Guild Wars 2

Ok, please understand that my question here is mainly due to comments I have received from others while trying to level a Ranger for WvW. I currently have a Thief, Warrior, and a Mesmer at 80 and haven’t yet found that class that just “feels” right. So, I figured I would give the Ranger a try since I didn’t much care for the Engi, Ele, or the Guard.

My question though comes from statements that people have made to me that Rangers are “easy bags” and that they are only good at being a zerg support. I had looked at a condi Ranger that uses S/T + A/D and loads of healing gear yet folks tell me that at best, the class remains secondary to every other class.

I typically don’t much give a crap about another person’s opinion about what I play and what I consider to be fun but after leveling 3 80’s, I’m somewhat hesitant to dedicate my time/gold to another toon. Can you all give me a better objective opinion on what I’ve been told?

I personally tend to spend most of my time roaming or with small groups. My goal is that should I get into a bad situation, it’s really important for me to be able to escape rather than just die. I have seen some LB Rangers that ate folks alive and camped areas of the Mist where they can use the LB skill to kick players off the bridges (looks like fun…).

Anyways, sorry for the long rant.

Rangers excel at roaming, there is absolutely no question about it.

Also roaming is more about personal skill than anything else. You are going head to head with someone else’s playing ability and knowledge. Bearbows tend to be horrible players and thus the bad reputation.

Rangers are good for solo and group roaming.

S/T+A/D is a very common setup for really any condition builds, and yes regen builds are also very often played on roaming builds and are very effective.

So, no. Rangers are in no way second to any class for WvW roaming.

What about the LB + GS power/crit builds? I saw a Ranger the other day completely wreck a thief before she had a chance to respond.

Yes rangers are extremely viable for roaming, if played right are one of the best classes for roaming. People say rangers are bad in wvw for two main reasons.

1. In zergs rangers aren’t the best. No denying it, it’s not our forté mainly because pets don’t go well with tons of aoe.
2. The majority of rangers I see and people fight just aren’t good. Ranger takes a lot of skill and dedication to be effective, and I can only imagine somebody coming from a warrior who has an easy time who tries out a ranger and has to actually put the effort in to be effective, and simply can’t make the transition. Those are the easy bags people talk about, and they do make up the majority of rangers in wvw.

That being said in roaming rangers can be lethal. What it really comes down to is player skill though. I have killed every single class in wvw thousands of times, on a ranger. I have also been killed by every single class in wvw while roaming. If a skillful player gets behind any class and plays it effectively, it will be the most dangerous thing on the battlefield.

Think fast, play smart, and out think your enemies and roaming is no problem with the right build. I once won a 4v1 on my ranger. Given these people clearly didn’t know how to play the game properly, but with the right build and experience on your class/build and other builds, it really isn’t that hard.

People say rangers are bad yet more than once we ran the show in spvp with various metas that people cried OP on. Ranger has it’s weaknesses but also it’s strengths, and if you capitalize on the strengths people will have a hard time beating you.

@ Warriorjrd,

Thanks for the comments. I agree that a Warrior can be pretty easy at times which is why I was really impressed when a Ranger completely made me look stupid the other day.

What kind of build(s) would you recommend for roaming? I have heard that the SB + whatever is fairly effective. Right now, my Ranger is only level 54 so I don’t have much of a clue.

it really depends on your playstyle. if you wanna kill people really fast you can go glass cannon. ranger can use signets to avoid the burst damage from the thief and then melt the thief in seconds before he can react. i use a full glass build in wvw and i really dont have any complaints about it when it comes to 1v1 and roaming with a small group. my build is the usual 6 6 0 2 0. it’s very glassy but with enough practice can be very lethal.

i havent tried the regen build in wvw but they say it’s also good. in spvp, ranger is top tier because of the spirit build but sadly this build is not viable in wvw.

FinalPatriot.8034:

@ Warriorjrd,

Thanks for the comments. I agree that a Warrior can be pretty easy at times which is why I was really impressed when a Ranger completely made me look stupid the other day.

What kind of build(s) would you recommend for roaming? I have heard that the SB + whatever is fairly effective. Right now, my Ranger is only level 54 so I don’t have much of a clue.

