Guild Wars 2

Still bugged? The 3-crits on first hit are only the tip of the iceberg.

A few days ago, I did some target dummy testing to see the effects of Arcane skills with Elemental Surge. This gave the following results:

~Fire: only 3 hits activate AP.
~Water: next 5 Water Blasts activate AP, but when using Frozen Ground, the frozen ground ‘eats up’ charges without giving an effect.
~Air: next 5 Chain Lightning casts activate AP but each hit procs, resulting in a grand total of 15 activations per AP.
~When using both Arcane Precision AND Arcane Wave, in water they cause the DOUBLE amount of chill, wheras in Earth they cause only HALF the immobilize.

So basically, a Mesmer’s skills are more reliable than AP. You literally have no idea what could happen whenever you try a new combination.

After my previous statement, I got calculating some things and I came to the conclusion that my earlier assumption wasn’t entirely true.

In my build, I used 10 Fire Magic combined with the 30% chance to burn on critical trait. For my build, the dps increase on an auto attack was 13% on average.

However, as it turns out, that’s only when there’s no burning on the target and I spam only Fireball. In practice, some of my attacks do quite a bit more than that, and burning gets applied much more frequently. On the other hand, bountiful power adds 4-6% on average with a potential of 12% or even higher. Plus, it will get me 1k extra health, better condition removal and added healing power.

So I’m making the switch. Even the added condition duration isn’t worth it in my build, so I literally have little reason to use Fire Magic.

To me, 10 points in fire is enough to get a bit of extra damage combined with a bit longer conditions and a little extra oomph on my crits. I don’t design my builds around min/maxing stuff and with the calculations I’ve done, 10 points in fire added more than the alternatives.

But I cannot give you a specific reason other than the fact that I’m an allrounder in both build and playstyle (mostly for WvW purposes) and that I do not wish to go either glass cannon or bunker.

Lorat.1085:

STRAWMAN

I dont want the elementalist to do all.

COUNTER-STRAWMAN!

You yourself mention a long list of various kinds of things that specific classes can do better. The reason they are weaker for the elementalist is because they’re all combined on a single profession. That’s also the reason why we cannot combo on all our attunements. Because we have so many different skills. It’s a tradeoff.

But if keeping up your dps while also providing good utility isn’t your goal, then I honestly don’t understand what you’re trying to achieve with this discussion.

Lorat.1085:

You mean field, right? Cause the elementalist only has one ice field

I agree though! Being able to combo a field multiple times would be quite useful. It would be nice if the elementalist was capable of that. But hey, 1 blast every 15 seconds, and another every 20

I meant fields as in casting them multiple times during dungeons runs, so you’re right on that. As for my statement, I meant to say that actively working together as a team negates the need for an elementalist to finish their own fields. A smart thief could, when he sees a water field appear, use his blasts to heal himself to full. he wouldn’t even need my blast.

naphack.9346:

so I was thinking:
Fire: Ring of Fire
Air: Static Field
Water: Geyser
Earth: Earthquake

Then I was like “meh… Just take some random spells which don’t have that much in common”

Then it struck me. How about:
-Gain an aura based on your current attunement upon falling. Take 50% reduced falling damage.

That could work if the aura traits didn’t exist.

Blaine Tog.8304:

The versatility of the Elementalist is for naught if we don’t have the ability to dynamically adapt to the situation.

But the thing is, we DO have that ability. It’s just restricted through the attunement system, but there’s probably a good reason for that.

Lorat.1085:

5 finishers, 1 field = 5 combos.
1 finisher 5 fields = 1 combo.
Which is better?
Fields are all over the place when playing in groups.

Quality over quantity. Personally, I prefer the chill from my ice fields over the retaliation caused by guardian fields.

Best would be another class that uses their finishes to proc multiple times on my fields.

