Curse

Seraphim of Chaos · May 25, 2011, 02:33 PM // 14:33

So here's the general bar that most Earth Eles use in lower pvp:

Ebon Hawk
Stoning
Glowstone
Grasping Earth
[Insert Elite - usually YAA or Flesh Wound]
Aura
Attunement
Sig

The bar isn't too bad in RA. It provides damage, knockdown, and it can gimp melee attackers. The only real flaw the bar has is its reliance on projectile based spells, which frankly, are awful.

Could Earth Eles break into higher level gameplay?

Jeydra · May 25, 2011, 03:05 PM // 15:05

The problem is RC / Draw Conditions ... it's also very easy to kite out of in more open areas (i.e. the GvG maps) and you face more of Aura of Stability / Balanced Stance.

I think it's a reasonable bar in RA, but I'm sceptical about it in GvG / HA.

Xenomortis · May 25, 2011, 03:06 PM // 15:06

Isn't it also horribly one dimensional?

Artisan Archer · May 25, 2011, 03:16 PM // 15:16

Spike damage is decent, be it a projectile, but utilitywise(mainly defensive) it's just outclassed in every way by water and air ele's.

And I don't think we need another ele attribute to choose from, 3/4 sorta balanced (water too strong imo) is something you don't wanne mess with. (for references; blood magic necro's)

And at this point, no, they aren't usefull in GvG. Although as secondary option they're quite decent (wards). They have seen use in HA though, mainly through eruption/unsteady ground type of builds.

kedde · May 25, 2011, 04:50 PM // 16:50

Anyone with half a brain can dodge 90% of the projectiles and render it useless without even devoting a skillslot to countering it.

Good old argument, build to win against good opposition, not to utterly destroy completely retarded opposition. It works against idiots because they're idiots, it won't work against those who are not, guess why.

Ariena Najea · May 25, 2011, 10:29 PM // 22:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xenomortis

Isn't it also horribly one dimensional?

This. If Stoning is hit with DShot/Magebane/Diversion the bar is next to useless. The template deals mediocre damage in exchange for knockdowns, but then again, it neither pressures nor spikes effectively. I would much rather have a Mind Blast Ele that can also split, or a MoI Water Ele that can spike better and has utility. Also consider a Mind Shock/Gale Ele who has more reliable knockdowns (at the cost of exhaustion, but most kd's from Stoning will be wasted), can bring Blinding Flash. For that bar, I would rather see GoLE replace Aura and drop Glowstone for Rend or some other utility as needed.

Reverend Dr · May 25, 2011, 11:58 PM // 23:58

Can we close this yet?

Killed u man · May 26, 2011, 02:00 PM // 14:00

Actually, if you're talking about splitting and utlity, I have no clue why Mind Blast got namedropped here...

A mind blast bar offers nothing on a split, aside from the ability to use healing breeze. The damage from a stoning ele will be comparable to that of a MB ele, if not more.

In return, getting 40/40 cast on an earth ele will be super-effective due to Stoning's lock abiliy, whereas burning doesn't stack with burning. An earth ele can also weaken 3 people in the enemies base (when splitting) so I wouldn't be surprised if a stoning ele with an assassin (or any kind of other split character) could take down both a warrior and a rit defending the base. And going by from what I've seen recently (observer) people always tend to respond to split with keeping a hammer and rit in base. (honor balance anyways)

Offcourse a stoning ele is prone to interrupts, but the same can be said for any ele split bar. If you get mind blast dshot, Rodgorts automatically becomes a no-go, and you're stuck with a bar that only contains meteor (2 s cast, so will most likely get rupted too) and immolate. A stoning ele will obviously be in a similar situation, but the only point I'm trying to make is that stoning eles aren't "more useless" than other split bars when shutdown.

I think a stoning ele is one of those underdog bars that hasn't seen any play because people nowadays like to stick with what they know works, even though that often isn't an optimal build.

