Guild Wars 2

Hello there!

Since my mesmer will hit lv 80 in the next few days I’m thinking about which build and equipment to use. I have lots of ideas for cool builds, my favorite one being a 20, 20, 0 25, 5 Phantasm build (http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgEQNAR8dlwzipHVzqGaNJyZGR3yhWAJFqWqVSxsdhA). Yet I have no idea how to equip my mesmer (I play Dungeons and WvW)!

My first Idea was to go full knight since I’ve read in other posts that crit dmg on equipment doesn’t work on phantasms. I dropped this plan after testing this on the training Golems in Heart of the Mists, because crit dmg on equipment does seem to work on phantasms!

So my second Idea was to combine rampager armor with knight trinkets and berserker jewels. But does the condition dmg make sense? I do always apply some conditions (bleeds from my illusions and confusion) but it’s hard to say if the condition dmg is worth it in my a Build! Or should I take more knight and/or berserker stuff?

I would really appreciate it if a more experienced mesmer would give some advice.

Cheers
Arahain

Hi!

I rock this very same build in 3W and I find it phenomenal. People just dont expect so many reflects with such high damage. Only difference is I swap the desperate decoy into the sword cooldown reduction, since I found DD to be unreliable and its hard to predict when it activates, which often results in myself being more confused than the enemy, and also presisting images in the inspiration line for mender’s purity. I have grown to not being able to roll without it.

For the gear question, I have used both knight’s and berserker’s full exotics, and mixmatched aswell, all with both success and demise.

-The knight set tends to be sturdy, but you often get outhealed or overrun when there is multiple enemies. Survivability goes up and 1v1 is easier, but many times I’ve had a guardian for example just heal and run. Then on the other hand having a thief blow his full opener just to notice you are still alive and being able to fight back is awesome.

-The zerker gear does have kick in it, seeing the izerker crit for 6k on lvl80 targets is very, very satisfying. With zerker you should have enough burst to down people and they shouldnt be able to outheal your damage so easily. On the flipside thiefs and 100b warriors will eat you alive if you get caught in one of their cc’s.

As for runes, i have full Air in the zerker and Centaur in the knight, but its all up to preference. Sigils are changing almost daily but thinking of settling for the endurance regen ones.

Also utilities I use with this build are feedback, decoy, blink and the elite depending wheter I play solo or in group.

This is my experience with the build in 3W, for pve you dont have to change that much, but its more just spamming greatsword skills and maybe swapping decoy for nullfield.

Also pre-grazt on lvl80, hope you find many adventures on your path!

Kisarachan @ Underworld

And a note for the rampager stuff, you wont be doing much condition damage, and making a balanced mix of stats doesnt benefit this build that much since most of your damage is power/crit based or reflects. :P

Kisarachan @ Underworld

Get berserker and then mix in as much defensive gear as you feel you need. If you get better/used to the content, you can switch back to berserker again.
If you have a lot of gold, get runes of air, but I still prefer runes of the centaur overall.

If you keep it on the down low … I made a tool to figure out this very thing.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AiQtMSF8MBTTdDVSZ2xkM3VESHVIMWFJT2thcWNxZVE#gid=1

Please do not use the page directly, but download it as an excel spreadsheet by going to File -> Download As and select Excel.

Edit…
Direct Link to the Excel version which has protected cells so you can’t break anything:
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0ByQtMSF8MBTTcy1QdkJZQzY3U3c

Again, Go to File → Download to download it.

Thanks for the answers!
I will probably try a mix of knight (chest, trousers, helm, rings) and berserker (everything else), ignoring condition dmg. I should have at least some survivability and rather high dmg with this combination.

@Kisarae: are the air/centaur runes superior to six ruby orbs (120 power, 84 precision, 12% crit dmg) or scholar runes in your experience?

Thanks for the advice with the traits btw. your suggestions make perfect sense!

@Arhain, I cant give you optimal advice for gear as phantasm mesmer but if you ever trying out and wonder about how to gear, rune etc for a shatter WvWvW / pve build drop into my guide, il answer al questions in resonable time.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/guide-WvWvW-Shatter-cat/page/9#post1109900

I also run a phantasm shatter hybrid that work extremly well in instances and in wvwvw.

latest vid:

/Osicat

Short, did-not-dig-deep opinion, in pve the orbs are better, but the set runes have a sweet flow in 3W. Then again no encounter in pve is too hard (dont know about fractals tho, havent set foot in them yet ) to necessitate any specific rune setup.

Also i went for full knights as my first set to get a hang of pvp without getting steamrolled all that often, now im bouncing between full zerk and knight armor/zerk accs.

Also, hi Osci! Youre videos and guide are fecking sweet, I’ve been rolling with shattercat too at times but i cant play it yet to the effect youve taken it to! Keep up to sweet work!

Then again I find this particular build to work wonders while siegeing keeps and towers, where as i find myself wondering around not knowimg what to do while in shattercat. Between reflects, yanking people off walls, throwing izerker/warden on the wall on people who dont pay attention you rarely run out of things to do while working with bigger raids.. But it might just be me not looking deep enough into the build. :P

Kisarachan @ Underworld