Expanded Weapon Proficiencies Beta Feedback: Elementalist

[mirage.8046]

The dual pistol skills felt very uninspired and lackluster. While the condi damage is fine, all attunements should offer different conditions instead of the typical conditions you'd expect. 

Fire attunement provides torment in addition to burning.
Water attunement slows enemies.
Air attunement has confusion and perhaps boon removal. Electricity doesn't just daze or fry your system; sparks can burn too. So burning and confusion would make sense.
Earth attunement causes burning. A smoke field would be bonkers here too. 

Pistol does not need to be scepter's twin. Air attunement not having any condition damage at all destroys the purpose of the pistol being a condition weapon anyway.

[Serephen.3420]

So all ele pistol got updated is some mixed up animations so everything doesn't look exactly the same and some more hard to read buff icons. Nothing with making the gameplay of pistol less clunky and more fun and nothing to make air a useless attunement to swap to. I guess I can't be too surprised looking at what they were trying to do with pistol(take all the messy annoying parts of being an ele to focus into one weapon). Hopefully the changes to shortbow for engie will at least make one of the weapons  a less bland and more interesting choice, though I'm really gonna have to wait and see on this one. (For most of the others it seems they listened to some of the main pain points kinda).

If pistol was more akin to necro pistol in that you could still do some decent power damage if you specced for it, it would explain air attunement and make some sense for a change.

Edited February 15 by Serephen.3420

[Dadnir.5038]

3 hours ago, Serephen.3420 said:

So all ele pistol got updated is some mixed up animations so everything doesn't look exactly the same and some more hard to read buff icons.

Their answer to the feedback is hilarious. If I didn't know that it's mid february right now I'd believe it to be an april fool joke.

Ah! I have to quote this!

Quote

And to finish off elementalist, we have the most important changes: Piercing Pebble will now pierce!

 

[RazieL.5684]

once again ele gets the shaft... other classes get their garbage mechanic completely removed and reworked but the kitten bullets that nobody liked on ele ofc will remain to be a hindrance... clutter that buff bar some more will you... it can still fit on the screen...

 

 

[soulknight.9620]

Surprised? Its basically an illustration on how ele balance patches are handles compared to other classes. 

[Mini Crinny.6190]

3 hours ago, RazieL.5684 said:

once again ele gets the shaft... other classes get their garbage mechanic completely removed and reworked but the kitten bullets that nobody liked on ele ofc will remain to be a hindrance... clutter that buff bar some more will you... it can still fit on the screen...

 

 

its alright, Piercing pebble now pierces

 

With the name itself, I would of expected it to pierce without being told that it has been changed to pierce

Edited February 15 by Mini Crinny.6190

[draxynnic.3719]

21 hours ago, RazieL.5684 said:

once again ele gets the shaft... other classes get their garbage mechanic completely removed and reworked but the kitten bullets that nobody liked on ele ofc will remain to be a hindrance... clutter that buff bar some more will you... it can still fit on the screen...

 

 

They've ignored (or at least not mentioned) the primary pain points on guardian pistol as well - might even have made one of them worse. Mind you, guardian pistols were more functional than ele pistol to begin with.

Edited February 16 by draxynnic.3719

[Jski.6180]

I hope they fix the bugs or say what the skill can do better then the way it worked/was reading in the beta. A lot of pistol skills did a LOT more then what they where reading and it was not clear what added effect the ammo gave vs what the skill simply had build in with out the ammo. The pistol from the beta if it was not bugged but just badly worded was very powerful but a LOT of bad ui. OR it was super bugged and very week a realty bad bate and switch set up.

[CETheLucid.3964]

6 hours ago, Jski.6180 said:

I hope they fix the bugs or say what the skill can do better then the way it worked/was reading in the beta. A lot of pistol skills did a LOT more then what they where reading and it was not clear what added effect the ammo gave vs what the skill simply had build in with out the ammo. The pistol from the beta if it was not bugged but just badly worded was very powerful but a LOT of bad ui. OR it was super bugged and very week a realty bad bate and switch set up.

