General / open world build w/ Short bow

[mikexg.7329]

So I recently made a rev and I am really enjoying it. It took a bit to get used to how it works but once it clicked, boy did it click. I really like the play style of short bow but it seems most of the Renegade builds are power focused or catered more towards raid content. Does anyone have a general build where they use Short bow? Or is it truly not worth it?

[Alchimist.4738]

Unfortunately the short bow is a terrible weapon in every game mode, most of its skills are easy to dodge, or can miss simple moving targets, the second ability is particularly garbage because of that, and the weapon offers zero utility.

 

I'm afraid if you want to play a competitive cRenegade you need to play Masse/Axe, as nothing else is worth it.

[otto.5684]

Overall, Renegade best build is condi build, full viper gear with mace/axe. SB works well with viper and sinister gear. I found it to be decent in open world with grieving. Overall though, I find SB kinda pointless. SB requires open range on a none moving target for it to work and thus its ability to play hit and run in PvE to is non-existent. This leaves mace/axe better in every situation. Though it can be okay to have it as a secondary weapon and switch between it and mace/axe as needed.

 

For detail build, use GW2 metabattle website and use renegade raid build and tailor some stuff as you see fit.

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

> @"Alchimist.4738" said:

> Unfortunately the short bow is a terrible weapon in every game mode, most of its skills are easy to dodge, or can miss simple moving targets, the second ability is particularly garbage because of that, and the weapon offers zero utility.

>

> I'm afraid if you want to play a competitive cRenegade you need to play Masse/Axe, as nothing else is worth it.

 

That's not true; shortbow is actually part of the highest dps rotation for condi renegade at the moment in pve

[Undertow.2389]

Ya I find shortbow does extremely high dps. Especially compared to other classes' ranged weapons. A "terrible weapon" is something like warrior rifle. More vs stationary targets sure, but that's true of nearly everyone. I find moving mobs even more annoying as mace/axe.

[Buran.3796]

What I hate the most about the short bow (aside for lacking any PvP functionality) is that isn't even a good weapon to get the 5k kills for the weapon master achievement. If you spec your stats for max damage with the shortbow and use the full 5 skills then less that 15% of your kills will be done with physical damage and therefore won't count. You need full physical damage stats + restrain you use of the bow to skills #1 and #2 to maximize scoring deaths with that weapon (which is the only reason I would use it, anyway).

[Amethyst Lure.5624]

I actually really like it, but it's obvious when you use it that you work 3x as hard as you would on a power hammer (or most other ranged weps) for damage. If that's cool with you, i think it works fine for open world, as a swap in or just when you feel like sitting in it.

[Undertow.2389]

It does tons of damage just camping in Kalla, using bow skills, citadel bombardment, and razorclaw's rage. You can push it further with legend swaps (to shiro probably) but a standard mallyx pairing for condi setups doesn't mesh well with being at range (the reason why you'd want to use s-bow in open world in the first place). Plus it's nice always having soulcleave's summit available for the healing (which is pretty crazy given the number of attacks shortbow fires off). It's not like you need to do a try-hard weaver level rotation to get it to be massively better than most other ranged weapons (including rev hammer).

[Dace.8173]

When I don't see a specific build for what I want to do, or more precisely, the weapon I want to use I typically pick the build that comes closest and then swap in the weapon I want to use. In my experience, if a particular weapon isn't being used in builds it's likely because the community doesn't see it worthwhile and so you're better of just modifying a build you like the most.

[narcx.3570]

> @"mikexg.7329" said:

> So I recently made a rev and I am really enjoying it. It took a bit to get used to how it works but once it clicked, boy did it click. I really like the play style of short bow but it seems most of the Renegade builds are power focused or catered more towards raid content. Does anyone have a general build where they use Short bow? Or is it truly not worth it?

 

Just use your standard raid dps build (all Vipers, 2 trapper/4 nightmare runes) since any condition damage based PvE build should strive to get as close to 100% coni-duration as possible--it is the single most important aspect of scaling your damage.

 

I would change the actual build for open world a little tho, and take a defensive-minded-Invocation, since the extra stunbreak and cleanse will go miles towards keeping you alive--99.9% of all open world PvE deaths occur when you've lost control of your character. So, I would do something like:

 

Corruption: 3-2-1 (Could use Pulsating Pestilence for extra condi clearing, but you shouldn't really need it in PoF, condi's are pretty light if yer not just standing in huge burning fire zones... And learning to play Rev w/o a lot of cleanse access if pretty key to being successful at Rev across every game mode.)

 

Invocation: 1-3-x (Either Charged Mists or Roiling Mists... I think in open world you'd get more out of Roiling Mists, since you won't have Spotter/Banners and most fights don't last long enough to take full advantage of Charged anyways.) (Also, if you are taking Pulsating Pestilence, you wouldn't need Cleansing Ire, so take Forceful Persistence instead--although it's use is pretty minimal in a short bow build... Also remember PP will only xfer the conditions if targets are within 240 range. If you're out of range or the enemies are already dead, it won't save you like Cleansing Ire can.)

