Curse

Skye Marin · Jan 28, 2007, 10:23 PM // 22:23

As far as pure skill strength and usefulness as an Elite:

Mind Shock > Mind Freeze > Mind Burn

The Skills' cost/strength/exhaustion condition should reflect that. For Mind Freeze and Mind Burn, these skills would not be used by anything other than an elementalist because of the required "if you have more energy than your target". In theory, the exhaustion could be removed altogether without disrupting the metagame.

Mind Shock is in a different class altogether. There are many more cross-profession abilities that rely on knockdown than there is on a 6-second hex or 7-second burning. Knockdown is a snare, interrupt, and blackout all in one package, and the exhaustion cost cannot simply be forgotten. Let's take a closer look to find some middle ground here.

Mind Shock
5/1/8
Target foe suffers 10...50 lightning damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe suffers 10...50 additional lightning damage and is knocked down. This spell has 25% armor penetration. This spell causes exhaustion.

Gale
10/1/5
Knock down target foe for 3 seconds. This spell causes exhaustion. (50% failure chance with Air Magic 4 or less.)

Essentially, Mind Shock can be considered as an elite Gale. The amount of Damage found in a single Mind Shock is equivalent to a Lightning Orb, but considering that it's instantaneous damage, it is more in line with Lightning Hammer.

Lightning Hammer
25/2/15
Target foe is struck for 10...100 lightning damage. Lightning Hammer has 25% armor penetration.

If you consider this, Mind shock has just earned it's exhaustion and elite status.

One more thing that you should not overlook, however, is the "have more energy" prerequisite. If you cast this spell and you happen to have less energy than the target, then you've wasted exhaustion on doing a piddly 50 lighting damage... equal to a single Lightning Strike. Considering this, the skill should be changed to the following:

Mind Shock
5/1/8
Target foe suffers 10...50 lightning damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe suffers 10...50 additional lightning damage, is knocked down, and you suffer from exhaustion. This spell has 25% armor penetration.

Of course, this isn't much of a buff, but it's a start.

frojack · Jan 28, 2007, 10:53 PM // 22:53

Start? Why start? Mind Shock is nigh on perfect. You can't really better it without over-powering it. One of the few examples in the entire class...

The simple fact is, if you cast this at low energy, it's your own fault. Another thing about the damage. It actually occurs 'twice'. Seems like a small deal until you consider using it on Prot. Spirit....

Skuld · Jan 29, 2007, 12:06 AM // 00:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shady79

@ Skuld: thats exactly whey they need a buff. never say let it rip, thats... bullshit?

anet did not make skills for farming only.

[skill]Otyugh's Cry[/skill]

[skill]Mirrored Stance[/skill]

[skill]Elemental Flame[/skill]

Don't try and use logic as an argument reguarding skill creation

Anyway, for it to be any use outside of farming, it would have to be completely reworked, for example given "nearby range", remove the aftercast delay, or make it targeted, etc.

BahamutKaiser · Jan 29, 2007, 01:35 AM // 01:35

Most of the skills in the game have never been overpowered, people just couldn't adjust their playstyles to counter them, or the appropriate counters are deficient. So trying to prevent "overpowered" effects is often a matter of improving the game as a whole.

Primary example. IWAY, MM, Paragon boosts and other strong group parties have always developed overpowered status because the effective counter, Group Damage, has always been ineffective. If heavy group damage was available, obviously in Elementist, than parties which succeed based on numbers and group synergy would have a serious difficulty taking significant damage on large groups and close quarters. Imagine if all DoT spells hit an Entire Area, and were frequent enough to maintain at least 50% of the time (meaning 10 second duration, 20 second recast at max), you wouldn't have so many huddled units, and grouping or mass units would become a liability. And it isn't like countering DoT and elementist in general is hard, any interrupter, even crappy ones, can easily stop a DoT spell, and killing an elementist is usually the easiest first target short of shuting down a vigilent monk.

