Guild Wars 2

Okay, so I’ve always liked support builds in MMOs & I rolled a Warrior at first (who’s now 80)… I can say alot for the damage but the party support I felt was limited in comparison to other classes.

I’ve started a Mesmer now and hit 11 last night – I was overwhelmed! The amount of utility for other players this class has I personally think is insane. I couldn’t hold all these traits in my head but from what I gather you can get automatic blind & confusion with a glamour field, reduce its CD – and that’s on top of the awesome chaos armor this class gets?

This build is so mine!

And there’s plenty of build variation where you can focus more on blowing up clones and getting neat effects from the interrupts…I could go on but you’d be scrolling for a while. I’m not kittening all over the warrior, I just wanna ask… is this class really as epic as I think it’s going to be at 80? Or is the damage output inferior compared to the melee classes? Either way I’ll be happy

The damage output is fairly average, and it has its weaknesses (backloaded, nullified by aoe, poor against objects, not very bursty, etc). The strong point of a mesmer is its survivability (don’t read this as the ability to take hits though, we’re kind of like agility tanks). It’s a fun class with a lot of neat tricks, and if you don’t mind trading efficiency for style (in pve) I think you’ll enjoy it a lot.

Our advantage is pvp/wvw just because the mob AI knows where the damage is coming from and clones don’t have any kind of taunt aura. Risen run right at you, poison aura and all.

The damage output looks weaker from just “you”, but when you factor in your phantasms, you’re really coming out on top. They take time to set up, but once they’re all on the field you see the difference.

Really, you’re all professions rolled into one. Greatsword is similar to Ranger’s longbow, sword/torch and sword/pistol work similar to Thief, Scepter/Sword is tanky, staff is support and aoe, etc.

So in short, we are still epic at 80, but soloing takes longer than other professions. Moa Morph and Time Warp to your heart’s delight.

I remember the people rushing up the levels in the class before me were saying that the class was pure dps vs other classes that were more support oriented. I found this hard to believe as to me it was clearly a class focused on AoE buffs / debuffs.

The fact is, there’s a lot of ways to play any class. Warriors can use banners, rangers can use warhorn and spirits, etc.

A mesmer build around staff / condition / glamours is constantly buffing allies while debuffing and reflecting enemies. But you can also focus on GS or shatters and build into just doing direct damage.

Yes, it’s that flexible. If you want to support you can be very good at it. If you want to be a glass cannon you can be good at that. And if you want to be very very hard to kill, you can be good at that too.

I remember starting my mesmer, it was early on and I was all about clones clones clones. I have since discovered you can choose from a pretty good range of niches (though you can’t be all at once ofc). I personally have settled down with condition/confusion & loads of clones, with very low vit but lots of healing power and toughness.

There’s a certain feeling I get from watching enemy players attacking my clones while I stand still and wear them down. Those moments are scattered between teleporting dodging stealhing and all the tricks of course, but they do exist (when I use the +50% clone hp signet). It’s just something I haven’t experienced before online, being able to actually trick the other players.

Mesmer is overall a well designed class. All trait trees are viable and all weapons are more or less useful even in PvP. Coming from the mess that is the ranger, my mes is a breath of fresh air

The Mesmer really shines in PVP and WvW, sadly in PvE they need some improvement. Still my favorite class. o3o

I made a warrior and got him to 80. Made a mesmer afterwards and got her to 80. The warrior is a nicely rounded class, but I haven’t really got back to him since playing as a mesmer.

The mesmer is an amazing class if you understand the mechanics and fall in love with them. It really shines in all facets of play, in my personal opinion. All of the weapons the mesmer brings to the table has its uses and styles.

In general PvE, one thing I found I could do better than the warrior is keep up fighting momentum with multiple mobs and continuous pulls. While I might eventually run out of steam on my warrior and be overwhelmed, the mesmer can really hold its own. It does take time to learn and it does take effort, but it’s definitely rewarding.

In dungeons you definitely offer quite a bit of support and can do decent damage. I think you’ll find that both the mesmer and warrior have different uses in a dungeon, depending on what party you’re bringing and what you’re up against.

In both sPvP and WvW, the mesmer is a monster. You bring amazing utility options to a fight, and various ways to eliminate your opponents. Focus on condition damage and stack confusion and detriments with your staff and scepter. Watch your opponents :melt: themselves. You can focus on berserker stats and get nasty numbers on the greatsword. Suck enemies into a cuddle pile, put a chaos storm on them with your staff, and put time warp on your enemies as you shatter your clones to put confusion on top of that. Stealth your team to confuse the other when you charge them, or create portals to invade a keep when they think they’re safe and repaired their walls.

There’s quite a few ways to weave evil on your opponents, and different ways to output good damage. I dont think the mesmer lacks in damage at all.

