Guild Wars 2

What the hell is it supposed to do?

Well it is pretty simple, trust the tooltip!

It says that attunements will linger for 5 seconds after you swap out of them.
And then it explains what each attunement does:
Fire – you can cast fire spells
Water – you can cast water spells
Etc.
So basically what this trait does is that, for example, if you were to swap from fire to water, then you would benefit from both of these attunements for 5 seconds. This means that for these five seconds you will be able to cast Fire and Water spells both at the same time!

Trust me, we have been discussing this awesome trait with the developers since game release. They have reworked it a number of times at it has been BUG FIXED many many many times.

Discussion exhibit number 1
Discussion exhibit number 2

So if you TRUST THE TOOLTIPS and believe what the developers say then this trait is working perfectly.

It’s a matter of good faith, really.

Your 5-point traits from each line (Flame Barrier, Zephyr’s Speed, Stone Flesh, Soothing Mist) will continue to exist for another five seconds after you switch out of that attunement.

For Soothing Mist it’s for a second or two longer, usually, since the regeneration provided is for a few seconds at a time while attuned to water.

Look at your bar with and without the arcana trait - when switching attunements without it, the old icon disappears instantly. The most noticeable effects to see it staying around are probably earth (looking at hero panel) or water (for the aforementioned regen).

cheese.4739:

Your 5-point traits from each line (Flame Barrier, Zephyr’s Speed, Stone Flesh, Soothing Mist) will continue to exist for another five seconds after you switch out of that attunement.

For Soothing Mist it’s for a second or two longer, usually, since the regeneration provided is for a few seconds at a time while attuned to water.

Look at your bar with and without the arcana trait – when switching attunements without it, the old icon disappears instantly. The most noticeable effects to see it staying around are probably earth (looking at hero panel) or water (for the aforementioned regen).

I honestly didn’t expect to find out the answer. Wow, thank you.

too bad it’s pathetic considering the 5 pts in air is awful.

In my opinion it is a rather weak trait, the only way it is effective is is going 10 in one trait and then 15 in the others.

I think it could do with a little improvement

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

In my opinion it is a rather weak trait, the only way it is effective is is going 10 in one trait and then 15 in the others.

I think it could do with a little improvement

I feel like they could allow it to stack bonuses outside the 5-point ones, so long as they limited it to one holdover element at a time (as in, the last element you attuned to lingers for five seconds). That way you don’t get someone stacking absurd amounts of damage by blowing through all of their attunements during a churning earth, for example, but you also make the trait vastly more effective.

My suggestion would be to make elemental attunement into 15 minor trait. It’s a very strong trait but it’s not like warrior doesn’t have the best minor trait at exactly the same spot.

Wishful thinking.

haviz.1340:

My suggestion would be to make elemental attunement into 15 minor trait. It’s a very strong trait but it’s not like warrior doesn’t have the best minor trait at exactly the same spot.

Wishful thinking.

Yeah I was thinking this, too – it still means that elementalists have to invest 15 points into Arcana to get at Elemental Attunement… but the vast majority of us take that trait if we invest 20+ points anyway.

The two could possibly be combined, or maybe the current Lingering Elements could be merged up into the (barely noticeable) 25 point Arcana trait – since we’re probably never going to see our ‘increase your damage for each boon’ triat where it belongs in the boon duration line.

Making Elemental Attunement a minor trait would really help us, giving many players an extra five points to play with or allowing them to actually use one of the other Major Master Arcana traits – most would probably opt for a second Major Adept, but at least Arcane Retribution might get slotted sometimes (encouraging people to play with Elemental Surge over Evasive Arcana).