Guild Wars 2

Anyone cares to explain why or show me the build and is there anyway way to counter them?

What I see in high end team fights is the necro is the priority target because it’s the biggest threat in team fights. A CC-ed or pressured necro can’t do much and dies pretty quickly because of lack of disengage. But when left alone, can really bring the rain down with loads of painful condis. As for 1v1, well there is no fun watching your toon get chain-feared 100-0 and you can’t do anything about it. Timing your stunbreaks/cleanse is trivial IMO since condi application is as easy as pie on the part of the necro. What works based on what I see in tourneys is to burst down the necro before he can lay down the inevitable fear-lock on you.

As for spirit rangers, the spirits usually whittle down on all the AOEs going about in team fights. Sun Spirit is priority spirit to kill since burn is just a pain in the kitten and it basically let’s enemies with this spirit buff to proc burn on hit with 35% chance traited IIRC. Then there is the Spirit Elite which basically revives and heals allies. It can turn the battle for sure. On 1v1, I haven’t had much success against this annoying build though. I was hoping spirits die when the ranger is Moa’d like when an MM necro loses his minions but too bad it doesn’t work that way and I wonder why Anet. The problem is that the spirits provide too much body block on the ranger add to that the difficulty of targeting the ranger especially if it’s an asura. Goodluck with that. The latter is somehow an issue with the game’s targetting system, but I’m not really sure. I’m no pro. XD

Gallrvaghn.4921:

What I see in high end team fights is the necro is the priority target because it’s the biggest threat in team fights. A CC-ed or pressured necro can’t do much and dies pretty quickly because of lack of disengage. But when left alone, can really bring the rain down with loads of painful condis. As for 1v1, well there is no fun watching your toon get chain-feared 100-0 and you can’t do anything about it. Timing your stunbreaks/cleanse is trivial IMO since condi application is as easy as pie on the part of the necro. What works based on what I see in tourneys is to burst down the necro before he can lay down the inevitable fear-lock on you.

As for spirit rangers, the spirits usually whittle down on all the AOEs going about in team fights. Sun Spirit is priority spirit to kill since burn is just a pain in the kitten and it basically let’s enemies with this spirit buff to proc burn on hit with 35% chance traited IIRC. Then there is the Spirit Elite which basically revives and heals allies. It can turn the battle for sure. On 1v1, I haven’t had much success against this annoying build though. I was hoping spirits die when the ranger is Moa’d like when an MM necro loses his minions but too bad it doesn’t work that way and I wonder why Anet. The problem is that the spirits provide too much body block on the ranger add to that the difficulty of targeting the ranger especially if it’s an asura. Goodluck with that. The latter is somehow an issue with the game’s targetting system, but I’m not really sure. I’m no pro. XD

Is there a build for them? xD

I was expecting a “I heard Spirit Ranger and Terror Necro is OP so I rerolled” thread.

Beating Necros:
Control and Burst, get the upper hand before they do.

Beating Spirit Rangers:
I’ll tell you when I have beaten one myself :/

1. Necro’s. ~ CC and burst.
2. Spirit ranger. ~ melee cleave?
Haven’t seen them in a long time but wouldn’t be surprised if DPS guardian blows it up.

Gallrvaghn.4921:

As for spirit rangers, the spirits usually whittle down on all the AOEs going about in team fights. Sun Spirit is priority spirit to kill since burn is just a pain in the kitten and it basically let’s enemies with this spirit buff to proc burn on hit with 35% chance traited IIRC.

You recall incorrectly. It’s 35% default + 35% with trait. 70% total chance on hit to apply 3 second burning with only god knows what little cd. Also, the pet, and if using ogres, rock dog also have this chance to inflict burning (not to mention allies around, probably cap of 5)

Immobilizes and cc’s combined with burst damage and/or aoes. 3 Condis are cleared every 10 seconds, so stack on a whole bunch and include an immobi. Also the pet only removes one control skill every 90 seconds, so more than one knockback,fear,stun etc will have a ranger down and out unless they are using Rampage as one, which any spirit ranger likely wont be. If they are downed and they have nature’s renewal up, u can interrupt it’s res skill. Whenever I see a nature’s renewal up I start playing survival mode and take down the spirit, it’s passive heal on ranger is strong. If it’s a real battle of survival, take out their stone spirit. Remember that when you go to heal, any good ranger will have his concussion shot ready to rupt you, although I see most fotm fools aren’t smart enough to use it, same goes for if you are trying to finish someone. When im on my ranger and I go up against another spirit ranger, I play cat and mouse, I go in and out, kill off the spirits, pull out, go back in and kill some more, then when they are all down, go on the offensive. Remember that shortbow has a crappy range now, take advantage of it. Watch thier dogs, wolf’s got a fear when it howls and drakehound’s got immobi. The howl animation is easy to spot and dodge… I notice alot of these rangers in hotjoins/solo Q don’t use the pet skills at all, and when they do, never effectively. Also be aware that when ranger swaps out a dog, for the other one, their first skill will be a knockdown which you can kite out of or dodge I believe.

