Guild Wars 2

Da Poolp.6809:

There is a mistake about cats & birds, I think.
Cats strike twice much faster, but with a single hit. Birds strike twice less faster, but 2 hits each time.
Cats is squishier than birds, birds got more vitality.

Upon further review, Birds have the exact same stats as cats. The only differences is that while cats attack faster, birds make up for it by doing doublestrikes, putting them in a higher DPS range, while having a smaller HP pool.

I still don’t really trust either of them, personally.

cafard.8953:

Something quite important (imho) that you may want to add to drakes: their tail swipe attack, which they like to use early in a fight, is the Ranger’s only Blast Finisher. Our large and long water field makes drakes a very good source of AoE healing. Drop field, F4 to drake, drake engages and blasts. In a tight group of 5 that drop lots of fields, the drake is a nice party addition.

As to the hyena, it can be hilarious in 1v1 with double the knockdowns. Very poor stats though, yes.

Ah yes, I knew I was forgetting something! Thank you, I’ll add that to the Drake entry

PvP
Tactics plays a large part in how PvP works, and oftentimes controlling what your opponents do is more important than coordinating with your team (but NEVER don’t coordinate. My point is to stress the importance of this.). Because of this, a wolf is a go-to type of pet. It has an AoE fear effect that you can even activate when you’re downed, possibly saving your life from a stomp if you time it right.

Drakes can be good, if you choose the right ones. River Drakes and Marsh Drakes both have f2 effects with good range and fair damage that bounces between enemies, one with direct damage and the other with the poison. They’re also tough and their cleave can, once again, hit multiple opponents if your enemy likes zerg tactics.

Felines are another excellent choice here. Though they’re single-target, they make a better choice if you go off on your own and 1v1 enemies, as they deal quite high damage.

Small bird are an odd case for me. They can be incredibly useful in a teamfight because, while they’ll get creamed by any errant AoEs (and thus why they are seldom used), they nonetheless carry the highest damage rating of any pet in the game. They can also be hard to spot if they’re a color that blends in with the background – for this reason, I prefer ravens.

WvW
This is the bigtime, and pets can make a difference. More often, though, they get smacked by an enemy zerg or are useless as you sit on the ramparts. Because of this, be mindful of what your pets can do; you’re not going to use a bear to tank enemy players, they’ll just ignore it and stab you in the eye with a greatsword, and there will be some many AoEs flying about that anything with a level of squishiness is going to get turned into paste.

Due to this, much the same considerations as in PvP apply, with an extra caveat – buffing allies can be more important than screwing with your opponent. For this reason, the sylvan hound shines as king of the crop, giving you and your allies regeneration when they need it, which can greatly increase the survivability of those you affect.

Choose a pet that can survive a few moments in the thick of combat with a large group of players, such as a drake, dog, moa, or similar. does it have an effect that can target multiple enemies or buffs your allies? If the answer is yes, that’s your pet of choice. If not, you might want to find something that does. Some such examples include the Brown Bear’s “Shake it Off” effect to cure conditions on your allies, the sylvan hound’s regeneration howl, the fear howl wolves get, the AoE poison fields spiders and carrion devourers get, and similar things.

Of note here are the ranged pets, spiders and devourers. they can contribute to your damage total without putting themselves at undue risk, though they still generally won’t attack from the ramparts. Make use of this fact if you can.

Final Notes
You may have noticed I mentioned drakes a lot in my recommendations. This is because they’re my pet of choice; they’re ugly waddlers that look like mutant crocodiles, but I love them to bits. As far as I’m concerned, they have the best mix of survivability and damage in any of the pets, combined with the fact that they can cleave, which is unique to them. I tried to keep my bias out of this though, to let people come to their own conclusions.

The pets you choose should shore up your deficiencies as a ranger. If you’re a bunker, have your pet deal damage. If you’re in full berzerker equipment, make sure your pet can distract enemies long enough for you to do your job. Use your own discretion and intelligence; this isn’t exactly rocket science.

Remember your F3 key. People often complain about pets not getting out of AoEs, well you can fix that by maneuvering your pet properly. F3 calls your pet to you, often out of the fray if you’re attacking from range. If you’re in a safe spot, so should he be at that point, before you press F1 to send it right back in.

Pet abilities can be activated when you’re downed. You can click still F2 for a pet skill – they’re still there. You just can’t see them.

