Guild Wars 2

dietzero.3514:

So basically just spam everything during those 10 seconds, until you can get back to your actual DPS. Nice. I thought we were meant to save the skills for when they are needed?

you know, some skills have quite low cooldown, you can use them and keep the long cooldown ones for when you need them, as you say… but you will be still limited by attunement cooldowns, just like any other class with weapon swap…

Just as a preface, I only have ~120 games in PvP and ~200 hours on my ele. All of the time in PvP has been on a cele staff 6 in water and arcana, with a healer/bunker style gameplay. I think this sugesstion is just silly borderline stupid (OP) along with some of the suggestions I’ve seen for traits other warriors want to make baseline or near baseline (make dogged march minor, or fast hands baseline).

Yes I use Elemental Attunement, at first it was because I wanted more swiftness in PvE and because I always tried to max out the profession mechanic line of each of my alts. I kept it because well there really isn’t any other Master trait that I liked. As others have pointed out the only reason you want this baseline is because of the protection. The 1-2 stacks of might you get in fire is pretty meh, and the regen isn’t that great either, outside of great synergy with Cleansing Water. If you’re using Sig of Air or have One with Air the swiftness isn’t as important either. The regen is nice when stacked with other healing abilities, but really the protection is all you care about. Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly, by that logic some would said that warriors should have cleansing ire, fast hands, and dogged march baseline (and of those 3 I only use CI). My war has never gone more than Adapt level into discipline for sig mastery and I’ve loved every 4,000+ hour on him.

On the “but it what makes the class feel right” I’ll say this. My friend mains a zerker staff ele, in PvP, WvW, and PvE. He goes 6 into fire and air, and has never once used Evasive Arcana or Elemental Attunement, nor does he feel the need to. Plus he’s already decided to go into water (for the damage traits) or maybe replace air for tempest if it strikes his fancy, but he’d hate to give up lightening rod. He doesn’t like the stuff in arcana and he’s done just fine for his life as an ele. And as he puts it, he’s gotten really good at dodging.

The only complaint I have is that we have to choose between Attunement and Evasive Arcana, which is a tough choice. I like Attunement more, but Evasive Arcana is more useful, so my ele will need to decide when the time comes. If they want to make Attunement more competitive they should mess with the numbers a bit and maybe increase the might stacks and/or maybe give water a small duration resistance instead of regen (though that’ll compete a bit against Diamond Skin). Plus all the master level traits kinda suck imo, I’ll most likely just take Elemental Contingency shrug, but then again I do get to get the entirety of earth to make up for it.

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

People can enjoy any build. That does not mean it is comparatively viable. Without Elemental Attunement, an ele explodes.

scerevisiae.1972:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

All you’re saying is that the ele needs the protection from that trait. I’ll agree that it kinda sucks being in a grandmaster spot against Evasive Arcana, which I’d say is slightly better (~2k heal with condi cleanse on dodge (plus the other effects, including a blast finisher) vs. perm regen, but you lose the 5s of protection on ~8-10 sec cd if you dance into earth constantly, which is a bit too powerful really). I think all the master level traits in arcane are incredibly bad too, so really Arcana has a bum wrap.

But I can list a bunch of GM traits that do not “change the way you play”. How do any of the Fire GMs “change the way you play”, were you not blasting your fire fields before? Were you not stacking might before? The only argument can be made for wanting to burn your foes more. How does Bountiful Power “change the way you play”, it doesn’t. It’s just a dps buff. Does Diamond Skin really change how you play, other than wanting to stay above 90% hp (which you want anyway if you run scholars runes), and it’s a had counter to some builds and completely useless vs. others. Stone Heart just means you camp earth, I guess good for a condi build, but not really “build defining”. For Ranger’s Marksmanship, all 3 are just a dps boost, but just in different ways, you just pick the one most relevant to your play style, again not build defining. I can go on a lot longer……is your argument that all of those other traits need to be change so they are more “build defining”. [To be fair, some GMs are really awesome, build defining traits, but there are so many that don’t fit the bill.]

