Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,

Looks like this trait now provides the chance to stack bleeds on your pistol attacks.
Tested in HotM just right after patch.
Magic Bullet definitely has around 33% chance to inflict 2 bleeds as per description.
Although I haven’t seen my iDuelist got any higher than 8 stacks in 1 single unload attack.

Anyone else want to confirm?

Edited: ok, further testing from others (and myself) confirms that still doesn’t work with iDuelist… sigh poor iDuelist still not getting the attention it deserves.

I did a quick test just letting my Duelist solo kill Wasps north of LA.

Was only getting 3-4 stacks of Bleed per attack (~50% crit rate). The fact that you are not getting more then 8 (Duelist hits 8 times) is telling though.

I don’t have time to retest but a third opinion would be cool.

Yeah for sure you get the 33% chance for 2 bleed stacks from magic bullet but it doesn’t appear to work with iDuelist attacks.

It don’t work with iDuelist attacks. So, if more players are agree that still don’t work, ,please change the title to not give devs the idea that it’s ok.

Ok, so it’s half fixed. Better than nothing.

I agree, just tested. Magic bullet works, not duelist.
I didn’t try before to see if magic bullet did work, so I don’t know if they fixed it.

Magic Bullet always worked with the trait. It’s the Duelist who didn’t work.

It’s possible that the devs think this is intended behavior. Maybe they think 33% chance of inflicting 2 stacks of bleeds along with sharper images is simply too strong for the large number of hits a duelist has.

Maybe it’s only supposed to work with magic bullet…

[sarcasm]
Yes, because that would certainly make sense.
A trait designed to benefit all two of our pistol attacks only works with one of them.
I can see how that would make sense to the devs.
[\sarcasm]

AlphatheWhite.9351:

[sarcasm]
Yes, because that would certainly make sense.
A trait designed to benefit all two of our pistol attacks only works with one of them.
I can see how that would make sense to the devs.
[\sarcasm]

Believe me, I would love this to work with regular duelist attacks – I’d opened a thread on this over a week ago.

I just think that if it wasn’t dev intended, this would have been fixed by now. I mean Anet has already released two patches with bugfixes et. This trait not working is huge. I mean…it’s build defining and doesn’t work. There’s no way they could have just passed that up and instead focused on useless things like mantra heal etc.

The only rational explanation I can come up with is that the devs don’t want it to work with duelist attacks.

I didn’t intend that to be a jab at you, but at the devs.
It’s nonsensical, but that doesn’t seem out of character for them.

AlphatheWhite.9351:

I didn’t intend that to be a jab at you, but at the devs.
It’s nonsensical, but that doesn’t seem out of character for them.

I’m sure it isnt on purpose.

There was a fairly long list of bugs for all professions, mesmers included. They would have definitely not written the description this way if they intended it not to work for iDuelist. Plus, the bleed on pistol 5 is fairly anecdotic. It was clearly meant to work for iDuelist but they just didn’t have time to fix mesmers yet (we were not very high on their priority list). Now, when they will start seeing a mesmer stack 50 bleeds on her/his own, they will definitely nerf it, so I’m only mildly optimistic about it.

Silverkey.2078:

There was a fairly long list of bugs for all professions, mesmers included. They would have definitely not written the description this way if they intended it not to work for iDuelist. Plus, the bleed on pistol 5 is fairly anecdotic. It was clearly meant to work for iDuelist but they just didn’t have time to fix mesmers yet (we were not very high on their priority list). Now, when they will start seeing a mesmer stack 50 bleeds on her/his own, they will definitely nerf it, so I’m only mildly optimistic about it.

This is true. 3 Duelists will maintain roughly 18 stacks of Bleed with a peak of 24 (assuming synced). They then have the possibility of getting 48 more stacks of Bleed (72 total) with an average of 16 additional stacks (38 total). Whether or not you have Condition Damage, you’re still looking at a hefty amount of damage (especially with the Chronophantasma… let’s hope they get de-synced like Robert said so it’s harder to cleanse the Bleed, huehuehue).

With 0 Condition Damage (and Might) you’re looking at 2640 damage with only Sharper Images, 7920 with 72 stacks (assuming you have the improbability of getting all procs), and an average of 4180 damage.

The DPS gain from 38 stacks is 836 with no CD or Might. Also, let’s hope they don’t add an ICD because it would be OP for us to have Bleeding on such a “short cooldown”.

