Guild Wars 2

I think the air buffs (lightning arc, lightning whip) in general go in the wrong direction. Instead of making them AoE, they should deal better single target damage. Damage-wise, air is generally lacking in damage when compared to fire.

I really hope that that +x%/boon does not become something passive and active all the time. I’d like to see that functionality on some skills or – if it has to be – on sigils/traits with on-crit and internal CD.

I agree that it was the bug fixes. Remember, we had two unbreakable 3s self stuns, three cone AoEs hitting nothing and ~5 patches that “finally” fixed those problems. Bottom Line: since D/D is working as intended.

You’ve made some odd choices. Why do take 20% reduced cooldown on Arcane spells, when only taking one Arcane utility (Arcane Power)? Why do you take Windborne Dagger, while wielding a staff? In condition-heavy areas you’ll probably have problems with Healing Rain alone, but you could swap a utility out for Cleansing Fire.

Elemetalist also has Obsidian Flesh (5s Invuln, 60s(?) CD, earth focus 5) and Glyph of Storms in earth attunement ticks blindness in ~3s intervals

I used it on my ele while leveling. The reason is simple: poison and weakness, both conditions, the elementalist has no/very limited access to.

condiments.8043:

Then proceed Hurl Rock Barrier-Switch Lightning Attunement for discharge-Hit lightning strike with auto-Arcane Blast. If possible follow up with RtL followed by Arcane wave for extra burst.

Bolded the 2 skills of your 6 skill rotation which are unique to scepter. The main source of damage in your burst is also available on D/D

If you enjoy content being obsolete because you outgear it, play ANY OTHER MMO out there. Seriously. It’s one of the few unique features GW2 still has. GW2 has a long way to max level like any other MMO (there’s just number progression after 30 – do you rally need 50 levels for 10 traits?), BiS gear takes ridicously long to get like in any other MMO (I’m looking at you, ascended trinkets) … so don’t take level scaling away.

Combos need 2 skills: a combo field and a finisher. You can read in the skill description if a skill is a field or finisher (or none).

On Staff, you have the following fields:

• Fire Field: Fire 2
• Water Field: Water 3, Water 5
• Ice Field: Water 5
• Lightning Field: Air 5

In earth attunement, you have 2 types of inishers:

• Projectile: Earth 1, Earth 5
• Blast: Earth 2

Since Earth 2 is a bit clunky to use as finisher (it’s delayed and you have to place the finisher before the field), you could use Arcane Wave as instant blast finisher. Blast finishers are considered the most powerful and so I list the effects with your fields when combo’d with a blast finisher:

• Fire+Blast = 3 stacks of Might, AoE
• Water+Blast = AoE heal
• Ice+Blast = AoE Frost Armor
• Lighning+Blast = AoE Swiftness

For more on combos see http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combo

I think the harpies just annoying. It’s easy for me on my elementalist (Blinding Flash, Swiring Winds, Gale, Magnetic Wave, Obsidian Flesh, Comet, Armor of Earth, Mist Form, Arcane Shield) but not every class has access to projectile absorb/reflect and stability.

Marcus Greythorne.6843:

what’s the fuss about ride the lightning?

isn’t the travel-distance greatly reduced by the 40% speed-debuff?

Never tried it, but I think/hope so. If not, RtL would be really OP. Maybe RtL gets reworked into a “normal” leap anyway to 1) balance it for the new map and 2) get rid of the self-stun.

Oglaf.1074:

I’d rather that Trahearne himself turns into a new Pale Tree so that we don’t ever, ever have to suffer through his company on our adventures ever again!!!

No. Nonono. NO!

Imagine the Sylvari storyline in an expansion or even Guild Wars 3: Trahearne as old and wise Pale Tree and the player character regularly seeks his guidance as part of the story. Trahearne would be probably a part of a Sylvari “Pantheon” along with (the at least two) other Pale Trees … just like Kormir…

Ronah.2869:

pmnt.4067:

Seems like OP does not want to spend 800 gems for character slots…

You are right, but I would spend 800 gems on new professions to level up on my character saving me the repetitive mechanic of unlocking the map, completing hearts and other vista and PoI non-sense with new alts, in basically the same order all the time. I could level my new professions where i want to and not always in the starter zones.

I … don’t get it. You said in your OP that you still would have to level each profession. If you are a Lvl 80 Elementalist / Lvl 1 Mesmer, where do you want to level the Mesmer except in a starting zone? What stops you now from skipping the starter zone and start leveling in a 15-25 zone or in a dungeon? You’d encounter one-hitting enemies in both cases.

