Rangers got a fairly serious nerf this last BWE. Their Greatsword damage was reduced by 50%. The 1H sword, which I am planning on running, is now out damaging the greatsword. This is fine for right now, but if they bring 1H sword to be inline with greatsword damage as it was in the previous betas (so that GS does 5-15% more damage than 1H sw), but nerfing 1H sword as well, then I will not be playing ranger.
A 50% nerf to damage is WAY too much for me to keep playing that class. At this point, warrios would well out damage ranger in melee, with more HP and better armor. Guardian and Thief would also out damage in melee, and mesmer is likely as well.
So right now I still plan on ranger, but if they nerf 1H sw like they did to GS, well I will probably roll a Warrior/Guardian or whatever else can do good burst melee DPS.
U are the only Ranger in Rare alongside with DJ if he plans on playing one.. almost every class being nerfed during this Betas, i really would not choose a class by its power at this stage...
Mark = Warrior Aaron (Teagen) = Ranger Atalay = Mesmer Jani = Warrior Seba = Guardian Niels = Ele Marc = Ele Marius = Ele Constantin = Necro Zilv = Mesmer Sven = Engineer Henri = Necro Mikael = Warrior Sarah = Mesmer Micha = Guardian Dan = Ele Kazys = Ele Claire = Mesmer Mike = Ele Aaron (Awesome Ant) = ? Guy = Engineer Alessandro = Guardian Chris = Guardian
Well, greatsword damage is currently not playable, so if the same thing happens to the other melee weapon, there won't be any reason for anyone in the guild to play ranger honestly.
Their condition builds are OK, but I think other professions can do that better. Besides, I am more interested in burst DPS than condition attrition. For example, the guardian got quite a bit of love on the greatsword in BWE3 and was out damaging ranger greatsword for that beta build. I'd much rather be GS guardian in that position than ranger. So we will see where they set balance for release and I will go from there.
Still planning on Ranger, as the damage from the 1H sw last I played was more than acceptable, in fact it may have even been buffed (so still doing almost double dmg of like guardian GS)
To illustrate the nerf, Ill show how they changed the 'displayed damage' per second from BWE2 to BWE3 for both warrior and Ranger.
BWE2;
Ranger Greatsword 1 skill combo: 670 per second Ranger 1H sw 1 skill combo: 634 per second
Warrior Greatsword 1 skill combo: 492 per second
BWE3;
Ranger Greatsword 1 skill combo: 259 per second Ranger 1H sw 1 skill combo: 370 per second
So 1H sw is still clearly viable, since it still (although now only slightly) out damages warrior #1 combo, though will be destroyed by the Warriors burst skills now in DPS. Where as before the #1 skill would be almost even if the warrior hit a burst skill or not. Even the guardian saw its Greatsword brought UP to the same level as the warrior, it does exactly 340 display per second on its 1 skill combo.
Greatsword is totally worthless in BWE3 for ranger. Hopefully they rebalance. I am really considering guardian if that is there goal for balancing, to have the guardian and warrior sustain equal damage with greatswords.
I really dont get why u even started playing ranger if u expected him to outdamage a Warrior in Melee Oo.. its like i would complain about Warrior being outdamaged by a Ranger using Longbow..
Also i dont really know where u can draw that much information from about DMG comparison in such a short time as i only saw you playing Ranger. Just taking the base dmg not including stats, skill effects, traits etc seems really wrong to me in this game.
They will probably adjust the skills for the release, i can only speak for mesmers but they changed the our skills and some mechanics many times and still that's not enough (at least they said so).
I'd say it's a rather frail decision choosing class based on their current status considering they'll first and foremost receive balancing before release, and then also after release (and hopefully end up in a kind of long term status wherein they have the potential they were meant to have based on what type of class it is).
With that said i'm tempted to give the guild its first thief myself but I still haven't decided if i'll go for that or my plan A warrior.