Guild Wars 2

Don’t invest in arcane. Seriously. I’m not sure why everyone is so focused on including arcane in their builds. It works ok on some builds, but it really shouldn’t be for everyone, and here’s why.

Swtiching attunements is critical to the Ele’s success. This is quite true. However, switching elements more rapidly doesn’t help much. We have a 15 second cooldown on our elements by default. We have four elements. With perfect timing, you can switch elements every 5 seconds. If you’re switching faster than that, you probably shouldn’t be (skill combos being an exception). Swapping attunements is like dodging, it’s 10 times more effective when done intelligently and strategically instead of spamming it.

Lowering the cooldowns on attunement swapping does NOT equate to lower skill cooldowns. Those really nice skills like Fire Grab, Earthquake, RTL (when it works), Updraft? A person with 0 in arcane can use them just as often as a person with 30 in arcane.

Maybe arcane is a vital part of your build. That’s fine. It has it’s place. But don’t mindlessley invest in it. Try going without it, and see if you can make those points work better elsewhere. It can give your defensive builds some offensive bite, or give your glass cannon builds some defense to make it more viable.

I like it for a few reasons – I’m Staff and being able to get back in to a particular Element quickly to recast that CC, or that damage move, or whatever, is really nice. I don’t know about the other weapons but a lot of skills on Staff have fairly short cooldowns. If I switch to an attunement for just one or two skills and then want to get back in to the attunement I was in, I at least only have to wait 10 seconds instead of 15. That’s big and allows me much more freedom in using the skills I want when I want to use them, instead of having to plan around a huge cooldown. Secondly, I really like Elemental Attunement and Blasting Staff, so… 20 points Arcane is important to my playstyle for a few reasons.

It’s a lot better on staff than it is for D/D (which is what I play).

However, you have four attunements to work with! Switching out to cast one or two skills before switching back seems like a total waste. Why not switch to the third and fourth? All of the elements in staff can contribute to offense in a fight. Switch to earth and immobilize, set the ground rumbling. Switch to water and freeze the ground, set up that big ice spike. Give yourself a little regen if your hurt. By the time you’re done with that, your attunement should be back up.

The problem I see in your statement is “That damage move” or “that CC”. There’s multiple CCs and damage moves (and combos) you can use in different attunements. Use everything you have!

Give it a try. I understand if you feel it’s too much of a sacrifice, but there’s so much you can do with 20 points.

It’s not that they feel the Arcane tree is amazing, and the cooldown benefit is required, it’s because the other trees are so lackluster that Arcane gives the only decent benefits for our playstyle

Xriah.5743:

It’s a lot better on staff than it is for D/D (which is what I play).

However, you have four attunements to work with! Switching out to cast one or two skills before switching back seems like a total waste. Why not switch to the third and fourth? All of the elements in staff can contribute to offense in a fight. Switch to earth and immobilize, set the ground rumbling. Switch to water and freeze the ground, set up that big ice spike. Give yourself a little regen if your hurt. By the time you’re done with that, your attunement should be back up.

The problem I see in your statement is “That damage move” or “that CC”. There’s multiple CCs and damage moves (and combos) you can use in different attunements. Use everything you have!

Give it a try. I understand if you feel it’s too much of a sacrifice, but there’s so much you can do with 20 points.

I generally do use everything I have – Staff’s versatility and useful skills in every Element is part of why I love it – but it needs to be done with purpose and with a plan. If you’re only switching to another Element because you’re waiting for a cooldown than that is a broken mechanic.

Why would you not spec heavily into arcana? I find myself only needing one ability here and there in an attunement, being able to readily switch quicker is great considering you can gain boons on each swap if you spec for it.

I run 30 lightning, 10 earth, and 30 arcana and did well enough to make it up to pvp 20 that way. Am I going to lose 1vs1 in some situations, sure, but PvP is a team game. I should never be left alone and games that balance classes according to 1vs1 are always fail. Do I feel that ele’s seem a little short on DPS, sometimes. But then factor in that alot of the dps is aoe rather than single target, and it makes sense.

I think people get used to caster’s in mmo’s being traditionally very easy, and most of the complaints about elementalists are about having to switch attunements and memorise abilities. Comming from Age of Conan, I had soem classes that would have 30+ keybinds, remembering 20 abilities all bound to 1-5 and easily swapped with F1-F4 feels like a give me class.

So my point is, if your a pver and think you can do well in pvp with an ele because it’s a caster, your probably going to get face rolled and complain the class is broken. L2P folks.

My 30 in arcance I think gives me, I seem to remember, a 9 sec cooldown on attunemets. I guess mathematically it is 10.5 but I only ever seem to see the number 9 I like it because I can access the main hand skills much more often and rarely use auto attack which is usually meh at best. If the game has time to slip in an auto-attack I will not complain lol, but I am often interrupting or preempting it with another skill. And yeah, I am loading skills like there’s no tommorrow and liking it alot.

But when you use enough of your skills you don’t need to wait for a cooldown. I’m not saying to use an element becuase your waiting for a cooldown. I’m saying if you need to slow, you can go to water OR earth. If you need to hit hard, you can use fire OR earth OR lightning. If you need defense you can use water or earth.

It’s more about having multiple solutions for the same problem. Is he getting away? Use Earth 4, or Lightning 5, or Ice 4. They’re all targeted solutions to help prevent someone from getting away.

Arcane may be the best place for you to put 20 points, and that’s fine. But you may find some other places where it helps more if you take a look. It’s not like you can’t switch it back.

