Guild Wars 2

Question: Is the Ranger Longbow the only weapon in the entire game with an auto-attack without some secondary effect built in?

It doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t bounce or pierce, it doesn’t shoot 2 shots, etc. The only thing it has is the ability to do less damage than the short bow at anything but max range, and barely do the same damage at max range?

If the Shortbow is the ranger’s condition weapon of choice, why can’t the Longbow be the ranger’s power/crit/anything weapon of choice?

I use a longbow and even though I know already that it doesn’t do as much dps as the short bow ,I has a longer range and it has a knock back and the #5 skill is quite useful (in basic pve anyway) then I switch to the greatsord and maul them,whereas when I use the short bow I do quicker damage but less aoe’s and its less useful imo I haven’t tried doing pvp with it yet so I Dupont know how good it is there

Well it’s just a general observation that I made that it has no unique secondary effect like every other weapon in the game.

But you’re right, having rapid shot and the AE is great and it’s the main reason I use the weapon over the shortbow simply because I feel like I’m doing more than auto-attacking all day.

But you will notice the lack of the snare, daze, and evasive shot very quickly in PvP.

You can use Lightning Reflexes to simulate an evasive shot, and you get some great options for keeping people/things at a distance when you’re using the longbow.

I use longbow/greatsword in PvP and it’s great. I extended the range of the longbow through traits and have my signets recharge as fast as possible, then I trait/gear for crits. Usually I can crush someone before they get close to me and if things get tight I have a greatsword also spec’d for crits that I can use up close, then it just comes down to skill.

Atherakhia.4086:

Question: Is the Ranger Longbow the only weapon in the entire game with an auto-attack without some secondary effect built in?

The secondary effect is that the damage decreases the closer your target is. =p

Longbow is great for PvP in right hands as long as ur not a fool who tries to duel someone with the base attack r0fl

1# is bad and u shouldn’t use it unless severly hurt and have to retreat, then to do attack support from afar help teammates (while hurt), could be good in PvE where u got max range all the time but #1 is mostly useless in sPvP except the above example.
Longbow should had 1500 Range Default, 1700 with trait 10% more dmg on range on 1, 20% more on 2, 30% more on range 3, 50% more dmg on new full range 1400-1500 range (Also projectiles from Longbow should Alooooot faster

2# Rapidfire is plain not very good imo but not bad either.

3# Huntershot + pet open strike + urself openstrike is AWESOME 20% more dmg then
switch too another wep and do massive damage. that’s what i do

4# As for the Knockback its AWESOME! knock back a point defender off point, meaning he loss the cap for it then initiate the real fight with a proper wep really hurts the opposing team Score. (oh and u should also switch to LB and do Knockback when you see opposing team trying to revive an teamm8, or finish off an ally of you LB Really shines here

5# Barrage is great for fighting theifs when they stealth or cast stealth field do a PROPER barrage and most of time you end up killing them while they are in stealth its simply AWESOME, or in some rare cases you end up fighting 4v4 or 5v5 the damage output of it Globally is godlike.

Dunno about PvE never played it

it’s a terrible weapon because opponents can strafe most of your arrows and easily dodge your Rapid Fire. barrage with 1500 range is boss, but finding a build to go with is impossible. LB rangers are fodder in wvw.

I have no problems with the longbow. I think it’s very useful in certain situations. Then again, i’m not much of a Player vs Player type.

Longbow is only for PvE.
Period.
Except if you’re talking about WvW but that’s not even real pvp, just smash buttons and look at numbers from far away.

yeah the number 1 is pretty lackluster but the other skills are all rather nice. i wouldn’t mind if it shot 2 arrows like the warrior bow or had a faster cast time. not as fast as shortbow, but faster than it is now.

