Guild Wars 2

Everyone’s favorite poll is back! The question is simple, what kind of Mesmer do you run? What are your traits geared towards? Boosting Phantasms? Enhancing Shatters? Dropping an abundance of support? This question is geared more towards traits than utilities since even a full DPS build can still support via Mantras, Glamours, ect. And of course.. Why?
Last time we did this poll, people had a lot of interesting results/responses. Though Shatter was more popular at the time, people played Phantasm more often. A lot of interesting information and styles were shared in the comments so I hope it happens again. Also, I thought it’d be cool to see how our tastes have changed over the last 10 months.

Note: DPS stands for Damage-Per-Second, essentially builds that trait to emphasise damage above all else.

PVE – OPEN WORLD
DPS (Shatter)- 4
DPS (Phantasm)- 11
Support – 1
Lockdown- 1
Condition-
Mantra- 1
Signets- 1
Power/Condition Hybrid- 2
Mixed Styles- 5

PVE- DUNGEONS
DPS (Shatter)-
DPS (Phantasm)- 12
Support – 1
Lockdown-
Condition-
Mantra- 1
Signets-
Power/Condition Hybrid-
Mixed Styles- 3

PVP
Shatter- 5
Phantasm- 3
Support –
Lockdown- 4
Condition- 4
Mantra-
Signets-
Power/Condition Hybrid- 1
Mixed Styles- 2

WvW
Shatter- 6
Phantasm- 5
Support – 2
Lockdown-
Condition- 6
Mantra-
Signets- 1
Power/Condition Hybrid- 4
Mixed Styles- 5

In my case, I like difficult playstyles. I come from a background of fighting games and I’ve always been geared towards the more technical playstyles that no one else liked to use (/coughYoshimitsu /coughDhalsim). Something about the feeling of being exclusive and doing something different from others always drew me, and that carried over into GW with the support and lockdown builds I play. For me, I’m almost always dipping into Inspiration or Chaos for traits; a firm believer in 20/20 Chaos&Inspiration for some of the best support possible. (But, when asked, I play whatever style my group requests. I’ll play a Dungeon-Meta Mesmer if so desired.. but I hate it -_- )

All pve play phantasm dps love seeing those high numbers and condition in pvp and wvw

Open world: Shatter, it’s simply the best.
Dungeons: I have not been in a dungeon for a long time. If I would, phantasm.
PvP: I do not care.
Wv3: Whatever trait setup I just use, so mostly shatter.

PvE/Dungeons/Fractals/WvW(usually) – Phantasm DPS; usually 10/30/0/30/0 with weapon, gear and trait choices changing depending on what I’m doing. I have a set of Berserker/Ruby Orb armor for dungeons and fractals, and a Knight/Traveler’s for open world and WvW (run speed <3).

tPvP – mostly Solo Queue, I like to experiment; some phantasm DPS, some Interrupt/Lockdown-ish 10/30/30, and most recently been playing Sensotix’ Stealth Shatter variant.

The only thing I haven’t played with much yet is condition builds, but that’s next on the list.

Although I usually play shatter, now I play power/condi hybrid. Trying to get my celestial armor to work… I put so much money on it T_T

OPEN WORLD: Hybrid
WvW: Hybrid

Dungeons: Phantasm. (0/20/0/25/25)
Open World PvE/WvW: Interrupt, Hybrid Power/Condition (10/20/30/0/0 or 0/20/30/0/20)
PvP: Haven’t really bothered, at this time.

pve/wvw: Power/Condition Hybrid (20/20/30 with clone spam and torch)
pvp: Condition (10/30/30 condi clone spam)

Open world/PvE: Quicker phantasms/shatter burst build. Sometimes interrupt!
Wvw/pvp: Very rarely play WvW but if so either power or condition PU. I don’t play s/tpvp at all.

I wish I could say Sword/Torch + Greatsword power/condi interrupt hybrid for everything but well, I never quite found a configuration to satisfy my personal demands on the setup there. If I find the right traits, the torch or greatsword skills fail me instead. iMage in a power build … aka, ‘it actually was possible for this skill to get worse’. Maybe i’ll succeed someday.

