Guild Wars 2

I have basically tried all the classes now and I have found that mesmers put out a seriously low amount of damage, at least at the lower levels. I am hoping to hear that with trait points or something they get better, I played mesmer in GW1 and it was one of my favorites for sure. I am really drawn to their unique play style and the amount of skill they require but I noticed that when I spawn a clone they hit for 0 damage and the phantasms only attack like once. So someone please tell me they get better and do more damage or something because it takes forever to kill mobs and I really want to play one. Thanks

Why not jump into the mists and build out a level 80 and check? FWIW, I have heard that mesmers are the best 1v1 in game. You can check taugrim’s website, as he plays a mesmer, and enjoys his time with them.

No character essentially gets any better, you more or less have all your abilitys within about the first 10 hours of play, with level capping per area in place also it will always feel the same.
People have started noticing this at about level 40-50 that they are not actually progressing, this is apparently how the game is designed, I cant say im fan of that aspect character progression is the primary point for me in any mmo.

Well mesmers…

Supposedly its the most difficult class to master, but unfortunately there arent really any great rewards for mastering it compared to playing the other and far easier classes.

You have some nice damageabilities, like illusionary warden and duelist, but at least the warden takes time and planning to set up, and it involves hitting two stuns perfectly.

If the target moves slightly, the spike fails, if the target attacks the warden one time, the spike fails. And even when it hits its hardly more or even less damage than from a warriors evisceratespike or rangers rapidfire – Both basically just pushing one button.

So its currently far too little damage compared to other classes in terms of the difficulty involved in setting it up.

What I miss from mesmers that made me love the class, and made good mesmers shine in GW 1 is freakkin shutdown. I have no abilities that punish people for attacking, aka backfire or empathy. Confusion is a non-issue as being “punished” with 500-800 damage when you hit for 5k will not prevent you from attacking, and this also involves you using alot of time to actually implement confusion in the first place, kittening your damageoutput.

You got the arrowdome (forgot its name), but that is way too visible, and takes any player about 1/2 seconds to move out of. Only way to get use of it is to hit it exactly when he casts rapid arrows or unload, and hope hes stupid enough to stay in.

Basically the mesmers have no role in the game at this point. No real AoE, medium singletarget DpS that takes alot of effort to setup, which basically means the fight will be over before you can start doing damage if youre grouped.

And dont get me started on the useless clones. They do no damage, and any player with half a braincell can easily figure out which target to tag. Just put a marker on himkitten

AND NO SHUTDOWN?!?! Why have you destroyed the lovable and rewarding mesmer from GW1??

PvE-wise, I find that once you get the “illusions bleed on crit” trait you can really do a lot of damage without even shattering — especially with the “clone on dodge” trait allowing you to keep 2-3 illusions active at all times.

Wait, if you call out a target, even when you summon an illusion, the target marker stays put on the original? Please tell me this is not the case, because if it is, that really sucks. Hopefully it’s considered a bug.

Mesmers get a lot better once you progress up your skill and trait trees.

As for the earlier comment about confusion only doing 600-800 damage per attack. That is waay off. I frequently see confusion hitting people for upwards of 3k. You need to use more +condition damage gear. The scepter #3 is a great way to apply 5x stacks in 2 seconds.

One option is Inspiration and Illusion paths and focusing on glamour skills creating blindness + confusion to the masses. Even more so when using a Staff w/ Chaos Storm.

My preferred option is:
The Scepter/Pistol // 1h Sword/Torch( sometimes focus) weapon setup.

The Illusionary Duelist does a massive amount of damage and with traits will bleed foes like crazy. The first 15 points in Dueling are vital. Take Phantasmal Fury as your first major trait (adept) which will give all your illusions an extra 20% crit chance.

Mesmers are not a brute force class. Mesmers are also not an AoE class. Mesmers require patience, and thanks to a multitude of abilities you can live forever (unless zerged by 20+ invaders in WvW), but your enemies won’t.

Vexor.3640:

Mesmers get a lot better once you progress up your skill and trait trees.

As for the earlier comment about confusion only doing 600-800 damage per attack. That is waay off. I frequently see confusion hitting people for upwards of 3k. You need to use more +condition damage gear. The scepter #3 is a great way to apply 5x stacks in 2 seconds.

