Spike Rangers

Are spike rangers still in?

What kind of build for PvP would you recommend for spike rangers USING ONLY Faction and Core skills? I know it's hard, but I have been looking for a very very long time for a good build I can use in PvP as I only have Factions, not Prophecies.

Please help.

Base Core Spike Build R/ :
Dual Shot
Quick Shot [E]
Savage Shot
Kindle Arrow or Read the Wind
-free-
-free-
-free-
-free-
~if you go with Kindle Arrow more attrib at WS or more Marksmanship for RtW
With Factions you can equip Needling Shot and better combine with Kindle Arrow.

Hope its help~

Would this build work?

Ranger/Mesmer
Expertise: 14 (12+2)
Marksmanship: 16 (12+4)

- Resurrection Signet ()*
- Read the Wind (Marksmanship)*
- Dual Shot (Ranger other)*
- Punishing Shot [Elite] (Marksmanship) (Prophecies only, might consider exchanging
with Precision shot.)
- Savage Shot (Marksmanship)
- Whirling Defense*/Drain Enchant/Hex Breaker... etc.
- Distortion (Illusion Magic)
- Winnowing/Favorable

Recurve bow, Hornbow,

Mods:Vampiric bowstring

Druid's Armor

Take a Sundering Recurve/Hornbow to prevent morbid health degeneration.

* means I have the skill already.

A little question though, how would I be able to make my expertise 14 and my marksmanship 16?

Also, how long would it take to cast Precision shot? Would quick shot be a better choice instead of punishing shot?

Sorry for...triple posting, but a final question. I got the idea of this build from the thread "Rangers in the Current PvP Environment."

The guide recommends I use a Recurve or Hornbow class. But a flatbow or shortbow shoots faster, making me steal more health. Which bow should I use?
(I bidded on a vampiric flatbow.)

It also seems obvious that I should run a sundering ...bow of Fortitude as my second weapon, right?

Should I put a fortitude bow mod on my vamp bow? Or a marks one? I'm playing spike, but I don't know if the build I made up there will be good enough.

flatbows aren't good, they take years to hit and are therefore easily dodgeable, and will not land the same time as the other teams bows

if your running an rspiker in HA. use a vampiric hornbow and a sundering longbow. If your running it in Ra/Ta its pretty much your choice. Shotbows shoot faster but hornbow deals a slightly more dmg.

The biggest question is whether the build I created above with the Precision Shot variation would work.

Here:
14 Exp.
16 Marks

Read The Wind
Dual Shot
Punishing Shot
Savage Shot
Drain Enchant
Frozen Soil or Favourable Winds
Whirling Defense
Res Sig

Bows:
Sundering (20/20) Longbow Of Fort (30)
Vampiric(5/1) Hornbow Of Fort (30)

Basic Ranger Spike Build for HA

the bow refire-speed doesn't really matter when you're spiking, since it will be overridden by the cast-time of the skills anyways. So for example, when you use Punishing Shot, no matter wot kind of bow you use, you'll get the shot off in 1/2 of a second (unless you're hexed with some sort of slow).

Like someone mentioned earlier, 5/1 vampric hornbow with a sundering longbow as switch-off(to prevent constant health degen) is the way to go as a spike ranger.

As for precision shot, it has no casting time, which means how long it takes depends on your bow. However, Dual shot > Precision shot when it comes spiking, in both 8v8 and 4v4(at least imo).

You get Exp 14 and Marks 16 with 2 superior runes, and leaving WS at somewhere around 6+1 iirc.

And finally, to choose between punishing/quick shot, I go with quickshot if you're more dmg-oriented than interrupt-oriented. With quickshot, you can chain Dual->Quick->Savage->pause->Quick. With punishing, you can only go Dual->Punish->pause->Savage->pause. Not to mention Quickshot has always been there for me when I need that one last hit to finish off a caster before they run out of range.

i use this:


punishing
savage
dual shot
kindle arrows
FW
troll
whirl
rez

14
12
11

I used this, and was called a noob for some reason. But I did pick up 5 gladiator pts, including 22 straight, with it this afternoon.

Marksman: 15
BM: 7
WS: 9
Exp: 8
Fire Magic: 8

Troll Unguent
Puishing Shot e
Tiger's Fury
Pin Down
Ignite Arrows (+16)
Conjure Flame (+9)
FW (+6)
Rez Sig

Vampiric Bow (+5)

If I recall correctly, this produces 8 seconds of Tiger's Fury-speed attacks with +36 damage to the default amount (6+5+16+9). It's pretty uncommon not to have all of the spike damage up constantly--not many people kill FW or strip enchants from Rangers.