BM bunker builds are very effective 1v1, always have been, a Dire/rabid trapper build would also be very effective.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQRAsY3fjEq0ua3KmrQ1aAAhaVA0uGa2wmdD0BfQJjqB-TliAwAXUCm4IAU4EAA4gAIT/wy9HOq+DnHAgDzfQV+RKgFVWB-w

That’s a solid trapper build to start off with. I like poison master for some extra oomph to your attacks, but bark skin and empathic bond are both solid traits to take as well.
With that you want to make sure your enemy is immobolized before you start bombing with traps, otherwise you lose a lot of damage as they can avoid the traps. Krytan hound with malicous training is very fun to use, I always start that before my bombs and use spike trap first to make sure they stand still. Also be sure to use axe as often as you can because with axe 2 on such a short CD you can stack some major bleeds with that.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAsYRnEqQvg2KIWsAXLGAQoWFAvPjrtsdfE9wQfxVVVB-TlyBABUcEAYUJYFHCAAeAAfp8DQdANfCAka/hOV/5FtBBAQAuZAwRP6RP6RPa33+23+23+kCgJlRA-w

Bm regen bunker. Clerics is hard to play, but benefits enormously from the grandmaster minor in beastmastery. Full clerics will get you about 135 bonus power. Which is a big bonus to get just from traits.

With lemongrass and x2 shout cleanse you should be covered as far as condies go. Biggest issue is full glass thives, they can get the better of you in some cases

Firstly, the answer to the question is yes, definately. And as for builds, bunker and regen rangers are very strong so i’d give them a try, but don’t dismiss other builds, have a play around for a while and see what YOU feel most comfortable with and suits your style. For example ranger can do some serious single target condi damage which is what i’m playing and enjoying the most at the moment, or with the new GM trait along with longbow range increase you can destroy people from massive range in a sniper-esque class.

I personally feel that with builds its what suits you, i for example am not very strong at bunkerish builds as i don’t enjoy the play style as much. I’d recommend going through the forums from the last few weeks as LOADS of builds have been posted and can offer an insight into what will suit you best!

:)

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Too bad you’re not on NA. I see you post here often and would enjoy a duel. You’re probably better ranger than me. Given all that, I am quite confident I have dueled better rangers than you. They can not beat my meta warr/engi/necro/thief builds. Oh well. Must be a L2P thing.

At a certain point, the build or profession is irrelevant and it’s purely a skill and game knowledge competition. Any forum discussion from that point forward is seeing who can kitten further.

And disussing it on the forums is on limited use anyway. I mean in my experience roaming on my ranger, I honestly cant remember the last time a warrior or dagger theif beat me. It doesnt happen, ever. Anyone else cant say what they like to me but I know that to be true in my experience.

But I am sure Narkodx isnt lying.. In his experience a ranger of comparible skill will lose to any other class. I might think he’s never met a proper range just like he thinks I’ve never met a proper warrior, but really neither of us know anything about the other player so it doesnt mean anything.

This game lacks any sort of true league table, proper dueling or ranking system which means these discussions are really all down to peoples anecdotal evitence of their very small window of experience. (And no, I dont could PvP servers as a proper measure or test of WvW roaming, because the stats and stats combinations in PvP are far too different. I physically cant recreate the hybrid build I like to play in WvW, for example).

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Even glass thieves are easy. If you’re running a Zerker build this is what you do :::

Counterattack → Maul

Counter attack could be a little better as a skill, but this is my standard response to any thief build.

Narkodx.1472:

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Too bad you’re not on NA. I see you post here often and would enjoy a duel. You’re probably better ranger than me. Given all that, I am quite confident I have dueled better rangers than you. They can not beat my meta warr/engi/necro/thief builds. Oh well. Must be a L2P thing.

Go duel Forzani (SoS). He is the only one ive dueled on these forums, other then chopps (which is on desolation now). If anything, Forzani is a good player, not far from my skill level. I am slightly better (beat him in 5 out of 9 fights). Mostly, i have better pet control and movement, he has excellent rotations though, so watch out.

Regen ranger is stupidly hard to kill, so yea roaming ranger (built for it) can do just fine..!!

Rangers have a bad reputation in wvw because most of them are using very simple builds.

My “noob” time in wvw was with Knight’s gear and I was dieing a lot so I stopped playing WvW. After some PvE and ‘learning’, I started doing a lot of wvw with a bunker build and it went well because it’s a bunker build. It’s supposed to help you survive. On a side note, the bunker condi (or regen) builds are ‘effective’ because they are mostly no brainers. There isn’t much depth to them.
The build got boring because I WvW’d so much that people started to recognise me and then automatically fled because they either didn’t want to die or fight for 5 minutes.

