Ranger Mechanics

Pets

Pets are the profession mechanic of Ranger. They can be controlled to attack with Attack My Target or disengage with Return to Me, and while their attack chain is automatic, each pet has one ability that can be manually activated.
Two pets may be equipped, and you may Swap Pets on a short Cooldown.

The Pet has its own health pool and may be targeted by enemies separately from the Ranger. This creates a good advantage for Rangers in the open world, but pets can also pull you into combat with enemies if you do not control them.
You may toggle between Guard and Avoid Combat to better control the Pet's passive behavior.

Builds that fight with their pet will usually want to choose a pet with higher damage, while a support build like Heal Alacrity Druid chooses pets based on the Pet's beast skill.
Some significant beast skills include:

All Ranger trait lines interact with the Pet to varying degrees, the most significant being Beastmastery. Many weapon and slot skills also interact with the Pet to benefit either the Pet or the Ranger.

The Soulbeast elite specialisation has a unique interaction in the form of Beastmode.

When the Untamed elite specialisation is selected, all of a pet's skills that would normally automatically cast can be directly controlled by the player, but will not activate unless Auto-activation is enabled for each skill.

Celestial Avatar

is the unique mechanic to Druid, which requires the build-up of Astral Force. Astral Force can be gained by attacking enemies and Healing allies.
replaces weapon skills with support-oriented abilities.

The effect ends when Astral Force is depleted, or by using . Both entering and exiting will trigger effects that would normally activate with Weapon Swap.

Glyphs have different effects while in .

Beastmode

is the profession mechanic unique to Soulbeast.
This skill will remove your pet from the field to grant the player additional attributes and skills. The pet can be returned at any point with , which incurs a Cooldown of 10 seconds until is available again.

The attributes and available skills in are determined by your equipped pet.
Two skills are inherited by the pet family and are similar in effect to the Pet's skills. These two skills will be identical whether you are merged with a Red Moa or a Blue Moa.
The third skill, and the granted attributes, are determined by the Archetype of the Pet. A Tiger is of the Ferocious archetype, while a Lynx has the Deadly archetype, despite the first two skills being identical.

When in , all traits and skills affecting your pet will instead affect you.
Attributes granted by traits, such as in the Beastmastery Trait Line are granted to the Soulbeast, which makes this a particularly powerful traitline for Power Soulbeast.
Commands have unique interactions as a Soulbeast.

Archetypes:

Unleash

and are transformation skills available to Untamed, which buffs you or your pet respectively.
Cantrips and some traits provide different effects based on which state is active:

While is active, these skills replace the standard Pet skills:

While is active, allows you to activate Unleashed Ambush skills. This buff has a Cooldown of 9 seconds.

Ambush skills

Utility Skill Types

Spirits

Spirits are a skill type unique to Ranger. They are summoned entities that grants boons to allies around them. Once summoned, Spirits will grant an effect and then activate their respective skill. Once completed, they continue to pulse boons.

in the Nature Magic Trait Line causes spirits to activate their skill twice.

• Heals the Ranger and pet and pulses Vigor.
  Heals nearby allies.
• grants Resistance and pulses Resolution.
  Cleanses Conditions.
• grants Aegis and pulses Protection.
  is a Blast Finisher that applies Weakness and Cripple.
• applies Vulnerability and pulses Fury.
  deals damage and Dazes.
• applies Blind and grants Might.
  applies Burning.
• Converts conditions and pulses Regeneration.
  Revives allies.

Traps

Traps are area of effect skills that can be placed on the ground and triggers once an enemy is within range. Ranger traps all focus on conditions, and are some of the only damaging slot skills that Rangers possess.

in the Skirmishing Trait Line increases the duration of applied boons and conditions.

• applies Regeneration and Removes Conditions from allies.
• applies Burning.
• applies Poison.
• applies Chilled and deals heavy strike damage.
• applies Bleeding and Launches enemies.

Commands

Commands are similar to Shouts and affect the Pet in both offensive and defensive capacities.

in the Beastmastery Trait Line allow them to grant Regeneration and Swiftness to nearby allies.