Look at people still using paragons (yesterday dirt ran them I think)... The game might have become less competitive, but the people playing it have not. Au contraire, people currently playing GW still believe it's srs bsns because otherwise we wouldn't see all these cookie cutter builds anymore. And with that competitiveness comes an unmatched need to win, and from that need results an inability to experiment with new bars. People have forgot about the underlying mechanics, and only know about what they've been told by a previous generation.

Just like with Rt and D/P (rending aura + spear attacks) "paragons", it's only a matter of time before people discover the potential of these other bars. It took years before people understood the power of crit spear sins, ...

fowlero · May 26, 2011, 03:06 PM // 15:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killed u man

Actually, if you're talking about splitting and utlity, I have no clue why Mind Blast got namedropped here...

A mind blast bar offers nothing on a split, aside from the ability to use healing breeze. The damage from a stoning ele will be comparable to that of a MB ele, if not more.

I'm sorry but just no. Granted mind blast is not the only ele bar that is effective on split, but if you're saying a stoning/ebon hawk is just as if not more effective it just doesn't add up. Ignoring the fact that Mind blast is (still...) an incredibly powerful energy source, their DPS's will be the same ballpark (i haven't bothered checking, but considering immolate is 113 damage and stoning 85 at 14 spec). However even if stoning has a higher sustainable DPS (which i doubt as glowstone is a more conditional, inferior energy source) it's almost immediately irrelevant for GvG, particularly split situations.

Why? Line of sight. This is an incredibly detrimental requirement for split characters, since one ultimate endgame (other being pure kills) is to pickoff lord chamber NPC's you're putting yourself at an immediate disadvantage. Then of course there's the added factor of everything you cast having a chance of missing in split skirmishes and stand collapses. Furthermore, on split any half decent player is gonna recognise that it's important to dodge stoning/ebon hawk else your gonna end up KD'd, and it's no harder than dodging pin down.

I recognise the previous paragraph makes rangers look useless by the same logic, but it's used to compare the Mind Blast and whatever potential stoning/ebon hawk bar. Obviously line of sight isn't as detrimental to rangers since they have a much higher survivability, as well as easily being able to get in your face where it becomes less of an issue.

The shutdown argument i agree is kinda irrelevant in that it would hurt both DPS a lot if a ranger were to bother rupting you, however as a stoning/ebon hawk you have a higher priority to rupts than a MB in preventing KD's (moreso than meteor) so you can expect a lot more attention from a ranger than a MB would in the first place.

Then again, back on the DPS argument you've also ignored that MB has 3 hard hitting AoE skills. This has obvious advantages, alongside potentially being able to tank two knights down.

Granted there may be a lot of builds that could be as effective as current ones in use, but you have to consider that for some of them maybe people have actually tried them and decided against it. Things just aren't as simple as DPS numbers.

Jeydra · May 26, 2011, 03:42 PM // 15:42

Good post fowlero, I'll add that MB Eles have the (very useful) KD on demand. Ebon Hawk / Stoning have little to no chance of hitting a foe who's running away (read: disengaging from a fight) as well.

I highly doubt a Sin and Stoning Ele will kill a Warrior and Rit who's defending the split. 2v2 in open terrain, maybe. Defending a split though, there'll be NPCs and LoS problems about, and they will survive. You try ganking the Lord room on Frozen with Stoning / Ebon Hawk ...

PS: I'm certain I've seen Rt/P's in organized GvG before. Don't remember which guild it was, but they were running some kind of spike iirc.

Killed u man · May 26, 2011, 04:37 PM // 16:37

Your post contains truth, and I never said a stone ele was the better bar. I said that an earth ele carries more potential than people realize, and that for most of the current situations/scrimmages, you'dd be better of with a stoning ele. The main reason here being survivability and shutdown, the ability to keep shit locked on the ground aswell as do reasonable damage, aswell as weaken all phsyicals.

It is true the earth ele lacks AoE, and I never said it was the better bar for all intents and purposes. The truth is that an earth ele will most likely not be able to take down both knights with a rit there, but neither will a fire ele. So whereas AoE is always better, for obvious reasons, in this particular case (balling up NPC which is the only arguement you can make for GvG purposes) however the difference is only minimal, as both bars will need some form of support to keep the rit busy.

