how about this for a real change?

Since Anet loves Mesmers and Thieves so much, that they think a 15k vault, no risk high reward gameplay is 'Balanced', so they will never hit these two classes with the 90% damage reduction nerf hammer they deserve (and thieves deserve to be hit with that for 6 years now).

How about these two simple changes?

a) make all ele skills cast on the move. No more 4s of waving your arm around, being a perfect target, to get some random hits with meteor shower (of which half end up eaten up by barrier, the rest is blocked). No more standing still for pile driver or churning earth.

b) remove the line of sight restrictions. Rangers are free to hit at 1.5range, without worry, why not ele? Ranger also has unblockable, a fine selection of pets and other goody stuff (apart from insane healing).

a third one that.. is less of a concern but would make some mesmers and thieves shit their pants: make all arcane attacks unblockable and undodgeable.

Ele needs something like a 30% damage buff on all of its sword/dagger skills to even be slightly competitive. That's not even starting to go into the all the mechanical flaws the class that make it unwieldy.

PvP has become a game of "who can put out the biggest burst?" and ele isn't even on the scoreboard for that. Most classes have near mender's Weaver level of sustain while putting out 2-4 times as much damage and tossing out CC like it's built into every single one of their low CD skills. (Oh wait....)

Ele seems to get balanced purely around Cellofrag, Phantaram and Roul (in PvE) while classes like Mesmer/Reaper get balanced around low gold scrubs.

@"NaturallyNick.4058" said:Ele needs something like a 30% damage buff on all of its sword/dagger skills to even be slightly competitive. That's not even starting to go into the all the mechanical flaws the class that make it unwieldy.

PvP has become a game of "who can put out the biggest burst?" and ele isn't even on the scoreboard for that. Most classes have near mender's Weaver level of sustain while putting out 2-4 times as much damage and tossing out CC like it's built into every single one of their low CD skills. (Oh wait....)

Ele seems to get balanced purely around Cellofrag, Phantaram and Roul (in PvE) while classes like Mesmer/Reaper get balanced around low gold scrubs.

It's not the damage of sword that is the problem. When you look in PvE, it actually does great damage. The problem is that this damage does not translate well against players, and that is what needs to be fixed instead of giving it even more useless damage buffs. There are many things that hold ele back from unleashing its true damage potential in PvP, compared to other classes.

First of all, elementalists need to invest way more into defensive stats than many other classes in order to get to an acceptable level of survivability. As you have pointed out, many classes have near mender weaver survavability. This survivability barely requires stat investment compared to weaver, which leaves them free to invest into more damage stats. As long as ele is chained to mender's, it simply won't do good damage unless you boost the damage of skills by utterly insane levels. It is obvious that survivability should be the main focus here.

The other issue is landing the skills themselves. For some reason the devs love to give elementalist all of the slow cast/aftercast/delay skills. You just can't give a class that is lacking even more drawbacks for no reason. Maybe if fits a caster "theme", but in that case ele should also get the benefits of the theme, which is a huge payoff compared to other classes. That payoff is not there, and it will never be there because of PvE so let's stop giving ele all of the long cast times and disadvantaging the class for no good reason.

Also, the lack of unblockables does not help. Many other classes have a good amount of them, which helps confirm some damage. Ele does not have this advantage either. I also have to mention boons, where there are several classes that stack might quicker and/or have quickness.

Even if you could land all of your DPS on a stationary golem, you're looking at 3.5k (with the full 20 might stacks). Compared to the 20k of a power shatter mesmer, 17k death's judgements, 25-30k maul+wordly impact, 5-6k over 6-10+ seconds of guardian burst, meme dps of reaper, etc. It's still woefully undertuned. Even engi does more DPS. Pretty sure Firebrands could compete with Weavers at this point.

There is something that bugs me with ele, and auras in particular.in Fire line: Might on aura (before Smothering Aura)Air: Swiftness and FuryEarth: ProtectionTempest: Regen/Heal/VigorWater: Peanuts.

What I suggest:Smothering Aura: Gaing Might on aura + Any aura apply burning when hit (in addition to existing effects).Soothing Ice-> Soothing aura: heal and gain regeneration when applying an aura to yourself or ally. Any Aura apply chill when hit.Zephyr's boon: unchangedElemental shielding: Auras grant protection and stability.

Elemental Bastion->Powerful AurasPowerful Aura> Powerful healing: Regeneration now stacks in intensity.Invigorating torrents->Aura restores a small portion of endurance.

Does it sound OP?