Guild Wars 2

One of the best uses of the wing backpiece.

My wuv! Come back to meeee! T_T

Argol Vazin.3061:

moony.5780:

Argol Vazin.3061:

moony.5780:

I agree with OP.
Its soo bad that the ele specialisation is just a better version of an excisting build. It brings completly new gameplay for me. In pve its again just a brainless mighstacker. It is fixing the problem elementalists have…that they need to switch the element every 2 seconds in oder to be good…and also makes it not a must to blast any firefield to give allies might…but to be honest..it will just be it again….to be most effective again brainless mightstacking is needed and switching the element every 2-3 seconds…maybe we will wait like 5-10 seconds 1 time to make that fireoverload..but thats it.

As for pvp..i didnt try it out yet..but it looks like it will be a bit stronger than the DD cele ele.

for me i think its so sad that ele have a very limited playstyle there r just 3 acceptable builds for pvp. and for pve anything other than the mightstacker makes no sense.

Would be nice to choose only 2 Elements but make them much stronger and better.

well all in all i think tempest is a nice try to solve the elementalists problem..but i guess it dont solve it.

(3 years experience in ele as main )

this percieved “problem” is not a problem. it is how the ele is supposed to play. that is why we have no weapon swap and high CD, an a bunch of traits all about switching attunments.

As for better…are you high? have you even played tempest? it is weaker in everyway and doesn’t synergise.

i dont get the part of me to take drugs (try not to insult everyone whos not with ur opinion)…..but…y i played the tempest and for me the mighstack and boonshare combo is now much stronger on ele..thats a fakt (with warhorn and firetrait)

bcs it is the way it is suppost to play it is a problem..
and what i mean by problem is..that elementalist got only 1 playstyle..so swap elements like crazy and the tempest just support this ..and this is for me a problem..i cant imagine playing this class even 2 years more if it stays like this (and this is already the class i enjoy the most).
The thief gets a tottaly new playstyle. also the mesmer….but ele just get the same playstyle as before.

saying that someone is high is not an insult. If i should insult you for anything it is your spelling.

Just wanted to comment just in case the posters aren’t native English speakers, saying someone is high or asking if they are is considered an insult…unless you do happen to be under the influence of some sort of substance that is impairing your judgement and thinking skills, to which it’s more a reason similar to not being a native speaker is a reason for grammar errors.

On topic, my issue on these forums is that players bemoan the idea of tempest for being a bunch of the same but they don’t want tempest to be a new playstyle. They want it to fit right on top of how ele plays with no variation.

Kaleban.9834:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

The concepts behind overloading an element were pretty well received

This is completely untrue, and if you actually believe this its a good indication of the direction the Ele is heading.

Overload in its current state (melee channel on extremely squishy character with no inherent defense) is an incredibly terrible idea.

It does nothing but hamper the Ele in any weapon set, nor provide any “tools” that the Ele doesn’t already possess.

Between Overloads and Rebound its pretty apparent that you guys don’t understand how the Ele functions at its most basic level. And you created it!

It’s not untrue. A lot of players really did and do feel the concept of overloads is interesting. That concept being casting a larger, stronger attunement spell for a cost. Now what you’re pinning the hate on is the numbers and circumstances of the spells they introduced. This is what people are bringing up issue with, not the concept of overloads themselves.

Raxik.5269:

I am probably waisting my time by typing this but f it,i feel better now.
Fanboys you can attack me now all you want!

It’s a lot of wasted effort to waist something when it’s much easier to shoulder something or even just carry it in your arms.

Alright, devs. I got a cool idea for tempest and overloads that might help flesh out its niche. Feel free to do your own thing but hopefully some sparks of inspiration will be had. I also think some of the idea may be regulated to traits. Anyway, here goes. . .

Changes/Fixes

• A new important mechanic, “Elemental Charge”, functions similar to adrenaline for warriors. The charge bar builds slowly while in battle and more quickly when you cast spells. There are only 2 ways to deplete the charge bar and one of those ways is swapping attunement. Swapping attunements resets your charge bar to 0.
• Overloads can be cast the instant you swap into an attunement. No wait time necessary. Also you can swap attunements while you cast overloads. These aspects are very important!
• Break Bar! I’m not 100% informed on how they work. . . That being said, Earth overload no longer gets a break bar by default. Once you start casting an overload, your charge bar converts to a break bar. The higher your charge, the better the break bar will cover you. This is the second way to deplete your charge bar. If your break bar defends you from any CC, once you are either interrupted or complete the cast, your charge bar is reduced to 0. If no CC is prevented by your break bar, it is reverted back to its equivalent amount of charge.

Additions

• Give a little incentive to fill the charge bar by giving slight bonuses while it’s full:
  - fire charged = take less damage from burning foes
  - water charged = gain a % damage bonus every time you remove a condition, duration of 10sec, stacks X number of times.
  - air charged = improve casting speed when fully charged.
  - earth charged = apply 2 stacks of bleed on your attacks.
• Breaking a full break bar results in the casting of another spell.
  - smoke break = blind and knock back nearby foes.
  - ice break = nearby foes are frozen in a block of ice.
  - wind break = foes in a wider range are pulled and stunned.
  - magnet break = remove all boons from nearby foes, you gain retaliation, protection and regeneration.
• completing an overload with a full bar might provide bonuses to that attunements spells. Your call.
• Rebound! Buff this shout to be instant cast, reduces the recharge of all skills used for the next 5 sec, instantly recharge all attunements and allows you to make an attunement swap while retaining your charge bar.

I like this idea because it allows players to continue to dance attunements effectively while incorporating overloads, give players an option to cover the cast of overloads and can help promote attunement camping if desired. It makes the time to swap attunement a bigger choice. As for changes to the overload effects and traits, maybe another time.

