Cleansing Fire- Lackluster

[Stallic.2397]

Given the spam of conditions in PvP, cleansing fire still doesn't have enough to take up a utility slot. CD is too long and it only removes 3 conditions

Recommendation: Cleansing fire heals for every condition cured. (On top of it's other effects).

Preferably 500 heal for each condition. 

[Downstate.4697]

I think I’d still run it if I wanted to play OG d/d with water air arcane.

[crosknight.3041]

i would love to see it buffed to work like warrior torch skill "Flames of War" where you cleanse conditions and become a mobile fire field. maybe keep it more supportive instead so cleanses a condi per pulse, edit: and heal per condi removed.

Edited April 8 by crosknight.3041

[Arheundel.6451]

On 4/7/2024 at 1:07 AM, Stallic.2397 said:

Given the spam of conditions in PvP, cleansing fire still doesn't have enough to take up a utility slot. CD is too long and it only removes 3 conditions

Recommendation: Cleansing fire heals for every condition cured. (On top of it's other effects).

Preferably 500 heal for each condition. 

Cleansing fire removes 6x condis alone, 8 x if taking water GM, that's good enough on its own and definitely a life saver when dealing with condi spammera. The rest thrown at you should be either dodged or blocked, the utility is definitely strong and worth taking

[Bleikopf.2491]

3 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Cleansing fire removes 6x condis alone, 8 x if taking water GM, that's good enough on its own and definitely a life saver when dealing with condi spammera. The rest thrown at you should be either dodged or blocked, the utility is definitely strong and worth taking

Cleansing Fire is an ammunition skill. It cleanses 3 conditions per charge, with 2 charges on a 25 second recharge. If we're saying 6 conditions, we should also say 50 seconds cooldown. But even 3 per 25s is a bad rate. 

Compared with other utility skills I could find, these are the ones with a worse rate:

• Signet of Agility
• Shadowstep
• Glyph of Equality (Celestial Avatar)
• Repose
• Utility Goggles

Almost all are either group cleanses, stunbreaks or shadowsteps as well.

Cleansing Fire pays a lot for being an ammunition skill and applying 1 stack of burning and 2 stacks of might. Edit: That's 2 might per condition removed. Using it optimally, that's 6 stacks of might. Gaining 6 stacks of might for using a skill optimally was probably good back in 2012. Since then I could not find any change on that in the wiki. 

You also mentioned water GM. That alone won't be enough, as you'll also need the Water Master Soothing Disruption, which is in direct competition with Cleansing Wave. So if you want your Cantrips to cure 1 more condition, you need two traits, one of which competes with a trait that cures one condition on attuning to water. 

Even still, there is competition in other traitlines. Fire's Smothering Auras  is a Master Trait that cleansws up to 3 condis if you transmute an aura. Due to the synergy with Sunspot it cleanses 1 condition every time you attune to Fire, making it a selfish Cleansing Wave. The only Aura with a higher CD than Cleansing Fire's recharge is Magnetic Aura.

If you don't value the spammy nature of Cleansing Fire's ammunition mechanic, you're usually better off with Smothering Auras + an Aura weapon, if you can afford it. And if you want to go through both charges of Cleansing Fire to cleanse 6 conditions, consider if that's really worth 50 seconds CD/25s CD until the next charge. 

It's an outdated skill that compares bad with other skills of Ele, and worse with skills of other classes. 

Edited April 8 by Bleikopf.2491
Removed Null Field from list as it pulses condi cleanse, grammar fixes, added formatting

[Stallic.2397]

3 hours ago, Bleikopf.2491 said:

Cleansing Fire is an ammunition skill. It cleanses 3 conditions per charge, with 2 charges on a 25 second recharge. If we're saying 6 conditions, we should also say 50 seconds cooldown. But even 3 per 25s is a bad rate. 

