Curse

Evilsod · Jul 21, 2007, 06:13 PM // 18:13

Well we already have a thread on the skills in the PvP section, but thats hardly a place for general discussion of the Ranger skills we get. So here we are.

A link to the skills on Guildwiki here

As for my comments on them...

Companionship

Quote:

Skill. If you have less Health than your pet, you are healed for 30...102...120 Health. If your pet has less Health than you, it is healed for 30...102...120 Health

.

Anet still haven't figured it out have they... this skill is absolutely useless. To use this skill i have to bring Charm Animal, so my pet is there, Comfort Animal, so i can ressurect it and heal it and Companionship so i can heal myself or the pet. Why the hell would we use this crap!

Feral Aggression

Quote:

Skill. For 5...29...35 seconds, your pet attacks 33% faster and deals 5...17...20 additional damage.

Ah now here is a potentially overpowered skill. The pet gains 33% IAS, easily meets its recharge and during the whole time to pet does extra damage. Call of Haste no longer has a use, but on the bright side it does mean you could probably get away with no using Enraged Lunge if you want damage, you can spam Ferocious + others. I'm expecting it to get nerfed slightly.

Expert Focus

Quote:

Preparation. For 24 seconds, your bow attacks cost 1...2...2 less Energy and deal 1...8...10 extra damage.

This just screams overpowered... it's unlikely to get used over Apply Poison, but look at it. At 8 expertise this hits 2 energy. At 14 expertise, this skill makes ALL 5e attack skills cost 0 and ALL 10e attack skills cost 2e. This is some major attack skill spamming imo, especially if you use the new Signet to inflict poison.

Rapid Fire

Quote:

Preparation. For 5...21...25 seconds, you attack 33% faster.

Really not what i was hoping for...you need 5 Marksmanship to hit the recharge for this skill, giving you a nice 33% IAS on any weapon you use (thats likely to change though). On the bright side, it isn't a stance... so i guess we can't complain too much, it just buggers up all hope of taking Glass Arrows or Read the Wind so our obvious attempt at causing DPS doesn't just miss or fall short. I guess we'll see... but i'll prob stick with Apply Poison and Read the Wind.

Sloth Hunter's Shot

Quote:

Attack. If this attack hits, target foe takes +10...22...25 damage. If that foe is not using a Skill, Sloth Hunter's Shot does an additional +10...30...35 damage.

This skill makes Keen Arrow look shoddy. I don't get it, we've been told from Gaile that the bow skills are apparently fine, even though most of them are ****. So we get this? Its a skill that is quite likely to deal +63 damage. Why are we getting more and more overpowered attack skills instead of just fixing the old ones? Combine this with Disrupting Shot... its likely to be the new Ranger Spike.. and will prob get nerfed. This skill far surpasses Tyrian and Canthan bow skills.

Disrupting Shot

Quote:

Attack. If this attack hits, target foe's action is interrupted. If that action was a Skill, you strike for +10...34...40 damage.

Apparently Rangers need another interrupt... A hefty recharge of 12 seconds makes it a bad choice though compared to Savage Shot. It deals 13 more damage at 16 Marksmanship, with over twice the recharge. How many 'skills' are there to interrupt anyway? On attack skills, its likely to be bugged in the same way Savage Shot is and not activate properly, and on other skills you'll have been better off just Distracting them in most cases. It has potential... but i think the recharge is too high for it to be considered useful outside of Ranger Spikers replacement for Savage Shot. Itrs more likely you'll be interrupt spells with this, if thats the case you'll be wanting a faster recharging interrupt or something that disables.

Volley

Quote:

Attack. All your Preparations are removed. Shoot arrows at up to 3 foes adjacent to your target. These arrows strike for +1...8...10 damage if they hit.

Yes... now they are infact taking the piss. As proved by 'Power Lock' they are simply taking elites and toning them down slightly and turning them into new non-elites. I can't see why this skill would be useful. It won't replace Barrage as far as B/P is concerned, its recharge is too high and it doesn't hit enough targets and it still removes all preps. Seriously this skill is pretty useless. Its not as spammable as Barrage needs to be and its not versitile enough to be taken for anything else.

Body Shot

Quote:

Attack. If this attack hits, you deal +5...17...20 damage. If it hits a foe with Cracked Armor, you gain 5...9...10 Energy.

