Gutter Rat [cry] | Gandara | Roaming nuisance
~ There is no balance team. ~
~ There is no balance team. ~
All condi, all the time.
What’s functionally bad about conditions, if you don’t mind me asking?
You still press a button to do X damage, only the X is done over 3/4/5/Y seconds instead of instantly, and in turn ignores Toughness. But gameplay-wise, it’s all the same, hammer damage dealing abilities to inflict maximum pew pew.
As such, the defense against them is actually much the same: Evade/Block/Dodge. If you avoid the attack, you avoid the conditions just the same you’d avoid the instant damage.
Should you fail to avoid them, instead of using passive Toughness to mitigate the damage, you now cleanse. It’s a more binary thing, you either remove 100% or 0% of the damage instead of X% according to Toughness. Granted. But functionally it’s comparable, taking up skillbar slots instead of item stat slots.
Also, please don’t call effective “cheesy”. If you want to run an inferior build despite knowing better that’s fine, but then the correct term is “You’re gimping yourself purposely” (which might be fine, again!), not “They are all running cheesy WTFANetsuxx”.
If you however just want to say that you think the game is a) too spammy and b) too bursty, then full ack and we already know the balance team (Assuming there is one, I doubt it) is absolutely understaffed or only works 2 weeks in the entire year. We’d need patches like the one we just got every single month. Because there’s a ton of work to do!
And in fact they need to be bigger in scope, ripping out entire skills, traitlines, skill types, item types, everything. Replacing them. Maybe even just flat out removing them.
The strength of heart to face oneself has been made manifest. The persona Carighan has appeared.
(edited by Carighan.6758)
Reason why condi works so well is because…well it’s condi. Enemy keeps getting damage cause of the lasting condition applied to him which makes kiting easier. Thus you don’t have to be on their face all the time aka better surviving. Doing so it pairs really well with toughness and/or vitality. Which makes it even more ridiculous.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomi
What’s functionally bad about conditions, if you don’t mind me asking?
When I play a power build, I “feel” the damage when it hits the target. There’s an immediate connect with cause and effect when a burst lands.
With conditions, it’s basically just loading them up and then watching to see what happens next.
Essentially, with power I feel like they died because I did something right. With condi, they die because they didn’t.
I agree though that I should not refer to functional builds as cheese. The word gets overused and I use it out of frustration. My main when I started the game was a Guardian, and I find it disgraceful what DH did to it. But when I see a core Guardian now I know it’s an easy kill, so the class is probably as locked into DH as we are to condi.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomi
Your build is similar to my current one. The reason I take some rabid trinkets is I absolutely love the pistol, and I need at least 40% crit rate for it to really get those bleeds going. I run Chaos/Inspiration/Dueling with Mistrust and traited pistol. I thought I’d miss MtD and Confusion-on-shatter but it turns out I don’t at all, nor do I need DE.
Gutter Rat [cry] | Gandara | Roaming nuisance
~ There is no balance team. ~
~ There is no balance team. ~
(edited by msalakka.4653)
What’s functionally bad about conditions, if you don’t mind me asking?
When I play a power build, I “feel” the damage when it hits the target. There’s an immediate connect with cause and effect when a burst lands.
With conditions, it’s basically just loading them up and then watching to see what happens next.
Essentially, with power I feel like they died because I did something right. With condi, they die because they didn’t.
I agree though that I should not refer to functional builds as cheese. The word gets overused and I use it out of frustration. My main when I started the game was a Guardian, and I find it disgraceful what DH did to it. But when I see a core Guardian now I know it’s an easy kill, so the class is probably as locked into DH as we are to condi.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomiYour build is similar to my current one. The reason I take some rabid trinkets is I absolutely love the pistol, and I need at least 40% crit rate for it to really get those bleeds going. I run Chaos/Inspiration/Dueling with Mistrust and traited pistol. I thought I’d miss MtD and Confusion-on-shatter but it turns out I don’t at all, nor do I need DE.
Of course a build that uses the UBER EXPENSIVE perplexity runes. They just need a nerf and other runes would be just as useful.
What’s functionally bad about conditions, if you don’t mind me asking?
When I play a power build, I “feel” the damage when it hits the target. There’s an immediate connect with cause and effect when a burst lands.
With conditions, it’s basically just loading them up and then watching to see what happens next.
Essentially, with power I feel like they died because I did something right. With condi, they die because they didn’t.
