Curse

Chthon · Jan 08, 2011, 07:27 AM // 07:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

As is explained in the link Haggis gave (scroll down), the time it takes to draw the arrow is not affected by IAS. IAS decreases the tail end of the shot where the ranger's Barrage is already recharging.

Mathematically, the timeline looks like this:
-------- Attack target
1.2s bow draw time. The only way to reduce this is to use a skill with an activation time
--------- Arrow is let go, Barrage starts recharging
Bow-dependent wait time until next attack (.8s/1.2s/1.5s). If IAS is in effect, this section is shortened. 33% IAS will change this to (.13s/.38s/.58s), 25% IAS gets (.3s/.6s/.82s), 15% IAS gets (.5s/.84s/1.095s).
--------- Ready for next attack

Note that IAS affects the overall bow attack time normally (33% IAS = attack time 33% shorter), but the decrease is taking off the tail end of the attack. The delay times are NOT all uniformly shortened.

The goal for maximum barrage speed is to get the second wait period to be 1s or below. Going below doesn't hurt you, but doing so just causes the animation canceling while not helping in any way.

That does not sound quite right. I had always believed that the arrow was released halfway through the activation time, whatever it was. Some re-testing might be in order.

Astral_Nomad · Jan 08, 2011, 08:20 AM // 08:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Artisan Archer

Paragons are like drunks, they run around and shout at strangers, don't believe anything they say.

LOL... nicely put.. ill have to rememeber that one..

Kunder · Jan 08, 2011, 08:21 PM // 20:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

That does not sound quite right. I had always believed that the arrow was released halfway through the activation time, whatever it was. Some re-testing might be in order.

I believe you are correct, but I can't really figure out the exact timing. Reducing the entire shot time with IAS would lead to a faster IAS increasing your barrage fire rate by 50% of the total improvement to standard fire rate, but that is clearly not the case.

Chthon · Jan 08, 2011, 09:03 PM // 21:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

I believe you are correct, but I can't really figure out the exact timing. Reducing the entire shot time with IAS would lead to a faster IAS increasing your barrage fire rate by 50% of the total improvement to standard fire rate, but that is clearly not the case.

1. The simplest test which would tell us if the info in that old thread is wrong would be to take two heroes with different bows to the practice dummies, pin them in place at close range, pan the camera around for a good view, and call the target. If the arrows release at the same time, it may be correct. If the arrows do not release at the same time, it's not correct.

2. Testing w/ Barrage is inherently hard because of the human factor. Take a flatbow to the practice dummies w/ no IAS. Now, try to hit every Barrage right on the recharge so there's no canceled auto attack. I can do it, but not consistently. My human error rate is big enough it threatens to eat time differences of the size we're testing for.

[edit: Come to think of it, that means that the info in the old thread must be incorrect. If base flatbow speed was split 1.2 / 0.8, you would always be 0.2 into the next auto-attack when Barrage recharged. We know that's not the case.]

3. Per my theory (which isn't really mine, I just can't remember where I read it), you'd get 100% of the effect of IAS down to a 2sec refire time, then 50% of the effect from additional IAS. That would predict:

Flat/Short:
- 0 IAS: 2.0 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 15 IAS: 1.85 rate of Barrage, always cancels
- 25 IAS: 1.75 rate of BArrage, always cancels
- 33 IAS: 1.67 rate of Barrage, always cancels
Long/Recurve:
- 0 IAS: 2.4 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 15 IAS: 2.04 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 25 IAS: 1.9 rate of Barrage, always cancels
- 33 IAS: 1.804 rate of Barrage, always cancels
Horn:
- 0 IAS: 2.7 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 15 IAS: 2.295 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 25 IAS: 2.025 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 33 IAS: 1.9045 rate of Barrage, always cancels

Now, let's go test those.

Kunder · Jan 08, 2011, 11:34 PM // 23:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

1. The simplest test which would tell us if the info in that old thread is wrong would be to take two heroes with different bows to the practice dummies, pin them in place at close range, pan the camera around for a good view, and call the target. If the arrows release at the same time, it may be correct. If the arrows do not release at the same time, it's not correct.

Did this. Arrows do release at slightly different times.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

2. Testing w/ Barrage is inherently hard because of the human factor. Take a flatbow to the practice dummies w/ no IAS. Now, try to hit every Barrage right on the recharge so there's no canceled auto attack. I can do it, but not consistently. My human error rate is big enough it threatens to eat time differences of the size we're testing for.

