Guild Wars 2

I was roaming around WvW the other day and was fortunate to group with 3 other rangers. This is out of the blue. The two were guild mates. I sort of tagged along with them. They invited me to join their party after a couple of encounters. We ran into a fourth ranger after a short time and we proceeded to do some damage in that particular borderland. This was like a “havoc” krewe … the two did not really want to take towers … just camps … and gank the unfortunate passers by, yaks and guards. The real fun came when we encountered a group of 6-7 pugs of various classes. Even though they had us outnumbered by 2-3 guys … they were very reluctant to “rush” us. The few times they tried to come at us with even numbers … it was a massacre … for them. I don’t know if they just had the wrong set-up or they were all zerk as well (hence being squishy). Anyway … it was fun to run around with my fellow flower rangers … until my guild came calling for a guild “raid” on the borderlands. One of the rangers with me told me to just ignore them and pretend to be afk. Unfortunately … the next group we encounter … were my guild mates … so that cut my ranger fun run short.

Anyway … this is about A ranger havoc krewe. What would you want your 5 man ranger krewe to be “specd”? Humor me on this one. If it was up to you to build this 5 man krewe … what would it be … armor wise, rune wise, utility wise, trait wise, pet wise. What would you spec for your 10 man ranger havoc krewe? … for GW1 veterans … wouldn’t it be nice to have the old ranger “spike” countdowns in this scenario?

Anyway … this is for those who would like to experiment on all things ranger. This is of course a havok scenario … we won’t be taking on blobs … we can try to take on heavies of similar numbers … that is as far as I am trying to push this … I don’t know what the results will be against them. For light to medium armored opponents … I believe we can win most of the time …

Ranger 1 = This is the “tank” ranger … its purpose is to be the guy “who gets hit first” … AND SURVIVE … hence the high health and defense … it would be ideal if this guy knew how to “spot” the correct target to take out first. He/she would be at the front … always at the front of any engagement … You can switch out sigil of purity to sigil of frailty in your longbow for more damage. Switch out “Sic Em” for “Protect Me” for … additional protection. Of course you should switch one of your pooches to a bear if you decide to do this …
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRnEqQBL2KIOsAVLGQPoWHAHQa3+HO4t1VCXwmK-TFCEABQcEAsZ/BnU+xlSQFV/piLAAAPAgHOEAkCgJhVA-w

Ranger 2 = This is your typical zerk ranger … high damage … hit em hard … kill em fast … high mobility is needed hence “rampage as one” for the elite. Use S/D for “dodges” … be aware of the rangers that can give u heals as kitting around them would probably mean your survival … You can switch out sigil of bloodlust/frailty … to fire/precision depending on your play style
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAT8YjEqUwaLLWsw1aA9gadAcApN7C+DKBXJcBbqA-TFCEABEt/gCXAgEV/ZLlgMp8zgjAAAPAgHOIAkCQPdVA-w

Ranger 3 = You are the “Spirit Ranger” … buff your team mates … supply heals to your squishy damage dealers … speed buffs for greater map mobility …
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNBjODbkRlWV7VxZFqWDoHUrDgDItf9GuT4toKKYTF-TlSBABWq+DBXAgnPIASp84Vlg4pJgo9HW4BAQmSMAOCAkCQXdVA-w

Ranger 4 = You are the “Trapper” … you lay down traps so your team can kite around that area … giving pause to would be melee opponents. You are zerky enough to deal significant damage with a longbow … you have heals for your team … you have group swiftness to navigate through the map faster …
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNBjODbkRl2V7WxcFqWDoHUrDgDItZXwpwK4KhLYTF-TlCBABGp0wq9HUSZmEKBh+gAAwFAIPNB+o+DDPAgAOCAkCwPdVA-w

Ranger 5 = You are the “Shout Ranger” … shout away … you give regen and swiftness … you have decent damage mitigation … and decent damage output … together with the trapper and the spirit ranger … you should be able to keep the group alive for prolonged fights …
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRnEqQvg2KIOsAVLGQPoWHAHQa/aOcnwHxTXwmK-TVCBABQt/AHHCAeU/ZWlgKp0YKlZAcBA84IAwwDAgUAjqrC-w

Tactics:

Since the longbow has insane range … kill the opposition from a distance. It would be wise to be close to each other as you get buffs from the shouts and the spirits. Lay down traps as needed and have the team kite around em … Together with Entangle and pet immob and fear … you should have very good crowd control … with healing spring and shouts – you should have decent heals and regen.

Against Heavies:

I honestly don’t know if this will work. Against similar numbers … I think we would be at a disadvantage. Depends on what build we encounter I guess.

