Guild Wars 2

Greetings and thank you for taking the time to read this. I am new to the Ranger profession and so far I am loving it. (huzzah) At first since I’m not a fan of condition damage I was working on a power/precision build which entertained me for a while but ultimately felt boring as time progressed as it mainly focused on auto-attacks with some slight CC.

My favorite class that I had enjoyed until I began my ranger was my support ele and so I wanted to try to make my ranger a suitable support. Sadly a personal pet-peeve/fault of mine is that I’m not a fan of playing “flavor of the month” builds in games so needless to say I didn’t take the traditional Spirit Ranger build that’s been quite popular recently.

I can’t deny spirits usefulness though and personally I like the benefits they bring to the team so I wanted to make use of them and the 30 point trait “Nature’s Voice” in the Nature Magic trait line that caught my eye. I wound up with this build which I’m still testing:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBMPdG2JRFdBXVhXFgWGQaF0k3jWJWER3jRpUCxL+4kJ-T0AgzE3o8y5l5GZX2uGisEZLypgpIPIA

The main features were to provide perma AoE healing+swiftness with the “guard” skill as well as having two spirits (frost and stone or for more damage frost and sun) and should things get bad (or if the group needs constant vigor/purifies) I have healing spring should the need arise. The major downside of course is that my spirits won’t move with me so this wouldn’t be great for constant mobile fights. As well as the complete lack of a stun-breaker. :/

Weapon choice (so far) is Sword+Axe and Axe+warhorn. I’m not certain on these choices as I feel like I should have at least 1 “long” ranged weapon or the torch for the fire field, however I felt off-hand axe was way too good to pass up and the warhorn felt needed just for group Fury.

For Pets I’m leaning towards the Jungle Stalker for AoE Might stacks and Fern Hound for more healing. (I’m not sure if the Regen will even work as mine heals for more and if it just adds to the duration or what not.) I’m looking to swap Fern Hound for something else but I’m not sure what would compliment this build best. The AoE Cleanse from the bear seems nice but only 1 condition every 20 seconds seems…sub-par compared to my healing spring. Other than that I’ve thought about perhaps one of the moa’s that dazes for some CC or the drake for it’s general usefulness. I could definitely use someone more experienced for advice on this matter.

Runes should be self-explanatory unless I’m overlooking something that would be better suited.

Weapon Sigils I honestly have no clue as to what I should place there, for the time being the might seems to work well as with my pet I can reach and maintain around 9-14 stacks.

I’m looking to use this build for a bit of everything, PvE, WvW, (gear-wise I’m learning towards clerics) and PvP with priorities set in that order. So it’s not meant to excel at a particular aspect of play. Any suggestions, comments, concerns, etc. is MUCH appreciated.

I’d avoid using it in dungeons. Better off running dps spec in there. For WvW/spvp you’d probably want the spirits mobile. I always incorporate a sigil of energy into my defensive weapon set (either warhorn, or greatsword or whichever else, offhand axe, dagger etc) for the extra endurance.

With this build you will do no damage and you won’t necessarily be healing your team very much either. Regeneration is based off the healing power of the target, not the original source of the boon. Therefore, someone with no healing power will not benefit much from your regeneration application.

swiftpaw.6397:

I’d avoid using it in dungeons. Better off running dps spec in there. For WvW/spvp you’d probably want the spirits mobile. I always incorporate a sigil of energy into my defensive weapon set (either warhorn, or greatsword or whichever else, offhand axe, dagger etc) for the extra endurance.

I’ll probably place one of those sigils in my warhorn, thanks for the advice! Also I figured the mobility of the spirits would be important but how would they fare since my weapon setups are practically melee? I assumed it would be safe to set them just out of range (and hopefully out of sight) to where they wouldn’t get blasted with AoE or targeted since I’d mostly be on the front lines.

Antisceptic.9174:

With this build you will do no damage and you won’t necessarily be healing your team very much either. Regeneration is based off the healing power of the target, not the original source of the boon. Therefore, someone with no healing power will not benefit much from your regeneration application.

Oh wow, I honestly did not know that about regeneration! o.O I figured it affected the source of the boon…seems kind of odd to be designed that way. So the only good healing builds are those that give a flat amount of healing with blasts and whatnot? :x Is there any way to salvage this concept or just trakitten? I feel like it’d still try to make it work just to see if it helps anyone at all but this does sadden me. Is pure Spirit Ranger the only support ranger playstyle?

