Guild Wars 2

Oh yeah, there is one single working build that doesn’t get smashed by every class, they should indeed nerf it and put back elementalist in uselessness.

daphoenix, you play ele perfectly and that’s why that build is so effective, but like that you’re really going to get it nerfed, as crybabies (and sadly developers) will assume every ele can play like that.

Strodor.6051:

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Finally, the cat is out of the bag. This build is drastically overpowered. When I first started going up against players using this build, I called it the “armored cannon build” because that’s exactly what it is.

This is pretty much THE Elementalist build for WvW. This build is going cookie-cutter and needs a nerf for good reason. The “only 0.1% of players are capable of playing this way” argument is completely inaccurate. The same argument was once used for Mesmers, and look what happened to them.

Learn to counter it and you’ll be fine. We need to be close to you to do anything, so use any immobilize/stun you have.

Our main damage skills are fairly easy to evade if you know what to look for, See a ball of lighting coming at you? dodge just as it hits you. This will also stopped you from getting knocked down as most players will use updraft just as they hit. Same goes with burning speed, use whatever you can to get away and keep your distance from us.

I’m sorry, please don’t try to play the L2P card. I can dodge every lightning ball and bolt. I can even come at you from behind when you don’t notice me, have complete control of the fight, stun you in between attacks, and still lose.

The problems:

1) DPS is significantly reduced against you.
2) Your HP regenerates rapidly.
3) Your DPS is on par with a glass cannon Mesmer.
4) Your mobility is second only to Thief.
5) Your sustainability is greater than a Necromancer..

All of these features combined makes the build too strong and too popular in WvW.

Too popular ? I rarely see elementalists in WvW, and most of them are Staff users or anyway nothing more than a 10 seconds pvp material.
I’m playing on Desolation, and nowhere in any of top tier 1 servers, I’ve seen an elementalist surviving a 2v1, without running away.

What daphoenix is doing in his videos is surreal, but it’s just 1 player over 3 millions.

He can easily survive 10+ random players, but I dare any Elementalist to win a 2v1 against a very skilled thief and any other class.

The solution to problems:
1) DPS is reduced because 90% of the build is based on defensive abilities (If it wouldn’t, what for to have in every single item Vitality and Toughness?)
2) His HP regens as fast as counter of weakest armor in game and lowest hp.
3) His DPS is 100% dodgeable, also every burst skill has around 40 seconds reuse.
4) Mobility is great indeed
5) Again, the build is 90% focused on sustainability

This build is in no way overpowered, it has it’s ups and downs like any other build and, on top of that, takes time to master. I can log on my mesmer, copy any given build and do very good at it, the same doesn’t apply to elementalists, you have to actually PLAY this class to be good at it. Just look at how many details Excala goes into in this build’s thread: camera angles, terrain, timing…

In my opinion, overpowered is something that will get you excellent results without time, focus or dedication and that clearly isn’t the case with this build.. So yes, we may be top players in pvp/wvw now.. but that is the result of an actual effort.

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Strodor.6051:

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Finally, the cat is out of the bag. This build is drastically overpowered. When I first started going up against players using this build, I called it the “armored cannon build” because that’s exactly what it is.

This is pretty much THE Elementalist build for WvW. This build is going cookie-cutter and needs a nerf for good reason. The “only 0.1% of players are capable of playing this way” argument is completely inaccurate. The same argument was once used for Mesmers, and look what happened to them.

Learn to counter it and you’ll be fine. We need to be close to you to do anything, so use any immobilize/stun you have.

Our main damage skills are fairly easy to evade if you know what to look for, See a ball of lighting coming at you? dodge just as it hits you. This will also stopped you from getting knocked down as most players will use updraft just as they hit. Same goes with burning speed, use whatever you can to get away and keep your distance from us.

I’m sorry, please don’t try to play the L2P card. I can dodge every lightning ball and bolt. I can even come at you from behind when you don’t notice me, have complete control of the fight, stun you in between attacks, and still lose.

The problems:

1) DPS is significantly reduced against you.
2) Your HP regenerates rapidly.
3) Your DPS is on par with a glass cannon Mesmer.
4) Your mobility is second only to Thief.
5) Your sustainability is greater than a Necromancer..

