Guild Wars 2

I peruse the forum from time to time and I see a lot of “Build” threads under specific classes. This is all well and good but if you don’t know how to play the class in general, either the build isn’t going to help you all that much or you won’t be getting the biggest “bang for your buck” when it comes to stats and what the build can do. Say for instance I want to play an elementalist. I look up how to play an elementalist and get all these awesome builds but no real “these are what ele’s can do” kind of things. Of course a lot of it comes with experience, L2P, trial-and-error, and all that mess, but it does help to know what the class has at its disposal in regards to how it can be played. So this is an overview on rangers and remember… ask not what your ranger can do for you, but what you can do with your ranger.

The Class Perk
Pets were the class perk of GW1 and they are for GW2 as well for our ranger friends. What does this mean? Well it means that your pet is doing some of your damage output. This makes logical sense in a developing and designing sense for balance… allow me to demonstrate. TO THE DRAWING BOARD!!!!

The Drawing Board
So let’s begin by taking the DPS (damage per second) of say… a warrior. Very high DPS and tanky build when it needs to be. If we write out the DPS as an equation it would look something like this:

DPS = DPS

Pretty straightforward right? The output DPS of the warrior is equal to the total DPS done by the warrior. Now if the ranger didn’t have a pet it’s DPS equation would be the same as the warrior right? Makes sense… so what happens when the pet comes into play? Now not only do you have RDPS (Ranger DPS) but you have PDPS (Pet DPS) as well! HOLD THE PHONE, if the ranger DPS is equal to the total DPS… then what happens to the pet? This is where the balance comes into play… the plot twist is… the RDPS does NOT equal the total DPS. Don’t believe me? Take a look:

RDPS = DPS + PDPS

Now how fair is that to our warrior friends? Not at all so the devs had to split the total DPS between RDPS and PDPS so it actually looks like this:

RDPS + PDPS = DPS

and now you’re getting the total DPS split between the pet and the ranger. So really the ranger is only doing a fraction of it’s total DPS. Now, there are ways to increase the RDPS so that you don’t have to rely on the AI of your pet to compensate… but usually increasing your RDPS too much leaves you pretty squishy. A nice balance is usually required for a successful and versatile build for a ranger. If you don’t want to rely on your pet as much, give yourself a bit more Power. If you’re okay with your pet doing some damage then give yourself something else and consider traiting into Beastmastery.

The Survivability of a Ranger
So what makes rangers appealing in sense of survivability? If you’ve played GW1 you’ll recall there was a Monk class that did all the healing so you didn’t have to be so concerned about keeping yourself alive. In GW2 we know better so what is their “shtick”? Warriors and Guardians can take more hits than Rocky Balboa, thieves are invisible and sneaky, even mesmers are essentially moving copy machines which can make them pretty elusive. So what makes the ranger survivable? What are its perks in that department?

Turns out rangers are like the Kings of Evasion. Sure they can’t poof in and out of stealth like thieves but they don’t have to. They can evade like nobody’s business. They have 2 sword skills that have evades (1 skill has 2 in it), 1 dagger skill with an evade, 1 shortbow skill with an evade, heck even their harpoon #5 skill is an evade! On top of that they have 3 seconds of stealth from the longbow #3 skill and now with the september buff to rangers the #3 skill on the gs I believe is also an evade. Don’t even get me started on their blocks (gs, axe…) but yeah, in addition to your two adrenaline evades… rangers are pretty elusive folk.

Now you can always boost your toughness and/or vitality stats for more survivability but these skills are the bread and butter of the ranger’s “staying alive” factor. Use them!

Okay… We know Rangers are survivable and about their DPS… so how do I play them?
The ranger, unlike pretty much every other class in GW2… is a very selfish class. What do I mean by that? I mean that while you might have Guardians and Warriors buffing allies or Ele’s and Mesmers providing swiftness (they can do that right? dunno I’ve never played a mesmer… but they can port allies too so there’s that) or Thieves and Engi’s providing stealth, the ranger really only has one skill that can be used to help allies… Healing Spring. Sure if you throw down a Bonfire they can use that for a fire field or if you trait Spotter they get the precision buff but in terms of direct assistance, rangers don’t bring much to the table.

This isn’t bad! This just means that rangers have more tools at their disposal to ensure their own survival and safety. This means that rangers can not only provide bow coverage in a large group, they can also go out on their own and do their own thing without changing their build too much (unless of course you go full glass but even then I’ve seen rangers take down a few people at a time).

One ranger build is usually versatile enough to cover a few things… usually.

