Ranger Start Tree feedback

"

Qarl wrote:

Note: I will ask support to aggressively moderate this thread. Please don't attack the ideas of others. (Attacking existing GGG design is fine (but be polite!), just allow others to provide their feedback)

Enough said.

<redacted>

[Removed]

"

No, they should take a look at all bow skills instead of just Ice Shot when making changes. Your suggestions are baised towards Ice Shot. The only viable comparison you mentioned is Burning Arrow, the other skills are AOE skills.

you can't say that ice shot is a single target skill, his strength comes from the cone behind it. It is comparable to explosive arrow, more than burning arrow actually.
But that doesn't change the point thought.

PS : status ailment avoiding chances are even more useful ( much more ) when it's about a CI character too, or any char that doesn't heavily rely on health. There are many who do this, they are not the most optimized players, but I believe that there are a lot of them, and I'm pretty sure than most of them don't bother coming on the forum.

"

Fruz wrote:

PS : status ailment avoiding chances are even more useful ( much more ) when it's about a CI character too, or any char that doesn't heavily rely on health.

Oh its useful alright. BUT take a look at its position relative to where CI is and what CI characters typically get. Completely out of place because CI characters typically don't need much from that highway instead opting to move into the Templar tree.

I've considered picking that up many times for CI characters but as it stands, the point investment to get there doesn't justify itself. It should actually be in the position of/swapped with the Piercing Shots cluster such that players can opt to pick up Pierce over Chain for their Bow Skills and CI characters have closer access to Status Ailment avoidance.

It's such a catch-22 situation between the Ranger's area and any magic-related area on the tree. Ranger needs more elemental damage? Too bad, its just too far and costly to reach and devote points into. Need/want more evasion/avoidance? Too bad, the ranger's area is far too convoluted and twisted to want to traverse for just a single benefit. Nothing outside of Iron Reflexes brings any other character into the Ranger's area, most especially CI characters.

Changing the tracks between nodes, adding more attractive Notable passives, consolidating petty 1 point passive nodes into notables that give more bang for the buck are just a few things to be changed, not to mention a big Dexterity overhaul.

I think of a ranger as being DW, but from a mechanics standpoint, I am more intrigued with a 1h + block as I feel this combines well with evasion and dodge.

My critiques/constructive criticism for the right side of the tree would be:

- Hit% is too high if you take no resolute technique, or accuracy nodes are not efficient enough in increasing dps, crit, or defense (such as slowing the enemies attacks, blinds, etc)

- Dexterity is the worst stat from both a defensive perspective, and perhaps as bad from an offensive perspective as intellect. Dexterity provides no life, a very weak increase in accuracy, more evasion (but no increase to block, dodge, chance to crit, or chance to proc a stun or blind by hitting better with a crit)

- Attack speed currently interacts poorly with armor mitigation. Slow, big hits are the way to deal with a large amount of armor. Resolute technique is too easy of a solution for pvp for sure and needs to be cut in half for pvp.

- Iron reflexes is not the problem. Instead, we need to provide players with a better alternative to deal with a low life pool and virtually no ES. Not only are a higher chance for blinds on crit a possibility, but using a higher attack speed to stack a weakened blows debuff on crit, could be an effective way to deal with RNG of evasion, block, or dodge.

- A silence mechanic needs to be added to the game. There is currently no way of evading a spell or evading a crit. Furthermore, blinds have no effects on casters. If you are talking about a theme where dexterity allows you to attack faster than the enemy, then this type of mechanic not only possibly belongs in the game, but on this side of the tree.

- A lot of the 1h bonuses in the tree should be moved more towards the right side with the 2h bonuses towards the left side.

- Frenzy charges could also give an accuracy boost.

Note: I do not currently have a ranger in my stock of characters. All my information is based on the elemental bow dualist which I have benched. I have thought about making this dualist a DW crit rapier user (I am toying with a templar atm), and I have noticed a desire to want to go to the left side of the tree more with the dualist than towards the ranger side, and am still not motivated towards taking acrobatics just yet, although I would not state this talent as being underpowered.

You're right about spell avoidance. Not only is the ranger extremely lacking in the availability to do elemental damage compared to other classes, they are also extremely vulnerable to the very spells they also lack. The one thing that typically hurts me the most as a melee-type ranger is the inability to effectively avoid most spells. Ranged avoidance is actually pretty good with Ondar's Guile. However, spells like Spark, Cold Snap, or Incinerate will kill your low HP Ranger off in a heartbeat without any means to mitigate or avoid, not to mention the unavoidable skills like Charge and Leap Slam.

Maybe a keystone that decrease life more and more from ... let's say over playerLevel*150 ( like 50% reduction over pLevel*150, 75%reduction over pLevel*200, etc .... ) and drastically raises armor + resistances cap ( like 7% ), this would discourage people to stack life with it and facetank everything, and that would give an alternative to tank, with a real dext scaling.
Number could be obviously changed, this is just to give the idea.

"

- Attack speed currently interacts poorly with armor mitigation. Slow, big hits are the way to deal with a large amount of armor

this is why we need an armor pen mechanism, because staying as it is, physical build will always be more efficient with huge strong hit than with many many smaller hits.
This is why crits build are getting ridiculous end game ( crit weakness gives 100% more crit dmg ....... T_T ), where the rest cannot stand a chance to compete against this ( but maybe shavronne's RF + low life builds ).

"

Oh its useful alright. BUT take a look at its position relative to where CI is and what CI characters typically get. Completely out of place because CI characters typically don't need much from that highway instead opting to move into the Templar tree.

well yeah, the design of the inner area between ranger and shadow is .... meeeeeh.
But CI ranger works, and any CI char getting 2 additional frenzy charges is really close to that. This way is not that long to go there, and the 50%chance to avoid projectile keystone right after is really good too ( for range character with some evasion ).
It is only 3 points after the first frenzy charge that shadow has access too or the second nullification cluster.

