Curse

Bgnome · Mar 23, 2005, 06:13 PM // 18:13

Class: Ranger / Elementalist

Assumed items:
+1 to Expertise
+2 to Marksmanship
+1 to Wilderness Survival

Attributes: (cost)
Expertise: 7+1 (28)
Marksmanship: 10+2 (61)
Wilderness Survival: 9+1 (48)
Fire Magic: 10 (61)

Total attribute points used: 198/200

Skills:
1) Barrage (availability) (elite) - (5,0,1) All your preparations are removed. Shoot arrows at up to 5 enemies near your target. These arrows strike for +13 damage if they hit. This is an elite skill.
2) Hunter's Shot (availability) - (5,0,5) If Hunter's Shot hits, you strike for +17 damage. If this attack hits a foe that is moving or knocked down, that foe begins bleeding for 21 seconds.
3) Storm Chaser (availability) - (10,0,30) For 16 seconds, you move 25% faster, and you gain 3 energy whenever you take elemental damage.
4) Greater Conflagration (availability) - (5,5,60) Create a level 7 Spirit. For creatures within its range, all physical damage is fire damage instead. This Spirit dies after 110 seconds.
5) Favorable Winds (availability) - (5,5,60) Create a level 8 Spirit. For creatures within its range, arrows move twice as fast as normal and strike for +3 damage. This Spirit dies after 126 seconds.
6) Conjure Flame (availability) - (10,1,60) Lose all enchantments. For 60 seconds, your attacks strike for an additional 11 fire damage.
7) Mark of Rodgort (availability) - (25,2,20) For 16 seconds, whenever target foe is struck for fire damage, that foe is set on fire for 3 seconds.
8) Glyph of Lesser Energy (availability) - (5,1,30) Your next spell cost 15 less energy to cast.

I was trying to work on a Conjure/Rodgort ranger idea before, and with all the recent changes to the skills, it seems that Conjure fell out of the limelight. Now that it has a requirement of elemental damage before it receives the boost, why not use Greater Conflagaration? With the new way that nature rituals work, it is likely that we can design new strategies with them.

Ok, here's the explanation. The keystone to this build is spamming barrage. With expertise at 8, that gets you just over the hump where the cost for 5en skills gets reduced to 3en. Since barrage does not work with preparations, you need to look elsewhere for damage buffs. Conjure is the classic example, however the elemental requirement puts a damper on things. Bringing Greater Conflagration along automatically makes all physical damage fire damage so hopefully that would make the Conjure work. Favorable Winds is also a nice ritual that will buff the damage on each arrow a bit, but more importantly, increases DPS by increasing your firing rate. Two spirits will divide the attention of the opponents and get them to last longer than if you just had one.

Mark of Rodgort / Glyph is useful if you have a single target you would like to get rid of. Set him on fire and shoot him with a Hunter's Shot for good measure.

Storm Chaser is there to get you out of those sticky situations, and if your Greater Conflagaration spirit is still up, nets you 4en every time you get hit!

SereneD · Mar 26, 2005, 02:28 AM // 02:28

Barrage and Greater Conflag are both Elites and can not be used in the same build.

I didn't get a chance to test my Ranger/Ele the last BWE, so maybe someone can clarify something for me. How does the "elemental requirement" effect the Ranger/Ele Build? Does it mean that Conjure no longer works to add damage to bow attacks?

It sounds like you are trying to get it to work with Greater Conflag but that would require you to drop Barrage, and that would drastically drop your DPS.

Lord Kinetic · Mar 26, 2005, 02:23 PM // 14:23

I think that build would work better off as Ele/rang because the elementalist side on that build isn't doing much, if it was the primary it would give you extra energy aswell, and you wouldnt miss much by taking ranger off the primary.

Bgnome · Mar 26, 2005, 04:59 PM // 16:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by SereneD

Barrage and Greater Conflag are both Elites and can not be used in the same build.

that does kind of put a damper on things, doesnt it?

edit: you know i must have missed it because that skills calculator uses GWO's skill set, which does not list it as elite. neither does knights templar..
the asbestos archer build is listed with both as well, although that build was designed prior to the last bwe..

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lord Kinetic

I think that build would work better off as Ele/rang because the elementalist side on that build isn't doing much, if it was the primary it would give you extra energy aswell, and you wouldnt miss much by taking ranger off the primary.

i would argue quite the opposite.

first off, lets look at the armor. if the ranger is toting a full drakescale set, he gets 70AL +30AL vs. Elemental Attacks +15AL vs. Fire Attacks. If Greater Conflagration turns all physical into fire, that becomes basically 115AL for everything but lightning, earth, and ice, which would be 100AL. The pyromancer set for the elementalist has a base of 60 AL + 15AL versus fire. That elementalist will be taking TWICE the amount of damage from ALL sources compared to the ranger.

