Guild Wars 2

Are Mantras viable at all (in sPvP)? I searched ‘Mantra build’ on the forums and nothing turned up… I’ve been playing Mes for a while now but personally the small number of hits after charging one up, and then the high chance of being interrupted trying to charge one up again – which make them near useless in fights – has turned me away from Mantras.

However, with the recent decrease of the cast time and an interesting abundance of traits regarding Mantras I hadn’t noticed before, I’ve been curious as to whether they can be used. Can they be played; or even better, has an unorthodox Mesmer somewhere come up with a build entirely based on them?

Cheers

Mantras can be played, they just aren’t very good. If you want to see the best mantra builds, take a look at the builds that Fay made. Unfortunately, even she is of the opinion that a build built around mantras simply isn’t competitive. They need a total overhaul to be worthy of a focused build.

Now, that’s not to say they have no place in builds. I treat mantras as a spice. You wouldn’t make a meal out of spices, but you add them sparingly to finish the flavor. Mantras are potent bits of utility that can shore up otherwise weak points of a build.

I play mantra build. It’s awesome for solo and small party play (both PvE and PvP), but lack of big team or zerg advantages – slot skills are filled by mantras, not by veil/portal etc.

If you know how to pull of a mantra build it ain’t that bad really. Plenty of conditional removal (Mantra of Resolve), breakstuns (Mantra of Concentration) and not to mention interrupt skills (Mantra of Distraction). Personally, Mantra of pain ain’t much of any help to damage tbh…

Personally, this is my build 30 30 0 10 0

Domination – With Mantra of distraction, Each interrupt deals damage on II trait in domination (Halting strike). XI trait allows your mantra to be activated 3 times. since i roll a Greatsword on this build i use X trait for cooldown reduction

Dueling – With VII trait (Mantra Masteries) reduces mantra CD by 20% which is good, you want your mantra to be constantly up. XI trait (Empowering Mantras) increase damage for each mantra. so with your 3 basic mantra and mantra of healing, you have 12% increase in damage. which is a nice increase. and since i use duel swords, III or IV are good.

I put my last 10 points in Inspiration for mender’s purity. If you are using mantra of healing, you remove one condition when you heal and that is 3 conditions removed.

So overall to sum up

- 3 breakstuns
- 6 conditional removal skills; able to remove 9 conditions
- 3 interrupts
- wonderful heal ability

Slight warning
The only prob for my build is escape mechanism. Mantra build leaves you very very vulnerable. and if u used up all your readied mantras you are even more vunerable.

Imagine Mantra of Pain would inflict Agony, Torment and Pain (damage) …
joke aside …

dragon posted the “usual” mantra burst build for pvp. the three charges and the bonus damage from charged mantras are the key-traits for it.

I use mantras for pve build, and I wouldn’t ditch them anymore. The healing of Mantra of recovery and Mantra of Pain with Restorative Mantras is just too powerful.

Only mantras, no. As said above, they simply are not competitive.

But they’re a very interesting complement for hybrid builds.

Namely, Mantra of Restoration + Mantra of Pain + harmonious mantras alone can, with few trait points (can fit in a lot of builds) and investing just 1 utility+heal skill slot, give a very nice support flavour.
(most of the time, if you’re using mantras is for harmonious.)

See builds like Glamour master + Mantra support. Or Phantasm + Mantra.

They have the nice utility or dmg of the base glam/phant build, but packs in the raw healing support of mantras.

I love mantras but they just aren’t good enough to play competitively as an actual build. You can use one as utility (Mantra of Distraction is good) but to run an actual build in sPvP won’t work. At least not if you want to play competitively, you will have some success in hotjoins with it if you don’t run into good players.

