Curse

Cuilan · May 24, 2010, 02:32 AM // 02:32

Obsidian Flesh is still used in speed clears.

You gave several ways of increasing damage.

Arato · May 24, 2010, 02:59 AM // 02:59

strong damage huh? I dunno but I was trying a searing flames spam build while doing white mantle today and just banging my head against the wall.

17 fire magic and with cracked armor and by ural's hammer I was lucky to be doing 80 damage a cast.

Without by ural's hammer and cracked armor it was hitting for 50ish damage a cast.

Yeah that's some sweet damage for 15 energy a cast alright.

Meanwhile my Mesmer hits the same mobs for 140-175ish damage for the same amount of energy using wastrel's worry + cry of pain or cry of frustration, hey I even have almost as much degen as searing flames does with cry of pain, or using ether nightmare, and that's the tip of the iceberg, because my mesmer is vastly underdeveloped and doesn't have a lot of skills yet.

That is not "good damage" that is crippled damage that is outclassed by what was not originally intended to be a primary damage class.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eluvatar

they dont realy have strong spikes in hm

they got there best tank skill nerfed

and the awsome spike your talking about only works with buh ebsoh the lightrbinger skill (+40% dmg in doa) and weaken armor, thats the only way you can spike with an ele and it takes a 25% dmg buff and a 40% dmg buff to do anything.

Not to mention that can be done with any class.. but the current meta for DoA is DWG anyway.

JimmyTyme · May 24, 2010, 03:18 AM // 03:18

I think the best option for buffing ele's would be to decrease a few cast times (most are reasonable), increase the aoe range on some skills I'll use fireball as an example it hits adjacent range which is just not practical and makes the skill sub-par to increase the aoe range to nearby and decrease the casting time to 1s OR the cooldown to 5s would make the skill alot more viable.

Secondly, scatter while I agree with it to a degree just is too quick if they were to delay the response time from RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing instant to... 3-6 seconds (depending on duration of spell) it would still limit the damage, but not completely remove these skills from any viable use at all except to piss of your group because of the lack of grouping. the other suggestion is let them stand in 1 DoT-AoE skill without reacting, but once the skills start stacking the AI then scatters (eg. with 1 firestorm on them they sit there and do nothing, with 2 or more they run)

3rd point, energy management, yes I agree it's completely shite and very very often requires 3 skill slots specifically devoted to it, which limits the bar extremely this should be brought down to 1skill (except in the most extreme situations) and instead of applying to ONLY ONE elementalist attribute it should be extended to cover ALL spells and not just elementalist skills as this VERY often a HUGE limiting factor in elementalist builds, and very often eliminates the ability to exploit your secondary profession which is devastating.

4th point, armor is a huge problem and a simple and quick-fix would me to make the attributes take on a more strength-like approach and add a armor penetrating effect to the attributes eg. fire magic, increases armor penetration by 0.75% every level (applies to fire damage only)

Finally, the base energy regeneration of the elementalist should be increased to 5-6 pips (based on energy storage), this would make the elementalist a very powerful force to reckon with and wouldn't require MAJOR changes to the skills themselves and would result in a BIG difference upon the elementalist class, as compensation for the advantages to all this it might be reasonable to decrease their initial (unmodified by runes or otherwise) health from 480 to 450.

*also elementalist bosses should be reduced from double damage (200% normal damage) to a minor 1/3rd increase (133% normal damage) because instant kills from some elementalist bosses are just not cool.

-This is only a 5 second quick-fix suggestion to update elementalists, so don't bitch and complain at me it's just a minor thought and may be completely missing HUGE factors.

Cuilan · May 24, 2010, 03:46 AM // 03:46

Giving fire armor penetration would give you two attributes with similar affects, but then nobody would have the need or want for air.

Six pips of energy on top of Ether Renewal is funny.

JimmyTyme · May 24, 2010, 04:00 AM // 04:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cuilan

Giving fire armor penetration would give you two attributes with similar affects, but then nobody would have the need or want for air.

and my response..

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimmyTyme

-This is only a 5 second quick-fix suggestion to update elementalists, so don't bitch and complain at me it's just a minor thought and may be completely missing HUGE factors.

not to mention that was an example.. air's ability could be that armor penetration... and fire could be... adds 2 firedamage per level to spells, attacks, & abilities which deal fire-damage already. (I'm not saying any of this has to happen I'm throwing out idea's for POSSIBLE mod's, which can be played with)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cuilan

Six pips of energy on top of Ether Renewal is funny.

and maybe ether renewal needs to be modified.... GASP is it possible that an elementalist skill may not be viable due to some unforeseen reason and may need a modification... BLASPHEMY!!!!!!!

Cuilan · May 24, 2010, 04:26 AM // 04:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimmyTyme

and my response..

Why would you quote yourself? You posted and I replied...

JimmyTyme · May 24, 2010, 04:39 AM // 04:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cuilan

Why would you quote yourself? You posted and I replied...

....And you replied incorrectly because you ignored the statement that I quoted.

Dusk_ · May 24, 2010, 04:46 AM // 04:46

The issue with Elementalists has nothing to do with the skills, and everything to do with the enemies.

