Why use an ele?

nope apparently they dont. I used firestorm before the AoE nerf, but not anymore, meteoer shower was always my favorite anyways. its not that they nerfed nukers, its just that you have to have some intellegence and a good tank to nuke now, its not as mindless as it used to be IMO. metoer shower knocks down every 3 secs, so with a good team, or a bit of slowdown from a water ele, the mob=toast. its just that eles arent all powerful "godly" characters as they used to be. get over it folks. balance is good.

Ckaz, i still devistate with my GoR e/mo as well, meteor shower is still effective, and i am still a major damage dealing asset to any party. i dont know what kind of eles you people run into, but mine still works just fine ty

and to the guy below me, who are you refering to? firestorm still has its uses, you can pull aggro off of your squishies with it

Have you played the game in the past month? A-net nerfed firestorm, and is now arguablly the worst skill in the game. enemy's now run out of the way.

Personally I have used my male pyro elementalist since around 2 weeks after the game was released and haven't noticed much of a change tbh. The "AoE nerf" didn't really do much in my opinion except stop me using firestorm which was a crap spell anyway tbh, I still use my pyro and have no trouble finding groups (when I use them) or farming (when I do it). Well no It did actually force me to find some sort of a build as someone said before instead of just cobbling a few high damage spells together.

- Knocking down is useful but why bother?
Area damage AND knockdown with repeat. If you haven't gathered 'why bother' I have to assume you haven't played an echo nuker, nor have no idea why and how this has owns, and still owns mobs.

- SS/MM again
SS- many higher level mobs don't clump up or necessarily act that quickly, plus those with the hex on them need to be standing. True Ele AoE is effected by the first point too but have strong DD as well (without reliance on health levels or sacrificing or costly mana like a necros might). Ele bombs don't care how fast the target is acting or if it is alive.
MM- many higher level mobs make use of corpses even quicker than you, may not leave a body, or simply own the little level 18s (sorry, its true) with increasing degen stuck on them. I'm a big fan and user of both these techniques. MM certainly has its place, and even uber in some cases, but I'd rather have a serious ele nuker first - power in all cases.

- Degen
You do know what burning does right? Mark of Rodgort and my little flame wand keeps you at 7 degen until the hex goes. Immolate is cheap dmg with burn, there's area burn. Air is a great utility element with conditions. Think about combinations with other classes too - no class lives in a vacuum. ie your SS necro - you're using arcane echo right?? Meanwhile you look at ele by itself.

- Prove better
Point is meteor storm Interrupts AND Damages. Immolate Damages AND Degens. There is no bigger mana pool, there is no reliance on mobs dying or having bodies - or even staying alive (SS soakage). There is raw power here and so far I've only been pushing the common PvE bombage of fire. Water and Earth allow combinations that push into 'invinci' territory. Air has utilities that can be used as serious DD but I like their combos even better. I'll even toss you one - heavy melee hitter on you? E/N - blind them and virulence. They can't hit you, have 7 degen, weak if they do hit, and you nuke them at will, yes when I pop this on I do extreme pvp ownage as part of a build - I was killing those ne/me or me/ne fragility spikers too with it.

It's funny how cyclical and 'bandwagon mentality' this game can be.
Some classes get the love and it moves on.
Some people open there eyes (or read some posts) and jump ship.
Now where Necro wasnt getting the love (from those not thinking for themselves) it is, maybe in part as the less popular classes get played.
Mesmers get more love than they used to but primarys still dissed - still I'm surprised you suggest primary mesmer>ele in PvE but whatever.
Rangers too are at least getting some recognition but are still left out more than not. Meanwhile the core got the most love at first. Now a post suggesting you cant be as productive with an ele, when truly little has changed. Shrug.

I've played 3 chars all the way across all the classes and I still have some pieces to learn about the primaries I haven't gone the whole way with.
But I can only assume you haven't gotten the most out of your ele if you havent laid waste to the opposition and don't find yourself a key player.

