Guild Wars 2

I am excited that maybe, just maybe, the epic boss battles will once again take longer then 15-30 seconds to complete. Some of the fights (Maw, Elemental) the stupid boss didn’t even have enough time to get an attack off before it was dead. I was lucky enough to get one skill rotation off before it was over.

This is good, You still get your reward, and rares will once again actually be rare.

staff is far more effective at close ranges. It has a longer ranger mostly so that it can bounce effectively still at mid range.

If you are finding yourself in long range constantly, take the mesmer weapon that actually excels at it, the GS.

I carry both in my pack depending on what I need.

The speed is fine if you use it in the range its intended to be used at.

The really cool thing about mesmers is that all their weapons have a purpose at some point or other.

I primarily run sceptor/sword sword/torch. But I also carry in my pack the staff for when my party needs more support and less control (clone death traited is awesome w/ sceptor), typically dungeons. And then I carry GS for when I find myself sucked into a zerg fight or some at-one-time-used-to-be-epic world event where range is a benefit.

I just get to bored with GS most cases, why it chills in my pack. I blow my cool downs and then I stand about and go pew pew backing up when needed. Its just not active enough for my play style. I love the spastic running and dodging and stealthing that my primary weapon sets give.

GS has its uses and is extremely effective at what it does. I think people would be foolish not to carry one.

(My ranger is same way, I have my primary weapons, but I’ve got my bows and sword/dagger combo in the pack for the times they prove most beneficial).

I’ve been enjoying runes of the eagle, which it looks like forum wise I seem to be the only one.

I’ve got them to help round off my precision which is on the lower end since I use a mix of valkyrie and knights to boost survivability.

5% sustained damage boost on targets below 50% averages at about 200-250 damage per strike against opponents I get on the ropes. Its not the burst of the lighting strike, but it averages out over the same period of time while the lightning is on cooldown.

On side note, I still get the lightning blast from both sets of weapons I use. Just lack the double tap.

It would also help to clarify that I don’t use focus except on rare occasion. I use sceptor/sword sword/torch. So the swiftness boost is wasted on me, making my decision a little easier.

I use Spirits already.

I might actually trait the spirits if the internal cooldown were reduced and spirits had perma protection up.

As is the only two spirits I consistantly run are stone and Elite.

Sun spirit underwater because I can’t have my fire trap.

Dunno, but I too have fallen in love with the scepter/sword.

10/20/10/0/30 clone jihad/shatter build.

sword/torch is my secondary and I switch between the two alot. Neither really takes the backseat to the other.

My only question: if you are enjoying the build, why would you want to change it?

Following meta is how classes get in ruts.

Gaiawolf.8261:

The block is really what defines the OH sword and gives it so much extra dps compared to other OH weapons. The swordsman is no slouch, but there are other phants that are just about as useful.

I have found that even with good timing I end up using the daze in PVE fairly often, so it’s best to try and get one of the “on interrupt” or “on daze” traits there. That way even if you don’t get the block, clone, and damage, you can still get some utility out of it beyond the daze.

In PVP, I usually have no trouble getting the block since ppl spam certain skills. Also, whenever you see a red circle, hit #4 while heading for the edge and you almost always avoid AOEs, snares, etc. and send the caster and nice present, too.

I’ve gotten into the habit of marching into the AoEs with scepter #2 and sword #4 following, not out of. Really nasty burst spike all the while negating a bunch of damage and setting you up for one dodge roll to shatter.

Embolism.8106:

Using the Sceptre with Clone death traits only works if your opponents are stupid and stand in one place. A good opponent would not target your Clones or would kill them from a distance, and they’d be constantly moving so unless you’re using Sword Clones the death effect is unlikely to hit them when you replace a Clone.

you are right. Many opponents are stupid though and fear the shatter and will try to nuke them 3 at a time.

It works best with fighting against melee as you can kite and keep people near your clones. once you start chaining cripple it becomes that much easier.

sword offset like you mentioned is awesome for those who are pesky and refuse to fight close. I carry both.

Majora.6028:

So, what about the current build I posted? Would that work well with Scepter/sword?

Scepter/sword is quite nice. I pair it with an off set of sword/torch.

the two blocks you get allow you to kite amongst your clones with ease and if you are waiting on cool downs the sword/torch can take you a long ways all the while popping more clones.

I do 10/20/10/0/30 instead though in my build. Because I am spawning so much and honestly shattering as well, I didn’t really get any benefit out of the greater damage dealt by phantasms. I like counting my self as an illusion since I am generating so much kitten anyways might as well make it go boom that much brighter.

