Curse

Mared Text · Apr 24, 2006, 09:32 AM // 09:32

Something I have not seen anyone point out is that if elementalists are buffed to the point where they are a "must counter" class, as warriors are currently, then interrupt rangers and mesmers will be recieving a passive buff since they are the best suited to distribute elementalist hate.

torquemada · Apr 24, 2006, 01:47 PM // 13:47

AoE nerf just showed how unrealistic fire line is when dealing with real people...why would you want to stand that close to each other...group photo?

Xpl0iter · Apr 24, 2006, 05:03 PM // 17:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mared Text

Something I have not seen anyone point out is that if elementalists are buffed to the point where they are a "must counter" class, as warriors are currently, then interrupt rangers and mesmers will be recieving a passive buff since they are the best suited to distribute elementalist hate.

I guess your ignoring the fact that rangers and mesmers *Do* have excellent ele counters. They are to a point where they can annihilate an elementalist without breaking a sweat.

What buffs are you talking about any way? rangers have been given a buff in faction just *against* elementals. Equinox {Elite Spirit} ( Description : Nature ritual. Create a level 1..8 spirit. Spells cast within its range that causes exhaustion cause double the exhaustion. This spirit dies after 30..126 seconds.) . I do not see how this skill hurts any other profession, as much as it hurts only elementalist attributes. At this point, rangers and mesmers do not need a buff. Anet actually needs to buff elementalist profession. With regards to Energy dealing issues, and high cost spells which are more or less crap in most situations. I remember ensign suggesting in his post about how to buff ele spells, and i found that post quite interesting.

Imagine rangers being given an elite which affects Healing spells or Protection spells by costing their monks the energy, or defficiency of healing or protecting, or directly affecting their primary attribute.

The recharge time over skills While having a long cast time doesn't make any sense. if the skill is so damn good that this skill needs 3 or 4 seconds for cast, and has a 60 second cool down ( exhaustion on top of that ), well, balance it out with the actual damage too. I don't want to spend so much energy, + cool down + casting time to do a damage as feeble as 40 to a ranger. Just cause it has a knock down? big deal.

Quote:

Originally Posted by torquemada

AoE nerf just showed how unrealistic fire line is when dealing with real people...why would you want to stand that close to each other...group photo?

How about mentioning of the fact in actual manual and sites while describing ele profession to the gamers that fire line is not good for PVP at high level environment, or shall i say, not efficient? ( along with other attributes for damage dealing purposes ) Fire line was designed to impact a number of people in certain area while dealing damage. just to scatter them, or force them to move out. like those in wards, and etc. The damage is not significant as well.

I wouldnt want to spend meteor shower over one person. It is unreal to do so. Specially when the person can just walk out of such spell. Mind you, as from what i notice in your post, you also believe the fact that they need to be *very* close in order to get hit. Oh well, why not increase the AoE size as mentioned in previous posts? or decrease our cast time and recharge.

The other issue with decreasing such cast times and recharge ( as mentioned before ) is a mesmer profession using secondary ele profession and dishing out damage much better than the primary profession because of fast casting. Well, that has to be dealt with incase those recast and charge time gets changed.

And i wonder where i read last nite about "Elementalist being the only profession which gets hurt by their primary attribute with exhaustion", while mesmers enjoy fast casting with no penetalties, monks enjoy divine, rangers with lower energy cost when put in expertise, and warriors with strength. Beats me. If eles are considered so gimp ( which they are ), why not deal with this issue and make their primary attribute a bit better?

Ok, how about increasing the area of effect and damage based on the points spent in attribute line? Keep it small for level 12 attribute, and start increase AoE damage ( be that burning affect ) + (the cast time or energy efficiency) based on Attribute 13 - 16. Might sound awkward, but that was what i could only consider in order to keep mesmers from taking advantage of ele spells with such efficiency which beats the primary profession itself.