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBHhx+0IRVldXlVFodgopQTm/pIWs39YUl6UVc3D-TQAjGWgs/YKC

With either,

Rune of the pack: to grant nearby allies more might, fury, swiftness and bit more dmg output for yourself (which you certainly lack with this build, but you asked for healing/support so….)
Rune of earth: for longer protection and more survivability for yourself
Rune of altruism: more might, fury and boon duration + for allies.
Last one is best I think.

Pets: fern hound and red moa: more healing and fury
Utility-skills are self explanatory
I’d stay in axe warhorn most of the time, other weapon set to get away in difficult situations, toggling your spirit-skills when doing that (maybe best to put sword skills on disable auto-attack, right mouse click first skill). Sigils help you with that.

Traits.

Wilderness Survival: IV for more vigor. VII because you have 2 offhands, but especially for warhorn, get that might, fury, swiftness pumping, and now it’s also a blast finisher for your healing spring which is nice too, more healing!

Nature Magic: No need to explain and I saw you had similar trait-setup with your build.

Beast Mastery: V for frequent healing (fernhound) and fury (red moa). X because AOE vigor when you have moa up for your allies.

So all together that’s a lot of support.

I can tell you that your healing power counts for the regeneration that you apply on others.
So if you have 1500 healing power you will have a 317 regen that also affects others not only you. So that is definitely useful.
As a beastmaster you can have a really tough pet but your damage won’t be really good.

Antisceptic.9174:

With this build you will do no damage and you won’t necessarily be healing your team very much either. Regeneration is based off the healing power of the target, not the original source of the boon. Therefore, someone with no healing power will not benefit much from your regeneration application.

this isn’t correct, with nature voice trait the regen boon u give is off of your healing power not theirs, ever time i use it i see the healing procing at 370 for the 5 guys around me

i run a modified version of this build that gives more survivability and ok dmg, 0,0,30,30,10 with gs lb and valkary gear/weps…running food and oil i get ~370 regen and Gs auto attack of ~500 and 2k thoughmess, its a group support build so as with any support build your dps isnt all that important as keeping the enemy attention on you as u take all the dmg and keep your allis up…all in all im vry happy with the nature voices trait

Bast Bow.2958:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBHhx+0IRVldXlVFodgopQTm/pIWs39YUl6UVc3D-TQAjGWgs/YKC

With either,

Rune of the pack: to grant nearby allies more might, fury, swiftness and bit more dmg output for yourself (which you certainly lack with this build, but you asked for healing/support so….)
Rune of earth: for longer protection and more survivability for yourself
Rune of altruism: more might, fury and boon duration + for allies.
Last one is best I think.

Pets: fern hound and red moa: more healing and fury
Utility-skills are self explanatory
I’d stay in axe warhorn most of the time, other weapon set to get away in difficult situations, toggling your spirit-skills when doing that (maybe best to put sword skills on disable auto-attack, right mouse click first skill). Sigils help you with that.

Traits.

Wilderness Survival: IV for more vigor. VII because you have 2 offhands, but especially for warhorn, get that might, fury, swiftness pumping, and now it’s also a blast finisher for your healing spring which is nice too, more healing!

Nature Magic: No need to explain and I saw you had similar trait-setup with your build.

Beast Mastery: V for frequent healing (fernhound) and fury (red moa). X because AOE vigor when you have moa up for your allies.

So all together that’s a lot of support.

Ah, that Altruism rune looks rather nice! :o

A few noob-ish questions though if you don’t mind as I’m rather in-experienced at this:

1. If by choosing the trait for 20% reduced off-hand cooldown, considering that and my boon duration runes, etc. wouldn’t the warhorn alone be enough for fury upkeep? If so would running another moa like the one that dazes be better suited as it provides some CC and still benefits the moa trait in beast mastery?

2. The 20% cooldown trait for off-hands is VERY tempting considering I’m running two of them however I seem to be rather fond of the 25 minor trait in beast mastery (10% of healing is added as power [which would help a little bit with my damage If I’m running clerics]) as well as the 30 point trait to give me quickness (which would also help my damage) every time I swap pets. (Which would seem to also help as I’m using the pets for the boons mostly so I’d be swapping often.)