Malchior.5732:

Not a bad idea. Makes Rebound a bit more useful; even though 33% still isn’t amazing for an elite, at least it recharges all attunements.

Thanks, I might try to flesh it out as a full idea…

And I think Rebound can be a little ‘unspectacular’ if the cooldown is short enough. Couple it with some runes or a trait for shouts to spice it up and Rebound mind rebound as one of the best elites Ele has currently.

scerevisiae.1972:

Conncept.7638:

A specialization mechanic that the vanilla class mechanic can actually work with, whatever changes that may mean.

And note, I would welcome it if those changes were more to the core class than the tempest.

How the attunement system currently works, enforced swapping for survivability and DPS amp, has always been a terrible system that enforces the zero build diversity we’ve suffered through since launch. Swapping should be a matter of strategy, build choice, and live current in-combat need; not rote-memorized button pressing to maintain the boons and condition cleanse that are the only method for survival and decent DPS against classes with massive defensive and mechanical stat advantages they are not required to do anything to maintain.

agree, but in 3 years, Anet have been unable to really change the Ele meta away from water/arcane/cantrips in WVW/PVP, let alone introduce traits/mechanics that make attunement camping ever worthwhile. so not holding out much hope there.

then of course we have Tempest, which is a straight-up clone of D/D with no differentation whatsoever.

Just had a random-ish idea…

What if they changed overloads so that you can cast them the moment you enter an attunement (no wait time in an attunement) but instead introduced a “charge bar” that would go up over time + as you cast spells in that attunement? Now, the “charge bar” has 2 functions and 1 drawback:

Function #1: It boosts your spells within that attunement in some way [insert whatever idea would be interesting] AND the power of your Overload (so you can cast right when you enter an attunement but it won’t be as strong?)

Function #2: The charge bar reverts to a “break bar” while you cast the Overload. If the foe breaks the breakbar, a different effect occurs [insert whatever idea would be interesting]. So long as CCs don’t occur during the cast, the breakbar will change back to the equivalent amount of charge in the chargebar.

Drawback: Swapping attunements resets the “charge bar” to 0.

In comes the Elite Shout, Rebound. Rebound would have multiple effects: 1.) The skills activated in the next 5sec for you and allies will have their recharge reduced by 33%, 2.) It will instantly recharge all attunements, 3.) If you swap to a different attunement, you retain all of your charge bar. Also might want to decrease the cooldown slightly on this elite as well as make it instant cast.

There. Now you got your camping style with some versatility to swap occasionally without drawback. You bolster your spells within an attunement in exchange for not swapping attunements as much.

I plan to use Tempest, Overloads, Shouts (sans the elite unless it’s changed) occasionally Warhorn in PvE, Fractals, Dungeons and the occasional WvW.

nearlight.3064:

I’d say that the biggest problem is the traits, they don’t really allow the temepst to specialize in anything cohesively great.

Reaper is the master of chill, chronomancer is the master of alacrity (and slow and quickness to a lesser extent) while berserker is the master of burn?

What is tempest the master of? Breaking stun for allies? Auras? Protection? I honestly cannot tell, but protection seems like the obvious choice, its too bad that earthen proxy is a wasted opportunity.

In my opinion the traitline for Tempest needs to be redone overall.

Tier Line 1 should power up auras and shouts for a brawler sustain spec and should fold in aura traits from water/fire/earth/air.

Tier Line 2 should power up protection by increasing overall effectiveness and duration, and giving better and more interesting ways to apply it. Tempest should be able to take those traits to the master of protection.

Tier Line 3 should be more offensive and focus on improving overloads. My biggest issues with the current traits is that there are so many traits that make the overloads less kittenty to use by reducing the drawbacks (harmonious conduits, lucid singularity) but none that make the overloads truly more potent by providing more damage or control or even support from the overloads.

Right now the traits within the Tempest line lack synergy and don’t improve the spec at all, they’re merely bandaids for poorly thought mechanics, mechanics that could be good if the traits were drastically redone and reorganized and improved.

This man has a way with words.

I agree. Except I’d likely roll the concepts of “Master of Protection” trait line and “Brawler/Aura/Shout” line together. Unless you make the protection line truly interesting, of course…like maybe adding effects like a chance to weaken foes that hit you while having protection or retaliation on application of protection and such…I’d say just make the 1st line about Protection/Support/Auras, the 2nd about Shouts/Brawling (could have a stability on shouts to add to the front-line aspect and other damaging effects) and the 3rd spec should be all about Overloads! And just like you said, it should be less about taking the kitten out of them and more about bolstering them up! I mean, Arcana has ‘cast a spell on dodge’, why can’t Tempest have ‘cast a spell when initiating and completing an overload’? Or interrupting an overload casts a spell?

I’m enjoying the Tempest speculation because I just know they’re going to change it and I just hope it’s into something interesting.

My dislikes of the Berserker is that they made it such an upgrade to Warrior and not a side-grade like it was supposed to be. They got Necromancer’s Reaper right and that’s about it (perhaps Dragonhunter too?)…

If they were going to go this route, they should have just made it so the Berserker gets OFF-HAND bursts so that picking the Berserker means you miss out on some capabilities of the standard Warrior. And since they already made the skills for a lot of weapons (longbow, greatsword, hammer, rifle, sword, mace and axe), you’d just need torch, warhorn and shield burst skills, preferably something tactical. But instead, it’s like Berserker has everything a Warrior has + a whole other book of tricks.

Kidel.2057:

How to 1hit kill a zerk group: the class.

See reaction pic.

I actually was pretty floored when I first saw that in the video but when they kept repeating that portion of the skill exhibit, I noticed that the targets he shot at with the skill were mostly half dead before he shot them. When it showed him shooting fresh targets, it didn’t even do half of their HP. When you see the skill performed with the pic as a result, it was likely after shooting through them 2 or 3 times.

draxynnic.3719:

The actual problem with fire tornado getting a fire field might be because it’s already a whirl finisher, and thus it might finish with itself…

…mind you, while that may be the reasoning, it would also probably be quite a bit cooler than just upping the damage.

