Assassin/Ranger

I'm very new to Guild Wars and I've started an Assassin character.

I've sort of grasped the basics of the game (have been out killing stuff with some NPC henchmen, have bought some armour and weaps, used the salvage/inspect tools) but I've just chosen Ranger as my second profession and this has made me think about skills.

So far I've spread my points evenly across my immediate new attributes but I have seen a few screenies showing more specialised dedication to certain attributes while leaving others at zero.

Can someone provide some brief pointers and hints at what I should combine/use?

Bit limited in usefulness, you could use tiger's fury but I don't think that gives much of an advantage. Wouldn't recommend you take a pet, the skill disable when it dies can really hurt you, leaving all your defense unusuable, and it will die if you don't dedicate yourself to it, and a ranger would be better for that.

This is the most popular use for an A/R, but to get barrage you need to do a mission _after_ you change your secondary! See A/R Critical Barrager on GuildWiki for a guide.

Don't want to put you off or anything, but unless you fully understand that (in most cases) an assassin's job is to stay back and zip in, kill something and teleport or run out and heal up. It might not be the best class for a starting character, you might want to look into some of the other ones, ranger is a nice class for taking through the game, and learning with, you can make some mistakes and still live thanks to strong armour and being a long-distance class.

Good luck with factions, hope you enjoy it Use the forums and take a look at GuildWiki if you get stuck

I'm an assassin, finished the game, got elite daggers, run A/R or A/W usually. I think I would also advise a ranger for your first character, and as you find neat stuff for an assassin that way, continue it on the side.

A/R makes a great Critical Barrager, and I have written up in another thread how to be a "micro beast master" which is excellent for PvE.

"an assassin's job is to stay back and zip in, kill something and teleport or run out and heal up" is the conventional wisdom and the baseline from which you must operate.

But there are always exceptions to every rule. Just try the usual attack pattern at Fort Aspenwood and you find that you are often solo, usually solo, and facing more than one opponent usually, and nearly always dead too because there is nowhere to run and heal up. A/W works very well in such situations, as does A/N which I have not tried.

The assassin is fun and fascinating, but I think it ought not to be anyone's primary character.