on a related note, the next thing you would consider are runes. if you are taking a ranger primary, you will be using expertise and 2 other ranger attributes while only using 1 elementalist attribute. if you took an elementalist primary, you will be using energy storage and the fire attribute, while using 2 attributes from the ranger line. this effectively nets you another attribute that is limited by only the points you put into it -- meaning you have just restricted yourself to dumping much more attribute points into your secondary and saving less when using runes.

and finally, let us discuss the attributes. expertise drops the energy cost of almost all your skills, (excluding spells), by 4% per point. energy storage raises your maximum energy pool by 3 energy per point. this is where it starts to get tricky concerning energy management. if we assume that you can fire an arrow off every 3 seconds, (for simplicity's sake), using expertise drops barrage down to 3 energy and you regenerate 1 energy per second. in theory, you could spam barrage to your heart's content. in the case of a primary elementalist, assuming an attribute spread of 7/9/10/10, you could reasonably boost energy storage to 9 if you wanted. that adds 27 energy to your base pool of 33, bringing you to an even 60. spamming barrage, which now costs the full 5 energy, every 3 seconds, costs you 1 energy after regen, (4 pips = 4 mana every 3 sec). sure, thats not all that bad, but does not look quite as good as the ranger. you could also boost your conjure/rodgort with runes, but your attacks are weaker, (marksmanship at 10 not only hurts your skills, but your bow damage in general as well).

basically, it is a pretty bad idea alltogether. if your character was spell-focused, and maybe dabbled in the ranger side then it may work. this build in particular is too heavy into the ranger skills to make a primary elementalist effective. granted, my points are somewhat theoretical and i cannot really test my math, but you get my drift.

Elonis · Mar 26, 2005, 05:11 PM // 17:11

hey thc bgnome you helped me with my char. onl instead of wilderness survival it will be beastmastery

thx.. now all i need to get is conjure flame and im all good and barrage.

read the wind is preperation isnt it?

Bgnome · Mar 26, 2005, 05:52 PM // 17:52

read the wind is a preparation, so it will not work with barrage. in fact, every time you use barrage, it will kill any preparation you had going. that is why i went with the nature ritual "favorable winds" instead.

Lord Kinetic · Mar 26, 2005, 06:02 PM // 18:02

i would argue quite the opposite.

first off, lets look at the armor. if the ranger is toting a full drakescale set, he gets 70AL +30AL vs. Elemental Attacks +15AL vs. Fire Attacks. If Greater Conflagration turns all physical into fire, that becomes basically 115AL for everything but lightning, earth, and ice, which would be 100AL. The pyromancer set for the elementalist has a base of 60 AL + 15AL versus fire. That elementalist will be taking TWICE the amount of damage from ALL sources compared to the ranger.

on a related note, the next thing you would consider are runes. if you are taking a ranger primary, you will be using expertise and 2 other ranger attributes while only using 1 elementalist attribute. if you took an elementalist primary, you will be using energy storage and the fire attribute, while using 2 attributes from the ranger line. this effectively nets you another attribute that is limited by only the points you put into it -- meaning you have just restricted yourself to dumping much more attribute points into your secondary and saving less when using runes.

and finally, let us discuss the attributes. expertise drops the energy cost of almost all your skills, (excluding spells), by 4% per point. energy storage raises your maximum energy pool by 3 energy per point. this is where it starts to get tricky concerning energy management. if we assume that you can fire an arrow off every 3 seconds, (for simplicity's sake), using expertise drops barrage down to 3 energy and you regenerate 1 energy per second. in theory, you could spam barrage to your heart's content. in the case of a primary elementalist, assuming an attribute spread of 7/9/10/10, you could reasonably boost energy storage to 9 if you wanted. that adds 27 energy to your base pool of 33, bringing you to an even 60. spamming barrage, which now costs the full 5 energy, every 3 seconds, costs you 1 energy after regen, (4 pips = 4 mana every 3 sec). sure, thats not all that bad, but does not look quite as good as the ranger. you could also boost your conjure/rodgort with runes, but your attacks are weaker, (marksmanship at 10 not only hurts your skills, but your bow damage in general as well).

basically, it is a pretty bad idea alltogether. if your character was spell-focused, and maybe dabbled in the ranger side then it may work. this build in particular is too heavy into the ranger skills to make a primary elementalist effective. granted, my points are somewhat theoretical and i cannot really test my math, but you get my drift.[/QUOTE]

Alright alright, hold your horses, i just thought the extra energy would allow for greater damage output.

Elonis · Mar 28, 2005, 10:20 AM // 10:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bgnome

read the wind is a preparation, so it will not work with barrage. in fact, every time you use barrage, it will kill any preparation you had going. that is why i went with the nature ritual "favorable winds" instead.

yes but i would only need my read the wind for power shot and dual shot. and with conjure flame thats more additional dmg. right now with 5 marksmanship and 1 fire i do 50ish dmg per shot with power or dual without conjure.. so im looking at close to 100 dmg or at least 80+

the barrage would be there to just take up the time between powershot and dual shot recharge or if i got swarmed. (80+ dmg being estimated on having 12 marksmanship and 10 fire attunement)