Guild Wars 2

Here’s a few things I noticed that could improve your play:

1. After you knock somebody down with air 4 5 combo and switch to fire, you should be using 3 4 right away. If you aim it right you’ll hit both while they’re still down. This utilizes the knockdown of air 5 and the mobility of fire 3 much better than using fire 2 right away when switching to fire.

Honestly, I wouldn’t even use fire 2 when first rotating to fire. Its dps isn’t that great, the hit box is extremely clunky when you and your opponent are moving (notice how few ticks you get off on opponents?), and you can’t dodge without cancelling it. The only time I’d use it would be if the opponent is slowed (so rotating to fire right after water) or immobilized (earth 3) to ensure I get every dps tick off. And that’s when fire 3 and 4 are off cd, so not often. Instead, I’d switch to earth faster to chain knockdowns together and get the bleed going.

2. And now that I’ve mentioned dodging, you need to dodge more, as well as dodge more intelligently. If you’re going against a sustained dps/low burst build like the ranger you faced, you should still be dodging to cover ground faster. Also, if you can get right next to their face it’s nice for the next point.

3. You under utilize auto attacks. D/D ele is bursty/less sustained damage than scepter/D, so you’re naturally going to run out of hard hitting spells by your third rotation.

Both fire and air auto attacks can do a decent amount of damage. Usually, if it’s a ranged enemy, air auto attack and 2 is decent enough to space out spells. Fire auto attack is harder to aim effectively (hit more than 1 line) when your enemy is running from you. In contrast, if a melee enemy, fire 1 has enough range to continue kiting. If you space it right, you’ll hit more than just 1 of the 3 lines as they ran at you (easier to predict where they’ll go since they want to give you a hug), and therefore do decent dps.

At the end of a couple of fights you’re just in earth attune spamming the auto attack to take the remaining health. Try avoiding that by managing spell rotations/auto attacks/dodging more efficiently.

4. Cleansing fire. Why do you have it? You don’t use it often and it’s taking a valuable utility slot. Arcane blast or wave are two great options, and you can choose one of them depending on personal preference. Air 4 5 fire 3 4 arcane spell is great combo.

You said you were 30 water/30 earth/10 arcane, but I’m not sure which traits you’re using. For the 30 grandmaster trait in water you can spec into ‘cure condition on regen.’ This should solve most condition problems you have since swapping to water will automatically cure 2 conditions (assuming you have cleansing wave as well, which most do), and another 2 from water 5.

It’s overall a great video. Keep up the good work

Before watching OP’s video I had ~25% win rate in sPvP after around 60 matches. After watching the video and practicing for a few days, I’ve gotten the win rate up to 55% after around 140 games (I’m top kills/skirmisher and/or top neutralizer around 50% of my recent games). So I think it’s rather obvious that I’ve majorly improved my own play.

That being said, I still feel weaker than the 5 signet warrior and heartseeker spamming thieves. In general, I can’t even compete with mesmers and guardians.

I feel like the drastic increase in my win rate is due to me (sometimes majorly) outplaying enemies in skirmishes.

Today, even after I dodged a hundred-blade warrior’s bull rush and subsequent spin and kited them for the majority of their health bar, getting hit 3 times by auto attacks left me at 20% health. While I was dodging nearly everything, hitting combo chains correctly and generally staying out of reach, all the (awful) warrior player did was walk towards me, heal, and spam auto attacks. And that warrior player nearly won the skirmish.

And god forbid I face somebody that’s playing better than me. When I outplay a warrior, thief, or mesmer, I survive with 20%. When a guardian, thief, or any class for that matter, outplay me, they skip away with over 50% of their health.

I’m open to improving my play further, testing different things out, and just becoming an overall better player. I recognize when I make mistakes and constantly try to avoid making them again. But I can’t help but feel limited by playing an elementalist.

Before I watched OP’s video I also rolled a mesmer to try it out. With no major mesmer experience beforehand (I leveled ele to 80 before trying pvp out for the first time), and as the worse player I was pre-OP’s video, I achieved a 50% win rate after 24 games. That’s a 50% win rate on a no-experience mesmer vs. a 25% win rate on an ele main. I understand there’s a higher skill floor for eles, but ouch.

One last thing – if they’re going to do anything immediate to eles it should be fixing ride the lightening. I die once every other match because it keeps me suspended in the same spot for a second while I take free damage and lose any positional advantage I had.