Big Fail! Pistol is the worst weapon.

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

2 hours ago, Blood Red Arachnid.2493 said:

Or, worst case scenario, everything else will be nerfed around pistol instead.  

Why not both? Nerf all other options and on top of that pistol, since you know, you can't have higher reward for higher complexity/difficulty in gw2.

[Stronger.8273]

2 hours ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

Why not both? Nerf all other options and on top of that pistol, since you know, you can't have higher reward for higher complexity/difficulty in gw2.

Why your talking about  difficulty! You play Soulbeast easier class on this game you don't know how we feel about this! We just want something fun to play! All the wapons from ele sucks and you can spam any of your skills and you deal insane dps! Besides you have those  pets  that can do all the job for you!  

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

3 hours ago, Stronger.8273 said:

Why your talking about  difficulty! You play Soulbeast easier class on this game you don't know how we feel about this! We just want something fun to play! All the wapons from ele sucks and you can spam any of your skills and you deal insane dps! Besides you have those  pets  that can do all the job for you!  

I have almost 10k hours on Ele alone, what I wrote was a sarcasm and sadly a potential future based on A-net decisions in the past.
A-net doesn't care how hard the rotations are for your class to squeeze all the juicy DPS. You'll work 10x harder to get same results as something that needs 0.5 IQ to execute. Sad reality.

[voltaicbore.8012]

On 3/2/2024 at 11:34 AM, Terminsel.5728 said:

Because it's the jack of all trades, in some ways, it's blocked from being the master of any one thing.

Agreed. The moment ele gets just a little too good at just a few too many things, it becomes something of a monster in competitive. Which is a shame, since with skill splits it's theoretically possible to have a weapon perform exceedingly well in pve but be nerfed more properly in competitive... but what we get instead are weapons that just kind of don't work anywhere.

As for my own experiences with pistol, it worked surprisingly well with my meme earth-bleeding build; it seemed much easier to reach 40+ stacks of bleed. Switching to water for heals-on-hit felt okay, but the real disappointment was that fire stance wasn't that much better than earth on dps, which is ridiculous given how heavily burning should outperform bleeding with the right stats.

Edited March 7 by voltaicbore.8012

[Assolador.3598]

On 3/1/2024 at 9:33 PM, Stronger.8273 said:

the gameplay sucks! Condi damage is not that good! when are we gonna have something easy to play without a big rotation and fun gameplay the animations are so bad and lack of creativity 

for me all the weapons for Elementalist are bad now! sword lacks range! staff is the worst weapon!  Dagger is a joke! Scepter could have a better improvement on some elements and a better damage ramp-up, the nerfed Hammer is just dead

THE pistol was promised to give us better gameplay and a good damage burst but the damage is so bad in Open World Primary attack is too slow, and some skills have big Cds, on raids it feels like a cheap weapon! I rather use the Sword  than this clumsy pistol  if devs don't want us to deal decent DPS they should just delete this class from the game 

 

alm down sir if its about numbers then it IS going to be fixed

[Ace.1784]

On 3/4/2024 at 2:24 PM, Tinker.6924 said:

Honestly I'm not keen on how the new pistol works, however when I was poking around for more info on it last night I came across snowcrows build rankings

https://snowcrows.com/benchmarks?filter=dps

Pistol/warhorn condi tempest is the #2 performing dps only build out of 33 they ranked.  Unlike other builds, snowcrows doesn't say it's complicated or has a high learning curve.  The rotation they show does use all 4 elements: very heavy fire and earth of course but also regular use in water and air.  I think the testing is based on golem because I didn't see any dps logs linked for this builds.

Interesting to note the gap between the #2 build and #33 builds is only 7k dps, but the gap between #1 and #2 is a slightly larger 7-8k. #1 dps build is axe/dagger condi deadeye.

If nothing else the build shows a lot of promise in raids and strikes.  

I wasn't playing with Tempest, but interesting to see I was on the right track with the rotation I came up with for Pistol Catalyst. When I get some free time, I'll see how it compares to this.

