Guild Wars 2

lLobo.7960:

Malchior.5732:

They’re not really enough though. The cantrip is fine and Phoenix is good too(although I personally hate Scepter), but the trait is rather mediocre since it’s uncontrollable and not constant(as in, you might cleanse 3 crappy conditions from some random Warrior and then get Condi Bombed by a Necro and not have it anymore).

Also, I thought the Condi Duration decrease on Fire Aura was bugged and didn’t work currently. I’ve been gone for a while, so I don’t really know.

And they are not really supposed to be enough, they are just there to help. In your example the trait would clean the crappy ones so your active cleanse can clean the other ones…

That’s the problem though. The only actives we have are Cleansing Fire(Cleanses 3), Focus Earth #4(pretty much the only good one), Scepter Fire #3(Phoenix), Staff Water #5(1 per pulse), and Dagger Water #5(Just one condition cleansed IIRC). Staff Air #4 only cleanses specific conditions(Cripple, Immobilize…).

Per weapon, you got:
1 on Scepter
1 on Focus
1 on Off-Hand Dagger
2* on Staff

*One of them is very specific in what it cleanses.

That’s why we’re always forced into Water/Arcana. The only way to get any decent amount of cleanses is to go 4 into Water and even that isn’t enough so we go 6 into Water for Cleanse on Regen, and only then do we have enough to not be completely threatened by Conditions. It might be a little too much Cleansing, but it’s pretty much our only good option when we need to solve that problem(a big one since we’re lacking in the Health department, which is the only other thing that can slow down the effect of damaging conditions).

Our cleansing options are pretty much non-existent in our trait lines outside of Water!
They don’t need to be AS strong, but not so worthless.

lLobo.7960:

Fire element and the spec has quite some condi clean on its theme too
– fire cantrip removes conditions and burn foes
– phoenix removes conditions
– trait in fire removes conditions (activates fire cantrip for free)
– fire aura already reduces inc condition duration by 20%

They’re not really enough though. The cantrip is fine and Phoenix is good too(although I personally hate Scepter), but the trait is rather mediocre since it’s uncontrollable and not constant(as in, you might cleanse 3 crappy conditions from some random Warrior and then get Condi Bombed by a Necro and not have it anymore).

Also, I thought the Condi Duration decrease on Fire Aura was bugged and didn’t work currently. I’ve been gone for a while, so I don’t really know.

That doesn’t feel as cheesy as Medi Guard?

I main Ele and while I love it, I want to play different classes and the Guardian being a Knight + Mage kinda intrigued me. Problem is, I don’t like playing a support role at all and Medi Guard always seemed really not-fun to fight against(as a Thief/Necro) and the few moments I played it on a Lvl 2 Guard also made it feel a cheesy(it censored bit and cheesy…).
I’m just wondering, since I know nothing about Guard really, if there’s another offensive Guardian build that can be used for PvP effectively and isn’t relegated to Supporting team mates, but can also fend for itself in a fight.

Ashen.2907:

lordkrall.7241:

Yes, it shows the class. But if you can have two completely different weapons using basically the same kind of skin, it will be rather hard (not to say impossible) to know what skills will be thrown at you before you see the first skill go off.

You mean like a greatsword that shoots laser beams and summons phantasms in one character’s hands but is a heavy hitting melee attack in another’s ?

No, he means a greatsword that shoots laser beams in one character’s hands and in the same character also drops Chaos Storms. Mesmer and Necro(post-HoT) would be confusing to fight against if they could have two similar skins for two completely different weapons.
That wouldn’t really be good since you wouldn’t be able to tell immediately what kind of build you’re fighting against; it’s kinda like the Asura problem there was in PVP: you can’t really tell what they have until they use it.

It’s funny, because a friend of mine actually thought RtL did the knockback(he’s only played Mesmer and a bit of Ranger) since almost every Ele ever always starts off with RtL → Updraft.
I try to mix it up and hold off on Updraft to then land Burning Speed or to stop a Heal, or when they’ve wasted their rolls, then I sometimes use RtL → Updraft.

Lawful.5314:

Malchior.5732:

Lawful.5314:

Personally i think the overall damage is okay, sure there needs to be some tweaking here and there, but the lack of vitality for elementaist is mostly the problem, because even mesmer while wearing cloth, still has way more base hp.
I mean, why does mesmer have 21k in zerker gear and elementalist 14k, while both wearing cloth? Yeah, thats food for thought.
If they bump up elementalist HP up to 21k in zerker, then the class will be way better.

Mesmer has higher base vitality, thats for sure, about necro not sure.
And they both wear cloth.

And some ele weapons are a bit too weak, specifically staff, i wish they would make it a proper 2h weapon, with high burst damage and aoe, like a 2handed weapon is supposed to be.

I always found it weird that D/D Ele is designed to be in-your-face, but has such low health, while Mesmers have clones and some stealth/blinks to cover themselves. I guess Eles do have insane healing and better mobility, but still.

Also, I would love it if we got a strong 2H option. Staff can be fun since you really have to plan out what you do, but it’s so hard so win a 1v1 that it makes me not want to play it. That’s what I would want, just a solid 2H weapon.

Exactly what i wanted to say just now, our D/D builds which is the strongest is designed to be almost in MELEE range, but we have the LOWEST HP pool of all classes in the game, even from cloth classes, Necro has like 19k in zerker and mesmer has like 21k, but we have 14k, while WE are the melee focused class, which makes no sense.

Sometimes i feel like anet either is really incompetent in balancing or just hates elementalists so bad.

