Guild Wars 2

Coarr.3286:

Bredin.5368:

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

This is very close to the build I run. I have 2000+power, 2000+ toughness (3100 armor), and 50% crit chance/51% crit damage. My traits are 0/30/30/10, so very close to Lert’s…just a bit more survivable. I use SB and S/D. I run wolf and jaguar.

The power/prec/tough ranger build is far from awful. It surpasses bunker/regen/pet builds in all circumstances (small groups all the way to zergs), except for 1vX. That said, this build can solo and beat or stalemate any class and pretty much any build.

It is more difficult to play than the popular regen builds…you need to be very active and you have no “set it and forget” defenses (like massive regen).

My prediction is that this type of build will be the next FOTM—the only downside is that it requires a fair amount of skill/practice to get it to work.

every regen/bunker/condition ranger will chew you up.

That just isn’t at all true.

Stealth isn’t too far from balanced. The problem is that stealth can serve as an amazing offensive AND defensive skill. So, maybe building in a ‘tradeoff’ for being in stealth that doesn’t nurf its utility for the thief, but allows players to better use their existing ‘soft’ counter-AOE.

Every class has access to AOE, and that can do damage to stealthed players. One possibility is to increase (slightly, say by 10%) the damage that a thief takes while in stealth. This gives us a chance to finish off thieves we have on the run, but isn’t too penalizing.

It wouldn’t affect their burst or use of stealth as an offensive tool. This would prevent ‘zerg-surfing’ and make it much more difficult for a thief to 1vMany.

Chopps.5047:

Lert.6287:

You might’ve noticed that ranger isn’t top tier proffession, while mesmer indeed is.
In terms of dps, survivability and group support (throught few seconds boons) mesmer is much better.
I run basicly knight with berserker orbs/jewel so i can achieve 64% critical chance, 70% crtical damage and 2950 armor. Sb/S&Wh is my favorite weapon choice. Both pets are for CC: hound (immobilize) and wolf (fear). Traits 0-30-30-5-5
As ranger I’d say that almost anything ranger can do, mesmer will do better. It’s just that not everybody enjoys given proffessions. Check yourself movies. Mesmer doing 1xX is norm. Ranger doing 1vs2/3 is considered as unusual.

That’s an awful ranger build, no wonder you struggle.

This is very close to the build I run. I have 2000+power, 2000+ toughness (3100 armor), and 50% crit chance/51% crit damage. My traits are 0/30/30/10, so very close to Lert’s…just a bit more survivable. I use SB and S/D. I run wolf and jaguar.

The power/prec/tough ranger build is far from awful. It surpasses bunker/regen/pet builds in all circumstances (small groups all the way to zergs), except for 1vX. That said, this build can solo and beat or stalemate any class and pretty much any build.

It is more difficult to play than the popular regen builds…you need to be very active and you have no “set it and forget” defenses (like massive regen).

My prediction is that this type of build will be the next FOTM—the only downside is that it requires a fair amount of skill/practice to get it to work.

Interesting. Is this a new issue? I wonder if this has to do with the recent changes to how ranger pet aggro is handled (i.e., npc do NOT aggro the pets unless the pet attacks them).

On a side note, I can now send my pet into a enemy camp to kill dolyaks or other players, and the NPC guards will do nothing to help so long as I stay out of range.

Link to build/equipment?

Yup. Thieves are better simply because a good one can reset a fight/escape. Perhaps the “stealth” traps will change this. Certainly if you can counter the stealth factor, then ranger>thief.

Forzani.2584:

Just take the whole stinkin camp. Can get it done solo now in less than 2 minutes.

Except that you can obtain MORE points by NOT taking the camp and farming yaks. Killing 4 yaks that have left an enemy camp nets you more than twice as many points as flipping the camp and holding it for the tick.

So, it seems not to take a camp unless you need the supplies. Better to deny the enemy supply by taking yaks (unless of course they need to go gather supplies to repair, etc).

So, I’ve been thinking about how small groups or roamers contribute to WvW, which is important because rangers excel in those roles.

Killing a yak on route to an enemy camp seems to net at least 3 points. Each camp releases about 6 yaks every 15 minutes. If you are by yourself and kill all those yaks, you will get 18 points for your realm during that time. This is more than taking and holding a tower, and just 7 points less than taking and holding a keep.

My understanding is that you get points per person tagging the yak. So if a small group of 3 people did this, you’d net 54 points for your realm—more than taking and holding stonemist! This is in addition to the added benefit of denying your enemy supplies (and the realm point for yaks reaching their destination?).

