Guild Wars 2

runeblade.7514:

How about no?

I don’t want to play Forest every single time because the majority likes it. If you hate those maps, go play ranked.

You mean “go play foefire” I don’t much care for this one and it is listed as my “favorite” map because everyone else votes for it almost every time in ranked.

Looks like you put quite a bit of thought into this. Nice build and Armour setup. 2500 armor is nice for playing with pugs in fractals. You might be better off putting 15 into NM to give your pets might though your team instead of on crit. Looks nice overall.

Fluffball.8307:

Archon.6480:

They only get 4 clears before they melt

They get 2 F2s, 3 shouts and 2 warhorn skills. Shout warriors are effectively immune to conditions to the point I’ve see people /sleep when up against condi builds on stream and still win. I haven’t done it in a match but I’ve done it after matches.

It’s a BAD matchup for condi builds. I’ve won it on cele/condi builds, but it’s because I was better. They were using the better build and messed up.

I mostly agree, except that celestial ranger has 1v1 advantage over shoutbow and should win that fight. Shoutbow has strength in team fight were it can clear conditions from allies as well as self. It has quite a few weaknesses when caught by itself. I agree it can /sleep against some really bad players running meta SB build and still win.

They have already tested stacking poison in Queens gauntlet. One of the Pirates had some form of poison stacking and it was deadly. Shout warriors are quite susceptible to really high condition damage output. If you can keep the pressure up, they have trouble. They only get 4 clears before they melt and the natural resistance they carry through traits won’t help if your condition power is high enough. In the current setup we have to be way too glassy to accomplish this, but after HotM I am not sure this will be true anymore. Fire stacking and poison stacking will give us several brutal bursts n same build.

1. Serpent strike – it evades and attacks so is the perfect counter to many attacks, like guardian weed whacker skill (2 on GS). You can also roll behind someone who hits you in the back.

2. Monarc’s Leap – Great to create distance or switch targets in group fight. Hit 2 change target, hit 2 again. Also to create distance when you need to get out of the fray. 2, throw torch, weapon swap.

You must disable auto attack, disable auto targeting, keybind change target and deselect target.

Hey, don’t get rid of the Occam’s gear, there are some very nice 1v1 builds that use that and it is sure to be useful when HotM expansion goes live. You can trash PvE mobs with carrion style builds. You can melt them in seconds (especially in silverwastes):

Carrion for Open World 1vX

Notice how Carrion vitality feeds into rune set, and might stacking through signets boosts both power and condition. Sigil’s of ice and weapon sets proc predator’s instinct, while pets are non-condition (so they don’t compete with you).

Try to get your stats to line up and synergize with the weapons and runes you choose.

I just can’t wrap my head around the fact that I will now be able to run my favorite build AND have 6 in beastmastery at the same time! My river drake (buttercup) is drooling balls of lightning…

I’ve always found Mai Trin easy with longbow and 1h sword. In fractals, one should run spotter and piercing arrows. LB should be used almost on top of enemy about 200-300 units away, in just about every battle. That being said, GS works just as well.

Wolf and river drake. I keep the river drake on cooldown until I can get them to blow their cooldowns or do something silly like try to revive an ally or stomp a friendly. Then, quick pet swap and lighting balls to the face. Wonderful combo.

Serraphin Storm.2369:

Maybe it not the class but the play style may rangers choose to use. The ranger suffer more from an image problem rather than an ability or lack there of. Yes we could use more cleave and aoe.

Dual melee any one. The concept is so foreign to 99% of ranger, yet it is very effective.
More than weapon choice it’s many ranger believe you can’t be in the heart of the battle but must perch or a rock or ledge really not help your team. Not stomping the enemy you have downed (many times saving an ally). Not helping capture the node.

Many of the selfish play styles that ranger would use in dungeon runs if they could.
Mainly just loitering around points and one of the first to cut out (after thieve and mes) when things go bad.

Arrow Slanger created a very nice Dual Sword build I’ve been using with much success. I only changed it by swapping EB for spotter in the trait lines. Works great on point, good team support, can go head to head with most classes. Good AoE, and cleave. Maybe not good enough for top tier, I don’t know? Seems to me it is strongest in current Meta.

T raw.4658:

Archon.6480:

That’s good, when you start playing ranked on a regular basis let us know how ez mode 662 LB ranger is. Ok, thanks. Maybe a few videos would clear up our skeptisicm? Most of us have only play 2 or 3 thousand ranked matches, but there is always a chance to learn something from “new blood.”

