Curse

CKaz · Jan 09, 2006, 05:24 AM // 05:24

Chapter 2 chatter sounds good, we're starting to see and hear some things, but I'm still a bit surprised on 2 fronts -

Nothing engaging for the Elementalist coming out (IMO)
Nothing party friendly or giving a real umph to the mesmer

Elementalist-
Soooo many possibilities don't seem to be coming up. I see mixing elemental lines but you can't have a couple existing that do, add a couple more, and really expect people to spend loads of their attribute points for some tricks. And being forced to pump extra lines to get the force umph... eh. If you're serious why not take some synergistic approach (like D2 did for somethings) where some lines might pump eachother, ie...

Thunder Storm - using cold[mist] and air[lighting], provide a 'satellite blaster' for a length of time, maybe it exhausts if it sticks around for a good chunk of time, but this thing should leverage both skills points for some real fun

Magma Torrent - using earth and fire, Slows, area bomb, and burns everything either big targetted area (best) or point blank (ok...). Once again leverage both skills and this has to bring the noise to make it worthwhile.

[I'd like to consider this the NUKE we've all been waiting for...]

Further into the idea...

Prismatic Spray - leverages all 4 yeah nuts in general but effects strength effect of the spray - you don't NEED all 4. Effects ranging from penetration, interruption, blind, slow, burn - severity by the four.

Prismatic Shield - again leverages all 4, now provides elemental resistances based on what you have pumped skillwise. Doesn't have to be limited to self, might even come in Prismatic Ward flavor.

Calculation nuts for all these? Well why not take the highest of the two skills used for a basis and factor in some of the rest, or again different attribs push different parts of the skill up. Not 'if they have water hex, earth hex have a little more fun', etc - honestly I dont think that kinda stuff is going to catch on.

I just went that route as I saw it mentioned by the GW team (and worry about my originally fave class the elementalist :b).

But why not, for exhaust cost and only allowing one at a time (glyph? don't think it should be an enchantment but could be a maintained one...) something like

Air Elemental - strikes from range, occasionally interrupts
Water Elemental - strikes from range, occasionally slows
Earth Elemental - strikes from melee range, occasionally knockdown
Fire Elemental - strikes from melee range, occasionally burns

That would lead one to think a good level here requires maxxing out line, but could do that differently, ie - level = attrib pts x 1.5 up to 12, then just extra bonuses on some of their effects. Was going to say x 2 up to 9 but maybe too much early love eh.

But *even better* treat it like a caster weapon - let these elementals be the level of the caster w/o respect to attrib line. 'Nuts!' you say? Then they're treated more like a ranger pet. Maybe only 1, max 2 comes out at a time (if the latter, have to balance some of this perhaps). But just like a pet with no beast mastery, so is one of these eles weak, and maybe even more reliant in some ways on the attrib line(s)

Going further with the mix why not have a Magma Ele (which uses the 2 lines) be the ground pounder, and the Thunder Storm (again using the other aligned 2) be the ranged blaster. Unlikely 1 ele could pump both lines up a bunch to make both great but that's allow max two of them. 1 ele might pump enough into two lines though to make one of these great.

If you wish to have the other lines mixing (even fire and cold, which I'm not sure if the message of GW is they want us to or not considering some other skills)... Steam/Hot Geyser form and a... hmm... Magnetic/Electric thing going on? Well ok that might need a little work but you see where its going.

I just think this class is hardly getting going with ideas and quite frankly they need an injection. Their blasts are capped down due to spiking issues and pvp consideration - which hurts the air ele already lagging behind fire in pvp. I also see more consideration of some area AoE 5-10sec spells, after a AoE nerf? New skills practically with a foot in the discard pile?

This segways into mesmer a bit - it still almost stuns me no mention of helping an ally (let alone the party) with energy or aiding vs some of the tricks they're so good at. They're still such the solitary player, doing their thing to the solitary target. Necros likely will add to their ways to give health, meanwhile still no mention of the mesmer aiding with mana. Or adding meat to its misunderstood frame in the PvE world.

I'm sure more primary mesmers can chime in - we get only so many character slots. But as first and foremost a E/ME, I can see a lot of room for expansion.

It's odd how everyone loves the necro - in EQ it arguably could do the most, and its hard NOT to see by the skill set it remains a favorite now and towards the expansion as well. I'd really like to be surprised though and find out that some of the creativity and flexibility going into this one class spread out a little bit. Adding a few more parlor tricks to the ele and mesmer will only point out how little attention they continue to get. I hope I get surprised!

Mo/R9 · Jan 09, 2006, 05:28 AM // 05:28

They are releasing 25 new skills for each of the 6 classes (at least) and that's just what they have announced, what else might they be working on? Your ideas are good though and they deserve to be taken into account. I especially liked the idea of mixing different elemental lines.