And just like you're pushing n/me as the way here it seems e/? has a lot of options as well as ?/e. There are some serious combos to be had. SS certainly is the flavor of the day and remains one of the few not batted by the repeating AoE nerfstick. It certainly makes sense as the choice in some situations like UW with the very heavy hp regenin Aataxes - it sticks on for the long haul, they clump up, and swing fast. But >> all, all cases? Nah.

That's funny man, I love it when people who don't play the class put their two cents in Yeah Firestorm key my arse. Can any SERIOUS elementalist raise their hand at this? OMG it left my bar after Met Storm and never looked back.

Obviously you didn't get that far



Secret my arse. Again I was a very happy SS user BEFORE people bit on it because 2man UW became the shiznit. Yes they have some good DD options as well as I mentioned. But no they don't bring the payload nukes, sorry.

And again you seem to be one who can't see outside this 'nerf' or even the skills you start with in presear

Oh well I've said my peace.. serious ele nuker with Firestorm indeed.
Yeah maybe Orion and your pre-sear character

I've pretty much got all the skills on my account now and can say a lot of skills constanly get overlooked, combinations, etc. This game isnt hard and there's not one primary that can't hack it VERY well, its much more in the hands of the player, and the group.

Oh by the way curse was hardly horrible - SS/MoP was solid until AoE backed MoP off too. AoE nerf effected all classes, and that first day even one-offs werent safe. The next day re-patch, no big deal. Yes 10 second firestorm and maelstorm got whacked a bit. The former tho isn't bad on your monk for some damage and clear-up, the latter lead with deep freeze or something.

Big deal. See I am open about the other classes and their skills. But if you're thinking Firestorm ftw, wow, sorry about the nukers you've been playing with!

Cheers
CKaz

Ckaz, if you read the last line of that, he was being sarcastic. he knows that that is bs. read carefully before you respond.

Use an Ele because they are cute. The males dance funny too.

Elementalists are very versatile, if you're willing to rely on your secondary.

Ever tried a five ele SF run? Bet you could do with with 4 Ele's and still do it as close to the same speed as a normal 5 man squad.

Just because some AoE spells can't be used doesn't mean there useless. There are plenty of fire spells that can do instant AoE damage and do good.

Echo/Arcane Echo Meteor Shower and throw in a Deep Freeze. I doubt your target will be running away anytime soon.

AoE spells still aren't useless. They still do damage to the whole area for a few seconds before they leave. If someone deepfreezes them as well, they take even more damage.

i might possibly get flamed for this but,
i actually use my air spike ele in pve quite a lot.
i dont see why eles have to be aoe damagers, mine does fine spamming air spells with dual atunements.
out of groups i am usually in, i probably do more damage to single targets than all or most of the other group members, plus, i throw in one or two support skills from the earth line or my mesmer secondary to help out.
half of the time when i use ward against melee is SF, i get a ty from the team monks and occasionally other players who have just been helped.

basically using a typical pve air spike build i can deal massive damage to the enemy via air spikes (including aoe and knockdown from chain lightning and lightning javelin) and support and help my team with wards or enemy debuffs.

can anyone tell me why using an air spike build in pve is a bad thing to do? i cant think why it would be as long as you know what youre doing.

Sarcasm >> CKaz

Self-ownage FTW

Not looking to bang out a novelistic post like the above, I will say but one thing on the matter.

Spiker.

What, ele is good only for volleyball? Lol.

Anyway, minion masters and Spiteful Spirit necros are good for consistent damage. For actual degen incendiary bonds, immolate, mark of rodgort, rodgort's invocation still are king...


People always forget about wards...and earthmagic PBAOE...

Go for the best of both worlds and make an e/n or n/e. My e/n regularly uses suffering + incendiary bonds on large packs of enemies for quick and nasty degen.

