Ranger Guide by Radiënt: Aim for Perfection/Job/Weapon

==Knowing the job | Choosing your race |  Choosing a support job |  Equipment |  Update notes== === Abilities and Traits | Stats, ranged and melee | Choosing your weapon |  Endgame roles===

Knowing the job
If you are a ranger, you are expected to do four things: dealing damage, pulling, tracking certain monsters or NPCs and landing "winds" on gods. Assuming tracking monsters and NPCs and landing winds are obvious, this sub page will cover all the abilities and traits, weapon choices and endgame roles.

The Archer
Archer for utulizing bows (not official naming but I like to make a difference between each kind). Bows are the best kind of weapons for new players to start off with as a ranger. It's easier, you get a new good bow pretty frequent and the arrows aren't that expensive compared to marksmanship-type weapons. They have high delay and deal good damage, and the best buyable bow is available at level 55: Eurytos' Bow, although rather pricy. Bows are the weapon to start off with from level 1 to 75, although you might consider switching to complete Marksmanship after some endgame experience as it. There are multiple kinds of bows however, but you shouldn't bother with bows under 400 delay (shortbows) and bows over 600 delay (long bows, but with much higher delay).

The Marksman
Crossbows are the most versatile among the three weapon choices. It can deal damage, inflict poison, defense down, blind, sleep and hp drain. Holy Bolts combined with damage bolts (Mythril bolts, Darksteel bolts) are a good combination, to top it off there is a bolt you can get with Conquest Points: Gold Musketeer's Bolt. Although all the good things mentioned, all the different bolts require alot of space and switch from acid, to holy, to darksteel bolts each time could be complex or simply tiring. For Holy Bolts to be effective, it requires alot of Mind gear and can be resisted if the target is resistant to magic damage or light damage. For personal use, merit parties, nyzul isle, assaults and more, crossbows are a good choice, but for endgame, you'll want to utulize either a bow or a gun.

The Gunslinger
High delay, high damage weapons. I only recommend using guns at early levels (22-30), mid levels (50-60) and endgame level (75). Many think that bow is alot better damage than a gun, simply because it shoots faster, I would like to prove this wrong, but it's simply preferences. Due to the high delay, a gun would only need 6 shots to get 100% TP, making Barrage slightly easier. Due to the high damage on the gun, Barrage will deal more damage as well. "Zerg" fights with a gun will always outperform a bow with those facts. It hits harder than the other two choices, just slower. It's worthwhile to try out the gun if you're used to bow.

Relic weaponry
Ah yes, the wet dream of every carreer ranger. The Annihilator (Marksmanship - gun) and Yoichinoyumi (Archery - long bow) are the ultimate ranged weapons a ranger can achieve, and after the mythic weapons were introduced, the third weapon type has it's own relic (or rather, mythic) weapon: Gastraphetes. Although I really shouldn't put this in this guide, but for completeness sake and delimma's over which relic to dream of, I figured it should belong in a guide. Please mind, these are all theories and opinions, I don't own a relic, not even one, myself as of yet.

No image yet of the Gastraphetes

Coronach
Coronach has modifiers much like Detonator, but with bigger modifiers so it will do a bit more damage. But still, Slug Shot seems to be the weapon skill for ranger. None the less, Coronach seems an extremely useful weapon skill as it reduces a significant amount of enmity, allowing you to punch more bullets into your foes with alot less danger of taking it's attention, and in worst case, leading to death. Another plus would be the affinity. Coronach is on the other side of the Light skill chain of Detonator and Heavy Shot, making chaining with other jobs for a Light skill chain much easier. Although keep in mind, you're not a samurai so don't get the strangest idea of doing solo light skill chains, even if it is possible.

Namas Arrow
Second: Namas Arrow, the Archery variant. The ranged accuracy bonus from Namas Arrow helps alot, you can eat ranged attack food even on foes you usually use ranged accuracy food (usually sushi) for. However, this is effect isn't permanent, you can miss a few shots here and there the moment it wears off. It is alot like Empyreal Arrow, but with bigger modifiers, but unlike Coronach, it doesn't lower enmity, but  Namas Arrow doesn't make hate anyways. But comparing to Coronach, I think the Annihilator won this battle.

True Flight
Although not restricted to relic weapons like Namas Arrow and Coronach, it's a weapon skill that is part of the Gastraphetes. After testing on different and random monsters, I have two conclusions: 1. It's crap And for the other, I have found use for it on Repeating Crossbow, firing Holy Bolts. Due to the low damage from the weapon, Slug Shot won't deal much damage either, making  Trueflight better. However it can be resisted and it's not practical unless you're using a Repeating Crossbow, which is very situational and will be rare. So again, it's crap.

Annihilator
The biggest plus on the Annihilator is the enmity reduction from Coronach, aside from that, the delay on the weapon itself is alot less than the best buyable gun: Hellfire +1, bringing it closer to a bow's delay. But the delay is just too low to get a natural 6 six shot build, you'll get a frustrating 99.6% TP! This can be fixed by wearing any piece that gives Store TP +1 or more however. The only downside of this weapon is that it isn't usable by other jobs, unlike the Yoichinoyumi.

Yoichinoyumi
Yoichinoyumi is usable by two different jobs, unlike the other two. Two jobs for the price of one relic! (is that even a correct way of saying two for the price of one?). Namas_Arrow isn't comparable to Coronach in terms of hate, but in terms of damage, starting a fight with Namas Arrow can make the difference of eating ranged attack food or ranged accuracy food. However, for longer fights or where enmity really matters like in Odin's Chamber, Coronach would do better.

Gastraphetes
It's paired weapon skill is Namas Arrow, it increases Ranged Accuracy and with that, Ranged Attack too! If that isn't enough, it has less delay than it actually says so on the weapon since it enhances Snapshot, further increasing it's DPS. You can also obtain this weapon alot earlier, depending on the server however, and it also takes alot of effort just to obtain this. But it comes with a hefty price. Damage-wise, Trueflight is not even worth using, and unlike the relic weapons, the hidden effect is that regular ranged attacks (including Barrage) deals twice the damage, where the relics have three times.