Guild Wars 2

I came back to the game after 3 months and I would like to level up a Ranger, but before I start I’d like to know a little more about the profession.

Since I have an high level character for each race I am not inclined to a specific one, so a list of pros and cons could help me decide on it.

Good builds or guides for different playstiles: I would like to play my future character in as many ways as possible to find the one which suits me better.
[edit] Allright this will be covered by jubskie’s list

General tips are always welcome!

Thanks in advance for your help guys, I’m looking forward to read what you have to say

Leveling the ranger will basically be a breeze in open world. You won’t be able to PUG high up into fractals due to internal biases between professions, nor will you be able to convince people of your usefulness as a ranger in wvw. In sPvP the play is pretty decent. One sad thing about rangers is that one of the strongest builds for wvw is a regen/healing power build but you want apothecary trinkets for that. That kind of armor scales nicely for rangers because you and your pet can have a lot of regen boon uptime leading to a very powerful and hard hitting cat that isn’t a paper tiger. With 1611 healing power max buff last night, I was getting almost 600 HP per second with near permanent regen in combat.

The reason why it’s sad is due to the price of apothecary trinkets, few can afford to play this build. Early on in November, I had observed the value of sigils of generosity and passion flowers and I bought as many as I could. That money helped me afford the gear (plus I picked up Southsun Rose the other day). Right now, an appthecary trinket will run you about 50 gold.

I could be mistaken but I’m almost positive apothecary gear (+jewelry) can be found on the orr temples pruchasable via karma.

Hmm, maybe, I thought that was rabid though. If anyone more familiar with temples wants to chime in, I’m sure OP would appreciate it. Thanks guys!

Oh, and if you can’t afford apothecary, try cleric’s in its place. Also, trap/rabid ranger (0/30/30/5/5) is considered ranger’s most “OP” bunker build in PvP. That’s because ranger are a condition source—as opposed to guardian, which is a condition sink or necro which is a condition manager. Not to say guardian/necro can’t give conditions of their own…they can, but they can’t keep throwing, basically, every condition at you the way a ranger can with unblockable traps and stuff.

Chopps.5047:

Leveling the ranger will basically be a breeze in open world. You won’t be able to PUG high up into fractals due to internal biases between professions, nor will you be able to convince people of your usefulness as a ranger in wvw. In sPvP the play is pretty decent. One sad thing about rangers is that one of the strongest builds for wvw is a regen/healing power build but you want apothecary trinkets for that. That kind of armor scales nicely for rangers because you and your pet can have a lot of regen boon uptime leading to a very powerful and hard hitting cat that isn’t a paper tiger. With 1611 healing power max buff last night, I was getting almost 600 HP per second with near permanent regen in combat.

The reason why it’s sad is due to the price of apothecary trinkets, few can afford to play this build. Early on in November, I had observed the value of sigils of generosity and passion flowers and I bought as many as I could. That money helped me afford the gear (plus I picked up Southsun Rose the other day). Right now, an appthecary trinket will run you about 50 gold.

I am used to being frowned upon by others in dungeons, my first char was an Elementalists and back then some people would even kick me out of a group because of my profession choice.

At first I was bothered, but then I realized it’s some kind of natural selection: unless we’re talking about the most difficult content in the game, which does require a specific set of classes/builds, then only an extremely bad person (not the term I was thinking about tbh) would remove a player from a group before they even started the istance.

That’s not a problem.

The main reason I created this post is to know whether there are unconvetional, but still effective, skills/racial combination or not, something like the Hidden Pistol Charr skill which has a great toolbelt utility. I still enjoy my Asura engineer and by no means I would have rerolled, but knowing something like that before I created it could have been a deciding factor ^^

Healing rangers with clerics and apothecary is unconventional and effective, if that’s what you’re after. Rangers are extremely powerful in the down state and also have lots of healing utilities/trait choices. Your water field, as a healing ranger, will be greatly appreciated at the right time. Run a sigil of life in the zerg and, in an organized group, enjoy doing well. The drawback is that you yourself won’t hit too hard so you have to use your skills to slow/cripple your enemy so your cat can get in hits. Again, I do not recommend these gears in dungeons since the healing power is easily overcome by bosses and you will want more damage so you can do the DPS race that currently catagorizes most dungeon encounters. But you seem smart, you already knew that I bet. But I’ll leave it for anyone else reading and interested.

