Guild Wars 2

I’m loving this build.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFEQJArYhcMoshNNwzB0RsIAYup2ZbuNIAUAKiCXySQNE-TxBBABA8AAuU9nsU+Zoego3fgRlgBcCAIFArCjA-e

It has good single target damage and has enough AoE to take out a pack of pocket raptors pretty quickly.

With fresh air you get your air overload a lot more often than you normally would. So, do your normal fresh air ele stuff, then add that sweet overload in there, maybe a nice little glyph of storms in air as well. All that vuln =).

Give me advice, or don’t. I like the build and I’m not a crazy-eliteist-world-record-setter-kinda-guy. I just want to voice how I am making the best of the new spec. =)

The email I received from ANet says that both codes have been applied in game and no further action is necessary. I’ll write a support ticket. I wish they had a phone line that I could reach someone in person at.

I ordered the expansion the other day and got an error message, so I went in and did it again, got the same error message. (I don’t remember exactly what it was, but it told me that it was unable to process the transaction.) I logged in yesterday and saw that the transaction had gone through and was elated. Now I come to find out it went through twice and I am being charged for 2 HoT Ultimate editions. I spent the last hour on the phone with paypal/customer support, only to find out that customer support wasn’t even for this game. I am losing my mind.

Who can I call to get this fixed? I love this game and have never had any problems with in game purchases but this is putting me off. Someone please help me.

I see your logic here. I finished my Wv3 completion when the game first launched and I do see, now in the current state of things, how difficult it could be to attain full map completion for Wv3. Especially for someone not on a busy or high ranked server. I do not, however, like the idea of just making it a free zone to aimlessly wander through and collect POI’s and vistas. If they could implement a better way to cycle the colors then I could see this problem being less of an issue.

I don’t want anything. The Dev’s said a long time ago that this is how they wanted it to be. I can’t quote it directly (flame me if you want) but I remember seeing them say that to obtain a Legendary weapon the player had to prove that they could excel in every area of the game. To me that includes the Wv3 environment. (Although, I don’t know why the maps in sPvP weren’t included as well)

It’s been said on here that if you want to grab the map completion just PM a commander and request it. More often than not if you ask they will try their kitten off to help you out. At least I would when I used to command. The more PvE’rs that show up to Wv3 the better the experience should be for everyone involved.

I fear that I am steering this thread off topic though. I apologize.

If the OP wants this just for the Legendary, then he doesn’t deserve it. The whole journey, leading up to acquiring one, is to prove that you have MASTERED all facets of the game. Thus the Gift of Mastery. This thread leaves me speechless. Just, speechless.

I think OP is speaking from a PvP/WvW standpoint. Correct me if I am wrong.

Neko.9021:

It’ll be single target since it has an internal cooldown. It’ll proc on the first thing it Burns every 5 seconds.

See: every trait in the game that has an internal cooldown is always single-target.

my dreams have been shattered.

I think Ele will make a comeback in s/tPvp with the new fire GM trait, but you are probably correct. If it isn’t able to blind multiple opponents on AoE then we will be 1v1 roamers. Unless we want the new water GM trait, then we can all just be heal-o-tron 5000’s.

oZii.2864:

This needs to be per target anything less would be a big disappointment.

Agreed. There is no way we survive anything other than a 1v1 encounter unless this affects multiple targets.

If it is AoE burn for blind and you can effect multiple players with one burn, I could see D/D ele on the front line of a zerg. Haha. Right before the groups meet, pop off Ring of Fire, Mist Form away and watch your hammer train mop up.

KrazyFlyinChicken.5936:

Kyon.9735:

Exactly. There are people locked into the mindset that you’re required to have 30 points in Arcana if you’re playing DD. EA is good but it’s not a necessity. You will just need 20 points in Arcana at most if you can balance your build well. I’ve even tried builds with 0/10 points Arcana for fun.

I’ve found it incredibly difficult to run a build that doesn’t have elemental attunement. But maybe it’s just me.

I’ve tried and tried to experiment and get away from the arcane tree, but I always end up back to at least 20 in arcana.

Call me crazy but this may end up being my build after the patch. Granted, my crit dmg will be lower. This will use blinding ashes and lightning rod…I think. I may take 10 from air and put it in arcana for final shielding if I don’t like how lightning rod works. It’s a GC pick team roll meant to roam the outside or back lines of an enemy zerg and pick off lower hp or glassier enemies.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEEQJAoYhcMqc24wsBf0AQ4hAIAwoQHiHPYBAA-zkCBYjAYLIYOgkIAEBJM5rIasVNFRjVVbIyqkYKXoBAQAuZAghezhezhezSBMqwI-w

Sounds good. I’m sitting at 65% crit chance with another 20% added when fury procs from auras. I should be able to use the burn on crit trait and not have to worry about my signet of restoration.
Probably won’t switch to Balth runes then either then.

