Guild Wars 2

Brilliant advice there, once you get over the learning curve of using the sword, you’ll never look back Eventually, once you’ve learnt the rhythms of the auto attack, you’ll rarely need to use the self interrupt and will be able to time the attacks to allow yourself to dodge. Have fun and I hope you have success with the sword!

I’d also agree with Cufufalating, go get Knights armour. There is a variant of this build that uses Knights armour and puts out a fair amount of damage while also being quite defensive, I’m not sure if you saw that or not? I use a very similar build to that and have a lot of success in WvW, but as Rangers we just won’t have the damage output others have.

Swapping weapons out a lot as well as skills to what each situation calls for can really boost the build, in my opinion. Utilising all of the viable weapons available to us is one of the best things you could do, so I always advise to carry one of every weapon we can use around with you if bag space allows you to do so. I’m not sure exactly how the build you’re using performs, so this is all based from my experiences with the variant build that I’ve tweaked myself to suit how I like to play. So maybe the Knights variant is more of what you’re after? I know it’s a shame because you spent so much on the Sentinel gear, but using Knights armour is probably the best option for you, however you could keep your Sentinel accessories equipped if you’re really concerned about that, also it’s a combination that’s working for me currently.

All of the tips here so far are good, follow those!
One tip I always tell anyone else who plays ranger which has saved me a lot; carry one of every weapon we can equip. I usually use Sword/Axe for my main weapon set, but I constantly swap the axe out for the dagger or warhorn, it depends on the situation and what it calls for. Doing this, especially if you’re in a small group in WvW means you can better aid the group and be of more use than if you just auto attack with your longbow from a distance, or with any weapon really. Always keep an eye on what is happening and switch in and out accordingly, but always remember to swap back to your main weapon set before entering a fight!

Oh, also, master using the 1h sword. One of the best weapons we have. It can be a big learning curve if the mechanic gets to you, but push past that and you’ll see its potential.

This is great! I love the sword and warhorn combination as well, watching this is making me consider going full melee. I noticed you use Sic ‘Em, have you noticed at all if it still get cancelled a lot or does it not with your jaguar? I use jaguar as well and if it doesn’t… that’s a lot of extra power for the pet.

Not to do with the build, but, I’m happy somebody else uses the weapon skins I have and love, this made me happier than it should have, haha!

I love my ranger as well, I tried to make alts but always came back to my ranger in the end. Anyway, if I could change one thing about rangers, I’d want my pet to be able to hit moving targets. Some have said a movement speed increase for the pets, while that’d help, because they stop moving to attack anyway it becomes useless. However, if they had a higher chance to hit the target that’s moving, that’d be great!

I love my beastmaster build and wouldn’t want to play anything else at the moment as it fits my current playstyle, but my pet not being able to land hits on targets that move even slightly is a big decrease in damage output. That’s my one thing!

My Sylvari ranger, Ancient Spirit! I’ve been planning how I wanted her to look for so long, it’s so nice to have it come together now! I was going for a more ‘tropical’ colour theme to go with her orange and green skin tones.

My level 80 Sylvari Ranger, Ancient Spirit!

Ya, it can be very annoying! Although I’ve only ever had it happen to me once, and this was just for a normal dungeon run, not a speed run or anything similar. I’ve had one person complain that I’m a ranger, and that they should get somebody “better”. However, I loved proving this player wrong when they were downed and I quickly got them up while dodging AoE’s (which they seemed incapable of – why they were downed so many times) and getting back to the fight. They didn’t say anything after that. As others have have said, it’s just people’s misconceptions about the class as a whole. They’ve heard other players talking about ‘how bad rangers are’ and believe it without having any knowledge or experience to back it up. Generally I find most players have no issue with going into a dungeon with me, just those two occasions.

You were probably better off being kicked anyway, playing with people like that can be a nightmare.

This was a great listen, and nice to hear people talk about the ranger so enthusiastically! I learnt some new things about my favourite class as well, which is always good and hopefully it’ll improve my own gameplay and knowledge. Thank you for this!

zTales.4392:

Spirit.9158:

Thanks for this! I was really surprised to see the differences in times as well, I didn’t expect them to be quite like that. Like others have said, I tend to run SotH for the 25% for both myself and my pet, can’t stand running at normal speed, it feels so slow. I can’t wait to see what these other things show!

Just curious, what’s your build like? Your traits and utilities? I go 0/20/20/0/30 or 0/30/20/0/20, but I’m unsure about utilities. :I

Currently I use Lightning Reflexes, Quickening Zephyr, and Sic ‘Em. I’m not sure about it, though. I plan on doing a lot of solo/small group WvW later on, so I thought maybe a trap build would be cool, but I don’t know. I like the idea of catching people in traps, but you can see the traps, and I don’t even know how long they last. Plus, don’t you need to spec into traps to make them effective at all? I have so many questions. xD

Sorry for the late reply, only just saw this post! Ya I also go 0/20/20/0/30, and normally I tend to use three signets, Signet of the Hunt, Signet of the Wild and Signet of Stone; I never really considered Signet of Stone until recently, and I love it. I have considered swapping one out for Lightning Reflexes, another escape would be good as the weapons I prefer at the moment are GS and SB, they have a couple of escapes but sometimes aren’t that useful in some situations. I want to get into using a Sword/Dagger combination to help my pet even further with the cripples etc. just need practice with it.

I’m very new to WvW, only been taking part in it for about a week and I use this build in there, some may chastise me for that but I think it works quite well – I’ve had many players think I’m an easy target because I’m a ranger and end up running away. I also swap out SotH when I don’t need it for a trap, either Spike or Frost trap for the impaired movement – again better for my pet. I haven’t used Sic ‘Em since for a good while, I used it while leveling but noticed it got cancelled too much (like others have said). I also use Healing Spring, I don’t like to roam solo much, I prefer small skirmishes for my playstyle so I want to help my team in some way. There are so many good builds floating around the forums if you want to be effective with roaming, check those out too!

Thanks for this! I was really surprised to see the differences in times as well, I didn’t expect them to be quite like that. Like others have said, I tend to run SotH for the 25% for both myself and my pet, can’t stand running at normal speed, it feels so slow. I can’t wait to see what these other things show!

I understand your pain, I’ve had this happen to be before when only wanting to join a normal dungeon run… let alone a speed run. I asked them to invite me and got quickly kicked once they realised I was a ranger. It was never said in chat but the reason was obvious. I’m glad I was kicked as it probably saved me a lot of hassle if I actually ended up in the dungeon with them anyway.

As Nevermore said, be grateful you didn’t end up having to play with players like that, I sure am! Every time I’ve had somebody raise issue with me being “useless” because I’m a ranger, I tend to prove them wrong quite quickly when they end up downed in a dungeon an I quickly swoop in and res them then get back to what I was doing. I think most of these people have heard so much from other plays about how “bad” ranger’s are without having much knowledge of them themselves, just prove them wrong!