Rangers bad again?

[Arranvin]

The ranger is a pet class in the way that a wizard is a class that casts spells. It's integral to the class. Yes, there was no animal companion in BG/IWD but that was simply due to it being a feature that was left out. 2nd ed AD&D, which BG and IWD were based on had rangers gain animal companions. Nobody is forced to use an animal companion in Deadfire. If you really don't want one, play a Ghost Heart.

[JFutral]

 

 

 

OTOH, I consider the animal companion to be a pain in the posterior and NOT part of the  Ranger ethos.  A/C's should have been a level 1 ability that you got to choose whether or not you wanted to have one as a  ranger.  Not everybody likes dragging around a damned pet that you have to dump ability points into when some might prefer to put them entirely into the Ranger and not worry about the bleeping animal.

 

 

You shouldn't buy or play PoE, then. You won't be happy. Buy and play a different game. You should be happy.

 

Joe

 

 

Or I can play POE and make my considerable displeasure know as I see fit.

 

 

Life's too short. Find something that makes you happy. No need to be miserable.

 

Joe

[Kaylon]

The pet should be a part of the class, but not the major part of the class. The ranger wasn't very strong in PoE either but at least he was the best ranged class. In Deadfire the class was nerfed into oblivion - stripped of every modals, wounding shot does the same dmg as the rogue's passive ( ), stunning shots and twinned shots are big jokes, etc... 

[JFutral]

Yeah, that whole wounding shot/rogue ability overlap makes me scratch my head, although then I don't have waste a skill on wounding shot (or the other way around) when I multi-class ranger/rogue, which is what I'm playing at the moment.

 

I love the pet. Wounding shot, Marked Prey, and all the ranger/pet synergies is still one of my favorite strategies.

 

And ranger (stalker)/druid with the same spiritshift form as my animal companion is a lot of fun. When I do that I don't even bother with ranged.

 

I do agree that the ranger has been nerfed from PoE1, but then I haven't had a chance to play higher than 9th level so I'll have to wait and see beyond that.

 

Joe

[Hazmy]

I personally feel if Maia's sublcass would be available to the player, ranger's would be amazing tier. At least my Maia is an absolute beast and I wish I could play that subclass as my main.

[MadMatt86]

I started playing as a Devoted fighter/Stalker ranger with a focus on hatchets. POTD. So far nothing has even damaged me....

[Michael_Galt]

I'm literally copy and pasting what I wrote in another thread, trying to get some ideas as to whether to play a ranger/chanter or ranger/cipher.  I very much enjoyed the beguiler/ranger I made and played.

 

 

"Well, I just beat it last night playing as a beguiler/ranger(no subclass).  I ended up going that way, since many of the recruitable companions can multiclass to chanter, and I didn't want the cipher companion on my first playthrough.  I ended up making Pallegina a paladin/chanter, and that worked out really well- tons of passive party buffs, plus summoning to help out the odds.

 

So, how did I play my beguiler/ranger?  Well, I stuck with bows and rapier and stilettos.  I was actually more dangerous in melee, but principally stuck to ranged attacks.  I worked with Maia, and we would scout out the territory together.  When we found enemies, I would look for the ones with the lowest will saves, and use Whispers of Treason... as soon as we had our impromptu traitor, Maia would then hobble the next melee type to slow them down.  We would each use our animal companions to knockdown approaching enemies, with Pallegina running in to support.  I got lucky and found a bow that delivers several extra shots in a single attack, and when I eventually got Driving Shot, I literally would end up with more Focus than I could actually use.  I would use my Watcher to blind enemies, give them flanked, dominate them, and terrify them.  Pallegina and our animal companions would go in and beat them down.  Worked pretty excellently.

 

A note, that while it is a very high level ability, ciphers can give Empower to their companions.  When I was getting close to end game, I would use that continuously, allowing Aloth or whoever to use empowered skills without losing any points, requiring us to sleep.  It was pretty great. 

