For those who think Ether Renewal is NOT overpowered

Funny how he dropped that tactic after this. Maybe he realised that arguing with engineers and statisticians is a bad time to drum up dumb numbers. Didn't use units, didn't specify any type of scale, so it could be nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio....

Basically any argument by the pro-ER folks falls into one of a few lame categories:

1) "You guys are whiners, play the game." This doesn't address the imbalance present.

2) "A counter exists" A counter exists to any skill. As many have pointed out through reductio ad absurdum, this doesn't hold. The statement that a skill is balanced because a counter exists becomes disproven by showing that any skill is thus balanced, including obviously unbalanced skills.

3) "Smite teams get beaten all the time" Yes, and there are many poor players out there. And it doesn't address ER's power. While I have a bone to pick with smiting as well, this is about ER, and the loss of a smiting team doesn't show that ER isn't overpowered - merely that it doesn't grant invulnerability, which we knew.

4) "It's only the El/Mo build that is overpowered" No, this is wrong. The amount of energy available through ER dwarfs every other elite out there - including other elementalist elites. You can easily generate 170 energy in 10 seconds (10*5 cost spells and filling your bar to 120 energy), and do it again 20 seconds later - generating 4-6 times the energy of any other elite energy regeneration skill, which cap out at around 3-4 pips, as well as healing for over 500 in those 10 seconds. Not a single other skill can do anything close to generating that kind of energy without a disadvantage - heck - the other elementalist elite energy storage skill for energy regeneration only generates 4 pips of energy and hurts you, or at best does no damage. Giving over 4 times that energy and a free 1000 health a minute seems a little absurd.

5) "Elementalists need ER because their spells cost so much" No, I really don't think so. For starters they have huge energy pools to make up for it - much like rangers have expertise to handle the cost of their over-priced skills. If you don't take energy storage as an elementalist you are screwing your build. Secondly, they have energy methods that work fine, at reasonable levels, like everyone else - Glyph of Energy provides 3 pips or so equivalent, ether prodigy provides 4 pips, Elemental attunement can provide 4 equivalent pretty well, and even more if you spend lot of energy in 45 seconds. There is no shortage of ways to get energy as an elementlaist, and most are in the same ballpark of 3-4 pips for an elite, less for a non-elite. ER is the only skill out there that trumps all others.

wow....as rediculous as that sounds it actually makes a lot of sense. I don't really have anything else to say other than Anti-Win Game made me chuckle a lot

lol I can do the same, brb with screenshot

EDIT: Tried it, impossible. They don't stack.

I can see it now: 6 N/Mo + 2 N/R. The N/R's drop EoE. Then 4-5 of them charge into the enemy with Death Nova + Balth. Aura and kill 4-5 of the enemy. The remaining 3-4 start mashing Putrid Explosion, followed by Vengeance. If anything is still alive, then Vengeance gives them another 30s to repeat. It would be funny to see once--but after that it would be a BORING game.

the guild SS uses that build all the time. the key is in the timing. they have the timing down pretty good. they used it againts my guild in "broken tower" the other day but i had seen them use it before so i told one of our minks to stay out of edge range. sure enough they kill everyone on the map except for the monk i told to move away.

stop discussing ER.

its clearly overpowered. Continue arguing this if you are scared that without smite, you will forced to play something of skill. The ability to maintain 80 enchantments, regardless of anything else is ridiculous, even if there is no practical use for those 80 enchantments.

i propose that instead we should discuss the following
1. how we hope that tatoo isn't really smgzor's
2. why he posted a picture of someone putting some penne into a to-go box
3. is the nikon d70 the best camera for your money?
4. what camera settings would be most appropriate to get rid of the blur in picture 81?
5. Why is EITS SO SEXY!

i will start.

1. what the hell is a bleeding heart? And why is there a burning woman in what appears to be the vena cava(u cant really tell its the vena cava, but it looks most like it)? i sincerely hope thats an elaborate temporary tattoo. i'll leave the boquet of purple flowers presenting the heart alone.
2. Smgz really likes penne.
3. d70 is pretty hot, but i like the 300d for the cheap used factor.
4. a quicker exposure would probably help
5. they're from texas, and "the earth is not a cold dead place" is the best album of 2003.

<3 smgzor

That's pretty much what it's all about.

The sad thing is that you can see traces of this sort of logic in the skill design, and it's maddening. This isn't a one class per character game, it's a two class per character game.

