Aze’s Ranger Guide (FFXI linkshell)
I wanted to let everyone in on the Ranger class. I’d like to post more on some other jobs and such, guess I’ll see how well this one is accepted first. Hope it’s helpful! ^^
So rangers are the premium melee damage dealers, and one of the most expensive jobs to sustain in the game. The nice thing is you usually won’t have a problem getting a party. Seems everyone wants rangers for their damage, and majority of the time you’ll be asked to pull. I myself have been asked to tank as well when the obvious options aren’t available. I rarely agree to do it unless I’m absolutely confident in my healer(s), and that this mob isn’t going to knock me for 500 pts. In those situations, Ranger has the ability to control the hate rather well, and with the moderate defense, agility/evasion, it’s better if we do it than a mage try to handle it ( I would highly discourage doing it unless you really need to get some xp going ). Now for the nitty gritties of ranger-dom
Ranger is a melee class, and consequently melee stats matter, but they are looked at differently than how a Warrior utilizes their stats.
The most important stat for a ranger, in my opinion, is Agility. There really is no way around it. Agility is the basis by which your ranged accuracy is determined. It works out nicely because the more accurate you are, the less likely you are to get hit. Woot for Agility!
The other stats can really go in any order; Attack(derived from strength and combat skill), Dexterity, and Defense.
I prefer to take pure attack over Strength. Ranged Attack is derived from your Ranged Combat Skill + Attack + Dexterity. Likewise your general Attack comes from your Strength, but Attack is a small part of Ranged Attack, and Strength is a small part of Attack, so Strength plays a decreased roll in the final result, however it does help. Now by having a higher Dexterity, you’re going to have a better melee accuracy and crit potential as well, meaning your TP will raise quicker also.
Now that we got the stat lineup out of the way, next is the races. There really is no bad race, there may be races better than the other, but each seems to have their advantages. Mithra is the obvious choice, natural Agility and Dexterity, however a generally lower Attack/Strength. Elvaan and Galka are a toss up, both having a low Dexterity and Agility, but a high Attack. Taru have an especially high Agility, but incredibly low Hit Points. Humes are just balanced across the board, they don’t stand out anywhere but have no real deficiency anywhere either. My personal choice was Elvaan, but Ranger wasn’t my first choice, it just kinda happened, and it’s happened rather well for me I think.
Next on my checklist is the Traits and Abilities.
First you have Alertness at 5, a general low effective Sneak. Never rely on this to happen, but it does generally let you get closer to a Sound Aggressive mob.
Then you have an Accuracy Bonus at 10 that affects both Melee and Ranged.
Third Ability is Rapid Shot at 15. It basically allows you to fire your weapon without the cocking cast time.
At 20 you get a natural resistance to Poison. I have honeslty seen this work 3 times. If the Resist Poison kicked in, the screen will read Resist! an something to the affect of it being resisted.
When you reach 30, you’ll receive another Accuracy Bonus. You won’t see it because it just stacks on the previous bonus.
There’s another Poison Resist bonus at 40, and a third Accuracy Bonus at 50.
Now for the Abilities you get. The Two Hour skill is first, but you also get Sharpshot and the option for Wide Scan under your Map and Markers screen.
The Two Hour is Eagle Eye Shot, a devastating short-ranged attack. Sharpshot lasts about a minute and increased your Ranged Accuracy; recast is 5 minutes.
Wide scan allows you see all NPC and Mobs within a certain area of the map. It also allows you to Track a particular subject, or scan a smaller area outside of your immediate scan for a particular type Mob. It’s incredibly useful for NM Hunts and for general farming.
At 10 there’s a relatively useless skill called Scavenger. It allows you to “scavenge” the immediate area for resources or the occasional quiver of arrows. I supposed you could run a Scavenge Macro while you sleep and see what comes up; recast is 5 minutes.
You get what will be your favorite ability at 30, Barrage. That will basically notch in 5 arrows or other ammo and fires them in one blow. You can miss any or all of them, so I’d recommend using Sharpshot just before Barrage; recast 5min.
Shadowbind is the skill at 40. It’s a fast shot, deals no damage, and temporarily binds the target. I’ve yet to see it fail and I had to use it on a Lesser Manticore recently. The length of bind however will vary on difficulty of the target; recast 5 minutes.
