November 29 Balance Update Preview - Elementalist

[Omg Im Target.3095]

On 11/11/2022 at 10:46 PM, AliamRationem.5172 said:

No buffs to sword weaver? No faith in these devs.  Rapidly losing interest. 

Amen. You can clearly see the pvp bias CmC and his "buddy" have. They really have no clue about the pve scene.

[AliamRationem.5172]

Just now, Omg Im Target.3095 said:

Amen. You can clearly see the pvp bias CmC and his "buddy" have. They really have no clue about the pve scene.

I guess we'll have to wait for the next change in leadership.  In the mean time, I'm spending my time on other games.

[JPUlisses.8756]

1 hour ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

SC2 exists if you enjoy 300apm gameplay. you could also just play an actual piano.

-mechanist/firebrand only player

[Jonas.2079]

I don't really mind the changes, although I am a bit worried about scepter losing its healing i guess dagger and staff will be able to fill that role. However, the bigger issue is that they haven't adressed the actual playability issues facing ele. DPS boosts are nice, but far more important than that is improving how fun the class feels to play. 

While I realize its a monster task to fix elementalist as a whole and that this is probably not the place for such a discussion, there are some low-hanging fruit that they should have looked at waay before reworking scepter, such as; 

1. Tempest alac should pulse on overload - such a simple change but would be very nice for the spec's reliability.  

2. Reworking catalyst's energy system, it currently feels bad. Either remove energy completely or at least change it to a system where you can gain energy while a sphere is active.

3. Changing catalyst's EE stacking. The GM should always apply to not punish you so hard for having anything but 10 stacks, and we shouldn't have to rely on wasting our CC to build the stacks either. 

4. Hammer air 4 needs to have the dashback optional on a flipover or something. 

5. Look into elementalist utility skills, and start working towards a world where the damage ones arent so central for dps (but still a little boost for the min/maxers), and the supportive ones have some more group benefits. Group aegis on arcane shield in PvE, perhaps? Cantrip cooldowns and a conjure rework are also things to look at. 

6. Speaking of Aegis, the proposed change to put aegis on earth sphere doesn't quite work imo. Aegis is great, but should be something you use reactively to counter a specific attack. Catalyst does not have the freedom to access earth attunement, much less earth sphere, at any given time because the rotation is very strict in order to upkeep quickness and energy. You basically rapid-fire your way through the attunements and there will  be many times where you go; "i need to give my group aegis but just left earth attunement" or "i need to give my group aegis but i don't have enough energy". A long-duration stack of stability would be better honestly, similar to mech. While stab also should be a reactive thing i think it's more appropriate to have passive stab than passive aegis. Of course it wouldn't be much of a problem if attunement swapping didn't have a CD, someting i think would fix A LOT of issues with ele's playability. Of course for that to happen some sort of balancing mechanic would also need to be in place. 

 

 

Edited November 17, 2022 by Jonas.2079

[soulknight.9620]

7 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

I guess we'll have to wait for the next change in leadership.  In the mean time, I'm spending my time on other games.

It doesnt really matter though. So the leadership changed, did we get something different out of it? Nope. Same thing that has been going on for years. Sure there was a "fan service" patch back in the august to get the negative vibe to calm down after july patch to help with steam release. Thats it. Now we are back to where we were. As i said in a different topic, its not CMC or Roy thats doing it, its the whole balance team, and they (well at least the majority of them) are the same people that has been there for quite some time. 

But yeah, i feel you, after the balance patch preview ive put gw2 into "login reward" mode. I dont want to "pray and hope" for another 3 months to maybe see some improvements to sword weaver. 

[Kozumi.5816]

13 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

I guess we'll have to wait for the next change in leadership.  In the mean time, I'm spending my time on other games.

Leadership change didn't stop the blatant bias against ele though?

[soulknight.9620]

15 minutes ago, Kozumi.5816 said:

Leadership change didn't stop the blatant bias against ele though?