But wait, that would mean that…

To be honest, I’ve been pondering the potential of a staff-aura build using combo fields to create auras. But that mostly depends on wheter your traits proc on those. Say, eruption+frozen ground=frost aura+protection? Could make for an interesting support build…

Lorat.1085:

A few things
- d/d and shortbow thieves can use initiative to dodge, and with endurance, dodge continuously. The lack of conditional removal is more than compensated for by the ability to avoid getting inflicted with conditions.
- both classes need a healing skill for healing. Water healing is a really tiny bandaid.
-You have a 3 second chill skill on a 15 second cooldown. Frost aura requires you get hit. Not a good deal.
- A lot of ele skills suck, frankly. Im not sure where I was going with that, but every time I look though the 20 skills for a weapon setup, I seem to think “man, this blows” about half.
-Churning earth requires your incredibly fragile character to stand within hitting distance without moving for just over 3 seconds
-The condition removal is 1 every 40 seconds. That barely qualifies.
-You do have a bunch of knockdowns, but against bosses/tougher mobs, those arent that useful. It basically takes 5 to get 1 interrupt.
-Cluster bomb is the best blast finisher in the game. Maybe the best finisher. You can just stand in a field, aim at your feet, and cast area _ 5 times.
-Thief damage is better. Significant Id bet, though I have no numbers to back it up.
-Thief has more survivability, just because of the ease of dodging, and the ability to move twice as far from an enemy while attacking.
-Thief has more utility value. This is harder to measure, but 5 blast finishers, 1 after another, every 20 seconds? It cant make many fields, but it can finish a hellovalot better, and thats much harder to find.
-Initiative is the most unique profession mechanical, and it completely changes how the thief plays compared to other classes. 1 really good ability makes a weapon worth it, cause others just leach off your initiative.

Basically everyone I notice weapon switching has a short/long range combo, mesmers being the exception. Actually, I have no idea what rangers/necros and engineers do in that regard (can engineers even switch? they have like 3 total options, r, p/p, p/s) But of ones I’ve noticed, three of four go short/long

Then by all means, go play a thief. Most of what you mention here has been adressed several times already. But to sum it up:

Other classes can’t do all, so it’s unreasonable to ask for the elementalist to do all. If you want long lasting conditions, great support or high dps, then you have to pick and spec for it. You can’t have it all in the same build. Not even on the elementalist.

Lorat.1085:

ThiBash.5634:

So, how many professions have both multiple field types and finisher moves in the same weapon bar?

all of them?

They have single fields yes. Not multiple types. And how many of the weapons that create combo fields are actually dps weapons? Just about all weapon choices are about choosing between roles. The elementalist is less restricted in this but not to the point where they can do everything and not get penalized for it in some way.

Lorat.1085:

I think everyone understands that attunement change is required to play even moderately effectively as an elementalist. Thats the problem – the time change is so high, 15 seconds, you have to invest in the talent tree to make that more manageable, because the class requires that you use attunement switching. Basically, instead of using trait points to customize our character, we have to use them to compensate for kitteny balancing.

In forming an effective party, the poor damage means that support is the only real role, but the inability of elementists to combo their own fields reliably means they are subpar at that as well. They can supply fields, but others have got to finish them

But that’s the thing: you don’t NEED to finish your own combos in a team. You have your team to do that for you. You don’t have to switch if you deem it to be suboptimal at that point.

Blaine Tog.8304:

However, cross-attunement combos often make you choose between DPS and DPS or Utility and Utility.

The thing is, I get the feeling you’re looking at this the wrong way. The staff elementalist isn’t about dps to begin with. It’s about combining utility with damage, not to be the top damage dealer. The various combos are about doing just that. Combining Lava Font with stoning increases the effective dps of your stoning skill to the point where you can apply weakness to a target without losing the dps that fireball gives. Combining Eruption with Geyser allows you to damage a foe while also healing your melee allies that are standing next to them. That’s how I view the staff at any rate, mixing multiple types of effects rather than focusing on a single thing.

I still feel that at the price they make you pay for T3 culturals, it shouldn’t be anything less than exotic quality. Especially now.

