Guild Wars 2

As the title says.

What was your Base line idea ??

There are ALOT of people wondering…

What is the idea for the Staff: ??? (the most debated weapon)
(wvw sieges only. or possible single target nuker).

What is the idea for Dagger/Dagger: ???

What is the idea for Scepter / Focus: ???

please enlighten us all.
What was your plan for our weapons. ?
What are your future plan for our weapons. ?

this is also a good way to show people that the designers actually do read forums.
if you answear…

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

I’d like that.

Chaosky.5276:

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

You can spec scepter for that. I would agree though that what is badly needed is a weapon set that gives more flexibility in terms of range, especially if they aren;t going to give us an out of combat weapon swap.

some minor fixes to staff and it becomes worth it, I mean, i want to wield a staff and feel powerful, right now only D/D achieves this. Though they have different themes, this does not justify its inability to peel off and reliably pumping damage. Bring staff to the dagger’s level, then we might have some eles wielding some weapons other than the already-tiring D/D

morrolan.9608:

Chaosky.5276:

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

You can spec scepter for that. I would agree though that what is badly needed is a weapon set that gives more flexibility in terms of range, especially if they aren;t going to give us an out of combat weapon swap.

Just posted this in another thread, ironically enough:

Tell me what causes you to think that it makes its wielder an effective ranged combatant.

In my eyes, the scepter suffers from many issues:

• Flamestrike is about as “meh” as attacks get.
• Dragon’s Tooth won’t hit anyone without a 3 second CC of some sort.
• Phoenix travels so slowly that it can be outrun with swiftness – good luck hitting anyone with that at 900 range. (It also won’t hit targets on elevated platforms due to some sort of bug, it just disappears into said platforms.)
• Shatterstone is useless – it does less damage than Ice Shards, locks you out of your non-instant skills for far too long, and is easy to dodge.
• I don’t know why Water Trident even has a damage component – you have to cast it at your feet to get the heal. (Minor gripe.)
• The earth attunement lacks offense – the only real damage comes from Stone Shards, and it’s absolutely terrible without condition damage. Building for condition damage leaves your other attunements weaker vs. power and crit, so that’s not very helpful, either.

eldain stenlund.4306:

As the title says.

What was your Base line idea ??

There are ALOT of people wondering…

What is the idea for the Staff: ??? (the most debated weapon)
(wvw sieges only. or possible single target nuker).

What is the idea for Dagger/Dagger: ???

What is the idea for Scepter / Focus: ???

please enlighten us all.
What was your plan for our weapons. ?
What are your future plan for our weapons. ?

this is also a good way to show people that the designers actually do read forums.
if you answear…

My read on it:

Staff = AOE damage/utility
Scepter = mid ranged damage/utilty
Dagger = Close ranged damage/utility
Focus = defense/utility

To me it’s pretty cut and dry.

Chaosky.5276:

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

I’d like that.

Scepter/dagger. You have a condition damage options and power damage options. Utility skills should include arcane blast. Run air attunement most of the time and switch to earth attunement on need. Water/Fire for utility or ring of fire/flame grab.

Admittedly they need to give some small love to fire and water scepter, but it is certainly a viable option and I use it all the time.

Ralathar.7236:

Chaosky.5276:

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

I’d like that.

Scepter/dagger. You have a condition damage options and power damage options. Utility skills should include arcane blast. Run air attunement most of the time and switch to earth attunement on need. Water/Fire for utility or ring of fire/flame grab.

Admittedly they need to give some small love to fire and water scepter, but it is certainly a viable option and I use it all the time.

I really don’t think that making heavy use of the air attunement and taking Arcane Blast is a good idea without crit damage. Also, condition damage only affects Flamestrike, Dragon’s Tooth, and Stone Shards, only one of which is both worth using and will hit. (Not counting the offhand dagger skills because they’re not ranged.)

I can zap and bleed all I want, but I’m not going to kill anyone competent at 900 range. I fought a s/d ele that attempted to use Stone Shards for damage today – know what I did?

