Curse

Kamatsu · Sep 12, 2005, 10:20 AM // 10:20

Hope this is the right place to post this. I've just been recently thinking about the different classes and was considering some off-beat combo's and styles of play, but due to the way the game has been 'tweaked' I've realized that there's no way I could successfully play them. I realized I was pigeonholed into the way I play.

Take for example

I considered playing E/W focusing purely on melee only. With this combo I'd have a huge energy supply for warrior attack skills as well as mixing it with elementalist spells.

Now people might point out that Elementalist's have lower armor than a Warrior.. but I'd like to point out that with points in Earth or Water I could easily have more armor than a Warrior. Consider, 60 base armor, +53 from Armor of Earth for a total of 113 armor vs everything with a bonus of +15 armor vs 1 element. Yes you do move slower with Armor of Earth, but in the middle of a fight that probably won't matter (thinking PvE here). Or if you go water you can use Armor of Mist for 94 armor plus +15 vs 1 element. Armor of Earth can be kept on permanently since the skill recharges in 15 seconds while Armor of Mist will leave you with lesser defense for 12 seconds. Other water option is Armor of Frost which would give you 100 armor vs physical while reducing your defence vs fire down to 36 (51 if you have Pyromancer Armor) and every other element will have 75 armor but you will be left at base armor for 16 seconds.

Now I've established that with Armor of Earth an elementalist can easily enough match a warrior for armor level. The only thing it can't match is damage absorbtion since only Warrior's can use Runes of Absorbtion or have armor which provides damage absorbtion.

So whats the problem? To do this relies heavily on enchantments. All the armor spells I've mentioned are classed as Enchantment spells. And ANet in their wisdom have flooded the game with enchantment strippers. Once you hit Ruins of Surmia mission you can basically forget ever using an enchantment spell ever again.. unless you want to take damage when it gets stripped. There are places where critters don't strp enchantments, but the vast majority of area's in the game - especially the missions - all have creature's which strip enchantments.

This means E/W being played as a warrior type is pointless & moot, as the only way to get armor willbe removed as soon as you get into a fight and forget re-casting it as they will strip them right away again. Only solution is to kill the enchantment strippers 1st - but how? If you blast em with elementalist spells.. why not just stick to the spells? If you attack with melee you'll get hit harder because your defense is not up and that will hurt. and you'll end up having to do this every fight.. run in to kill 1 or 2 critters taking major damage doing so just so you can put up your defense to kill the rest.

Now I know E/W might be a "stupid" thought.. and "not" what an Elementalist is about. But thats my point. If I play as an elementalist primary, I've been pigeonholed into playing a spellcasting character. If I want to play a sword wielding elementalist who has same armor as warrior via spells with huge energy pool to draw from for attack skills .. I can forget it as the way PvE is made it's impossible for me to do.

Or am I missing something here? And btw, to anyone who says "send in the henchies 1st"... that doesn't work. I have tried (using my current nuking elementalist) to send them in and then go in after them with an enchantment on me.. and it got stripped right away even though everything was attacking the henchies.

and btw, please don't say "but you couldn't use runes!". Thats not my point here. I know I can't use warrior runes, but it shouldn't matter too much.. apart from the Absorbtion Rune's..

In the same way they have pigeonholed Monk's to be healers, and reven then the healing options is limited. Why? Because most of monks skills are enchantments.... and unless your playing with players you can forget ever being able to maintain those enchantments on anyone. This means you can forget smiting monks..

Smiting monks *do* work in PvE in certain area's. But what does a smithing monk do when they get into fights where there every attempt to smite just gets stripped causing them to heal themselves or the party member who had the smite enchants on them?

How does someone play a smiting monk in PvE once they hit Ruins of Sumia since 7 out of 17 skills are enchantments? And the others there are either elites or have huge recharge times. So even if you try and rely on the non-enchantment skills.. you better have time to wait for the skills to recharge... and dont' forget some of them are conditional - these rely on the target trying to heal, sacrifice life or have a hex on them.

