Guild Wars 2

So, in every other MMO/RPG I’ve played I’ve always preferred the Ranger class. When GW2 hit I naturally made one, 80’Ed and have been running it as my main. Now, I’m really not all that fond of the pet system, or its’ broken mechanics, so I find myself searching for a “Ranger” feeling class.

From what I can see, the Thief is the new Ranger. Yes the range itself is lower, 900 compared to up to 1500, but the bow skills are much nicer on paper than the ranger ones. Also with access to traps and preperations… I mean venoms, they seem to have all the aspects (or a healthy chunk) of what a Ranger was supposed to be.

Assuming I m looking at a SB/S-P combo, with venoms and traps, is there a practical build for doing such and feeling Rangery? Please let me know.

And you should know that something like cluster bomb (AoE) does not count as a single hit.

If you have a venom that lasts 3 hits and you use a cluster bomb on 5 enemies, only 3 of the 5 enemies will get the condition and the venom effect is gone.

So it does NOT apply the conditions with the next 3 cluster bombs to 5 enemies everytime.

Venoms and Traps are the worst utility skills the thief has.

And engineer is the better ranged class.

Please forgive me as I joined a Ranger and have an alt Warrior 80 and that is it. I was looking at needle trap, immobilize yes please, and skale venom/basilisk venom/devourer venom.

This would effectively allow me to spread out torment, vulnerability, and immobilize quite a bit via cluster bomb, allowing my team/self to control our foes very well and keep my ranged attacks functional for an added time.

Once the enemy finally closes to 600ish range,swap to s-p, pop Basilisk venom, steal, then pistol whip.

Keep in mind I’d probably be running shared venom as well for my team. Would this be ineffective?

It’s true that thieves’ shortbow packs very nice skills, and it’s definitely one of our best weapon sets (some would say the best). However, you’ll find that thief traps are miles behind the ranger traps, and that venoms are… disheartening to say the least.

Traps only do single-target damage/one-shot effects, have an awkward rectangle area that many times fail to trigger, and are on rather long cooldowns that severely limit their usefulness.

Venoms only truly work if you devote your entire build to them, and even so, only truly shine if you are surrounded at kiss range by several teammates. In any other circumstances, venoms are just amongst the weakest utilities in the entire game.

So, yes, you can build a ‘rangery’ thief with a shortbow and maybe a Sword/dagger set (which was nerfed last patch BTW), but in the end, you will find traps and venoms overall pretty weak, and inevitably, you will replace them with most powerful ‘thiefy’ abilities… and you wont feel like a true ranger, but more like a specialized thief.

Thanks for the response guys.

yup – and the conditions themselves don’t last long. Venoms can be marginally useful in a venom share build – where you use the trait that gives them to allies. Unfortunately they’re balanced with that in mind, so they’re only barely useful in that situation, and much less so in others.

The unfortunate thing with the thief is that you’re always balancing survivability and damage output. The venoms and traps don’t give enough utility to significantly contribute to either (for the most part), so you wind up using deceptions, tricks and signets much more.

Hey man,

To be honest, I have not used a trap since the game released and I made my first thief. The venoms are essentially useless as well.

Thieves’ shortbow skills are good for sure but it takes alot more focus and concentration to play a thief right. Stick to the stealth utilities (Shadow refuge),
and the ones that are useful (smoke screen, etc). Don’t waste the precious 7/8/9 slots on venoms and traps.

Best of luck to ya

Some great responses here guys. Thank you all. Definitely alters my consideration of the build type. Kind of depressing though. They really ought to make cluster bomb work more like barrage where it is one attack on an area, utilizing one charge per “pulse.” Traps should get “Rangerized” as well. That would really help the Thieves group utility, not to mention a refinement on the venom skills.

Sadly you guys will probably never see it… not with everyone still screaming “Thief OP!!!”

Ah well. One can dream.

Edit: I am an idiot and made some lousy sentence structure. Did some repairs, probably not enough.

especially venoms with condition builds, it makes total sense that venoms would truly shine here and melt enemies with bleeds ticking on them too but really, venoms are just about as useless as they get. You lose so much damage output because you have to trait entirely around venoms to get any significant viability out of them.

Roll a warrior rifle build> go into Heart of the Mist.
Practice on the dummies and npcs, really learn its strenghts.

Roll a thief..play with the different specs.

Some of the skills you want to do will not work out as good as you think they will.

Now..above all else..Play What YOU enjoy.

Well, as advised by several I tried out the thief in PvP on the NPC’s. I now understand fully what you guys meant by saying they are sub-par. Arena net would be well advised to maybe share some love to these utility lines, and I imagine such would seriously create some much needed variety in the class. Hands down it is fun backstabbing berserker style in a heavy stealth build, but not my personal play type. I give you guys credit however for enjoying the spec, it is fun, and challenging, and I have a new found respect for all thief players.

Darksidhe- Ah, a fey reference! God I hate the fey. Lol. Anyway, I do have an 80’d warrior, and I find the rifle a bit too straight forward and lacks a flair feeling like the short bow on thief or longbow on Ranger. I utilize it only when necessary. The longbow on warrior is a little bit better, but still feels cheap in my Norn’s hands. Your advice to play what I want to play is some of the best ever given, the only fault lying in community use fullness. GW2 requires multiple people for its’ more challenging and enjoyable content. As a Ranger I often find myself kicked from groups, with or without a second to say 2 words. “Look I’ll bring my (kick) warrior…. wtf?”

On those grounds I have even been kicked on my warrior for not running full zerkers. Sure these are the kind of groups many want to be kicked by, but it took me 3 days, 4 hours a day to get an AR group. Just to find out my Ranger was despised for the impossibility of keeping the pet alive, (even though my drakes routinely face tanked mai in her blue circle while I rezzed our fallen…,) and my warrior could not avoid all of Mai’s face ripping action leading to a bloody, and I mean bloody, death.

I know thieves are also discouraged in dungeon runs, but they still bring more to the table. And had a possible, (though now proven ineffective,) build I liked the idea of.

Again, thanks for the responses. I’m back to the drawing board it seems.