Guild Wars 2

Keep ‘m comin’ ^^. No photos can be wrong here because beauty is subjective. Like in the actual world, our opinions on what’s attractive and what isn’t will vary greatly depending on the person.

And for those calling my character a barbie, you’re just jealous you’re not her Ken ( ;

My Necromancer in all her radiant beauty + Divinity’s Reach which I absolutely love.

Also @ OP, that first picture is amazing!

Awe, you’re all gorgeous. Even xsquared with his tightly puckered lips and semi homicidal expression.

Tyria needs our beauty!

After many total makeover kits and a lot of patience… I think I finally got my character just right. And she is one beautiful woman.
Initially I had wanted to share this in a pre-made thread, but I can’t seem to find the one I had seen (or possibly thought I had seen) some days ago now. And the search tool was no help at all…

Anyway, here she is in all her Necromantic beauty. Feel free to share your beautiful characters be they Charr, Asura, Human, Sylvari or Norn.

Zanshin.5379:

Caedmon.6798:

Honestly if you just De-tour because you see a single guy running and you feel the need to steamroll him with 25 guys….Un-Install.

Red is dead.

Killing a solo roamer or small group when you’re in a large group?
Of course you have to do it. So what if they don’t stand a chance? If you don’t kill them maybe they’ll take a tower 3 minutes later. Maybe they’re bringing supply to another group. Maybe they’re scouting. Every single enemy you kill is a tactical advantage.

If you want to play fair, just go play chess or something.

^
Exactly.

All is fair in love and war.

Eternal Battlegrounds ~ Warzone. Red = dead.

Lol, solo roaming stories are the best.

I’ve had many great ones but I’ll just give a semi-recent one since it’s still fresh in my mind.
Golanta had been flipped and I had decided to take our camp back. Clearing the NPC’s and carrying on with my business I was suddenly turned to stone by Basilisk Venom and a sneaky Thief. Fortunately I’m a Necromancer and I survived the initial burst, retreated and turned my camera around to see that he also had 4 friends with him. Making my way to Jerrifer’s, I went inside, up the stairs and peered over the walls to see what the Thief and his cronies were up to. One of them was emoting at me, the others were rezzing the Quarter master and Supervisor. I pondered on the situation for a few minutes before deciding I would play chicken and lure them in to a trap. So I hopped off the wall, inched forwards until the Thief and an Ele came after me, turned, ran back for the tower and one of the NPC guards nailed the Ele with an immob. I stacked a bunch of conditions, used Corrupt Boon to get rid of their defenses and that was pretty much the end of that. Continuing this until it was down to just me and the brave Warrior that had been /laugh emoting at me earlier, I walked towards the camp with all the NPC’s as well as the Warrior. Being the sort of fellow he was he kept jumping with all the NPC’s next to him taunting me to come closer. But I wasn’t going to fall for the trick I had just used to kill his 4 buddies. So I activated my kite, jumped around a bunch and took off through the marsh between the hill at Jerrifer’s and the Lowlands keep. Like a good puppy he followed me and I ambushed him around the corner, melted him pretty fast and /sleep emote’d next to him ( :

Just to make things so much better, he grouped me and told me I was a p**sy for running. Lol. My response, “My kite means I’m srs.”

Muchacho.2390:

There is a reason why on duel servers necros are allowed to start with 20% life force.

So i agree, but the 2 second delay on leaving ds kittenes me off more…

This ^
I cannot express how frustrated I feel the many, many times I have been killed when leaving Death Shroud because my utility bar has a delay after… If you’re going to enter Death Shroud be it offensive or defensive you better get a bit of distance before coming out of it.

I like it, what I don’t like it the lengthy recharge and the lengthy cast time. Reduce the cast time and the recharge a smidge and I’d like it a lot more.
Still, I agree it is quite a good ability and I use it from time to time. It’s just a bit more costly to use because of it’s recharge and cast time.

frifox.5283:

The necro in that party (you?) was carried, hard.

Because I’m not a Warrior or because you don’t know how to play your Necromancer?

Ran CoE just yesterday after writing this… Fastest clear I’ve ever done. Did all paths in less than an hour and each time Alpha died in about 10 seconds. Champ dog before paths begin died in a heartbeat.

Line up was
3 Ele’s
1 Thief
and one Necromancer

Crucible Of Eternity, path 3 is very easy so long as you stack in the right places. Overall, I find CoE in general a very forgiving dungeon. There aren’t many running stretches and if anyone goes down it’s rare you can’t get them back up. But if everyone is new and has no idea what to expect I could see it being extremely difficult. Especially P2 when Alpha is most aggressive.

