Ranger Tanking 40+

[alexandervaccaro]

so.. are rangers simply good for nothing? I was thinking about twinking one but... yikes.

[greatdane]

Depends how you look at it. Rangers are pretty much the worst of any category you can place them in - worst tanks, worst melee DPS, worst heals and buffs, worst soloers of the classes that can be considered soloable at all... but they can do a lot of things, and some find value in that. The game is easy enough that you don't have to have an optimal group or raid setup to succeed, so a ranger won't cause wipes on account of being a ranger. It's just hard to get invited when everyone knows you're the worst at whatever job you're needed for.

[Heartbeats]

Originally Posted by Heartbeats [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

If you're gonna tank as a ranger it has to be against lower level (barely at higher levels) blue mobs. You can do that well, but you can't tank level 50 mobs at level 51 as well as an sk/pally/war.

Pretty much all you have to do is read this and acknowledge that the conversation is now over.

[Sajan]

An older post from last year by Azeth comes to mind when I read this thread..

all this ranger QQ good grief. I fail to see the issue with Rangers.

Do they out DPS anyone? yes.
Do they out tank anyone? yes.
Do they have more buffs than at least 1 other class? yes.
Are those buffs useful in solo/group? yes.
Can they solo more efficiently than at least 1 other class? yes.


If you love the ranger class, play a ranger. If you played a rogue, wiz, mage, necro in live, it is not the class for you.

edit: have you ever seen a Rogue solo anything worth noting? no.

You can talk about spells, defensive/offensive caps, whatever. The player is the intangible that cannot be measured here. EverQuest is not hard, but taking a less-than-desirable class and making it excel at things it shouldn't do, and having fun while doing it, is the difficult, yet most rewarding path I could ever imagine to take.

No, I don't enjoy logging on and being LFG for hours on end, constantly looking for others to slap together a ragtag group with...

But yes, I do enjoy getting invited to a group and not knowing what my role is going to be! There's really nothing I hate more than logging on an alt and going LFG to only tank, or only heal. Depending on the zone and group makeup, I could be tanking, DPSing, CCing, pulling, or all of the above! While leveling up, I did atleast 3/4 of those things in just about any group I was involved with, while they sat back and watched. Was it the most efficient way? No... Did it beat sitting around wasting time while waiting on the holy trinity to log on? Absolutely!

I play a mid 50s Ranger here on P99. I carry different sets of gear with me at all times for different situations, because I know, as a Ranger, I need that extra boost to accommodate the skill I pride myself applying to this class. This is part of being prepared. Yes, I tank in KC, Chardok, Sebilis, and HS just fine with my full set of hp/ac gear equipped. Granted, most of my groups include a solid Cleric and a slower + mana regen. With Snare/Root, I can guarantee that all mobs pulled will be hitting me 100% of the time. So that Cleric will only need to CH me, nothing more. The biggest downtime creator is having a mob switching between targets and beating on multiple people, sucking your healer's mana dry. Can a Knight do the same job? Yes. Is a Knight always going to be around? No. You take what you can get. And maybe, just MAYBE your Ranger will be prepared for any situation as well!

P.S. I'm probably one of the few people here that enjoys tracking raid mobs. I spend many hours of my free time this summer ensuring my guild's cell phones receive my tweets before anyone else. I pride myself on having my guild trust me enough to log off every night, knowing I'm the Ranger that's left watching, hunting, tracking....

[Ennoia]

Speaking from personal experience (friend's character on live that I boxed on occasion), and all Ranger jokes aside, when played properly it IS a good class,especially when epics come into play, which skyrockets their solo capability with being a melee class with a good slow.

[Doors]

Rangers can tank any non planar situation just fine with the right group. I even remember reading that from Prima's guide years ago.

[Doors]

Originally Posted by Lazortag [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Rangers tank okay at all levels. I had a competent ranger tank Drusella and 6 other adds with only a shaman as a healer the other day, so they can't be that bad. Just don't expect them to ever tank in a raid situation.

Shoulda just quoted this =P

[Duie]

Originally Posted by YendorLootmonkey [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Even so, the extra DPS the ranger would do would in no way make up for the extra mana loss spent during the mana-to-hp conversion rate required to prop a ranger up vs a warrior, nor would it make up for the XP penalty the ranger is sticking the group with.

When you get to 50+ on your ranger, you will understand... unless you stick to Sol B or Lower Guk until you can't get XP from them anymore.

There is a reason they added Jolt on Live a few months into Kunark. While aggro isn't quite working the same here and rangers have been getting by just fine without Jolt, we're not efficiently tanking mobs that hit for 120+ in Kunark unless you've got the gear that Zilo has from being in the top raiding guild on the server.

I keep emphasizing efficiently, because you CAN tank these mobs. I am not saying you can't tank in Karnor's Castle or Sebilis or even in Howling Stones. We're just not the best choice for it when other options are available to a group.

With a shaman slowing , cleric buffs and the hpgear you can tank at any level just fine..... in some cases a ranger will accually tank better than said knight /warrior(key word some) .However, with that being said, that doesnt mean you should.

Jolt is a wonderful tool that will allow rangers to do the job they should be doing better, Secondary tank. get the mob off the caster/cleric and hold agro till its either mezzed or the tank as biult up enough hate .Cast jolt to assure that the tank can get agro back w/o too much of a hassle