Time to fix the ele problem

I'm not saying eles don't need improvement. I just don't think they are as useless as some of you think they are. They are deceptively simple. They have lots of flat-out damage spells, but really if you get creative you can do more with the ele. And frankly I don't see why people hate exhaustion. An ele doesn't need to be at full energy to continue. I'll spam Obsidian Flame until I'm two thirds exhausted if things are really getting rough, then rely more on my other spells in the next battle.

I must admit though, their penalties are silly and yeah, Lightning Hammer is a rediculous spell.

I also must admit that the channeling ritualist is strong competition for the ele. You guys keep talking about warriors, which I don't understand. If anything they should be compared to Ritualists.

In the land of Cantha (which is PvE obviously) my ele has had no problem whatsoever getting in to groups which is a positive turnaround from Tyria where it was SS or MM that were always in high demand. On top of that people have requested wards and EQ (because they mess with assassins)rather than the good old fashioned nuker. Its great to see ele demand and diversity in PvE.

All in all, these suggestions are ridiculous and over the top. While I agree that some aspects of the Elementalist are not quite as good as they once were, they are still a force to be reckoned with when used properly. Maybe you should play a little more before recommending changes to a class that already contributes many valuable skills to a party.

/notsigned even in the slightest

People keep talking abut warriors because they have the highest reliable and sustainable DPS there is, no question (not considering AoE). I think theyre refferring mainly to pvp where the concept of a "tank" doesnt exist and DoT AoE is pretty much useless for most situations (besides maybe nailing heal balls and nuking NPCs).

I think you've been playing a little too much pve where we all know eles are perfectly usable.

I think you've been playing a little too much pvp.
I would like to see you getting into to group to SF or Tombs or UW as ele.
Factions missions are totaly different story - you can get there simply because there arent many people there in general and group leaders would take anything but multiple assasins.

I think at most, the ele can do with maybe a couple of extra pips of energy at high Energy Storage level. Although a lot of testing needs to be done here.

The reason ele spells have to cost so much is because it stops non elementalists using them in the same style eles do.

I also would like to see more single shot AoE spells but w/e.
It would also be awesome if the persistant AoE spells can be ground targeting instead of entity targets. Although, that maybe more difficult to impliment with the control system in guild wars. It would allow for more strategic play for area denial and stuff, but may be a little overpowered since it would negate stuff like Spell Breaker.

Tombs and UW are a bit of a different ball of wax. Both of those have become little more than a silly joke. Only Monk + Necro teams or Trapper teams go to UW these days. Tombs is just the Barrage/Pet thing, which is lame. Warriors, Mesmers, and Eles can't get into those groups. Rather sad really. It stifles creative builds.

SF, I don't know. I haven't been back there after the gear trick nerf.

Well like I said, I think people are saying the problem with ele lies solely in PvP. Nuking is still perfectly viable in PvE. You can't really rationalise that point based purely on the fact eles have no place in gimmick builds.

It wasn't long ago that eles were a regular addition to most SF farming teams. Just because the people running those to-the-letter forum builds don't want eles anymore doesn't make them useless.

With factions out I'd say if anything, nukers will be even more useful. The new mobs seem to pack a lot more things like hex removal than before. You can't remove a meteor shower.

Oh please dont start this "All those people are stupid and I know better" thing. If eles are not accepted that means there is a good reason for it. And as a person whos first character was ele I can tell you what the reason is. DAMAGE! Not enough of it. Not nearly enough to compensate for fragility and all other drawbacks like exhaustion and insane energy cost and recharge times of most spells.
Meteor shower? Yes that is the only reason why eles are still accepted anywhere in pve. Take it away and eles are dead class. That said it is only useful to kill npc monks and such. Average lvl24 mob will take less than 150 points of damage over 9 seconds period... Who needs a removal for this junk?
On the other hand our dear smites have more than enough hex removal, yet SS still owns them like nothing, and it just got huge buff.
Yeah right useful my lower back...

A warrior can go higher, although being that immobile tends to be a drawback at times. The actual value of the armor that high usually isnt neccacary either and is just for showing off. Free and renewable AL combined with knockdown prevention on top of whatever the elementalist brings to bear with +31AL and damage reduction makes for a rather sorry comparison. I guess you never partied with a warrior that was really setup to just tank and hold ground. Damage comes on its own just with auto attack and perhaps the occasional cyclone axe or any other skill in a situation like that.

