Conditions Ranger guide
Condition Spam
The Ranger has quite an arsenal of condition based attacks at his disposal, and many decide to take advantage of that fact and take a whole slew of them. Condition spam rangers have access to many different conditions to throw at their enemies, including bleeding, poison, cripple, burning, and dazed. Alone, each condition is fairly weak, but as they add up, they cause more and more damage. This is made more lethal when the ranger uses condition preparations in conjunction with condition bow attacks, bestowing two conditions at once. The only set back of some conditions is the maximum degeneration of 10. If used in conjunction with a degeneration hexer, some conditions end up adding little to a target's pain besides a few more icons at the top of their screen.
Weapons
Shortbow (Sigil of Superior Earth: 60% chance on crit to proc a 5-second bleed)
Axe (Sigil of Superior Earth) + Warhorn (Sigil of Superior Agony: increase bleeding length)
The shortbow is by far the best Ranger sPvP weapon right now. It can output a ton of conditions, both to a single target and to multiple targets in a team fight. If you're able to flank your opponent (i.e. shoot them in the side or back) your auto-attack bleeds them on every shot, and with the shortbow's extremely high rate-of-fire that can be a lot of bleeds (especially when you add in the bleeds that can proc off crits from the weapon sigil and the Sharpened Edges trait in the Marksmanship trait line). Shortbow also has a lot of utility with an escape (skill 3), a Cripple (skill 4), and an interrupt (skill 5, which dazes by default but stuns if you're flanking).
The axe can also output a lot of bleeds, especially to multiple targets. Your auto-attack bounces between multiple targets, which makes up to three chances to proc a bleed on crit with every throw. Axe skill 2 can land multiple blinds on a single target if thrown from point-blank range. Axe skill 3 chills your target, which can be good both for chasing and escaping.
The Warhorn is my favourite offhand. Skill 4, which calls in a flock of birds, lands 16 or 18 attacks (somewhere in that range) over the course of several seconds, and each of those individual attacks has a chance to crit and proc bleeding. You have to keep them in range and line-of-sight for the hits to land, though. Warhorn skill 5 is excellent for mobility between points, something which this build doesn't have otherwise, and it also gives you 20 seconds of Fury, which significantly raises your critical hit chance (by 20%), meaning that many more bleeds.
Utility Skills
Healing Spring
This is the Ranger's best healing skill, hands down. It has slightly less up-front healing and a longer cooldown than Heal as One, but it makes up for those minor shortcomings by also removing a condition and giving the Regeneration boon every three seconds—and not only to you, but to any teammates who happen to be standing in it, as well! On top of all that, it's a Water combo field, so every time you shoot a projectile while you're standing in it, you refresh your regen buff, and the projectile carries that regen with it to wherever it lands. Other combo finishers will have further beneficial effects, as well.
Signet of Renewal
This is a really great defensive skill. It has a passive effect of removing a condition every 10 seconds, which is always nice, but when activated it draws all conditions from allies near your pet onto the pet (poor little Teddy Bear...) and it's also a stun-breaker, which can be life-saving when you're up against an enemy who's counting on landing a deadly burst combo on you. Be aware that the condition removal aspect of this skill can be a bit unreliable, since your pet has to be within a certain distance of you in order for it to draw off your conditions. It's always good to keep an eye on where your pet is, and use your F1 (Attack) and F3 (Return to Me) pet commands to keep a leash on it.
Spike Trap
A trap that bleeds and cripples. You can use this to prepare for a fight, and also to throw at your enemy in the middle of a fight. More conditions means more effectiveness for your offense, and the cripple can be helpful defensively, too.
Viper Nest
A poison trap. Use in tandem with Spike Trap to drop a whole lot of conditions on your opponent all at once.
Alternative Utilities
If you don't much like trapping, you could consider bringing Lightning Reflexes (escape + stun break + vigor) for more defense and Sharpening Stone for even more bleeds. If you do this, you'll want to grab the trait that shortens the recharge on Survival skills. With the bleed-on-crit procs, though, Sharpening Stone isn't the most necessary utility, and two traps are much better than one.
That said, my choices of utility skills change a bit from time to time, so you may find something you like better.
Entangle
For my elite skill, I almost always take Entangle. It slaps the target with a huge 20-stack bleed and an immobilize that lasts until they destroy the vines. Make sure you're within 600 range when you cast it, though, or you'll have wasted a very long cooldown!
Traits
Marksmanship: 20 points
III Keen Edge
Use Sharpening Stone when your health reaches 75%.
Sharpening Stone makes your next 5 attacks bleed your target. Definitely doesn't hurt!
VIII Piercing Arrows
All arrow attacks pierce targets.
Potentially very helpful in team fights, allowing you to spread a lot more poison and bleeding and maybe even land a lucky cripple or daze/stun on a secondary target.
Skirmishing: 30 points
II Sharpened Edges
Chance to bleed on crit. Perfect for this build.
VIII Trapper's Expertise
Traps are ground-targeted and have a 50% larger area of effect.
So much better for team fights, allowing you not to step out of position.
XI Trap Potency
Conditions caused by traps last twice as long, and traps recharge 20% faster.
Absolutely yes please.
Wilderness Survival: 20 points
III Shared Anguish
Incoming disables are transferred to your pet. This effect can trigger once every 90 seconds.
While this trait doesn't allow you to control when it gets activated, it can potentially help you avoid a very costly stun, fear, or knockdown.
VII Offhand Training
Offhand skills have a longer range and recharge 20% faster.
This means more frequent Fury and Swiftness from your Warhorn skill 5, and easier-to-land hits from your birds with the extended, or more burning from your Torch.
Alternatives
The traits from the Marksmanship line could be replaced by something from Nature Magic or Beastmastery, especially if you'd prefer vitality or healing over Marksmanship's power increase.
In Wilderness Survival, Hide in Plain Sight is a very attractive option at the second trait tier, allowing you to automatically camouflage when you're disabled, once every 30 seconds. A lot of big burst skills (like Hundred Blades) are area-of-effect, though, rather than directly targeted, so being invisible won't prevent that Warrior from dicing you up anyways.
Amulet
Rabid Amulet
+798 Condition Damage
+569 Precision
+569 Toughness
Soldier's Jewel
+125 Vitality
+75 Power
+75 Precision
The condi damage, precision, and toughness from the Rabid Amulet are all very important for this build's damage output and survivability. I use a Soldier's Jewel right now because a complete lack of +Vitality frightens me a bit. Having high Toughness is great, but Toughness doesn't protect against condition damage! More play time could very easily change my mind on this jewel choice, though.
Runes
Superior Rune of the Thief
(1) +25 Precision
(2) +27 Condition damage
(3) +50 Precision
(4) +40 Condition damage
(5) +90 Precision
Superior Rune of the Afflicted
(1) +28 Condition damage
.: Shoutbox voor je dagelijkse portie klets ::.
\