• copies the Ranger's boons to the Pet, and copies the Pet's boons to the Ranger. In , boons are reapplied to the Soulbeast instead.
• applies Revealed and grants your Pet increased damage to one target. In , the buff is granted to the Soulbeast instead.
• grants Regeneration to nearby allies and the Pet will teleport to Revive a downed ally. In , the downed player is teleported instead.
• grants Protection and Barrier, and additionally applies Stun Break to nearby allies.
• redirects damage from nearby allies to the Pet, effectively similar to Protection. A Soulbeast will redirect damage to themselves instead.
• grants Fury, Stability and Swiftness to the Ranger and the Pet.

Commands are commonly used for both support and DPS builds.

Survival

Surival skills are personal, defensive control effects in theme with Wilderness Survival.

improves Survival skills to grant Fury and Cleanse Conditions.

• regenerates health over a duration.
• Breaks Stun and Evades.
• applies Immobilize and pulses Cripple and Slow in an area.
• Breaks Stun while granting Quickness and Superspeed.
• adds Bleeding to the next 10 attacks.
• summons vines that apply Immobilize and Bleeding.

is the strongest Condition Damage slot skill available to Ranger.

is commonly taken to slow down enemies due to its wide range.

Signets

Provide a passive effect to the Ranger and the Pet while equipped and off Cooldown. Signets can be activated for an effect at the cost of the passive bonus.

in the Marksmanship Trait Line improves Signets to grant boons to allies.

• grants health regeneration and can be activated to Break Stun and pull conditions from allies to the Pet.
• grants Toughness and can be activated for a brief period of immunity to strike damage.
• grants movement speed and can be activated to make your next 10 attacks Unblockable while granting Superspeed.
• grants Ferocity and can be activated to Immobilize nearby enemies.

is used on Power Ranger builds for its passive effect, while Condition Druid makes use of its active effect.

Glyphs

Glyphs are unique to Druid and change their effects while in .

grants Protection to allies when using a Glyph.

• Heals yourself for a large amount and nearby allies for a smaller amount.
  Heals allies for a large amount and yourself for a smaller amount.
• inflicts Bleeding, Weakness, and Immobilize to nearby enemies.
  Heals and Cleanses Conditions from allies.
• tethers to nearby enemies and deals damage whenever you take damage.
  tethers to nearby allies and Heals whenever you heal yourself.
• grants Stability to allies and Dazes enemies.
  grants Stability to, Cleanses Conditions, and Breaks Stun for nearby allies.
• Pushes nearby enemies.
  Pulls nearby enemies.
• Heals, grants Stability to, and Cleanses Conditions from allies in an area.
  Heals and grants Stability, Regeneration, Vigor while Reviving allies in and area.

Stances

Stances are unique to Soulbeast and grant strong effects with a short duration. Stances can have either defensive or offensive effects.

extends the duration of Stances and shares them to allies at a reduced duration.

• Heals and Cleanses Conditions, with additional healing for each condition that was cleansed.
• reduces all incoming damage, grants immunity to movement-impairing conditions and grants Stability.
• grants Endurance, and you gain Might and Superspeed when Evading attacks.
• grants Protection, Fury, Swiftness, Regeneration and increases Boon Duration by 66%.
• grants Might and inflicts Poison when striking enemies.
• adds an additional strike when striking enemies.

and use the Soulbeast's attributes, even when the effect is shared to allies.

Cantrips

Cantrips are unique to Untamed and are defensive abilities that focus on survivability.
They additionally grant a boon based on the state of or .

• grants immunity to damage for a short duration, then Heals for half of your missing health.
  : Superspeed, : Stability
• creates a cluster of AoEs that deal damage and apply Poison. Enemies hit by all spores are Knocked Down.
  : Might, : Protection
• Breaks Stun and Converts Conditions into Vulnerability.
  : Fury, : Vigor
• creates a cage that enemies cannot escape.
  : Quickness, : Resistance
• teleports to the target and inflicts Vulnerability. Half the Cooldown is refunded if it hits.
  : Might, : Regeneration
• grants Stability, Resistance, Resolution and reduces damage by 50%.
  : Superspeed, : Vigor

Trait Lines

Each of the Ranger traitlines can serve multiple purposes and always provide some improvement to a weapon as well as a slot skill type.

