Build talk:R/any PvP Poison Arrow

Im pretty sure i've seen this before..  No  vii 19:17, November 16, 2009 (UTC)
 * yeah i just put this up since i didnt saw it tested builds, didnt check through archived ones. though either that one needs to get fixed since the hunters shot meta is gone, so is IA and this is tagged for low pvp only imo  Terran  19:31, November 16, 2009 (UTC)
 * Eh, this one has a better name, and has no votes on it to vote wipe. We can let this get vetted. Toraen TheJanitor [[image:ToraenSig2.png]] 19:33, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

this vs burning arrow ranger?--68.227.202.180 20:58, November 16, 2009 (UTC)
 * Wat? Spreading longlasting poison + bleeding is gud.  No  vii 21:00, November 16, 2009 (UTC)
 * I thought we agreed a long time ago that we hated this build. [[Image:Zyke-Sig.png]] 23:49, November 16, 2009 (UTC)
 * With axes in meta less bleeding is present, having more bleeding going around on top of the poison that rangers spread, it's not "bad"--Ikimono  "...And my axe!" [[Image:Monk-Paragon-icon.png]] 00:15, November 17, 2009 (UTC)
 * Only because hunter's used to be godly, and IA rangers were too. Toraen TheJanitor [[image:ToraenSig2.png]] 00:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Great build for RA, use to run it all the time in but with lightning reflexes instead of debilitating shot to tabby tab faster and higher WS over marks. Zero.Six 16:22, November 17, 2009 (UTC)

lol ra  Terran  17:38, November 17, 2009 (UTC)


 * brave team -- -Chaos- (talk) -- 17:57, November 17, 2009 (UTC)
 * but...but...it pwnz RA?FMK- 03:46, November 18, 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, and RA is serious business! --J0™ 09:05, November 23, 2009 (UTC)
 * I remember getting something between 15-20 wins, without a monk, having among others a ranger like this with Inspired Hex. Before TA removal. -- -Chaos- (talk) -- 09:10, November 23, 2009 (UTC)

AB
This is pretty good for AB as well, because the degen is easily spread over even the biggest of mobs, or you can solo cap in a similar way to an IA ranger. Either degen a huge group, solo cap a shrine cause lol AI, or piss of casters with interrupts, any way you want it works in AB Kurotou Shadestryke 00:07, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * need snares for AB, maybe add Ping Downs as a variant if an AB tag is going to be added?--ℜĭŧz ✔  01:35, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * lol. Thunda_Sig_2.png Pimp strong  hand  01:37, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * I would like to revoke my previous statement... don't run this in AB, takes fucking hours to take down something by yourself >.< Kurotou Shadestryke 04:22, November 30, 2009 (UTC)

The fuck?
When did this suddenly become good? I can't remember if something like this was ever vetted but I'm pretty sure it's been trashed numerous times. Poison Arrow/Barbed is bad because you're constantly using PA so you're less able to interrupt, which is the ranger's main role. Burning Arrow was always sort of bad in the same way, although it's a more useful elite due to its +damage. 129.67.169.61 18:23, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * Normally, I'd be on your side Random IP Address, because I've helped trash this numerous times. However, you should notice that this build is only tagged for RA & CM, both of which benefit from long-lasting poison+bleeding spam. You shouldn't be "constantly using PA", you should just be just tab spamming it every once in a while and then focusing on 'rupting. BA is better than this in many areas, but in RA and CM this is decent. Karate [[File:KJ for sig.png]] Jesus  <font face="Arial" color="gray" size="1">18:41, 30 November 2009
 * Oh ok, didn't check the tags. It's still bad, but I won't argue that it couldn't kill stuff in RA/CM. Symeon 20:53, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * Yeah, pretty much what jesus said... this build should NEVER be used in anything other than RA or CM, but its damn effective in RA. Either the other team doesn't have a monk, and this drains their health crazy fast in tandem with the rest of your team, OR they do have a monk and this pressures the fuck outta their energy. Its very good in RA, but not so much anywhere else Kurotou Shadestryke 21:53, November 30, 2009 (UTC)
 * dshot woh! <small style="font-variant:small-caps;font-family:Verdana;border-style:solid;border-width:2px;border-color:#BEBEBE;background-color:black;padding:1px 5px 2px 6px;"> Terran  21:55, November 30, 2009 (UTC)

meta?
starting to see this quite often now, put meta tag on it? <small style="font-variant:small-caps;font-family:Verdana;border-style:solid;border-width:2px;border-color:#BEBEBE;background-color:black;padding:1px 5px 2px 6px;"> Terran  17:52, January 9, 2010 (UTC)