All of these features combined makes the build too strong and too popular in WvW.

If all you say is true, you shouldn’t even be having a problem with us. So yeah, L2p. Sounds to me like you’re trying to win a fight with us using a glass cannon thief. If this is the case; Why the hell are you kittening because your main counter is winning most of the fights you encounter? You can’t expect to have it easy with every class/build.

Feel free to defend your overpowered build.

I actually main a Mesmer and have played many specs. As a previous posted pointed out, the DPS on this D/D Ele build is too great. When I bunker spec my Mes, I have negligable DPS — why should you get to be an armored cannon? Sorry, it’s too good.

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Feel free to defend your overpowered build.

I actually main a Mesmer and have played many specs. As a previous posted pointed out, the DPS on this D/D Ele build is too great. When I bunker spec my Mes, I have negligable DPS — why should you get to be an armored cannon? Sorry, it’s too good.

Please just kitten and leave, this is Elementalist forum and this thread is for build discussion, if you want discuss balance go else where. Stop using off topic posts to troll.

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Strodor.6051:

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Finally, the cat is out of the bag. This build is drastically overpowered. When I first started going up against players using this build, I called it the “armored cannon build” because that’s exactly what it is.

This is pretty much THE Elementalist build for WvW. This build is going cookie-cutter and needs a nerf for good reason. The “only 0.1% of players are capable of playing this way” argument is completely inaccurate. The same argument was once used for Mesmers, and look what happened to them.

Learn to counter it and you’ll be fine. We need to be close to you to do anything, so use any immobilize/stun you have.

Our main damage skills are fairly easy to evade if you know what to look for, See a ball of lighting coming at you? dodge just as it hits you. This will also stopped you from getting knocked down as most players will use updraft just as they hit. Same goes with burning speed, use whatever you can to get away and keep your distance from us.

I’m sorry, please don’t try to play the L2P card. I can dodge every lightning ball and bolt. I can even come at you from behind when you don’t notice me, have complete control of the fight, stun you in between attacks, and still lose.

The problems:

1) DPS is significantly reduced against you.
2) Your HP regenerates rapidly.
3) Your DPS is on par with a glass cannon Mesmer.
4) Your mobility is second only to Thief.
5) Your sustainability is greater than a Necromancer..

All of these features combined makes the build too strong and too popular in WvW.

3) Are you kidding me? Our hardest critting skill hits for 4k on the rare occation we do at it has 30 sec cd. The other one has a 45 sec cd. Mesmers can Shatter 4 clones + distortion every 15 secs for more than half your health. So no, bunker ele doesn’t have the same damage as glass cannon mesmer lol.

4) I dont agree. Ele mobility is way better without sacrificing much in the build.

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Feel free to defend your overpowered build.

I actually main a Mesmer and have played many specs. As a previous posted pointed out, the DPS on this D/D Ele build is too great. When I bunker spec my Mes, I have negligable DPS — why should you get to be an armored cannon? Sorry, it’s too good.

If you have negligible dps as a bunker mes, you obviously doing something wrong! As a serious note, I can handle 3-4 players usually as a bunker mes and still kill them (well, they kill themselves). Also, playing mes is nowhere near hard Anet thought it would be. As of this moment mes is similiary in depth to a thief, in other words, it’s a faceroll proffesion. I know it because I have one and I got so kittening bored of it and being so OP at the same time I’m no longer playing one. It’s so OP it must be nerfed, no?

Erebus Delirium.4892:

I’m sorry, please don’t try to play the L2P card. I can dodge every lightning ball and bolt. I can even come at you from behind when you don’t notice me, have complete control of the fight, stun you in between attacks, and still lose.

The problems:

1) DPS is significantly reduced against you.
2) Your HP regenerates rapidly.
3) Your DPS is on par with a glass cannon Mesmer.
4) Your mobility is second only to Thief.
5) Your sustainability is greater than a Necromancer..

All of these features combined makes the build too strong and too popular in WvW.

Sorry, your posts clearly indicate this is a l2p issue.

