Guild Wars 2

This guide covers a WvW mesmer build that I’ve found myself coming back to again and again. Seeing as how none of the stickied builds run the same trait spread, 0/20/0/20/30, I thought it’d be appropriate to share my build and some of the strategy behind it. The basic concept is to play a mid-line support role with a focus on reflecting projectiles. With the recent nerf to the Glamour spec, my hope is that posting this guide will encourage other mesmers to experiment with new builds.

Without further ado, here’s the “core” build:

http://bit.ly/YmNSeD

It’s important to note that this build is merely a starting point for the discussion. Part of being an effective mesmer in WvW is knowing how to adapt to different situations. I’ve previously blogged on general WvW tactics from a mesmer point of view, and this might be valuable reading if you’re new to the class: http://bit.ly/18qG7Ui

General Overview:

This build is kind of a “jack of all trades”. It has moderate damage output and moderate survivability. It has enough defenses to survive a typical glass cannon’s burst, but it’s also likely to run into a stalemate against a good bunker build. It has a little bit of boon removal and a little bit of condition removal. It focuses primarily on direct damage, which has its advantages in WvW, but also lays on some additional pressure through condition damage. It’s strengths are its high mobility and multiple sources of projectile reflection. It’s weaknesses are Necromancers and Guardians because of Dark Path and Retaliation respectively. A reflected Dark Path can drop you in the center of the enemy zerg and widespread Retaliation can drop your health quite rapidly if you reflect too many projectiles at once. I’ve made an effort to compensate for these weaknesses in the build, but it’s important to be aware of them.

It’s also worth noting that this build is designed to fit into a group. More specifically, it’s designed to complement the group composition of my guild. We typically divide our forces into a “frontline” and a “backline”, with one commander for each. This build fills a sort of “midline” role, and bounces between the frontline and backline as needed. In either situation, my main focus is on control. My goal is to prevent as much damage as I can through well placed veils, reflections, confusions and interrupts. When running with the backline, I can focus a little more on putting out DPS with the greatsword. Since both my phantasms spawn in melee range, this provides additional support for the frontline with regeneration. When running with the frontline, it’s important to stay tight on the rest of the melee to mitigate some of the AoE damage. Whereas other classes like guardians might stay alive in melee through healing, this build relies more on active defences like Blurred Frenzy, Distortion, and dodges. When your cooldowns are up, it’s time to pull out and rejoin the backline.

Traits:

I’m going to cover a number of variations of the core build. Each variation uses the same trait spread, 0/20/0/20/30, so you only need to respec once. The build revolves around three traits, each of which significantly changes the playstyle of the class.

20 Dueling – Deceptive Evasion is the main draw here, but the Sharper Images and Critical Infusion minors complement the build also. Illusions are a mesmers primary resource in combat, and DE provides the most efficient means of generating them.

20 Inspiration – Warden’s Focus is another main component of the build, adding two additional reflection skills to the mix. This trait is what differentiates this build from other “shatter specs”. The 15pt minor also allows you to provide regeneration with phantasms, providing additional support to your allies.

30 Illusions – Illusionary Persona is a real game changer. Having on-demand access to Distortion is a life-saver in WvW. This also complements the 1-hand sword quite nicely as you’ll be in melee range to get the 4th shatter effect. The minor traits in this line further complement the shatter oriented playstyle.

Aside from those three, the rest of the major traits vary from situation to situation. We’ll get to some of those variants later.

Gear:

Soldiers armor with Superior Runes of Air. Power, Toughness and Vitality are strong stats for WvW since they provide a combination of high effective health and decent base damage output. By using the Air runes and reduced focus cool-downs, this build has near perma-swiftness which is extremely valuable in WvW. For accessories, I run a mix of Berserker, Soldier and Celestial. While working for celestial, pick up some soldier accessories with Ruby orbs as a comparable substitute.