Eh, I think they hate every class in some way. Necros got crap they didn’t want and then got nerfed for it, Rangers have pets, Mesmers have pets, Warriors were trash in the beginning, Guards barely change, Eles have been through a roller coaster ride, Thieves keep getting nerfed all the time, and Engineers are kinda just there.

Lawful.5314:

Personally i think the overall damage is okay, sure there needs to be some tweaking here and there, but the lack of vitality for elementaist is mostly the problem, because even mesmer while wearing cloth, still has way more base hp.
I mean, why does mesmer have 21k in zerker gear and elementalist 14k, while both wearing cloth? Yeah, thats food for thought.
If they bump up elementalist HP up to 21k in zerker, then the class will be way better.

Mesmer has higher base vitality, thats for sure, about necro not sure.
And they both wear cloth.

And some ele weapons are a bit too weak, specifically staff, i wish they would make it a proper 2h weapon, with high burst damage and aoe, like a 2handed weapon is supposed to be.

I always found it weird that D/D Ele is designed to be in-your-face, but has such low health, while Mesmers have clones and some stealth/blinks to cover themselves. I guess Eles do have insane healing and better mobility, but still.

Also, I would love it if we got a strong 2H option. Staff can be fun since you really have to plan out what you do, but it’s so hard so win a 1v1 that it makes me not want to play it. That’s what I would want, just a solid 2H weapon.

Junkpile.7439:

I think that celestial amulet should give at least 1k more power when D/D ele use it because fire grab and burning speed are so weak burst skills.

I think it should also give 1k more Vitality because Ele has the lowest health.

Lawful.5314:

Malchior.5732:

wall of text

Aight, we’re going over the same stuff over and over now, while having slight differences in opinion but overall thoughts being the same.

Glad you realized it.

Lawful.5314:

Malchior.5732:

A good ~60 seconds just sounds like a fair fight to me.

These forums never cease to amaze me, really. One month people are complaining about Ele being unstoppable and murdering everyone in return and the next month the same build has a lack of damage and can only function as a bunker.

Well, here is an example of damage.
My hybrid warrior can oneshot someone, now thats damage, with pressing 3 buttons, while still having 30k hp.

I was never of the opinion that elementalist has damage, unless you build him as zerker, which is paper build.
You have to realize that people that claim that elementalist is “Op” are the 99% of the player base that are not that good.
Same principle as league of legends divisions, the silvers are crying when they get rolled by that 1% diamond player.

I ran cele meta ele build and i met some warriors , guardians and mesmers that were just as good as that 1% , and guess what, no sustain in the world, will keep you alive against them, was frustratingly annoying how all the correct rotations in the world, couldn’t help me.
In rest, i can probably win 60% of my pvp games as cele ele meta, because yeah its that easy to survive against people who are average.

Sweet, you have a strong Warrior build. I hope it doesn’t rely on your opponent lagging to land those moves, though, or having every buff imaginable against someone who’s in full white armor.

Now, I don’t know where you’re going with this, because I never said Cele D/D had great damage, just acceptable levels, which a lot of people seem to accept. You definitely don’t have the firepower to kill everything, but you shouldn’t be taking an obscene amount of time killing something unless they’re like a full tank Guardian or something, in which case, you have good mobility too(while they most likely don’t), so go do something else.

About the “99% being bad” thing, I’ve seen the same thing happen in Starcraft, and Gw2, and Dark Souls, and Civilization, and every game that has ever had any form of Player vs Player. Thing is, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change the fact that the Ele was, alongside the Engineer, dominating and showing results.
There were threads upon threads of people complaining about how OP these classes were(and there still are!) and how they could deal so much damage while surviving through a fight with full health. We can ignore a couple threads, but it was/is an epidemic; how much people hate the damage these classes can do with the amount of sustain they have. You could argue that their time-to-kill is high, but it seems like that’s perfectly fine especially since you can survive another player’s burst and kill them back before you die and you can out-sustain pretty much everything(which is what caused the pages full of whining) well under a minute, depending on your opponent’s spec and each of the player’s skill levels.

Speaking of skill, it doesn’t matter if that 1% can murder you, there will always be that one person who you just can’t beat. Either they’re just much better than you(everyone has met those) or they’re running a build that has an advantage against yours(and this game definitely embraces counter builds).
That 1% is irrelevant to this discussion though; what I care about is the 99% that should not be giving the OP(or most D/D Eles) the trouble that they give.
One final thing, the 60% win rate in PvP games is irrelevant. We’re talking about 1v1 scenarios, as the OP stated he was having trouble with.

Lawful.5314:

Malchior.5732:

Well, whenever I play WvW or PvP, damage is almost never a problem, so yea, im very real.
Sure, I can’t burst someone down in 3 seconds, but I can kill them much faster than you claim to be able to. Some specs take longer, no doubt.

Also, the word “burst” was nowhere in my post.

Exactly that is the problem, yes you can kill someone, but most often than not, it takes a good 60 seconds to do that, sometimes less if they are a squishy zerker and don’t dodge/sustain properly, but in most cases it takes forever to kill anyone and good players will just run if they see that they can’t kill you.
But i already said that, yet you are trying to “teach” me how to play, while supporting my point of view, lel.

