Guild Wars 2

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

Dagger/Dagger has high mobility, a lot of point blank AoE (Meaning you don’t have to be facing the enemy) and high survivability. It also has OK burst and maintained dps.
It is probably the most versatile weapon set. The only drawback is that almost every spell you has a range of about 300 units, meaning you’ll be in the fray all the time. D/D rewards attunement dancing a lot, so make sure you have that down, or set your key binds accordingly.

We’re using the classic 0/2/0/6/6 setup, but with small variations in Water and Arcana.
Let’s go over the different trait choices.

Fire
I usually run nothing in Fire. There are some interesting Traits though:

IV – Spell Slinger
Cantrips grant you Might when used
If we were using cantrips, I would consider going 10 in Fire over 10 in Air. But we’re not! More about that later.

VIII – Cleansing Fire
Cure three conditions and burn foes.
In the current meta, I can see this to be very useful, but I can’t imagine cutting anything else…
A friend and guildie of mine is running this trait, it’s crazy good though…

Air
I usually run 2 in Air for:

I – Zephyr’s Boon
Aura’s give Fury and Swiftness when applied.
Fury adds 20% crit chance. Swiftness adds 33% Movement speed. Zephyr’s Boon applies 5s of each, without ICD.

We have access to 3 Aura’s. Frost Aura (Water 4), Shocking Aura (Air3), and Magnetic Leap (Earth 3) through a Fire Field (Either Fire 3 or Fire 5) . That’s 15 seconds of Fury and Swiftness, and the longest cooldown on the auras is Frost Aura, with 40 seconds. Adding the 5 seconds from Zephyr’s Speed (Minor Triait 1) This means we can have permanent Fury and Swiftness if you keep Attunement Dancing.

Earth
I normally run 0 points in Earth, but you could take the 2 from Air and put them here:

VI – Stone Splinters
Deal 10% more damage when you are within a range of 600 of your target.
This could also be an alternative for Zephyr’s Boon.

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

(edited 2014-04-29 22:57:34 by Nuithari.3728)

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

Water
I run 6 Points in Water. I normally run the classic Water Traits: V – X – XI. I used to run VI – X -XII, but switched because of all the condi builds. Both setups work, and have their advantages, but you have to be more careful when you’re on the latter to avoid the condi stacks.

V – Soothing Wave
Gain 3s of regeneration when critically hit.
It has an internal cooldown of 10s, but with the number of precision/condi builds going around, this trait proves to hit “on cooldown”. This is basically an extra condition removes, every 10s, thanks to the Cleansing Water Trait.

X – Cleansing Wave
Remove a condition from you and your allies when attuning to water.
With 6 points in Arcane, this means we have a condition removed every 9s. this works on you, and your allies within range.

XI – Cleansing Water
Remove a condition when granting regeneration to yourself or an ally.
This has no internal cooldown, so it will proc on both the Soothing Wave Trait, the Soothing Mist Minor Trait and the Elemental Attunement Trait.

Counting Cleansing Wave (Water Skill 5) we have a total of 13 conditions cleared, every 40seconds, giving an average of 1 condition cleared, every 2.5 seconds, but it feels more like a burst clear when you swap to water.

Running the VI – X – XII variant clears 1 condition every 8 seconds per average (5conditions over 40 seconds)

VI – Vital Striking
Deal 10% extra damage when your health is above the threshold of 90%.
I roam a lot, so it’s nice to have my opening burst to deal more damage. However, as we’re running D/D, we’re in the middle of the fray, and we take a lot of cleave and condi damage. So dropping below 90% isn’t really rare.

XII – Powerful Aura
Auras are applied to nearby allies.
Aurashare rocks… especially with Shocking Aura! Remember Zephyr’s boon? Your allies get the Swiftness and Fury as well!

Arcane
Here’s where the build starts to deviate from the meta version. As we’re running triple Arcanes (yes, 3 Arcanes!) we don’t need the Cantrip oriented Traits, instead, we’ll focus on the ones that focus on those Arcanes:

I – Arcane Mastery
Reduces recharge on arcane skillsby 20%
This is kinda big in this build as Arcane Blast, Arcane wave and Arcane Shield have a 20s, 30s and 75s cooldown respectively. Taking 20% off of them leads to 15s, 24s and 60s cooldowns, which makes them usable. In this case, our burst will happen every 24s at the latest, if we choose to wait for Wave.

VIII – Elemental Attunement
When attuning to an element, you and all nearby allies gain a boon.
Your team gets Might when you swap to Fire, Regen to Water, Swiftness to Air and Protection when you swap to Earth. It’s a trait every elementalist should have. Period.

