Blinding ashe icd needs to be per person not per activation that alone would fix a lot about fire.
The cooldown needs to be removed completely. Why is it that necro’s deathly chill, which is infinitely more powerful than blinding ashes, has zero cooldown but this does? Especially considering that necro farts out chill with every step they take and ele’s burn access is nothing compared to necro’s chill access, i don’t see why we should have a cd on our gm trait when they don’t have a cd on theirs. Considering how powerful both are, they should be the ones with the 8 sec cooldown and we should have none. And even then, we still wouldn’t have as much access to blind as thief does. Given the current state of ele as far as offensive builds go, this wouldn’t be the least bit overpowered. It would just put us on par with other dps builds.
Icd need to be there and on more skills but the icd needs to be per person not per activation like glyph of element power. A kind of low stacking effect but able to land it on every one.
So i would even say put it on a longer cd but every time you burn some one you blind them but if you burn them right after it will not blind them. Same needs to be done with crit condis and even stun effects (mind you i think the stun effect needs to be a lot more impact full).
If we have to keep our Icd, necro needs one for deathly chill. even if we take every possible way we can get burn, reaper still outputs more chill than we output burn. And thief will still be able to blindspam more than we can. I still think its perfectly fair for our icd to be removed entirely on that alone. They either need to buff us to that point, or nerf them down to our level. I’d be fine with keeping an icd if they also gave necros an icd of 10+ seconds. But yeah, you’re right there is too much spam in the game already and powercreep is never good. toning everyone else down would be a better solution.
The difference is, DC doesn’t produce a CC effect but a damaging one. If you put an ICD on it, it becomes trash in PvE. On the other hand, if you remove the ICD on Blinding Ashes, it becomes OP in PvP… and still remains trash in PvE.
The concept of fun doesnt strike you huh?
It does, but it’s in no way impacted by existence of different level of difficulty modes. Or rewards being available by other means.
So, my point still stands. If it’s really about that, why such a strong opposition to other mode suggestions? Are some players’ fun really going to be so much negatively impacted if other players will be able to have fun as well?
It’s not that simple.
Legendary armor was meant to be an incentive for players to try and stick with raids. Getting it is the pinnacle of a long and hard effort. Adding an alternative method of obtaining it will devalue it and will make the players that put that effort feel cheated. It will essentially be robbing them of a sense of achievement. Which is part of why raiding is fun. The content doesn’t just have to be difficult, it has to feel rewarding as well.
That’s why I think we’re not going to see an alternative method of obtaining it, just like we’ll never see a PvE-obtainable Ascension or a non-fractal Ad Infinitum.
Competitive to what? The line is already competitive.
This is mainly for PvP, the Fire line is pretty terrible in that mode.
Then put a [PvP] tag in the title. Because the line is pretty great in PvE.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Its not reasonable to expect people who are paying to have fun to spend their “play” time not having fun. Customers telling you that they do not like aspects of your product is kind of important if you want to continue to sell to them in the future.
You seem to assume all the players have the same tastes and want the same things. This obviously isn’t the case. And frankly, you don’t even need to read threads like this to know this is an unreasonable assumption. You just need to have had contacts with people.
I’m just curious: how did you read the post you quoted and get “you seem to assume all the players have the same tastes and want the same things”?
Read my next comment, it has it explained.
I guess you must be responding to me, though you don’t quote my post. But no, I’m not going to read a different post to understand this post. I want to know how you go to your conclusion from the post you actually quoted.
Sorry, not going to explain the same thing over and over again because someone can’t be bothered to read a discussion.
It’s accessibility dependence to raid. Give an alternative currency, or anything else, that can be acquired outside of raid. Make it time gated too and differently difficult (structured group activities are hardly the only thing that can be made difficult) if you want, but not tied to raid type content. The precursor is already knee deep tied to raid anyway.
Ideally, a completely different suit of armor is what would be best, but when Anet people make us understand that there likely won’t be any other suit of leg armor before GW3 you kinda have to compromise on the topic.