A good ~60 seconds just sounds like a fair fight to me. If you want burst, you obviously cannot run Cele D/D and expect to kill THAT fast(as in 10 seconds). Cele D/D’s time-to-kill is very acceptable and doesn’t stop it from being a great build for both holding points and winning 1v1s. It just seems like you don’t know how to properly pressure an opponent though, when you complain about D/D’s damage output, so, naturally, I assumed you weren’t landing a key skill and/or not using Lightning Whip properly.
Go try S/F if you want fast kill times, but D/D does not lack damage.

These forums never cease to amaze me, really. One month people are complaining about Ele being unstoppable and murdering everyone in return and the next month the same build has a lack of damage and can only function as a bunker.

Well, whenever I play WvW or PvP, damage is almost never a problem, so yea, im very real.
Sure, I can’t burst someone down in 3 seconds, but I can kill them much faster than you claim to be able to. Some specs take longer, no doubt.

Also, the word “burst” was nowhere in my post.

Something tells me you don’t know how to land your stronger moves; you should practice that. For starters, Burning Speed + Lightning Flash will hit anything hard, so try practicing that and DO NOT stop pressuring. Lightning Whip has good reach and decent damage, there’s no reason to give them breathing room since you can heal very fast AND Might stack at the same time. You should not lose because of a lack of damage even with Celestial gear, you’re definitely doing something wrong.
The only builds I can think of that you will not kill, can’t kill you back, outside of a Condi PU Mesmer or maybe a Thief(S/D maybe) that’s very good. Everything else should be fair game.

Now that I’m done with my legendary, I wanna get a roaming build set up, but I’m unsure what to buy/make.
I was wondering how much I should generally have for each stat, like 16k Health or 2k Power or something, pre-food/buffs/etc. for a Classic D/D build; I need to Mix and Match stat types and since I have very little Tailor, I have to go for Exotic for now.
I definitely don’t plan on making any Celestial gear outside of two Ascended Rings I already have and of course my Incinerator which I can always change.

Check out the grandmaster trait called Diamond Skin. It makes the Ele immune to Conditions while they have their health above 90%.
A single Golem charge could have probably knocked him under.

lislis.8075:

where do you get the information `?

He made it up himself >.>

I think it’d be a pretty neat idea and I would be completely on board with something like this if it’s viable in a 1v1 scenario. There’s nothing I hate more than feeling useless when I don’t have my team mates, but that’s just me.

Random Weird Guy.3528:

robertul.3679:

The reason I keep hearing people say this requirement even exists is to prevent players from going naked. Which is stupid anyway.

So you would gladly run into battle without any clothes on in real life? Right.

I don’t think the skimpy outfits half the playerbase runs around in is much better than just going naked in terms of protection.

Hello, everyone! I never thought I’d ever want to make a Ranger, but here I am.
I have a few questions since I don’t actually know much about Rangers:

1. I’d prefer a Pure Melee Ranger or at the very least a GS focused one. It would mostly be for WvW/EotM roaming. Any recommended builds?

2. What are common Ranger mistakes I should avoid in general? Aside from letting a Bear tank stuff for me, this would include bad traits to avoid, utilities, etc.

3. What pets are best overall? I’d really prefer to use Wolves(reasons in question #4) though.

4. I’m a Dark Souls fan and I thought making an Artorias-look-a-like would be fun and the Ranger seemed like a semi-decent candidate. He would have Sif as a pet companion and a GS(of which I still need to find a similar sword), but I don’t know much about the Medium armors. You think there’s anything that could look ANYTHING remotely close to this:

http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2014/209/c/0/artorias_by_hypershadowx1-d7sm3aj.png

Doesn’t seem easy to me, but maybe the Ranger experts could help me out.
Thanks for any help!

Title says it all. What’s the strangest idea for a build you’ve had, regardless if it was good or not in the end, or if it even worked. it doesn’t even have to be strange, just something you came up with

Here’s mine:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQJAodhMMqZ2zw6Bd0AiABxukhBDl/GPB-TJRHwAw2fIwJAAZZAAPAAA

I don’t know if there’s anything similar to this, but the idea was using Elemental Surge + Arcane Power. I then added an Ice Bow because it has the best CC in the game and +Condi Duration(and because it’s more fun with conjures :p ).
What ended up happening is that the combo changed into:
Arcane Power + Ice Bow #2 while attuned either in Fire for less evasive classes or Earth for the ones that never stay still -> Ice Bow #5 -> Ice Bow #4
By that point, they’re usually dead or dying very quickly afterwards due to being frozen and all the Conditions just ticking away. Ice Storm puts a decent amount of Bleeds pretty fast.
I didn’t seem to die if I missed that combo either. Ether Renewal with Rock Solid and a Focus will keep you healthy for the most part. I made another version that used Blinding Ashes, but I never tried it in a duel. Speaking of duels…

Warning Wall o’ text

So, there’s my dumb build. Don’t be ashamed to post your own crazy ideas :p

My guild is doing a little 1v1 tournament for fun and I wanted to take my Ele(although we’re allowed to switch classes in between matches) and I was wondering what would be the best spec for general dueling. I know that my guild is bringing in a lot of Mesmers and Thieves and a few Guards.
I was thinking a Scepter build would be good, although I undoubtedly prefer Daggers. You guys got anything fun, but also effective?

So, I main Ele, and while I fell in love with it a long time ago, 700 hours later I just feel really tired of it and decided to take a break. Made a Thief and it’s like a breath of fresh air. I love it so far; done mostly some light EotM/WvW roaming and a few dungeons(mostly AC and CoF). I have a few questions though:

1. What spots do you guys usually roam around? Sometimes I can go an hour without finding even a little uplevel to prey on.(I’m currently Blue in EotM/WvW)

2. What weaponsets do you recommend? I really enjoy D/D and have been using 2/6/6/0/0 and have been meaning to try 2/0/6/0/6, but due to lack of Skill Points have been unable to do so for the moment. I found Sword a little dull, but that might be just my inability to get used to using the evades more defensively. Pistol was interesting, but again, Skill Points are a problem.

