Curse

Bob of Maple Ave · Mar 12, 2006, 09:22 AM // 09:22

Hello,

I'm writing this because of my growing inability to secure a spot on any team. Most notably, I simply cannot get onto a team of experienced players for Sorrow's Forge farming, for reasons I'll detail below.

I'm not socially inept, nor am I incompetent in any way. My main character is level 20, ascended, with 200 attribute points, all ele skills (minus a few elites), and a large portion of the monk, necro, and mes secondary skills. She's equipped with Rago's Staff, Rago's Wand & The Kindlerock, Galigord's Stone Staff, and Flint's Fleshcleaver...as well as both Drok's Armor and some grotto armor.

Anyone that's played the game for even a relatively short time knows that most of the farming done in Sorrow's Forge is done with 5 man teams, consisting of 1 bonder, 1 healer, 1 tank, 1 minion master, and 1 SS necro.

Essentially, the Minion Master and the SS necro do the damage.

After about 2 hours of trying to get onto a team today, I started asking questions. I said that there was no way that an SS necro could do more damage than a max fire (or Water, Air, or Earth) elementalist. People laughed. And I decided to go about proving them wrong.

What I found out was that it was I, in fact, that was wrong.

If you've farmed FoW with a decent group, then you've probably done the "book trick", which basically consists of the warrior holding the "unholy text" gotten in one of the quests and taking all of the aggro while Ele's nuke the area. From what I've heard, Sorrow's Forge (or is it Furnace?) works essentially the same way--the warrior picks up a master gear, gets pounded on, and, in this case, the SS casts "Spiteful Spirit" and the monsters kill themselves.

If you've done the "book trick" before, then you know that, for the most part, it's a bad idea to use "fire storm" because it causes all of the mobs to spread out, essentially nullifying the usefulness of AoE attacks. As a matter of fact, the only spells that are truly useful (that I've seen) that use the fire attribute are Meteor Shower and Rodgort's Invocation (with an occasional fireball thrown in).

Meteor Shower, at 16 fire, causes 119 damage every 3 seconds, and knocks opponents down. It takes 5 seconds to cast, costs 25 energy, and takes 60 seconds to recharge. It causes exhaustion. I usually use this in combination with a glyph of renewal and arcane echo--streaming up to 4 in a row if necessary.

Spiteful Spirit, at level 18 (with Awaken the Blood) does 42 damage every 2 seconds. Used in conjunction with Arcane Echo, it does 84 damage every 2 seconds (or more, or less, depending on the frequency with which the afflicted is attacking). 84 damage every 2 seconds is equivalent to 126 damage ever 3 seconds. It lasts approximately 22-23 seconds.

The only way that I can come close to 126 damage is by using a glyph of elemental power. The only problem is that it's only good for 1 spell and takes 15 seconds to recharge, whereas Awaken the Blood is good for 39 seconds at level 12!

Spiteful Spirit costs 10 less Energy than MS. It takes 3 seconds less to cast than MS. It recharges 50 seconds faster than MS. It doesn't cause foes to fan out. It lasts 14-15 seconds longer than MS. And it doesn't cause exhaustion!

I could cast 3 of Rodgort's Invocations in this pattern if I chose: Glyph of Renewal, Rodgort's, Arcane Echo, Rodgort's, (Arcane Echo Rodgort's)...with a total casting time of 12 seconds. Rodgort's does 127 at level 16 fire, with 3 seconds of burning. The only problem is that I'm limited to 3 castings before I have to wait for a recharge.

In my (extensive) time spent with henchmen, I've also used an Earth Ele strategy consisting of the following skills: Earth Attunement, Armor of Earth, Obsidian Flesh, Kinetic Armor, Stone Daggers, Earthquake, Aftershock, and Crystal Wave. In this scenario, I'm usually tanking, and I just hope that the mesmers are dead before Obsidian Flesh wears off. I've had <very) limited success, with 7 henchies accompanying me.

I've tried every variation of Ele skills I can think of, with a great deal of Necro/Monk/Mesmer skills mixed in. Experiments with Ele/War and Ele/Ranger are forthcoming...

If anyone can offer a build for an Ele that does more damage than an SS necro, I'd love to hear it. It would have to not cause enemies to fan out, or require them to be adjacent to the caster (myself).

As far as I can tell, SS necros are the real AoE damage dealers in this game, and ele's are pretty much useless for anything except spiking.

On a side note:

I've noticed that most mobs have a global resistance to all elemental spells, as opposed to just one or two types. In other words, no matter what type of element you use, you're going to do the same amount of damage. There are a few notable exceptions to this rule (Abaddon's Mouth springs to mind)...but for the most part, Ele's really don't get to exploit weakness because there are none. This is painfully obvious in SF, FoW, the Tombs, and the UW....all of the prime farming areas in GW. I think the fact that Ele's even get onto FoW teams is more of a misunderstanding than anything else. An SS necro outdamages an Ele by far, and it won't be long until word gets out.