What makes me happy about this thread is that although Rangers get little to no respect the majority of the time at least people understand a good Ranger can be a major asset to DPS and group support.
I got a lot of kicks before even saying “hi” when I used my Ranger but also got a lot of compliments on my support and damage with the groups that let me stay. So although it’s a frustrating situation to be in when you’re using the Ranger profession, it’s nice to see that people do understand a good Ranger can be a big help… Unfortunately 99.9% are terrible.

Anyway, I’d probably say either;
2 Elementalists – Firey Greatsword(s)/Might stacks
1 Warrior – Banners/Shouts
1 Mesmer – Timewarp
and 1 Ranger – Frost Spirit/Spotter/Warhorn/Moa’s

I’m positive the other professions have more to offer than what I’ve listed but I’m not as familiar with them as I am Ranger. Still, I believe that’d be a great DPSing group.

I agree. I specifically avoid using any hairstyles with accessories for this very reason. I think it would be fair if they made it so that what ever colours we currently have collected are the options we’re able to use on our hair accessories.

You can only use it in PvP? That sucks \ :

After a bit of research it appears that this armor may not have made it in to the game. And if that’s the case, I would really love to see it at the very least put in to the gem store. It’s pretty darn nice.

I had thought of something similar but with a higher cost. Since Transmutation Stones are so abundant I had figured something like 20stones for 2crystals. Drop them in the Mystic Forge with some kind of cheap materials and out come Transmutation Crystals. Still account bound of course.

Virtute.8251:

Dragonbrand is to Tier 3 what Tarnished Coast was to Tier 2 last year: just too big for the tier, but without a snowball’s chance in the tier above.

TC are in first place right now and doing a pretty good job of staying there.

I haven’t been on DB for a while now, but I do very clearly remember their SEA presence being completely ridiculous. When TFV and/or NNK get on the other servers may as well lay down and let them take everything. Even when the enemy tries to defend either they’ll leave for 5 minutes to regroup and devise a simple plan or they’ll just push through whether they like it or not.
I didn’t mind my time on DB but I’d say honestly the only downside (and a big part of what made me leave) is how much bickering is constantly going on in mapchat… If that doesn’t bother you then I’d totally recommend it. Very, very strong offence, legendary SEA crew and moving up in tiers pretty fast.

Oozo.7856:

Rennoko.5731:

Run 100% duration and you cancel out all the work he put into countering you. Yes you still have all the normal problems of fighting someone with a long immunity to your skills and you have to surive that period of the fight, but when zerker stance is gone, the BASE duration on your conditions is more than sufficient to deal with him.

Or go even farther out, and go over 100% duration to get some duration back on him, as extra duration over 100% will cancel out his subtracted duration, and cause your conditions to last longer again.

Just a standard 40% food, 30% spite, 50% fear build (the normal build), will still have 2+ second fear on a warrior with that build….

This is the weakness of my condition build. I don’t invest in condition duration to counter things like melandru and lemongrass. It hurts me in 1v1s sometimes.

I decided not to invest heavily in condition duration since most of our fights are group fights where the enemy group has a ton of cleansing. Condition duration means almost nothing when fighting those types of groups. I use the food, of course.

I understand your reasoning for not using duration but duration has a lot of potential depending on which conditions you’re focusing on using. If you decide to use one particular condition more so than the others, with high duration, you’ll more easily be able to stack them. No duration means that by the time you get to 5 stacks they’ll be going down instead of up because the duration isn’t long enough. The higher your duration the easier it is to put conditions on top of each other. I have an 80% duration with foods and my blinds last 10seconds, bleeds 10 – 15 second (1minute with Blood Is Power) and about 10seconds with poison. Which means the longer I’m alive the more dangerous I get.
So I’m by no means saying you should change your build but if you want to defeat an anti-condition build stacking condition duration will help a lot.
Just something to think about

Stack bleeds. We can stack them faster than they can cleanse them. Just keep stacking and stacking and stacking them and their health will slowly go down. If your conditions do enough damage they’ll completely negate their health regeneration and because we can stack our bleeds/other conditions so quickly all this leaves is to keep the pressure on.
They take a bit longer than other professions but as someone here has already stated it’s totally doeable.
My best advice would just be to do everything in your power to keep conditions on them at all times. When they hammer-stun you should be the only time you’re not applying them. Even then, you could use Spectral Armor or Spectral Walk to break the stun and continue to apply them.

SkylightMoon.1980:

Iris Ng.9845:

SkylightMoon.1980:

The thing about zerk is it doesnt really take any talent and just displays bad pve in the game I think. If you actually watch runs of official hardcore pve guilds (#lolhardcorepve), its pretty much full zerk with eles and fireswords, stacking a boss, timewarping, finished. Im actually embarassed as a player to see that in game as hardcore pve and id be embarassed to show my friends joining gw2 that this is hardcore pve. Hardcore pve should be hours of practice by a group of dedicated people to practice mechanics, positioning, build coordination, to kill a boss. Not skip 80% of the mobs and firesword the 2 bosses in the instance just to get done with your dungeon as quick as possible. I am glad they are nerfing zerk a tad and im sure future bosses will be designed to prevent zerk.

