Sparthos
05-06-2011, 03:03 AM
Ranger and to a lesser extent Corsair are jobs that center themselves on dealing damage from a distance yet in recent years the entire concept of ranged attacking has been put out to pasture. Going beyond Abyssea - the current gamechanger - ranged attacking has suffered dramatically from the improvements made across the board to other classes. Things have been going downhill since the conclusion of the Aht Urhgan expansion pack. The damage to these classes has been so extreme that these jobs are bordering on extinction to the majority of players.
Here are just a few problems with ranged attacks:
1. Ammunition.
The bread and butter of a ranged class yet prices are obscenely high due to the rare materials often backing the creation of these items. What exactly is the process that goes into choosing materials to make new ammo and why does it always involve shooting a king's ransom?
An example:
Oberon Bullets
This is staple level 80 ammo for RNG/COR yet the synthesis materials to make these and stock the AH require Gold Ore - a rare mining/BCNM result or a drop from a handful of monsters and Fool's Gold Ore which only comes from one place - Campaign Battles.
Couple those rarities with the high Goldsmith requirement and synergy and you'll easily see from AH records that this ammo is usually overpriced or in such short supply that no reasonable RNG or COR would shoot these. Worse, the classes are often forced to use inferior ammunition instead that is reasonable in supply on the AH instead.
This example works with pretty much all of the new ammo. Did someone forget that these were meant to be used up?
A running joke is that by 99 we'll see arrows made from Khimaira horns, bolts made from Hydra fangs and Bullets made from Cerberus saliva. Why can't ammo simply be made with cheaper materials coupled with newer drops?
Iron Ingot + Firesand + Goldsmithing Jewel = New Ammo. Tada.
2. Ranged Attack Speed
Unlike other melee, RNG and COR need to shoot ammo using the /ra command which already puts this form of attack at a disadvantage to engage and melee auto attack. As capping gear related haste has become so simple, the idea of using /ra to attack is slow, clunky, prone to human reaction speed and outdated.
In the time it takes you to hit /ra and launch off a ranged attack, a melee has already hit the enemy target numerous times. Snapshot which is the equivalent "ranged haste" simply does not compare. On easy targets it isn't surprising to see melee defeat a monster before a ranged attacker can even get off a shot. This leads to terrible DPS which makes all of the high damage ammo - if you can get any - fhe or naught.
While I understand that a few years ago such limitations were needed to keep ranged attackers from being too powerful, in todays XI world built on buffs attack speed increases and JAs cause RNG and COR to be simply too slow.
3. Enmity Control
If you've managed to snag some overpriced ammo and come to grips with shooting slow, you've now run into the problem of enmity control. Hey, no one said being a ranged DD was easy.
The whole purpose of being at a distance is to ease the burden on your support line. Less people up front means less AOEs hitting DD but the problem becomes that because you take no damage, you become a target and thus the whole purpose of being at a range is self-defeating.
Enmity patches were planned for Ranger some time ago yet were canceled because they would be too powerful. Perhaps before Abyssea yes but what about now? Would this patch be more powerful than the dominance WAR has right now on pure DD?
Ranged attacks require being at the proper distance in order to optimize damage yet without enmity control tools you are faced with being penalized, becoming a burden on mages, possibly putting mages into AOE risk when the enemy comes chasing and dealing less total damage than a typical front-liner.
Are we seeing why few play Ranger or shooting COR yet?
Here are just a few problems with ranged attacks:
1. Ammunition.
The bread and butter of a ranged class yet prices are obscenely high due to the rare materials often backing the creation of these items. What exactly is the process that goes into choosing materials to make new ammo and why does it always involve shooting a king's ransom?
An example:
Oberon Bullets
This is staple level 80 ammo for RNG/COR yet the synthesis materials to make these and stock the AH require Gold Ore - a rare mining/BCNM result or a drop from a handful of monsters and Fool's Gold Ore which only comes from one place - Campaign Battles.
Couple those rarities with the high Goldsmith requirement and synergy and you'll easily see from AH records that this ammo is usually overpriced or in such short supply that no reasonable RNG or COR would shoot these. Worse, the classes are often forced to use inferior ammunition instead that is reasonable in supply on the AH instead.
This example works with pretty much all of the new ammo. Did someone forget that these were meant to be used up?
A running joke is that by 99 we'll see arrows made from Khimaira horns, bolts made from Hydra fangs and Bullets made from Cerberus saliva. Why can't ammo simply be made with cheaper materials coupled with newer drops?
Iron Ingot + Firesand + Goldsmithing Jewel = New Ammo. Tada.
2. Ranged Attack Speed
Unlike other melee, RNG and COR need to shoot ammo using the /ra command which already puts this form of attack at a disadvantage to engage and melee auto attack. As capping gear related haste has become so simple, the idea of using /ra to attack is slow, clunky, prone to human reaction speed and outdated.
In the time it takes you to hit /ra and launch off a ranged attack, a melee has already hit the enemy target numerous times. Snapshot which is the equivalent "ranged haste" simply does not compare. On easy targets it isn't surprising to see melee defeat a monster before a ranged attacker can even get off a shot. This leads to terrible DPS which makes all of the high damage ammo - if you can get any - fhe or naught.
While I understand that a few years ago such limitations were needed to keep ranged attackers from being too powerful, in todays XI world built on buffs attack speed increases and JAs cause RNG and COR to be simply too slow.
3. Enmity Control
If you've managed to snag some overpriced ammo and come to grips with shooting slow, you've now run into the problem of enmity control. Hey, no one said being a ranged DD was easy.
The whole purpose of being at a distance is to ease the burden on your support line. Less people up front means less AOEs hitting DD but the problem becomes that because you take no damage, you become a target and thus the whole purpose of being at a range is self-defeating.
Enmity patches were planned for Ranger some time ago yet were canceled because they would be too powerful. Perhaps before Abyssea yes but what about now? Would this patch be more powerful than the dominance WAR has right now on pure DD?
Ranged attacks require being at the proper distance in order to optimize damage yet without enmity control tools you are faced with being penalized, becoming a burden on mages, possibly putting mages into AOE risk when the enemy comes chasing and dealing less total damage than a typical front-liner.
Are we seeing why few play Ranger or shooting COR yet?