Guild Wars 2

Hey so i was wondering what the best mesmer build only for PVE would be? is it phantasm or shatter? berserker or rabid? from tomorrow i am starting to craft my mesmer to level 80, i have gold put aside for the cost of the crafting, in pvp and wvw i will use shatter mesmer, even so it may not be so viable in pvp due to it being considered weak since the meta changed but none the less i still have fun shattering nubs, but when it comes to pve such as dungeons/fractals what is the top dog mesmer build, would like to hear what build it would be in your opinion and why you think it is the best? if i took a guess id say berserker shatter would be the best build in pve due to the distortions high dps etc, would like to hear from more of the pve mesmer veterans. Thanks.

It depends on the content. 10/30/0/0/30 GS + Sw/Sw shatterway is probably best for roaming since you can burst everything down easily in one shot. For dungeons, I like 0/20/0/25/25 phantasmway with Sw/P + Sw/F for higher sustained DPS on bosses. Phantasms are ridiculously strong against high-HP mobs like dungeon bosses and open-world champs but they take a few seconds to ramp up, which is a few seconds more than it takes to kill most non-elite trash mobs.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

10/30/0/0/30 GS + Sw/Sw shatterway is probably best for roaming since you can burst everything down easily in one shot.

Mind to elaborate this a bit more (e.g. traits, utility etc.)?

TIA

Basically, drop your two phantasms and by then the enemy is dead.

For fractals the 0/20/0/25/25 is ok.

But bring a GS instead of the OH pistol.

full zerker

For open world roaming, 20/20/0/0/30, at least IMHO, still outclasses all other builds. Most things are dead till you get close anyway, so GS is the preffered weapon. Phantasm skills simply recharge too slow and they die to fast with the mob they are cast on.
The AoE capability is beyond all other weapons, helps alot in events to tag mobs.

Give it a try.

If recharge is too slow, you don’t need to trait your greatsword and the 100+ precision, 10%+ crit damage and extra trait in dueling is better, like in Guang’s mentioned build.

I won’t reopen the discussion between +100 power vs +100 precision in berserker gear. Traited GS has incredibly short cooldowns, that is the point of ranged dmg while running around the map.
Retraiting is cheap, he can try both builds and choose what fits him better… ^^

Kaiyanwan.8521:

I won’t reopen the discussion between +100 power vs +100 precision in berserker gear. Traited GS has incredibly short cooldowns, that is the point of ranged dmg while running around the map.
Retraiting is cheap, he can try both builds and choose what fits him better… ^^

The power vs. precision is irrelevant (although the precision is clearly better). What you care about is the +16% damage you’ll get from the mantras. That’s a pretty massive chunk of damage to be giving up in exchange for 1.3 seconds off your GS clone and 3.2 seconds off the phantasm.

Something like this is what you want, specifically.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQBYEB1DsT7+OSFatSP4tLU2A

Run in, throw GS clones, swap to sword and make sword clone, shatter. If target isn’t dead, make a Swordsman and auto-attack, it shouldn’t take much longer than that.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/List-Find-your-Mesmer-Builds-Guides/page/3#post2722187

This is a thread to a build/guide list. Covers pretty much every build made by those who know what they are doing. Check it out, it has plenty of pve build for you to try.

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

The power vs. precision is irrelevant (although the precision is clearly better). What you care about is the +16% damage you’ll get from the mantras. That’s a pretty massive chunk of damage to be giving up in exchange for 1.3 seconds off your GS clone and 3.2 seconds off the phantasm.

Something like this is what you want, specifically.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQBYEB1DsT7+OSFatSP4tLU2A

Run in, throw GS clones, swap to sword and make sword clone, shatter. If target isn’t dead, make a Swordsman and auto-attack, it shouldn’t take much longer than that.

Silly question. Damage wise, what about a mantra nuker (30/30/0/0/10)?

I think that’s the Lupicus build.

Empowering Mantras unfortunately doesn’t work with Phant builds …

Mantra burst builds (30/30/x) are not meant for open world. Recharging the mantras will only harm with multiple opponents. It’s a pvp build.

colesy.8490:

I think that’s the Lupicus build.

No, Lupicus variant is 10/30/0/20/10.

