Elementalists summon the powers of earth, air, fire, and water and command them at will. They can inflict more damage in a single strike than any other profession. Earth Magic summons quakes and eruptions, encases enemies in stone, or protects allies. Air Magic harnesses the power of tempests to strike foes down with lightning or enable allies to run like the wind. Fire Magic manifests flames, fireballs, molten lava, and even meteors to burn enemies to a crisp. Water Magic conjures mist and ice to slow enemy movement and attacks, blur vision, protect allies against magic, and inflict cold damage on enemies. Elementalists have access to Energy regenerating skills, and when chosen as a primary character, they can increase their maximum Energy over time. The wise Elementalist avoids becoming surrounded, but keeps a local area-of-effect spell on hand just in case. — The Guild Wars Manuscripts The master of arcane lore and magical aptitude, the Elementalist calls upon the power of fire, earth, air and water to obliterate enemies. — in-game description Elementalists are multifaceted spellcasters who channel elemental forces, making fire, air, earth, and water do their bidding. What they lack in physical toughness, they make up for in versatility and the ability to inflict massive damage. __ Guild Wars 2 website This is just a reminder of what the original vision of the elementalist was. It will obviously guide my own opinion on the class as I will focus on a PVE standpoint.Elementalist is the mage archetype in the Guild Wars universe, it is frail by design but also deadly. The recent nerfs kept the elementalist frail but also made him not so deadly anymore, they also revealed that "damage dealer" was the only thing the elementalist was competitive at as the other role, support, is monopolized by the druid that brings everything a party needs.Elementalist is advertised as a damage dealer and I envision the elementalist as a damage dealer therefore my opinion will focus mostly on this matter. I. CORE ELEMENTALIST Core elementalist should not be nerfed because of weaver, the e-spec needed tuning on its own, the problem was not coming from the core traitlines that need more care and love before all else. I'd like to see core elementalist being a competitive option, the same way core guardian is. Core elementalist is all about this versatility, focusing mostly on damage but having easy access to supportive skill "just in case".Therefore Lava Font and Meteor shower nerfs should be tuned down.Now on core skills, staff and aoe.Elementalist should be the king/queen of aoe dmg. Meteor Sprinkles (check out Mela's vid, worth it) and Glyph of Sprinkles make no sense. I can understand that it was way too much dmg on big hitboxes but Weaver was at fault. Anet wants to reduce the disparity in the performance of these skills between big and small hitbox. Well maybe they need a mechanical rework.Will it be possible to transform MS into the forged attack that rains down from the sky? By this I mean: create an aoeinside this area up to five targets will be randomly chosen and a smaller aoe will be created on their position (same as the forged attack) and the meteor will fall.This change will make MS far more punishing, a skill that roots you for almost 4s should be potent and punishing. Big hitbox will most likely take all the projectiles, and the performance on small hitbox will remain competitive as projectiles will be set per targets and will be honed to their respective position.MS is a signature skill, dating back from GW1, a skill that has one sole purpose: obliterate, make it be.If possible make the glyphs work the same way Amala's Dwayna form performs with its lightning strikes. I won't delve into other skills as other members brought enough enlightened propositions but I will provide guidelines: Rework if technically possible the staff as said beforeClarify the design of water and earth weapon skills:Water does not feel "whole" as a concept, it provides poor healing when not geared and some occasional burst damage, make it more potent in terms of control,keep the healing while buffing it ever so slightly while reducing healing power scaling to balance things out.Rework the AA, I mean, just look at dagger water AA... tragic. I suggest an icy claw theme.Earth and bleeding is a good idea, just enhance the hard cc of earth ; for example a knockdown on staff Scepter and Focus need care.For balance reasons I guess, elem's AA have always been tuned down compared to other professions, let it be as a part of the design but make it worthwhile to cast your aoe and other spells, we have a lot of cd making us heavily dependent on alacrity, the latest nerfs are too punishing and changes must be made. Overall Elementalist requires an alignment to its original vision and more defined attunements. Concerning the traits: Fire should be the base core dmg spec, Conjurer is meh. Conjures should become ammo skill, there's nothing more frustrating than summoning you beautiful magical child on the perfect spot and seeing one teammate disengaging and rushing to put its dirty hand on your pristine scion... Make it selfish, ammo skill, proc an aoe damage spell effect when traited with Conjurer and grant a fire aura (see my new version of auras below).One with Fire, pulsing damage while under the effect of fire aura, remove the might buff.Blinding ashes should go with the theme of aura and blind when receiving fire aura.Air is not too bad, changes to make FA a thing again should be brought, I'd like to see it more offensive (see. 4 of this list). Make the Aeromancer's precision buff minor and replace it with dmg boost against vulnerable foes.Earth is nice for what it does but Diamond Skin should be changed by adding resistance to it for example on aura. While earth skills focused on bleeds and crits, the spec might focus on defense and barriers.Water, well see below with Tempest. Water should be scrapped from dmg bonus buffs that should be transferred to air (vulnerability dmg buff). It should focus on heal and control with an enhancement on chill and slow. In terms of utilities, conjures as ammo skills with a reworked Axe, cantrips could use a general cd reduction especially cleansing fire and lightning flash (also remove the damage and increase the range). II. THE TEMPEST Tempest did not really changed the core elementalist and that's the main problem. It was a glorified version of core with