Gale

[Gorani]

This is the second skill in the Skills of Interest series. I have chosen "Gale" today, as it is the "underachiever" of the movement altering Air Magic skills - or I have not seen the space and time where this skill can shine, compared to its brothers in Air Magic and "skill relatives" from other professions:

Gale

Current GW2wiki description (2nd BWE, 2012) : Knock down your foe with a charged wind blast. Knockdown: 2 seconds 900

Weapon	Attune.	Icon	Skill		Traits affecting the skill
Focus	Air		Gale	50	Grounded - Deal 20% more damage to Knocked down and Stunned foes. Aeromancer's Alacrity - All your air weapon skills recharge 20% faster.

Change-log (since February 2012)

• The recharge timer has been increased from 40 to 50 seconds after the first press beta weekend
• Knock Down duration has been reduced to 2 seconds.

Skill assessment

• One of the two knock down skills the Elementalist has, compared to the GW1 Elementalists that had 7 unconditional and eight conditional knock down skills, making him the lead profession causing knock down effects after the Warrior (who had a similar number, but more Elites and conditional effects to cause a knock down).
• Knock downs in general are very scarce in Guild Wars 2, which makes the effect a valuable asset.
• Knock down effects interrupt foes, just like in GW1, but have to be timed much better by watching foes prepare for big hitting moves.
• The 900 range is pretty good as other Guild Wars 2 knock downs are melee range or e.g. traps
• Compared to the other knock down skill the Elementalist has, it offers less (Earthquake has the same range, is also a Blast Finisher move and recharges 5 seconds faster) not even the longer knocked down state, which lasted 3 seconds before the 2nd BWE and is now on par with 2 seconds - the same as Gale and Earthquake. Earthquake also effects multiple foes in the area of effect.
• The 50 second recharge is bad compared to the "cross profession" Warrior's Tremor, which has 1200 range, can effect multiple foes in a line and has a recharge time only 25 seconds.
• In comparison to the "Push" effect from Gust (Staff skill) or Updraft from the Off-Hand-Dagger skills, Gale can provide nothing to rival those extras like Swiftness boons or faster recharges.
• As Knock down effects are so situational and scarce, taking the "Grounded" trait for this 20% damage bonus is hardly worth the slot.
• Aeromancer's Alacrity will help the skill to get a recharge timer of 42 seconds, but of course Gust & Updraft would also profit from that trait, keeping their leading position on Gale.

[cursedseishi]

I can't see the vid as it is blocked for me (probably because of underlying music). What does it contribute to the topic, as the initial pictures clearly shows a Guild Wars 1 PvP situation ?

Yep, its a fight from 2005, with someone apparently locking down a monk with Gale...
Most likely a reason why we don't see nearly as many skills with the "knockdown" effect, losing complete control of your character to the point where you die solely because of it is never fun, either to do (for me at least) or to have it happen to you.

[Gorani]

Thanks, cursedseishi, for explaining.

@ Vana: Would it be possible to just write a sentence, e.g. "A Gale knock down chain in Gw1 was a thing I didn't like" in the future?

I see the problem of a KD chain too, but you can not do it alone in Guild Wars 2, because you just can't stack skills on your bar that allow that. A Thief's "Smoke Screen" with its blind combo ability e.g. is a lot more unbalancing, at least on paper than the knock down you can create with Gale.

PS: Vana's post removed

It was a joke post - fond memories of GW1, it contributes nothing.

[Akirai Annuvil]

It's a three second, on-demand, full range stun. You should really be able to do something useful with it. Neither tremor nor eq is on demand, with tremor being avoidable (not sure about eq). EQ's description states "At your location", but it also has a range of 900 which seems a bit excessive for a misspelled radius so not sure what that is about.
That's my contribution.

[Gorani]

It's a three second, on-demand, full range stun. You should really be able to do something useful with it. Neither tremor nor eq is on demand, with tremor being avoidable (not sure about eq). EQ's description states "At your location", but it also has a range of 900 which seems a bit excessive for a misspelled radius so not sure what that is about.
That's my contribution.

Could you explain the "on demand"? Not sure what you mean with that. That Earthquake & Tremor are dodge-able? And just to make clear (although I think you did not mean it) "Stun" is another GW2 condition, which Gale does not deal.

[Akirai Annuvil]

Could you explain the "on demand"?

You press the button, it happens. There's no delay. Tremor has a 'projectile' travelling in a straight line from your character. If I'm not mistaken it was used on me during the GamesCom PvP demo, and I dodged it - and it stopped when it hit an obstacle. Could be that since the projectile is ground based you have to be on the ground to have it take effect (so jumping would be enough to avoid the effect). Gale is on-demand. It doesn't care what your opponent is doing, as long as they're not booned up with Stability, you're getting that 3 second knockdown as soon as you press 5.
I think EQ has similar issues, but I'm not sure.

[Redean]

Its worth noting the grounded trait, which deals more damage to knocked down targets. That extra second it has on tremor would make gale a favourite to those who bring the grounded trait. Although the 50 sec CD means you dont get the bonus too often and mistakes are even more costly.

Sent from my Sony Tablet S using Tapatalk 2

[Gorani]

2nd BWE news: Gale now has a 2 second knock down like Gale & Earthquake and not 3 seconds any more.

[Akirai Annuvil]

Hey, tried this out in PvP. For some reason, this does have something of a cast time (where I thought it didn't). I'd either make it instant (so you can use it during other skill casts, very interesting with the Scepter Air main skill), up the kd back to 3 or reduce the recharge. For a 2 second kd, it's too unwieldy for the utility it offers.