Suctum.6912:

Why would you not spec heavily into arcana? I find myself only needing one ability here and there in an attunement, being able to readily switch quicker is great considering you can gain boons on each swap if you spec for it.

I run 30 lightning, 10 earth, and 30 arcana and did well enough to make it up to pvp 20 that way. Am I going to lose 1vs1 in some situations, sure, but PvP is a team game. I should never be left alone and games that balance classes according to 1vs1 are always fail. Do I feel that ele’s seem a little short on DPS, sometimes. But then factor in that alot of the dps is aoe rather than single target, and it makes sense.

I think people get used to caster’s in mmo’s being traditionally very easy, and most of the complaints about elementalists are about having to switch attunements and memorise abilities. Comming from Age of Conan, I had soem classes that would have 30+ keybinds, remembering 20 abilities all bound to 1-5 and easily swapped with F1-F4 feels like a give me class.

So my point is, if your a pver and think you can do well in pvp with an ele because it’s a caster, your probably going to get face rolled and complain the class is broken. L2P folks.

I’m not sure where you went with that… The reasons you wouldn’t invest into arcana are the reasons I listed in my initial post.

That 30 in arcana could go into fire for some brutal damage, or water for nice regenerative abilities.

I run 20 fire/ 30 lightning/ 20 water, and I’m also coming from a PvP perspective. I do quite well. Water and cantrips allow me almost constant regen while I keep the pressure up with all my offense.

I’m just saying, give it a try.

Xriah.5743:

But when you use enough of your skills you don’t need to wait for a cooldown. I’m not saying to use an element becuase your waiting for a cooldown. I’m saying if you need to slow, you can go to water OR earth. If you need to hit hard, you can use fire OR earth OR lightning. If you need defense you can use water or earth.

Meh, not necessarily true. If I want to do damage my best bet is Fire for me. I’m Staff specced 30 Fire, 20 Water, 20 Arcane. I do have some condition damage on my gear set but it’s not going to make Earth a better choice and Air in Staff really only has one damage move, the rest are CC’s. And it chains a pretty long distance onto mobs that I may not want to pull. Not to mention, some of the great CC’s have longer CD’s so I’d like to save the CC CD as well as the attunement CD for when I really need them instead of saying “Oh Fire is on CD, let me use Earth/Air”. I prefer Air for the CC’s and Earth is good for CC, Defense, and Bleeds. But I’d prefer Fire for pure damage when I don’t need to do anything else because every skill in Staff Fire is aimed towards damage and with my spec it’s the best choice. So like I said – switch with a purpose and a plan. If a cooldown is preventing me from using the best skill for the situation – whether it be heals, damage, CC, protection, whatever – then I’m going to spec into Arcane to remedy that.

I do it less for the passive 5/15/25 bonuses than for the other perks. Free boons when attunement-swapping? Heck yes!

30 points in Arcane Power can give you almost permanent Vigor, boons on every attunement swap, a blast finisher on each dodge and ~1.5k healing every ~10 seconds.
How can you spend 30 points to gain more than that?

Also isnt arcane the one with the trait to make stafe aoe ginormous?

castillle.5248:

Also isnt arcane the one with the trait to make stafe aoe ginormous?

Yep. Shorter attune CD + yummy Staff AoEs+ free boons and more free boons= yes please!

I spec 30 into arcana 30 in water and 10 in air…but im a healer (with a staff)

I dont mind the extra recharge on attunements, it basically means when i do switch out of water (like people arent taking a lot of damage) i’ll switch off to earth or fire to do some dps, and after a few seconds water is back up so i can switch back without worry.

I also love evasive arcana too, ahthough from a dps standpoint maybe its not so useful, but dodge rolling to heal my allies?.. yes please

Leiloni.7951:

Meh, not necessarily true. If I want to do damage my best bet is Fire for me. I’m Staff specced 30 Fire, 20 Water, 20 Arcane. I do have some condition damage on my gear set but it’s not going to make Earth a better choice and Air in Staff really only has one damage move, the rest are CC’s. And it chains a pretty long distance onto mobs that I may not want to pull. Not to mention, some of the great CC’s have longer CD’s so I’d like to save the CC CD as well as the attunement CD for when I really need them instead of saying “Oh Fire is on CD, let me use Earth/Air”. I prefer Air for the CC’s and Earth is good for CC, Defense, and Bleeds. But I’d prefer Fire for pure damage when I don’t need to do anything else because every skill in Staff Fire is aimed towards damage and with my spec it’s the best choice. So like I said – switch with a purpose and a plan. If a cooldown is preventing me from using the best skill for the situation – whether it be heals, damage, CC, protection, whatever – then I’m going to spec into Arcane to remedy that.

I think we’re coming from different perspectives since we play different weapon sets.

Fire is very bursty in D/D, but the main hitters in fire also have a longer cooldown. Also, Lightning and Earth can hit pretty well in their own right.
I do switch with a purpose and a plan. I’d say I do so more than anyone using arcane since the longer cooldown gives me a bigger commitment to my plan.

Stick with it if it works for you. Maybe I didn’t make it as clear as I should have but this thread was more for people saying Ele is broken. There’s a definite “Arcane is a must” vibe that this forum has, and i think that’s causing people to invest blindly into it without a plan.

Edit: Curious, how many of you are primarily staff users?

I wasn’t trying to say you didn’t do things with purpose Xriah I’m just trying to make the point that the reason so many people use Arcana is because it is a great trait line that offers a lot of good things for a lot of playstyles.

