Guild Wars 2

“Illusionary Reversion: Updated functionality. You must shatter at least 2 illusions in order to generate a clone from this trait. (You do not count as an illusion towards this total.)
Yeah I know this one probably stings but when we started looking at it it was pretty silly that this trait could let you get so much power out of just using all shatter skills back to back.”

Mesmer is a very very unique thing, and I’m astonished that the creators of such a unique class type still do not understand either it’s roll, functionality, or build order. A trait that along side deceptive evasion combine to be a requirement of “effective” chronoshifts, is being nerfed because developers thing just using all shatter skills back to back is too powerful.

To state the obvious using all shatter skills in conjunction with this trait is a joke. You’d get little to NO effectiveness out of such a wasteful combo if you can even stomach calling it one.

None of the professional skills mesmer has access to are good yet alone offer you “sooooooooooooooooo much power”. To even state such an argument is idiotic.

Take for instance a power build, most popularly shatter. If you use Diversion for no good reason, you lose the ability to stack concentrated amounts of vul at once as well as a reliable way to line up damage. If you use cry of Frustration for no good reason, you lose access to a possible blind(traited) or the ability to remove boons before a large damage rotation(traited). If you use Distortion for no good reason… you die, do you need any other reason? If you use Mind Wrack for no good reason, you lose out on capitalizing your highest source of damage.

So… without even getting into how this effects Chronomancers unique f5-Continuum shift, you tell me how on earth you get sooooooooo much power from wasting professional abilities. Even in a condition build these rules apply but the functionality of mindwrack and cry swap.

So clearly shattering doesn’t give power to the professional skills without the addition of other skills, with the exception of distortion since more invul duration is never a bad thing.

This trait is nothing more than a direct nerf to f5-Continuum shift which will become near impossible to achieve long duration shifts that maximize the skills potential.

The potential in pvp of a mesmer is and always will revolve around portal and your elite. Without them any other class in the game will serve your purpose on a team better, the only saving grace is the utility the class offers.

Therefore it goes without saying that if you give a class that revolves around portal and a second elite cast that the specialization surrounding it will be taken hands down. The biggest issue with this obviously is that in committing to a role builds will be forced into getting as much “worth” out of f5-Continuum shift.

So what does this mean for mesmer in pvp? You will NEED to accomplish long duration shifts in order to take advantage of the cool-down reset. Example, burst a target with moa > portal down > rotate out.

Effective rotations do not spam mesmer professional skills off cool down, however the original functionality of the trait Illusionary Reversion in conjunction with Deceptive evasion do allow for such plays. Which again is another issue with Chronmancer/Mesmer in general as the roll deceptive evasion plays becomes larger and larger as the game progresses. Eliminating the availability of condition removal as Mesmer due to obvious trait line choices.

It’s laughable that you put slow spaming on your watch-list while breaking the functionality of a specialization you created…

Thanks again for pigeon holing Mesmer into another deceptive evasion spec which all but requires the domination line to make proper use of the illusions we generate

I think it’s worth mentioning that Robert Gee who posted that info did say it was a change but they are open to the possibility of lowering that number or switching it for a small ICD.

I would also say that while Robert Gee and the team he is on may not be as proficient with mesmer as some other people they do have a decent understanding of how it works. They have also clearly put in a lot of effort to engage with the community and try to get the elite specs as good and balanced as possible for launch.

Try not to be so rude and maybe you might get a nice red post saying “you make some good arguements, we’ll see how feedback goes from a beta weekend but probably change it to 1 clone.”

i agree but you need to attend the problem

the combo Anet was referring to is the combo of GS power shatter
they use izerk, mirror to create clone ahd MW to put zerk build almost in 5% hp and this is with 1 clone from mirror.
now consider they would have another clone from shatter they could start with f2 than f1 for more dmg or even f3 for more daze/stun to do 100-0 dmg
so they hurt all other builds by demand 2 clones
but they forgot that mesmer got 1 phantasm out and from mirror its another clone so after shattering izerk will come out again and more clone from shattering so its again 2 clones. the combo will be f2+f1 without f3 or with it as you cant stack daze. so anet failed with its theory dmg and hurst all builds of mesmer (condi and bunker) so all will go with DE and than what… the same problem untill anet will see the community stop QQ or hey will give a shart cd to IR to prevent fast shatter combos. or they (as usual do) give both 2 clones demand and 2 sec icd as double nerf

@apharma

I saw that but to be honest that hurt to read even more because again it shows no understanding for the class what so ever.

