Guild Wars 2

Hey, forum-goers and developers alike!
I am a lowly Mesmer concerned about an issue that’s become predominant since the patch for us.

Well, we can trait out manipulation skills to have not only 20% cdr but also to give us reflect (mirror) on skill use. Sounds great and all… but the problem is that this reflect reveals!

So you blink. Then you decoy. A Ranger’s shooting at you. The doofus hits himself in the face with his own arrows! Neato. But now you’re revealed.

It’s… frustrating. But, I mean, it’s not that bad! But then again, the elite manipulation, Mass Invis, has the sole goal of stealthing you and allies. That’s no good if it’s also going to reveal you! If you’re being shot at, it’s no longer about getting MI off; it’s about not revealing yourself after you cast it.

I know I could just not trait my elite and stun break teleport for 20% cdr… but it really shouldn’t have to be that way!

So, tl;dr:
Please make reflect not inflict reveal on a stealthed player. Or more likely, as Surbrus suggested, simply make Mesmer’s reflect on manipulations skill use an evade. It would be a great way to make it more fluid and less clunky—a great QoL change. Self-reveal like that is a strange thing. That’s all!
Thanks

well dont get hit when you are in stealth then.
And saying it doesn’t make sense to get revealed if you reflect something while in stealth… doesn’t make sense (pun intended). Imagine being that ranger you shoot and arrow at an area, and that area turns around and hit you in your own face… you would certainly NOT just turn around and go like “hmm nothing’s there” no you would try and find out what is there, thus you as the reflecter get revealed.

And yes my main is a mesmer

A simpler solution would be to change the Manipulation trait’s reflect into a simple evasion. I hesitate to say turn it into a Distortion, as that would be a very large buff (synergy with Inspiration’s minor trait to give allies your distortion), while a change from reflect to evasion would have some positives and negatives (mostly positive though, probably too powerful).

GummiBear.2756:

well dont get hit when you are in stealth then.
And saying it doesn’t make sense to get revealed if you reflect something while in stealth… doesn’t make sense (pun intended). Imagine being that ranger you shoot and arrow at an area, and that area turns around and hit you in your own face… you would certainly NOT just turn around and go like “hmm nothing’s there” no you would try and find out what is there, thus you as the reflecter get revealed.

And yes my main is a mesmer

An expected response!
The problem is stealth tracking, slow projectiles, and channeled skills.

Once you stealth, you have to dodge twice or pop Distortion to give yourself a chance of not revealing yourself due to Necro projectiles or Rangers’ Rapid Fire. That really is a gross misuse of either of those active, skillful defenses in either case.

Also, I’m not going to argue about anecdotal matters. It’s simply not the point of this thread! I’ll rewrite my tl;dr though!

Surbrus.6942:

A simpler solution would be to change the Manipulation trait’s reflect into a simple evasion. I hesitate to say turn it into a Distortion, as that would be a very large buff (synergy with Inspiration’s minor trait to give allies your distortion), while a change from reflect to evasion would have some positives and negatives (mostly positive though, probably too powerful).

This. This would be beautiful too.
Thanks for the suggestion!

ToaLux.6478:

GummiBear.2756:

well dont get hit when you are in stealth then.
And saying it doesn’t make sense to get revealed if you reflect something while in stealth… doesn’t make sense (pun intended). Imagine being that ranger you shoot and arrow at an area, and that area turns around and hit you in your own face… you would certainly NOT just turn around and go like “hmm nothing’s there” no you would try and find out what is there, thus you as the reflecter get revealed.

And yes my main is a mesmer

An expected response!
The problem is stealth tracking, slow projectiles, and channeled skills.

Once you stealth, you have to dodge twice or pop Distortion to give yourself a chance of not revealing yourself due to Necro projectiles or Rangers’ Rapid Fire. That really is a gross misuse of either of those active, skillful defenses in either case.

Also, I’m not going to argue about anecdotal matters. It’s simply not the point of this thread! I’ll rewrite my tl;dr though!

While making it and evade, would certainly solve the one problem your having with stealth reveal would be a pretty serious nerf for people that would actually use it for the actual reflect itself, which would likely be the more common use i guess (but ofc i do not have any actual statistics on it), and again, well RF and the like, well dont use a stealth manip for that and expect to stay in stealth, blink would work just as well for instance, and honestly getting a full RF back in your face for most rangers would be some serious injury, and worth much more than you few seconds of stealth tbh

become aware that reflection means you can deal unexpected direct damage at any time. good thing you know when it turns on!

Lumpy.8760:

become aware that reflection means you can deal unexpected direct damage at any time. good thing you know when it turns on!

The problem is that it turns on when you activate a skill literally meant for stealth and stealth only. It doesn’t make any sense.

I wish you could say, “Oh I really want it to reflect right now” or “No, I really don’t want it to reflect right now”; but the point is that two mechanics are directly clashing, causing a clunky mash up result that commonly gets you killed—specifically with stomping and ressing.

It’s not that complicated, people

ToaLux.6478:

Lumpy.8760:

become aware that reflection means you can deal unexpected direct damage at any time. good thing you know when it turns on!

