Guild Wars 2

I want to remain as unbiased as possible, so I will try my hardest to stay humble and civilized. This is about eles compared to every other class in PvP only

Given the latest development of the meta and the last MLG;

What can a ele bring to a table that other classes cant bring better and without that many sacrifices.

Perhaps you can answer me, given how there was zero eles in the last MLG I can tell they bring nothing, so I will expose my points and correct me if Im wrong, lets try to analize wht’s truly the ele’s problem, if he has any:

1. >Might stacking sharing;

As far as Im concerned, staff guardian already performs this better than us. In order for us to stack might to a party, we need to blow 1 arcane on 30 seconds CD, part of our combo, need to go from earth to fire, which each as 12-15 secs CD, huge in a fight where now your defensive attunement is on CD. A guardian provides about the same if not more amount and a heal, one skill, 15 secs CD, less if traited. Engis does a better job too. Warrior with banners if they do decide to do so too.

1. > Fury stacking;

I would say they are good with fire, but it goes down to the same issue with might stacking, long CDs, small radius, very conditional. Warrior has bigger radius and still uses the same banner. In this case warrior is still better while bring all the other things they bring already.

1. > Swiftness;

Once again, attunement used up, possibly arcane into lighting staff #5, or staff #4 , which has a 30 CD, small radius. Once again, guardian with one weapon, staff, does the same job, on lower CD, with a symbol so that people know where to go, instead of the ele having to chase down an ally and stick to it so that they get the buff.

1. > Healing.

I will admit they are good at this if traited for it, but in this game healing is not good enough, no amount of healing “120-300 healing” every second(unless self sustain in the case of healing signet for warriors and or the innate healing of guardians) will save you “1200-2500 damage” every second, plain and simple.

1. > Condition cleansing;

Shout guardian (which sadly is getting nerfed) does a great job, not only removes, but converts. A mesmer traited for it also does an amazing job (you would be surprised about it in this meta!) which each shatter removing a condition, I have been saved several times.

1. > Damage :

Here we could argue about LH and FGS, but I believe this are not acceptable in PvP, with a squishy build, and I believe gimmick mechanics should not become the main point of a class. I chose eles to play, well, an ele, not a warrior with low hp and armor. So while scepter has good potential, they only bring that, nothing to survive, nothing to the party, just that, damage. About every other class can bring tons of damage an still remain useful, this is not the case for scepter ele, D/D thief. We only have 2 damage conditions (bleed burn) so we cant fit in the meta.

DISCLAIMER Dont say “everything”, because this isnt the case. An ele traited in healing wont bring fury nor might stacking, an ele traited in damage wont bring healing nor condition cleansing. An ele with 2-3 cantrips bring NOTHING to the team, ALL cantrips are selfish, on long CD and their sole purpose is selfish survival of the ele. An ele with 2-3 arcanes bring nothing to the team either, all they do is damage. Please enlight me if I need to. Why should pros start bring eles to MLG when there is nothing that cna help them win.

PLease keep the “fun” argument out, I play eles for fun, but I want to also be a valuable asset, thats not too much to ask, right?

I believe the ele’s biggest issue is that; they spent so much time trying to keep themselves alive, that they cant do anything else. Hence why you see them bringing 2-3 cantrips and given the team well, nothing.

Same for arcanes. An ele with 2-3 arcanes has nothing in its mind but to burst and try to get out. They cant hold a point nor team fights because they got no protective spell to keep them from dying from one gap closer.

In other words; survival. Eles are ok, their survival is not. You cant do much when you are dead.

Why did you analize the ele instead of analyse it?

ensoriki.5789:

Why did you analize the ele instead of analyse it?

Cause eles take it in the kitten Xd

Hmm what ele can bring??Depends for the build.S/f fresh air for example can bring great sustain range damage,great instant burst,amazing downed damage (amazingly broken downed damage if you run with the greatsword elite),good roaming, great projectile reflections ,immunity for clutch rezzes or stomps and of course aoe prot and regen.
You might think that other classes get more such as warrior who has the numbers with is side but balance is not only about raw numbers. Balance has to also take into account in combat speed ,reach of your attacks,speed of your attacks,combat options etc
For example the ele air scepter burst is instant.That means that in perfect play you should always land it.It doesnt matter how hard it is,or how many button presses there are.Landing it is entirely based on your part and that is a huge bonus that wont show when you lay down the health and armor numbers.Now weather things are fair its another deal
Mobas have hard champions for example and people use them.If the game had more active pvp scene there might have been eles in the mlg.But not when half the teams didnt even practice for it ..lol

Btw try this combo for the lols (i d never try that in a real fight :P )
Put air on cd and have rockbarrier and earth up. Go phoenix-earth-blink(before phoenix is casted)-earth-magnetic wave-1arcane (recharge air with fresh air bypassing global cd)-air-L strike-arcane2
If you want to max damage pick 15 earth minor to add another instant damage spell
Can someone produce more damage at same or less time with any class??

One of the big reasons why ele is simply unviable right now is

1. They have little impact on heavy armor classes such as warrior even when you are full glass cannon. By the time I get my cooldowns back up to deal damage, the warrior will be full health again because of his regen abilities

2. The heavy condi meta. Although we have a decent amount of condition removal it’s nothing compared with the rate conditions can be spammed. + if we have weakness on ourself we’re simply kittened. It’s even worse then having 20 stacks of bleeding on you. Cuts your endurance regeneration in half which is the main surivability for a squishy class as ele, and it also makes a crit dmg build completely useless.

3. Our mobility got cut dramaticly in the past. Yes I’m talking about rtl. 25 seconds would have been a more rightfull nerf. 40 seconds is simply ridiculous, although you can get a 20 second rtl cooldown IF you hit someone let’s face it, who the kitten can’t dodge such an obvious animation..

Phantaram even made a giant post in the past what needed to be changed because it was too strong, this was coming from an expierenced pro player who was in one of the best teams. Yet Anet still didn’t make dramatic changes after that or after pax.

Balance has been a joke for a while now. If you aren’t playing warrior, ranger, necro, engineer, thief or guardian might aswel just do your daily’s until things are balanced again. That’s what I’m doing currently.

Avead.5760:

Hmm what ele can bring??Depends for the build.S/f fresh air for example can bring great sustain range damage,great instant burst,amazing downed damage (amazingly broken downed damage if you run with the greatsword elite),good roaming, great projectile reflections ,immunity for clutch rezzes or stomps and of course aoe prot and regen.
You might think that other classes get more such as warrior who has the numbers with is side but balance is not only about raw numbers. Balance has to also take into account in combat speed ,reach of your attacks,speed of your attacks,combat options etc
For example the ele air scepter burst is instant.That means that in perfect play you should always land it.It doesnt matter how hard it is,or how many button presses there are.Landing it is entirely based on your part and that is a huge bonus that wont show when you lay down the health and armor numbers.Now weather things are fair its another deal
Mobas have hard champions for example and people use them.If the game had more active pvp scene there might have been eles in the mlg.But not when half the teams didnt even practice for it ..lol

Btw try this combo for the lols (i d never try that in a real fight :P )
Put air on cd and have rockbarrier and earth up. Go phoenix-earth-blink(before phoenix is casted)-earth-magnetic wave-1arcane (recharge air with fresh air bypassing global cd)-air-L strike-arcane2
If you want to max damage pick 15 earth minor to add another instant damage spell
Can someone produce more damage at same or less time with any class??

The reason why people didn’t practice ele for tournaments is because they simply know it’s unviable at a higher skill ceiling.

