Guild Wars 2

Nemesis.8593:

A few i saw before where “sometimes you do this… other times you do this…” i don’t, and i always preach against them. All the benefits in those builds together would overshadow any of my builds… but those benefits never truly come together, so you are stuck sucking and everything…

This lovely little soundbite shows just how little you have been listening to everything myself and everyone else has been telling you, but I’m done explaining now. I don’t need to bash my head against a wall of ignorance. Everyone in this thread so far as pointed out the deficiencies in your build but you refuse to listen to anyone. There is no need to waste more time on this failure.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Nemesis.8593:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Nemesis.8593:

If you could fit me the duelist in this build i would literally delete my video… but i’m guessing who ever designed the build system made sure you can’t really get duelist and focus reflects…

In a team pve situation, in a build with high phantasm crit chance, you want to stay away from the duelists out of courtesy to your team.

Duelists do an 8 shot unload, and in a high crit build, this will generally stack between 7 and 8 bleeds on the target. You get 2 duelists, and you’re hitting 13-16 bleeds continuously. This is great for your personal dps, but if you have a competent condition class in your party, their dps is now getting crippled, and since your bleeds hit for far less than theirs, your party dps is also getting lowered.

The 10/30/0/25/5 build is a strong phantasm build that I use regularly (without mantras, because that’s silly). A few weapon tweaks and you get my Overpowered PvP Phantasm Build. I will also run it in some dungeons.

However, since the majority of my PvE content is fractals, the 20 points in illusions to get phantasmal haste for the wardens is extremely important. There are several fractals and fights where having that phantasmal haste is really key, and so even if I could do higher damage in general without it, taking that trait is worth it for the possibility of needing it.

The DPS is not actually crippled, i have tested long ago the bleeds stacks… but i wasn’t even able to post my results because of the method i used to get my results.
Suffice to say that 2 bleeders are ok, 3 are not…

What i did was bug the first boss in SE, and auto-attack it with scepter 1… average bleeding stacks 23, killing time 4 minutes.

I got a second necromancer with the exact same build and stats… we auto-attacked together… we took each other’s bleeding stacks you could say, yet the killing time was exactly 2 minutes 10 seconds.

I got a 3rd necromancer with the exact same build and stats… we auto-attacked together… took us 4 minutes and a few seconds to kill the boss.

Well, your testing is wrong, because the bleeding stack mechanics are not a hidden thing. Additionally, your testing is very obviously wrong because with 3 necromancers it took longer than with 2 necromancers.

Bleed stacks go up to 25, and then stop. If half of those bleed stacks are low damage ones from your phantasms, then the necromancer won’t be doing proper damage. With additional bleed stacking, the necromancer can push out the low damage stacks, but since your phantasms keep attacking, they will continue to push out the necromancer’s stacks.

Suffice to say, bleeds don’t stack higher than 25, and that’s the limit you have to work in. Duelists cripple the effectiveness of other condition classes in your party, and that’s not really a point for discussion.

Shows that 2 bleeders don’t cripple each other out… only 3 bleeders do.
The 2 bleeders had a combined stacking potential of 43 bleeds… if you get capped at 25, then the time of the kill would have not been exactly half… would have been considerable longer.

The fact that 3 bleeders took as much as 1… means that there are some hidden mechanics to how 3 bleeders interact with each other. While i do not claim to know these mechanics… the fact remains that i have demonstrated that two bleeders that can stack 23 bleeds on their own… do not cripple each other in a team.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Nemesis.8593:

A few i saw before where “sometimes you do this… other times you do this…” i don’t, and i always preach against them. All the benefits in those builds together would overshadow any of my builds… but those benefits never truly come together, so you are stuck sucking and everything…

This lovely little soundbite shows just how little you have been listening to everything myself and everyone else has been telling you, but I’m done explaining now. I don’t need to bash my head against a wall of ignorance. Everyone in this thread so far as pointed out the deficiencies in your build but you refuse to listen to anyone. There is no need to waste more time on this failure.

