[Ele is trash]

I think ele overall is in a okay spot.  That said, calling staff support tempest 'meta' is dumb.  Like others mentioned, its pretty much only good in tournies or in the very rare occasion that you get an ideal team comp.  It's terrible at holding a point by itself, and hits like a wet noodle.  It has to offer a little more to be worth using in ranked matches.  Same could be said for other supports probably.

 

[[deleted]]

2 hours ago, shion.2084 said:

If I played ele, I'd make sure I didn't do that in order to avoid the nerfs 🙂

How does ele do into warrior on a side node these days?   I have the worst time trying to kill BS's (which is BS) and solid SB's with my build.  

If you're playing cata, you shouldn't have too much trouble with SBs.  Most of them rely on stun-locking you in order to win, which shouldn't be a problem with the amount of stability spam cata can put out.  I've never had any issues with BSs.

[Yo CMC - the ele empire is here - all classes lose viability in the face of ele]

1 hour ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Also, one thing you should look into with your build, which I found interesting when I actually tested the numbers on it. The coefficients on the burst heals like Staff 3, CA Kit 3&4, and all blast heal finishers, are extremely low. The difference between wearing Avatar or Demolisher as example, the Avatar +500 is only adding about +10% more heal factor to those burst heals.

Kinda wondering if this also applies to other support builds.  Anyone try running support tempest without avatar/sage?

[Stealth attacks are the cause of dcs at starts of matches]

FYI, setting graphics options to 'best performance' seems to greatly reduce your chances of crashing.

[Please reconsider adding barrier to Armor of Earth]

43 minutes ago, Eddie.9143 said:

It's not a stun break so this is more of an ability for core to take, cata will most likely still use their blocking barrier skill 

 It is a stun break.

[Please reconsider adding barrier to Armor of Earth]

Unless it's a minuscule amount (100-200 per boon).  Even after the slight nerfs to deploy jade sphere, catalyst will still be able to put out huge amounts of boons on itself.  It doesn't need any more ways of increasing its already crazy amounts of sustain.  And now on a reduced cooldown (from 60s down to 40s).

[Ele changes previewed so far on Feb 3 preview]

Holy kitten, meaningful changes to staff.  Never thought I'd see the day.  I hope they can also make changes to earth 5 on staff, it's incredibly clunky and hard to hit someone with it.

[Please make staff autos ground targeted]

Well, looks like my suggestion isn't very popular.  I liked the idea since most staff skills are already mostly aoe skills anyway, and I can pretty reliably predict where someone will be with ground targets. Plus, if water auto became ground targeted, it would a be a lot easier to use it to heal allies.

[Please make staff autos ground targeted]

If the projectile speed of the staff auto attacks is never going to change, can we at least have some of the autos be ground targeted?  Specifically looking at the fire and water autos since they already have an aoe radius.  It would go a long way towards improving the reliability of actually hitting a target.

[Non support Tempest]

I use this build a lot: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PGgAs2lZwaYLsOGJO2P7tdA-z5YXGJUARmAqOAA

 

Good sustain, good condi cleanse/protection spam/minor healing/might generation for your team via the shouts, and decent damage.  Typically all you need to do is stand back and press 1111111111 a lot while in fire attunement.  Downside is 0 burst potential.

[Season 2 NA 1v1 Ladder Open Now - New 1v1 LFG Channel For Those Seeking General Practice For SPvP]

What happens when no one is winning?  Is there a time limit?

[WvW - Flamestrike Will Need To Be Nerfed. [Issue Resolved]]

Scepter in general is gonna get nerfed.  Played it in spvp,  it's ridiculously strong right now. 

[Engineer Spam getting really bad in sPvP [Merged]]

10 hours ago, Sahne.6950 said:

Yet you have people crying that ele succs.....   in all honesty.....  Tempest is borderline overpowered right now....

 

Yup.  For the first time in a long time.

 

Still wish that applied to staff ele though. 🥲 

[Tempest is the better Catalyst? here´s why!]

Played a variant of this build.  It's actually pretty kitten strong. Only major downside is that it's mobility is kitten.

[Everyone gets all or limited?]

Having every class fulfill every role seems like an unrealistic expectation. 

[Shocking Aura is objectively bad for the game and I'm tired of pretending it's not.]

Remove shocking aura.  Remove magnetic aura.  Please make tempest a wet paper bag...

