Curse

beanerman_99 · Jun 08, 2006, 06:08 PM // 18:08

After playing in the Random Arenas and Fort Aspenwood I am beginning to think that ele's burning hexes have a big disadvantage to other classes skills hexes and degens. Actually I think all the ele's hexes/degens are lacking compared to others.

What I mean is that the duration of the ele's burning, freezing, blinding is tremendously shorter that of all the other clasess. Take the Rangers Poison skill. It last a heck of a lot longer and and they even get mods to put on their weapons to make it last even longer. The Necros Disease skills and life drain skills last longer. The mesmers Conjur Phantasm last longer. The warriors Bleeding skills last longer. And Cripple definitely last longer.....god how i hate cripple....

If I fail to bring any condition cures or something with me into battle, my ele is basically screwed if she gets hit by poison,bleed,cripple,phant,disease,etc because their durations are obesenely long and I think its unfair.

I cast a freeze/slow spell and it does the same effect as Cripple but doesn't last near as long as Cripple does. I get an enemy to burn and they are like "big deal, it will wear off in like 5 seconds". I blind a warrior and in a few seconds he is wailing on me again. The fire skills that catch people on fire only make them burn for 7 seconds tops! Yet I can be Crippled, Poisoned, etc for over 13 seconds and longer. Wtf?

The only thing that I can do to make them burn longer is by bringing Mark of Rodgort with me, but that take up a spot on my skill bar that I would use for something else. Rangers don't need two spots to make be poisoned longer. Warriors don't need two spots to make be bleed or be crippled longer.

I just think that an increase in burn/freeze/blind durations in the ele's lineup would be fair. What are you thoughts?

Pick Me · Jun 08, 2006, 06:44 PM // 18:44

Sorry, I can't agree with you on that. Blinding Flash is very spamable, some of the other spells are not. Mesmers can only do slow, blindness (recharge of 15 seconds) and deep wounds (after the hex ends). Necromancers must suffer sometimes in order to get the conditions out there. Rangers take a very long time to get their Throw dirt to recharge (nowhere close the the recharge time of Blinding Flash). Lol, people in PvP complain that Blinding Flash should be nerfed due to its spamability and effectiveness against warriors and rangers.

Conjuring increases your weapon damage if you have a weapon that does that type of elemental damage. How many professions can do the following:
Weakness+blindness+knockdown? Only the Warrior (using hammer skills, I think).

How many professions have the ability to be completely involunerable to either magic or physical attacks? Only the elementalist. The use of Mist Form = immune to physical attacks, Obsidean Flesh = immune to enemy magic.

Elementalists have spells that cut through armor (Lightning or some earth spells), and all of your magic ignores blocking and evading. So, where is the fairness in that?

Elementalists can run with increased armor, warriors and rangers can't (although Rangers can evade while running).

Warriors and Rangers only have weapons that can make conditions that they inflict last longer, not spells/skills. If you blind a warrior or ranger, they can't hit you (90% chance to miss), so you then cast spells on them. Someone blinds you, and you don't care. You can move faster than Warriors or Rangers can, and you can slow them down easily too. Mesmers have only 1 speed skill and it endup crippling them, where is the fairness in that?

Fire does more damage in a short amount of time than poison or bleeding does. You can inflict more damage and more often in conditions than a warrior or ranger or necro can.

Think about this, Bleeding (I think 3 pips), Poison (I think 4 pips), Disease (I think 4 pips). Burning (I think 7 pips). Yes, it doesn't last even half the duration, but when you can burn them every 4 seconds (think thats how long it lasts) you can burn a lot of health faster than anyone can do to you with just one condition. How long does Mark of Rod last? Cast that then flare every few seconds and cast blinding flash every 4 seconds. With Max Fire and points into Air and E. Storage, you can defeat a warrior or ranger easily. A Ranger's armor doesn't protect against burning.

Freezing slows more than 1 person (unlike crippling from a bow/axe/mesmer spell) and it does damage. The longer freezing lasts (it slows I think more than crippling/mesmer's slowing spells) the more AoE spells you can rain down on people (even more damage and knockdown).

Its these reasons and more that I cannot agree with you on making burning last longer nor blinding nor freeze.

