Needed - Elf Ranger Help Please!

[Jiirix]

Your build thread references tempests as "squishy" and "less survivable than barbs or fighters" which is blatantly false.

Not sure why you would take epic reflexes or epic physical resistance either. Please don't post bad advice for new players.

This is a matter of your point of view. If you are giving advice to new players how to build for legendary elite other things are important compared to giving advice about playing the game from level one to level 30 and doing some hard/normal quests at cap.
For an average new player barbarians and fighters are less squishy than a ranger because of more hit points and armor as a main source of PRR. This difference isn’t that important to veteran players because past lives and are gear closing the gap. (And displacement, concealment, dodge) Sure, you can build great endgame rangers, but that can be very frustrating until you get there. Barbarians and Vanguards on the other hand are much more forgiving imho.

You may give good advice for a DPS focused toon, others give good advice for "easy to play" builds for newer players.

[Grailhawk]

The state of the game is sad these days, and will only get worse as new players listen to advise like yalls. I mean we have the guy recommending to craft spellpower LGS on a ranged DPS character. People have no concept of how to build DPS characters these days, and DDO is and has always been a DPScentric game.

You're right though, my ranger is TOTAL garbage. LOL. Not even going to bother debating how to build a character with someone who thinks epic reflexes, or physical resistance, is a good choice. Want to crunch the numbers on the DPS gain from 4 melee power? Also with improved evasion, MRR, resistances epic reflexes is pretty meh. 10 PRR barely does anything when you're already at 130 prr...

Barbarians are NOT survivable, and fighters are pretty sub par these days. You really want to argue that point?

1500 hp at 120 PRR = 3300 EHP
1500 Hp at 130 PRR = 3450 EHP

150 EHP difference

3450/3300 = 1.045 or 4.5% increase to your survival.

5d8+100 (1.9 crit power multiplier and 2.8 melee power multiplier)
122.5 * 1.9 * 2.8 = 651.70 avg damage per hit
5d8+100 (1.9 crit power multiplier and 2.8 melee power multiplier)
122.5*1.9*2.84 = 661.01

661.01-651.7 = 9.31

661.01/651.7 = 1.014 or 1.4% increase to your damage per hit

So 2 feat to increase dps by 1.4% is worth more then 1 feat that increases survival by 4.5%?

And no failing a save on a 1 is an even bugger survival bonus.

Soul stones have 0 DPS.

[Jiirix]

The state of the game is sad these days, and will only get worse as new players listen to advise like yalls.

Different goals imho: You want new players to become powergamers like yourself and others want new players to have fun and stay in game. Maximum DPS is not maximum fun for everyone. Not every build option is "right" or "wrong" but more or less fitting ones playstyle.

[unbongwah]

Your build thread references tempests as "squishy" and "less survivable than barbs or fighters" which is blatantly false.

I said pallies, not fighters. If you're going to accuse me of being wrong, you could at least quote me accurately.

Pure rgrs have a lot less HPs and start out with lower PRR (lt vs med / hvy armor); they also don't get Divine Grace, obviously, so they don't get the big boost to saves which pallies do. They get CSW, ofc, but so do pallies and they have LoHs to boot; while barbs gain free self-healing after lvl 12. The main advantages of pure rgr over barb / pally (in terms of survivability) are Evasion and can hit higher Dodge due to higher MDB on lt armor.

Not sure why you would take epic reflexes or epic physical resistance either.

Epic Reflexes is to hit no-fail Reflex saves so I can skip Evasive Dance, which saves me 6 APs in Tempest. Investing in Gtr Shadow DM is expensive, so I try to save APs where I can; otherwise I'd have to shave some DPS enhs from Tempest instead.

Epic DR is part of fixing the aforementioned squishiness: +30 PRR from Tempest, +12 from DWS, and +10 from epic DR; 22 PRR from lt armor at lvl 30 (30 if I run with Tensers of Div Power); which puts my standing PRR at 74-82. If you take Scion of Earth, it's another +20 PRR, so let's say ~100 PRR before gear. Right now I believe the max possible PRR from gear is +70, but I haven't figured out what's an optimal gear set. EDIT: Blitz is another +30 PRR, so say ~200 PRR tops.

Neither feat is essential; but both combined with other bonuses provide a nice boost to survivability to my Shadow Tempest, IMO.

Please don't post bad advice for new players.

I'll take your criticisms a bit more seriously when you've earned a few more pips.

[kalaka]

You may give good advice for a DPS focused toon, others give good advice for "easy to play" builds for newer players.

DDO is DPS driven, and always has been. Yes I want new players to be power gamers, as completing content is fun.

