Guild Wars 2

keenlam.4753:

Jester.1236:

Prismatic Understanding was buffed.

Sorry for my noobness but how PU was buffed. How is it different now?
I’m using it and can’t understand which it means in the patch notes. Thanks

I have a build centered around PU (in the signature) before this patch it required a very heavy investment to get it to be worth its slot. But I could do it.
Pre patch it pulsed once every 2-3 seconds. so that meant that half the time you were in stealth… that is all you were doing… NOW. It procs every second… So with the right runesets (monk/earth/water (or grove) you can get 45 seconds of protection up time… Without investment anywhere but that trait. This buff is godly. Check the build

decease.3215:

only shatter viable = reroll to different class. there will be more shatter mesmer, but overall less mesmer. hope you enjoy it..

You know I’m confident I’ll be able to hold my ground as a phantasm mesmer in PvP despite these nerfs and in PvE your efficiency really doesn’t matter cause you’ll only be there to provide boons to the zerker warriors.

keenlam.4753:

Jester.1236:

Prismatic Understanding was buffed.

Sorry for my noobness but how PU was buffed. How is it different now?
I’m using it and can’t understand which it means in the patch notes. Thanks

Instead of just getting a boon upon stealth, you get a boon every second while stealthed, that is how I’ve read it atleast, not that I use the trait myself tho.

Lue.6538:

decease.3215:

only shatter viable = reroll to different class. there will be more shatter mesmer, but overall less mesmer. hope you enjoy it..

You know I’m confident I’ll be able to hold my ground as a phantasm mesmer in PvP despite these nerfs and in PvE your efficiency really doesn’t matter cause you’ll only be there to provide boons to the zerker warriors.

keenlam.4753:

Jester.1236:

Prismatic Understanding was buffed.

Sorry for my noobness but how PU was buffed. How is it different now?
I’m using it and can’t understand which it means in the patch notes. Thanks

Instead of just getting a boon upon stealth, you get a boon every second while stealthed, that is how I’ve read it atleast, not that I use the trait myself tho.

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

imo build diversity suffer from lack of synergy between traits and their placement.
(pvp)
for example 3sec frenzy on interrupt is quite nice with sword/pistol setup. If you use pistol5 early in damage rotation you can get a nice boost. but because of the nerf of quickness it is not enough to justify grandmaster placement :\
if combined with 5might on interrupt it could boost your burst even more…. but then you are no longer a shatter mesmer so burst is meh.
another thing: 5might/interrupt is chaos master trait… more a defence trait line… but it gives 5might?! total fail imo. it should give protection 5 sec or whatever to further enhance your defence with 20/30 points into chaos.
or make another interrupt trait in chaos (defence one) and merge 5might and 3sec quickness in duelling grandmaster. whatever all the interrupt traits just seem a little off…

and scepter oh dear the scepter. now it cannot be used as a power weapon anymore. so give it a freaking damage condition on autoattack, otherwise it will always be total fail. (you know how much damage youre doing versus a target that evades the block and mitigates confusing images? zero)

really want to play something different than shatter mesmer but it just is not worth it.

IC replacement just nails the coffin

I completely agree with the OP.

May be someone from ANET should explain us how this patch will improve build diversity…

Lue.6538:

decease.3215:

only shatter viable = reroll to different class. there will be more shatter mesmer, but overall less mesmer. hope you enjoy it..

You know I’m confident I’ll be able to hold my ground as a phantasm mesmer in PvP despite these nerfs and in PvE your efficiency really doesn’t matter cause you’ll only be there to provide boons to the zerker warriors.

keenlam.4753:

Jester.1236:

Prismatic Understanding was buffed.

Sorry for my noobness but how PU was buffed. How is it different now?
I’m using it and can’t understand which it means in the patch notes. Thanks

Instead of just getting a boon upon stealth, you get a boon every second while stealthed, that is how I’ve read it atleast, not that I use the trait myself tho.

PU used to be boon every 2 seconds. It is now buffered to every 1 second that all. While a torch build with pristmatic understanding is a fun troll build for both pve and wvw the dps output is kitten as compared to phantasm or shatter build.

jportell.2197:

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

Inbefore:

-Fixed a bug where Prismatic Understanding was giving out unintended boons. Now it apply 5 stack of vulnerability (30 sec duration) per second.

I main a mesmer but have been spending most time in PvE. I am in the minority of mesmers not using Illusionist Celerity (I trait 20/20/30/0/0) but i do feel the pain of all fellow mesmers here with this trait nerf.

Regarding to the Blurred Frenzy nerf, I am heavily affected, the increase in CD pretty much negates the Blade Training trait I’m using

I’m trying to get into WvW but seeing this patch, we mesmers are now less effective in WvW. Not sure if this is Anet’s intention (too many mesmers in WvW before the patch?)
One thing we really need in WvW is a reliable out-of-combat speed boost since when I play mesmer and roam around, most of the times, I can’t respond timely enough when situations arise (too slow to run to a certain place in time when someone shouts on map chat). That means i either have to roam with a group or run with the zerg to leech from their speed buffs. I think the buff in Compouning Celerity is unnecessary since in-combat we can move around quite elegantly as if we’re all over the place, at the same time. We should have got an ooc speed boost instead.

