Guild Wars 2

Heat Sync: Give stacks of might to yourself, then spread burning from your target to nearby foes.

I would like that :-).

I also don´t need open world duels. When i can do a training duel within my guild i am happy.

Stacking auras might lead to OP setups stacking 2-3 water/tempest eles for constant aura power … I feel this is a no go :-/. Overwrite seems the right way. Of course it feels bad for us eles. But annything that givs the option to move away from water is good. Please don´t implement more water synergies.

While many see stab mandatory for overloads being baseline i don´t. It is needed in PvP. especially group fights, but i can come from a team´s guardian too. I see it hurts a bit now being forced to take it, but i think that is OK. Also remember earth has its own stab now!
If -20% on shouts is now added to tempestuous aria it will get grim to decide what to take. And basically its a good sign for balance if choices are hard :-).
And for the to much boon share. Just for might is booring and doesnt do much. Better rework it.Instant light aura on 30 sec CD ? Will fit tempest.

The 10% Boon triggering after 5s in one element and staying till swap would realy fit. Of course like might. so direct + condi damage.

I am glad that its only 1 Stack of stability. Having a stable overload on demand would be just bad. The overloads are against ele mechanic. They need a risk/reward mechanics. You can argue the whole overloads were a bad idea, but to fit them in to much stability will break them in the oposite way as no stab does.
Also the changes to earth overload are good.
I would say the changes are all good. Maybe not enough in the traits, but good for the current mechanics. People that don´t like tempest design in general will always be disapointed. Tempest won´t change its concept, this is up to the next elite maybe in a year or two.

I personally would wish instant shouts and a 20% CD reduction. And baseline speed.
Everything else now seems the right direction. (Well I think i won´t use WH unless doing a full healing build).

In general the changes are all good. I hope fire overload is not destroyed. The pulsing burn application is the most important part to make it worth and support condi builds. The final blast can be adapted if to much but it didn´t feel OP in BW2.

Shouts: I would find it perfect if the shouts are all instant cast so i can use it while channeling. Also while i agree it is strong the 50s for shock and aftershock still feel to long. With the healing buff shouts got much closer to being good.

Rebound. While i would have prefered instant aura aplication it now fits the support tempest much more. But i am not shure if it is good enough. FSG might still outperform it significant. A 45 seconds cooldown would make my day here.

In general a 20% shout reduction will do the job.

Speedy Conduit: Why not make it basline speed or even 33% instead of dancing around swiftness?
With 8s Swiftness i will have permaswiftness while running with constant overloads. Well … i don´t like switching and overloading constantly just for running around :-/. Its unneccessary complicated. Also in a group you usually get swiftness flields annyway …

Regen on tempest would be bad like hell. The goal is to allow droping water/cantrips.
As long as water + arcane are mandatory or near that there won´t be build diversity and no place for tempest other than aura/boon bunker.

I play S/F fire/earth an also like it. It has some problems. Mobility and if you don´t go water condi cleanse is very low. But i have no problems doing damage to static targets. Blowing fire 4/2/3/5 swaping earth 4/2/2/3 does a lot of damage and i will blind in the process. Usually i start air 2/3/4 too.
This results is missile defence, 3 blinds, hard direct damage, heavy burn + 3 blast finishers (5 if arcane in the tools), 5 + projectile finishers in the fire flield. In PvE or against guards that is huge.
PvP its diffrent. People move out of the fire flield and damage drops to meh level.
For my playstyle tempest seem to fit an i will try F/E/T setup. But it lacks a bit. I need mobility to free my toolbar for shouts, otherwise i can´t get enough out of the traits to justify giving up water/cantrips or arcane.

I am with Leo G. As tempest is, it should move straight to less attunement swaping.
This would give manny palyers a good feeling. None of the top 4 element riders need to use it and its totally against arcane spec line but i see no problem with that. Curently tempest is aready against arcane.
It might lower the skill floor for tempest eles, but even this is not a bad thing unless it gets OP.

I had two options in mind:
One is a weapon swap on 6-5 seconds instead of the elements swap. Looses skill diversity but gains a strong focus.

Second would be a trait named dormant elements:
You can´t trait arcane line.
You loose the ability to swap to untraited elements.
You permanently gain the passive abilities from untraited elements.

I think it woul work very well and feel good. Could be underpowered because it will need good autoattacks which eles lack. But i would give it a try an even put it in baseline. Tempest would immidiatlely become very diffrent in its feel and all the players that want elementalists more dedicated to an element will like it.

