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My Ranger experience so far.
while I am sitting here recovering from a gallbladder attack at 5am, I figured I'd do some writing to try and take my mind off of things here, since I can't sleep.
just wanted to share my experience with the HR so far, give a view from a noobie perspective.
So i am playing on PS4. I've played NW before on PC, but this was way back in 2013. it's been 3 years since I last played.
my HR is currently level 45. Stormwarden. I don't really understand the Pathfinder spec, for some reason I can't wrap my head around how it is supposed to work. Stormwarden seems more straightforward.
I tried a Paladin, he was cool. got him to 34, got a Warlock to 15. used my 3rd slot for a HR, on a whim, and kinda fell in love with him within the first 10 levels. It is easily the coolest, best-looking class in the game.
The class mechanic is amazing fun to use. I love it to death, the constant swapping from ranged to melee, and back. This, and the aesthetics, are the main things that draw me to the class. No matter what spec I use, I am always going to engage in that hybrid playstyle, it is just that much fun.
as far as specs go, I am mentally back and forth between Trapper and Combat. I honestly prefer Combat, but I understand that Trapper is the only spec path that actually works. so I feel forced to go that route, despite preferring Combat. Trapper I feel like I am forced into just a rinse/repeat rotation, where when I use the Combat tree, I feel like I have a little more choice as to when to use my powers to best effect. Trapper I feel like I am mashing buttons, where Combat I feel like I can use my powers strategically, adjusting to combat. if that makes any sense at all to you guys. I feel like as a Combat spec, my melee/range swap playstyle is more according to how and when I feel like I should swap, where Trapper kinda forces you to swap at set intervals. I am aware though, that I do not have all of the required feats and powers yet, but even at 45 I feel this difference.
that said, Devs...PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE FIX COMBAT. I honestly prefer to play that, and I don't want to be forced into Trapper if it can be avoided.
Also, at 45, I begin to feel just how much weaker the class is, damage-wise, than others. our At-wills are way underpowered, especially the Melee ones. I understand that high-level Trappers don't care about this, cause they don't really use at-wills, but at my level I can really feel it, when I am trying to finish off an enemy while my encounters are on cooldown, it takes far longer than it should. the melee encounters are pretty weak as well.
overall though, the class is damn fun, and I'm going to stick with it in hopes that the upcoming fixes do what they are supposed to do. cause I can barely picture myself playing something else at this point, I like my Hunter way too much.
Some random opinions on skills/feats, from my novice point of view:
I don't understand why Combat and Archery specs do not interact with Grasping Roots in any meaningful way. It is our only other class mechanic, and only one spec actually makes real use of it. I feel like Combat should have a passive that causes Grasping Roots to explode for AOE burst damage when hitting a Rooted enemy in melee. not sure about Archery, but it needs SOMETHING. either that or we need a new mechanic for combat/archery specs.
I LOVE Marauders Escape/Rush. Coolest-looking skill in the game, and it's not close. I wish Escape did not eat stacks of Aspect of the Serpent though, cause it does no damage and is therefore a waste of a stack. I wish Rush did a small radius AOE.
Bear Trap SUCKS.
I feel like Lucky Blades should reflect damage instead of increasing AP Gain.
Split The Sky (aka "Make it Rain on these Hoes") is pretty fun to use, precast it, then leap into Melee and let it work. throw it over the tank in a dungeon is pretty cool. I don't really understand Throw Caution, though, and this is the reason I don't use it as much as I probably should.
I dont like Rain of Arrows, or Boar Charge. maybe I'm just not using them right or something, but they aren't skills I put on my bar like, ever. The radius of Rain of Arrows is atrociously small.
Thorn Strike's execute damage should be increased. Thorn Ward needs quicker activation.
Combat and Archery Capstones are both pretty terrible in comparison to Trapper and need to be replaced. I don't even need to use them to realize this.
I understand that Trappers can get down to almost-zero cooldown on their Encounters, but why does that mean the other specs have to suffer for it? Our cooldowns are pretty painful. some Cooldown reduction(though not to the extent of trappers)in the other trees would do some good.
