Guild Wars 2

How do you win as Fresh Air build from thieves and mesmers?
If they are counters (which they seem to be), how do you do as well as you can?

Especially fighting thieves as this build makes me feel like pulling my hair out :P.

Almost all my abilities require a target, so I cant AoE anything when they stealth.
I dont seem to have enough cooldowns/tanky survival, to get through their resets.

Any tips are welcome.

I enjoy the playstyle of Fresh air, so I would like to improve.
The upcoming change to Dragon’s tooth I welcome.
Ground target makes it better in most cases.

Yashuoa.9527:

How do you win as Fresh Air build from thieves and mesmers?
If they are counters (which they seem to be), how do you do as well as you can?

Especially fighting thieves as this build makes me feel like pulling my hair out :P.

Almost all my abilities require a target, so I cant AoE anything when they stealth.
I dont seem to have enough cooldowns/tanky survival, to get through their resets.

Any tips are welcome.

I enjoy the playstyle of Fresh air, so I would like to improve.
The upcoming change to Dragon’s tooth I welcome.
Ground target makes it better in most cases.

What can I say bro?…..your only chance against mesmer/thieves is to play d/d because the skills don’t require target and you can cleave through the kittening stealth abuse.

You will never kill a decent mesmer/thief with scepter ele even if buffed…..

Now beware of those “pro” players who will come here telling stories about their unmatched killing spree on fresh air, they never show a single video…just fantastic stories

If you want ranged burst….forget ele and play something else

D/D thief doesn’t stand a chance against s/f fresh air ele.
non condi engineers don’t stand a chance against s/f fresh air ele.
You simply cannot win against something that completely counters you.

I understand that they counter S/F ele, but I would still like to do as well as possible.
So some tips are still welcome in 1 on 1 and group play if the latter is possible.

In groups, do you roughly just try avoid thiefs/mesmers and let someone else take care of them, while you attack something else?

Well, with mesmers having PU essentially reverted back to pre spec levels I doubt they will be a problem anymore outside of the PU condi build but you have better things to do than waste time on that.

So really you’re probably going to only suffer to thieves but asking them for advise would be pointless, bunch of whiney….yeah just try and get the drop on them. If they stealth up coming towards you I dunno use try to reduce the first hit with protection and be ready to cleanse the weakness. Then burst kitten them.

Don’t expect a fun time and expect to die a lot but on the bright side there’s a lot of bad thieves out there relying on stealth to cheese them through stuff for the reasons you said.

EDIT: Nevermind, my mistake!

target is lost when it enters stealth.

the way to kill a thief is catching him off guard. locking a thief down is impossible and stealth is generally bad for scepter.

the best way to kill a mesmer is.. well.. dodge mirror blade and mind wrack. dont let him outrange you and blind crucial skills like mirror blade, illusionary berserker or shatters.

in terms of winrations i would say..

40:60 in thief’s favour
30:70 in mesmer’s favour

matchups in general for fresh air are not on the winning end atm..

Jekkt.6045:

target is lost when it enters stealth.

Yes, but the mark remains, which means you can re-target them by pressing T (by default) when they come out of stealth. Marking them can help you re-acquire target lock more easily when they become visible again, especially for Mesmers.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Jekkt.6045:

target is lost when it enters stealth.

Yes, but the mark remains, which means you can re-target them by pressing T (by default) when they come out of stealth. Marking them can help you re-acquire target lock more easily when they become visible again, especially for Mesmers.

Stealth purges target markers…

Two main advices would be to

1 – Teach yourself how to best use the time your opponent is in stealth. This can include things like getting on unpathable terrain so they can’t blink/steal open on you, stacking might+deterring melee with dragon’s tooth, healing up, getting protection and rock barrier up, spamming signet of restoration procs for heal/s,….

You’ll still get screwed by stealth spam, but try to minimize it as best you can.

2 – Burst hard. Zerk vs zerk is burst wars. You have oneshot potential on both in WvW, and can chunk hard in PvP.

Video reference cause

Now beware of those “pro” players who will come here telling stories about their unmatched killing spree on fresh air, they never show a single video…just fantastic stories

SchmendrickTheMagician.8247:

Blaine Tog.8304:

Jekkt.6045:

target is lost when it enters stealth.

Yes, but the mark remains, which means you can re-target them by pressing T (by default) when they come out of stealth. Marking them can help you re-acquire target lock more easily when they become visible again, especially for Mesmers.

Stealth purges target markers…

So it does! I was mistaken. I thought it did but I just tested it in WvW.

what gokil said.

i would advice 2 more following things vs thiefs. blind them before their engage on air and only switch air if they re visible and u ve targeted them as air switch burst is one of ur main dmg sources.

My advice is to run s/f with earth, air, and arcane. Earth traits give you better survivability over time and the ability to actually use the signet heal, which gives you way more damage mitigation from low cooldown earth focus skills than say water traits or blinding ashes can do for you.

Pre-patch Mesmer and fresh air ele 1v1 was about 50/50, but Mesmer got a lot better in comparison and still has better team utility. The matchup will probably be closer to 50/50 again, but Mesmer with sword/torch (or shield soon) will have better damage mitigation options than fresh air ele, so I feel that Mesmer will be an all around better pick for a zerker build still. The PU nerf won’t impact them that much, especially since good mesmers didn’t really even need it.

