Let's talk about Ranger

[Abel]

As far as I am concerned the swwet spot is useless for me unless I am in a HNM fight where hate is planted well.

I will do more dmg AND get tp faster stand just within melee range shooting and getting axe swings in between shots. With Pbody and brutal there just isn't a reason not to stay with the other melees. My problem with doing this is it seems opposite of what SE seems to want us to do which is stay back and only range attack. If they can implement something that will mildly increase my dot and tp gain AND allow me to not pull hate I will be hanging back as a happy ranger only range attacking.

Has anyone actually seen any hints from SE ranger changes are on their list?

I can only really see this being viable if you A. Use gun or xbow where you take less dmg down from shots by being up close, or B. use sushi instead of meat and are at a plateau anyways (like i was at several times during exping to 75) and being further/closer is either a very negligible diff (5-15 per shot or so) or basically no difference at all, same can be said if you hit the ratk cap and distance no longer affects you. Both scenarios, while able to plateau are perfectly able to be hit, the only problem is that you need capped ratk at certain areas in order to hit those plateaus and not see a noted change. And I agree, if this can happen, why the hell did SE even bother changing RNG to need to stand at x distance? If you can hit the ratk cap, and distance no longer affects your damage, or is so low it hardly matters, why bother? It's another huge contradiction SE made and I hope they rectify it personally. Ranger's should have the *option* of going back if they want, but it shouldn't be necessary. When I do 40+ per axe (assuming I hit with all the -racc gear I have until I cap merits out and find a good racc/acc setup to go to ______ camp) or hell, even 30dmg per axe, that's 60dmg extra a round, and I would surely benefit more from 60dmg or so every 2 shots than a measely 10dmg per shot, or even 20dmg per shot, and it would help my tp gain as well. Yet at the present time on the mobs I'm able to get camps for (read: not GC) I'm stuck at doing my distanced ranged for the extra 40-63dmg on avg more per hit. That coupled with me eating meat and my meree acc being roughly 56% doesn't seem worth it atm. But again, personal experiences teach us different things, and I'm always glad to learn from another so that I may better myself and then another may learn from me, ever improving upon the same ideals.

In my opinion though, just from having played both BLM and RNG pre-patch, RNG fell so much harder than BLM did, yet there are still a lot of good RNGs out there that are making a name for their job, and after the initial bitch-storm many are still proving themselves worthwhile and eagerly getting into parties. Perhaps it's just my server/experiences but every BLM I've pt'ed with or seen that is a career blm, and lvling up is just a sour sour bitch. Most pt's I had with them were filled with nothing but complaints, and trying to belittle other jobs in the party while masking up their own inadequacies (hi2u blm casting burst 1x per fight then resting and doing nothing else). I've met some crappy rngs too, like ones who don't know you need to keep pressing /ra <t> in order to keep ranged attacking...since some of them attack so slowly you'd think their xbow was a culverin.

Though I feel remorse for the ranger of old, I don't think it needs to be brought back entirely, but in complete honesty, I wouldn't be surprised if SE tried to, back then RNG was absolutely 100% broken, no doubts about it. But now with BB mnks, ridill wars, 2h buff, etc, rng is sorely lacking. The main problem isn't that SE nerfed us, it's that the players have gotten much better at playing the jobs, since they had such a large room for expansion that few back then knew how to monopolize on. Given the widespread information now, war's and mnks aren't shirked off anymore for invites like they used to be, and many other adaptations and changes that were made, while rng has expansion, but drastically less than the aforementioned jobs, making it stagnate so to speak and the other jobs passed it by. I feel RNG or BLM are going to get something soon, though I could be wrong. Actually no strike that, I don't think either are getting anything, because in accordance with WOG armor-types, they're going for heavy armors that you'd see in war-time, and TAU was more cloth-like armors, which as far as I know, RNG's aren't big on heavy armor, scale armor maybe, but heavy armor no. We didn't even get all that much if anything good from TAU imo. Salvage gear is, 'eh' really for rng, not as useful as other pieces for the jobs that can get it. I guess it's just hard for SE to improve rng while afraid of overly buffing it and giving it too much power and everybody whining again.

[Zilong]

BLMs were for D2s before the nerf, it was always "get moar rng"

No level difference penalty takes the blame. It's good they implemented it.

PDIF floor was an issue too, you could whore sushi and iron arrows and still pops like 100+ shot on HNM.

[Mikichan]

As far as I am concerned the swwet spot is useless for me unless I am in a HNM fight where hate is planted well.

I will do more dmg AND get tp faster stand just within melee range shooting and getting axe swings in between shots. With Pbody and brutal there just isn't a reason not to stay with the other melees. My problem with doing this is it seems opposite of what SE seems to want us to do which is stay back and only range attack. If they can implement something that will mildly increase my dot and tp gain AND allow me to not pull hate I will be hanging back as a happy ranger only range attacking.

