Guild Wars 2

After the buff to signets and pet HP, Ranger is very solid in small fights. I’m consistently winning 1v1s and 1v2s after this patch as I suspect many Rangers are, so please don’t mislabel this as another “Ranger is so UP buff us nao!” post.

The biggest problem I see with my Ranger is that it brings almost nothing of use to my group. It’s not that the class is underpowered, it’s that it doesn’t help your teammates very much. The only thing I have found useful to my group in WvW is healing spring for blast healing, which is arguably the best water field in the game. Everything else the Ranger can bring to a group, someone else can bring better.

I can go for a DPS build, but that role seems better filled by Warriors and Eles.

I can go for a support build, but that role seems better filled by Guardians.

I can go traps and condition damage for control/AoE, but that role is filled much better by Necros.

So are we really only valuable as a roamer in WvW?

This is why, for the Ranger balancing that is supposedly still being worked on, don’t make us stronger. Make us more valuable to a group. I can think of plenty of times in WvW I’ve said, “Man I wish we had a mesmer/ele/guardian right now.” Give us something that will make a group wish, in even just one type of combat situation, that they had a Ranger with them.

Other than healing spring, what do you feel you bring to a group that no other class can do better?

Grant aoe vigor (moa swap with vigorous training/ vigorous renewal+healing spring) and fury (warhorn and red moa) as well as frost trap (unblockable) and muddy terrain (long duration cripple pulses with immo. on first hit) because I count that as group contribution. I’m curious to see what others think but from what I understand, ranger has great access to aoe fury compared to others, as well as aoe vigor.

Using brown bear with signet of renewal isn’t too bad TBH. Also, ranger pets create a natural 2v1 and more bodies means it’s harder to target your group and with “guard” you can order a pet through enemy traps for the benefit of the group. I don’t know, maybe none of this is what you consider helping a group? But, yeah, healing spring rocks.

^^^Six Sup Runes of Altruism are another source of AOE Fury (and 3 stacks of Might). Good for some healing/BM builds. Not that the runes are Ranger-only of course, but they do complement some builds nicely, IMO.

I generally run as a lone wolf who just helps out groups of allies as needed, so I don’t really coordinate with them. However, I’m going to start trying to do more organized stuff with guild groups tho and expect I’ll offer to be the CC for melee’s targets since I often run two canines, SB, and some chills (from sigils and food).

Vigor is an interesting contribution.

Fury is not so rare. I’ve never found myself wishing I had a Ranger in the group so we could have fury. There seems to always be plenty of it to go around. Maybe it’s just because we usually run with a few warriors.

As with all traps, frost trap is really a second rate aoe when compared to a necro with wells. Well of darkness when trated will pulse blind and chill while frost trap just chills.

Muddy terrain can be a valuable contribution. Is that our main benefit to the group then? CC through frost trap/muddy terrain/entangle?

i’m a bunker axe/torch s/d ranger, i was fine before the patch. i’m more of the CC guy, with nasty conditions. a constantly moving target with a huge heal, bunker rangers are deadly and annoying.

Sure but frost trap is up twice as long and is unblockable; surely that’s not second rate? Well of darkness is better for aie blind but, heck, sun spirit can do that with about the same CD (perpares to get attacked for suggesting spirits and flees).

Solar flare: 6s blind 25s CD to 60 s CD depending on time of death of spirit.

Not much. #RangerProblems

/endthread

It’s true, I feel that one day spirits will be able to live up to the task of allowing us to actually support allies (or even ourselves), but we will have to wait. Main things I bring are some nice aoe cc and condi damage. Profession lacks heals entirely (outside of a 4min cd elite and even that isn’t a burst heal) and is pretty poor at applying boons to anyone (including ourselves).

Spirits post patch with full traits do actually offer a lot if you’re ranged during a defense you’re often going to be standing in locations other support classes are not and you quite frankly have the best water field in the game cooperative organized play means the finishers applied to it are going to benefit the groups more than another class laying down that field. A few extra seconds of protection you can provide w/the spirit can go a VERY long way in Zerg vs Zerg in T1 as well especially if the buff up time of the opposing group is lower. The other AoE Fury/Might/Vigor you can potentially offer via pets and runes(altruism) plus +10% raw dmg w/spirit you can provide is just icing on the cake and you can do this all being effective at a further range from the enemy than others can more often than not while still doing damage giving good “back line” support to the squishier people. The spirits will still likely die regardless of the buffs unless you’re extra careful but in T1 WvW a few seconds of that extra oomph applied helps.

Rangers are capable of helping provide higher up times of poisons more consistently than other classes as well due to both pet fields/abilities and traps over an area of effect that -33% heal on poison vs organized zergs (common T1) is a game changer. Buddy up with some epidemic necros to time their epidemics after a full trap/condition barrage on a group is pure win. The time it takes to apply a lot of conditions/bleed stacks on a necro is actually higher in some cases for them than it is on a ranger surprisingly enough.

Secondary effects in WvW are very potent, they are game changers. Do not underestimate them at all.

Also as previously mentioned there is also a lot AoE CC/Movement restraint potential if you choose to focus on that. Muddy terrain lasts 20 seconds and is a major PITA in a choke point.

