Guild Wars 2

Is the Aoe nerf in the April 30th patch?

No, just hopefully the water trait line

Let’s just get this nerf over with instead of crossing our fingers month by month hoping nothing will happen. Let’s get AoE nerf and make those who want it nerf to be happy. And make Elementalist so useless, we may as well stand in LA and chat most of the time about how we used to go out into the world of Tyria.

AoE nerf? Does this mean that AoE goes from hitting 5 stuffs at a time to maybe 2-3 at a time?

Milennin.4825:

AoE nerf? Does this mean that AoE goes from hitting 5 stuffs at a time to maybe 2-3 at a time?

Probably more along the lines of keeping the limit at 5 but every AoE skill getting its damage cut in half.

Devs stated they don’t like that players use AoE abilities on single targets (makes me wonder why they created weapon sets and even entire professions that hardly feature any non-AoE abilities in the first place, but w/e). Reducing the AoE limit wouldn’t solve that, swinging the nerf-hammer at the damage values does.

Well a stupid move lacking any thought like that would completely gut the elementalist class, not to mention many other class/weaponset combinations.

If anything, AoE needs to be uncapped at the current damage. It is underpowered in the current state of the game, at least in W3.

They’re gutting the already kittened staff. Surprise? Not at all. Message from the Dev’s is quite clear – Roll a warrior, guardian or mesmer. If you’re into W3, rock the thief. Staff ele, already far and away the lowest damage in the game, is catching it again. Whee! (We’re still better off than rangers though – suppose there’s always something to be happy about…)

what amazes me is that everyone QQ about zergs in W3 and yet devs haven’t realized that actually insanely BOOSTING AoE would be the only solution against ’em.
Having AoE be lethal for enemies and -say- 50% damage for allies too, would force everyone to spread and actually be more careful instead of mindlessly zerging.

Whatever PvP changes come that’s fine – i already gave up ele since march patch for the now more OP engineer/mesmer/guardian. Just hope that PVE changes don’t destroy the class’s viability.

In any case, it’s safer to roll a variety of classes in PVE so that you don’t get destroyed by the nerf hammer in any particular update.

Funny thing is no matter what changes come people will still cry for this class to be nerfed as long as ride the lightning is not removed from the d/d arsenal.

Just let them remove AoE from the game. Capping aoe in general is a lame mechanic that does not make classes differ frmo each other.
AoE should be capped and uncapped on a per individual skill base.If staff is supposed to be The aoe weapon it should be uncapped.While burning rush aoe blast for example should have the 5 target cap.
Same logic should apply on other proff/skills.

Grevender.9235:

what amazes me is that everyone QQ about zergs in W3 and yet devs haven’t realized that actually insanely BOOSTING AoE would be the only solution against ’em.
Having AoE be lethal for enemies and -say- 50% damage for allies too, would force everyone to spread and actually be more careful instead of mindlessly zerging.

I dont see why this is an Elementalist topic…

Anyways, Zerg packing isnt boosting AoE, at the contraring, AoE limit supports zerg strategy and is completely stupid. AoE should be promoted to combat zerg behavior.

Strong and lethal AoE are fine as long as you have to run a squishy build to make them work. The current state of the game is perfectly balanced on that point.

innocent ouarior.1954:

I dont see why this is an Elementalist topic…

because 90% of our staff or D/D skills are AoE?

AoE limit supports zerg strategy and is completely stupid. AoE should be promoted to combat zerg behavior.

my point exactly…

Raptured.9307:

Whatever PvP changes come that’s fine – i already gave up ele since march patch for the now more OP engineer/mesmer/guardian. Just hope that PVE changes don’t destroy the class’s viability.

In any case, it’s safer to roll a variety of classes in PVE so that you don’t get destroyed by the nerf hammer in any particular update.

Funny thing is no matter what changes come people will still cry for this class to be nerfed as long as ride the lightning is not removed from the d/d arsenal.

That’s very true. Fact is I get more nervous about PvE thant PvP. I feel they have been threatening to nerf us for months and I get tired of feeling like the got the gun pointed but are toying with us until they shoot. I got 4 80 all are geared I split most of my time between ele and Warrior. I would love to see this class and DD make it out ok. I fear for burst ele the most. Fact is dps builds tend to eat the brunt of nerfs.