I might try out the condition build with Torment, but to be honest, the scepter (which i forsaken long time ago) still doesn’t look appealing to me enough.

AndrewSX.3794:

jportell.2197:

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

Inbefore:

-Fixed a bug where Prismatic Understanding was giving out unintended boons. Now it apply 5 stack of vulnerability (30 sec duration) per second.

Wait PU gives vulnerability on targets around Mesmer? I did not see that

Kudos to a concise summary of how bad this patch is for Mesmers and build diversity. The nerf to vengeful images was a complete surprise to me and definitely hit my phantasm build hard. It still bothers me that if you want to keep phantasms spawning you have to invest so heavily in a trait line that primarily benefits shatter builds. Now I have to invest in more useless traits while the core traits of my build are nerfed. Why are you forcing me to play shatter builds Anet?

Literally baffled by the attitude of a few masochist mesmers who seem to think they have some loyalty to the class regardless of what happens.

I swear if there was a nerf that all skill cooldowns were now 10 minutes and each time you shatter you get a physical punch in the face someone would post about how great it is that this will get rid of all the fairweather mesmers and now Only True Mesmers will be left.

Seriously this is an awful set of changes. From Into the Void, to IC, to Blurred Frenzy there is a set of utterly unwarranted changes that force us into one style of play and a limited couple of weapon sets.

For a patch that allegedly promoted build diversity this is worse than a fail, it’s a charge in the opposite direction.

Sure we now have a potential interrupt build, but the interrupt mechanic is inherently not something you can build around. And in return we’ve lost virtually every build except shatter and had our main MH weapon needlessly nerfed.

I can get the other classes crowing about it, but why mesmers are sitting here talking about how great it is I’m completely failing to get.

Seriously, this is something I do in my free time for fun. If the director of my favourite show deleted all my favourite scenes from my dvds I’d never watch them again. Why we put up with this nonsense in games I still don’t get.

I’m so sad, and it’s all the worse because I was so excited by the blog post that promised great things for this patch.

Thanks anet – you made one of your biggest fans sad after he got home from work tonight!

\o/

jportell.2197:

AndrewSX.3794:

jportell.2197:

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

Inbefore:

-Fixed a bug where Prismatic Understanding was giving out unintended boons. Now it apply 5 stack of vulnerability (30 sec duration) per second.

Wait PU gives vulnerability on targets around Mesmer? I did not see that

Ofc, but it will be now reverted to apply the vulnerability to mes and boons to foes.

(just in case for who’s reading and not getting it – it’s joke)

jportell.2197:

AndrewSX.3794:

jportell.2197:

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

Inbefore:

-Fixed a bug where Prismatic Understanding was giving out unintended boons. Now it apply 5 stack of vulnerability (30 sec duration) per second.

Wait PU gives vulnerability on targets around Mesmer? I did not see that

That was a sarcastic comment about how stealthing would apply vulnerability to yourself.

Pyroatheist.9031:

jportell.2197:

AndrewSX.3794:

jportell.2197:

Yes that is how it works. It is amazing now.

Inbefore:

-Fixed a bug where Prismatic Understanding was giving out unintended boons. Now it apply 5 stack of vulnerability (30 sec duration) per second.

Wait PU gives vulnerability on targets around Mesmer? I did not see that

That was a sarcastic comment about how stealthing would apply vulnerability to yourself.

Oh lol. Half reading right now.

Too lazy to switch accounts, but this is Sizzap. You’ve probly seen me in hotjoin

After hundreds of hours and over 2,000 games as mesmer, I had come up with a build completely my own and non-cookie cutter. It was probably a little OP in terms of survivability vs. DPS, but it amazes me that just about every single nerf hurts my build, considering no one else ran it. FML.

I’ve found several new builds that are equally powerful. I can adapt. That’s not the point. The point is that I don’t know if I care enough to adapt. I liked my playstyle so much, it was so me, that I might be done with this. Not this prof, the game. No other prof really caught my eye.

Way to go, totally nerfing EVERYONE’s build because of one OP build. GG RTARDS. :P

WAIT AND SEE…

I used to play heavy confusion before April 30. Now in my opinion, confusion mesmer is nerfed to the ground and I don’t see a viable way to make another form of condition mesmer yet, so my rabid gear is sleeping in the bank.

Now I play a variant on Pyro’s Immortal and ChaosMaestro support (thanks guys for the great ideas!). Most of the relevant abilities/traits I use that are affected by changes today are… nerfed. And I don’t see a significant/relevant buff to balance it, so for me it is indeed a nerf-patch.

We knew some builds were going to get nerfed or buffed today, but I don’t feel like nerfing the tanky mesmers was the way to go or necessary at all, probably was not intended that way but the result is the same. My opinion might be biased since my build/weapons is/are directly affected, so I will try it out for a couple weeks and see what happens. For sure the rotation will be slower, but it might still be viable.

DIVERSITY? NOT SO MUCH…

While I am not sure yet on some of the nerfs and will give it a shot, one thing is clear to me: the changes for the Mesmer in this patch do not promote Build Diversity. If anything, it pushes me to play yet another shatter build. I have no new relevant options to play with, just same old and a bit more nerfed, anyways that is what it looks like.

