Need advice - longbow ranger vs vitality guardian or heal-shout warrior

[Walder.6524]

Hey folks,

I mentioned in a General Discussion thread that I have a lot of trouble dodging, so I'm looking for a class and build that would not have to rely on dodge any more than necessary. My intent it open world solo play, for the most part. I realize that I can't avoid dodging entirely, but I need to minimize it.

Anyway, several people suggested a longbow ranger as an option. What do you think, would this be a superior choice to the other options that came up, vitality guardian and heal-shout warrior?

Thanks for any advice! I'm narrowing things down with your help! I'll be done posting about this soon.

[Crossaber.8934]

Bear Longbow ranger was a thing for ranger. The bear provide the ranger a easy tank while ranger just shoot the foe to death.

It was widely used in openworld since launch. The tool it provides will greatly help a solo player to get through harder or even group contents. But on the other hand, it promote bad habit like low map awareness, passive game play etc.

[beatthedown.2651]

Not sure if troll post, but please for the love of god learn how to dodge and play whatever you like. As I started this game the combat system blew my mind since I've never seen anything like that in an MMO.

You won't rely on this mechanic in most open world zerg events. They are built to be very casual friendly. But as you approach endgame content not dodging will make the game much harder for you.

If you have trouble with the keybinds you can enable dodging by double tapping any movement key, which isn't ideal but works for beginners. I personally have bound the dodge on a key next to the space bar so I can easily perform a dodgejump by pressing both keys with my thumb. Works for me at least and gives me a significant advantage in all gamemodes.

[Oenanthe.6549]

I was one who suggested a Ranger on the other post, unfortunately I can't suggest a build as I just make it up as I progress, I don't follow any guides or anything.

My best suggestion would be to start a Ranger and a Guardian and just try playing them, try the different weapons, take the time to read what the skills do and what the talents do. My prefered pets tend to be more damage orientated than some, I rely on a hard hit early on to grab the enemies attention, the snow leopard seems particularly good for me, as do the drakes. Keep away from the pets that have a ranged attack such as devourers

The most important thing is to get out there and start having fun, just because one person plays one way doesn't mean it is a style that would work for you. You don't need to be level 80 with a meta build and nimble fingers to enjoy yourself, the open world, particularly Core Tyria is fairly forgiving, the main thing is to know your class and how you play it. if you do get killed, don't get upset by it, think about what happened and how you can avoid it happening again without having to rely on dodging all the time.

I will add that if you can learn to strafe (move sideways while facing forward, not sure what the normal keybinding is I change all mine) then that can help you move out of some area effects before they hit.

[Prophet.1584]

is this for solo play? drakes and bears make good tanks. cats do great damage. LB ranger with beastmastery to buff your pet and marksmanship to buff the LB. i'd also play GS since it has built in evasion frames on the auto attack. sword/dagger could work as well and gives up to 3 evades on skills 2,3 and dagger 4(i think)

[Turkeyspit.3965]

You can definitely level a Ranger with Longbow and not have to rely on dodge too much, but that does change towards the end of the Personal Story, and once you get into the 1st expansion Heart of Thorns, the difficulty jumps up significantly, and if you're not dodging damage, you're eating gravel.

Unlike other MMOs that use the Tank/DPS/Healer formula, GW2 is more about avoiding damage than absorbing / healing through it, which is why some open world mobs hit harder than they should - because they aren't supposed to hit you.

I'm not sure about Guardian, given they have such a low health pool. Even if you work towards a self sustain build, can that really work without having to dodge? I find myself playing almost 'hit and run' with anything that survives past my initial burst + 2 blinds.

But as has been said, the beauty of GW2 is it is very forgiving (up to a point), and if all you're interested in is doing map completion and personal story in Core, you can play pretty much everything using any weapon and stat combination, and you'll succeed. All depends on your goals.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Necro though. They have very high health pool, minons, and can build to where they have a ton of life leech, which makes for very forgiving playstyle.

[Belishine.7493]

this is harder to say becouse i do not know what classes you play or what you main as. so in a short summery a ranger has range of 1500 meters and the only other class that can hit that is thief i think with riffle so your only threat so far. depending on what build you like you can go druid as a condi clear or go sb for the pet murg and use some cool skills its up to you on that. i use sb for wvw becouse i dont like my pet saying im runing this way and see a zerg fallow me and die from it. as for guardion they are close range fighter for 90% of the time but you can also be a good group healer if you want and you will die tone doue to you being a healer. if you go war go spellbreacker for the high buff and condi clear and the you have realy good hp in full zerker gear and its hard to kill you. that is all i have to say on this matter but it mainly comes to what is your playstyle and what class do you like.

[Fluffball.8307]

I find even the expac's absolutely trivial using a longbow druid (and I recommended that in your other thread.) The need for dodging is actually extremely low as long as you are fine with repositioning constantly. As a random example, there is a particular champion you fight for hero points in the first expac that will charge you in a straight line and likely 1-hit you. You could either dodge like a "normal" player, or simply sidestep it because you're constantly circling at range with your bow.

I have put in quite a bit of time working on dodging via WvW and PvP, so my opinion may be distorted, but I believe you could relatively easily finish ALL PvE content in the entire game with minimal dodging. (There are a few living story bosses you'd need to corpse rush if you just can't dodge ANYTHING, or you could just bring a friend.)

[anduriell.6280]

@Walder.6524 said:Hey folks,

I mentioned in a General Discussion thread that I have a lot of trouble dodging, so I'm looking for a class and build that would not have to rely on dodge any more than necessary. My intent it open world solo play, for the most part. I realize that I can't avoid dodging entirely, but I need to minimize it.

Anyway, several people suggested a longbow ranger as an option. What do you think, would this be a superior choice to the other options that came up, vitality guardian and heal-shout warrior?

Thanks for any advice! I'm narrowing things down with your help! I'll be done posting about this soon.For most gamemodes trailblazzer scourge is perfect. You won’t be the fastest but you will be a literal unkillable tank (you’ll melt your enemies before they can do real damage).

From the choices you give using warrior is the most relaxed: with double endure pain + shield you have a 80% block uptime and you would do damage like crazy. In all my fights warrior don’t dodge, so against NPCs it is even easier (I toy with warrior from time to time). But not the shout warrior look for permablock roaming builds (for wvw) that should be crazy good in pve ( not raids )

LB ranger is not a real choice. Bear will tank just few enemies but not all if they are many and in HOT and forward you will have a bad time.

Guard is a lot of fun but is also complex and you will need to dodge.

[FASTCAR.7831]

@"Walder.6524" said:Hey folks,

I mentioned in a General Discussion thread that I have a lot of trouble dodging, so I'm looking for a class and build that would not have to rely on dodge any more than necessary. My intent it open world solo play, for the most part. I realize that I can't avoid dodging entirely, but I need to minimize it.

Anyway, several people suggested a longbow ranger as an option. What do you think, would this be a superior choice to the other options that came up, vitality guardian and heal-shout warrior?

Thanks for any advice! I'm narrowing things down with your help! I'll be done posting about this soon.

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/36908/legendary-fastcar-survivability-in-wvw-vs-any-amount-of-players/p1?new=1

[ZNICK.8537]

If you're having trouble dodging because you're literally trying to dbl click to do it, STOP! Hotkey dodge to another key like V or something and it becomes SO easy.

Z