One option is Inspiration and Illusion paths and focusing on glamour skills creating blindness + confusion to the masses. Even more so when using a Staff w/ Chaos Storm.

My preferred option is:
The Scepter/Pistol // 1h Sword/Torch( sometimes focus) weapon setup.

The Illusionary Duelist does a massive amount of damage and with traits will bleed foes like crazy. The first 15 points in Dueling are vital. Take Phantasmal Fury as your first major trait (adept) which will give all your illusions an extra 20% crit chance.

Mesmers are not a brute force class. Mesmers are also not an AoE class. Mesmers require patience, and thanks to a multitude of abilities you can live forever (unless zerged by 20+ invaders in WvW), but your enemies won’t.

Vexor has the right idea here in a couple of areas. It’s better not to buy into all of the negative hyperbole some people may express with professions. You can really make any profession shine if you focus on finding a play style that works for you.

In Vexor’s case, I think he/she is spot on in regards to a similar play style I also have, and while my PvP experience is pretty limited with this game (but then again, who’s isn’t at this point?) this post would be an excellent starting point to really getting a handle on the Mesmer. Great advice!

I’m leveling a mesmer at the moment and it takes forever to kill anything compared to my guardian. Scepter damage is horrible. The offhand gun is okay, its phantasmal duellist does a nice bit of damage. Greatsword autoattack damage is horrible. On my guardian I can jump in and with a few swings of my greatsword everything’s dead.

shycrow.5982:

I’m leveling a mesmer at the moment and it takes forever to kill anything compared to my guardian. Scepter damage is horrible. The offhand gun is okay, its phantasmal duellist does a nice bit of damage. Greatsword autoattack damage is horrible. On my guardian I can jump in and with a few swings of my greatsword everything’s dead.

It’s all in the play style, and traits you use to compliment it. Is your gear up to date? What weapons are you using? The Mesmer takes more finesse to really make shine, and is overlooked and dismissed a lot when people don’t really have a grasp on the profession. I’m not implying that you’re having these problems, but more often than not, this is the case.

I would take a look at Vexor’s post above and study it a bit, maybe to see if anything is similar to the way you play, or to form your own ideas based off of the possible new info you’re reading.

People say it takes more finesse or skill, but when you have to put in more effort to do worse or the same damage as other professions something is wrong.

shycrow.5982:

People say it takes more finesse or skill, but when you have to put in more effort to do worse or the same damage as other professions something is wrong.

I don’t really think that more effort is a bad thing – just a preference people have. Keep in mind, this is my personal opinion, but I prefer not to be on cruise control while staying on par with other people, then again, I need an upbeat play style or things get stagnant for me pretty fast.

I wouldn’t say that something is wrong, however, as Mesmer’s really are a support role, but man what a support role they are! Have an experienced Mesmer in a dungeon with you and you’ll notice the difference!

I love my Mesmer, granted I mostly do PvE with her. I found her extremely easy to level an her damage out put is on par with most the people I run with. I kill enemies just as fast if not faster then they do. What I noticed most about her, I die way less … a lot less in fact. I have a guild member who plays an engineer, they are at over 100 deaths, same for the ele, and ranger, but me I made lvl 80 with 60 deaths to my name, and most of those came from us learning dungeons. In environment I hardly died, if I over pulled I left my clones to to keep them at bay and ran for it so I could regroup. Its all about learning what you can an can not do on your own vs with a group and keeping a plethora of weps to swap between for each situation you find yourself in.

shycrow.5982:

People say it takes more finesse or skill, but when you have to put in more effort to do worse or the same damage as other professions something is wrong.

while i love my mesmer and i feel like i can hold my own in pvp or pve, i agree with this sentiment. I really feel like im working dang hard every fight and kill, just to watch some war walk by and eviscerate the same mob in 1 shot and run away. not to mention we walk slow as hell to everywhere and dont really have a skill that directly gives us swiftness(every use that focus line skill and miss while your running and die?)

Celidon.1348:

shycrow.5982:

People say it takes more finesse or skill, but when you have to put in more effort to do worse or the same damage as other professions something is wrong.