That being said, I can understand why raiders won’t like that solution. It is their badge of honor and my solution compromise that. I too would not like it if the role were reverse. And I’m not even asking this for me since I will likely finish most of the suit before any such thing could be implemented. I just know that end game gear is an end game content many like to go after. Anet should know that too.
I think a change to the accessibility is unlikely for several reasons. First, the armor was supposed to be a driving force for people to play raids, similar to how the legendary backpacks are an incentive to play PvP or fractals, respectively. Changing the accessibility would defeat its purpose.
Second, I don’t want to imagine the backlash from the raiding community. It’s going to be bad. I can’t really see any way this could end up well for the playerbase.
The best you can hope for is a different set, likely tied to something else. WvW seems to be the logical choice, unless ANet want to leave this mode to die. Which would be a pity. Whether or not they are going to do a second set is a different story, of course. I’m 50:50 on the prospect. It took way too much time to produce the first set. But perhaps they have the process and can do another one easier? Only time will tell.
Competitive to what? The line is already competitive.
For all of those complaining that this topic has somehow run its course or that it isnt worth continuing, I would recommend that they (and ArenaNet) take a close look at pretty much every mention of GW2 raids outside of the forums – GW2 Facebook, MassivelyOP, MMORPG, etc. Read the comments sections on articles, Facebook etc, pretty much every time raids are brought up.
ArenaNet has a negative perception issue when it comes to raids. A lot of people see raids as inaccessible. Whether you think that is accurate or not in game is immaterial. The perception (which I actually do agree with) is there and it is very evident.
In my opinion, raids need a multi mode access model to address these perceptions (which again, I believe are based on in game realities). And, yes, in many cases it would do exactly that (or, at minimum, show players that Anet is paying attention to them).
Regardless of what happens in game, however, the persistent negative comments every time raids are mentioned outside of this subforum show that this is a topic that not only needs to continue – it is one Anet needs to pay close attention to.
Meh. The persistent negative comments come largely from people who decided to dislike raids when they first heard there are going to be ones in the game. The majority of these people never even tried the content, but keep being vocal. I myself wasn’t keen on the idea until I got to try them. And guess what, they’re the best part of the game. Accessibility issue does exist because of the 10-man format. However, this exact same format is what makes raids what they are. Maiming the content so a bunch of grumpy players can try it and confirm their opinion (this time with a reason, because 5-man version of the raid wings would most definitely suck) is an exercise in futility.
Queen Jennah put a giant glamour to cover the city and killed three White Mantle members, one at a time. Lazarus wiped out at least a dozen enemies with a single wave of his hand, twice.
But not while maintaining a giant, city-sized glamour.
Consider the play for power from Jennah in “Meeting of Ministers”. You could take it at face value and count it as being a defensive move. But I’ve watched Star Wars far too many times and I simply cannot resist drawing parallel to Palpatine. So I’m kind of waiting for a reveal about Jennah as well. Now, could the two reveals coincide?
I certainly do not dismiss this possibility. Again, it’s probably my Star Wars view count. But if Jennah was to pull this stunt off and pretend to be Lazarus, she’d end up playing on both sides, at least in regards to Krytan politics.
The actual weak point of this theory isn’t that Jennah can’t be Lazarus, it’s why would she be interested in Aurene and go to Rata Novus. Well. Unless she’s Kralkatorrik’s minion, but that’s quite a stretch.
There’s only two episodes left of Living World Season 3 and there’s been no sign of my favorite character anywhere.
Or… has there been? Maybe she’s hiding behind that mursaat outfit?
You don’t play games because they’re like the real world. You play them because they aren’t. In the real world there are far too many factors at play which can lead to changes you don’t like. In games it doesn’t have to be like this.
