Guild Wars 2

So I’ve been doing a lot of fractals with PuGs recently and I’m running the standard meta PvE ranger build for S/A + Longbow and I’m noticing that I’m usually the only person meleeing or, at the very least, I always have aggro. This makes me get downed A LOT, even with the two dodges built into S mainhand.
Is there any way to play as melee Ranger with PuGs or should I just bite the bullet and make some sort of Longbow focused build? What is the DPS loss of using Longbow only (with Longbow focused traits, not just using Longbow with the standard S/A build)?

I like running 4/5/0/5/0 with GS in cases where I feel like need to be more survivable. You lose a little single target damage, but you probably lose more if you’re always downed…

Yeah greatsword is a much better option to switch to if sword is too hairy (not longbow). The evades on auto and block on 4 will make things a lot easier. As you get more comfortable meleeing the content you can then switch back to sword.