Guild Wars 2

lol, wait to see if it’s good/sucks first…

scerevisiae.1972:

except maybe thief being more or less forced to take some level of stealth.

..and FWIW, i do think thief should get stealth as their F2 skill, it’s also a core part of the class.

FrouFrou.4958:

scerevisiae.1972:

Empathic Bond (EB) and Sirvival of the Fittest (SotF) are rangers’ only strong condi removal.

This is outrageous! I demand we get a new trait, Damsel of the Fittest!

How about merge them to create Survival of the Bond!!!111

kiwituatara.6053:

OGDeadHead.8326:

EB is not worthy of GM status as it stands right now.

Why is it not worthy of GM status? Almost every viable ranger build was running EB before SoTF was introduced. Rangers used to complain that they’re locked into the Survival trait line for condi clears.

Because almost all GMs have been moved up a notch in power. EB was really only good because for a long time it was the only condition-clearing option.

Personally, I think it’s weak and don’t like its passive, unreliable nature at all, notwithstanding being in the same line as SotF. I’d love to see something more useful, like remove 1 condi / 3.5sec, or better, something more skilful, like remove 2 condis on pet swap or using your pet’s F2.

I see it more as an alternative to SoTF for those that don’t want to run Survival skills.

which is fine in theory, except that it makes that trait line compulsory.

Arrk.4102:

1. Chronomancer
2. Reaper
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9. Dragon Hunter

DragonHunter, so wrong on so many levels

Wallace MacBix.2089:

If you think eles should have 6s of protection (even if it’s just self protection) on a 10s (8s in arcana) cd baseline, I just can’t agree with you.

Agree, 6s prot on a ~10sec CD is too much, something like 3s (self-only) would be more reasonable.

The trait is powerful, if you want it go trait for it. If you don’t want to be in Arcana find other ways to fill the hole (like the plethora of diverse weapon skills eles get or a different trait line) and move on.

that’s just the problem, for the past 2.5 years virtually every PVP/WVW Ele has been pidgeonholed into water + arcane + 2+ cantrip utilities + reasonably tanky gear just to perform half-decently.

It sucks. You can lightly say “spec something else” but when “something else” is objectively worse than the “core build”, is it really a choice?

I’ve tried playing Ele without EAtt and to me it just doesn’t feel right. i play all 8 classes fairly frequently and no other class has quite the same level of pidgeonholing… except maybe thief being more or less forced to take some level of stealth.

As i’ve said elsewhere, i’d glady take solo EAtt (in weakened form) as baseline and take nerfs elsewhere just to address 1) the baseline survivability issue and 2) the core “feel” of how the class plays.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

scerevisiae.1972:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

All you’re saying is that the ele needs the protection from that trait. I’ll agree that it kinda sucks being in a grandmaster spot against Evasive Arcana, which I’d say is slightly better (~2k heal with condi cleanse on dodge (plus the other effects, including a blast finisher) vs. perm regen, but you lose the 5s of protection on ~8-10 sec cd if you dance into earth constantly, which is a bit too powerful really). I think all the master level traits in arcane are incredibly bad too, so really Arcana has a bum wrap.

But I can list a bunch of GM traits that do not “change the way you play”. How do any of the Fire GMs “change the way you play”, were you not blasting your fire fields before? Were you not stacking might before? The only argument can be made for wanting to burn your foes more. How does Bountiful Power “change the way you play”, it doesn’t. It’s just a dps buff. Does Diamond Skin really change how you play, other than wanting to stay above 90% hp (which you want anyway if you run scholars runes), and it’s a had counter to some builds and completely useless vs. others. Stone Heart just means you camp earth, I guess good for a condi build, but not really “build defining”. For Ranger’s Marksmanship, all 3 are just a dps boost, but just in different ways, you just pick the one most relevant to your play style, again not build defining. I can go on a lot longer……is your argument that all of those other traits need to be change so they are more “build defining”. [To be fair, some GMs are really awesome, build defining traits, but there are so many that don’t fit the bill.]

Couldn’t really disagree more, all those GM traits you listed as examples do actually dfine how you play. Spec Persisting Flames, and you will try to CC people in your LF, & you will probably take both blast utilities so you can triple blast your fire fields for 30+secs of fury.

Pyro’s puissance makes you camp fire as much as possible.

