"Just Kill the Pets" or "Just Dodge"

[Abyssisis.3971]

If you die to a ranger’s pet, it just means you got outplayed by a dumb scripted AI. Haha

[Evodium.6058]

Monkey prot holo mains complaining about rangers and ranger pets being aids with the gs bug too. At least ranger dips in and out of the sidenode meta when prot holo has been there forever until unkillable scrapper was a thing

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Eurantien.4632 said:You don't have to dodge rapid fire or maul. You can eat those and be just fine.

dood damn. that's some deep kool aid. not everyone is running knights amulet with protection readily available.

[storm.3120]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:You don't have to dodge rapid fire or maul. You can eat those and be just fine.

dood kitten. that's some deep kool aid. not everyone is running knights amulet with protection readily available.More like not everyone is a prot holo.Degeneranger main doing his stuff...

[zoopop.5630]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:You don't have to dodge rapid fire or maul. You can eat those and be just fine.

dood kitten. that's some deep kool aid. not everyone is running knights amulet with protection readily available.

:#

[anduriell.6280]

@"RisenHowl.2419" said:

yet here's a video, with the dps meter, showing pets doing 2/3rds of the total damage.

pets shouldn't have power coefficients higher than anything players can access. Especially not when they have higher stat values than any players and access to higher modifiers than any players can achieve. I'm not sure how to make this more clear to you- ranger pets are massive outliers in the current meta because they were not adjusted like every other class was.

Yeh wow punce so much damage. I seriously think your dps meter is not working as intended.

Seriously dude next time show the chat log with the damage received, and also learn to play. No dodges no heals you would last 10s against any other class still manage to last over 1 minute against a ranger.

[Eurantien.4632]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:You don't have to dodge rapid fire or maul. You can eat those and be just fine.

dood kitten. that's some deep kool aid. not everyone is running knights amulet with protection readily available.

Lol are you not able to figure out how squishy someone is? In competitive 5v5 they're running knights. In ranked if they aren't they'll just lose the ranger mirror match up. Or they'll just get killed by someone who knows how to kite the pet and just kill the ranger. You can see in Shadowfall's and Naru's perspective that demo v demo, prot holo just kinda dominated the match up.

[CutesySylveon.8290]

@Eurantien.4632 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@zoopop.5630 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:

@zoopop.5630 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:@zoopop.5630

Soulbeast does not have enough damage to meme a prot holo in a fight btw.

You're going to have to run Sic Em + OWP but the Prot Holo can literally just SH4 reflect the Rapid Fire. When the Soulbeast stows so he stops shooting himself and uses Smoke Assault, the Prot Holo SH5 will just stun him out of it, toss the shield to daze any followup damage or CCs the ranger uses because he doesn't have any stab. If the ranger is using Dolyak Stance for some reason, SH4 will still reflect the Rapid Fire, SH5 will still block the Smoke Assault, dodge once to avoid the Takedown and run away for a second so you're out of range of the Worldly Impact. Then all you have to do is land CC the SLB once to get him to blow his remaining stunbreak and then Slick Shoes his GS if he tries to Swoop or GS4 block, CC chain or Flash Shell the longbow to prevent LB3 stealth or knockback. Etc. etc.

But ranger sustained damage is even worse on SLB so if you didn't kill him with the big combo then you're definitely not going to be able to box the Prot Holo for very long.

All of sudden unblockable attacks or dmg from pers don’t matter?

Ok.

Just because you die to soulbeast doesn't mean prot holos like drydude, or helio, or naru do. This is a l2p issue.

It’s a l2p when you have two monkeys riding each other on the forums.

If you are legit dying or losing to a demo amulet prot holo should probably consider getting off ranger and Stop telling everyone it’s a “l2p” issue.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/596294328?t=03h46m32s

Tell me what else I could've done against Naru's Prot Holo during this match. It's kind of interesting how I'm infinitely more pressured than him at any given moment and the most I could hope to do is keep the point neutral.