[wolfyrik.2017]

On 3/5/2024 at 10:51 PM, Hemdale.1520 said:

 

Yep, and this is one of the reasons it is not very dynamic. The bullets are not very exciting and feel more like a routine. It was actually the same situation with hammer and orbs, but I guess anet disagrees.

Aside from the fact that it feels like pistol should have been a two handed weapon, that the gimmick it's been given basically needs it to have a #4 and #5, I've been trying to work out what it is that pistol reminds me of, and this is basically it. It's the beta version of hammer, but even worse.

[Redfeather.6401]

It is not fun to use.

[SJWhat.9237]

1 hour ago, Redfeather.6401 said:

It is not fun to use.

This is the simple short of it. It's not fun. Fun has not been a part of the Elementalist design philosophy for a long time now. They only things they care about are needless complexity, golem benchmarks, and the bare minimum effort implementation. Their design philosophy for the profession is outright flawed. 

[Stronger.8273]

14 hours ago, Assolador.3598 said:

alm down sir if its about numbers then it IS going to be fixed

I hope so! the pistol looks to be high on benchmarks but in real gameplay is not effective or funny to play with it, they should give us some adjustment soon cuz just a small part of peps is playing with it cuz is boring.

Edited March 8 by Stronger.8273

[Jski.6180]

I did not realize the duel skills on pistol has aura too it could be such a great wepon if anet would give it real dmg and real aoe at least in the pvp/wvw enviorment. That and lets the auto attk give you ammo.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

4 hours ago, Jski.6180 said:

I did not realize the duel skills on pistol has aura too it could be such a great wepon if anet would give it real dmg and real aoe at least in the pvp/wvw enviorment. That and lets the auto attk give you ammo.

Man, the fire aura from Fire/Water (with fire bullet) is shorter than the one from Fire/Fire !? Did they read skills at least before the release ?
With dual skills you have 12 new effects to know, 2 effects per dual skills depending of the bullet (because they couldn't give the same effect per bullet, too simple) AND it doesn't give bullet if you don't have one ; plus the "previous" 8 effects from core #3 and #2.
So you're forced to use #2 before dual skill in some way, but if you're fire/water with no water bullet (because you used it 2 sec before ; you don't really have the choice because AA is lame) and you want the effect from water bullet then you have to wait for attunement swap. Same with core effect from #2 you can't have it until you swap attunement to fire/fire (Bye bye Raging Ricochet, unless you play unravel I guess). Etc, etc.
Still no boonstrip, no resistance/resolution, no might/fury/quickness, 3 bleeding or  some sec of burning, no condi bomb, 1stab of 3sec (and paired with an evade effect !?) ...
Pistol with weaver in pvp modes you need to see the future and have a predetermined gameplan even before engaging fight, or may be play with 400 ping to take time to read the iconbar and tooltips, IDK.

No, it's not just a matter of dmg, it's a matter of design. They wanted to develop further the gimmick for weaver, but no one ever tried it for real, I can't believe it.
Weaver is already not attractive for players, and despite is my main e-spec for wvw roaming (and Balthazar knows we're outmanned)  pistol  is a clown weapon.

Edit. I just wanted to be sure, but yeah, there is not even "Immobilize" in dual skills, nor fire field. So the synergies with condi traits are quite low actually !? A bit akward for a "condi weapon" ?

Edited March 10 by Zhaid Zhem.6508
Clown weapon

[Jski.6180]

2 minutes ago, Zhaid Zhem.6508 said:

Man, the fire aura from Fire/Water (with fire bullet) is shorter than the one from Fire/Fire !? Did they read skills at least before the release ?
With dual skills you have 12 new effects to know, 2 effects per dual skills depending of the bullet (because they couldn't give the same effect per bullet, too simple) AND it doesn't give bullet if you don't have one ; plus the "previous" 8 effects from core #3 and #2.
So you're forced to use #2 before dual skill in some way, but if you're fire/water with no water bullet (because you used it 2 sec before, before you don't really have the choice because AA is lame) and you want the effect from water bullet then you have to wait for attunement swap, same with core effect from #2 you can't have it until you swap attunement to fire/fire. Etc, etc.
Still no boonstrip, no resistance/resolution, no might/fury/quickness, 3 bleeding or  some sec of burning, no condi bomb, 1stab of 3sec (and paired with an evade effect !?) ...
Pistol with weaver in pvp modes you need to see the future and have a predetermined gameplan even before engaging fight, or may be play with 400 ping to take time to read the iconbar and tooltips, IDK.

