Guild Wars 2

Hello guys, I tried doing some snooping around in this forum looking for WvW builds for big group fights, and most if not all of the WvW builds on the sticky thread are months old, and since I’m a recent (2 months~) player, I dont know if they have stopped working, or people found something better.

At the moment I’m running the tipical osicat PU build(or whoever came up with it first..) , because I scout / hide in bases alot and this is the build that i feel most comfortable with. But I was looking to transition into group fights.

I tried doing a full glamour build yesterday, with null field, feedback, veil, time warp as utilities, but I ended up dying abit (we were fighting larger groups to be fair, but in PU I never die). Although I realize, you just can’t do a build in guild wars 2 that does everything well, I wanted to know what the most popular WvW builds for large fights is, and if you direct them to me, since I’m in a tier 1 server, and my guild is looking to “enforce” guild builds.

Also, if you guys do run full glamour utilities, how do you survive? Did you invest in dire gear to be as tanky as possible? I’d like to get these builds to work with rabid stats, but if dire is only solution let me know

EDIT: To be clear, I’m talking about 30 to 40 man groups

i run triforce build which gives u more survivability due to distortion, retal, reflection, but it is hard to tag with it. i also run glamour build with traited focus and perplexity runes. i usually kite around the zerg and use blink instead of mirror images. unfortunately is is still pretty weak even with perplexity, but at least u can tag well.

here is the build video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N736Yg57RcQ

now during the current meta, try to not run in the middle of your own zerg. if your zerg is stacking, try to be a little bit behind them or on the side. i usually try to put nullfield first in the middle of the enemy zerg, to rip their boons and then pick a target in the middle for my feedback. try to pull some enemies through your glam fields with temporal curtain. glam works with rabid btw. most of the commanders want u to use veil, so glambuild is great as portal and veil both are glamfields.

id recommend u to watch the videos from my guildleader kylia brefore glamnerf. we ususally ran around 8 to 10 glam mesmers.

here is 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5DaSPeEgg4

and here is one 13 vs 40

For Zerg work I run Rabid Gear, Sceptre, Focus, Greatsword, Perplexity Runes and a modified Glamour Confusion build, I/Warden & I/Berserker are useful to take out oil, people up on Structures when you get LoS, Glamours tag people, I know a lot of people moved completely away from Glamour. Builds, but like Selan said, the Triforce that Kylia came up with is a great start, experiment from there, I never lack for bags/badges.

The build is for mindless Zerging, no good solo, I generally don’t die that often.

selan.8354:

i run triforce build which gives u more survivability due to distortion, retal, reflection, but it is hard to tag with it. i also run glamour build with traited focus and perplexity runes. i usually kite around the zerg and use blink instead of mirror images. unfortunately is is still pretty weak even with perplexity, but at least u can tag well.

here is the build video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N736Yg57RcQ

now during the current meta, try to not run in the middle of your own zerg. if your zerg is stacking, try to be a little bit behind them or on the side. i usually try to put nullfield first in the middle of the enemy zerg, to rip their boons and then pick a target in the middle for my feedback. try to pull some enemies through your glam fields with temporal curtain. glam works with rabid btw. most of the commanders want u to use veil, so glambuild is great as portal and veil both are glamfields.

id recommend u to watch the videos from my guildleader kylia brefore glamnerf. we ususally ran around 8 to 10 glam mesmers.

here is 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5DaSPeEgg4

and here is one 13 vs 40

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTbyG5rHK9k

This is the triforce build your running right? The thing that it’s missing is veil, for some reason almost every commander wants a veil every 10 seconds and we’re kinda forced to use it..