RtL-Ring of Fire-Arcane Wave-Arcane Blast-Phoenix-Fire Grab

They lost 50% of their health, while I’d taken next to no damage, and just removed the bleeding after I’d finished the combo. (We’d been fighting for a bit, so they didn’t have an interrupt like Earthquake handy, and they were at half health, so they died.)

You may notice that that combo is my most reliable and best burst damage as a s/d ele, and only one of the skills used (Arcane Blast) is effective outside of melee range. The only reliable ranged burst damage I have is Lightning Strike (Electric Discharge trait)-Lightning Strike-Arcane Blast.

Chaosky.5276:

Ralathar.7236:

Chaosky.5276:

Hey.

Hey, devs.

Would you mind giving us a good ranged option for 1v1s?

I’d like that.

Scepter/dagger. You have a condition damage options and power damage options. Utility skills should include arcane blast. Run air attunement most of the time and switch to earth attunement on need. Water/Fire for utility or ring of fire/flame grab.

Admittedly they need to give some small love to fire and water scepter, but it is certainly a viable option and I use it all the time.

Are you seriously telling me to make heavy use of the air attunement and take Arcane Blast without crit damage? Also, condition damage only affects Flamestrike, Dragon’s Tooth, and Stone Shards, only one of which is both worth using and will hit. (Not counting the offhand dagger skills because they’re not ranged.)

I can zap and bleed all I want, but I’m not going to kill anyone competent at 900 range. I fought a s/d ele that attempted to use Stone Shards for damage today – know what I did?

RtL-Ring of Fire-Arcane Wave-Arcane Blast-Phoenix-Fire Grab

They lost 50% of their health, while I’d taken next to no damage, and just removed the bleeding after I’d finished the combo. (We’d been fighting for a bit, so they didn’t have an interrupt like Earthquake handy, and they were at half health, so they died.)

You may notice that that combo is my most reliable and best burst damage as a s/d ele, and only one of the skills used (Arcane Blast) is effective outside of melee range. The only reliable ranged burst damage I have is Lightning Strike (Electric Discharge trait)-Lightning Strike-Arcane Blast.

I did not tell you to neglect crit damage. I didn’t think I’d even have to mention it, especially since air is a precision line. Also, really what stops you from dodging the RTL combo? This leaves you with those skills on CD and them without those skills on CD, since they possess them as well. Do not judge viability via a player misplaying. Nor should you assume just because they are a condition build that they can’t do DD damage back to you when provided the chance. Kitten payed right they would have dodged and earthquaked you.

Also, you mention Arcane Wave and Arcane Blast. Did you think of Signet of Fire for condition build? Glyph of Elemental Power? Lava Axe? No these are not burst damage. Conditions are, duh, not about burst damage.

Additionally since he was in Earth Attunement was the noob you were facing even using Rock Armor? Did he place down his own rings of fire to self combo projectile finishers with his stone shards? Did he ever blind you to mitigate damage? A quick trip through water for healing/chill/condition removal?

Scepter Condition builds have alot of potential but it DOES require you to use that potential and build for it. EVERYONE should know how to dodge burst, that should go without saying.

Chaosky.5276:

• Flamestrike is about as “meh” as attacks get.
• Dragon’s Tooth won’t hit anyone without a 3 second CC of some sort.
• Phoenix travels so slowly that it can be outrun with swiftness – good luck hitting anyone with that at 900 range. (It also won’t hit targets on elevated platforms due to some sort of bug, it just disappears into said platforms.)
• Shatterstone is useless – it does less damage than Ice Shards, locks you out of your non-instant skills for far too long, and is easy to dodge.
• I don’t know why Water Trident even has a damage component – you have to cast it at your feet to get the heal. (Minor gripe.)
• The earth attunement lacks offense – the only real damage comes from Stone Shards, and it’s absolutely terrible without condition damage. Building for condition damage leaves your other attunements weaker vs. power and crit, so that’s not very helpful, either.

Flamestrike is 100% burn uptime, it should animate faster tho.

Dragon Tooth is an INCREDIBLE AoE burst, it hits like a truck, and applies burn. Yes, you need a CC to land it but Tooth+Phoenix is death sentence on many people.
Its easely avoidable but so it should be.