Apart from missing a snipe type shot and a few other tweaks the Longbow still feels more right to me than the Shortbow. I don’t actually mind the distance penalty, I enjoy positioning…to bad ANet hamstringed that by getting the random invoulnerable, or missing out on all the boons going on in melee range :/

I’m packing a LB and a GS for dungeons and low-level Fractals right now (if only because that’s my variety of the week), and apart from the Dredge Fractal where you need to be able to interrupt the Ice Elemental from healing (where LB #4 is better than SB #5 since I’m always the one drawing), my LB almost never comes out. It just doesn’t do enough damage quickly enough, or at least not as quickly and consistently as a SB. Top that off with #1’s lack of a secondary effect like you mentioned, and it remains a comparatively situational weapon next to the more general-purpose SB.

Just my two coppers. :T

Arekai.5698:

Longbow is only for PvE.
Period.
Except if you’re talking about WvW but that’s not even real pvp, just smash buttons and look at numbers from far away.

I use LB/GS in Paid tournaments. Longbow is viable in PvP also.

Regarding the original post:

Mesmer Greatsword.

Edit: Its only gimmick is that it does less damage the closer your target is to you.

Huxow.7259:

Longbow is great for PvP in right hands as long as ur not a fool who tries to duel someone with the base attack r0fl

1# is bad and u shouldn’t use it unless severly hurt and have to retreat, then to do attack support from afar help teammates (while hurt), could be good in PvE where u got max range all the time but #1 is mostly useless in sPvP except the above example.
Longbow should had 1500 Range Default, 1700 with trait 10% more dmg on range on 1, 20% more on 2, 30% more on range 3, 50% more dmg on new full range 1400-1500 range (Also projectiles from Longbow should Alooooot faster

2# Rapidfire is plain not very good imo but not bad either.

3# Huntershot + pet open strike + urself openstrike is AWESOME 20% more dmg then
switch too another wep and do massive damage. that’s what i do

4# As for the Knockback its AWESOME! knock back a point defender off point, meaning he loss the cap for it then initiate the real fight with a proper wep really hurts the opposing team Score. (oh and u should also switch to LB and do Knockback when you see opposing team trying to revive an teamm8, or finish off an ally of you LB Really shines here

5# Barrage is great for fighting theifs when they stealth or cast stealth field do a PROPER barrage and most of time you end up killing them while they are in stealth its simply AWESOME, or in some rare cases you end up fighting 4v4 or 5v5 the damage output of it Globally is godlike.

Dunno about PvE never played it

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

i love the longbow. granted rapid does the dmg of backstab etc.. in 10 hits instead of 1 (i got hit for a 5k steal today kitten?) and you’ll almost never land a full volley but it still hurts against people who can’t move.

3 is good as i run jaguars and it gives vulnerability.

4 is good because it banishes people

5 is great. anyone who thinks aoe crits of 1k with cripple is bad is stupid. it can hold off a zerg at a choke point easily of make people scatter from the gate.

rangers need a big dmg buff, especially on 1 and 2 considering how easily other classes can manage with 1 hit instead of many, but overall i find the longbow is much better for small engagements than shortbow.

yes it is, with the ranger LB you’re pretty much relegated to assisting others take down targets. Don’t even both on someone full health at range, the LB is just a minor irritant, nothing to be feared by a single target. Don’t believe I’ve ever taken anyone down from full health at range with a LB, well anyone who wasn’t afk. Don’t think any other Ranger has ever taken me down at max range with a LB. Like pointed out, to easy to roll out of most damage.

LB is the main weapon I use in w3… I’ve never used much of anything else besides the axe/horn swap out. Tis why I rolled a Ranger. Had I wanted to roll a Warrior and use blades, I would have made one.

Atherakhia.4086:

Question: Is the Ranger Longbow the only weapon in the entire game with an auto-attack without some secondary effect built in?

It doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t bounce or pierce, it doesn’t shoot 2 shots, etc. The only thing it has is the ability to do less damage than the short bow at anything but max range, and barely do the same damage at max range?

If the Shortbow is the ranger’s condition weapon of choice, why can’t the Longbow be the ranger’s power/crit/anything weapon of choice?

