Guild Wars 2

Overthrust.2659:

the ranger is in a bad position, mostly because 40 percent of your dmg is dead crawling in your legs 90 percent of the time (the other 10 is inmobile after pet swap) also all our traits are garbage for that dead pet and the rest are just nonsense that requirse you be half dead to trigger, on top of that nerfed weapons…. we have nothing to support a zerg. Icould go on all day long but Im tired and currently leveling my warrior permastun with 4kdmg without dimishing returns inmune to conditions with endure pain invulnerability

Sounds like the perfect profession for you

Kilger.5490:

Almost all necros have the ability to transfer their conditions to their opponent on a regular basis, and the heal eats them for lunch. I’d never met a ranger I couldnt steamroll on my necro. That said, any kind of stun hurts a necro very bad.

Empathic bond is better all I apply is bleeds and that gets cleaned if tossed back to me. Immediately after tranaferring 10 bleeds to me the necro finds he again has 10 bleeds on himself.

Robyn Yew.6072:

I think the runes are bugged. It doesnt seem to be as fast as signet. If someone can do test and confirm that would help.

I tested them with the signet. Upon activating the signet, the speed at which I am running does not appear to change.

Overthrust.2659:

I will never drop my perplex runes you hear me? NEVER! its currently the best pressure dmg we have sandlt comes from something that is not inherent to the ranger class

Have you tried rabid, sharpened edges, keen edge, sigil of earth, and muddy terrain with a shortbow? I feel like that’s more pressure. You might toss in a sun spirit too. Just make sure you take either traveler runes or a mix of afflicted/krait for hilariously long bleed duration.

Those are peircing bullets lol; I love you guys

Perplexity are really good too though

They’re really good. You can still get by without them but they’re very nice.

Rabid bleeds with muddy terrain is very strong in wvw roaming right now. Jcbroe is right about that. I run that now with jungle spider and drakehound to defeat overconfident warriors. I am very sick of their arrogance.

Setun.4368:

Did the new dungeon on my ranger and ranger weapon skills are crazy useful in all parts of this dungeon. For the oil / lava elemental part I just used path of scars to drag all the elementals away from the oil blobs in one shot.

Also pet is invunl to fire in that room

I use Path of Scars to pull holograms into the tree too. I think you can use it to pull the mid boss for the achievement. It’s good to pull steam watchers too.

Yelloweyedemon.2860:

Just a question to the rangers that run high level fracts/dungs.

How do you manage keeping the pet alive when going with 0 BM traits?

I’m level 74 atm on ranger, but even with 30 BM traits, in boss fights, the pet can die if I’m not too carefull or simply unlucky. I feel if i go with a glassy dps build (0 BM) the pet is going to die straight away lol

Red moa / drake / devourer

So your logic is that because (literally) 7 people on the forums don’t mind where ranger is but 100,000 think it needs help, anet listens to the vocal 7?

Your first mistake is thinking that ANET devs seriously consider profession forums for balance. They clearly use data, watch film of pro games, and do analytics. You have to be reasonable.

cyborG.3026:

Although your setup is good and all, you won’t last much against other condi builds, esp necros w/o a sufficient condi removal, aside from emphatic bond.

I defeat necros with my rabid build all day. I think they’re all running some kind of ascii / themightyaltroll power necro well build so ya, condis tend to hurt them. Sure they can reverse corrupt conditions but ranger applies bleeds and fire so fast it doesn’t matter.

Take muddy terrain and wilderness knowledge, you’ll thank me later also strongly consider keen edge and sharpened edges

I just wanted to point out to you guys that these two abilities are very nice in the new dungeon. I just really like healer’s celerity where you know people will down (like a new dungeon or when roaming in wvw). I also like muddy terrain because slowing these bosses via cripple and immobilize is so important. That also holds true for skull crack warriors in wvw. I hope that helps you face these new enemies.

