Showing Posts For Senario.2038:

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Everyone who is complaining about tempest going against how elementalist are supposed to work by promoting a character to stay in attunements without swapping every 3 seconds, do yourself a favor and as Bruce lee said “empty your cup”. Realize tempest was not designed to be played like a regular elementalist. Which also means a tempest can’t be built like a regular elementalist.

I liked tempest during the beta weekends and still do, albeit there are a few small issues, but the bottom line is, the class works. If you open your mind up, forget how you normally play your ele, and build and play your tempest accordingly, you will also e successful. If you can’t survive in pvp without swapping attunements every 3 seconds, you are playing and building your tempest wrong.

Tempest reminds me somewhat of necromancer because positioning is extremely important, whereas with most ele builds of the past, it just plain isn’t. Also realize you can’t rely on boons from swapping attunements, but Anet has provided a million ways to protect yourself without swapping attunements. Get a little creative and you will see what I mean. I don’t post often so I’m sure many people will think I’m trolling or don’t know anything about pvp, but I’m rank 46, and rank 1060 in wvw, almost exclusively playing elementalist since launch. I know a thing or two about pvp, and tempest is very viable if you approach the specialization with an open mind and forget what you know about old ele.

By the way, my current build is scepter/wh fresh air and it’s absolutely devastating. And I don’t use stability on overload, which most people would think is insane, but I’ve discovered I don’t need it as much as you would think when you play smart and time your overloads. Armor of earth works for 1 guaranteed overload on a 60s cd traited which is game changing in pvp. Just food for thought. I initially hated warhorn but as I’ve continued working with it and learning it’s strengths and weaknesses it’s very very strong. Just having a water field with scepter is amazing once you get used to it, I feel like an engi I can blast my own water field so much when things go south.

Give tempest a try and don’t get discouraged, look at your build and playstyle before you blame Anet. They delivered a spec that is completely different than elementalist as promised, so don’t expect It to be effective if you play it the same way.

And if you tried it and found it to be lackluster? This is another “If you don’t like it you are closeminded” post. A lot of us have already given it PLENTY of tries and plenty of builds. Your point about ways to defend yourself without swapping attunements generally is using your utilities or a getaway skill.

Swapping attunements after dropping your skills or based on what you need at the moment is core to what Ele does. Not waiting around in an attunement for five seconds then overloading for 4 very interruptible seconds (even with one stack of stab) then swapping to another attunement to wait more and not all the attunements have very good things to do within those 5 seconds and certainly not things that are not highly punishable.

While your input is noted comparing tempest to Necromancer isn’t encouraging because Necromancer was not very useful in game modes besides WvW before HoT. And referring to everybody who dissents as “not being open” is just plain wrong.

Oh and Bruce Lee said “Be water my friend” Not empty your cup. And I think it is not a good analogy for this. Maybe if you twisted it and said tempest is completely different and not in any way interacting with base ele but imo.

Gearing up in pve?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I believe playing along the HOT storyline rewards you with the Bladed set of exotic gear that you can choose the stats for so you don’t even need to buy upgraded gear if you play though the PvE story. I"m only partway through so I don’t know if it gives you the whole set.

It gives you a box where you can choose one piece.

"That feels good"

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Urge to Kill RISINGGGGGG

lol, I didn’t like them at first but I tuned them out. And I find them pretty silly sometimes too. There is a bug where humans will randomly say “Lyssa Confound you!” And you know what? They’re right, I am confounded as to why they said that.

What do you mean I'm "INACTIVE"? [Merged]

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Honestly, the anti-tagging system just isn’t working very well. Worse, it seems counter-productive.

The only time tag-and-run was truly an aggravating problem was during the one-time mordrem invasion event. Nobody cares about geode farmers doing tag-and-run during Dry Top sandstorm, and I can’t think of any other place/time where it is (or was) routine except on daily event maps.

But tag-and-run on daily event maps was a GOOD thing, since it gave more people a chance to get event credit and finish the daily. We often begged people to tag-and-run there to give others a chance. Now everyone has to hang around for the whole event, making it even harder to tag something before it is obliterated by the crowd.

It seems that ANet managed to solve a non-existent problem by creating a host of new actual problems.

Agreed, the tagging problem was really only a problem in the Mordrem event and that was because you got so little rewards for sticking to an event and got only an acceptable amount running around tagging all the events.

I think the system should be removed as tagging events is not a problem on most of the maps and in many of the newer maps the amount of time it takes to run to another event would be too long. Not to mention that nobody in their right mind would run to tag events on a map like Dragon’s Stand.

Let people tag events, it puts less arbitrary rules on players who simply want to do an event and on down time go do a nearby event. This is very important in places such as Silverwastes where you can run between events and there is a good amount of downtime between waves of enemies/yak escort enemies.

If you really wanted to make people stick to events you should have just made silver the previous gold (in terms of rewards) and give a bigger reward in both xp and loot if you stay for the end. Giving more rewards for those who stay is better than making people lose their rewards suddenly. Ideally the amount of reward for tagging events and for staying should be similar so some people can stay at an event while others go tag some.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Utility so like shouts vs wells? I think shouts win. When it comes to WH vs shield due to the way ele/tempest works WH is better then shield there just simply more use for the WH on its own then chron shield. The only thing added Chron gets for its f1-f5 skills is the time split but that in pvp is easy to counter it may have a use in pve though then f1-f5 skills for tempest are all useful and fill a very set in stone roll. I think the only thing chron has over a tempest is it trait line.

There a major problem looking at classes like this for the elite spec your forgetting the main class they are part of. A lot of what tempest is comes is what an ele who was an avages class but with good aoe tools to start with. Chron had mez to start with whom was a major powerhouse of a class with very good single target dmg and effects.

I’m pretty sure I’m wasting my time here since it’s pretty clear you just can’t be convienced that tempest in reality we all live isn’t as good as you think.

YES saying something is bad over and over with out playing it at all it seems or realy understanding it means you have no real position on what going on and how things work out. If you like chronomancer as much as you seem to go to the chronomancer forms and talk about it dont come to another form and just say how bad something is.

Any way back to the major point its a question of AoE vs single target effects when your talking about tempest vs chronomancer. Ele has allways been aoe aimed class so more of its skills are a bit weaker and on longer cd water 5 on off hand dagger is an good example of this. A 40 sec cd for a heal / condition removal is not that good but that it hits 5 targets makes it good.

With the same logic, saying something is good over and over doesn’t mean it is actually good. Plus you seem to think that everybody who speaks out on it doesn’t actually play the elite spec which is at best attacking the people criticizing it and not the actual problems with the spec as a whole.

The big fact is that a lot of people don’t enjoy how Tempest plays and it highly mismatches with the base Ele playstyle. In addition to this the actual new mechanics introduced for ele are lackluster and have few uses due to what other classes can do. Not to mention that Tempest seems way more suited for a Staff build than it does for the close up support it is supposed to be. And it doesn’t even do that all that well because it is not even on par with something like Water.

Well the logic is playing it vs not playing it when it comes to making a point and not just talking about it purely from an ideal point of view. On paper a lot of things about tempest look bad but in real combat they work out well. You would never think staff tempest would be an good aura support due to 600 range limitation and staff only having 1 aura build in but it works you can heal / conduction remove and do high end dmg with out losing self staying power.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQFAWn0XC9XidOAWYCcYilHAzdyeZ/sEDhgQLQIAcAahA-TVyHABKfBA4T1HmUC2jSPCVDYIlBNqDQn9HA4BAEAABwPH6QH6QHahO3ZpAGYoF-w

The build i am thinking about going for atm i have the same set up but ptv armor and str runs so less condition removal but a bit more staying power. In a big group this build should fill many rolls that an ele alone could never do nor could an chronomancer.

You’re still not addressing people’s concerns and blanket stating that they must not play Tempest because you think that one build works for you. Every single role that Tempest does is something ele can already do and in most cases it simply isn’t any better than taking one of the original traitlines. Even staff you could just take water and do all the important things needed from an Ele. Just because you think they fill a role that ele does not doesn’t mean it is so.

Chronomancer is an amazing spec with hard CC, good support, and fairly good damage. Anything tempest does base ele can do just as well without exposing themselves to extremely detrimental overloads that usually won’t finish in anything that isn’t PvE. Not to mention a 10% damage buff is only for 5 seconds after you overload compared to 10% from water+more if you are in water that is active all the time and you don’t need to put yourself in danger for the same ouput.

