Guild Wars 2

hi guys, i know it depends on your own playing style but i just wanna know if ranger is one of the popular choice in wvw? and for those who uses ranger, can you give us an insight about the ff:

1. choice of weapon/s
2. traits (ex. pow – 30 -II/V/XI)
3. pets
4. armor stats
5. runes,sigil

i also wanna know the comparison between mesmer and ranger in wvw.

thanks

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

Ranger has a very popular build at the moment. You can tank almost anything while your pet kills the target for you. I call it stupid to be honest, since any half witted noob can use it. But nevertheless it’s there.

Rangers are quite a strong class if you play it properly, we have a variety of decent builds that can be used. Mesmers are the bane of all rangers though, especially if you’re melee. I have an incredibly hard time killing them for one. But that’s just because they can kite melee so easily.

Other than that it’s really a great class to play. Extremely fun! :p Should try it!

I’m not really a fan of giving out my builds because I believe in you get there yourself or you don’t get there at all! But it’s not too hard to come up with a decent one, it’s just about tweaking it constantly to make it perfect :p

Regards

The vast majority of rangers seem to run SB and GS. I think this is the best option although I also like Axe/Warhorn.

Rangers are everywhere in low tiers, and almost none-existent in upper tiers. That said, ranger is actually good right now, I dunno why people hate on them all the time.

Oh let people think rangers are weak. Then thiefs go easy on you, and when you strike back, and even manage to kill them, you didn’t only stomp their body, but also their mind

Having 1000+ hours of WvW logged on my ranger, allow me to give you some insight into this awesome profession.. :-)

Weapons: Shortbow (with sup sigil of corruption (increased condition dmg))/Longbow (with sup sigil of earth (60% chance to bleed on crit))
Pets: Drakehound (knockdown/immobilize) and Spider (immobilize/poison)
Traits: 20/25/25/0/0
Armor: Power/Precision/Condition Dmg

Depending on where I’m running to/from, I switch weapons at times:
- When I’m running towards a keep/tower to defend, I replace shortbow with greatsword (to get into the tower blocking (#4) and running (#3)). Once I’m in the tower, I can easily switch to Longbow and start barraging..
- Running for an assault: Take greatsword instead of longbow to get there quicker (#3). Once there, take out the shortbow and start conditioning.
- Running in zerg: Take out the warhorn from time to time to buff the others, switch back to your weapon of choice afterwards..

Small video to demonstrate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ty7MP6M5_9c

(note: in this vid the build was still shortbow/axe+warhorn, btw. Builds do change in time, you see )

As far as rangers go, small group and solo, They’re in a good place. We’ve got some nice builds though mostly more bunkery right now.

The problem lies in organised guild groups, when we run as a team we have a group comp, glass eles and tanky guardians for backline damage and stability uptime is a must, mesmers and necros for ground control and heavy condition pressure…A must, hammer warriors are very good and venomshare thieves with SB for blasts….A must, those classes bring things that others can’t, that’s why they’re a staple of any good organised pushes, but rangers don’t have a place bar sometimes using muddy terrain and healing spring for water fields and condition cleansing, spirits are subpar for group comps. Like engis in wvw groups, we simply don’t have a role another class cannot do better, it’s just bad luck that we’re trumped in pretty much everything bar small group stuff right now. As it stands in a group of 10, it’s pretty much necessary to fill 9 of those roles above, rangers or engis are just kind of the 9th wheel and I feel somewhat detrimental to my guild when we do organised wvw sometimes despite the fact I’m running 4 group utilities

Depends on what you’re doing for builds/pet options/equipment.

I run ranger in our small man, it’s a nasty class if you understand the class mechanics. Send me a OM and I’ll help as much as I can, I’d rather not give out all of my trickseses to the entire forum.

If you plan on pulling the traditional back peddling “omgwhatamidoing” longbow ranger thenn please roll a different class so we can stop being hated on.