So the design of Elementalists is based upon having some of the best energy management, but horrendously overcosted skills? So why wouldn't you, instead, use the Elementalist primary for its outstanding energy management, and use that to cast spells from a secondary that *aren't* horribly overcosted? If you're powergaming there's no reason why you wouldn't. All that energy from Ether Renewal and Energy Storage is going to do a whole lot more casting Monk, Mesmer, or even Necromancer skills than Elementalist skills, so that's exactly what people do with it.

In sum: giving a class good energy management with which to cast bad spells is a weak balancing strategy, because players will use that good energy management to cast good spells instead.

Note that the Ranger has this problem as well. The entire Ranger class is almost universally overpriced, but Expertise is used to reduce those costs to something manageable. However, when Expertise is used with skills from other classes that are affected by Expertise, those skills become downright insane. The only thing keeping the Ranger and Expertise from going the way of the Elementalist is the fact that four of the other classes in the game are almost entirely spell based, and the other class, the Warrior, gets so much of its strength from adrenaline that Expertise can't have a huge effect upon the character. But if they want to create a new skill based class with energy based skills, I can virtually guarantee you that you'll see a bunch of Ranger/New Class combinations pop up that combine the best energy management attribute in the game with the new skills given. It's a sleeping giant that I hope they never wake.

Peace,
-CxE

I like this except make it so that for every ELEMENTAL enchant on you. And only energy regen for casting ele spells.

Uh, why not just change renewal so that maintained enchantments on people don't count...only enchants you have on you. That solves the problem right there.

Nerfing it so that only elementalist spells trigger renewal is too much, IMO. It eliminates a lot of interesting possibilities.

Although I already mentioned this, it was ignored:

Does shatter/drain/strip enchantments/chilblians not always remove the most recently used enchantment, in a similar way to ment ailment/condition will remove the most recently aquired condition? If so, removing ether renewal as soon as it's cast would surely do a lot of damage energy wise to that elem. These skills also have a good recharge time that can more-or-less keep up with Ether Renewal (25/30 seconds).

I'm not sure, maybe they remove one random enchantment... and even if not, the elem could cast another enchant on top of ether (not one already cast though as that would keep it in place in the queue)

If not, what's wrong with bringing rand enchantments or linering curse? These skills are, if you ask me, as important as res signet in serious matches.

If you think I'm taking the 'every skill has a counter' route that's because I am, and that's because most of the really cheap builds are based on stacking enchantments up; something you really need to be able to counter.

Odd Sock, it was a joke, shut the hell up. And seriously, stop acting like you know absolutely everything about everything. Because you clearly dont.

That's what it's like now. You get the energy for enchants on you, not on other people. And what makes it abusive isn't the stupid maintained enchant build, it's the El/Mo smiter. You don't seem to understand that you're regaining 5 energy for EACH enchant. So if you have 4 on you (Aura, Attunement, Zealot's, ER), you regain 20 energy. Combo that with a 5 energy spammable and you're netting 15. So do the math... it takes you a whopping 5 seconds to refil an elementalist that has 90 energy (you need 15 to start the combo). And that's if you only have 4 enchants. There's no other skill in the game that can do that for that cheap. Sure BiP is a sweetheart but the health costs associated to it is what makes it a balanced skill. Then there's the other stuff that's actually good but is junk when you compare it to ER. I'm talking about Offering of Blood, Energy Drain, Ether Prodigy, etc...

ER was waiting to be broken much like Zephyr was. Although the nerf to QZ was a bit harsh I do hope the upcoming balance will be similar. Same thing with Zealot's Fire, add a recharge timer that's actually decent and it'll be stop yelling ''abuse me'' like it is now. If not then smite will surely take the form of shouters with cover enchantments to protect the Zealot's Fire from single enchant removal (ie Aegis, Orders). And no Rend with it's ugly recharge won't be a decent solution.