You’re free to like it yourself, but many people don’t and telling them that they are wrong simply because you believe they don’t play the spec is silly.

Gearing up in pve?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Thanks for the replies!

DO NOT INVEST IN CELESTIAL EXOTIC. Celestial stats on armor are not worth it at exotic rarity and really people only get it in Ascended rarity.

Alright, though I’m still going to stack up to like 30 Chargeds incase I ever decide to do an ascended celestial, or for whatever requires it.

I would highly suggest getting a full berserker set of Armor/weapon in Exotic quality. If you have a World v World guild to run with I’m pretty sure you can actually buy the whole armor set for pretty cheap as it would be 1 gold per piece+badges.

Oh my god. I never knew about this. I got over 4k Badges stacked up from just lurking in wvw. I just looked at the prices, it looks like that’s more than enough for everything.

As for runes, Superior Runes of the Scholar are a big favorite though I would also argue for Runes of Strength in the case where you can’t stay about 90% hp all the time.

I can actually craft myself a full set of scholars. Should I get a 7th for my aquabreather or nah?

I prefer sigil of Energy to give myself a good amount of dodges to fall back on. Sigil of force is a good choice for more damage though.

I didn’t know Attunement Swap counted as swapping weapons, I might consider while I relearn every dungeons/fractals.

The more pro elementalist will carry all weapons, and then swap through them in the midst of might stacking to buff up the whole party.

I got the habit of carrying every single weapon real quick back then with my mesmer.

To might stack, just use a blast finisher in a fire field. Arcane Brilliance, Arcane Wave, “Aftershock!”, etc. You can still stack might with scepter/x and dagger/x.

Oh, but I’m aware of how combos works. Though, thanks for making me notice that Aftershock is a Finisher, I somehow never noticed. Those skills are actually what I use in Open World along Glyph of Storm.

Don’t bother getting an aquabreather. The only time you really should consider getting one is if you are in a WvW guild that will actually go in the water to fight other guilds. My guild does that because we are all geared up for underwater combat. Other guilds usually aren’t lol.

You can get it if you have disposable income and just are bored. Remember that you will need a rune for the aquabreather. As another side note, if you use sigil of bloodlust try to have a sigil of bloodlust on your underwater weapon (no need for second sigil) this is so that if you have stacks of bloodlust and enter water you will not be losing the stacks. This generally is only useful in WvW as most fights nowadays involve absolutely no water.

What the heck is Tornado?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

We just really need at least one good elite, even if it is mostly going to be a staff thing. If things such as meteor are not a problem in any game mode there is really no reason Tornado will be unbalanced as it would all be numbers if it was ground targeted.

It is surprising to me that even after all of our Elites are lackluster the new elite spec added another elite skill that is really bad. Rebound sounds good on paper but the numbers make it just not worth it. And even if it was worth it…it would be a very situational elite as it is supposed to save you from death rather than giving a benefit to you when you decide to use it.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Utility so like shouts vs wells? I think shouts win. When it comes to WH vs shield due to the way ele/tempest works WH is better then shield there just simply more use for the WH on its own then chron shield. The only thing added Chron gets for its f1-f5 skills is the time split but that in pvp is easy to counter it may have a use in pve though then f1-f5 skills for tempest are all useful and fill a very set in stone roll. I think the only thing chron has over a tempest is it trait line.

There a major problem looking at classes like this for the elite spec your forgetting the main class they are part of. A lot of what tempest is comes is what an ele who was an avages class but with good aoe tools to start with. Chron had mez to start with whom was a major powerhouse of a class with very good single target dmg and effects.

I’m pretty sure I’m wasting my time here since it’s pretty clear you just can’t be convienced that tempest in reality we all live isn’t as good as you think.

YES saying something is bad over and over with out playing it at all it seems or realy understanding it means you have no real position on what going on and how things work out. If you like chronomancer as much as you seem to go to the chronomancer forms and talk about it dont come to another form and just say how bad something is.

Any way back to the major point its a question of AoE vs single target effects when your talking about tempest vs chronomancer. Ele has allways been aoe aimed class so more of its skills are a bit weaker and on longer cd water 5 on off hand dagger is an good example of this. A 40 sec cd for a heal / condition removal is not that good but that it hits 5 targets makes it good.

With the same logic, saying something is good over and over doesn’t mean it is actually good. Plus you seem to think that everybody who speaks out on it doesn’t actually play the elite spec which is at best attacking the people criticizing it and not the actual problems with the spec as a whole.

The big fact is that a lot of people don’t enjoy how Tempest plays and it highly mismatches with the base Ele playstyle. In addition to this the actual new mechanics introduced for ele are lackluster and have few uses due to what other classes can do. Not to mention that Tempest seems way more suited for a Staff build than it does for the close up support it is supposed to be. And it doesn’t even do that all that well because it is not even on par with something like Water.

Question from a n00b: Should I re-roll?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Not really if you enjoy it. You don’t need the Elite spec to be optimal. The elite spec is something I’m not too fond of but vanilla Ele is more than viable in PvE situations and everything that Vanilla Ele does translates well into WvW. Staff mostly. As for PvP you go dagger dagger which is supposed to be a fast paced style but the damage is actually fairly low as most PvP eles will be trying to become as tanky as possible so they cannot be forced off of a point. Staff isn’t used there most of the time. The Elite spec of tempest helps with the tankiness but in terms of fun and actual viability I’d say it isn’t great. The only reason you would ever take it is not because you want overloads, you want heal on aura/regen/vigor on aura and run some shouts on your bar just to remain very hard to kill. But at the same time you will not be killing anybody.

Just stick with it. You have plenty of options with Vanilla Ele and if you are a PvE focused player all the things needed are available to you.

Gearing up in pve?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I would like to add that Blood Red Arachnid is completely right. And I hadn’t considered carrying around different weapons to stack might faster. I don’t think that is necessary tbh but yes. Use your blast finishers and at least in general there aren’t too many super rigid people out there who want perfect teams. High level fractals are usually run with friends anyway.

PvE wants damage because most things can be dodged. I will say that being human it is fine to mix in some celestial accessories/backpack/trinkets if you need a little bit more defense. But if you played perfectly zerker no contest.

Gearing up in pve?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I returned from 3 years about 2 months ago and leveled my elementalist. Then went back to my mesmer and decided to go back to elem after a few days of HoT. However, I have not done any dungeons or fractals since I came back. My elementalist has been poorly geared and I’m looking to gear it up in order to maybe get back into these contents. I know I should be looking for a guild, which I will probably do in some days, but I figured I’d ask here first because my main concerns are about the class itself.

What do people expect from an elementalist? I’ve read stuffs about people complaining that the elementalist doesn’t provide might, which lead me to the next question: Are we always expected to roll D/D, D/F or S/F with LH for dungeons and fractals?

People are also asking for berserker gears left and right, but does this also apply to elementalists if we’re just there to stack might?

Ever since I learned about Celestial gears being time gated, I’ve been working on stacking up Charged Quartz in hope to make myself an Exotic Celestial set(17/25, got Tempest Shoulders), but should I really get that? Elementalists seems to be doing a little bit of everything, so to me, Celestial gears sounds great.

As of right now, I’m geared with:
-Exotic Beserker Mask from Zhaitan’s quest
-Rare Berserker Shoulder, Chest, Gloves, Leggings and Boots
-Divinity Runes because cheap

-Exotic Berserker Staff, Rare/Masterwork Berserker Daggers, Exotic Berserker Scepter(from a drop), Fine Berserker Focus and Exotic Celestial Warhorn.
-Major Sigil of Force and Superior Sigil of Accuracy on everything

-Rare Berserker Backpack
-Exotic Celestial Earrings x2(Forgotten Seal and Karka Shell from 2012)
-Exotic Celestial Amulet(drop from Halloween)
-Ascended Offensive Berserker Ring and whatever Vine of the Pale Tree stats are(got these and a few more rings from Fractals back in 2012)

I know at some point I will have both set, but I’m not rich, so I’m looking for tips on what I should do as the first step for my gears. Superior Runes of Strength and Superior Sigil of Force are expensive, so I don’t want to throw them into a set I wouldn’t use them with. My current gears as been fine for anything I’ve done in HoT, so I guess I’d be asking for dungeons and fractals.

First things first, in terms of PvE the dominating weapon is Staff. In high level fractals that is the weapon you will be using. For general PvE you can get away with a lot of different setups.