Leiloni.7951:

I wasn’t trying to say you didn’t do things with purpose Xriah I’m just trying to make the point that the reason so many people use Arcana is because it is a great trait line that offers a lot of good things for a lot of playstyles.

I understand.

Perhaps it’s, again, because Arcana offers a lot more help to staff than it does to D/D.

It really doesn’t give much to a D/D Ele that we can’t get elsewhere. The boons you get with a cantrip build far outshine the boons from arcane (5 boons from Armor of Earth alone). The staff AoE booster trait equivilant for Daggers is a measely 15% speed buff that doesn’t stack with swiftness. The only thing that interests me in Arcana is the Evasive Arcana trait, but I’d rather just focus my rolls on being defensive than trying to do both defense and offense with them. Even with vigor, we can’t roll often enough to make it worth it. And since were in so close with D/D, our rolls are very important to us.

Even if you only consider the stat boosts, 30 In lightning gives you an instant crit build (crit chance+crit damage). 20 in water gives you so much survivability for your buck (healing+vitality and 500 ways to apply regen).

I guess another point that this thread brings to my attention is that, as Eles, our weapon choices make us way more different from each other when compared to other classes with differnet weapons. Two eles with different weapons have 20 skills that are different between them. Other classes have either 5 or 10. I think I’ll consider that more when I’m giving advice.

Edited for clarity.

Suctum.6912:

Why would you not spec heavily into arcana? I find myself only needing one ability here and there in an attunement, being able to readily switch quicker is great considering you can gain boons on each swap if you spec for it.

I run 30 lightning, 10 earth, and 30 arcana and did well enough to make it up to pvp 20 that way. Am I going to lose 1vs1 in some situations, sure, but PvP is a team game. I should never be left alone and games that balance classes according to 1vs1 are always fail. Do I feel that ele’s seem a little short on DPS, sometimes. But then factor in that alot of the dps is aoe rather than single target, and it makes sense.

I think people get used to caster’s in mmo’s being traditionally very easy, and most of the complaints about elementalists are about having to switch attunements and memorise abilities. Comming from Age of Conan, I had soem classes that would have 30+ keybinds, remembering 20 abilities all bound to 1-5 and easily swapped with F1-F4 feels like a give me class.

So my point is, if your a pver and think you can do well in pvp with an ele because it’s a caster, your probably going to get face rolled and complain the class is broken. L2P folks.

Ah Suctum, I was wondering if I was going to See you on the forums, also saw Cogbyrn posting somewhere.

I completely agree with this post. Arcana has to many good benefits to completely ignore, and the ability to keep protection and regen Boons up are HUGE, not to mention boon lengthening as well.

Edit: I’m Running D/D so swapping attunements for Boons cc’s and the extra protection and swiftness is great for my playstyle. Like suction said, coming from AOC I’m used to TONS of key ones and micro managing, that’s what drew me to the ele fast paced playstyle with micro management and the arcane feats help me stay in that style.

I run mostly S/D, and after speccing 30 into arcane (and trying a ton of different builds) it’s hard to imagine going back, but you’re right, it really is about weapon choice. With D/D I could see more benefit spending points elsewhere.

For example: scepter has a skill with a very short cooldown that grants vigor and a master trait in arcane that gives increased endurance regeneration when wielding a scepter. I run with runes of adventure that give me back 50% endurance (one free dodge) every time I heal (used to be 100%, kitten nerfbat….) and if I really want to be dodgy I can toss on a sigil of energy on my weapon. Evasive arcana has a cooldown, but with this build I can aoe heal/purify/burn/bleed/blind basically any time I want to.

How many boons are you really getting from Arcana that you can’t get elsewhere?

You can get virtually permanent protection with the powerful arua + elemental shielding combo along with a good amount of fury and swiftness. You can build around Cantrips and get 3 stacks of might + vigor+ regen per activation on top of the cantrip effect. With a cantrip regen cooldown, this is nearly permanent regen and vigor.
We’re already loaded with swiftness buffs and can maintain perma swiftness easily with Zephyr’s Boon.

I’m not saying ignore Arcana. I’m saying consider not using it. Those extra points open up so many other options.

Xriah.5743:

How many boons are you really getting from Arcana that you can’t get elsewhere?

You can get virtually permanent protection with the powerful arua + elemental shielding combo along with a good amount of fury and swiftness. You can build around Cantrips and get 3 stacks of might + vigor+ regen per activation on top of the cantrip effect. With a cantrip regen cooldown, this is nearly permanent regen and vigor.
We’re already loaded with swiftness buffs and can maintain perma swiftness easily with Zephyr’s Boon.

I’m not saying ignore Arcana. I’m saying consider not using it. Those extra points open up so many other options.

What I understand you to be saying is everyone should experiment with different trait combos to see what they like best. I totally agree with that, there are tons of interesting and viable builds with elementalist.

Most of the stuff you’re talking about there applies more to staff, D/D and D/F than S/D.

Scepter is my favorite weapon for several reasons, not gonna clog your thread with them, just know I been playing since BWE1 and tried about every build I could think of or saw with every weapon. If I ran staff primarily I’d probably use a 20-0-10-30-10 build or similar, D/D something like 10-10-30-20-0 (or maybe 10 water/10 arcane, still love that attunement swap boon share). My current build is 0-10-20-10-30 with S/D (dang, there I go clogging the thread…. woops).

You can get virtually permanent protection with the powerful arua + elemental shielding combo along with a good amount of fury and swiftness.

