Guild Wars 2

Update: I am currently on indefinite leave from the game in order to improve myself as an artist and writer. I do log on every so often to check out updates, but I’m nowhere as active as I used to be. Nonetheless, you are still free to contact me—I’ll try to keep checking my PMs here and keep this thread up-to-date, and in lieu of PMs, you are free to email me (falunel at gmail).

Jomo kenyatta.7351:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Hey guys.

I just wanted to give you guys a quick update. Based on your feedback, we’ve decided not to add Runes of Perplexity to PvP in the 4/15 Feature Pack. We’ll be monitoring the balance of runes closely, making more tweaks if necessary, and revisiting the possibility of adding Runes of Perplexity to PvP at a later point.

Thanks again for comporting yourselves in such a cooperative and constructive manner – you guys had some great points and counterpoints regarding this issue.

why do you listen this time but not we said dont put in diamond skin?

yeah, i mean, look at all those op elementalists running around wrecking eight necromancers at a tim- …wait.

more seriously, it is very very easy to get an elementalist below 90% HP. I’ve run Diamond Skin before in PvP and it literally takes one or two hits to drop me below the threshold, even against (competent) condition users. Eles also give up a lot of damage to go defensive and subsequently pose a lesser threat offensively. If you are getting wrecked that badly by DS eles, then either a) your build is fully dependent upon conditions and thus should expect some sort of tradeoff as a result, or b) you need to take a long hard look at your own skills.

Brando.1374:

what…. noo My necro would have been so OP. keep them in.
Please tell me this is a april fools post.

because unbalance is good when it benefits you

mercury ranique.2170:

They are very viable in WvW and actually my most favourite class there. All the people saying not, ask yourself, what you do if your attacking a gate and there is an ele on the wall casting meteorshower on your pretty rams

Hear, hear. Any WvW group fighter worth their salt will tell you how valuable staff elementalists are in organized zergs or GvGs. That’s in addition to the fact that they’re one of the best PvE classes in the game.

If someone says that playing an elementalist has zero rewards, chances are they don’t have the skill for it and aren’t willing to admit it.

Hello, Emma! If it’s all right with you, I’ve added you and will chat with you later. I do second Sandra’s suggestion, though; you can also browse http://www.reddit.com/r/guildrecruitment.

Best of luck, and welcome to the game!

ozmaniandevil.6805:

PUGs are the worst. You can’t take anyone in them seriously. If they kick you because you don’t have high enough AP it’s obviously because they need you to carry their sorry selves through the dungeon. You should really try to find a good guild to join. One with lots of people, and one with people willing to actually interact with guildmates. My guild is the 3rd largest on my server and I absolutely love it. There are always people who want to do many different things.

Good luck! And just ignore the AP. The only time I look at it is when I’m getting really close to the next chest. As soon as I get said chest I forget about it again. Just play how you enjoy.

This post absolutely, especially the part about joining a guild. I’m relatively low on the AP scale, but that’s because soloing champions, duoing dungeons, meleeing Lupicus, and leading teaching runs doesn’t give AP.

Find your group and do as you please. Laugh at the others.

Welcome to the game. Be aware of a few things, though:

-There is no healer/tank/DPS trinity here.

• There is no dedicated tank to take aggro off you- aggro here is random, and you will have to handle it yourself if you catch it.
• There is no dedicated healer here to heal you- everyone is responsible for keeping themselves alive through active damage avoidance (it’s more important to avoid damage here than it is to heal it).
• Everyone’s responsible for crippling the enemy with control skills, making things easier with support skills, and doing damage to down the enemy.

-Elementalist does NOT play like a mage from WoW or any other MMO. The class is extremely squishy in terms of raw stats, with the lowest base health pool and armor- however, it has a -lot- of defensive tricks, like high mobility, evades, AoE CC, high self-recovery, blinds, defensive boons, shields, invulnerabilities, etc. A well-played ele is very strong, but the class has an incredibly steep learning curve.

As an elementalist, you must memorize not only 20+ skills, but think of creative ways to use and combo them. Your survival will depend on active play- you must move constantly and change attunements constantly and use your skills deliberately in order to survive. If you stand still and throw fireballs, you’ll be in for a highly unpleasant surprise.

That being said! Elementalist is a very fun class, and I personally can’t play anything else for long. Playing it is rough at first, but if you practice and keep trying to improve, you will get better. I died a lot when I started out, and so did practically everyone else. So don’t get discouraged.

Here’s some elementalist gameplay demo videos. Some of them are old, but hopefully they’ll give you some idea of how the class works:

• Level 12 elementalist, soloing a level 16 veteran: http://youtu.be/Ubm6k-AX2U8
• Level 50 staff elementalist vs multiple level 54/55 mobs (no damage taken): http://youtu.be/0qteqpU0JIs
• Level 50 elementalist vs a champion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zMYvHTVEuI
• Level 80 ele soloing a champion: http://youtu.be/Hcf9PwSVP7Y

Again, a disclaimer: All of these videos feature my second and third elementalists. They were all made after hundreds of hours spent learning my first elementalist, who I died a lot on. These videos aren’t meant to show you how you MUST play coming right out of the starter instance, but to demonstrate how the class plays with experience.

I also recommend giving this a read: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/GW2-Combat-system-101-Guide/first

Hope that was of some help. Feel free to add me and hit me up if you have questions.

Kenage Achalarus.4276:

Falunel.7645 Here’s the Earth God’s Lyric from Legend of Zelda

Show Spoiler

hide spoiler

5
3/5 (^ 1 3 2 1) |v 7
4/8 6 4 7 5 8 6
5/7 5 4 8 4/6 7 |
5/8 (^ 2 3 1 2)|v 5
3/5 |(^ 1 3 2 1) |v 7
4/8 6 4 7 5 8 6
5/7 (^ 1 2 3 4 2) |v 7
8 1/3/5/8|

I’m afraid you wrote my contribution wrongly. Here’s the correct version:

Earth God’s Lyric – The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
Original: [link]
Video of the piece in GW2: WIP
Special version from Wind Waker, probably could do this with the help of some other musicians: [link]

If you could, for clarity’s sake, delete your post in this thread with my transcription, it would be appreciated.

Here’s the Earth God’s Lyric from Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.

5
3/5 |^| 1 3 2 1 |v| 7
4/8 6 4 7 5 8 6
5/7 5 4 8 4/6 7
5/8 |^| 2 3 1 2 |v| 5
3/5 |^| 1 3 2 1 |v| 7
4/8 6 4 7 5 8 6
5/7 |^| 1 2 3 4 2 |v| 7
8 1/3/5/8

Transcribed from the sheet music, which I don’t know if I’m allowed to post. I will attempt to add the chords later. (Edit: added some simple chords) Also, if you’re feeling adventurous, you can team up with another harpist and a flutist and try to replicate this version of the Earth God’s Lyric.