DO NOT INVEST IN CELESTIAL EXOTIC. Celestial stats on armor are not worth it at exotic rarity and really people only get it in Ascended rarity. And only for dagger/dagger builds if they decide they don’t want to do some interesting mixed set. Celestial has its benefits as a dagger dagger build as you do a bit of everything but as a staff build what you want is simply more damage as your base numbers are usually more than enough for a team. Water fields are blasted with blast finishers for healing and you do no condi dmg with staff/very little.

I would highly suggest getting a full berserker set of Armor/weapon in Exotic quality. If you have a World v World guild to run with I’m pretty sure you can actually buy the whole armor set for pretty cheap as it would be 1 gold per piece+badges. If you don’t you’ll either have to craft or buy them. Neither of which is cheap but it is completely worth it imo. If you get your daily login reward and get laurels you can actually buy Ascended trinkets with that. Generally I would suggest Berserker or Celestial. Celestial is very versatile and gives you a little bit of everything though I’m a bit skeptical about their use in extremely high level fractals where damage is king.

As for runes, Superior Runes of the Scholar are a big favorite though I would also argue for Runes of Strength in the case where you can’t stay about 90% hp all the time. For weapon runes I prefer Sigil of Bloodlust (stacking power sigil) and one other sigil of choice. I prefer sigil of Energy to give myself a good amount of dodges to fall back on. Sigil of force is a good choice for more damage though.

Trait Lines that work for staff ele right now:
Fire/Air/Arcane – more vigor uptime, a defensive arcane shield, more dmg based on number of boons you have.
Fire/Air/Water heal a bit more and stay above 90% for more dmg+if you switch to water attunement you do more dmg
Fire/Air/Tempest – overload for 10% more dmg

tl;dr
Get Berserker EVERYTHING and use a staff. Get Celestial backpack/trinkets if you are fine giving up a little damage for survivability. Exotic is attainable easily while Ascended is if you really want to work for it.
Superior Scholar runes and Bloodlust + another sigil.
Most builds use Fire/Air/X.

Optimal Critical Chance?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Acutally curious question on this. I am not too well versed in food as I always stick to things like Lemongrass poultry soup/Another thing that mitigates condi duration and damage while CC’ed and your standard sharpening stone (ogre) but…which utility and food buff (name) do people use for PvE? I’m thinking of exploring Raids and Fractals in the future if Fractals get better rewards. Before I stuck to open world meta events in PvE.

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I personally think the new spec is great. I have tried it only in PVE and some WVW but so far so good. The Dagger/Warhorn i found to be the most fun and destructive to play with. The Staff was good in massive aoe fights where getting close was a hassle. The Scepter/Warhorn is ok, wouldn’t do PVP/WVW with it though. I’m yet to try D/D or pvp with any builds.

I’m hearing a lot of “we just wait for overload and stay in attunement”. I disagree with that entirely, especially in the Dagger/Warhorn build. Lets remember we are Elementalists, the jack of all trades. If your just tapping 1,2,3 in air spec and waiting for overload…. tut, tut. I’m sure there is more you can be doing then waiting to use something. Im very rarely in the same spec for much longer than 1 overload, if i even use it.

Survivability is a lot higher, in my near full Zerker gear. The constant heals from auras is nice and it seems like i have almost perma-fury. Of course i speced into the auras and i am liking it nicely. I’m hearing a lot of hate about the tempest but i think ppl just need to open there minds a bit more and use there own brains. Not wait for a build that is spoon fed to them and told “this is best, use it or gtfo” Theres lots of flexibility now, be creative and remember to enjoy this great game.

Always with the blanket statements of “If they don’t like it they aren’t opening their minds” Warhorn is very lackluster compared to its offhand counterparts and while you say you can stay in an attunement for 5 seconds I find that hard to believe as an Ele will drop their 2 and 3 skills and 4 and 5 very fast if they are up. If you were using dagger you would be waiting forever with less damage doing dagger fire/water 2. Air being the only one with a decent auto attack you would usually finish all of your skills before overload was even up.

If you were using scepter as a main hand you would not be auto attacking as switching attunements would do more dps than auto attacking and waiting for overload to be up.

Literally the only reason ppl take tempest in PvP right now is not because of overloads because honestly they are easy to interrupt and easy to just get out of the way from if somehow you were taking too much damage. The reason is that Invigorating torrents+grandmaster heal on aura+minor trait for stronger protection makes bunkering stronger, note I did not say damage. You do barely any damage but hey, I guess you just don’t die? You don’t run warhorn either. You either run fresh air or go dagger dagger with earth+water+tempest

This is compounded with the fact that for a lot of ppl the spec isn’t fun. A lot of ppl play ele in order to switch between attunements and use skills in a very fast paced manner. Tempest ignores that entirely and says “ok you need to wait in order to use this skill, and it isn’t even good enough to warrant how much you are punished for it”. You went from bunkery with a little bit of damage to being extremely bunkery with no damage unless you have an ally nearby. And while I personally don’t have any problem with taking water it is pretty much necessary in order to cure conditions which are all too prevalent nowadays.

I give tempest a 5/10 if only for the fact that it does one thing right but it only really works in PvP. That is bunkering even more. Compare this with scrapper who does it better while doing damage, chronomancer who brings great utility and still does good amounts of damage, dragonhunter which can do a lot of damage afar and a good amount close up (though not op imo), Herald for sharing boons because they do it better than tempest…and so on. After today’s berserker buffs I would argue that berserker is likely to become a better elite than Tempest as the concept was sound. It just needed some tweaks. Tempest goes against everything people who Main Ele want to do.

You shouldn’t assume things, like that you know me and how i play and that your opinion reflects that of the entire Ele community.

I do run fresh air, because as you said air has best damage for a dagger on Auto/Attack but for other reasons also, i get the strike on swap plus the extra 190 precision while im in it. No.4 isnt a bad cc+buff either.

Air has the best autoattack but you’re still going to be better off switching attunements when it comes to overload vs don’t. Your build leaves much to be desired in terms of actual defense and especially condition clear which is a big deal for Elementalist because as a light class with low hp you need to get condis off you ASAP. Not taking water means that any condi build will destroy you even if the condis are just CC type condi. And while it is feasible to run Air that is mostly a damage choice and the Percision is a secondary thing to something like say…Power.

Not to mention your stats are totally out of wack for anything that isn’t PvE. 2.2k armor is almost nothing and you run 14k hp only. Add to that…you run the glyph as a heal and while it is alright due to the 4k heal+boons there is a ton to be left desired without healing power and using Signet of Healing or taking Ether renewal/Arcane brilliance for extreme amounts of healing/condi clear or Blast finishers respectively. Generally any close up build using tempest would use either Signet of healing to heal every cast or Ether renewal(extreme cases, usually not needed).

Your crit chance is nice but without any sort of tankiness you really are just gimping yourself in close up combat. Your damage when you are dead is 0. From a world v world or PvP perspective this is bad and it is definitely starting to be an issue with the new HoT maps as a really glassy build like that will go down pretty fast if you don’t dodge perfectly. Generating Protection which is a major part of tempest’s defenses is tough with your setup because nothing except swapping to earth and popping armor of earth with a 60 second cooldown will actually get you that important buff.

I don’t mean to insult you. I’m just saying that tempest leaves a lot to be desired and really is only a distraction in PvE due to the harsh punishment on overload and lack of stability as a baseline. Not mentioning that warhorn skills are generally not all that great compared to other offhand choices such as Focus and Dagger.

Small tip, switch out arcane for Water. Arcane and Tempest do not have great synergy because they are made to be clearly competing specs. One wants you to swap attunements more, the other wants you to swap attunements less. Air/Earth/Fire are all semi legitimate for the third spec…though I believe that tempest gets the most out of earth as it has protection on aura as well as a choice between stability on earth swap or less CC time taken. Fury and swiftness are alright…but all the damage in the world means nothing if you are dead. And Fire does not have enough defenses to sustain a tempest playstyle (though it worked for dagger dagger because you needed damage and swapped into water+used cantrips a bunch) This is all ignoring whatever runes/infusions you may or may not use.

(edited by Senario.2038)

What the heck is Tornado?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

To be fair, chronomancer well does heavy CC and you can drop it on a point. If Tornado did a good amount of CC and damage I would be fine with it because it is an Elite skill…in the ele world Elite skills are extremely lackluster so having one good one would be great.

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I personally think the new spec is great. I have tried it only in PVE and some WVW but so far so good. The Dagger/Warhorn i found to be the most fun and destructive to play with. The Staff was good in massive aoe fights where getting close was a hassle. The Scepter/Warhorn is ok, wouldn’t do PVP/WVW with it though. I’m yet to try D/D or pvp with any builds.

