Black Desert Online Ranger Skill Combos Guide

Black Desert Online Ranger Skill Combos Guide by Crit

Note: With the Ranger awakening introduction, this guide is now incomplete. I will attend to this issue when I have the time.

Introduction

Hello.
This is a list of all known useful (and some pointless) Ranger combos. In this guide, you will be given the following:

•    Combo name (unofficial): These are what I call them; feel free to name the combos after breakfast foods instead.
•    Required skills: You will need these skills to perform the combo.
•    Keystroke sequence: What you will need to press to perform the combo.

• A bracketed key means you should tap it once, viz, you should press the key for the shortest possible duration. Example: [Q] means you should tap Q once.
• [Hold Q] means exactly what you think it does.
• Keys separated by a “+” mean they should be used simultaneously. Example: [W]+[F] means you should tap W and F at the same time.
• A bracket with multiple keys, separated by a slash, means that you can use either, but not both. Example: [A/D] means you should either tap A or D but not both.
• Steps are separated by the “>” symbol. Example: [W]+[F] > [Spacebar] means you should tap W and F simultaneously, then tap spacebar.
• [LMB], [RMB], and [MMB] refer to left, right, and middle mouse buttons. The MMB must be mechanical.

•    Effects and suggested uses: What the combo does, and how you can use it.
Final note: These combos are in their most basic form. I am giving you, in essence, a way to play every note on an instrument; it will be your job to play the sonata.

Combo List

•    Kick Cancel (small strafe)
•    Bow Mastery, Crescent Kick, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold F] > [A/D]
•    Each time you either tap A or D, you will fire a single normal attack and strafe to the side. Repeated tapping of A or D results in repeating the strafe in that direction. This combo allows for fast mana regeneration and decent mobility at the cost of stamina.

•    Kick Cancel (medium strafe)
•    Bow Mastery, Crescent Kick, Riding the Wind, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold F] > [A/D]+[Spacebar]
•    Each time you tap A or D with spacebar, you will fire a single normal attack, strafe to the side, then perform the skill Riding the Wind. This takes slightly more time but will allow you to strafe 150% farther. This combo allows for more mobility at the cost of more stamina.

•    Kick Cancel (large strafe)
•    Bow Mastery, Crescent Kick, Riding the Wind, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold F] > [Hold A/D]+[Hold Spacebar]
•    Each time you tap A or D with spacebar, you will fire a single normal attack, strafe to the side, then perform the skill Riding the Wind twice. This takes slightly more time but will allow you to strafe 400% farther. This combo allows for significant mobility at the cost of significant stamina. Note that this combo has a slightly longer landing animation. (Continue holding down A/D and Spacebar to zoom across the map at the cost of all of your stamina).

•    Complete Evasive Explosion Shot
•    Evasive Explosion Shot
•    [RMB]+[A/S/D] > [LMB]
•    You will leap into the air in the direction of your choice, dazing (PvP) or knocking down (PvE) close targets. You will then release an umbrella of arrows which spray down, inflicting AoE damage with “Down Attack” status. This is useful in escaping people next to you (PvP) and is an easy AoE grinding combo (PvE) at the cost of little mana and no stamina.

•    Umbrella
•    Evasive Explosion Shot, Riding the Wind
•    [LMB] at any time you are using Riding the Wind
•    You will interrupt Riding the Wind, release the umbrella of arrows from Evasive Explosion Shot, and fall a short distance backwards. This is the Ranger’s stamina-only AoE – no mana required. Consequently, it is very good at AoE regenerating mana. Umbrella can be chained in complex ways; for example:
o    [Hold LMB permanently]+[F] > [A/D]+[Spacebar] > [F] > [A/D]+[Spacebar] > [F] > [A/D]+[Spacebar] releases three umbrellas of arrows, while strafing to the side, and
[Hold LMB permanently]+[F] > [A/D]+[Spacebar] > [A/D] strafes to the side into the air, releases an umbrella, then strafes again.