Reading the patch notes, not once did I tell myself “Can’t wait to try this out!” and this is where I think they missed a good opportunity to give mesmers new tools. To be clear, new options that are irrelevant because they are either too weak or too unreliable cannot be called new options. They are just ‘place holders’ in the Trait-lines.

HOPE FOR THE FUTURE… ?

I hope ArenaNet make changes in the future to give us more build diversity. I agree with Pyro on this, many mesmer mechanics or traits (or trait lines for that matter) are either broken/unusable/unreliable as is or simply too weak (since game release or since nerfs) to make them viable options.

Simply put, I am a bit disappointed as of now, I expected much more from this patch.

A trait that deals directly with illusions that shouldn’t be in the illusion section… Hmmm…

Pyroatheist.9031:

Summary
These changes accomplished nothing positive for the mesmer class. The fact that they were made in the name of build diversity is insulting to every intelligent mesmer player. These changes, far from providing build diversity and flexibility, have significantly lowered the diversity of the mesmer class and restricted the flexibility our builds have. This is far and away the most devastating and most ill-conceived patch since this game was first released.

Well said

Well, i am honestly kitten ed about this patch. I am a phantasm mesmer and all i got was a big nerf with nothing good on the side.
Anet decided to make my phantasms made of paper, increase my cooldown of them and a big nerf to my only decent shortrange/evade attack skill.
With my current build all i will be able to do is summon a phantasm and start running back.
Thx Anet for this “awesome” nerf. x_x
I have a question, why did Anet decided to butcher the phantasm build? was there anyone who actually thought it was too strong? i really dont get it.

Well, I like the changes. Sure, much is nerfs. But really, we’ll need a lot more nerfs than just these ones.

The thing is, we have a plethora of underpowered / useless / bugged / questionable traits and even abilites. Half our abilities could be removed and no one would really miss them.

I want these buffed.
However I’ll accept – I’m a developer myself :P – that this is hardly possible without nerfing something else in the process. Hence the buffs to Scepter, Interrupts and Stealth, plus the buffs to Phantasm base HP and the change of the signet are ok to counteract the loss of 20% CD reduction and the nerf on the signet.

Blurred Frenzy is questionable, but meh… can be changed back later.

Really, I don’t see the big deal. Most of these changes are minor, and the big one (20% CD + Signet nerf for Phantasm builds) is counteracted (increased base health + signet actually works now).

The sky is not falling. :P

But to re-iterate the most important point: We need a LOT more nerfs than just these if we want to make the remaining traits / abilities useful without overpowering the class. A lot more.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Summary
These changes accomplished nothing positive for the mesmer class. The fact that they were made in the name of build diversity is insulting to every intelligent mesmer player. These changes, far from providing build diversity and flexibility, have significantly lowered the diversity of the mesmer class and restricted the flexibility our builds have. This is far and away the most devastating and most ill-conceived patch since this game was first released.

This couldn’t be better put.

Carighan.6758:

Well, I like the changes. Sure, much is nerfs. But really, we’ll need a lot more nerfs than just these ones.

…

The sky is not falling. :P

But to re-iterate the most important point: We need a LOT more nerfs than just these if we want to make the remaining traits / abilities useful without overpowering the class. A lot more.

Quoted for… er… I honestly have no idea. I’m sure we should listen to this guy though because he posts a lot on this theme.

Oh don’t get me wrong, the nerfs sting if they affect the specific build you’re running.

But on a class-design level, we have too little base power + a handful of too strong traits.
On a utility level we have too many skills with too little interaction (with each other) + a handful of really powerful skills everyone picks.

And so on.
And I really don’t expect them to buff my base power or even versatility without nerfing the strong traits and skills.

For example on the case of Phantasms, as a not-20-20-0-25-5 spec Mesmer, my Phantasms feel… ok now. Take longer to recycle, but live substantially longer. Not judging whether the HP buff is enough, yet, but it feels like the things are more where they should have been in the first place.

Ofc, again: Individually the nerfs sting. On a larger class-design picture, things are very very slowly shaping up. Stronger traits and abilities are getting nerfs, weaker are getting buffs.

Oh kitten carighan, I am a phantasm mesmer and this was a BIG nerf to me around the board.

After a days work and exams, i arrive home to this crap and think “why the hell i wasted money on this game, i thought this was already out of the beta phase”.

For me the blured Frenzy nerfs as well as the prior nerf to Feedback, thus beeing unable to reflect more than 20 projectiles really are the worst things for PvE mesmer. I honestly don’t think that I will be touching my mesmer too much for the next months, granted that I mainly run Arah.

Hyung.6140:

Seriously this is an awful set of changes. From Into the Void, to IC, to Blurred Frenzy there is a set of utterly unwarranted changes that force us into one style of play and a limited couple of weapon sets.

For a patch that allegedly promoted build diversity this is worse than a fail, it’s a charge in the opposite direction.

Sure we now have a potential interrupt build, but the interrupt mechanic is inherently not something you can build around. And in return we’ve lost virtually every build except shatter and had our main MH weapon needlessly nerfed.
\o/

Mesmers already have a seriously limited set of weapons. I’ve been playing mesmer since beta and my mesmer has been officially benched. This patch completely destroys my build and leaves me with almost no options beyond becoming another cookie cutter shatter build.