3. How do you best deal with Rangers? I can’t seem to close the distance fast enough in certain scenarios to fight them, stealthing seems hit-or-miss due to the tracking of Rapid Fire and even if I dodge most of it, I’m usually too far and then I’ll eat a Point-Blank Shot or something. I’m talking about the situations where there is not a lot of cover. Last night, for example, I was typing to a friend as I notice a Ranger and before I could even react, I died to a PBShot -> Rapid Fire(with Air/Fire Sigils). 13k Health was gone in just a second.
That same Ranger always seemed to pop up whenever I was in a fight, outnumbered or not, and just completely ruin my day.

4. I usually solo Arah p2(and starting to do p1 and p3) with my Elementalist, and aside from my frequent lag spikes, it goes alright, but I was wondering if it might be slightly easier or faster on my Thief. If so, what’s the strategy for the bosses? I don’t see how you can beat Belka or phase 2 Lupicus. Arah p1 is kinda more straight-forward, so no questions there.

Thanks.

Caedmon.6798:

Malchior.5732:

Caedmon.6798:

Warrior is a faceroll class ? Are you kittening kidding me ? After all our nerfs while others have been getting buffs We are a faceroll class ? what specific warr faceroller build are you even talking about ? The build im using needs Timing,anticipating and proper use of adren filling/bursting,evading,condi cleansing etc etc…Honestly what in the kitten are you talking about when you call warrior a “Faceroll” class ?

No offense, but the nerfs to Warrior aren’t that big. Compare them to the nerfs Elementalists received a long time ago, or hell Necromancers. They left Eles virtually useless in pvp, Necromancers got nerfs across the board with little to make up for it and even though they received a few nerfs lately(small ones at that), Warriors are still top contenders and it still remains a very forgiving profession.
Don’t get me wrong, that doesn’t mean that Warriors don’t have specs that take some skill, but the passives pick up a LOT of slack.

The nerfs aren’t that big ? Just wow… With the recent adren nerfs we had lots of properly working builds evolving around adren that have been completely wrecked.We’re a class with multiple traits relying on adren,that don’t work as good as they used to do,building up is too slow,the adren out of combat loss happens far to fast,and the adren loss on miss is a pain aswell ( random blinds/blocks happens all the time) when building up is already slow.

Cleansing isn’t nearly as good as it used to be due to these changes,and the best cleansing weap is a bow atm… These changes only made them being pushed in the same direction,running the same traitlines and even more people picking up bow.Warrior is anything but a forgiving class.. again depending on the build you’re talking about,which you still havn’t said.If you want to talk about a faceroll class you should have put med guard up there just for the kitten of making sense.

They’re really not. Consider how Warriors went from being at the top to still being at the top even after the nerfs. Did they kill off a few builds? Sure, but it’s not like the Warrior is lacking in viable builds even now and Warrior IS a very forgiving class. Think about it, you have constant healing from two sources: Healing Signet and Adrenaline.
At the very least, Elementalists need to be attacking to keep up their Signet heals, but not the Warrior, he can be mauling me with multiple CCs and continue healing or he could be mauled by CC and still be healing and although the Stances aren’t the “meta” now, they allow the Warrior to just eat attacks that they shouldn’t be while keeping their own pressure up.
Fact is, Warrior has high health, heavy armor, a lot of passive healing and they still have a good amount of cleansing. Any newbie can pick up a Warrior, go with the classic HamBow and do okay. There just isn’t a lot of drawback to the Warrior builds.
You feel forced to using Longbow? Elementalists feel forced to play D/D with 6 Water/6 Arcana, Necros use Staff in almost every build, etc.

Anet did the right thing with those nerfs. The Warrior needed to be brought down a little bit and they’re still at the top!
Now, before you respond, I want you to know that I never said Warrior was faceroll, I said it was the closest thing to it. I just personally think that most of the other professions require a bit more finesse while a Warrior can screw up several times and still have a chance.

Caedmon.6798:

Warrior is a faceroll class ? Are you kittening kidding me ? After all our nerfs while others have been getting buffs We are a faceroll class ? what specific warr faceroller build are you even talking about ? The build im using needs Timing,anticipating and proper use of adren filling/bursting,evading,condi cleansing etc etc…Honestly what in the kitten are you talking about when you call warrior a “Faceroll” class ?

No offense, but the nerfs to Warrior aren’t that big. Compare them to the nerfs Elementalists received a long time ago, or hell Necromancers. They left Eles virtually useless in pvp, Necromancers got nerfs across the board with little to make up for it and even though they received a few nerfs lately(small ones at that), Warriors are still top contenders and it still remains a very forgiving profession.
Don’t get me wrong, that doesn’t mean that Warriors don’t have specs that take some skill, but the passives pick up a LOT of slack.

I’ve been playing Ele for a long time now; I started a bit after they became garbage and I remember how difficult it was to play in PvP at times. I always had to focus on survival, because NOT going 30 into Water and 30 into Arcana meant death. Even now, Elementalists have to trait almost entirely into defense and sustain and the only reason we can deal damage is because we can stack Might. Back then, playing Elementalist was rough for someone who was inexperienced(me), but now they made Burning Speed a non-suicide move(as in, you wont die by charging into an attack), reverted a few harsh nerfs(mostly Cleansing Water and SoR), and gave us a new amulet and boom, we’re now a faceroll class?

