Guild Wars 2

hello fellow necros,

im a power necro and i have much trouble vs longbow rangers. since the recent balance patch where they got buffed the lb ranger population raised in tpvp… how do you fight’em?

Longe range: defensive… Retaliation, break Line of sight, dodge rapid fire. If they cant get LOS then they will do the work of closing for you. Just heal up and roast some marshmellows or move on, they may volley but its not too bad. Youve effectively made them useless and it will sting them worse than you. Dont charge them open field, pointless.

Medium range: Land marks while closing. If you can close range with dark path thats probably the best use of the skill ever. Try and anticipate point blank shot. If they used rapid fire recently it will be the next thing on their itchy bow finger to get off, try and dodge.

Short range: Dodge the mauls and fear the rapid fires, otherwise should be a pretty standard fight. Take advantage of successful cc to heal.

If they are well played and keep their distance, they rek us.

Necromancers have no real ability to fight back (evn life blast does diminished damage at range). Necromancers also have no reflects and limited ability to dodge.

What you want to try to do is try to get line of sight to help you. In short range, simply running behind the ranger will cause skills to fail. At long range, you can avoid some damage by strafing back and forth against an untraited ranger.

Various walls force the ranger mid/close on most of the capture points on most of the maps. You shouldn’t have trouble with a close or mid ranged Ranger. You can also use these walls to “block” ranger damage.

So really you are only in trouble on Foefire (all points), Silent Storm (ranger camping above), Spirit Watch (capture points are fine but don’t run orb), and Kyhlo (side points, only if the ranger approaches from spawn). There are map specific strategies for all of these.

If you have minions, most rangers don’t trait piercing arrows and you can hide behind your flesh Wurm.

Or you can just eat the damage as long as you can.

A ranger who doesn’t fight on points is hurting his team. This is Much like “king of 1v1” invisibility mesmers, who can win the fight but can’t take or hold the point long and hurt their team.

It will take a ranger a long time to kill even a power necromancer. If you die but hold the point for a long time and the ranger can’t really hold the point against you…. Then that’s probably ok.

Most will try to knock you back before using rapid fire. Save your dodges for that, ie. once you got knocked back, if he used rapid fire, dodge twice. Maybe use death shroud to tank some of the damage and to get close fast (skill 2). I often use staff, so I could fear the ranger before he could do another round of rapid fire combo. After closing in, time your retals. I also spec my death shroud with retal.

Thank you guys for your answers!
I play necro in pvp for a long time and know other profession bursts and can handle them… but rangers are kinda my worst opponents!
if rangers are on a safespot (upper area) where i cant reach them then im forced to chase other points because necros are ALWAYS the first target in tpvp its frustrating

I generally play staff + scepter/dagger condi with wells with my necro. I found that staff 5 while at range is a great interrupt with the fear as you close in. Then hit them with dagger 4 for a blind, and well of darkness. This isn’t perfect but it helps as you can close in and prevent them from doing a bunch of damage while at range.

use flesh wurm or ds#2 to port to them. immediately.

then its the regular keeping weaknes and kiting them till death, just be aware of when they can switch back to bow u have last dodge ready.

Watch out for Wolf swap and Point Blank Shot animation. You’ll really need to dodge those.

Save Spectral Armors for Rapid Fire in situations when you run out of dodges. First is your action bar ability, second activates at 50% hp.

At start, I like to activate Locust Swarm, although you probably save it for their GS/Sword. Dark Path pet or Ranger, Shackles, pre-cast Enfeeble to hit Ranger in the location they end up after L. Reflex out of shackle immob. If they Reflex before you use Dark Pact, you have clear window for it. Always run around and strike immobilized targets in the back.

Decent power ranger will beat godlike Power Necro 1v1 on open map with no points. That simple.