The issue there being if the ICD is too high it’s even worst than it is at the moment because again… you wont be able to generate clones which you need to get long Continuum shifts.

If the ICD is what, 1 second, then what is the point in the first place because again just going f4>f3>f2>f1 isn’t a combo or in any way useful.

Lets not even go down the road of f5 being so short you are all but required to idle 3 clones to use it…

I wrote another post in general pvp I believe as to one of the causes of balance being so off in game. Take for example Mesmer pre-confounding suggestions patch. Mesmer has always had the ability to hit high damage spikes while running with utility. However, Mesmers have only have 1-2 (mirror blade – iZerker on a good day) skills you’d ever actually need to dodge without dying in regards to power shatter. If they don’t hit you get tickled by Mesmer. Come the June23rd patch Mesmers were given a way to line up the same damage they had before and everyone screams opopopopop. Point being the more situation you make something, the less effective it is in a pvp environment.

If anything the base duration of Continuum Shift needs to be raised and less emphasis needs to be placed on clone generation because this all but forces the hands of players who want to utilize the current mechanic.

Or, if clones are the mechanic that is kept why cram deceptive evasion upon us even more than it already has been.

And to continue the theme of Anet thanks for making this unique thing but please stop messing it up and look at the meta and understand the reasoning behind it. Look at the phantasm trait that was nerfed, which actually wasn’t even a nerf. This trait is INTENDED to function with possible phantasm builds but the argument is that just alone in any build the trait and the burst potential is too high at the moment possibly. Well Anet sorry but you missed the ball there too, the issue in regards to pvp is that you can force two dodge rolls at once with just something like iZerk>shatter>iZerk then you can burst with a Mind Wrack rotation. A possible way to fix this is with a charge function like on Lost Time, the new Chronophantasma could read, after the first time a phantasm is shattered a charge is stored. The stored charge is released after another phantasm is cast. And I know someone is gonna say it but just to amuse them, “but hey man that means that both phantasms will hit at the same time”. Yes they would and that’s why they are weaker than before because one dodge roll will save you from damage. This new mechanic would make their functionality more in line with a true phantasm spec and not just a worth while trait for any o’l build.

The largest issue and desirable quality with Mesmer is that they are unique. So unique that it seems Anet has build them around the idea of “cool” without taking the time to understand how their class has been utilized and it pains me because I enjoy despite it’s flaw this class. And every time Mesmer has something going for it, it’s legs get kicked out from under them and away they go.

The witch hunt surrounding Mesmers needs to stop and intelligent decisions should be made.

Also @apharma
Yeah I’m rude, don’t like it but I’ve been around for 3 years now and I’m just tired of the b.s. at this point, I’ve just lost the majority of my patience up to now and don’t know why I bother to white-knight what is actuality a floundering game that shows no real progress or future given how the last three years have gone by. My b

We’ll most likely see an ICD added to the trait rather than requiring two illusions. But we have to play test it first to see how it’ll play out.

In its original form, it was insanely overpowered that needed a change.

@phokus

Claims something is OP with no indication as to why they feel such a way. Welcome to the Mesmer witch hunt 2k15 I’m selling shirts. Want one?

BetterHappy.2517:

@phokus

Claims something is OP with no indication as to why they feel such a way. Welcome to the Mesmer witch hunt 2k15 I’m selling shirts. Want one?

Do you even play Mesmer? Did you even play Chronomancer?

Do I really need to go into a full in depth scope of how the trait is massively overpowered?

