA#3 blast. Now we're looking a situation where, by running Untamed or Druid + Smokescale + Jaguar + LB#3 or anything with leaps "which is almost every weapon it has including spear" the stealth detarget potential and abillity to access spear ambush skills that all hit as hard as maul, starts making Ranger play look as stealth heavy as a Thief. The only difference is the Ranger hits twice as hard and is 4x tankier.

All of this ^ aside, whether any of it ends up actually being good or not, all I'm trying to point out is that Jaguar is capable of insanely high damage output that is now actually practical to use due to all the aforementioned points.

Watch this video of what it can do by itself during a 10s burst. I was not exaggerating when I said it feels like an actual player showed up to help + with you. Imagine the possibilities here, if the Ranger joined in with mace/mace/hammer to lock down for the Jaguar, or w/e other setups could be used with this. Imagine what's going to happen in the lower tiers when every casual player figures out they can play 100% passive-defense and just let the cat dish the damage.

It may not be effective in higher tiered AT play, but I guarantee you this will create Rifle Mech like QQ within the lower tiers. It drops the indestructible golem to 68% health in a 10s burst, by itself:

 

 

It's like the new ranger dev is a thief main?

[Gotejjeken.1267]

6 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

<stuff>

The cat now also stealthing the Ranger, is why it's viable now. Because this grants a fast detarget/reposition for the Ranger, on top of all the other stealths it already has, which when compounded, starts to breach into "Thief level stealth capabilities" which is just not something that should be happening on Ranger.

 

I'll try once more--use any other cat, tell me how well that goes.  If the answer is 'not well' then it's not a cat problem, it's purely a stealth access problem.  If they nerf the cat to not stealth the ranger, it goes back to being unused as it doesn't have the survivability of Gazelle, Drake (or smokescale, but leaving that aside for comparison's sake).  

In other words, use spear with another cat that doesn't have Stalk (literally any other cat).  You still have your stealth opportunity in spear #5, so you will still say that cat in general is 'busted' now, right? 

Again, I highly doubt all of us missed how impactful the Stalking change was back in November 23' because of one new extra stealth to the ranger.  You talk about bunker builds that can use Jaguar and those don't use stealth and also haven't changed (except getting nerfed when maces did) --so how are we just discovering Jaguar is busted now? Why haven't bunkers been using Jaguar for 8 months if it's really the Fury uptime that's the issue here? 

If not just Jaguar but cat is busted, then so are birds--they do similar DPS.  In fact, Bird F3 takes off any movement impairing condition, gives swiftness, etc. which you can now do in stealth thanks to spear #5 charges.  Meaning your bird is your 'second player' and you also get to kite way easier than a simple stealth from cat.  Is this OP?

You also say ranger shouldn't be stealthing as much as thief, but I could swear you advocated for burst ranger and were quite miffed when we got nerfs to OWP, UT, whatever which took that out of the meta.  If ranger shouldn't be stealthing and has very limited stability to bunker with...what exactly is its role? 

Regardless, need to see it in actual match play--anything is OP against silvers, so would be nice to see it in a gold setting or above.  Since we won't get 5v5 ranked before spear beta is done, can just do it in the 3v3.  

Edited June 28 by Gotejjeken.1267

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

I'll try once more--use any other cat, tell me how well that goes

The Jaguar clearly has much more dps due to Stalk +375 feroc & +25% crit buff for 6s.

It also has actual utility now due to ability to stealth the Ranger.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

If the answer is 'not well' then it's not a cat problem, it's purely a stealth access problem

The stealth is questionable but that's only a portion of what's going on here. The dps buff from Stalk is enormous.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

In other words, use spear with another cat that doesn't have Stalk (literally any other cat).  You still have your stealth opportunity in spear #5, so you will still say that cat in general is 'busted' now, right?

The spear5 requires actual cast time so it can't be used instantly for a detarget in the same way the Jaguar stealth is used. IE: you mess up in a 1v1 against some build and get hard CC'd for the next 2-3 seconds. The Jaguar stealth can be used while you are CC'd to the floor and you can use it to tag a detarget, which against certain classes/attacks, makes it so they can't even damage you while you're stealthed. Good example would be most of the Power Shatter GS chain, it just can't aim anything to attack you at all if you're in stealth. It isn't designed to blind cleave like a Warrior Arc Slice.

The Jaguar stealth can also be used on yourself when you are in downstate. This means that Ranger not only has the most survivable downstate kit, but it now also gets stealth like a Thief or Mesmer downstate. This is actually an incredibly strong mechanic to add to Ranger downstate. It helps you stall death even longer than normal or in some cases, gives you the detarget you need to make sure the pet doesn't get CC'd off you, granting a 2s lead on your pet revive before anyone can stop it.

I never said the cats were busted. I simply pointed out the damage potential of 2024 boon creep + Stalk, in light of the pet also now bringing useful utility in the form of extra Ranger stealth.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Again, I highly doubt all of us missed how impactful the Stalking change was back in November 23' because of one new extra stealth to the ranger

We all did though. It was a sleeper resource that didn't have all the pieces in the right places yet to become useful at the time.

But now it is.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

If not just Jaguar but cat is busted, then so are birds--they do similar DPS

Few things:

1. Birds can't stealth you, and they don't have any other important utility whatsoever. This is why they don't get used.
2. Birds have damage, yes. But it isn't as good as Jaguar burst after he primes Stalk. +375 feroc and +25% crit that stacks with fury for 6s is kind of a big deal.
3. Bird damage also looks a lot better on paper than it is in application. The problem with bird skills is every good attack they have makes these telegraphs where they fly up in a crescent during those cast before they strike. When you see a bird fly up into the air for 1/2s or 3/4s before the strike it kind of shouts "dodge". The cats don't have that problem.