Pheonix gives vigor and cleans condition (on a 20sec CD, seriously, this is like a supercantrip)… and does loads of damage, yeah, its slow but it is how you damage yith scepter fire : wait for you time than unleash hell.

Shatterstone is bad, it should be a blast finisher again like it was on beta.

Water trident takes a good chunk of +healing power.

Stone Shards are our highest theorical single target dps (Ravager build with burn proc and poison field). Toughness buff is bad’ish and non instent blind (cast + travel time!) isnt reliable.

Not a fan of the OPs approach to addressing the community, if you look at everything.

Feels like WoW forums revisited. The tools available don’t fit how someone wants to be able to play (or aren’t obviously overpowered) so banging proverbial pots and pans and hyperbole is the answer. It’s so tiresome.

Sarethor.7625:

Not a fan of the OPs approach to addressing the community, if you look at everything.

Feels like WoW forums revisited. The tools available don’t fit how someone wants to be able to play (or aren’t obviously overpowered) so banging proverbial pots and pans and hyperbole is the answer. It’s so tiresome.

you are a wow player it seems..
(i was once too.. played in beta.. up untill Panda. so i know all there is to know).
so you realy want to go to, WoW. and comepare their mage to our ?

i can tag along.

WoW mages had: Staff. Dagger. Sword. Wand. + offhand stat buffer.
You had a spell book. where you picked the spells you wanted. depending on your specialization.. Fire, Ice, Arcane.
Spells wasnt tied to a special weapon. you could switch them around all you wanted.
You wanted a staff mage. just get a staff. you wanted dagger+offhand.. just get it.
Fire was more of a nuker specc. Burn them down fast. litteraly.
Ice was abit more tanky specc. abit lesser dmg. but still good burst potential.
Arcane was a high sustain dmg specc.

Now. GW2.
We have. Staff. Dagger. Scepter. Focus.
Our spells are bound to the weapons.. shift weapon, and you get different skills.
And its is more or less impossible to specialize on anything.
And also you are trapped in your weapon if you enter combat.

Wich had best system ? WoW.
It had alot better freedom. 3 totaly different specializations.
And you could also mix them abit for further customization, depending on what you wanted.

I never played GW1. but i heard the system there was better also.
wich made it possible to specialize in special element(+s).

This is why iam very interested to see what the designers have to say about our weapon types.
What was their base idea.. and what is the future idea.

But most important.
Will the future give us any freedom to play a weapon the way we want and see fit
depending on specc.
Like the Highly debated Staff.
Will we be able to specc it into being a range nuker specialization ?
Or will it stay as it is. Attack/defend a keep only.

Will Dagger/Dagger ever be considered a Melee/short range high nuker
instead of the ultimate. all in one super weapon it is now.

will scepter + focus ever be realy good at range.

I dont know about you. but i whould like to have more weapon freedom.
Should i use DD. staff or scepter…. hmm.. kitten . they are all realy good.
This is the dilemma i want to have. but i dont have.

eldain stenlund.4306:

Will Dagger/Dagger ever be considered a Melee/short range high nuker
instead of the ultimate. all in one super weapon it is now.

It isn’t an all in one super weapon. A staff is superior in big fights by far.

Ralathar.7236:

I did not tell you to neglect crit damage. I didn’t think I’d even have to mention it, especially since air is a precision line. Also, really what stops you from dodging the RTL combo? This leaves you with those skills on CD and them without those skills on CD, since they possess them as well. Do not judge viability via a player misplaying. Nor should you assume just because they are a condition build that they can’t do DD damage back to you when provided the chance. Kitten payed right they would have dodged and earthquaked you.

Also, you mention Arcane Wave and Arcane Blast. Did you think of Signet of Fire for condition build? Glyph of Elemental Power? Lava Axe? No these are not burst damage. Conditions are, duh, not about burst damage.

Additionally since he was in Earth Attunement was the noob you were facing even using Rock Armor? Did he place down his own rings of fire to self combo projectile finishers with his stone shards? Did he ever blind you to mitigate damage? A quick trip through water for healing/chill/condition removal?