 

I personally think that a ranger/cipher is BETTER than a ranger/chanter, in the sense that they can be slightly more versatile.  Now, if you were to play a stalker/chanter, that might make for a really cool build.  Stay with your animal companion, use chants to make the frontline more effective."

[Arnegar]

The ranger subclasses are just riddled with heavy penalties, to the point where I don't feel like taking any of them. It's even worse than wizards who at least get major bonuses in exchange for their substantial penalties. And the pet is a giant hassle and liability, bonded grief is such a severe debuff.

 

Sharpshooter gets a recovery penalty that mitigates the damage bonuses. The -10 deflection is harsh as well. Unless you invest a bunch of points into resolve (again counteracting the damage bonus), you're gonna have like 10 deflection or something and every enemy will make a beeline for you. It's just not worthwhile to have a character with a permanent -10 deflection penalty unless you're playing on a lower difficulty cheesing your way through the game somehow.

 

Ghost Heart gets no actual bonuses and is pure garbage. You get to not suffer a debuff when your pet dies, but you have to spend time summoning it in every fight and it has a duration. I'd almost consider taking this subclass and not bothering to summon a pet, just to get the ranger abilities without having to deal with the bonded grief debuff. But it's not like that's actually worthwhile.

 

Stalker is really strong on paper, but the amount of micromanagement you have to do to always stay within 7m of your pet will drive a level-headed man insane after a few hours. There's no pet AI option to have it stay close to you, so you have to constantly babysit this character. 7m is like half the range of a bow. It literally doesn't make sense that you start to suffer grief as soon as your pet moves further away from you than you could throw a chair. That's to say nothing of the 4m distance you need to maintain in order to actually get the bonus.

 

The main issue is that the pet simply isn't good enough to warrant this burden. If you invest several skill points into pet-related passives, it starts to become vaguely okay, but then you could probably have gained even more damage from some other class. You could make a very strong Devoted/Brute archer, for instance. These days, most games that have a class with a permanent pet let you choose a setup that forgoes the pet in favor of some passive buff, and this game frankly needs something like that.

Edited May 14, 2018 by Arnegar

[JFutral]

The ranger subclasses are just riddled with heavy penalties, to the point where I don't feel like taking any of them.

 

Sharpshooter gets a recovery penalty that nearly mitigates the damage bonuses and makes it awkward to use any other abilities with the character. The -10 deflection is harsh as well. Unless you invest a bunch of points into resolve (again counteracting the damage bonus), you're gonna have like 10 deflection or something and every enemy will make a beeline for you. It's just not viable to have a character with a permanent -10 deflection penalty unless you're cheesing your way through the game somehow.

 

Ghost Heart gets no actual bonuses and is pure garbage. You get to not suffer a debuff when your pet dies, but you have to spend time summoning it in every fight and it has a duration. I'd almost consider taking this subclass and not bothering to summon a pet, just to get the ranger abilities without having to deal with the bonded grief debuff. But it's not like that's actually worthwhile.

 

Stalker is really strong on paper, but the amount of micromanagement you have to do to always stay within 7m of your pet will drive a level-headed man insane after a few hours. There's no pet AI option to have it stay close to you, so you have to constantly babysit this character. 7m is like half the range of a bow. That's to say nothing of the 4m distance you need to maintain in order to actually get the bonus. It's just such a giant hassle that conflicts with basic game mechanics.

 

The main issue is that the pet simply isn't good enough to warrant this burden. If you invest several skill points into pet-related passives, it starts to become vaguely okay, but then you could probably have gained even more damage from some other class. You could make a very strong Devoted/Brute archer, for instance. These days, most games that have a class with a permanent pet let you choose a setup that forgoes the pet in favor of some passive buff, and this game frankly needs something like that.

 

And yet people are merrily rolling and rolling along with a ranger. Happily so, even. And killing things. Go figure.