I agree though that I should not refer to functional builds as cheese. The word gets overused and I use it out of frustration. My main when I started the game was a Guardian, and I find it disgraceful what DH did to it. But when I see a core Guardian now I know it’s an easy kill, so the class is probably as locked into DH as we are to condi.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomiYour build is similar to my current one. The reason I take some rabid trinkets is I absolutely love the pistol, and I need at least 40% crit rate for it to really get those bleeds going. I run Chaos/Inspiration/Dueling with Mistrust and traited pistol. I thought I’d miss MtD and Confusion-on-shatter but it turns out I don’t at all, nor do I need DE.
Of course a build that uses the UBER EXPENSIVE perplexity runes. They just need a nerf and other runes would be just as useful.
They are less than 5g per piece, so hardly expensive. Personally, though, since I don’t use Chrono I am relegated to Travelers.
Gutter Rat [cry] | Gandara | Roaming nuisance
~ There is no balance team. ~
~ There is no balance team. ~
Of course a build that uses the UBER EXPENSIVE perplexity runes. They just need a nerf and other runes would be just as useful.
They are less than 5g per piece, so hardly expensive. Personally, though, since I don’t use Chrono I am relegated to Travelers.
They are about 4g and 80s at the moment. You can get them for cheaper: above 3g and 33s as we speak. However i don’t remember saying that you SHOULD use these runes. I just chose for it myself back then. There are other alternatives if you like. I actually plan on swapping to Nightmare runes once i get my full Trailblazer set. Duo to the fact that i use my gear in pve too. (with other trait and skill setup ofc)
What’s functionally bad about conditions, if you don’t mind me asking?
When I play a power build, I “feel” the damage when it hits the target. There’s an immediate connect with cause and effect when a burst lands.
With conditions, it’s basically just loading them up and then watching to see what happens next.
Essentially, with power I feel like they died because I did something right. With condi, they die because they didn’t.
I agree though that I should not refer to functional builds as cheese. The word gets overused and I use it out of frustration. My main when I started the game was a Guardian, and I find it disgraceful what DH did to it. But when I see a core Guardian now I know it’s an easy kill, so the class is probably as locked into DH as we are to condi.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomiYour build is similar to my current one. The reason I take some rabid trinkets is I absolutely love the pistol, and I need at least 40% crit rate for it to really get those bleeds going. I run Chaos/Inspiration/Dueling with Mistrust and traited pistol. I thought I’d miss MtD and Confusion-on-shatter but it turns out I don’t at all, nor do I need DE.
Of course a build that uses the UBER EXPENSIVE perplexity runes. They just need a nerf and other runes would be just as useful.
They are less than 5g per piece, so hardly expensive. Personally, though, since I don’t use Chrono I am relegated to Travelers.
Base Mesmer doesn’t require Travelers. Out of combat just temporal curtain, swap back weapon, and spam your stealths or swap in soi for a long haul. Its no lazy 25% passive but Perma swiftness is obtainable.
Perplexity Runes used to be stupid OP, since the nerf they remain BiS but more in line with other sets.
(edited by Ballads.2509)
Base Mesmer doesn’t require Travelers. Out of combat just temporal curtain, swap back weapon, and spam your stealths or swap in soi for a long haul. Its no lazy 25% passive but Perma swiftness is obtainable.
Yeah I’ve tried it, and it’s not for me. I’m not going to waste a slot on SoI, and there were too many times when I was caught in combat with /focus. Which do I want to be caught fighting a Thief without, my main source of stealth (torch) or my main source of damage & interrupt (pistol)?
It’s not required, but I don’t need the headache.
Gutter Rat [cry] | Gandara | Roaming nuisance
~ There is no balance team. ~
~ There is no balance team. ~
Base Mesmer doesn’t require Travelers. Out of combat just temporal curtain, swap back weapon, and spam your stealths or swap in soi for a long haul. Its no lazy 25% passive but Perma swiftness is obtainable.
Yeah I’ve tried it, and it’s not for me. I’m not going to waste a slot on SoI, and there were too many times when I was caught in combat with /focus. Which do I want to be caught fighting a Thief without, my main source of stealth (torch) or my main source of damage & interrupt (pistol)?
It’s not required, but I don’t need the headache.
That headache is all about min/maxing your character, Changing weapons and traits effectively out of combat is the sign of a good player. You swap back to torch as soon as you cast Curtain so you are never stuck w/o torch. Rune 6 sets are to good give up for run speed. SoI isn’t really necessary as long as you spam stealths I would use it only for long runs.
Yeah but no matter how good you are, while you’re swapping to Focus sooner or later someone will catch you with your pants down. Sure, you can minimize the instances that it happens by skillful swapping, but you can not completely eliminate the problem unless you never swap to Focus outside of a safe zone.