Take note of when they put the spirits up, if you kill them right after they have refreshed them there’s 60 seconds its gonna take for them to renew them. That’s a whole minute you have to lay on the pressure.

Anyway’s that’s what usually gets me. It’s usually if there’s multiple people, one constantly laying on the cc’s the other bursting hard. A cc warrior is easy enough to dodge, but once you have a few other players on you, it gets tough and you gotta start being all stylish with the sword/warhorn :P

Butter.3024:

Is there a build for them? xD

I purposefully did not include the builds here since I don’t want to be part of another massive influx of forum lurkers bandwagoning and copy-pasting such horrid builds in either tPVP or hotjoin. But I heard Google might be willing to help you out in that regard.

Getting in melee range of a ranger is a bad idea because that is when they hit you with bonfire, storm spirit active, sun spirit active, and whatever else they want. The only thing that can handle that is the a warrior with berserker’s stance. For the other classes people seem to not realize that there is no point to stand on a node with a member of the other team on it in a 1 v 1 situation because they aren’t going to get the point neutralized. So, to beat a spirit ranger just stay back and either hit them with aoe to kill spirits or if you have the DPS just kill the ranger. A necro that just kites the ranger essentially avoiding the spirit actives wins hands down. Spirit ranger is not OP, getting hit by all the spirit actives will kill you (storm spirit active kind of OP 3k dmg that doesn’t scale so bunker’s can get even like 6k crits with it). 50% learn to play, 50% storm spirit OP, evade spam OP.

Eurantien.4632:

Getting in melee range of a ranger is a bad idea because that is when they hit you with bonfire, storm spirit active, sun spirit active, and whatever else they want. The only thing that can handle that is the a warrior with berserker’s stance.

Pistol Whip?

Eurantien.4632:

Spirit ranger is not OP, getting hit by all the spirit actives will kill you (storm spirit active kind of OP 3k dmg that doesn’t scale so bunker’s can get even like 6k crits with it). 50% learn to play, 50% storm spirit OP, evade spam OP.

Yeah, totally forgot about Storm Spirit active. But I notice I die more from all the burning andbleeds spammed rather than from the Storm Spirit active since at least I have the chance to dodge and evade the attack, it’s on a longish CD (20secs?) and only in a specified radius while on the other hand, proc burn is kinda difficult to predict and I’m not blessed with craploads of condi removal as a mesmur. So yeah, occasional 3k direct damage from Storm Spirit is just the cherry on top with Spirit Rangers. XD

Treat spirit rangers like a boss. Take out their adds first. Juke away to heal or wait out condis. Kill the nature spirit before blowing your load to down the ranger.

That’s if you MUST 1v1 them… MUCH better to not engage or 2-3v1 burst them down.

This build is so training wheels, ehrmagerd.

To hear people talk on the forums, it isn’t possible to counter them. If you meet one, your best bet is to bend over meekly and ask them to be gentle.

Yes you can kill the spirits yes you can kite the dog but you will be long dead befor you can do any of this things
there are 2 things you can do wen your in a fith with a spirit rangar 99.9% of the times
1 you can call for back up and hope they get there in time
2 die
i made a spirit rangar to see how the mechaniks work hoping i can find some soft spot
i can exploit and do you know hwat i find – nothing 1v1 i win all the time and its not even fun pop up all spirit atacks and then 1 1 1 1 1 2 and interup the heal if i dont want to torcher my vicktum more with 5 this is it folcks 80 % of the fiths i dont swich wepons. Wen you get bored from wining all fiths you have to understand there is somthing terably rong

transtemporal.2158:

To hear people talk on the forums, it isn’t possible to counter them. If you meet one, your best bet is to bend over meekly and ask them to be gentle.