And I’m someone who has been playing Mesmer since beta…

LMFAO someone comes into my thread, and throws wild accusations about my experience with Mesmer, claims something is OP with no indication or thought as to why, and then I receive and infraction & post deletion for basically telling him he can get lost.

I’m so done with this organization do what ever you want with your failing game I’m over it

Keep catering to ignorance and it will thrive in your dead game

BetterHappy.2517:

LMFAO someone comes into my thread, and throws wild accusations about my experience with Mesmer, claims something is OP with no indication or thought as to why, and then I receive and infraction for basically telling him he can get lost.

I’m so done with this organization do what ever you want with your failing game I’m over it

Keep catering to ignorance and it will thrive in your dead game

obviously, don’t you know the rules of the internet

phokus.8934:

We’ll most likely see an ICD added to the trait rather than requiring two illusions. But we have to play test it first to see how it’ll play out.

In its original form, it was insanely overpowered that needed a change.

pls explain why was it OP in the way which combos you could do better , harder, faster
and try to compare them to now

i testing it with 3 friends who play Mesmer from the beginning. at start we said OP but suddenly after comparing the combos with GS, staff, scepter etc we saw and up side and big down side (high risk high reward)

i would love to hear what we have missed.

messiah.1908:

phokus.8934:

We’ll most likely see an ICD added to the trait rather than requiring two illusions. But we have to play test it first to see how it’ll play out.

In its original form, it was insanely overpowered that needed a change.

pls explain why was it OP in the way which combos you could do better , harder, faster
and try to compare them to now

i testing it with 3 friends who play Mesmer from the beginning. at start we said OP but suddenly after comparing the combos with GS, staff, scepter etc we saw and up side and big down side (high risk high reward)

i would love to hear what we have missed.

I’ll try and keep this short and to the point – time constraints on my side.

A general thought process from others seems to be that they want IR to replace DE. But looking at the IR trait, it’s to supplement DE and active clone generation through the use of shatters (pretty simple point and purpose). With IR in its previous version, you’ve essentially had two clones out at any time after the initial clone is generated.

Not only does that improve your shatters, but also your healing and overall confusion from players. That’s not a bad thing, though. From my understanding, that is what this trait is meant to do. The part that becomes seriously overpowered is the use of Alacrity and then you can just roll your shatters and hit with 2 illusions per shatter without actively generating an illusion.

That is huge because now you’re Mind Wrack, Diversion, and Distortion have no illusion down time where you then need to build them up (albeit, rather quickly to produce). It was extremely easy to pump out 3+1 clones in rapid succession and with Alacrity buff on you, your shatters are exponentially improved just by pressing F1-4.

Ultimately I’d rather they place a very small ICD on it rather than the two clone limit.

phokus.8934:

I’ll try and keep this short and to the point – time constraints on my side.

A general thought process from others seems to be that they want IR to replace DE. But looking at the IR trait, it’s to supplement DE and active clone generation through the use of shatters (pretty simple point and purpose). With IR in its previous version, you’ve essentially had two clones out at any time after the initial clone is generated.

Not only does that improve your shatters, but also your healing and overall confusion from players. That’s not a bad thing, though. From my understanding, that is what this trait is meant to do. The part that becomes seriously overpowered is the use of Alacrity and then you can just roll your shatters and hit with 2 illusions per shatter without actively generating an illusion.

That is huge because now you’re Mind Wrack, Diversion, and Distortion have no illusion down time where you then need to build them up (albeit, rather quickly to produce). It was extremely easy to pump out 3+1 clones in rapid succession and with Alacrity buff on you, your shatters are exponentially improved just by pressing F1-4.

Ultimately I’d rather they place a very small ICD on it rather than the two clone limit.

There’s some ameliorating factors I think you’re not accounting for:
1. It’s not exponential. 100% alacrity is equivalent to 40% cooldown on skills (that’s true across the board, but less than 100% alacrity uptime affects longer and shorter cooldowns unevenly, with shorter cooldowns benefiting more from less alacrity). Now, 40% is still pretty strong, but your view is exaggerating the strength of the alacrity.