This thread really doesn't put a dent in the majority of elementist skills which don't do justice for a skill slot or elite, respectively. The general lack of physical attack, time spent casting many spells, cost and recast simply don't match the damage and effectiveness. It is a widespread weakness and oversight of elementist skill types and the class as a whole, trying to point out a few changes on a few spells really doesn't accomplish enough.

I don't agree with removing exhaustion from skills all over the place, or making conditions which remove them either, exhaustion is a unique limitation which either prevents you from reusing a skill repeatedly, or cost you a great deal of downtime if you do, it is ment to be an alternate form of limitation and cost, trying to make a byway around it is silly, and it opens up powerful spells to classes which typically wouldn't be able to utilize them without Elementists Energy Storage. Simply put, exhaustion is a legitimate cost, and if spells which involve exhaustion are not effective enough, the first alternative should be increasing the power and utility of the spell. Only in particular cases like Double Dragon should the Exhaustion be removed (and it already has).

There are dozens of weaknesses and deficiencies I can go into here, as I have dozens of times before, but I really don't feel the urge to analyze this here. Simply put, the ratio of damage dealt, frequency of use, and function or many elementist spells are just not equal to the cost or not useful enough in regular situations. Trying to balance a class based on obscure situations is an obvious flaw, and the class as a whole suffers in interest and enjoyment because of such lop sided features. Enjoyment being the most significant feature, whatever balance they can derive needs to include it.

Symbol · Jan 29, 2007, 02:40 AM // 02:40

Mind Burn is definitely a spell that needs the exhaustion removed though. You simply cannot raise the damage much higher (and no one cares about increased burn duration) without major problems.

Curse You · Jan 29, 2007, 04:14 AM // 04:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shady79

@ Curse You: haha did you notice that vapor blade needs only 7 sec to recharge, the elite 10 ? both 15 energy. come on. thats too bad for an elite.... 2 seconds casting time for little damage for 15 energy... that's just a joke of an elite. and dont try to tell me 2x80 dmg (most of the time you do 2x ~55dmg maybe) is much. then you have to wait 10 seconds haha. this skill IS crap (even if its the only 'spiking' skill available for the water line).

EDIT: LOL JUST NOTICED: You can't even spike with shatterstone cause it's a hex... and now tell me again its good at doing damage. hahaha.

It's a hex... you're point it? Sure you can try to prevent the damage with Hex Breaker, however the damage will still go through (both the initial and the damage after 3 seconds). Removing the hex does nothing, except waste energy (read the description).

You obviously failed to notice that I said "at 12 water magic." At 16 water magic, Shatterstone deals a total of 210 damage, and Vapor Blade deals 143. Add to that the fact that Shatterstone deals its damage in two packets rather than one.

Also, what skill description are you reading? Shatterstone has an 8 second recharge.

[skill]Shatterstone[/skill]

MegaMouse · Jan 29, 2007, 03:56 PM // 15:56

Bahamutt has a good point on the Exhaustion. As I have probably said earlier in this post my main character is an Elementalist. The exhaustion can cripple him if I don't watch out which skills I use. Removing it would create a major power imbalance in favor of the Elementalist. I am not in favor of that just give us back our ____ (insert word here that I realy don't want to get in trouble for).

Mega Mouse

Corpselooter · Jan 29, 2007, 08:13 PM // 20:13

Dear Shady, Legendary ultimatum

It has come to our attention that you are a(n):

[X] Clueless Newbie
[ ] Loser
[ ] Me too'er
[ ] Pervert
[ ] Geek
[X] Spammer
[ ] Nerd
[ ] Elvis
[ ] Fed
[ ] Freak
[X] Noob
[ ] Other

You are being flamed because:

[ ] You quoted an ENTIRE post in your reply
[ ] You continued a long, stupid thread
[ ] J00R UB3R 1337 D00D1!!!11!!!!111one!11
[ ] You started an off-topic thread
[ ] You posted a "YOU ALL SUCK" message
[ ] You posted something COMPLETLY off topic
[ ] You created a topic with absolutely no purpose whatsoever
[ ] You said "me too" (or something similar)
[ ] You don't know which forum to post in
[ ] You suck
[ ] You brag about things that never happened
[X] You pretend to have planned your stupidity from the start
[ ] Your signature sucks
[ ] Your avatar sucks
[ ] You posted a (phone sex or a make money fast) ad
[ ] Yuor spleeing iz al worng
[ ] You bumped your own topic 47 times this day alone
[ ] "YOU WROTE A MESSAGE WRITTEN ALL IN CAPS"
[ ] You posted racist s***
[ ] I don't like your tone of voice
[ ] Your. Grammer is! That of a 3 YeaR? OLd
[ ] You posted a "Test" message
[ ] You junkmailed me

To repent, you must:

[ ] Give up your account
[ ] Bust up your modem with a hammer and eat it
[ ] Read the goddamn rules
[ ] Jump into a bathtub while holding your monitor and/or CPU
[X] Actually post something relevant
[X] Apologize to everybody in this thread
[ ] Other

In closing, I'd like to say:

[ ] Blow me
[X] Now erase your post and forget your member password
[ ] Bite me
[X] Never post again
[ ] I pity your dog
[ ] Go to hell
[X] Your IQ must be 7
[X] Take your s*** somewhere else
[ ] Learn to post or f*** off
[X] Your "brain" is entirely made up of pork byproducts
[ ] Do us all a favor and jump into some industrial equipment
[ ] STFU
[ ] GTFO
[ ] See how far your tongue will fit into the electric outlet
[ ] All of the above

Mind shock is leet. Just learn how to use it.

Phoenix Ex · Jan 29, 2007, 08:43 PM // 20:43

Wow....talk about a no life spending all that time making a list of insults and ticking them >.>...even though I do agree mind shock is NOT a bad skill.

Mind burn however....

Personally....I believe all elementalist skills should do at least 1.5x the dps of a warrior just because they need to spend energy and time to cast and the horrid 60 armor with crappy elemental bonus, the only one skill that even comes close to the rigged power of warrior is Searing Flames which of course is gonna get nerfed since no one will ever bring a dedicated caster shutdown...for once I want to see a caster shutdown spammer instead of blindling flash spammer.

Thomas.knbk · Jan 29, 2007, 09:00 PM // 21:00

Corpselooter, I agree some of shady's buffs were way off the mark, but I have no clue why you're dissin Ultimatum here. His post were relevant, and he sure isn't a noob/newbie.

lightblade · Jan 29, 2007, 10:11 PM // 22:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shady79

10 sec recharge is spamming for you? so you are spamming fireballs? haha! no way. remove the RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing exhaustion from those mind things and we can use it in pve too. recharge 15 seconds maybe. damn i dont wanna use all the same skills everytime in pve. boring as hell.

10 sec recharge is is pretty short. You can always use Arcane Echo to double it and it becomes 1 kd every 5 seconds. Also, Mind Shock's conditional damage count as a seperate damage source, so the 100 damage can bypass Protective Spirit's 10% protection.

There is no point in spamming fireball. Because it's a projectile attack, and all it do is damage unlike Mind Shock's KD.

I don't think you realize how powerful Knock Down is. There is a pattern on how KD is allowed in GW. KD is only allowed when one or more of the following happen:
1. there's a required condition for the knockdown.
2. the knockdown requires a sacrifice of some sort. (exhaustion or loose all adrenaline)

Just for the near unconditional KD alone, Mind Shock should have exhaustion to it.

However...Mind Burn doesn't seem powerful enough to get exhaustion. Since it's damage is really not that great compare to Searing Flame.

BahamutKaiser · Jan 30, 2007, 04:15 AM // 04:15

Pheonix pointed out a very valid topic, people keep pretending that everything powerful an elementist can do needs to be nerfed, instead of creating a need for proper counters like the neccessary counters for Warrior. They would perfer to try and kill elementists quickly since they are weak in armor, and nerf their spells so they do not NEED to bring counters for Elementist the way they NEED to bring counters for Warrior.

