I’ve been really enjoying playing the ranger in Guild Wars 2, but I’m trying to decide on the best build to focus on. I currently have the Path of Fire and Heart of Thorns expansions, so I’d like to avoid builds that rely on weapon mastery or untamed options for now. I’m particularly interested in whether Soulbeast or Druid is more suitable for solo PvE and WvW roaming. I enjoy a mix of long-range and close-range combat, wanting at least one ranged weapon and one melee. I’m open to either condition damage or power damage builds.
4 Answers
If you want a powerful option, I’d recommend the Soulbeast. It deals a lot of damage overall and is quite effective in WvW. A common build is to use a Longbow for ranged combat and Sword/Warhorn for melee. The bow gives you great range to pick off enemies while preserving health, plus the sword can really dish it out up close with some great crit potential.
From my experience, if you want to play Druid, the condition build works pretty well, especially in roaming. It has decent durability and can perform fairly well in solo PvE scenarios. But if you truly want to dominate in WvW, I’d stick mainly with Soulbeast.
I’ve been running a Power Soulbeast with Longbow and Dagger/Warhorn for various content like open world and WvW. It works beautifully! You can switch between both range and melee seamlessly, making it a ton of fun. Just keep in mind that while power builds can be glass cannons, they can also really shine in solo PvE.
Both Soulbeast and Druid have their perks in WvW, but I feel like Soulbeast is often more versatile. It has a bursty and mobile playstyle with its longbow and melee options. The Druid can be tanky for healing, but it feels a bit slower to me. Just a heads up: Longbow in big groups gets tricky with reflect mechanics, so positioning is key!
