Rangerway and Spiritnuke

Quote: Originally Posted by Roger Brownthorn

Rangerway is a great build, thank you. Any idea where the best place to farm for the vampire bow strings are?

Eh is it me or the hero does not like to cast blood is power like at all?

Quote: Originally Posted by Roger Brownthorn

Eh is it me or the hero does not like to cast blood is power like at all? Yeah happens for me as well that the heroes only cast the BiP on other caster heroes, to counter this I just micro the BiP spell to my 'x' button.

For those of us with mercenary heroes, do you still recommend to bring a minion master necro or maybe another ranger?

Sorry for bumping this thread but i'm just wondering which skills are u guys using on rangers ? I'm talking about Rangerway btw

If you are talking about the skills with a "?" in them, I would imaging one would be an interrupt. The other could possibly be a pet damage skill.

I would be interested in seeing how the build can complete DOA's Gloom in HM. That place always seemed very bad for melee/ranged characters because of the enviro effect (50% chance to miss).

Thanks for this build! Works great for quick assasinations of any target but struggles in prolonged battles. For free slots I recommend at least 2 x throw dirt as the only anti-melee is displacement which usualy dies fast. I still wonder if its possible to replace BiP with Motivation Paragon or Ranger with resto spirits... ;> Because im using this on Imbagon, I have replaced Protective Was with Pure Was for party wide 2 conditions removal - heroes use this pretty well.

Edit: Another good optional (definetly for imbagon player) is Disrupting Accuracy, since it even rupts attacks. Two rangers got it and its enabled only on 1, on the other im using it (numpad hotkey, same for spirits)

http://imageshack.com/a/img845/3594/b479.png
http://imageshack.com/a/img835/9350/nraq.png - actualy ignore that beast mastery 6, its not neccessary, so expertise / marksmanship 12/12

Another great way to fill optional slot is Unseen Fury. Encountering Raptors taught me its invaluable - definetly worth more then petty 48% chance for crit...

It looks like a good build,

could you tell me if the dungeons can be done using rangerway?

Thanks for the comments guys. Been away so am a bit late answering:

Quote: Originally Posted by Voodoo Rage I'm sure this has been discussed before but how synergistic is a Soul Twisting Rit with all those minions and pets? It seems like they are going to be absorbing a lot of those potential Shelter prots due to their low health. The synergy lies exactly in shelter protting the minions. The minions do the tanking and their longevity protects your team and draws away knockdowns and hexes from your rangers. In HM especially, a minion basically becomes as tanky as a player due to shelter/union. It is ofcourse possible to turn the other spirits off when needed, which allows the soul twister to make a shelter every 5 seconds on average.

For the spirit build, with two soul twisters, this is not needed.

Quote: Originally Posted by Kosar The Cruel Replaced OoP on the N/Rt BiP'er with Blood Bond. Is the blood bond to heal the team, or heal the minions from the after-effect?

Either seems somewhat unnecessary as the microheal is tiny, and the minions are expendable.

You know, over its duration one cast of OOP produces around 250-400 pure damage on average for 5 flatbow wielding rangers with expert's dexterity.

Granted, it's not always up, probably closer to half or two-thirds of the time. But it is still an impressively high damage output for a single skill.

Quote: Originally Posted by Kosar The Cruel For skills, I run Distracting Shot and for some reason Arcing Shot or Keen Arrow Antidote Signet. The reason interrupts are not really productive is because targets go down so quick that you dont need it. The possible interrupts for this build do less damage than attack skills. And if anything, heroes may become distracted and interrupt another target instead of spiking off the target the human is calling. I would only use distracting shot in niche builds for the disable, against very high life bosses that take an age to kill.

Quote: Originally Posted by Kosar The Cruel For pets, I'm using Hearty as the pets will do little to no damage anyways.
Flatbows have the longest range and the fastest attack speed. This means the heroes move less and attack more. Vampiric is used in the build for additional damage Spot-on. Also, the great range of flatbow often puts you outside the cast-range of ele nukers. Long range bows can also benefit the most from the damage multiplier when shooting at targets at a lower elevation of the map (down hill).

About Vampiric bow string, it does slightly more damage on average than sundering, but it is too small to worry much about.

Quote: Originally Posted by Panda Girl Any idea where the best place to farm for the vampire bow strings are? Definitely kamadan, approximately 2-5k each.

Quote: Originally Posted by Roger Brownthorn Eh is it me or the hero does not like to cast blood is power like at all? For rangerway the sole purpose of the BiP is to feed the rit infinite power. BiP is automatically used on a casting profession when the energy drops below 50%. It will be used more frequently when your party comes under more pressure.

BiP won't be automatically cast on the ranger heroes but that is no problem. If you are running 15 in expertise you should not have energy issues.

Quote: Originally Posted by Roger Brownthorn For those of us with mercenary heroes, do you still recommend to bring a minion master necro or maybe another ranger? Definitely bring the minion master. Those minions take so many knockdowns and hexes away from your heroes.

Without minions you still have the pets, but their higher armor draws away much less attention from the heroes than minions do. Besides, the MM does his fair share of damage output. Death nova, putrid bile, and the minion's damage alone should deliver more damage on average than a 6th ranger.