2. They nerfed alacrity generation by 25%. That is a direct nerf to the problem you’re concerned with already, and should be taken into account, but it was not. It’s like the metaphor some folks are fond of using, that when Anet needs to slice off a bit of cheese, they take a chainsaw and cut through the whole table as well.
It can be worthwhile to nerf something, but if you identify 3 different ways to nerf it and do all three, you’re probably overdoing it.

3. Rolling across the shatters has a serious opportunity cost. This was mentioned above: if you use your Distortion and Diversion to fuel Mind Wrack and/or Cry of Frustration, you’ll find you don’t have them when you need them. That’s a cost.

4. Chronomancer doesn’t have dps traits. Danger time is the only one, and it’s not relevant to IR builds. Most builds that go Chrono had to replace Dom, Illusions or Dueling (few replace Illusions), and all three of those have sizable dps traits. In other words, Chronomancers deal less traditional damage, both through their own skills and through phantasms. Phantasms don’t get a damage boost through Chronomancer, so shatter-chrono builds are left to try to leverage “moar shatters!” to get there. That means arguing that they do more shatters because of IR is a moot point, because that’s what we want them to do in order to be competitive!

5. Chronomancer has no defensive traits. Unlike Chaos or Inspiration, Chrono has no defensive traits whatsoever, beyond slow, which again isn’t relevant to IR builds. So a chrono has to either choose to go Inspiration for defense, and lose yet another dps tree, or go dps to not lose more damage boosts than they did by going chrono. Most Chronomancers (bunker theory aside) seem to have chosen the dps route, meaning Chronomancers are more fragile, which means it’s a high-risk, high-reward kind of build. That’s bad design if you nerf it to “high risk, average reward,” because then people just go back to the old builds.

6. Elite specializations are supposed to be more powerful than regular trait lines. That’s why they’re elite, that’s why you’ll only ever be able to have one elite spec, that’s why you have to pay to get them, that’s why the Verdant Brink is harder than any existing PvE zones. If Tempest isn’t more powerful than Water/Fire/Earth/Air/Arcane, then either Tempest needs to be buffed or Ele needs to be nerfed (both are probably true).
If Reaper isn’t more powerful than the other trait lines, it needs to be buffed. And so on.

Those are specific caveats I don’t think many people have kept on their minds when discussing the Chronomancer’s power.

But I’d like to make a design point I think is even more important, and you’ll have to follow my logic:

• Anet wants mesmers to shatter more, both in pvp and pve
• Shatter damage is great burst damage, but terrible sustained damage (do the math, it just can’t keep up)
• Increasing shatter damage to make it worthy of being sustained damage would raise mesmer spike too high—people complain enough as it is.
• Therefore, there are only two viable ways to make mesmer sustained damage competitive:
  1. Decrease shatter cooldowns, or in some other way enable mesmers to shatter more often.
  2. Enable mesmers to have a decent alternate form of damage alongside shatters.
• Phantasm damage and shatter damage are contradictory as they are. You can’t keep up a good shatter cadence and still have your phantasms doing enough damage to be considered “sustained”. I’ve done the math, exhaustively. It doesn’t work out.
• Chronophantasma is clearly an attempt to follow solution 2, by enabling an interweaving of phantasm damage and shatter damage. It’s cool, but it still doesn’t quite get there (I’ve done the math). The added 1.5s of distortion will weaken that a little further.
• Chronophantasma also doesn’t solve the original problem with mesmer sustained damage, that phantasms die too easily to be reliable dps in a lot of content (especially pvp, but also in pve).
• Alacrity on shatters effectively works on the first solution. It doesn’t increase mesmer spike damage at all, it just decreases the time between spikes. But without more clone generation, alacrity on shatters can’t contribute enough to make up for the sustain damage loss, and few if any mesmer builds can generate illusions fast enough to tune Alacrity up above the potential of the other trait lines.
• IR provides that clone generation. Total clone generation isn’t any faster than Deceptive Evasion really, but combined with Alacrity it spawns clones in tighter strings than DE does.