For a ele to bridge the initial AL gap, the ele must use water magic as well, but has nothing to cover the damage reduction innate to warriors which makes far more of a difference at high armor levels.

From experience with both elementalists and warriors setup to tank, the ele takes more finess without outside aid and the warrior doesn't begin to panic at low energy levels or if enchantments get removed (except for shatter).

The difference is that other professions can do more than one thing with the existing skills, opposed to being forced to get creative in order to be sub-par mimics of what other professions achieve.

Clearly you havent been in too many fights that lasted more than 30s. When you talk about over a minute of recovery time following heavy exhaustion, then it becomes painfully obvious the drawbacks involved. Unlike other professions, the ele cant really sustain chain casting of many of the skills within the lines. Exhaustion and high energy cost typically prevent this and they actually need to break between casts doing nothing but wand damage. By contrast, other profesisons that are more hex based operate similarly, but the hexes are still in effect and they are still "doing something" other than wand damage.

The list doesn't start and stop with lightning hammer.

It gets brought up whenever you mention the word damage. There are plenty of non-eliete methods for AL increase and other damage mitigation. This allows the warrior to bring skills that pile on the damage easily, which coincidentailly largely ignore AL with the damage bonuses involved or additional effects like deep wound. Granted, its largely by single target, but behind them come rangers with their various spike methods which have alot of bonus damage from many sources that do not get mitigated either.

The hard comparison for eles is with ritualists. Rits bring alot of utility to the table though without even needing to goto the secondary profession to round them out. Then, when observing the channeling line, they are doing damage while creating synergy with their other skills that operate passivly. By contrast, elementalists do 10-30% more damage per skill, but have zero passive synergies. There is no ward that heals people within it every time an elementalist casts a nuke, while also protecting the party or helping augment offense further. There is no elementalist spell that recovers energy just because they are near other elementalists, or do more damage just because they are holding some other item that further augment's their ability to operate.

To be honest, the elementalist class feels rather disjointed by comparsion. This is not to say they are unusuable, but its the utility that other classes do not really bring to the table that makes them usable rather than the damage that they deal. The damage inflicted with the spells just seems to set elementalists apart from monks really. This is opposed to dealing damage off of an ally through other protection spells. What causes the frustration among many people, is that this is not what the elementalist is advertised as and the skill lines seem to suggest that they should be some kind of damage dealing powerhouse. Then you have other skills, like most of the glyphs, that seem like they would be cool, but in reality just waste space.

Elementalists are perfectly fine. I'm sorry all most Eles want to do is Echo Meteor Shower but the problem is not in the profession itself it is in the people who play it. Yes, Elemental damage has its notable drawbacks but there is perfectly viable non-elemental options available to Eles. What of Obsidian Flame, what of the 2 versions of Crystal Wave? In fact, Earth magic is as of this point incredibly powerful- combining potent self protection, with party protection, and massive damage skills. Air/Water are great for PvP. And Fire got substantial buffs.

There is certain skills that need to be looked at, esp. all the ridiculous energy management skills that cause Exhaustion, and perhaps a few on the new skills/elites but on the whole Eles seem to be perfectly fine to me. I know that the most potent skills are PBAoEs but I think if player correctly the close range shouldn't be an issue.

Physical attackers have the nastiest spikes, due to the combination of buff stacking and deep wounds. This has been discussed to death.

As far as single skill spikes go, ritualists are the best of the casters without contest. The runners up are elementalists and necromancers. Obsidian Flame hits a bit harder, but the cost is much more difficult to handle than that of Shadow Strike. Also Shadow Strike has a favorable interaction with Protective Spirit and Spirit Bond that makes the skill more attractive. I'm not sure which I prefer at this point honestly.

Normally chaining spells does not work very well, due to cast times and aftercasts - it is fairly trivial to land heals and protection between the first spell and the second. Fast Casting can somewhat address that problem - however, that particular build gets much of its strength from the sheer number of copies of Blinding Flash, and the ability to use Gale aggressively to disable monks while throwing DDs.


