Guild Wars 2

I love me some mesmer…. And this thread was inspired by a topic in sPvP called worst minor traits 5/15/25. I would like to expand upon this thread but make it specifically for mesmers (all traits minor and major that need help). There will be a TL;DR at the end for just a list of traits that need work.

Hokay! Here we go
Domination Adept
Illusion of vulnerability- (This is going to go for all interrupts) 3 stacks of vuln is cool but when trying to build around interrupts its just a pain in the neck especially in PvP when you have classes with garbage animations such as necro, or they just aren’t really a threat such as ele’s in their current implementation. IMO all of our “interrupt” traits should just be turned into “disable” as in stun/knockdown/daze/ etc. Or make it for a specific one such as with dazzling when you daze a target you also gain X effect for each of the traits that currently rely on interrupts. In a game that is mindless AOE spam a blackout mesmer will only be a threat for a small space of time.

Empowered Illusions (III) this is one of those traits that everyone just kind of hates… It is a relic from when illusions did damage in the early stages of the game and once clones started doing zero damage it should have been removed. Now we have phantasm builds that stack this with insp. 25pt trait and are doing insane amounts of damage. I know mesmer isn’t in that great of a spot for PvP at the moment but this trait plus phantasmal strength makes a phantasm build a little too strong I suggest deleting this for one and either moving another trait down the line or just replacing it all together.

Domination Master
Confusing Enchantments (VIII)- since the glamour build has been gutted stomped upon and regutted I think that some glamour traits should just be combined such as combining this with Temporal enchanter or dazzling glamours….

Cleansing Conflagration (IX)-This just seems to be in a very very awkward spot…. It’s a condition weapon in a power line with a defensive trait attached to it…. To me it seems better off in Chaos considering that’s the same traitline as PU so the torch trait should go into either master or preferably the adept tree considering that the cooldowns are ridiculously high and usually for people to out right benefit from the stealth of the torch they go 30 deep into a line having nothing to do with the torch.

Domination Grandmaster
25-Wastrel’s Punishment this one just kind of bugs me. Do they mean stunned? Just afk? Also is the 5% damage really worth the 25 pts.

Harmonious Mantras (XI)- This trait just sticks out like a fat woman at a bikini contest. There are no other traits in this line dealing with mantras and to make a 30 point investment while picking up nothing else for what should be a build defining trait seems a little ridiculous… Even Fay the world’s biggest proponent of a mantra mes says this just seems out of place. I may suggest moving it down a tree or moving it to dueling and combining it with mantra mastery.

Confounding Suggestions XII- Seems cool…. Maybe should be taken more often…

Dueling

This line in general I have no issue with it seems to me that Anet wanted this to be a mantra line as it has the most mantra traits for our class…. However nobody ever goes into this line for the mantras….Something for ANET to consider… The only other issue is this trait.
Confusing Combatants-It has good synergy with deceptive evasion but seems a little steep for a 25pt trait. Maybe up the stacks of confusion or increase the duration… In anything but the “clone spammer” build this trait is just fluff and kinda useless.

Pt. II to come

Pt II
Chaos Adept
5pt- Gaining regen at 75% health is cool and compliments the boon duration secondary stat of this line quite well. No issue really but mesmers seem to have way to many ways to get only regen and not enough passive heal other wise (more on this later.)

Chaotic revival (I)- I can see how it’s useful in the “Bubble Build” however it is a trait that is focused on you going down which nobody should be thinking is going to happen a lot…. But since the chaos armor “change” (some say its a nerf some say its a buff) it may be worth taking to get 100% chaos armor uptime if that is your builds focus.

Retaliatory Demise (VI)- Once again when you go down mesmer is one of those people that all they have to do is wait a few seconds and then you can be restomped… It’s not a class you have to try and DPS down so taking this trait is just as good as leaving it empty. (maybe move cleansing conflagration here? )

Debilitating Dissipation (V)- The clones when killed will cause Weakness, Vulnerability, Or Bleeding…. The vulnerability is only good for a power based build and if you are taking this usually it is a condition build. Can we get the vulnerability replaced with something like poison? Our only access to poison other wise is random procs from chaos storm (negligible) or if we take sigil of doom which just no.

Chaos Master

Illusionary Membrane-15pt. Since the nerf it’s kind of just fluffer for the trait. I think it may have been nerfed just a tad too hard 5 seconds on a 15s cooldown is more reasonable or 5s on a 10s cooldown… Right now it’s worse than the ranger protection on dodge but they have no ICD on that.