 

Joe

[Xsorus]

The ranger subclasses are just riddled with heavy penalties, to the point where I don't feel like taking any of them. It's even worse than wizards who at least get major bonuses in exchange for their substantial penalties. And the pet is a giant hassle and liability, bonded grief is such a severe debuff.

 

Sharpshooter gets a recovery penalty that mitigates the damage bonuses. The -10 deflection is harsh as well. Unless you invest a bunch of points into resolve (again counteracting the damage bonus), you're gonna have like 10 deflection or something and every enemy will make a beeline for you. It's just not worthwhile to have a character with a permanent -10 deflection penalty unless you're playing on a lower difficulty cheesing your way through the game somehow.

 

Ghost Heart gets no actual bonuses and is pure garbage. You get to not suffer a debuff when your pet dies, but you have to spend time summoning it in every fight and it has a duration. I'd almost consider taking this subclass and not bothering to summon a pet, just to get the ranger abilities without having to deal with the bonded grief debuff. But it's not like that's actually worthwhile.

 

Stalker is really strong on paper, but the amount of micromanagement you have to do to always stay within 7m of your pet will drive a level-headed man insane after a few hours. There's no pet AI option to have it stay close to you, so you have to constantly babysit this character. 7m is like half the range of a bow. It literally doesn't make sense that you start to suffer grief as soon as your pet moves further away from you than you could throw a chair. That's to say nothing of the 4m distance you need to maintain in order to actually get the bonus.

 

The main issue is that the pet simply isn't good enough to warrant this burden. If you invest several skill points into pet-related passives, it starts to become vaguely okay, but then you could probably have gained even more damage from some other class. You could make a very strong Devoted/Brute archer, for instance. These days, most games that have a class with a permanent pet let you choose a setup that forgoes the pet in favor of some passive buff, and this game frankly needs something like that.

 

I'm doing a Bleakwalker Paladin/Ghost Heart Ranger

 

I'm not sure why you think the Ghost Heart Ranger is bad? You get a pet that has an insanely fast cast time that you can cast directly behind an enemy once you engaged with him and make him instantly flanked. He then runs around the battlefield assisting and attacking mobs.. and if he dies who cares.. you can instantly summon him again. 

[MadMatt86]

 

The ranger subclasses are just riddled with heavy penalties, to the point where I don't feel like taking any of them.

 

Sharpshooter gets a recovery penalty that nearly mitigates the damage bonuses and makes it awkward to use any other abilities with the character. The -10 deflection is harsh as well. Unless you invest a bunch of points into resolve (again counteracting the damage bonus), you're gonna have like 10 deflection or something and every enemy will make a beeline for you. It's just not viable to have a character with a permanent -10 deflection penalty unless you're cheesing your way through the game somehow.

 

Ghost Heart gets no actual bonuses and is pure garbage. You get to not suffer a debuff when your pet dies, but you have to spend time summoning it in every fight and it has a duration. I'd almost consider taking this subclass and not bothering to summon a pet, just to get the ranger abilities without having to deal with the bonded grief debuff. But it's not like that's actually worthwhile.

 

Stalker is really strong on paper, but the amount of micromanagement you have to do to always stay within 7m of your pet will drive a level-headed man insane after a few hours. There's no pet AI option to have it stay close to you, so you have to constantly babysit this character. 7m is like half the range of a bow. That's to say nothing of the 4m distance you need to maintain in order to actually get the bonus. It's just such a giant hassle that conflicts with basic game mechanics.

 

The main issue is that the pet simply isn't good enough to warrant this burden. If you invest several skill points into pet-related passives, it starts to become vaguely okay, but then you could probably have gained even more damage from some other class. You could make a very strong Devoted/Brute archer, for instance. These days, most games that have a class with a permanent pet let you choose a setup that forgoes the pet in favor of some passive buff, and this game frankly needs something like that.

 

And yet people are merrily rolling and rolling along with a ranger. Happily so, even. And killing things. Go figure.

