(edited by RapidSausage.4620)
BM problems
press F1 to tell your pet to attack and let your pet get the first hit or two, by this time i usually find the enemy has its back to me and doesn’t let go of the pet and it just takes a beating there without moving.
i should point i’m talking in WvW context.
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
The only real PvP experience I have is sPvP, and the only advice I can offer is if your enemy is using a melee weapon.
Given how much of our defense is mobility based, it’s really easy to fall into the habit of letting the other player ‘lead’ and end up bouncing all around the playing-field with your pet trailing behind. So, what I’ve found that helps a pet to land attacks is….well, frankly a notion that’s pseudo-suicidal and completely counterintuitive.
Stay still on purpose.
I’m not saying try and approach fights by straight tanking, or eating a 100 blades to face to land your F2, or that flanking or getting behind somebody is off the table. But I am saying you can’t dodge and outrun everything, so I’ve found it’s better to get hit on your own terms and make those moments work towards a greater goal, than falling into a pattern of reaction and being unable to maneuver your pet into a favorable position because of it. Speccing BM comes hand in hand with some defensive benefits for the player, use that to help you survive pausing the motion of combat in controlled intervals that you coordinate with your pet’s offensive bursts.
(edited by Vox Hollow.2736)
The only real PvP experience I have is sPvP, and the only advice I can offer is if your enemy is using a melee weapon.
Given how much of our defense is mobility based, it’s really easy to fall into the habit of letting the other player ‘lead’ and end up bouncing all around the playing-field with your pet trailing behind. So, what I’ve found that helps a pet to land attacks is….well, frankly a notion that’s pseudo-suicidal and completely counterintuitive.
Stay still on purpose.
I’m not saying try and approach fights by straight tanking, or eating a 100 blades to face to land your F2, or that flanking or getting behind somebody is off the table. But I am saying you can’t dodge and outrun everything, so I’ve found it’s better to get hit on your own terms and make those moments work towards a greater goal, than falling into a pattern of reaction and being unable to maneuver your pet into a favorable position because of it. Speccing BM comes hand in hand with some defensive benefits for the player, use that to help you survive pausing the motion of combat in controlled intervals that you coordinate with your pet’s offensive bursts.
it’s hard for me to count the cooldown on my pet abilities to coordinate on this level, i just want to keep my enemy in a comfy position for my pet to maul, and prevent him from escaping (eles and thieves escape like they have jetpacks)
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
The bravest animal in the land is Captain Beaky and his band.
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
Panther is great but the cooldown takes a while and to dismiss all birds and their burst simply because of that one cat is unfair to the hard and often hitting birds. Eagle and Hawk have very short, within seconds, cooldown F2 skills which double hit for a start.
Not saying cats are bad, I’m just saying you can’t dismiss birds.
The bravest animal in the land is Captain Beaky and his band.
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
Regarding birds, put 10 points in skirmishing for the 30% pet crit damage and press F2 on the raven(raven currently has the highest damaging F2 of the birds afaik, also blinds which is nice) and you can get upwards of 6k from it easily, highest I’ve gotten was about 9k on some glass build thief, even without that crit they are by far the best burst anyway due to birds basic 2k precision meaning they crit often.
If you want to go bm and make sure your pet is actually getting damage off, go sword/x (I prefer warhorn but offhand is personal preference really) evasion tanky build, take the aoe vigor on pet swap for birds in the BM tree, since you’re in melee range as soon as you swap pets your pet is on the target and also the sword basic chain is a 100% uptime 50% snare for when you need to land that burst.
Just sit there dodging their big hits with while your pet is hitting away.
Between cc and speed buffs you should be catching someone pretty easily. On another note, cats and birds I would say are about equal DPS, I prefer cats because when I use them they hit more often. The can also hit high, I have hit 8k in a single strike, not mentioning 10k+bursts my cats have put out. Birds can also hit high from what I hear.
melee builds are better geared for BM. Dagger oh has 6s cripple. GS has sword toss cripple + number 5 which stuns and makes pets next attack do more damage. One handed sword has cripple for enemy AND might for your pet in its auto attack chain.
Yeah melee range is great for keeping your pet on your target, it keeps them in a smaller area and the secound they try and attack my pet instead I pet swap and unload a zephyr’d stuck on target #1 sword burst, half the problem that many rangers suffer is because they refuse to accept we’re not able to be ranged 100% of the time in 100% of situations, different situations call for different weapons but after a small amount of training the enemy with my shortbow the moment they are fully closed on me and I’ll switch to melee and either finish the fight that way or use my evasions to keep myself alive while my regen works and my escapes to return to ranged.
