Guild Wars 2

From the moment I first interacted with GW1 I have had some sort of strange obsession with and draw toward the Mesmer profession. I guess caster classes have always been appealing to me; but why not go with a monk or elementalist instead? The Mesmer has just always had something more to it. So, when GW2 launched I obviously knew which class I’d begin with.

Here is the struggle though: for all my love and adoration of the profession, I don’t feel as if I have ever adequately understood how to play them and play them well. I have been trying to do my best in reading posts, builds, discussions, etc… lately, but after many, it starts to blend together and becomes useless.

I would describe myself as an individual who loves to play games, but not someone who tends to inherently understand the finer details of said games. I have a full time job, am married, and recently added a baby boy to the family as well. Needless to say, my free time is limited, and what time I do find to play I rather not spend being frustrated my build is inefficient and worthless. I typically end up (if GW1 is any indication) waltzing around with some build I know is laughable, but not knowing the first step to take to dramatically improve it for the better.

My hope in making this post is that someone might identify with my struggle, or at least have some pity, and be willing to lend some training and/or direction for a lost Mesmer sole such as myself. I play basically 100% PvE if that helps narrow down any suggestions. I am also currently only a level 26, so even if you can’t provide me with much, suggestions on how to level (art least to this magic Mesmer level 40 I seem to keep reading about) would be great.

Ultimately I just want to better understand this mysterious class I’ve been drawn to for so long. So, to anyone who might take the time to respond to this, thank you!

For simple leveling, take Staff + Decoy/Mirror Images/Signet of Illusions and you get it easy, as staff clone’s Winds of Chaos does = condition damage to your own, even though it doesn’t have any viable base damage on the clones.

Look up “MrPrometheus” in YouTube. He has about 4 guides so far that are dedicated to the Mesmer. These guides are helpful for beginners and even experienced players.

My other suggestion is to try out some obvious basic builds like the Phantasm build. After playing with a build for a while you can then decide to branch out and try new traits or play styles.

An understanding of at least one basic build will give you a good place to fall back on.

As long as you’re soloing content easily just enjoy the class. Mesmer is one class where understanding comes through playing. Just know that it’s a busy class and be prepared to push a lot of buttons.

I find binding your heal skill to R and then ZXCV for your 7-9 + elite incredibly handy. If you use Blink you’ll find it becomes 300% more useful if you don’t have to stretch for a 7 key + click a spot.

^Or just buy a Razer Naga lol

I have to second the MrPromethius videos, they are very helpful, much more than the majority of this forum combined.

To be honest, I believe Mesmer has a very high learning curve to it – However, luckily for you, it’s unique in that the learning curve is essentially learning what you personally like.

There are a lot of ways to play the Mesmer, and how you play it is really determined by what makes you comfortable playing it. Some love shattering, some love phantasms, some go “confusion, ahoy!”, but each of these ways are all equally viable and work well in various situations.

The “Learning Curve” you’ll experience with Mesmer is less a series of meta-game skills. and more “Does this feel comfortable?”

If it feels comfortable, then you’ve found a good build for you. But there is absolutely nothing worse than a Mesmer who doesn’t feel comfortable with the way they’re playing. You can’t just 1234 a golden rotation with this class, you’ve just got really love how you fight.

I also have to recommend the MrPrometheus videos on youtube, they are quite long but they cover everything you need to know to start getting to grips with the mesmer!

Beyond videos and research, just try and find out how you like to play by trying out as many builds as you can while you level, you’ll get a feel for how you like to play!

I feel your pain. I want to love the mesmer, but it continues to frustrate me. As others have said, the Prometheus videos are great, but around level 30-ish, it stopped being as effective for me. Kill was painfully slow. I saw other mesmers chewing up mobs with dual swords, but that playstyle was too twitchy for me.

Since the latest Greatsword buffs, I’ve been running GS/staff, staying in GS most of the time. It’s been very effective, although I’m only 50 now, so that could change again.

Checking these forums daily can also be fruitful. The amount of things you can learn from other people’s experience or even little throwaway comments is surprising.

As others have said it does have a high learning curve and even after you think you have mastered the class you can learn new things that you can incorporate into your play style.

As a personal example, I reached level 80 without ever using Blink. The ability is heavily praised in these forums so I tried using it. At first I just used it for travel. Then I found it was a great defensive ability. Now I can use it to support other players and even as a damage dealing tool (the ability doesn’t do damage itself, but using it for positioning helps me to optimise my melee abilities).