It’s not that I’m really bothered by it, I’m just curious why faceroll is synonymous with powerful(Or overpowered if you want to use that). Something that is faceroll is powerful, but something powerful is not necessarily faceroll.
In many others games, something that is overpowered isn’t necessarily easy to use and I still see that in GW2. I see tons of Elementalists in all game modes just eat through all their attunements and immediately get destroyed or many of them don’t even know how to stack Might properly, or they don’t help out a team mate with low health even though they could have.
I’ve crushed many D/D Elementalists on my Staff build 1v1. Yea, it was unranked, but that’s kinda the point. If it’s so faceroll, you’d think I would have a tough time against them with a weapon set that has so much trouble in 1v1, yet I usually finish those fights at full health!
Then there are the D/D Elementalists that are just really kitten good and I get annihilated regardless of what I’m using.

I see the same thing happen to Engineers and Necromancers. Actually, Thieves get the worst of it, I think. I’ve played all these classes and I think they have some small intricacies that make them more complex that we’d like to give them credit for. Of course, there’s the brain dead moments where a Thief spams Heartseeker or an Ele goes through his routine without any variation or a Necro just drops all 5 Marks without a second thought, but overall, I don’t think there are that many faceroll classes in this game. The closest one, imo, is Warrior. I only played it for a bit, but it’s a really forgiving profession and that’s okay since every game needs something that isn’t AS demanding in every game mode.

What do you guys think? Are any classes in this game really that faceroll? They all require SOME knowledge to be used to their full potential. Faceroll builds, maybe, but not the whole profession.
I just want to end my little rant by saying that I don’t want to start a flame war or anything against any class(not even Warrior), I just wanna know what everyone else thinks of the term “faceroll” and if people are actually using it correctly or if they’re just mad.

tl;dr The top professions are not truly faceroll, just powerful in the current meta. Don’t start a flame war.

I don’t know about you guys, but I get tired of playing the Meta Cele Ele build and burst is always kinda fun to play, what with all the risk you put yourself in and such, but I hated being completely destroyed in a 6/6/2/0/0 build in slightly longer battles, so I decided to make something a little different:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQJAoYhcMaZ2zwzBd0AOAGxaQMQcEIA8CLeFWCA-TJBFwAOeAAl2foaZAAnAAA

Now, I know that S/X is kinda better for bursting, but I just love the mobility that D/D gives me, despite the fact that I have to sit closer in melee range. It’s just so satisfying when Lightning Rod hits for over 4k or you land an 8k Fire Grab.
I also realize this build might be a bit gimmicky, but I’m just a little tired of 0/2/0/6/6

The reasoning for my choices are as follows:
- I’m using Runes of Strength and Sigil of Battle so I can stack some Might during fights that last a little bit too long(against more tanky opponents) so I can punch through them faster.
- I put a little into Water so I don’t lose to a little condition application(getting immobilized, chilled, etc.) instantly and I can eat a little extra damage before dying and – I put 4 into Arcana for the Vigor and the on-demand Protection against Thieves(Air #3 helps a lot too) so those aren’t always an insta-death as well.

My real question is here though: Is this small amount of extra healing/cleansing and protection enough to escape semi-reliably from a bad fight or am I better off going back to full glassy burst? Also, should I just switch the Runes/Sigils to something more bursty as well?

Hannelore.8153:

Thank you kind sir. You have informed me that I should stop running around with my speed and loot weapon in open world, on a slow (mostly) melee class, to farm a small, chaotic map where events come and go in the blink of an eye.

-

Just for reference, many Guardians use burning for damage, not direct damage, so the Staff will have the highest chances of proccing upgraded Virtue of Justice. There is absolutely no requirement in open world to rely on direct damage, to run around in Berserker, Assassin or Rampager builds, and to use optimal weapons.

People play in the way that is easiest for them. It is not hurting you. Any pain that you feel as a result of their playing style is a placebo effect.

Between this and bell choir elitism, I have now seen it all …

It’s not really elitism. Fact is, you’re being ineffective and when there are only two people defending a falling fort, the Staff Guardian is literally doing nothing; not doing significant damage and not even getting any loot from the mobs.
I swear, this is the only game I’ve played where people WANT to be ineffective and just HATE to deal damage and kill things.

Dahkeus.8243:

Considering the large AoE radius of the staff, it’s actually potentially one of the highest DPS weapons for a guardian, even though it has a very low single target DPS. And in group events where there’s tons of mobs…it can be a good weapon to use.

I can guarantee that using something else will be better in almost every situation where time is important. The ONLY time a Staff would be better is against large groups of Menders.

Dahir.4158:

I use a blinding ashes build that revolves around dagger/focus weapons. My build is condition-based, not power… but it is still a fun build to use regardless.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/elementalist/WvW-broski-s-condition-ele-vids

build link in the description of the vids – no runes there because I keep changing them

a little side note… if you want to p#ss people off and make them mad use rune of perplexity!

Pretty cool! Never see anyone use the Shield. Nice.