I am curious how you handle 1v1 and outnumbered situations with such ease. Maybe there is an ez-mode button I am missing…

1v1 I’ve actually been able to handle. Was surprised I could tbh.

As for out numbered I handle them 1 of 2 ways.

1. Run away

2. Learn from my mistakes.

You should stick to thief then. They are the best class for running away. They can run faster than anything, and go invisible at the same time. Very forgiving to beginners.

That’s good, when you start playing ranked on a regular basis let us know how ez mode 662 LB ranger is. Ok, thanks. Maybe a few videos would clear up our skeptisicm? Most of us have only play 2 or 3 thousand ranked matches, but there is always a chance to learn something from “new blood.”

I am curious how you handle 1v1 and outnumbered situations with such ease. Maybe there is an ez-mode button I am missing…

I think all that can be said has been said, so it would just be nice to know if this is intended, or not. I suppose we could just accept we are loosing poison master and will have to trait 6 into NM for most builds… That still gives us a few good builds.

Sebrent.3625:

Stun and Knockdown are not conditions.

Right, strictly speaking those are control effects, which I always consider a nasty subset of conditions. I should have just said immobilize. Regardless, all three need to be cleared fast. Builds that can’t clear or mitigate those are going to have problems.

@Shadelang The most dangerous conditions are stun, immobilize, and knockdown. 1v1 battles should be manageable for most Rangers. The fights that we are talking about are 2v2 to 5v5, and sometimes 1v2, 2v3, or 3v4. I would love to see this TPVP build that is effective in those scenarios without condition removal.

@borya: direct damage is in no way superior to conditions in group fights. Look at shout bow, d/d elementalist, medi-guard. Look at Shatter Mesmer and tell me how he is not going to 100-0 you if you can’t break his immobilize. Same goes for thief.

Edit: look at meta engi as well. Not high damage.

Pimsley.3681:

I can relate with Extreme.8350 about the 4 ranger team.

Rangers annoyed me to no end when they got that buff last year so I ran a condi build to counter the dps builds.

My opinion on the ranger has changed dramatically because they seem to get the work done. This is a recent solo queued 4 ranger team I was in on my alt ranger. Granted, there are still a lot of inexperienced rangers but overall, they are reliable teammates.

:) Especially Esparie! That little Sylvari is a master! (Take a look at the picture again):

Extreme.8350:

Archon.6480:

Well, certainty some compositions can be weaker than others, for sure. Two glassy thieves can be countered rather easily if you think about it, but if, for example, the other team had three Rangers that turned out to be full on zerky pew pew, the thieves would be very welcome.

The Dark Side of the force is choosing the right counter just before the match starts. :-) ANet tried to ban class swapping before matches, but it was not received well, so join the dark side of the force and bring your anti-meta build with you.

No. Stacking glassy thieves is useless. Infact the best random team i had was 4 rangers and 1 warrior on foefire we won against premade they barely got to 100 points.
1 Ranger can kill a busy theif with 1 button.
U never played ranger if u think that make them very welcome.

You misunderstand. Ranger is all I play. Rangers are completely fine, and a skilled team could easily win with four rangers in the right circumstances. I was merely pointing out that thieves are the perfect counter to glassy pew pew bow rangers.

Shadelang.3012:

—Snip—
Its not like having condi cleanse grandmastes being in the same spot pidgeon holes us into those slots. Infact I have never needed run run either survival of the fittest OR empathic bond in any of hte gvgs or TPvP matches ive been in up to this point. largely because my build simply doesnt encounter that issue reliably enough to make it worth the sacrifice.

So its not as if there mandatory traits being locked behind eachother. Instead there traits that not everyone will need. And those that DO need it will have to chose HOW they want there condi cleanse to work. —Snip--

I strongly disagree. It does pigeon hole us into nature magic, and makes Poison Master a wasted GM, as you could never use it. You find that you don’t need either condition removal GM in TPvP and GVGs? The current meta is Celestial and it is full of knockdowns, immobolize, poison, fire, chill, and more fire. If you don’t clear those on demand you get insta-gibbed. Are you telling me the meta Warrior, Elementalist, and Engi builds don’t gank you with conditions? The only condition where you don’t need condition removal is when you are standing on a cliff with longbow and no one decides to come after you. In that scenario you don’t need armor, either.

