I think that both builds suggested could be evaluated better. I personally run a 0/0/30/10/30 in WvW with full apothecary gear and trinkets for healing and conditions but in Dungeons, though it keeps me alive, I often feel like I’m only along for the ride and not a contributing factor. If you want to stay alive in a dungeon and “slowly” wittle down the bosses, I’d say go for the bunker build, just keep in mind that your pet will not survive regardless of being traited because of the immense AoE in high level dungeons. I personally feel that in Dungeons, Power is the way to go. You should not have to frontline/draw aggro with guards/warriors so you won’t be getting hit too often, but if you do, utilize your evades and skills to get out of a sticky situation.
This is the build I personally run while in fractals or any other dungeon for that matter. You get plenty of protection from Signet of stone via Signet of the Beastmaster trait, 20k HP pool, and you crit with every other hit. Your pet choices can be up to you, but I usually use a wolf/stalker for CC fear and might buff. As always, smart play is required with any ranger build. I choose Axe/Horn over SB because in dungeons, you want to do as much damage to as many NPCs as possible and axe has the same range kitten but has 2 additional bounces so it hits up to 3 targets. Horn #5 is essentially Rampage as One in that it provides you the fury, might, and swiftness minus the stability. Swap pets accordingly, use sword/dagger for evades when you get mobbed and you’ll be fine. I survive with my own group or PUGs regardless and I put out the same amount of damage if not more because of the consistency in my crits and extra DPS from pets. Anyone who tells you that Rangers can’t do something is obviously playing another profession too much. you just have to know who you’re teamed up with, for example, Warriors spec’d for survivabilty do not have the Burst damage of a berserker warrior and vice versa, Berserker’s don’t have the survivabilty of a bunker or defensively focused tank. That being said, if you have tanks in your group, you contributing to the overall DPS of the group is more of contribution than you staying alive after everyone else dies. Ranger’s aren’t the best at a lot of things, but we’re consistently good at all things. Try out the build and tweek it to your own play style, only then can you determine whether its a good build for you or not.
Your linked build is sort of good, but here’s a few suggestions.
1. As of right now, you’re not using any traps so you should change Trap Potency to something more effective
2. You aren’t using a shortbow or longbow so you should probably change Quick Draw to Honed Axes.
3. Where are you getting this crit every other hit? In the build calc, it shows your crit rate at only 32% and I’m pretty sure you can’t chain fury well enough to have 50% all the time in fights.
I’m kind of curious as to why you chose sword/dagger as offhand. Even with the protection from Signet of Stone, it’s generally not a good idea for us rangers to be “in the fray” (I can understand sword though because lots of evades). I’d personally switch it for Greatsword so that you have the damage to back you up, but hey, that’s my opinion.
One thing I did with my new build is replaced “Protect Me!” with Sic ‘Em. It allows for more pet damage. I never really had a problem with survivability too much, but if the situation fits, I think I would rather have SoS instead of Protect me because I’m not throwing my pet under the bus then :P Then again, I haven’t used Protect Me too much so I don’t know much about it.
That’s an interesting build. I’d say do what gives you the most synergy (I hate that word but can’t think of a better one right now).
So in the mighty ranger build, the keys are
precision
companion’s might
Spirit buffs/fortifying bond for dungeon buffs
Will these elements be useful in your build? That’s up to you to decide. I would note that you seem to be a power/bleeds hybrid and bleeds tend to spike cap in dungeons (not always, depends on group/weapons). So there’s advantages and disadvantages in trying to find one build for all situations and all gametypes. The cool thing about gw2 is that because so much of the game is based on skill, even hybrid builds can be successful, like you anecdotally point out. Good job!
Sweet! Thanks for the feedback! I’m still tweaking it a lot, but it’s been working. I plan on changing it a little so that my pet’s more powerful, but I might have to look into spirits more also
All I ever see are people QQing about being a ranger or dismissing a ranger as worthless, and yet I’ve been playing one since launch and have never really had a problem. I do pretty well in almost every circumstance, PvE, PvP, WvW, and the only class I can’t handle is fighting guardians.
Am I wrong for thinking a lot of the complaining is baseless? =/ I feel like I’m the only one who knows how to play the class sometimes….
You’re not the only one that feels that way. I’ve actually continued to hold my own in everything, despite what people say. I really don’t have any complaints about it other than the change to pets. =/
Idk if it’s because I’ve played a ranger from gw1 or what (i know, they’re very different), but I really don’t have that much of a problem as a ranger. Really i just run shortbow and axe/warhorn, focus on survival skills and don’t have a problem. Idk if it’s because I can mitigate my damage more or what… I can hold my own in most battles in SPVP, WvW, and am just a little squishy in PvE, but keep up with sufficient damage. All in all though, I’m pretty satisfied with the changes for the ranger, except for pet debuffs
). In general, your traits buff you while your skills cause greater damage in bursts. I’ve been using it as a PvE/WvW hybrid and it’s been working well for me. http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=VG;4wE-y-r2JEV-0;9F8j;1TJJ;027B19-45;55JV4;2udbTudbTo-Fz0;06;2Vd-i0o1sYzZ352o-G-2i;9;9;9;9;9;9;0V8k3z