What are the best upgrades for my pvp air staff?

I'm using an air staff on my ele/me for pvp, but I want to know what everyones opinions are on the best/most beneficial upgrades for the staff.

I'll go with some of the obvious

+5 Insightful Head with +30 Fort
+30 Hale Head with +30 Fort

Also an enchanting wrapping may be good for attunement spells (at max 20%, that's 9 seconds for elemental attunement and about 12 or so seconds for air attunement)

I don't think +30 +30 is allowed. http://www.gwonline.net/page.php?p=125

Generally the best modifiers are armor. It all really depends on how defensive your build is. If you have protective spirit on you often then Insighhtful of "skill name" is the best, being that more armor will do nothing, and more hp will mean you will be taking more damage for you monk to heal.

I run a couple elementalist with a few Rangers for some minor spirit spam frequently so have Insightful of Warding is probably the most useful on an Elementalist in this situation.

IIRC, Half + fortitude staff wrapping adds up to 60 HP....

According to Ensign, they do stack.

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=26742

Sorry, what does IIRC stands for? I've seen it many times. Thank you!

If I Recall Correctly

IIRC = If I Remember Correctly

Ok, thanks you 2! BTW, they finally stack or not? anyone checked it in-game?

They stack, ensign is god.

Anyway I'd have to suggest using a 1 hand wep and an artifact :\.

Anything you can get with a staff you can get with an wep+artifact and more.

Agree, I've never seen a staff that equals my wand+artifact combo. The staffs I've seen have always few (in quantity) and few (in diversity) modifiers.

i go with staff head +30 staff wrapping +30/20% Enchant longer

Defensive staff of Defense, or Defensive staff of Enchanting if you use enchantments.
Defense beats +HP in the long run.

wands vs staves....

wands can have 2 modifiers and foci can also have 2 modifiers but you can't add anything to them yourself.

staves can have 2 modifiers + 2 additions (head & wrapping) of your choice.

therefore, the difference really comes down to this....

foci can give +12 energy, staves only +10
you can modify staves as you desire but wand/focus you're stuck with what you can find.

personally - i'm all for staves - collectors can give staves with maxed out base stats then you can choose your additions as you see fit.

oh and on the original topic - my choice for additional effects goes between +health and + energy. I'm favouring + health atm as i'm using inspiration magic to rob energy from my enemies

I'd just like to add additional comments about +defense vs +HP:

With +defense, you are making any healing spells cast on you more efficient (each hitpoint you get healed by stretches out farther if the attack you are hit by is affected by your AL).

However, +health upgrades will help you against stuff that isn't affected by armor (like mesmer/necro/smiter).

i find the foci/wand combo pretty decent. atm im running around with a flame artifact that gives +6nrg base, +5 when health >50% and +5 when hexed and a wand that gives +10 nrg with -1 regen (thou the dmg it does sux) which gives my Mo/E 51 nrg under normal conditions and 56 when hexed, which can be a life saver

Hmm...What would be better, a collectors staff with a total of +60HP added (2 hp upgrades) or a collectors wand + collectors artifact?

nothing can beat this.. no matter what mods you find on any wand or staff...

there is a collector that will give you a wand that is 11-22 damage with a 20% recharge rate... and there is a collector that will give you a artifact that will will give you a 20% recharge and a 20% casting speed. ..... having 40% recharge is godly on a elementalist becasue you can spam your attacks super fast...

I use these and have yet found any staffs or wand/artifact that can match this combo. I do however have a second slot weapon that has health increase on it just incase i need a quick boost in combat of 35 health or more that i switch too. but once you see what that above combo can do you will notice that it is the best in the game right now...

Now im not saying you cant find really nice staffs out there but nothing you will find will give you 40% recharge like this and you will see how fast your Chain lighting or Lighting orb will recharge in under 1 sec...

What collectors do you get those from?

defensive defense

+10 defense is >>> +60 hp

there are 2 of them in the Crystal Desert that provide this. one takes Hdydra Claws the other takes something else.

Defensive of Defense. If you don't need the enchanting on an Elementalist, it's the only staff to take. +5 energy is negligible given your already large energy capacity, and the +5 defense will more than pay for itself, energy-wise, from the healing your monks *won't* have to do while taking care of your soft ass.