Gamemode: All
Style: Mixed – Mantra Phantasm builds Zerker or Support.

Pvp: condi/ support (mixed style)
Wvw: on the odd chance ( rarer than a solar ecilipse) im in wvw, shatter. :p

Pve: Full zerk shatter build!

wvw: hybrid bleed phantasm build

pvp: lock down

pve: phantasm

I always run a same set of traits (10/25/10/0/25) because I can’t be bothered retraiting but:
for PvE: i wear almost full zerker gear , makes the build a shatter/phantasm hybrid.
for WvW: i wear rabid/dire gear —> the classic condition clone spammer build xD

PvE – OW.

• mixed style

PvE – D.

• mixed style

PvP

• condition

WvW

• mixed style

PS: There is also “the Mantra Mesmer” ya know?

Open world PvE: Phantasm
Dungeon PvE: Phantasm
PvP: Phantasm/Condition/Bunker (either or, not all together)
WvW: Phantasm/Condition

WvW

Well that’s gonna be mixed a lot since (i guess?) most people run 2 types of builds: raid and raoming.

Anyway: Wvw → Mixed ( Hybrid phantasm + Confusion Shatter)

PvE: Phantasm and Glamour
PvP: Interrupt and Glamour

I guess that’s “mixed”…

glamour = support

WvW : Condition mesmer since release

In WvW: Hybrid Mesmer

Haven’t yet updated, will do later today, but added Mantras and Signets to the categories. My bad!

WvW: Mixed Styles

Mix of Shatter, Phantasm, Interrupt and weapon skills with Hitter role.
Shatter for F3 interrupt or F4 to secure a stomp, F1 for sure kill.
Phantasm for main damage dealer
Interrupt to add more damage or prevent enemy Revival
Weapon skills coz i like beam. Pew pew pew!!

All in 1.

I use the same build in PvE as I do in WvW → DPS Phantasm build that will knock your socks off. 66590K wvw kills.

wvw
mixed Phantasm/shatter
gs/staff

Wow, I’m impressed at how many people embrace the shatter/phantasm hybrid. I know the mixed focus is supposedly suboptimal, but it does feel good to play.

A year later, I’m still in a messy mixed state with my builds. I find I favor a lot of support-on-shatter traits, so I should probably explore that. I’m a "mess"mer. Let’s call that “Open World: Mixed” for now.

spvp

shatter mesmer

once in a while phantasm.

PVE – Open World : Signets
PVE – Dungeon : Phantasm or Support – Glamour
PVP : Condition (Yay condition meta… not) or Signets. Mostly mixed styles in PvP, imo.
WvW : Signets (roam) or Support – Glamour (zerg)

Yeah… I like invulnerability too much… Mainly Signets everywhere except PvE Dungeons.

Pve -open world: whatever I’m using at the time, probably phantasm.
Pve – dungeon: phantasm
Pvp -hotjoin: shatter, lockdown, condition.
Pvp – tourney: shatter, but I want to try others too :o.
Wvw – roaming: ahatter
Wvw – zerg: arrow cart shooter, PEW PEW! support, or just shatter if i happen to run by while roaming.

WvW Condtion/Bunker

PVE & WvW – phantasm

Maybe someday for this poll, we could have people give percentages of their damage from different sources. My build is focused on phantasm damage, but the duelist is typically putting 2000 points of damage in bleeds on for every 6000 points of direct damage.

WvW shatter (staff roaming, GS zerg).

PVE- Dungeon: I like most a mixed build of phantasms and support. iDuelist, iSwordman or iWarden give the amount of DPS I need. But I also like to give support through reflects and boon/condition control. I love the combination of Chaos Storm-Bountiful Interruption-Signet of Inspiration when there are trash mobs to kill.

PVE-Open World: I run the same build, but I change my play style, shattering more cause I can have more AoE damage. Also phantasms tend to die very fast in big events.

WvW Zerg: Here I go full support. Sword/Focus Staff with Veil and Null Field. Since I’m in EU Gold League, there is no place for phantasm/condition builds while in zerg.