You can't really comment on this skill. It has the potential to replace Prepared Shot for energy management, opening up your elite slot... but at the same time we have no idea how easy it is to inflict 'Cracked Armour'. From reading through the skills earlier there seem to be VERY few (subject to update from new PvE only skills for use in PvE (well duh)). Like i said, it has potential, but not in PvP.

Piercing Trap

Quote:

Trap. When Piercing Trap is triggered, all nearby foes are struck for 5...41...50 piercing damage. Any foes with Cracked Armor are struck for an additional 15...51...60 damage. Piercing Trap ends after 90 seconds. While activating this Skill, you are easily interrupted

An extremely intrueging trap. As far as PvE is concerned it will probably suck, traps never caused very high damage due to level differences and/or additional armour, the only 1s of any use were Barbed Trap for cripple and an extremely long bleeding, Flame Trap for nice degen and something to start Searing Flames Eles on and Dust Trap for blind and armour ignoring damage. but for PvP... well if you can get a team going that works well with the odd skill to spam Cracked Armour on foes, your general pressure build with trappers/spirit spammers could work well since thsi does a nice 110 damage to most foes (i recall hearing that Cracked Armour reduces armour by 20, minimum 60AL). Potential to be good, but also potential to be utterly useless.

Poison Tip Signet

Quote:

Signet. For 60 seconds, your next attack also inflicts Poison for 5...13...15 seconds.

An attempt to get Rangers to move away from Apply Poison i see. But this skill needs changes... at 10 second recharge and 1 second cast its just too much to really be considered. It really should be 1/4 second cast at least, recharge may need lowering a little, but the cast time definately needs changing. I can only really see this skill been used on modified Burning Arrow gankers. A 1-shot poison is absolutely useless when a monk could just remove it instantly, however in a 1on1 with a Flag Runner, interrupt its Mending Touch and that 1 hit from Poison Tip Signet is all you need. Although with only 8 skill slots... and BA Gankers already stretched far... i can't see it happening.

Over to you.

Amy Awien · Jul 21, 2007, 09:45 PM // 21:45

It's so obvious. Every new expansion brings, or at least promises, new and (potentially) overpowering skills. They'll probably get nerfed within a few weeks too.

But a totally new condition? How much does that indicate they're trying to force players into buying it.

I assume expert focus applies the reduction before expertise is calculated? Otherwise, 5E skills would drop to 0E @13 Expertise.

Poison signet might be aiming for non-primary rangers. Could also be useful if you want to use another preparation. And it should work on Volley.

jrk247 · Jul 21, 2007, 10:24 PM // 22:24

Rapid Fire + Poison Tip Sig + Burning Arrow.

.defekt · Jul 22, 2007, 12:52 PM // 12:52

or maybe burning arrow + apply poison. poison tip signet is shit.

IAS on a ranger is only good for choking gas, and even then you use flurry/frenzy. oh wait, do pve scrubs use IAS on rangers in pve? i'm not sure

samcobra · Jul 22, 2007, 04:49 PM // 16:49

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Well_of_Ruin

Combine with Piercing trap (which incidentally does physical damage) for some pretty painful stuff.

jrk247 · Jul 22, 2007, 08:58 PM // 20:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by .defekt

or maybe burning arrow + apply poison. poison tip signet is shit.

IAS on a ranger is only good for choking gas, and even then you use flurry/frenzy. oh wait, do pve scrubs use IAS on rangers in pve? i'm not sure

I wouldn't know I've never used an IAS on my ranger. And if you are trying to insult me atleast know your facts I'm a PvP scrub (lol PvE scrub). Well not even a scrub I just don't like PvP so w/e.

Raven Nebula · Jul 22, 2007, 09:07 PM // 21:07

IAS is good on anything that attacks...and the idea would be to use the prep, the sig, the attack, and then maybe a different stance...why use a IAS as a stance when you can use it as a prep and use a different stance.

bunnyblaster · Jul 23, 2007, 12:08 AM // 00:08

These skills are insane. I am actually curious why there is so much hate for Volley? I actually love it. If its non elite status stays, I may use it for my BP build and find another elite...maybe punishing shot?

Just think about it, most farming areas like SF usually have groups of 5-7 monsters and very rarely are they perfectly lined up so more often than not, you are shooting at only 2-4 monsters. This synergizes very well with splinter weapon since splinter only does 4 attacks at 12 channelling. Furthermore, the skill offers a natural boost to dmg like barrage.

