With the probable end of elite specs, is anyone else even more upset that Catalyst exists?

[Serephen.3420]

57 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

People criticise the orbs for incentivising fast swapping because Weaver already did that with Weave Self (and, to a lesser extent, interactions with core traits). People criticise it as a boon DPS because in practice it's probably the hardest and least reliable quickness spec since maintaining quickness requires making sure you always switch to air at the right time, and with sufficient energy, without the benefit of being able to see the air sphere's cooldown. It's also hard to be reactive with other boons because they require being in (or able to switch to) the right attunement at the right time with a build that pushes rapid swapping. People criticise the hammer because it's another melee weapon - the 'favours ranged' profession is 3/3 for melee specs and now has more melee than ranged weapons (it could have been a good melee/ranged hybrid, but they dropped the ball by giving it 600 range and slow projectile speeds). I'll admit it has an interesting rotation, but a ranged weapon or a genuine hybrid weapon could have had that too. People criticise augments because, with the exception of earth augment and the elite, they're basically Stances 2.0, except with more conditions about when you can use them if you want full effect from them. People criticise the "new class mechanics to manage" because a lot of people don't actually enjoy having a build that's based around managing four different kinds of self-buff (oh, and weaver did the 'get self-buffs from traits as you go through your rotation' thing too, it just didn't take it to the extreme Catalyst did and waste dedicate more than half of the trait set to them)

Cannot disagree more. All of those at least made an effort to have a different playstyle. Harbinger is pushing to trade the durability normally associated with necromancer for a mobile glass cannon approach (necromancer traditionally lacks a lot of mobility) and if you're going to defend catalyst for being a good boondps, well, harbinger probably does it better if anything, albeit not at the level of the big boys like herald, firebrand, and to a lesser extent scrapper, and while I'm not fond of elixirs myself I don't really see them as being any less interesting as utility skills than Catalyst's "press for more damage, but make sure you're standing in the right sphere when you do so!" augments. Untamed, for all its current flaws, is the first ranger elite specialisation that actually encourages you to work with your pet, as opposed to druid basically ignoring it and soulbeast being designed around being able to get rid of it. Mechanist has the pet as a solid distinguishing feature. Willbender mobility on the previously relatively low-mobility guardian is not to be sneezed at, or the switch in playstyle to using the virtues actively without reservation because they have low cooldowns and you need to activate them to get what was previously a passive effect. Vindicator healing kinda failed mostly because it doesn't provide a key boon in PvE (but I see it in the build list for WvW...), but they at least tried to do something new with the double legend, and the dragoon jump is a distinct playstyle difference even if you're otherwise using core legends and weapons.

But the key and most fundamental difference between all of these and Catalyst?

Any similarities they have in playstyle with other elite specs on the same profession are because they're based on the core profession. The elite specialisations are all going in different directions, but because they're all starting from the same foundation, it takes something pretty extreme to completely change their playstyle. Catalyst, however, feels like it's not just building from the same foundation, it's reusing features that were already in Weaver and Tempest, when people wanted something that actually went in a different direction.

Don't get me wrong: Catalyst is reasonably functional for what it does (although I do wonder if what it really does is serve as a gateway to Weaver). If ArenaNet was to come out with a statement that they'd had a couple of ideas in mind but went with Catalyst because they figured it fit Cantha better*, but that we shouldn't worry because they have something else in the works which will be more in line with what people were asking for, then we wouldn't have this thread. But they've done the opposite. While I think people are grossly overstating the 'no more elite specialisations' case, ArenaNet's statements have at least cast reasonable doubt on the idea that there will be more coming that can fill the gaps that remain. Catalyst would be fine in isolation. What makes people angry is that if there are only going to be three elite specialisations, the third should not have been something that feels like it was cobbled together from ideas that had already been used with the first two.

*But this still leaves open the question of why Catalyst has no NPC representation apart from the obligatory lore NPC, while willbender, bladesworn, mechanist, harbinger, and virtuoso all have prominent roles in at least one point in the story, and spectre bosses are a little less prominent but still at least exist. 

Bravo 👏 

I'll just plus 1 this

[Ace.1784]

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

People criticise it as a boon DPS because in practice it's probably the hardest and least reliable quickness spec since maintaining quickness requires making sure you always switch to air at the right time, and with sufficient energy, without the benefit of being able to see the air sphere's cooldown. It's also hard to be reactive with other boons because they require being in (or able to switch to) the right attunement at the right time with a build that pushes rapid swapping.