Scepter Condition builds have alot of potential but it DOES require you to use that potential and build for it. EVERYONE should know how to dodge burst, that should go without saying.

I assumed that since you said to switch between earth and air that you were suggesting a power and condition damage build, which is why I brought up that other ele, as they were some sorta power-condition damage build.
Also, they did dodge and they did switch to water, but they were at half health and I was using fast/instant activation attacks that don’t really give the enemy a chance to react to them – they dodged when I used RtL, probably expecting Updraft, mispredicted their dodge on Phoenix, and didn’t have interrupts like Earthquake available because we’d been at it for a while. They’d switched to earth from air to attempt to stack bleeds on me, but I quickly forced them to abandon that pursuit by pressuring them.

Since you’re not trying to defend ranged power-crit-crit damage, let’s look at conditions. Now, I’ll admit that I’ve only played condition builds with 30 points in the Earth Magic trait line (they were all terrible due to a lack of healing and/or a slow attunement recharge rate). However, the main problem with building for condition damage is that I suffer a fairly massive DPS loss whenever I switch away from the earth attunement – eles just don’t have optimal options for condition damage like necros and engis do.
If you really think it’s worth building for condition damage, though, I’ll give a 0/0/20/30/20 build a shot.

eldain stenlund.4306:

Sarethor.7625:

Not a fan of the OPs approach to addressing the community, if you look at everything.

Feels like WoW forums revisited. The tools available don’t fit how someone wants to be able to play (or aren’t obviously overpowered) so banging proverbial pots and pans and hyperbole is the answer. It’s so tiresome.

you are a wow player it seems..
(i was once too.. played in beta.. up untill Panda. so i know all there is to know).
so you realy want to go to, WoW. and comepare their mage to our ?

i can tag along.

WoW mages had: Staff. Dagger. Sword. Wand. + offhand stat buffer.
You had a spell book. where you picked the spells you wanted. depending on your specialization.. Fire, Ice, Arcane.
Spells wasnt tied to a special weapon. you could switch them around all you wanted.
You wanted a staff mage. just get a staff. you wanted dagger+offhand.. just get it.
Fire was more of a nuker specc. Burn them down fast. litteraly.
Ice was abit more tanky specc. abit lesser dmg. but still good burst potential.
Arcane was a high sustain dmg specc.

Now. GW2.
We have. Staff. Dagger. Scepter. Focus.
Our spells are bound to the weapons.. shift weapon, and you get different skills.
And its is more or less impossible to specialize on anything.
And also you are trapped in your weapon if you enter combat.

Wich had best system ? WoW.
It had alot better freedom. 3 totaly different specializations.
And you could also mix them abit for further customization, depending on what you wanted.

I never played GW1. but i heard the system there was better also.
wich made it possible to specialize in special element(+s).

This is why iam very interested to see what the designers have to say about our weapon types.
What was their base idea.. and what is the future idea.

But most important.
Will the future give us any freedom to play a weapon the way we want and see fit
depending on specc.
Like the Highly debated Staff.
Will we be able to specc it into being a range nuker specialization ?
Or will it stay as it is. Attack/defend a keep only.

Will Dagger/Dagger ever be considered a Melee/short range high nuker
instead of the ultimate. all in one super weapon it is now.

will scepter + focus ever be realy good at range.

I dont know about you. but i whould like to have more weapon freedom.
Should i use DD. staff or scepter…. hmm.. kitten . they are all realy good.
This is the dilemma i want to have. but i dont have.

Thankfully, the Anet designers don’t actually spend much of their time trying to have meaningful dialogue with people on the forums who just want to make themselves feel better by claiming how bad things are and why they can do the job better.

You have been given a toolset which works to varying degrees in a broad range of circumstances and elementalists have more options than any other profession. Sure, are they all amazing – no, and they neither could be nor should be.

It’s clear you just want what you want and you feel like posting as much as possible might give you what you want regardless of the merit of your position. Just like with WoW, very very few players have the requisite background or mindset required to attempt to design/balance anything, let alone something as complex as combat in any MMO. The real problem is that some players actually think they can build a better mousetrap.

