GoodWithGravy.8019

Getting pulled off a wall: L2P Pull focusing commander: Sucks and should be fixed Hard CC should come with a building short-term immunity to reduce stab share dependence and make personal stun breaks more viable. Stab spam classes can have their output shaved to compensate. Eternal guard meta is boring.

Let's take a look at what the kind of people making these builds and benchmarks actually think about Ele: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/n25rto/thoughts_on_the_may_11_balance_patch_for_pve_and/ That's the start - they cover more in the full post. I can't believe after this long we still have to point out how poor of an indicator golem benchmarks are of actual viability. .....or the fact that PvP and WvW exist 😑

If anything, traits like stone heart should be given lesser effects (e.g. revert 33% of incoming crits to normal attacks) while out of the target attunement. One of the many problems all Ele specs have is that on virtually every weapon most builds have entire attunements that are too weak to be worth swapping to if you aren't traited in their line. A major part of this is the fact you effectively lose half of your traits when you swap to them. Attunement specific traits are Eles version of weapon specific traits, yet all but a small number were missed out when the sweeping changes were made to weapon specific traits on other classes.The changes were made for exactly the kind of reasons I mentioned earlier, and it is sad that Anet skipped Ele despite it being the most hard hit by traits like these. Unfortunately I think missing Ele was deliberate, specifically to keep the versatility low. The whole point of having four elements is completely undermined if entire attunements aren't even worth using. This gets worse when you swap to either of the E-specs because of their slower attunement swapping. Many similar things can be said about Eles outlier dependence on base stats too. Particularly the dependence on healing power for personal sustain. I find it crazy that people complain about (now deleted) menders Eles when you have other classes walking round in Demolisher amulets with close to the same sustain and tonnes more DPS/utility...

3 seconds is overkill. The main problem is spam and pulsing CCs undermine stun breaks (or at least the ones that dont also provide stability). I'd give stun breaks .75 s CC immunity to match the ICD between losing stacks of stability and then see how things settle down.

This thread probably seems a bit odd for anyone that remembers HoT release when Tempest was the only e-spec a trade-off (CD increase). Cool down increases (Tempest) and vastly increased swap times (Weaver) seem much more like real trade offs than having something replaced by an objective upgrade (reaper/DH/FB/etc.) Reaper shroud in particular is an example where replacing a skill bar slot alone is not considered a trade off - ANet gave it a faster depletion rate as a trade off years later. A few questions about the whole idea: Firstly - is there any record of any ANet Dev explicitly stating that a trade off must be a permanent removal of something? The thread seems to hinge on this and haven't seen it. Secondly, how does the increased time to access double attuned 3 skills count as a "permanent" removal when you can access them? How is increased time to access these skills different to increased time to access an attunement? This seems assumed true and I haven't seen any good argument of why this is justified. As a side note Weaver has many trade-offs: a base Ele can swap attunements every 2 seconds (4 with 8s cool down) whilst Weaver swaps half an attunement every 4 seconds - this is a 4x increase in weapon swap delay - they also lose all "on swap" trait effects if double attuning. I like the idea some people have raised of giving base Ele an F5 with some attunement dependent effect - especially the aura generator - I think also allowing this button to detonate any auras obtained (on separate CD from those on weapons) would be good and not OP.

I'd prefer leaving it as it is but make it so you can only use banners with the outnumbered buff

Arheundul is correct. It is very easy to remember the dates for when Ele disappeared from PvP. It was from the nerfs of Cleansing water and Signet of Restoration in April 2013 until these nerfs were reverted in April 2014: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cleansing_Water https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Signet_of_Restoration We all know what ANet are like about reverting nerfs, that was how badly they destroyed Ele.

