When I created my first ele in 2012...

[greedywholesome.9081]

I remember the description of the class as being along the lines of (non-verbatim) a "powerful ranged caster...etc etc"

Doesn't matter what mode, nerfing ele staff, as bad as it already was, is the most ridiculous "patch" this game developer has ever made. 

They also nerfed core engie. No sense, no sense at all. 

Maybe they play "spin the bottle" to determine what to patch.

[Dadnir.5038]

When people created their first ele in 2012, they quickly came to the forum to say that the profession was trash.

Then some people tried to cycle through the attunment and go melee and all of a sudden everybody was complaining that elementalist was OP.

After looking about, this is the quote to the 08/27/2012 elementalist:

Quote

Elementalists harness the magic inherent in air, earth, fire, and water to their advantage.

Nothing about range.

Edited May 11, 2022 by Dadnir.5038

[greedywholesome.9081]

20 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

When people created their first ele in 2012, they quickly came to the forum to say that the profession was trash.

Then some people tried to cycle through the attunment and go melee and all of a sudden everybody was complaining that elementalist was OP.

After looking about, this is the quote to the 08/27/2012 elementalist:

Nothing about range.

 

here you go:

 

I guess others felt misled too

 

 

 

 

[Eddbopkins.2630]

For me the closest feel to a long range caster comes from fresh air weaver.  It's only 900 range but it is sometimes effective in pvp.

Edited May 11, 2022 by Eddbopkins.2630

[Arheundel.6451]

48 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

When people created their first ele in 2012, they quickly came to the forum to say that the profession was trash.

Then some people tried to cycle through the attunment and go melee and all of a sudden everybody was complaining that elementalist was OP.

After looking about, this is the quote to the 08/27/2012 elementalist:

Nothing about range.

Hmm....no?! The OP is right and they changed the initial description to suit their agenda , originally the elementalist was described as light armor class favouring ranged combat and able to deal massive damage to compensate for the designed weakness compared to other professions.

And again, people in the beginning were complaining because ele was not able to play like other professions while using 2 or even 3 offensive traitlines.

A famous mesmer from team paradigm pointed this out to the devs during one of the very first open QA in 2013...and devs like Jonathan Sharp were clearly on the end rope

..because every major editing outlet was saying the same thing about ele in 2012...how the class was very weak...then....

Then @Daphoenix came along....publishing videos of him playing full water bunker with arcane d/d in wvw...not killing anybody mind you...but still able to survive as full bunker ele...since then the devs decided to capitalise on d/d and save themselves from redesigning the elementalist..they changed everything...even the description of the class...from squishy ranged caster dealing massive single target dmg to what you can read now on wiki.

Elementalist is a full ranged caster in GW1...that what people signed for, and that was how the gw2 ele was marketed as in 2012....the OP is 100% correct 

[greedywholesome.9081]

38 minutes ago, Eddbopkins.2630 said:

For me the closest feel to a long range caster comes from fresh air weaver.  It's only 900 range but it is sometimes effective in pvp.

 

Yes I still play FA and LR weaver in pvp. Old habits are hard to change I guess. They're rare now but I'm always happy when I see a weaver in pvp either on my team or opponent. 

[greedywholesome.9081]

14 minutes ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Hmm....no?! The OP is right and they changed the initial description to suit their agenda , originally the elementalist was described as light armor class favouring ranged combat and able to deal massive damage to compensate for the designed weakness compared to other professions.

And again, people in the beginning were complaining because ele was not able to play like other professions while using 2 or even 3 offensive traitlines.

A famous mesmer from team paradigm pointed this out to the devs during one of the very first open QA in 2013...and devs like Jonathan Sharp were clearly on the end rope

..because every major editing outlet was saying the same thing about ele in 2012...how the class was very weak...then....

Then @Daphoenix came along....publishing videos of him playing full water bunker with arcane d/d in wvw...not killing anybody mind you...but still able to survive as full bunker ele...since then the devs decided to capitalise on d/d and save themselves from redesigning the elementalist..they changed everything...even the description of the class...from squishy ranged caster dealing massive single target dmg to what you can read now on wiki.

Elementalist is a full ranged caster in GW1...that what people signed for, and that was how the gw2 ele was marketed as in 2012....the OP is 100% correct 

 

Was bitter about the WvW staff and GS elite conjure target nerfs. 

 

If played strategically in WvW, I would double meteor shower in choke points with staff catalyst. It felt nice using staff again and melting zergs larger than ours. For once in a long long time, I felt like a mage lol. 

 

The target reduction of fiery GS was brutal too. 