I’d rather use a Power build though(mostly because I don’t want to make a brand new set of armor since I’m making an Incinerator…) so I’m gonna try a bunch of different ideas here maybe. The S/F build looks like it would be a lot of fun actually; I’ll try to make something work for my roaming needs. I don’t expect it to be better than D/D at it, but I’m just mostly gonna ambush and chase with a friend, so it doesn’t need to be amazing, just evil

As the title says, is there any semi-decent BA build you’ve seen? I like to roam around in WvW/EotM with a friend usually(sometimes solo) and I do some light SoloQ every so often, but I always use D/D(Cele 0/0/2/6/6) and while I love it, I’d like to try something new and I always thought this trait was interesting when it was announced.
Before I get to experimenting though, I wanted to know if there’s anything you guys have found to be effective. Any ideas?

MeanCoffeeBean.2073:

Double pistols. Spellslingers for GW2 pl0x.

I would very much like this, or a Rifle
Gives me more of a reason to make the Predator instead of Incinerator.(I hate the Quip)

I opened a stack of Gifts and got a ton of these…too bad every other box causes the game to crash!

Prophet.6257:

Blackwyn.8127:

GW2’s first expansion screenshots have been revealed in a press conference.
I know this isn’t what the topic was about but I just had to. Please don’t ban me

pics or it didn’t happen…

(please let this be true)

“250 years in the future!”

I assume it was a poorly presented joke.

cthaeh.2168:

Wanze.8410:

cthaeh.2168:

Oh, I get it! People put actual facts in front of you, and you simply choose to see what you want to see. No wonder these arguments never go anywhere. The people who are wrong just make kitten up!

August 10 – 1351g
Sept 10 – 1313g
Oct 10 – 1225g
Nov 10 – 1305g
Dec 10 – 1339 g

That is in now way a steady decline. Not only you’re neglecting the previous 2 years of data, but you’re also ignoring the fact that it cost over 1300g.

I think there are some billy goats trying to cross your bridge.

You are ignoring the fact that 1351g>1339g.
Those prices are with a variation of 10% incredibly stable. In the same timeframe, ectos and t6 mats variated mostly around 20%, t5 mats over 40%

So, someone accuses you of cherry picking and lying, and your response is…cherry picking and lying? Brilliant! Thank you for only further validating my point.

I’m not ignoring anything. 1225g < 1305g <1339 g. Two of your 4 months of steady decline are steady increases. And I never said anything about T6 mats, so trying to redirect the conversation away from how wrong you are won’t get you anywhere.

Here, I don’t have the time to endlessly point your flaws. That would be a full time job. Instead of replying, simply replace what I would normally say with a random choice from https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/. I’m sure your argument will be full of whichever one you choose.

I don’t know if this is ironic or sad.

Guys, I think the better idea is to just delete RTL and Burning Speed. That way they can’t be nerfed or complained about ever again. In its place we’ll give Eles two different dancing moves inspired by their respective attunements.

Been using KrazyFlyinChicken’s Staff build lately(http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fFAQFAWnMISLD2zAOOArEGgAQIm8Y4AFGUc7XA-TJxHwADeAAa2fAwFAoYZAA)
and it’s been doing pretty decently. I can handle most fights, even a lot of 1v1s are simple enough, but there are a few that absolutely crush me sometimes that would be really easy with Cele D/D:

1. Ranger
Usually not a problem and Earth #3 helps, but I can’t help but feel really stupid when I die to a LB Ranger :L
They also have range, so it’s hard for me to force them into my AoEs and they can burst me down pretty fast if I’m not careful; conversely, they die in just a few hits too, but they can kill me faster.

2. Thief
Actually not a huge deal most of the time. Most players I currently fight are extremely predictable, but the decent-to-good thieves can be problematic. They have insane burst and I can only keep them off of me for so long before I just fall, especially with the Ice Spike when they steal from me

3. Mesmer
Same problem I have with the Ranger. I either just eat a billion damage and have to stop my AoEs so I don’t die from confusion, or it turns into a stalemate where the Mesmer keeps stealthing and resetting. Same crap happens to me when I play D/D though.

You guys got any ideas on how I can get better at handling these? I realize Staff has some glaring weaknesses, but I wanna try to make it work, at least at my level.
At the very least, I almost always get one of the higher scores on my team.

That’s a lot of help, guys.
I’m gonna try a run or two to test the waters, but I wont do a serious run until sometime after the 16th, because this’ll take a lot of work and I still have a few final tests to do, but all help is appreciated!

I’ve been soloing p2 for a while now and its good profit, but its gotten pretty stale.
I’ve been wanting to learn to solo Arah p4, but I have a few questions:

1. Is it possible on Ele? If not, what classes can?
2. How long does it take on a solo?
3. Got any tips for the bosses?(I don’t really know how to solo any of them yet)

Any help is appreciated

DiogoSilva.7089:

Malchior.5732:

DiogoSilva.7089:

Malchior.5732:

tl;dr Either Zerker is meta, or something else will take its place. Going against this is pointless.

Or, you know, they could always design combat to require roles.

The zerker meta exists because any party setup is meant to be viable, and when any party setup is meant to be viable, players simply pick the fastest one and stick with it.

A trinity would also have the same problem.(I know you didn’t say trinity, but bear with me) Even worse actually. Suddenly, I can’t play X class because Y is a better healer and Z is a better tank or the party alreayd has too many DPS roles.
It wouldn’t solve the problem most people complain about.

I think GW1 did it really well. Minion masters (to overwhelm opponents or to make them target random pets), control builds (with massive crowd control), healers, protters (damage mitigation), nukers, etc. The most optimal parties always had all of them, and there was at least 1 useful build for each profession.