3.If i do wind up going 0/0/20/30/20 would be better for me to use shortbow/ axe+hammer and shamans gear for condition damage instead? (mostly boils down to the 20 in wilderness or 30 in beast mastery, from what I’ve tested against golems in the mists with the cleric’s amulet, the quickness gives me some very nice spike with the sword. (Then again however that was with the jungle stalker’s buff and the pets dps added to it.)

4. I am attracted to the jungle stalkers AoE might stacks and it’s dps which helps me a lot when I need to do damage. If I do take 20 points in wilderness I will change it to the moa as the jungle stalker is really powerful with 30 in beast master with the quickness buff we both get. So personally I am leaning toward the 0/0/10/30/30. :x If you don’t mind would you list the pros and cons of going 0/0/20/30/20 or 0/0/10/30/30? I know the 20/30/20 gives some better group support while 10/30/30 gives me a much needed boost in personal DPS. I’m just having a little trouble visualizing how large the gap is between the two.

Also thank you for reminding me about Warhorn’s 5 is a blast finisher! _ Combining that with the fern hounds regen (does the fern hounds regen scale off of my healing stat?) I’m more than happy to change Nature’s Voice to Spirits Unbound, in which case I can change Guard to Lighting Reflexes enabling me to have at least 1 stun breaker (not to mention another mobility tool and free vigor <3)

Thank you very much for the help and advice! ^^

(Sorry for double post, message was too long. :/)

Arpheus.6918:

I can tell you that your healing power counts for the regeneration that you apply on others.
So if you have 1500 healing power you will have a 317 regen that also affects others not only you. So that is definitely useful.
As a beastmaster you can have a really tough pet but your damage won’t be really good.

phew! Thank the Pale Tree! _
I was severely worried about how Regen worked.

As for my lacking damage as a Beast Master, personally I’ve never really worried about my own damage. I enjoy supporting groups in any game I play either it’s healing, buffing, severe de-buffing, etc. I know Guild Wars 2 wants to get rid of the “Holy Trinity” of MMO’s but honestly I feel like they’ve just been trying to make everyone DPS, although thanks to bunker builds Tanks are in and doing quite well. So it’s rather hard for me to make DPS my main focus. ^^;

Arpheus.6918:

I can tell you that your healing power counts for the regeneration that you apply on others.
So if you have 1500 healing power you will have a 317 regen that also affects others not only you. So that is definitely useful.
As a beastmaster you can have a really tough pet but your damage won’t be really good.

denimdan.8642:

Antisceptic.9174:

With this build you will do no damage and you won’t necessarily be healing your team very much either. Regeneration is based off the healing power of the target, not the original source of the boon. Therefore, someone with no healing power will not benefit much from your regeneration application.

this isn’t correct, with nature voice trait the regen boon u give is off of your healing power not theirs, ever time i use it i see the healing procing at 370 for the 5 guys around me

i run a modified version of this build that gives more survivability and ok dmg, 0,0,30,30,10 with gs lb and valkary gear/weps…running food and oil i get ~370 regen and Gs auto attack of ~500 and 2k thoughmess, its a group support build so as with any support build your dps isnt all that important as keeping the enemy attention on you as u take all the dmg and keep your allis up…all in all im vry happy with the nature voices trait

Once again, thank you as well for the clarification on Regen! <3

That sounds rather interesting! I’ve been wanting to run LB/SB or GS because I really like the way they play, however I can’t seem to find a way to incorporate them into my build. T.T (Aside from LB in WvW) Just out of curiosity what utility skills are you running? :o

Edit: If I went 0/0/10/30/30 would it be better to take Sword+Warhorn and SB/LB/GS or Sword+Axe and Axe+Warhorn? I’m attracted to the amazing utility of off-hand axe but I’m not sure if it’s really needed and at the same time I honestly would like to use a bow (plus I’m not a fan of main hand axe :x), but not if it hurts the build.