But they really need to improve whirl and projectile finisher…

Most players put very little value in them. Leap finishers have their uses but tend to be on movement skills which also tend to be regulated with cooldowns so you can zip everywhere…

Well they can probably lower the cooldown on Warhorn skills then…not a lot but just some. Otherwise, Warhorn is just very lackluster.

Nephrite.6954:

“I’m gonna summon a rock!… To punch it!” Is it me or does it seem like the warrior got so fed up he became a hybrid Elementalist just to fire shrapnels to his foe’s face? And the beserk burst with main hand sword only supports the fact that the warrior is becoming an Elementalist lol

I really like Sword on my Warrior and really don’t like the whole fireball flinging sword deal.

I wish they had used the Guardian flurry slash-beam look but tinted red. At least there it’d just look like you’re so kittened and swinging your sword so hard you’re super-heating the air to create searing shockwaves of heat.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Oh, shield. Yah. Does anyone use shield?

As a non-offhand weapon? No one.

Honestly think the Tempest will get more people playing Ele possibly because there are subsets of players that like playing less-mainstream set ups. I honestly don’t think Tempest is necessarily an underdog but I can only see the devs helping it out with additions in the future and I know there are also people out there who despise having their builds pulled out from under them…

Diovid.9506:

That’s simply the wrong way of looking at it. As many elementalist players will tell you, the weakness of the Tempest is not just in the numbers. Everything from the warhorn skills to the shouts to the traits to the overload mechanic is not better than what an elementalist can already do. But you still have to give up one of your precious core specs to get access to all of that.

But you can still accomplish the exact same thing as a tempest. Again, the lines Eles seem to be married to are mainly Water and Arcane and you can take both as a Tempest and still ride the celestial D/D build train with all the same utilities.

I suppose you can say it’s the wrong way to look at it but it’s all just opinion (which is what I’m interested in discussing) and those really can’t be wrong if you’ve got even some means of explaining why you have such an opinion.

I think the reason people like the specs like the Chronomancer so much is because it plays exactly the same as a Mesmer + it has a slew of extra stuff. Sure there will be specific trait specials that will be missing from build to build but just how different will they play.

As for Warrior, yeah you’ll probably end up missing out on some % damage boost somewhere to pick up the Berserker line, but is a numerical change in how much damage you do that big a difference in playstyle?

I’d honestly say the way the specs are suppose to be are like the Dragonhunter (mechanic-wise) or Tempest (community acceptance-wise) as the spec is suppose to press you to play the profession differently, not fit into your ordinary rotations as all the builds you have played. Of course, that’s just an opinion…one that I’ve just started pondering so it’s not like an ideal I stand behind…just a thought.

scerevisiae.1972:

Leo G.4501:

scerevisiae.1972:

Leo G.4501:

Laraley.7695:

Leo G.4501:

scerevisiae.1972:

I might add I think it’s pretty silly that warrior has more long range (1200) weapons than ele.

Warrior has 26 ranged skills in total. Ele has 55 not including utilities, transformations or downed skills.

Do you realize this has nothing to do with what the person posted?

Seems about as pertinent as mentioning amount of weapons in this context. So compare the number of 1200 range weapons (3 vs 2)? Why not the number of 1200 ranged attacks (17vs 34)?

Ele has 2x the number of weapon skills as part of its core mechanic…

You have to admit it’s a bit weird that the highest-armoured, highest HP class has 2 1200-range weapons while the lightest armoured, lowest HP class has only 1.

No, it doesn’t sound all that weird to me, primarily because the professions in question are the ones with a) the profession with the 2nd least amount of available weapons due to their profession mechanic and b) the profession with the 1st most amount of available weapons due to profession concept and core mechanics.

It’d be different if we were comparing classes that were suppose to be balanced in a similar fashion but you’re comparing this to Warrior, the profession whose concept is “Martial Master of the most weapons”.

highlighted the important parts there for you.

Ditto.

pdavis.8031:

He knows who we (the player) are, knows of our deeds and actions. Is able to change appearance, and able to sneak up on someone with being seen.

Mis-wordings like this tend to make me think. Which is more impressive, sneaking up on someone without being seen or sneaking up on someone while being seen.

Wanze.8410:

Leo G.4501:

So the unidentified account bound dyes, are they just regular dyes? Special edition dyes? Can I get duplicates of dyes I already unlocked?

Sorry, never bought these packs so no idea. I’m a little low on good looking dyes but my past record with buying dye packs has left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

Once you open the account bound unidentified dyes, you get unbound regular dyes, which can be of fine, masterwork or rare rarity. They dont contain special edition dyes and you may get some that you already unlocked. However, you can sell those on the tp.

Thanks for the clarification!

So the unidentified account bound dyes, are they just regular dyes? Special edition dyes? Can I get duplicates of dyes I already unlocked?

Sorry, never bought these packs so no idea. I’m a little low on good looking dyes but my past record with buying dye packs has left me with a sour taste in my mouth.

scerevisiae.1972:

Leo G.4501:

Laraley.7695:

Leo G.4501:

scerevisiae.1972:

I might add I think it’s pretty silly that warrior has more long range (1200) weapons than ele.

Warrior has 26 ranged skills in total. Ele has 55 not including utilities, transformations or downed skills.

Do you realize this has nothing to do with what the person posted?

Seems about as pertinent as mentioning amount of weapons in this context. So compare the number of 1200 range weapons (3 vs 2)? Why not the number of 1200 ranged attacks (17vs 34)?

Ele has 2x the number of weapon skills as part of its core mechanic…

You have to admit it’s a bit weird that the highest-armoured, highest HP class has 2 1200-range weapons while the lightest armoured, lowest HP class has only 1.

