Guild Wars 2

Seriosouly lacking condition removal. HS is enough for general condition removal but against a strong condtion based ranger or necro (or maybe even thief) you will melt away.

Its one of the better armour sets for rangers, so yes it can own in 1v1s if you play it correctly. Its usually played with traps.

Both interesting problems that I have contantly with my trap build, and it really depends on how you want to play and how much you want to change your skills to suit the situation.

For me, I dont take a stunbreaker. You just cant be running traps, a stun breaker and speed boosts at the same time effectively, because as you said the warhorn is a rubbish offhand and you need at least 2 traps to be a trap ranger, which leaves you only 1 slot to boost speed/stunbreak or have another trap.

Personally I use melandru runes to reduce stun durations by 25%, as well as using axe/dagger + SB weapons, which means I usually keep a good distance from my target and can evade most stuns and knockdowns. If you get focused by a group it can become an issue but generally if you keep on your toes and dont get out of possition you will be OK.

For me I use SoH as default for the speed boost but if I can see I am about to fight a 1v1 or 2v1 which I think is going to be a hard fight, I will change it out for a frost trap. Most commonly though I just stick to SoH.

This wasnt meant to be a balancing update anyway, so a few bug fixes is fine by me

Press F4, then lick wounds.

Very simular to what I’ve been using for a few weeks now, although I am still using meladru runes with emphatic bond for the epic trolling of other condition builds, and it helps somewhat with the lack on a stun breaker / stability.

It is a lot of fun I find.. working on buying the condition damage / toughness / vita ascended trinkets to go with it

Other than the fact you have sigils of life for no clear reason, it looks alright. That sort of build isnt really my thing though.

I enjoy reading this thread but I really cant take it seriously because the name on your build is just too weird :P

If I ever want to go back to a BM build I’ll be sure to try this though.

Someone has got to be really very sad to spend months spying on another servers WvW…..

I like your ideas, especially #2.

About Shadows Embrace, perhaps it should remove 2 conditions upon entering stealth, rather than passively removing conditions while in stealth. That would act against permastealth thieves but still alow thieves who make use of stealth to cleanse themselves with it.

If you are in a group and are vs theives I find the best time to kill them is when they are trying to finish downed players.

They are squishy and for 3-4 seconds you know exactly where they are whether they are stealth or not.. so instead of trying to rez your poor friend just spam the hell out of their locations and either you’ll kill the thief or they will back off to heal and then you can res.

They could shadow step stomp but not too often.

Surely the obvious solution to the SB issue is:

>Keep the SB range nerf
>Increase LB to 1500 always
>Replace the LB range trait with SB range to 1200
>???
>Profit

Why cant you play whichever SB build you had before the nerf?

Theres a sort of irony that this thread is rapidly turning into the back and forth battle the OP was talking about.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/ranger/Shortbow-Longbow-setup-for-Zerging/first#post2300085

There we go.. maybe that will give you some ideas.

Xorus (I think) posted a bow-zerging build just the other day I’ll go see if I can find it…

But other than that a few things are that the type of build you are trying to make is not going to be tanky so if you find yourself at the end of 15+ charging you its game over regardless of your armour/condition removal. You’d be better off maximising your damage and just positioning yourself away from the main hammer-spam of the zerg as to avoid dying that way.

Use a ranged pet and possibly keep them on passive in zerg battles, its they only possible way they will survive.

You dont have the armour to be going melee in a zerg battle so forget the GS and move 10 points from NM to WS, and take the GM trait which moves conditions to your pet.

Was a fun reset for me. Pretty obvious how this week is going to go and maybe it will be boring by the end, but I had a good evening today

I liked fighting against INC especially.. You seem pretty impossible for us to kill but its nice to fight against a guild thats genuinely better than us, rather than just more in numbers (without any offense to anyone else :s).

Anyway, was fun

I’d really like to know the devs vision for rangers and what they really see us as being for.

Most other classes have a clear purpose they are by far the best at, but rangers seem to lack that core purpose within a team. I’d love to know what purpose they want us to / think we do serve.

I dont understand why LOTR and Aragorn are continually brought up on these forums.

Just because he could be seen as the basis (maybe) for the ranger class is some games doesnt mean every game from now until forever will have their ranger class based exactly on what he did and didnt do.

Anet dont care what JRR Tokkien’s idea of a ranger was and frankly neither do I.

Now, I do think rangers in GW2 should be the strongest class at range, and thats not because Ranger has the word “range” in it.. its because in ANets own description of the class we are "Unparalleled archers, rangers are capable of bringing down foes from a distance ".

So can we please oneday move past assuming all rangers should be aragon, or all ranger should use range because of the name, and just go by what Anet has told us their vision for the class is in this game which is “rangers can adapt to any situation”. All that to me implies that rangers have a stronger focus on ranged combat than most but are capable in close combat fighting as well, which frankly is exactly what we are.

