Guild Wars 2

Currently up to level 41, just learning as I go. But so far it seems like a fun and effective class with plenty of options. I didn’t really know what would work, but here’s what I came up with: Marksmanship, greatsword/longbow.

I found out right away that stacking might and signet actives with the opening strike effects from marksmanship can produce ridiculous damage at low levels using greatsword 2. Well in excess of my character’s max health on an opening strike, in fact! However, I’m assuming this has to do with the way stats scale at the low end as it’s leveled out to something a bit more reasonable as I’ve progressed.

But what do you guys think? I mean, I can read meta battle and find out what the latest raid, PvP, or WvW meta is. But I’ll be working toward reaching level 80 and then unlocking my elite spec for some time. What do you recommend to new rangers learning the ropes in open world?

You seem to be pretty much on the right track. The only things I can think of are:

• Always try to swap your pet before it dies.
• Depending on the mob, it’s generally best to open/swap to Longbow (LB) for burst, but swap back to Greatsword (GS) while you wait for cooldowns. It helps to use LB 3 just before LB 5 to relieve pressure off of you while you stand still.
• Don’t be that prick who knocks mobs away from other melee players with LB 4.
• Felines, such as Jaguar, have the highest DPS of vanilla pets, while Bears are the tankiest. Mind you, using a bear-pet, with a longbow is known as “Bearbow”, and it is the shame of all nooby Rangers. Try not to be caught like that too often.
• After Marksmanship, the next line you will likely want to go for is Skirmishing. Quickdraw is amazing.
• Until you hit lvl 80, I wouldn’t stress about your gear. Just equip whatever’s best that you happen to pick up.
• Finally, while Signets are ok, I would use more Survival or Shout skills after you fully Unlock Skirmishing. Go Beastmastery last if you want Shouts, or Wilderness Survival if you want Survival skills.

Cheers!

Razor.9872:

• Don’t be that prick who knocks mobs away from other melee players with LB 4.

Awh. =(

Razor.9872:

You seem to be pretty much on the right track. The only things I can think of are:

• Always try to swap your pet before it dies.
• Depending on the mob, it’s generally best to open/swap to Longbow (LB) for burst, but swap back to Greatsword (GS) while you wait for cooldowns. It helps to use LB 3 just before LB 5 to relieve pressure off of you while you stand still.
• Don’t be that prick who knocks mobs away from other melee players with LB 4.
• Felines, such as Jaguar, have the highest DPS of vanilla pets, while Bears are the tankiest. Mind you, using a bear-pet, with a longbow is known as “Bearbow”, and it is the shame of all nooby Rangers. Try not to be caught like that too often.
• After Marksmanship, the next line you will likely want to go for is Skirmishing. Quickdraw is amazing.
• Until you hit lvl 80, I wouldn’t stress about your gear. Just equip whatever’s best that you happen to pick up.
• Finally, while Signets are ok, I would use more Survival or Shout skills after you fully Unlock Skirmishing. Go Beastmastery last if you want Shouts, or Wilderness Survival if you want Survival skills.

Cheers!

Logged on to plus 1 that. Razor is spot on

Ranger is best for it’s melee.

sexuallegend.2153:

Ranger is best for it’s melee.

Isn’t every other class (i.e: warrior, guardian, thief, revenant) better than ranger at melee?

Wharrgarbl.9263:

sexuallegend.2153:

Ranger is best for it’s melee.

Isn’t every other class (i.e: warrior, guardian, thief, revenant) better than ranger at melee?

Depends on what you mean by “better”, and this is the crux of why you can’t compare professions in GW2 at a super basic level.

Anet has done a decent job balancing the professions. It’s not perfect, but you can’t look at druid and say “it does crap damage”. Why? Because druid is one of the most in-demand damage boosters.

Fluffball.8307:

Wharrgarbl.9263:

sexuallegend.2153:

Ranger is best for it’s melee.

Isn’t every other class (i.e: warrior, guardian, thief, revenant) better than ranger at melee?

Depends on what you mean by “better”, and this is the crux of why you can’t compare professions in GW2 at a super basic level.

Anet has done a decent job balancing the professions. It’s not perfect, but you can’t look at druid and say “it does crap damage”. Why? Because druid is one of the most in-demand damage boosters.

Anet balanced the professions for PvE, where it works very well. They did not balance for sPvP or WvW where the ranger does less well.

Ranger is usually poor at melee. It is best at medium to long range fire fights.

Thanks for the info! I chose beast mastery, but I am dying to try quick draw. It won’t be long!

I am a bit confused about pets. I’d heard that felines are the highest DPS, but I picked up an ice drake which has a tail swipe that seems to hit way harder than anything my jungle stalker pet can do. In fact, with boosters my stupid pet hits a good bit harder than I do with my biggest hit all boosted up!

Is there a resource that makes it easier to figure out what all these pets do? It seems the stats don’t tell the whole story. Or am I just missing something?

Drakes have a hard hitting AoE, so they’re a solid choice for PvE. Cats do very high single target damage. The best drake is probably lightning because the special F2 attack always hits multiple targets.

You should be able to google up a pet DPS chart, but basically it’s cats or maybe drakes for PvE.

Edit: For PvP/WvW you generally take a pet based on it’s F2 special attack because the other AI attacks are hard to land on humans.

Edit2: You can click on the pet info to see what skills pets have. I believe the default key is K.