I mean pre-patch I might've been able to use GS4 more often to help me trade with a build like this but hey whaddya know... they literally increased the cooldown by 10 seconds (almost double!) and look at how well it's doing now! /s

@CutesySylveon.8290 You might like this. There's a point where the ranger lands Hilt Bash and procs Moment of Clarity and Remorseless so maul will do 75% more dmg than normal. It lands and only does 5.4k. Normally that'd do 3.1k. Not a big chunk of your health.

From the engis PoV thats the only thing that even chunks his hp. And he just heals back to full.

You lost all credibility at this point. 5.4k isn't a big chunk of your health? That's more that 25% of a 20k hp spec, and it can be done again in 4 seconds like you said, assuming you didn't get hit with the first one, slightly less damage or not, since we're supposed to just eat it along with the skill that resets it.

'Not a big chunk of your health.' '..only thing that even chunks his hp.' Literally the NEXT sentence. Not everyone is running holo, stop trying to use this as baseline for how everything stands up to ranger.

[Eurantien.4632]

@CutesySylveon.8290 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:

@zoopop.5630 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:

@zoopop.5630 said:

@shadowpass.4236 said:@zoopop.5630

Soulbeast does not have enough damage to meme a prot holo in a fight btw.

You're going to have to run Sic Em + OWP but the Prot Holo can literally just SH4 reflect the Rapid Fire. When the Soulbeast stows so he stops shooting himself and uses Smoke Assault, the Prot Holo SH5 will just stun him out of it, toss the shield to daze any followup damage or CCs the ranger uses because he doesn't have any stab. If the ranger is using Dolyak Stance for some reason, SH4 will still reflect the Rapid Fire, SH5 will still block the Smoke Assault, dodge once to avoid the Takedown and run away for a second so you're out of range of the Worldly Impact. Then all you have to do is land CC the SLB once to get him to blow his remaining stunbreak and then Slick Shoes his GS if he tries to Swoop or GS4 block, CC chain or Flash Shell the longbow to prevent LB3 stealth or knockback. Etc. etc.

But ranger sustained damage is even worse on SLB so if you didn't kill him with the big combo then you're definitely not going to be able to box the Prot Holo for very long.

All of sudden unblockable attacks or dmg from pers don’t matter?

Ok.

Just because you die to soulbeast doesn't mean prot holos like drydude, or helio, or naru do. This is a l2p issue.

It’s a l2p when you have two monkeys riding each other on the forums.

If you are legit dying or losing to a demo amulet prot holo should probably consider getting off ranger and Stop telling everyone it’s a “l2p” issue.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/596294328?t=03h46m32s

Tell me what else I could've done against Naru's Prot Holo during this match. It's kind of interesting how I'm infinitely more pressured than him at any given moment and the most I could hope to do is keep the point neutral.

I mean pre-patch I might've been able to use GS4 more often to help me trade with a build like this but hey whaddya know... they literally increased the cooldown by 10 seconds (almost double!) and look at how well it's doing now! /s

@CutesySylveon.8290 You might like this. There's a point where the ranger lands Hilt Bash and procs Moment of Clarity and Remorseless so maul will do 75% more dmg than normal. It lands and only does 5.4k. Normally that'd do 3.1k. Not a big chunk of your health.

From the engis PoV thats the only thing that even chunks his hp. And he just heals back to full.

You lost all credibility at this point. 5.4k isn't a big chunk of your health? That's more that 25% of a 20k hp spec, and it can be done again in 4 seconds like you said, assuming you didn't get hit with the first one, slightly less damage or not, since we're supposed to just eat it along with the skill that resets it.

'Not a big chunk of your health.' '..only thing that even chunks his hp.' Literally the NEXT sentence. Not everyone is running holo, stop trying to use this as baseline for how everything stands up to ranger.

You can't do that much damage every 4.75s. You can only do that after a CC that's an interrupt.

Normally itd do about 3.1k and that's to a demo amulet with a demo amulet. Most rangers will go tankier and do less damage. There are also healing skills in this game and a lot of traits that provide some kind of regenerative sustain. Just like you can see in the video. Naru sustains back up just fine.