This is all going to be a PvE context, open world and instanced content

There's a flow to maintaining quickness on Catalyst and it's quite consistent. There's several variations of this based on different attunement orders. You'll almost always want to visit air off cooldown because it contains some of your highest damaging skills and utility.

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

People criticise the hammer because it's another melee weapon - the 'favours ranged' profession is 3/3 for melee specs and now has more melee than ranged weapons (it could have been a good melee/ranged hybrid, but they dropped the ball by giving it 600 range and slow projectile speeds). I'll admit it has an interesting rotation, but a ranged weapon or a genuine hybrid weapon could have had that too.

I think Hammer is much more interesting weapon than this forum gives it credit for. 

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Any similarities they have in playstyle with other elite specs on the same profession are because they're based on the core profession. The elite specialisations are all going in different directions, but because they're all starting from the same foundation, it takes something pretty extreme to completely change their playstyle. Catalyst, however, feels like it's not just building from the same foundation, it's reusing features that were already in Weaver and Tempest, when people wanted something that actually went in a different direction.

I think a lot of the issues people have with Catalyst is also based on the core profession. Elementalist has 4 attunements. Each attunement features varying degrees of damage and utility.

I would argue that Catalyst is a better personification of the Elementalist profession because it's one of the few builds where it's actually viable to visit all the attunements unlike the other rotations that swap between 2 elements unless Weave Self is off cooldown. 

One of the biggest let down for other Elementalist especs for me was that going outside of particular attunements was almost always a dps loss (unless for Weave Self, which entire point is to just extend the duration of the relevant buffs, not all of them). To demonstrate, when's the last time you were like, "I need to Weave Self for Woven Water" or "I need to Weave Self for Woven Earth". Air is more relevant now with the damage bonus on top of the movement speed, but Weave Self was primarily for Condi builds until this change.

The orbs on hammer are relevant because they A: Generate Energy and B: Provide survivability along with damage. Catalyst is at its best when it's surrounded by enemies to cleave. Energy can be weird when you're only hitting 1 target as mentioned above, but you'll find yourself with more energy than you know what to do with when you have orbs + multiple targets around you.

If you'll allow me to shift to a WvW Staff context for a second, one of the most interesting parts of Catalyst is that you're rewarded for setting up your group through CC and if you choose, dodging abilities. The flow of maximizing EE stacks in WvW is quite satisfying, as once you've performed the setup stage, it's typically time to bomb. Weaver often has more damage/abilities than what is necessary for organized play and it's more of a chore to access your CC abilities while also trying to ensure your rotation can maximize your self buffs for the bomb. I've done statistical analysis of the damage outputs, normalizing for some other metrics, and found that the damage difference between Catalyst and Weaver is not statistically relevant (but we can discuss more on that later).

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Don't get me wrong: Catalyst is reasonably functional for what it does (although I do wonder if what it really does is serve as a gateway to Weaver).

Personally, I have no interest in really playing Weaver after playing Catalyst. This is coming from someone who only played Weaver prior to Catalyst. I did momentarily visit it after some buff patches, but Hammer Catalyst just has an overall nicer playstyle and smoother rotation.

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

If ArenaNet was to come out with a statement that they'd had a couple of ideas in mind but went with Catalyst because they figured it fit Cantha better*, but that we shouldn't worry because they have something else in the works which will be more in line with what people were asking for, then we wouldn't have this thread. But they've done the opposite. While I think people are grossly overstating the 'no more elite specialisations' case, ArenaNet's statements have at least cast reasonable doubt on the idea that there will be more coming that can fill the gaps that remain. Catalyst would be fine in isolation. What makes people angry is that if there are only going to be three elite specialisations, the third should not have been something that feels like it was cobbled together from ideas that had already been used with the first two.

This forum has been upset with Catalyst for a while, even when it was one of the strongest builds in the game. I've been playing this game for over 11 years now. I've nearly always found Elementalist to be fine (a few cases do exist where this is not true) and I come to this forum and it seems like the sky is falling.

There was also a period of time where people had a weird obsession with longbow. 

Not necessarily accusing you of this, because we've had great interactions in the past, but I feel like the most of the problems with Elementalist is the forum just not giving it a honest chance.

