Curse

the ruloes · Sep 11, 2009, 12:44 PM // 12:44

Nukers aren't bad in AB, bad nukers are bad in AB. If you're running around with a person who only has spells like firestorm, meteor shower, searing heat, etc. of course all he can do is cap shrines.

When I play ele in AB, I try to stay away from such spells (I usually always bring one, for capping), but still bring AoE spells that do good damage. My main damage usually comes from rodgort's invocation and liquid flame, then with mind blast for small damage and energy management and fire storm for extra capping damage. With mind blast I have as good as unlimited energy, and between mind blast, rodgort's invocation and liquid flame, I nearly always have one skill ready to cast, even if hitting them all on recharge. From my experience, that's all the damaging spells you'll need to put severe pressure on whoever you wish.

tmakinen · Sep 11, 2009, 02:53 PM // 14:53

Actually, the recent Steam/Slippery nerf made my default build rather weak. Before the nerf the thing I liked most about it was the strong KD - like a Gale but without exhaustion. Since that was taken away I would switch to something else. The minimal correction would be to drop Steam and Slippery in favor of Blinding Flash and Gale (moving points from water to air of course) though you can't spam Gale the way you could Slippery.

And Jeydra, it's just a matter of different play styles. The kind of build that I tend to run is optimal for my play style and for things I want to accomplish. I've seen that you prefer a different style and you use a build that works there. You can't really compare apples to oranges when the properties of each build should be based on the overall strategy.

Jeydra · Sep 11, 2009, 04:42 PM // 16:42

@above - agree, I like my style of play, and it's effective for me; of course use whatever works for you

@Bobby2 - well ...

Shadowsteps are great, I've come to rely on them a lot. There're many places where you can shadowstep to gain some space and speed, while there're other places where shadowstepping can literally gain you >10 seconds of time. Some examples: shadowstepping from under the Res Orb to the Res Orb shrine on Grenz / Etnaran. Shadowstepping from up and down the bridge on Kaanai / Ancestral. Shadowstepping on the right lane (from Kurzick side) up and down to the bottom on Grenz. Shadowstepping from Res shrine to Stream Attack shrine. Shadowsteps can help you escape tight spots, as well as get into tight spots (e.g. Death's Charging the Monk at the Res Shrine puts you right in position to hit anyone who resses with Flame Djinn's Haste). You do leave the rest of your team behind though, that's a problem.

Flame Djinn's Haste is a good speedboost. It's not perfect, especially after it was nerfed, but it's good enough. It's not permanent, but then it's also 14s duration (I run a Major) with +20% enchant and 20s cooldown. It also does damage, which a stance like Dark Escape and Natural Stride cannot do (not to mention these stances have longer downtime). I like Flame Djinn's as a speedboost that doubles as a finisher while capping shrines.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bobby2

My perspective in general:
- solo nukers are easy prey (especially, I'm sorry to say, the AP PBAoE variants).
- 3 vs 4 is a bitch. Even if you overcome the challenge you'll have been forced to fight much, much more defensively than you would have otherwise.
- 2 Heats and teamwork cap faster than a solo AP nuker + 3 stragglers.

Verily, I just
- try not to get caught (if I die more than two times in a match I consider my performance a failure)
- leave room for my teammates to kill stuff. 3v4 is bad, you usually cannot win it, so I hope my teammates don't try it.
- 2 Heats and teamwork cap faster than solo AP + 3 stragglers, but then you cannot act alone anymore. I like to give my teammates enough time to kill stuff without having to worry about me. Solo AP + 3 stragglers may very well gain more points in unit time from more kills and / or more shrines capped, I don't know.

We play differently, that's for sure. You demand your Elementalists contribute more to the team, I build around the Elementalist. But so long as I win games, I'm happy

I might try dropping a skill for another nuke someday so I can deal more damage in fights - Bed of Coals -> Liquid Flame maybe? With good timing I should still be able to clear the Warrior shrine and Elementalist shrines, although the double Monk shrines might be impossible, I'll have to try it.

Nikki Wikki · Sep 11, 2009, 06:51 PM // 18:51

Nukers are bad in AB, yes, eles not so much.

dorin · Sep 11, 2009, 06:51 PM // 18:51

SF ele X 3
monk

lots of fun, especially on lands

Judge Nl · Sep 12, 2009, 07:24 AM // 07:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Silentbreath

Having a nuker on your team allow you to kill the npcs at a shrine faster, everyone knows that. Unfortunately, that is the -only- thing they can do. When facing another team of 4, they cannot help but standing casting long cast time spells which will do at most 40 dmg because people move out of the aoe. It is nearly as a 4v3. Your team wipes, then the team of 4 that wiped you cap a shrine while you're on the way to join back the field.

An Ele doesn't have to devote his whole bar on taking out npc's. It takes like 3 skills to clean a shrine, why would one take a whole AoE bar?