I love alphak’s advice. I would say yes always high DPS gear and rune of the ranger but also, in high level fractals, reflection is almost required as well as invulnerability. Therefore, your build becomes 30/0/20/20/0 for signet of beastmaster and offhand training. You make up for the lack of precision and crit damage with your utilities.

Sometimes I get stuck on terrain when fighting the boss in the new dungeon. This happens near the shield generator objects after they’ve been destroyed. Versus the final boss is when the problem typically rears it’s head. It’s even worse if you get stuck on terrain and he throws a gear on your head. >_<

[Reveal]

/15charac

I agree; it’s ranger friendly too. Pets are invulnerable to some aoe (like the fire in the ooze/gear walk) and mainhand axe even bounces off the boss’s gear spinner attack. That’s really cool because everyone knows ranger axe is weak without a bounce. And the last boss really is less of a dps race and more of a teamwork positioning battle. Very well done and even designed keeping rangers in mind

Kal Spiro.9745:

Where should the reticle sit? Especially when you’re talking about a bow that doesn’t shoot straight.

Ya I thought about that problem. It can’t precalculate where the arrow lands due to computational constraints, right? So the reticle has to be stationary. In this way it works much like an iron sight on a rifle in that it’s to be used as a point of reference for you to make a judgement with.

Well ya I agree about the elitists. For example, on reddit.com/r/guildwars2 there’s a thread on the fastest professions and ranger was barely brought up. Ranger is never ever taken seriously. I mean, Brazil recently wrote that in theory ranger would make their speed runs faster but at the end of the day “it’s too hard to play and no one has a geared ranger they enjoy playing”. @ _ @ some “pros” they are

AlphaK.9486:

Not complaining, just a joke I thought was funny. No need to be on edge, I’m usually suggesting ranger fixes.

I was talking to OP

Edit: and you were talking to kasama I realize lol my bad guys

I don’t even…ya there’s a lot. Traps, spirits, pet, and tons of traits that are unique

People must just really love to hate the ranger profession

Take peircing arrows with a longbow and hit teq’s feet twice by raking arrows over it. There you are unique. Run spotter in your dungeon party. You just boosted everyone’s precision so much they don’t need a sigil of perception anymore and instead could use bloodlust which has a two pronged effect of massive dps boost. Use a traited frost spirit instant +7% dps. Resurrect the awful warriors that constantly die in a dungeon with your spirit elite or healer’s celerity. In cof use traited signets with SOTW, RaO, SOTH, sword, and QZ with call of the wild for fastest possible gate kill.

What else do you want that’s unique? I get complaints about ranger but the more I listen to them the more I question why I try to help a community that only wants to feel sorry for itself. :/

I think it’s cool that the axe ricochets off aoe on the ground that the middle boss casts. This makes axe surprisingly strong against him (weakness and chill too). I hope we see more mechanics like this. This dungeon appears to be very ranger friendly.

Entangle is Great in 5v5 or 10v10 but scale up further and there’s too much aoe damage and condi cleansing for it to work.

Honestly the vigorous renewal change had me a bit perplexed.

Ya maybe a bad example I don’t play beastmaster anymore to be honest. After the dmg nerf and ZS change I quit putting points in BM and put my apothecary build on the shelf.

Many times, to maximize effectiveness with my ranger, I will zoom in and shoot manually. This reduces your peripheral vision but allows you to aim and hit say, a thief who just tried to stealth for a rez, with a concussion shot. You can also shoot up keep walls this way. It requires skill and is very cool.

My suggestion is to make a reticle appear when zoomed to aid in the aiming process.

I think ranger is both hard to see what the good builds are and hard to play making warrior or thief more popular choices for most players. Ranger is a skill profession.

I’m not defending any design decisions by ANET I was answering a question “why are traps in skirmishing” by saying “anet wants you to trap with on crit abilities”. If your playstyle is different and you want to make it better, that’s fine and stuff. I was simply trying to explain where anet is trying to push you when making a build. Make sense?

