Guild Wars 2

Following the Massive Grenade Nerf of 2012, I felt inclined to set aside my engineer and revisit my elementalist. I have studied the popular D/D build, though I want to play something a bit more damage oriented and that overcomes the range liability of D/D. Accordingly, I have developed a conjured weapon—i.e., lightning hammer—build for PVE that provides some advantages over D/D, most notably:

1. Better burst damage and sustained damage as long as hammer charges hold out
2. Spammable AoE blind and blast finisher
3. The ability to switch to staff (or S/D) immediately if ranged attacks are called for
4. The ability to provide support (healing) through staff

The build is available at:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQFAWhMmmbxRAhjDAUGn4SQhCDUZMzOA;TUAquMeJ8y11QEA

(copy and paste the link into your address bar if activating it does not work)

The build provides numerous boons with high up time. These are activated through cantrips, attunement swapping, and the blast combo provided by the hammer. Runes and sigil are selected to support boon uptime. The build does not provide the same healing as D/D with 30 in water, but with the AoE blind, the elementalist may actually be hit less so that the need for healing is reduced.

Mainhand Weapon
Staff is chosen to provide immediate access to a ranged weapon in case transition from melee to ranged is needed. S/D would be another possibility. I am uncertain whether the sigil on the offhand dagger would apply to the conjured weapon (see my comments regarding sigils below). Also, I believe that the selected traits would fit a support staff role better than S/D.

Sigil(s)
Testing suggests that the elementalist’s mainhand weapon sigil applies to conjured weapons. Sigil of battle provides 3 stacks of might on attunement swap while wielding the conjured weapon, though there is a 10s CD. If the mainhand weapon set was S/D and the offhand sigil also applied to the conjured weapon, then sigil of force would be a suitable choice for the offhand weapon.

It would make sense to carry a second staff with sigil of bloodlust to stack power and switch out for the staff with sigil of battle upon reaching 25 stacks.

Runes
Selected to bolster boon uptime. 2x superior monk, 2x superior water, and probably 2x major monk or water (the last does not appear in linked build).

Traits
F4, W3, and W9 are taken to support the use of cantrips for boon activation.

A5 provides an attunement-specific boon on attunement swapping.

Bountiful power in the water line is taken to translate boons into a percent damage increase. Soloing, I am able to keep 5-6 boons up constantly, which translates into a 10-12% increase in damage regardless of attunement.

Arcane fury allows the elementalist to keep fury up nearly 100% of the time assuming attunement is swapped at the end of fury duration. With boon duration food, 100% fury uptime could likely be maintained with ease.

A8 is taken to support staff use when needed.

F8 is taken to provide extra hammer charges.

When soloing, I imagine that one could get along without F8. This could allow one to put 10 points into air for A6 (bolt to the heart) or to pick up W6 (vital striking) or W11 (cleansing water) and A11 (evasive arcana). Given that the hammer forces one to be in melee range to use its most devastating attacks, I doubt one could stay above 90% health for a prolonged period of time, which calls into the question the value of W6. Evasive arcana would provide an excellent heal every 10s and solid damage through churning earth. I have found the blast finisher on the latter to be difficult to use effectively. Taking an arcane grandmaster trait would also enhance boon uptime by an additional 5%.

I have not tested the build in an instance. However, in dungeons or when fighting champions, I suspect that one would run out of charges well before the hammer’s 60s CD had expired. This could be problematic if wielding a staff since the staff’s damage is less impressive. When grouping or fighting champions, I believe that taking F8 would be a necessary evil.

Arcane precision is not that useful. However, the additional 5% boon uptime is. One could conceivably put the 5 points into water for W6 or W11.

Utilities
Signet of restoration is chosen presuming that the heal upon cast works with conjured weapons (I have not been able to confirm this) and that extra healing is needed. As an alternate healing utility, GoEH would provide additional boon uptime and, therefore, a boost to damage.

There is room for two cantrips. I have selected lightning flash to provide some mobility and cleansing fire for condition removal. Both have a shorter CD than armor of earth.

For the elite, I would choose glyph of elementals presuming that 100% hammer uptime could be maintained. If not, then I might consider slotting the fiery greatsword.

Tactics
For a casual player such as me, this build provides better damage than D/D for less effort. One would initiate combat with H2, hit H5 for the lightning field, swap attunement to proc fury, and then start spamming H1 while swapping attunement as needed to maintain fury uptime. I would be inclined to also load boons by activating the two cantrips (at least lightning flash) prior to combat. Dodge and use second hammer as needed.

Weaknesses
The build has certain obvious weaknesses. First, it cannot be used under water. Second, it is inherently more selfish than D/D as it does not utilize auras or powerful aura. The suggested build also lacks evasive arcana, which provides a solid heal.

Notes
This is meant to be a PVE build. I have tested the build against the popular 0/10/0/30/30 D/D build and have found it to do consistently more damage in a shorter period of time than the former. However, comparisons based on target dummy data are imperfect since they do not account for ability to mitigate incoming damage or mobility. D/D has greater mobility, though the suggested build is not bereft of tools to get into/out of melee range and maintain swiftness. Finally, there is a bug such that the second conjured weapon does not provide stat bonuses. Damage would be reduced when switching to the second conjured hammer. Hopefully, this bug will be fixed soon.

Well, that’s my build. I would be interested in your thoughts and suggestions. Suggestions for accessories would be greatly appreciated.

I’m not really sure why you have chosen the hammer, as I have only ever used that in jumping puzzles for the big knockback, have I been overlooking its auto attack? Is it better than an extra cantrip and 10 extra trait points to put into another trait line? The extra 10 in air might help your arcana-25 trait proc a bit more!