It takes a bit to get going but if you kite amongst your clones you’ll be proc’ing a lot of on death traits from over spastic AoE casters.

If they want to stay range and pew pew from there, all the better. I can still shatter, and I have sword so I can force a close range duel.

Fozzik.1742:

You know, I just noticed this (maybe everyone else already knew it), and it makes the scepter sound much better. Made me go, “OoooOooOOOOo” when I saw it. The little light bulb came on.

Trait five in the chaos line is Debilitating Dissipation. The tool tip just says it applies a random condition to nearby foes when your illusions are killed. The wiki explains further…

“The effect triggers when a clone is killed by a foe, when its target dies, or when it is replaced by a newly created clone or phantasm. The effect does not trigger when a clone is shattered. "

All of a sudden, you are applying conditions with the scepter auto attack (weakness, bleed, or vulnerability), just by keeping three illusions up and semi-close to the enemy. Each time you get to the end of the #1 chain, it replaces an illusion and drops a condition on your foes.

I guess that also means you could pretty much perma-cripple with the crippling dissipation trait in the domination line… or apply confusion with the 25-point trait in the dueling line. O.o

this man is spot on and why scepter is pretty sweet.

Cripple can be permanently stacked against AoE tossing spazzs (bosses, dumb players, etc.) weakness can be kept up semi permanently and that in my opinion is the nectar of defensive debuffs and make tank builds become godly.

the scepter also comes with a block allowing you to kite around your clones with greater ease… which consequently can force a dissipation. Take OH sword, and you get a second. As you dodge amongst all the clones you are generating, even more.

The Mesmer makes a purple mine field of awesome butterflies of flipping dooom (exctra o for emphasis).

Can it pop out conditions at the same rate as a staff, no. But it does stack conditions that staff can’t, cripple and weakness being my two favorites.

10/20/10/0/30

kamikazee clone build.

The effects on death are quite nice, for starters you can keep cripple up permanently in PvE if you aren’t forced to keep moving (dungeons particularly and other champs), makes fights much easier to bear when your team has breathing room.

The weapons I use are sceptor/sword primary; the sceptor obviously can pump out clones faster than all get out. The block also hits like a truck AND you get another clone. The sword off hand has another block that hits like a slightly smaller truck, and the iSwordsman who hits like a truck hauling serious kitten oh and that block also produces another clone. Insane clone spam for shatters and deathy explosions. Paired with dodge rolls and perma vigor and you have yourselves a good time.

Another bonus for PvP WvW is that the shatters have much larger visual shatter effects ON DEATH. It means if you are timing your shatters and know which one is about to explode you can blink in the middle of bright burst of color, go invisible etc. The visual can be applied to sow further confusion on the battlefield.

My secondary set is sword/torch for when i need to stall for time or melt groups of mobs. I swap between the two allot in any given fight. pending on what skills I need for the current situation.

Either way the weapon combos make for an extremely offensive defense.

Edge.4180:

Rouven.7409:

Well, that’s what I’m saying – why do you think then that eliminating the loot totally would be a “solution” – and worse, at what cost?

There needs to be something added (mechanics, technical/server, maybe story) – not taken away.

I think once you remove loot from these encounters you remove the players who are only attending these events for loot.. and I am perfectly fine with them not being there.

That leaves people who happen to be in the zone, or in the area. And if the event is even remotely entertaining, they’ll come. They already do, even with basic events, even though the only guaranteed reward is just some coin, some XP, and some karma.

These boss events can be completed with a dozen people. They don’t need 20, 50 or more players there saving the day. My fondest encounter memories in this game are not these dragon fights where a ridiculous amount of players spam attacks, but instead cool tactical battles where maybe three players win against a champion.

Heck, if it were up to me I would disallow waypoint travel into a zone once one of these boss events started, maybe even shutting down all the waypoints in the vicinity of these boss events as well to slow down reinforcements and encourage people to play smarter.

Shutting down way points could work… to a degree. It just means people will be showing up sooner for the event.

As a mesmer I never have to fight alone.

In all seriousness, What I enjoy most is the fact that when I am fighting it is not just a numbers game like most classes. Mesmers have so many tools to fight your opponents mind as well. It only gets better as you get higher in level.

Or equip drakes, take a flame trap, pull them in and watch them melt… I anchor for my pet all the time. plus when you swap it gets the full bonus of quickness, yay bonus awesome.

If you’re glass this obviously doesn’t work as well. Bring along muddy terrain as well as fire trap and kite a little. It is a really long CC that dumb AI fail to get out of.