In general, for combat, comparing WoW to this game isn’t apples-to-apples as they have almost nothing in common.

edit: I won’t even talk about your self-appraisal “so i know all there is to know” or the length of time you claim to have played. It’s comedy, but not really good comedy.

If you play all raids. all classes. and do this for 4 – 5 years.
You kinda get to know everything.. you just do. (dont blaim me for it).

But what made WoW a big success. ?
Right timing ? Check!
Options for your class ? Check!

What will make GW2 a success. ?
Right timing ? Check! (Swtor was falling, ppl wanted a new = good timing).
Options for your class ? .. .. .. .. .. still pending…

People want options. no matter what.
If you gonna go get new tires for your car… you want options (freedom). right ??

You dont want the dealer to say: “hey, i have your Worn out tires right here”.
when you can clearly see other options available behind his back…

How whould you respond ?
A: Take the tires… if the dealer says they are the best ones. they must be.. right.
B: No thank you, but i whould like those new 21" ones you have there in the back.

(I just love to make these

Iam asking for Options. Is that too much for some of you players ??

Chaosky.5276:

If you really think it’s worth building for condition damage, though, I’ll give a 0/0/20/30/20 build a shot.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJArYhEmYbzR5gjDAkHvYCLDFcoRRxM5A;TsAAzCuoay0koJbTumkNNq4UxsAA (copy/paste)

…It wasn’t bad, actually. Can’t compare to my condition engi, but… Yeah, wow, would not have expected the results I got knowing how poor signet condition builds are. Sure, air’s pretty useless for damage now, but it has better utility than earth anyway, so I prefer it to be the weak one, and I can’t say I’m upset that I don’t need to rely on fire as much.
Ether Renewal was extremely useful due to my lack of burst damage, too – I’d say it really helped hold the spec together.

So, while this isn’t the sort of ranged combat I’d prefer, I may have found a viable ranged option for my ele.

eldain stenlund.4306:

Iam asking for Options. Is that too much for some of you players ??

not only are you the only one complaining, but you keep making new threads about the same thing.

Scrambles.2604:

eldain stenlund.4306:

Iam asking for Options. Is that too much for some of you players ??

not only are you the only one complaining, but you keep making new threads about the same thing.

I’m complaining, too!

Chaosky.5276:

Scrambles.2604:

eldain stenlund.4306:

Iam asking for Options. Is that too much for some of you players ??

not only are you the only one complaining, but you keep making new threads about the same thing.

I’m complaining, too!

well look at any of the 4 threads eldain has made and you will find plenty of reasonable suggestions and rebuttals.

edit; and staff is an excellent ranged option. The general consensus has been: faster projectile speeds would be nice, and AoEs that did the initial dmg tick immediately would also be cool.

Scrambles.2604:

well look at any of the 4 threads eldain has made and you will find plenty of reasonable suggestions and rebuttals.

edit; and staff is an excellent ranged option. The general consensus has been: faster projectile speeds would be nice, and AoEs that did the initial dmg tick immediately would also be cool.

I only care about 1v1 scenarios, and I’m pretty sure the consensus is that the staff is pretty sucky in that regard. I get that the staff probably isn’t intended to be a 1v1 weapon, though, so that’s why my complaints are focused more on the scepter.

I did find something that works, though, so that’s nice.

Chaosky.5276:

I assumed that since you said to switch between earth and air that you were suggesting a power and condition damage build, which is why I brought up that other ele, as they were some sorta power-condition damage build.
Also, they did dodge and they did switch to water, but they were at half health and I was using fast/instant activation attacks that don’t really give the enemy a chance to react to them – they dodged when I used RtL, probably expecting Updraft, mispredicted their dodge on Phoenix, and didn’t have interrupts like Earthquake available because we’d been at it for a while. They’d switched to earth from air to attempt to stack bleeds on me, but I quickly forced them to abandon that pursuit by pressuring them.