Lol at that 13v40, that’s more like 13vs20 smashing random skills

I don’t have really recent uploads of how I play in raids but this is basicly how I do it.
http://intothemists.com/guides/1276-raid_shatter
You can easily swap feedback/null field for veil

Eremoo.2785:

This is the triforce build your running right? The thing that it’s missing is veil, for some reason almost every commander wants a veil every 10 seconds and we’re kinda forced to use it..

those are the glam build videos before nerf. triforce is in this one:

i normally dont run veil if i dont have to as i prefer nullfield feedback and either decoy or blink

My bad I meant to link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPPotO067lo which is the build ye. My only problem is veil like I said, since my guild requires it

Eremoo.2785:

My bad I meant to link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPPotO067lo which is the build ye. My only problem is veil like I said, since my guild requires it

id swap nullfield then or give up mirror images. feedback is very important in both builds.if i run glam build insteat of triforce, i still keep the focus traited so it refelcts projectiles and if im asked to veil, ill bring that instead of blink or mirror images. if u have 5 glam mesmers popping feedback all at the same time u might gonna get pretty nice stacks and somewhat ok dmg.
triforce build is good for pushing into keeps as u can get invul with distortion and maybe set up a portalbomb. it is not an easy build to pull off, but effective.

BlackDevil.9268:

Lol at that 13v40, that’s more like 13vs20 smashing random skills

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmJ1QZ_aPqc

I don’t have really recent uploads of how I play in raids but this is basicly how I do it.
http://intothemists.com/guides/1276-raid_shatter
You can easily swap feedback/null field for veil

That seems like an interesting build, but I’d have to convince them on not having veil which I don’t know will be possible

Eremoo.2785:

BlackDevil.9268:

Lol at that 13v40, that’s more like 13vs20 smashing random skills

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmJ1QZ_aPqc

I don’t have really recent uploads of how I play in raids but this is basicly how I do it.
http://intothemists.com/guides/1276-raid_shatter
You can easily swap feedback/null field for veil

That seems like an interesting build, but I’d have to convince them on not having veil which I don’t know will be possible

Wut, like i said, you can easily swap feedback or null field for veil. Besides, you only need 2 veils in 99% of all cases.

Is your group organized or just random pugs?

For my organized, group, my priorities are:
1) providing veil on-demand
2) staying with my commander
3) DPS

To best suit that, I often run with a hodgepodge of skills. Generally, 20/20/0/30/0 is the most successful. GS/S+F paired with Veil, Blink, and Mantra of Stability. If I’m going to stick with my commander, I’m going to need mobility mobility mobility.

Highlights of GS, of course, are ranged abilities and the near-instant cast ’zerker for AoE cripple. The cone knockback is the icing on the cake.

Sword provides more mobility and a defense skill while focus is a no-brainer pickup for out of combat mobility plus in-combat reflections, cripples/interrupts/pulls, and the warden (who can hold his own if positioned well).

Trait-wise, I go for reduced cooldowns on GS, clone on dodge, and inspiration to support my team. Anything to boost glamours is a god-send as null field, veil, and feedback are in regular rotation. Feedback is probably one of the biggest sources of my personal DPS, Veil is a must-have for my team, and null-field fits the cleanse role when no one else is providing it.

I definitely don’t overlook my stability mantra. 4s of stability is good now and should be great when it goes AoE. It’s not always on my bar, but when my team and the enemy team are zerg-bumping, it’s one of my most loved skills.

Kelthien.8593:

Is your group organized or just random pugs?

For my organized, group, my priorities are:
1) providing veil on-demand
2) staying with my commander
3) DPS

To best suit that, I often run with a hodgepodge of skills. Generally, 20/20/0/30/0 is the most successful. GS/S+F paired with Veil, Blink, and Mantra of Stability. If I’m going to stick with my commander, I’m going to need mobility mobility mobility.

Highlights of GS, of course, are ranged abilities and the near-instant cast ’zerker for AoE cripple. The cone knockback is the icing on the cake.

Sword provides more mobility and a defense skill while focus is a no-brainer pickup for out of combat mobility plus in-combat reflections, cripples/interrupts/pulls, and the warden (who can hold his own if positioned well).

Trait-wise, I go for reduced cooldowns on GS, clone on dodge, and inspiration to support my team. Anything to boost glamours is a god-send as null field, veil, and feedback are in regular rotation. Feedback is probably one of the biggest sources of my personal DPS, Veil is a must-have for my team, and null-field fits the cleanse role when no one else is providing it.

I definitely don’t overlook my stability mantra. 4s of stability is good now and should be great when it goes AoE. It’s not always on my bar, but when my team and the enemy team are zerg-bumping, it’s one of my most loved skills.