I’ve soloed the one crystal champ with the 20 something army (invulnerable til you take out everyone). Kited them to hell with traps and then my wolves and I went to town on the boss. (not even trap spec’d and it works awesome)

Swap around utilities, rangers are highly adaptive with what we get.

My ranger is lacking on the DPS end, pure p/t/v p/t/h. Front loaded all my damage to my pets.

So the difference between sword and GS DPS wise is negligable.

Overall the GS is much more forgiving with its auto dodge and gets even better the great the size groups you pull.

I also have sword/dagger set which I swap with GS from time to time. Great for single target fighting but gets overwhelmed quickly when fighting larger numbers.

I swap between the two pending on what I know I will be facing.

I actually broke the norm for leveling and went sceptor/sword. It is great for leveling in PvE especially lower levels where clone generation is sluggish.

Your auto chain generates clones and once you get your timing down on the blocks from sceptor and sword you have two more on demand clones. The sword phantasm is the hardest hitting single target phantasm that has a really low cool down even untraited.

Once you hit 40 it becomes icing as you get clones generated on dodge.

Also, your clone health pool is tied to your mesmer health pool, I forget the fraction, but at lower levels the health pool is a joke because we have so little as well. As you level up your clones will be able to take more and more of a beating.

Xavi.6591:

Also Burn should be before blind.

I will have to respectfully dis agree. At first I thought this but the more I play with torch the more I enjoy its current process.

Here is why.

Stealth is an amazing target drop, we all know that, but you can still get hit while in stealth. The blind at the beginning gives you the time you need to break away from opponents who are swinging blindly and reposition for the fire blast and whatever combo you have cooked to follow.

The blind is in my opinion what turns the awesome stealth move into a get out of jail free card. Now that its not channeled it gives us even more options for making distance healing, combo setting etc.

The blind is what turns the prestige into an extra dodge roll against melee. Placing the blind at the beginning gives me more control of when it pops. The flame damage is just icing on the cake.

pair up with guildies who can cast high amounts of swiftness?

works for me anyways.

The torch is now my welcome off hand for my sword. My primary is sceptor sword.

Amazingly enough my build uses two of the most hated weapons, and well.

I’ve never been one to get into focus and it was more or less swapped to get from A to B. I know all the benefits retaliation reflection whatever. Just never flowed and the phantasm kept getting its kitten kicked the moment it was spawned, faster then I could actually set up some clones to shatter with it.

Torch, now that is something I can get behind. The target drop is amazing, paired with clone death traits (they pop much bigger and brighter allowing more visual daze to dance and mind kitten with). Torch is an amazing weapon to keep enemies on their toes all the while allowing you to cast and prep chains (epic buff). Paired with sword and you have a good defensive chain, blurred frenzy, pop smoke, pop fire dodge roll back pop iMage, leap back blur again, shatter, roll out and swap.

paired with sceptor/sword primary blocking and I have insanely long and reliable chains of invulnerable damage spiking.

Torch is awesome, some builds, like an immortal mesmer just can’t hack it using it because they are tied into other weapons.

nobody in this thread is arguing that iMage equals god of all phantasms. But to dismiss the entire weapon over a phantasm that is going to be shattered or croaked in a short amount of time anyways… seriously?

I’ve got iSwordsman (spammable on epic proportions) to meet my dps fix if I wanted to not shatter for a time anyways.

oh good, glad I wasn’t insane. My Ranger destroyed the retaking first time she ran it and I was a little dissappointed in how simple it was. Then my mesmer who has more clones to distract then you can shake a branch at completely got rocked.

I had to come back and complete it with guildies at my back. The Respawn is the insane part. You kill three and another seven take there place.

On a bright side more allies will rush the square, groups of three at a time. Sadly they die immediately upon making contact with the horde.

captaincrunch.6731:

Aliased.5962:

This armor set is why I made my mesmer an asura; please fix it Anet!

Lol, I actually had a fully end geared level 80 human mesmer and rerolled asura for it. So sad

haha, I rolled asura mesmer for this as well. Loved the Golemancer look and wanted it to look like my suit was generating the holograms/illusions.

Please fix Anet, Old Helmet Rocked.

in my use of sceptor I have come to the realization that it is purely meant for clone spam and proc’ing clone suicide traits. Which it does alot.

