Curse

Francis Crawford · Mar 13, 2006, 08:31 AM // 08:31

The only character I've played past Lion's Arch is an elementalist. I suspect that the conventional wisdom is right, and he's a little less powerful than other classes -- but so what? Besides, it's tough to use more than one SS per party without having a target calling issue. And while the SS can probably do more damage than me and certainly do a lot more interrupting, I can spam Heal Party if need be at 59 points a heal, although the monks remember to thank me for that even less often than people usually remember to thank monks. Besides, with my double glyph build I rarely need to regen as long as the monks do, and with Heal Party maybe I cut a bit of their regen time, so I'm saving the party some of their time in the boring parts of the game (regen), whether or not I'm helping them kill quite as quickly.

Now, I do wish I could find another elementalist to team up with and chain some Gales; neutralizing monks would make some things to a LOT faster ...

Phoenix Ex · Mar 13, 2006, 08:35 AM // 08:35

Which is exactly what I mean, they are used to power spam other profession's skills like Heal Party and stuff more than they are used for their own skill. This is getting like the E/MO smiting issue in PVP from a while ago.

P.S. Mesmer can neutralize monks all by himself

Francis Crawford · Mar 13, 2006, 08:56 AM // 08:56

I've just been doing some numbers in my head.

In about 75 seconds I can cast 4 Rodgort's Invocations and 4 Incendiary Bonds at a total cost of 60 energy. Throw in a Meteor Shower and effectively I'm doing about 1200 points of damage (before armor) plus 24 seconds of burning (336 points of degen) for 85 points of energy. And three group knockdowns, if they stick around.

An Echo SS can spend 75 points of energy per minute (if IIRC that it is a 15 point spell) to cast 4 SS. Each SS might do well over 300 points of armor-ignoring damage, with a narrower area than some of my spells, and some danger of doing less if the target dies or just runs around, there's some dehexing, etc.

The comparison gets even more funky from there because the other useful things the Necro does with her remaining energy aren't AoE damage, while what I'm doing is casting Fireballs.

Yeah, the SS is probably dishing out more damage to high level mobs that are clustered around a gear or book, but the difference isn't so extreme that everybody should run out and delete their elementalists.

awelcomecomatose · Mar 13, 2006, 09:25 AM // 09:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Raxxman

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.

Thats why it is an elite. Having an elite skill with the same stats but the AOE effect would be about as useful as a candycane wand and a huge waste of an elite skill. It isn't by some huge oversight that SS doesnt induce the AOE effect.

So heres the lesson. Your ele IS just about worthless for a 5 man farm team. There is still plenty of things to do with your ele other than nuke and the value of a good ele has in no way diminished in PvP and other Areas of PvE. Maybe you could try a earth ele build or GASP a water build. You have 3 other slots and with the likely hood that you have 2k or a guild member who can run you can get A MM or SS necro up and running in a day. Necros prove to be excellent at 5 man farming but that doesnt mean they are overr powered.

If you want to 5 man bite the bullet and make one of the 5 man classes. Just becuase the ele doesnt fit in with the 5 man farm team just as the mesmer and ranger dont doesnt make the elementalist a usesless class. Your lack of imagination does.

Lord Cooper · Mar 13, 2006, 09:55 AM // 09:55

im an ele and it all depends how you play. anyone can throw fireballs all day but there is more to being an ele that just fire. you have to adjust the build to fit the situation. you have to be flexible like you do with any character.
sometimes echo nuke fits the team. other times you may have to go for air spike. or geo tank or water. or any combination. e/mo makes a very effective healer because of the huge energy pool for example. diversify, learn the class and the skills, use your secondary and an ele is still an extremely powerful and useful class.

if they ever get the 1v1 arena sorted out ill challenge anyone here

Leddy · Mar 13, 2006, 09:58 AM // 09:58

My ele runs fire nuke most of the time:

Ele Attunement
Fire Attunement
Fireball
Phoenix
Mark of Rodgort
Rodgort's Invocation
Healing Breeze (Swap/Meteor Shower if decent monk is available)
Light of Dwayna (Swap/Res Signet when required)

I use almost no energy at all when I nuke, and really the only thing stopping this from holding down a continous barrage is (eventually) skill recharge.

Other times I run Earth/Ether Renewal tank (though this sort of sucks now that Ether's been nerfed several times), and air spike sort of wore off on me.

Mordakai · Mar 13, 2006, 02:29 PM // 14:29

As has been said before, the good news about the AI buff to run from mobs is hopefully Anet will notice how inferior the ele is to other classes right now.