Blackout
Been running a variant in RA for over a month now, with Blackout (Dom 6) and Antidote Signet (replace Debilitating Shot and Mending Touch). This last week I'm seeing a significant uptick in general use of Blackout, esp. on Rangers, and Poison Arrow builds both. Blackout does not replace skillful 'rupts, rather expands your capacity for shutdown.

Build has been a very efficient RA farm, provding strong pressure, flexible control, and modest defense. General tactics: savage and dshot opponent key opening skills (spirits, avatars, preps, etc.), spread degen, then disrupt their offense further, or switch to disable defense/control to score kills. Generally, it's most efficient to Savage and Dshot offense, apply pressure, then Blackout monk for kills.

Few key notes on Blackout: Kill adrenaline buildup from enraging charge early, or adrenaline anytime to dramatically slow down warriors, paragons and some sins (backbreaker fail). Blackout cuts through blocking and pious concentration. With Savage you can shut down a second rez sig until Dshot recharges, thus dramatically improving your ability to maintain your kill advantage. Monks will often need to heal just after Blackout recharge, so sometimes you can anticipate a 'rupt. Versus two monks, Dshot a WoH, and Blackout other Mo to score kills. Be aware of your positioning so you don't have long runs to desireable Blackout targets, and use Natural Stride to close quickly.

Expertise 14 (12+1+1), Wilderness 12 (11+1), Domination 6. No points in Marks. So you get 7 secs of Natural Stride, 4 secs Blackout, and can spam your skill bar with no energy worries. Rotwing Recurve Bow is ideal. Non-bonus damage bow attacks at 9-11 marks do negligible damage, so dropping Marks is hardly a loss. Compare to Magebane, you get both more pressure, and more disruption. --ClavisRa 21:35, January 12, 2010 (UTC)


 * rotwing recurve bow is bad, you want to lengthen bleeding aswell and +5 energy isnt needed, might aswell want to try out 11+1+1 exp, 9+1 marks, 9+1 wilderness and 6 dom. bow damage is also part of additional pressure <small style="font-variant:small-caps;font-family:Verdana;border-style:solid;border-width:2px;border-color:#BEBEBE;background-color:black;padding:1px 5px 2px 6px;"> Terran  21:58, January 12, 2010 (UTC)


 * I already addressed that point in my remarks. The points in Marsmanship do not pay off with your slow attack rate. You get more resiliant and effective build with those points in Wild and Expert.  Way ahead of you, cause I had the same inclination until I tested it.--ClavisRa 05:42, January 13, 2010 (UTC)
 * poison/bleeding duration last already long and how are you gonna do extra damage when foes are suffering from poison/bleeding? bow damage IS needed, this way you can finish off foes yourself much quicker <small style="font-variant:small-caps;font-family:Verdana;border-style:solid;border-width:2px;border-color:#BEBEBE;background-color:black;padding:1px 5px 2px 6px;"> Terran  17:26, January 13, 2010 (UTC)
 * I notice having extended conditions comes in quite handy, but 15^50 is considerable damage, + energy mods are often very stupid.-- -Chaos- (moo) -- 19:08, January 13, 2010 (UTC)

