Trapping?

I love the Ranger class, and have been curious about the niche of trap rangers.

Damage dealers, no? Albeit, more tactical damage dealers.

Thus, I am a "noob" with Trapping and the correct method for this style of play has always eluded me. I would like some advice from the community on how to correctly trap, and if, while H/Hing or PUGing, this is an actual option outside of PvP.

Thanks for the replies.

trapping groups form to farm in the UW all the time, and many will take a first timer, just stand and trap exactly where they do, run when they say, and Bob's your uncle

To be honest, I wasn't aware that trapping existed in pvp besides the occasional shrine capper in AB. Two-second, easily interruptible activation seems like a liability to me. But hey, I'm no pvp expert...maybe it's actually prominent and now you're saying, "Wow, that guy's an idiot."

Anyway, in pve it's one of the few means of farming for rangers. The basic premise is just what you'd expect: lay as many traps as you can (quickly, they expire after 90 seconds) and then lure enemies to them. When I first started, I usually did a three-man UW trip with people in my guild. It was a good way to learn the process as well as the map. Eventually you can move on to solo trapping as a R/Me utilizing the echo skills.

As far as everyday, general pve is concerned, trapping is not exactly superb. In the time it takes to put out a good setup, you likely could have killed the enemies outright. There are exceptions like Urgoz's Warren, but overall it doesn't seem like a worthwhile pursuit.

Smoke trap > hard mode in most of the southern shiverpeaks (whirling and trap at massive bunched up feet of the dolyaks and mesmers). I also use an ursan trapping build for UW full clear as ice wastes and chaos plains are funny with traps, amd even easier when 2 of the ursans bring traps and prep the areas of the quests. This does of course require prior knowledge of the spawns.

Also you know those smokedemon trappers just inside charr lands? do you avoid those too?

trapping while yes slow is safer then killing the enemies outright. and yes pvp trappers do exist via smoke and spike trap. usually the trapper has alot of experience with trapping if its used in gvg..not so much an HA were it is just run around throw down traps and lol. trapping in ra on the other hand is stupid and should be avoided like the plauge

Trapping is screwed now as they updated EW (one of the spirits) and you can't lay as many traps as needed as you're energy is well.... ZERO.

Alright, well...how many traps should i bring on my skill bar?

For UW, the old standard was 4 traps with dust trap being the main damager due to the fact that it's armor ignoring, a spirit, rez (rebirth preferrably), troll or a fifth trap and whirling defense. I actually just started skipping the spirits recently and run 4 traps, whirling, serpents quickness and dwarven stability. At 16 WS you can lay 2-3 rounds of traps each easily. QZ only lasts about as long as serpent's quickness without the gwen pve skill, but you can maintain SQ indefinitely with it. An option would be to run 15 exp/16WS instead of bringing energizing wind.

Of note, Ursan blessing does more damage than the trapper elites

Being a fatass bear does look like fun.

Is Trapper's Focus a good elite? or is Oath Shot and Smoke Trap better?

It's ok if you wanna offensive trap with a group, or if you are a single trapper with a balanced group. I'd still take smoke trap in those cases, as it's effect precludes the need for the trapper's focus as well as provides defense. Sadly though, there's no graphic element other than using the bear skills.. you still look like you.

Well Lennymon, as an experienced source of knowledge about trapping (that has responded most to my questions lol), can you suggest some guidelines for trapping during quests or missions?

I speculate that it wouldn't be the "best" niche a ranger would be able to fill in a team, but i like to be innovative. It's PvE anyways, so why not?

I don't farm...and I tend to only play Factions nowadays, so the bunched up groups, i believe, will be an asset to me as setting up and triggering even one trap will be beneficial against the Am Fah or Afflicted.

Thanks for any tips and pieces of advice.

The am fah, as you've noticed use traps and they're really annoying. Trapper on trapper is kinda funny, try it in the zaishen elite as a trapper. In general these guys do not pose a threat on any level so feel free to experiment with anything.

With afflicted my reccomendations are a little different... heehee
get a looooong range bow and use barrage with splinter
you do NOT wanna be trapping when things get dead (think assassin tank wannabee but with vastly superior armor ).

It's kinda too bad though, in factions there are many many giant mobs of densely packed critter that are perfect for barrage. I really like running in Gwen where things spread out more and other builds are actually vastly superior. That said, anywhere barrage is good so are traps, but they're more dangerous to place (unless you prep with them and then aggro). I do like to use a pattern of drop a single round of traps then aggro. Once things settle a second run up behind the tank and drop them as they fight. Escape is also quite good in a dedicated trapper bar with dust, barbed, tripwire(great for knockdown combo with barbed) and perhaps flame trap as it will last long enough to get several traps down and get away again. Choking gas is fun in factions as well due to aoe, just use it up, then while its down drop a few traps.

Overall though, a trap or two IS good even if you are running a mass splatter damage build such as for afflicted. Other skills may be good as well however, but I do like to drop a barbed trap or such just as a defense for the backliners in case aggro breaks and some come after the monks. At least the monks will be able to kite easily from crippled melees. The only problem you face here though is the attribute point spreads, so consider a WS based build like apply cripshot and a trap or two.

So it would be better to spec in another style of play, and bring 1 or 2 traps for defense. gotcha.

And i take it traps trigger in the order they were placed in, so if I place Barbed Trap and then Tripwire, then the foes would be crippled and THEN knocked down?