This is a guide I made awhile back with my experience when leveling on the Red server.
Some thing have changed due to population but I feel that this guide could still help some ranger levels on blue and red when groups are no where to be found. I forgot I made this guild and figured I might as well post it here for feed back and maybe someone will get something out of this. Please feel free to add your input and experience. I will try and edit this if good information is posted. Thanks and happy hunting.
Lartanin’s Solo Ranger Guide:
The ranger is a well balanced utility class that seems to have a hard time finding a place in groups. It is also a class that is not seen as being able to solo till later on in velious when we get one spell that fears animals. I started on P99 Red server with little to nothing. With the hours I played and the lower population I was forced to solo many of my levels. This guide will be a look into what I did to make it to 55 and some tips and items that will help any ranger get some exp when not finding a group.
Tools for the solo ranger
Ways to solo
Setting goals for gear and exp
Hunting Areas
Tools for the solo ranger:
Fletching- This will be a must if you want to solo. Invest in making arrows and getting a bow early on. Do not worry about getting your skill to high early on but around 15-19 we will have the money to put forth to get your skill up high enough to make yourself a trueshot longbow. The bow is a huge part of soloing.
Here is a list of a few weapons I would suggest getting.
1. Swarmcaller-This is a really nice two hander for pvp and for pve. The slow is very useful for soloing. This weapon does not start procing till 45 so it is not super important to get this right off the bat as an early ranger. I suggest getting this if money is tight over any other two hander for pvp. Silver Swiftblade is a much better starter two hander do to damage caps at lower levels. If you can find a Silver Swiftblade cheap early on pick that up and get a Swarmcaller later on down the road.
2. Woodsman Staff- Great dps two hander for pvp and pve. Can be pricey but well worth the money. This weapon has the best dps till our epics.
3. Ebony Bladed Sword- When I first started I was given an ebony bladed sword and a dragonhorn of yhesha. I was never much of a fan of the dragonhorn other than early on but the ebony bladed long sword is pretty nice for pvp and pve once it starts procing the root. The root it procs rangers can’t even cast till level 49! I mean that is way better than the 10dmg short duration one we would have at level 25. This weapon can also we traded in for the Short Sword of Morin.
4. Orc Impaler- Nice stat boosting range slot or main hand/ off hand weapon. Quest is a bit hard to solo but I completed it once I got higher level. Sometimes you can get someone to help you kill the shadowman leader and the ghoul boss if you can catch someone in Lfay at lower levels.
5. Lamentation/Green Jade BroadSword- Nice for pve and to give your ranger a nice strength boost but not the best for pvp. Stick with the 2 handers above.
A good quality bow- With classic and Kunark there is not a large variety of bows that are good quality and are not no drop. Trueshot longbow and the Raincaller are the two bows that I have used most of my leveling career.
Tolan's Armor- This is nice armor not for the AC but for many of the utility you will get from them once you hit 45.
1. Helm- Cast Superior Camo, We don’t even get this spell till 49. You will need it if you plan on going into dungeons to farm some upgrades.
2. Vambraces-I used these a lot. They cast stinging swarm for free and we don’t get a better DoT till 54.
3. Gloves- These are nice but most of the time we should have 35 mana to ensnare something. Invest in them if you can get a good deal but I wouldn’t spend my money on these right off the bat. Iksar scale gloves are cheap and easy to get for this slot.
4. Bracer- This is the most important piece and yes I know it’s expensive but I managed to buy one myself and if you are in the same mind set as I was you should have more than enough money to buy yourself the things you need. This item makes soloing much cheaper since we no longer are going to make our own arrows.
Ways to Solo:
These are a few ways that I like to solo with my setup. You can snare and kite it around, this works pretty good at lower levels. You want to make sure to keep flame lick on them to keep their hps from regening up if you miss a few times. You can throw in some DD nukes and get them close to the 20% range where they will run and you can finish them off in melee
Root rotting- This is the same way druids root rot. Root it, flame lick/Stinging swarm and hit it with your bow. Sit down between bow shots and keep meding and keep reapply your 2 dots and root. I like this way of getting a mobs down to a range where you can most likely finish him off with melee. Make sure to always bring extra arrow crafting mats when you are out in the wilds.
