Analysis of the Elven Ranger

[Glenalth]

nice!

thinking of revisiting a ranger life on jaimmee. was going to grind out a lit 2 bow. this changes things for me. debating between going for a min2 bow or a triple pos.

i may just say screw it and use the silver longbow until 16, then bow of sinew, then pinon then tf.

i tr'd my ranger right before the range pass update, so i may be off base here. the only other thing i can see making for fun would be a vacum or ooze bow

I have a vacuum bow that permanently lives in my TR Cache. The proc rate is way too low to justify use unless you have absolutely no other options for obtaining soul gems.

[Glenalth]

My preferred weapon progression on a purely ranged archer would be:

• Greatbow of the Scrag: 2[1d8] base dmg and blunted ammo means you don't need Morphic arrows for skeletons, oozes, etc.
• Sapphire Sting or Silver Longbow: Sting is better but a PITA to farm, so SL is good enough for heroics until...
• Unwavering Ardency or Bow of Sinew: if you already have a Pinion, use your 10th anniversary gift to claim a free UA; otherwise just use BoS until epics
• Pinion: you can get one free if you don't have it already and it's still the second-best epic named longbow, so why wouldn't you?
• eSting: best named longbow; still a PITA to farm, tho.

Situationally useful bows: Shatterbow for constructs in Threnal, VON, etc. (turn on Morphic Arrows and use House D adamantine ammo for clay golems); Bow of the Silver Flame for undead (until you get lucky and find a good Disruption bow).

Epic Sapphire Sting has been entertaining, especially with the amount of Humans running around. Destruction helps support the party too.

Cannith crafting fills the gaps for specialty use bows pretty well, especially with the changes to the random loot system dropping some useful prefixes and suffixes.

Lvl 8 Metalline of Destruction or Lvl 4 Screaming of Greater Construct Bane instead of Shatterbow. I forgot how much I hate Shatterbow / Epic Shatterbow
Lvl 5 Holy of Greater Undead Bane or Lvl 7 with red slot and extra bane or light damage instead of Silver Flame bow.

[Marshal_Lannes]

LGS Bows

As we have defined Acid as our primary elemental attack due it bypassing the vast majority of DR, what are our options for a LGS bow? We have 6.

1. Dust (earth + negative) 50% chance to reduce enemy PRR and HAMP. Stacks. Unknown reduction %
2. Earth (earth) - attacks do stacking acid damage
3. Magma (earth + fire) - deals fire damage over time, slows enemy movement
4. Mineral (earth + positive) DR breaker, hardness.
5. Ooze (earth + water) attack reduce enemy PRR/MRR by 10 each. Chance to proc legendary Ooze.
6. Tempered (earth + Air) moderate chance to do extra acid or electric damage

These are the T3 bonus effects. I dismiss Mineral as DR breakers aren't really needed in the game. I believe Earth was over performing on release and was nerfed and is now useless. Magma looks interesting depending on how much enemy movement is slowed and how often. Hard to weigh in on Dust until we know how much it reduces enemy PRR and what exactly is the effect of reducing an enemies PRR? Do mobs have too much for it to even matter? And how much net DPS do we gain by reducing it? Ooze falls into this dilemma as well, but it does also give the chance of proc'ing an Ooze. Tempered looks like the pure DPS one with a moderate chance of extra damage.

Until more is known about these effects and how often they work it is hard to say which are best. At first glance I would say Tempered or Magma. As such I'm going to look at those two for possible bow configurations.

Tempered

T1 - For T1 we need to select an Air power as we'll want the Spell Power quality of acid on T2. Our best choices look like either pure DPS in 10d6 electric damage per hit or +35 MRR. However, the MRR looks like an enhancement bonus so it wouldn't stack with a sheltering item. Could also select +15 DEX here. I am inclined to think the 10d6 shocking is the way to go. Shocking also adds some DPS to your bow when facing Devils where acid isn't effective. I don't select the 150 acid spell power here because it is likely you will already be wearing a 150 Plus random loot gen spell power item.

T2 - Acid Spell Power +37 Quality bonus. Can't get this anywhere else. I don't think the +7 insight to CON is worth it since the Eidolons Necklace gives you +4 insightful CON and DEX. Not worth it to add 30 more HPs in my mind here.

T3 - Acid Blast on Vorpal 10d120 or Acid Spell Power +37 exceptional. Perhaps someone who is better at math then me can figure out what is more DPS the stacking 37 acid to your spell power or the average acid blast on a vorpal hit.

Active Augment - Stormrage seems to fit well with this bow's theme.

Magma

T1 - Flaming 10d6 or +15 Dex.

T2 - Acid Spell Power +37 Quality

T3 - Doesn't look like we get an Acid Blast option on vorpal, only a flaming blast option. In this case we probably select +37 exceptional.

Active Augment - Radiant Forcefield, a bit more defensive minded to work with the slows on targets.

These are some initial ideas with the limited information that is out there so far.

[Marshal_Lannes]

After five years, and with the release of Horizon Walker, it seems time to revisit the Elven Ranger. We will continue our journey as a slightly modified archetype to reflect the new tree released in U50.

What is a Horizon Walker?

I'm unfamiliar with Horizon Walker from PnP. After a google search (from DnD wiki) here I what I found...Horizon Walkers guard the world against threats that originate from other planes or that seek to ravage the mortal realm with otherworldly magic. They seek out planar portals and keep watch over them, venturing to the Inner Planes and the Outer Planes as needed to pursue their foes. These rangers are also friends to any forces in the multiverse—especially benevolent dragons, fey, and elementals—that work to preserve life and the order of the planes.

These sound like a D&D version of the Warhammer 40k Grey Knights. I can't think of any fictional Elves that are Horizon Walkers - if anyone has a book source for this I'd like to look into it. Because I don't have that source material I'm going to make assumptions on what an Elven Planar inquisition agent would look like. Since you're specialized in fighting planar entities it seems logical we will be Lawful. Death dealing hunters also need some moral ambiguity so Lawful Neutral seems like the most appropriate alignment.

Racial Choices and Stats

Elf, right that's the thread. Lucky for us though we now have three races of elves to choose from. Could a Drow be a Horizon Walker? Of course. But we are veering a bit too much into Drizzt territory so let's pass on the Drow for now. Both High Elves and Wood Elves could have planar hunters. I'm going to start off by picking Wood Elf. As such our starting stats will look like this:

STR 8
DEX 20
CON 16
INT 12
WIS 12
CHA 8

A note on my character here - this is more or less a beginning character so virtually anyone can follow along with this thread and play the build. I have two ranger past lives and one paladin with only 5 reaper points. Since DDO was recently giving away +8 tome sets I do have those for all my stats.