 

 

[greedywholesome.9081]

Being honest and blunt is what I'm all about. I don't like making crap up. Thanks @Arheundel.6451 for knowing the history behind this class. We kinda have bunches in common = our love for ele and disdain for...lol, necro, lol 

Edited May 13, 2022 by greedywholesome.9081

[Ace.1784]

On 5/11/2022 at 11:18 AM, Dadnir.5038 said:

When people created their first ele in 2012, they quickly came to the forum to say that the profession was trash.

Then some people tried to cycle through the attunment and go melee and all of a sudden everybody was complaining that elementalist was OP.

After looking about, this is the quote to the 08/27/2012 elementalist:

Nothing about range.

And Karl (Anet dev) gave a masterclass on how to play Staff Ele, MELTED opponents. Those who followed suit replicated that success, leading to the nerf from beta into pre-launch.

On 5/11/2022 at 12:47 PM, greedywholesome.9081 said:

 

Was bitter about the WvW staff and GS elite conjure target nerfs. 

 

If played strategically in WvW, I would double meteor shower in choke points with staff catalyst. It felt nice using staff again and melting zergs larger than ours. For once in a long long time, I felt like a mage lol. 

 

The target reduction of fiery GS was brutal too. 

 

 

This may be a joke, but this is a video game. You are not the main character. There are other players who need to have a good experience.

There is no way you can justify a single player killing a group of players. Those things happen in Marvel, in anime, or your favorite book. It's great for a story, but in a multiplayer environment, it is poor balancing.

WvW should be about group, coordinated spikes, just from the nature of the game mode.

[frareanselm.1925]

Anet forcing players to play melee and condis. "Promoting" build diversity.

[greedywholesome.9081]

42 minutes ago, Vinteros Asteano.1209 said:

This may be a joke, but this is a video game. You are not the main character.

Im not the main character. Queen Jenna is. Or the Pale Tree. But in my account, I'd like to think I'm the main character. 

Quote

 

There are other players who need to have a good experience.

There is no way you can justify a single player killing a group of players.

Thanks for thinking that I single handedly killed a group of players. Oh you, I'm not that good, stop making me blush. 

Quote

 

Those things happen in Marvel, in anime, or your favorite book.

I don't read comics or anime and find films based on comics to be a bore. You mentioned books. Two of my favorite books when I was starting out in life are: Only the Paranoid Survive by Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel and Crossing Chasm by Geoffrey Moore. Neither books mentioned eles though.  

Quote

 

It's great for a story, but in a multiplayer environment, it is poor balancing.

It's not a story, it's swift and strategic performance. 

Quote

WvW should be about group, coordinated spikes, just from the nature of the game mode.

I agree. I  love small coordinated groups that win in outnumbered WvW fights through the use of terrain, single or double flanking, going ape schitt at choke points and having the right comp. 

Edited May 14, 2022 by greedywholesome.9081
Credit goes to commander

[Puck.3697]

Tbh. 

As a ranger, I can say I still stand directly infront of the boss when using my longbow. I can't say using a ranged weapon feels any different. .

Although lack of any ranged options does feel bad when mechanics and things create a gap between you and the enemy. 

Although I blame conjures being so terrible for the fact elementalist lost that part of its compensation for no weapon swap more. That and ofcourse the repeated choice of elites having melee weapons 

Edited May 14, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Jski.6180]

I was all about the combo fields less about doing my own combos that game realty changed from that point of view and been out right power creeped from combos having an meaningful effect. Most of ele as an class is just out dated and balanced for 2012 with a bit of bits and pieces balanced for now. The over all kit of the ele class is updated as such a slow paces vs the other classes that you will never see the old days of ele being justifiably for having the lowest hp / def and missing most of the effects of other classes.

[AliamRationem.5172]

48 minutes ago, Jski.6180 said:

I was all about the combo fields less about doing my own combos that game realty changed from that point of view and been out right power creeped from combos having an meaningful effect. Most of ele as an class is just out dated and balanced for 2012 with a bit of bits and pieces balanced for now. The over all kit of the ele class is updated as such a slow paces vs the other classes that you will never see the old days of ele being justifiably for having the lowest hp / def and missing most of the effects of other classes.

I think the combo field mechanic is a lot of fun and very underutilized.  I hope they find ways to bring it back in a big way.  In my opinion, it would have been a better way to go than all of this passive boon generation.

[Jski.6180]

44 minutes ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

I think the combo field mechanic is a lot of fun and very underutilized.  I hope they find ways to bring it back in a big way.  In my opinion, it would have been a better way to go than all of this passive boon generation.