Forgive the off-topic nature of this post but,
Rangers who don't set up a real skill bar are the ones that plague random arena now. Right now, every time I see another interupted barbed trap or another blind shot poison arrow, it makes me wonder: is this the new wammo? Its nice that eles' are getting new and more creative builds but what happened to rangers?? Every time I go to the arenas its either half assed trap or poisoner/interupter/trapper/degen (joke for whoever gets it), or a ranger spike easily countered by blindness. The creativity in builds is a JOKE right now. When I went to the arenas with signet of midnight and antidote signet, along with mantra of inscriptions, I managed to shut down a warrior and ranger for most of the fight and keep a generic (must be the ele's version of a wammo) fire ele dazed and out of the fight. When we won flawless, the other team started talking crap like what kind of ranger blinds himself or noob has to blind to win. That shows that people are sore losers, creativity is opposed, and their monk sucked too much to bring mend ailment. I'm just curious, do you ele's have that feeling when you see another fire attunement or a tank seeing another mending or a ranger seeing another poison arrow? I need to share this frustration with someone and know that I'm not alone.

Anet dident really nerf the ele's , they made the Iron wall of Aoe pure and simple spells come off and the smart players know that by looking beyond this spells that if u build the ele correctly its much + lithol then the old builds people where using... I found killer : Earth/water build, Fire/Water (yep i swear it works ). But iven taugh the ele is now mother RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing (excuse the bad language) overpowered if u would just take the time to find the correct build, i find that without the aoe damage its boring. So in conclusion do not make the ele + powerful then he is. In other he is on the shelf till new elites arrive, i use him has a storage unit //Signed: Hector The Mursaat(my char's name)

Okay, build time. =D

Elemental Attunement [E]
Fire Attunement
Leech Sig/Energy Tap
Rodgort's Invocation
Meteor Shower
Incendiary Bonds
Fireball
Res Signet

The PvP version of this is a Fast Casting Mesmer/Elementalist (16 FC, 12 Fire) who can get these high-instant-damage spells off quickly and easily without being interrupted and with relatively nice rate of fire. Meteor Shower isn't impossible to dodge, but if you catch them at the right moment, they're going to get hit hard. After that, apply Rodgort's and Incendiary - the latter being a quick hex that a monk will be hard-pressed to remove. Then, if the target is in range, a fireball will add quick fire-spike damage to a foe and his surrounding buddies. Essentially, if there's any grouping up at all, these spells will hit more than one person.

In PvE, this skillset works too... but is better served with E/Me (Energy Storage 12+, Fire 12+) where you don't need to worry *as much* about being interrupted. This way, you do more damage with more energy as a resource.

As I said - add a few weapons/offhands that increase skill recharge with fire, and you're in business.

Downfalls: -Disenchants can turn this build into an energy nightmare. Best used, then, with a monk who can give something over the top of it - or by an E/Mo who can Healing Breeze from time to time, etc.

But overall, it's a solid build that does NOT rely on Firestorm's AoE damage over time - rather, it's a bunch of high-energy, high-damage AREA spells that will work a good majority of the time, thus making this particular Fire Ele a formidable foe.

Well well...
My ele is the key for 2 man IDS farm, 2 man SF farm or 1 man, 3 or 4 man UW or 4 man FOW farm... i still doing huge damage with fire skills (and dont scater foes), can play as massive healer, can play a real panzer tank(can tank like a mountain)... can play a deadely monk killer, can play a dont stop river of damage... dont need a necro, mesmer, ranger or warrior in my partys... just a monk... if u dont kwon how make a powerfull build... i dont tell to u...
But i like to play all classes, all have nice skills and are fun to play... before SS and mark of pain, be popular i use this skill with my warrior, i dont copy and past build of anothers, i make my ow builds... my ranger is the best, my warrior is the best and my ele is the best... just use the right skills...

Wow, I just read through the whole thread. Many of you need to stay in school. I got a headache by attempting to read some of the posts.