That said mantras are awesome for PvE/WvW support and I even like to run Mantra of Pain with Restorative Mantras trait in my damage build, so handy having that extra heal when it’s needed despite being full damage. I hope they overhaul the traits especially but the mantras themselves can use some tweaks also (Especially Mantra of Concentration)

Garr.1823:

I play mantra build. It’s awesome for solo and small party play (both PvE and PvP), but lack of big team or zerg advantages – slot skills are filled by mantras, not by veil/portal etc.

Mind re-creating it on an online build creator, and linking it? =3

I run a couple of mantras with Restorative Mantras when I solo roam in wvw. I play a phantasm build so I can afford to cast mantras in the middle of the battle if I have 2 or more phantasms out. Thats the only trait I use for mantra.

Mantra charging is a self inflicted interrupt for nearly 3 seconds and you simply don’t get enough for it. The toughness and heal should come standard. On top of that we should be able to trait into 1s of stealth when charging mantra and 2s of stability. On top of that, you have to micromanage them to make sure they are charged or not. To fix that, just allow each to have 3 ticks standard. The third tick automatically causes you to recharge it.

I tried a build that had Mantra of Pain in it after the patch. The only way I could make it work at all was to recharge only when in stealth.

Everytime I think I’ve got a good mantra build, it falls on it’s face performance wise to any of my other standard or gimmick builds.

I like the idea, maybe they’re good for pve, idk. In pvp, though, even if they were buffed to holy hell I’d probly not use them unless they significantly change the feel of mantras. Their whole charge use cooldown recharge mechanic is SO CLUNKY. I just can’t deal.

The mantra burst build does insane damage but wouldn’t work unless you had people to support you.

After the patch I tried a tank build because it would be nice to do that without having to go invis or port off of the point too much. I didn’t fair well but that doesn’t mean someone wouldn’t. I didn’t have the sense I was playing it near enough to perfect but I project improvement in my gameplay wouldn’t put it over the top.

Pyro makes a good point with his spice analogy. I think the cond-removal and stability are a good value at two uses. The daze one I find build-specific. Pain I would hardly ever consider.

last time i played mantra build it was like 30/30/0/0/10 with the extra 3% damage for each illusion in the last trait (“10”)…

total 4×4%(extra damage from readied mantra) + 3x 3%(extra damage for each illusion = 16% + 9% = 25% extra damage from traits alone…

good damage but like mentioned above nothing else you could do apart from pure burst dps…..

I think something would be cool for mantras is a trait that reduced/eliminated the cast time… Everyone can agree that the instant effects of mantras are pretty sweet in some cases however the cast times are just soooo long even with the reduction in the recent patch. I think a trait to make them instant prep (like guardian meditations) would be extremely helpful… The only mantra that this might be too much for is MOP in the right build because its just constant damage spikes.

I use mantra of distraction in my build when facing melee (otherwise feedback is my staple). With the 15point in domination you can get some nice vul stacks for burst with diversion (f3) and MoD.

Like many others said, mantras are nice situational utilities but a build for pvp will not be very effective.

jportell.2197:

I think something would be cool for mantras is a trait that reduced/eliminated the cast time… Everyone can agree that the instant effects of mantras are pretty sweet in some cases however the cast times are just soooo long even with the reduction in the recent patch. I think a trait to make them instant prep (like guardian meditations) would be extremely helpful… The only mantra that this might be too much for is MOP in the right build because its just constant damage spikes.

Removing their casttime would be the opposite of the design.

ANet lowered Mantras’ casttime twice. Honestly, I was fine with 4s (and 2s underwater ). It requires management and thinking. Alot players don’t like this playstyle.
Technically HealingMantra is far better than EtherFeast, but you sacrifice a bit since you can’t do other things while casting 2.75s.

