Guild Wars 2

This is a joke? My already ridiculous and poor elementalist got another big nerf – obsidian flesh. What about making absolutly useless skills of fire focus (fire wall and fire aura) actually normal skills? I dont play defensive or support ele, i like damage and i play zerk scepter focus, but with this update things are going worse and worse. When i enter PVP with zerk ele everyone is laughing because i play it and they dont understand i dont play support. Wtf? i thought this game should be adjustable and you should play what you want to play. But you obviously dont like some players want to play damage elementalist. Bye bye PVP! going to another pvp game because this balance is a garbage.

Vyko.6953:

This is a joke? My already ridiculous and poor elementalist got another big nerf – obsidian flesh. What about making absolutly useless skills of fire focus (fire wall and fire aura) actually normal skills? I dont play defensive or support ele, i like damage and i play zerk scepter focus, but with this update things are going worse and worse. When i enter PVP with zerk ele everyone is laughing because i play it and they dont understand i dont play support. Wtf? i thought this game should be adjustable and you should play what you want to play. But you obviously dont like some players want to play damage elementalist. Bye bye PVP! going to another pvp game because this balance is a garbage.

Agree, DPS and glass/cannon build required at least some protection, some “oh kitten buttons”, otherwise these builds it’s just a paper. So we more and more forced to play support. Why to play elem dont know…

You have no idea, do you? Obsi flesh and earth protection aren’t that big of a deal.

As a zerk scepter focus ele I’d be more afraid of the fact that there is NO MORE PROC SIGILS = 30% of the damage is gone.

Tomiyou.3790:

You have no idea, do you? Obsi flesh and earth protection aren’t that big of a deal.

As a zerk scepter focus ele I’d be more afraid of the fact that there is NO MORE PROC SIGILS = 30% of the damage is gone.

This^

why OLD bug with [Strength of Stone] is not fixed still?
the trait must give condition damage based on toughness
for example:
[Stone Flesh] gives 150 toughness, bit it does not increase a condition damage with [Strength of Stone]
[Rock Barrier] gives 250 toughness, bit it does not increase a condition damage with [Strength of Stone]

Tomiyou.3790:

You have no idea, do you? Obsi flesh and earth protection aren’t that big of a deal.

As a zerk scepter focus ele I’d be more afraid of the fact that there is NO MORE PROC SIGILS = 30% of the damage is gone.

yeah, I meant it that way Im weak anyway and they still nerfing it more, but not adding something good. Fire skills of focus are really useless.

So you buffed Glyph of Elemental Power before and made it good, but then decided, “oh wait, let’s just nerf it again.”

The fire trait change is a joke. Who even uses One with Fire? Just bring back Fire’s Embrace already and then we can have some real build diversity and not this dismal attempt you guys are calling balance.

Fair play on Arcane Power—you’ve made that somewhat usable. The only things that are left now are the conjures, signets and traits. You know what to do.

GoEP had its recharge reduced from 45 to 25 lol, how was it nerfed?

Also you guys feel like only ele got nerfed, fortunately every class pretty much got nerfed with sigil removals and skill removals.

Lich King.1524:

Vyko.6953:

This is a joke? My already ridiculous and poor elementalist got another big nerf – obsidian flesh. What about making absolutly useless skills of fire focus (fire wall and fire aura) actually normal skills? I dont play defensive or support ele, i like damage and i play zerk scepter focus, but with this update things are going worse and worse. When i enter PVP with zerk ele everyone is laughing because i play it and they dont understand i dont play support. Wtf? i thought this game should be adjustable and you should play what you want to play. But you obviously dont like some players want to play damage elementalist. Bye bye PVP! going to another pvp game because this balance is a garbage.

