Guild Wars 2

An article discussing the possibility that these two classes and their burst are the reason why people avoid going glass cannon builds for PvP.

http://www.tentonhammer.com/editorial/guild-wars-2-are-thieves-and-mesmers-cause-meta

I thought might stacking was the reason for the current meta? Take the double ele, double engi, s/d thief comp, every single one of them stacks might

I don’t understand what logic is that. A is choosen over B because B is too good? Let’s nerf B so that no one chooses A?

Mesmer + thief caused the bunker meta, which was slow and boring, so to find a way to kill bunkers, the might stacking meta began, incidentally, there was a way to build tanky with DPS when using might stacking, so the end result was a bunch of builds with the DPS to wreck a glass thief, but the armor to just bunker down when need be

This post doesnt make sense. Meta doesnt revolve around two classes. For one reason,mesmers and thieves are the worst class to syack in a team so i dont think people would focus their time dealing with them.

Anyway, I think we’ve established that meta rise out of a counter to a precious meta. Teams shift to the new meta because it counters their current comp and the cycle repeats.

In contrast and as it currently stands, Berzerker builds are still almost exclusively used by two specific classes: Mesmer and Thief.

In the last go4cups alone we have seen FreshAir-Bersi-Ele and Medidation-Bersi-Guard on EU, Power-LB-Bersi-Ranger on NA in the Top 4 teams; the team with the Medidation-Bersi-Guard even won the whole cup.
Let’s wait and see what todays Dezember Finals will bring us.

This “instant gib” that’s near indefensible against a skilled Thief, I believe, is the reason primary why players gravitated away from using squishy builds and towards Bunker or Celestial alternatives.

Is it really the thief, that causes us f.e. to see only a few fresh air eles, or is it more the dominance of might stacking celestrial D/D eles?
Not to mention that DPS guards are very well off against thiefs.

or Phase Retreat in order to survive. […] or a comfortable 6 seconds on a Mesmer without using an Elite is a long time.

So a ähm, staff+ X/torch build? Haven’t seen one of those in quite a while

Teutos.8620:

In contrast and as it currently stands, Berzerker builds are still almost exclusively used by two specific classes: Mesmer and Thief.

In the last go4cups alone we have seen FreshAir-Bersi-Ele and Medidation-Bersi-Guard on EU, Power-LB-Bersi-Ranger on NA in the Top 4 teams; the team with the Medidation-Bersi-Guard even won the whole cup.
Let’s wait and see what todays Dezember Finals will bring us.

This “instant gib” that’s near indefensible against a skilled Thief, I believe, is the reason primary why players gravitated away from using squishy builds and towards Bunker or Celestial alternatives.

Is it really the thief, that causes us f.e. to see only a few fresh air eles, or is it more the dominance of might stacking celestrial D/D eles?
Not to mention that DPS guards are very well off against thiefs.

or Phase Retreat in order to survive. […] or a comfortable 6 seconds on a Mesmer without using an Elite is a long time.

So a ähm, staff+ X/torch build? Haven’t seen one of those in quite a while

What we see in the Go4s are not good places to judge viability from. Unfortunately there are many comps and styles that are just not the best practice all-around, but people still want to play a certain way, even if it means never overthrowing the current meta comp.

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

It’s almost like Thieves and Mesmers were built to hunt squishies or something….

Runewolf.8456:

It’s almost like Thieves and Mesmers were built to hunt squishies or something….

You’re suggesting that the primary role of a mesmer is to hunt down squishies? Mesmers are actually a good counter to celestial builds if they don’t have a thief on their tail.

Random Weird Guy.3528:

Runewolf.8456:

It’s almost like Thieves and Mesmers were built to hunt squishies or something….

You’re suggesting that the primary role of a mesmer is to hunt down squishies? Mesmers are actually a good counter to celestial builds if they don’t have a thief on their tail.

Sadly they can’t do anything for an entire match if they do

Lewis Burnell.2493:

Random Weird Guy.3528:

Runewolf.8456:

It’s almost like Thieves and Mesmers were built to hunt squishies or something….

You’re suggesting that the primary role of a mesmer is to hunt down squishies? Mesmers are actually a good counter to celestial builds if they don’t have a thief on their tail.