Speaking for a PvE perspective of a mantra user:

• Due to trait synergy I’d never ditch HealingMantra and Mantra of Pain right now
• The effect/ cooldown is great for all mantras (maybe except daze), but for that they require long casting
• The 2.75s casttime is fine. You’re not able to do things, which is balanced (see above), yet it feels awkward for outstanders. I mean I stand beside a downed player and first have to charge my healing mantra. The downed player would usually think “why did he walk here and not do anything?”. Maybe charging mantra could receive a bit more visual effect.
• Not being able to do anything while casting. Similar as above. It is justified, yet lacks something. Vulnerable to interrupts and such might be fine, but the “unfair part” (in my eyes) is that you can’t dodge or swap weapons. The only thing you can so is to use other mantras or blink away while casting. Using other mantras just cause another CD, using mantra of stability to charge another mantra doesn’t work by design and blinks CD is too high for using it out of emergency. Allow us to dodge, weaponswap or grant us stability (instead of 400 toughness) or aegis with reasonable duration/ cooldown.
• Inconsistency with Dueling XI. You get rewarded for not using mantras. So you charge them and not use them? That’s a weird concept. You want us to us a single charge and then use autoattack? Not saying the trait is bad, but it’s somewhat against the concept of mantras.
• Single charges bind you. If you use a single charge in a combat with a mob, what to do with the other charge? Either rework it, or give us a possibility to recharge a single charge with reduced cast/CD.

My two cents.

About all the “you can’t do stuff in those 2.75 secs”:

Your phantasms can.

That’s the point.

Mantra + Phant hybrid build can easily charge up mantras during phant attacks, for a minimal loss of DPS.

(oh, and you can shatter while charging. or fire off the other mantra. or pop the feedback, or use phase retreat…)

Yes you can do all of those which is fine in pve I run a mantra healing build in pve but in pvp trying to charge a 2.75s mantra and possibly more than one is a deathwish. No amount of phantasm damage is going to save you if you aren’t actively moving and dodging and avoiding damage.

In PvP the mantra casts is literally a target over the mesmers head saying “free shot for the next 3s!”

Mantra is pve Only.

I can understand why people don’t like mantras, it takes a lot of micro managing and if you can’t stand the thought of having that much more to think about you basically mesmerise yourself.

I happen to have ran mantras a couple of times and it is after the latest patch that I feel they are on point, the charge time is perfect, the effects are solid and balanced.

I won’t delve into my build but what I will say is I was originally going for an interrupt based build before deciding that both mantras and interrupt traits go hand in hand. Alone, the two might seem lacklustre I suppose.

I can lock someone down and burst them before they get a chance to heal, I run as many dazes and interrupts as I can without compromising myself. I see staff as a compromise for example, AoE dazing is pretty good yes, but how often will you see a foe actually sit in a chaos storm? Other staff abilities don’t benefit me much either.

It is important that you don’t take more than 2 utility mantras in my opinion, as you leave yourself too vulnerable otherwise. I usually take decoy, which brings me to my next point.

To charge or not to charge? I’ll start by saying you shouldn’t really be feeling the need to charge mantras in a fight, if you are burning down your charges (you should have 3 charges per mantra if you are running mantras, harmonious mantras makes all mantras 50% more effective which overshadows any other mantra trait) that quickly then you are doing something wrong, if its mantra of pain you want to charge..then…I don’t know what to say really, mantra of pain is great for initial burst if you want it but to then charge it after you have used it if you are still fighting is incredibly counter intuitive.

Mantra of Stability – isn’t really a favorite and I find it to be a bit of a glorified stun breaker, I’d rather use decoy instead. But using this in a fight you would possibly get through 1 or 2 charges before your enemy ran out of cc, all 3 if they were cc heavy and you didn’t feel like dodging. Using it before a cc requires a crystal ball and I wouldn’t expect anyone would be able to predict cc before it happened, unless it was obvious like a warrior hammer blast boom ground pound smash thingy, or pure luck.

