Not-so-mighty Ranger

[drty]

I'm thinking about starting new playthrough with an Orlan Ranger as a main character. Looking at the forums, I haven't encountered large variance of builds for the class. Basically, I understand that this one is simple - you don't need to care too much about defenses - so Constitution and Resolve may be at low numbers. But what I'm thinking about - is to gimp Might attribute as well (have it set to 7 or 8 ), but in exchange give him lots of Dexterity and Perception.

 

The question is: how viable will it be in terms of DPS? Won't I face with big issues of how to penetrate armored foes?

Edited November 2, 2015 by drty

[Elric Galad]

Well well. Low might means that you will have (rather) low base damage. You might compensate with high dexterity and perception but I have some concern about ennemies with high DR.

 

Basically, it would make bow less interesting. You can choose a high base damage weapon but you'll have to skip twin shots then.

 

Wounding shots are nice with low speed high damage weapons... but low might reduce the potential of individual shots.

 

You can have high Int too, which is nice for stunning shots. But stunning shots are nice with fast attacking bows...

 

In my opinion, average might would be ok, but going so far as 7-8 for a damage dealer seems extreme (apart rogues and their crazy amount of modifier).

 

You might have might around 10-12, max Dex and Per with decent Int, go with bows (preferrably Superb and with DR bypass) and specialize in CC and interrupts.

 

Wolf pet is the most DPS, it could compensate for your ranger, and its target might be perma-stun anyway.

[drty]

I'm gonna use blunderbuss - it should be tech-oriented Powerless Ranger.

 

Not sure about wolf pet - it is too fragile on PotD difficulty- what do you say about bear with Resilient Companion talent?

[Elric Galad]

I play in PotD with a wolf pet (with resilient talent) and I have absolutely no problem to keep it alive. It is one of my off tanks and works well with a bit of support from time to time.

 

Bear has stupidly low attack speed as well as 2 less base damages par attack. It is a massive drop in DPS.

 

Antelope (if you don't mind RP it) has a slightly better attack speed than wolf with same base damage as bear and +7 all defenses. In my opinion it is currently the better compromise between attack and defense.

 

Blunderbuss is extremely sensitive to DR. With lead spitter and penetrating shots, it can reach 12DR bypass (and cost a talent). After this threshold, every single DR point will horribly lower your damages, especially with low might. Furthermore, there is no superb blunderbuss (unless you use dragon eyes), so few way to compensate might negative damage modifier.

 

If you absolutely want to go with blunderbuss, get a pistol as a backup weapon. They are the same group. A tech guy should have several tricks in his bag !

[Raven Darkholme]

I have to throw in, that 8 Might is not low at all, especially if you have an item with +2 MI you have the base damage of every weapon.

Idk much about rangers tho, I find ALL petrs too squishy.

[mosspit]

Moreover, blunderbuss does not work with twinned arrows (along with all other ranged weapon with reload mechanics).

[aweigh0101]

rangers are very useful in PotD. i ahve very fond memories of raiding the Dyrford underground temple/dungeon that houses like 30 million skaen priests and my indisputable gold-star MVPs were sagani and ituumak.

after getting wiped twice in a row due to my bad micro causing adjacent rooms' troops to join my current fight and stomping me, i realized i could just send ituumak into each room, and have him attack the skaen enemy ciphers, who were the most dangerous due to mind control spells. the enemy a.i. is so dumb they'll blow their charm/dominate spells on ituumak, and you have then tons of time to roll in with your crew and take care of them while they're "recharging". needless to say... perma death was NOT on, else ituumak would've died like 30 times over. you know, can itumaak actually permanently die? i know NPC's can, but can the ranger pet!? i actually don't know.

sadly i beleive pet-kiting and pet-zergrushing is the only true value of the ranger class. take away the pet, and there is literally nothing they do that any of the other martial classes will do better or bring way more to the table. so yeah i agree the ranger isn't mighty, but the ranger and his pet are a GREAT team and can bring TONS of variety to your party makeup and allows for many great ways to toy and tease the game's A.I., as the pet can do so many things if you know what to do. setting up flanking situations, setting up a knockdown + DoT disable on an enemy (pet gets knockdown ability), and even defense-oriented advantages, as the talent/ability that gives the ranger and their pet extra pluses on saves versus AoE's from enemies is actually REALLY awesome as it covers "AoE"'s like mass charm/confuse, or enemy druid's relentless storm "aoe" of stunning. it's an under-the-hood- sort of thing, as the description doesn't explicitely mention those things, but it works. so it's basically an affliction-resistance ability that's just as good as those available to paladins and monks.

if you're not keen on micro-managing the pet every single encounter, which i understand fully due to insane number of trash-mobs, i suggest building a dual-wielder melee ranger and dropping the ranged shtick entirely. ranger has same base deflection and same base ACC as the rogue, but has higher endurance and higher health. sure, ranger lacks the rogue's hit-to-crit talents, and the rogue's or the fighter's +dmg modifiers class abilities, but makes up for it with super high aCC (same as rogue, the two are the only ones in the Very High tier of ACC), which means lots of hits and crits regardless of anything else.

set the pet's AI on cautious/coordinated so it only attacks the same enemy your ranger is attacking (this ai script works much better when the ranger is in melee, as opposed to when the ranger is shooting at ranged; when ranged it bugs out a lot and the pet does whatever he wants. total opposite happens in melee) and enjoy pet-knockdowns and pet-flanking and pet-tanking without having to micro him much.

about the same amount of micro as a rogue, i think, but IMO more fun micro because pet is fun. moving rogue around every fight so he doesn't get one shotted = not that fun.

addendum: have the ranger dual-wield we-toki battle-axe which prones-on-crit (with edge of reason axe which is godlike), or have the ranger use the great sword the hours of st. rumbault or the pike tall-grass for prone-on-crit as well, and have fun mauling every enemy you crit-prone cos then your pet gets to inflict the bite-DoT ability on them, and it's all just downhill for the enemy from there.

ranger with a weapon that does -5 enemy defenses on hit, like white spire estoc, for example, also complements the pet as well facilitating the pet's tanking and the pet's knockdown/DoT-bite. may sound like blasphemy but melee ranger is much more effective at locking down enemies due to easier coordination with the pet.