To get a good protection uptime with Elemental Shielding you have to go with a signet aura build which means you can’t get a good vigor/regeneration uptime. It is all about efficiency. Elemental Attunement+Soothing Disruption(+Zephyr’s Boon if dagger) is the best combination for maximizing boon uptime (especially vigor/protection that are the two most valuable ones) with the minimum amount of major slots.

If you want a higher crit rate or other more offensive stats, modify your gear. With gear you have a near fixed amount of stat points. With traits however, each major trait is worth a different amount of stat points, and you need to focus on picking the ones that gives high value, even if that value doesn’t always coincide 100% with your build intent.

This is why I think Elem’s should have the ability to weapon swap just like everyone else does. There is a big difference between using the staff and a D/D or other combo.

The point of my post is that PvP is a TEAM effort. You can stack Water all you want, you will never be a tank, and you will never be able to out heal sustained DPS. The best way to play an elementalist is to think of yourself as a utlility class. Sure, you can murder bads all day in minis, but when it comes down to it a seasoned vet on any of the “considered” OP classes (mesmer, warrior, theif) is going to down you 75% of the time without someone to back you up. Playing as an elementalist, you should always roll with someone and and take advanatge of their CC’s. While we do have a bunch of CC’s, they are not game changers and they act more as intterupts rather than a full blown stun. I find myself doing only average when I try to win minis by myself. When playing with people who know their roles, I feel almost OP. Elementalist is not the class for someone who wants do straight up DPS, but if you enjoy kiting and outlasting most opponents, this is defitenly where it is at.

As to people who spec Fire…what traits are you goign for? 10% more dps is nothing, 5% extra burn damage is what? 10 dps? Other than the cooldown shortner on abilities or perhaps fire fields lasting 30%, I see no reason to even put a point into Fire. PvE, I have 2100 power without a single point in fire. What is 300 power with 30 trait points tied up going to do for me? Nothing. In PvP, what’s 300 power going to get you? Slightly more DPS but nothing that constitutes a game changer. When taking traits, go for ability unlocks rather than what little stats you get. It’s all about play style, so I’ll keep my recomendations to myself, but getting to PvP 20 already obvisouly what I use works and it’s nowhere near the garbage people are putting up on the forums.

Do yourself a favor and find what works for your play style, that’s what usaully works the best.

BlueprintLFE.2358:

Suctum.6912:

Why would you not spec heavily into arcana? I find myself only needing one ability here and there in an attunement, being able to readily switch quicker is great considering you can gain boons on each swap if you spec for it.

I run 30 lightning, 10 earth, and 30 arcana and did well enough to make it up to pvp 20 that way. Am I going to lose 1vs1 in some situations, sure, but PvP is a team game. I should never be left alone and games that balance classes according to 1vs1 are always fail. Do I feel that ele’s seem a little short on DPS, sometimes. But then factor in that alot of the dps is aoe rather than single target, and it makes sense.

I think people get used to caster’s in mmo’s being traditionally very easy, and most of the complaints about elementalists are about having to switch attunements and memorise abilities. Comming from Age of Conan, I had soem classes that would have 30+ keybinds, remembering 20 abilities all bound to 1-5 and easily swapped with F1-F4 feels like a give me class.

So my point is, if your a pver and think you can do well in pvp with an ele because it’s a caster, your probably going to get face rolled and complain the class is broken. L2P folks.

Ah Suctum, I was wondering if I was going to See you on the forums, also saw Cogbyrn posting somewhere.

I completely agree with this post. Arcana has to many good benefits to completely ignore, and the ability to keep protection and regen Boons up are HUGE, not to mention boon lengthening as well.

Edit: I’m Running D/D so swapping attunements for Boons cc’s and the extra protection and swiftness is great for my playstyle. Like suction said, coming from AOC I’m used to TONS of key ones and micro managing, that’s what drew me to the ele fast paced playstyle with micro management and the arcane feats help me stay in that style.

Good to see AoC players here. Any AoC player, even the most average one, has 4 legs up on these WoW players here. Sad to say, but you will not see much competition outside of tourneys. The fact people think that specing traits for stats rather than abilities will make them do more “dps” or “heal better” is out right lols. I hope the popualtion gets a bit quicker to realise that most people who offer advice on the forums don’t know what they are talking about. I find it’s bet to just point somethign out, and let folks find out themselves if it works for them or not. However, reading these posts for a while it’s clear to me 90% of the people playing elementalists have no clue what they are doing. I hope ANet is not like Funcom and listens to these people when it comes to balance.

Suctum.6912:

The point of my post is that PvP is a TEAM effort. You can stack Water all you want, you will never be a tank, and you will never be able to out heal sustained DPS. The best way to play an elementalist is to think of yourself as a utlility class. Sure, you can murder bads all day in minis, but when it comes down to it a seasoned vet on any of the “considered” OP classes (mesmer, warrior, theif) is going to down you 75% of the time without someone to back you up. Playing as an elementalist, you should always roll with someone and and take advanatge of their CC’s. While we do have a bunch of CC’s, they are not game changers and they act more as intterupts rather than a full blown stun. I find myself doing only average when I try to win minis by myself. When playing with people who know their roles, I feel almost OP. Elementalist is not the class for someone who wants do straight up DPS, but if you enjoy kiting and outlasting most opponents, this is defitenly where it is at.