Probably Jormag, since it already has a ‘zone’. Primordius has a small bit with destroyers but that’s it, not developed enough maybe.

I use my mouse mostly, and my arrow keys to move.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Except the long Attunement Swap cooldown fights you on this. It also means you can only produce combos if you’re ok leaving whatever Attunement had the Field. What if I want to combo my Lava Font, but I still need to be in DPS mode? I could switch to Earth for the combo finisher, but then my DPS takes a nosedive for 9-12 seconds. It’s a decision at odds with itself.

Which is why I liked the blast finishers on EA. It meant you could decide between safety and DPS or utility, rather than DPS and DPS or utility and utility.

So your main issue isn’t that combo system doesn’t work, it’s the fact that you have to sacrifice some dps to do so? That’s basically a ‘have your cake and eat it too’ problem. If you want an effect like that, you could switch to scepter/focus, or use Arcane Wave/Blast.

tigirius.9014:

ThiBash.5634:

Balance comes before realism. That’s why melee are able to hack through a pile of rocks with their swords faster than an engineer can blow it up with grenades.

You’ve just made my point for me. On second glance I think you did that on purpose? LOL

Not really. I was kinda illustrating why what you’re asking simply isn’t viable. You would basically invalidate any warrior build except a rifle wielding one.

Also, I feel that you cannot state that magic is more or less powerful than bullets and grenades. It gets even more iffy with Asuran tech, which combines both. With your reasoning a Glyphic Rifle should be less powerful than a normal one. However you simply cannot create a MMO that way.

Balance comes before realism. That’s why melee are able to hack through a pile of rocks with their swords faster than an engineer can blow it up with grenades.

cesmode.4257:

Take one stat: 63 power / 68 Power, 0.92 . This means that the exotic is 92% as powerful as the ascended, leaving 8%..The ascended is 8% more powerful.

Compound that, eventually, against every item, if the same statistical difference holds true for everything. You are saying this is not big?

One thing you should keep in mind though, is that a 1% stat increase doesn’t mean you become 1% more powerful.

Take vitality for example. Each point adds 10 health. Say you have 1000 vitality. That means you get 10000 extra health. Adding 1% vitality would mean you get 10100 extra health. That would be 1% more, except your base health isn’t affected. If that’s 10000 as well, it would effectively mean you only get 0.5% extra health. This is similar for other stats (though more complex, and the return is even less).

Gehenna.3625:

Advertisement in general is deceptive. They are trying to sell you something. I haven’t seen much or any advertisement that was actually objective and free of ambiguity or exaggerations.

Yeah, we have a great example of that in our supermarket.

There’s a fruit juice that claims to contain 50% pure fruit and 50% pure water, yet somehow they still managed to add a coloring substance to the mix. So besides it being an all natural product, you’re actually getting more than a full pack for your money’s worth!

Staff is viable in dungeons, mostly because you can reasonably predict what your target will do.

Well, you mentioned precision but unless you’re gonna get some power somewhere, or use traits that activate on critical hits, it’s not worth using in a support build.

Survival stats in general are useful for eles, so toughness/vitality is a good option. My advice would be to make sure you have at least 12k health so you can survive most boss spikes (but you probably knew that already).

As for more advice, it depends on what you want to use your build for. In my own build, I use a generic mix of all stats. Because I swap attunements a lot, I end up using a lot of different skill types (attacks, conditions and healing) and by mixing them up like that, I make sure any skill is decent. It also allows me to take full use of items like the Ancient Karka Shell, because I literally use all of the item. The benefit of this apporach is that I can reasonably supply what is needed at that particular moment in the fight. The downside of course is that nothing I do will ever be as strong as a specialist. But the combination works well enough for me, especially in WvW.

Leuca.5732:

You are getting the maximum benefit from conditions with a longer duration, and the ability to increase their duration is not limited to investing in a traitline. A scepter/dagger ele can stack 25 might without touching fire magic, and a dagger/dagger can get more than 10-12, so I don’t see why wasting time with might on cantrip could be seen as more beneficial than playing with a more universally effective line. Eles also have plenty of unconditional burning application, which stacks in duration, not intensity, making 30% chance to burn on crit a fairly useless trait, especially because it’s the weakest damage condition when it comes to numbers/side effects.