PS
I've heard that a recent patch has changed mob behavior so that they'll fan out with MS. That's just hilarious. I can't say I'm positive it's because of the recent patching, but I have noticed Shadow Monks moving around a lot more during and after castings. All I can say is Way to Go ANet! Way to render my first character completely ineffective.

Somebody let me know if ANet wakes up. In the meantime, I'll be working on my necro, so I can actually participate in the game...

Raxxman · Mar 12, 2006, 09:40 AM // 09:40

I think the imbalance is that foes should fan out from spiteful spirit but they don't. It's the only AoE attack in which this is the case.

Shyft the Pyro · Mar 12, 2006, 09:47 AM // 09:47

1) It is indeed Sorrow's Furnace and not Forge.

2) The only real problem with your experience is that last year's patch that made monsters flee from continuous damage AoE didn't make them flee Spiteful Spirit the way they flee Mark of Pain. That's it.

3) If you think that before that patch you were on equal footing with an SS necro only because you could cast Firestorm and have things stand in it you're sorely mistaken. It's just that until the patch hit, no one paid attention to necros except the necros themselves. You can't see SS working unless you're the caster, so no one else knows how amazingly effective it is. By contrast, everyone immediately recognizes an MS kill, which was why elementalists were so popular.

4) Why are you trying to outdamage an SS necro when you admit you can't? Why try to take over the role of that particular character in 5man Furnace runs when there are so many others available to you? The awesome thing about elementalists in general and E/Mo in particular is that you can fill so many spots in a party. With Earth Magic you can tank as well if not better than a warrior. With Ether Renewal you can bond and protect or crank out high-cost heals like nobody's business. And even if you're stuck in the pyromancer mindset, remember that SS won't work against enemies that can remove hexes as well as regular nuking would.

6) Just as necros have been plucked from obscurity by Sorrow's Furnace and rangers by Tombs, all you need to do is concentrate on the areas of the game where your character remains in demand. Echo nukers are a popular component of Kephket runs out of Augury Rock, and if those get repetitive there's always the Underworld - which sorely lacks a book to make all those SS necros effective beyond the 55 monk tandem runs.

7) If none of the above floats your boat, just remember there's always PvP. If you can't beat the SS users and don't want to join them, go beat them up in the arenas

TideSwayer · Mar 12, 2006, 10:02 AM // 10:02

I would really like ANet to explain why they don't consider the keg/book/gear 'tricks' as exploits and fix them? This is apparently the case, since we just had two major updates and the 'tricks' are still going as strong as ever. Just don't make the mobs flock to the carrier en masse. Does it really matter? The keg/book/gear tricks are just as abusive, if not moreso, than the old AOE stuff. Just like how monsters used to stand there after continuous AOE bursts, it's not natural for the mobs to act the way they do around these 'carriers'. Why would any decent creature just sit there and keep bashing at a carrier and flat-out IGNORE another enemy that is doing damage to them? I'm supposed to believe these monsters have come to the conclusion that the best way to kill a mob of players and reclaim their 'carrier items' is to only go after the one who ISN'T doing damage to them? Makes no freakin' sense. It just doesn't.

PLEASE FIX IT ANET.

Corinthian · Mar 12, 2006, 10:28 AM // 10:28

I'd say that Ele's are more of a PvP class than a PvE class. They do unconditional damage, instead of necromancer's Spiteful Spirit for example, which requires the enemy to do something to receive damage. I agree with the keg abuse, it should be removed. It would possibly increase the price of greens as well.

Rajamic · Mar 12, 2006, 10:38 AM // 10:38

Elementalists just aren't good for sustained damage. A warrior using axe and no skills can outdamage an lementalist. Eles work better for inflicting conditions/hexes. Air Eles with Enervating Charge and Blinding Flash can destroy the offensive capabilities of a group of Warriors and Rangers. Meteor (not Shower) is a great knockdown.

The problem is that such tactics generally aren't needed against the AI. Particularly when it comes to farming runs. The 5-man team has been refined to a science to be efficient with a small number of people, and it's iffy to replace one of them (particularly for groups that just follow the scripts for gear farming they have read without really understanding it).

Avarre · Mar 12, 2006, 10:46 AM // 10:46

Spiteful is devastatingly powerful, even without book/gear trick (why hasn't anyone mentioned proper aggroing? We know not..). However, in my opinion the best thing about SS (and what makes in shine especially in 2-3 man fow and uw runs) is that it is a single skill that gives continuous, high quality damage.

An ele, on the other hand, needs a large set of skills to continually cause harm. Nowadays I prefer support eles rather than pure damage, using water magic (blurred vision around a tank that hold aggro), wards, and such. The pure firepower is best left to spiking in PvP.