You’ve gotten replies explaining why your reasoning is narrow-minded, but you refuse to acknowledge them because you got owned in wvwvw by a d/d elementalist and came here to claim its OP.

If you actually played an elementalist, you’d realize more than half our trait lines and traits greatly lack design, so it would be wise to do a little more research and learn to be a better player instead of crying nerf for a specific build you haven’t learned to handle.

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Feel free to defend your overpowered build.

I actually main a Mesmer and have played many specs. As a previous posted pointed out, the DPS on this D/D Ele build is too great. When I bunker spec my Mes, I have negligable DPS — why should you get to be an armored cannon? Sorry, it’s too good.

Wait. This guy is a Mesmer? He plays an OP class and is QQing about Ele? ROFL, hahaha.

Absolutely a L2P issue here.

how do u get so many might stacks. when i run the build 0/10/0/30/30 i barely get above 4 might stacks. x.x

Sigil of Battle combined with constant attunement swapping will give you a constant 9 stacks minimum, 12 stacks maximum. Prenerf, Evasive Arcana had blast combo finishers, and that was another 6 stacks or so. 1 stack per every time you swap to Fire. Another possible 9 stacks via Earth 4/5 + Arcane Wave if you choose. That’s 24/25 stacks of might there (-6 now without Evasive Arcana finishers).

looks like i got alot to learn when it comes to that department that i really didnt even know o.o

Lordryux.9785:

how do u get so many might stacks. when i run the build 0/10/0/30/30 i barely get above 4 might stacks. x.x

fire 4
earth4-5
arcane blast (during 5 charge) (this gives 10 stacks)

you can get more traiting correctly…(10/10/0/30/20) and spamming cantrips during earth 5 channeling) (this gives 17)

What people won t tell you, is this is just a PVE build and risky even there…..
You just decide to go all in with an opening that requires all your skill (ele know how long cooldowns are) to be available, and just use them in a slow aoe circle any real player will evade easily.

Also requires you to stay in the same spot for 10 seconds at least if not more…without noone interrupting you (you can get 3 second stability >.>btw but that is far from enough).

Its the only viable PvE tactic for elementalist imho…and it has so many downsides while not gettng remotely near the DPS of a thief or even a ranger…..

Differently from them you cover an AoE instead of a single target, but this aoe is around you and not at distance like a staff…

DD also is a self buffing build not good for support.

The point is most DD builds require to know very well the game rather than using a couple of buttons….the tactic is easy to counter for any player with half amount of experience the DD ele has to use the build…

Infact if you use the 17 stacks combo for example as said you won t do damage to any player (yet you can if you survive in PVE but most champions dmg output is too heavy to stand still for 10 seconds), yet at the end you just can alt+f4 for a couple of minutes at least because you used all your offensive/mobility/defensive skills.

P.S. its so good to swap attunements to get mights stack AND being locked out of skills…..so i can look enemies with so many stacks…..

my first post nerf video

Haven’t played for like 5 days straight. Don’t plan on playing much this week or next, lots of rl stuff to do.

I def. do not think this is overpowered at all. Sure I am an ele and love the build and am rocking with it but I am not immortal. daphoenix is an exceptional ele to start with.

Pointing out a few things that isnt mentioned in all the OP OP OP OP NERF IT posts.

Even with this build and all our Toughness and Vit stacking if you notice in the videos we run away a lot to heal ourselves. True we are going to turn around and own you but we still can not just stand and fight you like a Thief or a Guardian can.

As you may also notice this build uses terrain to our advantage. I have fought in the open and had a very rough time. 2vMe in the open probably isn’t going to happen. 5vMe with trees or buildings and we are good though.

Thieves still give me issues but then again they give everyone issues. This build also takes a lot of work. You can not half stack your T and V. It has to be all or nothing to be effective I think.

I also could not take real advatnage of this style of play until I got a MMO mouse with extra buttons that I use for attunment switching and the 6-0 skills. Before that I was too slow.

This has a very high learning curve and I highly doubt I will ever be as good as daphoenix. Again VERY HIGH LEARNING CURVE. Also a very high speed internet helps a lot. ^^

Erebus Delirium.4892:

Feel free to defend your overpowered build.