Also, there’s a full thread on this build that’s pretty popular (600 hp/sec regen…) so you might want to check that out for more in depth explanation. I ended up goong with runes of dwyana but to each his or her own.

All right I’ll definitely check the thread, thanks Chopps:)

If you’re after a powerful race/ranger combo, then… I’m sorry to say but I can only give firsthand advice on Sylvari. The Sylvari get one of the better racial healing skills (which can be handy for thieves who otherwise have weaking healing skills), but it’s nothing compared to healing spring. Other Sylvari skills match up with rangers, to the point where you can consider them a minor version of actual ranger skills. It might be fun to be a nature crazy plant person, but it doesn’t provide any real benefit.

One thing I’ve found is rangers work great with environmental weapons, their stats are on par with other professions, but their weapons always feel a little on the weak side. Therefore, things like the Norn’s wereanimal forms can be handy. I tend to feel like my elite skills are underwhelming, so, say you were running a build with sun spirit? Hounds of Balthazar provide you with two additional allies proccing the burning effect, the humans get Avatar of Melandru too.

I’ve heard of a couple of rangers that use Asuran utilities because they think the ranger utilities are weak, so that might be worth looking into as well.

Mik Hell.8206:

I came back to the game after 3 months and I would like to level up a Ranger, but before I start I’d like to know a little more about the profession.

Since I have an high level character for each race I am not inclined to a specific one, so a list of pros and cons could help me decide on it.

Good builds or guides for different playstiles: I would like to play my future character in as many ways as possible to find the one which suits me better.
[edit] Allright this will be covered by jubskie’s list

General tips are always welcome!

Thanks in advance for your help guys, I’m looking forward to read what you have to say

Well, not gonna sugarcoat things here.
-Rangers are good in open world PvE and fun to level
-Suck in dungeons
-Good skirmisher/duelist in PvP with some of the best mobility in the game depending on want you use
-Basically the same thing as above in WvW, except weaker. In PvE you have better gear, food buffs etc but sadly your pet remains as it is. Your pet(integrated part of your dps) will be relatively weaker here than in the mists.
-Some builds like the regen build chopps mentioned may be good in WvW but I don’t think you will want to use that in dungeons. Quite a waste imo to get a full set of gear that you can only use in WvW and another unless you are not doing PvE.
TL;DR
If you just wanna be a skirmisher in WvW, ranger is a decent choice if you are able to gear it properly.
But if you wanna PVE/dungeons on your ranger too you may need to use a different build with a different set of gear optimized for that but sadly even so, you would be subpar compared to other proffessions.
My suggestion would be to outfit you ranger with gear/build optimized for killing players and WvW with it while you do dungeons with your other toons.

Or rather just roll a lvl 1 ranger and go to the heart of the mists and get an idea of how a lvl 80 ranger would be like. Just test it out yourself

HotHit.6783:

If you’re after a powerful race/ranger combo, then… I’m sorry to say but I can only give firsthand advice on Sylvari. The Sylvari get one of the better racial healing skills (which can be handy for thieves who otherwise have weaking healing skills), but it’s nothing compared to healing spring. Other Sylvari skills match up with rangers, to the point where you can consider them a minor version of actual ranger skills. It might be fun to be a nature crazy plant person, but it doesn’t provide any real benefit.

One thing I’ve found is rangers work great with environmental weapons, their stats are on par with other professions, but their weapons always feel a little on the weak side. Therefore, things like the Norn’s wereanimal forms can be handy. I tend to feel like my elite skills are underwhelming, so, say you were running a build with sun spirit? Hounds of Balthazar provide you with two additional allies proccing the burning effect, the humans get Avatar of Melandru too.