The birds are not OP. They're just a liability tbh. The attacks have problems hitting players who pay attention, and they bring little to no utility.

 

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

You also say ranger shouldn't be stealthing as much as thief, but I could swear you advocated for burst ranger and were quite miffed when we got nerfs to OWP, UT, whatever which took that out of the meta.  If ranger shouldn't be stealthing and has very limited stability to bunker with...what exactly is its role?

You guys always misquote the **** out of everything I say. Sort of like how 3x now in this very thread, you've made responses that makes it look like "Trev is saying cats are busted and need to be nerfed" and that is just not true. The only thing I've said and have pointed out 3x now, is that Jaguar is definitely going to see use due to it now being able to a useful utility "Ranger Stealth", which is a requirement to bring utility on pets, or a Ranger build can't do what it needs to survive to be able to be viable in higher tiered play. And that this is the first time we've seen a pet with this much DPS potential, be granted an important utility like Ranger stealthing. I stated very specifically that "it needs to be watched" because this is truly something new and will be adding a lot more damage into Ranger builds that are actually viable and not just gimmicks that have glaring weaknesses.

I don't understand where you're going with the Ranger role thing. Ranger is one of the classes that actually can do every role. It can roam, it can team fight, it can side node, it can support. And in wvw, it is definitely one of the alpha roamers.

1 hour ago, Gotejjeken.1267 said:

Regardless, need to see it in actual match play--anything is OP against silvers, so would be nice to see it in a gold setting or above.  Since we won't get 5v5 ranked before spear beta is done, can just do it in the 3v3.

I'll record some of this tonight. This rando Cat Ranger build I'm running is turning out to be very strong.

Edited June 28 by Trevor Boyer.6524

[DivineDreaming.7206]

I went to school with a trevor in los angeles, small world,  nice list

[Gotejjeken.1267]

 

8 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

You guys always misquote the **** out of everything I say. Sort of like how 3x now in this very thread, you've made responses that makes it look like "Trev is saying cats are busted and need to be nerfed" and that is just not true. The only thing I've said and have pointed out 3x now, is that Jaguar is definitely going to see use due to it now being able to a useful utility "Ranger Stealth", which is a requirement to bring utility on pets, or a Ranger build can't do what it needs to survive to be able to be viable in higher tiered play.

 

On 6/27/2024 at 11:54 AM, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

The reason why the 15k health doesn't even matter, is because this pet will function the best off of variants that run nature magic so the pet is constantly getting every buff that the ranger is getting. Essentially it will constantly have prot/regen/fury/25 might/if not constant direct heals from the ranger. He aint gonna be squishy. It will at least be as tanky as a Mech, and able to be swapped before death every 15s.

I'm in-game testing it right now on a Core Ranger build and it is honestly OP dude. 

That's where I'm getting you think cats are OP because of NM, not sure that's misquoting.  

I think we both agree the strong part here is the stealth to Ranger--the part I think we disagree on is that I think cat is squishy and without the buff to stealth ranger no one is using Jaguar even with buffed Stalk from 8 months ago.

Will also agree spear adds another level of power creep to this, but considering ranger has few ports or gap closers to use it with, not sure it's out of line with everything else.  Wish beta characters saved some kind of reward progress so I was more incentivized to try it--but from quick WvW test it already seems as if it is a great secondary weapon.  

[arazoth.7290]

1 hour ago, DivineDreaming.7206 said:

I went to school with a trevor in los angeles, small world,  nice list

😮

[Burnfall.9573]

On 6/28/2024 at 4:49 PM, Flowki.7194 said:

 

It's like the new ranger dev is a thief main?

 

Thief Profession Dev. is strictly Thief Profession and has been since the game was released. 

Unlike other Professions accessibility to Stealth Mechanics, Thief Profession Stealth Mechanic remain the Gaming Industry most Toxic Bad Design Mechanic ever existed in a so called Competitive game.

With being intentionally designed to be exploited and gaining unfair advantages to bypass gaming rules and policies of hacking, exploit, grieving, bullying, stalking, harassment etc...

More importantly, designed specifically to break Healthy Competitive Game Design rules willfully and intentionally.

This is what makes Guid Wars 2 Stealth Mechanic the gaming industry most Dangerous mechanic to ever  exist with having 13 years history to back it up.

I Know I went off a bit but I had to let it out.

As always, any Professions who has access to Stealth Mechanic especially Mesmer Profession will be used as a Scapegoat for Thief Profession Stealth Mechanic 

[EnderzShadow.2506]

On 6/26/2024 at 1:58 AM, DanAlcedo.3281 said:

I would say it's because your title implies you wanting to start a discussion. 

But instead, all you did is a list that has no rime or reason until you are like 70% in and it finally clicks that this is a ranking of how strong the spec's are. From strong to weak. 

Which you simply didn't state that this would be the purpose of the list. 

Without context, which we have find ourselves, your post doesn't make sense.

Note: I don't disagree with you. Just the way the information is presented could need some work. 

 

He asked for opinions/discussion and also shared his own.

It's very similar to RL convo with a friend. "Hey Joe, what's your favorite sci fi movies of all time?. Mine are x, y and z"

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

Yeah, each day that goes on, I'm really rallying that Vindicator is the primarily dumb spec right now.

It seriously needs a nerf to its damage output. IMO it is Death Drop. It just has too much counteroffensive pressure for what it is.

Death Drop could stand to see at least a 25% cut to its damage output.