Guild Wars 2

Grats!

I run a tweaked blackwater build in WvW as well. It’s a lot of fun 1vX and I’ve not lost a 1v1 in a really long time.

Hi xavi, you use full rabid for your variant? Would superior sigil of doom be better for this? I noticed that after I replaced my superior sigil of energy with superior sigil of doom, my survivability went down but dps went up.

Death, mind sharing your setup as well??

MountainPanda.5831:

Hi xavi, you use full rabid for your variant? Would superior sigil of doom be better for this? I noticed that after I replaced my superior sigil of energy with superior sigil of doom, my survivability went down but dps went up.

Death, mind sharing your setup as well??

This is what I currently use.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNArfWlwzKqXQTmGb9IipHBHyBckUUavWJF62FC-jgCBYhAINLakWQZkEJQ5QFRjtMsIasKZCpaGY6YR2jATKAImGB-e

-For Sigils, I chose 2 x Battle over Purity & Blood. However, I have been thinking of trying Sigils of Doom possibly.
-For utilities, I often use Signet of Domination, Null Field or Portal.
-I did choose some ascended rabid pieces with vitality which helps against conditions however with the Applied Fort buff and possibly Bloodlust buff, I will probably switch those back to pure Rabid.
-Lastly, after I get a 25 stack of Corruption, I switch out to a different Torch that has Sigil of Bursting (+6% Condition Damage)

MountainPanda.5831:

Hi xavi, you use full rabid for your variant? Would superior sigil of doom be better for this? I noticed that after I replaced my superior sigil of energy with superior sigil of doom, my survivability went down but dps went up.

Death, mind sharing your setup as well??

What I’m currently using: http://tinyurl.com/m82qpgl

It’s basically a carbon copy of the original, but with a few tweaks.

Runes: I use Superior Runes of the Nightmare mainly because I’m using a full set of TA gear, but it worked so well when I first tried it, I stuck with it. Also with all the complains and QQs going around about perplexity runes, I don’t have to feel bad about winning since I don’t use them.

Sigils: swapped out sigils of corruption and blood for Superior Sigils of Energy. More clone pooping with DE when need be. I plan on swapping out purity as well, but haven’t really gotten around to doing it.

Trinkets: I don’t actually have ascended rings, but the rest are as they are displayed on the build maker. My current rings are rare carrion rings with chrysocola gems, but I plan on changing them soon. Still haven’t lost a 1v1 in a really long time though.

Traits: all the same except the fact that I added Desperate Decoy. I’ve read that it’s buggy but it has been working for me and I’ve been very happy with it.

Utilities: same as the original, but I swap veil for Mantra of Resolve from time to time, depending on how much I need it.

Gear: same as the original less the scepter (I’m using a carrion scepter), due to the fact that I found it as a drop and am too cheap/poor to buy another exotic scepter for minor stat difference. It might not be elitist optimal, but it works.

Yeah, that’s basically it. I usually solo roam and I’ve beaten most people that I’ve dueled even with being too cheap to use food! Won more 1v2s than lost too, but any more than that and I usually am only able to down 1 before deciding to run or getting downed myself.

All in all it’s a great, strong build that I thoroughly enjoy playing.

@Deathreign,

Why would you use Nightmare runes over Perplexity? That is definitely a loss in damage.

Xavi.6591:

@Deathreign,

Why would you use Nightmare runes over Perplexity? That is definitely a loss in damage.

Explained in my initial post.

Funny, cause perplexity is not broken on mesmer really, it’s the other classes getting all the whine for using it oO

Lahel.6381:

Funny, cause perplexity is not broken on mesmer really, it’s the other classes getting all the whine for using it oO

One in the same. When there are threads of people appealing to “cordon off” runes, I’d rather stay away from it. Can’t accredit my doing well to a rune that way. A matter of personal preference, perhaps.

I’m still doing fine and having a blast with Nightmare runes, so I’ve not really seen the real need to switch over to perplexity.

http://bu.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1gy8ts/crystal_desert_commander_kate_austinmers_wvw/

http://darkcloudguild.enjin.com/forum/m/7410020/viewthread/7562198-kate-austinmers-build-for-wvw-mesmers-likely-to-get-buffed-during-next-patch

Actually blackwater, I got a build thats dated alot further back then yours, that can be similar. This build was posted, back before the torment patch, and it appears, that she even says that you can run the dueling line spec, in her guild posts…. so idk why everyone calls this blackwater, when its so similar to KATES >.>

thing is kate’s build got downrated, bc of how old it was, people didnt even understand it it is even before hidden fire build… soooooooo, idk just putting this all out there

they are exactly the same, except the two dueling specs, and in the comment they talked about rabid gear, so really!