The simplest solution is to reduce elemental resistance on HM monsters. Enemies don't get harder, and Elementalists (and even Channeling Rits) become viable damage dealers. The only issue might be that melee classes get a slight buff with elemental weapons.

expugnare · May 24, 2010, 05:22 AM // 05:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by WarcryOfTruth

I use Elementalists for damage, as far as I am concerned that's what their intended use was. I love dealing 80-130 damage to multiple foes at once (pending my buffs I deal around that much),

Notice, this is buffed. Eighty damage every 2 or 3 seconds factoring aftercast delay isn't good. In fact, its bad. Unbuffed, this damage drops down to probably about 50 a cast.

And so, it basically comes down to this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arato

17 fire magic and with cracked armor and by ural's hammer I was lucky to be doing 80 damage a cast.

I don't know what makes people think this is acceptable damage in Hard Mode, when the DPS of it barely comes to over 40. Even spread across a big area, it means nothing because the meta of the game is killing shit incredibly fast, which Ele's simply cannot do.

And to people who bring up speed clears etc: Yeah, sure, I can blast the hell out of Margonites (and sometimes, when I get bored, I do NF in HM so I can feel strong) and spike great with a Shitterflames build in DoA, but that doesn't mean that the class can do strong damage wherever it needs to. Yeah, there will always be differing circumstance, but it comes down to the fact that Ele's are underpowered in comparison to other caster classes.

For example, I played on my MoP Necro today, Hero Henching some stuff for fun and was shocked by the sheer damage output (a million little 42's all across my screen): even without a dedicated team, whole mobs were wiped incredibly fast. That is our competition. We have no chance.

Faye Aeris · May 24, 2010, 05:56 AM // 05:56

The problem with elementalists is twofold:

Low damage.
Elementalist damage is reduced by armor, making them hit for pitifully low amounts of damage. This problem is compounded by long cast times and long recharges, which means that the maximum DPS an elementalist can hope to get is around 50.

Lack of synergy.
Physicals get Strength of Honor, Great Dwarf Weapon, Ebon Battle Standard of Honor, Judge's Insight, Splinter Weapon to increase their (already high) damage exponentially. Elementalists get nothing.

Elementalist damage needs a major overhaul.

Arato · May 24, 2010, 06:27 AM // 06:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dusk_

The issue with Elementalists has nothing to do with the skills, and everything to do with the enemies.

The simplest solution is to reduce elemental resistance on HM monsters. Enemies don't get harder, and Elementalists (and even Channeling Rits) become viable damage dealers. The only issue might be that melee classes get a slight buff with elemental weapons.

This IS the MAJOR issue, yes. High armor in end game and hard mode is what really cripples us and makes us ineffective vs everything but the squishiest of caster opponents.

Though I still think some of our recharges and cast times are a bit excessive, considering the pace of high end pve. Mobs are dead before you get 5s casts off a lot of times, and 60s between pulls is unreasonable and we shouldn't need to rely on chancy instant recharge skills to compensate. Groups want reliable consistant high burst aoe damage, not a chance that they'll be able to deliver and a chance they'll be standing there using a low damage skill because their good spells are on cooldown. Meteor shower is the only nuke I can see having a recharge of 20s or higher, and I think it should be no longer than 30s. 3s cast time, and the first knockdown happens after 1s instead of after 3s.

I swear people trying to suggest workarounds like using air magic for armor penetration are starting to make me mad though. Air is not a nuking attribute it's a spiking attribute, groups don't want spikers most of the time they want nukers.

Myotheraccount · May 24, 2010, 09:44 AM // 09:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eluvatar

they dont realy have strong spikes in hm

they got there best tank skill nerfed

and the awsome spike your talking about only works with buh ebsoh the lightrbinger skill (+40% dmg in doa) and weaken armor, thats the only way you can spike with an ele and it takes a 25% dmg buff and a 40% dmg buff to do anything.

Lol no. You must be clueless. GoLE, AP, Lightning Orb, "YMLaD!", EVAS, "FH!" Chain Lightning, Air Attune. Reaps through everything on HM. You can take anything Air and still deal massive single target damage tbh. For everything else there is Cracked Armor. Also, most recent SC record was set with Ele spikers and probably still will.
Go play a Sorc in Aion and you will realise how OP Eles are here.

Mashiyu · May 24, 2010, 10:12 AM // 10:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myotheraccount

GoLE, AP, Lightning Orb, "YMLaD!", EVAS, "FH!" Chain Lightning, Air Attune.

Wow how elementalistic. 4 ele skills, 1 sin-elite, 3 pve skills. I'm sure you would not miss any of the ele skills (except for GoLE). When playing that with discord (and that build is ment to be played with discord) you just use AP, YMLaD, FH and then the foe is dead (sure you can try to waste 15e for Lightning Orb but 2 sec would be a long lifetime). Don't get me wrong - the build is good but i refuse to call it ele build (like the E/Rt ghostspammer)

@Topic: I think the best idea is to add elemental strong weaknesses to foes. Why should you have the choice between 4 elements, when you can choose between little dmg and even less dmg?