---

For some context, Elementalist is not the only class I play. Currently, I'm playing (but have played more in the past):

• DPS Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Herald (PvE)
• DPS Vindicator (PvE)
• DPS Herald (WvW)
• DPS Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Strip Scourge (WvW)

This list is organized by my favorite to least favorite to play. I want to highlight this because of the comments on other boon dps and I think Catalyst has the smoothest application of quickness outside of the just sit there Harbinger.

[draxynnic.3719]

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

This is all going to be a PvE context, open world and instanced content

There's a flow to maintaining quickness on Catalyst and it's quite consistent. There's several variations of this based on different attunement orders. You'll almost always want to visit air off cooldown because it contains some of your highest damaging skills and utility.

Yeah, I'm not saying it's impossible to do. But it's still a complication that the likes of firebrand, scrapper, and harbinger don't have, and even herald is simpler because your rotation only has two switches rather than four, and you can generally fairly reliably just switch to Shiro or whatever for ten seconds and then back and it's probably at least close to when your facets have recharged. Which just leaves warrior and chrono, whose quickness rotations I don't really have enough experience to comment on, but I have noticed they're not exactly popular.

The other issue, though, is that "it has quickness" is a pretty poor defence for an elite specialisation these days. They could have done a Herald and found a way to put quickness on Weaver. Alactempest hadn't been made at that point, so they could have made quicktempest (although I suspect they don't want tempest to be able to give itself quickness). Or they could have made an elite specialisation on a different theme rather than Catalyst and given it quickness.  

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

I think Hammer is much more interesting weapon than this forum gives it credit for. 

I actually agree - there is a certain dervish-like cadence to the rotation that is fairly enjoyable. However, there are a couple of issues, one feeding into the other:

The first is that it wants to be a hybrid melee/ranged weapon but it completely fails in that respect because ArenaNet was just too cautious. Every actual ranged weapon that had a range of 600 was extended to at least 900 for a reason, but they seem to have forgotten this with Catalyst. The low projectile speed just adds insult to injury: if you run forward while autoattacking with fire or air, your projectiles don't actually get very far ahead of you. In practice, it's just as much of a melee weapon as dagger is.

Which feeds into the second issue - a third melee weapon really isn't what most of the ele playerbase wanted. There was appetite for a true melee weapon for elementalist (namely, one that you actually hit with, while dagger is more along the lines of close-range spellcasting) in 2015-2017, but Weaver satiated that appetite (there's an irony here that I'll get to later). 2019-2021, people wanted a ranged spec. Hammer doesn't achieve that (although 900 range and higher projectile speeds on air and fire could help) and in a PvE context, Catalyst certainly doesn't because the sphere is enough damage that you want both yourself and your enemy inside the sphere. (Less so in competitive due to the sphere having anaemic damage.)

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

I think a lot of the issues people have with Catalyst is also based on the core profession. Elementalist has 4 attunements. Each attunement features varying degrees of damage and utility.

I would argue that Catalyst is a better personification of the Elementalist profession because it's one of the few builds where it's actually viable to visit all the attunements unlike the other rotations that swap between 2 elements unless Weave Self is off cooldown. 

One of the biggest let down for other Elementalist especs for me was that going outside of particular attunements was almost always a dps loss (unless for Weave Self, which entire point is to just extend the duration of the relevant buffs, not all of them). To demonstrate, when's the last time you were like, "I need to Weave Self for Woven Water" or "I need to Weave Self for Woven Earth". Air is more relevant now with the damage bonus on top of the movement speed, but Weave Self was primarily for Condi builds until this change.

I actually agree with this too - one of the things that hammer, the sceptre rework, and the water augment achieve is to make water a reasonable part of a DPS rotation. That doesn't change the problem of augments feeling like stances with extra conditions attached, though. The encouragement to go into water attunement could be achieved simply by making a skill have extra effect when activated while in water attunement rather than requiring you to be in the sphere, which introduces the extra steps of needing energy, placing the sphere, and being within the sphere.

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

The orbs on hammer are relevant because they A: Generate Energy and B: Provide survivability along with damage. Catalyst is at its best when it's surrounded by enemies to cleave. Energy can be weird when you're only hitting 1 target as mentioned above, but you'll find yourself with more energy than you know what to do with when you have orbs + multiple targets around you.

