Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,

So I just got my ele to 60, so I’m starting to thinking about builds/gears. I read some of the threads here that it’s better to go with D/D than staff, which I intend to try out, but I’m a bit confused about gear.

I see that ele has poor healing, and to boost it I need to have healing as part of my gear, but do I go completely all out on that? I read in another thread that it won’t be as effective if I do that (like if I do straight apothecary) , so should I just focus on vitality/toughness with CD? but which is more important, vitality or toughness? My thing is, I see ele in dungeons (on my thief) and they tend to be beefy enough to take hits, and I want to be like that, but still have “stuff” on my gear that can help me output awesome damage.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

I would prefer Toughnis + precision + power
So you get Crits, attack and defence. You dont need good heals because you have low life that can be easyly recoverd

but is vitality and toughness interchangable though? or it’s better to have toughness? I’m wondering because light armor is obviously weakest, and I don’t if it’s better to beef that armor up, or it’s safer to beef myself up.

If you plan on doing dungeons, then I recommend to get some vitality to get your health to at least 12k. It’ll help you survive attacks that’ll otherwise down you instantly. You won’t make that with just toughness.

so, should I just got with Carrion with some Rabid/Solider?

snizzle.6143:

I would prefer Toughnis + precision + power
So you get Crits, attack and defence. You dont need good heals because you have low life that can be easyly recoverd

The D/D threads suggest pow/tough/condition damage… but I have yet to see this on any gear, which is incredibly annoying, as it just “screams” “ideal thief and guardian gear” too.

Talks in-game indicate research is bearing out that precision >= power at high levels, though I have no substantiation of that.

So would that make the TA gear the best for offense (prec/vit/cd)?

@ plasmacutter:
i dont understand what you mean with TA gear.
Prec vit cd seems to be the worse combination for an elementalist.
You cant heal that big amount of healf with your tiny heals.
Without power your Crit does realy low damage.
Also your damage come from conditions not form burst and conditions cant crit.

If you realy go for condition damage i would play defenitly an asura with pain inverter.
Also with conditions you dont realy need power. So you can invest in healingpower or vitality.

snizzle.6143:

@ plasmacutter:
i dont understand what you mean with TA gear.
Prec vit cd seems to be the worse combination for an elementalist.
You cant heal that big amount of healf with your tiny heals.
Without power your Crit does realy low damage.
Also your damage come from conditions not form burst and conditions cant crit.

If you realy go for condition damage i would play defenitly an asura with pain inverter.
Also with conditions you dont realy need power. So you can invest in healingpower or vitality.

This is why I’m asking.

I’ve had one D/D suggest pow/vital/healing power

The main thread suggest pow/tough/cond as the priority stats(a stat combo which does not exist in game), then suggest pow/tough/vitality

I’ve had others suggest other combos like one of the karma sets.

So I’m looking for a “best case” setup for cross-game functionality (dungeons, soloing, AND pvp).

i can do everything with the knight set and a def trait. combined with ruby orbs complete.

To be honest, I find a mix of stats to be optimal. A bit of power combined with a bit of crit to up my damage, a bit of vitality with a bit of toughness to optimize my defense.

Items like the Triforge Amulet are best for the Elementalist, because we basically make use of everything all the time. Even the most offensive builds have acces to healing skills, and even power based builds cause (some) conditions.

Mix of stats is indeed optimal. How the damage formula works, results in the more you have stat x, the more some other counter stat y becomes, relative to x.

And Power is the best direct dmg stat in almost all cases unless you have high might stacks, power foods, specced in fire and high crit damage. Or rely on some procs on crit.
- if you have very high power (all max power gear), concider using precission runes&sigils and food
- if you have high crit, definetly go for more power

Same goes for defences. Every point in toughness will make a point in vitality better than before. So having toughness in all slots will be less optimal for effective health than having combination of toughness and vitality. Same other way around.
Unless you can make up for this with alot of healing, making toughness stronger than normally. Or lack of condition removal – vitality stronger.

I won’t give exact values as I haven’t found the time to research “what is the highest possible direct damage setup possible” or “most optimal dps and defencive setup” of the available items.

But I can just say, as said in many threads, invader (soldier) type items are very optimal set because it gives power as main stat (most optimal dps stat in most cases). Gives both toughness and vitality (optimal).
With most optimal crit damage items, aka Ruby Orbs/Rune of Divinity + Exquisite Ruby Orbs. With 0/20/0/30/20 this tickles near perfection due to the Fury uptime.
(wvwvw pure direct dmg setup)

For PvE purposes I might argue, without further proof tho, very optimal setup with survivability is full PVT armor with rampager jewellery, with max crit damage runes.

There seems to be demand for the stat tips, so mayby I’ll find out the actual numbers, but it’s gonna have to wait till after cristmast :/ EXAMS!

I would prefer the knight as well after your explanation.
I get very high crit 79% with (5%in my wepon + Fury)
Fury ist stackable ot be run unlimited with constant switching and the two auras.
I got 44% Crit damage
14k health and about 2,7k attack and 2,7k defence.
0 -10 -0- 30 -30
with 360 healing power

I think this as a good balanced setup. However your argumentation seems to be right but you need some mathematics to finde the crossing point between the stats:

Health vs. income Damage/s
Defence vs income Damage/s
healing power vs. Income Damage/s
Health vs. Damage*reaction time of the player ( to puffer opening burst damage)
Income Damage vs Outgoing Damage
Attack power vs. Crit Damage * Cirt chance

Iam not quite shure if that would be enough. The stat balance also depend on you playstyle.
Do you want to get a quick kill or do you want to stay longer in order to give morderate Damage over a longer time. Do you use Crit Triggerd abilitys ?

I use a some more triggert abilitys so i need my Crit Built.

My intentions that i bring with from playing other mmos ist that defence ist more effektiv than attack power.

To refer to your argumentation it would be the easiest way to just keep all main stats the same ;P

Woah, that got crazy for a second there with the formuals (to me, I mean).

Right now, I’m running a build that’s based on a thread here and it’s worked out really nicely for me, 20/10/30/0/10 and pretty much with nothing but signets with D/D. I like it a like and I plan on sticking with it. My only thing is that since I’m close ranged, I want to survive.

my problem with mix and match is that I’m not sure exactly what I want to mix and match with. I have an exotic Soldier’s amulet I plan on using though, and two rings I got from Fractals (one’s main stat is toughness, and the other is condition damage). With that said, that gives me some room to play with other stats that’s not focused on vitality, no?

I also cannot decide if I want to put runes of Dwayna on, or if I should go with Dolyak. I think Dwayna because I need the healing power.

Thoughts? Suggestions?