Yep, so if they do golem-testing (like for MtD), they’ll say we’re OP and nerf it. Of course realistically, having 3 duelists up and alive is strictly impossible in PvP. And in PvE, even like this, it would barely outperform and direct damage build. But those are big numbers you know…

Silverkey.2078:

Yep, so if they do golem-testing (like for MtD), they’ll say we’re OP and nerf it. Of course realistically, having 3 duelists up and alive is strictly impossible in PvP. And in PvE, even like this, it would barely outperform and direct damage build. But those are big numbers you know…

I think someone mentioned something like 20k theoretical DPS with 3 Duelist’s out.

The ramp time is an issue but once you get there (and stay) you become number 1. I think top DPS according to DnT spreadsheets is 17k (feel free to correct).

17k was the DPS I got for my hybrid build (sword-pistol, rampager) using the bleeding that was announced the week before the patch. With the current patch, I think I get 14-15k, which is about 1-2k above assassin. For the ramp time, I calculated that it was equivalent to a 1s loss of DPS before the DPS converges, but that was neglecting mantra of pain which can significantly boost the beginning of the fight. So that’s most likely 2s DPS loss.

I guess the DPS discrepancy may come from how you compute DPS. For example, I did not include the 25% increase from vuln.

I mean, 704 (average 18 stacks from SI and 16 from DD) bonus DPS isn’t big. Actually, fixing the trait would give, on average, 352 DPS with no CD (once all 3 duelists are up).

Esplen.3940:

I mean, 704 (average 18 stacks from SI and 16 from DD) bonus DPS isn’t big. Actually, fixing the trait would give, on average, 352 DPS with no CD (once all 3 duelists are up).

Yeah but comparing condition traits without CD or increased duration is kinda pointless.

With enough condition damage plus improved vulnerability (37.5% increased damage for 25 stacks) to get 300 damage Bleed ticks and 100% condition duration you be looking at 15k+ DPS from bleeds alone from the Duelist’s.

Condition DPS is something that is a bit of an unknown. DnT DPS spreadsheets didn’t even bother calculating them (their tables only include DD).

Now for current content that’s fine because we are so overgeared that most fight mechanics don’t matter. Xpac content will be made with current gear levels in mind though.

How do you get to 100% CDura now?

It’s pretty easy since we focus on Bleeding.

Signet of Midnight 20% all
Utility buff 10% all
Food buff 36% all (cheap) or 40% all (expensive)
Sigil of agony 20% bleeding
Krait runes 45% bleeding

Pick and match. An easy and cheap way is Krait runes, Signet of Midnight and super veggie pizza (only ~2 silver each).

If you go the Rabid route you max out at 80% since you run crystals and Undead runes.

Seems to me that Phantasmal Fury is a better way of insuring bleeding than Duelist’s Discipline anyway (unless you arent running precision of course, but I usually have pretty good precision), aside from the recharge benefits.

Hm. Power/condi/interrupt build without precision would feel weird to me, but if this trait was fixed that would be interesting.

phantasmal fury gives 20% more crit which means less than 2 more bleeds on average for a iDuelist. On the other hand, duelist’s discipline gives effectively 66% chance bleeding (2 stacks x 33%) which amounts to about 5 more bleeds. The benefits from phantasmal fury (outside of the fact that duelist does not work) is that you also get this bonus on the second phantasm and if you have some power you also get an improved power. But if you spec in bleeds, duelist wins (+ you possible get a good recharge reduction from interrupts to keep higher Duelist uptime).

Silverkey.2078:

phantasmal fury gives 20% more crit which means less than 2 more bleeds on average for a iDuelist. On the other hand, duelist’s discipline gives effectively 66% chance bleeding (2 stacks x 33%) which amounts to about 5 more bleeds. The benefits from phantasmal fury (outside of the fact that duelist does not work) is that you also get this bonus on the second phantasm and if you have some power you also get an improved power. But if you spec in bleeds, duelist wins (+ you possible get a good recharge reduction from interrupts to keep higher Duelist uptime).

your math and logic is flawed. It all depends on how high the phantasm’s crit chance is, which it inherits from the creator of the illusion prior to phantasm-specific buffs like Phantasmal Fury.