Point is ..Can you prove that at the highest reachable by human gameplay of gw2 pvp that ele will be useless and a bad pick for teams?How?
Are there any teams left pushing metas? Has this game seen the dedications other games communities show to explore its possibilities?Im just not convinced that you ele is useless and in fact i think it could work based on what some of its builds can do atm.Just not at support and not runnign around with valks and 30 water sustaining yourself and covering up your myriads of mistakes cause it didnt matter anyway

Avead.5760:

Hmm what ele can bring??Depends for the build.S/f fresh air for example can bring great sustain range damage,great instant burst,amazing downed damage (amazingly broken downed damage if you run with the greatsword elite),good roaming, great projectile reflections ,immunity for clutch rezzes or stomps and of course aoe prot and regen.

…

If you want to max damage pick 15 earth minor to add another instant damage spell
Can someone produce more damage at same or less time with any class??

Im sorry but we dont have sustained damage, sustained dmage is something a ranger would bring, or a warrior, or a necro, but what we have is burst, you unload all and you hope they die, run around until CDs are up again. Scepters autoattacks are something laughable. Fire #1 is a small damage with a burn, air is respectable but usually oyu try to spend as little time in air as possible in oder to proc lighting bolt more often, water autoattack might as well heal the enemy, is used mostly because they are 3 indepent attacks which might proc fresh air, earth #1 is a condition applier, without condition damage it does no sustained damage, also used to proc fresh air.

As for the burst, yes, granted, best burst after D/D thief, who can literally one shoot people with ONE skill as opposed to 4-5 skills in the case of the ele, which can be easily dodge, whereas backstab cannot. And for those who still think D/D thief damage is bad, I recomend you to look up a guide, 11-12k backstab is a normal sight., ele base hp is 11k hp, if the backstab doesnt kill then the 5k HS will.

Yeah they can kill downed people, but what about them first making said enemy go down in a teamfight? Why pick a kamikaze who has more miss than hit, when you can pick a shatter mesmer or D/D thief of warrior in any build who will do almost as much damage and still come out alive most of the time.

Once again, while raw damage is not outshined, everything else is, I didnt sign up to b a kamikaze, a drag to the team. I would much rather have some sustained high dmaage with as much survivability as any other class. So yes, nerf arcanes if needed, even though they are my favorite. But buff what needs to be buffed.

ensoriki.5789:

Why did you analize the ele instead of analyse it?

Sorry, English isnt my main language, in my language it is written with an “i” and tbh i cant tell the difference in pronunciation, though now thinking retrospectively I can see where I went wrong…

The elementalist can bring a few things such as S/F with 2 invunerable ress or stomps. Freshair burst + blink phoenix and stuff like that. This however as you say can always be trumphed by another class bringing something better.. as for the resses illusion of like, banner or elexir is just better…

And for those who say ele brings best burst? this is not the case….. And Warrior who speccs as much in burst as these eles have better burst. same goes for ranger! the only reason they dont is because they got better build. Ele dont have better build and therefore peps play uber burst to be able to do something.

And honestly if ele had “everything” why no cc? i mean dagger off hand one launch and one knock down on 40 and kitten cd? compared to warrior who can bring one aoe stun 2 sec 7 sec cd ane 3s+ stun 7 sec cd plus one daze and another stun? both warrior and ele needs to be melee yet warrior have too cc that are also leaps..

There is a reason why no one runs an ele.. and for all you who seem too think eles are strong outside this meta. well prehaps.. but next patch wont nerf warriors and if they dont buff the eles utility and cc a warrior will be superior.

So please Anet rework arcane spells, no more burst just make them always have elemental surge and less dmg.. then BUFF UTILITY! Make the fire field in focus same as mesmer, with and activate pull! (yes this would be sooo strong but guess what soo is 2 sec aoe fear and an 7 sec cd 2 sec aoe stun! ) and further more remove evasive arcana.. add the effect to 2 tier trait so they have 2 effects! make the focus daze target area! slightly buff focus and dagger dmg! (if they nerf arcane skills dmg by like 50%)

Avead.5760:

Point is ..Can you prove that at the highest reachable by human gameplay of gw2 pvp that ele will be useless and a bad pick for teams?How?
Are there any teams left pushing metas? Has this game seen the dedications other games communities show to explore its possibilities?Im just not convinced that you ele is useless and in fact i think it could work based on what some of its builds can do atm.Just not at support and not runnign around with valks and 30 water sustaining yourself and covering up your myriads of mistakes cause it didnt matter anyway

Do not confuse useless with unviable. People tend to take the highroad to extremes. While ele are not completely useless, they are quite suboptimal. Please get t right, read this response several times, you will understand what we are saying.

For anything an ele can bring, another class can bring 2x or 3x that or better. As simple as that. Im not saying eles got nothing, just that they get outshined in everything as a whole. And yes, we have to compare because there are 7 other classes and we cant just simply analyze eles in a vacuum, specially since matches arent 5 eles vs 5 eles.

You are wrong about the sustain damage though.
Ele burst didnt have sustain damage prior to fresh air.With that trait you dont have to auto attack with the crappy fire,earth and water skills at all.And the discharges plus the lightning strikes it make it decent enough considering its at 900 range. I know it makes a huge difference cause without fresh air i barely bypass a warriors passive regen but with the trait i can poke him to death.You shouldnt spend as little time in air btw.Its quite the opposite and theres a 5 sec cd afterall. You leave air and go back in when you dont need the other attunement any more.
Btw i understand what you are saying about viability.I asked you if you can prove that ele is indeed a bad choice assuming high level gameplay.
Bsgapollo responded saying that the gw2 "elite " tried,failed and so its decided that ele is unviable or else suboptimal for ALL the roles this games pvp can have.
I just say im not conviced at all..Cant a man have an opinion these days?? :P
I personally could find a use fotr that sexy s/f burst against the longbow warrior meta ,engi heavy teams at least. In all other games i played.. denying for 6 sec the damage equal to what an engi and his nades spam can do to my team would be a pretty freaking huge deal..But in gw2 if its not sustain and numbers its not worth it ..thats the trend not with ele specifically

Avead.5760:

You are wrong about the sustain damage though.
Ele burst didnt have sustain damage prior to fresh air.With that trait you dont have to auto attack with the crappy fire,earth and water skills at all.And the discharges plus the lightning strikes it make it decent enough considering its at 900 range. I know it makes a huge difference cause without fresh air i barely bypass a warriors passive regen but with the trait i can poke him to death.You shouldnt spend as little time in air btw.Its quite the opposite and theres a 5 sec cd afterall. You leave air and go back in when you dont need the other attunement any more.
Btw i understand what you are saying about viability.I asked you if you can prove that ele is indeed a bad choice assuming high level gameplay.
Bsgapollo responded saying that the gw2 "elite " tried,failed and so its decided that ele is unviable or else suboptimal for ALL the roles this games pvp can have.
I just say im not conviced at all..Cant a man have an opinion these days?? :P

Yes you can and hence this thread !! . But like I said, while you “delude” yourself that the sustain is good, as you said, we are poking, usually not enough to out do the 500 per second of a warrior’s healing signet, 5 seconds for a lighting bolt? thats 2500 healing from the healing signet, in those 5 seconds the warrior jumped on you two times, you had to burn 2 dodges, he then stunned you and gave you a nice 6k kiss, you healed nothing because you were using air autoattack which will not stop for skills but will stop for everything else like heals and such.

Want to know what good sutained damage? A ranger with its pet, he will be pewpew’ing you from affar, 800-1200 hits, crits go much higher, 1/2 second to 1 second, pet will be mowing away at you, spiritis will be healing the ranger and givinghim insane damage. NEcro’s pets the same, warrior has no pets, but no need for that when your opponent is perma CCed or dead, and even they can pewpew from afar.

Once again, you have to compare to others, eles bring nothing to the table that another class can completely outdo better, plain and simple. I dont want to poke people, I dont want to be more-miis/than-hit gameply. I want a fully viable, all rounded up class, versatile and strong, as sold at release. Right now we do not come not even close to that, and I think everyone who has played eles long enough will agree with me, specially the eles in MLG….oh wait..