 

Joe

 

 

 

Funny thing is, everyone is complaining that POTD is too damn easy. Its quite fun with a ranger so far. And lord forbid rangers suck because its a little challenging and you have to micromanage yourself and your pet besides auto attack. And then they go on to complain that autoattack is boring and they want a character with more engagement. 

Edited May 14, 2018 by MadMatt86

[Yosharian]

I agree that the Ranger subclasses in Deadfire are absolute trash, actually.

[cycloverid]

I agree that the Ranger subclasses in Deadfire are absolute trash, actually.

 

I agree with this too. I have a Sharpshooter ranger and I also made a Mindstalker out of Ydwin for fun and she is doing at least as much ranged dps as my ranger with unoptimized stats and gear...

[Yosharian]

 

I agree that the Ranger subclasses in Deadfire are absolute trash, actually.

 

I agree with this too. I have a Sharpshooter ranger and I also made a Mindstalker out of Ydwin for fun and she is doing at least as much ranged dps as my ranger with unoptimized stats and gear...

 

 

It seems to me that the Sharpshooter's crit/penetration bonus is pretty much canceled out by the increase in recovery speed, which leaves you with that horrendous -10 deflection which you get nothing in exchange for.

 

Maybe if they got both crit and penetration at the time time, it'd be worth those two penalties.  But one or the other?  Bugger that

Edited May 14, 2018 by Yosharian

[cycloverid]

It seems to me that the Sharpshooter's crit/penetration bonus is pretty much canceled out by the increase in recovery speed, which leaves you with that horrendous -10 deflection which you get nothing in exchange for.

 

 

Maybe if they got both crit and penetration at the time time, it'd be worth those two penalties.  But one or the other?  Bugger that

 

 

If you look at other classes - like cipher - they can get penetration on their attacks or bonus damage through passives. But the ranger sharpshooter has to pay a penalty for it? Why subclass into a sharpshooter when you can just pick a different class that gets a bunch of bonuses without negatives? It's weird.

 

I think another issue is that as a "ranger" I'd expect more ways to increase range damage, attack speed, or penetration through passives and skills. But especially early on there is mainly just accuracy and DoTs with a bunch of animal focused talents. I feel like calling it a ranger at this point is a misnomer. Just call it the beastmaster or something to avoid confusion! When I read ranger I would expect to be specializing above other classes in ranged weapons!

 

And one final point: The animal companion would work more in a small party or solo party and feels like a gimped companion even when fully leveled. In a party-based game it feels like a weird mechanic to force into the class. Could just be my personal bias, I suppose...

Edited May 14, 2018 by cycloverid

[cycloverid]

In conclusion, if you want a ranged character just pick one of the many other classes as they are all vastly better at ranged combat and there really is no need to be micromanaging a gimped companion when you can build dedicated body-shields to protect your true "ranger" class. In PoE3 or an expansion, rename this to beastmaster and remove the tiny amount of ranged specific abilities as they just get in the way of your animal micromanagement!

[Yosharian]

I think the word Ranger does imply an involvement with nature, to be fair. Otherwise he'd just be an archer.

[marc5477]

Ranger is fine. It has several roles. Personally, I feel its the perfect NPC class because its so simple to use (easy to program), effective, and does not need to move around which the AI is terrible at. I personally prefer to play with a team of 4 simple classes and 1 highly active that I control myself. I dont want to micro everyone... its broring after a while.

So to that end, ranger is great. I usually create a max int/per sharpshooter/troubadour at the tutorial island immediately when i have 250 coins. I customized the tactical AI so that its mostly like the aggressive ranger AI but I added an opening and recurring summon. It is an awesome team player. Wide area heals & buffs, great dps, tank support via summons and pet, does not spike damage too much to attract attention... It makes for a near perfect NPC companion.