I am not sure about being able to swing axes regularly. When I was asked to play RNG/NIN on one occasion recently, I found that if I time my macro well enough, usually I won't be able to swing many axes between shots. The extra damage from axe swings usually are equal/less/just a bit more than the gain from staying in sweet spot. And in sweet spot, your WS is actually much more, which bumps your damage up quite a bit. Not to mention the facts that using coeurl sub gives me a rather horrible accuracy using axes

There have been a lot of saying about pulling hate, but as far as I can tell, I can only really do it constantly in a incompetent party in which other melees are not really good. With good melees (not even counting relic), there are only a few instances when I can pull hate well enough: Triple damage proc, or Sidewinder. The first one will not happen w/o relic, the second one will make the mob likely be dead after one or two more shots, so it is not really a concern.

[VZX]

BLMs were for D2s before the nerf, it was always "get moar rng"

No level difference penalty takes the blame. It's good they implemented it.

PDIF floor was an issue too, you could whore sushi and iron arrows and still pops like 100+ shot on HNM.

No no no
If you were also the one who read my mistranslation, I apologize.

There was no pDIF floor, it was just that no level penalty made most of cRatio sitting on 0.9~1.1 range

when aspid goes into its shell, I still hit for single hit to low 10 damage back in early 2005. This is using hellfire and silver bullet IIRC

[Rammses]

When I do 40+ per axe (assuming I hit with all the -racc gear I have until I cap merits out and find a good racc/acc setup to go to ______ camp) or hell, even 30dmg per axe, that's 60dmg extra a round, and I would surely benefit more from 60dmg or so every 2 shots than a measely 10dmg per shot, or even 20dmg per shot, and it would help my tp gain as well.

What? Surely you're not going to swing anywhere close to every round if you shoot as soon as you can.

[Darcatvar]

As far as I am concerned the swwet spot is useless for me unless I am in a HNM fight where hate is planted well.

I will do more dmg AND get tp faster stand just within melee range shooting and getting axe swings in between shots. With Pbody and brutal there just isn't a reason not to stay with the other melees. My problem with doing this is it seems opposite of what SE seems to want us to do which is stay back and only range attack. If they can implement something that will mildly increase my dot and tp gain AND allow me to not pull hate I will be hanging back as a happy ranger only range attacking.

I am not sure about being able to swing axes regularly. When I was asked to play RNG/NIN on one occasion recently, I found that if I time my macro well enough, usually I won't be able to swing many axes between shots. The extra damage from axe swings usually are equal/less/just a bit more than the gain from staying in sweet spot. And in sweet spot, your WS is actually much more, which bumps your damage up quite a bit. Not to mention the facts that using coeurl sub gives me a rather horrible accuracy using axes

There have been a lot of saying about pulling hate, but as far as I can tell, I can only really do it constantly in a incompetent party in which other melees are not really good. With good melees (not even counting relic), there are only a few instances when I can pull hate well enough: Triple damage proc, or Sidewinder. The first one will not happen w/o relic, the second one will make the mob likely be dead after one or two more shots, so it is not really a concern.

I actually use bow and stand just barely in melee range the normal shot dmg reduction is small if any and my winders loose 100-200 dmg. I prefer bow for HNM which is what I have merited and sea torque for. Maybe I am in a good spot regarding rng att because I don't see a huge difference in dmg and I use subs also. I have gotten into the habit of using snipers on rng, that along with pbody and I have decent axe acc (~75%+). Also remember when you switch to a new mob (autotarget) you almost always get a melee attack round in and rng fire immediately after. With haste from mage I will usually get 1-2 more melee rounds in between rng attacks after the very first round after engaging. Not saying I never stand back in sweet spot which I will especially if I'm barraging right after.

[Abel]

When I do 40+ per axe (assuming I hit with all the -racc gear I have until I cap merits out and find a good racc/acc setup to go to ______ camp) or hell, even 30dmg per axe, that's 60dmg extra a round, and I would surely benefit more from 60dmg or so every 2 shots than a measely 10dmg per shot, or even 20dmg per shot, and it would help my tp gain as well.

What? Surely you're not going to swing anywhere close to every round if you shoot as soon as you can.

Good job on taking what I said totally out of context and make it look like I seriously meant that, wow awesome reading skills. It was obviously an example and not an example that is to be taken at face value, read what I said surrounding it or even afterwards before you post something that has no correlation to the whole idea of what I said. Selective reading ftw though. ^_^

"Yet at the present time on the mobs I'm able to get camps for (read: not GC) I'm stuck at doing my distanced ranged for the extra 40-63dmg on avg more per hit. That coupled with me eating meat and my meree acc being roughly 56% doesn't seem worth it atm. But again, personal experiences teach us different things, and I'm always glad to learn from another so that I may better myself and then another may learn from me, ever improving upon the same ideals."

