A Guide to Everything Earth

Oh yeah, but I was doing it for the power back. I guess I could wait for him to use some power then do the rotation.

Crystal won't start attacking until you hit something, so it's best to start off with a weapon attack to minimise her idle time.

An earth dps that does weapon>rumble>reinforce>weapon>fortify... (example) will end up doing a lot more damage than a dps using the same powers in a different order, such as fortify>rumble>reinforce>weapon, because the first dps has their crystal firing a lot sooner.

The 1st dps initiates pet attacks from the first button press, where the 2nd one's pet won't commence until after the animations of fortify and rumblecrush which is several seconds difference.

Actually, I hit Fortify clipped with Reinforce after my first weapon combo only because Crystal will literally attack the moment you hit something. Although, I've noticed she will hit enemies little sooner with certain attacks, specifically tap range moves, when compared to the hold range moves.

It's not a big difference, but it's something that caught my eye when switching between using Tap Range X3 Scissor Kick and Arrow Storm Mastery.

If you let her fire off 2 attacks before fortify you'll get more damage out of her in a shorter time frame. The rotation I stated above is example only, but a step in the right direction over using fortify on a full pet.

I've noticed the difference in pet delay using different weapons too. The difference in the pet attack time between HB range tap and MA melee tap might need to be looked into.

Non-aftershocked Gemstone Shield is bugged but GS aftershocked 1-3 times works fine.

Ok thanks guys.

I realized that the tray version of Gemstone Shield is behaving like a healer type in such a way that a healer shield takes 3 hits and breaks with a minimum of 1 second between each registered hit.

Once Gemstone shield is aftershocked it becomes a real tank shield in such a way that the shield can take any number of hits during the full duration of its effect or until the damage prevention cap is reached.

I think this problem has persisted for so long based on the term "duration." A healer shield and a tank shield can last for the entire duration if the healer shield is not taking hits.

Hard Light Shield or tray Gemstone Shield last about 3.5 seconds before breaking. Hard Light Shield however is classified as a healer shield in its very own description.

I find it quite hilarious that Gemstone Shield is both a healer shield and a tank shield at the same time.


All powers are used in proximity to the same npcs and I figured the number of hits would give a good approximation of the duration of the shields.

First part is the control just to show the duration of shields that are not taking hits. 12 seconds for Gemstone, tray or aftershocked, and 10 seconds for Hard Light Shield.

Aftershocked Gemstone Shield is hit 112 times and lasts the full 12 second duration.

Tray Gemstone Shield is hit 19 times and breaks after 3 seconds. Since earth receives an innate damage absorption of 25 percent for 12 seconds once a super power is cast and the innate damage absorption is from the start of Gemstone Shield. The innate damage absorption remains active for the remaining 9 seconds showing how much longer a full duration of Gemstone shield should have lasted.

Hard Light Shield takes 20 hits and breaks after 3 seconds. The innate damage absorption remains active for 9 seconds.

Second cast of the tray version of Gemstone Shield is hit 21 times and breaks after 3 seconds. The innate damage absorption remains active for 9 seconds.

As others have said, probably not best ATM. However, when Earth gets the melee/midrange/range treatment, Jackhammer might be a viable option. Remains to be seen, though.

In my testing, HL Shield always absorbed (Dominance+Restoration) damage before breaking. It was not limited to a specific number of hits. It costs a lot more power and has a much longer cool down period than Gemstone Shield.

1. HLS in my video shows 592 is absorbed and my dominance plus restoration is 10,438.
2. HLS has a 40 sec cooldown and 10 sec duration. GS has 20 sec cooldown and 12 sec duration.

Realistically, I really do not want to have to explain myself to you as I am pretty sure you just gloss over whatever I say. Fortunately a clear example of what has happened to the tray version of Gemstone Shield has once happened to Time Bubble.

So i will just provide links and you can read or not read it

October 11, 2014

• Time Bubble Bug

October 16, 2014

• Time Bubble Server Hotfix

I don't k is if this will help but when me and lace discussed GSS with loche this was his answer

I still don't get how that is intentional. Neither the description for GS nor the tooltip when using it show what Loche is describing. What mainly confuses me is that if I aftershock 1-3 times GS always absorbs the entirety of dom+resto but non-aftershocked GS doesn't, regardless of number of hits taken.

In the videos I posted a while back testing out both Earth's absorption and Gemstone, GS either didn't register at all or broke in 3 seconds or less. Completely forgot about Time Bubble and good catch on providing the links; what's weird is that this has been happening to GS for longer than Quantum has been a power.

I agree with you it doesn't make sense to me either it feels like something's wrong ... But it's like pulling teeth to get earth fixes ... To those who might laugh at that statement it took us literally years to get a decent revamp earth needed

"It's the revamp Earth deserves, but not the one it asked for. So we'll use it. Because we can take it. Because it's not our revamp. Crystal's a silent killer, Brick, a watchful protector. A black sheep."
- Lt. James Gordon

Sorry had to do it

The thing that seperates Gemstone Shield from any other shield is the fact that it has options to absorb different amounts of incoming overall damage and this increases the longevity of the shield vs other shields.

So the tray version is taking 50% overall incoming damage and should in theory be the toughest to break vs aftershocked Gemstone Shield which take higher amounts of overall incoming damage.

The tray GS is however treated like a typical shield with the 3 hits rule and the 50% incoming overall damage that is placed on the damage prevention cap actually becomes a hindrance.

The shields that do have the 3 hit rule have a normal 100% incoming damage is placed on the damage prevention cap. Which in some cases are likely to receive enough damage in the 3 seconds to achieve the damage prevention cap and break the shield.

The sweet spot of when a Gemstone Shield pays off vs other shields is when the amount of incoming damage reaches that damage prevention cap of a 3 hit shield and continues to receive damage until enough damage is placed on the GS or the full duration of a shield is achieved.

So the sweet spot of the tray GS with my dominance plus restoration is 10,438-20,876 incoming overall damage. However this sweet spot has to be achieved in 3 seconds to even merit justification of 50% damage absorption. So if 10,437 or less damage occurs in those 3 seconds would mean tray GS is underperforming than 3 hit shields that absorb 100% incoming damage.

In the video before, the tray version absorbed 274 and 379 damage. The HLS had absorbed roughly double the damage absorbed at 592 .

What really grinds my gears is why even have the tray version of Gemstone Shield absorb 50% if it must be in the same 3 hit group with shields that absorb 100%?

You guys are both right for different reasons; HL Shield does absorb dom+resto but it will break if it receives enough hits in a 2-3 second window. Basically what I did to test this was walked into Nexus to have the Lexs hit me and then I tested HLS in survival mode (this can be done in any other content with slow hard hitting enemies); in the former scenario HLS broke before dom+resto was met but in the latter scenario HLS would absorb damage equal to dom+resto before breaking.

Just eyeballing it but non-aftershocked GS doesn't seem to work as a healer shield. It just looks completely bugged as there are times I will cast it and it will not absorb any damage at all. I'm going to confirm with either solid numbers or a video later tonight.

Finally fixing that Pet CR bug in tomorrow's update. Was fun while it lasted I guess... meh, not really.

LT was saying HLS doesnt break via hits and only breaks once the damage prevention cap is reached.

I have been saying that the 3 hit shields break via 3 hits (each hit towards this hit counter is only registered a minimum of 1 second apart), damage prevention cap is reached , or duration.

In my past discussions with LT, he merely rejected all thoughts I had with him. I wasnt going to try and explain myself to someone like that again.

What was the bug?