#AwesomeHardcorePve
#AwesomeFireyFunSword
#AwesomeQuaggansVsLupi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlExHCTpZxw&list=UUPOv4tOYJRRG3kcUTBn4NUQ&feature=share

We have already seen that in today’s update that has the watchknights hit extremely hard(event to tanky people) at melee range. Thats not necessarily nerfing zerk but it is nerfing zerk warriors who go with hundred blades, stack 25 vulnerability and might, then hundred blades the enemy for 50k.

This reminds me of how a certain DnT member solo’d his platform because he is the only zerker warrior. Ironic !!!

Again I see nothing but stakcing lupi on a wall and bursting him lol. Its kinda a joke.

I agree that stacking is kind of ridiculous. Although it’s true you do need to know where to position yourself and understand the bosses, it still really doesn’t require much more than that. People can say stacking and zerking takes practice/talent all they want, it doesn’t. I’m not saying people shouldn’t do it, because I do it every dungeon run I do and it works very well. But I do it, and I’m sure most others as well, because dungeons really aren’t that fun.. Why spend an hour + doing something that you don’t enjoy. Maybe some people do, I really don’t, lol. I would be embarrassed to show someone what a dungeon is with an experienced group because of how bland it is, but I wouldn’t change it either because it gets the job done.
Point though, anyone who says stacking/zerking, what ever takes any kind of skill is completely nuts. All you need to do is see where to stack once and you’ll know to stack there every time in the future and bam, you’re officially a dungeon pro.

I’d like to be clear before saying the following that if you prefer to have a group full of zerker stats that’s your choice and you’re free to make it. There are time when I ask for the same, but it’s not always optimal.

How you know someone isn’t in zerk = They’re not dying every 5 seconds.

Being in full zerk is great for DPS but imho, at least one person not in zerk is a good idea. Because they’ll be there to pick the glassy ones up when they fall. And I say when because I’ve done many zerk runs and someone always does fall.
So sure you can blow through the dungeon fast but there’s such a thing as too much of a good thing. So remember to welcome at least one sturdy individual otherwise you could potentially be looking at a lot of wipes.

So much gossip about Blackgate, lol. What goes up must come down. By no means is that an insult. Blackgate has held the #1 ranking server for a very long time. If they do happen to fall, there’s no shame in it.

Imho, Necromancers are focused down because they have the most access to AOE’s, are usually the slowest and can spread conditions from person to person like the flu (Epidemic for instance.)
As for my thoughts on the profession I’d probably say the pros and cons are;

Pros
High base vitality coupled with toughness in your gear makes you pretty tanky. Vitality and toughness in your armor and you’re looking at a ridiculous amount of survivability.

Most people will welcome you in groups.

When roaming about Thieves will generally steer clear of you.

Anyone with low vitality but high toughness will melt against you assuming you’re a condition build (being that conditions ignore armor)

Lots of versatility

Decent group support (Well Of Suffering is a godsend for damage increase)

Cons
If not traited/using Signet of The Locust you’re slow as all hell.

No matter what build you shoot for conditions are pretty well always going to follow you. Meaning, as far as I’m aware at least, you’re never really going to put out a ton of direct damage

Health siphoning is absolute garbage. It’s great in theory but terrible in practice so unless you’ve got a healing power stat (even then it’s not very impressive) you probably shouldn’t waste your time with it

Although I’ve said most people will welcome you in their groups, that’s most not all. Next to the Ranger, Necromancers are probably just after them for not being wanted in dungeons

Lynnie.7213:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

I prefer d/d when solo roaming with the 25% movement increase while wielding daggers trait. I understand that’s only personal preference, but it’s just something to keep in mind incase you decide to try it.
Also, the best part about being a solo roaming Necro, the frequency of being attacked by thieves drops significantly :P.

Do you mind in share this dual dagger build? I saw a necro yesteday playing something like that and he just “tank” 5 ppl and still got away(okay ppl were bad ofc) but seems fun to try.

Thanks everyone for the answers.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Bleeding-Structure-Build/first#post3718729

This is my current roaming build. It’s very sluggish but after someone attacks you once they probably won’t bother you again so you don’t need to be very fast :P.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vQEQRAoY7Yjc00SbtNG1whbCQqAvTP4ectpe4e5oD-zkyAYrBRTRCNRAiKAk9KiGbZrIas6FMdZSVvCyeclVSBExwI-w

This is my more tanky build (the one I had mentioned earlier that uses the d/d movement increase) that’s a bit better suited for zerging due to it’s durability + speed but is also good for roaming even though it lacks a lot of damage.
And before anyone jumps on me for the second one I’m fully aware that I’m using Dolyak Runes, lol. But with that build you can pretty much facetank an atom bomb, believe me. I’ve had 10 + people trying to kill me and still failing with that set-up.