I am one of the biggest proponents of using AoE fire spells for their PvE mes effect - Firestorm on the monk boss keeps him from casting! - but given the costs and especially the recharges of these things I'm generally unimpressed by them whenever they're on my bar. The closest I've come to finding one of those that I liked was Dragon's Breath, but the recharge is around twice as long as it should be.


They also can't compete with Barrage, Triple Chop, or Hundred Blades. Therein lies the problem.


Those aren't gimmick builds. Those are strong, coordinated builds with a proven track record, used to power-farm specific profitable areas. Once people spend a lot of time attacking a certain problem their builds start to tighten up to become more effective. Which is why you start seeing the templates - people know they're good, and by bringing one and hooking up with other people running the template build you have a good chance of not wasting your time on a run.

That's a much different environment than what you find in a typical mission outpost. People who have completed the game usually don't hang out in random mission outposts, instead you have a collection of people with suboptimal equipment and partial skillsets, who very likely do not know what they are doing. You're not trying to find an optimal team here, you're just trying to find a minimal set of tools to get you on to the next mission.

Of course if you *could* find the equivilent of a farming build in a mission outpost you'd very likely rip through the mission without a hint of trouble.

Don't mistake 'good enough' for 'good', though. For instance I spent a good amount of time capping skills with my monk, with a bar composing of the three smiting signets, mantra of inscriptions, a res, and three capture signets. Was it good enough? Sure, I got to order the henchies around and cap a bunch of skills each run. Does that make it a good build? Far from it.


It's not even a very good spell in a lot of situations, and I've really wanted to cut it from my bar on occasion - with good pulling and aggro management the skill is a waste of time, maybe hitting once before the mobs drop dead. The only value of Meteor Shower is in the mes effect, that it knocks down the mobs a few times to both prevent damage and holds them in place for other damage to land. The damage really is nothing special - three hits of 119 before armor, usually something in the 40s-50s against the high-level melee mobs you'd want to use it on.

Peace,
-CxE

I think another thing that might help Eles is having those bigger spells a lot more like Deep freeze. Do damage AND a dangerous hex or sorts. You know have spells do double effects high damage and deadly hexes.

Wizards have always been known for possessing extraordinary powerful spells.

to CxE: As for spells like meteor shower its like they are forcing eles to depend heavily on snares I guess. Its possible though. Hit someone with a snare (water ele) while the other ele prepares the death from above.

Of course, that doesn't actually even work because if the target is moving from the instant the spell goes off in a straight line they will never get hit by "adjacent" DOT AoEs even with 66% slow. Not even Firestorm, let alone Meteor Shower's 3 second startup. This is a primary reason why Maelstrom sucks so much. You could convince me that the shutdown effect is worth the cost but there are exactly two spells that will slow them enough for it to work - one of them negates most damage (Iron Mist) and the other is elite, has a terrible duration, is conditional, and causes even more Exhaustion (Mind Freeze).

AOE ranges are absolutely tiny, which is a serious problem. Currently, fireball, which is a "nearby" AOE won't always even hit both enemies if they are next to you, but one is on the opposite side of your target. The size of a nearby AOE should really be at least as large as a ward if the cost, damage, and exhaustion aren't changed. If you are going to spend 10 energy and sit there for two seconds casting fireball, then you should at least be guaranteed to hit two targets.

I think making energy storage "expertise for spells" would make me want to play ele again.. I just find them boring, and not doing much in the way of damage usually. i'm just not impressed with falling rocks from the sky.

Actually, to nitpick, I think fireball is an adjacent AoE. Rodgort's is a nearby, and I think it will get the person on the other side in that circumstance.

Ok lets make some distinction

PvP

The elementalist work as fine , the provide usefull support spell and high damage output spell.

A warrior dont do more damage then a elementalist if correctly shutdown , a elementalist dont do more damage then a warrior if correctly interupted...

There is not a overdamaging profession BECOUSE they do DIFFERENT type of damage.

Its called balance.

PvE nuking is still viable , nuking easy outdamage a warrior becouse it get more mob while a warrior is attaking only one.

About the energy. EVER build in the world should avoid to use more enegy then it can consume. make your build around that and you will see you can easy out damage a warrior is doing.