[3 Major Flaws of Catalyst]

Energy definitely sucks.  Please make cata less complicated.  Ele is already one of the least accessible classes.

[Buff Staff (annual update)]

Buff staff.  Just increase projectile speed. That's it.  Not asking for much.  Just want to actually be able to hit moving targets.

[Alac heal tempest is almost there but]

buff staff

[How to win 1v1's/Duels?]

26 minutes ago, SamuelW.2685 said:

Title, I have ZERO CLUE how to win duels and idk where to start.

Sometimes I'll go into the arena in the pvp lobby and just duel people, but most of the time I lose and when I win idk how I managed. I get by in WvW though, I mostly stick to zergs but sometimes I'll find myself in small groups of a dozen or less and I fare fine in those too, even in 2v2's or 3v3's I do well, once I won a duel too but again, idk how.

I play Thief and Mesmer in PvP if that matters, in case there's classes that are better or worse for duels, I also plan to level Rev to use Dragoo - I mean Vindicator as my next class

Well, you're playing thief and mes so there's your problem.  Neither is great in 1v1.  From what I hear, vind is hard to learn but great once you learn it, so prepare to suck for a while.  Play harbinger if you want easy mode.

[About Those Tempests]

3 hours ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

I don't care to dig through patch notes to prove anything because I very specifically remember somewhat recently reading where that buff occurred and I thought to myself in that moment "Oh this is why everyone is bailing Core Guard for Tempest. Makes sense."

Ele did not receive any significant buffs outside of dagger buffs and alacrity from pre-EOD.  You should read patch notes especially after telling me to read patch notes.

[About Those Tempests]

46 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

Because it happens. There isn't always enough Ele players online to fill each team.

This is very simple straightforward observation.

1. p2+ teams with no support lose to p2+ teams with Tempest Support 90% of the time. But a team with no support is able to equally fight a team with Guard Support.
2. During the last 2v2 season, for almost a week straight, I noticed that when I clicked on people near the ffa who had plat badges, 90% of those players were Elementalists. <- Not even exaggerating this.
3. When no Supports are present, the game feels fluid to play. Even when Guard Support is present, the game feels fluid to play. But when Tempest Supports are present, the game plays like a traffic jam. This was always true, but lately the traffic jam is worse than it's ever been because of the sheer buffing Tempest has received.
4. Guard Support has D tier damage, B tier self sustain, C tier mobility, C tier cc output, A tier defensive support, C tier offensive support. Tempest Support has C tier damage, A+ tier self sustain, C tier mobility, S+ tier cc output, A tier defensive support, C tier offensive support.

After recent Ele buffs, Tempest is just straight pushing out bloated numbers for what it is. It should have tradeoffs like the Core Guard does, where it has high healing but low damage, has high boon generation but low utility support. Tempest is pumping high DPS for a Support, high self-sustain for a Support, high party support factors, and easily the best utility support in the game due to Aura Share.

Tempest is simply over-buffed right now. Nothing mysterious or complex has happened to make Tempest good other than those very direct buffs that have been given to Ele in the past few bigger patches.

The main crux of the problem is that the Tempest itself is way too hard to kill for a Support. It could almost be defined as a Bunker Support at this point. 

After all of those buffs, they need to adjust some other things on Ele in general to put it back into realistic balance. Shock Aura needs to go from 1s stun to a 1s daze. Stone Heart needs to work differently. Conjure Earth Shield needs a review. And it does not need 7s of party Alacrity per overload, obtainable with no concentration and no +boon duration.

This is a team fight meta. It is actually more rewarding to zerg around off node and snowball combats first and then worry about nodes later. This is the first time we've ever had a meta like this and it occurred after EOD drop when the mobility creep took a big jump forward. It is rarely rewarding to side node unless you're truly an excellent player because you'll get +d in under 10s and be forced 1v2, usually. Snowballing around maps as a zerg is rewarding because of so many compounded teleport bursts in the game now, which allows for exponentially faster kill rates while traveling as 3+ man wherever you go. It's very easy to get to nodes and full decap a map after sending the opponents on a full or near full wipe, due to mobility creep. The only thing that's important now, is winning team fights, no matter where that occurs, on or off node. Win team fight = auto snowball = fast triple decap. We've almost entirely lost the classic dynamic of team fight/support/roam/side node roles.

