Im fairly new to the game even though Ive owned it since it came out I just got busy with life.
My Ranger is currently lvl 64 (my highest character to date) and I actually enjoy playing it more than the other classes, but Ive just been doing solo pve.
I havent been reading any builds just playing what I enjoy which happens to be the Long Bow and the Short Bow.
Well today I start reading up and from what Im reading Im playing the character completly wrong.
So my questions are. Is there a LB/SB build thats viable? Whats wrong with using this combo?
Basically what I do is use my pet as tank, and just dps from range.
Longbow is a power weapon, meaning it gets the best benefits from Power, Precision and +Crit Damage.
Shortbow is more of a condition damage, meaning it gets more benefits from Condition Damage than Power.
However at your level it properly doesn’t matter yet because you just use armor you find.
The ranger is a strong class in open world PvE and until you get to level 80 you can just enjoy it. Experiment with skills and weapons and learn it for yourself. Once you start dungeons or PvP you can return to the boards and look for builds.
Longbow is a power weapon, meaning it gets the best benefits from Power, Precision and +Crit Damage.
Shortbow is more of a condition damage, meaning it gets more benefits from Condition Damage than Power.
However at your level it properly doesn’t matter yet because you just use armor you find.
Actually, the SB scales better with Power/Prec/CDMG than condition damage. Also, the SB is more of a utility weapon. You are not supposed to use #2 for damage.
If you want to argue SB power vs condi, keep in mind that SB only bleeds if flanking.
OP:
Just go with what you like and buy some blue gear on the TP. It’s really cheap.
While LB/SB can work in PvP and solo PvE, they are (aside from LB Barrage and SB poison which does trivial damage) single-target weapons.
For grouped play, you will want to have/know how to use the other weapons which damage multiple targets at once. Axe bounces. Sword and greatsword cleave. While bow DPS can come close to or beat out the melee weapons against single targets, against multiple targets the melee weapons leave the bows in the dust. I run with a bow and a melee weapon (usually sword/horn or GS) most of the time and switch depending on if I want to attack ranged/melee and single/multiple target.
Edit: Yes, technically piercing arrows can make bows hit multiple targets. In practice, a small movement by two targets can force you to make large movements to keep them lined up for piercing arrows. So piercing arrows aren’t like bouncing or cleaving attacks which are guaranteed to hit multiple targets. It’s more like single target unless you get lucky and the targets happen to be lined up. The only way to avoid the small/large movement imbalance is to move to melee range, at which point why not just use a melee weapon.
About SB as condi weapon: notice the attack speed also helps a lot. With trait and sigil of earth, you can proc both those bleeds every ICD. SB can make great bleeds if you don’t flank
