Guild Wars 2

Let them mesmers have fun. I don’t even bother anymore, and I find it quite hilarious!

Warhorn Bugs:

• Some warhorn skills still sounds like farts (I MEAN IT, FAAARTS): Fire #4, Water #5, Air #5, and Earth #5 – some of them have minor sound issues
• You cannot back-cast/side-cast Lightning Orb (only diagonal, and frontal); not sure if intended.

Jski.6180:

Valento.9852:

This is extremely support-ish, but tempests don’t need support role… not with staff being awesome and well-stablished. Ele lacks condi. damage and raw damage… folks thought this would be the focus… as much as they try to push a mid range support, no one is buying this idea.

That very confusing what your saying why dose tempest not need to be a support roll? If any thing tempest is support comply.
Tempest maybe the first true healing support of GW2.

Its a cool build but its a question of rune set your only getting 4 condition removals from that set i would think of the mnk would be better.

Are you basing that on Element Bastion and that cheap healing coefficient?

I don’t get the current outrage against raid-exclusive items, including legendary precursors. Since day #1 everyone knows legendaries in general have the same stats as top-tier equipment (this holds true even after they added ascended to the game), and the top tier are STILL easier/faster to craft than a legendary.

Why do people rant so much for content-exclusive rewards? Doesn’t it already happen with Tequatl weapons+mini, Triple Trouble armor+minis, sPvP-related stuff such as Glorious armor sets and llama minis? Fractal weapons and tonic? Probably they’ll introduce things WvW-specific too (by now we have Mistforged weapons).

I just… don’t get it.

This is extremely support-ish, but tempests don’t need support role… not with staff being awesome and well-stablished. Ele lacks condi. damage and raw damage… folks thought this would be the focus… as much as they try to push a mid range support, no one is buying this idea.

Axialbloom.8109:

I recommend refocusing the Tempest onto condition damage.

I secretly long for that too, specially attached to warhorn.

Oh, I thought about a trait here (reworked Unstable Conduit):

• Unstable Conduit: Deals damage and launches foes if interrupted when overloading an attunement. (Cooldown: 20s)
  • Launch: 700
  • Damage: 750

What do you guys think? If this replaces Earthen Proxy we can get Gale Song + new Unstable Conduit for a great interruption negation build. I put 20s ICD because you shouldn’t be able to spam, but I also don’t think it’s too low because it fits an anti-interruption meta + works beautifully in PvE. Damage coefficient or additional effects are on devs’ hands.

Fuzzion.2504:

Just bad. I think it needs an entire rework.

Could you detail how it’s bad or why it needs a rework? The devs won’t be able to fix or adjust if you give vague feedback.

Ganathar.4956:

The Great Al.2546:

Valento.9852:

Your suggested “Rebound!” is far more useful than the current one, but it requires us to predict some stuff and it can be very hard to do. It’s different than other elite specs which have a fixed effect for elites which doesn’t depend on third criterion. You could give us a 10sec PBAoE effect that empower allies around the tempest to increase effectiveness in an area (damage? outgoing condi. duration? periodic super speed?). If it could give some sort of boon, I wouldn’t mind to channel it, as long as I’m not forced to stay in melee.

I agree, I still don’t like it. This seems like the only spec that is specifically designed for something like high level Raid content. This elite spec is missing the fun factor that other elites (esp Reaper, DareDevil) have…would greatly prefer an elite skill that summons some sort of storm.

Due to its raid-centric design the tempest might be mandatory in raids, especially if rebound can be used to negate the effects of some massive boss attacks that could lead to wipes. Get ready for everyone to continue whining about how the elementalist is top tier in every game mode

I agree with that aswell. We don’t know raids, only the devs do. If they feel like we can provide some serious advantage at raids, then maybe the suggested elite can be considered part of our very elite spec?

@rotten, Heat Sync is the core skill for the WH. The reason we may equip it even if we’re not attempting at being support. It’s like a weapon-defining skill, along with Sand Squall and Water Globe. And I’m still hoping for a trait that increases condi. damage when wielding a WH.

The spec felt strong this time, and I have kind of given up on trying to deal damage in air (used mainly fire). However, the channeling nature of overloads render the spec useless in serious PvE (I’m looking at constant-CC mobs in raids).

