OMG A non-beastmaster R/N?!

I have been playing with and chaning this build for the last couple of days and I think it has potential. Here it is:


Attributes
Marksmanship 10
Wilderness Survival 12
Blood Magic 12
All the rest in beast mastery

Skills
Life Transfer {E}
Vampiric Gaze
Demonic Flesh
Apply Poison (or other preparation for HoH)
Dual Shot
Troll Ungent
Charm Animal
Res Sig

I know this is not the tipical R/N build but this is how to work it. When there is 5 secs left on timer you use Demonic Flesh and then Troll Ungent. When you approach an enemy you use: Apply Poison------->Dual Shot--------------->Life Transfer. This is how I have been working it.

P.S. The animal is a distration that is supposed to draw the warriors away as many n00b warriors will attack the animal first. :P This skill can be replaced with Distracting Shot.

I will willingly take and Comment, Complaints, or Suggestions besides: WTF!!! OMG!!! WHY ISN'T FIRESTORM SO TOTALLY IN THERE?! You get what I mean.

where are you fighting that your pet gets attacked right off. My pet gets ignored forever until it starts to piss them off.

why dual shot? doesn't make sense if you're using the apply poison preparation.

yea valheru is right, dual shot makes no sense in the build with apply poison, you're better off replacing it with a disrupting skill such as disrupting shot or savage shot

Um.. expertise? What do you do all the other seconds of the clock? Sit there and wish you had energy management?

A ranger with no expertise lmao.

lmao, a ranger with no expertise.
oh wait, that's workable!
someone trying something new lmao...

If using dual shot, i'd back it up with damage modification - lower defence hex, order of vamp/pain, barbs, then use a burst of speed from tigers fury. for those running around, since you look like you're going for degen, i'd pick hunters shot for bleeding, and diseasefor another 7 pip degen to stack on top of poison + life transfer.

Honestly, looks bad. No expertise means no energy management; extra health is nice, but it matters little since you crank out no damage really. I wouldn't want to be paired up with this build; your pet is functioning at dismal damage (4-5 Beastmastery?), probably hitting in the single digits (maybe low teens sometimes), once every 2 seconds for let's say 7 DPS. Apply Poison at least is efficient if you spread it around, but that's the least I'd expect from a ranger. At 10 marksmanship with no buffs you do piddly damage with your bow - assuming you have a maxed out bow (+15% when enchanted let's say, and customised) you deal 24.4 average damage to a caster, once every 2 seconds, or when dual shotting you deal 36.6, for an increase of 12.2 damage for 10 energy, one of the least efficient damage engines I've seen.

SO aside from relatively wimpy bow damage, a pet that barely functions, a useless damage skill that is overpriced and poison, you are casting spells. With your 3 pips regen you will get an energy per second, Assuming that you want to cast Life Transfer every time it refreshes you have 20 energy per 30 seconds remaining to you; that's an apply poison and a troll unguent or possibly 2 vamp gazes. Your peak damage output, assuming you are ignored, would thus be from casting your vamp gazes and life transfer, refreshing poison on targets when possible. The 15 energy to use apply poison nearly taps you out by itself each time you use it, so I don't see how you'll cast it and use life transfer, but assuming that you start with some energy you can keep a guy poisoned for a total of about 30-35 seconds and cast 2 vamp gazes and a life transfer before you can't afford to keep doing the apply poisons and your energy is bottomed out from casting the spells - you can then keep casting I guess: While poison is up, averaged over 30 seconds, DPS = 8 from poison, 7 from pet, 4.666 from life transfer, 3.5 from vamp gaze and (take out 3 seconds castig time, 2.25 seconds after casts, I'll allot 1 apply poison for 2 seconds so lets say 10 arrows?) 8.1 DPS from arrows, for a whopping 31.26 DPS.

In contrast, a ranger with a bow, no preparations, 11+1 marksmanship, 10+2 beastmastery, 9 Expertise, no skills excepting Tiger's Fury and Call of Haste will deal, spending only 24 energy (leaving him with 6 energy gained over that time and all his starting energy); 21.7 DPS with his bow and 14.3 with his pet, for an easy 42 DPS without using skills essentially.