I’m hearing a lot of “we just wait for overload and stay in attunement”. I disagree with that entirely, especially in the Dagger/Warhorn build. Lets remember we are Elementalists, the jack of all trades. If your just tapping 1,2,3 in air spec and waiting for overload…. tut, tut. I’m sure there is more you can be doing then waiting to use something. Im very rarely in the same spec for much longer than 1 overload, if i even use it.

Survivability is a lot higher, in my near full Zerker gear. The constant heals from auras is nice and it seems like i have almost perma-fury. Of course i speced into the auras and i am liking it nicely. I’m hearing a lot of hate about the tempest but i think ppl just need to open there minds a bit more and use there own brains. Not wait for a build that is spoon fed to them and told “this is best, use it or gtfo” Theres lots of flexibility now, be creative and remember to enjoy this great game.

Always with the blanket statements of “If they don’t like it they aren’t opening their minds” Warhorn is very lackluster compared to its offhand counterparts and while you say you can stay in an attunement for 5 seconds I find that hard to believe as an Ele will drop their 2 and 3 skills and 4 and 5 very fast if they are up. If you were using dagger you would be waiting forever with less damage doing dagger fire/water 2. Air being the only one with a decent auto attack you would usually finish all of your skills before overload was even up.

If you were using scepter as a main hand you would not be auto attacking as switching attunements would do more dps than auto attacking and waiting for overload to be up.

Literally the only reason ppl take tempest in PvP right now is not because of overloads because honestly they are easy to interrupt and easy to just get out of the way from if somehow you were taking too much damage. The reason is that Invigorating torrents+grandmaster heal on aura+minor trait for stronger protection makes bunkering stronger, note I did not say damage. You do barely any damage but hey, I guess you just don’t die? You don’t run warhorn either. You either run fresh air or go dagger dagger with earth+water+tempest

This is compounded with the fact that for a lot of ppl the spec isn’t fun. A lot of ppl play ele in order to switch between attunements and use skills in a very fast paced manner. Tempest ignores that entirely and says “ok you need to wait in order to use this skill, and it isn’t even good enough to warrant how much you are punished for it”. You went from bunkery with a little bit of damage to being extremely bunkery with no damage unless you have an ally nearby. And while I personally don’t have any problem with taking water it is pretty much necessary in order to cure conditions which are all too prevalent nowadays.

I give tempest a 5/10 if only for the fact that it does one thing right but it only really works in PvP. That is bunkering even more. Compare this with scrapper who does it better while doing damage, chronomancer who brings great utility and still does good amounts of damage, dragonhunter which can do a lot of damage afar and a good amount close up (though not op imo), Herald for sharing boons because they do it better than tempest…and so on. After today’s berserker buffs I would argue that berserker is likely to become a better elite than Tempest as the concept was sound. It just needed some tweaks. Tempest goes against everything people who Main Ele want to do.

What the heck is Tornado?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Tornado needs to be another AoE to drop. I like the idea that it drops a tornado that does damage (I prefer regular dmg over conditions since ele doesn’t have significant condition builds) and you can move it using the skill again. Assuming it moves slowly/cast time is instant/and it is still a cantrip. No long cast times either so I don’t want to be seeing anything beyond 2 seconds cast time.

It may seem like a lot but Ele has crap for elites. Look at other classes such as guard, they have an elite that makes them fully invulnerable while they channel and refreshes all of their virtues (meaning they just use all of them during the channel and there is no cooldown), or Mesmer’s Mass Invis/Time/chronomancer well/MOA all of which are amazing Elites.

Love tempest (pvp) Please don't nerf it.

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Ele was the strongest profession going into the expansion, so it would have had the least priority.

Hopefully Karl can salvage the Tempest like he did the Dragonhunter.

I actually don’t hope he salvages Tempest like Dragonhunter because it feels like he would go too far and get Ele nerfed down to something that is weaker than before.

Really what I wanted was a Mainhand sword spec dealing with Power/damage or Condi. That way it would be a legitimate replacement for Fire as I have no problems with the Water/Arcane traitlines that you use for fighting close up. Zero problems because well…you are an Ele, you wear light armor and have a low base hp. It makes sense that you devote two entire specs to pretty much making your defenses alright. It may not even be enough with the new elite since I’ve been hearing ppl now take EARTH. That is 3 specs for pure defense when I think the ideal ratio is 2 for defense 1 for offense on Ele.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

The issue I found with Tempest is that the Elite in a vacuum is rather on the meh side. The true potential is once you start mixing in resources:

Auras:

  • Zephyr’s Boon: Auras grant fury and swiftness when applied.
  • Elemental Shielding: Gain protection when applying an aura to yourself or an ally.
  • Elemental Bastion: Auras you apply heal allies. Apply a frost aura to yourself and nearby allies when struck while below the health threshold.
  • Invigorating Torrents: Auras you apply also grant regeneration and vigor.

Granted all those buffs/boons apply from just one Aura, and many of our skills share Auras making Powerful Aura unneeded.

Shouts

  • Superior Rune of the Trooper: Rank 6 – Shouts remove conditions

I haven’t played too much with Warhorn, but on paper it looks like a support weapon with a bit of recovery and support options.

Overloads are rather on the odd side seeing how it contradicts our core mechanic, but as someone mentioned above this feels more like what an Elite Spec should work (give up “this” for “that”). Though you can run into some odd combos such as Air Overload + Fresh Air for insta-refresh.

Ultimately, Tempest plays like a passive healer and boon bot. The selling point for me was that I could walk away from Arcana/Water comfortably and still be able to support myself as well as my team to an effective extent.

Chronomancer, on the other hand, is more of a buff bot. By itself the trait line offers Alacrity which that alone is a very strong buff. The Elite class also isn’t as straight forward to play and can excel very well for players who are creative or can think outside of the box.

Well, well, well…all of them offer very powerful effects, but the issue is trying to balance your utility capability. Chronos tend to burn out very fast if you try to slot utilities for multiple roles, and there’re more tangible trade-offs.

At the end of the day though, both classes play very differently and have different capabilities. There is overlap in their roles, but both classes approach a problem from different viewpoints.

The issue I have with this argument is that people are actually looking at possible applications for the spec and have come up with nothing really gamechanging or super useful.

To take your examples:
Zephyr’s boon is on Air traitline.
Elemental shielding is on earth.

This means that you HAVE to take both of those to get it to be useful rather than taking Tempest and taking two other specs that are not very locked into place.

Also in terms of Condi clear the spec has 1 every time you use a SHOUT ONLY 1. Compare that to clearing one every time you get regeneration. That is at most 4 clears…to put that in perspective that is about as much conditions that are cleared whenever Cleansing Fire goes off. 3 from being cleansing fire and 1 from being a cantrip that applies regeneration. Not to mention that you have two other cantrips you could use and cleansing fire is used both when you have 3 conditions and when you actively use it if you have it on your bar. (instead of say mist form)

[Feedback/Discussion] Fractals of the Mists

in Fractals, Dungeons & Raids

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I ran a few fractals at a low level with friends, while it is fun thanks to the single fractal change I do recognize that the rewards are pretty bad.

Every time I had opened a fractal chest I spent 20 silver and generally got anywhere from 10 silver to 20 silver total in liquid coin and sellable materials. When I got a daily chest I got a ring which had stats that I had no use for and the salvaging for that one thing costs 1 WHOLE GOLD. Imo salvaging should never cost that much, you’re taking a risk and in the end I only got 2 stabilizing matrix (20 silver a pop).

I was only mildly annoyed since it was a low level fractal and I treated it as a fun night with friends that didn’t need a monetary reward…HOWEVER there is really no excuse as to why the rewards are so crappy after “moving” the rewards from dungeons to fractals. Fractals need to be a good source of income at least nearly on par with the HoT maps and silverwastes.

In addition to this the upper level fractal debuffs seem really unfair as well as how the scaling works. You remove boons on dodge? Enemy Toughness is so high that you need to use a condi build or spend at least 20 minutes on just the boss? That isn’t fun and is just replacing the lengthy 4 fractal chain with 1 that lasts way too long. I’m all for the top levels of fractals being challenging, but not exceedingly hard and definitely not required if you want a half decent reward. I heard the drop rates of ascended chests are way down too which is a huge disappointment. I was under the impression that the expansion would make fractals more rewarding compared to the past, not less.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

What has Tempest over Chronomancer that makes it useful? I’m saying this because people are saying it’s a bad spec, Ele is my 2nd character (my main is Guard and I have a Thief, I also made a Mesmer a while ago but deleted it even at lvl 80 because I didn’t like it), I like the playstyle but I’m worried about it’s utilities when in Tempest compared to what Chrono does…

It’s kind of like comparing apples to oranges.

