Guild Wars 2

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNAR5dlsAh+dYpQweIQTEHzD1tAe0ho2AJQAgzhioKA-TpBFwAHOCACeAAMOIAH3fAbZAAXAAA

Basically I’ve been doing fairly well in unranked so far, and can 1v2 for a reasonable amount of time. However, in 1v1’s against eles and healing field engis. I think that my problem is lack of knockback and interrupt.

My rotation is: GS 4 into GS 3 into GS 5 + GS 5 again into GS 2

After that I pop focus 5, mace 2, focus 4, and then mace 3
^ this is basically just me sustaining until my greatsword skills come back out. If I get low I use sanuctary and then signet of courage, but most experienced eles know to launch me if they see me doing that.

I’m wondering what I can do gameplay-wise to beat them. I like building tanky/sustain, and I like my greatsword + mace/focus, and I think my traits are pretty good for a tanky style, but I just cant seem to kill staff eles because their healing is nuts… Even after all I said, Im open to any suggestions. Help?

long story short: you’re not gonna beat a non noob D/D ele, you’re just not.

thieves have a better shot at beating burn guards than any guards have of beating a D/D ele that isn’t a skill clicker.

In WvW, you can pull off some nice upsets and burst a DD down if you run full-zerk. If you’re not the one focused, this becomes a lot easier in a 2v2 or 3v3.

From my experience in spvp, you have a decent chance at 1v1ing an ele as a burn guard as long as they aren’t running Diamond Skin.

An excellent DD ele isn’t going to lose to most power- med guards though, that’s just how it is at the moment :/

That seems kinda silly, I should be able to kill any class, and not be hard countered or pigeon-holed into zerkmeta… that’s really disappointing actually

InsidiousWaffle.7086:

That seems kinda silly, I should be able to kill any class, and not be hard countered or pigeon-holed into zerkmeta… that’s really disappointing actually

There are less than a handful of builds across all classes which has a “fair” shot at downing a d/d ele 1v1. Worry not though:

Josh Davis.6015:

So, I can’t go into much detail on things quite yet, but I just wanted to reassure you folks that we’re actively discussing a number of issues that are affecting balance in PvP – including, but not limited to elementalist sustain/damage. Per the usual, we’ll be talking to you folks about the changes once we’ve finalized them.

Sorry I haven’t been that active on the forums lately – we’ve been pretty busy around the office.

“Thanks, Grouch. You’re the worst!”

Edit: Also, just because this is an elementalist thread doesn’t mean we’re only looking at elementalist, and it also doesn’t mean we’re only looking at doing nerfs.

Just a few thoughts on the build you posted, though, and why you might be having difficulty against ele’s:
1) Wrathful spirit is pretty meh against d/d ele’s, who rarely do fast attacks. Retal is good against ranger rapid fire or guard’s whirling wraith, but this trait has 0 mileage against eles.
2) Communal defenses is a great trait, but for obvious reasons will never help you win a 1v1.
3) Retributive armor is fine and all, but it won’t help you much against a d/d ele since so much of their damage comes from burning and will ignore your armor. You’re also using a barb amulet, which does nothing to give you toughness/ferocity to take advantage of the trait. I’m actually not too keen on this part either; even if you used a soldier amulet, you’d only increase your ferocity by 4.2%…
4) Sigil of water isn’t adding to your DPS.
5) Basically all of your utilities are team-support oriented. Although retreat can be used with shattered aegis for a burst, your ferocity is a bit low to make it really hurt. I think on a typical marauder setup shattered aegis crits for ~1.4K. You’re burst potential relies around GS#2 and mace #3, which isn’t optimized for bursting an ele since you’ve got a barbarian amulet. Bursting a d/d ele after they leave water is the best way to get them down, but that’s going to be difficult in your setup without JI and smite condition.

Your build is team-support oriented (which is perfectly fine), but it doesn’t really have the raw dps needed to take down a d/d ele (most builds don’t!). With the upcoming (but unknown) nerfs to d/d ele, your build might work better, but until then its going to be tough to kill them without switching to a marauder or carrion amulet (and even then its tough). The truth is that guardian excels against burst damage (blocks, blinds) but is weaker to sustained damage (low health pool), so I’ve never felt that guard vs. d/d ele was a good matchup for the guard.

Ele is hard. I am able to kill them with my Condi bild. Once. After they know whats coming its not possible anymore. basically a good elel can play point defense and sit there forever if you do not 3vs1 him quickly.

InsidiousWaffle.7086:

That seems kinda silly, I should be able to kill any class, and not be hard countered or pigeon-holed into zerkmeta… that’s really disappointing actually

Sorry buddy, I don’t like it either, but that’s the way it is lol. As I said before, you have a decent chance of 1v1ing a d/d ele with a burn guard.

See the quote from Salamander though, eles will likely get the nerfbat in due time which could possibly lessen their sustain.

you can beat ele with :
gs (fire/air) + mace/focus (energy/intel-generosity)
hammer (intel/fire) + mace/focus (air/energy)
zeal/honor/virtues
block fire burst, when they switch to water/earth/air full burst on them

they burst often come from air – stun with shield bubble, switch to fire and then they burst-after that they switch to earth and water→fire etc etc..mindless smashing buttons. Just stay away from fire field and you will be fine.