Compared with other utility skills I could find, these are the ones with a worse rate:

• Null Field
• Signet of Agility
• Shadowstep
• Glyph of Equality (Celestial Avatar)
• Repose
• Utility Goggles

Almost all are either group cleanses, stunbreaks or shadowsteps as well.

Cleansing Fire pays a lot for being an ammunition skill and.. Applying 1 stack of burning and 2 stacks of might.

You also mentioned water GM. That alone won't be enough, as you'll also need the Water Master Soothing Disruption, which is in direct competition with. Cleansing Wave. So if you want your Cantrips to cure 1 more condition, you need two traits, one of which competes with a trait that cures one condition on attuning to water. 

Even still, there is competition in other traitlines. Fire's Smothering Auras  is a Master Trait that cleansws up to 3 condis if you transmute an aura. Due to the synergy with Sunspot it cleanses 1 condition everytime you attune to Fire, making it a selfish Cleansing Wave. The only Aura with a higher CD than Cleansing Fire's recharge is Magnetic Aura.

If you don't value the spammy nature of Cleansing Fire's ammunition mechanic, you're usually better off with Smothering Auras + an Aura weapon, if you can afford it. And if you want to go through both charges of Cleansing Fire to cleanse 6 conditions, consider if that's really worth 50 seconds CD/25s CD until the next charge. 

It's an outdated skill that compares bad with other skills of Ele, and worse with skills of other classes. 

Agreed, given the recent change to this skill, it's clear the Devs want cleansing fire to be used more. In pvp, it's just not worth a utility slot.  Especially not on its own. Cleansing fire still needs traited cleanses in order for the build to be useful. 

From the builds I created it's more of a handicap given the utility slot use and  taken when only absolutely necessary. 

The utility skill seems to lack identity. It's an attack with the Burn, but only does 786 damage over 6 sec at baseline. 3 cleanses is pitiful when fighting true condi builds that spit out condi every other second. The only thing this skill is really good at is might generation. 

Edited April 8 by Stallic.2397

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

The cleanse part is okai. 3 conditions and 2 charges, it's quite nice.

I think it's more the burning and the might as "balance" that are lackluster. It is totally negligeable for foes and support the idea the cleanse are not enough.
2 stack of burning in pvp/wvw, or better, 2 stack per condition removed (or 2 + 1 per condition, whatever) would actually be more dissuasive for condi-spammers

[Downstate.4697]

It’s already on par with similar cantrips. Personally I’d remove the ammo, double the cleanse, remove might, and then have it also grant 1s of resistance per condition removed.

[Bleikopf.2491]

I think we can agree that the might and burning are lackluster and pulling the skill down with its cost in power budget. 

Some of the proposed changes sound good, but I'm afraid the design constrictions of Fire are limiting. 

Resistance isn't something I have seen out of Earth yet (maybe water?). Could be in Fire, but it's unlikely imo. There used to be a stunbreak on Cleansing Fire, but I'm not aware of any other Stunbreaks on any other Fire skill. There was also the suggestion of healing per condition cleansed, which is something I'd personally love to see in Water Traitline now that most people pick Fire if they need cleansing instead of Water. 

Fire is generally lackluster in utility, shoehorning it into damage (or the other way around). I'd personally prefer to see some underutilized aspects of Fire again. Vigor and Regeneration are boons associated with some Fire skills, although Anet might have forgot. Might spam in Fire is tiresome and bland, but not necessarily wrong so a buff to that wouldn't be the end of the world either. Creating a Firefield would be very interesting as we don't have combo fields on utility skills as far as I can tell. That would bring curious interactions as you can now create Firefields outside of Fire attunement.

[Codename T.2847]

On 4/10/2024 at 12:04 AM, Downstate.4697 said:

It’s already on par with similar cantrips. Personally I’d remove the ammo, double the cleanse, remove might, and then have it also grant 1s of resistance per condition removed.

That sounds like a fun suggestion yeah : D

Edited April 12 by Codename T.2847