Guild Wars 2

rabidsmiles.5926:

Ok so it sounds like I should stick with the zerk, easy enough. Was wondering if I ought to swap out the scholar runes for monk runes to get the 10% outgoing healing? My damage isn’t anything to write home about but a bit more healing for my pug groups might be more helpful?

Is there ascended zealots outside of raids? I don’t raid…and still got to work on opening up the magi sets. Suppose I can pick up the cleric stuff…just means more agony infusions I have to buy and reattuning rings.

Yes, you might as well do that. If you don’t intend to min-max your setup, it would most probably end up being the best pug composition.
Your DPS would not skyrocket by having an offensive rune, and I think mathematically you’d get more healing than damage with Monk Rune.

Long story Short:

If you’re with experienced premades – go for Condi.
If you’re with puggies – you might be better of with Cleric/Zealot/Magi accessories in addition to your Berserker Armor (it’s much cheaper to get jewels than armor – and berserker will be useful at any time)

UmbraNoctis.1907:

Pro league winner team was using druid. I doubt they went to the finals with something they would consider an “inferior” comp …

Role wise i would compare it more with scrapper than ele. Unlike ele, druid is not a pure bunker/support spec, it more a bruiser type. Teams are usually using druid OR scrapper but druid AND ele. Of course it might lookt different without the class stacking rule, but for now, druid is definitely a viable choice even for pro teams.

So…
… We were inferior mathematically and in performance for almost 4 years, constantly eating nothing but plain nerfs affecting all our builds…
… And now we became pro league choice?

How did this happen, if may I ask? I cannot find any other answer than it was the only bruiser-like class to compete. Technically the way it has always been. Players being able to outperform enemies by 3 times of awareness and predictions are able to compete with other classes even as Rangers (druids).

Because any way you look at it – There hasn’t been anything improved on ranger for PvP since release. And Rangers being inferior was more of a matter of fact before. I can’t see how could it have changed.
(Please, keep in mind I haven’t appeared in-game for some time but am still interested in what’s going on and somehow cannot grasp the situation. What did I miss?)

UmbraNoctis.1907:

Druid is totally viable at all levels of PvP, from SoloQ to Pro League. Even if the class isn’t as mandatory as some others, i wouln’t call it “bad”.

I wouldn’t rush it that much to call the Druid viable for Pro League.
I don’t recall any druid popularity in there but anyone could see openings if a druid was taken into a game.

If a druid was taken into a team, it was one of the easiest things to counter and play against. If a druid performed well – I can guarantee that the very same player would have brought the very same or much better results to the table with another class, especially elementalist.

Rangers are viable but inferior … Which makes it “bad” for pro league.

Darkness.9732:

In my opinion Ranger is bad as always.

Nothing has changed. We are not desired in pvp.
We are not desired in pve

Bolded part is incorrect.

Staff is mostly used for PvP because it fills Astral Bar, provides very solid mobility and okay sustain, and doesn’t suffer from reflects like our other Ranged Weapons, plus it pierces by default.

So it is technically our best untraited ranged weapon by far.

I believe they stated it even in the patch notes alongside with sword’s Monarch’s Leap…
That it will no longer be affected by stuff …

And it still does.
Meh, we will never get attention. Might as well just vent here.

My no. 1 would still be Enlargement and Quick Draw in interaction with CAF, though.

PvE: Meta (for group DPS; inferior at personal performance)
PvP: Viable for solo Q (yet inferior)

Ranger in a nutshell.

Faux Sheaux.6179:

Nah, that’s perfect. I’ve been away too long to really filter through decent builds and not-as-decent builds that get posted on my own, so thanks.

I’m technically in the same boat, already.
But if I’m correct – nothing has beaten this build in DPS min-maxing ever since it was created.

It’s for highest-tier organized game-play, though. You might get better results if you adjust your build to capabilities of your squad. But this is what “elitists” or “pros” would expect from you in terms of meta.

Faux Sheaux.6179:

Interested in this as well. I haven’t played in a couple years and want to run through everything again.

What weapon/pet combos are popular nowadays for PvE?

I don’t know …
… This is like the 10th time this month that we are saying this to players. So I hope you’ll excuse my laziness and just give the credit to these guyz.
http://qtfy.enjin.com/forum/m/27740239/viewthread/26116904-qt-rangerdruid-raid-builds

Oldirtbeard.9834:

What’s the tanking meta?

Most probably full Cleric. Or Nomad. Or Minstrel. Or any combination of that…

Because sincerely – no one cares what are you wearing as a tank, as long as your toughness value is the highest of your squad.

