Guild Wars 2

Dagger no. 5 in earth is a fun combo with lightning flash, you can teleport while it channels allowing you to hit almost 100% of the time. You can also use it as a threatening mechanism, some people choke up when they see you charging up the churning earth.

Also its good to know how other professions work, what CC’s they have on each weapon and being able to recognize those so you can act accordingly and not mess up mid-fight by channeling churning earth while they still have CC off cooldown.

I run a zerker blind build on my ele and win 1v2 fights from time to time. Small burst of 10k dmg and 1-2k dmg on air auto attack.

Make use of the terrain with your mobility and use timed dodges, CC and blinds to counter your opponents.

But that’s near the latter stages of your training. Right now you should just practice D/D and get a feel for the timing and cooldowns.
That’s that comfortable feel you’re getting.

As for sustained damage; try glyph of elemental power instead of lightning flash, only use churning earth in team fights or after you CC’d your opponent, swap out mistform for armor of earth. Use blast finishers in your firefields.

As for the initial engagement:
RTL-updraft-fire-3-5-4-earth-4-5-interrupt-water-3-air-auto-attack… Also use your auras whenever they’re off cooldown.

I go D/D 60206 with blinding ashes, seem to be able to 1v2 quite easily but beating or not beating people all seems to depend on how fast their attackspeed is, how much I can dodge and if they’re able to give proper chase or CC me.

you in EU? you can add me if you want a day of tips and tricks in pvp.

sigil of fire, sigil of force si what I use…

02066 with evasive arcana, zephyr’s boon and D/D for pvp. Once you master that try fresh air ele and staff ele.

Skenderbeu.9102:

I think elementalists will become boring if this ever happens. Sticking to just one element doesn’t have any sort of randomness to it nor any outplaying potential (maybe some) but you will be incredibly easy to read when matched up against solid enemies.

What attracts me about the elementalist is that the class is so much fun to play with all the attunement hopping and the more you play it the more you memorize and gain momentum of when to switch inbetween attunements in the most crucial of situations especially in WvW and organised raids with a raid leader.

I support the way elementalists are now because they offer boons in form of protection, swiftness, might and regeneration to allies on attunement swaps which is incredible considering fighting against enemies with active retaliation, the regeneration from switching into water attunement can nullify a portion of the damage done to you by the retal.

I agree that the current state of elementalists is great and the gameplay is engaging, fun and rewarding to learn. That’s why I said it could be a grandmaster trait in arcana. Seeing as all of the people that like the atunement hopping they will almost always go for Evasive Arcana but when someone doesn’t like atunement hopping (very few of those but they exist) it’d be nice to offer them a different fun grandmaster trait in the Arcane traitline. Though I’m guessing that’d go against the atunement recharge reduction you get from that traitline… Maybe have it be 4 different grandmaster traits each in their respective traitlines? As in we’ve got a trait for reducing recharge and increasing damage per atunement why not have one that also lets you get aditional benefits from staying in one atunement. Each atunement would also give different situational bonuses. Its not a one thing wins all.

Loboling.5293:

Ya, I’ve actually been playing around with a condi (blinding ash) build with D/F. I just love mobility, so I have a hard time committing to the build, although if people try to fight me 1v1 its very strong.

There is definitely some variance among ele builds. It kept me entertained for almost a year now, but I feel like I cant make a build really work with elemental weapons or glyphs, and not a big fan of all signet builds. What that leaves me is very few skills to slot. I guess I’m a little sad my signet of earth, Fiery Greatsword, rush into lightning flash is gone. It was fun to one shot people too clueless to see it coming, or those out of any condi removal. It feels like there is a certain rhythm to each ele spec, once you have it, its like playing out the same thing over and over. I actually felt the same about my thief before I switched to Ele. It was super fun, but once I got the rhythm of the spec down, it was more like watching a movie…lol My Burst ele spec is a little different, cause I got some moments in spvp mostly (and a few in wvw), where I kill a whole group in a few seconds and laugh. I still like the elementalist, but aside from switching between my 4 specs, I don’t get many surprises anymore.