More over, the sceptor is also quite powerful played in the 300-600 range with its block. Pair it with sword off hand and it is even more powerful close range with another clone spamming proc. Fighting amidst your clones also ensure a higher chance of death effects proc’ing. Kite enemies into them.

the amount of visual distortion (not skill distortion) from death effects is also pretty huge and bright and going invisible or blinking in the midst of it can be quite disorienting for opponents.

The sceptor becomes much more reliable and potent when traited for death. You will be spamming clones faster then you can shatter most drawn out fights anyways.

only real thoughts i have is building into phantasms a bit and pulling phantasmal defender to join you and your swordsmen. Will provide a decent amount of retaliation and if you have it traited for regen as well will support and keep one another up as you wail.

if you want defense while keeping dogging your opponent, it really doesn’t get greater than defender. Loved the guy before I swapped for my sceptor/sword suicide clone build.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Ok, I just tested out the retaliation. There are no noticeable differences from the patch. It applies exactly the same. It deals damage exactly the same. Having defender and other phantasms up still results in multiple hits of retaliation. Application duration is still the same, and I successfully stacked it up to a visible 28 seconds of duration from the leap combo and an immediate cry of frustration. This patch will have absolutely 0 impact on this build.

There was speculation in a WvW post regarding the stacks of retaliation that I think makes sense of it.

When attacking the number of proc’s of retaliation is capped at 5 for any one attack. (maybe in the same way that confusion only proc’s at the start of a channel versus for each tick of the channel). Duration isn’t changed, just the number of times people or bosses are punished for any one attack.

You’d have to test this against a channeled attack aka your friendly FT engi.

bhagwad.4281:

Bad news. Turns out we can’t have more than 25 seconds retal in all (assuming each stack gives only 5 seconds). So gotta spread them out a bit that’s all I guess.

I’m not certain but I don’t think it’ll affect this build that much. But some real life experience will clarify that.

probably not a bad thing to spread it out anyways. If you dump all your retaliation at once and get it stripped you only have shield buddy left proc’cing it. The Dual retaliation or triple or quadruple is what makes this insane when you get you and all the clones proccing retaliation at once and amplified through the shield phantasm.

I am still fuzzy on the wording. Does it mean you must have line of sight between entrance and exit, like with blink? or does it mean that you can’t enter the portal entrance located on the other side of a wall from you?

If its line of site only now… then the only use of it now really is to pre set a WvW dual so that you force your opponent to spin every which way for the duration… and culling abuse…

I run something similar 10/20/10/0/30.

sceptor/sword and Staff, Shatter/suicide hybrid.

Suicide builds are excellent in dungeon runs and can apply a lot of crowd control on bosses with their massive AoEs wiping out clone armies at a go. You can quickly rack up effects, I think I had 30s cripple stacked in a very short order.

Advantage of sceptor/sword is it also allows you to play more in melee range with short cooldown blocks plus all the blocks summon clones ontop of your foe. Its fun watching explosions pop all over the place.

haven’t taken it to WvW yet as I am still working on maxing gear, but when I am not in dungeons Sword/Focus replaces staff for running around.

I know there are a lot of haters on the sceptor (wouldn’t be opposed to some buffs) but it is still quite handy when the pink ray of doom works (I’ve watched some videos of it and blink decoy and other means of masking the wind up helps a lot as well as firing closer versus max range seem to help a lot). Having two clone producing heavy hitting blocks is also sweet (paired with OH sword), combined with some of the shortest cool downs for blocks. Semi/Permanent vigor to dodge roll often in between and it becomes quite actively tanky, combined with MH Sword on swap and it becomes win.

My two scents from my experience running a shatter/suicide build, feel free to flame my love of my sceptor, I’ve made it work thus far. Will probably have to adopt it in WvW a bit and learn my timing with pink death ray, but for suicide production it is king.

EDIT: also, for weapons like GS, a little harder because of diminishing returns the closer you are, but with other ranged options with stationary clones, kite your enemy into your clones if they are melee. Keep them amongst all the explosions, it gets really disorienting, especially if you stealth in midst, or blink in the midst of it all. Traited on death explosions are much bigger and brighter than your standard pop on death or shatter.

No!!!!!! I love the challenge of taking on Champions. Veterans just don’t do it for me anymore, even when they have like 6 or 7 body guards they go down like a sack of flower. Champions are the fights where you have to actually plan out your attacks. I’ve developed the build to challenge them. And I love the challenge of them. There are only two so far that I haven’t been able to take down. Giant Deasea Plateu (misspelt I know), and one other forced me to flee.

They are not impossible to do, some builds just can’t do it and are better suited for other play. I’ve yet to run across a champ that “had” to be fought. Most are tucked out of the way, or if they are in your way, one dodge roll and you can casually stroll on by.