Of course, getting even more people to do this would yield even more realm points, but at some point it becomes counterproductive, since the zerg should be going for bigger objectives.

Any class can do this, but rangers are fast (they can keep up sustained speed), have very good range, and excel in small battles, making them ideally suited for this role.

So it seems that rangers can contribute greatly to WvW, even though they are not the most zerg friendly profession.

Thoughts?

bobross.5034:

Thanks for the advice Bredin! What about the easy pet heals…dont know much, but doesnt that make killing pets somewhat tough?

also, my impression of rangers was that pet builds could be very strong 1v1, but very quickly lose value in larger fights, so a wvw ranger speccd for his pet is probably going to feel pretty useless at other times…when not in duels. Am I right?

If they are running full BM (beastmaster) their pets can be hard to kill. If the build is one of the popular high condition/healing/toughness + beastmaster, then you will have a hard time. That is a really tough build to beat one on one. It may be the equivalent of a fighting a good thief—the most you can do is hope for a draw.

The fact is that there are several excellent ranger builds for one on one’s. Some of those work well for small skirmishes/group fights, as well. But you are also correct that the heavy beastmaster/healing/condition builds do not contribute much to large zergs etc. That is why I run a high power/prec/tough build which allows me to be zerg-friendly with just swapping a few major traits.

OK, I’m a ranger and I only have a level 3 mesmer, but I’ll give you my perspective on this as someone who has gotten the hang of killing mesmers while roaming as ranger.

I run an evasion tank build (SB + S/D), high toughness (2034), high power (2004), and good crit/crit damage (50%/51%) and decent health (18k+). I run with 4 evades, and some passive healing (~150hp/sec + 130 when regen procs). You will have a hard time bursting me down.

I haven’t lost to a memser 1v1 since I can remember. I’ve even recently beaten two mesmers at once, though one was upleveled. I’m in T2, if that means anything. There have been some really good mesmers that I couldn’t kill and had to disengage, but mostly I can pretty easily wear them down.

Here is my recommendation of what I would hate to have done to me.

A good SB ranger will be DD and try to wear you down with high sustained damage. If the ranger is running SB as their main damage weapon then do :

1) If they have a DPS pet like bird or cat and you have a tough time hitting the ranger (due to evasion/dodge), take out their pet. We rely on our pet for 3 things: 1) DPS; 2) CC (knockdown/fear); and 3) Targeting (the pet is what keeps us on you. While you go to stealth and pop your clones, our pet stays stuck to you like glue and tells us which one to target.) Even a non-BM ranger without a pet is crippled. Also, You down our pet and then we lose big advantage.

2) watch their weapon swaps. If they move to sword and dagger, then go on the defense and target their pet. STAY AWAY from a ranger with S/D. They will do a surprising amount of damage with that sword and throw on bleeds, poisons and cripples. You will NOT be able to hurt a good ranger while they are holding S/D. Do not bother stacking confusion, etc at this time. Wait until they switch to SB then go on the offense—that is when we are most vulnerable.

I feel I’ve learned so much about how to beat mesmers by reading the excellent posts and guides on this sub-forum that I would try to return the favor.

Hope this helps…but not too much!

Chokolata.1870:

…the ranger sword is a weapon on the higher end of the skill scale . Mastering sword , the ranger goes from meh to awesome

This. The sword paired with dagger is really an amazing weapons set. Great defense and really good damage. Spamming 1 on a thief who missed their CnD (because I just evaded and poisoned) who is hobbling away them is satisfying.

This is my general build: http://tinyurl.com/ctg34he

It is essentially an evasion tank with power/precision/toughness. I think this is a great general purpose build. It affords relatively high sustained direct damage, excellent survivability (due to toughness, vigor for dodges and 4 evades), and versitility.

I switch around traits depending on the situation and really enjoy being able to move from a skirmish/roamer build by swapping in different major traits (traps), utilities (healing spring, muddy terrain), and weapons to contribute to group/zergs without respecing.

I’ve played the popular BM/Regen variants and they are great, but I find them no more survivable than the evasion tank because you need to be in their face to do damage (fire field, bleed on weapon swap, reliable hits with axe).

Healing, even with 0 healing power, is decent (150 hp/sec passive, 280ish when regen procs). Warning though: for this build to work you really need practice, as it has no “autopilot” defense like the BM/regen builds have. You really need to learn how to dodge, time your evades, when to swap weapons and how to use your pets.

I find this build works far better against good opponents than the condition builds, but again, it requires a fair amount of practice.

I run a power/prec/evasion build. The sweet spot for crit chance depends on your weapon and build. I use SB and S/D and have the following stats:
2004 power
2034 tough
50% crit chance
51% crit damage

With a proc on crit sigil you are procing nearly evertime the cooldown is up.