With ele teams (inc monk), those are mostly crap, unless people know they are doing, then it can rock bigtime.

Lux Aeterna · Sep 13, 2009, 02:42 AM // 02:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Silentbreath

I went to the kurzick side.... nukers are bad

I think this is all we need to see to know you'r wrong, "Mr.-Nukers-Are-Bad-In-Ab-I'm-A-Kurzick-And-I-Fail".
Seriously, disinformation like this is what keeps us from ever seeing the beautiful jade anymore.

Nukers are a deciding factor in many fights, in fact in a big fight they may be more powerful than any other class, experience shows this quite clearly and I rarely roll without a carefully scrutinized nuker.

I'll be looking forward to catching your TA looking team and squashing it under tactical disadvantage it just to prove my point.

Make sure you bring some R/As from GeAr EHHH?
/thread

Silentbreath · Sep 14, 2009, 06:15 AM // 06:15

I'm sharing my thoughts about the nuker because I enjoy fighting teams that brings challenge. Teams with nukers just aint strong enough. Since teams can hardly run away from a fight, they better be ready for it.

Mind blast eles or at some point searing flames 'nuker' can be part of a succesful team. I enjoy playing with a mind blast pug pinging a good build. I know it's gonna be ok for almost all situations. But, against great teams it aint enough, and I know it. If I meet one I know it aint gonna end well and I hate that. My team wont be as efficient as another well designed 4 man team. The fire eles does not bring enough dmg and does not provide enough defense, with only meteor. They cant help with snares and enchant removal. And they are extremely vulnerables to rupts. Only thing I like with all the fire going around is that it allows me to play powerblock more often.

A lot of people need to figure that you need not only to cap shrine but also defend them. Part of why the nuker is bad is that he cant help enough to kill people in order to defend a shrine. While we defend a shrine with a 4 man team against a 4 man team, our own team isnt capping anything, but we prevent another team from doing so. If we had choose to cap a shrine instead of defending one, we let the enemy cap a shrine while we cap one. In both situations, it is even for both side. But, when we defend a shrine, we fight another team with the npcs advantage. It is nearly an auto-win. When they are death, we go ahead and cap. So we got 4 extra point for killing the team and a full shine advantage. A team needs to be able to kill the other teams in order to be efficient and that's why nukers arent great.

moriz · Sep 14, 2009, 06:47 AM // 06:47

since when did 120 damage RIs with burning become "not enough damage"?

Sankt Hallvard · Sep 14, 2009, 07:24 AM // 07:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Silentbreath

I'm sharing my thoughts about the nuker because I enjoy fighting teams that brings challenge. Teams with nukers just aint strong enough. Since teams can hardly run away from a fight, they better be ready for it.

What would be a "better designed team" in your opinion when it comes to defending that shrine in a 4v4?

Lux Aeterna · Sep 14, 2009, 09:54 AM // 09:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sankt Hallvard

What would be a "better designed team" in your opinion when it comes to defending that shrine in a 4v4?

Basically what's he's saying; is that when building to fight 4v4 in an open setting you'd do better to pick another type of caster instead of a fire ele. A necro, water ele, air ele, mesmer, or anything like that would provide slightly better damage and support (meaning defense) than an all-nukes fire ele. The defense angle is especially important -- like an artillery battery or missile ship, a fire ele is a priority target which deals heavy damage but is weak to direct attack, where most substitute classes would add active defense to the team, as well as assisting in more subtle ways than a fire ele's raw damage.

I try to get my eles to run 9-10 command with FB and a q9 command shield defset, which helps greatly, but AB ele quality varies widely.

There are several reasons why I still prefer to usually run fire eles, though:

(1) AB isn't TA. AB isn't TA. Fights are often big and clustered -- a giant ball of 10 players is a fire ele's dream, and a few carefully places Savannah Heats can quickly win an otherwise difficult or lengthy mob fight. Additionally, because AB isn't TA, you are never forced to fight 4v4 against, say, a TA team specifically built for beating you 4v4.

If I see a carefully made guild group with an FF necro and magebane, I simply avoid engaging them directly -- rather, I'll wait until I see them fighting another team on my ally, whereupon my group will swoop in and we crush them badly 8v4.

Ideally, they'll leave and never play AB again.

The difference between AB and TA is painfully obvious when tactically outmuscling a team running something similar to the "AB Pieway" build on pvxwiki.

(2) The NPCs are a big factor. In the above situation -- cap team vs. cap team where one side controls an adjacent shrine, putting the other team at severe disadvantage -- if the attacking team can use a fire ele to neutralize the shrine within 5-10 seconds, the defending team is suddenly advantageless and much more vulnerable.

