Guild Wars 2

So, I’ve finally found a “groove” in WVW as a ranger. I run Xsorus’ condition (axe/torch and sword/dagger) build when I am in small groups or roaming. The survivability is great, and the damage is really goodj (it sort of catches people by surprise). This is a great build—well thought out, all the attacks are useful and can pump out respectable damage over time (though you still kill mostly by attrition).

Then when I am larger groups I run a completely different build, similar to a team SB/LB build that Sol has posted. I can do good damage, contribute to tower defense and pretty effectively pick off stragglers. But I die if an opponent looks at me the wrong way…

The problem is that the first build is awful for large group play and the second build is far too fragile for solo/roaming and small skirmishes. So I am porting back to the training guy and respecing several times an evening so I can contribute to WVW. Also, this limits flexibility—if our commander needs a small group of volunteers to make a supply run and I’m in my team spec, then I’m screwed (if I run into enemies).

This, along with pet responsiveness (why the hell is there a 2 second cast time for so many F2 abilities when the pet is soooo slow) are my two main gripes about rangers in WVW.

Is this the case for other classes? I have an 80 thief alt and I use the same build for all WVW situations. Do other classes have to rely on such situation specific build to be effective? Or is this unique to the ranger?

I tried to make build that would cover these problems but yeah, I am forced to change my build none stop to be effective, I personally hate roaming with a bunker build in small roaming groups due to fact we have little damage output, I do tend to run the 0/30/30/5/5 for both Zerging/roaming i carry 3 sets of armor that I can get to work effective under them traits.

Sol.4310:

I tried to make build that would cover these problems but yeah, I am forced to change my build none stop to be effective, I personally hate roaming with a bunker build in small roaming groups due to fact we have little damage output, I do tend to run the 0/30/30/5/5 for both Zerging/roaming i carry 3 sets of armor that I can get to work effective under them traits.

x-30-30-x-x build is good enough for multiple type of armors and builds,

eg.
1 set for glass cannon
1 set for condition trapper

I run a 20 I VIII / 30 II VIII XI / 15 III / 0 / 5 Condition trap build. Solo roaming I’m not tanky enough to with attrition but with the amount of trap dmg & duration I more often than not come out alive. Small groups I always keep my distance and very close attention to keeping that 1200 distance anything close and I drop traps around me for annoying thieves or d/d ele rtl etc Large scale I do fine as piercing shots shine in that type of fight and traps keep from being pushed you just have to have a cyclic movement of in drop traps and back out let group regens hit you. For melee I use sword/torch(whichI swap in warhorn as needed to get a 3rd trap on bar for keep defense etc).

So far I’ve only run Ranger and Mesmer in WvW extensively and this is a problem I only have on my ranger.

My mesmer I run the same trait build in pretty much every area of the game. I swap around my utilities based on what I’m doing though (unlike ranger the mesmer utilities are good untraited). I think the only time I’ve actually changed a trait in my mesmer build is to reduce the CD on ports when I’m in the JP.

This is one of the many reasons I dropped my ranger for my mesmer. I don’t have to carry around bags full of multiple gear sets and constantly retrait for different areas of the game (or in WvW the same area) or risk being seriously kitten because I’m specced wrong.

I found my ideal wvw build. Im a huge critic of the prof and let me tell u this is the one. Im putting up a short teaser in the morning with plenty more to come.

Ok, but you cant do this! Tell us now!

Alright fine im kinda bored at work. It’s not the best dueling build (I prefer attrition bunker) but this covers all the other bases. I started with Sol’s build and i actually found that traps did not do enough damage without significant cond investment and most of the time i couldnt justify using up the 2 utility slots.

I decided to take the SB to the next level. The build is 20/25/20/0/5 with thief runes and sigil of fire on the SB. TU, LR, QZ and SoH or Protect Me in utilities. RaO elite.

When flanking on full endurance I do 30% additional damage. Piercing arrows is essential for focusing a target who tries to run into the zerg for safety. Between frequent quickness and fire procs every 5 seconds your aoe damage far surpasses anything else the ranger might be capable of.

Pvt armor and weapon, knight accessories. With food and all bloodlust stacks I have 2400 power, 46% crit, 20k hp, and 1900 toughness. Fury is up whenever i want it. I use birds for the f2 and swapping otherwise i dont worry about the pets. This build is meant to last. It has decent supplementary long range aoe but most of all you can focus people down like a boss. Any bunker will be sweating bullets before eventually falling. high dps/zerker specs are my first priority and they melt like butter.

Anyway have fun with it and plz move all discussion to my thread tomorrow

Jos.8793:

I’ve been looking into differents topics but as I don’t sPvp much, i would like to have a discussion more WvW oriented.

