Curse

UnChosen · May 29, 2010, 06:08 PM // 18:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by bhavv

If your struggling in HM with an Elly, try using these hero builds:

You really shouldnt have anymore problems with that, it just wont work on Destroyers, just change to over to something else for those. In places with lots of condition removal, or Realm of Torment, change over to a Mind Blast build.

Searing Flames damage is boosted by Weaken Armor, one of the Ebon wards and fragility, the Paragon gives you damage reduction from ToF (9 spear, 10 motivation, 10 command, 12 leadership), and the Necro has mass condition / degen spam - bleeding, poison, weakness and cracked armor plus Ulcerous Lungs and lots of AoE armor ignoring damage (further boosted with fragility).

In NF you also get a third SF hench with Cynn. Just add two monk henchies, and whichever other two you like.

Its not about whether or not people can complete HM with Ele. Its about how Ele are weaker than the other classes (at least damage wise). All I see in that build is the presence of Glowing Gaze, Fire Attunement, Glyph of Lesser Energy, and AoR which already cause me to think of how other caster classes don't need three/four energy management skills just to spam ONE damage skills. Also, fragility is not an ele skill, so I don't count the fragility/necro combination to be part of the ele's damage.

The ebon skills are PvE skills which every other class can also use to boost their damage. Also, think of how much time is wasted on preparation. Before you spam SF you have to cast the two ebon, glyph of energy, and fragility, which is already 3 seconds. Then you might have to recast Fire Attunement and AoR midbattle, which waste even more time.

Meanwhile, the other classes are already spamming away on their cheap armor ignoring damage spells/attacks.

Myotheraccount · May 29, 2010, 07:18 PM // 19:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

You said "one spell". Make up your mind. If you're going to say "one strike" I'll show you a screenshot of Sun and Moon Slash doing 1k damage.

S&M is two strikes. Also, if one spell - not really. if one strike - depends.

Quote:

Really? Want to bet?

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...9&postcount=93

That it depends? Yes, that strike was a crit with holy damage against undeads so it indeed depends. You lost the bet. :>

Jeydra · May 29, 2010, 08:23 PM // 20:23

If Sun and Moon Slash does 1k damage in two strikes, how much does it deal in one strike?

Also that post linked 5 screenshots. Why'd you only look at the first?

@bhaav's build - I'd believe in that build if it can do tough areas, which I don't believe it can. Any screenshots from an area like Shards HM?

bhavv · May 29, 2010, 08:30 PM // 20:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnChosen

Its not about whether or not people can complete HM with Ele. Its about how Ele are weaker than the other classes (at least damage wise). All I see in that build is the presence of Glowing Gaze, Fire Attunement, Glyph of Lesser Energy, and AoR which already cause me to think of how other caster classes don't need three/four energy management skills just to spam ONE damage skills. Also, fragility is not an ele skill, so I don't count the fragility/necro combination to be part of the ele's damage.

The ebon skills are PvE skills which every other class can also use to boost their damage. Also, think of how much time is wasted on preparation. Before you spam SF you have to cast the two ebon, glyph of energy, and fragility, which is already 3 seconds. Then you might have to recast Fire Attunement and AoR midbattle, which waste even more time.

Meanwhile, the other classes are already spamming away on their cheap armor ignoring damage spells/attacks.

Yea thats true. I precast the enchantments, open the attack / lure with fragility, then the two wards. Thats quite a bit of time wasted at each mob to get it going.

The thing with searing flames is that you dont really need anything else if you can keep spamming it, I'm not too keen on AoE skills because of AI scatter, but I used Lava Font once and that one works because of its short recharge (all the AI come to you anyway, so they will be right on the lava font).

Now, the funny thing is that SF is arguably one of the two most powerful Elly elites, the other being SH. I mostly use SF just to go along with ToF.

The only thing that was reently too difficult was an Invoke Lightning boss hitting for 500+ damage, but I have lots of pumpkin cookies and candy apples stored up, so managed to kill him in the end (Lack of PI didnt help).