Last but not least, deal with the elites that an ele has. Eles are forced to take only elites which help them manage their mana even when their primary attribute is energy management. Sounds quite unfair to me when a so called `damage dealing` class is forced to not take any damage elites ( i wonder if damage elites are good at first place, maybe mind burn cause of its burning effect, but exhaustion is the winner )

Regardz.
An Elementalist.

Ensign · Apr 24, 2006, 07:05 PM // 19:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

I guess your ignoring the fact that rangers and mesmers *Do* have excellent ele counters. They are to a point where they can annihilate an elementalist without breaking a sweat.

He's pointing out that if elementalists ever became significant damage threats, mesmers and rangers would simply become more common because those two professions already hate elementalists so well. That is, the game already as the tools to naturally adjust to stronger elementalists without problems.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

Just cause it has a knock down? big deal.

Don't hate on the knockdowns man. Those are bloody good.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

is a mesmer profession using secondary ele profession and dishing out damage much better than the primary profession because of fast casting.

That's only the case if the profession is limited moreso by cast times than energy or recharges. In my experience, energy and recharge are much more limiting than casting time - the only reason casting time becomes an issue is because these skills can be so bloody hard to aim.

Fast Casting elementalists are popular for a bit of compressed damage plus a disable (Orb -> Strike has a 1.25 second gap on a mesmer, a 1.75 second gap on an ele), and I certainly can't knock that if you're trying to spike someone out. I wouldn't say that those gaps are the biggest issue the class is facing though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

And i wonder where i read last nite about "Elementalist being the only profession which gets hurt by their primary attribute with exhaustion"

From someone clueless. Energy Storage helps with exhaustion, it doesn't hurt it. The ability to use exhaustion much more aggressively is one of the perks of an elementalist and Energy Storage.

Bad players are terrified by exhaustion, and worship max energy capacity. It's not an opinion I'm about to take seriously when discussing adjustments to the profession.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

Last but not least, deal with the elites that an ele has. Eles are forced to take only elites which help them manage their mana even when their primary attribute is energy management.

Their primary attribute is only energy management in PvE. It's actually ok as emanagement there, actually. PvP battles last longer than 30 seconds and that makes max energy capacity much less important.

I don't know that you need to address elites directly (though in fairness there are some real stinkers in there). What you need are some ways to fix your energy that don't require you to burn your elite slot. You get, what, half a dozen elites that help fix your energy (between Prophecies and the expansion), but only a couple of terrible options (GLE and attunements?) if you don't want to use those?

Of course those energy elites tend to be retardedly good, and the damage elites terrible, which just makes it even more obvious which way you want to go.

Peace,
-CxE

Mared Text · Apr 24, 2006, 07:43 PM // 19:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

I guess your ignoring the fact that rangers and mesmers *Do* have excellent ele counters. They are to a point where they can annihilate an elementalist without breaking a sweat.

Something I have not seen anyone point out is that if elementalists are buffed to the point where they are a "must counter" class, as warriors are currently, then interrupt rangers and mesmers will be recieving a passive buff since they are the best suited to distribute elementalist hate.

Xpl0iter · Apr 24, 2006, 09:47 PM // 21:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mared Text

Something I have not seen anyone point out is that if elementalists are buffed to the point where they are a "must counter" class, as warriors are currently, then interrupt rangers and mesmers will be recieving a passive buff since they are the best suited to distribute elementalist hate.

Oh bah, sorry for that Mared Text, that one word flips my entire understanding. So apologies for taking you wrong.

@Ensign
Thanks for explanation ensign, makes alot more sense now.

Being honest, rangers are already quite common in pvp, as well as mesmers. i wonder how they would become more common in PVP just by buffing up the elementalists at this point?