Yeah, I've said in other threads other things handle ranger pretty well.Necro can do itCondi thief with thieves guildSage weaverZerker LR weaverCore guardburn guardCuilan scrapperMenders war stalemates itRenegodSymbolbrand (especially sage)

Mesmer doesn't existAnd not gonna list ranger again

Looks like everything has an option!

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

@Eurantien.4632 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Eurantien.4632 said:You don't have to dodge rapid fire or maul. You can eat those and be just fine.

dood kitten. that's some deep kool aid. not everyone is running knights amulet with protection readily available.

Lol are you not able to figure out how squishy someone is? In competitive 5v5 they're running knights. In ranked if they aren't they'll just lose the ranger mirror match up. Or they'll just get killed by someone who knows how to kite the pet and just kill the ranger. You can see in Shadowfall's and Naru's perspective that demo v demo, prot holo just kinda dominated the match up.

^ He's right on this one guys. Core Ranger sucks vs. other power specs without Knight's on. It's the stacked tough values that carry the Core Ranger and the play style.

The way that stacked toughness works is interesting, mathematically. Here is the actual damage equation:

• Damage done = (Weapon strength) Power (skill-specific coefficient) / (target's Armor)

So for those who don't quite understand the idea behind mathematical diminishing returns, what happens here is that: "Adding +100 toughness when you already have low toughness/armor is mitigating a lot less damage per that 100 toughness, than if you added +100 toughness after you already had high toughness/armor." So in other words, +100 toughness is worth crap investment at first, but if a build is able to get away with an enormous toughness stack, the effects per +100 toughness obtained begins to create this wildly exponential bell curve of effectiveness. THIS EFFECT IS NOT A LINEAR TRADEOFF for damage mitigation, it is exponential. It works very similar to how the damage equation is messed up in GW2, how it adds things multiplicatively rather than additively. That multiplicative stacking of damage is what was turning an otherwise 6k Maul on a Soulbeast into a 40k single strike, and it is what's turning a 3-4k tiger pounce into a 10k pounce. The way toughness stacking works, is extremely similar.

To give a more tangible explanation that most people will be able to recognize and agree on, for those who have recently experimented with running Core Ranger setups, look at this way, and you know this is true:

1. Take the meta Core Ranger setup, but let's put Berserker Amulet on it and assume it is wearing Resistance Rune. This will be a total of: 2204 armor value. For those who have tried to take this road, they will know that even while running Marks/Wild/Beast with triple defense utilities, the Core Ranger while wearing Berserker can still be easily and very quickly downed by power damage. In some cases this setup can still get 2HKO or 3HKO.
2. Now take that same Core Ranger meta setup, but let's change Berserker to Demolisher. Now we have a total of: 2704 armor value. This is only a +22% increase in armor value from the Berserker setup. But strangely enough, that +22% increase in armor value will double the sustain factor of the Core Ranger. Those who have been playing Core Ranger setups lately, will know that this is true. 2HKO or 3HKO threat range on Berserker setup, will become more like 4HKO to 6HKO threat range on Demolisher.
3. NOW let's take Demolisher and turn it into Knight's. This will be a total of: 3404 armor value. This is a +25% increase in armor value from the Demolisher setup, and a +54% increase in armor value from the Berserker setup. So for only a +25% increase from Demolisher, it is again doubling the sustain factor from even Demolisher. 4HKO to 6HKO threat range from opponents begins to look more like 8HKO to 12HKO on Knight's, and that's if the Ranger is standing still face tanking. But the biggest thing to note here, is that from Berserker to Knight's, the armor stat difference is 2204 vs. 3404, which is only a +54% increase, yet the difference in sustain factor here is massive. It's the difference between dying in 2 to 3 hits, as opposed to 8 to 12 direct hits if you're pinned down and can't move. So for only a +54% increase in whole number armor value, the actual damage mitigation is quadrupling or more.

@"shadowpass.4236" had mentioned "remove the Knight's Amulet" and honestly I think he may have nailed down the real problem here when he said that. It's the Knight's Amulet that keeps birthing builds that are somehow super bunkers without even using heal stats. I think it is important that Arenanet acknowledges post DPS nerf patch, that toughness stacking is really really strong now. Might be time to remove Knight's Amulet.