A double attument fire ele can nuke costantly , spamming all the skill(with a 20 recharge wand and 20/20 offhand) making far more damage then a warrior becouse of aoe and at end of the battle be full energy(as long you remember to keep attument up)

If the elementalist are so sucky why everone in pvp(where the bad build dont win) make a build with a balaced amount of warrior , mesmer,ele etc etc

dont try to say iway , if you ever played or faced that build you will know the big probrem arent the warrior but the support profession

if you want to buff ele's
just let ele players do the same dmge with spells as ele bosses in cantha
48 + 48 dmge from stone daggers
200 dmge from fireball
390 dmge from meteor

that oughta out dmge a warrior
*angelface*

Ok, warriors have what i call a higher 'crude' dps. Eles have a realtively low 'crude' dps. This is to say that if both were to attack dummies one by one, then the warrior would do the most dmg fastest, and more often.

However, in reality warriors do very little dmg in 8v8. In fact, their damage is almost comparable to that of an elementalists. Why is this? Well, its because warriors spend a vast amount of time being shut down relative to the elementlist. It is very rare for the warrior not to be blinded, weakened, or have some hex on them for much of the fight. Now, Faintheartedness drops dmg from a warrior by 50% straigh of, and weakness cuts dmg by a further 2/3s. Blind may as well just take the warrior away completely. Now, if there were conditions that did the same to spell casters, then you would have a right to complain. Ok, there is Migraine, but its elite, and is nowhere near as spammable as faint.

All in all the warriors high dps is offset by the large amount of counters they face. Elementalists, on the other hand, have a relatively low dps (although they can still spike very well) but are unhindered by quite the same amount of hexes and conditions as warriors. All in all it balanced.

Elementalists, while they do seem to simply facilitate spamming of Heal Party, are none the less well balanced, and imo, do not need fixing.

How did this turn into a pvp, pve debate? I don't have an elementalist, because of all the bad press they have gotten. I don't understand the logic behind having engergy storage to increase your max energy, only to have it taken away again by exhaustion.

concussion shot, boad head arrow, dist shot, savage shot, skull crack (asassin daze skill), incendiary arrow, choking gas, backfire, soul leech, mark of subversion, shame, guilt, diversion, migraine (hell of a lot of mesmer spells)

sure you can say a caster isn't worthless while under backfire but i rarely see casters cast while under it (besides newbies), same with soul leech etc

blind doesn't kill the warrior
backfire, soul leech, mark of subversion etc all kill the caster with relative ease (cover up hexes make it near impossible to get the hex off)

if ele is dazed he's just useless (someone else is going to have to remove it cause you try using mend ailement while dazed...)


war's can heal while blinded try self healing with a caster when dazed



about faint etc
ever heard of: flurry, frenzy, tigers fury etc to up attack speed?
i'm pretty sure alot of warriors use frenzy (they are being protected by a monk anyway and not the priory target)

Your logic is highly flawed. Especially when under weakness warriors come down to the wand damage level, but it doesnt affect their damage bonus from skills or any augmentation from any other source. You obviously havent been dazed either as a elementalist. That is far superior to faintheartedness in every possible sense. Migraine stacked with arcane conodrum is by far worse as well. Physical damage dealers have more types of counters, but the anti-elementalist ones are more potent.

The problem is that you must bring warrior counters in order to survive against them. To survive against one elementalist, you only need 1 copy of reversal of fortune. Against many you only need protective spirit. Those skills hurt warriors as well, but not nearly as much as how they flat out neuter single source damage packets with a long delivery time that elementalists represent.

You can choose to not bring elementalist counters and shut down options and do fine, you can not choose to avoid bringing physical damage counters. That is most certainly not balanced. Hell, even a all ele spike team cant happen anymore due to shelter existing. Have fun hunting that down with your team of eles on a ritual lord or soul twisting ritualist and possibly oath shotting ranger.

Oh boy, now we are on the road of nerfing elementalist energy gain again, because they are abusing another monk skill through unintended chain casting. Yeah, that hardly makes the entire skill sets from the ele seem worth while.

I actually have some hope that the Ritualist mass anti spike options might finally get Arenanet off their terror of Elementalist spiking (which is the reason Lightning Hammer is so retardedly overpriced). After all, if you can counter any number of Elementalist spikers with a single Ritualist, does it really matter if those builds are using a 170 damage Lightning Orb instead of 140?

i can write down many more skill who can shut down warrior damage.

but you can just use your w , a , s , d key ...

frenzy double the damage you take(the monk can heal some of that but it require another person to do that)
flurry reduce your damage
tiger fury is 10 energy and other draw back ...

