Guild Wars 2

While I don’t agree with your suggestion for Fire Shield (we can trigger one whenever we use signets so if it was changed to a blast finisher it would be even more ridiculously easy to stack might!). Not to mention that it’s an Aura and all the other auras are essentially the same [X effect when hit] I do agree that this skill needs a rethink.

Fire shield should be considered as being more than just an isolated skill, it needs to be looked at along with the traits.

Firstly it (much like the huge amount of pointless overlap in non-stacking speed increasing traits – such as Zephyr’s speed, One with Air e.t.c.) is yet another example of poorly thought through trait design, since both Flame Barrier and Fire Shield have pretty much the same effect… causing burning when hit.

This may not seem like much of a problem as one offers a chance of inflicting burning when hit while attuned to fire, while the other makes this a certainty for a short duration and when traited can be coupled with protection.
However given the many, many ways that Burning can be inflicted and the fact that Burning only stacks in duration it’s already trivially easy to get perma burning without either Flame Barrier or Flame Shield… Sure they have some use when attacked by multiple weak opponents, but that’s about it.
In groups or against single opponents you will be working hard not to be hit, not to mention using other means to inflict burning (fields), making these abilities doubly redundant.

Also the 3s duration on Fire Shield is very low when compared to the other Auras (5s Shocking, 7s Frost, 5s Magnetic), many of which have far greater effect, not to mention shorter cooldowns.

My guess is that Fire shield was balanced around the fact that it can be triggered from Signets and that Burning is considered strong, and it is – on paper at any rate. However kittening a weapon skill based on traits and making a slot 5 (loooong cooldown) skill markedly weaker than lower slot skills is a poor design decision.

If I had the choice I’d make Frost Aura the Traited aura triggered by Signets as chill is far less of a balance worry then burning and increase the duration of Fire shield to 5s and allow it to burn on proximity not on hit (Flame Barrier already does this).

PS Swirling winds does not and has never had the effect of reflecting projectiles. It destroys them. Magnetic wave reflects them.

Amnon.4769:

I agree that Elementalists could use a PvP-themed downed skill. As for Mesmers, oh how I hate you guys! The first 10% of the fight is killing you, and the following 90% is trying to finish you off in downed state!

Hell dude they could use a PVE themed downed skill as mobs will simply follow your mistform.

You can root them before doing so but it doesn’t last long enough to be significant, plus you can’t even use it to drop off the edge of cliffs to stop them getting to you as you still take falling damage while foggified and splat all the same.

To answer the OP, the disgruntlement with the profession probably has more to do with the fact that by now most people have had the chance to play other classes and make the comparison based on that.

As for Ele being durable… hmm I dunno. My Earth/Water endurance ele seems to have very little durability compared to either my warrior or guardian and further suffers due to having far lower dps … I can make one that is very good at running away though.. Does that count?

“It could be worse – you could have 2 [Elite] skills that totally replace your skillset. See, e.g., Guardians.”

What you mean in the way both Fiery Greatsword and Tornado do?

silvermember.8941:

elementalist has only one real flaw (except for the usual bugs), it is its really really really really really really to the infinity+1 low hp. I don’t know wth Arenanet was thinking nerfing their damage while nerfing their HP to oblivion and I am not sure how it manage to leave private beta in its current state ( a little overly dramatic I know).

That’s very true, but there’s waaaay more than just that. Admittedly though low HP is not really a flaw in it’self provided there were sufficient compensation to make up for it. Like a fellow Ele (now warrior) said “I’d have liked a little cannon to go with my glass!”

Here’s a few others, just off the top of my head..

There’s the fact that traits to increase damage are tied to attunements rather than weapons making them considerably less effective than similar traits for other classes.

The relatively Poor Elite skills (Tornado lol).

The lousy Downed state abilities making Downed Ele’s a free stomp in PVP as well as proving nearly useless in PVE.

But worst of all is the attempt to balance a low dps AND low health profession on the basis of their high utility in a setting where other professions have higher dps and hp, not to mention ample utility.

Frankly I’d say that the last is the biggest design flaw of the Ele.

Isn’t that why there are conjured weapons?
Y’know to give you the option of having a weapon capable of fighting at a different range.

The only design flaw I can see there is that Ice Bow has a 900 range, not 1200.