Mantra of Resolve <3 It is my favorite condition removal, it is the most reliable condition removal we have access to in my opinion, in a mantra build I find this to be a better choice than the alternative of Mantra of Recovery with Mender’s Purity. This choice does free up a utility slot for a different mantra but it kind of forces you to heal if you get a particularly nasty condition, like confusion or terror-fear. The only time I’ve ever burned through 3 charges is either against a necro or p/d bleed thief ( sjgidnajvkencig bleed thieves, hate them hate them hate them but can kill them kill them kill them with properly timed dazes). By the time I’ve burned through all three it is usually clear who will win and/or flee.

Mantra of Recovery – The staple heal in a Mantra build, this is the crux of your survivability and if you are fleeing you can often get this charged and used to keep yourself going, the charge is the hard part, and if you can stealth or distort, do so! This is the only mantra I will charge in a prolonged fight. – Usually in stealth.

Mantra of Distraction <3 its sooooooooooo good in a build with interrupt traits, soo soooooo goooooood! You couldn’t burn through these charges if you tried because of the cooldowns, but if you time these along with weapon skill dazes and f3 you can keep someone locked down completely for around 5~7 seconds spaced over 15 seconds-ish with dazes and if you are skilled/lucky you will interrupt.

Mantras reward careful and thoughtful play and just spamming the charges will inevitably punish you for that behaviour, just like if you shatter at the wrong time or summon a phantasm when you are blinded/ have no LoS/ the target is invulnerable. If you are in dire situations, which does happen and in a mantra build you have far fewer active defenses, use your stealths or distortion and charge whatever it is you feel will get you through the fight. You do have staying power when you have MoR charges and using LoS to your advantage will really benefit this build. Openly charging mantras is, as stated above by a few people, a bad idea. I’de like to repeat that I can see why people don’t feel they are viable enough to have a build based around but I can’t say I agree with it, it works for me and coming from a shatter build I don’t feel any less useful or threatening. It is harder to play however.

TL;DR (Sorry!) Mantras are good if you like micromanaging, and are cool. Obfuscate. Disorient. Confuse!

I’d wish mantra worked. The animation and chanting is so cool. However, so far in pvp it’s impossible to use well verse multiple opponents. In a 2v2, if you are focused, your only option is to run in a circle like an idiot while you try to charge up. In the end, all that healing and toughness is never enough when two people are bursting you down. Avoidance is simply superior.

The fix I suggest for mantra is to push the recharge time down to 1s. Additionally, allow us to do ANYTHING (except charge another mantra) without interrupting the recharge. If we do anything other than running (or whatever we are allowed to do now) then it will add 2s to the recharge. Once one recharge is finished, you can start another. This would allow mesmers to play more fluidly when they need to, but also take advantage of quick recharges when able. Also, make it more obvious a mantra is ready or not ready.

I was looking at trying a mantra build for fun. One potential build would be a 30(II, IX, XI)/20(VI,VII)/0/20(IV, X)/0 build. Take all mantras except Mantra of Pain. Also take Mass Invis and Torch and Staff for more survivability. The idea here would be to constantly daze, stack vuln, and outlast. This build would have a lot of cleanse, heals, and toughness which would increase your eHP quite a bit.

I never played GW1. However, mesmer feels like the “leftovers” class where all the class designers’ ideas went that didn’t fit into the other classes.

i really wanted a working mantra build that is also viable in wvw.i like the idea of it, but pyro is right, it needs a major overhaul

Mantra builds need a lot of micro and have a very high skillcap imo, with a few more tweaks i think they could be very viable.

A single Mantra is possible in pvp if your smart and time the recharge with decoy/blink/chaos armor etc. But more than one becomes redundant if the fight does not complete within your mantra usages.

Another thing I know every mesmer would want a fix for is the charges. The charges should regenerate based on the total mantra cd. This would stop the need for “wasting” the leftover charges to re-chant the mantra before another fight.

“As long as you have 1 mantra charge available, charges will replenish at the rate of the mantra cooldown”

If they make that change or even make it a trait, I see mantra builds working quite well in pvp. They give you stability/condition cure/daze/damage/heal etc

Mantra of Resto with Clear condition on heal makes for a great emergency healing spell.