Guild Wars 2

State the reason/s why you choose to go 30 deep into Arcana.
No arguments or insulting each other please, post your preference, keep it civil.

a) +30% Boon Duration
b) Evasive Arcana
c) D/D and S/D grants access to Elemental Attunement, Renewing Stamina and Evasive Arcana
d) Staff grants access to Elemental Attunement, Blasting Staff and Evasive Arcana

^^
especially because evasive arcana looks awesome and I am a sucker for flash.

For my staff elementalist:
a) Evasive Arcana (most active, varied and fun gameplay I’ve ever had with a MMO spellcaster)
b) Blasting Staff
c) Elemental Attunement
d) +30% Boon Duration
e) Arcane Fury

To be honest, the attunement cooldown is probably the last reason. Second to last after Lingering Elements/Soothing Mist combo maybe.

If EA water proc was an ice combo field that crippled, meaning it didn’t heal, then you would not see the demand for 30 Arcana. In fact, the devs would be fixing everything in Arcana to get people into it.

ImProVocateur.5189:

If EA water proc was an ice combo field that crippled, meaning it didn’t heal, then you would not see the demand for 30 Arcana. In fact, the devs would be fixing everything in Arcana to get people into it.

If it did that, I’d spec 60 points in Arcana for it.

1. !!!Vigor!!!
2. Evasive Arcana !!!Heal & Cleanse, Blind, Cripple & Finisher, Burn for Fire Grab!!!
3. Attunement CD: !!!Spamming Healing Ripple!!!
4. Elemental Attunement and Boon Duration !!!Protection!!!

I spec into it for defense.

1. Heal from EA
2. Regen, protection and swiftness from V
3. Vigor from VI
4. Boon-Duration for regen, protection and vigor from V and VI and water-traits
5. Attunement-CD-Reduction for more V and healing-ripples

dead eles don’t deal damage … therefore you need those traits ^^

1. Evasive Arcana
2. Shorter Attunement Cooldown.
3. Vigor
4. +30% Boon Duration
5. Boons.

ThiBash.5634:

For my staff elementalist:
a) Evasive Arcana (most active, varied and fun gameplay I’ve ever had with a MMO spellcaster)
b) Blasting Staff
c) Elemental Attunement
d) +30% Boon Duration
e) Arcane Fury

To be honest, the attunement cooldown is probably the last reason. Second to last after Lingering Elements/Soothing Mist combo maybe.

Same here

1. Faster Attunement recharge (Synergizes with too many things on this line and others).
2. Evasive Arcana
3. Boon duration
4. Elemental Attunement
5. Renewing Stamina (I’ve run without this on a few builds).

1. Heal and blast finisher from Evasive Arcana
2. Elemental Attunement – something I can’t imagine this class without
3. Larger staff AoE – IF I’m using a staff.

Currently I use 20/0/0/20/30 using both traits that will get nerfed in water (cleansing and water skills recharge)
When I’m out of combat I can switch between a staff and S/D for some might stacking. The update will ruin the freedom of my trait build and I will be forced to give up either 20% fire or 20% water recharge and I will probably sacrifice fire and go 30/30 arcane/water cause survivability is much more important for me. I’ll enjoy my build for the little time it has left to last…
I think nerfing both water traits AND the stamina is bad but at least I can use stamina food and stamina sigil whilst nothing can compensate the faster recharge on skills with massive c/d.

I trait just 10 for vigour and soon I will have to trait 20. Yay!

- Elemental attunement
- arcane fury
- renewing stamina/blasting staff
- evasive arcana
-+30% boon duration
-reduced attunement cd

1. Blast Finisher from Evasive Arcana
2. Heal from Evasive Arcana
3. Condition Cleanse from Evasive Arcana
4. AoE Burn from Evasive Arcana
5. Boons on Attunement Swap
6. +30% Boon duration
7. Blasting Staff when I’m wielding a staff (90% of the time)
8. Vigor on crits when I’m not wielding a staff (the other 10%)
9. Fury on Attunement Swap
10. Evasive Arcana, Elemental Attunement, and Renewing Stamina still work when wielding Fiery Greatsword.
11. Synergy with many other traits

… I could keep going…

Evasive Aracana

I love the recharge rate, too (and in fact cycle so quickly I run into cooldowns on all attunemets a LOT), but evasive arcana is just amazingly useful and fits very well into the d/d play style.

Evasive Arcana is the only reason I go into Arcana anymore. I’ve tried 20/30/10/0/10 S/D and it honestly wasn’t that bad, but Evasive Arcana is really influential. Imo, in most cases going without investing 30 into arcana for it is a worse idea than not.

I know that aNet is trying to avoid power creep, but would making Evasive Arcana a class mechanic and giving us something in place of it as an Arcana GM trait break the class?

Maybe EA should be broken down into traits for each of the other lines (and as a result, Fire/Air dodges would need to be buffed. They’re already fairly subpar, but it’s acceptable because the same trait is giving us the water/earth dodges.)

I don’t really have any ideas of what should replace it if that happened, though.

30 Arcana is good because it is traits which give you effect not specifically tied to your weapon set or attunement.

It is like many other class mechanic trait lines. Trickery, Illusions, Discipline, Soul Reaping. Many people tell you it is certain traits the cd reduction is a side benefit for most(probably because they are just use to the timing now).