Archive
Never used, outclassed by other Marksmanship elites(You must split in Wilderness too), Barbed Arrows is suicidal. It sucks in FA and in JQ, in RA its worst then BA or Mels. <font color="DarkGreen">Chonsy <font color="DarkGreen">Rulez  18:37, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Barbed is only lower armor while activating. That's hardly suicidal for a ranger with Nat Stride and any sense of timing at all. Inferior to mels: fair enough. Mel's rebuff made it versatile enough for RA again, and this only had slight advantage in some pressure situations over a BA (and then you got a blood necro and raged at your useless preparation). -- Toraen   confer  04:49, 15 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The only reason this isn't wicked good is because of how easy it is to dshot. If it wasn't an actual skill you had to use so often or had less activation time, it would be amazing Rawr 18:22, 17 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Still amazing once the pressure starts to kick in, stuff starts to drop shortly after one another. <3 PA. ~Terran 84.86.92.36 01:15, 24 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I was running it for a while and it's actually pretty decent pressure if you run it with flurry to avoid dshots. -- Diwo 03:06, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Activation time
m (Undo revision 1210481 by RRe (talk) the activation time is your attack speed) Are you sure? I am pretty sure it works the other way around, in so much as an IAS will increase the activation time of an attack skill with an activation time, but not the other way around. That would suggest that Rock Candies would give attack skills 33% faster and 25% reduced activation time, which I pretty sure is wrong and Relyk is wrong. A new misery 07:29, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * The first line in the attack skills section of activation time on the wiki says just that -.- I really should've checked that.-- Relyk 10:10, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

2018 Update
[build prof=r/mo expertise=11+1+1 Wild=11+1 Marks=8+1][Poison Arrow][Distracting Shot][Barbed Arrows][Natural Stride][Lightning Reflexes][Antidote Signet][Remove Hex][Resurrection Signet][/build] --Saxazaxx (talk) 19:28, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Variant without interruption skills
This is the main bar found on a duplicate page: [build prof=r/mo expertise=12+1+1 wild=10+1 marks=8+1][Poison Arrow][Point Blank Shot][Remove Hex][Antidote Signet][Natural Stride][Lightning Reflexes][Barbed Arrows][Resurrection Signet][/build] And below this line you'll find the associated discussion. --Krschkr (talk) 16:48, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

