Guild Wars 2

This was a thought I had earlier about the Arcane traitline. Being forced to invest 30 points into it due to the Mechanic of our class has caused extreme stagnation within our class causing most builds to only rotate around 0/10/10/20/30 or 0/10/0/30/30. This is due to having such a high base cooldown on our attunements, so I propose a new solution. I’ll model it somewhat after GW1 spirit WITHOUT forcing the 30 points again or forcing anyone into a particular playstyle.

Before we go further I would like to remind everyone this is only a very ROUGH draft idea meant to actually give a discussion point. Rather than whining, I feel this actually has a strong effect on how elementalist COULD be played according to ANETS own rules. I would also like to apologize for the flippant style of writing I have as I’m easily distracted/amused.

Elementalist:

Elementalists are multi-faceted spellcasters that channel elemental forces, making fire, air, earth, and water do their bidding. What they lack in physical toughness, they make up in versatility and the ability to inflict massive damage in a single attack.

Overcast:

My version of the overcast mechanic would require a few mechanical changes but it’s meant to replace the Attunement Swap in our Arcana line. While this seems like blasphemy I would like to point out with this I’d like to see our attunements normalized at 9 seconds. With our attunements normalized at 9 seconds we would need a new “bar” or some similar mechanical notification with only 1 “charge”. This would be our overcast bar, perhaps even just supersaturating our “attunement icons” in accordance to the charge. The overcast bar would be charged via spellcasting and/or attunement swapping.

Now, once filled, the overcharge effect would be something of a vanilla “crit” which is 150% of the attack’s damage. This won’t apply to just damaging attacking either, instead, we’ll have a 50% increase on spell effects triggered by pressing the WEAPON SWAP key since we don’t use it anyway. I will note this applies to the entire skill and not just the first “hit”.

A basic offensive example would be:

If Lightning Whip hits 736/736, it’ll hit 1054/1054.
If Meteor Storm hits 2400, it hits 3600 per meteor.

However for non-offensive:

If you use Shocking Aura and overcast it, the aura will last 6 seconds instead instead of 4.
Obsidian Flesh would be extended to 7s instead of the basic 5s.
If Geyser would heal 600 a tick, it now does 900.

Also for skills with duel effects:

If Cone of Cold would hit for 500 and heal 200 a tick, it’ll hit 750 and heal 300 a tick.

I’m sure I’ll get a ton of OMG BROKEN complaints for this but I would like to point out this could be easily broken down for balance in 3 ways.

1) The amount of Attunements and/or spells casted before it’s avaliable
2) Keeping with the Arcana line, instead of Attunement Swap, we’ll now have Overcast Recharge “%”.
3) Designated BASE recharge.

I’m more than willing to discuss pros/cons for this idea but I honestly think it could do nothing but bring variety and reinvigorate the class as a whole. This would give players a great reason the continue investing in Arcana if they adore the Evasive Arcana/Buff stacking playstyle. Those who are looking for something else wouldn’t be forced into the 30 point sinkhole that arcana currently feels like. It’ll also add a little more APM to our class and most importantly, increase the “tactical” playstyle elementalists want….for the most part. Choosing which spell to overcast in certain situations which most certainly lead to a life or death situation and give us that feeling of tactical awareness again.

Again, sorry for the flippant, spastic writing style. I had to get this all down on “paper” before it disappeared from my head. I honestly hope this sparks some sort of a discussion as I do feel this could be a proper solution/addition for our class if we temper it out and refine it.

So basically, you want us to have something like the warrior’s adrenaline mechanic? Some sort of ‘super strike’ every so often, except ours will just be extra damage and not a separate skill?

ThiBash.5634:

So basically, you want us to have something like the warrior’s adrenaline mechanic? Some sort of ‘super strike’ every so often, except ours will just be extra damage and not a separate skill?

Something of the sort except instead of super strike I would like to see it more as I said, overcasting as in GW1. Due to the overall scope of GW2 I don’t think they’d go around adding seperate effects to the majority of spells so I chose the most readily accessible option of giving us a tactical “choose when to use”. You can use it to overcharge burst healing, to get a slightly longer buff, or for doing more burst damage.

As for the Adrenaline, I’ll agree the warrior bar was just an example. I thought about a potential “overcast for each element seperately” where each attunement bar would have 1 overcast slowly charging/filling based on how many skills you used in that particular element which would give a little validation to those who want to duo-element spec.

It could probably work and if they copy the warrior’s adrenaline it might even be relatively easy to code. But I’m not particularly excited about it. It seems kinda…plain actually. Just a bit higher numbers.

ThiBash.5634:

It could probably work and if they copy the warrior’s adrenaline it might even be relatively easy to code. But I’m not particularly excited about it. It seems kinda…plain actually. Just a bit higher numbers.

Well you may be looking at it in terms of just attack. As I said I want this to effect attack, healing, buff duration, and even conditional duration. The way I see it this would allow any elementalist to continue playing the way he/she wants, but still adding the ability to pop the Overcast for accelerated effects. We’d still have to worry about storing it, internal cooldown as well as proper timing/selection on the spell. This is more or less inspired by the GW1 mechanic and since we don’t have energy to block off and our cooldowns are already insanely high, I decided to take the route of charging and storage of the mechanic.

That would be a bit better, but the same overall effect could be achieved by just increasing the numbers on all our skills by a small bit. And that way, there’s no extra potential balance issues with some skills suddenly being able to spike for twice as much health/conditions/damage/etc.