But yea I love easy to program companions. Pure fighter tank is nice for this reason. Very effective, great team player, and rarely needs micro which allows me to focus on my main character and move around the field without worrying about my minions.

Edited May 14, 2018 by marc5477

[cycloverid]

On second thought I agree. For me, I assume ranger is a double entendre but it might just be one of the carryovers from real-world rangers and D&D. Further adding to confusion is the druid class and their involvement with nature as well. 

[drchocapic]

I agree that the Ranger subclasses in Deadfire are absolute trash, actually.

 

Yeah especially when you compare it to Maia's, maybe we should be the companion in HER main story.

 

I don't mind giving special subclasses to companions but they should not completely outshine what's available to the player.

[cycloverid]

I'd like it if there was a class that supported archery that had a few skills/passives specifically for bows. I find it odd that ranger doesn't have a single option in their skill tree to support bows over guns. (See Twinned Arrows being turned into Twinned Shot. Also see Gunner passive and Maia). I suppose guns would be better than bows in this universe though so I guess story-wise it makes sense. Still, I think it would be cool if they just made one ability or passive - Call it like Archer/Bow Mastery or something and it could even be weak so guns are still superior like the designers want.

Edited May 14, 2018 by cycloverid

[artyom]

my only problem with ranger is that Maia is a very good ranger sharpshooter companion. There is no point of making one if you can recruit a better one. And having your main as a ranger is very, very bland 

[Katalmach]

 

There is a bow with 3 projections, this is what you combine it with Swift Flurry, so who is the 'best' ranger?

 

 

 

Well, that rather seems like the weapon is very very strong, not so much ranger itself. Where to get the bow tho?

 

 

You get Frost Seeker on Neketaka by leaving the city and heading west into the woods. You have to kill some spores and maybe some lurkers to get it

 

Ranger/Rogue is really nice with Frost Seeker because each of those projectiles will sneak attack, adding tons of damage to the otherwise low damage arrows it fires 

 

If you are playing a single class Ranger, I imagine that if you use the twinned shots ability, it would fire 6 arrows, but I don't have a ranger so I couldn't tell you for sure. I imagine it would be pretty powerful, but probably not fired by a single class ranger

 

Honestly, the ranger in Pillars is meant to synergize with the pet. You can play an archer by running a rogue, a fighter, or a swashbuckler. The ranger isn't just an archer. You get the best effect when you have a decked out animal that does sneak attack, bonus penetration, and extra damage on enemies who are taking damage over time. Take the accurate wounding shot and all those pet abilities, and the coordinated knock down to do tremendous damage

 

Rangers on their own are poo. With their pet, they are outstanding. I highly recommend Ghost Heart, to avoid bonded grief. That way you can devote ability points that would have gone into heal pet and revive pet, into something more useful, like pet buffs and stat boosting passives 

 

Frost Seeker is pretty much a must, it's like the only bow in the game that's any good, although for a gun ranger, duel wielding pistols or using the soul bound rifle might not be too bad

[Thetis]

I think my biggest disappointment is the amount of range damage and range skills you can acquire when picking the ranger. You have literally zero AoE options which would be fine if you had a lot of single DPS to compensate, but you don't even have that. You don't even have access to any generic charm beast spells or something like that, imo the class has too many utility pet skills which are all required to make the pet usable like heal pet, rez pet, masters call and so on, but they all provide no damage. Personally I think these spells should be automatically gained when leveling up as a ranger and therefor get replaced with more "fun" skills, like actually buffing your pet or any other summoned animal to do more damage and the whole generic skills we know and love about rangers in other RPGS.

 

The whole tree is riddled with skills which are all required to provide QOL to the pet handling but offer little in return. Either buff the pet to absurd numbers to make it worthwhile or change something about the skills.

[Vaneglorious]

Pet being optional I totally agree with. But oh well.  Would be cool to meld with your pet's soul and become the power of two.

 

Guess I'll need to stick to rogue/cipher for ranged dps.