Sadly they can’t do anything for an entire match if they do

#wtsfinal

Chaith.8256:

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

Thieves do have a great amount of gap closing abilities, but if we look at say a fresh air elementalist, they not only have the higher burst, which happens to be completely uncounterable, but they also have range and invulnerabilities.

Without points in acrobatics, thieves would be sitting ducks against a fresh air elementalist (blinds are useless against fresh air) and that is probably why thieves have migrated towards totally unpredictable evasion.

So it’s not entirely correct to say that class A keeps class B out of the meta, but rather that A keeps B and B keeps C ankitteneeps A out of the meta, which is why the meta consists of classes that can not be countered by any build to the degree described.

And to be honest, that’s how it should be. Issues with the currently dominating builds only exist because they are on classes that have the versatility to simply be better at x, y and z than the generalist builds of other classes.

TLDR: Specialist builds keep each other out of the meta, so people have migrated to generalist builds in order not to be countered by any specialist build. At the same time, elementalist and engineer (and warrior to a degree, though they are restricted in range) are more versatile than all other classes, thus they have stronger generalist builds by default.

Chaith.8256:

What we see in the Go4s are not good places to judge viability from.

It means, that you can still be successful even if you don’t play the ‘meta’ team composition.

Just because teams like Cheese Mode / TCG / Abjured knows how to counter a specific build, does that mean, it is not viable at all skill levels?
Go play Power Necro like Leeto and have fun with it; and if you are good with it, you will not be a burden for your team but an enrichment.

Random Weird Guy.3528:

Runewolf.8456:

It’s almost like Thieves and Mesmers were built to hunt squishies or something….

You’re suggesting that the primary role of a mesmer is to hunt down squishies? Mesmers are actually a good counter to celestial builds if they don’t have a thief on their tail.

never said they weren’t good at that but meso’s are built around deception and interruption which makes them extremely effective against squishies, even though they can still kill/counter other build/class types.

…aaand how many mesmers did we recently see in top-tier PvP to even make a difference again?

In mid games, if you do not have lightning reflexes and got good opponents, you get focused and melt in seconds because everyone knows that if you see a mesmer, it’s that meta shatter which can be focused and bursted down. I can say that I got tired of glass [antikitten] shatter pretty fast and switched to bunker condi for that reason, and I perform better as such. (No, don’t worry, I almost always go for unranked).

This is 100% correct. For example playing a necro vs mesmer/thief is really hard unless you also have a thief (on your team) who is dominating or at least causing serious problems for the other teams thief and mesmer.

With fire and air sigils and the burst dps, mesmer/thief damage is simply too high and too unavoidable and too repeatable.

As a result pretty much any squishy class except thief has problems. Which makes the meta boring.

Lordrosicky.5813:

This is 100% correct. For example playing a necro vs mesmer/thief is really hard unless you also have a thief (on your team) who is dominating or at least causing serious problems for the other teams thief and mesmer..

You make it sound like having a thief on your own team is such a rare occurrence.

Random Weird Guy.3528:

Lordrosicky.5813:

This is 100% correct. For example playing a necro vs mesmer/thief is really hard unless you also have a thief (on your team) who is dominating or at least causing serious problems for the other teams thief and mesmer..

You make it sound like having a thief on your own team is such a rare occurrence.

If you need to have a thief then it stops you having something else. Say you have 2 friends who are power ranger and fresh air ele. That is what they want to play. Well you can’t have a thief in addition to this because the comp wont work. You can only have so many classes who can’t point hold. Ideally you need 3 point holders at least, although I expect you can get away with 2. If you are a necro and you have to have a thief then you pretty much then are just hunting for tanky classes/builds. And not everyone wants to play that.

Thus is the actual REAL consequences of pushing the meta into such extremes. Having to have certain things in your comp really does limit the amount people can even party up to play the game. Result = dead game.

Being forced to have a class results in a dead game? How about every other mmorpg before GW2 that required a solid frontline, backline and support in order to function, regardless of the meta? You can’t use this argument against GW2.

Slim.3024:

Chaith.8256:

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

Thieves do have a great amount of gap closing abilities, but if we look at say a fresh air elementalist, they not only have the higher burst, which happens to be completely uncounterable, but they also have range and invulnerabilities.

???

4 Gap closers isn’t sufficient?

SobeSoul.6910:

Slim.3024:

Chaith.8256:

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

Thieves do have a great amount of gap closing abilities, but if we look at say a fresh air elementalist, they not only have the higher burst, which happens to be completely uncounterable, but they also have range and invulnerabilities.