Sure it could work, but your selection of what you can do is limited and those recharge times on the few skills you can use are not very nice considering the damage those skills do.

Oh and lets look at the ever popular Mo/W - apart from certain regions in the game does this work? You have less armor than warrior and no defense spells. You do have access to very nice energy stores for energy based attacks as well as skills that help keep your energy up as well as gaining adrenaline.. as well as making your damage holy damage which is cool... but wait! to do that you need enchantments.. whoops. Guess you won;t be able to attack with weapons in most of the game because of enchantment stripping.

Now for Ranger - we all know that Ranger as a secondary doesn't offer too much (apart from those W/R using it for 1 skill.. pfft). As a primary your semi pigeonholed into attacking with bow or pet as you don't have the energy to blast things with elementalist spells.. although you can mix it with mesmer for interrupting.. but again, pigeonholed into attacking with bow. R/W? that works, but seems from what I've read it's "frowned" upon.

Mesmer - can mix it up quite a bit. can play elementalist and get those spells off fast, but with lack of energy won't have the total punch an elementalist could have giving the chance (remember PvE). m/w? no defense spells, but can lock targets down so it doesn't matter, but lesser energy. against mass groups might have trouble because of armor. M/R? this works if your playing for interrupts.. can mix wand/bow attacks as needed. But again if you look at the options, it's still all about being a mesmer and doing what they do. So still pigeonholed.

Necros - if your not using necros skills to support henchies/groupies or heal yourself, etc.. then why play necros? Actually, an option that works is N/W. Can melee with decent armor and only needs a few necros skills to work out. This is one of the few combo's that doesn't rely too heavily on the 1st profession to work and doesn't require enchantments either. every other N combo is basically a mix of necro and the other profession to work out.. N/E .. lower energy but this can work if you can kill fast and have SR.. N/R .. errm yeah.. bow attacking necro? why? more energy? you'll need it without expertise.. pet user? pfft.. if you use pet skills you'll lack necro skills.. if you ignore pet skills your pet's just used for minion fodder.. N/M .. mix of mesmer and necros.. why Me? I'd say for condition locking and inturrupts.. N/Mo - monk is for what.. healing? heh.. still going to end up relying on necro skills..

Oh and E/W isn't "pigeon-holed" since you don't have to use any E skills apart from armor and wards - it's not what you'd say an Elementalist is all about.. but you have options to do something else.

That's what I mean when I say pigeonholed - your not able to play anything apart from the "stock standard" for each profession for the majority of the game. Your forced to play a certain style for each profession simply because the game prevents you from doing anything else - or you can do it, but you'll be suffering a huge disadvantage.

I mean they give you the means to play as something different but make sure you can't. Considering the ways to play as something different usually involves the use of enchantments to let you do something you normally couldn't do.. but due to what they have done in PvE you can forget that. Or no matter how you twist it your still playing the way the class is to be played..

Or am I just a total and utter idiot? Please remember I'm talking about the PvE game and not PvP with the consideration that you'd be using henchies and not real players - since if you have a good group of people you can play as wacky things and generally get it to work since the other's can help and support you as you help and support them... henchies don't do that.

I can think of a few combo's that can work doing a mix of the 2 profession's, but it's still a duality and still playing the main profession the way it's been pigeon-holed as being.

But for me I've been thinking about different combo's, but every combo I considered (apart from a few) relied on enchantments or were too close to the "original" profession "intentions" as to not really be considered different.. It just makes me wonder... we've been given a huge option of different profession combinations and skills.. yet the vast majority of off-beat combo's and idea's won't work because of what they have done in the game - they work on paper, but not reality.

I don't know.. I know I'm not the smartest player around and I know I don't know everything there is in the game. It just seem's that when I tried to consider playing combo's of profession' which were "different" I realized they either wouldn't work because of the way PvE has been setup or they were still close enough to their main profession as to not really be that different. It just seems to be that profession's are pigeonholed into set roles/routes and trying to do anything different is impossible.. even though they provide you the means of doing things "different."

