Guild Wars 2

Hi guys.

This topic is about PVE.

I’m really liking the gameplay of both the warrior and the elementalist. Thats why I am having a bit of a hard time deciding which one to focus on. :-)

I have always loved to idea of being support focused and helping others by buffing, rezzing, healing, protecting, removing conditions and so forth.

So seen solely from a support role perspective, if you could choose only one, would you prefer to have a support specced warrior or an support specced elementalist in your group when dealing with challenging PVE content?

If possible, please elaborate on why you would choose the one over the other. This could really help me decide on which one to choose.

I have asked the same question in the Warrior forum as well.

Thx a lot. :-)

probably a warr… mainly because its easier to play so theres less chance you’d get a horrible player

War, support ele is lame.

D/D Elementalist with Aura Sharing has very good group support, also, you shouldn’t die either.

Warrior is far easier to play though and offers more room for errors.

Thanks for your input. :-)

I’d say they’re both pretty keen but I almost feel Warrior has more ‘options’ in the broad sense because they have more weapons. A ‘tanky’ Warrior tends to be a supportive one in some nature and there are various weapons that can help accomplish that. While every weapon an Elementalist has can be supportive, it therein limits your offensive because you’ll need to spec for support which doesn’t seem a problem with most players in PvP but in PvE I like my 90-100% crit damage and decent power.

You can still support in other ways. Staff has a nice barrage of CC and just in general plays more like a support/supervising background damage dealer, but it’s main contribution is combo fields. You can do aura-sharing support with daggers, dig into fire and pick a signet or two and you’ve got a good deal of auras to juggle but the main advantage to that is the other boons you can get through the auras. I think the problem with that is, the boons are rather short lived or rather redundant in certain team make-ups.

In short, elementalist support can be rather complex and effective but it requires often multiple trait trees to do well. Warrior tends to have all their support in 1 tree, you just pick your flavor and weapon and it can be just as good.

Depends on what kind of support you are going for.
Offensive support (fart ton of crowd controls) would usually lean in the warrior’s (hammer) favor
while Cleansing support which keeps the party healthy is better with the elementalist (staff).

Both offensive and defensive a staff ele is far superior, sorry

Warhorn is pretty decent condition removal and Shouts removing conditions. They seem pretty good at cleansing, at least for those nearby.

I’ve stacked more might as a lone Elementalist than I have as a lone Warrior. I think they can both do either defensive or offensive support. I just think Warrior can do it the ‘easiest’.

Eles can use protection and reflection on party :p

If your group knows what it´s doing, ele (waterfield is the single best support you can have after maybe a time warp)
Otherwise, propably just up to your preference.

D/D healer specced cantrip elementalist is the best support

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

D/D healer specced cantrip elementalist is the best support

cantrips have no group support outside of mist form vuln though? or am i missing something?

Conjures can be pretty decent support too. Like little utility knives your opening the cans of annoying content.

Or maybe Frostbow just needs to be nerfed :{

Been playing with Earth Shield though and it’s pretty cool when you need a block every 45sec instead of every 60/75sec.

Leo G.4501:

Conjures can be pretty decent support too. Like little utility knives your opening the cans of annoying content.

Or maybe Frostbow just needs to be nerfed :{

Been playing with Earth Shield though and it’s pretty cool when you need a block every 45sec instead of every 60/75sec.

i like earth shield as a pull; useful if you need to group some lightly scattered enemies together to cleave/aoe down (and dont have a guardian… which does the job much better)

I don’t know much about war builds, but with ele, you have:

• healing support (staff w1 is best friend for melee players, or staff w5 with other players who understand combo)
• condition removal
• crowd control (chain them together = how many seconds of free dmg before your party engage?)
• chill is the king. (with help of sigil and runes, you can chill foes permanently = easier for your party to kite and 66% cooldown increase pretty much the same thing as 66% damage decrease)

soistheman.7208:

I don’t know much about war builds, but with ele, you have:

• healing support (staff w1 is best friend for melee players, or staff w5 with other players who understand combo)
• condition removal
• crowd control (chain them together = how many seconds of free dmg before your party engage?)
• chill is the king. (with help of sigil and runes, you can chill foes permanently = easier for your party to kite and 66% cooldown increase pretty much the same thing as 66% damage decrease)