Sidebar
Ranger’s are also very good at inflicting conditions… maybe not as good as Necros or Engis… but they’re good, it may be something you may want to consider when playing your ranger…

So now what?
Well the following are builds that you may want to look up if you’re searching for a new build to try. Now that you know the ranger stuff pay attention to the skills in the builds and don’t be scared to tweak things in the build if something better would suit your playstyle.

The Builds Are As Follows:
Spirit Ranger/Condition Ranger
Bunker Ranger
Trapper Ranger
Glass Cannon Ranger
Beastmaster Ranger

Test them out, modify them and find the one that suits you best. If other experienced rangers have input or criticisms I encourage you to share them to educate our ranger brethren to get them more comfortable with the class as a whole and not specific builds.

You forgot on the defence part, a 25% higher regen of endurance, lots of vigor uptime AND THE MIGHTY PROTECTION ON DODGE ROLL!

One can also make a very strange, but very good support/utility/shout ranger while in small parties. But other than that, you pretty much covered all the build types.

X Factor.2641:

RDPS = DPS + PDPS

Now how fair is that to our warrior friends? Not at all so the devs had to split the total DPS between RDPS and PDPS so it actually looks like this:

RDPS + PDPS = DPS

This mistaken belief by the Anet developer(s) is the reason ranger has sucked for so long. Ranger and warrior DPS are:

RDPS = DPS + PDPS
WDPS = DPS + adrenaline_DPS

Basically, ranger DPS should be the same as the DPS of any other profession. The pet’s DPS should be the same as the DPS of other professions’ F1-F4 abilities. (Actually, it’s the overall utility which should be roughly equal, since some F1-F4 abilities don’t contribute just DPS).

Also note that adrenaline DPS, shatter DPS, initiative DPS, etc. all scale with better equipment and buffs. Pet DPS does not scale with equipment, and only scales with buffs if the ranger takes the Fortifying Bond trait (the 5-person limit on AOE buffs means the pet never gets a group buff unless this trait is taken). So ranger DPS suffers from that handicap as well.

Solandri.9640:

X Factor.2641:

RDPS = DPS + PDPS

Now how fair is that to our warrior friends? Not at all so the devs had to split the total DPS between RDPS and PDPS so it actually looks like this:

RDPS + PDPS = DPS

This mistaken belief by the Anet developer(s) is the reason ranger has sucked for so long. Ranger and warrior DPS are:

RDPS = DPS + PDPS
WDPS = DPS + adrenaline_DPS

Basically, ranger DPS should be the same as the DPS of any other profession. The pet’s DPS should be the same as the DPS of other professions’ F1-F4 abilities. (Actually, it’s the overall utility which should be roughly equal, since some F1-F4 abilities don’t contribute just DPS).

Also note that adrenaline DPS, shatter DPS, initiative DPS, etc. all scale with better equipment and buffs. Pet DPS does not scale with equipment, and only scales with buffs if the ranger takes the Fortifying Bond trait (the 5-person limit on AOE buffs means the pet never gets a group buff unless this trait is taken). So ranger DPS suffers from that handicap as well.

That depends now… See warrior ADPS isn’t constant and “passive” like PDPS is so you would have to look at the PDPS over the time it would take to build up the ADPS. I’m not saying rangers didn’t get shafted on that deal but I am saying that it’s not a straight up comparison.

X Factor.2641:

That depends now… See warrior ADPS isn’t constant and “passive” like PDPS is

LOL. Clearly you’ve never used a pet on a moving target.

so you would have to look at the PDPS over the time it would take to build up the ADPS. I’m not saying rangers didn’t get shafted on that deal but I am saying that it’s not a straight up comparison.

Of course they’re not a straight up comparison. If they were, they’d be the same thing and there’d be no point distinguishing warriors from rangers.

They are different, and they are going to have differences. But it’s unfair to look only at the features of pets which are advantageous compared to other F1-F4 skills. Warriors can’t lose access to their adrenaline skills for 60 seconds like when a pet dies. Guardian F1-F4 skills always affect the guardian, whereas ranger misses out on pet buffs if the pet is too far. Ranger pets offer a dumb AI target for thief C&D. And as I already pointed out, pet DPS doesn’t scale with better equipment or buffs.

OTOH, ranger pets can take aggro and tank. They can revive a downed ranger even if he’s taking constant damage. The huge variety of pets (compared to other F1-F4 skills) gives rangers a wider access to different effects via F2. Just as pet damage isn’t increased by equipment, pet damage isn’t decreased by going with a bunker build.

