I really believe Ele needs some redesign

[Einlanzer.1627]

20 hours ago, fuzzyp.6295 said:

I understand your argument friend, the problem is you and I see Elementalist from different points of view.  You're trying to change the class, this is a rework suggestion after all, and I'm looking at it how its been previously balanced and the identity ANet has been pushing for Ele and its Attunements over the years. I just don't think it'd be a good idea overall and it will weaken the identity of each attunement and its purpose in the Ele's kit, making it even more of a balance challenge.

As ANet moves into having Water Catalyst doing  damage, maybe one day we'll see Air have a healing ability. I even said in my original post I think its great that Water is getting more DPS. But I just don't think trying to rework ever Attunement to do more than what it already does is practical and would just be even more of a balance nightmare for Ele. For Air to get that healing, something will need to be taken from it, no matter how thematically you try to make it fit in. I don't think that is the right way to go.

Bottom line, we disagree on this. You think it will make Ele better, I think it would make Ele worse. Thats all there is too it I guess, and thats fine. Different views are important. Yay.🎇

 

And I think you're wrong. This does nothing to weaken the identity of each attunement - you're just weirdly hung up on the idea that it does. In fact, the identity of each attunement is destroyed by the fact that you can't spend any signficant length of time outside of your main one without it dropping your efficacy to nothing. 

They are struggling to balance the class because it has a bad core design - fundamentally, that the attunements do not complement each other well, and instead each one is designed to work well only for a very specific build, with the others only providing situational utility that reduce your DPS or HPS to nothing by spending long in them. This forces attunenent dancing in a way that is much more aggressive than it should be or than feels good to play. 

This returns to my original argument - that attunement on paper seems like a stronger replacement for weapon swapping, but in fact is actually worse than weapon swapping as it just gives you a ton of skill bloat with less effective individual skills. 

The easiest way to fix this is to buff at least Water's damage values to something reasonable that doesn't destroy your DPS in seconds and offer some level of healing outside of Water attunement. That might be sufficient for everything but Staff, but honestly Staff needs more work than other weapons. 

Edited October 12, 2021 by Einlanzer.1627

[fuzzyp.6295]

7 hours ago, Aedil.1296 said:

Revenant, devastation trait line (the main DPS trait line) Battle scar effect. 

There you go 🙂

Having a sustain skill on a DPS heavy line is not the same as having a full trait line based around sustain/healing/cleanse that also has a decent power output, which is what I was referring too as the balance issue. Not to mention Elementalists will always have water as an attunement for healing, but Revs may not always have their healing focused line/legends, so having an ability like Battle Scars makes sense from a balance point of view.

I don't know if people think I'm somehow saying Water can't get better damage skills here, because I don't believe I ever said that. All I've said is that Water can and should be balanced without having to split up the healing to other attunements.

Edited October 12, 2021 by fuzzyp.6295

[AshenOwl.2485]

Personally, I think the answer is to spread the damage across attunements so that each attunement has a damage + utility identity. The way it stands now, the majority of damage is loaded into fire and air, with some condi in earth, and not a lot going on for water besides healing.

Spreading the damage out would give players the freedom to choose an element based on the utility the attunement offers, instead of doing your best to avoid one of your attunements. This would require Elementalists to cycle through all of their attunements in order to maximize their DPS, which I see as an absolute win.

[Einlanzer.1627]

6 hours ago, tesnow.4721 said:

Personally, I think the answer is to spread the damage across attunements so that each attunement has a damage + utility identity. The way it stands now, the majority of damage is loaded into fire and air, with some condi in earth, and not a lot going on for water besides healing.

Spreading the damage out would give players the freedom to choose an element based on the utility the attunement offers, instead of doing your best to avoid one of your attunements. This would require Elementalists to cycle through all of their attunements in order to maximize their DPS, which I see as an absolute win.

Exactly. But, in addition, I like the idea of spreading Healing out a little bit. Not as much as damage, which is why I suggested a couple of healing skills for Air.

Edited October 12, 2021 by Einlanzer.1627

[Aedil.1296]

11 hours ago, fuzzyp.6295 said:

Having a sustain skill on a DPS heavy line is not the same as having a full trait line based around sustain/healing/cleanse that also has a decent power output, which is what I was referring too as the balance issue. Not to mention Elementalists will always have water as an attunement for healing, but Revs may not always have their healing focused line/legends, so having an ability like Battle Scars makes sense from a balance point of view.

I don't know if people think I'm somehow saying Water can't get better damage skills here, because I don't believe I ever said that. All I've said is that Water can and should be balanced without having to split up the healing to other attunements.