As to people who spec Fire…what traits are you goign for? 10% more dps is nothing, 5% extra burn damage is what? 10 dps? Other than the cooldown shortner on abilities or perhaps fire fields lasting 30%, I see no reason to even put a point into Fire. PvE, I have 2100 power without a single point in fire. What is 300 power with 30 trait points tied up going to do for me? Nothing. In PvP, what’s 300 power going to get you? Slightly more DPS but nothing that constitutes a game changer. When taking traits, go for ability unlocks rather than what little stats you get. It’s all about play style, so I’ll keep my recomendations to myself, but getting to PvP 20 already obvisouly what I use works and it’s nowhere near the garbage people are putting up on the forums.

Do yourself a favor and find what works for your play style, that’s what usaully works the best.

I go for the Fire trait that gives me 3 stacks of might for each cantrip and the 10% damage traits. Might is nice. 3xMight is nicer still.

The more base damage I have, the higher my crits are gonna be. Specing 30 into lightning will get me nastier crits. It makes a huge difference, and I weigh both the stats as well as the abilities when I make selections.

I’m asking people to try something besides “must put points in arcane”. You say to find what works for your playstyle. Yet, your also saying my advice of trying something else is bad. A little contradictory.

Having an sPvP rank of 20 means you sink a lot of time into PvP. Doesn’t say anything about actual skill. Care for a friendly duel? I’m genuinely curious as to how you do. I shouldn’t be too much trouble with my garbage advice and tactics.

Suctum.6912:

As to people who spec Fire…what traits are you goign for? 10% more dps is nothing, 5% extra burn damage is what? 10 dps? Other than the cooldown shortner on abilities or perhaps fire fields lasting 30%, I see no reason to even put a point into Fire. PvE, I have 2100 power without a single point in fire. What is 300 power with 30 trait points tied up going to do for me? Nothing. In PvP, what’s 300 power going to get you? Slightly more DPS but nothing that constitutes a game changer. When taking traits, go for ability unlocks rather than what little stats you get. It’s all about play style, so I’ll keep my recomendations to myself, but getting to PvP 20 already obvisouly what I use works and it’s nowhere near the garbage people are putting up on the forums.

So tell me then what is a support/dps specced Staff user going to get out of speccing into Air? I’m not using Dagger or Scepter so a lot of those traits are useless. I don’t need the extra speed and I’m not speccing into glyphs or crit. How would that benefit me over Fire, or Earth, or an extra few points in Water or Arcana?

He won’t tell you. He’s “keeping his reccomdations to himself”. He’s just here to tell us that we don’t know what we’re talking about and that our advice is garbage. Also, that he’s srs bsns because he’s rank 20 in PvP.

DesertRose.2031:

30 points in Arcane Power can give you almost permanent Vigor, boons on every attunement swap, a blast finisher on each dodge and ~1.5k healing every ~10 seconds.
How can you spend 30 points to gain more than that?

All the reasons you mentioned are why I completely agree with you and disagree with OP. I don’t use staff very often though other than keep siege/defense where it isn’t as important to swap attunements as quickly so it may be OK with staff, but would kill D/D damage and might stacking.

One thing to mention though is even if you could swap through all the attunements with the default cool down, uh why would you do that? Attunement dancing is yes very vital to playing an elementalist, but if you’re going from air→fire→earth→water every rotation you’re doing it wrong. Attunements are situational and while yes for S/D and D/D it is good to start out with air→fire→earth, you don’t need water in every rotation and may need to swap to air or earth in an instant because your target starts running away and you need ride the lightning or to magnetic grasp them then earthquake.

I agree with OP, at least mostly. I hate to waste points in Arcana. Currently I put 10 in because I cannot do without it. I run a staff as main weapon and throw down fields a lot though (and like to get back to fire for my lava fonts =P). With 0 Arcana, I did find it hard to attunement swap and 10 felt like it made a world of difference (plus the boon on attunement are nice, but not great imo). But when I got 20 to try Blasting Staff, I didn’t notice a big chance in cool down (in fact, I feel it was bugged and didn’t lower as much as it should have, but my math may have been off too). Also, I didn’t care for bigger staff nukes, lava font wasn’t bad, but I felt I didn’t need it and would rather have 10 more in air. I did try 30 for the Dodge trait, still not big cooldown change and I never got hang of dodging and hated losing 20 trait points.

However, if you like Arcana like, it can still be useful. Mainly for traits over cooldown effect. A lot of good builds can use of Dodge Trait for Blast Combos which I would say is worth it if you do it right. And you can’t get Attunement cooldown from boosts on armor and jewelry like you can the other attributes.
Still, unless you really need Evasive Arcana for your combos (dagger/dagger or staff mostly), I’d say 0-10 Arcana should be enough. Arcana certainly isn’t a requirement for all builds, and if elementalist really do need to use Arcana always, then I think the initial cooldowns are too high since no profession should be required to trait their unique line to use their special mechanic.

Well, obviously you attune to what you need. Switching between all four lets you switch every 5 seconds. You don’t always need to switch every 5 seconds.

The arguement of needing to chase someone down is that, yes, you might need to switch at a moments notice to stop someone from running, but you have two options to do that. Earth or Lightning. One of those should be off cooldown or you’re switching way too fast.

Home now. Gonna start playing the game rather than chatting about it (Yay).

Feel free to message me in game if you wanna discuss builds more or even for a friendly duel.