With our 12 INT we are getting 28 starting skill points and will have 8 per level gradually increasing some as our INT tome kicks in. I took Heal, Jump, Spot, Search, Listen, 3 each into Hide and Move Silently and 2 into Tumble. Those 8 skills take up our points. Next point will go into UMD for raise dead scolls in epics.

Feats and Favored Enemies

Point Blank Shot at L1 is pretty much a no-brainer for Rangers. For favored enemies, we need to consider the following. Vistani Knife Fighter (Ravenloft) gives Undead. Horizon Walker Fey. Falconry Animal. Harper can give us another but it would require 12 APs and enhancements are going to be tight. For comparison, we only need to spend 2 points on VKF and Falconry. Primal Avatar allows the choice of Undead, Aberrations, or Constructs for Tier 2 twist. Keep in mind twists are going away with U51 so we can't rely on that. With all this in mind, we know that we'll get Undead, Fey, and Animal for free and possibly, before U51, either Aberrations or Constructs. Based on this Human seems like a good choice for level 1 since we will be facing a lot of them over the course of our career. And don't they say humans are the greatest monsters of all?

Level 1 and Enhancements

I used XP stones to move past level 1. I have one racial AP so our first 6 APs went into:

Wood Elf - Elven Accuracy
HW - Mark Target (best to get used to doing this)
DWS - Far Shot
AA - AA, Corrosive Arrows (the early imbue seems extremely powerful especially considering the Borderlands 38 corrosive spell power ring and I have a Vorpal Shortbow with +10 insightful corrrosion ML1.

We hit the streets soon!

[Marshal_Lannes]

Level 2 first steps

For the first time since Hardcore there was a Korthos LFM right from Heyton's Rest. Cool, let's jump in. A FVS and I team up running elites. The first thing I notice is that the Nicked Longbow (Sharn Market chain end reward) is better than the vorpal short bow. Higher base damage +3 deadly/seeker and 2d6 lightning. All mobs die in two hits. Because of that there is no reason to mark targets but I start doing it some anyway to get in the habit. I do most of the killing and move along easily thwarting the Sauhagin threat. One annoying gameplay element I notice is that when targets are moving at speed there is a tendency for the game to jump/skip/glitch whatever and you don't register a shot. This also happened when I was playing inquisitive but you're firing so fast it's irrelevant. You do not fire fast with a bow and it's noticeable. I hit level 3 before Misery's Peak and take Precision as my feat. Next APs go into Conjure Arrows and Opening Shot.

Level 3 Borderlands and Harbor

My FVS ally was logging for the day so I toss up an LFM for Borderlands getting a sorcerer to join. He's a strong character and his scorch does the most killing during our R1 Borderlands excursion. I have no AOE so I'm sniping at whatever is left from the ashes scorch is leaving. Right away I notice that I can't toolbar Opening Shot. That ability is vital and needs to be done fast. I key Opening shot to the thumb button 1 on my mouse. I put target marking at thumb button two. So for my configuration, it's mark down then opening shot up. This works much better than 1 and 2 hotkeys. Biggest takeaway from this level is that breaks are a pain. How does anyone consistently hit breakables with a bow?

I have a lucky chest hand and pull a lot of Borderlands items. This is useful since my character doesn't have much modern gear. That reminds me - quick gear check. Items of note that I'm using Faded Leathers +2 Mythic, Mantle of Gentle Descent +1 M, Stone Ring +1 M, Bottle of Smoke. I have 115 HPs. After the Borderlands the Sorcerers logs however fortune smiles on my ranger and I find an LFM for Harbor. I join this group which already has two TR train players and slowly fills up. Like any full group, we are blasting through content. Soon I'm level 4 and I take Opening Shot II, Take the Opening, and Improved Marking.

Level 4 Market, Cerulean Hills

Our group is pushing through everything on R3. This is a fairly stout test for my ranger considering I only have 3 reaper points. Fortunately, the group leader is quite good although since he's an Inquisitive I find it difficult to use Take the Opening. Where There's Smoke, always a step up in difficulty, almost wipes us at one of the ambush points with only the group leader surviving. We slow down a bit and have no further mishaps. Quests like Swiped Signet aren't a problem since the large fields of fire play right into our wheelhouse. The group leader logs before the Cerulean Hills Gatekeepers but the rest of us press on dropping down to R2. I finally get a chance to fully test out Mark/Take the Opening/Opening Shot. First off, I'm not sure you can ever use these when in a group with other ranged casters. I know it was pointed out that 100% was a barrier because of this. Since everyone except me is melee in the group I can see how it performs and when set up it's really nice. I don't want to make a snap judgment after using it for only a few hours. It's something I'm closely watching. As you might expect, this combo works well vs red-named bosses. The elemental in Heart of the Problem gets taken out rather easily in this manner. And look, this is what Horizon Walker is all about, single target boss DPS. The group breaks up after Gatekeepers, I didn't get to run Kobald's New Ringleader previously so I do that solo R1. Right off the jump I can tell soloing with Inquisitive is more fun because of RoF and you have to do a lot more kiting with a bow. I'm not sure how one could use Archer's Focus and the Horizon Walker bonuses you get from it if they solo a lot. This took me to 5.

Favored Enemies

It's a good time to touch on Favored Enemies again since this is something I'm sure everyone wonders about when playing Ranger and/or HW. Since you get one for a ranger feat at five I figured this would be an appropriate time to grab two from the enhancement trees. I spent two points in Vistani for Undead and two in Falconry for Animals. I had one more point and took Walker Training. For my feat choice, I selected Fey since Feywild is coming up in a couple of levels. My favored enemies are now:

L1 ranger - Human
VKF - Undead
Falconry - Animals
L5 ranger - Fey

Thematically, that's a rather dark side Horizon Walker list. Better get that Evil Outsider from HW tree ASAP!