Also, just having 4 of those Ravenous Gaze necros would probably be a lot more powerful too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

@bhaav's build - I'd believe in that build if it can do tough areas, which I don't believe it can. Any screenshots from an area like Shards HM?

I'm just using it for Vanqs, I only just finished all of Kourna, but have also fnished Mainalnd Cantha and Tyria mostly relying on Searing Flames.

I've not even started HM dungeons yet, I really doubt that it would work in those.

Jeydra · May 29, 2010, 08:38 PM // 20:38

Vanquishes are so easy I bet I can easily do most of them with 5 or at most 6 characters (me + 3 heroes + two henchmen of my choice), especially easy areas like Kourna, Cantha and Tyria. Hence it proves nothing.

PS:

1. The best Elementalist elite is Ether Renewal; second best is Assassin's Promise. Searing Flames is generally more powerful than Savannah Heat.
2. Getting killed by a 500-damage nuke is the price of not having Prot Spirit.
3. Having to use DP removal etc indicates that the build you're using and / or the tactics you're using are failing.

bhavv · May 29, 2010, 08:42 PM // 20:42

Yea, it wouldnt work in dungeons, I think I'd rather be prism healing in those.

Shards of Orr would work better with me healing, and with monks Smiting I think.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

2. Getting killed by a 500-damage nuke is the price of not having Prot Spirit.
3. Having to use DP removal etc indicates that the build you're using and / or the tactics you're using are failing.

Blame that on Kihm

. The only problem I have is some elly bosses because the prot henchie sucks at protting.

I think I'll try out Ether Renewal Protting next since the AI fails at it. I havnt used it in ages, usually I just use Prism. Thanks for pointing that out.

Arato · May 30, 2010, 03:42 AM // 03:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

Vanquishes are so easy I bet I can easily do most of them with 5 or at most 6 characters (me + 3 heroes + two henchmen of my choice), especially easy areas like Kourna, Cantha and Tyria. Hence it proves nothing.

PS:

1. The best Elementalist elite is Ether Renewal; second best is Assassin's Promise. Searing Flames is generally more powerful than Savannah Heat.
2. Getting killed by a 500-damage nuke is the price of not having Prot Spirit.
3. Having to use DP removal etc indicates that the build you're using and / or the tactics you're using are failing.

Searing flames is terrible.. well it's good in normal mode, and I suppose it's H/H friendly, because you can't expect H/H to be capable of balling up stuff.

With proper balling up, SH with MoR with meteor shower holding them in place is about as good of damage as an ele can get, which against heavily armored foes is still bad.

I also have to LOL that #1 and #2 for the best ele elites.. #1 is used for casting monk spells/functions rather than ele, and #2 isn't an ele elite.

bhavv · May 30, 2010, 07:23 AM // 07:23

So I vanqed a couple of areas with Ether renewal protting, and ditched the prot hench, I seriously cant believe how much easier that made the game lol.

I still used the same H/H builds with 1 SF hero and Cynn with SF, ToF paragon and Ravenous Gaze necro, plus Herta, Odurra and Mhenlo.

I just spam Shield Guardian, Spirit Bond and Prot Spirit and nothing dies, plus Extinguish and Breath of the Great Dwarf for contitions and Ruby Djinns.

The party only wiped once at the Searing flames boss, but didnt need to use any cnsumables.

Yea, Elly are better at healing, and monks are better at damage in PVE lol.

Arato · May 30, 2010, 02:16 PM // 14:16

I'm feeling right now that the earth magic attribute is our strongest element if you actually want to play an ele as an ele and a damaging one at that.

The damage on unsteady ground, churning earth, and eruption is as good as searing heat/tenai's heat, aside from the 3 seconds of burning if they manage to stay in it all 5 seconds. They also contribute knockdown and blindness, to make up for weak damage vs heavily armored foes, in fact, the those 2 things more than make up for the lack of damage since the heavy armor classes like warriors and rangers are the most affected by blindness and knockdowns for moving faster than normal (which all HM enemies are) or for attacking (which melee and rangers constantly are and won't stop even in the midst of being constantly knocked down). Combined with earthbind you can keep mobs on the ground much of the time, and the spells will do their full amount of damage without scatter.