The better question is why are there LBs with conditional dmg stats on them?

For use with sharpening stones so I can land 5 stacks of bleed every 30 seconds? LOL.

LB1 needs a chance cripple badly, where conditional stat should increase the duration of the cripple, and precision should affect the landing rate for the cripple.

If Anet expects people to only do max damage at the 1k+ killzone, there should be some way to help keep the target there for the ranger to take a meaningful second shot.

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

I use LB in Paids. Your argument is invalid.

Obstructed, obstructed, obstructed, vanishing arrows, out of range. Badly broken.

vespers.1759:

i love the longbow. granted rapid does the dmg of backstab etc.. in 10 hits instead of 1 (i got hit for a 5k steal today kitten?) and you’ll almost never land a full volley but it still hurts against people who can’t move.

Actually rapid shot is 12 hits. And in terms of DPS it’s pretty much the same as the autoattack. If you time it wrong and rapid shot interrupts an autoattack just before it fires, you’ll actually reduce your DPS.

Its benefits are that it’ll do the same damage even at close range, and it’ll automatically track targets (even if they stealth). Outside of those use cases, it’s pretty much the same thing as autoattack.

Solandri.9640:

vespers.1759:

i love the longbow. granted rapid does the dmg of backstab etc.. in 10 hits instead of 1 (i got hit for a 5k steal today kitten?) and you’ll almost never land a full volley but it still hurts against people who can’t move.

Actually rapid shot is 12 hits. And in terms of DPS it’s pretty much the same as the autoattack. If you time it wrong and rapid shot interrupts an autoattack just before it fires, you’ll actually reduce your DPS.

Its benefits are that it’ll do the same damage even at close range, and it’ll automatically track targets (even if they stealth). Outside of those use cases, it’s pretty much the same thing as autoattack.

maybe slightly less dmg per hit than 1 but it does it much faster than waiting for 12 auto attacks.

Solandri.9640:

vespers.1759:

i love the longbow. granted rapid does the dmg of backstab etc.. in 10 hits instead of 1 (i got hit for a 5k steal today kitten?) and you’ll almost never land a full volley but it still hurts against people who can’t move.

Actually rapid shot is 12 hits. And in terms of DPS it’s pretty much the same as the autoattack. If you time it wrong and rapid shot interrupts an autoattack just before it fires, you’ll actually reduce your DPS.

Its benefits are that it’ll do the same damage even at close range, and it’ll automatically track targets (even if they stealth). Outside of those use cases, it’s pretty much the same thing as autoattack.

What? Same as auto attack? Ive had crits of 12 13 and 14k with the last 3 of those 10 shots from rapid fire.

NargofWoV.4267:

yes it is, with the ranger LB you’re pretty much relegated to assisting others take down targets. Don’t even both on someone full health at range, the LB is just a minor irritant, nothing to be feared by a single target. Don’t believe I’ve ever taken anyone down from full health at range with a LB, well anyone who wasn’t afk. Don’t think any other Ranger has ever taken me down at max range with a LB. Like pointed out, to easy to roll out of most damage.

LB is the main weapon I use in w3… I’ve never used much of anything else besides the axe/horn swap out. Tis why I rolled a Ranger. Had I wanted to roll a Warrior and use blades, I would have made one.

If six digit crits are an irritant than thats fine with me and rolling wont save you.

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Huxow.7259:

Longbow is great for PvP in right hands as long as ur not a fool who tries to duel someone with the base attack r0fl

1# is bad and u shouldn’t use it unless severly hurt and have to retreat, then to do attack support from afar help teammates (while hurt), could be good in PvE where u got max range all the time but #1 is mostly useless in sPvP except the above example.
Longbow should had 1500 Range Default, 1700 with trait 10% more dmg on range on 1, 20% more on 2, 30% more on range 3, 50% more dmg on new full range 1400-1500 range (Also projectiles from Longbow should Alooooot faster

2# Rapidfire is plain not very good imo but not bad either.