Call out in Map chat if you need help, I myself always show up when someone calls out a champ, many enjoy the challenge and will join you.

@Hacker, kind of sad that your previous post with the video of the perma invulnerable thief was removed, taken down or whatever. It was quite impressive and entertaining to watch.

As far as traiting for the dodge for the dodge and not the trait I am honestly sort of fuzzy on… are thieves traited to gain vigor on dodge rolls, or do they get passive endurance buff while picking up caltrops on dodge? This greatly confuses me. You can dodge whether it’s traited for caltrops or not.

As far as caltrops being a horri-bad skill to take, I am calling bull-kitten on that. I have watched my friends bleed build melt entire groups in seconds with max stack bleeds that he built and sustained himself. Not to mention the insane amount of CC you can stack up for free with dodging. Caltrops are nasty when played right.

So yes, I stand by what I said earlier, if you are traiting your dodges to to become a free utility then they should be treated like the utility it has become.

I am sorry your invulnerable thief build met a hard counter, all builds have them. Deal with it and play smarter. Trait for condition removal which i hear thieves are great at. or simply run for a few seconds. Infiltrators arrow away (take the hit, risk) and then wait (reward). Its quite difficult to keep confusion up permanently, especially in high stacks that actually deal anything significant, and it comes rather more in bursts. Arena was purposeful when designing confusion in this manor.

edit: after looking about wiki at thief traits, there are indeed a lot of neat incentives tied to dodging. looks kind of entertaining really. But to debunk your statement of traiting caltrops for the dodge and not the caltrops, the only thing the trait does is drop caltrops. If you trait for caltrops then you are specifically picking it for caltrops. I feel no remorse. If it is such a gimping issue for your invulnerable build then I suggest dropping it, especially since you find caltrops “bad” anyways.

If you are looking for high mobility in combat Ele is pretty great, and with the 4 skill sets you can hit any and every sitiuation from a different angle.

Risk vs Reward. Confusion is meant to punish whenever you take an action. Tossing Caltrops is an action, it would be stupid if suddenly certain classes got get out of jail free cards outside condition cleanse.

wait the few seconds, or if you think the caltrops will make a difference take the hit. Risk vs Reward. Same applies for clone spam or healing. Risk vs Reward. Confusion is working as intended as a quasi shutdown condition. Play wisely and less Pew Pew

Its doable, it can be a bit on slow side and most effective on off hours. Sanctum of Ral here tier 1. But I’ve capped several camps already.

Best part is when thieves pop in trying to interupt you and then realize their all dependable burst combo only knocks out half your health… priceless…

Moddo.7105:

DaisyRogers.6837:

Shiren.9532:

Well with the suspension of belief I give to the game (fireballs anyone?) they really don’t bother me. I like being able to bring my cats underwater, even if my main water pets are reef drake (feedback OP) and salamander drake.

It’s an easily fixable solution, but if they did make cats and bears land only, a lot of rangers would be in for a rude awakening when they first do underwater combat (a lot of people’s first aquatic pet isn’t tamed until after hitting 30).

What he said, most of the starter areas have you diving under water well before you find a dedicated aquatic pet. Rangers are kitten without them. It is annoying yes, the cats particularly I am sketch over, but they are definately necessary.

Cats love water.

touche good sir, touche

Yes!!!!! we should replace them with… RAINBOWS AND UNICORNS!!!!!!!!!!! oh wait… that bow already exists… they need to hurry up and allow mesmers to equip the bow so that we can truly be complete.

Shiren.9532:

Well with the suspension of belief I give to the game (fireballs anyone?) they really don’t bother me. I like being able to bring my cats underwater, even if my main water pets are reef drake (feedback OP) and salamander drake.

It’s an easily fixable solution, but if they did make cats and bears land only, a lot of rangers would be in for a rude awakening when they first do underwater combat (a lot of people’s first aquatic pet isn’t tamed until after hitting 30).

What he said, most of the starter areas have you diving under water well before you find a dedicated aquatic pet. Rangers are kitten without them. It is annoying yes, the cats particularly I am sketch over, but they are definately necessary.

The mid tier is pretty meh in stats, as others have mentioned i picked off a second first tier trait, pets heal for more. I believe if I read right that the health leach off pet critical hits works off of pet heal.

30 points in BM makes your pet nigh impossible to take down except via one shot blows which wipe anything anyways.

0/20/20/0/30 makes for an extremely sturdy pet and ranger. And the pet becomes self sustaining, especially if you carry sigil of the wild. Add Healing Spring or Troll Unguent, nothing can keep up with the regen.

