Guild Wars 2

Vol.5241:

As someone who has made over 800g from the union waypoint farming, it was bound to be nerfed. I agree with it being nerfed (though I’d love it to still be there). But you must ask, which is more destructive for the economy?

25s dust or 40s dust? and rising? I think the latter.

Now, as I mentioned earlier, arenanet can nerf bugged or immensely rewarding events all they want.

But they just keep nerfing the events that players find as the next best thing ( and just aren’t bugged)

i.e. Collonade, plinx, shelt/pen

40+ silver for dust would be awesome. Finally running events in Orr won’t have to feel like such a huge waste of time that I do anyway because “Zombies are cool.”

Phantom.8130:

could it be 3 people in a party, on 3 seperate carts, using ctrl + T to mark you? i’ve done that on defense before, and it’s absurdly simple to pull off.

My wife and I group in WvW, and we do this often.

I can imagine how it might seem like botting from the other side, when in reality we’re just in the same room communicating and marking targets.

I didn’t care about the skelk fix, because I don’t like Southsun. I do like Orr, and my reaction to the tunnel fix was GOOD! I bug reported that event at least 5 times! It was obviously broken, and almost impossible to complete as it was. The fact that we exploited this broken event for material gain doesn’t matter.

I’m glad the skelk spot got fixed. Broken content is broken.

Just because a fix doesn’t help you make gold faster doesn’t mean it’s a “Nerf.”

Caffynated.5713:

It usually appears underground if you use it without a target. You just hear it land way down below you in the bottom of the world box. WTB ground target DT.

Ah, yeah. Forgot about the non-ground target DT. I don’t use it often.

Definitely want Ground Target DT!

I love the new Arrowcarts. I’ll still like them when they reduce the range a tad. I think the next thing to add should be Ram Mastery that makes rams slightly more resistant to AC damage. And since they made it far easier to rank up I’ll probably buy the increase to Ballista range (eventually).

Phantom.3548:

Is this guy trolling or what? Because staves are good as they are right now, I mean come on now. And there’s not a lot of players playing with a staff anyway.

I think A-net have more interesting nerfs to do in the moment. Let them work on the important stuff rather than force them to work on the less important stuff, maybe?

He’s absolutely trolling, but has unwittingly started a relatively interesting conversation.

Blaine Tog.8304:

@Asomal, Sunflowers answered your question pretty much as I would’ve.

The Thief is going to potentially pop out of nowhere to deliver his full burst in less than a second, but here’s the thing: even if that burst fails to kill you, he can just stealth and reset the fight. And even if some of his burst does miss, he can Heartseeker Heartseeker Heartseeker to finish you off (I don’t hold with these newfangled S/D or P/D thieves, it’s D/D all the way for me!).

The S/D Ele certainly has a lot of damage options, but most of them are easily missed (too easily missed IMO, but that’s neither here nor there). And if he misses his big burst, he can’t just reset the fight without running away.

That’s a problem with WvW Thieves, not a problem with Ele.

And I would argue that Thief being imba is specific only to WvW roaming, due to how resetting a fight doesn’t cost anything.

In PvE it usually resets the mob’s health too. In sPvP it costs you the opportunity to capture a node. In WvW it might cost you a supply camp or sentry point, but usually it costs nothing.

eldain stenlund.4306:

blackgoat.5172:

OP you’re mad that GW2 isn’t what you want it to be. But it is what A-net designed it to be. are there bugs/problems? Yes. Are they working on them? Yes. It may not be the speed at which you or I would like but they ARE working on it. No MMO is ever finished, that’s the nature of the type of game it is. There is no trinity in this game and you know what? it works. It’s frustrating at times because this game is different from any MMO we’ve played before but it DOES work. This isn’t WoW, (thank god). If you don’t like the game for the core mechanics, (no trinity everyone is heals, dps and support) then maybe this just isn’t the game for you.

Iam more annoyed about that we are given false choises.

“here you have skill points to use as you want, but you still cant specialize in any field no matter how many points you spend”.

I couldn’t disagree more.

The playstyle of a S/D Burst Ele is completely different to a Staff Buffs/Heals Ele. Both of those are completely different to a D/D Bunker. Ele is my favorite class because it’s so trivial to build it to do whatever I want. If I want sustained damage, condi damage, burst, bunkering, mobility, support, whatever. And I can mix and match those functions pretty easily as well.