I’d also like to stress that while some pets are optimal, none of them are non-viable, with the exception of the Hyena. This is a post to make educated decisions about the pet type you want to use, not direct recommendations on what you should use, as everybody has differing opinions on that.

And my last note, for the love of Balthazar, do not use a hyena. I don’t care how cool the concept of a hyena is, or that it can summon a second one, it does not justify the loss of nearly 1000 power from their stats, enough to cripple them as a damager and putting them on par with the abysmally damaging bears for damage while being far, far less tanky.

Jellyfish
-Respectable damage. Nothing spectacular, but the Red Jellyfish’s poison tentacles can shore that up
-Boons and conditions. All Jellyfish can give people around them regeneration, which is significant. They can also blind enemies, and while Red Jellies have poison, blue jellies chill enemies.
-Non-tank. I wouldn’t quite call them squishy, but they’re far from being masters of defense. That and being a melee pet is a hazard.
-Aquatic. Really, did you expect them to flop up onto land?

Personal Recommendations
Bear in mind these should be taken with a grain of salt, as they’re based around how I play and my preferences. Everybody has a different way of handling the game, even if the differences can be subtle.

PvE
I recommend drakes here. It’s not hard to bunch up AI enemies, so making the most of the Drake’s unique cleave effect is not hard to do. They also have a considerable level of tankiness; a beast mastery ranger’s drake can tank the vast majority of open world champions with little management, letting you stay back and relax. Be warned, however, that barely taking part in combat is a surefire way to kill your personal DPS. Don’t be that guy.

If you don’t like the feel of the drake or are looking for a baying companion (a hunting term that means distracting your quarry long enough to line up a kill shot), a bear is the way to go. An out-of-the-box bear is still far tougher than tank specced players, even with no points in beast mastery, letting you sit back and plink away with your super-damage bow or sword or something.

If you want to rely on pets for damage, cats and birds are the way to go. In basic PvE, your pets are rarely in danger of being downed as long as you don’t get in over your head, so even the horribly squishy birds can be used to excellent effect, though I still prefer cats for not needing to switch when I do get in over my head. It often comes when you least expect it, after all.

Dungeons
Some lump this in with PvE, but I feel it deserves it own section. Dungeons are very dangerous and require a different set of tactics than open world combat, as even a group of silver monsters can end a party if handled improperly.

Dungeons are dangerous. I, personally, wouldn’t go into a dungeon with anything less tanky than a dog, and even that’s pushing it. Once again, my preference is for drakes due to the target rich environment, cleave, and survivability they have. A wolf can be fun to utilize with its fear effect, but be mindful of the defiance ability nearly every boss in the game has, so it’s more useful for making mobs scatter. Alternately, just grab a bear and you can forget about its safety. The kitten thing will run up to an end boss basically ignore all efforts to kill it.

I also recommend having a ranged option in dungeons, as many bosses and rooms are melee unfriendly. Devourers are my preferred choice here; they’re not as squishy as spiders, which is important in the high lethality setting of a dungeon, and they’re amphibious, so they can handle HotW.

Bears
-Terrible damage. Lowest attack speed of all pets, and when it does hit it’s for less than the moas. If you’re looking for damage, you’ve come to the very worst place possible.
-Tanky. You want a tank ranger? This is it. This is where it’s at. This is the alpha and omega of ranger tanking. They have, far and away, the most health and armor of any pet. Far more than any player, certainly. They have an innate ability that lets them ignore damage for a few seconds, brown bears can cure conditions on themselves, they have passive regen. Seriously, if you are a damager, then having a bear to tank for you is not only a good idea, it’s recommended. I can’t stress enough how amazing a bear can get when you’re not relying on its DPS.
-Amphibious. Yes, your ultra-tank can also survive in an airless environment. It’s just that tough.

Devourers
-Moderate damage. They’re not as bad as some people think, though they’re not great. They do two attacks at once, so be mindful that, and have a chance to poison their opponent with every hit.
-Ranged. there’s only two pet types that deal ranged damage, and this is one of them. it can be incredibly useful against melee-unfriendly bosses to have devourers as an option, so many players choose to run a normal pet with a ranged pet in their off-slot.
-Tanky. This is no squishy bug, as they have a considerable toughness. be mindful of conditions on them though; their vitality isn’t as high.
-Amphibious. The only underwater ranged option, devourers make a good choice if you don’t want to get close. Once again, no idea how it survives underwater, especially since they live in arid lands, but it’s so very cute to see them swimming like giant prawn.

