Guild Wars 2

I came up with a pretty fun elementalist build the other day and I thought I’d share it with you all! I present to you, the living bomb build!

DD Elementalists, you may thought you were the only ones capable of fighting in melee, well think again! With the living bomb build, even us staff users can join in the front lines!

Some disclaimers before we get started:
First of all, due to the nature of builds, this of course is by no means the hands down best thing ever. Most of this comes down to personal preference, and I’ll even go into further detail at the end that I actually use a variation on this build. This build works well for me and I have a lot of fun with it but it might not be your cup of tea and that’s perfectly fine, just don’t flame in the comments because you don’t share the same opinion.

This build has been tested in PvE ONLY and mostly for solo purposes, though since you’re using a lot of area combos, others will definitely enjoy all the boons you’ll be giving them.

Also I’d like to point out that I’m no theory-crafter, I don’t have the time to generate spreadsheets showing exact numeric changes in stats/damage etc. This is merely a fun build I came up with and it’s effectiveness is based totally on observation, not math.

The living bomb build:
http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/elementalist#5|0|2771|3983|2816|48|4480|30|1664|1653|915|0|0|0|0|10|1645|0|0|0|0|0|0|30|1838|1630|965|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|

What is this build all about?
This is a solo PvE build based on creating as many blast combos as possible using Evasive Arcana and Arcane Wave. Doing this can rack up tons of might stacks and allow you to tear straight through enemies. I’ll go into the actual “rotation” later but the general play-style of the build involves constantly setting up fields and dodging into them while using Arcane Wave. Due to the fact that you’ll usually be dodging straight INTO enemies instead of away from them, it’s a great idea to pick up defensive traits/skills and armor to ensure that you don’t die.

Trait breakdown:

Arcane Mastery – This is a pretty great trait to have, it makes your arcane spells recharge 20% faster. Now, we may only be using one arcane spell BUT trust me, the more you can use Arcane Wave, the better since it’s such an integral spell to the build.
Alternate Suggestion: Final Shielding – Arcane shield at 25% health. More survivability just in case? Yes please.

Blasting Staff – All your area attacks with a staff become larger. This is the one trait in the Arcane tree that I’d say completely comes down to personal preference. I happen to like using this since it makes dodging into your fields much easier while making sure the enemies stay within them.
Alternate Suggestion: Arcane Energy – Every time you use an arcane spell, you gain 25% endurance. This synergies very well with Arcane Mastery for a constant supply of dodges and Arcane Wave casts.

Evasive Arcana – As stated previously, this is really the cornerstone of the build. This trait allows you to produce a blast finisher at the end of your dodge roll. This is KEY. It allows you to stack ungodly amounts of might on yourself or throw out some insane heals if used correctly. There’s a cooldown on the finisher, but it’s fairly short, either 10 seconds goes by really fast or the tooltip lies since it sure doesn’t feel like it’s on a 10 second cooldown.

Embers Might – 5% extra damage to burning foes. This one’s kind of a throwaway trait I pick it since most of the time things will be burning, so yeah why not add a little extra damage? Pick whatever you want in place of this though.

Internal fire – We’ll be spending a lot of time in Fire so an extra 10% damage increase while attuned to fire is a fairly obvious choice. However, it’s still kind of a throwaway so if you like another trait better, go for it.

Pyromancer’s Puissance – Is that even a word? Anyway, this trait is the reason we put so many points into fire (well, other than getting 300 power ). This build focuses on stacking might as much as possible so an extra stack with every fire spell cast is fantastic! It also synergies well with the fact that we have 30 points in arcane, increasing boon duration.

Earth’s Embrace – This trait is amazing for helping you survive. It gives you so much more time to swap to water and heal yourself if you’re in a tight spot. I highly recommend it and wouldn’t suggest picking anything else.

It’s a good idea to point out that you gain a couple of nice minor traits building this way as well. The extra toughness per level you get from Stone flesh in Earth is nice for when you’re in a pickle and switch to earth. Since you’re going to be spending a lot of time in Melee, the Flame Barrier in fire is also going to be great for when you get smacked.

(splitting into two due to character limits, haha)

Skills:

Really, other than Arcane Wave pick what you want, there’s no right or wrong choices with this build. I suggest taking Signet of Earth for the extra toughness and Lightning Flash for the blink. For the elite, I suggest the elemental, mostly because our other elites are pretty meh. But again, all preference, so do what you want.

Rotation/Play style:

Alright, here’s where it gets fun, this is how the whole thing comes together. As previously stated, you’ll be focusing on setting up fields and dodging into them and casting Arcane Wave to make tons of combo fields. Most of the time you’ll be in melee range of enemies, so this build requires a LOT of movement and dancing around your foes.

A standard fight goes like this:

• Start out in Earth Attunement
• Aggro a few enemies and start casting eruption in a place where it will hit all of them.
• Switch to fire and place a Lava Font on top of the eruption.
• Dodge straight into the Lava Font and cast Arcane Wave, the eruption will go off at the same time, this will set off 3 fire combo finishers, giving you about 9-10 stacks of might if you do it right. This will also deal a ton of burst damage and cause bleeding.
• Cast Flame Burst to set all the mobs on fire
• Use burning retreat to get some distance from your enemies
• After your foes follow you back into the fire, dodge back through it, causing another fire blast finisher for even MORE might.
• By now you’ll have about 15 stacks of might and your auto attack will be dealing some kitten good damage as well as add another stack of might every time you cast it.
• Continue to auto attack, set up fire fields, dodge into them and cast Arcane Wave whenever it’s off cooldown. Doing this, you can easily keep yourself over 20 stacks of might at ALL times. If my math is correct (and it very well could be wrong so let me know) that’s about 700 extra power and condition damage that you’re providing to yourself with very little extra effort. Seven-freaking-hundred!! That’s insane!

