Guild Wars 2

I’ve played the ranger, engineer, and and elementalist. So far i’ve yet to really find a jack of trades that has what i’m looking for. Something that can range and still take a decent number of hits. Ranger came close, but the pet dying issue really hurts it.

So now i’m looking at warrior. I’ve seen a lot of them running around with rifles and I know one of the trees at max level focuses on bleeds. Bleeds if I understand it being one of the better dots to have on a target. Along with decent defense and heavy armor it seems that the rifle, though single target, would make a good solo/group character.

Am I wrong in this assessment?

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

Maybe explain, never played vanilla wow so idk how rangers were but I can guess that aimed shot hasnt changed, that is a sniper like attack that I loved and now they even have another one called power shot or something, I could live with the pet if my longbow made me feel like a archer who is sniping, and not just someone trying to get off as many arrows as possible in the shortest amount of time. I loved cammo+aimed shot on my wow hunter, felt unique and dangerous, Id like something like that for rangers.

Well from what I remember you had to tame pets (you also had to survive taming them which sometimes required a healer friend) but also had to feed them to keep them happy. Less happy means less damage, but happy gave you a 150% pet damage increase. I think (didn’t really play a hunter at that time) there was a pokemon trainer aspect where you could train abilities from different pets to your current pet. But yeah in the end pet damage made up a large portion of the hunter’s damage. Not to mention it was one of the more costly classes to train and use since you had to consistently worry about ammo, even one of your bag slots was just for ammo and fire speed.

Apparently now you have the option after a certain point that it doesn’t hurt you to not have a pet out, which if dps wasn’t so overpopulated would make me want to try out the hunter again after all these years. Almost, but that would require going back to wow…. Then again I start yawning after a while playing mmos and so far haven’t with my ranger.

I get what they were trying to do with the longbow as a long distance attack…but with no conditions other then vulnerability it falls a little short. Now if the #1,#4, or #5 did bleeding it would help out a lot. But I don’t see as much use for the longbow outside of tower defense.

Raven.9603:

post

Actually I never knew of the bug. I was planning to put 10 in beast just for the +stat per kill, but that was not a high priority. I’m going to respec for that bonus now. So thanks for making my low levels a little easier. (Not that i’ve had to much trouble, but this is the 6th class trying to get past 60 and its getting a little old)

I agree actually with your good/bad points. Though what is this short bow QZ bug?

Dante Dragonhand.2538:

A stupid direction, they should do what wow did and give the OPTION to be pet based or weapon based. Atm you are almost 80% pet based with the weapons just being extra damage for your pet.

I also agree, but point out that vanilla wow was very much similar to what we have right now. With added bonus of having to keep the pet happy and fed, and buy arrows/bullets.

Though i’m not sure how the profession mechanic could be changed, I like my eagle that does decent damage and adds the best dps condition bleed. That and it’s a tough little raptor. Maybe an inactive passive kinda like what Raven suggested as if it were down?

Here are three more.

1)Reduce the effectiveness of the zerg. I can think of a few easy ways to do this, like having siege becoming more powerful like events do the more players are around. So the siege weapons hit the door and stuff harder, but the npcs and defender’s siege hit harder in return. Inversely defenses should also become weaker the more defenders there are. Basically encourage players to spread out more on the map and not just move in a big zerg, and having counters appear when in the area of the ‘event’ would let approaching players know if they would be helping or hindering the current action.

2) Dead player timer. To stop spying and the instant raising of a zerg players should be forced to auto spawn or be unraisable after so long. But either way a corpse should be a corpse and not an undercover agent.

3) Institute more bonuses for holding things. Things like the more towers held the faster the run rate out of combat on that map. Keeps maybe reduce upgrade costs for that faction by say 5%. Supply camps might reduce siege cost with gold or supplies by either 2%.

1)Work on better class balance (got rofl stomped by a perma stealth thief, seriously I come back after 3 months and no balance changes?)

2)Adjust the boost on lower players so that while they aren’t on the same stats as the now seriously geared out 80s, they are closer. New players will just get rofl stomped and quit the game if they came for wvwvw with the current imbalance. New players will just feel useless and I doubt many want to grind out 80 levels, fractles, dungeons, and whatever else just to feel at least moderately useful in what should be a fun pvp mode.

3)exploits that have been in for months need to be fixed.

Seriously what exactly have the teams been doing the last 3 months? Other then the power creep the game feels no different coming back now. After only a few days…I want to leave again. >.>

Ok, i’ve read a lot on what a Ranger CAN’T do, but not much on the CAN. I’ve only hit 25, but yeah the pet and lack of burst are bad. Then again I hit harder and more steady then my necro which I feel is in a similar boat. But I can still see a lot of people playing high level rangers and have been advised to try it if I want to be a ranged fighter. On the bright side I love having to track down new pets, I love not having instant access to new abilities since it makes me explore more. I loved that about vanilla wow, and miss that from today’s mmos.

So what exactly is the highlights of this class right now? If there is no burst, pet stinks, and damage stinks if my pet dies why would people keep recommending this class? Why do YOU keep playing it?

What about the thief? It has guns doesn’t it? Does it do well at ranged?

So i’m trying to find my fit in what class to play since I love/prefer ranged combat. I tried engineer…and it isn’t bad to me but I find i’m having a problem with range and damage. I feel I must be doing something wrong since i’m a dedicated range character and yet I see warriors breeze past me with their rifle.