I slowly changed over to a build that is squishier than Knight’s and simply proves that ranger has a learning curve.

The point is that ranger’s have a special learning curve. The first part is nearly flat and goes up slowly. The second part has and angle near 90 deg, which is steep as hell. The third part is like the first part.

Don’t be a sheep, try everything you can. Try “Evasive Purity” and “Bark skin” even if people say they aren’t worth the trait points. Skill comes mostly with experience and a bit of knowledge. It’s easy to say “Oh you should’ve have used skill X and then skill Y instead of skill Z because so and so” but actually doing it is difficult.

Narkodx.1472:

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Too bad you’re not on NA. I see you post here often and would enjoy a duel. You’re probably better ranger than me. Given all that, I am quite confident I have dueled better rangers than you. They can not beat my meta warr/engi/necro/thief builds. Oh well. Must be a L2P thing.

By “meta” you must be referring to the borderline OP builds like PU mesmer, or D/P theif. If you run a cheese build it invalidates any sort of competition.

Rangers are more than capable of keeping up incredible pressure on a single target, and I’ve met some rangers that were literally impossible to kill so the answer is yes especially since pets actually work sometimes now. It does seem like anecdotes don’t work because rangers seem to be either really good or really bad. Some Rangers I can just keep pressing pistol 1 on my engineer to kill. On the other hand, other rangers can kill me just by pressing 1.

Also, I can’t wait til they lay the hammer down on perplexity.

“By “meta” you must be referring to the borderline OP builds like PU mesmer, or D/P theif. If you run a cheese build it invalidates any sort of competition."

Actually. That is what I am talking about. When people talk about OP/Meta builds no one talks about a ranger build. PU Mesmer or D/P Thief or Terror Dhuum Necro or Perplex Engi… etc. ALL of those builds assuming equal skill with a ranger will defeat said ranger. That is the only point I am making.

EDIT – As far as invalidating competition. That is YOUR opinion. When you solo roam on a borderland do you expect people not to use cheese? Or what you consider cheese. I do not. I roam to WIN, that is the only thing I care about. Not the respect of the guy I am spiking. Main reason I do not run ranger anymore.

Ranger makes a fantastic roamer. You’re also extremely compitent in team fights, as a roamer, bringing access to Revealed to deal with enemy thieves, a water field, and the ability to quickly disengage if a fight isn’t headed in a good direction.

warriorjrd.8695:

Narkodx.1472:

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Too bad you’re not on NA. I see you post here often and would enjoy a duel. You’re probably better ranger than me. Given all that, I am quite confident I have dueled better rangers than you. They can not beat my meta warr/engi/necro/thief builds. Oh well. Must be a L2P thing.

By “meta” you must be referring to the borderline OP builds like PU mesmer, or D/P theif. If you run a cheese build it invalidates any sort of competition.

Pfft, because you can’t beat something it’s a cheese build that takes no skill? Part of playing any profession is playing it to the level that builds aren’t as important.

That said I’ve gotten a few kills lately because rangers would volley into a full reflect. Is it not common knowledge that sword off hand block doesn’t end on ranged attack? I’ve never seen so many bow rangers, and I have to admit I love it from a bag perspective.

definition of a cheese build;
A build that requires only a single, short and uncomplicated skill rotation that can be repeated endlessly to ensure a close to 90% win rate no matter what.

GSSBlunaspike.4153:

warriorjrd.8695:

Narkodx.1472:

Prysin.8542:

Narkodx.1472:

Shirk.6421:

In all honesty and despite the fact that I love roaming with my ranger:

It’s all fun until you run into another player who plays a dueling build. like a mesmer, warrior, necro, thief, ele or engi. Even if you’re as good as the other person, the class WILL make the difference. Go into the dueling area and fight some people using dueling builds there. Have fun – or not.

THIS sadly is the truth. Once you face top tier players on META roaming builds you will lose. Ranger does not have the damage in a condition/sustain build to defeat a perplexity engi/thief/necro. (Perplex not even necessary just makes it more OP) Power builds have no chance against those type of builds either; Power builds also have weakness against high burst classes like warr/thief. They have better mitigation skills. In the end though you should run with a ranger if you enjoy it. I sure do. But you must know the limitations of the class.