Porcines
-Low damage. Pigs are alongside moas for damage, though if I recall they’re slightly higher due to the bleeding damage they can inflict. It’s still nothing spectacular.
-Foraging. Pigs are unique in the fact that all versions of the different pigs are basically just cosmetic changes; a warthog does the same damage and has the same f2 skill as a siamoth or domestic pig. Foraging isn’t really that useful if you don’t like world weapons though.
-Tanky. Second only to the ultra-tank bears, the porcine pets have high vitality and toughness
-Joke pet. The pig is a hilarious little pink thing that’s almost cute. Recommended names: Capitalist, Wilbur, Babe.
-Terrestrial. Pigs apparently can’t swim. Probably enjoy shallow water though, such as mud wallows. Whether you take the pig to one is up to you.

Sharks
-Underwater damager. its frenzy ability is a considerable source of bleeds, though not great as it doesn’t have great condition damage. Still, damage is damage, right? It’s about on par with dogs plus bleeding damage.
-Average Survivability. Not unkillable by any means, but it’s like a dog in that respect. A warrior won’t drop it immediately, but it’s far from a tank.
-Fear effect. One of the few stuns pets have
-Crowd Favorite. It’s a shark. Seriously, what more do you want?
-Aquatic. Sorry, you’ll have to find a landshark somewhere else.

Armor Fish
-Low-ish damage. Not as low as you’d expect from a tank pet, but I wouldn’t use it as a damage source..
-Tanky. If the name didn’t tip you off, this is your fish-shaped tank of choice. Once again, bear does it better, but, once again, the fish has more damage
-Stun. It can stun enemies! That’s kinda cool, and puts it to match the shark for such a thing.
-Aquatic. Like the shark it shares an animation skeleton with, armor fish are incapable of surviving on land. Poor thing.

Spiders
-Surprisingly high damage. Sure they’re spitting black gunk at people, but it must be poisonous or acidic or something because they have impressive damage despite being ranged pets. Keep in mind, it doesn’t hold a candle to cat or bird damage, especially with their low precision.
-Poison. All spiders have a poison effect in an AoE. This makes them somewhat more popular than devourers as ranged pets, as only one devourer type has an AoE poison effect.
-Ranged. As mentioned in the damage entry, spiders are ranged compatants, though I’m not sure why. I’m not complaining though, as their squishy nature makes attacking from range preferable for them.
-Squishy. Compared to other pets, spiders are rather weak in the health and toughness department, so I only recommend them if you can keep them out of danger.
-Terrestrial. Itsy bitsy spider drowns, so you’ll have to find something else for underwater exploration. Devourers can cover the ranged option underwater.

A big thing I see on this board is that players often have a hard time figuring out how to make a ranger effective, and I feel this is in large part to not understanding their pet. This is meant as a guide for players that are either learning ranger or are struggling with their pets; this is not a definitive guide, but an aid to help you make educated decisions about your pets.

If you have any tips or suggestions for changes, let me know and I’ll consider adding them.

A Rundown of What Pets Do
Cats
-High damage. Mainstay if your pet is your main source of damage. I’ve seen them hit close to 2400 damage with basic attacks.
-Not a glass cannon. They have high damage and can sustain more damage than birds, but they’ll also likely survive a fight with anything but a boss.
-Crowd favorite. Many rangers run cats due to their combination of damage and not being horribly squishy
-Amphibious. I find it kind of silly that air-breathing mammals can last indefinitely underwater, but acceptable breaks from reality, right? Bear in mind that the lynx, one of the best types of cats, is terrestrial, with no real explanation as to why that’s so.

Canines
-Respectable damage and knockdown effect as part of the auto-attack skills. While I was testing out a wolf, this saved me from getting hit a couple times
-The howls they can do can often seriously change a battlefield. Sylvan hound regen for the party, Wolf fear effects, drakehound immobilization. Excellent Crowd Control, and the Sylvan hound regen howl is one of the only party buffs rangers have.
-Fairly tough. It’s no tank, but I’d put it as the average level, and it won’t eat dirt the moment a zerker warrior breathes on it.
-Crowd Favorite. The CC effects and party buff that dogs can do are important in PvP/WvW team fights, though aren’t necessarily as strong in dungeons.
-Home of the Hyena. This is a black stain on this otherwise noble and graceful family of pets.
-Terrestrial. Your faithful hound is, unfortunately, afraid of water.