WvW is a game mode, raids are not. PvE is the game mode raids are part of. One can get the GoB doing most anything in WvW — zerging, roaming, doing PvE-like dailies over time. Once cannot get LI — and thus Legendary Armor — without doing a very specific part of PvE that is aimed solely at the hobbyist gamer. The comparison to the GoB requirement does not stand up to scrutiny because one does not even need to play WvW as a pastime to get the GoD — one need only play for a few hours at one’s convenience.
Consider legendary requirements in time. Legendary weapons are the first to appear in the game and they require something out of every game mode (even though you can get around PvP and buy the associated stuff on the TP).
The backpacks are more recently added and they both are specific items requiring you to play specific game modes. And in the case of Ad Infinitum – a specific part of a specific game mode. This may well indicate a change of design philosophy – rather than make you try everything, the items now try to get you involved in their associated area of the game. This is certainly the case for the armor, by the way.
Again, I agree WvW would benefit from getting access to something similar, I just feel the argument is a bit biased.
Feanor.2358
The reason I figured it had to be a person reborn, is if it enhanced a person to godhood why wouldn’t Caledus do it to himself? As in what was revealed in the Head of the Snake he’s willing to go to any end to have absolute power. What’s more powerful than a god? Being that the risen would have four aspects of Lazarus they would be more than powerful if that’s how the spell works. It would also give reason to why he refused to work with Caledus, meaning he didn’t want to fight his daughter. Them being trapped may actually be Lazarus keeping his daughter safe from the dragon while the rest of dragon’s watch fight against Primordus’ minions deeper in the Firelands. It’s what makes the most sense to me outside of Lazarus being Lazarus but needing the last Aspect to attain his true power and hating Caledus for not waiting to assemble all of the aspects before doing the spell. That’s pretty much where it feels like it’s going to me.
My question was more of a “metagame” one. Step outside of the lore and look at it as a story and writing. ANet are obviously setting up a big reveal. Lazarus was a namedropping bomb on his own. They could have easily used him as a shady unlikely-ally-to-betray-us, villain/anti-villain and whatnot. The players know about him, the veterans are excited and everything just works.
But they didn’t. They chose instead to say “oh, but this isn’t the real Lazarus”. Why? Hiding a minor character behind such grand and exciting mask wouldn’t work from a story perspective. The eventual unmasking is only going to diminish the potential of the character, whoever it is. It simply has to be a very important character. It has to be someone equally exciting. It can be a character exciting for other reasons, but Kasmeer’s family? Come on… who cares about them?
In my opinion there are two possibilities. It can either be a character we’ve already been interacting with. Or it can be another entity of a legendary status similar to Lazarus’ own. Otherwise it will only disappoint. I tend to lean toward the first choice, as the latter feels like adding an unnecessary step in the reveal of the character. They did a big reveal in “Out of the Shadows” already. It makes no sense to essentially repeat it, and for the same character.
Dis just an advise, but for me (and i guess a lot of players) i actually don’t care who lazarus is. Maybe the obsessed RP players or something.
Personally i see it like only as a reason to log in for a few hours and done, go back to play other games.
Why? because if you play the game outside from the living historical thing there is no more white mantle and more importantly nothing at all about lazarus thingy going on in the open world. Is he living under a rock or something?
Do you want me to care who lazarus is? Do it better, more interactions between the Living word thing and the actual living world WOULD BE AMAZING.
i care more about the anomalies that appear from time to time that about who the kitten lazarus is. He is just another plain baddie we have to beat. Or not i don’t care anymore.
Make the game feel alive and do impact the actual world like scarlet did and i will care. otherwise is another cartoon villain with no deep and no interest from me(at least).
I beg to differ. White Mantle stuff is going on in human personal stories. In retrospect, all the centaur troubles are also WM related, as we learned in “The Head of the Snake”.
If you’re expecting changes to open world maps similar to what happened in LS1, it won’t happen any more, ANet have clearly stated it.
Even still, we’re talking Thief here. Them along with Ele’s should have the highest damage output. Granted they’ll be the first ones to drop to the ground after a missed green or a Haduken to the face.
