Rangers in Velious?

[Elmarnieh]

The defense cap issue only really pertains to mobs of levels greater to 51, lower than that rangers that focus on ac can tank mobs lower than the rangers level well. The majority of my time in Karnors 51-56 was spent in the roll of tank. Druids could heal me, shaman could heal me, clerics were bored of healing me.

I sometimes tank in sebilis though the defense cap issue is much more clearly revealed in sebilis and I try not to tank even cons or greater.

In groups we are very useful unless the group has a perfect balance, even then one LD tank and who is tanking, the cleric, the enchanter, or the rogue? Enchanter dies or LD, flame lick aggro and root park 3 mobs, then tank them down one by one.

In raids the tanks are defined and rangers become dps with utility. Moving to next target the ranger can toss a regen on their necro and patch heal people up to save the cleric's time, mana, and concentration.

You can build a "perfect" group warrior ench cleric rogue rogue rogue but it has very little flexibility if one of the trinity drops, and thats if you can find all of those available. In the real world xp and farming groups are usually made up of what is available and in those situations rangers are a great addition that provides a lot of flexibility to resist changing circumstances.