20/30/20 is good enough too for pve roaming and stuff. and its for lazy players, cos u dont have to bother with utilities that much^^.
i recommend multiple weapon and armor setups, cos u can tweak your build into some directions (pure mantra glasscannon, sensotixs styled interrupt build with solid to very good stacks of might and vulnerabilty asf).
u can use, like me ^^, greatsword + scepter/pistol or even gs/staff (cd reduction traits).

actually i run around with maxed boon-duration tryin to tweak my setup in sensotixs bounty-build.

if u dont bother about not being a maxed out dps char, u have plenty of space to experiment with your armors and weapons.

my actual gear, which is probably an average casual “krautundrüben”-setup ;D, has these stats
around 3100 attack
around 1500 toughness
around 60% crit with food and stacks
around 70% critdamage
around 17k to 19.5k hitpoints depending on weapon setup and armor
condition duration 30% (i still cant decide between cond duration and boonduration armor ^^, but with mainly berserker gear u go just power/crit anyway)

all in all decent amount of stats and in a nutshell its all about mantra dmg boost and cooldowns for gs and pistol or staff (or sword if u prefer. unfortunately for me no scepter trait is available ^^) + u can go full offensive or more defensive with traits and gear.
big downside is the lack of team utilities, if u dont wanna sacrifice mantras for them. but hey, u cant get it all ^^.

@Ryn

No, that’s just Brazil’s Arah build.

Like I said, 30/30/0/0/10. Compounding Power to make feedback hit harder, traited mantras again to make your feedback hit harder, plus the raw stats from going 30 in the two top trait lines means stronger feedbacks (and the precision = more reflect crits).

@hardloop

OP asked for the best build, not post whatever the hell you want builds.

Ryn.6459:

Silly question. Damage wise, what about a mantra nuker (30/30/0/0/10)?

30/30/0/0/10 builds took a hit with the change of illusionists celerity from 5 to 25 illusions. I still have not yet decided what to do with mine, but it feels no longer optimal.

colesy.8490:

@hardloop

OP asked for the best build, not post whatever the hell you want builds.

so then mr. communicationtheory can answer me the question what the hell he meant with “best build for pve”

1. best dps
2. best roaming build
3. best allover no trouble build
4. best dungeon build

or
maybe

5. best mr. coleslaws personal and therefor opinion for all theory about what is “best” for evryone?

He asked “what is the top dog mesmer build”.

The quality of a PvE build boils down purely to DPS since no survival stats or traits are needed. This makes 10/30/0/0/30 the best for raw damage, like Guang said. Dungeons however, you need to actually be useful since other classes do sheer DPS better than us, or at least more reliably, so sacrificing 10 in dueling and domination, and 5 in illusions for 25 in inspiration (to make up for the phantasm damage loss, traiting your focus and reduced glamour cooldowns for chaining reflects) leaves us with 0/20/0/25/25 which gives us utility and as much DPS as possible with our remaining 45 trait points.

If you want to be smug or arrogant I don’t care, just don’t trick the OP with a build that’s bad for what he wants to do.

People are still wasting points to get IC? I thought we all got past that months ago.

Illusionist’s Celerity and Phantasmal Haste increases our practical DPS by giving us longer phantasm uptime through faster cooldowns (since they tend to need replacing) and the faster recharge again increases DPS because it means they’ll get more hits in before getting killed.

Compounding Power also makes reflected projectiles hit back harder which is useful.

Ayrilana.1396:

People are still wasting points to get IC? I thought we all got past that months ago.

yep was discussed and after 2 days of tests almost everyone jumped back to IC in a way or another.

Ayrilana.1396:

People are still wasting points to get IC? I thought we all got past that months ago.

I would harldy call it a waste if you choose a shatter heavy build… ^^
Still, a 10/30/0/0/30 is not an ideal roaming build in PvE. It has the raw damage, but things are dead if you use a GS till you even get close. GS2 has a cooldown of 4.8s if traited, by far the fastes clone generater with some serious damage (even if you are not getting the might buff, if you are out or range) and AoE capabilities.

No other weapon will get you more tags in large scale events, Berserker is fire and forget with AoE. Some people don’t like the GS (I’m looking at you cosley ^^), but nothing can come even close to it in open word PvE roaming. Till someone has switched from GS to sword and back, traited GS will have done the job, twice…

I like 0/20/0/25/25 for pve, because I find quick phantasms beats harder hitting ones, and is slightly more active/fun. However, I so very much wish I could play something less phantasm-reliant and still feel as useful.

In open world though, I think most build works well but I almost always use GS/staff as weapons because they are the best tagging weapons in my opinion, and provide decent perks for you and possible others. Staff actually beats Greatsword at times, but remember that it works much better in near melee range than at range in this regard. I usually use the same build unless I’m using something else for variety, but might change in Illusionary Elasticity for more Aoe tags. Its phantasm also gets monstrous hits on debuffed champs.

Phantasms do better in longer sustained fights. Shatter does better on trash and burst. I like 10/30/0/0/30 as you can change traits around to bolster one or the other. If your group gives you a few seconds to retrait before bosses this build is quite versatile. I like to run Sword/Pistol, Sword/Sword and Staff with this depending on the situation. iLock targeting something with a pile of conditions can do some serious damage over a longer fight.

