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Posted by: Jasher.6580

Jasher.6580

So my first thought was to ask some of the top players in the game. I was met with a few jokes but no real answer to my question. The closest thing to a valid response was being told to roll an Engineer instead.

I then decided to make a post on the profession specific forum where a few people gave some feedback, none of these people were actually on the leaderboards so I took their feedback with a grain of salt. I did try a few of the builds though…

So here goes, let me ask the general population. Since the recent changes, could someone link me the most effective Ranger build for high bracket sPvP. Something that is not only viable but effective.

Kind Regards… also please don’t bury this in the Ranger forums. I’ve already tried that avenue.

Thanks.

(edited by Jasher.6580)

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Posted by: Eurantien.4632

Eurantien.4632

Team queue:
The most viable option is spirit ranger.

Full zerker power ranger is decent with good positioning but you need something like a thief or an aura share ele to help peel for you when their thief comes for you.

Solo queue:
Either team queue build, or this…
Can also swap for vigorous spirits and Spirit of Nature over nature’s protection and RaO.

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-F7kF3FC-FFx-d2cDV-0;2Vt-d27Fk2O317T-T9-23A;126A5;3U-m6VRk0fgm9fgm91Fj

A variation (rabid or rampagers)
http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-FV-FkFC-FFx-d2cDV-0;2Vt-d27Fk2O317T9T;023A1;026A;4IJl6VRk0fgm9fgm97ZH.

With either of these builds, if you use wolf to just bide your time and bait out skills, you can then use spider immob =5s with malicious training and then just condi load your target. You can practically 100-0 engis, necros, mesmers. You can eat through guards fast. Warriors with cleansing ire are just hard to deal with cause you have to be in melee range using an axe so I prefer sb.

Apparently you didn’t like my answer on the other forum.

Spirit ranger:
http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-FV-F3FC-FFx-d2BEk-0;2Vt-d27FF5E317-9TT;21;026A36A;1K-m6VRk0fgm9fgm92VB

(edited by Eurantien.4632)

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Posted by: Jasher.6580

Jasher.6580

-snip-

Hey There, I didn’t “dislike” your answer. I just like scouting for more information from a variety of sources.

That Spirit Ranger build is unlike any other I’ve seen. There are only two spirits including the Elite?

Is sacrificing the utility of two more spirits worth it?

Of the three builds you’ve linked, which do you feel is the most effective and why?

(edited by Jasher.6580)

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Posted by: masskillerxploit.2165

masskillerxploit.2165

The other 2 spirits are completely useless….. you should take eurantien’s advice. Easily one of the best sPvP Rangers na.

Ferox, multiclass’r, ESL’r
Team Lead For Radioactive [dK] B Team

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Posted by: Jasher.6580

Jasher.6580

The other 2 spirits are completely useless….. you should take eurantien’s advice. Easily one of the best sPvP Rangers na.

Thanks.

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Posted by: Eurantien.4632

Eurantien.4632

Why not to take other spirits:
Frost: 10% damage increase on 70% attacks and kitten chill. Why take this when you could take a stunbreak and are using condition damage?
Stone: Protection on proc, most of the time, you are dying because the other team is focusing you, in that case you are probably stunlocked and aren’t getting a protection proc. The only person this helps is your guardian that has to stand in the passive aoe getting tossed about, but he/she doesn’t need your help.
Storm: Best of the others, straight like 2k dps, and swiftness. This provides you swiftness coming out of combat. Notably, when fighting something on node, you can dodge through your target (which makes the spirits run up to where you initiated your dodge and cast their skills) allowing you to effectively proc this skill. However, with recent boost in damage from others its best to just take another stunbreak.

Therefore, you are left with sun, LR, SoR which are all great skills, the main reason for sun is the blind is always a nice utility and passive burn procs are strong.