With that said I think we arnt actually that bad at range, the longbow for all its failings actually has pretty big DPS at 1000+ range. If you use it for that, and then swap out to another shorter range weapon set if/when people approach you its actually quite a good weapon. Its just not a “use this at all times always” weapon like the SB can be.

Any decent BM ranger isnt put off by immobilize, purely because they can still use all their evades while immobilized. Sure, you might not actually move, but you still evade all the same. BM are much weaker to stuns and knockdowns because a lot of the BM builds dont have a stunbreaker or stability.

But back on topic, it depends a lot on the theifs build, but most theives are weak to pretty much anything. They often have poor condition removal, poor defence and a low health pool. You just need to predict their attacks and movements in stealth and AoE, spam #1, and dodge backstab.

Tankier builds fair better against theives, so you might also consider more toughness/vitality.

I was really dishearted by the SB range decrease, but to be entirely honest I’ve barely noticed it when actually fighting.

I never used the SB to actually fight at 1000+ range, I used it for 300-500 range usually, just because thats an easy distance to maintain vs a melee opponent.

Occasionally when people start running I suddenly notice myself shooting and then realising they are out of range, but its not bothered me as much as I thought.

Other than that my build wasnt much effected by the patch. I started using spotter trait pre-patch in anticipation of its buff and I have to say getting an easy +150 precision is really a great trait, and coupled with the fact it boosts nearby teammates as well its really a no brainer for me.

Mm interesting. Personally I think I still would prefer rabid since full GC doesnt do it for me, but interesting none the less.

I suspect the reason is the SB’s attack speed.

The theifs pistol stacks 5 bleeding at most (excluding condition duration increases), whereas the rangers SB can get 8? I cant remember exactly, but its certainly more than 5.

lol^^ obivously not the best opponents but still.. nicely done

My favourite was the thief @~4mins.. tried to HS spam to close the gap, used all his initative and didnt even hit you once.. what a clown.

Looks quite good really, although the obvious problem that comes to mind is you have no condition removal or reducations of any kinda.

I’ve been a little disappointed in GH this week, sadly. I remembered you as a fun server to fight against, and one which had many really great guilds to fight against.

Unfortunately it seems many of you have given up roaming as a guild and having good fights in favour of roflstomping and pvd’ing in one mega zerg. This isnt directed at any guild in particular, and there have been some good fights here and there, but last night was really just pointless.

On EB you owned more or less everything but instead of dividing your attention between BT and us, giving us all some fun, you thought it would be funner to all group up in one mega 60+ zerg and go wipe one of us off the map whilst leaving the other untouched, and once that was done you swapped over to the other side, wiped them out as well and let the other side retake their stuff before repeating.

Good for WvW XP maybe, but I cant see the point in such play and I know it caused myself and most of my guildies to stop playing last night sooner than we’d have liked.. but when you are faced with a 25vs60+ theres no point in even playing.

I cant blame you for having more people, we’ll always be outnumbered I know that, but you could at least try not stack 2-3 guilds into one big group.

I have to admitt, that made me lol :P

Not immediately. The only things (that I know of) that change on my build are I will get +80 prec from spotter trait, and my SB will drop in range.

The SB nerf is annoying but I dont think it will be enough to make me drop it. Its basicly the key to beating any melee based opponent for me and I really feel very vulnerable without it :P

>Get told every single trait line has at least one change
>First line of the news post is “Domination: Nothing changed on this trait line.”

Oh Anet you do make me laugh.

I have rabid as well, and fun as it is sometimes I find its not all that effective because you are only stacking 1 type of condition, maybe it extremely easy for people to cleanse continually.

Because as good as barrage is, its a slow a long cooldown.

Hunter shot and point blank shot are certainly nice skills, but for what you are talkking about here (might stacking) they offer nothing over and above the #1.

The #2 is OK but as is often pointed out, its DPS is questionable given the long channel.

Depends on the situation partly.. I mean for 1v1 shortbow or sword will easily stack the most because they attack the fastest (and sword stacks might on its own anyway).

Axe hit 3 targets always, if there are that many targets around, so will stack quickly and GS (and to a lesser extent sword) can cleave multiple targets.

Thinking about it the LB sounds like one of the worse weapons for might stacking because of its lame #1 attack speed.

Happy to see you both again

Call out to the VcY Asura Ele I duelled outside SM just now. Enjoyable fights, thought I had you a few times (and thought you might have me at others ) so well played

I have to admit I would be curious to know what niche/gap the devs think the ranger is meant to fill.

I can agree some pets like Jaguar hit too hard, but honestly they have nerfed too many pets that didnt need it, and nerfed some pets that did need it way too much.

Also, the whole point of the cats are that they are GC type pets.. It would have been more appropriate to half their vitality so that they still hit like a truck (as a GC should) but could be easily killed if not played well (again, as a GC should). With the way they have done it cats become kinda pointless because they have little defence compared to other pets, and not much more damage.