I also hurriedly put together this simple bit for the Hymn of the Fayth from Final Fantasy X:

2 4 3 5
5 4 5 6 2
6 7 5 6
5 4 5 6 2
2 2 3 3 4 4
3 1 1 2 2

(note that this is just how I personally matched the notes- I can’t hear absolute pitch, so they may be a bit off.)

I’ll post videos once I’m better.

Armor is T2 heavy sylvari cultural armor: http://argos-soft.net/GW2/ArmorGallery/index.php?color=0&sex=1&race=4&w=3&skinID=culthaci&lang=en

I don’t have a character that wears that armorset, so I can’t give advice on dyes at the moment.

Face looks like the first, most human-like face, but with the sliders for eye angle, eye size, and squint, adjusted to look more sinister. Skin tone would be Dark Olive, eyes would be any dark color. Physique would be one of the middle-weight ones.

Freakinaye.4612:

Didn’t even think to watch gameplay demos on youtube. I have a completely different understanding of professions now. mes & nec seemed to be the same play style, with eng and ele similar as well, but ele just appeared more efficent. The eng was going all over the place doing the least dmg, and just going nuts on skills trying to keep the mob away from him.

Just a disclaimer- there’s a wide variety of playstyles for every class, and each playstyle will seem more or less effective depending on the player’s skill level. Engi and ele especially have extremely high skill floors and high skill caps- you’ll hear people whining about how weak they are, when in reality, the player just doesn’t play them well.

Overall, as trite and unhelpful this may be, I recommend trying absolutely everything that catches your fancy; though, going off what I read in your post, engi and ele would be a good place to start.

Try an elementalist. It’s a difficult class, though.

Also, some things about GW2:
-You can move when you attack.
-Skill cast times are extremely small.
-You will need clear sight of an enemy to fight well- in a battle, you MUST watch and read the enemy’s animations and react to them. There’s no tank and no healer to take the brunt of all the attacks in a party.
-Some parts of the game will involve running alongside a hundred other players who are attacking the same target (WvW or world bosses). Even in a five-man group, the animations can be overwhelming together.

For the above four reasons, skill animations pretty much have to be small here. There are actually a lot of neat details in skill animations, but they’re very subtle compared to other MMOs.

How are you fighting? Combat in GW2 is about using skills actively, moving, and dodging to avoid damage.

Here’s an example of a sword ranger fighting an event boss in melee- pet disabled so I have to handle the aggro myself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbE4-5KBQTs

(disclaimer 1: please do not click your skills, it’s a bad habit.
disclaimer 2: once you’re used to handling aggro on your own, don’t disable your pet- learn to micro it, since it’s a major part of your support/damage/control.)

What is your server?

+1 and bump. Would like to see this on threads regarding class balance so I don’t have to dig through pages of whine.

You can make it accountbound two ways:

First way (transfers only the skin of the weapon)
1) Buy a white-quality sword from the Trading Post.
2) Use a Transmutation Crystal to transmute the white sword and Jormag’s Breath together. Pick the look of Jormag’s Breath and the stats of the white sword.
3) The sword should now be accountbound. Put it in your bank.
4) Pick up the transmuted sword on your thief and use another Transmutation Crystal to transmute the looks of the transmuted sword (which should have the looks of Jormag’s Breath) onto the stats of an exotic sword of your choice.

You should now have an exotic sword with stats of your choosing and the look of Jormag’s Breath. There is another way to accountbind, by following steps 1-3 and using a Transmutation Splitter instead of a second Transmutation Crystal on the transmuted sword, which will return the original item itself- however, this is only worthwhile on Ascended and Legendary items.

Give this a look: http://www.guildwars2roleplayers.com/home

Also, regarding losing your targets, turn off Right-Click to Attack/Interact.

Check your PMs

Here’s some places to look for a guild.

Browse some listings here: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/guilds/recruitment
Or make a post here (specify your server, playstyle, and what you’re looking for): https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/guilds/lfguild
Also look here: http://www.reddit.com/r/GuildRecruitment

WvW and PvE are linked, so you carry over exp and any gear you get in one mode to the other.

Welcome back!

Firstly, by “paladin,” I assume you mean guardian, right?

Secondly, there is a huge difference between the combat here and the combat in WoW and most other MMOs, so if by common RPGs you mean common MMOs, then no, I’m afraid your skills -won’t- transfer over. A few things of note:

• The combat in this game is much more action-oriented- you can avoid attacks by strafing and dodging as you fight, and using skills to counter enemy attacks. It’s more important to avoid attacks than to heal them.
• There is no healer/tank/DPS trinity. Everyone is responsible for their own survival, for DPSing the enemy, for coordinating support and control to make fights more manageable.
• Your success in this game depends largely on your skill as a player, rather than your gear.

I highly recommend giving this a read: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/GW2-Combat-system-101-Guide/first

In addition, GW2 is highly unlike WoW in many other respects. The game’s meant to be more of a journey- you take your time and enjoy the process of leveling, explore to your heart’s content, and when you hit 80, there aren’t tiers of raids and gear to chase one after the other. You pretty much find what you enjoy doing and do it.

My and other players’ advice- don’t treat this game like WoW. Forget everything you know about MMOs and enjoy the journey.

Slightly late to the conversation, but regarding /map chat advertising, I’d say it depends on who you’re looking to recruit and what your guild is focused on. In my case, despite my general dislike of the practice, I do post ads in the map chats of starter zones. However, the messages are very firm about the kind of players we recruit- my guild was primarily founded to provide a “safe space” for LGBTQ players, female players, minority players, players with disabilities or illnesses, and other marginalized groups to play the game and socialize with support and without harassment or prejudiced remarks.

As such, this is the general /map form I use:
Ember Solace [SOL] is a small social guild devoted to being a warm, prejudice-free space for LGBTQ individuals, women, people of color, and other groups at the margins in MMOs and reality. We welcome players of any experience level and are extremely newbie-friendly. For more information, PM me or visit http://redd.it/1w93gs.

I never use the following:

• Anyone welcome
• PM for invite

I’m also specific about the purpose of my guild and what it offers that most other guilds don’t (a safe space where LGBTQ players/women/others are openly welcome and not just tolerated) and the kind of people I want to recruit (people who are looking for a harassment-free space and people who are supportive allies of those groups). That tends to filter out the majority of MMO players, sad as it makes me to say.