I think this is actually part of the problem - Catalyst feels like it's built around the assumption that you're using hammer in a way that Tempest and Weaver aren't regarding their respective weapons. Other weapons don't necessarily have the reliable access to multi-hit skills on every attunement to build energy (although sceptre is close). Other weapons don't have the reliable access to finishers on every attunement in order to trigger Catalyst's bonuses related to completing skill combos. While there are builds that work with other weapons regardless, there's often a degree to which it feels like using any other weapon means giving up some of Catalyst's functionality that you don't get with the other specs.

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

If you'll allow me to shift to a WvW Staff context for a second, one of the most interesting parts of Catalyst is that you're rewarded for setting up your group through CC and if you choose, dodging abilities. The flow of maximizing EE stacks in WvW is quite satisfying, as once you've performed the setup stage, it's typically time to bomb. Weaver often has more damage/abilities than what is necessary for organized play and it's more of a chore to access your CC abilities while also trying to ensure your rotation can maximize your self buffs for the bomb. I've done statistical analysis of the damage outputs, normalizing for some other metrics, and found that the damage difference between Catalyst and Weaver is not statistically relevant (but we can discuss more on that later).

Personally, I have no interest in really playing Weaver after playing Catalyst. This is coming from someone who only played Weaver prior to Catalyst. I did momentarily visit it after some buff patches, but Hammer Catalyst just has an overall nicer playstyle and smoother rotation.

Meanwhile, I used Catalyst as training wheels to finally move on to Weaver, which never really clicked for me prior to EoD. Catalyst is definitely the smoother build and easier to pick up, but the big question is: if we're only going to get three elite specialisations, should we really have two of them that are so similar to one another?

4 hours ago, Ace.1784 said:

This forum has been upset with Catalyst for a while, even when it was one of the strongest builds in the game. I've been playing this game for over 11 years now. I've nearly always found Elementalist to be fine (a few cases do exist where this is not true) and I come to this forum and it seems like the sky is falling.

There was also a period of time where people had a weird obsession with longbow. 

Not necessarily accusing you of this, because we've had great interactions in the past, but I feel like the most of the problems with Elementalist is the forum just not giving it a honest chance.

---

For some context, Elementalist is not the only class I play. Currently, I'm playing (but have played more in the past):

• DPS Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Herald (PvE)
• DPS Vindicator (PvE)
• DPS Herald (WvW)
• DPS Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Strip Scourge (WvW)

This list is organized by my favorite to least favorite to play. I want to highlight this because of the comments on other boon dps and I think Catalyst has the smoothest application of quickness outside of the just sit there Harbinger.

And here's that irony I alluded to earlier: If the release order of Catalyst and Weaver had been swapped, we'd probably be having the same uproar about Weaver. Maybe a little less because Weaver works better with core weapons than Catalyst does, but there'd probably still be the same discontent.

Thing is that for all of the criticism above, there's nothing inherently wrong with Catalyst that couldn't be resolved with a few tweaks. If Catalyst had been the first elite specialisation introduced, it wouldn't have received this backlash. If it had been the second, it wouldn't have received this backlash unless Weaver was the first. If ArenaNet was signalling that we could expect an expansion in, say, late 2024 that brought a new set of elite specialisations, we wouldn't have this thread.

The problem is the context. We've had two elite specialisations in a row with very similar playstyles - both designed primarily for melee, both built around rapid attunement-swapping for the purpose of maintaining self-buffs (even outside of Weave Self, DPS builds still want to be swapping regularly to maintain Elements of Rage, although this doesn't require swapping through all four), and both loaded with stance-like utilities. That Catalyst also grabs some themes from Tempest is really the "and jaywalking" part compared to how much it has in common with Weaver. Sure, you could theoretically make an aurashare build with Catalyst, it might even be better at spreading auras than Tempest, but Tempest does have a much more distinct playstyle.

It doesn't matter which of Weaver or Catalyst is actually better - what matters is that they represent 2/3 of what may be the only elite specialisations that elementalist gets, and on top of that, 3/3 are melee-oriented, and importantly in the context of this thread, there is at least reasonable concern that this might be it. The anger comes from the feeling from people who wanted something different, particularly an elite specialisation that's actually designed to cater for the classic ranged nuker playstyle, that catalyst has come at the expense of ever getting that. If we're only getting three elite specialisations per profession ever, then we shouldn't have had two that are as similar as Weaver and Catalyst. And Catalyst has the misfortune of the one that was made second of the two.