By your logic I could quote many other wars saying that Fast Hands, Cleansing Ire, and Dogged March should be made baseline because “every war takes them” (cough). Or that Fast Hands and Cleansing Ire make the “class mechanic feel right.” Guess what, before Cleansing Ire was introduced warrior had no real useful condi cleanse outside of a single build. It would be crazy if they made it baseline, freeing up a spot for wars to take more +damage traits.

All you want is it baseline, so you don’t have to spend a traitline to gain some sustain, like other classes have to.

dietzero.3514:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

People can enjoy any build. That does not mean it is comparatively viable. Without Elemental Attunement, an ele explodes.

On the staff an ele has, 1 knockback, 2 interrupt fields, immob, chill, heal, heal and condi cleanse, reflect, an evade, and a blast finsiher (for either might, healing, swiftness, or frost arua).

Having the versatility on the weapon skills frees up what you need to fill on your utils. If you want more defense you can take it, just like other classes have that option to spec for more defense.

If you want protection/defense you can:
Glyph of Elemental Harmony (earth)
Glyph of Elemental Power (earth)
Arcane Shield (block)
Armor of Earth
Mist Form (invuln)
Conjure Earth Shield (which will be getting a buff)
Signet of Earth (Which is 16% less damage in exotic zerker gear)
Use skills that apply blinds or evade skills or skills that let you kite better (chills, immob)

Or you know, just take Elemental Attunement

Any class that doesn’t take any survivability traits, utilts, or both will be blown over by a stiff wind, that isn’t unique to the ele.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

dietzero.3514:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

People can enjoy any build. That does not mean it is comparatively viable. Without Elemental Attunement, an ele explodes.

On the staff an ele has, 1 knockback, 2 interrupt fields, immob, chill, heal, heal and condi cleanse, reflect, an evade, and a blast finsiher (for either might, healing, swiftness, or frost arua).

Having the versatility on the weapon skills frees up what you need to fill on your utils. If you want more defense you can take it, just like other classes have that option to spec for more defense.

If you want protection/defense you can:
Glyph of Elemental Harmony (earth)
Glyph of Elemental Power (earth)
Arcane Shield (block)
Armor of Earth
Mist Form (invuln)
Conjure Earth Shield (which will be getting a buff)
Signet of Earth (Which is 16% less damage in exotic zerker gear)
Use skills that apply blinds or evade skills or skills that let you kite better (chills, immob)

Or you know, just take Elemental Attunement

Any class that doesn’t take any survivability traits, utilts, or both will be blown over by a stiff wind, that isn’t unique to the ele.

Your list is pointless. Every class has utlity skills. You also listed some horrible skills, which leads me to believe you just wikied and copied them, without understanding what you were saying.

And no, it is very much unique to Elementalists. Having the lowest health and armour does that.

There will not be a viable PvP build without Arcane and Water, unless Tempest is ridiculous.

dietzero.3514:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

snip

Your list is pointless. Every class has utlity skills. You also listed some horrible skills, which leads me to believe you just wikied and copied them, without understanding what you were saying.

And no, it is very much unique to Elementalists. Having the lowest health and armour does that.

There will not be a viable PvP build without Arcane and Water, unless Tempest is ridiculous.

I did wiki to make sure I got them all, and I realized that some were trash, but they still provide what you’re asking for baseline: ways to help you survive.

Yes, if you want to be tanky, you will most likely take Arcane and Water (and earth). If you want to be an Auramancer you will most likely take Fie, Water, and Earth (maybe air instead of water if you want to be selfish auramancer, which the Earth trait means you can live without Elemental Attunement). If you want to do the most damage you’ll go Fire, Water, and Air. And I’m sure there may be an attempt at a condi ele, Fire, Earth and ???. It’s called tradeoffs. Kill something quickly and you don’t need to worry about protection, for example. Or go auramancer, it seems to be what the new meta is going to be to finally replace d/d eles.

