[Build] Power Buton

[Build] Power Buton

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Posted by: Ross Biddle.2367

Ross Biddle.2367

Introducing Power Buton

Nothing really new. I mostly wanted to put together a new vid on what I’ve been doing lately, and since this forum has been devoid of legit build threads in the last few months it’s now my duty to lavish you all with some good times. I wanted to move away from PU and heavy stealth options (even dropping my fabled torch two-weeks before finishing Rodgort). Thus blocking and interrupts came in to fill the gap.

  • Build is Scepter/Sword, Sword/Focus (Trademark mains and offs, no two-handers here)
  • It’s a raw power/crit build utilizing interrupts and phantasms
  • Good mobility, good landspeed (for a mes anyway with no filthy Travellers).
  • Lots of control
  • Might stacking.
  • Lots of interrupt synergy
  • Low condi cleanse. Kiting and avoidance are your best condi defense.

Now I know this is being published on the heels of the focus and sword DOOM. All of the fights in the vid are recent. Some pre sword nerf, at least the last half post sword nerf. Either way it hasnt effected my build choice despite my stance that the sword change should be reverted, and (obviously) all mesmer bugs fixed with priority.

Last note on the vid. I didn’t make it a straight up string of roflstomp clips. I’ve had a lot of fun fights with this build, and sometimes I got downed or beat. Within the context of those fights I threw it all in to make for a more, hopefully fun and interesting watch

Try it. Enjoy it! If there’s any questions about the synergies and what’s going on in the fights, inquire at your leisure!

~Buton

[Build] Power Buton

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Posted by: trooper.2650

trooper.2650

Ross, I whatched almost all your vids and never seen you going down so often. You either edited your previous vids or this build isn’t as effective (but it is probably fun for you) as the previous were. Obviously PU builds give much more survivability. Yet I am not sure how much sc+sw/sw+f can really save you in a 1v1 vs a good thief thus making the build only partially viable.

I hate saying this but every time I move away from PU and builds with heavy stealth I start having the feeling that all other builds cannot go beyond a certain level of competitiveness. There must be some skill level to be factored in and for sure I am not the best mesmer out there, and in this respect it’s quite comforting to see this video from you

[Build] Power Buton

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Posted by: Ross Biddle.2367

Ross Biddle.2367

Ross, I whatched almost all your vids and never seen you going down so often. You either edited your previous vids or this build isn’t as effective (but it is probably fun for you) as the previous were. Obviously PU builds give much more survivability. Yet I am not sure how much sc+sw/sw+f can really save you in a 1v1 vs a good thief thus making the build only partially viable.

I hate saying this but every time I move away from PU and builds with heavy stealth I start having the feeling that all other builds cannot go beyond a certain level of competitiveness. There must be some skill level to be factored in and for sure I am not the best mesmer out there, and in this respect it’s quite comforting to see this video from you

I completely agree with you about PU and viability. Not just that but stealth. To a certain extent this is also true of having particular weapons on hand in our setup (staff, for example. Purely a survival weapon).

That said, while a good thief might be a hard fight, and certain thieves (condi) are blatently OP right now, the duel block mechanic and interupt setup can wreck a thief. Phantasms, iduelist and iswordsman are especialy potent against thieves. I know I didnt put in any footage vs thieves, but that was because I wasnt recording at those times. Having said that, moving to a glassy power build with minimal stealth has meant the games much harder vs them. The block/riposte, hiding in iWarden, and blurred frenzy are your only real defence, which are also powerful offence vs the glassy class with so few hp’s.

To give you an idea, I fought one thief who was chasing me with some friends far in tow. We tango’d for a bit and both came away with a few scratches. He got caught in a blurred frenzy, but ported away and began to kite. I hit f3 and my clones began to chase. The first hit and interupted, dealing 2k damage, granting 5 stacks of might. As he continued to move the next hit, interrupting his next action, dealing 2.5k and triggering my fire sigil for something like 1.7 + another 5 stacks of might. The next clone hit after that, interrupting again for another 5 might and a 3k interrupt. The thief took a dirt nap and I was left wondering what the hell had happened (I was in withdraw).

With swordmen hitting for 4k crits, sword 4 4k crits, scepter 2 2k crits, interrupt damage, iWarden, blurred frenzy combo, even scepter 3 hitting for 1k per pulse, there’s plenty of damage to take down even the most aggressive thief. vs sword thieves you just have to play defensively. Vs codi… well, the meta is skewed horribly against mesmers no matter how you look at it. It’s skewed horribly against everybody.

