Guild Wars 2

So before the last balance patch, most people complained about eles and engis and that they were too OP.

After the best ideas of the balance team were implemented, what do I still see dominating?

Eles, nade spamming engis, turret engis.

Bravo.

style.6173:

So before the last balance patch, most people complained about eles and engis and that they were too OP.

After the best ideas of the balance team were implemented, what do I still see dominating?

Eles, nade spamming engis, turret engis.

Bravo.

Word and Action is different; that is why.

Remember; Action is serious, Word is joke.

Suggestion; do not take word serious until Action.

The last balance patch was incredibly forgettable. The difference it made was so tiny that it really didn’t change anything. I predict it may have something to do with not wating to spend the resources bandaid fixing things that will be changed on a larger scale come HoT. Or maybe its wishful thanking, and not much will change, but I’d rather believe its the first thing.

Well we still see a lot of zerker thieves around too. Where is the nerf to fire+air?

I don’t remember people complaining about class stacking when every single team had a guard-thief-mesmer in the comp. Now that we see more eles-engi-war than before people start to QQ.

xDudisx.5914:

Well we still see a lot of zerker thieves around too. Where is the nerf to fire+air?

I don’t remember people complaining about class stacking when every single team had a guard-thief-mesmer in the comp. Now that we see more eles-engi-war than before people start to QQ.

That’s because the OP is a thief like all the ones that make ele/engy nerf threads. He fails to understand the role of a thief, which is not to 1vs1 tanky specs( made to hold points under heavy fire), I’d suggest him to play an ele seen as he likes to play duellist hero so much …but got screenshots of him playing as ele..he failed terribly, ended up with 0 pts so…

Incendiary Powder wasn’t touched. That’s why you still see cele rifle engi around so much. Shaving even 1 second off the base would be a step toward better balance.

Turret engi could be easily fixed by making Accelerant-Packed Turrets a master level trait again.

I actually see a big difference with d/d ele’s power. Though still a little too good, it’s not nearly as overwhelming of a difference.

Exedore.6320:

Incendiary Powder wasn’t touched. That’s why you still see cele rifle engi around so much. Shaving even 1 second off the base would be a step toward better balance.

Turret engi could be easily fixed by making Accelerant-Packed Turrets a master level trait again.

I actually see a big difference with d/d ele’s power. Though still a little too good, it’s not nearly as overwhelming of a difference.

PERSONALLY, I still feel that Ele’s boons in arcana are a bit over the top. Boons tend to be the reason why ele stand out so much, boons are potent and they have a lot of them. (Duration might be the bigger concern, not really sure). Its a big part of why they have a bit too much sustain. They also tend to do a bit too much damage for being Arcana+Water and some earth, but again that’s probably a bit of a boon issue.

ronpierce.2760:

Exedore.6320:

Incendiary Powder wasn’t touched. That’s why you still see cele rifle engi around so much. Shaving even 1 second off the base would be a step toward better balance.

Turret engi could be easily fixed by making Accelerant-Packed Turrets a master level trait again.

I actually see a big difference with d/d ele’s power. Though still a little too good, it’s not nearly as overwhelming of a difference.

PERSONALLY, I still feel that Ele’s boons in arcana are a bit over the top. Boons tend to be the reason why ele stand out so much, boons are potent and they have a lot of them. (Duration might be the bigger concern, not really sure). Its a big part of why they have a bit too much sustain. They also tend to do a bit too much damage for being Arcana+Water and some earth, but again that’s probably a bit of a boon issue.

•Elementalist: Flexibility, jack of all trades, large skillsets. High AoE potential. High skill floor – hard for new players to jump in and high skill ceiling.
?Weakness: Recovering from burst damage, but water attunement can help sustain the damage. Versatility is strength but also weakness – higher cooldowns on weapon skills. Inability to deal with booned enemies.
?Official design: Versatility through weapon skills – we want to maintain that. Defense against sustained DPS is good and they are very supportive in most roles they assume. Low base HP is an intentional design so we can give them more support. Poor defense against spike damage is also intended so they have to wary about spike damage. Escapeability: too much in the past and helped them against spike damage. Inability against booned enemies is a specific hole in the role since they can AoE from ranged.

Lowest base stats among all classes is the price ele pay for the powerful boon as you say, working as intended according to anet, unless you have a better suggestion as trade off for being the squishiest class by design

Supreme.3164:

ronpierce.2760:

Exedore.6320:

Incendiary Powder wasn’t touched. That’s why you still see cele rifle engi around so much. Shaving even 1 second off the base would be a step toward better balance.

Turret engi could be easily fixed by making Accelerant-Packed Turrets a master level trait again.

I actually see a big difference with d/d ele’s power. Though still a little too good, it’s not nearly as overwhelming of a difference.

PERSONALLY, I still feel that Ele’s boons in arcana are a bit over the top. Boons tend to be the reason why ele stand out so much, boons are potent and they have a lot of them. (Duration might be the bigger concern, not really sure). Its a big part of why they have a bit too much sustain. They also tend to do a bit too much damage for being Arcana+Water and some earth, but again that’s probably a bit of a boon issue.

