Guild Wars 2

Original Build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsfWl4zKqHWTmGb9IipHBHFCckK0alewbz2FC-jACBoiCiEBCi5PhNRaIalVFRjVxET5iIq2cuIa1SBMqwI-e

Newly Traited Build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsfWl4zKqHWTmGb9IipHEHyBckK0alewb22FC-jACBoiCiEBCi5PhNRaIalVFRjVxET5iIq2cuIa1SBMqwI-e

Thief-Mesmer
This build was more of attempt to copy the thief and merge it with the mesmer, in a sense. It uses a mix of stealth and teleports to place oneself accordingly combined with clones and a traited shatter to trick and damage the opponents while they focus on catching the mesmer. This is meant mainly for WvW roaming and has high crit-rates for better damage with mobility.
Also, the build’s name is a pun on my attempt to combine the words “Thief” and “Mesmer”, creating “Thesmerf”, thus “The Smurf”.

Weapons

-Sword/Torch: The sword was mainly picked for its teleport[#3] that sends a clone to attack that you can switch with, breaking stuns and such as a result. It’s also relatively strong offensively and defensively. The torch was picked solely for The Prestige, letting the mesmer cloak and blind opponents. Already, together with the sword, the mesmer can teleport and stealth much like the thief.

-Staff: While not the most thief-y weapon, it has a good back-step teleport[#2] which can become annoying if used correctly. The defense of Chaos Armor[#4] and AoE of Chaos Storm[#5] is also a plus.

Skills

-Decoy: Stealth+Clone

-Veil: Stealth

-Blink: A targeted teleport, good for moving around opponents

Traits

10/30/30/0/0

Domination:
-Mental Torment: Plus 20% damage to Mind Wrack

Dueling:
-Blade Training: Plus 50 Precision with sword
-Far-Reaching Manipulation: Blink range increase
-Deceptive Evasion: Creates a clone when dodging

Chaos:
-Master of Manipulation: Shorter Blink cool-down
-Chaotic Dampening: Extra toughness with staff
-Prismatic Understanding: Gain extra stealth duration[+1 sec] and a random boon[Aegis/Protection/Regen] when you cloak.

Equipment
-Weapons: All Assassin, with Superior Sigils of Accuracy to maximize critical damage.
-Armor: Upper body is all Assassin for criticals, with the lower body made Rampager for both precision and some condition damage for staff. They all have the Superior Rune of the Thief, which ups precision and condition damage, along with +10% damage while behind foes.

-Accessories: Back is Rampager, all the rest are Berserker.

-Buffs:
Bowl of Curry Butternut Squash Soup: +100 Precision, +10% Critical Damage
Potent Master Maintenance Oil: Precision from 6% of Toughness and 4% of Vitality

Play Style

In a 1-on-1, this build is meant to start off with the Sword/Torch to immobilize the enemy with Illusionary Leap to gain the advantage first, swinging behind them to attack before switching to staff and Phase Retreating away. When attacking, always try to stay behind the opponent. When they try to put on pressure, stealth or Blink away behind them and attack, rolling while stealthed to create clones spread out around them. While behind, you can shatter these with Mind Wrack to get a good critical hit in with +25% damage. The main point of this strategy is to keep moving and staying out of the target’s sights, thus keeping safe while stabbing them from behind.

In a 1-on-many scenario, you can first target a single person, tap them with the sword a few times while using Illusionary Leap/Swap to confuse them and Phase Retreat to evade, then a mix of Veil, Decoy, and Blink to dance around the field a bit with The Prestige added here and there. Thus, you avoid most attacks while taking people down one by one, though this will only work on only small groups of under 5 people, probably. With multiple clones circulating the field, it helps to disorient the foes to deal with fakes, which helps the mesmer get away. Despite the effort, it’s more fit for 1-vs-1 scenarios, so don’t expect miracles if attacking larger groups.

This is untested and would benefit from any advice/critique from those more experienced in builds.

Firstly, it’s a really interesting and unique concept for a build, and a fun name :P.

Secondly,

Desperate decoy is very unreliable, and youll be nearly always better off using something like far reaching manipulations (because you like teleports). Hances are, youre auto attacking with a staff, which will most likely reveal you from desperate decoy’s stealth.

You plan to shatter your clones alot and/or spread them out. Debilitating dissipation doesnt work on shatter (only when they get killed or replaced), so it wont do you much good. I’d recommend master of manipulation for your blink. Debilitating dissipation would kinda work vs melee or if you dont shatter much.

Mirror of anguish doesnt do a whole lot, youll probably get more out of chaotic dampening in terms of defense.

I wouldn’t rely on such a long rotation, as you’ll be using most of your cooldowns (if not all important ones). It’s easy to get lost while doing it, or unexpected things can happen, like your opponent dodging your mind wrack, or countering your stealth. Now, most people you meet while roaming won’t do anything excpect let you hit them, so you should be fine :P

Illusionay swap doesn’t stun, it just immobilises. Your target cant move, but still use skills.

Your build doesn’t have a whole lot of damage. You seem to sword auto attack alot in the rotation, which doesn’t do much damage compared to other professions, and puts you in danger of being hit too :o.
It’s ok though, high damage isn’t essential, and you can still kill people with this.

Youre probably better off swapping the few pieces of rampager gear with power gear.

Try to save your blink, decoy and veil for when you really need them. Theyre best used as defensive skills, and gives you something to fall back to incase your weapon skill rotation fails/or you get pressured.

It’s an interesting build, and most traits you picked make sense and fit it quite well.

If I didnt explain somehing properly or you want to say anything, feel free to whisper/PM :D

quite similar to my build #2, if you want to take a look at it, but with a completely other focus (i focus on interrupts)

Rampagers works extremly fine with this 10/30/30 setup, but i have to agree with most of alissahs points.