I like this tactic because it allows you to take minimal damage and be higher on mana incase of a pvp situation. This tactic should only we used on non caster mobs unless they can be out ranged by your bow/arrows. When fighting casters apply the same but make sure you are out of range to sit and bow. Move back into range and reapply dots and then hurry and back out before their spell can land. (This no longer applies due to patch change.) . Please note that when a mob is standing still and is shot by a bow it will increase your bow damage at higher levels.
This does not apply to rooted mob but with the dots plus that lowered bow damage works pretty well.
Joisting- Root your mob and joist it while you have some dots on it. By joisting you just run into range turn on auto attack and move out of melee before they get another swing at you. I sometimes use this tactic to see if I can get my swarmcaller to proc before going into constant melee.
Straight up tank and spank: Make sure you are fully buffed and have thorns on. Root and back out to heal or reapply dots/ ds. This is a good combo with the root rotting if you want to conserve arrows.
Setting goals for gear and exp:
Setting goals for yourself is a good way for keeping yourself interested in the game and your class. I like to look for upgrades and what levels I could get exp while camping these said upgrades. This will be outlined in my hunting area section below.
When looking for upgrades we are going to check mob levels and zone levels. This does not always mean we will not be farming a green mob but we need to see if there is something solo able in the zone while we wait between spawns.
Most of the mobs we need to look for are non casters. These are not our strong suit for soloing. We can always come back at a higher level if we cannot take them out.
Use the wiki to search for the types of armor you want. I suggest mostly strength items. Having a dexterity set of gear is nice too for procs and bow crits but I never found it necessary. You will want resist gear for pvp.
Always fighting in areas with good money drops is another goal to exp tactic that is usually outlined in many other class guides.
Hunting Areas
This is an outline of the path that I took while soloing most of my levels. This is in no way the only path you can take. We have track and if you can make it work for you go for it. Most of this guide will be heavily in Faydwer. I branch out later on in this guide for more upgrades and money farming.
1-8
Greater Faydark. - Not going to go into much detail on this. Noobie trash stuff, kill bees sell the jelly. Move over to Orc hill and start collecting those belts for your leather armor.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Cracked staffs
Crushbone belts
9-16
Crushbone- Use your discretion on where you want to kill.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Crushbone belts
Bracers of battle x2- Can stay in CB till around 17 or 18 to get this or move onto next hunting location and come back around 20 to get this and a Dwarven Ringmail Tunic. This is optional because it can take some time to get these.
Brass earrings x4- You will want to wear 2 of these and do the Taskmaster Earring quest. Hand them into the Highelf male to get the quest piece for the 2 strength rings.
Shiny Brass Shield- You can use this till you get 17 and get duel wield. It’s an ok saleable item on red.
16-19
Lesser Faydark- Nightbright sister’s camp. This is a great cash camp, bronze weapons sell for up to 5pp each. I know this may be over camped on blue but it was open all the time for me on red. Worse case it is a good place to get a gank and make some extra plat. There is a ranger outpost close by at (-280, 1255) this is a good place to find some ring mail on the vendors if someone from Mistmoore sold some to them. Sell all your bronze weapons here if you become over weight. Make the judgment call on if you want to run back slow or run back with a bunch of money on you.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Bronze weapons(Vendor junk)
Another thing to note from being the Faydark. Foraging made me a good amount of money leveling up with selling morning dews. These do not sell as well now due to the change in cultural armor needing blue diamonds. It doesn’t hurt to collecting them and attempt to sell them. Cinnamon sticks are also an item to keep.
Keep an eye on track for Whimsy Larktwitter. She can drop a nice bow.
After spending some time here this is a good time to spend your money on some banded armor or work on your fletching.
20-45
Castle Mistmoore
This is an amazing zone for a ranger. Great money and it is an outdoor zone. I will just go through a brief walk through on where I camped through these levels. Note that certain mobs change from living to undead based off of the in game time. After 7pm mobs will flip to undead/werewolves. Be careful if soloing in an area that may be cleared but when the time changes they will respawn.
20-30
Pond area/ Front enterance. – You can kill mobs here and in the gorge till around 30. Gargoyles’ drop eyes that vendor for 9pp each. Make sure to use harmony once you get level 22. This will make almost all your pulls single. Note that even though a mob is harmonized you cannot walk into them or pull another mob through them or they will agro.
30-39
After level 30 we will move into the graveyard. This is a nice place to pick up some sellable items.