And on the topic of just Core Ranger, the more I think about it, I don't think anything needs to be done to Core Ranger outside of removing Knight's Amulet. It really is largely the sustain that carries this build, not the pet damage.

[Eurantien.4632]

@Trevor Boyer.6524

I am under the impression stacking toughness has diminishing returns. Like if I start at 0 and i add 200 toughness I gain around 6% dmg reduction.+200 = 6% dmg reduction+400 = 12% dmg reduction+600 = 17.5% dmg reduction

Going from +400 to 600 a difference of 200 now has only 5.5% dmg reduction

Next +200 (+800 total) is diminished again to plus 5% more dmg reduction relative to that +600 total.

The thing is you just get the best effective health pool with knights than anything else because your heals have higher effective healing power than with menders due to healing power scaling nerfs and the existence of knights.

And you're not wrong. Without knights amulet the ranger cant just tank a point and dmg and all of a sudden it becomes wildly harder to hold a node, keep yourself alive, and keep your pet alive.

You basically have to choose 2 without knights vs good players.

[Moira Shalaar.5620]

@"Trevor Boyer.6524" said:Look man, say & suggest whatever you want. Just try to keep it factual so bandwagons don't get started and steer things into heavily unnecessary nerfs in the wrong places. You probably won't believe this, but Core Ranger is getting hit so hard with complaints right now, that I highly doubt it will remain viable after the next round of nerfing. And since they will be hitting CORE so hard, it will directly effect Soulbeast and Druid, which already C- tier or worse. We don't need further embellishment about how Ranger Pets are Raid Bosses.

I really appreciate your methodical, logical approach in trying to inject some reason to this "nerf ranger" rant, but honestly I don't think any of the anti-ranger crowd is going to be willing to listen and reflect in an objective manner. They WANT Ranger to be nerfed into oblivion. There seems to be a collective desire for Ranger to be unplayable in any sort of competitive arena.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

@Eurantien.4632 said:@Trevor Boyer.6524

I am under the impression stacking toughness has diminishing returns. Like if I start at 0 and i add 200 toughness I gain around 6% dmg reduction.+200 = 6% dmg reduction+400 = 12% dmg reduction+600 = 17.5% dmg reduction

Going from +400 to 600 a difference of 200 now has only 5.5% dmg reduction

Next +200 (+800 total) is diminished again to plus 5% more dmg reduction relative to that +600 total.

The thing is you just get the best effective health pool with knights than anything else because your heals have higher effective healing power than with menders due to healing power scaling nerfs and the existence of knights.

And you're not wrong. Without knights amulet the ranger cant just tank a point and dmg and all of a sudden it becomes wildly harder to hold a node, keep yourself alive, and keep your pet alive.

You basically have to choose 2 without knights vs good players.

Yeah you're right. What I was noticing with ballpark observation without running the numbers, is how the tough stacking effects the true value of heal skills, cycles, resets and gradual regeneration effects.

This here is a very realistic look at the diminished returns during the practical application of tough stacking:

• Let's use 2,000,000 as a number in the equation for (2,000,000) / Armor Value = damage taken. 2,000,000 inc damage is a pretty standard damage that is probably more often seen than any other number, roundabouts.
• So with Berserker, 2,000,000 / 2204 = 907 damage taken
• With Demo, 2,000,000 / 2704 = 759 damage taken. This is a +500 tough from Serk and lowers the damage taken by a difference of 168
• With Knight, 2,000,000 / 3404 = 587 damage taken. this is a +700 tough from Demo and lowers the damage taken by a difference of 152
• If we stacked a misc additional +900 tough on top of Knight for a 2,000,000 / 4304 = 464 damage taken, which is only a difference of 123 from Knight alone

The effect that I improperly explained in the first post, about how Serk > Demo > Knight goes from like 2-3HKO sustain to 4-6HKO sustain to 8-12HKO sustain, is mostly due to how heal value becomes seriously bloated with tough stacks and even greatly depreciates any necessity to run vitality.