I actually main a Mesmer and have played many specs. As a previous posted pointed out, the DPS on this D/D Ele build is too great. When I bunker spec my Mes, I have negligable DPS — why should you get to be an armored cannon? Sorry, it’s too good.

…..Your Joking….

You have to be joking….

Your doing something very wrong on your mesmer…
If you post your build on the mesmer forum though I and some others may be willing to help you get a working and viable bunker build.

@Erebus Delirium.4892:

You sir, misunderstand. There are many of us that play this build. There are VERY few that play it as well as Excala. I’m just glad I’m in the same guild, I wouldn’t want to run into him on the field of battle. I don’t know what he’s doing. I can confuse people and kill them, but I often die and have a tough time. I wouldn’t dream of attempting to take on so many at once as he does.

Maybe if I get a Nostromo….? All I know is I can’t change attunements nearly as fast or as comfortably as he can. It’s work for me, all the time, every time. I also don’t use my mouse as well and I have a Razer Naga….but I think I need a new mouse pad. Point is, there is a skill factor involved here and a gear factor imo.

In order to really shine at this build you have to

1) Memorize every ability you have, and also know which attunements to switch to at a moment’s notice
2) Be very quick with hotkeys
3) Awareness around you at all times
4) Know your limits
5) Almost have to memorize every enemies ability as well, or at least understand what their moves do

What you don’t see in these videos is all those times those of us who have spent hours pvp’ing as elementalist making key mistakes. Accidental ride the lightnings back into a zerg. Wasting a cooldown too early. Cleansing too late. Etc, etc. It takes a good while to know ALL the in’s and out’s of this build and get it down properly. Not saying it’s rocket science, but it does require some practice to pull of some of the more crazy stunts.

The difference between a good d/d ele and bad one is still huge.

As for the mesmer complaining, all I have to say is….

lol

@Hexxen

I play sPvP every now and then, and I can say for certain that sometimes I have trouble fighting off 2 skilled players, and need to utilize terrain in order to win. Same thing applies WvWvW, I’ve died at times only against 2 well equipped skilled players since they hit me at my most vulernable points / in open terrain (2 burst thieves come to mind>_>).

Yes you need a fast internet connection too:]. Any delay in your internet is going to be fatal, regardless of how good you are.

I forgot to respond to previous questions, so here they are :P
@Erebus
My dps is actually kind of mediocre, it just seems as if I’m doing a lot because most WvW’ers aren’t properly equipped or run full glass cannon. Plus EA nerf really hurt my DPS too :S. Generally I win by outlasting all my enemies (whether it would be one person, or 6) and slowly kill them all off. If you notice in my videos, I’m actually never running away most of the time (its actually kiting) I’m usually still in combat upon running, and I plant rings of fires at chokepoints to soften up my enemies. So in all the times that I’m usually running away, I’m actually kiting :S. Yes my survivability is kind of extremely high, but thats what a tank is =P. Its fairly hard for me to kill someone using a sustainable build setup w/ proper gear setups.

@Chandelier
Ether renewal just means I have to waste time casting it when I could be dealing damage. Plus its interuptable, and if its interupted your screwed (I also don’t run stability either).

I’ve learned to maximize signet to almost is full potential. Maximizing spell output on the go is challenging, and SoR is more rewarding for that :P. Plus SoR is more adaptable to any situation, Ether renewal requires proper cover so you don’t get interupted.

@Enlight
Its a combination of playing well and playing against random Wv3’ers that have crappy gear and a mediocre concept of proper PvP (albeit some players that are really good give me problems). Not everyone plays as crazy as I do :P

@Dolores
I like to say it as high input= high reward

@Lordyrux
Attunement swapping is considered to be a weapon swap ,where sigil of battle has a 9second CD. Used in conjunction with boon duration armor and arcana boon duration passive effects, you can effectively get 9 stacks of might simply by just fighting an enemy. Add fire4+ earth4+earth5 for more stacks of might :P

@omgwtfBBq
actually before EA was nerfed, you could have effectively maintined 15-18 stacks just by EA. (2 dodge blast finishers per 9-11 seconds)

