Guild Wars 2

… I mean relative to other builds. I have a level 11 Ele and have a ton of fun with the build. I think this may be because it’s a D/D build so the damage output compared to my P/P thief and SB ranger is simply much higher. I play PvE exclusively at the moment, and I play strictly builds I find fun. I realize my other two builds are ranged, which might explain the difference in felt DPS, but as long as my Ele doesn’t get comparably weaker to my others as I level up, I’ll stick with the Ele for now. So much fun. Thoughts?

Don’t get too attached to the damage. At higher levels ele damage is lower compared to a similarly built ranger or thief, and the skills are more difficult to land.

If you like the playstyle, by all means stick with ele. That’s what I enjoy about it too. But, be prepared as you reach 80 you do noticeably less damage than your counterparts. You will also realize how much more fragile you are compared to other professions. Over time you will learn to get better at dodging and timing defensive skills out of necessity, or spend a lot of time on your back.

Just don’t stagnate in d/d, try all the weapon combinations for long enough to know what they are best at. Most ele players are really inflexible and you see lots of whining on these boards when the 1 build they know gets changed.

d/d is my preferred weapon set, but you do need to learn other weapons. I switch between d/d and staff in fotm. I even have 2 sets of daggers – a p/t/v set for mostly healing, and a cd/p/v set for melee dmg assist (fun). Staff you will always need available, and there is no reason to use anything other than zerk stats on staff.

Also: Give Focus a try. It’s definitely a niche weapon, but use it for projectile hate. Focus makes the Uncategorized Fractal (harpies), Volcanic Fractal (lava elemantals), Snowblind Fractal (ice elemental), the wurm in every TA path, the spider in TA up … so much easier just with Swirling Winds. Plus you get better versions of Cleansing Fire and Mist Form in earth attunement, and a long KD (good if you coordinate defiant stacks), an aura to share (on a too high cooldown) and a (too small) fire field.

Yes, ele is lacking damage-wise, but not utility-wise.

My damage has went up considerably after learning the class and getting zerker gear because I know how to survive. Lightning whip doing 4k twice in pve is quite nice I think! In pvp I see 5 digit numbers quite often.

Yes, yes it does. FGs has a long cooldown.

In pve, ele’s can do good damage when specced for it. I haven’t felt inadequate in the least bit in pve content. I can kill a veteran solo in around 5 seconds and solo about 80% of the champions.

I am not built pure beserker either, but can still do amazing burst damage while maintaining good survivability using scepter/focus. The focus defensive abilities make me fairly difficult to kill as well when I don’t play poorly. I am a casual player, and there are many better elementalists then me.