Evilsod · Jun 08, 2006, 07:13 PM // 19:13

Oh come on, have you read the threads regarding elementalists and there ability to suck?

Mist Form sucks, its Shatterfodder, and is useless against every other form of attack. Even the effects of attacks go through it, Concussion Shot + Mist Form = gg i believe. A warrior with 90% miss factor is equally as useless as an ele who can't cast.

Obsidian Flesh... it too sucks. Without an entire build revolving around it the 50% slow is just useless +20 armour doesn't make up for the fact that you lose all ability to kite. Dryders Defences beats this skill in many situations. 75% evasion and almost negligible damage from elements. Not to mention you can still move at a reasonable speed.

They can inflict Weakness, Blindess and Knockdown. Welcome to the trapper, they can inflict Blindness, Burning, Knockdown, Bleeding and Crippled, also with the introduction of Poison. Its not targetted, but its still there.

Elementalists can run with increased armour, so... where are they useful? Where can an Ele run that either a Ranger or Warrior can't? They're still enchantments, as we all know, enchantments are just loved pretty much everywhere. Illusion of Haste is just as situational, for a start you can spam it and it removes the Crippling effect. Oh and also, Shields Up adds both Armour to piercing and Evasion to projectiles.

They have armour penetration? Big whoop, it makes up for there awful damage. A Lightning Orb can be dodged just as easily as a Ranger attack. An Obsidian Flame can be interrupted pretty damn easily too.

Blinding Flash is NOT, i repeat NOT spammable unless you dedicated your elite to energy. 15 Energy a cast doesn't leave you with much variation. And also the last time i checked, an Me/N (or N/Me) could keep 2 Warriors blinded nearly permenantly using Signet of Midnight and Plague Touch, a lot cheaper and alot longer.

Your right, a Rangers armour doesn't protect against burning, but Troll Unguent almost counters it entirely, add to that an incredibly obvious spamming of Flare to keep you burning and a Distracting Shot soon comes your way.

The point is to make Burning last longer. Mind Burn gets a nasty 7 seconds burning. But its elite. Immolate gets 3 seconds and small damage, why this doesn't go to 4 seconds at lvl15 Fire Magic i'll never know.

Deep Freeze can slow more than 1 person, but its for 10 seconds only. Barbed Trap can do the exact same thing for twice that, with the added effect of bleeding. The inability to target the latter skill doesn't make it any less potent if you scatter them around while people kite or place them in key locations. If you can devote your entire skill bar to Burning the opponent senseless using Mark of Rodgort, then what does increasing Burning duration matter? You can activate it by Wanding the target for christ sake, At lvl16 Fire Magic, you could miss every alternate wand attack and still keep em burning constantly. It just makes skills like Immolate and Rodgorts Invocation sub-par. Obviously Rodgorts is a devastating spell if used on a large group of enemies, but the burning is more to add pressure than to cause damage.

When you see that your health is degening at -7, you shit yourself, 3 seconds later, it stops. Poison could've done the same thing, over a longer period of time. It will always end up dealing at least twice the damage.

The majority of the fire skills only need a boost by 1 second or 2 imo. Immolate and Incendiary Bonds for example. Would it unbalance the ele or something?

Why_Me · Jun 08, 2006, 07:53 PM // 19:53

First off, Mist Form, concussive shot, a counter, big deal, ALL guild wars skills have counters, and I could say the same about your condition causing traps, or energy denial with concussive shot. It depends on the situation. You can either get traps up before the battle over a lengthy time, or you can use ele skills during battle and get the same effect, and these skills can be reused during the course of a particularily long battle, unlike traps, which will be interrupted if you're facing anyone good. Obsidian Flesh is earth magic, meaning that you will probably also have kinetic armor up, giving an impressive 104 armor level bonus. Sure your favored dryder's defense will be more effective for the mere 15% of time its active, but Obsidian flesh/mist form can be kept up 75% of the time. If you think elementists have pathetic damage, where do you think the term "nuker" came from. And with elementist conditions/hexes, the reason they have a pathetic duration is to compensate for the extreme effect. Almost any condition can be kept up 100% of the time with the right build. Sure, poison will do twice the damage over four times the time, but like I said, keeping one condition up 100% of the time isnt hard.

beanerman_99 · Jun 08, 2006, 08:17 PM // 20:17

Evilsod, you seem to get my point and thanks for backing me up.

