Guild Wars 2

I would like to add that the class is not without complications, but I have accepted those complications by taking on the role I have chosen (support/heals) I know im not going to deal a crap ton of damage… im ok with that

I waited a while to even say anything. Whether I play support (which I do 100% of the time now on the cute lil ele) or I play DPS. I have always enjoyed my ele.

I do realize im about to perpetuate one of the problems people have stated here (my build consists of arcana) but for my purpose (healing in any formal party of farming DE’s) it works for me. I live a lot longer, and can actually solo content with i’d say a 98% survival rate (assuming i dont make too many mobs unhappy)

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=VkZ;1J0R0-U085sN-Z0;9;59-TT;14;304A47A;6nBnBnBnB3NX

Now why do I play support? cuz I have a bunch of glass cannons in my guild and no solid healers, since I was the ONLY ele in the guild, and I knew I could do it, I did it.

I roam around Cursed Shore healing.dpsing DE’s. Do I get a lot of loot? not unless im in a party, do I have an easy time farming the DE’s for karma?… yeah..lol

I love my ele, and prefer it to my warrior (who was solely created for farming)

ya know… cant honestly sa I ever really cared about the blast finishers on EA… i picked up the trait because a nice heal after a dodge was pretty spiffy.. does it break my spec for not having the blast finisher crap?… seriously i never paid enough attention to know it even WAS a blast finisher… so doesnt affect me at all.

I still play support, i still heal my cute little butt off.

I use clerics masquerade gear, with sapphire gems in it, dont remember which ones, but my gear is literally clerics masquerade boots of the cleric.

http://www.gw2db.com/items/57729-clerics-masquerade-boots I have gone with more precision gear in the past (as 5% of it is converted to healing) but I found that my soloing sucked, couldnt really do anything damage wise.

Heres the latest picture of my ele

forgot to add I use a sigil of superior water in my staff

I would like to add that the auto attack in water is immensely useful.. thats your main heal to be honest… assuming you get your stats to where you want them.. but going from wow where the heals are more purpose driven..

IE I cast a heal on my party because they are losing health.
in GW2 I put down a water combo field, if they need some insta healing I combo off that with arcane blast for burst healing, I keep them up with staff 1. this isnt some complex rotation, this isnt some situation where you NEED to be focus healing anyone in specific. staff support is basically aoe healing, its old school druid healing..

or maybe shammie chain heal..lol

Well my sexy elementalist is support… staff. Yes I only have 2 main heals, but the auto attack from water attunement using a staff is a heal for everything around that target… so, keep attacking something near people.

Also the water elemental… do not forget to use him..lol

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=VkZ;1J0R0-U085sN-Z0;9;59-TT;14;304A47A;6nBnBnBnB3NX

thats my build, my utilities, and pretty much everything

I am using clerics masquerade gear. I am focused on support and healing.

IK pretty much exclusively play asura… lol have an asura warrior and elementalist.. plus every new character i make to toy with a new profession is an asura, its just what i prefer

im support (read heal spec) on my ele, and I use glyph of elementals… why?.. because im in water attunement quite frequently and that extra bit of heals in a dungeon is just awesome..lol sure its “random” but whatever, its something i can cast and switch to another attunement to put out some damage and still feel reliably sure theres a heal going to be some where

I spec 30 into arcana 30 in water and 10 in air…but im a healer (with a staff)

I dont mind the extra recharge on attunements, it basically means when i do switch out of water (like people arent taking a lot of damage) i’ll switch off to earth or fire to do some dps, and after a few seconds water is back up so i can switch back without worry.

I also love evasive arcana too, ahthough from a dps standpoint maybe its not so useful, but dodge rolling to heal my allies?.. yes please

Well, given that Gandalf was pretty epic with a sword…lol

I think the issue lies in the fact that some arbitrary value (range) has been placed on every weapon that classes have access to. Obviously mesmers use great swords as a ranged weapon, rangers use axes as a ranged weapon (which felt weird to me)

So, I would in theory say why not make every weapon available to everyone, or perhaps open the choices a bit more to make sense?

I could sorta seem eles using a great sword. I would see it as being midrange, frontal cone style attacks.

not AOE per se, but cone attacks.

So:

Fire 1: frontal fireball focused from sword, slight splashy style damage
fire 2: fire arc spreading outwards in an obvious cone pattern

etc

but meh.

I guess the humor is in comments (paraphrasing) Elemenatlists are hard, i want to play my easy guardian.

meh, yeah eles arent an easy class to play, big whoop.

I know for a fact that on my ele in various dungeons (especially CM and AC) I was getting focused fired down. Especially in CM with the room after the door man (on story mode) or the snipers on the tree.

then i tried it out on my warrior, and she was getting focused on too!… turns out they just dont like ME!

seriously though, there are times when i was just DPS that my ele would just spend more time on her back, than standing up… but thats what im used to as a clothie anyway.

Yeah I noticed the earth version too..lol

I was like “hmmm i dont think thats supposed to be that way…”

I agree the cast time is too long, but i personally still use glyph of renewal, and will continue to do so… I like it.