The mesmer is also excellent at escaping a bad situation when things get out of hand. Great maneuverability on the battlefield.

Enjoy exploring your means as you level up your mesmer!

Effusion.4831: “not very bursty”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkZoDfN-IZI
rly ? :-D

@effusion
“if you don’t mind trading efficiency for style (in pve) I think you’ll enjoy it a lot.” best line ever

Lewi, do you mind sharing your shatter build? Looks fun.

Yes, mesmers excel beyond the usual gameplay of other professions.

Mesmers are the god class. Although, the nerffix to iB’s LoS means that Mesmers are only “great” in WvW instead of OMGBBQIWIN.

Brb testing confusion damage thresholds with full Carrion gear. I thank all the farmers for the lower current ecto prices.

Edit: Although I may have to l2rapid dungeon to get the kitten Nightmare runes. Sigh. Maybe I’ll just Carrion orb it. Although, the cduration is nice … and Confusion has no breakpoints.

anyone who says mesmer isnt good really has no idea what they are saying. After all these nerfs we still ahve amazing burst/and survivability it is nonsense. I went back to my ranger for alike an hour then stoppped cause it was terrible compared to mesmer

I really dislike the class Mesmer , Everyone knows they are to Overpowerd, And they can confuse you like nothing and just walk away. I think ArenaNet, Should NERF these characters abilitys because it is unfair. None of my characters can kill them…? I GUESS WE, ARE ALL GONNA BECOME A MESMER. You guys mest up there ArenaNet.

Cristina P.6241:

I really dislike the class Mesmer , Everyone knows they are to Overpowerd, And they can confuse you like nothing and just walk away. I think ArenaNet, Should NERF these characters abilitys because it is unfair. None of my characters can kill them…? I GUESS WE, ARE ALL GONNA BECOME A MESMER. You guys mest up there ArenaNet.

Trolls will be trolls, maybe you should actually pvp and see how most classes from ele to warrior can beat a mesmer and spend some time learning the class you want to play.

Cristina P.6241:

I really dislike the class Mesmer , Everyone knows they are to Overpowerd, And they can confuse you like nothing and just walk away. I think ArenaNet, Should NERF these characters abilitys because it is unfair. None of my characters can kill them…? I GUESS WE, ARE ALL GONNA BECOME A MESMER. You guys mest up there ArenaNet.

Yet, on the last count (graph shown by economics guy several weeks ago), Mesmer was the least-played class, along with Engineer.

Lol, … Mest up?

you messed up your spelling on that one. everybody knows that trolls cant spell.

I really wish the game had DPS meters. I think damage output is less about the class and more about the build and what you’re fighting.

Many classes can kill things faster than us.

We shine in being alive when the killing stops

I would hate it if ANet were to introduce a DPS meter. Honestly I think that the game would just become number driven like…. WoW. I used to play it for around 6 months and on occasion there would be guys in dungeons telling me that my ‘numbers weren’t high enough’ and that I’m doing it wrong etc.. which I despised. That’s just my experience and they could’ve been right, but it made me feel the game was cold and lifeless. People had done the math on WoW x1000 and it helped them figure out EXACTLY what was best in the game and what wasn’t viable (but what was actually just slightly less viable)… I know this wouldn’t come from just a DPS meter… rather from game mods.

Anyways, thanks for the feedback guys. I’m level 38 now and still enjoying the hell out of mesmers. I discovered a few things like clones dealing only slight damage, and that chaos armor doesn’t trigger always when hits are close together (i think) but it hasn’t stopped me from loving the profession. I hear alot about this talk of classes being nerfed because of what they are in PvP: speaking as a purely PvE player, I only hope they don’t make PvE-ers suffer for it by nerfing our skills too. Bring the split skills from GW1 back!

PvE for Mesmers is fine, short of Orr DE farming.

I rarely see a mesmer in PvE, but I see them all over in WvW.

As far as “good” goes, I roll stuff in WvW 1v1. I even do lots of damage 1vX. I ran into 4 invaders taking a dolyak last night in eternal. They stayed clustered on a bridge (bad for them, good for me). GS 4 + GS 2 + dodge + F1 and they were all hurting. Dodge again, Mantra of Distraction, GS1, GS2, dodge, some autos, F1 again…

I’m well geared (exotics) but I don’t have the best runes (they are soooo expensive). I suspect a lot of people in WvW are not well geared. In addition, I’m not the best player at PvP, although I think I have an awesome build (20,30,0,0,20) — this is not pure glass cannon as I use valkyrie armor and knights jewelry. Mesmer must be good otherwise I’d get rolled a bit more often.

When I run up against other mesmers in WvW it can be hard. If it’s a staff mesmer, kiss them goodbye. I had a tough fight against another GS mesmer and won, but it was a bit hairy at times.

(GS is amazing in WvW btw… I rarely use my 2nd weapon set)