Guild Wars 2

Yeah staff is super strong when used for what it is good for, as others have mentioned. And with the trait in Arcane to enlarge the size of your AoE spells its not that difficult to land stuff. But Staff Ele isnt about the dps its about supporting your team and the objectives, it is super strong at that. I think it is hard to get a hang of I am and ele I SHOULD be blowing stuff up and this thing doesnt do it right, I know thats what I was thinking when I first tried it. Then I saw a couple good streamers using Staff and was like OHHHHHH GOTCHA. lol. Check out Phantaram’s stream on twitch.tv/phantaram really really good.

Gelrod.1295:

I’d say, Ele is the most balanced/polished class there is atm. It is strong, yet not too strong. Sure, a few minor tweaks could help a few aspects, but they aren’t that important.
Every weapon (maybe exept focus) is viable. And there is a good build for each trait-tree… thats way more than other professions have.

In terms of strengh… Ele doesn’t deal as much dmg as other classes, an Ele can’t be as survivable as other classes. But you can combine all these aspects way better than other classes.
I love elementalist for this versatility… yes it comes at a cost, but it’s totally worth it.

D/D = Melee on the most squishy class with near to no survivability in close quarter fight.

With a good set of traits + amulett you are really survivable with d/d. There are some amazing defensive skills with this setup.

S/D = DPS is extremely delayed, lack luster, slow and no survivability at all.

I don’t understand how you could say that. You’ve got good survivability from the skills(2 heals, 2 aoe kd’s, earth shield, blind, vigor…) and can improve this survivability even further with traits + amulett, depending on the playstyle.

S/F = DPS is extremely delayed and even worst then S/D but the survivability is what it should be for every ranged weapon.

S/F isn’t good for a power build, I agree… but thats because focus lacks good skills in fire attunement. You can run an OK condition build with good survivability and dps, though it isn’t competetive imo, cause other classes fill that roll way better.

Staff = DPS is absent, spells are extremely slows, extremely delayed and the CC is poor version of other professions CCs due to the near impossibility for it to work unless running away from people in strafe mode (Which will undoubtfully make people catch you as you are slower in strafe mode.)

Yep, Staff got somewhat bad damage for sPvP since the staff nerf… but staff still got the option for a strong support specc. Good heal, good conditionremove, AoE damage that helps killing all the nasty phantasms and pets… overall good support.

I have to agree with pretty much all you posted here, thanks for saving me the time to write it up. I really fail to see where these arguements are based off of. I have not have a problem in sPvP with my ele, sure certain class/build combos can be problematic, but you cant be strong against everything with 1 build. The only not viable spec is S/F because focus just isnt very good right now in pvp. D/D is problematic because of the squishiness of the class in melee range, it can work in some instances but I dont think it is very strong against many class/builds. S/D and Staff are great for spvp.

And I am not sure if the poster was stating these things off of hot join 8v8 pvp matches but that is not a good way to measure how a class performs, those matches are hardly competitive or balanced because all it is a zerg for the most part and anything but organized. I just go in there for some practice on my rotation when waiting for tourneys to come up. tPvP is where you really see how well a class is performing.

So my experience with my Ele so far is that I am happy with the class right now. It could benefit from some a small number boost and I think that would be mostly for PvE. In sPvP I dont really have a hard time. Some builds I have a difficult time with but a build has to be weak against some others, it cant beat everything.

In PvE I think D/D or Staff work the best or are at least the most fun for me. I have used S/D the past few nights for PvE and idk, it just doesn’t feel right for me. So I think in dungeons I will stick to staff like I have been doing and D/D for solo questing. In sPvP and tournaments I have been having a lot of fun with my ele and I usually do not have trouble against many other classes. Rangers have been a bit annoying this week, S/D Poison Thieves can be tricky and Mesmers are always annoying. But I don’t feel that my Ele cant compete/beat them in a 1v1 situation regularly. I have talked with a few of the better Ele streamers like Phataram, Zamoa, and Power and the general consensus is that Ele’s are good right now and Thief/Mesmers should be brought down a bit to around where the ele is and things would be good. But they are not significantly UP. And the nerf to HS today was a step in that direction.

http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.1.2.0.13.0.20.0.4.0.2.20.21.9.24.10.2.6.0.0.0.18.25.0.0.0.0.50.52.0.65.61.72.0.20.0.20.30

That is the build I use in pvp and it is very strong. I used to run it with Beserkers Amulet but Valk gives you so much more survivability and healing. Even though you have like 2k less hp I survive much longer with the toughness of Valk amulet. Anyway I like the way the ele plays now, yes they are a high skill cap class and I understand that some people feel that they shouldnt have to be masters at a profession to compete with others. But I think someone mentioned before either they would need a major buff to flat damage which would make them too OP imo or redesign the class from the ground up, which I would hate to see. I think we will either see the ele get slight damage boosts and maybe some trait adjustment or other classes will be toned down a tad, I am speaking from a pvp pov btw.