Most ground-targets are like this. You can Meteor Shower at the top of keep walls/towers if you’re within horizontal range of the target area.

Arrowcarts work this way as well.

Thieves have amazing condition removal.

Bad thieves don’t use it.

I don’t know why, but I kill them pretty consistently because they are bads.

Good players laugh at my conditions and get a free badge. That’s just life. If someone’s running a lot of cleansing then I’ve just been countered, and kudos to them for bringing a build that counters mine.

chronometria.3708:

durick.8064:

i want what he is smoking. So you want a weapon that has great aoe damage and great single target damage lol.

Yes, because other classes can have two contrasting weapons and switch between them. They are never stuck in a single mode. Warriors can spec greatsword and rifle, giving them access to excellent range and excellent close range, both with good damage. Elementalists cannot weapons swap and thus their weapons must be able to offer two styles of fighting across their attunement range.

Conjure Fiery Greatsword fills this gap for me pretty well. It excels in most of the places where staff fails.

FinalPatriot.8034:

LordByron.8369:

There is a reason if there are so many guardians and warriors in www.

Also a guardian can easily survive a zerg for minutes….they don t need mistform….

My group of 5 fought against a Mesmer, an up-leveled Ranger, and a hammer-wielding Guardian (not sure the build) this morning and though the Mesmer and Ranger went down rather quickly, the Guardian felt like he was just laughing at us. We could get him down to about 25% but then he’d somehow heal back up and negate a massive amount of incoming damage.

S/F Cleric Guardians take a beating like none other.

Liquid Swords.1740:

Calling it now. This is just a setup to nerf zephyrs boon and get rid of easy perma fury/swiftness for d/d. Can’t wait to hear them claim how awesome the new traits will be. I hope I am proven wrong though.

Why do you need Zephyr’s Boon for perma swiftness?

Glyph of Harmony + Any other Swiftness source does it for me.

OliverT.9021:

Let me put it in another way…

CoF p1 netts you 5g an hour.

How are you able to nett 5g an hour if you run around Orr to make it worth your time? Because earning anything less than 5g an hour, you might as well go back to CoF p1.

The answer is, the price of the loot you get increases to a point where they become worth 5g in total.

Which means that the price of the materials you get from Orr, has to rise to a point where it becomes equally rewarding as running CoF p1, not because ArenaNet made it to be so, but because of price increase.

When that happens, arbitrage is said to have taken place because that is the point where supply will come back and demand will normalize.

While I agree with your overall premise, I also think it’s more complex than that.

First, you can’t farm CoF solo. You can solo farm in Orr. This makes Orr more accessible.

Secondly, arbitrage only happens when there are two separate marketplaces. What you’re talking about is equilibrium prices, assuming that prices are set based on the value of the labor (in this case the opportunity costs of doing other things) it takes to produce a product. This was one of the biggest arguments in economics about 100 years ago, and demonstrably untrue. Just because something is expensive to make doesn’t mean it’s worth more money. What makes it worth more money is demand. Cost of labor provides a price floor, but since there’s no risk of going “out of business” in GW2 that price floor is not that strong.

Finally, farming CoF is only a viable alternative if you know about it and actually want to do that. Many players either do not know that it is more profitable to farm CoF, or do not know how much more profitable it is. Many other players (myself included) may just despise doing the dungeon and refuse no matter what.

So, it isn’t as simple as choosing between farming CoF and farming Orr. There are qualitative differences between these two methods of gaining wealth that make such a stark comparison misleading. This doesn’t even touch on the fact that CoF is largely a gold faucet, while Orr is largely a material faucet. Also I’m not discussing the messy relationship between price and demand, which is seldom linear or even knowable.

I do agree that, if ANet doesn’t do anything odd, that Crystalline Dust will probably increase more in price and probably stay there for quite some time. Demand for it is just too high for it not to. Think about it like this. If Crystalline Dust goes to 40s each someone will probably still buy it. If it goes to 50s, the same holds true. I’d imagine it could go as high as 99s and still sell (if slowly). That tells me that the market isn’t through shifting, and we’ll just have to wait for the prices to get high enough for people who have been hoarding the material to sell off their backstock.

eldain stenlund.4306:

Blaine Tog.8304:

LordEnki.9283:

Yeah I agree that Elementalist are the red head step children of Anet.

