Guild Wars 2

It seems now that anet has moved all the damage modifiers and even nerfed a key modifier in air (changed to crit damage instead of flat 10 percent increase is a pretty big nerf, not to mention another key modifier being made grandmaster so you have to either chose that over fresh air or lightning rod further nerfing ele damage specs) and then moving all of the survivability traits to be in those same trait slots is forcing eles to have to chose between the two. Which is bad because eles have the lowest health and armor pool and really just die without some key traits that have now been moved into places where now you have to chose them over damage or get dead.

Water had a key modifier too, bountiful power, and now you have to either chose that, a trait other classes get for free under different names and eles used to get for free, or your key traits for survivability like mainly cleansing water and powerful auras so you are losing even more damage there too.

Further more these changes also DO NOT change the fact that every ele build in the game at a competitive level depend cantrips so you either will be taking the new trait (which is good tbh) but you are pretty much forced to take that and then lose a damage modifier from not taking aquamancer’s training, and then you either give up another survivability trait in cleansing water or you are forced to take bountiful power to get your damage modifier back.

Now some may say BUT YOU SHOULD HAVE TO CHOSE DER OTHER CLASSES HAVE TO! But no, thieves definitely don’t have to now, neither do mesmers or necros or warriors or rangers, guardians do to some extent but they are still a heavy class and can take a lot of punishment.

So, to recap, eles lost or had nerfed 3 key damage modifying traits. Had a couple survivability traits moved into positions where you will lose one or the other and I still haven’t mentioned the arcane nerf. I am honestly not as mad about it but it is still a nerf.

Other classes seem to have gotten major buffs but eles look to be in a definitely worse place then they used to be compared to what other classes have received and pigeonholed even more into certain traits.

SO MUCH DIVERSITY!

here is a tip for you. Put more dps in your gear. Being able to invest so far into earth is a great tradeoff. Id choose it solely for geomancers defense.

Staff builds in wvw will probably be 06066.
D/D will probably be 06660 or 00666.
Sc/f will probably be 66060 or 06066.

The core functionality won’t change too much

FrownyClown.8402:

here is a tip for you. Put more dps in your gear. Being able to invest so far into earth is a great tradeoff. Id choose it solely for geomancers defense.

Staff builds in wvw will probably be 06066.
D/D will probably be 06660 or 00666.
Sc/f will probably be 66060 or 06066.

The core functionality won’t change too much

Yeah, the the problem is that fresh air won’t be viable since other classes got major buffs and ele won’t be able to compete with them. So that leaves us with a dd ele viable, yikes. There is no gear in pvp, so your argument is invalid there. It hurts fresh air dps quite a lot. Also, you’ll have to pick a useless major trait in Arcana.

Laraley.7695:

FrownyClown.8402:

here is a tip for you. Put more dps in your gear. Being able to invest so far into earth is a great tradeoff. Id choose it solely for geomancers defense.

Staff builds in wvw will probably be 06066.
D/D will probably be 06660 or 00666.
Sc/f will probably be 66060 or 06066.

The core functionality won’t change too much

Yeah, the the problem is that fresh air won’t be viable since other classes got major buffs and ele won’t be able to compete with them. So that leaves us with a dd ele viable, yikes. There is no gear in pvp, so your argument is invalid there. It hurts fresh air dps quite a lot. Also, you’ll have to pick a useless major trait in Arcana.

the amulet will provide more stats to compensate. I see fresh air eles picking up one with air again since its now 3s of superspeed. Just imagine less burst and more survivability from traits. Zerker will still hurt. Bolt to the heart is overrated. most players at less then 33% health are on the verge of dying anyways. So just think, you can get 3s of super speed to kite around and you can also get an extra heal from evasive arcana now. Blinding ashes was buffed if u choose that route and the defence from earth is op if you want to go that route as well. Our damage modifiers where nerfed, but our defensive abilities got buffed.

