Guild Wars 2

So I recently (well, a while ago, I’m not very on top of things) found out that I still retain full control of my pets while I am downed. I use this a lot to keep enemies off of myself while I am lying on the ground healing, and I can use it to get an easier rally. That said, I notice that a lot of rangers have their pet just attack a random enemy or sit next to their downed body while they attack things.

Anyways, what tips or tricks might you all have that other rangers might benefit from knowing, or that aren’t well known?

For a “jack of all trades” class, I don’t really see many tips/tricks like I would expect there to be. The only useful “tip” I have is depends on if you’re using a sword, which is turning off the auto targeting, using the 2 skill to get out of the fight, turn around, deselect the target, and hit 2 again to get even further away. If you have the short ow you can use the number 3 skill to get even further.

Useful in WvW when you find yourself too deep in the enemy Zerg. However, sometimes you do get stuck in the air when jumping back…. Which is annoying.

Probably well known but I met a few who did not know. If you take the trait in wilderness survival that gives vigor when you use healing skills, this will give you constant vigor buff while in the healing spring water field. Really useful for groups in pve and WvW.

Yea, pet swapping is pretty awesome. In PvP, we have a pretty good downed state because of it. Use a wolf as a second pet and when you go down Thunderclap (down ability 2) → swap to wolf and use the howl F2 → set wolf to attack your target, which often leads to a knockdown.

Also, as far as tips go, avoid using a Black Widow since they have less vitality for some reason. A jungle spider does everything the same as a black widow, but has better stats. Also, avoid using Hyenas. They have what looks to be a great F2 ability, but they have half as much power as any other canine pet, which gives them less damage overall.

There’s a hidden behavior mode within ‘Guard’ (the pet UI, not the shout)

When a pet is first activated they will treat any weapon skill used while an enemy is targeted as ‘Attack my Target’. This is true even for skills being used while out of range and buffs which don’t normally put you in combat. Pressing ‘Return to Me’ once will stop this effect for the rest of the pet’s activation.

It’s kinda’ handy when I’m running around in open world PvE, and I’m feeling exceptionally lazy. F1’s just so faaarrrr for my dainty little lady fingers. I’ll just sort of target something and halfheartedly bat at the air with my greatsword, and my pet will roll it’s eyes and proceed to humor me.

Seriously, though, it’s mostly a good thing to know so that you’re not accidentally sicc’ing your pet on things you don’t want to be.

I’ve killed theives while entirely in the downed state, they were bad but the thunder clap -> pet swap-> wolf knockdown -> wolf aoe fear -> thunder clap is usually enough stall time to do 12+k dmg, if you time the stomp interupts well.

Get into habit of pet swapping when they are off CD, your pet has allot of useful skills.

It’s already well known, but equipping a Warhorn from your inventory to use Call of the Wild for the AoE speed boost only to swap back weapons is a good source of mobility every so often.

Note: You can switch weapons by either double clicking the icon or right click and select equip from the drop-down menu.

Another well known but rarely used trick (mostly due to the difficulty) is near-instantly self reviving from the downed state by activating Nature’s Renewal from the Elite skill Spirit of Nature just before going down.