Elementalist weapon swap
Please don’t hate me, and I’m not sure if I’m allowed to quote myself, but here’s my original, and still ongoing stance on this matter:
I like the concept behind this idea.
However, letting Weapon Swap not put Attunements on cooldown is unbalanced.
Each of the 2 actions must place the other type of action on a longer-than-usual cooldown for it to be fair, otherwise you are giving the profession a significative, unwarranted buff:
- When you change Attunement, the Attunements go into the usual 15 second cooldown, and the Weapon Swap must go into a 30~60 second cooldown.
Yes, 2, 3 or even 4 times as long as the usual Attunement cooldown.
You play the Elementalist, having access to multiple elements by being locked to 1 weapon.- When you swap Weapon, the Weapon Swap goes into the 10 second cooldown, but the Attunements must go into a 20~40 second cooldown.
Yes, 2, 3 or even 4 times as long as the normal Weapon Swap cooldown.
You play the Geo/Aero/Pyro/Hydromancer, able to swap weapons by being locked to 1 element.I think this would make Weapon Swapping for Elementalists fun, balanced and provide alot of flavour.
It would give players the option to play the “Aero/Geo/Pyro/Hydromancer” instead of Elementalist if they wish to, by giving up the ability to swap Attunements for a long while every time they swap weapons.
Hey, whoa! Since you posted I can actually access the thread without using that stupid link in my history. You’re MAGIC!
Anyway, I edited the OP days ago with changes from your contribution. Swapping attunements puts your weapon swap on a 25 second CD, swapping weapons puts your attunements on a 15 second CD. I’m debating longer CDs, but for now that’ll do.
(edited by Conncept.7638)
25/15 is too short. Doesn’t feel like a compensation at all.
I didn’t edit my original suggestion, but I’m more inclined towards 4x the normal cooldowns.
That means swapping weapons puts a 40 second cooldown on Attunements, changing Attunement puts a 60 second cooldown on Weapon Swap.
Elementalist is already very versatile.
Weapon Swap should feel like an option, not a buff.
So my suggestion aims to give Elementalists:
- The flavor to play a single element on 2 weapons if you commit yourself to spending 40 seconds without changing Weapons.
- The ability to swap weapons if you commit yourself to spending 60 seconds without changing Attunement.
I think this sort of commitment makes it fair against other professions.
Endurance 2.0 || Attributes, Traits and Conditions || Skill Variants
(edited by Nurvus.2891)
25/15 is too short. Doesn’t feel like a compensation at all.
I didn’t edit my original suggestion, but I’m more inclined towards 4x the normal cooldowns.
That means swapping weapons puts a 40 second cooldown on Attunements, changing Attunement puts a 60 second cooldown on Weapon Swap.Elementalist is already very versatile.
Weapon Swap should feel like an option, not a buff.
So my suggestion aims to give Elementalists:
- The flavor to play a single element on 2 weapons if you commit yourself to spending 40 seconds without changing Weapons.
- The ability to swap weapons if you commit yourself to spending 60 seconds without changing Attunement.I think this sort of commitment makes it fair against other professions.
I see what you mean, but that high of a CD worries me in SPvP. If you are facing a longbow/shortbow ranger and you get stuck in daggers for 60 seconds, you’re boned. He’s going to kite you to death, and there’s nothing you can do. Similarly, what happens if you get stuck in earth against a warrior who runs three condition removals? Once again, 40 seconds is a death sentence. One of the things this needs to fix is our inability to adapt to our enemies in combat. Too long of a CD, and this will just make it worse by giving the elementalist a heaping helping of niche builds. I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying that long of a CD greatly worries me.
(edited by Conncept.7638)
I have to disagree there.
Pick an element:
- Fire – Burning Speed, threatening damage.
- Water – Frozen Burst and Frost Aura as well as healing to keep you nice and healthy
- Earth – Magnetic Grasp, Churning Earth and Earthquake are simply nasty.
- Air – reverse-Updraft and Ride the Lightning for mobility; Lightning Touch to apply Weakness, reducing enemy damage and Endurance recovery.
It’s not like the enemy does 2x the damage you do.
If you build glass cannon, don’t fight alone and be opportunist, otherwise face the consequences.
If the Elementalist lacks the ability to adapt to an enemy, despite having 4 elements, then it’s the Elementalist skills that need to be looked at.
4 different elements and none does its job? That’s some design flaw right there.
I do not think Elementalist needs to be able to swap weapons during combat.
If there’s a problem with Elementalist ability to survive, deal with that by adjusting the skills themselves.
To me, weapon swap for Elementalist should be mostly about flavour, to be able to play ’mancer or Elementalist.
60 seconds bound to 1 Element isn’t that much when you make use of your Utility skills as well.
Endurance 2.0 || Attributes, Traits and Conditions || Skill Variants
(edited by Nurvus.2891)
The only thing I would suggest from this is a shortcut weapon swap, so I don’t have to do it manually by clicking the staff from my backpack inventory. Meaning after I’m done using D/D, I’m out of combat, I can press that weapon swap button, and then it becomes locked in until I’m out of combat again.
Aha!
Figured out a compromise to the cooldown debate.
Basically I didn’t want people to be pidgeonholed in to a single element by a huge CD like some were suggesting. Doing so would lock people in to mono-element builds in situations where said build might not be applicable, and prevent dual-element builds, something I wish to open up with this class change.
So, thusly, the CD shall act as such:
- Each time you switch attunements, the CD of your weapon swap will go up by 30 seconds, maxing out at 90 seconds. Likewise, when you swap weapons, each of the attunements will have a 20 second CD added to it, maxing out at 60. Neither of these CDs will work with the Arcane tree, so the arcane tree will be maintained as it is. Additionally, the standard CDs for weapon swapping and attunement swapping will be unaltered, except wherein they are altered by equipment or traits.
Basically, this system will make it so you have to invest in one build or another, but there will be levels of investment because of the stacking CD, allowing one to change strategies earlier on if one needs to. There may be a better calculation for making an actual scaling CD, but it would need to be simple, ANet doesn’t like complicated stat calculation and neither do I.
(edited by Conncept.7638)
Old topic, but still valid
Elementalist should have their weapon swap at least when out of combat. I don’t mind if it also had a little cooldown on all skills or whatever they want to do, but having to go to hero panel to swap just isn’t good enough.
This has nothing to do with balance if they only allow it out of combat and give us a cooldown on the skills. It’s simply for convenience.