TheGuy.3568:

I fear for burst ele the most.

well, gotta be very optimist to call it “burst” xD

Grevender.9235:

TheGuy.3568:

I fear for burst ele the most.

well, gotta be very optimist to call it “burst” xD

Lol your right. Its really sad but that’s the way it is. At least its aoe…..sort of.

makku.2508:

Devs stated they don’t like that players use AoE abilities on single targets (makes me wonder why they created weapon sets and even entire professions that hardly feature any non-AoE abilities in the first place, but w/e). Reducing the AoE limit wouldn’t solve that, swinging the nerf-hammer at the damage values does.

So basically Elementalists might as well do nothing in fights when fighting 1 enemy at a time.

Okay.

In that case, why not make the whole game with 1 on 1 fights, and just remove multi-targeting? Would solve all these difficult balance issues.

Milennin.4825:

makku.2508:

Devs stated they don’t like that players use AoE abilities on single targets (makes me wonder why they created weapon sets and even entire professions that hardly feature any non-AoE abilities in the first place, but w/e). Reducing the AoE limit wouldn’t solve that, swinging the nerf-hammer at the damage values does.

So basically Elementalists might as well do nothing in fights when fighting 1 enemy at a time.

Okay.

In that case, why not make the whole game with 1 on 1 fights, and just remove multi-targeting? Would solve all these difficult balance issues.

Wrong, all they need to do is make every class use a sword. only 1 skill. Slash. No ranged, no magic, no nothing. It solves everything. In fact, remove all classes and only leave 1 class. Warrior. Then you won’t have this problem where we AoE 1 enemy because we liked it. But hey, there is an unwritten rule that if you AoE 1 enemy that is against this rule. Only 1 on 1 skills are allowed.

I can’t find any other threads with the developers talking about their class balancing plans for the Elementalist aside from the one by Symbolic’s write up. I’ve been looking around but I can’t find what I’m looking for, can someone please provide some links to the threads where developers said they’re going to nerf AOE, water trait, or in general what they plan to do in April 30 for the Elementalists?

Thank you very much!

Others have hit upon the truth that seems to have escaped Arenanet: The counter-balance to zergs is to increase the scope of AoE damage, not decrease it. Either an MMO has AoE damage that needs to be feared, which then requires people to spread out, or it has AoE that can be shrugged off with barely a snicker, in which case densely packed zergs rule.

I honestly don’t understand what has happened to Arenanet post-launch…

Wait, if AoE isn’t supposed to be used on 1v1 targets, if you run staff, what do you do? Just auto-attack and fire-3 them to death? Better hope you can CC the crap out of them (and they don’t cleanse ANY of your conditions) b/c you will be dead if they can actually land a hit. Maybe if you could weapons swap like other professions, you could switch up your weapon for a style of play. For those crying: “But you have 20 skills per weapon!!”, it doesn’t help when staff is purely aoe, scepter is single-target range damage, and dagger is a mix at short-range. You don’t swap between weapons as a warrior for more skills, you swap for different types of skills to mitigate weaknesses. Ele’s get shafted in that regard (staff ele better not be alone!).

I hope they go through with this and drive ele’s off the map completely!! AoE should probably do less damage than an auto-attack, and take twice as long to lay down (you know, cause its not easy to dodge). If this is even in the pipeline, then I am sad that my ele won’t be given new life in a few months. Hooray for more bank-space!

makku.2508:

Milennin.4825:

AoE nerf? Does this mean that AoE goes from hitting 5 stuffs at a time to maybe 2-3 at a time?

Probably more along the lines of keeping the limit at 5 but every AoE skill getting its damage cut in half.

Devs stated they don’t like that players use AoE abilities on single targets (makes me wonder why they created weapon sets and even entire professions that hardly feature any non-AoE abilities in the first place, but w/e). Reducing the AoE limit wouldn’t solve that, swinging the nerf-hammer at the damage values does.

That’s pretty stupid because they didn’t give Ele’s the ability to swap weapon sets, if you’re staff, all your skills are aoe except stoning. Literally.