Let’s just look at the builds and what they bring to their team:

S/D Burst
- Very strong untelegraphed burst (should be decreased) with no survivability
-For this build, you are better off bringing a thief or mesmer as they burst nearly as hard but survive much longer

D/D Dps (cmc’s 0/20/20/0/30)
-Brings pretty good burst and good sustained damage in air for team-fights, plus team support through elemental attunement and rock solid
-DPS guardian fulfills this role way better as they get around just as quickly, apply might, and burst more reliably, also aoe (spin2win+pull = more damage than burning speed +arcane wave + ring of fire + firegrab), while surviving MUCH better. Can still apply aoe stab nearly as good with SYG every 24s

S/F burst
- Survives about the same as a thief or mesmer, but now does nowhere near the damage

Staff bunker (0/0/20/20/30)
-Provides decent team support with elemental attunement + rock solid
-Still dies much faster than a guardian, can’t decap b/c lack of reliable pushbacks/other peels, still dies much faster

Any balanced build that tries to actually be the best “Jack of all trades”
-Engineer still does that better, plus has an instant-win 1v1 with their elite (supply crate), while being more survivable and bringing better team utility (elixir’s support, esp elixir R is better than anything we bring).

In my view, the issue is that ANY role the ele plays, other classes just do it better while surviving longer. Even the “jack of all trades” moniker that gets us so pigeon-holed into being terrible is done better by another class. So why would I bring an ele on my team?

Avead.5760:

You are wrong about the sustain damage though.
Ele burst didnt have sustain damage prior to fresh air.With that trait you dont have to auto attack with the crappy fire,earth and water skills at all.And the discharges plus the lightning strikes it make it decent enough considering its at 900 range. I know it makes a huge difference cause without fresh air i barely bypass a warriors passive regen but with the trait i can poke him to death.You shouldnt spend as little time in air btw.Its quite the opposite and theres a 5 sec cd afterall. You leave air and go back in when you dont need the other attunement any more.
Btw i understand what you are saying about viability.I asked you if you can prove that ele is indeed a bad choice assuming high level gameplay.
Bsgapollo responded saying that the gw2 "elite " tried,failed and so its decided that ele is unviable or else suboptimal for ALL the roles this games pvp can have.
I just say im not conviced at all..Cant a man have an opinion these days?? :P
I personally could find a use fotr that sexy s/f burst against the longbow warrior meta ,engi heavy teams at least. In all other games i played.. denying for 6 sec the damage equal to what an engi and his nades spam can do to my team would be a pretty freaking huge deal..But in gw2 if its not sustain and numbers its not worth it ..thats the trend not with ele specifically

of course you can find a use for an ele… that is beyond the point though! Try this: Find an use for your ele that would make him viable in your team. Now consider every other proffesion and see if they can fill that roll. When you now have 3-4 other proffesions, put them in ranking order with the most effective at filling that roll on top. This process can be done 1 miljon times and never will the ele be first in the ranking list.

But im comparing with other classes.I am fighting warriors,rangers engis all the time in soloq or hot joins.See the thing is that you arent doing 500 per sec but much much more.We cant have a rpoper conversation when you blow things up like that.The fight example you described is what would happen if the ele has like 1 week experience with the class. You know if you really think the ranger can do ranged damage of 1k hit every 1/2 sec (power ranger?? :S )then use magnetic wave and kill him??! Or use swirling winds and completely kill that amazing super damage..
What ranged damage does warrior have?Longbow is good but with focus you can neutralise it coimpletely.. rifle??
Even necros are manageable 1vs1.I dont think you understand about what magnitude of damage im talking about.As i said the burst is mostly instant..If you fail completely to land those spells then its your problem especially against classes with no vigor like necro.But i dont think you know what build im talking about and or how to play it if you think damage (not only burst) is not good enough

Fortus.6175:

I want to remain as unbiased as possible, so I will try my hardest to stay humble and civilized. This is about eles compared to every other class in PvP only

Given the latest development of the meta and the last MLG;

What can a ele bring to a table that other classes cant bring better and without that many sacrifices.

Eles have the best burst in the game. Eles give the best swiftness in the game. They’re competitive for being amongst the most mobile. These are not grounds for saying they are balanced, I feel they don’t stack up in the current meta, either.

My point is that you’re asking the wrong questions. The question should be, what kind of tools do elementalists need so they can stay relevant in teamfights, and relevant in sidepoint 1v1s.

Elementalists have never been about utility. Don’t stress out that your utility skills don’t hugely support your team. If that’s your goal, then try a Spirit Ranger, or a Mesmer with Portal & Illusion of life. Or a Banner warrior. Obviously, these builds have limited use and aren’t all included in ’what’s good’ right now. Many, many builds that are most viable right now aren’t totally support oriented, and that’s ok.

My analysis of Elementalists in PvP teamfights:

Elementalists are essentially ‘too good’ a target. I really think Elementalists should have the option as D/D bruisers to make them a pretty un-satisfactory target in a teamfight. Take the modern day Warrior for example. A typical 20 seconds of stability, and 10 seconds of condition immunity – enough for any smart player looking for a quick kill to deselect the warrior (even though he’s usually Berserker) and go for the peripheral team fighter – IE, Grenade Engi, Necromancer. That’s why Warriors work in teamfights. If Eles had some kind of short condition immunity period, I think that would be almost all it would take for D/D and S/D eles to be valuable in teamfights. They can already get a good amount of stability.

Overall it’s just important for professions that are designed to have a presence in fights (Guardian, Elementalist, Warrior) to be difficult enough focus targets while not being unable to eventually be brought down. It’s kind of perfect how balanced Warriors are in teamfights right now, actually. I wish the same for D/D and S/D eles.

Eles are not viable in top tier pvp because of their low health pool and low armor.They make easy targets in organized pvp where players have the skill level and coordination to burst down targets 1 by 1. You do not see this coordiantion in solo q and low lvl tvpp.

Chaith.8256:

Fortus.6175:

I want to remain as unbiased as possible, so I will try my hardest to stay humble and civilized. This is about eles compared to every other class in PvP only

Given the latest development of the meta and the last MLG;

What can a ele bring to a table that other classes cant bring better and without that many sacrifices.

Eles have the best burst in the game. Eles give the best swiftness in the game. They’re competitive for being amongst the most mobile. These are not grounds for saying they are balanced, I feel they don’t stack up in the current meta, either.

My point is that you’re asking the wrong questions. The question should be, what kind of tools do elementalists need so they can stay relevant in teamfights, and relevant in sidepoint 1v1s.

Elementalists have never been about utility. Don’t stress out that your utility skills don’t hugely support your team. If that’s your goal, then try a Spirit Ranger, or a Mesmer with Portal & Illusion of life. Or a Banner warrior. Obviously, these builds have limited use and aren’t all included in ’what’s good’ right now. Many, many builds that are most viable right now aren’t totally support oriented, and that’s ok.

My analysis of Elementalists in PvP teamfights:

Elementalists are essentially ‘too good’ a target. I really think Elementalists should have the option as D/D bruisers to make them a pretty un-satisfactory target in a teamfight. Take the modern day Warrior for example. A typical 20 seconds of stability, and 10 seconds of condition immunity – enough for any smart player looking for a quick kill to deselect the warrior (even though he’s usually Berserker) and go for the peripheral team fighter – IE, Grenade Engi, Necromancer. That’s why Warriors work in teamfights. If Eles had some kind of short condition immunity period, I think that would be almost all it would take for D/D and S/D eles to be valuable in teamfights. They can already get a good amount of stability.