The problem is that it turns on when you activate a skill literally meant for stealth and stealth only. It doesn’t make any sense.

I wish you could say, “Oh I really want it to reflect right now” or “No, I really don’t want it to reflect right now”; but the point is that two mechanics are directly clashing, causing a clunky mash up result that commonly gets you killed—specifically with stomping and ressing.

It’s not that complicated, people

It apparently are too complicated for you, there are 6 different manipulations skills, and only ONE of those stealth you (mirror (okay i admit the reflect part of that trait is kinda wasted on that particular skill since… it part of the skill already), blink, Mimic, Illusion of Life, arcane Thievery and finally the stealth skill in question, mass invisibility, so its not the only time it turns on, and im pretty sure a big amount of memser runs at least blink as well (probably more than run MI), and the amounts of uses blink see due to the low cd compared to MI is gonna be HUGE compared, so really a better fix for your problem would likely be to remove the manip skill type from MI, rather than nerfing MI for 4 skills just to make it better for your one skill, IF anything should be done

GummiBear.2756:

It apparently are too complicated for you, there are 6 different manipulations skills, and only ONE of those stealth you (mirror (okay i admit the reflect part of that trait is kinda wasted on that particular skill since… it part of the skill already), blink, Mimic, Illusion of Life, arcane Thievery and finally the stealth skill in question, mass invisibility, so its not the only time it turns on, and im pretty sure a big amount of memser runs at least blink as well (probably more than run MI), and the amounts of uses blink see due to the low cd compared to MI is gonna be HUGE compared, so really a better fix for your problem would likely be to remove the manip skill type from MI, rather than nerfing MI for 4 skills just to make it better for your one skill, IF anything should be done

Ok, you made a good point there right at the end! Maybe MI shouldn’t be a manipulation skill; that’s a valid point.

I’m not here to argue; that’s a fair suggestion. However, Blink is commonly paired with Decoy to make a clean getaway. That also causes an issue. My suggestion was make reflect not reveal; Surb suggested make it an evade. Not sure if either is the best option! They’re just suggestions

They just need to program the reflect on mass invis to proc when the stealth is intended to end, just like the blast finisher on the prestige.

Mikkel.8427:

They just need to program the reflect on mass invis to proc when the stealth is intended to end, just like the blast finisher on the prestige.

Awesome suggestion!

Still wondering about Blink/Decoy combo though… but I really like this suggestion.

I got myself a bunch of experience with the Manip trait and manip skills last night. Although changing the reflect into an evade might sound powerful (and would be far more powerful against melee/AoE), personally I prefer the reflect.

The reflect on Mass Invis isn’t too intrusive. In fact you’re probably trying not to get hit while channelling the skill anyways (so that it does not get interrupted), so either using LoS, use a faster invis skill before, or simply using the skill while the enemy’s focus is elsewhere.

The vast majority of the time the MI reflect is just inert. It still does feel a bit clunky that it exists in the first place, however I think it’s a small price to pay for the reflect on all the other Manipulations. Another suggestion raised here was to take away the Manipulation tag from MI, again even though reflect on invis feels clunky, the cool down reduction from the trait is more valuable than the cost of having a reflect on an invis skill.

Thieves say hi.

Oh, you forgot about us? Yeah. Considering our current sub-par stealth, I would too.

Yes, the option of removing MI was a valid suggestion, but it was not necessarily the best one.

The one of making the reflect apply after MI ends as how the Prestige function is an example of a great suggestion. Or yours, Surbrus!

The fact is that in WvW, you most definitely will be revealed by MI if you’re running from a zerg. You are also likely to reveal yourself when you try to red or stomp someone with MI. Same with Blink/Decoy combo in those same situations. Of course, the most glaring problem is simply MI by itself. The issue may not always seem like a big deal; but it is absolutely still an issue!

ToaLux.6478:

Lumpy.8760:

become aware that reflection means you can deal unexpected direct damage at any time. good thing you know when it turns on!

The problem is that it turns on when you activate a skill literally meant for stealth and stealth only. It doesn’t make any sense.

I wish you could say, “Oh I really want it to reflect right now” or “No, I really don’t want it to reflect right now”; but the point is that two mechanics are directly clashing, causing a clunky mash up result that commonly gets you killed—specifically with stomping and ressing.

It’s not that complicated, people

it’s about as complicated as switching out traits that you don’t want to take advantage of

I don’t care about what people think here, and I don’t want to start a ticket and disturb moderation with that.
So I just post here to up the topic and maybe have a official position from devs.

Reflect cause reveal. With the new trait, we can’t even choose the reduced cooldown on manipulation traits without having that reflect issue.

So, is that a desired behaviour, or not ?

Desired. Reflect in GW2 is performed as if you fired the shot that you reflected. This is why a LB ranger using #3 against an enemy with Reflect up makes the enemy stealth instead. So, if you reflect just as you enter stealth, you’ll reveal if your reflected shot lands. If you don’t like it, then don’t enter stealth with Mass Invis while someone’s shooting you with ranged damage. If LB rangers don’t like losing their stealth to you if they try to hit you with #3 when you have Mirror up, then what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.