3. Per my theory (which isn't really mine, I just can't remember where I read it), you'd get 100% of the effect of IAS down to a 2sec refire time, then 50% of the effect from additional IAS. That would predict:

Flat/Short:
- 0 IAS: 2.0 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 15 IAS: 1.85 rate of Barrage, always cancels
- 25 IAS: 1.75 rate of BArrage, always cancels
- 33 IAS: 1.67 rate of Barrage, always cancels
Long/Recurve:
- 0 IAS: 2.4 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 15 IAS: 2.04 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 25 IAS: 1.9 rate of Barrage, always cancels
- 33 IAS: 1.804 rate of Barrage, always cancels
Horn:
- 0 IAS: 2.7 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 15 IAS: 2.295 rate of Barrage, no cancel easy
- 25 IAS: 2.025 rate of Barrage, no cancel possible but difficult
- 33 IAS: 1.9045 rate of Barrage, always cancels

Did this on a much more rigorous test. Changed the macro to include a stop watch that started automatically and would record time exactly, rather then eyeballing my system time. To make it more precise I shot exactly 25 shots and stopped the clock as soon as barrage started its recharge the 25th time.

3 trials of Flatbow without IAS:
50.84s
50.52s
50.16s
= 2.02s/shot

3 trials of Flatbow with 33% IAS:
44.91s
45.36s
45.16s
= 1.81s/shot

I believe you are on the right track, BUT the IAS benefit is actually even smaller than 50%. In this test, it appears to be slightly less than 30% of the real IAS bonus, meaning a 33% IAS only improves barrage by 10%. I'm not sure why this is, perhaps the animation canceling actually does eat into the IAS benefit a little?

Given that you absolutely have to spam your barrage at least 10 times a second to even see a difference, I still highly recommend not using IAS with a barrage ranger. Not because it doesn't give a very small benefit, but to spare your keyboard and fingers. If you are in fact running 33% IAS even with hammering the keyboard, you are probably going to miss a few animation interruptions and actually slow down your barrage slightly (this happened when I tried to manually spam it under IAS).

On an unrelated but amusing note: ping factors massively into barrage ability. My previous test last night I was sitting at about 400ms ping, where as tonight my ping was 50ms. The difference caused my barrage speed today to be about 350ms faster than it was yesterday. I did make sure my ping was approximately the same after every test I did today, so it shouldn't have contaminated the results.

Rites · Jan 09, 2011, 04:01 AM // 04:01

Noted ur response to what i said, moved a few points around,and honestly didn't see too much of a difference. I don't really worry about 3-5 points of damage difference.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

To top it off, you are using up a PvE slot. You can put something much better in there.

I'm quite sure I've spammed this enough... I personally don't care for the PvE only skills. I use NrO and sunspear signet, the others don't get played on my bar, specially the asuran ones cuz i find them unbalancing.

reaper with no name · Jan 09, 2011, 09:45 AM // 09:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rites

hmmm

@13 expertise ( i think thats what my ranger has) NRA costs 8e
@9 BM scavenger strike gives 10e
a zealous bowstring + volley or barrage on 2-3 mobs = 2-3e return (thinking HM by the way, so only like 1 or 2 volley/barrages unless you have a good baller)

but seriously, how is that bad? the only thing is now you have to choose either even marks and WS or just choose 1 line instead of both (most just stick with marks if they are barraging anyway)

OR you culd just stick with lightning reflexes as your IAS, but personally i don't like the recharge or duration of that skill, besides i love my pets

Why pets are bad:

Everything in PvE comes down to the almighty hit point. Therefore, for pets to useful, they have to be good at either making red bars go down, preventing them from going down, or bringing them back up.

Pets do not provide any significant healing power.

Moving on, it is time to consider the pet's offensive prowess. A level 20 pet on it's own will do something like 10 dps at 12 BM. Throw in PvE's 33% damage increase for them and you get 13. HM armor cuts this down to about 7. This is before considering the delays that come from the horrible pet AI (which will make the practical dps even lower).