On a side note: Hunting thieves and mesmers is actually that one thing that Tempest is currently good against, as Overload Air hits though stealth (you see no damage indicator but your target will be hit despite being stealthed). The radius of overload air is quite okayish, so if you are good at the guessing game this can really put the fight in your favor. With fresh air you can also bypass the very long attument recharge times. I seriously dont know if that is going to change when HoT is going live, but that was the state in the last BWE.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJArdhcMokhtMwnB0RMIBYzHYCQujBgKY9EaCJBA-TJBFwACOBAv2foaZAAPAAA

Earth Trait is up to you on the end, depending on whats harder. Easy way is they will drop you to the point infiltrate gives stealth. From there do the little knockdown rapid nuke combo (if you play FA S/F you know it by heart like I do). Congrats, you just murdered Thief/Mesmer.

Thieves mitigate their low hitpoints (Medium Armor) with stealth and evade. One is core to the class and the other is spread generously spread throughout the class lines and utilities.

Mesmer’s mitigate their low armor (Medium Hitpoints) with stealth, teleports, blocks, distortion, ect. One is core to the class and the others are generously spread throughout the class lines and utilities.

Elementalists mitigate their low armor and low hitpoints with Dagger/Dagger, Celestrial Armor, Cantrips, and the Water/Arcane lines. You get an option for the third line.

Oh, and IceBow nerf

#MicDrop

Now to go gloat on twitter

Columbo.5924:

On a side note: Hunting thieves and mesmers is actually that one thing that Tempest is currently good against, as Overload Air hits though stealth (you see no damage indicator but your target will be hit despite being stealthed). The radius of overload air is quite okayish, so if you are good at the guessing game this can really put the fight in your favor. With fresh air you can also bypass the very long attument recharge times. I seriously dont know if that is going to change when HoT is going live, but that was the state in the last BWE.

You mean like any other cleaving move in the game? You can do that now with Air Autos on Dagger.

Serious Thought.5394:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJArdhcMokhtMwnB0RMIBYzHYCQujBgKY9EaCJBA-TJBFwACOBAv2foaZAAPAAA

Earth Trait is up to you on the end, depending on whats harder. Easy way is they will drop you to the point infiltrate gives stealth. From there do the little knockdown rapid nuke combo (if you play FA S/F you know it by heart like I do). Congrats, you just murdered Thief/Mesmer.

You really need to do some math on this … 20% of 11k hitpoint with 1000 toughness and no condi clears … you will die in stealth if you ever make it to stealth in the first place. 2,200 damage is not outside any DPS classes ability to take from you in a single shot at that low a toughness.

So S/F fresh air is only good in WvW zerk mode?

Supreme.3164:

If you want ranged burst….forget ele and play something else

Who would be called good ranged pewpew classes?

Ranger.
Necro.
Mesmer.

?

I’ve not had issues with thieves and mesmers since I started using this build about a month ago. I use vamp runes/air sigil with the arcane shield trait now since air sigil got buffed.

http://intothemists.com/calc/?build=-o3d;2B2-Y0-5sMkY0;9;413G;0057147146;4Ow0;3H7W3H7W3a0S

Use this build and practice your heart out! You’ll get there.

I think Revenants and Heralds will be more scary for you come HoT.
Easy Boon Strips(along with Confusion), multiple ways to apply Chill, can apply Resistance to ignore our conditions(like Immobilize and Burning/Bleeds), has multiple long Evades/Blocks, good Stab uptime if traited properly, and ridiculous gap closers(on Shiro) that I think any Ele will have trouble running from. Not to mention how it can support its own team with +50% Boon Duration and a multitude of Boons for little effort.

I think a Mallyx/Shiro or Mallyx/Glint build could be troublesome to fight as an Ele. Then again, condition builds aren’t exactly great in higher ranked games, but regardless, this could change or they could use a Hybrid damage build and I expect them to be a threat to consider even if Shiro/Glint ends up being more popular.

S/f counters thief easily. Land your burst after thief evade frames. Lock target by channeling air AA through stealth.

You’ll never defeat a well played mesmer though.

Haha I’m playing Fire/Water/Arcane S/D Ele and I can beat Thieves when I play right. I’ve also fought several Fresh Air S/F eles who have destroyed me on my Thief when they played right and I’m known amongst my peers in game to be a pretty good Thief so yeah. Just gotta know when to burst and when to defend. It is tricky because of the Stealth abuse but you got ground target Dragonstooth now, Phoenix, invulns, and some really good cc’s(which are devastating to a thief).

To say the truth I was suffering from the same symptoms that you mentioned stealth abusers wrecked me in F/A then I start using Phanta’s build.

That reduced CD on focus invulnerability and SoR still proccing after using the active heal with Written in Stone is lifesaver. You will be still alive when they will be out of their stealths then it is time to turn the the table.

When their stealth is up your heal and inv will be also up.

To my surprise I won many 1v1 against Thiefs after using this build.

I know that earth beats thiefs. I play nerarly only S/F and after trying elements it settled to fire/earth/arcane. I die to condi mesmers, but zerker builds tend to bite the dust. Thiefs and mesmers included. Fastest thief was about 5s. Died 1 second after restealthing on my cleansing flame when recognizing OooPS …

So S/F fresh air is only good in WvW zerk mode?
Not in conquest?

No. S/f is good in both conquest and wvw. But it’s not as good as d/d.

out of all available dps builds in pvp s/f fresh air ele is by far the weakest of all. in its current form it simply lacks damage. this patch was supposed to change this, the attempt failed surprisingly.

It does not lack damage, it is only extreme difficult to land the damage.

DT + Phoenix + Lightning Strike + Electric discharge + Air Sigil proc can hit for 15K inside of 2s but how many time you can reliably land those.

And when you do that 15K burst you have to run around 15s doing crap damage, while it has no sustain.

So it is better to find a wounded target and kill him instead of trying to kill somebody at full health.