Not to mention it’s annoying and conducive to carpal tunnel syndrome. ;-)
I do it for some classic builds in WvW, but it’s a pita for sure.
I keep my inventory minimized and dragged over in the bottom right corner of my screen. I put the focus in the top left bag slot. Just double-click on it, cast curtain, and double-click again (because the weapon you swapped with will be in that spot.)
In four years roaming in wvw, I only remember three times when I was stuck with focus in a fight.
Note: It’s important if you use on-kill sigils to make sure you don’t wipe your stacks when you do the swapping. Easiest way is to make sure the sigil is on a single-hand, mainhand weapon.
Reason why condi works so well is because…well it’s condi. Enemy keeps getting damage cause of the lasting condition applied to him which makes kiting easier. Thus you don’t have to be on their face all the time aka better surviving. Doing so it pairs really well with toughness and/or vitality. Which makes it even more ridiculous.
I for one am pretty much in similar position as you are. Don’t like to play condition builds but it works so i use it. However unlike you i do have a few changes. For instance my setups is a mix of Dire/Trailblazer. This mostly because Dire is super easy to get as where Trailblazer is expansive to make. (I do plan/work my way up to full Trailblazer btw). Also i run Chronomancer instead of core Mesmer, because i love chrono and core is kinda meh to me. Again not the most fun build to use. But it works.. hell.. its very strong even. My current setup: http://tinyurl.com/chrono-wvw-condi (Yes its absolute cancer)
As for powerbuilds. I find them mostly weaker, but likewise i also have seen people that can play it really well. Even in outnumbered situations. few examples are these:
http://tinyurl.com/yt-scarlet-phantom
http://tinyurl.com/yt-tsuki-yomi
We apply condition damage and power damage in the same way: shatter clones. There is no fundamental difference. It is just as hard/easy to do one way or the other.
The reason why condition build is superior is following:
1. We can trait to apply condition damage through all shatters. But power shatter mostly comes from F1 shatter. We do have a bit better power damage phantasms but that is not the main source of our damage.
2. Illusion line is better than Domination line as it synergies with chronomancer line better. It so happens that illusion line boosts both our clone summoning, shatter and condition application at the same time. It is only natural to go condition builds.
I can argue that even if you build for power. Illusion line is still better compared to domination.
I feel your pain Gutter. Power Mesmer just feels so irrelevant, especially in WvW. The relative effort it takes to do meaningful damage makes it an unappealing choice (I just play power Thief now or Ranger if I’m feeling ultra lazy). Condi is just so much better. But even then, our method of landing condi burst is similar to power, so it also quickly becomes irrelevant as more people get involved in a fight in WvW…unlike Necro that can just vomit marks on people and now do some extraordinary bleed stacks. This has always been a problem for Mesmer, but it feels like it’s only getting worse.
Gandara
I am tired of condi builds. Sick and tired of them.
I am a (mostly solo) home border defender and scout in WvW. I rarely bother with sPvP or the mind-numbing dullness of PvE.
As such, I need to run a build that can handle 1vX encounters and escape randomly appearing zergs and gank squads.
Pre-ferocity I used to run Power Phantasm (<3) or Osicat’s PU Power, because Blackwater was never my thing. After HoT, a marauder/zerk mix with shield and Defender runes was pretty good at first, and I won my share of 1v2s with it. But now, for whatever reason, it just gets eaten alive, particularly by thieves (who even completely disable my downstate skills, for good measure). Not to mention DHs, and BlockMaster 2000 Scrappers…
So here I am running Trailblazer/Rabid and the condi pressure is absolutely disgusting. However, it works. So I get to do what I log in for and run a boring as kitten build while doing it. Hooray. Even with 2k+ toughness I still ate a 10k Arc Divider so I shiver to think what I’d have taken had I been glass.
I’ve tried everything from Minstrels to Marauders to Commanders, from boon duration & BD to wells and glamour. I am sure some of them are workable if you run in an organized havoc group, but for solo play, not so much.
Please for the love of O’Brien tell me there is a build I’ve just not found that can breathe life into this game, because I am tired of condi bullkitten being the only viable option and listening to remarks from fellow WvW players, most of whom run equally cheesy specs on their Druids, DHs, Berserkers and Daredevils. They think that because they’ve been bursted down by a Power Shatter in a havoc group that you can run that kitten solo.
I feel your pain and agree with you. I just am glad we actually have a build that works so well.
In a perfect world power would be our best build since it has high skill requirements.