If someone PMs me asking questions, I answer them, but also make sure to ask them if they read the reddit link I posted (which links to our reddit posting and is extremely upfront about our guild’s nature). If someone PMs me asking for an invite, I direct them right away to the reddit post. In addition, entering the guild itself requires a detailed written application (that directs people to our Purpose and Principles) and trial period.

So far, I’ve recruited in /map about fifteen times (never more than once an hour, and spaced out across different starter zones). Out of those fifteen times, I’ve gotten five PM queries. Four asked immediately for an invite- I told them about our application process, directed them to the reddit post, and didn’t hear from them again. One PMed me to ask about the philosophy of the guild- I sent him the links and afterward chatted with him for an hour afterwards about the game and life. He applied and has been getting along with the guild extremely well.

tl;dr if you want to recruit via /map, some personal dos and do nots:
Do:
-Say what your guild’s purpose is
-Ask for a certain type of player/personality
-Be ready to answer questions in-depth
-Link to your website/a post with more information
-Have a way of filtering prospective applicants
-Space out your posts, across maps and time
-Overall, design your posts to be both advertisements and filters.

Do NOT:
-Say something like “Generic Guild [Tag] is recruiting, PM me for invite.”
-Say “PM for invite” or “anyone welcome,” or invite everyone who PMs. You can say “any experience level welcome” and such, but when it comes to maturity and personalities, you want to be selective and recruit people who won’t clash with your guild.
-Spam /map chat every five minutes (or less).
-Recruit just to up your numbers. In my case, I recruited in /map in order to reach players who wanted a safe space, but didn’t read the forums or weren’t aware one existed.

Behellagh.1468:

And don’t underestimate the need to move and dodge to survive. You say you are new to GW2 and this isn’t an MMO where you plant yourself and slug it out even as a warrior. And Kraits are an enemy that can force you into melee with their grapple so trying to hang back with range attacks can be a problem considering your relative squishiness.

Very much this. Surviving as an elementalist is all about active play- what you don’t have in raw stats, you make up for in shields, healing, boons, antiprojectiles, slows/snares, and probably a few more active defenses I’ve forgotten.

Here’s some videos- hopefully they help you visualize the above advice.

Level 12 elementalist, soloing a level 16 veteran
Level 50 underspecced glass elementalist versus a champion (this one’s long- don’t feel obliged to watch it all the way through)
Level 80 elementalist soloing a champion

Disclaimer 1: please do not click your skills- it’s a very bad habit that I’ve lately been working on shedding.
Disclaimer 2: all of the videos above were made using my second and third elementalists. Prior to them, I had spent hundreds of hours learning to play my first elementalist, and many, many deaths were involved. It’s all ultimately a matter of practice and persistence, not some inborn ability. I recommend reading http://doodlealley.com/2012/10/10/be-friends-with-failure/ if you’re feeling down- his philosophy is excellent and applies to much more than art.

Also, as previous posters have mentioned, some enemies are harder to face than others, and krait often make the top of that list due to condi spam, pulls, and ranged attacks that hit hard.

Hey, Copeh! Welcome to Tyria. ^^

I’m afraid my guild isn’t primarily based on Stormbluff Isle- though we accept members from any NA server, we’re primarily located on Tarnished Coast. We’ll still be able to do all PvE content (including dungeons and guild missions) together via guesting,, as well as sPvP, but you won’t be able to do World vs. World with anyone on a different server, nor access the guild bank and other guild upgrades (which are small boosts to magic find, exp, etc).

If you’re all right with that, though, then allow me to pitch my guild, Ember Solace [SOL], to you. To summarize some things in our GW2 forum recruitment post and our /r/guildrecruitment post, we are a guild devoted to making a warm, welcoming space for LGBTQ individuals, women, and other groups that have faced discrimination and harassment in MMOs and reality, as well as their allies. We take our safe space seriously and do not allow any prejudiced attitudes or comments- everyone deserves respect and affirmation.

Gameplay-wise, we are a casual/social PvX guild. We dabble in a bit of everything, but if you’re not interested in a certain part of the game, you won’t be forced to participate in it. If you have RL obligations and have to take a hiatus or get pulled out of the game, that’s perfectly all right with us. Real life comes first.

Socially, we’re a small guild that’s focused on the person behind the avatar. We often chat about real life in /guild, from our favorite TV shows, to cooking, to issues concerning the LGBTQ community. New players are very welcome- people here like answering questions and understand that we all start somewhere. We also have guild forums that are used daily.

This is what we’re looking for in our recruits:

-Members who not only tolerate the LGBTQ community, women, and other marginalized groups, but respect and affirm others regardless of their identity. For example, someone who refrains from harassing LGBTQ members but still believes homosexuality is sinful, wrong, or a kind of disease does not belong with us.

-Members who respect the safe space and are mature enough to understand that racist/homophobic/sexist slurs, casual use of the word “r*pe,” and humor at the expense of another’s trauma or identity are not okay, and that “I was just kidding” or “I didn’t mean any harm” are never excuses for offensive behavior. (Darn forum filter bleeped out the word.)

-Members who respect others’ playstyles and experience levels- members who will not berate others for making mistakes in a dungeon, who will not insult someone for wearing Knight’s gear instead of full zerk, who will keep a cool head during wipes or strings of PvP losses, who will not insult someone for being a casual, hardcore, or roleplayer. Remember that we are all here to have fun.

-Members who enjoy interacting with others, are newbie-friendly, and enjoy learning and teaching. New players are absolutely welcome here.

For more information, feel free to visit the recruitment posts I linked earlier, or drop by our forums at http://www.embersolaceguild.com.

I wish you the best of luck finding a guild that fits you. ^^

PS: We have a member here who loves to use emotes and caps and is very silly, so I think we’d get along just fine on that respect.

Let me preface this by saying that I am an elementalist- have been since launch, made and still make a daily habit of soloing champs for the hell of it, run glassy builds in organized groups.

That being said, I am in favor of nerfing Fiery Rush. No matter however which way you dice it, there’s nothing not broken about a mechanic that lets you down a boss before it can ever pull out its most threatening attacks. DPS-oriented groups should down an enemy faster than non-DPS groups, but not to the point that it trivializes the fight entirely.

However, the rest of the elite IMO should be left alone. It does good but not absurd damage considering its CD, and as with all conjures, holding a FGS locks you off from your weapon skills, where a lot of active defenses are located. So nerf Fiery Rush (reduce the damage of the trail and/or make it just do burning), but leave the rest of FGS alone.