What is a mesmer now? It’s an occasional tool, something I can port with, or avoid something with. Other than that, this is trashing the class. Adding a second to into the void destroys its purpose as more than a speed buff. If my enemy has a second to react to it, what good is it?

Buffing interrupts? Come on, they do so minimal damage, if any, it’s ridiculous.

Torment? Seriously? On one scepter skill? Thanks for nothing!

I’m thoroughly disappointed in ANET here and seriously thinking about what my next game purchase will be (I was going to buy gems but after this, I have no faith).

I’m really not even sure I want to play anymore……not if you’re going to willingly destroy stuff we’ve spent months perfecting and creating.

I’m going to have to disagree on brushing off the bouncing fix as just a ‘not counting’. It’s obvious they were messing with something behind the scenes to cause the initial issue – they just let it slip in unfinished, much to our annoyance.

If you notice, bouncing isn’t the same as it was before the ‘bug’ appeared. Illusions are now viable targets for bounces where they were not before, and bouncing now sets them low on the priority. This is quite a good quality of life change for the Mesmer.

I hope you don’t mind me snipping the parts of your post I didn’t feel like touching.

Literally baffled by the attitude of a few masochist mesmers who seem to think they have some loyalty to the class regardless of what happens.

I swear if there was a nerf that all skill cooldowns were now 10 minutes and each time you shatter you get a physical punch in the face someone would post about how great it is that this will get rid of all the fairweather mesmers and now Only True Mesmers will be left.

Seriously this is an awful set of changes. From Into the Void, to IC, to Blurred Frenzy there is a set of utterly unwarranted changes that force us into one style of play and a limited couple of weapon sets.

-snip-

It actually has little to do with “loyalty to the class” but rather the simple fact that a majority of the mesmers uses a mainhand sword due to iLeap + Blurred Frenzy,
Considering Blurred Frenzy flat out ignored retaliation, it was simply on par with popeye in strength, and nothing should be that strong. By nerfing Blurred Frenzy, we might see mesmers going for one of the other MH weapons, especially now that the Scepter was given Torment.

I don’t even find myself worried over the changes, I’ve had a couple of rounds to play my tPvP build in (phantasm) and guess what, no changes, I’m still playing it just as before and I’m still spawning phantasms as fast as I need to despite the lack of IC in the build. You see, while IC was moved up in the trait-line, they gave us a health-boost to cover for that, yes we don’t spawn as quickly anymore, but in return they may just survive slightly longer in return!

Infact the only part of the changes I find to be odd is this:
Decreased the clone base hit points by 25% in PvP and WvW.
Surely the clones that were already being one-hitted did not need further health reductions, soon, they’ll be losing fights against ambients.

And what weapon sets are we limited to right now? Torch has always been subpar to everything else and you can definitly still continue to use both sword (MH or OH!), scepter, focus, staff or GS and create builds just fine around these..

Paifas.3196:

Oh kitten carighan, I am a phantasm mesmer and this was a BIG nerf to me around the board.

After a days work and exams, i arrive home to this crap and think “why the hell i wasted money on this game, i thought this was already out of the beta phase”.

You are correct good sir!
It is indeed out of beta, but being out of beta does not mean the game should stop developing and evolving, while you may dislike the path they’ve taken with this patch, I’m confident you’ve got something with another class that bugs you, and once that gets adjusted you’re going to be filled to the brim with joy and jappy thoughts!

I am confused Lue, do you actually play mesmer main class? Because if you read the patch notes carefully and you know how to play phantasm mesmer, then you would notice that your phantasms have, in fact, less HP.
Now go read the patch notes and try understand what i just saied, im too lazy to spell it out for you.

And blurred frenzy was not overpowered, it was our only decent close range skill, dumb thiefs got “3” spam, who pretty much makes them imortal. Ele’s have the “bunker” build who also pretty much makes them imortal, and so on.

Edit:
One other thing Lue, i am too old to like “updates” that makes us have to change the way we play the game.
I dont like getting my build Nerfed ALL the way.
I dont like to have to re-learn how to fight other classes because of huge updates and “evolving’s”.
Starting to wish BF4 comes out faster.

prismatic understanding have a crazy buff to the point it is stupid to not take the trait for a staff build

Lue.6538:

By nerfing Blurred Frenzy, we might see mesmers going for one of the other MH weapons, especially now that the Scepter was given Torment.

May I ask what ‘one of the other weapons’ you are referring to? The only other MH we have next to Sword is Scepter; and that thing still isn’t even remotely viable. If anything, it was made even worse because ANet nerfed the damage on #2 by 50%. And the 2s telegraphed ‘please hit me’ for Torment doesn’t make up for the nerf.

Now if we actually had something like a Mainhand Pistol and an actually viable Scepter, then we’d have alternatives.

/signed, well thought out post Pyro, couldn’t agree with you more.

Illusionary Celerity is moved to minor grandmaster trait.
^ this alone is big enough nerf to overshadow all buffs.
I’ve used this since.. forever..
all builds i use take this traits..
im really disappointed with the nerf. and i feel kitten not using this trait..
good job anet.. good job.!

Ayrilana.1396:

A trait that deals directly with illusions that shouldn’t be in the illusion section… Hmmm…

You have really missed the point. Build diversity > flavor text fluff.

