From 4/23 Patch Class Balance
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, I IMPLORE YOU TO VISIT YOUR CLASS THREADS instead of posting up silly memes and doesn't have any idea of the class they are playing...
P.S. nicely done explaining to fluke btw 
Wish granted.
I haven't posted any ideas here, because I don't really care about the ranger class. Basically, because it's simply impossible to match my idea of this class with the expectations of the other players. A few examples:
- no acrobatics => rogues and assassins instead, already has Wind Walk
- no AGI boost => rogues and assassins instead; should get hit & crit. chance instead
- no Falcon Assault => Beastmasters instead
... and some more. To make it short: In my opinion, a ranger should be about perception, not agility.
Rangers are heading in the complete opposite direction:
Quote: Popular suggestions have been: Give rangers some sort of healing ability.
So let's create one main tank and nine DPS classes who can heal themself... sounds fun.
That's why I somehow regret that I wrote something about the ranger class on the class balance thread.
The only thing that kept me replying was the misunderstanding of that first comment.
But since I started it, I should be at least consequent....
My suggestion was:
Impact Arrow: 250% damage, no slowing effect, no cooldown (basically it's a 1sec cooldown)
Poison Arrow: Adding a slowing effect on the poison, increase cooldown to 30sec.
So after a few replies, we are at that point:
The only skill that I can find that gives 2 debuffs is Crescent Moon on a Rogue. It gives knockdown from 1/10+ and at 6/10+ it applies Fracture for 10 seconds. This is a master level skill and would probably be the equivalent to the Poison Arrow you describe. If we are going that route, I'd make it a 15 second CD just like Crescent Moon is. You could take the 10/10 level off of Impact Arrow and make that a 5/5 level skill instead if you wanted to lower it to 260% with a small cool down, even charge arrow has a cd on it, albeit very low I'd say similar should suffice.
So the thing is, we pretty much have those abilities already and a stronger attack attached to them. Right now, depending on your vigor and skill levels we can cycle back and forth between both Impact Arrow and Poison Arrow, almost instantly. Impact Arrow is broken right now and only giving us about 350% damage with the 70% speed reduction attached to it, followed with 250% Poison Arrow and the 30% DoT attached to it. So within about 1 second we can already apply the 70% slow and the 30% Poison DoT and do a combined 600% damage. Now if Impact Arrow is fixed to the 453%, it would be a combined 703% damage. I went back and made sure to reread what you posted, you didn't mention increasing the damage output of Poison Arrow to compensate for the loss you are giving Impact Arrow. Being able to nearly instant fire Impact within that same 1 second would still result in less damage. You also mentioned vigor in your original post and that would greatly affect the current standing of Impact and Poison Arrow, possibly with new gear, they would be nearly instant cast as well.
[...]
So, is that a sufficient explanation?
To me, it's almost miraculous how your ranger can swap between Impact and Poison Arrow within 1 sec.... and more surprisingly that you still call it 'balanced'.
And as a small side note: AFAIK, the Beastmaster can use Wild Crush to create an DoT and a defense debuff, so your research was incomplete, but that's not the point.
The reason, why I don't like to swap between these two skills too often is quite simple: The DoT countdown resets on each hit, possibly ending in dealing no DoT at all. (That's why a Multishot DoT was such a great idea [giving the ranger a 4th DoT was also really needed]). It's also cool and balanced to reset a 10sec slowing effect every 2sec (or the DoT of Poison Arrow)... because slowing multiple opponents at the same time really makes the ranger a ranged class...right? And another "btw!: Pets can create a DoT and another debuff at the same time as well.
I stated a 30sec cooldown for the Poison Arrow and a 10sec poison (DoT & slow) effect to make it almost impossible to create a permanent DoT or a permanent slowing effect.
If fear that with the same argument of 'balance', Warriors or other classes could demand a permanental 50% speed boost and a ranged attack as well, just to negate the Impact Arrow.
I also mentioned a 250% damage multiplier, because I think it's better to balance the weapon damage than fixing weapon inblances with a skill balance.
But hey, I'm just a guy (my age can be seen on my username) and not a class representative... so let's suggest a higher focus on Impact Arrow as well.
Maybe someone will see the reasons behind my statements, but I am not in the mood to quarrel about a class that I think has the wrong concept to begin with.
Edited by Greven79, 22 April 2014 - 12:58 PM.