No, it's not just a matter of dmg, it's a matter of design. They wanted to develop further the gimmick for weaver, but no one ever tried it for real, I can't believe it.
Weaver is already not attractive for players, and despite is my main e-spec for wvw roaming (and Balthazar knows we're outmanned)  pistol  is a clown weapon.

Well that why i say that the 1 skill should give and use bullets. That and give all of the skill at least 3 target cleave.

[draxynnic.3719]

2 hours ago, Zhaid Zhem.6508 said:

Man, the fire aura from Fire/Water (with fire bullet) is shorter than the one from Fire/Fire !? Did they read skills at least before the release ?
With dual skills you have 12 new effects to know, 2 effects per dual skills depending of the bullet (because they couldn't give the same effect per bullet, too simple) AND it doesn't give bullet if you don't have one ; plus the "previous" 8 effects from core #3 and #2.
So you're forced to use #2 before dual skill in some way, but if you're fire/water with no water bullet (because you used it 2 sec before ; you don't really have the choice because AA is lame) and you want the effect from water bullet then you have to wait for attunement swap. Same with core effect from #2 you can't have it until you swap attunement to fire/fire (Bye bye Raging Ricochet, unless you play unravel I guess). Etc, etc.
Still no boonstrip, no resistance/resolution, no might/fury/quickness, 3 bleeding or  some sec of burning, no condi bomb, 1stab of 3sec (and paired with an evade effect !?) ...
Pistol with weaver in pvp modes you need to see the future and have a predetermined gameplan even before engaging fight, or may be play with 400 ping to take time to read the iconbar and tooltips, IDK.

No, it's not just a matter of dmg, it's a matter of design. They wanted to develop further the gimmick for weaver, but no one ever tried it for real, I can't believe it.
Weaver is already not attractive for players, and despite is my main e-spec for wvw roaming (and Balthazar knows we're outmanned)  pistol  is a clown weapon.

Edit. I just wanted to be sure, but yeah, there is not even "Immobilize" in dual skills, nor fire field. So the synergies with condi traits are quite low actually !? A bit akward for a "condi weapon" ?

Honestly, the problem with weavers using pistols contributes to another problem I have with pistol: just which elementalist builds in PvE is it meant to really synergise with? It's getting used on Tempest, I believe, but Tempest is basically a melee spec due to overloads. Weaver just makes the bullet mechanic even more awkward as described above. While with Catalyst... I guess if you're relying on conditions for damage you're not losing as much damage by your enemy not being in your sphere as a power catalyst would?

[Ragnarox.9601]

I am waiting for Anet to redeem themselves (after garbage hammer and pistol) with offhand op sword or axe/axe op combo. 

[Bleikopf.2491]

15 minutes ago, Ragnarox.9601 said:

I am waiting for Anet to redeem themselves (after garbage hammer and pistol) with offhand op sword or axe/axe op combo. 

More melee? 

[rotten.9753]

6 hours ago, Ragnarox.9601 said:

I am waiting for Anet to redeem themselves (after garbage hammer and pistol) with offhand op sword or axe/axe op combo. 

We need a new designer for that.