What I mean by this is, considering a world of just power damage, what is the difference between 8k health pool or 16k health pool, if the toughness value is so high that you heal more whole number than the enemy can dish damage to you? Even if the heal output is equal to the damage being taken, the 8k health pool would suffice. Even if the opponent dealt slightly more damage than you were healing, it would surely take longer if you had 16k health to down you but it would take long enough with 8k health. At that point the vitality is only delaying defeat, not allowing a person mechanics to win. And even when considering condi, the same rules apply but only vs. condi cleanse and its usage. If you can cleanse nearly as frequently as the opponent can apply the condis, mixed with a bit of your heal, there is no difference between 8k or 16k health. If the opponent is dealing more condi damage than you can cleanse, he'll kill you faster if you had 8k health and a bit slower if you had 16k health, but it won't change the fact that he is going to eventually win. If you were the one who could cleanse condis as fast as he could apply them and your damage was higher than his ability to heal through it, it wouldn't matter if you had 8k or 16k health, you're going to eventually win.

My point being is to outline the great strength behind stacking damage mitigation in a game like this, especially after an intra-class wide massive nerf to everyone's damage. As much as I know some players would rather bite their tongues than admit this, things become much more broken & imbalanced during sustain heavy metas. We start getting builds that just win due to sheer attribute tied statistics. There is much more skill factor involved and ability to outplay others during high damage metas, where even would be bunkers are only delaying defeat, rather than becoming immune to it.

Look at how many builds began using Demo/Paladin/Knight/Resistance/Dolyak, directly after the big nerf. I'm certainly not crying OP at this stuff, but I really think it's important that all of the current participating forum users are able to identify to the degree that this high defensive value stacking is effecting the game right now and how it is enabling certain specs to do things that they probably shouldn't be doing. This way, maybe forum users can give some better feedback, rather than crying for nerfs in the wrong places. <- That is honestly the only thing I am concerned about, is all the bad feedback lately.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

ah, I see the game now. went from other ppl using knights now its the ranger using knights. brilliant! since everyone is using knights then this dingo dango math of 3k mauls and 4k pet attacks make sense now. many logics heff bin lernt.

[Revolution.5409]

@"Hex.2579" said:It's not that players cannot dodge, block, or play around with the skills mentioned above, it's that they're all on a the shortest possible cooldowns. That's why it's unbalanced and broken. Which is why I think they need to tweak ranger GS.

Have you ever seen a skill #2 on a 4s cd? Nope, only on ranger GS if traited. Other classes when they trait their weapons, the shortest is 8s cd.

Some examples.https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Chilling_Isolationhttps://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/True_Shothttps://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mighty_Blow

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Revolution.5409 said:

@"Hex.2579" said:It's not that players cannot dodge, block, or play around with the skills mentioned above, it's that they're all on a the shortest possible cooldowns. That's why it's unbalanced and broken. Which is why I think they need to tweak ranger GS.

Have you ever seen a skill #2 on a 4s cd? Nope, only on ranger GS if traited. Other classes when they trait their weapons, the shortest is 8s cd.

Some examples.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Chilling_Isolation

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/True_Shot

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mighty_Blow

seriously putting mighty blow into that list lol? those are all 8-10 sec cds that don't take away half of someones hp, and if for some reason they do the build is ultra meme. unlike ranger who can pack a lot more active defense, mobility, and stealth into their builds. no other class can buff their attacks with over +100% in damage mods. I've seriously never seen another group as entitled as rangers in any game, altho i'll admit I haven't exactly played many different ones.

[God.2708]

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:Look at how many builds began using Demo/Paladin/Knight/Resistance/Dolyak, directly after the big nerf. I'm certainly not crying OP at this stuff, but I really think it's important that all of the current participating forum users are able to identify to the degree that this high defensive value stacking is effecting the game right now and how it is enabling certain specs to do things that they probably shouldn't be doing. This way, maybe forum users can give some better feedback, rather than crying for nerfs in the wrong places. <- That is honestly the only thing I am concerned about, is all the bad feedback lately.

