I Tried DPS TEMPEST in Guild Wars 2 - Thoughts

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The Build:

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Editing done by Noxxi:

Outro Music:

[arkanaloth]

Fresh Air tempest is the build that made me actually enjoy playing Elementalist.

[theArcosa]

I’m one of the Tempests in the video! Some key rules when playing PTemp:

1. Your goal is to Overload Air as often as possible, so you MUST press Air (F3) on cooldown even if you had to move.
2. Use the Overload Air cast time to think about your next moves. This build is extremely high APM so you have to plan ahead. You can use F5 (Wildfire) every other rotation, so keep it in the back of your mind which one you casted last and plan your button presses before you swap Fire. Also, mentally track your A5 (Lightning Orb) cooldown.
3. Fresh Air’s damage buff is very short. To make the best use of it, we want to sequence our Fire and Water skills to hit as much in the Fresh Air as possible. We are casting spells in Fire/Water but having them HIT AFTER WE SWAP AIR. W2 then W3, and F3 then F2/F5 (the video has the Fire priority backwards, Phoenix should be cast first). Play with some urgency in Fire/Water and think of Fresh Air’s damage buff as being used for the non-Air elements (though it does buff Storm and A5).
4. This class functions best at the MIDRANGE. It is NOT melee. Standing farther will let you squeeze out a few extra thousand DPS. Stand as far as possible so that (1) your Lightning Orb goes through the boss rather than originating at it and (2) you can shoot the Phoenix BEHIND the boss and have it remain in the air for longer so it gets the Fresh Air buff.
5. Skill queuing will allow you to swap skills without confirming their cast bars. Once the Shatterstone/Phoenix are out, press the longer cast skill and swap immediately. The game will still fully cast the second skill while you’re in Air.
6. A3 does not do any damage (actually 0). You can save it for soft CC. When entering Air, mash A2, Lightning Orb, Glyph of Storms, command elemental skill, and shout. When exiting, A2 should be back up.

[Ape_Hawk]

I love a lot of things about this build, from an ele main perspective: It gives a fair amount of passive support (10 might and fury, healing, blind, boon extension[earth 4]), its easy to learn but difficult to master, it gives ele some much needed vitality, and it's easily modifiable without sacrificing too much dps.

To me, it's the perfect ele dps build that I love playing all the time.

Note: You can also provide 100% alac with this build just by changing to Lucid Singularity. You overload air enough to keep the boon up and it actually makes the rotation easier (air-fire-air-fire-air-fire)

[CuriousMoth]

You want to use Wildfire (preferably) OR Dragon's Tooth (never both), after casting Phoenix. Dragon's Tooth has a longer cast time and lands its hit after a long delay, so you always use Phoenix first --to trigger Fresh Air as soon as possible-- (turns out this reasoning isn't necessary, read lashonwaldmeister1111's comment below), then start casting your second Fire skill and immediately swap back into Air attunement while you're casting it. This whole build is just, "How many times can I cast Overload Air in one fight?", and the solution is to minimise the time spent out of Air attunement; delaying getting back into Air is where you're losing most of your damage.

[demenion]

Power tempest is definitely one of my favorite ele builds and for sure the one with the easiest rota. There are couple of things I would like to point out about it tho.
- first about the rota: it really has such an easy to grasp concept imo. 1) never delay air overload. 2) leave air immediately after overloading. 3) alternate between fire and water, casting at most 2 skills per attunement to not interfere with 1). 4) cast air 2, 3, 5, glyph, elite and the shout whenever possible
- a warning for people with trouble pressing buttons fast: by the nature of fresh air, you cannot idle during the rotation. By far the most part of your dps comes from a single skill. If you fail to get air overload reset and casted asap, you will lose a lot of dps. It's the same reason why muk didn't like berserker.
- in terms of survivability, you actually do have a good amount of options on tempest. Due to running water trait line, you heal your party for a decent amount every time you attune to water. And even though soothing mists is not very powerful on dps tempest, it's still free group healing. Moreover you heal yourself whenever you hit a target with water 3. And prot on tempest is stronger than normal, so you also take less dmg. Overall it's definitely a fairly sturdy build. Only downside being the low base HP that ele has.
- for support, you also get some nice options. As a matter of fact, the fire elemental elite is only a very small part of your dps, so you can freely swap it for something else. As muk said, rebound is a cool tool for specific fights, but you can also use an air elemental for frequent, sizeable cc or a water elemental for a massive group burst heal on a low cd (and some cc and cleanse). I would try to avoid swapping utility skills, but you would first replace the glyph of storms. And unlike mentioned, tempest has access to "eye of the storm" for group stab, superspeed and group stunbreak, or "aftershock" for group aegis, or even glyph of renewal for a very powerful revive skill. Moreover you are free to pick "wash the pain away" as your heal for aoe burst heal and cleanse. And if that's not enough support, you can also replace one skill use in fire by fire 4 to generate and extend group fury and might (can be very useful while being a minimal dps loss) or you can occasionally swap to earth before going to water or fire and press earth 4 to extend all boons on your group. Water 4 and 5 also heal allies, mostly in front of you.
- for cc, you have access to 450 cc on a short CD with air 4, water 4 and water or air elemental. That is imo a fair amount of contribution for a dps class. With arcane wave, you can even improve that or go all out with frost bow or lightning hammer at larger dps losses.
- what is nice about the build is actually the range (which got briefly mentioned in the video). Your scepter skills are generally 900 range while your overload is 480 range. 480 is larger than most boon radii, so even though it's not virtuoso with full dps at 1200 range, you still don't have to stay close to the target all the time. On tempest you can even walk and jump during the overload, so you can avoid standing in bad stuff or getting hot by shock waves.

