Bringing earth and water into damage realities

[Poelala.2830]

(RELEVANT SPECIFICALLY TO PVP/WVW BALANCE) No damage build for the past 7 years has had earth or water unless it was core which used water. If there was some type of life siphon trait in water where you get added sustain and damage and some type of barrier trait in earth or maybe vigor in earth (or both) I’m sure there would be viable damage builds containing those two. 

Edited May 30, 2022 by Poelala.2830

[Popel.1468]

There is already necromancer class, no need to have it in ele.

[Garret.1965]

Yeah, let necro dominate!!!! Throw ele in the trashbin plz.

[gooddrakkarboi.4870]

2 hours ago, Zerthi.5493 said:

There is already necromancer class, no need to have it in ele.

ftfy

[Emberheart.8426]

Earth is used in most condition damage builds and has been for years. Don't get me wrong, it is the most outdated of the ele trait lines, but not because of damage. Of course, right now there is no reason to run elementalist at all except maybe if you are playing a couple of power catalyst builds, so you won't see earth being used.

[AzuritaBlues.3206]

Water is fine, it just need a bit more baseline Condi Cleanse (it can't compete with Fire traitline in most scenarios since Smothering Auras is too strong).

and IMO Earth could use some buffs/reworks in some traits ( Earth's Embrace, Rock Solid, Earthen Blessing and Diamond Skin), but it is viable when paired with Trailblazer Weaver, Support Tempest and Celestial Catalyst.

 

[Poelala.2830]

3 hours ago, Ganathar.4956 said:

Earth is used in most condition damage builds and has been for years. Don't get me wrong, it is the most outdated of the ele trait lines, but not because of damage. Of course, right now there is no reason to run elementalist at all except maybe if you are playing a couple of power catalyst builds, so you won't see earth being used.

Simply wrong. All high performing condo builds are fire arcane 

[Emberheart.8426]

1 minute ago, Poelala.2830 said:

Simply wrong. All high performing condo builds are fire arcane 

https://snowcrows.com/builds/elementalist/weaver/condition-weaver

https://hardstuck.gg/gw2/builds/elementalist/condition-tempest/

 

[Poelala.2830]

I am a pvp and wvw player. I do not care about pve balance. Why would water siphons and earth barrier matter in pvp where there is always a pocket healer?  @Ganathar.4956

Edited May 30, 2022 by Poelala.2830

[Bizgurk.5639]

I agree with you. Many traits from Fire have been reworked and buffed during the past years whereas Water and Arcane were nerfed. Arcane is so bad compared to what it used to be, the reason why it's still picked for many builds is the lack of alternatives. I'd wish they would do something about the Water and Earth traitline in terms of certain conditions like we had in GW1.

 

GW1 Water Ele a lot about Chill application and even had some interaction with Fire (e.g. the ability called Steam did also apply blind if the target was burning). Did someone in GW2 ever made a Weaver with Fire, Water and Rune of the Weaver? No? Because Ele, the profession that could be a Master of Water and Ice, doesn't have enough Chill application for such a build...

 

Earth traitline is either used for Condition Damage Builds in PvE or for tanky bunker builds. Something like a Power based Ele with Earth traitline doesn't exist. Here I'd wish something like short Weakness application from the earth traitline to make some sort of Air+Earth Weaver with Superior Elements (+15% Critchance) and Lightning Rod.

 

I'm not saying my wishes are great, they might even turn out to be too strong if I'm honest. They're rather meant as an example what could be done to make different traitline combinations possible. The build variety for Ele was so huge in GW1, it makes me sad about how limited we currently are in our trait choices.

Edited May 30, 2022 by Bizgurk.5639

[Popel.1468]

Earth is strong. I am running [Fire/Earth/Arcane] over most classes, except heavy chilling or confusing. Without earth, every class run over me instead 😄

[soulknight.9620]

7 hours ago, Ganathar.4956 said:

https://snowcrows.com/builds/elementalist/weaver/condition-weaver

https://hardstuck.gg/gw2/builds/elementalist/condition-tempest/

These are pve builds. OP was talking about pvp/wvw builds and you rarely will see any use of earth/water traitlines aside from Solemns wvw builds. 
Sad part is that air/fire are your damage traits with some utility build in and arcane is just too mandatory for what it provides (sustain/boon support).

[Emberheart.8426]

2 minutes ago, soulknight.9620 said:

These are pve builds. OP was talking about pvp/wvw builds and you rarely will see any use of earth/water traitlines aside from Solemns wvw builds. 
Sad part is that air/fire are your damage traits with some utility build in and arcane is just too mandatory for what it provides (sustain/boon support).

The OP edited the post after I posted these.

[Einlanzer.1627]

On 5/29/2022 at 10:29 PM, talesbfftt.4596 said:

Water is fine, it just need a bit more baseline Condi Cleanse (it can't compete with Fire traitline in most scenarios since Smothering Auras is too strong).

and IMO Earth could use some buffs/reworks in some traits ( Earth's Embrace, Rock Solid, Earthen Blessing and Diamond Skin), but it is viable when paired with Trailblazer Weaver, Support Tempest and Celestial Catalyst.

 

 

The problem with water is in the attunement itself, not so much in the traitline. It gives up too much damage to be the healing attunement, which is a very outdated design. Virtually all of the damage-oriented water skills, but especially the #1 skills across weapons, need a significant damage buff so a.) water can be at least a little bit solo-friendly, and b.) you don't immediately crater in DPS by swapping into water to access its utility.

Earth has a similar problem, but it's less severe and mostly a problem with the staff.

Edited June 3, 2022 by Einlanzer.1627

[Poelala.2830]

On 6/3/2022 at 9:20 AM, Einlanzer.1627 said:

 

The problem with water is in the attunement itself, not so much in the traitline. It gives up too much damage to be the healing attunement, which is a very outdated design. Virtually all of the damage-oriented water skills, but especially the #1 skills across weapons, need a significant damage buff so a.) water can be at least a little bit solo-friendly, and b.) you don't immediately crater in DPS by swapping into water to access its utility.

Earth has a similar problem, but it's less severe and mostly a problem with the staff.

I somewhat disagree the water attunement is not that great but I completely agree the autos need a damage buff. Focus, warhorn and main hand dagger are all very strong in water and shatterstone is a pretty good skill too.

[William.3871]

Good old days in GW1 where you ran water build in pvp or some hard pve content.

 

For some reason I rarely played Air and Earth, and usually went Fire or/and Water.

 

Also, it was fun to play as Ele healing ritualist/monk in random arena or Alliance battles. Quite rare builds you could go and work with.