Although I’m by no means an expert on builds, nor have I researched many in my time playing Guild Wars 2, I believe I’ve created a monster… I’m too lazy to get in to all the technicalities of it so I’ll just post a link with a brief description of what’s there and why.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vQEQRAoY7Yjc0UTb1NO2wfbCZqQ2A9YXePQM6BxcMJDA-zkyAIMIkmANtI0UlAlDLiGbBrIasaGMVaS1xCyOElVSBsowK-w

For starters, we want precision not power. Although power will obviously contribute to damage (hence why I’ve gone with using a sharpening stone instead of maintenance oil), the more precision we have the greater chance of inflicting bleeds. Which, as I’ll explain shortly, will be our primary source of condition damage.

With Superior Runes Of The Afflicted we’ll get an additional 15% bleeding duration, plus our foods and sharpening stones, plus our 30 points in to Spite will add up to a ridiculous 80% condition duration and 1 minute + of bleeding time doing over 19k damage with all your stacks of corruption when using Blood Is Power. On top of that, with every few hits you’ll be adding burning, extra bleeding (traited + runes + foods = over 100% chance of bleeding on critical), poison with your scepter #1 chained attacks, cripple with #2 and weakness + more bleeds with your dagger #5 attack. All that without using your Signet Of Spite or Plague.
And just to shake things up, you can go in to Death Shroud while near an enemy to inflict more bleeding, teleport to them with Dark Path for… More bleeding… And basically everyone around you is going to be sweating, shi**ng, puking and crying blood. Plus other conditions on top of those.

After playing with this build in WvW a bunch I can honestly say I’ve never had this much fun with one profession/build before. You get the usual opponent who will rush you trying to DPS you down as fast as possible but with the Necromancer’s high base vitality plus the toughness in your armor you’ll endure it with relative ease. So long as you know how to dodge every so often of course. Unfortunately for them, the longer you’re alive the more painful their life is going to become. Infinite stacks of bleed no matter how many times you cleanse and a kitten near indefinite duration. I’ve melted Warriors, Guardians, you name it faster than they know how to react. The real beauty of it is even if they try to run you’ll see those numbers stacking in the distance until they go down.

Anyway, that’s about all I care to explain. This is just something I put together after a bit of theory-crafting and wound up falling in love with. If you dislike it or feel you can make it better by all means. If not, I hope the world looks good painted in blood for you ( :

P.s. With your d/d for those close encounters, you’ll still inflict plenty of bleeds. I manage to keep 15 – 20 on my opponents at almost all times with scepter and 10 – 15 with d/d. So which ever you choose to use they’re both going to stack a ton of bleeds.

P.p.s. This isn’t a zerging build but if you swap Well Of Corruption for Epidemic it transfers pretty well. It however is built more so with roaming in mind as it’s what I most often do.

I prefer d/d when solo roaming with the 25% movement increase while wielding daggers trait. I understand that’s only personal preference, but it’s just something to keep in mind incase you decide to try it.
Also, the best part about being a solo roaming Necro, the frequency of being attacked by thieves drops significantly :P.

I agree with the above. Stick with what you enjoy ( : If you choose to make another character by all means do so, but if you enjoy Ele I see no reason to change. Practice, practice, practice and you’ll just love it more over time.

Cush.4063:

Lol I rember when I mained a thief and tried to debate the class and how it wasn’t op at all. Then I got bored with it and rolled a different class and realized I was talking bullkitten and was just trying to defend my class from getting nerfed.

Whenever I see someone post a thief op thread I just laugh as I see all the thieves coming in full blast saying its a l2p issue and thieves have this high skill ceiling somewhere. Either I’m an incredible gamer and don’t realize it or thief is just as easy as warrior to play and all you gotta do is stealth backstab, stealth backstab. Oh you can’t see me? Too bad, take 6k+ to the face, I’ll just vanish again. The only time you press a different button is when you get cc’d or you get low on health and you just sr and run away. I wish they would just redesign the class with CD’s and make it so it didn’t “solely” rely on stealth and backstabs, or pistol whip if you play s/p. I would go running back to my thief to play it again because it might actually be fun and not cheaply boring =\

Sorry, its the truth thieves. You all should be screaming for the class to be co.lletely redesigned as well but I’m sure if you do so you’re afraid Anet will nerf it to the ground instead. I don’t see how you all can keep playing the class when its so repetitive. I mean I guess killing people quickly has a fun of its own but it could be so much better. I love bursty classes as well and would hope if they redesigned it it would keep that but the overall initiative and stealth reliance class mechanic really needs to be fixed.