Like in sPvP, neither has effectively changed the class role too much of what I have seen in the meta. Tempest is still filling bunker role and Chronomancer is still filling a burst or condi role. The playstyles for each are different then they were before.

But Chronomancer has given Mesmer a lot of power creep while Tempest has not done the same for elementalist which is why Tempest is considered bad.

It seems less like the Tempest is bad, and more that the Chronomancer is too good. Chronomancer was one of the specializations that just got pure upside. They just got an F5 without having to pay anything. The way the Tempest was done seems like a much more intelligent way of doing the elite specialization. You have to give something up to get that different gameplay. But when you compare yourselves to something like Chronomancer, that was just pure dumb power creeping, it seems like you got shafted.

Well that isn’t even a problem. It seems kinda like a foreign idea since we have Tempest but nearly all elite specs do not have a downside. They are almost all pure upside for what they do. Even if that role is a little different than what the base class did it is still generally a complete upside.

Tempest on the other hand is the only elite spec to be actively punished for using the mechanics of their elite spec. Dragonhunter/Daredevil/Scrapper/Chronomancer/Druid/Herald/Reaper all don’t punish you for using the new things. Berserker is in my opinion a close second for worst elite spec out there but I think their problem amounts to adrenaline not being correct numbers wise rather than a flaw a tthe basic conceptual levels of the class (condi warrior is interesting and different. but numbers are off).

All that said, I don’t have a problem with the strength of other Elite specs, Chronomancer gives mesmer a good reason to exist in PvP due to alacrity.

Please add an Endless Batwing Tonic recipe

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

No because it is a skin, it isn’t REQUIRED for anything. If some gear is going to be really expensive because it is cosmetic that is fine. Lots of things are expensive due to cosmetics already. This should really be no different.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Tempest has an water field chronomancer dose not that alone is a big game changer for comparing the classes in spvp and wvw.

Correction. Tempest has a water field that you cannot drop almost on demand and must wait 5 seconds past the time you actually need the water field. The amount of healing you do is also fairly low for something that occurs over 4 seconds and then the regen. Also you are going to have a hard time blasting that overload and will need a buddy. Oh did I mention you needed stability to actually complete the overload and you only have one stack on overload?

Whats that? Staff has 2 water fields with which to blast? And you can blast them yourself without using a utility? That is great!

Seriously though. Earth 2 -> Water 3 or 5 on staff is great in WvW for extra blasts. sPvP is a different beast but saying in water for that long is just dangerous as you do no damage. Not to mention Ele has not needed to use a water field blast as part of their role, if you needed to do that just get an Engineer who can use heal turret and blast it 2+times before the water field goes away.

You need tempest/ele in a wvw group you can live with out mez/crons becuse so many other classes fill there roll. It realy as simple as that.

Thing is you need them for very different reasons. The biggest reasons ele is needed in WvW has less to do with water fields and more to do with hard CC such as static field/earth 4. As well as several area denial skills that make it tough to advance as a zerg without significant condi clear. This role was never going to change in WvW as Ele is currently the only one who offers this much (although chronomancer shield and wells make a very good case for it being a good support in WvW.)

You don’t NEED a tempest. Everything is covered by base ele and really taking tempest means you will be skipping out on a spec that is arguably slightly more beneficial. Aura sharing is great and all but unless you have a surplus of Ele you can’t do that.

Trait lines like Air for lower static field cooldown, Water for defense, Fire for more uptime on area denial spells like lava font or downing enemies with meteor. Taking tempest means you skip out on one of these and while Air or fire seem like likely canidate it is definitely NOT worth one really bad heal from overload. And a small revision to what I said earlier…WATER OVERLOAD IS NOT A WATER FIELD.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Overload_Water

Yeah…that just makes it even more useless compared to taking a traitline to help with your area denial.

Tempest can still use a staff and WH also makes the water field.

And? Regular Ele has access to staff and its water fields already. Also only water globe is a water field. Meaning Tempest has 1 water field on a 35 second cooldown compared to staff which has two. You could blast it yourself but by using warhorn and dagger/scepter you are immediately placed much closer to the enemy and therefore much more in danger of getting hurt. Not to mention you are only blasting at most maybe once or twice yourself and have 4 seconds to do so. Oh and the range on the skill is the same as geyser.

Lets review.
Warhorn Water field:
35 second cooldown
240 AoE (same as geyser)
Duration is 4 pulses with 1 sec interval (assumed 4 seconds of Water Field)
You have a blast finisher on water 3 on dagger, and Warhorn earth 4. Earth Overload will be impossible to use as a blast finisher due to the fact that you would have to switch to it after casting your water field.

Staff Water fields:
20 seconds and 45 seconds cooldown (Healing rain is much larger than geyser)
Geyser is 240 healing rain is 450
Duration is 2 seconds for geyser and 6 whole seconds for healing rain (and it is much easier to blast into)
You can self blast into it by using earth 2 → Water 3 or water 5. Admittedly one less blast finisher but the thing here is that you don’t have to be right on top of your Water field (usually a dangerous place, hence you dropped a water field to heal allies) to blast it.

And honestly if you really wanted a front line support take a scrapper.
A scrapper can toss down water fields and then blast them multiple times while doing good damage and being tanky. Heal turret → Detonate → Either Elixir gun 4/rocket boots. I’m fairly sure if you are really good there is a way to blast it a third time in a very short duration. Engie has a lot of tools to work with and it is silly to think that with the advent of scrapper that Tempest offers a unique front line support build. It really doesn’t. It doesn’t do enough damage and it also doesn’t do as much as its fellow front line classes to support.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Tempest has an water field chronomancer dose not that alone is a big game changer for comparing the classes in spvp and wvw.

Correction. Tempest has a water field that you cannot drop almost on demand and must wait 5 seconds past the time you actually need the water field. The amount of healing you do is also fairly low for something that occurs over 4 seconds and then the regen. Also you are going to have a hard time blasting that overload and will need a buddy. Oh did I mention you needed stability to actually complete the overload and you only have one stack on overload?

Whats that? Staff has 2 water fields with which to blast? And you can blast them yourself without using a utility? That is great!

Seriously though. Earth 2 -> Water 3 or 5 on staff is great in WvW for extra blasts. sPvP is a different beast but saying in water for that long is just dangerous as you do no damage. Not to mention Ele has not needed to use a water field blast as part of their role, if you needed to do that just get an Engineer who can use heal turret and blast it 2+times before the water field goes away.

You need tempest/ele in a wvw group you can live with out mez/crons becuse so many other classes fill there roll. It realy as simple as that.

Thing is you need them for very different reasons. The biggest reasons ele is needed in WvW has less to do with water fields and more to do with hard CC such as static field/earth 4. As well as several area denial skills that make it tough to advance as a zerg without significant condi clear. This role was never going to change in WvW as Ele is currently the only one who offers this much (although chronomancer shield and wells make a very good case for it being a good support in WvW.)

You don’t NEED a tempest. Everything is covered by base ele and really taking tempest means you will be skipping out on a spec that is arguably slightly more beneficial. Aura sharing is great and all but unless you have a surplus of Ele you can’t do that.

Trait lines like Air for lower static field cooldown, Water for defense, Fire for more uptime on area denial spells like lava font or downing enemies with meteor. Taking tempest means you skip out on one of these and while Air or fire seem like likely canidates it is definitely NOT worth one really bad heal from overload. And a small revision to what I said earlier…WATER OVERLOAD IS NOT A WATER FIELD.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Overload_Water

Yeah…that just makes it even more useless compared to taking a traitline to help with your area denial.

Dev Feedback?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Karl is Dragonhunter, Daredevil and Tempest.
Robert is Berserker, Reaper and Chronomancer.
Irenio is Scapper and Druid.
Roy is Revenant (and maybe some Scrapper and Druid?)

Find the pattern :^)

Aaaah so I was wrong. Ok so lets see…Out of the 3 things Karl worked on…two are meh and one is unexpectedly good. (The one where he continuously talked to the community for feedback on, they got a lot of changes.)