Drakes
-Moderately high damage. slightly less than canines, but still respectable
-if you can deal with the chargeup for the attacks (so, basically, not in PvP) you can get good status effects from drake breath weapons, or considerable damage. Marsh drake for long lasting poison, or river drake for a powerful chain lightning effect. Stuff like that.
-Very tough. A beast mastery specced ranger’s drake can tank legendary opponents that can murder an entire team normally.
-Cleave on attacks. If you can bunch up enemies, drakes end up doing up to triple the damage of most other pets, though more spread out.
-Tail Swipe. This deserves mention because it’s one of the ranger’s only blast finishers, while being a considerable source of damage and the weakness condition.
-Amphibious. An excellent combination in and out of the water, and actually looks like it could live in water to boot.

Birds
-Small and hard to see, making them very good in WvW and PvP, where players need to see what they’re doing to fight you. Pitched teamfights and flying particles mean a small raven will go unnoticed.
-ludicrous damage. Each strike they do is only as powerful as a cat’s strike, but they do two of them every time they attack, resulting in attacks that deal between 1800-3200 damage. They have a slower attack rate, though, making them burstier than cats, but less damaging in extended fights
-Glass cannon. Despite their damage, they are unequivocally the squishiest of all pets. you have been warned.
-Terrestrial. Until we get a king fisher or something, birds are staying out of the water.

Moas
-Low damage. Not as low as a bear, but that’s a pretty low bar.
-Tanky. Potentially tankier than a drake, though I haven’t really seen it happen.
-Screeches. Much like the canine howl effects, moas have a variety of CC and party buff screeches. Red moas, for example, give the party fury, while pink moas daze enemies
-Has the benefit of being underestimated. this can be important in PvP, where if the enemy is ignoring a source of DPS, they’ll be wondering what happened when they go down. Wouldn’t rely on this though.
-Terrestrial. Same thing as the birds; these are not animals meant for adventures under the waves.

DarksunG.9537:

elprimo.4398:

As for a wish of improvement, like Rayean said pet should feel like it’s an extension of yourself, they should be able to do some tasks on their own. For example in pvp pets ninja caping points. Ranger two places at once OP?, I don’t think a pet would be able to solo something that is not an npc. Neither a ranger would. Pets need to be more than gimmicky dps.

This is true.. they kinda are gimmicky DPS. I don’t play PvP, but that sounds cool.. As for mechanics-based Pet wish in PvE: I wish they stayed NEXT to you, not 15 ft in front, only attacked enemies if you used F1 or HIT a target & the F2 skill was instant.

been waithing for that massive ranger revamp for a year almost.

you can set them to passive and they’ll do that. mind, the instant-cast f2 would be nice.

As for a personal wish, I’d love to see larger pets, like a drake broodmother or a siege devourer. but since those aren’t going to happen (likely) I’d settle for my rainbow phoenix from GW1 or a raptor

So, I’m a minion master necro and I’ve been looking at all the different dungeons I can do, and I realized I wasn’t sure if minions got the agony resistance you get when you’re running fractals. In theory, this could potentially make minions kitten near useless in fractals higher than level 15, so my concern is, I believe, understandable

So, do Necromancer Minions get your agony Resistance, like Ranger Pets do?

if you look closely at their stats, the pet types already fall under these distinctions. most pet types are built towards a specific build type, with the exceptions being not very good in the first place. Bears, for instance, have massive health and armor pools, and the ability to ignore damage for a short period, as well as cure conditions on itself. A cat, on the other hand is as you said a damage dealer. Birds such as the raven are the only pets in the game that got amped up during the last ‘balance’ patch because nobody was using them, but they’re our highest damage pets; they’re just fragile.

I’d recommend swapping Greater Marks for Minion Master. the reason behind this is that due to large AoEs and low minion health, minions die with unfortunate regularity, and that cooldown reduction is extremely usefull in situations like that. if you’re solo, then greater makrs is better, but if you’re assaulting as part of a team, you can expect your minions will die a lot, and a few seconds of having a blood fiend or flesh golem out can mean a world of difference when they’re healing you with every attack.

Beyond that? It looks like a remarkably solid build. Kudos.

