Improve. The. Ranger. Area.

As I see it, ranger shouldn't even have melee nodes at her starting area, she should have two branches, a worthy archery area and a nice fat defense area. Those that want melee will still have the option to grab the large defense bonus then go to duelist or shadow for melee expertise and it would work much better then having a cluster of halfhearted defense nodes and lackluster melee.

"

raics wrote:

As I see it, ranger shouldn't even have melee nodes at her starting area, she should have two branches, a worthy archery area and a nice fat defense area. Those that want melee will still have the option to grab the large defense bonus then go to duelist or shadow for melee expertise and it would work much better then having a cluster of halfhearted defense nodes and lackluster melee.

Ranger is seen like the diablo character. bow and a weapon (javelin in diablo). Therefore melee nodes are there.

However, the character is noted for a bow, but is NOT the best character to start with a bow. And with evasion worthless/unreliable to get, it makes the evasion nodes WORTHLESS in the tree.

The ranger needs to be fixed so they are again, THE best archer. And something really needs to be done with evasion.

"

computertech82 wrote:

Ranger is seen like the diablo character. bow and a weapon (javelin in diablo). Therefore melee nodes are there.

However, the character is noted for a bow, but is NOT the best character to start with a bow. And with evasion worthless/unreliable to get, it makes the evasion nodes WORTHLESS in the tree.

The ranger needs to be fixed so they are again, THE best archer. And something really needs to be done with evasion.

Agreed. A Ranger in the traditional sense is able to wield both melee and range weapons as deemed fit.

However, it doesn't change the fact that her starting highways suck donkey balls. The evasion highway (mentioned before) is pretty darn lackluster, considering for 4 nodes, you can get the equivalent with a single Steel Skin cluster with 3 nodes and 2% extra armor (if going IR). Where's the balance in that? I think a good way to make her highway better is to either seriously buff her evasion nodes or add some flat life to said nodes. Also, the Stun Avoidiance and Stun Recovery passives are quite useless and should be replaced with something better, like more life (because we can't get enough of it amirite?) or life/mana regen passives.
_________

Here's my beef with the weapons-related starting highway. Aside from bad pathing, her notables aren't really up to snuff. In fact, when compared to her Duelist counterpart, everything he gets notable-wise, he does it better. Let's compare.

Ranger:
Weapon Artistry - 3% add block chance when DW/shield + 10% inc melee phys dmg

Duelist:
Dervish - 10% add block chance when DW + 10% inc melee phys dmg

There's no comparison, even if Weapon Artistry affects shield usage. I suggest buffing the block portion of Weapon Artistry to 5% to make her better without being overpowered since shields grant a lot of block chance compared to DWing.

Ranger:
Heart of Panther - 4% inc phys dmg with 1handed + 2% inc AS with 1handed + 30 dex

Duelist:
Master of Arena - 8% melee inc phys dmg + 2range to weapons/unarmed + 20 str

This case may present itself as evenly matched but its not. A 8% dmg node can be considered equivalent to a 4% dmg and 2% inc AS node. So the difference between these two notables is that Duelist is given more range on his weapons, which is a huge advantage in melee combat. (Not going to go into why Dex is inferior to Str, we all know why) Ranger is missing something. As such, I would like to see Heart of Panther be buffed into 8% inc phys dmg with 1handed + 4% inc AS with 1handed + 30 dex. This would make her melee highway FAR MORE attractive than before.

Last but not least,

Ranger:
Finesse - 4% inc AS + 30 dex

Duelist:
Acceleration - 12% inc AS + 20 dex

No comparison. Duelist blows Ranger out of the water with this notable. I'd buff the AS to 6% to make it more balanced.

Next stop, the starting cluster with melee from the 12% acc to Weapon Artistry seems severely unbalanced for the following reasons:
1. 12% acc isn't necessary considering she starts out with the most Dex.
2. The 6% inc melee phys dmg between the 8% and Weapon Artistry doesn't make sense.

Solution? Replace the 12% acc node with a 4% inc AS node and change the 6% inc melee phys dmg node to an 8%.

