Guild Wars 2

Mainly for WvW but with some sPvP. I have played around with both and can’t decide, I like the ele however it feels too squishy. I like the guardian play style feeling very tanky and like the idea but am worried it may get boring using great sword, staff and sceptre and focus whereas the ele has so many attune ends and combinations. In WvW I like the idea of being on the frontline which is my main draw to guardian and main thing putting me off ele. Any help is much appreciated.

Sounds like you are leaning more towards guardian. I actually feel as though they are less tanky, but thats a difference in experience playing both classes. If you plan to wvw frontline alot guardian would be your best bet. Smaller scale stuff you can run either. In pvp ele is probably alot easy to get good enough to where you can help your team. Guardian in pvp is really hit or miss for me (they are either really useful or they die right away). I say focus on your guardian and play ele a bit more casual for now. If in a couple months you find guardian boring then try to play ele.

Thanks very much for the advice, think i was leaning that way and just needed some affirmation and will stick to guardian more. Thanks again!

@ OP:

I have a similar problem and have asked the same question. I like the ele because of all the skills and it just “feels” exciting to switch between them. The play style is so quick that it never gets boring to me. The problem I have is that the ele just feels limited and is forced to go through all those combo’s to simply put out close the damage of my medi-guard.

While my ele used to be the build/class I loved when I first game to GW2, these days I tend to drop on my guard when I really need to get the job done.

On a side note, play armor just looks amazing too.

That’s what I found too! Felt immensely complicated for the damage that it caused

Well the ele has a much much better protection & regeneration up time, it can also apply them at a wider range then the guardian can.

The ele also has more crowd control effects & can make more use of conditions. Both of which are quite powerful for roaming groups.

The ele also has much better ranged damage potential.

The guardian on the other hand has better condition removal, a bit more self healing and a bit more passive damage reduction.

Overall I would suggest the ele because it can do pretty much everything the guardian can do plus more, it just takes more work to do it.

With regards to the ele in WvW, other than using the staff to aoe, are there any other play styles for serfs? Can you go d/d and survive wading through enemies like the guardian can even though they are squishy?

*zergs not serfs

Casabunga.7806:

With regards to the ele in WvW, other than using the staff to aoe, are there any other play styles for serfs? Can you go d/d and survive wading through enemies like the guardian can even though they are squishy?

you can but its far from optimal. In fights where you are outnumbered most of the time you will spend trying to stay alive than doing any damage. If you do decide to, the best trait set up is the 0 0 10 30 30 cele build with a few minor differences in runes/sigils and what not.

In regards to WvW just about every play style is viable. It’s very easy in Zerg play to go D/D and spam your AOE’s as you zerg dive. Aura Share can be great in this environment with things like Shocking Aura weeding out anyone who doesn’t go Stability and other benefits like Frost Aura as well. Spamming lightning whip as you dive is every bit as viable as any other melee AOE class like Guardian.

How defensive you go depends on your preference. There is some absurdly tanky builds for Elementalist and some not as tanky builds as well. Most people these days shy away from them because they find them unnecessary. As always WvW is a balance of finding “just enough” survivability. Some zergs you face you will need more, others less. I own 6 suits of gear for a reason and that reason is options.

The primary difference between Guardian or Elementalist simply is the ranged options. Elementalist has the capability to throw on a staff and do AOE support (offensive or defensive) at 1200 range and the Guardian simply can’t. They get Scepter and a GTAOE staff ability. That’s about it.

The nice part about the Elementalist is it’s staff is full of both Offensive, Control and Defensive options all in one weapon. You have fire for damage. You have Air for some damage and AOE control. You have Earth for some control. You have Water for recovery and a bit of control. Even if you spec healing support and go full 100% healing mode you still have that baked in Control regardless. Even if you go full crazy time DPS town you can always swap back out and drop a Water field and blast it up for some heals and the control is still there.

My ele is my main 3k+ hrs and guard 2nd class 500hrs+. For the wvw zerg perspective both the guardian and ele can offer a great playstyle. The guardian in the meleetrain and the ele in the casterbackline. D/D ele can be good as ganksquad but generally the D/D ele gets worse incase the zerg v zerg becomes bigger. To fully understand the combatmechanics (for example when you’re gonna start commanding) you need to understand both the casterbackline and meleetrain, so i’d advice just to lvl up both. For the rest the ele is not better/worse then a guardian, just pick w/e you like!

Just worried that the back line dps and support won’t be as fun as being in the meleetrain.

Honestly there’s no reason not to make both and give them each a try. With HOT could end up with a specialization on either class that changes the view point down the line.

If u like frontline then def go hammer guard. Blast finisher every 4 sec is just fun and ppl will love u for the might, swiftness, heals on water (tidal wave animation is just awesome) and so on. No one blasts better.