Please view the map below to show camp spot and what mobs we will be killing.
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The Red is our camp; it is right behind the mausoleum. Make sure not to hit Ssynthi, He can be killed but will ruin your faction with Sol temple in Lavastorm. The three blue circles will be the mobs that are pretty safe to kill without having to worry about them being casters. The one by the secret wall in the PH for an avenging caitiff. It will path out of the wall so you do not need to go into the jail room to pull it. At night it can be a vampire and can drop essence of moonlight. These are also used for cultural armor and can be sold sometimes. The next blue circle closest to camp if the ph for an imp familiar. He can drop a couple low end items that tend to sell. After you gain a few levels you can attempt to take the other mobs within the graveyard on but remember they are casters and we have no way of interrupting them.
39+
Once we hit 39 we will have sow and levitate. This is when I moved up to a cloaked dhampyre camp. You will want to levitate up the tree up by the castle entrance and float across the gorge. You can kill the mobs on the outside of the wall for exp and kill the other mobs in the court yard by levitating over the wall. Mostly all of these mobs should be solo pull with harmony. The hooded black cloak is a good selling item and make sure you pick up one for yourself.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Bronze/Fine steel weapons/ Vendor junk.
Ring mail armor.
Gargoyle eyes.
Bloodstone Eyepatch-Good upgrade and worth some plat.
Crested Spaulders- Sells pretty good.
Crested Helm- Sold many of these in my days on red.
Essence of moonlight.
We would like to get some diamondine earrings but we will have to come back at a later time to farm these. We will want to get the vampire fangs from the Maid and Butler later on too to complete our Call of Flame quest.
This is a good time to head over to Steamfont and spawn the Minotaur hero and get the shackle for your hero bracer.
40-44
Rathe Mountain’s Hill Giants.
Since we have SoW it’s time to do some traveling. This camp is a hot spot for some ganking but the rewards are worth it. Make sure you sell your stuff to buy stack of peridots from the gnome over by the inn. Since we get sneak we can sell and bank in Oggok. Use harmony and sneak up behind the vendors and sell you junk. Do the same for the banker/ guard there.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Platinum and gems.
Petrafin can spawn here and drops a nice bracer we could use.
45-50
Oggok guards.
These guys drop good sellable weapons/ shields and steins. Use sneak to vendor and bank here. Make note this can be a hard place to get out of it pvp happens.
Items we are looking for in this area?
Vendor junk.
Steins can be sold to other players.
50-55
This area is kind of hard and I spent some time doing fear kiting duo with a friend and did some charm kiting with another friend. Shout out to Mcloven and Loudog.
When soloing in this time frame I would do Ice giants in Everfrost. The aviaks in TD and the raptors in TD.
I hope this guide allowed you to see my path soloing on my ranger and maybe give you some ideas for yourself. I did many other things while leveling up like farming gear but these are the areas I made most of my gains in levels.
Below I will post a list of gear that I currently wear to give some look into what I use.
Head- Tolan’s Darkwood helmet. Hammerhead Helmet. Blackened Iron Crown.
Neck-Flame Runes Pendent.
Mask- Grotesque mask. Mask of Wurms.
Earrings- Diamondine. Sarnak Earrings of Station. Fish bone earrings.
Shoulder- Pegasus feather cloak. Bloodstained mantle.
Back- Hooded Black cloak. Cloak of Shadows. Cloak of the Icebear.
Bracers- Tolan’s Darkwood bracer. Bracer of Vajeen. Hero Bracers. Granite Bracer.
Gauntlets- Tolan’s Darkwood Gauntlets. Gauntlets of Potency.
Chest- Rubicite Breastplate. Treeweave. Sarnak emblazed tabard.
Arms- Tolan’s Darkwood Vambraces. Mithril Vambraces.
Legs- Mithril Greaves.
Boots- Dwarven Workboots.
Rings- Platium Fire Wedding Ring. Gem Encrusted Ring.
Belt- Flowing Black Silk Sash.
Ranged- RainCaller
Weapons- Swarmcaller. Woodsmans Staff. Lamentation. Green Jade Broadsword. Sarnak Warhammer. Wurmslayer.
Please let me know if I have messed anything up or need to change something.
I spent some time trying to make this as helpful as possible and I look forward to all your feed back.
Thank you and hopefully this helps out some young rangers out there.