Also, your standard MB bar will look something like: MB - Immo - Rodgorts - Meteor - Flame Djinns - Fire Attune - Breeze - Rez sig (for the occasional stand match) or aura of restoration. The bar is almos intirely damage, and very few utility, or even room for utility. Taking utility means you'll have to cut back on either a damage skill (which you need) or drop aura of resto. (Which is a viable option)

An earth ele needs to pack: Ebon Hawk - Stoning (Which does 101 damage at 14*) - Glowstone - Earth Attunement. Those are the necessary skills, and then you still have 4 more slots which you can fill in with defence and utlity.
Assuming we're going to build the bar similar to that of a fire ele, you could back healing breeze, aura of resto and a speed boost.

After that, both bars are pretty much on par with utlity, and the earth ele has alot more added utility from knockdowns, aswell as 1 final free skill slot which most importantly can be an elite skill.

You could go /Me and take some kind of interrupt, and use glyph of resto for some extra self heal, or you could opt to not even replace heal breeze, as every enemy physical will be weakened anyways. (Though necros will give you problems, but the interrupt elite could take care of that)

I'm just saying that a stoning ele bar offers alot more options, aswell as more potential threat on the battlefield because of stoning's amazing ability to knocklock shit down.

As for kiting the projectiles and using walls: true, but only a bad player would cast on foes that far away. Either you run up to them, change your elite for some kind of snare (crip anguish - YAA) or you simply opt to not cast as opposed to wasting your energy.

Yes, you might not be able to kill a rit behind a wall, but neither will a fire ele. At that particular time, both bars are doing exactly the same thing, which is keeping the enemy rit in their base. Wether or not you can damage him is a non-issue because you're not going to kill him anyways, and he most likely doesn't need his energy anyways.
As a matter off act, with dash, the fire ele has got very limited control over the rit's movement (He can leave any time he wants, push out a flag, even with a fire ele on him -pass it on-) whereas with the earth ele with his elite which potentially could be anything, he will most likely die or get caught offguard by other split characters pushing in. (Whereas the fire ele hasn't got anything to control his movement, as dash > meteor)

fowlero · May 26, 2011, 05:28 PM // 17:28

I wasn't entirely sure whether you were saying it was a better bar so fair enough. Though from my experience as a flag runner i just don't think the bars potential is that high. Also yeah sorry i meant Ebon Hawk not Stoning to compare Immolate with 80 dmg, since they have the same stats.

I forgot to actually make the point with AoE and two knights, it is sometimes possible for an ele to kill 1 vs a rit when they're balled (depends if they're weaponed already when aggro'd or not, ie whether the rit's in base when you arrive). A lot easier since resilients duration got hit. Something the earth cannot do.

Balling npc's isn't the only argument either, AoE does have quite a large effect (over a game) at stand through the nature of people inevitably kiting into each other at times, choke points (stairs on solitude) and punishing bad plays.

You're right in that the bar does have no utility (outside of meteor), but i feel it's not really necessary in a similar vein to dervishes not requiring bulls/dchop equivalents. A free utility elite on the earth is a good positive, but i feel actual bars with breeze (which i wouldn't drop, its a very strong split skill) as well would end up with a pretty tough attrib spread, i don't really know.

My point with projectiles was more that there are a surprising number of times in split skirmishes where not having the ability to land damage at long range reliably will cost you kills. You're right an MB wouldn't be able to kill the rit through a wall etc, but my point was meant to be without having to rely on line of sight you can get a few valuable seconds hitting a lord room npc and potentially score kills whereas in the same situation you wouldn't with stoning which may cost a kill (eg closest archer/bodyguard to stairs on solitude is hittable from stairs, you'd have to enter the pit to get line of sight, a good 5-10 second delay).

I'm not saying you're wrong in that there are skirmishes and situations where the earth ele would be better than the MB. But in my experience i can only think of ones where if you are in such a situation, it's because you've already screwed up. A flagger shouldn't really ever be in a 1v1 flagpush, and if him being holed up in base alone vs ele is causing stand issues it he shouldn't be holed up alone, or it should be being defended by an offensive character.