At best Point Blank is worth a variant slot mention on the existing page. Distracting Shot is not optional though. Toraen (talk) 18:23, 27 September 2020 (UTC)
 * This is Build:R/any PvP Poison Arrow except it gives up rupts to be a bad SoS Necro? --<font face="Cuckoo" color=Fuchsia >P <font face="Comic Sans MS" color=Aqua >e <font face="Monotype Corsiva" color=lime >W  :> 18:31, 27 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Well yes, my position is that you should not need to bring rupts if you're going to play ranger. i dont know why everyone assumes that you must bring dshot if youre a ranger. And this build does a much better job of maintaining degen on the opposing party - why do you call it a bad SoS necro?.. I mean it doesnt have weakness and enchant stripping, but it has self-cleansing and more defense. I took this build to a 17 win streak today.--Saxazaxx (talk) 19:40, 27 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Because distracting shot is such a powerful skill that it's foolish to not bring it when playing a bow ranger – people even bring it on warriors and botters used to bring it on their bot mesmers despite of the involved disadvantages. Disable a key skill – word of healing, lightning strike, hammer bash, resurrection signet – and you can turn a match. The low cost and recharge time make distracting shot really shine. It's worth so much that you can't outweigh it with the additional damage from Zojun's/point blank shot.
 * I assume that the comparison with blood necromancers stems from the similar effect of the two builds: Not-so-great direct damage paired with the spread of degeneration (bleeding + hex/poison) without means of shutdown of the level of a typical ranger. The difference lies in different counters to these builds and a different level of wasted potential. As a blood necromancer you have less potential to force a kill against a monk when playing alongside physicals compared to a curses necromancer. In return your build has a better universality both regarding ally and opponent builds. You can tweak the build a bit still, but there's not really a big potential you're giving away. In case of a bow ranger that's different, as you'll always have to compare yourself with the other bow ranger builds that feature very quickly recharging hard rupts that hold an immense tactical value that goes far beyond what direct damage usually achieves. When I played healer in RA I was always glad to have a bow ranger in my team as no matter what the opponent played: The ranger interruption would stabilize my team against high-damage teams or in situations when I was hit by an impactful interruption. When no defensive shutdown was needed my ranger(s) could play on the opponent's healing, turning the shutdown into an offensive tool. Giving this ability away doesn't find a justification in the gains from the skills that have been taken instead of interruption in this build variant. --Krschkr (talk) 21:09, 28 September 2020 (UTC)
 * “Because distracting shot is such a powerful skill that it's foolish to not bring it when playing a bow ranger . . . Disable a key skill – word of healing, . . . resurrection signet – and you can turn a match. The low cost and recharge time [make it worth so much] . . . that you can't outweigh it with the additional damage from Zojun's/point blank shot.”
 * When I designed this build, I originally took dshot with me. I found myself sitting in the midfield, tabbing around to try and find a target that had been cleaned of poison and bleeding, and I found it very hard to split my focus between that and playing the dshot mindgame with a nearby caster. I reasoned that instead of standing still for 3-5 seconds, trying to play mindgames with the caster next to me, I instead could be spamming Point Blank Shot for damage. Yes, you are right that disabling a key skill like Word of Healing can turn a match, but my contention is that there are plenty of bars which have little or no hybrid offensive/defensive shutdown skills which are primarily focused on damage, and they all have Great ratings.
 * You bring up the issue of “wasted potential” or “opportunity cost” when comparing a bow ranger without rupts vs a bow ranger with rupts:
 * “In [the] case of a bow ranger . . . you'll always have to compare yourself with the other bow ranger builds that feature very quickly recharging hard rupts that hold an immense tactical value that goes far beyond what direct damage usually achieves.” You then explain that interruption can be both offensive and defensive, depending on the required combat situation.
 * If the standard we’re going to use here is: you must have a build that can fluctuate between offense and defense, look at how many Great bars are almost only designed for offense/damage:
 * Avatar of Balthazar bar has 1 hybrid offense/defense skill: Harrier’s Grasp: the snare can be used defensively to lineback, and offensively to snare. Ok.
 * Avatar of Grenth bar: Harrier’s Grasp/Crippling Victory. Same thing.
 * But PvP Double Dragon? What skill on there is hybrid offense/defense? Ok, Meteor, but that’s a 30s recharge with a 2s casting time! That hardly qualifies – there might be a combat situation, like you were saying, where more defensive shutdown is needed than Meteor could provide. In other words, the Double Dragon bar is basically 95% focused on damage, and everyone’s ok with that!
 * Mind Blast: it’s direct damage and direct damage only. No defensive shutdown besides Meteor.
 * PvP Stoning, RA Mind Shock, RA Blinding Surge: obviously hybrid offense shutdown/defense shutdown.
 * Mesmer builds are all hybrid offense/defense obviously.
 * PvP Signet of Suffering… I mean, it has weakness and a 2-deep enchant strip. Not on the same level of hybrid offense/defensive shutdown as Mesmers or the Earth and Air eles listed. So, let’s say there’s a combat situation where defensive shutdown is needed – this bar cannot succeed at that, yet is has a Great rating, all the same.
 * Stunning Strike Para and Apply Poison Ranger need not be addressed.
 * The 3 Meta Warrior bars all can be offensive or defensive shutdown.
 * In other words, there are 6 bars with a Great rating which have 1 or 2 skills invested into hybrid offensive/defensive shutdown: Avatar of Balthazar, Grenth, Double Dragon, Mind Blast, Invoke Lightning, and Signet of Suffering Necro. These bars are almost completely offensive, and any defensive shutdown they can provide is minor, when compared with the Mesmer bars, Warrior, bars, Ranger variants, etc.
