R/W vs R/E vs R/N for solo farming

I definitely have to disagree with Druid Arrow. A R/E will not have enough energy. You have 32 energy with full druid armor. As spells are not affected by expertise, your 3 elementalsits spells will cost 35 energy. That's way to much for a ranger.

Rangers are great with non-spell skills, thanks to expertise - the golden rule is generally to avoid spells. Sometimes a ranger may bring a spell (often an enchantment), maybe 2 under some circumstances, but that's it (popular choices are JI, Conjure X, or Brutal Weapon for example). The ranger's energy is needed to spam his attack skills.

Now there is also a big problem with your attribute points - let's take your R/E build for example. You have the following skills: Crystal Wave (air) + Whirlwind (air) + Aftershock (earth) + Armor of Earth (earth) + Oath Shot (exp) + WD (exp) + Troll (WS) + Throw Dirt (exp). And you need 8/9 in markmanship to use your bow, unless you wanna drop it completely to deal damages with your spells only. In this case you can bring a staff and have 47 energy, which still wouldn't be enough to keep spamming your spells recharged with Oath Shot.

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I really liked one thing in your first post: the fact you grouped your skills in defensive/offensive skills, and the feeling I had you definitely know solo farming is the balance between enough skills to stay alive, but not to much as well to have enough free slots to kill quickly.

It won't be exhaustive, but let's give it a try.

Let's focus on the defense skills now. Popular choices include:

Ranger skills:
- defensive stances
- throw dirt (I wouldn't use this one on a map where warriors and foes with ranged attacks work together, prefering a more versatile defense skill - you can put dusttrap in the same category I guess)
- troll unguent (great regen when you have a WS based build)

Mesmer skills:
- Mantras: if you're facing foes dealing the same kind of damage, then Mantra of Frost/Flame, etc are great. Physical resistance is always nice when you fight foes dealing physical damage only. If you're facing mixed group, Greater Conflagration + Winter + Mantra of Frost will give you an amazing defense, however your arrows will deal cold damage too, which may be problematic in Southern Shiverpeaks. It also let no room for another elite.

[EDIT]I wanted to post about warriors and monks as well but I've already typed too much I gues, sorry. I'll try to do that later[/EDIT]


Now the offensive part:

Wilderness Survival Based: the combo Kindle/ignite arrows + dual shot + poison arrow is great. And with 16 WS you also have a 10 arrows troll unguent.

Barrage: depending on the maps, barrage may be a great addition. It can't be used with preparations, but there are other skills adding more damage. Weapon Spells may be nice. Brutal Weapon adds a fair amount of damage for a few attribute points for ewample.

Markmanship based: Read the Wind, Punishing Shot, Penetrating Attack an another attack skill would do the job.

And there is more, including what you can invent

PS: here is a list of the solo ranger builds posted on guru: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s....php?t=3001252