Ebon Vanguard Standard of Honor and Ebon Vanguard Standard of Wisdom are nearly musts however, otherwise recharges bite you in the rear, and EVSOH helps replace lost damage.

That all said, it makes fire even weaker in comparison for hard mode. Your damage advantages come exclusively from burning condition (which is affected by degen cap, and multiple people spamming SF for burning is a waste). Fire magic needs tweaks. Earth is almost perfect.

Daesu · May 30, 2010, 02:34 PM // 14:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

Vanquishes are so easy I bet I can easily do most of them with 5 or at most 6 characters (me + 3 heroes + two henchmen of my choice), especially easy areas like Kourna, Cantha and Tyria. Hence it proves nothing.

PS:

1. The best Elementalist elite is Ether Renewal; second best is Assassin's Promise. Searing Flames is generally more powerful than Savannah Heat.
2. Getting killed by a 500-damage nuke is the price of not having Prot Spirit.
3. Having to use DP removal etc indicates that the build you're using and / or the tactics you're using are failing.

I have to agree with this.

Myotheraccount · May 30, 2010, 06:34 PM // 18:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

If Sun and Moon Slash does 1k damage in two strikes, how much does it deal in one strike?

Also that post linked 5 screenshots. Why'd you only look at the first?

500 which is probably with a crit, tons of buffs against undead or possible tormented creatures with LB on. So it depends on what you take into account, what mobs you fight, if you crit or not hence my statements are correct thus far. I looked through all the screenshots but last ones were showing DPS so they are irrelevant in a discussion about a single strike.

:>

Xenomortis · May 30, 2010, 07:30 PM // 19:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myotheraccount

in a discussion about a single strike.

But I have no idea why you even want to discuss that. PvE is all about DPS, period.

What is the most damaging "single strike" that an Ele can give then?* In anything in HM that's not a level 5 Charmable animal I can garuntee any physical can exceed it in one strike (regardless of enemy type). I can confidently say that for most things in NM too.
This would be with buffs of course: you can buff the Elementalist too, but all those buffs (with the exception of Intensity) work for the physicals as well and they get loads more that only work for them.

*It's Energy Blast - 130 Damage (armour ignoring) when cast at 73 energy. Let's be fair and apply "By Ural's Hammer" to get it to 162.
If you look for armour sensitive sources, the Rit beats the Ele for the "single strike"

Now with no buffs, the physical isn't going to do that much damage and in a single strike, they'll never reach the 130 damage from Energy Blast.
But do you see why this isn't at all relevant?

It's because you never run a physical without any buffs. However casters are frequently run without buffs because the gains are significantly smaller. You don't even need that many to outdo anything the Elementalist brings out - especially since an Elementalist almost never brings Energy Blast and is therefore not going to ever reach that 162 armour ignoring "single strike".
This doesn't even consider recharges, cast times, after cast and energy - all those have a massive detrimental affect on DPS which is the entire point.

Myotheraccount · May 30, 2010, 09:22 PM // 21:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xenomortis

But I have no idea why you even want to discuss that. PvE is all about DPS, period.

To pass time. Jeydra brought up some stuff from Guild Wiki and GWW that talked about how Eles were supposed to be. So we are discussing if they still live up to that. One of the sources said that Eles can hit strongest in a single strike so i said it can still be partially true but Jeydra disagreed.

Jeydra · May 31, 2010, 12:39 AM // 00:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myotheraccount

500 which is probably with a crit, tons of buffs against undead or possible tormented creatures with LB on. So it depends on what you take into account, what mobs you fight, if you crit or not hence my statements are correct thus far. I looked through all the screenshots but last ones were showing DPS so they are irrelevant in a discussion about a single strike.

:>

Yes. And so what? So what if it's done with a crit and tons of buffs? It's still single strike. Or if you dislike getting buffs from other people, look at that screenshot again. 610 / 2 is still 305, which is more than anything an Elementalist can do with a single strike. Any more excuses?