And well, for a life based build ... it still is useful since getting chilled shuts down one's dps, even for a short duration.

"

Fruz wrote:

And well, for a life based build ... it still is useful since getting chilled shuts down one's dps, even for a short duration.

Seldom if ever an issue. The only time I get any status ailment is in a -max, +damage map and even then it doesn't happen often. It would see greater play being shifted north as opposed to being so far south.

Actually, that entire portion needs to be redone. Frenzy Charges while useful generally, are not always something one would pick up although there is definitely merit for CI players grabbing those nodes (Blood Rage yay!). That portion needs identity. It needs to know what exactly it wants to be because right now it really doesn't.

If it's supposed to be where you pick up additional damage nodes, it fails miserably due to how difficult it is to get to it. Compare it to the southern highway where you're presented good or cheap options (Endurance Charge (2), Frenzy Charge (2), DEX node (1)). I'll have to think more on making it a meaningful choice to enter that location.

The more I look at the tree the more I see that the Ranger secton doesn't appear to have a clear 'identity' so to say. I mean, beyond being where most of the bow nodes are, what else is there? Frenzy Charges? I suppose so, but there doesn't seem to be a clear meaning for them to me. Hmmmmmm, guess I could explain a bit more what I mean, and please keep in mind this is all subjective and a bit of hyperbole thrown in there, but I will try to keep it reined in as much as possible.


Shadow - I see this area being the place you want to go for Crit nodes and Energy Shield needs. I know it does share a bit with the Witch, but even then it definitely is loaded with Crit and Crit Damage Multiplier areas.

Witch - Hello Mana, Spell Damage, and Energy Shield heaven. You want to focus on caster-type stuff then go here for everything you could ever want and then some. With access to the Shadow tree nearby you also get those lovely Crit nodes mentioned earlier, too.

Templar - Spells or melee weapons? No problem...got you covered here along with a lot of Elemental Damage nodes that are desired by many others and decent life to boot, too. Next to the Witch for the damage, or head down to Marauder for more melee goodness and to just 'drown' in life nodes galore.

Marauder - You want to be heavy weapons guy and become a living meat shield? Look no further than this place and then the adjacent areas for more life, ED, or even venture further and you can even become a decent bow user, too. Of course, don't have to do that as there are tons of melee areas to choose from and don't worry about mana...lots of mana reduction to make it easier to spam those skills like a BAMF.

Duealist - Speed, speed, and did I mentioned SPEED in the form of IAS? Oh yes, and don't forget you have access to the Marauder's beefy life defenses and those mana reduction nodes are just a stone's throw away if you're hurting for that. And of course, want to try out bows and actually do a better job then the Ranger at what should be her forté? You're right there to show her how it's done.


And that just leaves the Ranger. Now, I know this has been very generalized but the Ranger really doesn't feel like she is good at what she should be outside of maybe a good physical damage build, but even then the Shadow can give her an extremely good run for that title. Not only that, but the other areas seem to have something that people want to go after and spend many a highway node point to get there, but they avoid the Ranger tree. It's been pointed out that her paths are too convoluted (I agree) and she doesn't seem to have a clear focus, and more importantly, she doesn't offer a good tree for those that would want to stay in it on purpose and be a little more 'safe'. That and there seems to be something that the other areas offer as incentive to go there be they keystones or even just notables...Ranger feels lacking in those save for Iron Reflexes.

I was doing some thinking and decided upon a quick of potential suggestions to help spice up her tree and give her that special something that would make players go, "I'll spend many points to get there for these abilities because they are worth it to me." I am well aware that they aren't balanced or what not...they're meant to spark discussion or be a jumping point for other ideas. Here are a few:


1. Elemental Status/Curses with bows - Have some notables that enhance your arrows to inflict either random curses on enemies, or perhaps specific ones like say Vulnerability or Elemental Weakness. Maybe even a Keystone that permanently imbues your shots to inflict those curses, but at a price of either say loss of damage, IAS, or something else. That way the Ranger can not need curse gems if said Keystone is so chosen and free up those sockets for other stuff. Same for elemental statuses...although maybe that's too similar to what the Witch and Shadow have, but a possibility.

2. Potion enhancement notables/Keystone - Some mentioned earlier about how weak and out of place the potion passives are, and it got me thinking. The Ranger in this game is basically seen as an outdoor type that lives off the land, or at least spends a lot of time outside hunting it up. It wouldn't be unreasonable to think that being out there alone most of the time she's found ways to make her potions far more potent than other classes and would offer her something unique. Could be something as simple as say doubling flask charges or doubling potency of them all, or giving them another enhanced effect beyond what others can do. Again, I KNOW that's not balanced but this isn't strictly balance...it's an idea and the balancing can come later.

3. More notables like Piercing/King of the Hill - The Ranger tree seems to focus way too much on raw bow damage and that's necessarily a bad thing. However, it would be nice to have a few more notables like the mentioned ones to allow for more customization and tweaking. Want a chance for your shots to chain instead of having to slot the Chain gem...a notable could give you say a 25% chance for your shots to do so. Again, I KNOW balance needs to be thought out, but it's the idea that counts and should be looked at.


Basically, the way I see it is that the Ranger is -the- face of the bow class, and as such she should have the most options for fine-tuning and enhancing bow combat far more than any other class. I know about melee stuff, but I am not an expert on it so I leave that to others and I'll stick with the bows. Give her the damage for sure but again, let her be flexible with bow skills and make her tree have some enhancements that really make others classes give her section a serious look and think about going there to pick up those tasty nodes for their builds.