Judging by the quality of your posts you're in absolutely no position to make such a judgement. I don't act like I know everything because you're right, I don't. But when you propose a stupid skill and claim it's balanced I just have to show you isn't. There wasn't anything in your post that said it was a joke and by what you posted here and in other threads I couldn't assume anything else. I also appreciate your wording. I'm a troll and even I find that to be a little too much. What can I say, you're a noob in denial that's getting angry.

edwinna: nobody is claiming it can't be countered. But in a fight with someone using Ether Renewal, if you manage to disable his energy engine once, that means he'll be down to 'normal' levels as far as energy management is concerned, he's not utterly gimped or anything, and you're basically out of the picture having to babysit the E/Mo to make sure none of the Ether Renewal casts get through. Miss a single casting of it however, and he'll instantly be back at full capacity and health again, whereas everyone else is scraping to get by at that point, and that is what people are trying to address. Just because you can prevent the effect from occurring doesn't mean the effect itself can't be imbalanced, that's what people have been painstakingly trying to make clear in this thread.

my wish is that everytime someone encounters a skill on another class that challenges them to become a better player and learn to counter it affectively, that they wouldn't come to every game forum and start crying and begging that Anet or whatever game developer nerf it. Please people, it's an elite skill, thus it's suppossed to be harder to counter. I honestly don't think that the original post photo is real and have NEVER seen anyone maintain that many enchants...people love photoshopping pics up and then posting them to enflame the masses.

I saw your post before it was deleted. All of the quotes you had NO personal attacks. They said, basically, you didn't understand. Albeit, some were ruder than I would have liked.

If you said 2+2=5, people would correct you. If you kept insisting you were right, they'd keep trying to explain it. Telling you that you didn't understand it would be perfectly true and reasonable.

In this matter, the answer isn't anywhere near as clear-cut. However, the same thing holds true; Telling you you don't understand something is NOT a flame or personal attack.

One of your quotes said something like, "You don't know [fecal matter] about the build I posted". Once again, poor wording, but you don't know [fecal matter] is NOT the same as you don't know [fecal matter] about the build I posted.

And now you're intentionally breaking rules and going off topic because you're frustrated. At this point, if you get banned, you'll have actually warranted it.

Edit: And as a moderator [of another forum], you should ideally know about the importance of taking issues with the moderation system to PM's. I've PM'd moderators and other forum users about issues multiple times since I've started posting here, as I've also done moderation for another forum.

Not overpowered my foot.

I understand the topic perfectly well thank you, I've used the Emo build myself and have done something similar to this. I deleted that character because I had no use for something so easy. So when I say I know what I'm talking about, I actually do. And I hold my opinion of this skill, regardless off my inpending warning, ban or what ever else anyone has to say about me.

But I will not be insulted. That is the one thing I will not allow.

I understand how ER works, thanks, I just assumed that the original screenshot had some, you know, relevance to the topic at hand. If it doesn't we can move on.

Regarding your example that requires you to use half your skill slots for enchants, which is possible if your build revolves around spamming one or two skills, but not if you're say, an elementalist focused on nuking.

I'm not denying that ER can and does become overpowered in a lot of circumstances, but I'd like to see it changed in a way that doesn't nerf it into oblivion for non abusive builds. I'd also like to see other energy management skills like ether prodigy and ether lord become more useful...

The easiest change would be a cap in the number of enchantments that ER takes into accounts, say 3. That means with max energy storage and a fast cast 5 mana spell like flare you get 60-10=50 energy every 31.75 seconds, which is the equivalent of just under 5 pips of regen.

NOW you're not getting it. Whether or not you understand Ether Renewal was not is irrelavent. Whatever the subject matter may have been, people are entitled to their own opinions. Saying that you don't understand their point of view is a perfectly reasonable statement, and saying you don't get it at all is a rather close-minded statement, but is NOT a personal attack, regardless.

It is indeed true that what has been said could have been said with more tact. However, it seems to me that it is your pride that is at fault in this instance. You perceive comments that say you're wrong as attacks on yourself, and have so you've stepped up the hostility to keep apace.

You're frustrated and annoyed with other people who don't see things the same way as you do, and it's perfectly fine, seeing as it's human nature. I'd suggest stepping out of the topic for a while to collect yourself.
Instead, you could try and figure out what points your view diverges from that of others, and argue those independently.

I've noticed a lot of people have different views of what balance is, and what broken is.

Also, keep in mind that when people say they want Ether Renewal nerfed, the way they want it changed may vary per person. Some people suggest changes that would do little to affect elementalists, and mainly damage the combo in question. You could instead divert your resources to figuring out how you think it should change in a way that would leave the less harmful builds you mention untouched.

I do not doubt that in your position, I'd feel upset as well. People writing things in a patronizing or condescending tone, whether they're right or wrong, and occasionally being downright rude. However, it doesn't justify becoming unreasonable and hostile. Discretion is the greater part of valour, and what-not.

At least consider some of the above. I'd lashed out at the admins of GWonline as well, for banning me over something EXTREMELY trivial without warning, which was not listed in the forum guidlines, and would not fall under the heading of common sense. In the end, we'd come to an understanding that it was a misunderstanding, and they made an addendum to their rules because of it, and I left, and never went back.

