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Frontline – (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger for PVP
Frontline – (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger for PVP
“She who knows when she can fight and when she cannot, will be victorious “ - Frontline (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger
This is my first build guide so please show your support by leaving positive comments and constructive feedback. I am not very forum savvy and this will not be an aesthetically pleasing guide until I have the some spare time. However, this first edition will provide all of the information you will need to build your Frontline (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger.
Be advised that this build is built to have a specific purpose in which it excels; in doing so this opens a few weaknesses not shared by it's Hybrid counterparts.
Strengths
Excels in 1v1, 1v2 and 1v3, node contesting vs Melee Classes
Can go toe to toe with an equal geared GWF, and can kill them with less difficulty than other HR builds
Weaknesses
Restricted mobility and ranged damage compared to other HR builds
Needs to be in melee range to deal any reasonable damage
Less effective in Pick Up Group (PUG) PVP, this is due to having little control over what class you fight.
Race
I must stress, please play whichever race you enjoy the most; this is something you cannot change currently.
If you are interested in Min/Maxing choose Halfling for the best rolls and class features.
Ability Scores
Get your CON and DEX as high as possible on your initial roll and put all bonus points into these two stats. CON will give us the ability to tank and DEX will increase both our damge output and deflection chance.
Gear & Enchants
Armor
Grim or Profound Combatants Armor (Set bonus is set to face a rework, we will see how this affects us only after it is implemented) This set has 3 essential stats for us, Power for damage, Armour Pen for cutting through our enemies defences and Deflection for avoiding bust damage.
Weapons
Whichever weapons give you the highest weapon damage (I use CN weapons but will move to Formorian or Fallen Dragon when I can). The Weapon Enchantments that we will use deal damage based on our weapon damage so this is a no brainer.
Armor Enchantments
Souldforged/Barkshield – I like both of these and think of them as extra HP, you can’t go wrong with either. One gives you HP up front (by way of reducing incoming damage) the other on the backend (by giving you a second life or extra HP). Barkshield is effective against a GWF and GF because their first hits will be high damage encounters. An HR or TR on the other hand will burn your charges with weak at wills, rendering Barkshield less effective.
Radiant in all Defense slots (HP in PVP is BIS for this build) we will have 5 Defense Slots
Radiant or Dark in all Offence slots, Dark (Armor Pen) will give you a higher damage boost vs GWF and GF by way of cutting through their high defense. Radiant (Power) will give you a higher damage boost vs every other class, because you should have enough Armor Pen from the Combatant set to bypass their defense anyway. We will have 4 Offence slots.
Dark (Movement) in all Utility slots
Weapon Enchantments
Plague Fire or Flaming (I use a Greater Plague Fire, the dot is important which I will explain further down)
Artifacts
I can only share what I use however feel free to use your own combinations. I think the best complement to HP is Regeneration, so I use Blood Crystal Raven Skull, Defenders Banner and Waters, currently all at level 61.
My Regen with these Artifacts and the gear listed below is just over 2,000, giving me 12.5% Hit Point Regeneration.
Gear
I think the choices I have made are always subject to tweaking, if you have a more effective set up do feel free to share, I prioritized Regeneration and Power.
Neck –Dominators Cloak
Ring – Ring of the Noble Beast
Ring - Ring of the Noble Beast
Belt – Renewing Belt of Smiting
Shirt – Gemmed Exquisite Shirt
Pants - Gemmed Exquisite Pants
Powers and Feats
http://nwcalc.com/hr?b=p8v:27sgts:1by9f4,13n0iii:100000:1uu5uv:1u0000&h=0&p=pfr
These are not set in stone however they complement the builds focus on staying close range and in the line of fire. The synergy of the power Careful Attack, the feats Seeker and Master of Combat and a Plague Fire/Flaming enchant helps us burn down foes HP and provides stamina/AP for our dailies and dodges.
Class Skills
I slot Lone Wolf which gives you a tanking abilty and Pathfinders Action. Pathfinders Action synergises perfectly with a combat HR and periodically can give you the movement of a mount and deflection in the low forties.
Boons
Please give me some time to analyse these for their best effectiveness. I currently do not have all of the available Boons. Keeping the concept of the build in mind, prioritize like this:
HP, Regeneration, Power/Arp (Whichever provides you more damage against either Melee or Everyone else, synergise with your Offence slotted enchants), Deflect/defense, Choose damage options for “You have a chance to deal……boons”.
Also, Madness stacks are easy to reach with all our dots, this boon is a good choice.