Quote: Originally Posted by Wenspire If you are talking about the skills with a "?" in them, I would imaging one would be an interrupt. The other could possibly be a pet damage skill. I put highly situational skills in the two miscelaneous slots usually. In fact, I have left town a few times without even filling those slots. Silly I know...but there is not much that you can put there that does not reduce the ranger's damage output.

Even more attack skills will reduce the frequency with which the existing ones are used. Especially in the case of volley, this means a fair bit less damage.

Quote: Originally Posted by Wenspire

I would be interested in seeing how the build can complete DOA's Gloom in HM. That place always seemed very bad for melee/ranged characters because of the enviro effect (50% chance to miss). A friend claimed to have completed it, but after trying numerous times..it does not seem possible, even with consets. I have updated the original post to reflect this.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bLeda Thanks for this build! Works great for quick assasinations of any target but struggles in prolonged battles. Kill fast or die hard Quote: Originally Posted by bLeda For free slots I recommend at least 2 x throw dirt as the only anti-melee is displacement which usualy dies fast. Them minions and pets should be making a wall to stop melee getting to your rangers and backline. Ofcourse, a wall is not always possible, nor are minions always up, but it should not be often that anti-melee is needed. The touch range of throw dirt may also reduce the damage output somewhat, especially since heroes have to walk a fair distance sometimes. But hey, you can always deactivate the skill and activate at key moments. Quote: Originally Posted by bLeda I still wonder if its possible to replace BiP with Motivation Paragon or Ranger with resto spirits... ;> Because im using this on Imbagon, I have replaced Protective Was with Pure Was for party wide 2 conditions removal - heroes use this pretty well. Imbagon should work nicely with the build. But it does go somewhat against the essence of the build, that is to kill quick. The imbagon may bring more defence, but at the cost of offence. I somewhat doubt the imbagon can even come close to the damage brought to the table by the human ranger. Quote: Originally Posted by bLeda Edit: Another good optional (definetly for imbagon player) is Disrupting Accuracy, since it even rupts attacks. Two rangers got it and its enabled only on 1, on the other im using it (numpad hotkey, same for spirits) Disrupting accuracy kind of goes against the essence of the build as well. As explained above interrupts are not needed when targets die fast. In fact, all preparations lower damage output quite harshly, even when they add damage to attacks. They take two seconds to cast which is about 1.5 attacks from a +33% ias flatbow. 1.5 attacks is a lot of damage in this build and usually more than can be gained over the 24 second duration of a damage preparation like read-the-wind. Furthermore, it clashes with volley, arguably your most important attack skill. Quote: Originally Posted by bLeda Another great way to fill optional slot is Unseen Fury. Encountering Raptors taught me its invaluable - definetly worth more then petty 48% chance for crit... Unseen fury could be nice, but I should explain "go for the eyes" more. It affects not only the heroes, but also the minions and pets. Rangers get +44% critical chance (@3 command), and an additional 18% from 18 marksmanship, so a total 64% chance. The critical chance is therefore greatly increased from less than 1/5 to almost 2/3rds for the rangers. The actual damage increase from the critical is also impressive. It gives your damage the max of the weapon stat and then adds a x1.4 bonus (see:http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Critical_hit) So you will usually do around double of your base damage with a critical. Adding the damage gained by minions, pets and rangers from a single cast of "go for the eyes", you are probably looking at 100-200 on average. This kind of damage from shout you only have 3 atts in, and which is rapidly charged by a +33% ias flatbow with volley, is hard to pass up on imo. Quote: Originally Posted by banda.daler It looks like a good build, could you tell me if the dungeons can be done using rangerway? I have done maw numerous times in HM without consets with rangerway. Not that hard, just a couple of deaths on average. Tread lightly though, so as not to attract too many wurms. Well, that is it with the answers. Any improvement suggestion is always welcome, but please state why it makes the build more efficient in general. Cheers

I don't know why you have the Rezz on the Player (Ranger build).
Also i don't see the sence of Triple shot, since you can spam Barrage.
I would suggest FgJ! + SY! for a improved partywide prot, might make this more fitting for longer combats, as when the minions are dead, SY is ready.

Another option would be Never Rampage Alone + Comfort animal. Provides Ias + Another pet.

Rebirth on the human ranger is for when your heroes die and you are the last man standing. This is kind of useful in areas like DOA or other places with no resurrection shrine. Like was said earlier this is a high risk build, relying solely on the quick speed of killing, so rebirth comes in handy from time to time.

The reason for both barrage and trip shot is their different functionalities. Barrage offers AoE nuking, whilst triple shot offers single target spike damage. 250+ DMG with triple shot happens quite often.

The SY + FGJ option on the human ranger has been explored before but there is poor synergy with the build.

Sure, it can be useful, but only in niche situations.

The problem is that SY is situational and uses up two slots on the human, which otherwise always increase the damage output of the build.

It also clashes with the usage of the honor ward, SY cannot be maintained indefinitely and it precludes the possibility for a monk/rit hard rez on the human.