Xriah.5743:

Suctum.6912:

The point of my post is that PvP is a TEAM effort. You can stack Water all you want, you will never be a tank, and you will never be able to out heal sustained DPS. The best way to play an elementalist is to think of yourself as a utlility class. Sure, you can murder bads all day in minis, but when it comes down to it a seasoned vet on any of the “considered” OP classes (mesmer, warrior, theif) is going to down you 75% of the time without someone to back you up. Playing as an elementalist, you should always roll with someone and and take advanatge of their CC’s. While we do have a bunch of CC’s, they are not game changers and they act more as intterupts rather than a full blown stun. I find myself doing only average when I try to win minis by myself. When playing with people who know their roles, I feel almost OP. Elementalist is not the class for someone who wants do straight up DPS, but if you enjoy kiting and outlasting most opponents, this is defitenly where it is at.

As to people who spec Fire…what traits are you goign for? 10% more dps is nothing, 5% extra burn damage is what? 10 dps? Other than the cooldown shortner on abilities or perhaps fire fields lasting 30%, I see no reason to even put a point into Fire. PvE, I have 2100 power without a single point in fire. What is 300 power with 30 trait points tied up going to do for me? Nothing. In PvP, what’s 300 power going to get you? Slightly more DPS but nothing that constitutes a game changer. When taking traits, go for ability unlocks rather than what little stats you get. It’s all about play style, so I’ll keep my recomendations to myself, but getting to PvP 20 already obvisouly what I use works and it’s nowhere near the garbage people are putting up on the forums.

Do yourself a favor and find what works for your play style, that’s what usaully works the best.

I go for the Fire trait that gives me 3 stacks of might for each cantrip and the 10% damage traits. Might is nice. 3xMight is nicer still.

The more base damage I have, the higher my crits are gonna be. Specing 30 into lightning will get me nastier crits. It makes a huge difference, and I weigh both the stats as well as the abilities when I make selections.

I’m asking people to try something besides “must put points in arcane”. You say to find what works for your playstyle. Yet, your also saying my advice of trying something else is bad. A little contradictory.

Having an sPvP rank of 20 means you sink a lot of time into PvP. Doesn’t say anything about actual skill. Care for a friendly duel? I’m genuinely curious as to how you do. I shouldn’t be too much trouble with my garbage advice and tactics.

Again, your reverting to 1v1 to say one spec is better than another, I am basing my opinion on group play. If MMO’s were based on 1v1, they would not be MMO’s would they? You can stack all you want into fire, but your not getting any extra DPS that’s worth mentioning. Why do I spec Arcana, because I can put conditions on Arcane Wave and Arcane Blast if I choose. I can also apply vigor every time I crit, which is sually 1/2.5 times. I can aslo cast attunement bonuses for my team. Why precision? Bolt through the Heart is by one of the best skills in game. Why 10 in earth, because a free Armor of Earth coupled with an attuntment switch to earth gives me 66% damage defelction, which is plenty of time to cast a quick cleansing wave and swith to lighting and RtL out of danger. The fact each arcane ability recharges my stamina by 25% gives me plenty of time and chances to dodge telegraphed animations like heartseeker and BC. I could continue to explain myself but that does not help players improve their PvP skills. I can only tell you basic builds and you all need to find what works. But I can tell you now there is nothing in fire to warrant a single point…

30 earth 30 Water 10 Arcane d/d

Never felt weak, good survivability in PVP (still weak against theives but meh).

I switch attuns for healing or damage combo’s without constantly stressing.

Suctum.6912:

Why precision? Bolt through the Heart is by one of the best skills in game.

Like I said, for a support spec staff user that’s a waste of points. I’m not specced into burst damage and I don’t play that way, so why would I take a trait that does that, in a line with a ton of stuff that does nothing for me, and a stat I’m not even stacking on my gear anyway? People use different weapons, different utilities, different gear, and have different playstyles. Just because something works for you, that doesn’t mean it makes sense for everyone.

Leiloni.7951:

Suctum.6912:

Why precision? Bolt through the Heart is by one of the best skills in game.

Like I said, for a support spec staff user that’s a waste of points. I’m not specced into burst damage and I don’t play that way, so why would I take a trait that does that, in a line with a ton of stuff that does nothing for me, and a stat I’m not even stacking on my gear anyway? People use different weapons, different utilities, different gear, and have different playstyles. Just because something works for you, that doesn’t mean it makes sense for everyone.

If you read my post, that’s exactly what I said. The other guy wanted me to explain why I choose what I do. The only spec that works for someone is what will work FOR them. However, as in all MMO’s there are things that just do not work for anyone. I’m sorry, but DPS/Utility wise, there is nothing in Fire worth it for anyone. To waste 30 points in Fire for an extra 300 dps? I just can’t see someone thinking that 300 dps at 80 with full exotic gear is worthwhile…

As for staff or dagger/sceptor, I never said which one I use because I use them both. It depends on who I am fighting an who I am with, I prefer dagger/sceptor, but sometimes I like to use the staff. I limit dagger/dagger pretty much to PvE, but since they changed some of the abilities to conal attacks it seems more viable for PvP. I just do not like the short range, I tend to stay about medium range as that’s what I am used to from Age of Conan.

Suctum is kind of right about fire, A lot of it’s perks are gimmicky.

I can argue that earth arguably supports the fire attune more so than fire could ever support earth, so earth is pretty much a twofer.

Comming from an MMO that had the best PvP potential a MMO game ever had, I hate for ANet to make the same mistakes Funcom did with Age of Conan.

People complaining about Elementalists being underpowered, unplayable, over-complicated, this is all not true. However, if people are speccing traits wrong and not building the class as it’s meant to be played, yes it will be fail. Putting 30 points into Fire is an example of this. You gain very little at the cost of almost half your point pool. Successful players always test abilites, then spec according to what works. Builds become public, and successful builds become common knowledge. However, it takes well known players publicaly promoting those builds.