Everyone thinks this. Seriously, you can find threads on every profession board that go on and on about how Anet has it out for them specifically.

True.

Isnt it about time then that A-net Admit they made a misstake on their core design ?
And that they try to fix it. Instead of just ignoring it.

The place i work at IRL. our top boss, is just ignoring everything we say to him.
“its 2013, we live in sweden, and we have no water in our building, please fix this”. Ignored for 3 years now.

“you have to repair the building, its falling apart, the roof can come down any second on us, look, when it rains outside, its more dry out there than in here”. ignored.

In Short: HE is running his company into the ground.
the sad part ? He is running a bussines that is very rare and have INSANE potentials.
We, his workers see the potentials, we even tell him. but we get ignored.

HE is boss. HE knows whats best.. ye right.

He can NEVER admit he have been wrong, in any way.
you can even show him evidence of how wrong he was, and still he says he is right.

I cant complain and bring in our system against his company, because the ppl i work with there are like family, and realy great ppl.

So iam curious about A-net. will they behave like my boss. being totaly stupid.
OR
Will they infact open their eyes, admit they made some misstakes, fix them.
And have a good chanse at actually becoming a good E-sport game.

1) They are making a lot of money off of GW2. Like, a lot. They aren’t “running it into the ground.”

2) If every class thinks they are the red-headed stepchild then that’s pretty balanced.

3) They have rolled out multiple balancing tweaks and changes. We may not like them, but they’re absolutely working on it.

4) Making and running an MMO is hard, expensive, and time-consuming. Content updates and balance patches aren’t going to just fall out of the sky. Not to mention that every time they add/change something it’s easy to break something else, which adds to how long it takes to roll out new stuff.

5) Finally, what core-design flaw are you talking about? I won’t say that GW2 is flawless, but it’s certainly the best MMO on the market right now. I tried RIFT this past weekend, which I used to thoroughly enjoy, and it’s unplayable in comparison.

Here’s a handy tip that has saved my life several times in WvW.

Other than your auto attacks (which are mostly very bad) very few staff skills give any indication of where they’re coming from. If you’re 1v1 it might buy you an extra second or 2. If there’s multiple things to Tab-Target, or your grouping, it’s useful to run outside someone’s field of view and drop non-thrown stuff on them so they don’t really know where you are.

eldain stenlund.4306:

Your talking Dagger elemental.

If your staff and stumble upon a thief. just drop the keyboard, go get a drink, and resurrect at closest waypoint. you cant do anything.

I’ve found that bad thieves, which counts for a lot of them, don’t run much condi cleansing. I know they have a trait that cleanses on stealth, but for some reason the guys in our newest WvW matchup don’t often take it.

Let me just say that it’s hard to reset a fight when you have 30+ seconds of burning on you.

I don’t know what’s going on, honestly. With the WvW change I went from being on a winning server and getting schooled by thieves constantly to being on a losing server and absolutely wrecking thieves on a regular basis. Either I got a lot better over the weekend or they got a lot worse. The first time I beat a thief 1v1 I thought he must have been upleveled. Turned out he just didn’t cleanse anything. It was the strangest thing.

The only way I’ve come up with to kill a Thief is to bring an insane amount of burst. Once he has “Revealed” on him, you have 3 seconds to take him from 100 to 0, or he’ll just reset and heal up.

Have fun. I usually burn defensives and run to a keep, because who’s got time for all that?

Blaine Tog.8304:

haviz.1340:

PinCushion.7390:

So basically it’s for ganking people while they’re fighting someone else?

Wait for them to hit 70%, then unload and run away?

Exactly. It’s gimmicky and broken build, unlike meta build.

A bit gimmicky but that’s not inherently bad. The game is better when there’s a dynamic range of options available. If you roam in WvW, you should have to worry about getting slammed by someone packing crazyhigh singletarget damage, as well as more balanced builds and bunker builds and condi builds etc etc. We shouldn’t be able to expect to fight one kind of opponent and always be right. That leads to stagnation and ultimately the death of the game.

Oh, for WvW I’d say this playstyle is pretty normal. It’s just we’re used to calling it “Thief.” Ganking is just part of any open-world PvP system, so what’s so gimmicky about that?

haviz.1340:

PinCushion.7390:

So basically it’s for ganking people while they’re fighting someone else?

Wait for them to hit 70%, then unload and run away?

Exactly. It’s gimmicky and broken build, unlike meta build.