Sorry this is a big no no. 

I am ex Ele main now revenant main. I go full DPS with battle scar and when I need extra healing I go either jalis or glint if I'm herald. I never touched the Ventari trait line which is supposed to be the healing one. 

I always have huge sustain and healing being a total DPS. 

[fuzzyp.6295]

2 hours ago, Aedil.1296 said:

Sorry this is a big no no. 

I am ex Ele main now revenant main. I go full DPS with battle scar and when I need extra healing I go either jalis or glint if I'm herald. I never touched the Ventari trait line which is supposed to be the healing one. 

I always have huge sustain and healing being a total DPS. 

Please consider the context of the original post.  I never said it wasn't possible to get good sustain and dps by choosing certain traitlines, I said it was hard to create an singular attunement on the Elementalist with access to good sustain and damage without making balance issues for the other attunements and class. In the context of the original post, I was saying creating Water with the same DPS level as Fire/Air would have lead to balancing problems.

One of the big differences between Battle Scars and Water is that Elementalist will always have access to its Water Attunement. It doesn't have to compete to be chosen, it can only be made stronger by speccing further into it. The fact that it is a baseline trait of the Elementalist means it has be considered more carefully in how it plays with the other attunements so its not directly competing with its own profession mechanic and adds to the overall synergy of the class.

Battle Scars is a great trait that rewards you for speccing into that style of play, but I'd imagine you'd consider it kinda problematic if it was a baseline trait across all the Rev specs and legends without any investment, and then further enhanced by speccing into Devastation.

Edited October 12, 2021 by fuzzyp.6295

[Aedil.1296]

1 hour ago, fuzzyp.6295 said:

Please consider the context of the original post.  I never said it wasn't possible to get good sustain and dps by choosing certain traitlines, I said it was hard to create an singular attunement on the Elementalist with access to good sustain and damage without making balance issues for the other attunements and class. In the context of the original post, I was saying creating Water with the same DPS level as Fire/Air would have lead to balancing problems.

One of the big differences between Battle Scars and Water is that Elementalist will always have access to its Water Attunement. It doesn't have to compete to be chosen, it can only be made stronger by speccing further into it. The fact that it is a baseline trait of the Elementalist means it has be considered more carefully in how it plays with the other attunements so its not directly competing with its own profession mechanic and adds to the overall synergy of the class.

Battle Scars is a great trait that rewards you for speccing into that style of play, but I'd imagine you'd consider it kinda problematic if it was a baseline trait across all the Rev specs and legends without any investment, and then further enhanced by speccing into Devastation.

Well to be fair I don't even think there is a revenant build without the devastation trait as you get Assassin's Presence only there. So it is basically mandatory either you are a support or a DPS to have the devastation trait line and therefore battle scar is available any way.

 

I have no idea on how to make the ele better to be honest, I am just hoping Anet will find a way 🙂

[Jski.6180]

I think a lot of ele problems are the non one step effects ele must get one effect to get another stronger effects where other classes just simple have the step 2 effect on a skill. Clears are a good example of this ele in a real way must clear though reg or though auras but over all they have very few skills that simply clears a condi for both it self and other players.

Dmg can be some what the same way ele must have a target burning and be in fire to do higher dmg  and not just simply do more dmg by using an effect.

Ele needs less low level boon effects that triggers "stronger" effects such as condi clear (not realty a strong effect) and get skills with the stronger effect.

[Shiyo.3578]

Expect more random nerfs, not reworks.

[Exzen.2976]

Buff Shatterstone

[Joswi.2635]

I definitely feel like it needs something changed to make it better. It's like ele can do so much so it's all underpowered so that it isn't overpowered. There is always another class that can do what you do but better. I think they worry about buffing it in anyway because you might end up with another firebrand that is just good at everything.

[Jski.6180]

I pension would like to see massive shift on where the utility are in the atument trait lines (re named as well where needed). There just some odd chose that do not fit the atument ideal.

Conaj weapons should be in earth line and give the player stab when in use. The though it earth magic is that of creating most of the time its making a rock in your had to throw at some one but your still making something. As well as your giving up your magic wepon skills to hold a mostly melee aimed wepon there needs to be a way to keep you alive when doing this and keep you moving at the same time.

 

Signet should be in water line as well as give an over all support effect to your group and not just for your self. Right now the core ele has very few utility that let you support your team on there own. Signet has 1 skill that heals your team something you cant say for any thing say conja bow and rez glyph (though these are very limited in there effects and use). So i suggest letting sigent be on the trait line with added effects of applying boons to your gorup as well as being able to shair the signet effects on some level. This will give signet a new life of use with out removing there curent effect.

