Guild Wars 2

I need help with mesmer pvp. As you can see in the screen shot I got destroyed by a thief, He opened up with an 8k hit followed by a 7k hit which I only have 16k hp. So I was dead in literally 1 sec. I got off 1 daze and my chaos storm where I thought he was refuging.
This happens all the time also, so it isn’t just this thief, all of them who don’t keyboard turn will take me down this fast. I will post my build but I have played with just about all the good builds out there and honestly there is not enough time to even react to make a viable build.
So my question is are they going to fix mesmer or should I just abandon my mesmer who I like to play the most and play a thief instead.
In wvw I only see like 4 classes, I assume cause they are the best ones for pvp: Thief (kills), warrior (kills), guardian (support), necro (fear/support).
I would ask what other mesmers are doing to kill thieves but I know I wont get an answer, I can see in wvw no one plays a mesmer, and if I do get a response is prolly from someone who plays a thief and doesn’t want it to get nerfed.

Build is:
staff and duel 1h sword
20/20/0/0/30
Dom: 6,4 (did this for the stack of vulnerabilities)
Duel: 3,10 (did this so when I use my block with swords I get 2 clones, most of the time)
Illusions: 1,5,11 (did this to try and get out damage fast and so I can pop my shatters as soon as I get hit by a thief to daze them, but it doesn’t seem to work or doesn’t work long enough to really do kitten to them)

1. Dodge
2. Stealth

I am not saying mesmer is better than thief. A very good thief is hard to beat and if they want to run there isn’t much you can do about it. But 1 out of 20 thieves are very good I simply lay a beat down on the rest. Really the trick is dodge and stealth. There is no magic build that will make it easier.
Get a friend who play thief go to the mist and duel him over and over . You’ll do each other a world of good.

1 move move and move, dont be still and keep moving from side to side to avoid backstab
2. keep clones and phantasms up. dont shatter them, rather than finish the fight
3. use staff number 2 and stun breakers
4. be aware of areas when he is invisible , that indicates where the thief is coming through.
5. patience

It´s always though at the beginning, but to be honest, aside p/d conditions thief’s ( i hate them), they are one of the best classes to fight with for mesmers. you shouldn´t lose against them. conditions specc are our weakness, as we lack of condition removals.

try to cripple them as well. If you do that and continue moving, dodging, and stealthing it will be hard for them to get behind you. If stealth and dodge aren’t an option I typically walk irregularly like walking backwards in a circle.

Debuti.6017:

1 move move and move, dont be still and keep moving from side to side to avoid backstab
2. keep clones and phantasms up. dont shatter them, rather than finish the fight
3. use staff number 2 and stun breakers
4. be aware of areas when he is invisible , that indicates where the thief is coming through.
5. patience

It´s always though at the beginning, but to be honest, aside p/d conditions thief’s ( i hate them), they are one of the best classes to fight with for mesmers. you shouldn´t lose against them. conditions specc are our weakness, as we lack of condition removals.

I love it when good people post good tips that one CAN use. Thank you.

Hmm. I’ll look for some footage of mesmer v thief, and get back to you.

Amazing tips so far, i dont have much to add ^__^.

Oh, i do have a skill combo with the off hand sword actually: if the thief is casually heartseekering or slapping you, use riposte, just when the damage triggers use mirror images and mind wrack. It will do huge melee damage as all clones and youreelf are in range.

I like keeping my toughness at about 2050 in solo roaming, it leaves my burst high but still allows for some mistakes, which come in the form of backstabs.

I very highly recommend you to get Mental Torment, I in domination. It will improve your burst a lot.

If you need a shatter build with slighlty more survivability but still with burst, i recommend the Shattercat Heavy 3.0 its by no means better than 20/20/0/0/30, its just a different style with some more toughness ^__^.

Also, the mesmer community it setting up a guild, where our goal is to create a friendly environment where eveyone is willing to help each other/have fun… Hey, that sounds just like the forums, but better : D!
You can sign up in this thread , and you will receive an invite very shortly if you’re interested ^__^.
(No representing required)

Well, I couldn’t find any Mesmer v. Thief footage that I really liked, so I uploaded some of mine. It was hastily (poorly) done, so I apologize for the bad editing, but hopefully it’s of some use.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaeovbBeoEk

Tactical Notes:
Thieves are masters of burst and stealth. The first stage of a fight, then, is countering this burst. Evading, blocking, blinking, or stealthing cripples their attack. As such, these utilities are extremely useful against thieves:
-Decoy
-Blink
-Veil
The second aspect of a thief fight is the stealth. During this time the thief is
a) running away. Not much you can do about this.
b) Recovering health; removing conditions
c) preparing for the next attack.
For (b), AoEs (depends on your build; e.g. Chaos Storm; Blurred Frenzy) still hurt the thief. If you know/guess where he is, attack around that area. Channeled skills also continue to channel into stealth. If the thief has finished his burst (usually takes ~10s), he will soon re-enter stealth. Use your channel attacks at this time (E.g. Confusing Images; iDuelist).
For ©, bring your health up. Use your healing skill. Pop buffs. After ~4s, his stealth will end soon. Channel a block skill (Scepter #2).
Again, hope this helps some. Let me know if you have any questions about anything.