I first played Mesmer just for the style, but found that it’s like meeting a beautiful woman and discovering that she has a lot of substance underneath the pretty face.

Quex Fehftir.7619:

For simple leveling, take Staff + Decoy/Mirror Images/Signet of Illusions and you get it easy, as staff clone’s Winds of Chaos does = condition damage to your own, even though it doesn’t have any viable base damage on the clones.

Do not take signet of illusions. It works by applying a max health buff to your minions after they’re summoned. So you summon, then wait a second or two, and then they get a health boost. In a situation where they need extra health they’ll usually die in that second or two. In situations where they don’t need the health then the signet is wasted.

I’m currently (and have been for awhile) leveling with staff in a condition build, and like the advice above I also took decoy and mirror image. It’s not “bad” exactly, but it’s not very quick either. If you’ve got limited playtime and want to get in, get things done, and get out, I’d reccomend going with a power build. Grab a Greatsword as your main weapon. I’m not sure about your alternative weapon set, but I’d probably say to go with staff. Staff won’t deal much damage in a power build, but it will help when you need to play a bit more defensively. (disclaimer: I’ve never really gotten the hang of the mesmer one handed weapons. I loathe the scepter thematically)

One mental hurdle I had was realizing that illusions are not minions. Clones are just distractions and fodder for shatter, they help reduce monster attention on you. Phantasms are just damage over time effects that are cast on a single enemy. They just have an avatar in game instead of a debuff icon. When I started seeing illusions like that I had a much better grasp of how to use them effectively.

Hey Switch. Awesome that you find time to play, and although I think a lot of people like to characterize their own class as elite-only and hard to play, I firmly believe that you don’t need to be a hardcore player to play mesmer and enjoy it… and most classes in this game have a decent skill ceiling if you happen to be a quick learner too.

I’m not sure what’s hardest about breaking through to a great understanding of the class… heck I’m not even sure I’m anywhere near that myself. But learning to use everything all at once can be overwhelming… maybe that’s what’s making it harder? Do you think it would it be easier if you learned one big aspect of the class at a time? Levelling for a while in one spec then swapping was definitely how I got used to different weapons, and I found that different weapons lent themselves to different specs.

So example: maybe starting with learning to spam clones, primarily as “extra targets” to help you last longer, kill tougher enemies and get used to having them around and positioning them… I’d suggest staff, possibly greatsword for that. Then starting to incorporate shatters, at first right before mobs die so that you can get extra value out of them, but then in mid-fight as well… this might be a nice time to try out scepters, since they don’t have “on-demand” clones but can spam them by autoattacking. Then maybe adding phantasms to the mix… you can maybe flip between off-hands since they all have different phantasms to try here. “Good” players may decry leaving phantasms out at first because of how much damage they do, but if doing it all at once feels like too much, I think defense-before-offense is a decent way to learn things for mesmers.

Like you I loved mesmers in gw but never felt like I played them that well. Usually I’d make the build and let a hero use it, since they were better than me.

Take your time to learn the class. I used one weapon at a time for five levels or so each before I started weapon swapping to see what works well together. Once you’ve gotten comfortable with your weapons, start cycling through utilities and make yourself use everything so you can see what’s comfortable. I think a build needs at least one way to deal with conditions, and preferably at least 2 combo fields, along with a variety of finishers. After that its all about your preference of what feels fun.

I found (based heavily on the MrPrometheus videos) that leveling with a staff and sword/pistol worked quite well. Open with phase retreat, warlock. Circle a bit. When the mob/mobs close drop chaos storm on myself and them, wait a second or two, phase retreat for the chaos armor. If things are going well and I’ve got space and phantasms out, continue this. Otherwise switch to sword/pistol, blurred frenzy, stun with pistol, duelist, the crippling leap skill, usually blurred frenzy is close to ready, use it again, switch back to staff and continue. The precision traits to reduce cool down on sword skills and bleed on criticals and having lots of precision and condition damage meant a nice continual stream of bleed damage.

That worked great from about 30 until I tried WvW at 60+ or so. It turned out to not work well for me at all in WvW, probably both because of the slow damage from the staff and because I wasn’t 80. I switched the staff to GS and added more power and less condition damage to the mix and that seems to work better for WvW although it doesn’t seem to work as well for PvE.

http://www.youtube.com/user/finallyanime goldmine of mesmer info and vids.
This guy is primo!!!!