Even if you keep the stats of your first class, you’d still have to level up your second class 79 times. I don’t think that that would be any faster than leveling an alt. You’d also miss some one-time-only XP from map completion and story.

So what would have you won? 800 gems and the ability to re-use some soul bound equip.

That would not be a concern at all if ascended gear would be just exotic+AR+infusion slot…

I have to agree that it definitely feels like there is some kind of character-bound, long-time DR in the entire game: loot from world bosses, jumping puzzles, fractals … everything seems to get worse after a time and “resets” after a few days.

Seems like OP does not want to spend 800 gems for character slots…

Personally, I leveled all crafting disciplines, because I’m a completionist… otherwise I fully agree with your post

Seems that I have to be the one to say it, so: L2P.

The whole combat system is about actively avoiding damage. You can use nearly every skill while moving and circle-strafing around your target avoids A LOT of damage especially at lower levels.

In case you didn’t know: Every class is able to dodge. Press V to dodge back or double tab W, A, S or D to dodge in other directions (with default keybinds). You’re invulnerable while dodging. Each dodge roll costs the half of your endurance bar (the yellow bar above your health)

No, that’s not an evil plan to make money from the cash shop – if you die a lot, the overpriced and underpowered boosts from the shop won’t help you.

Crafting is a money SINK, you pay basically for faster level up (mastering one crafting discipline nets 10 whole levels). I’d gather the materials and sell them on the trading post, or use them to level your twink faster.

For specific tips: What profession, level, zone are you?

Resdan.2359:

Easy fix. Add a new chat channel entitled “trade.”

Then everyone would turn off the annoying trade channel. THEN everyone would post their wtb/wts into /map.

@OP: I agree with everything you said (especially with the dungeon token part), but the peer-to-peer trading part.

I think OP meant tuxedo-smoking and not tobacco-smoking

Even though I think that Thieves are kittenly OP, they should have 1200 range option for PvE/WvW – even if it is as bad as the Guardian scepter. How about a trait that increases the range of Pistols and/or Bows to 1200, but reduces the damage by 25%?

It would be the laziest band-aid patch I could think of, but at least it could be implemented in a reasonable time and – most importantly – would not require to design a whole weapon set.

I’d like a damage meter, but only for personal use. I’ve played wow and I think there’s nothing more poisonous to the community than Recount etc.

It would really help if we could export the combat log as text file – the rest could be done by a perl three liner.

I’d merge the 15 point traits of every element into one trait in the Arcana tree (maybe the 25 point minor?) because Arcana is all about attunement switching, so why shouldn’t it grant on-switch effects?

The 15 point minors in the elemental trait lines are replaced with a trait that reduces the attunement cooldown for that element to fixed 5-7 seconds, not stacking with the attunement cooldown reduction from Arcane.

That way, the players who want to focus on one element can use the other elements as utility and switch back to their main element with the standard weapon switch cool down.

Attunement switchers could either spread 15/15/15/15/X or X/X/X/X/30 depending if they want to deal damage or take the 30% boon duration from Arcana for support.

That change would also make the “while in X attunement” traits more powerful, because it allows to stay longer in the main attunement.

Maelstorm that doesn’t interrupt enemies? You’re making no sense! How about a small (Geyser-sized) Water-Combofield that lasts 6 seconds and pulses a 0.25/0.5 second daze every 2 seconds?

Sliver Armor: If anything, it would be implemented as reflection skill, or something granting Retaliation – both are not the same as Sliver Armor, but look what they did to Pain Inverter…

Daecollo.9578:

Elementalist is the most overrated ranged DPS glass in the game, and probably the best tank in PvP situations.

Yes, the elementalist really shines with AoE damage in PvE, but there is no real single target option for the ele – and single target damage is needed in dungeons for boss battles or killing specific mob types fast. The AoE helps only with trash which is skipped anyway.

The survivability in PvP comes from many small heals, which negate the next 2 or 3 attacks. But that small heals are worthless in dungeons, where everything two shots an ele with 0/10/0/30/30 spec, PVT+Cleric gear.

You don’t bring an ele for damge, but for his amazing utility – which is just unwanted/useless in high level fractals.

@Vid: Win through outlasting, not damage. If you try something like that in Fractals you’re downed at ~0:20

It’s a similar situation with the Sons of Svanir in Hoelbrak: Nobody really likes them, but they are tolerated until they (as an individual, not as a group) break the law. You can’t kill someone just because they are part of the wrong krewe/worship the wrong spirit of nature.

Yes, Asura and Skritt have a diffucult history, but there are some Asura which are really interested in the Skritt. In Metrica Province there’s a heart where you help researching the Skritt and even a Skritt rebellion event.

