Druid PvP Gameplay Tips
I wish I had mained a thief and not a ranger.
Am I good?… I’m good.
I haven’t played ranger a ton since the patch but going off of last seasoned in which I played a slightly glassier version of the normal bunker build, I can offer a tip against mesmers.
If you are at alone at a point and a mesmer is headed towards you, you have to prepare to at minimum give the mesmer a decap. If you are greedy and try to prevent the decap, you will just die instead. If the mesmer focuses on decapping/capping the point, you can use los while you are moaed to not die. If you get through moa without taking tons of damage you have a good shot at winning the fight.
Last season I struggled with the bunker build since it seemed to just be worse than an ele in team support. I generally tried running the same traits but with marauder/zerker amulet instead of menders. I found that I could put more pressure on enemy eles this way.
1) Stay near your group, unless you’re bunkering a point.
2) Celestial Avatar is your friend, not a crutch. Use it.
3) Learn your pets abilities and use them at the proper times.
3 A) If using smoke scale… DON’T USE THE F2 ON POINT
4) Sublime Conversion is a must use staff skill when engaging at Mid.
5) You’re not a thief, you can take more hits and survive.. don’t panic and run off point.
6) You’re not a Revenant, you can’t eat a ton of damage. Know when to use your pet as a meat shield.
7)Beyond popular belief, you are not obligated to stay on Long Bow the whole fight, so don’t do it. Reflects hurt… a lot… a lot lot lot.
8) Turn off Map Chat
9) Turn off Say Chat
8-9 you have some people who believe rangers and druids shouldn’t be in PvP or Raids or Fractals or Dungeons…. they are still stuck in 2012 mindset wise.
2015-2016
Fort Aspenwood
If you are against Condi Heavy-classes – wait till you get condi bombed. Use the maximum out of Druidic Clarity (full cleanse).
Especially against Condi Mesmers … Sometimes not doing anything at all is the key. Don’t touch auto-attacks with 12 confusion.
If your enemies happen to pressure you a lot – try to disengage with Staff / Celestial Shadow. There’s a difference between loosing and going into an unwinnable fight. Sometimes leaving the point is your only option.
Against Thieves… Well… They will burst you down – so land a CC on them. If you do – you technically won. They’ll either rotate or keep wasting their time.
Tip #1 which is different from the thief meta style of hitting hard early… wait out for your burst. Even if you are the plus 1 be patient and use it when you know it’ll land. Bristle back f2 and LB 2 a potent potent when used together even with Menders.
I recently swapped out my LB for the GS and love it. The ability to punish stealth still is awesome and the escape block and cc from it are sweet. Also as was said before. Learn to love avitar. The more you play in it the better you will be. When I am coming into a fight late staff 5+3 on my team is awesome and if the enemy is really laying down the deeps your avitar can be the most potent tool on the battlefield. The staff combo above plus a glyph and avitar 3 into the light field and water field is so lulzy it ain’t funny.
Thieves still give me a hard time and some condi builds can keep up pressure that makes healing through it hard but just keep playing and learning the healing possibilities and the damage will come secondary to that.
8) Turn off Map Chat
9) Turn off Say Chat
8-9 you have some people who believe rangers and druids shouldn’t be in PvP or Raids or Fractals or Dungeons…. they are still stuck in 2012 mindset wise.
I had to do that. My game improved when I stopped thinking about some of the angry wording thrown at me.
10) set to offline ;-)