Again you come at me… i have so much work i barely have time to read properly and reply. Yet i do so…
Your build and the way you do things is exactly the reason i started making videos in the first place, people thinking that they can do it all, and they do nothing properly in fact.
Having a condition damage weapon in PvE and using conditions without condition damage stats is a waste. You also advertised false numbers with your build, which i carefully tasted to be sure i wasn’t wrong.

See me calling you a failure ?… Yeah… we’re done.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097… the latest build you have shown me does what you advertised. You still missed out my ability to add vulnerability but that’s ok.

Same phantasm damage if not a bit more at times + party support and great damage vs mobs with projectiles (yours) vs… well… same phantasm damage if not a bit less at times + GS DPS uptime and vulnerability stacking.
I agree… i also think your build is very good, your build… not the ones with condition damage weapon and healing and… and and and…

I’ve been reading through this thread and it looks like people are putting in a lot of effort to give assistance guidance for your build.

Mesmer is not a class where peak efficiency (in this case dps) can be achieved by simply racking up the numbers.

There are tools – utilities, skills, traits – for every situation which can be used to augment damage (through reflects/boons/conditions…) which can also help with supporting your team. A large part of this class is knowing what to use in each situation, and being flexible with skills/traits.

Yes you can go at it with consistent brute force, although this will be less of a cannon and more of a pistol – ultimately you will perform better (put out bigger numbers) by remaining flexible and adapting to each situation.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Phantasmal_Haste
The swordsman doesn’t require phantasmal haste to attack at a rate of 3.2 seconds. The duelist on the other hand, attacks every 5.4 seconds. Since the swordsman leaps in and out and evades while leaping and leaps often, I’ve found he is less likely to die and overall, does more damage than the duelist. You also don’t run into the whole bleed problem. Now for more math with a TEAM in mind.
When I warrior uses FGJ or a medkit runes of altruism engineer buffs… or other classses doing their boon thing, I’d like to show you how much of a DPS increase for your whole party this is. My build for example relies on fury to get that 100% chance of phantasm crit so lets see how much damage I would lose without it.
(1+ 1(1.13+0.5)) = 2.63 crit modifier
(1+ .81(1.13+0.5)) = 2.32 crit modifier or I do 88% of the damage I could with fury. This is a huge drop in damage. This also applies to anyone that has trouble with fury uptime or getting any fury at all. With the power of Signet of Inspiration, you can double that fury uptime and make sure that your team doesn’t do 88% of their damage potential half the time. This is in comparison to 4% bonus on your auto attack and I consider this “the mesmer’s damage” even if the mesmer isn’t doing it directly. After all, most of our personal damage is from phantasms anyways. This is just fury though. Let’s look at might. Between a warrior and runes of altruism med kit or any heal, your party will get 6-10 stacks of might. That’s about 350 bonus power/condition damage that you can turn into 700 for your whole team. So base power of 3864+700 is a 118% increase for you and for your whole team. However this requires coordination or at least listening for the shout to use your signet. When you pull it off, it’s amazing dps for your whole group. Not to mention other boons the guardian might be giving you.
Some enemies also give themselves lots of boons or huge stacks (Jellyfish gets 25 might when he eats a person) so arcane thievery +signet of inspiration is 875 power/condition damage for your whole team for a bit. Again much better than the 8% cost on your auto attack.