[Esquilax.3491]

In the whole of End of Dragons, the Catalyst existing is what bothers me the most.

 

I have always loved Ele, I even rany first playthrough of EoD as a Catalyst and did the full story and all achievements with it. It still wasn't fun to me. 

Even with all the changes since, and the fact that it's now got high dps and survivability and has a boon support option, I still don't like it.

We just did not need a fourth spec that essentially does the same thing as the other three. A melee that flicks between elements to do damage... now with orbs flavouring tied to one slow, boring melee weapon.

Anet have made it clear the staff is a support or healer weapon... I still don't understand why. OK sure. Then they buff the scepter "look you have range now!!1" to try to appease us. Ignore the fact scpeter still has only 900 range, important skills which emphasise being next to the target and is forced to operate within the melee framework of the 4 existing specs.

I mean wow, I can STAB in melee! I Can SLASH in melee, I can SLAM in melee, I can BLAST in melee. I can do the same thing four times over with slightly different elemental sprinklings, what's not to like!? Thanks to Anets masterful game design I can have this much variation in my favourite class, so many playstyles, it's almost too much excitement.

[Bankrotas.8215]

I just wished one spec to have weapon swap and lower access to elements in return.

[Stallic.2397]

Trait two different elements, with the third being the elite. Whatever two elements you choose, become your attunements for combat. Then you get weapon swap to make it 4 (20 skills)

Add a Longbow and tada, you have what catalyst should've been  

[Helgaley.3619]

1 hour ago, Stallic.2397 said:

Trait two different elements, with the third being the elite. Whatever two elements you choose, become your attunements for combat. Then you get weapon swap to make it 4 (20 skills)

Add a Longbow and tada, you have what catalyst should've been  

Honestly they could have given us the exact same traits and utilities but with a longbow that has the exact same skills where only the element changes, and it wouldn't have had half as many complaints as catalyst. Lol. A hammer with a max 600 yard range that they tried to sell as a "traditional wizard" was the most tone deaf thing ever, and I have no sympathy for all the hate they've received for it. 

[draxynnic.3719]

41 minutes ago, Helgaley.3619 said:

Honestly they could have given us the exact same traits and utilities but with a longbow that has the exact same skills where only the element changes, and it wouldn't have had half as many complaints as catalyst. Lol. A hammer with a max 600 yard range that they tried to sell as a "traditional wizard" was the most tone deaf thing ever, and I have no sympathy for all the hate they've received for it. 

Heck, making the hammer ranged skills 900 and with a higher projectile velocity would go a long way. It'd still feel pushed to melee due to the other attunements and the spheres, but it would at least be a credible hybrid rather than daggers 2.0.

[Flamenco.3894]

I'm not upset in the slightest. In fact, I'm rather elated that Anet has managed to pull off yet another fun elite spec.

In most of PvE content where you stack and go through your rotations, it is merely a matter of picking your flavour. Most classes have their identity stripped in such monotone playstyle and the discussion of lacking diversity in elite specs becomes a superficial one.

[scerevisiae.1972]

On 5/6/2023 at 6:29 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

Nobody asked for Dagger 2.0 where the 'ranged' is 600 and you have several reasons why it's not really practical to actually go outside of melee range even on those attunements. Not knocking dagger, but... well, we already had dagger.

Thing is, had hammer actually had more than 5 (of 20) ranged dmg skills (fire #1, #2, #4, air #1, air #2), it might not have been received so poorly.

This could have been changed during beta in response to the torrent of hate feedback but they basically ignored it all.

Had hammer had ~10x 600 range skills and ~3x 900 range skills, with a mix of cone AOEs (like fire #2) and targeted projectiles (like fire #1) it would have been fine and actually unique.

It still boggles my mind that anyone thought it was a good idea to make yet another melee weapons for Ele when sword and dagger already existed. 

Still so, so disappointed.

 

Edited June 24, 2023 by scerevisiae.1972

[Batalix.2873]

On 6/8/2023 at 9:12 PM, Ace.1784 said:

This is all going to be a PvE context, open world and instanced content

There's a flow to maintaining quickness on Catalyst and it's quite consistent. There's several variations of this based on different attunement orders. You'll almost always want to visit air off cooldown because it contains some of your highest damaging skills and utility.