I don’t really think that more effort is a bad thing – just a preference people have. Keep in mind, this is my personal opinion, but I prefer not to be on cruise control while staying on par with other people, then again, I need an upbeat play style or things get stagnant for me pretty fast.

I wouldn’t say that something is wrong, however, as Mesmer’s really are a support role, but man what a support role they are! Have an experienced Mesmer in a dungeon with you and you’ll notice the difference!

I don’t feel the need to feel like I’m putting in more effort than other people. That may be what gives some people enjoyment. What’s fun for me is killing things as fast as possible. In comparison to my guardian, the mesmer takes longer to kill things. For me it’s as simple as that. It does have some fun mechanics, but I feel killing time is too long. I will keep playing it to see if it gets any better as I become higher level.

For Direct damage, take Sword/?(I prefer pistol) or Greatsword. For DoTs through conditions, pick Scepter/?(Torch most likely) or Staff.
My experience in sPvP with the Mesmer is that they will strike when they choose and will outlast their enemies quite easily if played skillful.

My personal favorite is the Staff + Scepter/Torch setup with glamours skills, focusing on Condition damage and team buffs. Each clone(normally dealing low damage) will apply the conditions just as effectively through their auto attack(the bouncing ball thingie from staff) as you do and will also buff your allies.
This leads to 4-5 Vulnerability stacks, 4-5 Bleed stacks(about 100 damage per second each), and almost permanent burning(about 640 damage per second) against single targets and even group of enemies when you have 3 clones auto attacking. Chaos Storm and Chaos Armor buffs and debuffs even more.
The Glamour skills can be upgrade to apply confusion(further boosting your condition damage potential) as well as blindness.
As for defenses, they have both decoy(Breaks stun, stealths you and leave a clone) from utility and the torch stealth skill, if you run out of clones.

Finally, Timewarp can be a huge damage boost if used in coordination with your team.

As for lockdowns, they can be quite disruptive(while not as disruptive as GW1), as you have a lot of daze abilities and also quite a few stuns(also you can count Moamorph as the longest lasting disable in the game. Shuts down every ranged proffesion). And the clones makes the enemy “waste” some of their key abilities like Bull’s Charge, if used at the right time, greatly reducing their damage potential.

Mesmer isn’t a dps class to me, they are more of a trickster class. You have to keep that mindset with them.
I enjoy the class because of all the little tricks you can play, but I prefer to be in a group in WvW, they can make nice keep defenders if you use them correctly.
You can do good one vs one pvp, but I prefer to avoid it really.

To be honest, the Mesmer is the perfect example of a profession that improves drastically as you play it and become more experienced. I’ve played one since BWE2 and can say that with confidence. Of course, the profession is like any other in that all of your different weapons and weapon combos play to a different aspect; DPS, support, control…and the Mesmer can excel at all of them. I play a Staff + Sword/Pistol Mesmer and feel just fine about its’ damage, although I will concede that AoE damage is a weak point, in my opinion.

shycrow.5982:

People say it takes more finesse or skill, but when you have to put in more effort to do worse or the same damage as other professions something is wrong.

Yeah this is the real issue. The illusion summoning is a bad mechanic that currently is a pain to use. And for mastering it….and putting up with it you really get nothing special from it. There are plenty more more effective and easy to use classes in the game that do not rely on such gimmicky game play mechanics. The phantasms are simply like easy to dispel DoT’s on enemies for all intents and purposes.

I think Mesmers may be the “Marmite” class, some people are going to either love them or hate them. I played one briefly in the early beta’s and did not like it one bit. I created an Elementalist at launch as my main character and created various others to try them out. I went back to the mesmer and I am really loving it right now.

It does take some getting used to, but you can pull off some pretty insane things with the tricks you have. The illusion/summoning mechanic can be initially tricky to figure out, you cannot play this class like your typical stand there are pew pew class, you have to think about what you are doing you are not essentially a direct damage class.