Agree, DPS and glass/cannon build required at least some protection, some “oh kitten buttons”, otherwise these builds it’s just a paper. So we more and more forced to play support. Why to play elem dont know…

well they didn’t help us support players either, they cut our sigils, and ups the time on our skills. after they took our stats and amulets..all we had was a few good skills and sigil and, they removed the sigils and increased recharge times

Lich King.1524:

why OLD bug with [Strength of Stone] is not fixed still?
the trait must give condition damage based on toughness
for example:
[Stone Flesh] gives 150 toughness, bit it does not increase a condition damage with [Strength of Stone]
[Rock Barrier] gives 250 toughness, bit it does not increase a condition damage with [Strength of Stone]

Thats probably not a bug. Temporary stats (they are indicated by green numbers in the UI) are not included for the % based traits/runes. And to my knowledge Stone Flesh and Rock Barrier are coded as temporary stats.

Abelisk.4527:

GoEP had its recharge reduced from 45 to 25 lol, how was it nerfed?

Also you guys feel like only ele got nerfed, fortunately every class pretty much got nerfed with sigil removals and skill removals.

It now has 1 stack of burn instead of 2 plus it only has 5 charges instead of using the 5-second cooldown interval. The old GoEP was way better for the Fire Attunement version, but this one is completely unusable.

The 5-second cooldown system was better because it allowed the continued use of the skill over a period of time while applying pressure from others, whereas this new one is a simple 5 strike attack. I enjoyed being able to use skills from other attunements while the burn effect was in use. Sadly, this new change has made the utility pretty lackluster and I’m not the only one that thinks so.

Thanks for ruining a decent glyph skill.

I see your viewpoint, when I used to play condi ele I relied on Fire GoEP for damage too. However try coupling Arcane Power with GoEP in Fire attunement while casting a skill from another attunement.

Abelisk.4527:

I see your viewpoint, when I used to play condi ele I relied on Fire GoEP for damage too. However try coupling Arcane Power with GoEP in Fire attunement while casting a skill from another attunement.

Yes, I know that works, but after your 5 attacks hit what then? The old one was 2 stacks every 5 seconds for 30 seconds and I think that was better instead of this 1 stack.

well it sucks that eles kinda got shafted since dmg sigils gone but now perhaps a silver lining… they can see the issues without those sigils corrupting their balance decisions. it was very odd all needed those sigils to even do any dmg in the first place.

Dahir.4158:

Abelisk.4527:

I see your viewpoint, when I used to play condi ele I relied on Fire GoEP for damage too. However try coupling Arcane Power with GoEP in Fire attunement while casting a skill from another attunement.

Yes, I know that works, but after your 5 attacks hit what then? The old one was 2 stacks every 5 seconds for 30 seconds and I think that was better instead of this 1 stack.

Now that Bleeding exists in Earth that may find use. Vulnerability might make power builds better. With air swap in FA sf ele you can get a quick 20 vulnerability, especially if you used scepter 2 in earth midcast into air.

Also you can play a chill spam burst build by using scepter 2 in earth midcast into water attunement. The possibilities are interesting. Idk how dagger would work though.

This patch proves one point:

DEVS NEVER EVER TIRED TO MAKE OR THEORY CRAFT ELE PVP BUILD
DEVS NEVER EVER TIRED TO PLAY ELE IN PVP.

Agreed, Ele has been so dry in build diversity for a while now in spvp’s meta, sigh.

Not even a token increase in shatterstone?!?! I mean, don’t they realize that scepter is AT LEAST 1 stack of vuln away from being viable.

I mean, taking away like 30% of the damage from sigils won’t hurt scepter ele burst all that much…now it can just…you know……I really hope you know, because I dont!

Support ele will also be very hurt by these changes. Reduction in protection on auras (when eles only really shared 2 auras from shouts) + reduction in healing from wash the pain away, combined with what appear only small nerfs to support druid and none to support rev, make it a quite questionable choice. Perhaps if you drop earth for arcana, you could build a bruiser-type build, but that is highly unlikely to work as there isn’t a viable toughness/healing power amulet.

I guess eles are stuck being just a worse version of heal-bot. Enjoy being boring!