I’ve heard of a couple of rangers that use Asuran utilities because they think the ranger utilities are weak, so that might be worth looking into as well.

I already have two Sylvari, I like the racials and starting zones, but it’s enough for me

Also I think Asuras do not realy fit the idea of a Ranger in GW2: if I am not mistaken, being masters of their natural surrounding, Rangers tend to shun technology hence no pistols or shotguns

This leaves me with three options: Human, Charr and Norn.

[edit]:Yes haxi, as soon as I will be able to log into the game I’m going to roll a random level 1 and experiment a little.

I have to admit that reading your and Chopps’ posts made me reconsidere whether I should roll a Ranger or not: I already have two tank/support (Guardian and Ele) so what I’m looking for is a non-magical high damage dealer.

In most RPGs Rangers can deal high melee and ranged damage, but this might not be the case with GW2.
I am not obsessed with performance, I will stick to a character if I have fun with it even if it’s not the best at what it does. I played an Ele when everyone said they sucked because I had a lot of fun with it, but I’m starting to think that sticking with my Engineer or rolling a Warrior could suit my tastes better.

So I guess I will level both a War and a Ranger before I finaly decide which one I will get to level 80.

I want to tank all of you for helping

I had every class but ranger to 80 until about a week ago. Lot of people have claimed them to be weak, but I’ve found an incredibly fun build using a lot of dodging for protection and sword/dagger for lots of evasion abilities. And I’m considering maining ranger now instead of my juggernaut warrior.

Hey, I got my ranger to 80 just a 2 weeks ago so here are my starter tipps.

Right now shortbow + axe/warhorn is extremly flexible. You get the swiftness, a good burst and cleave. For the rest shortbow with good snares and evade.

Berserker gear is great for leveling and group events. I started with a signet build and later changed it to a trap/condition build. Now at 80 I’m mixed with rabid armor, rest berserker gear(will perhaps be switched with rampagers).

I only did hotjoin maps but at this entry level you have very good chances to win a fight if you don’t explode in the first 3 sec by a glass cannon. Perhaps I’m still not good enough at anticipating thiefs (not the very bad ones) but except them and some mesmers your sustained damage will win the lasting fights for you.

The trap build is strong against melee champions so at least here is good solo potential. If your pet got some hits pull it back/ switch/ stealth it.

Oh and if you know you have more than a few meters to go, change one utility slot to the +movement speed signet. This makes the leveling soo much better.

And like always save the karma until 80. If you don’t have unlimited gold you can at least but stuff from the orr temple guys (like some already said).

Have fun. Edit grammar

My take on it

Human:

• Heal: Ranger has three great heals and I don’t think this would heal your pet too … though I could be wrong (never tested it).
• Condition Removal: Ranger can be lacking in this area so this is very nice
• Random boon/condition: I could see this in a condition build, maybe … I don’t have much experience with it.
• Grenth: this is an awesome elite that is great if you want to be a melee of any type. Ranger can be effective at short, medium, and long ranges so it boils down to how you would play your Ranger
• Avatar: this isn’t as good because you lose your pet when you change to a form.
• Hounds: always a welcome addition.

Asura

• Pain Inverter: There are some videos around (I think they are Xsorus’s) of using Pain Inverter as a Ranger to great success
• Technobabble: That same ranger has been playing around with this as well since the Ranger has access to several interrupts already
• Radiation Field: Ranger has plenty of access to poison and weakness, but another AOE is always welcome in a class that sometimes doesn’t have much for AOEs (Ranger does have some pets, traps, torch, and barrage)
• Bot elites are okay, but Ranger elites are nicer in my opinion. Personal preference here.

Charr

• Landmine, meh, we have traps
• Pistol, meh.
• Battle Roar you may get some mileage out of for more Might/Fury for you and your pet.
• Warband Support: I could see this being nice between the pet and warband on an enemy … somewhat like Human’s hounds.
• Bazooka, meh
• Artillery Barrage if it had range … but it doesn’t.