Lethal Stranger.5093:

My little guy :>

I’m sorry, but where did you get the monocle? I could certainly use that for my character.

I have a semi-similar problem, though it’s not related to weaponry. whenever a new area is loading, my asura looks scrunched from the waist up, being about half as tall as she should be until the area loads, and then she’s back to normal.

I’m not actually level 80 yet, so this was taken in a preview window, but this is rullu, my necromancer

Zevanth: A good first attempt, even if it’s completely outside of Asura naming conventions 6/10
Fartt: Okay, I take issue with this, but that’s personal taste, so I’ll skip rating it
Crott: I like the wordplay. 8/10
Snortt: oddly, this seems more like most asura names I’ve seen. 8/10
Skooll: Here we go! This one I like. 9/10

I only have one personally, and that’s Rullu. Necromancer; uses minions almost exclusively. They basically golems made of meat and bone, after all. One’s even called Flesh Golem.

This is what i was intending actually. in the same way that Black Moas are identical to pink moas in everything except looks, that’s what I’d go for. New pet types would add things in, but assuming they’re still on the level of other pets, it wouldn’t be a problem.

I’ll be honest, I wish I had a pet Salamander Drake or River Drake Broodmother, though I know that’s unlikely to be in the cards. I don’t even want extra damage or anything like that, just to have a larger pet :/

I wouldn’t mind a bow build, personally, but i enjoy beast mastery a lot more. Trapping has no appeal for me; I like feeling like an animal tamer and a hunter, not some jerk with a dog waiting for someone to stab himself in the foot with the spikes you left laying about.

Might applied by Rampage as One lasts for eight seconds. every stack on might that gets applied to you, from what I’m seeing here, would also apply to the pet at 12 seconds, so you’re actually getting more time out of it.

Zorby.8236:

No
/15characters

Sorry, but this was helpful how? This is a reasonable idea, adds to the business plan, adds more pets to the game, and can potentially be a good addition to how things run about in Tyria. Please state your concerns, rather than typing a two letter word and juking the 15 character limit

I hate to say it, but this seems the direction things are going in. We only have two viable builds right now – Beastmastery and Trapping – and if one drowns, we’ll all jump ship and move to the other, so that we can feel effective.

An idea struck me that I think would actually garner some attention from the community.

A big thing with rangers is pet selection. While plenty of pets are sub-par (moas in particular, if the community is anything to go off of) some are still chosen for their appearance and overall contribution to appearance and character of the… character.

To this end, I had a realization. There’s plenty of animals not currently available (rock dogs, gryphons, raptors, and plated behemoths come to mind) that are, surprisingly, available to NPC characters (there’s even an event chain where you help an ogre chieftain tame a siege devourer to take back his tribe from a rival.). We also have items available in the Trading Post that spawn particular NPCs, and this got me thinking; what if we could summon exclusive pets?

The idea is fairly simple. There’s a few pets that aren’t tamable in the overworld by normal means, and are instead available through perhaps flutes, whistles, or other means of calling them available through the gem store. An animal flute. It spawns a juvenile version of the animal in question that doesn’t respawn after a ranger has tamed it, and possibly can only be tamed by the individual that purchased the animal flute.

Whether it’s simply a different look for a pet identical to another one, or an entirely new type of pet, I think this has the potential to be a very big thing, especially among the ranger playing community.

Travlane.5948:

RFI is ROLL FOR INITIATIVE
DB is DEATHBLOSSOM
PVE is PLAYER VS EVERYONE/ENVIRONMENT

thank you, though the PvE one was unnecessary. What about IA and HS?

Travlane.5948:

KeyLimPi.9031:

I have a build that’s 2500 attack, 57% crit chance, 1800 toughness, 99% crit damage (all unbuffed), it’s in the way you theorycraft. Thief can absorb a little damage but we have RFI, SS, and IA for a reason. To book it if things get bad.

wow 2500 attack is low. u must be running full condition build. :P anyway dont use IA…..HS is much muuuuuch better. IA only does about 175 distance more.

Sorry, could you un-abbreviate those for me? I haven’t played thief enough yet to figure out what those mean.

Deathspike.1870:

A thief cannot magically become sturdy. If you do that, you will hit like a wet noodle. You’re spoiled with bunker classes; you will just have to learn how and when to evade, every profession skill and tactic in order to have somewhat of a counter. Good luck!

