Pyros_Eien
Member
I don't feel the CC issue is a big deal. You can still CC in one turn, you just can't CC as many things unless they're packed(which air helps a lot with with Teleport and Nether Swap, but still).
Main issue is aero and hydro just don't have enough damage spells. Or well good damage spells.
Aero has Blinding Light(low damage, low range, good for the blind aura but not for damage, also doesn't shock), Electric Discharge(average damage, single target), Shocking Touch(good damage but melee range only, single target), Dazzling Bolt(3AP which is way overbudget for the damage and aoe it does) and Superconductor(3AP but does good damage, acquired late though, pbae so not the best for positionning). There's a few other spells that do damage but they don't do enough to matter(teleport doing like 20phys dmg, Pressure Spike doing like 30dmg and whatever else).
It simply doesn't have a good aoe until Superconductor which is a "tier 4" spell in the sense that's it's only available fairly late in the game(I consider tier 1 the starting spells, tier 2 the spells unlocked at lvl 4 in fort joy, tier 3 the act2 spells and tier 4 after), and the single target spells are not really great either. It's just very low damage output, and while most spells shock, there's just not enough to make it easy to shock a bunch of stuff.
Hydro is in a bit better position but similar, spells cost too much AP for the damage they do and there's too few options.
All in all, most options in these 2 schools are bad, but if you only use the good spells, you have like, 3damage spells, and they're not even that good. You have to use bad spells, and to make them work you basically rely on Elemental Affinity to reduce their AP costs to acceptable levels. Luckily for Hydro, Rain is 1AP to set an easy water surface AND debuff every enemy to increase your damage, but setting up an air surface is more annoying and mostly takes 2actions(can create a cloud with scoundrel but then you can't see anything without moving, have to get The Pawn, it's like annoying).
Meanwhile Fire alone has like 5 good damage spells and a couple of situational/meh spells.
Earth is similar to fire, has plenty of good damage spells, although the split between poison and earth is a bit annoying imo especially with poison being garbage against undead, on the other hand earth spells oil pools afflicting Slow is great. And then the synergy with Fire for even more damage.
Both air and water suffer heavily from having CC rolled into their effects and from having too many utility spells so they don't have enough options for damage.