As someone who has played a full PVT (tanky gear) ele, a Knight/Zerker (balanced) ele, and a full berserker ele, I will say that gear DOES make a difference. When running the Tower of Nightmares (open-world dungeon in a previous update), my PVT ele could laugh at enemies for the most part as long as I didn’t make stupid mistakes like sitting on a mine or not dodging guaranteed one-hit kills. This was very useful in that dungeon, since I spent most of it running alone or running a “rescue patrol” to rez other people. My Knight/Zerker ele, though, struggled more. I could definitely get through the tower with her, but I couldn’t take as many little hits and was pushed on the defensive more, which made both running through and running rescues more difficult.

I can also attest to the following- on average and assuming no boons, at scale 32 Fractals, a 10/0/0/30/30 knight/zerk elementalist will survive a direct hammer hit from the Legendary Archdiviner with about 20-30% health and be able to heal to full almost immediately. A 30/0/0/10/30 full zerk ele, however, will die right away. So yes, having some defenses does make a difference at that level and any equivalent/lower content.

The overall things I’ve observed:

-No matter what gear you have, you’ll ALWAYS want to dodge the big one-shot hits. Always. Even if you don’t get downed due to being tanky, it’s poor play and highly risky.

-When it comes to offensive power and survivability, your traits and skills matter more than your gear. A defensive gear/offensive traits character has more trouble surviving than a offensive gear/defensive traits character, assuming good play. This is because having active defenses/sustain (boons like vigor/protection/regen/swiftness, condition cleanses, counter-projectiles, blocks, invulns, etc) help much much more than stacking toughness or vitality. Defensive gear does make a difference, but if you really want to survive, you need something more than stats.

(Regarding the Legendary Archdiviner example I cited above, I do feel a full zerk ele can handle getting hit by the hammer and barely survive assuming the protection boon is up.)

-Survivability as a glassy character also depends on your party. This is twofold- it’s incredibly risky to rubrez someone as glass, since you’re pretty much completely vulnerable. In addition, you WILL need your party’s assistance in reflecting projectiles, applying boons, debuffing the enemy, etc. Thus, going glass (especially with running traits with little sustain) in an inexperienced group where people are likely to die or not use their skills to counter boss attacks is very, very risky. I personally never run full zerk or glassy builds for teaching runs. On the flip side, when I run with my static group, I know I can trust them to take care of themselves and coordinate defenses, so I’m a lot more comfortable being glassy.

-Don’t ever listen to anyone who says that the only way to survive as a zerker is to stack and cheese everything, lol. Again, it’s all in active defense, personal skill, and party coordination. (This is assuming full zerker gear and traits/skills with reasonable sustain, and a skilled, coordinated group- you’ll be pinched much harder if you have absolutely no sustain in your skill and traits and a bad group. At that point, it’s more a matter of luck.)

-Finally, realize that going glass is your personal choice. If it stresses you out, don’t feel obliged. Full zerk is the go-to for speedrunning and min/max groups, but there’s plenty of people out there who don’t give a skritt about optimization or speed. Find your people, run with them, do whatever you have fun with. At the end of the day, GW2 is a game.

Also, regarding your question about how warriors and thieves survive- as mentioned before, a lot of it is party coordination. I run regularly with a good friend who plays a warrior, and I keep enemies blinded or buff him with protection, which negates a lot of damage. A lot of it is also personal skill and awareness- there is a -shocking- number of warriors who will not dodge out of red circles of death, won’t strafe while fighting in melee (and strafing actually avoids a lot of damage), won’t get behind an enemy that’s aggroed on someone else, or won’t do anything to cleanse twenty stacks of bleed off themselves.

So ultimately, a tank is not needed assuming all players in the group are skilled- it should be also mentioned that traditional tanking does not exist in GW2, as there is no way to control mob aggro. In an inexperienced group, though, you can run an “anchor,” who will be oriented towards providing a lot of defensive support and helping people up when they go down. An anchor won’t be able to completely carry a group, but they can make it easier for an inexperienced group to learn. In more experienced groups, anchors are less important when everyone understands how to use and coordinate active defense.

Hope that helps!

Hey, webtoehobbit. I’m not sure if you’re still around to see this, but a lore-loving guild posted an ad in the GW2 guild recruitment subreddit. Here’s their link: http://www.reddit.com/r/guildrecruitment/comments/1vp2kg/gw2pvxlorestorynasf_forgeman_destroyers_ford/

Cosmetic-wise, it’s ultimately up to you. I rather dislike Norn but know people who love them, and love sylvari but know people who hate them, etc. You can check the race boards on this forum- they should have some threads where people will post pictures of their characters. That might give you an idea of what to shoot for.

theguildless.1386:

Falunel’s answer is spot on, but keep in mind that in an upcoming balance patch (tomorrow?), they are increasing the cooldown on Renewing Stamina from 5s to 10s, meaning it will be harder to achieve perma-vigor. Boon duration and a skill like Phoenix can help palliate.

iirc elementalist vigor will be left alone. Only guardian and mesmer vigor will get hit.

@azizul: Elementalists have much lower HP than mesmers and the same or less armor. As someone who plays both ele and mes, let me tell you that it’s a helluva lot easier to suddenly go squish on an ele than a mesmer, even if the mesmer is glassier.

Hey, no worries. Welcome to the elementalist class.

Regarding permavigor, put 10 points into the Arcana trait line and choose trait II, Renewing Stamina. This trait will give you 5 seconds of vigor every time you crit, with an internal cooldown of 5 seconds. You can stack permavigor by having a high enough crit chance to proc it consistently and/or having high boon duration, which will extend the duration of the procced vigor so it will keep stacking. I am able to achieve permavigor with +45% boon duration and 33% crit chance (not counting fury), but these are not absolute numbers.

As for permafury and permaswiftness, there are several ways you can achieve them. The first is to run a build with 30 points in Air Magic and at least 20 points in Arcana, choosing the traits Fresh Air (recharge Air Attunement on critical hits) and Elemental Attunement (gain a boon whenever you attune to a certain element). Elemental Attunement gives swiftness on attuning to air, the 5-point minor in Arcana gives fury upon attuning to any element, and Fresh Air will make it so that, with a high enough crit chance, you will be able to swap into Air Attunement constantly, stacking up fury and swiftness. You can also put ten points into Air Magic and choose Zephyr’s Boon, which grants swiftness and fury upon using aura skills, and stack them up that way. You can stack permafury (but not permaswiftness) by putting 30 points into Fire Magic and choosing Persisting Flames, which will give you and nearby allies fury whenever you use a blast finisher in a fire field.

In addition, you can gain a permanent +25% speed boost without swiftness by slotting Signet of Air, or using Superior Runes of the Traveler or Superior Runes of Speed. Both come at a price, though- you are giving up either your runeset or your utility slot.