Blinding ashes makes burn your go to IWin button.

etc, i could go on, but i’ll just generalise and say that most GM traits do define a playstyle.

EAtt doesn’t, because with the exception of pure PVE builds, every Ele must switch attunements often.

All you want is it baseline, so you don’t have to spend a traitline to gain some sustain, like other classes have to.

Every other class comes with innate survivability built in: warrior has the highest HP & armour, 7.5K HP more than (nearly double) base Ele HP, plus heavy armour. Not sure what kind of point you’re trying to make with warrior conditions, warrs have among the best condi management in the game now.

every other class than Ele has some kind of built-in sustain/survivability mechanic, eg: mesmer has clones + stealth, thief has steath + mobility, guardian has aegis + heals & heavy armour, necro has a second HP bar, etc.

Ele has… more skills?

True. 30 new skills just for 1 new specialisation prob is too many to be likely.

There is a 3rd option: a 5th attunement but no new weapon -that would “only” be 20 skills.

Will be interesting to see what they go with.

Yamsandjams.3267:

Is this in regards to the upcoming changes? Because currently, EB is in survival, whereas SotF is in nature magic.

A clue to this vexing question is in the title.

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

posthumecaver.6473:

They tried several thing that we leave the Arcana line but we have somehow always landed with x/x/x/x/6 build. I think they really want to swing the axe and get people out of Arcana line.

Ok, renewing stamina is nice, but what crap master arcana skill you are going to get now?

The only thing Elemental Attunement as GM does is to keep arcane being more or less mandatory for PVP/WVW.

Even for PVE, I personally hate like how Ele plays without Elemental Attunement, so i’ll be speccing arcane regardless of what else the line has.

Arcane master line is weak but ele contingency won’t be terrible for PVP/WVW, it’s effectively a passive source of vigour & prot with decent uptime. Final shielding isn’t bad either.

2. Moving Bolt to the heart to GM.

Let’s face it, this was a pretty bad design decision, it was only a strong trait for FA spec and moving it to GM kills the only spec that really needed it.

Now it’s just a really weak GM.

Laraley.7695:

scerevisiae.1972:

After seeing dragonhunter (worst name ever) and now reaper, i’m betting that Tempest will add a 5th attunement, arcane maybe?

The name also strongly implies something to do with storms, so could be wildly wrong there.

Not super fussed about what the utility type is, Anet seem determined to keep cantrips as the only reasonable utility choice.

That would mean designing 15 (old weapons) + 15 (sword most likely) new skills, I doubt that will happen.

Not necessarily, they could just be 5 “tempest” skills in the arcane attunement, not tied to weapon.

Also your maths are off, even if they kept the current convention it would be 5 staff, 5 trident, 3 sceptre, 3 sword, 3 dagger MH + 2 dagger OH + 2 focus == 23 skills, of which only half need to be any good, the rest can be filler, just like current Ele ;-)

Empathic Bond (EB) and Sirvival of the Fittest (SotF) are rangers’ only strong condi removal. Why are they both in the same line? This effectively makes the survival line mandatory in every spec.

The other thing is it means Poison Master will never be used in PVP/WVW.

The only other options for condi removal are: brown bear (never going to happen, i’d sooner quit GW2 than run a god-kitten brown bear), the signet (of renewal) is not reliable, and healing spring isn’t up often enough.

The 2 condi traits need to be separated or a third condi-removing trait option needs to be added.

Never liked EB as a condi removal trait anyway, too unreliable. With TU being a survival skill, i expect everyone will be speccing SotF anyway.

After seeing dragonhunter (worst name ever) and now reaper, i’m betting that Tempest will add a 5th attunement, arcane maybe?

The name also strongly implies something to do with storms, so could be wildly wrong there.

Not super fussed about what the utility type is, Anet seem determined to keep cantrips as the only reasonable utility choice.

Laraley.7695:

Wat. Air is getting buffed? Yeah, no.

?? All but one of the adept and master traits were buffed.