If I have a 50% chance to crit and my iDuelist has fury, thats 70% of all hits, on a 8-shot burst thats 5.6 stacks of bleeding, vs 5.28 for the duelist:

8*0.7=5.6 > 8*0.33*2=5.28

It really depends on your chance for crit on the main character + the 20% increase via fury; the higher the crit chance the more likely that phantasmal fury will win out. The break even point is at 66% crit chance:

5.28/8=0.66, or 66% chance of crit.

So, less than 66% chance to crit, Discpline wins on bleed stacking. More than that, Phantasmal Fury wins.

Of course, Phantasmal Fury effects ALL of your phantasms, not just duelist, so if you also have out, say, a swordsman or berserker… on the other hand, Discpline in its intended form would allow you to recharge the duelist faster, and maybe magic bullet if you have other interrupts.

No my logic is fine really. Sure you get more bleeds out of “sharper image” than out of “duelist discipline”, but you get more bleeds out of “duelist discipline” than out of “phantasmal fury” (sharper image is always taken in dueling).
In your case, if you have 50% crit, 70% with fury, you get the numbers you mention (5.6). BUT if you take instead duelist, you get 8*0.33*2 + 8*0.5 = 9.28. You still have the 50% crit. So the added crits from fury is indeed 8*0.2 =1.6 compared to the added 5.28 from discipline and IT DOES NOT DEPEND ON YOUR CRIT CHANCE except if your crit chance is already above 80% in which case the fury is even less useful.

Bugged or “intended to not work because it would be OP”, its a problem either way honestly.

If its bugged, well obviously its a problem that needs to be fixed.

If its working as intended because having it apply to Duellist would be too good, then… why the heck did you design the trait that way in the first place? Surely you could have come up with something more reasonable that would have at least affected both Pistol attacks without being OP?

If it intended then it really unfair on use considering class that can use fire are having so much fun burning the crap out of others.

This need fixing for pve at list for out condition damage if they think it is too powerful for pvp

I do not think it would be a problem in PvP. That would basically amount to 5 more bleeds (so about 1k damage) on a 20s cooldown. And in PvE, that would just make a hybrid build “decent” for mesmer (about same DPS, higher ramp time, more resilience to phantasm instead of personal DPS).

Morfedel.4165:

Silverkey.2078:

phantasmal fury gives 20% more crit which means less than 2 more bleeds on average for a iDuelist. On the other hand, duelist’s discipline gives effectively 66% chance bleeding (2 stacks x 33%) which amounts to about 5 more bleeds. The benefits from phantasmal fury (outside of the fact that duelist does not work) is that you also get this bonus on the second phantasm and if you have some power you also get an improved power. But if you spec in bleeds, duelist wins (+ you possible get a good recharge reduction from interrupts to keep higher Duelist uptime).

your math and logic is flawed. It all depends on how high the phantasm’s crit chance is, which it inherits from the creator of the illusion prior to phantasm-specific buffs like Phantasmal Fury.

If I have a 50% chance to crit and my iDuelist has fury, thats 70% of all hits, on a 8-shot burst thats 5.6 stacks of bleeding, vs 5.28 for the duelist:

8*0.7=5.6 > 8*0.33*2=5.28

It really depends on your chance for crit on the main character + the 20% increase via fury; the higher the crit chance the more likely that phantasmal fury will win out. The break even point is at 66% crit chance:

5.28/8=0.66, or 66% chance of crit.

So, less than 66% chance to crit, Discpline wins on bleed stacking. More than that, Phantasmal Fury wins.

Of course, Phantasmal Fury effects ALL of your phantasms, not just duelist, so if you also have out, say, a swordsman or berserker… on the other hand, Discpline in its intended form would allow you to recharge the duelist faster, and maybe magic bullet if you have other interrupts.

You’re absolutely and entirely wrong with your analysis. This is really simple, let me explain it.

Phantasmal fury adds 20% crit chance to the phantasms. This is a flat 20% that is unaffected by anything else. It doesn’t matter how many times they crit without it, and it doesn’t matter how many total times they crit with it. The only thing that matters is that it will make an additional 20% of their attacks crit.

The only time when the base crit chance matters is if fury will cause it to be overcapped, meaning that part of the added 20% is wasted, giving the advantage even more to duelist’s discipline.

The duelist fires 8 shots. 20% of 8 is 1.6. Phantasmal fury will cause the duelist to stack 1.6 bleeds every time it unloads.