I love, love, love, Split Shot. it's probably the only skill that has NEVER left my bar. Split Strike is kinda weird though, imo. I don't use it often. Might benefit from increasing the dash range and blast radius, to make it an actual aoe charge
but these are just my uneducated opinions. I'm gonna try to get to 60 within the next day or two and get to the endgame grind and see how things change for me.
thanks for indulging the rantings of a noobie in terrible pain.
just wanted to share my experience with the HR so far, give a view from a noobie perspective.
So i am playing on PS4. I've played NW before on PC, but this was way back in 2013. it's been 3 years since I last played.
my HR is currently level 45. Stormwarden. I don't really understand the Pathfinder spec, for some reason I can't wrap my head around how it is supposed to work. Stormwarden seems more straightforward.
I tried a Paladin, he was cool. got him to 34, got a Warlock to 15. used my 3rd slot for a HR, on a whim, and kinda fell in love with him within the first 10 levels. It is easily the coolest, best-looking class in the game.
The class mechanic is amazing fun to use. I love it to death, the constant swapping from ranged to melee, and back. This, and the aesthetics, are the main things that draw me to the class. No matter what spec I use, I am always going to engage in that hybrid playstyle, it is just that much fun.
as far as specs go, I am mentally back and forth between Trapper and Combat. I honestly prefer Combat, but I understand that Trapper is the only spec path that actually works. so I feel forced to go that route, despite preferring Combat. Trapper I feel like I am forced into just a rinse/repeat rotation, where when I use the Combat tree, I feel like I have a little more choice as to when to use my powers to best effect. Trapper I feel like I am mashing buttons, where Combat I feel like I can use my powers strategically, adjusting to combat. if that makes any sense at all to you guys. I feel like as a Combat spec, my melee/range swap playstyle is more according to how and when I feel like I should swap, where Trapper kinda forces you to swap at set intervals. I am aware though, that I do not have all of the required feats and powers yet, but even at 45 I feel this difference.
that said, Devs...PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE FIX COMBAT. I honestly prefer to play that, and I don't want to be forced into Trapper if it can be avoided.
Also, at 45, I begin to feel just how much weaker the class is, damage-wise, than others. our At-wills are way underpowered, especially the Melee ones. I understand that high-level Trappers don't care about this, cause they don't really use at-wills, but at my level I can really feel it, when I am trying to finish off an enemy while my encounters are on cooldown, it takes far longer than it should. the melee encounters are pretty weak as well.
overall though, the class is damn fun, and I'm going to stick with it in hopes that the upcoming fixes do what they are supposed to do. cause I can barely picture myself playing something else at this point, I like my Hunter way too much.
Some random opinions on skills/feats, from my novice point of view:
I don't understand why Combat and Archery specs do not interact with Grasping Roots in any meaningful way. It is our only other class mechanic, and only one spec actually makes real use of it. I feel like Combat should have a passive that causes Grasping Roots to explode for AOE burst damage when hitting a Rooted enemy in melee. not sure about Archery, but it needs SOMETHING. either that or we need a new mechanic for combat/archery specs.
I LOVE Marauders Escape/Rush. Coolest-looking skill in the game, and it's not close. I wish Escape did not eat stacks of Aspect of the Serpent though, cause it does no damage and is therefore a waste of a stack. I wish Rush did a small radius AOE.
Bear Trap SUCKS.
I feel like Lucky Blades should reflect damage instead of increasing AP Gain.
Split The Sky (aka "Make it Rain on these Hoes") is pretty fun to use, precast it, then leap into Melee and let it work. throw it over the tank in a dungeon is pretty cool. I don't really understand Throw Caution, though, and this is the reason I don't use it as much as I probably should.
I dont like Rain of Arrows, or Boar Charge. maybe I'm just not using them right or something, but they aren't skills I put on my bar like, ever. The radius of Rain of Arrows is atrociously small.
Thorn Strike's execute damage should be increased. Thorn Ward needs quicker activation.
Combat and Archery Capstones are both pretty terrible in comparison to Trapper and need to be replaced. I don't even need to use them to realize this.
I understand that Trappers can get down to almost-zero cooldown on their Encounters, but why does that mean the other specs have to suffer for it? Our cooldowns are pretty painful. some Cooldown reduction(though not to the extent of trappers)in the other trees would do some good.