I use it while soloing out in cursed shore, when morons just arent fast enough to get out of the way of the abomination, and 3-4 people go down, I can easily get 3 people up and back in the fight.

But im a healer, so your mileage will vary

my ele was a jeweler at first, and I may still end up switching back to it, but as for artificer… yeah its meh…lol

ive been enjoying tailoring, paired it with Artificer but while my tailoring is almost maxed, my artificing isnt..lol

theres a lot of truth to that right now. Right now I am using my ele water spec (staff ) and im farming a lot of the events in Orr… but I am reduce to basically just karma farming and occasionally getting enough damage on something to trigger loot.

I really dont like being punished for healing… but thats the long and skinny of it right now… even if i group with someone their progress on a quest doesnt usually count as my own, and its rare (maybe i just miss it) that i get loot off something they kill)

it happens, but farming Karma is always fun..lol. I will be working on my dual axe warrior this weekend, to try and get here into that area (got about 40 levels to go… woo)

I have found that after going pretty much full water spec on my ele that I just cant keep up with the AOE spammers farming in Orr… but whereas everyone else just wants the massive loot, im satisfied for now to assist, be support, heal people, and get at least silver medal on the events, usually gold on the abomination.

I will admit that because I chose to go water spec (for the good of the other squishy glass cannons in my guild) I have nerfed myself… but im ok with that. not every profession can do anything and everything. Except of course they redefined what everything is.

Can every single profession provide healing support in some way.?.. yes it would seem so..

can every single profession be called a healer?.. not so much.

can every single profession DPS? yup,
are some better than others? yup
are some skills and professions going to always congregate more players? yup

I think I was just about the only elemenatalist out in Orr this morning (meh, it was early, had a few minutes to kill before work, got about 4k karma, yay me)

but… since thats not really the topic of this conversation. I do agree its a little odd for an MMO claiming to do away with the majority of the aspects of the traditional healer/tank/dps to then fall back on it for armor, for health, and other things..

but then with the guild I run with I pretty much have no choice but to run water spec… good thing I like it :P

Well clerics gear is nice… but heal wise power is less than stellar to stack. I was using clerics winged gear on my water ele, til I realized that it was only really helpful for soloing (and still doing some damage) So I made a second set of gear just for soloing while still in my water spec. my healy gear is just for dungeons.

stat wise I am looking at precision/toughness/vitality/healing power

the toughness and vitality is interchangeable, depending on what you can find.

the problem with the removal of the holy trinity here, is that… well have you ever tried running a dungeon with 4 greatsword warriors running deep strike and a lot of signets…. and 1 warrior running a supportive build?

yeh thats painful.

Ran a CM last night (story mode) with 1 tanky guardian, 3 warriors (1 gs signet, 1 banner warrior 1 supportive shout dual axe warrior) and a very VERY glass cannon thief. This group (my guild group even) was dropping left and right. I switched to my ele and healed with my dps build in water attunement (scepter/dagger) it was still painful, but a smidge less.

So now I have for the good of the glass cannons, switched to a water spec, switched all my gear over to healing, and now we are running stuff just fine.

Sure maybe Anet wants any group to be viable, but thats just not the reality, sometimes you are going to have to bite the bullet..

But just because my ele IS a water healing spec now, doesnt mean she cant also dps, in fact with her using a staff, my auto attack on water DOES damage and Heal for quite a lot (thanks to the gear and runes).

But the point im trying to make, maybe the other 4 people suck, maybe they dont, but I do know that if I were running this group in WvW and I got punished for being a healer and actually doing my job, i’d be mighty upset

I like your suggestions Cosmic Teapot… for an entirely different build… but I like them

I recently switched to water, and switched pretty much all of my gear out to compensate. Right now its pretty slow going killing by myself, but in a group I do pretty well.

My guild typically runs at least 2-3 dungeons a week, and without me we have no solid heals.. and at least a fair amount of glass cannons

I was however in Ascalonian Catacombs yesterday with 2 other warriors, both using nothing but signets and a rifle

that was a painful run.

my build at most uses 3: Might, Fury and Rage… but thats only while soloing, or running with my girlfriends guardian.

When I go to dungeons I switch out the Fury with For Great Justice (i run on my mark as my other utility)

But I dont spec for Deep Strike anyway, so meh

so far i jhave yet to see people using any one single calculator its like there are tons out there! I like it..

Hmm Its an interesting build to be sure, its the typical “great sword with a metric crap ton of signets” it would appear. I was actually hoping to avoid that myself, I do enjoy using a few signets naturally, they are pretty good, but i refuse to just throw in any old signet for the sake of precision

I originally was going to go for 30 strength 30 arms, but I ended up finding that it didnt quite have the expected synergy with axes, maybe I was wrong i’ll check again

Now when you mean paladin like warriors, what exactly are you referring to?

back in WoW people used to call me the best pallie tank the warrior class had to offer (used to love aoe tanking). So, thats my real exposure to that comment..lol

So, for those who do prefer gw2db’s skill calc, I did put my build up there

http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/warrior#11|0|60|66|227|16754|246|30|836|1488|1496|10|1975|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|30|1107|1109|1105|14|0|1|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|

its actually a pretty cool site, compared to guildhead, as it does show you flat out what you get, so theres that.