Sounds like burst DPS to me. You turn long fights into short fights and make your opponents waste time being dead.

Why is that broken and gimmicky? I don’t sPvP all that much, so I guess I’m just not understanding why it’s bad to down someone every 36 seconds.

I’m enjoying 6x Elementalist.

I wouldn’t call it “Optimal,” but it’s a lot of fun.

Dingle.2743:

oZii.2864:

That is a full zerker build lightning blaze dude said its not glass. Which depends on his definition of not glass as a ele.

Because it doesn’t actually rely on precision (which is just a backup during the time in which arcane power is down) it could actually run Valkyrie gear and at least have vitality.

The burst relies too much on huge cooldowns to really be useful for anything other than GC, though. If it fails it’s relying on the opponent not being able to just heal up again or kill it.

So basically it’s for ganking people while they’re fighting someone else?

Wait for them to hit 70%, then unload and run away?

Rush is Right.9723:

Eles are a very weak cl;kitten currently and the staff makes them slow and weak. We need either more skill points, no delay on staff like thief weapons, medium armor, or a companion like a beast or spirit full time like the ranger to draw aggro. We also need a much farther casting range and a larger AOE area as even current expanded area isn’t that useful or far. A true ele or caster class should almost never be in melee but this class is in it constantly and cannot always dodge or run or get outnumbered. Downed state is a joke as we need at least 6 seconds of invisibility not three. I can’t play WVW solo as I die in 2 seconds after three hits unless I’m in a group so not good balance at all. Not sure how I’ll do in dugeons but I died 20 times in MF in large boss battle which was embarassing even with fairly good dodge abilities. True balance in this good would give every charter type arounf the same HP amounts like 20,000 not 14,000-18,0000 for ele. If anything we should have the most HP as we have the lightest armor. This is why heavy armor characters are just easier to play. I hardly ever die with my warrior but die 4-5 times a day with my ele even in low areas especially with the staff. I gave up on staff and went S/D as it dealt more damage faster in a medium range. I just don’t like D/D as it seems too melee for me which is not what this class needs to be. I don’t mind support roles but I should not be forced to play this role in group play which I feel I have to because of lack of power and toughness and damage output. I agree meteor shower hits like 1 in10 times, real effective. My ranger hits 100% of the time from further back and has a pet for aggro draw so my ranger hardly ever takes direct damage. I liked this character a lot in GW1 but it is NOT the same now and is the weakest class in the game and I have played all other classes up to level 60 at least. My only good point about this character is that it has made me a better character and player as I would never have learned to dodge or manuver as well if I did not have such a weak character and it helps me with my strong characters to never die. To those who find this game easy, I challenge you to get off your warrior or heavy armor class and play an ele with a staff in fractals and dungeons and on Southsun as this makes the game as challenging as you could want, I KNOW, and this challenge is fun but it still would be nice once in a while to feel like the fight is fair and my ele can stand on even ground with all the other classes. For NOW, this is NOT the case.

How are you dying this much with staff? In WvW I’d understand, as Thieves take me out pretty fast if I don’t see them coming.

You have so much CC, you should almost never die in PvE. I haven’t done dungeons on my Ele in a long time but I run Southsun with staff and run by Iron Marches now and again to solo the champ charr there (he’s pretty easy since he’s so kitable). I only really die to the Vet Karkas in Southsun, but I’m just bad at spotting their tells so I miss dodges all the time and waste CDs on evaded shots.

Razor.6392:

use all attunements lol

lure like 5 monsters, CC them with water 4 or air 5 or earth 4 (or all of those), then drop the rest of the aoes.

its really easy

Basically this.

I was trying to be more detailed. I haven’t leveled an Elementalist in a long time, and assumed fights would be much longer in bad gear with no traits.

You have to use all the attunements. The hardest part about the class is remembering 4 different sets of weapon skills, and keeping track of all their cooldowns.

If you get rushed by a group of Ettins you can drop Unsteady Ground followed by Eruption in Earth attunement, swap to Fire and drop Lava Font on top of your Eruption (grants bonus Might buff) followed by Flame Burst followed by Burning Retreat. NPCs are dumb, so they’ll run through your Retreat field and take damage. If they’re almost dead swap back to Earth and Shockwave through your Retreat Field. If not….