In case anyone doesn't remember what Ele was like for the first ~2 years of PoF: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/51552/poll-current-most-useless-profession/p1 https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/53399/poll-has-the-most-useless-profession-changed/p1

I'd like a map with some of the basic WvW mechanics mixed up to promote fights, reduce snowballing and increase the impact of roaming. For example, objectives that could either upgrade, stay the same, or downgrade depending on how many Dolyacks they received in the last ~1h. Increasing the importance of camps and escorts. Also it would hopefully move the fights more to inside the objectives rather than being siege vs siege. Similarly, upgrading could upgrade some aspects but downgrade others, resulting in trade offs. For example, giving T1 keeps waypoints rather than T3, that way increased map mobility comes at the cost of objective vulnerability and the map mobility of each team becomes much more dynamic. I imagine more than a few players would be interested in a no down state border. There could even be a list of mechanic changes that cycle per matchup or even day. You could put these changes onto one of the alpines and not even need to make new assets. For a new map design though, I would be interested in a well templated (for balance sake) procedurally generated map that redraws itself every matchup. Each camp, tower and keep could be pseudo-randonly selected from a list of options. Things like towers and camps could potentially swap places if the assets for each can be designed to fit each location and avoid exploits. It may take some fine tuning but there would be new cata spots, treb spots, choke points, etc, every matchup. Maybe there could even be a smaller chance of moving keeps somewhere else...annoying as an unlucky layout could be in some matchups, the variation would be worth it. I wouldn't mind occasionlly zoning at the start of a matchup to find a mix up on the level of red keep and the ogre camp swapping places....

We don't want to change the roles, we want to create other viable options in those roles. Its not so much a case of why FB is meta so much as why no other options can compete. There are often other potential options for the same slots in each game mode but they don't get a look in because they typically have to invest completely in getting that one thing, leaving nothing left to compete with the extra tools that come baseline with FB, regardless of what traits or utilities it slots. This is true in every game mode. All that is needed is to is to change some of the "and"s in the FB kit to "or"s. That would avoid smiter's boon-ing FB because it can still provide the core things that make it viable in each mode, but without being bloated with so many other tools it removes other classes from the picture. There is also plenty good reason to add some of the tools to other classes. I mean, FB aside, why do we only have ~2 classes which can quickness share, ~2 which can alacrity share and, more importantly for WvW, only 1 class with viable stab share??? This is pointlessly restrictive to the game, especially given how key the boons are. You can either hit FB hard and the whole mode loses out, or shave FB and move those capabilities elsewhere. Both things close the gap by the same amount, but only one without reducibg the tools available to your party. The aim is to balance minimising changes to FB (which does need some, is clearly still bloated), with minimising changes to the whole party, in each mode. In short: Give other specs access to enough of a key tool to be viable in that role, make FBs have to chose from it's excessive extra kit to prevent it still having a monopoly. Firstly, for Revenant it is at least on varying elite specs, rather than all on FB. Secondly, at least in WvW, Rev is meta but not a mandatory slot in every party. Also, at least in both competitive modes, Rev is also in line for a tune down. Again, the problem isn't that they are meta in every mode, it is that they are such an outlier in every mode that other options for the same role are being shut out. FB has been doing this across the board since release. Sadly, outside of tuning numbers, balance is still game wide, so it does strongly affect what changes are likely to occur. Also, it is all evidence towards whether or not the design is overturned, and why. An outlier in one game mode and role can probably be corrected by much simpler means than something that is an overperforming across the board. Like you said, nerfing stab wouldn't do anything for PvE, so we could use that information to make a better choice. Ultimately I'd just like to be able to log on for WvW without knowing that if I don't go on my FB I will probably have to immediately swap. Combine that with peak hour queues and there's little point even trying to get in with another class.

Maybe if Firebrand was only oppressively meta in one game mode rather than all of them it could be a simple case of toning down some numbers or adding some tools to other classes. Currently FB can do so many things in a single build, some of its toolkit needs to be completely reassigned to other classes. For example, the tome 3 reflect bubble is excessive; there is already a utility Guard can slot for it, and other classes that bring less to a party could have had it as part of their role. Alternatively, a GCD on tomes should be considered to introduce opportunity cost - tomes are far too powerful to have all 3 as a baseline part of the spec. You should have to decide between healing, supporting or damage/pulls. Note that a GCD doesn't lock you permanently into one, it just makes you pick one each time. A grandmaster trait could allow access to all 3 but do nothing else and maybe even reduce the number of charges available. FB is also very low risk because almost it's entire utility bar is low cool down and instant cast. All mantras except the elite stun break could do with a 1/4 cast, again to introduce some opportunity cost. Though, that probably wouldn't be required if tomes were bought in line. None of these things make an instant condi pirate ship meta, they just make firebrand have to play by the same rules as most other specs and actually have to chose between the things it can do. Edit: FB aside, yes WvW needs much less hard CC.

