Basically I'm wondering which is better?

I know in terms of Archery the Ranger isn't as good as Scouts, especially since Scouts get Slam so it's porbably best to go melee, but wouldn't that mean it would be better to roll a nightshade?

could someone shed some light onto which is better for me, I'd like to roll a ranger for it's bow, but I don't know...

any help would be appreciated

Rangers have self buffs,that is their biggest advantage.

Yeah I was told that the buffs are their biggest advantage, how to they fair against Scouts, Hunters, Infis and SBs?

and which is better, bow or melee?

I don't expect them to do as good against the assassins classes

In ranged damage, Ranger is far superior to the Scout because of the self-buffs and the damage add. The same is true for melee damage. The Ranger with celtic dual by far outdamage any Scout in melee and will also penetrate better the evade-defense of assassins.

However, Scouts can be tough opponents in melee, but they have to spec for high shield and weapon and need a decent realm rank.

Nevertheless, in melee, Nightshades have much more options than Rangers. The missing self-buffs are compensated by the poison-debuffs and dots, which can be quite nasty with viper 3. Due to the much higher evade chance they can much more often use after-evade combos e.g. from the Critical Strike line.

The only reason, why melee rangers win frequently against assassins is (i) by opening from stealthed (because of Master of Stealth) with e.g. side stun and (ii) by using Purge & Ignore pain. High realm rank rangers ca be quite nasty in melee with Physical Defense, Ip and Purge, but well played high realm rank assassins, too.

playing a ranger in see hidden land when old ras are around will make you want to cut your wrists.

a NS do better dmg in melee bcs of better styles in CS line compared to CD, they also have poison that boost dmg even more.

a Ranger stands alot more dmg in melee and with defensive RA´s like pd and ip they can take alot of beating while a NS goes down very fast.

Ranger have better stealth and can avoid stealthzergs and opponents u dont want to fight with camo up. This will change with old RA´s.

Personally i like both classes, a NS feels more fun to play with more toys to play around with but they are really weak so if u are jumped by more then one enemy ur in trouble. My Ranger almost always get a kill in a 1vs2 and pretty often take both out if Ra´s up.

actually camo stays in game with old RA´s...

camo was implemented with a low 1.6x patch..as compensation of the imbalanced see-hidden ability.

Camoflauge will make melee Rangers playable once every 10 minutes. At least you'll be on equal footing with other assassins. You can even pop True Sight and open on your target with side-stun like you do now. Once every 30 minutes.

Medium to high RR Rangers will do ok with Old RAs. You still benefit from self-buffs and the best damage mechanic in the game. Assassin damage will be lower over-all with the loss of viper and you can take Avoid Pain which is like a cheap PD on a 15 minute timer.

With the current RAs I don't know why people choose NS over Rangers. The Ranger has so many more options with speed shout, camoflauge, insta-win RR5, and bow. The NS is better against high defense targets and casters because of poison and PA, but those classes rarely solo. Most of your opponents will be other stealthers and this is where the Ranger is broken on Uthgard.

Seyha wrote: Most of your opponents will be other stealthers and this is where the Ranger is broken on Uthgard.

Sorry about my bad english. But what do you mean with the ranger is broken?

Imbalanced. By saying the Ranger is broken I am implying that it needs to be fixed. Your english is great.

Seyha wrote:Imbalanced. By saying the Ranger is broken I am implying that it needs to be fixed. Your english is great.

The ranger itself isnt unbalanced, its the combination of RA´s, no ToA and no bb´s on uthgard that makes it good. No ToA takes out LW wich is the only way to counter PD, no bb´s makes ranger better as it cheaper to play with and gives higher stats then charges/pots etc. RA´s like IP is just the finshing touch makes it OP on this server setting. This isnt a uniqe case, several classes have really high benefit from this servers setting, like friars, champs etc. Live with it or move on!

A NS still makes better damage from weapon alone and then add posion to it but the amount of beating my ranger can take when using IP equals 3-4 NS´s. During this time i always get a atleast 1 kill and sweet rps. With a NS i would hit the dirt before i know what hit me.