???

4 Gap closers isn’t sufficient?

Is that what I wrote? Interesting analysis.

Mesmer, thief, fresh air, and dps guardian push other berserker builds out of the meta.

Mesmer and theif have stealth and mobility on their side, which make them stand out as better roamers. Fresh air is close to being at the same tier as those two roamers, but with Phoenix and dragons tooth being so unreliable at range combined with how squishy they are if the go close quarters without invuln combat, they are a slight grade down from top tier.

Dps guard is interesting, because it has an edge over Mesmer and Thief in 1v1 scenarios and can in 2v2 scenarios as well. The lack of free roaming mobility is what keeps dps guards a tier down, but if it had that it would be in its own top tier.

I think the reason for the current meta has little to do with thieves/mesmers. We have hybrid bunkers because a hybrid bunker will beat a full bunker in a fight, while still maintaining enough survivability to not be instagibbed by a burst class. A good thief/mes +1’ing a fight can still shut down a celestial engie/ele/war pretty quickly, though. Nerfing thief/mes would just cause teams to either run more hybrid bunkers, or to bring in other DPS builds like fresh air or power necro.

What thieves and mesmers do is push out all the other burst builds. Other burst builds, like fresh air ele and medi guard, start off strong when their (long) cooldowns are ready. However, once they pop their cooldowns, they have no way to disengage and will just be focused down. Thieves and mesmers are able to disengage and re-engage almost at will, which let’s them avoid this focus fire and do other productive stuff (such as back-capping or ranging) while waiting on cooldowns.

Slim.3024:

Chaith.8256:

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

Thieves do have a great amount of gap closing abilities, but if we look at say a fresh air elementalist, they not only have the higher burst, which happens to be completely uncounterable, but they also have range and invulnerabilities.

Without points in acrobatics, thieves would be sitting ducks against a fresh air elementalist (blinds are useless against fresh air) and that is probably why thieves have migrated towards totally unpredictable evasion.

Fresh air ele only has higher burst if you add in a phoenix (20s CD) + lightning flash (40s CD). Otherwise, a full air burst by itself (as in air attune + lightning bolt) does less damage than a backstab. In fact, the damage that comes from Arc lightning + fresh air lightning bolts is pretty much comparable to just getting autoattacked by a ranger.

In a team fight scenario, it is not difficult for a thief who knows what he’s doing to jump and nearly instagib a fresh air ele, you just have to time the burst right so it happens after the ele has left fire. (Remember, the ele has to keep locking himself out of attunements to proc fresh air). In a 1v1 scenario, fresh air ele probably has the upper hand, but that makes sense b/c he lacks the thief’s mobility + ability to stealth open + ability to disengage.

The sheer number of disengages thieves and mesmers have make the other glass builds less viable in teamplay, because the other glass builds are much easier to focus and pressure down.

idk about mesmer mobility. i have played plenty of mesmer and they are slow as kitten.

except for blink and portal which take up 2 utility slots with long CDs.

That is so not true. Bunker meta has been around since release. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the best way to win is bunker up a pt. Since kills get you so little pts compared to holding a pt. What changed is cele meta made the bunkers do as much damage as burst as well. So the old meta that required 1 or 2 dps changed to all bunker now.

ResJudicator.7916:

Fresh air ele only has higher burst if you add in a phoenix (20s CD) + lightning flash (40s CD). Otherwise, a full air burst by itself (as in air attune + lightning bolt) does less damage than a backstab.

Air burst + just one arcane deals more damage than backstab with zero counterplay and long range. In fact you can perform this combo (and add a second arcane) while being knocked down or stunned.

We are talking burst that surpasses stealstabs, has no positional requirement and can be performed at any time. If elementalists played fresh air today with 6/0/2/0/6 d/p thieves, they would destroy them.

What you say about being able to disengage better is obviously true. Mesmers and thieves have better tools for leaving a fight. DPS guardian and fresh air s/f elementalists do however have the tools for staying in the fight longer.

Slim.3024:

SobeSoul.6910:

Slim.3024:

Chaith.8256:

And yes, thief does keep non-Guardian berserkers out of the meta due to their relentless gap closing ability, hard countering builds with an over-reliance on good positioning to protect themselves.