Right, except ele doesn’t do its dps by using 2 weapon skills and a dodge.
No they don’t, but I don’t see Thieves offering passive Protection, stun breaks, rebounds, and healing….well, I guess there’s skelk venom. So being able to offer group support while still having high damage potential (albeit at the cost of having an actual rotation)? I’ll take it.
Edit: My point being that Thieves are Ele’s were introduced into the game as the ones being top damage dealers in contrast to something like Guardian that was introduced as more of a defensive archtype. Though Daredevil further advanced Thief’s damage role while Tempest shifted Ele into more of a support role (or at least has more potential to be). So seeing a Daredevil produce high numbers with something as simple as auto-attack and dodge? I can’t say I’m too surprised at that.
You don’t see eles providing prot either, because taking Earth is a huge dps loss and nobody does it on a dps build. “Rebound!” and the free stunbreak from Gale Song are occasionally used – again, because they result in a dps loss, albeit a lot smaller – but there’s basi venom and don’t tell me it has no value for the group. The minor heal from the shout is hardly worth all the struggle to maintain reasonable dps you could easily achieve with a thief. The only actual advantage is cleave, but this isn’t a factor on so many bosses.
P.S. Of course you’d take it, the grass is always greener on the other side, you know. But as an ele main since vanilla, I feel offended at 1-button builds that outperform a properly played rotation.
Again, the change wasn’t dictated by the content. It was a reaction to wrong player perception.
By the way, unlike you I still play staff ele in WvW. The nerf was bad, I know that as I used to also play staff in PvE, however it’s not as bad in WvW as it is in PvE. In WvW it only affects your damage output against siege, and most of the siege you want to destroy ASAP is already small. Which reduces the ICD impact even further. To say this kills the viability of the weapon is simply a blatant exaggeration.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Yes, and pleasing every customer is impossible.
Exactly. Which is why I said, “if,” regarding Anet’s desire to sell to customers who do not like aspects of the product. The customer expressing disatisfaction with an aspect of the product gives ANet the opportunity to make an informed decision about those aspects.
The problem is, if they do that they won’t be selling their product to other customers. And while the ones unhappy with HoT have an alternative – stick with core Tyria – these other customers don’t. I’m not a marketing specialist, but making HoT different seems a smart move to me.
Even still, we’re talking Thief here. Them along with Ele’s should have the highest damage output. Granted they’ll be the first ones to drop to the ground after a missed green or a Haduken to the face.
Right, except ele doesn’t do its dps by using 2 weapon skills and a dodge.
Nothing stops you to play the way you want. You’re complaining about specific content replacing one meta with another. It doesn’t make any difference.
“Raids are destroying the game” is utter nonsense. It’s the best content in the game and like I’ve already said the case of the staff nerf wasn’t dictated by the raids, it was dictated by wrong perception.
Seriously, learn to read properly. It’s pointless to continue like that.
But it’s fine when the balance nerfs another class based on the same premise, right? Sheesh.
The funny thing about being salty regarding Elementalist nerfs is that it’s still better than literally every other DPS class in the fights it excels at.
Right, I’ll tell that myself next time we pug a 12k dps one.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Yes, and pleasing every customer is impossible.
Considering it’s getting 38k and some claim they’ve seen 40k then a 3-4k shave would bring it to a solid 34-37k range where it still vastly outperforms most options on a much easier rotation. There’s your reason to run it, it’s like math is hard. Sheesh.
Yes, we should totally balance all classes based on how they perform on the DPS golem boss. It’s like understanding context or words is hard. Sheesh.
But it’s fine when the balance nerfs another class based on the same premise, right? Sheesh.
1. Backpacks were released one by one. There was a period when an alternative method did not exist.
2. Suppose I like The Ascension more and want it. I’d be forced to play PvP, no way around it.
3. Either has nothing to do with the purely cosmetic ability to hide your backpack, existing on all tiers of gear.
More importantly, of course, it is my personnal taste.
