Elementalist spear hopes

[Dadnir.5038]

22 minutes ago, RazieL.5684 said:

so i wrote a paragraph, then saw your number of posts... so i deleted the paragraph and decided to go with:

i'm not explaining range...

Nobody need 1500 range on a weapon, not even the professions that do have such thing.

• In sPvP, 1500 range have no meaning because this is a gamemode of conquest not a siege gamemode.
• In PvE, you want to stand shoulder to shoulder with your allies to get the benefit of the group support and being at range is counter productive.
• In WvW, there are a few situation were having a some range is useful but that's extremly occasional and ultimately you'll want to be able to take care of yourself against melee range player when the need inevitably arise. Your commanders will seldom tell you to stay at 1500 range of the fight. In fact, it might kitten him off to see someone break away from the raid to go throw a few spears at 1500 range and get downed through reflect. (As for WvW in general, I don't think anybody want a 2nd or 3rd coming of the pirate ship meta)

What elementalist lack isn't maximum range but flexibility in range. One of the biggest "hole in the role" of the elmentalist is that he can't switch from a ranged weapon to a melee weapon. So far, the devs' answer to this concern have been to slap melee skills effects within a range skillset which is far from being a satisfying answer.

You don't need to explain range to me indeed, but I do think you need to be toldd that having a lot of range in this game isn't necessarily a good thing. And that's especially true for elementalist.

[Fueki.4753]

52 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

• In PvE, you want to stand shoulder to shoulder with your allies to get the benefit of the group support and being at range is counter productive.

PvE is then just the melee pile. PvE even is more than just playing in groups. Not every weapons should be designed for that specific purpose in mind.

There are people who enjoy playing open world PvE with ranged weapons. It'd be fine, if spear was designed for these players.

And even if the range ends up being 1500, it can still be used in the melee pile.

Edited June 16 by Fueki.4753

[Dadnir.5038]

20 minutes ago, Fueki.4753 said:

PvE is then just the melee pile. PvE even is more than just playing in groups. Not every weapons should be designed for that specific purpose in mind.

There are people who enjoy playing open world PvE with ranged weapons. It'd be fine, if spear was designed for these players.

And even if the range ends up being 1500, it can still be used in the melee pile.

Still 1500 range isn't needed.

I get that some people have the fantasy to play an old school backyard elementalist. Even now, personally, I'm still playing staff just fine in PvE and staff isn't nearly as bad as the elmentalist community like to paint it.

The point is that going beyond 1200 range is always superflous and, in some case, counterproductive. The only niche there is for that is WvW and that is only if it's used wisely.

Even for "people that enjoy playing PvE", it isn't recommended to play builds that do not benefit other and do not benefit from other. And standing at 1500 range already mean losing out on support from other. All in all, it's bad design to encourage poor gameplay even if it's "open world PvE".

[WindBlade.8749]

45 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Still 1500 range isn't needed.

kitten it we ball make it 10 000 range and call it a day /s

[RazieL.5684]

54 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Still 1500 range isn't needed.

I get that some people have the fantasy to play an old school backyard elementalist. Even now, personally, I'm still playing staff just fine in PvE and staff isn't nearly as bad as the elmentalist community like to paint it.

The point is that going beyond 1200 range is always superflous and, in some case, counterproductive. The only niche there is for that is WvW and that is only if it's used wisely.

Even for "people that enjoy playing PvE", it isn't recommended to play builds that do not benefit other and do not benefit from other. And standing at 1500 range already mean losing out on support from other. All in all, it's bad design to encourage poor gameplay even if it's "open world PvE".

i am not sure if there is even a single thing that is true from what you have stated so far in this thread... but as i said, i saw your post count so i can't bother explaining...

[Fueki.4753]

1 hour ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Even for "people that enjoy playing PvE", it isn't recommended to play builds that do not benefit other and do not benefit from other. And standing at 1500 range already mean losing out on support from other. All in all, it's bad design to encourage poor gameplay even if it's "open world PvE".

Recommend by who? High-end people who mix-max their numbers? People who simply take builds from some website, instead of making their own builds?