Powers to Slot
At Wills – Careful Attack/Aimed Strike – This combo is amazing and with an enchant with a Damage over Time(DoT) effect very lethal.
Dailies – Forest Meditation/ Your Choice (I like Disruptive Shot however Forest Ghost and Slashes Mark can be more useful depending on the situation you are facing.
Encounters – These all depend on your situation that’s what I love about this game, they all have a use in the right situation. Please take note, if you are fighting against a good team you will change powers frequently. Don’t stay stagnant, adapt and change.
Thornward/Strike is a great choice as it provides damage to anyone fighting you toe to toe and if placed correctly can make a ranged character dodge backward and out of their own firing range. I like to position the edge of the outer circle on an enemy CW. If they blink forward they risk landing in Thornward and if they blink backward you can shift back out of range. Thorn Strike has been buffed and while it is not a huge damage dealer it can finish of an enemy if they have only a slither of health.
Boar Charge/Hide is great for two reasons. Firstly when fighting a melee, Boars Hide will allow you to resist their intial damage burst easier and it is an easy skill to pop before ever engaging an enemy. This skill also helps your team. Boars Charge allows you to easily follow up with either Careful Strike or Aimed Strike which both have a casting time. And the prone can help your team kill a Healing Tank DC or a pesky CW.
Fox Cunning/Shift is a skill to good to give up. If used correctly and with perfect timing Cunning can save you from the most damaging skills a melee can inflict on you, also Shift is an instant kill after you enemy is resurrected by Soulforged.
Maruaders Rush/Escape is amazing for a combat focused HR. Rush gives us the ability to close a huge distance and Escape can help you aviod being surrounded.
I will cover some effective set ups for fighting each class below in a few days, so make sure to come back and look. Keep in mind if you want to be as good as you can be, you will need to change your skills depending on what you are fighting.
As a general stratergy with this build we need to do two things to our enemy as soon as possible. Choose your encounters based on how they will help you acheive these two things quickly and safely.
1. Mark them with Careful Attack
2. Hit them with Aimed Strike
Here's what will happen,
Careful Attack will proc every 1.5 seconds consistently from your Aimed strike bleed and the Dot from your Weapon Enchantment. All these procs will in addition proc skills such as Master of Combat and others over and over and will eat away at your ememies health for a very decent amount of time before needing to be refreshed. When refreshed it will start all over again.
During this time you can have complete focus on you defence much like a TR has the luxury of doing while in stealth and using PoTB. Because of the consistent damage your feats will proc meaning your shifts will always be there for you when you need them and Forest Meditation (an amazing heal) will always be there for you immediatly after it comes off cooldown.
Whatever encounters you have taken use periodically to your advantage. Fox Shift will burst them down and frighten them, Thornward will synergise with Careful Attacks proc and debuff your foe. Boars Charge will keep them from running and Marauders will give you breathing space should you need it.
I hope that you like what I have written and as long as this thread stays positive and productive I will update it through different Modules and continue do my best to pass on any helpful information I come accross.
Now stop reading as I have done writing, and go and enjoy this wonderful game.
“She who knows when she can fight and when she cannot, will be victorious “ - Frontline (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger
This is my first build guide so please show your support by leaving positive comments and constructive feedback. I am not very forum savvy and this will not be an aesthetically pleasing guide until I have the some spare time. However, this first edition will provide all of the information you will need to build your Frontline (Pathfinder) Combat Ranger.
Be advised that this build is built to have a specific purpose in which it excels; in doing so this opens a few weaknesses not shared by it's Hybrid counterparts.
Strengths
Excels in 1v1, 1v2 and 1v3, node contesting vs Melee Classes
Can go toe to toe with an equal geared GWF, and can kill them with less difficulty than other HR builds
Weaknesses
Restricted mobility and ranged damage compared to other HR builds
Needs to be in melee range to deal any reasonable damage
Less effective in Pick Up Group (PUG) PVP, this is due to having little control over what class you fight.
Race
I must stress, please play whichever race you enjoy the most; this is something you cannot change currently.
If you are interested in Min/Maxing choose Halfling for the best rolls and class features.
Ability Scores
Get your CON and DEX as high as possible on your initial roll and put all bonus points into these two stats. CON will give us the ability to tank and DEX will increase both our damge output and deflection chance.
Gear & Enchants
Armor
Grim or Profound Combatants Armor (Set bonus is set to face a rework, we will see how this affects us only after it is implemented) This set has 3 essential stats for us, Power for damage, Armour Pen for cutting through our enemies defences and Deflection for avoiding bust damage.