I'll remind you that your comment was "Their DPS on other hand is lacking that's why they take support roles in casual stuff where DPS is favoured. But Eles were never supposed to be a heavy DPS class."

You've still ignored what GuildWiki wrote about Elementalists, by the way.

@Xenos - the largest damage an Elementalist can inflict in a single strike (without resorting to using martial weapons) in PvE is when it's buffed with EBSoH, By Ural's Hammer, Glyph of Elemental Power and Elemental Lord casting Lightning Orb @ 16 spec. The Orb does 140 damage at 16 Air, and I just tried that combination on the Master of Damage and hit him for 224 damage.

@Arato - I've been giving Earth a serious go recently and I'm concluding it's rather weaker than Air. Eruption is the only good skill in Earth. It's not that good even if you don't need the blind, which you usually will not. Churning Earth takes too long to cast, and if you wait for aggro to settle before using it like any other AoE skill then, well, you 1) won't get all the damage from it since balled mobs die exceedingly fast and 2) you don't get the KDs. Ward Against Melee is compensated for by Eruption, the other wards are all pretty useless and nothing else in the Earth line is good since AP-backed PvE skill spam beats all of them.

You can ball stuff while H/H'ing, you just have to do it yourself (that's why you have Prot Spirit).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arato

I also have to LOL that #1 and #2 for the best ele elites.. #1 is used for casting monk spells/functions rather than ele, and #2 isn't an ele elite.

Life sure sucks as an Elementalist, doesn't it?

Xenomortis · May 31, 2010, 01:13 AM // 01:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

@Xenos - the largest damage an Elementalist can inflict in a single strike (without resorting to using martial weapons) in PvE is when it's buffed with EBSoH, By Ural's Hammer, Glyph of Elemental Power and Elemental Lord casting Lightning Orb @ 16 spec. The Orb does 140 damage at 16 Air, and I just tried that combination on the Master of Damage and hit him for 224 damage.

Replace Elemental Lord with Intensity.

UnChosen · May 31, 2010, 01:32 AM // 01:32

Debating whether or not ele should be DPS is pointless. Assassin was not designed as a tank, and yet they got SF, Shroud of Distress, and other survival skill buffs. I don't think rits are designed to be the greatest long ranger damage dealer in the game either. Mesmer was supposed to be pure support and got a damage dealing buff recently. Warriors can tank, do heavy DPS, and support all at the same time with SY....

Even if someone from Anet comes here and personally proclaim that Ele was designed to be a support class, Ele still needs a buff....in the form of a complete class redesign. You don't give a support class 90% damage skills. Its like looking at RoJ and then proclaiming that monk is a damage dealing class.

Arato · May 31, 2010, 03:37 AM // 03:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

Yes. And so what? So what if it's done with a crit and tons of buffs? It's still single strike. Or if you dislike getting buffs from other people, look at that screenshot again. 610 / 2 is still 305, which is more than anything an Elementalist can do with a single strike. Any more excuses?

I'll remind you that your comment was "Their DPS on other hand is lacking that's why they take support roles in casual stuff where DPS is favoured. But Eles were never supposed to be a heavy DPS class."

You've still ignored what GuildWiki wrote about Elementalists, by the way.

@Xenos - the largest damage an Elementalist can inflict in a single strike (without resorting to using martial weapons) in PvE is when it's buffed with EBSoH, By Ural's Hammer, Glyph of Elemental Power and Elemental Lord casting Lightning Orb @ 16 spec. The Orb does 140 damage at 16 Air, and I just tried that combination on the Master of Damage and hit him for 224 damage.

@Arato - I've been giving Earth a serious go recently and I'm concluding it's rather weaker than Air. Eruption is the only good skill in Earth. It's not that good even if you don't need the blind, which you usually will not. Churning Earth takes too long to cast, and if you wait for aggro to settle before using it like any other AoE skill then, well, you 1) won't get all the damage from it since balled mobs die exceedingly fast and 2) you don't get the KDs. Ward Against Melee is compensated for by Eruption, the other wards are all pretty useless and nothing else in the Earth line is good since AP-backed PvE skill spam beats all of them.