Why_me says:
[Q]And with elementist conditions/hexes, the reason they have a pathetic duration is to compensate for the extreme effect. Almost any condition can be kept up 100% of the time with the right build. Sure, poison will do twice the damage over four times the time, but like I said, keeping one condition up 100% of the time isnt hard.[/Q]

Extreme effect? How so? 3 seconds of burning, like I said, most people who are burning don't even care, one monk or self-heal and all the damage the burning did is completely countered. And how am I going to keep up burning or freezing 100% of the time. Oh, I have to use the "right" build. Um ok. How many rangers need a "correct" build to use Poison? None. They just add that 1 skill to their bad. Big whoop. Hmm they got poison...just add crippling shot to keep them from running...Oh and lets throw in an interupt to stop them from casting. Yeah, thats nice gaming balance.

Look I don't want to seem like I am picking on Rangers. I just think that the Burning and Freezing effects should be looked at again. Like I said in my first post Freezing=Crippled so why can't I freeze for the same duration time as someone else can Cripple??

It just does not make any sense to me. If you don't think Burning should be increased because it is 7 pips, well I would be happy to make burning be 4 pips and last as long as poison. Sounds good to me. Most if not all burning damage is completely negated by 1 or self-heal. So it NEEDS to last longer.

LoyalSoldier · Jun 08, 2006, 08:51 PM // 20:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Why_Me

but Obsidian flesh/mist form can be kept up 75% of the time.

With ele armor your foe only needs 25% of the time to kill you. And Mist form is nothing if there is a mezmer around and even though you aren't getting damaged the warriors, assassins, and rangers all can still put conditions on you.

IMO Elementalist are vunerable to most amount of conditions out of any class. They have no regen ability without being part monk, so degen builds own them frequently. They have the longest cast times out of any of the casters so that makes interupt builds very good against them. Not to mention one backfire and they are useless. They have no armor so warriors have no issue cutting them down. They have to stay still to cast their only speed buff. I don't know about you, but generally when you need a speed buff you are running for your life. And when a Warrior is blinded he is still able to cast healing spells, but when a ele is dazzed he can't do anything. And last but not least, All you need is one monk to put protective spirit on your target and you are worthless.

The way this game is set up it favors a series of small hits in place of one huge hit.

Pick Me · Jun 08, 2006, 09:02 PM // 21:02

If indeed Elementalists suck (in PvP), then kill you character and create something else.

I do like your compromise, change all burning to 4 pips and make it last longer. Works for me. I hate when Imps and Sparks burn me for 7 pips over and over again. Damage from fire, burning, repeat, repeat, etc.

So if you foolishly run around into uncharted areas and fall into a 90 second trap, who's at fault? People say there is a counter for every build, you just have to know what build you're facing.

Elementalists have the 2nd worst healing ability in the game (I still believe that Mesmers are the worst). So, I think ANet should improve on both of their abilities to heal themselves.

Well, if lets say enchantments are removed (Restoration is gone, so no healing from that), Warriors won't be using it, Rangers won't be using that either. So who's casting remove enchantments? Oh, a mesmer or necro. If that's the case, then where is the rest of your team? Killing the monk. Then where is your monk? If 3 people are attacking you in a 4 on 4, then their monk is dead, you won't have the luxury of healing hands or mark of protection, let alone a cover enchantment or spellbreaker. So basically, your dead regardless of what type of condition you use.

I'm not trying to be harsh against Elementalists, but if what EvilSod said is true, then no one would be an elementalist. I doubt that extra length of hexing will suddenly turn the tide to make the elementalist become the most improved character of all time, or playable either.

I know people complain about certain builds or characters not being upto par with other professions, but its all on how you play it.

LoyalSoldier · Jun 08, 2006, 09:04 PM // 21:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pick Me

If indeed Elementalists suck (in PvP), then kill you character and create something else.

Ah typical cop out. If something is broke fix it.