Any meta build can be beaten with any ranger build. Skill is all that matters. Also lol at perplex thief, their annoying, but not that difficult to beat. Its a L2P issue.

Oh and, the only real threat to rangers is glas thieves and condi engies. Luckily, there aint too many of those two around.

Too bad you’re not on NA. I see you post here often and would enjoy a duel. You’re probably better ranger than me. Given all that, I am quite confident I have dueled better rangers than you. They can not beat my meta warr/engi/necro/thief builds. Oh well. Must be a L2P thing.

By “meta” you must be referring to the borderline OP builds like PU mesmer, or D/P theif. If you run a cheese build it invalidates any sort of competition.

Pfft, because you can’t beat something it’s a cheese build that takes no skill? Part of playing any profession is playing it to the level that builds aren’t as important.

That said I’ve gotten a few kills lately because rangers would volley into a full reflect. Is it not common knowledge that sword off hand block doesn’t end on ranged attack? I’ve never seen so many bow rangers, and I have to admit I love it from a bag perspective.

Are you trying to tell me PU mesmer and D/P theif takes skill? I’ve killed both of those builds plenty of times btw, so I can beat it. It doesn’t change the fact it’s a cheese build that requires a minimal amount of skill to be effective.

As a Rabid trap roamer (SB Sword/Torch or Dagger) The only class I consistently have a problem beating in a 1v1 is a good hambow warrior. Necro on occasion, but with SoR it becomes a non issue. PU mes are just annoying. D/P thief…. meh….. 96% of thieves are pure garbage, if I have my traps down before he attacks, I win, if not, could go either way.

Are you talking about roaming or dueling?. From my point of view thay are different things

Dueler
- good at 1v1’s
Roamer
- acceptibal at 1v1’s
- Move form objective to opjective quicky
- can speed buff a yack
- can flip a camp quickly (you don’t want to have white sowords on a camp for to long)
- can walk up to a full upgrade keep and hit the gate with out the guards giving you to much trouble
- can trail and enemy group and get away alive when spotted

but for most classes the best roaming builds are not always the best dueling builds and the best dueling build are not always the best roaming builds

So in answer to you question rangers excel at roaming and are good at 1v1’s

I’ve been following this thread with interest because I plan to start working a my ranger next week (WvW solo roaming only).
Regen and Trap builds have already been posted (thanks, Prysin and Warriorjrd) so it would be much appreciated if somebody could post a Full Glass Cannon build and a Condition build (assuming the Trapper build posted it’s not a conidtion build itself). I’ve found some builds around but I’m not sure they come from a reliable source and I don’t have lots of gold to spend, so I would prefer to avoid any mistake…
Thanks in advance!

Having run a whole manner of condi and regen builds, the railgun sniper and now my own custom chill might stacker build I can say ranger is a great roamer . can get around pretty fast and handle camps and 1v1 situations very well.

My custom build stacks frost armour and thus chill along with any of my chilling skills. Takes little physical damage and can deal with conditions as long as you play safe and how the build demands. Also has huge burst if you can land it but that’s what the chill is for.

One thing I can say as a ranger roamer and may apply to all roaming if you aren’t situationally aware you will get jumped and eaten unless you are playing a very forgiving build.

I love it that people think the Ranger sucks. Love it! Ranger has a difficult time fighting thieves, but everyone does for the most part. Every other class it just comes down to skill, and I think Rangers do very well against mesmers. However, a good condi Engi imo has no weakness at all.

Disclaimer: opinions highly based on the build I play. Game experience may differ between rangers.

Ranger is most certainly viable as a roamer class, although we are far from the best at it. I’d say even the infamous kite-and-condi builds, as strong as they are rank maybe 4,, 3 tops in most consistently powerful roamer builds/classes. Still IMO it is by far the most fun class I’ve played in all the MMORPGS I’ve played, at least the current build I run.

1) So first thing, know your limits. You must accept that you will never be able to win some of the fights you see thief/mesmer roamers winning. Stealth when coupled with low cool down teleports is the strongest mechanics in the game in 1vx fights as it gives you the ability to completely control the positioning in a fight and brief unassailed periods to come up with quick plans of action. Yes, that is even far stronger than a single warrior chucking CC everywhere by far. So when you see thieves doing things that you simply cannot and boasting about winning 1v3s that you could not, do not get down about it. Everyone has things they can and cannot do.