The heart of the problem is that a single SS necro has enough firepower to kill anything. Both the 3-man FoW and UW teams use 1 necro to level the entire map (although we use a warrior to apply a bit of the damage for FoW). SS, having only 10s recharge, is capable of just so much that an ele has been reduced from. The difficulty is balancing an ele so that they are neither too weak, or too capable.

I'll leave the question of how, if at all, they should be rebalanced to the eles..

frojack · Mar 12, 2006, 10:57 AM // 10:57

Another thing to consider with the fire line is that good armour is pretty good at nullifiying it's damage output. Spiteful however, ignores armour.

Eles' are still ok though

. Since burning can give good degen. I wish it just lasted longer. 3 seconds is just stupid for something, that I recently found out (thanks guys

) can be removed as easily as any other condition.
The kicker is, nobody bothers because it's a waste of energy, lol.

TideSwayer · Mar 12, 2006, 10:59 AM // 10:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rajamic

...The 5-man team has been refined to a science to be efficient with a small number of people, and it's iffy to replace one of them (particularly for groups that just follow the scripts for gear farming they have read without really understanding it).

There's only ONE person on the team taking damage at any given time. What kind of science was needed to refine that? With less players on the team a monk's job of healing is easier, and the same goes for mass-area damage spells since mobs cluster around the carrier. Do NOT think this is some Einstein-level build at work here. It's a major exploit of the way the AI works in today's GW. Not an advanced tactic, an exploit. Not something only level 20's with 7 straight months of day-and-night GW experience can handle. Anyone. One time I took my healing monk into a 5-man Oro-farm party, and was bored to tears. I didn't have to do a damn thing 97% of the time for the whole run.

Avarre · Mar 12, 2006, 11:05 AM // 11:05

Hey Tide, you do realize the gear is just an aggro magnet? If you had a tank that knew how to draw aggro, you'd have even LESS work, because they can still wear a shield. Is that an exploit too? Considering that 'exploits' the function of the AI to attack in an aggro bubble.

Sekkira · Mar 12, 2006, 11:07 AM // 11:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by TideSwayer

I would really like ANet to explain why they don't consider the keg/book/gear 'tricks' as exploits and fix them? This is apparently the case, since we just had two major updates and the 'tricks' are still going as strong as ever. Just don't make the mobs flock to the carrier en masse. Does it really matter? The keg/book/gear tricks are just as abusive, if not moreso, than the old AOE stuff. Just like how monsters used to stand there after continuous AOE bursts, it's not natural for the mobs to act the way they do around these 'carriers'. Why would any decent creature just sit there and keep bashing at a carrier and flat-out IGNORE another enemy that is doing damage to them? I'm supposed to believe these monsters have come to the conclusion that the best way to kill a mob of players and reclaim their 'carrier items' is to only go after the one who ISN'T doing damage to them? Makes no freakin' sense. It just doesn't.

PLEASE FIX IT ANET.

What gave you the insight to detirmine this behavior is broken?

unienaule · Mar 12, 2006, 11:08 AM // 11:08

The main reason that ele's are used more in PvP:

PvE mobs are level 28 and have really really high AL's (like over 100)
PvP enemies are level 20 and have much lower AL's.
Therefore, since SS damage ignores armor, it's more effective in PvE. If PvE was against level 20s with regular armor, then ele's might be useful.

Kai Nui · Mar 12, 2006, 11:17 AM // 11:17

I'm a mesmer. I eat shit because I wasn't meant to be a primary profession.

TideSwayer · Mar 12, 2006, 11:19 AM // 11:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sekkira

What gave you the insight to detirmine this behavior is broken?

Uh, let's think about it for a second. Let's say an army needs to carry something from one end of an area to another. Do they put it on the front lines or do they put it in back with people in front of it to defend it (if need be) ? So you're saying that people are using the keg/gear/book tricks because it's some devised work of superior intellect? Hell, much of the time these tricks are being used the carrier items in question aren't even being used for their particular quest! (Sometimes nowhere near it.)

People only use the carrier tricks because it makes their job easier. It makes farming an area of Level 20+ monsters, some of which drop items which are among the most valuable in the game, easier. Why shouldn't ANet have a problem with that? Monsters have already been given the ability to shatter player enchantments in RECORD time if you are carrying one (and won't even bother to try if you aren't - which IMO is a little cheap but whatever), and they also gave monsters the knowledge to get away from constant damage sources elsewhere like AOE spells. Why are monsters too dumb to learn about the carrier trick? Why can they not realize they are taking constant damage from Spiteful Spirit cast on them or their neighbor?