I would love to have some feedback on this. I want to know what i've missed if anything.... I just want to learn

PS. Pigeonholed? Is that the right term for if something is sort of being forced to play the one way and anything else is discouraged?

John Bloodstone · Sep 12, 2005, 10:35 AM // 10:35

No offence mate, but I really wish people would make an effort to compact their post into a nice readable concise few paragraphs. No doubt what you said there holds truth, and the number of enchantment strippers in the PvE game does limit the flexibility quite substantially. Unfortunately, what good points you did make are lost in the quagmire of the rest of the post...

aron searle · Sep 12, 2005, 10:56 AM // 10:56

I agree completly

again though, make your post shorter as youve said everything about the subject theres nothing left for me to say

Narcissus · Sep 12, 2005, 11:16 AM // 11:16

Any game that uses a class or profession system, pigeonholes players by definition.

No profession should be better at a role than the profession actually designed to do it. Like with your E/W example. Surely you didn't expect your Elementalist to be able to tank better than the profession that was designed to tank?

Iere · Sep 12, 2005, 11:23 AM // 11:23

I might add that elementalists who tank make monks angry. ANGRY.

You're not a better tank than a warrior, and when you get to enemies who can shatter enchantments and cause heavy damage (yes, they do this in PvE!), you're screwed.

And for some reason, I never ran into delusional Elementalists in the beginning of the game; no, only at the end when they couldn't survive all the damage. There's a reason we call warriors "tanks"- because they don't need enchantment upkeep to be able to survive stuff without constant babysitting by a monk.

Sorry to be a bit rough with you, mate, but speaking as a healer, I get REALLY frustrated when elementalists and mesmers try to tank (IW is a crappy spell, by the by).

The only time I've seen an elementalist actually do well when under attack was fighting a very, very dumb Wa/Mo runner with no attack skills in random arena. And even he needed to heal with his monk spells (E/Mo supporter).

Rancour · Sep 12, 2005, 11:34 AM // 11:34

I see your point, I really do, but I agree mostly with Narci. An Elementalist is supposed to use spells just like a ranger is supposed to use a bow. If each profession could do everything, why not just make one profession for everyone?

Also, secondary classes are supposed to be just that... secondary. Playing a necro/warrior means that you're a necromancer who can, if needed, use a few well-picked warrior skills to aid him. It isn't designed to be a pure warrior who has a little Soul Reaping.

Consider a warrior/monk. It's a warrior who uses a few monk skills, healing or protection, to support his role as a warrior. The healing and protection skills aren't supposed to dominate. That's why it's called a secondary.

Use alot of skills from your primary profession (after all that's what he's best at) and a few support skills from your secondary.

That way you'll get on fine I think.

PS: If you want to make a warrior who can use alot of skills, I suggest you either invest in adrenal skills so you don't use all the energy you want to keep, or pick elementalist as secondary. The elementalist has a few skills that give you more energy or make those you use cost less. Maybe you can use some of those.

Remember, all the professions have something to offer. I'd say you aren't restricted by anything but your own preferences and playing style. I myself won't play elementalist as primary because I prefere to deal some down-to-earth damage instead of standing back and firestorm spam. Of course you don't have to do that, but I really don't like using squishy classes as primaries.

audioaxes · Sep 12, 2005, 11:35 AM // 11:35

well shouldnt the warriors always be a better tank? sure the ele's have more flexibility with skills but they are have their own downfalls and rightfully so

Charcoal Ann · Sep 12, 2005, 11:44 AM // 11:44

as a monk i can make any class easily capable of tanking for 10 secs. if there are enchantment strippers then the secret is to stack the enchantments. rarely do they strip the same person more than once. so simply cast a worthless enchantment after armor of earth. i have found that healing seed+prot spirit+breeze makes any profession capable of taking a massive amount of punishment. the breeze gets stripped but so what i can cast it again.

i don't have a real problem with casters tanking if they know what they are doing. they should not go in first, ever.

Leddy · Sep 12, 2005, 12:05 PM // 12:05

I'll just dismiss this topic as a whine.