Robert has Berserker (I think it just needs adrenaline numbers tweaked) which is meh, then Reaper which is pretty good, and Chronomancer which is AMAZING

Irenio is Scrapper/Druid (both really good though druid suffers from base design of the game not needing a healer. Still a good spec with changes to celestial form happening already.)

And Roy made Revenant which is great including Herald.

I was going off of who posted the feedback threads and I guess I made a few assumptions. That said…it really does feel like Karl did not have enough time to understand daredevil/Tempest compared to how much time he put into dragonhunter.

Dev Feedback?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

At the very least I’d like Anet to consider not to put Karl in charge of Ele elite specs in the future. Give us the people who were behind amazing specs like scrapper/Chrono/Herald. I don’t keep up with their names but from what I’ve played of Chrono and scrapper they are a heck of a lot more fun (viability aside, though both chrono and scrapper are very good).

This is a little harsh, I’m sure he put time into Tempest and to read that would probably be a little soul crushing. Also, wasn’t Karl part of the Reaper as well,( I don’t follow the names either so I could be off here) which seems to be widely accepted.

I think they just need to explain what exactly they were trying to do with Tempest, because none of us are getting it. If what their answer is bad, well

Fair, I’m not asking to fire him though. I just don’t think he should be placed in charge of the next Ele spec. From what I can tell he was assigned multiple classes which includes daredevil, Reaper, Dragonhunter, and Tempest. As far as I can tell Dragonhunter and Reaper recieved the most changes and the most feedback from Karl. This is clearly evidenced with both of these specs being very good in their own ways despite outcries of “weak” for dragon hunter. A lot of work went into both these specs and it shows. He can do good work, but I think he works better on classes that are not jack of all trades or have several things to juggle like Mesmer shatters/illusions and Engineer’s…well everything. In general it feels like a huge mismatch between a developer who doesn’t understand elementalist, the amount of time they were allowed, and their personal interaction between the community and the development of the class.

Much less feedback was acted upon for Daredevil and much less for Tempest. Daredevil is somewhat rare but I have not seen it be called straight up bad (though correct me on this if I’m wrong.) Tempest clearly did not have as much discourse between the developers and the players and feels very much like a rushed spec going with warhorn skills that barely synergize and a base concept that would require making it OP before it is usable.

Take from it what you will but I’m not saying he should be fired or anything. I’m saying he should be tasked on things that fit his style of development and that does not include Elementalist. His silence and lack of BW3 change notes is telling, the community had to put together a list of changes when HoT launched while many other classes did not have to self make a list.

EDIT: I was wrong about who was in charge of what elite spec. Karl was only in charge of Daredevil Tempest and Dragonhunter. (Though if that is any indication…)

(edited by Senario.2038)

Dev Feedback?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

At the very least I’d like Anet to consider not to put Karl in charge of Ele elite specs in the future. Give us the people who were behind amazing specs like scrapper/Chrono/Herald. I don’t keep up with their names but from what I’ve played of Chrono and scrapper they are a heck of a lot more fun (viability aside, though both chrono and scrapper are very good).

Its literally the worst weapon ingame.

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Time to move on to a new elite spec. Maybe the next one will be a good one. I do think that Ele needs their own condition build though at this point since Anet is pushing hard for conditions to be just as viable as power builds at least in PvE. It likely will never be fully viable in big WvW groups due to the amount of condi clear but if it is viable with these high toughness bosses I’m ok with that.

(psst, offhand dagger is already really well balanced for a frontline build minus Churning Earth which is terrible, go make Mainhand Sword ele a condi ele. Fire is burn/blind, air is vuln/weakness, earth is bleeds/cripple, water is chill)

No thanks, don’t want a condi offhand when none of the mainhands support that.

No, bleed centric builds are garbage and none of the mainhands provide any reasonable amount of burning to make a condi build remotely viable in PvE.

Leave the condi builds to engineer/ranger/necro/mesmer/mallyx rev and keep ele power centric.

Lol READ, No changes to off hands. I would like to see Mainhand sword give ele something we don’t already have or work with the rest of what we already have. CONDI IS ONE OF THESE IDEAS. Seems like you saw “oh condi build” and thought “oh they only want bleeds” Attunements give you a wide range of different types of condis to place based on attunement and being able to place a decent amount of everything would be really cool and would be a new role for Ele.

Just because other classes have good condi builds doesn’t mean ele can’t have good condi builds too. And notice how engineer and rev both have power builds as well due to their similar position to ele in their weight class? They are versatile but difficult classes and Ele honestly should be no different. A condi based spec would be interesting to say the least if it is done right.

It doesn’t even have to be mainhand sword, though that is the main thing I want to see in general out of any ele elite spec.

I’d be fine if Mainhand sword is going to be a power build. Makes literally no difference to me. Elite Specs either improve on what is already there (like chronomancer/Herald) or add new playstyles (dragonhunter/Scrapper). Really it could go either way if you want a successful elite spec.

Condi elementalist?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Is there even such a thing?

Yes

It isn’t very good. Ele only applies burn and bleed relatively consistently. A good condi build that is viable usually stacks both primary damage dealing condi and a few condi that is trash to have a pseudo shield against condi clear. And can generally re apply the condi again with low cooldowns. Look at Revenant’s condi build with torment mace axe. Add that with Fear and you force the enemy to move+they have a hard time clearing the torment which is doing a lot of dmg. And if they do, it is fairly easy to re apply the condi.

Its literally the worst weapon ingame.

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Time to move on to a new elite spec. Maybe the next one will be a good one. I do think that Ele needs their own condition build though at this point since Anet is pushing hard for conditions to be just as viable as power builds at least in PvE. It likely will never be fully viable in big WvW groups due to the amount of condi clear but if it is viable with these high toughness bosses I’m ok with that.

(psst, offhand dagger is already really well balanced for a frontline build minus Churning Earth which is terrible, go make Mainhand Sword ele a condi ele. Fire is burn/blind, air is vuln/weakness, earth is bleeds/cripple, water is chill)

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Tempest has an water field chronomancer dose not that alone is a big game changer for comparing the classes in spvp and wvw.

Correction. Tempest has a water field that you cannot drop almost on demand and must wait 5 seconds past the time you actually need the water field. The amount of healing you do is also fairly low for something that occurs over 4 seconds and then the regen. Also you are going to have a hard time blasting that overload and will need a buddy. Oh did I mention you needed stability to actually complete the overload and you only have one stack on overload?

Whats that? Staff has 2 water fields with which to blast? And you can blast them yourself without using a utility? That is great!

Seriously though. Earth 2 → Water 3 or 5 on staff is great in WvW for extra blasts. sPvP is a different beast but saying in water for that long is just dangerous as you do no damage. Not to mention Ele has not needed to use a water field blast as part of their role, if you needed to do that just get an Engineer who can use heal turret and blast it 2+times before the water field goes away.

Tempest vs Chronomancer?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Well if you don’t like mesmer don’t worry about chrono since you won’t play it as it mostly plays the same. That said dragonhunter is amazing in PvP I heard.

Also, Tempest vs Chronomancer is a night and day comparison. Chronomancer makes pretty much everything good about mesmer better and Tempest tries to focus in on Auras which are at best minorly useful and an extremely flawed overload mechanic that doesn’t even work on most weapons except maybe staff. And staff is dubious on how useful it is because overloads are close range abilities.

About The World map and unopened areas

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I just want to make my way to Cantha.

Dev Feedback?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Warriors are in the same boat with the Berserker, but their dev is Robert so…

I would argue warriors have a half-sound concept though the execution is terrible. A condi warrior is basically what berzerker is and I’ve seen some ppl be successful with it, that said it is a little lackluster though I would not say it is as lackluster as Tempest.

I do think the numbers need tuning but the build seems to be able to stack a whole bunch of burn using sword and rifle. That said I’ll let warriors talk about the spec, they need to find out a good balance between how easy a warrior is to play compared to what they can get.

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Tempest isn’t bad for open world and warhorn isn’t bad for a support weapon. Is that simple of enough to understand?

Anyways, I don’t really care about PvE. For PvP and WvW, Tempest functions very well if you know how to think outside the box.

This isn’t an argument that is a legitimate rebuttal to points made about what things are currently not good on tempest. What you are doing is essentially setting up any argument that is not “tempest is great” as “Well you can’t think outside the box” when really you provide no rebuttals on any points as to why tempest functions well in spite of the mentioned flaws.

Please, enlighten us as to why tempest is good because everybody else can’t think outside the box apparently (a huge assumption).