XII – Elemental Surge
Based on your current attunement, arcane skills cause a condition to foes that they hit.
You read that right, we’re not running EA. Elemental Surge offers a lot more in terms of utility and control. An Arcane Spell used in Fire will apply Burning to your foe, Chill in Water, Blind in Air and Immobilize in Earth. All of these condis help your team win the group fight as you can apply more damage, root the target, chill an escaping foe, blind downed enemies, etc etc. It’s an awesome trait, but it takes a bit of getting used to. After all, you’re dropping an extra heal and condi remover.

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

(edited 2014-05-06 09:26:04 by Nuithari.3728)

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

Runes of Strength
(1): +25 Power
(2): +10% Might Duration
(3): +50 Power
(4): 15% Might duration; 25% chance when struck to gain Might for 10 seconds. (Cooldown: 5s)
(5): +100 Power
(6): +20% Might duration; +7% damage while under the effects of Might.
This is the new go-to rune for a lot of classes. For Elementalist in particular, this is awesome. We generate a lot of might thanks to our Fire Fields and Elemental Attunement.

I used to run Ogre Runes, they got buffed as well. But these result in a higher dps.

Sigil of Battle
Gain 3 stacks of might (20 seconds) when you swap to this weapon while in combat. (Cooldown: 9 seconds)

Attunement swapping counts as a weapon swap. More Might, thank you.

Sigil of Doom
Sigil of Doom focuses on inflicting poison after weapon swap.
Poison inflicts damage, and reduces the effect of healing by 33%. Applies 6 seconds of Poison, every 9 seconds. This is… painful. Especially against other Elementalists, or Signet Warriors. The damage helps, but it’s the Healing reduction that kills them.

Alternatively I’ve used Geomancy, but they nerfed it.

Sigil of Generosity can be a good alternative (60% chance to transfer a condition to your foe on a critical hit.). With the perma-fury, and all our AoE attacks, we will crit a lot, meaning this will proc every 10 seconds. Using this sigil could mean we can swap back to the VI – X – XII setup in water and still be fine. You clear 9 condis in 40 seconds, averaging 1 condi cleared every kitten . But you gain a lot of team support thanks to sharing your auras, and your opening burst will be higher.

Only swapping out Soothing Wave, and keeping Cleansing Water would result in the same amount of conditions removed though. Without any might to start the fight, and assuming the poison does not get removed from your foe. The burst is better with Vital Striking, but if we take the healing deficiency into account, Sigil of Doom out damages Vital Striking. With might, Doom does more damage over time than Vital Striking. This was calculated on a heavy target.

Celestial Amulet
+295 Power
+295 Precision
+295 Toughness
+295 Vitality
+15 Ferocity
+295 Healing Power
+295 Condition Damage
An Elementalist uses all stats well. With this being buffed, it’s the go-to trinket for a hybrid Elementalist. It’s better than the classic Valkyrie ammy + Zerker jewel.

We do not have a lot of health. Heavy condition stacks in group fights kill us in moments. If you’re getting targetted, you’ll die quite quickly too. The trick is to get in and out of the fight at those points. Go in, burst, get focused on, escape. Rinse Repeat. If this is not the case, you’ll do a lot in the team fight.

Most classes are very beatable 1v1 with this build. Of all the “problem builds” for classic Ele’s, Fear Necros and Engis are probably the hardest opponents, but I beat most of them.

Thieves are fine, thanks to Arcane shield, shocking aura, arcanes to blind and the AoEs we have. Most of the time fights against thieves follow a scenario, they come in and try to burst you. You activate shield or shocking, burst them back with Burning Speed + 2 arcanes + Fire Grab, they go invis, you Earthquake or try to root with Earth 3 and AoE them to death while they’re invisible.

Hambow Warriors are hard, but doable. This is the matchup where you have to be careful not to blow all your cooldowns. You need them (Your Arcanes, Shocking Aura or Shield) to interrupt the hammer lock.

Minion Masters / Spirit Rangers / Mesmers are OK. Just kite the mobs, focus the caster. Your AoE’s will get rid of the add-ons quite quickly.

In short, you’ll do good 1v1 but you’ll excel at Group Fights. you can last a while 2in outnumbered fights, but they will widdle you down. And you’ll just die to heave Condition Stacks.