As for the knockdowns, i still dont see why i would spend 25 mana for 3 knockdowns which are not even guranteed. Meteor does much better job for a right away knockdown when the spell has been casted, and doesn't allow people to move out of the area before the spell even makes its first contact to inflict damage. Tried quite a few times with meteor shower for testing purposes, and ended up in a 2 times success out of 8 times meteor shower casted. Since then i carry meteor when ever i play fire. And what i meant by Big deal on knockdowns was the fact that no one gets 2nd or 3rd hit 95% of the times in PVP ( people can consider me noob for carrying meteor shower, not sure how every one thinks, but testing that skill is fine by me ). I compared knockdowns on behalf of meteor shower only, not in general. why would i make it a big deal to take a meteor shower with me? It is because 60 second recharge just blows, and the damage is never enough for such spell.

I would not call mesmers using ele skills the *biggest* gaps, but i definetly hate being asked by every team leader to make a mesmer/ele to do same thing that i was suppose to do with ele/mesmer. For spiking, that is definetly the case, unless i am being used as a utility character which is true for most of the times.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Of course those energy elites tend to be retardedly good, and the damage elites terrible, which just makes it even more obvious which way you want to go.

For the part where you mentioned about elites, that was exactly what my point was. Not much of an option in damage lines, but way too much emphasizing over energy elites. But then, like i guess you mentioned above, the energy elites sure give energy back, but there are not many skills to spend the energy over to make it worthwhile.

Oh and Apologies Again Mared Text. Thanks for taking your time Ensign to explain my concerns.

Regardz.
An Elementalist.

SaintGreg · Apr 24, 2006, 10:58 PM // 22:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

Being honest, rangers are already quite common in pvp, as well as mesmers. i wonder how they would become more common in PVP just by buffing up the elementalists at this point?

Its a similar situation to rangers vs warriors. Currently warriors pack much more of a punch. If the enemy rangers got to the point where they could cause a problem, then you would focus your warrior hate at them more heavily. In a similar situation, if elementalists got to be a problem, then the anti-caster hate that you pack would likely be aimed more at them then at the enemy monks/mesmers.

Its not necessarily a situation of if mesmers would become more common. If anything eles would become more common, meaning mesmers and rangers would be less common. Its more about using the caster hate you already have anyways against your biggest threat, which could be an ele if they were buffed.

Alleji · Apr 24, 2006, 11:16 PM // 23:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xpl0iter

As for the knockdowns, i still dont see why i would spend 25 mana for 3 knockdowns which are not even guranteed. Meteor does much better job for a right away knockdown when the spell has been casted, and doesn't allow people to move out of the area before the spell even makes its first contact to inflict damage.

Meteor is a damn good skill in concept, but the long recharge is the problem. You only have 8 slots to spend on skills and if your team needs a knockdown in there, you're probably taking gale because you'll get more use out of it. In fact, the 30-second timer is even longer than it seems. Because the skill can be used so infrequently, you'll want to maximize its effectiveness and will wait for the ideal opportunity to use, which might not come up for another 15 seconds.

I'm not even talking about meteor shower here... the only PvP use for it is to bombard an altar, provided it doesn't get interrupted in the first place. When cast on a target with a brain, the most you'll get out of it is 1 knockdown or having that target cancel the spell he was casting and move away.

Xpl0iter · Apr 25, 2006, 09:49 PM // 21:49

Alleji agreed with ur point of view
the recharge not sure how things can be fixed with ele profession *sigh* and what makes me wonder is that, are they even going to take the suggestions mentioned by so many people?

Loch · Apr 27, 2006, 04:47 AM // 04:47

Well, the balance update came. I anticipated something interesting to happen with Fire Magic. Here's how it got balanced further:

- Bug fix for Mark of Rodgort (not a balance change)
- Fire Attunement now recharges in 45
- Flare deals slightly more damage

That's right, the only Fire nuke that was buffed was a non-money spell. Ice Spear and Stone Daggers were buffed as well, which makes it seem like they want Eles to have better spammables.

But the problem with Fire wasn't just the spammable issue. Those supposed "money nukes" really aren't worth their energy, cast time, nor recharge time, and nothing's changed about them this time around.