The point is that the problem you’re complaining of is in fact the selling point of the chronomancer for shatter dps: a way to turn shatters into sustained damage without making Mesmer burst damage any more powerful.
If that’s too strong, the objective should not be to disable the combo, but to turn down the numbers in some way.

One solution would be to move IR to Grandmaster tier, so it’s competing with Chronophantasma, and thus no longer able to combo with CP directly, cutting out the super-zerker combo that Robert Gee mentioned.

Another could be to reduce the illusion requirement to 1 illusion. This wouldn’t prevent shatter-chains, but it would enable counterplay: a well-timed cleave would cut off the shatter-chain at its knees, so pvpers could stop the shatter-chain before it gets going.

Another would be an icd solution, but too long of an icd and it becomes worthless. I’d say more than 2s would be too long. 1s would be closer to viable, while still chopping off the shatter-chain if you’re really worried about it.
Additionally, an icd on IR makes the whole trait backward. You have to shatter to get a clone, but clones are only useful for shatters, so you’re just left hoping that your clone survives past the icd so you can shatter again without losing the benefits of IR, but clones just don’t survive, man. At any icd longer than 1s, I’d say they’d need to invert the trait, so that you don’t summon a clone after the shatter, you summon a clone as part of the shatter.

Lets be honest here, this is a response to the Chronoshift f5 shatter, because during the time you have with it it was ALWAYS advantageous to spam all your shatter before it ended, and this trait made it so that each one was a +2 clone shatter rather than just 1 from IP. I do agree that this change does not really change all that much, it is still going to be worth spamming your shatter after f5 now we are just going to have to either dodge or use decoy etc. to make sure we have at least a few clones per shatter. It seems more tedious, but maybe they are trying to make the new mechanic less spammy. We’ll have to see how this plays out.

@AlphatheWhite

Someone worth discussing with, lemme just enjoy this for a second. ok done

So yes you’ve hit the nail on the head just about from my eye with an exception. I’m not sure I agree with you that the elite spec is the bottom line strongest moving forward.

I think for Mesmer it is because to beat a dead horse our build designs keep being forced into 2 lines with the third making use of the traits withing the other two. Which imo is a design flaw, but maybe more will open up down the line based off of what others are playing. Elite specializations should be another flavor not the flavor, something that lets you flex other lines in a new way. For instance some trait A, weak by itself so never taken but when combined with a new trait B (from elite spec), A+B are strong and worthwhile.

Back to the functionality of Chrono I agree, alacrity while strong was already nerfed, so we’ll see how that functions on next beta.

The big issue is the mechanic of Continuum Shift. It requires illusions to use properly/maintain, and it’s impossible to maintain/generate enough illusions without IR and DE.

I love staff and wanted to find a way to play Chrono double ranged shatter and my first reaction was o cool a replacement for DE, but after playing Chrono it became obvious that the IR trait was the only way to maximize the specialization which is flaw in my opinion. Traits should fill a function of a specialization not make up for an ill design mechanic. Again, this is why DE is so popular.

People are so used to Mesmer having so little going for it they scream op at the sight of anything good. I still feel the only effective use of this trait is through continuum shifts especially after the alacrity nerf. If they feel this trait is too strong (for no good reason) then the actual mechanic of Continuum shift needs to be different, because in reality that is the only meaningful functionality of the trait aside from general usability of the shatters we have available.

Fuel to the fire…

Mesmer trait lines, in a nut shell…
Domination
The minor traits highlight the use of vulnerability with application as well as a bonus effect. Dazing is the highest impact/application of vulnerability, because dazing can interrupt as well as applies vulnerability due to traits.
The major adept line offers: 1) damage line up 2) phantasm buff 3) vulnerability buff
The major master line offers: 1) traited signet/sustain 2) access to quickness 3) boon removal
The major grandmaster line offers: 1) traited gs/kite potential+might 2) damage buff to shatters 3) new damage source + new weakness application
Summary, Domination functions as a Mesmers strongest application of damage be it power/phantasm/condition (due to the new functionality of vulnerability). All the buffs/boons/conditions applied through this tree influence damage.