Warrior:

• Perma Fury
• 6-7 might group stacks average (not exactly sure the number)
• Perma Regen
• Close to perma swiftness when needed (no necessary during boss fights
  From banners:
• Power: + 90 (+70 more if in range of your trait)
• Cnd dmg: +90
• Precision: +90
• Crit Dmg: +10%
• Healing Power: +90
• Boon Duration: +10%
  and the ability to still do decent damage

TL;DR : Warrior support > Ele support

As others have said – people use your fields, warrior doesn’t even hold a candle. Ele can give a lot more might (warrior can give 3 perma. Ele can stack as man as people burst on their fields, not counting their at least 6 self triggered), actual perma fury, heals, regens, prots, GIVE condition damage, etc. On top of giving constant better buffs via fields, auras, and attunements – they are also a great utility share with frost bow and fiery GS.

On top of all that, most warriors don’t build for support. The most you can usually expect is FGS spam and maybe a flag. An ele spams support just by doing it’s copious AoEs and hopefully attunement swaps. The only concern with ele is if they go full pvt (which is relatively likely). They’ll have crappy DPS while the warrior wouldn’t.

TL;DR:
Good support ele: Ele wins
Good team: Ele wins by a mile
Everyone sucks: Warrior wins

Pizz.3698:

Warrior:

• Perma Fury
• 6-7 might group stacks average (not exactly sure the number)
• Perma Regen
• Close to perma swiftness when needed (no necessary during boss fights
  From banners:
• Power: + 90 (+70 more if in range of your trait)
• Cnd dmg: +90
• Precision: +90
• Crit Dmg: +10%
• Healing Power: +90
• Boon Duration: +10%
  and the ability to still do decent damage

TL;DR : Warrior support > Ele support

Don’t see why you break up each banner into their own little bullet. And you can’t have all 3 of those banners’ effects AND have those 6-7 might stacks without FGJ. You’re honestly better just picking 1 banner, keeping 1 ‘oh crud’ button and another team utility like SiO or FGJ. You’re wasting the majority of your potential using 3 banners. 2 banners has their place in certain circumstances.

But frankly, all that stuff, all that stuff provided by banners (the extra boon duration, power, etc) is completely outweighed by decent team condition removal.

The utility and support of an Elementalist is wholly different and very complex and can overshadow a good support Warrior. Simple coordination via combo fields can be a huge contribution. But then there’s also auras, the varying effects you can employ from various weapons like wide AoE CC, AoE conditions, reflects, projectile destruction, healing, even the skills wrapped up in the conjure kits can turn some slog encounters into kitten. In the wrong hands though, it can be useless but in the right hands, there is no situation an elementalist cannot adapt to.

As a Warrior with my gf playing an Ele, I can tell you that even a DPS Ele can give more support than a full healing specced Warrior.
Rain+Geyser are just better.

Leo G.4501:

Don’t see why you break up each banner into their own little bullet. And you can’t have all 3 of those banners’ effects AND have those 6-7 might stacks without FGJAfter verification you can only keep 3-5 stacks of might average with 9 at the start of a fight. . You’re honestly better just picking 1 banner, keeping 1 ‘oh crud’ button and another team utility like SiO or FGJ. You’re wasting the majority of your potential using 3 banners. 2 banners has their place in certain circumstances.

But frankly, all that stuff, all that stuff provided by banners (the extra boon duration, power, etc) is completely outweighed by decent team condition removal. You’re not better off with only 1 banner, with a party at least a bit intelligent you dont need massive AoE condition cleanse as most bosses never give more than 2-3? average, and most experienced players have self condition cleansing via heals, sigils or utilities.

The utility and support of an Elementalist is wholly different and very complex and can overshadow a good support Warrior. Simple coordination via combo fields can be a huge contribution. Eles can only drop fire, water and lightning fields that are significant, while the lightning field being on the staff and on a long cooldown. And you can only put 1 fire field or 1 water field every 12 seconds unless you stay in an attunement (which is, most of the time, nerfing your DPS by a lot). Meanwhile warriors can keep a fire field up most of the time (combustive shot). But then there’s also auras, the varying effects you can employ from various weapons like wide AoE CC i havent seen trash be any kind of problem to any kind of group, and a hammer warrior has more CCs, AoE conditionsconditions from a support build(unless using apothecary gear) is a nerf to the group’s damage( due to condition caps), reflects, projectile destruction, healing, even the skills wrapped up in the conjure kits can turn some slog encounters into kitten. In the wrong hands though, it can be useless but in the right hands, there is no situation an elementalist cannot adapt to.

