Curse

woesla · Oct 25, 2005, 09:07 AM // 09:07

I wanna make a ranger character, combined with the curse line of a necromancer.
Now is my real question, would it be better to go R/N with high expertise....
Or go N/R with high soul reaping???
The main thing i wanna do with my charachter is do High Damage from a distance, *in my opinion curses work great with that [weaken armor and mark of pain and such]*
I dont wanna use a pet, since this will be a "sniper" like character.
If ya have any suggestions they are more then welcome , but plz be gentle with me..

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 09:56 AM // 09:56

Go ranger primary. Can't say I agree with using curses to do high damage, but whatever floats your boat.
Your expertise should be at 14. This goes well with 10/10/10/5 setup of expertise, marks, curses, beastmastery. Mark of Pain probably won't work as well as you'd like. Since you won't have wilderness survival your prep will be read the winds. Keep Tiger's Fury on all the time, also consider quick shot for your elite.

woesla · Oct 25, 2005, 11:24 AM // 11:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

Go ranger primary. Can't say I agree with using curses to do high damage, but whatever floats your boat.
Your expertise should be at 14. This goes well with 10/10/10/5 setup of expertise, marks, curses, beastmastery. Mark of Pain probably won't work as well as you'd like. Since you won't have wilderness survival your prep will be read the winds. Keep Tiger's Fury on all the time, also consider quick shot for your elite.

K lets say i pick ranger primary, then my atrribs would prob. be
-10 exp
-10 mark
-10 wild
and rest in curses..... Don't i need high wilderniss to survive ??? healing and such???

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 11:37 AM // 11:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by woesla

K lets say i pick ranger primary, then my atrribs would prob. be
-10 exp
-10 mark
-10 wild
and rest in curses..... Don't i need high wilderniss to survive ??? healing and such???

If you try to heal yourself, you'll kill nobody. The damage they put out will outweigh your healing and they'll kill you anyway. If you want damage mitigation be a trapper. If you want a pure damage ranger do just that...and enter organised competitions, not random arenas, pick good monks, be happy. With that setup you have there...you'll get 5 curses which is a 20 second weaken armor, thats not the problem though. The real problem is you have nothing in beast mastery, you're giving up a good deal of damage AND the ability to do good burst damage for what? Healing Spring and Troll Unguent? No sir.

The basis of a good ranger is utility, the ability to switch targets in less than a second, the ability to condition a target for 1 energy when it takes a monk 5 energy to fix it, the ability to switch instantly from spike to DPS, from offensive to damage mitigation using just one or two skills. To be blunt, curses doesn't help with this. Weaken armour adds another prep to the list, 5 second Favourable Winds (ok you can cast it before the fight), 2 second Read the Winds and now a 3 second Weaken Armor? Assuming that the weaken armor doesn't get removed and you're left dry...which it very well may do, it leaves you unable or at least undesirable to switch targets should the initial punch not work out. That sir...is why a weaken armor ranger smells funny to me...

woesla · Oct 25, 2005, 11:59 AM // 11:59

I think I understand most of the things u are saying.... exept fot his part.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

Weaken armour adds another prep to the list, 5 second Favourable Winds (ok you can cast it before the fight), 2 second Read the Winds and now a 3 second Weaken Armor? Assuming that the weaken armor doesn't get removed and you're left dry...which it very well may do, it leaves you unable or at least undesirable to switch targets should the initial punch not work out. That sir...is why a weaken armor ranger smells funny to me...

So if you could plz explain it you would be a great help.

And the part i disagree is that wilderniss only has healing for me.....
How about kindle arrow and ignite for aoe???

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 01:03 PM // 13:03

You can't stack preps, pick one prep. Read the Winds is good, and its in Marksmanship which means you can spread your points out among beastmastery and curses in your case. Kindle arrows is good for damage alone, the standard quickshot ranger consists of this and I have nothing against that. The rest of the post is directed at the use of Weaken Armor, which I disagree with.

