Guild Wars 2

(Just the tips)

So, I have created and deleted more level 10 ele’s than I care to admit, but I’m really going to do it this time and wanted some opinions from people.

I have a level 80 necro,guard,ranger and mesmer, so I have never had to hit my profession skills (f1,2,3,4) very often. Now I am really going to take the else to 80 and i want to know what you all use for key binds for the attunements.

Currently, 6,7,8,9 are bound to Q,E,R, mouse 4 and T for elite.
F keys are pain to hit every few seconds. I know picking something and sticking it out is best, but I wanted to see what the community is using. I mainly WvW at 80 and consider myself to be above average (not pro, but not terrible) player.

Trying out z,x,c,v ATM. Pls suggest/share what you use

My current key setup is as follows:
Auto-attack: Tab
Healing: Q
Dodge: E
Weapon Swapping: ~
Attunements/Profession Function skills : F1-F4
Weapon Skills: 2-5
Utilities: ZXC (Originally bound to 6,7,8 respectively)
Elite: V
AOE Loot: L

As far as attunement swapping goes, just get used to where your keys are and the rest should come naturally. Once you ding the 80 bell, you will wonder why you ever had any trouble (if ever).

P.S. Try AOE Loot if you haven’t already. It loots all mobs/bags/wooden chests (rare & exotic drops) within a 900 range diameter around you if you inventory isn’t full.
If you don’t have it enabled —> Press ESC > Settings > Wrench tab > AOE Loot; After that go into controls tab and find AOE Loot and bind a key to it. (I find that L works best because I use Alt for TS.)

P.S.S Take the time to read through all of your skills and traits. In the end it will all click, making everything worthwhile.

P.S.S.S I have done the same thing you have with deleting guardians instead of elemenalists. I can never get past level 3. Idk why, but it just seems so boring. Maybe one day.

Have fun!

My keybindings are as follows:
1-5 weapon skills
middle mouse button: Heal
zxc: 6,7,8
alt:elite
Fire attunement: E
water: Q
Earth: R
Air: T

Thinking of switching Air to F though so i don’t have to extend my finger as far.
The reason my attunements aren’t in order is that i find it alot easier getting combos with fire/earth this way.

Try shift modifiers. I use shift+1-4 for my utilities/elite.

I have a gaming keyboard with 12 extra buttons that I can reprogram so I end up using the ones under the spacebar. I am also someone who generally plays builds that boost the class mechanics so by the time I started my ele I was used to hitting F1-4.

Some advice I’ve seen is to add another binding with Ctrl+A, S, D, F for F1-4.

Other advice. Head to the Heart of the Mists, make your build, go to the golem dummies and practice. While you’re not in a combat situation where you have to worry about positioning and other things, it’s good to start working on muscle memory. That’s one of the biggest drawbacks and greatest reward of playing an Elementalist. You have a lot of combos. None are really difficult to pull off, but it’s very good to be able to pull them off without having to stop and think what buttons you need to hit.

Last piece: If you want to craft to speed up levelling, wait until 40-50 to do so. The first 40-50 levels will be the most…difficult. You won’t have the crutch of traits to help you out. You’ll quickly get a feel for when you should be using OH CRAP combos and when to use high burst combos.

And also…ignore all the whiners on the forum complaining about our lack of damage. We have low base stats since we’re meant to build ridiculous amounts of might on our own. And damage is only 1/3 of this game.

Corsair M90 mouse:
Bottom buttons F1-F4
Top Buttons 7-9
Big Button Heal (6)

Keyboard:
Skills 1-5
Heal Utilities Elite 6-0 (elite is also on R)
Auttunements Shift 1-4 & F1-F4 (don’t click skills if using this)

A and D strafe
W and S walk
Q and E free (did have these as skills, but pudgy fingers)

I´m the lazy man: Logitech G13 Game “Panel” and Logitech G700 Mouse.
Dodging, Ctrl and Alt bound to the mouse. Walking is on the joystick in the pannel. 2-5 Are placed so my fingers naturally lie on them when I controll the joystick with my thumb. Jumping and 1 are bound around my forefinger. ctrl+1-5 is utility skills elite and heal, alt + 2-4 is F1-F4. Only thing i have to shift is my left forefinger :P

I use my mouse and click on them manually. Works just fine.

You could ALT modify them as 1-4.
That way you wont have to learn to press new buttons. My thumb rests naturally above the alt key whilst playing so its no extra movement, just a matter of getting used to pressing at the right time.

Alt 1-4 attune
Rebound Strafes to A/D (use mouse to turn left/right)
Q/E/D/C/X are bound to what would be the default 6-0 slots
Dodge/Take target/Auto run on extra mouse buttons