List Of Skills That Should Be Changed

Wheee, let's give everything exhaustion! Eles are way overpowered to begin with, they can spam exhuastion spells forever because of energy storage!

*end sarcasm*

*bets 50K that Searing Flames will be nerfed*

This damage is too insane esp with 2 or more Searing Flames eles.

I've had a lot of fun with that skill but it's time for it to go to the nerf pile.

A simple nerf would probably reducing the burning time to 1...3 so that you can't get as much damage off without reappling Burning

Of course you want to leave it alone, you are an elementalist ¬¬

And wait for the next skill balance to complain about something, good lord.
Searing Flames is overpowered and it IS getting nerfed, get used to it, dont even try to reply complaining, it is and thats the end of it. ¬¬

General Commentary: Anyone who doesn't believe in balencing for PvE and ALL forms of PvP really shouldn't say anything.

Elitist garbage like AB doesn't matter, or Fort Aspenwood doesn't matter, doesn't fly. They're pvp styles. They might not be YOUR pvp style, but they're somebody's and those somebody's bought the game just like you, they deserved balenced skills just as much.

If you have an issue with that fact, cram it.

you know guys, you dont really need a specific class to 'counter' SF. all it takes is a couple arrow keys, and not group up in one *** pile.

and before people start quoting me on this and saying how you cant always seperate in a good game of pvp, well really, theres heaps of other things you can cry about too...

And you are sure of this because...?

Searing Flames is not overpowered. Not anymore than IWAY, Touch Rangers, Rampaging Thumpers (I haven't seen anyone complaing about them recently).

There is at least one good damage dealing elite for each strand of Elemental magic.

• Invoke Lightning
• Sandstorm
• Searing Flames
• Shatterstone

Now why haven't I seen any complaints about the other ones?

As far as it concern searing flames, at start I was saying the same thing - they have to change it. Until I made a PvP elementalist. SF can run your energy down too fast. It dont hurt Spirits - as they cant burn, plus it dont hurt people that have fast removing skills of conditions on them, and classes like rangers and warriors that has good regen skills and high armor against eles. I dont believe it should be changed. Its fine. And I see a great balance in professions and skills in PvP game with the coming of NF.

But reading that post, i remind a new Elite Skill of Necro that is really catastrophic. "Spoil Victor" .. For 30 seconds, if the enemy attack or use a spell again an enemy with less health, he takes about 105 damage. With 10 energy, 1sec casting time, and 10 recharge time, it can make useless 3 enemies at the same time! It overcomes the "Backfire" of mesmer, as it work like "Backfire" and "Empathy" together, for almost triple time, making huge amounts of damage that can not be avoided.

This mean that for 30 seconds you cannot kill anyone-you can only die doing some damage! Because if enemy has one point less than you, you take 105 damage, and enemy will take about 50dmg more or less with a decent skill. Plus the enemy will do to you about 50dmg with other decent skills. I'd say, or reduce the time that it last (30seconds without attacking is too much!, do it 15 seconds max), or increase its recharge time to 20 seconds, or make it do damage for 1-3max hits and then this hex to end (300dmg is enough i think :P)

Same matter for Throw Dirt, who the hell actually needs any experince in anything to grab a fistfull of dirt and throw it, yet it has a 45 second recharge and costs 5 energy.

Because the other ones are far less popular then SF.

Calctrops: .. They are a spell, because you create them at that time with magic. Thus you need 1 second to summon them at the enemy and his adjacments enemies feets (I never had prob with that).

Throw Dirt: ...With that though, anyone can blind the others.. Just pick up a fist of dirt and throw it to enemy to blind it. This is a skill and with some magic anyone can take a fist of dirst and convert it in such way thus to be enough to blind many adjacment enemies together. Thus its require magic, and some time to recharge that skill (that use magic). Also blinding a melee unit for about 10-15 second make it completely useless. Smaller recharge time (30seconds f.e), would give great power to rangers - every 15 seconds to blind the same enemy - its not normal. Look what air eles do... Concequtively blinds... To do the same and the Rangers? It is too much I think. I believe 5 energy is ok. The smaller energy need. And dont forget that these skills blinds all adjacment foes, not only one target as ele's air skill.

Of the 4 of these, I can offer my expertisse on 3 of them.

I'm going to say this very simply. None of them are uber. Sandstorm has a 2 second cast time - it's interrupt food; Shatterstone is a Hex Spell and therefore vulnerable to hex removal; Searing Flames is 15 energy and spammable. People who say thats nothing for an ele because of energy storage are wrong. Likewise, fire attunement and glowing gaze isnt perfect either, as that only covers the regen for SF, leaving no management skills for the other 5 skills in their skill bar. Oh sure, you can spec in inspiration as well, but that reduces your ability to effectively use other elementalist attributes, not to mention in PvP, it removes the option for taking heal party etc.