 * I mean, look, it wouldn’t be hard to throw dshot and savage shot on that bar, and let them sit there until a very opportune moment presents itself, so that your DPS isn’t compromised by sitting next to a caster and playing the rupt mindgame. However, it’s generally a bad idea to let skill slots sit on your bar, unused (unless your bar is designed for utility and has a plethora of niche-use skills that sit there until the opportune moment arises). But if you think about it, straight DPS can be considered offensive shutdown in some sense: any front or midliner who is getting low on health will switch to shield set and flee. Of course, if the situation is that the opposing team is all at 75%+ hp and your team is all at 33% hp, then straight DPS really can’t be used as offensive shutdown, where rupts or KDs can. Yet, let’s say you’re in that combat situation, and you have one of those 6 bars on your team: what then? Are you going to rely on your SoS Necro to shutdown 33% of the opposing Warrior’s base damage with Weakness, and irritate the opposing ele by stripping his enchants? No, you’re going to rely on one of the more balanced Great builds, but again, that doesn’t hurt SoS Necro’s rating. Let’s say you’re up against a team of 2 Warriors and a Ranger and you’re playing an SoS Necro: what, are you going to Weaken all 3 of them?
 * I don’t see why you need to compare yourself to a rupt ranger if you focus on degen/damage with PBS. It’s not like you have a Mind Blast ele scratching his head and going, “You know, Meteor isn’t that great of a defensive shutdown skill, I should swap it out for dshot to give those darned Mesmers a taste of their own medicine if my teammates mess up.” By that logic, every bar should have dshot. Mind Blast eles are damage, damage, damage, and everyone is ok with that!
 * I mean, RA is might not be worthy of so much finely detailed discussion like this, since things are always so haywire anyway, and half the time people are screaming, throwing matches, they’re newbs, or your team is not balanced. But nobody is going to get mad at you if you bring a Mind Blast ele in there, whether you have defensive shutdown or not. However, let’s say that just in case, you want to bring a skill that is hybrid defensive/offensive shutdown. You don’t want to bring dshot, because it would cramp your style, in terms of ensuring that all opposing enemies have -7 degen for 90% of the match. What if you bring Pin Down instead? Or Debilitating Shot?
 * I really can’t accept the argument that a skill is too powerful not to bring – again, if that was true, then every caster should go /R with 6 in Wilderness Survival and bring Natural Stride and Dshot. Of course, no one thinks like that, and there are plenty of Great rated bars which have minimal hybrid offensive/defensive skills. The 6 bars I mentioned specialize into their damage skill trees, and that’s that. What is true is that for extended matches that last many minutes, you do need a bar that can shutdown offensively and defensively, in case one or more of your teammates make a critical error, and your team is on the retreat. But again, this bar is more comparable to Mind Blast or Double Dragon, in that it’s not trying to do any shutdown, and no one would ask it to – instead, the team benefits from and welcomes the superior DPS it provides (in the case of this bar, the DPS is much more sustainable, since it can be reapplied much more consistently than an SOS Necro can, due to the fact that most rupts are for spells only, and with the two self-cleansing skills, the only thing standing in the way of its DPS is Blocking stances).
 * So yeah, I guess I have no issue with taking out Remove Hex for any other hybrid offensive/defensive shutdown skill, "just in case things go south." I just don’t agree that that skill has to be dshot. The truth is that most of the bars in the Great category are finely--criminally--balanced, and the team that ends up winning is the one with better micro and that makes fewer tactical mistakes. How boring is that? I mean, I watched your recent GvG video, and that was basically a perfect example of what I'm talking about. I'm just tired of seeing the same thing run day in and day out.--Saxazaxx (talk) 03:59, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
 * This build is RA-only and you're comparing it with builds that have tags for a couple of other PvP modes. It may come as a surprise to you, but I consider all the builds you listed that don't really have proper defensive potential inferior picks for random arenas.
 * AoB dervishes have great damage, but due to lacking proper self-defense/lineback potential they put additional pressure on your own backline aswell. When you have two defensive midliners and a healer in your team, great, that extra damage is welcome. But getting such an ideal team setup in random arenas is unlikely. AoB dervishes usually face the same fate as axe warriors when played in random arenas: Linebacked to uselessness and death because of a lack of self-defense. That is why RA-only avatar of grenth builds with permanent blocking, multiple sources of health drain and the occasional weakness are strictly superior for the context of RA. They relieve their healers from some of the healing burden (health drain), can lineback the opponent's frontline (weakness, cripple) without being prone to getting linebacked themselves (blocking) and still create a large overall damage output. That's why I'd rate RA-only AoG dervishes great for RA and AoB dervishes not. However, I'm standing in the tradition that seemed to always be in place in PvX, which is to rate builds that are used in GvG for their performance in GvG. If I were to play AoB in random arenas I'd probably give it double condition removal and attacker's insight so it's not as out-of-place.
 * Double dragon: I don't think it's a good bar anywhere, but certainly not in random arenas, so I'd be fine if the RA tag was removed. We ran double dragon builds for fun, sometimes, but only against opponents that deserved an easy and fun match, and even in that context it didn't precisely deliver. Probably only suitable for HA?
 * Mind Blast: Used to be fine when people ran multiple of those in team arenas with distortion on everyone. In RA I don't consider it a good build. I also played it in GvG and it was... very questionable. Only really useful for permanent main-team usage, but in that context usually inferior to an invoke lightning elementalist and weaker against shutdown like distracting shot on mind blast. I'm not sure mind blast can compete in any regular context with invoke lightning and mind burn.