You have to look at the whole package, not just those parts which favor the argument you’re trying to make. On balance, the approach you’re taking leaves rangers with a huge DPS deficit compared to other classes – that’s why you ended up with silly things like rangers doing more DPS with warrior banners than their own weapons.

Solandri.9640:

X Factor.2641:

That depends now… See warrior ADPS isn’t constant and “passive” like PDPS is

LOL. Clearly you’ve never used a pet on a moving target.

so you would have to look at the PDPS over the time it would take to build up the ADPS. I’m not saying rangers didn’t get shafted on that deal but I am saying that it’s not a straight up comparison.

Of course they’re not a straight up comparison. If they were, they’d be the same thing and there’d be no point distinguishing warriors from rangers.

They are different, and they are going to have differences. But it’s unfair to look only at the features of pets which are advantageous compared to other F1-F4 skills. Warriors can’t lose access to their adrenaline skills for 60 seconds like when a pet dies. Guardian F1-F4 skills always affect the guardian, whereas ranger misses out on pet buffs if the pet is too far. Ranger pets offer a dumb AI target for thief C&D. And as I already pointed out, pet DPS doesn’t scale with better equipment or buffs.

OTOH, ranger pets can take aggro and tank. They can revive a downed ranger even if he’s taking constant damage. The huge variety of pets (compared to other F1-F4 skills) gives rangers a wider access to different effects via F2. Just as pet damage isn’t increased by equipment, pet damage isn’t decreased by going with a bunker build.

You have to look at the whole package, not just those parts which favor the argument you’re trying to make. On balance, the approach you’re taking leaves rangers with a huge DPS deficit compared to other classes – that’s why you ended up with silly things like rangers doing more DPS with warrior banners than their own weapons.

+1’d
/15characters

Razor.9872:

One can also make a very strange, but very good support/utility/shout ranger while in small parties. But other than that, you pretty much covered all the build types.

Agreed. I ran a support/spirit ranger for a while. Found it to be pretty fun for general PvE group play.

I also think rangers are not all that selfish when compared to the necro class. Rangers have spirits, pet buffs, war horn #5, healing spring and SoR (along with a couple of other utilities) that can directly aid a party.

Solandri.9640:

X Factor.2641:

That depends now… See warrior ADPS isn’t constant and “passive” like PDPS is

LOL. Clearly you’ve never used a pet on a moving target.

so you would have to look at the PDPS over the time it would take to build up the ADPS. I’m not saying rangers didn’t get shafted on that deal but I am saying that it’s not a straight up comparison.

Of course they’re not a straight up comparison. If they were, they’d be the same thing and there’d be no point distinguishing warriors from rangers.

They are different, and they are going to have differences. But it’s unfair to look only at the features of pets which are advantageous compared to other F1-F4 skills. Warriors can’t lose access to their adrenaline skills for 60 seconds like when a pet dies. Guardian F1-F4 skills always affect the guardian, whereas ranger misses out on pet buffs if the pet is too far. Ranger pets offer a dumb AI target for thief C&D. And as I already pointed out, pet DPS doesn’t scale with better equipment or buffs.

OTOH, ranger pets can take aggro and tank. They can revive a downed ranger even if he’s taking constant damage. The huge variety of pets (compared to other F1-F4 skills) gives rangers a wider access to different effects via F2. Just as pet damage isn’t increased by equipment, pet damage isn’t decreased by going with a bunker build.

You have to look at the whole package, not just those parts which favor the argument you’re trying to make. On balance, the approach you’re taking leaves rangers with a huge DPS deficit compared to other classes – that’s why you ended up with silly things like rangers doing more DPS with warrior banners than their own weapons.

Hence the "" around the word passive. I know people can avoid pets, but people can avoid warrior adrenaline shots too and those are a one hit trick whereas you don’t have to “wait for your pet to power up”. In fact anyone can avoid anyone really… so that’s not a really fair point. Granted the PDPS is reliant on the AI whereas the warrior adrenaline isn’t, but enough about warriors.

In addition this thread isn’t about F1-F4 skills… it’s about rangers and getting a feel for their mechanics and abilities but I see what you’re saying. That’d be a good thread for you to start though if you wanted to press the matter.