If you think eles should have 6s of protection (even if it’s just self protection) on a 10s (8s in arcana) cd baseline, I just can’t agree with you. The trait is powerful, if you want it go trait for it. If you don’t want to be in Arcana find other ways to fill the hole (like the plethora of diverse weapon skills eles get or a different trait line) and move on.

There will only be a condition ele if Tempest somehow does it. Same with Auramancer, due to the bad trait layout, and the ‘only from weapon skills’ aura sharing trait.

You keep talking about eles like they are the same as other professions. They are not. They have the lowest health and armour, and have to use every single trait point and utility for survival in PvP. NOTHING has indicated this will change. All Anet has done is force 99% of eles to once again spec water/arcane, and drop Evasive Arcana.

dietzero.3514:

There will only be a condition ele if Tempest somehow does it. Same with Auramancer, due to the bad trait layout, and the ‘only from weapon skills’ aura sharing trait.

I said the condi ele might come out as an option, they do have 2 traits that can give them extra condi from power and toughness. I was thinking if Soldier’s gear would give a celestial “feel” after the trait changes happened, though the fire trait is in a really bad spot.

And if you listened to the live stream, they said that they were considering auras from all sources not just from weapon skills, thus making an auramancer very viable.

You keep talking about eles like they are the same as other professions. They are not. They have the lowest health and armour, and have to use every single trait point and utility for survival in PvP. NOTHING has indicated this will change. All Anet has done is force 99% of eles to once again spec water/arcane, and drop Evasive Arcana.

I never said they were the same. Every profession has their different mechanic, hp, armor, weapons, traits, and utils that separate them.

Eles have a ton of skills that provide them with utility
Necros have a bit of fear and a 2nd hp bar (which are honestly in a much worse place compared to ele)
Mes have clones and steath
Rangers have range, and a few evades
Thieves have steath and spamable skills
Engis have kit versatility
Guards have high armor, protection and aegis
Wars have high hp/armor and a decent amount of blocks and invuls

And again I point out that you could just go straight up damage, which is also getting a boost with the new traits. You’ll die just as quick as a necro (who doesn’t have an evades or many helpful boons). And you’ll be able to ~2-4 shot a thief, guard, mes, necro. When the new traits come out, you can also go auramancer, or try something new that’s fun.

If you think an ele is only viable with 75% uptime on protection then either you need learn to dodge/try a ranged version or the entire class needs a rework.

The entire profession DOES need a rework.

Eles are not getting a DPS boost with the new traits, they are mostly getting nerfs. Auramancer is not viable, which I just said, and a glass ele dies about 10 times faster than a necro.

I have to ask: do you play the game?

Wallace MacBix.2089:

scerevisiae.1972:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

All you’re saying is that the ele needs the protection from that trait. I’ll agree that it kinda sucks being in a grandmaster spot against Evasive Arcana, which I’d say is slightly better (~2k heal with condi cleanse on dodge (plus the other effects, including a blast finisher) vs. perm regen, but you lose the 5s of protection on ~8-10 sec cd if you dance into earth constantly, which is a bit too powerful really). I think all the master level traits in arcane are incredibly bad too, so really Arcana has a bum wrap.

But I can list a bunch of GM traits that do not “change the way you play”. How do any of the Fire GMs “change the way you play”, were you not blasting your fire fields before? Were you not stacking might before? The only argument can be made for wanting to burn your foes more. How does Bountiful Power “change the way you play”, it doesn’t. It’s just a dps buff. Does Diamond Skin really change how you play, other than wanting to stay above 90% hp (which you want anyway if you run scholars runes), and it’s a had counter to some builds and completely useless vs. others. Stone Heart just means you camp earth, I guess good for a condi build, but not really “build defining”. For Ranger’s Marksmanship, all 3 are just a dps boost, but just in different ways, you just pick the one most relevant to your play style, again not build defining. I can go on a lot longer……is your argument that all of those other traits need to be change so they are more “build defining”. [To be fair, some GMs are really awesome, build defining traits, but there are so many that don’t fit the bill.]