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

No, it’s just not pet-focused, neither condition one.
I didn’t say I’ve got problems as ranger. Tho, I’m mainly ele (for 4-5ppl group roaming), i basicly solo only as ranger and still enjoy it. All I said, that ranger in comparsion to mesmer, is just worse in countless things.

I run with a Sb/Lb with 30/30/10 with full zerker gear. I use a brown bear (mainly for distraction), and a wolf for knockdown and howl (fear). My longbow carries the superior sigil of fire, and my shortbow has the rune that adds precision. I am thinking of changing these though.

I’ve tried every other build and armor combo under the sun and this combination (for me), provides the most killing power and best survivability. That is unless I come across a roaming thief, but that’s my own problem as I take on that risk lol.

Depends on how you want to play, if you want to be in the thick of things, you’ll need better survivability gear, if you want to hang back and deal heavy damage, go with what I suggested, but learn how to escape quick. To me, Rangers are best suited for hitting from long range and are best to support groups that way. Though I know they can be effective in 1v1 or small groups with the right build, these builds I find aren’t nearly as effective in zerg vs zerg battles.

It’s not uncommon for me to get wiped out in small group battles and definitely not uncommon to get wiped in 1v1. On the same token, it’s also not uncommon to deal 20K + damage to a group within a zerg if they aren’t fully aware of what’s going on.

Very few rangers repping organised guilds in wvw at tier 5 and up and there are extremely good reasons for that. If its a choice, for the love of all that’s holy go Mesmer! There exist SOME good rangers but they are few and far between. The large majority either get the pet to tank while they do damage, or tank themselves while the pet does the damage. Both are terrible tactics that may work in pve, but is innefective in wvw. The pet can be a massive liability in wvw and you need to take account of that to be effective.

As someone who has battled a number of good rangers in wvw, I can tell you that I fear a GS ranger more than a SB/LB ranger.

Commisar.8695:

As far as rangers go, small group and solo, They’re in a good place. We’ve got some nice builds though mostly more bunkery right now.

The problem lies in organised guild groups, when we run as a team we have a group comp, glass eles and tanky guardians for backline damage and stability uptime is a must, mesmers and necros for ground control and heavy condition pressure…A must, hammer warriors are very good and venomshare thieves with SB for blasts….A must, those classes bring things that others can’t, that’s why they’re a staple of any good organised pushes, but rangers don’t have a place bar sometimes using muddy terrain and healing spring for water fields and condition cleansing, spirits are subpar for group comps. Like engis in wvw groups, we simply don’t have a role another class cannot do better, it’s just bad luck that we’re trumped in pretty much everything bar small group stuff right now. As it stands in a group of 10, it’s pretty much necessary to fill 9 of those roles above, rangers or engis are just kind of the 9th wheel and I feel somewhat detrimental to my guild when we do organised wvw sometimes despite the fact I’m running 4 group utilities

was about to post but this explained things very nicely.

1500+ hours on ranger w/ commander
zerg style

1. gs lb
2. 30 20 20
3. bears
4. knights
5. emerald orbs

stone / protect me will save your kitten
wild = 25% damage + 12 seconds of stability
entangle = cc

The thing many people get wrong about rangers are pets. It’s not the end all and be all but it’s also not useless. I for example use wolves for great cc and snow wolf for frost when chasing, but it’s about that. They do a bit of damage and swapping them gives an awesome 2 second speed boost(5 points in beastmastery), which can give you a bit of a burst.

The trick is just to balance the use of your pets with your playstyle, which means you need to be able to micro manage well.(not even that well though, just enough to be able to know where it is and to be able to press 3 extra buttons.) But making a build around them is just not going to keep things interesting. That jaguar with regeneration build for example is just so silly, 5 year olds can play it!

I rant a lot today.

Anyhow!

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

This is very close to the build I run. I have 2000+power, 2000+ toughness (3100 armor), and 50% crit chance/51% crit damage. My traits are 0/30/30/10, so very close to Lert’s…just a bit more survivable. I use SB and S/D. I run wolf and jaguar.