FrownyClown.8402:

here is a tip for you. Put more dps in your gear. Being able to invest so far into earth is a great tradeoff. Id choose it solely for geomancers defense.

Staff builds in wvw will probably be 06066.
D/D will probably be 06660 or 00666.
Sc/f will probably be 66060 or 06066.

The core functionality won’t change too much

Why would wvw staff builds be 06066? They already aren’t the meta as LR has taken over and the only reason to go into arcane is for Blasting Staff which will be baseline when these changes hit.

I am pretty sure the meta will change away from arcane for staff because of the three traits that make it worth it, blasting staff you no longer need, ele attunement and EA you are going to have to chose between, so you are basically going into arcane for EA and none of the other traits makes going into Arcane for EA worth it at all for staff.

So yeah. Personally, 66060 looks like where it will be at and in those trait lines all of the key damage modifiers in those lines took rather large hits in comparison to the other professions.

EDIT- Although either 06660 or 60660 look good too. Especially with the mesmer and thief mega buffs.

FrownyClown.8402:

Laraley.7695:

FrownyClown.8402:

here is a tip for you. Put more dps in your gear. Being able to invest so far into earth is a great tradeoff. Id choose it solely for geomancers defense.

Staff builds in wvw will probably be 06066.
D/D will probably be 06660 or 00666.
Sc/f will probably be 66060 or 06066.

The core functionality won’t change too much

Yeah, the the problem is that fresh air won’t be viable since other classes got major buffs and ele won’t be able to compete with them. So that leaves us with a dd ele viable, yikes. There is no gear in pvp, so your argument is invalid there. It hurts fresh air dps quite a lot. Also, you’ll have to pick a useless major trait in Arcana.

the amulet will provide more stats to compensate. I see fresh air eles picking up one with air again since its now 3s of superspeed. Just imagine less burst and more survivability from traits. Zerker will still hurt. Bolt to the heart is overrated. most players at less then 33% health are on the verge of dying anyways. So just think, you can get 3s of super speed to kite around and you can also get an extra heal from evasive arcana now. Blinding ashes was buffed if u choose that route and the defence from earth is op if you want to go that route as well. Our damage modifiers where nerfed, but our defensive abilities got buffed.

Erm what? A free heal from Evasive Arcana? You know, that half of the eles were already running 26006 or 06026? You basically can’t survive with just Evasive Arcana and go air and fire, it’s not possible. It would be less survability that it’s now. One with air is okay, but I still would prefer Bolt to the heart. Mesmers and thieves got giant buffs, fresh air ele won’t really be any close to it.

yeah sorry, my PvE (this does NOT mean dungeons. and certainly NOT speedruns, so don’t even start with me on that) staff ele will go 6/6/6/0/0 with signets, fire auras, and fury/swiftness/protection when auras are applied. forget cantrips… their cooldowns are still way too long for me. and now that i get a fire aura when attuning to fire, why on earth would i want to trait into arcana?

no, the traits that i will miss, are +10% damage when endurance is full, and the +10% damage within 600 range. i understand why we lost the under 600 trait, to bring D/D cele eles down a notch. but losing the +10% damage when endurance is full really hurts.

my staff ele takes sigil of renewal for that little bit of sustain, by the way. (to make up for no sustain from the water line) so no need for evasive arcana heal. and besides, when i dodge, it’s to avoid being hit, not to get into combat. i’ve never liked EA because of that.

the only way i would ever trait into arcana, is if i got a new trait that gave me all the master minors from the other elemental lines all in one go, to replace a 3/3/3/3/2 build.

EDIT: 6/6/6/0/0 obviously means fire +air +earth, two offense lines plus a defense line.

Gonna quote myself. "game at a competitive level "

PvE is not that, I don’t really care about that tbh, but WvW and sPvP builds 100 pecent rely on at least lightning flash and mistform.

What PvE does is sorta irrelevant.