Therefore, the only way for pets to hope to deal any damage is through skills. However, pet attacks suffer from the following problems:

1) There is a high likelihood that the timer for a pet attack will run out before the pet can use it, causing the skill to be wasted.
2) Pets can only have one pet attack queued at a time. Attempting to use a second before the pet has used the first will remove it, causing the first pet attack to be wasted.
3) Pet attacks must compete for bar space with bow attacks (or whatever weapon their owner is using).
4) Pet attacks, as Beast Mastery skills, require a significant attribute point investment to be effective.
5) Many pet attacks are conditional. This is bad when you can't control the exact time your pet will use the skill (if they do at all; see 1) ).
6) Most pet attacks are either expensive or have a high recharge time.
7) Pet attacks just aren't that powerful.

To counteract these drawbacks, pet attacks have the following advantages:

...Clearly, pets are neither an effective nor efficient method of offense.

So, what about the pet's ability to keep red bars from going down?

Diversionary defensive bodies (such as pets) have the ability to absorb damage instead of a party member. In general, this is considered a desirable trait.

Pets are the exception.

The reason diversionary defensive bodies are attractive is because they are either A) easy to keep alive or B) expendable. Often, both are true to varying degrees.

Pets are neither. The defensive skills in beast mastery (as well as the pet's innate defense) are woefully inadequate for dealing with the ravages of HM (and sometimes even NM) play. To keep a pet alive, one must utilize the same kinds of healing and defenses normally reserved for party members. Thus, far from being a load off of one's backline, a pet turns out to be yet another mouth for them to feed.

So, then, what if one opts instead to allow the pet to take damage until it dies?

The result of this course of action is, as we all know, having your own skills disabled, effectively rendering you temporarily useless. Since you cannot perform your job, monsters will live longer and/or deal more damage than they would have had your skills not been disabled. This puts more stress on your backline, undermining any defensive benefits your pet's sacrifice could have offered.

So, in conclusion: Pets suck.

Haggis of Doom · Jan 09, 2011, 05:16 PM // 17:16

^You've forgotten physical buffs. GDW, Splinter, SoH, MoP, Barbs...

Sure, if you're in a full party of players you don't care that much about adding a low dmg pet. But if you're h/hing, the lack of good physical damage source makes the pet more worth considering.

Also, pets are a good choice for 4-man areas for obvious reasons.

If you're h/hing as a ranger, chances are your pet is the only one on the frontline. Yes, this is one more thing to prot for your backline and you'd say why is it different from protting anyone else? Thing is, pets take less dmg than squishies, AND they're on the frontline, just like minions. This means if a Savannah Heat or a Searing Flames goes off on its spot, you'll be happy it did where it did.

The only thing holding me back from always bringing them on my ranger is their terrible melee AI. Unless I'm running a BM build, babysitting a pet can get pretty annoying so when I bring it, I usually do not take advantage of the melee buffing part and merely use it as a meatshield + NRA platform.

Kunder · Jan 09, 2011, 05:41 PM // 17:41

I was challenged by a friend to create a PvE pet build that could be considered decent, and to my surprise I think I've actually found one.

Volley/Enraged Lunge/"Save Yourselves"/"For Great Justice"/Ebon Battle Standard of Honor/Comfort Animal/2 optional slots (1 PvE)

PvE optional selections: NRA (good if someone else in party is a GDW spammer), BUH (probably best for H/H)

other optional selections: EoE (good for large groups, but probably a bad idea if you have a MB in your group. Not too detrimental if you have a MM though), Distracting Shot (for obvious reasons), Antidote Signet (F***K blind)

I've really taken a liking to Enraged Lunge. It slices through blocking stances since by pet mechanics the attack is simply a buff that lasts until the next hit, and this also allows you to pre-buff a pet going into battle and deal about 170 damage + deep wound with the first two attacks. Ranger is in dire need of single target damage as it is, and this gets it into the build fairly easily while being light on skill space. Rest of the build is a pretty standard Ranger PvE build that doesn't compromise too much AoE damage. Obv. make sure an SoS rit or w/e is casting Splinter Weapon or GDW on you or your damage sucks as always.

As to pet survivability, it doesn't seem to be a problem since the -33% damage update. Haven't tried the build in DoA or anything, but it passes HM dungeon tests. Since the build is mostly pre-cast buff dependant anyway losing skills for a few seconds wouldn't hurt too horribly either.

reaper with no name · Jan 09, 2011, 07:38 PM // 19:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Haggis of Doom

^You've forgotten physical buffs. GDW, Splinter, SoH, MoP, Barbs...

Sure, if you're in a full party of players you don't care that much about adding a low dmg pet. But if you're h/hing, the lack of good physical damage source makes the pet more worth considering.