Want to counter stuff and do spike damage? Mesmer or Ranger > Air
Tank AND do consistent damage? Warrior > Earth
Sustained damage? Warrior > Fire
Want to slow down people and cause damage? Ranger > Water

For more on the subject, check out the Why Nuking Sucks thread.
(although that's primarily PvP.)

byteme! · Mar 13, 2006, 02:38 PM // 14:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by [Uchiha]

You cast it on another person adjacent to the one you already casted it on, since you can't cast two of the same hex on the same foe. I'm pretty sure he meant to add his damage together, 4x+4x = 8x.

SS' potential max dmg is 43. That means 12 curses + 3 (superior rune) + 1 (head gear) + 2 (Awaken the Blood) + 1 (+1 Curse Magic 20% chance offhand). So you're 33 dmg isn't near max dmg anyways FYI.

FalconDance · Mar 13, 2006, 03:13 PM // 15:13

NO class is useless unless the person behind the character hasn't gotten a good grip on the skill set yet. Plain and simple.

Warriors are good at what they do, direct damage. There is not very much subtlety to a warrior

. Mesmers are very subtle....so much so that a foe will not immediately realize they are being Backfired or drained/blocked. Necros fall in the middle unless they have minions (and those are not in the least subtle). Rangers are obvious but deadly with their piercing attacks. An elementalist can be blatant with a meteor shower or subtle with a warding or attunement skill.

Now all that is in a small, generalized nutshell, of course. And I know I left out monks. But the key is that unless you have a specialized "build" for a specific task (55, SS, etc.) then the game really does require a team of some sort which means a mixture of styles and skills. The casters are support for warriors, and warriors are support for casters. Why there are so many mavericks who think they can do it all every time boggles me.

No one profession is better than or worse than any other on a whole. At certain tasks that maybe the case, but as a whole, it is a truism. I would not want to put my mesmer on the front line to take direct damage as a warrior would, but keep her a little further back and she can deal 60 dmg every 3 seconds or less indefinitely with a single skill. How does that match a warrior's damage? Well, pair it with a decent Backfire, Egy Drain, and Inspired/Drain Enchant or Hex and the foe goes down faster than most tanks I've ever seen drop a foe. My necro can drain your life at +8 hp degen........surely does soften that baddie up for the tank. My ranger can interrupt the spells/hexes/enchantments that are making that tank's life miserable. My monk can remove the hex/condition that hurts the ally. And a warrior protects all those people because that is what he/she are best at.

Elementalists have their place alongside everyone else. But if you think they should only be massive damage dealing machines, then perhaps you'd be better served by a warrior after all.

Moa Bird Cultist · Mar 13, 2006, 03:13 PM // 15:13

I dont care. I'll keep playing as an elementalist/warrior as long as GW is in existance. I've had 10x my fair share of criticism, just for that combo, but as has been said before, to each, their own. So I'll keep playing E/W and theres not a thing anyone's SS necro can do about it. I know the numbers add up to Eles=worst class, but the sad thing is that no-one looks beyond the hard calculated stats into how classes are played by different people. There is life after fire magic for the elementalist. Sadly, no-one sees the use of a water snare in party positioning and aggro management. Water trident is one that has been criticised here already, but I'd say WT is one of the better elites out there. Another thing worth mentioning, is energy. Eles can pottentially have lots of energy. Infact, a common mistake made by the new elementalist is to put as much into energy storage as possible. As a spellcasting class, eles have 4 pips of regen. This imo is far more important than their 'Starting energy,' as it means, if I'm not mistaken that they will recharge approximately 80 energy per minute, so just like every other caster out there, they can expend 80 energy a minute while remaining efficient. This also applies to monks, necros, assassins, ritualists and mesmers. Rangers have a pool of 60 energy per minute, whilst warriors have a pool of 40. Now, what ele have you ever seen that can remain within that efficiency level? Including myself, none. Eles do have energy management dilficulties, but the problem is not solved by pumping energy up to a ridiculous starting level. That just takes away from potential attributes which are better invested elsewhere. The point is that starting energy need only be high enough for you to have enough to cast your first wave of spells. In the case of my E/W, in an absolutely ideal situation, I'd only need 30 energy for my opening spells.

To be honest, I'm not really sure where I'm going with that, but there are a few facts in that long ramble of mine just now. All casters gain 80 energy per minute. Echo MS is therefore one of the most incredibly inefficient combos out there, based on energy cost alone, not to mention the exhaustion. But who cares, it's a game after all and i dont wanna argue the point any more.

One last thing though...

I'd like to see some different eles in PvE not just the same old echo nukers and wardens - there are a few geos about too if you look in the right places, people. No, I'd like to see more meleemancers, (E/W geo stancers, E/Mo fire/prot melee,) more water snare eles, (Deep freeze=one of the best energy 25 skills, period,) more dual magic eles, (Fire AND Water, Elemental attunement, Deep Freeze then Meteor Shower, anyone?) or even some old school air spikers.