I posted about this in my feedback thread too (http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/361537) its just unbearable leveling a ranger when the closest resistances is a far away un-optimal diamond skin and a 6% all rez with 2 bleedin 15% behind it.. it really needs something like the mara/shadow/templar area, some eva/resistance nodes, so does the witch in my opinion she is also low on res early on just like the ranger, give these classes some of these hybrid resistance nodes too..

"

VictorDoom wrote:

I posted about this in my feedback thread too (http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/361537) its just unbearable leveling a ranger when the closest resistances is a far away un-optimal diamond skin and a 6% all rez with 2 bleedin 15% behind it.. it really needs something like the mara/shadow/templar area, some eva/resistance nodes, so does the witch in my opinion she is also low on res early on just like the ranger, give these classes some of these hybrid resistance nodes too..

I'm not quite sold on the resistance issue, seeing how you would be able to get Diamond Skin fairly quickly. Of course, if you're talking about immediacy like that of the Templar/Marauder/Shadow, then I agree it's a bit far out.

I personally think that by moving Mana Flows deep into the Duelist tree was a seriously bad move. The Ranger would have to spend quite a bit of tax nodes to get to it, and there are no other notables of such nature near the Ranger tree. (The Deep Thoughts on the other Ranger class border is in a bad place surrounded by a ton of tax nodes.)

"

Islidox wrote:

"

VictorDoom wrote:

I posted about this in my feedback thread too (http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/361537) its just unbearable leveling a ranger when the closest resistances is a far away un-optimal diamond skin and a 6% all rez with 2 bleedin 15% behind it.. it really needs something like the mara/shadow/templar area, some eva/resistance nodes, so does the witch in my opinion she is also low on res early on just like the ranger, give these classes some of these hybrid resistance nodes too..

I'm not quite sold on the resistance issue, seeing how you would be able to get Diamond Skin fairly quickly. Of course, if you're talking about immediacy like that of the Templar/Marauder/Shadow, then I agree it's a bit far out.

I personally think that by moving Mana Flows deep into the Duelist tree was a seriously bad move. The Ranger would have to spend quite a bit of tax nodes to get to it, and there are no other notables of such nature near the Ranger tree. (The Deep Thoughts on the other Ranger class border is in a bad place surrounded by a ton of tax nodes.)

Yeah i mean early game its quite far away and its a small amount of it too..

its not a horrible move, snce you can get L&S, 12%IAS proj damage etc on the way, but it is a long way and you will kind of suffer without the mana, just like shadow casters do, the shadow area is a int/dex hybrid with no mana anywhere in sight..

As I said in my Witch Tree thread >>> http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/374308/page/1 I will be making one for the Ranger as well.

But first of all. I have to say the ranger is a hard one. I tried my best but it just eats a lot of time.

So far I only will post my Alpha version with some backing thoughts.

I think the Ranger staring area isn't really bad. But it is messy and to prove a point I made these here. Comparing the Rangertree to the Shadowtree.

Image 1

http://oi44.tinypic.com/4s01s5.jpg

This is the Layout for both trees.
I will fist concentrate on the numbers on the right.

As you can see. The Shadow tree ends pretty well with 67 nodes. 54 of which are small ones and 13 which are Noticables.

The Ranger on the other hand is kinda weird. It's hard to say when it really ends.
I descided to make it the way it is shown in the picture and come to 70 points.
61 of those are small and only 9 are noticables.

You see the Ranger already has less "good" nodes in it's core than the Shadow.

I will compare it to the other trees as well. But that later.

Image 2

http://oi42.tinypic.com/10qhz4p.jpg

As you can see here I outlined where the Starting area ends.
The Shadow is clearly defined.
The Ranger tangles all over the place.

This is why I came up with 70 points and not 67 as for the Shadow.

It's so hard to say what is the end of the tree.
I think the other areas are much better designed.

And here comes my point. It's alpha because the core issue is the layout of the startingarea. And I really didn't wanna spend hours to build a better one.
So I worked with the one right now and tweaked a little.


Image 3

http://oi41.tinypic.com/30adl4w.jpg

This picture shows you where the big clusters are.
The shadow has 2 "arms" reaching out, spreading out in many directions.