2) Fight smarter, not harder. It’s easy as a solo roamer to get this pride where you want to take down a massive challenge (3-5 players at once) with all the merit going to you. Ie. you don’t want to be called “cheese build”, you don’t want people claiming you only won because you fought with camp npc backup, people laughing at you when you retreat from combat. Reality is, when your foes have to work hard for it, especially with a ranger due to the high amount of easy ranger lootbags, people can get anywhere from frustrated to downright infuriated. Sometimes they will party you to give you mad props for how far you brought a ranger, but a lot of the time those party invites are to kitten talk you and use every excuse to downgrade losing to a ranger, especially when they have the numbers advantage. Ignore the haters and use your surroundings as your edge. If you’re running a ranged kiter build, always consider wisely where you are moving your character to, get it down the instinct level of being in the best place possible.

3) Build up your instincts. I feel like there are other classes in GW2 that have a lot more time to think. More periods of invulnerability, bubble shields, stealth, time to think. With ranger I feel like every single split second counts in a fight, even on tanky bunker builds. In other words, there may be two kinds of skill out there: Skill where a player is specifically calculating timings on all their long cooldown burst skills and fighting almost mathematically. Another type of skill is like that of olympians where they practice a single physical art until they don’t even have to count down when they jump off a diving board in their head, their body almost automatically reacts like a machine. That second type of skill is what you need on the ranger class. As a ranger, you need fast reaction times to survive. And I don’t mean high speed uncoordinated APM like random button mashing, but doing the exact thing you need at the exact time you need it almost 100% of the time. It takes a lot of practice to get this class down since it’s so movement based. Harder still, your movements must be meaningful and not spontaneous panic.

4)Use your pet properly. If your pet is dying all the time, or at least dying without meeting some kind of high quality quota, no offense but you’re doing this class wrong no matter your build. As much as we hate the pet at times for legitimate reason in this phase of GW2, you must use it, you don’t have that choice to build independently of it. Your pet is a part of your character, and you must use it wisely. First and foremost, use pet swapping properly. There are so many crappy rangers out there that only swap pets to avoid them dying. All pets have a skill they will use almost immediately when called out, and if you swap immediately you can take advantage of that. For example with drake tail swipe. You could hit bash your foe, your drake does a tail swipe. Immediately swap to your other drake, and it will also tail swipe and if your opponent is locked down hard enough they may eat two tail swipes which combined with path of scars and/or maul is a huge burst amount. If possible, try to keep it attacking from behind your foes while they lunge at you. That will reduce the cleave damage it takes and enable it’s F2 skills to hit your opponents from their blind side. If you’re using a damaging F2, just as above always use it from behind your foes. Skilled players WILL watch your pet movements if it’s obvious, and they will try to for example, blink behind your drakes when f2 is charging to avoid it/teleport out of wolf howl range, etc. Don’t let your enemies see all your cards in play. Now, if they specifically try to kill your pet, don’t be afraid to expend a heal just to keep it alive. If you use your pets correctly they ARE WORTH IT.

5) Finally.. master all the skills. Weapons and utilities. Most of them have seemingly “unconventional uses” where they can be used in a way they weren’t designed for to gain an edge. Some people are familiar with, others not so much. Here’s some of the basics of the top of my head, as a melee ranger:

Distance closers: We all know the “Hit the esc key and reverse direction of the leap” trick on sword 2. Similarly with Lightning reflexes as well, if your opponent is fleeing you can use these distance creator skills as gap closers. Great for melee builds when used wisely.

Protect me: This skill is extremely underrated. If you build properly for it and use it wisely and with the right pets/buffs on the pets, it will rarely ever kill them. Also be advised that you do not have to use the pet to fully soak if you merely want to stun break with it. Hitting a pet commander after engaging protect me will break the skill, Ie. sending your pet to fight or hitting a skill. So if your pet is low hp, you just got stunned and want to fight back, hit protect me and then immediately hit a pet attack so your pet won’t soak damage.

Path of Scars, axe 4. “Stop shooting at where they are, but at where they will be!” Against skilled foes, this amazing weapon skill will be virtually nullified if you always have your foe targeted. Don’t be afraid to hit the esc key and throw it towards where they are heading. Get the projectile timing down right, and you can manage to land more pulls.