Thieves do have a great amount of gap closing abilities, but if we look at say a fresh air elementalist, they not only have the higher burst, which happens to be completely uncounterable, but they also have range and invulnerabilities.

???

4 Gap closers isn’t sufficient?

Is that what I wrote? Interesting analysis.

Misread, thought that read “do not have a great amount of gap closers.”

Yes, the meta exists because of pseudo-power meta.

Thieves have basically infinite gap closers because of Shadowshot(cancel)
Which allows them to blind and stay in stealth while also teleporting the thief for backstabs. BUT SKILLCAP, bind shadowshot next to stow weapon, skillcap.

Thief has the best mobility in the game while also being able to 1v1 any zerker class in 14-30 seconds, a good chance at 1v1ing nonzerker classes and the ability to disengage from almost any fight.

So yes, why bother playing mesmer when you can play d/d ele with more mobility, group utility, 1v1, team fight potential.

TBH if thieves didn’t have consume plasma mesmer v thief would be much closer to 50/50 then to 75/25 winrate, and this could potentially put mesmer back into the meta.

BUT before that; Passive play needs to go.
Sigil of Fire
Sigil of Air
Sigil of Battle

And so do the ridiculous unintended skill behaviors.
Lightning whip cancel, Mesmer gs cancel, Shadow shot Cancel.

Darnis.4056:

Yes, the meta exists because of pseudo-power meta.

Thieves have basically infinite gap closers because of Shadowshot(cancel)
Which allows them to blind and stay in stealth while also teleporting the thief for backstabs. BUT SKILLCAP, bind shadowshot next to stow weapon, skillcap.

Thief has the best mobility in the game while also being able to 1v1 any zerker class in 14-30 seconds, a good chance at 1v1ing nonzerker classes and the ability to disengage from almost any fight.

So yes, why bother playing mesmer when you can play d/d ele with more mobility, group utility, 1v1, team fight potential.

TBH if thieves didn’t have consume plasma mesmer v thief would be much closer to 50/50 then to 75/25 winrate, and this could potentially put mesmer back into the meta.

BUT before that; Passive play needs to go.
Sigil of Fire
Sigil of Air
Sigil of Battle

And so do the ridiculous unintended skill behaviors.
Lightning whip cancel, Mesmer gs cancel, Shadow shot Cancel.

I don’t think the d/p build you are suggesting can 1v1 all zerker builds. They will kill a mesmer, ranger and a necro, but lose to elementalist, guardian if players are on the same skill level. Engineers and warriors are a toss up. Sword + dagger builds are a different kind of beast.

As far as cancelling shadow shot to backstab, that is definitely used and not that hard, but especially against mesmers it’s much less feasible, as your projectile is bound to hit an npc.

Slim.3024:

Air burst + just one arcane deals more damage than backstab with zero counterplay and long range. In fact you can perform this combo (and add a second arcane) while being knocked down or stunned.

We are talking burst that surpasses stealstabs, has no positional requirement and can be performed at any time. If elementalists played fresh air today with 6/0/2/0/6 d/p thieves, they would destroy them.

What you say about being able to disengage better is obviously true. Mesmers and thieves have better tools for leaving a fight. DPS guardian and fresh air s/f elementalists do however have the tools for staying in the fight longer.

You seem to think very highly of Fresh Air Eles, and perhaps it’s true they have a fighting chance in 1v1s against Berserker professions. However, bringing Arcane abilities doesn’t happen anymore in PvP if they are seen (Besides Arcane Shield). The benefit of their guaranteed Air burst is far outweighed by the fact that they get blatently outmanoeuvred by hit and run tactics, and have no choice but to rotate through big cooldowns.

With this in mind, in a conquest setting, the weakness to constant harassment and dependency on big cooldowns is the reason that Fresh Air is easily countered and turned into a liability.

Mogar.9216:

That is so not true. Bunker meta has been around since release. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the best way to win is bunker up a pt. Since kills get you so little pts compared to holding a pt. What changed is cele meta made the bunkers do as much damage as burst as well. So the old meta that required 1 or 2 dps changed to all bunker now.

Pretty much this.

Lewis’s editorial is well written but kind of lacks perspective. Metas are shaped by all sorts of confounding variables. Saying that people bunker because they’re scared of Thieves and Mesmers is only possibly true of very low end play. But really, it’s just that the community has had enough time to deduce that celestial bunker builds are extremely viable right now and are often optimal builds for bunkering (an established role existing since beta) whilst still dealing decent burst (air and flame sigil stacking) and noticeable condition damage.