Hope that helps!

I can’t answer you on your first query.

As for the second, it’s a graphical glitch. Go to the selling tab and then back to the shop tab, and it’ll fix itself.

Iris Ng.9845:

I call it bull. No one would teach a student speed run if they have no idea how capable the student is. My first lesson of meta (Arah p4), I was given advices on traits, rotations, utility skills, consumables. I was told to stack in what corners, what to expect, what skills to use in what situations. They are all in a very clear manner.

Can you elaborate on the bolded bit? When I say “traditional, then speedrun,” I mean it in regards to teaching students who are brand new or practically new (e.g. have only ever done AC story) to dungeons. If the student’s darn good at combat already and says, “I think I’m fine without learning the traditional method, just teach me the speedrun,” then by all means do so.

Teaching the traditional method isn’t about efficiency. As I said, it’s inarguable that a calculator is faster than mental math. It’s basically about getting students used to situations that require split-second thinking, like “oh no, I’m out of stamina and Kholer’s starting his windup, what do I do?” The goal is to transform the reaction from “panic!” to “I’ll stunbreak from his pull or use a reflect/block/invuln,” and then have that reaction carry over to novel situations. Adaptability and fast thinking are hallmarks of a good action gamer.

Now, here are the main concerns with traditional->speedrun:

-Time. Usually, you won’t get students to stick around for two runs, so if you’re going traditional->speedrun, you would have to do a traditional run while explaining how the strategy would be different in a speedrun. From my experience, if you can do a traditional run proficiently and are geared/built right, it shouldn’t be too hard for you to transition to a speedrun’s strategies- still, there’s a difference between hearing about something and experiencing it.
-The method’s effectiveness depends a lot upon the student. There will be people who will struggle to improve or improve very slowly over multiple traditional runs. In their cases, if they’re frustrated and just want to know speedrun methods, skip the frustration and go straight to speedruns.
-Upper-level dungeons. This is where your Advanced Analytical Chemistry comes in. I’m pretty sure that if you can speedrun Fractal level 49, you’ll be fine with -not- learning how to do CM story traditionally. Traditional->speedrun is more about teaching completely new people who don’t have a foundation.

Clumsy.6257:

@falunel: let me give you a metaphor, when you teach someone how to make a wheel you don’t tell them to use the very first version that inevitably was a square and didnt work well, you tell them to go straight to a circle because thats what works best

Here is my metaphor- the calculator.

It is inarguable that using a calculator is easier and faster than mental math (unless you have a godly gift with numbers, which most people do not). Calculators are also in easy access, portable and cheap. Why, then, do you think math teachers forbid students who are just learning the fundamentals from using calculators?

Solve this in your head or on paper, right now: 314 + 128. It shouldn’t be too hard for anyone here. But I’m pretty sure everyone here has had math teachers who’ve refused to let them use calculators when they were learning to add.

Here’s what your thought process likely was on that question: you added the numbers in the ones position, 4 and 8, to get 12. You carried over the one and added it to the tens, 1 and 2, to get 4. Then you added the hundreds to get 4. Answer: 442.

It seems like such an easy and logical process to you. However, imagine a person who has never learned to add beyond counting things on his fingers. Perhaps he might not have even learned that. Instead, whenever he had to solve a problem, he was handed a calculator and taught how to punch in the numbers. That’s all math is to him- punching in the numbers.

Now, ask him to solve 314 + 128 without a calculator. Remember, he hasn’t learned -anything- at all about math. Chances are, he’s going to struggle. When he goes out on his own, into a world that demands addition of grocery prices, bills, gas, etc, he’ll be bound to his calculator. He can’t do anything without it.

Now, take that a step further, and imagine if all the calculators in the world stopped working. Or imagine him getting thrust into an alternate universe where there are no calculators at all. What can he do then? He can learn, but better to learn early on than when he’s at the stage of needing to buy groceries. Meanwhile, the people who have learned early on how to add without calculators will have a better grasp of the situation.

That’s what teaching traditional before speedruns is all about. It’s less efficient, it’s clunkier, it’s rather painful at times. But it teaches you how to add instead of just handing you a calculator. You’re better equipped to understand the game and adapt to novel situations. I fight Kholer without stacking and have zero issues. I ran with a guildmate the other day, though, who has only ever killed him by stacking. He struggled, a lot. Fell prey to almost every pull.

Now, imagine if Kholer was altered so he was unskippable and unstackable. Or if a boss was added like him that was unstackable. Recall that Anet’s looking to address the zerker meta. And what if that player looked to enter PvP, our alternate universe where calculators don’t exist? Of course, dungeoning alone won’t make you a PvP master, but in traditional runs, you are exposed to fights that do not end in a blink, where you must dodge more than two attacks and understand how to sustain yourself.

Granted, as I said before, this is a game. If someone outright says, “I don’t care about mastering everything, I just want to speedrun,” go ahead and teach them the speedrun. However, in other cases, especially cases where people say, “I want to learn,” teach traditional before speedruns if at all possible.

And @Anierna.6918, that’s NOT a “play how you want” problem, that’s a reading comprehension problem, which is an entirely different thing. In those cases, yes, it’s the PUGs’ faults for not reading. It’s illogical to insist EVERYONE adopt the zerker meta just because you ran into some dumb players, just as it’s illogical for someone to insist that all rangers should reroll because they asked for heavies only and a ranger joined. Many of the non-meta players I know outright avoid zerk/speedrun parties and make their own groups. If someone doesn’t read when you ask for zerkers only, go ahead and kick them (you have every right to do so if they don’t read), then get on with your day.

Also, for your latter post, that’s why I included point three:

-Explain the zerker meta and why it’s efficient, but emphasize that it’s ultimately a matter of choice and group. If the student’s into speedrunning or hardcore PvE, let them know to use zerker. If they just want normal runs with PUGs, explain that some PUGs are going to ask for zerkers, but they can join PUGs who don’t care or even start their own groups. If they’re doing casual runs with friends/guildies, then it’s entirely up to them.

Anierna.6918

@ Sarah: The objective of PvE is to complete it as quickly as possible. Zerk/assassins is optimal for achieving that. It also forces a player to becomes better because it eliminates his margin for error. Anyone who does not accept this is delusional. I’m fine with you being delusional; that’s your choice. But the buck stops when you try passing your delusions onto others. Spreading misinformation to innocent little pugs is a travesty. You’d be a better help to the community by refraining from saying anything at all.

sorry, but

The objective of PvE is to complete it as quickly as possible.