Organized, we broke off from a guild to form a new one with the best and most active players. Unfortunately there’s not alot of mesmers yet, or I could tell them to run veil and I’d run a different build with null field and feedback, so right now doing a “full” glamour build feels like a waste considering I’ll only have 1 glamour. On our raid today I ran blink + feedback + veil but using full rabid and a typical PU condition build, so my combat damage ain’t awesome considering it’s a build made for smaller fights but atleast I could stay alive, even when we were fighting 3 way.

This might change tuesday when the AoE mantras come out, but I think they’re effects can be provided by guardians already so I’m not sure why mesmers would run it aswell.

Sometimes… I think folks over-emphasize damage in wvw.

My commander would rather we survive and do low damage than do high damage for a few seconds and die. When your zerg strategy is “run through the middle and gather on the other side”, skills like feedback and Mantra of Stability are the only way you’ll succeed.

I’ve found that my responsibilities change almost week-per-week for a medium-sized server. Some days I’m roaming, and a 20/20/30/0/0 selfish-condition build works. Some days I’m in a zerg and on veil/survival. Picking a build often relies on the needs of the group you’re with.

So far though, in general, I’ve found the 20/20/0/30/0 flexible enough to get me through 80% of the encounters I run in to

Kelthien.8593:

Sometimes… I think folks over-emphasize damage in wvw.

My commander would rather we survive and do low damage than do high damage for a few seconds and die. When your zerg strategy is “run through the middle and gather on the other side”, skills like feedback and Mantra of Stability are the only way you’ll succeed.

I’ve found that my responsibilities change almost week-per-week for a medium-sized server. Some days I’m roaming, and a 20/20/30/0/0 selfish-condition build works. Some days I’m in a zerg and on veil/survival. Picking a build often relies on the needs of the group you’re with.

So far though, in general, I’ve found the 20/20/0/30/0 flexible enough to get me through 80% of the encounters I run in to

well roaming is different form zergs. op stated 30+ man zerg builds. and yeah the commander only cares that u are alive so u can veil them. of course i like being able to help the zerg with nullfield and feedback, but just being a support utility slot is not what our class should be about. i wanna be able to deal dmg and get lootbags too and not just veil the zerg and stand on the side and survive so i can veil them again. c’mon a mesmer should be more than that!

Kelthien.8593:

My commander would rather we survive and do low damage than do high damage for a few seconds and die. When your zerg strategy is “run through the middle and gather on the other side”, skills like feedback and Mantra of Stability are the only way you’ll succeed.

This really depends on the size of your group though. Skilled tactics and damage* is better up to around 15-20 peeps IMO.

(the following is from T1 perspective)

Guilds running 40ish peeps, its no big deal. You can all have low damage because you will still roll over whatever you focus on and be invounerable against anything less than a guild group of equal size or a twice as big angry pug mob.

Guilds running 10 people will have problem with this because they will not be able to properly focus people down. You’ll have superior survivability, but fights can drag out so long that adds will wear you down. These kind of groups are usually countered by more damage oriented group with a harder frontline to take the brunt of the damage. Even if you just get 2-3 of them down in the initial assault… Well you’ve practicly won already if you avoid the counter-attack.

*"damage" being relative. I’m not talking berserker builds since you can still have 2000 power, 2000 precision, 2000 toughness and 1500 vitality with 50% crit damage ^^

This is the build I run, when we run organized WvW.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgEQNAW7dlw1CrHVzqGa9IxJFMv5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jUCBoOCy0CwkDA0HQZSFRjtsuIasaGYKWER1eEFRrWIgFrBA-w

Veil is a must, Nullfield is a must for boon stripping and tagging, Feedback is godlike vs. ranged pew-pew’ers and for tagging and Time Warp is also a must. Also to those who don’t know. You can use Feedback without a target. It will spawn about 900 range straight ahead of you, it’s mostly easier than picking a target.

For survivability try not to get focused and have Chaos armor up most of the times with Phase Retreat in Glamour fields. If you find you have problems with surviving you can pick Blink or Decoy instead of Feedback.

selan.8354:

well roaming is different form zergs. op stated 30+ man zerg builds. and yeah the commander only cares that u are alive so u can veil them. of course i like being able to help the zerg with nullfield and feedback, but just being a support utility slot is not what our class should be about. i wanna be able to deal dmg and get lootbags too and not just veil the zerg and stand on the side and survive so i can veil them again. c’mon a mesmer should be more than that!

