Guild Wars 2

Well as the title says, I’m a new Ranger, and still new at the game. I’m level 16 right now, just looking to see what is the best way to set up for the lower levels as most people post builds for lvl 80.

I’d like to know a good build through leveling during the lower levels and what weapons you guys use for primary and secondary. Not sure if what pet you use really matters or not. And which way through the trait tree I should be going.

I was using Longbow/short bow and now trying shortbow/sword and dagger build for a bit to try something. Any tips would be appreciated thanks.

While you’re leveling, don’t be afraid to experiment, but if you’re looking for something efficient, then the shortbow will be your best bet with long bow as a close second. The rapid fire of a short bow pushes it ahead of a long bow in damage for most situations, even if you can’t flank for the bleed. Unless you can really keep max distance for the entire fight (which rarely happens when leveling), then you’re getting less damage than you would from a short bow.

For your offhand, axe + horn is the way to go since it will give you more aoe options with the axe and the swiftness from the horn is awesome to help you get around quickly. If you run up close to your enemy and use splitblade, you also get a lot of stacks of bleeds, so grabbing gear with +condition damage works very well for this.

As for pets, go with what deals as much damage as possible without dying. For most content, you can get away with just using a glass cannon pet, such as a jaguar. They will bring strong consistent damage and also deal big damage when attacking from stealth. There’s no real wrong answer with pets and each of them brings something unique to work better in certain situations (well, most of them at least), so get comfortable with using a different pet in different settings.

Ok thanks, but isn’t rapid fire on the long bow? Did you mean use the long bow over the short bow?

And what about traits which way should I be going first?

I just meant that the short bow has a fast attack speed with it’s auto attack and wasn’t talking about the Rapid Fire skill on the longbow. Sorry for the confusion.

Short Bow > Longbow

As for traits, go for damage traits while leveling and if you plan on running dungeons, get Piercing Arrows (requires 20 talents in Marks) as soon as you can.

For the most part, you can go straight into Marks and Skirmishing. I usually don’t go more than 20 into marks, but that’s a matter of preference. Also, picking up 10 points into Wilderness Survival is a strong choice since it works so well with Quickening Zephyr (great skill for any build). Muddy Terrain is another handy skill for leveling and benefits from this talent as well.

Traps are great for leveling, but they won’t really shine until you can invest 30 points into Skirmishing for the matching talents since this will greatly increase their damage and allow them to be used at range.

Tl; dr Go for something like this until you can get master level talents:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMMQNBlODbEoqxOySzi1SAsUsXgtCcyUYIjfBA;TgAAzCpomxMjYG7MuZkzA

When you can get master level talents, go for something like this:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMMQNBlODbEoquOySui1SAsUsXgtCcyeYojP+K0KA;TgAAzCpomxMjYG7MuZkzA

Well every manual you use will re-train all your skill points so you can experiment… alot.

Personally Ive gone for a pet tank build. I’ve got a shortbow for my main and a great-sword for backup. Ive got a fern hound for my main, the cripple ability helps keep the enemies away and the special ability helps keep their health up with a polar bear for backup. Ive set all my stats and ability s to increase my pets stats so he has 2 passive healing abils, speed boosts, toughness boosts. My pet does over half of my damage as a result but if you can keep the enemies focused on them then you can take on any solo enemie basically, I solo’d a champ and a vet at the same time yesterday… Just don’t use it for PvP or WvW.

I mainly use sbow & lbow. Sbow is my main, but then in certain situations I’ll switch lbow, use the #2, #5, then #2 again (3 & 4 if the situation calls for it), then switch back to my sbow.

Another popular weapon set is axe & warhorn. Very good against 2 to 3 mobs, horrendous against 1.

My number one piece of advice would be to roll a profession that isn’t bad. (My main was a ranger.)

Other than that, investing in Beastmastery at low level can be profitable until you hit say level 40.
Then you can respec and get piercing arrows (From the power trait line) and then into Skirmishing up until at least 25 points to get the extra 10% damage when flanking.
The trait that gives an extra 50% endurance recharge is also a must have (I think it may be in Nature Rituals?) it only requires 5 points to obtain.

As you can see, I don’t even remember the name of an entire trait line 100%, simply because rangers are pretty stuck with one effective build.

Weapon wise for PvE you’ll want a Shortbow (Only decent ranged weapon) and then a Horn offhand (For the speedboost mainly) and then either a sword (Rooting problems with the auto attack) or an axe, which will give you an extra ranged weapon as well as some potentially nice bleeds.

I’m in the minority, but I went LB/Axe + Warhorn. In most (PvE) cases I can just send the pet in, let it strike first to hold aggro, and then stand back and snipe/barrage. Any thing that comes my way gets knocked back, or has to walk through a Barrage. I love the Warhorn. The axe isn’t great, but it along with the horn’s one damage skill are decent for while your bow skills are on CD. I have had no trouble at all in PvE.

If you plan on doing any PvP or WvW, you will probably find your Ranger lacking, at least until more patches, or one really huge one, is rolled out. Lots of people here on the forum have given up all hope that Rangers will be fixed to their liking, but I’m not doing that this early.

Ok perfect I’ll take all your advice into consideration, I haven’t had any issues with the Ranger yet, just wanted to see what kind of weapons you guys are using at lower levels and which way to go with traits to improve, thanks for all the advice