You can all call me a noob now, I really dont mind. I wont criticise you and your entitled to your opinions

But I'm gonna keep playing my E/W no matter what anyone else thinks.

I've thoroughly confused myself, so I'll go take my medicine now...

[Uchiha] · Mar 13, 2006, 03:15 PM // 15:15

I don't remember saying 33 was the max damage for Spitful, but what ever...

The builds with the attunements, if there is any way to remove the attunements before the recharge, your going to be screwed for energy. Elemental Attunement duration is 45 and has a recharge of 60 seconds. It's also your main energy management skills with getting 50% of your energy back. With a downtime of already 15 seconds which is already bad enough, if this gets, Stripped, Rended, Shattered, Drained, or Interrupted then your basically going to rendered useless for quite a while. With rather you wasting all your energy while Elemental Attunment is up, or waiting for it to recharge.

Francis, yes you can do 1200 damage in 75 seconds, that's just awesome, too bad a Spitful Spirt Necromancer can do around 410 within roughly 10 seconds.

Even if a Fire Elementalist could deal more damage then a Spitiful Spirit Necro, people still wouldn't bother with Elementalists, it would take extremely long to deal all that damage, 5 second cast times, mobs running away from AoE based Fire spells, and if you accidently don't notice your Attunements down, the recharge of energy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FalconDance

Elementalists have their place alongside everyone else. But if you think they should only be massive damage dealing machines, then perhaps you'd be better served by a warrior after all.

This is coming from someone who clearly has no problem finding a group, you have a Mo/N and a N/Mo, You can play 4 different roles that can farm Sorrow's or 2 roles that can dual farm Underworld.

Even if you do find that golden build for the Elementalist, what says anyone will invite them into your group.

SpeedyKQ · Mar 13, 2006, 03:16 PM // 15:16

The new conventional wisdom is that fire elementalists aren't any good anymore, and it is just not true. When I play mine I can still do massive damage, and I certainly don't feel "useless" to my team. I've played around with earth and air a little bit, in an effort to be less cookie-cutter, but I didn't personally feel as useful with them, and didn't enjoy them as much.

Maybe the gear trick lets SS necros be 25% more useful than an echo nuker in a couple of places. This isn't an ideal game balance considering how much else necros can do, but it isn't the end of the world. Fire ele's are getting way more hate than they deserve in this thread.

FalconDance · Mar 13, 2006, 03:36 PM // 15:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by [Uchiha]

This is coming from someone who clearly has no problem finding a group, you have a Mo/N and a N/Mo, You can play 4 different roles that can farm Sorrow's or 2 roles that can dual farm Underworld.

Even if you do find that golden build for the Elementalist, what says anyone will invite them into your group.

You're right, my monk never has trouble finding a group, most recently because of the rash of monks demanding payment for their services. Plus she's fun, good at her job and heals pets as a bonus

.

My necro, however, does have trouble and always has had trouble getting into a group when they discover she is not a minion mistress or SS. She has more often than not been co-healer by proxy and currently I'm playing with Curses after having finished the game with Blood.

My ranger has always had trouble because she is not a trapper.

My mesmer has trouble because she is not a "pure" shut-down build.

AFTER they are accepted into a group, it becomes apparent that they know their jobs and can contribute to the team. I've been fortunate (and proud) to have not had complaints....indeed I've received many compliments and thanks.

But then I don't play GW to farm Sorrow's or dual-person farm anywhere. My girls can and have gone out with only one or two others in areas, make no mistake. But to say that is the reason or end product of my gaming experience is wrong and somehow vaguely demeaning to all the great groups I've quested with in seven months.

Ira Blinks · Mar 13, 2006, 03:37 PM // 15:37

actually gear/book trick benefits eles much more then it does SS necros. It is ele who require mobs to stand still while dropping nukes on them, not SS. So please stop using this retarded argument.

Kakumei · Mar 13, 2006, 03:41 PM // 15:41

Elementalists aren't useless. They can spam Heal Party like nobody's business.

Wayne0205 · Mar 13, 2006, 03:50 PM // 15:50

Quote:

Basically it comes down to necros being totally overpowering on the PvE side of the game.

I've been playing GW since it was released in '05, and at that time I NEVER thought I would hear this from anyone playing the game...much less having it be true.

