Seyha wrote:This thread is about choosing a class, so here's why you should choose the Ranger: Best melee damage of any stealther

Thats not true. Assassins have by far better melee damage, even when the Ranger is self buffed.

[/quote]The Nightshade by comparison has poison, and that's about his only significant advantage. [/quote]
The Nightshade has critical strike openers from Stealth like PA and Backstab dealing huge amount of damage combined with high growth rate follow up styles and side effects like stuns.

[/quote]His ranged attacks are weak[/quote] I frequently used my insta and cast DDs to rupt casters when rooted. This is quite good when you are skilled.

A Shadowblade with Viper 3 is a gimp.

A Ranger with 12 bow (melee ranger) is gimped too. Helpless against e.g. any caster/healer class since the lack of rapid shot and true shot. In addition, against low defense and high damage classes like e.g. friar, merc, berserk ypou will have a hard time without bow spec, since they will outdamage you in melee.

I never advocate the melee Ranger. It's not gimp, but it is an inefficient use of the class. The Ranger is made to be hybrid spec, because it can do everything.

Nightshade DDs provide some utility, but you aren't going to kill anything with them except in very rare circumstances. You can kill everything but shield spec classes with a Ranger's bow.

Ranger's have the highest melee damage before you count poison, granted. Assassins can out-damage a Ranger if they re-dot, but it's hard to swap weapons and turn to face a strafing opponent at the same time. The best Ranger players know this, and take advantage of it. In my experience I can be killed almost as fast by a Ranger in melee as an assassin, and the Ranger can tank twice as much damage. Even without IP you will out-last your opponent, unless the assassin gets an evade streak.

Seyha wrote:unless the assassin gets an evade streak.

Which is impossible if you are a shadowblade

Seyha wrote:I never advocate the melee Ranger. It's not gimp, but it is an inefficient use of the class. The Ranger is made to be hybrid spec, because it can do everything.

Nightshade DDs provide some utility, but you aren't going to kill anything with them except in very rare circumstances. You can kill everything but shield spec classes with a Ranger's bow.

Ranger's have the highest melee damage before you count poison, granted. Assassins can out-damage a Ranger if they re-dot, but it's hard to swap weapons and turn to face a strafing opponent at the same time. The best Ranger players know this, and take advantage of it. In my experience I can be killed almost as fast by a Ranger in melee as an assassin, and the Ranger can tank twice as much damage. Even without IP you will out-last your opponent, unless the assassin gets an evade streak.

If you spec Ranger as a hybrid then the ranger is too weak in melee with assasines.
Bow Spec is for Leecher-Chars only... you cant kill anyone on uthgard with bow if the player is not AFK or stupid.

A Ranger who wants to kill all other stealthers dont need any bow-spec. He just need full melee-spec and high pathfinding for the highest selfbuffs. And if he find an assasine with viper3 and has no purge up...he will loose

Sorry Seyha but you talk a lot BS. First of all, the Ranger RR5 RA is no way that strong. Strong RR5 RAs are Sorc, Friar RR5 RAs. Its a good RA but on the other hand it is (still) bugged like hell. It works vs realmmates, vs yourself and vs dead players-

Ranger has the best melee damage? You made me laugh All people have access to pots/charges and the buff advantage of a ranger is minimal. Furthermore, you can say that the ranger hasnt that much points to skill high melee like assassins. Rangers also dont have access to high growthrate styles except supernova, without taunt I wouldnt kill that much like I do. The only way to deal enough damage is to use sidestyles.

You showed again that you dont have a clue. Sure Rangers can use DA charge too, but it is nowhere as efficient like for SBs (100% offhand swingrate and slow mainhands ftw)

Personally I would pick a NS, because of the strongest abilites old RAs have to offer (avoid pain, dualiest reflex, dodger, wild arcane, viper)

Sorc rr5 strong, against what ? It just delays the inevitable for 15 seconds. Odds are you'll probably kill the sorc through his rr5 if you just have dd/dot procs on weapons. Ranger rr5 isn't "bugged like hell" the only bug is that you can target yourself or corpses with it. Theurgist rr5, now that's bugged like hell.

I have a theurg and it works good so far

Yeah, the ranger rr5 IS bugged like hell. Did I mention the huge variance and it is supposed to be essence damage? No matter to which damage type the gms have changed it, it must have gone wrong. Versus the same target it is possible to hit for 150 or 280. So for using it as a killing blow I would not recommend it. In my opinion good for sniper but worthless for other ranger specs.

