Guild Wars 2

Now mind you, I’ve spent most my time using either S/F or S/D, but I was interested in switching over to the Staff for PvP&PvE.

-Can the Staff offer anything that the Dual Daggers cant? (Besides range and combo fields)
-What are the best types of Staff builds in PvP?
-Hypothetically, is a staff user at a disadvantage against a D/D of equal skill?

If someone could give the pros and cons of both, I’ll be sure to remember you in my path to elemental glory =P

Staves give waterfield, single most useful thing anyone can throw down to support their team. Also, a lot of soft cc and ability to aoe spam like no tomorrow, great for defending chokes in wvw.

Apart from that, yes, staff user is in disadvantage against d/d, and against anything 1v1 or smallscale oriented. Staff is a support weapon (artillery is still support, so shut up about offensive staff)

Range and combo fields are the main thing the staff has as it’s advantage. Not considering them is like saying what advantages the daggers has besides mobility and higher damage. It’s the core of the weapon.

Staff = Easy target. As soon as both your water heal spells are over You are done.
Thieves love to insta gib staff Eles.

Anet nerfed the DPS staff build. Are now moving to nerf the D/D Build. All ele’s are required to play a Scepter/?? build.

Anet has not balanced anything since release but nerfed builds into the ground. The Ele is done for.

As a result, I’d like a refund on my incinerator so I can switch to a Thief and only receive buffs and have OP amounts of invis.

Staff from mine an a friends experience is a long range weapon that almost forces you into short range anyway, especailly when bunkering/supporting a point in pvp with the staff.

Cynical.2097:

Staff = Easy target. As soon as both your water heal spells are over You are done.
Thieves love to insta gib staff Eles.

Anet nerfed the DPS staff build. Are now moving to nerf the D/D Build. All ele’s are required to play a Scepter/?? build.

Anet has not balanced anything since release but nerfed builds into the ground. The Ele is done for.

As a result, I’d like a refund on my incinerator so I can switch to a Thief and only receive buffs and have OP amounts of invis.

They nerfed Scepter back in beta.

I can manage with Staff when fighting other classes 1v1 except thieves. I prefer to own thieves using D/D.

But staff is a great support weapon in group fights or 2v2 scenarios. Actually, the best support weapon for eles.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Now mind you, I’ve spent most my time using either S/F or S/D, but I was interested in switching over to the Staff for PvP&PvE.

-Can the Staff offer anything that the Dual Daggers cant? (Besides range and combo fields)
-What are the best types of Staff builds in PvP?
-Hypothetically, is a staff user at a disadvantage against a D/D of equal skill?

If someone could give the pros and cons of both, I’ll be sure to remember you in my path to elemental glory =P

Discounting range and combo fields is pretty much discounting staff. There are other advantages but by far those two are the biggest.

Probably would help if you’d put what context of what content you’re doing in PvP and PvE.

In PvE, there isn’t any problems so far.

In my opinion,
- Staff offers range, combo fields, and very good crowd-control skills. Air 5, Water 4, Earth 4-5 are invaluable against zerg in WvW. Staff offers healing and support in a tight-knit group. If our guild has 5 elementalist, 4 will be asked to use staff.

- For defense, cantrip build is arguably the best. I’ve seen 0/0/20/30/20 or 0/0/30/20/20 or 0/0/10/30/30. The team has tougher elementalist certainly has more advantage.

- I only speak for myself, but I believe staff user can’t beat a d/d in 1v1 setting.

P.S.: I only play WvW, no experience in sPvP so far.

Sorry for not going into deeper detail, I specifically meant for PvP, and when I mean advantages besides range and combo fields, I mean..

-Does the Staff have better/more CC than D/D?
-Are traits any more flexible for Staff than D/D?
-Can the Staff do better damage in any elemental attunement?

As well as a bit of curiosity as to what kind of builds do staff users make since DPS goes to D/D?

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Sorry for not going into deeper detail, I specifically meant for PvP, and when I mean advantages besides range and combo fields, I mean..

-Does the Staff have better/more CC than D/D?
-Are traits any more flexible for Staff than D/D?
-Can the Staff do better damage in any elemental attunement?

As well as a bit of curiosity as to what kind of builds do staff users make since DPS goes to D/D?

You should probably edit out where you typed “PvE” lol.

Even then, sPvP and Wvw are two different PvP environements where there are entirely different viable roles for a Elementalist to play. Sometimes roles are only effective in one and not the other. In addition, unless someone has an elementalist who is built solely for WvW, a player will use a build that is effective in both Pve and Wvw supporting the style they want to play. How they like to play is as much a determining factor as anything.

So, are you asking about sPvP or WvW builds? If WvW, are you interested in a build for full time WvW use?

Your questions seem overly broad and general and simplistic. DPS numbers are pretty easy to add up. More or less CC pretty easy to count. What are you really asking?

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Sorry for not going into deeper detail, I specifically meant for PvP, and when I mean advantages besides range and combo fields, I mean..

-Does the Staff have better/more CC than D/D?
-Are traits any more flexible for Staff than D/D?
-Can the Staff do better damage in any elemental attunement?

As well as a bit of curiosity as to what kind of builds do staff users make since DPS goes to D/D?

I use either this or this when on staff. I mostly WvW with it, my attributes end up different though since I use the PvE armors and accessories. 1v1 you will likely not ever kill anyone, but luckily, they probably won’t be killing you either.

But to answer your question, I’d say it does have more CC, Water 4, air 4 & 5 and earth 4 & 5. And glyph of storms (if you choose to use it) in water or earth.

Well, traits are not really more flexible simply because most ele traits are utter dreck.

And no, the damage output is not that great. I never see anything over 2k and am happy for 1.5k.

Really, I play staff b/c it offers excellent support, combo fields, and its easy to tag large groups of people in wvw.

Staff offers safe range, unrivaled aoe damage, combo fields, and superior control and supportive spells.

Tradeoff? You’re pretty much helpless against close range enemies. (edit: that’s for PVP)

-Does the Staff have better/more CC than D/D? Yes, safer too.
-Are traits any more flexible for Staff than D/D? Not really. 20 in arcana is kinda mandatory.
-Can the Staff do better damage in any elemental attunement? Depends on how many people you aoe nuke down.

As others have said, you get range, combo fields, control, and support.

With staff, you don’t need Powerful Auras in order to grant fury/swiftness to allies since you can place Frozen Ground and use blast finishers for AoE Frost Aura. You have to be a little more mindful of where the enemy is going to be when dealing damage.

Staff is awesome if you have good party members who don’t knock your target out of your fields or kite them endlessly (note that you have some control over this as well, considering the plethora of CC skills).