[Marshal_Lannes]

Level 5 - Saltmarsh

Most of level 5 was spent in Saltmarsh. Grouping for Saltmarsh is much easier in epic than it is in heroics. Feywild has this same problem. I put up the LFM and did some inventory adjustments. With still no party forming I solo'd parts one and two of Waterworks R1. I felt pretty good about this considering my gear is neither idealized nor do I have significant past lives or reaper points. Looking back in this thread from the early days I don't feel my ranger could have pulled this off. Still no group forming so I put myself to the test and tried Under Cover of Darkness solo on R1. This is one of my favorite Saltmarsh quests feeling like a James Bond fantasy-style infiltration mission. I played it like an old Metal Gear stealth mission and was able to complete the quest. My best accomplishment thus far with Horizon Walker. Here is when marking targets shine since you have the luxury of slowly taking out the enemy.

At this point, a sorcerer joined me for the next quest and we dove fully into the chain. Bow combat at these levels is clearly inferior to sorcerers. I've grouped with several now and they are simply better at killing things. At times, fighting with a bow can feel like you're underwater or running through sand. Shooting feels neither nor fluid. In quests where mobs rush at the whole target marking system tends to fall apart. Now again, I realize HW is a single target DPS tree but there must be some tactics for dealing with mob rush aside from running backward (which invalidates Archer's Focus). This and a slow RoF are glaring drawbacks. Nevertheless, on a mostly duo group that slowly expanded, I was able to complete the hardest L3 content in the game on reaper. Some of these quests took a while - 38 minutes in Danger at Dunwater and 30 minutes in the Final Fight. Part of that is the nature of the quests, part is that we had to use tactics to overcome situations that we didn't have the manpower to DPS through. One bonus for the ranger, it's far more survivable than a sorcerer.

At level 6 I took Dodge, FVE Evil Outsider, Haste, No Step Missed III. I also get Manyshot for ranger 6. I have 4 reaper points now.

Level 6

Level 6 brought a substantial increase in power. Manyshot is a big deal. I enjoy this version of the ability more than the previous. With No Step Missed running, a mark, opening shot, and manyshot combo are virtually certain to kill any mob you're targeting. This makes dealing with champions rather easy. We also have five favored enemies now providing a +10 to damage on those. Level 6 certainly seems to be the threshold where we are starting to take off. I'm still using the L2 Nicked Longbow so all this is going to take a further leap at L8. I should switch to the Silver Bow at this point but was in a fun group and simply forgot about it. Ran through Shan to Kar, Depths, Irestone, House K tavern quests, and Necro1 including Bloody Crypt. Quick aside; Frogo the rogue hireling is highly effective in all these quests. He was able to neutralize the traps in part 3 of STK turning what is often a dangerous, deadly quest for under-level characters into a painless finish. Same with Necro trapping. He also has an endearing hopping motion that drew comments from the group on both animation and utility. A bit of a plug for the Saltmarsh upgraded editions. All these quests were run at R2. A quest like Irestone is made incredibly easy as target marking allows for the rapid assassination of firestorm slinging clerics or beefy Ogres from distance. It's fairly easy to see the pros and cons of HW early on. A con for example is in Bloody Crypt when you get mass spawns of ghouls. There is no effective way to deal with those especially if you get a reaper spawn in the middle of them. I don't mind this, a well-balanced class should have benefits and weaknesses. From what I'm seeing HW offers a lot of tactical nuances. In fact, often when I'm playing, especially solo or in a two-man group, the gaming experience almost feels like Balder's Gate.

I went to level 7 during the course of this game session but didn't take any enhancements since we were mid-chain.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Level 7

Spent most of this level in 3BC with a strong group which carried me through to 8. This brought a flood of APs, 10 in total, so I went on a HW spending spree picking up Dexterity, Tenacious Hunter, Opening Shot III, Two Places at Once, Walker Training II, Scattershot, and Corner the Quary I. I'm not sure if it is optimized to go full HW like this (only one point in DWS right now) but I wanted to give a good test and so far I can't complain about the results.

With our new enhancements, it is time to discuss Manyshot vs Scattershot. Remember, our mouse is set up so that Mark and Opening Shot are keyed to the two thumb buttons. Scattershot is keyed to 1 and Manyshot to 2. I've placed Corner the Quary on 3. Both Scatter and Many share the same charges and cooldown. Both trigger our 12-second displacement from Two Places at Once. Which to use and when? Well, Many hits a single and Scatter, in theory, hits multiple targets. I've found that you can't actually control where Scatter goes, or if you can I haven't figured out how to do it as of yet. Scattershot finally gives a bit of AOE and is best used to group mobs rush you. Scatter nicely tears them up and since it has an almost non-existent cooldown two Scattershots will kill most onrushing mobs if you roll well. Manyshot puts all your arrows on one target so this has two applications - either in conjunction with your marked target or directed at a half-strength enemy to take them out. All these shot choices represent deep tactical decisions which are either pure joy or pure pain in the rear depending on how you like your combat. In many ways, HW is the ranged version of monk melee combat.

Onto Feywild

Upon taking 8 I went into Feywild. I'm capped 8 working into 9 at this point which attests to how much more XP Saltmarsh has added to the early levels. I solo'd R1 Wake Me Up Inside, Endless Revels, and Make Believe. Scattershot certainly makes its weight felt here and it feels like we've passed another threshold on ease of questing. I don't think there is any way I am soloing these quests on this character in past versions on reaper. Found a group for the rest of Feywild and did those at R3. HW single target is brilliant when you can find a perch spot (Immortality Lessons) and target pick. Bosses, in all quests, die noticeably quicker. Assuming this scales up, HW feels poised to be a key contributor in high-level reaper. Quests like Needle in Fey Stack are a breeze because you can single target the fleeing stags/ravens/etc. On a side note, we may need to reevaluate Feywild at some point. This expansion is better and better the more time you spend with it. I'm almost capped to 9 and will pick up there going forward with a gearing update next time.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Gearing Level 9

As promised here is the main gearing breakout at level 9:

5-piece Feywild set (Belt of the Ram, Lionheart Ring, Greendragonscale Bracers, Lotus Mail, Winter Court Necklace)
Bows - Ship-Siege Bow (ML8)
Spectral Longbow (ML8)

There is likely a more optimized Feywild set but this is what I had available without a gear swapping around and it worked out fine. At level 10 I went to Cheap Shot for a longbow. I also made a Cannith helmet with +12 sheltering, +8 accuracy, topaz of wizardy +96, and sapphire of false life +18. Note - I don't have any Ravenloft gear for this character because again I didn't want to go around and pull stuff and I also want to see how HW works without being completely geared out.