If you would like to improve your build, feel free to look at some of the posted ranger builds, and to look at the damage output you are seeking; remember that a skill like Dual Shot only ups your base arrow damage by 50%; not very much for the 10 energy it takes - it only pays off with multiple buffs applied to each arrow. With a nice high level kindle arrow, a vampiric bow and perhaps a few more buffs (favourable winds, read the wind, take your pick really) the extra damage from the second arrow becomes worthwhile, but without the buffing it is a waste of energy.

Look at it this way - even though you have some extra health, a guy using virtually no skills in a build that is inefficient anyway (the pet/bow above) is dealing more than 35% more damage than you, so even with a 200 point boost to your health, he'll still win the race. Add to that the fact that you have no energy, and he still has energy to burn and he can add a heal of some sort to his lineup.

In general i agree with comments above, though it sounds a bit harsh to kill the idea outright.

If you want to be a necro and do damage as a bow user, while dealing with less energy, then you'll have to
1. use lower cost ranger skills
2. use necro skills that benefit the build

necro skills to increase bow damage
1. barbs (curses - and you get this early from lord tiamot, reversing the scale quest from greywind)
2. order of pain (blood)
3. order of vamp (blood)
4. mark of pain (cussing)
5. weaken armor (bad language)

skills on the ranger side
1. fav winds - numbers game if you're facing multiple bowusers (const dam)
2. hunters shot - low cost, adds damage, may cause bleeding (marks)
3. read the wind - take advantage of lowered defence, marksmanship, so you save on attribute points. (marks) excellent on flatbows, which have the highest arc, but let you stay out as far as a longbow, but shares the fastest refirerate of other bows as well. this straightens the arc, letting you hit easier.
4. quickshot, dual shot, poison arrow (none)
5. tigers fury, you dont need, 10, 7 is fine really. You just want a boost if you use order of skills to take the most advantage of it. (beast)

since this also isn't a generic conjure bow, you can also take a vamp string eventually and make it more powerful for yourself.

misc skills
faintheartedness, enfeeble/enf.blood, shadow or fear - cripple physical damage to you
marksman wager, well of power, offering of blood - easy way for you to regain energy

Wasn't killing the idea outright, just pointing out that dual shot works with buffs to arrow damage; expertise is needed to make it playable and that since it isn't an interrupting build but a damage build one should look at what a simple build can do, and try to imrpove upon it. If 40 DPS are doable easily, how do you get above that? As well, can you add spiking to your build, or can it only deliver consistent damage? Spiking can be much more useful for downing an enemy.

By showing where your energy goes I was hoping to lead him to think about energy usage and to create a maintainable build - it's alright to operate at a deficit in energy, but you can only do so for as long as your initial energy pool allows it. When you realise that you are paying 10 energy for 12 damage in the build it is obvious that the skill is out of place; replacing it with a skill like Kindle Arrows would add 20 fire damage per shot for 24 seconds, at a cost of 5 energy, for a whopping 48+ damage per energy - a bettr investment no doubt, and also more effective in terms of time spent and DPS; the boost to DPS is about 10 DPS, while the DPS boost from Dual Shot (with no buff) is 2.4 DPS. I think anyone who wants to improve their build should start by learning how to figure (at least roughly) the DPS and damage/energy, damage/timespent ratios to appreciate why one would add a skill.

Ranger with 0 expertise is a ranger I do not want on my team.

I don't CARE how well your skill setup is. There's just no EFFICIENT way of running a ranger with 0 expertise. I'd see one as low as 7 expertise or so if they're using things like 16 BM with Ferocious Strike. I run 9 exp with my 16 BM pet and he eats things for dinner no problem...

i was trying to refrain form dipping into another attribute to let him maintain some flexibility. it's suppossed to be HIS build.

dual is bad, but it's used to take advantage or + damage per hit modifiers

barbs + spirit + prep + order + weaken defence