Ele is great, and yes final shielding helps a bit. The thief might cloak an kill you 3 seconds later XD…

I have very good experience with stone heart + elemental contingency. When he strikes it´s like he hits a wall. An E/W/Ar ele will survive. I did run F/E/Ar (S/F) very long and had arcane shield, air signet and cleansing flame + arcane brilliance on my toolbar. Even without water the thiefs got wide eyes. My counter did hurt. I did not run ;-). I also had about 3k exta HP on my gear running with 15k and high toughness.
In zerker gear you have a hard time. He will kill you unless you react perfect in milliseconds …
But this build has other weaknesses. Condi mesmers and necros kill me.

Things that help:

Passive auras. (air (best) and water have it)
Stone heart in earth.

But nothing will save you against a good thief if you don´t react fast and usually disengage for healing.
I swap to earth running stone heart and fire my focus 4 (magnetic wave). Then it depends how hard the hit was and i better fight or run/teleport.
Good thiefs usually get me around the fourth attempt if i don´t run (they cloak, attack, cloak ). Bad thiefs die on the second of even first try.

I would do balace by simplification. Tempest is diffrent an for less ele swaping.
To take that route you can just substitute ele swaps with a weapon swap on 6-5 s CD.

Or you take mysugestion of the dormalt element trait. That removes untraited elements from swaping but permanently give their passive abilities.
This lowers the skill floor, is not OP and fits the current tempest. Must not be admitted by old ele´s but will give a good feeling for a lot of players. It would be largly diffrent. If its underpowed numbers is all it would need…

This was what i said. The team support must have its full value in 2-3 man fights. If you calculate it for 5 and drop its self sustain/power acordingly the result is a spec without practial value. And in WvW Zerg there is chaos and usually its a number issue. The side with significant less players looses and not spec will help. You can´t “Balance” that.
So the traits must be made for small group combat WvW roaming, PvP and the new raids, where for raids its more on the raide side not character.

3 flies at once with trashing mainhand dagger.

1.) Scepter becomes more used when mainhand D is away
2.) OP D/D PvP ele is gone.
3.) Prepared for sword as next elite close combat mainhand …

………

I am not shureabout ful ascended armor :-).
Using 3 signets go with written in stone.
The build has no stunbreaker and low condi cleanse. but is OK.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYhcMosh9NwxB8RMIAYRAoAUEnYwOoIUbymYaA-T1RFABDqE0F1fA4EAgz+DwpH4JlfJ/AACAgAsz6MAszjuzjuzdWIgyrBA-w

Try the signet version and then try my arcane focus version:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAodnMIC9Mg1NAOOA8RgBBALCAFgi4ED2BJxaT2EPDA-TFSFABuouDAnAAVUJ4D9A4s/wTK/ySJYyPAgAAIAszjuzjuzdWKA7WAA-w

Not unless the support outshines what we have so we win a 2:2 buddy fight.
My measurement is the small team 2-3 player setup. Not 5+ or PvE.
For me its not so far away. Speed and -20% shout CDR reduction an off we go.

I agree. Its not so far away from being good. Of course not always usful and it might(should) be difficult trying to make a current D/D better …. Traits are a bit of a mess but that can be fixed …

As i said i had the best experience with F/E/Ar. But it has a heavy condi defence hole.

Save overload should not happen. Sad for some eles, but it will push us to much.
Also the wait timer is important. The whole mechanic is unfiting, but the way it is was intentional to make it work not OP with ele …..

I will continue to try it with scepter. For me it adds intresting things. I like the 600 range shouts with not to long CD´s. It fits my playstyle. Even the overloads are OK, but not class defining. Its the shouts/auras taht make the tempest worth for me. This means all traits put in overloads, even the basic ones, are weak. I would also add tempest on a staff support build.
The changes done till release will tell if i stick to tempest. And its not the overloads, i would not push them more. The traits are important. Speed added to tempest would be the best. Speedy conduit basline speed or even 33% which would be unique and Wooooot.

Tempest: Yes. The changes done till release will tell how long. Movement added will get me.
Berserker: Maybe.
Cronomancer: I will take a look.

Others don´t know. Always thought of making a necromancer, so maybe reaper.

This is it. The Dagger Dagger fire/water/arcane meta build is extremly strong.
Staff has a good spot in WvW keep/zerg and PvE.
All other are average to low tier.
The ele has good builds but not much meta divesity :-).
An the fear of eles is that a nerf to d/d will hit the other builds much more which would be very bad.