Overall it’s just important for professions that are designed to have a presence in fights (Guardian, Elementalist, Warrior) to be difficult enough focus targets while not being unable to eventually be brought down. It’s kind of perfect how balanced Warriors are in teamfights right now, actually. I wish the same for D/D and S/D eles.

Best burst? how do you define it as best? i mean it is not the strongest in just straight up dps.. warrior eviserate + quikness HB is far man dmd than any ele build att all can put out? or do you mean the most reliable? wich in a way is true but still not.. with the lack of defenses your burst becomes highly unreliable. if you have the defenses too pull the burst of then the burst is no longer that strong.. so this burst you speak of is it fresh air + arcanes? or is it the phoenix blink? How can you define the ele burst as “best”? The best burst is the one that can’t be countered right? id say the mace + gs burst from warrior is the best… the got 10 sec invounerablility that still caps points to get it off and 7 sec cd… and as a small bonus it includes 3 sec stun -.-

How is an burst is best when it have 0 cc or 0 survival… the best cc is the one that doesnt eat your utility spots.. the best burst is the one that can be consistant and doesn’t hinder your defenses. the best burst is the one that actually streangthen your defenses such as the burst with a stun…

If you mean highest dmg then you are wrong… you only think this because elementalist are the only class out there desperate enough to go 100% burst..

Hopefully they will change up the ele so it becomes good and viable without any op tendenses. But if anyone claims the ele is “fine” they are just simply wrong… the proof of that is too overwhelming

Chaith.8256:

Eles have the best burst in the game

If you consider damage alone, yes, but what after you bursted that ONE person? You die. Like old zerker warrior. No, best burst in the game is currently held by shatter mesmer and D/D thief, who bring just as much damage and still survive it almost all.

Chaith.8256:

Eles give the best swiftness in the game.

Once again, wrong, guardians and warrior do this, heck even ranger does it better. Guardians symbal has 1200 range, people can see it and walk over it to get the benefices, whereas for the ele, the le has to walk next to them to give it to them, 180 range, thats almost melee….. Warriors banners have greater range. Rangers also give fury and might I believe. Eles? short range, long CD, short duration. Im sorry but wrong.

Chaith.8256:

They’re competitive for being amongst the most mobile.

WHAT?!?! By any chance are you implying an ele is more mobile than a warrior, or a thief, or a ranger? Like really? Do you even know what mobility is?!

No bro, just no. Nothing what you said cant be outdone by an ele. A warrior will have as much mobility, utility and survival while remaining top DPS in the game. Rangers the same, guardians to certain extend, thief with Sw/D….

Eles are not ok by your standards of “viable”

People, you guys dont seem to be getting the question, let me repeat it;
Every class has an emblematic thing you would bring them over to your team;

Guardian; unmatched team utility and boons. Good sustained DPS.

Mesmer; best duelist in the game, incredible amount of team utility.

Warrior; Best damage in the game. Insane CC. Great aura utility on banners, including revival and might/fury buffs.

Necros; Condition damage, fear, DS, very durable, wells.

Engis; great point defense, team buffs in the form of boons, heals, more heals, very sturdy.

Rangers; spirit ranger can take on the world…and still survive. They bring best sustained DPS in the game and very useful traps in the right hands.

Thief; Unmatched dueling power. Most mobile class after warriors. Can insta burst anyone out of the blue. Very OP useful Sw/D in this meta.

Eles; Very telegraphed moves, damage dependent on AF]K players, 0 team utility since arcanes and cantrips are selfish. Boons are good, at expense of very lenghty cooldowns who leave them on even longer attunement CD, which cuts their only way or survival. Only “viable” build is a burst hit-or-miss who will die in a teamfight first thing.

Sure it isnt that bad, but like I said, while not completely useless, we are suboptimal. We dont outdo absolutely no one, and we cant be a jack of all trades because traits can only let us go one way. True jack of all trades is engi, shame about their appearance.

Fortus.6175:

People, you guys dont seem to be getting the question, let me repeat it;
Every class has an emblematic thing you would bring them over to your team;

Guardian; unmatched team utility and boons. Good sustained DPS.

Mesmer; best duelist in the game, incredible amount of team utility.

Warrior; Best damage in the game. Insane CC. Great aura utility on banners, including revival and might/fury buffs.

Necros; Condition damage, fear, DS, very durable, wells.

Engis; great point defense, team buffs in the form of boons, heals, more heals, very sturdy.

Rangers; spirit ranger can take on the world…and still survive. They bring best sustained DPS in the game and very useful traps in the right hands.

Thief; Unmatched dueling power. Most mobile class after warriors. Can insta burst anyone out of the blue. Very OP useful Sw/D in this meta.

Eles; Very telegraphed moves, damage dependent on AF]K players, 0 team utility since arcanes and cantrips are selfish. Boons are good, at expense of very lenghty cooldowns who leave them on even longer attunement CD, which cuts their only way or survival. Only “viable” build is a burst hit-or-miss who will die in a teamfight first thing.

Can you please cut the hyperbole garbage – summing a profession up in one oversimplified sentence that’s nice and exaggerated just to support your point.

The first 20 words of my post were merely there to outline how hyperbolic garbage that anyone can say doesn’t mean any class is going to see play, or not. “There are some things the Ele does well, but that’s the wrong question to ask” and then you continue to fixate on that exact thing, ignoring 100% of the point of my post. Kind of ironic.

Just to explain, those exaggerated things I said at the start of my post were there to entertain your bad question of: “Name one thing Eles do really gud”. I said these before I made my point (which you ignored):

This is clearly going down the gutter already, but I’ll explain why I said those things, and why tracking what classes do ‘da best’ are not good metrics to track for balance.

• Arcane S/D Eles’ wombo combo does have the highest singular burst in the game, in tPvP. Higher than Shatter or Backstab. It’s nothing more than a simple numerical fact. Meanwhile, S/D Ele remains as one of the overall mediocre burst specs. Shatter Mesmers and D/D thieves have problems of their own, not to mention being just as non-existant in tPvP as Eles are.

• When I referred to the ‘best swiftness’ in game, I was merely referring to the “Staff Lightning-field-swap weapons back” combo to give the whole team 60 seconds of swiftness before a match starts, so the mid point can be contested better. Nobody can give that kind of pre-game swiftness. Again, it’s a numerical fact, not sole justification to take an Ele.

• For the 1-2 D/D Eles that remain in tPvP somewhat, Skovex & Sivvy, I’m pretty sure that RTL -> Vertical Lightning Flash -> Burning Speed is going to get you on point @ Clocktower faster than 7/8 professions can. EVERYTHING GOOD about Ele has remained since launch, besides the sustain nerfs, and RTL’s cooldown. They’re still more mobile than your average tPvP Engineers, Rangers, Guardians, Necros, Longbow/Hammer War/Mace/Shield War, Mesmer. Yet Elementalists still aren’t a desired pick. Well I wonder why that is? We already brainstormed on things that Eles do well :Sarcasm.:

There. I hope I explained the point I was trying to make there, better.

Now, I explained in my last post what I feel Elementalists need to push them back into being a good pick. If you have any more comments, try that.

Even though I agree eles is not doing well in pvp, I think eles may still be the best designed class in the game. This implies that other classes are not well designed. My reason is that most popular builds right now are about brainlessly spamming something: conditions, cc, stealth, evade, movement skills, minions, etc. The game allows these skills to be spammed without much consequences. Eles is well designed because brainlessly spamming skills will get punished much harder than other classes. Eles players need to consider timing, position, and counter play much more than other classes. I think this is good direction that other classes should move toward.

By the same logic, you could say the engineers are bottom-tier because they can’t bunker as well as a guard or condispam as well as a necro. I’m not saying eles are in a great place right now, I’m just saying that line of reasoning is very dangerous.