Level 9 was smooth and fun. I led kill counts in both Tear and Gwylans. Tear was fun perching and shooting from position - marking and taking out targets is becoming second nature now. Feat wise I took IC Ranged, pretty much a no-brainer. I also started pushing into the DWS tree finally taking Favored Defense 3 and Increased Empathy. Have we ever talked about how weak T1 is for DWS? Underwhelming and mostly filler.

Level 10

Had a mixed experience at 10. There are pros and cons when running with people who have 50% XP pots. The pro is they are almost always competent, good players who make quests go by smooth. The con is that many are so rigid and inflexible and invariably, for me anyway, there is about a 6-7 quest limit before I go do something else. Went through Von 1&2 and Necro 2 (been a while since I did that whole chain) then they were going to do Von3. But what about Stormcleave and Xorian? Waste of time. What? They are fun! Bad xp/min. Uhhh...OK. I dropped and did them the next day with a druid and we had a blast. Gameplay, like life, is often about expectations. I also fit in some solo Sorrowdusk along the way, I have a soft spot for that adventure pack and probably run it more often than most.

For my favored enemy at L10 I took Elemental. I think we're officially as the flex position on these and open to personal preferences. Giants used be a popular choice but GH is easy by modern standards and there isn't much point in picking it Formorian Giants since almost all of those are red-named and HW is going to eventually give us marked targets are favored enemies. Elf is another choice to consider as well as construct if you aren't twisting it in or it won't be available after U51. Right now, I'm planning on twisting constructs.

A note on marking - you can't mark warforged. Or slimes.

Enhancements were 3 into DWS - Sneak Attack and Survivalist.

Level 11

More DWS enhancements, Action Boost Damage II, Sniper Shot, Survivalist II. We pick up IPS from Ranger but are we ever going to use it? I haven't so far. I also now have 6 reaper points.

This is a quick level since has those big XP quests - VON3/4, White Plume Mountain, Shadow Crypt. A good time to look at our toolbar. Marking and Opening Shot on the thumb button are just about second nature now. My 1-0 are Scattershot, Manyshot, Corner the Quarry, No Step Missed, Sniper Shot, Haste, Cure Moderate Wounds, Damage Boost, and 9 and 0 mostly open. So while HW does require tactical selection on when to use Scatter or Many shot and target marking we are no where near as button intensive as monk. DPS remains strong and the build leads in kill count when in a melee group but falls behind like everyone else when grouped with favored souls/sorcerers. Those bearbarian builds also are quite good and would interest me more if you could change the bear color.

Not HW specific, but few classes are as fun in slayer zones as rangers. The ability to pick targets off from across the map makes the area fly by (I was messing around in Red Fens waiting for an afk player). True, some of the newer zones require that you activate mobs by coming near them but for the zones that don't it's the proverbial turkey shoot. One of the many small details that make this an enjoyable gaming experience.

[Marshal_Lannes]

A Tale of Two Quests

Levels 12 and 13 brought out the strengths and difficulties associated with Horizon Walker. The Newcomers, with its 300 mobs that come at you in rushes puts the tree to the test. Now granted, this quest was designed in the era where DDO was throwing huge mobs of monsters at players. This development trend hasn't continued in modern content. However, you can really feel the weight of the mobs here and for the first time, I switched over to IPS. It is likely quests like that cause players to complain about IPS incurring a 20% damage penalty (easily noticeable) and needless to say target marking goes out the window. Fortunately, I was grouping with a FVS who more or less Holy Smited them all. A DWS/Rogue sneak dice focused build would be better in these circumstances.

And yet, in quests like Dreams of Insanity Horizon Walker shines. With many high-priority red name targets or dangerous spawning enemies like Tharask hounds, you're armed to the teeth and built to take them out quickly. The quest becomes easy as you're able to eliminate the monsters before they even become threats. I won't know how HW plays in epics until I get there, but I did get a taste of raid play at these levels with good old Vault of Night and Tempest Spine. So far so good and the class seems to make the raid easier for everyone.

Bows, bows, and more bows

Oddly, I don't have a ML12 bow. I'm going to grab a 12 Ship Siege bow next chance. I mostly used Cheap Shot still preferring it ML9 Inferno Sniper or the vorpal on ML8 Spectral. I also tried out the Macabre and Barovian bows. Barovian is the clear choice for undead outperforming the Spectral bow. It might even be better than Cheap Shot although I didn't test. It certainly feels powerful. What a great deal those Barovian weapons are, huh? Next level I finally get Unwavering Ardency! A quick side note on bow visuals. DDO Devs do a fantastic job designing bows. Cheap Shot looks great. Spectral Bow looks wicked. Unwavering Ardency is divine.

I have 7 reaper points now. I do enjoy these early reaper levels the progression is fairly rapid. 12 and 13 brought a bonanza of saved-up enhancement points. Purchases were: Dauntless Marking, Dexterity (HW), Tenacious Hunter III, Walker's Guidance, Feywild Attunement, Banish the Quarry, Powershot, Misty Step. With the T5 HW abilities unlocked and Unwavering Ardency in my hands, I expect to see a major combat capability spike at level 14. This is coming at a good time since I started to feel for the first time some pushback from quests, namely the Ravenloft 2 chain. But considering I am still using a 5-piece Feywild set that makes sense.

A couple of spell notes. It's rather cool that some spells which were rarely used before now are useful in conjunction with the HW tree. Tumble gives you a +10 to your tumble (obviously) skill. And while that 10 doesn't escalate like Jump, it means you only have to hit 25 for the full Buffy the Vampire Slayer gymnastics animations. Tumble isn't a ranger class skill so that's good to have and you don't need to waste an equipment slot putting in a tumble skill gem. The other spell that has more utility now is Wild Instincts. This spell raises your Listen skill by 10. Again, no escalation (should there be?) but an easy-to-grab bonus. With Cure Serious Wounds, Resist Energy, Jump, and these two we have a fairly robust buffing suite.