Couldn’t really disagree more, all those GM traits you listed as examples do actually dfine how you play. Spec Persisting Flames, and you will try to CC people in your LF, & you will probably take both blast utilities so you can triple blast your fire fields for 30+secs of fury.

Pyro’s puissance makes you camp fire as much as possible.

Blinding ashes makes burn your go to IWin button.

etc, i could go on, but i’ll just generalise and say that most GM traits do define a playstyle.

EAtt doesn’t, because with the exception of pure PVE builds, every Ele must switch attunements often.

All you want is it baseline, so you don’t have to spend a traitline to gain some sustain, like other classes have to.

Every other class comes with innate survivability built in: warrior has the highest HP & armour, 7.5K HP more than (nearly double) base Ele HP, plus heavy armour. Not sure what kind of point you’re trying to make with warrior conditions, warrs have among the best condi management in the game now.

every other class than Ele has some kind of built-in sustain/survivability mechanic, eg: mesmer has clones + stealth, thief has steath + mobility, guardian has aegis + heals & heavy armour, necro has a second HP bar, etc.

Ele has… more skills?

Wallace MacBix.2089:

If you think eles should have 6s of protection (even if it’s just self protection) on a 10s (8s in arcana) cd baseline, I just can’t agree with you.

Agree, 6s prot on a ~10sec CD is too much, something like 3s (self-only) would be more reasonable.

The trait is powerful, if you want it go trait for it. If you don’t want to be in Arcana find other ways to fill the hole (like the plethora of diverse weapon skills eles get or a different trait line) and move on.

that’s just the problem, for the past 2.5 years virtually every PVP/WVW Ele has been pidgeonholed into water + arcane + 2+ cantrip utilities + reasonably tanky gear just to perform half-decently.

It sucks. You can lightly say “spec something else” but when “something else” is objectively worse than the “core build”, is it really a choice?

I’ve tried playing Ele without EAtt and to me it just doesn’t feel right. i play all 8 classes fairly frequently and no other class has quite the same level of pidgeonholing… except maybe thief being more or less forced to take some level of stealth.

As i’ve said elsewhere, i’d glady take solo EAtt (in weakened form) as baseline and take nerfs elsewhere just to address 1) the baseline survivability issue and 2) the core “feel” of how the class plays.

scerevisiae.1972:

except maybe thief being more or less forced to take some level of stealth.

..and FWIW, i do think thief should get stealth as their F2 skill, it’s also a core part of the class.

Nilix.2170:

Conncept.7638:

Immunity to conditions while above a certain health threshold

Hey man, if you don’t want that, they can always give it to Engi instead

Engi’s can have it as far as I’m concerned. The threshold is 90%. On paper I couldn’t wait to equip this trait, but then I found it completely useless is just about every facet of the game (PvE, WvW, and PvP), since as an Ele getting knocked below 90% HP is far too easy.

Woljnir.7810:

Nilix.2170:

Conncept.7638:

Immunity to conditions while above a certain health threshold

Hey man, if you don’t want that, they can always give it to Engi instead

Engi’s can have it as far as I’m concerned. The threshold is 90%. On paper I couldn’t wait to equip this trait, but then I found it completely useless is just about every facet of the game (PvE, WvW, and PvP), since as an Ele getting knocked below 90% HP is far too easy.

Yeah I would love to see Diamond Skin go, it’s a really bad trait: totally overpowered in 1v1s vs condi specs, but close to useless in every other PVP/WVW scenario.