 

Renegade 2-2-x (Either Vindication or Lasting Legacy... I would probably go with Vindication since you'll benefit from the extra might while solo and Citadel Bombardment scales really well versus hoards of enemies or Large/Huge hitbox ones--which describes most everything in open world.)

 

Obviously, mess around with it yourself and see what works best for you, but I think that would be a pretty good place to start at... GL and happy Rev'ing.

[Arkaile.5604]

> @"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:

>

> That's not true; shortbow is actually part of the highest dps rotation for condi renegade at the moment in pve

 

That rotation abuses a targeting bug to make Sevenshot simply awkward to use, instead of outright worthless in most scenarios, in order to achieve that damage. This is just personal opinion, but I'd rather not learn and come to rely on a particular rotaion which which could have a chunk of its dps taken away by a bug fix. It would be nice if ANet incorporated that sort of dynamic targeting into the skill, but I doubt it will happen.

 

@"mikexg.7329" I don't know where you found these PvE power renegade builds; the only builds they use in PvE are condi builds with viper stats, as others have already pointed out, and sometimes a healing/support build. Shortbow is an okay weapon with decent damage, but I'd advise using it only when you absolutely have to when it comes to higher end group content due to a renegade's role usually being condi dps (mace/axe is better) with some support from f2 and f4 if necessary. However, if you want to use it in open world, just find a condi build of some sort which you enjoy and have at it.

[narcx.3570]

> @"Arkaile.5604" said:

> That rotation abuses a targeting bug to make Sevenshot simply awkward to use, instead of outright worthless in most scenarios, in order to achieve that damage. This is just personal opinion, but I'd rather not learn and come to rely on a particular rotaion which which could have a chunk of its dps taken away by a bug fix. It would be nice if ANet incorporated that sort of dynamic targeting into the skill, but I doubt it will happen.

 

You don't even have to use the bug vs large hitbox bosses tho... You can just stand right behind them like normal and all 7 easily hit. Vs small hitbox, yeah you need to use the bug... Or you can also just leave 7 shot out of your rotation and start channeling EtD earlier, it's a dps loss, but meh, playing Renegade vs Small hitbox bosses is a dps loss anyways--you could also just use the old rotation and camp M/A vs small hb.

 

I think all the complaining about 7shot is pretty ridiculous tho... So it's a skill shot? That's nothing new to Revenant's class identity--most of our high damage skills require aim to use effectively.

[otto.5684]

> @"narcx.3570" said:

> > @"Arkaile.5604" said:

> > That rotation abuses a targeting bug to make Sevenshot simply awkward to use, instead of outright worthless in most scenarios, in order to achieve that damage. This is just personal opinion, but I'd rather not learn and come to rely on a particular rotaion which which could have a chunk of its dps taken away by a bug fix. It would be nice if ANet incorporated that sort of dynamic targeting into the skill, but I doubt it will happen.

>

> You don't even have to use the bug vs large hitbox bosses tho... You can just stand right behind them like normal and all 7 easily hit. Vs small hitbox, yeah you need to use the bug... Or you can also just leave 7 shot out of your rotation and start channeling EtD earlier, it's a dps loss, but meh, playing Renegade vs Small hitbox bosses is a dps loss anyways--you could also just use the old rotation and camp M/A vs small hb.

>

> I think all the complaining about 7shot is pretty ridiculous tho... So it's a skill shot? That's nothing new to Revenant's class identity--most of our high damage skills require aim to use effectively.

 

The problem With 7 shot is that it is that it is an extremely high risk skill with low reward. It does not work against moving targets, especially that if you are moving as well. It barely works against small boxes. If you hit all 7 it does good damage, which is around same damage to mace 3. And as you mentioned, if you are in close/melee range, it only work against large boxes. Way too many limiting conditions for not that highly damageing skill. Sword 4 hits in huge cone infront of you and does around the same damage, instantly. It has a zero chance of not hitting in PvE.

 

7 shot needs to home in on the target. I do not see any logical reason why that should not be case.

[narcx.3570]

> @"otto.5684" said:

> > @"narcx.3570" said:

> > > @"Arkaile.5604" said:

> > > That rotation abuses a targeting bug to make Sevenshot simply awkward to use, instead of outright worthless in most scenarios, in order to achieve that damage. This is just personal opinion, but I'd rather not learn and come to rely on a particular rotaion which which could have a chunk of its dps taken away by a bug fix. It would be nice if ANet incorporated that sort of dynamic targeting into the skill, but I doubt it will happen.

> >

> > You don't even have to use the bug vs large hitbox bosses tho... You can just stand right behind them like normal and all 7 easily hit. Vs small hitbox, yeah you need to use the bug... Or you can also just leave 7 shot out of your rotation and start channeling EtD earlier, it's a dps loss, but meh, playing Renegade vs Small hitbox bosses is a dps loss anyways--you could also just use the old rotation and camp M/A vs small hb.

