Guild Wars 2

Survival-Berserker LB/GS Build.

I’m sure many have their own version or similar builds, I wanted to share my build and some strategy and tactics I use.

V.1 is focused on landing your burst damage using spider/spider immobilize and being able to escape at low life using earth runes.

V.2 is almost the same in terms of damage but you are running spider/wolf, the idea behind wolf is to combo with your mercy/healer’s celerity combo. Your team now has very effective team res-bot that also deals burst damage on par with other burst classes.

V.1 Build Link: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRjEq0vaDLusQ1ag+ga9DEAjd7c4HuBW/bJXKK-TpBFwACuAAn2fAxhAYxRAoaZAAPAAA

V.2 Build Link: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQJATRjEq0vaDLusQ1ag+ga9DEAjd7Y4HuBW/bJrIK-TpBFwACuAAIOEAz2fYxRAoaZAAPAAA

So let’s talk about the difference between the builds and why such small changes have a massive impact on how well you will do.

V.1 Build

Shared Anguish is your hard counter to Magnet (Tool Belt) Engineer skill. There isn’t many skills in the game you will find that is going to affect you at range with a big impact. Also Shared Anguish counters Nightmare Runes so no more fear chains from Necros.

Runes of Earth is one of the most effective runes you can use for survival, why one of the biggest problems for burst ranger is they lack escape where other burst classes have easy access to stealth “Mesmer/Thief”, in most fights once you reach around 20% health you try to peel out, re-position and heal up. (6) Magnetic Aura is like having an extra utility slot, GS Swoop + Counterattack synergies with Magnetic Aura.

E.g. you just reached 20% health Aura proc’s you now try to escape, swoop out of combat using the 1/2 evade with magnetic aura making so no melee or ranged attacks can hit you peeling yourself 1200 from the fight followed up with counterattack. You roughly have around 10 seconds where you won’t take single drop of damage. This allows you to save your utility skills. Signet of stone should only be used when you have no other options left.

So hopefully now you understand why earth runes are so effective on a burst ranger.

V.2 Build

Healer’s Celerity, Rune of Mercy and Wolf (F2 Fear) is your hidden gem, if your team has decent support you don’t need to run Shared Anguish or Earth runes so you run the res-bot combo.

Your res combo will synergies with your Utility skills and your elite Entangle, you pop your elite followed with signet of renewal to counter any aoe stun’s and condition bombs and poison on the downed ally. Now you don’t always pop your signet of renewal right away i find holding off for little bit as the other team will start laying down cleave you want to be able to team wipe there conditions and remove that poison so your downed team mate.

So after reading that brief on minor changes between the two builds you can see why there so different in terms of survival and what they bring to the team.

Now allot of players seem to think Mesmers and Thieves are the go to classes for burst in Top Tier PvP. Well I Believe there wrong, Ranger is just as effective in terms of damage output as other burst classes. If anything you take less risk to land your burst.

Note Also Signet of Renewal and Empathic Bond works well Spiders, conditions won’t effect Spiders ability to land there skills as they are ranged and due to large HP pool they won’t die in a hurry.

Break down vs other classes.

Your hard counters are burst guards and s/f burst ele’s. Just play smart vs them dodge there burst and wait out there barrage once they burnt throw their defensive CD you should be able to beat them. If you don’t dodge and play defensive there burst damage will kill you before you can kill them.

Vs Necro’s doesn’t matter if there Power or Conditions you will destroy them. You remove 4 conditions every 10 seconds you can escape from immobilize on demand and you can wipe full stack of conditions in a split seconds. Necro’s won’t be able to handle you’re none stop kb’s into immobilize rapid fire spikes. Just keep kiting them around once immobilize just stand behind them they won’t be able to do much.

Vs Thieves, counter play. Keep close eye on them all game you’re going to save your team mates and yourself. Most thief’s won’t be able to beat you 1v1 unless you stuff up, you outburst them and have allot of counter vs melee. (GS)

Vs Mesmers, focus fire them with 1-2-4-5 and spider/elite combo and there dead, they can try and close the gap or escape won’t affect you much you can counter/evade all there burst damage. Also make sure to kill there Phant Clones.

Vs D/D Ele, there is good chance you won’t kill a skilled one in a 1v1 but he won’t be able to kill you. So focus on de-capping and playing defensive d/d ele won’t be able to stop you from de-capping them. If you have team mate there Mesmer or Necro they will die rather fast (Boon remove)

Vs Engineers, vs the current Meta Cele and Rapid. Just focus on landing rapid fire immob spikes at the start of the fight. Make sure to dodge there chill nades and poison, you have LR for their immob from rifle so they shouldn’t land single good rifle skill. Once they use healing turret, hit them with your elite Entangle and they won’t be able to recover. Most Engineers will spam the last of their blocks which is what you want them to do, blocks won’t remove entangle all its doing is putting nail in there coffin, once the engineer stops and try to break the roots you can free fire there is no way they can recover at this point 1 rapid fire = there heal follow up with KB and auto’s there dead. Now won’t always go to plan but try to repeat the combo’s and just matter of time before you get them.

Vs Warrior, just kite them and you will win, it’s that simple. Warriors is the easiest class for you to beat.