Blood~

Bloodgruve.6038:

Phantasms do better in longer sustained fights. Shatter does better on trash and burst. I like 10/30/0/0/30 as you can change traits around to bolster one or the other. If your group gives you a few seconds to retrait before bosses this build is quite versatile. I like to run Sword/Pistol, Sword/Sword and Staff with this depending on the situation. iLock targeting something with a pile of conditions can do some serious damage over a longer fight.

Blood~

for once someone made sense on this forum section when talking about pve build, thank you.

Identifying the “best” build for pve is too subjective. Even so, I will throw in my subjective consideration and say phantasms are the way to go. Frontloaded, shatter burst builds in pve is far too much work for such a casual environment.

So much text, keep it short and clear

Overall, what you need in PvE as Mesmer is damage and reflection (!!!). Your main damage comes from phantasms and reflection traits fits well weith phantasms.

Go 20/20/0/30/0 or 10/30/0/30/0. Your phantasms deal 30% additional damage wich is everything you’ve ever dreamed of.

0/20/0/25/25 deals great dps while having really short cds

Without IC you find yourself too often waiting for next CD, with IC you have Always a phantasms ready to replace.

In real game means you can do more sustained damage due to reliability.
Also better support.

I don’t understand why people suggest 20/20/0/30/0.

Is there some trait in domination besides Empowered Illusions that’s actually worth taking?

You can go 10/30 if you want some clones on evasion but 25 at Duelling is crappy :P you go there more for precision and crit damage.
I prefer 20/20 because there is a trait that crippels enemies for 4 or 5 seconds whenever a clone dies. It sounds meh but it’s one of the better traits we got. The cripple is aoe with a range same as the chaos storm… also your illusion will go BOOM instead of poof xD If you play GS only (I often switch with staff so I don’t do it :P) you also could get the 20% CDR and damage for GS.

colesy.8490:

I don’t understand why people suggest 20/20/0/30/0.

Is there some trait in domination besides Empowered Illusions that’s actually worth taking?

GS mastery .

Helps to spam lot of illusion, but that is more a shatter hybrid trait.

Oh lord.

People actually trait that awful weapon?

colesy.8490:

I don’t understand why people suggest 20/20/0/30/0.

Is there some trait in domination besides Empowered Illusions that’s actually worth taking?

20 in Power for GS traits cause they’re too stubborn to drop the crappy GS, i guess.
(ninjia’ed)

For me best build(s) is either

10/30/0/30/0
10/30/0/0/30
0/20/0/25/25

Depending on weapons used, content, preferences.

Swapping around with Sword + Pistol, Sword, Focus and a Staff or GS as backup from time to time (using it very rarely tho).

Youtube:

Mesmer fractal

checked only first 4 vids high level fotms 50+

100% of them use GS.

I bet most of them uses GS.
Learn to respect Others opinion sometimes.

I don’t care who uses it, it’s a lousy weapon.

The only time a mesmer should consider using it is when dealing with trash, or when the rest of the party has gone range too. We have a fat HP pool (more than 11k HP 10/30/0/5/25 guards can say), we’re in a party of glass cannons, and yet we’re ranging?

Like I’ve said in a thread before, I think mesmers just got in to the bad habit of using the weapon and couldn’t break out of it.

I saw the mesmer in Define’s speed videos using GS and staff in TA and SE and I still think it was completely pointless to do so.

Colesy. what if i use 10/10/25/25 instead of 0/20/25/25 because i feel that im losing quite a bit without empowered illusions. or Is it that important to get 20 in dueling for the bleed and pistol cooldown?

The loss in crit chance, crit damage, sharper images and no pistol cooldown will be enough of a DPS loss to make empowered illusions not worth taking. If you want more phantasm damage, use a sigil of either bloodlust or perception and sigil of battle in your off-hands.

I agree with cloesy, GS isn’t that great weapon as everyone thinks… It’s damage is lower than the 1hS but the GS has huge AoE burst and a safe distance. But thx to 1hS 2 it’s safe aswell

GS is great for trakitten has an awesome phantasm, 3 is “ok”, 2 is pretty good too, it has an aoe interrupt but after casting everything, its aa is weak. However, if you attack the right target, you may hit 3 enemies at once (hidden op: Scepter hits 5 with 3 ;D). Thats why I only use it for 2, 4, 3, 2, 1… SWAP -> I swap every 10 sec, so I can enjoy my sigill wich grants me 6 stacks might forever

But in the end I can just quote colesy: Sword > [enter weapon here] :P However I would never use it 2 times as swap-mesmer.

I think you just don’t like the idea of having the same main hand weapon on both weapon sets.

You get used to it after a while.

LordByron.8369:

Youtube:

Mesmer fractal

checked only first 4 vids high level fotms 50+

100% of them use GS.