Nothing funnier than a culling thief trying to kill me while I roll around all over the place with 6 evasions on short cooldowns/high regen then if I need to pull away, quick shot, lightening reflexes, hornet sting, monarchy’s leap.
Not sure I could pull off anything like that with a shortbow/longbow combination.
The bravest animal in the land is Captain Beaky and his band.
@OP,
if your opponent is running from your pet, your pet is doing its job. if you really want to stay on top of a target that is running from you, you need 1h sword. GS is good too but it doesn’t have 100% uptime cripple like 1h sword. use “about face” to double leap chase with sword 2.
shortbow is a great chasing weapon as well, but it doesn’t have the same gap closing potential outside of short cripple & backside stun. combine both weapons for best chasing—cripple with shortbow, then swap to sword and leap-chase.
Ranger Sword & Pet Mechanics:
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfhikZxZ-rtr_knUtXZNJMw
http://twitch.tv/cutsu
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfhikZxZ-rtr_knUtXZNJMw
http://twitch.tv/cutsu
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
Regarding birds, put 10 points in skirmishing for the 30% pet crit damage and press F2 on the raven(raven currently has the highest damaging F2 of the birds afaik, also blinds which is nice) and you can get upwards of 6k from it easily, highest I’ve gotten was about 9k on some glass build thief, even without that crit they are by far the best burst anyway due to birds basic 2k precision meaning they crit often.
If you want to go bm and make sure your pet is actually getting damage off, go sword/x (I prefer warhorn but offhand is personal preference really) evasion tanky build, take the aoe vigor on pet swap for birds in the BM tree, since you’re in melee range as soon as you swap pets your pet is on the target and also the sword basic chain is a 100% uptime 50% snare for when you need to land that burst.
Just sit there dodging their big hits with while your pet is hitting away.
Jaguar stealth (100% crit chance), 30% extra crit dmg, quickening zephyr >>>Raven.
@OP,
if your opponent is running from your pet, your pet is doing its job. if you really want to stay on top of a target that is running from you, you need 1h sword. GS is good too but it doesn’t have 100% uptime cripple like 1h sword. use “about face” to double leap chase with sword 2.
shortbow is a great chasing weapon as well, but it doesn’t have the same gap closing potential outside of short cripple & backside stun. combine both weapons for best chasing—cripple with shortbow, then swap to sword and leap-chase.
i’m all for these suggestions, except none of them work in WvW because i’ll get instagibbed if i melee even with durability stats.
I don’t think BM builds are really viable in the majority of WvW encounters because most of them are zergs. Your pet just gets melted way to quickly from all of the AoE even with survivability talents. BM builds are great for spvp and perhaps roaming squads or havok squads in WvW but that’s about it.
SoR – Nethernoz (Necro), Zealot of Pain (Guardian), William The Butcher (Ranger)
i can keep my pets alive just fine, but even with the shortbow and speed buffs/snares, all my pet does is run around to catch up with it’s target, i honestly don’t know what to do, shortbow snare is 4 seconds and it only slows the target down, pet speed boosts work to some extent, but it seems to want to get into a certain position relative to my target, so it doesn’t always attack the target even when in range.
i end up having my main dps down 90% of the time.
how can i aid my pet unleash its fury on my enemy without derping like this?
p.s: i use panther and lynx.
Try running with a wolf and raven. The wolf has pretty strong dps while also bringing a cripple and a knockdown. The fear is also clutch for a lot of PvP situations, such as when an enemy is about to stomp you or a teammate.
Ravens don’t have any snares themselves, but they do cast swiftness and do high damage on their attacks. Their F2 is also one of the strongest for burst damage, so you can run primarily with your wolf and when you get ready to unleash big damage on your enemy, swap to the raven and cast the F2.
@OP,
if your opponent is running from your pet, your pet is doing its job. if you really want to stay on top of a target that is running from you, you need 1h sword. GS is good too but it doesn’t have 100% uptime cripple like 1h sword. use “about face” to double leap chase with sword 2.
shortbow is a great chasing weapon as well, but it doesn’t have the same gap closing potential outside of short cripple & backside stun. combine both weapons for best chasing—cripple with shortbow, then swap to sword and leap-chase.
i’m all for these suggestions, except none of them work in WvW because i’ll get instagibbed if i melee even with durability stats.