I remember with my engi (although maybe is was cause I was a newb back then) I would pick a few skills and make my whole build around it, and with a lot of tweaking I could get it to work. I had slickshoes burst builds, 3 kit (bomb/grenade/EG) or (bomb/EG/toolkit), various S/D builds (rifle turrent//utility goggles/rocket boots/grenades/toolkit/battering ram, and probably some I don’t remember now), Elixir specs, and now I see all sorts of turret specs. A lot of variety. It was also fun/cheap to be a rifle engi in jumping puzzles.

Almost everyday I logged on, I changed builds. But I always looked like crap… If they would change hobosacks I would switch back very quickly. lol

About race, I think sylvari is cool, but when leveling them, I found I couldn’t relate to waking up from the dream as interesting as it sounded. And all my asurans have gotten on my nerves with how full of themselves they are. Norns are heavy drinkers and I don’t really like drinking much in real life, so it clashes with me again. I loved Charr for a while, but just preferred human. (I also RP a little, and I think my human characters RPing about hating the charr has rubbed off on me lol)

try the aoe spam staff support build.
glyph of storms in air, frost bow aoe, FGS aoe, Meteor shower, not sure what the final slot would be though…

I’m saving up for new character slot because I still need a mesmer, already have 60+ tomes of knowledge and one of those scrolls for the first 20 lvls :p

Kuju.2153:

I like to run Elixir R when going with at least 3 points in the Tools Traitline.. then I can toss for condi removal if I desperately need and it resets cooldown when i hit 25% hp to toss again for self rez attempt (obviously you use on a teammate if necessary). You can run Elixir C I suppose, but I feel if I am going to slot an elixir for condi removal then it might as well be elixir R for the endurance gain + rez utility. Thats just my opinion.

Healing Turret is nice too, but keep in mind the burst with condition removal doesn’t always fire right away (annoying), so don’t detonate or move out of the field too quickly.

Going three points into Alchemy gets you 1 condi turned into a boon every 15 seconds. Also, some builds are run with Sigil of Generosity to give 1 condi back on crit (60% chance) every 9 seconds.

Lastly, elixir gun skill #5 actually removes 1 condition upon initial heal, which is not stated on the tooltip.

you sir are a genius

6/10 looks pretty bland.

below is one of my armor sets the other one looks kinda grim.

Grenix.1576:

Elixers are weak imo. Too slow casting/animation time. 1 sec for throwing a potion on the ground? rlly? Guardians can spam 6 skills in 1 sec why do we need to be nerfed with slow animations and cating times.. Really if you like elixer engineer, try playing shout guardian. You wont roll back to engie.

I play 7/8 professions including shout-guardian yes they are supperior but that doesn’t immediately mean that HGH’s condi removal is useless its just harder to pull off and not as effective…

Mbelch.9028:

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

why not have the air no. 5 knock down be you jumpin into the air and onto the target knocking them down? It’d look cool, gain a bit of an effect and we’d love the devs a whole lot more just because.

Yeah that was my idea with the water knockdown. It teleports you to the target you knock down. It makes sense with the air one too.

Only thing is if you don’t have anything selected for the skill, it should still automatically do its effect at max range.

that would make it more of a RTL which the dagger already has. Plus we also already have lightning flash…

Norn Ranger?
http://www.gw2armor.com/norn/male/medium_list.php
this might help you make a decision.

Asura might be more fun but I think the sylvari and humans have better medium cultural armor.

well all three of those are classes that require alot of apm (actions per minute). I’d say you could widen your gaze and try other professions as well.
Why not try sylvari or a small asura engineer? I use a simple rifle barbarian build on my engineer with runes of the wurm. 29k hp and still do decent damage. you do most certainly lack toughness though so I switched it up with a turret build and the toolkit for dmg and rifle for chasing.

This is all in pvp ofcourse, I also main elementalist and am having lots of fun with the D/F GoEP spellslinger celestial build (40226).