Example: trap potency + spike trap = immobilize. Maybe you have companion’s might and a sigil of strength and fortifying bond. Now your 20 stack might cat (with pet prowess) is chewing on an immobilized enemy. If you run beastmaster or basic traps build, you should be trying stuff like that for most effectiveness.

Frustration is an internal quality; something that happens to your mentality irrespective of difficulty. You get frustrated when you don’t get what you want. Maybe deal with your emotions better?

Ya because they want you to bleed on crit with conditions. See why? It’s clear from the trait sharpened edges and also clear by the fact that traps are in the crit dmg / crit chance line. Many professions do not even get crit dmg and crit chance in the same line. Ranger is a great profession for “on crit” type abilities.

Finally, thank you for chiming in Guanglai. Please talk some sense into this thread.

Wolf is a great pet and it’s only found in wvw EB NE part of map, just north of a camp. Also, someone asked about HoM pets. They are identical to pets rangers can already get. Literally: they are just skins.

Realistically you could combine healer’s celerity and trapper’s defense.

Healer’s celerity is actually pretty good but the rest I sort of agree with. Instinctual bond isn’t horrible but it’s no zephyrs speed. Carnivorous appetite really is kind if good in pve.

Norn: strong transformation elite (evasion/mobility), legendary’s are huuuge

Human: additional condition removal, prayer to lyssa, and hounds of balthasar, traditional look (overall defensive)

asura: small, hard to see animations make it great for pvp; offensive boons like confusion can be strong in certain ranger builds

I hope that helps

Leuca.5732:

Chopps.5047:

I haven’t ran the numbers but 40% of damage seems awfully high. Maybe in a regen bunker condi build. But rabid or berserker there’s just no way it’s 40%. Probably more like 10% or 15% tops.

Your setup is irrelevant because your ratios are still balanced around having the pet. If the pet wasn’t a factor you would be even stronger running those setups you mention, the margin easily being by more than 15%.

My pets are only used for buffs/debuffs at this point. I do not use them for damage, even though they do damage. Honestly.

Atherakhia.4086:

Chopps.5047:

I haven’t ran the numbers but 40% of damage seems awfully high. Maybe in a regen bunker condi build. But rabid or berserker there’s just no way it’s 40%. Probably more like 10% or 15% tops.

Pets scaling with gear becomes a problem with ascended in wvw though, depending on your build.

I ran simple DPS numbers from a Thief’s dagger (their highest DPS weapon) and the Ranger’s sword (our highest DPS weapon) and found the Dagger at 2469 and the Ranger at 1663. So that would be about 33%. I haven’t timed the pet attacks yet as I got lazy so can’t do a DPS comparison as the wiki doesn’t have any values and I didn’t find them yet.

This is before traits and food and such. It’s also just auto attack. Rangers don’t seem to really benefit that much from using their abilities. Especially with the bows (which are the only weapons I really care about) so I haven’t done anything else to see if maybe the horn #4 is worth using etc.

Simple test? Explain. There is no such thing. The result depends on the assumptions. You didn’t take any traits did you?

Lol those gears! And every time I tried to cast my spirit elite he’d chuck me across the room. I wonder if stability negates that.

Did you run devourer or drake with a signet of stone / sig of beast GM? They seemed to stay alive for me (for the most part). Did you guys have trouble with getting the ooze to absorb the oil during the midboss?

I haven’t ran the numbers but 40% of damage seems awfully high. Maybe in a regen bunker condi build. But rabid or berserker there’s just no way it’s 40%. Probably more like 10% or 15% tops.

Pets scaling with gear becomes a problem with ascended in wvw though, depending on your build.

Cool dungeon today, looking forward to wvw once it gets fixed thanks guys

I like this. +1

Specifically, the fire in the ooze / gear room doesn’t damage pets. Other aoe’s do. The final boss blows up pets but it doesn’t matter because it’s not a HP sponge. It has low defenses once you remove the shield. To beat the final boss, DPS actually isn’t an issue. It’s removing the shield by kiting the holograms and the tree together and then blowing up the hologram. Then he’s very vulnerable for several seconds.