Again the emphasis on this build and playstyle ISNT to stack bleeds, should bleeds happen, cool, but the real shine here is vulnerability, which is a benefit more in single target fights of course, however with Rending Strikes and Cyclone Axe following with a Whirling Axe on a group of foes… yeah that gets fun REAL quick.

I hope to devote enough time this weekend to hitting 30 (eh, I work alot, go figure) then I can see how this build holds up as I level into it, and get into dungeons

I dont tend to weapon swap as often right now, but given the focus of some of the other traits, I chose very specific ones, and discipline ended up making the most sense, even though its not a sure thing

I am looking for some advice when it comes to a build for my warrior. I am enjoying dual axes with rifle, so I fully intend to continue working on that playstyle, as its pretty enjoyable

the build I am working towards right now is http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#McRzzo0MMohNmMohNmxa9MxVRaVVcb

I understand that it could be better, right now the warrior is only lvl 21, however I love to plan out exactly what I am doing. I am not interested in bleeds per se, if they happen they happen, but what I am interested in is supplying the vulnerable condition as well as generally being useful

So, thats my focus, but in addition, I am trying to keep a respectable crit/precision/power as well

So im trying to find this build, but it seems that the site you used is currently down, perhaps you can build this on something more stable like guildhead.com or something

I wouldnt mind seeing your choices

all in all what matters is what you enjoy… but meh

I started with Great Sword/Hammer, after switching off of sword/warhorn, sword/shield, I am currently dual axes/rifle and I really enjoy it. I am currently precision/power focused, but I am only lvl 20, however I really dont have any problem killing mobs upwards of 3-4 lvls higher than myself

It may not have the visual punch of a short little asura using a great sword, but it is pretty impressive to me.

what do you mean NOW, i’ll philosophize mykitten off :P

but, I would add that gearing for power/precision/crit while leveling is kind of contraindicated on the bottle

Eh, its all relative, you know that.

Way to actually read what I wrote there. I said that yes, they do have strong per swing damage (meaning they tend to hit harder per individual swing of their weapon), however I still will out damage my other toons.

and yes, I do tend to get 2-3 shotted if im not paying attention.. but what do you expect from a class wearing light armor?

but you arent really looking for a differing opinion, neither are the majority of the people crying about how they get killed so fast when playing an ele… So, meh, whatever

I really dont understand where this fascination with “underpowered elementalists” comes from.. yes I have played other professions (thief, warrior and guardian mostly) and yes, they do have stronger per swing damage, but I still prefer my elementalist, and will probably out damage my own other toons.

I havent had a time where I really felt weak, although there are plenty of times when I am 2-3 shotted pretty quickly, usually on my personal stories thanks to crap AI (stupid Trahearne just stands there sometimes doing absolutely nothing)

But other than that, totally fine.

glyph of elementals ALL DAY AND NIGHT long.

seriously.. im not kidding, sure I toy around with the tornado from time to time, but it just makes you a bigger target. When i pvp on my lil bitty asura ele, the last thing i want to do is become a bigger target… besides, the fire elemental is prettykittenpowerful, so long as people ignore him..lol

surprisingly I thought I was going to have a thematic problem with dagger/dagger…. but I actually like the idea of it… even if I havent fully gone dual daggers yet myself.. I still very much like the idea. I just prefer scepters attacks to dagger main hand attacks

I ended up switching back to scepter/dagger, I missed the utility, and I missed the constant switching.

the build I went to is http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#MzsMz9colvaMoTvaMxxa9MoVbzRac

very nice, regardless of its merits, it FEELS right to me, and really thats about all that matters to me

I actually made the switch back to scepter/dagger (and got some prettykittensweet drops shortly after picking up some scrubs weapons) I have to say I friggin missed the immediate damage, while I was using a staff I didnt find myself switching as often, in fact I spent most of my time in fire/water, because honestly the other 2 just werent as good for me.

Now that im back to scepter/dagger after echecking out a new spec in the mists, I found that I am fully capable of doing a nice amount of damage, while still stacking crit,/precision, condition and power. Naturally end game may be different, but they really do pigeon hole you into condition damage as you are leveling.

So… this is the build I went with http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#MzsMz9colvaMoTvaMxxa9MoVbzRac

My first and only major toon has been as Ele… sure it hasnt been all face roll.. and it requires some thought… and on occasion I have had guild mates help on quests… and yet I still stick with my cute lil Elemenalist, because I feel that it is the best fit for my style of play

i think I recall this quest… or at least one thats similar. I actually found it to be easy to avoid the weapons on the ground, as they turned out to be pretty easy to spot. So while Trehearne was working on being a completely useless mix of useless and use imparied, I just avoied those areas where the 2-3 weapons were and everything worked out

I dont know what to tell you, ive done it ALOT… but your mileage apparently varies…lol

did you know if you start summoning your elemental in fire attunement, then say switch to water before it goes off… you get that elemental instead?…. yeah fun right?