I wouldnt actually say its "against ele". The scepter rework looks good for pvp/wvw. The catalyst buffs are amazing (i may say even a little bit broken). Tempest received some love earlier this year (with alac being introduced). Scepter condi weaver is decend dps now. Its not all doom and gloom.

But there is like no excuse to not change anything on sword weaver that underperforms a lot atm. And the sad part for me (that rly gets me down atm) is that it doesnt require a lot of work to do so. Sword is fine as a weapon, skills do not need a rework or anything, just some number adjustments which isnt hard at all. They could have given sword some coefficent boosts and if something went overboard (like it will get with catalyst lol) just tone it down with a hotfix or smtn. The "we made stormsoul proc on defiant enemies and we need to see how that goes" or "we reworked FB and need to see how that goes" thing is laughable. People did the math in the first evening and found out stormsoul buff is roughly 5% dmg increase if you take this trait over the "free ferocity" one. It still doesnt boost power dps sword weaver in any way to become decent. And it doesnt affect condi sword at all. So there is literary no reason not to buff sword. People were giving feedback for months now. And i think thats why people upset atm - its easy to do, no reason not to do so. 

[AliamRationem.5172]

29 minutes ago, Kozumi.5816 said:

Leadership change didn't stop the blatant bias against ele though?

In fairness, they gave scepter a lot of attention that it hasn't had pretty much ever.  That's a win for ele (for the most part).  I'm just disappointed that weaver got basically no attention at all when sword really needed it.  I'm tired of waiting for each patch expecting something different and being disappointed.

 

[Arheundel.6451]

13 hours ago, soulknight.9620 said:

It doesnt really matter though. So the leadership changed, did we get something different out of it? Nope. Same thing that has been going on for years. Sure there was a "fan service" patch back in the august to get the negative vibe to calm down after july patch to help with steam release. Thats it. Now we are back to where we were. As i said in a different topic, its not CMC or Roy thats doing it, its the whole balance team, and they (well at least the majority of them) are the same people that has been there for quite some time. 

But yeah, i feel you, after the balance patch preview ive put gw2 into "login reward" mode. I dont want to "pray and hope" for another 3 months to maybe see some improvements to sword weaver. 

Are you actually serious?.....Are you guys for real now?. Comparing CMC balance team to the horde  we experienced before for years...it's like comparing copper to Gold. CMC has bias against ele?.....I mean guys, before CMC, all we could ever hope was some buff to shatterstone as meme laugh for reddit. This was ele life before CMC....

This is the first time ever! That you see a DPS ele ranked meta in PvP after a decade since the time of old valkyrie d/d ele in 2012 , after Jon Peters left..the best you could hope on ele was to play some tempest support as fringe role....CMC biased against ele?!....wow

Edited November 17, 2022 by Arheundel.6451

[Sugar Min.5834]

On 11/12/2022 at 5:46 AM, AliamRationem.5172 said:

No buffs to sword weaver? No faith in these devs.  Rapidly losing interest. 

I have already lost interest in this game. Now I visit the forum more than I play the game and I hardly visit here too 😄, just really sick of seeing the never ending nerf patches. And when Tempest finally gets a little buff in Elemental Bastion (and ONLY in WvW), fake Tempest mains who are totally oblivious to how multipliers work, cried that it's too OP 🙄 

Anyway, finally I have found myself a new game and I have been spending more and more time in it ❤️ Not totally leaving GW2 but will play this game more if I see updates or QoLs that I like. But knowing ANet, there will be none but only nerfs... forever.

Edited November 18, 2022 by MintyMin.2718

[Serephen.3420]

9 hours ago, soulknight.9620 said:

I wouldnt actually say its "against ele". The scepter rework looks good for pvp/wvw. The catalyst buffs are amazing (i may say even a little bit broken). Tempest received some love earlier this year (with alac being introduced). Scepter condi weaver is decend dps now. Its not all doom and gloom.