Dueling
The minor traits are sporadic giving survivability and two separate forms of damage increases. The most efficient use of the dueling tree would be a condition/hyrbid build because no minor traits would be unusable and the major traits would further strengthen the build.
The major adept line offers: 1) access to a free utility/survivability 2) traited pistol/condition application (bugged) 3) fury boon application to phantasms
The major master line offers: 1) access to blinds 2) access to reflect 3) traited sword/damage buff to sword
The grandmaster line offers: 1) access to clone generation 2) traited mantras/damage buff 3) additional access to condition damage
Summary, Dueling offers access to both survivability and damage and while hybrid or condition build offer the maximum efficiency the grand master trait deceptive evasion is a core mechanic to many power builds which all but forces the line be taken. The buffs/boons/conditions in this tree are separated between damage/sustain/conditions giving the tree no specific focus. This trait line is a poor example of the hybridization of power and condition options within the same line.

Chaos
The minor traits stress boons that offer sustain and have the added benefit of improving condition durations. Access to regen and protection are ideal of stacking up conditions which fit the trend of the minor traits.
The major adept line offers: 1) traited fall damage 2) damage reduction 3) traited manipulations skills/reflects
The major master line offers: 1) traited staff/protection 2) condition damage bonus 3) disable reflect
The major grandmaster line offers: 1) boon application+ stability 2) application of immobilize + offensive boon + random boon 3) stealth buff
Summary, this tree highlights sustain for both power and condition based builds if taken and highlights boon application as well as neutral conditions. When I say neutral conditions I am referring to the ability of the conditions applied through the tree itself to be used in either power or conditions builds, neither is favored. This is an example of an excellent hybridization of power and condition options within the same line, wasteful selections are removed from build paths.

Inspiration
The minor traits highlight strengthening your heal/support. Mantras make the best use of the minor adept trait because it provides access to condition removal on every cast.
The major adept line offers: 1) revive buff/access to a free utility 2) buff to survivability of phantasms 3) access to an additional heal on mantra cast
The major master line offers: 1) buff to phantasm survivability 2) access to condition removal and minor heal 3) traited focus/reflect
The major grand master line offers: 1) survivability buff to phantasms/boon spread 2) access to a free utility/phantasm on evade 3) traited glamour/access to resistance boon
Summary, this tree highlights phantasm buffs or condition removal/minor support. We will call this a minor support because it is in no way comparable to true support builds. This tree’s intent is to be a true support of phantasm line. However do to the synchronization of mantras and the access to condition removal otherwise hard to achieve with Mesmer the trait line has become a viable option for power based shatter builds.

Illusions
The minor traits highlight condition application. Reducing the recharge on illusion summoning is a direct buff to the amount of condition application available due to other lines.
The major adept line offers: 1) hybrid power/condition damage buff per illusion 2) access to phantasm recharge reduction 3) traited torch/minor condition removal
The major master line offers: 1) access to torment 2) buff to phantasm dps 3) access to might per shatter
The major grandmaster line offers: 1) conversion/condition application on blind or evade 2) traited scepter 3) buffs to all shatters
Summary, this tree is the broken remains of pre patch Mesmer which has devolved into a condition tree while having access to some nice power buffs. It was always wasteful for Mesmers to trait into Illusions to gain access to I.P. due to its influence in power builds despite the condition damage in the trees stat line. With I.P. becoming base line as well as the other dual ranged shatter selections the tree has some vague indications of what it once was in what is ideally a condition tree. This is a poor example of the hybridization of power and condition options within the same line.