3# Huntershot + pet open strike + urself openstrike is AWESOME 20% more dmg then
switch too another wep and do massive damage. that’s what i do

4# As for the Knockback its AWESOME! knock back a point defender off point, meaning he loss the cap for it then initiate the real fight with a proper wep really hurts the opposing team Score. (oh and u should also switch to LB and do Knockback when you see opposing team trying to revive an teamm8, or finish off an ally of you LB Really shines here

5# Barrage is great for fighting theifs when they stealth or cast stealth field do a PROPER barrage and most of time you end up killing them while they are in stealth its simply AWESOME, or in some rare cases you end up fighting 4v4 or 5v5 the damage output of it Globally is godlike.

Dunno about PvE never played it

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

Its not the weapon…..L2..

Softspoken.2410:

Regarding the original post:

Mesmer Greatsword.

Edit: Its only gimmick is that it does less damage the closer your target is to you.

Hot kitten you found one! And what’s sad is I actually have a level 20 mesmer lol!

But yea, the Longbow just doesn’t make sense.

Any overlapping range with the shortbow should do one set of damage, the extreme range should give a 10% damage increase. If the shortbow is condition, make the longbow power.

Attack one should give a 10% additional chance to crit from the side/back.
Attack 2 should also provide stacking vuln.
Attack 3 can be changed to an aimed shot.
Attack 4 400/600/800.
Attack 5 should allow you to move while channeling but reduce your movement speed by 30%.

I dislike the shortbow myself to be honest,the skills on it seem to be very situational/condition focused.

Eurantien.4632:

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

I use LB in Paids. Your argument is invalid.

Usage does not equate to effectiveness or being an optimal choice. So technically, neither argument is truly logically valid.

Although based on my own experience and testing with the longbow, inside of 1000 range there is no point at which the longbow ever outperforms the shortbow. This was confirmed numerically showing that rapid fire outputs an almost equivalent amount of damage to the shortbow autoattack.
This also means that unless somehow a person can keep an opponent at farther than 1000 range and then force them to eat auto attacks over a fairly mediocre time-to-kill period, the longbow doesn’t have a real purpose other than being a preference.

Atherakhia.4086:

Softspoken.2410:

Regarding the original post:

Mesmer Greatsword.

Edit: Its only gimmick is that it does less damage the closer your target is to you.

Hot kitten you found one! And what’s sad is I actually have a level 20 mesmer lol!

But yea, the Longbow just doesn’t make sense.

Any overlapping range with the shortbow should do one set of damage, the extreme range should give a 10% damage increase. If the shortbow is condition, make the longbow power.

Attack one should give a 10% additional chance to crit from the side/back.
Attack 2 should also provide stacking vuln.
Attack 3 can be changed to an aimed shot.
Attack 4 400/600/800.
Attack 5 should allow you to move while channeling but reduce your movement speed by 30%.

If by aimed shot, you mean holding down the button for more damage, I’m with you. If you mean that it’s unblockable, I’d like that too. ;o

vitali.1609:

What? Same as auto attack? Ive had crits of 12 13 and 14k with the last 3 of those 10 shots from rapid fire.

That number is the total of all shots you fired.

Please think about your numbers before assuming they are valid.
If the longbow really did that amount of damage (thats 70k-80k from your numbers) you could kill (downed and executed by damage) every player in the game with that single skill.

one can say what you want about the longbow, but in PVE and WvW it is short of unrivaled in terms of proper DPS, IF you go for a full crit build.

My personal favourite combo is Rapid fire/Barrage + Sharpening stone + quickening zephyr.
Either way, you get massive single or multi target bleed laid down within 4 seconds.

The basic skill, is indeed rather weak. It does shine, from time to time, but outside a critbuild (i got 53% crit chance and 104% crit damage), it is absolutely rubbish.