I am sceptical about how much these LB changes will effect it but I’ll wait to see before judging. I can see why they wanted to nerf the SB range but I think its really ruined one aspect of the ranger, and thats the ability to hunt people down as they run. SB was perfect for that with its cripple and stun, but with 900 range you wont be catching anyone because with 1 leap they are out of range. The LB, even if its DPS is greatly improved, has no way to catch a fleeing target. Thats what really REALLY bugs me about the SB nerf.

The LB was bad. Making our other weapons worse doesnt make the LB better (although I do admit the improvements they are putting on it will hopefully help).

150% of 1000-1500 would be 1500-2250, but still.

I’m just grumpy because we have, as usual, been nerfed while others get buffed.

Dardamaniac.1295:

Calling lightning skill in spirit does like 1000-1500 dmg i think…now it will do 2500-3000?Power Ranger here i come….

Interesting maths.

Not that pleased, honestly. Nerfing SB and pets in exchange for some LB buffs.. Eh.

Our traits dont really change that much either, 1 or 2 minor things but nothing game changing.

Well, yes it depends on how long you can survive them. In the experiences I had it was bunker vs bunker which are always long drawnout battles, so I could survive long enough to achieve it.

And yes, they can pet swap. The key is to wait till they pet swap and then to immediately try burst down their pet and kill it before the swap is off cooldown. They will then swap back to their original pet which you have to then kill as well. Once a pet is downed the cooldown to swap to (and therefore revive) it is increase from the usual 15 seconds (when traited, as BM will be) to 1 minute.

It is does take time to do, but if you are confident you can survive their attacks for the ~20-25 seconds it will take to kill both pets, you will gain yourself about 40-50 seconds of them having no condition removal which really should be eanough to down them if you’re a condition build.

It also depends a bit of their pet.. on a drake I wouldnt bother trying because they have insane HP, but on cats and birds are pretty weak and its very doable then.

In my dreams each server would have its own unique borderland… Thats would be so schweet.

Of course it wont ever happen because that would require them to design what, 50 maps? But still.

More maps would be amazing.

killahmayne.9518:

Now onto its effectiveness vs other classes ..

I’ve had most of my problems against Rangers actually. Ranger’s not only have excellent condition removal most of the time, it is very accessible and most rangers I find in WvW come equipped with it. They can also transfer conditions onto their pets as well as sometimes they have good heals and sustainability. Sword rangers can be trouble some due to their amount of evades, and beastmaster builds because the pet is a nuisance in the damage it deals and how it protects the ranger. They can probably outsustain you as well and deal more dmg over time. Doesn’t mean however I got completely destroyed or I have never beat them.

I’ll tell you a secret that I realyl shouldnt, but I am feeling generous. If you kill a BM rangers pet they will 90% of the time have no other method for condition removal.

Thats exactly how I beat other BM bunkers on my condition bunker rangers. Kill the pet first than they are sitting ducks (as far as conditions go).

>Has one of the highest damaging abilities in the game
>Has it on low cooldown
>Thinks it needs improving.

OK.

If you want it to be essentially unavoidable (which is what your suggestions imply) it needs to have its DPS dropped and cooldown increased.

Not sure where this idea of “you must have protection to bunker or gtfo” has come from. Rangers bunker extremely well even without traiting into much protections.

I dont play a warrior so I cant offer much help, but you do not need protection I cant assure you.

Guardians are not about dropping 3 people in 2 seconds (usually), but in a large group where guardians can continually heal and buff eachother they are almost unstoppable. Basicly they are not about individual performance but about team play, and if you have a whole team of players built to help everyone else thats a LOT stronger than a team of players all built to maximise their own power.

I dont think I have ever seen someone with 3000 armour think they are too squishy :P You’ll be fine, if anything you seem to have gone overboard on the healing power but thats just my opinion^

SB is a godly weapon and should never be underestimated. Even good players can be kited with it, perhaps not indefinately but warriors (as the prime example of a melee warrior) are really easily outplayed by a skilled SB user.

I dont know why you cant control your wolf when down, but the most likely problem is your pet-swap is on CD which is why you cant swap.

Also with thr wolf F2, if you have a target selected when you hit F2 your wolf will run over to that target before using its howl, which again, is the most common cause of people not being able to make it howl when and where they need it to.

Ontopic though… As other said, if you dont have the condition removal to get out, then just hack at the vines and evade whine still in them if needs be.

I have to say credit where its due to RoF. Its been a very close week and while there may be some truth in what RoS are saying, I think theres no denying RoS are not as strong as they were (certainly not as strong as I remember them), or perhaps it’s that RoF and WSR are much better than we were.

Anyone would have expected this week to go more like the GH-DZ-AS matchup, but instead its very close and even still possible for RoF to win it.