A team of rank 5 spirit rangers would give a team of rank 50 anything else’s a really tough time. That’s broken.

aleks.5473:

Yes you can kill the spirits yes you can kite the dog but you will be long dead befor you can do any of this things
there are 2 things you can do wen your in a fith with a spirit rangar 99.9% of the times
1 you can call for back up and hope they get there in time
2 die
i made a spirit rangar to see how the mechaniks work hoping i can find some soft spot
i can exploit and do you know hwat i find – nothing 1v1 i win all the time and its not even fun pop up all spirit atacks and then 1 1 1 1 1 2 and interup the heal if i dont want to torcher my vicktum more with 5 this is it folcks 80 % of the fiths i dont swich wepons. Wen you get bored from wining all fiths you have to understand there is somthing terably rong

I sense whine and QQ. But I really feel where you’re coming from man. Spirit Ranger is basically training wheels spec with very passive play but is a pain in the kitten to face and be put up against. We all have the same sentiments.

Spirit Ranger has a pretty strong team fight presence, but other than the tankish Spirit Elite, all other spirits go down with all the crazy AOE happening. In 1v1, you just run away, struggle to survive while waiting for backup or bend over. That’s it. XD

How sad do you have to be to continually insult another person for not being amazing at a second language? At what point do you become utterly despicable trash? Discuss!

Edit, on topic:

The funniest thing is, Anet is only letting these builds persist because of a desire to retain consistency throughout a tournament. To feed some desire to be an e-sport.

Thing is, any potential new ‘competitive’ player (attracted by the tournament spectacle) that sees the game in it’s current kitten -poor rng, AOE Spam, AI dominated state, won’t even think about touching it in the first place. Irony much?

feliscatus.1430:

transtemporal.2158:

To hear people talk on the forums, it isn’t possible to counter them. If you meet one, your best bet is to bend over meekly and ask them to be gentle.

A team of rank 5 spirit rangers would give a team of rank 50 anything else’s a really tough time. That’s broken.

I hate to burst your bubble, but I’ve beaten a 5 spirit ranger premade with 2 thieves, a ranger, a guardian, and a mesmer. It really wasn’t that hard. In fact countering 5 spirit rangers is very easy. Everybody is running the same build!

We just had both thieves prepare to spam cluster bomb while our mesmer brought null field and I swapped to river drake pet for aoe. After a few changes to reflect our opponent, we went 500-250.

If you say “5 spirit ranger OP, we lose” then of course you will lose. Good players will stand back and objectively think of how to counter their enemy. That is why they win.

Both can be countered using the M+Sh/GS warrior (search "The Skullcrack 3.0 thread in the warrior forum).

Both are played the same way :
1. Use the berserker stance to survive the first condi spam
2. Build adrenaline
3. Use signet of rage
4. Loop : Skullcrack > 100b > whirl.

The loop will melt down spirits or minions, and build enough adrenaline to repeat it almost every 7.5 seconds.

Use your two signets (stab + cleanse) in case of emergency.
Run away with GS 3+5 if you need to, both can’t catch you with their low mobility.

Red.3572:

How sad do you have to be to continually insult another person for not being amazing at a second language? At what point do you become utterly despicable trash? Discuss!

Edit, on topic:

The funniest thing is, Anet is only letting these builds persist because of a desire to retain consistency throughout a tournament. To feed some desire to be an e-sport.

Thing is, any potential new ‘competitive’ player (attracted by the tournament spectacle) that sees the game in it’s current kitten -poor rng, AOE Spam, AI dominated state, won’t even think about touching it in the first place. Irony much?

I wasn’t being serious lol. Don’t get your e panties in a bunch i was kidding and i thought he knew that.

Ouroboros.5076:

Both can be countered using the M+Sh/GS warrior (search "The Skullcrack 3.0 thread in the warrior forum).

Both are played the same way :
1. Use the berserker stance to survive the first condi spam
2. Build adrenaline
3. Use signet of rage
4. Loop : Skullcrack > 100b > whirl.

The loop will melt down spirits or minions, and build enough adrenaline to repeat it almost every 7.5 seconds.

Use your two signets (stab + cleanse) in case of emergency.
Run away with GS 3+5 if you need to, both can’t catch you with their low mobility.

This isn’t really the best way. You should be able to dodge/block their condi burst (you can even reflect some of it). I find it much more effective to save the zerker stance for that aoe blind that will proc when you kill the spirits. This mitigates a big defensive tool for them vs melee, especially if you plan on stun locking them.

Of course I use a hammer, so the spirits all die fairly quickly.

