what buffs do they give? i havent noticed anything
Fire does good damage, water heals and creates an ice field, air gives swiftness, and earth gives protection… it is random when they do this though.
Ice Shards (Scepter #2) – Projectile finisher? This is otherwise one of the least exciting attacks in the game, largely lacking in any sort of flavor or utility.
Either being a finisher, or a flat damage buff is the only real option. My build uses water atunement in scepter as a dps spec, it is decent enough but beyond the auto-attack you have no real burst.
The build feels like a warrior with regen using a bow, only your bow can only auto-attack.
Just went into sPvP to get a nice clip for you with
0 points in water and
only 15 in arcane
0 in earth ….No might stacking…
No Quickness…
No Elite…
No Roots…
No CC …to burst someone down ( unlike Warri or Thief) , and all AOE!!!
1 clip is kinda meaningless, don’t you think? Show us all the other footage where you get 2-shot by everyone and die in seconds. Now spec glass cannon on thief, mesmer, or warrior and kill people in seconds without being 2-shot consistently seconds after engagement.
Why? People said Ele woudlnt do any meaningful damage and i proved them wrong.
Ele has more killing potential (because of the aoe) and still more group support then those classes you mentioned.
Thiefs, Warriors, Mesmers do literately nothing outside their combo.
Thiefs cant kill kitten if their opponent has even 1 CD left and are free farm for any class in high tpvp. They cant 1on1 on a even skill level and they need to have everything ready to kill (+ Elite —> Basilisk Venom)
Warriors cant burst if their target isnt stunned or rooted and they cant get a HB trough without Frency and get destroyed through conditions same as thiefs.
The 3 classes have 1 skill or 1 rotation to keep track off and try to avoid. Ele has 15 skills that are worth dodging and no fixed rotation and a rediculous amount of conditions.
In high tpvp against ladder guilds im the 1 to engage their mesmer on their point because i take them down 100% of the time, its cake. Same with Support Eles, Engis, Guardians, Necros.
Now do it with a scepter, good luck..
I love my ele, but combat feels less like “never gets dull” and more like a chore. I still enjoy he amount of options we have in combat, but I want to not be reliant on them.
I think that is the most salient point.
Elementalists are great and possibly the best class in the game, but only if you can use them properly.
Which most people can’t.
I would warn off bad/clumsy players from playing an elementalist.
I would invite, nay, urge hardcore/skilled players to play an elementalist, it was made for them to really show what they can do.
I’m betting you use D/D, part of the problem is that D/D is the only way to viably use ele outside of a group setting. D/D is great, doing anything else makes you simply under par. You still achieve results, but for 5x the work of another class.
Each individual element needs to be able to work as a stand-alone build, if someone wants to be a lightning mage, fire mage, earth mage, or even a dps ice mage then don’t force them to change atunement to not be out-dps’d by a ranger rolling his face on the keyboard.
I enjoy guild wars partly because there is no subscription. What you suggested is essentually what Star Wars: ToR is doing with their “free to play” option, I can tell you in three words how that works:
Everyone hates it.
maybe they could give us a conjure using up 3 utility skills which gives us tiny wings reducing the fall damage by 1% if we click it really fast.. would be in line with the rest of the class balance..
seriously though, either an air trait with an aoe blind at the end of the fall or one in arcana (hey, we have a grandmaster slot available, since EA is unusable now!) giving different effects for each attunement would be plausible and fit well into the class..
Conjure parachute.
Of course, it would inevitably be nerfed in a later patch to instead conjure an anvil or tire or something.
I couldn’t help but think of old Bugs Bunny cartoons when you said that.
Scepter air could maybe use a little love but it’s usable at least.
Scepter water is truly awful. #1 should do more damage, #2 should do more damage, #3 should heal more. Just flat out numbers buff across the board needed.
Agree 100%
I think we should try to get our damage trees up to par before asking to make our best tree even stronger by making it a DPS alternative.
Throw in some survival traits into Fire and Air. Tempest Defense is a good skill, but alone it’s not even close to enough to keep a high burst ele alive longer than a few seconds.
I realize the whole point of a glass cannon is to do massive damage quickly but have no defense. But with the game set up as it is now, glass cannon elementalist is more like a suicide bomber. You WILL die in seconds even to a balanced build opponent. Or even a bunker. Likely before you can even get your burst off if the enemies are even paying attention! This is especially frustrating when you see other glass cannons running around with loads of defense built into their very core mechanics.
Use cantrips, or arcane spells to kill them before survivability becomes an issue. I do agree ele as a class is the highest “risk” class, it is also the softest. The main issue is that we have 3 viable builds, most builds are pretty much the same anyway.
1)DD Assassin, most ele that have given on on staff go DD. Massive damage and control.
2)Bunker, usually using DD.
3)Group Staff Build, called “group build” because using a staff solo puts you through 5x the work another class can plow through without thinking. When the party needs actual dps pull out your DD weapon set.
Notice a pattern?
Yeah Lightning strike is what kills people when i am in air. The total damage for Arc lightning is fine it just needs to channel fast. The air attunement description said heavy damage and control, right now scepter air does not feel that way.
Also blinding flash is the only blind we have that does no damage why is that? Signet of air does AE blind and damage, Lightning Surge AE blind and damage, Dust devil AE blind and damage and even our underwater blind Steam does a AE blind and damage. Just a little bit of damage to it would help.
I love scepter water, but it needs more offence. The basic attack is amazing, but beyond that you have no burst (unless you use arcane spells.) Make Shatterstone better/worth casting, or make either focus or offhand dagger have better water offence.
Well the description of water attunement is superior support and healing. So its damage should not be as high as someone in Air/Fire/Earth. The aura and the amount of healing you gain with water OH dagger is fine. The only change I would want with water focus is making freezing gust an AE.
Wanting to viably dps in water atunement isn’t as bad as you make it seam. I simply like ice, water, and the dps role. You are essentually saying “just live without, and do something else” is silly, i bet every DD elementalist pops into water for all of 2 seconds for the heal to sustain their “dps” spec.
I don’t care if water dps will ever be top fire, I just want the option to be viable doing it. I’d make up for the lacking dps with the group regen.
/agree with the Water Attunement request. Every Attunement should have good dps potential and that includes Air Staff, which sucks right now for that.
Right, as things are now air staff is only good for group encounters, make it usable single target by default but talent-able to re-create the chain. Make the chain lightning part a perk, or even make a perk to remove the chain effect to buff single target damage.
“support” can mean many things. Mesmer has much projectile reflection/condition removal, healing is only needed when somebody did something they weren’t suppose to/wasted a dodge roll.
Giving water atunement better dps alternatives I hope! While ele can already do good dps I don’t like being forced into being in fire/air to do it.
If i spec into dps i want to do good dps, I am aware it will make the heals worthless and am willing to give that up in order to have the combat cosmetics i desire.
I play a dps ice mage, using scepter and focus. Personally I have no trouble keeping up with the dps of any other class/build but I do agree that Shatterstone needs a rework. In addition to the cast time (charge time aside) it has an involuntary daze-like state you are stuck in for another good second.
I love scepter water, but it needs more offence. The basic attack is amazing, but beyond that you have no burst (unless you use arcane spells.) Make Shatterstone better/worth casting, or make either focus or offhand dagger have better water offence.