Norn

• Preface: my Ranger is a Norn for aethetic reasons.
• The utilities aren’t useful to me
• The elites aren’t useful except Snow Leopard
  • About to get swamped by an enemy zerg that has Warriors/Elementalists (they can catch even the most mobile Ranger), pop Snow Leopard and use #4 (LONG dash) and #5 (stealth) and you’re fine … just has a long cooldown.

Sylvari

• Healing Seed is nothing compared to Healing Spring. Done :-)
• Grasping Vines + Entangle Elite could be very mean
• Turret, meh … you’re not an engineer … Ranger is a mobile class
• Fern mastiff … don’t know much about it … never see it
• Spirit … same as mastiff to me
• Turrets … Ranger is a mobile class and I’ve killed every Ranger that’s used this against me 1v1 … on both my Mesmer and my Ranger.

I rolled a Norn Ranger, he is level 6, I know it’s way too early to elaborate any kind of judgement, but yesterday my bear soloed a veteran

I guess you all were right about how easy it is to level up, which is good.

And bad at the same time, don’t hate me, but I hope you guys are wrong about the healing build being the only viable pvp spec

Anyway, it should not take long to get to level 40/50, try some story mode dungeon and then switch to a Warrior for a comparison.

Thanks all for the insight you shared

Healing is not the only viable build for pvp. I run a tanky toughness build for pvp without focusing on toughness and it works fine. Damage is decent and your pretty muchimmortal for 12 seconds. Majority of combat lasts for around 1-3 minutes against good players. Against bunkers its 5+. Had a 10 minute fight with a d/d ele the other night. Can just about take him to 5% then he bursts heals.

Sebrent.3625:

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My take on it

Human:

• Heal: Ranger has three great heals and I don’t think this would heal your pet too … though I could be wrong (never tested it).
• Condition Removal: Ranger can be lacking in this area so this is very nice
• Random boon/condition: I could see this in a condition build, maybe … I don’t have much experience with it.
• Grenth: this is an awesome elite that is great if you want to be a melee of any type. Ranger can be effective at short, medium, and long ranges so it boils down to how you would play your Ranger
• Avatar: this isn’t as good because you lose your pet when you change to a form.
• Hounds: always a welcome addition.

Asura

• Pain Inverter: There are some videos around (I think they are Xsorus’s) of using Pain Inverter as a Ranger to great success
• Technobabble: That same ranger has been playing around with this as well since the Ranger has access to several interrupts already
• Radiation Field: Ranger has plenty of access to poison and weakness, but another AOE is always welcome in a class that sometimes doesn’t have much for AOEs (Ranger does have some pets, traps, torch, and barrage)
• Bot elites are okay, but Ranger elites are nicer in my opinion. Personal preference here.

Charr

• Landmine, meh, we have traps
• Pistol, meh.
• Battle Roar you may get some mileage out of for more Might/Fury for you and your pet.
• Warband Support: I could see this being nice between the pet and warband on an enemy … somewhat like Human’s hounds.
• Bazooka, meh
• Artillery Barrage if it had range … but it doesn’t.

Norn

• Preface: my Ranger is a Norn for aethetic reasons.
• The utilities aren’t useful to me
• The elites aren’t useful except Snow Leopard
  • About to get swamped by an enemy zerg that has Warriors/Elementalists (they can catch even the most mobile Ranger), pop Snow Leopard and use #4 (LONG dash) and #5 (stealth) and you’re fine … just has a long cooldown.

Sylvari

• Healing Seed is nothing compared to Healing Spring. Done :-)
• Grasping Vines + Entangle Elite could be very mean
• Turret, meh … you’re not an engineer … Ranger is a mobile class
• Fern mastiff … don’t know much about it … never see it
• Spirit … same as mastiff to me
• Turrets … Ranger is a mobile class and I’ve killed every Ranger that’s used this against me 1v1 … on both my Mesmer and my Ranger.