I’m by no means an exceptional player, but this does show what the build can do (this is with the Vital Striking version)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgdnL4maaoQ

The next video is Qt Vain after I passed him the build to try out. (This is with the Soothing Wave version)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuBV7FUAWEs

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

(edited 2014-05-06 09:26:10 by Nuithari.3728)

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: manveruppd.7601

manveruppd.7601

Tried this, indeed it feels very different from cantrip ele, much bigger burst but less survivability. It’s particularly vulnerable against condition classes, I kept switching to water and dodging cause of how used I was to Evasive Arcana saving my derrière! :p In the end to stand a chance against necros and engis I had to drop doom sigil for generosity as per your suggestion. It was just impossible to cleanse enough conditions otherwise!

I had a lot of fun using Magnetic Leap as an opener, especially through Ring of Fire to give myself Fire Aura. Then I could do the Earthquake→Churning Earth combo while chaining the 2 Arcane skills mid-blast to cause immobilise.

By the way, did you know that Arcane Might causes your next FIVE attacks to trigger Elemental Surge? You could try swapping it in for either blast or wave, woiuld be slightly less bursty but for team fights you could spam earth 1 for significant amounts of lockdown to let your team burst down someone!

Ultimately though I really found this build more difficult to play than the cantrip ele. D/D is pretty unforgiving even with cantrips, and without Evasive Arcana mediocre players like me who can’t spot an enemy burst a mile away and dodge with their eyes closed just don’t have enough healing. You really need to be more skilled to survive with this than with the cantrip build, but when it works the damage is pretty awesome!

There was another build floating around the forums a couple months ago from someone who made a staff-based arcane ele, and ultimately I thin k that would work better since you can blast your water fields for extra healing. Staff might not have the damage of d/d but tbh most of your burst comes from the arcane skills anyway so might be worth trying,

A bad necromancer always blames the corpse.

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

Hey manveruppd,
Thanks for reading through this, and trying the build out, I really appreciate it!

To b honest, I didn’t know Arcane Power made your next 5 atacks trigger ES… That might be annoying :P I do feel uncomfortable dropping any of my utilities though. Will try it out, thanks.

The way I fight condi builds, is to open RtL>Updraft>Burning Speed + 2 Arcanes> Dragon’s Breath> Fire Grab> Earthquake If you land even half of this, it’s quite a lot of damage. Enough to put them on the defensive. And as you have enough dps left, you can keep them there.
The way this build works is to never let your opponent breathe :P

I remember the Staff Build. Iirc, he made a really nice tutorial vid explaining his combos too. The thing is, the playstyle is completely different and doesn’t suit me too well. I’m way too aggressive to be able to play that build, or any staff build for that matter, decently.

I’ll try to upload some duels with this build in the coming weeks.

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

(edited 2014-05-06 09:26:19 by Nuithari.3728)

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Iris Ng.9845

I’m thinking of a possibility to swap out Arcane Blast for Arcane Power and modify your rotation to something like this:

RtL>Updraft>Burning Speed + Arcane Wave+Arcane Power> Fire Grab (crit!!! unless missed)+ Swap to Water > Frozen Burst + Swap to Earth > Ring of Earth

At this point, I should have stacked a fair amount of condi (Burning, Poison, Chill, Immobilization, Bleeding, Cripple) and would be ready to interrupt the enemy’s condi cleanse or heal. The next Earthquake would still be under ES effect, immobilize the target and I would cast Churning Earth at about 300 range for the final touch.

All of this is just a bit of theory crafting. I haven’t tried them yet.

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

- doranduck, 2016 on Lore in Raids

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Spiderwick.1879

Spiderwick.1879

Iris Ng.9845:
I’m thinking of a possibility to swap out Arcane Blast for Arcane Power and modify your rotation to something like this:

RtL>Updraft>Burning Speed + Arcane Wave+Arcane Power> Fire Grab (crit!!! unless missed)+ Swap to Water > Frozen Burst + Swap to Earth > Ring of Earth

At this point, I should have stacked a fair amount of condi (Burning, Poison, Chill, Immobilization, Bleeding, Cripple) and would be ready to interrupt the enemy’s condi cleanse or heal. The next Earthquake would still be under ES effect, immobilize the target and I would cast Churning Earth at about 300 range for the final touch.

All of this is just a bit of theory crafting. I haven’t tried them yet.

You did all this, but what if the enemy dodges and then starts with condition aplicationon you and you just burned your water attunement for 1 skill?