Don’t get me wrong. I like playing a build that’s hard to take down. I enjoyed being able to go up against a number of opponents and sustain myself for a really long time. Holy Hell, Hybrid builds could do that. It’s just that since the last patch and the way in which the meta has been sliding, it has actually become unviable to run those builds to good effect. You can survive with the use of PU. But everybody else out there has not only learned to survive, but they’ve bridged the gap between merely surviving and using the tools that’ve been made available to them in order to actually kill. New Runes. New Sigils. Conditions spam. It’s all become a bit much. Maybe I’ll go down (and I am still new to the build), but I’m gonna be taking a hell of a lot of people down with me.

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Posted by: trooper.2650

trooper.2650

do you do any spvp at all? Which build do you use?
I was running a phant build which I enjoyed sooo much (4/4/0/6/0). I was dueling this thief… he stealthed. I had three phantasms out: 2 zerkers and 1 duelist. They barely scratched him. He was one of those perma evasion thieves always flipping and jumping over your head. I was so frustrated… if I was with my condi napalm build I would have eaten him.

I still like the build but I was thinking of changing weapon sets. This is the reason I appreciated your video. I wanted to see how you’d perform with double block… I am thorn whether to go with sc/sw or sc/pistol. The other set would be either staff or sw/focus. Purely a phantasm build (the increased phant HP from trait AND sigil works very well in conditions with high AoE spam. Exception zergs vs zergs in wvw, of course).

One more question. Since it is purely a phantasm build, would you drop DE so that you do not overwrite them? I played without it long time ago but if I can choose… well I take it. What you say?

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Posted by: Absconditus.6804

Absconditus.6804

I totally thought this was a troll topic that’d just say we should all hit our Power Buttons to turn off our PC’s, instead of playing Mesmer with all the bugs we have and the recent fixes.

Vella Absconditus | Human Mesmer
Seafarer’s Rest

[Build] Power Buton

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Posted by: EnderzShadow.2506

EnderzShadow.2506

Would you say you’ve optimized the build ‘gear wise’?

Is there anything you’ve thought about doing or trying out? Any changes you haven’t yet experimented with?

Lastly, could you play this build highly defensive, more toughness etc?

Shadowbane DarkAges Of Camelot WoW AION WarHammer GuildWars2

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Posted by: Ross Biddle.2367

Ross Biddle.2367

do you do any spvp at all? Which build do you use?
I was running a phant build which I enjoyed sooo much (4/4/0/6/0). I was dueling this thief… he stealthed. I had three phantasms out: 2 zerkers and 1 duelist. They barely scratched him. He was one of those perma evasion thieves always flipping and jumping over your head. I was so frustrated… if I was with my condi napalm build I would have eaten him.

I still like the build but I was thinking of changing weapon sets. This is the reason I appreciated your video. I wanted to see how you’d perform with double block… I am thorn whether to go with sc/sw or sc/pistol. The other set would be either staff or sw/focus. Purely a phantasm build (the increased phant HP from trait AND sigil works very well in conditions with high AoE spam. Exception zergs vs zergs in wvw, of course).

One more question. Since it is purely a phantasm build, would you drop DE so that you do not overwrite them? I played without it long time ago but if I can choose… well I take it. What you say?

I do spvp a little. I find the atmosphere, balance wise, different. I run zerk with some variation of dom, dueling, and chaos. Similar to this build but with some variation between it and tghe Holy Hell build. I was using torch for the longest time, so PU, or torch condi cleanse. Or CI instead of PU running iWarden iLeap blurred frenzy combo’s for long imob duration. Or… well i tried out a lot of things. OH sword has been a recent addition for me, and so I’ve only recently had it in spvp.

I don’t consider this a purely phantasm build. Reason being that there’s more optimal ways to build a phantasm build. That, and if you approach it like you would a phantasm build, you’re undermining a lot of your resources. The build has a high clone output and you’d be wrong to not use those clones with your shatters. iWarden great for the interrupt imob burst combo, but after that he’s usually good for a shatter. iSwordsman is the only phant you’re going to want to really want to keep out and stack, and sometimes he dies. Every time I’m in scepter/sword I’m thinking to myself “blind or block, block or daze” and playing into that is “block + clone?”. If I’m blocking I’m stopping an incoming attack and producing a clone. With two consecutive blocks I’m two clones up (plus that riposte damage). Produce a third, or have an iWarden out and I’m happy to shatter. I’m either using Diversion for more interrupts, or Mind Wrack for straight damage. Then getting back into the clone summons.

So would I drop DE? It occurred to me yesterday that I could simply because I have the clones on block + scepter auto generation which just happens as you go. That said, when I want a clone I’ll always get one with DE so I like it a lot. It’s always there to, say, give me a +X clone heal when I need it. The question is what would I take in it’s place? There’s a few options, but DE is a solid choice.

