Guild Wars 2

It’s hard to think of a build/playstyle that exists now that will not exist after this change – with many of those gaining new utility. I know the builds I play most often should all see bumps in efficiency.

It will be interesting to see if any new ways to play mesmer emerge.

Ballads.2509:

Illusionary Invigoration missing is a Huge loss imo. I hope they add it back in as was mentioned in the stream.

This x100

They mentioned that weird confusion dmg text once didn’t they? Have they said it’s a bug could it be that there is a rework coming?

Well then, new build trait layout will be

DO DU CHA – Saying 6 6 6 is redundant now :p Also it’d mean all builds are of the devil – Anet new trait system philosophy :p

But I could see some fun DO DU INS

Illusions, while practical for many reasons, is the most boring of the lines.

So what does Master of Fragmentation do? Just reduce shatter CDs or am I missing something?

I didn’t quite understand Master of Fragmentation when they were going over the Illusions line. It seemed they pointed out the trait adding confusion and might to the various shatter skills, but is that not due to the effects of the minor traits in that line?

Noss.4105:

So what does Master of Fragmentation do? Just reduce shatter CDs or am I missing something?

It combines Precise Wrack, Confusing Cry, Masterful Reflection and Imbued Diversion i guess. They said that this one would combine all of the single shatter improving traits.

Ansau.7326:

Confusing combatants with 3 staff clones and IE being baseline will be totally OP…

I was feeling weird about that trait when I read it. Now I know why. Lol

Noss.4105:

So what does Master of Fragmentation do? Just reduce shatter CDs or am I missing something?

Those traits that individually improved shatters has been merged. Extra mind wrack damage, I believe, and reflect on distortion and imbued diversion… oh. IMBUED DIVERSION. Anyway. Unsure what happened to Cry of Frustration given they stated they wanted to phase our retaliation traits out.

DavyMcB.1603:

Ansau.7326:

Confusing combatants with 3 staff clones and IE being baseline will be totally OP…

I was feeling weird about that trait when I read it. Now I know why. Lol

Imagine this with a Rampager 90% crit build :o :o :o

Me Games Ma.8426:

DavyMcB.1603:

Ansau.7326:

Confusing combatants with 3 staff clones and IE being baseline will be totally OP…

I was feeling weird about that trait when I read it. Now I know why. Lol

Imagine this with a Rampager 90% crit build :o :o :o

Most likely gonna get an icd. Maybe a short one. Without it, I’m sure you can keep VERY high stack of confusion with staff alone and that would render scepter, which is supposed to be better at it, obsolete. But then icd never brings anything good… Either way icd less confusion on crit is too good gor a minor.

DavyMcB.1603:

Me Games Ma.8426:

DavyMcB.1603:

Ansau.7326:

Confusing combatants with 3 staff clones and IE being baseline will be totally OP…

I was feeling weird about that trait when I read it. Now I know why. Lol

Imagine this with a Rampager 90% crit build :o :o :o

Most likely gonna get an icd. Maybe a short one. Without it, I’m sure you can keep VERY high stack of confusion with staff alone and that would render scepter, which is supposed to be better at it, obsolete. But then icd never brings anything good… Either way icd less confusion on crit is too good gor a minor.

Don’t say that too loud they might actually do it.

There are some seriously OP builds in there in the the current format. Imagine:

Dueling/Chaos/Illusions: Condi – Staff/Scepter/torch

Desperate Decoy/Evasive Mirror/DE
Master of Manipulations/Chaotic Dampening/PU
The Pledge/Malicious Sorcery/MtD

That is slightly ridiculous when you also consider the greater flexibility with gearing and also all the great minors and buffs we get as standard now.

Although saying that, Thieves look like they have some crazy builds, along with Guardians and Rangers

1 thing that is really bothering me is if IP is now passive why do all ability’s start with 1 clone and stop at 3? Shouldn’t 1 be our 0 value or it total up to 4 with IP?

Ballads.2509:

1 thing that is really bothering me is if IP is now passive why do all ability’s start with 1 clone and stop at 3? Shouldn’t 1 be our 0 value or it total up to 4 with IP?