I play a lot of WvW and I have yet to beaten 1v1 if someone catches me alone, as for keep siege’s / defence if you use the right abilities you can do some serious damage. Feedback is one of the best abilities in the game and you can put out some serious AoE Burst DPS if you use the right abilities, example. Chaos Storm, Feedback, weapon switch and put a Berserker and Warden up there and you will see damage numbers flying through the air. Phantasmal Berserker + Phantasmal Warden are amazing for taking out siege on keep walls, they can do some pretty good DPS, sure they die quick but not before putting some serious hurt onto your targets. I even think I could out DPS my Ele if I do it right with the mesmer + your adding conditions / confusion to all those targets if you do it right.

That’s my take on the mesmer, but as I said. Some will like it, some will not.

Elementalist damage is waaaay lower, just saying, and we die much faster

Asthenea.1546:

I have basically tried all the classes now and I have found that mesmers put out a seriously low amount of damage, at least at the lower levels. I am hoping to hear that with trait points or something they get better, I played mesmer in GW1 and it was one of my favorites for sure. I am really drawn to their unique play style and the amount of skill they require but I noticed that when I spawn a clone they hit for 0 damage and the phantasms only attack like once. So someone please tell me they get better and do more damage or something because it takes forever to kill mobs and I really want to play one. Thanks

A couple of questions:
- what level are you?
- where have you put your traits?
- what weapons are you primarily using?

Here’s my advice if you’re starting out as a Mesmer – or go to my guide on the forums here – it’s a work in progress but should answer some of your questions.

I played around a lot early on with different combos. What I found with Mesmer is that different things work better at different times. But here’s what I’d do if I was starting fresh again:

1) Put at least 5 points in Chaos for auto-regen at 75% health
2) Put your remaining points into Domination (for +Power) – this will buff your damage
3) Find a good staff and keep it upgraded (Chaos Storm → Illusionary Warlock is a sweet damage combo; Illusionary Warlock is great in a party as well since his damage is based on how many conditions are on the target)
4) Play around with your weapon combos and find the one that feels good for you (I loved sword early game, but I prefer scepter now)

Mesmer isn’t always about your own raw damage output. Your allies pump out extra damage because you’re buffing them (that extra damage is really your’s). Foes are taking more damage because you’re debuffing them (that additional damage dealt is also your’s).

And don’t get me started on the tricks!!

The Sy.5409:

Elementalist damage is waaaay lower, just saying, and we die much faster

You’re doing it wrong then, mate.

Personally I’ve found 2 traits to be immensely helpful. The first is creating a clone on dodge in the + precision line, and having all shatters cause confusion in the + condition damage line. This supports an active shatterer play style which is what I’ve found to be the most fun.

Some people try to buff their phantasms and leave them running like necromancer minions, but this sort of passive play style fails badly in many common situations such as when targets change/die fequently (this despawns all your illusions), or when there is a lot of AoE damage.

As for weapons, I personally love everything swordy though greatsword got some heavy nerfs since beta and staff is easier to do well with lately. Mainhand longsword is a lot of fun if you put the time into mastering it, and will let you stand toe to toe with enemies instead of needing to kite – I prefer it over scepter which feels too slow and I only use if I need a ranged option to go with an offhand.

And yes, mesmer can to amazing spike damage but requires some setup to achieve.

The mesmer is a complicated class there are half a dozen things you have to keep track of simultaneously, you have to love it to play well, and it can be very rewarding but it’s also easy to play a mesmer badly.

There’s a lot of great advice in this thread. Mesmer is a unique play style that you’re unlikely to encounter anywhere else. For starting Mesmers I give this advice:

1. Try every weapon combination you can think of. The Mesmer has a pretty solid selection with no one choice being above the others. If none of these combinations fit your play style the Mesmer is likely to be a miserable experience for you.

2. Illusions are your lifeblood. Those 3 purple DoTs should always be shaded in when in combat. Replace your clones/phantasms ASAP!

3. It is all about the conditions. Regardless of how you spec the vast majority of your damage is going to come from conditions. The +Condition Damage stat is your #1 goal. There are very few Mesmer abilities that do not have some sort of conditional effect.

4. Mantras are currently underpowered and highly situational. Traits focusing on them are a good way to kitten your Mesmer. Those precious few utility slots have far better options.