[Marshal_Lannes]

To IPS or not IPS

Levels 14 and 15 brought to the forefront a question that will badger all rangers, to use IPS or not. This is further magnified with HW since the tree is geared toward Archer's Focus. I soloed Wiz King and Relic of a Sovereign Past(R1) then ran the Diplo chain on R4. Quests like Framework are tailor-made for HW sniping. However, once you get into GH and mobs start hall rushing you IPS can decimate them. Essentially you're now doing so much damage and Manyshot has such a short cooldown you pick a mob in the back Manyshot through to him and pick up the kills. I haven't been able to tell if marked has a passthrough effect - for example mark a shaman then manyshot toward him. It seems like every mob you hit is rolling for doubleshot. It feels very powerful. You aren't even missing the 20% damage reduction since when you do single target mark you're unloading so much DPS on them that you're killing it anyway.

Marked targets are starting to take a beating now that my character levels are adding up. Lalilat was carved up in at level DQ raid done with 3 of us. I brought her down faster than I remember rangers at cap being able to from years ago. OK, power creep, sure but wow single target HW sure is becoming special. I'm starting to get the feeling that DWS might be better at trash clearing than HW but when you combine the IPS with manyshot and the ability of HW to carve apart red-named we have a real intriguing tree here.

At 15 I took Shot on the Run and FVE Elf. I also equipped the Wallwatch set. I've built up 10 APs and will spend them at some point. I'm torn on where I want to go. The DWS tree, aside from the level 5s, simply feels weaker than HW. For example, Favored Hunter is 50% weaker than Tenacious Hunter. Do I need Killer? I mean who cares about 5% doubleshot now, I already am going to have a ton of doubleshot. Falconry's ranged attacks are based off a wisdom DC so it's not exactly ideal to go for those. AA same way except for the imbues. I suppose I could go deeper in those. I must say its a real puzzle here. I will likely go DWS for now and see how that plays. The survivalist HPs are always nice if nothing else. I could always go into Wood Elf with the bonus to longbow damage but I feel they are overpriced at 2 AP a box. Again, you get spoiled from Tenacious Hunter. Eight reaper points now so I have the +20 HP core.

This is an ideal class to do racials on since they have a very real impact on the Wood Elf tree and both Dex and Wis would be useful for the build. Plus having more reps to figure out where to spend our APs is going to be needed.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Concluding Heroics

Levels 16-20 progressed without much trouble HW handling the increased mob difficulty without trouble. I was able to solo Lost at Sea then pulled an amazing group together that hammered through the last couple of levels. Touching back on IPS/AF a wise HW has the tactical flexibility to adjust their use of these to accommodate what the group is doing. For example, if you have a sorcerer that is crushing trash you can focus on taking down reapers and champions before they ever become a threat. I also noticed that people in higher levels have become aware of your green marking level and will lay off those mobs knowing you're going to kill them. Working in conjunction with another ranger is an incredibly fun gaming experience. Again, the tactical choices available to HW elevate gameplay outside of the Gauntlet style dungeon zerg.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in heroics with HW. And remember, other than tomes, this character has nothing that virtually anyone can't pick up and start with. There is a lot of ceiling on this character which would enhance combat abilities even more. This is going to be my 3rd ranger life (4th life total). Initial steps to enhancing the character would be picking up 1-3 monk lives for the additional damage. Monk lives would also allow us to try out a HW monk archer. Racial preference would be toward Elf/Wood Elf and Halfling for +2 Dexterity then Human and Aasimir for +2 Wisdom. Those four APs would give us two ranks of Wood Elf weapons training. I think the character would probably be "finished" at that point although Wood Elf is such a good tree for our purposes that full racial investment would pay off. Still, the realistic goal I'd set for the revamped Elven ranger would be

Paladin life (HAMP) - accomplished
Ranger life x3 (+6 damage ranged) - accomplished
Monk life x3 (+3 damage) - TBD
Wood Elf life x3 (Dex, RAP) - TBD
Halfling life x3 (Dex, RAP) - TBD
Human life x3 (Wis, RAP) - TBD
Aasimir life x3 (Wis, RAP) - TBD

Closing out our heroic feats I took Empower Healing at 18. I've always been a fan of this on rangers as it allows fairly decent cure serious wounds usage plus you can't use epic defensive fighting as a ranged character anyway. Dragons was my last favored enemy which brings our list to this:

FVE - Human, Undead, Elemental, Animal, Evil Outsider, Fey, Dragon, Construct (primal twist). That's +16 damage on all marked targets, +32 on marked from this list. This is noticeable, to say the least.

We are moving onto epics now - I'll give my final AP breakout and a gearing update for L21 next time.

[FengXian]

I hope I'm not interrupting (c-c-combo breaker).

I have some questions about AP split and possible splashes.

Assuming we go 41 points in HW, we have 39 left bar racials/universals.

I was considering going 31 in DWS to get Hunter's Mark. After that we'd have 8 points left.

Now you could put them all in VKF to get Haste Boost as pure ranger. However seems a waste not getting Core III at that point, which would mean removing points from DWS as Carpone suggested, but I'd like to keep the 31 DWS.

So, since we don't need 20 ranger levels for capstone anyway, how about splashing 1 Fighter for just 4 AP Haste Boost?

That would leave use with 4 points: 2 for FE: animal and 2 for FE: undead.

I believe you're also missing some FE damage: 16 from 8 FEs, +3 from DWS and another +2 from DWS core, that's 21 damage. Which means 42 to any marked target that's also a FE and 63 to Reapers if you take both Evil Outsider and Lawful (?) Outsider.

Am I missing something huge here? Also which level would you splash for 18/1/1 besides Fighter? Barbarian for movement, Rogue for 1d6 SA, Monk for Greater Fire stance (giving up light armor though)?

As for the race, I had considered even Shifter for the +4 dex rage. Sadly it doesn't seem to work with Precision. I'm also not sure whether lv 1 barb rage give you an extra use to your shifter rage or not.

Let me know what you think please, nice feedback so far!

[Marshal_Lannes]

I have some questions about AP split and possible splashes.

Good questions. My thoughts. Currently, I'm running 20 Ranger so I am getting the capstone for double marking from HW. Yes, my bonus favored damage more than +32 I was only including FVE there. As you point out DWS and double marking increases that. I believe there are plenty of level splits that offer other/different options depending on what you want to focus on. Fighter gives access to haste boost and rogue add sneak die which has a rather large impact on DPS in this build.

