Guild Wars 2

Hey guys. I’m a new Charr Ranger here. I previously mained a Warrior and got tired of Engineer. I found Ranger who so far felt like Warrior but still felt different enough to keep me entertained.

Anyone have tips for PvE+Dungeons/Fractals? And is this the right class for me? I was looking for a DPS-profession, and although people said otherwise about the Ranger, their DPS didn’t really seem all that bad when I tested it in the mists.

What SHOULD my role be in the team? I heard Ranger pets could efficiently tank Old Tom in Uncategorized Fractal, as well as allow you to skip much of the Volcano fractal.

What weapons do you recommend using? So far Axe seems godsent for general PvE and areas with dense mobs. I’m also interested how Sword allows you to “chase” foes and hop around, but is it really that bad of a weapon? What about Greatsword? Is longbow our only decent weapon?

Utilities? Spirits seem to be pretty decent

Traits? (For DPS? And for Dungeons?) The one I tested in the mists is 20/30/20. Is Beastmastery worth investing in wahtsoever?

What about pets? Currently I’m fond of the Red Moa because it reminds me of Warrior who has on-demand, near perma-fury. Is Fury worth trying to upkeep with Warhorn too?

Swiftness for open-world PvE? Just the warhorn or any other decent sources you recommend?

Elite skill? Rampage As One seems like an inferior version of Signet of Fury with much higher cooldown.. Is it worth investing in the other elites? Spirit of Nature heals+res worthwhile? Or Entangle good on ranged bosses who cannot hit the vines? (I’m Charr, by the way.)

Runes? Ruby Orb? What stats do you use on your armor?

I also hear Rangers excel at Quickness? Explain. It involves GZ and a trait? Is it really worth using?

And just overall tips for a new Charr Ranger? Is this class for me if I want a DPS-alt to Warrior? Thanks!

Ranger has lower DPS than tank builds of other classes.

Your role in a team is to be a burden. People will essentially be carrying you while you contribute barely anything to the team.

As for weapons, considering they all suck, just take one which seems fun. Greatsword, longbow, and axes never cease to bore me.

Spirits suck. As for the other utilities: our shouts suck as well, and the only somewhat decent signet we have is Signet of the Wild. Traps are decent when traited into them. Several of our survival utilities are average.

Beastmastery is worth investing in if you want to pretend that your pet can actually hit something, or for when you want to pretend you’re supporting your team with heals.

All pets die when sneezed upon. In WvW, your best bet are ranged pets as they die less often. For sPvP, dogs should do the trick.

Warhorn is the only viable swiftness we have. We have an elite with an atrocious cooldown and we can gain a few seconds of swiftness when swapping weapons if traited, but it requires you to be in combat.

The elite spirit is decent in certain specific situations. The AoE root is good for PvE kiting or against dumb PvPers. Rampage As One is our only source of stability, so it’s almost a must in PvP.

Runes depend entirely on your build. I use Dwayna because I like to pretend I make a good substitute for a support guardian (which I don’t.)

Rangers have one 4-second quickness on demand during which you cannot heal. You can also trait into having 2 seconds of quickness whenever you swap pets in combat. That would be every 20 seconds if I’m not mistaken.

Finally, if you want a DPS alt to warrior, this is not the class for you. Pick thief or hell, even a guardian.

Agadar.4931:

You can also trait into having 2 seconds of quickness whenever you swap pets in combat. That would be every 20 seconds if I’m not mistaken.

When in combat i think its 60 seconds. Everything else is very right, if you have a ranger Reroll for your safety.

CalGarith.6517:

Agadar.4931:

You can also trait into having 2 seconds of quickness whenever you swap pets in combat. That would be every 20 seconds if I’m not mistaken.

When in combat i think its 60 seconds. Everything else is very right, if you have a ranger Reroll for your safety.

Oh come on, Rangers can’t be that bad, right? I only deal 300 average dmg each hit with the Engineer’s Pistol 1… Engineers are locked into 1 viable build (Grenades)

Kain Francois.4328:

CalGarith.6517:

Agadar.4931:

You can also trait into having 2 seconds of quickness whenever you swap pets in combat. That would be every 20 seconds if I’m not mistaken.

When in combat i think its 60 seconds. Everything else is very right, if you have a ranger Reroll for your safety.

Oh come on, Rangers can’t be that bad, right? I only deal 300 average dmg each hit with the Engineer’s Pistol 1… Engineers are locked into 1 viable build (Grenades)

In that case, engineers have one more viable build than rangers have.