Rather than theme I hope Anet focus more on giving the spec useful roles in every game mode and then actually provide tools to make it a viable/meta option in those roles.

Zerg retal has shut out a lot of builds ever since vanilla. Even post nerf builds like genade and flamethrower engi used to get downed by retal just for using their 1 skill for a couple of seconds. You could easily fix zerg retal without affecting roaming just by adding an ICD to receiving retal damage, something like 1 second between ticks, tune it for balance.

If trade-offs are being added to all elite specs - can we add some kind of positive side to balance the attunement nerfs that Weaver suffers? Dual skills are generally average to poor, so they provide no benefit over the normal 3 slot skills, which become difficult to access. Baseline (adept minor) barrier application is a joke... Do something like make both attunements count as the active attunement for other traits (still amazed this isn’t the case, are we double attuned or not?), revert arcane attunement to trigger on double attuning, etc A lot of effort seems to be going in to making sure the changes never give Ele any viable PvP builds. Also: Revert Ride the lightning, why did this not happen years ago?

This is clearly never going to happen but: This thread has been at the top of the forum 2 weeks, had 10K views, 300 replies and in that time even outside the Ele forum we saw this poll and this poll - both giving Ele twice as many votes for being the most underpowered class as all the other classes combined. Can we get some kind of response from a Systems team Dev acknowledging the thread has at least been read by the team, with a brief summary of what they have taken away from the thread as the core issues and how to approach them.

A legendary weapon should require playing every part of the game - I am surprised all the PvP components can be obtained over the TP. If any way of converting or crafting the gifts is introduced, I think the recipe should be locked behind an achievement based on obtaining them first, so players have to get at least 1 legit legendary first. Also, for Gen 2 legendaries the early collections require huge amounts of PvE, well beyond the relevant map gifts...the time spent WvWing is incredibly small. Unless you are happy with the Dev team sinking months into developing PvP and WvW only legendary crafting routes most likely at the expense of PvE content - because the PvP and WvW teams are small and fully tasked for the foreseeable future - it’s probably best to just make the most of your 4 hours in WvW. Heck you can even get the gift in Edge of the Mists which is pretty much an old school champ train.

Part of Ele's problem is its need to invest in healing power to make good use of many of its healing abilities - this is fair for AoE heals, and some classes have been adjusted to have the same high weightings (Druid springs to mind), but maybe for some personal abilities like Weaver barrier the base amount should be increased whilst healing powers effect is lowered. Or - some of the extremely powerful low investment healing of other classes should have its baseline reduced and healing scaling increased - Necro barriers and Adrenal health are exceptionally powerful for no healing power investment at all. It is unfair that classes with high health pools or armour can also ignore the healing power stat in their builds. A particularly bad offender is chrono - which has wells on lower cast times (before alacrity!) that have a base heal about as much as a full healing power Grandmaster traited Ele shouts - because of an Adept tier trait! So they are usable on their insanely brokenly OP boonshare build (that essentially all high end PvE revolves around...) without any investment... I would consider changing the minor master trait to somewhere between 750 and 1k base barrier with lower healing power scaling, and putting it on attunement swap rather than dual skill usage - 500 barrier every ~10-20 seconds is very underwhelming for a master tier trait and as with much of the weaver kit, punishes full attunement.

One problem for Ele in PvP and WvW is that a disproportionate amount of both its survivability and damage have been based on boons compared to other classes. The introduction of scourge, spellbreaker and even meta mesmer builds have hit it especially hard - an interesting change to diamond skin could be to make the Elementalist immune to boon corrupts and strips - no health threshold because these abilities are much rarer than condition applications. The current diamond skin is an example of the poor “when hit” trait design that is incompatible with Elementalists base stats. This would be a very different and situationally strong trait, without being OP due to the many classes which don’t rely on strips/corrupts and the fact it still allows normal conditions to be applied.