I love, love, love, Split Shot. it's probably the only skill that has NEVER left my bar. Split Strike is kinda weird though, imo. I don't use it often. Might benefit from increasing the dash range and blast radius, to make it an actual aoe charge
but these are just my uneducated opinions. I'm gonna try to get to 60 within the next day or two and get to the endgame grind and see how things change for me.
thanks for indulging the rantings of a noobie in terrible pain.
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Comments
I played a HR and I went the whole Archery path only but honestly, I never felt like I was not dealing enough damage. But instead, once I reached 60 and went to the first map there, I felt like I was missing a lot of defense. Each pack of three mobs there can kill you in three hits...
Sounds like Trapper is the only real path to go to survive in this world but I sticked with my full-archery character... even if it's not balanced and too difficult.
note never met a HR that did not respect at some point trick is find out what things give free respects like the winter event and certain rewards picked up from completing campaigns cash in for free respects token in PE
Ara
also, i don't feel like trapper tree forces you to play any sort of way at all. for one thing, if you are simply button mashing then you are most likely missing out on a lot of damage. it's not that brainlessly simple. but again, at level 45, none of that really even matters.
as a trapper, you can play the traditional way that so many love. or you can play with archery encounters. you can be a buffer if you want or go for dps. you can do both at the same time. yes, its horrible that there is only 1 viable tree at the moment for the hunter ranger, but really, other classes have similar problems. at least with HR trapper tree, you have the flexibility to play in a number of different ways... and even change it mid dungeon based on what the party needs.
SoonerGM - HR Trapper
Haven - Righteous Cleric
Ethereal Justice - OP Paladin
the main thing that has changed about my view, is that all the other classes seem to get exponentially better, damage-wise, where my damage has fallen off drastically. I think this is a fault of Combat seemingly being based on the usage of At-wills(per the Combat Capstone), while the At-wills do terrible damage. Combat's first tier feat needs to be a straight increase in Melee damage(Your melee At-wills and Encounters do 25/50/75/100/150%% more damage), imo.
Combat damage seems to be a whole lot of little numbers flying around. if they added up to a really big number, that'd be great, "death by a thousand cuts" kind of combat. but they don't.
I am currently full Combat spec, but I will be switching to full, or almost-full Trapper. (I may put 10 points into combat for the extra deflect and LS) Depends on whether I decide I want to take the Thorned Roots way, or take Serpent's Bite instead. or both. I haven't decided yet. I'm honestly wondering if a Trapper without Thorned Roots can be a decent way to play, or is Thorned Roots basically mandatory.
I'm not well-geared at all, but I can already see that as Combat I will routinely be at the bottom of every leaderboard just about(even when I get well-geared), and solo is beginning to actually get a little difficult, just because I don't put out enough damage to end fights quickly.
I'm watching what is going on in Preview very closely. if the Combat feat tree and spec ever gets really fixed, I'll switch back to it, but I can see already just at 60, that going in that direction right now will be an exercise in futility, despite the fact that I really like the playstyle. I like using the At-wills, they just simply don't do enough damage.
Still trying to wrap my head around how to use Pathfinder. I tried it for a few levels before going back to Stormwarden.
" once I reached 60 and went to the first map there, I felt like I was missing a lot of defense. Each pack of three mobs there can kill you in three hits..."
Noticing this so much. I've died way more since reaching 60 than prior to 60. Shoot an arrow "boom" 3-6 mobs leap across the screen and land on top of you and burst you down to 10% health. I've started by opening with Fox's Cunning, then Hunter's teamwork before quickly dodging away knowing they're coming, then switch to melee for Careful attack and AOE'ish type stuff. If my dog happens to hold aggro I'll switch back to ranged for rain of arrows but that's a rarity. Half my fights end up dodging/running with the occassional shot and eventually winning, the other half things seem to click and stuff dies fast and it feels easy. Trying to find how to make that the norm rather than sometimes is the tricky part.
the main thing that has changed about my view, is that all the other classes seem to get exponentially better, damage-wise, where my damage has fallen off drastically.
This stands out to me. Seems like most other people I see just charge into these packs that give me so much trouble and take them out, whereas to me each fight is a challenge. I will say that on fights where I'm part of a group and I can run my rotation without worrying so much about taking damage I can do pretty good damage, it's just when I need to worry about not dying more than doing damage that things go bad.
