Ranger Start Tree feedback

In answer to the post above ^

That's funny because I always thought the ranger was oversaturated with life nodes :) Everywhere you spec, there's a life cluster on the way. In fact I was going to suggest that the 3-node right beside the Thick Skin cluster should be put deeper within the Duelist south area.

But this isn't a Duelist conversation... anyways, what the Ranger is truly missing is +str somewhere in the start area. Accessible by both bow and melee. And somehow Dex + evasion to become worthwhile as a stat!

Pretty much the way GGG handled the life/mana problem was to pepper her already disorganized tree with some more minor clusters of average nodes with no notables. Not hating on GGG, but it was done sort of haphazardly, which is why this thread exists now. :)

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Thalandor wrote:

That's funny because I always thought the ranger was oversaturated with life nodes :) Everywhere you spec, there's a life cluster on the way. In fact I was going to suggest that the 3-node right beside the Thick Skin cluster should be put deeper within the Duelist south area.

There are quite a few life nodes around - a lot of bad life nodes. Many of which in bad positions. On top of that, strength based characters gain life through strength, whereas dexterity characters do not. In it's current form, pure evasion characters require a bigger life pool than armour characters, but they aren't getting it.

Perhaps making the evasion nodes evasion/life nodes, but that wouldn't really solve the problem. The thing that I think needs to happen is some way that pure evasion characters can get life that pure armour characters can't, but other than a change to acrobatics and/or iron reflexes, I can't think of anything, and it's a shame that evasion characters will require a keystone to function properly. That is, unless evasion was overhauled somehow.

^
Someone else gets it.

Ill go in a progressive manner on the nodes with this feedback.

First off, Heart of the Panther, has not been buffed by the recent physical buffs at all, i really think it needs some more increased physical damage on it, not much, but a minor buff would be nice.


The 8% stun recovery nodes, i dont think anyone ever took these, stun recovery is a mod which can be gotten in massive amount on gear, i dont think investing points in such a low amount of stun recovery is worth it for any build, i really think these nodes should be replaced with something more useful or just removed.


The Heavy Draw cluster could use another buff, its 60% physical damage and 6% ias for 6 points, i would suggest removing the physical/IAS nodes and just replacing them with normal physical damage nodes.

I say this because usually people who go for physical damage with bows will opt for Slow bows that have a high physical base such as the Harbinger type, that means they would much rather invest in increasing that damage on hit, rather than improving the attack speed which is already low and it would require a lot of points to make the difference noticeable.



Resistance nodes is something that the ranger area really lacks, the only ones are the Diamond Flesh notable and 2 6% ones, which are very far apart.. it really needs some more resistances especially in cruel and early merciless when you just can not get enough of them from passives! You can even replace the "avoid X" nodes with resistance nodes, but please add some more.




I also think Mana Flows should have been left where it was, it was perfect right in between duelist and ranger. It was an equal investment for both classes to get it, now i understand the duelist needed a lot of love, but now the ranger needs some too.


Other nodes:

The intelligence nodes right above the Perfect Aim notable, they are just too much of an investment to get to that mana or resists, i think you should remove 1.

http://i.imgur.com/2MhG8YA.jpg

This is a VERY quick mock-up that mostly moved some nodes around, but a new Notable was added, and one was modified. Cluster/Node/Branch placement is most likely not ideal. Changes are most likely not balanced. This is just something I threw together as a rough draft.

Mana Flows was moved into the middle of the starting area, and 2 of the the 3 mana nodes that were just to the right of the starting area were moved in with Mana Flows. The 3rd went to where Mana Flows used to be. This should help the Ranger a bit when it comes to mana. Due to this, I removed the first Int node just North of the starting area (though this isn't necessary, I just didn't like it there).

For bows, I moved Bow Attack Speed to an optional early path, and simplified the Bow Damage and Bow Damage and Speed area, putting Greater Impact in the middle of them. GI takes an extra node to get to, though the cluster could be moved to the left, and GI moved back to the right of the cluster to keep it 3 nodes from Perfect Aim (I would then rearrange the nodes in that cluster).

I tried to put all the melee somewhat close together and mirrored the Marauder layout, to an extent. Finesse was changed to a +Life, +Evasion Notable. Hopefully this will boost early evasion a bit while offering a bit more life. I'm still not happy with how that areas is laid out (it seemed better in my head than on 'paper').

I added two new nodes called Parry, which would increase chance to Block while Dual Wielding (2%). A new Notable was also added, Riposte, which increases chance to Block while Dual Wielding (4%), and deals a % of damage to an enemy after a successful block.

A third Block and Stun Recovery node was added, to fill in a small circle, though a Notable could have been added instead. After looking at this again, I would probably swap the location of this cluster and the above Parry cluster. This would give an more accessible boost to the Ranger, while forcing non-Rangers to go through the Stun Recovery cluster, or find another route through the Ranger starting area.

To fit the rearrangement of nodes on the bottom right, the curve was reversed and some clusters to the right were altered a bit. The sword cluster was moved, while the two health clusters were separated (they were not connected to begin with, so this is a visual change only).