It dint loocked like this kitten s anyway apology is acepted

Just wait for nerf dont worry its coming, as ranger I can say spirits OP

Phaeton.9582:

This isn’t really the best way. You should be able to dodge/block their condi burst (you can even reflect some of it). I find it much more effective to save the zerker stance for that aoe blind that will proc when you kill the spirits. This mitigates a big defensive tool for them vs melee, especially if you plan on stun locking them.

If only Berserker’s Stance protected you from the Sun Spirit’s blind. Unfortunately the blind from the Sun Spirit is not working as intended and has an infinite duration, which leads to it piercing Berserker’s Stance and applying the blind regardless.

If you happen across a good spirit ranger protecting a point and you attempt to fight them at melee range without first killing the spirits, you will likely die. With all their spirits up, they are OP but once you kill the spirits, they are the weakest class in the game – by far!

TBH, spirits have almost no health, a 60 sec cooldown and can be killed in 5 seconds with even the most bunkerish of builds. When I use a spirit build, 90% of the people I fight will focus on me and completely ignore the spirits. That always makes for an easy win!

TGSlasher.1458:

I was expecting a “I heard Spirit Ranger and Terror Necro is OP so I rerolled” thread.

Beating Necros:
Control and Burst, get the upper hand before they do.

Beating Spirit Rangers:
I’ll tell you when I have beaten one myself :/

The answer to both is cc/stun locks.

Killing spirits with “the most bunkerish of builds” is kind of a hyperbole.

People do not focus spirits for several reasons:

- They do not know how long of a CD you have on them upon engaging, thus risking that all their efforts have been in vain

- They need to use cool downs on spirits that are both offensive and defensive in nature, as they will apply their effect upon killing them

- The Ranger can attack at range and pull the spirits away and pressure them at the same time

- It takes time, time in which reinforcements can arrive and nullify all your efforts

Bursting Spirit Ranger Strats

Thief with 20/30 Shadow Arts can take anybody. Look up Cruuk’s build and learn its strategy and you’ll have a great answer to Spirit Rangers. If you bring Dagger Storm you’ll heal to full and wipe out all the spirits, after which D/P, S/P, or S/D will completely destroy the Ranger. If they try to summon spirits you have Headshot, the cast time is long enough to react to. You can also Cluster Bomb the spirits. This is the best class to take them b/c you can disengage when other ppl show up and cost them ppl in the midfight. 2 on their home point with 3 at mid/far vs. your 4 teammates should end in a 2 cap quickly. If it doesn’t your teammates aren’t very good.

Warrior can start in LB and then close once the Stone Spirit is down. You do have to be careful with the evades but chances are they’ll use them trying to get out of your Combustive Shot or Arcing Arrow, so timing it right after will be effective. Bulls Charge to Greatsword and Hammer both work because these builds have no stun breaks. If you’re good at LB/Hammer you can take out the Spirit Ranger very fast, which is good but not as good as Thief b/c if someone else shows up you’re in more trouble. If you have GS you can disengage and get back to mid faster than anybody.

Mesmer can GS range them really well. You’re at 1.2k while they’re usually at 900. If you stay at range then close once they lose Stone and Sun spirits, they’ll be easy to kill. Use Diversion first, not Mind Wrack, so you can set up Illusionary Leap and Blurred Frenzy. They build for evade spam opening with Mind Wrack is stupid. If you bring Signet of Domination you can bait with Diversion, hit them with it after a couple clones/phantasms go up then unload a Leap/BF/Mind Wrack burst. I like Portal, Null Field, and Sig of Domination but you have to be really fast with Portal if you don’t want to get destroyed by their teammates when reinforcing.

Eles can Earthquake, Lightning Flash to do massive AoE on the spirits. Don’t worry about the blind that just costs you the Lightning Flash, not the money maker. Fire 2, 3, and 4 will clean up whatever’s left and moving between Air and Fire for the rest of the fight will clean up the Ranger. Out of the four burst classes, though, they’re the worst equipped against condi classes b/c their condi cleanse has been nerfed so much since launch. Triple cantrips doesn’t clear condis like it used to, which really hurts the class overall. Add how easily S/D thieves can take out Eles and you don’t really bring that much if they reinforce. Mist form is only 4 seconds and RTL can be interrupted by fear.

The most important ability to dodge from the Ranger is the Torch 4. That single skill can take off half your health and has range. SB can stack bleeds if you’re not facing them, so don’t let them flank you! You have to keep them in your sights and use your camera angle to target ranged attacks. The other skills are more annoying than dangerous, b/c poison is weak and bleeds only get dangerous past a certain amount.