That’s another thing entirely. I can understand why you’d appreciate if things were done differently, I was primarily giving reasons why they aren’t. But I’m not going to convince you to change your tastes.
Like The Ascension isn’t tied to PvP and Ad Infinitum isn’t tied to Fractals of the Mists? Both require you to play a LOT in their respective modes.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Read my next comment, it has it explained.
I keep my Ad Infinitum turned off for aesthetic reasons, but I still fail to see how is that relevant to its acquisition.
How is turning off relevant? Also, Ad Infinitum pushes you pretty hard into fractals, and not just briefly.
I’m not disappoint in the looks of the armor as much as I am in the method to obtain it. It is basically a Raid only armor. This means ANeT spent years developing something that only the elites and those who pay the elites can obtain. At least with PVP skins you have a decent way to obtain them.
Oh wow, the most prestigious item in the game is only available if you put in some effort, what a shock! On a side note, I’m apparently elite now. On a different side note, I likely won’t ever get The Ascension because I dislike PvP, but I’m not complaining about it.
What makes this game great to me is the possibility to get the best gear/rewards in the game doing whatever I want to, if I want to pvp and just do that for the rest of my life, I can. That’s why I came to Gw2, because I was tired of MUST make PVE to get my PVP armor in other games.
By putting Legendary Armor only obtainable after I clear a raid, I don’t need to explain why this is a huge mistake. I don’t matter to farm it 100x harder on pvp as long that I still can have it, as long the possibility still there. Players that makes raids MUST get it easier for SURE, but to me, what makes this game unique is everybody can have their legendary weapons doing anything they please.
Please, don’t tell the gamer what we should do, don’t make the other mmorpgs mistake, they are all falling. LET WE CHOOSE what we want to do, don’t FORCE us to do raids/dungeons.I know elitists players will disagree but think about it, you are a pve exclusive player and the best gear is only avaliable through pvp, how would you feel?
Thanks.
Ok, I had to edit this to explain that I’m talking about WvW not SPvP.
I’m inclined to agree with you, however legendary weapons require a Gift of Battle, only obtainable through WvW. It doesn’t feel unfair if the legendary armor also has some sort of requirement tied to a specific game mode.
The funny thing is, death in raids is mostly relevant on encounters where you face a single boss. For instance, I remember clearing Escort with only 3 surviving members of the group. It just doesn’t matter if someone dies, because the mobs are trash. The established strategy also includes a mesmer skipping the mobs in the cave in order to port additional members to the first tower. Yeah, you certainly can increase the density of the mobs there to prevent that, but… should you? How is fighting a throng of faceless mobs using generic attacks interesting or fun?
I don’t think it will be an endless loop. Gen 2 legendaries offer alternative to gen 1 ones. Even though we have Astralaria people still like and use Frostfang. I should know, I’ve sold two of these. And even though I’m a huge fan of Nevermore, I wouldn’t say Bifrost is outdated. It has its own theme and does it extremely well.
Eles are certainly not “required” for any raid content. That’s to say, you can clear everything without ever having an ele in your squad. You can also clear everything with one, of course.
You can clear every encounter without any specific DPS class, you can clear every encounter without be in 10 and you can clear every encounter even without chornos and warriors.
But unlike the ele, a missing PS or Chrono would require a lot more skill from the players.
Yes, and you can change the word “ele” and insert “ANY other DPS class” and you sentence Will not change.
That’s true. DPS classes are quite interchangeable, however ele is one of the harder to play and while it does have a great dps potential new eles are unlikely to do well. As opposed to, say, new thieves.
Like ele offers anything beside dps? Only lower, and using 3x more skills?
Yeah, but why would ANet introduce in such a way a character we never cared about?
Eles are certainly not “required” for any raid content. That’s to say, you can clear everything without ever having an ele in your squad. You can also clear everything with one, of course.