I’m a monster hunter Vet; for the most part, I know how to avoid if it’s an AI trying to tackle me with a mountain sized critter. what I have problems with is WvW and sPvP, as dodging players is a whole other ball game. I’m not asking for a build that magically makes the thief sturdy. I’m asking for a setup so that, if all goes well, I won’t need to be.

So, as the title says, I’m having a bit of trouble getting into being a thief proper. My problem stems from the fact that i have a hard time moving quickly and evading, so fragility is a big issue with me. Is there any way around it? I want to optimize my damage if I can, so either zerker or knight’s builds are preferable, but if that’s not in the cards I’ll understand. I’m used to playing a mace/shield warrior and a BM/Bunker ranger, so I’m used to being capable of taking a lot of hits. I guess I’m maybe looking for something where I simply won’t take damage if i do it properly, I guess? I want this to be effective in all three setups if possible; PvE, WvW, and PvP

Can anybody help me?

I’ve not encountered this problem. Are you trying to activate it while these things are coming at you? You need stability active first before it’ll work and make you immune to things.

Dub.1273:

50g when you show me a lupicus solo without dying pets.

You’re missing what we’re saying here. We are NOT saying that your pet won’t die. What we’re telling you is not to waste a resource, particularly one that can tank for you, or deal damage. Pets, at their core, are a distraction mechanic that can deal damage. Use yours as one; you’re playing ranger anyways, there’s literally no reason you shouldn’t

A commonly pronounced thing in WvW is “When in doubt, follow the blue dorito”. there’s usually a commander on any WvW map, and you can see their little blue icon on your minimap even from across the map. People gravitate around commanders because they’re a rallying point, and this makes them exceptional to follow around.

as long as you stay with a group and don’t try to take too much on solo, a zerker setup should be fine; the group will mitigate whatever damage you would have taken and spread chaos around, but when alone you’re just a target. if you want to go around solo, I’d suggest knight’s or Soldier’s armor, depending on whether you want to maintain your large number of crits

I’m trying to weigh the merits of the different weapons that rangers can use in conjunction with a pet. At the moment, my build is 30/10/0/0/30 because I love signets (6 seconds of invuln is amazing against bosses, as is getting a few seconds of amped damage to go with Rampage As One) and have my salamander drake tanking bosses using the regeneration Grandmaster trait from BM, while dealing some fair damage at the same time. Also, I’m wearing full sentinel gear (got it when it was cheap).

The problem, however, is that I can’t seem to decide on a weapon type. I’ve been using a longbow for a while, but I don’t know if it’s my best bet. Thoughts?

matenji.3809:

slingblade.1437:

I’m doubtful they do. I have not heard of any runes or sigils or anything that applies to the pet’s damage and suspect a lot of people have looked at that pretty hard by now.

You can share buffs generated by Runes with pets via the Fortifying Bond trait, but that’s the closest similar thing I can think of.

If only Fortifying Bond also shared boons with 5 people closest to you, too.

Arguably it does you one better, particularly if you’re solo. RaO becomes absolutely monstrous with this one trait.

Sure, you can’t keep the pet alive, but that doesn’t mean you can swap like a jerk. See, with 15 points in BM, you get swapping every fifteen seconds, and 2 seconds of quickness every time you swap. While this doesn’t mean your pet will survive a super-punch, it will give you extra DPS and distract the boss. Particularly if you go with a bear, which actually CAN survive the super punch, and will draw the aggro of your enemies, on top of being the single toughest type of pet available. go with a brown bear for the fact that they have the warrior skill “Shake It Off” as their F2, and you have a winner.

So, actually, yes, the pet is honestly a good thing to have. you just have to use it properly. I’ve seen players do ludicrous things with bears.

I took the time to run a few tests in the mists, specifically with an outfit consisting of having no runes, and an outfit with scholar runes (for the +10% damage when your health is over 90%)

my test drake dealt 887 – 928 damage with normal, not critical auto-attacks when not using runes. 1550 – 1630 criticals

When I swapped to the outfit with the scholar runes, there was no visible change; if there had been, the damage with the criticals would have gone up by another 150 or so, and it hadn’t. I think I can safely say “No” to my own question.

the problem with Dwayna runes is that one using a healing skill, the regen spreads to all of your allies, so it’s not a good one to judge with

I’ve got superior runes of infiltration on my beastmaster ranger, but I’m not entirely certain whether or not they affect my pet. Is this the case? he seems to do more damage when enemies are low on health, but I’m finding it hard to gauge.