Since you’re not trying to defend ranged power-crit-crit damage, let’s look at conditions. Now, I’ll admit that I’ve only played condition builds with 30 points in the Earth Magic trait line (they were all terrible due to a lack of healing and/or a slow attunement recharge rate). However, the main problem with building for condition damage is that I suffer a fairly massive DPS loss whenever I switch away from the earth attunement – eles just don’t have optimal options for condition damage like necros and engis do.
If you really think it’s worth building for condition damage, though, I’ll give a 0/0/20/30/20 build a shot.

It’ll definitely take more work than necros, but then they also get a bit more utility than necros too. Not all of that comes into play in sPVP sadly, but it certainly does in WvW. I think it can be viable played well.

I’m actually going to experiment with a tough/vit/condition/healing power build focused around fire shield and flame barrier soon to see if I can make it work. I already know I can tank well with /Focus, so making them pay in burning for it seemed like a natural step.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/elementalist/?1.4|8.1f.hf.d.1d.hf|0.0.0.0.0.0|1f.719.1d.719.1f.719.1d.719.1f.719.1d.719|1f.66.1d.66.1d.66.1f.66.1f.66.1d.66|u29a.0.u23c.a1.0|30.d|1n.26.27.24.28|e

Is the next idea I will be tinkering with for WvW.

Flame Barrier + Fire Shield + 3 second Fire Shield when using a signet + 4 signets + written in stone + A boatload of surviability + good heal power + 70% condition duration and 90% burning duration. It oughta be fun. Who needs retaliation, I’ll burn ya hahaha. I’ll trade out the water signet for Lava Axe when I feel like being more offensive.

Chaosky.5276:

Chaosky.5276:

If you really think it’s worth building for condition damage, though, I’ll give a 0/0/20/30/20 build a shot.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJArYhEmYbzR5gjDAkHvYCLDFcoRRxM5A;TsAAzCuoay0koJbTumkNNq4UxsAA (copy/paste)

…It wasn’t bad, actually. Can’t compare to my condition engi, but… Yeah, wow, would not have expected the results I got knowing how poor signet condition builds are. Sure, air’s pretty useless for damage now, but it has better utility than earth anyway, so I prefer it to be the weak one, and I can’t say I’m upset that I don’t need to rely on fire as much.
Ether Renewal was extremely useful due to my lack of burst damage, too – I’d say it really helped hold the spec together.

So, while this isn’t the sort of ranged combat I’d prefer, I may have found a viable ranged option for my ele.

Good on ya. I’m one of those weird people always trying weird builds. The more people tell me it’s not viable the more I wish to try it. I run tons of alts so I have good instincts on most builds and classes.

The 5+ years I played Dark Age of Camelot doing the same thing really helps and gives me some perspective though. Even my own guild looks at alot of my builds weird, but they don’t deny that they work and I end up providing advice and answering questions about a fair amount of stuff.

Addendum: I finally ran into some good HGH condition engis and condition necromancers, and found that I just didn’t have the sustainability necessary to effectively utilize condition damage. Maybe someone else can make it work, but I guess I’ll just go back to Valkyrie s/d.

Personally, i don’t find a single reason to build around conditions as an ele. We don’t have enough ways to both put on conditions and maintain them to make it worth the effort.

covenn.7165:

Personally, i don’t find a single reason to build around conditions as an ele. We don’t have enough ways to both put on conditions and maintain them to make it worth the effort.

Well that was my thought, too, but I really wanted ranged damage.

Ah well, it’s always worth experimenting.

I would love for them to change Arcana VII to increased range with scepter to 1200 on at least the auto-attack abilities.

Regarding conditions build: I do that for staff when I use siege. I bought a full carrion set with badges on patch day, with carrion staff (cond. charge on kill). The cows on a treb went from doing 84/tick to 158. And that’s with a bunker build, no points in Earth. Maybe a 0/0-10/30/20-30/0-10 build would be fun for cowing/carting. Gonna try it. hheeheheheehuehe

katniss.6735:

I would love for them to change Arcana VII to increased range with scepter to 1200 on at least the auto-attack abilities.

On the one hand, increased range would be great – on the other, I wouldn’t be able to take Arcane Mastery or Renewing Stamina if I took extra range, while d/d specs would have no such problem, so it’d probably still be an unused trait.