Guild Wars 2

Been playing with your hybrid spec, I love it so much, it’s good if you play solo, just hard to chase enemies, and if you play in a small group you deal tons of damage, and with 25 stack of vulnerability you do easily 5,5k with iSwordsman.

also got chased by 4 people, almost died, then my friend tanked their damage and we crushed them, was a good fight there.

Edit:
I notice alot of shattercat builds, in WvW, but sometimes I win and sometimes they do, depends on if you got your timings right or vice versa, but I have found it very easy to snipe enemies down, and still be able to take enemy damage, and like in your “hybrid vid”, i did like you instakilled a guardian, was so fun to see his health bar just drop to zero and getting into downed state, also I find Moa morph very usefull sometimes if there is a 2v5 etc.
Last words: Happy new year!

Osi, are your swords berserker, or one of them knight? Like at the sword/pistol. Also do you still use the sigil of generosity on them?

Happy New Year for you and for all mesmer

@UnknownFreak, y Moa have its moments but I feel the other two offer alot more for group fights.

@Varg, 2 x zerker on swords yes. And I tend to love Sigil of generosity more and more, with that combined with rune of air and sword block 2 it hurt alot to attack you. Have matereal for anew vid but no time to edit atm, some nice moments of the sigil in it.

/Osicat

@Osicat, was my friend’s idea, and we where against two thief (glass), moa them and bam not even one sec of battle, also got a laugh out of it.

I have Knight’s sword (OH), also works, just a little less damage though.

I noticed that one of your rings is an Event Ring. I presume it’s the Karka ring?

What would be the alternatives if someone doesn’t have that ring? Any suggestions?

@Mogster, best would be get a fractals ring with eather some mixed stats, alternative if you run precition stacking sigil on staff a valkyre ring, and if you run energy on staff a knight.

Note thu, this is just how I would do and my suggestions, Im sure there are ppl who would do different and mabye even dissagree with this but I can only say what I would do.

/Osicat

Your hybrid spec inspired me to try my own hybrid. I’m using a heavy mix of carrion and berserkers, trying to replace some carrion with rabid stats to balance vit and toughness. While I’m glassier than my old full carrion / rampager build, I am totally in awe of the number of people I can drop as soon as they clump up. I won my first 1v5 today against 2 80s and 3 uplevels. I had no idea that was possible.

Going confusion heavy with just enough crit to keep the damage on while people wait for the stacks to drop is obscenely powerful.

After much experimenting with various direct dmg shatter specs I’ve come to the conclusion they are great from a WvW point of view in:

a) small, organized strike teams
b) vs. bad players in a 1v[x]

Given b) can be done with any class/spec, a) is where the build really shines IMO

From an offensive stand point vs. good players, in a 1v[x], you’re going to blow through cooldowns way too quickly to be effective given good players will typically not die to a plain 4x MW/BF burst and you’re going to need cooldowns to maintain pressure leaving yourself way too open for adds/coordinated bursts. IMO a somewhat tankier confusion shatter spec is a much better choice given how OP confusion is in terms of damage mitigation/controlling a fight

Anyway that’s just my 2 cents and is not meant to derail the thread. The build is a lot of fun and has it’s uses primarily in small team play

Just switched server, big mistake, everone zergs there it seems, rendering issues makes battles vs thief’s impossible, for some random reason I do not get server buff. Bad luck or what the…

@Volatility, most of my gaming (80% of the time) is in smal (5-15 player) strike times with Teamspeak and organicsation. And the spec realy shine here. I generaly get it to work in 1 vs x versus as you say non leet players and often feels like alot of the teams of 3-4 players roam in wvwvw is unused to advance players.

I feel thu the spec is kinda strong in 1 vs 2 full geared organiced players in wvwvw, just have to play smart. Fought alot of 2 player roaming teams latley, seem be a popular setup on the server Desolation fight atm to have smal roaming partys on the morning (my solo roaming time) of 2 players of same guild. I got alot of good fights.

I will post a video today of group fighting and 1 vs 2/x tactics when enemy is well geared and deliver a good fight.

You are totaly correct that in a 1 vs 2/x you should not go for a full bursts and its good to clarify this. Ty for this imput.

If you seen the Advance tactics video (if not:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xXw97Wz7R8) you notice that save cd,s and instead keep a constant preassur on enemy while juke back and forth and whne somone is 50% ich on hp then you do the burst.