Another possible (relative) buff would be to make all dmg dealt by physicals armor-reduced - not only the weapon dmg but also the skill dmg. Armor is ment do protect from physical dmg in any other RPG (and also in RL ^^) - why not in GW? I know it would be a rather deep cut in game mechanics, but so the ele would be stronger compared to other classes without being OP.

Edit: Are the conjures the only +XXdmg skills whose dmg is reduced by armor?

Stoney Malloney · May 24, 2010, 10:52 AM // 10:52

I would like to point a few things;

- It is called HARD MODE, for a reason. If it were a stroll in the park, it would be no challenge.
- Searing Flames is not a suboptimal build for HM. I run a mission service and actually use an elementalist for this, I have found a mesmer and necromancer to be lacking in terms of damage in NM, let alone HM where foes have higher health and more healing ability. The fact it is armor ignoring will not change much about it being lacking.

Some advantages of Searing Flames:
- It does not cause scatter, you can actually get them to ball up with proper pulling/playing.
- It causes burning, great synergy with Glowing Gaze & Mark of Rodgort (on heroes especially).
- Very easy energy management.
- Very 'spammable'

Consider a situation in particular where there are two monks in the enemy team in HM. You could bring all kinds of fancy chars to interrupt/disable them. Or you could just have them ball up, 2 nukers with SF, trust me, they'll be outdamaged in no-time.

SF underpowered? NO
Elementalists underpowered? NO

As to air; air is a very interesting concept to run, and even in HM using it properly can be very rewarding for certain missions, among them Moddok Crevice and Gate of Madness are just two of them.

Don't try to get the elementalist buffed just because enemies have high armor/health in HM, instead, learn how to use the elementalist instead.

Arato · May 24, 2010, 12:14 PM // 12:14

It's hard mode for elementalists, but for nukers with armor ignoring damage it's not hard at all. They rip through things.

50-80 damage a cast on a 15energy spell NOT underpowered? You're crazy.

Air is effective SINGLE TARGET SINGLE TARGET SINGLE TARGET

God ffs get that through your skulls. People don't WANT single target damage in high end groups, they want aoe.

An SoS Ritualist has all the sustainable single target damage you need for mop up duty.

It's also armor ignoring.

Alicendre · May 24, 2010, 12:31 PM // 12:31

The problem is not that Eles can't do things. They can. But there will always be one class that does it better, except for healing, which should be Monks' role.

Let's compare them to Mesmers pre update. Mesmers could do some damage but it was often too conditional or single-target based. They could interrupt but couldn't in HM. They could do E-denial but fights are too short in PvE for that, and mobs have big energy pools. So really they didn't have an use. You feel that Eles do not need a buff because they can have uses even though they are subpar.

You can use your Ele for damage, but its entire bar will be used for this, and it still won't be as good as another class doing damage. See the Master of Damage for proof, and even then it won't show how pitiful Ele's damage is compared to other classes since he has 60 AR whereas mobs in HM have 80-120 AR.
You can use your Ele for utility, but another caster can too and it will still be doing damage.
You can use your Ele as a tank, but sins do it better.

OP is right. Eles need a fix, they are in the very same situation as Dervishes, except Dervishes are less wanted in groups because people are used to pick Eles.

Stark Dynasty · May 24, 2010, 12:33 PM // 12:33

"For each rank of Energy Storage, your maximum energy increases by 3. Your spells that deal damage deal an additional 2 chaos damage per rank. Several skills, related to gaining Health or Energy, become more effective with a higher Energy Storage."

Power creep ftw.

Arato · May 24, 2010, 12:47 PM // 12:47

I'm thinking adding armor penetration to an attribute would be the wrong way to go due to ele bosses in hard mode already hitting hard. What needs to be adjusted is armor vs elemental damage on hard mode mobs and end game mobs. Either that or add the armor penetration ability to a skill, giving fire and water eles the ability to apply cracked armor (yes you can go E/N but then you don't have assassin's promise, for recharges on your 30-60s long cooldown skills do you?) would help too.

Intensity might be a good target for review. It's outdated and outclassed completely by "By Ural's Hammer"

Jeydra · May 24, 2010, 03:51 PM // 15:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Myotheraccount

Lol no. You must be clueless. GoLE, AP, Lightning Orb, "YMLaD!", EVAS, "FH!" Chain Lightning, Air Attune. Reaps through everything on HM. You can take anything Air and still deal massive single target damage tbh. For everything else there is Cracked Armor. Also, most recent SC record was set with Ele spikers and probably still will.
Go play a Sorc in Aion and you will realise how OP Eles are here.

That build does a lot of damage doesn't it? /sarcasm

Really, compare that vs. other player builds and say it's a lot of damage. It's not even "massive single target damage"; the best you can hope for is 140 from Lightning Orb, but there are a lot of ways to hit more than 140 damage a hit. Hell you can even do it yourself as an Elementalist if you use melee weapons.

Elementalists need revamping. I prefer nerfing everything else, but the sky will fall down before that happens.

Eragon Zarroc · May 24, 2010, 03:55 PM // 15:55

there is nothing wrong with the ele class >_<