Given the fact that Elementist have the additional counter option of simply killing them, and when countered, die a rather instant death, their spells should be powerful enough to make it a neccessity, not an option. If Elementist skills become as powerful as they aught to be in general, than the vast sum of skills used to protect against them will come into play and some of them can be improved accordingly.

As for mindburn, I don't agree with removing Exhaustion, simply because it is part of a series of "Mind" spells that all deal extra damage and effects if they hit a target with less mana. But it has to be improved, because 5 energy and exhaustion is far more costly than 15 energy, and it even has longer recast, as if you can afford to spam it very long..... Real option, the base and conditional damage be dealt on that foe and all adjacent foes, and the burning applies to all adjacent foes.

Cost wise your still spending way more than Searing Flames, and the damage is still in steep competition since Searing Flames is nearby instead of adjacent, and the significant damage is only delt if your have more energy.

Elementist skills do need to be more powerful, but it is important to be creative and functional with it.

Another option for mind burn is extreme burn duration, ranging into 10 and 12 seconds, which would make it worth casting semi regularly to land some significant damage and lasting burn, but even that is hard to compare to 25% armor penetration and knockdown. Mind Freeze could use a spot of added damage too, 90% slow is nice, but the damage is nearly none exsistant.

On a related topic, It would be nice if they came up with an earth based mind spell, just for shits and giggles..... but it would be hard to make something better than obsidian flame..... Perhaps Mind Crush 10-40 earth damage on target and adjacent foes, if you have more energy it deals 10-40 earth damage on target and adjacent foes, and blinds for 5 seconds......

I don't know, whatever, there is work to be done on alot of spells, and mumbling over a few doesn't amount to much. Developers need to accept an improvment to Elementist as a whole for it to be acceptable, they can make reasonable improvements if they accept the weakness and disfunction of Elementists selection. I'm more concerned about the application of group damage and usefulness of DoT than I am with a few elites and the poor compensation of exhaustion inclusive skills.

Priest Of Sin · Jan 30, 2007, 05:00 AM // 05:00

Dude, elementalists are INSANE damage dealers... the beauty in their damage is that it's hard to counter! Sure, a warrior does more DPS, but there are a ton of counters to his damage (blind, entering a stance, weakness), whereas an elementalist can smack you while he's blind, while you're in a stance, or while he's suffering from weakness with little to no downsides! Take Mind Shock for example... you can knock someone on his arse for a long, LONG time if you keep at it. IMO, ele skills are fine the way they are, because eles have become more of a balanced, defensive class (see: blindbots, flag runners, SS/Warders), instead of the unstoppable "if the ele gets his spell off we're so gonna lose" juggernauts that they were at the beginning.

dreamhunk · Jan 30, 2007, 05:29 AM // 05:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Priest Of Sin

Dude, elementalists are INSANE damage dealers... the beauty in their damage is that it's hard to counter! Sure, a warrior does more DPS, but there are a ton of counters to his damage (blind, entering a stance, weakness), whereas an elementalist can smack you while he's blind, while you're in a stance, or while he's suffering from weakness with little to no downsides! Take Mind Shock for example... you can knock someone on his arse for a long, LONG time if you keep at it. IMO, ele skills are fine the way they are, because eles have become more of a balanced, defensive class (see: blindbots, flag runners, SS/Warders), instead of the unstoppable "if the ele gets his spell off we're so gonna lose" juggernauts that they were at the beginning.

that is anets fault they were made to be juggernauts not monkeys runing around! elemantals are easy to counter by the way.