Greatsword 4 Block/Counter-attack: Many know this but for those that don’t, the counter attack can be extremely counter productive when you are fighting multiple foes as it roots you for pretty much a full second. If you are trying to escape multiple players/soak ranged damage with it, don’t use it when in close proximity to a charging warrior, he will trigger the effect and cause you to soak up all his ranged buddies’ damage.

Axe 5: Whirling Defense. This skill has much more to it than projectile reflect. Three words, boon share combo. With 15 in nature, this skill becomes extremely powerful with melee pets as your pet gains retaliation as well. If you’re running a bunker build, you can a new counter-mechanic to high-hit combo attacks. If you have enough defense(protection on roll is a good trait for this) hit axe 5 when a guardian uses his greatsword whirl on you, when mesmers use their sword flurry and you can double retaliate and reflect huge amounts back to them, in some cases upwards of 5k+.

Sword 1: Commonly known trick but always worth mentioning. Without a target, you can use the number 1 chain leap to create distances and aid escape.

All distance closers: When fighting melee against kiting players remember you can drop target and cut off their movements by aiming where they will be.

Guard: Guard does not merely exist for spamming regeneration and swiftness. I can’t tell you the amount of players I overtook with a drake F2 launched from stealth. (I use River and marsh drake for the range/poison.)

Know your heals. While Healing Spring is amazing, it’s extended cool down makes it weak against burst. If you’re already rolling with an EB equipped soldier shout/signet of renewal build+blind and poison removed on dodge you’re not really going to need the extra condition removal. Consider heal as one or Troll unguent in those cases, especially if you’re not running a s/x+gs build. If you’re running with the Vigor on heal trait, Heal as one becomes better by far as you potentially gain vigor much more frequently.

When fleeing multiple opponents: Keep in mind predictability can get you killed. Consider doing something unexpected now and then. What I mean is when you keep going in the same direction with distance creators, many people will be able to deal with that. Now and then, stop for a second, and use your sword 2 to fly, behind your opponents and escape in the opposite direction, behind them. Players with poor instincts will be slow in swapping their camera angles and easy to lose. It also looks completely kitten.

Edit: Great melee sa/gs combo using hydromancy sigils: When your pull a foe with path of scars, swap to GS the moment they’re at your feet and maul asap. The AoE chill will trigger, adding extra burst damage and almost guaranteeing the maul will make contact if they don’t use a distance creating stun breaker.

Final generic captain obvious suggestion: Make sure to use the most out of the combo fields your allies create. Leap in those smoke fields!

In my 5s team I run ranger roam. It’s the most fun and rewarding experience I’ve had in the game. I would recommend it to any ranger. You have to be able to win in a one vs one situation vs any class though.

In my 5s team I run ranger roam. It’s the most fun and rewarding experience I’ve had in the game. I would recommend it to any ranger. You have to be able to win in a one vs one situation vs any class though.

If you want real roaming experience, go thief, there are no other classes even close to 1/2 of what a thief can do in roaming. All good roamers in every server are ALL thief. It’s a pity but truth.
If you want reliably counter a roaming thief (well there is never a way you can kill the good ones but you can still troll them), go for condition engi, that’s the only choice and hope.
Yes , roaming build is viable for ranger, but remember, it’s just for fun. You just can’t take it serious. You have to over play/ over geared your opponent like at least 200%.

A equal skilled thief can still troll you easily even with all blue gears.

I’ve personally never got used to the Axe and I was really inadequate with the regen build until I went back to the SB, and reworked my build to a regen spirit so I can get the burn back and compensate for the torch loss. It’s a fun build but my personal preference, Dire gear with perp runes any day. 29k HP with applied fortitude, 17-19xx condi dmg (playing corruption sigil for kicks) ~31xx armor, all that with the meta spirit build and I engage 2v1 without any hesitation knowing I got more than fair chances to win unless I get outplayed. Ranger is by far the class that fits my playstyle best and offers me the most versatility. Only draw back is escape mechanics other than the more than generous health pool and armor that allow you a lot of slack in every encounter.

The class has its drawbacks but over time you learn how to work around them using the terrain and better positioning to your advantage.

I do want to mention that I exclusively roam in small group of <= 3. Depending on your playstyle, you’ll either hate the class or love it.

I would listen to Detharos tbh, that’s the kind of depth knowledge of his class and build that only comes with experience and skilled play. I don’t actually know ranger well apart from as an opponent, even then as many say, skilled rangers are few and far between, I use my alt just for big ranged numbers when I get bored.