Jack of all trades professions—even when well-balanced, like engies are currently—will never fit the criteria you’re looking for.

Eles are fine. They are not intended to be great at anything. They are intended to be pretty good at everything. They fit their role nicely. The issue is that many of you want a return to the super OP ele of several months ago. That isn’t going to happen.

Eles are not supposed to be beating out other professions in 1-1 narrow comparisons like you have decided to do.

As far as Im concerned, staff guardian already performs this better than us. In order for us to stack might to a party, we need to blow 1 arcane on 30 seconds CD, part of our combo, need to go from earth to fire, which each as 12-15 secs CD, huge in a fight where now your defensive attunement is on CD. A guardian provides about the same if not more amount and a heal, one skill, 15 secs CD, less if traited. Engis does a better job too. Warrior with banners if they do decide to do so too.

This is a skewed picture. Here’s another perspective.
Staff Guardian has Empower, this is a channeled rooted ability, the guardian is vulnerable during this time to interrupts and offense. Guardians also have a fire field they may or may not bring.
Every Elementalist weapon set has a fire field. What this means on a different note is that Eles always have the ability for the team to stack might. So yes if an Ele wants to stack it himself he will have issues but as a profession with a significant amount of combo fields he doesn’t have to, since he brings the fire field which oddly enough have “cross profession combos” he allows everyone to contribute. In certain respects this can be better, in certain circumstances not, but if you’re choosing the Elementalist individual ability to stack might for a team when the way he does it allows the team to do it themself you’re painting a skewed image.
In addition while a guardian will have that staff, A Staff ele will bring for instance more zoning potential than the staff while keeping the ability to might stack. A Scepter/Focus ele, will have Vigor he can bring out though focus fire attunement is underwhelming (ill give you that). The S/D Ele will have fire grab to be able to hit a single target for respectable damage when needed. Then you can look at weapon swaps outside of the staff, but you can look that an S/F ele is stopping all projectile assault with Swirling winds, meaning engineer grenades, pistol/rifle shots, ranger 111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 spam are put to a halt. The D/P Thief who was going to 5-2 spam, can’t blind a member and now gets interrupted, or has to wait out the 6 seconds. The Staff guardian isn’t bringing that and even if he weapon swaps he isn’t bringing swirling winds, he has an alternative but it’s range of effect is nowhere near as large nor as flexible.

That’s not to say Ele is beast mode, but they do have aspects of them that are very attractive. You can’t do the 1-1 narrow comparison on aspects of a prof it undersells them drastically.

I do feel Eles can be a bit too easy to focus on. You can very quickly end up having to pop a lot of CD’s just to stay afloat oh and for a jack-of-all-trades profession that uses all stats… Celestial is disappointingly underwhelming on them.=

Eles; Very telegraphed moves, damage dependent on AF]K players, 0 team utility since arcanes and cantrips are selfish. Boons are good, at expense of very lenghty cooldowns who leave them on even longer attunement CD, which cuts their only way or survival. Only “viable” build is a burst hit-or-miss who will die in a teamfight first thing.

All of your comparisons were hyperbole and this one is just melodramatic horsekitten.

Illusion.1807:

Even though I agree eles is not doing well in pvp, I think eles may still be the best designed class in the game. This implies that other classes are not well designed. My reason is that most popular builds right now are about brainlessly spamming something: conditions, cc, stealth, evade, movement skills, minions, etc. The game allows these skills to be spammed without much consequences. Eles is well designed because brainlessly spamming skills will get punished much harder than other classes. Eles players need to consider timing, position, and counter play much more than other classes. I think this is good direction that other classes should move toward.

Lets not bring in talk of design, it is getting old between talks of “Warrior best design prof”…brb “omfg can’t dodge this god kitten untelegraphed skull crack”, “It’s sad that all thieves run daggers because sword thief was the way it was meant to be played with teleports” brb “Omfg I can’t hit this kitten, for the life of me, jesus christ Anet”, “I’d love to see Necros more they deserve it” brb “What the flying kitten is with these instant marks, instant doom, and this life shroud doesnt take no god kitten damage”

Forget design talk, 3 months later we’ll be screaming how horse kitten Elementalist air spikes are or that Mantra of Pain can’t be dodged or go back to talk about pointblank shatters having no animation time to dodge.

Fresh air ele burst requires:

1) Positioning
2) 2 utilities
3) above average level of skill

-No stealth
-low HP
-low healing
-low armour

Thief/mesmer burst requires zero skill, like anybody can take a thief/mesmer and feel pro in GW2, just take a look at hotjoin and tPvP…still some “pro” complain.

Guess this game has been simplified enough to allow all level of skill to join “pvp”.

This fresh air burst despite being so “OMFG OP” has guaranteed a 0 presence of eles during the last MLG, guess the game has not been simplified enough….some professions still require the use of more than 2 buttons on the keyboard…

ensoriki.5789:

Illusion.1807:

Even though I agree eles is not doing well in pvp, I think eles may still be the best designed class in the game. This implies that other classes are not well designed. My reason is that most popular builds right now are about brainlessly spamming something: conditions, cc, stealth, evade, movement skills, minions, etc. The game allows these skills to be spammed without much consequences. Eles is well designed because brainlessly spamming skills will get punished much harder than other classes. Eles players need to consider timing, position, and counter play much more than other classes. I think this is good direction that other classes should move toward.

Lets not bring in talk of design, it is getting old between talks of “Warrior best design prof”…brb “omfg can’t dodge this god kitten untelegraphed skull crack”, “It’s sad that all thieves run daggers because sword thief was the way it was meant to be played with teleports” brb “Omfg I can’t hit this kitten, for the life of me, jesus christ Anet”, “I’d love to see Necros more they deserve it” brb “What the flying kitten is with these instant marks, instant doom, and this life shroud doesnt take no god kitten damage”

Forget design talk, 3 months later we’ll be screaming how horse kitten Elementalist air spikes are or that Mantra of Pain can’t be dodged or go back to talk about pointblank shatters having no animation time to dodge.

Let me rephrase what you just said: If we “forget design talk, 3 months later we’ll be screaming how horse kitten Elementalist air spikes are.”

To me what you said actually shows design talk is more important than merely balancing. As we can balance/buff a class by simply making some aspects of it to be op, but such things are not acceptable in a good design, which also takes skillful play into consideration. Therefore, it is important to understand design before talking about balancing.

As for fresh air burst, many eles including me don’t really like it, which is almost like a cheese, you either quickly kill or die, or do both.

Illusion.1807:

As for fresh air burst, many eles including me don’t really like it, which is almost like a cheese, you either quickly kill or die, or do both.

From a design standpoint, I think fresh air is interesting, but all it really is:

• Air 15pt Minor – Un-telegraphed instantaneous spike.
• Air, Scepter 2: Lightning Strike – Untelegraphed instantaneous spike.

It does add some really good sustained damage, but seems way more fun and engaging for the Ele than it is for people on the receiving end. For the people getting targeted, it’s more like, “Oh that Ele just took 35% of my life from 900 range, with no animation. Nice.”

Since arcane abilities are very difficult to predict as well, you just have a lot of instant damage flying around. Typically Ele has been balanced so well with risk vs. reward, and designed so well with telegraphed skills having the most value. Fresh air feels like a small step away from the good design.