For the sake of civilized discussion, I ask again, to redirect resources constructively. If you're going to present a vastly divergent view, it's most likely going to have to be a seperate topic addressing each aspect, explaining things clearly with concise examples and parallels, all in a single post. PM the people who have offended you personally and ask them to politely word their posts differently. I've done it successfully already on these forums, and the person was very reasonable about it. PM the moderators and make your view on moderateable content known, and explain it in detail, and provide links to examples.
Anything else is pointless and unreasonable, like throwing a temper tantrum. It happens to people of all ages at times, and is not a detractor of character. People are people.

I hope this helps calm the nerves of various parties and presents a reasonable satisfactory, or at least practical, solution to all parties involved. Thank you.

[Edit: And I apologize for unrelated ideas presented together and sentence fragments, as I was eating, and wrote it and edited it in 2 parts before posting. Unfortunately, proofreading changes should always also be proofread >.<]

I think it's quite amazing how ignorant some people can be to basic game mechanics, the fact that ER alone is much stronger than other comparable energy regens (I'm thinking offering primarily) is alone enough to suggest there is a balance problem.

The "you can counter it" argument is an absolute joke - just because it can be countered doesn't make it balanced, there is much larged picture to it than that... and that's why these fixes aren't instant, nerfing one spell will probably make another more effective than it probably should be, I mean.. I can't see this being the case if ER took a nerf...

It's simply much better than any spells that are similar to it, elite or otherwise, there actually isn't much of an argument on that, it is.. it's cleary better

People promoting the fact it needs a nerf have done so with pretty convincing images and definititions. well.. they convinced me more than "whining elitist!"

I also think it's debatable as to whether the smite build is just a "flavour of the month" - Air Elementists were just a flavour, people knew that too, there were plenty of ways to beat them and were clearly just a fad.

Thing is, smite builds are being used to dominate pvp, and farm in pve (not all ER ones I know, but they do work) - I think it's clear ER needs looking at, and I just don't see how people can be so blind to not see it. I doubt Anet won't see it anyway, I think we'll see it getting toned down in a future update

no need to nerf the skill, just fight elites with elites. Throw in lingering curse, WHOA there goes all the enchantments on them, and all their energy gets sucked away.

Personally I don't care either way... nerf it or don't, just quit whining everyone.

People should read Ensign's post a couple pages back... he summed it up well... for a straight Ele ER would not be overpowered. It's the profession combo that makes it overpowered. I would like to think there is a way of keeping it there for what ANet probably intended it for, energy management for Ele's, while removing the way it can be abused.

I play PvP and E/Mo smiters make me laugh. For PvE, who cares?

I have a question. Maybe I'm out in left field on this, but who here agrees with me that maintainable enchantments are the real issue with lots of the unbalanced builds?

That's funny, as every post you've made in this thread thus far has been a personal attack on both your own character and intelligence.

Peace,
-CxE

Kinda like that one? Cause lets face it, you just called me an idiot too just now. And you call yourself a mod....

Jesus christ, what the hell type of place is this? Filled with jackasses and trolls.

Angel: It wasnt that people said I was wrong, it was that 5 different people had to keep saying it over and over. I mean, if I'm wrong, people will know it, but they dont have insult my intelligence level trying to prove their point.

Btw, apparently my account is broken, because I cant see the forums in it, but I didnt recieve any notification that I was banned or suspended. If someone would like to clear that up for me?

You can't get 2x the same enchant on you...

Being a mod doesn't mean I have to be nice to the idiots and trolls. In fact, as a mod who's here to help maintain the content quality of the site, coming down hard on the idiots and trolls is part of the job description.

Peace,
-CxE

Yes, but again, I'm not an idiot

So all you are is a troll mod.
Thanks for proving my point.

Now why dont you make yourself useful and go fix my other account instead of acting like a dipshit and getting in my face. And you know, from what I remember, a mod's job was to maintain order, not add to the fights. So all you are is a Troll in power when you act like that.

It seems as tho most mods have strayed far from this directive. Especially those that depend on past conditions of the game to weigh judgement on so called "noobs". With the recent patches, many, many skills are finding uses, and counters are being fleshed out.

I think its way past time this thread was locked.

I think all useful and valid points that can possibly be made have already been made. Since nothing useful is being discussed anymore this thread should be closed.