Guild Wars 2

Elementalist

Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.

Conjure Flame Axe skill: Updated the Flame Leap skill fact to display the proper burning duration.

Rock Blade skill: Projectiles now correctly hit targets up to the intended 1200 range.

Mist Form skill: Activation now locks heal, utility, and elite skills.

Ride the Lightning skill:
Increased recharge increased 20 seconds to 40 seconds.
Recharge is now halved if the player strikes a foe.
Reduced the range to 1200 from the previous (hidden) 1550.

Signet of Earth skill: Passive stat bonus increased by 100%.

Signet of Fire skill: Passive stat bonus increased by 100%.

Glyph of Elemental Power skill: Added a skill fact to indicate the percent chance.

Signet of Restoration skill: Reduced the passive healing by 18% in PvP.

Cleansing Water trait: Can now trigger only once every 5 seconds (only in PvP).

Glyph of Storms skill: Increased duration of Lightning Storm by 50%, Ice Storm by 50%,
Firestorm by 25%, and Sandstorm by 11%.

Glyph of Lesser Elementals skill: Increased the health of summoned elementals by 33%.

Glyph of Elementals skill: Increased the health of the summoned elementals by 33%.

Conjure Fiery Greatsword skill: The Fiery Rush skill no longer consumes a warrior’s adrenaline pool.

Swirling Winds skill: No longer destroys unblockable missiles.

As we expected no buffs for new builds.
Also i think now its only 0/0/10/30/30 instead of 10 in airs cause of the survivability loss.
Ah and ele is slow as kitten now

I guess the idea of “more spike damage and less mobility” can be translated to “less mobility”. Not surprised, but maybe a bit disappointed?

While I’m agnostic on the D/D changes, the lack of fire/air/earth viability improvements us unfortunate. Especially because the May patch is supposed to be a bug fix patch instead of a class-tweaking event

No buff to staff, crappy signet buffs, awesome.

Mist Form: I had no idea we could use Utilities and such with it, actually. Not much of a loss for me there.

RTL: I’m in Staff almost 100% of the time, sooo…

Signets: I like. I’m starting to use them a bit more than before, so this is a nice plus.

Glyph of Storms: Nice. Very nice.

I’m very okay with this patch, honestly. The one that had me worried was the Signet of Restoration nerf, but thankfully it’s PvP only.

Welp, glad I quit the game a while back. Anet devs either don’t have the first clue what they’re doing when it comes to ele, or they secretly want everyone to run full bunker and nothing else. Again they nerf us in a way that barely affects bunkers but prison kitten everything else.

dreztina.4820:

Welp, glad I quit the game a while back. Anet devs either don’t have the first clue what they’re doing when it comes to ele, or they secretly want everyone to run full bunker and nothing else. Again they nerf us in a way that barely affects bunkers but prison kitten everything else.

Can I have your stuff?

Glyph of Storms might be nice for pve now.

“Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.”

Okay so it’ll heal at the target location if you stand in a healing field, no blast finisher benefits for the user. (Nerf) What’s the point of this?

QQ @ RTL cd, no more zooming across the world in PvE. It could’ve been made seperate from PvP as well, same with the mist nerf. Q__________Q

Y NO staff buffs.

I needed to vent. Kay, moving on.

Zero buffs with drastic nerfs. R.I.P ele.

OH WOW 100% INCREASE TO SIGNET PASSIVE. kitten! What are you thinking anet? Its been so many months now, why is cantrip build still the only viable ele build? Ridiculous.

Disappointed in this patch, zero effort into fixing our useless traits. It’s unfortunate that they’re listening to people cry about our mobility instead of listening to the players that actually play the class and want a larger variety of builds.

ANET’s idea of balancing appears to simply be: kill off anything viable without adding anything to compensate for it. balancing needs to go both ways sometimes, and this is one of those instances.

Now we have to wait another month for more minimal buffs that still don’t fix our traitlines and probably rtl being killed further by decreasing the range to something like 600. Sorry I sound so negative in this post, but ANET has made it clear that they simply aren’t listening to numerous suggestions (most which say the same thing) made by players that actually play eles.

The days of the roaming D/D elementalist are over. It wasn’t as if a roaming spec warrior or ranger or theif couldn’t already catch us….

Also, thanks for making D/D even less useful in PVE and in WvW (where it was completely useless save for roaming)

Not all of us care about sPVP. Keep the nerfs seperate. The RTL nerf was completely unnecessary for PVE and WvW.