 * Signet of Suffering: That build is indeed great – in GvG. But in RA I consider it lacking as it doesn't have proper means of linebacking. The pressure it puts up is nice and as it shares mostly the same counters as your healers it can sometimes be worthwhile to bait out rupts (as you said yourself) that accordingly won't hit your healer. But that's a bit meek and in the context of RA often not worth playing over a ranger (similar pressure, superior shutdown) or mind burn elementalist (similar pressure, superior finishing power, no shutdown).
 * I know that pure damage builds can work in RA, but in most cases teams are better off with characters that can also contribute to the team's defense by (usually) means of their own profession. An elementalist doesn't need distracting shot when he can already provide blinds and/or knock downs. A ranger however, that is already wielding a bow and standing in the middle of the opposing team? I don't think I'll ever see a reason to not bring at least distracting shot and usually also a second rupt on it. --Krschkr (talk) 12:40, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
 * "I really can’t accept the argument that a skill is too powerful not to bring" - D-Shot is one of the single most powerful skills in the entire game, let alone in a 4v4 format. If you're not putting D-Shot on a Ranger bar, there better be a very good reason; this isn't. People literally used to do the exact thing you mentioned; it wasn't uncommon to see a sync'd team with a Dev Hammer with D-Shot as well as a Ranger. How is this even a discussion 15 years into the game? <font face="Cuckoo" color=Fuchsia >P <font face="Comic Sans MS" color=Aqua >e <font face="Monotype Corsiva" color=lime >W  :> 15:29, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Re: Krschkr: AoB & Grenth dervs: "AoB dervishes have great damage, but due to lacking proper self-defense/lineback potential they put additional pressure on your own backline aswell. When you have two defensive midliners and a healer in your team, great, that extra damage is welcome. But getting such an ideal team setup in random arenas is unlikely. AoB dervishes usually face the same fate as axe warriors when played in random arenas: Linebacked to uselessness and death because of a lack of self-defense." Ok, so there's a few issues here. The first one is, all RA builds should be designed with the recognition that your team will not always be balanced. That is somewhat counter to the current mindset of many "regulars" at RA, who will forfeit and let the opposing team kill them and re-enter until they get a balanced setup. But if we are going to say that the former attitude should be adopted when designing RA builds--prepare for an unbalanced team--then builds that are highly balanced, as opposed to being more specialized, are preferred: meleers should have self-cleansing, midliners should have self-blocking--instead of relying on the backline for cleansing and protection--and all offensive players should have some amount of defensive ability - support, healing, or shutdown.
 * That means that yeah, we should update the tags, and maybe even the ratings, for those builds I mentioned. Either that, or the build pages should all have RA variants listed. "RA-only avatar of grenth builds with permanent blocking, multiple sources of health drain and the occasional weakness are strictly superior for the context of RA. They relieve their healers from some of the healing burden (health drain), can lineback the opponent's frontline (weakness, cripple) without being prone to getting linebacked themselves (blocking) and still create a large overall damage output." Ok, so AoG is obviously better for RA than AoB, due to defensive skills. However, the original issue here is about the importance of defensive shutdown, and this bar only has 1-2 defensive shutdown skills: cripple and weakness, and the weakness skill is finicky. That would place AoG in the same category as the SoS Necro, actually, which also has only 2 somewhat weak defensive shutdown skills: weakness and enchant stripping. And if the argument against the main bar I posted on this talk page’s build page is the fact that the bar lacks enough defensive shutdown, well, what the bar does feature is 4 self-defense skills, including condition cleansing, hex removal, blocking, and IMS – condition and hex cleansing and IMS can be both offensive and defensive, but still without a powerful defensive shutdown skill like dshot, as you say, this build falls short. I do understand where you’re coming from and do agree that the mainbar should have defensive shutdown, not just damage. More on that in a minute. But what this means is that even AoG and SoS are not ideal for RA, since they tradeoff powerful defensive shutdown for more damage. Both builds have two minor defensive abilities: weakness/cripple and weakness/enchant stripping. It is true that cripple is kind of a medium-strength defensive shutdown skill, in that you can lineback a hammer warrior who’s about to KD your Monk while the opposing Mesmer is about to rupt WoH, cripple is still not as strong as KD for defensive shutdown. Which means that AoG is really not ideal for RA, even though it features self-defense that AoB does not have. And that goes for SoS too – changes would need to be made to that build to make it work – perhaps Dark Pact would need to be taken out for more defensive shutdown. I do have an Offering of Blood build in the Trial section for RA, actually.
 * “An elementalist doesn't need distracting shot when he can already provide blinds and/or knock downs. A ranger however, that is already wielding a bow and standing in the middle of the opposing team? I don't think I'll ever see a reason to not bring at least distracting shot and usually also a second rupt on it.” I can see where you’re coming from here. The original problem I had with bringing dshot in the first place was that I was standing still, doing the rupt mindgame, when I could have otherwise been spamming damage mindlessly and ensuring Poison and Bleeding upkeep. In hindsight, I think that poison + bleeding is a bad idea in general for RA, since those are two of the most common conditions, and your bleeding and poison will overlap with many other builds that you will be paired with. If we are going to keep the build, however, I would like to get your opinion on the following setup:
 * Exp 14, Wild 7, Marks 12