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

They mindlessly follow a rotation because that rotation is how you maintain DPS in PvE.

What are you going to do, sit in fire and do fire autoattacks on dagger? Bye-bye DPS.

You gotta keep using burning speed, frozen burst to blast, earth 4 to blast again, and switch to air for the only non-garbage autoattack DPS on dagger.

It seems like you are the one who doesn’t have a clue why elementalist can only function by constantly swapping.

It will continue to be the case until the autoattacks on attunements besides fire staff and air dagger aren’t total garbage. Any autoattacks besides those two are a large DPS loss in PvE and doing an overload doesn’t come close to compensating.

And yes, you have to swap attunements to blast your fire fields to proc perma fury from persisting flames for your group. That is why they’re even bringing you.

Right now Tempest only functions as a gimmick bunker pvp spec, complete garbage in any other game format or gear set/playstyle.

How is that not a problem?

I don’t see reaper/chrono/scrapper/dragonhunter/herald being pigeonholed into a single role and a single tank stat combo.

I don’t know how you’re stuck auto-attacking for 5 seconds, I don’t have that problem. Also, if you care enough about might generation there’s Tempestuous Aria.

Yeah, that MUST be it. It cannot possibly be that the spec has several obvious flaws, that make it difficult to use…

I’d like to know what these flaws are. Care to list them?

Where to begin…Warhorn abilities are subpar and the only unique one on fire 4 was nerfed to only be might and fury.

Overloads have a 5 second wait time which makes water overload mostly useless because if you needed to heal your teammates they needed healing…five seconds ago. 4 second channel which is easily interruptible and only comes with 1 stack of stab (except for earth overload which gets more). Overloads also have a 20 second cooldown in addition to being generally not as rewarding as you still are channeling for 4 seconds and will get hit for damage/CC or both. Any increases in dps are dubious at best.

None of the spec feels like it synergizes well with the base mechanics of the class unlike say Chronomancer and auras are pretty much the only real build for the spec.

Oh and have we mentioned Tempest just doesn’t feel fun to play? That is the biggest offender imo because you play a videogame to have fun right? If something is not fun to play I would say it isn’t worth playing.

Dev Feedback?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

the problem is, even during bwe1-3, out of all devs working on the elite specs we got the one who was the least talkative, especially in the ele forum.

it would be nice if karl just opened a thread asking for feedback on x and y, or talk about his ideas, asking what we think about z. one can only dream.

100%.
It’s hard to feel left out. I get the sense that a lot of the elementalist community has felt and continues to feel neglected at this moment. Everyone is receiving these great traitlines and we don’t value what we have. In my opinion, it is like being the poor family in a wealthy neighborhood on Christmas.
I bought the expansion; however prepared myself to be disappointed with Temptest after reading all the feedback. I attempted to utilize warhorn but felt it did not compete with the current offhands we have. The PVP style of the traitline doesn’t add to the D/D playstyle and only enhances the bunker ability of the staff setup. While I watch other players falling in love with their new lines, I keep placing further and further distance between myself and the game hoping that someone finds the perfect setup the Devs intended or some kind of discussion from the team explaining what they are going to do to make it shine a little more. If I don’t play and notice the glaring issues, then I wont hate it right?
I’ve thought of class switching numerous times (i like to focus on just one class/character); however I’ve played my ele since the headstart and feel guilty switching.

I generally agree that the spec feels like it was the most rushed. The Devs don’t really seem interested in giving Elementalist any kind of unique spec outside the pseudo tempest-auramancer. The class lacks direction, the dev has been less than helpful in acting on feedback, and watching everybody else get shiny new specs that are almost universally loved is painful. I haven’t met a single engie/chrono who disliked their elite. Whether or not they used it.

Suggestion: Churning Earth

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

While I recognize that dagger offhand does not necessarily need buffs I would like to address this skill since I’m of the opinion that there should never be a skill that you have absolutely no use for. Honorable mention to staff 2(which I honestly think just needs its cast time lowered to 0.75 sec)

What I suggest is to make Churning Earth more like dragon’s tooth in that it is ground targeted and has a delay on it before it activates and blasts on the area targeted. In addition to this I’d also like the damage to be the same as evasive arcana earth dodge to make up for the fact that there is no channel at the beginning of this skill anymore(less damage). No changes to cooldown.

Reasoning; With the recent power creep of elite specs and the realization that with many skills on other classes you generally do have a time or situation to use them there is no reason to have a skill that is absolutely useless in many situations across all game modes. The best use of the skill is to start channeling then lightning flash into the enemy which is definitely not practical at all. Also you have no stab. Compare its 3.5 sec channel with the 4 sec overload earth which does much of the same things except allows you to move and gives you stability.

tl;dr Make churning earth like dragon’s tooth, nerf the damage. There is no reason to have skill you will never use on any class or weapon.

(edited by Senario.2038)

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

“Tempest is bad” because people can’t adapt.

If you can adapt, you’ll see it strangely fits in the current meta better than D/D ele ever could. You have to throw away every idea you have about playing D/d ele to play tempest well. Tbh, it plays a lot more like a necromancer in terms of weight and feeling and intuition, since it’s slower and more strategic instead of fast paced and rotational,

This is totally a legitimate argument, I mean. It is as if you are arguing that “Well they think it is bad because they don’t know how to play, I know how to play and it is ok”.

Seriously though, you completely disregard any feedback about the class which is generally not fun to play and maybe is only viable or usable in PvP (and likely can’t even keep up with good players of the new elite spec). There is WvW (useless in this mode) and PvE where it is likely that it isn’t viable at high level fractals or raids.

You also argue that it is more like Necromancer but isn’t that a bad thing? If you wanted to play a Necromancer go play a Necromancer, the spec has no business being an Ele spec that tries to be a Necro when reaper exists.

Less of the strawman of the “Players who can’t adapt” and more looking at the actual facts. Warhorn is subpar compared to focus and off hand dagger, and it’s only unique skill to share boons was stripped of all boons except might and fury. Overloads are something you have to pay 3x for a relatively small benefit and bunkering more with regen is really the only thing the spec offers. 1) You pay with 5 second wait time, this makes water overload useless because your team needed healing 5 seconds ago. 2) You have a channel time of 4 seconds, this is a problem without stab and you only get one stack of stab per overload and cannot swap attunements while overloading. 3) After you finish or don’t finish all that your attunement is now on a 20 second cooldown with which you can either attack a few more times in the attunement then swap or swap immediately to get a new set of skills to rotate through. Generally in terms of dps you were able to achieve good amounts simply by swapping. And the only real useful overloads are Fire and Air and that is because of faster stacks of might and vulnerability, that said they are absolutely too risky to use with one stack of stab and the amount of investment you have to put in to use them.

While I won’t say the guy who created Tempest should be fired, I do think that Anet should at the very least get somebody else to do elite specs next time. Preferably somebody who knew what they were doing with the class like with Herald/Scrapper/Chronomancer.

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

I love elementalist and i cant stop playing it, but seriously, why did they made such a shameful spec?

I think at the source it’s a lack of communication with the community and the concept artists, perhaps a lack of time invested in the fine-tuning of the skills (rebound specifically and warhorn) and a misunderstanding of how the class is played by the best players.

Perhaps 10% of the elementalist like to play bunker builds, I know I don’t; dagger and focus are better offland.

I don’t think the problem was that eles don’t like bunker builds. I like bunker builds, I see their place in the game. But I am confused as to what does Tempest do that base Ele cannot do better? Warhorn just screams of a rushed concept same with overloads. With only 2 skills per attunement and needing only to compete with offhand dagger/focus it is very obvious that it was chosen for these reasons.

I don’t have a problem with any ele build but the pure fact is that warhorn added nothing new to the table, and what they did add was nerfed into the ground. That and being the only spec without actual minors and extremely punishing overloads I think that the whole spec is honestly just a huge miscommunication and a rush job. Minors serve to make attunement’s overloads actually worth it to use and it still isn’t worth it. Look at scrapper and Chronomancer minors and how good they are+how they actually add to the class things that are not specific to only the new mechanics.

Boons on finish/revive (you have a gryo that does that automatically for you), dazes that last longer when applied to enemies and the effect of those same statuses are decreased on you, function gyro and base traitlines that already synergize with hammer for scrapper.

A new shatter/shield, Alacraty when you shatter (huge use out of this regardless of build as lower cooldowns are always good), and time marches on which is faster movespeed and base speed. Not to mention it also synergizes with any other spec.