So between all the ranged choices, which would allow me to stay at range while giving the best damage/support to my pve/wvwvw teammates? Also without being a glass cannon that can’t survive a gust of wind (Ala elementalists). Is rifle warrior the best option right now for ranged combat?

So I was playing around with my engineer again after taking a break and decided to try a 0/30/0/20/20 build. I’m doing p/p or p/s with utilities being grenades with the battle and speed potions. Traits being to increase pistols range and piercing along with reduction of cooldowns. Potions are reduced cooldown and cleanse conditions. Finally I took the zap toolkit usage and scope which gives a 10% buff to my crit chance if I stand still.

For my gear i’m slotting all minor and major divinity runes. Going more to precision emphasis with increased crit damage. I have Major sigil of earth and a sigil of might for my pistols, with the might I can switch out for chance to steal health on my shield.

So…is this completely messed up or viable for pve/ wvwvw? Any recommendations to make it better?

While I love the dark nature, the tankiness, and above all the non-critical need for minions (oh stars above do I hate pets) I do have one major complaint. There really is no burst damage to this class. That special mode we go in, what SHOULD be our burst, isn’t even close. The traits…aren’t really there for synergy. Our long distance attacks aren’t there either. Finally I feel like I do more damage from getting downed then I do on my feet.

…Ok maybe that was more then one problem. I like this class, but I feel the overly complicated elementalist is starting to feel more powerful and handy then my necromancer. Necromancers really have several problems and after two months away I haven’t seen any significant changes.

@Lynspottery: It isn’t a bad class or even broken. But it is a very rough cut gem of a class. I love caster classes and this is pretty much the toughest to kill caster I have ever played, even beating the mesmer. However it does have serious drawbacks, the lack of burst and reliable and accessible cc to name a few. Also get used to fighting from your back, you will do so a lot. But on the other hand, no other class really can keep fighting when they get downed, every other class it is a desperate battle but as a necro getting downed doesn’t faze me all that much.

Don’t get me wrong, the class is far from ideal. But if you play it you might find that it is still pretty enjoyable. I bring up my complaints not because I feel the class sucks, but because I get frustrated at seeing what the class is as opposed to what the class seems to want to be. Go with a scepter/dagger+staff build and give it a go. You can’t really tell what a class is about till about 30.

Jaydee.8143:

I agree thats one thing you have wrong, we spread conditions better than we even produce them. Our ability to SPREAD conditions is fantastic, whats funny is that we personally dont produce as many bleeds or vulnerabilities as other classes such as ranger or sometimes a thief.
We have plenty of ways to SPREAD them, epidemic, dagger4, plague signet, 3 ways right there. And epidemics cd is really really short for a utility.

Actually no, that is not spreading that is transferring and usually single target unless other people are really close with dagger4. Epidemic is really the only ability we have that actually SPREADS rather then move conditions from ourselves to our enemy. even then it doesn’t really spread. Even with a short(er) cooldown with traits you still are waiting 10 seconds to spread again. The only other skill I would stretch to call spreading would be plague form, but that has a large cooldown and isn’t useful in a world where everyone and their dog can cleanse since it does not build them up quickly and limits you from doing anything other then adding one of three conditions at a time.

Spreading would be more if say staff1 acted like the elemental lighting staff1. I.E. it bounces between many targets inflicting conditions. But the thing is if you think about it, with all our AoE we still don’t actually have much AoE. Take our wells that corrupt or transform boons/conditions. Why exactly do we have two separate wells that do pretty much the same thing? Further why do we have to trait 20 points to make that actually useful? Even pve if something has that many boons that I need to go out of my way to corrupt them, it probably isn’t something that I want to stand anywhere near.

@Kayotik.5790, I enjoy the animation for Death Shroud and I think the look of it, the staff, and lich form are pretty much the defining looks for necromancer. (I personally would like to see something done for each of the necromancer weapons, or at least scepter but that is asthetics.) The point I wast trying to state though is to augment the already clunky mechanics you have to go into lines that may have little synergy with what you might naturally expect, such as having vulnerability in a tree outside of the minion tree. On top of that the mode is not really that much a threat in and of itself considering even with the 25% drain reduction you might get 3 shots in combat before you hit 50% and your damage goes down the toilet. For something that makes us stand out, it does not really match the natural threat it puts us in. On further reflection I would say the same for lich form. Yes it does good damage, but do we really need to be Godzilla sized for the duration? I would think the ALL GLOWY GREEN BODY would be a big enough hint to other players.

Furthermore, I want to reiterate that we as a class are pretty limited. As was stated previously the large health pool and second lifebar does not make up entirely for poor cc and few defensive options. Even with all that we can still be rather squishy since we, being shoehorned into being conditionmancers, are more limited then even the supposedly weak elementalist if we wish to compete. We have the option of minions or conditions, but not much else. We cannot burst, we cannot reflect, we cannot control, and our conditions are harder to spread despite that our entire point is to spread conditions. Our mechanic is clunky and both it and our 30 point elite make us stand out needlessly for what they actually are. This does not mean the class is stupid or broken, but it is make a clanking noise under the hood that probably needs to be looked at.

Ok, now i’ve gotten quite a bit more experience with the necro…and I think I see what the developers were going for and kinda what they ended up with. Be warned i’m trying to avoid a wall of text but it might happen regardless.