Swap to Water and drop Ice Spike followed by Frozen Ground (while maneuvering so the mobs are in a straight line from you). Then swap to Earth and cast Shockwave through the Frozen Ground (grants bonus Chill condition and pierces).

If they’re still alive do it again. If there’s just one left and he’s meleeing you swap to Air and use Gust to get him off your face, Static Field to stun him, and Lightning Surge to blind him. Then swap back to Earth or Fire and kill them the rest of the way.

It seems like a really clunky pain in the rear, but as you get used to it it gets way easier. Then you start adding utilities to the mix and it goes way faster.

Baladir.2736:

I like it. Because:

You play with your team in mind.

You put offensive dps in.

You built synergy.

You are survivable.

You didn’t use and don’t need the utility skills many elementalists think they must have.

This. I don’t really understand why everyone thinks they need 3 stun breakers at all times. On D/D I can kinda understand it, since you’re in melee basically all the time. On Staff? I run with 0-1 stunbreaker and get by just fine. Even in non-zergy WvW I make do with using terrain, range, LOS, and coordinating with team members. And if I need a stun breaker I’m probably going to die 5 seconds later anyway.

I’m crossing my fingers that they don’t destroy my build by trying to improve it.

Guns and Giblets.9308:

Daecollo.9578:

Elementalist has very easy access to weakness.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Glyph_of_Elemental_Power
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stoning
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Lightning_Touch

Elementalist has a way easier chance to apply weakness then most other classes, I think you will all be suprised when the changes come in and weakness is lowering enemy damage by 25-33%, it would open up an AIR dps build for ele, because you could throw up perma weakness on your targets.

It would be interesting to see if you could base a build around weakness and then adding cover conditions. It would make for different fights and possibly reduce the need for bunker builds. (Possibly.)

I’ll be interested to see the theory-crafters get to work once weakness changes are implemented.

More likely, it’ll create bunker builds that stack Protection and Weakness to become SUPER BUNKERS!

Cyphel.3659:

Perhaps they don’t use it, because from in-game it is not very intuitive to learn. Also depends what class you are to some extent…

Blast finishers are easy and good to start with. I started the game as necro, which is a bit sparse on those, and didn’t really “get” combos until I played a guardian (hamma #2!) and read the wiki tables and charts.

ET does need to read this though. If the zerg is on the move, how many hammer guardians do I see ignoring a static field…doesn’t matter what level you are, a lvl 2 can contribute here..haha

OMG I know your pain!

Large battle with lots of people taking damage.

Drops 2 Water fields to cover as many as possible.

Nobody splashes them….ever.

I ran with a Warrior once that thought Water fields were the most amazing thing he’d ever seen! I swear he’d Leap/Blast/Whirl finish every single one. Apparently getting free cleanses and heals is a pretty big deal on warriors.

Badges are incredibly easy to farm. Here’s the secret.

1) It’s WvW. You’re going to die a lot. That’s ok. It isn’t that expensive.

2) You don’t have to be good at PvP to be good at WvW.

3) You spent loads of cash on ectos and a precursor. Now spend just a tiny bit more….

Craft Superior Arrowcarts and Superior Ballistas! Lots of them! And always have a couple of rams and catapults in your inventory as well.

It isn’t hard to learn how to place these so they won’t be instantly obliterated by AoE. It’s only slightly complex to learn when to drop siege and when to save it.
You will lose a lot of siege just because your team lost, and that’s fine. If you won all the time then it wouldn’t be competitive. Don’t sweat it.
You will also get into amazing pitched battles where you manning siege will be the difference between losing a keep/supply camp and driving your enemies away.
And you will rake in the badges doing this and be done with WvW in a month (with fairly casual play). Who knows? You might even have fun!

I do events in WvW. The XP is pretty incredible, and I get loads of skillpoints without really trying.

I think the bigger question is, “Which method for getting XP will be least likely to make me hate turning my computer on.” Out of all the Legendary components, skillpoints will be the least of your problems. After you’ve gotten all the other stuff you’ll easily have 200 SP, as long as you don’t spend them and don’t play lots of alts all the time. I try to informally budget my time from playing 1 main & hoarding SP for the Bloodstone and dabbling on alts & using their SP for the Clover combine.

I found the Necro and Warrior whining hiliarious.

1) ANet creates a game where avoiding damage is far superior to taking it on the chin.

2) ANet is surprised that their “Bag o Hitpoints” classes can’t stay “In the Pocket” long enough to be effective.