18k+ health, all with food buffs.

These stats really allow pretty high levels of pressure—you can’t burst people down, but you sure can quickly wear them down. It is very survivable due to high vigor and 4 evades (1 with SB and 3 evades with S/D). Healing is 0, but you can still get good regen.

The nice thing about this build is that you can very effectively solo and roam, and then just switch around some major traits, utilities and weapons and contribute relatively well to a zerg.

Overall, I find this build more survivable than condition/bunker because I can keep my distance and have more effective evades and higher tough/vit. It does require a LOT of practice to become proficient with the 1-hand sword and how to switch between being on the offense (while your TU is up) and defense (S/D while TU is on cooldown).

I have 2 level 80s: a thief and a ranger. I don’t play the thief often and am not very good. I can very easily kill other bad players, but struggle against good ones (of all classes). I mostly play a ranger and feel I am very good. I rarely lose to thieves on my ranger (I guess I “win” about 9/10 fights). But if I encounter what I consider to be a really good thief, I simply cannot beat them and they will usually down me.

So, I’d say thief is easy to do well in WvW, even if you aren’t good. But the class has a very high skill cap, so if you master it, you are truly awesome (at least compared to ranger) in small fights.

Very nice, and I’m going to give this a whirl, I think. But what do you do for condition removal? It seems you have none!

Have you posted your build yet? I will subscribe to your channel after you post your build…your videos are really enjoyable, but not helpful beyond that without links to build info!

cheers!

@ObscureOne

“Maybe on your tier in WvW, but never in tier 1 and 2 where getting ripped apart by a Ranger is something you are relentlessly mocked for”

I play a ranger on tier 2. I love hearing about this attitude, though I’ve never experienced myself. I believe that those who have this attitude probably mostly roll with zergs and rarely roam in small groups/solo which would allow them to see what a good ranger can accomplish.

>>Pressing F2 does not instantly command the pet to perform the skill. Instead, it puts the skill in queue for the pet to perform after their current action is complete.

This can currently be circumvented by telling your pet to “Heel” (F3) right before pressing F2 as F3 does interrupt the pet’s current action<<

Wait. Is this true? Really? If pressing the F3 prior to F2 really fixes this, this will be a (game) life-changing fix.

Maybe I’m dull, but I’ve never noticed this. Thanks!!!!!

….Hunter class?

I play on TC and am in the borderlands every day. I really enjoy the WvW competition in this tier and thought I’d share had three positive experiences with FA players recently in WvW.

1. I was snooping around water camp when an FA invader sent me a party invite. S/he then told me they wouldn’t attack if all I wanted was the point of view there. I replied that I was there to cause mischief and they wished me good luck! Nothing special, just a pleasant interaction.

2. I was engaged in a long fight with a KA thief when I noticed an FA mesmer come along. The thief and I were evenly matched and it was really a great duel. The FA player waited until the fight was over before attacking, after which another kick kitten fight ensued. Thanks to the honorable FA player who realized that fun small fights are hard to come by!

3. We had some great small group fights with FA on the bridge south of Hills. We outnumbered them, but they were unshakable. It was a small group of extremely skilled players, with unusually well-coordinated attacks (a mix of CCs, condition stacking etc). When we’d down one of them, they would put up a barrage of CC, knockdowns and have their ally up in no time. They were a real challenge and frustratingly pleasurable to fight!

Does anyone else have something positive to share about encounters with players from opposing servers?

@sceptus.9415

That is strange. I’m on your server and on the WvW mumble every day and I’ve never heard what you experienced. Even though the server is T2, perhaps you spend your time in a lower tier channel?

All kidding aside, well-built/well-played rangers on our server kick kitten solo and in small to mid size group skirmishes. Maximizing our contribution in large zergs requires some very specific skills, but I don’t know that thieves, for example, are any better in this situation.

I do admit that rangers have core problems (e.g., pet responsiveness) and provide ‘special’ group contribution, like ele’s or mesmers.

Here is my take:
1. WvWvW: Rangers are good, but have a very high skill cap. Meaning that it takes a lot of practice and tweaking of builds to achieve success. That said, rangers can do very, very well in WvW. WvW success is largely about situational awareness, knowing your strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of your opponents. One big disadvantage is that optimal roaming builds and optimal zerg-support builds require you to respec (the latter usually needs piercing arrow).

2. sPvP: I’ve only dabbled, but trap/condition bunker builds work well as can power/crit/evasion tanking. Others will have better knowledge about this.