The fact is that there’s nothing the fire line can achieve that can’t be done more efficiently via equipment/other lines.

If you compare single builds then yes, I’d agree. However, if we take a staff bunker/cantrip build, they cannot stack might. So for them, it would be beneficial. Likewise, a precision build could use the trait to increase both their base damage and add a little extra to their spikes.

Basically, what you’re saying is that when it comes down to focused builds, the traits won’t add something worthwhile and I agree. However, for balanced builds, they can sometimes add something that they don’t have normally have acces to. And for that I’d say it can be worth investing a few points.

I believe the karma sets come close to what you need. And then there’s the cleric crafting set.

But bear in mind that our support consists of more than just healing power, so you don’t have to focus solely on that.

Lorat.1085:

And those are the only combo finishers eles get from their staff, they are still sorely lacking. And they don’t have a field under earth
Attunement timers means you cant use your finishers with your own field more than every 10.5 seconds (assuming maxed profession talent, 15 without)

So, how many professions have both multiple field types and finisher moves in the same weapon bar? Exactly.

It’s something that many of you just don’t seem to get: attunement swapping isn’t a gimmick. It’s the core mechanic of the class. You don’t HAVE to use it, but in order to get the most out of your class, you’ll have to. Just like how a ranger can do ok without their pet, but the game is designed on the assumption that they do.

The earth finishers are designed in such a way that you can place an Eruption, switch to fire, get a blast finisher, switch to air/water to another field, and then back to earth to shoot projectiles through it.

There is nothing wrong with that. We don’t need earth fields and we don’t need more finishers.

To make some distinction between the races you play. Not all racial skills are bad to be honest, and in some cases it depends on the class you play.

For example, the Asura golems are useless on an elementalist…their elemental summons will outclass them any day. But to a warrior, it may be the only way to get some summoned allies, so they could work. But not to the point that they make the warrior match the elementalist’s own skills. And that’s about the case for the other, non-elite racials as well.

They have their uses, but they’re slightly weaker to remove the balance headache.

Gaudrath.6725:

The main point is that people have the right to choose how they want to play – but if they choose to play with a quarter of their chosen class skillset, they should not be complaining that the class is weak and underpowered.

Indeed. To name but a simple example, wouldn’t a Meteor Shower be more powerful if you cast a Frozen Ground right after it?

I think you’re confusin Arcane Blast and Arcane Wave. For the record, he’s talking about the 1500 range projectile skill.

Yeah, but to be honest, I do understand why the ‘main questions’ were adressed. Anet had to do some serious damage control.

As for EA, guess no developer will ever know how sad we are.

Chamone.6890:

Mackdose.6504:

Avatar.1923:

the stat progression, as mild as it is, is in opposition to their original intent.

But that’s flat out incorrect. Mike O’Brien is on record stating that (mild) vertical progression has always been on the road map.

I wish he would have shared that little nugget of information more openly and freely with us, the people that bought his game on faith when it wasn’t even out, just to get access to the Beta.

I see no mention of it in the Manifesto, or any of the press releases written before October 2012.

That’s kind of the point. They may not have stated they weren’t gonna add it, but they didn’t exactly deny it either. Not until AFTER many people who bought the game specifically for the “no vertical progression ever” made their purchase.

The whole thing is just one big bit of nasty business, and to bo honest, I’m ready to move on. Time to look forward to the things we can enjoy in the game, instead of complaining about what we don’t.

Viator.9801:

the Range of most of our support abilities is right next to my “LITTLE TOE”

You play with your feet? Because if so, then I think I know why you have trouble playing the Elementalist…

Lorat.1085:

Arcane blast. Completely awful. I cant think of a single realistic scenerio it would be worthwhile. (Maybe if you were 1500 away and didnt want to get closer because it had some awesome 1 hit kill attack that couldnt be dodged, and it only had 500 hp left)

How about a fleeing player? Or the CoE path when you get to man the southern forst cannon? You can hit the boss with it without leaving the cannon.