Blueshield.6291:

There are a few things you can do to locate stealthed players, although this won’t remove the stealth buff. Channeled skills will continue to hit stealthed players if initiated prior to stealth. Many of these, like the elementalist’s Arc Lightning, will graphically track the thief’s location. Additionally, non-target-dependent skills can be used to great effect, such as the guardian’s Blinding Blade (which can additionally be used to pull the stealthed character to you, making it so easy to kill them that a caveman could do it).

Pet classes are also great, pets aren’t affected by culling issues, start pew pewing and shwing shwinging as soon as your pet starts to charge in a random direction, that is where the thief/mesmer/whatever is.

sceptor/sword here. Another fun thing is if you run with a thief friend or anyone for that matter who pops a bunch of smoke combo fields. Your swordsmen will be invisible leaping balls of death; quite entertaining.

PvE River and Marsh Drakes, extremely hardy, AoE damage out the wazoo blast finishers. Easy mode

PvP Jaguar and Lynx when I am looking for a little more burst solo roaming. Otherwise if I am in a part I pack wolve and alpine wolf for CC. Other advantage of the wolves is they are pretty sturdy and can typically make it inside the other teams zerg line.

This all taken, from a full 30 BM build. Results may vary for those who refuse to trait into pets.

WvW names don’t show up on pets for enemies.

PvP honestly don’t know

What is the ranger good at? Just about everything but high level fractals. What is the ranger great at nothing.

If you look at any given one roll: conditions, buffs, tank, healing, dps (with proper pet play), etc; the ranger can do each fine. But as others have complained others classes can do them better.

Here is the thing, the beautiful thing about the ranger is that it is quite easy to mix and max between builds and go hybrid. The ranger isn’t stuck with any one single build or role (despite what the complainers say). The magic of the ranger is they can do anything they want.

And running with a pet has become a real pleasure and I have become quite attached to each and every pet I employ. Every other class I try to get into just seems so lonely running alone. I may wind up with a necro zoo mancer just to deal with my abandonment issues…

Seriously though, back on topic. The ranger is “good” at just about anything, mix and match it up pending on what the party needs to fill out. And whatever you do, play with the pet, not against it. You will seriously start seeing huge returns from the pet the more you trait into it.

My Sweet Lily.1952:

I’ve said it many times and I will say it once more:
Make pets rally from killing an enemy. Wouldn’t be OP in 1v1 pvp, since the pet would rally from defeated player, not from downed player. This would also improve pets effectiveness in dungeons. We could still swap our pets just like now. Only add a possibility for the pets to rally when killing an enemy.

EDIT:
I’d like to add, that didn’t Anet mean the pet would be big part of Rangers dmg and pets should always be there helping. Or something like that. I hate it how a champion can make my dmg 1/3 lower with only 1 hit. And pls don’t tell me about controlling the pet. Most times, the pet will run really slowly or run in the opposite direction, and then run to me – through the foes 1 kill hit.

I actually like the pet rally function on a kill. In lou of it, when it rallies it should still trigger the pet swap timer (there should still be some kind of penalty, but congratulations on avoiding the downed penalty). Makes you think, is this going to be long and drawn out, longer timer is worth it, or can I stick it out with reduced damage for a few more seconds and rally pet. risk/reward is always awesome. I +1 this.

And as others have mentioned, Agony resistance is needed. It is rediculous that this still isn’t available. The stat is there in the pet info window. Simplest solution would be to copy and paste the rangers stats over to the pet.

Pets getting blown to kitten by AoE. honestly, the only time this happens is when players would have been splattered in the same area. You shouldn’t have had your pet in there, should have had a different one equipped, or should have been sending pet in and out with attack/recall function swaps. I still blame this on poor playing on part of the ranger.

Fawcett’s Bounty: I had completed many jump puzzles before this one, but this one was the first one that I stumbled upon all by myself. Curiosity rewarded me when I hopped down to check out a rusty door in the cliff side.

Was so proud to make it through with no videos or walkthroughs. And, pirates, and goonie ship… simply awesome.

Also completed Forgotten Treasure today. Holy Kitten that thing was annoying and I must have fallen to my death at least 20 times but it felt good to complete it.

Signet of the wild passive is always on my bar. Having multiple sources of regen is a huge boon to survivability. I always hate myself when I accidently trigger it by mistake.

I agree, ranger signets the CD is way to long to really be of any benefit without huge trade off.

as far as passive still active… no there needs to be some trade off, that is what makes signets signets.