Ability to rapidly wipe out NPC forces is also a major advantage when attacking Ancestral from the Luxon side. Not only the gate NPCs, but also the Rit/Mes/Necro shrines are very difficult to take out without an effective nuker, and if these NPCs stay alive for a bit they end up putting your team in trouble especially if an enemy group comes by to fight.

Especially in a big fight where a shrine is involved, you cannot overstate the advantage given by a competent fire (or water) ele. I wouldn't run fire nukers in an exlusively 4v4 setting, but as was previously stated, AB is not TA, and you are are rarely if ever forced into fighting 4v4 against a team built for it.

BlackSephir · Sep 14, 2009, 10:39 AM // 10:39

I once had a fun time with a nuker with like 6 nuking skills on his skillbar.

He casts some aoe shit on me, I move away, he casts another, I move away, another, another, another. Think he even had MS in there. Poor sob was out of spells and since they were all recharging I began to eat him alive without any effort.
Bottom line: BAD nukers are bad.

Lux Aeterna · Sep 14, 2009, 12:01 PM // 12:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlackSephir

I once had a fun time with a nuker with like 6 nuking skills on his skillbar.

He casts some aoe shit on me, I move away, he casts another, I move away, another, another, another. Think he even had MS in there. Poor sob was out of spells and since they were all recharging I began to eat him alive without any effort.
Bottom line: BAD nukers are bad.

Try 1v1ing, say, a wastrel's collapse or devastating hammer and you'll think your build is bad too.
Anyway, you probably wouldn't beat a good nuker 1v1.

You do far less damage than a fire ele in 8v8 or 10v10, and I bet you can't clear the elite ele shrine by yourself.

BlackSephir · Sep 14, 2009, 01:58 PM // 13:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lux Aeterna

Try 1v1ing, say, a wastrel's collapse or devastating hammer and you'll think your build is bad too.
Anyway, you probably wouldn't beat a good nuker 1v1.

You do far less damage than a fire ele in 8v8 or 10v10, and I bet you can't clear the elite ele shrine by yourself.

Huh, seems like you've got an insight on what class I play and even what builds I use in AB.
Are you just anal damaged nuker or some average troll?

Bobby2 · Sep 14, 2009, 02:12 PM // 14:12

You ARE an Assassin/Necromancer, always, all the time.

BlackSephir · Sep 14, 2009, 02:15 PM // 14:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bobby2

You ARE an Assassin/Necromancer, always, all the time.

But what right does he have to comment? He doesn't even have secondary for christ's sake.

Lux Aeterna · Sep 14, 2009, 03:36 PM // 15:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlackSephir

But what right does he have to comment? He doesn't even have secondary for christ's sake.

Wow you beat a fire nuker 1v1, fire nukers must be terrible.

I consider nukers to be priority targets, I routinely gank them 1v1 and think absolutely nothing of it. Once I even killed 2 at once.
They're important AB objectives, but also extremely weak in a 1v1 setting.

Smarty · Sep 14, 2009, 03:39 PM // 15:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlackSephir

But what right does he have to comment? He doesn't even have secondary for christ's sake.

I bet he's missing his 30 atts too. Damn luxon noob. (<3 Lux.)

*

I got asked by someone to bring SH rather than MB on my ele this weekend. I refused. (Normally I don't mind changing skills, but if the suggested change makes the bar worse than the one I'm already running then I'd rather stay as I am tyvm.)

It's been bugging me ever since whether they knew something I didn't.

I used to run triple heat a while ago, pre-SH nerf, until someone pointed out to me that you only need two heats to clear a shrine in seconds and the rest of your bar is best devoted to player killing and utility, and since then I've never considered going back to SH. Can anyone here convince me that SH is actually better than MB in AB?

IrishX · Sep 14, 2009, 04:01 PM // 16:01

Nuking (as in DoTAoEs) are not optimal. Running an E/D with Rodgorts and Meteor as your only AoEs is more than enough to clear shrines, and is actually useful in 4v4s, unlike your heats. Solo capping is inefficient anyway, so if that is your reason for bringing DoTAoEs, you should be reevaluating your strategy.

Also, you don't have to cap shrines if you have a higher shrine count. As long as you neutralize it, they don't get points, so if you know that a group on the other side is capping a shrine, leave the one you are capping once you neutralize it, and stop them. You taking one of their shrines and them taking one of yours does nothing to help you.

BlackSephir · Sep 14, 2009, 04:02 PM // 16:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lux Aeterna

Wow you beat a fire nuker 1v1, fire nukers must be terrible.

I consider nukers to be priority targets, I routinely gank them 1v1 and think absolutely nothing of it. Once I even killed 2 at once.
They're important AB objectives, but also extremely weak in a 1v1 setting.

Are you blind or perhaps mentally challenged? I specifically said

Quote:

BAD nukers are bad

which in no way implies that all nukers are bad.
But obviously you wanted to enlarge your epeen and failed miserably at it. Better luck next time, junior.