I can't believe what GW players complain about these days. At least their "grind" argument has ANet's backing; now people complain about their Warrior not being able to deal damage, and their Elementalist not being able to take damage.

This is ridiculous. GW already has like... none... of the major concepts associated with a traditional MMORPG.

I find that the mere fact that Elementalists can boost their armour rating incredulous.

Makkert · Sep 12, 2005, 12:22 PM // 12:22

It is a nice idea for a pve build. original for sure.
as for enchantment stripping, why not take a coverenchantment? bring Aura of Restoration for instance. and recast the Armor of Earth before it completely runs out.
with maybe a Ward of Melee, you could make a nice tank. However, your damage willl not be the same. you will miss the strength attribute, which gives the armorpenetration bonus. as well as superior runes for your weapon.
However, you may be able to partly compensate this with close range earth ele spells such as Aftershock, or something like that.
However, you will have a hard time convincing a PUG of your creative approach.
And pack a speedbuff to partly counter the Armor of Earth.
good luck.

Kamatsu · Sep 12, 2005, 12:24 PM // 12:24

John Bloodstone & aron searle - I have a dreaded bad habit of not making short post's when I'm thinking things through. The thing is I like to explain my thinking out and then see what people have to say, this way I'll know if my thinking is correct or not or how to improve myself. Yes I could just ask "Are we being pigenholed?" - but how much does that say about why I think that way or how I'm seeing it be.

Narcissus - I'm not saying that 1 character should be better than another. Even if you took out all the enchanter strippers a W/x is still better at melee fighting than a e/w would ever be even with their spells. Heck a W/E >>>>>>>>> E/W. Sure the W/E has less energy, but has same access to the spells and access to better armor and better runes..

What I'd like is to have the "flexibility" to be able to play off-beat combo's and styles of play. E/W are a possibility and they work on paper, but the game neuter's them because of enchantment stripping. Only way around that is to run multiple enchantments constently and hope that the one's you need aren't removed .

Forget E/W. What about smiting monk's? Now smiting is a primary attribute for them, but a lot of the smiting skills are enchantments.. thus limiting the feasability of being a smiting monk except in certain area's.. or spending extra time and energy to run useless enchants to protect from enchant strippers. The Monk gets piudgenholed into playing mainly healer... or healer/protection.. but if we're talking PvE with henchies.. what can they do?

I'm not about trying to make it so 1 character can do everything, but i'd like some flexibility to play something other that "normal". I'd like to have the ability to try different builds and such - who cares how well they work.. but this game as it is right now in PvE prevents that or makes me go to huge length's to make sure I can do what I want to do.

Iere (and later Rancour) - Here's a suggestion: read my post

I say this because I believe you didn';t even bother to read what I was saying and just read the 1st line about my thoughts about playing a E/W melee'ing and then made your post based on that. Take the time to read my post and you'll see I answered parts of your post.

Case in point -> "and when you get to enemies who can shatter enchantments and cause heavy damage (yes, they do this in PvE!), you're screwed. "

That's my whole damned point. They give you skills which let you playt a certain way.. which isn't quite what one would see as an Elementalist.. but it's still possible... but wai.. no you can't because while you have the skills you can't use them due to the huge number of creature's in PvE which screw the whole build up.

Why bother giving Elementalist's a defense spell if 90% of the game they can't use it anyways? I've just been pigeonholed into playing your stock standard nuking elementalist.. because in the game thats all I can ever be... even though I can combine my skills with 5 other professions which "should" let me play differently.. but nope.. all I can do is nuke.

"Remember, all the professions have something to offer. I'd say you aren't restricted by anything but your own preferences and playing style."

Now just if this statement was correct. If it was correct I'd not have made this thread - because you ARE restricted to what you can do by the way the game plays. I may want to play a sword wielding E/W who relies on Armor of Earth to keep my defense up.. but nope, that won't work as there went AoE and bye bye defense and ability to play my sword wielding E/W!