[xezzee]

13:22 Eye of the Storm! is 5 target stab and Aftershock! is 5 target Aegis. Mukluk accidentally said there is no group stab when actually there is. He was thinking about Armor of Earth and forgot that Tempest has amazing Souths!

Ramble:

1: Don't use Water Traits if there is Heal Tempest because you will overwrite Shooting Mist. Take Fire Traits and then you jugle between Air and Fire only.

2: Conjure Lighting Hammer is 532 cc and you press 532. Arcane Wave is 100cc with shorter cooldown and easier to use.

3: Tempest has Souths which are amazing. Feel the Burn is your dps south with might. Aftershock! for Aegis. Eye of the Storm! for stab. Rebound! if you know how to use it. Wash the Pain Away! is the best heal in the game healing like 4300 without Healing Power. Flash-Freeze! is the only South you don't really use.

4: Fire Horn 4 shares your Might and Fury with 5 targets. Great if you see your Might be under 25. If your might is 18 using Fire Horn 4 is more dps. Earth 4 is Reflect and boon extension which can be amazing, especially if you see Quickness and Alac being like 85% the 3 second extension every 20 seconds is basically +10% boon uptime. I often use both Fire 4 with Earth 4 if I see Might under 20 stacks or any boon under 90%

5: Glyph of Renewal is amazing reviving skill if you take your time to learn it. You also don't attune to Earth which is 3 target revive. Air Revive pulls the target to you which is amzing in places like Dhuum when someone downs on Fire or Slothasor. Water revive is Full Heal revive. Fire revive is 15s Rebound! effect, I don't often use Fire Revive because of course I'm never in risk of dying...

6: you can Panic! and Overload Water which will cleansh conditions and do small healing. You would only use this like Slothasor under 30% if people have ton of conditions or to stabilize Boneskinner.

7: Reflects. Aftershock! + Earth Horn 4 + Rebound! in Earth all gives you Reflect. It is not as strong as Mesmer's Feedback but nice backup when situation demands it. I have saved W7 Aladin CM where knock back to sand insta kills you few times. There aren't many times you can use it. Supre rare but you in theory can reflect in W2 Matias but it depends if the person getting hit is in your subgroup.

[artiviser]

I have played a loooot of Tempest. I was also testing this today. I found that with Alacrity you can actually change the rotation a tiny bit. Going Air overload - Fire 2/3+5 (if off cd) - Water 2/3 - Air then loop. Damage difference is negligible but you get more uptime on soothing mist and you get to switch into water more often which is good for the water trident skill which hits like a truck especially if there is more than one target.

I also get better effects of out the Air Elemental rather than Fire. You only need to command it to use its skill for defiance bars and it does the same if not more damage than the Fire Elemental - you also don’t have to spam its button off cd which is nice to reduce the looking down at cds issue

[Blackbupf]

Edit: Soothing Mist healing is 160hp/s, so instead of the free 400hp/s it would be 250hp/s average. Original comment below.

While there are multiple things I'd love to point out here, the main thing that really got me is how fast you discarded soothing mist as being ineffective. It heals for 320 health per second per player for your entire group (so no, it is not "250 across the entire group" it's 1, 600 across the entire group per second). I'd have assumed that as a healer you would appreciate when a dps class can bring a heal that strong for free. Combine with healing ripple which also comes for free and we end up at around 400hp/s for your entire group and you're a DPS build. If you want some burst heal you can also simply replace fire elemental for water elemental, its' active skill is a 6, 000+ heal in an AoE around you and play the tempest heal shout for even more AoE healing.

- 46k dps ceiling
- Increasing allies' dps with static charges (~300 dps per ally)
- Mid-high range damage capability
- 400hp/s group healing for free
- Decent self sustain with heal signet + water trident
- Access to AoE heal skill and water elemental
- 10 might + fury for the group
- Access to really high cc options with lightning hammer (532CC x2) and tornado (up to 2, 574CC total over its full duration)
- Access to might and boon extension for downtimes in fights (warhorn 4 in fire/earth)
- Access to AoE stability/stunbreak or aegis with shouts (eye of the storm, aftershock), conveniently they come with extra benefits like superspeed or magnetic aura for reflects aswell
- Access to "Rebound" which literally prevents one shot attacks/mechanics for the entire group
- Access to a high range shadowstep (lightning flash)
- Permanent lightning fields for daze finishers (they provide a lot of extra cc, I had some logs where daze leap finishers were amongst the top breakbar skills)

I probably missed some stuff but this build is absolutely stacked and can adapt to just about any situation while doing insane dps and still supporting their allies. This stuff I listed are utility options and things I have used over my time playing the build a bit, maybe there is more to be listed that I haven't used myself yet. This build absolutely carries in more ways than just personal dps.