...at least you can throw a bunch of Flares at enemies between your "giant" nukes... if you really wanted to...

Xpl0iter · Apr 27, 2006, 06:05 AM // 06:05

as far as i see Loch, i feel happy right now, atleast my attunes and aura recharge faster
A step towards betterment of my favourite profession, i am happy.

Regardz
An Elementalist.

Goonter · Apr 27, 2006, 06:28 AM // 06:28

On Meteor, I don’t think the recharge is such a raw deal. When I used the skill I haven’t thought, "This is crap" but then, that may have to due with how I play it.
At a 3 second cast time it’s not an optimal KD anyhow. Even if it were a 15 second recast, gale would be better for a timely KD. Meteor is a nice KD with added damage.

Good thing about meteor, it mixes well with glyph of renewal. Its low cost, you can cast it every 15 seconds or twice in a row every 30 seconds. It certainly gives you something to do between cast of something for example, like Fireball and Rodgorts Invocation. That’s three heavy hitting spells every 15 seconds including whatever else you can through in there. And the energy management isn’t to bad if you pace yourself, granted the metagame hasn’t favored elementalist pacing. It looks to be turning around though.
Meteor Shower.... from concept to product is like a premature ejaculation. It, unlike Meteor, needs to go back to the drawing board and shoot again.

On another note, my opinion is beginning to side more and more with the idea that the armor we have would be a better place to start looking to buff elementalist.
As has been brought up and we all realize, if you nerf something sometimes you passively buff something else.
In order to beef up the elementalist maybe it would be best to even out the armor ratings (respectfully) amongst the warrior and ranger classes. I like the idea that rangers have good armor vs. elements and warriors are sturdy no matter what. But maybe it needs to come down a notch. Elementalist pay a price for heavy hitting spells. To have your damage naturally reduced by half could be some reason as to why they seem gimp.
Also, balancing the disruptive abilities of certain skills is another passive buff that I would like to see to help the elementals keep its footing.

Hows this sound for Mind spell buffs?

Mind Burn. 15/1/20
Target foe takes 15-60 fire damage. If you have more energy than target foe, that foe takes an additional 15-60 fire damage and is set on fire for 1-7 second. If you have less energy than target foe you gain 10 energy. This spell causes exhaustion.

And you can tac on plus 10 energy for the other two mind spells and catch my drift. Either you get the bonus damage or with an attunment up its basically a no energy spell every 20 seconds.

[edit: I just saw the armor updates. It looks much more logical than before. Monks and mesmers will likely have more +physical armor making elemental damage an attractive alternative. Ranger spike is slowed down (daul shot nerf) so the likelyhood of seeing a team with all rangers may decrease. If so, in turn it could be a sigh of relief to elementalist and they can start poking thier heads out in the game even more often.
I still think ranger and warrior armor can be slightly modified, but Im willing to see what happens with this small adjustment first.]

cookiemonkie · Apr 27, 2006, 07:32 AM // 07:32

The reduction in attunement cycle time is a good start. I can understand that ANET does not want to upset the balance too much so drastically by reworking too many skills at once. Lets see how things work out. Aura of restoration would make a great defensive cover enchantment for other skills, but unfortunately the Ele doesn't have the luxury of a skill slot for it in PvP..... unless Ether renewal was reworked to be more effective and apply to ele echantments only, then there would be a reason to bring it.

Ele's need more armor options besides vs elemental damage.

Xpl0iter · Apr 27, 2006, 05:40 PM // 17:40

Being honest, as far as i see, Eles are not only buffed with skills, but passively buffed by capping the number of minnions. Now, a Team has to keep either 2 mms or 1 mm 1 nuker to dish a decent damage out. It is more of a balance type of damage between the two class, and i definetly feel much more relaxed. I did first mission in Factions, and it was obvious that teams now need eles along with MM to deal damage, since eles take spirits down way too effectively. 200ish damage per spirit. MM wont be the winning factor in alliance now, but definetly a great facor, just like others. I love this new passive buff. My anger seems to have been gone since i saw the Cap on minnion masters.