Death-shroud: “Ok, Necromancer is all about being a bringer of death. The second lifebar mechanic is nice, but lets add some abilities that show necromancers mean buisness! Even better lets let people augment the mode to their playstyle!” I think that is what they were thinking when they came up with this… but it is clunky to say the least. Not only does it make us a highly visible target but the traits and the lines they are in don’t synergize. Ok we have a trait that makes DS pierce and cause vulnerability, but lets put it in a line not where minion masters could take natural advantage of it. On top of that lets put everything in DS on long cast times and cooldowns then reduce the attack speed to painfully slow.

Fear: As far as I can tell no other class can reliably put fear up like the necromancer. However this condition does…nothing. Yes it interrupts, and is useful if not lifesaving. But as a control mechanic, and it took me a while to realize that this IS our reliable control mechanic, it falls flat. When a thief can steal an AoE fear that lasts 3 seconds at range, well they have stolen a fear that is better then ANYTHING a necromancer can normally do. Read that again, they STEAL an ability that is better then what the class can naturally do even with traits! To make it worse all our cooldowns with fear last upwards to at least 40 seconds. I have verified that a thief could steal and fear about 2 times easily if traited. So not only do they get our control but better, they can use it more often!

Conditions: This is pretty much the trade of the Necromancer. Everything we do leaves a condition of some sort. Well no, actually the staff only one that does not but that is a different matter. Now no other class deals with conditions quite like we do. They basically do the inverse of Guardians in that we are better at turning boons into conditions to their turning conditions into boons. But the problem is that we…kinda lack at it. We have ONE ability that spreads conditions around, and here is the thing. With our corrupting wells, our ability to suck conditions from people around us to send back at foes, and just in general almost everything we do dealing with conditions it has lead me to one conclusion. We are supposed to be the answer to large amounts of damage dealing targets; in pvp terms the “zerg”. But we fall flat because we have a hard time spreading the conditions out, and that is our flaw because conditions is our bread and butter.

TL, DR; I could go on but basically i’m getting tired of, assuming I see this class for what it is, the flaws. We are the class that is supposed to be able to confront large groups and have our power increase. The more people we see the better! But with no burst, trouble spreading conditions, very limited CC, and basically what feels like a half backed class. This is not me saying that the class is ineffectual or broken however! It is like a hybrid car, if you take the battery out can you still drive it? Yes. Is it as good as it could/should be? Not really. Can we play this class while succeeding and enjoy it? Yes. Is it as good as it could/should be? Not really.

Ascii.9726:

My thoughts on deathshroud skills:

Life Blast Hits pretty hard as it is, someone did suggest scaling damage with Life Force amount rather then it dropping off at 50% or less LF. Maybe a tad decrease on its channel time.
Dark Path The teleport and effect should be instant, not that extremely slow moving skill that’s easily blockable/ LoS breakable.
Doom No change really needed, maybe 1s Fear duration increase but who plays necro for fear?
Life Transfer Totally broken, Power Precision Crit Damage build i can hit upwards of 20k+ on a full channel to enemies in WvW, also it being a non-target moving AoE its almost always guaranteed to hit people.

Most people forget Death Shroud is as much of an offensive mechanic then defensive. Its base health amount is around 18k and can go up to 24k with the Soul Reaping tree. Thats 18k free HP on top of our already highest HP pool in game.

Just remember every 1% LF you gain from skills, or kills is +240 HP instantly, as a passive.

Hmm, didn’t know that life blast hit so hard if you focused on power/crit. With all my gear/weapons being power/crit and my trinkets being crit/condition I still don’t hit very hard with DS. But then I’m still leveling up, so 80 is probably different. (Hit 45 last night)

I still say that it should hit faster then, with such a slow moving pojectile and a slow cast time it just doesn’t seem that great. But I could be doing it wrong as I stated. I’ll try moving more gear to power/crit.

As for the life transfer that is basically our hardest hitting attack. It is also why I say the DS should be our burst. According to the tooltip it basically is meant to extend our time in DS, or originally was. Currently even when I have 10 plus mobs around me it barely increases my life pool at all. Is that a problem? Not if it is hitting as hard as you claim. Since it is already on a extended cooldown even with it’s cooldown trait along with the requirement of being in DS I would say it has its balance. No way to check cooldowns on DS skills until you go back into DS. So if you go back to early you either waste DS or have to wait for it’s DS’s own cooldown when you leave it.

If it really is hitting so hard at 80 then leave #1 damage alone, but please make it hit harder. #2 should be insatant as has been said. #3 should have more bang for our buck so either last longer or be an aoe (kinda like the warlock fear ala WoW). #4 is probably the only skill that is fine as is, especially since you need to really build to it hurting and some of us are building to it healing our party-members more then killing mobs. But in the end, the DS should be us visibally powering up. That currently really is not happening.

Pretty much the title thread. DS should be hitting much much harder then it does. Even with life siphoning which I assume improves life transfer you can only stay in DS for so long. On top of that, DS has a built in limiter in that the less life you have on the bar, the less damage you do. So not only the longer you are in it the less damage you do as it drains, but with things attacking you get even less time. So the end result this should get a big buff to damage, projectile speed, and the cast time.

Is the class broken? No, and the way it is the class is serviceable and playable and most importantly very enjoyable. But thus far after playing most of the classes to 30+ this is the only class that has no real burst capability. At all. Can it outlast and eventually kill pretty much anything? Sure, but it is kinda embarrassing to be wailing on something and seeing the supposedly underpowered elementalist burst down the same mob in half the time. Heck our DPS can be so bad sometimes that I feel like I kill more stuff from the downed position then I do on my feet. Heck we even got a TRAIT for it!

