17 replies to this topic

[Schwarzseher]

Hello everyone!

I've been thinking about how to optimize my Elementalist in various ways since I hit 80.
Now the question is should I rather go for something like Knight's, Soldier's(btw where to I get that?^^), Valkyrie or Cleric?
To give you all information: I'm playing 0/10/10/20/30, do PvE regularly, love to do WvW too.

Hope to get some good answers =)

[Aetou]

I'm not entirely sure what your build is based around just from those numbers.  Is it direct damage?  If so, mix Knight and Valkyrie to give you a good balance of stats.

[animaillusionaria]

Aetou, on 01 November 2012 - 02:43 PM, said:

I'm not entirely sure what your build is based around just from those numbers.  Is it direct damage?  If so, mix Knight and Valkyrie to give you a good balance of stats.

seems to be a damage build based around auras

Edited by animaillusionaria, 01 November 2012 - 02:59 PM.

[Schwarzseher]

Yep auras with direct damage.
ATM I run around with just about anyting so that I can at least hold my ground. So...Aetou you'd recommant a mix or Valkyrie/Knights? Like 3/3?

[Aetou]

Schwarzseher, on 01 November 2012 - 03:07 PM, said:

Yep auras with direct damage.
ATM I run around with just about anyting so that I can at least hold my ground. So...Aetou you'd recommant a mix or Valkyrie/Knights? Like 3/3?

You have to factor in your trinkets and weapons as well, meaning that you have 14 slots in total.  Different slots also carry very different amounts of stats so an even numerical split isn't necessarily going to give you an even split (and once you have about 35% of each which you give the last 30% to is largely a matter of personal preference.)  How you are planning on getting your armor also makes a difference, as if you are getting dungeon armor then you may not be able to get exactly those pieces but may need to do something else to achieve the same result (e.g., AC Pow/Tou/Vit armor combined with Berserker trinkets will give the same result.) If you're just spending gold or crafting, though.  One other point to keep in mind is that different slots are better than others for +crit Damage in terms of what you are giving up.  The 'best' slots for Valkyrie/Berserker are (if I remember rightly, check in the Ranger forum just in case tho) Shoulders, Gloves, Boots, Weapons, Amulet and Earrings.  Taking all of those as Valkyrie/Berserker and then your other slots as Knight/Soldier would be pretty good, for example.

[elmdor]

The gear I'm currently using on my D/D ele is the Rampager set plus Valkyrie trinkets. The Rampager stats are power/precision/condition damage, since most of D/D damage abilities does burning and bleed I feel that taking Rampager boost both my direct damage and the damage from those burns/bleeds. To round out the build I take Valkyrie trinkets, the trinkets stats are vitality/power/critical damage. Valkyrie trinkets compliment the Rampager set high critical chance with increased critical damage and they also provide vitality so my ele wont be that squishy. As for the weapons I took the power/vitality/toughness ones again for added survivability.

Those added survivability will really help since D/D need to be in melee range most of the time.

[Fenice_86]

I'd say go full Knight or 4 Knight / 2 Valk (trinkets ur choice but if it was me i would say Berzerk)

[Cinnamonfox]

I am currently using mix of knight and valkyrie (with valkyrie chest to get the highest stat boost to vitality) with Runes that increase might duration (Fire or Hoelbrak for example) and Sigil of Superior Battle + Superior Force. Stacking up might with sigil and runes boosts both direct and condition damage so you don't need to worry about lack of cond.dmg in gear.

[Vackashken]

carrion armor set for me.

[Danael]

Vackashken, on 03 November 2012 - 09:20 AM, said:

carrion armor set for me.

Carrion is not for Aura/Burst damage, it's for condition. And since the OP said it's about direct damage Carrion sets won't help at all.

[Vackashken]

Danael, on 03 November 2012 - 10:09 AM, said:

Carrion is not for Aura/Burst damage, it's for condition. And since the OP said it's about direct damage Carrion sets won't help at all.

Regardless it gives a different perspective of how people play seeing as his first sentence says "optimize my Elementalist in various ways".

[Danael]

Vackashken, on 03 November 2012 - 12:08 PM, said:

Regardless it gives a different perspective of how people play seeing as his first sentence says "optimize my Elementalist in various ways".