Build in this video is 20/20/30.

Dodge near clones so that the backstab lands on them, revealing the thief.

It´s always though at the beginning, but to be honest, aside p/d conditions thief’s ( i hate them), they are one of the best classes to fight with for mesmers.

That does depend on the builds. I dont think a shatter mesmer can ever beat a s/d thief who knows what he is doing.

Many good tipps here. As this is a common question I get in mails or in my guide I made a " how to" guide a while ago. notice boon timing contra immunitys. Also how to aim your dodge to get a thief revieled an mess with hes positioning.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1afZXOD8fE

/Osicat

Ps, you can also spec Condition cat 2.0 and just make him dead. The spec dissable thiefs

No offense but the thieves you guys are showing me videos of are horrible. No thief should try to run at you and follow that by a cloak and dagger or heartseeker. They shadow step to you…that is how I know right away those thieves are horrible. Please show me some videos of good thieves in them. The things you guys are suggesting I appreciate but I have done them or tried to do them and they do not work. You say they are all about burst damage but I dodge there cloak and dagger and heart seeker they have 3 initiative left then get enough to do another cloak and dagger in 2 sec or they just heal then backstab followed by heartseeker quick and cloak and dagger then repeat. No thief attacks when u dodge, they throw dagger then cloak and dagger ( 5-8k there) then I evade heartseeker, evade death blossom, then they cloak and dagger followed by backstab and get 3 initiative and follow in with heartseeker or heal then backstab. which equalls 5-8k plus 5-8k plus 4k plus 5-8k = dead.. my hp is about 16k

Ok I see your problem from your comment about how we have 3 initiative left. We have a trait that virtually all of us thieves use called Infusion of Shadow. This nifty trait gives us two initiative whenever we go into stealth, so cloak and dagger really costs only 4 initiative if it lands, some thieves even use a trait when they get initiative faster while in stealth but regardless I may be able to help you out, though disclaimer, just as you need help with them, alot of players need help with mesmers, including thieves so like me, if any are experienced, it’s more a matter of dealing damage and mitigating damage rather than using clones to “confuse” (literally confuse not the condition) your target)

Decoy may help you, you’d want skills that stealth you and blink you away to alter your positioning. Remember that word, the major key for some classes for beating others is positioning. You aren’t using stealth to outlast the thief so get that out of your head. This isn’t even bragging, you simply can’t outmatch the stealth burst a thief has, you’ll be using it to get yourself out of his sights and re-positioning. If he goes into stealth, try blinking a ways away to confuse him a kitten

aos storm in the refuge is ok, but not the best solution. This is because all it will do a peck him with some damage and give him conditions, which he can easily shed while in stealth, and illusory wave or into the void however will give him a bad time. Pistol off hand kitten es them off too due to the blinds and dazes, blinds and dazes ruin thieves, CC in general. Moa Morph won’t help you much, idk why people think it’s such a godsend. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying it is useless, but when you moa someone they will run and evade and wait it off, however I’ve seen mass invis used in a way so that the mesmer and clones and such get cloaked and then open up from stealth on an unexpected thief, that was pretty cool<—that however is not an instant kill but works really well to get damage in.

Double edged sword here really, if it is an inexperienced thief, expect them to attack your clones while you laugh, an experienced thief though will actually use you own clones and phantoms against you by stealthing off of them, and they will keep doing it until they see an opening. It’s funny because for us, fighting mesmers requires patience since you guys are so fatal in 1v1 combat. So if you see him stealth but he doesn’t attack you right away, don’t worry he will, he is just waiting for the right time and position, he’s not dumb and CnD’ing the clone, he knows exactly where you are. Then what do you do? Stealth and re-position to throw him off, he is going to be in your “clone field” working his way toward you so blinks and stealths help tons.

To avoid backstab damage, stand in your clone, that helps, not a lot of us know how to counter that actually (took me weeks to figure out how :p) so you’ll reveal him. And if you focus on confusion, that helps a lot for the spammy guys for obvious reasons

Mesmer is by far one of the strongest pvp classes, if you are playing mesmer you really shouldn’t be losing 1v1s in WvW or Spvp to any class (except maybe healing sig/banner/condi warriors). Generally for thieves I’ll go invisible right after they get into steal range or (if using d/p) wait until they drop their blackpowder and then pop my invisibility. Your phantasms should easily melt the thief once you avoid the initial burst, retaliation and confusion also melt thieves – use this to your advantage if you get pressured. The block on the scepter is another tool which can directly counter backstab builds and seriously hurt the thief. Mesmers also have access to the second most amount of stealth in the game on top of all the clones which they can produce which makes it very difficult for a thief to pin down a well played mesmer. I have a thief and a mesmer both played extensively in wvw and pvp and mesmer is by far the stronger class in every aspect except for mobility.