/Osicat

Osicat.4139:

@Volatility, most of my gaming (80% of the time) is in smal (5-15 player) strike times with Teamspeak and organicsation. And the spec realy shine here. I generaly get it to work in 1 vs x versus as you say non leet players and often feels like alot of the teams of 3-4 players roam in wvwvw is unused to advance players.

I feel thu the spec is kinda strong in 1 vs 2 full geared organiced players in wvwvw, just have to play smart. Fought alot of 2 player roaming teams latley, seem be a popular setup on the server Desolation fight atm to have smal roaming partys on the morning (my solo roaming time) of 2 players of same guild. I got alot of good fights.

I will post a video today of group fighting and 1 vs 2/x tactics when enemy is well geared and deliver a good fight.

You are totaly correct that in a 1 vs 2/x you should not go for a full bursts and its good to clarify this. Ty for this imput.

If you seen the Advance tactics video (if not:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xXw97Wz7R8) you notice that save cd,s and instead keep a constant preassur on enemy while juke back and forth and whne somone is 50% ich on hp then you do the burst.

/Osicat

Totally agree with you on the small team point, that has been my playing style for the last few weeks since switching servers and I’m having a blast with the shatter build.

I may have discredited the build a bit too much in 1v[x] in my previous post. When it’s 1v2 (good, organized players), you still have a very good shot of coming out on top given smart cooldown management. When you start going 1v3+ however, with a decent GC thief in the mix that’s not going to be dumb enough to get baited by a MW burst, it’s much tougher to stay alive given my point on the need to blow cooldowns. The latter is primarily my solo roaming experience on Maguuma against servers such as Ebay, Yak’s, etc.

• * @ Uppdate @ * @ Uppdate @ * **

New movie, 2nd part of phantasm high dmg spec. Its alot focused on how to fight outmanned versus well geared player or in group vs group.

Enjoy and ask questions if anything is unclear.

/Osicat

“FooD: I nowdays always use 100 precision 10% crit dmg food. and prescision oil. This as my crit dmg is so high that I gain more form add a little extra crit chance and dmg than more power.”

Where do you get Perscision oil from and exactly whats the name of the food you use?

@Lunatic, Curry butternut squash soup is the food, oil is from Auctionhouse and called :Master Maintenace Oil

PS: Latest High dmg 1 vs x Movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJzO2btc1iE

I will see if I will encounter you, cause the server I switched to is blacktide, well I will only stay on that server for another 6 days. just to see new tactics etc.

nice vid btw

@UnknownFreak, haha y mabye see you later then, Jude done some crazr rading on arbor al night in eb, I be away some days from game now ut back on sunday evening. If you want a fight just /w me ingame and we meet up somewere in a borderland

Glad you liked last vid, im wery happy with it as it sow a more durable side of the build at same time as the dmg it deliver is extreme.

/Osicat

PS: Latest High dmg 1 vs x Movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJzO2btc1iE

@Osicat

When you are switching to more zerker items in the hybrid build how do you still have 16.5k hp. what items do you wear that have vitality on it? Thanks in advance love the vids.

@Kuniva, The sword I get zerker replaces a knight pistol so same hp there, the neclese is valkyre but changed to zerker, still valkyre jewel thu. I dont run full zerker build, still invader one ring with zerker jewel aswell.

\osicat

PS: Latest High dmg 1 vs x Movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJzO2btc1iE

I’ve been using Sword+Pistol/Staff on a shatter build since beta, but I was struggling to find any rune set or combo that satisfied me. I was using 6xRuby Orbs, but the general utility of Air runes compensates for the loss of pure power. Not sure how I managed to never notice them.

Many thanks, and kudos.

Mesmer

Shatter skills now share a global 0.25 second recharge, to prevent multiple shatter effects triggering on the same illusion.

Shattered Strength: This trait now grants 1 stack of might per illusion shattered.

Did the update hurt this build?

Kuniva.4573:

Mesmer

Shatter skills now share a global 0.25 second recharge, to prevent multiple shatter effects triggering on the same illusion.

Shattered Strength: This trait now grants 1 stack of might per illusion shattered.

Did the update hurt this build?

Shouldn’t have ruined it, I think the build was around before shattered strength got buffed anyway.

But it will “hurt” the damage.

No, this build was good before the might so that’s probably nothing. The cooldown might cost you a few fights, but it’s probably livable. I just think it’s funny that, rather than fix the cause of the “bug”, they just give us a global cooldown. I just know this is going to be an issue. I’ve yet to play after the patch so we’ll see.