[Puck.3697]

On 3/2/2024 at 1:15 AM, Mini Crinny.6190 said:

however, if we are talking about actual end game content like Raids or Fractals, then other classes can do similar damage with less effort, this makes Ele less viable

Other classes being easier to play doesnt make ele less viable, their never gonna balance the game on difficulty, the concept is every class do similar dps, difficulty isn’t apart of that.

difficulty exists as a choice in mmorpg, for those who enjoy / can keep up with more challenging options, to lean the balancing in such fashion would severely damage the accessibility of the game as it’d become a expectation for anyone filling a dps role to play ele

I haven’t tried pistol, so I won’t comment on what it can and can’t do, returning to the game I decided to make a new character instead of Ele to change things up for myself. 
 

a lot of the new weapons seem to be considered a disappointment however 

Edited March 11 by Puck.3697

[Puck.3697]

On 3/7/2024 at 2:09 PM, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

have almost 10k hours on Ele alone, what I wrote was a sarcasm and sadly a potential future based on A-net decisions in the past.
A-net doesn't care how hard the rotations are for your class to squeeze all the juicy DPS. You'll work 10x harder to get same results as something that needs 0.5 IQ to execute. Sad reality.

It’s not really a sad reality, this is the case in all MMORPGs, difficulty is a choice for fun, it exists for those who want it for the right way, literally balancing based on difficulty has never succeeded. 
 

pretty sure wild star tried this idea, and it got shut down after attempting to reboot twice, you can’t balance a mmorpg on difficulty, it just makes the game wildly unapproachable 

You will find in every successful mmorpg difficulty is never factored into the balance, difficult options should exist, but it’s there for the users choice, if your choosing the hardest to play class because you think it should do the most dps, u just aren’t choosing your class for the right reasons so ur getting burned 

Edited March 11 by Puck.3697

[TrollingDemigod.3041]

17 minutes ago, Puck.3697 said:

It’s not really a sad reality, this is the case in all MMORPGs, difficulty is a choice for fun, it exists for those who want it for the right way, literally balancing based on difficulty has never succeeded. 
 

pretty sure wild star tried this idea, and it got shut down after attempting to reboot twice, you can’t balance a mmorpg on difficulty, it just makes the game wildly unapproachable 

You will find in every successful mmorpg difficulty is never factored into the balance, difficult options should exist, but it’s there for the users choice, if your choosing the hardest to play class because you think it should do the most dps, u just aren’t choosing your class for the right reasons so ur getting burned 

Wild Star was a garbo game though, it had "some decent combat" but beyond that was bad af.
What's the point of that choice if it doesn't reward you properly? You learned 30+ step hard rotation for high DPS(not top, high) that requires your focus constantly and the moment you break it it hits rock botton, then you see some Virtuoso or whatever smashing face on keyboard with 10key rotation to outdps without any penalty. 
There's really no reason to go for higher difficulty if you get same results as someone who just can semi-afk. Waste of time and energy.

[draxynnic.3719]

3 hours ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

Wild Star was a garbo game though, it had "some decent combat" but beyond that was bad af.
What's the point of that choice if it doesn't reward you properly? You learned 30+ step hard rotation for high DPS(not top, high) that requires your focus constantly and the moment you break it it hits rock botton, then you see some Virtuoso or whatever smashing face on keyboard with 10key rotation to outdps without any penalty. 
There's really no reason to go for higher difficulty if you get same results as someone who just can semi-afk. Waste of time and energy.

On the other hand, if the hardest thing to play always gives the best result, that pushes out everyone who isn't eager to get the highest APM possible.

On the gripping hand, golem benchmark values are not the indicator of the most effective builds that some people seem to think they are. If a build takes a complex and easily disrupted rotation to achieve its DPS numbers, it can probably stand to be a bit higher on the golem on the basis that you're not actually going to get that rotation in practice.

Play rates are a better indicator. If the play rate for a complex build climbs enough that it seems like people are being forced to play it, then there'd be a need to take action. 

Another thing to consider...

4 hours ago, Puck.3697 said:

You will find in every successful mmorpg difficulty is never factored into the balance, difficult options should exist, but it’s there for the users choice, if your choosing the hardest to play class because you think it should do the most dps, u just aren’t choosing your class for the right reasons so ur getting burned 

That's the thing: not everyone playing elementalist is doing so due to wanting to flex on a complex rotation. It's an archetype that a lot of people want to play for the sake of the archetype. Now, there's potential there for everyone to be satisfied, but to bring it back to the subject of the thread... not when every new weapon seems to lean more and more into focusing on complexity over functionality.