WvW Roaming: I run an hybrid shatter/phantasm build. Scepter/Pistol-Sword/Sword with Blink, Arcane Thievery and Decoy. Very good condition removal and lots of active defense.

PvP: I rarely play PvP, and when I do is to theorycraft in HotJoin. I normally use the base 10/30/0/0/30 shatter build with modifications.

Always condition. I think getting more than one set of gear is ridiculously grindy. At least if you want to play more than one class.

PvE, both – Mantrasm (30/30/0/0/10)
PvP, Phantasm
PvE, Shatter

UPDATED: 11/1/13 (WvW going to be changed)

You guys have a good point, gonna divide WvW into WvW (Roaming) and WvW (Zerg).

A thing of note, please try not to give multiple answers to a single question, as it makes it much harder to count. If you do, at least specify what you use most often.

WvW Roaming – Condition
WvW Zerg – Glamour/Confusion

PvP: Phantasm.
PvE: Shatter (but stopped doing so a lot ago).
WvW: Phantasm

All dps

PvP: power/condi hybrid
PvE: Phantasm
WvW: Shatter

Chaos Archangel.5071:

UPDATED: 11/1/13 (WvW going to be changed)

You guys have a good point, gonna divide WvW into WvW (Roaming) and WvW (Zerg).

A thing of note, please try not to give multiple answers to a single question, as it makes it much harder to count. If you do, at least specify what you use most often.

how about if we divide WvW as this,

• Solo, (looking for duels in wvw environment, going solo)
• Roaming (Small scaled)
• Zerging (Large scaled)(include Pugs, Blobs)
• Raids (For Guilds)(large scaled)(have Restrictions)
• GvG (Large scaled), (Guild vs Guild), (Deathmatch mode), (include some offical rules for both guilds)(Balanced Match)

so it all needs differ spec, roles, styles? as being competitive or for fun..

PvE – Open World: Phantasm deeps
PvE – Dungeons: Phantasm deeps

(s/s + s/f + s/p depending on situations, using ranged only if necessary)

Entire game – RIP
Anet finally broke me with the constant nerfs. Let me know if they ever decide that confusion should be more than a joke, that precursors need a definitive way of being earned, that limited-time skins shouldn’t be tied to ridiculously low RNG chests or that the living story actually involves elder dragons. Or Cantha. I would put up with a lot of foolishness to see an updated version of Cantha.

UPDATED: 11/7/13 Haven’t gotten to dividing WvW just yet as it’s a bit more recounting than I have time to do at this moment.

@Azo: Not a bad idea, but too much for this particular poll, however another thread about the subject may be interesting…

@Crossplay: I sincerely hope ya come back to the game eventually man.

I play:

• PvE – Open World:
  DPS Phantasm
• PvE – Dungeons:
  DPS Phantasm
• PvP – Shatter
• WvW – Roaming
  Shatter

Bumping for weekend update

PvE & WvW – No idea what it’s called lol 30/30/10/0/0 GS + Sword/Pistol DPS build

I have no idea what category it would fall under (probably hybrid or condition?), but I play a condition-on-clone-death + sharpened images build with full Rampager gear and a secondary focus on Phantasms. Love dodging around spewing clones everywhere and the satisfying explosion effect and sounds that accompany those traits (seriously, with certain utilities and weapon swaps I can make it sound like a freaking action movie, and its glorious), and phantasms synergize well since more phantasms means less clones, and that means clones get overwritten and blow up faster and more frequently.

For PvE only, though. I don’t do WvW or PvP, and have yet to really delve into dungeons even though I keep meaning to.

PvP + WvW: Lockdown
PVE: refuse to do it. :-)

Open pve: pu/condi blackwater
Dungeons: phantasm
Wvw: pu/condi blackwater

Marsares.2053:

PvP + WvW: Lockdown (e.g. Mindcrush build)
PVE: refuse to do it. :-)

OpenWorld: Events- Mantra/Support (10/10/20/30) Farming-Shatter (20/20/0/0/30)
Dungeons: Mantra
sPvP: N/A
WvW: Varies, working on one I like