Sorry about not doing my research on Sigil of Fire.

This would probably go well with Ether Renewal though, especially if you don’t have any stability off CD. Heal, burn, blind, RUN!!!!!, and get your pulses off while they are blinded and can’t hit you. Also good with Cleansing Fire. The more I think about this trait the more excited I get about it.

maybe

So I was fiddling around with ideas in my head earlier and I thought I would propose this to the community.

Blinding Ashes, blind on burning, right? How well would that synergize with Blathazar runes, a sigil of fire, and Signet of Restoration? The runes 6/6 gives you an aoe burn every time you activate a healing skill. Will that proc on any of the on cast heals? If so then you should be effectively be proccing burns (and blinds) as soon as the ICD on Burning Ashes is up, because you will be constantly casting while in combat.

I was just curious if this combo would work or if you actually have to activate the healing signet to get the proc for the runes.

Sigil of Fire is a no brainer in this situation as it will proc burns on crit.

…discuss

Thank you very much =)

Gave up on conditions and went back to my old build. =( Conditions just weren’t for me. Thanks for all the replies though.

I’m looking at transferring to a more populated wvw server. Are you accepting else’s atm? Level 80 with some ascended trinkets and an Incinerator.

oZii and Delores, thank you a ton for your input and helping me hash this build out. Maybe someday we will meet in the Mists. Although I don’t think DH will ever reach the level of Maguuma. C’est la vie.

The more I look at it the more I am tempted to take the last 10 out of earth and put it into water making a 0/0/20/20/30 build. Taking the soothing disruption trait for regen and vigor and then taking sigil of Doom and Sigil of Bursting. I’ll lose the option for DS and WiS but I’ll gain a group heal and regen and vigor because I use the cantrips a lot. Seeing as I won’t be able to use the signet’s active and keep it’s passive going I’ll change the heal to ER.

This will still leave me very tanky in the way of burst mitigation while giving me access to a crazy amount of condition removal and added vitality and healing power.

Still keeping FGS. xP but will use RoG situationaly.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEEQJAoYnMMcMowhwhNOsNwzhyB8RcJOAQU4yJDFh8R5BNzYDA-z0CB4iAYLIoOgk0gUHAUBI5dFRjtsuIasKbYadER1eFER1BAOAIocpAWUaE-w

After looking at it further Torment is an on critical proc. I have almost zero crit chance on this build so I don’t think that it will work. Maybe if I ran something like Sigil of Smouldering and Sigil of Doom, or maybe even Smouldering and Energy. Or, I could do Smouldering and Geomancy. There are just too many different options. =…..(

Okay, so a few modifications here.

Replaced Earth II with Earth III.
Replaced Signet of Water with Cleansing Fire
Replaced the Sigil of Malice and Sigil of Bursting with Sigil of either Doom or Torment and possibly a Sigil of Energy? That could help not having 20 pts in water for Soothing Disruption and would still give me an extra condition to cover my bleeds and burns.

Also, I am human and I have thought about Reaper of Grenth, but I have a question about it. I love FGS purely for the mobility. FGS and LF can get me away from almost anything. Especially with Windborne Dagger and if RTL is off CD. Is it worth sacrificing the escape route/mobility of FGS to go with Reaper of Grenth? I will gladly give it a try if it is. I just don’t like not having an exit strategy.

Here’s the updated build I have. I’ll give the Diamond Skin and Ether Renewal combo a shot too. I think I just have to see it in action. Having a hard time visualizing it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEEQJAoYncMcMowhwhNOsNwzhyB8RcJOAQK4y4RIfQS5BNzYDA-z0CB4iAYLIoOgUHA0HgUBI5dFRjtsuIasKbYadER1eFER1BAOAIocpAWUaE-w

I’ll look into the sigil change. I was thinking of going that rout but wasn’t sure if they would work well together.

I like the cleansing flame idea as well.

I still feel like Written in Stone/Signet of Restoration is a better bet than Diamond Skin/Ether Renewal. I don’t know why I am so hesitant to try it out. I just have this nagging feeling in the back of my head. Maybe it’s just hubris but I can’t get over that hump.

I was thinking that the sheer amount of healing I bring with this build would offset any remaining conditions though. Constant uptime from the signet, coupled with the burst heal every 20 seconds if needed. Also heals/cleanses from the water skills. I’m thinking that should be more than enough to make up for not having ER and DS.