Sure, the recharge is 2 seconds vs. barrage's 1 second. But more and more in farming runs, I am noticing that I move right after I shoot the first shot OR now that I switched to splinter builds, I have to recharge splinter.

I think the skill will make a huge splash into the already popular bp scene in PVE. Of course, PVP, there is pretty much little use for the skill. But than again, some of the other skills make PVP interesting like the rapid fire one. At the very least, I can see lots of new potential builds.

BohemianKeith · Jul 23, 2007, 12:47 AM // 00:47

Well its good to see i'm not alone. After reviewing all the new skills it became quite apparent that it is nothing more then a ploy to get people to buy the new expansion. Almost every skill i saw is simular and superior to those from previous campaigns....much like factions over prophecies and certainly nightfall over both. (cough searing flames?, burning arrow? zealous benediction? etc) So yes i think these new ranger skills are awesome but are either going to be elite or nerfed to oblivion and i just wish anet wouldn't treat the community like we're a bunch of idiots drooling over their new skills. I know i'm gonna buy it but not just because its the only way to stay competitive in pvp but hopefully for some more cool pve.

Evilsod · Jul 29, 2007, 04:03 PM // 16:03

Well its a little late... but after a computer crash i couldn't exactly reply earlier.

Volley is crap. It has a 2 second recharge, which means no matter what bow you use you will have to wait for it to fire again or you'll completely mess up the attack animation and end up firing 1 arrow every 5 seconds or something stupid. It hits 3 targets and removes all preps. Its not spammable enough to be useful in the same way Barrage is, and because it removes preparations its not flexible either. This skill has absolutely no place on any build, ESPECIALLY Barrage/Pet. Why do i get the feeling this skill is basically gonna make people start thinking this skill is actually good and drop Barrage so they can use this? No other elite in a B/P team build can surpass Barrage.

Epinephrine · Jul 29, 2007, 06:56 PM // 18:56

Feral Aggression is stupidly powerful as is, and promotes the "bring a pet with your hammer/spear/scythe" style of beastmastery. At 33% increased attack and +17 say it adds up to 12 extra DPS on its own, way too much for a passive skill. For comparison, at 16 axe mastery Cleave adds 31 damage per 4 attacks, or ~6 DPS, ~9 DPS under a 33% IAS.

XvArchonvX · Aug 02, 2007, 08:13 AM // 08:13

Feral Aggression and Rapid Fire might have some good synergy since Rapid Fire doesn't require high marksmanship to maintain. Put this with Enraged Lunge and Brutal Strike using a zealous bow and you might have some pretty good dps.

Some of the skills look interesting, but in a game like GW, the more skills you put in, the more likely the game is to become unbalanced. I'm not even sure if I'll find enough interest to come back to the game when EotN is released tbh, but who knows, maybe somehow things will work out and GWEN will be just the thing to respark my interest in GW again.

Orange Milk · Aug 02, 2007, 01:57 PM // 13:57

These skills are all basically poop.

@Bunnyblaster - so your basically sayn "hey I don't always have 6 targets, so I'm going to take volley over barrage in my B/P build" way to be prepared, good job planning ahead there because when ther IS a situation where there are more targets you are now not hitting some of them AND attacking slower, well done.

I guess Experts Focus + Rapid Fire + that posion sig thing would be ok for and Interupter build but yeah, apply still better for that.

Between these skills and some of the NF skills ANet seems to be trying to make pure BM builds viable for somereason.

Disrupting Shot is a waste, I see NO REASON EVER to put that in a bar over any of the interupts already in game.

2 skills depend on cracked armor, a condition a Ranger can not apply. So now I have to use my secondary class AND move att points into there weaking my Ranger skills, nice one.

Sloth Hunter - Hit some one NOT activating a skill. I love to interupt and have traind myself to hit foes casting/attacking, now I need to look around for the guy standing around doing nothing and attack him to get the bonus? Yeah, I can see myself not useing this one.