Evilsod · Jun 08, 2006, 09:24 PM // 21:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Why_Me

First off, Mist Form, concussive shot, a counter, big deal, ALL guild wars skills have counters, and I could say the same about your condition causing traps, or energy denial with concussive shot. It depends on the situation. You can either get traps up before the battle over a lengthy time, or you can use ele skills during battle and get the same effect, and these skills can be reused during the course of a particularily long battle, unlike traps, which will be interrupted if you're facing anyone good. Obsidian Flesh is earth magic, meaning that you will probably also have kinetic armor up, giving an impressive 104 armor level bonus. Sure your favored dryder's defense will be more effective for the mere 15% of time its active, but Obsidian flesh/mist form can be kept up 75% of the time. If you think elementists have pathetic damage, where do you think the term "nuker" came from. And with elementist conditions/hexes, the reason they have a pathetic duration is to compensate for the extreme effect. Almost any condition can be kept up 100% of the time with the right build. Sure, poison will do twice the damage over four times the time, but like I said, keeping one condition up 100% of the time isnt hard.

And what are you using to keep up Kinetic Armour? Stone Daggers no doubt? *oops my finger slipped* Oh sorry, i just distracted it. Now to desperately spam some other skills in the hope that you can keep it up, oh wait your now out of energy *damn* Obsidian Flesh is elite, meaning you lose any decent form of energy management to keep Kinetic Armour up for any length of time.

Mist Form isn't a good skill, face it. I've ran my Ele to Droknars from Beacons purely because almost every enemy on the way uses physical attacks. (its not my build so i can't take the credit). What do you do when the Eidolon uses it? I'll tell you, laugh at how it just protected itself from warriors 1 second before you Shatter. That or just ignore it and let the rest of your tem wail on it with magic while you interrupt through it, then when it recasts, interrupt it... If your talking about PvP, many boon prots bring Drain Enchantment. And also, if your in PvP, why the hell are you running Mist Form!?

The term nuker is because they do high damage to LOTS of targets. The term spike is lots of damage to single targets. Of course a frigging nuker will do more damage! Rodgorts Invocation can hit for plenty, if it only hits 1 target its a huge waste of energy. All nuking skills cost alot of energy and take a long time to do. If a warrior could wail on 4 targets simultaenously, knocking them all down (Earth Shaker i know), then unleashing Crushing Blow on them all and Irresistable Blow, theres a good chance the hammer warrior would beat them in damage. Especially later on in a fight when eles are exhausted to shit and the hammer warrior is still smacking away. PvE you can wait for ages to recover from exhaustion between battles or simply calm the next 1 down a bit. PvP there is no waiting time. The longer a fight with eles goes, the less chance that team has of winning.

I'm not bothered about Deep Freeze only slowing for 10 seconds. Thats fine, its merely a snare for several targets. Cripple can be removed a lot more readily than Deep Freeze can. Also it has no conditional on its freeze time, it remains 10seconds whatever your Water Magic.
Reducing Burning to 4 would really eliminate the point of burning. Bleeding does 3, as you'd expect its a slow painful process. Burning as it sounds it should be frying the life out of you. 7 is fine to me, its just the duration of it is very poor. Seriously how the hell would adding 1 or 2 seconds to some of the spells unbalance things. For a start it might make Hells Precipice at least a challenge rather than a complete joke. Mind Burn is a bitch to interrupt, Rodgorts Invocation? You've gotta be kidding. You have time to tab through targets and see that and still interrupt it. Not to mention that for a 25 cost skill, Prot Spirit reduces its effectiveness way too much for what you pay. At least the burning could be useful for a change.

Francis Crawford · Jun 08, 2006, 10:13 PM // 22:13

I agree that burning's duration should be taken up. But it it really wouldn't do that much good, as multiple spells that cause burning would tend to overlap (something that's a problem right now usually only when you'd like to immediately follow something with Immolate, or when you use Incendiary Bonds' delayed effect).

