Guild Wars 2

G’day all,

I’m leveling up my Mesmer and wanted your thoughts on this PvE build:
http://tinyurl.com/bxkmnx7 (goes to gw2skills.net)

It uses the scepter and torch to cause blindness to prevent damage, while pounding on confusion.
Blindness comes from Scepter 2, Torch 4, and Signet of Midnight.
IX Blinding Befuddlement in Illusions makes blind cause confusion.
Scepter 3 and Torch 5 help keep the confusion up.
Although all shatters add confusion, the idea is to keep illusions up to take any damage for you and deal damage through retaliation.
Phantasms have retaliation so will deal damage when hit, and Phantasmal Mage will give it to clones.
Mage and Disenchanter will give regen to nearby allies, while Disenchanter will keep a level playing field.
Illusions give bleeding on crits.
Shattering is either a last resort, or something to do when all the illusion skills are off refresh and a new stock can be created quickly.
Scepter 1.3 overwrites an illusion with a clone, also causing confusion.
Condition durations (blind, confusion, burning, bleeding) are extended 23% through runes and Domination trait points (this build editor didn’t have Runes of the Mad King, although those are rather costly anyway).

How does this look?

To be honest, it looks like it could work better in PvP. Confusion is a killer condition there because people use skills frequently, but in PvE mob take actions seldomly though when they do, they are more powerful than the damage you inflict with confusion.

Smirgel.9460:

To be honest, it looks like it could work better in PvP. Confusion is a killer condition there because people use skills frequently, but in PvE mob take actions seldomly though when they do, they are more powerful than the damage you inflict with confusion.

Yeah, I was wondering if it was better for PvP, but I don’t do that at all. And you’re right about frequency of skill use. Waiting for foes to kill themselves with confusion seems crazily slow.

I leveled a mesmer all the way to 40 in beta with a similar build, mind had almost 100% of the damage output invested in confusion though, you just have to use it differently than you would in PvP.

Observe and hit the mob at the right time. Some mobs aggro on your clones, some don’t, I don’t know why, but as a basic rule you want to stay in close if it aggros on you, and away if it doesn’t

If the mob aggros on your clones let it take the swing and damage itself or blow up your clone for extra confusion right before the hit. If he insists on aggroing you get up to him quickly so as not to waste precious seconds of confusion, and bait it into attacking.

The prestige is the best skill for baiting, use it as often as possible and use it right in the mobs face, it’ll miss and take damage, and because you dropped aggro by stealthing it will aggro on your clones. Do the same thing with your dodges and illusory counter. I used dual swords off-hand just for the extra evasion and blind, and I really recommend it.

Traits can vary, but you absolutely have to get the blind->confusion trait as early as possible. And, most importantly, you need balls of steel, you’re going to have to be right in the enemies face as a squishy with a ranged weapon and still have the presence of mind to cycle through your blinds, evasion, and dodges in proper time; and not blow them all in a panic when something goes wrong.

I found for PvE it takes so much time to finish the fight that I now keep a Sword/Sword in my other weapon slot and use it for trash creatures, and the blind/confusion for veterans and above.
It’s a slight pity I can’t have one trait build for one weapon set, and another for the other.

I use a Blind/Confusion build in PvP but it really isn’t effective for PvE. Note that if you want more AoE blind then there is a trait which causes your Glamours to inflict blindness.

My PvP Blind/Confusion build is pretty effective, but very different from what you run.

20 Dom
-Adept V: Crippling Dissipation
-Master VIII: Confusing Enchantments
20 Chaos:
-Adept V: Debilitating Dissipation
-Master X: Chaotic Dampening
30 Illusion:
-Adept V: Master of Misdirection
-Master VIII: Dazzling Glamours
-Grandmaster IX: Blinding Befuddlement

Scepter/Torch & Staff. Sigils are up to you, but avoid on crit effects.
Runes do 2 Lyssa 4 Nightmare

Ether Feast, Feedback, Null Field, Blink, Elite is up to you.