It use to be rare to have an water field and even rarer to have an forst field but the power creep for the other classes anet give them these fields yet did not expanded what ele could do as an class being locked to 4 fields (no earth but i guess ele has a poions field). Still balanced for 2012 yet all other classes are power creeped for 2022.

[Ashen.2907]

21 hours ago, Vinteros Asteano.1209 said:

And Karl (Anet dev) gave a masterclass on how to play Staff Ele, MELTED opponents. Those who followed suit replicated that success, leading to the nerf from beta into pre-launch.

This may be a joke, but this is a video game. You are not the main character. There are other players who need to have a good experience.

There is no way you can justify a single player killing a group of players. Those things happen in Marvel, in anime, or your favorite book. It's great for a story, but in a multiplayer environment, it is poor balancing.

WvW should be about group, coordinated spikes, just from the nature of the game mode.

Except that for the situation he is describing either his opponents had to cooperate with him in killing them or he was part of a coordinated group of his own. Only an unbelievably bad or suicidal group, literally trying to die, would be killed by him solo in that situation. Poor balance would be a group trying to die and failing.

[Obtena.7952]

It's going to be interesting to see when people become woke to the fact that ranged play in GW2 was never going to be high performing because of how the game was designed, not because of the skills on the class. 

In otherwords, if you push for a 'ranged' caster because of your resignation to traditional archetypes, you are essentially asking the class to be left behind when it comes to performance.

Edited May 16, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

9 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

It's going to be interesting to see when people become woke to the fact that ranged play in GW2 was never going to be high performing because of how the game was designed, not because of the skills on the class. 

In otherwords, if you push for a 'ranged' caster because of your resignation to traditional archetypes, you are essentially asking the class to be left behind when it comes to performance. 

As much as I can agree, I feel this just highlights a downfall anet has allowed to live in the game realistically. 

As we both know this is largely down to the fact.

- Raids and fractal content don't have mechanics which require players to distance themselves from the boss to do (excluding hand kiting) 

- boons force clumped tactics, which mean raid mechanics can't force the team to split up without severely nerfing every player in the raid or fractal. 

The reason gw2 pve group and raid content can't push boundaries, can't be innotive is down to the fact no other strat outside of being clumped works due to both boons and the fact ranged gameplay was never built to become anything. 

WoW and ffxiv 2 games which are idolised for their pve mechanics do this extremely well and while we see WoW rip fractals concept out from gw2 and make it 300x better, now ripping out the mount mastery system we have and improving on it once again. We are shown why gw2 has always fallen behind. 

Because gw2 are unwilling to do what other games do:

Take successful design and innovate on it. We need a purpose for ranged combat. Boons need to stop forcing clumped tactics and we need to see bosses demand different things and become more complex. 

The fact ranged options suck in gw2 shouldn't be the excuse. It's something we should be holding anet accountable for. 

This games a decade old. It's time to push for some change and direction because so far, our pve content has created nothing which can compete against WoW and ffxivs options. 

Guild wars 2 has all the foundations needed to be as big as the big 2, however, if they don't follow this up and progress the game its simply never getting there

 

Edited May 16, 2022 by Daddy.8125

[Gibson.4036]

5 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

It's going to be interesting to see when people become woke to the fact that ranged play in GW2 was never going to be high performing because of how the game was designed, not because of the skills on the class. 

In otherwords, if you push for a 'ranged' caster advantage, you are essentially asking the class to be left behind when it comes to performance. 

Shortbow renegade? Longbow Ranger?  Staff mirage? Hammer Rev? Shortbow Soulbeast?

GW2 can have fun, effective ranged builds in multiple game modes.

Except for some reason Ele needs to be clunky and soft hitting.

[Obtena.7952]

6 minutes ago, Daddy.8125 said:

As much as I can agree, I feel this just highlights a downfall anet has allowed to live in the game realistically. 

As we both know this is largely down to the fact.

- Raids and fractal content don't have mechanics which require players to distance themselves from the boss to do (excluding hand kiting) 

- boons force clumped tactics, which mean raid mechanics can't force the team to split up without severely nerfing every player in the raid or fractal. 

The reason gw2 pve group and raid content can't push boundaries, can't be innotive is down to the fact no other strat outside of being clumped works due to both boons and the fact ranged gameplay was never built to become anything. 

WoW and ffxiv 2 games which are idolised for their pve mechanics do this extremely well and while we see WoW rip fractals concept out from gw2 and make it 300x better, now ripping out the mount mastery system we have and improving on it once again. We are shown why gw2 has always fallen behind. 

Because gw2 are unwilling to do what other games do:

Take successful design and innovate on it. We need a purpose for ranged combat. Boons need to stop forcing clumped tactics and we need to see bosses demand different things and become more complex. 