There are people who want to enjoy the game on their own terms. Not everyone enjoys cutting their cookies. If that means no boons or healing from other players, so be it. If that means sniping enemies from as far as they can, so be it.

But that doesn't mean it's automatically bad design. It just means that the design differs from what the "meta" people like to see.

I'd very much welcome a new long range weapon for Elementalist with Fire and/or Earth abilities that are fun to use. I doubt I'm the only one.

Edited June 16 by Fueki.4753

[fuzzyp.6295]

I'm either hoping for a lower damage but high mobility/control  fully ranged weapon or a hybrid weapon. Hammer was a good start, but having a hybrid range weapon with longer (900 or 1200) would be good. If its hybrid in that sense, then I hope the close-range skills have pulls or gap closers, something that Hammer is lacking.

I'd be very unhappy if Spear is just a four attunements of: Throw Ranged Spear, Throw Mulitple Spears, Big Charge Up into Big and (easily dodgeable) Spear Throw.

EDIT: Oh and Reveal and/or Stealth somehow built into the Weapon. That alone would make it worth looking into for me. 🙂

Edited June 16 by fuzzyp.6295

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

With pistol being "condi", scepter "more power" I just hope they'll go in the same way and not versatile and useless everywhere like always.

[Sarm.5923]

Is it bad for me to say I'd like it to be something chill and simple? I figure no matter what's added, ele's swapping and elite mechanics will throw a wrench into anything that's made, so I'd rather it not compound on that.

Though it'd also be kinda neat if it was a weapon that predominantly focused on air and water as damage, kinda like a Poseidon-themed weapon. Though maybe that'd be more of a trident thing, if that ever comes out of the water in the future as well.

[CETheLucid.3964]

1 hour ago, Sarm.5923 said:

Is it bad for me to say I'd like it to be something chill and simple?

A bit. I don't get the complaint about it being complicated to play because of the exact nature of the class. That's what you signed up for. You attunement dance. You're an elementalist.

Weapon swap x 4 isn't 300 IQ stuff. It is more effort. You do need to understand how the class works.

I will say that there shouldn't be a system on top of a system (looking at you energy bar + CD spheres) and that complexity should be rewarded. Parity with simpler classes isn't really a reward.

Personally I like the class enough to keep with it if that condition is met but monkey brains are going to wonder why they should bother with a complex class when they can achieve the same standard for less effort.

It scratches at their sanity. Especially if you outperform them. I like that. I'm crazy though. I'm an elementalist. It's flashy and fun. 😁

[draxynnic.3719]

10 minutes ago, CETheLucid.3964 said:

A bit. I don't get the complaint about it being complicated to play because of the exact nature of the class. That's what you signed up for. You attunement dance. You're an elementalist.

Because the attunement dance is already creating a fairly high level of complexity, especially with weaver. When you layer complexity on complexity over even more complexity, at some point it just gets unwieldy. Where, exactly, that is varies from person to person, but generally speaking, when your baseline complexity is already on the higher end, you should be wary about compounding that.

[CETheLucid.3964]

20 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

generally speaking, when your baseline complexity is already on the higher end, you should be wary about compounding that.

Sure. I'd agree with that.

[Sarm.5923]

Yeah, that was my point. I already know I'm going to be swapping through attunements as the class's replacement for weapon swapping, + elite spec mechanics. That's why I wouldn't want a minigame made out of a weapon as well. Granted, I don't have the expansions to try out hammer and pistol, but just looking at hammer's skill3 orbs and pistol's bullet mechanics as described in the tooltips have me going "ew, why was any of this necessary".

[draxynnic.3719]

28 minutes ago, Sarm.5923 said:

Yeah, that was my point. I already know I'm going to be swapping through attunements as the class's replacement for weapon swapping, + elite spec mechanics. That's why I wouldn't want a minigame made out of a weapon as well. Granted, I don't have the expansions to try out hammer and pistol, but just looking at hammer's skill3 orbs and pistol's bullet mechanics as described in the tooltips have me going "ew, why was any of this necessary".

