Guild Wars 2

So, I just hit 80 on my mesmer and I’m working on zone completion in Orr. I’m running the basic shatter build (20/20/0/0/30), but I’m wondering if there is a better build for doing this? I leveled with variations of this build, so I think I’m okay at playing it, but outside of shattering, the damage feels light. All of my gear is rare quality berserker apart from jewelry and back piece (Which is still the terrible low level one I got from completing a piece of my personal story).

Also, is it just me or is there a large jump in difficulty once you hit Orr? I’m having a lot of trouble completing some of the skill points because I’m constantly overwhelmed with creatures and it seems like I’m forced to fight almost everything that comes my way because I can’t skip or get away from much of stuff there.

I never had trouble clearing a veteran+1 or two regular creatures in order to get at a skill point until I hit the 70-75 Orr zone (and I’m 80!). It just seems like I’m either playing wrong or my build is wrong. Any advice?

Hi OP,
It’s definitely not you and there is indeed a large jump in difficulty in Orr maps compared to other areas.

I assume you solo roam atm.
Since you have trouble with survivability, and your gear is still not optimal for a DPS build like shatter (you need to be at least in full exotics), I suggest you go with a more tanky setup with good condition removal or something with a bit of CC to keep mob away from you or give you chance to disengage. Alternatively, you can try a different build altogether, anything using Prismatic Understanding is really tanky.

Here’s a shatter variation you can try: (0/20/0/20/30) (link: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsdWlwzKqHVzqGb9IyJFM3yh6B4ZdfXJF42FC-e)

Anyway, browse the forum to look for more builds.
Hope it helps.

Thanks, I’ll give this a try and see how it goes.

So quick question: SHOULD I be able to solo some of these skill points. Some of them are in contested temples… Or is it just not possible?

I wouldn’t recommend bersker for the ‘fresh 80’. I had some PVT stuff and it really helped my lazy-butt out.

Build-wise, shatter is VERY strong for solo, world pve when you familiarize yourself with it. Phantasms feel a bit better in dungeons currently.

I also have a GREAT time with pvp builds like the Blackwater one (20/20/30/0/0) that emphasize survivability and condition damage over raw bursty power. You kill slightly (SLIGHTLY) slower in world pve, but your plethora of stealths, boons, and escape tools make you much more survivable. The gear also transitions well into wvw, if that’s and end-game goal of yours.

I read over the blackwater build and it looks like another one I’m itching to try. But where do you get the rabid gear for it? Doesn’t look like you can craft anything with those stats and the karma gear only has 4/6 that are rabid pieces.

Dwayna temple has exotic Rabid trinkets. WvW has the missing Rabid Armour.

No need for PU that is a waste of dps and time I think. Hmm, unless he is just trying to complete it, not farm. So, you could run to the points with full stealth in a PU build then use phantasms.

I was playing shatter for a long time. It’s nice to have distortion easily available. However, I’ve since switched to phantasm for PvE. I really only loose the condition damage, which I rarely needed anyway for more health, healing, and the focus reflections. I do miss being able to spare 10 points for chaos though. There are a lot of useful adept traits there.

I actually went ahead and tried the Blackwater build mentioned above and geared it appropriately. It’s a lot of fun and I’m not squishy as hell anymore.

It’s nice to be less dependent on clones and shatter because 1. I found it annoying to have to get in melee range in order to shatter off of myself, and 2. when I tried to shatter, sometimes a few of my clones would refuse to run to my enemy and just shatter in place without hitting anything.

The only thing I’m missing is the swiftness from the focus skill.

Then why don’t you just carry one around for swiftness? Swap it back out when you’ve casted temporal curtain.

I think you will find a phantasm build is generally going to be more useful to you in a given scenario than shatter is. Don’t get me wrong shatter can have great survivability and utility when played well but it does take a bit more effort. If you build for phantasms and take signet of illusions, use iDefender and iDisenchanter rotating between them and your damage dealing phantasms you basically can go afk and let the phantasms fight for you in open world pve. Plus as someone else mentioned most people run phant builds in dungeons simply because it pairs well with having reflects from the inspiration line (which you don’t always need but…it’s another topic all together). I guess what I am getting at is, if you like having a build that you can do anything pve related with and not have to switch around too much a phantasm build is for you!

Do phantasm builds work well with rabid gear? I’m still kind of new to the class and still learning, but it seems like it would work well if I used staff and x(scepter?)/pistol since pistol phantasms can cause bleeds(I think there’s a trait?), and the warlocks do more damage when there are conditions present on the target. And you get to remain at range.

I’m about to do Arah so I can finish up my personal story, so I think it would be good place to try it.

Phantasm builds are power builds. Besides, if you go for the 0/20/0/25/25 build w/berserker gear then you end up with 1,175 condition damage at 25 stacks of might anyway, which is plenty of condition damage considering we didn’t use a single piece of equipment to boost it.