Nice list Sebrent, thank you! I was still writing when you posted it so I missed it earlier, as I said I decided to roll a Norn and that’s because I want to play around morphs and pet combos

KensaiZen I am looking for a damage oriented build, I already have two tanky/healing characters: Guardian and Elementalist.
As I said it does not have to be the absolute best class/build combo, but it has to be at least fun, which is a subjective matter and only playing will help me decide on it.

I created this topic in order to gather some informations about the Ranger from people who play it and so far I think I have enough: I originally planned to roll a Ranger, but the lack of enthusiasm torward damage dealing builds made me consider the option to level up a Warrior too.

Of course any more tip you can share will be welcome!

Don’t roll a ranger. For the love of god, don’t do this to yourself. Roll a longbow warrior if you really want a ‘ranger’ type of feel, it does more damage and a lot more burst with conditions to boot.

If your looking for max damage. Roll a warrior lol damage is what they are designed for.

No KensaiZen, I’m not looking for max damage at all costs, there has to be a balance between fun and performance for me to stick with a class.
So unless you guys are absolutely positive about Ranger’s damage being pathetic and not viable in any circumstance, I will prefer it over a Warrior if I find it’s more interesting

The damage is far from terrible. Dont believe the QQ. If going by fun and challenging gameplay, pick ranger. For mind numbingly boring gameplay. Pick warrior.

Take a ranger with greatsword into the mists and let it just hit the dummy with the pet on passive. Then do the same with a warrior with greatsword. You’ll be disappointed.

Now, have that same ranger put the pet on aggressive and attack the dummy. You’ll be impressed.

This, however, goes back to the reliability of pets. Once that is fixed, people may start griping about fighting Rangers ;-)

I do have one gripe of lately about in WvW … Elementalist focus has swirling winds that can block enemy siege shots … I have nothing close to that on any of my toons except my elementalist. It’s become more apparent as I see large groups of Elementalists working together to make a wall and/or their siege pretty much immune to enemy siege.

Makes me want Guard to put pets on the walls again so I have a “siege trick” :-/

Don’t worry, I usualy dont listen to people complaining unless they provide solid reasoning or it’s an opinion shared by the vast majority of the player base (and even then I like to try things firsthand).

At the moment I don’t have a lot of freetime to play, but so far it’s been nice. Some of the weapons do not make much sense to me, like the longbow because it feels so slow compared to the shortbow, but maybe it gets better later on…
I like sword’s 2nd and 3rd skills, they are very good imho, but that autoattack animation lock is terrible, it’s messing a lot with my timing to evade attacks (both with dodge and skills).
I haven’t found a greatsword yet, I know I could just go to the mists, but since I took a long break from the game I am enjoying exploring, it’s one of GW2’s strongest points for me

Mik, the longbow is more for team play than anything else, at least in my opinion. It shines in WvW, group event bosses, and dungeon bosses mostly. Other than that it’s not really worth keeping on you too much, at least for the time being. And you can buy a cheap Greatsword from any weapon selling NPC.

Yeah Ryu, I know a longbow is more of a WvW weapon because of it’s nice range, but I was surprised by how slow it felt fighting with it… Also I am not concerned with finding a GS, I still have other weapons to try and when I’m done with them I’ll probably head to the nearest TP to buy one

I only wish I had more time to play hahaha.

Longbow can be nice, but it does feel slow which most of us (myself included) are not thrilled with. However, when faced with bosses in dungeons that use retaliation or confusion, you’ll want that longbow as using a shortbow is going to gib you quite quickly.

The Longbow is a max range weapon. Synergy with pet is also amazing. However, if you find yourself always fighting under 900 range. Go with the Shortbow. The damage is consistent whereas you will have damage reduced with a longbow. Longbows crit more and do more damage at 900+.