(ugh..sorry for the triple post, still trying to get used to these forums…)

The fern hound uses his own healing power which is 0 or 350 if you trait for it in the beastmastery trait line. I think the regen from the fern hound is 130 with 0 healing power and its like 174 with 350 healing power.
So I would rather use my own regen. Also your regen will be applied to your pet even if it is not next to you thanks to the fortifying bond. Your increased boon duration helps alot with these buffs.
A support ranger is really not bad. If you use altruism runes + healing spring + war horn + red moa you can keep up permanent fury for your party and a really strong regeneration + some might stacks for the group.
You will be very tanky and your healing spring is great for blast finishers and leap finishers with the swords for selfheal and you can even trait for high vigor uptime for everyone standing in the healing spring. Also it removes a condition every 3 seconds.
I liked the water runes back then. They healed around 1400 (with ~1400 healing power) two times per healing spring but they are not working any more.
The black bear is also a nice option for group support with 11 seconds of weakness and he is very tanky.
The jungle stalker is also nice for the 5 might stacks. You could even enhance the pets boon duration (fury from moa, might from jungle stalker) by 50% with concentration training in the nature magic trait line.
Another way to play support ranger are the spirits for high protection uptime and burn for the group. But I never really used them.

MyraKai.9326:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQRBHhx+0IRVldXlVFodgopQTm/pIWs39YUl6UVc3D-TQAjGWgs/YKC

1. If by choosing the trait for 20% reduced off-hand cooldown, considering that and my boon duration runes, etc. wouldn’t the warhorn alone be enough for fury upkeep? If so would running another moa like the one that dazes be better suited as it provides some CC and still benefits the moa trait in beast mastery?
The warhorn alone would not be enough for fury upkeep, even with the 20% reduced. If I recall correctly, with the trait you have a 27 cooldown instead of 35, while the might fury and swiftness lasts about 12 secs or so when you cast it. So that’s a 15 sec gap. So you could keep the Moa. Feel free to try out other pets though. I wouldn’t go for birds or felines with this build-setup, especially not in WvW. You need more (25+) points in Beastmastery to keep them alive.
On a sidenote as a tip, switch your pets in time! If you don’t it’ll cost you much more cooldown, thus less damage output or support, depending which pet you have. I got my switch-pet button as mouse nr 5 button. A lot of rangers forget or don’t bother to switch in time, which costs them greatly, especially when they’re build also has a lot of points in BM. Pet AI isn’t too swell, but we’re bound to it.

2. The 20% cooldown trait for off-hands is VERY tempting considering I’m running two of them however I seem to be rather fond of the 25 minor trait in beast mastery (10% of healing is added as power [which would help a little bit with my damage If I’m running clerics]) as well as the 30 point trait to give me quickness (which would also help my damage) every time I swap pets. (Which would seem to also help as I’m using the pets for the boons mostly so I’d be swapping often.)
I don’t see a question here ;P. If you put more points in Beast Mastery you will have more points in Healing Power so that’s not too shabby. In that case I would change weapon sets into axe/warhorn (same as above) and longbow. Why longbow? Because I find longbow ideal when using spirits. They give you the oppertunity to stay in the backlines in a fight since longbow have a big range, so the spirits won’t get targetted by AOE too much and your allies will be the meatshields instead of you and/or your spirits.

3.If i do wind up going 0/0/20/30/20 would be better for me to use shortbow/ axe+hammer and shamans gear for condition damage instead? (mostly boils down to the 20 in wilderness or 30 in beast mastery, from what I’ve tested against golems in the mists with the cleric’s amulet, the quickness gives me some very nice spike with the sword. (Then again however that was with the jungle stalker’s buff and the pets dps added to it.)
I agree on shaman’s. Not sure if shortbow is better per se, it’s different. I also thought of shortbow, but then I found the offhand -20% less usefull because you only have warhorn in that case. Then again shortbow is condition-based, sword/axe is less condition-based. Both has it’s ups and downs. Your choice, your preference, try it out what fits you best, no bad or good.

4. I am attracted to the jungle stalkers AoE might stacks and it’s dps which helps me a lot when I need to do damage. If I do take 20 points in wilderness I will change it to the moa as the jungle stalker is really powerful with 30 in beast master with the quickness buff we both get. So personally I am leaning toward the 0/0/10/30/30. :x If you don’t mind would you list the pros and cons of going 0/0/20/30/20 or 0/0/10/30/30? I know the 20/30/20 gives some better group support while 10/30/30 gives me a much needed boost in personal DPS. I’m just having a little trouble visualizing how large the gap is between the two.
I would only take felines with 25 or 30 points in BM, though I’m talking in a WvW perspective now. So I agree with you.
Stay leaned to 0/0/10/30/30, no problem!
It’ll be a very long list with pro’s and con’s to sum up. But taking all of them in account, I really think you’ll do fine with 0/0/10/30/30 which you like.