Oh, and exhaustion on a spammable skill? Frankly, I think the people saying stuff like that have never experienced exhaustion for themselves. Exhaustion on Searing Flames would make it the de facto worst skill in the game, full stop.

And yes, I'm an ele, so of course I'm gonna stand up for my classes skills, but I'll have you know that I use Sandstorm.

Just a little edit. As has been stated, SF is fine in itself. If there is a problem, it is that the energy gain from glowing gaze perhaps needs to be toned down a bit. Say, maximum of +8 and make the top tier of energy gain available at 15 fire magic, (As in make the increase narrower.) - this is so people dont need to buy an overpriced superior rune to get the best out of the skill.

I guess that wasnt very clear tho, so I'll do a quick chart type thing.

--Glowing Gaze--

Fire Magic---1--2--3--4--5--6--7--8--9--10--11--12--13--14--15--16
Energy Gain--1--1--2--2--3--3--4--4--5--5---6----6---7---7---8---8
Damage- Inconsequential, leave as is

I was thinking more because a team of 4 Shatterstone Eles do absolutely nothing to a target other than cancel there own hex out.
A team of Sandstorm Eles are interrupt bait and your target isn't dumb enough to stand and attack inside its massive AoE...
A team of Invoke Lightning Eles do have there strengths... but they're still interrupt bait.

Theres nothing wrong with Searing Flames itself, its just the fact they made it too powerful if used with other Searing Flames eles. If you brought along 4 Fire Eles and only 1 ran Searing Flames, barely anybody would give a crap. All they can do is reduce its damage/burn duration without completely destroying the skill.

Its only over powered if you come up against its in PvP and you havent had the sense to bring an anti-casting spell.

SF is a elite spell which actually lives up the title of elite.

It offers great recharge time and low energy cost. Unlike every other elite skill ingame which is no better then its normal counterpart.

Stop winging about it and just re-think your party and skills when you play PvP.

And its not that impressive a skill. It soon drains your energy if you continually use it. Once an elemental looses all their energy by spamming it, you can wipe the floor with them.

BTW, yes I am an elemental. If your NOT, then Id say i have more idea what im talking about then you.

SF is fine. I maybe played SF in HA for a week and I got extremely bored with it. Sure it's easy to use but there's flaws in it as well. And any good ranger can drop a Concussion Shot on an ele to daze them and just sit there and interrupt everything they've got.

Blinding Surge on the other hand...is absolutely rediculous. 5 energy, 3/4 cast time, 4 second recharge, damage + blind (and sometimes AoE blinding). An air ele can constantly keep a number of melee attackers completely useless with no problems. I'd say leave SF alone and go after BS. Something like maybe more engery, 1 second cast time and sure, leave the 4 second recharge. That way it gets spammed till they have no energy anyways.

As it has already been pointed out SF on it's own isn't a problem, it's that it wasn't testing thoroughly enough to see what it can do when multiple elementalists are running SF builds.
From my mesmers point of veiw, 1 SF elementalist has it's counters, it's doable. But a group of SFs I don't know of any mesmer skill that can stop that. Only having a group designed to counter that particular group could I see it being no problem, but that leaves an imbalance in that you don't want to force people into bringing a whole group to counter one thing.
It's a tricky pickle!
If they tweaked SF, it would only be to lower how effective it currently is when used in tandom by multiple eles.
I always wanted a skill added that increased ele damage if the target is being hit with all 4 elements. It would be useable by a single 9,9,9,9 build or it would be very cool used by a group of eles, each specializing in 1 of the four elements! They could name that skill Tetra Magic! Inspired from the good old Final Fantasy skill.

Here we go just for fun!
Mark of the Tetra. [Elite] Non-Attribute spell
25e, 1s cast, 30 second recharge
Target is hexed with the Mark of the Tetra for 30 seconds. If target is struck with elemental damage, that damage has an added +20% armour penetration. Mark of Tetra ends prematurely if target is hit with the same element twice within four elemental hits.

Here's another one!
Casting Streak Non-Attribute spell
10e, 1s cast, 30 second recharge
For 10 seconds you are enchanted with Casting Streak. Each spell cast while under the effects of Casting Streak lowers your casting time by a cumulative 10%. When Casting Streak ends you suffer exhaustion.

Lengthening the recharge on SF will not really do anything unless the recharge is greater than 7 seconds, which makes it pretty much a sucky skill. Although SF is bound for a nerf, the only thing that will make it an actual nerf is if the area of effect is reduced to adjacent instead of near by foes.

i guess we will have to wait and see how Anet will nerf searing flames

Sorry, AB isn't pvp, its going to a cap site and killing NPCs. If someone says something works good in AB and RA but nothing else, it basically sucks.

As for searing flames. I say reduce the fire duration to like immolate.

Then some of those npcs are pretty realistic at acting like people and being rude
Remind me, what does a guild lord do?

LOL

but seriously, just because some certain pvp might not be your flavor doesnt really constitute the fact its not player vs player