CRrabbit doesn’t really know what he’s talking about, as there’s a lot more to thieves in roaming – just that it’s rather easy to play and if you play it well no one will ever kill you, because yknow mechanics. Same can be said of Warrior with its mobility, and those are common also. I play guard roamer, which is rather rare, in terms of solo at least. I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen another, most run med builds, if looking at the forums is any indication. I know my build as well as it seems Detharos knows his, so I would consider what he says carefully; there are included a lot of the small tricks that you learn once you’ve played with your build for a while.

I also came to drop this here:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Ranger-Pets-Overpowered

CRrabbit.1284:

If you want real roaming experience, go thief, there are no other classes even close to 1/2 of what a thief can do in roaming. All good roamers in every server are ALL thief. It’s a pity but truth.
If you want reliably counter a roaming thief (well there is never a way you can kill the good ones but you can still troll them), go for condition engi, that’s the only choice and hope.
Yes , roaming build is viable for ranger, but remember, it’s just for fun. You just can’t take it serious. You have to over play/ over geared your opponent like at least 200%.

A equal skilled thief can still troll you easily even with all blue gears.

Sorry but this is incorrect. Thieves are good for trolling people and killing roamers which is something I can easily do as a ranger or any other class. What they aren’t good at is speeding up yaks or flipping camps, which is a big part of roaming.

I kill the majority of thieves I run up against because I have the sense to ignore the ones that don’t go down quickly. If you run into one that keeps resetting the fight on you just waypoint and flip another camp. Stealth spammers aren’t worth the time or effort for 1 bag.

Hello again,
I found an old thread (https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/BUILD-Boon-Tank-Ranger-BTR-Variations/first) that maybe may answer my previous question above and I would like to know if these builds are still viable for solo WvW Roaming or if they have to be tuned a bit after latest major patch.
Thank you!

running a trap ranger with sword/dagger + short bow. It is very viable when I go into a 1v1.

Your posts mentions group fights and I would have to say… be something other than ranger… at least in my experience. Any group fight I always get bum rushed. People believe rangers are an easy rally so they rush them. Not that rangers are any easier a rally than an some of the other classes but because I always get nuked on sight, it ends up furthering people’s belief in it. It sucks being ranger for that very reason, but sometimes it is fine I guess for any teammates because they can easily come down on enemies to deal damage for people trying to double down me since they stick to me like a leach.

Andrea.4251:

I’ve been following this thread with interest because I plan to start working a my ranger next week (WvW solo roaming only).
Regen and Trap builds have already been posted (thanks, Prysin and Warriorjrd) so it would be much appreciated if somebody could post a Full Glass Cannon build and a Condition build (assuming the Trapper build posted it’s not a conidtion build itself). I’ve found some builds around but I’m not sure they come from a reliable source and I don’t have lots of gold to spend, so I would prefer to avoid any mistake…
Thanks in advance!

Best Glass sniper build currently (Great range/damage. Good mobility/ability to engage/disengage, addequate defence for glass)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRjMqUyaLLGsw1ag9gadAUAndrhw9B3EtdGPVisJ-TpRBwAUuAAP3fYxhAQzRAgcZAAPAAA

Great Condi Burst/Spam build (Max condi dmg & easy 25 bleed stacks/burn/poison… huge condi pressure with burst and sustain)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAV8YjMqUzaLLGsQ1iABhaVA0sGSWWJg789H+6MeqEZTA-TZRAwAKOIAAuAAUeCAlLD0b/BA

Edit: I realised i left dagger on there in the build editor. Usually I use S/T, dagger is also an option to replace burn with perma poison and extra evades in melee.

Otherwise as others have said BM bunker is great. Never been too into trappers myself although they are effective, loved them in gw1 but gw2 they feel a little clunky.

irk.2047:

running a trap ranger with sword/dagger + short bow. It is very viable when I go into a 1v1.

Your posts mentions group fights and I would have to say… be something other than ranger… at least in my experience. Any group fight I always get bum rushed. People believe rangers are an easy rally so they rush them. Not that rangers are any easier a rally than an some of the other classes but because I always get nuked on sight, it ends up furthering people’s belief in it. It sucks being ranger for that very reason, but sometimes it is fine I guess for any teammates because they can easily come down on enemies to deal damage for people trying to double down me since they stick to me like a leach.