@hexxen / bleeds
Thanks for compliment. Also I don’t actually run any special hardware (mouse / keyboard).
My keyboard is just a standard $20 basic logitech keyboard, that has a high response rate and is very functional / reliable. It has no special functions.
My mouse (I think its like 5years old) from logitech has nothing special either. It has everything every other mouse has, and 2 thumb buttons (up and down buttons). I use those 2 buttons to target nearest/ next enemy

So to sum up: you don’t need fancy hardware. A decent cheap, functional 2 extra button mouse and a standard keyboard gets the job done just fine :P

@Kuthos
:D you summarized practically everything I do.

1. I memorized all my abilities just by playing d/d alot. Yes you do have to know when to swap attunements based on situation, and when not to / conserve an attunement.

2. I agree with you here:P

3. Usually I pan my camera while fighting, although sometimes I don’t pay attention whatsoever to my surroundings (unless a serious challenge comes my way). Lots of pressing “look backwards” though.

4. Yes there is so much a d/d elementalist can do. I rush into a mob only when I know that I will have a high chance of succeeding. There is always going tobe that unknown element when rushing into 5+ people, as those people could be all fully equipped heavy CC burst classes, or just 5 random poorly equipped noobies. It comes down to making quick decisions based off of how much damage you do to each opponent, and who you see as a threat while fighting.

5. I don’t think you need to memorize everyone’s ability. Not everyone plays their class to their full potential, although you should recognize common trends b/w each class.
i.e. generally spekaing
thieves stealth and can get away easily
warriors generally go HB burst you
mesmers like to stand in the back, but if you know what skills they have, its very easy to predict and see the real mesmer (you need to play one to know one)
Necros like to transfer conditions and take ages to kill
Rangers tend to hate close combat, and their pet can knock you down
Engineers are like campers, they want you to fight on their turf. They also like dropping AoE bombs that CC you too, and autorez themselves.
Guardians just take ages to kill, and there DPS is kinda meh across most build types (so you kill them last)

There’s other class trends, but I think the 3 more important points that weren’t mentioned are:
Strategy / Creativity
(coming up with strategies depending on each terrain location can be challenging to some, and you won’t fully master a d/d ele unless you have that initial creativity / intuition to accomodate for every situation. I always make up tactics on the go (its heavily dependant on positioning of enemies and terrain) in all the videos I make, and have some strategies that I know beforehand / used before.)
Positioning
(Knowing where evreyone is relative to you is very important. You can’t properly block projectiles using trees unless you know where your enemies are, and you can’t quickly change targets unless you know where they are. Also look for where projectiles are hitting you from to determine the enemy’s position. Positioning is also important for setting up ambushes)
Timing
(Timing is crucial. In all the videos I make, most of my stunts are pulled off right as the skill’s CD is back online. I usually plan a few seconds in advance of my next tactic based on what the CD cooldown says, and time it just the way I want it too. So I have to constantly look at my CD’s for timing/strategy, and look at the battlefield for positioning/strategy. I used to just spam all my abilities at random when they were back on CD, but I tend to conserve my skills alot more and plan ahead. When you first start playing a D/D elementalist, there’s going to be a natural tendency to blow off all your skills before swapping to the next attunement.)

@Mesmer/elementalist discussion
The problems:
1) DPS is significantly reduced against you.
2) Your HP regenerates rapidly.
3) Your DPS is on par with a glass cannon Mesmer.
4) Your mobility is second only to Thief.
5) Your sustainability is greater than a Necromancer..

1. Well yes, because I run all toughness in all items to make up for my crappy base armor.

2. Yes, I agree here, no class has as much healing burst potential as an elementalist, although maybe a properly specced guardian might.

3. I’ve played mesmer a decent amount of times in sPvP, and against many high tiered ones. I can definitely say that a glass cannon mesmer deals way more single target damage than this build setup here. Mesmers and elementalist should not really be compared, since the playstyle is drastically different. The GC mesmer can kill at a distance, whereas this d/d setup revolves around close combat.

