Guild Wars 2

getting close to deleting my ranger out of pure rage and dissatisfaction. hanging on by a thread, wanna try out a few more builds.

major mistakes: culling, stealth spam with culling, allowing 5-6 specs to dominate for 6 months, releasing spvp with paltry amount of content and support, not hotfixing major pvp bugs that ruined tpvp for weeks, not giving us access to a PTR

muddy terrain and LR are a must for me. i usually get caught in combat with SoH, so i might as well just leave it on my bar. this is with my condition bunker. but for SB hybrid, i think 2 traps + LR is a must.

a vid about culling exploitation and diving into clueless zergs is new and refreshing.

keeping 8v8 hotjoin will be a colossal MISTAKE. at least make it 5v5, if not taking it out altogether.

no i like what youre doing. imo crit > toughness > condition damage > healing, cuz id be using two traps. some condition damage is needed. likely i’ll just do apoth/knight’s

while i love the tank and dueling capabilities of full conditions, i’ll be switching over to a hybrid SB build. i cant down people fast enough in a zerg with just conditions. too much cleansing, too much safety in a zerg. anyway, it’s nice to have both options.

how did you get those stats? apothecary/knight’s?

you can bunker and have some of the best mobility in the game. That’s about it. GS/sword / dagger is a tpvp combo

They’ve acknowledged the game seriously lacks build variety. They acknowledged there are OP and UP builds. They’ve acknowledged AOE is a problem. So I’m left wondering when the devs will actually wake up and come up with a patch that actually rocks the boat a little. Not a single patch thus far has changed or challenged the status quo.

absolutely. power SB (without crit) fizzled after the QZ nerf. it hits like a wet noodle. however, even with full condition gear, SB is a little lackluster. SB is really a hybrid weapon requiring high crit and some condition damage. knight’s gear and 0/30/30/x/x is most definitely the BEST build for the SB, if thats your thing.

Monkeymonger.9235:

[link to twitch tv channel: http://de.twitch.tv/prydatv/b/355515191]

I don’t play in “zergs”, so i can’t give you any advice on it.
Have fun with your necro!

other than aoe blindness, i dont see him doing anything useful at all =( it’s not like they need the mitigation anyway.

conditions seem to be more of a nuisance in wvw than something to be feared. too much condition clearance out there (my support guard can clear 12 around him in one sequence). i also play a BM ranger, and i will occasionally face a condi necro. i will think “oh man these conditions are a pain”, but then they’ll be gone either cuz my pet ate them or because of my omnomberry cream food. or my healing spring.

the ranger just seems to be able to apply more conditions much faster than a necro while retaining all tankiness and some burst with the pets. there arent really any other condition specs out there other than necro and ranger, and unfortunately wvw is all about instant aoe burst, or insane single target burst. the necro cant do either.

thanks guys, i am intrigued. what gear would you recommend? typically condition/precision hybrids?

thats a squishy build, i wouldnt recommend to a beginner. you will get dropped by a haste thief in under a second.

entangle now scales appropriately with condition damage. a lot of people, myself included, find this elite effective especially on the reduced 2 min CD. SB and LB projectiles got a 30% velocity boost. Sb is great now, Lb continues to blow. minor improvements to pets hitting targets while moving. f2 still bad. thats about it.

im in a small casual guild (7 people) and we had more than enough influence for Art of War lvl 5. quit your whining.

Omega.1473:

nerva.7940:

Sb does way better damage because more of its arrows HIT. Youre lucky if rapid fire lands half of its damage on a moving dodging target lawl. If lb got 30 percent projectile speed buff I would consider using it. Until then warrior rifle and mesmer gs remain vastly superior

“Lawl”? The arrows fly at the same speed. There’s no difference in flight trajectory or speed between a SB or LB arrow. The only difference ends up being range. At longer range, EVERY projectile attack in the game is more likely to miss. SB at 1200 and LB at 1200 miss at the same rate.

Its either your imagination or some fault of yours that is making your LB miss more than your SB.

you fire the SB one arrow at a time at a faster, spammable rate. the LB has longer CD’s and slower autoattack. when half of your rapid fire whiffs, you have to wait before doing dps again.

build it and they will come.

who cares even with 200% movement speed, the pet is still completely unreliable in landing its dps. this is why i ultimately dropped SoH in addition to all movement enhancing traits for the pet. pet is good on swap for the burst, and whenever your target is right on your crippled or immobilized.

Jiiub.7135:

not to forget my second life bar that refills every 5-10 sec and my already huge life pool, and unless you run crappy glasscannon build you got enough toughness to stick around forever.

and do no damage. or anything useful for that matter.

does anyone actually stay in wells? wells work just fine on points in spvp, but everyone in wvw usually scatters after the first tick. dunno, just what ive seen. the other thing is wells only have a 600 casting range, which means youre basically point blank. whereas mesmers can cast glamour spells from 1200 while doing full dps.

