Guild Wars 2

I’ve played a ranger since beta. I now have a second one at about lvl 45 and want to use her solely for pve/solo play. I am currently running around getting maps opened so I can at least get some of my central Tyria points in order to get my 80 skills once I hit 80.

I am currently using sb with sword/torch for my weapon sets. My first ranger uses LB with Axe/warhorn and I am using power build with berserker armor, etc. But wanted something a bit different on my second ranger. I have a hard time not using a bow of any type so decided to concentrate on sb for this one and see what I can do about my second weapon set as I leveled.

But, all the build information I have found is mostly directed for Conquest, Fractal, GvG and Raids. I just wondered if anyone here has found a useful build for simple solo/pve play?

I am a casual player and usually will join in regional events as I come across them. I will be working to getting druid setup later because I really like the support that offers no matter where I am in group events.

simple solo/pve play

I’d say you can run pretty much anything for solo PvE and dungeons.

You almost can’t go wrong with Beastmastery as a start. The better your pet is the better you are. Shouts are really useful now and the adept reduction trait is in BM and works great.

Going shortbow, you might want to consider skirmishing as well. There’s leeway of course but the bleed traits in the line synergize well, assuming your condition damage is decent. If you’re more power focused, you can swap to Primal Reflexes and Spotter. Then it’s up to you whether to take the Light on Your Feet GM trait (SB skill recharge reduction + pierce) or Quick Draw. (If you swap weapons a lot)

You’ll want at least some condition removal. You can go brown bear, but you need to be close to him. You can take the signet of renewal and just let its passive do most of the work. Or you can spec Wilderness survival and use either Empathic Bond or Wilderness Knowledge. Empathic gives you more flexibility on build (the condis actually don’t transfer to your pet, they just disappear) but taking WK and a few survival skills won’t hurt. Going condi, you can take the Elite entangling vines and Sharpening Stone for extra hurting when you cleanse.

That should give you some ideas. When you get to HoT, you might want to look into Markmanship. CC is king in the jungle.

If you like longbow and like your conditions:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQJATWjEqQNLWuCusAVLWMEsm3VqrFwEAGdNA4u6YNteyKSjK-TVTFABA8ECUSZQyXAhEOEALpkihDEQb7PaCOU9HqPgArpDpKlK1qhoPlgbGEAuxGJb///dbbTKg7WWB-w

It gives you power dmg, condi dmg, mobility and fun.

You can run it as full rampager in pve but I have the build tailored for wvw roaming with a few pieces of celestial gear and a captains amulet which gives some much needed armor/vita.

You can also use sword/torch ( I used to before HoT), axe/torch and shortbow effectively in any combination. I just love my 2k range longbow and easy mobility with staff ;-)

There is also a shortbow bleeder build for hot pve floating around if you like that weapon, with axe/torch as swap set. I believe it is Sinister gear stat (Condi Dmg, power/precision) wrather than Rampagers (Precision, power/condi dmg).

Reguardless of your build choice, don’t stack healing power through the ceiling just because you are a druid. Keep it bare minimum especially in open world pve. Staff doesn’t scale super great with it and celestial form skills are excellent heals without it already.

I have been having a relatively easy time in Heart of Thorns content with this classic bear-bow build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQJATRjEqQ/KWwCWsAXLG2DqtJCgzuL4eYH+nvcf6UqlVXvF-ThCBABSoEMBzfA8EEwR9nAuEAYt/QK6CMS5nzHgA71gAA-e

This is a very easy to play build:
- Your pet tanks the target for you while you shoot it down from range. Oakheart salve heals both you and your pet.
- Signet of the Wild and Strength of the Pack grant Stability.
- Signet of Renewal, Shared Anguish and Empathic Bond get rid of a lot of annoying conditions.
- When you encounter an enemy with projectile reflect, or have to fight in close spaces, you switch to Greatsword, which does less damage but has an awesome auto-evade.
- Swap out your first pet for your second pet shortly before it dies (around 10% hp). This allows you to swap back to the first pet again sooner. Swapping pets in this way makes ensures you always have a tank up.

Chrury.4627:

simple solo/pve play

Empathic gives you more flexibility on build (the condis actually don’t transfer to your pet, they just disappear)

Say what? Since when? This is how the trait used to work way back, are you telling me this is how it works again now?

You can go full condi and use axe/torch + axe/dagger. Constantly swapping weapons with quick draw to reduce cooldown on dagger 5 and torch 4 and using sharpening stone +sun spirit deals some nice dmg. I run beastmastery/skirmishing/wilderness survival. Even with cheap rabid gear you can do at least 8k solo dps while also having high toughness. You don’t even have to use any traps. (I personally don’t like them)

You can just incorporate druid staff into this build for the insane healing at the cost of dps, it will still be decent and pretty much unkillable.