As for improvements, i see two or three possibilities
A) Give it a condition like most other weapons
B) Increase the range and projectile speed considerably (1500 range and nearly twice the projectile speed)
C) Consecutive damage buildup. Each successful hit grants 5% bonus damage on the next. This ends when you miss(or target dodges) or when target dies or when you switch targets.

I never understood the whole Longbow does less damage the closer you are to the target..

Maybe i’m just not understanding it correctly…

But wouldn’t it be about the same damage if you hit a target 50 feet away vs 100 feet away?

Actually, I’d think the further you got out the less stopping power the bow would have?

vitali.1609:

If six digit crits are an irritant than thats fine with me and rolling wont save you.

I’m not shooting mice. I was talking in w3. I’ve yet to see a 6 didget crit on any player. Like I mentioned, I can’t recall dropping anyone at distance on my ranger (afk’rs aside). I’ve sat on wall after wall, over 600 keep defenses and I don’t recall killing anyone at max range with my LB alone. Of course it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened, but if it has, it is a pretty rare event…. Not something routine at all, not even close.

Prysin.8542:

one can say what you want about the longbow, but in PVE and WvW it is short of unrivaled in terms of proper DPS, IF you go for a full crit build.

it’s out-dps’d by the SB by a large margin.

nerva.7940:

Prysin.8542:

one can say what you want about the longbow, but in PVE and WvW it is short of unrivaled in terms of proper DPS, IF you go for a full crit build.

it’s out-dps’d by the SB by a large margin.

There’s a reddit gear calculator that was circulating about a month back that directly refutes that statement. As long as you’re not in Rampager’s gear and stacking max bleeds on top of the direct damage, the difference was pretty low. They showed that at max range with Eagle Eye and Quickdraw, using 3 and 5 on cooldown (2 slowed down DPS), the difference was less than 10%.

I put my gear into the calculator (Knight’s with some Soldier + Cleric) and compared the two with a 30/20/15/0/5 build and it came out at a 10.5% difference in favor of shortbow. That’s not taking into account permanent 10% vulnerability on the target for your pet and team or the fact that you’ve got Barrage in the mix for AoE.

Now, I’m not saying that the calculator was infallible or that the situation of “ideal usage” ever really occurs. I do know the calculator did use the proper refire rate for LB (not the .75 that the tool tip says), but I didn’t go through the whole spread sheet to make sure it checked out. Also, no, you can’t always be at max range but just the same, you also can’t always be behind your target.

Does LB need help? Yes. Is it absolutely crushed by SB to the point of uselessness? No way.

EDIT: I’m currently looking for a link to the spreadsheet, but using my saved version, I did a simple berserker’s gear (30/20/15/0/5) comparison:

Just auto attacks :
LB at max range = 1463 dps
LB at max range w/ 10% vulnerability = 1609
SB without bleeds = 1489
SB with bleeds = 1777

The difference between “LB max + vuln” and “SB with bleeds” is 10.4%. This is without Barrage and this doesn’t bother to consider the 10% vuln for your pet and team.

^ Those numbers are fine and all, but the fact that LB dmg is only good at long range is the kicker. LB auto-attack is way to easy to side-step, or run out of. This more than makes up for it.

NargofWoV.4267:

vitali.1609:

If six digit crits are an irritant than thats fine with me and rolling wont save you.

I’m not shooting mice. I was talking in w3. I’ve yet to see a 6 didget crit on any player. Like I mentioned, I can’t recall dropping anyone at distance on my ranger (afk’rs aside). I’ve sat on wall after wall, over 600 keep defenses and I don’t recall killing anyone at max range with my LB alone. Of course it doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened, but if it has, it is a pretty rare event…. Not something routine at all, not even close.

i run full zerk and if i land a full rapid fire i’ve hit 9.8k max (vs an upleveled ranger lol).

couple that with entangle and jaguar 3k crits and many people go down quick. longbow on a tank build is pretty bad, but don’t under estimate what it can do.

also don’t forget about pet swap for quickness and rapid fire. it comes out quick when not expected.