Omg I love this guy… Someone who UNDERSTANDS, lol. I won’t go on about it but this is the truth… You may be able to kill people fast and easy but fact of the matter is it’s not hard to play a Thief. I’ve played one as well and it’s just a cheese profession. There is very little skill involved… Although there certainly are players who do have skill in their strategies, most use the same basic methods. Stealth + backstab = win. So tell people it’s hard to play all you want… It ain’t. Sure you’re glassy with few condition cleanses/stability… Ever played a Ranger? Same idea but they can’t stealth/blind spam or hit massive crits and use a bunch of gap closers to escape if they’re in trouble.

Although I passionately hate Thieves… I’m a fair person… And just because I hate them doesn’t mean I would suggest a change. All professions have some kind of unique attribute. Initiative is a part of the Thieves unique-ness. I believe a big part of the reasoning behind this is because of their fragile nature. They are meant to strike and kill their foes as quickly as possible which shouldn’t mean having to wait on cooldowns only spending ones initiative wisely.
If you think only a Thief has a unique design, you might also consider the Engineer who has access to multiple “kits” all with different skills and utility with no cooldown between swapping kits. Or, the Guardian who basically has built in signets, Virtues as they are called, and instead of having to use a utility slot for health regeneration one of their virtues already provides this.

People make no sense with their requests to make the blue of the Zodiac armor changeable…
There are people saying that it’s too revealing, and in some cases the same people saying the colour should be changeable… Why? So people can make the blue skin coloured and have a bunch of characters running around you would at first mistake for completely naked instead of perceived nudity?
It’s like a wet suit, or yoga pants. It highlights curves and nothing more. You wouldn’t accuse someone of being naked in public for wearing tight clothing the same way you can’t call these sets revealing… UNTIL the blue is made changeable… Because at that point it will be revealing.
Let me be clear I have no problems with these sets. If people wanted to run around naked as the day they were born all the power to them… I’m just stating that I do not understand this logic of wanting to freely change the blue while at the same time saying it’s too revealing.
Think before requests are made in such high volumes leading to yet another communal complaint.

P.s. The Zodiac set is an awesome design, ANet. I enjoy the very, out there, inspiration it has. And I would love to see more creative designs like this in the future.

FenrirSlakt.3692:

Frankly, I wouldn’t blame it on the good meta players at all. Their group descriptions always express what they expect clearly and concisely. The blame here is on those players who refuse to read the advertisement and just join.
My advertisement format usually goes like this:
Zerk|Speedrun|XP|PX|Already in
In an ideal world, they would have to read the whole ad to know if I’m running the path they’re looking to run. Unfortunately, this is not an ideal world, so I often get Clerics, Soldiers and other undesired stat combos despite the fact that I explicitly stated what I was looking for.

At first I wouldn’t ask them to ping their gear, as I would trust people to do their part, but after experiencing this situation over and over, I now feel compelled to do so if I want to have quick, efficient runs.

I don’t enjoy having to tell people that they don’t meet the group’s expectations and kick them afterwards, but I must.

So yeah, my beef isn’t with casual/inexperienced players. It’s just that insta-joiners happen to be casual/inexperienced most of the time.

^
I very often teach people who are new to dungeons, or even the game in general, what to do and how to do it. I by no means mind showing people the ropes (most of the time.) And for those that already understand, I don’t mind if the run is a bit slow either. But when I’m farming, or not in the mood for having to explain every detail of a dungeon’s strategies, I’ll specifically state so in my group description. Which is usually the path(s) I’d like to run and my requirements. Eg. P3 ~ [Experienced.] Not that strict… If you join and decide to run all over the place and not listen to the group when we ask for you to cooperate, you’re out.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with stacking or “meta.” Although it does suck a lot of the fun out of dungeons, honestly they’re not that fun done the “proper” way either. Stacking is the easiest way to share boons/buffs, get people up if they go down and to keep damage packed tightly on the enemy(s) at all times. It’s not an exploit it’s a strategy, as boring and repetitive as it may be. If you don’t want to skip mobs, state so in your description. Some people are okay with that. Personally, I try to avoid skipping enemies as well but only if it won’t take a lengthy period of time to clear them. It’s too much effort for no return. Maybe if it were actually fun I’d be more interested…
Anyway, if you don’t want to be kicked or yelled at or what ever else… Read the group description carefully before joining. Or, make your own group with your own requirements.
As long as people aren’t blatantly bashing others like calling them idiots or what ever else, I really see no problem with kicking if the person has directly gone against what the host has asked in their description. Their entitled to their preference as much as yourself.