I am restricted. I am forced to play certain professions a certain way in PvE. Thats pigeonholing me and reducing my enjoyment of the game.

E/W isn't as good a tank or melee as a W/E would be.. but why can't I play it? Why can't I play it even if it isn't as good as a W/E? Why am I forced to play as a nuker if i play as an Elementalist?

I have a E/Mo right now and I am having fun playing her. But she's a nuker. No tankage and runs around if anything gets too close

But I'm forced to play this way. It is fun, don't get me wrong on that. But i also like playing off-beat characters. GW doesn't let me even try. Oh and to comment about the Firestorm spam.. anyone who tries to rely on spamming firestorm is an idiot :P mixing up the spells and having a selection of fast and slow casting ones is the way to go...

sorry, another long post ...

Obsiedion · Sep 12, 2005, 12:48 PM // 12:48

IMO spell casters are spell casters. With the possible exception of Monk as a secondary, Primary magick users should stick to...well using magick. I have a W/Ne and a Mes/Ele. I play them in totally different ways. When i started out i tried to play the mes like a war, but i got whooped real bad. So i started thinking ok, re-think and adapt. As a W/Ne i have a good range. I use a sword and Idol, or Ageis, Well of blood, well of suffering, plague touch, maybe life siphon but usually not, and some bleeding, and other warrior skills. I dont try and play a necro. Sure i can animate bone horrors with the best of them, and have even got my energy up to about 40 i think (with gladiators armor and Idols). But still i dont waste time. I wanted to be a warrior. Stand up in someones face and slap it with my big....Sword

As a Mes, i let someone else do that bit. I used to think that it was a lesser role, as a magick user, standing at the back, not doing much. But i was wrong. Warriors are great. W/Mo wow can usually go solo. But W/x Will get whooped if he runs into trouble on his own. Ok i have seen a Axe W/Mo take out about 30 griffs in about 6 mins, but thats only because he has a build for that. like Rancour said each proffesion has its pros and cons, i play a mes, cause i like fast casting, and the Ele part, for some cool area effects, i play a warrior to beat people down. enjoy playing one for something, and the other for something else.

Mixes things up

Obs

Jhyphi · Sep 12, 2005, 12:55 PM // 12:55

First off, keep things concise. Great writers get their points across in a few sentences.

Quote:

E/W isn't as good a tank or melee as a W/E would be.. but why can't I play it? Why can't I play it even if it isn't as good as a W/E? Why am I forced to play as a nuker if i play as an Elementalist?

You said it yourself, it's not as good at it. But you CAN play it. You just won't be as good which you've spent 10 pages already stating.

aron searle · Sep 12, 2005, 01:06 PM // 13:06

Quote:

aron searle - I have a dreaded bad habit of not making short post's when I'm thinking things through

notice the

thats me making a bad joke.

I once made a Mo/Ra for PVE. Now this was my second character after playing a w/m and i wanted to try something a little creative. I got him to level 9 and kind gave up.

What i wanted to do was create a smiting monk combining ranger power attacks, i didnt have a build already though up i was just experimenting. I did not want to just be a healer, its not my bag of tea.

Everytime i got into a group it was the same thing, people would tell me that a monks job was to heal and would just kick me unless i was to do as they said and act as healer.

not quite the same as your point, but i understand your frustration in this matter.

UnOrthOdOx · Sep 12, 2005, 01:43 PM // 13:43

Cover enchants are the way to go, really. Sadly, there aren't a WHOLE LOT of cover enchant options available to the elementalist.

That said, if you could convince a monk to give the thing a go with you, and with a little coordination, the monk could deal the cover enchants for you just fine. Any protection monk has had to learn to deal cover enchants anyway.