In my humble opinion you devs could sit down and split gameplays throughout the traits, much like Daredevil and pretty much all the other elite specs. It’s not like the overloads idea is complete useless. It is not useless. But you have to work out what you want to offer us with the elite spec, so we don’t feel like “oh, base ele can do better”, or “why am I spec’ing if it doesn’t offer new gameplays” (I’m looking at chronomancer usefulness, and reaper chill damage).

Your suggested “Rebound!” is far more useful than the current one, but it requires us to predict some stuff and it can be very hard to do. It’s different than other elite specs which have a fixed effect for elites which doesn’t depend on third criterion. You could give us a 10sec PBAoE effect that empower allies around the tempest to increase effectiveness in an area (damage? outgoing condi. duration? periodic super speed?). If it could give some sort of boon, I wouldn’t mind to channel it, as long as I’m not forced to stay in melee.

One thing I tried was running. I used all my skills to see how movable/evasive the spec was (since WH is melee), and I kind of felt it was a bit lacking in that department (only one synergic enough to get me out of a situation was Burning Speed). Supposedly, our CC should be enough to help us stay alive (Tidal Surge W/Water #4, Shocking Aura D/Air #3, Cyclone W/Air #4, Dust Storm W/Earth #5). Cyclone has a swiftness factor but I’m still studying if it’s worth rather than some sort of Teleport + Control (not sure if it would be too OP if it was control PLUS teleport, though).

One thing I noticed that really helps survivability is Blinding Ashes (5s cause blindness upon setting foes on fire). It can be coupled with Overload Fire + Drake’s Breath + Wildfire. If you trait into Burning Precision it helps even further, but then we need a condi. removal trait if you’re trying fire/air/tempest, and it leads me to…

Condition removal. Not sure if I was the only one, but I kind of preferred Ether Renewal rather than the other healing skills, and I also took Burning Fire to help cleansing condis. If I spec’d into water everything would be smoother, but then I’d lose Bolt to the Heart (+20% boost to foes under 50%, not an unusual scenario, and specially strong against legendaries and champions).

For the traits I always get Latent Stamina + Tempestuous Aria, for GM I usually get Element Bastion (REALLY helps survivability with Frost Aura but the healing is too meh to even consider part of the trait). I think Speedy Conduit is the most useless minor trait I have ever seen in this game, considering how overloads work. When overloading, you don’t need to be fast, except maybe Overload Water to get away from the mobs? But in team gameplay you will have someone giving you swiftness every now and then, so having swiftness to channel something onto a stack of mobs isn’t useful in any way, it doesn’t help me because if I want to get away I will simply evade out of a situation, or Lightning Flash away, or blind foes so I can safely run away. If I’m in a bad situation I won’t need swiftness to continue channeling because the overall point of overloading an attunement is staying onto the mob (except water), and if I’m running away I will simply give up on going on with the channeling, right? Replace it with 2 stacks of stability upon STARTING an overload.

TL;DR Fire feels strong, melee overloading is a no-no without stability, “Rebound!” will hardly ever be used and is way less useful than other elite specs’ elites, we may need more evasion depending on upcoming content. Traits are… bad.

Has anyone else noticed that Tempest’s Water Globe is a self-moving 4sec water field with 50s cooldown, while Berserker’s Flames of War is a character-centered 5sec fire field with 25s cooldown? Also, Water Globe only pulses healing 4 times and fades away, while Flames of War first cleanses 2 conditions, pulsing burning, and delivering a final hit with decent damage + 2stacks burning (5s).

@Edit
I know that they serve different purposes, but Flames of War only strengthens the stacking meta, doesn’ it?

Jski.6180:

Valento.9852:

And taking warhorn or shouts is less effective than anything else core ele can do. It cannot replace anything at all. For these to be worth, it shouldn’t be stronger, but on pair with core ele, which isn’t the case.

Shouts are something new for ele altogether the thing about most ele utility they are self only where something like shouts are very team base. Mostly the fire shout and frost shout are going to be major useful for your pt. WH on its on is not that good but it lets you brake pt stuns boots the ranges on your boons and lets you give your pt boons that ele cant not give out.

You just said the two small things WH is bringing: AoE stun-break, and Signet of Inspiration v2.0. Those can make a difference, and I think they will. WH is the least worrying thing about the elite spec.