Ye, I don’t wanna be a veil bot and then afk the rest of the fight because I’m useless. I don’t care too much about loot bags, but it still feels nice to get them. But since we lack so much aoe our damage is not impactful..what I try to do now is veil my group and then just blink to they’re back line and harass they’re ranged. Also used this tactic on a “scrim” gvg we did today, but ended up 1v1 a thief while our guilds fought xD

Chrhal.4983:

This is the build I run, when we run organized WvW.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgEQNAW7dlw1CrHVzqGa9IxJFMv5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jUCBoOCy0CwkDA0HQZSFRjtsuIasaGYKWER1eEFRrWIgFrBA-w

Veil is a must, Nullfield is a must for boon stripping and tagging, Feedback is godlike vs. ranged pew-pew’ers and for tagging and Time Warp is also a must. Also to those who don’t know. You can use Feedback without a target. It will spawn about 900 range straight ahead of you, it’s mostly easier than picking a target.

For survivability try not to get focused and have Chaos armor up most of the times with Phase Retreat in Glamour fields. If you find you have problems with surviving you can pick Blink or Decoy instead of Feedback.

The confusion when you blind only affects 5 targets if I’m not wrong, considering placing the glamours only blinds once, so in a big fight I think those 2 talents are a waste. I’ve considered a similar build, but it feels I’d only consider using it if we had more mesmers that can veil, and I can go blink+feedback+null field

Chrhal.4983:

This is the build I run, when we run organized WvW.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgEQNAW7dlw1CrHVzqGa9IxJFMv5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jUCBoOCy0CwkDA0HQZSFRjtsuIasaGYKWER1eEFRrWIgFrBA-w

Veil is a must, Nullfield is a must for boon stripping and tagging, Feedback is godlike vs. ranged pew-pew’ers and for tagging and Time Warp is also a must. Also to those who don’t know. You can use Feedback without a target. It will spawn about 900 range straight ahead of you, it’s mostly easier than picking a target.

For survivability try not to get focused and have Chaos armor up most of the times with Phase Retreat in Glamour fields. If you find you have problems with surviving you can pick Blink or Decoy instead of Feedback.

That’s pretty much the original style (now gutted) glam build, except dire armor/trinkets and the crutch of perplexity runes.

Eremoo.2785:

Chrhal.4983:

This is the build I run, when we run organized WvW.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgEQNAW7dlw1CrHVzqGa9IxJFMv5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jUCBoOCy0CwkDA0HQZSFRjtsuIasaGYKWER1eEFRrWIgFrBA-w

Veil is a must, Nullfield is a must for boon stripping and tagging, Feedback is godlike vs. ranged pew-pew’ers and for tagging and Time Warp is also a must. Also to those who don’t know. You can use Feedback without a target. It will spawn about 900 range straight ahead of you, it’s mostly easier than picking a target.

For survivability try not to get focused and have Chaos armor up most of the times with Phase Retreat in Glamour fields. If you find you have problems with surviving you can pick Blink or Decoy instead of Feedback.

The confusion when you blind only affects 5 targets if I’m not wrong, considering placing the glamours only blinds once, so in a big fight I think those 2 talents are a waste.

What would you pick instead?

Chrhal.4983:

What would you pick instead?

I’d pick confusing enchantments, which causes confusion to people who enter or leave glamours, it’s easier to tag people and will apply more confusion overall. I’d still try to keep the two traits in inspiration.

Eremoo.2785:

Chrhal.4983:

What would you pick instead?

I’d pick confusing enchantments, which causes confusion to people who enter or leave glamours, it’s easier to tag people and will apply more confusion overall. I’d still try to keep the two traits in inspiration.

Again if you look at the build I posted, confusing enchantments is already picked, as well as the two other traits = more confusion

I know but what I’m saying is the two in illusions are not worth it since they only apply blind and 1 stack of confusion to 5 people per field, which is nothing in a large fight..