The global cooldown is pretty silly rather than fixing the issue itself. :P Very interested in this hybrid build, Osi. Since I don’t feel like my Phantasm build is doing much for me anymore, over the last several updates of Mesmer tweak and damage caps, I think I’ll give this a shot. It’ll be unlearning my tactics and playstyle, but I don’t want my poor Mesmer just getting dusty on my character select screen or becoming a Sanctum portal bot.

I’ve been meaning to ask, where do you get all this awesome music?

New patch usualy mean a q/a time in the thread

@RuchUnplugged, Cheers, the utility and dmg from air is alot more worth than a some extra stats.

@Kuniva, and All.

I guess i should clarify exactly how I feel for this patch and how it affect the game for shatter mesmers. First I can say im kinda happy, woot is he mas you now think but in fact if we look at just 3 week back in time we ALOT stronger now than then. Sens start of december we got,

1×3 stacks of might for 10 seconds for a 3 clone shatter buffed from 5 sec, a 100% uptime buff

5 sec vigour / crit instead of 1 sec, 100% incombat uptime

8 stacks of vouln for 8 seconds /daze, a huge dmg buff.

What we lost is the huge might stacking, but still we got to keep alot of the buffs, especialy the vigour one is night and day. It let us use aprecision stacking sigil instead of energy sp we run around with several hundered higher precision.

The 0,25 sec cd on shatters will demand a little planning, but overall it vill go fast to adjust to it.

A sword attack 2 is 2 seconds, say we open with 2 clone daze, cast phantasm throw a cripple clone dodge and hit leap, blurred on a dazed target and phantasm hit, we hit mv early, djuring the 2 seconds sword 2 hit we have time to get mirror immage cry of frustration out and still have the cd ready for disorsion if needed after.

/Osicat

Found that after you do your first shatter, by the time you use mirror images that .25 seconds is up already.

Sinergy.6374:

Found that after you do your first shatter, by the time you use mirror images that .25 seconds is up already.

Probably won’t notice this that much, prolly if you press shatter #3 and #2 same , one will trigger and the other won’t, so you can save a shatter if you are missclicking now.

Wonder if they add same for thief, they can spam skill after skill…?, like we could with our shatter, almost…

Yeah true. Cuz I know we have all mis shattered before.

If your clones are far away when you hit MW can you still hit a CoF before they get to the mob? Does this work?

I’m not too bothered about these changes, I think they were probably needed but I run a more condition spec than Osi’s shattercat.

@Ravbek, haven’t tried, but have no idea if they will shatter with both MW and CoF, if that is what you mean. But I don’t think they do.

So im guessing the S/S hybrid build is completely useless now because i feel verry weak with it… x.x

@All, tested the shatter mecanics alot today in wvwvw. Big dmg is still possible, best I had today was a 4x 4,3k~ so it still do good dmg, nothing stealth nerfed. About the cd it dont affect anything elsle than glich wrack is impossible. Tested on cayotes.

You still thu can do a awsome combo, set 3 clones up (staff ones), press daze shatter, swap to sword+ oh, summon phantasm and cripple clone, dodge away from enemy and in air hit leap, insta sword 2 on a enemy with high couln and 4 x mv. most of the time you have fury up aswell so most thing crit.

Alternative just get 3 clones up, hit range daze, when they hit blink to enemy dodge and mirror + mindwrack. This is a insta kill on most low hp classes or enemys with 70% hp.

/Lordryux, been running the spec al day, exept lesser might no change, good dmg, 8 k sword 2 , 16k mv combos and 6,5 k iswordman hits. The core dmg on the spec is vouln + % dmg buffes, al that remain.

/Osicat

@Lordtyux, yh, feel the same, little sad, but guess I have to learn or switch back to S/P, and go back to the good ol´ shatter, but I switched server recently, getting no serverbuff, and I feel very weak, only 16.9k hp :/, with serverbuff at this time I should have ~18k hp, and now I feel no damage done… vs elementalist today, got him to 10%, all skills on CD… and what was left, retreat… I have a feeling enemy gets buffed and I don’t, so for me it’s very much like hardcore now. dying a bit more, haven’t played so much with the new patch so I cannot say so much now.