Each line also has access to various boons and many traits that affect your Pet in various ways.

Skirmishing

The Skirmishing Trait Line offers strong traits for both Power and Condition builds.

is important for most Ranger builds, which all benefit massively from .

and are the most important traits for Condition builds, and significantly improves Short Bow skills.

can reduce the cooldown of strong skills such as or .

Beastmastery

The Beastmastery Trait Line mostly focuses on Pets, but a Soulbeast will inherit these bonuses for themselves while in .

, , , and all passively grant strong bonuses to Soulbeast. is also important to any build using Axes.

grants increased damage for Greatsword.

Nature Magic

The Nature Magic Trait Line is dedicated to healing and supportive traits.

heals and grants defensive boons when using beast skills.
causes spirits to use their respective ability twice.

improve Warhorn and Regeneration.
grants Might and Fury when using Swap Pets.

casts when you start reviving an ally.

grants more Healing Power.

Wilderness Survival

Wilderness Survival has a combination of Condition damage and survivability.

increases Vitality and Expertise, increases Condition Damage and improves damage from Poison.

Additionally, reduces the Cooldown of Dagger and Torch skills.

improves Regeneration to also reduce damage taken. and creates synergy between Dodge and Protection, and adds a healing effect to Protection.

These defensive traits are all important for Hand Kite Soulbeast

Marksmanship

The Marksmanship Trait Line is entirely focused on Power damage and offensive traits. Despite this, Power Soulbeast does not take this line due to the amount of stats gained from Beastmastery Trait Line.

and increases strike damage.

is a powerful trait that increases Stun and Daze durations, particularly useful on Eye of Fate, Eye of Judgment and Cardinal Sabir.
Heal Alacrity Druid will typically take this trait to increase their effective Breakbar damage.

allows Longbow to pierce targets.

grants boons to allies when Swapping Pets and grants good personal Might.

Druid

Druid is an elite specialisation designed for supportive utility, healing, and control.

grants Alacrity to allies near abilities. This trait is the most important for Heal Alacrity Druid as it is the only source of Alacrity.

and grants substantial increases to healing output. heals allies when using a Heal skill.

Removes Conditions from allies when entering .
allow Glyphs to grant Protection.

grants Superspeed and Stealth to allies when leaving , which can be useful in many situations, but may interfere with the abilities of Thieves.

increases the damage and duration of conditions, while reducing strike damage taken for a time after entering or exiting .
applies Bleeding when Immobilizing or disabling an enemy. It also Dazes enemies when entering .
adds damaging and controlling conditions to .

These traits are important for Condition Druid.

Soulbeast

Soulbeast is an elite specialisation with strong damage modifiers and synergy with offensive boons and .

increases strike damage while affected by Fury and increases all damage after disabling a target.

increases strike damage and Condition Duration to enemies with lower health percentage than the Soulbeast.

extends the duration of Stances and shares them to allies at a reduced duration. This is particularly good for increasing bursts of damage or sharing supportive effects.

grants Fury and Quickness when using a Pet skill, or upon using the Archetypal skill in . increases the duration of all boons when gaining Quickness.

steals life when applying Poison.

Untamed

Untamed is an elite specialisation that draws benefits from inflicting crowd control and managing its profession mechanic and .

grants Quickness to allies when using an Unleashed Ambush skill. Additionally, Weapon Swap resets .

grants either Stability or Quickness when you disable a foe, based on which state of Unleash is active.

increases the damage of Unleashed Ambush skills and .
increases strike damage of you and your Pet.

and together grant Vitality, damage reduction and life steal, which makes Untamed a durable profession.

Breakbar Skills

, , and apply Breakbar damage over a duration, which increases with Condition Duration.