But there is like no excuse to not change anything on sword weaver that underperforms a lot atm. And the sad part for me (that rly gets me down atm) is that it doesnt require a lot of work to do so. Sword is fine as a weapon, skills do not need a rework or anything, just some number adjustments which isnt hard at all. They could have given sword some coefficent boosts and if something went overboard (like it will get with catalyst lol) just tone it down with a hotfix or smtn. The "we made stormsoul proc on defiant enemies and we need to see how that goes" or "we reworked FB and need to see how that goes" thing is laughable. People did the math in the first evening and found out stormsoul buff is roughly 5% dmg increase if you take this trait over the "free ferocity" one. It still doesnt boost power dps sword weaver in any way to become decent. And it doesnt affect condi sword at all. So there is literary no reason not to buff sword. People were giving feedback for months now. And i think thats why people upset atm - its easy to do, no reason not to do so. 

I think you're over estimating catalyst, maybe due to the depressing lack of love given to weaver this patch. Maintaining stacking buffs will be slower and harder (dps loss) gaining energy will be slower (dps loss) so really only quick cata a real buff due to it not relying on those as much and having the -10% dmg removed.

 

It balances out. There is still some crazy theoretical dps for a lot of classes right now. But I can promise you it is unlikely to reach anything like bladesworn. Very rarely do any of those paper estimates turn out accurate. 

 

Please don't encourage further nerfs with commentary like that, it's exactly how weaver got into the spot it is now with sword. 

I loved both sword and hammer as weapons, now I only have hammer left, will you at least leave that for me? Won't you have mercy?

[soulknight.9620]

11 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Are you actually serious?.....Are you guys for real now?. Comparing CMC balance team to the horde  we experienced before for years...it's like comparing copper to Gold. CMC has bias against ele?.....I mean guys, before CMC, all we could ever hope was some buff to shatterstone as meme laugh for reddit. This was ele life before CMC....

May i remind you of the broken op state that tempest was on release for years? 45-55k dps with staff, frostbow, GoTS. No CMC lead back then. Let me also remind you of weaver during POF launch which did somewhat 40-45k dps with staff. Hey no CMC here. Weaver power dps was considered meta for raids/t4 fractsls for a long time before it got nerfed. Catalyst update after EOD launch? Where even someone as mediocre as me was doing 38-40k dps with it. Still no CMC in lead. 

Frostbow/GoTS needed to be nerfed if you do not agree than you have no clue on the issues it was causing. I played during this time, every LFG was "dps ele/tempest or kick" like 24/7. It was not healthy for the game and they made a good call. And yes i am an ele main and was back then, it was broken. The only thing i had and still have a problem with is MS nerf. Since it is kinda iconic skill on staff and it should actually have someking of "power" to it. Atm its a nerfball shover. 

As i said no need to praise/hate a single dev for the work of the whole balance team. If good calls are made by the balance team, we need to aknowledge that, if mistakes happen we need to critisize it - simple as that. 

 

11 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

This is the first time ever! That you see a DPS ele ranked meta in PvP after a decade since the time of old valkyrie d/d ele in 2012 , after Jon Peters left..the best you could hope on ele was to play some tempest support as fringe role....CMC biased against ele?!....wow

Thats just plain lie. We have seen cele dps ele/tempest during HOT, Fresh Air ele during HOT-POF, Fresh air weaver during POF, Fireweaver during POF-EOD (and it is still viable u know), some Lightning rod builds were pretty decent too. Catalyst has been in the meta since EOD launch (and no CMC wasnt lead at the beginning of EOD launch). 

 

And please get ur quotes right, i wasnt the one that said CMC is biased towards ele, on the contraty i said there were some decent changes to ele and that i am  (and so many others are) upset that there are no sword weaver buffs (its just above ur post cmon man). 

 

9 hours ago, Serephen.3420 said:

I think you're over estimating catalyst, maybe due to the depressing lack of love given to weaver this patch. Maintaining stacking buffs will be slower and harder (dps loss) gaining energy will be slower (dps loss) so really only quick cata a real buff due to it not relying on those as much and having the -10% dmg removed.