Manny options … I test a lot what is the best spec added to fire and earth.

Air has baseline speed + a cover condition throug vul proc. Also furry + swiftness on auras. Furry is very helpful in this rabid build. Also tempest defence is there or go glyphs.

Water: You use cantrips. It adds greatly to your survival. But i felt a great damage lack. The whole condi build has low overal damage and it hurts to further reduce it.

I had the best experience with arcane. I did not test PvP. I am a WvW roamer, an so i can adapt my stats better. I use a mix of rabid, dire/rabid trinkets and a piece of rampager. This means i run with 15k life, 3k armor in earth, holding 45-50% crit chance and maximum condi damage using undead rune.
I think in a PvP build the loss of HP is a noticable drawback.
Nightmare seems a better choice in PvP then undead. Also you can use Lich rune but that costs damage.
The low health an condi cleanse is the deadly part. Any condi build takes you appart, but its quite deadly against zerker.
Thats why focus is great in this. Strong missile defence, another condi remover (earth 4) + 4s invul trough obsidian flesh. The low HP cry for a bit more defence :-).
For me magnetic wave is the greates ele spell. I even did run geomancers training for a while but again to much damage loss :-(.

If you like D/D its like this.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYnMIC9Mg1NAOOA8RgBBALCAFgi4ED2BJxaT2EPDA-TJRFABAcCAUa/hoKDk8DAAA

This is a D/D condi ele. You have two stunbreakers on the toolbar. Speed with air sigil.
Two blast finishers with arcane shield and arcane healing. These two are traited, in fire they burn. This was my utility setup for a long time doing a good job.
You use fire/earth elements waiting for CD on the other. Air/water are swapt through fast. Fire instants, 1-2 spells and swap. So ist like 7s in fire (ring/2x breath), 1s air, 7s earth, 1s water, 7s fire, …

I also run rabid for condi. Earth sigil is good. There are some options how to build it.
I prefer focus on that, but ring of fire is very strong. Baltarsar is OK but you do more then burn. Nightmare or undead are my prefered runes.
Also your need dodges. There is low regen and no vigor but arcane evasion. So i would use the classic energy sigil.

Signets add great here. Earth as a catcher. Fire for burn. Both long range option you lack and keep oponents in combat.
You might miss the flash but FSG pulled out at the right moment is a killer.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAodhcMoxhlNwvB8RMIAYRAoAUEnYwOoIUbymYaA-TJRFwAAOBAK3fIaZAFPAAA

Beware of necromancers, and condi mesmers. You are weak against them.
An the low HP make me worry …. You need to be good :-).

I personally run a semi bunker in WvW roaming with scepter/focus. When starting ele i had to low damage trying to bunker and constantly worked to bring it up. I have a berserker staff in my backpack swaping for keep combat.
Defence helps if you are targeted. Offense always help your team by blasting oponents :-).

My signet build has a lot of defence stats. Healing usually scales not good. With staff you have water fields which do the most healing and blasting them counts the healing of the blaster.
Full Zerker usually kills full defence, unless you are a stone heart ele (which has bad damage and dies to conditions), …. But you need speed/catchers when using full defence otherwise oponents will run away after one minute fighting …. Or he will get reinforcements. Zerker means your oponent must be on gurad. If he makes mistakes or isn´t fast enough … kaboom.

Hmm its a bit personal taste but i find my valk/captain setup with a zerker staff nearly as hard hiting then full zerker, but stand longer. Also air means significant more damage.
The build i showed has a reason: Be as easy to use as possible for PvE and WvW and don´t be squished by stray fire or conditions. The signets fit very well.
Also this build is hardened against conditions. Chill/Criple/Imob is neutralized (-93%), the first condi bomb autoclensed, evrything else dampened -60% + 1 cleanse per 10s.

For an experienced ele i would take arcane not earth and blast all in my way with an arcane setup + maybe lighning flash. Someone called it Jihad Staff ;-)

Hi

I did such builds you want :-).
Berserker is good because as already trained player, you avoid damage by dodge, control or other active utilities like block or shields.
You want to kill faster then the oponent. I find Berserker is not the efficientest statset, but the fastest to blow someone if hes off guard :-).

Ele is usually difficult for a beginner. you have 4 elements to swap.
But i am happy that i did coose it as my first character. I start at the hard side with low HP and 4 Elements instead of 2 weapon sets. After playing S/F warrior feels booring XD.
I even don´t go for high HP. I got used to 15k now :-).