Personaly when someone gets close to 900 range I dont bother kiting. Just switch to a GS swoop in and hack them to death

Chopps.5047:

Leveling the ranger will basically be a breeze in open world. You won’t be able to PUG high up into fractals due to internal biases between professions, nor will you be able to convince people of your usefulness as a ranger in wvw. In sPvP the play is pretty decent. One sad thing about rangers is that one of the strongest builds for wvw is a regen/healing power build but you want apothecary trinkets for that. That kind of armor scales nicely for rangers because you and your pet can have a lot of regen boon uptime leading to a very powerful and hard hitting cat that isn’t a paper tiger. With 1611 healing power max buff last night, I was getting almost 600 HP per second with near permanent regen in combat.

The reason why it’s sad is due to the price of apothecary trinkets, few can afford to play this build. Early on in November, I had observed the value of sigils of generosity and passion flowers and I bought as many as I could. That money helped me afford the gear (plus I picked up Southsun Rose the other day). Right now, an appthecary trinket will run you about 50 gold.

Instead of getting exotics for apothecary you should aim for ascended gear as its much easier and more affordable imo. 20 fractal runs(which can get you around 20-50 gold depending how lucky you are) for the 2 rings , 35 laurels for amulet, and accessory u can use guild commendations if you got a decent guild but accessory you should probably buy the exotics.

As for healing/regen build being best in wvw, I say its more useful in spvp. WvW a good affordable build which you can tweak like I did and get 81% crit dmg, 40% crit chance with 3k toughness is this build http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdsmOmMwXCo.

Also I’d be carefull going a condi route in wvw as I heard its frustrating.

Blackhawk, as with every condition damage build, it can get frustrating when you fight anybody capable of constantly washing away your conditions from themselves. When you’re in small groups, the odds of encountering somebody who does that is pretty low, but if you’re in a zerg, good luck keeping up the condition damage on anything.

I recently made a ranger and I have a ton of fun in WvW. I can run with the zerg but I don’t have as strong AOE spam like other classes so I run a borked up build with my Char racial for an extra boon, sharpening stone, and signet of the hunt. As for pets I have a bear and a hyena. If I am running with the zerg I swap out hyena for a cat for the buff.

I just roam around and pick off random objectives such as scouts, supply mules whatever.

I am not 80 yet so no specific traits/gear, mostly I follow the zerg unless they are across the map when I join, then I just go for close objectives and get run over by 10 people.

BlackhawkSOM.6401:

Chopps.5047:

Leveling the ranger will basically be a breeze in open world. You won’t be able to PUG high up into fractals due to internal biases between professions, nor will you be able to convince people of your usefulness as a ranger in wvw. In sPvP the play is pretty decent. One sad thing about rangers is that one of the strongest builds for wvw is a regen/healing power build but you want apothecary trinkets for that. That kind of armor scales nicely for rangers because you and your pet can have a lot of regen boon uptime leading to a very powerful and hard hitting cat that isn’t a paper tiger. With 1611 healing power max buff last night, I was getting almost 600 HP per second with near permanent regen in combat.

The reason why it’s sad is due to the price of apothecary trinkets, few can afford to play this build. Early on in November, I had observed the value of sigils of generosity and passion flowers and I bought as many as I could. That money helped me afford the gear (plus I picked up Southsun Rose the other day). Right now, an appthecary trinket will run you about 50 gold.

Instead of getting exotics for apothecary you should aim for ascended gear as its much easier and more affordable imo. 20 fractal runs(which can get you around 20-50 gold depending how lucky you are) for the 2 rings , 35 laurels for amulet, and accessory u can use guild commendations if you got a decent guild but accessory you should probably buy the exotics.

As for healing/regen build being best in wvw, I say its more useful in spvp. WvW a good affordable build which you can tweak like I did and get 81% crit dmg, 40% crit chance with 3k toughness is this build http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdsmOmMwXCo.

Also I’d be carefull going a condi route in wvw as I heard its frustrating.

Now that’s what I’m looking for, I’ll definitely try this build asap on my ranger, thanks!