Usually that’s all you need to do, however if you’re taking damage, don’t worry about it. If you’re stacking at least one defensive attribute in your gear you’ll be fine and the Earth’s Embrace trait you’re using will provide plenty of time to swap to water and heal. The best part is that when you DO need healing, drop yourself a water field, roll into it and use arcane wave. Not only will the water finisher from the dodge heal you, it’s blast finisher along with the blast from Arcane Wave will most likely over heal you no matter how much health you’re missing (I’ve gone from 25% to 100% instantly using this).

If adds join in on the fight and you need to regroup, switch to water and put down a frozen ground or go air and try to stun everything, then switch to earth and try to catch most of the enemies in a Shockwave, cast another Eruption and start the standard process all over again.

Personal thoughts/variations
I love this build, having played almost nothing but staff from 1-80, staying away from enemies and kiting them, this is a huge change in play-style and is a ton of fun. I’ve tested this build out in Orr and have had great success with it so far. However, I mostly use a slightly different variation of the build since I like to do dungeons and would rather build for more support. I put 10 points into fire, 10 into earth, 20 into water and 30 into Arcane when I play, that way I have more vitality and I can easily swap my traits/skills to more supportive ones in case I choose to do dungeons. Even built with water instead of fire, I usually tear through mobs fairly quickly after stacking so much might but I figured I’d go to the extreme with this guide and show it off with fire.

I haven’t tried stacking different attributes on armor with this build yet, as I said before, I use clerics for the extra healing in dungeons. I’m sure balancing out all the power with some condition damage would do nicely for this build though since there will be a lot of bleed and burning going on (and might also gives bonuses to condition damage). So that might be a good way to go.

Anyway, that’s about it, I hope you guys enjoyed the guide and I hope you give the living bomb a try and tell me what you think! I’d love to hear some suggestions and constructive criticism! Thanks for reading!

This is interesting.

Do you (or anyone else) find that making a specific build is easier if you start from the ELITE skill and work backwards, to maximize it’s potential?

Just a thought.

Another variation you might try, if you’re up for a further playstyle change, is to use scepter/dagger. You get four blast finishers on your skills this way (Phoenix in fire, Earthquake and Churning Earth in earth, Arcane Wave) to quickly lay down 12 stacks of might before traits factor into things with F4→3→E4→Arcane Wave→5. You might not get your might stacks quite as high quite as fast (you have to wait for Ring of Fire to come off cooldown, rather than having Lava Font and Burning Retreat to use for fields), but Churning Earth hits so hard that I feel it more than makes up for it. This build doesn’t have quite as much kiting and healing ability as the staff, but it does get a lot of control (blinds and knockdowns in Air and Earth, all of them AoE) and, if you take Glyph of Storms and use it in Earth, you get an AoE attack that pulses bleed and blind to create a sort of safe zone in the middle of mobs (which allows you to make the most of Dragon’s Tooth on Fire 2, since mobs won’t be moving).

I also use this build in dungeons; as after the might stacks go up I can use sandstorm and Tornado to keep mobs blind and on the floor for long periods to reduce their output, and spam vulnerability (via Water 2) on hardier targets.

@Eddard
With our ele elite skills being kind of lacking, I wouldn’t build around an elite (maybe the GS conjure though). Other classes, maybe though. I just find one little niche, be it a skill, trait or playstyle and find things that compliment it.

@Isila
Ooh that sounds interesting indeed! Especially how you use it in dungeons. I haven’t played around with scepter or daggers in a while. perhaps I’ll look into it some more thanks for the info!

Very interesting build, I was actually thinking of trying something like that in WvW. I am currently running staff cantrip 10/0/10/30/20 and it is providing me with awesome survivability. I am not sure I will be able to face the zerg well in melee range chaining the fields. Have you had any experience with this? Was the Lightning Flash sufficient for escape?

XodoK.8734:

Very interesting build, I was actually thinking of trying something like that in WvW. I am currently running staff cantrip 10/0/10/30/20 and it is providing me with awesome survivability. I am not sure I will be able to face the zerg well in melee range chaining the fields. Have you had any experience with this? Was the Lightning Flash sufficient for escape?

I actually haven’t even stepped foot in WvW yet, so I can’t comment on how it would work out. Though I may try it sometime this weekend and update the thread with my opinions on it. I would suspect that the variation that I mentioned would work a little better, taking 20 points out of fire and putting them in water for the extra vitality/healing/condition removal. Since there are so many people dealing damage, you personally wouldn’t need all the power that comes from 30 points in fire since everyone’s dealing damage all over the place and it would give you more survivability, it wouldn’t hamper your ability to stack might like a fiend either.

Edit: As for escaping, In PvE I haven’t found that it’s been all that necessary to escape so either lightning flash or mist form works just fine, in WvW on the other hand it may be best to swap out the Earth Signet for a second escape utility.

Thanks for posting this build, very fun way to play indeed.

I’m yet to master it though, but I’m enjoying the fact that I can play pretty much similar to how I was prior (S+D Glass) – but able to take alot more damage and deal more as well.

Build guides like this needs gear part. Same build can be different with different gear. And one more thing – why don’t you have condition removal? Or you like 30-60 sec dots in Orr?

This is very close to the build I run in Wv3 and its nice. I dont think there is any big secret to it though. I see lots of Ele’s run like this almost every night.