Talent Builds
Note: Fire builds are struggling in AoE and Mythic+ scenarios at the time of writing this.
Single Target (Lightning Farseer)
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This is the standard build for single target and revolves around spawning as many ancestors as possible from Ancestral Swiftness and Call of the Ancestors with Primoridal Wave, reducing their cooldown thanks to Flash of Lightning.
Storm Elemental with very high uptime lets you cast incredibly high amounts of Lightning Bolt casts.
To make the build handle occasional AoE better some talent choices can be to swap Elemental Equilibrium for Liquid Magma Totem and Earthen Rage for Flames of the Cauldron.
AoE/Mythic+ (Lightning Farseer)
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What is essentially the same version as the Lightning Farseer single target build with the changes mentioned to improve AoE. This build tries to strike a balance of heavy AoE damage while not foregoing Single Target entirely.
Always adapt the class tree depending on the dungeon at hand, maybe needing Purge, Tremor Totem or Poison Cleansing Totem.
AoE/Mythic+ (Lightning Stormbringer)
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Same talent tree as the above build but with Stormbringer instead of Farseer. This gives more AoE capabilities thanks to Tempest, Arc Discharge and Voltaic Surge.
It does however lose a decent amount of single target throughput losing out on the Ancestors (from Call of the Ancestors) from Farseer.
Class Talents
The Class talent tree has received a small rework that mostly makes it easier to traverse in order to pick up more utility without losing throughput or defensives.
Defensive Talents
Astral Shift - Our staple defensive spell that can be further improved with either Planes Traveler or Astral Bulwark. Planes Traveler is the default choice since most of the time 40% damage reduction is enough to survive most things.
Stone Bulwark Totem - A welcome new addition that serves as a second personal defensive spell providing a large absorb shield that will let us have more agency over our own survivability.
Earth Elemental - Still providing the 15% health increase for the duration. It’s not the most powerful defensive, but worth using, especially when combined with Primordial Bond. It loses some value when Primal Elementalist is taken since you’re limited to a single elemental at a time with that talent.
Earth Shield - This is a very efficient amount of healing for an instant cast and I’d recommend using it whenever you have nothing better to cast while moving or during downtime. Should also be cast on yourself and another dps player before a boss fight with Elemental Orbit.
Brimming With Life, Elemental Warding & Nature’s Guardian - Passive increases to survivability that should always be taken.
Throughput Talents
Spiritwalker’s Grace - The most important talent for damage in the class tree. Casting while moving is a massive benefit and having Evokers in your raid that can provide Time Spiral for extra casts is a game changer. Should always be improved with Graceful Spirit.
Gust of Wind - Burst movement is always handy and can save you in a pinch, this is the default choice.
Spirit Walk - The alternative to Gust of Wind is less universally useful but has the ability to remove all movement impairing effects that can help negate certain mechanics that slows or roots.
Enhanced Imbues - Makes your Improved Flametongue Weapon provide more Fire damage.
Nature’s Swiftness - Grants an instant cast once a minute. Vary minor gain but mandatory when playing as Farseer thanks to Ancestral Swiftness.
Fire and Ice & Nature’s Fury - Self explanatory damage increases.
Totemic Recall - This is most of the time going to be used on Liquid Magma Totem in order to spread Flame Shock faster but can also be used to get another Wind Rush Totem in certain scenarios. Can not be used to reset the cooldown of Stone Bulwark Totem as it has a base cooldown of three minutes.
Totemic Focus & Totemic Surge - These are only really throughput increases when paired with a build that plays Liquid Magma Totem.
Utility Talents
It’s not possible to allocate all of these talents at the same time, pick and choose depending on what’s needed for the encounter or dungeon.
Wind Shear - The most universally useful and powerful interrupt in the game.
Capacitor Totem - Great AoE stun that can be improved with Static Charge to cast it more often or Guardian’s Cudgel to get a second stun right after with shorter duration.
Earthgrab Totem - An AoE root with a fairly short duration is rather niche.
Tremor Totem - Even more niche and rarely sees use.
Purge - Lets you remove any nasty buff the enemies apply to themselves, this ability is usually either entirely useless or incredibly powerful.
Cleanse Spirit - In a similar vein this is often useless but being able to remove curses is a great tool to have since it’s not that many classes that can do so.
Wind Rush Totem - Movement speed for the entire raid is always good to have, Jet Stream brings it closer to the power of Druid’s Stampeding Roar and can have it remove snares.
Thunderstorm - Specifically paired with Thundershock is a great tool for dungeons, serving as an AoE interrupt without sending mobs flying in all directions.
Poison Cleansing Totem - The rate at which this dispels debuffs is unparalleled and should always be taken when there’s any poison debuffs.
Spec Talents
The Elemental talent tree has seen a large rework that allows for more flexible pathing and choices. It’s no longer as bottlenecked by how many of the powerful talents were locked behind having 20 points already allocated.
The majority of the talents are now rather passive damage increases that don’t alter gameplay all too much.
Elemental Blast - Now a choice talent with Earth Shock at the very top of the tree. It still provides the buffs to Crit, Haste and Mastery.