You can ball stuff while H/H'ing, you just have to do it yourself (that's why you have Prot Spirit).

Life sure sucks as an Elementalist, doesn't it?

Earth is weaker than air, but it's still aoe. Single target damage is pretty useless in pve unless you have no other options. Regardless how you swing it, killing mobs 1 by 1 takes longer than killing them all at once. The only possible benefit comes to situations where killing 1 single target fast reduces the danger of that group by a significant amount, ie a healer, or an enemy elementalist or boss of any class (however pain inverter is usually best against either of those)

Where churning earth shines is in scatter. Mobs that try to scatter out of it, eat a knockdown (in hard mode they're all moving faster than normal) and take 2 more ticks of it.

Myotheraccount · May 31, 2010, 09:37 AM // 09:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arato

Earth is weaker than air, but it's still aoe. Single target damage is pretty useless in pve unless you have no other options. Regardless how you swing it, killing mobs 1 by 1 takes longer than killing them all at once. The only possible benefit comes to situations where killing 1 single target fast reduces the danger of that group by a significant amount, ie a healer, or an enemy elementalist or boss of any class (however pain inverter is usually best against either of those)

Where churning earth shines is in scatter. Mobs that try to scatter out of it, eat a knockdown (in hard mode they're all moving faster than normal) and take 2 more ticks of it.

Lol not really. In majority of general HM balling is not worth the effort. Some of the best hero setups like Spiritway and Discord for instance rely on single target damage. The more small, weak mobs there are the less are returns from AoE and Tanking which is the case in allot of areas on HM.

Earth Magic is amazing. I <3 UG and take it with me very often. Churning Earth, Erruption, Earthquake duo, Stoning are really nice too.

Quote:

Yes. And so what? So what if it's done with a crit and tons of buffs? It's still single strike. Or if you dislike getting buffs from other people, look at that screenshot again. 610 / 2 is still 305, which is more than anything an Elementalist can do with a single strike. Any more excuses?

You are still repeating what I said in argumentational tone. Depending on what you take into account I can see where people on GWW were coming from saying that.

Quote:

I'll remind you that your comment was "Their DPS on other hand is lacking that's why they take support roles in casual stuff where DPS is favoured. But Eles were never supposed to be a heavy DPS class."

You've still ignored what GuildWiki wrote about Elementalists, by the way.

Not at all. DPS = Damage Per Second. Because of long recharge and casting times on their spells Eles never really had it. They do have strong damage bursts and spikes like GuildWiki said but DPS is still going to be low. You can fix the recharge issue by using AP, Cons or PvE Skills. :>

Jeydra · May 31, 2010, 04:22 PM // 16:22

The time delay on when you can use your AoE nukes is bad, and Air does a lot more single-target damage than Earth so you can compensate for the damage. It may be single-target, but sufficiently high single-target damage is still better than AoE damage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myotheraccount

You are still repeating what I said in argumentational tone. Depending on what you take into account I can see where people on GWW were coming from saying that.

Read GWW again. Analyze it. Then post.

You're coming dangerously close to ignore, by the way. You remind me too much of Tyla.

Arato · May 31, 2010, 07:25 PM // 19:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeydra

The time delay on when you can use your AoE nukes is bad, and Air does a lot more single-target damage than Earth so you can compensate for the damage. It may be single-target, but sufficiently high single-target damage is still better than AoE damage.

Read GWW again. Analyze it. Then post.

You're coming dangerously close to ignore, by the way. You remind me too much of Tyla.

Depends on how many you can pull together and kill all at once.

Not something to use H/H though, you are right there.

Even when single targetting though, in pve anyway, you're best off not even really using air skills, but just pve skills and AP with discord heroes. AP, YMLAD, FH, and PI for bosses. The rest of your bar is almost insignificant. You might take some fast, semi-spammable cover hex (chilling winds maybe), GoLE, I suppose maybe lightning orb, and I dunno blinding flash. You're hardly using Ele skills really, but expecting to take the time to cast ele damage skills when discord users will kill them faster than you can get them off is silly.