Mirror Of Anguish (VII)- Very specific and has way to long of a cooldown to be too useful.

Cleansing Inscriptions (VII)-Should be combined with signet mastery or blurred inscriptions… Signet traits are way to all over the place for mesmers to make a decent signet build like other classes can benefit from.

For the two interrupt traits in this line like other interrupt traits I suggest ANET makes it a specific disable like daze (i think mesmers have the most dazes) Right now interrupts are a high risk low reward build and only good 1v1 not so much in team fights.

Chaos Grandmaster

PU XII-this trait is amaze balls however like harmonious mantras it is a build defining trait in a line with nothing else to do with stealth skills (desp decoy is fine as is) however i suggest cleansing conflagration be moved to chaos adept.

PT III next

Inspiration Adept I have the most issues with this line
Vengeful Images 5pt- Useless since the nerf needs undone ASAP.

Glamour Mastery (II) Combine it with temporal enchanter leave it as is in the trait tree.
Menders Purity (IV)- Up the amount of conditions removed and give mesmer basic heals condi removal.

Compounding Celerity (VI)- Switch it to 10% faster for the less illusions mesmer OOC speed is a huge QOL issue that has been driving us nuts from day 1.

Inspiration Master

Phantasmal Healing 15pt-Remove the boon regeneration (we can get that other ways) and just make it a passive heal over time. Mesmers are the only class that is lacking a non-boon passive heal.

Malicious Sorcery (VII)-Why is this even here? Seriously I can go 20 into illusions and get better condi damage from iElasticity with the staff not to mention this really only effects one skill (Confusing images) and doesn’t even touch illusionary counter.

Inspiration Grandmaster
Phantasmal Strength will be fine when empowered illusions is dealt with (may even need a buff)

Restorative Illusions- Up the healing coefficient or remove the trait all together it is in dumb spot considering you have to go 30pts to get a trait dealing with shatters in a tree that has jack diddly to do with shatters.

Shattered Conditions-Rework the trait so that active illusions draw conditions from you every 10s. (Mesmers are hurting the most in this AOE condi spam fast)

Illusions
The biggest thing for illusions is changing ICelerity to a lower tree or to do something about mesmer base cooldowns. All of them were increased in oct/nov time frame of last year and now that Icelerity was nerfed it has not been adjusted since hurting non shatter builds the most.
Dazzling Glamours- Combine with confusing enchantments and move it to Insp Master.
Blinding Befuddlement- This nerf needs undone and an ICD added to dazzling glamours. It hurt not glamour confusion mesmers the most.
Shattered Strength-Up it to 2 stacks of might and change it back up to GM.

Illusionary Elasticity-Should this affect our illusions bouncing attacks (staff clones, iMage, iDisenchanter) if so fix the bug please.

iCelerity-This trait doesn’t work on two skills particularly well… Illusionary Riposte/Counter. They summon illusions therefore the CD should be reduced by 20% if the block procs. The respective weapons should receive the trait reducing the CD anyways. (they dont currently)

TL;DR These are the mesmer traits I feel are lacking and need help over all:
Illusion of vulnerability (all interrupt traits)
Empowered Illusions
Confusing enchantments
Cleansing Conflagration
Harmonious Mantras
Confusing Combatants
Mantra Mastery
Illusionary Membrane
Mirror Of Anguish
Cleansing Inscriptions
All interrupt traits changed to Just disables.
Vengeful Images
Medics Feedback/Glamour Mastery
Mender’s Purity
Compounding Celerity.
Phantasmal Healing
Malicious Sorcery (seriously WTF is this doing in inspiration)
Restorative Mantras
All of Insp grandmaster.
Illusionists Celerity
Illusionary Elasticity
Blinding Befuddlement
Dazzling Glamours

If I bored you with that list mah bad. But this is a trait specific post not really trying to focus on specific illusion types (weapon/utility) or weapons in general. If anyone has input agreements disagreements please do share! This is not an unbiased list and some suggestions may be a bit much I did try to stay objective and I know it is impossible to be fully objective.

Bump, because, good post imo.

Maybe a red will see it. :/

Bump I would like a dev to actually say something about the sad sad state of the mesmer in PvP and WvW due to the lack of AOE. And absolutely horrendous condi removal.