SpiritNuke build is what i am currently using and its very good at surviving. I run it on my monk. Maybe its because i dont know all of the quests, but i cannot complete UW in NM. Tried many times but fail by about the 7th quest. Maybe i need cons? Any tips or sugestions for UW on NM and what is your average clearing time of UW on nm?

Yeah spiritnuke is solid. You can be careless and lure what are normally way too many mobs and still survive unscathed.

Not sure which UW quest you mean by the 7th one.

But it is probably either chaos planes or frozen wastes since these may be tricky if you don't know where to place your heroes.

If its the frozen wastes, don't split the team. Stay near the edge of the spawn point, on the side where the reaper is. As you stay on the edge and kill more terrorwebs, work your way toward the center of the spawn as they keep popping up. You can leak a few terrorwebs that head toward the ice king no problem, just make sure the reaper recieves none.

For chaos planes, position your party slightly north of the reaper. Do this in such a way that the reaper will tank one side, and your team nukes the other. The reaper can tank well with the spirits up. Seeing as you are monk, you need to focus your heals on the reaper as the heroes won't heal the reaper enough.

Alternatively for the chaos planes, you can position your team away from the reaper, but between both waves so the reaper will do almost all of the tanking.

It is also helpful to pick up a few minions before the fight who will tank like mad.

Pre-spirit as much possible before both areas, and watch your heroes closely so you can move them out of a meteor shower before the first stun.

My average clear time for UW is around 1.5-2 hours. Definitely no speed clear but no 7 hero build is.

Also, it can be completed 100% of the time, given practice.

Hello, just a short remark...

On both builds you recommend a +20% enchants mod for the BIP. Indeed this would be useful to boost BIP to 12 seconds... but it does NOT work with the builds you show as they have a bundle skill!

When heroes have a bundle skill they WILL cast it as soon as possible and keep the bundle as long as possible. Unfortunately, carrying a bundle removes all the bonuses of your weapons/offhands.

I don't imagine you could micro-manage the heroes bundle skill, as that would negate the AI intelligence to know when to cast BIP.

Thus with these builds, the +20% is useless... in fact with such a build, you don't even need to give any sort of weapon to your hero.

In conclusion, I'll try tweaking those builds a little!

Maybe ditch PwK? It is kinda redundant to have it on a team where only one person (the BiPer) ever needs healing...

No, actually you'll have at least 2 heroes to heal, because the MM will use Blood of the Master.

With a superior rune and Masochism, he can have 10 minions, thus sacrifice 25% life.

In fact you might also want to ditch Soothing Memories as you won't benefit from the energy bonus because you don't carry a bundle any more!

Will all those spirits around, there is an awesome rit heal: Spirit Transfer. Even on a secondary rit, you will get 205 heal, a 1/4 sec cast time (almost not-interruptible!) and a 5 sec recast (or 2.5 if HSR triggers). Yes it eats up 41 life to a spirit around, but that would be of no importance with such a wall of spirits.
205 heal / 1/4 sec / Recast 5 sec, is equivalent to what a regular primary monk can do with non-elite skills. So that is a good one here.

For the second skill, you can choose Rejuvenation for more heal, and one more spirit to feed you Spirit Transfer. The downside of this spirit is that it will be eaten very fast by your minions natural decay, even out of combat. The benefit being that your MM will need less cast of BotM.

The second possible choice is Recovery. I don't find it very useful in general situations, but it can come handy in zones like Foundry where you get a lot of burning from the Dryders, and other conditions from the lesser titans. The upside of Recovery is that it will last its full duration, unless killed by the enemy, giving you an excellent source for Spirit Tranfer.

Summary :
- remove : Soothing Memories, Protective was Kaolai
+ add : Spirit Transfer, Rejuvenation or Recovery


... and don't forget this team is supposed to be led by a monk, so, of course, you can adapt your monk build accordingly.

The MM hardly ever uses BotM, except maybe outside combat on long walks, and under those circumstances the BiPer has an easy time healing him.

You know the problem with theorycrafting is that it usually involves assumptions about a build's functionality, or about AI behavior, that don't hold to be true in the game itself, so it's usually better to test the build ingame than to make guesses on guru and pass them off as facts.

Indeed, you are very right, the AI can be very tricky. It uses some skills much better than players (like BIP, or insta-rezing with UA), and wastes some other skills.

I tried the SpiritNuke at Sytgian Veil, went like a breeze.
BIP replaced: PwK + Sootinh Memories, with Mend body & Soul + Spirit Transfer.

But Foundry was a complete catastrophe. The third room is lethal as AoE tend to spread out the foes, agroing the other groups more than with "standard" teams ==> and wipe. Furthermore, none of the Titans found here are fleshy, meaning that the MM becomes quickly useless at providing a steady meat shield with minions.

Quote: On both builds you recommend a +20% enchants mod for the BIP. Indeed this would be useful to boost BIP to 12 seconds... but it does NOT work with the builds you show as they have a bundle skill! The bundle is not always up you know, especially during pressure when he drops it to use as a heal. This is when the +20% duration becomes handy.