No, it doesn’t sound all that weird to me, primarily because the professions in question are the ones with a) the profession with the 2nd least amount of available weapons due to their profession mechanic and b) the profession with the 1st most amount of available weapons due to profession concept and core mechanics.

It’d be different if we were comparing classes that were suppose to be balanced in a similar fashion but you’re comparing this to Warrior, the profession whose concept is “Martial Master of the most weapons”.

I’ve posted a lot of varying ideas of how one could change Tempest to try and give the spec some unique flavor of usability. From traits that let you cast warhorn skills while channeling overloads to stability on certain skill uses (such as shouts or when you get an aura). I think someone suggested an upgrade to protection that made protection also give you a stack of stability upon applying (I’d assume that would have an ICD per target tho).

My purpose for making suggestions though are give the devs some other ideas they may not have thought of to put in future updates. Currently I don’t have a huge problem with the overloads currently but I do see the downfalls and they often times outweight their use especially considering some of the other elite specs revealed.

Here’s an idea from another threadhttps: //forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/professions/elementalist/The-Changes-in-Tempest-That-should-be-Made/first#post5387171

The major aspect I favor most from it is that casting the overload WILL get you the effect of the overload regardless of if someone interrupts you or not but the effects would differ in some way if you complete it or not. The other aspect I favor is that finishing the cast grants a bonus to your current attunement’s skills. That would give you a reason to complete the channel but also give you some other means of playing your elementalist, namely one that focuses on using 1 attunement for extended time. You can say we currently have that but the purpose is to give the Tempest more tools when doing that rather than just having loads and loads of damage.

Another eloquent idea I posted were Overload Breaks. Basically, flip skills that you can use to self-interrupt your overload for strong CC or movement. A strong CC option might work well with a support frontline melee ele and having more CC tools would make it unique from current ele. I also like the idea of it because it draws on the secondary elements of each attunement. Smokebreak would interrupt Fire Overload and create an ash plume that would blind and KB nearby foes; Icebreak would interrupt Water Overload and freeze the water bubble you’re in then quickly shattering, freezing nearby foes caught in the shatter. Windbreak would create an implosion of air currents, dismissing the lightning storm but pulling foes in a wide area into the center and stunning them. Magnetbreak would be the engage/disengage that would knock a single target down while leaping a long distance in the opposite direction of that target. They also have that pun worked in their name (Smoke break, Ice break, Wind break….Magnet break doesn’t really mean anything though).

When I went to Pax South earlier this year when HoT was announced, the devs were describing the elite specs as horizontal progression, i.e. giving you a new/different way to play our professions. That they wouldn’t be stronger or necessary to complete/compete in the new content.

However, as more and more of the elite specs are revealed I’m beginning to question if they kept that goal clear during the steps to making these specs. I’m sure people will have their own opinions on each spec but I’d like opinions on the general premise of these specs being upgrades (and not ‘side-grades’). Do you feel it’s true that they aren’t upgrades? And what makes you come to your conclusion.

For me, I see the Reaper as a neat ‘side-grade’ that just happens to have a coat of paint that miiiiight make it look more enticing than the standard Necromancer. But I have a feeling the spec is different enough from the core specs that Reaper doesn’t cross it into upgrade territory. Will everyone be playing a Reaper? Likely, a lot will but I don’t see it as an outright replacement and Necro will still have features unique to it.

Unsure about Dragonhunter (sorry, I don’t play Guardian and haven’t been keeping up with it lately) but from what I hear of Chronomancer, I’m curious to know if people will really keep with the core specs because they offer something the Chronomancer completely cannot achieve. To me, it sounds like a choice of upgraded profession mechanics or not. So it seems an upgrade to me.

Tempest, I feel also seems to fall into the upgrade territory BUT where it currently sits number-wise puts it behind standard Ele. The thing that makes it an upgrade is purely the fact that that is exactly what it does, it upgrades your profession mechanic to do more. But to take advantage of the upgrade hits a numbers speedbump. Whatever you can accomplish as an Elementalist, you can do the same as a Tempest.

Berserker, plain and simple, is an upgrade. I see no alternative. Even if your Berserker can’t provide as much support as you could with a set of core specs, you can still do it and you lose nothing, only gain more and better burst mechanics. Sure, there might be niche builds aimed a super-high max PvE dungeon speedrun DPS that requires pure burst and Berserker sounds more hybrid at best, but a level of DPS hardly seems a different playstyle (so long as the gap isn’t huge).

So what are your thoughts? And is it even a bad thing that the elite specs are or aren’t upgrades to you?

2 questions:

1. How is this not a straight upgrade of warrior?

2. Can a player-made-into-a-projectile be reflected?

Malchior.5732:

Leo G.4501:

Humans have emotions.

Where’s that Slowpoke newsflash meme?

“Yet you felt you are worth more of my time, which was my point. I’m not going to sit around picking your posts apart even if I had the time to spare. That would be giving you the attention you feel you deserve. :P”

What happened to this? Maybe it’s what happens when you argue with emotions and not logic and reason.

I was treating your posts like you’re treating the Tempest, over exaggerating the situation, hyperbole and just sensationalizing everything.

Humans have emotions.

Where’s that Slowpoke newsflash meme?

rotten.9753:

As ever, when arguments end it’s time to use a higher caliber.

Everyone else gets their chance to lose their temper. This is just me taking my turn.

Malchior.5732:

You wasted your time the second you responded with that non-sense.

Yet you felt you are worth more of my time, which was my point. I’m not going to sit around picking your posts apart even if I had the time to spare. That would be giving you the attention you feel you deserve. :P

rotten.9753:

Leo G.4501:

A rather skewed example. For one, you’re comparing tempest line to 2 lines (water and arcane), neither of which is exclusive to tempest. Secondly, overloads aren’t meant to be spammed on cooldown. They are more burst effects if what you have isn’t sufficient enough. Even if you did spam water overload, you can still swap out and back into water for at least half of the hps the others can accomplish on top of what your overload provides.