Leave your thoughts and feedback from BWE2 about the tempest here!

Only a fool would believe there won’t be any RNG involved, sorry. Even if it’s to a less extent, it will most likely make its way there.

I hope they don’t nerf raids aswell. Content intended to be difficult should never be downgraded to a laughable level because some individuals can’t overcome it. If the devs have balanced around it and it is doable (specially without bugs), then there is no need to dumb it down.

I will try once more for Tempests… depending on how much fun I have, I may leave it for the next BWE, or delete it and try Herald. Actually, I’ll try Herald anyway (bye bye Reaper).

@heartless, but you fail to see overloads as a whole. Read the elementalists’ forums, people are annoyed by the mix of: channeled+melee+no stability. You are just making yourself a vulnerable doll who’s about to get interrupted. The very raw concept isn’t really bad, but it has such a poor execution. And since eles already have damage, we wanted more appealing traits and effects. Fire and Air didn’t even need to deal damage, but provide cool effects. Our elite is… something… I can’t even comment on.

And you are devaluing chronomancer’s Continuum Split. Just like you can land two healing/utilities, you can also land two Time Warps, or two Phantasmal Berserker. You can do almost anything twice.

I personally find it funny! I have a delicate winged elementalist, and a giant bearded norn parks onto her, and it’s like he’s just trying to place himself there to wait for the boss but he’s a bit clumsy. hahah

heartless.6803:

Tempest is only useful with fresh air.

Tempest is a boring elite because Ele’s are overpowered. It’s basically that, Elementalists as a profession is near perfect. Which makes it extremely overpowered. You can’t really do anything to change a near perfect profession can you? Though I get the rising feeling half the specializations changed since the announcement. I can almost assure you thief changed from rifle to lolstaff. Which is the single biggest disappointment I’ve ever had with specializations.

Can you decide yourself? I, among other players have been giving feedback in the elementalists’ forums. Not sure how balanced and tangible our ideas/feedback are, but we all agree the elite spec concept as a whole needed more identity and usefulness, even if it means nerfing base class to accomplish that. Now, they do what they feel it’s fair with the feedback we’ve been providing. We will see how much popular and used the spec will be, specially months after the xpac release.

BrotherBelial.3094:

You forgot to say PvP chests OP. I’ve had them from track reward chests as well as rank up chests.

My friends got two ascended boxes in a row these last 2 days (both armor)!! I envy much, my luck is pretty bad.

Reducing endurance regen. is a no-no, and I wouldn’t go to weakness path.

@Zalavaaris, for many people hardcore equals time played, and for other many it means how skillful someone is, regardless of time spent. I take the latter.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

Wolfric.9380:

Ele is harder to play, but currently if you can handle it well D/D is stronger then other classes. This is also a bit a problem when a game introduced harder to play classes. Its on one side fair if better play is rewarded, on the other side its frustrating and unbalaced when the best players all pick one class because they get the most out of their skill.
A good counter against this is a class with massiv chilling.

Again, d/d cele ele isn’t the hardest to play by any means.

This is… correct. Although you can’t screw up totally, you have a somehow reasonable margin of error. Of course if you’ve never PvP’d you will be killed by a mono-finger, but D/D eles can work out even being a bit lazy.

Envy.1679:

Valento.9852:

TheGrimm.5624:

lol, some of this discussion will vanish/change once they give us more details. Blogpost 2 , where are you?

We know for sure we will get legendary armor piece precursors in the raids, not the complete piece. So it’s not like you must do raids to finish the legendary anyways, you NEED a piece of it that lies in the raids, just like the Gifts bought from dungeon tokens. Not too much different, except the hardest part will come from the hardest content. It should at the very least provide less RNG to grab the precursor, or a way to lessen it.

They said you would get a unique reward from a raid once a week. That sounds like its some kind of guaranteed drop once a week for completing a raid. I hiiiiiiiighly doubt that that reward will be a precursor, meaning that theres something other than precursors that you need that can only be found in raids.

Now that precursor crafting is becoming a thing, maybe it won’t be that random? I’ll hold my 2 cents on this.