That’s just a tooltip issue.

I’m only looking at the summaries, so tell me if I’m missing something.

All of Inspiration’s Minor Traits are Phantasm buffs. You get all of those automatically right? But then the Traits you choose later in the Specialization… many of them involve shattering Illusions. But you don’t typically want to shatter Phantasms. Is that intentionally anti-synergistic, or am I missing something?

There’s a lot of cool changes, but I noticed that except for the focus and sword traits, there’s a bunch of gimmicks attached to the weapon recharge reductions now. That seems like something that could be problematic.

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Looking at some of these traits, I can see the nerf hammer already. Let’s not get too excited! lol My hope is that our buffs will simply pale in comparison to the buffs of the other professions.

I see a lot of potential for build variety in pvp. Interrupt/Lockdown will become the top meta build. Classic shatter will be no more since its defining trait was IP. Depending on how accepting the meta is of conditions, Torment/Confusion will be much more deadlier on Mesmer.

IBountyHunterI.4601:

Ballads.2509:

Illusionary Invigoration missing is a Huge loss imo. I hope they add it back in as was mentioned in the stream.

This x100

Yeah, they definitely need to bring it back into the illusion trait line. I think it has good synergy with shatter builds. Getting 5 stacks of confusion on someone and only applying 1 stack of torment is currently underwhelming. Hopefully they bring back illusionary invigoration or adjust that trait. Phantasmal haste should have been added into inspiration possible. I also wish they reduced the cooldown on mirror of anguish. Some way of removing conditions would’ve been appreciated in illusions other than torch for the master trait. Overall, I’m really happy with these changes, although I believe there could be a few tweaks here and there before the final version.

Confusion got a buff if anyone of you noticed.

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

I get your point ross, but what I dont get is why still exclude classes on a GM trait?

MailMail.6534:

Looking at some of these traits, I can see the nerf hammer already. Let’s not get too excited! lol My hope is that our buffs will simply pale in comparison to the buffs of the other professions.

I see a lot of potential for build variety in pvp. Interrupt/Lockdown will become the top meta build. Classic shatter will be no more since its defining trait was IP. Depending on how accepting the meta is of conditions, Torment/Confusion will be much more deadlier on Mesmer.

Think we may be looking at a new higher sustain shatter meta:

Domination/Dueling/Inspiration:

Rending Shatter/Shattered Concentration/Mental Torment
Phantasmal Fury/Blinding Dissipation/DE
Mender’s Purity/Restorative Illusions/Shattered Conditions

Gives a bit of AoE support in there with a bit of sustain while also completely destroying someone who didn’t see you coming with mental torment still. Looking pretty strong

StickerHappy.8052:

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

I get your point ross, but what I dont get is why still exclude classes on a GM trait?

Thieves are also immune to chill. Just accept it and move on.

StickerHappy.8052:

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

I get your point ross, but what I dont get is why still exclude classes on a GM trait?

I’m not sure. The wisdom of the masses (ill use the term wisdom loosly when it comes to thief players :p ) is that it’d impact the class mechanic to harshly.

That said, I should add, rupting other classes skills into a 15s cd is to hard to pass up.

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

I get your point ross, but what I dont get is why still exclude classes on a GM trait?

I’m not sure. The wisdom of the masses (ill use the term wisdom loosly when it comes to thief players :p ) is that it’d impact the class mechanic to harshly.

That said, I should add, rupting other classes skills into a 15s cd is to hard to pass up.

Hmm..the masses… hahaha. When you try to visit the forums, thieves still act disappointed with the changes they will get even though a lot of them are great.

/slitwrist /emo LOL.

StickerHappy.8052:

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Ross Biddle.2367:

StickerHappy.8052:

Too bad Thieves are still powerblock proof.
Revenant will be next in line for power block proofing.

Irrelevant if you’ve got CS and CI mixed in to the same build. Power Block is also Halting Strike, and weakness. Which will hit thieves hard. So the PB timer might not effect Thieves 0 cd skills, but the rest of it will hurt.

I get your point ross, but what I dont get is why still exclude classes on a GM trait?