My own personal opinion about the following:

Mist Form skill: Activation now locks heal, utility, and elite skills.

I can live with this. But it will be an annoyance. Depending on how annoying I might change up from Mist Form – Armor of earth – Lightning Flash to Mist Form → Cleansing Flame.

Ride the Lightning skill:
Increased recharge increased 20 seconds to 40 seconds.
Recharge is now halved if the player strikes a foe.
Reduced the range to 1200 from the previous (hidden) 1550.

This is the biggest annoyance in this patch. I use RTL to travel alot everywhere (along with swiftness) because their really isn’t alot of viable ways to travel fast in this game. I will miss the fast traveling every 20 seconds. Obviously the skill still functions the same in combat, so really no changes there. As for the hidden 1550 range nerf to the actual 1200 range I feel like they should have left the range at a hidden 1550. But oh well.
I can also live with this.

Cleansing Water trait: Can now trigger only once every 5 seconds (only in PvP).

Since I never pvp I really don’t care about this. I mainly run for pve and wvw, and since wvw is NOT affected by pvp changes, this skill will still function the same in wvw. Although I prefer using Water 12 > Water 11 in both wvw and pve.

Overall the changes will add annoyance but in the long run will not affect playability of the class that much. Now if they could get on Earth 1 underwater skill doing pretty much no damage….

They simply don’t care about PvE and people who play something else than D/D. That’s a fact and now – my Ele is dead. Great job Arena Net…

-Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.

Dat dartboard balancing. GG ANet.

Delak.1064:

Disappointed in this patch, zero effort into fixing our useless traits. It’s unfortunate that they’re listening to people cry about our mobility instead of listening to the players that actually play the class and want a larger variety of builds.

ANET’s idea of balancing appears to simply be: kill off anything viable without adding anything to compensate for it. balancing needs to go both ways sometimes, and this is one of those instances.

Now we have to wait another month for more minimal buffs that still don’t fix our traitlines and probably rtl being killed further by decreasing the range to something like 600. Sorry I sound so negative in this post, but ANET has made it clear that they simply aren’t listening to numerous suggestions (most which say the same thing) made by players that actually play eles.

I’m fairly certain that’s why they have a suggestions forum. So they can isolate ideas from anyone who may see them.

Part of the changes makes me feel Anet was listening to us. Signets got a minor buff, as did glyphs (non-earth elemental summons really needed this). They DO want to buff our lesser used skills.

However, I do feel that they grossly underestimate the effect boonhate will have on the non-tank builds and these changes aren’t enough to compensate. Running a signet build still lacks a good stunbreaker. Glass cannon staff builds will still be hurt by the new anti-boon skills, and got the few non-boon defensive skills they had left nerfed.

TwoBit.5903:

-Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.

Dat dartboard balancing. GG ANet.

That’s actually a bugfix. Don’t fault them for fixing bugs. You’d not want them to stop fixing bugs, do you?

Don’t forget the nerfs on Spirit Watch:

• Ride the Lightning distance is reduced by 40% while carrying the orb.
• Tornado move speed is now correctly reduced while carrying the orb.
• The orb is dropped if the orb carrier uses an invulnerability skill.
• The orb now spawns 10 seconds after match start instead of immediately.
• Increased altar commune time from 2 seconds to 3 seconds.

All of those nerfs hit the ele really hard. There is absolutely no reason to use an ele as the orb runner anymore. Well done Anet, well done…

ThiBash.5634:

Part of the changes makes me feel Anet was listening to us. Signets got a minor buff, as did glyphs (non-earth elemental summons really needed this). They DO want to buff our lesser used skills.

However, I do feel that they grossly underestimate the effect boonhate will have on the non-tank builds and these changes aren’t enough to compensate. Running a signet build still lacks a good stunbreaker. Glass cannon staff builds will still be hurt by the new anti-boon skills, and got the few non-boon defensive skills they had left nerfed.

Boon hate will have no effect. Look at the warrior tree its in and you’ll figure it out. Boon hate won’t do a thing. The changes to sword for thief will.

Does anyone know if thief is faster than ele when it comes to travel? I think even before this patch that changed RTL thieves were still slightly faster than d/d ele with movement. Now they are gonna be really really tough to catch up to in wvw…

Blackhat.4016:

Don’t forget the nerfs on Spirit Watch:

• Ride the Lightning distance is reduced by 40% while carrying the orb.
• Tornado move speed is now correctly reduced while carrying the orb.
• The orb is dropped if the orb carrier uses an invulnerability skill.
• The orb now spawns 10 seconds after match start instead of immediately.
• Increased altar commune time from 2 seconds to 3 seconds.