You can clear every encounter without any specific DPS class, you can clear every encounter without be in 10 and you can clear every encounter even without chornos and warriors.
But unlike the ele, a missing PS or Chrono would require a lot more skill from the players.
I disagree here. Trash mobs are trash if they are not keeping you on your toes. It doesn’t help if you can avoid them too easily (AKA stealth). When you are in constant danger of aggroing too much, and there is a consequence to dying, the “trash” are a very effective way to make your progression to the end satisfying while providing a sense of immersion (yeah, I part of that weird group of ppl that like immersion in a game, book or movie).
That’s a very rare case. And it usually ends up in people finding ways to avoid these mobs. See the established strategies for running Caudecus’ Manor or how you skip mobs in Arah. In my opinion raids do well on this front, focusing on epic bosses which feel ultimately satisfying when defeated, especially for the first time.
Jennah would be very cool. It will make her totally a more attractive Emperor Palpatine.
You can’t solo the meta events for sure. This includes pretty much the whole Dragon’s Stand. Some of the champions (including some hero point ones) would be too difficult or at least require a build tailored specifically for these fights. The rest can be soloed, after you learn the specifics of the monsters, their attacks, etc.
For starters ANET could just be pulling our leg.
They could, but it would end up as huge disappointment after setting up a giant red neon “PLOT TWIST” sign for months. Same goes for not revealing L’s true identity. So I’m fairly certain we’ll see the mystery revealed in Ep5 and it won’t be just a red herring.
As for Scarlet, she fits the role but bringing her back is only going to diminish her character. The finale of her story was satisfying enough, bringing her back will only make the past story look cheap and you can’t make the same impact with the same character again. There are plenty of other characters to fill in, no need to make her cheesy.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Grind isn’t a problem. Grind is the only way to keep players in your game, because players can always exhaust content faster than you can produce it. Not to mention content creation is expensive as well as slow.
So the question can never be “will the game X involve grind or not”. The question is “what the game X will make you grind for”? Here, I feel GW2 is at its best – it makes you grind for fashion, rather than power. HoT doesn’t change that at all. You don’t want to grind? Fine, no problem. You can still play the game just as well.
Why have other game types then other then pve raids? If its all realty just for pve raids what has gw2 been for the last 5 years with out it?
You’re misinterpreting my words. I never said raids are all there is to PvE. I said it’s the only place where balance actually matters. And it’s because the rest of the PvE is easy enough so you don’t need to bother being optimal.
The other modes are a different story. I see no real value in PvP. Since the rise of the MOBAs, this format is way better done there and a game designed around PvE will never match it. That being said, I’m fine with the game having one, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the core of the game.
WvW on the other hand has great potential because the combat system of the game works surprisingly well in large-scale combat. However, your focus seems to be mostly WvW roaming, which is just a less fair and balanced PvP.
Even in pve raids things like root blind slow and chill are useful vs mobs. I can see out running adds or even holding them (so in ff11 you would do massive sleeps to deal with adds that would let your group take out powerful mobs one at a time also know as mass cc) so you can take out one at a time or even run away. In a way it would be a grate roll for ele fall into.
Useful, sure. Worth sacrificing dps to get them? Certainly not.
Your very worlds are showing of this “raids are the only place where skill/trait balance actually matters” that about as polarization as can be “my ideals are the only important ones and your means nothing” this is effectually what is wrong with the world over all (out side of the game and realty what was the ideal for gw2 not to be.)
Except not. My words aren’t merely an opinion, because I gave arguments to support them. Either attack my arguments, or don’t. Trying to ignore them and diminish my point to an opinion isn’t going to work with me.
And again from PvE perspective: soft cc is mostly irrelevant and you get enough of it on weapon skills and utilities. Dedicating a whole trait line to it is an overkill which would make that trait line share the unfortunate fate of Water and Earth and never get picked in PvE. I agree Signet of Water is useless.