And the changes to fire are rather sad than good.

there are some more improvements that could be made but overall are in the right direction i think:

• blinding ashes on a 3sec CD looks pretty good, nice synergy with fire aura
• fire aura being made into a major source of might is a change in the right direction, up to now fire aura has been totally useless. FA may still need to be stronger though, need to see what the changes are to burning. if burning is weaker (as it appears to be), then fire aura prob needs to come up some more
• adept traits are all a bit unexciting, burning precision is the best of them

so there are some stronger traits, some weak traits, fire as a line all hinges on what the changes are to burning and fire aura.

burning precision – burning fire – blinding ashes looks pretty good

Mattmatt.4962:

By the way, its not a matter of “missplacing the LF”, its a matter of “is the ennemy dumb enough to stay in it ?” … blaming a player for facing opponent that use they keyboard to walk out ….

i thought we were talking about large-scale? a well-placed LF will have the whole train travelling through it. plus Ele has 2 hard AOE CCs, 2 soft AOE CCs, not too hard to maximise LF damage, just takes a bit more skill than dropping a static once every 30sec and lolbignumberz….

By the way, Air is already stornger than fire, and its getting enhanced (exept for fresh air spec) while fire is still poor (worst gm trait ever)

air and fire are both getting buffed because they were weaker than earth.

it’s ok if you want to surrender the argument buddy, pretty clear we’re on different skill levels anyway.

if you’re not able to land all your LF ticks, then i think i’ve found the problem, you’re not placing them well, L2P?

also, you’re not getting 6K lightning rod crits on level 80s, LR has a 0.322 coeff, mathematically it’s not possible, you’d need 10K+ power.

also, i get focused/target-called all the time, i just don’t die to rangers… at least, i can’t remember the last time, their damage is so easy to avoid, lol. Reflect/fire #4/LFlash/obstruct/prot-tank/counter-pressure/kite through or past your melee train, and if start running out of options you should be able to out-heal them for a long time by double or triple blasting your own fields and cycling CDs. Fire #4 on a 16sec CD helps a lot, as does dodging/pre-kiting as soon as damage is taken.

Again, sounds a lot likea L2P issue, i’m sensing a theme here…

We can agree to disagree on how good air will be in the expac, noone really knows until we try it. On the other stuff, the things you describe as problems i simply don’t have. Maybe our playstyles are vastly different… or maybe there are L2P issues, idk lol.

Mattmatt.4962:

Two more tick on lavafront isnt worth taking 3useless minor and 2useless major (well in fact 3 since persisting flame is too ^^). You might have not notice, but there is now an ICD on fury stack, and since you’re supposed to be gorup with eles, they got nice fury uptime by swapping …

2 more ticks on one of the highest-scaling (3.2 co-efficient), most damaging skills in the game, gg. Like i said, traited LF is effectively a 100% uptime necro well, and should be your most damaging ability.

Fire’s other traits in the XP are not great, but not bad either (+20% dmg, -20% fire CD, cleanse 3 condis + cantrip), but they are better than air.

Btw, fury from swap trait is max 22% uptime, L2Ele.

but i fell like you’re a camping fire pve boy that think is somehow usefull in wvw with the same playstyle

I only roam solo and zerg with staff in T1, but nice try. Solo roaming with staff on Ele takes a fair amount of skill…

When you need damage now now now, PS + fire is where you need to be, and I also find reduced fire CD to be one of the best survivability traits, because fire #4 is incredible. cleanse 3 condi cantrip trait is also great for solo roaming.

Last time was when 2ranger and one shortbow venom share thief focused me

You sound like you’re doing it wrong. As a staff Ele you should easily be able to avoid/counter-pressure a glassy ranger for long enough to re-position or force him to flee. L2 use earth #3, fire #4, lightning flash, and your 3 CC abilities properly.

Point is, passive 20% damage reduction all the time is super strong, in every part of the game, and that’s before you add in the anti-crit or anti-condi GM. Maybe the best reason to take earth as 3rd trait line is that it should enable you to gear for higher damage, without losing survivability.

We ’re talking about large scale battle right ? long range stun arent legion, and half can be reflected with magnetic aura. Stability on a gorup of ranged … obviously usefull ….

You’re right, stability while healing, caught by the train, or channelling meteor shower is totally not useful……

lightning rod small damage …. have you ever tryied it out ? or maybe are you playing full cleric ? (i’m not even mentionning the weakness)

The damage is ok, when you can actualy get it to proc. good groups/players will avoid or stab through your 2 good CC skills, which makes your GM trait useless a lot of the time.

