Curse

Vrake Brae · Dec 24, 2006, 04:54 PM // 16:54

what is wrong wit this build:

Flare, Fire Storm, Phoenix, Meteor Shower, Immolate, Lava Font, Mind Burn, Resurrect

I have been useing those skills for months, but every time I go into someones team, and I show my skills, they always tell me to change some of them. I can see nothing wrong with them, but if anyone can give me some explenations, I would be very gratefull.

dudeimoncoke · Dec 24, 2006, 05:03 PM // 17:03

many things: 1) fire storm 2) flare 3) lava font 4) no energy management 5) its a builf not a build

Francis Crawford · Dec 24, 2006, 05:12 PM // 17:12

Hi! You came to the right place!

1. Most of those skills do way below the theoretical amount of damage. Enemies run away before the Fire Storm or Meteor Shower is over.

2. That running away -- called scatter -- can make your teammates less effective.

3. Flare is actually underrated, but let's not chalk that up entirely to prejudice; in a good build, there are better things to do.

4. You absolutely should use some of the skills that give you energy. Every fire build should have at least two and probably at least three of:

A. Glowing Gaze (Nightfall)
B. Glyph of Lesser Energy
C. Fire Attunement
D. An elite that gives energy, such as Elemental Attunement

5. Searing Flames is far superior to other fire damage elites, such as Mind Burn. I capped it almost as soon as I got to Command Post in Nightfall. If you don't have Nightfall, however, that's not an option for you.

------------------------

Before we try to suggest alternative builds -- which chapter(s) of the game do you have access to, and how far have you gotten?

Also, you can look around this forum for lots of alternative builds.

Vrake Brae · Dec 24, 2006, 05:12 PM // 17:12

thanks for the suggestions, i don't have nightfall yet, (most likely will have tommorow), i have gooten up to the christle desert in prophecies (but have droknar's and some of the surrounding area), and am "befriending the kurzick", and have gotten up to the gyala hatchery for the luxon.

Dutch Masterr · Dec 24, 2006, 05:21 PM // 17:21

theres a few things wrong. first...always use an attunement (fire, earth, water, air). attunements save you alot of energy. fire storm is a useless skill because it does mediocre damage and it scatters groups. meteor shower is ok for pve, but no really pvp. phoenix and lava front are just pointless skills to be using. flare also does next to no damage.

i use this for pve--fire attunement, aura of restoration, mystic regeneration, searing flames, glowing glaze, liquid flame, meteor shower, optional (i use meteor, fireball or incendicary bonds)

Vrake Brae · Dec 24, 2006, 05:34 PM // 17:34

I know that flare does little damage (55 per hit with my character), but I use it to fill in the time when skills are recharging

Skuld · Dec 24, 2006, 05:39 PM // 17:39

Don't, you'd be better with Conjure Flame and a wand. When your other skills recharge, you won't have the energy to cast them if you've been flare-spamming!

jacen110091 · Dec 24, 2006, 05:59 PM // 17:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

You absolutely should use some of the skills that give you energy

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dutch Masterr

always use an attunement (fire, earth, water, air). attunements save you alot of energy.

You'll hear that a lot mate!
You *need* to have some form of energy management when playing Pyro!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skuld

you'd be better with Conjure Flame and a wand

Indeed, but because I personally like having as few enchants on me as possible when going Pyro, I'd recommend the rather unappreciated MoR...
You're likely to have run out of skills near the end of a small PVE battle, so just cast MoR on any priority target and let them burn for the next 30+ secs . .

Oh and finally, Lava Font is a *great* skill if you are ever under melee pressure! Semi-decent damage and a very small cast/recast/cost . .
It has no use other than that however!

Vrake Brae · Dec 24, 2006, 06:04 PM // 18:04

that is the reason that i use lava font, but nobody ever seems to like that reason

jacen110091 · Dec 24, 2006, 06:17 PM // 18:17

Aye, I know the feeling . .
But you should use Lava Font only for areas where you know there's going to be a lot of melee . . a lot of enemies actually . .
Up to the Crystal Desert, I don't think you really need it . .

Also, and I may not get the best reception for saying this, but a Nuker really has no need to bring a rez.

I ALWAYS tell my party that I'm not carrying a rez, and I've never faced much hostility because of it... Even staying in the backlines, an Ele with its piddly armor really has no need to worry about other dead team-mates!

Vrake Brae · Dec 24, 2006, 07:31 PM // 19:31

Thanks for all your advice

Francis Crawford · Dec 25, 2006, 09:20 AM // 09:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vrake Brae

that is the reason that i use lava font, but nobody ever seems to like that reason

What's good for you personally might not be so great for your teammates.