Could someone clear this up for me?

even at low levels, pets are an amazing resource. having a buddy is a great way to get a sense for the game, and being a beginner means you likely don’t have many friends in-game. the pet covers your butt while you learn the ropes, and it’s a fun class in and of itself

I’ve been playing a ranger for a while now, but have yet to come across a pet with a higher power rating than anything else beyond a shark, despite that being what I want. Is that just not going to happen? Are there no other power-focused pets? If that’s the case, why not?

So, here’s the thing. I’ve heard a couple times that there’s different tiers for different game modes; such as mesmers being top tier for PvP in general. I’m not about to contest that, but it’s made me curious where the ranger supposedly falls. I’ve heard a few people claim that rangers are garbage in PvE but godly in PvP, and yet it’s the only class I’ve heard of that can consistently solo legendaries, and I have a hard time playing them in PvP.

So, where does it fall? In general anyways. I know there’s variances based on build.

Iove.3902:

Going for a 8/10 for Faeros is an Arthurian name. Sylvari use Arthurian names.

I… had no idea. It was just a bunch of letters I thought sounded cool together o.O

Welp. Learn something new every day.

/off topic

I’m going to go with a 9/10 for Holokostas. the first name is a bit long for what we normally see among charr, but on the whole, it’s a great name.

My character is Faeros Fireblade, Blood Legion Warrior. He gets in close and can hit hard, but knows how to stay at range and use a rifle if melee is looking dicey. The origin of his name comes from the fact that his warband comes from liberated flame legion children. Blade because he became the strongest fighter in the fahrar, and he specializes in the use of a greatsword.

Yeah, I’ve noticed that melee pets tend to get stomped by anything of higher level than veteran.

Good vote on the Rending Attacks thing. Didn’t realize that also applied to devourers.

Given that they’re already rendered and done up, I very much doubt that they’d be completely left out. My best guess is that they’re going to bundle them up as part of a future content release.

So, I very much doubt I’m alone in this, but devourers are quite frankly one of my favorite pets. They don’t do the most damage, but they’re capable of range and are very durable, and devourers have been a fixture in Tyria since the first game (which I’ve played, and I loved them then)

My issue is finding a build that works with devourers and focusing on them as a beast mastery build, because that’s how I want to play my ranger. And so, I come to you, dear forums, looking for ways to make my ranger have an awesome build.

Also, as an extra note, I’d like to avoid any derailing comments like “Devourers aren’t that great, you should go with a cat” or something similar. I understand the position, but that’s not what this thread is about.

Thank you very much. That definitely solves the problem.

I just recently got my Armorsmithing to 400, and noticed something odd. The crafting recipes throughout heavy armor of lower tiers (such as mithril tier, for the barbaric armor) all contain insignias so that you can actually craft a piece of armor; can’t have a piece of armor without an insignia, after all, because it’s what determines the item’s stats.

However the issue I’ve encountered is that the apothecary’s insignia is the only Gossamer inisignia available. This is unusual because all the insignias for a given crafting tier have been available right from the get go to me, as long as I have the appropriate crafting level requirement; and at 400, there’s nothing higher to reach. I even tried to go into the discovery tab and enter all the necessary materials for crafting an intricate carrion gossamer insignia, but globs of ectoplasm and ancient bones (both of which I have, and both of which are necessary for creating said insignia) don’t even show up in the panel of what I can use to make discoveries.

Is this a bug? Is it required to get other crafting types just to get the exotic armor I want? What’s going on here?

My understanding of the mists is that the entire place is everything. It’s the multiverse; each little bit of the different worlds and realms we have to look at? Those are all part of the mists. Tyria is part of the mists. the underworld, the fissure of woe, everywhere else, mists. The land from beyond the keyboard, that grey bleak thing known as Real Life? Theoretically, also part of the mists.

Not really that important in the grand scheme of things, but it’s something that I felt should have been mentioned.

Mmm, true. We don’t really have enough information to go one for that line of thought, do we? Both sides have merit.

The mists connect to every world there is in existence, so the idea that they’re occupied with fighting an issue has merit. Obviously, it’s easiest to get to similar worlds or similar versions of the same world (Servers), but it’s pretty well flat out stated that they connect to everything ever.