While the Ranger is like a drunken Policeman shoting at a gun target. It's all over the place.

It would be much more aesthetically pleasing if the Ranger was designed like the others with 2 clear way that path again into 2 more and then come together or at least end defined at some point.

Version 1 Improved Ranger Tree

http://oi44.tinypic.com/sou9gk.jpg

Keep in mind, this is all changeable. I didn't have too clear ideas about what I really wanna change like I had with the witch. But there were some things.

I took in a lot of ideas from this thread, and also placed my own.

In the end the whole area needs to have a better layout. Because as you can see I still struggle with some things and would like them to be better.

@KenshiD: To comment on some of the changes you want, I'll comment by # according to your chart.

3. Heart of Panther: if I had it my way, I'd make this notable give a substantial amount of life. Keyword to hone in on is "heart" while the "panther" part denotes stealth and strength. So something like this:
> +20 to max life
> +15 to Str
> +15 to Dex

4. Finesse: you mispelled it, it's not Fitness but Finesse. Thematically speaking, this node should instead grant a lot of move speed instead of AS. So something like this:
> +6% inc move speed
> +30 Dex

6. HeartSeeker: I like the +Bleed on Crit part. Makes it a great notable to pick up for crit Rangers.

7. Stun Avoidance: Get rid of it and put in some life or mana regen nodes. The only people that could possibly use stun avoidance are CI users, and those are normally Witches and Shadows.

8. Naturalist: I think this a great idea for a notable. It will also address VictorDoom's concern about a lack of an all-rez notable early in the tree compared to Marauder/Templar/Shadow.

"

Islidox wrote:

@KenshiD: To comment on some of the changes you want, I'll comment by # according to your chart.

3. Heart of Panther: if I had it my way, I'd make this notable give a substantial amount of life. Keyword to hone in on is "heart" while the "panther" part denotes stealth and strength. So something like this:
> +20 to max life
> +15 to Str
> +15 to Dex

4. Finesse: you mispelled it, it's not Fitness but Finesse. Thematically speaking, this node should instead grant a lot of move speed instead of AS. So something like this:
> +6% inc move speed
> +30 Dex

6. HeartSeeker: I like the +Bleed on Crit part. Makes it a great notable to pick up for crit Rangers.

7. Stun Avoidance: Get rid of it and put in some life or mana regen nodes. The only people that could possibly use stun avoidance are CI users, and those are normally Witches and Shadows.

8. Naturalist: I think this a great idea for a notable. It will also address VictorDoom's concern about a lack of an all-rez notable early in the tree compared to Marauder/Templar/Shadow.

3. Yeah I agree. STR DEX and Life is most fitting for a Panther.
The amount is in GGGs hands.

4. Oh crap right!... I will change that some time. But not today anymore I worked way too much already on it.

6. I fear it will be too similar to adders touch though. Though it wouldn't deal chaos damage.

7. I think Stun avoidance is also good for Evasion based characters. But I like nodes that couple 2 things at once.
I'd love to have more offensive and defensive nodes in one. Like 6% damage 6% evasion.

Two Defensive nodes are also nice, like I proposed. But it's not 100% elegant.

8. Glad you like it. I only dislike the position. But overall the layout is horrible. I might chance the entire starting layout myself these days. But I don't wanna promise anything.

Here's why Stun Avoidance/Recovery is useless for Rangers.

Stun is calculated based on the incoming physical damage relative to your HP. More details, look here:

The reason why stun is useless is because of the current metagame of stacking as much life as possible, which goes double for pure Evasion/ArrowDodging/PA/Acro characters. On the chance that a major hit goes through the psuedo random evasion, the character NEEDS the life buffer to survive it and then some.

Which then we run into the issue of having that much life stacked, the chances of being stunned are very little (almost next to none really). As such, nobody takes said passives as it's really unnecessary. Rather than stacking stun passives, stacking life is a lot more optimal, not to mention that Unwavering Stance for IR users.

Also like the Shadow tree, Ranger lacks some early mana options, which is really terrible for early game. I'd personally like to have those passives reworked to address that issue in some way.