Edit: you can still do much raw damage in a couple of seconds, and if you are against a unprepared enemy, you can instakill him without any issue

alright just wondering cuz i spent around 150g gearing this baby out and looking good. im currently working on my fractals finally for a first so ill be doing that more than WvW

Literally got it to 80 last night bought all my gears and then wat i see new build??? watttttt bam nerf lol… i was about to like quit mesmer and go back to my ele if they think mesmer is OP. yea sure do you know how hard a good bunker ele is to kill and they can get 25 stacks of might way more easily than wat we could with shattered strength so i really dont get why anet reverted the buff we got. i think thats a first for them right thier.

Want a reason to why they nerfed shattered strength, seems they just did it…
seen warriors easily get 25 might, necro same, ele …why not mesmer…? and I have been to 24 most unless I use arcane thievery, and steel 25 might stack, now I got 7 might, and it’s nothing, also that channeled skills attack even if you cloak.. happen to me today, got killed due to that, hope they fix that asap

Dear Osicat!

I didn’t have the chance yet to play with the patch (Shatter skills now share a global 0.25 second recharge, to prevent multiple shatter effects triggering on the same illusion.).

Is that means now i can’t shatter the F2-F3 at the same time to the enemy? And every time i use any shatter the other 3 – if they not in CD – get a 0.25 sec CD? :S

Ps: Sorry for asking from you every Mesmer change, but afaik you are in charge in the shatter/mesmer questions :p

Yes you will now have a .25 sec CD between F2-F3 or between any shatters.

Xavi.6591:

Yes you will now have a .25 sec CD between F2-F3 or between any shatters.

it’s sounds more anoying then a big nerf, is it?

@Cactus, Well tbh 0,25 sec go so fast you dont even notice the cd unless you specify look for it.

I been wvwvw ing al day and after read thru the forums it feel like I need to fill in a bugg report cause apperently mesmers is nerfed to the ground but somehow I make alot of ppl wery wery dead extremly fast in wvwvw Somthing is wrong here, in some end.

/Osicat

Osi,

are you currently running the 10/30/0/0/30 or the 20/20/0/0/30 after the patch?

yea honestly i kill people just as easily shattered strength isnt even the problem its that GCD like i feel verry slow now doing my combos. believe it or not. if you keybind ur shatters to your mouse or a specific key then you will definitly notice the delay i literally got killed by a thief today because i couldnt use distortion after my mind wrack. and whabam 12k backstab.. gotta love that.

For your hybrid spec, what gear are you using? Is it still the same as in the OP (I noticed the section about traits hasn’t been changed so I’m guessing any potential changes to gear might also not be included)? I’m currently running full Berserker armor, PVT weapons and haven’t decided on the jewelry (thinking Knight but not sure).

So, seeing that Duelist’s Discipline is still causing the iDuelist’s damage to be significantly lower, is it still worth taking the trait to get a lower cd on the stun? Or would we be better off swapping it with something else until it gets fixed?

@Pimsley, I been running normal shatter cat, phantasm hybrid and even strapped on Khilbron set and run nuke condition. I explain (;. Played “Shatter cat” on morning for solo roaming as it give better stun range. The " cat leap" with pistol is a great cath for runners.

Alot of ppl expect you to run the spec and versis thiefs the block is a insta kill if you hit mindwrack as soon your block clone get summoned. When you se block, hit sword 2 and mv, the rune of air, block dmg and 1 clone mv hill him, sword 2 protect you. So later on the day I respecced for hybrid.

For smal group play, alread when you in a 2 man roaming team phantasm hybrid offer more group utility and 2 nd half of the day I did run this spec.

On the late night it was a zerg fiesta. Blacktide zerged hard in the borderland but had bad leadership, (exept Red Guard if you run into them with a smal roaming party run for your life). Ressult was that i specced for condition nuker strapped on Kilbrons and fought/farmed big groups with guild team. Big pink clouds of 3-4 k confusion hits in middle of a zerg is wonderfull, almsot as pretty as al the lootbags.

@Rainu, late down the first page I listed what I changed for phantasmhybrid. scroll below normal shatter car spec/guide. Basicly sword is zerker and neclese. Also changed sigil.

@Oriflame, tbh main reason you have the pistol trait is for cotroll, lower cd on pistol skills and range inc on stun. If you after phantasm dmg I would change spec to hybrid. The strenght of “shatter cat” high contoll and shatter dmg and ok burst. Mobility especialy in combat is outstanding and beat most other classes and spec.