I use a 20/20/0/0/30 zerker melee build and I do prefer this build but I hope I’ve managed to convince you that there are better cannon specs (10/30/0/25/5) than the one you presented. I haven’t convinced you that shatter is viable but that is mostly for another thread. An example: Dredge fractal. I use shattered concentration to constantly strip 4 stacks of boons in an aoe. This is really good since it gets rid of the protection boon that makes your whole team doe 33% less damage. Null field is an excellent option for the phantasm build but of course comes at the cost of 4% bonus to your auto attack. 33% for the whole team vs 4% for just your auto attack: the choice is obvious. Next, feedback is of course useful for this area as there are lots of those pests with rifles and reflecting that damage can add up. You then loose another 4% of your auto attack.
So for single player PvE, these mantras are great but once you start synergizing with your group and adjusting your abilities for the fights ahead, mantras are some of the worst utilities you can take because other ones, when used correctly will buff your teams damage or defense by upwards of 20-50%. You won’t see these numbers but they are happening and they are “your DPS”
If you swap these utilities in and out, the mantra trait becomes obsolete and the 25 minor in dueling sucks anyways. 10 more domination for shattered concentration/ gs trait/ signet cd becomes more viable. Or 5 more into inspiration/illusions for more glamour traits/ get that bonus auto attack damage etc.. You lose 10% crit damage but your party gains so much.

Nemesis.8593:

Yes it is nice, i like it… what i wanted was to make the most glass cannon glass cannon… with the only support being acting as a debuffer by applying stacks of vulnerability while interrupting, which you do quite often because of pistol 5 and 3 mantra interrupts…. the extra vulnerability you bring to the party on top of the up to 26% extra damage from your greatsword… as well as the fact that you can attack at all times from 1200 range… makes my build a cannon, a glass cannon.
…
If you come and say that my extra DPS uptime from GS is not worth it compared to the reflect you bring to a group in a real scenario… then i demand more greatsword DPS… so you are faced with a real decision.
…
A few i saw before where “sometimes you do this… other times you do this…” i don’t, and i always preach against them. All the benefits in those builds together would overshadow any of my builds… but those benefits never truly come together, so you are stuck sucking and everything…

You are right, I forgot to mention the vulnerability… against 1 target when you do much better aoe damage. Also keep in mind that vulnerability lasts half the time on defiant targets so it isn’t as much gain as you might think. As for the 26% you have on the auto attack; this is false. I showed the numbers and it adds up to only 9% more damage vs singlet targets when you compare the builds. My auto attack actually does more against multiple targets because of the sigil of fire. Also, my intention with the glass cannon statement was to show that there are greater cannon builds and therefore you shouldn’t claim that your build defines the glass cannon. Phantasms in my proposed build do 119% more damage and phantasms make up the majority of your damage while only losing 9% damage against singlet targets. So all around, my builds dps defines a cannon more. Some of this is from traits/food and some of this is from understanding team synergy/the mesmer.

When it come to balance, every encounter is going to be slightly different and will favor different weapons/utilties/traits. That’s just how it works. If there was perfect “balance” according to you, there would only be one class with one build and no weapon swaps. The abilities with higher skill ceiling SHOULD be balanced to do more damage since you can also do NO damage with them if you use them incorrectly. So I would have to disagree with you that your build should be buffed. This is also why warriors are having problems in PvP balance. They are too simple so they need high dps but if they had any more dps they would be unbalanced since it is so easy to pull off their even more insane DPS.

When you are saying in your build phantasms do 119% more damage, are you saying they do double the damage mine do ?… I can quickly re-trait again and see if they hit 14k on average in your build, i can even record it…

Up to 26% damage on auto-attack…
Empowering Mantras: 4% more damage for each readied mantra x 3 = 12% +
Compounding Power: 3% more damage for each of your active illusions x 3 = 9 +
Superior Rune of the Eagle: (6): +5% vs. targets with less then[sic] 50% health = 5

That’s… 26% so far… in a perfect world that so rarely happens of course, but we’re comparing maximum potential, i think…

Wastrel’s Punishment: 5% increased damage to inactive foes… that would be 31%, but i’m not that cheesy rofl.

ps: I already said you make valid points, and it’s a worthy alternative. Thanks for taking the time to debate these with me in a polite fashion…

Let’s assume i completely agree with you (i won’t give up on my build, i find it still valid), am i the only person bothered with the fact that mesmers according to what many have said… “must” bring utility, that is why they are taken for ?…
I just got here… but if that it’s true, then don’t mesmers want to be in some builds equivalent to warriors… as warriors would be equivalent to support elementalist in some builds.