I think Hammer is much more interesting weapon than this forum gives it credit for. 

I think a lot of the issues people have with Catalyst is also based on the core profession. Elementalist has 4 attunements. Each attunement features varying degrees of damage and utility.

I would argue that Catalyst is a better personification of the Elementalist profession because it's one of the few builds where it's actually viable to visit all the attunements unlike the other rotations that swap between 2 elements unless Weave Self is off cooldown. 

One of the biggest let down for other Elementalist especs for me was that going outside of particular attunements was almost always a dps loss (unless for Weave Self, which entire point is to just extend the duration of the relevant buffs, not all of them). To demonstrate, when's the last time you were like, "I need to Weave Self for Woven Water" or "I need to Weave Self for Woven Earth". Air is more relevant now with the damage bonus on top of the movement speed, but Weave Self was primarily for Condi builds until this change.

The orbs on hammer are relevant because they A: Generate Energy and B: Provide survivability along with damage. Catalyst is at its best when it's surrounded by enemies to cleave. Energy can be weird when you're only hitting 1 target as mentioned above, but you'll find yourself with more energy than you know what to do with when you have orbs + multiple targets around you.

If you'll allow me to shift to a WvW Staff context for a second, one of the most interesting parts of Catalyst is that you're rewarded for setting up your group through CC and if you choose, dodging abilities. The flow of maximizing EE stacks in WvW is quite satisfying, as once you've performed the setup stage, it's typically time to bomb. Weaver often has more damage/abilities than what is necessary for organized play and it's more of a chore to access your CC abilities while also trying to ensure your rotation can maximize your self buffs for the bomb. I've done statistical analysis of the damage outputs, normalizing for some other metrics, and found that the damage difference between Catalyst and Weaver is not statistically relevant (but we can discuss more on that later).

Personally, I have no interest in really playing Weaver after playing Catalyst. This is coming from someone who only played Weaver prior to Catalyst. I did momentarily visit it after some buff patches, but Hammer Catalyst just has an overall nicer playstyle and smoother rotation.

This forum has been upset with Catalyst for a while, even when it was one of the strongest builds in the game. I've been playing this game for over 11 years now. I've nearly always found Elementalist to be fine (a few cases do exist where this is not true) and I come to this forum and it seems like the sky is falling.

There was also a period of time where people had a weird obsession with longbow. 

Not necessarily accusing you of this, because we've had great interactions in the past, but I feel like the most of the problems with Elementalist is the forum just not giving it a honest chance.

---

For some context, Elementalist is not the only class I play. Currently, I'm playing (but have played more in the past):

• DPS Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Catalyst (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Herald (PvE)
• DPS Vindicator (PvE)
• DPS Herald (WvW)
• DPS Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Boon Harbinger (PvE, WvW)
• Strip Scourge (WvW)

This list is organized by my favorite to least favorite to play. I want to highlight this because of the comments on other boon dps and I think Catalyst has the smoothest application of quickness outside of the just sit there Harbinger.

I don't really understand how making yet another heavy-on-DPS espec was supposed to improve Ele. Catalyst is still doing the same spastic four-attunement rapid-swapping that every Ele build is tyrannized by. And it's even more railroaded than Tempest or Weaver.

Catalyst should have been designed with more selectivity to jade sphere and orbs. It should have had the option to camp one element and augment/pump effects, or to blend together various attunements. As it stands it is a one-trick pony that punishes players for not going through the same 1-2-3-4 routine.

[KawsMeCal.5923]

Should have been a cool magic archer elite spec I can picture a ton of cool concepts for ranged archer elementalist that could also have stuff for melee range as well. 

[Helgaley.3619]

It looks like ele will get main hand pistol in the mini expac, but I'd bet 10 laurels it will just be variations of using the pistol as a blunt force object to pistol whip the enemy in all 4 elements. 

[Joswi.2635]

Would be cool to get pistol but wish it was main and off hand like it looks like guardian is getting. It would be good to get another ranged option for main and off hand, not just main. Assuming they actually give us ranged pistols.

[KawsMeCal.5923]

Looking like Weaver with Hammer is just Catalyst but better? Feels weird

[asket.5674]

1 hour ago, KawsMeCal.5923 said:

Looking like Weaver with Hammer is just Catalyst but better? Feels weird

Its more like cata with sword is the better weaver