Of course if you're running an Ether Renewal build or the like you're probably going to want the Enchanting part.


The +30 HP mods are better if you're using multiple superior attribute runes that would otherwise drop your health below 400. But under normal circumstances, Defensive upgrades just keep you alive better.

Peace,
-CxE

^See! I wish I could lock him in a cage in my basement and poke him with a stick when I need an answer.

Ensign is indeed god.

FYI !!!! Croud Controllers dont need more Armor

and as for Increasing your HP well thats a waste to becasue believe me a monk will spend more of his energy on a tanker to keep the Preys at bay than you..

What you want as a elemental is the ablity to spam faster ane a large pool of energy to keep the spams going...

Go play a Monk for a day, then come back and tell me that with a straight face. And yes, I'm talking PvE. In PvP this isn't even up for debate.

Elementalists are the *biggest* healing tax in a group. They have low armor, low hit points, draw a lot of fire, and it's *always* an emergency situation when they get hit. It's attitudes like this one that cause it.


A good one won't. If a group is pulling well and keeping the aggro on a Warrior or two I can play Monk one handed, without dipping significantly into my energy reserves. You know what chews up energy? When things don't go according to plan. When an Elementalist gets too close and gets attacked, or when pulls don't go perfectly and the baddies run past the Warriors to rampage in the back ranks. When enemies start using AoE attacks or spreading around DoTs that force you to do triage. THAT burns up energy like no one's business.


Tell me this - just how much of a difference do you think a 75 energy maximum is going to make as opposed to a 70 energy maximum? Do you think that's going to be the difference between winning and losing a textbook battle? I don't. If the Warriors pull melee aggro into a nice little clump where they can sit invincibly under Healing Seed while the baddies die in a Meteor Shower, you win, and whether you have 14 Fire Magic or 16 Fire Magic or 85 Energy or 90 Energy is really just a bunch of e-penis measuring that doesn't amount to anything.

What I want is for my Elementalists to be able to be able to do more than run around screaming for heals when plan A fails. I want them to ditch their foolish 'I can put everything into offense, I'm never going to get hit and the Monks will take care of me anyway!' attitudes. Things are going to go wrong, you are going to take fire, and your 60 armor, 380 hit point pushover is going to get rocked. You know what's going to save you there? A bit more defense, the ability to absorb a bit more damage, to buy your Monks, and your team, much needed time to pull through. 5 more energy on top of your already abundant energy capacity is not going to win the tough battles. The 10% damage reduction, and the energy you'll save the Monks healing you, will.


I'm not so sure of this. Take your generic 'top' focus (say, a 20/20) and a 20/20 staff. The two 20/20s are a wash, the damage is the same with a wand, and the energy is comparable (+12 energy from a focus, +10 from a staff).

So the real difference between the two is up to two rare mods on the wand, plus two energy, versus two staff upgrades. You can value things in different ways, but +5 armor as a mod is hard to beat with any of the natural, rare mods. Two of them? Well, I think there's some room for debate here but not much.

Peace,
-CxE

:O

Yeah but I play a monk. Having the 12 from focus and 5 from weapon is awesome, along with offering of blood my energy is very nice. 17 versus 10.

I'll take any energy I can get. I honestly don't find myself being targeted as much anymore in PvP. I stay a safe distance away and to get to me they'll have to run through whatever group I'm with which will cause more problems then it solves for me to just get healed.

It's just those nasty mesmers that are a problem.

Regarding air staves, I'm currently hunting Bleached Shells for that one collector staff with 20% for both cast and recharge and I have a defensive staff head to put on it once i get it, but I don't want to risk losing the defensive. So, is this staff the one with the best inherent attributes availabe?

they stack but if you read corectly on gwonline.net it say

That line refers to random modifiers that appear on weapons. You won't find, for example, a wand with "+5 energy while health above 50%" and "+5 energy while health below 50%".

At least, in theory. I know this applies to fast cast / fast recharge modifiers, but it doesn't apply to some other modifiers, such as -2 damage per attack based on a condition. I'm not sure of the exact list of what doesn't stack.

In any case, this does not apply to which upgrades you can put into a staff. You can put in two +30 health upgrades and they'll both work just fine.

Peace,
-CxE