[Rylkan]

Are you tired of hearing people say Rangers just can't produce the same damage output as the other classes? Well, say no more! Coming to you from the great wide world of somewhere, now you can easily take down a tank or squishie in nice and manageable, yet quick, nibblets.

Spamming Ranger


Skills
Apply Poison, Onslaught, Screaming Shot, Power Shot, Called Shot, Needling Shot, Whirling Defense, Pious Restoration

Runes
Anything that will add to Marksmanship and Expertise. Expertise is good for making the build work as a spamming build, but marksmanship makes it easier for the true use of the build to kick in.

Weapon
Anything with an Enchant Plus 20% Preferably. Vampiric Bowstring is also very very nice with this build. Though I am hoping someone tries this with zealous, it might work really well, but I havent tried it.

Usage
Onslaught is a Dervish Elite that reduces Attack Skills energy cost and recharge time by 25 percent. The concept is to add this on to the Rangers Expertise allows for energy reduction of somewhere in the range of 60-70 percent easily. Done correctly you can spam power shot and such for 3-4 energy each, and they recharge quickly.

What makes this build powerful though isnt the power shot and other moves, it's actually needling shot. Once someone reaching 50% health, needling shot recharges instantly. Now, normally you can only spam it so much without crying for energy. With this build you can spam needling shot, which does armor ignoring damage for 2 energy each, and its a quick attack time. So imagine they reach 50% health, and suddenly you can always hit 25 damage constantly on them, without energy issues. It adds up fast. With a vampiric bow, thats also alot of health from them going to you. And if you have poison and bleeding still, they still have degen.

As for blocking opponents, thats the time to spam called shot.

Weaknesses
Standard Warrior Weaknesses, actually. Blinding, or anything that reduces chance to hit. Blocking, even with called shot, can be an issue since you cant use very strong moves anymore. Healing will bring opponent above 50 sometimes, so it can ruin your flow, so be careful of this. And the biggest issue is spiteful spirit or spoil victor, and moves like that, they kill you fast. Also the standard enchant removals.

Also, make sure, MAKE SURE, to notice when your Enchant runs out, you will suddenly drop to no energy if you try and spam without it on. Also be warned, Pious restoration will remove Onslaught, so use it sparingly.

Otherwise, this is a fun build and can kill things very quickly if used right. Good against bosses seeing as it is rather straight forward, making it something you might want to have a real purpose for.

[Neraphym]

Oh, this looks neat... does that mean you're going for most creative build maker? I wasn't planning on making a new one, but I guess i can give you some competition.

[Rylkan]

lol. You see I put out a new build every week or so, I don't care about the GWENIE award for me really, just giving builds to the people. If you want to "compete" just helps everyone else with giving them more builds to try.

[Dragonman]

Stop making me want to buy Nightfall.

[Rylkan]

lol. Fine, I will make you be happy you have proph

[Goto]

Nice build idea, I could see it working quite well. I also like that you thought through the major weaknesses in advance, makes it easier to plan around using it. It might be worth pointing out to watch out for hexes that make you miss, particularly along the necro lines.

Depending on your target, Penetrating Attack has an even shorter recharge. Probably not quite as effective against squishies as Power Shot is, but it'll give Warriors and Paragons something to think about, and to a lesser extent the 3 other physical classes. Of course that stuff only matters until 50% health, because of course Needling Shot doesn't care what class it hits. If you're fighting a lot of mages (particularly those with medium-to-long recharge times, such as Eles or Necros) consider taking Concussion Shot (maybe instead of Screaming Shot, or Called Shot if you're not too worried about being blocked). It'll cost much less than usual, and Needling Shot should be able to keep them silenced once they're below 50% health quite well. That might also work quite well on Monks, it depends on what their setup is like.

[Rylkan]

Yeah. I had penetrating attack in my first attempt at this build. It does work well on warriors, and in someways, makes more sense to bring if one is facing warriors alone. So far I have run into alot of monks, and I like power shot since it can get them well under 50, letting me start spamming needling shot before they can get a heal off, and meaning I am more like to kill them fast, or they will not heal over 50.

And a very important thing I found out, watch out for moves that add to maximum health. I need to test it out to see how it works exactly, but I have had issues fighting things that use endure pain with this. Even though they are still less than half their new maximum health, when they are above 50 of their original health, needling will recharge.

[Goto]

Ouch, really? Didn't know it worked that way.

[Rylkan]

Yeah. Was in Random and found out the hard way

[x..]

I always spam skills.

Look at my warrior.

[Cspace]

That sounds pretty cool, but is Pious Restoration necessarily the heal you'd want? Perhaps Troll Unguent would be a better choice alongside Whirling Defense. Just my thoughts though, haven't tried this build myself.

[x..]

That sounds pretty cool, but is Pious Restoration necessarily the heal you'd want? Perhaps Troll Unguent would be a better choice alongside Whirling Defense. Just my thoughts though, haven't tried this build myself.

You changed your profile! :O

[Goto]

Pious Restoration might not be ideal, but neither is Troll Unguent. With that amount in Wilderness Survival it's only a +4 regen, nowhere near enough to constitute an effective self-heal. Whirling Defense is an Expertise skill, not Wilderness Survival. Pious Restoration only 'needs' the enchant in order to remove hexes, however it does stop you using it while Onslaught is active without removing it. Lets see... If you're not planning to have Onslaught active while healing, Natural Healing is more powerful. If you do want to be able to heal while it's active, you could try Dwayna's Touch for a pretty spammable self-heal. Not quite as strong as the others, but with such a short casting and recharge you could just use it more than once as necessary. Off the top of my head I can't think of any other Wind Prayer healing skills, and since you've got the points in there for Onslaught you might as well make use of them.

[Rylkan]

I looked at Natural healing, but given the purpose of this build is to spam most of the time, Onslaught will be on. With the enchant on, Natural healing would take a net energy of ten energy away, which to a ranger is rather nasty. And Dwayna's touch could work, just didn't think much about the numbers. I guess since it recharges twice as fast as Pious, and it's max value is only around twenty less than pious's it might be viable. But still spamming a spell as a ranger is asking for energy issues. Which, with this build, is an issue if you mess up your enchant timing.

And I tested some more on endure pain skills. I don't know why, but whenever they cast this, I can never get needling shot to not recharge. So I guess that's another place where this won't work well.

[Cspace]

That sounds pretty cool, but is Pious Restoration necessarily the heal you'd want? Perhaps Troll Unguent would be a better choice alongside Whirling Defense. Just my thoughts though, haven't tried this build myself.

You changed your profile! :O

Pious Restoration might not be ideal, but neither is Troll Unguent. With that amount in Wilderness Survival it's only a +4 regen, nowhere near enough to constitute an effective self-heal.

Oh yeah, didn't think about that.