For APs here is my breakout:

41 Horizon walker
23 Deep woods sniper
9 Vistani knife fighter
3 Arcane archer
3 Wood elf
2 Falconry

Getting 2 more racial APs would allow me to grab the 3rd Vistani tier for 5% doubleshot and Quickdraw. As I mentioned above, racial APs will have a decent impact on this build. I could probably drop my elemental imbue from AA as well, but I find the bonus damage is quite nice, even from tier one. The two things I didn't take from DWS - Aimed Shot and Killer/Merciful Shot. Honestly, the build already has enough clicks so I didn't think bringing in two more would do anything. It might. Depends on how many buttons hitting you do and if you think you need these beyond Many Shot/Hunt's End.

Also as promised a gear layout for L21:

Epic Raven's Sight (Dex+9 slotted eyes)
Heroic Wallwatch Set (Head, armor, gloves)
Epic Vulkoorim Pendant (neck)
Epic Bloodstone (trinket)
Mithral Cloak of the Wolf (cloak)
Heroic Bronze Dragonscale belt (belt)
Heroic Lionheart ring (ring)
Blackfeather boots (boots)
Ring of Blind Devotion (ring)
Black Opal Bracers (bracers)
Epic Elemental Longbow of Earth (weapon)

As you can see I'm not fully optimized. I'm running the Wallwatch set and the rather nice Vulkoor's Chosen (+2 Dex/Con +2 Sneak attack die) sets. One of the nice things about the sands sets is you have a couple of options to get the 2-piece. For example, I could take the Vulkoorim fighting leathers. That would break the Wallwatch set which also allows me to equip the Epic Spectral Gloves. I could then replace the bracers which give me Ethereal (its on Spectral gloves). At 23 when I equip Pinion I could put a ghostbane ruby in that. Gear always has a lot of choices so I'm not getting too bogged down into it right now.

[CrackedIce]

Been loving your write-up.


How have you found the comparison without taking into account capstone?

Or is the HW capstone such a powerful ability that going tier 5 in DWS fully pigeonholes you into 41/38 that it's just more efficient to be go 41 HW tier 5 HW?

Thanks.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Been loving your write-up.


How have you found the comparison without taking into account capstone?

Or is the HW capstone such a powerful ability that going tier 5 in DWS fully pigeonholes you into 41/38 that it's just more efficient to be go 41 HW tier 5 HW?

Thanks.

I thought Horizon Walker was tactically enjoyable in heroics but taking the capstone and moving into epics vaulted it into another tier. One of the sneaky benefits that end up being huge is the extra charges of manyshot. At first glance, you think that's a throw-in like some added cosmetic what difference does that really make? However, tactically the significance is enormous. With five charges of Manyshot you can almost constantly be using it. It's hard (for me) to quantify mathematically but the added 2 charges available to you throughout an entire quest and the DPS increase associated with it add up. And everyone one marked is favored is devastating against red names/bosses. So much so that I wouldn't be surprised to see it nerfed somewhat within the next year once the best players fully take advantage of what it offers. My character is doing 12-20K on a marked Hunt's End at L23 with Pinion and I have moderate gear and weak past lives/reaper points. What is a fully decked character doing?

The question becomes if you take the 41 in DWS will you end up "chasing" what you gave up in HW? Conversely, if we go HW it becomes somewhat easy to replace the 20 ranged power and 3 SA die we lost from DWS with filigrees/set bonuses. True, DWS can get the same bonuses but there is a diminishing return on ranged power the higher you go. SA is great, no denying that. If you're going for a max SA build maybe you're better going into rogue levels. A 41/39 split usually requires sacrifices to get back what was lost from other enhancement trees - especially since DWS isn't a 'modern' tree and lacks the base to top power across the tiers that many of the newer trees have in particular at the low-hanging fruit levels. Plus there are very real benefits in other trees here - nothing in Vistani is fluff for example. I'd even like to go 6 points into AA for morphic arrows although the AA tree T1 has a lot of fluff and I can't justify taking 3 points in spell points.

I'm at the point in epics where people are starting to ask questions about HW. Sorcerors will still outkill you but you're going to outperform most other classes. Without question, HW ranger has joined my list of favorite class builds.

Glad you're enjoying the journey!

[Marshal_Lannes]

Epic numbers

Some data points for my epic journey:

At level 25 952 HPs 791 SPs

STR - 21
DEX - 64
CON - 43
INT - 25
WIS - 39
CHA - 21

Quest example Madstone Crater R1 (kill count)

Elven Horizon Walker - 79
Reaper-winged ranger inquisitive - 79
Wizard - 15
Monk - 7
Barbarian - 7
First life sorcerer - 5

Now I'm not saying my character can consistently outperform one with reaper wings that would be crazy. What I am saying is that with little past-life investment and moderate gearing you can pull off some pretty spectacular things in Horizon Walker. Gianthold consistently followed this pattern. I ran through Catacombs on R3 with like results. Since we have Undead FVE and marked targets double even without a DR breaker Pinion blew through them. Again the key, always always always mark. Get in the habit of it. Thumb button fire. Thumb button fire. It's second nature now for me.

Ranger is one of the few classes (others might be FVS/Cleric/Bard) that can fully take advantage of the epic feats. Combat Archery at 21 and Overwhelming Critical at 24 are no-brainers and significant. Level 26 is a utility choice. You can pick Holy Strike for ghost touch so you don't have to worry about it on an item or weapon slot. Or you can take either Adamantium or Silver DR breaking. For my purposes, I want to try out gearing options so I took Holy Strike. Once we have a gear set up that we like (and if it includes ghost touch) I'd probably go Admantium. That seems more relevant vs silver since the L29 Barovian Longbow is pretty nice if you are in a devil/vampire heavy quest. We are going to run into the same question when we get to Blinding Speed and I guess I'm going to have to go back and reread how it was changed to affect ranged combat.

I don't have a sentient gem slotted into Pinion although I would if I end up doing multiple epic lives. I might look into a Thunderforged longbow. I have the base. T2 is ML 26 (if I recall it was fairly easy to get to T2 with 3 being the serious grind). I'm considering a Blinding Fear/Paralyzing Fear combo. It doesn't look like any of the damage effects scales with anything so they are fairly blah by modern standards. However, a blind/paralyze combo (both no save) seems like it might have a use.