If any of our mechanics could and should give us that utility and ability to burst, it is our DS mechanic. Built in limiters and built in nerfs for trying to spam it would keep it from being “OP”.

Macros.8715:

Death Shroud. first time I saw it, I was like, awesome im about to go into an overpowered mode, and decimate my enemies. The selection of abilities howevwer and what they do is abysmal, it was a severe dissapointment and continues to be so even now at 80. There is little that seems to be fun with death shroud, so much in fact I forget to use it most of the time, even if I have a full bar.

After that you have minions…..wells, and marks.

Minions: I had the idea after watching the yoggs cast review that I would be seeing my necro send forth his wave of minions to destroy his enemies, however I was quickly shown the errors of my ways. The minion armies of necromancers are more of a threat to there masters, than a benefit.

Marks, and Wells: AoE spells with cast times. I can see the cast times, if they did some insane damage, but they dont, in turn you have to predict the enemies movements and cast, which usually yields random results in pvp.

TL;DR
The things that set the Necromancer apart from the rest of the classes, are weaker than the run of the mill abilities, making necromancers feel like they are willfuly taking the shorter end of the stick in terms of special abilities. You can make the class work and succeed, but it still wont stand out amoungst the others in the crowd

I basically agree entirelywith this post. On one hand I know I hit pretty hard and my survivability is there. But on the other hand with no burst at all and the extreme cooldowns I have trouble even justifying this class as a support sustained dps or even just support.

DS should really be our burst, even with the trait to extend it the life force drains so quickly and with it the damage DS does. The attacks are slow (underwater you might as well not use #1) in DS, and even the weapons that should be doing serious damage doesn’t. This is supposed to be our class mechanic that sets us appart and… it is a bit underwhelming. Why as a caster when none of my DS abiliets are affected by range would I want to pull myself to a target? I could see it if the target was pulled to ME. Life transfer considering it does not do much to extend DS should be on a much shorter timer. But I could complain about DS all day, the extra life bar is kinda what saves it for me.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love my necro and something about the class has me coming back despite it all. Mainly I think speeding up the attacks of a few weapons and just making DS attack faster would do it for at least some of the shortcomings. But with no burst and what seems a waiting game on cooldowns and attack animations I can see why many people wouldn’t like them.

@Andele: Um….why? Why would casters need to be restricted from mechanical devices? Mesmers, a caster I believe, get pistol though on long cooldowns I grant you. But what rule states that casters can not have mechanical devices? Besides, the charr necromancer would not be bared from their “Charzooka” and the Asura would still get their golem suit.

But forgetting all that, did you miss the title? It is a wishlist, so go crazy on your wishes such as a new weapon of Scythe.

This is not an “ArenaNet give us now!” thread. This is a wishlist of things that we might get in an expansion that Anet actually consider in an expansion. So if you want a particular weapon or role of a weapon post it here. Who knows, we might just get it. Please no arguments about balance, this is a wishlist and hopefully to give Anet feedback/suggestions on how we as players would like to see the class grow.

The weapon I would love to see Necromancers get would be the rifle. Since playing one seems to give me the feeling of a mage that doesn’t fight fair having a rifle to put up conditions at range seems just the Necromancer’s style.

1. Death’s clutch: Every 3rd hit causes chill for 1 second/Range 1000
2. Dirty ammo: Causes poison for 3 seconds / 2% life force / 10 sec cooldown / Range 800
3. Precordial thump: Cripple/knockback 3 seconds / 12 second cooldown
4. Dead call: Target area causes cripple for 5 seconds / 20 second cooldown / Range 600
5. Blood Bank: Siphons health for 3 seconds, might 3 seconds / 35 second cooldown / range 800

Ok, after finally getting my hands on the grandmaster traits I verified that flamethrower and other kits simply do not scale to weapon power. So should someone who is not built with support traits such as the healing bombs simply forgo the weapon kits?

I’m not saying that weapon kits are useless, but if they don’t scale to your equipable weapons when leveling, that means the difference will only get worse at 80 with the legendary weapons. So would it be better to maybe forgo them unless absolutely needed for a support build such as Bomb/elixir gun kits for healing?

@ Eicherjw:

Well that is ok if you don’t like that suggestion. Personally I find bleeds/burns with the scepter to be especially deadly especially in pve, but also in pvp. What do you prefer with your elementalist?

Spoon.3826:

No… Not not really
Just now, I was actually lamenting the fact that I was nearly dying in a level 50 area with my level 80 elementalist because I took on 3 spread out ranged mobs at once.

Whereas with my guardian I can do this with so much ease that I actually get out of the fight with full health and without all my utilities on cooldown.

Must be in your head bro.

To be fair the guardian has two ways to negate ranged combat where most only have one, further they last longer then others as well.

But yeah, went through a story quest I just could not finish and kept breaking my armor. But last night they didn’t hurt me as much. This was at level btw, which means no adjustment.

Maybe it wasn’t a direct buff, but since I can actually play again I think i’ll give my ele some more time.

Ok, so we all have problems playing this class and the ‘elite’ players just keep saying that you need to switch attunments. But I wanted to start a thread on what you may or may not know as an elementalist that might help you play better.

1. Learn your spells, all of them. It takes a while to unlock them, but having all the elements and spells unlocked for all weapons will makes how you approach different areas easier.