CKaz · Jan 09, 2006, 02:40 PM // 14:40

Thanks - yeah I know 25, but getting the 4 lines [well 5 with energy storage] to work with some cross-over mix you must admit is a stretch when today there's only a couple, and there's even some cases cross-over is a bad thing right now with some of the skills (ie water using fire).

Just wanted to get the juices flowing - we seem to have 3 classes already doing kinds of minions/summons/spirits where traditionally the elemental magic users are able to to some kind of creating, summoning and teleporting, so far we only have creating damage, some utility, and riding a lightning bolt to the enemy (which any pug would like the ele to do - yikes! lol - have the necro put death nova on them first and that new monk dwayna spell...)

I think a bunch of powerful prismatic spells might be of some interest as well, obviously you won't have all 4 lines pumped there but could prove interesting. For example there's so much stress on damage and healing but not as much on defense (outside a prot/bond monk). What if the prismatic defense(s) lowered the damage output much like the necros aura of the lich? Lets shave a % right off whats coming through the defenses. 50% too much? Make it variable based on how many points used across the board.

*But this should reduce the global damage, not just traditional armor*
ie, holy/dark/chaos, arguably even leech, etc - thats one reason the elementalist suffers. king/queen of damage but always reduced by armor, lightning does some of that but other caster lines do all of that. Ele has a couple options in earth but at the cost of exhaustion or removing conditions.

I just think the 'end all dealer of damage' hasn't panned out. If you've seen a little of what seems to be coming, there seems to be ways to even improve SS (yeah that's what we all needed!). I'd just like to see a real shot in the arm. A shot of traditional options sorely lacking (summons for starters, I hope eles might get invisible/see invis options for stealth too if this is going to be a piece of the new GW pie) and/or some innovation and REALLY cross the elemental streams for REAL benefit, those attribute points aren't cheap and a skill or two with a particular combo isn't going to cut it.

I want my Magma Elemental and Thunderstorm now too

Or the second could be a Thunder Elemental/something airborne/hovering - Thunder Bird...! again one melee, one ranged, and you had to leverage 2 lines, 4 if you wanted to toy with them all!

I'd also like to see the level based on character level, and the abilities/powers of the thing adjusted by the pumping of the appropriate lines.

Whereas if you have the option for the one line elementals, those could be by the attribute level.

With all this mixing you might even get people trying out glyph of elemental power! Toss that out before heaving out any of the cross-casts...

So problem is what line do these cross cast spells live in? Listed in both/A new hybrid category/or simply dump them in energy storage, noting how they get pumped up. Shouldn't be a show stopper.

I just hope to see some really cool things for em as stuff comes out.

And some love for the mesmer PvE.

CKaz · Jan 09, 2006, 02:53 PM // 14:53

Couple more thoughts, obviously may need balance tweaking/etc:

One for Ele, Energy Storage -

Energy Bomb 25e/1s/25s, large area surrounding the caster, burn ALL mana to do energy burnt * 3 armor ignoring damage to all surrounding caster

[yes a lot of damage potential but keep in mind the mana pool wipe, and if you swapped in -regen items for more, an even negative pool balance, considering how it might scale with energy storage value]

Two for Mesmer

Mana Monger
15e/1s/15s, all [nearby] player party members get 1 pip of energy regen for x seconds (enchantment)

Hex Defense
20e/1s/20s all [nearby] player party members get enchantment 'Hex Defense' placed on them which will negate the next hex cast on player. Lasts x seconds.

nearby if necessary, but I dont think too drastic with all party members, look at the monk, well abilities you can head to and their duration, etc

Also be happy to make this more like a shout/not as strippable, just tough to see a Mesmer shouting these things

CKaz · Jan 09, 2006, 05:52 PM // 17:52

If you're going to have cross-elemental skills I think you're going to need a non-elite attunement to aid from going mad, we'll stuff this in energy storage

Prismatic Attunement
For xx-yy seconds you are attuned to all the elements. You gain 25% of the energy cost of the spell every time you use a spell of any element.
(or if they really did devise cross-attrib line calculations, use that)

Noting that we aren't doing QUITE as much as the single lines, and it might not last (being based on E store or cross-calculations) as someone going hard one element line. But it has to be made worthwhile, and I think something needs to be in place rather than having to burn your elite.

Also noting its tough to pump this being spread out so don't start thinking it out ranks/knocks out all other options if you're focused on 1

Kinda gets back to my point though if you're really going to start having eles mix ele skills, you're going to have to help them out with the sheer amount of points they're going to have to toss around.

I'd REALLY like to see Elementalist armor adding Energy. Yeah we get energy storage but as I mentioned in another thread, should we be forced to pump this to offset other classes options - does any other class have a similiar hole to dig themselves out of with their attribute lines? Want us to be more flexible? Don't make us go 1 element / pump energy store up, let us have the +mana armor too.

Some of these ideas may not work but I think the ele mana armor and some work with elemental summons makes a heck of a lot of sense at the least - straight, crossed-over or otherwise. The elemental shapes are out there, you're just not letting us do anything with them

Though new models wouldn't hurt either