I can't have a conversation with someone who thinks forum rep matters, so I am going to ignore his entire reply. I was power gaming, theory crafting, and crushing DDO content before he even knew what forum rep was. I'm glad his greenis is huge though.

[Jiirix]

DDO is DPS driven, and always has been. Yes I want new players to be power gamers, as completing content is fun.

I can't have a conversation with someone who thinks forum rep matters, so I am going to ignore his entire reply.

Then why blinding speed for a melee ranger? Sure, for ranged combat it is 7% more attack speed but for melee combat haste, blinding speed or a speed XV item are all the same. Goatskin Boots , legendary raid armors, Boots of Blessed Travels, Epic Boots of the Innocent, Epic Quiver of Alacrity, Epic Ethereal Bracers, Legendary Brazenband all give 14% or 15% attack speed bonus to melee. Waste of a feat I would say.

[unbongwah]

I mean we have the guy recommending to craft spellpower LGS on a ranged DPS character.

Spellpower boosts both AA imbues and Scion of Plane of <Element>; presuming they're the same element, that's 7d8 + 2d20 or 52.5 avg dmg per hit. LGS item is +225 spellpower if I'm adding right, which is 52.5 * 2.25 = +118 dmg per hit. Whether that's the best use of LGS slot obviously depends on what you're giving up to equip it, of course.

People have no concept of how to build DPS characters these days

INDEED

[kalaka]

Then why blinding speed for a melee ranger? Sure, for ranged combat it is 7% more attack speed but for melee combat haste, blinding speed or a speed XV item are all the same. Goatskin Boots , legendary raid armors, Boots of Blessed Travels, Epic Boots of the Innocent, Epic Quiver of Alacrity, Epic Ethereal Bracers, Legendary Brazenband all give 14% or 15% attack speed bonus to melee. Waste of a feat I would say.

No max dps gear set can fit speed. Ps. My ranger out dpses any of your characters. Guarantee it. Your insinuation I don't know how to build a dps build is laughable.

[Assassination]

This run through on a ranger life I'm doing this:

Dex build with scimitars. Typical feats everyone else is taking. I did not take the dragonmark of shadows, but I have displacement clickies.... I find in epic lvls I don't use displacement as often

because i'm in Div Crus and have good healing and decent damage "mitigation". Also I'm wearing upgraded TOEE leathers, that have lesser displacement...

I also went tier 5 and capstone in DWS. I think this is a strong play for a hybrid type character. Previous life I went tempest cap and tier 5, "Dance of Death" was often a ceremony I performed before my own death.

I believe my Ap's are 46 in DWS, 31 in Tempest, and 3 in AA for free arrows.

I find this style of character works very well in pug groups (which I mostly do) because you can adapt to what the party needs.

Couple of Items I find helpful:

I try to use weapons that paralyze, blind, or freeze opponents. After lvl 26 I'm using the "Epic Leapord Chill" from Toee, and a LGS Radiance scimitar. I use pinion as my longbow.

As an assassin I have improved deception and deception items, I think these are worth wearing as a ranger as well. They up your sneak attack time, and help defensively by flipping your opponents around so they can't strike

you. This is a major benefit during melee.

For me this has been a great build, my survivabilty seems to be way up from my tempest run, and I just enjoy playing a toon who is not locked into melee or ranged all the time. Play your ranger the way you like, and have fun!

P.S. Enjoy the drama that most build posts provide as well!

[unbongwah]

I believe my Ap's are 46 in DWS, 31 in Tempest, and 3 in AA for free arrows.

If you were running in LD instead, I would recommend 42 DWS 31 Tempest 6 AA (Morphic Arrows) with 1 pt of filler. [Maybe 7 APs AA for EotW+Conj Arrows.] That way your crit specs would be 14-18/x3 19-20/x5 w/scimitars and 17-18/x3 19-20/x5 w/longbows (IC:Ranged+DWS core+Pulverizer all stack). Should have 120 MP/RP from Horizon Shot+Blitz+epic lvls too. EDIT: oops, just realized that should be 125 MP/RP; forgot about Imp Archer's Focus.

[Assassination]

If you were running in LD instead, I would recommend 42 DWS 31 Tempest 6 AA (Morphic Arrows) with 1 pt of filler. [Maybe 7 APs AA for EotW+Conj Arrows.] That way your crit specs would be 14-18/x3 19-20/x5 w/scimitars and 17-18/x3 19-20/x5 w/longbows (IC:Ranged+DWS core+Pulverizer all stack). Should have 120 MP/RP from Horizon Shot+Blitz+epic lvls too.