Something that was brought up earlier was the fact that kneeling in front of the statue of Grenth in Reaper’s Gate (in Lornar’s Pass) gives you a blessing. The priory storyline seems to support the idea that the statue itself is enchanted in a certain way, as Sieran says “That statue of Grenth has been leaking magic. I couldn’t think of anything else that matches the power of the Sanguinary Blade.” This suggests the statue is pre-enchanted, not having direct influence granted by Grenth

@Dagshy; the problem there is that the DSD isn’t really influencing anybody except the underwater races at the moment. Humans are more closely in conflict with Zhaitan because of his sitting on the Orrian throne, which is human holy land. On top of that, while Lion’s Arch is indeed a port city, it’s entirely multiracial, and is by no means solely a human city; there’s even skritt and hyleks that make their home there, and one of the city leaders is a norn privateer. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on viewpoint), the EDs don’t line up nicely to the different races.

It’s said that prayers are still answered, but that many people are skeptical as to whether it’s just magic rather than divine influence. Truth be told, we don’t know exactly what’s going on, but we do know that Sylvari, for example, are skeptical to the god’s existence in the first place. It suggests that the other races believe the gods are either entirely silent or don’t exist at all.

@Konig – I have to admit, the idea of Dhuum getting free has merit, given that his minions were constantly trying to set him loose. The same could be said for Balthazaar, who may be having some trouble with Menzies. Unfortunately, that theory still leaves Lyssa, Melandru, Dwayna, and Kormir unaccounted for. And yeah, saying they were human mages was a bit of a stretch, but I did mention I don’t think they’re entirely human just… similar, I suppose. Kinda like how a norn or mursaat is similar to a human, but certainly isn’t one. Also, from the wiki: “As early as 1078 AE, Jormag was actively influencing Tyria.” This suggests that there may be a correlation, as Jormag started his influence in the world not 50 years after Nightfall, but only 3.

Reasonably speaking, the horrible state of affairs assailing humanity at the moment can pretty well all be laid at the feet of Abaddon, yeah. Shiro Tagachi, Vizier Khilbron, Varesh Ossa, and others all kind of send humanity into the meatgrinder with their successive plots for world domination, and all of them were working towards it because of Abaddon.

I’m also aware that the gods didn’t create magic, but that Abaddon, before being imprisoned, gave humanity the “Gift” of magic, which could simply mean teaching them how to manipulate it, which seems likely. The bloodstones are just a control mechanism, like a floodgate; it controls an already existing force in a fundamental way

But yeah, altogether, the idea here is the gods don’t want to be completely gone, but that they can’t contact the world. Also, I wasn’t aware we can contact a reaper, given that I’m not terribly far into the story.

Basically, all that’s left to do is murder the dragons and see if that helps things :P

So, here’s a thought. The silence of the human gods has been a major problem for the humans of Tyria; Their dominance was mostly assured by the blessings of the gods, and as they grew more silent, the humans became easier for the other races to handle. I’ve been considering this for a while, and realized that it’s only since the dragons have been rising that they’ve gone quiet, right? Let’s take a look at Arah, the City of the Gods. Holy land for all humans, this is where the entire Tyrian pantheon lived until the Exodus. Then Abaddon screwed things up and they decided to leave.

Now, Zhaitan is sitting in Arah, and getting ready to eat the world. The thing is, the Elder Dragons eat magic. It occurs to me that this is what divine connection is. For example, Josir of the Durmand Priory, a guy you meet in the human storyline, states that the priory studies all magic, both arcane and divine. But we don’t have any divine magic now; I certainly wouldn’t call a charr guardian drawing from the gods when they are steadfastly on the point of “If it’s powerful, I wanna try killing it.” rather than worshipping things.

So, under this theory the gods are essentially beings of magic itself, perhaps being advanced human mages (in a sense. No way Grenth, with the animal skull for a head, is entirely human) that maintain their connection to Tyria through their own use of magic. The problem here, however, is that with the EDs eating magic, any attempt they have made to contact Tyria is being swallowed up, particularly because Zhaitan is sitting on the seat of the place where they’d have the easiest time making a connection.

Does anybody have further evidence to either prove or refute this concept? I’ll admit, I’m not a loremaster like I know some people are, but this makes sense to me.

Also, if this has been discussed before and I’ve simply missed it, please provide a link to the thread so that we don’t talk in circles