Besides, a handful of 2K dmg ticks from your 2 main CC skills every 30sec+ is not that exciting. With PS, your LF can do an extra 2x 2K+ dmg ticks every 5sec, it’s so much more damage it’s not even comparable. Not to mention, PS gives close to 100% fury uptime… tons more dmg.

Not to mention: LR coeff = 0.3, LF coeff = 3.2

I’m not saying LR is a bad trait, it’s not bad at all, but it’s not as much damage as you think it is + the crappiness of air puts it 3rd of my list of 3rd trait lines after water & arcane.

the rest of air isnt nice … tempest defense is huge, especially combined to lightning rod,

TD is pretty crappy, if you’re getting caught by a melee disable (the only thing it’s useful against), you made a mistake and/or are doing it wrong. TD + LR will be an improvement though, i’ll be trying it ofc, but i think earth or fire is going to be overall better.

There is only non sense in your statement and examples (cause they’re adapted to 1V1 and very small scale fight while we’re talking about large scale)

I think you need to L2Ele better. like i said above, my perspective comes from someone who plays t1 oceanic, so while it’s true i do roam 1v1 (and 1v2 ;-)) with staff (because i like hard-mode), i do plenty of large and v large scale as well. PS is better than you think, try it.

You’d need around 6k power to do a 4k crit with LR, LR has very low scaling. Not to mention it can only proc on 3 staff long CD skills, and only on players who don’t have stab.

Vs a 50% increase in damage for one of the highest scaling skills in the game, which is on a 5sec cd. I do way more damage with LF in WVW than any other skill.

YMMV but it’s not even close to me.

Am still so frustrated that Elemental Atunement wasn’t made baseline in some form. There is no trait more class-defining than it in the whole game.

Mattmatt.4962:

scerevisiae.1972:

• fire/water/arcane for persisting flames + dmg/CD reduction, or
• earth/water/arcane for AOE stab and 20% DR.

Persisting flames is useless in WVW

wtf? hard to take you seriously with this comment. do you think necro wells are useless too? PS lava font is equivalent to a necro well with 100% uptime and a 5sec CD. triple blasting your lava font solo gives your whole group 36seconds of fury. it’s not uncommon after group pre-buffing for my whole group to have 1-2min of fury.

Dame reduction at 600 range is useless in pirate ship

when was the last time your Ele died to ranged damage? exactly.

AOE stab was a thing before the nerf stab, it snow a crappy trait since it gives only 1stack. I used to play DD with the MT, i just cant now cause it high risk for now no reward

maybe you’re not used to fighting good players who interrupt heals. with this trait: attune to earth, use heal, don’t get interrupted. An extra source of AOE group stability is ALWAYS good to have.

The build WILL be Air/Water/Arcane

lightning rod is a small damage add, versus bad players who don’t run/use stability. the better your opponent, the worse the trait becomes. the rest of air is not very useful for a staff ele.

earth offer a lot more to a staff Ele than air any which way you cut it.

MaXi.3642:

dietzero.3514:

Eponet.4829:

Switching elements is already important to the class. Making it baseline would reduce build diversity by punishing elementalists from focusing on one element (Other than fresh air builds) when it’s already one of their weaker options to the point where only one very specific weapon build can get away with it in one particular game mode.

All of PvE is Fire staff. Nearly all fire traits are related to being in fire. We need MORE reasons to be encouraged to attunement swap, instead of just losing 80% of our damage.

aren’t you encouraged already by having different skills? so you can be all the time in fire except for situations where you need some other skill, some CC or heal for example, then back to fire… what’s wrong with this? I think ele was played as a spammy attunement dancer for too long, another options are welcome…

Attunement swapping by itself is a really weak profession mechanic – there are more (20) skills but really, all it amounts to is padding 10 good skills out with 10 bad skills and forcing players to use a switching mechanic to access these 10 good skills.

Without something like EAtt, having to attunement swap just to get to use your good skills is worse than not having the attunement mechanic at all, and just having 2 regular weapon skill bars.

Combine this with the lowest HP and armour in the game, and no innate survivability (through class mechanics like stealth, clones, aegis, etc), and it’s little surprise that virtually every PVP/WVW Ele specs EAtt and takes survivability utilities (cantrips).