What happened in Age of Conan, was they drastically changed the PvP system. Instead of rewarding players due to skill, they rewarded players with time spent in game and gear-based reliance. With PvPers upset, the PvP population dwindled was replaced with more casual players which the majority would complain about 1v1. Funcom, over a year or so, actually listened to these players and based PvP off of 1v1 rather than group play. All of this because dissinformation by uninformed players.

I see the same kind of QQ happening here. I would hate to see Elementalists get buffed not because they need it, but because the skill curve is to high for the current population to handle to make it a popular class. When you start balancing games in this way you are locked into a progessivly bad balancing system which never attempts to solve any “issues”, it only attempts to level the playing feild with bubbles, cc’s, and all other of stupid abilities that slow combat rather than improve it.

I am having alot of fun in GW2. Please don’t put dissinformation on the forums before you actually put time into learning a class. I don’t want another AoC incident.

Interesting, I knew very little about AoC’s failures until now

One of the things I’ve learned after playing several MMO’s is that people prefer the feeling of being powerful in 1v1 situations before they ever get the urge to work as a team. This is brought on by simply losing to a single player of another class multiple times, which gets the player mad because they are unable to best them and therefore push for the game to focus on balancing their class solely so they can get back at those they have lost too.

People like to run the shows, feel like they are the one tipping the scales, and feel that they can accomplish tasks on their own.. hence why people get angry when classes are more support based, even if their assistance is vital.

That’s really bad advice. Arcane tree is without a doubt the best tree we have with any weapon set. Its crucial for Evasive Arcana. That skill alone is better then the 3 you’ll get from fire, not to mention you’ll rack up way more power thanks to all the might you can then build up. The fire tree should be avoided at all costs, cause the traits in it are all terrible, unless your an auramancer, and even that build can be done better without fire, at least in PvE. I suggest the OP change his post to “ignore arcane before level 60” as pre level 60 the stat bonuses are more significant then the traits themselves.

I run D/D with 30 fire, 10 air, and 30 arcane. I enjoy the arcane line because 20% reduction on CD for arcane skills, I use shield, wave, and blast often. I use windborne speed trait to be mobile on the battlefield and get back into the fray if I do die. I use my 30 point, to provide an effect on arcane skill use based on attunement.

I find the last one especially useful. Need to apply a lot of chill to a boss? Use blast and wave on a boss while in water. Immobilize in earth, blind in air, and burning in fire. Its very useful.

SwickHobo.5096:

That’s really bad advice. Arcane tree is without a doubt the best tree we have with any weapon set. Its crucial for Evasive Arcana. That skill alone is better then the 3 you’ll get from fire, not to mention you’ll rack up way more power thanks to all the might you can then build up. The fire tree should be avoided at all costs, cause the traits in it are all terrible, unless your an auramancer, and even that build can be done better without fire, at least in PvE. I suggest the OP change his post to “ignore arcane before level 60” as pre level 60 the stat bonuses are more significant then the traits themselves.

“QTF” If more players made informed posts like this the quality of the dedicated Elementalists would go up. Evening up the skill curve amongst the population is the best way to actually acheive balance and see what needs tweeking rather than people who try the class for a day or so and cry it’s underpowered simply because they are ignorant to the strenghts of the class. You can only acheive mastery of a class by playing it…not by reading QQ on the forums and not testing for yourself.

I have played this class from pre-release. First leveling to 80 and using every ability/skill. I then moved to PvP only after knowing every ability inside and out. While it can be said some classes are simply create and go PvP, Elementalist is certainly not one of them.

i m actually more confused than ever after reading this thread … ?_?

i m staff ele only do some pve and wvw. i run with berserker armor and invader accessories, 30-20-0-0-20, so i should not put any points in fire?? i get 20 in arcane only for staff aoe increase. plz advise

Think of traits like a feat tree. You benefit from getting stats, but you should not pick your feats according to the stats they provide. With 30 points invested in a trait line, you only get a maxium of 300 stat points. 300 points at level 80 with full exotic armor and trinkets is nothing. It is not enough of a stat increase to be readily noticably. Instead, go with the abilities the trait trees unlock. Fire, for example, gives little benefit to actually up your dps. 5% more burn dps is nothing, 10% more dps is still not that much considering spells have a minium/maxium damage potential. 30% longer fire feild is intersting, but 30% of 6 seconds is only going to round to 2 seconds. These abilites are meaningless compared to unlocks you get in Lighting, Earth, Water and particularly in the Arcana tree. In fact you can up your dps more using Lighting/Earth more than Fire. Also, don’t forget CC’s or debuffs. Losing a small amount of DPS to chill, bleed, snare, will always win you a battle than going for 100% DPS and not having any utility attatched to spells.

As for staff, the blasting power which increases your AoE is not that signifigant, so I would suggest you go with renewing stamina and arcane energy. With a high enough crit chance you can dodge as much as you like providing you use arcane wave and blast. You can use Ether Renewal and Cleansing Fire or Mist Form as CC breaks, and if you use Stop, Drop, and Roll with water you can shrug off nasty chills for free.

But playing staff, you defitinely want skills that keep you mobile and keep you at range. This will go alot farther in keepign you alive than stright up DPS, as a dead Elementalist deals 0 dps being dead.

