Guild Wars 2

dukevonart.2691:

TL;DR – Critical damage was reduced for the celestial stat combination while there was an increase in all other stats.

If you’re lucky, they even changed the celestial stats on armor you already have so you don’t have to go out and buy/find/craft replacements.

My experience & luck: not so great, evidently (see attached)

I’d probably recommend D/D as our best groundspeed with RtL, Blazing Speed, and easy permaswiftness.

Then just gear as offensively as you feel comfortable – particularly if you plan to guest a high-population server so you won’t have to deal with e.g. soloing an event chain just to open up a map area so you can get it for completion.

Traitwise, at least 10 points in water for Arcane Abatement (reduced falling damage) so you can take more shortcuts.

Rottaran Owain.6789:

Thief, because invisible churning earths.

I really want to try this now.

In addition to removing blinds & aegis, Dragon’s Claw is also useful for proccing Renewing Stamina, since 3x hit = 3x chance to crit.

At level 80 with no precision from gear but Fury (which any standard D/D build will have 100% of the time) there’s only a 42% chance that you won’t proc Renewing Stamina with a Dragon’s Claw if all three attacks hit.

CountzuCrytus.7256:

The patch on the 15th seems to be reversing a lot of nerfs that they originally gave us (Evasive Arcana’s Cleansing Wave no internal cool down, Signet of resto being back to its full power in pvp) Along with the #3 dagger in ice and fire buffs, I cant wait for some D/D

I felt this way initially too, but it’s also introducing some new indirect nerfs to D/D, namely: (1) boon duration rune nerfs; (2) stacking sigil nerf; and (3) Celestial/ferocity rework.

To the OP: Elementalists are great in PvE at the moment, but pretty poor in WvW – especially roaming – and PvP.

The problem with WvW roaming is, as others have stated, that while we might be good in duels we lack the tools to chase an escaping opponent without overextending and making ourselves vulnerable to a double-back stomping. Further, most of the other common WvW roaming profession/builds “counter” Ele roaming setups pretty hard – Thieves, PU Mesmers and the like.

The problem with PvP is that Eles cannot perform any desired role as well as another class. We can’t bunker/decap as well as a Guardian/Engineer, we can’t run objectives as well as a Warrior (except maybe in limited circumstances with FGS cheese), and we can’t harrass a point as well as a Necromancer. We can gear to be glass cannons that burst people down very fast with perfectly executed Fresh Air combos, but when the cooldowns aren’t available such builds are extremely squishy, and good players will know how to avoid the burst.

I have a lot of fun with my Elementalist and will probably never stop playing it, especially for PvE farming, but I’ve been playing my other characters much more lately and will probably continue the trend post-April 15th.

vorfeed.5396:

My elegant Elementalist.

Very cool mate, I’ve got a Charr or else I’d be tempted to try something classy like this

JonathanSharp.7094:

Ya, sorry to post it on April’s fools.

This is 4 realz.

Praise be!

This would be a unique and highly attractive incentive to playing Fractals (and getting rewarded endless unwanted, bank-cluttering rings…).

Big thumps-up!

“…you’ll also see new legendary weapons and new types of legendary gear in 2013.”

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/

lolwut

On the other hand, this is great for D/D Eles, who get wrecked pretty hard by confusion

Zylonite.5913:

In the large 80+ zerg battles, the servers drop down the calculation/processing to exotic level so that there is less overhead.

Source please?

Cecilia.5179:

Originally, I was looking forward to this patch, but after seeing all of the nerfs to d/d ele, I don’t think I could dread it any more.

You’re not alone, mate. I was very excited initially too, with the changes to Burning Speed and Frozen Burst. But the boon duration, Celestial nerf, and indirect sigil “nerf” are disappointing.

The boon duration in particular seems like it will hurt D/D Elementalists very much, since we rely heavily on boons (and not armor/equipment) for our survivability. Celestial armor doesn’t offer significant defensive stats, and is about to offer even worse offense; the combined effect could be that D/D Elementalists become lackluster in all areas — defense, offense, AND support.