Where exactly are you getting this? Maybe it is for you, but it isn’t for everyone. Some people just play the content because they like it, or because it’s their way of spending time with friends, and they don’t care if it takes ten more seconds or ten more minutes or if they have to wipe ten times in the process, as long as they’re enjoying themselves and laughing up a storm in the process. I’ve been in the groups that run everything swiftly and smoothly as butter, and I’ve been in the groups that meander through things but socialize a lot and have many laughs together. There’s fun in both types.

I’ve met people who are anxious as glass. People who are anxious in melee and range instead. People who find the meta builds incredibly boring and like to experiment in dungeons. I am not anxious as glass, love melee, and play meta-slanted builds in groups that can support them because I personally like to push the envelope and am a math person. But I respect the people who do not do that, because people are different and enjoy a game differently.

If this was a business, you’d be justified in saying that the most efficient way is the only way. But this isn’t a business- this is a god kitten game. It’s shocking how many people forget that. Someone who decides to run PVT in their own group several servers over has no effect on your zerker only group- and by all means, go ahead and make your zerker only groups. It’s not the PVT group’s business.

That being said, I personally believe -this- is how things should be taught:

-Newcomers in dungeons should be allowed to wear whatever they like on teaching runs, and be taught the traditional (no exploits, minimize stacking) way of running first. This is because traditional runs, though less efficient, do a better job of teaching boss mechanics and instilling a fear of red circles/glowy animations than speedruns where the boss will die before putting out said red circles and glowy animations. As for “wear what you want,” defensive stats do make a difference. Sure you can’t facetank and it’s now three hits instead of one to kill you, but it’s much easier to learn with a margin for error.
-If the student will be PUGing or speedrunning later, teach speedruns, but again, only after teaching the traditional way first. Preferably do multiple traditional runs to get the student used to mechanics. If multiple runs are impossible, say “this is where you would stack if you were speedrunning,” etc.
-Explain the zerker meta and why it’s efficient, but emphasize that it’s ultimately a matter of choice and group. If the student’s into speedrunning or hardcore PvE, let them know to use zerker. If they just want normal runs with PUGs, explain that some PUGs are going to ask for zerkers, but they can join PUGs who don’t care or even start their own groups. If they’re doing casual runs with friends/guildies, then it’s entirely up to them.

Ultimately, students should be given the information to choose and explanations of what to expect for each option, but the choice should be left up to them. There is never any “only” way to do things, especially not in games.

Saying that zerker is the most efficient way to run things isn’t a delusion.
Likewise, saying that there are other methods of doing PvE other than zerker isn’t a delusion.
Saying that people should play as they want isn’t a delusion.
Saying that everyone should conform to your notion of fun and play the game your way, even if they do it in their own groups and leave you to your own methods, IS a delusion.

Heya, Perfectruin. I main an ele and would be glad to give you some tips in-person. I’m online right now for two more hours, but if you have another time you’d like to meet up, or prefer I explain myself here, let me know.

For now, though, let me leave you with this link (read the latter half): https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/Old-folks-trying-to-game/first#post3437123

Bump for an excellent guide!

IonusX.7905:

blah blah blah

sigh, seems like you don’t understand what RP is. Looks like I have to post this again…

As a resident of the unofficial RP server and a strong advocate of RP and all gameplay styles, I feel obliged to provide this clarification:

Not speedrunning dungeons does NOT make you a roleplayer. A roleplayer is someone who “acts without a script”- who pretends to be their character and tells a story by acting as their character, as sort of a collaborative creative writing exercise. RP guilds are devoted to this practice (with storylines and sometimes elaborate plots), and not necessarily to dungeons, etc.

If you try to optimize everything, you are a min/maxer. If you do not care about optimizing everything, you are a non-min/maxer and simply a normal (or casual, depending on who you ask) PvEer. Thus, a player who does dungeons without caring about optimal setups (and there are a lot of people who don’t care about super deeps) would be considered the normal or casual PvEer, and a player who always strives to optimize everything would be a min/maxer. These definitions are blurry and depend most on the perspective of the person you ask, though.

Overall, the takeaway message is: RPer does not equal non-min/maxer PvEer.

While yes, you technically can RP on whatever server, TC is the only NA server where all the RPers congregate- it was voted on by RPers before launch that it would be the unofficial RP server. It’s the only server where you’ll run into people RPing in the cities and the wilderness, where you’ll see RP being discussed, where a bunch of RP events will be held, where the bulk of RP guilds will be recruiting, and where non-RP guilds will have “RP-friendly” as one of their selling points.

As for the OP: TC is definitely a good starting server. It’s very well-populated and quite friendly. WvW-wise, it’s tier 2, one tier below tier 1- however, we still have a lot of good fights, skilled commanders, and dedicated WvW guilds, and the benefit of being T2 versus T1 is that the wait times for WvW aren’t nearly as long. The great majority of TC commanders and players are also friendly to newbies and glad to have them along.

Feel free to drop by http://forthetoast.com/ and say hello or ask any questions you may have. Overall, do feel free to guest around (you can also transfer for free once a week by deleting all characters) and try out any server that catches your interest. Welcome to GW2!

Hey, RedAnders, and greetings from a resident of the unofficial NA RP server.

I’m not in a RP guild myself, nor am I a formal RPer, so I can’t give you personal recommendations. However, if you haven’t already, I recommend giving http://www.guildwars2roleplayers.com a look. They have a listing of RP guilds there, and it’s a good way to get to know people.

Best wishes!

StefanSaegull.5804:

This is intended only for World vs World

Hey , I currently have the tanky guardian with a staff as everyone else have .. but I just wanted to make another toon just for fun.

Sooo , can you guys help me pick a profession that would be good for running with the zerg wearing full berserker gear.

I wana see them big numbers and good aoe. I dont care if I die but ranged class would be awsome. Careful positioning with big numbers sounds fun.

kinda torn between a shortbow thief and a Ele.

all feedback welcomed

If you’re going to zerg in zerker gear, you’re going to have to be a backline class like staff ele for sure. Backliners will be outside the main zerg, a distance from the fringes.

The thing about being a zerker in WvW is that even if dying isn’t an issue for you, it’s a major issue for the rest of the zerg. If you get killed (and zerkers tend to melt), every single enemy that hit you will get revived if they were downed. It can turn the tide of a battle.

Even as a backliner, I’d recommend building some balance and maybe wearing some Knight’s pieces or even Celestial (which is popular among eles), at least until you become experienced. This is because even when positioned outside the main zerg, smart commanders will circle around and charge the enemy backliners or order their own backliners to focus fire, or smart players and havokers will single out and snipe/pull backliners. You can never avoid all of the damage and a dead DPS does no DPS.