Works if you are a lazy shmuck like me and want less skills to fire off, or for more gutsy get some good bang for the effort with some down time to wait for passive to come back. Currently there is little bang, and takes way to long to reload muzzle load musket ranger signets.

I completely agree, rangers can be quite great at a good number of roles. I myself have fallen in love with a spirit support/BM tank hybrid. it is a beast to take down and in WvW most foes make the mistake of targeting me first thinking that because I am ranger I will go down quickly and quietly.

D/D burst thieves are the most entertaining to face. I’ve yet to come across one that didn’t just stand there dumb struck after blowing their entire burst chain to find me still standing at half health (yes, I realize there are a bunch of nub thieves, good thief would eat my face etc., I’d figure I’d save you the typical rebuttal argument. There will always be some better player then me, or a build that can counter me)

I am still a huge advocate of pets, a ranger is infinately better once they master control of their pets and start combo’ing skills to work with them rather then alongside them. Not a fire and forget weapon.

And I agree with the sentiment on skill cap. The skill cap for a ranger is deceptively high. It feels pretty pew pew at beginning levels when that will cut it fine, but higher levels, you want to shine, you must shine with the pet.

Casey.9687:

DaisyRogers.6837:

GS is better at roaming then zerg. It has amazing closing and escape utility. I have axe/horn paired with it.

If you have GS, I suggest tanky BM. You will tank hits like none other and your pet will still dish tremendous damage (roaming, your pet is typically and foolishly ignored).

The best part about fighting in melee, is your opponent will hold still for your pet. Rangers IMO shine far more in melee than at range.

Rangers are not built for melee and they are far from ever being the best class for melee. No one is going to hold still for you in combat unless they are a warrior or guardian. People need to stop spreading that the GS is a reliable weapon because it is far from that and its not going to get fixed if people keep getting on here and saying its good. The sword has better damage then the greatsword, and better escape and dodge ability. I understand that you guys go into WvW and get some good kills on lowbies and people with less skill and think this weapon is great, but its not…you have never fought a hardcore guardian, warrior, thief, mesmer, or bunker ele if you think this weapon is great.

Learn to use the 2 skill on the sword for when you need to escape…use the launch back and then turn around and launch forward….works just as good if not better then the greatsword.

I actually for a time used both the sword and the GS on swap with each other. Swapped the sword for axe for a little more versatility with range.

I love both weapons to pieces. Play style though I am more at one with GS. It feels better with my skill rotations and the cleave is awesome. Personal preference I will admit. And again, I love the sword too.

As far as ranger being horrible in melee, that I will not agree with. I have little problem mixing it up in melee. And no, enemies won’t hold still for you, but you can control the direction your opponents kite much easier fighting as melee then fighting with a bow. You can force your opponent to choose the swipe of your blade or the snapping maw of your pet, often times it winds up being both. I will admit, it wasn’t well stated that opponents will take your beating standing still. But it still stands, I’ve found melee much more synergistic with playing with melee pets.

Most opponents have no idea what a melee ranger is capable of.

Strategy:
-Place them behind your party, whenever you use them this is key. And then move away from them. The more you can keep them out of AoE the more bang for buck you will get.
-PvE: You also get more bang for buck the more drawn out the fight will be. Don’t summon if you are facing a trash mob. If you are going to charge down 7+, a group of Vets, champs etc. excellent time to drop, you will be buffed the duration of the fight (protection is awesome).
-Dungeons: Placement is more important here. Again it is wise to place it behind your party and make sure you party doesn’t stand on them. The stone spirit has been my best friend on all my dungeon runs, and there is very few party support skills that can trump elite spirit (IMO). Also use pillars and other obstacles to place behind for a little extra layer of defense.
PvP: Spirits are much more limited in usefulness due to the fluidity of combat. Again, Spirits really start to pay off the longer drawn out your battle is going to be. I’ve yet to get great use out of them here.
WvWvW: Awesome, most of my fights have been small group v small group or zerg v zerg. Stone spirit makes a huge difference in survivability for your party. Place the spirits behind your line and watch the magic unfold. The more fluid the battle is the less effect you will get out of it (this is where walking spirits probably is the most useful). I fricken love my stone spirit, Its a good day when you see your whole party rocking protection.

This is my insight in my current Tank Support Hybrid build 0/0/30/10/30 completely untraited in spirits but still finding them highly useful to play.

How can we use Spirits right now, in their present form?

