Ranged without Ranger?

[razcalking]

Hi all. From the builds that I've been able to put together, it seems pretty hard to put together a viable ranged build without including the Ranger class. Marksman, Gunner, and Shot on the Run just seem absolutely necessary from a newbie's perspective.

 

Thing is, I don't want to be a Ranger. It might be silly, but I hate the animal companion thing as just want to shoot things with dual pistols. I know I can do Ghost Heart, but the animal button is still there and it still triggers Ranger conversation reactions from NPCs "Oh, I see you like animals too, hur hur".

 

So is there a way to make Rogue, Fighter, Cipher, whatever else work in a ranged build?

[basilkingcalcifer]

I haven't built one myself, but general sentiment from others on these forums is that blackjacket/ascendant seems to be a pretty viable option for a gun toting character

Edited May 11, 2018 by basilkingcalcifer

[Voltron]

Rogue is good on range if build properly.

[dunehunter]

Rogue/Helwalker, or Rogue/Cipher

[Zzz]

Ranger get you only some hit, reload speed and hit conversion.

So you can build rogue/monk/cipher/fighter/pally as ranged, as result trade some hit and reload speed to dmg and durability.

[Crucis]

You don't have to use rangers for ranged builds.  It's just that you end up with ranged builds that are more in keeping with the class you select. 

 

Build a ranged fighter, and you end up using the weapon specialization and mastery passives, and other things that buff weapon damage.

 

Build a ranged rogue, and you end up with a a character who is more focused on abilities more in keeping with rogues, largely working off of sneak attacks, and such.

 

And so on and so on.

[Voss]

Easily. The ranger class has a couple passives that help ranged builds, but its mostly centered on the pet.

 

Almost any noncaster class will build a better ranged attacker. As will chanter.

[Takkik]

the ranger have some cool passives but me too I hate how perhaps half the actives/passives are devoted to the pets. And I find the ranger got the worse active set of actives abilities (personnal taste). On paper I like the rogue but right now it have lot of issues, like invisibility broken by dots, overpriced abilities like the upgraded escape that pass from 1 cost to 3, or cloud smoke at 2pt, same as the invisible skill. I think it should be a veil upgrade not an independant skill. (sap too, 2pt for confuse 1 target??).

 

About the gunner skill (-20% reload), it's really usefull for arquebuse/crossbow, if you dual weild pistols it's less usefull if you take two weapons fighting (with a 15 dex character, you go from 2.8 reload to 2.3, 0.5sec).

[evilcat]

Combination of Fighter/Rogue/Cipher is good start.

Paladin Walkers or Goldpack could also work.

[Crucis]

the ranger have some cool passives but me too I hate how perhaps half the actives/passives are devoted to the pets. And I find the ranger got the worse active set of actives abilities (personnal taste). On paper I like the rogue but right now it have lot of issues, like invisibility broken by dots, overpriced abilities like the upgraded escape that pass from 1 cost to 3, or cloud smoke at 2pt, same as the invisible skill. I think it should be a veil upgrade not an independant skill. (sap too, 2pt for confuse 1 target??).

 

About the gunner skill (-20% reload), it's really usefull for arquebuse/crossbow, if you dual weild pistols it's less usefull if you take two weapons fighting (with a 15 dex character, you go from 2.8 reload to 2.3, 0.5sec).

 

I'm not so hung up on active abilities.  OTOH, you are 100% correct about how many of the ranger specific abilities are tied to the damned pets.  It becomes really obvious when you start thinking about a Ghost Heart build where you don't need to focus on the pet, and you realize that your options are really limited.

[jakesmurf]

I'm also not a huge fan of the Ranger.  I was originally using one as my ranged character but it felt like I was constantly suffering from bonded grief because my bear was getting one shot by everything (don't know if its just underpowered or doesn't scale with difficulty well), even with some of the defensive passives selected.  

 

I decided to reroll my ranger as a Bleak Walker Paladin / Skald Chanter, and am very happy with the results.  I suspect that it does more damage than before and it has a lot more utility / active abilities of interest.  Bleak Walker gives us some nice damage / accuracy passives, Flames of Devotion for big hits + lash damage, defensive stats, heals, etc.  Chanter gives me a big dps boost from the reload speed phrase and a ton of utility in reducing enemy armor, etc.  I almost exclusively use the aoe Paralyze Invocation because it gives you a big chunk of Hit->Crit conversion against those targets, which keeps the skald resource generation going.  

 

I would say the biggest weakness here is that neither of these classes have access to reliable hit to crit conversions naturally besides paralyze.  You do have a lot of accuracy/deflection debuff sources but conversion feels more consistent to me imo.  

 

[Takkik]

I was full of hope with the cipher because of multiclassing but I have hard time to like this class. Multiclassing with a martial class offset the big let down for me of the cipher : no weapons skills that help you to generate focus. But I still have hard time to enjoy a mindstalker because of 3 problems :

 

- the recovery time of cipher spells : With crippling strike (two pistols) at level 4-5 (soulblade cipher) I'm often at max focus, then come the problem to spend it. Even using only fast cast spells I loose 4 sec (+ with armor penalty) where I can do nothing after each spell, for a rogue it's really painfull. The class don't have any fast recovery spells like wizard self buffs which is bad for a martial oriented caster.

That why I took soulblade so at least I can switch to melee and use it with annihilation and do something with my focus when I don't have any use of my spells (but because you can't access any talents that reduce the switching time outside the fighter it feel less optimal).

 

- The cipher is the only caster class that get no bonus spells as you level up (well with the chanter) That mean when you multiclass that really reduce your spell list. With priest, druid and wizard you can take no spells and still have something to cast at each tier. Often you only need to spend few points to get some key spells to complement the free ones. With a limited spell list, it's harder to spend your focus (outside of spamming same spell over & over, which isn't fun and don't fit a rogue archetype in my opinion).

 

- For the cipher, they really put all the best spells behind the tier 8 gate. The tier 7 isn't interesting for any offensive cipher.

 

I feel like the cipher need free spells, a better selection at mid level, and some fast cast/recovery debuf/self buff spells like pain block and the other one that give you +20accuracy/defense. I understand the recovery is here to limit the spell spam, but a limit like all debuf/self buf spell etablish a link to the target, so you can keep only one at once. Like pain block : you can only debuf 1 target, if you recast it on someone else it remove the debuf from previous target. You create a link to a target and ransack it's spirit to buff yourself.

 

I would love to see more spells that use all your focus, like a defense spell that unleash a shockwave around you pushing foes and doing dmg based on the amount of focus. Or a self buff (inspiration) where the duration/level of the inspiration depend of the amount of focus.