Crit damage has already been nerfed. Any further nerf will actually perpetuate bunker dominance and Thief and Mesmer will still fill zerker roles because this is what is most viable for these classes.

Chaith.8256:

Slim.3024:

Air burst + just one arcane deals more damage than backstab with zero counterplay and long range. In fact you can perform this combo (and add a second arcane) while being knocked down or stunned.

We are talking burst that surpasses stealstabs, has no positional requirement and can be performed at any time. If elementalists played fresh air today with 6/0/2/0/6 d/p thieves, they would destroy them.

What you say about being able to disengage better is obviously true. Mesmers and thieves have better tools for leaving a fight. DPS guardian and fresh air s/f elementalists do however have the tools for staying in the fight longer.

You seem to think very highly of Fresh Air Eles, and perhaps it’s true they have a fighting chance in 1v1s against Berserker professions. However, bringing Arcane abilities doesn’t happen anymore in PvP if they are seen (Besides Arcane Shield). The benefit of their guaranteed Air burst is far outweighed by the fact that they get blatently outmanoeuvred by hit and run tactics, and have no choice but to rotate through big cooldowns.

Not sure what qualify as big cooldowns for fresh air. I also don’t see why given an invul and a 3-hit block that deals massive damage would not allow for at least one arcane ability with the last utility slot reserved for lightning flash.

Fresh air is a lot stronger now since the signet buff and the air/fire sigil changes than most people remember. Also the fact that most builds actually do not have high burst damage (mesmers are rare, s/d isn’t s bursty and neither is d/p panic strike builds) helps the build as well.

Slim.3024:

Chaith.8256:

Slim.3024:

Air burst + just one arcane deals more damage than backstab with zero counterplay and long range. In fact you can perform this combo (and add a second arcane) while being knocked down or stunned.

We are talking burst that surpasses stealstabs, has no positional requirement and can be performed at any time. If elementalists played fresh air today with 6/0/2/0/6 d/p thieves, they would destroy them.

What you say about being able to disengage better is obviously true. Mesmers and thieves have better tools for leaving a fight. DPS guardian and fresh air s/f elementalists do however have the tools for staying in the fight longer.

You seem to think very highly of Fresh Air Eles, and perhaps it’s true they have a fighting chance in 1v1s against Berserker professions. However, bringing Arcane abilities doesn’t happen anymore in PvP if they are seen (Besides Arcane Shield). The benefit of their guaranteed Air burst is far outweighed by the fact that they get blatently outmanoeuvred by hit and run tactics, and have no choice but to rotate through big cooldowns.

Not sure what qualify as big cooldowns for fresh air. I also don’t see why given an invul and a 3-hit block that deals massive damage would not allow for at least one arcane ability with the last utility slot reserved for lightning flash.

Fresh air is a lot stronger now since the signet buff and the air/fire sigil changes than most people remember. Also the fact that most builds actually do not have high burst damage (mesmers are rare, s/d isn’t s bursty and neither is d/p panic strike builds) helps the build as well.

I think Chaith is referring to the key defensive skills that FA runs. Arcane shield = 75s cooldown to block 3 attacks, expires after 5s (and Mesmer’s GS2 goes right through it). Obsidian flesh = 50s CD for 4s invuln. Those are your main defenses vs. thief and mes (since neither relies on projectiles for burst except mesmer w/ mirror blade, which is unblockable). Fresh air generally relies on popping those and then downing the other guy before invulns run out. All the thief/mes has to do is disengage for 5 seconds (port out, LOS, run beyond 900 range, etc.) then come back to burst, or wait until the ele has popped those skills vs. another player.

Fresh air ele also has more positional requirements than you seem to think. Even just cycling through the air burst requires that you maintain constant LOS (because you need to keep the arc lightning chain going through an attunement swap to proc a crit for fresh air). Ducking in and out of cover doesn’t work well. Ironically, this is the opposite of mes and thief, which benefit from and excel at LOS juking (more so thief).

