Dont Nerf Chain Lightning Petition

[Balkroth]

Chain has been overpowered. I'm glad it's nerfed.

[Catching Zees]

Im kind of reluctant to accept the Fireball and Meteor buffs. Seriously, was it really needed? Fire eles are already dominating in PvE, but do we really want them in to be just as effective in PvP too? Now, fire eles will be just as good as Air eles, but they have AoE too. Seriously...logic please?

Chain lightning nerf was needed. Killing 3 people with a 5 eles in ONE cast is just too much.

[Tralus]

Chain lightning nerf was needed. Killing 3 people with a 5 eles in ONE cast is just too much.

The ability to kill 3 people in one cast was only a threat to groups who seriously had no idea what they were doing, any serious group had little or nothing to fear from air gank. But since it seems you people seem incapable of grasping that fact, I see I am wasting my time.

[Uriah_Heep]

Im kind of reluctant to accept the Fireball and Meteor buffs. Seriously, was it really needed? Fire eles are already dominating in PvE, but do we really want them in to be just as effective in PvP too? Now, fire eles will be just as good as Air eles, but they have AoE too. Seriously...logic please?

Chain lightning nerf was needed. Killing 3 people with a 5 eles in ONE cast is just too much.

Agree with first part.Why make changes to fire when it it is already used by a lot of people?Buff water and earth instead.I mean 25 energy and big recharge time is unacceptable for Deep Freeze.Ice Spikes should be buffed too.Mind Freeze too.

Don't agree with second part.Exhaustion is enough of a penalty for CL.When was the last time you saw 5 ele team win in Tombs.It was months ago when I last saw it.Also probably there are others classes that can kill 3 people with single cast if coordinated.5 Feast of Corruption necros can maybe kill 5 people in one cast.

Edit:Tralus,exactly my thoughts.

[MasterNightfall]

Why make changes to fire when it it is already used by a lot of people?

Please, give me the name and address of at least one. Who used it in serious PvP. With good success.

[chrisis]

I have to say I like the finesse that a.net have employed with this nerf *um, I mean, patch*.

We had three types of teams dominating in Tombs:

1. air spikers
2. smite bombs
3. spirit spammers

Each one of them has had a tweak: chain lightning is more focussed, zealot's fire triggers have been slowed down, and spirits can be called but not spammed.

All it means is we have to start THINKING again about what to put in our team. I've run with air spike teams. Do you call it skill to stand in a line, hit T, and then cast chain lightning? How about spamming spirits? What skill is there in choking the map and owning ppl's fps?

Hopefully we are back to the situation where a team will need to figure out the 64 SKILLS they'll take along, instead of the 8 template characters that has become everyone's favourite...

Gosh, nerfing farming pissed me off WAY more than this nerf :D

[Uriah_Heep]

Please, give me the name and address of at least one. Who used it in serious PvP. With good success.

This game is not only PvP. 90% of PvE players use fire and 90% of PvP players use air so I am surprised there are no water and earth buffs.25 energy for Deep Freeze just bugs me.

[Catching Zees]

Please, give me the name and address of at least one. Who used it in serious PvP. With good success.

PvE? Alot of Fire eles there. Thats why we are complaining. Fire eles should excel more in PvE, while Air eles should excel more in PvP. Since with the huge unneeded Fire buff, not only will they be used alot in PvE, but in PvP too. What would be the point in being an Air ele is Fire els can do the same job but better? A buff to Water magic would have been a better way to go.

Gosh, nerfing farming pissed me off WAY more than this nerf

Wait a gosh darn minute! They nerfed FARMING!?!??

[MasterNightfall]

This game is not only PvP. 90% of PvE players use fire and 90% of PvP players use air so I am surprised there are no water and earth buffs.25 energy for Deep Freeze just bugs me.

And "Balance" in PvE is seriously < balance in PvP. I like PvE as much as the next person, but "Balance" is the last thing I worry about when I play it.

And, just FYI, my PvE ele hasn't used fire ever again, after he got to Fisherman's Haven.

The reason that fire is "Overpowered" in PvE, is because stupid monster AI doesn't move out of the firestorms.

I can't think of any decent ways to "Balance" the elements for PvE without completely gimping PvP balance.

The reason there "Are no earth or water buffs", is:

A: That "List" is a very limited list of patch changes.

B: Earth is quite bloody fine as it is. It's defensive properties (And by that I mean, ones that affect the ENTIRE team) are amazing, and the offensive spells are good.

C: Water will most certainly receive an indirect buff through the nerfs to QZ, NR, and Air. And, as said in A, there may be direct buffs.

Deep Freeze has a huge area of effect.

[Archangel Raguil]

I think you need to reread the spirit info again.

? Can you be more clear? You made no sense.

Yeah, now if you look carefully, you'll see the flaw in that arguement. You even answer you're own question with another question. You say mean, why weaken the only AoE style spell that Air has?" and then say "If Air is supposed to focus on dealing a large amount of damage on one player, then why aren't they letting it?" You'll see that they ARE letting it. 2 or 3 people does not count as one person. Check the facts, you'll see it's true. The idea was that air is supposed to be a one-person killer.

