Guild Wars 2

I was playing the defending the keep mission last night as a level 28 ranger. The mission was a story quest for level 22. I died over and over. Maybe i’m undergeared or is it just not a good suggested level?

Here’s a video so you can see what I mean.

That was hilarious. I would recommend NOT running in circles and attacking random mobs until you have 10 risen on you. They do have a tendency of going after you when you bomb a group of three then randomly shoot a bunch more without killing the first three.

Yeah, some missions I prefer to do them if I can outlevel them. Some players may tell you that they did level 10 missions when they started the game, but its a new game, so its ok to not know the class in perfection.

The issue is your execution. You seem to think aggroing as much stuff as possible and then trying to AOE them down when they’re beating the crap out of you is your best strat, and that’s a pretty awful way of doing it. When mobs are on you, focus on killing those, not running around autoattacking more stuff.

You are clicking and keyboard turning, that makes it almost impossible for you to kite.

Have to agree with others, you’re a ranger for a reason, the way aggro works in this game you can easily make sure mobs that are even on you at the moment can lose interest in you if you disengage/survivor skill (like lightning crack). You’re pretty much doing the opposite, grabbing everyone’s attention. You also seem to dodge only when you’re already in a pickle rather than avoid being attacked at all. As a ranger with some attention on toughness I still have to be very careful around multiple mobs. I also notice you haven’t used your pet for anything at all, he just follows you around. Don’t forget that you get to control your pets skill which can help you with AOE or tanking. Let alone you can switch pets on the fly if they get into too much trouble. You rarely pay attention to your health, sitting with 10% health and heal off cooldown. Basically practice dancing around your enemy and you will have a better time. Hope my 2c can help

Also back walking is very slow, turning around and running away is a lot more efficient if you absolutely need to run, otherwise dodging is a much better alternative. Learning to move with a mouse, like others suggested is a must.

The risen are annoying to deal with but you really gotta just take it more slowly. Especially not let any of the suicide bombers hit you.

Thanks for sharing the video, it was interesting to see what others do.

To answer your question, no the levels are not too hard. They are hard but not too hard. I think your real problem is movement and tactics.

First, on my ranger the 2 weapons I use are Shortbow and Longbow. I always get the best “Strong” shortbow and longbow I can find/buy. This gives +Power and +Precison. All my Armor is also +Power +Precision. I eat food that gives either Vit ot Regen. I think at your level they are the apple pies. My Trinket slots are either +Power + Precision or +Vit +Healing. I swap them depending on whether I need more health or attack power also add the sigil of bloodlust to all your weapons. This allows you to gain a stack of extra power that lasts until you die. The minor sigil of bloodlust gives you +5 power and can be stacked to 25, that is +125 power!

The shortbow has a very high rate of fire on the 1 skill and damage does not depend on range. This is the one I use most but I switch back temporarily to Longbow for the AOE and #2 rapid fire. With the build I suggested above you can kill fairly quickly with just the #1 skill on the shortbow. At your level you should be able to get around 30% crit which is one out of every 3 shots. My ranger is ~50s at the moment and has 50% crit.

Movement, circle strafing while facing your enemy is the most important thing to learn. This allows you to keep hitting your target while it chases you (kiting) and the continuous movement away from the direction the mob is facing makes it very difficult for them to hit you. The way I do it is to hold the E or Q button down while moving the mouse with right click held down. then I use either my pinky or ring finger to hit 1, 2 or 3. If you need to move forwards while strafing hold both left and right buttons down. If you need to move back keep strafing left and right and back up at the same time. In an emergency dodge roll forward or back.

With the above technique and a good pet, I can whittle down a fairly large group without dying. I rarely have to dodge. Test out different pets, you will be amazed at how different they are. Some of the pets are much more powerful at killing than others. While some are better at slowing, rooting and knocking down the opponent. I don’t like to use the Bear much because even though it has high Health it has low attack. The Lynx has one of the fastest kill rates, the Krytan Hound can root and knockdown and has decent attack. I swap between those two as soon as one dies.

In this particular quest it tells you in advance that you WILL be overrun, so you want to be aware of where the action is and not be so far forward that you can’t retreat without dying.
Hope this helps.