Guild Wars 2

So, first things first, I think the tempest is a pretty neat spec and I’m really excited to play it, but I think some of the traits are a little lacking, especially when compared to the other elite spec we’ve seen. Particularly the minor traits, since you have to use all three when you take tempest.

The main issue I have with the tempest minors is that they all build directly onto each other so they may as well be one trait. The first one give you access to overloads, and the next two give you swiftness and protection while overloading, so we may as well just roll the swiftness and protection into the base skill facts of overloads. The current traits really feel to me like tempest doesn’t have minor traits 2 and 3.

My proposition, and I encourage others to comment with their ideas, is to roll swiftness and protection into overloads automatically, and make the minor traits 2 and 3 effect other aspects of the base ele.

my idea for a grandmaster minor is a trait the adds additional effects to auras we apply, since the devs clearly want to push the use of aura builds. I think something like this would be really neat.

minor trait 3: fire auras you apply remove 1-2 conditions, frost auras you apply weaken foes that hit you, shocking aura pulses damage to foes at melee range, and magnetic auras you apply blocks incoming melee attacks (only 1 attack per aura)

this trait, i think, interacts well with the base elementalist, and promotes aura builds, which I actually think are very fun.

I’m not quite sure what I would want to do for the tempests minor trait 2, so if anyone else has ideas they’d like to share, please do!

This is actually pretty huge.

It’s standard for the Minor Adept to just give access to the spec’s new mechanic. However, Chronomancer, Reaper, and Dragonhunter’s Master and GM minors all add something to the class as a whole, rather than just further defining the new class mechanic.

For example, Chrono’s 2d minor gives alacrity-on-interrupt, while the 3rd minor gives perma 25% movespeed and reduction to impairing conditions. These bonuses work completely separate from the new Shatter5 mechanic.

Reaper’s 2d minor gives chill on fear, and 3rd minor improves chill duration and makes chilled enemies do less dmg. These bonuses synergize with the new Shroud, but they also work completely separately, too, because necro has many other sources of chills.

Dragonhunter’s 2d minor makes it so blocking an attack maxes out your justice virtue, and the 3rd minor makes you deal more damage to enemies beyond a certain range. These also work independent of the DH’s spears virtue and longbow (although the 3rd minor obviously synergizes with the longbow).

As you pointed out, the Tempest minors just stack on to the class mechanic. They offer absolutely nothing to the rest of the class. It’d be like if the Reaper’s 2d minor gave access to Shroud skills 2+3, and the Reaper’s 3rd minor gave access to Shroud skills 4+5. Or if the chronomancer’s 2d minor let you increase the duration of Shatter5 by having more clones, while the 3rd minor let you pop Shatter5 early.

Well at same time Reaper minor also gives us access to our new weapon and shouts. It looks as if you may have access to your shouts and warhorn with out specing tempest. Also the other minors do just build on the first by making it not a punishment for using fear as a melee and also reducing damage again as a melee (a melee with no reflect, aegis, block or damage immunities)

honestly, there’s enough aura traits as it is, having one in every single trait specialization. i’d rather see some damage multipliers and stability. or maybe something like

master minor trait: gain swiftness while channeling overloads. swiftness has a 20% chance to evade any incoming damage
GM minor trait: gain protection while channeling overloads. gain retaliation when you gain protection

or
master minor: gain swiftness, protection, and stability whenever you channel a skill
GM minor: whenever you complete a channel, blast the area for an additional 2-4k damage. OR pulse additional 500 AoE damage every second while you channel a skill.

Samhayn.2385:

Well at same time Reaper minor also gives us access to our new weapon and shouts. It looks as if you may have access to your shouts and warhorn with out specing tempest. Also the other minors do just build on the first by making it not a punishment for using fear as a melee and also reducing damage again as a melee (a melee with no reflect, aegis, block or damage immunities)

No, the Reaper minors synergize with the new shroud. They don’t just modify it the way the Tempest minors do. Applying chill on fear obviously helps reapers in the way you described, but it also helps other builds by increasing chill uptime (which slows your opponent’s CDs). Same with the 3rd Reaper minor — reducing your opponent’s damage when they have chill benefits the class as a whole (not just the specific reaper mechanic).

The better comparison would be if the 2nd Reaper minor simply made your Shroud1 skill cleave, and the 3rd Reaper minor just reduced the CD on your Shroud2 skill.

The tempest’s 2nd and 3rd minors just modify what the first minor does — nothing more. They might as well be made baseline as part of singularity, and better minors added in that can be applied to the class as a whole.

For example, it’d be neat if the minor traits improved the tempest’s in-combat mobility, which would synergize with overloads but also work with the ele class as a whole. One potential trait would be “When you successfully evade or blind an attack, gain superspeed for 2 seconds.”

Forgotten Legend.9281:

honestly, there’s enough aura traits as it is, having one in every single trait specialization. i’d rather see some damage multipliers and stability.

the reason I went with auras is because, since we have so many traits that affect them, it would be nice to see them become a better, more unique defensive asset to the elementalist. I do agree that tempest needs some more stability though, we are lacking there