So you go, RtL followed by updraft. Target is knocked back. You then swap to fire and use burning speed. Remember, you just burned air atunement, didnt use weakness or aura. Then, use fire grab for a big crit with arcane skills for burst and might stacks. No drakes breath or ring of fire. After that, you swap to water for frozen burst and follow by earth swap. You wasted water attunement for 1 skill, didnt use aura, and now are locked from it for 9-10 secs. You got 3 might stacks. You go Ring of Earth, applied conditions and want to use Earthquake to interupt.

All that is done really fast, but you burned your attuenements so fast, you wont have them when you need them.

That would be really great and fast if the target is a NPC who wont do much. But a decent player – he might know that when you RtL you’ll try updraft and swap to fire for Burning speed and Fire grab.

What I do – I try to surprise my opponent. Not always do the same. Just the other day, a guildie asked for a help and 1v1 so he can try his new build. I jumped in and went to duel. But, instead of charging in and burning it all, I played a bit slowly and tried to suprise him. Not waste attunements just for the sake of getting skills of cooldown. Think that confused him a lot, and he wasnt able to beat my not once.

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Iris Ng.9845

Do you seriously think I would continue the whole rotation seeing the enemy already dodged my Updraft? o.o"
The whole rotation I proposed was to reply to the perfect scenario of Burst where Arcane Power replaces Arcane Blast. This is a power build, which puts undeniable pressure to your enemy so I don’t think I have to take it slow with this build. Of course, in practice, a decent opponent should have managed to dodge or block both Updraft and Burning Speed. There is no point to counter attack against both skills providing evade to the ele. Wasting the enemy defense also put a sente to the ele where he can decide the direction of the fight.

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

- doranduck, 2016 on Lore in Raids

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: KrazyFlyinChicken.5936

KrazyFlyinChicken.5936

This build looks like a lot of fun

I love arcane utilities, so this build really strikes a chord with me.

Great video too It drives me nuts how many times you used arcane wave without a fire field though!

Fort Aspenwood – Elementalist
Character name: Azilyi

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

Hey all! Thanks for reading the thread, watching the vids or even trying out this build. I truly appreciate your feedback

@Iris Ng
Let me know how you fare with Arcane Power in there. A guaranteed crit on Fire Grab does sound appealing but when I tried it, it felt too slow. 36s cooldown, over 16s on Arcane Blast is a big difference. None of the condis on lemental Surge stack, only in duration. So having 5 spells in a row trigger ES isn’t reaaly that big of a bonus. unless you cycle through all the attunements, but then everything will be on CD. I prefer to have an extra seperate Elemental Surge trigger, if that makes sense. It’s even an extra stomp every 20s. And I like my 1500 range chill

@Iris Ng & Spiderwick
You’re both right, tbh. the rotation I posted is kinda like an ideal situtation. If your opponent eats it, he eats it. If not, well, you break it off. IIn a normal group fight, he’ll eat it. 1v1, probably not.
In most cases, against most classes, I’m all out aggressive. This build puts out enough pressure to put most classes on the defensive. Once you get them there, you can keep enough dps down and outheal them to widdle them down. this build isn’t really made to play it slow indeed, but you can play in a reactionary way. Meaning, you hold back either Shocking Aura or any of the 3 arcanes. I play that way against Warriors and to a lesser extent, Thieves. Against Fresh Air eles, I’ll skip Water and keep it open for that extra heal after the first burst.

@Azilyi
LOL – I’ve seen your guide. While you dedicate 90% of your vid to combos, I just throw away my blasts left and right… I can see how it drives you nuts :P
I really don’t care too much. 3 might is nice, but it’s not what this build is about. I won’t hold back Wave till Fire comes back up, or skip to Fire asap when I feel other spells are necessary first. But I guess it wouldn’t hurt me either to keep it back 0.5s till the Fire Field is actually there… ^^*

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

(edited 2014-05-06 09:28:19 by Nuithari.3728)

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: phaeris.7604

phaeris.7604

No stability = no point holding/being knocked down and killed/being feared 100 times off points/ledges.

Look at it this way. Does the spike dps you gain from the arcane abilities = the damage and point holding you could have gained from not being cc’d.

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Iris Ng.9845

@ OP: I made a mistake between Arcane Wave and Arcane Blast. In PvP, I would appreciate Arcane Blast better for its 1500 range that complement the lack of range attack of D/D ele. If ES condi don’t stack, then Arcane Power is a bad idea. I haven’t had a chance to come back to play at all, but I enjoy theorycrafting on your build. What fascinates me the most about this build is it almost shares the same philosophy with the meta PvE of dungeon speedclear. It pushes the limits of the ele: discard passive defense and the abusive EA to do what the ele does best, burst damage and active defense by crowd control and condi. (If you are interested in dungeon speedclear, we runners hardly have any defensive utilities on our bar- it’s still like a comparison between an apple and a pear, though)

About combo, most the fire field is PBoA and your target would be like 200-300 range from you. If you can afford skill-clicking Arcane Wave, the blast finisher will always happen at your position, and your combo won’t miss.