In the single ele vs rit situation, whilst your right in that earth forces him to stay in base by being able to KD him to hell if he tried to leave, and that the fire blast has zero movement control. However the MB retains it somewhat by just killing npc's (or at least forcing the rit to save them) instead if the rit were to try and leave.

As such i just see it as gimping yourself on split for the potential to KD a fair bit, excluding out of base 1v1 skirmishes (which most players wouldn't engage in, for the exact reason) i don't see a huge advantage from them.

Granted at lower end play it'd probably be a very fun bar to play, but at higher end the MB does a lot more to help you than earth would with more reliable straight damage. It's not helped by the fact that most split builds atm have 1 or 2 KD's on a sin alongside MB's meteor which is usually sufficient.

makosi · May 26, 2011, 10:58 PM // 22:58

What makes Ebon Hawk and Stoning more effective than they might look from their descriptions is that they're homing missiles.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kedde

Anyone with half a brain can dodge 90% of the projectiles and render it useless without even devoting a skillslot to countering it.

That's true, but only in a 1v1 scrimmage where nothing else is going on... where you're neither casting, attacking, kiting, training or watching the field.

kedde · May 28, 2011, 10:21 AM // 10:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by makosi

What makes Ebon Hawk and Stoning more effective than they might look from their descriptions is that they're homing missiles.

That's true, but only in a 1v1 scrimmage where nothing else is going on... where you're neither casting, attacking, kiting, training or watching the field.

No, not really. It is just as easy as consistently dodging paragon autoattacks, which anyone should be able to do. You're not supposed to ever just be standing still unless you're casting or turtling in your boat. This means that unless you can't do 3 quick clicks in succession in something resembling a triangle, then you can dodge them 9/10 times.

The point isn't to necessarily avoid every single projectile, but to avoid whatever you can and the ones that are important. Therefore the point still applies in skirmishes where it's often easiest, which was also what most of the thread ended up being about.

Killed u man · May 28, 2011, 01:22 PM // 13:22

Can't kite when you're crippled/snared, or atleast so I heard. Even at casting range distance (so the very edge, at which only bad players would use projectiles), it becomes tediously hard to dodge stoning/ebon hawk when you're not just focussing on that alone.

I see no reason why an ele couldn't throw in Icy Chackles, crip anguish or YAA in his final skill slot, closing this arguement once and for all.

Xenomortis · May 28, 2011, 01:26 PM // 13:26

That doesn't fix the line of sight issues you're liable to face on skirmishes and you're trash in 8v8.

tealspikes · May 28, 2011, 03:46 PM // 15:46

An earth ele might fit into a quad ele spike build of some sort, but I really can't see it being useful in a more balance'ish team. The only significant way it could contribute to the team is full duration wards.

I Angra I · May 30, 2011, 06:05 AM // 06:05

We ran a shockwave/stoning/shadow walk/dash/wards bar for a spike build on weeping stone sometime late last year, it worked out pretty well actually combined with another ele (water or air depending) and mesmer midline.

I think earth eles are just an incredibly situational template that are extremely map and opponent dependant. Most cases I don't think they are they effective though, at least for GvG. HA might be a bit different because it's a lot more 8v8 based, and in fact you do (or did last time I played a few months ago) see quite a bit of Unsteady Ground eles in matches.

For just messing around in GvG as like a byob template I used to run this a lot and it was a lot of fun:

Shockwave
Aftershock
Ebon Hawk
Stoning
Shadow Walk
Dash
Glyph Lesser
Earth Attunement

ebon hawk -> stoning -> shadow walk -> aftershock -> shockwave, and anyone you catch out running around the map is usually dead or close to it.

Reverend Dr · May 30, 2011, 07:09 PM // 19:09

To me the earth ele just looks like a squishy hammer warrior that puts out less damage and can't Q-knock.

Infectious · May 31, 2011, 01:28 AM // 01:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reverend Dr

To me the earth ele just looks like a squishy hammer warrior that puts out less damage and can't Q-knock.

/thread
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