Also, pets are a good choice for 4-man areas for obvious reasons.

If you're h/hing as a ranger, chances are your pet is the only one on the frontline. Yes, this is one more thing to prot for your backline and you'd say why is it different from protting anyone else? Thing is, pets take less dmg than squishies, AND they're on the frontline, just like minions. This means if a Savannah Heat or a Searing Flames goes off on its spot, you'll be happy it did where it did.

The only thing holding me back from always bringing them on my ranger is their terrible melee AI. Unless I'm running a BM build, babysitting a pet can get pretty annoying so when I bring it, I usually do not take advantage of the melee buffing part and merely use it as a meatshield + NRA platform.

Apparently, you didn't read my whole post. Pets do not take stress off the backline; they add to it, because you cannot adequately protect them yourself and you can't let them die without becoming useless yourself. And unlike party members, they take up resources without offering anything significant to offset those costs. It would be a different story if they were worth the cost of healing and protting them (as party members are), but they almost always aren't.

Pets are a horrible choice for being a vehicle of physical buffs because they attack far too slowly. And their AI makes them even worse still. You'd probably be better off taking those buffs on yourself.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

I was challenged by a friend to create a PvE pet build that could be considered decent, and to my surprise I think I've actually found one.

Volley/Enraged Lunge/"Save Yourselves"/"For Great Justice"/Ebon Battle Standard of Honor/Comfort Animal/2 optional slots (1 PvE)

PvE optional selections: NRA (good if someone else in party is a GDW spammer), BUH (probably best for H/H)

other optional selections: EoE (good for large groups, but probably a bad idea if you have a MB in your group. Not too detrimental if you have a MM though), Distracting Shot (for obvious reasons), Antidote Signet (F***K blind)

I've really taken a liking to Enraged Lunge. It slices through blocking stances since by pet mechanics the attack is simply a buff that lasts until the next hit, and this also allows you to pre-buff a pet going into battle and deal about 170 damage + deep wound with the first two attacks. Ranger is in dire need of single target damage as it is, and this gets it into the build fairly easily while being light on skill space. Rest of the build is a pretty standard Ranger PvE build that doesn't compromise too much AoE damage. Obv. make sure an SoS rit or w/e is casting Splinter Weapon or GDW on you or your damage sucks as always.

As to pet survivability, it doesn't seem to be a problem since the -33% damage update. Haven't tried the build in DoA or anything, but it passes HM dungeon tests. Since the build is mostly pre-cast buff dependant anyway losing skills for a few seconds wouldn't hurt too horribly either.

Pet survivability only seems fine because the pet is being healed by other characters. It is still a drain on the party's defensive resources.

That said, however, what you have there is a good example of what I would call a decent pet build. Even in this case I would not call the pet "good" (as a ranger, hitting multiple targets is your job, but you're making yourself about half as good at it by losing Barrage, just to give your pet some damage), but it's certainly far better than nearly every other pet build (and also far better than what most people in this game run, regardless of profession). So, I salute you.

Of course, just because pets are bad, doesn't mean they aren't fun. Whenever I'm going through something easy, I always bring my Lurker Crabbycakes with me, because he's awesome.

Kunder · Jan 09, 2011, 08:11 PM // 20:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by reaper with no name

Pet survivability only seems fine because the pet is being healed by other characters. It is still a drain on the party's defensive resources.

That said, however, what you have there is a good example of what I would call a decent pet build. Even in this case I would not call the pet "good" (as a ranger, hitting multiple targets is your job, but you're making yourself about half as good at it by losing Barrage, just to give your pet some damage), but it's certainly far better than nearly every other pet build (and also far better than what most people in this game run, regardless of profession). So, I salute you.

Of course, just because pets are bad, doesn't mean they aren't fun. Whenever I'm going through something easy, I always bring my Lurker Crabbycakes with me, because he's awesome.

I agree, but keep in mind pets have both decent armor (80) and -33% damage reduction. Since the damage reduction applies to armor ignoring damage, they are probably about was well defended as a player at 120 armor or so. Most of the time, damage taken by the pet would have otherwise been absorbed by players, so its a much better idea to have a 120 armor character take that then a 60-80 armor character. The only time a pet really acts as an extra drain on party energy is when you face lots of AoE, where the pet is just taking extra damage and unfortunately can't be healed by party wide healing. Or if your party is under constant SY, I suppose; In that case simply having another body to block enemies from your weak SY-using player is enough to about break even (and its not like healing damage under SY is a huge problem most of the time anyway lol).

