Best way to level?

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Djinii.6932

Djinii.6932

Q:

Well, I just made a ranger. And found out their pretty squishy, tank wise and DMG wise.
Now my question, whats the best way to level a ranger.

Based on weapons. LB/GS, SB/?? or idk.
Traits: Where to put them when leveling

Thanks for the help in advance.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Arcona.9285

Arcona.9285

Huh, no replies yet? Well, I havn’t even reached 80 with my little ranger but I think something like this might work out pretty nicely.

I’m currently using a build along the lines of this: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBHPxG2IQVkdgllFrdgY9YP7/P8DHyzAVhC

Axes are excellent for cleaving down mobs and the shortbow does fairly okay ranged damage. Feel free to switch sword + warhorn for anything else if you don’t like how it plays. GS works pretty okay. Mostly it’s nice to have a melee combo to deal some cleaving dmg.

As for traits, I simply went with lots of opening damage and buffs on kill since things do tend to die quick enough. Just be sure to open with your heaviest hitting ability.

When it comes to secondaries I just went with what I like most while leveling. Moving faster is always a good idea although with this weapon and trait setup you have a pretty easy access to swiftness so it might not be needed. Other then that, I like pushing buttons. If you find that annoying simply go with signets all the way.

As for gear, zerker all the way. Power, precision, crit damage are your friend.

Another option would be to use a spirit build once you hit uh.. 60? Whenever you get access to the grandmaster traits at any rate. Something like this? http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBHPxG2IQVTdZlXFodgYzYP7nf4QuHlKUnC
I honestly don’t know alot about spirit builds but if you like running around with a small pet army, it might be your thing.

Oh, and picking up a bear pet for tanking veterans and whatnot might be a good idea.

Good luck!

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: naphack.9346

naphack.9346

Just hit 80 yesterday, so I feel like dropping a comment here.

Weapon breakdown:
Greatsword: Defensive weapon, got a big hit on 2, rest is mostly utility. Great sidearm to any other weapon set and good against groups.
Shortbow: Skirmishing weapon. Probably the easiest way to get high single target damage
Longbow: Ranged control weapon, good dps weapon at 1000+ range, got some burst application.
Axe: Good for tagging, else not that useful outside of condition builds
Axe offhand: Unless you want to wrestle with karkas or plan on going into a dungeon, forget it. There is not many places where the reflect is useful.
Sword: Wouldn’t recommend this until you mastered your pet. It needs way too much micromanagement to be worthwhile. Highest dps out of all ranger weapons tho.
Torch: Condition offhand. High damage. Use only when geared for condition damage.
Dagger: Defensive condition offhand. Wouldn’t recommend outside pvp.
Warhorn: Honestly, I never really used it much. It’s amazing to buff your damage and your pet tho.

I levelled running Greatswort+SB/LB for most part, depending on which bow I just happened to loot^^ At around lev 60, I grabbed a torch and went for some sort of hybrid cond. beastmaster build with shortbow+axe/torch.

What I’d recommend:
-go to wvw early on and get yourself a wolf. It’s an amazing pet and you will get to love it, when you are downed and it fears the mobs away from you.
-level to level 35 with a mix of dogs, birds, cats and drakes, whichever you prefer. I ran wolf+[bird, eagle for me] for a long time, before switching to owl+raven.
-Put points into beastmastery. The pet can dish out a ton of damage.
-Once you hit level 35, go to the harathi hinterlands and level there till ~ 50. It’s amazing, how fast you can rake up levels(and lootbags) running through the event chains there. Also, the greatsword just MELTS centaurs.

Build: Greatsword+X(axe/warhorn, SB or LB), Healing Spring(GS3 is a double leap finisher, healing you for lots of hp when using it in the spring), Signet of the Hunt(movespeed, keep on passive), Flame Trap(good to clear groups, even without having traited into cond damage), whatever you like(Lightning Reflexes or some defensive signet would be prime candidates. If you simply want to deal damage, put sick’em in here), Rampage as One(just eats champions alive, especially with sick’em and axe or shortbow to stack loads of might on the pet)

If you can’t manage the squishiness of your pet, get more sturdy ones. Your damage will take a dive, however. Another valid strategy is combining a sturdy pet with a high damage pet, something like jaguar+drake or raven+bear.

While playing ranger, you will find, that if you take good care of your pet, your pet will take good care of you. Nothing beats being downed at 10% hp while the mobs just can’t finish you because your pet heals you faster than they can kill you.
Treat them well and you will be able to have them take turns at bashing down a champion with huge crits. Treat them well and they can knock down or chill dangerous foes to give you some room. Ranger is all about the pet, so use it to its fullest.

As for gear, whenever you feel, like you get downed too much or don’t deal any damage, go get some fine rarity(blue) items from the trading post. Ranger doesn’t really need gear. At times, I realized, my gear was 20 levels below my level. My birds still took down everything in a matter of seconds, so it just didn’t matter.