 

Cantrips should be on fire atument line. This is mostly going back to the old fire line giving might on cantrips these are fast tricks utility to use during combat for your self only. It will let your power dmg though fire have ways of letting you get in to land more dmg in a burst OR simple give you the ability to deal with other ppl dmg mitigation of soft/hard cc. I like to see cntrips get might back on usages and add more reward for "landing" these effect on targets.

 

Arcain skills need to be on the air line (and renamed). Arcain skills are about landing crit dmg very fast with out the need for high crit rate. They also empower your ele to land harder crits. Arcain line is NOT about this type of dmg and speed of skill usage. Arcain skills simply dont fit in the arcain line by for there name. I would like to see arcain skill become less about condis and more about landing burst dmg and setting up to do more burst dmg.

 

Glyph skills should be on the arcain line. glyph skills are general utility that chase base off of your atument. This is what arcain line already dose so having glyph here would fit the very ideal of the arcain line far better then the current arcain skills. I like to see glyph get more condi effects base off of the ele current atument as well as more powerful self boons.

[Artyport.2084]

Ele is hard to design for because it has access to all attunements when it should really only have access to two. Jack of all trades classes always suffer 

[ScottBroChill.3254]

3 hours ago, Artyport.2084 said:

Ele is hard to design for because it has access to all attunements when it should really only have access to two. Jack of all trades classes always suffer 

agreed. And to that point, with how especs are, since ele has the jack of all trades ingrained into the weapons/mechanic, it's impossible to change the mechanic without breaking the weapons. This in turn makes EVERY espec have to be a jack of all trades which then results in what all of ele's especs are which is just more of the same + 1. It's also very apparent on catalyst because they tried to do some minor changes with the hammer like making water more dps oriented and making the mechanic, skills, and traits more in tune with staying in a fight and constantly attacking in order to get more bonuses. Only issue is that ele has become dependant on water for heals, many evade frames, and basically a whole lot of survivability to the point where if one of those is changed too significantly then ele has no leg to stand on. Everything on catalyst is there to bolster ele's offense but they totally screwed the pooch by forgetting that most of ele's survivability is on it's weapon skills, so catalyst has all this great stuff to become more powerful the longer they are in combat but has nothing in it's kit to last more than 10 seconds in a fight, and since the damage is more built-up based it barely makes a dent in any healthbars for that limited time of survivability. 

Catalyst isn't even a glass cannon, it's a glass snowball that gets smashed before it ever gets down the hill, totally dependant on others to keep it alive. It's a parasite and a leech lol 

[Puck.3697]

On 10/9/2021 at 5:50 PM, Einlanzer.1627 said:

I do not main Ele, but it is one of my favorite peripheral classes to dabble with due to its "mage" theme and some of its mechanics. Unlike other classes, though, certain facets of the base design simply don't work well, and it does not receive the proper attention it needs to make it feel good to play consistently. The poor reception of the Catalyst is a manifestation of general frustration among Ele players that I believe is totally justified.  

 

On 10/9/2021 at 6:39 PM, FrownyClown.8402 said:

The design problem comes entirely from high end pve. They should take a look at that instead of reworking ele

 

Catalyst needs scrapping imho.. it just iisnt good enough it feels like a Core ele with a Unfun F5 Ability effectively outside hammer nothing changes at all.. it defintly needed a Second mechanic to really make catalyst feel like a Elite really.

Imho Catalyst shoulda got some proper hybrid magic where it combines Elements into Attacks.

(if i could design Catalyst)

I'd of taken away attunements for the Specc and Replaced it with hybridizing magic.

whcih would Act as a F1 Ability So ur core abilities Would have Super low CDs to ensure u could Swap around the hybrid bars Quickly.

you get Weapon Swap + a Standard 5 Per Weapon Set, you can choose the Element which gains 2 abilities of.

F2 would be the Jade Orb. reactivating it would change the Element Instead of ur Attunement.

F3 Would move the Jade orbs Location.

When u combine the different Elements it'd change the Element ur F1 Goes into

so if u used a Fire ability then a Earth ability, you'd gain access to Magma Abilities which would be a combining of Earth and Fire Magics used Together these abilities would Contain Conditional Damage and Barrier

If u used a Water abilioty into a Fire Ability you'd gain Frostfire where u'd gain Attacks which both Heal and Power Damage.

If u used Water into Earth you'd gain nature Abilities, these abilities Condi Cleanse and Heal.

If u used Air into Water you'd gain Electricity These abilities are CC Abilities With Small power Damage.

and so on and so on.

onto the second point:

Elementalist doesnt need  a Rework as such but parts of it defintly needs fixing.