0.o

Guns and Giblets.9308:

PinCushion.7390:

emikochan.8504:

Daecollo.9578:

Elementalist are getting a huge buff soon.

haha good one :p

He’s referring to Weakness getting better, which would buff Staff – Earth 1

I wish there was more reason to stay in Earth and take advantage of the auto-attack.

100% Projectile Finisher?

I usually end up with a couple extra seconds of Chill from tossing the Earth auto and Shockwave into my chill field.

Kardiamond.6952:

You all are lucky to have good finisher and field…

With my necro, all I can do is poison/darkness field, that can’t be stacked before a fight, and even during a fight “WoW AoE weakness everyone back the fudge up!”

We also get the shaft with finisher.

Flesh Worm? Yeah because everyone use Flesh worm as a blast finisher, not like it’s our escape mecanism.

Putrid Mark? So powerful, situational and on a long cooldown, you don’t want to use it before you need it, so can’t really time it with a field. You also need an enemy to detonate it, so no prefight stacking.

Bones Minions? Yeah necro pet, the AI is so utterly bad in WvW nobodies use them. The only blast you can use prefight, yet you waste an utility. During a fight, their AI is so freeaked up that you won’t be able to aim a field, especially with both of them. They will be dead anyway.

Rest are our staff projectile and minions projectil. Minions projectil are good, but they suck in WvW. Nobodies use staff to auto attack people, as it prolly the worse auto attack in the game because it doesn’t track target.

I had to rant, sorry about that.

Would have loved my necro to be able to pull some cool combo like my Elem or my Engi.

Well of Blood + Projectile Finishers = Cure All The Conditions!

Chillblains or CPC + Bad Staff Autoattack = Piercing Poison Stacking Autoattack

Just a couple. People constantly write off Projectile Finishers as bad, but some of them are quite potent.

TheMightyAltroll.3485:

Some classes have too much access to it, and it’s a ridiculously OP condition that still does nonsensical damage even with no condition damage. I main all classes, and ALOT of builds are made unviable simply because of that dumb condition.

This is awesome.

Go to the Elementalist forum and read how Burning is so bad, and nobody should ever bother to fit more in their build.

I think it’s hilarious, and use it on every class I can. So glad Necro is getting it, since I think it kinda fits (if it stays limited.)

TakeCare.3182:

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Leo G.4501:

Feels like that suggestion would be ridiculous.

Glyph of Elemental Power would pretty much be standard. Now all your attacks can knock people down if you cast it in earth. Would be fun and funny but more than crazy.

They could make GoEP an exception, much like Plague Form doesn’t trigger chill on blind for the necromancer.

I believe Plague does trigger chill on blind.

If you trait for it, yes it does. Both Plague and Well of Power do.

emikochan.8504:

Daecollo.9578:

Elementalist are getting a huge buff soon.

haha good one :p

He’s referring to Weakness getting better, which would buff Staff – Earth 1

Qori.9671:

What do you guys think about having a trait in earth that made it so you knocked down an enemy when you apply cripple to them ? It would make things like unsteady ground actually worth using , and even make that grounded trait in air more worthwhile.
Just switching to earth with that would also knockdown in a small area around you , which could be too strong , but if it was a grandmaster trait and had the 2 sec stability trait when attuning to earth moved to a master trait , i think it would be a fair trade off for specing that far into earth. It would also make firegrab much easier to land and justify its long CD. I feel like we must have had knock downs in early beta and they got nerfed or changed because our damage was much higher back then , but since our damage is pretty average now maybe we could get back more stuff like this rather than heals to help us.

If memory serves, as it was almost a year ago, Ele was designed primarily as a burst class with some support/CC tossed in.

They nerfed it before release because we could burst people down very easily.

Then people learned how to gear and dodge.

This could all be wrong though, as my memory isn’t what it used to be. Still, I find myself thinking often when I’m trying out a full burst build…. “That’s it?”

Then I get 2-shot by something and remember that my place is healing myself and running away.

I think it’s misnamed as State of The Game. It should be called State of tPvP Meta.

Leo G.4501:

I find it funny that apparently ‘aura share’ is a build. Tell me, how is pressing 3 in Air and 4 in water to grant fury and swiftness a ‘playstyle’? There’s hardly any play in it anyway, and you’re only sharing Frost and Shocking aura…if we’re calling that specific tactic a build, you should call it ‘Frost&Shock aura share’ because the actual offensive auras (half the purpose of sharing auras there) you can’t share with daggers.