When i first set my eyes on guild wars 2… i remember hearing “you don’t have to wait for a tank or a healer or a DPS, any class can take any role… you are not stuck into one role, but every class will perform that role in a different way”.

So yeah…

Edit: i will even recommend your build to people that would want to do bring some support to the party when doing dungeons/fractals.

When I say 119% I mean my builds does (your phantasm damage) x 1.19 not +119%. The reason I say 26% is false is that in comparison to my build, I have 16% more damage from mantras to your 12%. I could swap from ruby orbs to eagle but I don’t think this is worth it. The extra precision doesn’t matter since we both hit 100% crit chance. 4% less crit damage and 120 less power than ruby orbs. Also, most builds have some sort of more damage at less health. This means that if the boss takes 5 minutes to reach 50%, it usually takes less time (2-4 minutes) for him to go from 50% to 0%. So 5% below 50% is more like 1-2% more overall damage. Since this game doesn’t have enrage times, this is bad. I also have sigil of fire. For single targets, sigil of air is better. So between the various trade offs, you don’t do 26% MORE auto attack damage COMPARED my build. I don’t mean to say those buffs don’t exist but it’s only about 9% more auto attack damage.
Wastrel’s would be cheesy to count and with defiant stacks/dazes only lasting 1 second, it only matters maybe in PvP.
PS. To other mesmers in this thread you look like a troll. I mentioned this before but the reason I’m trying to give this much detailed advice is because I know you make decent necro guides and it worries me that those great necro guides are being placed right next to misleading mesmer guides. I’m glad you are understanding the alternatives. In most other games, your build would be the way to go. With GW2 and current fotm/dungeon design it’s not optimal. It isn’t optimal DPS. It isn’t optimal mesmer DPS. It doesn’t have any utility. You also insulted a lot of mesmers with a few comments in your video so some of us are responding rather harshly.

Edit- Example of weapon/utility swapping. If you are on your necro in AC exp p1 or p3 and you are fighting burrows, do you stick with your scepter or swap to a dagger/warhorn and bring flesh golem/well of power EVEN if you are a condintionmancer? This is why so many of us are confused at why you are bashing on mesmer builds that are much more organic and MUST change between fights.

Nemesis.8593:

Let’s assume i completely agree with you (i won’t give up on my build, i find it still valid), am i the only person bothered with the fact that mesmers according to what many have said… “must” bring utility, that is why they are taken for ?…
I just got here… but if that it’s true, then don’t mesmers want to be in some builds equivalent to warriors… as warriors would be equivalent to support elementalist in some builds.

When i first set my eyes on guild wars 2… i remember hearing “you don’t have to wait for a tank or a healer or a DPS, any class can take any role… you are not stuck into one role, but every class will perform that role in a different way”.

For the most part, you can bring any build you want but in high lvl group settings like FOTM, or even just single player, there are still optimal builds. They got rid of the trinity in its previous form but the roles are still there. It’s easier to have a guardian tank. Things are easier when you have a warriors dps or a mesmers support. The great thing about mesmers is that optimal DPS happens at the same time with support so why lock yourself into just 1 role when you can do 2 or 3. Other classes can pull this off but most dont do it as well or most pugs just dont.

You will likely get kicked from pug fracs if you are too lazy to change a utility slot. So I hope you have a static group you do everything with.

Your crediblity is rapidly deminishing when you make claims like that, and that 2 necros share bleeding. They just don’t. There must have been something else you weren’t taking into account. Which at this point wouldn’t surprise me.

shyrith.3462:

You will likely get kicked from pug fracs if you are too lazy to change a utility slot. So I hope you have a static group you do everything with.

Your crediblity is rapidly deminishing when you make claims like that, and that 2 necros share bleeding. They just don’t. There must have been something else you weren’t taking into account. Which at this point wouldn’t surprise me.