Its all fail in my opinion

Fishmonger · Aug 02, 2007, 02:19 PM // 14:19

Personally, I like a lot of these skills (Volley +Spirit's Strength+Splinter wep anyone?) but their usefulness on a primary ranger seems half baked at best. When I look at these skills, I don't see a single one and think "wow, this is an awesome skill for rangers!" I agree with evilsod on the idea that rangers have every skill they could ever need to fufill their purpose, yet all have them have been nerfed so much and Anet tries to patch it up with more IMBA skills that will be nerfed once the exploitation begins from other professions. Personally, I would use companionship and feral aggression for a pure Beastmaster build, but every other beast mastery skill has never gotten to a happy medium. So yea I will use Companionship, but only on my Spirit's Strength rit. For some odd reason, expert's focus seems like the single dumbest move I've ever seen Anet do. Why put e management in a attribute with great e management (not overpowered, but balanced), and pop a dmg mod on there to top it off? Rapid Fire doesn't say anything about arrows, so this could be exploited by assassins with a modest investment in marks, and now we have a SP sin far superior to the tiger stanced one.
I just don't see what's good about these skills

Evilsod · Aug 02, 2007, 08:42 PM // 20:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by XvArchonvX

Feral Aggression and Rapid Fire might have some good synergy since Rapid Fire doesn't require high marksmanship to maintain. Put this with Enraged Lunge and Brutal Strike using a zealous bow and you might have some pretty good dps.

Some of the skills look interesting, but in a game like GW, the more skills you put in, the more likely the game is to become unbalanced. I'm not even sure if I'll find enough interest to come back to the game when EotN is released tbh, but who knows, maybe somehow things will work out and GWEN will be just the thing to respark my interest in GW again.

I actually think Feral Agression in its current state would go better with Ferocious. Especially if you were aiming to use the bar you describe. It would be very energy heavy and cramped if you brought enough skills to fuel Enraged.

[skill]Ferocious Strike[/skill]Feral Agression[skill]Distracting Shot[/skill]or[skill]Savage Shot[/skill]Rapid Fire, Triple Shot/Forked Shot/Dual Shot[skill]Brutal Weapon[/skill][skill]Charm Animal[/skill][skill]Comfort Animal[/skill]

You'd lose an interrupt and a bow attack skill purely to fuel Enraged Lunge.

I do agree with the skills requiring Cracked Armour to be extremely lame, in PvP. But in PvE... we never know, they might give us some useful PvE only skills that inflict it.

The trap will be shit though... in both PvE and PvP.

Jeff Highwind · Aug 03, 2007, 05:55 PM // 17:55

Some of these make me wonder "Why isnt this an elite?"

But yea, Feral Aggression = staple pet skill for Packhunter. You and your pet attack faster and the pet gets a buff along with it. Dear God.

Poison Tip Signet would be epic if the recharge wasnt so high. It'd be okay with barrage...well maybe not but still it open up a slot for a 2nd prep. So you can get Burning, Bleeding and poison for a fun gimmik build. V:

Sloth Hunter Shot: Broken.

Expert Focus: Moderatly overpowered but takes your prep slot.

Volley, Companionship and Rapid Fire: *psycho sarcastic laugh*

Evilsod · Aug 04, 2007, 03:45 PM // 15:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeff Highwind

Poison Tip Signet would be epic if the recharge wasnt so high. It'd be okay with barrage...well maybe not but still it open up a slot for a 2nd prep. So you can get Burning, Bleeding and poison for a fun gimmik build. V:

Expert Focus: Moderatly overpowered but takes your prep slot.

I'm expecting Poison Tip Signet to only work on the 1 arrow from Barrage so it'll probably be worthless there.

And i guess we can't comment on Expert Focus until we actually get to use it. Since we don't know if it takes energy off after or before Expertise.

Darkpower Alchemist · Aug 05, 2007, 02:09 AM // 02:09

Rapid Fire has potential to be used as an all around IAS. That is probably the most interesting skill yet for a ranger thus far of the whole group. They should link it to Expertise, or it will be abused in short order while not limiting it for ranger useage.

That would be about all I have to say until "Cracked Armor" is more defined and experimented with.

Evilsod · Aug 05, 2007, 02:20 AM // 02:20

Rapid Fire only works for a Bow, or at least i remember reading it somewhere supposadly officially from Izzy.

Jeff Highwind · Aug 05, 2007, 02:34 AM // 02:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Evilsod

I'm expecting Poison Tip Signet to only work on the 1 arrow from Barrage so it'll probably be worthless there.

See, that confuses me. It says next attack, which is odd because GFTE and Splinter both say the same but work on different mechanics.

If it works like splinter, we're gonna see alot of "Poison Barrager lfg!"