The fact ranged options suck in gw2 shouldn't be the excuse. It's something we should be holding anet accountable for. 

This games a decade old. It's time to push for some change and direction because so far, our pve content has created nothing which can compete against WoW and ffxivs options. 

Here is the thing ... the 'new direction' isn't likely to be any better than the current one. MAYBE the game can live with the current 'melee' focus/encounter design and a new 'something else'?

But for balance, Anet will always have to choose one or the other. We already see that decision coming to pass in WvW and it's ALWAYS been there for PVE. 

Edited May 16, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Obtena.7952]

11 minutes ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Shortbow renegade? Longbow Ranger?  Staff mirage? Hammer Rev? Shortbow Soulbeast?

GW2 can have fun, effective ranged builds in multiple game modes.

Except for some reason Ele needs to be clunky and soft hitting.

Weird take, considering none of those things are immune to the game changes or the melee-focused design of the game. I mean, all of those things you say suffers from the SAME game design that any ranged ele build does so ? I really don't care what ranged build you want to talk about. When played at range, they aren't getting team buffs that are so critical to high performance play. 

Here is the hot take fix ... if people want buffed ranged performance or purpose, then the melee performance of ranged weapons needs to go DOWN to make up for the advantage of playing a ranged weapons within it's range.

Edited May 16, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Puck.3697]

9 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Here is the thing ... the 'new direction' isn't likely to be any better than the current one. MAYBE the game can live with the current 'melee' focus/encounter design and a new 'something else'?

But for balance, Anet will always have to choose one or the other. We already see that decision coming to pass in WvW and it's ALWAYS been there for PVE. 

WoW and ffxiv prove otherwise 

By creating raid mechanics that require ranged gameplay and having melee do higher dps u create a requirement for the existence of both for different reasons. 

And yes as said above, harbing3r, scourge, renegade and ranger all use quite alot of ranged abilities in their kits. 

The reason one will always be balanced above the other is because of the problems I stated above. 

Because the raid mechanics all drive you to all stand in melee range regardless of being melee or ranged. If such things didn't exist range builds could be given utility jobs. 

I.e hunters in WoW. HunterS In WoW do actually the lowest dps in benchmarks however are built on a run and gun playstyle meaning they can continously move and deal with mechanics while outputting that dps. 

This creates a valuable role for them to fill.

Through raid mechanics and ongoing things over the course of the fight with the freedom of being able to move freely without consequence 

[Obtena.7952]

I mean, I'm not saying it can't be done. I just don't think there is a business case to do it in GW2. Just having a few raids/strikes where there are anti-melee mechanics simply means the need for a different approach to succeeding. It doesn't create an environment where Anet needs to 're-imagine' how the game is designed or classes are balanced. A fraction of ranged-favoured group encounters is just not a significant enough of a development to require what we are talking about here. 

Edited May 16, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[greedywholesome.9081]

On 5/16/2022 at 12:11 AM, Ashen.2907 said:

Except that for the situation he is describing either his opponents had to cooperate with him in killing them or he was part of a coordinated group of his own. Only an unbelievably bad or suicidal group, literally trying to die, would be killed by him solo in that situation. Poor balance would be a group trying to die and failing.

 

Yes, I must have worded it incorrectly because of being the only staff cata in the small squad, we had to outsmart zergs larger than ours in  WvW. No way I could wipe a zerg alone. I'm just average and give credit to the commander of the squad. At choke points, the double meteor shower melted larger zergs. Even more effective if we had 2 staff cata. 

[Axl.8924]

On 5/11/2022 at 6:18 PM, Arheundel.6451 said:

Hmm....no?! The OP is right and they changed the initial description to suit their agenda , originally the elementalist was described as light armor class favouring ranged combat and able to deal massive damage to compensate for the designed weakness compared to other professions.

And again, people in the beginning were complaining because ele was not able to play like other professions while using 2 or even 3 offensive traitlines.

A famous mesmer from team paradigm pointed this out to the devs during one of the very first open QA in 2013...and devs like Jonathan Sharp were clearly on the end rope

..because every major editing outlet was saying the same thing about ele in 2012...how the class was very weak...then....

Then @Daphoenix came along....publishing videos of him playing full water bunker with arcane d/d in wvw...not killing anybody mind you...but still able to survive as full bunker ele...since then the devs decided to capitalise on d/d and save themselves from redesigning the elementalist..they changed everything...even the description of the class...from squishy ranged caster dealing massive single target dmg to what you can read now on wiki.

Elementalist is a full ranged caster in GW1...that what people signed for, and that was how the gw2 ele was marketed as in 2012....the OP is 100% correct 

Do you think staff should be buffed?