Currently:

A boon duration focused Elementalist can “mix and match” 2 runes of each: Water, Monk, and Traveler for a combined 45% boon duration (15% from each 2-piece rune bonus).

Currently, general boon duration is rarer on items than specific boon (e.g. regeneration-only, might-only) duration bonuses. It is easier to increase the duration of a specific boon, and possible to increase in total by a larger amount, than to increase duration of all boons at once.

Proposed changes:

The 2-piece rune bonus on at least one (Monk) is being gutted to one-third effectiveness; see attached. Assuming the bonuses on Water and Traveler are retuned accordingly, the maximum possible boon duration from the traditional “mix and match” approach will plummet from 45% to 15%.

Arenanet’s stated goal with the changes is to discourage “mix and match” investment in runes and promote more 4-, 5-, and 6-slotting of a single rune set for the later bonuses. For other runes, this goal is accomplished by backloading boon/condition duration into these later setbonuses. See attached for the new Balthazar & Strength numbers, for example.

Maths:

The highest new proposed single-set boon duration – Might from Strength runes – is 45%. Given that presently it is easier to increase max duration of a single boon higher than max duration of all boons (at a general rate of 15% all-boon vs. 20% single-boon), it is likely that the new maximum all-boon duration bonus obtainable from runes will be less than 45%, most likely around 33.75% (if current ratios are maintained)

TLDR: proposed Rune changes will very likely result in uncompensated 25% nerf to boon duration builds.

Worst-case scenario: 2-piece bonuses nerfed and no boon duration included on later setbonuses to compensate = 67% nerf.

Dislike.

Atoss.1056:

A mechanism that would allow us to take out rune from the item would be really nice, even if it would cost a small fee.

There is a gem store item called the “Upgrade Extractor.”

The cynical part of me wonders if they introduced it prior to all these ex-post item changes specifically in order to make money off people fleeing from nerfed items, in lieu of implementing e.g. a free, across-the-board one time stat reselection a la Magic Find items.

motherbox.5493:

I log in and Lion’s Arch is destroyed, and I’m in the ruins with no direction or explanation

So when you clicked the game application on your computer for the weeks ahead of time and saw the news stories about it, you ignored them, then on patch day you downloaded a giant mass of files with multiple news & announcements accompanying them and you refused to read all that, too? And NPCs shouting things and mission text like “Kill the X to advance to Y” and “Leave the city, it’s poisonous” aren’t clear directions enough for you?

motherbox.5493:

it thrusts you into a zoned area where if you’re not in a zerg you are instantly dead, there is no explanation

Reading is fundamental. Listening, too, although maybe you’ve got the sound on your computer turned down or something; I’m assuming you can read, though, since you’re on the forums. I really don’t understand how you can refuse to read the copious plot and exposition that’s been added to the game in the form of NPC dialogue, mission text, achievements, news stories & announcements, etc. and then complain that nobody has informed you. Were you waiting for a personal invitation? A one-on-one candlelit dinner with a game developer to talk you through everything step by step?

motherbox.5493:

To finish it all off, the kill on Scarlet was totally rushed and didn’t explain anything! Why did she gather the molten alliance, etc.? No one knows. In fac,t no one knows why she did anything at all.

You know she has a base in Lornar’s Pass, right? With diagrams and records of her experiments and endeavours? You may also check the GW2 official wiki, or perhaps even the forums you’ve currently found for pages upon pages of folks answering these questions for you (or – and in my opinion even more intriguingly – speculating about future things to come).

Honestly, I never have a problem with Mai Trin. I facetank her most of the time (same as any other boss), really. Running a classic 0/10/0/30/30 D/D boon duration build.

I guess my best advice would be to become very good about knowing your condition cleanses and timing them, plus knowing when to step back and heal vs. continue DPSing. I struggled the first few times, but once you’ve done the fight on several occasions you should develop a good feel for how squishy you are and how to compensate appropriately.

If you’re just plain too squishy at all, well… you might wanna fix that; I’m guessing groups aren’t wild about your dropping dead constantly in other circumstances, either.