You have +73% Confusion duration with this build and 40% for everything else.
Open with iMage (it has 1200 range, so you can cast it before you’re in range for anything else.), then double tap scepter 2 for a quick blind and channel Scepter 3. If necessary you can toss out Feedback during the channel without interrupting it. This will blind, confuse and reflect ranged attacks. If they move out of it then they take more confusion. Then you spam skill 1 for as long as you can avoid attacks (I like having a sigil of energy on both sets), do a CoF for 6 more stacks of confusion. Use The Prestige if someone closes in on melee, blinding and confusing more.

Switch to staff once all of your blinds/dodges are blown. Now you play defensively, trying to maximize uptime of Chaos Armor with skill 4 and Phase retreat combos (you should have 3-4 Fields to combo off of). Chaos Armor makes you harder to kill and will inflict confusion 2/3 times you are hit. I’ve had a Hundred Blades warrior give himself over 10 stacks of Confusion just by hitting me.

In big group fights you can do some pretty impressive confusion stacking by overlapping your fields in a vin diagram format over the capture point. Portals are excellent for this too. Double tap a portal when someone is on you and the stacking potential is nasty. The 90s CD hurts though.

Blind confusion glamour build in action in a organiced team, several mesmers with the spec and a necro blinding aswell. Enjoy

/osicat

One doubt I have on feedback with blind, the people inside, does it still make them damage themselves? Or they would start missing themselves? lol
From the vídeo Osicat posted it seems they still hit themselves, but was just wanting to make sure.

Dan.8709:

One doubt I have on feedback with blind, the people inside, does it still make them damage themselves? Or they would start missing themselves? lol
From the vídeo Osicat posted it seems they still hit themselves, but was just wanting to make sure.

Reflection skills are… odd. As in they don’t behave the way one would expect. As far as I’ve seen…

1) When a projectile is fired at a Reflection-based field, it is first negated. Then it is fired back in the direction of the projectile source, following the same flight path it normally would but the source is from the Reflection field.

2) This means the reflected projectile’s new source is you, not the enemy. Hence while the enemy’s Blindness is counted for on the attack, the reflected projectile will still deal damage, assuming you yourself were not Blinded.

3) As mentioned above, the reflected projectile inherits your stats, such Crit chance, Crit damage and Weakness. Furthermore, if you have other on-crit effects, it will also trigger, e.g. Superior Sigil of Fire will trigger from a reflected projectile.

4) The reflected projectile will also receive Combo effects if the Reflection was from a Combo Field, i.e. you will get a Confusion Bolt combo with Feedback, while Wall of Reflection gives Cleansing Bolts.

Ojimaru.8970:

Dan.8709:

One doubt I have on feedback with blind, the people inside, does it still make them damage themselves? Or they would start missing themselves? lol
From the vídeo Osicat posted it seems they still hit themselves, but was just wanting to make sure.

Reflection skills are… odd. As in they don’t behave the way one would expect. As far as I’ve seen…

1) When a projectile is fired at a Reflection-based field, it is first negated. Then it is fired back in the direction of the projectile source, following the same flight path it normally would but the source is from the Reflection field.

2) This means the reflected projectile’s new source is you, not the enemy. Hence while the enemy’s Blindness is counted for on the attack, the reflected projectile will still deal damage, assuming you yourself were not Blinded.

3) As mentioned above, the reflected projectile inherits your stats, such Crit chance, Crit damage and Weakness. Furthermore, if you have other on-crit effects, it will also trigger, e.g. Superior Sigil of Fire will trigger from a reflected projectile.

4) The reflected projectile will also receive Combo effects if the Reflection was from a Combo Field, i.e. you will get a Confusion Bolt combo with Feedback, while Wall of Reflection gives Cleansing Bolts.

Oh, now I can certainly see how it works, it’s a lot better than I thought.
Thanks so much for your response, was really great and taught be quite a bit!