NightFury.1758:

EliteZ.1682:

NightFury.1758:

EliteZ.1682:

NightFury.1758:

EliteZ.1682:

This is not world of warcraft though is it. It’s Guild Wars 2. There is a big difference. Why do you need to take 20 people into a dungeon with you when you can have 5? You get nothing different from having 5,10,15,20,25 or even 40 players in the group you’re still going to be running the same dungeon. @Nightfury, what does it matter if you can’t have ALL of your friends in the same group? Rotate who you do them with simple.

Rotate my friends? This is a MMO not a single player game. I like the challenge of coordinating with more than 5 people.

HAHAHAH… Coordinating more then 5 people in raids. I’m assuiming you played wow and there was no coordination in raids. It was “right stand there press this button” “You stand there and press this button” “Everyone else DPS!”… yeah that’s really coodinating. Atleast in these 5man dungeons they are a challange. EVERYONE has to move everyone has to coordinate with eachother as you can just boost one person through it unlike wow where i knew guilds that sold heroic raid runs to people who can’t do them for mounts/gear.

Yes I have played WoW since beta. It never used to be like the game it has become today. Today its mad easy for 12 year olds to play. Back then, you had to coordinate 40 people, and if one person screwed up then you failed. So get your facts right.

I’ve played wow since vanilla too and yes the 40man raids was more challangeing then Cata raids, but i’d still say doing these dungeons are much more fun and better. if you want raids go back to wow. I know my facts and i know you don’t need 20 players just to have a challangeing yet fun dungeon.

@Nuadu Oh the hardest raid in ages FL i knew afew guilds selling heroic rans for people to get the mount from it.

If you played vanilla why would you even mention cata? What 40 man raids did you do?

P.S You might like dungeons that only have 5 people in it, but that does not mean it is fun for everyone else. I am not going back to wow since its to easy, making it a bore fest. I left after wrath because they “were not making the game for hard core raiders anymore” I bought this game to enjoy it, not to be told to go back to WoW which I did not even come from nor want to play.

I came from WoW and SWTOR and a few other MMO’s I played through the years. And I am loving GW2 as it is and it is such a breath of fresh air to the scene imo. If they kept the game with no raids being added i would continue to play and be perfectly happy to do so. However I understand that some people do want raids, if they were added I would be all over them.

I dont think they would hurt the game if added correctly. The biggest issue with Raids is that in MMOs raiding serves as a way to obtain the best gear in the game. GW2 was designed completely opposite so that no matter how you chose to reach 80 and play the game, you could still have the highest tier gear for your character. (Min/maxing and stat optimization is another thing) So Raiding would have to be done in a way that the rewards provided do not give an advantage to Raiders vs Non-Raiders. And still be rewarding enough so that you feel the effort put into the raid is worth it.

That I feel would be the hardest part if ArenaNet did ever decide to put them into the game. I would love to raid if each boss dropped specific loot unique to that encounter that looked awesome and could not be obtained elsewhere. Or if each boss or the last boss dropped a few rare materials for level 80 epic or legendary crafting. Things like these would be fun to have and give people reason to do them. But its a very touchy issue and Anet would need to really balance it properly if they ever added Raiding content in.

For me I would like to see it, its not a must have but i would participate if it was added. I will be around this game for a long while regardless.

Jnaathra.6549:

rom.9726:

the thief is NOT one of the most easiest classes to grasp. Sorry. And No I will quantify my statement since you didn’t bother either.

My first 80 was an elementalist. Here I am swapping through attuenments.. Trying to keep track of which is on cd and which is not. I need some extra condition removal and healing, water. I need high damage, get into fire. Oh no that melee is to close to me.. I need some control and protection, earth. etc etc etc. Regardless of weapon and spec you are in a constant state of juggling all this stuff around.

Enter the thief…

So last night I feel like making a thief. I go through the tutorial/story area. I hit level 2 and immediately go to spvp. I throw together a dagger/pistol with pistol/pistol spec. I don’t touch a target dummy and go immediately into spvp.

Put on some poison, pop and assassin signet. Spam HS and watch crap die. Start getting hurt and throw down a stealth field. Watch my teammates take them down a notch.. come out of the stealth field and spam HS and watch crap die. Get into a few situations that require ranged, spam unload and watch crap die.