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

- doranduck, 2016 on Lore in Raids

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

@ Iris Ng: Well, they stack, but only in duration. It’s not really that I miss my Wave, It’s more that I don’t take care to actually put it in the fire fields :P Pure carelessness.

@ phaeris: I disagree. This is not a bunker build. You won’t be holding points. Stab is no requirement for a good build imo. And you have your dodges to actually dodge as you won’t be using them for the EA effects, there’s still a stunbreaker around in Arcane Shield. And this build is absolutely packed with CC, mostly I’m the one CC’ing.

But to each his own… In the end it’s about what you like to play and feel comfortabel with, and what role you need to fulfill.

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Jae.5138

Jae.5138

hey nuithari thanks for sharing. having a lot of fun with it atm. personally i feel that it’s a bit too squishy without armor of earth / cleansing fire so i’m running it with focus , with relative success. traveler rune + zephyr’s boon do very good job in making up for the focus’s lack of mobility. thanks again for sharing.

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: oZii.2864

oZii.2864

Watched the videos enjoyed when Vain was like “hmm this seems strong”. What about D/F? It would give a defensive/sustain set a good burst output something it is missing. You have a 3 condi clear on earth 4 with reflect and invuln on earth 5. I might try this later with D/F.

[Good Fights]Sinndicate{Ele}Sinactic{Engineer}
Sinnastor{Warrior}Sinnacle{Mesmer}Sintacs
{Thief}

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Iris Ng.9845

Nuithari, which maps are in the favor of your build and which are not? And what is your usual role in a match? Lucky me, I haven’t had a chance to play against you so far :p

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

- doranduck, 2016 on Lore in Raids

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728

@ Jae & Ozii: D/F…. I think it could work. It should give you a nice balance between offense and Defense. But it’s just not my cup of tea. But please try it out and let me know how you fare!

@Iris: Hard Question Because I feel maps are only a part of the equation. Without a doubt Forest is my best map. Small map, small nodes, a lot of terain to work with. Yeah, forest is my best map. After that, I’d say Kyhlo’s pretty good. Foefire too.
Temple is good as well, but if the opponents decide to put a nuker or condi spammer on one of the pillars or on the roof. I’ll always kill them first. I hate those spots :P

I don’t like spirit watch, and I absolutely hate Skyhammer. I’d say Skyhammer is the only really unfavorable map for this build as it doesn’t utilise the cliffs. I have only one knockback, no push or pulls. I sometimes equip hammer and shield for this, but I still hate it….

As for my role, I’m a roamer. In most cases I’ll mainly rotate between back and mid to assist wherever the fight is. My mobility allows me to switch nodes really fast, especially on forest and kyhlo. If we don’t have a thief or decap / nodefighter engi, I will roam more offensively and peal from mid by harassing far as my 1v1 is quite good. Most teams will need a second to deal with me, meaning it pulls the mid fight in our favor. If their back has a port mesmer, I’ll atleast pop their port till it runs out, then head back mid with fresh cooldowns so I can burst again.
I also try to burst thieves in group fights to put them on the defensive. And I stom quite often wiith my arcanes.

It’s all situational as I play a lot of SoloQ, but the git of it is teamfights.

I don’t think you’ll meet me in tourneys though, I’m EU

Nuithari – Elementalist
[Mist Angels] – Piken Square

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: iNitrogen.2716

iNitrogen.2716

Hey. I’m a new elementalist here. I’ve been playing this build in spvp for a few days and I actually like it. But here’s my question:
Would this build work in wvw solo/small group roaming? If it would, what kind of gear should I get?

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Iris Ng.9845

Well, I’m grinding for my Champion Genius title and actually saw one ele using the build today. I noticed I got immobilization from an ele while he was channeling Churning Earth. It surprised me and I got killed in no time with the pressure from both the ele and another thief.

@iNitrogen: You’ll be melted down fast if getting ganked by any trollish PU/napalm squads or hammer warrior squads. The arcane build lacks the bunker properties of the cantrip build, nor any projectile defense.

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

- doranduck, 2016 on Lore in Raids

Nuithari's sPvP D/D build

Posted by: Nuithari.3728