But I guess a lot has happened since I last played...(June 05

). I was SS'n before you all even knew was ascension was (kidding xP). Hehe, it's kinda nice to see SS getting the glory it deserves. When I first capped and used it, I thought it rocked and made a curse necro to utilize it. At that time everyone wanted blood necros, and thought they were the ONLY useful necro build, so I was left out a lot...oh how the tides have turned (and my MM build too

).

In any case, it's interesting to see how the game has turned around since it came out. Last complaints I heard were lightning spike ele's in PvP, spirit spammers, and PvP MM's...

Anyways, for such a diverse game with so many character combinations and skills, it's sad to see it boil down to just a handful of these being effecient at the end-game.

Poor ele's. Being pigeon-holed is hardly fun

trankle · Mar 13, 2006, 03:51 PM // 15:51

My two cents...

The core problem here seems to be that the Ele is no longer the core damage dealer in a few specific situations - popular farming spots. I really don't buy it when people say that Eles are useless throughout the game.

1. SS isn't available to the straight-through player until after all of the desert missions, so it's hard to argue that necros are fulfilling the AoE damage role with it until that point. In every PUG I've joined, that's still the role of the Ele. Or Eles. How many PUGs have you been in that have said "Grab another nuker"? I've been in plenty, certainly more than I've been in that have asked for another curses necro.

And that holds true in the later game as well. That's because people take groups of eight, not five, whenever they do quests and missions, and they want to fill the party with damage dealers. An SS is a great part of any party, but having two in a PUG coordinating so they don't target the same mob and waste their spell? I haven't seen it work that often. Put two Eles in, however...their nukes stack nicely, thank you very much. Honestly, I've never been in a PUG where somone refused to take at least one Ele; Eles are still in the "core three" classes for the entire PvE game.

2. Which is different from the PvE job. Farming. Now I know that some people farm for the fun of experimenting with new builds, and to see how far they can solo with their character, but that's not what I'm talking about. SF farming is a job, meant to efficiently collect rewards with the fewest amount of people, to maximize profits. Those profits can be spent on the characters involved, or other characters in the players' accounts. If players have found a way to maximize the group of characters into an easily playable build that doesn't require alot of startup communication and planning, doesn't it make sense that people stick with it?

If I want to raise money using my Ranger, I'm not going to spam SF groups. I'm porting over to ToPK with my barrage build. I can transmit a series of acronyms, and within minutes, I'm in a group that has been pre-optimized for killing and collecting rewards. Aside from making sure we have all of our spirits, and that the Necros won't be doing the same job, we don't need to spend ten minutes discussing strategy. Everyone knows what they're doing; they all have a job. We'll have some fun while we're in there, but that's not why we're going down.

Not every character type is represented in the different cookie-cutter farming builds, I know. But, every player has multiple character slots. Even if you only use three slots for PvE characters, as long as you don't duplicate professions, you will have at least one character that's desired for a particular farming location. Have that character go to work when you need money, and enjoy playing your favorites when you want to play.

That may be cynical, but remember, farming isn't part of the actual game storyline, and it isn't something that anyone needs to do to be successful at the game. It's an ancillary option, and it comes with it's own caveats.

trankle · Mar 13, 2006, 03:59 PM // 15:59

And think about this. How many Eles that are trying to get into five-man groups would prefer to add three more members to the group? With eight members, you could kill those mobs alot more quickly, couldn't you? You could even have mesmers and rangers participating. Trouble is, there's now less reward for everyone involved. So noone wants to do that. It's not the most efficient way to collect rewards.

If you wouldn't select that option, why complain to five-man teams that have found their efficient balance?

[Uchiha] · Mar 13, 2006, 03:59 PM // 15:59

The thing is Bob's original post was about not being able to get into a Sorrow's furnace group since he was not a Warrior, Necromancer or Monk. It's simply since Necromancers are better in this situation. Meanwhile, people in this thread are talking about builds for other locations or other uses.

Yes it's true that the a Fire Elementalist would be a lot more efficient with the Gear trick, since enemies wouldn't be running around, but still overall, a Spiteful Spirit Necromancer would end up dealing more damage, due to faster recharge times, and faster damage dealing.

Bob was simply stating how Necromancers taken over a field that was once prodominantly held by a Fire Elementalists.

If the OP sees farming and getting rich as the whole point of the game, then yes, Elementalists are useless in his view, maybe his wording was a little bit poor, and he should have stated that Elementalists can no longer farm.

trankle · Mar 13, 2006, 04:16 PM // 16:16

True. I was trying to demonstrate that Eles are the primary AoE damage dealers for the bulk of the game, and part of an AoE team after that. Farming was mentioned, so I think it was relevant to discuss that as well.

So many people say that eles are useless because of SS, but what I've seen is that Eles and SS necros work hand in hand nicely in many teams, farming being the exception. That's all.