Orbs, honestly, aren't really that bad. You shift an attunement, you pop an orb unless it's already up. Ideally you don't want to throw the orbs until you have all the orbs you're going to have in your rotation, but if you accidentally throw them early, it's not a big deal - the cooldown on replacing that orb has a good chance of already being up.

Bullets, though... you can just about make them work on a tempest, but otherwise...

[phandaria.4891]

1 hour ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Orbs, honestly, aren't really that bad. You shift an attunement, you pop an orb unless it's already up. Ideally you don't want to throw the orbs until you have all the orbs you're going to have in your rotation, but if you accidentally throw them early, it's not a big deal - the cooldown on replacing that orb has a good chance of already being up.

Bullets, though... you can just about make them work on a tempest, but otherwise...

Tempest pistol is fine because mostly you only cycle Fire and Earth attunements for damage, and Water and Air can be added situationally. Hammer Cata is a nightmare.... Cycling 4 attunements means you have to predict whenever you need cc break or condi cleanse, or you break the whole cycle.

I hope the elementalist spear will be a much simpler range weapon, needing only 2 attunements (at max) for damage rotation and the other 2 attunements for utility purposes.

[Fueki.4753]

6 hours ago, Sarm.5923 said:

Is it bad for me to say I'd like it to be something chill and simple?

It's absolutely not a bad thing to say. It's actually a good thing and more people should voice this sentiment. Elementalist needs more weapons that are simple.

Some people want to play Elementalist for thematic reasons, not because of high complexity.

Edited June 17 by Fueki.4753

[draxynnic.3719]

4 hours ago, phandaria.4891 said:

Tempest pistol is fine because mostly you only cycle Fire and Earth attunements for damage, and Water and Air can be added situationally. Hammer Cata is a nightmare.... Cycling 4 attunements means you have to predict whenever you need cc break or condi cleanse, or you break the whole cycle.

I hope the elementalist spear will be a much simpler range weapon, needing only 2 attunements (at max) for damage rotation and the other 2 attunements for utility purposes.

I think three or even four is fine... but three or four while also keeping up with a mechanic that requires skills with different cooldowns to be used in precise orders in order to get the best results, where each attunement has its own separately tracked instance of that mechanic without good signalling to the player of what state the mechanic is in, and where each instance persists through attunement shifts so if you lose track you might have that instance on the wrong state when you shift back to the attunement... that's getting over the top.

[Zhaid Zhem.6508]

Hammer's orb isn't complex, it's just particulary lazy to me ; it's a loop of buffs to compensate bad base, coef and effects and somewhat oblige you to attune in all elements for the grand final (at least in raid/perfect rotation).

Pistol is an other issue, it suffers of bad design in many points :  long cast, lack of dynamism, poor effects, delay on effects, poor visual effects and UI, over-complicated mechanic with weaver, and globally pistol is about long duration 1 stack conditions skill ; , not really appealing for wvw/pvp and OW. It is unnecessarily "complexe" for absolutely nothing crazy.
If it had correct power damage, condi bomb or a huge "Elemental explosion" (skill #1 with all bullets) 360 radius, 10 burnings + 10 bleeding + stun, etc it would be worth it.

[draxynnic.3719]

16 hours ago, Zhaid Zhem.6508 said:

Hammer's orb isn't complex, it's just particulary lazy to me ; it's a loop of buffs to compensate bad base, coef and effects and somewhat oblige you to attune in all elements for the grand final (at least in raid/perfect rotation).

Pistol is an other issue, it suffers of bad design in many points :  long cast, lack of dynamism, poor effects, delay on effects, poor visual effects and UI, over-complicated mechanic with weaver, and globally pistol is about long duration 1 stack conditions skill ; , not really appealing for wvw/pvp and OW. It is unnecessarily "complexe" for absolutely nothing crazy.
If it had correct power damage, condi bomb or a huge "Elemental explosion" (skill #1 with all bullets) 360 radius, 10 burnings + 10 bleeding + stun, etc it would be worth it.

Yeah, pistol kinda feels like it's barely ahead of other options for bossfights, but pretty much pointless everywhere else.