It is a hex so can and will most likely be removed, it has a long recharge so you can't cast it again, plus it costs a lot of energy for a ranger, bear in mind that Concussion shot only really costs 9 energy with expertise. The nature of the hex itself means you cannot switch targets if the person you cast it on also has lots of enchantments on them.

I have nothing against using wilderness for kindle arrows, ignite is a waste. This is a really generic 11/10/10 quickshot ranger: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...68&postcount=9 the utility slot, I use for Pin Down. It's not great...but a couple seconds of slowness can make a difference. My point with wilderness survival is that your attribute points are already spread out for a damaging ranger. You have

14 (10+1+3) Expertise
11 (10+1) Marksmanship
11/13 (10+1/10+3) Wilderness Survival...in your case 10 Curses
6/5 (5+1/5) Beastmastery

Thats 4 attribute lines. You're already hurting from the 10/10/10/5 distribution. What would you do if you wanted to go wilderness survival, marksmanship and curses? Remember that no matter WHAT a damaging ranger distribution goes for...he will need to have 14 expertise and 6 beastmastery. (some choose frenzy over TF so they can skip beastmastery but thats another story)

woesla · Oct 25, 2005, 02:44 PM // 14:44

So if i understand u correcly you say for a pure damage dealing ranger u have to be a pure 1???? with Tigers Fury

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 04:40 PM // 16:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by woesla

So if i understand u correcly you say for a pure damage dealing ranger u have to be a pure 1???? with Tigers Fury

You certainly have to use a speed buff yes. Plus, the armor of a ranger isn't really that hot. You could go warrior and use frenzy, but the benefits for a pure damage ranger isn't that great, you don't have space for a sprint skill to snap you out of it. Very simply, increased attack speed = increased damage per second. Whats not to like? Also speed is very important, thus all the fuss about spike. Thus we use Tiger's Fury. It fits in with our ranger, it is cheap with 14 expertise.

It is certainly the case that rangers will MOSTLY be pure. They don't have enough energy for caster business and indeed why would you want to waste energy on that when you get VERY good deals on energy at high expertise, on the switch side, as a ranger secondary, you won't have enough energy to use the shots without expertise.

That said, you do have 1-2 slots to play around with, depending on the team setup. If you look at the template I posted, obviously if someone else on your team has Favourable Winds theres no need for you to bring it as well, so you have another slot to use.

As for R/N as a class on its own, theres certainly very interesting things you can do that doesn't the cookie cutter ranger. Heres a tip. The necromancer touch skills are overpriced. The expertise line drastically reduces the cost of touches. Though that sort of build does have problems in its own, and I will assume here we're thinking along more conventional lines.

This leads to more fascinating theory about the nature of Rangers in general ¬_¬. See, despite all the "essential" slots I brought up here in the ranger, theres very little else you HAVE to bring. One reason is energy concern, another is that simply Ranger skills are highly spammable and fills up all your time. On the necro side theres a few spells you HAVE to take (corpse deinal a la necrotic traversal/enchant removal via rend etc.) which fits very well into your 1-2 slots. Sure theres not a whole lot of synergy...but someone's gotta deny the corpse...or 1 well of the profane later you're face first in the dirt. On the mesmer side you have faster enchant removal via drain enchants, which btw at 0 inspiration is still free, still fast casting.

Don't get me wrong though, certainly not all the numbers have come in, theres still plenty of room to experiment. One point of debate is the magical third prep a ranger can use, aside from spirits and actual prep in the form of magical buffing. Conjure I tried and didn't like because you had to extend your attribute lines beyond all reasonable lengths and only lasted as long as your kindle lasted. I still know some people who use and swear by Judge's Insight+Favorable Winds+Read the Winds...

Personally? I'd go pure ranger with whatever my team is lacking in the last spot. ie. necrotic if my team doesn't have corpse denial. Drain Enchant if my team is lacking in that department.

