Guild Wars 2

Hi guys. I have been on a break from the game for a while, and I have been trying different builds ever since I have come back. I noticed that the condition elementalist seems to be receiving alot of hate lately. I decided to crank the condition damage and see what happens… and it works great. You bypass armor, can do it from a distance. works great in PvP, and you get lots of power as well for when you want to pull out your ice bow and destroy objects in PVE/Dungeons. I even have a 47% crit chance so I can swap out weapons for specific situations. Seeing how I am the one making a case for this I’ll present the numbers to go with it.
I use the scepter/dagger combo for this. If I am being lazy, the numbers stabilize at 300 impact damage, 2000 bleeding damage, and 1000 burning damage, EVERY 1.5 seconds. This is a MINIMUM of 3,300 damage without delay, a bare minimum so to speak. I can spike it from here to though.

Here is something to consider. A greatsword zerker warrior when stacked with might and team support, and not having to chase a some one around, not dying and running back to heal, and the planets aligning juuuuuuust right, can pull of 15,000 – 20,000 damage with his hundred blade move. Now if you take into consideration the full cycle of the hundred blades move, and the average attack speed, you get about 7 attacks in between hundred blades. If you average out the critical hit range and chance with the average damage of a fully exotic Zerk warrior you are looking at and average of about 1,300 damage a hit with a GS. Add it all up, and your average is 24,660 over 13 seconds. So a warriors DPS is 1896 (this is an average of course.)

Now remember the numbers for my condition elementalis earlier? 3,300 over 1.5. My elementalists damage, not stacked with might and no team support, from a range so it doesnt matter if the guy is moving, not getting hurt because I am away from the big boss, and the planets don’t need to align for crap. My dps is 2,200. That is 304 dps higher than a GS warrior every second, while I just let my auto attack go. If I ACTUALLY USE SKILLS I can crack the bleeding to around 3,000 and the burning to 2,000. That is a spike of 3,533 Dps.

Yes I know the staff meteor storm is great for big targets, but I can do this to ANYONE… except objects….. that’s what ice bow is for

screen shots for proof

You’re probably better off using glyph of storms in fire attunement for the extra burns than using that cantrip.

The problem with PvE dungeons and conditions, is that everything is already dead before you can pull of your entire condi rotation (which then gives you the high dps).

psst you tell that condi ele works. :-).
I did a scepter condi build and its great for me. I use focus but i think i shall try dagger.
But its not stable. There are hard counters. Most necros kill me. Also other condi builds are hard.
And it needs at least 5 seconds to peak damage. When two other zerkers fire at something its often dead before the first auto chain is finished ….
Also the direct damage is pathetic if you stay in earth. If e.g. a warrior pops berserkers stance and can land his hits (thats the moment i wish for endless endurance) you are dead.
Its not meta, and its counterable. Its a rock/paper /scissors type of build. So its not considered meta and also called cheesy because it can destroy builds that don´t expect it ;-). For me it works well in WvW roaming.
what runes do you run?
I had taveler, which i droped due to lack of damage.
I see nightmare and undead (i use that) are very good for it. Also krait can work.

Because it works. Since most of your “real” damage can only bee seen after a certain amount of time, you will certainly lose damage while building this damage / conditions up. That at least goes for PvE.

For PvP. I don’t know if it’s that viable since you will be targeted first almost every time.

I could imagine it being fun while roaming but still, there a builds which are more versatile especially when going around solo or in groups / zergs.

Greets

Just play the elementalist as you want it to be. Have fun and be nice!

Conner.5803:

You’re probably better off using glyph of storms in fire attunement for the extra burns than using that cantrip.

The problem with PvE dungeons and conditions, is that everything is already dead before you can pull of your entire condi rotation (which then gives you the high dps).

On my bar in the screen shot I have sigils glyphs and cantrips all rolled into one big mess lol! I was just tinkering with the numbers when I took this screen shot, it was more of a proof of concept for base attack more than anything. For the dungeons though I have run a few and I found the signets to be effective. I start with a churning Earth, it gets the conditions started nicely. I was just using the elementals to hold the boss in the screenshot so I could get a clean pic.
You do have a good point though, the “rev up” period is no good for cleaning up smaller mobs. I have found switching to duel daggers when not fighting a boss to be a effective solution for this though. So boss=sceptor, little guys=d/d hence another reason to use a dagger off hand, so the only weapon you swith is the main hand

Yes thats it i play like i want to have fun. I know well played d/d is great and it usually kills me, but there are oponets i kill while the d/d has a hard time. That makes the game for me.
I did run healin gyph but went back to arcane heal. Of course i run cleansing flame, its the best for that build. also earth sigil fits. I use it to catch fleeing targets. And i love arcane shield as stunbreaker.
The option would be to use more glyphs an trait for it. This also works well. I use Air for the speed and the vul proc is good for covering condies.
the complete build including equipment looks like a chaotic mess on the first glimpse. But all together it works. And its an ele without water/cantrips :-). OK flame is there.
There are two options for me to build it. One has air, one has arcane. When i use arcane i trait for arcane utilitis an run air sigil instead of earth (stunbreak/blind is fine).
But the arcane version is harder to pull of and can´t catch fleeing targets as well as the air one on the other side the boons make it great.
An i have a complete power set with staff in my inventory for keep fighting or PvE if needed. Often i just pull out the staff even if that is not realy good to use a zerker staff with condi gear. But there might be no time to swap all pieces when you suddenly need to fire up or down walls.

Wolfric.9380:

psst you tell that condi ele works. :-).
I did a scepter condi build and its great for me. I use focus but i think i shall try dagger.
But its not stable. There are hard counters. Most necros kill me. Also other condi builds are hard.
And it needs at least 5 seconds to peak damage. When two other zerkers fire at something its often dead before the first auto chain is finished ….
Also the direct damage is pathetic if you stay in earth. If e.g. a warrior pops berserkers stance and can land his hits (thats the moment i wish for endless endurance) you are dead.
Its not meta, and its counterable. Its a rock/paper /scissors type of build. So its not considered meta and also called cheesy because it can destroy builds that don´t expect it ;-). For me it works well in WvW roaming.
what runes do you run?
I had taveler, which i droped due to lack of damage.
I see nightmare and undead (i use that) are very good for it. Also krait can work.

In WvW I have a tendency to switch to a staff when running with a big group, or if I am defending a structure, but when in a small group or by myself, I use the sceptor and most people actually arent used to dealing with so much condition damage and it works pretty well. I use signet of Earth, signet of fire, and cleansing fire, I actually found a golem works good in wvw as well, its a good distraction. and you dont play like you want to get in there, just sit back and let the conditions do their thing, and aside from a few necros, it actually works really good. Thiefs try and stealth away alot, but I usually find a downed thief come out of stealth a few steps away.

Oh yes thiefs are fun also many rangers. The last thief cloaked three times but died so fast i had been surpriesed myself. I think it was because he got also hit by cleansing flame and his 1 condi clean on stelath did hit the cover condies.