I really wish it wasn’t this bad. I really do. But when I can own face on my friend’s warrior and guardian while barely having played either class, while struggling with my ranger, on which I spend almost 300 hours on, it becomes atrociously obvious that rangers are a horrible class.

Don’t play the class

When your dps totals are predicated upon the output of a pet, which tends to die a LOT or if you’re up on a wall are rendered useless… The class has issues.

One of Ranger’s advantages is good single-target ranged DPS, due to the combination of Shortbow attack speed + high quickness uptime. Which is very very useful for dungeons (In my opinion).

Rangers have the best quickness skill in the game (Quickening Zephyr) and quickness everytime we swap pets if you trait for it. If you trait for the 20% survival skill cd reduction, and have 15 in Beastmastery, we are talking about ~8s of quickness every 50 seconds (If your pet lives). Which is nothing to sneeze at.

Quickness is also pretty amazing for non-dps purposes too. In dungeons, it’s a pretty common occurance that people will get downed. Use your quickness to quickly rez them. Quickness rezzes + Spirit of Rez Elite makes very me very beastly when it comes to saving downed teammates (and it WILL happen in dungeons).

Also, Rangers have a ton of battle mobility. Between the Shortbow’s 3, Lightning Reflexes, and the passive endurance regen trait, you will have lots of dodges at your disposal. Which is incredibly useful in dungeons.

On the downside though, Rangers are reliant on pets. I’ve yet to run tests on how much percentage of a Rangers damage is contributed by pets, but you rely on pets for 1. dmg and 2. source of quickness. If your pet is dead, you gain much less quickness due to pet cd being 48s instead of 16s.

And again, this is from perspective of dungeon/PvEs. sPvP/WvW is a completely different beast.

Gentlemen, you have more than enough places to vent your frustrations, there’s no need to hijack this poor guy’s thread for another soapbox opportunity.

That’s quite a few questions, OP. I think a deeps dungeon ranger would be better suited to answering alot of them, as I tend to fool around with more defensive and beastmaster-focused builds. I can help out with a couple of them, though.

For open world PvE Swiftness;
You can abuse Quickening Screech from Birds by using a combination of Attack, Swap and Return to keep swiftness up on yourself so long as you are running within mid-range of a mob. You do this by getting within mid-range, Pressing ‘Attack my Target’, and then pressing ‘Return’ after you’ve received swiftness but before your pet has hit the mob. You do this while continuing to run, so that you’re sort running past mobs and using them as anchor points to speed yourself forward. When you’re almost out of swiftness, swap to another bird and run past another mob within mid-range to refresh it. It’s tricky to find that sweet spot, if you press ‘attack my target’ at too far away the bird will fly closer to the mob before casting and you’ll be out of range to receive it, if you’re too close the bird will just use Swoop and put you into combat because Bird AI seems to be conditional to player proximity to the enemy. But with a little practice and you’ll be soaring through whole zones before you even know it.

Spirits:
There are people who swear by them, so if they look interesting to you you should give them a try. But, there’s alot of little odd hang-ups to working with them that keep them from really gaining popular traction. Like the vulnerability and stationary aspects can encourage this sort of ‘stuffing the buff-dealer into a protective hidey hole’ gameplay, but range limits and the inability to control where they are summoned in relation to you don’t allow you enough space and precision to get really clever with it. There’s a few traits that can encourage you having them as sort of traps or mobile traps, but the cast time is hard to work with and it’s a bit functionally redundant to our actual traps. They’re utilities with alot of different possible playstyles, but all the concessions made to keep it from being overpowered with one trait, keep them from really reaching their full potential with others. The mechanic needs to resolve it’s identity crisis, or embrace it fully by making the necessary balance tradeoffs for the benefits of taking a trait on each trait independently and not the mechanic as a whole.

Not one, but TWO Rangers at FoTM lvl 54! Can’t be that bad, especially when his attacks deal 2000 dmg at 1500 range, can it?

If any fellow enthusiastic Rangers wanna party with me or level with me, pm “Dalal Kruschev” ingame (my Charr Ranger!)

Kain Francois.4328:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQPt8STlszg

Not one, but TWO Rangers at FoTM lvl 54! Can’t be that bad, especially when his attacks deal 2000 dmg at 1500 range, can it?

If any fellow enthusiastic Rangers wanna party with me or level with me, pm “Dalal Kruschev” ingame (my Charr Ranger!)

People complain way too much on the forums. At least from a PvE/Dungeon perspective, rangers aren’t THAT terrible. Hell, I played ranger since day 1; it’s my only lvl 80 and I don’t plan on shelving him for a very long time. I use SB/LB, know how to use both well enough depending on the situation, ankittenanky as balls (3k armor w/18k hp). I literally never go down in solo PvE and dungeons.