To Avarre:

Yeah, I agree, a good tank is just as effective at building & holding aggro as a 'trick' carrier. However, that takes some semblance of actual skill to do (as evidenced by the myriad of Warriors in the game who have no clue whatsoever how to do it). You don't just pick up some random item and walk around. Also, the mobs don't automatically stick to you like flies on fecal matter, do they? No. If a caster gets too close, it isn't uncommon for a creature to shift focus. It actually takes a whole party to concentrate on not getting too close, unlike the keg/gear/book tricks, where you can be sharing the same pair of pants as your carrier if you wanted to, and they still won't go after you over this 'carrier'. They are locked onto the carrier item, until they inevitably die because of it.

ManaCraft · Mar 12, 2006, 11:21 AM // 11:21

You have to wonder what kind of an impact the ritualist's "ash" spells will have on the pve side of things - the ability to conjure up an aggro magnet whenever you want certainly seems to favor the 5-man party mindset.

Perhaps W/Rt is the future for pve warriors?

- Mana

frojack · Mar 12, 2006, 11:34 AM // 11:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by TideSwayer

Uh, let's think about it for a second. Let's say an army needs to carry something from one end of an area to another. Do they put it on the front lines or do they put it in back with people in front of it to defend it (if need be) ? So you're saying that people are using the keg/gear/book tricks because it's some devised work of superior intellect? People only do it because it makes their job easier. It makes farming an area of Level 20+ monsters, some of which drop items which are among the most valuable in the game, easier. Why shouldn't ANet have a problem with that?

To Avarre:

Yeah, I agree, a good tank is just as effective at building & holding aggro as a 'trick' carrier. However, that takes some semblance of actual skill to do (as evidenced by the myriad of Warriors in the game who have no clue whatsoever how to do it). You don't just pick up some random item and walk around. Also, the mobs don't automatically stick to you like flies on fecal matter, do they? No. If a caster gets too close, it isn't uncommon for a creature to shift focus. It actually takes a whole party to concentrate on not getting too close, unlike the keg/gear/book tricks, where you can be sharing the same pair of pants as your carrier if you wanted to, and they still won't go after you over this 'carrier'. They are locked onto the carrier item, until they inevitably die because of it.

I must say, I agree. I can't count the amount of times I have begged/pleaded with 'softies' as a warrior to stay out of radar range if they don't wanna' get hurt.
Some just don't realise that they have as much of a responsibility as the warriors for proper aggro.

[edit]

Another good example of this is when you have 'stompers' in the area. Most casters don't 'have' to fall, since a lot of spells can be cast just outside of radar range, and thus, outside of the stomp.

lg5000 · Mar 12, 2006, 11:36 AM // 11:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kai Nui

I'm a mesmer. I eat shit because I wasn't meant to be a primary profession.

Oh come off it.. we all know how weak/powerful mesmers can be, there's been enough discussion about it.. let the eles feel sorry for themselves again, then the rangers can be next again...

As for necros using SS.. they used to be in the position most mesmers are in.. no-one knew exactly what they did.. and so.. the curses line sucked according to the greater community who seemed to want necros (and still do) for battery purposes.

allience · Mar 12, 2006, 11:37 AM // 11:37

why don't u make a necro or a monk and stop complaining?
i don't get u ppl that only have 1 char, maybe it's time u try something new.

zakaria · Mar 12, 2006, 12:11 PM // 12:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corinthian

It would possibly increase the price of greens as well.

this why Anet doesn't want to remove gear trick from game..removing this exploit damaging the prices of green items..means less greens >more empty hands from the farming run> green items prices jump high> rich people become more rich>poor ones still poor
the idea of inventing green items with perfect mods and upgardes was to lowering the prices of rare items (i heared they were selling crap golds for high prices before the greens came) also because many was complaing about they can't get good weapons with at least average mods and upgardes
so i don't think they will remove it

Kidney Licker · Mar 12, 2006, 12:38 PM // 12:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by zakaria

this why Anet doesn't want to remove gear trick from game..removing this exploit damaging the prices of green items..means less greens >more empty hands from the farming run> green items prices jump high> rich people become more rich>poor ones still poor
the idea of inventing green items with perfect mods and upgardes was to lowering the prices of rare items (i heared they were selling crap golds for high prices before the greens came) also because many was complaing about they can't get good weapons with at least average mods and upgardes
so i don't think they will remove it

They could easily keep the price of greens down by increasing the drop rate in SF. My last 5-6 runs yielded nothing. At least with an increased drop rate ppl may not be as insistent on such small groups, and rangers and mesmers could get a look in.

With useless eles I think you just need better elites, what's up with all of the hexes? I recently capped all the ele elites for my necro, and I have to say that they look pretty bad. Looking at the build submissions in the Campfire -> Elementalist thread and the general lack of variety of elite ele skills in the builds it seems to be true. Hopefully Factions will have something nice for this class.