A big part of peoples perceived problem with rangers is there is that extra micromanagement with the pets, spirit, traps, and positioning depending your build which requires better planning/quick thinking causing a higher player skill ceiling than face rolling classes. If you are not good at the aforementioned things it is going to make things seem a lot worse than they actually are.

With that said a lot of things mentioned are still lacking and could be improved. I’d say in smaller skirmishing groups rangers will generally be the most effective but they bring some good support and damage to the zerg as well.

As far as personal wishes go we’re capable of keeping a decent amount of boons up on ourselves if built for it, adding a passive to a signet or trait that auto-shares our boons over a certain pulse/time frame to nearby people would go a very long way in adding additional group value.

Barrage → cripple
Muddy Terrain → cripple and root
Entrangle → root

Rangers do very good at ground control, also they add damage while doing it, add a warhorn before atacking the enemy and you have enough fury for the fight.

Soldier armor and berserker jewels for max stats in power, soldier adds some nice numbers in survibality.

I run a build with that with lots of mobility (lightning reflexes, sword) and is great for GvG and fights between 10-25 ppl.

I usually bring jokes.

The Rooster.2615:

Vigor is an interesting contribution.

Fury is not so rare. I’ve never found myself wishing I had a Ranger in the group so we could have fury. There seems to always be plenty of it to go around. Maybe it’s just because we usually run with a few warriors.

As with all traps, frost trap is really a second rate aoe when compared to a necro with wells. Well of darkness when trated will pulse blind and chill while frost trap just chills.

Muddy terrain can be a valuable contribution. Is that our main benefit to the group then? CC through frost trap/muddy terrain/entangle?

Yes, multiple CC is really all we got to offer. All our spirits die instantly to all the massive amount of AoE there is in WvW. So all we can really do is give 70 precision to allies, and cast ranged AoE CC. But we do that very well though, as the Ranger is capable of casting both immobilize (Entangle/Muddy Terrain), chill (Frost Trap), cripple (Barrage/Muddy Terrain/Spike Trap), and more when using pets.

It’s not just CC; don’t forget AoE vigor because that’s a great contribution. More vigor means more dodging and, because evasion is the primary source of invulnerability for each profession, it could mean the difference between winning and wiping.

PsionicDingo.2065:

I usually bring jokes.

Yeah, warrior jokes are the best. Like, how many blades does it take to smash a light bulb?

Chopps.5047:

Using brown bear with signet of renewal isn’t too bad TBH.

Send in the bear, aww yeah. Pretty good.

nagymbear.5280:

PsionicDingo.2065:

I usually bring jokes.

Yeah, warrior jokes are the best. Like, how many blades does it take to smash a light bulb?

They can’t. It Blinds them and runs away.

Allow me to parrot and only slightly add to what was said above:

CC is by far the main thing we bring. Rangers can spam a lot more CC in a short time that will just eat up enemy stun breakers and condition removal so the enemy will spend a good deal of time crippled. Muddy Terrain is an amazing skill to run in WvW, the cripple lasts long for a quick cooldown. There is a lot of value to the skill and the utility it brings to the team is excellent especially when fighting ZvZ in bottleneck situations.

AoE Vigor. My friend who mains guardian was quite jealous when he saw that I was able to spam vigor on the party. To tell you the truth though, I find the average player doesn’t dodge as much as they should and I found in practice a lot of the time the Vigor was mostly wasted in zerg situations. Added to the fact that only 5 people get the boon, it becomes problematic to make sure that the right people are getting it. I tend to not bother with this outside of small, coordinated groups where it has been a gamechanger. I’m sure others will have differing opinions but that has just been my experience.

Support. We aren’t Guardians by any means but Rangers can actually do a lot to support your team beyond Healing Spring which is of course excellent. SPIRITS are NOT useless in WvW, just MOSTLY useless. I use Stone Spirit all the time right on the inside of a tower/keep wall that is under siege as our forces pop out to push the enemy off our wall. I have also deployed spirits on the upper levels of many a Lord’s Room to help protect during some pretty hairy situations where our side needed every advantage we could get. Spirits used outside the enemy’s ability to damage them are a wonderful thing to bring to the table. You can also often get away with ducking under a bridge and placing one during battles over bridges, and even just out in the open(!) as long as you place it away from the action. People tend to ignore spirits and just fire into the zerg mass. I don’t trait my spirits either, the key is to just use them intelligently and know when to swap to the skill (because most of the time you will want to run something that isn’t a mostly-useless spirit, lol)

Red moa for some long duration fury, blue moa for protection, and brown bear condi removal is nice too.

I have an aoe fear that is helpful for many uses. aoe regen. Healing spring. Quickness revive/stomp. Lots of interrupts.

I feel very useful to my team in WvW.

I bring a sexy Norn for people to feast their eyes upon … and pets with amusing (sometimes innocently sexual) names.

This does a few things:
(1) It raises morale

(2) It makes me a huge target in fights … which is nice since I am pretty hard to take down.

On a more serious note:
(1) Best water combo field in the game (Healing Spring) … excellent with organized group for combos as well as just general regen + condition removal for disorganized

(2) Large AOE control via Muddy Terrain, Spike Trap, and/or Frost Trap

(3) Interrupts on key targets (shortbow, longbow, greatsword, dog/wolf pets, etc.)

(4) Group condition removal (signet of renewal)

(5) Boons