Morganas · Oct 25, 2005, 05:21 PM // 17:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

As for R/N as a class on its own, theres certainly very interesting things you can do that doesn't the cookie cutter ranger. Heres a tip. The necromancer touch skills are overpriced. The expertise line drastically reduces the cost of touches. Though that sort of build does have problems in its own, and I will assume here we're thinking along more conventional lines.

Expertise doesn't affect spells, only attack skills, which only warriors and rangers have.

Using touch skills on a r/n makes no sense. You're best off taking curses like barbs and mark of pain. In 4v4 or pve, curses are awesome for rangers to take since you'll have trouble getting a nec to take them for you.

Since taking curses will require that you skimp on an attribute, I recommend you drop marksmanship down to the minimum 9 after runes. You *need* tigers fury for faster triggering of barbs and mark of pain, and if you bring a pet it will trigger mark of pain and barbs as well, so you might consider taking that pet attack speed boost also. Expertise is necessary for distracting shot and if you decide to take a bow attack quickshot is the best bet for this build, and its unlinked. Any other skills should be pet attacks.

pagansaint · Oct 25, 2005, 05:36 PM // 17:36

The Necro touches are Skills not spells.

Expertise reduces the costs of skills.

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 06:08 PM // 18:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Morganas

Expertise doesn't affect spells, only attack skills, which only warriors and rangers have.

Using touch skills on a r/n makes no sense. You're best off taking curses like barbs and mark of pain. In 4v4 or pve, curses are awesome for rangers to take since you'll have trouble getting a nec to take them for you.

Stop spreading misinformation. Expertise affects more than attack skills, preps, spirits, signets under primal echoes. This certainly is NOT limited to warriors and rangers. The touch skills are just that...skills, not spells.

Thus...using expertise, you get cheaper touches...since they're skills - and yes this has been tested courtesy of clan SPEC - they have extremely little or no aftercast. They are powerful at even low attribute points making it ideal for a secondary profession. They are reasonably strong, and the fast casting speed and no aftercast means they're faster than an axe under a speed boost.

Doesn't make sense?...kk then.

Curses have many many skills that work well with low attributes, weaken armor lasts a good amount of time at 0 curses. Yet you have managed to magically pick out a curse which does not..in barbs. You have there, a barbs build, though since you didn't care to post a full build I can't comment on the details such as stat distribution/skill synergy etc. Though I can mention that basing an entire build on 1-2 essential hexes, especially one with as long a recharge as barbs is a bad idea. Mark of Pain for PvP is bad. The fact that by limiting his marksmanship and then boosting his beastmastery high because you wish to get a pet...you won't have a half decent prep to use.

Bear in mind that everything I've said is for PvP. In PvE...ranger farming is hard, trapper would be your best bet, mark of pain is also good. As for story mode...take 7 henches and finish the game...forget about builds.

Manfred · Oct 25, 2005, 07:27 PM // 19:27

Morganas... are you seriously recommending turning him into a... cursing beastmaster? *distaste* There are far better ways to be a beastmaster, in my opinion. And far, far better ways to be a curser in pvp.

In pvp, I can envision this build as one that utterly debuffs a target within 5 seconds of target call. Pin down or crip shot, weaken armor, defile flesh and (naturally) rend enchantments, with parasite for cover (duh) would make a covert debuffer quite effective, although mana problems might happen if you try to spam everything at once. That could be mitigated by filling in the rest of he skill bar with low-cost longish recharge high-impact skills like read the wind and distracting shot. No TF, sadly. No QS. No traps.

MSecorsky · Oct 25, 2005, 07:57 PM // 19:57

Bah, I like the keep it simple ranger myself. Skill bar:

Poison arrow
Hunters shot
Dual arrow
Distracting shot
Kindle
Whirling
Trolls
Rez sig

It's simple, it's not the standard "must have Tigers or you suck" ranger, but with my sundering PvP bow and with (I think.... ) 14 Exp, 11 Wild, 12 Marks I can drop most squishies in a hurry, causing not only impact damage but long lasting degen.. but I've also found I can take out most warriors that choose to stand toe to toe.