 * My whole intention here is to make a ranger bar that is more mindless and based on pressure, rather than mindgame rupting shutdown. I kept dshot and took out condition cleanse on both bars, because if you’re in a team without a Monk, not only is there a low chance of winning to begin with, but you can get your blind shield out and rupt Blinding Flash. [I put antidote sig back in re:teams without a monk, can survive a bit longer if you can clean bleeding, poison, and cripple]. I understand the idea you mentioned about “wasted potential” more now re: wielding a bow and standing in the midfield. However, I want to get your opinion on a bar like this:
 * Exp 14, Marks 13, Tactics 3


 * One might say that “because you’re wielding a bow, you have to bring Apply Poison or Barbed Arrows, because it’s just too good to be able to simply attack and cause -3 or -4 degen.” This would kind of force you to bring Apply, Natural Stride, and Lightning Reflexes, in order to spread poison faster in certain situations. However, with the Broad Head build, 24 seconds of Dazed is not something to sniff at, and Determined Shot could even be thrown in there when someone throws up a blocking stance or you get blinded. Dshot is a backup rupt in case Broad Head gets diabled, misses, or gets blocked (not putting all your eggs in one basket), and this allows for a more pressure-oriented playstyle with Debilitating Shot, and provides excellent finishing power with Needling Shot.
 * The Crippling Shot variant is not trying to “reinvent the wheel” so much, and is following the idea of more of a pressuring playstyle than a shutdown one. However, it is commonplace that your Apply Poison gets disabled when you reapply it. Also, the value in a bar that is more focused on pressure, rather than shutdown, is that if you make it difficult for the other team to get their damage (and pressure) accomplished, there should be fewer critical moments that your party will need to go into defensive shutdown mode – pressure is kind of a “pre-emptive strike,” depending on what kind it is.
 * I have to head out now, I’ll leave what I said here for now. I do understand the idea that bow rangers are well-suited for shutdown with dshot and spreading degen with Apply skills. I just want to figure out whether there is any value in maybe bringing only Dshot as a shutdown skill, and filling the bar with other utility skills, in order to allow a more of a pressure playstyle. That’s all.--Saxazaxx (talk) 17:35, 30 September 2020 (UTC)