It takes work to be tanky enough to melee fight in a zerg. I do it all the time now that I’ve got the hang of it. So here are some tips:
1. Condition Removal: Empathic bond IS amazing, but not for melee zerging. Reason being is you need on demand condition removal the moment you get focused. Waiting 10 secs for a passive cleaning will get you killed, especially if immobilized. I run a human ranger, and use both Cleansing signet AND Blessing of Kormir.
2. Bark Skin: Since you filled your bar or found other active forms of condition removal, you can go ahead and take Bark skin.
3. Armor: 3100 armor rating is doable. Knights/Soldier gear all the way.
4. Damage or Healing: You can either kill quick with soldier/knights, or heal with Soldier/Clerics. I personally like critting, to harness all the sources of Fury a Ranger has. (Weapon swap, Pack Runes, and ofc RaO)
5: Tactics: People tell you to use your evades, and that’s fine. But you need a strategy when ‘going in’. If you just lock on to a target like a snapping turtle you will just be dragged to your death. This is the hardest thing to get across to another. You need to Think like a predator, like a wolf. You need to be able to see individuals in the herd (enemy zerg) who can be picked off, or separated, or dragged back away from the herd. Then you do it. Another simpler tactic is jousting where you run in swinging your sword like a madman doing damage to as many people as possible, then turn back and jump away before they have time to coordinate a focus on you. You break combat (USE F3!!) heal up, and repeat.
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
Regarding birds, put 10 points in skirmishing for the 30% pet crit damage and press F2 on the raven(raven currently has the highest damaging F2 of the birds afaik, also blinds which is nice) and you can get upwards of 6k from it easily, highest I’ve gotten was about 9k on some glass build thief, even without that crit they are by far the best burst anyway due to birds basic 2k precision meaning they crit often.
If you want to go bm and make sure your pet is actually getting damage off, go sword/x (I prefer warhorn but offhand is personal preference really) evasion tanky build, take the aoe vigor on pet swap for birds in the BM tree, since you’re in melee range as soon as you swap pets your pet is on the target and also the sword basic chain is a 100% uptime 50% snare for when you need to land that burst.
Just sit there dodging their big hits with while your pet is hitting away.
Jaguar stealth (100% crit chance), 30% extra crit dmg, quickening zephyr >>>Raven.
Maybe in that one instance, but you’re forgetting the very very low cooldown of the birds F2, as low as 6 seconds for some.
Throwing away birds just because one cat is very good is silly.
The bravest animal in the land is Captain Beaky and his band.
i don’t know about WvW, you might have better luck dumping the cats and going with the birds (they move a bit faster with their swiftness buff) or a ranged pet like a devourer/spider?
the damage won’t be worth it then, the point of speccing BM traits is to empower your pets and you taking the support role.
and currently, drakes and felines are the dps pets.
Birds are more than worth it and hit often, birds and more so ravens provide some of our best burst which is far more important in PVP than DPS.
how do ravens provide burst damage?, i thought stealthed panther is best,
Regarding birds, put 10 points in skirmishing for the 30% pet crit damage and press F2 on the raven(raven currently has the highest damaging F2 of the birds afaik, also blinds which is nice) and you can get upwards of 6k from it easily, highest I’ve gotten was about 9k on some glass build thief, even without that crit they are by far the best burst anyway due to birds basic 2k precision meaning they crit often.
If you want to go bm and make sure your pet is actually getting damage off, go sword/x (I prefer warhorn but offhand is personal preference really) evasion tanky build, take the aoe vigor on pet swap for birds in the BM tree, since you’re in melee range as soon as you swap pets your pet is on the target and also the sword basic chain is a 100% uptime 50% snare for when you need to land that burst.
Just sit there dodging their big hits with while your pet is hitting away.
Jaguar stealth (100% crit chance), 30% extra crit dmg, quickening zephyr >>>Raven.
Maybe in that one instance, but you’re forgetting the very very low cooldown of the birds F2, as low as 6 seconds for some.
Throwing away birds just because one cat is very good is silly.
yeah, the eagle has 4.5 second cooldown on his F2 when traited, which is pretty awesome, but i just dumped the whole “my pets is the damage, i’m the support” kind of BM, it doesn’t work very good, pets can have really unusual behaviors, and when they act weird i’m just sitting there doing nothing useful, so i respecced 25/0/15/0/30 and using twin devourers with high Healing power, toughness, and condition damage boost to pets.