Also, the air burst itself is not great sustained DPS. It’s ~850-900 tooltip dmg for each lightning discharge (~6 effective cooldown, since it takes time for the fresh air to proc), which is comparable to the autoattacks from most zerker classes. The point of the air burst is to supplement the scepter’s otherwise awful autoattack damage, which is why it’s about as dodgeable as a regular autoattack. To actually down someone as fresh air ele, you really need to combine a double air burst with a solid hit from phoenix, which is super easy to dodge outside of close range.

Mogar.9216:

That is so not true. Bunker meta has been around since release. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the best way to win is bunker up a pt. Since kills get you so little pts compared to holding a pt. What changed is cele meta made the bunkers do as much damage as burst as well. So the old meta that required 1 or 2 dps changed to all bunker now.

That’s not strictly true. During closed Beta, and Open Beta the majority of all players ran Berzerker builds. Bunker’s only began to creep in as people grew tired of being 1 shot and having an inability as a Berzerker to secure a point.

Slim.3024:

Not sure what qualify as big cooldowns for fresh air. I also don’t see why given an invul and a 3-hit block that deals massive damage would not allow for at least one arcane ability with the last utility slot reserved for lightning flash.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Obsidian_Flesh

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Arcane_Shield

If you observe latest builds that Zoose and Phanta use, they’re opting to incorporate Signet of Air over an offensive Arcane ability and that is quite a bit better than relying on a 75s stunbreak to stay alive.

Slim.3024:

s/d isn’t s bursty and neither is d/p panic strike builds helps the build as well.

S/D Thieves being not bursty does not do glass Ele any favors, trust me. S/D thieves are a nightmare for Fresh Air Eles if they do anything the entire match except watch out for the Thief.

He makes a few interesting points. If the current Celestial overlords are brought down in the future, this discussion will become more relevant.

Technically, I could agree.

Those two professions have always dominated “zerk” place because of their inherit “tricks” I’d say.

They’re quite possibly the only professions which don’t really get much goodie by switching zerk to other power amulet, but it really hurts the damage.

And since their defensives are based on evasion and general prevention of damage, defensive stats have much less value. In opposite, example, for Necromancer.

Is it a bad thing? Yea. But it’s been in this game for so long that I doubt we’ll see any shift in here. If you want to play other zerk build, you have to have tools to deal with thieves and mesmers. All.

As for the article – while the author starts by accusing both professions, only the Thief is being described in latter parts. Dunno…

Rym.1469:

Technically, I could agree.

Those two professions have always dominated “zerk” place because of their inherit “tricks” I’d say.

They’re quite possibly the only professions which don’t really get much goodie by switching zerk to other power amulet, but it really hurts the damage.

And since their defensives are based on evasion and general prevention of damage, defensive stats have much less value. In opposite, example, for Necromancer.

Is it a bad thing? Yea. But it’s been in this game for so long that I doubt we’ll see any shift in here. If you want to play other zerk build, you have to have tools to deal with thieves and mesmers. All.

As for the article – while the author starts by accusing both professions, only the Thief is being described in latter parts. Dunno…

This is getting close to the right question.

Rather than asking why these two are killing glass options ask why do they have to fill this role of glassy dps.

How many balanced or bunker options do these two classes have access to?

Thief and Mesmer are two prime examples of outliers in a game more centered on self encapsulated and sustained builds. Most of the other classes have a lot of passive sustain and aid while these two are purely active with no back end. They also lack balanced options which require a min max stance to gain effectiveness…

Mesmer and thief are the high burst roamers because they cannot take any other roles.

Is this unbalanced? In contemporary or historical terms no, having classes be specialized is a healthy thing. In the context of gw2 it’s terribly unbalanced as many other classes do not or cannot specialise and have the options to fill so many other roles or multiple roles at the same time.

if thieves were such an issues everyone would run medi guards

reason why people run celery crap atm is because is is braindead and effective at holding point, end of story

the guy who wrote that article is a troll. If mesmer or theif is nerfed… they will not be played in competitive pvp ever… mesmer is almost not played already.

Michael.9517:

the guy who wrote that article is a troll. If mesmer or theif is nerfed… they will not be played in competitive pvp ever… mesmer is almost not played already.

His nerfing of Thief/Mes proposal hinges on Celestial being over nerfed and everybody going back to soldiers amulet.

So basically it won’t ever happen.

Rym.1469:

And since their defensives are based on evasion and general prevention of damage, defensive stats have much less value. In opposite, example, for Necromancer.