The thing I find fascinating is how many people complained/complain about it being a condi meta, when condition damage is what leaps as being the first response to someone stacking toughness like that. The ranger's condi clears are enough, but really nothing to write home about compared to some other classes builds, so it seems silly to approach it from that nerf angle. But the condi builds that are in the meta aren't really working vs it despite working against many other common things. Would a condi build that is more mobile than your typical condi herald/symbol brand need to emerge, or?

[Grimjack.8130]

@God.2708 said:

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:Look at how many builds began using Demo/Paladin/Knight/Resistance/Dolyak, directly after the big nerf. I'm certainly not crying OP at this stuff, but I really think it's important that all of the current participating forum users are able to identify to the degree that this high defensive value stacking is effecting the game right now and how it is enabling certain specs to do things that they probably shouldn't be doing.

This way, maybe forum users can give some better feedback, rather than crying for nerfs in the wrong places.

<- That is honestly the only thing I am concerned about, is all the bad feedback lately.

The thing I find fascinating is how many people complained/complain about it being a condi meta, when condition damage is what leaps as being the first response to someone stacking toughness like that. The ranger's condi clears are enough, but really nothing to write home about compared to some other classes builds, so it seems silly to approach it from that nerf angle. But the condi builds that are in the meta aren't really working vs it despite working against many other common things. Would a condi build that is more mobile than your typical condi herald/symbol brand need to emerge, or?

theres actually not enough condi in the meta, tbh i kinda want condi thief back in the game to check the knights amulet and lr weaver

[Revolution.5409]

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:

@Revolution.5409 said:

@"Hex.2579" said:It's not that players cannot dodge, block, or play around with the skills mentioned above, it's that they're all on a the shortest possible cooldowns. That's why it's unbalanced and broken. Which is why I think they need to tweak ranger GS.

Have you ever seen a skill #2 on a 4s cd? Nope, only on ranger GS if traited. Other classes when they trait their weapons, the shortest is 8s cd.

Some examples.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Chilling_Isolation

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/True_Shot

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mighty_Blow

seriously putting mighty blow into that list lol? those are all 8-10 sec cds that don't take away half of someones hp, and if for some reason they do the build is ultra meme. unlike ranger who can pack a lot more active defense, mobility, and stealth into their builds. no other class can buff their attacks with over +100% in damage mods. I've seriously never seen another group as entitled as rangers in any game, altho i'll admit I haven't exactly played many different ones.

He talked about CDs and I showed him that Maul isn't the only ability that has CDs less than 8 seconds.Herald and DH are both usable in this Meta.If other professions did not have equally strong skills we would have a Meta composed solely of Rangers, and this is not the case.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

@God.2708 said:

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:Look at how many builds began using Demo/Paladin/Knight/Resistance/Dolyak, directly after the big nerf. I'm certainly not crying OP at this stuff, but I really think it's important that all of the current participating forum users are able to identify to the degree that this high defensive value stacking is effecting the game right now and how it is enabling certain specs to do things that they probably shouldn't be doing.

This way, maybe forum users can give some better feedback, rather than crying for nerfs in the wrong places.

<- That is honestly the only thing I am concerned about, is all the bad feedback lately.

The thing I find fascinating is how many people complained/complain about it being a condi meta, when condition damage is what leaps as being the first response to someone stacking toughness like that. The ranger's condi clears are enough, but really nothing to write home about compared to some other classes builds, so it seems silly to approach it from that nerf angle. But the condi builds that are in the meta aren't really working vs it despite working against many other common things. Would a condi build that is more mobile than your typical condi herald/symbol brand need to emerge, or?

Core Ranger's condi cleansing is a bunch of small clears that happen routinely in rather short intervals.