Raiding is a hobby, and I chose to play GW2 just as a pastime. I wondered if L. Armor would make me regret that stance. Thankfully, it has not. For all those who like it, I hope that it lives up to your expectations.
I’m not particularly excited by the screenshots. I’ll wait until I see it animated, but I’m not holding my hopes high. However, I’m still doing my light set, for the sake of character completion. Same reason I have Ad Infinitum on my main and I always keep it hidden.
Gnashblade’s eyes aren’t green on the picture, too.
New Player, Sad Player. Expansion ruined it.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Feanor.2358
Its not reasonable to expect people who are paying to have fun to spend their “play” time not having fun. Customers telling you that they do not like aspects of your product is kind of important if you want to continue to sell to them in the future.
You seem to assume all the players have the same tastes and want the same things. This obviously isn’t the case. And frankly, you don’t even need to read threads like this to know this is an unreasonable assumption. You just need to have had contacts with people.
No such assumptiin on my part.
I know that my reasons for disliking HOT are different than some others’ reasons. I know that the aspects of HOT that I like are not liked by some others.
Not really showing in your original comment. You were talking about customers in general and identifying with them. My point was there are many different customers. Some, like you, didn’t like HoT for a variety of reasons. Others, like me, liked it. Sometimes for the very same reasons. So it’s not just black-or-white. The fact users are complaining about something isn’t indicative of anything, by itself. Every decision made is likely to make you lose some customers and gain others. That’s life.
Eles are certainly not “required” for any raid content. That’s to say, you can clear everything without ever having an ele in your squad. You can also clear everything with one, of course.
The remark about PvP was just a stray thought. A clarification, if you prefer. My commends are based mostly on PvE, as it is what I care mostly about. PvP and roaming in WvW aren’t my thing.
I think i got that its just hard when ppl switch from one to another but still nice that you clarified. Pve to me is open world with a bit of dungeons and small story lines i am staying away from raids its too max min checks for me. So when i am talking about these things i am talking every thing but raids.
Any way back to my list Conjurer, Rock Solid, and Tempestuous Aria.
Conjurer need to make holding a conjure wepon better so i think this should give you a 1 stack puling stab ever 3 sec as well as a pulsing fury 3 sec every 3 sec. Over all conjurer weapons need to be duration not charges but this is what we have atm.
Rock solid i think needs to be an passive aoe def buff not a weak stab. Have a say class only buff that is -10% stun duration / condi duration (far better then just dmg -% i started out with). I think it fits the becoming solid and unmovable as a rock but for your team.
Tempestuous Aria NEEDS to have a cdr effect on it but not a blunt one it should reward you for hitting ppl with aggsive part of ele shouts and the aura part of the shouts to. So say -3% cdr on should per person hit (max 30% if you hit 5 team mates with the aura and 5 ppl on the other team).
About raids – raids are the only place where skill/trait balance actually matters. In open world, dungeons, even high-level fractals you can go with pretty much any sensible build. Want to play cele d/d core ele? No problem, you can. Yeah, you won’t be optimal, but who cares? You still clear the content. Btw, I played briefly with full celestial in t4 fractals, so that’s not just a speculation.
Now, from PvE perspective, about the traits you mentioned:
Conjurer
Stab can be helpful, mainly as a way to avoid interruption on your icebow 4. However, it still doesn’t compete with Burning Precision. A fun way to make Conjurer more appealing would be to make it add a “stow” (and subsequently “draw”) action on your conjure, making it function like engi kits for limited time and charges. It might require a rebalance of the conjures, of course.
Rock Solid
Frankly, I doubt there ever will be a reason to pick Earth at all in PvE. So I trust you on this one.
Tempestuous Aria
Interesting idea, however I’d say the effect should cap at 5 targets, either friends or foes, because in PvE you’ll very rarely be able to take full advantage on it. Consider running solo, the fact the healing shout only targets allies, and that “Feel the burn!” can hit a very large number of foes.