Could be. Im not a good math guy. Ive just seen some "math nerds" post their opinions on the topic and thought that they have a point. There are some nice coefficent buffs to hammer 3 spheres and a buff to stacks of auras. Although i doubt maintaining stacks would change much. Since the only thing they remowed is the ability to use other peoples auras and since i always kinda stacked it myself i wont see the difference. This will be a learn ur rotations issue i presume. But it has always been this way, if you couldnt maintain stack on cata you were underperforming. 

9 hours ago, Serephen.3420 said:

Please don't encourage further nerfs with commentary like that, it's exactly how weaver got into the spot it is now with sword. 

I loved both sword and hammer as weapons, now I only have hammer left, will you at least leave that for me? Won't you have mercy?

I dont. There is just pure math. Atm a good catalyst can maintain around 35-37k dps. With nonexistant coefficents on the hammer 3 and with 2% per stack dmg boost. Now we get a 1.0 coefficent on the spheres (0.25 each) and an increase in dmg by 5%, that would inflate the dps to atleast 39-41k. Not counting the other changes like stormsoul. So i presume it would end up somewhere like 40-42k (but ive seen calculations on 45k, but i doubt it unless ur a Fennec or Roul). 

[Kozumi.5816]

23 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

I'm tired of waiting for each patch expecting something different and being disappointed.

Then stop doing this. Their vision for the game and classes is clear, it will not change. Do what most people I know did and move on.

[Arheundel.6451]

For years elementalist has been balanced based on number crunching on a static NPC golem and the class was pure trash to play everywhere else outside creating snowcrow youtube videos. 

It's not that I have a problem with PvE in a MMO or anything , I do however have a problem with people whose only interest is killing a golem and be DPS obssesed for that end...and these same people delude themselves into thinking a game should be balanced around this idea of...gameplay.

Average player doesn't give a kitten about DPS on a golem, they will go for most comfortable and easy, relaxing class to play and that's how the game must be balanced for every class! It doesn't matter how much your rotation does on that golem, the average pug will still stack mechanists, shortbow renegades and builds at similar level.

 

 

[AliamRationem.5172]

4 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

For years elementalist has been balanced based on number crunching on a static NPC golem and the class was pure trash to play everywhere else outside creating snowcrow youtube videos. 

It's not that I have a problem with PvE in a MMO or anything , I do however have a problem with people whose only interest is killing a golem and be DPS obssesed for that end...and these same people delude themselves into thinking a game should be balanced around this idea of...gameplay.

Average player doesn't give a kitten about DPS on a golem, they will go for most comfortable and easy, relaxing class to play and that's how the game must be balanced for every class! It doesn't matter how much your rotation does on that golem, the average pug will still stack mechanists, shortbow renegades and builds at similar level.

 

 

The game must be balanced to your subjective interpretation of what is fun, easy, and relaxing rather than utilizing any sort of objective measure of performance, huh?  No, thanks.  I think ele players play ele because they like the way it feels and would rather not have it turned into mechanist just because you'd prefer it that way. 

Better if they just increase the damage on underperforming specs like sword weaver and update outdated garbage like backloaded alacrity on overloads, conjure weapons and other utilities.

[zeyeti.8347]

3 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Average player doesn't give a kitten about DPS on a golem, they will go for most comfortable and easy, relaxing class to play and that's how the game must be balanced for every class! It doesn't matter how much your rotation does on that golem, the average pug will still stack mechanists, shortbow renegades and builds at similar level.

Thats the point of making some Qol changes for ele , just look at the buff they made for weaver ... 3rd water/earth skill on sword give 4 stacks of bleed now ... just ... wtf , sword is melee , and obviously now scepter is more powerfull than  a sword , melee vs range , why even play melee ? and once again in pve , you do not attune to water/earth.

As for mech , ppl take it cause they are sure they won' f uck up their rotation , as it is pratically impossible to fail it , so in those regards , more complex build should do way more tha  them , and actually it is kind of starting seing less and less mechs being played . 