Staff and Sceptar need reworking into functional Ranged Weapons, we dont need a New Ranged weapon as much as these get reworked ( I Say this because having only 1 viable ranged weapon that requires a Elite to use imho just isnt good for versatility)

Core Ele eneeds F5 Arcane to give it a Feature that is traded off whe nusing a Elite over Core.

i think they could do something with Ele fields to make them relevant again realistically.

 

 

 

Edited October 26, 2021 by Daddy.8125

[Logos.3042]

I feel like Anet has not figured out how to address Ele utility while increasing a given role.

 

This will continue to hurt Ele until they decide to do something like raise base HP, sustain, or perhaps most importantly... limit attunements with a given elite spec.  

[Emberheart.8426]

23 minutes ago, Logos.3042 said:

I feel like Anet has not figured out how to address Ele utility while increasing a given role.

 

This will continue to hurt Ele until they decide to do something like raise base HP, sustain, or perhaps most importantly... limit attunements with a given elite spec.  

This would have actually been an issue if it was still 2014, but times have changed. The utility that ele brings inherently is nothing special. In fact it's way inferior to what other classes can bring for almost free, especially scourge, firbrand, and renegade. It's no longer a viable excuse for being conservative with what is given to elementalist, and it definitely does not demand a redesign to limit the attunements. In fact, if you are not allowed to clearly do the most dps, then more utility than others should be the reward for being the squishiest.

[usernameisapain.7163]

3 hours ago, Ganathar.4956 said:

This would have actually been an issue if it was still 2014, but times have changed. The utility that ele brings inherently is nothing special. In fact it's way inferior to what other classes can bring for almost free, especially scourge, firbrand, and renegade. It's no longer a viable excuse for being conservative with what is given to elementalist, and it definitely does not demand a redesign to limit the attunements. In fact, if you are not allowed to clearly do the most dps, then more utility than others should be the reward for being the squishiest.

Less attunements isn't a punishment, if those attunements gets a boost. Is what I think Logos was hinting at.

[Emberheart.8426]

1 hour ago, usernameisapain.7163 said:

Less attunements isn't a punishment, if those attunements gets a boost. Is what I think Logos was hinting at.

I am not saying that it is a punishment. What I am getting at is that elementalist inherently having utility from 4 attunements is not an issue, due to the overall state of the game. If anything it's not even enough utility, judging by the state of its DPS builds, compared to what is actually good at the moment. It's a pointless rework, that takes work that could have been used to improve core ele as it is designed now. 

[Logos.3042]

8 hours ago, Ganathar.4956 said:

I am not saying that it is a punishment. What I am getting at is that elementalist inherently having utility from 4 attunements is not an issue, due to the overall state of the game. If anything it's not even enough utility, judging by the state of its DPS builds, compared to what is actually good at the moment. It's a pointless rework, that takes work that could have been used to improve core ele as it is designed now. 

I disagree with you on this to a degree.  Ele benefits from all stats well, especially healing and more importantly can do both support/heal and dps well due to attunements.  If you made ele pick between attunements, you could arguably let them specialize better and actually excel at something.

I agree with you on boon support, ele is far from what it was at launch and nothing compared to current other elites, as you pointed out.  

Edited October 26, 2021 by Logos.3042

[Einlanzer.1627]

On 10/11/2021 at 8:44 PM, Aedil.1296 said:

Revenant, devastation trait line (the main DPS trait line) Battle scar effect. 

There you go 🙂

Indeed. It isn't hard at all, and it's the norm outside of Ele/water, and this is because it's controlled to a far greater extent by your gear than it is by the coefficients of the skills.

Again, there's no reason to make healing skills do terrible damage because if you're spec'd for healing the damage will be terrible, while if you're spec'd for damage the healing will be terrible. If you're spec'd for both, they'll both be okay. 

Bottom line - making them do slightly less damage than non-healing skills is the correct approach and should be the norm at this point, and this is especially true for healing autoattacks, which are super important for maintaining a reasonable baseline of DPS (it's fair to have some big heals on #2-5 skills that do no or very little damage, but Water attunement massively over-focuses on it).

This core problem with ele and water is in especially high display on the Staff, which silos each attunement's "role" to the point of absurdity.  Swapping to either Water or Earth will kill your DPS in seconds due to how undertuned the #1 skills on both attunements are in terms of damage output (even Air is still undertuned in this regard). This wrecks the entire playability of the weapon and results in the endless complaining about staff. 

 

 

Edited October 29, 2021 by Einlanzer.1627