I just wanted to add some more experience i had with playing the build with dual bows :
1] longbow 3 gives vulnerability and 11.5 seconds of speed for the pet
2]rapid weapon swapping will sustain 6-9 might on both you and your pet
3]fury and swiftness from weapon swapping are active 50% of the time
4]rapid fire will do anywhere from 3.5k to 6.5k damage
5]there is enough time from activating the longbow and unloading 3 and 2 m to cast 5 arround yourself for DoT damage and cripple
6] the shortbow will crit for anyhwere between …. 450 and 700 damage depending on might stacks and target armor , critical chance with fury goes over 60%
will add more later
(edited by Chokolata.1870)
Ok, i have played a dozen matches in PvP ,and i have goofed off in WvW a bit . I must say, the build is pretty kitten awesome . I have been using the variant that i suggested btw , burnt 10 gold in 5 minutes to buy the gear that i needed .
Honestly the cycle is insane , not to mention the perma fury . I had a bit of an issue in closed spaces because i am used to shortbow greatsword-sword m but man did pretty much everyone drop . I had a couple of close calls vs necromancers, because i was to stingy to eat my poultry soup , and guardians are unkillable when in bunker form, but they cant touch you either so i suppose thats ok . Thiefs die in 1 cycle . He can run or die .
Simply obscene
yes, but take into consideration that you CANNOT be bursted down because the first hit over 10% over your total hp will activate the protection, that with boon duration lasts longer
An alternative would be sigils of battle on both weapon sets . meaning that every time you swap weapons your pet would have fury might and swiftness . Which is quite good .
I do not like emphatic bond because id rather have my pet move at top speeds then myself . I can dodge and stall for time , my pet cannot .
Also consider playing a shortbow + longbow setup , the cycles are great , especially if dual sigils of battle .
Start off with shortbow – 4 , 2 ,pet F 2 , SoTH , swap weapons 3 2 , if he closes in swap pets use longbow 4 pet f2 , swap back to short bow , rinse repeat .
The single target and crowd controll is obscene, not to mention the pet damage with 10 vulnerability stacks
Also the condition overload on the ranger is a non issue with rune of hoeblbrak 20% condi reduction and 40% with lemongrass poultry soup .
Alternatively one could swap to zephyr and entangle and take the 20% reduction on them . By using dual bows , standing in the spring isnt really an issue
NOTE:
I have tried this build with dual bows , SOTH + SOTW + sickem + RAO, hoelbrak rune , dual battle sigil and amulet of divinity in SPVP . Stuff gets demolished . I used lynx and black cat
First off i would love to commend you on a great guide and build . It is very similar to something that i have been thinking about , but i have been hesitant to implement .
Same as you i would be using the black and white cat and making them the hard hitters , some of the utilities would be the same as well . But i will try to explain the differences now .
I am thinking about putting my traits in this order :
marksmanship 0
skirmishing 15
wilderness 10
nature 15
beastmaster 30
The beastmastery makes your pet the best it can be , and i would use the same traits as you .
Why nature magic one might ask ? Well , to put it bluntly , the 2nd minor trait that you get that gives any buff you have is given to your pet as well . This ties dirrectly to the skirmishing as you have speed and fury on weapon swap , buffing your pet every 10 seconds .
Of course you would lose a lot of survivability by only having 10 points in wilderness, but this would be offset somewhat by placing the nature protection trait in the Nature magic slot .
As for runes i would use the runes of Hoelbrak which buff power and might specifically, and its final bonus reduces the condition duration by 20% , and with lemongrass food it could go up to 60% reduction .
For sigils i would use the Sigil of strength on my shortbow and sigil of battle on the alternate weapon .
So in essence , each critical would give might to yourself and your pet , each weapon swap would give might ,fury an speed to your pet , each hit for more then 10% of your hitpoints would give protection to both you and your pet .
Thoughts???
cats or birds , cause they look cool . I liked my brown bear Ted, but he seems rather useless. Still keep him for underwater combat though
thank you , that was a quick reply
The 6th bonus of the Rune of the soldier says that it removes conditions on using a shout . Do ranger pet shouts count towards this ?? Anyone tried??
We will see soon enough if and what changes they will put out for the ranger . Irrelevant of balance changes , pathing and AI fixes should be a priority . A player should have the most control possible over any and all segments of his character .
Also, if pet is on passive mode, it should take significantly reduced damage or no damage at all , this is just my opinion . This way in dungeons you could swap to support pets and actually be usefull to the team . Perhaps even give passive bonuses depending on the class of pet
I have another question . I am running with knight armor for the most part, but my chest piece is rampager . Would i get more out of some berserker instead? I like to keep some of my condi damage because it helps immensly with chasing down people due to flanking bleeds
imho, the coolest looking shortbow is the fractal one , which i am using btw
the ranger doesnt get a 2nd autoattack for free, he pays for it with his own autoattack damage, for which the coefficients are lower then for other classes . Just puttin it out there
longbow and greatsword buffs , look at utilities
Xssorus, what is the build, traits, gear you are using?