I wouldn't consider it opitmizing if you select arcane/water for traits and then condition damage for the amor. And as long as the OP doesn't post the major traits all we have is this:

Schwarzseher, on 01 November 2012 - 03:07 PM, said:

Yep auras with direct damage.

And since direct damage and condition don't mix very well (in my experience) I'd advise against a full carrion set.

[Vackashken]

Danael, on 03 November 2012 - 02:47 PM, said:

I wouldn't consider it opitmizing if you select arcane/water for traits and then condition damage for the amor. And as long as the OP doesn't post the major traits all we have is this:

Irrelevant, he asked for multiple ways/views and thats what he is getting. Why would you even bother to argue about this for a second?

[Milennin]

I have the full 42K set from the Dwayna altar and my trinkets are an equal mix of Knight and Cleric. Works very well for me.

[Aetou]

Presenting multiple views is fine and valid.  Arguing that all such views are equal, or could be described as optimized, is not valid however.  For example, stacking all Valkyrie gear without raising precision is a really bad idea even though when combined with Knight gear you end up with a very strong combination.  Another alternative that is similarly strong would be to go heavily into Berserker gear (with perhaps chest & legs as Soldier) and rely on the 20 in water as being enough extra survivability (not something I'd recommend myself, but valid enough still.)  

The question is about optimization and if his build is fixed in that way then some gear options just don't optimize it even though Carrion gear, for example, is pretty awesome for an Ele in general (I use a lot of it, for example.)  Now if you presented a compelling argument for that build wearing Carrion gear we'd have something to engage with but just saying you wear Carrion is at best irrelevant and more realistically is actually unhelpful.

[Schwarzseher]

Just to clear it up this is the build I run when I run around in D/D: http://gw2skills.net...cyoQIiCPUeMDO2A
Although I try out Scepter/Dagger atm D/D is my main weapon set.
I think condition damage on my armor would be a waste for precision/toughness/healingpower/anything because I don't optimize for condition damage/it is not my main goal. Most damage is done in fire. Carrion set I'll try to get for my S/D build..thanks for that first things first =) (totally forgot about that armor).

[The Great Al]

You spend most of your time in fire, so presumably more often than not, your enemies are on fire. Your next best damage dealer is earth, where your enemies will be bleeding. In that case, doesn't it make sense to supplement your condition damage?

[Nyth]

The Great Al, on 05 November 2012 - 06:08 PM, said:

You spend most of your time in fire, so presumably more often than not, your enemies are on fire. Your next best damage dealer is earth, where your enemies will be bleeding. In that case, doesn't it make sense to supplement your condition damage?

That depends how big a % of damage they ultimately are for you.
Burning does nice damage, but it's only 1 stack; so you might not be the one rolling it (as in someone else applied burning and is keeping it up). Bleed has similar issues, how many stacks do you keep up? Are there other condition damage dealers, and is the mob capped on bleed stacks?
All those small things are at the expense of condition damage stacking.

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As for the main issue here.

It's always hard to say what is the best armor. My view on things for PvE is the following:
- Survivability is the best thing you can maximize at first. Staying alive will help your group out the most, and especially at the start of your gearing getting that survivability allows you to survive until your next heal comes up.
- Stacking full survivability is not needed though, there is a certain point where you simply stay alive through most stuff (note: concentrated fire or certain abilities on you will kill you no matter the gear). At this point I think it's better to move towards more damage; as having too much survivability is a waste, where as having more damage never hurts.
- As you get more familiar with the dungeons and with the class and spec, you'll notice that you can cover for a decent part of that survivability by using your skill and substitute that on gear with more damage.

It's hard to determine where the tipping point is at. I personally went for full soldier gear first (Power / Toughness / Vitality; with power as primary stat), and I'm noticing I'm much more sturdy while still dealing solid damage. I decided that I'm going to get full berserker trinkets (I had pretty crappy blue lvl 80 ones with some random damage oriented stats) and use that as my base gear. After that I can orient towards more damage gear for the easier dungeons and solo PvE; and possibly aim for a set of defensive trinkets should I need it for something like WvW or really tough content. I've been thinking about some cleric gear as well (Healing Power / Power / Toughness), should the need arise.

Eventually I plan to end up with a bunch of sets for different situations which I can mix and match.