Blaine Tog.8304:

6) Combo finishers. Especially now that EA has been gutted, Eles are sorely lacking in ways to complete our own combos. It’s great that we can throw down a lot of combo fields, but you know what? Everyone has combo fields and just about everyone has easy ways of completing their own combos. Many professions get combo finishers on their Weapon autoattacks. How awesome would it be if Fireball counted as a Blast Finisher (20% chance)? But nope, we get nothing as shiny as that because then we’d be too versatile or something.

This is one point I have to correct. Most of the earth staff spells are in fact combo finishers.

At least you can lower the cooldown on some of the healing skills.

By the way, if you wanna spam chill, there’s always Glyph of Elemental Power.

In Guild Wars 1, I always played earth because its spells were so versatile.

So yeah, the new Elementalist turned out pretty well for me.

Maybe it’ll happen in a future update.

TransparentlyOpaque.1824:

I’d like a reverse puzzle that is modeled after a giant sled-ride.

There’s a giant slope in Hoelbrak near the keg brawling.

Ryuujin.8236:

With great modesty,
The Incredible Zizi, future Grand High Sovereign of Tyria, alumni of the college of Synergetics, Golemancer, Mesmer and Greatest Asura Since Snaff™

Wow, just…WOW. Especially the TM at the end. Priceless.

Agreed. It’s a very useful feature and I made use of it as soon as I learned it was implemented.

Let it be known that I complain when it’s deserved, but also compliment when it’s deserved.

And a compliment is deserved in this case.

Heard some NPCs talking near the destroyed statue in Lion’s Arch and just to be sure…

Don’t make a Trahearne statue!

Thank you.

Moderator edit: removed CoC infraction

So they do glow in dark areas. Cool.

I think I may just get one to replace the torches in the dark area of the EB jumping puzzle…

THANKS!

Does anyone know wheter it glows in the dark like torches do?

mouse.1689:

funkin.3814:

Excellent tips. Thank you both.

Regarding Zephyr’s Boon, I have to admit I always found the wording a little confusing. Let’s say some guy finishes off one of my fields (I’m thinking fire aura since it happens so often). Did I apply it? In other words, who gets the swiftness and fury: me, him, or neither since it’s only for those auras that I apply to myself?

You only get it off Auras you apply to yourself. Water Dagger 4 and Air Dagger 3 give you auras which let you keep up Fury and Swiftness pretty much perpetually if you run Monk’s/Water Runes for boon duration.

You’re also supposed to be able to get an Aura proc using Earth Dagger 3 combo with RoF, but it’s been bugged since last patch.

Never thought of that. What about Frost Armor (the ice field blast finisher)? Would that work too?

The cheapeast, easiest to get armor that I can think of (with exactly the stats you descrive by the way) is the set you can buy with the tokens from Ascalonian Catacombs (explorable). The dungeon itself is relatively easy, and you’ll rake up enough tokens quickly enough.

Best of all, you’ll make money instead of spending it.

For levelling, I greatly recommend the elemental summons, together with the Air trait ‘Quick Glyphs’. They will make your life a lot easier.

Hi! I’ll respond to the top part since it’s a quote from me.

Obviously the key phrase I’m going to point you to in that quote is, “if someone wants to play for a thousand hours to get an item that is so rare that other players can’t realistically acquire it”. That really is the litmus test we’ve used. That’s why, at ship, we gave better stats to exotic gear and didn’t give better stats to legendary gear.
More generally, I hope we’ve been clear that GW2 is not a game with virtually no stat progression in it like GW1 was. That’s why GW2 shipped with a higher level cap, and with a hard separation between PvE and PvP. In GW1 we never advanced the level cap through four campaigns/expansions. The game design didn’t allow for it. But GW2 was designed without those restrictions, and we’ve always expected that we will someday raise the level cap in GW2.
That’s why we’ve always said that GW2 rewards players through both progression and collection, whereas GW1 primarily rewarded through collection. Presumably players aren’t shocked that GW2 rewards through progression, since it has a level 80 cap.