[zzcorrode]

This is my go-to build for most pve content these days. Throw on relic of zakiros and you've got decent sustain in open world too. Can also swap the vitality trait for aura share and pulse tons of lightning auras in fractals and meta events, though trading so much health for it feels rough.

[trytophz]

the only thing I would add, is that you do have some stab or aegis on the other tempest shouts. So if you need it, you can slot in aftershock for aegis or eye of the storm for some stab and superspeed.
And the fact that you can play alac on this build by just changing the trait is just the cherry on top

[tabe]

"A dps is coming"
Mukluk: "Open the gate"
"It's an ele"
Mukluk:"Close the gate"
"It's a tempest"
Mukluk:"Open the gate... A little"

[Jacksontruman]

As someone who doesn't like ele builds, this is becoming one of my favorite pure power builds as of late. A key tip to help is to have your AOE snapped to target, and have it be an instant cast. That way it's just simple presses to help keep the dps up and high. The only time you would have to aim would be for the lightning orb, but as long as your mouse is pointing towards them, it isn't that hard.

[elrobert]

I know the Earth Attunement is not really used as part of the rotation but it would have been nice to mention the utility it has: the overload like all overloads stunbreaks you but also gives personal stability and magnetic aura at the end while also AoE immobilizing mobs, warhorn 4 is another magnetic aura and party-wide boon extension, warhorn 5 and scepter 3 are blind sources, scepter 2 can be used defensively and it's a free precast etc.
Edit: Scepter 3 in air does no damage, zero so it doesn't even proc anything. It's good if you need the blind or weakness and it doesn't cost you anything to cast since it's instant but it doesn't do much either so you might as well skip it.

[beneteus]

on Ele Build i can recommend to FIRST look at the order of elements

then look at the good skills in each element

then start looking at roation

[jerod]

Very slight comment on anyone looking to min/max the build. When you swap to fire attunement use 3 first then 5 and then back to air. If fire 5 is on cooldown, substitute fire 2. Don't use three fire skills in a row. With the cooldowns, fire 5 will be off CD every other time to swap to fire. The APM for the build is weird, it's low APM for 4 seconds and then all the APM for 1 second. I also think Muk is down playing the amount of healing on the build. Soothing mist is 160 hp per second per person for 10 seconds. Healing ripple is 1.3k healing per person every time you swap to water attunement, and water 3 is a 1.8k heal on yourself and the improved protection gives you 39.5% damage reduction instead of 33% damage reduction. The build is pretty survivable.

[xErdzax]

My tips with this build as Ele main : Signet of Healing is Good because of Air 2 and 3 spell = easy heal. Swaping to water 2 - 3 -3 is good damage boost, because of water trait that 3 spell hits hard, so it looks better for me use both charges of water 3. Fire if Might needed 2 - 5 - 3 - Overload + Fell the Burn. Then making it to 100% Crit chance is for me better. It´s even good as Solo elementalist build. Vitality from water trait is huge HP boost for paper elementalist. Dont underestimate the Fresh Air, always try to hit last spell from other element in air while chanelling. These +250 Ferocity helps Storm Sigil so use it as burst at start when u change into Air. (All this is just my opinion, it´s always better to try it yourself and customize it to your gameplay)

[shadesofgrey]

This is one of my favorite builds. It's easy to play and it pumps.

You could also try a scepter/warhorn condi tempest. Just camp fire attunement and do whack-a-mole, and that's easy 35k. And for open world on that build you swap the bleed damage trait for the one giving you protection, lose maybe 0.5-1k dps (camping fire means you deal very little bleed damage, so the trait isn't as great as it seems) but gain near permanent almost 40% damage reduction.

[FGaborka]

Smooth transition from the Cerus fight back to the golem around 5:50, if you watch the fire overload cd, nice touch :)

[aggeman]

Not totally sure, but I think that using 3 then 2 or 5 is the proper way to go in Fire because the atunement swap won't cancel the cast-time of those skills while it will queue after 3. The same goes for 3 then 2 in water.

[TioChesnaughty]

I started playing recently just for open world and im having a lot of fun with it, I swap glyph of storms for glyph of lesser elementals and get to run around with a small army of minions (each one lasts 2 minutes but the skill cooldown is only 40 seconds). Obviously that open world has a different "meta" than raids, strikes, etc. but in my experience so far its been a really nice class to use, specially cuz since you get to use earth (for the skill that gives extra toughness) and water (for self and minion healing) so it gives the sensation of a jack of all trades class instead of the dps focus that a strike requires.