Bacon.4918:

Mesmer is by far one of the strongest pvp classes, if you are playing mesmer you really shouldn’t be losing 1v1s in WvW or Spvp to any class (except maybe healing sig/banner/condi warriors). Generally for thieves I’ll go invisible right after they get into steal range or (if using d/p) wait until they drop their blackpowder and then pop my invisibility. Your phantasms should easily melt the thief once you avoid the initial burst, retaliation and confusion also melt thieves – use this to your advantage if you get pressured. The block on the scepter is another tool which can directly counter backstab builds and seriously hurt the thief. Mesmers also have access to the second most amount of stealth in the game on top of all the clones which they can produce which makes it very difficult for a thief to pin down a well played mesmer. I have a thief and a mesmer both played extensively in wvw and pvp and mesmer is by far the stronger class in every aspect except for mobility.

When people say “You shouldn’t be losing to any class 1v1” I just don’t get that. You cannot win every battle. You can win a lot, even most, but not every. Let’s not forget the devil’s advocate rule here, you can learn how to beat a class with a counter, but then that class will come up with a counter for yours, it’s a never ending cycle. that being said, yes, mesmers are the best dueling class but that doesn’t mean “there is no reason you should lose any 1v1”

Yes sure, everyone can lose; however, if you are playing the best 1v1 class in the game and are losing consistently it’s a L2P issue. Many great tips have been left for the OP but they don’t seem to want to accept they haven’t been doing these things or have been doing them wrong and instead would rather keep griping about the damage they are taking. I’ll rephrase; if you are a skilled mesmer there are very few classes/specs that should be giving you trouble 1v1. Thus, I encourage you (OP) to reread what has been posted.

When thief goes into stealth, wait 2.5 sec then try to dodge. If you are already in combat, you will create a clone on dodge if you have the trait. Also as suggested, stand in your clone and do the dodge as well.

Please show me some videos…of good thieves in them and you doing these things you are talking about…
Also if the mesmer was soo good at pvp why does no one and I mean no one play them in pvp. I was on yesterday for almost 8 hours and saw a total of 2 mesmers in EB….. stop trolling and post in another post I would rather find real solutions to the problem so i can play my mesmer happily, every other class is not nearly as fun in pve and I just don’t care for other classes play styles. Bring the mesmer some love.

Also I would also note there are several videos out with thieves who are doing 1 v 6 and they say in the video i will take down the mesmer first cause they are so squishy…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRcTKt47ixk at 14:44

Thing is Jayster, if you realy want a thief proof build, a build who fit current pvp meta in terms of survival and dmg then you look at PU 20-20-30 builds. You specificly asked around the fact you was in a 20-20-0-0-30 shatter build. Problem is that in the contest pvp meta we see atm the pu mesmers are rather weak as point cappers. We both kill close to anything we run into and survive in 1vs x as pu.Still fact is pu 20-20-30 is a bad class for cap and keep points as the builds core is stealth.

The question for good theifs is harder in vids, alot due to as soon somone lose a duel vs a PU mesmer he is seen as a bad player. The build simply make players look bad.

I can for sure thay this. I play 20-20-30 both in duels, wvwvw and spvp, Im aroun 95-98% win rate vs thiefs in the spec in both wvwvw duels and unexpected fights. I duel alot.

Many duel servers banned PU builds even as they seen to effective.

I add 2 vids from the spec.

After first fight you see how it work vs a bs thief in a duel. The named thief destroyed alot of ppl in fights before. Tbh when defenses are up and a duelist its not realy anything he can do. I can outsurvive, outmobile and out dmg him

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7wd_cJkxY

Second fight is not specifly a Thief vid. Instead its coop wih a thief but as you asked for good mesmer kill rate compared to thiefs here you go.

http://m.youtube.com/?reload=7&rdm=up56e1v2#/watch?v=VpqP_AHb7p8

/Osicat

I can’t stress this enough but blink @ 1200 range is your best friend then stealth or stealth then blink at that point you have the time to heal then burst down the theif .. Thief is just as squishy as you if not more so don’t be afraid to attack if your on the run The whole time then you die

Jayster dont get discouraged. I’m a thief so if a fought a group of people that consisted of say a mesmer, a guardian, and a necromancer, I’m going after the mesmer first, why? You attack any structure akittens weakest point. Weak does not mean worst class or worst player but weak as in durability in this case. mesmers weren’t meant to be buffy or else why would you need clones? If that group had a thief added in, I would take him out first then since he’s even squishier and actually a really big threat since he can burst me down as fast as I can burst him down.

