Meet the Druid: Ranger’s Elite Specialization

[Val the Moofia Boss]

wat? lol seriously?

Seriously.

nothing changes other than the fact that we're getting one role that burst-heals better than others. We already have a few healing roles in the game that work as effective, but it's only used in PvP so far. With HoT we'll get more challenging group content which turns the faceroll environment almost into a PvP environment.

Exactly. More variety = more development of the healing role in the game. More "challenging" content (Or harder content, depending on whether or not your an Anet spokesperson) will require more roles to succeed in the tightly tuned environment.

You still can't manage aggro

I was talking about the classic trinity, as my link had stated. Tank is a form of control. Though we do not have a tank, the Defiance mechanic makes control far more important.

You still don't lose your powerful selfheal

Healing 50% of my health over 10 seconds is powerful? Words to live by in an instanced encounter with fine-tuned numbers and a floor riddled in red circles 24/7.

druid you still do damage

How is that - in any possible meaningful way - relevant, at ALL, to the effectiveness of a dedicated healing spec? I know my discipline priest can do damage. I'm not sure what your getting at here.

Almost every profession (besides Thief) can switch in-combat from a damage into a healing role, so there is still no waiting for that one profession.

But not as effectively as dedicated specs the likes of Water/Ventarri/Druid can (at least in Anet's own blogs, for the latter two).

And PLEASE cite me that sentence in the Manifesto, that "promised" us what you think they did.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...tter-interview

"I think one of the core ones for me is taking the holy trinity – you have your front line, you have your healer and you have your ranged character, basically – and just throwing it out the window."

Your welcome.

[Fencers]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/20...tter-interview

That wasn't part of the manifesto, it was just something Colin Johanson said in interview. There is no indication "required roles" specifically means X/Y/Z roles are required- it could be X/Z/X or Y/Y/Z roles. We don't know for certain yet.

A class trinity system typically requires specifically three necessary roles of X/Y/Z composition. Role determinant gameplay with three distinct requirements is a 'role trinity'.

[Lotus Victoria]

More like an Astrologist than a Druid. Still, cool enough for me.

[Karizee]

More like Khaleesi, mother of motherfuckin dragons than an Astrologist. Did you see the new dragon pet?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2ZHhJQn0B8&t=30m9s

[Lotus Victoria]

more like khaleesi, mother of motherfuckin dragons than an astrologist. Did you see the new dragon pet? :d

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2zhhjqn0b8&t=30m9s

Hmm...A Dragon...FUS RO DAH!

[Valeron]

Not a fan of the Druid specialization but that fire wyvern pet is pretty badass

[Kelimbror]

Just wait until you hear the complaints on forums about how bad their druid 'healer' is b/c they let them die when they stand in all the things. I may play the spec in an open world setting, or maybe even PvP, but certainly not in instanced content.

[Edge-]

Just wait until you hear the complaints on forums about how bad their druid 'healer' is b/c they let them die when they stand in all the things. I may play the spec in an open world setting, or maybe even PvP, but certainly not in instanced content.

I'm so ready for this to happen. It's one of the problems that comes along with a trinity and a reduction on the importance of personal responsibility for survival.

"Well, the controller didn't stun the boss!"

"Well, the healer didn't heal me enough!"

Oh well, I'll still likely have a fun supporty build on my guardian and ranger because I gravitate towards that type of play anyways. And after a decade of being blamed for DPS dying because they stood in fire or ran into the cleave of an enemy facing away from the group, I've come to quite enjoy their tears : 3

[Kelimbror]

I'm so ready for this to happen. It's one of the problems that comes along with a trinity and a reduction on the importance of personal responsibility for survival.

The game may avoid a lot of it due to being pretty clear on gameplay rules in all other settings plus the playerbase is primarily used to the mode of play, but I can see a lot of people reverting to other expectations as soon as they see something like Druid out there. I fully expect these people to have a list of specs and spells you *should* have used to keep them alive, while not actually playing the class or spec themselves.

It's going to be hilarious...but so not for me. I'll stick to healing in public events when I don't want to shoot things with my bow. It will be nice to have slightly altered gameplay objectives and focus more on supporting people instead of spamming my three buttons to wreck things.

[Deleted]

Annnd we've come full circle! We got "new, challenging cooperative PvE content" (Raids) that even Anet themselves describe as requiring certain specs and roles to complete. Control is more important than ever, and now we're getting a dedicated 6th spec. Sounds familiar...

There goes another one of the famous promises on the manifesto.

water field + blast finishers = full health.

healing has always been in this game, just not as prominent. Calm down.

- - - Updated - - -

I remember though, way.. waaaay back when the game released. I was playing my ele in an Orr path and someone was raging that I wasn't constantly in water to heal him.

[Aylashae]

am i the only one that things how those wings work and fly looks.. very insect like and unappealing o.o

[zito]

so becoming obsessed leveling my ranger with axe and I finally noticed you can use off hand axe which has no synergy with main hand axe yet I will some how make it work :l

axe/axe just sounds neat and you never see an axe/axe ranger

[Edge-]

so becoming obsessed leveling my ranger with axe and I finally noticed you can use off hand axe which has no synergy with main hand axe yet I will some how make it work :l

axe/axe just sounds neat and you never see an axe/axe ranger

All the spinning.

[zito]

All the spinning.

Think I have to end up using survival skills for perma fury opening strikes bull crap. Trap whirl combo seemed ok but it takes too long to set up.

[Edge-]

Think I have to end up using survival skills for perma fury opening strikes bull crap. Trap whirl combo seemed ok but it takes too long to set up.

You just wrote a lot of words that mean very little to me.

I'm really bad at this video game.

[Valeron]

You just wrote a lot of words that mean very little to me.

I'm really bad at this video game.

lol

fury is a boon that grants +20% crit chance, opening strikes is a minor trait that causes vulnerability in your first strike in combat (vulnerability causes increased damage taken). There is a trait in the wilderness survival line that grants fury every time a survival skill is used, fury can stack up to 2 minutes and 30 seconds length.

[nevermore]

I think Druid is the closest we'll get to (Cataclysm-era) Discipline Priests in WoW where you're a healing-dps hybrid. It's almost(!) the ideal example of a soft-trinity healing specialisation I've been advocating for since early GW2.
It's also why I love being an Elementalist, when things go wrong I can swap to water attunement, put down Healing Rain and Geyser, blast the water field and voila things are looking much better.

In my understanding the soft-trinity (damage-control-support) was always part of the intended GW2 game design but they failed to implement it correctly. If they succeed this time I'll be a happy camper!

Not to mention even if you're a Druid, you will still swap to your other weapon and do damage (and you have 2 other trait lines that support your damage) so it's not like you'll be standing in the back healing 24/7.

[Kazgrel]

It's basically water attunement elementalist with a side of crack thrown in. Covers more of the support and control aspects of play instead of damage. After getting over the knee jerk reaction to the initial announcement where Anet was like "zomg SO MANY HEELZ LYKE NEVER B4", I think it'll be an interesting twist on things.

There's always been a trinity in GW2. It's simply a different spin on it vs. the typical "tank/healer/dps" trinity. Problem the game has had, though, at least in pve, is how control and support have a much smaller role in success compared to damage output. Looks like Anet is working to balance that out a bit. We shall see...

[Thelxi]

Does the auto attack cleave? Is it like mesmer GS where it cleaves whatever the beam touches? Didn't catch that in their twitch stream.

[zito]

Does the auto attack cleave? Is it like mesmer GS where it cleaves whatever the beam touches? Didn't catch that in their twitch stream.

It's like mesmer GS auto attack.