Guild Wars 2

Hi Guys,

I really want to play a ranger; it’s pretty much why i bought the game. However, due to all the forum talk and ingame talk regarding the “underpowered” / “bugged nature” of the profession, i decided to roll a mesmer till lvl 35 only to find i don’t actually enjoy the mechanics.

I want to know if the profession is viable; preferably in sPVP as that’s what i enjoy most. I also enjoy WvW and PvE/Events and perhaps dungeons but i havent had a chance to try them yet.

im not a pro ranger, just fyi

you will have to work quite hard, but you can split even with the other average players in pvp, just dont expect it to be easy, and some pro players of other classes will still stomp you . play the class, and if you like the playstyle, go with it in hopes of future buffs

enjoy your ranger

I love my ranger. Shes not the my powerful class, but I love how it feels. I have tried everything else…and some are ok. But its my ranger I always go back to. I assume they will fix us up at some point. I found it very easy to get to 80 solo. Get all the pets you can. Sometimes its good to have 2 to switch between for different parts of a fight.

As much as I love my Ranger, if you’re a serious SPvPer, you would be better off playing the FotM professions.

Today’s flavors are:

-Mesmer
-Guardian
-Thief

Until next patch when rangers get buffed. Then the ranger lovers will come back and give it another go. Atm Im banking on those buffs and next patch, if they fail to keep me interested there is always engineer.

The ranger class is a little broken at the moment – so if you roll one now, it can only get better. The glass is half full!

Yea but even if it was being overly optimistic, its true. Anet plans on buffing/fixing us so even if its only a little we will get better.

For spvp mesmer and thief are considerably more powerful.

For example lets say there are 2 fundemental ranger playstyles; bow based kiting with melee burst/escape/evade, and pet based. You can play the kiting bow type class with powerful melee burst with the thief or you can play the pet based class with the mesmer. The reason the thief and mesmer do the typical ranger playstyle better is because:

(1) both thief and mesmer can run glass canon builds with essentially the same survivability (or more) than a fully tank-upped ranger.
(2) the thief shortbow is now better than ranger shortbow
(3) thief melee is better and has better skills than ranger skills
(4) both thief and mesmer have amazing game changing utility skills
(5) mesmer “pets” are significantly better than ranger pets- you can really do the pet based game properly with mesmer getting huge burst out of the pets (which are really good at hitting the target and can move through walls, reach impossible places etc).
(6) mesmer pets synergize better with mesmer through traits and provide amazing CC that is hard to avoid.
(7) Easier to kite with a thief

There is likely more reasons but thats all that comes to mind at the moment. Despite all that a ranger has a unique playstyle and is worth playing with in spvp. Probably the best bet at the moment is a condition/toughness build using traps and SB, plus warhorn and axe or sword.

If you are looking to roll Ranger for PVE, do it. It’s super simple/easy to master.

If you want to roll Ranger in sPVP, do it…but only after playing a NON-BUNKER Elementalist in sPVP for at least 5 ranks. That will force you to anticipate what other classes are going to do, get very good at avoiding damage, learn to deal with sub-par burst and garbage healing and how to use the map environment to your advantage just to stay alive.

Once you’ve got the above down on an Elementalist, roll a Ranger in sPVP and you will feel like a god.

Also, use the Shortbow + 1h Sword&Warhorn. When you are running from point to point, always have 1H sword and Warhorn equipped. Do not expect to use the 1H sword as a damage weapon, as the #1 auto-attack skill is broken and roots you in place. However, you have 3 actions with the 1H sword that work as evades. Use them when someone runs at your Ranger and begins to unload their opening bursts (I’m looking at you backstab theif/100b Warrior). They will blow their wad trying to burst you while you are evading all over the place and you will still have 2 dodges left to use. Hit the warhorn abilities, swap to shortbow and unload with QZ, then /laugh on their corpse.

Play the profession that you find most enjoyable. Bugs will be squashed eventually (one can hope, after all, it’s only the first two months of GW2). Have fun, and you will find a way to make it work, no matter what downsides people say there are.

Yasha.5963:

For example lets say there are 2 fundemental ranger playstyles; bow based kiting with melee burst/escape/evade, and pet based.

A condition/crit SB/traps ranger is actually very tanking and dangerous to be in close with. My sPvP ranger runs with 3k armor, 50% crit and 1400 condition damage.

But I think the issue with rangers is less about “power” and more that there isn’t a lot of build variety to the class because a lot of the weapon sets and skills are really sub par.

I run both a ranger and mesmer in sPvP and I find my ranger to be just as viable. The issue is that with my mesmer I have many different options in how I build out. The class just has so many good weapon, skill and trait combinations to play with. With my mesmer I’m always wanting to swap out to new things and respec. But with the ranger I rarely even bother to weapon swap.

If you want to play a ranger and bought the game specifically for that, play a ranger. Don’t listen to forum talk. All I play is a ranger and I love it.

You either see problems with a class as a hindrance, or as a challenge that allows you learn and become a better player. The idea that you will waste your time if you pick up the Ranger now is silly. It all depends on your perspective.

Roll ranger. Currently they have limitations but they aren’t horrible… If it’s the style of play you enjoy it will be the class for you.

I’ve tried just about everything, for all the rangers weaknesses which are more isolated per build than overarching. That is you can develop builds to address specific issues and have fun accepting those builds will also have weaknesses.

Your definitely not the OP class, some fixes are definitely needed but we also know changes are en route. One thing I don’t think you can expect is for pets not to remain an important part of the class. And while they have issues they aren’t completely unusable or without benefits.

Don’t read QQ or “play another class” comments.
If you currently like ranger, just enjoy it and don’t listen to anyone, people whine too much and most of the ones who say ranger is bad will just tell you “I heard it’s bad” or “people says it’s bad”. Most of them haven’t made a self test or give you a good arguement of why they are bad.

Also, unlike other classes, ranger is not going to be nerfed…so it’s pretty safe to play a ranger not having to worry about why you can’t two shot someone anymore

If you enjoy sPvP then what’s the deal with making a class or not…you can join sPvP being level 1 so if you don’t like it just create another class and you are ready to join sPvP within a few minutes again.

Arekai, I try and try to convince my guild mates that I, as a ranger, am useless. Time and time again, they convince me that I’m wrong. Rangers are not useless in dungeons or in PvE (unfortunately, can’t say for PvP since I only do occasional WvW). I do quite well, thank you very much. :P

Rangers aren’t exactly weak in PvE, especially when comparing to mesmers. Though support-wise it’s mostly due to healing springs. Spirits are supposed to get some sort of buff, but it’s anyone’s guess how that’ll turn out.