It’s actually skewed in favour of tempest, casting water overload once in a while won’t make it better than core elementalist at healing since the cost of that is nearly 28 seconds and losing water attunement swap (which traited is quite powerful) for 20 (15) seconds.

It’s skewed in a lot of ways, I wouldn’t even say in favor of tempest either. I mean, what other aspects are you missing in regards to the comparison? Like the healing shout or aura heals and such? I’m not dismissing your numbers, just saying you can’t really put up a definitive answer with those numbers.

You see it as nitpicking, and I see it as not wasting my time responding to ever little sentence you post. Why would I need to bother whining like a child about a game and it’s gameplay when the only real purpose is to have fun. What all your temper tantrum amounts to is you’re not having fun with something. Well newsflash: No one is forcing you to play.

I could spend all day picking your feeble hypocritical nonsense apart (OOH! Overloads will only do pitiful damage! devs give you more damage OMG! You don’t know what you’re doing!!) but holy crap is it a waste of my time. But thank you for showing your true agenda (although it’s not hard to tell) of simply getting people to hate without even trying things out. My hope is, after seeing your behavior, people will realize just how pessimistic you are, that you backtrack your points and don’t know what you want but insist the devs should figure it out, and that your feedback beyond the basic message, won’t likely amount to much more so no one else wastes their time with you.

Malchior.5732:

You whose one specific word and completely ignored the rest of the post.

Huh? What are you talking about?

Malchior.5732:

As for the Overloads, the pulses are pretty much all the damage your ever going to get with them ever outside of PvE, so why even point it out?

Uh, because they’re the damage/effect you’ll get out of them in PvP? Why not point it out? I mean, you didn’t seem to want to bother pointing that out with your first reply.

But one good note about the effects when you complete an overload is Air will have a pretty nice range on it. The only other change that might be nice is having the Flame tornado follow you (slower) so you can use that somewhat to your advantage too.

thetwothousand.5049:

nearlight.3064:

Dear devs,

Please give all of the overloads breakbars and stun them if the breakbars are broken like revenant shield.

Love,
a sad elementalist.

I’ve been advocating for this since the original PoI reveal. The break bar is such a natural defense to the overcast mechanic, that feels thematically appropriate, and retains a good risk-reward ratio. Now that the damage/heals of the spells have been adjusted that’s really all that needs to happen at for overloads specifically to be usable abilities. I think adding a decrease to the unlock timer to the Harmonious Conduits trait would be good too.

It might be too easy to get the cast off, but it’d definitely sound like a Grandmaster trait (meaning the other 2 GMs would have to match its usefulness, hopefully). I wouldn’t mind a trait like one of the above posters that gave you stronger effects from casting the attunement’s spells as another GM trait that then makes you choose between stronger overloads, more reliable overloads and [some other option…more/faster overloads maybe?].

Argol Vazin.3061:

flesh out how?

Like, flesh out how the other attunements would work with said style of change and/or how they’d work together or apart? And just how long do you think it should take to build up?

And would there be any possible ways to minimalize changes but still incorporate the spirit of your idea? (the last part mainly trying to flex the idea around in various ways, if need be)

Malchior.5732:

Finally, way to nitpick and ignore the big picture.

Oh the hypocrisy…

I wasn’t ignoring the big picture, simply painting it in a subjective light.

As for Churning Earth, that’s not a little known fact. That’s where the cripple comes from, after all. But the comparison, I was speaking of effects, not simply 1. Like Air pulses damage, vulnerability, swiftness and protection during its channel; Water pulses 1 condi cleanse, healing, swiftness and protection, etc. You can use these to your advantage while you overload.

Malchior.5732:

Ardid.7203:

Can someone explain me clearly what the Overloads do? I did not have the oportunity to prove Tempest myself during the BWE, and now I’m regretting it because I can’t understand how it could be so bad. Do the tempest really stands there, doing NOTHING while waiting for the overload?

Here’s an example, something that actually happened to me:

You go into Fire, cast some crap then use Warhorn #5 which is just a huge Fire Field. you start Overloading Fire and well, if your obvious spell isn’t immediately interrupted, you’re now chasing someone around like a spinning idiot. Don’t even think of swapping attunements or dodging or casting Burning Speed or anything because your Overload will get canceled.

Not completely true. You could do all that if you are trying to be bad and paint overloads in a bad light. There are instant skills you can cast while overloading (some shouts even) that can cover you while you overload or attack. Not sure why the hate on the spin animation, is the same as warrior whirlwind Axe or thief dagger storm. You can use it for Extra might or as a finisher to take advaadvantage of your might.

Don’t be fooled by comparisons to Churning earth. Not only can you move while Overloading but you pulse effects while doing so. It’s more asks to whirlwind Axe.

rotten.9753:

Malchior.5732:

With the recent buff to Water Overload, probably the Tempest.
Before it was definitely an Elementalist who swapped constantly rather than camp Water.

Let’s see, the current heals on the overload:

• Healing: 392 (0.05)
• Healing Final Healing: 2,132 (0.75)
• Regeneration (8s): 1040 health

Those values were modified to:

• Healing: 392 (0.25)
• Healing Final Healing: 3,198 (0.75)
• Regeneration (8s): 1040 health

Compared to Healing Ripple together with Elemental Attunement which you can use about every 10 seconds:

• Healing: 1,302 (1.0)
• Regeneration (5s): 650 health

Spamming Overload Water on cooldown brings us to 251.1 hps with 0 healing power, 296.5 hps with 600 healing power (celestial spec) and 431.1 hps with full healing power build. Spamming water attunement swap gives 195.2 hps with 0 healing power, 292.7 with 600 healing power and 4’55.2 hps with full healing power.

