65 replies to this topic

[blindude]

Mitch, on 07 December 2012 - 03:27 PM, said:

Well assume they would be on par with other trait lines, would you ever spec less than 20 points into Arcana? I sure as hell wouldn't, it's the only way to make attunement switching have less cooldown and without it you're just waiting for cooldowns a lot.

I'm all for more options in trait lines for Elementalists, but it's gonna take a lot more than simply buffing Fire and Earth Magic.

Even then it would be great for build diversity if you could go  arcane/water/fire or arcane/earth/fire compared to our current options.But truth be told i would prefer they lower the base attunement recharge rate to 13 or 12 and then lower the bonus you get from going into arcana.

[kilger]

Whats this about scepter/dagger being nerfed???

I was considering an aura spec but I'll stay away since it looks like its next on the chopping block.

[Featherman]

Mitch, on 07 December 2012 - 12:20 PM, said:

Meh I don't think it's so bad, sure with a pure GC build you will fall over when there's a moderately strong breeze in your general direction, but quite honestly the elementalist weapon and utility skills dont lean themselves to such a build anyway, a lot of skills require you to go into the fray and this means you will take some damage.

Even if our fire/earth traits wouldn't suck, I don't think a glass cannon build will work, compared to thieves and mesmers we simply lack the tools to set up 1 hit combos and the tools to survive for more than half a second should the situation go south. Don't get me wrong, Mistform is godlike and Arcane Shield (including the one from the trait) are great defensive spells, but that's where it stops, outside of using a focus or an earth shield there's not much that allows you to survive a skirmish other than being able to actually take a hit due to toughness aqcuired primarily from gear.

I really like the Ele playing style that forces you to build a bit more tanky and allows you to stay in the thick of battle for a good while, while still dishing out more than decent damage and providing a lot of utility and support in the mean time.

I really don't think this type of balance is good for people trying to get into the class. Most players playing this archetype are conditioned from other games to play glass cannons, cause really that's the main features of the wizard/mage archetype. It's all the more obvious why there are many complaining about this class being weak if you think about it this way. I think letting GC be more viable, and thus more successful in a players first attempts of using it, will help ease others into the class and eventually let them learn of other builds and playstyles. At this rate, ANet may as well rename the Elemenalist to Elemental Healer in order to avoid confusion with its playstyle.

Edited by Featherman, 08 December 2012 - 11:57 AM.

[Mitch]

Featherman, on 08 December 2012 - 11:54 AM, said:

I really don't think this type of balance is good for people trying to get into the class. Most players playing this archetype are conditioned from other games to play glass cannons, cause really that's the main features of the wizard/mage archetype. It's all the more obvious why there are many complaining about this class being weak if you think about it this way. I think letting GC be more viable, and thus more successful in a players first attempts of using it, will help ease others into the class and eventually let them learn of other builds and playstyles. At this rate, ANet may as well rename the Elemenalist to Elemental Healer in order to avoid confusion with its playstyle.

GW2 Isn't other games though, just because people associate elementalists with glass canon mages doesnt mean Anet has to conform to this, such players can stick to PvEasy and play GC builds to their heart's extent, heck GW1 elementalists were far more defensive (with the exception of Mindblast or Shatterstone split eles) than they currently are in GW2.

I'm not against GC Eles being a viable build though, I just simply don't see it happening with the current skillset they have.

[Featherman]

Mitch, on 08 December 2012 - 02:57 PM, said:

GW2 Isn't other games though, just because people associate elementalists with glass canon mages doesnt mean Anet has to conform to this, such players can stick to PvEasy and play GC builds to their heart's extent, heck GW1 elementalists were far more defensive (with the exception of Mindblast or Shatterstone split eles) than they currently are in GW2.

I'm not against GC Eles being a viable build though, I just simply don't see it happening with the current skillset they have.

Right, but it's a legitimate problem with taking up the archetype. The argument that GW2 isn't any other game is a poor one because it's adopting a class archetype without advertising it in any other way. In fact, if you've only read the ANet's description of the elementalist and know nothing else about the game you wouldn't even consider running them as bunkers. Additionally the thief and warrior professions fit their archetypes to a T so why not the Ele? If anything, adding more build diversity to the classes, including builds that fit profession archetypes, can only help the metagame.

I think the staff already has all the tools necessary to be a GC weapon and can easily be tweaked to fill the role of large area dps with some numbers and animations changes. ANet can add traits that are more specific to staffs as well. For example traits that decrease animation time of staff AoE attacks will greatly increase its effectiveness as a nuker.

[Shinimas]

Featherman, on 08 December 2012 - 03:50 PM, said:

Right, but it's a legitimate problem with taking up the archetype. The argument that GW2 isn't any other game is a poor one because it's adopting a class archetype without advertising it in any other way. In fact, if you've only read the ANet's description of the elementalist and know nothing else about the game you wouldn't even consider running them as bunkers. Additionally the thief and warrior professions fit their archetypes to a T so why not the Ele? If anything, adding more build diversity to the classes, including builds that fit profession archetypes, can only help the metagame.

I think the staff already has all the tools necessary to be a GC weapon and can easily be tweaked to fill the role of large area dps with some numbers and animations changes. ANet can add traits that are more specific to staffs as well. For example traits that decrease animation time of staff AoE attacks will greatly increase its effectiveness as a nuker.

Warrior is extremely squishy in this game, not really fitting the archetype. Ele has too much built-in versatility to be as good a damage dealer as the other classes (the same stands for Thief and Mesmer, they have a lot of versatility and a lot of damage, as the result those two are the most played profs in sPvP).