[vardeleanu.8972]

I hope it's a full melee 130 range single target weapon where every skill is is a 4 second channel time that hits only once at the end, like bladesworn, or spawns a tinny little dust around you that buffs your damage by 2% and lasts for 13 seconds with the same cooldown so you have to swap attunements awkwardly to keep up all the little dust bits.  The weaver skills can just be placeholders that summon 2 specks of dust at the same time. The damage should also be at most low, since ele has so many skills, and those skills should come with high cooldowns too. Auto attacks should do like 500 power damage in full berserker setup max, with no condition on top, since elementalists shouldn't auto attack out of fire ever anyway and we should punish them for doing that.

I think this kind of design is what elementalist has really been missing for the last 3 expansions, and it would help weaver, tempest and catalyst out hugely by combining the best parts of every single elementalist weapon.

I'm sure the dev team agrees.

Edited June 18 by vardeleanu.8972

[valchales.2068]

I hope for a power-oriented ranged weapon, without specifying the range due to certain reasons. I believe it should involve precise aiming, akin to Skyscale Fireball (skill 2), which would be ideal. However, I'm concerned about the inclusion of a minigame mechanic, such as needing to gather energy to cast a fireball. Considering the quality of spears introduced so far, I remain hopeful that an elemental spear would capture the essence of what we appreciate about elementalists.

[Flaming.4250]

Just read the blog post and it looks like the spear is long range power and croud controll.

Quote

The elementalist wields a spear as a long-range, power-damage weapon capable of conjuring powerful elemental forces such as volcanos, whirlpools, and lightning storms. The spear has a couple of minor defensive tools but is primarily focused on damage and crowd control, leading to a “glass cannon” style of play that will be more comfortable when you’re unleashing spells from a distance rather than ending up in the thick of combat.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en-gb/news/spear-me-the-details-mesmer-revenant-and-elementalist/

Quote

All of these skills also have a relatively short casting time—or none at all

However it does look like the 5th skill is is a little bit of a piano skill.

Quote

The fifth weapon skill slot contains the most potent skill of each attunement, assuming you can fulfill the requirements. Each skill starts off in its base state, a quick cast that etches a spell circle into the ground. As an example, the fire skill Etching: Volcano creates a spell circle that grants might to the elementalist. The skill then flips over into Lesser Volcano, a ground-targeted spell that erupts to create several damaging strikes. Unlocking the skill’s full potential requires the spell circle to be completed before reactivating the skill. To do so, the user must simply use three other skills while standing inside the etched circle.

This process isn’t limited to spear skills, so instant-casting utility skills can be utilized to speed things up. Once the spell circle is completed, the skill flips once more to its final form—in this case, Volcano—allowing the user to unleash the full potential of the effect. The full-power Volcano erupts for a longer period of time, creating additional damaging areas and inflicting more damage than its lesser version. Other attunements utilize the same etching process, but each has their own flavor and skill effects.

I am happy about it being long range power. However I will reserve full jugement nutil I have beta tested it next week.

[CETheLucid.3964]

On 6/14/2024 at 1:56 PM, CETheLucid.3964 said:

1500 range explosion stick. Or 1200 range explosion stick and make staff the 1500 range slightly less explosion but still explosion + support stick (except for meteor shower, please make that super powerful again).

Hopes and dreams 🪄✨

💥 It's time! 💥

Spoiler

Please don't forget about staff. 🥹

 

[Dadnir.5038]

You thought using 2 skills back to back to get the right effect was not enough of a pain in the back? Spear is the solution! You'll need to mind your position and use 3-4 skills to complete your magic circle in order to have the right effect! Ah... I knew they could make it worse than pistol!

[Sarm.5923]

NGL after trying to put up with mage's Rune of Power from WoW for years only to see FF14's black mage have a Leylines ability, reading that spear introduces a circle-etching mechanic reflexively made me go "oh god no".

Given that even the autoattacks seem relatively quick, I'm guessing/hoping it might be the least frustrating of the "this skill is designed to make you feel bad if you have to move" mechanics, but I can't help but remember past frustrations from other games and worry it'll carry over here.