Why gear this way? First, the primary goal is to stay alive. Going with toughness and vitality on your armor gives you more time to react to incoming attacks. You won’t be able to stand and take hits for long, but it will give you enough time to dodge out of the way when you get flanked. Damage is a secondary consideration. Power is your most effective damage stat, and is important because it allows you to deal the most damage against siege.

Since this build goes for a balance of both survivability and damage, the Celestial accessories have a lot to offer. All of the stats synergize with each other, and you get slightly more stat points with +all stats than you would by mix and matching. As your vitality goes up, toughness looks better. As your toughness goes up, healing looks better. As your Power goes up, crit rate looks better. As your crit rate goes up, crit damage and condition damage looks better. Remember that reflected projectiles use your stats, so having a mix of direct and condition damage allows you to capitalize on a variety of projectile types.

Weapons:

Berserker Greatsword of Fire – By using the sigil of fire, the GS provides strong AoE damage from a distance even in “high lag” conditions. While the main purpose of this set is damage, the boon removal, AoE cripple and knockback all provide some nice utility.

Soldier’s Sword and Focus of Blood and Stamina – This is mainly a defensive set, but it can put out some nice damage at the risk of entering melee range. Since the sword naturally cleaves, I went with the sigil of blood for extra single target damage and healing. The sigil of stamina is highly underrated, and this build uses it to provide a steady stream of clones once the enemy starts dying.

For my underwater weapons, I run a Rabid Trident of Leeching and Berserker Spear of Leeching. The original reason why I went with Leeching sigils has been nerfed, but I’ve grown to appreciate having it in certain situations and the underwater set is one of them. Underwater fights are somewhat rare in WvW, but the Leeching sigil is useful because entering water while in combat counts as a weapon swap. Jump into water to gain the leech effect, then come back out and hit someone with it.

In addition to the primary weapons above, I also carry several alternate weapons in my inventory.

“Whatever” of bloodlust – Keep a secondary sword/gs/focus for Bloodlust stacking, then switch to the main weapon after reaching 25 stacks. Pretty straightforward.

Soldier’s Staff of Leeching – I sometimes switch the GS for staff to put extra pressure on walls during a siege. With the lifesteal on swap, it also makes a more defensive option as needed.

Soldier’s Scepter of Fire – In situations where its too dangerous to melee, the scepter is the only other main hand option. It’s not spectacular, but it has its moments. Rarely used.

Soldier’s Pistol of Leeching – In times when I run both sword/scepter, the pistol provides a secondary offhand. Rarely used.

Consumables:

I typically carry a variety of food choices in my inventory. Remember that you can switch food buffs while in combat, providing additional build flexibility at a cost.

Sharpening Stones – Provides more power and synergizes with the high vitality and toughness of the build. What else to say?

Omnomberry Pie – Since I usually run Mirror as my healing skill, I depend a lot on lifesteal effects to stay alive. Even with the nerf adding an internal cooldown, this is still one of my favorite foods because it procs off reflected crits as well. This is my primary food choice in Zerg vs Zerg because it helps negate some of the damage from dropping Feedback on a large group with Retaliation up.

Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew – This food is a nice choice in small group situations. More Endurance = More Dodges = More Clones = More Shatters. The might on dodge also synergizes nicely with the sigil of stamina.

Lemongrass Poultry Soup – There are situations where the reduced condition duration can be extremely valuable. It’s worth having in your bag just incase you go up against a condition heavy enemy force. Running this food allows you to drop Mender’s Purity for Glamour Mastery safely.

Omnomberry Compote – This food is most useful in situations where the enemy forces respawn quickly. It will keep you alive as long as enemies are dying on a regular basis. Very situational, but worth carrying just in case.

Templates:

The exact details of my build change from situation to situation. For lack of a better term, I’ll refer to these common skill, trait, equipment and consumable configurations as “templates”. Switching between templates is time consuming and error prone, so sometimes I only change the weapons/utility skills and not the traits. If anyone at Arena-Net is reading, please bring the template system back from GW1!