I'm not flaming, just pointing out your flaws as well... and that being, I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. Chain Lightning's damage has been reduced, so it's not doing as much damage against one target. If it did less damage on the second and third target, it would make sense, but they're basically weakening one of the few powerful air skills that air had. If I was going to use this for PvE, I would have no reason to bring this skill, since the AoE is also being reduced. It seems only people who use Thunderclap or Glimmering mark can really still benefit from Chain Lightning.

Also, you'll find that chain lightning is still more effective than fireball in some respects. Fireball has to be fired at non-moving targets, and all others basically have to be point blank next to the person to be affected. Chain lightning doesn't miss, and still has a wider area of affect than fireball. Same goes for meteor. And doesn't lightning still have penetration, hmmm...? Face it, it's not as bad as you make it out to be... In fact, pretty much all fire spells have to be cast on immobile targets (with the exceptions of immolate and mark of rodgart...) Lightning never misses (unless there's some sort of hex on you).

Actually, you can't say it has a wider area, without knowing how much the range was changed. Also, as far as my experience, I havne't ever been able to avoid meteor, I get hit with it when I'm running, so I assume it'll hit unless you're weaving from side to side. And in addition, it knocks down.

And Air isn't completely undodgable... hence Lightning Orb, Lightning Javalin... along with 4 "close ranged" skills: Lightning Touch, Shock, and Whirlwind. The only undodgable damage skills is: Chain Lightning, Mind Shock, Enervating Charge, Lightning Strike, Lightning Surge (of course, you can only use four at once, since both Mind Shock and Lightning Surge is elite). So there's more avoidable damage spells (2 dodgables, 4 "touch") and 4 insta-hits.

As for the Dodgability of fire, there are ones that are undodgable. Immolate, Incendiary Bonds, (I still think Meteor isn't exactly dodgable), Mind Burn, Phoenix (half the damage isn't dodgable, or I've never seen it dodged), Rodgart's Invocation. Let's see, even if you don't include meteor and Phoenix, Fire has 4 undodgable damage skills? How many did Lightning have again? 4 (5 if you could use 2 elites)? No way! There are plenty of dodgable fire skills (Flare, Fireball, Meteor (or so you say)), and plenty of AoE spells. So it seems you've lost a major argument point on that "undodgable" thing you were talking about. Fire seems to have about as many. Just because you don't use them, doesn't mean they don't exist!

I'm glad you understand the range change. Again, you have to look at the ARMOUR PENETRATION that is in effect all the time. Also, like I said before, you can dodge fire, but can't dodge air... People are more intelligent than monsters that just stand there, y'know.

When did make it seem I didn't understand the range change? 25% Armor Penetration is in effect, but they've reduced the damage of Chain Lightning by about 20 points of damage... (used to do 106, now 85). That's, gee, about 20% damage reduction. So it won't be doing much damage anymore. Meteor will do 119 damage, but with no armor penetration (but knockdown). Fireball will deal 119 damage, but area of effect (I'd say, that after they cut the range of Chain Lightning, it would probably be about the same range, but we'll see). F

Think of something else? Like what? Making it 15 mana wouldn't stop a 75 energy elementalist(s) firing off several blasts of it. And both those protective spells only protect one person at a time... that's assuming the person is even using them! Again, I re-iterate the armour penetration and the ability to auto-hit.

I think I've made it clear auto-hit is a non-issue. Armor penetration is supposed to be the power of air, but unfortunately, if they weaken the damage, they're essentially weakening the armor penetration too. Also, although it's true that adding mana cost doesn't seem bad on paper, believe me, battling with air, using Lightning Orb as often as you can, you can exhaust mana quickly. Also, there's... ironically, exhaustion, which depletes your maximium pool. And if you use Lightning Surge... well exhaustion will kick your mana to the curb.

Protective spells do protect one person at a time, but there are a lot of defenses. Mantra of Lightning, Elemental Resistance, spells that add armor from the warrior, the armor spells from the elementalist, Protective Spirit, Protective Bond, Ward Against Elements, and there might even be more. I mean, seriously, there's lots of ways to prevent a lot of damage, or even reduce it. Ward Against Elements can even effect an entire team.

That's it? You thought a 5 second cooldown one one spell made a whole skill tree crap? That one spell being more powerful that the fire equivilent in the first place? The one that's designed to lump damage on one player? The whole point is that you can fill the 5 seconds with other spells...

I'm not flaming, i'm merely pointing out flaws in your logic and reasoning. :winking47

Seriously, did you read everything? Either everything I said, or the changes? I'm not sure what 5 second cooldown you're talking about (or are you talking about Lightning Strike? Cause it was always like that), but I certainly thing that Air Magic has taken a huge hit, and that I'm going to start into Fire, since Arena Net seems to favor it so much. I mean, they made Fireball recharge faster, and cheaper. I'd gladly wait two seconds to do AoE damage not too far off in damage, and that's 5 mana cheaper than Lightning Orb. Meteor is also a viable skill if you're low on mana, because although Exhaustion would eat up 10 mana, if you've only got 5, you have nothing really to lose.