Regardz
An Elementalist.

cookiemonkie · Apr 28, 2006, 11:59 AM // 11:59

Don't worry, you're anger will come back once you hit the pvp to realize that now you have to bring not just a couple of warrior hate skills (say blinding flash and blurred vision).... But to contend with the assassin who will deep wound / cripple and spike you down faster than a warrior can if you aren't careful..... You need a couple of snares from the water line (say shard storm and ice prison). Stick in your energy management skills, and you are left with 2 slots to deal pathethic damage hmmm what will those skills be, yes of course it can only be Lighting Orb and Strike.

Factions looks to have made the situation of the ele being a defensive role even more solidified. Granted the Assassin class is as solid as a wet paper bag in the wrong hands (due to low armor), but give it to a focused player and it is deadlier than a warrior (spike dmg / conditions wise)....... Oh you know what that means... Drop all the ele offensive skills, because now you need to take along "extinguish" to deal with the additional conditions so another party member can free up a skill slot to do actual damage.

Xpl0iter · Apr 28, 2006, 05:57 PM // 17:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

Don't worry, you're anger will come back once you hit the pvp to realize that now you have to bring not just a couple of warrior hate skills (say blinding flash and blurred vision).... But to contend with the assassin who will deep wound / cripple and spike you down faster than a warrior can if you aren't careful..... You need a couple of snares from the water line (say shard storm and ice prison). Stick in your energy management skills, and you are left with 2 slots to deal pathethic damage hmmm what will those skills be, yes of course it can only be Lighting Orb and Strike.

Factions looks to have made the situation of the ele being a defensive role even more solidified. Granted the Assassin class is as solid as a wet paper bag in the wrong hands (due to low armor), but give it to a focused player and it is deadlier than a warrior (spike dmg / conditions wise)....... Oh you know what that means... Drop all the ele offensive skills, because now you need to take along "extinguish" to deal with the additional conditions so another party member can free up a skill slot to do actual damage.

As time passes, every thing comes and go. for all i know, i am going to do alot of alliance battles, which is fun

and No, my anger is not coming back cause of those issues that you have discussed above. The simple point i mentioned was, now i will be taken into teams again. Not just an MM alone.

Regardz

Wasteland Squidget · Apr 28, 2006, 06:04 PM // 18:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

Don't worry, you're anger will come back once you hit the pvp to realize that now you have to bring not just a couple of warrior hate skills (say blinding flash and blurred vision).... But to contend with the assassin who will deep wound / cripple and spike you down faster than a warrior can if you aren't careful..... You need a couple of snares from the water line (say shard storm and ice prison). Stick in your energy management skills, and you are left with 2 slots to deal pathethic damage hmmm what will those skills be, yes of course it can only be Lighting Orb and Strike.

Why would you need anything other than Blinding Flash and Blurred Vision to take out an assassin? A single miss screws up their entire combo, so these skills are an assassin's bane.

Of course, if you're playing a water guy you should be bringing Shard Storm and Ice Spikes anyway because snares are really versatile and useful skills, but they're not specifically for anti-assassin. Things which prevent attacks from hitting are your anti-assassin skills.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

Factions looks to have made the situation of the ele being a defensive role even more solidified. Granted the Assassin class is as solid as a wet paper bag in the wrong hands (due to low armor), but give it to a focused player and it is deadlier than a warrior (spike dmg / conditions wise).......

I disagree. I have yet to see any assassins dealing anything like the spike damage of a warrior. Do you have any numbers to back this up?

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

Oh you know what that means... Drop all the ele offensive skills, because now you need to take along "extinguish" to deal with the additional conditions so another party member can free up a skill slot to do actual damage.

