Guild Wars 2

Thrashbarg.9820:

It’s “Jack of all trades”.

/grammarlesson

Jack of all traits
traits as in those things you can pick and choose to make a build.
It was a play on words. Because the webcast made it seem like they want us to trait and stat into everything a little bit in the hope that we’ll have some kind of viability in game. I’ve tried and its not viable in the least. 15/15/15/15/10 build with divinity everything gets you killed 10/10 times in pvp, wvw and pve. Only way to do notable damage, healing or survive at all is to spec-ifically spec for it. But even if we do spec for it (what we’re forced to do anyways) we’re sub par whatever we end up deciding to spec towards. (I didn’t agree with it for a long time but after seeing videos of other classes I can’t help but agree)
Thieves (you know about them; no need for me to repeat it)
Warriors…. same thing
Mesmers…..
Guardians….
Engineers…..
Rangers (are/were decent not sure about where they’re currently at)
Necromancers (used to think they were worse off but after seeing what they’re capable of I’d say they do the most damage in the game and still have more survivability than us elementalists. I mean they have biggest hp pool in game and they can one-shot warriors with ranged.)

Razor.6392:

Sunflowers.1729:

Razor.6392:

-Ranged aoe damage

That would probably go to Necromancers.
(But I agree with the other one!)

Nope. Wells are ground cast unless traited for it.

Also, no necro goes crit damage(?)

necros can hit for 28k dmg

Kain Francois.4328:

Seemingly every time I invite an Elementalist to a group, they always just stand there spamming Fire #1 on Staff, even on bosses. No conjure, no buffs, just spamming Fire #1 on staff.

Even when I do Harpy fractal, they just stand there using Fire Staff autoattack instead of switching to Scepter/Focus and making life easier for the entire freaking team.

Elementalist has what, only four weapons? Would it kill someone on level 30 FoTM to have those four weapons, instead of just standing there spamming Staff Autoattack?

Y U no block projectiles!? Y U no protection!? Y U not use melee on boss we need melee!? Y U switch to D/D on boss we need ranged? No Ice Bow for the Snowblind Elemental!?

In all seriousness, what is with all the bad Elementalists? I’ve never met a decent one. Enlighten me. Is there something I’m not understanding about the greatness of their staff autoattack? Or are they just bad and deserve to be kicked from level 30 FoTM?

What if you saw a warrior do the same with a greatsword? Would you kick him too for not using a mace to knockdown foes?

Kain Francois.4328:

How to be a good Elementalist:
Use Focus on first few mobs with Swirling Clouds and interrupt from Comet.

During cooldown if out of combat, switch to Staff if you can share auras and use Magnetic Aura on allies.

For Utility, I would recommend Ice Bow for “Deep Freeze” to keep them stunned.

So much could be done to mitigate knockback and damage. Much better than 1-spam.

In dungeons if anyone is in combat so are you meaning you can’t swap weapons during fights.

the projectile defence from focus does not work on bosses at all. Plus over 50% of the focus’s skills don’t do damage and the few that do do very little damage. It also doesn’t come with a healing skill ( only weapon that doesn’t).

So:
no damage
no protection against bosses
no heals

That’s why you don’t see us using focus.

As for conjures, because of our light armor and low health pool and the nerfing of bunker we need the slots for our cantrips to survive that’s why most elementalists don’t bring conjures. (I do though and die alot because of it).

Haven’t made it to that fractal lvl yet. Fractals just haven’t been able to interest me all that much yet. Too many hardcore players; I try to stay away from hardcore players because of all their trash talking.

As for fireball spamming… Possibly a noob. Earth auto-attack is better. Gives weakness which results in 50% reduction in outgoing damage on single foes. Which is decent I guess. Water auto attack heals a bit (300ish health). Air auto attack hits 3 targets for decent damage (for a ranged attack that is). Fireball does tiny aoe’s (bigger when traited) and does decent damage but nothing special.

S/D is my new personal favorite. I like D/D roaming but bursting 2 people down in one S/D rotation made me switch.

the elite glyph of elementals doesn’t proc a boon when traited for boons on glyph usage

Water scepter #2 and Focus fire #4 don’t cast anymore

Marcus Greythorne.6843:

so much hate here

thank you Izzy for the video, definitely helpful for some of my friends who never played an Ele and are interested in doing so. People QQ over eles but seing how loved we are in WvW I have no fear. I love my Ele, even if he might not do the most damage we do pretty good damage. I’m starting to hate the min-maxers these days, this thread is the perfect showcase of why I do.