Open Field Template (Core)

http://bit.ly/YmNSeD

Food: Omnomberry Pie

This is my typical open field spec. The goal is to provide support to the melee group by reducing incoming damage. With this build, it’s important for you to be at the head of the pack to Veil the initial push. Once the melee group hits, drop Time Warp to boost their damage and proceed to shut down the enemy backline with Feedback. I usually drop iBerserker at the same time as Feedback so the whirl combo spreads extra confusion around. Once the enemy has blown most of their cooldowns, it’s usually safe to push into melee range with the sword where you can put out a lot of damage. Use the focus skills to shut down ranged attackers while you push in, and be sure to finish off the downed to refill your endurance. If you have a necro in your group, call your shatter spikes so that they can Epidemic all the confusion stacks. Once you’ve blown all of your invulnerability skills, pull out and switch back to greatsword.

Sieging Template

http://bit.ly/159Q1gV

Food: Lemongrass Poultry Soup

This template is designed for large close quarters fights, such as a siege situation. Here you can’t make use of the surprise element from Veil and the cripple from the greatsword is less important, so I swap in Null Field and a staff instead. Chaos Storm helps to hit arrow carts on the walls and also can help lock down a choke point. Picking up the blind on glamours trait helps provide additional defense in the event that the defenders try to push out through their portal. I typically try to drop Null Field and iWarden at the same time, as the blind will help him stay alive longer and the whirl finisher spreads around some additional confusion.

Solo Template

http://bit.ly/18pXKmX

Food: Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew

This template is designed for situations when I’m all alone or in a small group. Typically this what I use when running supply or sniping yaks. The goal here is to have enough burst to kill the roamers that will try to pick you off, while also providing sufficient escape options to run away if you encounter a larger force. Facing off against a bunker build will often result in a stalemate, so pick your fights wisely.

Portaling Template

http://bit.ly/ZWgeuK

Food: Lemongrass Poultry Soup

The main purpose of this template is to provide an offensive portal into dangerous territory. If possible, have a thief give you shadow refuge and a guardian give you aegis and stability before making your push. Expect to use two dodges, Distortion, Decoy, Mirror, Blink, and Mass Invis to get through the choke point. I typically drop Temporal Curtain first to shut down projectiles, then double dodge through it and blink to skip over the heaviest regions of AoE. Try to save decoy for its stun breaker property. Cripple, Chill and Immobilize are the other big threats to making it through alive, so use Mirror if you get afflicted with any of them. Weapon swap to the staff once you get through and Phase Retreat will create some additional space between you and the enemy before dropping the portal.

Reflection Placement:

The most important part of learning to play this build is knowing where and when to drop your reflects. In this spec, you’re using Feedback primarily for the projectile reflection and this means using it slightly differently than a glamour spec. For example, a glamour mesmer will usually drop Feedback on the enemy to spread the blind and confusion. With this build the best place to drop Feedback is on your allies— specifically the “frontline”. If you drop Feedback on an enemy, they can just move out of it and suffer no penalty. By dropping Feedback on your allies instead, they’re safe from projectiles as long as they stay inside of it.

Since this build uses the focus trait, Temporal Curtain and iWarden both reflect projectiles also. Like Feedback, you want to use Temporal Curtain defensively by placing it between your allies and the enemy back line. Temporal Curtain will continue to reflect projectiles even after using Into the Void, so you can use the pull to disrupt the enemy’s frontline while still reflecting projectiles from their backline. Temporal Curtain also works great at choke points, such as a broken wall piece. iWarden is a little bit harder to use because it dies easily, but the general idea is to use it on a nearby enemy and then stand next to it for the duration of its attack. This not only will protect you from projectiles, but also give you regeneration.