WELCOME BACK!!!

just interrupt your no. 5 halfway and switch to water for no. 3 if you feel uncomfortable about staying still for the duration of churning earth + you’ll heal up, chill foe and have 9 stacks instead of 6 then dodge roll in water for an extra heal/damage mitigation/ condi removal and switch to air to chase ’m down knock ’m down and spam 1.

heals over all don’t help much but for sake of argument; this is what I would and have done:
Shout-hammer-gaurdian with runes of the grove. The hammer auto attack puts down a symbol that can be buffed to last 2 seconds longer this way you can provide 100% uptime of the protection boon which reduces all incoming damage by 33% for those affected.
The nice thing about it is that you can still spec for damage while being a good support for your team.

I used to run a cleric elementalist but I achieved the same result with hammer guardian but the hammer guardian is also able to do decent damage in the proces of keeping people alive.

Nanyetah Elohi.4852:

also, I don’t seem to be getting killed faster at soldiers ascended armor than clerics exotic.

you get killed in clerics exotic…. how is that even possible? When I went full clerics bunker build I was able to survive an onslought of 5 people in tpvp for 6 minutes before a backstab got me. (I was somewhat lucky with my opponents though, I hardcountered all of ’m).

Anyways, the usefullnes of healing power only comes to show based on what healing signet you use and what build you’re running. If y’r trying to stay above 90% hp for runes of scholar, dmg trait in water and the earth grandmaster immunity to conditions then having a boosted passive heal from signet of restoration is vital to your build.
If you’re going for sustained dps having attleast some healing power will up your battle potential, you could fight 2 instead of 1 effectively.

how about this for a good arcana gm trait:

The longer you stay in one atunement the stronger a certain effect becomes?

like in fire you burn all nearby foes the longer you stay in fire the bigger the radius that people get burned at becomes. In air it just ups your movementspeed by 1% every second, earth you move slower but you gain toughness and a form of retaliation that ups in strength the longer you’re attuned to earth and in water since we already have a passive heal have something like condition duration is upped the longer you stay in water. (would work wonders for chill builds).

Those are just some ideas off the top of my head, you guys might have cooler ideas.

why not have the air no. 5 knock down be you jumpin into the air and onto the target knocking them down? It’d look cool, gain a bit of an effect and we’d love the devs a whole lot more just because.

I once did a double greatsword spirit weapon build with on swap sigils of hydromancy and such. It was gimmicky but the dps was great.

earth, it needs a spike dmg and more healing…

focus has become my favorite off-hand…

I quite enjoy the music you’ve got on your vid

I like the elixers, I just see the f1-4 elixer skills as condi-removal. Plus one of ‘m gives guaranteed stability, another stealth and then there’s the main invulnerability elixer S allowing for some very decent stomping in pvp.

Darius the Prime.2137:

Hi guys
As the title says…

I´m kinda new engineer. So far, I like the playstyle very much. But conditions are really a big problem for me. I understand, that they are meant to be our weakness. But I don´t get it – how do you deal with condition-based specs? Not only necro, but ranger, thief etc.
Any help appreciated, thanks in advance. Have a nice day

HGH, clear condis with elixers, gain might and boons while doing so and then just shoot away at them with the rifle. Rifle auto-attack is actually quite good.

Eleivo.2761:

Hi everyone, I’ve seen a few of these posts in other Forums, and wanted to start one here!

I’ve been playing Mesmer for quite a while, but decided to shelf it for now. Now I’m trying to pick a new class. Hopefully you all won’t mind discussing how engi is currently doing, along with what you feel are its strengths and weaknesses.

Just some ideas, talk about whatever you feel like:
s/tPvP – easiest/hardest opponents
WvW – Roaming, Havoc, Zerg
PvE – Dungeons/Fractals
Skill Floor/Ceiling for the class
Is Engi the least played class, or are they all hiding from me?

Thanks everyone!

Engineer has one of the highest skill ceilings in the game. but any bomb build can win you a match or you can run through a dungeon with a simple bomb-kit build and do just fine.
Engineer are just not really a much used profession in general pve content.
Engineer in pvp is invaluable.

Haven’t done much wvw with my engineer yet. I’m mainly a pvp player.

you are a really good engi, I wonder if I’ll ever get that good, I’m currently running a variation with HGH and rifle.