EDIT

• Prot Monks, ER Infuse Elementalists (using prot monk skills), Ritualists, “Imbagon” Paragons;
• Minion Master Necros, Minion Bomber Necros, Signet of Spirit Ritualists;
• Panic Mesmers, Illusion Mesmers;
• Fire Elementalists, Mark of Pain Necros, any melee cleave builds;

4 different roles right here, and that list doesn’t even includes the classic “tank” role (which was kind of niche in GW1).

Gw2 would need a massive change to have as much customization as Gw1…which also suffered from “OP” builds.

DiogoSilva.7089:

Malchior.5732:

tl;dr Either Zerker is meta, or something else will take its place. Going against this is pointless.

Or, you know, they could always design combat to require roles.

The zerker meta exists because any party setup is meant to be viable, and when any party setup is meant to be viable, players simply pick the fastest one and stick with it.

A trinity would also have the same problem.(I know you didn’t say trinity, but bear with me) Even worse actually. Suddenly, I can’t play X class because Y is a better healer and Z is a better tank or the party alreayd has too many DPS roles.
It wouldn’t solve the problem most people complain about.

No matter what you guys suggest, the meta will always be the fastest and most efficient way to beat something, which will always be the point where you no longer need more defense and can focus everything else into offense; Zerker gear falls into this category.(along with Assassin)

Even if you nerf it, or change the game in some way, the meta will shift to another gear/trait set-up to maximize speed. Fact is, the only way to change the “Zerker meta” is to make Zerker non-viable, which will just make some other set the meta. The diversity that people want has always been there, but that doesn’t mean your Magi Condi Guardian will ever win any speed-runs.

It’s like this in pretty much every other game: Run as little defense that you need to survive and dump everything else into your offense, which happens to be Zerker gear. People will always prefer the faster methods, so taking 5x longer to kill an enemy isn’t on their list of things to do.

I can understand if people are angry that they can be kicked, but if a person has to do all their dungeon runs so they can make some money, the last thing they want is someone who is just gonna slow them down by being incredibly sub-optimal, but that’s the beauty of the LFG…just make your own room with your own criteria.

Can Anet make more content that requires, say Condi builds? Yea, but we’d have the same problem: Zerker is made non-viable, but something else would take its place, maybe Sinister gear, for example.

tl;dr Either Zerker is meta, or something else will take its place. Going against this is pointless.

I was trying to sell Arah p2 today(and yesterday) and both times my LFG posts wuld just delete themselves after a few minutes; one time it was literally 5 seconds before it disappeared. It’s extremely annoying and I can’t re-post it too many times because I will get suppressed, and not for 5 minutes either, I got suppressed for nearly an hour until I sold the path. My friend had to join my party and post for me for it to no longer delete itself and he’s experienced the same exact problem.

I wonder if there’s a way to fix this because this has only been happening recently; I was previously able to post without any issues.

malismagnis.5960:

just wondering why you don’t use sigil of hydromancy instead of geomancy – yes geomancy gives you more bleed stacks but hydromancy does a lot of dmg as well as chill which helps you to gain an advantage because their skills take forever to recharge, and can also provide you with a way out considering their movement speed will be decreased. yes they can easily cleanse the chill off themselves, but then that makes the bleeds from geomancy pretty useless too if they can cleanse it…

also why don’t you use IX (cantrips grant regeration and vigor) in water instead of X (remove a condition when attuning to water)? since you use 3 cantrips, and you use the trait XI (remove a condition when granting yourself regen) it would mean you’d have 3 condi cleanses. also since whenever you attune to water you gain regen from arcane trait VIII (I presumed you used that), you’d get another condi cleanse. finally from cleansing fire, you clear another 3 condis – so all together you could clear 7 condis at once (if you wanted to ofc but that’d just be dumb). finally you have ether renewal that clears a massive amount of condis. plus the regen and vigor from the cantrips would help you survive longer.

I thought you were an Ele, not a Necromancer.
Seriously, this thread is 11 months old.

Purple Miku.7032:

I think on NA it’s a lot better to sell Arah than EU. I have some friends on NA servers that laugh at me because of how many problems I have had selling paths that they sell in a fraction of the amount of time I have to wait.

I play on NA and I duo’d p2 with a friend and we sold the path for 7g in about 10 minutes. We probably could have even gone to 8g.

So me(an Ele) and a friend(Guard) tried to Duo Arah p2. We’ve never really done Solos or Duos like this before, but we wanted to just try and maybe get a bit of gold out of it when we get better.

We killed Belka no problem. The run to the Abomination gave my friend some problems, but we pulled through it. The abomination kept getting aggro’d when we tried to pull the Asura, but we managed to get enough rifles to kill him too.

Then we got to Lupi; We went the safe route(I went with PVT gear and changed to a slightly tankier spec) and we took forever to kill Lupi, but we finally did it on our third try.(I got stuck on Lupi when I once tried to solo P2) The one problem we had was that Lupi kept trying to Bubble us even if we went under him. Did we need to push him to the wall to prevent that?

Anyway, we pushed through to Alphard, which was a complete joke and we got to our biggest challenge on this run: Brie. Not only was the run to Brie a kittenallenging to my friend(I just spammed Obsidian Flesh + Mist Form), but once we got there, we were stumped. I could DPS Brie below 50% in time, but after that, we would have the terminal swarmed. We could hold everything back up until the Deadeyes came and murdered us. We tried both DPSing Brie down, but without the proper Runes, it seemed like we fell short on damage. Then we tried both defending the terminal, but we seemed to randomly exit our Godmode buff. In the end, we just wanted to finish, so we got some people to help us murder the boss so we could leave.