Farm Crucible Of Eternity… I get them by the truck load from that dungeon off of trash mobs.

Ross Biddle.2367:

This image accurately demonstrates why you’re right to bring a warrior into any game mode

Best

+1

On Jade Quarry the event to open CoE has been bugged for well over a week now. Often times I would do the event myself to open it or get a friend to come along to speed things up a bit. But a week or so ago I went on to find that a part of the event will not progress. The destroyers won’t spawn and it’s been stuck like that for a good while now. Although it’s not a huge burden having to guest to another server to open, this still needs to be fixed.

I agree 110%. The day I decided to make a Ranger, I had been researching builds and watching some videos of roaming Rangers. When reading traits and utilities, I was beginning to see it as a burst-y profession. I don’t range and/or melee my opponents in an average duel, I play more like a thief and catch my opponent off guard, demolishing their health before they know how to respond. Then, after actually playing the profession, I went from PTV, to PTV/zerk, to full zerk before realizing that even when I’m 100% glass bursting an opponent down isn’t easy… Not only that, if you’re full glass and can’t burst them down all they have to do is blink in your general direction and you’re dead.
So although I really have only myself to blame for assuming that the Ranger was supposed to be a burst profession… The description of them, and a lot of their traits/utilities didn’t help me to think otherwise.

After a good period of time neglecting my Necromancer, I’ve come back to her and have rediscovered my love. I’ve been running d/d and I’m loving it. I have no idea why I avoided using them in the first place but I really enjoy their utility.

I won’t ramble on forever though, so here are my questions;
If I were to spec for a vampiric Necromancer, eg. siphoning health with everything I do, how well would my sustain be in a 1 versus 1 situation? I would prefer to use a half and half mixture of clerics/magi armor (power/toughness/healing power and precision/vitality/healing power) so as to have a good balance of offensive stats while still having a focus on healing stats. Also, if I were geared in such a way, would I hit like a wet noodle or would I still do a reasonable amount of damage?

As for the build itself, I would run wells in my utility, d/d as my main source of offense, a/w for my other two weapons, and 0/10/0/30/30 for traits. Spec’ing for “siphoning health is more effective”, “reduces recharge on wells” and increases movement speed for each dagger that you wield" in Blood Magic and “life force drains slower while in death shroud”, “reduces recharge on death shroud”, and “reduces recharge on death shroud skills” in Soul Reaping.

P.s. this build is with WvW in mind as it’s what I spend the majority of my time doing. I don’t expect it to be top of the line, I’m just curious whether or not I would have good sustain and still be able to hit hard enough to kill my enemies rather than it always being about outliving them until they give up and go somewhere else.

Himei.5379:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

It’s not the profession that’s bad it’s the players.

You just bit yourself. You said that the class isnt up to par, then say that its not the class, but the player.

Rangers ATM are in a fine state. Give or take a few pet AI fixes and general bugs, the class is good. We are not suppose to be top DPS class, nor the top Condition damage class. Anet designed Rangers to be a skirmishing class, someone able to outfight another class and it shows, in PvP and Roaming WvW. For PvE, we are in the middle/upper middle in terms of survivability and damage.

IMO, stop trying to be something the ranger isnt designed to be. If everything was designed to be top damage, mind as well have no class besides a Warrior and no other class mechanics since they will all play the same.

I specifically stated “I’m not as good with the profession as I’d like to be” if you had read more carefully. I also said no where that the profession was bad, or that it needed a buff. Only that I would like to see it become more viable because as is, I feel the tables are tipped too much in favor of any other profession I come across when roaming in WvW. I’m not trying to be top DPS, I simply don’t want to have to sacrifice all of my survivability to make my opponents go “oh kitten ” and back up a bit. I’m the kind of person who enjoys making my enemies panic, and putting out high damage in a short period of time is a great way of doing that. As a Ranger, even full DPS, I can’t do that against certain professions… So yes, they are supposed to be experts in skirmishing and more about whittling their opponents down. That shouldn’t mean that even when spec’d for DPS they still have to “whittle them down.”
Also, I’ve been kicked more than a few times from dungeon groups just for being a Ranger… And I’m not one of the ones who doesn’t know how to control their pets. I actively use them on passive and aggressive as they’re supposed to be. So that’s just another reason I’m leaving this profession… Because people treat it like a bad disease and I’m sick of being booted before even being given a chance to say “hi.”