Extinguish isn't causing us to drop offensive skills because nobody really carried offensive skills on an Ele to begin with. You might see Lightning Orbs now and then to throw towards a spike or solo NPCs, but most of the Ele damage skills are so bad that you'd never put them on your bar to begin with. Factions doesn't change this, it just gives us more secondary skills which happen to work well supported by Ether Prodigy - Extinguish being a prime example.

In other words, if damage elementalists were viable to begin with then you'd see elementalists as something other than Extinguish and Heal Party spammers. As it is Extinguish isn't pushing a damage skill off the bar, it's pushing yet another utility/defensive skill off the bar.

cookiemonkie · Apr 28, 2006, 10:26 PM // 22:26

Any decent utility ele that had BF also brought Lighting Orb to assist in spikes. Add extinguish to the list of wards, snares and, and blind/blur ailment/hex and you are left with nothing for support offense.

As for the exact #'s of the assassins, don't really need to bother why? Make an assassin build and play it, see for yourself. From a monking perspective I'm more concerned about a good Assassin than a warrior, why?... with the nerfing of contemplation of purity.. it makes the assassin that much more effective. Does the Assassin change the current metagame? Of course it does.

Wasteland Squidget · Apr 28, 2006, 11:04 PM // 23:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

Any decent utility ele that had BF also brought Lighting Orb to assist in spikes. Add extinguish to the list of wards, snares and, and blind/blur ailment/hex and you are left with nothing for support offense.

If you need to participate in a spike, why are you swapping out Lightning Orb for Extinguish? Why not swap out another skill? Unless Lightning Orb is really the weakest skill on your bar then you'll be swapping out something else.

I'll grant that it's another skill Elementalist can power out with Prodigy, but that kind of skill doesn't signal the end of Eles as spike damagers. It seems like an odd connection to make.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiemonkie

As for the exact #'s of the assassins, don't really need to bother why? Make an assassin build and play it, see for yourself. From a monking perspective I'm more concerned about a good Assassin than a warrior, why?... with the nerfing of contemplation of purity.. it makes the assassin that much more effective. Does the Assassin change the current metagame? Of course it does.

I've played some assassin builds. I'll grant that their combos can be effective, but I haven't found any two-skill combo from the assassin that even begins to match up to Eviscerate + Executioners.

Furthermore, looking at an assassin build in a vaccum is the wrong way of going about it, because the assassin class is so ridiculously easy to disrupt. A lot of the good attack chains require something from the previous part of the chain - target must be hexed, target must be Crippled, or whatever. If you're facing monks that don't suck, it's not going to be long before they find the weak point in the chain and just start removing the key condition/hex and invalidating your combo.

That or they'll just throw on Guardian, thus owning the face of your combo and turning you into a gimped warrior.

As for CoP, I don't see how the nerfage to it is hitting you too hard. Most assassin combos have a recharge of longer than 10 seconds, so you should be able to CoP off crucial parts of the combo just fine.

I think assassins will have their place, but to be honest the best skills I've seen them use have been in the utility and disruptive lines, rather than in pure offense and damage.

cookiemonkie · Apr 28, 2006, 11:53 PM // 23:53

Its simply easy to see why lighting orb is swapped out. with 2 wards, blurred vision, BF, and a couple of snares, along with ether prodigy to power heals and extinguish. The ele is doing what its best at utility. More conditions from the Assassin metagame. Let the ele handle the high energy monk skills and free up the another backline character from having to use conditions removal.

As for the assasin? I guess you haven't seen a few observer matches of a few of the Assassin front builds running around with shadow refuge. I don't remember the guilds name but they went from unranked to top 100 in a single day beating some top 20 balanced build guilds along the way. Gaurdian is nothing if the monk waste their Contemplation of purity and then have rigor mortis on them and covered, thats why COP was nerfed... and thats what rigor mortis is for. Thats exactly what the guild did. But again you fail to see any usefulness in the assassin primary; All you did was make an example of an uncordinated attack, that sucks no matter the profession.