•    Forward Acrobatics
•    Bow Mastery or Charging Kick, Flow: Call from Sky, Evasive Explosion Shot
•    [W]+[LMB] OR [W]+[F] > [Spacebar] > [LMB] OR [RMB]
•    You will rush forward (either firing an arrow while moving forward, or kicking forward), then perform a Riding the Wind-esque leap forward. You can then either end the combo, hit LMB to release Umbrella in the forward direction, or hit RMB to perform a third, even higher, leap. These acrobatics allow you to essentially strafe forward, which often confuses players that expect Rangers to only move to the side or back. Releasing Umbrella lets you AoE in front of you for no mana cost; performing Evasive Explosion Shot gives you more mobility. The two leaps – [Spacebar] and [RMB] – allow you to vault over obstacles, negating the need to use a parkour skill instead, which takes considerably more time. The LMB version of this skill is slightly faster, and easier to use. It also appears that this skill is an immunity frame.

•    Instant Q, aka Q cancel
•    Blasting Gust, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold Q]+[Hold A/D]
•    Fire Blasting Gust instantly and strafe to the side. Continuing to hold down all buttons results in more shots and more strafes. This empties mana and stamina quickly, but is AoE; therefore, it is good at sustaining an AoE from the mana regeneration in PvE, and it is good burst damage “filler” in PvP. Note that a Q Cancel can be used the same way as a Kick Cancel for using Riding the Wind or Umbrella.

•    Instant Q (Flow version)
•    Blasting Gust, Pinpoint, Flow: Pinpointing Gust
•    [LMB]+ (S) > [Q]
•    Fire Blasting Gust instantly. Useful for utilizing Blasting Gust’s knockdown effect quickly without wasting stamina.

•    Instant Q (S+E version)
•    Blasting Gust, Tearing Arrow
•   (S) +[E]+[LMB] > [Q]
•    Fire Blasting Gust instantly. Useful for utilizing Blasting Gust’s knockdown effect quickly without wasting stamina. Higher mana cost than flow skill; less skill points needed (as you will have learned Tearing Arrow for other usages, anyways)

•    Kiss of the Wind
•    Flow: Kiss of the Wind, Razor Wind III, Penetrating Wind IV
•    [E]+[Hold LMB] > [Hold Shift]
•    Fires the full duration of Razor Wind, then ends it with an instant Penetrating Wind. Very useful for DDing bosses that aren’t chasing you, or that are slow.

•    Instant Penetrating Wind (E version)
•    Flow: Kiss of the Wind, Razor Wind III, Penetrating Wind IV
•    [E] > [Shift]+[LMB] OR [Shift]+[RMB]
•    Fires a Penetrating Wind with a faster animation at the cost of much more mana. Using LMB versus RMB or LMB+RMB results in different effects; using the latter two results in a knockdown (I forget what LMB does).

•    Instant Penetrating Wind (S+E version)
•    Flow: Kiss of the Wind, Razor Wind III, Penetrating Wind IV, Tearing Arrow
•    [E]+(S) > [Shift]+[LMB]+RMB
•    Fires a Penetrating Wind with a faster animation at the cost of a little more mana. Penetrate Wind released in this manner is a long-ranged knockdown, which is very useful for PvP. Not using LMB will result in a slower animation, so make sure to use [Shift]+[LMB]+[RMB] in its entirety. Update: This knockdown is less effective now, and emphasis has shifted to burst damage. See Ultimate: Charging Wind. Special note: This combo requires a minimum of 350 mana to use, even though it won’t consume all of it. Also, this combo looks like this.

•    Instant Penetrating Wind (Crescent kick version)
•    Penetrating Wind I, Crescent Kick, Flow: Sharp Feather I
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold F] > [A/D] > [Shift]
•    Fire a Penetrating Wind slightly more quickly than with normal animation by comboing it off of Kick Cancel. Kick Cancel’s shot must hit target for this combo to succeed. Good for dodging and firing Penetrating Wind at the same time.

•    Instant Penetrating Wind (multiple shots)
•    Penetrating Wind I, Crescent Kick, Flow: Sharp Feather I
•    [Hold LMB]+[Hold F] > [A/D] > [Hold Shift] > [Tap F]
•    Fires multiple Penetrating Winds while remaining in place, with very little delay in between each usage. Requires extremely precise timing (took me several hours, good luck!). Good for converting your entire mana bar into damage quickly without using much stamina.