Amulet: People used to run carrion, people often run settlers, but in the build I linked is rabid. The reason for this is because I find offense is better than defense (rabid > settlers). Then, there is carrion and rabid, both are good options (carrion is 2/0/6/6/0) and although the longer bleeds from keen edge are nice, you get all around more bleed damage from rabid with sharpened edges and sigil of earth. With all the power classes running around, the extra toughness is better. People used to argue carrion was better because it was less likely to pull bleeds to the top of the condi clear list. Well, condi clear is random so it doesn’t matter when you apply the bleeds since covering them is pointless (making rabid a better choice in the current “meta”).

Note: I might be wrong on this. If I am, someone PM please, that would be awesome.

EDIT: Conditions are first in last out cleanses, so you can cover conditions, however due to the ranger reapplying bleed all the time, it doesn’t seem to be worth it since bleeding always pulls the bleed stack to the top, reapplying burning however does not do this.

Heal skill:
People swear by healing spring, which is fine, it’s a good skill, provides condi clear, you can leap through it for more heals, etc. However, it requires you to sit in one spot to get max healing from it and you get left with a 30 sec CD. Troll, heals for more, allows you to move, and you can cast it early so instead of having a 25 sec cd heal you instead have a heal on a 15 sec cd (for that first bit), also you can kite wherever the hell you want while healing. Which imo is how ranger NEEDS to be played.

From there, it is just knowing how to play.

Of course, there are varations, keen edge, carrion, settler’s, oakheart salve, dwayna runes, runes of rata sum (especially with rabid). So experiment around, some people prefer storm spirit over SoR or LR (I used to run it all the time). Try a combo of axe, dagger, sword, torch, warhorn (often with healing spring) or even different pet combos, fear wolf, drake hound, immob spiders, river drake, etc to see what works best for you.

My advice: Experiment, 1 v 1 a lot, practice pet control. The difference between a good ranger and a bad, is pet control.

(edited by Eurantien.4632)

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Posted by: Ryan.9387

Ryan.9387

This thread should be moved to the ranger forums.

(hehehe)

Ranger | Elementalist

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Posted by: Valentin.2073

Valentin.2073

this is a bunker spirit build with warhorn.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNBHhVakRlGW7VxZFiWDAIIrC0eWtYuX+MZFrkC-TJRAwAsLDA4JAwc/hAnCAA

you can still use two spirits. it really depends on your playstyle. i use stone and sun because i love the protection i can get from the stone spirit. the extra slot, i use signet of stone for extra tankiness but i often replace that with sic ’em if i see an overabundance of thieves and mesmers on the other team.

there are different variations of the spirit build and most of them are viable in tpvp. just play with the skill slots that you want to use but i advice you to use the elite spirit because that’s probably the best elite that rangers have.

PVP Ranger: Prince Valentine, PVP Warrior: Prince of Hearts I, and PVP Mesmer: Prince Valentine I

(edited by Valentin.2073)

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Posted by: Rezz.8019

Rezz.8019

I will give you a real spirit ranger build.

10 (3) 0 30(3, 8, 11) 30(4, 7, 11)
undead rune, settler amulet, sword/wh + axe/dagger (both sets geomancy+energy)
3 spirits (no storm spirit) + elite spirit + healing spring
snow owl + lynx pets

reason for 3 spirits = all 3 have awesome active effects, they make more clutter so its harder to target and kill, frost spirit doesn’t really have the internal cooldown even though it says it does.

You are welcome.

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Posted by: Eurantien.4632

Eurantien.4632

You don’t want to use either of the 2 builds used above.

Let’s start with, http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNBHhVakRlGW7VxZFiWDAIIrC0eWtYuX+MZFrkC-TJRAwAsLDA4JAwc/hAnCAA
Like I said about stone, it isn’t really worth it since when you really need that protection proc you probably won’t be getting it, and when you don’t need it you shouldn’t be taking that much damage anyway. The reason not to take stone is that an extra 180 toughness just isn’t going to be useful as a stunbreak. If you use LR you remove an immob and throw yourself back guaranteeing a higher damage reduction than 180 toughness. Or even SoR, since you can full clear condis that the toughness will not help. So either way, you get a stunbreak and a lot more damage reduction than signet of stone. Not to mention, signet of stone toughness does not scale with undead runes making it practically worthless.