I'm really hoping the changes make being an archer viable. My hope when I chose the class was to spend most of my time shooting arrows and only melee when needed, rather than the full hybrid style currently required.
The main difference between Stormwarden and Pathfinder is that Pathfinder has Careful Attack. In that sense, Stormwarden is more of an AoE spec while Pathfinder has stronger single target damage, as well as an easier time keeping ranged Aspect of the Serpent stacks up because of CA (which is fixed on preview).
The only real playstyle difference when going Trapper is Careful Attack and somewhat Slasher's Mark. CA is fairly powerful in large group fights against single targets, since it procs based on the amount of people hitting it rather than the supposed 1.5s cooldown the tooltip states it has, so you get a lot of hits and hence damage from in those cases, as well as generating absurd amounts of AP besides the currently bugged Trapper capstone (which again, is fixed on preview). Additionally, it synergises very well with Gushing Wound, because of how the hits interact with each other.
For starters, when using Pathfinder, select one target, most likely one of the stronger mobs such as an elite or boss mob, and use Careful Attack on it (you'll see a red mark appear). When you gain more experience, you'll be able to consistently tell whether it's a crit or not, but this does take time and no small amount of awareness because of how many dots HR has, so don't worry about it for now. Pretty much after that just play as you usually would with encounters (for Trapper), and just check the mob every now and then to make sure CA is still up, since it only lasts about 20-30 seconds (used to be 30s, but I think it got nerfed down to 20s).
I think for the purpose of levelling and/or casual play, you might find Stormwarden's Clear the Ground more interesting. In my opinion, CtG/Electric Shot are one of the most aesthetically pleasing HR skills, but apart from that they're not fantastic. CtG used to be the old meta at-will for Stormwarden Combat HRs back in Module 4, before 70 cap was introduced but the skill was never scaled up. It has great AoE range but lacks damage. Also, if you're a Trapper you're not using a lot of at-wills anyway, so it's less useful than Pathfinder's Careful Attack, which is basically a fire and forget skill, so that benefits Trapper since you can pay more attention to everything else you do.
While levelling with Combat, I might actually recommend that you try equip 2 Greater Red Dragon Glyphs if you have overload slots, since at-will damage is rather low and hence the 600 damage ticks does provide an okay amount of damage boost if you go that route.
Also another thing that you might want to learn about HR is how to weave certain skills - i.e. move the maximum amount of distance while animations are running, so that you spend less time repositioning and more time attacking. CtG is a good example of this, if you jump and execute the at-will while in the air, you'll move and still execute the animation. It's not necessarily overly important for PvE I guess, but it's a habit that's nice to pick up and makes the combat a bit more fluid. On PC, people call this "bunnyhopping" in PvP, but it's a useful habit to have, and helps you understand your skill timings a bit more.
Last thing in this wall of text - a large portion of playing an HR is about awareness. The most important skill for an HR player is awareness - things like buffs and positioning play a major part in setting you apart from other HRs, especially if you decide to PvP. There's not really much skill involved with playing HR since it's pretty brainless right now with Trapper, but you can excel more than other players if you have more awareness of what you're doing. For example, critting Careful Attack is far better than not critting it, for both damage and utility (if you run Trapper's Cunning, a crit Careful Attack can proc that + Forestbond), and it does take a fair amount of awareness to be able to determine whether it crits or not when you have a lot of damage floaters on the screen. Obviously, this sort of thing would apply more in PvP than in PvE, but the principle still stands either way. Another example is Aspect of the Serpent stacks - if you want to maximise your damage, then use your hardest hittings skills when the serpent stacks are at their max, and Thorned Roots when ranged stacks are at their max since it snapshots the base damage. Another important thing to note is if you go Trapper, be mindful of when Biting Snares procs. I've seen many HRs continue on their merry rotation without swapping stances to activate Master Trapper, and this is a fairly sizable damage loss. As soon as you see "Biting Snares", most of the time you should be double stance swapping at the very least to proc it, or as another example, fire off a long animation skill such as Constricting Arrow, and double stance swap while it's firing.
Hopefully this gives you a bit more of an idea of what Pathfinder and other HR things are like, though you seem pretty well off on your own so far
thanks for the advice! I just respecced to Pathfinder Trapper, and I am going to go with this for a while and see how it goes.