I think I've only died once in epics. With displacement, improved evasion (through clickie), high reflex saves and being ranged the build is fairly survivable. However, Legendary R6+ requires a lot of HPs so I'm not sure where I'll get those. That's where the lack of past lives comes into play. Could use those extra HPs from primal or reaper trees.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Slayer Zones and L29 feat choices

One of the popular methods of leveling these days is hitting the slayer zones. This then begs the question, how does our HW perform in the popular slayer areas? Feywild and the Orchard are similar in that we are both dealing with favored enemies (undead/fey) and they have wide-open vistas offering gorgeous fields of fire. As you might expect, my ranger excels in these circumstances. Double marking takes out any big bads and switching over to IPS allows machine gun fire rates of killing. Healing spring keeps us healed consistently leading to an overall fun gameplay experience. The sniping/marking playstyle even does a credible job of doing a hunting simulation. Big Game Werewolf Hunter anyone? Many classes have to slog through these areas. Not so with a HW ranger.

Thunderholm isn't quite as fun. Anytime we are in cramped corridors we have to be more adroit in our gameplay. Compounding our experience is that most of the mobs give us yellow numbers (skeletons, elementals) - or at least they do with Pinion without morphic arrows. I'm not saying we didn't kill our way through it, I'm just saying the gaming isn't as fun and feels more of a chore. Out of 10, I'd rank the Orchard a full 10, Feywild a 9, and Thunderholm a 7. If you're wondering I haven't run Ravenloft so no opinion on that as of yet.

I've also hit level 29 and this brings up some interesting feat choices. Dire Charge doesn't have a thematic fit for our build and we don't have the wisdom for Mass Frog (which is also a thematic stretch). I have four feat choices worth considering; Fount of Life (20 HAMP 20 POS SP) Wind Through the Trees (5% knockdown on miss chance no save) Harbinger of Chaos (1d20 Bane, 2d20 Chaos vs Law) Embodiment of Law (10 Bane, 20 Law). I don't have martial spheres filled out on this character (so glad they are removing that system in U51!) so I can't take Embodiment of Law. That's a shame since Embodiment of Law seems to fit our theme. Or does Harbinger of Chaos fit as well? As a plane walker, we are constantly exposed to the forces of chaos (or is that Grey Hunters again?) and let's face it, Harbinger of Chaos is a wicked name. Both Wind and Fount would also fit the theme (defensive hunter boosts to face our enemies). Good arguments can be made for any of the four actually. Since we have deflect arrows and are often displaced Wind will likely go off fairly quite a bit. For a well-lived character, Fount won't do much, but since we don't have much in the way of those PLs the 20/20 would be a benefit. I'm going to try them all out at some point. My gut feeling is that you can't go wrong and depends on whether or not you want more defense, more consistent offense (Law) or bigger spike damage chances (Chaos).

[Marshal_Lannes]

Endgame Bows

It's time to take a look at longbow options at level 30. Longbow happens to be one of the weapons in DDO that is well represented so our ranger has multiple choices. Chances are you will have, or be able to obtain, one or more of these without too much effort and grief.

Level 28 Bows

Spectral Longbow (Night Revels)
Chaosbow (Killing Time - RAID)
Ship Siege Bow (Crystal Cove)
Void the Endless Coil (Old Baba's Hut - RAID)

I almost never used my level 20 Spectral Longbow. In almost all cases Pinion was simply better. Based on that it's hard to justify recommending getting the level 28 version (which I don't have). Then again, if I never use the L20 version, might as well make the 28 and see if it's any better? I'll probably do that when Night Revels rolls out next month. I thought I was going to use the Ship Siege Bow a lot in heroics (ML8) but only ended up using it for two levels before going with Cheap Shot. I don't have the L28 Ship Siege bow either. It does seem perfectly credible to make though having a 19-20 crit zone, improved destruction, strong vs constructs, and a 52.20 base damage. If nothing else, it would be situationally useful vs constructs. I recently pulled the Chaosbow although being a Chaotic weapon, getting the full benefit out of this would require us to take a Chaotic alignment. Chaosbow has a 57.75 base damage with a 20 crit zone. However, it does come with two augment slots, Ranged Alacrity 20, Elasticity, and vulnerability stacking (20 fully applied for bosses/red-names). I'm going to assume everyone has at least Speed 15, Quickness augment, or Blinding Speed so the next benefit with Ranged Alacrity is going to be an extra 5% attack speed since it doesn't stack with those. 5% attack speed plus 20% more boss damage and +1 crit multiplier on 19-20 is a large DPS increase in red named fights. Void has the exact same crit profile, augment slots, and base damage as the Chaosbow. It applies cold vulnerability in the same way Chaosbow applies general vulnerability which is obviously much worse since the Chaosbow affects all damage and Void only enhances cold damage. Void has Frozen Aether which is one of those rare proc spells. I don't have Void so it's an on-paper comparison. Chaosbow seems much superior. In terms of looks, Chaosbow has the pink glowing effects found on all chaos-aligned weapons. Void looks like Pinion. I've already touched on the great look of the Spectral Longbow and the Ship Siege bow looks uninspiring. I would rank these:

1. Chaosbow
2. Void
3. Ship Siege
4. Spectral

Level 29 Bows

Ferrocrystal/Syranian/Morninglords/Night Mothers (Feywild,Sharn,Ravenloft)
Twisted Willow (Just Business)
Aerania the Boltbow (Dryad and the Demigod - RAID)
Inferno Sniper (White Plume Mountain werewolf chest)

All four of what I call the "expansion pack bows" are similar. All have the same damage and crit profiles differing in the effects that they produce. Being easy to get, all these bows are solid, workable weapons. You can use them in epics and do just fine. Night Mother's (evil damage) is key for doing high-level reaper runs of Trial of the Archons. Twisted Willow is a decent option if you don't have one of the L28 Raid bows (and it might even be better than Void). 57.00 base damage and a 19-20 crit profile with one augment slot. It also has Elasticity and Armor Piercing 20. If you don't have Armor Piercing slotted this ranks up a bit more. Inferno Sniper has a 20 crit with 52.25. It gives fire vulnerability so is opposite of Void but doesn't have Void's bells and whistles except one big one - it's aligned. That makes it a fairly useful DR breaker. There are subtle differences in many of these bows which is a testament to good game design. Finally, we have Aerania which is what most players consider to be the best bow in the game. With a 63.00 base damage and 19-20 crit profile it's the best in the game. Two augment slots go with Ranged Alacrity 20, Elasticity, and the occasional alchemical air blast. For general purpose killing, Aerania is going to be the bow with the highest DPS. However, for boss fights, Chaosbow far outdistances it if you're the only one applying stacks of vulnerability on a monster. Rankings:

1. Aerania
2. Twisted Willow
3. Inferno Sniper
4. Expansion Bows

With a final ranking being:

1. Aerania
2. Chaosbow (although see notes above)
3. Twisted Willow
4. Void
5. Ship Siege
6. Inferno Sniper
7. Expansion Bows
8. Spectral

Note: There are 3 level 30 bows, Cheap Shot (30), Legendary Shatterbow, and Legendary Bow of the Silver Flame. I don't have any of these and haven't been able to dive into their stats so will comment on them at a later time.