The sigil choices aren’t great because smoldering doesn’t give you more burn duration (since you need a full second to get damage), agony just doesn’t work with sb (bug), and the only skill that benefits from the agony is axe in this build which only gives an extra bleed tick (which should be cleansed before 7s). So as you can see it’s not worth it.

As for the pets, lynx will get trucked and killed in any team fight/ even 1 v 1 it will die without pet regen. Engis and definitely against a hambow warrior the pet will die leaving you with no condi clear pretty soon. The weapon choices leave you highly susceptible to focus fire in a team fight.

But, you shouldn’t even really be at a big team fight as a ranger because you are better at 1 v 1s by the nature of this class and by going to a team fight against a class that doesn’t have a ranger is providing the other team with a distinct advantage.

As for the second build, it’s a bit better, however 10% dps increase is only useful to your teammates, but again, you don’t want to be at a teamfight as a ranger anymore. Not to mention, if you get focused, you have no stunbreak.

The sigil choices are much better as energy is very strong as always and each geomancy proc is another 3-4k free damage.

The weapon choices are kinder to being focused or to dodge burst in this second build but the weapon choice puts you at dangerously close proximity to warriors which hinders your 1 v 1 capabilities against them.

The amulet choice for both these builds is ok, allows you to face tank a bit better, but they won’t have enough damage to pressure a warrior enough that it just can’t bully you off the node while might stacking to 25, effectively slaughtering both the owl and the lynx (leaving you with no condi clear).

The ranger, is a 1 v 1 class. Every other class brings more to the team fight so you don’t want to be there. You need to be able to 1 v 1 at either home or far. Both these builds are like strictly for team fights, where you don’t wanna be!

Hence, you want to be able to be mobile so you can outplay whatever you are fighting and not try to out tank it as they will out might stack you and win. That is why you use SoR, LR, sun spirit, and troll as heal. The pet choices, fear wolf, drake, spider are all tanky enough to not get slaughtered in that 20s, and both provide needed damage or CC that the spirit ranger build is missing while providing a capable companion to abosrb the condi’s that empathic bond will transfer to it.

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Posted by: Ryan.9387

Ryan.9387

I don’t think he really cares enough if he reposted this into spvp main…

Ranger | Elementalist

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Posted by: Dave Pare.2069

Dave Pare.2069

The build I’m about to post is not mine, and sice you asked for someone on the leaderboard, this is Nìah’s build (32nd on EU leaderboard right now, 8th 3 days ago).

I had the pleasure to face his team once last week but, unfortunately I haven’t got the chance to 1v1 him so I can’t give you any tip on strenght and weaknesses of the build (I haven’t tried this build either). Anyway, even if I would probably make a couple of changes, this is the exact build Nìah’s used when his team (BYOB) faced team “Legendary No Names” on the ESL Weekly cup #32; I’ll link the video as well.

This is the build:
http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAsfVjMq0xaLL+rQ0agAha5AEANjhbwdSkDhdBrOA-TJhHwACODAo3fAwjAwYZAA

And this is the recording of the match:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAXa5l56cDM

Just want to mention that during the first match Nìah made a mistake and went for GS instead of SB; he also used warhorn instead of torch at the beginning just for the initial swiftness.
I hope this will help you, even if I think that Ranger is a bit out of the meta right now, as it is for Mesmer (but I also hope that this will change soon since Ranger is definetely my favourite class).

(edited by Dave Pare.2069)

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Posted by: Jasher.6580

Jasher.6580

I don’t think he really cares enough if he reposted this into spvp main…

The quality of the responses in this thread are substantially higher than the ones in the Ranger forum. I’m glad I posted here.