2. Learn to “dance”, how much you need to though will be personal preference. but you have 4 elements and related abilites, use them to your advantage. If you want faster access you will need to invest in arcana. 10 points reduced my 15 to 12 seconds and now gives me a boon for a few seconds when I switch to different elements.

3. Turn on “Fast Cast ground-targeting”. This means that when you have a ground target spell, when you use it it will cast at where your mouse is pointing instantly with no indicator. Since a lot of our spells are ground targeting it will free up your mobility to be able to keep running while throwing out a dragon tooth or Phoenix. This in under options/combat.

4. Invest in condition damage, this is probably what will damage your enemies most and make you the most deadly. Since earth and fire have the easiest time putting on conditions, this will help you a LOT.

Ok, now granted I am currently in lower areas and being adjusted level wise but I feel a lot less squishy all the sudden. Even mobs that gave my guardian a hard time just last week seem to be a lot less a threat as my ele. I’m not having to hit keys wildly just to kill stuff and keep alive and can even take a few hits before I die.

Granted this is a 26 human ele in the 1-15 sylvanti area, but two guild mates also claim they feel a bit stronger with this patch and they are much higher in level. So anyone else feel stronger or are we suddenly all three ‘clicking’ when it comes to this class?

tolunart.2095:

TransparentlyOpaque.1824:

Varyag.3751:

Most professions have easy mode builds.

Tell me what the elementalist easy mode is please?

Fire.

Liar. ;p

Zyrhan.3180:

I’ll try to keep this brief.

In Guild Wars 1, Hard Mode was unlocked for each of the game’s campaigns after you completed the final mission….

I actually like the idea that the OP has given. I already like being able to go to lower leveled areas with my engineer and still have a decent challenge from mobs, but this would make it that much better. The only thing I would mention is that maybe a background percentage depending on where you are as to how much loot or mats you get. Because even 1-15 zones are a little easier and forgiving even 4 levels below the mob. At least with my engineer.

I think the biggest divide in the player base is the debate of whether or not “attunment dancing” or being able to stay in one attunment should be viable. I personally would rather see both as an option.

So my suggestion would be to buff all abilities in damage, sync the animations a little better (meteor storm for example) and give solid reason to go into each attunment. I would make it that the more points you put into say earth attunment the cooldown on that attunment is reduced. Arcana would be a universal cooldown for all elements, but if you put 20 points into earth you gain additional cooldown on top of that.

Further giving a stacking or renewing buff for staying in an attunment longer would give more reason to staying in that attunment. So with earth again perhaps giving defense for 3 seconds per 10 seconds in earth. Or maybe giving 20 toughness per stack for 5 stacks every 5 seconds in earth. This could be further reinforced by traits.

This way if someone wants to keep “dancing” they can, but also rewards those who wish to stay or be able to quickly return to an attunment. So I still have the option to go to air or fire, but if I start taking to much heat I can switch to earth quicker then I could if I didn’t have any points invested.

Kidel.2057:

I agree with the OP.

atm guardians can’t go ranged at all and they’re also weaker in a group where everybody can benefit from guardian buffs, since guardians have lower stats compared to almost every class in the game (half hp of a necro or a warrior, lower atk with the same power stat, lower armor)

I personally think if they make the scepter give a liitle more kick and speed then it would be fine. Kinda like a magical pistol to the engineer’s pistol. Also i’d just make the #2 a ability that just centered on the target and followed to make the weapon a little more mobile. Other then that i’d say it is fine since guardians have two abilities that instantly can negate ranged combat for a few ticks.

Guardians are in a funny place. If you know what you are doing you can take on a big bite no problem. But if you aren’t paying attention you will go down fast. But since mine is only at 14 and most experience comes from wvwvw i’m not to sure how much my input matters. Still…far better then my ele has given me.

I don’t know if Arenanet is going to overhaul the elementalist as so many of us hope, but if they are I could suggest a couple of stopgap solutions for the meantime. I don’t know if a pick or taking all would be better, but again just some suggestions.

(1) Rearrange the abilities
Right now you kinda can go with certain weapons knowing they will work a certain way. Rod is basically supposed to be your bigger harder hitting spells, rod your medium hitting but still ranged spells, and dagger the close range spells. Off hand items like the dagger should be about movement and the focus defensive abilites and our equivalent to a shield. But the end result is a few spells that if done slightly differently would increase our odds a little.

Example, why is unsteady ground and shockwave on the staff and earthquake and churning earth on the dagger offhand? If you reversed the placement of these abilities and make unsteady an automatic 5 meters in front of the PC it would fit more with the way the weapons appear to be presented to us.

(2) Change Signet of Restoration
Ok, a signet that heals us as we cast spells? Sounded great on paper, but then I found out that this signet does nothing in the way of increasing our survivability. If you buffed how much it healed by say 150% then this would go a long way to making the class more accessible. For those who would worry about this making the elementalist unkillable, remember that this would not affect our health pools which are very much smaller compared to the current heavy hitters. But it would go a long way to making us harder to kill then simply 2-3 hits from a warrior who isn’t even trying.

Alternatively, increasing another minor heal from say condition damage could also be viable. This means the more condition damage we put out the more healing we receive. In theory this would scale with the amount of danger we face, so bigger mobs pulled means more healing which in the end keeps our odds at about the same.