If the event is completed there’s a nice little dialogue at the end, something like:
Assistant: I told you that Skritt are dangerous! Why do we not study something sensible like … magical explosions?
Professor: No, we can’t stop now! The experiment was a complete success – We have to learn more.

Yes, Skritt should have been a choice for Asura. Maybe an Asura wouldn’t help them because of sympathy, but surely because of curiosity.

dreztina, if you are not trolling, I can think of 2 reasons why stun breaks fail:

1. You are immobilized. Immobilize is a condition and unaffacted by stun breakers (Yes, it’s somehow inconsistent with fear but that’s how the game works)

1. You used the stun breaker on a blowout effect. That’s indeed buggy. If you use the stun breaker too early, the blowout animation stops, but you can’t stand up. You have to wait until you fully lie on the ground before using the stun breaker. (Other classes are affected by that as well – there has been a qq thread about how broken updraft is recently.)

I’d buy the crafted rare armor (Masquerade) for ~25s per piece and green trinkets (Mithril). That’s what I do on my alts, as soon as they reach 80.

The stats are personal preference, I’d take Knigh’s for the gear (Toughness, Power, Precision) and Clercic’s trinkets (Healing Power, Power, Toughness). By stacking Toughness you reduce incoming damage, healing power helps to fill your (small) health pool up, you have power as minor stat on every piece and also get some precision.

Personally, I’m not a big fan of (pure) Valkyrie, because the crit damage stat is wasted without precision. Mixing Valkyrie with Knight’s (+near perma fury from your traits) should do the trick if you don’t feel like supporting/self healing.

As the title says, I suggest a small quality of life improvement: We should be able to equip an offhand in addition to the two handed weapon. The offhand is deactivated, so you don’t gain any stats or sigils from the offhand.

The reason is simple: When changing the weapon sets from two one-handed weapons to a two-hander, the offhand lands somewhere in the inventory, most of the time somewhere between the vendor trash.

If you switch from a two-hander to 2 one-handers, it leaves a gap in the inventory and if the inventory is full some drop fills that gap in the middle of your weapons.

Personally, I change weapon sets A LOT in dungeons between encounters. And at every weapon change there is that small annoyance with the inventory. Thoughs?

PS: Killer argument for the nostalgics of you: GW1 did that

Please the last thing GW2 needs, is more mindless grind. I can not understand the positive reactions about the paragon system at all. It just adds an tedious to increase counter to artificially stretch that bit of existing content … with the only goal to replace magic find on the equipment which should not be a stat anyway.

As someone who’s heavily alting, I’m against any grind-with-only-one-character mechanic in any game.

I hope that they are just nerfing the damage to secondary targets on Staff (full damage on target, 50% aoe on fireball/chain lightning). Still, there would be a problem with ground-targeted AoE since there is no primary target. I’m worried.

Burning Speed is a multi-hit: Before the blast at the end if Burning Speed, you’ll probably get hit by the fire trail … and one tick of that trail is blocked by Blindness.

I think it’s primary a PvE update (guesting and fractals dc recovery). Other than some skill/trait balances/fixes I’d expect nothing for sPvP

I think that would force any class into 30/30/10 specs…

I tend to agree, but if the elementalist gets damage buffs, they should only apply to PvE (WvW uses the PvE balance, so there might be a problem). Eles have more than enough surivalbility in PvP and a damage buff would make them definitely OP.

The funny thing is that the survivability comes from lots of small heals, which are nearly worthless in dungeons – like the damage of 100b is nearly worthless in sPvP.

I’d say ele is fine as is (I have no problem with supporting in PvE) and if there are bigger balance changes, skills should be split for PvP/PvE.

OP said 30 minutes and someone calculated that it equated 3.2 gold per hour if you spent all money on gems to buy keys – not exactly a waste of time.

I tend to say it’s okay since it doesn’t hurt the economy.

mursie.3681:

It’s pretty obvious that d/d ele’s are in desperate need of a buff. How in the hell can they possibly crush 30 man zergs with that spec… just can’t do it. sure you may annoy the zerg…but ultimately you’ll have to run away on that build. ANET… for the love of god…give the ele d/d some love and buff them.

To wipe a 30 man zerg, no damage buff is needed, just a game mechanic change: remove the 5 target AoE limit ;D

Zonzai.2341:

Combo fields are crucial for dungeons and nobody does that better than necros.