All of those nerfs hit the ele really hard. There is absolutely no reason to use an ele as the orb runner anymore. Well done Anet, well done…

Meanwhile, the ranger zips by and got buffs to the pets… WHILE TANKING AND DOING TONS OF COND!

Araito.5869:

Does anyone know if thief is faster than ele when it comes to travel? I think even before this patch that changed RTL thieves were still slightly faster than d/d ele with movement. Now they are gonna be really really tough to catch up to in wvw…

In terms of traveling, here is the ranking. (this is long distance straightline traveling)

1 – Thief (was/is/now/in the future/no kittening body is faster than a thief when they spec for it)
2 – Warrior (GS +Sword)
3 – Rangers (GS + Sword)
4 – Ele (D/D)

Signet of Earth is potentially a good utility now. The 3s immobilize is good for scepter’s burst, but now the toughness increase is relevant, which is important for bursty glass cannons.

Could we have a PvE split for Ride the Lightning? I pretty much use it for traveling around huge maps as opposed to actually attacking foes. I find it a bit strange that guardians and warriors can still leap with very short cooldowns but elementalists can not? I guess this has something to do with PvP.

I don’t like the Mist Form change. It’s pretty useless now in PvE seeing that the only reason to pop it is to heal while you are invulnerable. Well, at least I found the needed space for Arcane Shield now.

ThiBash.5634:

TwoBit.5903:

-Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.

Dat dartboard balancing. GG ANet.

That’s actually a bugfix. Don’t fault them for fixing bugs. You’d not want them to stop fixing bugs, do you?

Some bugs can be so good it should stay. Onimusha’s bug birthed Devil May Cry, and when Valve fixed a Counter Strike bug that had been there for 7 years, the community cried out.

Besides, come to think of it, what’s the point of having the blast finisher occur on th comet area?

Araito.5869:

Does anyone know if thief is faster than ele when it comes to travel? I think even before this patch that changed RTL thieves were still slightly faster than d/d ele with movement. Now they are gonna be really really tough to catch up to in wvw…

Warriors, Thieves, and Rangers were faster than eles, pre patch.

Obviously even more so now.

I’ve told Jon Peters in-game that elementalists’ stunbreakers shouldn’t all be cantrips, and he agreed. That might be good pvp news for a future patch.

It’s a balanced balance update imo. The RtL nerf should not do much in PvP (it’s still possible to charge in, do damage and charge out) it just makes wandering around in open PvE a bit slower. The slow for carrying orbs was needed and even elementalist players (me incloded) agreed that an unslowed RtL when carrying orbs is OP. I like the buffs for Glyph of Storms for PvE and the rest of the buffs is just fine-tuning.

TL;DR: No major nerfs, some minor buffs, we still have only one viable build. It could be worse.

So they buffed my glyphs…but not by much. I still want some improvements to them. The pet buff was more a consequence of the overall pet update so I think they could do more with them.

Hmm seems like mistform interups ER when activated…
So far trying to heal before hitting mistform

Do you see in whose hands we are in?
PVE NERFS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tell me how i m going to match warrior performance as U promised ANET

I have no words aside informing any possible gaming forum how balance works in this game….and how much their word Worth.

Bad reputation earned…and deserved.

Wow, I just used air’s storm with the glyph, and the duration was quite high. Very satisfying. Pity that lightning hammer’s version was left at its sucky state. :P

Earth Storm lasted for about 10s, and did 11 hits, if I’m not wrong.

TooBz.3065:

Delak.1064:

Disappointed in this patch, zero effort into fixing our useless traits. It’s unfortunate that they’re listening to people cry about our mobility instead of listening to the players that actually play the class and want a larger variety of builds.

ANET’s idea of balancing appears to simply be: kill off anything viable without adding anything to compensate for it. balancing needs to go both ways sometimes, and this is one of those instances.

Now we have to wait another month for more minimal buffs that still don’t fix our traitlines and probably rtl being killed further by decreasing the range to something like 600. Sorry I sound so negative in this post, but ANET has made it clear that they simply aren’t listening to numerous suggestions (most which say the same thing) made by players that actually play eles.