Vexor’s short list of favorite skills/abilites:
-Magic Bullet – Found in the pistol offhand. Despite it’s somewhat lengthy recharge this skill is superb for interrupting big hits from Ettins/Trolls and other nasties. It will also stun 3 enemies in close proximity to each other. Be warned this can sometimes cause unintended aggro.

-Feedback – A utility skill that will turn any ranged unit into a sloppy mess of self inflicted damage. Rangers in pvp frequently melt their own faces when this is placed upon them. Add in further condition damage (see: Confusion) and your dps becomes godly. If you are within the bubble and use the #2 staff skill you will gain Chaos Armor. This field also turns ranged attacks into Chaos projectiles (Combo’s well with Illusionary Duelist)

3. Phantasmal Defender – This is a prime choice for pve and pvp. If the mesmer has any “required” skill, it’s this one. The defender will absorb 1/2 of all damage dealt to you. Without a doubt this is the first skill you cast in a fight. The trait and signet’s that boost phantasm health turn this guy into a brick and he will go the distance. Only major bosses can shred through him. If the fight is protracted enough it is possible to get 2 or 3 of these summoned. It’s uncertain if their benefits stack beyond the first.

Mesmers considering phantasm builds should take this list into consideration:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Phantasm

Phantasms can be built to provide amazing group support through condition removal, buff bots, and dps. In instances my phantasms are frequently taking the initial “alpha strike” from all major pulls. After all, they’re expendable, use once and discard like a tissue. Get used to the length of time for phantasms skills to recharge. It can be beneficial to simply recast the phantasm vs waiting for it’s skills to cooldown.

I hope aspiring Mesmers find this post helpful. Feel free to message me in game at any point at Vexor.3640. I’d be happy to share any Mesmer related advice.

Some superb info here.

I run a phantasm build atm with sword/sword and greatsword. The issue I have is that our phantasms die with the mob. Do you all spread your phantasms to multiple targets rather than training them on one?

Or is it irrelevant because if the mob dies faster than you can summon illusions you are winning regardless? Lol.

Vexor’s advice is largely helpful. However, we are incredibly weak in dungeon PvE and in DEs we’re pretty bad outside chaos storm unless you want to run a sword. Ranged shatters would go such a long way to making dungeon play more fun.

For dungeons the best you can do is trait all your phantasms up (15% more damge from 10 in dom 15% more damage for 25 in inspiration bleed on crit from dueling 20% recharge reduction on phantasm attacks) and start with scepter pistol. Spawn the duelist and 3. Switch to staff Chaos storm and spawn an Iwarlock, spawn 2 more overwriting the duelist. Congratulations your 3 pets now crit for upwards of 5k at 80 but this is also unspeakably boring. If the boss has a lot of AoE you can’t even afk through the snorefest that is our DPS in PvE. Cooldown on weapon swaps and the scepter auto overwriting our warlocks prevents you from going back to scepter to apply more confusion. Not to mention unless the boss has some way to attempt to deal damage at ranged you won’t see confusion tick at all, and if it does probably only once. No one wants to eat a swing from a boss ever so confusion doesn’t help contribute to our output enough in an instance.

Boss AoE is usually a 1 shot even with signet of illusions on our clones. This ruins shatter builds. They’ll die before they reach the boss so really the only shatter worth mentioning half the time is distortion. Using phantasms to soak initial abilities is a neat idea, until you realize that blind is just as effective. Necro plague form and well of darkness provides a group with much stronger damage shut down so we’re not really suitable for that role either. Other classes can bring safer ways to apply immobilize so we’re not a prime candidate for melee shut down either. And thanks to all of our damage being lumped into phantasms who often die rapidly during mob pulls our DPS output is low as well.

We’re outclassed in most categories here capable of only really shining on already easy fights and even then, the best way to deal damage is soooooo boring and passive.

We’re really good at allowing bad groups to do fights that they’d die continually on however. Our clones are enough of a distraction that we’ll live more than long enough for our group to run back from the closest waypoint. This can be moderately useful on a boss like the one that Scorpion Wires and then Garen spins on everyone in ACE.