It’s also why many/most Eles consider EAtt to be fundamentally part of the core class mechanic, which should be baseline to the class (in a solo, instead of AOE, form).

Without it as baseline, every PVP/WVW is going to be forced to spec arcane, just like we’ve had to do for the past 2.5 years, just to make our class playable/enjoyable/viable.

are you going to cover the EAtt-as-GM fiasco?

Durzlla.6295:

One thing Anet was foaming at the mouth with “yes!” About was an aspect system where instead of having a second pet you stowed said pet and gained an F1-F3 abilities based on pet (NO STAT BONUS), and then F4 brought the pet back out and you’d be dancing back and forth between using the pet and using an aspect of the pet.

That would be awesome. i love ranger but hate the way they’ve implemented the pet (as an unreliable, readily-disposable weak semi-ranged auto-attack).

actually i quite like the changes. my biggest concern is all the condi removal is still in 1 line, pretty much making it mandatory for every build.

i especially like what they’ve done with the beastmastery line, it’s almost worth speccing now. now if there were just a trait or w/e to get rid of the stupid pet….

smekras.8203:

If they follow the current trend with specialisations, it will be something Elementalists currently have.

Mesmers got necro stuff, Guardians got ranger stuff, Necros are most likely getting warrior stuff… so yeah…

this is my guess too. nature & elemental magic would mesh pretty well.

disagree on WVW: the meta build will be:

• fire/water/arcane for persisting flames + dmg/CD reduction, or
• earth/water/arcane for AOE stab and 20% DR.

air/water/arcane is a distant 3rd, due to only 1 genuinely useful trait (lightning rod), which doesn’t really do enough damage or proc enough to give up the more generally useful benefits of fire or earth.

obviously, staff + cantrips, because Anet haven’t bothered to address (the lack of) weapon/utility choices in WVW; i don’t expect the 20% DR under 600 range to make D/D a practical choice (at least in T1). The superiority of cantrips in PVP/WVW has not been addressed at all.

Vinteros Asteano.1209:

scerevisiae.1972:

Vinteros Asteano.1209:

If anything, we should be looking at the water line. The water line has more issues than arcana when it comes to diversity.

Each of the 3 (PVP/WVW mandatory) lines have issues:

• earth: 20% dmg reduction up to 600 range, anti-crit
• water: heal on attune, condi removal
• arcane: elemental attunement

seriously, who’s playing PVP/WVW and not going to spec these 3 lines?

I meant along the lines of, majority of ele builds in pvp/wvw run water…and the same 5 or so traits.

Even if they kept E. Att Master tier, I feel as if eles would still run those three traitlines.

I know and i agree with you. The issues are that baseline Ele is too squishy and too reliant on traits + cantrips, and that the key survivability/sustain traits are in these 3 lines, which means everyone will take them.

I note that in all the changes that utilities are not changing, so we’re still going to be pidgeonholed into cantrips for the most part as well.

All in all, pretty much worst case scenario IMO.

5054075

Doing a simple Synonym search for the word Guardian we get several better options for the Elite Specialization.

we have:
advocate, ally, backer, challenger, champ, conqueror, defender, endorser, exponent, expounder, hero, heroine, medalist, nonpareil, number one, numero uno, paladin, artisan, patron, proponent, protector, supporter, sympathizer, the greatest, titleholder
top dog, upholder, vanquisher, victor, vindicator, warrior, winner.

out of those there are some that would be better suited, like:

advocate, conqueror, defender, paladin, vanquisher, vindicator.

for me the last (VINDICATOR) would fit the role much better than a generic “Dragon Hunter”.

Arbiter, sentinel, justicar, warden… many others…

Vinteros Asteano.1209:

If anything, we should be looking at the water line. The water line has more issues than arcana when it comes to diversity.

Each of the 3 (PVP/WVW mandatory) lines have issues:

• earth: 20% dmg reduction up to 600 range, anti-crit
• water: heal on attune, condi removal
• arcane: elemental attunement

seriously, who’s playing PVP/WVW and not going to spec these 3 lines?

This whole EAtt thing i just so frustrating. EAtt has never really changed the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether a trait is GM-worthy), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and i would actually it really is part of the core class mechanic.

It’s been said before 100x but a solo-only version as baseline with a trait for the AOE version is the fairest, most reasonable thing to do.