I bought HoT on release and quickly quit the game because ele was a tanky snorefest, so I decided to keep an eye on patchnotes and comeback whenever ele got a viable dps build.

I guess I’ll keep waiting.

Mr Godlike.6098:

This patch proves one point:
DEVS NEVER EVER TIRED TO MAKE OR THEORY CRAFT ELE PVP BUILD
DEVS NEVER EVER TIRED TO PLAY ELE IN PVP.

I’ve read every single patchnote since beta and this quote is so true. All the changes are either random & useless or plan nerfs to push ele into being tankier because there’s no real active deffense other than going full healer

Now when I am more chilled …there are some interesting things dudes…

Personally obsidian flesh nerf is bad…there was no reason to ever touch this…but rebound buff on tempest healing elilte make’s it usable on non healing amulet and this is important on class with no build diversity outside heavy defence amulets.

Some things in this patch need to be tested.

Support ele was nerfed because of how much damage was taken out of the meta by the nerfs to sigils and over half the classes damage.

Ele sustain had to be nerfed or else support ele would be godmode. The sustain nerfs to ele where no worse than the nerfs to every other class’s sustain.

Agreed, ANET just doesn’t care about elementalist at all or completely lack understanding of what they built with the class and again the balance patches proves it.

I don’t necessarily disagree with the nerf to Tempest healing – i think it over performed on the heal side and frankly I also don’t give a kitten about the elite spec as I hate it.

But to consistently leave the base elementalist or any build that is not a heal or in PvP and WvW the broken mess they are today (and nerf it to add salt to injury) is just a kick in the nuts and a mic drop to the face.

GG Anet, well played.

Personally, I just decided to quit, and from what I’ve seen of the PvP community this is the best decision for alot of us. The balance in this game continuously shows anet doesn’t have any idea what balance is, and the pve story consistently shows they have given up on the depth and scope that Guild Wars 1 had.
So I’m just out.

Lol, all these people quitting the game when sustain and damage was nerfed across the board. Something they promised to do months ago.

I can’t even. When people figure out where the meta settles I doubt things will be as dire as some people are claiming.

Even if it is a nerf to damage and sustain across the board (seriously, because of sigils? they contributed so little in PvP anyway) nerfing Elementalist’s one good role is madness.

Savvy.3258:

Even if it is a nerf to damage and sustain across the board (seriously, because of sigils? they contributed so little in PvP anyway) nerfing Elementalist’s one good role is madness.

Arenanet forgot the logic:
they nerfed the same sustain skills for tank and for glass cannon
then tank still can survive but not so long anymore,
but glass cannon will become a paper and can not live anymore

saerni.2584:

Lol, all these people quitting the game when sustain and damage was nerfed across the board. Something they promised to do months ago.

I can’t even. When people figure out where the meta settles I doubt things will be as dire as some people are claiming.

Imagine that you have to play same build since expansion realise because every other build is pure suicide and you leave your team 4v5. Imagine that you play build only good for healing two classes because nothing else has value when you +1 them to help, cause you have 0 damage and nobody will come to help you cause…you have 0 damage. Imagine that even if you kite to try at least to contest node…your will stay there till you die cause you have no stealth, no good enough mobility to disengage so you can’t carry on your own. Imagine that you MUST use ,,elite spec" that main mechanic it stopped by random cc so you can’t even press one button like reaper and clave people with freaking scythe and feel that you are freaking reaper.

Since start of HoT ele faced only nerfs and nothing was given to compensate NOTHING. More and more amulets became unviable till we could only use mender or magi to be able to be useful in 5 man PREMADES that this game doesn’t support. Ele are STUCK at ranked solo/duo q healing those who can carry can only hope they will carry. Because instead they keep alive useless players and they will LOSE BEACUSE YOU CAN’T DO NOTHING ON YOUR OWN LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE IN THIS GAME EVEN ON TRASH BUILD!

Somebody from anet higher ups should come to dev responsible ele balance and ask:

1. What did you managed to balance in this class after release of HoT?
2. Do people would buy this game to play this class?