Obsidian.1328:

^ Those numbers are fine and all, but the fact that LB dmg is only good at long range is the kicker. LB auto-attack is way to easy to side-step, or run out of. This more than makes up for it.

So are a lot of ranged attacks, that’s nothing new and that’s not just a Ranger problem let alone a LB problem. LB and SB have the same chance of missing when fired from the same range.

Your statement makes it sound like you want the LB to be an ideal weapon in every scenario and that its damage should be compensated for the fact that it can be dodged. Its not and its not going to be. How much do you buff it to compensate for its lag time / flight? Or do you make the arrows fly faster? If its the latter, then your argument is not counter to mine and you’re nitpicking on something that’s irrelevant to what I was showing.

Someone argued “Apples > Oranges”, I countered with math to show that “Apples = 1.1 Oranges but that Oranges have extra bonuses”. You then responded with “But Oranges are citrus!” which has nothing to do with what I was trying to show.

LB has some great niches it shines in. People trash the concept of the keep defender LB Ranger but honestly, few things scare me more than when I’m seiging a door and I hear the growl of a Jaguar and I have to be constantly on the move to avoid being pinned by Barrages or nailed by 1.5k auto attack arrows. It makes it quite difficult to man a ram or offensive arrow cart effectively. At least with a disruptive Thief, I can fight back, but that Ranger is sitting safe in his tower, hitting me from 1500+ (because LB can easily hit outside of its effective range if you manually click attacks).

Not to mention it being a great PVE open world zerg champion fighting tool. Good luck to the melee folk who have to spend their time dodging through the champs legs, I’ll be back here with my devourer giving you 10% damage boosts and doing decent DPS.

jcbroe.4329:

Eurantien.4632:

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

I use LB in Paids. Your argument is invalid.

Usage does not equate to effectiveness or being an optimal choice. So technically, neither argument is truly logically valid.

Although based on my own experience and testing with the longbow, inside of 1000 range there is no point at which the longbow ever outperforms the shortbow. This was confirmed numerically showing that rapid fire outputs an almost equivalent amount of damage to the shortbow autoattack.
This also means that unless somehow a person can keep an opponent at farther than 1000 range and then force them to eat auto attacks over a fairly mediocre time-to-kill period, the longbow doesn’t have a real purpose other than being a preference.

In a 1 0n 1 situation under 1000 range I never use the LB autoattack. 1 shot might get fired before I have time to switch weapons but the KB recharge, the 10 stacks of vulnerabilty, and the rapid fire (easily used with quickness) equates to a pretty good weapon with CC and dmg. If you stay in LB while at point blank range then sb would have a strong advantage.

The question posted by the OP is, “Is Ranger Longbow really this bad?” By posting my background with it I was simultaneously answering this question by saying LB is good and saying that LB is viable pvp weapon when in the right hands. Granted I have not seen ANYONE who can use it well. I can. So therefore my opinion of the weapon is that it is a good weapon and just like any other weapon, if the weapon is in the right hands then it is a good weapon.

Eurantien.4632:

jcbroe.4329:

Eurantien.4632:

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Lol no, not even in the right hands. Its still a crappy weapon. If it was good, Id be on my ranger all day, instead Im on my engineer. No its not a learn to play issue either, Im actually good.

I use LB in Paids. Your argument is invalid.

Usage does not equate to effectiveness or being an optimal choice. So technically, neither argument is truly logically valid.

Although based on my own experience and testing with the longbow, inside of 1000 range there is no point at which the longbow ever outperforms the shortbow. This was confirmed numerically showing that rapid fire outputs an almost equivalent amount of damage to the shortbow autoattack.
This also means that unless somehow a person can keep an opponent at farther than 1000 range and then force them to eat auto attacks over a fairly mediocre time-to-kill period, the longbow doesn’t have a real purpose other than being a preference.