Not only talking about pug groups , but if you want to do the very hard endgame you cannot use "average" dps , as for you pvp matters at highest level , pve matters for some of us higer level too .

Nobody was playing scepter dps ele in pve , i saw some but they were all underperforming (and it will not change with this patch , scepter being a condis weapon for pve , all changes were made for power) , i only saw healtemp with scepter , cause it allow a better healing (a ranged one !!!!) and have some combo field for might , doenst care about dagger aura blast , auars are useless if you dont take elemental bastion who you cannot take if you want alacrity , so what anet should have done is make those changes for pvp only , who cares your dragon tooth follow your target , thats obviously made for pvp , in a pve patch ... who cares about water trident healing only yourself , you never attune to water if you are a dps , especially a condi one ... in pve.

make those changes for pvp and let us our already weak healer healtemp as it is .

And stop talking like there is a huge scene of pvp or wvw in this game , anet barely make any update for those modes , remember the last wvw huge addon ? warclaw ? lol . They know there is not a huge % of player playing those modes , pve is the corner stone of the game , and this again make me say cmc is a pvp player , he shouldnt touch pve , balancing pvp/wvw/pve is a complete other story , you dont want to play a hybrid healer/dps/booner in pve , because he will be average in all those domain , and thats the whole ele problem since 5-6 years.

This patch who was supposed to be a pve patch , turned out to be a pvp patch for ele only ...

Edited November 19, 2022 by zeyeti.8347

[Arheundel.6451]

5 hours ago, zeyeti.8347 said:

Thats the point of making some Qol changes for ele , just look at the buff they made for weaver ... 3rd water/earth skill on sword give 4 stacks of bleed now ... just ... wtf , sword is melee , and obviously now scepter is more powerfull than  a sword , melee vs range , why even play melee ? and once again in pve , you do not attune to water/earth.

As for mech , ppl take it cause they are sure they won' f uck up their rotation , as it is pratically impossible to fail it , so in those regards , more complex build should do way more tha  them , and actually it is kind of starting seing less and less mechs being played . 

Not only talking about pug groups , but if you want to do the very hard endgame you cannot use "average" dps , as for you pvp matters at highest level , pve matters for some of us higer level too .

Nobody was playing scepter dps ele in pve , i saw some but they were all underperforming (and it will not change with this patch , scepter being a condis weapon for pve , all changes were made for power) , i only saw healtemp with scepter , cause it allow a better healing (a ranged one !!!!) and have some combo field for might , doenst care about dagger aura blast , auars are useless if you dont take elemental bastion who you cannot take if you want alacrity , so what anet should have done is make those changes for pvp only , who cares your dragon tooth follow your target , thats obviously made for pvp , in a pve patch ... who cares about water trident healing only yourself , you never attune to water if you are a dps , especially a condi one ... in pve.

make those changes for pvp and let us our already weak healer healtemp as it is .

And stop talking like there is a huge scene of pvp or wvw in this game , anet barely make any update for those modes , remember the last wvw huge addon ? warclaw ? lol . They know there is not a huge % of player playing those modes , pve is the corner stone of the game , and this again make me say cmc is a pvp player , he shouldnt touch pve , balancing pvp/wvw/pve is a complete other story , you dont want to play a hybrid healer/dps/booner in pve , because he will be average in all those domain , and thats the whole ele problem since 5-6 years.

This patch who was supposed to be a pve patch , turned out to be a pvp patch for ele only ...