I mean yes, kate went with the last traits, but the person in the comment, pointed out rabid gear, and dueling, and kate talked about how that would work, and it depends on the person, so dont give me that lmao.

Hidden fire mesmer build is the only thing close to when kate posted her’s tbh

So after fixing your link, I was able to look at the real build.

That build has a focus on confusion and retal as exhibited by the points in illusions. It takes full apothecary, and since there is no crit chance, there is of course no use for sharper images, which already significantly distinguishes that build.

However, the real key to understanding how these builds differ is in the runes. The build that you posted uses a boon duration rune mix. This focuses on maximizing the defensive benefits of PU, and uses the condition damage traits and stats as more of a side benefit of the build rather than a main focus.

The blackwater build is the opposite. It focuses on the condition damage and offensive condition applying capabilities of the Mesmer, and uses PU as a way to shore up the defense.

The fact that you think these builds are the same simply betrays your lack of knowledge about this topic.

well on the guild website, kate uses perplexity(once it was released), wat does blackwater use?
also yes apo is there, but they talked about rabid and using dueling not illusion, dont forget to read the chats….

PLEASE do remember this was BEFORE TORMENT, and perplexity, so she had no access to such things

Lapreea.4287:

well on the guild website, kate uses perplexity(once it was released), wat does blackwater use?
also yes apo is there, but they talked about rabid and using dueling not illusion, dont forget to read the chats….

PLEASE do remember this was BEFORE TORMENT, and perplexity, so she had no access to such things

I suggest you read the chats yourself, as they tell a significantly different story than what you’re claiming.

so… are you not the least bit impressed, that she managed all this back in june o.o? i mean seriously that was back when everyone was power based….

why are you all so offended, just because its not exactly the same is not what is important, they rely on the clone death/condition removal from torch, and boons, Might I add kate even used the boon on stealth before it was patched as well… black water was all after these patches, so I find kate to be very creative to manage all that so early on.

Lapreea.4287:

why are you all so offended, just because its not exactly the same is not what is important, they rely on the clone death/condition removal from torch, and boons, Might I add kate even used the boon on stealth before it was patched as well… black water was all after these patches, so I find kate to be very creative to manage all that so early on.

I understand you have a …raging clue… for kate, but please look at the builds themselves and actually compare them. You’ll quickly see that they are rather different, as I explained at length in a previous post.

Lap, I cant find it on this forum here, thus its irrelevant for this forum. I honestly do not care that someone else was making a similar build before I posted this one, of cause someone else had similar idea’s before I posted, its inevitable that someone else had a similar idea at the very least, its also not my fault/problem that they didn’t put it up here to share

Also, 1 of your links doesn’t work.

The fact remains is that I was the first one to post this (exact, 20/20/30/0/0 rabid/condi) idea around here, (I started this one off as a simple theory craft and build from there, (and I also have NEVER heard of this kate person, I have no idea who they are or what builds they use), these were my own ideas and thoughts when I posted, that I simple wanted to share around to see if all you lovely people in the Mesmer community thought it could/might be viable.

Tl;DR I don’t care if others had similar builds before?, that’s all well and good for them and I hope they are still enjoying it just as much as I am, and quit trying to hijack this thread with other peoples builds, its not the place, if this “kate” person wanted to share their build with us over here, they would have done so already.

Yerp my tl;dr was just as long as the rest of my post, oh well, lol.

Well, it looks promising to me , though I’ll probably experiment with sword + torch rather than scepter + torch.

Thanks for the inspiration!

Do not go sword. I have tried it for over 3 hours straight. I don’t mean to be a debby downer but it is not the way to go. I seriously felt that sword was very awkward and not as useful as i thought it would be. Sure the melee clones are great for Debiliating Dissipation, but they were less effective as the Torment and Confusion provided by scepter was. If you learn how to anticipate when the enemy is gonna auto attack you and apply the block skill,(whether they be other Mesmers or different classes) The scepter is definitely an eye catcher in damage and defensive capabilities. Plus Anet is gonna lower cd on #2 and #3 skill on scepter MH. It’s not gonna be alot, but at least its something we can throw in ideas about it.