•Elementalist: Flexibility, jack of all trades, large skillsets. High AoE potential. High skill floor – hard for new players to jump in and high skill ceiling.
?Weakness: Recovering from burst damage, but water attunement can help sustain the damage. Versatility is strength but also weakness – higher cooldowns on weapon skills. Inability to deal with booned enemies.
?Official design: Versatility through weapon skills – we want to maintain that. Defense against sustained DPS is good and they are very supportive in most roles they assume. Low base HP is an intentional design so we can give them more support. Poor defense against spike damage is also intended so they have to wary about spike damage. Escapeability: too much in the past and helped them against spike damage. Inability against booned enemies is a specific hole in the role since they can AoE from ranged.

Lowest base stats among all classes is the price ele pay for the powerful boon as you say, working as intended according to anet, unless you have a better suggestion as trade off for being the squishiest class by design

That’s exactly what needs to happen. I don’t play ele enough to give “proper” suggestions, and they don’t just need nerfs. But the problem is that boons cause sort of an exponential effect with buffs AND nerfs, so they swing really easily from UP and OP. They need less boon duration (maybe access, but not necessarily) and more incentive to go into other trees for damage, since they’re a little too good at everything at once. They would clearly need compensation. A possible good compensation is reducing some of the cooldowns on some of their abilities in the process, since its often discussed, and again, more reason to go into other routes for damage in PvP. Don’t have all the answers, just stating an underlining issue. Of course they’d need buffs to offset the nerfs or they’d go back to being useless.

That’s exactly what needs to happen. I don’t play ele enough to give “proper” suggestions, and they don’t just need nerfs. But the problem is that boons cause sort of an exponential effect with buffs AND nerfs, so they swing really easily from UP and OP. They need less boon duration (maybe access, but not necessarily) and more incentive to go into other trees for damage, since they’re a little too good at everything at once. They would clearly need compensation. A possible good compensation is reducing some of the cooldowns on some of their abilities in the process, since its often discussed, and again, more reason to go into other routes for damage in PvP. Don’t have all the answers, just stating an underlining issue. Of course they’d need buffs to offset the nerfs or they’d go back to being useless.

Your concerns are valid and justified but cannot be considered, not out of spite ofc but because the elementalist rather than buffs would need a considerable re-work at core design levels. For starters the base stats should be changed, then most weapon skills should be reworked, finally the traitlines should be re-designed also.
Anet devs know this perfectly, they tried to force eles in more offensive trait lines( with quite few heavy nerfs in 2013) but that only revealed the huge core problems of the profession ( lack of sustain outside defensive lines, extremely low base stats etc etc etc ).

As you’ve correctly pointed out, the elementalist can only be buffed/nerfed from an UP state to an OP state and viceversa given the complete mess which is the core design. At this point it’s not only you who can’t come with a reasonable suggestion, the devs themselves don’t know how to balance ele without a huge rework

Supreme.3164:

That’s exactly what needs to happen. I don’t play ele enough to give “proper” suggestions, and they don’t just need nerfs. But the problem is that boons cause sort of an exponential effect with buffs AND nerfs, so they swing really easily from UP and OP. They need less boon duration (maybe access, but not necessarily) and more incentive to go into other trees for damage, since they’re a little too good at everything at once. They would clearly need compensation. A possible good compensation is reducing some of the cooldowns on some of their abilities in the process, since its often discussed, and again, more reason to go into other routes for damage in PvP. Don’t have all the answers, just stating an underlining issue. Of course they’d need buffs to offset the nerfs or they’d go back to being useless.

Your concerns are valid and justified but cannot be considered, not out of spite ofc but because the elementalist rather than buffs would need a considerable re-work at core design levels. For starters the base stats should be changed, then most weapon skills should be reworked, finally the traitlines should be re-designed also.
Anet devs know this perfectly, they tried to force eles in more offensive trait lines( with quite few heavy nerfs in 2013) but that only revealed the huge core problems of the profession ( lack of sustain outside defensive lines, extremely low base stats etc etc etc ).

As you’ve correctly pointed out, the elementalist can only be buffed/nerfed from an UP state to an OP state and viceversa given the complete mess which is the core design. At this point it’s not only you who can’t come with a reasonable suggestion, the devs themselves don’t know how to balance ele without a huge rework

Resources are a huge issue across the game. It probably would require a lot of core changes. For starters, though, Boons could have been slightly reduced in potency and all HP pools increased to 14/16/18k instead of the 10/14/18k (or whatever it is??) that we have right now. And things like Protection could possible go down to 25 or MAYBE even 20% (depending, because it’d have to be tested), and possibly even increase durations so that it balances itself out a bit. Sustain can still be sustain and soakers can still be soakers but the difference could be smaller.

Regardless though, you are right. Its a lot of work, and not really likely, not to poke fun, but especially given the types of 6 month “balance updates” we’ve been seeing, it seems a bit out of reach.