NatalieD · Jun 09, 2006, 12:34 AM // 00:34

There's nothing inherently wrong with short burning durations. It's just that most skills that cause burning are really weak. And increasing the burn time would power them up nicely in a distinctive way, without turning them into yet more spike skills, and making them suck less against armored opponents.

beanerman_99 · Jun 09, 2006, 05:51 PM // 17:51

First off, Thanks for everyones input for or against. I love a healthy discussion. I just find it frustratingly unequal that a Ranger, Necro, and Warrior and Poison me for so long that I usually die from it off just one hit from their skill.....just one hit. If I can't cure myself and have no monk to to it for me I am as good as dead. Now, the nay-sayers will tell me to bring a self cure. Ok thats fair

That would force me to pick a specific 2ndary class to do this and I say that is complete crap. I still say that an ele need to have a similar hit and forget skill like Poison, cripple, bleed, disease etc. Strategically it only seem fair. In some battles a ranger spreads the love of his Poison to keep the other teams healer very busy because that Ranger knows his poison will be working for a very long time. Same the a Mesmer spreading around Phantasm and a Necro spreading around disease. All these degens skills make the Opponents Monk very busy and may burn their energy trying to keep up with heals.

The ele has jack and squat to make any enemy worry for long. If someone dies from meteor shower its because they didn't move. They burn for 7 seconds tops and they shrug it off. They are slowed for 10, big whoop. Maelstorm? bigger joke.

Look, I love my ele. I can be very effective playing it. I just think that after playing in some PvP and just watching how the ele's skills stack up to other classes skill..just maybe someone should look at the balance again and maybe, just maybe, up the burning duration a tad. OR maybe they should add the Crippled condition to it. So if you are burning you are also crippled just like when you have to run through lava!

Francis Crawford · Jun 09, 2006, 07:28 PM // 19:28

I don't understand a one-hit death from some other degen.

It might be what -- 4 pips = 8 health/second for a little over 20 seconds?

Pick Me · Jun 09, 2006, 07:38 PM // 19:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by beanerman_99

First off, Thanks for everyones input for or against. I love a healthy discussion. I just find it frustratingly unequal that a Ranger, Necro, and Warrior and Poison me for so long that I usually die from it off just one hit from their skill.....just one hit. If I can't cure myself and have no monk to to it for me I am as good as dead. Now, the nay-sayers will tell me to bring a self cure. Ok thats fair

That would force me to pick a specific 2ndary class to do this and I say that is complete crap. I still say that an ele need to have a similar hit and forget skill like Poison, cripple, bleed, disease etc. Strategically it only seem fair. In some battles a ranger spreads the love of his Poison to keep the other teams healer very busy because that Ranger knows his poison will be working for a very long time. Same the a Mesmer spreading around Phantasm and a Necro spreading around disease. All these degens skills make the Opponents Monk very busy and may burn their energy trying to keep up with heals.

The ele has jack and squat to make any enemy worry for long. If someone dies from meteor shower its because they didn't move. They burn for 7 seconds tops and they shrug it off. They are slowed for 10, big whoop. Maelstorm? bigger joke.

Look, I love my ele. I can be very effective playing it. I just think that after playing in some PvP and just watching how the ele's skills stack up to other classes skill..just maybe someone should look at the balance again and maybe, just maybe, up the burning duration a tad. OR maybe they should add the Crippled condition to it. So if you are burning you are also crippled just like when you have to run through lava!

I understand what you are say. I said it before, and I'll say it again, GW MUST improve the healing abilities of the Mesmer and the Elementalist. Warriors get a healing signet (0 energy), and shouts to combat conditions. Rangers have troll ungeant (5 energy) and melandru's resilience (to combat hexes AND conditions), as well as healing spring (yeah, I know thats a big joke), and antidote signet (0 energy, cures poison, blindness and disease). Monks, well lets just say they have cure for everything that ailes you. Necromancers, Blood Renewal, Plague Sending, Plague Touch. Sure they also have nothing aginst hexes, but conditions go away easily. They have so many ways of healing (BR as mentioned, Life Siphon - requires enemy, etc.), most do require a corpse or foe to get heal. Ritualists, see monk. Assassin, they have a few ways of healing, but also no way to combat hexes or conditions (that I know of).

Elementalists and mesmers have horrible healing powers and no way of combating any conditions (mesmers have illusionary speed to delay crippling). Mesmers can remove hexes though. The only way for an Elementalist to heal is to cast spells. This reduces their energy and doesn't heal them nearly enough to be helpful. And Mesmers NEED a foe to heal, so if they are bleeding and no foes are around, they just have to sit there and die.