The popular traits in Arcana are elemental attunement, renewing stamina and EA. Traits that will give you good benefits regardless of your build which is why they are popular.

Other classes I play

Class mechanic line popular choices

Warrior : Discipline – Signet Mastery, Warrior sprint, Burst Mastery, mobile strikes, Vigor on focus, fast hands at 15 point minor is actually really good and always considered in warrior builds.

Necromancer: Soul Reaping – Path of Midnight(cd reduction on DS skills), Foot in the grave, Master of terror, soul marks.

Thief – Trickery – Sleight of hand, bountiful theft, thrill of the crime, flanking strikes, caltrops on dodge/

Mesmer – Illusions – Compounding power, Masterful Reflection, master of misdirection, illusionary invigoration, illusionary persona.

The theme you can see is trait choices that will give you benefit regardless of your build type, Those are the most popular traits in those lines and fit with why arcana traits are popular also. The side benefit is the extra death shroud life, burst cooldown reduction, shatter recharge rate and steal cooldown.

Mesmer would be the class I say has the more niche traits that get picked up in their class mechanic line when IC was a 5 point minor was when you saw more mesmers go deeper into illusions on builds.

TL&DR – Arcana is a popular tree beause the traits in it can give you benefit regardless of the build you are running it has flexible traits.

With renewing stamina I don’t have to put sigil of energy on my off-hand, and don’t have to get hit by everything when playing staff.

I don’t have to wait to swap to something else, so I can pump out those combos in D/D with ease, and heal up in a fell swoop. I can change it up in a longer fight where a guardian starts anticipating my next move.

Dodge cleansing is uber.

oZii.2864:

30 Arcana is good because it is traits which give you effect not specifically tied to your weapon set or attunement.

It is like many other class mechanic trait lines. Trickery, Illusions, Discipline, Soul Reaping. Many people tell you it is certain traits the cd reduction is a side benefit for most(probably because they are just use to the timing now).

The popular traits in Arcana are elemental attunement, renewing stamina and EA. Traits that will give you good benefits regardless of your build which is why they are popular.

Other classes I play

Class mechanic line popular choices

Warrior : Discipline – Signet Mastery, Warrior sprint, Burst Mastery, mobile strikes, Vigor on focus, fast hands at 15 point minor is actually really good and always considered in warrior builds.

Necromancer: Soul Reaping – Path of Midnight(cd reduction on DS skills), Foot in the grave, Master of terror, soul marks.

Thief – Trickery – Sleight of hand, bountiful theft, thrill of the crime, flanking strikes, caltrops on dodge/

Mesmer – Illusions – Compounding power, Masterful Reflection, master of misdirection, illusionary invigoration, illusionary persona.

The theme you can see is trait choices that will give you benefit regardless of your build type, Those are the most popular traits in those lines and fit with why arcana traits are popular also. The side benefit is the extra death shroud life, burst cooldown reduction, shatter recharge rate and steal cooldown.

Mesmer would be the class I say has the more niche traits that get picked up in their class mechanic line when IC was a 5 point minor was when you saw more mesmers go deeper into illusions on builds.

TL&DR – Arcana is a popular tree beause the traits in it can give you benefit regardless of the build you are running it has flexible traits.

A well-stated and excellent post. +1

I was going to make this thread myself, glad someone else had the idea. Anet really needs to understand why 30 arcane is still mandatory.

Because all the Arcana traits are the very basic traits that an Elementalist needs. All the other trait lines are too focused on their own element, which doesn’t synergize well with the rest of the elements.

In order for me as primarily D/D ele:

1. Boon duration
2. Elemental Attunement (honestly No. 1 and 2 are linked)
3. Evasive Arcana blast finisher + heal/condi cleanse
4. Vigorous Precision

I’m a D/D ele:
1. Elemental Attunement + Renewing Stamina is a core requirement (100% req) For close combat, evasion, and support.
2. Attunement Recharge Rate is a must since a cycle through attunements on a 9 sec interval to build up Sigil of Battle up to 14-18 might.
3. Evasive Arcana required for heals/condition removal, crippling and blinding.
4. Boon Duration

Evasive Arcana is pretty much the only reason and thats just for the heal and blast. The cd reduction was nice on dd but I hung that up back when the over nerf hit.

Boon Duration & Evasive Arcana.

ele just badly needs survivability…

elemental attunement = water regen, earth protection, air swiftness + its aoe
renewing stamina = vigor = dodge
evasive arcana = heal with condi cleanse on 10sec cd alone makes it worth + some minor dmg, blast finisher and blind
30% boon duration = more protection, vigor and regen
15 → 10 sec attunement CD = more boons from elemental attunement and btter access to weapon skills when you need them

no other line gives you more survivability and utility which ele needs that much

1: evasive arcana is amazing, does take some micro-managing with the dodges, but its ok because…
2: renewing stamina is awesome synergy with evasive arcana
3: boon duration with might stacking on superior sigil of battle, maintain about 14 stacks of might with that alone, then with cantrips, maintaining your own fire fields on d/fire 3 & 4 followed with d/earth 4 & 5, easily can maintain 21-25 stacks of might on your own during the entire fight.
4: when running d/d, it helps immensely with the mobility

BEcause has so many repercussion on fun and gameplay…

You can play a DPS ele that feels slow and boring.
Or just try to reduce the proactive play lowering CD and having more skills (EA, combos etc).