I believe the ‘Poisoned Apples’ build uses Sword/Torch + Scepter/Pistol.

It appears that scepter #2 and #3 just got their cooldowns reduced, and this build just got that much stronger

*from leaked patch notes, not confirmed

Scepter – cooldowns reduced on both #2 and #3 (confusing images –12s recharge, Illusionary counter – 10s recharge, these are all base values without trait reductions). This will improve Confusion and Torment uptime with a bit more defense as you are blocking more often.

Yes, it was announced on yesterday’s live stream about the CD reduction to Scepter #2 and #3. Awesome.

I’m wondering about Sigils in sPvP. I’m not having any trouble surviving, but some of these new bunker builds are beginning to feel immovable. For that reason, I was thinking of using these Sigils for more offense, thoughts?

Staff: Earth (bleeding on crit) – Staff autoattacks are decent condi application, so I definitely continually autoattack, and the Earth sigil is here to add a tad more punch to the autos.

Scepter: Doom (poison on swap) – I feel like Scepter is a burst condi weapon, and I don’t autoattack with it too much. Doom does a tiny bit of damage, helps that burst stick and not get healed, and it provides protection from cleanses for your Torment and Confusion conditions.

Torch: Corruption (stacking condi dmg on kill) – This is a bit iffy. I’m not sure that stacking sigils are a good idea in fast-paced sPvP at all. Other options are Accuracy (flat crit chance) and Agony (bleed duration). It really throws me off that On-Crit and On-Swap sigils share a cooldown, that really needs to get fixed/changed.

Perplexity Runes look to have been untouched. The build lives on!! (Unless they destroyed them ninja style.)

C’mon Ninja Style!

SO I have banked perplexity runes, but that move speed on travelers is freaking tempting. Still need to get the armor. Too cheap to spend all these free Badges for it.

Sobiech.9613:

Perplexity Runes look to have been untouched. The build lives on!! (Unless they destroyed them ninja style.)

As long as they just add a medium ICD, only PvE would truly be affected (and there, 20 stacks of Confusion are still pretty weak :P) .

This is how a Mesmer should feel.. I love this build.. tricky tricky tricky.

thanks for sharing

Been trying to play this build in wvw and is really bad for zergs, i play on desolation and lets say u face a 3 way in stonemist castle with about 300 ppl in same area, chaos storm is impossible to cast coz of lag, your no.1 skill projectile moves too slow and by the time it reaches anything they’ll long be dead.
The only place this build works is against small teams but imo wvw is about big battles and it just doesnt works there.
I’m open to suggestions, i want a build that works in 100-300 ppl battles not 5vs5, til now the only wep i had some success to actually tag anything and do some dmg is the greatsword.

This build isn’t meant for Zerg vs Zerg……..

Just do a search, there was a thread discussing this recently.

^ yeah, I cant recall the exact name of that thread, but this build was never intended to be used in large scale wuv wuv, however it excels in duelling, roaming, and some aspects of pvp/Tpvp

Natsu Dragneel.1625:

^ yeah, I cant recall the exact name of that thread, but this build was never intended to be used in large scale wuv wuv, however it excels in duelling, roaming, and some aspects of pvp/Tpvp

That being said, you can modify it a bit to be workable in zergs without a retrait. Toss on feedback and null field, grab confusing enchantments, and you’ve got a decent tagging build. You can also get into the middle of some skirmishes to make use of the clone explosions for some more tagging.

I also like to run into a zerg, use Torch Invis for Blind, switch to Staff and drop Chaos Storm and then when I come out of Invis it does a blast finisher which is AoE Burning and allies get Chaos Armour. Then use Blink to get out.

Lag is your enemy.