I agree that even buffed up our phantasms in dungeons (esp explore mode) get wasted far to easily. At these points you’re best off just using your own dps through sword or debuffs (ala chaos storm). Duelist is usually your best bet for any boss and even then it’s just not up to par with other classes as a small sneeze kills the duelist.

For Eofkent – I usually stick my Defender on the toughest mob with usually 1 duelist supporting, but I’ll spread them across 3 separate targets if my goal is survival. The dodge spawning clone is immensely helpful if you’re trying to run through an area. If you can keep mobs relatively clustered it makes your fields vastly more useful.

Dungeons are definitely a Mesmer weak point. I tend to be more pvp oriented so it’s less of an issue personally. We can do them, it’s just not always ideal. My role is usually relegated to supporting and off tanking through clone spam.
Boss fights I usually load up for group support through fields and boon distribution through our signets. Working with a necro spamming blind actually works nicely as illusions don’t die to “missed” attacks.
I actually find the scepter clones (which spawn directly on your target) are great since they’re point blank you can shatter them freely.

Feedback and Chaos Storm are ethereal fields which offer up some of the best combos for your party.

I’m just unsure as to why our shatters are not as on demand as scepter clones on everything other than creatures with PBAoE. The problem I have with scepter is you need to auto attack 9 times to get the clones out to shatter it, 3 if you running mirror image. but I’d rather bring null field and feedback and signet of illusion eats up my last slot. In the time it takes you to do that a duelist or a warlock will have easily outpaced the shatter damage on anything but a situation that calls for a lot of AoE.

Now in a situation that requires that much AoE the target will probably be dead before the 2 clones spawned from Mirror Images reaches the target and it’s probably time to loot if you sit there for 9 auto attacks. You can reduce the time needed by running the clone on dodge trait but even then you’re putting a bandage on the gaping wound that is mesmer AoE right now.

BUT YOU HAVE CLONE GENERATING ABILITIES ON YOUR WEAPONS. No I have phantasms, with cast times, I could auto 3 times spawn a duelist and weapon swap and staff 2 and only waste 1 phantasm if I really needed AoE here but again to the bandage analogy, and I’ve traded one of my best single target abilities for horrible AoE damage. Oh and the target probably died before they got there anyway. Warlock is always too valuable to shatter on a boss fight. The damage he puts out really is insane even compared to a duelist if enough conditions have been applied. There is never really a good time to make use of scepter clones other than giving packs more targets to attack.

Would we really enter warrior territory if when I press my Mind Wrack button, it’s affect just triggered? Hell make it a trait for 30 points in the domination tree and give us a good power build.
I love our play in structured but in WvWvW I feel the same dungeon woes, same thing in Dynamic events. Although this has more to do with everything dying before we can get clones out unless we’re fighting a world event boss and then it’s dungeon woes all over again if they have any AoE. Looking at you Asuran Fire elemental.

Chaos storm and Winds are good for supporting, but I’d like to branch out to something other than mediocre support when feedback null field and Chaos storm are on cooldown.

Fixed a bug with Signet of Illusions. It now give phantasms 50% more health instead of 300% more.

Great….

u serious? It was bugged and they were dying that easy? I debated using that signet off and on anyways as I never noticed where it actually helped all that much…and it was BUGGED? rofl….what a joke…can’t wait to see what it does now lol.

Well now … if a mob even turns around and looks threatening .. my phantasm self-destructs.

I cannot dungeon and have even an iota of fun at this point.

Abarcine.7189:

Fixed a bug with Signet of Illusions. It now give phantasms 50% more health instead of 300% more.

Great….

This is awful news. My stuff could barely survive as is!

The real purpose of illusions is to be shattered. They’re the opposite of a tanking pet and I don’t mind that they get nuked. I typically shatter them at 2 illusions anyways. The only diffference I’ve noticed with mesmer is that even small fights require tactics. There’s no mesmer faceroll. You maybe charge a mantra, mirror image, chaos field, shoot a few times, shatter, clone, swap weps, illusionary zerker, snare, use mantra, invisible cloak clone, maybe chaos shield or another chaos field. Great! That centaur is dead!

Lol mantras. Oh god I could go on and on about how useless they are.