And backfire and stuff dont kill you , you just dont cast and you dont take damage , plus they last about 10 second.

a warrior blinded (or clippled) is complety useless , until tha get removed by a monk ...

see? is balanced.

Sorry, but then you force groups to run ritualists because of just how deadly the spikes would be without one. I really don't think thats the solution (despite some spirits being amazing counters).

So this is not shutting down a caster because?? There are many ways to shut down casters as there are warriors.

i was replying about blind dont kill a warrior while backfire kill a caster. not is not about shut down stuff.

and your last sentence say what i concluded. the ele (but minor fix) are balanced.

*takes a deep breath*

Soul Bind, Wail of Doom, Diversion, Clumsiness, Amity, Pacifism, Healing Hands, Mark of Protection, Holy Wrath, Shield of Judgement, Faintheartedness, Spiteful Spirit, Empathy, Shadow of Fear, Blurred Vision, Price of Failure, Spirit of Failure, Reckless Haste, Soothing Images, Sympathetic Visage, Ranger dodge skills, warrior dodge skills, assassin dodge stances, Distortion, Aegis, Guardian, Shield of Deflection, Mist Form, Ward Against Melee, Displacement, Crippling Anguish, Muddy Terrain, Ethereal Burden, Imagined Burden, Shared Burden, Iron Mist, Ward Against Foes, many slow-down water hexes, Shadowy Burden, Binding Chains, any skill that causes blind, any skill that causes weakness, any skill that cuases cripple including many traps, and any skill that can teleport you away.

All ways to stop the warrior's attacks that the elementalist can get through. Actually, in a sense, the ele's power comes from the fact that people prepare to defend against the warriors. If you just have warriors, it's a peice of cake to stop them. If you just have eles, it's... well if you have a lot of eles it can be difficult but you can stop them. If you have both, that's a lot harder to manage.

That's like complaining that IWAY forces groups to bring Warrior counters. If Elementalist spiking is being used successfully (and I doubt it would be very often even if Lightning Orb did 170 damage) then you bring the skills that counter it (which, BTW, can be done with a large selection of skills other than a ritualist's). Welcome to Guild Wars.

Say what? Where did you get that impression?

Smite Hex is "more than enough" hex removal? When I referred to factions having a lot of hex removal I meant expel hexes which I've noticed on a lot a mobs. If I remember right Smite Hex removes 4 hexes a minute and is easy to prevent with a cover hex. Expel Hexes can remove 14 a minute and takes 2 at a time which means you'll have to double cover. Plus every time I've tried SS vs. these mobs they remove it before I can get off even 1 cover, never mind 2. That mean's you have to cast 4 hexes (junk hex, SS, cover, cover) just for 1 cast.

When I said you can't remove a meteor shower I meant it comparatively to the other main source of AoE damage. I'm trying to discuss not argue so please, there's no need to be a jerk.

I think if we just add Agro's Cry, not only will Elementalists sound cool, (Guild Lord!! PRIEST!!!!!) but will do some respectful damage too.

One thing I surely agree... the eles are way underpowered and their role seems to start being replaced. Nuker? There's the N/Me which doesn't have Exhaustion and VERY fast cast/recharge, not to mention it doesn't trigger the AoE AI fleeing. All for 15 energy and lasts 21 seconds?? (16 curses) What's this? A joke? I think SS should get its recharge to at least 30 seconds to get the balance a bit better.

Also... Flare at 1 sec cast time?? That skill (like stone daggers and ice spear) should get it's cast time to 1/2 sec. I mean, eles know their element so well that they can just shoot basic spells like that in a jiffy, not take a whole second to contemplate on it. I know about the spamming thing but this is not what i'm in with this. Simple spell such as this should be more than spammable.

I would also like to point out the HORRIBLE state of the Meteor Shower. While I agree about the exhaustion and energy (but maybe a little faster recharge? Say 45 sec) Meteor shower starts right? and the animation makes all ppl int its area scatter. IMO it should hit IMMEDIATELY, lasting for 6 seconds instead. If you don't understand what I'm saying, look:

Current Meteor Shower:

Casting: 3sec, dmg + knockdown, 3sec, dmg + knockdown, 3 sec, dmg + knockdown.