Well, certainty some compositions can be weaker than others, for sure. Two glassy thieves can be countered rather easily if you think about it, but if, for example, the other team had three Rangers that turned out to be full on zerky pew pew, the thieves would be very welcome.

The Dark Side of the force is choosing the right counter just before the match starts. :-) ANet tried to ban class swapping before matches, but it was not received well, so join the dark side of the force and bring your anti-meta build with you.

I queue ranked because every once in a while you get queued with amazing players and that is really fun. I am pretty sure I got put into a game with Phantaram today. I think I expressed concern when he said he was starting far on foefire because we would be -1 on mid, before realizing who he was. Whoops! Regardless, he was very nice and the game went really well. The really good ranked players are actually very nice. It’s the wannabes that are nasty.

I have to agree with Serbent. I don’t get it. Our pets are fine in PvE where our damage is really high right now regardless of pet. In PvP, the pet can do anywhere from 0% of our damage to… I don’t know, a huge well placed spike. Relatively easy to use, situationally effective if you plan it right.

Maybe OP should be more specific about how they can be fixed. For example:

Pets would be better if they could move 30% faster in combat without training it.

Your not supposed to survive. You are supposed to keel over on fire bleeding from multiple places and let out a loud shriek while the poison eats kitten in your stomach!

All joking aside, I think your best bet is to trait 6 into nature magic, so you’ll have condition removal on demand. You might want to have a look at Lyssa runes, as an alternative, with grasping vines, along with healing spring, but you’ll have to be quick as you’ll only get two complete cleanses that way.

It would be nice if someone would verify they are aware of the issue and looking into it… It is troubling as it really hinders our build diversity.

Find method to acquire resources to build ascended gear and finish Armour and weapons.

Very nice toy! It’s refreshing to see another healing spring user! I was starting to think I was the only crazy ranger to use it. Excellent hunting.

I use Krait runes and really have alot of fun with them. Go full Rabid and slowly swap in Sinister as you feel more comfortable. Earth and Air sigils work great. If you have the money, you can swap Air for Torment.

Rabid/Sinister work great in Silverwastes, by the way. Many of the enemies are weak to conditions. Use Poison Master and SW/T to get your poison and Fire ticks in there.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Nike.2631:

Wondrouswall.7169:

If it is categorized as a Trap, I would hope it remains as it currently is without an activation time or needing allies/enemies to activate it.

Then it wouldn’t be a trap, now would it?

Healing Spring was a trap in GW1 with different functionality to the other traps, but it was typed as a trap and worked with Trapper’s Speed and Trapper’s Focus. I see no reason they couldn’t do the same here, leave the functionality exactly the same, just adding the trap classification so it functions with runes and traits. Would be less work too.

Ah, that was nostalgic! This I could live with, only with .5s to set.

Zenos Osgorma.2936:

Archon.6480:

They are giving traps longer activation times, so… That would make it worthless…

erm no they are adding Arming times , they take the same amount of time to cast but won’t be armed untill 0.5secs after the trap is seated on the ground so in effect the further your throw it the less noticable you’ll see the 0.5 arming time because by the time you reach the said healing spring trap it’ll be ready to be tirggered.

HaO and Tu are much better for a fast heal than Healing spring .

and making healing spring clearly defined as a trap adds different game play to the heal a throwable water field you can main from Mid line zerg with a SB and Gs for movement while supporting with thrown traps + healing AoE into the front line or back line.

versitile use healing spring is much better off as a trap with the 0.5 than without the 0.5 as someone else will activate it before you could even reach it, onther reason why a 0.5 arming time could be very useful.

Ah, understood. I am coming from PvP perspective. The activation time is too long on HaO and TU. Too easy to pick up poison or get interrupted while casting HaO and TU is in no way a “quick heal.” It heals you over time, and does little to help if you get gang spiked. I spend most time in melle range so Healng Spring is fantastic as is. Can drop it n .5s and leap through/into it instantly.

I solo queue in Ranked and usually have a great time versus whoever… Teams need a place to practice and train. That is what unranked is for.

Ok, are we talking about hot join or Ranked, because I’ve played a couple thousand Ranked matches and never seen this…

Yep, effective for good players, but not so strong as to be nerf worthy. A good challenge, nothing more and quite less in the hands of a beginner.