My guess is that he had bleeds that ticked for …70 per tick, and the 2nd necro had bleeds that ticked for 130ish per tick, and the 2nd necro overwrote his ticks, and so you get a double kill speed. The third necro had lower bleeds than his, probably around 50 or 60, and overwrote some of the higher ones, resulting in a kill speed similar to the original one.

Pyroatheist.9031:

shyrith.3462:

You will likely get kicked from pug fracs if you are too lazy to change a utility slot. So I hope you have a static group you do everything with.

Your crediblity is rapidly deminishing when you make claims like that, and that 2 necros share bleeding. They just don’t. There must have been something else you weren’t taking into account. Which at this point wouldn’t surprise me.

My guess is that he had bleeds that ticked for …70 per tick, and the 2nd necro had bleeds that ticked for 130ish per tick, and the 2nd necro overwrote his ticks, and so you get a double kill speed. The third necro had lower bleeds than his, probably around 50 or 60, and overwrote some of the higher ones, resulting in a kill speed similar to the original one.

yeah… and i don’t read what you write…
Thanks for the feedback on the build, it was most valuable.

Nemesis…. I was going to keep quiet on this one… But at this point I hope i can provide an objective look at your build.

You are going for glass cannon stats… you got em. Good grand great! However these are stats for you and you alone. Do your phantasms inherit these stats? Aye! They most certainly do. However you would do well to actually take stats that boosts ur phantasms damage…
The damage on interrupt trait. Objectively is terrible… It only does like 200 damage GC V GC… and in all dungeons you are going to have bosses that get interrupted by other players and you are essentially wasting a 10pt trait for something that could be more useful like empowered illusions (15% damage to phantasms too!) or mental torment. Both of these are objectively better numbers wise than the damage on interrupt build…
Now lets move onto mantras. a 30/30/0/0/10 build is the most selfish mesmer build around. It offers no group suport through traits. Zip zilch nada.
Even the 30/20/0/20/0 mantra build by fay offers better group support.

Now back to your “But everyone elses numbers suck mine is bestest” argument. The numbers for the player may not be all that great. But lets say it is a 10/30/0/25/5 build. This build takes two traits that increase phantasm damage so we have Dom:III and Insp 25 minor. That is a 30% damage increase to phantasm. Then we have phantasmal fury Dueling II.
So in a build like pyros (think it was 3100 damage or something close) lets say for the sake of argument it is 3k total power with a 50% crit chance (guessing). Well with these 3 traits phantasms now have a total of 4k power (30% total increase) and 70% crit chance. There in lies the secret to why a build like 10/30/0/25/5 will be numbers wise better. This isn’t because their base stats are better but they take the traits that increase the stats of their summons. Which is where the power for a mesmer comes from. Our summons. We aren’t meant to do insane direct damage for ourselves in anyway except shatters. And in dungeons phantasm builds bring more utility than shatters.

I don’t like GC builds for dungeons. I use a protection sharing build that is 100% uptime for the group on protection. And lets just say that goes alot farther in doing well in dungeons than being a fully zerk GC mesmer. After awhile I would stop ressing you especially if i saw that you had that many mantras. You need better group support. That is why people want mesmer for PvE material. Group utility. not dps.

It’s been interesting to read this thread given that I recently made a change from almost exactly the mantra build the OP outlines, to a phantasm build with plenty of reflection and flexible utilities. This isn’t from a theorycrafting perspective, but just a casual player’s experience of the change in build.

While I found, and still find, the mantra build to be superlative in open world PvE, that really is the game’s ‘easy mode’ and the mantra build was simply the laziest option for grinding Orr, Southsun, etc. I realised that I was contributing bugger all to groups, particularly in fractals, and wanted to be able to switch out my utilities without feeling like I’d kitten my entire build. Sure, I could (and did) swap out to get Feedback, Veil, Null Field, Portal Entre etc, but since I was losing a huge chunk of dps by doing that, I figured that if I was going to have to use those utilities regularly I might as well not run the mantra build at all.