I tried LD, but found I had a hard time keeping blitz going. The crits are nice though! I find i'm just not "zergy" enough to keep up blitz... but I may try again... Thx

Couldn't leave my build alone, just made the changes you suggested Unbongwah... Those crit #'s can't be ignored! At least on this build I don't have to stop to do traps, so the Zerg is on!

[kalaka]

I tried LD, but found I had a hard time keeping blitz going. The crits are nice though! I find i'm just not "zergy" enough to keep up blitz... but I may try again... Thx

Hit haste boost, be at 10 stacks, ????, profit

[Jiirix]

No max dps gear set can fit speed. Ps. My ranger out dpses any of your characters. Guarantee it. Your insinuation I don't know how to build a dps build is laughable.

You may give good advice for a DPS focused toon, others give good advice for "easy to play" builds for newer players.

Different goals imho … Maximum DPS is not maximum fun for everyone. Not every build option is "right" or "wrong" but more or less fitting ones playstyle.

Calm down, I already filed you under “building for maximum DPS”, I am just not totally sold on blinding speed. And there is no “your vs. mine” character competition because I probably invest far less time into the game and am therefore lacking gear and pastlives anyway. But when I am looking for max. DPS builds I look for them in the same place than you do. (And no, I am not him, just saw the little coincidence that he asked similar questions.)

Most of my own builds are not made for maximum DPS and more “how to get the most low hanging fruits into one basket” attempts. My ranger is STR based human with khopeshes just because Bleeding Edge is the best weapon set for him I have at the moment and speed is on my non-max-DPS gear.

[kalaka]

Calm down, I already filed you under “building for maximum DPS”, I am just not totally sold on blinding speed. And there is no “your vs. mine” character competition because I probably invest far less time into the game and am therefore lacking gear and pastlives anyway. But when I am looking for max. DPS builds I look for them in the same place than you do. (And no, I am not him, just saw the little coincidence that he asked similar questions.)

Most of my own builds are not made for maximum DPS and more “how to get the most low hanging fruits into one basket” attempts. My ranger is STR based human with khopeshes just because Bleeding Edge is the best weapon set for him I have at the moment and speed is on my non-max-DPS gear.

Speed gear may work for many people, but doesn't for me. You understand that I build for max dps, and the rest is irrelevant. My comparison was simply to ung since he felt the need to insinuate I can't build a dps character.

There is nothing wrong with tailoring a build down to suit your needs, but that isn't what theory crafting is.
The game needs min max to make a return. Hopefully reaper mode is good.

[Assassination]

Hit haste boost, be at 10 stacks, ????, profit

That's a good idea, will try. I just find in some quests there are natural pauses that cause me to lose blitz at times.... and that's a sad thing, because stacks of blitz are "Awesome"... Thanks guys

[Grailhawk]

The game needs min max to make a return. Hopefully reaper mode is good.

You really thing reaper mode will validate taking a feat that gives 0.7% increase in DPS over a 4.5% increase in survival?

There is max DPS and then there is full ******...

[blerkington]

I think what appeals to me is a mainly melee toon who can back up and range from time to time. That seems to fit a Ranger perfectly? The Many Shot option just seems like a nice damage boost when needed. Here are the Feats I was thinking of taking:

1- DM of Shadow
3- Dodge
6- Point Blank Shot (is this needed to open up other ranged options?)
9- IC:Slash (assuming scimitars - if I decide in rapiers, I would go pierce here - any suggestions?)
12- Empower Healing Spell
15- Precision
18- Two Weapon Defense - more PRR seemed nice
21- Combat Archery
24- OC
26- PTWF
27- Great CON?
28- Doubleshot
(29 and 30 are FAR away.....)

Favored Enemies: Construct, Evil Outsider (for playing at cap?), Giant, Undead, and one more?

With a bit more of what I am thinking, does this help? I did check out the diary thread. I thought it was just that, so I only skimmed the first 1 or 2 posts (I've played the game plenty, so know the quests and such). The thread from unbongwah looks really interesting. I'll be reading that next.

Thanks for the help - would appreciate any additional insights!

I'll be going DEX for flavor - seems fun!

Hi,

I think there's been some good advice in this thread from the more recent arrivals. Here are some more suggestions about feat choices.

For me the main issues seem to be whether you can you save yourself a feat and some AP by using gear as a source of displacement, how you intend to self heal, and how effective you want your manyshot to be. Then there's also the general issues of whether you'll mainly be soloing or grouping, raiding frequently or just doing normal questing, how hard the content you want to run will be, and how important it is to squeeze every last bit of performance out of your character.