I wouldn't say that Volley is half as good as barrage. Its not as good obviously, but since a good portion of the damage from splinter barrage is from splinter weapon, volley + autoattacks activate splinter as fast as a channeling rit can cast it on you anyway. I just tested the build in Battle for Lions Arch in HM, I think I wasn't losing too much overall AoE damage. The pet spiked off lone enemies in the backline and EoE did a good job of adding extra damage when fighting 20 enemies at once. That said, Volley is certainly much less impressive since it isn't spiking as hard. This would presumably be a problem if enemies were more prone to scatter from AoE and you needed to front load your damage much more.

In an unrelated note, if you wanted to use consumables Volley and Enraged Lunge would both benefit tremendously. Volley could fire as fast as Barrage and Enraged Lunge could be used every 3 seconds. That might actually bring this build ahead for most purposes. I don't use consumables though, but its worth mentioning.

Regardless, its certainly a more fun way to play. Directing a pet well while barraging is more interesting than facerolling 1-2-3 on the keyboard, and in the current state of PvE finding ways to make killing the large numbers of enemies interesting is almost as important as actually killing them fast.

Amy Awien · Jan 09, 2011, 10:50 PM // 22:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by reaper with no name

Pet survivability only seems fine because the pet is being healed by other characters. It is still a drain on the party's defensive resources.

What an odd argument, the survivabilty (healing and protection) of most partymembers depends on other partymembers. How would a pet - 80 AL, 33% damage reduction - drain party defensive resources more then other characters, with say, 80 AL and no damage reduction? That said, you can even setup your pet tough enough to not need any party support. The damage the pet takes would otherwise be taken by other partymembers, but with a 50% increase.

Quote:

... as a ranger, hitting multiple targets is your job, ...

Ranger AoE is only worthwhile for some area's going in human parties with human frontliners to collect mobs and phys-buffs to make it worthwhile. In H&H situations Barrage is meh.

Quote:

Originally Posted by reaper with no name

Why pets are bad:

1) There is a high likelihood that the timer for a pet attack will run out before the pet can use it, causing the skill to be wasted.

Plain wrong, there's enough time on the timer for 4-5 attacks, even without IAS

Quote:

2) Pets can only have one pet attack queued at a time.

Since when is not (wanting to) understand mechanics or the interface valid arguments? If you can't handle this aspect of the user interface, don't bring a pet, but don't blame it on the mechanics/interface/pet - you woudn't want queued pet-attacks to stall your bow attacks either.

Look at it differently, what other weapons allow you to spam attacks simultaneosly (bow and pet).

Quote:

3) Pet attacks must compete for bar space with bow attacks (or whatever weapon their owner is using).

If you need the space for bow attacks, use it. You probably won't however. Damage buffs and PvE skills are stronger competition then yet more (bow) attack skills.

Quote:

4) Pet attacks, as Beast Mastery skills, require a significant attribute point investment to be effective.

12/12 versus 11/10/10, factor in runes and the diminshing returns for attribs > 12 and you won't loose much on weapon damage.

Quote:

5) Many pet attacks are conditional. This is bad when you can't control the exact time your pet will use the skill (if they do at all; see 1) ).
6) Most pet attacks are either expensive or have a high recharge time.

Non-argument. (1) there are strong, cheap and unconditional pet attacks and given their usual 5 sec recharge there are more of them then you could use efffectively. The expensive or conditional once don't matter, you don't toss out the bow because there are so many useless bowattacks?

Quote:

7) Pet attacks just aren't that powerful.

Deep Wound plus 55 armor ignoring damage, for 5E, on a 5 second recharge is not powerfull. Is there actually any deep wound that can compete with it? Brutal Strike can hit for around 100 and Scavenger's Strike has a damned good energy return.

They're powerfull enough, but they lack the backing of damage boosters like Asuran Scan, BuH and AoHM

Quote:

The reason diversionary defensive bodies are attractive is because they are either A) easy to keep alive or B) expendable. Often, both are true to varying degrees.

Or (C) they require less healing.

The damage your pet absorbs would have had 50% more impact - and thus required 50% more healing, had it been absorbed by another partymember. Furthermore, pets are easy enough to keep alive ...