I'd love to have a skill that has the effect "Target and all nearby foes will stop attacking you and go attack your teammates instead." But other players might not be as thrilled if I ran it.

Enko · Dec 25, 2006, 09:43 AM // 09:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vrake Brae

what is wrong wit this build:

Flare, Fire Storm, Phoenix, Meteor Shower, Immolate, Lava Font, Mind Burn, Resurrect

I have been useing those skills for months, but every time I go into someones team, and I show my skills, they always tell me to change some of them. I can see nothing wrong with them, but if anyone can give me some explenations, I would be very gratefull.

Flare: Fireball is probably a better skill to use. 10 energy, aoe attack, roughly twice the damage, and it won't drain all of your energy from spammage.

Fire storm: Causes almost immediate scatter of enemies which breaks agro off of a tank (Well one who knows how to hold agro anyways). Scatter isn't good for a team as it pretty much sends the mob to the squishie backline

Phoenix: It has its uses but only if you plan on some melee range nuking (so you get both the adjacent hit on them plus the fireball hit). If you're running some sort of ele tank build, its useful (but those tend to be earth)

Meteor Shower: Great skill to use in PVE since it doesn't cause scatter since it hits every 3 seconds. You'll need to know when to use it though since its pointless to cast it on a moving target as by the time it would hit, they would have already moved away from it. Try it on a mob that is focusing on a tank for instance.

Immolate: It also has its uses but I've found Rodgort's Invocation or Mark of Rodgort + Fireball to be more effective.

Lava Font: Causes scatter on enemies it hits which is probably why other people don't like you having it. Plus if a bunch of melee guys are hitting you to warrant the use of Lava Font, you probably should be kiting to try to avoid the agro and get them back on the tank.

Mind Burn: From the description, Mind Burn looks to be a useful skill but there's better ways to light things on fire such as Searing Flames, Mark of Rodgort, Rodgort's Invocation, etc. Also a spell that is spammable and also causes exhaustion can quickly lead you to have no energy.

Resurrect: Most teams should have monks that are good enough to keep you alive or rez you up if someone dies. Resurrect has a slow cast time, revives a teammate with 25% health, and 0 energy so you won't have much use for it in battle. If you still want to bring a rez with you, Resurrection Signet is probably better (if you need to bring a rez along at all). Rebirth might be a better option since if the team is facing a wipe, you can run away and revive the team while pulling them out of agro.

Your build is also lacking any sort of energy management. Since you said you spam Flare while other skills are recharging, that means you're probably out of energy for quite a while and then have to wait to recharge. Use at least Fire Attunement. If you toss in Elemental Attunement as well (they stack), you'll have very few energy problems ever. Other skills such as Glowing Gaze which returns energy if it hits a burning foe are also useful.

Your build feels like you picked individual skills that by themselves look good but don't work as well together. With a skill bar of 8 skills, a good synergy between the skills can be achieved.
Here's a build that I used throughout Prophecies, Factions, and some of Nightfall (until I capped Searing Flames and went to an Echo SF build).

Meteor Shower, Rodgort's Invocation, Fireball, Mark of Rodgort, Aura of Restoration, Fire Attunement, Elemental Attunement, Rez skill of your choice.

Casting Meteor Shower immediately followed by Rodgort's Invocation causes the first meteor to hit at the same time as Rodgort's Invocation so there's a 250 damage hit right there plus burning. Then followed by Mark of Rodgort and then Fireball and Invocation until target is dead.

Looking at the cast times and attack times of the spells to see when they'll hit can give you opportunities for mini spikes such as these. With the dual attunements, you'll never have to worry about energy since the little recharge times between the skills will allow enough time to regeneration the less than 20% energy used per skill.

Francis Crawford · Dec 25, 2006, 11:47 PM // 23:47

The post above reminds me of something I forgot to say -- Fireball is individually superior to almost every spell in the build you posted. Good energy efficiency for the damage, decent recharge time.

Vexed · Dec 26, 2006, 01:30 AM // 01:30

@ Enko,

Good notes in general, but I just have to ask, why on earth would you echo SF - a skill that already recharges in just 2 seconds? Or did I misunderstand what you meant?

@ Vrake,

One thing you are always going to run into in groups is build discrimination. 90% of people look for builds they know - i.e. SS necro, SF ele, Barrage Ranger, etc - and if you aren't running that, they're gonna give you flak simply out of ignorance. There are some good hints here in this thread. I would advise you to take a well-known build and tweak it to your liking.

IMO, if you're going to use the fire line, you need to make the most of its strengths - Burning and AoE damage - while minimizing its drawbacks - low single-target damage and scattering. Aim for clusters of mobs, not single targets, but use skills that deliver a bang in one go like Fireball over skills that pulse damage like Fire Storm.