Duelist’s Discipline is a 33% chance of stacking 2 bleeds. The duelist fires 8 shots. 33% of 8 is 2.64. 2.64*2 is 5.28. Duelist’s Discipline will cause the duelist to stack 5.28 bleeds every time it unloads.

These numbers have absolutely zero correlation with base crit chance, or even bleed duration (since the base bleed durations are the same for both of them).

Duelist’s discipline is is exactly 3.3x better than phantasmal fury for stacking bleeds. No more, no less.

I already answered that above ^.^
But thanks for the additional support

Fay.2357:

Duelist’s discipline is is exactly 3.3x better than phantasmal fury for stacking bleeds. No more, no less.

Except, again, when above 80% crit chance via Precision.

Time to put the Phantasmal Fury vs Duelist debate to rest.

Assume base crit probability = c

Scenario 1: Phantasmal fury enabled

Total crit probability = c+0.2

Sharper imags inflicts 1 stack of bleeding on crit. Ergo, expected number of bleeds per phantasmal duelist hit:

c+0.2 —-- (1)

Scenario 2: Duelist’s Discipline

Expected bleeds per hit with duelist’s discipline = 0.3×2 (33% chance with 2 bleed stacks) = 0.6 —-— (2)

Now here’s the key part. Sharper images can trigger at the same time duelist’s discipline can trigger, since only Phantasmal Fury and Duelist’s discipline compete with each other.

Therefore, expected bleeds per hit with sharper images = c (only 1 bleed stack). —- (3)

Expected number of bleeds with duelist’s discipline therefore = expected bleed from sharper images + expected bleeds from duelist’s discipline = (2) + (3) = c+0.6 —-- (4)

Final result:

Expected bleeds with phantasmal fury = (1) = c+0.2
Expected bleeds with duelist’s discipline = (4) = c+0.6

(4) > (1) always

Conclusion: Duelist’s discipline always yields a higher bleed amount with regard to the dueling phantasm alone regardless of base crit probability.

Now this obviously becomes more complex if you have another multi hitting phantasm like the Berserker or the warden. We can look at that as well. I’ll have to take into consideration the number of hits of the warden as well as the berserker. But that’s also a bit misleading since the warden hits are much more easily avoided. The results of this equation (if calculated) will heavily depend on the assumptions made.

But if we’re only talking about the pistol, then duelist’s discipline seems to hold a clear advantage over phantasmal fury as far as the expected bleed stacks are concerned. We obviously haven’t taken into consideration the additional damage itself due to phantasmal fury. But a comparison of those two will also have to include the values for condition damage and power.

bhagwad.4281:

We obviously haven’t taken into consideration the additional damage itself due to phantasmal fury. But a comparison of those two will also have to include the values for condition damage and power.

I did some quick calcs that includes both condi and direct dps. DD still wins.

0% base crit

• PF – 2,236 dps
• DD – 2,408 dps

80% base crit

• PF – 4,764 dps
• DD – 4,937 dps

Now… if only the trait actually worked as intended…

frifox.5283:

bhagwad.4281:

We obviously haven’t taken into consideration the additional damage itself due to phantasmal fury. But a comparison of those two will also have to include the values for condition damage and power.

I did some quick calcs that includes both condi and direct dps. DD still wins.

0% base crit

• PF – 2,236 dps
• DD – 2,408 dps

80% base crit

• PF – 4,764 dps
• DD – 4,937 dps

Now… if only the trait actually worked as intended…

Does that take into account ferocity from….whatever?

Fay.2357:

Does that take into account ferocity from….whatever?

I assumed 221% base crit dmg but even if you do account for 10 stacks of FF, PF gets a tiny bit closer with DD still being the better option.

So you used a assassin/berserker set-up. For a hybrid or condi build, there is not even a doubt about DD superiority.
With this acronym I feel like I’m speaking about elementalist builds o.O

I’m going to offer an apology. I forgot to take into account that sharper images also works for both trait choices. Kinda got slapped down there but maybe I deserved it. My bad.

That being the case there are more elements to consider. Pf effects all Phantasms, such kitten Berserker with 4 hits or swordsman with faster attack, plus extra damage From crit + ferocity vs Condi damage, interrupts recharging the duelist faster. ..

When we start adding in defenses like stability and reflection I think we’ll end up going crazy lol , but we might be able to establish a mathematical baseline.