@Edit
To clarify “that random”: I think Mystic Clovers are a great example. They are reachable, and not complete random with a ridiculous chance. It should make you lose something, but at least you would get it eventually. It’s all a matter of percentages.

djsarcher.9263:

I’m happy for you.

I’m a casual myself, and don’t see any appeal to dungeons, fractals, or raids, so I just hope there will be ways for me to obtain the new shinies like the Legendary Weapons and Armor without having to pug, it’s a nightmare for my main Ranger.

I hope you will have time to raid with your friends, because it shouldn’t be time-consuming, just the learning curve would be slower. And I hope your ranger shines in the new raids.

TheGrimm.5624:

lol, some of this discussion will vanish/change once they give us more details. Blogpost 2 , where are you?

We know for sure we will get legendary armor piece precursors in the raids, not the complete piece. So it’s not like you must do raids to finish the legendary anyways, you NEED a piece of it that lies in the raids, just like the Gifts bought from dungeon tokens. Not too much different, except the hardest part will come from the hardest content. It should at the very least provide less RNG to grab the precursor, or a way to lessen it.

TheGrimm.5624:

Valento.9852:

Funny fact: legendary gear does not make you stronger than anyone with ascended (far faaaaar easier to craft).

That’s a red herring. Comparing one set to one set yes, but it is when you consider all sets to one set then its a different story. For players that play meta and never change their build then your right. For people that change their builds more often it quickly becomes better gear. And it sounds like they are listening and working towards giving us more challenges where meta will fail. So flexibility will become even more important then it is now.

And that’s perfectly fine, don’t you think? You want to embark into a content that requires you to swap stats, then you will want legendary armor for that. You want to endlessly farm gold and never changing your gear, then you won’t need legendary armor.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Valento.9852:

Funny fact: legendary gear does not make you stronger than anyone with ascended (far faaaaar easier to craft).

Lol I’m sure most are aware it has the same states as ascended. That’s not the point though.

What is it, then? Legendary armor having kittening awesome-looking skins and make you like a living big bang of particles? Or is it the facility of stat-swapping, despite swapping ascended stats requiring only an exotic insignia rather than a much more costly ascended insignia?

It’s obviously optional. Just like original legendary weapons, only the acquisition will require something more than raw material farming in Silverwastes/dungeons.

There is a uniqueness. Bleeding deals less damage with small number of stacks, but has longer durations so it’s easy to stack more and deal overall decent damage, plus it ticks more often. Burning on the other hand can’t stack much and has slightly shorter durations, but hits pretty hard, and ticks per second.

Funny fact: legendary gear does not make you stronger than anyone with ascended (far faaaaar easier to craft).

Testudo.4620:

ummm i don’t understand why i don’t get to play a game i didn’t pay for?

That’s weird. Does it mean the devs have been working really hard to bring such content? I thought it just popped out of thin air! /mindblown

…was cool? And provided diversity and a rewarding feeling for healing your folks, or tanking for them? But in a more action way with the awesome fluid combat system GW2 has? What if a great part of the raid still could be zerker-focused and feel rewarded for dealing huge damage? What if those horrible thoughts about this single word has been a devil’s advocate fallacy?

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Valento.9852:

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Yup…

RAID META INC

or you can say

Old & Busted: Dungeon Meta

New Hotness: Raid Meta

Some people just don’t understand no matter what there will always be a optimum setup (thus meta) to run for content.

Oh, c’mon dude… at least they get to design monsters which takes half damage from critical and 100%+ damage from conditions. Or both? Or under certain criteria? Who knows!

Regardless whatever clears the content fastest and most efficiently will become meta. Whether it is Sinister or Zerker or Soldiers is irrelevant. Not to mention, all content will eventually be trivialized because we, most humans anyway, have the ability to learn and adapt. We will, as a player base, eventually come up with strategies to finish the content the fastest. It is futile to think it will happen any other way. Even with constant changes to the content we will still adapt our strategies and remaximize efficiency to complete content quickly. Some will do it for fun, some will do it for loot, but a good many of us will participate in the meta or a variation of it.

The good thing is there WILL NOT be a LFG tool for Raids. Personally, I’m building up my friends list with good fractal 50 players because those are the people that I expect to be able to learn and adapt quickly to raids.