The problem is that the Illusions tree offers the passive bonuses to +condition damage and -shatter recharge, making the whole tree only beneficial to two builds, one of which (condition build) is very weak. That is a huge stat loss to invest in for non-shatter builds for a trait that until the patch was considered a requirement for every Mesmer build.

I have a question about Signet of Illusions post patch – is this 50% of old HP boost… or 50% to new HP boost (I mean, after new HP base)?

Cause if second is true, we have now with SoI:
Increased the phantasm base hit points by 55% in PvP and WvW = 232,5% old HP against 300% with old SoI
Increased the phantasm base hit points by 270% in PvE = 555% old HP against 300% with old SoI
Decreased the clone base hit points by 25% in PvP and WvW = 112,5% old HP against 300% with old SoI
Increased the clone base hit points by 28% in PvE. = 192% old HP against 300% with old SoI

So we have tremendous Phantasm HP boost in PvE.

I have been playing the Mesmer since launch. I have no other characters. I PvE only, save for occasionally dipping into WvW to complete a monthly or two (probably two, over 6 months ago). I run, for the most part, a clone/bleed-bunker build of 0/15/20/25/10 (Staff, Sword/Focus). I’m not huge on theory crafting, but I assume my damage was sub-optimal, but I felt my role came down to survival and support of which I was quite good at.

Now for the sake of build diversity everything I do takes about 20% longer (from kiting with Phase retreat to setting up defensive Phantasmal Wardens). This means I have fewer illusions up and therefore I have less reliable damage, damage reduction, healing, bleed stacks and boons. I am now FORCED to compensate by using a Signet, which eats one of my very precious support utility spells in an attempt to increase the health of my now also very precious array of illusions.

My build is not on a whole ruined. However, this is a dramatic change which I fear will inevitably lead to someone on a dungeon run saying I should, at this point, just play a shatter build or a greatsword build or a scepter build (well, ok, I realistically don’t think they’ll mention the scepter). All of which I find to be particularly boring builds despite what their merits are.

And while I am reading arguments from both sides here, I am finding it odd that for the sake of build diversity, my already debatable sub-optimal build (in terms of DPS at least) has to take such a significant hit. Perhaps I was playing “wrong” and this change is going to make me play “right”? Hard to say, but I feel pigeonholed more now than I did.

Frankly I always thought that celerity being an adept trait was overpowered. Just 5 points to increase the recharge of half the weapon skills and a ton of utilities by 20%, and this recharge stacks with other recharge reductions to a full 40% reduction. No other class gets near that level of universal reduction, let alone for just 5 trait points.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Summary
These changes accomplished nothing positive for the mesmer class. The fact that they were made in the name of build diversity is insulting to every intelligent mesmer player. These changes, far from providing build diversity and flexibility, have significantly lowered the diversity of the mesmer class and restricted the flexibility our builds have. This is far and away the most devastating and most ill-conceived patch since this game was first released.

Thank you for writing this up. Your write-up was very clear and concise without being inflammatory like so many of the other posts around here today. You are right in your claim that ANet could have handled this patch differently and had much unutilized room for improving poor traits/abilities. However, I do have to respectfully disagree with your stance that this patch is so overwhelmingly negative for mesmers.

First of all, let’s look at the nerfs.
1. Blurred Frenzy: Neither of the changes are that significant. In an entire night of WvW, I didn’t find that taking retaliation damage made any sort of significant difference in my survivability. Also, the cooldown change didn’t seem very important either; I like to think that skilled mesmers don’t spam this skill the second it’s off cooldown, so other than one or two clutch situations where you needed an extra second to stealth/heal/whatever, this doesn’t seem like much of a change.

2. Signet of Illusions: First, in any sort of PvE, Illusions received a massive health increase. Also, the base hitpoints of phantasms was increased in WvW, so while their health is overall slightly lower, the nerf is not as great as the SoI change would indicate. Also, because SoI now activates immediately upon illusion generation, they are now much more reliable than they were before this change.

3. Vengeful Images: I definitely agree that this change was overkill. It basically eliminates any sort of build that relies on have phantasms out for sustained periods and pushes them into more of a role of temporary burst damage meant to ultimately be shatter fodder.

4. Illusionist’s Celerity: I have mixed feelings about this change. I miss it to be certain, and I dislike having longer cooldowns on a vast majority of mesmer skills. It also does a number on phantasm builds, though those arguably needed to be toned down. However, I find that most builds don’t necessarily need it. Many builds that needed rapid clone generation take Deceptive Evasion which is unaffected by this switch, and most shatter builds already go 30 in illusions for IP. For instance, my condition build works just fine post-patch. I continue to get plenty of clones from DE and while Phase Retreat being a second slower to recharge, I can live with that. It seems like the skill that suffers most from this is Decoy, which is a defensive utility. I do think that certain cooldowns need to be lowered to compensate for this change, but certainly not all of them.

5. Into the Void: I’d also agree that this change was unnecessary. The only time this really mattered was in high-end PvP where yanking people off of a point could make a substantial difference. I honestly wish they would have made this a PvP-only change. This change reduced ItV’s ability to function as an interrupt, which is pretty significant in PvE and WvW (it was great for stopping a bunch of people about the stomp an ally). I just really hope this change wasn’t made because people were too stupid to not know to avoid lethally high cliffs.