So I have been playing an elementalist since release.. Spvp, wvw, pve.. dungeons.. Trying out every weapon, every spec possible.

First time using a thief… get the highest score I have ever gotten in spvp, first place overall, lots of kills, a single death..

How do you think I feel about my Elementalist now?

I am really getting tired of seeing these posts. I play Ele and rarely die to thieves anymore. Once you know the build they are using they are fairly easy to counter. Unless they are good then its a more even match, maybe giving them the advantage on damage since they are a bit higher then the ele right now. But anyway, basing a thief being OP off of hot join spvp matches is pointless. Those matches are full of bad players and players that are trying out different builds or just running around to smash things. Its easy to roflstomp with a thief on pub games. In tPvP with my guilds I play roamer so i usually 1v1 thieves alot since the other team usually has one as their roam. S/P venom builds give me more trouble usually and im okay with that since it requires some more skill then d/d hs spam. But a HS spam thief is useless in a tpvp match agianst smart players. They are easily countered bu updrafting as an ele when they HS in then drop dragon tooth, phoenix, arcane blast and wave while they are in the knock down. This will finish about 75 percent of their health. then you can just use your 1/2/3/ in air to finish them. Water if you need heals, you should start out in earth to get the armor as well. Just my experience. Take it as you will.

Mescaline.2743:

Luthan.5236:

Mescaline.2743:

2 vs 1 situation .
You kill one ,and you think that this should reward your skill … Wrong!
Instead here comes the guardian ccing you , shield blocking everything and rez the guys you downed .
When this happens i’m such a sad panda .
I’m for completely removing it from PvP but this , unfortunately , is not going to happen.

Then you should not go 2 vs 1. No class should be able to kill 2 others by themselves without help. Yeah. It is annoying if you got him downed and can’t kill him because some other guy is around. But that’s how it works.

Sorry but i completely disagree .
Not saying i should go 1 vs 2 but what about if i’m defending a point , 2 enemies come and i’m able to down one of em ?
I clearly played better so , imo , i should be rewarded instead of being punished.

This is where the fact that it is team based gameplay really comes into play. In this example if I am defending or on a node solo and 2 enemies come to fight me. Immediately our team is at an advantage else where. I communicate this to them and let them know they can push for a different objective on the map because they have one less man on the map. In my mind at the point its all about how much time can I buy my team and keep these two people here. If I down 1 thats awesome, but in tourement pvp unless I have mist for um to stomp a player I just dont expect to win a 2v1. For the most part the odds are not in your favor and imo thats how it should be. They sent 2 back to take out 1 of you, they already put themselves at a disadvantage whether you down 1 both or none. Its your job to let your team know to play aggressive because they have the numbers advantage or take map control while you do whatever you can at the point your in against the 2 your facing.

Thats just how I play out that scenario, another way is call for help from an ally, stall as long as possible. If you are good enough to down 1 person in a 1v2 then if you call for an ally, when they get there they can finish the stomp for you and then you have a 2v1 against the remaining enemy. At that point they either are going to have to send 3 back to get the point or just concede it for the time being, either way your team comes out with an advantage.

Oh and a third way to play that out is if you see 2 coming, leave the point they cap it and usually people will go back to their team and leave the point open and you can back cap on them or if there is only 1 defending then its just a simple 1v1, hopefully you win and get the kill plus a cap.

Thats just my thinking on that type of scenario.

Yeah cant wait for this. This way teams trying to go pro wouldn’t waste practice time on players starting out in tPvP and roflstomping them. This way Pros can play Pros and lower elo players can learn and climb the ladder. It would be nice to have a post from one of the devs on this.

Im just going to throw my 2 cents out there. I feel that for a launch client the professions are balanced okay. Necros could use some help, thiefs and memsers could be brought down a bit to about where they Ele. From talking with a few different competitive streamers, people feel that the ele is where the mesmer and thief should be. However I do not think the Memser and Thief are TOO powerful. There are ways to deal with them if you know how the class works. Mesmers you just need to have Target on a keybind and always be marking the real memser. Thiefs that run stun lock pistolwhip can be tough but the stunned and focused they are easily killed since 90% of thiefs build pure glass cannon.

And also, going into a spvp match and dominating when you first try out a diff class doesnt mean they are op because your crushing. The only place to really judge how a class works is in tPvP. Hot join matches are too chaotic and zergy to really see how well classes perform. 5v5 is a good balance where you can more clearly see the strengths and weaknesses of other players and compositions.