Reading is good mmkay.

[Mayareira]

Eagle Eye Shot:

Well, simply, increase the accuracy and potency of EES. Make it ignore DEF/VIT or land a 100% critical hit.

Weapon/Ammo Delay/Base Damage:

Just like dagger damage buff, since we cannot be hasted, make some adjustments on weapon delays or base damages, or make snapshot a tiered job trait further enhancable by merit points.

Tiered Recycle Job Trait:

...at around 30% proc rate at level 75, enhancable by merits and Scout's Beret.

[Jotaru]

In all of this discussion, it just gets me thinking, perhaps we don'thave all our bases covered when it comes to new jobs after all... Time Mage (or whatever else) getting a Hastey-type spell that affects Ranged could be just one of those things, gives a new job some unique usage while enhancing an otherwise weaker job. Not to derail onto topics of new jobs, but the potential is definitely there... and didn't they say a little while back they were looking at job balancing a bit?

[VZX]

There'll always be jobs rebalancing as new jobs introduced.

[Alistaire]

So many walls o' text here, sorry if this has been said, but in regards to the idea of STR=ratk AGI=racc, the same logic that gave 2h melee their STR/DEX boosts (using 2 hands makes you hit harder, more accurate) applies to RNG as well for bow as you don't exactly shoot bows one-handed. Couldn't argue that for gun or xbow though.

[sherazhina]

How about offering a different option with weaponry? IMHO, RNG are supposed to be the masters of ranged attacks. Then why is it that whenever you're attempting to pull mobs, you can be outpulled by anyone main or sub WAR with a voke? You cannot (generally) get your arrow off faster than it takes them to close the extra distance to voke. It annoys the hell out of me that a RNG gets so easily out-pulled. The only person that should be able to out-pull a RNG is an even better RNG.

So my recommendation is this....

Create a handful of bows that don't go for the power path, but instead speed (and perhaps accuracy to if ppl feel it is needed). That way, equipped with the right bow, you can fire faster than someone can close to voking distance, but you just do less dmg (guess would have to be minimal dmg for it to balance out). That way ppl can choose whether they want a ranged weapon that puts a hole in anything it hits, or a weapon that'll hit the target faster than anyone else can (lame example: Legolas in LOTR: Two Towers taking out like 3 bad guys before they reach the evacuees (and warriors guarding them) going to Helm's Deep, or managing to get 3 goddamn arrows off while just sliding down the stairs during the Helm's Deep battle!)

[Shadida]

Have you seen Loxley Bow? I used it to pull Executioner Antlions for my old LS to CFH on them during Rostrum runs, and Loxley often quick-claimed and didn't actually fire.

If the 'new' elemental arrows weren't such a pain and an INT build was actually feasible, I'm sure it would rank up there in DoT (at least in certain situations).

Repeating Crossbow is the marksmanship equivalent.

[terraflarex]

Have you seen Loxley Bow?
Repeating Crossbow is the marksmanship equivalent.

Indeed, good sir.

[Forewarned]

Loxley was nice to carry around when levelling ranger. A second party comes to your camp and the bard laughs as the 2nd party has a ranger pulling only to see you pull out loxley - shame the damage sucks, because if your being forced to pull with loxley you have to switch to regular bow / x-bow (losing TP) or DD with a poor damaging weapon. Often its just easier to let bard pull lol.

- edit because I forgot the main point of the post

[VZX]

You lose TP - this is what's important

[Mythe_Seraph]

You lose TP - this is what's important

Or at least for like 30 min or so, until/if the other Party leaves of course.

[Alistaire]

1-minute JA Quick Shot?

[Dian]

They could make snapshot a lv5 job trait starting at 1% ranged delay reduction, and have it increase by 1% for every 5 levels to 75. Then have merits apply an additional 2% per merit.

[Alistaire]

They could make snapshot a lv5 job trait starting at 1% ranged delay reduction, and have it increase by 1% for every 5 levels to 75. Then have merits apply an additional 2% per merit.

So a permanent 15% haste for unmeritted rangers @ 75 that doesn't need a rdm or whm to cast it on them every 3 minutes? Noooo that's not unbalanced. 15% haste generally wouldn't make you outpull a bard anyway. If you want a pulling ability my idea for a 1-minute ja to do an instant shot would be better, and can be balanced by lowering the accuracy and/or damage on it because it's a hastily-aimed shot.

Another option would be to make bows fire right away and have it so the delay is the time till you can shoot agin, so rather than "delay delay SHOOT! delay delay SHOOT!" you have "SHOOT!delay delay SHOOT!delay delay".