Guild Wars 2

Hey guys. Seeing there will be no balance changes anytime soon I decided to change my build and finally try something different. Seeing how popular is bunker build I decided to try it first.
One thing I learnedwhile playign ranger is, things can be different than they seem at beginning. For this reason I’m making this topic and hoping for advices from experienced players, instead of only trying it myself (tho I test on my own too).

My idea:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQJAVRnEVUFciFCWwahgYpAQBqL49YWqv9+DjKjjKRWE-ToAgzCtIuRdj7GzNybs3MgYBC

I have some problems with it…
1. The 2 signets are a must. Last utility slot is hard choice between Sic and stun breaker.
2. I made ranger for bow (don’t even mention rerolling!) and I want to make this build work with one. The problem is, I can’t play any bow without piercing arrows – will this build work with 20 points in MM?
3. I don’t see reason to stick to LB without 30 in MM (piercing + range), so I’ll go with SB. Is SB alone better for cleric or apothecary? With flanking req. and no crits it’s hard to keep good bleed stacks
4. 2nd wepon. I love GS, but I’m not sure if I shouldn’t get something other for this build. SW+WH?
5. 10 points trait in MM… does malicious training even work? I can’t see difference on golems.

I’d appreciate any feedback on this. How does it work in sPvP, WvW*, open PvE and dungs? Is the bow option viable, or it’s just wasting potential (if so, how big waste)?

*I’m mostly WvW player and I sometimes run in organized groups. Has someone tested it in multiple environments? I mean how is it in pug zerg, organized zerg, GvG, roaming in group/solo.

I know it’s many questions, but I’ll be very thankfull if you could answer at least some of them

There is no point to healing power if you don’t have toughness to protect it. You should go at least 20 into survival and while you are there you can get cooldown reduction on GS. Getting all those great skills on a faster CD is really nice. This is my build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQJARVjEV91JWCWsWCiVBC1UoJL9ekea1eXhRlxRJILC-ToAgzCtIuRdj7GzNybs3MKYBC

I went with compassion training because my wolf has leaps which splash in the healing spring, and buffs natural regen for me.

Are you sure it boosts natural? And I have toughness from gear, 150 less isn’t that much O.o

But yeah, as I said, I’m interested only in using bows :|

Yes, compassion training boosts natural for you, not your pet. Also makes any healing they do via skills (fern howl, moa heal) or combos heal for more.

Second, the greater the difference between your armor and their power, the greater the percent of dmg you take. If I am not mistaken that difference is exponential, so depending on who you fight it could make a big difference.

The best bunker rangers are melee, see http://youtu.be/tI7ouz1xt9E for example

But you can rock it with a SB. SB doesn’t need a single trait to be good. It’s just that good of a weapon. I like having it as a foil to my GS, some enemies I fight at range with SB others I fight in melee with GS.

Also no don’t go apothecary, expensive waste of time. In zerg vs zerg fights flanking can be too dangerous. SB is a power weapon, it just happens to have conditions you can use in certain situations.

Lorelei.3918:

Yes, compassion training boosts natural for you, not your pet. Also makes any healing they do via skills (fern howl, moa heal) or combos heal for more.

Second, the greater the difference between your armor and their power, the greater the percent of dmg you take. If I am not mistaken that difference is exponential, so depending on who you fight it could make a big difference.

The best bunker rangers are melee, see http://youtu.be/tI7ouz1xt9E for example

But you can rock it with a SB. SB doesn’t need a single trait to be good. It’s just that good of a weapon. I like having it as a foil to my GS, some enemies I fight at range with SB others I fight in melee with GS.

Also no don’t go apothecary, expensive waste of time. In zerg vs zerg fights flanking can be too dangerous. SB is a power weapon, it just happens to have conditions you can use in certain situations.

Waste of time? I run apothecary and do fantastic, as do a few others . It’s a preference, there isn’t 1 way to play bunker, and how would GS be any better in a zerg vs zerg fight?