I really do hope with the upcoming changes the Ranger will be a more viable profession… But as is, I believe I’ve had enough. I’ve tried every spec one can imagine and although if used properly the Ranger can have either amazing survivability or great DPS, they can’t have both. Not only that, they can’t even have a happy medium. It’s a great profession, and of the ones I’ve played (all of them save Elementalist) I’ve enjoyed this one the most. Unfortunately, after months of play time, then going back to my Engineer and Necromancer… The differences are a lot clearer than they used to be. I can’t put out high DPS without being vulnerable to death-by-a-stiff-breeze. And I can’t be tanky without hitting like a wet noodle. At least on my Necromancer (which I’ve now gone back to as my main) I can have tons of vitality/toughness and still deal decent damage. And thieves are usually too scared to come near me which is just an added bonus.
So as much as I love Ranger, and will certainly come back to the profession from time to time, I’m going to put this character to rest as a former main… Of the many mains I’ve hopped.

Don’t lose hope! No matter how many people tell you Ranger sucks they’re far from terrible. It’s not the profession that’s bad it’s the players. If done right, they can be a seriously formidable opponent. Unfortunately… I don’t seem to be as amazing with them as I wish I were. Either way, 19k with Rapid Fire is a pretty impressive number, despite being glassy as hell to achieve those kind of numbers, no one can say the Ranger is a crappy DPS at the very least.

Any how… If you’ve let your Ranger go, or are still hanging in there… Feel free to share your stories, what ever they may be, regarding the profession ( : I hate to be a quitter but I’m clearly not good enough to use this profession because although I win fights at least half the time, there are ones I know I’d have won if I had had just a bit more survivability or just a bit more DPS… Oh well I guess… The Necromancer has always suited my morbid personality anyway : 3

I run glassy and with the right buffs/chain of attacks you can tick up to 19k(+) with Rapid Fire. Although this means I sacrifice survivability, if you know how to dodge it’s not as consequential as you might think. Put some thought in to what will compliment what attack/trait best and you’d be surprised how viable this weapon can actually be.

Trait for regaining opening strike on enemy kill or gaining stealth if you’re not running a signet build. First I do Long Range Shot, Opening Strike Included, then, I do Hunter’s Shot to regain Opening Strike afterwards using Rapid Fire. 25stacks of Vulnerability = high damage.
Although having my signets effect me has a lot of great benefits, I only use one so I’d rather go with regaining my opening strike. If you decide to use this trait and the aforementioned chain of attacks, you can stack a lot of vuln and tick some pretty decent numbers.
25 stacks of vulnerability = 25% incoming damage.

Although the cast time can be a bit of a pain, if traited/rune-d properly, you can stack swiftness/regeneration pretty much indefinitely with this utility… It’ll keep your pet alive longer and if you cast it at the end of the 12 seconds (traited) every time your regeneration will just keep stacking, and stacking, and stacking. So I wouldn’t say it needs a fix… If anything I feel sorry for the people who don’t know how to interrupt me when I’m casting it because every time I do I’m just going to be harder to kill.
Once again, this is a matter of people assuming Ranger and their skills are useless because they’re too one dimensional to put effort in to understanding there’s more to the profession than stand here and pew pew while pet tanks.

I won’t rage because I’ve been a Ranger long enough to know people are completely oblivious to how this profession works and just immediately assume it’s garbage.
So here’s my input;
Barrage while a good AOE skill has a lengthy cooldown and without being a trapper build is also one of our only AOE skills. Also, if you’re not full zerk it does pitiful damage. I run a glassy build and can tick some pretty good numbers but that’s at the cost of survivability, where other professions can put out the same or greater numbers with AOE’s and don’t have to sacrifice much or any survivability to do so.
Not only that, why Barrage OP? Have you never been hit by a Meteor Shower defending a tower? You say 3 Rangers, yeah 3 Barrage is going to hurt pretty bad… One Barrage from one Ranger is only going to hurt if you dance in it like rain. One Ele doing a Meteor Shower will hurt as long as you’re anywhere on that wall (and for the record I’m not complaining about this skill just using it as a comparison.)
So Barrage is not OP. It can hurt if the Ranger is glassy, and you’re stupid enough to stand in the middle of it for the entire cast time of it. But besides that it’s a pretty weak skill… Also, handy hit, because of the long CD and cast time of this attack, interrupting/forcing the Ranger to stop will mean only about 5 – 10 arrows fall and the attack will stop all together. I can’t tell you how annoying it is when I drop a Barrage in a dungeon or zerg and I’m knocked down or forced to stop before the attack is finished because it feels like such a waste.

There are ways to counter it, many of which have been suggested here such as melandru runes. This however isn’t exactly a solution. You shouldn’t have to center your build around having near immunity to one condition. Because without using -condition duration runes/foods, it’s a very big problem. As someone who plays a Ranger and has access to Entangle, I choose not to even use it because for those who can’t simply walk out of it, it feels like a gameover, I win, as soon as I snare them with my roots. And I don’t find that any more fun to immediately win with one attack than I do to immediately lose being hit by it.
Immobilize can be used strategically, but when it’s stacked for any more than 8 seconds it’s just plain not fair. Sure you can condition cleanse, but as I’ve said… You shouldn’t have to center your build around having immunity to one condition.