The power/prec/tough ranger build is far from awful. It surpasses bunker/regen/pet builds in all circumstances (small groups all the way to zergs), except for 1vX. That said, this build can solo and beat or stalemate any class and pretty much any build.

It is more difficult to play than the popular regen builds…you need to be very active and you have no “set it and forget” defenses (like massive regen).

My prediction is that this type of build will be the next FOTM—the only downside is that it requires a fair amount of skill/practice to get it to work.

Tobias Steele.2071:

Very few rangers repping organised guilds in wvw at tier 5 and up and there are extremely good reasons for that. If its a choice, for the love of all that’s holy go Mesmer! There exist SOME good rangers but they are few and far between. The large majority either get the pet to tank while they do damage, or tank themselves while the pet does the damage. Both are terrible tactics that may work in pve, but is innefective in wvw. The pet can be a massive liability in wvw and you need to take account of that to be effective.

Depends on what you’re doing in WvW, zerging around, this is correct.

Solo and Small manning, No…..I’ll stomp on Mesmer’s all day long usually.

I have run a LB/SB full zerker ranger for the past few months in WvW and it has been great fun. I really don’t understand the naysayers…

Sigils/Runes:
LB: Sup Blood for survivability
SB: Sup Generosity for condition mitigation.
Full set of Superior Runes of Ranger

I run a signets build and traited to receive all active effects of signets. This gives me 6 seconds where I do not take attack damage (great in duels with thieves or anything with massive burst damage). And I can get big for significant increase in damage and stability. My elite is Entangle.

As for pets I run drakehound and spider for the immobilize. I can usually down most medium/light classes with one shot from longbow #2 on a immobilized person. If they are not downed I kite them with shortbow until they are dead. For 1v1 fights, I’d say I win more often than I don’t. Trouble comes mostly from thieves. I have never lost against another ranger. Mesmers usually run away (which they are superb at)

Running in a zerg use barrage for groups and pick people off with shortbow. Can usually bag 50-100 badges an hour on active nights (once got 42 badges during a single epic battle for Durios). Barrage and Entagle are great for people on walls.

Running solo I can take a camp in 30 seconds alone. (NPCs too stupid to get out of tangly vines…just group them up, entangle, and barrage.)

Bredin.5368:

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

This is very close to the build I run. I have 2000+power, 2000+ toughness (3100 armor), and 50% crit chance/51% crit damage. My traits are 0/30/30/10, so very close to Lert’s…just a bit more survivable. I use SB and S/D. I run wolf and jaguar.

The power/prec/tough ranger build is far from awful. It surpasses bunker/regen/pet builds in all circumstances (small groups all the way to zergs), except for 1vX. That said, this build can solo and beat or stalemate any class and pretty much any build.

It is more difficult to play than the popular regen builds…you need to be very active and you have no “set it and forget” defenses (like massive regen).

My prediction is that this type of build will be the next FOTM—the only downside is that it requires a fair amount of skill/practice to get it to work.

every regen/bunker/condition ranger will chew you up.

Coarr.3286:

Bredin.5368:

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

This is very close to the build I run. I have 2000+power, 2000+ toughness (3100 armor), and 50% crit chance/51% crit damage. My traits are 0/30/30/10, so very close to Lert’s…just a bit more survivable. I use SB and S/D. I run wolf and jaguar.

The power/prec/tough ranger build is far from awful. It surpasses bunker/regen/pet builds in all circumstances (small groups all the way to zergs), except for 1vX. That said, this build can solo and beat or stalemate any class and pretty much any build.

It is more difficult to play than the popular regen builds…you need to be very active and you have no “set it and forget” defenses (like massive regen).

My prediction is that this type of build will be the next FOTM—the only downside is that it requires a fair amount of skill/practice to get it to work.

every regen/bunker/condition ranger will chew you up.

That just isn’t at all true.