The reason why I like conditions/toughness here is because you end up doing a fair share of kiting. Now, I’m sure rT will release a video showing direct damage is king again but for general PUGs taking some strong condition damage in shouldn’t hurt. Avoiding death is really the key thing.

Think about taking sig of beastmaster and signet of stone.

Overall very pet friendly though compared to what we’re used to.

I agree, this dungeon was very well executed and appears to be ranger pet friendly in terms of certain aoe doing zero damage to pet

Just an fyi—pets are invulnerable to certain aoe in the new dungeon, I was definately happy to see that. The tree is even pretty condi friendly for carrion or rabid players. This is just my take away after one play through. Let me know what you think.

PvE/dungeon there is no question: berserker or assassins or berserker/assassins mix armor. You can get enough vitality and toughness from traits. If you need more toughness you can put it in trinkets.

Use the following for general dungeon min/max:

20(spotter)/25(companions might/pet prowess)/0/25(vigorous spirits)/0

And go frost spirit and sigil of strength. The amount of might your pet gets will freak you out: that’s due to fortifying bond. Fortifying bond really is a “must” in dungeons because that’s the only way pet gets buffed in a 5 man due to boon aoe cap of 5.

For general defensive dungeon play (high level fotm) play this following (yes I need to update my theorycrafting thread on that):

30/0/25/15/0

The main reason is for signet of the beastmaster. You’ll want that signet of stone and occassional that signet of the wild for additional stability (harpies for example, on uncatagorized fractal). The other reason is for offhand training. Why? Because ANET made reflection a must-have skill. Reflection makes FOTM so much easier it’s a little weird there aren’t easier ways to get it (this is where the PUGs say “just roll guardian bro”) but ranger has reflection: offhand axe. And path of scars is AWESOME. I mean, how good are ranger offhands right now?

Where is reflection necessary? Just anywhere you find projectiles. Crazed Asura. Legendary Imbued Shaman. Mossman. Archdiviner. Harpies. There’s more I just can’t think of them right now. Twilight Arbor forward/up before they removed it (lol).

KyreneZA.8617:

The better question is: are there any good Ranger pets?

Wolf, hyena, drakehound, fern hound, black bear, red moa, jungle spider, shark, armorfish, jellyfish, carrion devourer, lashtail devourer, jungle stalker, lunx, jaguar, eagle, hawk, raven, snow owl, snow hound, siamoth, pig, warthog, river drake, marsh drake

Are all pets that should be used consistently in wvw and pve/dungeon. It depends on the situation.

Facing Old Tom in a pick up group? Use a devourer, take the fan or a battery, and stand behind the devourer with shortbow. Devourer eats damage since you stand behind it. Easy as pie—if you know your pets. Because most of you might not have known how useful a devourer can be to kite around.

Need fury? Red moa.

Want real CC potential? Dogs. They’re great roaming in wvw and actually good versus some enemies in pve. Say you’re in TA original path struggling with hound knockdowns. Use your own dogs to knock them down. This applies in COE too versus the ice hound elementals.

What about a good charged knockdown? Porcine believe it or not. Their charge used to be 600 units so it almost never landed. It was recently shortened and it works much better now. Plus, the environmental drops are actually pretty good.

Black bear for the aoe weakness which negates a ton of damage potentially. Also, it’s another dynamic invuln. with the shout.

I think there’s a lot of good pets honestly.

There is a chart you can find on the ranger forums that demonstrates spider is highest DPS of ranger pets when the target is moving, all things being equal. Also, that jungle spider’s cacoon immobilze is just fantastic. I love using that spider in wvw. I also use it in fractals versus enemies it’s important to slow down, like the legendary suit when it gets under the bucket (muddy terrain is a better option there but I still bring spider just in case), or the legendary archdiviner who is much easier to fight when perma crippled or outright immobilized.