I have to say, the new build using a Sword/Focus and Greatsword has performed incredibly well in dungeons. Phantasms die fast (especially when their tagged mob dies, grrr) but the utility I feel I can justifiably bring to the group now completely outweighs that niggle, and in boss fights the phantasms more than pull their weight in terms of raw dps. Dungeons and fractals which were once a real hassle (especially the Underground Facility fractal) are now completely do-able thanks to the utility my character brings – plus the beefed up iBerserker and iWarden do a nice chunk of aoe damage which the mantra build was lacking.

In short, while I have a soft spot for the original mantra build, if you’re wanting to do group content then a more flexible build will make life much easier for everyone in your party, including you.

I do believe in general Nemesis was looking for more of criticism for the build he made…DPS and damage, not necessarily for “utility/support”. Regardless of what people seek in dungeon runs/fractal runs or anything, the build he made has its own role, and I can personally see this being useful in many situations without the “utility”; a Backline Laser if you will… If you guys want a support build, I’m quite sure he can make a build for it as well that still does pretty well and then contribute criticism there instead based on what’s needed. However if this is “damage build” post on that instead…

Everyone should have the ability to share/post even play the way they want without the say so of “whats meta”. If theres a role in it, its worth it.

Lithril Ashwalker.6230:

I do believe in general Nemesis was looking for more of criticism for the build he made…DPS and damage, not necessarily for “utility/support”. Regardless of what people seek in dungeon runs/fractal runs or anything, the build he made has its own role, and I can personally see this being useful in many situations without the “utility”; a Backline Laser if you will… If you guys want a support build, I’m quite sure he can make a build for it as well that still does pretty well and then contribute criticism there instead based on what’s needed. However if this is “damage build” post on that instead…

Everyone should have the ability to share/post even play the way they want without the say so of “whats meta”. If theres a role in it, its worth it.

I guarantee you, nemesis was not looking for criticism of his build. He received an awful lot of criticism, but he definitely didn’t want it.

I just want to reiterate the importance of out of combat weapon swapping, utility skill swapping, and even trait swapping. They are essential if you want to be an effective mesmer (effective in terms if DPS, as well as utility).

I usually use Sword+Focus/Pistol and GS, so within a single fractal/dungeon path I may change between Focus and Pistol 5-10 times depending on the group of mobs or boss we will be facing. Usually the Focus’ iWarden is good for AoE damage against groups of mobs, and Pistol is good against bosses, because it’s ranged. On some other bosses (e.g. in CoF p1 / CoE) where you’re always in melee, I switch to Sword/Focus + Sword/Pistol, but after the fight I immediately switch to GS + Sword/Focus because the Berserker and Warden both do AoE damage, and you’re likely to be facing groups of mobs again.

The obvious traits to swap are the dueling major trait: either reduce Pistol skills recharge or Sword skill recharge, depending on whether you have a Pistol equipped for the next encounter. Also you can swap the reflection trait in inspiration for the healing mantras trait, or for longer glamour duration, or for faster glamour recharge. There are many combinations.

These are just random examples, there are many places in dungeons/fractals where you can be more effective by using a specific weapon/trait/utility setup, and it’s important to take advantage of this.

Edit: You know how on the Ele forums people are complaining that eles have to do so much button mashing in order to keep up with other classes? Mesmers can also be micro-managed intensively, it just happens between fights.

I couldn’t agree more. While I haven’t got round to switching my traits around between encounters, I’m constantly swapping weapons. I even intend to pick up sigil of [enemy] slaying weapons for inquest, undead, ghosts and sons of svanir just so I have the strongest weapons possible for the dungeons I want to do. Night sigils stack with these as well, so if you run COF or COE night/smothering, night/undead and night/inquest stack for 20% damage increase.