Perfect? No. Effective and simple, yes.

As for Ranger armor... hey, ranger armor kicks. I'm a huge fan of Druids armor, it does well keeping me alive.

Advise to the OP, if you're new to rangering, keep it simple, get the feel, tweak from there.

carnivore · Oct 25, 2005, 08:25 PM // 20:25

[QUOTE=MSecorsky]Effective and simple, yes.QUOTE]

makes me think you havent played any other build besides this

MSecorsky · Oct 25, 2005, 08:32 PM // 20:32

[QUOTE=carnivore]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MSecorsky

Effective and simple, yes.QUOTE]

makes me think you havent played any other build besides this

Rephrase that to "haven't been as comfortable with" and you'll be more accurate. I've tried with a variety of secondary skills and be it inexperience, ineptitude or just personal preference I always drift back to a pure ranger.

There is that evil pleasure in watching a monk try to flip out Mend Ailments faster than I can fire Poison Arrow... some actually do try...

rii · Oct 25, 2005, 08:42 PM // 20:42

expertise also works on glyphs apparantly... not tested, and not like it matters, they cost next to nothing anyway.

Corwin · Oct 25, 2005, 09:06 PM // 21:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manfred

Morganas... are you seriously recommending turning him into a... cursing beastmaster? *distaste* There are far better ways to be a beastmaster, in my opinion. And far, far better ways to be a curser in pvp.

In pvp, I can envision this build as one that utterly debuffs a target within 5 seconds of target call. Pin down or crip shot, weaken armor, defile flesh and (naturally) rend enchantments, with parasite for cover (duh) would make a covert debuffer quite effective, although mana problems might happen if you try to spam everything at once. That could be mitigated by filling in the rest of he skill bar with low-cost longish recharge high-impact skills like read the wind and distracting shot. No TF, sadly. No QS. No traps.

You could go with Marksmen's Wager on that build, to help with the energy problems as well.

Pin Down
Weaken Armor
Defile Flesh
Rend Enchantments
Parasitic Bond
Marksmen's Wager {E}
Distracting Shot
Res Sig

You'd have to play it in a team role, though, because this would be pretty weak on its own.

JYX · Oct 25, 2005, 09:25 PM // 21:25

That just sounds like a Fast Cast "prepper" to me. Fast casting at 16, Lingering Curse/Rend Enchants, Weaken Armor, Rigor Mortis. The premise is just massively fast enchant stripping every call and inspiration to keep it running. The casting time is really a problem, 3 seconds for a rend? A further 3 for Weaken? 1 second for parasitic. Even so...you'll get everything done in a grand total of 7 seconds. That doesn't sound like a good deal to me. Add in another 2 seconds to marksman's wager...Thats a helluva lotta casting/prepping. Fast Casting ftw.

Though we're getting decidedly off topic...the OP said he wanted to do high damage from a distance.

Corwin · Oct 25, 2005, 09:45 PM // 21:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

That just sounds like a Fast Cast "prepper" to me. Fast casting at 16, Lingering Curse/Rend Enchants, Weaken Armor, Rigor Mortis. The premise is just massively fast enchant stripping every call and inspiration to keep it running. The casting time is really a problem, 3 seconds for a rend? A further 3 for Weaken? 1 second for parasitic. Even so...you'll get everything done in a grand total of 7 seconds. That doesn't sound like a good deal to me. Add in another 2 seconds to marksman's wager...Thats a helluva lotta casting/prepping. Fast Casting ftw.

Though we're getting decidedly off topic...the OP said he wanted to do high damage from a distance.

Good points, all. I was looking at it more from the "stealth debuffer" angle, didn't really put much thought into the casting times.

As far as decent damage from range - quick shot ranger with a flatbow and Read the Winds or Favorable Spirit is generic, but works. There's generally a reason these things get to be generic, after all.

rii · Oct 25, 2005, 10:02 PM // 22:02

How can you 'stealthily' removed all someones enchants, then 'stealthily' hex the hell out of them over a 10s period?