Curse

stoop14 · Mar 11, 2008, 03:43 PM // 15:43

From the face i can tell they are both range and have pets. Are they similar to play? Are rangers one of the better soloing chars in gw since i don't know anyone? Also would monk be best for 2nd pro since i'll be playing solo alot so i can heal myself?

Ele Mental · Mar 11, 2008, 03:47 PM // 15:47

it all depends on what you want to do...
as you are new ill give you a link that will help you decide

http://www.pvxwiki.com/wiki/Main_Page

a play around with that and see what you want to accomplish out of the game, may i suggest you looking at the great general pve builds first so you can get to know the game.

FoxBat · Mar 11, 2008, 03:51 PM // 15:51

Biggest difference vs WoW soloing: you can have a full party of AIs accompany you. If you have nightfall or EotN, you can even customize the skills those AIs are using. Given that, pretty much any character can "solo"; the only time you'd leave with less than a full party is farming, which most classes can do, but they show efficiency in very different areas.

That said, soloing as a pure support class (like monk) can be a nusiance. The AIs tend to function much better with you attacking things, as they will all focus on your target.

Longasc · Mar 11, 2008, 03:56 PM // 15:56

Stoop, the main difference is that pets are much less powerful and important than in WoW.

While having some self-healing early on, it is usually better to focus on blocking or evading damage and let your healer henchmen or heroes do the job.

Soloing in GW is also not really viable, it is a team game. You can play all alone of course, but you will fill your party with henchmen or heroes. If playing solo, people mostly farm for money. There is no real soloing, going out all alone, in GW, it is not like WoW in that regard.

You secondary profession hardly matters as you can later switch between them at will. But Monk is a good choice for the hard rez early on, you can use it when your henchmen died and you escaped to res them later.

P.S.: Warriors are the damage dealers in GW, Rangers are very versatile and excel at spreading conditions and interrupting mobs. Two more common elite skills are Barrage, shooting multiple arrows at multiple foes, and Broad Head Arrow, to daze caster. Daze is a condition that makes casters easy to interrupt and renders them quite helpless.

Erm yes. I hope this is good enough for starters.

ogre_jd · Mar 11, 2008, 06:10 PM // 18:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by stoop14

From the face i can tell they are both range and have pets. Are they similar to play? Are rangers one of the better soloing chars in gw since i don't know anyone? Also would monk be best for 2nd pro since i'll be playing solo alot so i can heal myself?

No idea on the Ranger vs. Hunter bit, sorry. A lot of the Ranger skills are based on their bows and their pets, making both more effective.

As for the second profession, well, they're all good - not that there's any necessity to ever use your second's skills.

All of the classes, at least in the beginning, can solo (and by 'solo' I include taking AI henchmen or Heroes with you when needed) quite effectively in the RPG/PvE portion of the game, but no matter what classes you take, you'll almost certainly need to hook up with real players sooner or later - whether it be via pick-up groups or joining a Guild (avoid the ones that sit around spamming the chat channels, though - how good can they be if they have to resort to that to get members?).

It's not really that hard to find people to play with, either - heck, I was in a friendly guild within 2 days of starting to play. All it took was a slow morning in an out of the way outpost to end up chatting with someone for a half-hour or so before they (without any prompting on my part) invited me. All it takes is a decent attitude (no begging or whining, a willingness to learn, etc.), a little attention to basic spelling and grammar, and a bit of friendliness to find decent people or a decent guild to play and hang out with.

moriz · Mar 11, 2008, 06:38 PM // 18:38

no. WoW hunter is a DPS class. GW ranger is a shutdown/utility class.

Stormlord Alex · Mar 11, 2008, 07:15 PM // 19:15

I echo moriz - Hunter is more damage-orientated; GW's ranger is essentially a disruption character with some (not that impressive) damage.

For solo-ing... In GW, you don't solo. It's a team game; skills and classes are balanced to be used as part of a team. And /Mo stuff is really bad for healing yourself. Troll Unguent is better.

ogre_jd · Mar 11, 2008, 09:08 PM // 21:08

Ranger bow damage isn't all that bad - with the Nevermore Flatbow (maxed bow, GotY Edition), my level 9 Ranger is, on a Power Shot or a Point Blank shot, able to get up over 90 damage on a critical hit against the stuff in Old Ascalon. My Warrior, who was level 12 at the time, was doing only a little more (on a crit, naturally) with his maxed Hammer (Rhino's Charge) and Mighty Blow in the same region. And even half that, on normal skill hits, is quite good for the region.