The only field where a support ele has the advantage is projectile reflecting which, often are, really usefull., but then again : warrior has the warbanner which gives a insta rez (much better than the ele glyph) and gives AoE stability for short while. I’d still rather have a banner warrior than a support ele.

note: comments in bold

Pizz.3698:

After verification you can only keep 3-5 stacks of might average with 9 at the start of a fight.

I think the main point of that paragraph was pointing how you’re stacking all the banner effects as well as FGJ effect in your rundown when you’re not going to have all those things at once.

You’re not better off with only 1 banner, with a party at least a bit intelligent you dont need massive AoE condition cleanse as most bosses never give more than 2-3? average, and most experienced players have self condition cleansing via heals, sigils or utilities.

Well you’re certainly better off with 2 or less banners, was the point. Besides, as a support character, you don’t just leave others to their own devices. If that were the case, let others get their own fury and regen, not to mention for a support warrior, Warhorn is just really nice. Perma Vigor/Swiftness and can give boons by converting conditions? Oh, and it inflicts AoE weakness.

Eles can only drop fire, water and lightning fields that are significant, while the lightning field being on the staff and on a long cooldown. And you can only put 1 fire field or 1 water field every 12 seconds unless you stay in an attunement (which is, most of the time, nerfing your DPS by a lot). Meanwhile warriors can keep a fire field up most of the time (combustive shot).

It depends which weapon you use. A staff can pretty much keep a perma fire field down and other weapons often can blast off their field 3+ times before it expires. But might isn’t the only boon Elementalists has.

i havent seen trash be any kind of problem to any kind of group, and a hammer warrior has more CCs,

conditions from a support build(unless using apothecary gear) is a nerf to the group’s damage( due to condition caps)

Hammer is near useless on boss mobs and only minutely good vs trash mobs. Hammer only has 1 cripple and some knocks (as well as a stun with Adrenaline). Traited, your cripple can immobilize and if you have Bow you can have another immobilize and blind. Just daggers blows that out of the water with its various skills. For staff, it’s no contest. AoE chill, AoE cripple that stacks more cripple duration, line immobilize, AoE daze that daze multiple times and can create daze leaps but the knockback is still slow with a long cooldown but it is ranged.

And bleed/burn/poison isn’t the only conditions. AoE Chill, AoE Blind, AoE Vulnerability. The only thing they can’t do is Confuse and Poison.

But then most teams don’t do condition damage. It’s there but most don’t focus their build around it. In those cases, burn and bleed is just extra damage.

The only field where a support ele has the advantage is projectile reflecting which, often are, really usefull., but then again : warrior has the warbanner which gives a insta rez (much better than the ele glyph) and gives AoE stability for short while. I’d still rather have a banner warrior than a support ele.

No doubt, Warrior has the better rez skill. Warriors that use the banner are perfect support even if they don’t build for any other other supportive skills. But Warrior utilities are largely static whereas Elementalist are just too wide to fully comment about. I mean, just sticking a lightning hammer in your utilities + Glyph of Storms + Staff and you can keep a rotation of AoE blind long enough to destroy most foes. You don’t even need heals/regen in those cases. Warrior has nothing like that in their kit.

Pretty much anything you can list as Warrior support, Elementalist can do to a degree but the same doesn’t work the other way around. I think the only thing a warrior can do that an elementalist can’t is the secondary buffs of the banners and condition conversion. Any condition a warrior can apply, an elementalist can also. Any boon a warrior can apply, an elementalist can too…with the exception of Aegis…a warrior can grant Aegis by converting burn (I believe) using warhorn. AoE stability? Elementalist can do that on earth swap. Regen? Water swap and easily with staff. Might? Ha! Fury? Ha ha!

I wouldn’t be so quick to judge, though. I just like support characters in general. Lots of professions can support a team in their own unique way and they are usually all welcomed by a team. Personally, I like them Thieves that keep AoE weakness down over a support Warrior or Ele, primarily because they are so rare.