Guild Wars 2

So basically the title says it all. If you can’t kite the enemy you’re trying to kill (and there are a LOT that you can’t) you’re pretty much dead. Basically there is almost no way to avoid it neither having a tank spec nor using like all vitality/toughness armor… you’re still going to get absolutely murdered by anything that can get to you…

Staff is aweful dps. Its our main ranged weapon, yet enemies get to you extremly fast.
You have to throw every cc you have, switch attunements on the go and throw our everything you have.
You kite around like a merry go around and you cant heal effectivly becouse your running around. Even after throwing out everything, the mobs many times are not dead so your dealing with cooldowns.
God forbid you get more then 2 mobs on you.

At the same time, the guardian or warrior next to you have cleared the path with 10 mobs, tanking them while standing still spamming aoe and using a little healing, while your still fighting your first 2 mobs.

Kiting and avoiding dmg… What else did you imagine with an guy using his bathrobe as armor?

There are tons of skills have push back, knockdown, stun, cripple, and some that give you invulnerability. Just learn how to use your attunements and you’ll be good.

not as staff no, and theres not tons. theres 4 cc abilities, which you need to switch attunements for, with long cooldowns. and one single target knockback, which also has long cooldown.
And all of them are easily avoided.
No invulnrability in Staff.

That applies to pretty much every class though. Nothing is intended to be able to facetank all the time.

You don’t need to be full tank. I played bigger part of game in hybrid build/gear always with D/D (staff only for dungeons and WvW). Pow/pre armor/accessory with toughness runes (and later toughness/vitality, like dolyak). At 60 level you can buy knight gear (pow/pre/tough) and spec traits more offensive. This way you can get good damage and survivability. And earth armor is your best friend for killing packs with AoE. At 80 lvl if you don’t want knight, buy at least valkyrie gear and combine with berserker acccessory. Just keep crit chance close to 40%.
I’ve tried to play in condition tank build, but it’s to slow and boring for me.

There are tons of skills have push back, knockdown, stun, cripple, and some that give you invulnerability. Just learn how to use your attunements and you’ll be good.

2 huge CD skills from 20 in D/D is not tons. I don’t count auras, it’s bad CC skills which requires to recieve hit for activation. And frozen burst… hydromancer signet is better.

Kreit.4709:

You don’t need to be full tank. I played bigger part of game in hybrid build/gear always with D/D (staff only for dungeons and WvW). Pow/pre armor/accessory with toughness runes (and later toughness/vitality, like dolyak). At 60 level you can buy knight gear (pow/pre/tough) and spec traits more offensive. This way you can get good damage and survivability. And earth armor is your best friend for killing packs with AoE. At 80 lvl if you don’t want knight, buy at least valkyrie gear and combine with berserker acccessory. Just keep crit chance close to 40%.
I’ve tried to play in condition tank build, but it’s to slow and boring for me.

There are tons of skills have push back, knockdown, stun, cripple, and some that give you invulnerability. Just learn how to use your attunements and you’ll be good.

2 huge CD skills from 20 in D/D is not tons. I don’t count auras, it’s bad CC skills which requires to recieve hit for activation. And frozen burst… hydromancer signet is better.

I went through the story mode largely on D/D as well. I only use staff when it’s suicidal to play close range, which is really only when I don’t know how an enemy behaves and they do large amounts of close range damage.

I find there to be plenty of CC on D/D, not as much as staff, but still plenty. I’d count Shocking Aura, but not Frost Aura. There’s Earthquake, Updraft, Shocking Aura, Frozen Burst, and Churning Earth + Lightning Flash. Churning Earth obviously relies on a teleport to make the cripple defensive.

The above is more than enough for me, but thathat said there’s also other Slot skills. you can grab Glyph of Storms and use it while in Earth attunement to create an area where you won’t take melee damage. There’s two signets (Earth and Water), good for single targets only though. Lightning hammer has Static Field, and AoE blind with Thunderclap.

Assuming we’re talking about PvE here, so I’ll bring up CC skills no one ever seems to notice. Glyph of Elementals – while in fire both of them often times cripple enemy movement, while in ice enemies get chilled, while in air enemies get stunned. Seeing as there’s two of them and the Elementals do help tank for you (specially the earth/fire ones) as well as damage enemies they’re actually quite more functional than people give them credit for.

As a staff ele that’s solo’d up to 80 I can agree that it’s kite or die. However I can also start taking hundreds of screens where I see guardians failing to kite and dying thinking they can facetank if you really like. The game is set up for active dodging because you’re supposed to avoid damage or mitigate it through use of skills – not stand in one spot and hope the computer rolls a die in your favor.

If you don’t like it then go back to WoW kids.

They wont “go back to wow” they will simply choose a different class that gives better results for less effort. They shouldnt have to do that.

chronometria.3708:

They wont “go back to wow” they will simply choose a different class that gives better results for less effort. They shouldnt have to do that.

I hate opinion “just pick another class”. Personally I (and many other people) want to play elemental mage, not curse/DoT user, not prestidigitator and not boring warrior-type class (I like guardian, because it’s semi-mage, but I hate his ranged attack). Anet said there will not be roles for each class. But elementalist is forced to play as support most time.
@Shockwave.
I know about other CC, but many of them are just waste of utility slot in certain situations (like lightning hammer). For example in WvW you need mist form and arcane wave (to activate combo fields for team). So only 1 slot left. I used it for flash, because without it i’m dead in seconds after shot with cripple or immobilization.

No, go dual daggers and dive bomb and play suicidal.

Tip: If you spec and play correctly you won’t die and you can actually deal some competitive DPS so that you can get some actual loot.

Kreit.4709:

chronometria.3708:

They wont “go back to wow” they will simply choose a different class that gives better results for less effort. They shouldnt have to do that.

I hate opinion “just pick another class”. Personally I (and many other people) want to play elemental mage, not curse/DoT user, not prestidigitator and not boring warrior-type class (I like guardian, because it’s semi-mage, but I hate his ranged attack). Anet said there will not be roles for each class. But elementalist is forced to play as support most time.

I have a level 80 Guardian (Greatsword/Mace+Shield), and I find Elementalist quite different to an enjoyable extent, because the Guardian was quite frankly rather boring to play. For context, I normally play mages in fantasy/RPG games (D&D sorcerer all the way), but I am finding the Elementalist to be a difficult experience versus the usual.

To hear someone say “pick another class” really angers me, as an elemental-mage IS my go-to class. If I “should’ve” picked a different profession I would have from the outset, but I want to play an Elementalist, and without leaving 76% of my blood on the field after every fight.

And what if I don’t want to be a glass-cannon? Maybe I want to tank by focusing away from Fire, and relying on the other three? As I am currently learning, the answer to those questions is “good luck”. I understand we as Scholars wear light-armor, but each profession is supposed to be equally viable across the entire spectrum, and when it comes to staying alive, we just cannot compete. Necros can steal health, and Mesmers can teleport or distract enemies with other selves. As the OP so perfectly put: we can kite, or we can die.

It’s disappointing, to say the least.

You can tank for awhile with a S/F blind build. You can kill a opponent blind for 10sec or so. After that you will have to use the other control skills(inv, daze, reflect, freeze) but your target should be dead before you multiple blinds are on cd for to long. You can take on 3-4 enemies with all of your utilities skills. It is easiest to kill multiple opponent with staff but S/F blind build can lock down a single opponent better.