Arcane S/D Eles’ wombo combo does have the highest singular burst in the game, in tPvP. Higher than Shatter or Backstab. It’s nothing more than a simple numerical fact. Meanwhile, S/D Ele remains as one of the overall mediocre burst specs. Shatter Mesmers and D/D thieves have problems of their own, not to mention being just as non-existant in tPvP as Eles are.
When I referred to the ‘best swiftness’ in game, I was merely referring to the “Staff Lightning-field-swap weapons back” combo to give the whole team 60 seconds of swiftness before a match starts, so the mid point can be contested better. Nobody can give that kind of pre-game swiftness. Again, it’s a numerical fact, not sole justification to take an Ele.
For the 1-2 D/D Eles that remain in tPvP somewhat, Skovex & Sivvy, I’m pretty sure that RTL -> Vertical Lightning Flash -> Burning Speed is going to get you on point @ Clocktower faster than 7/8 professions can. EVERYTHING GOOD about Ele has remained since launch, besides the sustain nerfs, and RTL’s cooldown. They’re still more mobile than your average tPvP Engineers, Rangers, Guardians, Necros, Longbow/Hammer War/Mace/Shield War, Mesmer. Yet Elementalists still aren’t a desired pick. Well I wonder why that is? We already brainstormed on things that Eles do well :Sarcasm.:

Do we even play the same game ?

Did you really say that a s/d ele deal more burst dmg than a backstab or shatter ?…seriously dude, yesterday got hit by a 7k backstab while having 1.5k toughness…we’re talking about a single skill eating over 50% of my HP bar and the kittening thief was a trolling d/p perma stealthed, you don’t see him coming as he can stealth from his base and reach your..while still stealthed

And mesmer? The other day was trying this bunker build with 2k toughness and 14k HP…got killed in a single shatter rotation… over 14k total dmg , only the I zerker can hit you for 7-8k dmg from 1200 range

The majority of you don’t even know that both arcane skills got nerfed by 22% last patch, now base dmg is 700 dmg, meaning an ele must go full glass to deal over 2k dmg with each arcane skill, and using 2 aracan skills + LF, the ele will have 0 stun breaker

An electric discharge engy deal that dmg with the freaking rifle auto-attack.

Despite all these claims of “OP one-shot wambo combo”, even [CC] the last official team to use an ele in GW2, decided against bringing one at the last MLG.

In SoloQ all you find are warriors/ranger and necros, so where are these OMFG one-shot combo wonder eles?

P.S
about your “numerical analysis”, a zerker ele with scholar runes and 50-54% crit dmg deal the following numbers on a heavy armour golem using the “untelegraphated” skills:

-Lighting stike: 1700-1900 dmg
-Electric discharge : 1900 dmg
-Arcane skills ( same dmg ) : 1700-1800 dmg each

And I’ve run 300 acrobatics with zerker and went literally from 16.4k health to 0 the moment I was lightning flashed to.
Get real brah they’re not trying to condemn the Ele its spitting truth that burst hits hard. I had never been hit harder through all phases of thief and mesmer burst.
Who gives a kitten where they are in SoloQ truth is truth one of the top bursts in game.

ensoriki.5789:

And I’ve run 300 acrobatics with zerker and went literally from 16.4k health to 0 the moment I was lightning flashed to.
Get real brah they’re not trying to condemn the Ele its spitting truth that burst hits hard. I had never been hit harder through all phases of thief and mesmer burst.
Who gives a kitten where they are in SoloQ truth is truth one of the top bursts in game.

And you are…a zerker amulet user…
Dude you should get real, I repeat myself, yesterday I was using a blasted soldier amulet and this thief backstabbed me from stealth for godkitten 7k dmg, I had full HP and 1.5k toughness., a single kittening skills followed by 2 HS and my HP was down by 90% all happened in a split second

The other blasted day in SoloQ , was trying this bunker build with 2k kittening toughness and this mesmer brought me down from 14k HP to downed with a couple of skills : I zerker hitting me for over 8k dmg followed by dunno what..it all happened in a split second…against from kittening stealth

A burst ele must chain all godkitten skills on his bar to bring you down to 30-40% HP if you have some toughness and then they’ll run away because they’ll die if you sniff at them

The day that a burst ele can burst me down from 100% to downed while wearing a soldier amulet, like a thief or mesmer, will be the day I’ll join you in asking to tone down ele burst

Why has the elementalist been the dominating profession for the first 9 months? Why has everyone stopped playing elementalist since the trait rework patch?

Obviously “low HP and low armor” are not the correct answers, these are just excuses made by bad elementalists. Further, there are no fundamental problems with the profession.

The trait rework patch buffed several other professions and shifted the meta in a direction unfavorable for elementalists. The condition meta combined with some minor nerfs made the elementalist an inferior choice in competitive play.

The ele does not need a rework. Some minor buffs could fix the ele such as reducing the cooldown of RTL back to 20s.

Arheundel.6451:

Do we even play the same game ?

Did you really say that a s/d ele deal more burst dmg than a backstab or shatter ?…seriously dude, yesterday got hit by a 7k backstab while having 1.5k toughness…we’re talking about a single skill eating over 50% of my HP bar and the kittening thief was a trolling d/p perma stealthed, you don’t see him coming as he can stealth from his base and reach your..while still stealthed

And mesmer? The other day was trying this bunker build with 2k toughness and 14k HP…got killed in a single shatter rotation… over 14k total dmg , only the I zerker can hit you for 7-8k dmg from 1200 range

The majority of you don’t even know that both arcane skills got nerfed by 22% last patch, now base dmg is 700 dmg, meaning an ele must go full glass to deal over 2k dmg with each arcane skill, and using 2 aracan skills + LF, the ele will have 0 stun breaker

An electric discharge engy deal that dmg with the freaking rifle auto-attack.

Despite all these claims of “OP one-shot wambo combo”, even [CC] the last official team to use an ele in GW2, decided against bringing one at the last MLG.

In SoloQ all you find are warriors/ranger and necros, so where are these OMFG one-shot combo wonder eles?

P.S
about your “numerical analysis”, a zerker ele with scholar runes and 50-54% crit dmg deal the following numbers on a heavy armour golem using the “untelegraphated” skills:

-Lighting stike: 1700-1900 dmg
-Electric discharge : 1900 dmg
-Arcane skills ( same dmg ) : 1700-1800 dmg each

Arheundel.6451:

The day that a burst ele can burst me down from 100% to downed while wearing a soldier amulet, like a thief or mesmer, will be the day I’ll join you in asking to tone down ele burst

Look man, try searching up some videos on how to combo your zerker Ele’s abilities better. Cause you just aren’t getting how it’s possible to get your numbers up there.

Cancel that. Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gAif9qE4WY

Basically, just from memory (I don’t play Ele at a high level), the highest hitting combo that Eles can do that does like, 20k damage off a lightning flash in a bit over a second: Earth → Hurl → Earthquake → Lightning Flash → Fire → Phoenix Triple hit → Air → Lightning Strike → Arcanes. This happens in the span of about 2 seconds. There are other ways to combo this. Regardless, it is indeed more instant damage than a Mesmer or Thief can do.

So now you actually know what everyone is talking about. Now you’re on the same page, don’t think that I’m saying that every MLG team needs to take an Elementalist using this.

FirstBlood.7359:

Why has the elementalist been the dominating profession for the first 9 months? Why has everyone stopped playing elementalist since the trait rework patch?

Obviously “low HP and low armor” are not the correct answers, these are just excuses made by bad elementalists. Further, there are no fundamental problems with the profession.

The trait rework patch buffed several other professions and shifted the meta in a direction unfavorable for elementalists. The condition meta combined with some minor nerfs made the elementalist an inferior choice in competitive play.

The ele does not need a rework. Some minor buffs could fix the ele such as reducing the cooldown of RTL back to 20s.

Pretty much, this. I still stand by giving burst Elementalists a tool to survive condition pressure long enough to do things in teamfights, and/or a tool if used intelligently could nullify a 1v1 condi-burst and counter. In the past, we had Eles outlasting everything through sustained healing, but that was more of a permanent near-invulnerability, rather than something that had a lot of counterplay.