I ended up with both, personally. As to which of the two I play more often? Elementalist.
Don’t get me wrong, I dig Guard’s combination of melee and buffs. However, on my Ele, I can do reasonable melee, buffs, or ranged nuking. It all depends on gear and Traits.
I’d say – if you have the slots – it wouldn’t hurt to run both.

Casabunga.7806:

Just worried that the back line dps and support won’t be as fun as being in the meleetrain.

Depends on what you consider “fun”

Do you like doing a ton of AOE damage, getting allot of bags & helping allies without having as much risk ? If so ele is great.

There is also the fact that if your commander is good back like can also circle around groups (with some melee support) while the bulk of your melee ties up their attention.

As far as I know eles have the upper hand against a meditation guard.

wvw zerg: both are usefull
roaming: ele has much more mobility and doesn’t relly on lucky ambient creatures to be able to blink away

spvp: ele is better
pve: both are usefull

Can you be a commander as ele, and be effective?

Casabunga.7806:

Can you be a commander as ele, and be effective?

Ya you can & your nearby allies will probably be thankful for all the regeneration & protection you keep up around you.

Just remember to keep those up however or you will melt.

I rotate between a 0/2/0/6/6 D/D build and 0/0/2/6/6 staff build for WvW. I don’t play D/D except when I roam, because I find you are paying your zerg a disservice to not play staff backline. You have roughly the same potential for sharing protection and healing among 5 players via attunement shifting and ability use in both builds, but staff has far more combo fields than D/D does.

If you are communicating and timing blast finishers properly on teamspeak, you have far more potential to spread might, healing, swiftness and frost aura among more players than you do with D/D. Not to mention the variety of other effects from projectiles and pulls.

With arcane wave as a slot skill in staff, you can easily maintain perma swiftness on yourself and others.

Moving beyond the raw power of all your combo fields, staff has essential CC skills for managing an enemy zerg like Unsteady Ground, Static Field and Frozen Ground which can be literal game changers if you lure an enemy zerg into a bottleneck. Staff water has better condition removal, particularly if you trait into removing conditions on regen, making Healing Rain a powerful cleanse. Your AoE is overall better, particularly in terms of blast radius. Magnetic Aura is also awesome.

In the end, staff is just built for use in zergs which it’s why it’s the current zerg meta build and D/D is not.

Casabunga.7806:

Can you be a commander as ele, and be effective?

Yes it is possible to command on an elementalist, but there are several negative consequenses so definitely not adviced.
1st psychological effect (seems kinda dumb but really one of the most important factors), most of the WvW public is completely tunnelvisioned to the guard/war meta and won’t trust an ele when he’s commanding.
2nd you will have to run full nomad, creating a total useless build for yourself xcept for staying alive.
3rd you will never reach the amount of surviveability that the guard/war can get.

I ocasionally use my ele when there’s a need of a tag in combination with a queue on the map and no1 willing to tag. also the ele commander is still fairly doable for unorganized 20-25 man tops zergs. 30-80 is just alot more inefficient then guard, so if you have any commander dreams, i’d definitely pick the guard over the war :p

Casabunga.7806:

Mainly for WvW but with some sPvP. I have played around with both and can’t decide, I like the ele however it feels too squishy. I like the guardian play style feeling very tanky and like the idea but am worried it may get boring using great sword, staff and sceptre and focus whereas the ele has so many attune ends and combinations. In WvW I like the idea of being on the frontline which is my main draw to guardian and main thing putting me off ele. Any help is much appreciated.

Ele and guardian are my top 2 prof but I really prefer ele in WvW. Why? Because with my guardian there are a lot of situations where it is really fun to play and many others where it is not. With my ele it is always fun no matter if I’m in a zerg, roaming, duelling, attacking or defending a tower etc. You are ALWAYS relevant as an ele no matter the context.

Also, for me, playing my ele is a lot more interactive than pretty much any other profession. I would compare playing an ele to driving a manual car where as driving my war, feels like I’m driving automatic.

To answer those who think ele can’t or should not command, I do happen to command with a staff (I do all with my staff) wearing 100% zerker (02066) and I’m very often the last one standing. Granted, it will take you a significant investment into playing the profession, but once you have reach a point, you can do a wonderful job. It’s just more work to reach that point. The question is, do you feel like investing into that?

i was playing pve and some dungeons with guardian gs/staff for a looong time.

One day i switched to hammer /staff and with a few changes to some traits it was sooooooo refreshing and a complete diferent experience .

While you wont have the initial burst that you get from a great sword ( symbol, leap/aoeblind, whirwind wrath) you will however get a spamable mighty blow blast finisher that hits like a train, and a auto attack chain that,while a bit slow, does deal quite a lot of dps specially during the time you have the symbol of protection on the ground that also applies protection to you and others for almost 100% time.