4. That is true. No purpose in denying that

5. I would be inclined to disagree here. Necros in my opinion are one of the strongest classes out there. I’ve had my share in fighting good necros, and they take ages to kill, and there DPS in lich form is something I’m always wary of. I haven’t played a necro all that much, but I know for certain that a good necro can do just as much if not more than a good elementalist, save the mobility part though (there so much slower than elementalists :P)

Daphoenix, want to ask, are you still using ascalon gear? cause in your vid youre wearing winged armor(did you transmuted it?)..i ask this because ascalon gear stat is low compare to exotic lvl 80. or i guess stats didnt matter to you since you are uber god of ele..hehe.

Hm, after Mesmer and Thief got boring you made me want to try this. Thank you very much. I hope it is ok if i contact you someday IG, as i progress leveling my new ele ;-).
Cheers.
Also cheers to my old buddy Vaerah!

daphoenix.4283:

my first post nerf video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2_GXr9o-Us

Haven’t played for like 5 days straight. Don’t plan on playing much this week or next, lots of rl stuff to do.

Amazing!
When you can do a summary of the build and gears that you use in the last video “post nerf” pls

I love this build, I’m currently working on making it right now. But my buddy Lawrence Gavin, a Guardian, did a 1v1 with Excala and tied. Neither could kill each other and the battle lasted almost a full hour lol. I couldn’t get my video to work otherwise I would post it here but if they fight again I will try to get the video so everyone can see.

That’s me. That was an awesome 1v1 btw (props to Excala). Should definitely do it again. If anyone wanna 1v1, hit me up → Lawrence Gavin.

Oh excala. It’s fun to see you in WvW. I think I fought you at least 3x times today alone.

You were with another d/d ele too. I couldn’t kill you guys but you couldn’t kill me. So instead you guys resulted in perfectly timed knock backs to knock me off the cliff in hills on TCBL :P. Fun times though!

See you on the battlefield!

Dear Daphoenix555,
What do u use for gears and runes post nerf? I’m wondering cuz AC gears are low in stats in compare to lv80 exotic gears. Anyway, Have u ever planned
to make Legendary dagger?

RealmAngel.7052:

Dear Daphoenix555,
What do u use for gears and runes post nerf? I’m wondering cuz AC gears are low in stats in compare to lv80 exotic gears. Anyway, Have u ever planned
to make Legendary dagger?

AC gear has the same stats as all other lvl80 exotic gear. Just use the level 80 tab with the exotics not the lvl 35 rares

“Clerics Exotic set (Condition damage, toughness, healing power)
Jewelery Exotic Set (Power, condition damage, and vitality)
Guild backpack (doesn’t matter what you pick here) + gem(^same stats as jewelery)”

i cant see any instance Exotic with this stats. Did you buy this? I like the Arah Style but it has the wrong stats. The Cleric set has Power, thoughness and healing power oO ?

I want to buy arah items and use the skins for the exo fe Clerik from the auction house. Or wich instanz gear is similar/ shoul be my first target?

Power, Condition Damage, Healing Power souds the best way for me as a noob :p pls help me out^^

The last time i wrote in englisch is more than 15 years sry g

people like you make me spend more time on the forum than in the game, wow ur vid’s are awesome. now i realy gotta play tho xD