PvE cornerstone of the game and wvw/pvp non existent?

https://massivelyop.com/2021/09/13/guild-wars-2-outlines-testing-phases-for-world-restructuring-and-future-plans-for-wvw/

Whatever you may think, the PvP/WvW scene is alive and well, they are here to stay. We can go back and forth with people assuming GW2=PvE the end, but I won't do that! Few people may have enjoyed  spamming water trident, yes...and? These changes to scepter will open new gameplay options for all ele players in all gamemodes, including those players who don't visit the forum, don't care about the rat race in raids and simply want to play an old school elemental mage because as far as old player remember, the main weapon for ele in GW1 was scepter ranged...not dagger/dagger, this set of changes was expected since launch....about bloody time they changed scepter to what it was always supposed to be : RANGED DAMAGE

[the krytan assassin.9235]

1 hour ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

PvE cornerstone of the game and wvw/pvp non existent?

https://massivelyop.com/2021/09/13/guild-wars-2-outlines-testing-phases-for-world-restructuring-and-future-plans-for-wvw/

Whatever you may think, the PvP/WvW scene is alive and well, they are here to stay. We can go back and forth with people assuming GW2=PvE the end, but I won't do that! Few people may have enjoyed  spamming water trident, yes...and? These changes to scepter will open new gameplay options for all ele players in all gamemodes, including those players who don't visit the forum, don't care about the rat race in raids and simply want to play an old school elemental mage because as far as old player remember, the main weapon for ele in GW1 was scepter ranged...not dagger/dagger, this set of changes was expected since launch....about bloody time they changed scepter to what it was always supposed to be : RANGED DAMAGE

Are you really trying to say WvW and PvP house a significant amount of the playerbase? WvW probably has around a 50.000 man daily logins across EU & NA. Not sure exactly about PvP numbers, but purely based on my personal observations i easily see like 5* more players in WvW then PvP. Matchmaking also takes quite a while, so my guess is that im not that far off. 

Total daily logins on gw2 has been estimated to be around 450k. 

Not sure exactly when the last pvp map was added (i absolutely detest the gamemode and its toxic community) but its definitely been a while. Last update on WvW was the warclaw update in 2019, before that it was the desert Borderlands in 2015.

 

Apart from that, i do agree that all weapons/skills/professions should be balanced somewhat throughout the different gamemodes. The ele community in general support the changes made to scepter, but just think the changes to water Trident are stupid. 

 

Your argument about scepter being a dmge weapon aswell is kinda ignorant to its original design aswell. The elementalist's weapons have always been designed to be a jack of all trades. All weapons offer some sort of condi dmge, power dmge, (allied)healing, some extra conditions, crowd control etc. Suddenly changing scepter to dmge only is not a continuation of the trend. Its breaking it. 

 

In the end the proposed skill change to water Trident will simply negatively impact most of the ele community. Skill was completely fine to begin with. Could have easily been fixed in PvP aswell by simply reducing the outgoing heal towards allies. 

On top of that i simply really dislike the heal on hit mechanic that was introduced on hammer cata and now on scepter aswell. If you need to heal up abit, you want to use a skill that you can rely on. Crashing font and new water Trident can be blocked/dodges easily, completely negating the healing effect. Would be fine if other classes have similar mechanics, but heal on hit is mostly an ele only mechanic yet again. 

Edited November 20, 2022 by the krytan assassin.9235

[Sarm.5923]

I get why people are ragging on the water/earth sword3 skill because it's the only change sword got, but isn't that pairing used for the water field multi-combo heal gimmick? Wouldn't the bleed on its skill help slightly lessen your damage drop during that transitory period before you go back to attacking like normal?

[AzuritaBlues.3206]

I'm super happy with the scepter changes, looking forward to see how catalyst performs with all the buffs. Scepter+focus plus fire trait line should generate enough auras and it's not THAT hard to upkeep the buffs by yourself. I wonder if these changes could make scepter competitive with hammer. I think it maybe could damage wise, but not with the energy generation. We'll see.

 

[AliamRationem.5172]

6 hours ago, Sarm.5923 said:

I get why people are ragging on the water/earth sword3 skill because it's the only change sword got, but isn't that pairing used for the water field multi-combo heal gimmick? Wouldn't the bleed on its skill help slightly lessen your damage drop during that transitory period before you go back to attacking like normal?