Could someone please explain to me the MOMENT OF CLARITY grandmaster trait in the skirmishing line
I have read the wiki and the tooltip but i still do not understand it . How is the damage calculated? does it affect both the ranger and the pet ? what weapon skills does it affect ?
Do you have to stop the oponent from doing an action or is it enough to simply daze him or stun him ?
Is there supposed to be a status icon on the ranger or not, because this is the thing that confuses me the most.
Answers would be awesome , thx in advance
There is only one competitive ranger build, the Trapper build. Everything else is inefficient due to low weapon attacks and messy traits .
Also a solid build is the clerics beastmaster build .
Having said that, there is absolutely no reason to not play a build you like , however ludicrous it might seem . Its about having fun in the end .
QZ is by far the best utility the ranger has, it never leaves my side other then when i am using traps, like then protecting Meg in CoF
do not underestimate high power and precision shortbow with sigil of air . The consistent damage is quite awesome .
If you are doing fractals or dungeons i would say 15 in BM is paramount
glass cannon rangers are really bad . You do half the damage of other GC classes .
What ranger does great is mobility and consistent damage .
If you want to go for a condition build (spell caster) you would want rabid or rampager gear . Axe + warhorn and sword+torch . Trait up 30 in skirmishing and upgrade trap traits . 15 in beastmastery for the fast swapping . Rest in wilderness survival.
Alternatively you can go for a more power less condition , i would suggest full knight gear with 30 in wilderness 25 in skirmishing and 15 in beastmastery .
At the moment you should put at least 15 in BM because otherwise pets will be completely useless , but they still are considered at least 30% of a rangers value .
actualy, its 8×1 second … Also it would increase the torch throw duration . Quite nice i would say
For much better dungeon performance, you need at least 15 points in beastmastery. The extra stats and 20% reduced swap timer is invaluable . If you want the pets to tank you go bears . There is also one trait in the skirmishing line that gives pets life on critical .
There is a silly thing that i have noticed . Whenever i use an axe as a main hand weapon, and use the rickoshet skill , the off hand weapon and the quiver disappear for 2 seconds .
I run a build based on toughness with 30 points in wilderness , 25 in skirmishing and 15 in pet . I think its necessary to get the 20% reduction on pet swap for dungeons and fractals .
I run SB and GS , with mostly rabid gear , and my stats are around 1200 power, 1800 precision, 2100 toughness with 45% crit chance and 40% crit damage .
I use Rune of Melandru, but this is mostly for WvW combined with lemongrass food because other then the Healing Spring i have no other condition removal .
I do quite well in endgame PvE content , and contribute quite a lot . But maybe iam wrong
Imagine if the ranger could use Rifles…. oh so sweet
I have always considered the GS to be more of an utility then a DPS weapon . The Sword would be the dpser ye?
What if the tweaking of the GS goes more into expanding its already solid utility . For example :
- the 2nd attack in the autoattack chain applies 3 vulnerability stacks for 1.5 second
- Swooping hawk applies 2 seconds of cripple or perhaps even chill
- block-throw attack knockdowns the oponent instead of crippling it .
Why i think it would be ok ?? The graitsword would remain a lowish DPS weapon more focused on utility and defense thus differentiating from the other weapons . Its abilities would serve really well for teamwork with either your party or your Pet . And lastly , the ability 4 is on a fairly long cooldown .
Thoughts?
Hi guys, long time lurker and fan of the game here. I just wanted to offer my 2c .
I am a big fan of elegant and simple solutions , and if the developers decided that the pet is here to stay, then it is something that should form the basis of the discussion , agreed?
What i think could be done , to not make things too insane would be this :
- limit the damage pets take from a SINGLE attack to 10-20% of their hitpoints . A series of attacks or conditions could still take them down quickly, but you would still have time to swap them out
- give the pets shared agony resistance with the ranger
- fix the signets and lower the longer cooldown ones to something more reasonable .
- make the f2 ability cast instantly , and in case of melee range ones , just make it so that the pet leaps to the target super fast and casts it . This is to improve responsiveness .
- ofc fix various bugs, but this should go without saying
Choko
Thanks for the quick response . Thinking about it, my Pet does seem a bit wonky to control .
It dying in high level fractals i have noticed as well , but thought nothing about it really .
I run a 0 25 30 10 5 build with Rune of undead and focus on tougness , and i did fairly ok in WvW or dungeons .
I always thought the pet as an addon , I didnt think that it is worth 40% of my overall power.
I am fairly new to the game , started out after the New Year. What are the rangers problem exacticly? I play a ranger as my main, and i think i have been having a solid run without too much problems. The only thing that annoys me is that i cant use the rifle weapon
ty in advance