My Suggestion:

Elementalist:

Signet of Water has been reworked – Active ability no longer chills enemies, but reduces the duration of incoming conditions by 100%. Duration, 8 seconds. Cooldown increased to 40 seconds, now instant cast. Passive effect remains unchanged.

beautiful video! Thats why im playing this class
But at 1:31 the burst is impossible currently unless you hace air at cooldown and you recharge it on earth.If you try what he did you get caught by the global attunment cooldown and you got to wait for the air brust.
Perhaps it was made with the bugged fresh air..Then again he does wait the full second before going to air while he is spamming it..so only the icon must have been bugged!
Combos..combos everywhere

@Chaith

You really need to check your numbers before posting any video…they guy is using a 2k armor target golem , 2k armor =1k toughness more or less…just few pts above base toughness , we’re talking about a freaking glass cannon

A thief or mesmer go around with 2k armor like the target golem in the video, I stand by what I’ve stated already..the day a burst ele bring me down from 100% to downed while wearing a soldier amulet..I’ll agree with you.

Avead.5760:

beautiful video! Thats why im playing this class
But at 1:31 the burst is impossible currently unless you hace air at cooldown and you recharge it on earth.If you try what he did you get caught by the global attunment cooldown and you got to wait for the air brust.
Perhaps it was made with the bugged fresh air..Then again he does wait the full second before going to air while he is spamming it..so only the icon must have been bugged!
Combos..combos everywhere

When your burst fail..you run away and you’ve got somebody to peel off for you, like that everything can be used as burst, with that style you can play even a burst guardian..because somebody will protect you while you run away.

Yes..I played with you, when your burst fail , you take and run..somebody will watch your back, you may enjoy the playstyle but I do not, if I wanted to play an assassin..I’d play thief, certainly no ele

Arheundel.6451:

And you are…a zerker amulet user…
Dude you should get real, I repeat myself, yesterday I was using a blasted soldier amulet and this thief backstabbed me from stealth for godkitten 7k dmg, I had full HP and 1.5k toughness., a single kittening skills followed by 2 HS and my HP was down by 90% all happened in a split second

Reality is that toughness is not going to scale the damage you take from ele burst differently than Thief/Mesmer. As a glass if Im hit by a thief burst, its stun break and move. If you are actually hit by an ele burst you are dead, it has to be avoided because the burst is that high. Being in soldier or berserker doesn’t change that it does more damage in a shorter time frame than both thief and Mesmers. Full Stop.

The day that a burst ele can burst me down from 100% to downed while wearing a soldier amulet, like a thief or mesmer, will be the day I’ll join you in asking to tone down ele burst

How the hell do you get bursted from 100-0% in Soldiers,? If your in a soldiers a thief and Mesmer burst should be counteracted by a break and heal and if you die it’ll be follow up damage, not the burst specifically. It wont 100-0%. You can not join me on something I have not requested.

Chaith.8256:

My Suggestion:

Elementalist:

Signet of Water has been reworked – Active ability no longer chills enemies, but reduces the duration of incoming conditions by 100%. Duration, 8 seconds. Cooldown increased to 40 seconds, now instant cast. Passive effect remains unchanged.

I agree with pretty much everything you’ve pointed out in this thread, but on this one…No dude.

Condition immunity like the Warrior exhibits has no counter-play and should not be in the game to begin with, let alone expanded on.

There is an overall issue of power creep that has evolved over the last few balance patches. The introduction of more conditions without balancing the relative number of cleanses available lead to a condi-overload meta, and reactionary balance pass(es) thereafter created condition immune, auto-healing stun lock turrets. Ele’s problems are pretty much all derived from the fact that conditions are still too out of check with cleanses and Warriors were over-buffed in an effort to give the primary offenders of the condi-meta (Necro, Ranger and to a somewhat lesser extent Engi) a super-mega-hard counter. In fact, Ele and Mesmer (generally regarded as the sub-optimals at the moment) are both suffering for the same root cause. The solution is to attack the root of the problem and fix the condition overload and fix warrior to a position that it can have intuitive counter-play. Further buffing classes will only add to the power-creep and cause more bad meta’s.

No one likes nerfs, everyone likes buffs, but the reality is that the combat system in this game will get better with Nerfs than it will with Buffs in the current state of things.

You don’t seem to get the point at all….

The ele burst is high risk=high reward, and cannot be compared to thief or mesmer burst as it’s low risk= high reward because : stealth + low CD on burst skills , instead the ele got 20s + CD on all burst skill and this means if you fail…you die..or run away and call it a victory like players as @Avead do.

On sidenote got absolutely nothing against @Avead, I’m simply using him as an example for all zerker burst eles out there, a playstyle I don’t enjoy, I played as sustain ele in GW1 with enourmous success and I’ll do the same in GW2, I simply hate the whole ninja style..it’s better suited to thieves or mesmers in my opinion.

You see now that I’m not even interested in all this burst race, but I’ve got problems when somebody say :" ok ele dmg must be lowered"…kitten no
If you do that, all those who don’t use a zerker amulet would suffer even more than now, a better solution would be:

- Lower dmg of ele
- Reduce CD of dmg skills ( ex : phoenix 15s CD, arcane wave 20s CD )
- Add an additional effect as compensation ( ex : arcane wave now apply 2s burning if used while in fire )
- Add a 3/4s casting time to arcane skills

This is what I call balance, what you guys propose is…whack a mole balance, an example of it would be : RTL, overly nerfed for no legitimate reason but feverishly asked by the "wise know all " GW2 community

Chaith.8256:

Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gAif9qE4WY

Nice vid. Where can I find one on a moving target that can dodge, get protection and counter-attack?

Well when you can pull that high damage in a split of a sec and follow it up with good sustain ranged damage you DONT need to stay and eat kitten in the team fight
You can break los.,disengage a bit,find cover behind teammates.Its called getting into position.By that logic if you had a zero damage immortal build youwould say its a good build..it can stay in teamfight but it produces no damage?!
I personally think damage is fine if not a bit too high.And with that damage this is the survivability that should accompany it..Im sorry just my opinion..Now the sustain specs..yeah they absolutely suck atm

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

Chaith.8256:

My Suggestion:

Elementalist:

Signet of Water has been reworked – Active ability no longer chills enemies, but reduces the duration of incoming conditions by 100%. Duration, 8 seconds. Cooldown increased to 40 seconds, now instant cast. Passive effect remains unchanged.

I agree with pretty much everything you’ve pointed out in this thread, but on this one…No dude.

Condition immunity like the Warrior exhibits has no counter-play and should not be in the game to begin with, let alone expanded on.

There is an overall issue of power creep that has evolved over the last few balance patches. The introduction of more conditions without balancing the relative number of cleanses available lead to a condi-overload meta, and reactionary balance pass(es) thereafter created condition immune, auto-healing stun lock turrets. Ele’s problems are pretty much all derived from the fact that conditions are still too out of check with cleanses and Warriors were over-buffed in an effort to give the primary offenders of the condi-meta (Necro, Ranger and to a somewhat lesser extent Engi) a super-mega-hard counter. In fact, Ele and Mesmer (generally regarded as the sub-optimals at the moment) are both suffering for the same root cause. The solution is to attack the root of the problem and fix the condition overload and fix warrior to a position that it can have intuitive counter-play. Further buffing classes will only add to the power-creep and cause more bad meta’s.

No one likes nerfs, everyone likes buffs, but the reality is that the combat system in this game will get better with Nerfs than it will with Buffs in the current state of things.

I agree wholeheartedly. I suggested what I did because I just can’t see Arenanet making this solution:

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

The solution is to attack the root of the problem and fix the condition overload and fix warrior to a position that it can have intuitive counter-play.

I thought about trying to draw up the patch notes for that one. That would probably involve more changes to the game than the PvP balance team budget for 2014 is. This one-liner solution needs like, a 10 page analysis, not to mention making the “Warrior’s body less sturdy”.