I’m fairly certain that’s why they have a suggestions forum. So they can isolate ideas from anyone who may see them.

Yes, I’m fairly certain that both class and suggestion forums are being read on a regular basis by employees at ANET. The fact that they seem to ignore many positive suggestions (in which many players agree upon) and favor the “NERF X SKILL PLZ” suggestions is pretty disappointing and has started to discourage a lot of positive input toward the game. There used to be a lot more player discussion on methods to improve the weaker parts of each class (traits/utilities/weapon skills), but people quickly realized that no one was taking those suggestions into consideration.

I’m not saying that every suggestion is a great one, but I’ve yet to see ANET even simply comment on popular viable suggestions.

Glyph’s Fire storm also hits 11 times, like earth. For some reason, ice storm seems to last for a less amount of time than the three other storms, and about as much as the conjure’s version. It’s probably bugged.

ThiBash.5634:

TwoBit.5903:

-Comet skill: Blast finisher now occurs at the comet’s location rather than at the elementalist’s location.

Dat dartboard balancing. GG ANet.

That’s actually a bugfix. Don’t fault them for fixing bugs. You’d not want them to stop fixing bugs, do you?

The bugged version is more useful logistically. You used to have control over where the blast occured, but with the change the control is delegated to the whims of the horrid targeting system. I’d call the original functionality a happy accident.

LOL and they are nerfing the focus ! Give us a real firewall and then nerf it.

At least no more rage on the elementalist. (hope)

The comet’s blast finisher now works the same as with dragon’s tooth. From practise, this is a good change, but DT also has the advantage that you can cast it before ring of fire, or cast flamewall after casting DT, to make sure the might stacking is activate, so I don’t know if it’ll work as well with comet. Still, it’ll allow focus users to create blast finishers from range, which is important.

That cleansing water nerf is going to hurt more than people think.

It’s not just a matter of “spacing out cantrips”. Switching to water will activate the ICD too.

There’s actually a very real possibility people will want to use signet of water for that crappy “remove 1 condition every 10 seconds” passive now

This is an horrible update for the ele class. I totally hate it.

- I always healed and use utilities in mist form, it’s one of the things the ele could do that was “cool”.

- I got a focus only to stop siege projectiles, now its useless.

-RTL nerf… wtf are the developers thinking? There is other thing to improve before nerfing that.

Basically all these nerf are aimed at stopping a specific d/d build, and have been made by disregarding people who play the class with balanced stats, that use a staff and that have developed certain playing strategy (like the mist form casts).

No thanks for this kitten.

DiogoSilva.7089:

The comet’s blast finisher now works the same as with dragon’s tooth. From practise, this is a good change, but DT also has the advantage that you can cast it before ring of fire, or cast flamewall after casting DT, to make sure the might stacking is activate, so I don’t know if it’ll work as well with comet. Still, it’ll allow focus users to create blast finishers from range, which is important.

The problem with that logic is that only 2 fields affect the enemy target when you dop a blast finisher on them: dark and poison. Ele get neither of these fields in any weapon combinations, let alone in a water attunement. All other blast effects affect the caster/friendlies, which there is no guarantee of hitting when targetting a ranged enemy. Its sort of just there, you might get it to proc vs some dynamic event boss when 30 people are standing on the enemy and fields are active under them but in those situations the number of players matters more than anything else anyway.

So much meh. The only things we got that seem worthwhile are the glyph love and the signet boost.

Still nothing to help staff.

Going to shelve the ele for a while. Wipe the dust off my warrior. (who received nothing but buffs for the 5th straight update).

For clarifications sake, does the ICD on Cleansing Water apply to WvW? I’m still not always clear on how Anet defines “pvp”.

PvP is ONLY the S/Tpvp.

To Anet, WvWvW is PvE.

My biggest disappointment is actually the lack of staff buffs.

rhodoc.2381:

Zero buffs with drastic nerfs. R.I.P ele.

You obviously didn’t read all the way down to the patch. D/D needed a nerf, obviously was way too much OP. That IS a fact. So don’t complain like an idiot. Elementalists still are awesome. It’s a bit more balanced now.

I actually agree with their approach of reigning in builds that are OP enough that the majority of players use them to match other builds. However, they aren’t consistently getting all the details right. Staff is still awkward and hard to use in comparison to D/D and it’s going to take more than a nonsensical (even if justified) nerf of RTL to fix that.

Am I the only who liked this patch (condi signet support build)