Guild Wars 2

I’m sure this topic has been beaten, no smashed in the head multiple times over multiple threads but I’m curious to hear the wisdom of some veteran rangers as to what they think is the more valuable trait in terms of PVP. I have no trouble surviving most PVE encounters, but my issues lie within the player versus player encounters I have. Currently I run Valks armor and have around 21k Vit. Trinkets are a mixed bag of berserkers and some vit, power, and toughness. All exotic (havent made ascended yet). Can anyone give me their enlightened opinion on which is more important for survivablity in PVP?

Thanks in advance.

Also, I am a fairly new player to PVP and WvW so I do understand that surviving those types of encounters will get better over time but I still am curious about the Vitality vs. Toughness delima.

It’s a bit of a wash but I prefer toughness over vitality because rangers get a decent HP pool and vitality adds flat HP versus a percentage so it’s less useful to rangers as apposed to thieves or elementalists.

I like to keep my HP pool above 20k and then after that toughness.

Since you are referring to mixed trinkets and exotics which seems to be pertaining to wvw I will speak from a wvw perspective. I don’t know about the pvp game mode enough to comment on that.

I have not played warrior or mesmer, but for every other class which includes ranger, I’ve noticed toughness is generally the superior stat unless you are going for a dps build with mostly zerker and offensive traits and you’d like to pad out your survivability a bit, in which case adding a chunk of vitality may stop you from being instagibbed. But it’s not that simple.

Of course, this depends on your ability to deal with conditions so you may want some extra health to be comfortable. Rangers generally do not have as strong condition removal compared to other classes barring certain grandmaster traits so if you’re not taking these, you generally want to have a minimum amount of health. Also, if that other thread in the ranger forum is correct, toughness doesn’t mitigate retaliation so that can be an issue.

You have to realize that the main heal skill (and this is true of many classes) doesn’t scale well with healing power and thus as your health pool increases, your heal will usually not catch up with it. Thus making every unit of health worth more due to more toughness means your heals are more valuable. In losing fights, you may notice yourself not dying but being unable to really refill your life, which tends to result in an eventual death.

Tl;DR Vitality is better in quick fights where you’re just looking to not get instagibbed by thieves or whatnot while toughness tends to be better in longer fights. But given the prevalence of condition damage, having a buffer will save you more. In larger fights where cleanses and heals are more prevalent, toughness becomes increasingly better as you mostly have to worry about direct damage, the opposite is true in small groups and roaming.

ArchonWing.9480:

Since you are referring to mixed trinkets and exotics which seems to be pertaining to wvw I will speak from a wvw perspective. I don’t know about the pvp game mode enough to comment on that.

I have not played warrior or mesmer, but for every other class which includes ranger, I’ve noticed toughness is generally the superior stat unless you are going for a dps build with mostly zerker and offensive traits and you’d like to pad out your survivability a bit, in which case adding a chunk of vitality may stop you from being instagibbed.

Of course, this depends on your ability to deal with conditions so you may want some extra health to be comfortable. Rangers generally do not have as strong condition removal barring certain grandmaster traits so if you’re not taking these, you generally want to have a minimum amount of health. Also, if that other thread in the ranger forum is correct, toughness doesn’t mitigate retaliation so that can be an issue.

You have to realize that the main heal skill (and this is true of many classes) doesn’t scale well with healing power and thus as your health pool increases, your heal will usually not catch up with it. Thus making every unit of health worth more due to more toughness means your heals are more valuable.

Tl;DR Vitality is better in quick fights where you’re just looking to not get instagibbed by thieves or whatnot while toughness tends to be better in longer fights. But given the prevalence of condition damage, having a buffer will save you more. In larger fights where cleanses and heals are more prevalent, toughness becomes increasingly better as you mostly have to worry about direct damage, the opposite is true in small groups and roaming.

Thank you for the information. Would you be willing to give my ranger a bit of an evaluation if I were to post my stats, runes, etc.? Just an FYI, my gear isnt perfect but you sound well informed on this topic and I’d like to get your opinion. I’m at work so later today I could post my stats.