I’m not trying to make any comparisons at all and all I was doing with the OP if you look reeeeeally reeeeeeeally closely was breaking down the effect the pet has on the RDPS. I wasn’t saying this compensated and I never said it was better than warriors. All I did was provide the breakdown in a very simplistic fashion. If you’d like to argue the effectiveness of a pet then perhaps you should start a thread about it. Notice how I didn’t mention which pet is better than which other pet. That’s because it depends on the build you’re running. And, as I’ve tried to explain, this is a general overview of the tools the ranger has. This thread isn’t focusing on any one build. There are no points I’m trying to make. I’m just laying out for new rangers what everyone who already plays a ranger knows. If you’re a vet ranger then obviously there are technicalities and specifics and you can tear this thread apart if it would help you sleep at night. But this is for people who are thinking about playing a ranger to get an idea of their GENERAL mechanics and how they work.

Thank you for your comment

Bandit.8279:

Razor.9872:

One can also make a very strange, but very good support/utility/shout ranger while in small parties. But other than that, you pretty much covered all the build types.

Agreed. I ran a support/spirit ranger for a while. Found it to be pretty fun for general PvE group play.

I also think rangers are not all that selfish when compared to the necro class. Rangers have spirits, pet buffs, war horn #5, healing spring and SoR (along with a couple of other utilities) that can directly aid a party.

Obviously it would depend on how exactly you have constructed your ranger which is why I said when compared to “pretty much” every other class. There are exceptions but there are also selfish guard builds so there are exceptions to everything.

But yes you are correct I didn’t name all of them I was generalizing, which is never a good thing. Thank you for calling me out on it

pretty good post.

btw, i command in wvw using a spirit/condi/bunker build. it’s a frontline ranger build and it could take a lot of damage while giving a bit of support to my allies and also causing insane condi damage.

Valentin.2073:

pretty good post.

btw, i command in wvw using a spirit/condi/bunker build. it’s a frontline ranger build and it could take a lot of damage while giving a bit of support to my allies and also causing insane condi damage.

I feel like I know you… But that’s cool, spirits have never really worked out for me but I cmd with a BM build so to each his own.

X Factor.2641:

Valentin.2073:

pretty good post.

btw, i command in wvw using a spirit/condi/bunker build. it’s a frontline ranger build and it could take a lot of damage while giving a bit of support to my allies and also causing insane condi damage.

I feel like I know you… But that’s cool, spirits have never really worked out for me but I cmd with a BM build so to each his own.

we are from the same server. i was that ranger who was co-commanding with Nem last week. it was a lot of fun. i was able to cap the whole EB while i was commanding last week. lol

anyway, spirit ranger is awesome as long as you avoid the arrow carts. lol. i have used this build to command both small and large scale groups. imo, it is the best support build for rangers.

Anyone have a nice condition ranger build ? And what gear should i wear as a condition ranger ?

Valentin.2073:

X Factor.2641:

Valentin.2073:

pretty good post.

btw, i command in wvw using a spirit/condi/bunker build. it’s a frontline ranger build and it could take a lot of damage while giving a bit of support to my allies and also causing insane condi damage.

I feel like I know you… But that’s cool, spirits have never really worked out for me but I cmd with a BM build so to each his own.

we are from the same server. i was that ranger who was co-commanding with Nem last week. it was a lot of fun. i was able to cap the whole EB while i was commanding last week. lol

anyway, spirit ranger is awesome as long as you avoid the arrow carts. lol. i have used this build to command both small and large scale groups. imo, it is the best support build for rangers.

Ah see, you may not know this, but my unofficial name on DR is the Zerg Magnet so where I go… acs and blobs of red names follow… spirits can’t keep up but alright that’s cool that I’m not going crazy… small world!

CONSTANTINES.2630:

Anyone have a nice condition ranger build ? And what gear should i wear as a condition ranger ?

Valentine may be able to answer this better than I can considering he’s running one now whereas I am not but here’s my rough build for you.

Conceptual Build I’m Pulling Out of My Butt for You

So if you want to run a condi ranger with max condition application you may consider the Spirit Ranger. For this you need to trait into NM. Not arguable, you need the Spirits Unbound to be able to move and be tougher. Consider using the following spirits:

Sun
Stone
Frost (although I heard people complaining about a frost spirit nerf post patch so it would help to know what that’s about)

Traits
We talked about NM, for more survival you may want to consider WS and then have Marksmanship be your “dump stat”. Because you’ll be applying conditions faster than a zerg killing an unfortunate roamer, power isn’t really as prevalent so something like this might be worth consideration:

2/0/6/6/0

Gear
The "go-to* gear that I think of is Settler’s. A lot of people give it a bad rap saying it’s “noob” gear and whatnot but for a prototype condi build, it’s a good place to start. Settler’s gives you Toughness/Condi/Healing. This is the stuff of survival, let the people say what they will, you’ll be the one who’s standing over their dead bodies. If you go full set of Settler’s this gives you just over 2k Toughness which is a good foundation for survival stats so you can play around with your trinkets a bit more and weapons.