Thomas.knbk · Jan 30, 2007, 07:27 AM // 07:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Priest Of Sin

Dude, elementalists are INSANE damage dealers... the beauty in their damage is that it's hard to counter! Sure, a warrior does more DPS, but there are a ton of counters to his damage (blind, entering a stance, weakness), whereas an elementalist can smack you while he's blind, while you're in a stance, or while he's suffering from weakness with little to no downsides! Take Mind Shock for example... you can knock someone on his arse for a long, LONG time if you keep at it. IMO, ele skills are fine the way they are, because eles have become more of a balanced, defensive class (see: blindbots, flag runners, SS/Warders), instead of the unstoppable "if the ele gets his spell off we're so gonna lose" juggernauts that they were at the beginning.

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...d.php?t=113319

Read the part where he says that the dmg from warriors for the most part doesn't go directly into health, but into the opponent's attention and energy in particular.

Zonzai · Jan 31, 2007, 06:51 PM // 18:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shady79

damn i dont wanna use all the same skills everytime in pve. boring as hell.

I feel you there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MegaMouse

...I started Guild Wars with an Elementalist mainly due to the fact that the time they were the Highest damage dealers in the game.

Me too. What a joke we are now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MegaMouse

Over several "updates" NC-Soft and A-Net have pretty much gelded the Elementalist. A once proud profession is now relegated to Nuking in missions or running flags in GVG. Not realy what I thought the profession was supposed to be.

You have a much nicer way of putting it than I would. They nerfed AoE, nerfed spikes, nerfed MS and generally just nerfed the ele in so doing. Then they added other classes that have better armor and can do at least as much damage if not more.

Let's face it, we aren't even that good for running flags as squishy as we are.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MegaMouse

I know of several players who only bring their Ele's out when a guildmate eeds a nuker for a mission and can't get one in the district he/she is in.

Yeah, I pretty much only use mine when people need nukers too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MegaMouse

I'll sign this only for the simple reason that they need to reset the Elementalist back to the agent of doom that they used to be when the game came out.

I concur. Do anything to make the elementalist a viable choice for a damage dealer again please. We don't have to deal more damage than all the other classes, but I would so love to be able to compete with an assassin or dervish without sacraficing all hope of survivability to be able to do so.

/signed

clawofcrimson · Jan 31, 2007, 06:55 PM // 18:55

aslo would like to see aoe spells targeting differently

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10112710

Retribution X · Jan 31, 2007, 07:05 PM // 19:05

I hate playing a gelded ele. Mine is female.

Secondly, Ride the lightning needs a SERIOUS buff.

You're friggen stepping right next to something that wants you dead! So you use on a warrior, he uses Balanced stance, or the monk uses B pend.

You are totally screwed.

Or in the words of Abaddon, "You got served!"

Shady79 · Feb 01, 2007, 11:30 PM // 23:30

Quote:

10 sec recharge is is pretty short. You can always use Arcane Echo to double it and it becomes 1 kd every 5 seconds.

yeah and double exhaustion, great idea... -20 energy... great.

@Corpselooter: no comment

I'd like to see the suggested buff by Skye Marin... at least. even better would be:

Mind Shock
5/1/9
Target foe suffers 15...75 lightning damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe takes additional 5...25 lightning damage, is knocked down and this skill causes exhaustion. This spell has 25% armor penetration.

(compare the 'new' skill above with invoke lightning...5 less energy, but only 1 foe hit instead of 3 and conditional knockdown/conditional exhaustion)

Mind Freeze
5/0.75/8
Target foe suffers 15...75 cold damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe moves 90% slower for 2...6 seconds and this spell causes exhaustion.

Mind Burn
5/0.5/7
Target foe takes 15...75 fire damage. If you have more energy than target foe, the foe is set on fire for 1...7 seconds and this spell causes exhaustion.

Or something like that.

BryanM · Feb 02, 2007, 12:22 AM // 00:22

I kind of would like to have some innate energy management in the elementalist - to have an effect like Expertise on its own skills.

All energy storage is good for is upfront exertion of energy and exhaustion.... and the linked energy skills that were pretty much completely mandatory no matter where you were or what you were doing. The buffed Glyph of Lesser Energy was kind of okay, but by no means a solution for pumping out damage spells.

Such an action would be a crazy change for the game; Strength and Expertise weren't changed this much.