MightyMicah.7451:

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

Male human ele since pre-launch

Is that…Hulk???!!!

Yea that’s my hulk friend, I’m Iron Man, I’ve also found and beaten Loki in pvp. He was a mesmer :p

I feel that the thieves attackspeed compared to the other professions is simply too high. A 10-20% reduction would allow other professions the little leeway they need to defend as it sits now we get attacked 3 times when we dodge and 2 of ’m hit and one of ’m gets dodged. Then when we decide to strike back we get hit 5 times when we attack once.

But the number of actually decent thieves is quite low and only when I got staff zerker ele do I stand absolutely no chance against ’m. The real problem is when two of ’m jump you at the same time stealth-rezzing is also an issue.

Male human ele since pre-launch

I prefer rune of the grove, its root has saved me and annoyed foes soooo often. Plus since I use signets passive healing I have no use for the healing runes that provide a bonus upon healing skill usage.

if you focus on applying burns and poison, slowly whittling him down all you need to do is a timely dodge. Don’t lose your cool. Also mesmers have very poor chasing ability so if you see that y’r about to lose just go out of combat, cleanse and heal back up.

Many of the condi mesmers will apply confusion due to clones exploding so try and dodge those, destroying them will only apply more condi stacks on you.
I’ve been able to beat some condi mesmers, sometimes they have very low health so bursting them down in fire and air tends to work. If you beat ‘m before they can apply any conditions on you you’ll win 4 sure.

Liewec.2896:

in pvp i play a Stoneheart Conjure ele,
its not a serious build though, you just stay in earth attunement and nuke people with Lightning Hammer, Frost Bow and Fiery Greatsword :P

it basically plays like a zerker warrior

here is my build incase you’re interested,
once again its not a serious build, just hella fun chasing warriors as a “melee-ele”

This is how everybody should approach their theory-crafting. “is it fun” rather than ‘does it work in high competitive play’.

I run a similar thing with blinding ashes as a D/F elementalist. with arcane grandmaster trait ya can blind spam alot. Have had warriors whisp me: ‘I miss every hit I take’, 3 matches later ‘Still haven’t hit you with eviscerate, it always misses, aaargh!’
Ofcourse that is combined with the Focus innate defensive abilities and a timely dodge here and there. Add in some perma weakness on foes you hit and ya got y’rself a set-up for zerker gear but I’d bet that going soldiers or clerics could work too.

Blackjack.5621:

cheese.4739:

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

I just use gust on people that’re stomping and I use 2 as I’m charging into a fight while charging the skill, the blind at the start of the fight always comes in handy.
Nothing broken about those two skills, they’re just somewhat situational

Also, a well-timed Blinding Surge on someone in an invuln transform (Mist Form Ele, Mini Engi…) or timed block will get you a high-damage hit and a blind as they come out.

how can you time lightning surge when it casts 1,5 seconds? you simply can´t because it´s bad design, random blinds shouldn´t be in the game either.

Swimsasa Stoon.8936:

I just use gust on people that’re stomping and I use 2 as I’m charging into a fight while charging the skill, the blind at the start of the fight always comes in handy.
Nothing broken about those two skills, they’re just somewhat situational

somewhat situational means more like useless during the fight because they don´t land or you die before it goes off.

If you die before it goes off that either means your opponent was too good or you missed an opportunity to practice dodging.

for pvp:

00/6/4/4 D/F bunker build.

it works well against conditionmancers. Y’r in luck if the intire opposing team is condition because you can basically sit on a point indefinately without dying.

00644 earth shield build might work for pve. glyph of elemental power while in air atunement will help greatly.

2200 hours of total game-play 1400+ hours on my elementalist. I’d say the elementalist is alot of fun in pvp and pve though a bit too squishy for wvw. I like to make my own niche builds for pvp and get compliments about ‘m almost constantly. Don’t get that with the other professions I play.

comparison of ele vs. guardian in dungeons:
guardian – auto attack – alt tab to check skype and facebook and check back in every so often to cast a wall of reflection.