Suctum.6912:

Think of traits like a feat tree. You benefit from getting stats, but you should not pick your feats according to the stats they provide. With 30 points invested in a trait line, you only get a maxium of 300 stat points. 300 points at level 80 with full exotic armor and trinkets is nothing. It is not enough of a stat increase to be readily noticably. Instead, go with the abilities the trait trees unlock. Fire, for example, gives little benefit to actually up your dps. 5% more burn dps is nothing, 10% more dps is still not that much considering spells have a minium/maxium damage potential. 30% longer fire feild is intersting, but 30% of 6 seconds is only going to round to 2 seconds. These abilites are meaningless compared to unlocks you get in Lighting, Earth, Water and particularly in the Arcana tree. In fact you can up your dps more using Lighting/Earth more than Fire. Also, don’t forget CC’s or debuffs. Losing a small amount of DPS to chill, bleed, snare, will always win you a battle than going for 100% DPS and not having any utility attatched to spells.

As for staff, the blasting power which increases your AoE is not that signifigant, so I would suggest you go with renewing stamina and arcane energy. With a high enough crit chance you can dodge as much as you like providing you use arcane wave and blast. You can use Ether Renewal and Cleansing Fire or Mist Form as CC breaks, and if you use Stop, Drop, and Roll with water you can shrug off nasty chills for free.

But playing staff, you defitinely want skills that keep you mobile and keep you at range. This will go alot farther in keepign you alive than stright up DPS, as a dead Elementalist deals 0 dps being dead.

You should pick your traits based on both. 300 can make a large difference, Especially for us since our stats are well matched. Going 30 into Lightning gets us 300 percision AND %30+ crit damage. Going 30 into fire gets us 300 extra damage AND extra condition duration. Crit damage, condition duration, lots of stats can be harder to mix and match on gear.

I put 20 in fire for 3xMight in cantrips, 10% extra damage in fire, and the extra damage it affords. It’s a good compliment to our damage, which could really use the boost. Especially if you run a cantrip build, giving you several moments with 3x and 6x Might.

Evasive Arcana kind of screws what dodging should be about, which is avoiding damage. It, again, makes more sense in staff where you have range and can afford to lose some dodge than it does in D/D where you should focus on dodging the big hits.

Since you went into your build, I’ll go into mine.

20 in fire, for cantrips and extra damage as I mentioned earlier.
30 in lightning, Zephyr’s boon because it rules, 20% lightning cooldown for extra control, Tempest Defense for a wonderful anti 100b talent
20 in water for cantrip regen and vigor, and 20% cantrip cooldown

Cantrips and dodging is my defense. Cleansing fire, Armor of Earth, and Lightning Flash.

Each cantrip activated gives me regen, vigor, and 3xMight. My defense boosts my offense. Auras are used to set up big damage combos. Tempest Defense sets up melee attackers wonderfully, and I never notice my attunement cooldowns.

I think we agree on one thing, and that’s that people should be trying their own builds and learning what works best for them. I’ve tried Arcana, and it feels lackluster on D/D. I think other people should see if they can invest elsewhere instead of just assuming it’s the best fit for them, becuase it sure as hell wasn’t the best for me. Isn’t that what you want?

Yes, I think we agree, but the only thing I can add is that if you do not top itemed gear than maybe 300 power seems like alot. But if your in full exotics 300 power really is not a game changer, nor does the damage you get from 300 power really show in your numbers. My point is that if your going for a DPS build, unless your are going for cantrips, avoid fire as it does not really up your DPS as much as say, Bolt through the Heart, and other abilites like that would. I do not use cantrips alot since I base my spec off of arcana, and rely on team work to avoid CC’s. Having only 2 cc breaks may seem weak, but I am quite practiced at dodging. Like I said, my build does not work for everyone, but 4 years of AoC probably puts me above standard players as I am used to a squishy, kiting class where movement, rather abilites, kept one alive. Still, Fire does not net you that much gain in DPS once you have all the best armor and trinkets.

They need to change the Arcane bonus, and make the swap cooldown 9 seconds baseline. It is getting stupid.

Xriah spent about 2hrs with me this morning in the Mists helping me with my build. I started with a more normal arcane focused build. I switched to Xriah’s and started utilising some of the things he’s been talking about (nowhere near mastering it btw!) and I gotta say, Xriah’s build is incredibly strong in comparison to Arcane, for me. It hits harder, still has survivability, and gives me better control of the fight.

Suctum.6912:

Yes, I think we agree, but the only thing I can add is that if you do not top itemed gear than maybe 300 power seems like alot. But if your in full exotics 300 power really is not a game changer, nor does the damage you get from 300 power really show in your numbers. My point is that if your going for a DPS build, unless your are going for cantrips, avoid fire as it does not really up your DPS as much as say, Bolt through the Heart, and other abilites like that would. I do not use cantrips alot since I base my spec off of arcana, and rely on team work to avoid CC’s. Having only 2 cc breaks may seem weak, but I am quite practiced at dodging. Like I said, my build does not work for everyone, but 4 years of AoC probably puts me above standard players as I am used to a squishy, kiting class where movement, rather abilites, kept one alive. Still, Fire does not net you that much gain in DPS once you have all the best armor and trinkets.

I’m decked out in full Exotics and I still notice it. It’s a decent amount when you have a crit build to go with it. It adds about 1000 to my highest crits. (Combined with the extra 10% fire dmg trait). I’ve tested it in sPvP. It’s not a massive night and day difference, but it can still make the difference between a kill and death.

Also, Hi Illurim! Morning? Woah. We must be in differnet parts of the world. That was evening for me.

It’s worth it for me.