Also thank you for reminding me about Warhorn’s 5 is a blast finisher! _ Combining that with the fern hounds regen (does the fern hounds regen scale off of my healing stat?) I’m more than happy to change Nature’s Voice to Spirits Unbound, in which case I can change Guard to Lighting Reflexes enabling me to have at least 1 stun breaker (not to mention another mobility tool and free vigor <3) You’re welcome

Thank you very much for the help and advice! ^^

MyraKai.9326:

(Sorry for double post, message was too long. :/)

Arpheus.6918:

I can tell you that your healing power counts for the regeneration that you apply on others.
So if you have 1500 healing power you will have a 317 regen that also affects others not only you. So that is definitely useful.
As a beastmaster you can have a really tough pet but your damage won’t be really good.

phew! Thank the Pale Tree! _
I was severely worried about how Regen worked.

As for my lacking damage as a Beast Master, personally I’ve never really worried about my own damage. I enjoy supporting groups in any game I play either it’s healing, buffing, severe de-buffing, etc. I know Guild Wars 2 wants to get rid of the “Holy Trinity” of MMO’s but honestly I feel like they’ve just been trying to make everyone DPS, although thanks to bunker builds Tanks are in and doing quite well. So it’s rather hard for me to make DPS my main focus. ^^;

Arpheus.6918:

I can tell you that your healing power counts for the regeneration that you apply on others.
So if you have 1500 healing power you will have a 317 regen that also affects others not only you. So that is definitely useful.
As a beastmaster you can have a really tough pet but your damage won’t be really good.

denimdan.8642:

Antisceptic.9174:

With this build you will do no damage and you won’t necessarily be healing your team very much either. Regeneration is based off the healing power of the target, not the original source of the boon. Therefore, someone with no healing power will not benefit much from your regeneration application.

this isn’t correct, with nature voice trait the regen boon u give is off of your healing power not theirs, ever time i use it i see the healing procing at 370 for the 5 guys around me

i run a modified version of this build that gives more survivability and ok dmg, 0,0,30,30,10 with gs lb and valkary gear/weps…running food and oil i get ~370 regen and Gs auto attack of ~500 and 2k thoughmess, its a group support build so as with any support build your dps isnt all that important as keeping the enemy attention on you as u take all the dmg and keep your allis up…all in all im vry happy with the nature voices trait

Once again, thank you as well for the clarification on Regen! <3

That sounds rather interesting! I’ve been wanting to run LB/SB or GS because I really like the way they play, however I can’t seem to find a way to incorporate them into my build. T.T (Aside from LB in WvW) Just out of curiosity what utility skills are you running? :o

guard (obviously lol)
protect me (i cant live with out and oh kitten button and its a stun breaker)
signet of the wild (cant beat a 150 passive heal)
RaO or Elite spirit (depends on if i’m roaming my self or in a group)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fMAQJARTnAV0FcWQKWwaZAp9YSsEM5VYWcPGFUJEP5VPaF-jEyAotARNAIIQZxioxW3EiquasqZioalNGA-w

that’s my build with gear and runes ect. stats slightly lower as i have ascended.
gives you 500 passive heal
2k toughness
room for easy modification if you want more dps or more support.
can keep 5 guys busy for a while with the massive healing power and the GS leap and RaO(30 sec of stability instead of 20) giving your friends time to get to you.
as a lot of you know ranger is first one normally targeted in group fights, well you can survive all the initial burst with this build leaving the enemy on total CD while your friends kill them and you not going below 25% health.
most the survivability is staying mobile with the gs 3 and the perma swift helps alot.
the LB allows you to get your downed up with the 4 knock back to stop stakes and the 3 stealth for the rez. along with “protect me” and “troll unguent” u are almost guaranteed to rez every 48 sec.