If you are not talking about Raids – tanking doesn’t exist. When talking about meta – Chronomancers are tanks. Not druids.

Oldirtbeard.9834:

Hmm would any of these builds lend them selves to tanking?

Depends on what are you planning to tank. Most probably no.

Starbreaker.6507:

Sorry…my bad. It’s sometimes tough to tell when it comes to the forums.

I’ll redact what I said.

No H8

No harm done, Sir.
Nothing happened. I could have clarified that earlier. (Using PoS actually is fun. No one expects Ranger to be helpful and this way they actually burn themselves – I liked it myself)

UnitedChaos.8364:

It’s a learn to play issue. Most just spam 1-4 and 5 when they feel like it, because they understand that 1-4 are instant cast and 5 is an aoe. While in fact, the autoattack, with the exception of rapid fire, is the best dps. I see players all the time including 3 in their rotation just because.

Experienced players will know to use 4 for interruption and deliberate kb and 3 to escape.

Just for math clarification,
Using #4 is a DPS increase at any range. Not only it is a 0,5 vs 0,75 (without aftercasts) cast time, it also deals the same damage as Auto-Attack at 500-1000 range.
With the most important fact: It is a guaranteed projectile Finisher.

The difference is neglectable but using PBS is a DPS increase. The truly experienced players will use #4 for DPS into rotation to targets that cannot pushed or knocked back (aka bosses or targets with Break Bars).
Especially since you’ll mostly be in less than 500 range if you are at a PvE content where DPS matters.

You shouldn’t associate yourself with bad players.

If you realized people do that – it was in your interest to keep your distance from people like that.
If you hadn’t – the joke’s probably on you, already.

Brimflamme.3587:

I really want to try this build cuz it looks amazing, but the zealot gear is so expensive are there an cheaper alternative?

Combining Berserker with Clerics or Magi.
You don’t need much healing power for open world, tbh. Getting to ~500 should be perfectly enough if you need the sustain.

Technically, in PvE the more DPS you bring the better. But for soloing and roaming – mobility saves more time. That’s why GS + Staff goes so well. But one way or another, stats are not as important.
You just need to know what do you need. Ranger is a class that needs to respec most of the time. So… Most of what you choose wouldn’t be of harm in soloing as long as you don’t combine GS with Condition damage or something.

I’m not sure mathematically…
… But how much boons do you usually keep up?
Maybe you could benefit more from Instinctive Reaction (Healing > Power + Quickness)

Apart from that, your build looks comfortable. You should be good to roam.

Bigpapasmurf.5623:

But how would one get around the “you have 60 seconds to move or get logged off” function that GW2 has for afk’ers?

I think the auto-loot function once worked as a refresh to being AFK. Just as if you looted it manually.
Not sure if it still works that way.

Clarification would be appreciated indeed.

But pet is not a skill. So if it were me, I’d keep doing this and if they really decided to get to me, I could refer to their own policy.
Pet is not an ability. Pet controllable skills such as F2 are classified as skills. But technically, you can’t even set your pet to passive since that would mean using a skill. And pets are on Defensive by default.

Unless they clarify, you’d have to remove any interactive runes from your equipment every time you decide to go AFK at a beneficial place. Which is just as illogical.
Using just a pet should be fine.

That way I’d actually consider Axe/Axe + GS
… You’ll have some easy-to-get burst this way.

But your CAF will not be filled often and your mobility will drop, so it’s a trade off.
One way or another, Nature Magic without WHaO is a complete waste. Skirmishing all the way. Double PoS / Maul makes a difference.
And with PoS > Maul > Maul combo, usually everything dies in an AoE.

OneHitWonder.5741:

and what happens if you don’t use any skills and only your pet defends you?

and since when is not responding a reason for a ban?

It says if all 3 applies.
Not responding alone is not enough evidence for being punished.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

I still seriously want to see axe AA damage get a buff. In full berserker it crits for like 2k max.

I understand that it stacks might and it bounces but the damage is still extremely low.

I might be wrong, because ever since I stopped playing I never really did any maths or equations but …
… Didn’t the big weapon update bring axe to a bearable level? I mean, with the after-casts gone, the DPS should have brought it near other weapons, with a slight lower DPS unmighted (which is understandable since it provides might).

Does anyone have the numbers?

If you don’t go for any condition damage – the base condition damage is ridiculously weak (if you are 25 mighted, which you aren’t without WHaO + NM + Axe synergy, it gets better but it’s still less than a dedicated build). If you are not going for Apothecary / Sinister / Viper which offers condition damage – axe and torch are not worth taking a slot. That’s math.