a dps/burst increase on F1-2 skills. Elem is already versatile and has access to a large skills pool, tempest should really change the way core plays by enhancing the aoe capacity and the support. Tempest can heal a lot but it's not that necessary in PvE, Tempest should bring aoe buffs, boons, deal aoe damage and make its allies part of the "tempest" with the help of aura. Tempest should unleash the storm on the battlefield with solid damage and good supportive skills to enhance its allies, making the whole party a tempest, a force to be reckoned with.Thus, auras should be buffed and made more original: (might need tweakings) Fire aura grants direct might, 5 stacks for example and keeps its active might generation on hitFrost aura is fairly good but condi dmg reduction should be added Magnetic aura, I'd like to see stab added with it, for like 2sShock aura would be nice with an aoe blind effect (inspired by: https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Lightning_Touch), after all, air is all about blinding effects.With that in mind auramancer should be built-in the base design of the Tempest by reducing the cd of aura skills. Tempest might use the overloads for damage (tweak a trait line for this matter) but will have the rest of its traits directed to offensive support. Scrapping prot on aura from earth (https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Elemental_Shielding) to give it to tempest lines might free the tempest from this trait line allowing it to focus on damage and utility by adding fire/air or arcane or even water (might be too much support).Earth Elemental Shielding should be replaced by barrier generation.Water line hinders Tempest by monopolizing most of the condi clear capacities but mostly by holding https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Powerful_Aura.Tempest should benefit from condi clear on aura without water. This way water condi clear will remain linked to regeneration and Tempest condi clear will be linked on aura, with the necessary changes to make it clear: Powerful aura should become a Tempest grandmaster trait by merging it with Elemental Bastion which will be stripped from its frost aura proc effect in exchange.Powerful aura should be replaced in water line by a damage enhancing trait to make sense with piercing shards and aquamancer training. III. THE WEAVER With the weaver our dps has skyrocketted to the heavens. Wigs across the world flew off... But it was mostly make up. Weaver clearly enhanced the only role where elementalist used to shine: dps. It is a dps spec, it is a power creep. But look at weaver now, just a shell of what is used to be.We loved Elements of Rage (EoR) but on a pure design standpoint it does not make much sense, Weaver is all about weaving magic and dual attune, therefore EoR should compliment dual-attunements gameplay. I did not appreciate the will to force weavers to gear for vitality. Elementalist is not about vitality, it feels out of place in my opinion and it's uncalled for. Weaver was the perfect occasion to bring back the PBAoE elementalist build of old. While Tempest makes sense being an offensive support class, Weaver should shine at dealing heavy but yet predictable PBAoe damage with means to engage and disengage. Why predictable? Well if you see a sword weaver coming to you, first of all you should be scared, second of all you should be able to take it out at range but if it reaches you, well pray the Six. It's more balanced like this.Building a bruiser build with an elementalist sacrifices a significant portion of your dps, therefore it's easier to build a weaver that is a glass cannon, high risk, high reward. We need the reward.The sword build damage should be buffed, it's not easy (I'm not saying it's not possible) for the scholar class with the lowest HP to fair at close range, we do not benefit from the evades (hello mirage) and illusions of the mesmer, nor the teleports and blind of the thief or aegis of the guardian... Stances are lackluster (looking at you Stone Resonance). Weaver illustrates an identity trouble.While Tempest was rather clear in which direction you could go with it, offense support, which can then be easily refined and enhanced, weaver does not have this luxury.You cannot create a spec that is supposed to deal melee damage with its e-spec weapon while not giving it either the high damage or the high defense/sustain necessary.Staff weaver is pure bliss dps, sword weaver is looking for an identity and other weapons set are lackluster because of core problems. Dual skills and attunement playstyle should be rewarded with this e-spec. Sword and dagger weaver: drawing inspiration from PBAoE of GW1 builds, it should benefit from good damage with effective damage mitigation that do not sacrifice your dps too much, evades, better barrier generation (stance), blocks maybe. The vision is, you go in, you destroy everything before you get destroyed. Of course remove Master's Fortitude HP boost for balance, btw it is quite weird that is does not work with the new EoR.Staff weaver: the pinnacle of dps, powerful aoe for days, staff weaver is the deadly cannon in the backline that can easily be taken down, but it should not be completely defenseless thanks to the core elementalist changes.Other weapon sets clearly need attention, scepter AA are simply not good and even Weaver cannot make it up.In terms of traits:Well EoR seems to be the main reason of all these nerfs, but it caused too much damage.If core elementalist is buffed, if weapon skills are buffed too (Lava font, MS, focus and so on...) then it will become less necessary to rely on flat damage bonuses (which are unhealthy for the game and quite boring). We already have it with fire and Air, make EoR enhance this aspect by bringing back a lingering effect:--> EoR enhances the X-mancer (pyro, aero, etc) bonus and make it linger on swap. Why? Because the only thing we get by "weaving" is just dual skills (and frustrating cooldowns)--> EoR makes you benefit from the bonus of each elements you are wielding.==> EoR will transform you into a master Weaver mage and might create a nice interaction with the core class.Keep the other GM traits as they insist more on dueling which is fine. TL;DR: Weaver should be a selfish e-spec that excel in one thing: obliterating foes. For this you should have two main ways: pure direct damage or better dueling. and the traits should reflect that.