Your Weapon Skills are pretty effective also, goes right along with the Ranger’s high damage theme. I’ve only maxed out my Archery skill, but as far as the three Weapon Skills prior to the first level cap, Marksmanship and Archery skills have the same effect.
Flaming Arrow will be the first one. It’s a high damage, Fire based attack. The higher the TP, the more damage.
Piercing Arrow is second. It’s also a high damage weapon skill, but with greater TP, it’s more likely to ignore defenses.
Dulling Arrow is third. It’s a moderate damage weapon skill, but with greater TP, it’s more likely to lower target’s Intelligence.
I will update the Weapon Skills, Traits, and Abilities as I learn more about them, these will take you up to 50, your first level cap. At this point, I’m nearing 48 myself, so I don’t want to talk about anything I’m not completely confident about. I will mention that Sidewinder is the fourth weapon skill and will be able to learn it around 55. You go a long time and several levels between Dulling Arrow and Sidewinder, but once you get Sidewinder, the Weapon Skills become more frequent again.
So now you think want to be a ranger? Yea, I like high damage too. It’s a power trip. You know the only other person netting your level of damage is the black mage, and he only has so much MP. Unfortunately, a warrior is only as good as his sword, a good sword comes at a price. Depending what stats you prioritize, you may not spend as much as some. Now you don’t need an Emperor’s Hairpin or a pair of Leaping boots, but they’re nice if you can get them. It is good to shell out top dollar for your ranged weapon. In my case it was +1 bows across the board, with the exception of my Ryl Archer’s Longbow. For maximum damage, longbows are the preferred bow. The speed of shortbows doesn’t make up for their lack of damage. Once you hit Power Bow +1, each subsequent +1 longbow does higher damage with greater bonus to Ranged Attack. The Artifact bow is a good bow, however it’s shortbow based, therefore lower damage, but good speed. If shortbows are your thing, you can look forward to the Sniper’s Bow. Otherwise just get it so you can continue with your AF quest.
My Bow order was: Shortbow +1, Royal Archer’s Longbow, Power Bow +1, Great Bow +1, Battle Bow +1, and have a War Bow +1 in my locker waiting for me. On Asura, my prices starting at Power Bow +1 were 30k, 55-60k, 60-70k, 75-95k.
As far as Arrows, I went with Stone Arrow, Iron Arrow/Fang Arrow, Silver Arrow, and I’m still using Scorpion Arrows. Iron and Silver you can get in Quivers, all others only come in 99 stacks. Now, because you run out of Quiver options, it’s good to do Gobbie Bag quests to increase your personal Inventory, and possibly even the Mog Safe quests to give you more room to store other items, like extra arrows for quick restock. It’s pretty obvious that crafting is worth your while. Creating your own arrows and bolts will cut down ammo cost considerably. The only downside is you have to continue to fund the crafting skill to keep it caught up to whatever you’re using. This can eat up a lot of time, and money that may have been better spent on arrows outright.
Our armor issue is both a curse and a blessing. We just don’t have very much armor to choose from. This can keep armor cost down, but you end up like me, and wearing Lizard set straight into Khazam. Killing Mandragora’s with my 60k bow … oh, and I’m wearing no0bish armor, don’t let me get hit. Your choice of armor and when you upgrade is completely up to you. I preferred to hold out for a piece that affected my stats as opposed to increasing my defense and wasting money on armor. The armor I’ve been usually seen in is…
Centurion’s Visor, Ranger’s Necklace, 2 Beetle Earring +1’s, Iron Scale Mail, Swordbelt, 2 Beetle Ring +1’s, Nomad’s Mantle, Martial Slacks, Magna M Gauntlets, and Magna M Ledelssons. However I recently replaced Iron Scale Mail with Brigandine, and sold my Martial Slacks for Gil, replaced with Iron Cuisses, and am in the process of getting the Magna M Chausses. As you can see, you don’t need all the absolute best gear, but instead make sure to have good gear, and keep a balance on your stats. If you gear too much for Agility and Accuracy, you hurt you damage. If you gear too much to damage, you’ll never hit.
If anyone needs it, I can post the Ranger Flag quest, and the AH Quests, but their pretty well discussed in other threads. I just wantd to cover some of the misconceptions and what goes into being a ranger