The Paralyzation sigil is getting the axe tomorrow, I’m waiting to see how that affects the Warrior profession. It might be more significant a nerf than people expected.

To be honest, I’ve started doing a lot better against Warriors since I found some meaningful counterplay to Berserker Stance, Rifle Engineer PoV:

• Overcharge shot his face and wait the Berserker stance off.
• If he stacks multiple stances, like stability, all I have to do is give up the point, make a strategic 6 second retreat out of his grubby paws, and then bang out a defenseless Warrior, or demolish him with Supply Crate. It’s not the hardest thing to deal with, once I got my head around the fact that letting the point neutral/cap isn’t the end if I can just re-cap/neut it.

I understand not all classes can just escape the engagement, but I feel that people haven’t learned they need to, yet. Personally, I am not a huge hater of Berserker Stance. To me, it made the game better, allowing Warriors to do their intended roles for a short period. I still think Warriors aren’t going to be the top of the food chain for long, even without any drastic nerfs.

Avead.5760:

Well when you can pull that high damage in a split of a sec and follow it up with good sustain ranged damage you DONT need to stay and eat kitten in the team fight
You can break los.,disengage a bit,find cover behind teammates.Its called getting into position.By that logic if you had a zero damage immortal build youwould say its a good build..it can stay in teamfight but it produces no damage?!
I personally think damage is fine if not a bit too high.And with that damage this is the survivability that should accompany it..Im sorry just my opinion..Now the sustain specs..yeah they absolutely suck atm

No no, the immortal build is even worst than burst build, I’m sort of glad they’ve got rid of it, sort of because they did it in the wrong way ( RTL nerf , really uncalled for ).

When necessary I like to stay and get some fire off my allies, or I can more easily survive focus fire with a sustained build compared to burst build, sure with good team you can have somebody that can peel off for you..but that rarely happen in SoloQ, furthermore I simply don’t enjoy the hit and run/gank tactics, , you really don’t need to play an ele to do that

Chaith.8256:

The Paralyzation sigil is getting the axe tomorrow, I’m waiting to see how that affects the Warrior profession. It might be more significant a nerf than people expected.
…
Personally, I am not a huge hater of Berserker Stance. To me, it made the game better, allowing Warriors to do their intended roles for a short period. I still think Warriors aren’t going to be the top of the food chain for long, even without any drastic nerfs.

The change to Paralyzation Sigil will be impactful, but the over-buffed passive heal combined with high damage output probably still is enough of a crutch to hold warrior firmly in the meta for now. Killing a warrior 1v1 requires either kiting zerkers stance (like you suggested) and then condition-kiting him to death or poison+DD pressuring him to death. Neither method is available to a number of the classes in this game that fail in either poison ability, damage output or kiting ability. Even the classes who can manage to win that match-up usually take an extremely long time (too long to be a viable solution). Perhaps they might slip from being the apex predator, but I don’t expect them to go anywhere. The primary builds are just too effective and too easy mode to disappear.

Arheundel.6451:

You don’t seem to get the point at all….

The ele burst is high risk=high reward, and cannot be compared to thief or mesmer burst as it’s low risk= high reward because : stealth + low CD on burst skills , instead the ele got 20s + CD on all burst skill and this means if you fail…you die..or run away and call it a victory like players as @Avead do.

Everyone understands your points, you don’t have to keep drilling the basic Ele risk/reward facts for the playstyle.

Arheundel.6451:

- Lower dmg of ele
- Reduce CD of dmg skills ( ex : phoenix 15s CD, arcane wave 20s CD )
- Add an additional effect as compensation ( ex : arcane wave now apply 2s burning if used while in fire )
- Add a 3/4s casting time to arcane skills

This is what I call balance, what you guys propose is…whack a mole balance.

What could doing these things possibly change? Using a ton of development resources to give Eles more actions per minute, but net the same amount of damage? How will that make Eles wanted in PvP, or perform better in the current meta..

Sure.. telegraphing is good on abilities, I agree, I’d be fine with a visible cast time on Arcane utilities in exchange for more utility.

But honestly, something needs to be done about how bruiser Eles perform in their non-glass cannon builds against conditions I.E, using Valks or other more balanced stat distributions. There’s no way for them to win a sustained battle now. I think the Berserker, arcane, ninja-style Eles should retain their unique playstyle, but they could stand to benefit from simpler ways to exist. That’s why I still am a fan of a short, easily accessible condition immunity, as to not repeat the same mistake of simply adding too much sustained healing. But I’m repeating myself.

Bottom line is, if we’re talking about brainstorming ways for Eles to become wanted, valued members of a tPvP roster, then the changes either have to give the Ele the tools to cope in the current meta, or change the current meta. No damage shuffling or overpowered RTL relapses are going to be effective.

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

Chaith.8256:

The Paralyzation sigil is getting the axe tomorrow, I’m waiting to see how that affects the Warrior profession. It might be more significant a nerf than people expected.
…
Personally, I am not a huge hater of Berserker Stance. To me, it made the game better, allowing Warriors to do their intended roles for a short period. I still think Warriors aren’t going to be the top of the food chain for long, even without any drastic nerfs.

The change to Paralyzation Sigil will be impactful, but the over-buffed passive heal combined with high damage output probably still is enough of a crutch to hold warrior firmly in the meta for now. Killing a warrior 1v1 requires either kiting zerkers stance (like you suggested) and then condition-kiting him to death or poison+DD pressuring him to death. Neither method is available to a number of the classes in this game that fail in either poison ability, damage output or kiting ability. Even the classes who can manage to win that match-up usually take an extremely long time (too long to be a viable solution). Perhaps they might slip from being the apex predator, but I don’t expect them to go anywhere. The primary builds are just too effective and too easy mode to disappear.

That sounds like you’re saying Warriors will have a secure spot even after losing Paralyzation sigil and Apex Predator status (I never thought they were Apex Predators, lol.) I think that’s good. In the MLG tournament, we’ve observed a lot of Spirit Ranger vs. Longbow Hammer Warrior duels, and it’s not a guaranteed win for the Warrior. It truly isn’t.

I think that if Eles can get a re-introduction to survival in the current meta, Warrior, Necro, and Ranger aren’t going to be quite as represented as well.

I think S/D thieves and Power Engineers to a lesser extent (it’s not easy), counter berserker Longbow/Hammer warriors pretty well. Poison, either Boon Strips or CC, and resistance to stuns through high evasion and limitless pseudo stunbreaks, aka being a thief (lawl), or protection injection. I imagine that if we ever saw Mesmer vs. Warrior matchups, it’d be a pretty easy roll for the Mesmer, too. It’s painfully hard for a Warrior/Engineer to land anything on a Mesmer.

I am really not a fan of healing signet. I dislike that it’s always ticking, ticking, ticking away, and poison is really the only counterplay. It’s pretty boring, actually. It’s like not having a heal skill at all. I would like it if Warriors had to micromanage it.

Would be cool if Healing signet was more like Hercules Mitigate wounds but the constant healing isn’t really boring to me. What’s lame is that Signets have actives with the purpose of them being used and the healing is strong enough that most just disregard the active and the active itself is fairly underwhelming.

ensoriki.5789:

Would be cool if Healing signet was more like Hercules Mitigate wounds but the constant healing isn’t really boring to me. What’s lame is that Signets have actives with the purpose of them being used and the healing is strong enough that most just disregard the active and the active itself is fairly underwhelming.

It’s just like the Ele Glyph of Renewal heal. Except I’ve actually seen Eles pop that when they get desperate enough. 90% of the Warriors I see will take the Healing Signet passive with them to the grave. It’d be cool counterplay if once the Ele/War were incentivized to use the Actives enough, but they’d be forced to kite or disengage until the passive effect was closer to kicking back in.