ThiBash.5634:

That would be a bit better, but the same overall effect could be achieved by just increasing the numbers on all our skills by a small bit. And that way, there’s no extra potential balance issues with some skills suddenly being able to spike for twice as much health/conditions/damage/etc.

50% =P I outlined it in the summary along with it being used for everything. I agree with increasing base for our skills/stats but ANET wants us in a niche “jack of all trades” role. This would keep that thought process while giving us the ability to be on par for a specific moment when we need it. Basically, the ability to excel for a single moment lol.

I think I understand your train of thought. We’ll see how well your idea holds up against the critisism of the masses. Should it survive in Anet’s eyes, then credit to you. For me personally though, I’d rather keep the attunements the way they are now (mostly because I have no issues with taking Arcana traits). :-)

Haha thanks. Honestly I feel being forced into arcana is, as I said, causing stagnation. That said even if my mechanic doesn’t hold up in ANET’s eyes, if I can at least get people to discuss the class and solutions in here that would be enough for me.

Bump For Discussion

Tbh a 9 second base recharge sounds fine. That can be lowered to 5 seconds if that doesn’t sound too OP?

sorrychief.2563:

Tbh a 9 second base recharge sounds fine. That can be lowered to 5 seconds if that doesn’t sound too OP?

9 is the 30 point arcana currently which I feel should have been the original goal. It allows you to properly rotate which is why I threw it out there : )

KeyLimPi.9031:

Bump For Discussion

A bump after only 3 hours? Are you starved for attention or something? It’s not like you’ve come up with the next Higgs particle theory or something. It’s just a bland copy of adrenaline.

ThiBash.5634:

KeyLimPi.9031:

Bump For Discussion

A bump after only 3 hours? Are you starved for attention or something? It’s not like you’ve come up with the next Higgs particle theory or something. It’s just a bland copy of adrenaline.

And you’ve gone from a respectful discussion to insults. I’m not exactly going

BUMP
BUMP
BUMP
BUMP

as some topics do. I’m simply trying to get “some” form of discussion going. I won’t degenerate to being disrespectful, I ask you to be the same way. I got 1 reply afterwords and gave 1 in response. Nothing after that. I’m simply interested in getting the ball rolling.

Also, I would ask you to read up before just calling it “a bland rip off”. What I gave was an example of a mechanic that would be easy to implement, but the fact is Overcasting was a Guild Wars 1 mechanic for elementalist. I simply refurbished it for the GW2 world, again, in an easily implemented way. Otherwise the closest thing would be a self induced"chilled" since we have no energy to block.

One more thing:

The Adreneline mechanic that warriors have is used to sit on for their bonus stats then execute except for certain builds. I’m suggesting a RAMPED effectiveness for 1 skill, not out entire stat tree via this mechanic.

Keep it respectful, do unto others.

My apologies. It’s just that I find it disrespectful on your part that you ‘bump’ something if we don’t talk about it for 3 hours. If I misunderstand your proposal, then maybe you should explain it a little better instead.

Whelp I do understand that bumping after 3 hours may seem overzealous, but I was a bit excited to see how the community would look at it. If it goes over decently enough I’ll try to think of the full mechanic myself but think of this as a beta run lol.

Something just struck me and forgive me if I’m wrong on this but, aren’t combo fields essentially the GW2 version of the overcast mechanic?

I mean, essentially what they do is ‘after you cast this spell you have small window of time to make certain other spells (finishers) do something extra’. That’s basically what overcast does, IS IT NOT?

Edit: added emphasis on the last part because for some reason the language filter kittens it out.

ThiBash.5634:

Something just struck me and forgive me if I’m wrong on this but, aren’t combo fields essentially the GW2 version of the overcast mechanic?

I would honestly say the XII trait in arcana is the closest thing we have to anything relating to that mechanic.

Combo fields/finishers are usable by EVERYONE though, not just an Ele. This Overcast idea is meant to be something unique to the Elementalist. And while it could potentially be overpowered (would Tornado last 30 secs, or FGS have 22 base charges or something under this?) I can really see it being a unique setup, since you not only use it for raw damage, but for utility purposes as well.

Kamui.3150:

Combo fields/finishers are usable by EVERYONE though, not just an Ele. This Overcast idea is meant to be something unique to the Elementalist. And while it could potentially be overpowered (would Tornado last 30 secs, or FGS have 22 base charges or something under this?) I can really see it being a unique setup, since you not only use it for raw damage, but for utility purposes as well.

That’s the basic idea I was going for, I’m glad you understand. I said it was a beta idea but that would be more refined it’s more in line with alpha testing as I haven’t thought all of the things through but yeah, it does require tempering.

I honestly have no idea what to do with tornado aside from maybe unlocking an “arcane” option when you’re spinning. FGS doesn’t need to have 22 base charges though, we could instead make it so perhaps if you use the Overcast with it instead of just summoning 2 swords we could make single autonomous one like guardian weapons, or even leap to where you cast it.

Just brainstorming though =P there’s also no rule that says it has to effect ults/utility

This would probably be op but for conjures maybe doing something like a super charged one, where it doesn’t drop a second on the ground but gives you double the charges and time on it.
Or perhaps removing the charges or timer on the conjure when cast with it.

I have to disagree with the need for Arcana to be maxed. Im a Scepter/Focus zerker build, and only have 10 in Arcana for the Vigor on Crit. If you plan your moves properly, you don’t NEED the Arcana. Mind you that’s debatable be that everyone has their own play style.

And before I’m shot down, I do main the ele, and I do very well in sPvP/PvE (not to boast). It just takes some getting used to.