Ele – weaving through the elements protecting, cleansing, healing, buffing, damaging everything and everyone.

But the first 500-600 hours I was bad at the elementalist sticking to one atunement and such. Once you get used to the weaving between atunements the fun really starts. Learning all the CD’s intuitevly to the point where you don’t even need to look at your cooldowns. (besides maybe utility).

I’m using blinding ashes D/F 62006 build with celestial amulet and runes of the Wurm. It gives decent hybrid damage and lots of damage mitigation. Problem is that there’s so much stuff you can do and choose to do that I just get plain confused as to what I should do :p. It also works with Staff but dueling with Staff is a whole lot harder to do.

I do like the combination of constantly applying blinds and the focus inherent defensive features.

Male human elementalist here. You can see some of my armors in my signature and I’ll link another picture too.

I just use gust on people that’re stomping and I use 2 as I’m charging into a fight while charging the skill, the blind at the start of the fight always comes in handy.
Nothing broken about those two skills, they’re just somewhat situational

I’d say:
I’m giving party-wide every boon known to man + heals and I’m still doing more damage than you; how dare you ask for more?

D/F berzerker with spell slinger and strength runes.
perma 25 might stacks with the high speed Dagger auto-attacks. Could add in a lightning hammer instead if you want.

1900 x (1+1,0 × 2,34-1)=1900 x (2 × 1,34) = 5092
This is the effective power I can reach with my warrior before mightstacking…

How do you add up 1000x (1,2×0.7) to be over 8000?

luatnguyen.5064:

Hi I am coming back from a 5-6 month break from the game where I played as an elementalist (only up to level 39 though so I’m still very much a noob). At that time there was a lot of stuff going around the forum saying that ele was the most fun class to play but was the worst/weakest of them all. I just wanted to know with all the changes thus far, has the power level of the elementalist change at all, if so for better or worse?

Biggest change for me is that the focus has become viable. 6 months ago it was unusable and now its my prefered weapon in pvp.

been playing D/F soo long, haven’t really tried out staff much in pvp yet. Will have to try that out sometimes soon

Soulblighter.4187:

i’ve been playing for a while and havnt really done much with the elementalist and the other day i was sitting around bored and got thinking about diff ele ideas and this is what i came up with

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fFUQFAGBlNbZYygOaAIAjYMYGIuBEAygFnCHBA-ThBFABIt/o8LNdAtdBAA4BAUo6PXpEMAwBwwDHAWf91Xf91b4hHe4hHuUAjKMC-e

so far its working out ok me personally am not that far due to work and other things . but my brother on the other hand liked it so much he made a new toon to try it it’s at lvl 63 and seems to be doin fairly well with out too many issues

he also was the one who dubbed it wet zapper due to how i suggested playing it
wich would be to F4 , W2 , W1(auto atk until attunement cooldown over) , A2 (on switch free lightning), A1 , A5, E2 (for a little xtra dps) , E5 (little more dps and means to move away a bit if needed ) use AB as often as cooldown allows rinse and repeat or well any rotation u like as long as you switch to air alot get that free lightning lol

was wondering wt ppl think

its basically a fresh-air build but then with staff instead of Scepter.

glyph of elemental power while in air provides near permanent weakness up-time on foe, Add in couple auras + elemental shielding and runes of the grove for good protection up time, That basically reduces incoming damage by well over 50% total.
As for the healing, sigil of doom for again near perma poison up-time.

But I have no idea what achievement you’re talking about…

Valkyrie is better in my opinion. more hp also protects against pesky conditions + since you probably have near perma fury up time the extra crit damage outweighs the extra crit chance. Or if its in pve/wvw you could combine the two.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fNAQNAV8YnMqQvKWxC+CCXLGAToaPAdaA86GcvBXwEnxRf8KC-TJxGABA8EAkqMQuXEAf2fAA

This is my tpvp point-holder build. So far it has been the only ranger build that I’ve been able to work with. Win 90% of all 1v1’s but lose in mere seconds when it turns into a 1vX.

I really enjoy playing my ranger. Just want to know if there are any good 1vX ranger builds out there.

wow very nice combos and gameplay