It's the water/air sword 3 skill that received bleeding, actually.  And that isn't part of any rotation.  You might sometimes rotate to air from water in competitive modes as you can score a heal off of riptide using the leap on polaric leap while gap closing and possibly scoring an interrupt.  But that's a very niche case.  Generally speaking, water/air is going to be the least-used attunement configuration in any game mode.

In other words, if you were to pick at random out of a hat full of possible changes to weaver, this would be one of the most useless changes you could select at random.  That they chose to make this the only change to weavers in PvE is why weaver players are feeling ignored and justifiably upset at these patch notes.

[the krytan assassin.9235]

1 hour ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

It's the water/air sword 3 skill that received bleeding, actually.  And that isn't part of any rotation.  You might sometimes rotate to air from water in competitive modes as you can score a heal off of riptide using the leap on polaric leap while gap closing and possibly scoring an interrupt.  But that's a very niche case.  Generally speaking, water/air is going to be the least-used attunement configuration in any game mode.

In other words, if you were to pick at random out of a hat full of possible changes to weaver, this would be one of the most useless changes you could select at random.  That they chose to make this the only change to weavers in PvE is why weaver players are feeling ignored and justifiably upset at these patch notes.

Id say for FA it will actually give a very small dps increase of like 50 dps (and abit more group support). Shearing edge can be easily implemented in the AA-FA-FF-FW-WA-AA cycle. Normally results in the same dps as going straight to AA after water. Depending on bleeding duration the balance update will probably result in a very small dps increase (like 50 tops) while simultaneously providing extra group barrier. FA Weaver was already more versatile then the traditional BttH Weaver while offering similar dps (like 100 dps difference atm), so Far will probably a better pick for ele's that are able to properly run it (alot higher apm however). 

 

Fully agree with the other stuff you said. 

[AliamRationem.5172]

18 minutes ago, the krytan assassin.9235 said:

Id say for FA it will actually give a very small dps increase of like 50 dps (and abit more group support). Shearing edge can be easily implemented in the AA-FA-FF-FW-WA-AA cycle. Normally results in the same dps as going straight to AA after water. Depending on bleeding duration the balance update will probably result in a very small dps increase (like 50 tops) while simultaneously providing extra group barrier. FA Weaver was already more versatile then the traditional BttH Weaver while offering similar dps (like 100 dps difference atm), so Far will probably a better pick for ele's that are able to properly run it (alot higher apm however). 

 

Fully agree with the other stuff you said. 

Didn't think about FA builds.  That a weak condi on a pure power build is all we got just makes it seem even more sad.

[zeyeti.8347]

15 hours ago, the krytan assassin.9235 said:

Are you really trying to say WvW and PvP house a significant amount of the playerbase? WvW probably has around a 50.000 man daily logins across EU & NA. Not sure exactly about PvP numbers, but purely based on my personal observations i easily see like 5* more players in WvW then PvP. Matchmaking also takes quite a while, so my guess is that im not that far off. 

Total daily logins on gw2 has been estimated to be around 450k. 

Not sure exactly when the last pvp map was added (i absolutely detest the gamemode and its toxic community) but its definitely been a while. Last update on WvW was the warclaw update in 2019, before that it was the desert Borderlands in 2015.

 

Apart from that, i do agree that all weapons/skills/professions should be balanced somewhat throughout the different gamemodes. The ele community in general support the changes made to scepter, but just think the changes to water Trident are stupid. 

 

Your argument about scepter being a dmge weapon aswell is kinda ignorant to its original design aswell. The elementalist's weapons have always been designed to be a jack of all trades. All weapons offer some sort of condi dmge, power dmge, (allied)healing, some extra conditions, crowd control etc. Suddenly changing scepter to dmge only is not a continuation of the trend. Its breaking it. 

 

In the end the proposed skill change to water Trident will simply negatively impact most of the ele community. Skill was completely fine to begin with. Could have easily been fixed in PvP aswell by simply reducing the outgoing heal towards allies. 