When defending a keep, rotate between placing Feedback, Temporal Curtain and iWarden in front of the gate. Most zergs will just auto-attack the gate in a siege, and you can tag lots of people with reflection this way. Do not attempt this if you’re low on health, as you can be insta-gibbed by retaliation damage. Also note that you can place Feedback on the gate from behind. This can soften up the enemy forces before you Veil and push out through the portal.

reserved space

On any mesmer build, i use energy sigils. Have you thought about this? I run hybrid specs as well, and sometimes shatter, and idk what i would do without my energy sigils. Its amazing, one on both weapon sets. What do you think?

That’s awesome. I run a similar build that I just described in another thread (not to the same detail, but my post was more an example of HOW to develop your own build rather than “here’s MY build, go play it.” I took 10 in Dueling instead of 20, and put the extra 10 to cap out Inspiration (for the heal on shatter.) If I HAVE to shatter, I probably need the extra boost in health it can provide, and the 25 points in Insipiration adds to the phantasm’s damage output. I specifically didn’t want dodge roll clones, because mine is hybrid “reflect” and “phantasm support” and I didn’t want clones destroying phantasms while I’m avoiding damage. I’m glad to see other people had a similar idea, though!

@Tek
Sigil of Energy is superior in a small group setting but Stamina is amazing in large fights. If the cost isn’t an option, you could have both and switch as appropriate.

Yea i tend to roam low man vs zerg. I guess i just tend to get focused more xD good point. Either way though, more clones to shatter since you are goin 30 in illusions.

@Tiger That sounds a lot like my sPvP build. That heal on shatter is very nice if you gear for it. In WvW, I find it hard to rely on phantasms for my damage because of how easily they die.

My goodness… That’s a long explaination that could simply be summed up by saying: for any Mesmer reflection build, just trait Warden’s Feedback and use a Focus weapon.

That’s it. I personally prefer to run with the Mirror heal and Feedback in WvW or sPvP as well so I can roll four reflection spells for the duration of a fight. I also think the Illusions tree is a dead tree unless your build is totally dependent on shattering for damage and burst. Even then I’d not put more than 10 points in it.

My build used to be 0/0/10/30/30, but I’ve adjusted it due to this patch to 0/20/20/30/0. I also am using Restorative Mantras + Mantra of Pain with decent success. It comes in handy verse the insane damage Arrow Carts put out. I’ll probably tweak the build as I go though and still need to replace my armor…. sigh

Helios.3598:

My goodness… That’s a long explaination that could simply be summed up by saying: for any Mesmer reflection build, just trait Warden’s Feedback and use a Focus weapon.

Agree, Ive used this for months as my alt build to confusion. Why on earth do we need people telling (guiding) us every step of every build. Play 1-80, learn your class and share tips with other players.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice of you to share.

Yes, this is arguably just the x/20/x/x/30 meta with those 20 discretionary points spent in Inspiration. However, you often hear mesmers talk about how awesome Warden’s Feedback is without ever really talking about specific builds with it. Usually when someone does go Inspiration, they’re going for the 25pt minor in a phantasm spec. The general gearing guide is “zerker or go home”. That works great for small group stuff, but in large scale group fights I think control and support are arguably more important features in a build. This is a hybrid shatter/support spec that happens to be work well in a variety of WvW situations. Take it for what its worth.

Flor extreme would be nice the trait distortion have reflection And mimic skill for troll

Why take phants have fury in this build? The I warden is often tricky to set up damage wise so it’s only really buffing the izerker (which has been proven to still be bugged despite what they’ve said). I would think with a 1h sword you would want to lower the cd’s on that 20% instead.

I often swap in Blade Training or Desperate Decoy in that slot when I feel I need some extra defense. The reason why I like the Phantasmal Fury is because it helps compensate for my modest crit rate. Since the zerkie only seems to hit twice on average, I wanted a 50% crit rate to average 1 bleed per target as a cover condition for the cripple. My base crit chance from gear is about 30%, so the Fury makes up the difference.