You can; this is generally the easiest way to do it:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/

And when you’re done, use the “get quick link”

As with any build, it’s best to detail what you want to do (small fights, big fights, roaming, sniping random people) as some builds can be good for one thing and be completely useless in another situation.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNBjODbkRlWW7YxhFqWDsHUrDgC4sb1Ds7gRIEO5QLjF-TZBBwAQ3fAwFAAzTAoxBBocZAA

This is what I run in tPvP. It’s not the highest toughness or vitality, but I like it. It’s not super glassy, but does have a bit of vitality. I don’t know. But I like it.

Most good Ranger tPvP build are either use Beserker, Carrion or Rabid for amulet. Beserker for the Longbow/GS power build, Carrion for more hybrid power/condition build with Sword and Rabid with pure condition that need crits to give more condition.

You have 65% crit chance… Why do you use Intelligence sigils? Use Strength and -idontknow- Energy. Neither the longbow nor the Axe has a true single hit burst skill worth for a 100% proc sigil.

The only time i can think of vit being more use full then toughness is in builds that have a very high protection up (spirit of stone. forge runes etc) this where Carrion amulet is often used.

For almost all other build types I prefer toughness over Vitality. the reason being that Vitality reduces the effect of healing and toughness increases the effect, healing is a set amount of HPs so if you decrease the amount of damage you are taking you increase the value of each HP. If you increase the amount of HP you have your decrease the % of your health your healing will return to you.

keep I’m mined though conditions ignore armor, so you always need a way of dealing with that, high vitality only delays the conditions killing you.

How bout Power Rangers, are they a thing of the past? That was kind of what I was goin for really….

Often when playing power ranger, you defenses is you ability to kill you opponent quick, CC and evades. When I play glassbow I typically use full zerker gear but with some defensive traits/utlitys

2 examples are
6/2/6/0/0 EB signets
6/0/2/6/0 SotF

In my opinion power ranger is not very effective but a hell of a lot of fun to play it.

hear is a melee power build I some times play (SotF Variation)

eugenstash.8610:

How bout Power Rangers, are they a thing of the past? That was kind of what I was goin for really….

This build works well if you are good with GS. I tend to think it is in the strongest power ranger build category. Way better than the zerk meta. This goes with toughness and regen over vitality. You’ll rofl stomp thieves, mesmers, and other glassy builds. This build puts you at a disadvantage against turret engineers and some necros.

You’ve got 3 good hits in your GS rotation. Make them count.

Edit: fixed build, posted wrong one…

LB Power rangers are about putting alot of pressure and control the the battle by kiting the opponent with distance control, stealh, knockback etc.. . This build is one of the best i have seen, published by flopy the rabbit(potatoveg) but requeirs high learning courve.
The build :
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAT8YjEq0yaFL+rw1ag+ga9DEAjdzfYFY+vfQJfqI-TFTEABKqWBUKJg7CAAwBBYgHAAiqqwlSwoUmZ0+DMpUwhjAQb6GCAcAc+5ZezDO/8zP/8z78zP/8zPvUAVsAA-w

flopy(potatoveg) channel : https://www.youtube.com/user/BlueFlopy/videos

Me I go full DPS in sPvP with my ranger.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRjEq0waFLGsw1ag9gadAUAndreg9APChQFrVB-TZBFwAPuEAk2fIxRAoaZAAPAAA

When I start a fight i’m full endurance (10%dmg) + signet of the wild (25%dmg) + Elite (Fury+Switfness). 1 point blank shot for interrupt, 1 rapid fire while running toward him, switching to GS for a Maul. Usually, he’s dead, if not he will panic and use his heal while he just gave him poison.

But its all in. I burst like hell, but can’t survive much. I kill or I get the hell out. It perfect to go from one point to the other to help someone that bunker a point while you kill from the sideline.

If I had to pick one I’d pick Toughness, although generally I like to aim for 2750+ armour and 19-20k HP rather than picking one over the other entirely (this being in WvW and excluding exceptional builds such as full zerker).

T2 health sure opens up some doors, you really can’t go wrong with either one. The key is to decide what you want your build to do and where it’s role comes from and expand on that. Once you figure those things out, look for the gear (or amulet) that gives you the stats most fit for your build.

One thing to consider is are you weak to power builds or condi builds. 8k toughness won’t help you versus a condi necro. I guess “all things in moderation.”