D/d aura share is about as close to a build as Staff aura share is. They both have 2 auras to share, so….wooptie doo :P

I was under the impression that Aura Share involved spamming signets for Fire Aura, and thus giving your entire party Fury, Swiftness, and Protection along with the auras themselves.

Here’s a test.

In the middle of a big fight where both sides are taking tons of damage drop both your water fields in the midst of your side.

Count how many other people blast finish them.

If that number is less than 2 then it’s not Staff that has the problem.

You’re running with newbies that don’t know how to play.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/16t7rb/elementalist_a_guide_to_the_focus/

Since stealth is only really a problem in WvW, and not so much in sPvP, why don’t they use the thing that’s unique to WvW to balance it.

Just introduce a food that grants you the perma ability:

25% Chance to inflict “Revealed” (5 seconds) on your target when you strike them.

They can play around with the %chance and the number of seconds, but that would pretty much solve the Thief QQ problem.

Ryan.8367:

Bunch of whining kids who have a class that has the easiest learning curve in the game , the best condi removal in the game, the best healing in the game next to guardian , the most escapes in the game next to thief , and some of the best aoe application/fields you can give to a group next to ranger’s water healing spring field and are complaining.. Utterly ridiculous. You guys have absolutely no idea how well you have it made and you guys are crying like little babies.

You guys are ALMOST as good in playing the victim game as thieves and guardians. Keep it up.

Jesus christ

In case you didn’t notice, this is the Elementalist forum. We come here to chat about the Elementalist profession. That includes sharing builds, venting our frustrations, and pointing out holes and flaws in the class.

One major frustration is that the Ele has one build that completely outshines the others to such a high degree that it makes it impossible for any of the obvious problems to get fixed. Anytime anyone talks about any deficiencies in the class, Fire traits for example, someone brings up “Ele is fine, they have amazing heals and cleanses and do decent damage with high mobility.”

What you’re describing is one build that has those things. The fact that one build has all those things, and other builds don’t have anything equally impressive, is why there are so many complaints and “Depressing Threads” on the Ele forums.

When I’m chatting on the Necro forums I don’t tell them that they’re great at Condi damage so they should quit being babies. When I’m reading the Warrior forums I don’t tell them that they do amazing PvE dps and to quit whining. Nobody likes to be pidgeonholed into one predictable build/playstyle because it’s the only build that was designed well.

Every class has things it excels at, and every class has legitimate design flaws. It would be stupid to just pretend they aren’t there.

Fishbait.6723:

Yeah, only time Ele` got a mention was Zoosee saying they have really good heals over ten seconds.

Shame that a thief can remove your hp in 1-3 ;p

Yeah, I LOLed. Ele is fine because we have great heals in one build. Ah, well. I guess having one viable build in tPvP is better than having zero (Warrior).

Torqky.3682:

PinCushion.7390:

In order to achieve what you’re talking about an Ele has to be totally bunker/condition defense built. That means Melandru runes, instead of solid damage. That means Lemongrass food, instead of damage. That means 20 Earth/20 Water/30 Arcane, instead of taking 20 Air for lots of fury. That means skipping on extra Bleed duration to be hard to CC. Basically, it means doing terrible damage. That build is going to be good at soaking snares and healing and that’s about it.

I never bothered with the Melandru runes, but I’ve run the trait/food setup and the damage is laughable. It’s a build designed to not die, and that’s it.

You are making an assumption that the ele is running a particular build. What if an ele took 30 into earth for written in stone and used signet of earth. Thats enough to have about 2500 armor base (melandru 165+ 300 from traits + 180 from signet) which allows you to gear full zerker considering you are immune to snares and have good healing potential. There is alot of theorycrafting that can be done around this that other classes don’t have an option for.

I hadn’t really considered that, as it’s almost blasphemy to not put 20 in Water and 30 in Arcane. Still, considering that the number of viable Elementalist builds is generally considered to be a total of One, I’m overjoyed that there might be a bit more build diversity.

The most likely result, however, is just a nerf to Lemongrass Soup. I’ve yet to hear about any Warriors or Elementalists ripping apart the sPvP scene with Melandru runes.