Quote:

Pets are neither. The defensive skills in beast mastery (as well as the pet's innate defense) are woefully inadequate for dealing with the ravages of HM (and sometimes even NM) play.

+24 AL (makes it's attacks unblockable), 17 damage reduction and a 50% damage redirect, all unstrippable, cheap and with long duration. When properly prepared you can send it in alone and it just.won't.die.

Quote:

So, in conclusion: Pets suck.

I'd say you need to get your facts straight.

Pets are excellent damage soaks and thus good tools for defense, when used with some skill. Their offense lacks but that is due more to extreme effectiveness of PvE skills like Asuran Scan then the pet skills.

Xiaquin · Jan 10, 2011, 12:07 AM // 00:07

As nice as a pet discussion is, this is way off topic. I'm not sure I'd bring a pet with Barrage unless I really needed the extra body, and even then I'd want to invest in BM for a couple of skills and to prevent long black outs. That means Splinter Weapon is off the table, but if you had someone else/hero casting weapon spells on you then it would make sense to grab the pet.

Kunder · Jan 10, 2011, 12:26 AM // 00:26

@Amy Awien

The biggest problem with pets, by far, is bar space. You are right, pets are amazing conceptually; being able to do damage with your weapon and pet at the same time is a great idea. Enraged Lunge is almost like if Paragons had a shout that did 80 damage and deep wound, and we all can see how overpowered that would be. The problem is that you simply don't have bar space to do that much with both weapons effectively, and pets on their own aren't as good as your weapon. Even before you add attacks, your pet bar looks like this:

1 - Pet skill.
2-4 - PvE skills (if you aren't using them you have a bad build lols)

Leaving you 4 skills left. Want a res? Want interruption? Want defense? Want damage? Good luck fitting that all in there. Not to mention the energy problems you can have. PvE skills can take between a decent amount, and you are using two skills at a time when using your pet and weapon. This pretty much limits you just to 5e attacks, and they all need to be something absolutely amazing to justify their bar space well. Which is why the bar I posted uses exactly 1 amazing pet skill and 1 pretty decent attack skill. If those two bar compressing skills didn't exist I would have no idea how to make a decent pet build, and an entire line depending on exactly 1 skill is just a bad thing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xiaquin

As nice as a pet discussion is, this is way off topic. I'm not sure I'd bring a pet with Barrage unless I really needed the extra body, and even then I'd want to invest in BM for a couple of skills and to prevent long black outs. That means Splinter Weapon is off the table, but if you had someone else/hero casting weapon spells on you then it would make sense to grab the pet.

Unless you really have something to add to the barrage with IAS discussion, than there is no reason it can't continue on to any other aspect of Ranger-ness that is worth discussing.

Chthon · Jan 10, 2011, 01:41 AM // 01:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

3 trials of Flatbow with 33% IAS:
44.91s
45.36s
45.16s
= 1.81s/shot

It is now very hard to formulate a hypothesis that accounts for all the observed data.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kunder

I was challenged by a friend to create a PvE pet build that could be considered decent, and to my surprise I think I've actually found one.

Volley/Enraged Lunge/"Save Yourselves"/"For Great Justice"/Ebon Battle Standard of Honor/Comfort Animal/2 optional slots (1 PvE)

PvE optional selections: NRA (good if someone else in party is a GDW spammer), BUH (probably best for H/H)

I think I posted something similar to that several months ago.

Regarding pets generally, often I find I end up bringing one for Scavenger Strike because ranger e-management options all suck so bad.

Assume I want to do a Barrage build. Toss in SY! because (1) it's incredible, and (2) it actually synergizes Barrage. Now toss in EBsoH for the damage boost that synergizes well with Barrage. Now, we need to come up with energy for EBsoH. How? Barrage takes out both any e-management elites like Prep Shot and any preps like Expert Focus. The warrior secondary offers no useful e-management. You're left with basically Scavenger Strike or Body Shot. Body Shot would be the obvious favorite, if only it would work. R/W has no way of kicking out cracked armor where you want it, and heroes don't put it where you need it reliably enough. Scavenger Strike, by comparison, can feed off of something common and AoE like Enfeebling Blood or Death Nova.

Regarding pet damage, since the 33% boost applies to SoH and/or GDW, and their attack skills, you can get them hitting very, very hard. Obviously, they are not a replacement for a sin player with stacked buffs doing 200 DPS, but, with just Scavenger Strike and SoH, they probably add more DPS to the team than, say, Little Thom.