[Marshal_Lannes]

Raid Performance

Time to take a look at how Horizon Walker has performed in the various raids. Note; all raids are referring to their Legendary version with difficulty maxing out at R1.

Vault of Night - A+. Misty Step helps one on the bridges. Improved evasion bursts eliminate trap worries if you don't have someone bringing those down. DPS is excellent and S tier here. Ideal for air boosting up the shaft.

Demon Queen - A+. Ranged marking makes trivial work of the venerable queen. Ideal, perhaps optimal build, if you're farming items from this raid.

Master Artificer - A. All enemies are double damaged with Construct/Marked favored enemies. Ideal, possibly optimal build for titan DPS. High burst damage is perfect for Tovin so make sure you have your Hunt's End saved. Only negative is the electrified floors/crystals stage. A lower pool of HPs makes you vulnerable here without high amounts of electric absorption and a solid healer.

Lord of Blades - A. Ideal, possibly optimal build for pillar DPS. Good at most everything in here DPS wise. Drawback is that you are fighting in a claustrophobic area with a lot of enemy spawns so if you're too focused on your marked target and/or pillars you can get smacked and killed.

Fire on Thunder Peak - A. A raid where you can look good racking up both a high kill count and doing a tremendous amount of damage to the dragons. Doesn't get an A+ because quite a few builds can do the same thing and you have to remember to switch between IPS for trash mobs and AF for the dragons.

Temple of the Deathwyrm - A. The incredible versatility brought by Horizon Walker is put to good advantage here. Can be a star in areas like Tower for burst DPS grabbing mark. Misty Step aids in Jumping zone. Overpowering DPS and a big final room play right into our hands. Same with the shadow side.

Chronoscope - A. Several sub-bosses are perfect for HW. Can also go around Abasahi flyer sniping which is fun. Doesn't get the A+ because most classes excel at this raid now.

Project Nemesis - A. Again, high single target DPS allows you to fulfill a variety of roles in this raid. You might end up on Irk duty or they might have you throw your arrows around on kill order. Effective in the elemental zones.

Dryad and the Demigod - A-. I ding HW half a grade here because you can get yourself killed in the end fight if you draw agro. Also not the most optimal killer of fire beetles. You won't do badly here but your skills aren't put to their best use. You will want to run this often though for the bow.

Vision of Destruction - B+. Ever notice how this room is maybe the most dangerous in all of DDO? So much stuff wants to kill you here. Bats, traps, curses, orthons, devils, Sulo, circles, and some spikes in the middle just to be mean. Fortunately, HW is well set up to mitigate much of this with strong dodge/meld/evasion. Your marking is perfect for orthon kill order giving everyone a target to focus on. This is a raid where your best defense is HPs however and death is always lurking around the corner for our nimble HW.

Tempest Spine - B. Really only the end fight matters here since the rest of the raid is an easy zerg. The pros - ranged with good damage. The cons - lightning strikes are going to kill you sometimes.

Too Hot to Handle - B-. Once again HPs are an issue here. Several times in this raid you need a big pool to fall back upon. You'll need a good healer to survive. You do have high utility here though as you can snipe and put down cultists running for the lake of fire. One time I took one out a second before they plunged in. Very cinematic feeling.

Killing Time - D. Completely ill-suited for this raid due to the constant AOE burst damage without the HPs to absorb it. Sure you can hurt things but you get hurt in return. The only raid I don't like playing on this character and have had downright miserable runs with 5 deaths.

[Marshal_Lannes]

One of past lives that are beneficial to our Elven archer is monk providing a straight +1 damage every hit. Having picked up all three ranger lives I decided to run a monk live both for the past life and see how the Elven archer works with a monk/ranger split using Horizon Walker. Thematically, I envision this character as part of a holy order devoted to purging the wood elf realm from corruption. Possibly part of a great tree cult (from the ES challenge). As such, I'm going Lawful Good. This should provide for exactly the type of moral inflexibility I imagine would exist among the order.

Class split will eventually be 14 Monk/6 Ranger. Leveling order is monk, ranger x6 then the rest monk. This keeps it simple and actually lets the feats fall in place rather nicely. Starting stats are:

STR 8
DEX 20
CON 16
INT 10
WIS 14
CHA 8

Initial Feat progression:

1 - Point Blank Shot
1 - Dodge (monk)
3 - Precision
6 - Mobility
7 - Zen archery (monk)

Favored Enemies - 1) Human (ranger) 5) Fey (ranger) Undead (Vistani) Evil Outsider (Horizon Walker)

This covers all the main corruptions to the woodland realm except for Drow and Aberrations. Ultimately, humans are far more populous than Drow both in gameplay terms and the likely threat they would pose to the forest.

We will likely use our full allotment of enhancement trees going into Horizon Walker, Arcane Archer, Wood Elf, Deep Woods Sniper, Ninja Spy, and Vistani. As you can see from my stats I'm going with a DEX build and therefore won't be using Falconry. An argument can certainly be made for Falconry and WIS however WIS has no synergy with Horizon Walker. How much I use DWS and NS remains to be seen. Right now, at level 8, the primary focus is on low-hanging fruit from AA, working my way up HW, and pulling Undead FE from Vistani.

Up through 8, I haven't actually used a monk stance yet and probably don't plan on it until L10 when I have access to the Ravenloft outfit. There really isn't anything worth using over the Lotus Mail (and just being uncentered). I only have the caster cloth outfit and don't have the Garb of Spring Winds so that's an option. Either way, it doesn't really matter just depends on how optimized you want to be for these levels.

For all intents and purposes gameplay is nearly identical to pure ranger Horizon Walker at the moment. I expect to see some divergence in the next few levels as I make use of monk stances and more monk levels. Elite at killing reapers and red names but mostly a bystander when killing trash if you have high DPS classes like sorcerer or FVS in your group.