Staff is AoE by default. It’s not as good for tagging because the AoE is linear, but the range width is much greater, too.

@ Zenith
Yes.
To all of it. Hands down, this all combined is an illogical nightmare.

Justine.6351:

Something crazy like a skill on sb shooting an arrow that is tethered to the ground at you feet, the target(s) hit with it are knocked down when trying to leave its tether range. Weird stuff like that.

…

It’s not weird at all.
It’s one of the most interactive and fun mechanics taken from another game where – it naturally works.

It wouldn’t even have to be hard to implement. Something like 1-man Maw Prison from DHs spawning with a center at your target. It would be cool, actually.

Zenith.7301:

And, yes, I care about character animations. Maybe you don’t, but plenty of people do.

I don’t want to imagine 1/4-1/5 sec cast attacks with quickness up, it’s just dumb.

All of our animations… Actually all animations, not just ours – under quickness look unrealistic and dumb already. I still don’t see your point.

Let me guess…
… We never had problems with Maul being the most obvious burst-attack ranger had? And haven’t we ever had problems to hit it since it was so slow that every enemy just dodged it one-handed?

Attack Speed is one of the main issues in the game. While every single class has everything instant and bursty, we have delay on every bloody ability in this game (not to mention that our only burst ability hits for less than auto-attack of other classes), forcing us into twice the effort for still less reward.

Less reaction time is a drastic QoL improvement. I can’t blame you for having priorities in cosmetics over game-play, but I and a lot of others would rather play an entertaining game than a game that looks nice.
Having both is a luxury that I don’t remember having in this game.

P.S. I’m not saying other ideas are bad. I’m just saying reducing attack animations is a solution that solves a lot.

Axe/Torch is a terrible waste in the build you posted since you don’t go for any condition damage at all.

I’d personally recommend you to go for GS-Staff build since it is by far the most mobile thing you can get on druid – which is a huge (and most rewarding) benefit for solo content.
So I’ll only throw some reasoning why and possibilities how to polish that build further.

You really fancy druid, which has very good synergy with Healing overall. Plus – you like Greatsword a lot. That being said – we are currently glued to Power (and/or Healing Power) oriented setup (other might get boring for you or would be inefficient).

So, my suggestions:
-Ditch Nature Magic completely. It doesn’t compliment your play-style. You don’t have anyone to support (solo build), and you don’t really work with boons either.
Pick Skirmishing instead. Definitely. It boosts your mobility, damage, utility, simply everything. Quick Draw is by far the best thing to have on most builds.

-You don’t need 1000 healing power on a solo build. To be frank – you need light years less. Glyph of Empowerment can be used for 25% boost in healing, which is usually the only thing you need to get back to full HP. And it has good synergy with Druid runes. Plus you have Staff and GS in combination with Healing Spring water field.

-Swap Rune of the Druid for any other. It’s bugged. Vampirism is my personal suggestion for roaming and solo content.

UnitedChaos.8364:

Ranger will probably receive another nerf, because you did get a couple shots in…eventually

Sad, but true.

Zenith.7301:

Even if you reduced the casting time, you would have to buff greatsword to such a degree where the animations would be so quick, it’d look bad. Now apply perma quickness on raids, I don’t think that will work.

Because we all cared about the animation when they reduced Rapid Fire’s cast time from 5 seconds to 2,5.
And we all mentioned it at least once in the forums. [/s]

No, this argument is not valid. No one cares about speed of the attack animation. If all GS skills got reduced cast time – it would be a great improvement. #5 would improve QoL by 10 million, #4 counter would be a massive QoL, #3 and #2 are kinda unimportant and #1 would be a much loved DPS increase.

I see no reason why reduced attack animations would be a problem.

Justine.6351:

Use a stun break then try again naturally !

I swapped entangle for SotP recently and good grief, that skill is soooo slow to cast, I feel naked.

But you can’t recast it for several seconds after you had it interrupted, you know.
And it can sill get interrupted even after using a stun-break.

Justine.6351:

OGDeadHead.8326:

Unless they allow us to move when using WD, give us stability while channeling. Me and others have suggested this before. Pretty much for the same reasons we have stability on CA#5.

so use a stability skill?

I tried but then I got interrupted.

StickerHappy.8052:

…

Also, I kinda thrive on this stuff, theorycrafting. So please if you can post more ideas. Thank you.