Kale Ironfist · Mar 11, 2008, 10:16 PM // 22:16

Why are you comparing damage in old ascalon?

ogre_jd · Mar 12, 2008, 12:28 AM // 00:28

Because that's where my Warrior switched to his Rhino's Charge and when my Ranger got his Marksmanship to 9 to get the full benefit of his Nevermore Bow, and where the latter currently is. Comparing their damage at their current/latest locations (Lion's Arch and Piken Square, respectively) would make no sense when trying to point out that a Ranger's damage output doesn't qualify as 'not that impressive'...

moriz · Mar 12, 2008, 03:01 AM // 03:01

you must remember that the monsters in old ascalon typically have an armor of 6. that's why you are capable of getting such big hits.

on 60 armor (which is caster armor), my cripshot at 10 marksmanship can crit for 93 damage. that's only with sloth hunter's shot, which is probably the best +damage bow skill available. that's not very impressive, considering it has a recharge of 8 seconds and 10 energy cost. overall, my cripshot can sustain a maximum DPS of about 27.

if you dedicate your entire skillbar to damage, you might be able to pull off some pretty big hits. however, you are sacrificing some serious disruption and utility just to thump someone for 300 damage every 10 seconds or so... which if you calculate it, equates to about 30 dps. hardly impressive. especially considering that you can run 1 skill (sloth hunter's shot) and take a full bar of utility+shutdown and get almost the same dps.

lastly, you are comparing individual bow hits with individual hammer hits. a hammer has a 1.75 second swing cycle. a bow has a 2.0 (flatbow, shortbow) to 2.7 (hornbow) second fire cycle. in other words, a hammer warrior just swinging his weapon will hit almost 1.5x as much as a ranger just firing his bow. factor in the hammer damage vs bow damage, the hammer warrior is doing well over twice as much damage as the ranger. that's before you factor in attack skills.

Asha Rai · Mar 12, 2008, 05:39 AM // 05:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by moriz

if you dedicate your entire skillbar to damage, you might be able to pull off some pretty big hits. however, you are sacrificing some serious disruption and utility just to thump someone for 300 damage every 10 seconds or so... which if you calculate it, equates to about 30 dps. hardly impressive. especially considering that you can run 1 skill (sloth hunter's shot) and take a full bar of utility+shutdown and get almost the same dps.

While I agree a pure damage ranger isn't the most effective use of a ranger, 30 dps is a bit misleading. If one dedicates their whole bar to damage, 80-90 sustained dps is achievable (from memory when messing around with the master of damage). And I have gone this route when playing some areas in normal mode where monsters die before degen has time to have much effect, and they are harmless enough that interrupting their skills is a waste of time and energy.

Antithesis · Mar 12, 2008, 05:56 AM // 05:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by moriz

no. WoW hunter is a DPS class. GW ranger is a shutdown/utility class.

Bingo. No gun fun in GW either.

ogre_jd · Mar 12, 2008, 12:02 PM // 12:02

*shrug* Have it your way, folks. My Ranger's been having plenty of gun fun so far, however.

Div · Mar 12, 2008, 07:00 PM // 19:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by ogre_jd

Ranger bow damage isn't all that bad - with the Nevermore Flatbow (maxed bow, GotY Edition), my level 9 Ranger is, on a Power Shot or a Point Blank shot, able to get up over 90 damage on a critical hit against the stuff in Old Ascalon. My Warrior, who was level 12 at the time, was doing only a little more (on a crit, naturally) with his maxed Hammer (Rhino's Charge) and Mighty Blow in the same region. And even half that, on normal skill hits, is quite good for the region.

My monk crits for 100 damage with his wand :S

The only damage type ranger is the machine gun ranger, and you don't really solo stuff in GW, you play in a team, whether it's NPCs or other people.

Zazael · Mar 14, 2008, 11:27 AM // 11:27

Rangers in GW are nothing like the Hunters in WoW.. Hunters do huge damage, with both bow crits and pet attacks, can solo very well and escpecially kick ass in solo situations.
Rangers on the other hand, are not really good at dealing huge amounts of damage, but there are some damage classes. The main strenght of the rangers in GW is that they can play alot of different builds, from trapping to interupting, and from splinter to conditioner. Really, ranger can run the biggest amount of builds of all classes i think.
And you cant really compare GW classes to WoW ones, because in WoW you take as much skills as you like, while in GW you are limited to 8 skills and only 1 elite skill among those.

Molock · Mar 14, 2008, 04:43 PM // 16:43

What has been said already is pretty much true, and hust to make one thing more clear.. pets in GW are a lot less important than in WoW, they deal less dmg and don't usually act as very good tanks. Rangers can deal a fair amount of dmg but are better at shut down, conditions... being annoying in a way.

Hassgropper · Mar 14, 2008, 08:47 PM // 20:47

A basic WoW hunter= Send in pet, kill, repeat.

A well played WoW hunter can trap(crowd control) like crazy, kite, and drain mana. In non-instance solo and group quests, a hunter is pretty much king.

The thing is WoW questing is ~85% soloable where as GW is more like WoW instance runs where you need a tank, healer, dps, and cc or offtank. The play style of WoW and GW are so different that there really is no comparison.

A WoW hunter is all about damage and cc with traps. A ranger (or any GW class for that matter) is far less pigeonholed than WoW classes. Sure a ranger can't solo three mobs with his pet but how many hunters can heal themselves, offtank, offheal, DoT, aoe DoT, aoe heal, etc..........

DreamRunner · Mar 14, 2008, 09:43 PM // 21:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stormlord Alex

ranger is essentially a disruption character with some (not that impressive) damage.

Spreading poison? Poison gives a lot of pressure.

Mist Walker Skarloc · Mar 20, 2008, 08:50 PM // 20:50

Be warned!

Pets in WoW are unbelievably overpowered, our pets make me cry.

Don't use a pet. Please.