Ranger elite skills

Any ranger elite skills in prophesies you find worth keeping on the skill bar ? I have read through them a few times and don't find that any of the descriptions make me want to search them out. ( I do like the sound of glass arrows... but it's not prophesies ). If I am missing something and there is one you find invaluable, pls let me know. I run a marksman / pet build. Thanks!

Depends on what you are using it for. Several are good for various activities ranging from farming in PvE to PvP. Consider skills like Incendiary Arrows, Barrage, Crippling Shot, and Spike Trap. Barrage and a pet was extensively used for a lot of things for a really long time. It is still effective, just not as widely used. But the basis for that was in working with a team of Rangers all using a similar build and having multiple pets.

Depends upon whether or not you mean "only in Prophecies". Barrage is a very useful skill, but it's "core" so it's available in other campaigns.

Other than that, there are a few, like Greater Confligration, Spike Trap, Famine, & others, that are useful in particular builds. This is normal.

Ferocious Strike could be good for your pet and give you energy ;-)

I only have prophesies atm, so no elites from other campaigns as yet. I was just wondering if any rangers considered any particular elite skill a must have....

Barrage is a staple elite skill, but usually used in conjunction with weapon spells (splinter weapon, great dwarf weapon) since it removes preparations. Another solution for prophecies only is to go R/E and combine it with the elementalist Conjure skills to boost the damage.

As others have said, Barrage and IA are good options. Marksman's Wager can also be used to spam skills like Penetrating Attack and Sundering Attack. You'd probably want to use that with a conjure as well, since prophecies doesn't give you access to skills like Asuran Scan.

Go http://guildwars.wikia.com/wiki/Elite_skills_list and look at the skills list under Prophecies Ranger.

I started in Prophecies long ago and found many of them very useful. Melandru's Resilience is wonderful in an area with lots of conditions and hexes. Poison Arrow, Crippling Shot, and Punishing Shot were also great favorites.

Click on the name of each and see advice on usage.

As a Ranger using a bow in PvE, [[Barrage] is about the only thing going for you. Otherwise, you would use an Elite from your secondary profession.

Melandrus Resilience - I've used this in a solo farm build especially in Jaya Bluffs. One of my favorite/fun skills

Barrage - Gets boring after a while but it is very effective and I use it in most team builds with other players.

Ferocious Strike - a fun pet elite that helps with energy management.

Hope this helped!

AC

I highly disagree with this statement. Outside of elites from other campaigns (Glass Arrows, Magebane Shot, Broad Head Arrow, etc.) you still have skills like Incendiary Arrows. The benefit of Incendiary Arrows over Barrage is the use of a preparation, and it only loses half the AoE ability. And yet you have Escape which works well for using other weapons (Hammer, Scythe, Daggers).

I rarely use anything but a bow on my Ranger, and yet I rarely use Barrage in PvE. It has uses, but I prefer other options.

A good deal of the ranger elites that are used frequently are either core or prophecies.

From the top of my head
Barrage, from Core
Crippling Shot and Incendiary Arrows from Prophecies
BHA and Glass Arrows from Factions
Magebane Shot and Burning Arrow from Nightfall

Incendiary Arrows can do more then would be apparant on first sight, keep in mind that it doesn't remove preps, like Barrage, and it hits nearby foes. But it's in Wilderness Survival which makes it hard to combine with a pet and a bow.

Melandru's Arrow, also in Wilderness Survival, plus it's +damage depends on foes being enchanted. But it hits harder then Glass Arrows.

Ferocious Strike may be worthwhile, has been the staple of thumpers for a long time.

Melandru's Resilience can have application in hex/condition heavy area's.

Punishing shot may have application but is, I think, too expensive to be a match for other interrupts (elite or not).

For Pet/Bow the choice is probably more limited anyway, the real nice ones came with Factions.

I loves me some Barrage. Only downside is that you can't use it with preparations. Aforementioned Splinter Weapon or a Conjure can make for some pretty number-clouds, though.

I think you should seriously consider Punishing Shot. It's a skill that's often forgotten, but it's actually very good. It will help you learn how to interrupt, and is great with Apply Poison in general Prophecies areas. You'll be able to deal with nasty casters much better with it.

Incendiary Arrows is nice, but you should only consider it when you are willing to bring traps along, since there's not much else in Wilderness Survival for Prophecies characters apart from that and Apply Poison. Bring a Dust Trap, and a Flame Trap, for some good AoE damage. Whirling Defense and Troll Unguent give you plenty of survivability.

If you only have Prophecies, you should only run Barrage if you are R/E. Take Barrage + Mark of Rodgort + Conjure Flame + Glyph of Lesser Energy, with 8 in Fire Magic, and you're able to lay down some good amounts of damage.

Oath Shot can be nice, if you are planning to go full-time trapper. Take Whirling Defense along, and as much traps and Energy Management as you can get, along with Troll Unguent.[

Choking Gas works well with IA, since IA hits multiple opponents in a nearby range, not just adjacent, and Choking Gas will spread to all foes adjacent to those. That gives it quite a range if you have a mess of casters to interrupt.

The two i mostly use from prophecies are barrage and incendiary arrows. I used to use barrage a lot, i use it a lot less now. As some people said, it gets boring. I'd be more inclined to use IA now. My favorite is still Broad Head Arrow (factions) + epidemic so for now it's not an option for you. You might be able to work out something nice with IA, and epidemic though depending on the length of the burning condition and other preparations you bring with you.

I like brett's suggestion to go IA with chocking gas, it could lead to some nice interrupts like BHA + epidemic.

[[Glass Arrows (PvE)] won't do much for you since single target damage isn't really that good in PvE, [[Magebane Shot] is more for PvP since you don't really need to use an Elite for an interrupt in PvE, [[Broad Head Arrow] is kind of a wasted Elite when there's a PvE skill to cause daze.

[[Incendiary Arrows] makes you lose out on a lot of AoE and there aren't much preparations worth bringing. If you're thinking [[Ignite Arrows], it causes scatter so you will lose your clump for the AoE. And there's not much use for [[Escape (PvE)] outside of running when you can use [[Lightning Reflexes] with [[Dwarven Stability] and free up your elite slot for an elite from the weapon's attribute.