Ronian wrote:I have a theurg and it works good so far

Troll

Seyha wrote:I never advocate the melee Ranger. It's not gimp, but it is an inefficient use of the class. The Ranger is made to be hybrid spec, because it can do everything.

Hybrid spec works only, if you are buff-botted or use charges or if you are very high RR. You cant spect 35+ weapon, 35+ DW, 40+ buff line, 35+ bow and 30+ stealth. Anyway, you want to have mimimum 44 weapon or CD (for Wyrd spec) for melee.

Nightshade DDs provide some utility, but you aren't going to kill anything with them except in very rare circumstances.

Standart situation for attacking casters somehow surviving PA and CD ... they will, if they can mezz you. You purge, they root. Or if they have no mezz, they root and your purge might be down. In this case, you can prevent self-healing (e.g. for shamans, healer, friars, etc.) or rupt their damage casts. For my NS, the cast and insta-DDs helped me ALOT to kill hybrids and casters, which are capable of rooting. This cases are far from rare, but normal, if the first strike PA CD dont kill the caster.

Ranger's have the highest melee damage before you count poison, granted.

I dont know you you calculate the damage. Assassins and Rangers have the same damage table. They have similar stats. Assassins have much more better styles (highest growth rate in game, beside sme styles from polearm) and stealth opener, which outdamage the best sytles from ranges from the CD line by far. When the ranger is self-buffed and the assassin is unbuffed, the ranger outdamage the assassine, when you take out crit strike stealth openers. But when you cnount in the self buff line of the ranger you have to count in the poison line of assassins. To compare self-buffed rangers with assassins without poisons makes no sense. When counting in poisons, the assassin damage is buffed alot. Lifebane give a boost of around 16 DPS, wouthout any viper.

Not to forget that asassins debuff the damage of their opponents. When I played NS and I fight against pure strenght base damage dealer, I used base str, str/con and disease, which all stacks in reducing the str.

Assassins can out-damage a Ranger if they re-dot, but it's hard to swap weapons and turn to face a strafing opponent at the same time.The best Ranger players know this, and take advantage of it. In my experience I can be killed almost as fast by a Ranger in melee as an assassin, and the Ranger can tank twice as much damage. Even without IP you will out-last your opponent, unless the assassin gets an evade streak.

Strafing for me is somewhere in the gray-zone between bug-using and skill. Normally, when you face the opponent, you shoudn't able to side stun. With my NS, I always faced and rarley sticked.

bawww wrote:Which is impossible if you are a shadowblade

Right. But an Assassin will go down quick if you attack from outside his evade arc or if he is stunned. This is not a problem for the Ranger.

Garad wrote:Hybrid spec works only, if you are buff-botted or use charges or if you are very high RR. You cant spect 35+ weapon, 35+ DW, 40+ buff line, 35+ bow and 30+ stealth. Anyway, you want to have mimimum 44 weapon or CD (for Wyrd spec) for melee.

Why would you need minimum 44 weapon or CD? You don't need that extra edge of melee damage because you'll be Critting with bow in the 500-800+ range. If you want to be lazy you can play a melee spec from RR4-6 and you will do well. Like I said, any Ranger spec is good. Ronia has been played as a hybrid from the begining. It's no coincidence he is the highest ranked Ranger on the server. If you choose to ignore bow as a Ranger then you make yourself vulnerable to kiters.

Nightshade DDs

You can pew-pew with weak, 1500 range DDs. Or you can kill and interrupt at 2200 range with a bow.

Not to forget that asassins debuff the damage of their opponents. When I played NS and I fight against pure strenght base damage dealer, I used base str, str/con and disease, which all stacks in reducing the str.

We agree with each other. I never said the NS was gimp. I even said it was better against tanks and casters (assuming you land PA). My point is that on Uthgard, playing a stealther, most of your enemies will be other stealthers. And the Ranger is much better at fighting other stealthers.

Strafing for me is somewhere in the gray-zone between bug-using and skill. Normally, when you face the opponent, you shoudn't able to side stun. With my NS, I always faced and rarley sticked.

Then its no surprise you think the Ranger is balanced.