I don’t min-max stuff anymore either but even with min-max anything we’re always sub-par. Then when we hear that they might nerf our mobility again çourse we’ll QQ.
Would be nice if they stopped spreading on coming nerf stuff about the elementalist for a while. That way the forums wouldn’t be full of the QQ because that’s what’s causing it.

Sunflowers.1729:

Razor.6392:

-Ranged aoe damage

That would probably go to Necromancers.
(But I agree with the other one!)

Or grenade specced engineers. or mesmers with glamour skills (quickness AoE?).

May I also note that the elementalist don’t get retaliation, quickness, aegis. OR give fear- torment – poison etc. All very usefull boons and conditions. Thus I conclude that we can’t do everything. Therefore we aren’t a jack of all traits we’re just worst or 5th place at anything we do.

Also forgot to mention the lowest health pool and light armor, take away our mobility after disabling bunkers means we’ll be on deathrow.

Zandia.4985:

Hi all and thanks for all the posts everyone took the time to put up. I am very new to the game and have tried out many of these suggestions. I have really learned a lot from reading everyone’s comments.
Thru my experiments thus far I still prefer staff over daggers and a “black mage” version of elementalist in lieu of healing/support. Idk, guess its time spent on other games, this just seems right and more fun.
This build is still in testing but I would appreciate any feedback. I know it flies in the face of many of the versions here but seems to do a fair bit of damage and in PvE is relatively survivable as long as you keep moving and take advantage of air speed.
Just starting dungeons so working on adjustments that apply there – my alternate set of armor is Knights but this is my full GC with the equipment I have thus far.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEIQFAWhImcbmR1gjDAhHEwQCiHVYBFlCzA-jwBBYLAkIAJPFRjtksIasaHYqSER1eDFRrGA-e

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEIQFAWhImcbmR1gjDAhHEwQBCFVYRRxM7A-jwBBYLAkIAJPFRjtksIasaHYqSER1eDFRrGA-e

This is what I would change to your build.

20 arcana does help alot, also give longer boonduration which as an elementalist helps more plus getting fury off of blast finishers will give you 20% more crit chance (fury lasts for 10 seconds+ boon duration will make it even longer). Add to that the bigger fire fields thanks to the arcana trait… Well good luck!

Currently I’m using:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEIQJArYhImkbuR9wjDAEFpgi4xDWIRRxM5A-jQCBYLCh0yAkIgsBIJPFRjtRoIasaHYqSER1eDFRrOIAzB-e

Timelord.8190:

Staff is still terrible in spvp. Firbeall doesen’t don’t even hit for more than 500hp.

1.5k for me….

I use it to protect me when I’m casting churning earth.

hint:
lingering elements and 10% more damage while in air atunement.
Kind of like a permanent 10% damage boost.

depends on your party. If your party is dying all over the place you might wanna go full clerics D/D and if your party doesn’t need the heals swap back to Zerker/rampager/knights/rabid which ever one works best in your party.

0/10/0/30/30 has had its glory days taken from it though. Better to change it up a bit. Its still decent but there are better options.

Durzlla.6295:

Um…. if you’re just now realizing that Ele is the Hybrid prof of the game i’m kinda thinking you should get your eyes checked…

That being said they don’t want ele to be the BEST at anything, they’re certainly not going to be the worst at anything.

EX: An ele will NOT have the damage of a warrior, but it’s going to have high damage, and it WONT be as mobile as a thief, but it will still be one of the most mobile profs (or can be). etc.

Not saying that I don’t like being a hybrid profession. But every single option we have or had is getting nerfed.
Since patch:
healing nerfed
damage nerfed
mobility nerfed
survivability nerfed
There are very few skills that have not been nerfed in the past year and even fewer that received buffs. If this continues then nothing’ll be left for the elementalist to do.

Even though we say that we can do everything I’m pretty sure the warrior, guardian and mesmer can do the same but better. (Not sure about a condition guardian though).

I’d say go for just a tiny bit more healing power and then you’ll be survivable in most instances. I use 0/30/0/20/20 with zerker/rampager/clerics armor and orbs and do double the damage I used to do with a similar build as yours and with more healing power.

A good elementalist doesn’t swap attunements every 10 seconds but every 3-4 seconds.
So either you learn to like it or you play thief.

So for those who’ve watched the twitch video you can hear what Arenanets vision is of the elementalist. That is that we can’t do both damage and healing at the same time as well as other professions.
We will always be able to heal and do damage but arenanet doesn’t want us to outshine ANY profession in ANYTHING! They don’t want us to have mobility that matches or exceeds other professions. No we have to be slower than other professions too!

