Issues with ranger mastery
Sorry in advance for the wall of text but I'm trying to be helpful in providing as much detail and suggestion as I can....
I’m one of the (likely) few who is either stupid enough or masochistic enough to be trying to get Tier 1 mastery on the Ranger. In doing so, I’m running across numerous ‘issues’ that are making this particular task rather difficult and unenjoyable. Before anyone gets the idea to say “pick another vehicle to master”, I’ll just say that if that’s the ‘official response’ to this ‘issue’, then the Ranger has no business having a Mastery associated with it to begin with. All items in a particular category should have basically the same degree of difficulty for Mastery as the next, and in the case of the Ranger, which is classified as a ‘vehicle’ that is most certainly NOT the case. Not even close.
So, the first issue is – why is the Ranger even classified as a vehicle? The Ranger doesn’t seem to fit any definition of a ‘vehicle’ the way the game lays it out. ALL other items classified as vehicles can be sat in and used as a mode for transportation. Not so with the Ranger. The Ranger, the way the game presents it, is more of a gadget or mobile sentry, similar to Boris’ stationary sentry. Suggestion for first issue: Tie the Ranger to a particular Specialist ONLY instead of being a universal call-in.
The second (and most important) issue facing the mastery with the Ranger is the overall weakness and unreliability of the robotic dog, which is actually a two-pronged issue in and of itself. The first ‘prong’ of that would be that the Ranger is incredibly underpowered with it’s actual firepower. It takes an exorbitantly long time to actually get a kill with a Ranger, even if it’s firing directly on an enemy player with an unobstructed line of sight. It typically takes two to three ‘bursts’ of gunfire from the Ranger to actually kill a player whereas PvP kills are a fraction of that time. This doesn’t seem right considering the Ranger is a mobile sentry gun with an auto-targeting system. Suggested solution here would be to GREATLY lower the time to kill (TTK) for shots made by the Ranger, as well as making the individual shots themselves more damaging.
The other ‘prong’ of the weakness and unreliability of the Ranger comes from it’s actual targeting system. It’s absolutely mystifying to me how a robotic AI can be so ridiculously stupid. I’ve been playing this game since the first few days it came out and in that time, I’ve seen Rangers shoot at, tanks, planes and tiny drones in the sky, none of which it stands a chance of doing any damage to or providing any real help against. Suggestion here would be to completely remove the targeting of tanks and planes from the Rangers’ AI and prioritize the tiny drones in the sky (which I have NEVER seen it kill one) as the lowest and last threat to be shot at, only if no other enemies are around. As for firing on other Rangers and sentry guns, I don’t have as much of a problem with it, but how about giving absolute priority to any player enemy within a certain range (50m? 100m??) ? It seems to me that if the Ranger is a personal mobile protection device, it should be focused on protecting the owner from the greatest and closest threat. Also along these lines, I’d like to see the Ranger immediately and aggressively auto-target the player that downs you if they’re within a certain range (30 -50m??). Just a personal preference but I think it would be a nice touch to the personal companion / protector aspect of the unit.
The final issue I have with the Tier 1 mastery of the Ranger is more of a cosmetic one, but one I’d like to see something done about anyways and that is, where are any customization options for the Ranger??? Everything else in the game has at least some customization options, but not the Ranger. How about adding some color schemes and designs to these things? The obvious benefit would be that players have an easier time on crowded and hectic battlefields discerning which of the numerous Rangers is theirs.
All the above issues plaguing the Ranger mastery and the paltry and pathetic number of kills & assists you get per match with the Ranger, no matter how careful, solid, tight, or well you play with it, add up to making it incredibly difficult and frustrating to get the T1 Mastery with the Ranger, FAR MORE so than it needs to be. All other vehicles in the category can rack up multiple double-digit kills in any given match with some skill. But the most kills I’ve been able to obtain with the Ranger in any given online MP match is ……3. Seriously guys – 3??? And **maybe** an assist or two with it the same match if I’m lucky. Playing in solo / off-line matches I can rack up 10-15 per match against medium difficulty AI, but online, where it counts, it’s beyond frustrating due to the incredible difficulty it takes to actually get a kill or an assist with the Ranger. Accordingly I’d really like to see some significant improvements made with the Ranger, it’s effectiveness, it’s AI, and in general I’d like to see MANY more kills with it per match than the current state it’s in. It feels very, very out of line with all the other items in it’s category. Thank-you!
[Edit: Caps Lock removed]
UPDATE [01.02.22] - I figured I would come back and provide a small update to this 'issue', in hopes that if anyone from EA or Dice actually stumbles across this AND actually cares enough about improving this aspect of this game, then they'll have a little more info to work with. Having said that, I've now completed the T1 masteries for a specialist (Falck), a weapon (PKP-BP) and a gadget (Proximity Sensor). In doing those masteries, I played as aggresively and as mindful as I could with a device from each of the four categories, including of course, the vehicles and using a Ranger almost exclusively and as often as posisble from this category. All three of the masteries I mentioned were completed within a 1-2 week timespan of each other. The vehicle / Ranger however? I'm currently sitting at T3 and 493 kills & assists w/ the Ranger. That's NOT EVEN HALF WAY to the 1,200 needed for T1. But in that same timespan I was able to get T1 mastery on every other category. Does it really seem like that 'vehicle' is balanced properly??
In the interest of providing a few more issues and suggestions on this topic in hopes that one day it gets improved, Here are just a few more
- When you get downed, it would be nice to have a solid way to determine if your Ranger is still up and running or if it's also been downed as well. Quite often the ranger moves out of the field of view and with all the cacophany happening on the battlefield, it's not always easy to hear or see if it's still up and running or not.
- Dovetailing into the above, when the Ranger is also in a downed state along with you, it would be beneficial to have some sort of display on the HUD to make you aware of an enemy within the Rangers detonation range, r approaching it. In the months since release that I've been playing this nearly every day and I have NEVER, EVER seen the Ranger's detnation damage or kill an enemy. Is it actually supposed to?? If so, that aspect of this 'vehicle' is broken outright.
- Something else that would be helpful for Ranger operators would be to have your Ranger show up as a unique color on the minimap. With all the blue and potentially green if you're with your squad, it gets very hard to see where your Ranger is at or if it's still even running.
Again, and in short, PLEASE fix this 'vehicle' - it's in drastic need of an overhaul to become truly effective and have any value (or most importantly - FUN) in being worth mastering.