Seyha wrote:

Strafing for me is somewhere in the gray-zone between bug-using and skill. Normally, when you face the opponent, you shoudn't able to side stun. With my NS, I always faced and rarley sticked.

Then its no surprise you think the Ranger is balanced.

When you are focued to strafing, you can be much more effective with a Nightshade, than a Ranger. Of course you need more skill because of the more difficult playstyle of an assassin. But when you can handle it, you will be at least effective as a ranger. For tough opponents, I used to strafe for stun for my NS too, followed by the side chain crit strike combo.

Anyhow, good assassins can counter strafing, by walking backwards or kiting.

But there is another advantages of Assassins over Rangers, I recently noticed. They can climb in keeps. Many assassins doing RvR kill tasks on guards. With the low population on this server, you will probabley have a higher RP / h than going solo in hadrians and odins for pvp.

Rangers on this server are nerf'd compared to live. On live there was not many melee rangers and the bow damage on this server is based off of 2hd damage table not "bow" damage table. Hench why there are so many melee rangers on this server. Its known fact that bow rangers are gimped. Most every weapon on this server has a proc ability. Bows still wont proc on this server. If they fix the bow damage table and proc on bows, you would see a increase in the making of a Bow ranger.

IMO melee rangers are too over powered. PD just to name one, but that's what happens when something is not in balance, one side will get strong if the other is week on a class.

Ranger is OP, Ranger is OP. He used IP, He used DB on me, He did this. While most of the assassins RAs and abilities are passive and always up. But all this has been cryed about before.

In the sense of comparing the Ranger to the Nightshade, you have to consider that we are going to old ra setup.

(Ranger Self Buffs vs Nightshades Poisons)
The ranger does get self buffs, but does have to spec for them, which consume many of there spec points. On the other side the Nightshade does get poisons, but do also have to spec for them also. Exept the NS can use item bonus to increase there poison spec lvl without costing the extra points. The assasin gets a str/con debuff, with a max value of 118. This lowers there enemys health and damage stat. Now yes they could be purged or resisted. But mythic made it so assains poisons have no immunity timers, so they can be reapplyed, if you carry additional weapons. They also get a dieases poison, dot poison, snare poison for more utility. Yes the ranger gets fancy buffs, but the assasins also get a counter to that with there poison debuffs and dots.

(Ranger RAs, IP PD ETC vs Nightshades RAs)
The ranger does get some nice RAs like Ignore Pain or Physical Defense. While the Nightshade gets RAs like Viper and Vanish. While a ranger can be difficult to fight when they have Ignore Pain up, it is still something that has a long reuse timer. While Viper at its highest Rank, doubles the damage of there dot. Making a dot go from 80 dmg to 160. After max resist it will do about 120 x 6 = 720 damage. That is an extra 360 HP stolen. And when they get str/con debuffed, they will also lose HP. This combined can out do an IP. Now the Ranger can get PD, but that doesnt help vs Viper. They can get empty Mind or AoM, but at the same time the assassin can get other RAs to increase there damage.

(Ranger Camo vs Nightshades Detect Hidden)
Yes a Ranger can be useful with camo up and MoS3 or higher vs an assassin, but when it is down, which is often. They are valurable to assasins. I think that is a fair trade off, but many will point out that a ranger will own with his camo and MoS. But ignore that if its not up they have the edge. Depending on what MoS they get. If a ranger buys MoS 4 and a Assasin gets MoS 2, well then the ranger is paying more for a little edge with camo down.

A lot of this will change with old RAs. But many of them are balanced as is. Its just some look at the good stuff, and ignore the good stuff they get. Yes rangers get buffs. Yes assasins get debuff poisons and dots that can be reapplied at all times.

Pick the class that intrest you. Don’t base it on , who gets what and what sounds over powered or strong. Everyone gets things, some things work better , in difference situations.

Anyone can get buffs when using potions or charges. It is expensive but possible and most assassins I fight with use at least potions, many of them I guess even charges.

Melee Rangers are much easier to beat on this server since weapon skill don't influence evade. Hence, in some fights asassins evade more than 5 times against me even with halfed evade chance by DW. And the crit strike evade combo have a ridiculous high damage and the highest growth rate styles in game.

But you are right, rangers are so overpowered that I currently levling an infil to team up with a minst. This is a real underdog duo and needs a lot of skill to play

One's inability to play a class well doesn't make the class any less powerful tbh.