If you want to see what the vision is for the elementalist equip Dagger/Focus and use traits: 15/15/15/15/10 with divinity runes. (you won’t win any 1v1 fights, you won’t be able to run away but hey. You can do defence, attack and healing at the same time so its alright, right)

But that’s just my reaction to what he said as to what they’ve done to our traits in the last patch I’m actually happy about the changes. Its still hard to do decent dps and still be survivable but its possible.

So because we have the innate ability to do more than on thing we are nerfed to the point where even though we can do everything we are the worst at everything. While we’re at it we’re gonna destory your ability to get out of tough situations too!
How fun…..

There are more interesting traits to mess around with. You’d probably want to use sigil of battle and sigil of water with 30 in air instead of 30 in fire.
Staff is pretty hard to play with but if you want to then I’d definately go for air with the higher crit chance and crit damage already getting power from your cleric armor will maximize your damage a bit more.
You’ll also want more crit damage so probably zerker/rampager trinkets (4zerker/2rampager).
Healing power is good but you generally don’t need more than 600-700 healing power.

If you do want to do more damage then select traits that let you do more damage overall (like air 20% more damage to foes with 33% less health.

so I’ve tried to cast this one 10 times and it only worked once. Its horribly bugged. It was useless already but now its a waste of time completely since it doesn’t do anything 9/10 times

Please fix it Arenanet!

you can build more swiftness while in combat, gives you more lightning strikes…. that’s about it. I prefer the other air trait that gives damage boost on downed foes add to that the water trait that lets you do more damage on vulnerable foes while in water atunement + lingering atunements providing a 40% damage boost to your burst.

0/30/0/20/20 healing+zerker, so I kill enemy and I heal allies. Who said you can’t do both was wrong! (larger aoe+ vigor on crit + air recharge on crit+ lightning strike upon swapping to air + lost of aoe always critting means that you do some actual damage (gotta hit an awefull lot of buttons for it but its worth it.)

signet of air+ FGS lets you stay up close to your target while doing decent pbaoe damage with your auto attack. (lightning flash-3&4 combo is sweet too). Did 7k dmg with the FGS 1 in wvw couple days ago. Took just 3 attacks to take him down. Add to that the chill, cripple, immobilize with a hammer-warior… 8 fights-8wins in wvw.

Or you can use Dragons tooth and cast tornado while dragons tooth is in the air, will give it a damage boost. Could possibly do it with other delayed spells also. Just watch out for the tornado’s casting time.

I think with the faster casting time they had to reduce the base damage a bit.

paperluffy.9148:

Hello, for the past week i have been excited to think of all the new builds available if that patch is real. I will continue to look into scepter, but for now I have been trying to make a d.d build that has huge def, huge crit, and huge attacks. So i went with the 4 aura build and did theory tweeking (only using exotics)

What do you think? any suggestions, I find this part of the process the most interesting. And again we will ultimatly have to wait and see.

Edit: updated tests
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fEAQJAoYhEmmbtR5gjEA0DmMKkh8wDlHzkjNA-jUyAYrASeAJCApvioxW7KiGreBTXmU9pgs3oIa1CBobMA-w

Choose no. 5 of the earth traits for more protection.

So if I get it right, at first the elementalist bunker was hard to kill so people were all sad about it and complained so elementalist got nerfed. They became even easier to kill but they could still run away. So people complained so arenanet nerfed mobility. Now they can catch us the moment we go out of a keep and kill us easily without us getting away our only saving grace being mistform in downed state with which we have 3 seconds to run into a keep and get rezzed…..
Lets nerf that too…… seriously?

Jarek.2430:

Kodiak.3281:

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

Same reason why I use this build as well but with the upcoming trait changes I’ll probably move out of water and into air or something.
0/30/0/20/20 maybe.
10% more crit dmg+trait that gives +10% crit damage plus food that gives +10% crit damage…. already running around with 50% crit chance so that’d be an instant 15% damage boost. Similar to the 30 in water.

also the 20th in water I use for the regen on mistform, signet of water and icebow. The downed mist form does damage that way too which is a pretty neat trick. Otherwise there’s the 20% damage to vulnerable foes, vulnerability on signet/arcane, equip signet of air (new stunbreaker and perma speedboost+blind) I wonder if that’d work with lingering elements and then swapping to air making the lightning strikes hit for 20% more too….?