If you actually want to heal I guess equipping cleric’s or at least celestial gear is something logical and then tempest loses or is equal to base ele. There are a lot of assumptions which can skew this base calcualtions, e.g. assumption that we won’t ever be interrupted during overload water or that we won’t ever have to dodge during the channel.

A rather skewed example. For one, you’re comparing tempest line to 2 lines (water and arcane), neither of which is exclusive to tempest. Secondly, overloads aren’t meant to be spammed on cooldown. They are more burst effects if what you have isn’t sufficient enough. Even if you did spam water overload, you can still swap out and back into water for at least half of the hps the others can accomplish on top of what your overload provides.

Argol Vazin.3061:

I kind of like the idea of overloads working like Greased Lightning for Pugilist/Monk in Final fantasy 14. On that, as long as you keep your base combo going, you build up stacks of greased lightning that increases damage and skill speed.

So imagine as long as we use skills from 1 attunment we build up overload stacks that have effects added to it for each increase in stack.
So fire could be
lvl 1 Might stack 5
lvl 2 Might stack 10, Retaliation stack
lvl 3 Might stack, Retaliation, Mobile fire field on character that ticks damage on enemies.
then you can unleash the overload stack in a big storm like AoE. swaping attunment removes the stacks.

Sort of the premise I had with another idea but kind of reverse. Overloading would give the current attunement skills extra effects or something. Not sure how I feel about your idea. Maybe flesh it out more?

Zaoda.1653:

Righteous Resistance:

Become invulnerable while using an Overload. (my reason behind this is that overloads are very short in duration, and there should be a HUGE incentive to using an overload. This would be a great incentive, would make enemies truly fear you and try to avoid you, and would be a pretty good trait, hence grandmaster).

Maaaaybe on a, like…60sec ICD? I mean, all things considered, 60sec is long but you likely won’t be popping off a lot of Overloads in a min anyway…I might see this as possible without being too good.

Zaoda.1653:

War Caller:

Based on your current attunement, shouts inflict a condition on foes. Gain more ferocity (+150) when using a shout. Shouts recharge (20%) faster. (inspired by the arcane grandmaster trait, elemental surge)

Fire: Burning
Water: Vulnerability
Air: Weakness
Earth: Bleeding

Would personally rather just have Stability (self) on shout + the ferocity/cooldown thing. If it were, I could actually see some counter-counterplay by using one of the 2 instant shouts while you’re overloading. Also, would be nice if Shock and Aftershock gave stability baseline.

Taboria.3071:

After reading all this constructive feedback, I feel encouraged to post mine.

I think about the tempest who plays with the forces of nature, but to achieve this she might have to find the balance between the elements. The concept art of the Tempest on the shore gave me these ideas.

So how would I imagine the
Overloads:
First, overloads are something big that comes with a price. But what if instead of locking you out of the Attument you have to earn your overload by using opposite elements.
So:
-if you are camping in Fire by using Fire Skills, you charge your Water Overload. If you are in Water by using Water Skills, you charge your Fire Overload.
-Same for Air and Earh.

Fire and Air Overload are location targeted, because they are offensive Overloads, but for the range they may make you immobile while casting it, so still there is a downside. The extra range provides more flexibility and more interworking with other weapons, not just for the dagger.

Interesting ideas, not sure if they could work without changing a lot of things though. The whole “charging an overload with it’s opposite” might work if they relegated overloads to a kind of ‘adrenaline’ bar but again, that might be a lot of UI changes. Stuff like that may simply not be the type of solution the devs would try to use yet.

Taboria.3071:

Traits:
I agree with most poeple that all minor traits actually should be in one minor.
Rest of the minors should open up possibilites and interworking with the rest of the elmentalist abilities. The same for some of Majors.

Some example trait ideas:
-Glyph of storm has slightly longer duration or larger area
-Mist Form receives properties based on your current Attunement. In fire you leave fire field behind or pulsating fireburst. In Air you become something like the current ball of lightning, but you are free to move in any direction. In Earth you blind and cripple everyone you touch.
-Lightning Hammer may last longer and has more charge or its skills has faster recharge
-Shout Trait!
-Arcane Shield after exploding provide all Auras. for a short duration
-Your blast finishers have an offensive component as well (where it has offensive, would have a defensive):
fire – flame burst
lightning – blind
ice – vulnerability
light – weakness
and so on…
-Your whirl finishers would pulsate defensive boons.

I like some of these ideas, especially the ones aimed at multi-type utilities and skills. The idea to make storms persist longer (aiming at Glyph of Storms, Conjure weapon storms and some weapon skills) seems like a neat idea. A trait that pulsates Retaliation and Protection (or what have you) while using Whirl finishers could also be pretty neat to build around. A trait that gives Auras a weak Arcane Shield effect (1 block) could be something too although having Arcane Shield grant all auras on destruction might be too strong >_>

Finally, the Mist form thing could definitely be a cool trait especially if they gave Tempest another means of getting Mist form (via a trait) so you can double (or triple with runes) up on Mist form and utilize it for more than it currently is. Lol making Mist form take the form of your current attunement would be a cool concept. Make it so you become a moving ‘Mist Storm’ for its duration with its own effects.

scerevisiae.1972:

Leo G.4501:

it can be changed to make it better without being disrespectful and non-constructive.

nothing in this thread is disrespectful and most of it is constructive. speaking of respect, i think it’s important to recognise that some of us are passionate about the game/class and this is reflected in our feedback.

Well I don’t agree. There is a lot of disrepsect and a lot of non-constructive posts. It’s all in how you word things. When I made that post, I could have worded it in a far more disrespectful tone (calling out people for whining or some other such nonsense) but I didn’t. I tried to form my message in a way that gets across the information that I want with less of an emotional charge to it. Hopefully, doing so will allow people to read more of the message rather than the emotion.