Could the kind community of the Dungeons section please give me every bit of info on Brie? We’d like to try to Duo again sometime and I’d personally like to Solo it at some point.

Thanks for the tips, everyone. I have one more question, just so I don’t have to open another topic: Is the build I was using good or is there something else all the Elementalists are using nowadays? I mean, I felt like I could survive pretty comfortably and I almost always had 20+ stacks of Might in every battle. Any suggestions?

My friend wanted to practice playing Ele so we decided to both go on Hotjoin in PvP and just rush the Far point in every game. Being hotjoin, the other team usually got crushed, until we encountered another team using dual CondiMesmers. We tried a 2v2 and we just died. We tried 1v1s and we just couldn’t last; we would run out of cleanses before we could kill them. My friend got so frustrated with it that he literally just stood still and auto-attacked the air for the Signet regen and managed to stay alive for a while.

My question is: How do you deal with a CondiMesmer exactly? I can handle Warriors, Terrormancers, Decap Engies, tanky Guardians and other Eles, but CondiMesmers always give me trouble.(and really good thieves)

I didn’t really know the current top Ele build for sPvP and didn’t feel like searching it, so I kinda just made one up real quick:
2/0/0/6/6
Strength Runes – Celestial Amulet
D/D with Sigil of Battle and Sigil of Doom.

I’ve made about 300g from doing dungeons and some small-time flips, but I want to learn how to make some real money since I need to buy the Spark now ;_;
You guys got any tips? I try to look around for items, but without risking my profit, I only see a few silver of profit per stack. I don’t see how people are making hundreds per day unless they played literally 24/7. I’m probably just doing this all wrong.

So I’ve never actually completed Arah(last attempt failed at Lupicus), but I really want to learn the best methods, and more importantly, I want to learn how to solo Arah p2.
The skipping parts seem annoying, but nothing I can’t do.
The first boss seems pretty easy for the most part with careful positioning.
Lupicus however, I couldn’t even beat with 4 other people.
My problem when fighting Lupicus(after many failed attempts in a group, I told them to let me try soloing for fun) was that his kicks in phase 1 were pretty much instant and they would one-shot me in full zerker gear. I actually managed to get him down to phase 2 by myself, but failed in my rotations and died. Other than that, his near-instant attacks in phase 3 also one-shotted me and the death bubble was pretty difficult to escape without a full endurance bar.

My question to the Elementalist community: What gear should I use to solo Arah p2/Lupicus? What can I do against those near-instant attacks? What tells should I watch out for? While we’re at it, can you guys explain the other bosses as well?

I kinda just wanna do this for fun, not really for selling. Maybe I’d invite guild members or friends before the final boss, but overall this is just a personal accomplishment. Any tips?

FrownyClown.8402:

Dagger focus cant kill a warrior. When they switch to bow dodge the immobalize then strafe behind them with air auto until they switch to hammer. Dodge the stuns. They key is to focus might stacking, hit them with a drake breath that ticks for over 400 a second, land fire 5 (dagger dagger) when its up and then keep the farthest range you can and spam lightning auto. Long fight but they will go down. In pvp you need to have decent dps. Try valk trinket with zerker jewel. For runes i like ranger. Ogre is nice too.

Hmm, alright. So if I use D/F, it’s more of a “Tank till team arrives or run away” sort of deal? Bleh. Guess I’ll go back to D/D and try to 1v1 my friend again and see how it goes.
Thanks for the info.

I usually play D/D in sPvP(yea, I know it’s not exactly ideal), but lately I’ve been trying D/F. It’s a lot of fun, even if the damage is sorta lacking and the Fire spells are garbage.

Anyway, I asked my friend to 1v1 me just to test it out.(I’d like to point out that neither of us are that great; we mostly just play very casual PvP, but highly prefer it over WvW zerg-fests) I had boon duration runes, Ether Renewal, 30 Water/30 Arcana, and 3x Cantrips since I had D/D equipped previously and didn’t know what to change it to, and I went up against his S/D burst Ele because he rarely plays Elementalist and kinda wanted to try it out. I died the first time, then slowly got the hang of it and started actually killing him and surviving the burst.

I then tell him to switch to his Necro main so I could see how I could handle a Condi Necro. We were pretty much locked. I wouldn’t die and neither would he. Took me a few minutes of constant fighting, but I finally downed him. He did the same to me when I messed up my rotation though.

At this point, I’m starting to really like D/F as I had some trouble dealing with Condi Necros before, but then I told my friend to try out his Warrior against me. Now, my friend doesn’t really run meta builds on his Warrior, he kinda does his own thing, but I told him to run HamBow with Endure Pain and Healing Signet. Much like his Necro, he had a lot of trouble actually killing me, but this time, he was at 100% health nearly all the time. What exactly can I do? I tried just dumping all my attacks, not caring too much about his attacks(outside of the CC), and I could still barely knock him below 75%. I actually told him to stand still so I could just attack and it was still a very slow death.

Now, I’m not saying Warrior is OP or anything, but after the duel, my friend tells me that he’s not specced for damage(I was at like 40% health most of the time, with 19k health as my total) and that he actually forgot to put runes and sigils of his armor and weapons. That’s kind of scary to me. What I’d really like to know is the runes and utilities I can use to increase my damage a tad bit as the only cantrip I truly relied on was Cleansing Fire or whether D/F just simply isn’t fit for casual PvP.(Or at least not 1v1)