Arheundel.6451:

Nothing new here really….seen dozen of these guides and they all come to the same conclusion:" If you want to play ele …go glass cannon", but thx no….
I don’t want to play in a way that I need to constantly watch over my back if not a random sneeze from somebody would kill me, I really don’t care to see a big 5k white number appear on screen…

To play a good ele you dont have to go glass cannon. I dont think the build that the OP and I use as well is a complete glass cannon. Between water and earth attunement you will be suprised at the ammount of survivability you will have. With PROPER POSITIONING, you can deal a lot of damage and stay in a fight without being insta gibbed.

And if you want even more survivability this build works great, lots of healing and toughness. http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.1.7.0.0.0.5.0.0.0.2.17.11.9.24.1.1.8.0.0.0.0.0.0.33.0.0.46.48.56.65.68.71.0.0.10.30.30

Ayame Yoshimoto.1860:

Sorry, but you seem INCREDIBLY pompous. Who, exactly, are you that you’re some sort of PvP authority?

I didnt feel that his post was in any way pompous. A lot of eles have been complaining about needing to be buffed and they are too squishy. He is just trying to educate to ele community on how they can be played well.

In talking with some of the bigger streamers for gw2 spvp like Erho and Phantaram they feel that Ele’s are where the dps/roamer classes should be and that thiefs and mesmers just need to be brought down a bit because right now they are a little too strong. I feel the same, I dont feel that the thief and memser are broken but they do need to be brought down a little.

Anyway great post the build is solid. Especially with the Valkyries over the Beserker. This is what I have been using for the past few days and really love it. So much more survivability with the Valkyries. I stole this build from Phantarams stream though, lol. He is a really sick Ele check him out sometime twitch.tv/phantaram

Thats a really hard combo to land to try and burst someone down completely. What is your spec? I run this build that Phantaram posted on his stream (http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.1.2.0.13.0.20.0.4.0.2.20.21.9.24.10.2.6.0.0.0.18.25.0.0.0.0.50.52.0.65.61.72.0.20.0.20.30) It used to run the Bezerkers Amulet which gave a bit more damage but now with the Valkyries Amulet it has way more survivability and healing and I love it. I actually switched over to thief last week, then when he suggested the Valkyries I tried it out and have been sticking to my ele for spvp and tourneys. But anyway a much easier way to win fights is like Voltric said poke with your 1/2/3 from Air. In this spec I usually get some ticks off for 3k so it can lower them about 20 percent or so depending on how long I can delay going into melee range. After that I usually ride the lightning in(or not if I am able to walk to updraft range) followed by updraft, immediately switch to fire and drop dragons tooth and phoenix. You have to be quick but you can land them all during the updraft knock down. I run Arcane blast and Arcane wave in the build so while getting back into range I will drop that as well. A squishy target like a thief will be dead most of the time, if not I just swap back to air and chase them down because they are usually really low health and trying to leave the fight.

If they are tanky then the fight lasts a bit longer but I have 1v1 guardians and warriors before, it takes time and a lot of attunement swapping. After the first big burst combo I mentioned above swapping to earth then getting the knockdown and churning earth helps to get the bleeds down and wear them down as you keep switching to air and fire for dps and water if you need the heal or condi removal. Hopefully that helps a bit.

EnochDagor.6185:

Ya, it is not changing any game mechanics here. Just an ease of use thing. Hitting H and right-clicking the items you want and selecting equip/equip in off hand… just takes a lot of effort to do.

/signed

Im not trying to bash this post but its an interesting world we live in when you see someone saying it takes a lot of effort to open up the Hero tab and manually swap weapons.

Anyway it would be handy, but I don’t really think its a must have change. I dont swap weapons all that much with my Ele.

FireRunner.9481:

I read in a Forbes article GW2 had over 400,000 in head start.

They has 400,000 CONCURRENT users. Not copies sold. I believe they sold over 1 mil pre purchases. You should be able to find the article somewhere, I think Joystiq had one on the sales.

Ennarian.4620:

I just hit 80 today and my mindset hasn’t changed. I still have to complete my story, clear each zone 100%, find and complete all the puzzles, get in some Keg Brawls, explore all the WvW zones, rank up in sPvP, get stuff for a Legendary or so, run the last 6 dungeons and all explorable modes, get exotic gear, and start saving up tokens for some of the cool dungeon armor.

After that, I’ll probably make my first alt.

My list exactly Except I still need to get to 80, lol. Im at 62 but LOVING the way there. I just always split up my time between pvp tournaments with my guildies and leveling.