Illusions are may be designed with shattering in mind however there is never an opportunity where doing so is rewarding outside of melee range in PvP. My favorite part was where you described using multiple cooldowns, all long ones to kill one creature. Needing to push more buttons doesn’t make us more complex, it just makes each push weaker than that ranger over there.

Okay, so I’m in a dungeon and switch signet of illusions ( it’s a waste of a slot now anyway) for Mirror Image so I can actually get enough clones out to press shatter before they’re instantly wiped from the map. I’ve done it ! My clones are now happily on their way to the … oh wait there was an AoE effect that went off while they jogged up to it and they died before they could do anything. Guess I’ll just have to try again in 45 seconds. So 45seconds down the line I staff 2 and quickly mirror image and shatter, and then my target died before they could arrive.

Shatters are bad for DEs, WvWvW and dungeons. So very very bad. Phantasms will outpace a shatter build after 2 of their attacks are able to go off per phantasm. They are so much better for single target it’s moronic. If you space them out properly you can usually get them to live for at least 2 volleys, at least before the “fix” to our signet. Illusionary defender and Illusion of Life now take up the slot where that signet used to be. Sig of dom makes a guest star appearance if I expect damage output to be low.

We have no good to decision to make when it comes on whether or not to shatter our phantasms as each hit is a one shot, before you could notice it was low on health and count how much time it had before it’s next attack, order a shatter and hope it made it in time for a little extra damage while you replaced them. Now they just die, poof and they do too much damage to shatter after one volley, the tradeoff is not there. Compound this with the fact that shatter build damage is not limited by how many clones you can churn out but Mind Wrack and Cry of Frustration cooldowns and we have a very big problem.

Sounds like its almost better to focus on conditiondmg+ and equip staff and hope you get bleeds and burns with winds of chaos. Chaos field when you can and run alot. I haven’t played in a few days. Did the hp on clones get nerfed?

Big time. Not an intended nerf but signet of illusions was bugged. It was giving 300% more life instead of 50% more. At 300% boss AoE effects would still 1 shot our phantasms. You are correct that condition damage the 20% staff cooldown reduction and Illusionary Elasticity is the way to go for dungeons. You’re utility slots consist of Feedback and Null Field and 1 optional. We’re incredibly pigeon holed for dungeons right now.

You’re correct about how we can reliably deliver damage right now, the problem is so much of our output is tied into our phantasms and (should be anyway ) shatters. We’re probably operating at 50% or less damage than they intend for us to do right now in any scenario ( all dungeons) with a lot of AoE friendly or unfriendly. I mean to say that if the occasion calls for AoEing down numerous low health enemies the target will die before the clones arrive to deliver the shatter most of the time. Boss AoE is self explanatory. This leaves us with Chaos Storm ( great ability ) and Blurred Frenzy. If you’re running sword you’re going to want either decoy or blink to get out of the way after your invulnerability is gone. You now have no choice on utilities.
The best that we can do is provide support with our combo fields and, even there, others have us beat while bringing usable damage to the table.

harlander.1983:

The real purpose of illusions is to be shattered. They’re the opposite of a tanking pet and I don’t mind that they get nuked. I typically shatter them at 2 illusions anyways. The only diffference I’ve noticed with mesmer is that even small fights require tactics. There’s no mesmer faceroll. You maybe charge a mantra, mirror image, chaos field, shoot a few times, shatter, clone, swap weps, illusionary zerker, snare, use mantra, invisible cloak clone, maybe chaos shield or another chaos field. Great! That centaur is dead!

If this was true, then we wouldn’t have so many traits that boost/buff our phantasms. I’m not saying they aren’t meant to be shattered, but you can use them in different ways if you want (ie: buffing their damage, HP, etc).

This post is very helpful, as I’m trying to play mesmer. I have some problem in PvP sometimes though, especially against thiefs. Even if I try to use my decoy to cloak and flee, thiefs continue to spike me when I’m invisible, like they still know where I am. Well, they probably don’t know, but their skills “know”. So I don’t really see the point of decoy :/ Maybe I’m doing it wrong.
Although I’m wondering if sigils for weapons, like “x% to do y on a critical hit” is triggered by phantasms too. After some tests, I’m guessing they are not, but I’d prefer asking. What sigils should I use with my mesmer ?