I actually run a 20/30/15/0/5 build with shortbow and longbow/GS. As i was mainly running with zergs my stuff was close to full berserker…Now i’m considering roaming solo a little bit and therefore change some of my gear from berserker to knight in order to not be One Shot….

nerva.7940:

thats a squishy build, i wouldnt recommend to a beginner. you will get dropped by a haste thief in under a second.

Since u are actually running quite the exact same build could i just know what changed your mind ?

However i totally agree that one of this build advantages is to adapt well to different kind of gear

From what i have tried I’m not a big fan of pvt gear as I think that vitality is not that useful (even if it’s nice to have more than the minimum 20k seems a bit too high)

Furthermore your base precision seems a bit low … 46 % is good but u could easily up it by switching gear or weapon, which could be more useful especially since u’re using sigil of fire which would proc more…About weapon, if sigil of fire is great for zergs, i would recommend to also get a shortbow with sigil of purity or sigil of generosity for solo as u have no condition removal on your build.

Full knight’s is questionable as thieves can cut through 15k hp in no time. What changed my mind was pvt gear and the insane damage output compared to what im used to. It’s not a solo build. High vit and toughness is the only way to go if you dont have +healing. The high hp is a nice buffer and your group should have cond cleansing. If solo, confusion and bunker necros/rangers would probably be a problem. Have a look at my thread tomorrow we can talk about it.

I am considering getting a berserker sb. Survivability hasnt been an issue in a good group. With fury 66% crit is plenty imo.

Slowly starting to settle my new shortbow power build into WvW and I’m pretty happy with it, I can sit with 2000 power and 40% crit and that’s before I put any points in either marksmanship or skirmishing. So that means I can have 2000 power, 40% crit in a BM build if I wanted and sit at round 600 healing, 1800 health and 1900 toughness.

Throw in a sigil of fire and I’m pretty happy.

Edit – sigil of generosity is great for roaming, kinda funny to see all your conditions jump back to the mez or necro.

nerva.7940:

Full knight’s is questionable as thieves can cut through 15k hp in no time. What changed my mind was pvt gear and the insane damage output compared to what im used to. It’s not a solo build. High vit and toughness is the only way to go if you dont have +healing. The high hp is a nice buffer and your group should have cond cleansing. If solo, confusion and bunker necros/rangers would probably be a problem. Have a look at my thread tomorrow we can talk about it.

I am considering getting a berserker sb. Survivability hasnt been an issue in a good group. With fury 66% crit is plenty imo.

Sounds like we landed around the same place with power builds, our stats fall about the same place if I put my points in the same place. I reached the same conclusion with conditions in WvW as you and just never wanted to give up utility for traps

Sounds like you will have less healing than me but a fair amount more health. Using TU really helps with lower healing, I might try adding more health like you and see how that goes.

I love runes of the thief as well. The flanking damage is great. As is sigil of fire.

Only class to give me trouble is PD thieves, but then that’s nothing new. I can still keep them running around after me if I don’t try and kill them and just worry about staying alive. Glass cannon backstabbing thieves are fun to kill.

I run condition, 5 marks 30 skirm, 30 wild 5Beast mastery, I get by with simply switching the trap traits for SB/LB cool down a stun duration (sb 5) I also run with +90% bleed duration (45% all other conditions) SB and sword/torch (with horn swaps from back pack for moving) . Prec/tough/condi temple armors (around 1700 condition damage with corruption stacks and food). I constantly swap out my traits and utilities for what i’m doing. In zerg/ tower defense I’ll go with 3 traps, solo I’ll run QZ LR and Sharpening stone, or if someone Is kiting a lot I’ll swap in the sylvari root/ frost trap/ spike trap.

If you want more stats I’ll look them up when i get home from work

I miss the days of GW1 when we could reset our attribute points for free any time we were in an outpost. Although, it wasn’t always that way. You used to have to earn skill points to respec.

I’m hoping that sometime soon Anet will give us the ability to respec our traits for free out of combat so that we can experiment with builds more readily and be more versatile as situations present themselves. I can see this being limited to out of dungeons, but it’d be super useful in PvP and lotsa fun in PvE. As it is we can swap out traits, but our trait points are locked in. Just free em up please.

I’ll lay this out there …

A warrior can have permament fury, swiftness, and 5 stacks of might using 10 points in Discipline, 20 to 30 points in Tactics (for 20% to 0% boon duration) and Runes that give boon duration (Monk, Water, Altruism). That’s only a 30 to 40 trait point investment and rune investment to have permanent 33% movespeed, 20% crit chance, and 5 stacks of +power/condition damage. The warrior can do this with ANY weapon set. The only slot they have to take is Signet of Rage (the elite most take anyways).

Can ranger do this? Heck no. Just to get permanent swiftness the Ranger has to take horn and runes of the centaur … which also forces us to put our heal on cooldown to get that swiftness.