(3) Weapon swaps and/or reduced cooldowns
Yes this would allow access to 40 abilities, but having a 10 second cooldown should reduce most if not any abuse this could bring. Not to mention that this wouldn’t increase our damage just put variety in how we do it. Alternatively or included would be a reduction of the attunment cooldown from 15 to 10. For a class that seems to favor constant switching of it’s attunments the current 15 second cooldown is extremely prohibitive of that.

(4)Trait redone
Right now there is no real trait line to invest in outside of 20 points into arcana. That is for no other reason then to reduce the 15 second attunment cool down to closer to 10 seconds, much more agreeable. putting 10 into every trait line just to unlock a 20% reduction in cool down just for that attunment seems a waste. Much more agreeable and useful would be a 20% chance to gain the boon of that element for any spell cast.

This means that 10 points in earth would give the trait option to have 20% chance to gain toughness with any spell in any attunment. Water gives regeneration, air swiftness, and fire might. This means that players have more options in how to make their characters play to their style while at the same time with a minor investment make much more survivable characters.

I have no idea if these ideas are actually any good, but this is the easiest stopgap buffs I could think of that wouldn’t require to much time on the development staff if they should choose to do something like this. If not then oh well, still plan to play the class.

A lot of threads have been started on if someone should or should not try the elementalist. Even more have been started stating that the class is underpowered. After playing the class over the last week I can finally say with absolute certainty what I think on this class. Yes, you should try the class if for no other reason then just to try it. If you are curious there is no real reason not to see if you like it. But yes, the class is severely underpowered. Not only in damage but in accessibility, cool downs, and survivability.

This is not an easy class to play. It is complex and unintuitive in mechanics and what abilities might be assigned to what weapons. It has overly long cast times for some of its abilities that simply do not hit hard enough to justify the cast times or cool downs. Even worse is that to play the class to its full potential you will not only have to balance ability cooldowns but the cooldowns you accrue trying to switch ‘attunments’. These attunments are billed as different play styles, but the truth is that to effectively play the class you will be constantly switching between the elements to use their various abilities. Taken with the squishy nature of being a mage where it will only take a monster 3-4 hits maximum to down you and you have a VERY unfriendly class.

So then why would I say anyone should play this? Well a couple reasons. Yes it is extremely unfriendly to play and not a class you can pick up in even a day or two. I would venture as far as to say it even has the longest time to learn all it’s abilities since you have to unlock each ability in each elemental attunment. But once you do you will find various play styles to explore, more abilities available then anyone else, and more maneuverability then most classes.

For example, my personal favorite is the dagger/dagger combo. This turns your mage from the traditional support or background fighter into a mystic close combat monk. This combo has so much maneuverability I personally think it even outmaneuvers the thief with it’s shadow-walk. other combinations with the dagger could use the rod or focus, or even just the rod and focus. Finally the two handed staff could be used for more traditional support and damage spells. All this with four attunments that gives you 20 weapon abilities each. There is nothing more thrilling then taking on a giant mob and winning despite knowing just one of those monsters will make short work of you if they get their hands on you.

But in the end, as the current elementalist stands, you will be severely behind compared to anything any other class can do. It is widely believe that Arenanet will be buffing or changing this class sometime in the next month or two. Will it happen? I don’t know. But I can tell you the class is playable, and more importantly enjoyable, but either because or in addition to the underpowered nature VERY unfriendly to new players. Compared to doing just about anything other classes are doing in every scenario you will have a tougher time with this class. But if you try it you might find the elementalist growing on you despite yourself like I did.

Underpowered or not, I think the elementalist has replaced my engineer as my main character now. Might happen to you if you try it too.

Ursu.4163:

Pinkerton.5643:

Roziel.5720:

While I understand the arguments made on skill triumphing the drawbacks in a class there is an inherent flaw in the argument. Elementalist could be fine in a player who has mastered the intricacies being able to do fine in regular content, either pve or pvp. But the problem is that you have to master the class just to be “competent”. If you haven’t mastered the class you will die often before you even get out of your teens pve wise, pvp we might as well call cleanup after other classes get done with you.

Now take another class like say the engineer. I have gotten to 38 and definitely haven’t mastered the class quite yet. But I can still progress without to much difficulty. But here is the kicker, i’m competent NOW without having mastered the class. When I do master the class then I will inherently be ahead of the elementalist no matter what since they had to master the class just to be considered competent. Now they will lag behind the classes that have more inherent power just because they have no more to give.

If you have to master a class just to be able to survive basic low level content, which as an elementalist you do, then how exactly is that NOT underpowered? Even if you want a challenge, why beat your head against a wall for hours when you can play a more fun and accessible class? That isn’t fortitude or skill when you master a broken class it is masochism. If wanting to play a game for actual fun makes me a ‘baddie’ or ‘kitten’ then i’ll just have to live with that as I rip your avatar a new one.