I’m not sure. The wisdom of the masses (ill use the term wisdom loosly when it comes to thief players :p ) is that it’d impact the class mechanic to harshly.

That said, I should add, rupting other classes skills into a 15s cd is to hard to pass up.

Hmm..the masses… hahaha. When you try to visit the forums, thieves still act disappointed with the changes they will get even though a lot of them are great.

/slitwrist /emo LOL.

Thievery IS only half the reason why they wear all that black.

I like much of what I see but, traiting into Dueling is still esseintial for every build and Inspiration still has useless Masters and Grandmasters. What a pity.

The changes seem quite balanced considering what other classes are getting. I like that we may get a passive swiftness on Signet of Inspiration, also possibly a little more condi clearing, and increase of PU stealth.

I don’t like that DE was made a GM trait, seriously not many people run without it, so people will feel tied to Dueling specialization. They should have made it a baseline on-dodge skill if they want build diversity. Also I’m not impressed with the new mechanic to reduce some weapon cool downs. The greatsword skill reductions at 2% on spatial surge hit means you have to hit 10 times to get to the present value of 20%, this seems quite low considering we don’t know how this will stack, for how long, and if a ICD is involved.

I feel DE was done in such a way given how they seemed to want to buff Phantasms, thus feeling different builds could take Mistrust or Harmonious Mantras if built towards phantasms more than shattering.

Vague Memory.2817:

The greatsword skill reductions at 2% on spatial surge hit means you have to hit 10 times to get to the present value of 20%, this seems quite low considering we don’t know how this will stack, for how long, and if a ICD is involved.

You or your clones need to hit 10 times, so it’s not as bad as it sounds.

Dondagora.9645:

I feel DE was done in such a way given how they seemed to want to buff Phantasms, thus feeling different builds could take Mistrust or Harmonious Mantras if built towards phantasms more than shattering.

Although on contrary to popular belief, I would say DE in GM is a good trait to bring phantasms or other types of builds into the limelight.

I have no problem with DE there, especially given all the other goodies we’ll have (lets face it, it was 4 points in dueling as it is now anyway).

Fact is, if you can shine without DE then all the more power to you, and it’s possible (though very limited in build choice) now.

A few things of note:

1. Chaos Armor now gives guaranteed protection upon activation and another boon added
2. Burning now stacks, maybe intensifies?
3. Confusion was changed – it adds its stack but also has a high damage value in tooltip; quite possibly a tick from confusion as well as tick per skill use
4. Holy reflects.. way more access to reflects
5. DE being grandmaster is fine with IP being baseline
6. Interrupt builds, from first glance, is going to syngerize extremely well with power shatter that we could see some high spikes – even moreso
7. Lastly – these changes are not all finalized so temper expectations just a bit.

Overall, I’m happy to what they’ve done with the traits and layouts. This is getting me more excited to see what’s in store for our specializations.

phokus.8934:

A few things of note:
1. Chaos Armor now gives guaranteed protection upon activation and another boon added

I believe that is only with the trait.

Ah, just realized something. We might end up becoming great WvW utility bots[still], as our traited glamours can now give zergs massive amounts of Superspeed.

Blaeys.3102:

It’s hard to think of a build/playstyle that exists now that will not exist after this change – with many of those gaining new utility. I know the builds I play most often should all see bumps in efficiency.

It will be interesting to see if any new ways to play mesmer emerge.

Phantasm
Clone death

Keep in mind that they only showed traits and we had some hints at other stuff happening so the traits alone might not be the complete picture I’m really eager to see the whole picture to see what is what and what is really OP or what is really nerfed..

After having a look at the screenshots I found some issues with the new Duelling set up.

First, maybe not that important but probably vasted space: The new Duelists Discipline basically has a build in Sharper Images. It might be an improvement to the trait itself but it is rather boring since you get Bleeds from Sharper Images anyway.

Second, which annoys the hell out of me: Why are Blade Training and Evasive Mirror in the same tier although Sword MH is the only weapon which could synergize with that trait? Blade Training could be Adept instead of Duelists Discipline. Or Evasive Mirror could replace Sharper Images which could be moved to the Adept Major slot while Duelists Discipline goes back up to the Master level. I don’t really care which way it is done. But Evasive Mirror and Blade Training really shoudn’t be in the same slot.