If you can make yourself two or three displacement clickies, I think taking the dragonmark and spending AP on it doesn't give much additional benefit and the slots could be better used on other things. I don't think displacement is really needed at all in heroic levels, even on elite, especially if you're playing in group and capable of managing your aggro properly. It will be nice to have in certain situations, but the most dangerous thing you'll ever face in melee while levelling is that one hard-hitting variety of champion that has true sight and displacement won't help you there.

Quicken and maximise can provide good self healing all the way to cap and will save you a twist slot, but it's a little SP inefficient. If you do intend to use your bow fitting in IC:ranged will be worthwhile. If you're not set on elf, and think you can cover displacement with gear, then you may find human gives you better returns on your AP and the extra feat slot helps you cover what you want both from self healing and archery too. I don't think TWD is a particularly good feat and that slot could be better used to support either your self healing or archery. Precision is a good feat, but it's mostly useful in raiding and more difficult epic content; as someone who will be mainly meleeing, power attack may give you better mileage in heroic levels, with a feat swap later on.

Anyway, I hope you have fun with it. Selecting AP once you get the basic template will be less of an issue because you can change them around without much cost and inconvenience. If you have any questions about gear, then let us know.

Thanks.

[Jiirix]

Speed gear may work for many people, but doesn't for me. You understand that I build for max dps, and the rest is irrelevant. My comparison was simply to ung since he felt the need to insinuate I can't build a dps character.

There is nothing wrong with tailoring a build down to suit your needs, but that isn't what theory crafting is.
The game needs min max to make a return. Hopefully reaper mode is good.

Sure, you can build for solo legendary elite but this was a new player asking for builds, what should he care about min-max builds that are needed for nothing in game as long as you can stick to a couple reliable people to play with? Keep it simple and achievable with a few hours play per week or some/most people might get to the “screw that, takes too long for me”-point and look for something else. As far as I can get it from the feedback in this forum section there are a lot of people quite happy with the builds that are provided here.

You hope for things that are long dead imho. Powergaming has never been as irrelevant as is now in DDO. Take the event dungeon as an example: What would have been the deal to make it what it is now AND a ridicules hard challenge for those that want one on top? Like make it scale up to level 50 just for the lulz. Most game companies see the money with the casual players (ever heard of hardcore mobile gaming?) I don’t say that this is right and maybe there is a niche for games with an actual challenging endgame, but I highly doubt this will be the road DDO is going to take.

[kalaka]

Sure, you can build for solo legendary elite but this was a new player asking for builds, what should he care about min-max builds that are needed for nothing in game as long as you can stick to a couple reliable people to play with? Keep it simple and achievable with a few hours play per week or some/most people might get to the “screw that, takes too long for me”-point and look for something else. As far as I can get it from the feedback in this forum section there are a lot of people quite happy with the builds that are provided here.

You hope for things that are long dead imho. Powergaming has never been as irrelevant as is now in DDO. Take the event dungeon as an example: What would have been the deal to make it what it is now AND a ridicules hard challenge for those that want one on top? Like make it scale up to level 50 just for the lulz. Most game companies see the money with the casual players (ever heard of hardcore mobile gaming?) I don’t say that this is right and maybe there is a niche for games with an actual challenging endgame, but I highly doubt this will be the road DDO is going to take.

If I could have run it on level 50 I wouldnt have TRed.

As to the other guys comment...always go full ******.

My first post listed feats and advice with a new player in mind. There's lots of good named scimitar easy to get also

[Marshal_Lannes]

The state of the game is sad these days, and will only get worse as new players listen to advise like yalls. I mean we have the guy recommending to craft spellpower LGS on a ranged DPS character. People have no concept of how to build DPS characters these days, and DDO is and has always been a DPScentric game.

This is not 2012. You probably were one of the people complaining that the new changes to manyshot were nerfs as well huh? The advantage that new players have over veterans is that we are not pigeon holed into FoTM build layouts and gear set ups. I will repeat what you must have just skimmed over, I was duoing Trial by Fire on EE with a veteran Barb and outkilled him 59-19. He asked me after the quest, how are you killing things so fast? My elemental AA imbues and my Scion elemental damage proc TWICE on every single hit for 150-200 damage EACH, every hit in just elemental damage. On a double shot that is 700-800 points of damage in just elemental damage. The way you deal damage with LGS has changed. LGS offers bonuses to spell power that are not available anywhere else. It is certainly one of the better ways of increasing DPS on ranged Ranger. Note I don't even have a LGS bow crafted yet so a LGS bow would take my elemental damage up even higher. It seems you do not fully understand the Ranged trees for a Ranger yet. I direct you to either my Analysis of an Elven Ranger or Scrimptons Acid Ranger threads for a fuller description.