Thanks !

I’m a level 80 Asura Mesmer and I can tell you mesmer is a very strong class even end-game. I use Sword/Pistol + Focus. I’ll probably post my build here once they open the mesmer section, I posted it on the guru forums tho.

All your stats affect your phantasms, if you don’t have any toughness expect them to die in 1 hit, and pick the confusion when they die trait if you’re going that path.

Killua.8041:

I’m a level 80 Asura Mesmer and I can tell you mesmer is a very strong class even end-game. I use Sword/Pistol + Focus. I’ll probably post my build here once they open the mesmer section, I posted it on the guru forums tho.

All your stats affect your phantasms, if you don’t have any toughness expect them to die in 1 hit, and pick the confusion when they die trait if you’re going that path.

Stacking toughness does nothing to allow them to live longer. Your solution is summed up as “stack toughness to deal damage.” I hope I don’t need to explain why this is a problem but I’ll go ahead and do it anyway. Not only do we need to stack power condition damage and precision, we need to stack toughness and vitality to allow our delivery system a snowball’s chance of seeing those stats actually benefit us.

Again the problem is not solo PvE. It’s our difficulty tagging mobs in DEs if we actually want to play like a caster instead of a butcher with imaginary friends and dungeons. Please do the illusionary spider boss in the Nightmare Court instance and tell me that toughness will let my phantasms survive. Or the burrow events in ACE etc. We simply do not work and things are even worse with 250% health lost on the phantasms. There is no way to allocate enough stats to allow them to survive let alone survive and still have enough stats left over to contribute in damage.

I do not know the answer to this question but I assume the answer is no: our phantasms have no built in AoE damage reduction?

You’re right dayrinni. No pets in this game have any AoE damage reduction.

Abarcine.7189:

You’re right dayrinni. No pets in this game have any AoE damage reduction.

Figured as much. I wonder how much that would help in dungeons and PVP.

I also wonder what %’s the phantasms get from our stats?

Before the bug fix on the signet, I did notice a big difference in my phantasm’s survivability. I did feel like it was way more than 50% and actually thought it was bugged before it got patched. I’m probably biased, but I thought it was worth it because it did take up a single slot skill and they are precious.

Not sure what you mean by biased. It was flat out necessary to allow them to endure long enough for a second use of their phantasmal attack in practically every pull trash included of a dungeon. Now they’re nothing but targets unless you have a necro running plague form around.

Abarcine.7189:

Not sure what you mean by biased. It was flat out necessary to allow them to endure long enough for a second use of their phantasmal attack in practically every pull trash included of a dungeon. Now they’re nothing but targets unless you have a necro running plague form around.

Sorry, when I said biased, I meant because I played the class

I guess we can hope for Arenanet to make a change.

We need to be toned down in structured and buffed in every other place. Not sure how to do this.

Mesmer is the only class I truly enjoy.

It does indeed get much stronger as you progress, though builds can be quite hard to figure out at times – though admittedly I enjoy this.

Only trouble I’ve had leveling my mesmer is when I outlevel my items. Other than that its fast kills and all that. The game isnt very forgiving even if you outlevel a zone, since the de-level system seems to set your active gear level lower than your de-level if your gear is lower than your actual level.

Like say you are level 50 with leve 25 gear in a level 25 zone. Even though the gear is at the level of the zone its 50% lower than your actual level, so the game de-levels the gear stats to level 12 or 13… or so it feels. But if you run a level 25 zone at level 50 with level 50 gear it counts as a level 25 with level 25 gear. Atleast thats how it feels to me.

You also need to figure out if you wanna run a condition based build or a power, crit, crit damage build. I personally run a power+crit build, focused on phantasm damage and cooldown reduction, both for the phantasms own skills and the skills to summon them. Running with Greatsword and scept+pistol, works great. Lovely burst, very short phantasm CDs. Using disenchanter, defender(thats the name right?) and mirror image as utility and the chicken as elite currently.

Fully maxed dualist will be on an 8sec CD or something.