/Osicat

Hi Osicat, I’m really enjoying the play style of the shatter cat builds. I used to play a condition based build but got annoyed at it and wanted to try something different. I am interested in the "nuke condition" build that you mention. If I had to guess, I would say it was a 20/0/0/20/30 build, with glamours and related blind/confusion traits. That is a pure guess though. I really like the ability of glamours to melt zergs.

@Trickstick, Np, mate. I hinted I run condition sometimes a while ago but have not released any vid etc of it, wont say I wont do in the future but for now its just to have a alternative for group runs.

I did run a 20-20-0-0-30 with glamour confusion and using the Azura skill “Pain inverter”, Feedback and portal. Stealth Jumped into enemy pack, chaos field, feedback, cry of frustration, paininvert and portal out. A guildmate did same time run glamour blind and blind cause confusion so the combo of that and other guild aoe did hurt a full zerg in a doorway.

Alternative I run 0-20-20-0-30. But as said its nor realy my area. I 90% of the time run Hybrid or normal Shatter cat. If you interested in more confusion builds and vid see

Flimp: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/FLIMPY-Mesmer-PvP-Updated-31st-Dec/first#post1136109

Kyris: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/76747-video-illusion-confusion-in-wvw/

/Osicat

@ * Minor uppdate * @ *

Uppdated Sigil for normal shatter cat and the might stacking description for hybrid spec to match current recomended gear and gamestyle with latest patch.

/Osicat

Hi Osicat, Mesmer was my 1st character I got to level 80, but I couldn’t find a build that I felt comfortable with in WvW. I also have an 80 Necro and 80 Ele, I have been using my Ele as my main for a few months now running D/D 1vsMany. But I want to get back into my Mesmer.

I normally gear all my toons defensively for WvW, purely because the likely hood of a 1v1 becoming a 1vsMany happens so often, I find if I don’t spec and play defensively I get nuked down extremely quickly and I don’t like losing fights!!

I currently use, positioning, los, I time my abilities, know how to kite etc… However the skill cap for what you do looks really high, since you are effectively a glass cannon(ish).

So my question is, if I try out a shatter cat spec or hybrid spec, what kind of survivability would I expect from the dodges, clone spamming, blinks, pistol CC etc… I would imagine this isn’t very forgiving for mistakes as even know on some of my bunker type specs, if a thief or another high burst profession get’s on you, your toast.

@Loco, Hi mate, glad you joining the ranks of us mesmers. If you come from the Ele and Necro ranks with Tank experience and now going mesmer you will feel a big difference in both gamestyle and in utilitys.

As you say the 1 vs 1 often turn into a 1 vs x and what every spec and gearing you play you as long you run solo run need to plan for this. Thiefs solve this by stealth and good escape skills, many other classes by good mobility and escape mecanics. We have other ways.

As you notice this 2 spec the guide is al about have a wvwvw focus. Even if the gear seems a big glass ich (not full but idd alot of dmg low hp and tought compared to tanks) the spec in no way is a glass spec. The thing is that instead of as many classes who use passive dmg reduction in terms of boons, % dmg lowing skills and gear shatter mesmer build our survival on ACCTIVE survival.

In this we are outstanding but as you say it raice the skillcap. Yes in a glass cannon get’s on you you toast…. or no accualy no. Here alot of new mesmers and non mesmers have a wrong way of see the situation. We dont use our clones as decoys, expect the enemy to know who is the real mesmer.

Yes alot of new players have porblems figure out who is the clone and who is the mesmer but as soon you play versus good players or guild teams you will get constant marked and they will ignore your clones and go al out for you. Here is where the skill cap come in and a good shatter mesmer can do 1 vs x or smal group versus big group extremly effective. Most of the times when we wipe in my guild its the mesmers and thiefs who get away and come back to res.

We have so many incombat movment sills, dmg dodges, stuns, immobelices, dmg immunitys and dazes. Add blocks, retaliation, reflection and full dmg immunitys and its a pain to go versus a good shatter mesmer. Tbh even I try to find other targets if I can than versus a shatter mesmers with a staff pistol/sword if i run into a group on battlefield.

A thief who jumps a Phantsasm shatter hybrid mesmer using sword oh, with rune of air can expect to get close to 1 hit if you react. If you good at reacting he wont even dmg you.

To make it a bit easier in start I recomend you get a little more knight and valkyre, change to more zerker later on when you more used to the spec and expect to have a hard learning period.

I reccomend see the folowing movies for survival explanation in 1 vs x:

/cheers Osicat

totally should make a new vid since this last update xD