Fay.2735:

Keep in mind that they only showed traits and we had some hints at other stuff happening so the traits alone might not be the complete picture I’m really eager to see the whole picture to see what is what and what is really OP or what is really nerfed..

Yeah, it does seem like there are a bunch of changes to conditions. Stacking past 25, Confusion working like Torment, etc. Seems like at least a few skills are changing, too (one of the Trident skills apparently getting Chaos Armour). Hard to say just how widespread the non-trait changes will really be.

Xaylin.1860:

Second, which annoys the hell out of me: Why are Blade Training and Evasive Mirror in the same tier although Sword MH is the only weapon which could synergize with that trait? Blade Training could be Adept instead of Duelists Discipline. Or Evasive Mirror could replace Sharper Images which could be moved to the Adept Major slot while Duelists Discipline goes back up to the Master level. I don’t really care which way it is done. But Evasive Mirror and Blade Training really shoudn’t be in the same slot.

Evasive Mirror just seems really weird in general. Like, you have to Evade an attack and then get attacked by a projectile within 2 seconds. So, yeah, an MH sword build seems like the most obvious synergy with it, but it also seems like kind of a garbage trait anyway, soooo…

I’m surprised nobody noticed that instead of 30% CD reduction on shatter recharge the most we can get now is only 15%.

For Mind Wrack it’s not a huge deal but we are going to be standing around staring at timers ticking down and swearing alot waiting for the other shatter skills…

Turbofan.4569:

I’m surprised nobody noticed that instead of 30% CD reduction on shatter recharge the most we can get now is only 15%.

That’s not correct. All former profession-specific traitline bonuses are going to be made half baseline, half trait. In other words, the base recharges will go down 15% from current (yes that’s another buff), the other 15% will come from the Illusions trait.

Clone death builds will be no more, but I’m not as sad to see the lack of synergy in phantasm builds.

On the plus side, it appears like FINALLY our class mechanic is a hallmark of our class. We finally will see different ways to shatter effectively. Overall, this seems to be a positive change of direction in terms of the identity of the Mesmer class. Control and Shatters!

MailMail.6534:

Clone death builds will be no more, but I’m not as sad to see the lack of synergy in phantasm builds.

On the plus side, it appears like FINALLY our class mechanic is a hallmark of our class. We finally will see different ways to shatter effectively. Overall, this seems to be a positive change of direction in terms of the identity of the Mesmer class. Control and Shatters!

Unfortunately both are useless in PvE

Arshay Duskbrow.1306:

Turbofan.4569:

I’m surprised nobody noticed that instead of 30% CD reduction on shatter recharge the most we can get now is only 15%.

That’s not correct. All former profession-specific traitline bonuses are going to be made half baseline, half trait. In other words, the base recharges will go down 15% from current (yes that’s another buff), the other 15% will come from the Illusions trait.

Thank goodness. The CD’s on everything but mind wrack are too long as it is…

Anyone else think there should be at least SOME damage on F3 like there is on F2? Kinda silly that it does no base damage at all and has such long CD….

tobascodagama.2961:

Evasive Mirror just seems really weird in general. Like, you have to Evade an attack and then get attacked by a projectile within 2 seconds. So, yeah, an MH sword build seems like the most obvious synergy with it, but it also seems like kind of a garbage trait anyway, soooo…

Just think about PvP and especially WvW. It might actually be pretty powerful.

Apparently Signet of illusions now gives permanent swiftness? If so about kittening time. How does it work? Is it in addition to the current passive?

Levetty.1279:

Apparently Signet of illusions now gives permanent swiftness? If so about kittening time. How does it work? Is it in addition to the current passive?

Signet of Inspiration. And, yeah, apparently now it grants Swiftness plus some other boon on every tick.

Also worth noting is how incredibly strong the Minor line is in Dueling. Like omg. Vigor is so important, but it’ll be a hard choice if you’re going for a condi build.