Otherwise, if you want AoE, staff ele sounds like a good choice- just know your job won’t be only AoE DPS, but supporting with water fields and dropping CC as well.

Turn down your post-processing and shaders, and adjust the “Effects LOD” settings to lowest. It’s not going to remove everything, but it’ll cut down on a lot of bloom and light. I’d also recommend turning down everything else in zergs to reduce lag, which is more of a danger than excessive spell effects in WvW.

WvW itself, I find, is more of a matter of practice. I’ve been in a few 100v100 fights and haven’t had issues with targeting, but it’s probably because I’m desensitized to the stuff that goes on and able to sort out what is what. And also because I go into a sort of trance where my whole focus is staying on the commander like white on rice, and everything kind of follows. (Also, you actually don’t want all spell effects turned off, since you’ll want to be able to see friendly combo fields for blasting, know when you’re about to walk into a hostile Static Field, or know that the reason you’re getting hammered is because someone cast a Feedback on you. Older games tend not to rely so much on sight identification and positioning of effects.)

First of all, good guide.

Second of all, DreamyAbaddon’s post didn’t come off as rude or whiny at all to me, just informative. Note that in that first line, he says “if you are new”- he doesn’t leave it at “don’t follow this guide or the train.” Nowhere does he attack your guide itself. It’s a good post and certainly not one that should be removed.

Sure, stuff can be worded better, but overall I think you’re overreacting a bit…

Orenard.2541:

Hi Falunel,

Thanks for that, what a great welcome! Your post gives me a good helping of faith that I’m going to enjoy this game a lot. I actually just submitted an app to a guild that looks perfect for me and they’re on tarnished coast too- they’re called Remnants of Hope.

Question- would it be a problem for me as a UK player to make my home on Tarnished Coast?

You’re most welcome, and good luck!

As for playing on TC, you should be fine. The two issues you might come across are population and lag. Most EU players say they don’t experience lag, so you should be all right there. As for population, TC’s peak hours are NA peak hours, but from what I’ve seen, we do have a decent amount of people who play during EU hours. Overall, give it a try and see how it works out.

Welcome, Orenard!

You came to the right game. Here’s a little thing I wrote in another thread:

GW2’s not a typical MMO- it’s not about rushing to max level to then grind one tier of gear in order to grind the next tier of gear so you can participate in X raid to get another tier of gear and then be able to participate in Y raid to get another tier of gear ad infinitum. It’s more like Skyrim in that a huge part of the game is built around exploration and finding secret events, secret caves, interesting tidbits of lore, and so on. You take your time and progress at your own rate.

When people say that the endgame starts at level 2, that’s what they mean. From the beginning, you can unlock your skills and go exploring wherever you wish. You unlock dungeons as you progress and can do them again at level 80 with them still being challenging and rewarding. If you don’t enjoy running from heart to heart, then turn off your minimap and simply navigate by what you see on the screen- follow an interesting path, dive to the bottom of a lake to find a network of underwater caves, or read a book in a creepy shack to spawn demons that will ambush you from behind. There’s a whole world of things to discover out there, and practically everything in it will give you exp.

I’ll warn that you’ll run into people who, to put it politely, are “typical MMOers”- the people who complain that everything’s a grind and do nothing all day but run in circles (in fact, you may encounter these people in the human starter zone). However, I have played since launch, have several fully geared level 80s/a legendary weapon/a bunch of other nice cosmetics, and can attest that GW2 is only grindy if you make it so. It’s very easy to get top-tier gear (with cosmetic stuff being harder to get), and I funded everything just by gathering while I explored and dungeoning casually.

Since you’re interested in RP, I would recommend joining either Piken Square (EU) or Tarnished Coast (NA), the unofficial RP servers. I can’t say anything for Piken Square, but I’ve been on Tarnished Coast for months and it’s a well-populated server with a lot of nice people and plenty of RP. Feel free to check out any server that catches your fancy, though- you can “guest” to play PvE content on any server in the same region as your home server. You can’t guest cross-region (from a EU server to a NA server, or vice versa), but you can transfer for free once a week by deleting all of your characters (and it works cross-region).

If you’re interested in a RP guild, or just the RP scene in general, I’ll recommend taking a look at http://www.guildwars2roleplayers.com, the GW2 RP hub. In addition, if you decide to play on Tarnished Coast, you’re free to check out my guild, Ember Solace. We’re a small social/casual guild primarily focused on creating a welcoming, affirming space for LGBTQ individuals, women, people with disabilities, and other groups at the margins. We are also incredibly newcomer-friendly and devote a lot of time to answering questions, taking people through their first dungeons, and helping them level.

I wish you the best of luck and happy gaming!

Wow, the amount of whining in this thread. shakes head

OP, what are you interested in? GW2’s not a typical MMO- it’s not about rushing to max level to then grind one tier of gear in order to grind the next tier of gear so you can participate in X raid to get another tier of gear and then be able to participate in Y raid to get another tier of gear ad infinitum. It’s more like Skyrim in that a huge part of the game is built around exploration and finding secret events, secret caves, interesting tidbits of lore, and so on. You take your time and progress at your own rate.

When people say that the endgame starts at level 2, that’s what they mean. From the beginning, you can unlock your skills and go exploring wherever you wish. You unlock dungeons as you progress and can do them again at level 80 with them still being challenging and rewarding. If you don’t enjoy running from heart to heart, then turn off your minimap and simply navigate by what you see on the screen- follow an interesting path, dive to the bottom of a lake to find a network of underwater caves, or read a book in a creepy shack to spawn demons that will ambush you from behind. There’s a whole world of things to discover out there, and practically everything in it will give you exp.

At level 80, it’s left up to you what to do. The game doesn’t transform, you simply have no barriers anymore. You can do any dungeon, do WvW on an even level and learn to command havoc squads and zergs, explore any zone you want. You can start working on Ascended gear, shoot for a legendary, shoot for a hard-to-earn title like Dungeon Master. You can challenge yourself with solos and learn to master your class. You can climb ranks in PvP. You can do guild missions, take newbies through their first dungeons, or organize server events like Tequatl kills. You basically can do whatever.

(But some people won’t be satisfied unless the game spoonfeeds them on what to do. =/)

About warrior, it’s a good class for newcomers, but it’s NOT the ~supah OP~ class everyone whines about. In PvE, thieves, guardians, and elementalists all provide better DPS than a warrior while bringing more utilities to the table- if you look at any organized min/max group, they will have only one warrior at most for their banner buffs, and fill the other slots with other classes. In WvW, guardians do just as well if not better in zergs, thieves and necros are better havokers, and a bunch of classes do just as well if not better than warriors at roaming. The main appeal of warrior is that it’s the “Mario” class- it has a low skill floor and can tolerate mistakes, while other classes will perform more effectively but take more attention to play. Unfortunately some people just conflate “lower skill floor” with “hopelessly OP.” (Also, the part about warrior being a lovechild that never gets nerfed is blatantly false, given that warriors experienced a HUGE nerf to hammer and other nerfs to control traits, longbow, and elsewhere recently.)