3. PVE: Rangers are amazing. You can safely go anywhere, deal with multiple veterans at at time. When leveling, I would purposely try to get in over my head and see if I could pull through. PVE open world is very fun as a ranger.

4. Dungeons/events/raids: Never done a dungeon.

5. AOE: We are quite poor in this regards. Piercing arrow trait in Marksman line is a very good (but not great) trait. Other than that, our options are limited and pale in comparison to other classes.

When I run piercing arrow I get double the loot bags compared to when that is not traited. I also use superior sigil of fire on my bow, which does an AOE flame damage on critical (30% or so chance). For some reason I do NOT think that the AOE from a sigil counts as tagging for WvW loot. Can anyone confirm/disconfirm this?

I could be mistaken, but I don’t get very many loot bags. To “optimally” contribute, the ranger should probably respec for zerging compared to roaming. I no longer do this, since my roaming spec performs well enough in zergs and WvW loot accumulates fast enough.

I switch between running the build capuchinseven posted (although he plays it much better than I) and a modified Ikira power ranger damage spec:
20/30/20/0/0—I mainly go the 20 in MM for piercing arrow which works amazingly well when running with a large group. With sigil of fire you can rip apart a large group of enemy, especially if you can flank.

I’m actually quite satisfied with our AOE/damage, although you need a pretty specific build for it to work.

The only “problems” I see are 1) that the skill requirement for effectively playing a ranger seems to be much higher than for most other classes, and 2) we sort of have to chose between builds for small group/roaming fights or large zergs. There aren’t great universal builds (at least that I’ve been able to make work).

Never posted here, but just thought I’d add my 2 pennies. I’ve played a lot of MMOs and I must say that GW2 is the most bug-free and stable game I’ve ever experienced. Play is responsive and crisp (except for my kitten F2 pet ability!), and large scale combats work really well. True, massing zerg vs zerg is plagued by choppiness, skill lag, etc, but the play far exceeds other games.

Removing culling was fantastic and the solution actually works. A tremendous feat—one that was worth the wait to do it right.

I look forward to hearing about new developments in WvW which is the only reason I play the game and the only reason I pay $ to the gem store. I need to keep stocked on food and I constantly play with new builds and equipment configurations.

No need to pay $ for playing sPVP, by the way…so maybe you all want to give WvW the priority. It makes $ense!

Been playing more with this build and I must now agree that it kicks kitten for group engagements (defensive/offensive siege, small group roaming, etc). It has much more survivability than it initially seems. I literally doubled the # of bags I get during these types of engagements.

I swap out a few utilities and the heal (add healing springs for group field benefits sometimes) as needed. I do use a Pow/Prec/Tough weapon, though and it feel more sturdy without the zerker weapon, and very little drop in DPS.

Surprisingly, this is a great core build for solo roaming as well. All you need to do is swap a few major traits and I add in SoR for some condition removal. Nerva is right—because of the high DPS you don’t miss the healing, even against 2v1 (if you are good using the sword for evasion/defense). Then, when you meet up with your group, put things back according the core Nerva build.

I can’t tell you how many times I in the last few days I’ve had 1 or 2 enemies come running at me, thinking the ranger must be an easy kill, and I drop them fast or send them running.

Thanks for the build, Nerva!

So, does SOH provide the speed boost while in combat? I should know this…

Also, I’ve been running a variant of this and have switched to 2 dogs as pets when I’m running solo or in very small groups. The CC from the dogs (knockdown, fear, chill) really makes up for being weak on healing.

>>Difference between my ranger and my thief is.
On my thief, I run towards zergs
On my Ranger, i run from zergs.<<

This. I have an 80 ranger (my main/favorite to play) and an 80 thief. I’m not at Xsorus’ level of play, and I actually do a bit better on my ranger than thief (due to more practice/hours spent on the ranger).

But the ranger, while able to take more of a beating than a thief, is far, far less survivable. There is no “escape” button or skill to save us if we get in over our heads. We have far less “burst” mobility/speed than other classes (e.g., warriors, thieves, elementalists).

Good play with a ranger is very rewarding but also frustrating. Just fixing a few things (e.g., F2 responsiveness, slow pets who can’t land a hit) would bring MUCH more parity to rangers in WvW compared to other professions.

Ok, but you cant do this! Tell us now!

Thanks for explaining the F2 bug!

On a related note, I’ve noticed the following with the wolf. He wants to do the knockback/pounce when summoned, and I sometimes see him prepare to do so. But if the target moves out of range during the long animation, that seems to screw him up as well. So he does a lot of running to the target, stopping to try to pounce, then running again as the target continues to move out of range.