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Posted by: Ross Biddle.2367

Ross Biddle.2367

Would you say you’ve optimized the build ‘gear wise’?

Is there anything you’ve thought about doing or trying out? Any changes you haven’t yet experimented with?

Lastly, could you play this build highly defensive, more toughness etc?

Have I crunched the numbers for optimization? No. I’ve pretty much gone “Ok, I’m going zerk with a bit of cav to up my toughness, and I like the around about of these numbers”. That’s good enough for me. If you’d like to crunch some then be my guest. I’m also not pedantic about it because I don’t enjoy grinding gear. Unlike my guildies, I don’t get to sit around all day playing GW2, farming gold, level alts, and generally having whatever I want. When I play it’s straight into WvW on my Mesmer, which I’ve done almost exclusively for the past two years. I have a set of cav ascended trinkets, rabid, dire, and now a couple zerk.

As for tweaks and changes, yeah I have played around with a few things. When I GvG for my guild there’s a few alternative setups to go with depending on what you want that utilize the interrupts and hard phantasm hits. This is working as a small pick team too. So you might go 20, 30, 20, putting boon removal on shatter in the major to help with your interrupts, and to add team utility. Or 10, 30, 30, with CI in chaos’ Grandmaster so you can really lockdown a target and the team can pick them off (arcane thievery to strip stability, curtain pull interrupt, iWarden on top of that into iLeap, blurred frenzy. Meanwhile Killshot warrior pops an undogable cap. Target’s down, thief stomps.) You can also add more CC into the build by swapping master of manipulation for debilitating dissipation. That’ll introduce weakness to the mix which will ruin your enemies damage output.

As far as a defensive variation goes, I assume you’re asking for sPvP and bunkering cap points without the use of stealth? If so, you can do a decent job of holding a point for longer with iWarden and scepter/sword blocks. You can even kill an aggressor in a zerk setup. But it’s very risky, especially when it turns into a 2v1, or you encounter the ever over abundant condi nade spam engies. If you’re talking about going full bunker, tank, healing, condi cleanse mesmer then there are ways to approach it. But I’m not sure I’d want to. Unless you can kill or drive off an opponent, they’re only going to whittle you down or push you off the point. In which case you’ve only really built to lose. Fact is if you want to bunker effectively there are better classes for the job.

If you’re talking WvW, and just want more toughness, there are options for you such as full cav trinkets, and 30 in chaos (drop 10 from dom, or give up 10 from dueling). The trouble is that you’re going to come up against opponents who you’re not going to be able to break because you’ve shaved off your damage for more toughness. That’s just the sad state of things atm, especially for the mesmer. And that extra toughness might not even be enough to sustain you. Toughness is great, I love having more of it than not. But as a Mesmer you want to try and get to a point where you’re using every little trick, from traits, gear, weapon skills, utilities, terrain, the environment (that blink to the griffins when the necro got me down wasn’t random, and that mesmer didn’t defeat me at the start by luck, he knew his GS and the opportunity struck him), and your enemies limitations in order to survive. That’ll allow you move away from things like toughness which you can exchange for raw dps and an offensive that puts your enemies on the back foot. Thieves for example aren’t perturbed by how much toughness you have. They are however pushed back by raw damage and hard hits. That you appear weak actually serves to draw them in. You just have to figure out how to turn that overconfidence around and crush them.

(edited by Ross Biddle.2367)

[Build] Power Buton

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Posted by: Greyalis.2309

Greyalis.2309

nice build, I will definitely use some of these ideas. I’m also now playing around with 4/4/3/3 mainly trying to keep a bit of offensive but taking the 3 in chaos and 3 in inspiration for the regeneration from phantasms and then the protection. So far I have gotten regen and protection but how often or how close to phantasms you have to be is iffy. I was playing around with even using Grove runes for the healing and protection—not sure if its worth it though, like you said a Mesmer can only be so tough anyway so might as well try to put out as much damage as possible while kiting.

Self Is The Emblem All

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Posted by: Ross Biddle.2367

Ross Biddle.2367

If you’re going for an all in Phantasm build, then Inspiration offers you so much.

I definitely agree with the 3 in chaos. Take Pack runes if you care to. It’s a boon to your damage, and with chaos when you get struck you’re going to have your bar light up with all your essential boons. Protection is going to soak up a lot of damage but no rune set is going to provide you enough all around coverage to rely on it. Try to find other means to sustain and survive. If you do want or need protection, take PU. You can drop 10 from domination and even put desperate decoy as a dueling choice. That’s two sorces of invis without needing a torch, and you still have mass invis for when the kitten hits the fan.