Regarding pet survivability, I've never found it a large problem since the damage reduction was added. It seems the monster AI tends not to favor them for targeting very much.

Now, if a future update gave rangers a useful non-elite, non-prep e-management skill, I'd probably drop the pet in a minute. But, for now, he often gets a spot on the bar.

Kunder · Jan 10, 2011, 02:56 AM // 02:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rites

@Kunder
There's your problem, just like all the other noobs playing lately, you have come to rely too much on the PvE skills (which i have said before I feel are a lil unbalancing). I have been playing GW since before EOTN, and have learned (and still prefer to play) without these ghastly skills. As for a pet build, you need a condition, scavenger strike, comfort animal ( tho i have recently switched to HaO), and maybe 1 or 2 other skills for either defense Otyugh's cry is still pretty nice) or IAS.
Yes properly playing a pet build takes a lil time of actually learning something, but imo its been very fun. Granted there will always be naysayers (who mostly have no idea how to use pet builds), and yes there might be better builds for other classes, but i have found the pet/barrage perfect for my playstyle.
ALSO if you have a rez on your bar if playing H/H like i do, then apparently you have no trust in your heroes skillbar(s).

I play 3 setups, all with me using the same pet/volley bar and can run thru HM on any campaign pretty well. So apparently you seem to lack what it takes to properly play a pet build, and as such, you should not be posting anything about them.

full volley/pet rangers (heroes are volley/interrupters with shortbows and only have comfort animal)
2 volley paragons with healing rit
sabway

There is no need to insult me. I have probably been playing for far longer than you and have most likely played harder areas under harder conditions than you. I am the first one to agree to any nerfing of the current loloverpowered pve crap-heaps we now have. However, imposing arbitrary restrictions on any open discussion of builds is futile; there is no way that we could hope to come to a consensus on what 'should' be used and what 'should not' be used. Therefore everything is open game in a discussion of what is a more powerful build. If all you want to do is insult people for having a discussion over what is the most powerful builds and (gasp!) including the most powerful skills in the discussion, then please don't post. Your contribution is not appreciated.

Rites · Jan 10, 2011, 03:03 AM // 03:03

bad day, bad time to post any thoughts.. my apologies

reaper with no name · Jan 10, 2011, 05:13 AM // 05:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amy Awien

What an odd argument, the survivabilty (healing and protection) of most partymembers depends on other partymembers. How would a pet - 80 AL, 33% damage reduction - drain party defensive resources more then other characters, with say, 80 AL and no damage reduction? That said, you can even setup your pet tough enough to not need any party support. The damage the pet takes would otherwise be taken by other partymembers, but with a 50% increase.

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Or (C) they require less healing.

The damage your pet absorbs would have had 50% more impact - and thus required 50% more healing, had it been absorbed by another partymember. Furthermore, pets are easy enough to keep alive ...

+24 AL (makes it's attacks unblockable), 17 damage reduction and a 50% damage redirect, all unstrippable, cheap and with long duration. When properly prepared you can send it in alone and it just.won't.die.

Your C) falls under my A) easy to keep alive.

Why would you want your damage-soaking pet to redirect damage to you?

When monsters are dealing 100 damage a hit (the kind of situation where you would want a pet to absorb damage), the innate survivability of pets does not help enough. They either get prot/heals and live, or they die. Unlike minions or spirits and the like, pets cannot be allowed to die. The same can be said of players. Therefore, the pet is not helping, except in the rare case that the prot gets stripped. But this must be weighed against the potential cost if the pet dies.

But let's assume that with enough of these sorts of buffs a pet can effectively take damage without dying or requiring prot to survive.

How much energy and skill slots are you burning for this? How certain can you be that the enemies will attack it, seeing as how it is only one body and has so much defense on it?

No matter how many buffs you put on a pet, in the end it will still be an inefficient way of absorbing damage in terms of energy, skill slots, and effort.

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Ranger AoE is only worthwhile for some area's going in human parties with human frontliners to collect mobs and phys-buffs to make it worthwhile. In H&H situations Barrage is meh.

And if it's not that kind of situation, then the ranger already has no mechanical justification for being in the party in the first place, which would make this entire discussion of whether or not the use of pets can be justified from a mechanical perspective moot.

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Plain wrong, there's enough time on the timer for 4-5 attacks, even without IAS

And yet, somehow, when I tell my pet to use Predator's Pounce on a guy, a third of the time it never happens, despite the pet being right there.

