I've been reading this post very interestingly given my main is a Ranger. Experience from playing a Ranger main on Live for many years has given me a few thoughts I'd like to add to the discussion.
Our primary damage output is through our bows. This is our role as Rangers. We have several AA's and a few spells to help increase our bow damage. I was very disappointed when Live came out with a pair of swords instead of a bow for Epic weapons. This completely defeated our purpose of being Rangers.
In a group or raid, Rangers are less desired, if altogether not wanted. This is because there are a high number of more beneficial DPS classes. We're geared more toward solo play than group play.
By definition, we are not intended to be a melee class, although, we have been forced into this unfortuante situation of becoming a light tank, and as players, we've had to adapt to this kind of play style, so emphasis has been pretty much forced upon us to want more melee ability.
I understand the argument about it not being fair for us to just stand back and knock off mobs from the distance without penalty, but considering our roles in a group fight, there's more to it than this. Whenever I would go on LDoN adventures and things like that, my role would be to defend the clerics and mages. While the tanks are on the front like whacking the main mobs and the other DPS classes are at the mobs back, who's left to defend? The lowest DPS on the melee DPS chain. In the role of the Ranger, we have a few fighter abilities like taunt and kick to get those strays off the healers and nukers, and when not doing that, we are a DPS class after all, and sitting on the bench at the back of the class with everyone not partaking of ripostes and enrages, the only thing we have at our disposal is a couple of weak DoT's and of course our trusty friend the bow.
I think that 70% of melee damage is way too low. I think it should be switched, with our bow damage being on par with the other DPS classes, and our melee damage being less, even 50% would be fair. We are a ranged class. We should use ranged attacks, and be penalized for not using ranged attacks. This is what a Ranger is. This is what a Ranger does. I think our Epics should be bows. I think we should be put back to where we were intended to be.
Just my 2 copper
