Guild Wars 2

I’m having lots of fun learning my condi trapper ranger. I’m mostly roaming solo in WvW.

I know I’m still making lots of mistakes, but I’m trying to set my expectations on how hard a particular fight should be in general. I had a fight the other day with an elementalist, and it seemed like I could barely scratch him (but it could just be my lack of skill and experience)

I have two years experience as a phantasm mesmer, so I have a good feel for what kinds of professions/builds that character should be able to win against in a 1v1 (and that build did really well except against good thieves).

Are there any particular professions or builds which should be extra strong or extra weak against a condition ranger (using traps)?

Without listing every possible build for every profession it’s a little hard to answer.. but in general I think the most important thing to remember is that you are on a mid-range build which relies heavily on your AoE fields.

This means you are inherently going to be strong against pretty much any melee build because they will have no choice but to pass through / stay in your traps for most of the fight and can be kited pretty well thanks to you being ranged.

On the other side it means you will often struggle with long-range opponents, most notably are GS mesmers and LB Rangers, because they can pretty easily avoid your traps for the most part, can’t be kited and will make you be the one chasing, which is not ideal.

Of course this is purely in general, because GS mesmers and LB rangers are builds which are often played by low skilled players and are also builds in which some variations take little / no condition removal, which means once you do get in range it’s an easy fight. But if they are equally as good as you and have a rounded build, a LB ranger will probably give you the run around and there is not a lot you can do about it.

From my own personal experience on traps, my order of preference to fight (from easiest to hardest) was Warrior > Guardian > Ranger > Thief > Elementalist > Engineer/Necromancer > Mesmer, but again it varies with build, and most importantly, player skill.

Easiest you can kill using condi traps would be thieves and the hardes would be other rangers.

Thx much! I know it’s a very general question, and for sure, player skill is the dominant factor.

I’ve never really played any of the other professions and I’ve never played a condition build before, so I’m just trying to get a feel for how fights might tend to go or if there are any “hard counter” builds for a condi ranger.

I’ve seen that engineers often seem to have limited condition removal, and careless thieves can easily get loaded up with conditions. But I also got taken down by a good condi thief build (probably this is just him being a much better player).

Thanks again for the feedback.

eldenbri.1059:

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I know I’m still making lots of mistakes, but I’m trying to set my expectations on how hard a particular fight should be in general. I had a fight the other day with an elementalist, and it seemed like I could barely scratch him (but it could just be my lack of skill and experience)

Are there any particular professions or builds which should be extra strong or extra weak against a condition ranger (using traps)?

If you were literally not scratching him he could have been using the trait “Diamond Skin” where you cannot apply conditions to them if they are above 90% health. The best way to beat these eles is to either equip a power damaging pet and evade until his health gets low enough then spam your conditions.

Played right, warriors, guardians and thieves are especially weak to condi rangers since we have high poison upkeep (limits warrior and guardian healing) and an active “reveal” to stump thieves.

Any condi heavy builds will be tough, condi PU mesmers, condi thieves and necromancers being the main 3 culprits.

eldenbri.1059:

I’ve never really played any of the other professions and I’ve never played a condition build before, so I’m just trying to get a feel for how fights might tend to go or if there are any “hard counter” builds for a condi ranger.

I’ve seen that engineers often seem to have limited condition removal, and careless thieves can easily get loaded up with conditions. But I also got taken down by a good condi thief build (probably this is just him being a much better player).

There’s a condi thief build that removes conditions whenever they stealth, has almost unlimited access to stealth and can churn out bleeds at a high speed. 1vs1 this build is almost always guaranteed a win so I wouldn’t feel too bad about losing there. (I use a condi ranger and I’m ashamed to say I also have one of those thieves…)

Hard counters for condi rangers are diamond skin elementalists, condi heavy necromancers and that thief build I mentioned.

Thx very much – really useful information!