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Posted by: Zoose.6257

Zoose.6257

I don’t play enough Ranger to know, but I would probably take some of Eura’s advice

Good luck th0

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Posted by: manveruppd.7601

manveruppd.7601

People used to argue carrion was better because it was less likely to pull bleeds to the top of the condi clear list. Well, condi clear is random so it doesn’t matter when you apply the bleeds since covering them is pointless (making rabid a better choice in the current “meta”).

Sorry for hijacking, but the above comment highlights what I’ve been saying since release: boon and condition removal should be on a transparent and predictable last in/first out basis like it was in GW1, not this stupid arbitrary hidden priority list that’s different for every single skill!
The poster I’m quoting is factually wrong, as far as I’m aware: it’s not random. But with so many differnet skills, each with a different unpublished priority list, IT MIGHT AS WELL BE RANDOM from the player’s perspective! It’s a stupid system it makes anything short of a full cleanse liable to fail by not taking off the 1 condition you most need cleansed, and it discourages forms of skilled play such as covering your most important boons/condis so they don’t get pulled.

A bad necromancer always blames the corpse.

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Posted by: Eurantien.4632

Eurantien.4632

People used to argue carrion was better because it was less likely to pull bleeds to the top of the condi clear list. Well, condi clear is random so it doesn’t matter when you apply the bleeds since covering them is pointless (making rabid a better choice in the current “meta”).

Sorry for hijacking, but the above comment highlights what I’ve been saying since release: boon and condition removal should be on a transparent and predictable last in/first out basis like it was in GW1, not this stupid arbitrary hidden priority list that’s different for every single skill!
The poster I’m quoting is factually wrong, as far as I’m aware: it’s not random. But with so many differnet skills, each with a different unpublished priority list, IT MIGHT AS WELL BE RANDOM from the player’s perspective! It’s a stupid system it makes anything short of a full cleanse liable to fail by not taking off the 1 condition you most need cleansed, and it discourages forms of skilled play such as covering your most important boons/condis so they don’t get pulled.

I know some condi clears aren’t random (Hide in Shadows) but from my experience it definitely seems that some are (Engi healing turret). At this point in time, I believe the system to be half random and half planned. I’ll be testing this soon enough.

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Posted by: Dahkeus.8243

Dahkeus.8243

I haven’t been terribly active in PvP in a while and I’m not top of leaderboards, nor do I run in tournaments, but I would recommend checking out Dante’s build list:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23vbkh/tpvp_build_list_up_to_date_builds_as_of_the_april/

He follows high level PvP builds pretty closely and while it’s only as up to date as of 4/24, I don’t think there has been much of anything that’s really changed to out date this (no major balance patches).

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Posted by: Jasher.6580

Jasher.6580

I haven’t been terribly active in PvP in a while and I’m not top of leaderboards, nor do I run in tournaments, but I would recommend checking out Dante’s build list:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23vbkh/tpvp_build_list_up_to_date_builds_as_of_the_april/

He follows high level PvP builds pretty closely and while it’s only as up to date as of 4/24, I don’t think there has been much of anything that’s really changed to out date this (no major balance patches).

That build list though current isn’t very up to date, especially for Ranger.

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Posted by: YourFriendMarvin.4127

YourFriendMarvin.4127

I highly recommend listening to Eura’s advice. His experience with ranger is pretty high. He’s played mostly every variant of a ranger build out there. One of the few rangers that have pet control compared to most rangers I’ve fought. Ranger if built for team fights will obviously be better for team fights, but what Eura said about it being one of the strongest 1v1 classes is true. BM ranger and other variants are still strong 1v1 specs that can kill still give a Warrior, d/d ele , and mostly nearly anything a hard time if played right. The problem with this is that you’re better off pressuring far than being home point defender, and if you are constantly getting de -capped at home by a thief, you’ll lose point advantage. You would have to have a team composition that has good team fight presence and map awareness if you were to assault the enemy home point on a far point ranger build. You can have good rotations, but if you get outclassed or out sustained it wont matter, because you’ll most likely lose most of your fights due to being overwhelmed unless the enemy team messes up.

#MostTeamQueueWins before December 2nd, 2014 Patch
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