Seyha wrote:Imbalanced. By saying the Ranger is broken I am implying that it needs to be fixed. Your english is great.

The power of a melee ranger is highly timer dependent. With IP/Purge/Camo down any skilled assassin should have no problems to take out a ranger, when the RR is at equal level.

Comparing my NS on live-classic with my ranger here, I would say, that my NS had overall a lesser survival chance than my ranger. But while I have to retreat with my ranger, when my I-win RAs are down, my NS was immediately ready after any fight. The NS had a lot of more tactic options and could handle a very broad range of enemy classes, while the melee ranger dominates mostly in stealth war.

Seyha wrote:Imbalanced. By saying the Ranger is broken I am implying that it needs to be fixed. Your english is great.

Ok, i play a rr4 Ranger wich is templated. I win much of my fights against other stealthers. But my ranger is only made for killing other stealthers. So i have only 12 points in bowskill. And i use 2 Buff-potions all the time (haste and s/c)
I did kill rr9 Infils and some higher Minstrels, hunters (lol) and shadowblades.

But some good played assasines killed me really fast! I think many other players are not templated on Uthgard. Most of them dont use buff-potions...some even doesnt have heal-potions at all!

And if you compare a ranger with a hunter oder scout...you are right: Rangers are much stronger. But if you see to usability of alb-stealther-duo´s (or even more stealthers in a group, like BA does ist every day at amg ) then the albs have much more chances to win. Scout+infil = slam from scout and dmg from infil, Minstrel+Infil = stun+dd´s+VM from minstrel+ dmg from infil and SOS if they seem not to win...

Ranger and NS: They only have a 4 sec stun from the side. No mighty 9 sec stun like scout or minstrel!

In Mid: Hunters got a 9-sec-stun as backstyle. Ok, hunters are really weak...but for do the stun-style for a SB in group it must be a nice duo at all!

What i want to try to say is: The rangers are hard if they are melee-specced for other stealthers. But in stealther-groups albion and midgard has more utility i think because of the longer stun-time.

Albs are a little overpowered with the minstrel...like alb-groups in fact are stronger then hib or mid groups i think.

If you say: Rangers are broken... then what is viper3 on a classic freeshared with no buff-bots? Viper3 on a char without getting heal is a free-kill for every assasine. Thats much more overpowered than rangers are.

If you nerf rangers then hibs will loose many players who will play a mighty infil or slam-bot-scout or minstrel (ora pet, climbing walls, insta-stun, singel mez, ae-mez, speed, absorb, sos and vm is crazy...i really dont know what the mythic-developers have smoked when they implemented such an overpowerer class but i would try smoke this too if i would get it ^^)

Regards
Yol

If ranger is broken, what about SB with viper3, dotproc weapons and damadd add charge? (in other words insane dps). Hunter is too weak and thats why Seyha annoys everyone again and again. And no, Scout is not to weak but you cant compare a Scout to a Ranger. A Scout has much higher defense capabilities, thanks to his shield spec.

@Yol
Backstun is like 6 sec I think.

It's a 5 second stun.

I don't know why you get mad over me calling the Ranger broken. It is what it is. This thread is about choosing a class, so here's why you should choose the Ranger: Best melee damage of any stealther, best bow damage of any archer, a good 1v1 RR5 ability, access to IP/PD, and a speed shout. The Nightshade by comparison has poison, and that's about his only significant advantage. His ranged attacks are weak, he has no speed shout, his RR5 is only useful against other assassins, he can't detect other assassins with MoS, no camouflage, no self-buffs.

A Shadowblade with Viper 3 is a gimp. Worthless against RR5 assassins, and easy to kill with such a limited RA set. Since he has to weapon swap to maximize his Viper 3 it should be easy to land the strafe-stun on him. I'm sure you rage when a Shadowblade uses a damage add charge, but a Ranger can use charges too.