Fire Elemental & Storm Elemental - This pick is normally an easy one, choose the one that the rest of the build specializes in.
Surge of Power & Aftershock - These remain as a choice talent with Surge of Power losing some of its appeal in single target situations since the additional overloads from Lightning Bolt now deal significantly less damage thanks to the Mastery (Mastery: Elemental Overload) change.
Flash of Lightning - Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning reduces the cooldown of nature spells by one second might not sound like a whole lot initially but adds up very fast on builds that cast these a lot. It also reduces the cooldown on more spells than one might initially think, it’s essentially everything apart from Lava Burst, Ascendance, Fire Elemental and Liquid Magma Totem.
Icefury - Now a proc from casting Lava Burst to transform your Frost Shock button into Icefury. Casting Icefury is now instant and grants you two stacks of a buff that increases the damage of Frost Shock by 225%.
Fusion of Elements - After casting Icefury you need to cast both a Nature and Fire spell in order to trigger a free Elemental Blast that still gives you one of its buffs. Certain spells count as both Fire and Nature, like Flame Shock, Primordial Wave and Elemental Blast itself.
Echo Chamber - 10% increased Overload damage means Overloads now deal 35% of original, compared to 25%. This is a very big increase, going from 25 to 35 is a 40% increase to Overload damage. Overload casts come from Mastery: Elemental Overload.
Stormkeeper - A shadow of its former glory with the reduction of Overload damage. In an ideal scenario this now deals roughly half the damage it previously did. This doesn’t however mean that it’s a bad talent for Lightning Builds, it just doesn’t pack as much of a punch as it used to.
Ascendance & Deeply Rooted Elements - These are no longer a choice talent and can be taken at the same time. This offers both the power spikes of the random Ascendance procs while also giving you a reliable and predictable way to trigger it for the most important parts of a fight.
Echo of the Elementals - This lesser elemental doesn’t do a whole lot of damage itself but does provide Elemental Fury and Primordial Bond for the duration.
Skybreaker’s Fiery Demise - A must have talent in most builds, not only does it increase Flame Shock damage by a significant amount with the 50 percent units increase in Crit chance. It also gives your Fire Elemental or Storm Elemental much better uptime that in turn gives better uptime of Elemental Unity.
Primordial Wave - One of the key talents that has been enabling builds specializing in Fire damage and Lava Burst to be able to perform well in dungeon and cleave scenarios, providing you with a large amount of Haste through Splintered Elements.
Liquid Magma Totem - The best tool of setting up a lot of Flame Shocks fast in order to get the full benefit from the Primordial Wave and Splintered Elements synergy. With only a 24 seconds cooldown when taking Totemic Surge this should be available to set you up for every pack in dungeons.
Mountain Will Fall - This talent has taken a large hit in effectiveness with the reduced damage of Overloads. Overloaded Maelstrom spenders now only deal an underwhelming 17.5% of the cast's damage, assuming Echo Chamber is taken.
Echoes of the Great Sundering - Is a much more viable option now that it only requires a single point to get the full effect and gives us the playstyle of alternating our Maelstrom spenders in AoE.
Primal Elementalist - A talent that remains rather underwhelming if playing with Fire Elemental but a must have when using Storm Elemental. For Storm Elemental make sure that it casts Call Lightning before using its other pet ability, Tempest to benefit from the 30% increased damage.
Hero Talents
Elemental’s Hero Talents offer Stormbringer that is incredibly focused on Lightning damage and has no synergy with Fire.
And Farseer which is far more neutral and offers a more well rounded toolkit.
Stormbringer mostly shines in AoE situations and is not really keeping up with Farseer on single target.
Farseer
Call of the Ancestors - Spawns a ghost that casts Lava Burst or Chain Lightning depending on what you cast while it exists.
Routine Communication - 8% chance to get an ancestor from Lava Burst is much better than the alternative.
Heed My Call - 4 second increase means they last 67% longer and will cast far more Lava Bursts before expiring.
Final Calling - Makes the Ancestor cast an Elemental Blast when they expire.
Ancient Fellowship - Thanks to Final Calling and Offering from Beyond this should on average be better than Latent Wisdom but will have bigger variance.
Offering From Beyond - Even more cooldown reduction for Fire Elemental or Storm Elemental.
Ancestral Swiftness - Should be used on cooldown to not lose any cooldown reduction from Flash of Lightning.
Stormbringer
Tempest - A supercharged Lightning Bolt that deals AoE damage around the target. It can Overload from mastery but doesn’t benefit from Surge of Power or Power of the Maelstrom. You get one cast of this every 300 Maelstrom spent.
Arc Discharge - This 40% damage increase stacks with Stormkeeper though the benefit of instant casts is wasted.
Rolling Thunder - A bonus Stormkeeper charge every 50 seconds was a lot more impactful back in Aberrus when this was the Tier Set bonus, with the Overload damage nerf this is not all too exciting.
Conductive Energy - Makes Tempest not only apply Lightning Rod but also have 20% of its damage dealt to all targets also be dealt to targets with Lightning Rod.
Awakening Storms - The other way to get a cast of Tempest.