A couple things. First, you don’t have to absolutely master the class with no room for improvement in order to be competent with Ele. It just takes a higher level of skill than most other classes do.
Second, the skill curves are very different. After becoming competent with most professions in this game, the effectiveness level remains relatively flat all the way to profession mastery. With elementalists, on the other hand, after competence has been reached, effectiveness shoots up at a ridiculously high speed and puts them at the same effective level as other professions.
This picture is what I’m trying to get at. What happens above the line of competence, I’m not so sure on. The curves aren’t going to be constant in the same fashion as below the line, so don’t start flaming on something dumb like that. At some point, though, the effectiveness of the elementalist begins to match that of other professions.

ahahaha, well , hello there.
aren’t you the guy that was doing soooo well on elementalist that the community actually asked for some capture of your awesome work? I guess still waiting for it.
Your post sounds like the speech of a sales manager that actually has no idea about what he’s selling and what’s the market segment he’s after. But his powerpoint presentation- and in your case, you nice graph – actually show millions or billions in profit and how the masses will flock to the product he’s trying to put on market. Want real life examples? Nokia N8, Blackberry tablet, etc.
Spitting out words without real substance, in sentences that no one can really contradict because they don’t have any real substance is something I see very often and I was actually expecting from trolls sniffing around on this forum

Um…what? Never claimed to be awesome at the elementalist. If anyone wanted capture of my “work” they would be in for a long wait since I wouldn’t know really about how to get it. I have played it, I am still trying to play it since I WANT to enjoy it, but pretty much giving it up for the moment as a lost cause. If I have claimed to be anything it is competent as an engineer which I am. But even at that I haven’t “Mastered the class”.

So basically…what are you talking about and where can i get the stuff you are smoking?

Weapon X.5163:

Roziel.5720:

While I understand the arguments made on skill triumphing the drawbacks in a class there is an inherent flaw in the argument. Elementalist could be fine in a player who has mastered the intricacies being able to do fine in regular content, either pve or pvp. But the problem is that you have to master the class just to be “competent”. If you haven’t mastered the class you will die often before you even get out of your teens pve wise, pvp we might as well call cleanup after other classes get done with you.

Now take another class like say the engineer. I have gotten to 38 and definitely haven’t mastered the class quite yet. But I can still progress without to much difficulty. But here is the kicker, i’m competent NOW without having mastered the class. When I do master the class then I will inherently be ahead of the elementalist no matter what since they had to master the class just to be considered competent. Now they will lag behind the classes that have more inherent power just because they have no more to give.

If you have to master a class just to be able to survive basic low level content, which as an elementalist you do, then how exactly is that NOT underpowered? Even if you want a challenge, why beat your head against a wall for hours when you can play a more fun and accessible class? That isn’t fortitude or skill when you master a broken class it is masochism. If wanting to play a game for actual fun makes me a ‘baddie’ or ‘kitten’ then i’ll just have to live with that as I rip your avatar a new one.

Some people like being challenged, and some people like being lazy.
Just like some poeple like the statisfaction of beating the dog **** out of someone with a “broken class” and some poeple like to roll “FOTM 1 button iwin classes”.

In the end, if your playing the harder of the classes to master, your getting the most knowledge. Which would only be a bad thing if you had short term memory loss, or are just flat out bad.

You missed the point, if you have to master the class just to do what others don’t have to work to do then you are already starting behind the eight-ball. You can be as intricate as you want, but as it stands even the most mobile weapon combo of D/D means if you mess up even slightly you will either be mostly or all dead. Bottom line.

If you like beating yourself up just to play on an average level then by all means go for it. But at the end of the day it is still subpar to other classes. I can think of no better way then to have Indiana Jones demonstrate how other classes see your ‘learn-to-play’ class.

@OP: Yes the class isn’t COMPLETELY broken and unplayable. You will find just enough enjoyment to wish that Arenanet would make fixing the class a priority so you can play on the same level as everyone else. But until then i’d take the time you could spend banging your head against a wall, or if you will “learning the curve”, and play a class that you will actually have more fun playing. Anything really.

Yeah, i’m a disgruntled Elementalist. Don’t let it happen you you kids!

While I understand the arguments made on skill triumphing the drawbacks in a class there is an inherent flaw in the argument. Elementalist could be fine in a player who has mastered the intricacies being able to do fine in regular content, either pve or pvp. But the problem is that you have to master the class just to be “competent”. If you haven’t mastered the class you will die often before you even get out of your teens pve wise, pvp we might as well call cleanup after other classes get done with you.

Now take another class like say the engineer. I have gotten to 38 and definitely haven’t mastered the class quite yet. But I can still progress without to much difficulty. But here is the kicker, i’m competent NOW without having mastered the class. When I do master the class then I will inherently be ahead of the elementalist no matter what since they had to master the class just to be considered competent. Now they will lag behind the classes that have more inherent power just because they have no more to give.

If you have to master a class just to be able to survive basic low level content, which as an elementalist you do, then how exactly is that NOT underpowered? Even if you want a challenge, why beat your head against a wall for hours when you can play a more fun and accessible class? That isn’t fortitude or skill when you master a broken class it is masochism. If wanting to play a game for actual fun makes me a ‘baddie’ or ‘kitten’ then i’ll just have to live with that as I rip your avatar a new one.

Well I think a weapon switch would be nice, but the class is still underpowered. I am going through the same areas as I did an engineer and where I had absolutely no difficulty as that class as an elementalist I am dying left and right. I mean I literally am struggling to get through the teens where I haven’t even slowed down as an engineer in the high thirties.

Survivability is a big part, but the class is just to squishy compared to the damage output. Yes, as a D/D I can get fantastic maneuverability but I can only take a few hits before I go down. PvE or PvP it does not matter. Making a what I can only describe as a mystic monk is awesome but the thing is that unfortunately as the class stands it does not work. The cooldowns are to long, the damage to low, and the health is just not there. Taken together and the class just becomes more frustration to play then fun, you know that thing we supposedly play games for?

