Guild Wars 2

So, uhm.
I want to play axe/xxx, mostly pve… And I am asking, would it be good idea to go for a second ranged weapon, instead of greatsword?

And if so, which would be better? From my informations, rifle got better damage output, but longbow has more utility, right?

If you must range bow is better. But GS is far better than bow

Depends. GS certainly does more damage than a bow, but some fights are very GS unfriendly. For example, if you’re pugging, then most likely first set of minibosses at harpy fractal will be running all over the place, making GS basically unusable.

There’s a bit of a debate about whether its better to camp GS, camp axe or switch between them like the old meta build, but thats a story for another time.

Exactly. In my opinion it’s always good to have any ranged option for sudden combat, which would be too risky, facing with blades. Rifle seems similar to axe itself. Kill shot, just like eviscrate…

Tarreth.8914:

Exactly. In my opinion it’s always good to have any ranged option for sudden combat, which would be too risky, facing with blades. Rifle seems similar to axe itself. Kill shot, just like eviscrate…

Except Kill Shot takes 3 seconds to aim ._.

You don’t always need a ranged weapon, especially for faceroll content like CoF or AC, there’s just some fights which are very awkward without a ranged weapon in PUGs.

For open world content you might as well take a longbow. For dungeons you can swap in any weapon that’s good for a fight beforehand. There are plenty of instances where you can use a greatsword or hammer without ever needing a bow.

Of course there are. But let’s take for example uhm… Tequatl. Ranged phase should be used by ranged weapon. And longbow seems nice, but rifle got better damage output

Bow does better DPS then rifle

How comes? I mean, I’ve never been into number, so explain me, how rifle does lesser dps than bow?

I assume you’re mostly pugging. I run axe/mace + rifle (mostly cuz I have the fractal rifle skin and like having vuln + cripple when having to be ranged for survival cuz the pug doesn’t have reflects or if I’m tanking everything cuz the rest of the group can’t keep up) , having vuln / cripple / knockdown options always good in pugs IMO. When you’re in a dedicated group then worry about 100% best, but if you’re in a pug you have to just survive sometimes. Obviously having other weapons available when necessary is important too, don’t skip out on other weapons and only run with these.