The only crime, turrets committed, is being good against the celestial meta.
The mob has spoken and the turrets shall be burnt at the stake.

(edited by naphack.9346)

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Djinii.6932

Djinii.6932

Thanks for both the answers, you guys explained it really well.
Ill try leveling with berserker gear, and a Tank/DPS pet.

I’m not sure yet, how to keep DPS pets alive, Like birds or cats they always seem to die really quick. Whats the trick to keep them alive?

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: thefantasticg.3984

thefantasticg.3984

Using F1 and F3 a lot… then again, when they are doing all that running they aren’t DPS’ing or tanking.

RNG is a bell curve. Better hope you’re on the right side.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: naphack.9346

naphack.9346

First off, dump around 10 points into beastmastery, those few extra attribute points work wonders for birds and cats already. Utilize healing spring to keep the pet alive, even if you aren’t hurt yourself, if need be. Birds got an ability with a leap finisher, so they can get additional healing from the spring. While the spring is up, try to get as much aggro as possible and use greatsword leap to heal back up. Use stuns and chills to keep your pet safe by stunlocking dangerous foes and swap it out in time. Also, learn when to use f2.
The jaguar is a bit easier to keep alive than other dps pets, cause he got stealth. Start with him. If you still got problems keeping your pets alive but feel like you had the capabilities to micro it around if you only had the tools to do so, grab guard. It’s a 10 second stealth+protection+movespeed+command pet to target location on a 15 second cooldown. You can use it to simply give protection to the pet and send it fighting again or micro the pet out of tight situations.
Never really needed it, but it might be just what you want

The only crime, turrets committed, is being good against the celestial meta.
The mob has spoken and the turrets shall be burnt at the stake.

(edited by naphack.9346)

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Daemon.4295

Daemon.4295

Thanks for both the answers, you guys explained it really well.
Ill try leveling with berserker gear, and a Tank/DPS pet.

I’m not sure yet, how to keep DPS pets alive, Like birds or cats they always seem to die really quick. Whats the trick to keep them alive?

They shouldn’t be dying very often in open world PvE, but if that’s the case just use tougher pets. If you’re leveling in berserker gear you’re doing most of the damage anyway, and you need your pet to tank for you. For fast leveling you should build to do as much damage as you can, as quickly as you can. I’d run a 30/30/10/0/0.

Ayana Wenona (Ranger) | Doctor Skorn (Necro) | Electra Lux (Elementalist)
Scarlett Daguer (Thief) | Gritt Bloodstone (Warrior) | Sirius Zand (Guardian)
- Whiteside Ridge [EU] -

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Arcona.9285

Arcona.9285

Yeah, DPS pets are squishy indeed. A bear, though, can easily hold its own against a veteran mob. Against tougher opponents I like to start with my DPS pet out, buff it with whatever buffs I have lying around. I use a jaguar and a bear combination myself. Open on the mob, wait with stealthing the jaguar until it gets a bit low on health (it tends to drop aggro when it’s stealthed I find) stealth the jaguar, get some good damage in, wait until it gets aggro again (if it does) then switch to the bear. Pet switching and management is quite an important skill to master from what I can understand so might as well start practicing right away.

Or, if you feel that’s too much, just stick with a bear all the way. It’ll tank for you just fine and won’t die from just about anything. Bit lower damage but makes for a generally more laid back play style.

(edited by Arcona.9285)

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: naphack.9346

naphack.9346

A bear won’t deal any damage tho. I mean, come on, the servers will reset before a bear gets anything killed on its own. With 2 birds, I can take on champions and have them deal absurd amounts of damage on their own.

The only crime, turrets committed, is being good against the celestial meta.
The mob has spoken and the turrets shall be burnt at the stake.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Arcona.9285

Arcona.9285

Indeed it won’t do much DPS, but it won’t die, either. And allows you to pretty much auto-attack things to death while watching TV. As I said, it’s for more of a laid-back sort of playstyle. I like pet switching myself and well, the bear does fine as a backup while leveling if I feel like slacking off Otherwise I’d most likely use two kittens. Jaguar and.. uh.. jungle stalker? Whatever the might buff cat is called now again. Or a bird. Or whatever.