After the changes I’m going to do something completely different from everyone else:

Conditimentalist

I’ve been testing it lately, it’s pretty insane. If they give me a Stun Breaker on signets (they said they will regardless of the leaked notes) it’ll become pretty great. If the leaked notes are accurate, it’ll become fantastic.

^ Not a staff elem. Interesting build just not sure why you have ignored signet of Fire as part of you utilities. With such high condition damage you could hit for alot per sec and only hope they are unable to remove the condition.

XD that’s insane, barely any toughness or healing power.
Wouldn’t rabid gear with its toughness work better +runes of the undead for even more cond. damage? But yea condition duration is also an interesting spec. Haven’t tried that one yet.

I’ll also be changing over a bit. Not a huge change but I’m going 0/30/0/20/20 full zerker armor+rampager/cleric trinkets. even worse survivability but you hit like a truck while still being able to swap weapons with minor trait changes (so no complete rework of your traits).

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/elementalist/?1.0|6.1g.h1|0.0.0.0.0.0|1g.a7.1g.a7.1g.a7.1g.a7.1g.a7.1g.a7|3z.0.1o.64.1o.64.1j.68.1g.67.1a.9a|0.u6a9.0.k4a.k58|54.0|1m.1v.26.1y.2a|e

Hamartia.3421:

Good Eles run full zerker in PVE.

Worse Eles add some PVT or Knights for survivability

Terrible Eles stack healing power or go full PVT/Knights.

I will not be replying to people who go BUT ELE HAS GREAT HEALING SCALING because it doesn’t change anything. PVE is about damage.

That’s what I thought for a while too but having some healing power for long pve solo fights to outheal the opponnents dps is somewhat nice. That way you don’t need to constantly dodge thus gimping your dps.

After the upcoming patch I’m probably gonna play S/D exclusivly again :p. Got a great build in mind

All I know that this patch will increase one of my bursts damage by +50% and overall damage will be more consistent and higher thanks to air-25 (which actually works very very well with ice shards and the 20% increase damage to vulnerable foes).

Glyph of elemental power is now a stunbreaker….. in other words we have one less usefull stun breaker now… Now it’ll just be Armor of Earth, Mistform and Signet of Air for utilities I guess :p.

Glyph of elemental power is one of the worst skills we have… I can see why they wanted to improve it but this is not the improvement it needed….

Mirta.5029:

Yuujin.1067:

At least we’re back on topic.

So you believe that the answer to a Elementalist only mechanic is “Switch out utility and change your playstyle so that when cheesy Elementalist use this tactic during siege you have the utility available to CC them so they can’t get back inside”?

Yes. I’m sorry but both in Mobas and MMOs I have to switch my skills depending on a situation.
In regards to GW2: you can’t run a permanent build in dungeons nor in WvW. To be good at your class you actually have to adapt. When you’re asked for stealth in dungeons, you give stealth, when you need to immobilize, you immobilize, if you don’t adapt, then don’t be surprised that you can’t kill someone who did adapt.
In regards to games like Smite: I love going for a damager build in matches while playing tanks. Last time I played Vulcan I had to sacrifice my ability to kill efficiently just not to feed, hence for survival I had to go with magical protection and slows. The enemy team lost and the ones that were in our lane got blamed for it. Me and my friend had to explain that it’s not the players fault, but we were specking to be hard counters while they didn’t spec to adapt.
In short – in any competitive game a stagnant build will be the end of you.

WELL SAID!!!
There is no one trick pony. Elementalists are to be a jack of all traits not stuck into dps or healing or tanking. We got a little bit of everything. Mist form and an immobilize while downed are a couple of ’m.

I think you’ve got the right balance already. Though nowadays I dropped 3k hp and 300 healing power for double-triple the damage thanks to zerker gear and rampager trinkets.

yup, 20 arcane is a must and with the new changes 30 water has become less of a requirement…. Way less…. So instead of 0/20/0/30/20 I’ll probably be going 0/30/0/20/20.

yes eles always do terrible damage. Above and under water. Our highest damaging attacks max out around 16k while zerker necros can practically one-shot wariors, thieves hit 4k on auto attacks and mesmers go full zerk and beat ya to a pulp in no time. That’s why the pvp scene is plagued by bad mesmers and thieves. With the occasional beast warior/ranger/necro.

Kodiak.3281:

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

I only use staff in wvwvw and dungeons because if you have people that distract the mobs you can rain lots and lots of fire on them from afar.
Switched to all zerker gear recently and standard build: 0/20/0/30/20
That way your water skills don’t become totally useless.