Laii.2780:

If you want to roam around in WvW and duel people and win 90% of the time with the least amount of effort, go roll a theif, and dont’ make silly threads like this where you complain about beating a necro, or loosing as a necro 1v1. ~

oh im not complaining at all actually. just giving you my observations. necros seem to be downed quite easily in both larger and smaller engagements, unless theyre bunker in which case they dont really do much.

Main message here is if youre so afraid of failure and criticism just give us access to the ptr. Make us a part of the balancing process. No secrets need to be kept. Look at the balancing process for dota2

Sylvari tier 3. Hands down the coolest gs in the game. Would have it rather than a legendary

Thanks. Another reason not to use these garbage shouts. Add it to the list.

What is the role of this build in larger fights and how do you contribute to your team? Id like to roll a power necro but feeling kinda discouraged because I never see necros making a difference on the battlefield. I dont see this doing any damage or bringing much utility.

I want to roll a necro but am discouraged. Still welcoming responses from people with basic reading comprehension

Sb does way better damage because more of its arrows HIT. Youre lucky if rapid fire lands half of its damage on a moving dodging target lawl. If lb got 30 percent projectile speed buff I would consider using it. Until then warrior rifle and mesmer gs remain vastly superior

Bird for wvw for best burst and vigor. Cats for nonbunker spvp and pve. Cats do way better dps on stationary targets like when fighting on a point or dpsing a mob. Birds give most reliable burst.

I want to start leveling a caster for wvw. There are way too many eles and mesmers out there and I like my power necro in spvp. However im really disheartened because necros get stomped hard in wvw. I dueled a few good necros on my condi bunker ranger and their damage was laughable. I’m able to put out way more single target condi dps and reapply it way faster.

So any reasons to invest in gearing up a necro? Any objective gosu necros out there care to convince me?

Jazenn.7526:

nerva.7940:

You get the exact same playstyle with apothecary gear except you do way more damage and dont get killed spamming sword #1

I switch between veggie pizza and lemongrass poultry soup. Bark skin + 40% reduction on conditions is the best combo imo. You should maintain perma vigor no problem with birds

I don’t get killed spamming sword #1.

So you play the condition damage variant? Hm, what weapons and skills do you have?

sword/dagger or torch/GS with traps and entangle. 0/20/30/0/20. pretty tanky

Prysin.8542:

one can say what you want about the longbow, but in PVE and WvW it is short of unrivaled in terms of proper DPS, IF you go for a full crit build.

it’s out-dps’d by the SB by a large margin.

You get the exact same playstyle with apothecary gear except you do way more damage and dont get killed spamming sword #1

I switch between veggie pizza and lemongrass poultry soup. Bark skin + 40% reduction on conditions is the best combo imo. You should maintain perma vigor no problem with birds

it’s a terrible weapon because opponents can strafe most of your arrows and easily dodge your Rapid Fire. barrage with 1500 range is boss, but finding a build to go with is impossible. LB rangers are fodder in wvw.

BM conditions traps is EXTREMELY strong in dungeons. you can tank, and bring more utility and dps than a necro. i have issues with my pet only on some bosses.

Atherakhia.4086:

Pets just need to move faster, take significantly less damage from AE, use thier abilities instantly when pushing the F2 button (and dart into range if the F2 requires a melee range), and actually retreat when told and retreat in a straight line back to the ranger.

agree up to here. pets actually dont need too much tweaking, just AOE resistance and more responsiveness.

some of our utilities definitely need work. spirits, signets and shouts are weak, while survival and traps are very strong.

LB and OH axe need tweaking rest is fine.

jkctmc.8754:

This is what a good Thief looks like, and how noobish he makes the Ranger class look.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHOpACoX4ic

where do i begin?

1. it takes him 5 minutes to down a scrub sword ranger with a little bit of vigor and a few points in wilderness. that ranger btw uses a drake. lulz. i wonder how he would feel about a perma vigor / near-perma prot sword/dagger ranger…hmmm.

2. culling is culling. he is always able to get off 2-3 hits (about 2 seconds) before even rendering. great work ANet. sucks for about 80% of the wvw population who cant pvp.

3. when i play MY ranger, any thief bladestorming is essentially committing suicide. because what usually follows is muddy terrain, burning, double bird burst, and if i feel like it, spike trap + daze followed by 8-10 stacks of bleeds, poison and more fire for good measure. thats 1v1. in a smaller group, glass cannon thieves dont even get to duel me because my hammer warr buddy has already slammed him to the ground. so, bladestorming thieves go severely punished on my watch and i usually brighten up when i see one popping it

4. true, rangers cant do what he does. kind of impossible without at least one on-demand invis. but it needs to be emphasized that CnD chaining is a low skillcap procedure that is made even easier by culling. this type of gameplay is indeed fun to watch, but only because people are completely clueless. it’s a borderline exploit that can actually be easily countered.