Continued on next post…

Clearly, there were quite a few nerfs; that we can agree on. However, I feel you really didn’t do justice to the buffs/bugfixes and the role they play in promoting build diversity.

First, you overlooked the buff to Prismatic Understanding. This buff is huge; getting four seconds of boons for every second I’m in stealth is incredible. I often leave stealth with ~10 seconds of protection due to this buff. This allows for stealth-centered and protection-stacking builds to have a powerful tool to make them more viable.

Interrupt Traits: These received huge buffs. While I don’t personally see a way to make a build using solely these traits, they offer new potential for the many inventive mesmers of the game to play around with.

Bug fixes: I agree that these bugfixes should be expected from ANet, they nonetheless help build diversity. Many people were claiming that GS was unviable due to the iZerker bug. Many people claimed that condition builds were dead due to the bouncing bug. This patch alleviates those issues and allows more freedom to experiment with those weapons. My own condition build, which I’ve been using successfully in WvW since the confusion nerf, has gone from being slightly underpowered to completely viable once again. Even the SoI fix enables phantasms to be more reliable, since they don’t have to wait for a health buff (though whether that can begin to compensate for the IC nerf is beyond me).

To briefly touch on areas where ANet missed the boat… I have to agree with you there. Mantras, Scepter, and iMage all are in need of some love, and this patch was the perfect opportunity to fix them. Likewise, we still have many useless traits that didn’t get polished.

Finally, I just want to say that life as a mesmer will continue. Yes, nerfs hurt and sting, but we can adapt. Sure, Shatter builds will be the most obvious and straightforward to play following the nerf, but many other builds have potential. Stealthy condition and protection builds received a massive buff in PU.

Would I say that there’s more build diversity? Well, the patch has only been out a day, and I’m not sure if the nerf to phantasms will be offset by new builds springing up elsewhere. However, I don’t believe that these changes are the end of mesmerism as we know it. My own first-hand experience has shown me that a condition build has remained more-or-less viable after the confusion nerf (the bounce bug did hurt though), even though everyone claimed that conditions were dead. Maybe I’m just a super amazing player and can do 1vX fights all night long with a build that’s complete garbage, but I like to think that I, as well as many other mesmers, have the ability to come up with creative new build ideas that defy the notion that shatter is the only way to go.

Paifas.3196:

Oh kitten carighan, I am a phantasm mesmer and this was a BIG nerf to me around the board.

After a days work and exams, i arrive home to this crap and think “why the hell i wasted money on this game, i thought this was already out of the beta phase”.

Well if a nerf in a MMO you play (and many of the changes we got were entirely expected) upsets you so much, you really shouldn’t be playing it in the first place.
Generally when gaming aggravates you, that’s a good time to stop (I mean, gaming, not only the specific game). Give it a rest and then try entirely new genres and games. You become too invested, hence it upsets you so much.

About the specific change though, I’d argue I have more Phantasms up now. They survive much better, hence the increased CD actually doesn’t seem to do much. It takes longer to get the initial set up, but I mostly used 2 Phantasms + 1 Clone-slot so I could still fire Mirror Blade and iLeap.
I get those two Phantasms up ASAP (1 Weapon + 1 Utility), so it’s rarely an issue.

High-level FOTM may be different, but at 29 it wasn’t a problem so far.
Plus the signet does feel much stronger now, really. Sure, much less HP-boost (in PvE it’s still a win/win with the upped base health, in PvP it’d be less, buuuuut…) however with it applying ASAP the Phantasms survive that much more.

Ramiel.4931:

I am now sure that ANet does not know what they want the Mesmer to be.

They had a vision in the beginning, tried to make it true to that vision, then started to change different things as response to different problems. Somewhere along the line, they lost track of what the Mesmer was supposed to be and now they just go with the flow, nerfing and buffing things according to the meta flow.

They also seem to have adopted a pet, in the form of the shatter spec. Every good thing that they did so far has revolved around a shatter spec.

This makes me quite sad. I love the class and it has so much potential, but for all the potential and possibilities, there’s an equal number of bugs and problems.

I won’t abandon the Mesmer, it’s basically the only class that doesn’t bore me to tears but the future is grim. Nothing good will come of it.

I totally agree. Mesmer’s class concept used to be very clear. Through use of misdirection, illusion, mind games, and duplicates we serve to confuse our foes and mess with their minds. Confusion was a core element of our concept. Then they got rid of it. When we lost confusion, the concept of the Mesmer got a little foggy. Now I feel like Anet just lost the scent completely. What in Grenth’s name do “interrupts” have to do with Mesmers? Sure we can make them happen if we’re lucky, sure they add a little spice now and then, but to release an entire patch redesigning traits intended to push us towards an interrupt build is just silly. So now we no longer mess with people’s minds, we just clear our throats and interrupt their actions? Wow… What a lame class trait. There is nothing cool about being The Great Interruptor. “Here he comes! that dreaded, dastardly Interruptor! He never let’s us finish our sentences! He—-”. It’s just silly. Give us traits built around stuns/dazes if you must, or a new trait line called “Mind Kitten” which allows us to cause friendly fire or briefly take over other characters. Something cool and useful! Interrupts are just not cool or useful. And before you say “But interrupt traits were always a part of the Mesmer trait line!” I honestly thought that when Anet said they were removing useless traits, interrupt traits would be the first to go. Instead they get front and center while blurred frenzy gets nerfed into the ground.

high level fotm is not 29….

and phantasm stil get oneshot by everything.