I love my ranger and as the fixes start coming it, I’ll love it even more. The Opening Strike fix is already a big step IMO and I’m gunning down mobs even faster (<5 seconds).

Agadar.4931:

Ranger has lower DPS than tank builds of other classes.

Your role in a team is to be a burden. People will essentially be carrying you while you contribute barely anything to the team.

As for weapons, considering they all suck, just take one which seems fun. Greatsword, longbow, and axes never cease to bore me.

Spirits suck. As for the other utilities: our shouts suck as well, and the only somewhat decent signet we have is Signet of the Wild. Traps are decent when traited into them. Several of our survival utilities are average.

Beastmastery is worth investing in if you want to pretend that your pet can actually hit something, or for when you want to pretend you’re supporting your team with heals.

All pets die when sneezed upon. In WvW, your best bet are ranged pets as they die less often. For sPvP, dogs should do the trick.

Warhorn is the only viable swiftness we have. We have an elite with an atrocious cooldown and we can gain a few seconds of swiftness when swapping weapons if traited, but it requires you to be in combat.

The elite spirit is decent in certain specific situations. The AoE root is good for PvE kiting or against dumb PvPers. Rampage As One is our only source of stability, so it’s almost a must in PvP.

Runes depend entirely on your build. I use Dwayna because I like to pretend I make a good substitute for a support guardian (which I don’t.)

Rangers have one 4-second quickness on demand during which you cannot heal. You can also trait into having 2 seconds of quickness whenever you swap pets in combat. That would be every 20 seconds if I’m not mistaken.

Finally, if you want a DPS alt to warrior, this is not the class for you. Pick thief or hell, even a guardian.

Respect! I only would add clearly until the class is fixxed (if), to reroll

Don’t listen to the whining BS, most of it it’s even false (like tanky builds doing more DPS than glass cannon ranger…quite funny)

The best spec for PvE/dungeons is glass cannon if you want to maximize your DPS, weapons are up to you but imo shortbow/longbow is the best combo overall.

Ruby Orbs are great, not the best but they are not far from it and they are cheap…you can get 6 for like 30s instead of spending 20g+ to get 5%+ dmg more. The optimal runes for glass cannon probably are Scholar imo.

The spec varies, some people likes a more defensive or glass cannon. But at least 5 points into BM are a must have for the situational quickness which you can use for different things, for example to rez people faster.
My spec is 20/30/5/0/15, no complains so far tho sometimes i miss the increased range trait on my longbow :O

Rangers are great, the best fractal teams i’ve grouped with (randoms) had 2-3 rangers on the group…it’s a decent class.

Yea, I have a tip for you… Read the “Rangers are OP” thread, watch the Video’s and make sure you can deal with these issues in the class you play. They’re not as 100% rampent as the video’s portray, but these two/three bugs are pervasive and do happen in dungeons, WvWvW and PvP, so you need to be aware.

Sleepy.2647:

Don’t listen to the whining BS, most of it it’s even false (like tanky builds doing more DPS than glass cannon ranger…quite funny)

The best spec for PvE/dungeons is glass cannon if you want to maximize your DPS, weapons are up to you but imo shortbow/longbow is the best combo overall.

Ruby Orbs are great, not the best but they are not far from it and they are cheap…you can get 6 for like 30s instead of spending 20g+ to get 5%+ dmg more. The optimal runes for glass cannon probably are Scholar imo.

The spec varies, some people likes a more defensive or glass cannon. But at least 5 points into BM are a must have for the situational quickness which you can use for different things, for example to rez people faster.
My spec is 20/30/5/0/15, no complains so far tho sometimes i miss the increased range trait on my longbow :O

Rangers are great, the best fractal teams i’ve grouped with (randoms) had 2-3 rangers on the group…it’s a decent class.

Glass-cannon is risky in dungeons, even with a coordinated group cuz any silver mob that comes by and looks at you funny will take a good chuck of your hp out. I hate glass-cannon builds for the sole purpose that if I make a mistake, half to 3/4 of my hp is gone. It’s never fun to see someone go down in the heat of battle cuz then the group temporarily has lost 20% of its peak fighting efficiency.

The stats on my build are 3k att, 3k def, 45% crit rate, 25% crit dam (0% come from gear btw). I run my traits very similar to yours (20/25/10/0/15). Granted, I was a little bit hasty when I said that I gun down mobs in 5 seconds (more like 7 seconds on average). But compare my build/gear to yours, which I’m assuming is glass-cannon, you’d be sacrificing a ton of vit and toughness for smaller increases in damage over the long run.