Weapons
Whichever weapons give you the highest weapon damage (I use CN weapons but will move to Formorian or Fallen Dragon when I can). The Weapon Enchantments that we will use deal damage based on our weapon damage so this is a no brainer.
Armor Enchantments
Souldforged/Barkshield – I like both of these and think of them as extra HP, you can’t go wrong with either. One gives you HP up front (by way of reducing incoming damage) the other on the backend (by giving you a second life or extra HP). Barkshield is effective against a GWF and GF because their first hits will be high damage encounters. An HR or TR on the other hand will burn your charges with weak at wills, rendering Barkshield less effective.
Radiant in all Defense slots (HP in PVP is BIS for this build) we will have 5 Defense Slots
Radiant or Dark in all Offence slots, Dark (Armor Pen) will give you a higher damage boost vs GWF and GF by way of cutting through their high defense. Radiant (Power) will give you a higher damage boost vs every other class, because you should have enough Armor Pen from the Combatant set to bypass their defense anyway. We will have 4 Offence slots.
Dark (Movement) in all Utility slots
Weapon Enchantments
Plague Fire or Flaming (I use a Greater Plague Fire, the dot is important which I will explain further down)
Artifacts
I can only share what I use however feel free to use your own combinations. I think the best complement to HP is Regeneration, so I use Blood Crystal Raven Skull, Defenders Banner and Waters, currently all at level 61.
My Regen with these Artifacts and the gear listed below is just over 2,000, giving me 12.5% Hit Point Regeneration.
Gear
I think the choices I have made are always subject to tweaking, if you have a more effective set up do feel free to share, I prioritized Regeneration and Power.
Neck –Dominators Cloak
Ring – Ring of the Noble Beast
Ring - Ring of the Noble Beast
Belt – Renewing Belt of Smiting
Shirt – Gemmed Exquisite Shirt
Pants - Gemmed Exquisite Pants
Powers and Feats
http://nwcalc.com/hr?b=p8v:27sgts:1by9f4,13n0iii:100000:1uu5uv:1u0000&h=0&p=pfr
These are not set in stone however they complement the builds focus on staying close range and in the line of fire. The synergy of the power Careful Attack, the feats Seeker and Master of Combat and a Plague Fire/Flaming enchant helps us burn down foes HP and provides stamina/AP for our dailies and dodges.
Class Skills
I slot Lone Wolf which gives you a tanking abilty and Pathfinders Action. Pathfinders Action synergises perfectly with a combat HR and periodically can give you the movement of a mount and deflection in the low forties.
Boons
Please give me some time to analyse these for their best effectiveness. I currently do not have all of the available Boons. Keeping the concept of the build in mind, prioritize like this:
HP, Regeneration, Power/Arp (Whichever provides you more damage against either Melee or Everyone else, synergise with your Offence slotted enchants), Deflect/defense, Choose damage options for “You have a chance to deal……boons”.
Also, Madness stacks are easy to reach with all our dots, this boon is a good choice.
Powers to Slot
At Wills – Careful Attack/Aimed Strike – This combo is amazing and with an enchant with a Damage over Time(DoT) effect very lethal.
Dailies – Forest Meditation/ Your Choice (I like Disruptive Shot however Forest Ghost and Slashes Mark can be more useful depending on the situation you are facing.
Encounters – These all depend on your situation that’s what I love about this game, they all have a use in the right situation. Please take note, if you are fighting against a good team you will change powers frequently. Don’t stay stagnant, adapt and change.
Thornward/Strike is a great choice as it provides damage to anyone fighting you toe to toe and if placed correctly can make a ranged character dodge backward and out of their own firing range. I like to position the edge of the outer circle on an enemy CW. If they blink forward they risk landing in Thornward and if they blink backward you can shift back out of range. Thorn Strike has been buffed and while it is not a huge damage dealer it can finish of an enemy if they have only a slither of health.
Boar Charge/Hide is great for two reasons. Firstly when fighting a melee, Boars Hide will allow you to resist their intial damage burst easier and it is an easy skill to pop before ever engaging an enemy. This skill also helps your team. Boars Charge allows you to easily follow up with either Careful Strike or Aimed Strike which both have a casting time. And the prone can help your team kill a Healing Tank DC or a pesky CW.
Fox Cunning/Shift is a skill to good to give up. If used correctly and with perfect timing Cunning can save you from the most damaging skills a melee can inflict on you, also Shift is an instant kill after you enemy is resurrected by Soulforged.
Maruaders Rush/Escape is amazing for a combat focused HR. Rush gives us the ability to close a huge distance and Escape can help you aviod being surrounded.