But for a newbie just starting out? The bear is pretty sweet for just learning the class abilities before delving into deeper complexities of pet switching and what abilities they have at their disposal.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: naphack.9346

naphack.9346

The bear promotes bad playstyle and is the main reason, rangers are shunned in dungeons, as has been pointed out in many threads before.
Ranger is the only class where you can get to level 80 without ever learning the basics of the class. All because you can get carried through the PvE content by the training wheels, which the bear provides without actually learning to use the class mechanic or any of the skills/weapon sets.
If you don’t learn important clas mechanics during early PvE, you will have to learn them the very hard way, cause there is no other point in the game, where you can experiment as much as while you are still leveling. Most rangers, however, never learn them, which is damaging the reputation of the class as a whole.
I for my part rather have my pet die on me from time to time than having a pet, which sits around at 95-100% hitpoints all the time while hitting like a wet noodle. Because in skirmishing with squishy pets, you learn way more than leaning back and staring at the screen like on drugs while pressing a button once every few minutes.

The only crime, turrets committed, is being good against the celestial meta.
The mob has spoken and the turrets shall be burnt at the stake.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Daemon.4295

Daemon.4295

The bear promotes bad playstyle and is the main reason, rangers are shunned in dungeons, as has been pointed out in many threads before.
Ranger is the only class where you can get to level 80 without ever learning the basics of the class. All because you can get carried through the PvE content by the training wheels, which the bear provides without actually learning to use the class mechanic or any of the skills/weapon sets.
If you don’t learn important clas mechanics during early PvE, you will have to learn them the very hard way, cause there is no other point in the game, where you can experiment as much as while you are still leveling. Most rangers, however, never learn them, which is damaging the reputation of the class as a whole.
I for my part rather have my pet die on me from time to time than having a pet, which sits around at 95-100% hitpoints all the time while hitting like a wet noodle. Because in skirmishing with squishy pets, you learn way more than leaning back and staring at the screen like on drugs while pressing a button once every few minutes.

What you say is true, but I think you could say the same for the other classes as well. So long as you’re up against trash mobs you can run pretty much any setup without worrying about learning the finer skills of your class. Granted, Ranger is the easiest class of all to level with, but you can auto-attack your way through hearts and personal story on other classes as well. The difference is just that Rangers can do it against mobs 4 levels above theirs thanks to pet tanking.

Ayana Wenona (Ranger) | Doctor Skorn (Necro) | Electra Lux (Elementalist)
Scarlett Daguer (Thief) | Gritt Bloodstone (Warrior) | Sirius Zand (Guardian)
- Whiteside Ridge [EU] -

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: AEFA.9035

AEFA.9035

What these guys are saying. Really depends on your playstyle. If youre going full on damage you might need a pet that can tank for you. I use hybrid in game cause I find it that the longer I can stay the better. As for pets it depends on how you play too, for me I use Raven for blind to keep them alive for the duration of blind and dish out that damage and survive. Or if Im planning on pulling tons of mobs, I use River Drake for its electric move that bounces off of target. Very strong and can kill multiple mobs if it can bounce. I use shortbow with my raven. Sword and axe with my drake. Axe 4 skill then 5 plus f2 on drake, should be enough to kill a huge mob. Unless veteran and champs.

For my build i use shout with heal. 0-15-15-30-10

Success is my only option, failure is not.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: Arcona.9285

Arcona.9285

I agree! I really do. All I’m saying is that it’s nice to not pile everything on at once when you’re starting out. Learn to use your weapons and switch between them in most situations first, getting a feel for when abilities you might want to use go off cooldown on your other weapon set. Get a handle on your various utility skills and what they are useful for. Try out some different trait lines and experiment a bit with what you feel works. Then go in for the kill with the more high risk / reward type pet combinations was all I really was suggesting.

Trying to do everything at once is a bit detrimental to the learning curve, unless you’re already very used to the type of playstyle GW2 offers. Take your time, don’t worry so much about what other people shout is OP or just plain bad. But DO always try to improve your ability to take down monsters and players alike. Strive to do better, listen to others advice but in the end make up your own mind if it’s something that fits you and your playstyle and you’ll be just fine. Just try not to lock yourself into the mentality that your build can never be improved upon, and always try to do better then you currently are.

But.. we all have those days when we’re maybe not at our best and just want to relax and by god, use a friggin’ bear and shoot at things while drooling over the keyboard instead of hammering at your abilities like a monkey on speed. No?

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: naphack.9346

naphack.9346

well, getting a feel for the fluent game style of ranger is better done with dogs tho.
Standing behind a bear, it doesn’t matter when you swap weapons or if you swap at all.

The only crime, turrets committed, is being good against the celestial meta.
The mob has spoken and the turrets shall be burnt at the stake.

Best way to level?

in Ranger

Posted by: brandon.6735

brandon.6735

I used two bear pets for sometime and use Shortbow/GS. Once i finally got some traits into BM then i grab some cat pets to dps and even tank. It’s obscene how much heals you can give your pet once you go into BM trait line. Once i got the skill Signet of the wild with Master’s Bond up and Compassion Training and Natural Healing my cat pet would usually never die. I mean i did that before all the nerfs to pets so i don’t know about now.

Guardianhipster
Thiefhipster

(edited by brandon.6735)