[Puck.3697]

5 hours ago, TrollingDemigod.3041 said:

What's the point of that choice if it doesn't reward you properly? You learned 30+ step hard rotation for high DPS(not top, high) that requires your focus constantly and the moment you break it it hits rock botton, then you see some Virtuoso or whatever smashing face on keyboard with 10key rotation to outdps without any penalty

And on the other hand why make the best option something 99% of players can’t use.

choice exists for fun,you sit here saying this, yet 99% of the playerbase can’t get a 90+ percentile log on virt, every class is high difficulty when your wording it like this, because the vast majority can’t do it. 

[Tinker.6924]

Tempest pistol has definitely grown on me to the point where I’m shelving my scepter in favor of pistol now. The rotation isn’t hard: if you want damage you go 3-2, for defense you go 2-3 (except for water).   Plus mix in whatever you want to use from the offhand and overload  for fire/earth, then you switch attunements. Water is actually worth using with it.  Air still seems meh for condi dmg. 

There are a few things I don’t like about pistol

 1. if you get interrupted/knocked down while trying to cast the bullet generator that ability can go on cd without giving you a bullet and it’s too hard to tell if there is one from the boon bar

2. Air 3 is too glitchy.  Most of the time i just want to crash into my target with it instead of flying past out of position. I don’t have this issue when D-4 Ride the Lighting, yet somehow this mini pistol version is harder to control. I will probably skip air in my loop unless I need the mobility or cc. 
3. They should have switch waters abilities around to be consistent with how things worked in the other elements. Water does deviate from the defensive ability on 2 instead of 3. 

4. This one isn’t too bad but the auto attack feels a bit slow compared to other professions version of pistol. I know it’s not but it feels slow comparatively. But given the rotation is all about hitting CD abilities, there should rarely be a moment when the auto attack has an opportunity to trigger. 

Edited March 11 by Tinker.6924

[Puck.3697]

3 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

That's the thing: not everyone playing elementalist is doing so due to wanting to flex on a complex rotation. It's an archetype that a lot of people want to play for the sake of the archetype. Now, there's potential there for everyone to be satisfied, but to bring it back to the subject of the thread... not when every new weapon seems to lean more and more into focusing on complexity over functionality

Well of course there is, there’s several things they could do.

- buff easier aspects of the class to raise the minimum damage and reducing the dps loss because of misplays

- return staff as a good dps weapon to give ele proper ranged options in competitive environments

They could make each weapon flat in terms of dmg type, I.e reduce the attunement pool to 3 and remove fire or air based on the weapon choice to reduce buttons.

they could add more dmg in pve to the water / earth elements, where all the defensives are.

remove quickness and boons from jade sphere into a trait which applies it from a passive effect on abilities in each attainment  and jade sphere be only static area dmg pulse.

there’s lots they could do to simplify ele down, and imho they should. The core playerbase can’t play ele, that is a problem realistically  

Edited March 11 by Puck.3697

[zeyeti.8347]

Another weapon with some hybridish feeling , air auto damage is a joke (think it's the lowest damage i have ever see with hammer 3 skills) , and we have healing in water ofc , only for yourself ofc , so no potential support weapon ... , and do you think anet would make combo make sense like skill 2 enhance skill 3 in term of damage and skill 3 enhance skill 2 in term of survivability ... nahhhh sometimes it's 2 for 3 for damage , then it's 3 for 2 for damage ... yep make sense ... i forgot ele isn't allowed to have some Qol, yeah yeah i know scepter/warhorn still perform ok , but why take a class with less hp and less armor doing the same damage as something having 22k health ? fun ? yep . Efficiency ? biased.

Can we have a full focused weapon on a particular role , efficient in every attunement ?

And best part , it's doing 46 k on golem , so be ready for the nerf , i foreshadow it ! complicated rotation that will do as any duh rotation build in 1 month ! i don't even want to train it , cause i know it's gonna get nerfed , same as deadeye condi axe speeny.