Guild Wars 2

Hi there,

I’m a longtime player of gw2 (6 months after release). I’ve mained thief (was very fun, but felt limited in build diversity). I tried elementalist and loved it, but felt crippled by the low hp, forcing me to take certain traits and utilities to compete. (so again, although not as much, felt limited in build diversity) I played a ranger, and loved the diversity, but each build felt shallow and too easy to “master”. I’ve played engineer, which has in my opinion the most build diversity. I love trying various builds, and the challenge in learning to play them optimally. This is where I stand now, but I feel like the visuals of the class are lacking. And some of my favorite utilities are garbage for competitive play (rocket boots).

I usually prefer direct damage focused builds on all classes (fresh air ele, d/d thief, s/d engie, ranger is a cleric melee build) I’ve tried mesmser a bit, with varying success. I got to level 29 and had some good moments, but often feel I have to wait too long before delivering another “punch”, which meant leveling was a chore. (and map completion) I tried pvp on a mesmer, and was destroyed… XD I think its a class you need to learn from the ground up. I’m considering trying to main mesmer. (I always use the name Loboling on my main, and the same look) I just feel that I know very little about the profession. I’m going to try and pvp a bit more and see if I can get a better feel for the class, but I’m worried that I’m missing something that would help me achieve success. On my engineer, I consider a good mesmer to be a giant thorn in my side for arena. Sure I can kill them, but they are very slippery and bring amazing utility to their team.

Anyone have some advice on how to approach this profession? Ways to get through pve faster? Builds that are fun for learning the ropes in pvp? Does mobility feel as lacking as guardian did? (reason I could never main guards was watching thieves dance around me, so I mained thief) Even if I could destroy most thieves, if I let them get away with a sliver of health, that was the last I’d see them. My favorite classes all have decent chase potential (elementalist fiery greatsword, ranger gs/sw, thief has so much, and engineer has rocket boots and elixir gun along with endless swiftness)

Sorry for such a big thread for some simple questions, but I wanted to get some background.

Thanks in advance.

TLDR: Each paragraph is divided, so if you dont want to read one, you can ignore it and not lose much. I’m looking to play mesmer, but don’t know much about them.

First pro tip: Level your mesmer with PvP tomes, or in an EOTM kTrain. Once 80 you can start playing the mesmer game.

I’ll let someone else take over the rest.

Ross Biddle.2367:

First pro tip: Level your mesmer with PvP tomes, or in an EOTM kTrain. Once 80 you can start playing the mesmer game.

I’ll let someone else take over the rest.

Thank you for your response, but is the mesmer game vastly different at max level?

Ex: my fresh air elementalist doesn’t even exist at low level, and yet its my favorite build.

Also, I hear some people call mesmer’s the class with the most build diversity. But I’ve always thought engineer had the most build diversity.

I love playing bursty classes, that can at times, switch it up and play very different playstyles.

There is a world of difference between a Mesmer with/without their traits, so it does make a big difference being 80 with those traits and being sub-80 without those traits.

Leveling can still be done, but I can only imagine how aggravating it has to be to be locked into Adept traits for most of the leveling experience and not even have access to Grandmaster until 80. (I thankfully levelled both my Mesmers before those changes).

That being said, your best bet is to stick with the Power weapons to level up. Summon phantasm, do any burst (like Mirror Blade), swap weapon, summon phantasm, do any burst (like Mirror Blade), get good at judging when to Mind Wrack … repeat.

Thanks Serbent.

I’m looking forward to trying the mesmer in heart of the mists to see if I can get a good rotation going. (killing the profession npcs) I want to like the mesmer, as I’ve never found a class in this game that sits right with me for long. I always miss something from another class. The elementalist, ranger and engineer offered enough build diversity to keep me playing for a long time, and I started with thief (which was perfect since they lack some diversity, but teach you a lot of fundamentals of the game)

I’ll come back to this thread when I finish trying out a few builds on the mesmer.

Thanks again, and have a great week-end everyone.

We’ll I had a lot of fun playing mesmer. The burst that a shatter mesmer can put out is insane. I only really played sw/t gs shatter, as I wanted to get to a skill level where I felt I could contribute. It got very fun, but in the end I went back to my engineer and still felt more powerful. I’m sure a lot of that has to do with having played engineer for years and mesmer for days… XD But I can finally see some of the potential.

The mobility is poor, but often people only start to run after they felt one of your burst cycles, and they have 10% hp left. You can just blink and finish them off easy enough. So for chase potential it felt good.

I tried making good use of portal and only succeeded once. Allowing me to destroy another mesmer by teleporting around him over and over. But I still never found a good team use in solo queue.

I’m going to put some more time into mesmser and see how comfortable I can get. I want to feel at least as powerful as my no kit, no condi removal burst engineer. (I call him the shotgun ninja) Since that build has a lot of weaknesses, I know a meta mes build should out preform it.

Thanks again for the help, and I’m still looking to learn more about the mesmer, so if anyone has some information on things you’ve learned playing a mesmer, let me know.

Ross Biddle.2367:

First pro tip: Level your mesmer with PvP tomes, or in an EOTM kTrain. Once 80 you can start playing the mesmer game.

I’ll let someone else take over the rest.

Game of Butterflies eh?

Mesmer at lower levels is pretty tough to use. I suggest scepter/torch and staff. Using swords requires practice timing the blocks correctly.

Personally I use Scepter/Sword and Sword/Torch. Load up on clones and confusion skills. Then get the weapon sigil (mischievous snowball) and take the confuse on blind trait. Also take the blinding signet and the trait that gives you distortion on signet use.

Every weapon swap causes blindness and confusion. Every shatter causes confusion. Both healing signet and blinding signet give distortion and blind grants another stack of confusion. The torch causes blindness and confusion. Having sword in each weapon set gives you blocks which generate clones or cause blindness. You can keep an enemy confused and blinded and between all the blocks, evasion, blindness and distortion your Mesmer will be very survivable.

Ross Biddle.2367:

First pro tip: Level your mesmer with PvP tomes, or in an EOTM kTrain.

Right, so you can get dumped into level 80 content with no traits and no idea how to play your class.