If you happen to play evenings eastern time, I on around 10 PM when I can be. I have an ascended monk who would be happy to try this out.

octaviancmb · Sep 12, 2005, 02:02 PM // 14:02

I think the idea of an Ele/Wa is a great idea, although I wouldn't make the character into a damage dealer. I'd think along the lines of wards and shouts, and I'd try to fit into the same niche the Protection Monk fits: defending party members from harm. Ward against Harm, Ward against Melee, Ward against Elements, Watch Yourself, and Shields Up would be a great boon to any party, and depending on the situation, you chould choose to place your defences on the tanks or on the squishies. Add into the mix your armor buffing spells (which can usually be cast on others) and some conditional interrupting through Maelstrom or some armor ignoring damage (Obsidian Flame) and you have a great variety of tools at your disposal.

Sure, a "tanking Elementalist" is going to probably result in numerous deaths, but there's more options available to you than that, some of which will result in a very, very strong, team-oriented character for PvE.

cmb

Racthoh · Sep 12, 2005, 02:03 PM // 14:03

I understand where you're coming from, being a warrior it is difficult to take advantage of your secondary with such a limited energy pool. I pretty much have to rely solely on my warrior skills because if I try to use even the simplest of cantrips it requires more energy than I can maintain.

Look at w/mo for example. 2 pips of regeneration, and a lot of monk enchantments require you to lose a pip of regen. Well, you aren't going to be able to do much with such a pathetic energy state. You're left to rely completely on your adrenaline skills, and depending on your weapon of choice this becomes quite the situation. In the end you're left with the majority of the population using Mending + Live Vicariously (sp?) swinging their swords wildly. To some extent, it can work. But it's not like you have many options to begin with, and in most games once someone finds something that works it becomes the cookie-cutter build. Just look at the solo monk, and the amount of nerfing required to finally kill it (although some say they can still do it).

In your e/w example, axe, hammer, and sword all require you to be in the melee. You already know your AL sucks and you won't last very long and it will make your monks job very difficult. Unless you have a cheap enchantment that you can constantly throw up to cover armor of earth you'll be a sitting duck. And since you can't put any points into strength that whole skill area is useless, save a few skills that have use in limited areas. In which case you're left with tactics, and the focus of that tree is to enhance your defensive capabilities. Well, if you're not in the melee you won't have much use for this tree at all. But like strength there are some skills that will have their uses but it's not worth the points. The fact that I can't even think of any off the top of my head and I use tactics heavily proves the point right there.

Algren Cole · Sep 12, 2005, 02:39 PM // 14:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Narcissus

Any game that uses a class or profession system, pigeonholes players by definition.

No profession should be better at a role than the profession actually designed to do it. Like with your E/W example. Surely you didn't expect your Elementalist to be able to tank better than the profession that was designed to tank?

a properly built ranger can tank better than a warrior...so why not?

Ollj · Sep 12, 2005, 03:59 PM // 15:59

cryptic:

History of Guild Wars:

Dawn of Gaya: "Firestorm fraking ownz. If only i had a fire staff."
Prehistoric: "Get a Tank!"
Stone Age: "More damage!"
Copper Age: "Team looking for one more monks"
Bronze Age: "Get their monks first!!! Rez ... rez plz ... omg rez ... noob monk!!!"
Iron Age: "Spiker trapping Tank looking to make the uber build with only 2-3 diferent classes"
Classical antiquity (only on the european server): "Lets just play, dont leave. Noobs NOOBS!"
Dark Age: "Air ele looking for spike group! Putrid necro with tainted flesh looking for group"
Middle Ages: "Ranger looking for ranger group."
Renaissance: "I will avenge you!"
Romantic Aera: "Goddamn mesmer got me again."
Industrial revolution: "lets make that build"

ontopic:
the secondary profession is only 0/8 to 4/8 as important as the primary profession, depending on your strategy. 2/8 as important for 80% of all.

lord_guru32 · Sep 12, 2005, 04:33 PM // 16:33

kamatsu, u can b an e/w if you want, you can kill people with it and be good at it. just dont complain when people strip your enchantments. if they couldnt you could just use armour of earth and be a warrior with extra armour and energy, you can do anything but there is a counter for everything, and think of it this way: if they are taking enchantment strippers then they have less skills to use and as an ele primary theres a good chance you have 1 spell atleast to simply blast them away