Guild Wars 2

hate to be that guy, and i did read around the forums a bit, but i’m jumping back in after playing for about a month after release (RL obligations took me away) and trying to get a feel for professions. i’m sure the balance has changed tremendously, but it sounds like warrior and guardian are pretty much the easiest and most “OP” profession, and ele seeming to have no consensus whether it is easy or difficult to master, but pretty solid for playing all aspects of the game. as a casual player who dabbles in pvp and more in pve, i would prefer not to go with easiest if that translates to boring key-spamming.

any advice on a fun, but not too complex, and well-rounded profession in terms of ele, or am i looking at the wrong one? i realize “fun” is highly subjective, but i’d love to hear some opinions.

thanks!

Ele has the highest AoE DPS in GW2 atm(single target goes to thief).
It also has the lowest armor(light) and lowest HP pool(10K). Because of the attunements, you’ll have 20 weapon skills, so you’ll have to learn how to use them effectively.

It’s a very rewarding class to play in PvE, high risk very high reward

Some builds:

Staff:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQFAGnMISLDY9A0RQACgIcQ0gwyMA-ThRBABXt/o8DPdA5dBAA4BAQp6PmpEUQAjC-e

Last 4 points depend on situation: 66200 66002 64220 64202 are all viable(traits to take are Tempest Defense, Stone Splinter, Vital Sriking, Blasting Staff).After a while you will learn what build to use in every encounter.

Last skill is either: Signet of Fire or Lightning Storm(insane Vurn stacking)

Standard S/F might stacking build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQJArdnMISTDWABWPAdEGYAwCHAmAFgR1AxngLwME-TxRBABXp8jm9HwTPQenAAAeAAUq+jZKBFEwoA-e

D/F FA build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQJAodnMISTDW2AWPAdEGQAwCHAqAHgR3AxpgMQNE-TxRBABXp8jm9HwTPQenAAAeAAUq+jZKBFEwoA-e

If all of this sounds interesting, make sure to read Haviz’ and Zelyh’s guide on Dulfy:http://dulfy.net/2014/07/11/gw2-elementalist-pve-class-guide-by-haviz-and-zelyhn/

Like Acotje said, Ele is a high risk/high reward profession. While it seem to have no consensus about whether or not its a hard or easy profession is because of the Celestial D/D elementalist build in sPvP and Roaming.

This buid is really hard to play right at the beginning, then you reach a plateau where your can rapidly reach the level of other profession with a bit less skills. But if you want to go further and really reach the skill ceilling, a lot of work will be needed. Since D/D Cele Ele is really popular in the moment a lot of ppl reached that plateau while a bunch are really good and are making a lot of casual/normal player rage. Its still a really high ceilling build.

The Elementalist is part of the meta in PvE and WvW, while being in the top profession for roaming and sPvP. Its the profession in the best shape right now.

awesome advice – thank you both for the help and links to builds!

Acotje pretty much summed it up for PvE. If you want to check builds for other areas of the game too this might be the good place to start at.

Be careful OP. Ele are no where near as strong as they were at release. Devs will probably nerf us even more due to QQ.

I run a celestial D/F build, it can beat any D/D ele & those (swirling winds) tho<3 LB rangers get dumb when they see an ele counter their BS
Youll have abit of a tough time with fresh air eles, they are rare but a good one will kill you slowly

I find it super fun to play though, I just dont understand why people are QQing saying eles are op? is it because noone likes a skilled ele? Because when people see eles they think the kill should be easy?