Yes, who needs those underpowered water fields anyway :P

Nurvus.2891:

4. In GW1, you could extract and replace item properties through the use of expert/superior/perfect salvage kits.
5. In GW2, everything is made a grind. If you want the same skin on 3 sets of gear (for 3 different builds), you must farm the skin 3 times.
In GW1 you could just replace the properties and voila, fits the chosen build.

These 2 are just unfair/false. You can salvage Sigils in GW2 just like in GW1 (with the difference how the perfect salvage kit / black lion kit is optained)

In GW1 you also needed the same skin 3 times if you want to use it with 3 different inscriptions/prefixes . Unless you always have inscriptions in the inventory to change your weapon – but that’s also possible with the GW2 sigils (and they even stack in GW2!)

Sabull.5670:

it is probably because Frost Aura and Fire Aura can be done with Combo Fields (fire aura can’t be comboed to be aoe).
So if frost aura has Shock aura durations it would be way too powerful to aoe blast for your group. But I don’t think Shock aura should have shorter durations with the ~10s base.

Interesting… by that logic Magnetic Aura sould also have the long swiftness duration. Can anyone test it?

I recently got my (condition-) necro to 80 and I can’t say that they are underpowered in PvE – I even find soloing PvE easier than with eles. The higher health pool makes fights more forgiving and the necro is able to do damage in his “Oh, kitten!” forms (death shroud, plague)

Necros also bring good dungeon support support with their wells and Plague Signet. Never tried them in WvW/sPvP though.

Problem with Dragon Tooth is that the blast finisher now triggers on the target, not the player…

Just because the media came up with the “clever” term god particle it does not mean that there is anything religous at particle physics…

Draygo.9473:

pmnt, how long did it take league of legends to get a spectator mode?
how about replays?

I think you are mistaken in your belief that spectator is important to make a game an esport.

Too long.

Spectator Mode and Replays are basically the same thing. The difference is how long the data for replays are available: a few minutes (delayed spectator mode) or a few days (replays, for example GW1 mATs). Sure, advanced replay features like fast forward, jumps in a time line, slowmotion, … take additional time.

I may be mistaken, but even ANet stated how important a spectator mode is for the esport scene. Or maybe I’m just giving spectator mode a higher priority because I enjoy watching tournament plays ingame.

Marbelos.1234:

Problem is, when you add frog legs, it goes into a potion slot with ferns, with which it isn’t compatible. The things that go into the slots with sparkfly essences aren’t compatible with them…

From an interface point of view, if I am making the potion, I get control of my hands, which means I choose whether to work on one potion at a time or five. And I get to choose which slot an ingredient goes into.

I quoted the parts that finally helped me to understand your problem.

You are making a single potion at a time. Your skill bar acts as a reminder which ingredients you have already added. Add frog legs → you gain the “Frog Legs” skill. Add a sparkfly → gain the “Sparkfly Essence” skill. With that logic you know that ingredients sharing a skill slot have to be automatically incompatible.

If you have found 3 compatible ingredients, the empty 2 skill slots become the “Potion Ready” skill and you can take the potion to Cessellia. If you add an incomatible ingredient, all 5 skills become the “Incompatible Ingredient” skill. If that happens talk to Cesselia to take out a single ingredient (only one of those you’ve actually added)

Just keep in mind that you are only supposed to see the symbols in your skill bar and the highlighted tooltip. (the attack chain preview patch messed that up, but that’s the only instance in the game where the additional tooltips do actual harm iirc)

Personally, I read J’s post as “Custom Arenas have an internal ETA in February”

What really bugs me, is that spectator mode is not on your top 4 list. If we are really optimistic, we get Custom Areanas, Ladder/Leadership, 1vs1team in Feb, Mar, Apr respectively, meaning that the #1 feature for eSports is not released before May.

You may rethink your priorities.

With “how to read tooltips” I also meant “interpreting them right”. There’s only one tooltip highlighed – the one with the ingredient you actually added. Just ignore the additional other tooltips.

The wiki also does not state that the 3 ingredients go into the first three slots – it is just a list of known working recipies. Just add a frog, a sparkfly and eagle feathers (in any order) to your potion, let Cesselia mix it and use it on the spider. Congratz, the first quater of the heart is done.

Somehow I’m under the impression that you did not read my whole post. I give up. I’ll just requote the only thing that might help you.

pmnt.4067:

If you still have problems, just kill undead

Arheundel.6451:

The funny thing is the developers say that ele being a high skill cap profession, …

The funny thing is that elementalist has been designed as an easy profession (the Warrior for casters). In the same interview they gave 2 examples of complex classes: Thief and the mysterious-not-yet-revealed-8th-profession-which-nobody-ever-could-have-guessed.