Is it a bad thing? Yea. But it’s been in this game for so long that I doubt we’ll see any shift in here. If you want to play other zerk build, you have to have tools to deal with thieves and mesmers. All.

Sure? I don’t know, maybe I am still too noob but, as a zerk necro, thieves are the class that gives me less trouble (1 on 1), they just break against my retaliation, wells, and locust swarm, and i can even reach them when stealthed thanks to death shroud 4 and sigils of fire and lightning.

Good mesmers are another thing, though: the really experienced ones take too much time to kill and get help from their thieves.

The author has a clear idea of what he is talking about. Because:

“As an individual who plays both a Mesmer and a Thief, I’m well aware of each classes limitations”

“it’s the combination of readily available stealth and evasion”
Is he talking about the infamous 20066 d/p or the s/d thieves abusing CnD?

“when using Sword/Dagger. The latter build still relies heavily on Mug”
God thanks, i was thinking about the Air/Fire combi. Does he know that Mug cannot crit for ages?

“burst damage against anything other than a Celestial or Cleric is too high especially when both classes are playing together”

Yeah, because 2 full glass cannon zerker builds shouldn’t deal so much damage.

" the fact the Mesmer had no opportunity to ever target me (I stealthed after my first Backstab)"

Because 4 seconds of revealed are not enough to target a thief. It’s a fact. It’s physically impossible to hit a single button in a 4 second interval.

“I only used 5 skills and critically hit 4”

I hope he is not waiting for Mug to crit.

“Having almost 8 seconds of stealth on a Thief”

What 8 seconds? I have no idea of a skill combination that grants 8 second of stealth.

" If there’s ever going to be build variety outside of the extremes of pure damage or pure defence, there has to be some sort of balance pass across Critical Hit Chance, Critical Hit Damage, Evasion and Stealth. Without this, I suspect Guild Wars 2’s PvP will always be one of extremes."

Is he not talking about the cele Meta? Which extreme is this Meta?

And a lot more…..

apocom.3172:

“burst damage against anything other than a Celestial or Cleric is too high especially when both classes are playing together”

Yeah, because 2 full glass cannon zerker builds shouldn’t deal so much damage.

Yes, they shouldn’t deal so much damage. Because in fact they aren’t such ‘glass cannons’ due to sick mobility and stealth. If you watched Abjured vs DoD yday, then you probably noticed that the only thing Abjured has to do was not dying because Magic Taker (or however A thief is called) was just blinking between points and obliterating everything in seconds.

Existence of such super high dps/burst class with superior mobility and stealth just means there is no reason to ‘glass canon’ builds to be played by any other classes in competitive play, because thief will just obliterate them in seconds and thats the point of article.

Has it really taken 2 years to finally start to catch on onto these classes(thieves mostly really) and their completely near unavoidable damage that cant be blocked/blinded/revealed(by most)/seen/prevented from being spammed in a few secs?

My friends literally quit this game because both thieves and mesmers a few months after release; we all come from PvP backgrounds in WoW (2,3k -2.4k rating arenas), Rohan (outright imbalanced), 2moons, among other asian and american mmos…. so we are not, by far, inexperienced. I managed to make them play again a few months ago and once again it didnt take more than 3 months to make them quit for the very same reasons they first quit. They are now back into WoW, where they reached high rating in arena last season….once again….

High damage shouldnt be coupled with high mobility and escaping potential on top of being spammable, unpredictable and near unavoidable.

Perhaps it is time that Anet revises the balance seriously. My biggest proof that they dont really care about the PvP community is the grindboard; NOBODY can disagree with me in this one when I say that it was designed for casuals to feel good, for PvE grinders to grind their way to the top, like they are used to in any other content they do. Once season was over they went back to PvE to farm there, period. Meanwhile we PvP players are left with a slap at best.

Fortus.6175:

Has it really taken 2 years to finally start to catch on onto these classes and their completely near unavoidable damage that cant be blocked/blinded/revealed(by most)/seen/prevented from being spammed in a few secs?

My friends literally quit this game because both thieves and mesmers a few months after release; we all come from PvP backgrounds in WoW (2,3k -2.4k rating arenas), Rohan (outright imbalanced), 2moons, among other asian and american mmos…. so we are not, by far, inexperienced. I managed to make them play again a few months ago and once again it didnt take more than 3 months to make them quit for the very same reasons they first quit. They are now back into WoW, where they reached high rating in arena last season….once again….

