Curse

rangersaurus · May 22, 2005, 08:08 PM // 20:08

So I am getting my copy of GW in a few days and I was thinking of a strat and wanted to run it past some people who can give me some good feedback. As the title implies I want to do a ranger with a elemental secondary, my friend tried ot explain the skill system to me, but if something is totally wrong let me know... here are the skills I want to use:

~Whirling Defense/ Lightning Reflexes
~Penetrating Attack/Dual Shot
~Read the Wind
~Favorable Winds
~Frozen Burst/Ice Spikes/Ice Prison/Deep Freeze
~Blurred Vision
~Water Attunement
~Antidote Signet

So basically, I thought use one of the cold spells to slow enemies down and blind them (I am not sure which one has the best "stopping" power so suggestions are welcomed). Either Whirling Defense or Lightning Reflexes as my stance (again... not sure which is best). From what I have read does it work like use a prep, stance, then bow attack in that order... or does it work differently. Let me know if there are ranger "essentials" that I missed. Thanks.

rangersaurus · May 25, 2005, 08:58 PM // 20:58

After talking it over with some peeps online I think this might work out better... what do you guys think:

~Whirling Defense
~Penetrating Attack
~Read the Wind
~Res Sig
~Frozen Burst
~Blurred Vision
~Water Attunement
~Troll Ungent

rangersaurus · May 28, 2005, 05:41 PM // 17:41

^bump^... anyone =(

Xinil · May 28, 2005, 07:38 PM // 19:38

What's your attribute point distribution?

~Whirling Defense = How often are you actually targeted? If you're the one being killed over your monks, then the other team is n00bish. Toss out this skill.
~Penetrating Attack = This is a keeper
~Read the Wind = Not too great imo. The time you could be hitting the person is much more valuable than the time it takes you to cast this (every 12 seconds too).
~Res Sig = Yup, keeper
~Frozen burst = Do you have enough mana for this? How often do you have foes adjacent to you too? You're a ranger, you're fighting from afar.
~Blurred Vision = Again, being an R/E...I believe you're supposed to be dealing out damage...
~Water Attunement = No
~Troll Ungent = Not effective enough unless you have 10 Wilderness Survival. And if you have 10 Wilderness Survival, you might as well be a trapper.

My current build is this (R/E):
1) Dual Shot
2) Frozen Soil (a must for any ranger)
3) Penetrating Attack
4) Res Sig
5) Distrating Shot (gotta interrupt those resses)
6) Barrage (a must imo)
7) Conjure Lightning
8) Pin Down (how could you not have this?)

Attribute Points:
Air Magic: 10
Expertise: 10
Marksmanship: 11

runes and stuff change for me as I use different armor. So at any time I have 13 marksman or 12 expertise and stuff.

rangersaurus · May 29, 2005, 05:17 PM // 17:17

well in terms of my role, i wanted to be able to freeze and slow them down which is always a handy thing to be able to do, but I also wanted deal out some damage too. i was thinking lightning reflexs or dryder defense instead of whirling... particularly reflexs becuase of the speed boost. I could have reflexs on, run in, cast frozen, back off, attack. if anyone gets to close, blur vision. what would you recommend instead of read the wind? and isn't a good idea to have some kind of self heal like ungent? again i am new at this so if i am totally off here let me know.

rii · May 29, 2005, 08:56 PM // 20:56

Guild Wars is a game that rewards specialisation, due to its team based nature. Therefore rangers have always seemed a bit underpowered to me, since they are proclaimed as a 'jack of all trades'. Of course, its hard to balance a jack of all trades, and i feel the ranger came out the looser in the balancing process. Apart from their nature rituals and traps, most of the other classes can do whatever it is you want as a ranger but better.

For you, there might be a problem with snaring them. A ranger has 3 pips of energy regeneration, which means 1 energy per second. Blurred vision for example, is 15 energy, and therefore if you want to keep casting it your going to be sacrificing a lot of your time regening energy which could be used for other things. The most common tactic with r/e is to use conjure element spells to make you do more damage, then spam barrage for aoe damage.
Frozen burst has the same problem as blurred vision, and having them both is a little ambitious

. Water attunement wont help, its not enough of a gain. Troll Unguent is great for self healing, although the casting time is a little long. You might want to take storm chaser as well (from wilderness survival) to help gain energy (if used at the right time) and also to run away...which is always useful

.
I agree with Xinil on read the wind, its too short lasting and too long casting. Res sig is also definetly in, but if you ever find yourself in an organised team you might be able to convince them to let you take something useful.... If you were to use storm chaser you could get along without whirling defense, as said above you really are the last one to be targeted. Penetrating attack is a good one, but for dealing damage its never been a rangers strong point.