I will cover some effective set ups for fighting each class below in a few days, so make sure to come back and look. Keep in mind if you want to be as good as you can be, you will need to change your skills depending on what you are fighting.
As a general stratergy with this build we need to do two things to our enemy as soon as possible. Choose your encounters based on how they will help you acheive these two things quickly and safely.
1. Mark them with Careful Attack
2. Hit them with Aimed Strike
Here's what will happen,
Careful Attack will proc every 1.5 seconds consistently from your Aimed strike bleed and the Dot from your Weapon Enchantment. All these procs will in addition proc skills such as Master of Combat and others over and over and will eat away at your ememies health for a very decent amount of time before needing to be refreshed. When refreshed it will start all over again.
During this time you can have complete focus on you defence much like a TR has the luxury of doing while in stealth and using PoTB. Because of the consistent damage your feats will proc meaning your shifts will always be there for you when you need them and Forest Meditation (an amazing heal) will always be there for you immediatly after it comes off cooldown.
Whatever encounters you have taken use periodically to your advantage. Fox Shift will burst them down and frighten them, Thornward will synergise with Careful Attacks proc and debuff your foe. Boars Charge will keep them from running and Marauders will give you breathing space should you need it.
I hope that you like what I have written and as long as this thread stays positive and productive I will update it through different Modules and continue do my best to pass on any helpful information I come accross.
Now stop reading as I have done writing, and go and enjoy this wonderful game.
Post edited by jabsolum on
0
Comments
Hey rustlord, thank you for post! If your looking for a melee HR build I highly recommend this one. With regards to the "roar" breed, I honestly think that this build will still be the victor againts a similar geared GWF with roar slotted. To lay my cards on the table I only ever Pug in PVP (my guild has 6 members) and I have no issue with the roar encounter. In fact I was pugging last night and was holding a node vs 2 GWF and 1 GF with at least one of them using roar and still lasted roughly 4 minutes before dying. Now granted, I may have out geared them, I have a mix of rank 8s and 9s, but still I don't see a lot of builds that can accomplish the same.
Whilst roar may freeze you for a couple of seconds, it does not freeze the dots dealing damage to your foe.
so this build will be soon not really viable
Thank you for your post, not a very positive outlook raydan. Yes the set bonus helps but only if your attacked. The heal for Forest Meditation alone is more then enough, the extra 2% per deflect helps, but trust me I have been through the log and the nerf (when it comes) will not be a build breaker and does not effect the damage we deal. Maybe read through the guide again and you will see that I have not put much emphasis on the 4/4 set bonus.
It's great to hear you play the same build. In this case I would like to see you share a more positive outlook on the things that this build can do rather then concentrate on a small negative. I don't even have profound which is .5% more than I have now. When the nerf goes through (which really is a shame) we can still adapt with this build. Tell me about the good stuff, surely you aren't just running with a HR that only relies on a bugged armour set to make you relevant in PVP?
you can easily hold a node 2vs1 and why not even 3vs1 if you are smart enough. Meditation helps a lot doing it but why it heals so much? bonus set...100% deflect = 700 hp every time you get hit meditating.
about that: it's not relying about a bugged set, it's about i cannot deny them to attack me and heal me and hell...it heals a lot.
So a great part of that survivability is around a set..it's not really the build but what that 10% deflect more in it can lead to.
When the nerf will hit the server im going archery for sure because there are some "domino effects" to exploit even there
Aelar Hawkwind - Archer
Karrin Feywinter - Mistress of Flame
Errin Duskwalker - Executioner
Darquess - Soulbinder
The most important thing in life is to be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. Always be Batman.
I'm archery spec, but it's only for the reduced cooldown on crits, and the increased amount of crits. These feats work on melee attacks just as well as ranged attacks even though they're in the archery tree (and ironically it's the only way to get reduced cooldowns on melee encounters).
You give up the deflect from combat but for me it's worth it. For example, with a decent amount of crits, I can self-pop a double thornward. Not for very long but things like that help a lot, if in no other way than psychologically. I know I'm always like, "WTF" when a single HR has two thornwards running at the same time. Constricting arrow can be cast pretty much as soon as it stops affecting the target.
I've even go so far as to pick up the cooldown feat from combat and have had people call me a "perma-stunning" HR because of how often I can get off a constricting arrow. I find you give up too much survivability without the nature feat though.
Everything else in the guide is pretty much exactly how I play and it's very effective.
Also, a note on boons- pick up fey thistle when you can especially if you're using forest meditation. I had two GWFs literally kill themselves on me today at the same time, spamming their at-wills, giving me great heals and hurting themselves with every hit.