But then we shouldn’t need people around trying to police up how we interact with each other. Lol I’m not here to do that, just getting across my 2cents. Take or leave what I say as you will. I’ll try to stick to talking about actual suggestions posted instead.

Vinteros Asteano.1209:

You haven’t worked in the industry or near it apparently. Some reading:
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/KatherineRogers/20140403/214684/Working_in_the_Games_Industry_a_job_to_die_for.php
http://trenchescomic.com/tales/post/my-life-in-hell-1-6...-and-hell-1-2-6...-and-hell-1-6-2...-hell-1-2-3-6

A reddit post, take it as you will: https://www.reddit.com/r/truegaming/comments/1wvs6z/what_is_it_really_like_to_work_in_the_gaming/

People in the gaming industry are not paid well at all, and work really bad hours already. Add on the fact that you’ll lose your job because someone overseas can do it for cheaper and email the files. It’s not an “easy, cozy job” where you go home to your family. More like “long, difficult job where you go home to your dog in your 1 bedroom apartment”. Caveats exist of course, as in everything.

Well, I don’t think the gaming industry is as bad as low-level retail or fast food (that’s your 1 bedroom/dog scenario in many cases) but yeah, it’s not as great as people seem to think. Only higher level/more experienced devs tend to get the fat loot people think of and most of the time I hear that’s more team-lead spots so likely not as much hands-on with ever line of code and art asset as those under them. I actually wanted to be a game designer myself in my younger days but the industry is very competitive and seems driven by trends rather than what’s actually fun (sort of like the whole meta-game thing in MMOs!!). Now my goal is to get an easy well paying job that I have spare time to make games for fun in….so I joined the military >_<

Vinteros Asteano.1209:

Earth overload ticks cripple and immobilzes at the end of the channel. Earth traitline grants you base toughness, protection on aura or armor of earth at 50%, geomancer’s defense, and then stone heart or diamond skin to top it off (with a break bar). There is a lot of moving parts there, and I feel that is the hardest part of balancing elementalist.

True. This is one thing few people tend to discuss in depth. The way I see these overloads is that they could be several different possibilities, one of which being they could allow you, as a Tempest, to sort of specialize in certain trait lines and make them + the overloads quite potent…or perhaps they can actually make up for shortcomings you have for speccing a certain way. I actually felt the latter when it came to the Water Overload because during the beta1, I decided not to touch the Water or Arcane line and only use Fire, Air and Earth. With celestial gear, water was quite decent and using the shout heal, I could still provide a good amount of condi cleanse and healing. I had fun, but this is coming from someone who hadn’t played the game for a couple months.

Next time, I think I might try a mixes of different gear (I was too lazy to mess around with gear/runes) perhaps going more glassy but using support lines? I dunno.

scerevisiae.1972:

Forgotten Legend.9281:

wow, this thread is more toxic than queensdale champ train map chat… come on guys, be respectful!

Feedback from BWE1 was close to 100% negative; it could hardly have been more negative. Yet here we are with a bunch of purely superficial changes that fail to address any of the key feedback points.

How is it possible to be both passionate about the game and not feel completely kittened off by this response?

Close to 100% negative isn’t 100%. And it sort of ignores the fact that, some negative feedback wasn’t complaints about the same points. One major thing people complained alot about was how they could get the same effect by swapping attunements alot and using different skills.

Try not to fence everybody into your personal emotional state. Some people aren’t happy with where Tempest is but think it can be changed to make it better without being disrespectful and non-constructive.

scerevisiae.1972:

Killyox.3950:

Going to quote this because apparently people are incapable of reading more than 1 page of thread.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Not all feedback could be addressed this iteration in fair part due to time constraints on key members of our design team. That does not mean we are dismissing your feedback or that all the issues you’ve raised up to this point will go unchanged before expansion release.

This is a small set of changes from the first beta weekend event; we will continue to iterate on the specialization skills and mechanics and shall be listening for your constructive feedback.

We will be reviewing the Tempest traits along with casttimes vs. effects on overloads among several other aspects of the elite specialization.

The fact they spent time tweaking the numbers on all the skills strongly implies they’re not going to materially change anything, that’s why people are kittened off.

The core issue is that Tempest is just a reskinned D/D Ele, which we’ve already been playing for 3 years, there is nothing new or particularly interesting about yet another close range support role. WE ALREADY DO THAT IN SPADES.

Then play something different!! Holy moly, it’s like people don’t know what they want! They think they know what they want but they really don’t (which a large majority of customers are like that). If something isn’t new and exciting enough for you, try something else!

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Jski.6180:

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Jski.6180:

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Killyox.3950:

Going to quote this because apparently people are incapable of reading more than 1 page of thread.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey everyone.

Not all feedback could be addressed this iteration in fair part due to time constraints on key members of our design team. That does not mean we are dismissing your feedback or that all the issues you’ve raised up to this point will go unchanged before expansion release.

This is a small set of changes from the first beta weekend event; we will continue to iterate on the specialization skills and mechanics and shall be listening for your constructive feedback.

We will be reviewing the Tempest traits along with casttimes vs. effects on overloads among several other aspects of the elite specialization.

That’s really funny… I mean, especially after reading the Rev, Reaper, and Chrono BWE feedback Dev notes. They must feel that the Tempest is in a good place trait and utility wise therefore are ignoring our feed back. If they agreed with us they would act on it like the did for the Rev, Reaper, and Chrono.

Bottomline is there is time for it. If they think there isn’t time that means that they think they aren’t going to make their internal deadline, thus they need to make the time either by longer hours or weekends. It’s a job for them. If I’m late on a project and the deadline is coming up, guess what? Yup, I put in longer hours to make sure everything is done on time. Yes, that means I make time.