My idea: dmg + knockdown, 3 sec, dmg + knockdown, 3 sec, dmg + knockdown.

This way you get at least 1 hit with it. AI stays until after the 1st hit, but players use their eyes and flee as soon as the animation starts. (I do as well)
__________________________________________________ ___________

Some skills I think would be nice (but not overpowered)

Earth wave: 15e, 1/2 cast, 30 sec
All creatures in the area are thrown outside your agro range.

Meteor Shower (revisited): 25, 5, 45
Target foe and all foes in the area are hit for 7-112 fire dmg and are knocked down. This is repeated every 3 seconds for the next 6 seconds. If Meteor shower hits a moving foe, that foe is knocked down for 2 seconds instead. This spell causes exhaustion.

Static Hit: 10, 1, 15
Target foe is struck for 10-75 lightning dmg. Foes near your target are struck for 1-15 lightninh damage.

Lung-freezing Mist: 20, 2, 45
Create a Lung-Freezing Mist at target foe's location. For 3-18 seconds, foes in the area are afflicted by weakness and have -15 armor against cold damage. This spell causes minor exhaustion.
__________________________________________________ ___________

I also like the idea of faster energy regen while out of combat for casters. ^^

*deep breath*

THERE IS NO ELE PROBLEM! THE LAST TIME I CHECKED, THEY'RE THE ONLY CLASS THAT CAN DO 150+ DAMAGE WITH ONE SKILL FOR GOD'S SAKE! AND ALL THE ELES COMPLAINING ARE FIRE ELES, THE LIGTNING ELES DON'T GRIPE ABOUT IT BECAUSE THEY KNOW THEY CAN TOTALLY OWN ANYONE! PLEASE BE QUIET NOW! AGAIN, THERE IS NO ELE PROBLEM.

Disagree with me? Go try to take the elementalist shrine by yourself, or with one buddy who isn't a monk. Pwnt.

I have to say I am a fire elemental, I personaly think yes the elementals needs to be looked at. I also think that water, earth and air should be doing the same amouts of damage or close to each other. However fire should be doing a little more damage than the others but they should be close. There needs to be more creative skills for these classies to other than damage.

There is no ele problem, the only problem with eles is trying to force them into a role they don't work at - extended damage over a large timeframe. Make a utility build and own with it (pvp or pve) and then come back. Earth ele with wards, air ele with blinding flash spam.

lol i read like 2 sentences of your statement and i just have to laugh. warriors thinking they are better then eles? any warrior anytime go up against a earth ele and see what happends to you. o and don t stand there and try and use heal sig lol. oooooh that uber mending like lot of good it does through a spike plus kd plus 2 more spikes b4 you even get 2 feet to the ele lol. there are other eles out there other then the fire ele. as for the rest of what was said i didn t know there was a ele problem did i not get the memo again

Irresistable Blow can knock an Earth elementalist off of his feet.

Seriously.

Been there, done that.
Dodge his lightning orbs. You win.

Also, they can't do 150+, unless they use Glyph of Elemental Power and Lightning orb, then maybe it's possible.

Even so, if you do 150 damage, you won't be able to dish it out fast enough.

I don't use fire ele anyway, when I beat Shiro, he found it very hard to hit anyone when frozen, blinded, knocked down and eviserated, with lower armor.


It's all about knowing your skills, there are several earth spells that ignore armor, like obsidean flame add to archane echo, that will kill a warrior faster than anything, thats the whole point of "balance".

Maybe you'll kill the warrior, but you won't be able ot kill anything else for a long time if you Arcane Echo Obsidian Flame. An Elementalist can kill a Warrior. An Elementalist cannot kill anything else as fast as a Warrior can however. And there's 2 Earth Skills that ignore armor. Crystal Wave and Obsidian flame. Crystal Wave is a lot of energy and requires you to be very close to your target to do anything.

Sorry, but you are sadly mistaken. Warrriors, rangers, assassins, and even mesmers spike harder than elementalists do. When you begin to figure in things like deep wound doing 90+ damage on top of the listed damage, your figurative numbers of leetness go out the window. What is interesting is that most of all the other professions in the game deal the bulk of their hard hitting damage in armor ignoring fashions. Elementalists are the exact reverse.

Gross ignorance or misinformation ftw as it were.