It did exactly what it said. However the icons were place holders. So if you're more visual minded it was a real touch and go experience. Good fun trying to follow what the hell I'm doing on Weaver. It was okay on Tempest and Catalyst. I went into it thinking I'd hate it based on the initial preview but actually playing with it, it wasn't so bad. I had fun with it. There's a lot of potential there. I left my thoughts on it back when it happened.

But I do unironically appreciate the Piecing Pebble change. Little to no AoE, splash, and cleave are real pain points for pistol. So that will help it even if people poke fun at it. It's mostly single target DPS with not enough DPS to justify it when every other elementalist weapon has plenty of splash and DPS.

If it comes out too strong it'll get nerfed into the ground without much thought given to it beyond 'golem testers say it good make number go down'. Conversely if it comes out weak, within a month or so you can expect it to be really looked at and changed for the better. So while I'd prefer that 'just right' if I had to pick between an OP release or a weak one, I'd go for the later just so it could get the attention it deserves.

Scepter changes were magical. It's a much better weapon than it used to be. I want pistol to get some love like that. And staff too. Please buff staff. I miss the real Meteor Shower.

[Jski.6180]

6 hours ago, CETheLucid.3964 said:

It did exactly what it said. However the icons were place holders. So if you're more visual minded it was a real touch and go experience. Good fun trying to follow what the hell I'm doing on Weaver. It was okay on Tempest and Catalyst. I went into it thinking I'd hate it based on the initial preview but actually playing with it, it wasn't so bad. I had fun with it. There's a lot of potential there. I left my thoughts on it back when it happened.

But I do unironically appreciate the Piecing Pebble change. Little to no AoE, splash, and cleave are real pain points for pistol. So that will help it even if people poke fun at it. It's mostly single target DPS with not enough DPS to justify it when every other elementalist weapon has plenty of splash and DPS.

If it comes out too strong it'll get nerfed into the ground without much thought given to it beyond 'golem testers say it good make number go down'. Conversely if it comes out weak, within a month or so you can expect it to be really looked at and changed for the better. So while I'd prefer that 'just right' if I had to pick between an OP release or a weak one, I'd go for the later just so it could get the attention it deserves.

Scepter changes were magical. It's a much better weapon than it used to be. I want pistol to get some love like that. And staff too. Please buff staff. I miss the real Meteor Shower.

There where a lot of added effects that did not show up on the wording of the skills and it was very unclear if the added effect only trigger on ammo or not. Some things look like they only combo with ammo but often they would combo with out. Things like that.

[Aedil.1296]

I won't repeat again how trash is pistol for Ele. 

I would like to focus a sec on the fact that you don't play your own game. And I have proof of it. 

Everyone kindly pointed out to fix the bullets UI as they are not visible on screen. 

I would have expected a bullet symbol above Each 4 attunements on the left similar to the dots mesmer has for blades to indicate that the attunement had a bullet...

...but no... 

YOU GAVE US BUFFS ICONS LOOOOOL. 

It's clear you devs don't play the game or you would know how the buffs area is already infested with Icons and unreadable, not to mention when the icons go below the minimap and gets hidden completely. 

I personally feel offended by the poor choices (we are not stupid) and the degradation of quality we keep having on the game. 

 

[Emperor Palpatine.5329]

Pistol ele is by far the worst implemented weapon. It makes me HATE ele! The skills, lack of animations, the freaking sound while equipping hope, the damage output on some attunments, and the overall implementation is just atrocious.  This needs a serious rework! 

[len.7809]

The pistol for ele in competitive modes, WvW in my case feels totally useless

the power build hits like wet noodle, condi builds lacks of consistency. Scepter fire can apply easily consistent stacks of burning while pistol auto does 1s burn without expertise.
Elemental Explosion requires the elementalist to store a bullet of each element which means that if I want to use it under pressure, I need to sacrifice a skill intentionally, to able to use it. If its rewarding for using it, im ok, but its not. It gives an aura based on your attunement and do some damage + conditions, totally not worth it.

 

[Traveler.2450]

ups wrong post

Edited June 27 by Traveler.2450