Not exactly a solution but something that speaks to why playing Ele generally feels a bit unfair - We have been given a wide array of unique changes to punish our abilities and no other classes with similar abilities seem to receive, classic examples include Ride the lightning, especially given Ele is currently one of the lowest mobility classes there is no excuse for its current stateDiminishing returns on 'storm' abilities - which already suffer from RNG in PvE and heavy retal in WvWA wide array of traits which are not particularly powerful yet are restricted to one attunementA comparatively huge array of weapon skills which root us, or have very long cast times, especially given we are the most vulnerable class in either scenarioMany classes have traits which have separate ICDs for different foes, but it couldn't be done for blinding ashesDisproportionate trade offs for our elite specs:Tempest's lockout is far too long, as are the cast times of the overload effects, especially given they require us to be melee rangeCore Ele can swap attunement on average every 2.5 seconds, a weaver swaps half an attunement every 4Essentially, frustration at the general lack of any initiative taken to fix Elementalist's fundamental problems is exacerbated by the contrasting creativity the balance team puts in to nerfing anything viable we have.... All in all our core mechanic does make up for what we have to sacrifice for it. The lack of weapon swap cutting out the ability to swap between ranged and melee is incredibly limiting - conjures don't even begin to fill the gap. Meanwhile half of the skills on every weapon (and a large number of dual skills) are pointless filler...if your mechanic is having twice as many weapon skills, half of which are useless, you don't have a class mechanic. Every ability needs to be impactful, take air staff 2 - why is a blind on an ability with a 1s cast time? Another part of the reason Ele remains so weak is that its only real method of survival is healing (less so on sword weaver, but it is still important there!), which requires it to first take damage, which - Ele is poorly built to do; our class is a chicken and egg problem. We need more baseline mitigation or avoidance tools. This is also one of many reasons that Golem benchmarks are atrocious balance metrics. Furthermore, we are the only class that, regardless of build, has to give up our own pressure to heal; all water autos should put out similar pressure to the rest of the stances, the cost of swapping to water is the loss of damage and CC abilities in the attunement - again many other classes do not even have give those up to get their sustain....Even in celestial avatar, Druids still have Smokescale etc! On a similar note - something which has posted repeatedly in every balance thread for years now - why is almost all of Elementalists condition cleansing dependent on the Water tree? The Devs had a clear ability to remove the reliance with Unravelled Hexes by making it a condition clear when super-speed or swiftness is applied (amongst a number of other options). With Tempest to make introduce condition clears when auras are applied, instead regen is always added. All of these ideas were raised, yet the balance team stubbornly shoe horned water in, it doesn't come across as an unhappy coincidence because of how things were balanced, it seems like Ele players are being flat out forced into something they don't want to do... Furthermore, a lot of lazy changes have unnescecarily removed a lot of the rewarding aspects of Elementalist - the removal of Arcane Fury is and always will be a mistake. Elementalist is one of few classes which has a weakness as part of its core design philosophy, similarly its specialisations are one of few which have sacrifices as part of their core philosophy (for comparison: what exactly does Chronomancer give up?) Whilst there are many widespread problems, I think a start would be - since you appear to have given up on the high damage and versatility parts of the core design, to scrap the vulnerability part as well, move a large array of mitigation traits to the baseline (including Lingering Elements), add more active defences to weapons - not rooting ones like earth sword 2 please... The core theme of weaving the elements will stay in tact even if we stop being 1 shot by auto attacks. This will not solve all of Elementalist's problems, but not having a hollow shell of a baseline class will make it easier to balance in the long run. Now time for my token crazy:Make tempest work a bit like Scourge - have 2 storms which can't hit the same target, one centred on the Ele, one centred on a (changeable) target at 1200 range. Would make dagger tempest a lot more interesting...