With food and wvw buffs this build only sits at around 14.5k HP, so it’s more difficult to stay above that 90% threshold than if I were running with more vitality.

and yes, it’s pretty hard for a burst player to take this build down. I 1v2’d a thief and mesmer yesterday with it in the tunnel from red keep into Panglos and downed the thief and only had to run away when more reinforcements showed up.

*not arguing with you, just counter pointing. I really appreciate the input =)

The old adage, “if you can’t beat em, join em,” recently popped into my head as I was thinking of a way to make a viable Ele build the other day.

With the current “Condition Meta” as it is, I thought to myself, how can I be relevant in the current state of this game with a currently irrelevant and/or unwanted class?

I then came up with this build that I present to you now.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEEQJAoYncMcMowhwhtNsNwzhyB8RcJOAQK4y4BIfQS5BNzYDA-z0CB4iAYLIoOgk0g00AUBI5dFRjtsuIasKbYadER1eFER1BAOAIocpAWUaE-w

Coming back to the game about a month ago, from a long hiatus, I found the old D/D bunker build that I loved so much had been torn down from it’s Godlike status and cast aside like an unwanted novelty item.

I am attempting to create something with the ability to sustain damage and CC enemies while mitigating burst, and at the same time being able to cleanse conditions at a fairly reasonable rate and/or heal through them with high healing power. Although I forwent the tradition 30 in water, which many would say is the bread and butter of condition removal and healing, I feel it is still a strong build with the traits and weapon/armor stats I have chosen

30 in Earth
Earth II Signet Mastery: due to the synergy between it, signet of restoration, and signet of water. Constant “passive”, if you will, heals with a burst heal and the ability to chill opponents once ever few seconds with the water signet and water dagger 3 &4 is a great soft cc.
Earth VII Strength of Stone: that is an extra 210 pts (almost 300 with wvw bonus and food) to condition damage. Good for sustain.
Earth XII Written in Stone: once again the synergy between it and the two signets I use in this build is amazing. I like it better than DS simply because this build has such low HP that it is hard to stay above 90% and I can out heal/remove almost any conditions placed on me in a matter of seconds with the passive from the water signet and the two cleansing waves in water.

10 in Water
Water II Cantrip Mastery: Armor of Earth and Lightning Flash are the two cantrips I use, and I use them a lot. You all know what they do and how to use them properly.

30 in Arcane
Arcane II Windborne Dagger: I like to move fast. Although at times I may switch it for III Final Shielding or V Blasting Staff. It’s situational.
Arcane VIII Elemental Attunment: we all know this one
Arcane XI Evasive Arcana: again, we all know this, but, with the condition power and healing power this, imho is a must for the heals, condition removal, bleeds, burns, and maybe, if I’m feeling particularly plucky, a blind here and there. Probably not hahaha.

Travelers armor with perplexity runes is what I run with this. While the Ele doesn’t have it’s own ability to confuse, we do have some interrupts and you know we all use them as soon as they are off CD. So the chance to add confusion to the mix of other conditions that we can apply is an added boon. I think.

So, the goal is to keep your opponent/s chilled, crippled, bleeding, burning, and dance around them all the while clearing their conditions and dropping a massive amount of healing for yourself and teammates.

Please let me know what you think. This is my first condition build with the Ele so I’m treading new ground. Please don’t flame me too much if I got all of this wrong. =)

All other classes bore me to death. Regardless of how “superior” they are to the Elementalist, I will always choose to play my Ele over my Thief, Guard, or Mesmer.

Purely due to that fact that it is so much more fun to play.

I also don’t feel like the full potential of the Ele has been unlocked, build wise. I experiment with new builds almost every day and still find new things.

This thread is painful to read through. =/

I use 15 in water and 15 in arcana and I do just fine.

I’m not saying it’s a L2P issue and I’m not talking down to anyone here, but, you shouldn’t feel like you’re “pigeonholed” into a x/x/x/30/30 build.

Experiment with your build. That is part of the fun of playing this class.

Da Beetus.1275:

To all those that constantly compare Ele’s performance to Warrior’s performance, please watch this playlist:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EitZRLt2G3w

That is all.

Warrior -> Foo Strategy -> Foo Fighter -> Dave Grohl.

Dave Grohl = Warrior.

I get it now.

off hand focus, air 4, protect your catapult and other siege.

the end

If both are “equally skilled” I call it a draw.

Also, your video prompted me to mess around with a new build and I must say it is DESTRUCTIVE. Not as tanky but it hits like a truck.