I wonder if the core sentiment is more this: It’s only been two-and-a-half months! We don’t even all have exotics yet, and already you’re introducing another tier. Is this the start of a power progression curve that I’ll never be able to keep up with?

I certainly appreciate that worry. I myself don’t want a constant struggle, as exists in some other games, to keep my equipment viable.

Then we’re left with a balancing act. Some progression is ok, but pushing players onto gear treadmill isn’t ok and isn’t what the game is about.

So I would ask you to judge us by details, and not by making slippery-slope arguments. We introduced a ton of new content in November, and the sum total of new progression rewards we added to go with it provided a 5-10% stat increase in 2 of 12 slots. I hope you’ll agree that that kind of very shallow and gradual progression does not force people onto a gear treadmill.

I think it’s important for GW2 to be able to have this kind of gradual progression. Of course we made some mistakes with the way we introduced ascended gear. (See ChrisW’s answers for details.) But those are addressable issues. I don’t think they invalidate the fundamental concept that GW2 can have gradual stat progression without being a gear treadmill game.

This is actually a very good explanation. While I still don’t agree with it, I do feel less betrayed than before. It’s acceptable for me and I thank ArenaNet for the answer.

While it’s still easier to point the finger and blame than to accept the upcoming plans with gear, I must admit that overall, I’m reasonably satisfied.

Yes, there will be new gear coming out all the time. Yes, it will have better stats and yes, we will have to keep playing to keep up.

But also, it will be relatively easy to get. No more endless fractal grinding. We will again be able to play the game the way we like and come across ascended gear while we play.

Even if grinds are relative, I hope it won’t be that much harder to get compared to current exotics. Because enough is enough.

Like I said, it’s easy to start arguing again but for now, I’m a bit more at ease than I used to be.

The main issue I have with these analysis is that although failrly accurate, they fail to incorporate WHY the Asura would want to wage war?

They’ve already got a fair number of the other races working for them. They’ve got no desire for military conquest, only scientific discovery. In the end, the Asura got everything they want and need through peaceful means. Why would they wage war just to destroy some distant nation with cat-people that can also be convinced to help them peacefully? All they need to do is hand out some minor trinkets. Whatever damage the Charr may cause with that is irrelevant because it’s highly unlikely to ever affect the Asura themselves.

Leuca.5732:

What trait do you “need” from fire magic

How about the +3 might when using a cantrip or the 30% chance to cause burning on crit?

And condition duration increase is useful for more than just bleeding&burning you know…

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Yeah for a normal game company i dont think it would be that hard

That’s a discussion we’d best not get into, as it has no value to the problem in this thread.

So yes, adding a cooldown would be an acceptable way to solve that problem from a gameplay point of view.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Thats true a simple fix – activate every 10seconds then they wouldnt be changed at all or maybe 15seconds

Yes, the fix would be simple…but the programming required to make the actual change is not. That’s kinda what I was referring to.

Yeah, let me rephrase that:

ThiBash

Agreed. Arcana isn’t needed, especially since most skills have bigger cooldowns than your attunements.

However, there’s some very nice traits in there too that I just like too much to pass up.

Better?

You probably weren’t the one who came up with the name, but really…was that the only ‘cool’ name that could be attached to it?

As for how it works, yes it’ll work with a scepter too, though you may wanna check if you have enough auras to activate the air trait.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

why not reduce the attunement switching to 1second cool down?

Because we also have traits that activate whenever you swap attunements. They’d have to be rebalanced, making it a bit harder than just lowering the cooldowns.

Agreed. Arcana isn’t needed, especially since most skills have bigger cooldowns than your attunements.

However, there’s some very nice traits in there too that are just too nice to pass up.