Staff is not a good option for condition bunker. But you can make a ranged nuker that won´t die within two seconds. For condition scepter or dagger mainhand is better. the most damage comes from mainhand dagger but that is no option for you.

For casual PvE and WvW i did an easy to use staff build for a friend:

It looks like that and plays very comftable. In PvE you use some cheap power food not the -40 condi.

This build was done als mainly camp fire easy to use staff.
It nukes very hard, builds might, well rounded automatic defence.
Easy to adapt with a staff that fits you. Berserker is of course good here.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFEQFAWhcMoshtNwvB0RMQAYRBIAsAmdwLIIITyOQJA-TFyDwAKuAAQV+BwEkIdAJeAAIUCKb/hXq/EAABgde0de0dmMAMbB-w

————
Another fun option that might be camping earth with stone heart using conjures.
This is a bunker build. It has a diffrent armor set and staff. Trinkets can be the same. So its something to just try. Has a bit teamsupport with aurashare.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFEQFAWhMMozhNOw6B8RMMAY0WIJUEiAQEYIO/gYwRE-TFCBwAC3fYryvcq/swEEgLAgKdAUeAATUCGAABgde0de0dmMAMbB-w

Condition ele? It starts a 1500 condition damage and begins to be good at 1700 ….
Water offers the least for condi builds. Its just survival, which is of course strong.

For condi damage you use fire/earth most. Specing earth helps a lot here.
I would go F/E/X for condi builds, and not full celestial.

so an offhand 900 range heavy control/condition weapon that fits perfectly to scepter …..

Hmm. I woul definitly like that you can´t change build, utilities and weapon outside of safe Zones ;-). There saved builds would of course be great.

Exactly. If ele gains weapon swap, he should be bound to one attunement. The swap time then must be short enough to compensate the losses.

thats it. We won´t go back doing a new elite. But traits can be reworked a bit. There are aproved and implemented mechanics that can be reused. Easiest are static boons like basline speed or stat boons which will get better build options.
I am already fine with overloads. A stability trait just to swallow one CC would be great but i am not shure if this is already to much.
If you trait shouts they are already fine. If you don´t trait them tey don´t feel worthy.

I still think there is no need to do much effort for rebound. They have a mechanic implemented. Just add shared light aura and make rebound instant cast on kitten CD and woot you have a useful tool.
Of course sharing an aura dependend on the current element feels better fiting ele.

fire aura stacking would be important. Also rune of radiance fully working and also taking into account the fire trait one with fire. This might be a base for some aura builds. There are manny fire aura applikations and i am tempted to use one with fire + rune of radiance, focus and feel the burn for keeping fire aura on the team.
Fire aura on: swap, focus 5, feel the burn and optional conjurer trait + maybe reworked rebound. This is a lot of fire auras with +66% duration. Theoretically …

Yes. Missile reflection is usually a pain for rangers. I kill them using focus quite easy.
But focus has two good defences with magnetic wave and swirling winds against rangers.
When using a staff you have magnetic aura. DD is a bit more tricky if hes good at kiting, but you have so good regeneration. Disengage and come back.

To fully utilize overcharges you must use it in a team. Invis to get the drop, stab from guardian to be more save….

well a weapon swap would be to powerful for ele.
I did suggest to give a weapon swap on 6s CD (5 if arcane) instead of elementals swaping.
With tempest playstyle more focused against arcane playstyle i have another idea i would find gorgeous.
Instead of latent stamina a new trait:
Dormant element:
You loose the ability to swap untraited elements. Gain all passive abilities from untraited elements.

Fire: 150 power + 10% damage boon against burning
Air: 25% speed + Vul proc
Earth: 150 toughness + 10% damage reduction 360.
Water: Sothing disruption + 15% outgoing heals.

So if you trait tempest + air + water, you gain 150power, 150 toughness, 10% damage on burning targets and 10% damage reduction. Nicht buffs if you like to mainly camp one element …
Also it helps specing out of water for gaining permanent healing.

This would fit tempest. Its against ele playstyle but i makes sense.

The main thin it does is: It lowers the eles skill floor. You go on a two elements swap (or even none but that might be stupid but for pure fire ele maybe)

This trait would help new ele players + be good in PvE. For high tier play i think it´s not so good, because you loose 2 swaps and the 10 skills keyed to it.
This will give a diffrent feeling and especially help PvE and casual players. IT´s just one trait, you must not use it so nothing is realy lost.

