Double Dragon and Ride the Lightning

can someone please explain to me why either of these spells are elite? I don't see my anyone except maybe a warrior would want to use RtL. The two spells would actually probably work well together, RtL in on a monk and cast DD...but that's impossible. I guess DD is ok, but it's not good enough to use over an energy management elite.

DD is only good for places like fort aspendwood and jade quarry, where you energy is no problem at all. In other place, you can only expect to try to get someone kill with it, then bench the rest of the game.

While ride the lightning... although it actually does have 25% armor penetration, it still sux. No decent reason to use it, as assassin teleports are far better. It cast slower, it does so so dmg, it cause exhaustion, it even has the .75 delay while death charge etc didnt. Why is it elite? I don't know, Anet's skill designer really need to start measuring things, rather... Start playing PvP more.

and also, why would an elementalist want to be teleported to an enemy?

The ONLY way that this spell should be an elite would be for it to say "enemy is teleported to you." To make this an elite spell, and an exhausting spell, in order to do the complete opposite, is laughable

Not just that. An "AIR" ele want to teleport close.

PBAoE fire teleport close is completely fine, but you can just you assassin skill. Why RtL?

The only time RtL should be elite is that it is a true teleportation like necro teleport. (teleport thru wall)

Then people will start to fear ele ganker, with blinding flash on them, hard hitting, etc. For GvG that is.

Quote: Originally Posted by Vermilion Okeanos

I was having a look at the Factions skills earlier. I honestly though RtL was a normal skill. Its not till i read it and realised its actually elite that i really how truly shit it is. I mean come on! There are no PBAoE air skills other than Lightning Touch, and even then its not technically a PBAoE.

Vermillion... the excuse that you do literally teleport to the enemy is besides the point. It still sucks. Until i see AT LEAST 150 damage w/ AP there is no reason for me to consider this spell....ever.

Double Dragon is sub-par aswell. Isn't it basically Pheonix with Exhaustion? The only new ele elite i've seen that looks good is Shockwave (admittadly i haven't checked any out or looked in detail) but at least Shockwave is some good base damage.
I mean honestly... haven't Anet learnt anything? Energy Boon?! It *sucks*. Why pick this over Ether Prodigy or just leaving it to an outside source (BR on a necro) and bringing a decent elite... Its almost as bad as Glyph of Essence. As the wiki description says, its only real use is along with Rebirth for instant res and no additional side-effects. I honestly didn't realise the new Factions ele skills were quite this bad until today.

Shockwave is basically 1.5 Aftershocks if the enemies are adjacent to you, 1 Aftershock or less of damage if they're nearby/in the area. Big whoop. I'd rather have an energy elite that doubles the number of times I can cast the rest of my skillbar each minute.

Yeah, Factions ele elites are terrible. Indeed, elementalist damage elites are terrible in general. And the Factions energy elites happen to be inferior to the Core/Prophecies ones.

It's true I haven't spent the time to check out how to best use all the new Ele Elite skills, and I have yet to figure out in what situation Second Wind would be preferrable to Ele Attune. 2nd Wind does work well, but you may as well ask your party to go brew some tea in between bouts as you recover from all the exhaustion you end up with.

Shockwave on the other hand I do enjoy. I've taken the skill back to Tombs (Prophecies) with me and have been Echoing it before an Earthquake/Aftershock shock combo on the grasps. Much damage dealt but I don't live to long using that build as I usually find myself going even deeper into the mob than i generally would in order to inflict the most area dmg. Unsteady Earth however is a much needed Earth skill and I employ that quite a bit as it basically stops a casting mob in their tracks for 5 seconds. Using UE on a high level mob that already has a Meteor Shower on them means that you won't have to worry about that mob anymore, they're toast.

That being said, yes, I do like the 2 new Earth elites, but the others? Hmmm,..

150 damage+armor penetration? do you have any idea how muh damage that would deal versus an enemy with 60 armor? 233 damage (about), with one hit. But I agree, for the most part it sucks, used with ele skills at least. Vampiric touch/bite, holy strike, balthazzar's aura, are all skills that can go massive PB damage in an increbibly short amount of time w/ ride the lightning. Additionally, earth works great, cast RTL, whirwind, then aftershock can do a massive amount of damage in a small amount of time. Getting rid of RTL in the last combo and subbing for shockwave (which is great, considering it is finally a damage elite for earth), and casting after the other 2 skills would also work. Oh, and by the way, second wind, although it looks like an exhaustion recovery skill, actually works amazing when you DONT have other exhaust skills, in PvP, where you can have 40 energy exhaust, and never worry about recovery.