Guild Wars 2

Updraft —-———————————————————————Gale
AoE——————————————————————————-Single target
40 seconds CD—————————————————————-50 seconds CD
Knockdown is arguably longer———————————————Shorter knockdown
Gives swiftness—————————————————————No added bonus
Extra dodge——————————————————————-No dodge
Instant cast———————————————————————Delayed cast
Melee range———————————————————————900 range

So basically, the only advantage that Gale has over Updraft is that it can be casted from afar.

…

I don’t think that outweighs the MASSIVE cons in every other aspect when compared to updraft.

Discuss. I really think that Gale needs mass buffs.

sshhh..you want updraft nerfed or what?? :P

Gale should have a 50% failure chance if you have less than 5 points into Air. /sarcasm

It should at least be a projectile finisher.

With gale you don’t have to face target

Gale should be 35s other than that it’s not that bad, I can use it to combo phoenix much easier than updraft

I think the Gale cooldown should be 20 seconds if it stays single target. Single target + the cooldown it has seems weak
But there are other problems with offhand dagger vs focus.

Flamewall sucks in comparison to ring of fire which scales better and is larger.
Fire Shield would be good if it reflected projectiles.

Freezing Gust seems very weak for a single target skill. If they keep it single target it should be like Deep Freeze but only 1 sec

Benji.9203:

With gale you don’t have to face target

Edit: nevermind. well, I guess that’s not very consistent with focus water #4

I would be happy if gale had a 40 seconds base CD instead of 50. Everything else is a plus.

Super Riceman.8702:

I think the Gale cooldown should be 20 seconds if it stays single target. Single target + the cooldown it has seems weak
But there are other problems with offhand dagger vs focus.

Flamewall sucks in comparison to ring of fire which scales better and is larger. It could block movement for summoned units that way it has some use over ring.
Fire Shield would be good if it reflected projectiles.

Freezing Gust seems very weak for a single target skill. If they keep it single target it should be like Deep Freeze but only 1 sec

Flamewall should have a faster cast time and be more useful, freezing gust could have base damage added to it and a longer chill duration… but that’s another subject.

Btw I find fire shield to be perfectly fine.

With the changes to Fire Aura, Fire Shield is alright.

My persistent idea for Flame Wall to be made better is to give it the Mesmer Temporal Curtain treatment in that it either buffs friendly allies in some way when they walk through it (say, it burns away conditions and converts it into a stack of might or something) or give it a sequence attack like Into the Void but reversed…give it Backdraft, an AoE launch…Focus is suppose to be an defensive weapon after all and yet it has less CC, area denial, mobility and healing than any other set of 4-5 weapon skills! The only semi advantage it has is that Earth is amazing (4sec invulnerability and 3 condi removal/reflect both instant cast) and Air can destroy projectiles.

Anyway, yeah, I think Gale and Freezing Gust could be improved too…lowering cooldowns would be nice if a bit bland…

needs baffszzzzzz

I think Gale should last 3s instead of 2, so it could interact better with the fire burst skills. I’m not sure if it would be enough, but it would be a good first step.

Freezing Gust’s animation makes it feel like an AoE skill. I’d make it aoe because of that, and increase the damage.

Fire Shield is a bit weird. Elementalists aren’t really meant to take straight up damage, but this skill wants you to do so. Besides, it doesn’t shields you from anything. I’d say that, at the very least, it should last 7 seconds like Frost Armor. Why not? It would still be the worst aura for elementalists due to the lack of defensive mechanics, but it could very well go the opposite way, and be even more aggressive: add 2s of burning instead of 1s. If nothing else, split for pve and have it cause 2s there, because thw AI attacks slower.

Flamewall is underpowered. First, it should apply the entire stack of burning at once, like the mesmer’s line, but keep the direct damage there. Maybe even increase the direct damage. Second, a sequence skill would open a lot of new design space for any neat stuff.

I would even go as far as suggest to switch the order of the two fire skills. Fire Shield makes no sense as an ultimate (making it the 4th would be consistent with Frost Armour or Chaos Armour), and rework Flamewall to be ultimate-worthy by giving it a cool sequence effect.

Because focus’ fire relies so much on burning for damage, I’d say it should get a bit more bleeding too, so condition builds for elementalists can be viable. And elementalist’s condition builds need some bleeding outside of earth. Water’s cutting shards make flavorful sense, so that’s the best way to improve Comet.

Comet: Adds a few stacks of bleeding.

Focus earth is strong, but Magnetic Wave is a bit unelegant and busy. I would transform it into a skill sequence:
1st – Reflect projectiles for 5s;
2nd – The reflection effect is removed. Push back foes, crippling, damaging and bleeding them.

Pushback makes sense to keep foes at range, especially for a long-range s/f setup. And then:

Obsidian Flesh: lose one condition each second. I’d put it here to not make Magnetic Wave so busy. Seriously, magnetic wave does waaaaaay too many things already.

I found alot of skills to be poorly balanced. Usually between the elements. Like compare Impale to the other 3 elemental auto attacks of the main hand dagger, its pathetic.

I’m really not a fan of the current set up where fire is almost always the damage dealing element and water, earth, and air gets just 1 or 2 good skills and the rest are basically crap.
And I really hate the skills that are only there to add a condition, Like Blinding Flash that ONLY adds blind nothing else, not even damage. Or Frozen Burst that chills with very low damage. Yet fire gets high direct damage often coupled with a burn on most of its skills.

But what do I know, I deleted my pyromanc.. I mean elem at lvl 20 because I just hated the way the class was built.

^Blinding Flash might see boring at first, but you can do some pretty neat tricks with its instant casting. Think of when you are stunned or KDed, and you can use it to prevent a burst. Or when you are casting Churning Earth, switch to air, and use it to prevent your enemy from interrupting you.

Likewise, Frozen Burst,much like Ring of Earth, are there to keep your foe within your range. But you can strike hard with mw dagger’s auto-attack.

Anyways, the fun of an elementalist is almost always on switching attunements and combining different skills from different elements. ^^