I bet most of them uses GS.
Learn to respect Others opinion sometimes.

i have done thousands of fractals, do a lev48 daily and GS is my main. That guy doesn’t do fractals but easy mode CoF path 1 instead so yeaaa.

I haven’t done CoF p1 since … when were the champ bags added?

I use it as an example sometimes to explain concepts for people since basically everybody has done it so they’d understand.

Nuka Cola.8520:

LordByron.8369:

Youtube:

Mesmer fractal

checked only first 4 vids high level fotms 50+

100% of them use GS.

I bet most of them uses GS.
Learn to respect Others opinion sometimes.

i have done thousands of fractals, do a lev48 daily and GS is my main. That guy doesn’t do fractals but easy mode CoF path 1 instead so yeaaa.

These.

For fracs48, ranging bosses (final dredge boss, both grawl shaman and grawl elemental [though keep melee on switch for the bubble], jellyfish, mossman, bloomhunger, archdiviner, phase 2 of ascalon boss) is required for almost any non well-coordinated group; and thus GS is a very solid weapon for fracs48 and our best ranged option. The final bosses of snowblind and uncategorized are fine to melee, but I always have my GS on switch for them just in case (as I do with fracs48 trash as well, I melee but keep my GS with energy sigil if I need to get out due to damage). Given how lvl48 fractals are, calling GS lousy seems as if they are being overlooked.

Dungeons, on the other hand, like CoF, CoE, most arah bosses (pugged lupicus withstanding), TA, AC, etc are perfect venues for sword/x and sword/x, and is definitely the way to go since the boss tells are usually pretty obvious.

These.

For fracs48, ranging bosses (final dredge boss

Dredge boss can be melee’d without even superheating it.

both grawl shaman

…dodge?

grawl elemental

yes

jellyfish

…except I never talk about underwater content which is awful. even then I’m pretty sure there’s a full melee video at 48 from obal.

mossman

no

bloomhunger

camping behind and dodging aoe does not require you to range

archdiviner

lol. reflect the projectiles, spam autoattack and frenzy/dodge when he actually does something is hard?

phase 2 of ascalon boss

yes

is required for almost any non well-coordinated group

i’d have thought being on your own in melee would have reduced the clutter and made it easier to melee

GS is still terrible, please stop convincing players to use it when not necessary

colesy.8490:

These.

For fracs48, ranging bosses (final dredge boss

Dredge boss can be melee’d without even superheating it.

both grawl shaman

…dodge?

grawl elemental

yes

jellyfish

…except I never talk about underwater content which is awful. even then I’m pretty sure there’s a full melee video at 48 from obal.

mossman

no

bloomhunger

camping behind and dodging aoe does not require you to range

archdiviner

lol. reflect the projectiles, spam autoattack and frenzy/dodge when he actually does something is hard?

phase 2 of ascalon boss

yes

is required for almost any non well-coordinated group

i’d have thought being on your own in melee would have reduced the clutter and made it easier to melee

GS is still terrible, please stop convincing players to use it when not necessary

If you want to take an hour on the dredge boss, sure. Realistically you should probably at least superheat him before trying to melee. And if you’re in a bad pug you definitely want to range, because good luck trying to burst him down with 4 bearbows in your party.

GS is still bad though.

I was actually making the point that the dredge boss is so meleeable that people can even do it without superheating.

To be honest, if I was in a group with bearbows I’d have left before even entering the portal. I really want to give rangers a chance, but it’s just that the players are bad and they can’t hide behind hundred blades/whirlwind like a warrior can.

Threre are so many mesmer threads on this forum … but they all escalate with colesy, me, some random guys, the ot and allways about the “swordsword VS gs” thing xD
NEVER ENDING CIRCLE

Because i think the fact 99% mesmes uses GS as backup weapon is already meaningful

And the only point that have been made is “who uses GS sucks” that can be translated in “all but colesy sucks at mesmer”.

I would add that too many players take as excuses runs in uberoptimized guard/war parties in wich i could easily finish anything moa morphed…….

It happened many times to me…….
In those party you can even use GS melee and succeed….then post"stop using sword….its bad…use GS melee"

I have been trying a lot of builds here lately and though I am not as experienced as you guys are, so far the easiest method for zone clearing (map completion) is GS S/F. I generally only use sword/focus for the swiftness and then I suppose I use it for veterans and if a champ event spawns or something. I trait mantras and Gs with as many " + X% damage" boosts as I can get and trash mobs usually die with a single GS2→dodge→f1. GS is the fastest weap for zone clearing isn’t it? or am I just missing something. I fully understand that sword does way more deeps but hell, I usually never in melee range unless its a vet or higher.

Oh and I just bought volcanus.. so please tell me its good for map clearing :X