It was nearly universally criticised when it was proposed in the Ele forum, but they went ahead with it anyway…

scerevisiae.1972:

Woljnir.7810:

Nilix.2170:

Conncept.7638:

Immunity to conditions while above a certain health threshold

Hey man, if you don’t want that, they can always give it to Engi instead

Engi’s can have it as far as I’m concerned. The threshold is 90%. On paper I couldn’t wait to equip this trait, but then I found it completely useless is just about every facet of the game (PvE, WvW, and PvP), since as an Ele getting knocked below 90% HP is far too easy.

Yeah I would love to see Diamond Skin go, it’s a really bad trait: totally overpowered in 1v1s vs condi specs, but close to useless in every other PVP/WVW scenario.

It was nearly universally criticised when it was proposed in the Ele forum, but they went ahead with it anyway…

Karl is pretty bad at designing traits. 10% faster movement while in Air? 10% chance on crit to cause a 1 second burn, as a GRANDMASTER minor?

I am really worried about the Tempest traits…

Anyway, they need to nerf Elemental Attunment and then bake it in.

This class needs to be nerfed to the ground or redesigned. Sadly arenanet neither have a class team or a balance team.

Simzani.4318:

This class needs to be nerfed to the ground or redesigned. Sadly arenanet neither have a class team or a balance team.

I’m going to take a wild guess and say you’ve never played it.

Elemental Attunement is getting nerfed even if they wouldn’t make it GM trait. The reason for that is reduced boon duration which you currently get from putting points in arcana line. The protection uptime will go down.

scerevisiae.1972:

I’m going to take a wild guess and say you’ve never played it.

He’s quite right. That profession is never balanced properly, it’s either overpowered or underpowered and anet balance team has no idea how to make that class tick. The next patch will swing the pendulum to the underpowered side for about a year.

rotten.9753:

scerevisiae.1972:

I’m going to take a wild guess and say you’ve never played it.

He’s quite right. That profession is never balanced properly, it’s either overpowered or underpowered and anet balance team has no idea how to make that class tick. The next patch will swing the pendulum to the underpowered side for about a year.

He wants eles nerfed to the ground. That is not balance.

rotten.9753:

scerevisiae.1972:

I’m going to take a wild guess and say you’ve never played it.

He’s quite right. That profession is never balanced properly, it’s either overpowered or underpowered and anet balance team has no idea how to make that class tick. The next patch will swing the pendulum to the underpowered side for about a year.

Totally agree that Anet don’t know how to balance Ele, that much is obvious, it’s gone from UP at release to really OP to UP to reasonably balanced in 2.5 years, while being stuck in water/arcane for the entire time (and for the foreseeable future).

I only meant that Ele hardly needs to be “nerfed to the ground” atm.

I think what it does need is greater baseline defense, such as caster-only, shorter duration Elemental Attunement as baseline, and then other stuff needs to be brought down a bit (or maybe not, as everything else is going up in power).

runeblade.7514:

Can Ele be viable without Elemental attunement or Evasive arcana?

If so, it doesn’t need to be baseline.

If we’re talking PVP/WVW, then no, it can’t. Even berserker Fresh Air specs used to take EAtt.

So in practise, looking at the past 2.5+ years, every competitive PVP/WVW spec has involved EAtt.

If a particular trait ceases to be a choice, then surely it should be baseline, even if it means bringing other stuff down.

IndigoSundown.5419:

In my view, Elemental Attunement is getting a buff via the projected update. Half of its benefit is baseline, and the other half no longer costs stat points. At this point, the question becomes whether the actual trait choices (minor and major) justify the investment.

Elemental Attunement is a trait. You are confusing it with Attunement Recharge Rate.

dietzero.3514:

Elemental Attunement is a trait. You are confusing it with Attunement Recharge Rate.

Thank you, yes, I was.

Looks like they changed it to an Arcane minor trait:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/elementalist/Well-Elemental-Attunement-is-back/first#post5127394

Probably replacing Arcane Precision, which is quite possibly the worst trait in the game.