Against Softies and Medium:

We would win … hands down … that is why other softies or mediums have second thoughts on engaging a ranger group …

For a 10 Ranger havoc:

I would bring 2 more Tank rangers, 2 more zerk rangers, I would drop the trapper in favor of a shout ranger. So the group would be 3 Tanks, 3 Zerks, 2 Spirits and 2 Shouts …

Wutcha guys think? Hopefully you can improve on this … but this is just my take on a ranger havoc krewe. We can’t be all zerk … It is in the diversity that we will sustain.

Additional thoughts: Add a venom share thief into the mix = good times. =)

Personally I’d probably have your shout ranger actually take some healing power gear/runes. Damage is great and all, but the whole purpose of that set up is sharing regen to improve group sustain, so healing power would go a long way to improving the survivability of everyone in your group. You could also move the points out of Marksman and into Beastmastery for more healing power and a stronger pet, which will make Sick ’Em much more effective and compensate for the lack of offensive power somewhat. Make sure to give it Healing Spring and a warhorn offhand, probably coupled with axe mainhand, and you have some pretty strong group heals and can maintain permanent swiftness on the whole group with just one character.

You could also make your tank ranger a beastmaster if you wanted. It won’t effect his defensive stats at all, and will allow him to have additional damage coming from the pet in skirmishes that will likely exceed the damage he has with just longbow. Plus you could take Zephyr’s Speed for free quickness on pet swap that would increase the longbow’s Rapid Fire burst on mid-range opponents.

Probably wouldn’t advise them both making the transition to BM though. You want to keep your team as versatile as possible.

Might also look at having your spirit ranger take Spirit of Nature for a powerful condition cleanse and the ability to revive downed allies mid-battle.

That’s just what I think though. There’s likely a lot of ways you can make an all ranger crew work well.

Spirit ranger is already a bunker build so I guess a good comp would consist of 1 spirit bunker ranger for Rez and buffs, 1 bleed condi bunker ranger, 1 trap ranger, and 2 zerk longbow rangers for a 5 man group.

For a 10 man group, I would choose 2 spirit rangers to alternate in rezzing allies, 2 bleed condi ranger, 1 shout ranger, 1 trap ranger and 4 zerk longbow rangers.

Hahaha, I remember that.

That was crazy fun. That’s what I’m trying to get started up in [Wind]. Just on a larger scale.

But yeah, we wrecked superior numbers multiple times and got them bagz.

As for havoc. I’ve commanded for a zergbusting guild on my ranger before, and I’ve run ranger squad 2-3 times. If we’re running havoc, we’ll literally go zerker. I taught my guys how to survive and we called targets and just wrecked people. We did this a while back as well, before all the buffs, so we’ll be even better now.

Basically, if we have terrain advantage, we’ll win nearly 95% of the time unless we have everyone standing in an ele’s meteor shower, or get hit with a blade storm (1 mesmer, 7-15+ thieves… time warp + dagger storm = gg. All of the projectiles bounce, and with health gain on crit, the signet that heals every time they hit, life steal food, fire sigils, blood sigils, etc. etc. they can do massive damage with full zerk and still stay alive.)

For GvG, we never got a chance to GvG on full ranger, but we need everyone quite tanky. With high might stacks, fury, and a good number of buffs, we’d still do a good amount of damage while maintaining survivability.

shadowpass.4236:

As for havoc. I’ve commanded for a zergbusting guild on my ranger before

I would be very interested in hearing about how you zergbusted on your ranger since my guild is dead set on the idea of all heavies are needed for serg busting. i realize this isn’t havoc related so feel free to message tankstager in game if you are willing to educate me on zergbusting as a ranger.

on this topic I would probably take, for a 5 man team, 2 zerk rangers(3 is over kill with focused rapid fire), 1 spirit ranger(power: frost, earth spirits), 1 BM shout ranger(w/ healing power gear), and spirit condi ranger(sun, earth spirit). most of the people in the party should have muddy terain which would be the cc for the party instead of the trap ranger controlling cc, spirit rangers running healing spirit elite(shout ranger and spirit ranger), zerk rangers running entangle. BM bunker taking RAO for stability if he has to res someone

tankstager.1975:

shadowpass.4236:

As for havoc. I’ve commanded for a zergbusting guild on my ranger before

I would be very interested in hearing about how you zergbusted on your ranger since my guild is dead set on the idea of all heavies are needed for serg busting. i realize this isn’t havoc related so feel free to message tankstager in game if you are willing to educate me on zergbusting as a ranger.

on this topic I would probably take, for a 5 man team, 2 zerk rangers(3 is over kill with focused rapid fire), 1 spirit ranger(power: frost, earth spirits), 1 BM shout ranger(w/ healing power gear), and spirit condi ranger(sun, earth spirit). most of the people in the party should have muddy terain which would be the cc for the party instead of the trap ranger controlling cc, spirit rangers running healing spirit elite(shout ranger and spirit ranger), zerk rangers running entangle. BM bunker taking RAO for stability if he has to res someone

When I get the chance, I’ll hit u up in game.

As for the set up, that would be a good 5 man to run :]