My idea:
Sword’s Serpent Strike now always puts you behind your target, regardless of your former position.
Dagger skill #4 no longer makes your character move to the side. Now has 600 range.

Wondrouswall.7169:

There is so much wrong here that I’m glad the Devs don’t often browse our forums.

Is a place next to you still vacant?
<sips coffee>

@GussJr
Perfectly fine, pal. We’re all human. None of us was born perfect. We were able to get your message in the end and that’s all that matters.

And while we might not share your passion for the current Glyph of the Tides functionality it doesn’t mean we do not respect it. We just have a different opinion.

@GussJr

Now I think I understand. You just mentioned the beginning wrong.
Yes, yes I completely understand this rotation, I used it myself. That’s why I said some people prefer it this way – exactly for this purpose.

But if you ask yourself if you could do the same with the flipped functionality, I believe you would have said yes in the end. Now it’s just the matter of what you are already adjusted to.
But you would have been able to pull off the very same result even with the flipped mechanic.

GussJr.1643:

Because, I use the knock back to push enemies off point to start de-capping it…I don’t want the pull to be the non-CA form when I am trying to de-cap a point with enemies already occupying it….why would I want to pull them all to me when the first thing I want to do is get them off of it.

Because you just say so. And also because for decapping purposes there is LB with half the cooldown to bait initial cooldowns.

GussJr.1643:

Glyph of tides in CA = pull everyone in with glyph of tides,
<edit: you have to leave CA here>
3 on staff, 5 on staff, 4 on staff, switch out of CA glyph of tides to push them all away again, repeat.

Its perfect as is, no swap needed

You wouldn’t have to swap out of CAF to push them all away again.
And you wouldn’t have to Activate CAF to pull them in just to use your staff combo.

I mean… That’s all your words right there. Right now I feel like it’s your own word against yours and I just can’t get to understand what did you mean. Unless you explain, I won’t know.

GussJr.1643:

Except that it works, tremendously well. Plenty of my vids show exactly how I do it…you can easily control several enemies at once – to bunker points or give your team free reign to kill them while enemies are being dazed and pulled and immob’d…its really not that confusing. Annoying CC’s and huge team heals.

That’s all amazing and stuff but how is it different from being able to do exactly the very same thing but easier and more user-friendly?

If it was flipped, you could do the same thing but you wouldn’t have to blow CAF for nothing at the beginning of your mentioned rotation.

The sequence is not confusing. Your reasoning why is it better the current way is.

The most important question:
Which part of PvE is this build for?

Open World?
Fractals? Dungeons?
Raids?

For as far as I can tell – this build is not really efficient for any group content apart from open world. It lacks a lot of stuff. And the personal damage it deals is not even as high as a party buffing zerker build.
So as long as you are in the open world tagging events and farming stuff – this build is completely fine. Anywhere else – don’t get surprised if you by any chance get kicked out of the group.

GussJr.1643:

Glyph of tides in CA = pull everyone in with glyph of tides, 3 on staff, 5 on staff, 4 on staff, switch out of CA glyph of tides to push them all away again, repeat.

Its perfect as is, no swap needed

I’m lost.
You just said showed us the most wonderful, most amazing example of a horrible scenario.

-Blow off your CAF for Tides only
- drop CAF loosing all benefits you could have had
- Use your normal abilities that you could have used without entering CAF if it was swapped

- And push them away if you want to be on defensive … While holding your offensive setup (weapons) … outside CAF.

No, plenty of what you said feels wrong.

I suggested this in the early PBE.

PvE:
When I’m on the offensive – I want stuff stacked. Having to blow CAF for it to work my way is user-unfriendly.
When I want to heal stuff – I want everything else out. This way I pull everyone in to smack my team.

PvP
When I’m in melee – I want to hit everyone in melee range. So I might as well want the pull instead of push. In case I’m ranged and want to push guyz back – I should have LB. But having Staff+LB is the only valid point of PvP knockback in normal mode.
By entering CAF – the same as PvE. I want to heal stuff – let enemies stay back. The only reasoning to why is it good in PvP now is the Tides>#5 synergy.

Naturally, both functionalities work and may be “better” for a part of the community, but I think swapping them makes more sense from “role” perspective.

Prophet.1584:

at one time anet had given pets a buff and the salt in the pvp forums was overflowing. all the hate about having AI killing players etc, etc. basically everyone in PvP wants to be able to completely ignore the pet.

If that’s what anet wants, fine, but give the damage back to the ranger.

I wouldn’t mind this myself, actually.
I’m not sure who gave the concept initially but there once was an idea of pets who wouldn’t actually deal auto-attack damage at all, but would be sorted into utility categories.