This is not asking for more power, i’d gladly take nerfs elsewhere to preserve the core feel of the clsss with EAtt but NOT be pidgeonholed into arcane (again) for every spec.

Without it (or something similar), virtually every PVP/WVW is just going to spec earth/water/arcane, just like we’ve had to do for the past 2.5 years.

Raif.9507:

The major power of the trait is it’s AoE nature in those game modes as your’re generating team wide boons for everyone leading to a more support oriented style of gameplay.

Agree, the basic mechanic of gaining boons on attune is not especially strong (adept trait-ish), it’s the AOE nature that makes it strong. A solo-only version as baseline is not that big of a big power jump in light of all the other changes.

TyPin.9860:

scerevisiae.1972:

Exactly. It’s the poster-child of generic names.

For me it’s also a poor name because:
1) if the class is supposed to hunt/kill dragons, why is not one of the skills/traits/mechanics/anything is tailored to killing dragons? do the new trap skills work against elder dragons? i think not.
2) it’s the only class named this way. it sticks out, and not in a good way.
3) it’s more in line with a profession name than a class name.

1) Why does the engineer not build things? Why does the Thief not actually steal things?
2) It’s the name of a specialization, not a class. And you don’t know yet, what is to come.
3) Yeah, well, we have no classes in GW2. We have only professions, like Guardian, Mesmer or Thief (that is the actual wording, which ANet uses). Chronomancer and Dragonhunter are no classes either, they are elite specializations (see #2).

@all:
And how is it, you all know better, how a profession and specialization is “supposed” to be. When the actual game designers, who define the content of the game, say otherwise. A lot of entitled opinions in this thread… but when children scream “childish”, what can we expect?

are you familiar with the phrase “the customer is always right”? we are the customers.

this forum exists to garner feedback, we are providing it.

why do you arrogantly assume the role of trying to censor legitimate opinions? you need only post that you like the name, and leave others to express their own opinions.

Alice.5360:

Christ that is terrible reasoning. “Other generic names”. What could be more generic than “Dragonhunter”? And there is NOTHING subtle or nuanced about “Dragonhunter.”

Exactly. It’s the poster-child of generic names.

For me it’s also a poor name because:
1) if the class is supposed to hunt/kill dragons, why is not one of the skills/traits/mechanics/anything is tailored to killing dragons? do the new trap skills work against elder dragons? i think not.
2) it’s the only class named this way. it sticks out, and not in a good way.
3) it’s more in line with a profession name than a class name.

Power levels across the board are being increased, a solo version of EAtt as baseline is pretty reasonable. Base Ele has 10.8K HP, the lowest armour in the game, and no innate survival mechanic like stealth, clones or aegis.

Plus the whole point of the trait changes is to increase choice/diversity. Leaving EAtt as a GM just means every non-PVE Ele is going to be speccing arcane, just like they have had to do for the past freaking 2.5 years.

Jedge.3619:

scerevisiae.1972:

How EAtt can be considered not baseline worthy while at the same time making the 2 strongest mesmer GM traits, IP and PU, baseline (plus 1 master and 3 adept traits as well)?

Wait what? Please stop spreading misinformation. PU – Prismatic Understanding is not being made baseline for mesmer

http://dulfy.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/gw2-mesmer-chaos-specialization.jpg

Part true – they made the extra second of stealth from PU baseline. The new PU doubled the amount of stealth. Going to be so OP.

Bottom line: mesmer is getting (effectively) 2x GM, 1x master and 3x adept traits all made baseline. It’s a huge power jump.

Meanwhile a core class trait, Elemental Attunement is being made GM after being adept for a year and a half and then master for a year.

Rylen.2147:

The question really comes down to: Does it change your gameplay? Arenanet have stated that grandmaster (EAtt is now grandmaster) should be something to that really impacts and changes the way you play.

That’s just it. EAtt does not change the way you play, it just makes playing feel right.

lighter.2708:

Guardians before announcement:
“Where is my condi, where is my long range weapon”
Guardians after the announcement:
“Wah, condi, wah ranged weapon”
[…]
but i do agree the name is kind of funny.

It’s also cause the DH doesn’t seem to fit the guardian. Like, at all.