You're looking at:

• Troll Unguent 24s CD - 4 clears.
• Quick Zeph 32s CD - 2 clears.
• Light Reflexes 24s CD - 2 clears.
• Zephyr's Speed Trait which casts Lesser Quick Zepher on pet swap, which is another 2 clears on a 15s CD
• Resistance Rune 6th ability, 4s of Resistance upon using an elite skill, which is normally used with SOTP 60s CD. And keep in mind that Resistance Rune is also granting -25% duration to condis.
• Some Rangers will from time to time, opt to take Entangle, which is ANOTHER 2 clears on a 48s CD, which activates the Resistance Rune 6th ability more frequently than when they run SOTP.
• Then you're also looking at cleansing sigils or possibly escape during certain matches.
• And the utility Protect Me!, which grants a 4,000 health barrier that can be used to soak condi damage in the event that clears are on CDs.

^ That's a lot of defense vs. condi tbh. However, certain condi builds do trash a Core Ranger and it's not because they trash the Core Ranger, but rather they trash its pet so quickly. The pets cannot clear condis. In fact, the Ranger traits/utilities are designed to throw condis off the Ranger and onto the pet. So when pets take big massive condi bursts, it's pretty much GG for the pets. Then when those pets die, the Core Ranger by itself doesn't have enough offensive pressure to force the condi opponent into defensive stature and then the Core Ranger gets snowballed in the 1v1 with 100% condi offense from the opponent which will eventually overwhelm its cleanse CDs.

Things that honestly counter Core Ranger, despite bell curve or bellow players complaining from a place of l2p issues:

1. Symbol Guardians - You can't stay on a node with these. If you want to kill it or not die yourself, you usually have to leave the node and try to dip in and out with pet bursts to get anything done. The Symbol Guard will control the node during this 1v1, regardless of who ends up winning.
2. Burn Guardians - If they're smart and just repeatedly target every pet they see, the Ranger cannot stop the burns from nuking the pet, and then the Ranger can't deal damage. The Ranger can usually stay on the node with the Burn Guard and hold against it, but the pets will be dead 100% of the time if the Burn Guard knows what he's doing.
3. Prot Holo - One could say that this match up is balanced in terms of combat mechanics, but the Holosaiyan has advantage in conquest because he will be able to control the node while the Ranger has to 1v1 him with kiting & stealthing & pet regrouping, as it looks for ways to catch its sustain and find pet burst opportunities.
4. Fire Weaver - Yes, a well played condi heavy Fire Weaver can pretty much guarantee that the pets stay dead in the same way that Burn Guardians can do, and then the Ranger can't deal damage. The Ranger can usually hold against the Fire Weaver but it won't be worth it with perma dead pets and it's too risky.

Those are the things that are actually strong vs. Core Ranger in 1v1s. But see the problem is that only 1 of those builds, the Prot Holo, is of meta quality vs. everything. So Symbol & Burn guards and Fire Weavers may be good at beating Core Rangers in 1v1s, but they're kind of bad vs. everything else right now. So due to the circumstances of what is in play vs. Core Ranger in this particular patching, it's making Core Ranger look a lot stronger than it actually is. There are plenty of counters to Core Ranger, but those build archetypes just so happen to not be in circulation at the moment.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Revolution.5409 said:He talked about CDs and I showed him that Maul isn't the only ability that has CDs less than 8 seconds.Herald and DH are both usable in this Meta.If other professions did not have equally strong skills we would have a Meta composed solely of Rangers, and this is not the case.

those cds aren't less then 8 seconds, and you missed the point which was that ranger has more things to dodge then any other class atm.

[Chokolata.1870]

Can anyone tell me what is the golden standard in the current meta for how a class should perform? Perhaps that would help focus the discussion on whether the ranger is OP or not.

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

@Chokolata.1870 said:Can anyone tell me what is the golden standard in the current meta for how a class should perform? Perhaps that would help focus the discussion on whether the ranger is OP or not.

Depends if you're talking bell curve play or high tier play.

And that right there my friend, is the very essence that fuels the pvp forum wars balance discussions.

[Chokolata.1870]

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

@Chokolata.1870 said:Can anyone tell me what is the golden standard in the current meta for how a class should perform? Perhaps that would help focus the discussion on whether the ranger is OP or not.

Depends if you're talking bell curve play or high tier play.

And that right there my friend, is the very essence that fuels the pvp forum wars balance discussions.