In a 1 0n 1 situation under 1000 range I never use the LB autoattack. 1 shot might get fired before I have time to switch weapons but the KB recharge, the 10 stacks of vulnerabilty, and the rapid fire (easily used with quickness) equates to a pretty good weapon with CC and dmg. If you stay in LB while at point blank range then sb would have a strong advantage.

The question posted by the OP is, “Is Ranger Longbow really this bad?” By posting my background with it I was simultaneously answering this question by saying LB is good and saying that LB is viable pvp weapon when in the right hands. Granted I have not seen ANYONE who can use it well. I can. So therefore my opinion of the weapon is that it is a good weapon and just like any other weapon, if the weapon is in the right hands then it is a good weapon.

Feel free to back up your amazing claims of talent with some kind of evidence if there is any. Claiming the LB is viable in pvp is one thing, but claiming that you, and only you, have unlocked it’s true power is something else entirely.

Sb does way better damage because more of its arrows HIT. Youre lucky if rapid fire lands half of its damage on a moving dodging target lawl. If lb got 30 percent projectile speed buff I would consider using it. Until then warrior rifle and mesmer gs remain vastly superior

I’ve been trying out a DPS build with longbow in WvW for defense purposes. While it’s certainly not as useful in PvP situations as the tanky build, it works fairly well in group fights where I’m not being focused down too much due to the 1500 range.

The key to it for me has been multiple sources of quickness. With quickness, rapid fire turns from a lousy skill to a fight finisher which does 10+ k damage. Surprised people haven’t seen those numbers, I only have 90% crit damage and 80% crit chance (including fury) for the moment and have done 10+ k numerous times (use of signets will boost it even further), with video footage to back it up. Autoattack at max range can do anywhere from 2000-3000 damage so it’s not entirely horrible for shooting down people trying to run from you. Thieves can barely take 3 of those hits.

Targeting issues and arrows randomly missing or being obstructed by seemingly nothing makes it a pain to use sometimes. You lose fights you should win due to these issues. On open field or defending though I have no problems. Anybody who stands too long at the edge of a tower or keep will go down from rapid fire/barrage combo.

i feel like the rapid fire should be 5 shots instead of 10. it is simply too easy for people to dodge out of the way, not to mention that half the arrows simply miss vs a target running sideways.

running full zerk i can land a 7k rapid pretty easily, but i have to land nearly every arrow. i got hit for a 7.9k fire grab last night. that’s 1 hit.

a 5 arrows rapid fire with the same dmg would still allow people to dodge, but also at least give a chance for most arrows to actually land.

TheRatso.2956:

I use a longbow and even though I know already that it doesn’t do as much dps as the short bow ,I has a longer range and it has a knock back and the #5 skill is quite useful (in basic pve anyway) then I switch to the greatsord and maul them,whereas when I use the short bow I do quicker damage but less aoe’s and its less useful imo I haven’t tried doing pvp with it yet so I Dupont know how good it is there

It actually doesn’t have a longer range. Short bow and long bow both have a 1,200 range.

Grigthar.1892:

TheRatso.2956:

I use a longbow and even though I know already that it doesn’t do as much dps as the short bow ,I has a longer range and it has a knock back and the #5 skill is quite useful (in basic pve anyway) then I switch to the greatsord and maul them,whereas when I use the short bow I do quicker damage but less aoe’s and its less useful imo I haven’t tried doing pvp with it yet so I Dupont know how good it is there

It actually doesn’t have a longer range. Short bow and long bow both have a 1,200 range.

Agree’d unless you trait for the longer LB range, but you know that.

vespers.1759:

i run full zerk and if i land a full rapid fire i’ve hit 9.8k max (vs an upleveled ranger lol).

couple that with entangle and jaguar 3k crits and many people go down quick. longbow on a tank build is pretty bad, but don’t under estimate what it can do.

also don’t forget about pet swap for quickness and rapid fire. it comes out quick when not expected.

Making sure you understand me, my original statement was LB at range or at Max range… Entangle and pet swaping are not a good idea at 1500+ range when it takes so long for your pet to run up to the person. They won’t be just sitting there waiting for you pet to arrive, because you swapped them out so you could acquire quickness.