Ele mains are right to leave this game. I agree there is great value for team to have ele player…pro league showed that really well…but that player has no personal value to BE f***** ele.

Elementalist PvP has been completely broken for me since I started playing it last season.

I like to play Celestial S/D ele to have some survivability while still doing some damage. Having a nice compromise between ranged combat and melee range.

[desired build]

But everything I like in my PvE and WvW build is unavailable. Celestial armor. Sigil of Malice. Sigil of Bursting.

I end up playing with a completely broken build. When I select damage stats I get one-shotted by rangers and thieves. When I select a defensive amulet I deal no damage. Sure, there are completely different builds that work for other players. But other weapon builds do not fit my play style or require too much micro-managing.

Well, I can still rank up by losing, but more than bronze I won’t ever get. And it is not much fun. Still, I like to at least get a bit of the massive amount of achievement points that are available in the sPvP tree.

Just more nerfs to the core ele because tempest has every thing or is simply an ele +1. So if the core ele has it and the tempest has it too then duration and dmg numbers become messed up.

Right now burning is too much in raids its going to get hit on ele soon. Ele is up in wvw this will make it worst and odds are hit spvp to a point all because tempest (tankly support that dose good to best dmg for ele) add on too much more to the core of ele.

This is going to hit the next elite spec all the one behind it. Anet needs to stop nerfing core ele realty all core classes because of power creep they added in with the elite spec. They NEED to nerf the elite spec it self.

The Ele forums should form a union.
Kappa

Vyko.6953:

Tomiyou.3790:

You have no idea, do you? Obsi flesh and earth protection aren’t that big of a deal.

As a zerk scepter focus ele I’d be more afraid of the fact that there is NO MORE PROC SIGILS = 30% of the damage is gone.

yeah, I meant it that way Im weak anyway and they still nerfing it more, but not adding something good. Fire skills of focus are really useless.

It baffles me why people think Ele was weak before patch. It definitely feels more challenging now. They nerfed skills across the board. Part of trying to dial down power creep

R O C.6574:

Vyko.6953:

Tomiyou.3790:

You have no idea, do you? Obsi flesh and earth protection aren’t that big of a deal.

As a zerk scepter focus ele I’d be more afraid of the fact that there is NO MORE PROC SIGILS = 30% of the damage is gone.

yeah, I meant it that way Im weak anyway and they still nerfing it more, but not adding something good. Fire skills of focus are really useless.

It baffles me why people think Ele was weak before patch. It definitely feels more challenging now. They nerfed skills across the board. Part of trying to dial down power creep

Ele as a bunker support never been bad but that is the last thing a class must play as before its comply out of the meta or viable for game types.

The power creep added was though tempest and its line NOT the core ele and they keep nerfing the core ele because of this. If they wanted to dial down the power creep they NEED to nerf tempest or the very power creep not the old things to fit the new.

What they are doing now is super shorted sighted and is going to be a problem down the rode for these mostly temp fixes that make ele viable now that will most likely lead to not being viable later on.

Ele cant do condi dmg because of atuments so they add in condi bust both aoe support and self condi. So now ele can be some what viable with condis but these are on charges and charges do not work well with aoe. As they drop the condi dmg on these effects it going to become more worthless on aoe skills and in a lot of ways the aoe and paoe of the ele skills tend to get in the of ele out put for condis.
So not fixing the fact condis are so locked in places with atuments a major core ele problem they are simply adding in counter productive and short sighted tools that only work in the moment that are going to get nerfed over time. The nerfs see to be aimed at the core ele to fix these op effects too making it even more of an issues over time.

The balancing with ele is a joke a bad one.

They are trying to lower survivability. So you see obsidian flesh lose some duration, wash the pain away got an increase cool down…

Stop thinking of it as HOT vs Core. They are looking at the profession as a whole. If you don’t have HOT, I don’t feel sorry for your lack of competitiveness. Buy the xpac cheapskate!