I really like your videos and skills in WvW. Impressive!
I started playing an ele in GW1 and in GW2 I did on the release and as I don’t have that much time, I play it since then as my main.
As probably everyone I tend to use staff at the beginning (which was too slow), then changed to S/F (which was too defensive), finally landing on S/D which is a great option imo. What is a downside of S/D is the fact that the spells use too long (eg dragon tooth) to get casted, so most of the mobs (even in PvE), if they change direction and make few steps just don’t get hit by it. After countless experiences like that in situations where a few thousand dps would have made a tremendous effect on the whole battle and after I nearly bit my keyboard into two while watching a tooth, phoenix and a shatterstone hit only air because the kitten PvE mob moved 2 steps to hit another group member, I changed to D/D = best decision I could have made.
I use to play PvE and sometimes WvW (here I use basically the same skills as you do, however my traits are a bit different). I don’t like PvP, as I don’t like playing bunker or taking down the bloody trebuchet all time :P
Playing high crit/support ele with D/D in PvP is lots of fun and I tend to kill the enemy pretty fast but am not that useful on capping and holding so not really that much useful to the team.
This is the PvE setting I use:
http://www.gw2builds.org/create/bwe_1/elementalist#1.0-3.4.10.9.3-0.25.0.15.30-4.9.4.6.9.8
Items are berserker/ruby (alltogether), runes – sup divinity, sigils – sup battle / sup strength.
Pretty straight forward. Survivability depends on Water being 15 with the traits to heal, soothing winds and signet (healing 320hp / spell) and permanent vigor (jumping around like Master Joda all time) with all the other boni I get by such “high” crit and the traits and placing vulnerability on every enemy I target.
For WvW I swap few traits (zephyrs boon, some of the arcana etc.) and use D/D for attack / group guerilla and staff for defense (towers etc.).

As said previously by many: ele is difficult (probably the most difficult class to play efficiently), squishy and hard to master. However an ele is a great support class (Imo the best in GW2) and most rewarding in many terms. I am happy to be an elementalist player and will not change to any other class for a main.

My feeling is however that ele being the first announced class, the ele did not receive so much love from ANet as all the other classes did. I suppose ele skills and traits got created as the first ones because they just copied the gw1 ele in many ways, as the concept was pretty clear (existing in GW1 already – we were discussing it over and over again in forums years before GW2 arrived) and all the other classes got adapted to it. (maybe I am wrong here but that is what my 7th sense is telling me)

There are some problems with the ele I see, and in a way good player like yourself are prevent the elementalist to get the balancing it needs imho to make the class a bit more “mainstream” (bad word but I am missing a better one).
Elementalist is the only class that has to really trade damage for survivability. If chosen damage the way we manage to hit hard the way a warrior or a thief does (and that is near impossible as far as I can tell, the way I compared my ele with my friends lvl 80 thief and warrior in terms of dmg) we lack survivability. Compared to all other classes the elementalist has the lowest hp and armor, this is an ele thread so we all understand it very good I suppose.
If we go for survivability, which is very well possible – bunker D/D eles who can just like that survive against several enemies in sPvP forever – we lack damage. You won’t be able to kill anyone with some skills, brains and good setting with a bunker ele, but you can cap and hold the bloody point till your teams can kill’em’off
Speaking of survivability: a skilled necro with a survivalist setting would lhao at half an army and deal more dmg in the end…

This brings me to your build. You have tremendous survivability with 19k hp and the traits you chose, however imho you lack the dps. I know, you bring down some people but compared to some other classes I’ve seen (when playing with my guildies) you can see, that the trade off hp for dps is the worst one with the ele class in general. Don’t forget here, you are a great player and I suppose that many would just die off ages before you do.
The setup is awesome though, I did a test, thanks for the ideas I got from some parts of it ;D

For me the elementalist as it is right now is not a difficult class because it has 20 weapon skills to chose from, or because it lacks hp and armor and dps of other classes. It is the most difficult class because it lacks the LOVE of the programmers from ANet.
They watch your video and think – hey eles rule so why give them a little boost? Maybe nurf them again
And in hands of a really skilled person they rule, however there is only a handful of them I met out there.

The last problem with eles – they tend to get reduced to PvP as there is a really big bunch of people who play PvP only. So till D/D bunker works we won’t see any improvement, even if that would be necessary in certain PvE parts & m8be in WvW.

Improvements could be (here CHOOSE ONE ONLY with 3rd one being insanely great and no, we will NEVER get it)

1) Giving the ele a slight HP increase would help make him a better survivability overall being better supporter and solo.
2) Giving an ele a slight dps increase would give him the ability to solo in PvE more efficiently (m8be with the same efficiency as a warrior) because we would actually become what eles are supposed to be – glass cannon (lowest hp, lowest armor, highest dps), while being a bunker would actually allow you to kill an enemy before you sleep in.
3) Giving an ele a second weapon to choose from would allow us to go for defense or offense (the thing we are missing at this very moment the most) depending on the situation like ANY OTHER CLASS can do.