I run with 24K health, your nice crit and cat crit has taken me down to 1/2 health, to which I’ve now popped a 940 tick TU… You ready for your next set of cool downs? Hope you get your crit on those as well.

Edit: What should really get your goat is… with 24k health, I’ve been 3 shot by a thief.

@grigthar
Longbow have 1500 range when you use a trait-skill. Which grants 5% bonus range to Harpoons and Longbows.

Looking over most the replies here, i will with great caution and a bit of humility, suggest that most of you have the concept of the ranger completely wrong.
The ranger and it’s skillset aren’t made for solo fighting in an open area. The whole idea behind the ranger, is for it to be a hunter. You’re supposed to chase your target till it dies, or ambush people.
Playing the ranger as a supportive role, and or as a trapper (not spamming traps, but literally backstabbing people who does not suspect it) has proven to work out very well, for me at least.

As for WvW, the longbow DOES come with some major advantages over the shortbow, since you can stay outside the range of most mesmer/elementalist/engineer/warrior attacks. Given that i use full berserker, coupled with crit + power + precision trinkets, traits set to 20/30/0/20/0. I have both the HP to tank, and the DPS to make most people soil themselves whenever they come close to the edge of a wall.

The basic shot may not be very effective. But IF you stand down, and try to HELP kill instead of getting the kill, you may just find yourself getting a lot more kills altogether with the longbow.

Oh, and as a sidenote, i have yet to loose in a fight against a shortbow. Even if it’s 1v1, the shortbow user always run or switch to melee.

with my high crit build I have no problem using the longbow from a tower wall to do over 20k worth of dmg with rapid fire. Short bow does not give me this kind of satisfaction. With that said, longbow is best used while behind lines.

nerva.7940:

Sb does way better damage because more of its arrows HIT. Youre lucky if rapid fire lands half of its damage on a moving dodging target lawl. If lb got 30 percent projectile speed buff I would consider using it. Until then warrior rifle and mesmer gs remain vastly superior

“Lawl”? The arrows fly at the same speed. There’s no difference in flight trajectory or speed between a SB or LB arrow. The only difference ends up being range. At longer range, EVERY projectile attack in the game is more likely to miss. SB at 1200 and LB at 1200 miss at the same rate.

Its either your imagination or some fault of yours that is making your LB miss more than your SB.

NargofWoV.4267:

vespers.1759:

i run full zerk and if i land a full rapid fire i’ve hit 9.8k max (vs an upleveled ranger lol).

couple that with entangle and jaguar 3k crits and many people go down quick. longbow on a tank build is pretty bad, but don’t under estimate what it can do.

also don’t forget about pet swap for quickness and rapid fire. it comes out quick when not expected.

Making sure you understand me, my original statement was LB at range or at Max range… Entangle and pet swaping are not a good idea at 1500+ range when it takes so long for your pet to run up to the person. They won’t be just sitting there waiting for you pet to arrive, because you swapped them out so you could acquire quickness.

I run with 24K health, your nice crit and cat crit has taken me down to 1/2 health, to which I’ve now popped a 940 tick TU… You ready for your next set of cool downs? Hope you get your crit on those as well.

Edit: What should really get your goat is… with 24k health, I’ve been 3 shot by a thief.

nobody ever uses longbow at max range unless it’s a zvz. in a 1v1 i usually ignore the number 1. only 1 is affected by distance from target. rapid fire works best at close range because more arrows land. besides, the longbow still crits for about 1200 when in about 600 range with my build, so that’ll overcome your troll anyway.

going into a 1v1 i unleash 3 and then 2 while running up to the target, then i entangle, swap to sword/horn and go to work with my invis jaguar. then i can swap back for the number 4 and another rapid fire.

tbh, rangers are the easiest class for me to kill, which i guess is kind of sad. most are using bows and they die before they escape my entangle.