Guild Wars 2

I set out to find the best ranger ranged build with the following parameters:

1) Balance between offense and defense. (18xx Toughness, Condition removal)
2) Short-bow main weapon.
3) Pet to play a pivotal role with both offense and defense. (15 points caninewolf)

It was extremely frustrating to feel forced into 30 Wilderness Survival for Condition removal and Toughness, I may be looking at this wrong any advice is appreciated.

SB seems to need a high amount of critical hit and critical damage -while flanking, I can’t seem to hit that and maintain my perceived acceptable level of toughness.

Pet wise I want at least 15, I enjoy the play style of swapping every 15sec -or was it 20- and the dynamics of lining up burst with pet and quickness.

Ended up with: 0/20/30/0/20 Troll/Reflex/QZ/SotH/RoA Wolf+Dog

Is this the best a ranged ranger can be? Again, LB is out of the question, no matter how long I play with that weapon I just end up hating it even more.

I was going to post a total rework of your build but then i realized i missed the “ranged” in the title eheh. Tbh i gave up with ranged builds simply cos melee is just better, but ye the shortbow is kinda needed in a ranged build. Overall it seems a decent build. 30 in ws is not a must have but is probably the best choice.
But i wanna be honest, don’t expect to roflstomp everyone (but u already know that don’t u).

What gear are you using? Precision / crit damage is pretty much gimped if your base damage is low, and you have no points in marksmanship for power.

I run no points in Marksmanship at all and I’m a Precision/Critical Damage ranger, you make up for loss of power in might stacking and most armor/acc, why waste points in a trait line when critical is so much better.

Is this for pve or pvp? If it’s for pve, I’m going to give you some solid advice. Drop the toughness parameter, and use dodges for survival. For good damage in pve, piercing arrows is a must, and so is crit rate/dmg. This limits your other trait options, but I actually run 15 BM for maximum damage on quickness for pet swap, with the CD reduction. Pvp is a different story.

Also, piercing arrows is more important in pvp than some people realize. It can pierce through necro minions, mesmer illusions, and other ranger pets.

If I was ever to go pure ranged damage then I would want the maximum range possible…which is 1500 units with LB.

Sol.4310:

I run no points in Marksmanship at all and I’m a Precision/Critical Damage ranger, you make up for loss of power in might stacking and most armor/acc, why waste points in a trait line when critical is so much better.

But crit damage scales off base damage. If your base damage is low than points into marksmanship will give you lots more average attack per point than skirmishing. At near equal damage levels crit is preferable due to ‘on crit’ effects from sigils and traits, but do the math to make sure you wouldn’t be better off damagewise with additional power.

TBH one of the best ranged builds I have seen and actually have switched to would be what Sol uses: (I have 0 points in Nature Magic)

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/Video-Ranger-WvW-Part-4/first#post1079078

The ‘best’ -other- ranged build would be BM+Bleed+Axe+Torch+SB build. Use shouts, stack bleeds and learn when to use your shouts+QZ and things melt.