Much as I love the elementalist and just sank a lot of time into trying to level one today, I think i’m going back to my engineer. The class if it ever gets buffed will immediately get my attention again though. There is a difference between a steep learning curve and a broken class, i’m not masochist enough to figure out right now which one the elementalist truly is. I’d rather play a class I actually have fun playing, sophisticated class mechanics or not.

I was thinking about making a thread question on that. Is 20 points going to give you that much of a benefit?

Masternewbz.4953:

Ementalists are good, you are bad.

sorry but its true.

use all 4 attunements and stop spamming your buttons

Wow, with this bit of awe inspiring critique of the conversation I feel shame for ever doubting the Elementalist. Thank you Masternewbz for eloquently piecing these words together as a wordsmith of unprecedented caliber. I am moved sir, simply moved.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/images/action/large/211ecf5.jpg
This is how Elementalists react to freaking wildlife, let alone the actually dangerous stuff. >.<

I’m trying to figure out why it is almost twice what other people get with switching their weapons. My thief takes 9 seconds to switch weapons but it takes 15 for my ele? If versatility is the selling point of the class making it twice as hard to get that versatility is doing it wrong.

Honestly I can’t see it, i’ve gone back and played with it more and I just can;t see the use since even with less damage I can do most of the same stuff with grenades at range .

If you just made them mines, or at least on proximity they would be far more useful. Even with the healing, simply giving the option to set them off like the remote mine would give some controlled healing while damaging the enemy.

From the thread what I’m reading suggests that most people only use it for the elixir bomb talent and not really using it outside of that. So basically…worthless. That or only useful in pve and that is it, cause as a thief with the blade/pistol I can swoop in and do a lot of damage before teleporting back before you get the chance to lay the first bomb, why take them when better options exist?

Chii.2814:

I hate it when people think “Warrior” Means up close and personal class.

Its obvious at this point that what anet meant with “Warrior” is someone who is TRAINED to be a man of war, trained to make effective use of weapons of war.

A warrior is going to be better at using a rifle when it comes to killing while an engineers ability to use rifle revolve around gagetry like net shots, wacky use of explosions to make a speedy hop, overload the barrel to make a shotgun spread, or use the explosiveness of shots to knock people back

I think it is more that the warrior is more set up for melee then engineer. I personally love that you can make an effective rifle warrior, i’ve played one for years in D&D and love that I can finally take that to an mmo. But abilities like the rocket jump and blunderbuss seem more in vein with a warrior then engineer. Simply put, the warrior is able to switch to a melee weapon set as needed while the engineer does not want to be getting in melee if it can be avoided. Or at least that is my interpretation of the classes.

I agree with Rehero, in fact it is my sentiments exactly. If they were mines the kit would be 10x more useful to keep around. maybe even merge the big ol’ bomb with the remote mine.

I understand the thoughts on kiting, but I find two flaws with that. One is that with pve that means the enemy is already in melee range and you still have to wait until the bomb goes off 2 seconds later. The other problem is with pvp not only do you have the melee bit from pve, but currently it feels 70% of players are playing ranged or will quickly switch to range.

I guess I just thought of a third, while you are focusing on using bombs you can’t really focus on using slot skills with it. If I am using other kits like elixir or flamethrower I can mix in slot skills as needed, but with bomb kits i’m so focused on bombs I can’t really get those skills in as easily.

Well, the backblast makes sense to help keep us out of melee distence along with the net, but basically I only use the auto attack. Bunderblast is kinda…stupid in both concept and damage output, while I only really use the gun jump to move around the environment. The jump is just to slow to be all the useful and I thought that being more on cc the concept would to be keeping us OUT of melee and not giving us stuff that moves us into it.

I want to love the engineer more, but as I go up I keep finding more problems. Basically all the weapon skills are just…underwhelming. Even the weapon kits, especially the bomb kit., are high on originality but low on actual use.

I get better mobility and variability as a rogue/warrior vs as a engineer, less random stuff from elixers too.

Ok, i’ve been trying to use every skill I unlock a bit to try and figure out it’s use or when I would use it. Even Elixir X I could see using as a tank in a dungeon, but the bomb kit? Not really.

Ok, the bomb kit is powerful. I can see it being used with a lot of fire support from teammates in a dungeon or pvp setting. But the biggest gripe I have with it is that the explosions while powerful requires that the enemy is basically in melee distance. So having a glue bomb is useless since if it an enemy they are already on you, and if pvp they probably can switch to distance weapons or just keep casting those spells.

So maybe i’m missing something. Anyone else finding good consistent use out of the bomb kit? Because I can take all the perks of the bomb kit and get them elsewhere while not putting myself into melee so much.

Maybe i’m missing something. I know the Engineer is decent because i’m clearing pve stuff with not to much trouble…but then comes the pvp. To counter the mostly ranged fighters I usually go with shield and pistol. But I find that the magnetic shield ability is both on to long a cooldown and doesn’t last long enough to be useful. But without my shield I lose a lot of my survivability.

I also find that one of the useful kits in pve, the bomb kit, is not as useful in pvp since I have to literally run up to my enemy and then drop bombs, which by then people naturally back off if ranged or rip me apart if melee focused. Turrets…turrets seem to be useless in both pvp and pve except the healing turret.

Maybe i’m just not getting the class, but like I said I have no trouble in the pve arena. Before the game came out I could have sworn that there was supposed to be a mine kit. If the bomb kit was a mine kit I would be fine I think.

I play a human engineer if that makes a difference. Any tips to make my play better?