Chain Lightning now takes as long as Meteor to cast, does less damage (I'm sure it'll still do less with armor penetration), effects a shorter area, and doens't knockdown. I'm sorry, it seems that Meteor is going to be the better skill.

As it is, the only air spells I really used was Lightning Strike (whose 5 second recycle was always unfair to Fire Magic's Flare), Lightning Orb, and Chain Lightning. My other spells were defensive, or energy management. Lightning Strike can do more damage because of Armor Penetration, but I certainly don't think a full five second cast time was justified.

Anyways, yes, I'm switching to fire, but I've always considered it. It's not one thing or another exactly, but more it seems to balance has shifted to fire. With Arena Net shoving fire in our face in the beginning of the game, and making it hard and long to switch into any other line, it seems that they must really want people to use it more. These changes only reinforce what I thought. They nerfed one of the only three lightning spells I always used, and improved the fire ones I used to use when I was a Fire Elementalist. Personally, that's all the real reason I need to switch. But if that wasn't enough, fire also has a lot of good Area of Effect spells that could help to do a lot of damage.

Note I'm not trying to flame you either, Incognito2me, but simply repaying the favor: showing you your flaws in argument. It seems to me that fire was always the most "developed" line in the game. It had one person damage, unavoidable damage, AoE damage, hex damage... I mean, if it had some kinds of speed boost, and protection, it would have everything! Although Air has armor penetration, besides two spells (Lightning Orb, and the elite exhaustion Lightning Surge), fire does more damage. In some cases, I'd assume enough to compensate for the Armor Penetration. So now that they made fire spells better, and one of the few air spells I use worse, there's no real point in my Air Elementalist anymore. In fact, I went and got a Superior Fire Rune, before prices increase (for they very well may).

I know I can't be the only one that noticed the numbers on chain lightning went up 3 max damage in the "decrease" ...


which is horribly gimped

Yeah, I noticed that too! But since they said "decrease" I assume that it was either out of 15, or out of 16 attribute points. Also, because of what they were saying, it makes little sense to make chain lightning stronger...

It seems people are getting angry that they might have to learn to use another attribute set. Oh No!

I'll say this, fire has always been just as powerful as lightning but no one seems to use it in PvP. If you've ever come accross a REAL fire spike team (five fire eles and three monks) you'll be in a lot more trouble than being air spiked.

...

Don't even get me started on how good earth magic is for damage...

Oh god. No one here said that the other elements weren't powerful. I personally just don't want to change my attribute type simply because air spike builds were the flavor of the month, and everybody hates fighting them. God, there are so many counters to air I don't know why people complain. Spike builds are good, but they don't win against everything!

In fact, I thought that fire was kind of over powered. Given some secondary spells, and a group of fire elementalists, you can do air spike type damage or more, as you pointed out. Earth Magic also seems to be a line that Arena Net put a lot of thought and power into... I mean, they can do a lot of damage, knockdown, AoE, and have protection skills. Meanwhile, it seems Air and Water magic really got the shaft. Although Water is good for specific purposes (slowdown), and has good protection spells. But it doesn't have the damage that all the other three lines have. Air magic used to have a lot of damage going for them, but it seems that it won't for long. I've always thought that Chain Lightning's bouncing from target to target (to target) was a bit too strong, especially since it did a lot of initial damage. But this is hardly the way it should have been changed.

I don't like the prospective chain lightning nerf.

Adjustments I could live with (and be happier with):
1.) Make the spell elite.
2.) Make chained targets take less dmg.
3.) "Nerf" the skill as proposed but lose the spell's exhaustion.

If this is implemented (with the buff to the fire skills), Fireball > Chain Lightning.

I agree, although I'd say that if it was elite, it shouldn't cause exhaustion, or it should cost 5 mana, personally...

You can have Multiple Spirits out at once, but only ONE of each type. Making a new one of the same type erases the old one.

"Now when you cast a Spirit, all other allied spirits within the newly cast Spirit's range are destroyed."

It doesn't talk about multiples of the same type, it says all other allied spirits.

People saying fireball will be the new spiker really need to look at the skills.

Sure Fireball is cheaper, but it always has been with no exhustion.

The catch with fire is, is there is no armor pen with those skills and if this does catch on, ward against harm will reduce the damage fast. Lightning has no real super powerful ward to block it, and lets face it, for the cost, chain lightning was way too overpowered. Name one other skill that if cast by five people can kill three target dead as soon as it is cast?

Which is why increasing the cost, and making the "bounced" damage less would be a perfect solution, IMO

This game is not only PvP. 90% of PvE players use fire and 90% of PvP players use air so I am surprised there are no water and earth buffs.25 energy for Deep Freeze just bugs me.

Exactly. I always thought Water needed a buff. But yeah, Earth is a fine attribute on it's own.

If it wasn't clear, I sign this petition whole heartedly. Nerfing Chain Lightning, is just like killing the attribute line, IMO. It'll turn into another Water Magic. Has a few specific uses (like Thunderclap + Chain Lightning) but not good enough to use most of the time.