Until you get Nightfall, you might consider a different elite like Elemental Attunement or Ether Prodigy as has been suggested here. Tighten up your energy management, get rid of your scatter spells (Fire Storm and Lava Font can both go - keep ONE if you need to cause a defensive scatter, i.e. mobs clustering on you or the monk). You'll have a lot more success that way.

Enko · Dec 26, 2006, 09:34 AM // 09:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vexed

@ Enko,

Good notes in general, but I just have to ask, why on earth would you echo SF - a skill that already recharges in just 2 seconds? Or did I misunderstand what you meant?

try echoing SF and see what happens. It increases DPS quite a bit. I've tried a SF build without it and its a lot slower to take out targets. In 4 seconds, you've 357 damage to a target and its mob plus whatever burning damage is dealt. Arcane Echo also doesn't take any extra attribute points so you don't even need to worry about that. Here's the build I use:
Arcane Echo, Searing Flames, Glyph of Lesser Energy, Glowing Gaze, Mark of Rodgort, Fire Attunement, Aura of Restoration, [optional]

Fire Attunement and AoR beforehand, Cast GoLE, Arcane Echo, enter agro range, Cast SF, then MoR, then just start hitting both SFs on your skill bar with an occasional GG. If you do run out of energy, cast a GoLE (shouldn't take long to get 5 energy), and either use GG or just keep on SFing. Even though the next two spells don't cost anything, Fire Attunement still kicks in to return energy so SF will return 6 energy and GG will return the full 12. Quite easy to fill up. If you enter battle for some reason while short on energy, echo GG and you'll fill up almost right away.

alarico511 · Dec 26, 2006, 02:46 PM // 14:46

Quote:

@ Enko,

Good notes in general, but I just have to ask, why on earth would you echo SF - a skill that already recharges in just 2 seconds? Or did I misunderstand what you meant?

U answer ur own question.

Speedy Lunar · Jan 02, 2007, 07:33 PM // 19:33

As every1 before me said: make your energy management work. You've probably got NF by now, I suggest going to Marga Coast, with the quest of Magi Malaquire on if you didn't complete it yet, take signet of capture. Marga coast isn't that far in the game(you can reach it after doing just 4 missions) and Elemental Attunement is really easy to capture there...For the exact location of the boss you can check guildwiki :P
It's best to buy Fire Attunement and keep them both ALWAYS active. I found out that without them I'd be out of energy in no time.
If you don't want to be "the noob ele" in a party, I strongly suggest you ditch flare, lava font and fire storm, perhaps immolate and meteor shower too (Meteor shower because of the things mentioned by Enko). I know ditching flare would seem weird to you, I also used it for spamming purposes until two weeks ago. It's really better to use conjure flame and a max dmg fire wand/staff, also for your (yes, again

) energy management, and in combination with Mark of Rodgort it causes burning.
"Burning" should ring a bell when used next to energy management problems. Yes, I'm talking about the popular Glowing Gaze. You can buy it in Kamadan and in every other city in Nightfall that has a skill trader. It'd make your "builf" (sorry, can't help it

)have no more energy problems at all.

Francis Crawford · Jan 02, 2007, 10:27 PM // 22:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Enko

Fire Attunement still kicks in to return energy so SF will return 6 energy

5, actually.

Have you counted how many SF damage hits you do in the first 20 seconds or so of shooting:

A. In an Arcane Echo build?
B. In a Serpent's Quickness build?
C. In a plain-vanilla SF build?

I'm guessing that B will be very competitive with A.

That said, the energy cost of Arcane Echo is indeed largely offset by the need to take attribute points out of Energy Storage and stick them in Wilderness Survival. And the Arcane Echo build also gives you the option of speccing into an attribute such as Earth.

Enko · Jan 02, 2007, 11:07 PM // 23:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

5, actually.

Have you counted how many SF damage hits you do in the first 20 seconds or so of shooting:

A. In an Arcane Echo build?
B. In a Serpent's Quickness build?
C. In a plain-vanilla SF build?

I'm guessing that B will be very competitive with A.

That said, the energy cost of Arcane Echo is indeed largely offset by the need to take attribute points out of Energy Storage and stick them in Wilderness Survival. And the Arcane Echo build also gives you the option of speccing into an attribute such as Earth.

It returns 6 energy not 5. 15 x 0.3 = 4.5 + 1 =5.5 (game rounds up to 6)

Serpent's Quickness works also, just need to watch your energy more since you have to add points to WS instead of just going straight 16 fire and 13 energy.