Again, this is a very ugly first draft that even I'm not overly happy about, but it got some of my initial ideas into a visual form, which will allow me to refine/alter some of these ideas (if I have time). I figured I'd post it here in the off chance that it sparks an idea from someone else.


One thing to note, even with these minor changes, is that I feel that something needs to be done with Evasion. Dark Legionary covered this well in his post, and he hit all the key issues that I have with Evasion, especially with melee characters.

Evasion, in its current form, is a mostly useless form of defense. It works well against potential high damage blows, as it adds another roll that gives a chance to avoid the damage entirely. But, especially with crowds of white or magic mobs, you're pretty much ensured to take a lot of damage, given you aren't specced into armor or block.

I think perhaps evasion should still inherently always provide some damage reduction. Of course, not as much as armor, but since the concept of evasion already relies on chance, why not have a small array of possible values to reduce damage: as well as that additional chance to evade an attack entirely.

For example, if you were speccing into armor, and got to a point where your armor rating guaranteed 25% reduction for you: given that same number for evasion rating, you'd instead have a field of something like 16-22% damage reduction, and a low chance of evading damage, like maybe 10%.

I play a melee ranger (2h sword puncture w/ IR, CI, US, VP and GR, eventually) and am only able to survive through IR. My point is, simply, evasion should still provide an ensured form of protection at all times, and doesn't rely on chance. Otherwise it will always be beneficial for you to spec into IR.

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swishyfeather wrote:

if you were speccing into armor, and got to a point where your armor rating guaranteed 25% reduction for you: given that same number for evasion rating, you'd instead have a field of something like 16-22% damage reduction, and a low chance of evading damage, like maybe 10%.

+1

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Qarl wrote:

What do you want for your bow characters.

What is your ideal melee ranger?

Bow Rangers:

1. If we are strictly talking about the passive tree, I would like bow rangers able to stack crit easier than before. Yes, I know that the Lethality (aka HeartPierce) cluster was buffed to 120% increased crit chance, but considering all else, something needs to be added to prevent Rangers from crossing the tree into the Templar tree for its Catalyze cluster. Most Rangers end up going elemental because it is far harder to build up physical damage. Being able to go crit will allow players to choose either elemental or physical. Physical on crit compared to other elemental crits grants stun and pretty much punches through mob armor, which then deals overall more damage than elemental damage.

2. The second point to address is the accuracy issue. Accuracy should be something that all characters gain equally, but if Dexterity is to grant accuracy, then it needs to be in meaningful amounts to offset the Resolute Technique keystone that virtually has no downside. (Critical damage is also harmful to players due to Reflect mobs.) Perhaps all bow and melee weapon passives in the Ranger tree should grant a flat amount of accuracy? Could be one possible solution, and maybe applied to all weapon-related passives. After all, as long as RT is in place, accuracy has no meaning other than to build for crit. As for evasion/life, see previous posts.

3. The third point I'd like for my bow character is to increase the amount of bow clusters and ultimately bow notables. Currently, there are 7 bow notables in the Ranger tree (not counting Fury Bolts or King of the Hill). 4 of them relate to physical/projectile damage, 1 of them relates to the piercing mechanic, and the last 2 are related to crit. Understandably the Ranger has a melee side as well, but considering the fact that she has a whopping 10 notables dedicated to melee, it seems a bit unbalanced. (Not counting Twin Terrors or Blade Barrier) The 2hander cluster "Wrecking Ball" shouldn't even be in the Ranger tree as the majority of her melee passives are dedicated to 1handers and/or shield. As such, it should be relocated near the Duelist border. Same with the Claw cluster "Raptor Talons", it just seems so out of place and should be moved to the northern part of the tree. It would be nice if some of the melee wheels on the outer ring could be replaced with bow clusters and/or relocated to the Duelist/Shadow borders.


Melee Rangers:

If I wanted to go Melee, then it makes sense to pick up the best melee passives and then move towards the Duelist or Shadow tree. As a continuation of point 3, melee clusters should be relocated to the borders of her tree. The claw cluster should be up north where there are more claw clusters and Int passives, and 1-handed/sword clusters should be moved down south to the Duelist border. This would leave the core of the Ranger tree and the outer ring dedicated to bow passives, and thereby streamline her tree. In fact, I believe the Ranger's defense and offense highways should switch places, defense being on top and offense on bottom. This will also grant Shadows an additional defense option should they choose to delve into the Ranger tree. (Assuming that her defense highway is buffed and reworked accordingly.) I've never seen Duelists go up the Ranger defense highway as they tend to go towards the left to the Marauder tree, which is extremely strong.

This is a bit of a tangent, but regarding the low health vs. Strength characters:

What if instead of finding some way to buff life on dex characters, you change strength to give Armor instead of Life? This would likely require another retuning of monster damage, but makes all three stats give a secondary defense, instead of only Strength giving the primary defense and the best stat in the game for anyone who isn't CI.

It's been said before somewhere, but it seemed a good time to bring it up again.