Along that blurred frenzy get a HUGE hit to mesmer pve survivability that is already too low because mobs don t care for illusions mostly.

You know that aggro is made on armor or dps, that paired with aoe and stupid dps from mobs makes that buff useless.

P.S. from what i heard the people who made the game is not the same that are balancing it for the most.

So i m more inclined to think they are clueless rather than they have a long range vision….

Paifas.3196:

I am confused Lue, do you actually play mesmer main class? Because if you read the patch notes carefully and you know how to play phantasm mesmer, then you would notice that your phantasms have, in fact, less HP.
Now go read the patch notes and try understand what i just saied, im too lazy to spell it out for you.

And blurred frenzy was not overpowered, it was our only decent close range skill, dumb thiefs got “3” spam, who pretty much makes them imortal. Ele’s have the “bunker” build who also pretty much makes them imortal, and so on.

Edit:
One other thing Lue, i am too old to like “updates” that makes us have to change the way we play the game.
I dont like getting my build Nerfed ALL the way.
I dont like to have to re-learn how to fight other classes because of huge updates and “evolving’s”.
Starting to wish BF4 comes out faster.

Overall, the health was reduced by a fairly insignificant amount, however try to follow my reasoning here: They nerfed the signet, yes that much is true, but they also buffed the base HP to cover some of it, my phantasms are just fine after the patch.

Blurred frenzy didn’t change that much, the only thing is that you can now get hit by retaliation while using it, which is perfectly fine.

You don’t have to change the way you play, you can play this exactly as before.

Aveneo.2068:

May I ask what ‘one of the other weapons’ you are referring to? The only other MH we have next to Sword is Scepter; and that thing still isn’t even remotely viable. If anything, it was made even worse because ANet nerfed the damage on #2 by 50%. And the 2s telegraphed ‘please hit me’ for Torment doesn’t make up for the nerf.

Now if we actually had something like a Mainhand Pistol and an actually viable Scepter, then we’d have alternatives.

I meant the scepter, which has always been perfectly viable, people just prefered blurred frenzy, not that unlike the 100b warriors.

the blurred frenzy change was huge ._. it’s not just retal that’ll hit u thru it, never just consider things u see in patch notes. retal was the reason for the change, but the consequences are much greater lol.

and scepter has never been freaking viable -.- oh I’m sorry, it was, in what was it again? bwe 1 or 2?

LordByron.8369:

high level fotm is not 29….

and phantasm stil get oneshot by everything.

Along that blurred frenzy get a HUGE hit to mesmer pve survivability that is already too low because mobs don t care for illusions mostly.

You know that aggro is made on armor or dps, that paired with aoe and stupid dps from mobs makes that buff useless.

P.S. from what i heard the people who made the game is not the same that are balancing it for the most.

So i m more inclined to think they are clueless rather than they have a long range vision….

Hrm. Two observations:

• English is not your native language, because you didn’t really get what I wrote. I said it might be different in high-level FotM, at 29 it still feels like a very noticeable and very powerful buff. Phantasms are much meatier at that level now, especially since I can viable use a different skill than the signet now.
• You have a weird way of dealing with aggro, because I specifically love the Mesmer because I can provide PvE enemies with so many targets to waste their skills on. Btw, aggro doesn’t work on “damage and armour”, or rather, while those are factors they are just two and not even the most important ones.

Anyhow the point is this: If these changes are so destructive, coupled with the fact that you didn’t see nerfs in general coming then I would say reroll or quit, because MMOs as a whole might not be a favourable genre to you. They all work this way, EVE Online excepted for being a market simulation. (and a kitten good one at that)
Nothing about this patch is truly surprising, and as a whole we gain a lot for the lot we lose. Especially since the – unexpected – Illusion HP buff cushions the CD nerf to a degree.

Long-term I’d like to see shorter Illusion CDs, more ways to summon illusions, DE removed (it should not be required for clone-generation at all) or reworked, Shatter made much more rare but much more powerful, and more trickery and less raw mobility / power / defence.
But that’s long-term, and even then much of that is wishful thinking and musing, not something I think the class “needs to function”. It’d be cool to see, but if not, the class is fun to play anyhow. And if not, I’ll find another game and the devs will be one feedback wiser.

Though, one addendum to people in general:
If you rerolled to Mesmer because it’s such a powerful PvP / WvW class, did you honestly suspect to not take nerfs, especially where it hurts the most? The idea of FOTM-rerolling is stupid exactly because you’ll end up always being on the class taking the worst nerfs each patch, simply because you keep rerolling to the classes which are scheduled for a nerf.

Double Nerf to blurred frenzy and +20pts on illusionary celerity (I don’t spam my shatters, I use them intelligently) was just brutal.

Forget the 1sec Nerf to temporal curtain/into the void (a good tell to help avoid it) and the FIFTY PERCENT Nerf to sirens call (my berserker mesmer could kill faster with 25stacks of bleed then using a spear…).