5. rangers are meant to tank because they cant drop targets. if you dont evade/prot/regen tank your ranger, you will get crushed not only by thieves but by mesmers, condi necros, and berserker warriors – all of which do your “glass cannon” job much better than you. how many rangers in that vid are built correctly for the meta? it’s a sad sight, but how is “none” for an answer?

if it’s not 0/0/30/10/30 or its variant, it’s not unstoppable.

you dont need bunker to solocap camps. i did it in full zerker gear. then i did it with cleric’s, and now doing it in apothecary. solocapping isnt a big deal and every prof can do it.

pet DPS is more than fine. it’s excellent. pet survivability in smaller engagements that arent spammed by aoe is also fine. therefore, pet is fine in SPVP.

problem is reliability. pets are extremely unreliable due to ridiculous pathing/AI. also very squishy against aoe spam.

pets should dodge when you dodge.

im likely the ranger you speak of. i left because i couldnt fit my ranger in their paradigm no matter how well or what build i played. great bunch of guys and gals, had a blast with them. but i loves my gimpy ranger more than anything in this game >.< if i were to do things differently, i would have probably invested more time and effort into an LB/SB ranger with knight’s/zerker and piercing arrows because it was somewhat effective at times. but even then, my damage would be laughable compared to what other profs can put out at 1200. and utility for the group would be almost zilch.

frankly, all profs except for the ranger and engineer, are capable of doing something on a massive scale that can change the tide of a larger battle. even thieves built full glass cannon, stone and haste can annihilate almost any target at will on a short CD.

can i kill a gosu full zerker warrior on my ranger? sure. there’s probably nothing i cant handle 1v1. but ultimately, wtf does it matter in wvw? if you cant down multiple opponents with your group, or provide significant lasting boons on a short CD, you might as well kitten in a corner.

we’ll see where rangers stand with the upcoming aoe nerf, if it ever happens. it should make things pretty interesting.

any kind of condition build will annihilate any thief. d/p culling exploiters just take a little longer. thats without traps. with traps, it’s not even a fight. if his cd’s are blown and you slam Entangle, you might as well just go afk.

power/crit burst builds with little sustain and toughness, well it comes down to who lands their burst first.

colin, we still dont have a reason to kill champ mobs.

epic fail. anything less than “we’re currently testing significant pet AI changes internally” is unacceptable at this point.

i had a blast with my cleric set until i decided to stop using it. when i looked back at the footage i realized i wasnt really doing much for my group, even though it looked impressive. overall, it was a waste of 35g (sorry OP). i would stash it aside until they maybe revamp spirits or something, but even then spirits would work better with HTC gear.

im glad there are others using these exhilarating, high-APM builds. bunker ranger is one of the funnest, most balanced specs in the game. but really, he belongs in tpvp.

no suggestions. cleric’s doesnt work on the ranger in WvW. i tested it for about 2 months and will soon have a vid demonstrating some of its strengths. in tpvp, cleric rangers are very powerful because they can do 13k burst with double ravens. if you have the white raven in pve, then youre in luck.

the innate problem with the cleric ranger is that you take forever to kill something, period. yes, you can tank 10-15 scrubs for a while and leave battle at will (assuming sword/dagger/GS), but in order to kill a single good player you need to stick around an area for a few minutes at least. meaning, you will get zerged and killed.

in addition, cleric rangers bring absolutely nothing to large scale engagements. you dont have damage. you can dive in and tank people for a while, land a few Entangles and raven crits here and there, until someone lands a lucky immobilize on you.

roll with apothecary gear because it’s flexible. it tanks just as well as cleric, but you can do more damage and it synergizes with pets better. bunker trap bomber is actually a pretty fun spec and you can help bring groups down. it works way better when you have actual condition damage, as opposed to HTP.

as things stand, best gear sets for the ranger in WvW are Apothecary, and Knight’s with a combination of Soldier’s/Berserker’s. with the exception of Healing Spring and spamming immobilizes/traps, rangers dont have a true support role in WvW. so unless youre doing some serious damage, you aint doin much.

kitten like this just cant be in game. it’s like having headshots with no skill requirement. reason #500 why GW2 cant and wont be a competitive pvp game.

still no reason to kill champs.

a way to make OH axe viable:

- #4 needs to be a NUKE. so maybe 3-4k crit one way
- #5 needs to be cast while moving

axes are horribly ineffective outside of condi builds (axe/dagger or axe/torch). OH axe abilities are so stupidly bad. #5 roots you and only deflects projectiles. the opponent can just wait until the cast is done, or just switch to melee/interrupt you. you have no evades at a much shorter range, therefore no flow in battle (this is why LB is such a horrible weapon, as opposed to SB, which has the best evade in the game).

if you wanna talk combo fields, lets talk SB and swords. SB through frost field applies chill much better than anything else. leaps through frost = frost armor. leaps through water fields = extra 6k heals. somebody mentioned some sort of chill build. well, my condi ranger does that without giving up his tankiness and damage. axe#3, sb through frost field, snow owl.

in conclusion, axes are a skirmishing weapon due to their range. they suck because axe OH is horribly gimp and you have no evades. axe MH only works in power/crit PVE scenarios, and in condition builds in pvp.