Realistically right now, it's just Support/Bursters. They've power crept everything so much that somewhere along the lines Team Fighters and Roamers became the same thing, now better defined as Bursters. Old Side Node builds aren't working anymore due to that mobility creep allowing for too fast of +s. You just need to run a Burster with good grade mobility. Side Node is no longer a job role but more so an action you can take if it happens to be advantageous. It's not really something you design a build around anymore. Really, team fighting - roaming - +ing - side noding, these are plays or actions that can be taken now. They are no longer job roles.

The "Burster" archetype could be more offensive less defensive or more defensive and less offensive, but all non-supports do the same thing in Conquest now. They move around the map together as a team fight presence and burst for kills. There is no more dedicated Roaming or dedicated Side Node play. When we play Unranked/Ranked where p2+ is mixed in with g1+ it sometimes feels like dedicated Roam and dedicated Side Node is still a thing, but this is simply not true in p2+ vs p2+ 5man organized. Mobility creep has changed everything.

As far as damage types, both power and condi are equally of value in higher tiered play. Some classes are better at power or condi due to class design yes, but the damage types as a base are equally as valuable as the other. I think this may be the first time I could say that about a current meta. Some matches it may be better to go more power comp, others more condi comp, but the rock/paper/scissors here is a balanced rock/paper/scissors.

Due to so much team fight oriented zerging in Conquest nowadays, it does empower Support play. But this does not change my opinion that Tempest has too much value too much potency with the way the game is being played now, and it is largely due to over-buffing Ele in general. Again, the crux of the problem is that the Tempest itself is too sustainy for a Support. It has no tradeoff decision between "selfish-sustain" or "party-support" it just gets to have both. Ultimately this is all a domino effect set into motion from mobility creep, but that mobility creep is very real, it has changed everything, and it is here to stay. I highly doubt Arenanet has any plans to full dial-back everyone's mobility. And as such, Support Tempest needs to be dealt with. It's too impactful for what it is with how the game is being played now.

That is definitely not what we need. The game does not need power creep. In higher tiered play people are already blowing each other up in 2s with bursts with +ing. The damage in the game is right where it needs to be. It's just that Tempest is too hard to kill man. As a dedicated Support it should not also be a Bunker.

Strangely enough, I can say that the game feels fine outside of a few nuances in balance here and there, but when Support Tempest is present everything feels like a traffic jam.

Again, a team with no Support Guard can beat a team with a Support Guard. It's just a difference in play styles selected, those two comps being generally equal in outputs, just different. But when a team with no Tempest plays into a team with Tempest, you are greatly punished for doing so.

Tempest is too impactful right now. It also is completely shutting certain things out of viability. I'm not saying you SHOULD be playing a PD Thief or even that it would be good if Tempest wasn't around, but I am saying that it should a least be a viable option if you want to play it, as example. But due to Support Tempest, that build is actually 100% entirely useless. Too much anti projectile, too much passive CC, too much cleanse. Support Tempest has this effect on many build structures. It's created like an existential crisis vs. half the build structures in the game. It's not that Support Tempest counters them or even hard counters them, it's that Tempest doesn't allow them to play at all.

Support Tempest's defensive capabilities are bloated man.

Nah, Support Tempest is on a different level of effect than general over-tuned classes. When Supports that negate & nullify 50% or more of all attacks & build structures become too strong, that is an entirely different deal than having some Roamer be slightly too strong.

Tempest needs to be dealt with. It's over-buffed and it's gating way too many build archetypes out of viability.

Man, I'll be honest, I didn't read your post cause it's too long.  But tempest is literally in the same spot it was pre-EOD. No major changes or buffs.  And it wasn't even meta pre-EOD.  If you think it's too powerful in the current meta....then switch back to playing the pre-EOD meta.

 

[PvP as a new Guardian. Tips?]

Play it and learn it.  You'll get there on your own eventually.

[Bias Aside, What is the Absolute Strongest Class in PvP Right Now?]

Harbinger by far.

[About Those Tempests]

49 minutes ago, Trevor Boyer.6524 said:

If you go stand near the ffa and pay attention to who is wearing plat+ badges next to their name, 9 out of 10 of them are Elementalists.

That is actually happening this 2v2 season.

2v2 is a meme season man.  No nerfs/buffs should be based around how well a class performs in the 2v2 season.  Plus, hardly anyone even plays the 2v2 season.