Um… The armor does nothing in PvP… The amulet has the stats…

How to kill LB ranger as ranger:

1. Block with GS skill 4 and press 4 again to throw sword.
2. Press 3 on GS to both close the gap and/or evade.
3. Equip rampage as one and walk to him without dodging or evading.
4. Use SoS to eat 6s or arrows.
5. Use SoW to walk to him without dodging or evading.
6. Use lighting reflexes to break immobilize or dodge.
7. Use skill 1 on GS repeatedly.
8. Use skill 3 on sword to evade and poison him.
9. Use skill 2 to evade and close gap.
10. Use skill 4 on dagger to evade and attack.
11. Bind them with spider
12. Fear them with wolf.
13. Bind them with entangle
14. Bind them with mud.
15. Swap to lightning drake when you get into range and use lightning breath, they evade backwards and will usually eat it as they enter its cone of death.

You should be able to 100-0 a 66xxx ranger in 3-4s with celestial Ammy. If he pops SoS, evade spam it out and hit him with conditions. SoS does not stop them.

Spirigo.2897:

Stealth, 1 knockdown, 2 knockbacks, cripple, 2 immob, leap, stunbreaker, fear from pet.

How can you possibly not escape with that?

Stability. Block. Dodge. Weapon evade. Easy.

Legionnaire.8703:

In every thread I see someone complaining about an aspect of sPvP, I see people use the sentence <low playerbase> or something similar. I recently got back into the gamee, so I am not in the know, but from my impression it doesn’t seem THAT small. HoTM always seem pretty active, and there’s rarely more than 2 min queue.

Is it really that dead? If you had to estimate how many people play, what would you guess, and do you think HoT will revitalize the scene?

No, there is a huge PvP player base, but the matchmaking system is working perfectly as intended. Ranked is full of solo and partial teams (2-4 players). It may be that tPvP is dead, because I rarely run into 5 man premades anymore and I am sure my skill level has increased. That being said, it may just be that ANet tries to keep the queues separate.

Many players that QQ on the forums don’t know (or like) that the matchmaker WILL keep you at a 50% win/loss ratio. If one queues with a 4-5 man premade, and uses 3rd party voice communications, they will win most matches even with mediocre skill level. Voice communications change everything.

Many of these “PvP heroes” get discouraged when they later queue Ranked in a small team or as solo… Because the match maker will work to bring them back to a 50% ratio by queuing them with complete beginners. Thus starts the cognitive dissonance and the QQing.

That being said, ANet should give us more to do while waiting for a match. I’ve become really good at the TP and trade while waiting in queue, but it would be nice to have more to do.

The current system makes it hard to tell if you are getting better or not, so ANet should find some way to show you how you are doing.

Hm.. I think it would be fun to transform enemies into lizards or something. I do like take root and would use it more if it had a better cooldown. It is a nice 3s invulnerability followed by bleed spamming plants. Not horribad but the cooldown makes it useless.

They are giving traps longer activation times, so… That would make it worthless…

I love it as is. Don’t want it to be a trap that needs activation. The only reason to take it over ungent is for the fast initial burst and reliable water field. You are usually dropping it in battle followed by a quick leap or pet swap to blast it. It needs to be reliable to be used like this… Or those pansy warriors will continue to run around and away from you with their flaming bows and not proc it. Biggest cowards in gw2. I always picture them with a skirt.

Man Eurantien, you are making want to revisit LB power ranger again! :-) I usually get frustrated when I feel like I can’t decap or stomp when running LB power. I do like being able to use the landscape and such to advantage but am more comfortable with celestial style builds. I feel the full Zerker build can be a hindrance when the match maker puts me on team with newer players where, if I am fighting on point with tankier builds, I can give better support. I usually queue ranked as solo. Do you think LB power is good in ranked as solo player as well? I am asking honestly. No sarcasm. :-)

Quick question, do you ever use Assassin amulet? Why or why not?

No, no, no you’re doing it all wrong! You should try the Merciful Quaggen build!

As the name suggests… It hits like a Quaggen.

Sevans.4619:

For WvW:

Harpoon Gun (Sinister) — Air & Blight — Air makes up for the lack of physical damage on the auto attack, Blight adds another condition to the mix and is particularly potent underwater ’cause downed state. It helps finish off surfaced enemies a little faster.

Spear (Knight’s) — Leeching & Doom — Both of these are persisting buffs and spear isn’t very useful for fighting so I use them to boost my other weapons. If I’m near water I’ll pop in and out for free life steal and poison. You can also take some fall damage then jump in some water between combat and gain these buffs so that your next attack on land does about 1,000 more damage and applies poison!