Viking Jorun.5413:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Viking Jorun.5413:

Oh, guess what? We get twelve of these threads every week, buddy. L2P, because people like you are ruining this class. We’re already at the bottom of the balance rungs with eles (who are getting buffed majorly on March 18, while we get nerfed more due to QQ like this), and this doesn’t help the case of balance. I bet you play a warrior, or even worse, a ranger. See signature for details. Come back when you reroll and start beating thieves.

Lol @ even worse a Ranger. Thieves are able to stealth/blindspam all day long. As a Ranger in full zerk, with 0 defense and 2k more health, I still win in fights without spamming either of those things. If I can win in fights without being invisible for 80% of it, so can you ( ; Maybe thieves are the ones that need to L2P.

Your argument is irrelevant. I run a stealthless build and own rangers like you all day. You’re probably one of many with a bear for a pet too.

Bearbow Rangers are idiots, sorry… The only benefit to a bear is their condition removal and that’s only a Brown Bear, besides that they’re garbage. Then again, most pets are…

Oh and good for you, you run stealthless. I bet that means either you Dagger Storm everyone to death or you’re a tanky thief, which doesn’t make “owning a Ranger like me” that hard because I would have less defense than you. Hence why I said “as a Ranger in full zerk.”

Also, I don’t suggest a nerf to thieves. But knowing we’re hitting them while they’re stealthed would be super instead of swinging blindly and having absolutely no idea whether we’re hitting them or not.
And to clarify, that’s not a nerf. Just because I know I’m hitting you doesn’t mean I’ll be able to track you, it just means I’ll know you’re close by. As is, when you stealth you may as well be invincible. And let me stress may as well. I’m fully aware you’re still vulnerable while stealthed, but unless you’re standing directly infront of your opponent, it’s really not hard for you to literally side-step an attack and your enemy being none the wiser.

Viking Jorun.5413:

Oh, guess what? We get twelve of these threads every week, buddy. L2P, because people like you are ruining this class. We’re already at the bottom of the balance rungs with eles (who are getting buffed majorly on March 18, while we get nerfed more due to QQ like this), and this doesn’t help the case of balance. I bet you play a warrior, or even worse, a ranger. See signature for details. Come back when you reroll and start beating thieves.

Lol @ even worse a Ranger. Thieves are able to stealth/blindspam all day long. While in stealth you regen 300 something HP a second? With a healing signet on Ranger, we regen a whopping 62.
In full zerk, with 0 defense and 2k more health, I still win in fights without spamming either of those things and not having any regen. If I can win in fights without being invisible for 80% of it, so can you ( ; Maybe thieves are the ones that need to L2P.

If the decision to remove pets is made, I would support it.

~ If not, I would also support it under the following conditions;
When I press F3 to put my pet on passive, make it a permanent passive. i.e. Instead of the pet randomly becoming aggro’d again in mobs, and attacking other enemies, it stays on passive until I hit F1 so I don’t repeatedly have to spam F3 every few seconds to make sure it stays passive.
Add a permanently stow pet option. Personally, I enjoy my pet despite it’s stubborn nature. But there are many situations where it would be better off not with me all together.

Bow damage ~ A slight buff to short and long bow damage would be great. I’m not asking for a huge increase, just a smidge to make them more viable as a primary weapon.

If new pets are an option, I would love to see; Basilisk [drake family, would be amphibious], Skelk [amphibious], Griffon, Dolphin, Minotaur

Signet Of The Beastmaster Remove this. Many of us Rangers would prefer to not have to spend trait points for our own signets active effects to effect us as well.

More mobility. As a profession focused on ranged combat, it would make sense for us to be able to more easily keep distance between us and our opponents. As is, we really aren’t all that fast. Quite average speed even if traited and with Signet Of The Hunt infact.

There are many other things I would suggest but I’m not completely sure of how it might affect the profession as a whole. So this will be all I say and I’ll hope at least a few of these things are implemented with the upcoming changes. The Ranger is my favorite profession and even with its bad reputation and obvious flaws, I enjoy it far better than the rest. If some of the glaring issues with the profession are fixed, I couldn’t express how happy I’d be.

I noticed this, too. Although I don’t have a problem with it, they are definitely getting stronger. First was EotM, now Lion’s Arch under attack. I used to be able to kill vets without breaking a sweat, now it’s actually a struggle to kill even one.
However, they are almost all level 83 – 84 in LA and most of them are some kind of Aetherblade Warrior, so. That might explain the damage and resistance they have. I’d just say that if you’re going to travel alone in LA while it’s being invaded, do what you can to avoid fighting more than one vet at a time. Elites are a whole different story.