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Elementalists command the four elemental forces: earth, air, fire and water. With magic derived from the very foundations of nature itself, Elementalists can inflict more damage in a single strike than any other profession. There are as many types of Elementalists as there are elements and ways to combine them. Some Elementalists choose to study two or more elements to maintain broad discipline, though many prefer to focus on one unique element.
Earth Magic triggers quakes and volcanoes, envelops foes in solid rock and can add to the strength and stamina of allies. Earth Magic is especially powerful against fighters with many skills that cause blindness and knockdown or weaken attacking foes.
Air Magic is driven by the power of storms and lightning, granting allies greater speed or targeting specific foes with a focused, high-damage attack.
Fire Magic is often considered the most purely destructive form, inflicting searing pain and damage on multiple enemies.
Water Magic summons ice and mist to slow enemies down and blur their vision, inflicts freezing cold damage and even protects allies from other forms of magical attack.
The primary elementalist attribute, Energy Storage, gives elementalists the highest maximum energy pool in the game. This is useful as a buffer for exhaustive and high energy skills, but should not be seen as energy management.
Attributes
Energy Storage (Primary)
The Elementalist’s primary attribute, Energy Storage, increases maximum Energy and boosts skills that help regenerate Energy.
Air Magic
Air Magic increases the duration and effectiveness of the Elementalist’s Air skills, which pierce armor, cause Blindness, and knock enemies flat.
Earth Magic
Build up Earth Magic to increase the duration and effectiveness of the Elementalist’s earth skills, which can protect both hero and ally or inflict damage on opponents that ignores their armor.
Fire Magic
Improve Fire Magic to increase the duration and effectiveness of the Elementalist’s fire skills, which inflict fire damage and can affect large areas.
Water Magic
Allocate points to Water Magic to increase the duration and effect of the Elementalist’s water skills, which slow enemy movement and turns the blood of foes to ice. This line of skills includes many snares, these skills are helpful in pvp battles were you need to slow down a enemy.
Common usage
Echoing
Due to the slow recharge of some very powerful nuking skills, some elementalist choose to use the Mesmer skills Arcane Echo and the elite Echo which allows an E/Me to repeat his/her strongest spells upon a target. Using both the echo skills, area of effect spells like Meteor Shower and Rodgort’s Invocation can be cast up to three times in seconds. Using this tactic, the Elementalist can potentially triple their damage per second (DPS). The elite elementalist skill Glyph of Renewal also allows the caster to instantly regain the skill they just cast. Either of these methods delivers high damage output in a very short amount of time, but may also drain the elementalist’s energy in a very short amount of time if proper energy management tactics are not taken.
Nuking
In PvE gameplay, the Elementalist can usually be found filling a heavy damage role called a “nuker”. The role of a nuker is to inflict large amounts of damage over a given area in a short period of time weakening or killing whole groups of enemies. This is typically done using Fire Magic, which lends this role its nickname, but other elements are being used with the introduction of some new skills like the elite skill Sandstorm. An efficient nuker will usually remain behind a set of tanks while they casting spells from a distance. In PvE, a nuker may effectively take out an entire group at once just by understanding the effects of their skills on the enemy AI.
Spiking
Spiking is the art of focusing a lot of damage on a single target during (very) short period. For example, an Elementalist who uses Air Magic to deal a large amount of damage to a single target concentrates its power inflicting more damage on a specific target with 25% armor penetration against that target. Another example of spiking is the Earth Magic skill Obsidian Flame, which is sometimes used by teams during GvG casting it all at the same time at one target to take it out in just 2 seconds.