I’d like to see a commentary that ranges across:
- Usefulness (Which Spirit buffs/abilities do you like? Why?)
- Synergy (What other skills/traits really help to make a Spirit a bit more viable? Think outside the box, not just the more health/movement/etc.)
- Strategy (What kind of placement/timing/purpose might you use a Spirit for?)
- Context (Second to strategy, different uses for PvE, WvW, sPvP?)
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I have taken great pleasure in running specs that people hate, which has brought me into my BM tank support build that of course to maximize the buffs that i can share, uses spirits.

Usefulness:
- There are only three spirits I have found useful to my hybrid tank support play style.
-Stone Spirit, this thing rarely ever leaves my bar now. 33% damage mitigation 30% of the time is a game changer no matter what context you are fighting in. Combined with protection from 15 pts in wilderness survival you get extremely heavy mitigation, combined with the mitigation from 30 pts in survival and it becomes a real pain to knock the last sliver of health off the ranger. I am typically the last man standing in my dungeons runs making the difference between wipe and rally.
-Sun Spirit, I use under water because fire trap can’t be. Gets best debute in organized parties, you can keep burn up 100% uptime (heavy condition damage) on enemies your group focuses on.
-Ice Spirit, rarely makes it onto my skill bar. It depends on the party make up. If there is an elementalist or engi who can keep up burn by themselves, then sun spirit becomes pointless. Get a little damage spike for your party. Overall kind of meh, since you can’t control which of your attacks proc it, it often gets wasted on auto chains or some other lesser hitting skill.
-Ultra Spirit, Huge game changer in dungeon runs and I have used it often to keep wipes from occurring. Great to Pop out when you find yourselves pulling way more than you can chew. Best part, because he heals himself it boasts pretty good survival in and of itself.

Synergy:
-I actually don’t use any of the spirit traits. Health doesn’t provide enough except lets it survive one extra hit, and movement, the grand master trait I am convinced is the worst trait you could ever pick. The biggest downfall of spirits is AoE, they rarely get targeted alone. You are only asking them to get targeted. Because of the internal cooldown there is no point in picking up the increased proc chance, 30% is default and will proc reliably every 10s alone. Save your traits for other things.
-Now, boosting surivability: it all comes down to placement. I fight with GS predominantly, I’ll dodge roll back begin summon while running backwards diagonally, once the spirit is down I will swoop back in. Typically this will place it far enough away from non Dungeon AoE.
-Make sure you instruct your group not to fight ontop of the spirits, again this is why I hate spirits walking. You doom the spirits. The proc range on the passives is pretty large.
-Because of survival issues I rarely use the active skills (barring elite). the passive far outways anything the active puff brings. And the active range is pretty meak unless traited, and even then its meh. I play them for the passive party buffs.

Peter.9406:

DaisyRogers.6837:

Pet dodge Mechanic -

5 points in Wilderness survival auto-matically grants you protection on dodge roll plus boosted endurance regen. another 10 points in nature magic and you can have vigor on heal. Congratulations your pet is now tanking like nobodies business the damage that the rest of your party is now attempting to rally from. I’ve yet to come across an AoE that this doesn’t get the pet through to swap (BM specc’d).

Except you get Companion’s Defense with 15 points in W.S. not 5.

yay buggy keyboards… thanks for mentioning it. Never picked up the one. Editing it now.

Pet dodge Mechanic -

15 points in Wilderness survival auto-matically grants you protection on dodge roll plus boosted endurance regen. another 10 points in nature magic and you can have vigor on heal. Congratulations your pet is now tanking like nobodies business the damage that the rest of your party is now attempting to rally from. I’ve yet to come across an AoE that this doesn’t get the pet through to swap (BM specc’d).

Zerg Fighting-

Two ways to do this. First method, passive pets and utilize pet utilities for buffs heals whatever… not as much fun. Second method, fight from the edges of your zerg on the outer flanks. Use guard to stealth your pet behind enemy lines (tanks through AoE as well). Once your pet is on the other side of Red Circle no mans land it is free to attack at will. Hardly anybody ever pays attention to pets when they are two busy hopping out of circles and aiming their own circles. I’ve had best luck using wolves as they pack their own CC.

Pets attacking moving targets-

It is possible to kite pets indefinately. Until you CC your opponent. Once the pet catches up they are on them like glue. Some pets attack on the move better than others. I’ve had good luck with wolves. All primary hand weapons come with some form of CC and we have several utility CCs as well. Also try fighting in melee, your opponent doesn’t move as much in melee range allowing you to bring all your damage to bear.

[edit] fixed incorrect numbers