Edited November 3, 2015 by aweigh0101

[aweigh0101]

as for the OP's original question of what to do with a low-MIGHT ranger, i say give him the drake's bell estoc you get from the first bounty, which has built-in -8 dr, 3 more than all other estocs. have the ranger pick talent vulnerable attack for an extra 5 dr bypass, makes now for 13 total, and when u reach TWM you can sweet talk alpine dragon for a bracer that adds a final extra 3 dr bypass, for a total of 16 dr bypass with drake's bell. that is the best weapon to use on a low-MIGHT character, as the minimum damage on every hit will be 34, every single time.

[drty]

Don't like the idea of melee ranger. But thanks for the hint - will be looking for a gun with decent DR.

 

And another question: what Aim (Swift/Vicious) talent will behave better for my setup (low Mig + lots of Dex/Per + hard hitting gun)?

[aweigh0101]

guns have 3 phases: attack (the firing of the shot), the recovery (the unit is experiencing the gun's kickback, and usually you see small wisp of smoke curling up) and thirdly and this is exclusive to guns the reloading phase, which is where you see them... reloading.

Dexterity speeds up the attacking phase, and the recovering phase, but does not affect in way whatsoever the reloading phase. that is hard-coded.

the only thing that speeds up gun reloading are the gunner talent, the chanter phrase, and the ranger class ability pick that says so along with higher rate of fire and, if IIRC, a penalty to ACC. the ACC penalty is moot IMO since the ranger's ACC is one of the highest in the game anyway.

bar none the best hard-hitting big ass gun is the arquebus. there are only 2 magical ones in the entire game though, that's how good they are. they have the longest reloading phase out of all of the guns in the game. in second place, but not close, just second place, is the pistol. there are many magical guns throughout the game. besides the DPS they do, the other difference is their range. pistols are 8m, arquebus are 10m. to put in perspective, hunting bows, warbos and crossbows are 12m. arbalests are 10m. the difference from 10m (arquebus) to 8m (pistol) is HUGE. numbers seem small, but once you notice just how much more close the ranger has to shoot from you'll understand.

take gunner talent when available, take the ranger ability that speeds up rate of fire and reloading, but DON'T take the other one; all 3 guns have built-in DR and all 3 guns hit hard. you do NOT want to slow down your rate of fire with guns just to increase their DPS, they already have huge DPS and the end result of slowing them down might actually LOWER their DPS. that particular talent is only useful if you plan to use a bow-wielding ranger. THEN it's the exact opposite, take that one, and DON'T take the one that speeds up reloading, etc.

with a high dex, gunner talent, swift aim, and a Speed enchanted Pistol (you get one in defiance bay) you are going to be slugging serious lead.

i don't recommend using blunderbusses as they have been nerfed over time and are no longer the darlings they used to be. there is one legitimate, and very viable synergy between ranger and blunderbuss which is their class ability hobbling shot or however it's called which applies Damage over Time; this ability, and others like it such as Envenomed Strike for example, are applied per-pellet of shot, and blunderbuss' shoot 6 pellets. they're very innacurate though, with a native -10 ACC penalty, and IIRC are also 8m in range, or maybe even 6m. Gotta look that up. They also do very little damage unless all 6 pellets hit, so if you're gonna plan on using lead-spitter blunderbuss for example to take advantage of 6-pellet DoT abilities make sure your ranger is packing very high ACC through gear, stats, or whatever.

i wholeheartedly advise against using them since pistols are way better, and faster, and arquebus when handled properly are the best. i remember a ranger i was using for one playthrough used to hit for 60-80 dmg per arquebus shot on a regular hit, and would climb into 100's on a crit by the time he was lvl 12. fun times.

mid-level ranger ability Driving Flight is awesome as well. makes gunshots/arrows ricochet off the target and strike a nearby one. also make absolutely sure to pick up Stalker's Link and Stunning Shots, in that order, as soon as you see it available in your level up screen. very important talent for any ranger; if you shoot at the same target your pet is engaging you'll inflict Stun on them with an ACC bonus on the shot, they must save vs. Fortitude to not get stunned. Stun is one of the deadliest afflictions, right up there with petrification and paralyze. Not to be confused with STUCK, which is not that great.

the stunning shot, btw, can also ricochet if you picked the driving flight ability earlier on. it's active for any and all shots you make. the ricochet chance depends on some variables, it's not always guaranteed, but it's pretty consistent.

Edited November 3, 2015 by aweigh0101

[drty]

Oh, I didn't suspect that blunderbuss uses shotgun-like mechanic with pellets. Good to know. And if I understood you correctly every pellet's hit is evaluated separately for all possible calculations. Means DR value will also be subtracted for every pellet? And if it's so, why are you still suggesting to use it with Wounding Shot? As far as I know, Its damage is based on the damage of the initial hit. So considering the fact that initial damage is reduced by DR for every pellet - applied DoT should be really insignificant, isn't it?