It seems SOOO much would be better if they made the pet special attacks/F2 instant/nearly instant. I can’t see how this would be unbalanced—it would just make the skills and pets more reliable (e.g,. work as they should).

So, I’ve finally found a “groove” in WVW as a ranger. I run Xsorus’ condition (axe/torch and sword/dagger) build when I am in small groups or roaming. The survivability is great, and the damage is really goodj (it sort of catches people by surprise). This is a great build—well thought out, all the attacks are useful and can pump out respectable damage over time (though you still kill mostly by attrition).

Then when I am larger groups I run a completely different build, similar to a team SB/LB build that Sol has posted. I can do good damage, contribute to tower defense and pretty effectively pick off stragglers. But I die if an opponent looks at me the wrong way…

The problem is that the first build is awful for large group play and the second build is far too fragile for solo/roaming and small skirmishes. So I am porting back to the training guy and respecing several times an evening so I can contribute to WVW. Also, this limits flexibility—if our commander needs a small group of volunteers to make a supply run and I’m in my team spec, then I’m screwed (if I run into enemies).

This, along with pet responsiveness (why the hell is there a 2 second cast time for so many F2 abilities when the pet is soooo slow) are my two main gripes about rangers in WVW.

Is this the case for other classes? I have an 80 thief alt and I use the same build for all WVW situations. Do other classes have to rely on such situation specific build to be effective? Or is this unique to the ranger?

So, I’ve been running your build (human ranger, no inverter), and it is really fantastic for roaming and skirmishes. I fought a warrior today for a good 10 minutes. Neither one of us could finish the other off, but when others joined the fray, we would kill off the opponents and just continue our endless battle.

I have downed pretty much all other opponents…I no longer fear thieves or mesmers! Thanks!

But I still need a build that lets me contribute when we run medium to large groups. I’m thinking of trying Valroth’s beast master hybrid (or a variant). Do you have any suggestions?

Yashi, thanks for the video and commentary. I’ve played a lot of MMOs and usually with stealth characters, but just couldn’t get the knack for playing a thief. Was ready to hang it up when I saw your videos.

So, I modified my build and went out there—and then I wanted to hang it up because I met with so much fail. Then I actually listened to your commentary and watched how you moved into, out of, and around skirmishes.

And then it clicked! I can stay in battles forever, have great survivability and have become much more adept at stomping. I still can’t down people as fast as you (could be because I’m fighting against Blackgate players currently!), but I feel much more effective.

Essentially what I learned from watching your vids is to be quick, be patient and be persistent (and don’t miss your CnDs).

I do have a question: How do you deal with or anticipate all the CC (knockdowns, etc) that gets thrown at you while you are stealthed? It seems I’m always getting knocked down or held by AOE. Any advice?

thanks again!

The worst thing about this type of PVP is that the it reduces the importance of role diversity among the classes. Basically you need lots of AOE damage. Lots.

That’s mostly how zergs work. In other games (like Shadowbane, for example), classes like scouts which didn’t do much damage and no AOE were invaluable for large scale PvP because they could, well, scout. And good ones could solo most classes. In GW2 WvW there isn’t much need for scouts (aka roamers) because the map tells us where the action is.

Instituting changes that encouraged people spread out over the map more, making the supply runs/pack animals worth more, and even provide some bonus to encourage engagement of multiple targets at once would discourage the zerg. Anything to encourage more free-form pvp with small groups, scouting parties, rewarding stealth play, etc might help.

Sick ’em
As awge, I am running a WS+BM build for PVE, WvW and sPvP. With 10 in skirmish for the pet buff (either +30% run speed or +30% crit damage), the jag is a great burst tool. If you are careful, you can effective use this to pick off single target even during zergs. I’m beginning to think the +run speed is the best choice for the pet, since their biggest weakness is catching up to targets. What do others think?

Protect Me
This is really an amazing ability, especially in sPVP. I can get out of very sticky situations by hitting this and doing a quick pet switch before it dies. Highly underrated

Learn to use 1-h sword+dagger defensively
I’m still getting the hang of this, but you can really surprise people by pulling out the sword and dagger and doing 3 consecutive evades and then crippling. My advice is if you need to get out of bad situation and create some distance, use sword 2 to leap back then swap to SB and hit 3. Now you have some room to work with.

Howdy! I’ve always played scout/bow type characters and really like how you play. I notice you tend to give some info on builds, but not the full detail. Like above, you say you are 30/20/20—is that 30/20/20/0/0? Would you mind give more specifics about trait choices, etc?

Your videos are a great service to the ranger community! thanks!