10/20/20/20/0

It’s weird being out of the arcane tree, and running more zerk gear than I’m used to, but this morning in WvW I popped off a 10K fire grab and insta-killed thief who had just popped out of stealth into my dragons breath.

Must not have been a very good thief, but nonetheless its fun to say you finally got one of those kittens.

Thanks for giving me the nudge to finally break away from the x/x/x/30/30 mold.

=D

Teatray.8036:

are you using might duration runes?

this is what I was thinking.

2 runes of the Pirate, Hoelbrak, and Fire, will give you +75 power and +60% might duration.

Thats killer because you can stack might and it essentially never runs out.

25 stacks at level 80 is +875 power and condition damage. (I think those are the numbers)

Graendall.4765:

Zabroccoli.5870:

I think he has 30 in arcane for the Evasive Arcana, dodge roll procs an attunment based spell. =) Unless my eyes deceive me.

I want to pick your brain and know your secrets. My play style is very similar but I have no where near the burst that you do. =(

Your eyes decieve you

That they did. =)

Okay, on the last video he posted I thought I saw churning earth after a few dodge rolls.

Edit: Earth 15pt minor trait? is that what I saw? I think it is.

I think he has 30 in arcane for the Evasive Arcana, dodge roll procs an attunment based spell. =) Unless my eyes deceive me.

I want to pick your brain and know your secrets. My play style is very similar but I have no where near the burst that you do. =(

Best advice, roll them all, play them until you find what you are comfortable with. I have always played stealth/rouge-ish characters in mmo’s. I rolled a thief and leveled him to 80, full exotics included. I got very bored very fast. Not saying thief is a bad class, it just didn’t do it for me. I rolled an Ele and have never looked back. It might be “in a bad place” but it will “recover.”

It is more difficult to grasp and you do have to be good at “playing the piano” (lots of keystrokes) to play an Ele effectively. But, it is hands down the funnest and imho most rewarding class to play. T/sPvP, PvE, and WvWvW…fun. This is why when I finished my Incinerator it went directly to my Ele and not my thief.

Try all the classes that appeal to you and make your own decision. It’s fine to ask advice but too many people will hate on the disparities of the Ele before they will tell you that it is fun to play.

Play an Ele because you love the class/mechanics. Not because you want to be good in PvP or top the dps charts.

My $.02

Eviscera.9703:

ThiBash.5634:

Eviscera.9703:

Staff has never been good for PvP and probably never will. It’s to clunky and slow to play with. The only reason you want to go staff is for PvE and WvW. D/D, S/D or S/F is the way to go for PvP.

It depends on how you play it. Staff is obviously a group weapon, and I can tell from experience that in larger fights (2v2 or 3v3) the staff gets better. Especially if you’re fighting over control of a point, you get the room to support your allies through area control.

And on a sidenote, whenever I encounter a non-staff ele, I usually beat them 1v1 with my staff ele. Anecdotal maybe, but so are most posts.

A good ele using s/d or d/d will never lose to a staff ele, never.

Never EVER.

It’s been said on here a million times, Ele’s are fun to play but you have to put in 4x the effort (keystrokes) than other classes to get the same damage. Can you play the piano?

I run a variation of a d/d bunker auramancer with a lot of boon duration and i can 1v1 most classes. It just takes more time to burn them down. Usually by the time i get close to stomping someone they have friends show up and it turns into a 1v2,3,4,5,ect…and then I just have to bail out and find my own backup.

It is an INCREDIBLY FUN class to play. I like it more than all the others. I just takes time to get comfortable with bouncing in and out of attunments, finding which skills combo with the others, and stacking your might (with my build). Once you have 20+ stacks of might (and maybe 25 stacks from a sigil of bloodlust) you can chew through almost anything.

My advice, make one. Play it. Learn it. If it’s something that you feel you enjoy then keep at it. I’ve had my ele for about a year and I’m still learning new tricks about her. It is a labor of love to play an Ele. Don’t play it because you want to do a ton of damage. That’s not what they do. Unless you spec zerker gear/staff and hang out in the background. You can faceroll as a support/damage staff ele. The only downside there is if you’re caught 1v1,2,3,4,ect…you’re a goner.

A fight with an elementalist is like a chess match. You need to know your opponent inside and out. Know what they intend to do before they do it. Then counter and make them pay for making a mistakes.

In my experience, conditions are just little bonus’s that tack on to your other attacks. You really can’t rely on them to melt through anyone’s health pool. =/

As Tei said, “cavalier’s gear is your friend.”

Half the fun of playing a d/d ele is experimentation. That, and trolling others in wvw. If played right this class “subtype” can whittle down an opponent through a battle of attrition. I have learned to be patient and to wait for others to make mistakes.