I would not recommend staff since the encounter area overall is a bit too small to be making use of its max range (1200) vs. scepter or dagger (300-900 is plenty), and Mai Trin has a small hitbox and moves so frequently that AoEs and large field damage is impractical.

Hey mate,

Elementalists are very, very weak in PvP right now, mostly because the “jack-of-all-trades” profession role doesn’t fit well in very small scale lineups where specialization and min-maxing works better than improvisation and mixing roles.

In WvW we’re good, but only in group/zerg circumstances. Roaming we get killed very easily, and it doesn’t help that most of the other good roaming classes counter Elementalists very hard in a fight.

Specific Game Mode
PvP

Proposal Overview
Dramatically reduce – or possibly even remove – weapon swap cooldown, innately or by a trait.

Goal of Proposal
Distinguish Rangers from other physical DPS professions by making them less predictable, more flexible, more fast-paced and combo-driven in combat.

Proposal Functionality
Rangers are supposed to be agile, cunning, and great skirmishers. To me, this means they should excel at hit-and-run tactics as much as any other class, if not more (current prize for this, in case anyone had been living under a rock, goes to Thief of course). They should be able to dart in to capitalize on an opportunistic opening in an opponents defenses, then dart back out after baiting their foe’s reaction. They should be able to trick an opponent into committing to a toe-to-toe fight, then disengage quickly to harass from afar.

In brief, they shouldn’t have to telegraph their strategy – moves, yes, but overall tactics and combos no. Currently the weapon swap mechanic (and even kit/attunement swapping for Engineers and Elementalists) serves as telegraph to your opponent. If I see a Warrior switch from his greatsword to a mace and shield, I’ll know that for the next five to ten seconds he can’t access any of the great mobility that greatsword provides.

Allowing Rangers to swap weapons at any time, or with a drastically reduced cooldown, would make fighting a Ranger much more challenging and mindgame-y, akin to fighting a Thief or Mesmer, and would also make playing a Ranger more challenging and interesting. Currently the respective playstyles are “ignore pet, stick close to Ranger until it dies” and “start fight with whatever weapon seems to give you the most advantage, and hope it counters their setup.”

Associated Risks
Some weapon skills may need to be toned down so that swapping back and forth between them in rapid succession wouldn’t be too powerful; not so much the skills with long cooldowns, obviously (those can already be cycled back and forth more rapidly than they’re usable) but possibly skills in the zero-to-five cooldown range.

The traits Tail Wind and Furious Grip (boons on weapon swap) might warrant adjusting to prevent permanent swiftness and permanent fury, although I’d point out that perma-boons are very possible with several other profession & build combinations already. Not that I’m complaining… ];D

I still play a 0/10/0/30/30 cantrip D/D slightly modified to adapt to the nerfs/balance changes. It’s all right and has fairly good mobility and condition cleansing skill – actually about on par with warrior – but you will never kill anything unless you build full on glass cannon, and if you go the other route and build bunker style you’ll still get splatted by condition builds and skilled burst damage.

Classic D/D boon duration builds also get wrecked HARD by confusion (because they’re action-intense) which is more prevalent now, and boon conversion/stealing/removal. It’s also got very limited burst options: Fire Grab and Churning Earth, both of which are telegraphed and easy to avoid.

It’s a phenomenal group support class and I have loads of fun playing it, but definitely nowhere near as competitive or meta-advantaged as it once was.

Also completely impossible in SPvP due to nerfed/unavailability of boon duration runes.

I would greatly support this change. Chill is definitely a powerful condition and should be, but the way it impacts Elementalists is devastating.

It’s fairly clear that the profession design is meant to encourage shifting through attunements (based on individual skills’ long cooldowns, and the entire Arcane trait tree as previously mentioned). Having chill affect this basic profession mechanic hamstrings Elementalists in a manner not comparable to other classes.

So, this change was announced months ago ( https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/world-xp-and-you/ ) ……

Any ETA on when it’ll actually make it into the game?