all in all its a tank/support build and i enjoy kiting around 20 man zergs cause they cant catch me, a Warrior can only keep up for about 20 sec the rest have no hope to catch u.

also if u WvW a lot its a grate build for holding points and staying at the front of the zerg tagging every thing that attempts to kill you

Edit: as a reference to how tough you are and dps wise its about the same as a full tank/bunker Warrior but more survivability

Arpheus.6918:

The fern hound uses his own healing power which is 0 or 350 if you trait for it in the beastmastery trait line. I think the regen from the fern hound is 130 with 0 healing power and its like 174 with 350 healing power.
So I would rather use my own regen. Also your regen will be applied to your pet even if it is not next to you thanks to the fortifying bond. Your increased boon duration helps alot with these buffs.
A support ranger is really not bad. If you use altruism runes + healing spring + war horn + red moa you can keep up permanent fury for your party and a really strong regeneration + some might stacks for the group.

Thanks! I think I may go Jungle Stalker+Red Moa then for my general setup then since my own regen would be better than my Fern Hound.

Bast Bow.2958:

The warhorn alone would not be enough for fury upkeep, even with the 20% reduced. If I recall correctly, with the trait you have a 27 cooldown instead of 35, while the might fury and swiftness lasts about 12 secs or so when you cast it. So that’s a 15 sec gap. So you could keep the Moa. Feel free to try out other pets though. I wouldn’t go for birds or felines with this build-setup, especially not in WvW. You need more (25+) points in Beastmastery to keep them alive.
On a sidenote as a tip, switch your pets in time! If you don’t it’ll cost you much more cooldown, thus less damage output or support, depending which pet you have. I got my switch-pet button as mouse nr 5 button. A lot of rangers forget or don’t bother to switch in time, which costs them greatly, especially when they’re build also has a lot of points in BM. Pet AI isn’t too swell, but we’re bound to it.

Definitely making Moa one of my “main” pets then since my Fern Hound’s regen is less than my own, not to mention that 15 second Fury Downtime. :x

Bast Bow.2958:

I don’t see a question here ;P. If you put more points in Beast Mastery you will have more points in Healing Power so that’s not too shabby. In that case I would change weapon sets into axe/warhorn (same as above) and longbow. Why longbow? Because I find longbow ideal when using spirits. They give you the oppertunity to stay in the backlines in a fight since longbow have a big range, so the spirits won’t get targetted by AOE too much and your allies will be the meatshields instead of you and/or your spirits.

Egad there was no question. >.<
I did change my weapon setup since I decided to go 0/0/10/30/30, I’m now running the Longbow as you suggested and Sword/Warhorn. Personally I like the sword better than the axe as I won’t have any condition damage and the evades are ever so wonderful. <3 As for the Longbow it took some time getting used to it without my old power build as I obviously do less damage but I’ve adapted to it once I stopped playing like I used to (trying to burst anything moving) and started acting as support for my pet with it’s utilities. I’m still a low lvl (lvl.23 at time of writing) so I’m hoping later on when I acquire cleric’s gear and the passive trait that boosts my power that my LB Damage will be decent enough that I can easily kill mobs in PvE (not dungeons lol) before they reach me while my pets take out mobs on their own.

3. Wound up not going that route, so no comment aside from thanks for the input. ^^

Bast Bow.2958:

I would only take felines with 25 or 30 points in BM, though I’m talking in a WvW perspective now. So I agree with you.
Stay leaned to 0/0/10/30/30, no problem!
It’ll be a very long list with pro’s and con’s to sum up. But taking all of them in account, I really think you’ll do fine with 0/0/10/30/30 which you like.

I am liking the 10/30/30, thanks for the reassurance! I had absolutely no experience when it comes to rangers when I started this. :x

I can’t thank you enough for all the help you provided me with, I really appreciate the time you took to write this in detail. <3

denimdan.8642:

all in all its a tank/support build and i enjoy kiting around 20 man zergs cause they cant catch me, a Warrior can only keep up for about 20 sec the rest have no hope to catch u.

also if u WvW a lot its a grate build for holding points and staying at the front of the zerg tagging every thing that attempts to kill you

Edit: as a reference to how tough you are and dps wise its about the same as a full tank/bunker Warrior but more survivability

If I ever take a break from spirits I might actually try running a setup like that, sounds pretty interesting!