I’m not intending to start some flame war between us, but even as a tanky build (I don’t even slot runes, just soldier crests), I can still dish out great damage, on ranger standards, and still be a living fortress at the same time.

Sugoi Travis.2651:

I’m not intending to start some flame war between us, but even as a tanky build (I don’t even slot runes, just soldier crests), I can still dish out great damage, on ranger standards, and still be a living fortress at the same time.

A glass cannon has over 100% crit damage and with over 50% crit chance that’s where your biggest damage comes from.

I have no doubt that a power/vit/toughness can do “decent” damage but if you can survive being glass cannon you should do it…full tanky stats is overkill imo unless you play with other weapons (melee).
You can always switch some berseker gear for valkyrie gear which gives you some more survivality without sacrificing your damage too much.
The damage difference is huge, not small. You have 25% crit damage and 45% crit rate, i have 55% crit rate and 104% crit damage tho only 2k armor and 15.4k HP.

It’s just up to the player…to me glass cannon has enough survivality for PvE/Dungeons, it doesn’t have to be the same for everyone.

Sleepy.2647:

Sugoi Travis.2651:

I’m not intending to start some flame war between us, but even as a tanky build (I don’t even slot runes, just soldier crests), I can still dish out great damage, on ranger standards, and still be a living fortress at the same time.

A glass cannon has over 100% crit damage and with over 50% crit chance that’s where your biggest damage comes from.

I have no doubt that a power/vit/toughness can do “decent” damage but if you can survive being glass cannon you should do it…full tanky stats is overkill imo unless you play with other weapons (melee).
You can always switch some berseker gear for valkyrie gear which gives you some more survivality without sacrificing your damage too much.
The damage difference is huge, not small. You have 25% crit damage and 45% crit rate, i have 55% crit rate and 104% crit damage tho only 2k armor and 15.4k HP.

It’s just up to the player…to me glass cannon has enough survivality for PvE/Dungeons, it doesn’t have to be the same for everyone.

Ah that’s right. I didn’t factor in the trait bonus and other things (such a dummy). That really does change things in favor for you. But I’m kinda wondering how do you have such monstrous crit damage. Full berserker/ruby gives 48%, max crit trait gives another 30%, 6 divinities give a total of 12%. Where does the other 14% come from?

30% from traits, 9% from weapon, 16% from armor + 12% from runes, 4% backpiece, 8% amulet, 8% and 5% ring, 6% x2 earrings = 104, could have some more if i had another 8% ascended ring (or the orichalcum berseker ring, but i use both ascended) and an ascended quiver i guess.

I’m cheap for using ruby orbs, but 20g for scholar runes…hurts, still debating on how much of an increase it actually is, probably worth it.

Gotcha. Thanks man.

Hey Sleepy, do you use a Crimson Moa or do you even bother caring about fury at that point?

Jay.3284:

Don’t play the class

Different Jay same answer.

I don’t like Moa pets at all, i don’t use them. Pets I tend to use are double devourers or jaguar/hawk, and bears in certain stuff. I love jaguar/hawk but i switch to devourers when i know melee pets won’t do much or die “oneshotted”. I wish we could at least change our non used pet even while in combat, it would really help.

About fury…it’s still nice but i don’t care about it, a better pet will serve you more than a buff every now and then. Either way, pets are pretty much a matter of taste but devourers are probably my favourite pets in Dungeons because they are durable and make decent DPS. Probably red Moa boosts more your party if you happen to use it when everyone is close enough tho.

Kain Francois.4328:

Hey guys. I’m a new Charr Ranger here. I previously mained a Warrior and got tired of Engineer. I found Ranger who so far felt like Warrior but still felt different enough to keep me entertained.

Don’t ignore the pet, and don’t expect to match the warrior’s DPS or the thief’s burst without it. Especially the warrior; that’s the ‘herpaderpa i keel u with big numbers’ class. The ranger is the “works with pets and/or spirits” class. My advice is play it up to level 25, making sure you put points into beastmaster first since some pets are Too Squishy without it imo, and then the extra 5 levels let you decide if you like the pet mechanic or not.
In dungeons you need to pay attention to the pets. Sometimes there’s the cheap AoE murderskills that the pet probably won’t survive, but beyond that so long as you don’t treat it as some fire-and-forget feathered/furry/scaled missile and pay attention to it should be okay.

To be very clear; this incarnation of ranger is not an archer class like it was in GW1. If you go in expecting to beat the Warrior, a class designed to be the best with weapons, using only your ranger with the pet for eyecandy, you’re going to set yourself up for heartache. The pet being the primary mechanic and the F keys should have tipped you off, but considering how many topics there are..