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Since when is not (wanting to) understand mechanics or the interface valid arguments? If you can't handle this aspect of the user interface, don't bring a pet, but don't blame it on the mechanics/interface/pet - you woudn't want queued pet-attacks to stall your bow attacks either.

Look at it differently, what other weapons allow you to spam attacks simultaneosly (bow and pet).

If you need the space for bow attacks, use it. You probably won't however. Damage buffs and PvE skills are stronger competition then yet more (bow) attack skills.

12/12 versus 11/10/10, factor in runes and the diminshing returns for attribs > 12 and you won't loose much on weapon damage.

The concept is very good. But since pet damage is low, even with the pet skills, the end result is still underwhelming.

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Non-argument. (1) there are strong, cheap and unconditional pet attacks and given their usual 5 sec recharge there are more of them then you could use efffectively. The expensive or conditional once don't matter, you don't toss out the bow because there are so many useless bowattacks?

Which ones? I cannot find any combination of them that will allow a pet to produce any meaningful damage. There's too much delay, the pet's autoattack damage is too miniscule, and the attack speeds are too low.

Conditionality matters a lot more with pet attacks than it does for players, because pets are not as easy to control due to their poor AI.

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Deep Wound plus 55 armor ignoring damage, for 5E, on a 5 second recharge is not powerfull. Is there actually any deep wound that can compete with it? Brutal Strike can hit for around 100 and Scavenger's Strike has a damned good energy return.

Not in HM it won't.

Enraged Lunge would be great, if it didn't require you to burn your elite slot.

Scavenger's Strike, as good as it is, does not justify the use of a pet.

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They're powerfull enough, but they lack the backing of damage boosters like Asuran Scan, BuH and AoHM

So...Then they're not powerful enough?

Kunder · Jan 10, 2011, 06:48 AM // 06:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

I think I posted something similar to that several months ago.

Regarding pets generally, often I find I end up bringing one for Scavenger Strike because ranger e-management options all suck so bad.

Assume I want to do a Barrage build. Toss in SY! because (1) it's incredible, and (2) it actually synergizes Barrage. Now toss in EBsoH for the damage boost that synergizes well with Barrage. Now, we need to come up with energy for EBsoH. How? Barrage takes out both any e-management elites like Prep Shot and any preps like Expert Focus. The warrior secondary offers no useful e-management. You're left with basically Scavenger Strike or Body Shot. Body Shot would be the obvious favorite, if only it would work. R/W has no way of kicking out cracked armor where you want it, and heroes don't put it where you need it reliably enough. Scavenger Strike, by comparison, can feed off of something common and AoE like Enfeebling Blood or Death Nova.

Regarding pet damage, since the 33% boost applies to SoH and/or GDW, and their attack skills, you can get them hitting very, very hard. Obviously, they are not a replacement for a sin player with stacked buffs doing 200 DPS, but, with just Scavenger Strike and SoH, they probably add more DPS to the team than, say, Little Thom.

Regarding pet survivability, I've never found it a large problem since the damage reduction was added. It seems the monster AI tends not to favor them for targeting very much.

Now, if a future update gave rangers a useful non-elite, non-prep e-management skill, I'd probably drop the pet in a minute. But, for now, he often gets a spot on the bar.

Heh, amusing how similar it is xD. Like I said, there isn't much variety you can have trying to shove pet skills, attack skills, and other good stuff into a build at once. Thread is a barrel of lols also.

Can't say I often have problems with energy management, though. Do you take Radiant/Attunement armor? Using skills like EBSoH isn't too energy intensive long-term, its only heavily front loaded. Long as you use a zealous bow for your volley/barrage you do mostly OK. Though if you are using both EBSoH and GDW, you definitely need energy management.

Hopefully the upcoming melee AI update will make running SoH/GDW parties worthwhile. As it is bringing them solely for the pet is too much of a waste. Also crossing my fingers for SoH eventually being changed to include all attacks. Why it hasn't yet is beyond me, its not like Paragons are overpowered at the moment either...

Rites · Jan 10, 2011, 07:19 AM // 07:19

energy management in pet builds is actually quite simple...... get rid of the PvE only skills that everyone has become so reliant on considering the fact that a ranger's expertise has NO effect on these skills. my ranger is set with 30 energy, and even with me spamming NRA on recharge, with the use of scavenger strike my energy never goes below 5.