Vs Rangers, vs conditions keep them at range and you will take them down. You could decap them but its rather risky fight getting in to close vs condition ranger make sure to dodge there pet it is half the reason condition ranger lands there condition spikes. Burst Ranger just get them first. If you land your burst first from that point on you have the upper hand. Most burst rangers are running close to same utilities so landing your burst first will force them to use E.g. Signet of Stone. So from that point on just play smart watch their pet and out play them. Player skill…

Vs Guards, if there not burst wait for team mates to take them down, they will take you month of sundays.

So that’s my build I will try to get some video footage up of it in action. Hope you enjoy and it works for you.

Less damage then thief/mes

Less bunker than guard/warr

Why are we taking this build on our team?

I’m not convinced every matchup is a positive one which is how you spinned it vs every class

The issue with 6/x/6/x/x builds is you lose your burst and become tankier but still not tanky enough to hold a point against multiple foes since zerker ammy – too in between for me not enough purpose – medi guard is better in tanking AND damage with zerker all you got is range which is nothing in conquest

Shared Anguish has a 90s CD. Magnet has a 25s CD. L2Dodge?

I would rather take Vigorous Renewal and…dodge?

Just a comment about Shared Anguish, not really gonna go over the entire build.

If you call it “Survival” why don’t you go with 6/0/2/6/0, actually investing into Survival skills/traits? Makes you more resilient to conditions and provides some fury.

http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Ranger_-_Read_the_Wind_Power_Ranger – 2nd trait table.

Soon as I made this post I new I would get negative replies.

Not going to bother and explain my reasons test the build out for while first and you will catch onto what I’m talking about.

Sol.4310:

Soon as I made this post I new I would get negative replies.

Not going to bother and explain my reasons test the build out for while first and you will catch onto what I’m talking about.

I’ll give some positive feedback. I like your thoughts behind earth runes and think this is a nice variation of LB ranger. You’ve improved the normal glass version by adding decent Armour and evasion to boost protection. You’ll have an advantage over most direct damage builds, I think.

Every good thing comes with cons. I think this build will suffer against what I call malice. That being all armor ignoring attacks, such as conditions, retaliation and life stealing. Thanks for sharing!

Archon.6480:

Sol.4310:

Soon as I made this post I new I would get negative replies.

Not going to bother and explain my reasons test the build out for while first and you will catch onto what I’m talking about.

I’ll give some positive feedback. I like your thoughts behind earth runes and think this is a nice variation of LB ranger. You’ve improved the normal glass version by adding decent Armour and evasion to boost protection. You’ll have an advantage over most direct damage builds, I think.

Every good thing comes with cons. I think this build will suffer against what I call malice. That being all armor ignoring attacks, such as conditions, retaliation and life stealing. Thanks for sharing!

Yeah, retaliation isn’t to bad, the only real problem vs conditions I’ve found is IP on Engineer’s. EB+Renewal keeps it in check but vs other condition heavy classes isn’t so bad. Condition Warriors can be pain if they land Torment on you and use Krait runes, if they land there combo and your Renewal is on CD your going to be in a world of hurt.

But other then that I don’t really have a problem, when I made this build the idea was to handle conditions effectively.

*Empathic Bond
*Signet of Renewal
*Lightning Reflexes

That’s on par with most bunker ranger builds in terms of condition remove.

I’m really not sure why Sol is receiving negative criticism about these builds. 6/2/6/0/0 is easily the strongest variant of a power build for PvP in terms of how versatile it is.

The “damage” variant with Skirmishing doesn’t actually add all that much damage output other than situationally assuming your opponent is actually blind and careless enough to eat a Bash->Maul combo, or boosting up a LB autoattack from time to time, which has the temptation and potential to teach the bad habit of attempting to throw out LB4 WAY too often in attempts to get “more” damage instead of using it intelligently in the right situations.

I run the damage rune variant of the first build Sol posted all the time, and the only 2 differences I run it with are Ranger Runes over Earth Runes and Doom sigil over Energy Sigil on Greatsword. Those choices both differ in effectiveness from scenario to scenario and are highly dependent on playstyle choice.

The ONLY direct competitor ranger has in terms of output is Mesmer, and where mesmer has a few more utility functions, it can’t take damage, especially condis, at all, and mesmers are practically thief food. Thieves have to run backstab to have competitive damage (yes, I would argue that power ranger easily has better damage than S/D acrobatics, even with these variants) and have to play extremely opportunistically and intelligently to be effective and not a detriment, where rangers can avoid the mass of AIDs effects that get spammed on a point in a teamfight, constantly pressure a target, and burst them from a much safer location, and if placed strategically enough, Rangers have the mobility to stand “in between” 2 points and be able to quickly assist or get to and defend/assault either one.

Just because these builds aren’t currently considered “meta” builds doesn’t mean that they aren’t good and effective.

jcbroe.4329:

Just because these builds aren’t currently considered “meta” builds doesn’t mean that they aren’t good and effective.

Yeah, seriously. I’d put both of the META builds at 2.5-3.0 out of 5. Both of SOLs are easily > 4.5. I’d have to try them to see for sure, but they look great. Not sure what the draw is to burst builds in conquest with so many high armor/evasion builds roaming around in a point capture game.

Its good to see some positive feedback, I posted this build hoping to see more good rangers pick it up with there own version and push it into the meta, I don’t see why It can’t be a meta build, its got everything you require to be apart of top tier team.

I currently train allot with this build, I’ve found what classes it combo’s with really well. Kinda funny the class it’s most effective with isn’t a meta build “go figure”.