At worst, Elementalists can cast armor of earth to heal a small bit.

If you don't want to rely on a single skill from another profession, that's fine. But changing the duration of burning or creating another health degen won't save you from IoR or Suffering or Poison or bleeding.

Honestly, I would like to know what type of elemental damage/skill/spell that will allow you to do a health degen condition?

As for AoE, Chaos Storm is a huge joke, more so than Maelstrom. As far as health degen is concerned, Mesmers and Necromancers should be the best at it. Hexes are their forte, they really can't do any direct damage otherwise. They just have conditional damage (yes Necros have Vampiric Bite, Gaze, Touch, Death Swarm, etc.) but they are single opponent spells/skills that don't have the damage capabilities that an Elementalist has. I've already heard that Mesmers' health degen isn't very good in PvP (removed too easily, takes too long to do damage, etc.) but that's they only non-conditional way they can do damage.

If anything, ANet SHOULD do something to improve an Elementalist's and Mesmer's healing.

I still don't think giving Elementalists more health degen will save you from others doing health degen on you.

Iraqalypse Now · Jun 09, 2006, 07:43 PM // 19:43

The shorter duration of water magic hexes are to make up for the fact that hexes are harder to remove than conditions.

beanerman_99 · Jun 09, 2006, 08:50 PM // 20:50

Ok I agree that we ele's and mesmers need a better way to heal ourselves that would be more in balance with the other classes. But somehow I am still stuck on the whole degen for some reason. Maybe because other classes, in my opinion, are really getting 2 things the ele doesn't. 1) a degen that lasts insanely and unfairly long and 2) it cost them very little energy to do so. Ele's on the other hand have 1) crap for degens and 2) the degens we do have have and insanely high energy cost. As Evilod mentioned earlier, in drawn out battles the ele is at a huge disadvantage due to the high cost of energy our spells use. This is a wholely different subject so I won't get into it here except to point out that the ele's skill Mark of Rodgort is a very cool spell to use but it cost 25 energy to cast so using it in conjunction with your other spells tend to darin you rather quickly. Maybe if they reduced the cost of Mark of Rodgort it would make it a more practical to use spell for the ele.

Francis Crawford · Jun 09, 2006, 09:05 PM // 21:05

Because of the elementalists' high energy availability, we're better suited to use self-heals from other professions than most other primaries are.

I wouldn't put better self-healing high on my wishlist for elementalist buffs.

Evilsod · Jun 11, 2006, 05:01 PM // 17:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

Because of the elementalists' high energy availability, we're better suited to use self-heals from other professions than most other primaries are.

I wouldn't put better self-healing high on my wishlist for elementalist buffs.

You make it sound like the eles self-healing is on par with Ether Prodigy as the best energymanagement in the game. Aura of Restoration is very poor. Yes at 13 ES is returns 367% health. But most of the time you cast your 25 energy skills at the start of a fight before your even taking hits. It does help take the strain off a monk when you heal for ~37 when you cast Fireball, but it really does suck at the same time.

Moving into other professions for there self heals just reduces your own effectiveness too.

LoyalSoldier · Jun 11, 2006, 08:46 PM // 20:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

Because of the elementalists' high energy availability, we're better suited to use self-heals from other professions than most other primaries are.

I wouldn't put better self-healing high on my wishlist for elementalist buffs.

Though I don't think any profession should have to go into another profession to be effective. At that point you are just using a working profession to fix a broken one.

beanerman_99 · Jun 12, 2006, 01:27 PM // 13:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by LoyalSoldier

Though I don't think any profession should have to go into another profession to be effective. At that point you are just using a working profession to fix a broken one.

Exactly. I shouldn't have to rely on my 2nd to heal me or make my primary profession better. But self-healing isn't the point of this thread. I know that there are a few things wrong with the ele but on a whole I enjoying playing this class. I just thought that by uping the burning duration would help people take notice of the ele and be wary around us more. As it is now, enemies head straight for you pretty much knowing that they can kill my ele before I can kill them. They then heal up any damage i have done. Why do you think we are called "squishy" characters? Bah. Let me set them ablaze for about 10 seconds and see how "squishy" I am then