That’s perfectly normal, it would be weird if it wasn’t, but that doesn’t take the beauty of learning and enjoying the content without being too tightly “locked” into too simplistic setup composition. If anything, it should at least provide better showcase videos than people stacking in a corner, or onto the boss.

Zalavaaris.5329:

I really hope the raids are a lot like wow raids in that the speed at which you clear it is not inportant but the important part is actually clearing it.

Why not both? I remembered Crash Bandicoot 3 for some reason. There were speed trials, and the better you did the higher your score would be, awarding a platinum relic. Oh the feelings…

Zalavaaris.5329:

Astralporing.1957:

Zalavaaris.5329:

Buh bye zerker raiding meta… you wont be missed xD

You missed the enrage timer confirmation in the same blog post.

Oh I didn’t miss that part. I like the fact zerker has its place and role to fill. But all the roles aren’t the same using the same gear. So the meta 100% zerker all the time mentality can die in a fire where raids are concerned.

In a game like Guild Wars 2, the sky is the limit. They can reverse what enrages the bosses, instead of relying only on time. They can spice up requirements for sub-battles taking into account several factors related to stats and effective combat mechanics (healing, boon generation, amount of evades, distance, etc).

A raid does not HAVE to rely on most damage to be successfully interesting and compelling for diehard hardcore gamers. ANet knows better than this I’m sure.

Nilkemia.8507:

As long as they don’t force raids into the story itself like Arah was for the longest time.

At least I know to avoid these.

Hopefully this story isn’t part of the central one, like a side-story which is totally optional. I too don’t want people to be forced doing raids to know the story, just like the legendary armor, everything should be optional.

Hahah these forums get funnier every day. Raids are one of the selling content for the expansion, what did you expect?

TheFantasticGman.9451:

Yup…

RAID META INC

or you can say

Old & Busted: Dungeon Meta

New Hotness: Raid Meta

Some people just don’t understand no matter what there will always be a optimum setup (thus meta) to run for content.

Oh, c’mon dude… at least they get to design monsters which takes half damage from critical and 100%+ damage from conditions. Or both? Or under certain criteria? Who knows!

You’re going to have a bad time. But don’t worry, as we’re leaving you a repair anvil at the entrance. You know—to collect your tears on.

Source

Hahah love it. Do not tone down raids, please. Folks need to learn not all content is faceroll, and that GW2 engine can provide content that requires actual coordination and gameplay. I love how this latest blog post tells us we might consider grabbing our toughness equipment. Itemization is a core feature for many RPG players! Tweaking numbers, and compositions, etc. is like an exciting stuff truly RPG players love.

Kuddos to the raids team. After 3 years doing the same easy-pie content available to all the players, I’m so looking forward to try the new challenging content you built for those who seek something more!

I myself don’t have a full opinion on the matter because I only did raids a couple times when I played Allods Online (yeah…). It’s great to read your experiences. I fully understand LanfearShadowflame concern, and agree to an extent, and I also like PopeUrban idea. I think up to 2 hours is a reasonable duration, as long as the time is worth mechanics-wise + trash mobs.

I’m specifically interested in how they’re planning to make us position in the area, and making us split up in duos or trios! Oh, and the environment. GW2 level designers and artists and all those devs responsible for that never failed me!

Hey guys!

Before raids announcement, and even more now, people have been complaining about how much time it might take to finish a raid, specially when you consider it will probably have more than 1 or 2 bosses, along with trash mobs. Many existing players claim if raids take more than one hour it will be just the same thing, but will only require more time, therefore rendering long raids as simply time-consumers, and that time does not equal to quality of combat.

I’d like to know if this line of thought is still true, and if a single raid takes, say, 2 hours it will be seen as a bad design decision. Considering raids will have a progress, and this progress will never be “erased” on a weekly basis (like most MMOs), are long raids a poorly-designed content? Is it a perception issue from a certain type of player (casual)? How much time is it good to finish a raid?

Per here.

Welp, they don’t see ele forums but at least the information is elsewhere. Just thought I’d let you guys know.

Wolfric.9380:

Staff is diffrent, but yes its very hard to compete, because staff is backline support.
It combines long range firepower + healing support and this plays so well, that even with much more direct helaing staff beats WH from handling.

The backline part is where things get pretty unfair to tempest + Water Blast. It’s like… tempest doesn’t even compare.