Xsorus.2507:

Tobias Steele.2071:

Very few rangers repping organised guilds in wvw at tier 5 and up and there are extremely good reasons for that. If its a choice, for the love of all that’s holy go Mesmer! There exist SOME good rangers but they are few and far between. The large majority either get the pet to tank while they do damage, or tank themselves while the pet does the damage. Both are terrible tactics that may work in pve, but is innefective in wvw. The pet can be a massive liability in wvw and you need to take account of that to be effective.

Depends on what you’re doing in WvW, zerging around, this is correct.

Solo and Small manning, No…..I’ll stomp on Mesmer’s all day long usually.

Thats probably true. As a thief or necromancer I dont have issues with roaming rangers, but I can imagine them being a problem for mesmers.

Small scale they’re pretty good. Large scale not so much.
Basically pet becomes irrelevant once you hit a certain number of players as it just dies in aoe instantly. Have a few good utilities in muddy terrain, healing spring and entangling roots and they’re pretty good at condition removal though.
One of the tougher classes to be good at in large scale fights and they’re not particularly desirable but one or two wont hurt a group if your good.

Mesmer is great in small scale if you can get past the lack of swiftness which makes getting around a bit of a pain in the kitten really.
In large scale they’re brought for their utilities – portal, veil and null field. All are extremely necessary but beyond that they’re pretty meh. Feedback has a massive counter thats makes it too dangerous to use against good groups so glamour spec is basically reliant on choke points and one utility to do any vaguely decent damage. Other specs are reliant on clones for damage which die instantly in aoe so dont do any damage really outside of picking off guys seperated from their group.
Its a bit of a boring spec to play in large scale fights imo. Once you’ve dropped veil and null field you can basically go akitten till they come off cd – you wont be missed.

edit: away from keyboard is censored? : /

I pulled out about 225 badges today in an hours time with a Ranger in full zerker gear. I could never pull that off with any other Ranger build; nor with my Warrior or Elementalist. This is soley because of the heavy damage from combination of barrage and rapid fire (piercing) can do to a group that isn’t coordinated. I think nearly everyone can attest to running around in zergs and seeing how many people tend to lose focus on the groups goals.

I’m not sure how people come to the conclusion that Rangers are less desirable in zergs or don’t do as much damage as other classes. I can usually pull 20K+ damage to a group with the combination above in a short amount of time, without fear of getting run over. In zerg vs zerg encounters, what other class can do that while consistently surviving at the same time?

Sure the build isn’t meant for 1v1 play, and more often than not i’ll lose to other classes in any 1v1 encounter (like running towards the zerg), but if the class can rake in that much badges and loot in an hours time with minimal deaths, i’ll take that over a more conservative tougher build any day.

DeadlySynz.3471:

I pulled out about 225 badges today in an hours time with a Ranger in full zerker gear. I could never pull that off with any other Ranger build; nor with my Warrior or Elementalist. This is soley because of the heavy damage from combination of barrage and rapid fire (piercing) can do to a group that isn’t coordinated. I think nearly everyone can attest to running around in zergs and seeing how many people tend to lose focus on the groups goals.

I’m not sure how people come to the conclusion that Rangers are less desirable in zergs or don’t do as much damage as other classes. I can usually pull 20K+ damage to a group with the combination above in a short amount of time, without fear of getting run over. In zerg vs zerg encounters, what other class can do that while consistently surviving at the same time?

Sure the build isn’t meant for 1v1 play, and more often than not i’ll lose to other classes in any 1v1 encounter (like running towards the zerg), but if the class can rake in that much badges and loot in an hours time with minimal deaths, i’ll take that over a more conservative tougher build any day.

All the badges mean is that you tagged an awful lot of mobs. Says nothing about your overall effectiveness. Had any of your opponents been intelligent enough to use retaliation you would auto gib yourself on every second skill use. Pets are walking condition bombs in the making, against organised opposition zergs a build like that + dumb pet may actually be a liability.