In terms of what's useful with each path, I'll do a quick breakdown for you.
Pathfinder
Ambush: live state is absolutely useless, however with the buffs it's kind of okay for a quick single hit but overall not a great skill still. It's mostly for PvP I guess.
Bear Trap: I don't think anything will ever make this useful for a long time.
Hunter's Teamwork: less damage than Rapid Shot but still decent. It hits slightly harder than Rapid Shot per hit, but it fires slower.
Careful Attack: a good single target damage skill, and synergises well with other attacks like Gushing Wound. Very high AP generation.
Pathfinder's Action: okay in PvP, useless in PvE.
Battlehoned: useless everywhere.
Slasher's Mark: nice gap closing skill, does decent damage (Seismic does more, but it's still comparable). Stamina regen is nice, but ultimately in good parties isn't very necessary.
Cruel Recovery: lol
Stormwarden
Split the Sky: recently changed to do periodic damage at the same rate Thorn Ward does, but lacks the debuff and I think the damage is slightly less. However, also has an on-hit activation, so it might end up doing more.
Throw Caution: this power is rather iffy. I was testing it on preview but determining the damage buff value was a bit difficult since I couldn't be bothered to load ACT at the time. However, I was able to determine that it's a 5 second damage buff that gives somewhere between 15-25% damage bonus, and 20-30% with the Combat feat. Longstrider is better in almost every way, especially since it's a party buff and not a self-buff like Throw Caution is.
Electric Shot: aesthetically pleasing, but terrible damage and slow casting times.
Clear the Ground: this at-will has the best AoE range out of all HR at-wills, but the damage is rather lacking. It's fun to use, though.
Stormstep Action: as a Trapper this is completely useless, as any other path it's still pretty useless but alright if you have nothing better, I guess.
Cold-Steel Hurricane: people underestimate the value of this skill. Currently has no target cap on live, but will have a target cap of 10 after the recent changes. If you position this skill correctly, such as going right through a Dragon, it actually can do a lot of damage.
Twin-Blade Storm: one of the best AoE damage buff class features that HR has. Completely useless in single target, though.
Cryptic has actually defined Pathfinder as a support/utility tree, and Stormwarden as a damage tree in one of their blogs I can't be bothered to look up. I find it more that Pathfinder is single target and utility, while Stormwarden is AoE damage.
also, is there any way to increase the healing from the dropped supplies after the target dies?
HT vs RS is a matter of preference, RS is more damage overall because it fires faster, but HT is passable and you can really use another at-will instead of RS if you're going that route.
The healing from hunter scale with your power. Maybe out going heal ( not sure).
The most important thing in life is to be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. Always be Batman.
SoonerGM - HR Trapper
Haven - Righteous Cleric
Ethereal Justice - OP Paladin
Alts :
Storm (SW70), Edge (TR70), AD Farm (CW70), Grunt (GF70), Rosa (DC70), AD AD AD (GWF70), Your Mum (OP70)
Member of Q-Snipe
I'm aware that numbers-wise, Trapper is the better path. but the Combat style suits me better, I think. I really hope at some point the numbers get fixed with Combat.
that said, I have not tried Pathfinder Combat yet. that might be interesting.
The most important thing in life is to be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. Always be Batman.
I can't gtten Plant Growth yet though. leveling post 60 is a lot longer than pre 60.
SoonerGM - HR Trapper
Haven - Righteous Cleric
Ethereal Justice - OP Paladin
I finally have it and it's pretty damn nice.
the Combat Capstone is based on melee at-wills, but the main at-will for Pathfinder kinda...is a debuff and not an attack. how does that work, does Careful Attack apply twice?
also, how do you tell when Careful Attack crits, before someone else hits the target?
lastly, as far as at-wills go, what's the better combination? Rapid Strike/Careful Attack, or Careful Attack/Split Strike?
Split strike is somewhat awkward to use, however; so I'd recommend Rapid or Aimed for single target, or CtG for AoE (if Stormwarden).
As for Careful Attack, the only surefire way to tell if it crits is if you have the Lostmauth set, which will start proccing damage asap from the crit.
Very hard to tell on a raid with all the spam though.