> >

> > I think all the complaining about 7shot is pretty ridiculous tho... So it's a skill shot? That's nothing new to Revenant's class identity--most of our high damage skills require aim to use effectively.

>

> The problem With 7 shot is that it is that it is an extremely high risk skill with low reward. It does not work against moving targets, especially that if you are moving as well. It barely works against small boxes. If you hit all 7 it does good damage, which is around same damage to mace 3. And as you mentioned, if you are in close/melee range, it only work against large boxes. Way too many limiting conditions for not that highly damageing skill. Sword 4 hits in huge cone infront of you and does around the same damage, instantly. It has a zero chance of not hitting in PvE.

>

> 7 shot needs to home in on the target. I do not see any logical reason why that should not be case.

 

A full hit of 7 shot generates 98 ticks of torment for 7 energy (14 per energy)

Mace 3 generates 64 ticks for 5 energy (12.8 per energy)

 

Even if you don't use the bug and just cast 7shot right in a small hitbox's face, you generally get ~3-4 hits depending on your aim and the specific size of the hb (some of the raid bosses vary slightly in size.) Getting 4 hits is still 8 ticks of torment per point of energy spent, so it's not completely terrible.

 

I still don't really see what the problem is tho, it's not that hard to hit things with it in PvE... I mean, in PvP, ya, it's super hard to hit people, especially with a little latency, but you have MUCH bigger problems if you're trying to play short bow renegade in PvP (like your team reporting you for match manipulation :tongue: ).

 

While a skill like Sword 4 is easy to hit in PvE, it's wide range sort of works against it since its damage gets severally cuck'ed by any adds--even if you step inside your target's hitbox.

 

If anything, I think this game in general needs MORE skill shots, not just a bunch of "hit the button without even looking at your moniter for instant damage" skills. Personally, I'm happy Renegade has a few of these since it makes them fun and interesting to play... If you don't like aiming your condi skills you can always just play Zerker and do more dps anyways.

 

 

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

> @"narcx.3570" said:

> You don't even have to use the bug vs large hitbox bosses tho... You can just stand right behind them like normal and all 7 easily hit. Vs small hitbox, yeah you need to use the bug... Or you can also just leave 7 shot out of your rotation and start channeling EtD earlier, it's a dps loss, but meh, playing Renegade vs Small hitbox bosses is a dps loss anyways--you could also just use the old rotation and camp M/A vs small hb.

>

> I think all the complaining about 7shot is pretty ridiculous tho... So it's a skill shot? That's nothing new to Revenant's class identity--most of our high damage skills require aim to use effectively.

 

Both your posts about shortbow are spot on ?

 

> @"Arkaile.5604" said:

> That rotation abuses a targeting bug to make Sevenshot simply awkward to use, instead of outright worthless in most scenarios, in order to achieve that damage. This is just personal opinion, but I'd rather not learn and come to rely on a particular rotaion which which could have a chunk of its dps taken away by a bug fix. It would be nice if ANet incorporated that sort of dynamic targeting into the skill, but I doubt it will happen.

 

 

I agree with you about the targeting bug; I don’t personally use the rotation on small hitbox. Narcx already mentioned you can use it on large hitbox bosses no problem, tho, and I do use shortbow rotations on bosses where that’s applicable (Dhuum/Samarog/Sloth/Artsariv). I have a nice 14.5k 99th percentile Dhuum log simply due to shortbow. You can use it for pretty good damage on Range Deimos strat too (with full buffs on golem at range it can hit nearly 30k last time I checked). Also there are a fair amount of open world pve bosses like Chak Gerent with hitboxes big enough to use the rotations on for more damage than mace/axe. For me, I use a few different rotations depending on a bunch of different factors (hitbox size, party comp/needs, role etc.); shortbow certainly isn’t useless you just have to use it in the right situation. A change to the targeting to let you choose the distance could be nice, tho!

[narcx.3570]

> @"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:

> I have a nice 14.5k 99th percentile Dhuum log simply due to shortbow.

 

Yeah, I am so happy just easymoding Dhuum with 13-15k Renegade if I'm in a low dps group.

 

Weeber almost becomes a liability when everyone else is doing very low numbers and you have to see so many mechanics... Plus boonstrip and you get to be the AP hero!

[LucianTheAngelic.7054]

> @"narcx.3570" said:

> > @"LucianTheAngelic.7054" said:

> > I have a nice 14.5k 99th percentile Dhuum log simply due to shortbow.

>

> Yeah, I am so happy just easymoding Dhuum with 13-15k Renegade if I'm in a low dps group.

>

> Weeber almost becomes a liability when everyone else is doing very low numbers and you have to see so many mechanics... Plus boonstrip and you get to be the AP hero!

 

Right? Its honestly the most satisfying fight to play Renegade on for me lately, just simply because I'm almost always 4k ahead of most others XD

[AliamRationem.5172]

Oops! Just posted a similar topic and then noticed this, which has some good info along the lines of what I was looking for. Good stuff!