Guild Wars 2

http://www.youtube.com/user/StonishGamer

I got into his videos a couple weeks ago, and his last one “Tips/Guide on Greatsword Ranger” made me subscribe!

I hope you guys will enjoy it as much as i did!

Impales.

I rarely play GS on my ranger but this video really breaks it down well and has some decent tips. Probably nothing new for current ranger gs users but I don’t think they are all that common at the moment.

Thanks for posting this!

the fascination with GS fascinates me. it’s a very gimpy weapon, nice for lulz every now and then. works fine when youre fighting noobs or running away.

nerva.7940:

the fascination with GS fascinates me. it’s a very gimpy weapon, nice for lulz every now and then. works fine when youre fighting noobs or running away.

It is the only weapon I have found that synergizes at all with the playstyle of the one handed sword (best utilized, personally, with no active target). Axe works, to an extent, but you need to aim very carefully and frequently have to aim “up” for the arc. Off hand axe is a little better than main hand since path of scars seems to follow the ground plane.

It gives me a gap closer so I can continue jumping around like a bouncy ball, as well as a block, and an evade (third attack in main chain). If you turn off auto attack, you can “hold” the last part of the chain for a couple seconds to wait for the best moment. The stun is useful as well.

On its own, I found it lackluster, but used together with sword/dagger I find it to be quite effective especially when taking a slightly more defensive stance (though not running away).

Very helpful indeed. I think that’ll help me out in PvP whenever I play it for a bit.

nerva.7940:

the fascination with GS fascinates me. it’s a very gimpy weapon, nice for lulz every now and then. works fine when youre fighting noobs or running away.

Utility

Any clue which server is he on?

Yeh works well for bunker play which is great for spvp. The issue in wvw is that the gs and “utility” increase your kill time. If ure dancing around, blocking or whatever ure not doing damage. And considering there are no points to hold in wvw, utility is a waste of time. If you cant get kills quickly or support your team in a significant way, youre just derping around and wasting time. Ranger gs has absolutely no purpose in the wvw meta.

works fine for me in wvw….and bunker build has a lot of burst if u use your cc properly..
almost always solo roam

nerva.7940:

Yeh works well for bunker play which is great for spvp. The issue in wvw is that the gs and “utility” increase your kill time. If ure dancing around, blocking or whatever ure not doing damage. And considering there are no points to hold in wvw, utility is a waste of time. If you cant get kills quickly or support your team in a significant way, youre just derping around and wasting time. Ranger gs has absolutely no purpose in the wvw meta.

My main weapon is SB. My secondary was GS for the longest time. I made the switch to sword a couple of weeks ago. Currently combining it with torch but haven’t made a final decision on that yet …been trying all the offhands.

I think I do more damage with sword/torch as compared to GS, but in regards to “derping around wasting time”, I think that happens for me more with sword. Now that could be because I am not very good with it yet. When I jump into melee I pretty much use Hornet Sting first to make sure I get some distance/movement.(I haven’t actually made contact with the enemy yet) Then use Monarchs Sting as a range finder to get into melee. Next is serpants strike while I wait for Hornet Sting to reset. Then I use it to disengage and get back to SB.

I find GS to be much more linear…and easier to track for the enemy. For me sword is a delay tactic to get my CDs to reset….and it definitely causes confusion for the enemy trying to track me as I am derping around.

yep thats exactly how sword should be used. with some power/crit and quickness it hits super hard, and keeps the target locked down for your pet. so sword actually flows more naturally from offensive to defensive compared to the GS, which ends up being mostly a defensive weapon due to its poor damage output.

This one is not about GS, but he is really good ranger
http://www.youtube.com/user/karlesigw2

nerva.7940:

Yeh works well for bunker play which is great for spvp. The issue in wvw is that the gs and “utility” increase your kill time. If ure dancing around, blocking or whatever ure not doing damage. And considering there are no points to hold in wvw, utility is a waste of time. If you cant get kills quickly or support your team in a significant way, youre just derping around and wasting time. Ranger gs has absolutely no purpose in the wvw meta.

Sure glad the people I play with arent min/max anymore!

Either way, the “dancing around” was referring to the sword main hand and not the GS. And, as you say, the sword does more damage than the GS, but its auto is pretty much bouncing around. Of course, it also does damage at the same time. I can understand the miscommunication if you have never used the sword much, it does feel a bit clunky at first!

I also like to use my entire skill set (including weapons), so that means choosing a secondary weapon which synergizes with a very specific playstyle. When one weapon has the majority of skills on cooldown, I switch to the other since you cant activate abilities that are on cooldown. Even if it isnt as good as the sword main hand normally, it sure is when it has skills available.

Of course, I have found a very, very predictable response to the auto attack of the mainhand sword, and that is drawing the enemies attention. When this happens, they are attacking me and not my team mates (called tanking). The GS allows me to continue to take enemy fire without going down, even when one weapon set has all skills on cooldown. The longer this can be done, even with ZERO damage output from myself, the longer my team can fight without taking that damage.

I play to have fun, if I win its just icing on the cake but its not a huge issue to me. I believe we have quite a fundamental difference there.

I dont do spvp/tpvp, pretty much only WvW.