I’m just rehashing a lot of what others have said above, but these are people who love this class and know all the ins and outs. It takes time to truly master the ele (which I still am nowhere close to).

I run a variation of the Boon duration/cantrip build. Maybe my build will give you some help, maybe it won’t I’m not saying to copy it but if you see something that others aren’t using then it might further your knowledge of the class.

0/10/10/20/30

air 10
I – Zephyr’s boon, everyone knows what this one does. auras and swiftness

earth 10
III – armor of earth, armor of earth when health drops below 50%. great when you get caught in a kitten storm and don’t have a cantrip off cd. also the added toughness from the earth line is in my opinion better than vitality (i’ll get into that later)

water 20
III – cantrip mastery, reduces recharge time of cantrips 20%
IX – soothing disruption, regen and vigor when using a cantrip (dodging is the best damage mitigation)

arcane 30

III – final shielding, arcane shield when health drops below 25% (also explodes if hit 3 times) once again…and great for oh kitten kitten kitten moments.
VIII – elemental attunement, boons based on attunment.
XI – evasive arcana, dodge rolling (which you do a lot as an ele) procs an attunment based field.

signet of healing – continuous heals for every spell cast (you are a spell caster)

mist form – oh kitten, stun breaker. also you can rez and/or stomp an enemy, pop mist form and take no damage while channeling.

armor of earth – improved toughness, stun breaker coupled with the earth trait and the boons you can keep this up for almost 18 seconds if needed.

lightning flash- teleport, great to get out of trouble/catch up to an enemy, or cast it while channeling earth 5 and teleport into a group of enemies who think they have escaped your field.

fiery greatsword – great damage but more than that, awesome mobility if you need to move somewhere fast, running away or catching a victim. (most people who 1v1 a decent d/d ele will have to move away to heal and then come back to finish the fight. don’t let them.

Cavalier’s gear (over Valkyrie)
I like the toughness over the vitality because it mitigates burst better. Some will argue that you get your toughness from the protection that procs from all the boons and auras that carry over with the auramancer/boon duration build. Well I think there’s nothing wrong with a little extra toughness, that, and you can clear any conditions that you receive in a matter of seconds so the high health pool isn’t something that “I personally” worry about. Add in the oh kitten shields from the proc’d armor of earth, the cantrip armor of earth, the proc’d arcane shield, and any protection from your boons and you are one of the most survivable classes in the game.

I also use the “standard”…is it standard? 2 runes of the traveler, 2 runes of the monk, and 2 runes of water, for the heals and boon duration.

Zerker daggers with 1 sigil of battle and 1 sigil of bloodlust (once i hit 25 stacks) then switch to zerker dagger with sigil of force to make up a little for not speccing at least 25 in water to get the bountiful power skill that gives you 1% damage for any boon you have.

I do have a few ascended celestial trinkets, and clerics earrings for the added healing power.

This is just my personal build. I hope it helps to convince you not to give up on this class. I like many others have played other classes and no matter what I always come back. There is no class that is more fun to play and more rewarding than the ele.

You will not one shot anyone with this build, but you will troll the heck out of them until they make a mistake. That’s how you win. Bury them with constant pressure, make them eat their CD’s and wear them down into the ground.

^^ what s/he said. I was in that fight for SM. we may have lost it in the end but we were able to hold IOJ and AR off for almost three hours. Not to mention I only had to respawn and rush back three times during the fight. I will gladly fight side by side with anyone on DH. This group of folks knows how to play.

Don’t always use the scepter, but it looks cool for the pic.

Scepter/dagger is good for ele is you take the time to learn your rotations. I mainly use it in fractals and dungeons for ranged attack/control/mobility. Great for kiting mobs. Although not as effective for damage as D/D and not as good for support as Staff. But if you need a mix of the two S/D might be fun.

My advice, play all 4 scepter classes to level 2 or 3 and see which one best suits your play style with the scepter.

I run a rotation similar to Graybes but mine differs a bit.

I start in Air, use 4 to get to the target then 5 to knock it back. Switch to Fire use 3 to get back to the target then 2 then 5 (does extra damage to burning opponents) then 4. Switch to Earth, use 4 to knock down opponents (creates area might) then while opponents are down channel 5 (you may get hit but the toughness while attuned to earth should mitigate that. Then Earth 2 and 1 for bleeds. Finally to Water, 2 (heals while doing damage) 3 to chill and roll out to heal (if need) repeat…if needed.

I also agree with Gibson. Go somewhere safe and just mess around with the build.

It’s such a versatile class that as soon as you learn how to switch between attunements fluidly, every other class seems boring and dull by comparison.