This is a build for r/e i made a bit ago, but ive never bothered to use it.... because im too lazy...:

r/e

expertise: 10+2
Wilderness survival: 10+1
beast mastery: 11

Barrage [E]
Fertile Season
Troll Unguent
Storm Chaser
Tigers Fury
Healing Spring
Glyph of Concentration
Barbed Trap

Ive tried to aspire to the jack of all trades nature of ranger.... but it comes out seeming to be a bit lacking... which could be me or just rangers

Barrage and Tigers Fury are for damage. With high expertise your faced with two choices... shoot your one arrow at one person per seconds ish, or shoot 5 arrows at 5 people per second, for a loss of 2/3 energy.
Fertile Season is more what i consider a 'must'. Theres no way of quickly stacking it in this build, but while it is lame it is useful and valuable. Troll Unguent and Storm Chaser allow added toughness, these two moves can take you a long way, and limited tanking has been known to occur

. glyph of concentration and healing spring give you some team support, its not a lot but 500 health aoe is 500 health aoe.
Finally barbed trap is the best trap around methinks. Why not....

Xinil · May 30, 2005, 05:40 AM // 05:40

I totally agree with rangers being gimped. I can't tell you how difficult it is to find a PVP group in the Tombs. Why get a ranger when you can have more of some other class?

Too many times do I see groups with:

Monk
Monk
Monk (3 monks are necessary. 2 for healing and 1 for protection)
Warrior
Warrior
Elementalist
Mesmer
Necro

Why bother with the ranger? What can a ranger bring that's better than any of those? It's very frustrating.

As for Rii's build...I'm not really seeing the usefulness of a few of the skills you chose:

Fertile Season: How exactly does this help out your team? While you get the extra armor and HP, so does your enemy. Waste of a skill imo.

Glyph of Concentration: Eh? Being a ranger...I don't think I can recall any time in my entire PvP career that i've ever been interrupted. Granted, I don't bring along Troll Ungent with me (that's 'cause it takes entirely too long to cast, and I'm rarely ever hit). So, this skill isn't needed again imo.

In any event. Rangers are kinda gimped imo. :-/

Gh0sT · May 30, 2005, 08:48 AM // 08:48

I agree with Xinil, the first thing my guild asked when i showed up at the tombs with a ranger was:

"Do you have any other character..."

I mean wtf, it was the first time i PvP'ed with them... how can they ever know HOW i play with him...

I think Rangers are Gimped indeed and most of all uberly stereotyped, because of all those legolas fanboys and other games...

---

Its kind of sad

... atm i use a R/Me (Illusion line) build with Poison arrow as my elite, combined with Conjure Phantasm = 9 arrow degen which is quite nice, the only drawback (HUGE MEGA DRAWBACK) is that its usually despelled within seconds by a monk... so i might switch to Domination line...

Maybe its nice to keep a monk a little occupied, but i dont think i help my team THAT much with it... not to mention the energy conjure phantasm costs me...

rii · May 30, 2005, 02:28 PM // 14:28

Fertile Season is for people who are lame. Spam up enough of them and the battle just never ends. I dont know whether you know this, but there are certain guilds who specialise in simply standing at the guild lord and spamming this move. Since their whole team is doing it, soon everyone has about 30000000 health and 6000 armour :S. It has some tactical use, i just cant remember what it is.

Glyph of Concentration is for healing spring mainly. and for fertile season.
Healing spring is 'easily' interruptable, which basically means anything past poking them interrupts. Glyph stops this. For fertile, its a 5 second casting time, and if the enemy realises theyve got you on the ropes, and they see the animation for fertile, they obviously have a vested interest in stopping you. glyph also helps with this.

rangersaurus · Jun 01, 2005, 01:00 AM // 01:00

gimpness aside... what about this:

~Dryder's Defense
~Penetrating Attack
~Conjure Frost
~Res Sig
~Ice Spear
~Aura of Restoration
~Barrage
~Pin Down