To chime in this is the build I use 99% of the time as well because it also opens up D/D play as well if I want it or staff play.

Same reason why I use this build as well but with the upcoming trait changes I’ll probably move out of water and into air or something.
0/30/0/20/20 maybe.
10% more crit dmg+trait that gives +10% crit damage plus food that gives +10% crit damage…. already running around with 50% crit chance so that’d be an instant 15% damage boost. Similar to the 30 in water.

also the 20th in water I use for the regen on mistform, signet of water and icebow. The downed mist form does damage that way too which is a pretty neat trick. Otherwise there’s the 20% damage to vulnerable foes, vulnerability on signet/arcane, equip signet of air (new stunbreaker and perma speedboost+blind) I wonder if that’d work with lingering elements and then swapping to air making the lightning strikes hit for 20% more too….?

GS+Sw-Focus gives you a block, 2 blinds and you still have 2 dodges. Haven’t died with my guardian all the way to lvl 47 now.

In combat you should pay close attention to how the mobs move before they attack. All of ’m have something that give it away.

Also you can bind dodging to any key you want to make it easier for you.

That’s basically all I know and have used with great efficiency.

Bats screech and fly up slightly right before they attack.

Also as you are leveling always try to wear armor and trinkets not more than 5 levels under your own level.

Monsters have better drop rates if they haven’t been killed in a while or if you’ve just entered the area. I believe this is one of the core mechanics in gw2 drop rates resulting in the absence of an absolute farming location and encouraging exploration.

please become an elementalist we need more theory crafters. But honestly all the profession specific forums are negative (except for thief and mesmer and warrior only about pvp)
What helped me choose was youtube. Watch famous youtubers of each profession and see which you like best.
Nemesis-Necromancer
Daphoenix/Woodenpotatoes- Elementalist
Dontain- Warrior
etc.
You might also enjoy the guardian but I hope you’ll give the elementalist a try.

I used to be in Jade quarry and its pretty active. Stormbluff Isle is really active as well but since I live in europe I went to Piken Square (EU) which is also pretty active.

Elementalist does decent damage and has some support but I think a zerker guardian would allow you to do amazing damage and still have good group support.

Thrashbarg.9820:

Benji.9203:

Grevender.9235:

Sitkaz.5463:

Grevender.9235:

the choice is easy when choosing between mages in GW2:

Easy Mode: Mesmer

Nightmare Mode: Elementalist

What does that make Necros?

oh right, necro does exist too.

Necro: beginner mode with free cheats enabled

Since when were necros easy mode?
It’s pretty much the one class in the game that has to commit themselves when they enter a fight.
To put it simply: A necro escaping a zerg or surviving/winning a 2v1 is a highlight reel in and of itself.

It’s totally easy mode ;p

Here’s what you do:

Find a zerg near a high cliff. Get them to chase you off the cliff. Stand on their corpses spamming /laugh.

Or maybe that just means cliffs are OP….. Or players brains are UP…… Or something.

Or fear them off the cliff or spam staff aoe’s or one-hit wariors which I’ve read on the forum to be possible even though Necromancers have more health and Death shroud as a survivability mechanic.

Better minions (as in more of ‘m if you want), More health, more single target damage, more and somewhat better aoe’s that become unblockable with one trait.
Should I point anything else?

in dungeons for some extra stacks of vulnerability on enemy. But the vulnerability from shatterston doesn’t last long enough either.

I only use staff in wvwvw and dungeons because if you have people that distract the mobs you can rain lots and lots of fire on them from afar.
Switched to all zerker gear recently and standard build: 0/20/0/30/20
That way your water skills don’t become totally useless.

Sitkaz.5463:

Grevender.9235:

the choice is easy when choosing between mages in GW2:

Easy Mode: Mesmer

Nightmare Mode: Elementalist

What does that make Necros?

Necros can burst 28k dmg just l2p I guess

I used to always run around full bunker spec and cleric runes. Now I use a bit of everything with zerker stats and hybrid build. Do triple the damage I used to and I still don’t die simply because I learned how to survive.

it has decent aoe, no. 5 works on some bosses, nomber 2 can do 3kish dmg and apply vulnerability, no. 3 can do about 1.5k dmg up close I think and apply quite alot of chill + it goes through foes/mobs/aoe chill. no.1 can heal and for cleric elementalist the boost in healing power could be a go-to thing.

Those are some of the reasons I use ’m.
Plus as a zerker staff ele casting a ton of AoE is fun:
Meteor shower
Glyph of Storms
Ice bow no.4
Fiery greatsword no.5

etc. etc.