Travlane.5948:

Azaruil.3406:

Travlane.5948:

ugh…i shouldnt have used p/d as an example. and i do die to classes other than thieve plenty of times. its not a kill all build. but any build thats offensive based should have a chance at some lvl to kill another. it shouldnt be a HARD COUNTER. ok let me switch to my necro. or my engineer. very condition heavy and reliant classes but also not great (perhaps some engi builds) in the 1 v 1 department. how do they deal with this?we all know that cripple/ice is a necros friend…..immobilize is an engineers lbest friend. why should they have a hard counter?

it doenst matter if you have +500% condition dmg….it wont mean diddly :P like i said the -40% cond dur is MUCH stronger than the +40% they are not equal.

The trait on ele and warriors is -33% immobilize, chill and cripple duration. This doesn’t effect other conditions.

You are right about the -40% condi duration being more powerful than the +40% condi duration but it seems you didn’t explain it clearly.

For starters, +% condi duration isn’t cumulative. It only seems to affect the base number. So lets say you have your base condi is 10 seconds and you have +30% duration from runes, +30% from traits and +40% from food. It wont add the +30% ones to 17 seconds and then apply the +40% to the 17 seconds, but instead the 10 seconds. The -% condi duration stacks on each other however.

Additionally, -% condi duration is applied after your total condi duration is applied. Let’s say your base condi is 10 seconds and you only add the food to give you 14 seconds. -40% would then put the condi at 8.4 seconds.

also the 65% is enough to cripple any build as is. but 98% on crip immob ice is just crazy……..ok check it out……when fightin an ele u know that they knock you down you know that they chill you alot and can even immobilize you. so the entire time you are tryign to catch up with them you ahve to do 2 things….. A) remove your chill/immob/cripple and cripple/immob/chill them which is 2% effective or basically might as well say 0. all the time they are just barely out of range and strike with the meat adn potatoes dmg ksills and then chill you or w.e. and step back until they are ready to rinse repeat. this is just what i noticed….i mean they have alot more heals than all but guardians so its hard to keep up the dmg when u cant keep them within range/enough condition dmg…..even conditions they dont have on 98% then can cleanse regularly. i mean i didnt lose to the ele…i could have if i didnt decide to accept the draw.

This isn’t necessarily true.

In order to achieve what you’re talking about an Ele has to be totally bunker/condition defense built. That means Melandru runes, instead of solid damage. That means Lemongrass food, instead of damage. That means 20 Earth/20 Water/30 Arcane, instead of taking 20 Air for lots of fury. That means skipping on extra Bleed duration to be hard to CC. Basically, it means doing terrible damage. That build is going to be good at soaking snares and healing and that’s about it.

I never bothered with the Melandru runes, but I’ve run the trait/food setup and the damage is laughable. It’s a build designed to not die, and that’s it.

Truga.5897:

There’s only “one” build that works well with any weapon you choose. It’s the 0/x/y/20+/30 build. Since most of us don’t like to be forced into using just one weapon until we get a chance to visit the book dude, we pick that.

I also think 30 arcane is almost mandatory. Attunements should be off cooldown as soon as possible so that versatility people talk about actually exists…

I find it amusing in the extreme that after nerfing Evasive Arcana, Cleansing Water, and Zephyr’s Boon we still use almost the exact same build as before. Most people dropped Cleansing Water after the nerf, but otherwise it’s the same build.

I wonder when it’ll become obvious that the Water/Arcane build isn’t the default because it’s so amazing. It’s the default because the others are just not that great.

Melkiah.2496:

Coopziana.1802:

This buff wouldn’t change the balance of the elementalist as speed just makes you move faster.

Actually it also removes every movement-impairing condition (immobilize, cripple and chill)

Also, do you have an idea of how big a 750 radius aoe would be?

This is why the 250 radius is fine by me. It makes using the skill to cure conditions into an actual decision rather than just something you spam because it’ll hit everyone in your group all the time.

I’m of the opinion that almost all group cures should be like this, or have other balancing hinderances like Water 5 being an immobile field with a long cast time. Big AoE cures/buffs are just something you can spam constantly and don’t have to think about where they’re actually needed (aka every Shout build + Runes of the Soldier).

Staff – Air – 3

Should be Point-Blank AoE, 45 degree arc in front of you, Knockback

Ranged, single-target, slow projectile knockback is just bad.

Edited: Changed 180 degree because I realized that it would be very OP when used offensively.