One thing to note is that people are being bought by the idea of how tempests are mobile, and how shouts help tempests keep that mobility while still allowing support, but on the grand scheme it still doesn’t help tempests conceptually. In other elite specs, the new skill type available helps to further provide diversification to the already stablished spec, i.e., it’s just an add-on, while the most important aspect are the mechanics.

Nerf catnip ele.

/jk

posthumecaver.6473:

Well Reaper for PVE seems extremely cool, I don’t think it will function for PVP but I will try.

Daredevil and Chronomancer looks awesome for PVP so I will concentrate on those for PVP.

Tempest looks to me like with Aura Share, Auras on Overload and Heal on Aura seems like going to be strongest healer in the game, I will wait to see new Raids will need such a healer not, if not I think I will not have anything to do with Tempest.

Wat? Strongest healer? Someone please give this man a staff.

Leo G.4501:

An idea to conceptualize the traitlines under an altered scale with the 3 Tempest core aspects in mind: “Stormcaller”, “Eye of the Storm” and “Channeler”. To the traits…

MINOR
- Singularity = no change. Same deal, you get access to warhorn, overloads, shouts, etc.
- Speedy Conduit = Add Vigor to this effect.
- Hardy Conduit = Same.

Storm Caller
The “Stormcaller” line is meant to describe the weapon that put out the flames to support the fight in Ascalon. It’s the “support” aspect, not so much the calling of storms.
[Minor] Unstable Conduit = [Added to] Grants an aura at the beginning of an overload and when you swap attunements (15sec ICD) based on your attunement.
[Major] Elemental Bastion = Same.
[Grand Master] Masterful Aura = [NEW] Elemental auras you apply have additional effects. Fire aura reduces damage you receive from the burning condition and decreases physical damage you receive from burning foes; Frost aura converts chill to regeneration and increases the damage you do to chilled foes; Shocking Aura decreases duration of stun and daze and grants quickness upon being CC’ed; Magnetic Aura blocks an attack upon applying. ((All subject to various ICD not noted))

Eye of the Storm
This is the brawler spec meant to describe the tempest being in the thick of melee. This is a sustain type of set aimed more to support yourself.

[Minor] Gale Song = [Added to] Combining Gale Song and Tempestuous Aria. Cast Eye of the storm when CC’ed. Your shouts apply might to allies and weakness to foes.
[Major] Latent Stamina = [Added to] Combining an altered version of Latent Stamina and Earthen Proxy. Applying Vigor restores endurance. While Vigor is active on you, Protection duration is increased by 25%. Damage is reduced further while under the effect of protection.
[Grandmaster] Echoed Melodies = [NEW] Breaking stuns applies retaliation to and around the target (this includes stuns you break on yourself or stuns you break from allies). Hardy and Speedy Conduit occurs again after completing a channeled spell. If making ally stunbreak baseline for warhorn is too strong, roll it into this trait.

Channeler
This is technically the offensive aspect of the spec as it’s aimed toward pressuring and punishing foes via channeling/being interrupted from channeling as well as give you a boost from channeling. The traits include all channeled skills (not just overloads) unless specified. There are a lot of ideas I had for this but I’ll just put up the least insane ones I can think of…

[Minor] Storm’s Crescendo = [NEW] Gain a small bonus to damage and conditions for 7seconds for every second you channel (Max of +5 bonus) in combat. Being interrupted by CC cuts the recast cooldown by 50% and the recast cooldown of Overloads by 66%.
[Major] Tempestuous Octave = [NEW] Reflect CC effects back to their caster if they interrupt you and reflect CC effects to all foes around you if they interrupt an Overload. Gain a damage bonus for each foe you affect with control effects (max of +5 bonus).
[Grand Master] Lucid Singularity = [Added to] Gain massive resistance to movement impeding conditions while channeling, remove such conditions when you begin an Overload. Gain invincibility for 3sec if you’re channeling at a certain health threshold (60sec ICD)

These are solid ideas they could improve upon… if they’re keeping the way they are. Though, still, they need to give us something more particular that defines the spec.

I didn’t meant to sound harsh. I too defend eles, but if there’s an issue with D/D we should humbly try and check if it’s real or not…

People misunderstanding Gaile because someone just merged the topics.