Bunker builds weren’t made for zerging in retrospect, even though you can and have great survivability, they were made for small skirmishes and roaming.

I think he was saying that Apoth is expensive and not worth the time to farm to invest in it. I would agree with that 100%, unless you have a burning desire to play a conditions build, in which case there is nothing that comes close to Apoth. I have a nearly complete Apoth set, and I still prefer to play with my Clerics set. Not because it’s necessarily better in a fight, but mostly because I can’t play w/o the escapability of Sword/GS. The point though, is you can have similar results with either set, but one is dramatically less expensive.

Except power/gs build will stalemate with more classes/builds than a condition one will.

However the added mobility of GS would be really nice sometimes. But hey I always have sword2.

Furajir.3815:

Bunker builds weren’t made for zerging in retrospect, even though you can and have great survivability, they were made for small skirmishes and roaming.

Well, in GvG and organized zergs bunkers are the way to go. Meta is to have min. 1,5k toughness and vitality (can be less of some, depending on class abilities to go immun, regen etc).

About trait for SB: I know some play without it, but I simply can’t. It’s too annoying when pet, mob, or even stupid critter blocks your attacks :P And in this build it’d be my main source of AoE (other than drake).

So, has anyone used bunker build for things other than roaming?

I’m currently going for my legendaries because I’m bored, so I had to farm 1mil karma and over 1k badges and I’m running my bunker build while zerging, it’s nice not dying constantly.

Furajir.3815:

Except power/gs build will stalemate with more classes/builds than a condition one will.

However the added mobility of GS would be really nice sometimes. But hey I always have sword2.

True, but Power has the greater burst potential, which can be handy in a 1 v. x. Both builds are great and have their +/-. I would swap back & forth more, but I look much cooler in my Clerics gear. Style over substance all the way baby!

It doesn’t take me forever to kill people in an apothecary set, if anything I feel like I can burst someone down faster than GS, given the amount of conditions/pet dmg i can apply at once, especially with 25 stacks of corruption, 25 Masters Bond stacks and rare veggie pizza.

It takes time to get all those conditions on someone, so I wouldn’t exactly describe that as “burst”. Effective? Yes Burst? Not really.

What I meant by burst is just a couple of nights ago, I was fighting 2 Thieves and I dropped the first thief in about 3 seconds. Stealth Jag + Swoop + Hilt Bash + Maul. I did in the neighborhood of 16K very quickly.

Now, in a vacuum I probably would have beaten both of these guys in my Apoth gear, but in this case a fairly large enemy zerg came rolling over the hill. I was able to get a kill that I probably wouldn’t have had time to get in Apoth gear, plus get away from the remaining thief who was trying to cripple me for the zerg.

Guys, guys! There is already topic about gear for bunker AND one about condi vs power Actually, I’m reading them, and it’s easier to have all discussion in one place.

I stand by what I said. Between condition and physical dmg you will get more dps with physical. Especially if you can’t get a flank. In other words Clerics > Apothecary. I think Bunker Rangers don’t realize dps difference because pets make up the lions share of it either way.

PS Im talking about when using a SB, not GS lol. I would take a apoth SB over a power GS for dps. But would take a power sb over apoth sb or cleric gs for raw dmg.

Lorelei.3918:

I stand by what I said. Between condition and physical dmg you will get more dps with physical. Especially if you can’t get a flank. In other words Clerics > Apothecary. I think Bunker Rangers don’t realize dps difference because pets make up the lions share of it either way.

PS Im talking about when using a SB, not GS lol. I would take a apoth SB over a power GS for dps. But would take a power sb over apoth sb or cleric gs for raw dmg.

Okay, I’m glad you clarified that it was specific to the shortbow.