Actually for the last week or so, I’ve been trying a SB (sup venom sigil) Shortsword (sup rage sigil) /Axe (sup sigil of corruption) build with traps with rabid gear, and I’ve been doing really well in roaming, small group fights and larger fights as well. But thats just me.

Ranger is the primary class I play. I have a Thief(80), Engineer(80), Elementalist(44), Warrior(80) and Guardian(80). I’ve finished the PVE story line with 4 of the 6 characters.

I built my ranger in PVE long before going to WvW. Leveled all the way up to 80, picked up all exotic armor/jewelry and made exotic weapons for myself. The build I run is thus:

Long Bow, Sword/Horn(I have other types of weapons but run mostly this)
20, 20, 10, 15, 5

It’s a fairly balanced build and I do quite well in both WvW and PVE. I recommend to any player trying any class – do PVE for a while and learn your skills and discover what works for you. In PVE you can get extremely good equipment and you learn to use your character instead of just following the zerg and shooting. It’s only a recommendation – some players don’t like PVE very much and stay exclusively in WvW.

Coming from an organized guild I can attest that it will be hard for you to find a home in a structured wvw guild. There is no doubt when built right that a ranger can do great. However, it has very little group synergy, adding very little to a team that couldn’t be done by another profession. Great for small man teams roaming / selfish in larger team builds.

I add lots to synergy. It’s all in how you play. When playing you never have any idea what a person’s build is. If I was in your team/group/zerg with my build you’d never be able to tell the difference between me and others. If people are helping and your team/group is successful, the build is meaningless. If you are not following instructions and running off in all directions you aren’t adding to the overall synergy.

My guild is primarily PVE. We know how to add to a group’s synergy and support the group as a whole. We learned to play our classes. I wouldn’t be successful in WvW if I didn’t know how to be part of the group.

1. choice of weapon/s
Rocking Longbow/Gsword

2. traits (ex. pow – 30 -II/V/XI)
Varies, but 20/30/20/0/0 right now

3. pets
Varies, aoe fear from wolf is pretty troll though

4. armor stats
Knights, Cavaliers and Zerker mix

5. runes,sigil
I’m always poor so used ruby opals for runes.
Bloodlust sigil on bow, and still changing my gsword pretty often.

Heibi.4251:

I add lots to synergy. It’s all in how you play. When playing you never have any idea what a person’s build is. If I was in your team/group/zerg with my build you’d never be able to tell the difference between me and others. If people are helping and your team/group is successful, the build is meaningless. If you are not following instructions and running off in all directions you aren’t adding to the overall synergy.

My guild is primarily PVE. We know how to add to a group’s synergy and support the group as a whole. We learned to play our classes. I wouldn’t be successful in WvW if I didn’t know how to be part of the group.

your right you may not detract from the group, and we may never notice your there, that however is part of the issue. We run specialized builds for each class designed to meet a specific need. Rangers do have some group support, however for a structured wvw team, the support they offer can be done better and more often by other classes.
I’m not trying to knock rangers though, my first char was a ranger, as it was for half the guild.

Then you have never run with a ranger who knows how to truly play a ranger and help create a winning situation. Since you are so concerned about builds you have lost sight of skill and tenacity. You may say you have, but your overall attitude is one of “We don’t really need rangers.”

The key is, a decent build – it doesn’t need to be maximum, good equipment, a cooperative attitude, and skill. That’s true of all classes.

Heibi. Look I’m not trying to argue with you here. My comments are for the OP, from the standpoint of a hardcore wvw/gvg guild that focuses exclusively on the team synergy provided by each class through field testing. Rangers are good, especially in spvp and pve, and can do quite well in wvw. However, when you are trying to maximize the potential of as small a group as possible your forced to consider class/builds/equipment. If your are a 20-30 man guild trying to go toe to toe with a 50-60 man Zerg it is essential that you are using every party slot to its maximum potential.

I would be happy to continue this discussion private or In game with anyone so we dont derail the OP’s thread further.