Dose not make it right to make others work the same hours as you do (though this is getting way off-topic). Its like the Amazon thing yes some ppl are marry to there work and these ppl tend to get payed very well for there time but then these same ppl tend to feel every one should work as they do leading them to push ppl who may simply want a job to make money to live and have a life out side of work.

Any way i have a strong feeling if you did not like say overload on tempest then odds are your never going to like this elite spec and that is ok. Keep on with ele its still a good well rounded class. Ele lose nothing for you not liking tempest.

Please, leave your feelings at the door. It’s a job. I’ve worked jobs where I’m gone half the year. Military personnel leave for much longer periods working their jobs. So, please, leave your strong feelings at the door. The Devs, who have a very safe job and who go home every night to their families, can put in a some extra hours to get the job done THAT THEY ARE PAID TO DO… And it’s not like they won’t be compensated for those extra hours.

If you leave your feeling at the door why cant you leave your job as you come out of the door. It just seems its all lost and no gain or all work when you told to and no “life.” The very ideal of mmorpg IS counter to the ideal of living to work. Just being payed dose not mean they own the person.
It will be done / talked about when its ready.

Can’t talk to you as you’re all emotion and no logic. Good day, sir.

If you’re all logic, why can you not see the surge of animosity being thrown around for little reason here on this thread?

Xillllix.3485:

How about making the overload do something the elementalist couldn’t already do:

It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to come up with something that would cheer up the elementalist that will buy HoT:

Water Overload:
Pulse cleanse condi, gives accelerated regen to 5 allies
at the end of the overload ressurect up to 3 in-down-state players on a 900 radius with an arcane shield

Fire Overload:
Gives retal when overloading
Rapidly stacks burning to close opponents (3 stacks per second for 3 seconds, 320 radius)
At the end of the overload burns 5 foes around you (600 radius) with 1 stack of wild fire, (high damage burning, new condi).
Wildfire prevents the usage of dodgeroll

Earth Overload
Stacks Cripple and bleeding to enemies in 320 radius
When it blast if gives slow up to 5 enemies and 2 seconds of quickness to the caster per foes hit, blast always crit

Air Overload
permanently blind foes in a 320 radius for the duration of the cast
Blast a bolt of lightning that will bounce between 12 targets and give alacrity to allies in its path

After starting with something interesting (could be something else, but at least something new) it’s going to be much easier to tweak numbers.

Hhmm none of that really sounds new though.

Some of the ideas sound interesting though. I wish more people posted and commented on ideas.

Well I think we’re just at odds with the definition of “overhaul” and “start from scratch”. How some of the vocal posters that cry the same thing tend to want something extreme like the nix of war horn for main hand sword and things like that. However, suggestions like the combining of traits and introducing new ones, adding effects to the overloads and looking into features of the base class to change, that sounds different from an overhaul.

My beef tends to be on how people communicate and it’d be wrong to put the sole blame on the devs either. The devs may not inform us on this extremely well but posters aren’t any better. And they aren’t paid to post on the forums either so mentioning your customer status doesn’t exclude us of blame.

There’s nothing wrong with expressing distaste just do it constructively. Just put yourself in their shoes with all the same context of budget, deadlines, PR but with your ideas and work. Consider overhauls a last resort (right along with just accepting what we got as is or uninstalling the game), mechanical changes/additions as somewhere in the middle and number tweeks as a preliminary to change.

I’d honestly rather they not scrap all the work they’ve done and just look at ways to enhance what they have.

Making posts that try to speak for the majority is wholly useless. I mean, it completely ignores the players that are really excited about the Tempest currently, it underminds the opinions of those that think it’s bad but should be tweeked with to improve it and is just disrespectful to those that paid money (regardless of if they agree or disagree with you) since you’re trying to divert what they paid for toward a direction you want.

Please continue feedback though. Make more constructive posts about what you’d like to see (more than just “throw what you have in the garbage and start over” though).

Aetrion.8295:

If healing and HP is merged there is no more need to strike a balance between offense/defense/support because defense and support will simply be the same thing.

You would be right if there was a means to directly improve how much you support by just making said support better…In other games, you just take a heal skill that heals for more but sacrifice taking skills that do more damage. Or you allocate resources so you have a skill that improves team defenses more but allocate less resources to offense making them less efficient (having longer cooldowns or costing more energy to cast or something).

In GW2, it’s hard to make healing power worth its sacrifice because just loading on healing power doesn’t make you support. You have to take utilities, weapons, traits and sometimes runes to be able to support and yet very few aspects of the game back a “healing support” playstyle. It’d be different if healing power made my 6-slot skill recharge faster and castable on allies but it doesn’t. Nor does it even make the boons I offer more potent.

Basically what I’m saying is, healing as support is niche at best. You can hardly focus on it and even if you do, you have to generate the situation where it will make the biggest difference (instead of using other mitigation + your own heal). I won’t say no to keeping Healing Power the same but just making it stronger, but if it doesn’t do much else, that still doesn’t change its niche status.

Heck, even if Healing Power was rolled into Vit, the combo would be niche status, but at least you can make a healer that won’t die as easily to a time burst and has some resources left to allocate to offense.

Good start. I think the only other topping you need to add on overloads is maybe some extra bonus to the attunements skills after an overload or some kind of bonus to help reward those that stay in the attunement or manage to pull off the overload.

Since last beta test I sort of only focused on feed back to the attunements overloads but that doesn’t mean I think the traits and utilities are fine. The elite, especially, need some changes. When I get back home, I’ll get right on leaving my feed back for those (although it’s hard to leave feed back on the elite since I used it for a grand total of 15min then swapped to a racial skill)

Calling people out accomplishes nothing. If all I did was call out people on their mistakes in my line of work, I’d have no time to actually accomplish anything. One can highlight someone’s mistakes (that’s what criticism is), but if that’s all you can manage, you should back down and let the creative minds form a solution.