In another year or two we will see more horrid changes. In 5 years the skills will do completely different things then they do today. Just look at gw1. You need not look any further.

Carighan.6758:

Hrm. Two observations:

• English is not your native language, because you didn’t really get what I wrote. I said it might be different in high-level FotM, at 29 it still feels like a very noticeable and very powerful buff. Phantasms are much meatier at that level now, especially since I can viable use a different skill than the signet now.

warriors and mages in ascalon for example hits for no less than 10.000
and they are trash mobs.

Dredges hits for the same if not more.

Everything is AoE.

That buff is basically putting wo work on mesmer everything that is was wrong on ranger

But the best part is Blurred frenzy…
Wonder where it took the biggest hit?
Now you never know if its gonna work or not.

• You have a weird way of dealing with aggro, because I specifically love the Mesmer because I can provide PvE enemies with so many targets to waste their skills on. Btw, aggro doesn’t work on “damage and armour”, or rather, while those are factors they are just two and not even the most important ones.

in 90% of situation they are not buffs at all.
And tell mw how often a mob will just run to a phantasm rather than ignoring it to come at you and oneshotting everything aoe.

As i said pve damage is unreasonable and the result of a flawed system that is being ruined by PvP.

Anyhow the point is this: If these changes are so destructive, coupled with the fact that you didn’t see nerfs in general coming then I would say reroll or quit, because MMOs as a whole might not be a favourable genre to you. They all work this way, EVE Online excepted for being a market simulation. (and a kitten good one at that)
Nothing about this patch is truly surprising, and as a whole we gain a lot for the lot we lose. Especially since the – unexpected – Illusion HP buff cushions the CD nerf to a degree.

2 questions/quotes will answer
Were they needed? (pve)
Were they FUN?

Carighan.6758:

Though, one addendum to people in general:
If you rerolled to Mesmer because it’s such a powerful PvP / WvW class, did you honestly suspect to not take nerfs, especially where it hurts the most? The idea of FOTM-rerolling is stupid exactly because you’ll end up always being on the class taking the worst nerfs each patch, simply because you keep rerolling to the classes which are scheduled for a nerf.

I’ve not seen anyone in this thread talk about how they rerolled to mesmer. Personally I’ve mained mesmer since pre-release and fell in love with the mechanic and the combat, only to find the style I like in particular get nerfed to hell in a balance patch I was excited about for the “increase in options” it promised.

(seriously, 8/10 weapon skills nerfed if you run sword/focus/greatsword)

As for the whole “games are not for you” argument, not only is it a little needlessly personal and patronising, for me it’s precisely BECAUSE Guild Wars is a pleasant bit of escapism after work that I’m so annoyed.

If the director of my favourite tv show came round to my house and deleted all the best scenes from my DVDs I’d be rightfully annoyed. Guild Wars is a bit of fun escapism for the evenings, and now it’s been made less fun for me.

Even worse, merely expressing this fact leads to patronising comments about how maybe you shouldn’t play MMOs, or pointlessly childish accusations of “crying” (not from you, but you will have seen this in other threads, mainly from players of other classes).

It means it’s impossible to have a mature conversation about how your leisure time just got made worse by an outside force beyond your control! ;p

So. I’m going to play around with a few other builds/classes, though I feel way too invested in my mesmer to properly switch mains, and I hate the shatter style we’re being forced into.

Overall I’m just left feeling genuinely sad, like my favourite footballer asked to come visit me, got me excited to meet one of my heroes, only for him to kick me in the stomach and then leave.

You still want to like him, but really you feel like you ought to find a new team to support or maybe just stop watching football altogether and make some use of all that new free time :p

Edit: just saw this

LordByron.8369:

2 questions/quotes will answer
Were they needed?
Were they FUN?

This is it exactly. You could debate endlessly whether they were needed, and I would say no – mesmers were very much beatable, you just had to know how to counter them. Some would say yes.

But what isn’t debatable is that these changes definitely reduce fun.

Waiting for cooldowns isn’t fun.

Having less options in fights as you have fewer skills off cooldown isn’t fun.

Into the Void being reliant on luck and the mistakes of your enemy (I HOPE he moves back into range by the time this 1s cooldown is done and doesn’t try to run away!) isn’t fun.

Interrupt builds are also pretty luck dependent for much the similar reason – it’s almost impossible to reliably interrupt even in 1v1s and if you have more than one enemy to keep track of it’s definitely not possible except by luck. Luck isn’t fun.

Being pushed into just one spec isn’t fun.

I think you get my point…

“Fun” is a very relative thing, LordByron.
Ask the Greatsword Rangers how “fun” the huge damage and perma-fury on Warrior 100Blades is. Sure, the Warriors probably love the huge numbers. The other melee fighters not getting groups because of that probably think of it as much less fun.

Your answer would now probably be “Then buff the other classes”, right?

However, if we all hit for 10 000 per attack against an enemy with 2 000 000 HP, that’s factually no different from all hitting 1000 against an enemy with 200 000 HP, unless someone has size paranoia. :P
Nerfing has a big upside (speaking as a developer myself) that it usually means touching one class instead of 7, and it also means you get more direct feedback as to your PvE balance (overpowering everyone means they will not accept more difficult encounters later on).

i’m getting tired reading complaints over complaints.