Are you kidding? That’s the best part of being a ranger. A few days ago I got to kill the same warrior outside of bay four times in a row because he couldn’t accept losing to a ranger. When I’m roaming with a small group I can lure people away from the safety of a camp, or their group because they want to kill me so bad.

Rangers are pretty close to mesmers and thieves when it comes to evading and escaping damage. If people are intent on focusing you just use it to your advantage.

Filterkat.2143:

Great Condi Burst/Spam build (Max condi dmg & easy 25 bleed stacks/burn/poison… huge condi pressure with burst and sustain)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAV8YjMqUzaLLGsQ1iABhaVA0sGSWWJg789H+6MeqEZTA-TZRAwAKOIAAuAAUeCAlLD0b/BA

Edit: I realised i left dagger on there in the build editor. Usually I use S/T, dagger is also an option to replace burn with perma poison and extra evades in melee.

I dusted off my ranger to level him up, he is 39 at the moment, and I’m looking at this build. I’m assuming you are running dire gear / rabid weapons / rabid amulets?

Jim Hunter.6821:

irk.2047:

running a trap ranger with sword/dagger + short bow. It is very viable when I go into a 1v1.

Your posts mentions group fights and I would have to say… be something other than ranger… at least in my experience. Any group fight I always get bum rushed. People believe rangers are an easy rally so they rush them. Not that rangers are any easier a rally than an some of the other classes but because I always get nuked on sight, it ends up furthering people’s belief in it. It sucks being ranger for that very reason, but sometimes it is fine I guess for any teammates because they can easily come down on enemies to deal damage for people trying to double down me since they stick to me like a leach.

Are you kidding? That’s the best part of being a ranger. A few days ago I got to kill the same warrior outside of bay four times in a row because he couldn’t accept losing to a ranger. When I’m roaming with a small group I can lure people away from the safety of a camp, or their group because they want to kill me so bad.

Rangers are pretty close to mesmers and thieves when it comes to evading and escaping damage. If people are intent on focusing you just use it to your advantage.

It’s true, people underestimate rangers and it is a lot of fun that way especially with my ranger whom I built to be great at punishing aggressiveness. Maybe it’s the people I run across but whenever I encounter a group of other players, they all target me. I would love to have your experience where single targets deciding to deviate from their group. It happens every once in a while, usually hammer warriors, but most of the time, I get nuked by necros, CCed by warriors, and crate dropped by engineers almost instantly as a skirmish starts; maybe I should stand 1800+ range back and wait a couple seconds for everyone to expend all their skills now that I think about it. Though I wouldnt be doing any damage… shortbow only goes 900 range and I can’t throw traps. I could dodge spam at a fight start, but that only gets a ranger so far and depletes what my ranger is good at, countering.

I run power so I get the range, stealth, knockback on my bow, and then the block, daze and swoop on my sword. Not to mention the entangle and wolf fear. I find that the block and/or stealth is great for the initial burst and making them waste skills.

NondSwiftshot.9168:

Filterkat.2143:

Great Condi Burst/Spam build (Max condi dmg & easy 25 bleed stacks/burn/poison… huge condi pressure with burst and sustain)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAV8YjMqUzaLLGsQ1iABhaVA0sGSWWJg789H+6MeqEZTA-TZRAwAKOIAAuAAUeCAlLD0b/BA

Edit: I realised i left dagger on there in the build editor. Usually I use S/T, dagger is also an option to replace burn with perma poison and extra evades in melee.

I dusted off my ranger to level him up, he is 39 at the moment, and I’m looking at this build. I’m assuming you are running dire gear / rabid weapons / rabid amulets?

I tend to run full rabid. Dire armor is an option also though. I tested dire armor and its still good, but a little less bleed on crit from traits/sigils, since crit chance goes down. full rabid in WvW with this you have just under 19k hp which I think is acceptable and around 50% base crit chance (70 with fury from survival skills) so you get a lot of bleeds from that. I dont find the extra HP from Dire to be a worthwile tradeoff for critchance especially since this build relies on crit to proc bleeds a lot, but I would probably reccomend the setup you suggested while you get used to it, then switch to full rabid once ur comfortable.

Then again I have defence against guards WvW trait which puts me up at close to 23k hp with full stacks.

Thank you very much for your help, Filterkat, now I have something to work with

Rangers in wvw are free bags. Killing one is like chasing an uplevel, don’t do it.