R O C.6574:

They are trying to lower survivability. So you see obsidian flesh lose some duration, wash the pain away got an increase cool down…

Stop thinking of it as HOT vs Core. They are looking at the profession as a whole. If you don’t have HOT, I don’t feel sorry for your lack of competitiveness. Buy the xpac cheapskate!

I feel sad if what you say about “looking at the profession as a whole” is really true for anet. That means eles are now only relegated to play bunker for the whole expac. Funny how they say when elite specs rolled out that they wanted build diversity. I guess 1 build is pretty diverse enough when some professions had none in the past.

Ele has been a mainstay in the meta since what 2014? Every time we see Anet change things we get the “Sky is Falling” threads from players about ele’s.

If they were some how nerfed out of the meta then so be it since they’ve been there for 3 years straight now.

p.s. FYI no class in the history of GW2 has been more OP then Ele. Remember 4x Ele winning a tournament with a bunch of no names beating pros? I do.

Azukas.1426:

Ele has been a mainstay in the meta since what 2014? Every time we see Anet change things we get the “Sky is Falling” threads from players about ele’s.

If they were some how nerfed out of the meta then so be it since they’ve been there for 3 years straight now.

p.s. FYI no class in the history of GW2 has been more OP then Ele. Remember 4x Ele winning a tournament with a bunch of no names beating pros? I do.

Its not about the sky falling its about how mindless the buffs / nerfs are. If you want to nerf ele protection up time you need to do more then kick one sec off of aura protection you need to deal with the underlining problem namely tempest’s protection up time. Ele core has been ok its tempest that is pushing it over the top in both def and akk. If you only go after the core ele your not fixing the power creep your simply making the power creep bigger.

Jski.6180:

Azukas.1426:

Ele has been a mainstay in the meta since what 2014? Every time we see Anet change things we get the “Sky is Falling” threads from players about ele’s.

If they were some how nerfed out of the meta then so be it since they’ve been there for 3 years straight now.

p.s. FYI no class in the history of GW2 has been more OP then Ele. Remember 4x Ele winning a tournament with a bunch of no names beating pros? I do.

Its not about the sky falling its about how mindless the buffs / nerfs are. If you want to nerf ele protection up time you need to do more then kick one sec off of aura protection you need to deal with the underlining problem namely tempest’s protection up time. Ele core has been ok its tempest that is pushing it over the top in both def and akk. If you only go after the core ele your not fixing the power creep your simply making the power creep bigger.

The main problem in pvp-balance that Arenanet can not understand that protection has to be removed by players, not by developers. Then gameplay will be interesting and tactical.

As an example: do you remember https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Protective_Spirit in GW1?
Attacker must remove it from his target. Why developers try to reduce or remove protection? Give to players tools/skills to do it on their opponents! Otherwise in the end of such “pvp-balance” all classes will have average dps, average protection, average healing, same HP, same skills (may be with different names/colors), and completely boring&random gameplay.

It’s a shame that Fire specialization is nearly useless and Water is mandatory in PvP, but a lot of classes have too-important specializations (Revenant – Herald spec; Thief – Trickery spec; Guardian – Valor spec; Mesmer – Inspiration spec etc)

I feel like specs that are focused on sustaining are the cornerstones of our builds, without them we’d drop like flies.

Problem is each specialization should have a nice amount of sustainability. For example for elementalist the Fire spec has Cleansing Flames which procs on 3 different condis. This is countered by Mesmers because one of their shattered clones can deal 3 condis which will just waste that utility.

I think all of the specs need a good condi cleanse option. Water has the regen-into-cleanse trait which is too important to give up. Anet needs to tone down on the conditions, reworking how they work.

I am currently running a defensive Mender’s Dagger/Dagger ele build in PvP, I have no idea how it works in Ranked games but it has been super successful in Unranked. It can stack up to 25 Might stacks with ease and keep it there for several seconds, and is easily restackable.