Complete summary

Without continuing to discuss what’s wrong with Mesmer trait options let me discuss what is good and well. The most used trait line, and most balanced in terms of build selection is Domination.
Domination was given a new and very clear identity after the patch, vulnerability which translates into damage increases. Because vulnerability increases condition as well as power damage, and the tree offers access to phantasm damage it is clear and present that the focus is damage. All you need to do is decide what type of damage you want and go.

The Chaos tree is next on the A+ list because it is clearly a survivability through boon application tree which offers benefits to power or condition builds, all you need to decide is your direction and go. Because the condition applied through traits (immob) functions well with power and conditions.

The following three trait lines conflict in direction and identity but all the while have access to traits that are arguably mechanics at this point in the games development.

To add to the issue with the trait lines remaining, many of the available traits that function amazingly outside of the focus of the line only do so in combination to another.

Take for example traited mantras and the inspiration line. Dueling offers access to additional stacks while Inspiration offers condition removal and sustain through mantra stacks while having a fairly wasteful grand master trait options. What would be so game breaking to have access to traited mantras within Insperation? Combinations like this force Mesmer into trait lines, successful builds are made by selecting the 1-2 core mechanic traits needed, then selecting from what you have based on the core traits. The entire line of traits are almost irrelevant in most cases because no matter what you need as specific trait to make an entire build work. This theme has been continued again with Chronomancer making it a flawed design from the start.

Mesmers realistically have access to, power/conditions/phantasms/. With six trait line options to be made available with Chronomancer, why is it not possible to structure trait selections focused on one objective be it power, condition, survivability, phantasms, etc then allow the players to connect these in combination rather than broken combinations of the focuses listed?

phokus.8934:

messiah.1908:

phokus.8934:

We’ll most likely see an ICD added to the trait rather than requiring two illusions. But we have to play test it first to see how it’ll play out.

In its original form, it was insanely overpowered that needed a change.

pls explain why was it OP in the way which combos you could do better , harder, faster
and try to compare them to now

i testing it with 3 friends who play Mesmer from the beginning. at start we said OP but suddenly after comparing the combos with GS, staff, scepter etc we saw and up side and big down side (high risk high reward)

i would love to hear what we have missed.

I’ll try and keep this short and to the point – time constraints on my side.

A general thought process from others seems to be that they want IR to replace DE. But looking at the IR trait, it’s to supplement DE and active clone generation through the use of shatters (pretty simple point and purpose). With IR in its previous version, you’ve essentially had two clones out at any time after the initial clone is generated.

Not only does that improve your shatters, but also your healing and overall confusion from players. That’s not a bad thing, though. From my understanding, that is what this trait is meant to do. The part that becomes seriously overpowered is the use of Alacrity and then you can just roll your shatters and hit with 2 illusions per shatter without actively generating an illusion.

That is huge because now you’re Mind Wrack, Diversion, and Distortion have no illusion down time where you then need to build them up (albeit, rather quickly to produce). It was extremely easy to pump out 3+1 clones in rapid succession and with Alacrity buff on you, your shatters are exponentially improved just by pressing F1-4.

Ultimately I’d rather they place a very small ICD on it rather than the two clone limit.

sry to say still didnt see any different as to now
now you create 1 phantasm ans 1 clone and do GS combo with mw shatter.
at beta you did the same but got 1 clone after mw and 1 phantasm
now if you shatter fast your phantasm wont do its dmg and if you w8 your clone get be killed.
now if you shatter them you get another clone
so now ppl will just take DE and dodge and the result will be the same. 1 clone 1 phantasm than shatter and another dodge so the result as you see is the same
problem wont solved.

the main problem is F5 combo. ppl will use f5 and all shatter even without illusions up so they can do another burst combo as before. again with de the problem wont get solved.

the problem is now with 2 illusion so i must take DE and dodge. so lets nerf DE and F5

just give is 1-2 sec icd will sove the problem as you wont be able to shatter it fast but ppl refuse to learn how to kill mesmer thus they wont kill his illusions.

also what would have happend if you lower it to 1 illusion. you already got 1 phantasm from CP. so if you shatter it you get 1 clone i dont see any problem with it. thus ppl wont have to take DE.