Guard getting ranged weapon == good.
Guard becoming pet-less ranger == silly.
DragonHunter name == silly.

lLobo.7960:

EAtt is not baseline to Ele, is baseline to Eles that constant att swap (and therefore keep the buffs active).

Baseline doesn’t necessarily mean that all eles need to benefit from it, eg: attunements are baseline, yet PVE Fire-camping eles that don’t attunement swap are not using their baseline profession mechanic either. The fact these eles don’t attunement swap is really an argument for EAtt being baseline — to create an incentive (ie: an opportunity payback) to attunement swapping.

The only reason fire eles don’t swap is because there is no real reward to, because all their traits are spent maximising damage, whereas if EAtt were baseline, you would see more PVE fire Eles switching to earth for the prot for example.

Point being, fire Eles still have plenty to gain from EAtt, the fact they’re not currently using their profession mechanic doesn’t mean there should be incentives added to make it more worth using.

lLobo.7960:

I play ele since beta in all game-modes, and I think I understand it quite well.

my comments were directed at (i thought rather obviously) DevilLordLaser…

lLobo.7960:

I can understand why IP was made baseline for mesmer, PU on the other hand…

EAtt is not borderline to Ele, is borderline to Eles that constant att swap.

IP and PU were already seriously good traits and probably many mesmer specs had 1 or the other… all my mesmer specs sure did.

With eles however, virtually every non-PVE, non-pure zerker spec was based around 4+ water, 4+arcane. With the current changes, this will not change. The only difference will be that the new core spec will be earth/water/arcane.

Point being, making EAtt GM achieves nothing other than nerfing EA eles…. the main design goal – improving choice and diversity has not been achieved.

^ you very obviously don’t play/understand Ele. Yes there’s twice the skills, but a lot of them are filler and are not worth casting in WVW/PVP. Watch any good Ele player play, they only cast 1-2 skills per attunement. So having more skills is not that big of a deal, it’s the diversity of those handful of good skills that are the real bonus. But I digress.

Ele base survivability is the lowest in the game, by a fair margin – lowest base armour, lowest base HP, only 10800HP, and no innate survivability mechanic.

This is why almost every Ele playing PVP/WVW for the past 2.5 years has been forced into some variation of 4+ water, 4+ arcane with cantrips as the only sensible utility choice.

It’s been seriously boring. I play all 8 classes (ele, ranger, mesmer, necro, thief being favourites) and no other class has the same restrictions (ie: big performance/survivability dropoff when deviating from this core spec).

EAtt is both a core survivability mechanic, but it’s also fundamental IMO to making the attunement fun & worthwhile. IMO the class doesn’t feel right without it. If there’s any trait in the game that should be baseline, it’s EAtt, even in a solo, weakened form, and even if it meant nerfing other aspects of the class.

As it stands, most PVP/WVW Eles are going to just spec earth/water/arcane, just like we always have had to do, because the same restriction (low base survivability) applies, and the changes have achieved nothing: the skills/trait lines that were weak before are still weak, the ones that were strong are still strong.

If the express goal of the design changes were to improve choice & diversity, then they have failed hard, and if anything, take the class backward, not forward.

ronpierce.2760:

If Warrior [it] was renamed “Doofy Butt-Clown” it would likely cause some controversy

IMO Dragonhunter is about on par with “Doofy Butt Clown”; they both sound juvenile and try-hard and just too… silly for an otherwise serious MMO.

Vargamonth.2047:

Going a bit off topic, there wasn’t really any better name suggestion for the specialization?

Oh come on, paragon was a super obvious, good candidate. Dragonhunter doesn’t fit with guard at all.

Not to mention it’s a ranger without the crappy pet, the ranger community is going to be rather kittened off i suspect.

Paragon would have been the logical name, and a nice throwback to GW1.

it’s kind of kitteny, and it’s nothing like a guard, in any way, so not a fan.

How EAtt can be considered not baseline worthy while at the same time making the 2 strongest mesmer GM traits, IP and PU, baseline (plus 1 master and 3 adept traits as well)?

red.2387:

This change has me really bummed out. These two traits were the things I liked best about elementalist.

I can live without Evasive Arcana, which to me is a playstyle choice, and therefore an ideal GM trait, but EAtt feels like it’s very much a core part of the class, and accordingly should be baselined, even in a solo/reduced duration form.