Something like dogs sniffing out stealthed
Birds pecking eyes – blinding
And stuff like that.

I personally think this would have been the best pet concept I can think of. Having a pet that would help you according to content but would only help you hunt down targets instead of pretending to hunt them itself – that would be amazing.

One can dream, right?

Zenith.7301:

This is so wrong.

Optimal groups bring ONE mesmer. Optimal groups bring TWO druids and PS warriors. That alone tells you the strength of the buffs provided for a class that make some wanted to be stacked over others.

Nothing beats PS warrior in terms of group damage boost, and druid comes in second place.

That’s exactly the reason.
One mesmer can support more than 5 people with quickness and provides alacrity (not everyone benefits from it that much, only some classes need it).
You wouldn’t have brought 2 Rangers if 1/3 of what they bring would be a pointless overkill at a cost of low DPS.

And some groups (non-hardcore groups) still bring 2 mesmers.
Which means 2 mesmers are still optimal. Not the top efficient but still very optimal.

FrownyClown.8402:

Not really. Look at druid before smokescale nerf. It did so much damage that you couldn’t ignore it in the fight. All the druid had to do was heal and then they won all the 1v1 fights. The pets need more reliable damage from their f2 skill and thats it.

And that was exactly how it was supposed to be.
A ranger(druid) sacrificing 2 traitlines, 1 heal and 1 Elite utility and a pet skill was actually able to hurt just like I think he should.
I’m sorry, but you just said something you shouldn’t. You just admitted you believe Ranger pets should be ignorable. And I’m sorry if this gets surprising but that’s something that our whole ranger community tries to change ever since day 1.

A thief will blow your head of by auto-attacking and you can either force him to evade and make you waste half of the attacks of your whole team or he’ll wipe you all out without your team ever being able to resurrect you (because elite). And if you successfully focus him down, he’ll just decap another point thanks to stealth.

Pets need more reliable damage. Full stop.

bearshaman.3421:

Prophet.1584:

edit: I will also add that for Rangers to max out condi DPS we have to play a completely selfish build that does nothing for the team. There is very little content in this game that is meant to be played completely solo therefore playing a build that gimps your team is not desired. When you build a condi or power Druid you’re not putting out nearly as much personal dps but buffing the entire team.

What build is that?

Someone already linked it up in the thread.

bearshaman.3421:

Mesmer has one role and one role ever in any group content, or they get kicked. Trust me, they have it worse.

Yet they bring more in PvE mathematically, and I alone know of Burst Mesmer as well as Condi or Well bunker builds.

I played one, so I think we are only in kind of similar boat as mesmers. But they certainly don’t have it worse.

I think pets should get fixed.
Not removed.

We already know pets are not going away and I personally prefer the attitude of fixing problems rather than replacing them.

bearshaman.3421:

If you make a ele for anything other than dps, you will be told to respec or gtfo. Because that’s what people expect eles to do. My statement was one of what people expect your character to be, not whether it had build diversity.

And I would argue ranger does have build diversity, but let’s stay on topic.

I have been witness of several occasions where an Ele was asked to take on a duty of healer. In PvP they can technically get away with anything. Cleric. Berseker. Any good ele will take the lead of the battle.
In WvW, they are beasts as Celestials (or at least used to, not sure about today).
And there is a video of the slowest Vale Guardian fight achieved by 10 elementalists (which means they are even the most versatile class, not only the most efficient – I think it was 17 minutes long VG)

No one else is scrapped into a single role as we are. That comparison to Elementalists was on spot.

Jim Hunter.6821:

You’d still need to increase their base speed since their pathing is garbage (seriously… why the hell do they like to run past players before turning to attack?) and they can’t attack while moving.

Yes, this mostly.

Teraphas.6210:

They are more asking for the skill to continue at its current range but extend the affected area to 300 to compensate for the pet stopping to a track vs attacking while moving

Yea, I do believe I know how they meant it – but how they word it implies the wrong functionality.
And we can’t just trust the ones in charge to be able to read our minds when we already know they can’t read our complaints properly to begin with.

Prophet.1584:

Pet Hit reliability: I still think the easiest and fastest way to make pets more reliable is to increase AA range to 300 all around. birds hit extremely reliably on AA, they just die to everything. 300 or more range on AA would fix this with little effort on the part of the devs.

This might not work. If you do this – pets will simply stay at that 300 range, most probably. That way, absolutely nothing might change except pets holding their distance against their targets with the same unreliable hit pattern.