On top of that i simply really dislike the heal on hit mechanic that was introduced on hammer cata and now on scepter aswell. If you need to heal up abit, you want to use a skill that you can rely on. Crashing font and new water Trident can be blocked/dodges easily, completely negating the healing effect. Would be fine if other classes have similar mechanics, but heal on hit is mostly an ele only mechanic yet again. 

Yes i remember gw 2 trying to reach e-sports level when it came out ... quickly forgot about that ... it will never reach the level of a sc2 pro player or even league of legend standarts.

 

2 hours ago, AliamRationem.5172 said:

It's the water/air sword 3 skill that received bleeding, actually

Ty i really thought it was water/earth who received that (make more sense , earth-bleeding), it's even worse ... haha. Even with that cringe buff (more like an april fool joke) sword is still crap for weaver . We get that ele is more played in pvp/wvw but atm in pve it's a chore to play and ineffective in most endgame content.

Edited November 20, 2022 by zeyeti.8347

[Serephen.3420]

On 11/18/2022 at 6:49 PM, soulknight.9620 said:

May i remind you of the broken op state that tempest was on release for years? 45-55k dps with staff, frostbow, GoTS. No CMC lead back then. Let me also remind you of weaver during POF launch which did somewhat 40-45k dps with staff. Hey no CMC here. Weaver power dps was considered meta for raids/t4 fractsls for a long time before it got nerfed. Catalyst update after EOD launch? Where even someone as mediocre as me was doing 38-40k dps with it. Still no CMC in lead. 

Frostbow/GoTS needed to be nerfed if you do not agree than you have no clue on the issues it was causing. I played during this time, every LFG was "dps ele/tempest or kick" like 24/7. It was not healthy for the game and they made a good call. And yes i am an ele main and was back then, it was broken. The only thing i had and still have a problem with is MS nerf. Since it is kinda iconic skill on staff and it should actually have someking of "power" to it. Atm its a nerfball shover. 

As i said no need to praise/hate a single dev for the work of the whole balance team. If good calls are made by the balance team, we need to aknowledge that, if mistakes happen we need to critisize it - simple as that. 

 

Thats just plain lie. We have seen cele dps ele/tempest during HOT, Fresh Air ele during HOT-POF, Fresh air weaver during POF, Fireweaver during POF-EOD (and it is still viable u know), some Lightning rod builds were pretty decent too. Catalyst has been in the meta since EOD launch (and no CMC wasnt lead at the beginning of EOD launch). 

 

And please get ur quotes right, i wasnt the one that said CMC is biased towards ele, on the contraty i said there were some decent changes to ele and that i am  (and so many others are) upset that there are no sword weaver buffs (its just above ur post cmon man). 

 

Could be. Im not a good math guy. Ive just seen some "math nerds" post their opinions on the topic and thought that they have a point. There are some nice coefficent buffs to hammer 3 spheres and a buff to stacks of auras. Although i doubt maintaining stacks would change much. Since the only thing they remowed is the ability to use other peoples auras and since i always kinda stacked it myself i wont see the difference. This will be a learn ur rotations issue i presume. But it has always been this way, if you couldnt maintain stack on cata you were underperforming. 

I dont. There is just pure math. Atm a good catalyst can maintain around 35-37k dps. With nonexistant coefficents on the hammer 3 and with 2% per stack dmg boost. Now we get a 1.0 coefficent on the spheres (0.25 each) and an increase in dmg by 5%, that would inflate the dps to atleast 39-41k. Not counting the other changes like stormsoul. So i presume it would end up somewhere like 40-42k (but ive seen calculations on 45k, but i doubt it unless ur a Fennec or Roul). 

That's fair enough, but even that would be within the acceptable range with a lot of what we already have now with other classes. I doubt anyone would hit 45k unless in a flawless speedrun. Sad thing for me with non American ping 😅 no matter how well I execute the rotation, I'd never reach that. But who knows, maybe this will slow the apm down a little and be good for the class. In the end we'll have to see how it performs live and in actual scenarios, because that's where the real numbers come out.