Cuz I was about to say, my apothecary set is able to match/beat my knights/zerk set in terms of DPS, simply because of the combination of burning, poison, and bleeding. There are lots of people in WvW who are stacking toughness now, but it seems most people are still neglecting condition removal, so lots of times, I’m finding my apoth armor to outperform my physical damage build.

yet some of the most infuriating builds in wvw right now are loaded with condi removal. Like P/d thieves, d/d eles, bunker guards, Bunkers Rangers , ect…

No doubt. However, I don’t think I’ve come across a build that stacks cleanses and NOT toughness. Of course I’m sure they’re out there.

That being said, the clerics vs apothecary argument comes down to a weapon preference. Bows and the greatsword are pretty miserable damage choices in apothecary armor (note I only mentioned damage choices).

I don’t do WvW / PvP and stopped bring my ranger into dungeons months ago.
My guardian does dungeons …

Having said that, in PvE I run a dual-bow hybrid BM with 2 cats:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMEQJATVjEVB2JWWWsWCi+BKxUcIG9UEL17P4/MuqEZRA-jAzAYLhMkGEJKQUhkl+EETgKrF1ioxqZwUmCpqzI7NIiq9BYA-e

This was originally based on a WvW cat beastmaster build. I tried 30 in BM and didn’t like it. My bows felt like pea-shooters because I gave up too much damage for Natural Healing, and IMO pets are still too broken to justify 30 points in BM. Also, I don’t use any other grandmaster traits.

With mixed armour and trinkets, this becomes a very balanced build. The link has my general PvE running armour, but I also swap to a Soldier (p/v/t) set with runes of Melandru for some content.

Play-style is to continuously swap bows while skills are on CD to stack might and fury on you and the pet. I also have greatsword with a sigil of Battle when melee is necessary.

This build can be modified for WvW or for dungeons. In dungeons, you obviously need to swap out one or both cats for something more survivable.

So does anyone actually have specific info for this build, because i’m also very intrested in this.

I suppose clerics would be better for a SB/GS than Apoth?
What about the jewelry?

I’m trying out a carrion/rabid/sentinel mix with 25 20 20 5 0, this being my 1st attempt at WvW as a ranger i’m not sure how it would compare to other builds…

Im looking to solo roam and well… use the Bow.

GS/SB is good if you mix a bit of Cleric/Knight maybe a piece or two of Soldier.

Here is Bow based bunker:

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/ranger/?6.0|3.1n.h1j|5.1n.h1j|1c.71d.1k.71d.1k.71d.1c.71d.1k.71d.1c.71d|2u.d1b.1c.68.1c.68.1c.68.1c.68.2u.d19|0.0.u49c.a6.u3ac|1k.1|4j.4y.4r.4q.56|e

Effective Power 2259.14
Effective Health (EHP) 34002
Damage Reduction 39.59%

Enjoy! Double cats!

My latest

http://tinyurl.com/qzh7epl

Sarlack.4096:

My latest

http://tinyurl.com/qzh7epl

Hi Kalo,

Looking good! So you opted for a x3 signet build? I see you lost the cleric armour also and halved your healing? You know we want to see you in action Ranger runes working now?

Cempa.5619:

Sarlack.4096:

My latest

http://tinyurl.com/qzh7epl

Hi Kalo,

Looking good! So you opted for a x3 signet build? I see you lost the cleric armour also and halved your healing? You know we want to see you in action Ranger runes working now?

Yeah, 3 Signets =) I like to be tough w/o hitting a button. Though I noticed its still using sigils of blood, the link is a few days old…I have since gone back to Energy Sigils

I like the Ranger runes, 5% more damage for both me and pets, a touch of Crit in there and the badly needed precision so I don’t compromise the 0-0-30-10-30

I had thresholds, wanted 500 healing but that will come with full Ascended build, besides that I hit Every other mark I wanted. the build has 20011 hits so Barkskin at 5K.

3K attack
1/3 Crit with 20% Damage
2K Tough
3K Armor
20K hits
3 Passive Regens
Vigor Machine = Protection machine

With a 100% Bunker Spec.