The Sun Spirit is the most dangerous offensive one, but the spirit that is the higher priority for burst is the Stone Spirit b/c the clock is ticking. If they have no protection they will feel a lot more pressure from you.

i play spirit ranger and the ones who have beaten me (on 2vs2) have stacked dps on me/spiked me on cooldown (necro/mesmer) and beaten me (on 1vs1) coz of attrition (pistol mainhand with tree and with Minions perma evade bunker thief)

everything else is easy.

or prolly i don’t play it right.

or you are overrating spirit rangers.

necro aint op, spirit ranger is better than necro but that’s not even op.

If you ask me its pretty balanced right now, every profession has 1 build that’s pretty good. If you play any other build besides the “op” or “meta” build your just hurting yourself and your team.

Because that perma stunlock warrior, that’s pretty op if you wanna play this game. For mesmers I find that build where you constantly create clones and constantly vanishing, that’s pretty op as well, for elementalist if you use zoose build, you pretty much faceroll anyone as long as you get your combos down correctly.

Theres so many op builds out there, the fact is its not op its just the best build for the professions and you’d have to be stupid not to run them.

Beat Necro and Ranger pet out if misery before they cause any havoc is the best way to deal with them

I think terror necro is powerful but somehow still inline.

The necro is slow, just slow, and he doesn’t have nearly as much damage mitigation unlike the ranger.

Without abusing fear, the necro is a punching bag, albeit one with a long lifeline.

Not OP just hard to beat…

Zerroth.2401:

Not OP just hard to beat…

That is not OP by definition? Especially considering how little skill is required to play the spirit build well.

So, as a grenadier conditon engy, spirit rangers are rather simple to beat. Glue shot and grenade barrage if you can get in close (the crits make a lot of little bleeds), drop your grenades in the little aoe pack he sets up for you, and don’t let that burning stay on you, as it should have a full ten seconds between applications, give or take. The strongest tools you have are superior condition control and attrition, as you can keep poison up almost constantly, and just let the dots kills him while you shrink down into a mouse-gineer. Re-apply as necessary, and save the confusion shot for when there’s only the ranger and one spirit left, otherwise it’s mostly wasted.

Necro-fear spam, best I’ve seen had trouble with getting a supply crate dropped on their head after their chain was broken. I’ll need to fight more of them though.

I beat spirit rangers on my nec with aoe. Damaging them along with killing spirits and they go down. I never really thought spirit rangers were that difficult to deal with. Really good thieves on the other hand….pain in kitten

ensoriki.5789:

1. Necro’s. ~ CC and burst.
2. Spirit ranger. ~ melee cleave?
Haven’t seen them in a long time but wouldn’t be surprised if DPS guardian blows it up.

This. A decently traited thief can wreck a necro and deny them any skills…and bingo on #2, DPS guards stomp adds.

Necros aren’t so broke. The best way to kill them is to dodge their fears (especially DS fear) and interrupt their heal. Knowing what they have up when is extremely important.

Rangers on the otherhand are a bit more difficult. Range down their spirits ASAP. If they they have a nature spirit up KILL IT IMMEDIATELY!!!! It is THE strongest AoE heal in the entire game healing for about 480 per second with a massive radius. If you don’t kill it in around 10-20 seconds you’ll probably lose the teamfight.

Kill their sun spirit asaply as well. AoE burning for the entire team is extremely strong. Avoid their storm spirit’s active (it activates on death as well). It hits for around 4k.

One of the best ways to deal with a spirit ranger is to constantly harass them on backpoint. They become far, far stronger in larger fights as their spirits become harder to focus and their buffs are given to more people. It can also be relatively easy to 1v1 them depending on what class you are. Down their sun spirit and cleanse the burning they apply to you. Blind the storm spirit’s active. Wait for the solar flare to go down from the sun spirit and go in to kitten the ranger up. If you keep a spirit ranger out of a larger fight then you’re doing a good job IMO. If you make him pop his elite in a 1v1 then you’re doing an awesome job.

Spirits do not regenerate HP out of combat on their own. It’s also good to note that they only have hide in plain sight and shared anguish to mitigate stuns.

Many rangers run forge runes and have perma-protection from all their sources of prot. They’re EXTREMELY hard to kill depending on what they’re running and how good they are. It’s smart to take a quick note of their weapon sets too. If they switch out of sword they have far less dodges than if they’re in sword. If the ranger uses monarch’s leap (the sword 2) he’ll roll backwards while evading. If he jumps forward at you he IS NOT evading and is practically a sitting duck.

GL friends, nerf spirits and godspeed.

Spirits don’t need a nerf.