Oh yes mesmers are not only good they are fun and thematically just great all around.
But still like my ele and hope for the right changes to enjoy tempest. :-)

I already suggestet to swap the unneccessay vigor on water attune for a flat 5% condi damage and healing power from vitality. At least something fiting and a bit condi help.

OK right it has good swiftness. The rune gives it on auras :-). So one more reason to get feel the burn, because its on 20s CD. I know the flash ist great, saved me yesterday again … but going all shouts is tempting when you trait them.

depends. If its instant cast and on a 45 seconds or lower CD as shout it might be worth.

Funny i used fire most and earth second. And yes not in duels exept once when i attacked with a fire overload. Air felt meh and water to situational. Maybe its a thing of learning to use it :-).

Oh yes that staff cleric is nice :-). But i would even remove lighning flash and use the third aura shout.
But there is a problem. No speed ….

i know … condi mesmers kill me and the burst ones with PU are a pain. Huge stealth is anoying as usual.
And i used the earth signet for a while, to catch disengaging targets. :-).
But now i hope for a good addition with tempest for a well rounded build.

If A-Net makes the radius of fire overload large, then its getting intresting. Pair with a guardian for stability and burn into the Zerg :-). you might die, but with a large radius it will hurt. Or just use earth armor… you don´t need it afterwards XD.

Hello

I did more tempest playing and now also warhorn.
I am not a PvP player that goes for meta. I enjoy fire + earth traitlines using scepter.
I had been testing air,water,arcane since playing ele to find what fits best. Water is the save one, air so/so and arcane gave me the best experience but none was perfect for me.
So i looked on tempest, especially a shout build and it was promising for my playstyle.

The result:
It seems the right third line fore me, but it feels a bit lacking.

Warhorn: Felt slow. It´s not the weapon for me.
Also i am not a fan of fire 4. I have concernes it might lead to ele groups sharing permanaent max boons and thats worse then the 4 ele stacking meta ….

Overloads:
Not a real PvP tool. But i am OK with it. I usually am a WvW romer and its useful outside of hard small scale fights.

Fire: the most used for me. But not in player combat (used it once in a figth and without interruption it killed …). It helps to finish NPC´s fast and without klicking much. While i can do camps fast and easy an early interrupt might even kill me.

Air: a bit like fire in use. But feels not great i left it after a few uses.

Water: It seems good with the shorter channel but i don´t get a real oportunity to use it ….. äh ….

Earth: Second most useful for me. Its for engage/disengage. The effects feel weak but in a situation where you can´t/won´t do much other things OK.
So like all on CD and fights going bad … Turn and overload earth … Or go through the oponents so your teammates can flee … one for all ^^.

Traits:
I only see one straight forward line for shouts/aura support being good.
This feels like full shouts or scrap tempest.

Shouts: The part i like most. Traited shouts feel good. All instant cast will be the kick.
A -20% shout trait added to gale song would be great.

So for my playsyle tempest fits, but its a bit below the needed floor.

My personal wish still would be baseline speed for better build options. Rebound is reworked so i will see.
Also a runeset for condi removal on auras with apothekers stats will be the kicker for aura builds allowing to drop water.
I now wait and watch what will come with next beta.

I also play Scepter and tested tempest as much as i could and i like it. It fits scepter and my playstyle better then water/arcane. Still hard to replace my arcane but feels close.
The main problem for me is i loose damage, speed a stunbreaker and a condition cleaner. When i try to substitute arcane for tempest with shouts, the group support i add feels less valuable. I help more if i am fast in the right spot doing more damage then sharing an aura :-/.
So if i don´t look on overloads much, i need baseline speed so i can get enough out of the shouts, because being forced to use traveler rune or a slot for speed ruins the shout build :-(. This is because the rest of the tempest (overloads and non shout traits) is of no real value in player combat.

So in the end currently tempest is not realy worth taking, but i see hope. Currently i expect till HoT it might work.

At least people who understand that scepter is fun and even playable without fresh air. Once you got to know how to use your autos to do real damage, its not to bad. And blackbeard descibed one of my favorite tricks, fire stone barrier into your second fire field :-). This has less standard rotation. You use fire early, balst your flieds (i used arcane brilliance + shield) + earth to put barrier up but the rest is more situational.
An yep this does main auto attack damage :-)