Osicat.4139:

Thing is Jayster, if you realy want a thief proof build, a build who fit current pvp meta in terms of survival and dmg then you look at PU 20-20-30 builds. You specificly asked around the fact you was in a 20-20-0-0-30 shatter build. Problem is that in the contest pvp meta we see atm the pu mesmers are rather weak as point cappers. We both kill close to anything we run into and survive in 1vs x as pu.Still fact is pu 20-20-30 is a bad class for cap and keep points as the builds core is stealth.

The question for good theifs is harder in vids, alot due to as soon somone lose a duel vs a PU mesmer he is seen as a bad player. The build simply make players look bad.

I can for sure thay this. I play 20-20-30 both in duels, wvwvw and spvp, Im aroun 95-98% win rate vs thiefs in the spec in both wvwvw duels and unexpected fights. I duel alot.

Many duel servers banned PU builds even as they seen to effective.

I add 2 vids from the spec.

After first fight you see how it work vs a bs thief in a duel. The named thief destroyed alot of ppl in fights before. Tbh when defenses are up and a duelist its not realy anything he can do. I can outsurvive, outmobile and out dmg him

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aL7wd_cJkxY

Second fight is not specifly a Thief vid. Instead its coop wih a thief but as you asked for good mesmer kill rate compared to thiefs here you go.

http://m.youtube.com/?reload=7&rdm=up56e1v2#/watch?v=VpqP_AHb7p8

/Osicat

Osicat if you are a 20-20-30 build how are you leaving a clone behind when u dodge? that is a duel trait….?

fakeblood.2576:

I can’t stress this enough but blink @ 1200 range is your best friend then stealth or stealth then blink at that point you have the time to heal then burst down the theif .. Thief is just as squishy as you if not more so don’t be afraid to attack if your on the run The whole time then you die

Thing about running is it doesn’t kill anyone and second if i am healing so can they…

Jayster.4697:

Osicat if you are a 20-20-30 build how are you leaving a clone behind when u dodge? that is a duel trait….?

20-20-30…. domination – dueling – chaos. You get clone from dodge in that

I wonder if its possible to defeat condition thief with p/d …. ofc without condition build , lets say with balanced or burst build. Its so annoying when they appear for 2-3 seconds and put tons of conditions on you and then goes back in stealth and just waiting. I started to hate gw2 because of condition builds …. with every day theres more condition builds its doesnt matter if we talking about pvp or wvw … its the same.

Newgod.6207:

I wonder if its possible to defeat condition thief with p/d …. ofc without condition build , lets say with balanced or burst build. Its so annoying when they appear for 2-3 seconds and put tons of conditions on you and then goes back in stealth and just waiting. I started to hate gw2 because of condition builds …. with every day theres more condition builds its doesnt matter if we talking about pvp or wvw … its the same.

If you want power build use PU power. Summon 3 phantasms, sit at invises and use correctly skills… but it will be not easy in any case

well theres still problem with condition removals. Im using mantra of resolve … which can remove 4 conditions per 20 seconds… but thats not enough if they put 7 conditions on you in 1 second.

Osicat.4139:

Many good tipps here. As this is a common question I get in mails or in my guide I made a " how to" guide a while ago. notice boon timing contra immunitys. Also how to aim your dodge to get a thief revieled an mess with hes positioning.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1afZXOD8fE

/Osicat

Ps, you can also spec Condition cat 2.0 and just make him dead. The spec dissable thiefs

at third minute, best portal ever.

Most have already said what you can do against the thief (keep moving, dodge, stealth), keeping phantasms up helps massively when fighting a thief ‘cause they all attack when the thief comes out of stealth (as I’ve observed… do correct me if I’m wrong, this also doesn’t really happen if they have company, phantasms would target the visible one then) and that deals tons of damage.

But what you can also do is save your blurred frenzy/chaos storm for defense. When you see them come, drop the chaos storm on your feet (do a phase retreat too if you want. Hey, it’s free chaos armor!); it’s either he still comes to you and gets damage and condi or he stays away from you until it’s gone, you still get boons, all still cool. When they go in stealth, try to predict when he’ll attack you so you can use blurred frenzy. That way he blows his combo on your evades and you damage him. Cool. You can also probably do a shatter combo and that should at least get him low. If you have these on cooldown, you still have your riposte and the other utilities you have.

Just keep playing defensively against them until you catch them off guard/wear them out and eventually they die when they make a mistake or run away. Don’t go landing your chaos storms on where you think they’ve gone (unless it’s shadow refuge). As much as possible, keep it on your feet and it should buy you time on dealing with them.