Class Changes: Ranger
Ranger Core Changes
The Ranger overhaul focused on several goals: free ourselves from the shackles of our avian oppressors, give Rangers a defined role in melee combat, introduce area-of-effect (AoE) capabilities, and enhance Ranger utility. These changes streamline the Ranger’s toolset, making them more versatile and better equipped for both damage dealing and group support.
Ranger Pet and Archery Changes
The first goal was to eliminate the bird pets and instead enhance Rangers’ quiver-based buffs that exist around the same level. The following changes were made:
- Lesser Rangefinder, Rangefinder, Greater Rangefinder, and Runic: Bird of Prey have been removed.
- The following quivers now offer both archery accuracy and damage bonuses:
- Quiver of Fire and Quiver of Frost: 2% increased archery accuracy and damage.
- Quiver of Lightning: 4% increased archery accuracy and damage.
- Quiver of Flame, Quiver of Cold, and Quiver of the Sun: 8% archery accuracy and 6% damage.
- Runic: Quiver of the Legion: 16% archery accuracy and 10% damage.
Ranger Melee and Area-of-Effect (AoE) Changes
To both boost melee effectiveness and grant Rangers AoE damage capabilities, a series of new disciplines and spells have been added:
- Savage Strikes has been replaced by New Tempest, a discipline buff that grants a 35% chance for melee attacks to strike three additional nearby targets. This ability has no cooldown or endurance cost.
- New Discipline: Growing Tempest (available at level 50) grants a normal buff that enhances the Tempest effect, increasing the chance to strike additional targets to 80% for 4 ticks. It has a 12-second cooldown and costs 150 endurance.
Four new fast-casting, melee-range AoE spells were introduced to further support this AoE role:
- New Static Burst (Level 37): 72 damage per target, 1s cast time, 12s recast, 105 mana.
- New Shock Burst (Level 52): 180 damage, 1s cast time, 12s recast, 175 mana.
- New Stormlash (Level 65): 600 damage, 0.5s cast time, 12s recast, 555 mana.
- New Runic: Lightning Lash: 1300 damage, 0.5s cast time, 12s recast, 725 mana.
Ranger Utility Changes
To enhance Ranger utility, particularly on the defensive front, a new class-specific AA was added:
- New AA: Brambledome: Grants a spell rune that absorbs 3000 spell damage for the target’s group. When the rune is consumed, it triggers a 1000-point physical damage nuke on the attacker. The ability has a 60-minute cooldown at rank 1, reduced by 15 minutes per additional rank.
We made a few changes to Exposure to replace the armor class debuff lost from the buff that had been provided by the ranger’s bird pet, and make sure it remains an efficient use of mana relative to rangers new runic nuke. The Exposure spell was adjusted to compensate for the loss of the Spot armor debuff and to better align with the Ranger’s updated damage output:
- Exposure: Deals 600 damage, reduces armor class by 120, and costs 185 mana.
Ranger Runic Spells
Rangers received several new Runic spells to round out their spellbook:
- New Runic: Winter’s Grip: A cold-based nuke dealing 1500 base damage, followed by two ticks of 350 DoT damage. It shares a cooldown with Icerend, has a -50 resist adjust, a 0.5s cast time, and costs 725 mana.
- New Runic: Aspect of the Predator: An upgrade to Call of the Predator, providing a 60 bonus attack.
- New Runic: Bastion of the Wild: A buff that grants 150 extra hit points, a 20-point damage shield, 75 armor class, and a chance to proc a 125-point magic direct damage ability with a -100 resist adjust when attacking with a melee weapon.