Tempest at least until the end only has one minor that does a little bit more than providing overload benefits. First and second minors are for overloads and for swiftness on overloads, third one also is mostly overloads but it increases the effectiveness of Protection which I think is a mostly good minor in general. That said, most of the major traits are based on making overloads viable, using the new shouts (without a lower cooldown trait), or buffing auras. Really it is just an “Auramancer” Tempest sounds better but is totally a misnomer on what the class actually does.

This would be less of a problem if the aura traits weren’t so spread out. Earth has protection on aura, Air has fury/swiftness on auras, fire has might and competes with reduced fire recharge, water has powerful auras which allows you to support the team in an auramancer style, except it competes with cleansing water meaning you can’t even be an up front support removing condi from your party if you want to. You would have to burn a shout to do that, and not the air one. Besides the air one, shouts are mostly offensive and the reason cantrips are so successful is that you need them as an ele with light armor and the lowest base hp in the game. Other classes which have light armor can get away with a little less focus on utility escapes because they either have clones/stealth (mesmer) or they have as much base hp as a warrior (necro).

People often complain about cantrips but honestly until ele gets more survivability through health/toughness/different escapes, cantrips will always be top tier. That said, I have ZERO problems with that as if it is effective and fun to play there is no problem.

why is tempest so bad?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

It doesn’t give Elementalist a true new role or at least build upon existing roles like Chronomancer does for Mesmer. It only vaguely represents an Auramancer build with some highly costly Overloads which are dubious on their benefit. Fire is ok, Air is alright, Earth is eh, and NEVER use water. It honestly just is a spec that lacks understanding of elementalist and direction. In all honesty if it was retooled to be called “Auramancer” you wouldn’t be far off on what it does that is somewhat unique.

That said they had so many ways they could do an elite spec. Either with the existing base idea “shouts” and “auras” or with something particularly new. Personally I want mainhand sword, and I think that giving ele a good frontline spec for big groups would be great. Just use wells for the utilities. Another idea is an Ele spec that boosts conditions and applies a lot of them with low cooldowns. Particularly Fire, Bleed, Vulnerability, and chill. Ele has at best dubious Condition options for offense as it is always paired with power or being purely a support role. Though I think they would need to add a new buff to make it so massive condi removal isn’t crippling to such a condi build, maybe a new debuff that shields 1 condi removal?

This new "event inactivity"-thing

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

This is kinda a bad feature because honestly it is PvE. Sometimes you have to take care of something and leave your keyboard. Sometimes you die and have to walk back.

Honestly the whole system is problematic. Tagging events is not as much of an issue in the new maps due to the size and distance between events. And in Silverwastes where it is very common it is actually part of the fun. “Ok I’m going to defend this fort, oh? That caravan is in trouble/fort is in trouble let me run over to help”. It really just hinders people who do try to work towards map objectives.

Tagging events is honestly a non issue imo due to the way the new maps are and due to how intuitive it is. No arbitrary rules as to why if you hit two events (sometimes close together) you don’t get credit for one of them.

Unable to Login/Disconnected After Map Change

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Cannot log into any of my characters at all after the patch ):

A last minute change might've saved Tempest

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

The reason you take Water is more for the ability to cleanse conditions which is something in addition to healing you need in spades when you have the lowest base hp and a lot less armor than most other classes when you get the stats you need. Invigorating torrents kinda solves the problem of healing by giving more things healing but really it isn’t any better (not to say I have a problem with cantrip builds because I actually enjoy them).

Instead of Cantrips for regen → now you use Shouts+auras with some healing (slightly higher than cantrips). To get condi clear on it you have to run a very specific rune set for some condi clear giving up completely the idea of using any power runeset when you need a lot of stats to make Ele work in front line/PvP. It is also arguable that as a tempest for those modes you really can’t afford your elite spec as it does not really add damage per say. You need Power, Toughness, Vitality, Healing power to sustain since you don’t have the armor/health to back anything up, percision for crits (30% approx), and of course feriocity so you can be sure you actually do crit for a decent amount. And this is not mentioning condi damage which does contribute to your damage.

Elementalists rejoice!

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Forums are devoid of ele ANYTHING…

It is because all the Ele players moved on to Rev since we didn’t get much of an incentive to stick around for Ele. :P

naaaah but really I am only sticking to ele due to my gear and a sense of loyalty. I would honestly suggest people not play ele if they asked me what class they should play. All the other classes seem to offer so much in HoT.

I actually really want to move on. It almost feels like betrayal; however no other classes provide the feeling I get when playing my D/D ele. So I basically just play the new content as if nothing was added to the ele.

I’m mostly the same though I do also like Staff ele when I’m feeling a little less “press all the buttons” and more of “I kinda just want to go through this without putting much stress on my hands”. It is more of a personal thing but I do agree that Dagger Dagger Ele is just about the most exciting thing I’ve tried in this game to date as it requires a lot of skill and is just exceptionally fast paced.

That said, if Mainhand Sword Elite spec came out and was similar to Dagger dagger (maybe with a more damaging moveset with fast casting/rotations to match the power creep of other elites) I’d be very excited. I love battle mage type classes and have seen many types of them such as the super main group tank type, one that does a bit of everything and has enough durability to last in the front line, and one that focuses on basic attacking and auto casting (through use of skill buffs) basic skills which add up to high dps.

Honestly I think giving Mainhand sword a way to play fast, do decent(higher than dagger dagger damage), and be good in frontline AoE/big battles would be amazing. I think the main problem being that you would have to make it a spec that is about both tankiness and damage as Water/Arcane can only take you as far as small group fights even if you have ascended gear. Big fights you generally aren’t as good.

As much as I just want to see a mainhand sword ele, I’m not sure it’ll be happening anytime soon. They likely will try to fumble around with tempest a bit more trying to get ppl to play it when really a lot of the ele community just feels lukewarm to it as they notice other classes’ elites and how good they are comparatively.

Elementalists rejoice!

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Forums are devoid of ele ANYTHING…

It is because all the Ele players moved on to Rev since we didn’t get much of an incentive to stick around for Ele. :P

naaaah but really I am only sticking to ele due to my gear and a sense of loyalty. I would honestly suggest people not play ele if they asked me what class they should play. All the other classes seem to offer so much in HoT.

Elementalists rejoice!

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Forums are completely devoid of ele qq now, yay! That means our class is okay and doesn’t suck right? Looks at tempest

It’s just sad that gw2 pvp has regressed till this state. Massive power creep across all classes except warrior and Ele, which makes us irrelevant. Even with a build that was strong pre-expac.

You know balance was thrown out of the window when a spec that was strong becomes under – average after the expac. I called it too. Rip ele #timetomainrev

Lol I would have to agree. At least forums are completely devoid of Ele QQ. I’ll take it.

I still wanted a good elite spec that matches the power that others have gotten. Or at the very least had a good concept. Seriously I think that Mainhand Sword would have been an amazing spec.

Is Tempest worth it?

in Elementalist

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

If you want to play PvE only with it then I’d say it is worth it if you personally like the way it plays.

If you play anything else then no. The elite spec simply is flawed at its core. It has some interesting mechanics that you could play around with in PvE but honestly it feels like a total waste compared to other really good elite specs.

I know work was put into it, but it just doesn’t feel like a quality elite like say chronomancer/reaper/herald/scrapper/druid is. Honestly at this point I don’t even run it anymore. I’ll just wait until an elite with Ele Mainhand sword comes out and hopefully it’ll be made by the person behind classes like Chronomancer/herald if how fun they are is any indication.

Bug?? Follow the path Rox left of chapter 14

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

Stuck on this step as well

Part 14 Story Mode [possible spoilers]

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

For Story mode Part 14 (tracking)
I’m on the story mode and have been eagerly anticipating the content in HoT but I recently ran into a bug at the middle of this part of the story where you are following the trail. The tangled depths sign that is at the bottom of the area does not progress the story but instead gives no dialogue and removes the marker for where the next part of the story takes place.

Please get this fixed as soon as possible as I would very much like to continue the story.

Issue Reports: Heart of Thorns [Merged]

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Senario.2038

Senario.2038

This is concerning Story mode Part 14 (tracking)

I’m on the story mode and have been eagerly anticipating the content in HoT but I recently ran into a bug at the beginning of this part of the story where you are following the trail. The tangled depths sign that is at the bottom of the area does not progress the story but instead gives no dialogue and removes the marker for where the next part of the story takes place.

Please get this fixed as soon as possible as I would very much like to continue the story.