Soothsayer.9476:

If you complete zones 100% then you’ll have plenty of these stones for free. You can even find the fine transmutation stones so you can use them on lvl80 gear.

I have been doing the 100% completion for any zone that I wander into and I am lvl62 with 21 Basic Transmutation Stones and I think 3 of the lvl 80 ones. There are ways to get them without spending IRL money.

fingis.2867:

I stopped repairing my armor and now do dungeons naked. I’ve saved a forturne. If anyone asks why I’m naked, I tell them it’s a bug.

This one made me chuckle.
But from what I have experienced, this games dungeons can be really frustrated when running with a group, even a guilded group but your not communicating during or before fights on what exactly needs to go on. Sure you can try and work it all out before with in game chat, but VOIP is really the best way to go. I only jump on vent in my guild when going into a dungeon or a tournament.

Thief and Mesmer arguably the best down states in the game right now. Downed state isnt there to see who out damages the other person. As mentioned by Mog, its to delay the killing blow to allow your team to revive. So in that respect, the profession is amazing at it. And Thief downed state does a nice bit of damage as well.

I play an Ele and when I down a thief I down bother trying to down them, I just burst them down because its just a waste of time imo to try and get the stomp off.

Thanks for posting this, I will deff be checking this out.

Thanks for making a post like this. It will be very helpful for people understanding how to counter Thieves. There is so much qq over them right now, and while I do think their damage as it is should be nerfed a bit I don’t think they are as OP as people make them out to be. If you know how a Thief works and how to counter their abilities then they are quite easy to kill, especially since 90% of people in pub games are running glass cannon builds. One stun or knock down to them and a quick burst combo usually does the trick, lol. Thanks again for a nice post for the community.

Sky.9347:

In this game, we fight in PvP because we like to fight. The gear all has equal stats, because we like to fight on even terms.

If we just live in the Mists, we will eventually earn some really kitten looking gear to flaunt how awesome we are.

But no matter what, sPvP is always an EVEN PLAYING FIELD where you win or lose based solely on your strategy, and tactics. Never will you lose just because your opponent has all the free time in the world to get the highest tier of gear and 2 shot you into oblivion while only taking 13% of your damage.

But fear not! For there is one other method of PvP which combines your PvE progression (and gear) with a somewhat level playing field.

WvWvW – You will use your unlocked skills, equipped gear, and earned money. You’ll be scaled to level 80.. but you don’t get instant access to skills/traits/gear.

Yeah you gave the condensed version of what I said, lol. I type to much.

sPvP in this game is completely separate from PvE. You are auto leveled to 80 with all skills and traits unlocked and everyone has access to the same gear. This is done so that PvP is not dominated by players that have grind to top level PvP gear on it and win games because they out-gear you and not necessarily out-skill you. Also this is pretty much the only way that devs can balance PvP combat without affecting the way someones class performs in PvE. IMO this has been done extremely well and should stay that way.

Now the annoying thing for some people is that you get to 80 on your real character and say you have all exotics and even a legendary weapon, then you go to Heart of the Mists, and your stripped down to the general PvP gear everyone has. I understand the desire to want to wear your amazing looking PvE gear while playing maches but bringing PvE gear into the sPvP area will offset the structure they have set up with balancing classess and gear designed for sPvP. However if you want to go into WvWvW and play pvp, gear really matters there because you get ranked up to 80 but your gear, skills, and traits still stay with you and if you are out geared by another player they have the advantage.

sPvP has its own Mystic Forge where you can craft different set of gear to show off and display how dedicated you are to that aspect of the game as well. There are different ranks of Glory in sPvP and depending on which rank you are you will be able to craft different sets of gear. So if you play tons of sPvP and get to max Glory rank and have idk the Flame Legion armor set(I dont know what rank is required for this but I figure its high) and you roll around in games wearing it, a new player coming into sPvP will see that and be like holy crap that guy looks amazing. And they then have that drive to keep playing to get the cool looking gear. And the best thing is that the same person that comes into the game, if he is skilled at his profession, can still beat the guy wearing the highest ranking armor because they have the same stats, one guy just looks like he is God Mode and the other guys not so much.

Anyway, I think you just have to look at them as almost two separate games. Your PvE side character that you have your gear you have leveled and ground for hours and hours to get and can use in WvWvW and your sPvP character that is made only for sPvP maches has access to their own gear locker.

In my opionion this is amazing because it gives me so much to work for. Getting my character to 80 getting all exotics with the right runes and sigils then crafting legendaries. And then i still have to rank my way up in Glory to get my Flame Legion set for PvP (Can you tell thats my favorite set) lol.

Hopefully that made sense.