Wow! That’s a really good idea!

StickerHappy.8052:

Archon.6480:

Ooh, I am jealous. Still working on my ascended sinister set. I was planning on using Earth and Lightning. Earth will add many more bleeds when you use skill 2 on harpoon gun. Watch your foes melt.

Um, you can also to sigil of force and dungeon specific sigil if you are into the whole dungeon speed running thingy. Can’t really go wrong with that, but then you should probably use Assassin or Zerker stats. Sinister will do great with lightning and earth.

What is a lightning sigil? Is this new?

Ha, that’s true. No I mean the Air sigil that causes lightning strike.

How about Death of the Unfit? Using a utility transfers all conditions to your pet and it dies.

Ooh, I am jealous. Still working on my ascended sinister set. I was planning on using Earth and Lightning. Earth will add many more bleeds when you use skill 2 on harpoon gun. Watch your foes melt.

Um, you can also to sigil of force and dungeon specific sigil if you are into the whole dungeon speed running thingy. Can’t really go wrong with that, but then you should probably use Assassin or Zerker stats. Sinister will do great with lightning and earth.

Tragic Positive.9356:

What would I do if I could change anything on the Axe? (I wouldn’t change the sword I guess).

Well, I’d improve the casting animation. I can’t handle that my axe is thrown instantly and then I have to wait for ages till the character breaks out of exhaustion and starts doing something different.
If I want to use the bleed, I want to use it when I want to use it. Not half a second later. Apart from that, I find Axe to be a clear condi weapon. Every ability supports the Condi playstyle (Might, Bleed bomb, chill, weakness) while only the autoattack supports the Power one.

So the attack animation cast time improvement would be all I’d ask for.

Hit the nail on the head, methinks. The only improvement I would ask for would be the animation cast time. It too often ends up being just a hair to slow. Feels about a half second too slow on all 3 attacks.

I find both useful. I am still experimenting, but I have been finding dagger works great when I need one more source of poison. If the opposing team is warrior heavy, I find myself swapping torch out for the added poison. This all depends on the build you are running, though. Many builds might already have enough poison output, so it wouldn’t matter.

You worded the question so oddly, but I run both meta, and all kinds of non-meta builds. Sometimes, I’ll switch weapons or respec right before match starts, depending on matchup. You do realize that the meta builds don’t work that well in the wrong composition? Right?

I mean, if the random queue genie dumps 3 meta LB rangers on the opposing team, should you really run the cookie cutter x-meta build? Kitten that, I am bringing off had axe and some bleed bombing fun to town (not meta mind you).

Don’t worry about the points, they are meaningless. Generally speaking, the more you stay on point and keep it from being capped the lower your score. The in-game points are silly and anyone worth their salt knows this. If someone trashes you for low score, you know they are a beginner. Just smile inside and move on.

Laserbolt.6731:

Tragic P.,

I did indeed read that thread by Jcbroe, and that is where I got the idea.

That was one great thread. One of the best I have seen on the forums.

But it also became obvious to me:

1) How complex it is to find the optimal build for a given profession and strategy. I mean, this was just LB Ranger!

2) That you really have to discern who in a thread knows what they are talking about, and who drops in with strong opinions based on little apparent evidence. Tragic, you and the OP and a couple others seemed to really know what you were talking about. Some others seemed to be just chiming in confidently without facts or compelling logic. (In typical forum fashion! . One can easily be misled. )

In regard to #2, you’ll just have to take everything with a grain of salt and try the more interesting builds you see for yourself. Some are better than others, but eventually you’ll start to anticipate and counter your foes movements at which point you should be able to win with a wet noodle. The build will only take one so far.

There is nothing wrong with using a variety of weapons, skills, and utilities. When you get really good you will be able to win with sub-optimal builds. This may be the reason people swear by so many different kinds of builds, as well.

LughLongArm.5460:

Archon.6480:

ChubbyWarlord.6037:

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

The build is designed for after the specialisation patch hits, so you cannot currently use it.

Oh ok thanks, I was kind of worried it was like a hypothetical build.

Does that mean we get 18 trait points to spend after update (sorry haven’t been closely following)?

Its more of 3 full trait lines, you wont be able to split like 2-2-2-6-6 but you’ll be able to 6-6-6 in 3 out of 6 trait lines (including elite the trait line)

That’s fantastic, I think. Just wait till you see my 6-6-6 build! … Erm, wait. That sounds wrong…