•    Instant Will of the Wind
•    Will of the Wind, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Hold A/D] > [Hold F] (Hit A or D slightly before F; this will not work unless you are first moving to the side)
•    Instantly fires Will of the Wind, one extra evasive shot, and then strafe to the side. Essentially a “melee Q cancel”, this destroys anything – especially downed targets – for extremely high mana cost and some stamina cost. I have no idea why the key combination works, as its not even listed in the description, but because of it I have no reason to put Will of the Wind on my bar or use the given key combination for it.

•    Instant Ultimate: Charging Wind
•    Ultimate: Charging Wind, Evasive Shot OR Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    [Any usage of Evasive Shot OR Ultimate: Evasive Shot] > [Spacebar]
•    Instantly fires Ultimate: Charging Wind, which is one of the hardest hitting skills a Ranger has (and the only one not to have a cooldown usage penalty). Combos extremely well with any skill. Examples below:

• [LMB]+[F] > [A/D] instantly fires Ultimate: Charging Wind
• [Hold LMB]+[Hold Q]+[Hold A/D] > [Spacebar] instantly fires Blasting Gust and Ultimate: Charging Wind. This combo is very good in PvP for the burst damage, which is now focused on in PvP.
• [Hold A/D]+[Hold F] > [Spacebar] instantly fires Will of the Wind and Ultimate: Charging Wind. (The bread-and-butter down-attack combo of the Ranger.)
• [Hold LMB permanently] > [Hold A/D until Evasive Shot goes off] > [Spacebar] > [A/D] > [Spacebar] continuously fires Ultimate: Charging Wind (easy grinding).

•    Instant Ultimate: Charging Wind from non-combat stance
•    Ultimate: Charging Wind, Ultimate: Evasive Shot
•    (Starting from non-combat stance): [W]+[LMB] > [A/D] > [Spacebar]
•    Instantly fires Ultimate: Evasive Shot from a non-combat stance. Extremely useless combo except for feeling cool as you whip out your bow and fire 12 arrows faster than Usaint Bolt.

•    Arborist
•    Call of the Earth, Botany major from certified university
•    [Hotkey for Call of the Earth] > move a few paces > repeat
•    Grow a forest of trees to instantly reduce global warming by .0000001%.

Miscellaneous Notes

•    Holding MMB down locks your “strafe vector” – i.e, even if you rotate your camera, “left” and “right” will remain the same for your character. This allows you to fire in a completely different direction than where you would normally. Example: [Hold MMB] > [Rotate camera 90 degrees to the right] > [Perform Q cancel with D] allows you to continuously fire Blasting Gust while, from your perspective, moving forward. This is an amazing chasing strategy. (Doing the above combo with A instead of D turns it into a retreat strategy, as you strafe backwards while firing.)

•    Experiment! When I said there are more ways to put combos together, I mean it. For example:
[A/D] > [F] > [Hold LMB]+[F]+[Shift] > [Shift]+[LMB]+[RMB] > [Spacebar] results in an Instant Will of the Wind into Kick Cancel into Penetrate Wind into Charging Wind into Ultimate: Charging Wind (which also, by the way, is one of the hardest hitting combos on a downed target.)

FAQ

•    Help! This combo isn’t working!

• Do you have enough mana?
• Do you have the required skills?
• If yes to both questions, you might want to try experimenting with your timings until you get them right. Feel free, also, to PM me or ask questions below – I’ll do my best to give you a more detailed description of each combo.

•    Where can I practice my combos?

• Find wooden dummies; they’re scattered in big rows across the map. When you hit them, you regenerate mana; this will save you a lot of money if you practice for a long time. I particularly like the wooden dummies in Hidel, as there are a lot of dummies, there is a lot of space, and the background music is good.

•    Do you know more combos?

• Yes. However, they are either useless (i.e, you can do an instant Penetrate Wind using Flow: Sharp Feather II instead, but it takes too long and merely looks cool) or they are already some combination of the combos I have listed in this post. Additionally, I do not know everything about this class, so feel free to contribute if you discover something by posting below.

•    I keep running out of mana and stamina when I’m fighting! Help!

• That’s resource management. Go practice.

Thus concludes the list of all known useful (and some pointless) Ranger combos.
Bye.