The hilarity alone is worth the boon.
Aelar Hawkwind - Archer
Karrin Feywinter - Mistress of Flame
Errin Duskwalker - Executioner
Darquess - Soulbinder
I have 2 HR and yes SW and Path, I find SW fun and path for sure dominating, contesting at node2 vs 2-3 toons (similarly geared) and come out alive and when my mates arrive the table turns. Its kinda boring though if you're also facing a path hr cause it will always boils down to the battle of patience which is the opposite notion of SW that I'm used to. Path gives us the ability that SW can only dream off
facing head to head with a GWF or GF (I find this shield wielding turtles annoying).
the Fox melee is a sure kill vs an enemy with low hp and still got the soulforge charge, the trick is when they turned black mash fox melee and their casting animation for artifacts are nullified therefore killing em, I'm always saving the melee part when the enemy is near death.
BlackberryCheesecake CW
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
CheeseCake House
I'm currently running archery with the healing feat. It's fun to have insanely fast cooldowns but you give up too much in survivability I find. The synergy with the healing feat and regen and our set-bonus is just too good.
I might switch back when the set bonus is nerfed.
Thanks for you post. Care you share the "Domino Effects" you are speaking of with everyone. I myself had a Archer Spec before changing to full Combat and did not notice any glaring advantages, perhaps you would be so kind to elaborate?
Hi and thank you.
Awesome another guide on the way, it is great to see some movement in the Wilds.
Obviously with this set up you need a good team to support the role you need to play. Without any gap closers or a means of escaping quickly you will have a hard time with ranged classes.
One thing I have noticed in PUG PVP is that TW attracts a lot of attention from the enemy team and leads to me being focused. Sometimes I use Boar's/Fox/maruaders and just focus on one GF or GWF. I Maruader in, knock them down, Careful Attack, Fox Shift, Aimed Strike, and Marauder out. This usually leads them to focus me allowing me team to focus on the enemy team without fear on random knock downs.
Anyway I was just wondering which set is best for pvp? Thank you for everything.
Hey thanks for your post. Glad you like the guide.
That's a tough decision, to be honest I would wait to see if the coming changes to our PVP sets make them less relevant, before choosing which ice set you want. One thing to keep in mind is that their are some amazing HR players and you can view their gear set ups to get an idea of what the best think the best gear is. Until the changes to our PVP set happens grim and profound are still BIS.
To clarify I would hold off on crafting you ice gear. I used brutal, then grim and soon profound. Brutal is not great but it will get you by until getting grim.
Its very cool to see bis gwfs running away from u
Some tips:
- Pathfinders action is nice with disruptive shot. But its kinda redundant for forest med (there u already have 100% deflect), for forest ghost (ur invisible anyway and it was nerfed so it doent stack with other movement buffs) and slashers mark (with the mark up u can shift endlessly for few seconds so u dont need more deflect or runspeed from the passive)
---> Try out aspect of the serpent. There lies a secret snyergy in it. If u have cast thorn ward and them using melees to stack 5x buff for ranged u get permanent 15% dmg increase for ur TW. How? A TW tick doesnt count as a ranged for reducing the buff stacks but still gets the benefit from it. Have tested this and its very nice dmg increase if used correctly.
- This build utilizes the 4/4 set bonus. Why not the artifacts with hps? Gwf artifact and vanguard banner are really sweet. Dont like the raven skull.
Keep up the good work in the wilds
Hey, thank you for contributing!
Aspect of the Serpent never crossed my mind however you make some really valid points for using it. I will definatally give it a go.
I too think the HP artifacts are great, I will try the Vanguard after I get my profound (way to much farming), however I do not have a GWF and will not roll one likely.
You mentioned you were running this build until a few days ago. Can I assume you have found another build equally as good?
If so will you be sharing it with the community?
I would find it hard to manage Aspect of the Serpent during pvp, its just too frantic to actively keep an eye on the buff for me. I used the feature early on but only because I misread the tooltip initially.
The most important thing in life is to be yourself. Unless you can be Batman. Always be Batman.
1. Pathfinder action without slasher's speed seems pretty useless cause it last for like 0,5 second with feat around 3 seconds i tested on preview.
2. I would rather use will and dex instead of con and will loosing 4% control immunity and 4% critical strike for 4% more health seemes not worth bother.
3.I like to combine stag heart with oak skin it give me nice regen for team
4. Aspect of serpent give me dmg boost i lost from stormwared you said in your post use aimed shot then go melee
5.Adding to rapid shot as pathfinder is quite pointless i bet you using hunters teamwork with aimed shot or split shot its better