Weapons
For condi weapons you really only have a few choices: sb, axe, dagger, sword, torch. I wouldn’t go a/t because that gives you no evades, which as I mentioned in the OP is a crucial part of ranger survival. If I were going to use this build I’d try s/t for the main and secondary either a/d or sb depending on how I’m feeling. S/t gives you evades and sb and a/d each have one.

Trinkets & Weapon Stats
Because we have that 2k toughness you can play around with your weapons and trinkets a little more. Keeping with Condi Damage focus you might consider Dire for more toughness and vitality or Carrion for more power. Up to you really.

Sigils & Runes
For sigils I’d go with Sigils of Bursting and Sigils of Battle perhaps. Bursting adds 6% directly to Condi Damage and Battle gives 3 stacks of might on weapon swap… never a bad thing. Alternatively you may look at Sigils of Energy instead of Battle which restores some adrenaline for more evades if you want that.

For Runes I’d probably go with Traveler’s or Water. Traveler’s increases Condi Damage as well and at the end increases movement speed by 25% passively, which will help considering you can’t have Signet of the Hunt in the spirit build. The reason I say Water might be worth consideration would be for the Healing and for the chance to remove conditions. You don’t have a condi remover in this build so having that can greatly help.

Edit: Engineer might be worth looking at too… Condi Damage AND Toughness…

Conclusion

This build is very conceptual but if you want I can use the build editor to try and make it for you. Like I said though, Valentine might have a little more know-how considering he’s running one right now and I’m not. This is just my blueprint on what I’d be looking for.

Hope this helped!

X Factor.2641:

2/0/6/6/0

Gear
The "go-to* gear that I think of is Settler’s. A lot of people give it a bad rap saying it’s “noob” gear and whatnot but for a prototype condi build, it’s a good place to start.

Or just skip the beginner’s step and realize that condition/tank/spirit builds should be using Dire Gear and just mix in Rabid or Rabid/Dire for trinkets. Healing stat is pretty bad unless you are going for BM Natural Healing variant (really for PvE) and even then it takes balance (Celestial makes more sense). Note, this is more for roaming then zerging.

Thanks guys the guide is very useful to me.

I use settler amulet only for spvp. for wvw, i use dire stuff for my armor pieces and trinkets, undead runes and a mixture of condi damage and defense on my infusions. Setup is 0 2 6 6 0. I put 2 on skirmishing to trait for sharpened edges on crits.

I use shortbow and axe+war horn as my weapons. for my utility skill, i use healing spring, sun spirit, stone spirit and signet of the hunt (i replace SOTH with other skills depending on the situation). elite is also situational.

sun spirit maybe the most important spirit that you need to use because it buffs your allies with burning and its active skill blinds your enemies with a pretty good radius. This build is an in your face build so you need to be very aggressive in fighting enemies.

X Factor.2641:

Valentin.2073:

X Factor.2641:

Valentin.2073:

pretty good post.

btw, i command in wvw using a spirit/condi/bunker build. it’s a frontline ranger build and it could take a lot of damage while giving a bit of support to my allies and also causing insane condi damage.

I feel like I know you... But that’s cool, spirits have never really worked out for me but I cmd with a BM build so to each his own.

we are from the same server. i was that ranger who was co-commanding with Nem last week. it was a lot of fun. i was able to cap the whole EB while i was commanding last week. lol

anyway, spirit ranger is awesome as long as you avoid the arrow carts. lol. i have used this build to command both small and large scale groups. imo, it is the best support build for rangers.

Ah see, you may not know this, but my unofficial name on DR is the Zerg Magnet so where I go... acs and blobs of red names follow... spirits can’t keep up but alright that’s cool that I’m not going crazy... small world!

I’m more of a ballista + cata type of commander. I make sure no ac is gonna hurt my spirit babies.

Valentin.2073:

X Factor.2641:

Ah see, you may not know this, but my unofficial name on DR is the Zerg Magnet so where I go… acs and blobs of red names follow… spirits can’t keep up but alright that’s cool that I’m not going crazy… small world!

I’m more of a ballista + cata type of commander. I make sure no ac is gonna hurt my spirit babies.

Catas and trebs are the new rams, I’m convinced