So from what i seem to understand here is, that at mid to low level ranger is strong due to pet damage reliability but at the higher level of play isn't. It is just a matter of who you are balancing for, correct?

[Trevor Boyer.6524]

@Chokolata.1870 said:

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

@Chokolata.1870 said:Can anyone tell me what is the golden standard in the current meta for how a class should perform? Perhaps that would help focus the discussion on whether the ranger is OP or not.

Depends if you're talking bell curve play or high tier play.

And that right there my friend, is the very essence that fuels the pvp forum wars balance discussions.

So from what i seem to understand here is, that at mid to low level ranger is strong due to pet damage reliability but at the higher level of play isn't. It is just a matter of who you are balancing for, correct?

This is correct.

To quite exactly sum up the problems that Ranger has ALWAYS had with balancing between mid to top tiers, we have these issues:

1. Players in mid to low tiers lack a fundamental recognition & understanding of how to use LOS tactics and correct positioning, so they often get blown up by 1500 ranged attacks and complain that "It's overpowered". But in high tiers, everyone uses LOS frequently, they have great map awareness, and they think 2 steps ahead of if going and standing somewhere is actually be good idea or not. I've been in plenty of higher tiered matches as a Ranger, where you very seriously think to yourself "I may as well have brought Axe/Axe over Longbow" because the enemy team is doing everything in the book correctly to completely shut down longbow play.
2. Players in mid to low tiers get hit just as frequently by a slow Tiger F2 as they do the Tiger's auto attacks. They lack knowledge of animations & telegraphs or reflex time or maybe both in some cases. Players at higher tiers know exactly what all the animations look like, they know what to dodge, and they have the reflex time to do it.
3. Players in mid to low tiers NOT UNDERSTANDING THE JOB ROLE OF THEIR CLASS/BUILD. So you have some kid waddling around off node by himself trying to push lord as a Scourge. And then when he gets 100-0'd by a Ranger, he comes in here and complains about how OP it is. All the while he does not recognize that although Necromancers are historically the most powerful team fight presence, it is also historically the worst 1v1 class in the game, and the absolute worst possible class counter he could be caught against is a Longbow Ranger in a 1v1. But rather than acknowledge that he is not playing the rock/paper/scissors correctly on his class, he'd rather advocate that Ranger damage was nerfed hard enough so that his no-swiftness Scourge could realistically chase down and kill a class that is supposed to be designed around the idea of high mobility kiting with ranged attacks that counter and kill low mobility targets. Or at the very least, he advocates the idea that the Ranger's damage should be so low that his Necromancer should be able to stand in the open and face the ranged damage while ignoring it. In a higher tiered game, a good Necromancer would never allow himself to get caught prone like that vs. a class counter. He would 100% stay in an optimal positioning/rotation with his team, so that his Necromancer was doing the scissoring to the paper, instead of being scissors getting rocked. If you see what I mean there.

So to get back to your original question of:

@Chokolata.1870 said:Can anyone tell me what is the golden standard in the current meta for how a class should perform? Perhaps that would help focus the discussion on whether the ranger is OP or not.

It would be super complex and a thread of its own to answer that question in detail.

For now I'll just say that I believe the Ranger class is heavily subjugated in the balance patches and always has been, because well let's face it, it is a ranged class and it is a class with an AI counterpart. For some reason that just pisses people off. Something about long range and pet AI, it just enrages kids. Even if the Ranger ultimately had the exact same damage/sustain output as say a Holosmith, 10/10 threads in this forum will be complaints about Ranger longbows and pets because the mechanics trigger people, and you won't see a single thread about Holosmiths. You might see a comment here or there where even top players say things like: "Holosmith is stronger than the Ranger" and people even AGREE with them, yet you see not a single thread written about it.

It would say that, due to players HATING to play against Ranger's inherent design, their standard expectation of Ranger's balance is that it should be weaker than other classes ultimately, to balance out the fact that is annoying to them. <- I truly believe that is what's going through most people's heads, whether they would admit that or not, or even recognize that this statement is somewhat true.