High damage shouldnt be coupled with high mobility and escaping potential on top of being spammable, unpredictable and near unavoidable.

Perhaps it is time that Anet revises the balance seriously. My biggest proof that they dont really care about the PvP community is the grindboard; NOBODY can disagree with me in this one when I say that it was designed for casuals to feel good, for PvE grinders to grind their way to the top, like they are used to in any other content they do. Once season was over they went back to PvE to farm there, period. Meanwhile we PvP players are left with a slap at best.

wat? mes/thief dmg can’t be blocked, blinded, avoided etc. ? are we playing same game?

[GoM] Gate of Madness Server
Elementalist|Guardian|Mesmer

you can’t be serious…..

as far as your friends go, wow pvp is so imbalanced you could drool on keyboard and get gladiator if you played the “right” class… cough wars one shots, bugged hunter stampede, dks with frostmourne etc…. not to mention exploiting, ddos, hacks, glad sells etc.

Cele meta isn’t a thing because of the ability that Thief/Mes has to shift the meta and wooow how they d00Mm1n4te Zerk classes. Cele meta is a thing because it is easy to play lol, with easy access to sustain, some condition pressure, and class mechanics to mitigate damage to keep stacking Might like a god, etc, etc. So if it is clearly one of the easiest specs atm why don’t play it and win with less effort than playing something different?

Now, going back to the point of Mesmers and Thieves in pvp:

Thieves are the ones who shifted the Meta for about two years. People needed to build to survive against Thieves because of the amount of dodges / invis / mechanics for engage and disengage (invis can be one too). It was a pain in the kitten to be insta bursted by a Thief and not be able to do anything, or waste everything on a Thief who would just random dodge everything and disengage to come back and try to burst again. So people wanted to have fun, and wanted to play the game even if Thieves existed, so the easier way was to bunk everything and survive a little more from Thieves bursts.

Mesmer has never been something to considerate so seriously in PvP. The amount of time a Shatter mes need to set up their burst damage (which still have the chance to be avoided with one single dodge) plus the lack of passive damage (think of Phantasms like Condition damage that scalates with Time, but can be cleansed with cleave) and little ways to mitigate damage because of long defensive cooldown skills (Distortion 60s, Decoy 40s, Blink 30s, and Blured Frenzy that locks him on the spot to be a easy target), make Mesmer one of the hardest classes to be played effectively (go against good players that know how to click on the right target and don’t use Tab). Mes need a lot of effort do be able to do something, and have a 50/50 chance to be played really well or be the weak link on your team (100/0 if there is a Thief on the enemy Team). And I will not discuss about how Mes don’t have sustain and can’t stand on a fight too long because of the lack of Con removal (oooh, the pain of a simple 18~20 stacks of bleed) or the need of good positioning to not get rekt by bullkitten.

The thing is: Everybody is stopping playing Mes (Helseth, Supcutie, even Misha), because this class ins’t viable anymore (and it never really was besides or Portal Bot), so don’t put the class in this conversation saying it has something to do with the current or past Meta, because it was clearly never like that.

@inhearth: totally agree with you
yes thief is kitten…
broken evade spammability…stealth ( but it is even not the worst issue)
broken insta (read uncounterable without chance) gap closers
broken mobility…
broken damage in regards of their survivability

Mesmers are just as other squishies chained rapped by these ennemy they can even not run away.

What an epic failure anet seriously.

The funny thing is that thieves have never stopped complaining…
Being nerfed and nerfed again is not a reason to say thieves are underpowered…it can be a sign they were absurdly owerpowered.

Kicast.1459:

@inhearth: totally agree with you
yes thief is kitten…
broken evade spammability…stealth ( but it is even not the worst issue)
broken insta (read uncounterable without chance) gap closers
broken mobility…
broken damage in regards of their survivability

Mesmers are just as other squishies chained rapped by these ennemy they can even not run away.

What an epic failure anet seriously.

The funny thing is that thieves have never stopped complaining…
Being nerfed and nerfed again is not a reason to say thieves are underpowered…it can be a sign they were absurdly owerpowered.

and yet there is not a single person out there that wants more than 1 thief on team… but it is fine to have multple wars, guards, engis, eles, necros, rangers even mesmers on same team~