In other words, OP, there’s a lot of whiners about. Take whatever you read with a grain of salt.

Finally, this gets stickied! o/

GW2’s quest system is much different than TERA’s. TERA sends you on a linear path, from one quest hub to another. GW2, on the other hand, is about exploration and free roaming. If you see a path that’s interesting, you can follow it north to discover a cave of skritt who need your help defending themselves from marauding ettins. Or you can go south, to the farmers who are fighting off centaurs. Or east, to explore an underwater system of tunnels and fight an undead monster in the deeps. It’s all up to you.

You do not turn in quests in GW2. Once you’re done with the task, you get your reward. However, you can talk to the NPCs to see if they have any interesting items for sale or any new information, and even continue following them to discover new events. I highly recommend giving this a read: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/Completely-New-to-GW2/first#post3353537

As for combat, the combat system here is much different than from most MMOs. There are no tanks or healers. Everyone is responsible for keeping themselves alive, damaging the enemy, and using support and control to help keep themselves and others alive. Some skills do less damage, but do additional effects that help you stay alive.

For instance, watch this video of a level 12 elementalist (the class with the lowest base HP and armor) soloing a veteran (harder-than-usual) enemy that’s four levels stronger: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ubm6k-AX2U8

You will notice that the enemy hits me for over half my health. If I’d stood there and tried to take it, I would have died, even if I had used my heal (on a side note, it’s more important to avoid damage than it is to heal it in GW2). However, I defeated it by cycling my skills. Some of my skills, like the ice blast skill, do not do much damage at all- however, they slow the enemy down, allowing me to avoid being hit, keeping it at arm’s range while I cut away at its health.

I recommend reading https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/Combat-System-101-Guide/first
As for a general newbie guide, allow me to toot my own horn and link this: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/New-Player-Outreach-Resources-Events-FAQs/first

Welcome to the game!

Added Equinox to the list- thank you for volunteering!

Conncept.7638:

Falunel.7645:

Conncept.7638:

and the elementalist has systematically received ‘improvement’ after ‘improvement’ over the last year removing any and all play value it once had, stay away.

You are aware that elementalist is currently one of the top two classes for PvE and one of the most wanted classes for WvW, right?

Do you have anything at all to back that up? I know they are played, the last ANet infograph showed that they are the second most played class, my main is an Ele and I am on it for over 90% of my playtime, but that does not in any way equate to being sought after in any content. Because I not only do not see that in game I don’t even know a single solitary person other than you who believes that. However the above is admittedly nothing more than my opinion on the current state of the elementalist, so if you have statistics I would love to see them. If not, well then you’re wasting your time correcting an opinion with nothing but a differing opinion to offer as evidence.

I do have explanations.

First of all, elementalist in PvE. Read this post: http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1o3l2q/playing_with_a_larger_5_group_of_friends_need/ccol9eb

To restate what’s in that, elementalists have the second highest PvE DPS in the game, ranking right under thieves. They outdamage warriors by 3k due to damage multipliers in their traitlines and skills. On top of that, they can stack 16-25 stacks of might and maintain permanent group fury.

You will see mostly warriors in PUGs, but this is not because warriors are a better class, but because they are, simply put, harder to screw up on than thieves and eles. They are easier to reach optimal DPS on, while reaching optimal DPS on an ele requires people to coordinate to stack vulnerability and buff each other. In organized min/max play, however, people will prefer to mix classes, often with eles. In semi-organized runs where conditions aren’t 100% optimal, but the players understand class synergy and play competently, the group will still always benefit from having a competent ele who can stack might, drop conjures, and buff party members. Even if an ele has somewhat lower DPS than a warrior due to suboptimal conditions, the ele brings a perpetual partywide 16+ (often 25) stacks of might and permafury (which a warrior cannot) and thus contributes more to the entire group than stacking another warrior.

(Also, I’ve played a mightstacking ele in semi-organized and casual dungeon groups. Despite being glassy, I usually don’t have issues if I pay attention and if the rest of the group plays well and doesn’t go down constantly, since rezzing other people is the primary reason I get downed or close to downed. If I decide to run as a tougher build, usually 10/0/0/30/30, I can usually serve as an anchor or bring down bosses solo if everyone else wipes.)

You can see this same effect with rangers- though their max-DPS-if-all-conditions-are-met is lower than a warrior’s, they provide a partywide precision boost and a partywide raw damage boost of 7%, making it more desirable to run a ranger instead of another warrior. Like with eles, though, the skill floor for ranger is higher than that of warriors.

That’s only looking at dungeons. In open-world stuff, elementalists are a major backbone of Tequatl frontline squads. Conjure Ice Bow’s fourth skill does massive AoE damage, especially to large structural objects. (It should also be noted that eles are wanted for this same reason in AC exp runs.) I also have no issue soloing any group events or champions I come across as an elementalist.

Now, WvW-wise, you’re not going to make up the bulk of a zerg out of elementalists, in the same way you wouldn’t make a zerg out of mesmers or necros. However, practically every zerg will have a number of staff elementalists on hand, especially organized guild groups. This is due to the fact that staff eles provide:

-Very high AoE DPS (look up the Meteor Shower + Tornado trick)
-Water fields (a major source of healing for zergs) and wind fields (usually saved for battles, but a source of swiftness outside of battles). No other class can provide wind fields, and the only other classes capable of making water fields are rangers and engineers (both of which sacrifice their dedicated self-heals in order to do so, and both of which contribute less than an ele does in other categories).
-AoE CC- see Static Field, Frozen Ground, and Unsteady Ground.

I had a fairly recent (about 3 months old) reddit thread asking what the most useful WvW profession was. Almost every post in it mentioned staff elementalist. I’m trying to find it again (keep getting stuff that’s a year old), but I’ll post it here if I can find it.

The one field elementalists are currently weak in is sPvP, but in WvW and PvE they’re in a pretty good spot.

Conncept.7638:

and the elementalist has systematically received ‘improvement’ after ‘improvement’ over the last year removing any and all play value it once had, stay away.

You are aware that elementalist is currently one of the top two classes for PvE and one of the most wanted classes for WvW, right?

You could also record the video and submit the link privately through a ticket on the support website. Can take a while for them to get to it, but I’ve done it for several severe trolls and haven’t seen them since.