Leaving the ele the way we are… well I don’t care much tbh, I can survive nearly anything (but the one hit AoE downers from certain creatures in certain areas). But it would for sure help many people to get used to this awesome class!
I don’t think this will ever happen though… unless the community of eles will raise and claim what should be ours – with lowest HP comes the highest DPS ;D

Down there that is my PvE ele:

daphoenix.4283:

Hey Vaerah,

……..

This is what I run in Wv3 and PvE

Clerics Exotic set (Condition damage, toughness, healing power)
Jewelery Exotic Set (Power, condition damage, and vitality)
Guild backpack (doesn’t matter what you pick here) + gem(^same stats as jewelery)

Dagger one and two(Condition damage, precision, and power)
Dagger sigils (+10 power per kill, gain 3 stacks of might when you swap in battle)

Staff and Trident(Condition damage, precision, and power)
Sigil (5% damage)

…….

Hello daphoenix,

I just wanna ask about the armor set, I search the Block Lion I cannot see the “Clerics Exotic set (Condition damage, toughness, healing power)” the Cleric Exotic Armor set stats is power, toughness and healing power, while the name of armor set that has (Condition damage, toughness, healing power) is Apothecary’s, sorry which is which? thank you so much.

also I can find a "Dagger one and two(Condition damage, precision, and power) " cost 42G
and it doesn’t have a “(+10 power per kill, gain 3 stacks of might when you swap in battle)”
can i just put +10 power per kill later and how bout this gain 3 stacks of might, where can I get this?

sorry I’m still new, in this game … I hate being a noob in mmo.. ehehehe
Thank you so much, looking forward hearing from you.

Keep it up.

Edit: 2:03 AM 01.16.2013

I understand now…

New question, what is the best sigil for armor or at least the one you use??

Thanks

Ele is the all-rounder profession in the game. Can easily fit in every role but it can’t be every role at once. If you invest like 30 points in water and do everything else like daphoenix.4283 described you can do a lot of damage same way as he does. If you happen to carry gear with healing stat including staff you can be fantastic healer and can change role when out of combat.

Some other builds can’t be like that. Some can perform ridiculously high amount of damage that is hard to keep ele alive due to no defensive stats but it is best way to learn evasive skills that will benefit with every other profession you role.

Other can make him indestructible but with almost no damage at all yet might be good for tenking.

In any way, playing elementalist require some research and fitting toon into your personal prefferance and playstyle. Usually end up somewhere in the middle between those. But it is fun and interesting how easy you can fit yourself and be good into so many roles.

Too much OP , Nerf this !!! Nerf to Death! Buff warrior dmg

Excala, when are you going to throw out a staff vid? I have no doubt I would learn some new trick from it!

Those videos are amazing. I’m mostly a casual PVEer, but I’ve been inspired to run D/D on my Ele following this build. At level 60, even with my slow, stumbling fingers, I’ve been surprised by how well I’ve stood up to mobs when I get more aggro than I expected.

Daphoenix, I would love to see a video with a small picture-in-picture overlay of a recording showing your keyboard hand while playing. It just boggles my mind at how you can keep moving so much while rapid firing skills and swapping attunements like that. I’m working on it, but man… I could only hope to be half that good, I think

Thanks for sharing you expertise. It’s very motivational.

Hey Excala I don’t know if you know me but im in RET with you and I love outnumbered ganking and sometimes run “Gank Squads” which im going to make a series out of and if you want you could join us.

Hey, I was wondering how the rotation works with this build (for the attunments) and what skills do I need to make sure I hit before moving on to the next.

The normal rotation is to start with Air : RtL + Updraft. Then switch to Fire: Burning Foot +Burning Grasp then lay down Ring of Fire. Then to earth : Dodge Roll in ROF for Might Stack, Earth quake for Might Stack then CE. Switch to Water for Heal when needed. That is our basic Rotation for Eles. But simply follow this won’t get you good against a good player. By playing Dueling a lot, you can immiliate some movement and know when to use them. All come with Experience. My name is Kaane Moka Server NA in game, if u need help, pm me. I am willing too.