I have been running blackwater for a while now in wvw, and the only class that I know for a fact I never ever win is against another phantasm/burst mesmer. And the stunlock war gets me if I miss my dodges. But how the hell do you beat a bursty phantasm mesmer? As soon as I run out of my tricks they burst me down in like 3-4 seconds

Jhughes.8341:

But how the hell do you beat a bursty phantasm mesmer? As soon as I run out of my tricks they burst me down in like 3-4 seconds

The best known counter to a phantasm mesmer is a phantasm mesmer

I figured. Does the phanty mesmer do as well in small skirmishes as black water? I generally run with 2-5 people. If it performs just as well.. I may switch over for a while

Jhughes.8341:

I figured. Does the phanty mesmer do as well in small skirmishes as black water? I generally run with 2-5 people. If it performs just as well.. I may switch over for a while

See an update Pyro posted on the OP phantasm build. He added a roaming spec and discusses dealing with 1vMany:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Overpowered-PvP-Phantasm-Build

I saw people were mentioning using a couple of pieces of Dire(cond-vit-tough) gear along with the rabid for some extra health. Would it be viable to use a full set of this gear? You lose out on sharper images and have to use different sigils, however it seems like the extra vitality would help a lot in slightly larger engagements. The precision stat doesn’t seem to grant much of a benefit outside the trait, due to a very low power, so would speccing to be even more durable be beneficial?

I’m just gonna post this one from Pyro from another thread, saves my typing it out and essentially answers the question.

So let’s start with the easy one: Precision.

A massive amount of mesmer condition pressure and sustain is obtained through crits. Your dueling 15 point minor trait causes all of your illusions to bleed on crit. That’s massive. Since illusions take your precision, having high precision is a must for good bleed pressure.

A slightly less direct reason is the interaction with the 5 point minor in dueling, 5 seconds of vigor on crit. Vigor = 100% faster endurance regeneration = twice as many dodges = twice as many dodge clones, which leads to more damage and more damage avoidance.

Next up is toughness.

Toughness actually has a direct benefit too. Your 25 point minor in chaos adds 5% of your toughness to your condition damage. That’s at least 100 more condition damage right there.

Now, both vitality and toughness are defensive stats, but they defend against different things.
•Power damage will eat right through vitality with no toughness, but conditions take much longer with more health, so vitality is condition defense
•Conditions don’t care about toughness, but power damage does. You get strong reductions in power damage with more toughness, so toughness is power damage defense.

In the blackwater build, you have strong condition defense already due to your traited torch, and so more condition defense is a lower priority. Additionally, mesmers already have medium base hp, so you’ve got a good amount of hp. When I run the build, I generally have 20k hp, which is fine, and so every bit of toughness you can get does much more for you.

Additionally, toughness indirectly increases the strength of your heals, while vitality decreases it. The same strength heal heals for a lower % of your hp with a lot of vit, making it indirectly weaker.

Lastly, we can talk about power.

This one really is quite obvious for anyone that’s ever played mesmer, but less obvious for a necromancer, which is why I’m thinking your friend is a necro. Mesmer condition skills don’t use power, generally. Your entire build is designed to do high condition damage, and not power. You have a couple skills that scale well on power, but the thing is that power does not matter at all without crit power. Pure power damage sucks, in order to do any appreciable damage, you absolutely have to have crit power.

Therefor, taking carrion gear would be lowering your condition damage because of vit instead of toughness, vastly decreasing your endurance regeneration, vastly decreasing your bleed pressure, making your heals less effective, and reducing your power damage defense, while providing you with a tiny bit of power.

20k hp? …. I def did something wrong im running around at 15-16k hmm

ahhh I have diff jewels and no carrion pieces. maybe I should change that

just adding one thing: Thank You.

I have all classes at 80 and obviously for PVE Power is the main goal. Engi/Necro I use hybrid builds for PVE. Im using your build with undead runes and decided to use it in regular PVE today and im actually enjoying it more than I do running my power build. While full zerk power builds obv kill quicker, for some reason this is working just as well if not better. All I did was take off torch and put on pistol. shrug, thanks again!

Azure.8670:

20k hp? …. I def did something wrong im running around at 15-16k hmm

I reach 20k hp by using the dire/rabid blend on full ascended trinkets, and rabid everything else.

btw Pyro you contribute a LOT to the forums. A lot of your posts have made me a better Mesmer, thank you

For zergs this build is still useful. Veil is great for zerging obviously, and Mass Invis is sweet for rezzes since it stealths the downed player too.

For aoe zerg damage I use interrupts with perplexity runes to apply aoe confusion. Chaos Storm is great for this, and I also carry a focus in my backpack, and the pull from focus can also interrupt lots of people too.

Intigo, a very experienced D/D elementalist, uploaded today a dueling video against a PU mesmer running a build that looks to be pretty close to a Blackwater except using sword/pistol instead of a staff.

In case you want to see it from the other side to have an idea how messy that fight may look for the enemy when all your clones are up.