Guild Wars 2

I’ve always enjoyed the theme of sword-sword mesmer but it’s always been somewhat out-shadowed by other options in PvP, now with the advent of shield there seems to be very little reason to pick it in PvP as the sword block is “twitchy” and significantly weaker as a defensive tool. Currently the 4th skill, Illusionary Riposte, blocks one incoming attack. Upon a successful block it teleports you a very short distance (this is the twitchy part), creates a clone, and delivers a counter-blow up to 900 range away.

My suggestion is that instead of blinking you where you already are, it blinks you to the attacker instead. It makes the sword a true offensive option even in PvP, giving you access to a long-distance gapcloser and adds some identity to the weapon over the other off-hands. Other than the blink I don’t think it needs much changes, maybe speed up the actions after the block, it seems to have almost a full second of delay before the riposte effects happen. I don’t mind the damage being delayed but the clone and blink could happen nigh-instantly.

The activation skill, Counter Blade, could use a little love as well. It has far too long of a cast for what it does as it is. It could use a little extra treat if it actually interrupts something, for example a damage proc, reduced cooldown on sword skills or something extra like that to give some depth to the weapon and reward skilled sword users.

You are correct that offhand sword needs love, But I personally would consider this a nerf more than a buff.

Although an extra gap closer would be pretty neat, I don’t think warping towards your opponent into their combo is the best option. Plus you can’t really doge out of it if they choose to keep the delay, and with A-net who knows… They wouldn’t be able to attach that context lol. Even without the delay however, unless there is a corresponding interrupt attached (which is what I have been vocal about so a bit of a bias opinion from me) you will be forced to blow another cooldown just to save that damage, presuming you are marauder or zerker and can’t take to many hits.

A warp behind your target might have some merit, but I just feel an obvious tell your opponent can trigger, that puts you in a specific spot is not the best way to go imo.

It might be a bit OP, but something I have considered apart from an interrupt daze is warping you a considerable distance (or spawning your clone a considerable distance) away but still within cutting range, and forcing a 1/2 -1/4 sec taunt into that clone but still keeping the delay.

As for counter blade I do like that idea, it might be a bit OP with what I suggested above, but reducing the cooldowns would make landing it a lot more rewarding, especially if they keep the current velocity… But the cast time is a bit too long yeah, should be like 1/3 – 1/4 sec cast. 3/4 is close enough to a second for a rather meh outcome.

(Edited for worse grammar than usual :p)

I argue to remove counter blade entirely.

Make it so that sword 5 does a leaping attack as well as spawning the phantasm.
And make it so that sword 4 is a phase retreat.

Gives opportunity for a little poke and run, or run and poke. Whichever one you prefer.

Personally, I just poke.

Another idea would be to make sword 4 do, lets say 3 blocks. And if the blocks aren’t broken, you have the option for a few seconds afterwards to do a leap attack.
But that seems mechanically clunky.

I much prefer my previous suggestion.

I really like the gap closer suggestion – all the offhands other than shield are long range, and especially for sword that seems unnecessary (in fact I’d go further and reduces the phantasm cast range to 600 while boosting its damage)

Also with the riposte effectively being a melee skill it could hit 3 targets, dunno. I’m suggesting a little more because I agree with daishi about this not exactly boosting its power to competitive levels.

Daishi.6027:

A warp behind your target might have some merit, but I just feel an obvious tell your opponent can trigger, that puts you in a specific spot is not the best way to go imo.

That’s the thing though, I don’t think it really has a tell and if it does that’s entirely a good thing. The blockframes are instant as far as I know, so the idea is you use this skill on reaction rather than on prediction. If youre being predictable with it you deserve to get thrown into their combo, thats counterplay for you. The counter blade should help to make it a bit less predictable too.

In my mind the ideal situation is: you see an enemy trying to poke at you with ranged attacks (ie. necro scepter) and you catch an attack for a free ticket in. If blinking behind is impossible to implement they could just give it a brief evasion-frame during the counterattack. That’s probably better for consistency too come to think of it. The delay is there just to give the opponent a slight chance to react to the damage, not to make you vulnerable.

As for the other suggestions I do agree there’s more that could be done with the sword. The 5th skill is about as boring as they come but I can’t come up with any ideas off the top of my head though that wouldn’t negatively affect the PvE DPS phantasm casting. As for the viability, well, all of the viable PvP offhands for mesmer are picked for survivability, to boost the weapon to viable status without making it too blocky or stealthy it should probably have some half-defensive mechanic like the block-blink I suggested on 5 as well. Maybe with evades? Who knows, it’s great to have some constructive discussion here on the forums though.

While you’re right offhands are currently chosen for defense, I think that’s a symptom – they suck at other roles.

Focus support/ control just isn’t good enough when Chrono runs fast already.
Pistol shoots too slowly to work well with chronophantasma, and is single target, body-blockable
Sword, everything discussed here… But also the high sustained dps is irrelevant in PvP where your phantasam dies too fast and is still just single target.

None of those phantasams compare favorably to iBerserker in PvP, so why would people use them?

Uuni.3561:

Daishi.6027:

A warp behind your target might have some merit, but I just feel an obvious tell your opponent can trigger, that puts you in a specific spot is not the best way to go imo.

That’s the thing though, I don’t think it really has a tell and if it does that’s entirely a good thing. The blockframes are instant as far as I know, so the idea is you use this skill on reaction rather than on prediction. If youre being predictable with it you deserve to get thrown into their combo, thats counterplay for you. The counter blade should help to make it a bit less predictable too.

In my mind the ideal situation is: you see an enemy trying to poke at you with ranged attacks (ie. necro scepter) and you catch an attack for a free ticket in. If blinking behind is impossible to implement they could just give it a brief evasion-frame during the counterattack. That’s probably better for consistency too come to think of it. The delay is there just to give the opponent a slight chance to react to the damage, not to make you vulnerable.

The obvious part was the putting up the sword being a “hit me and I’ll come close!” sign.

In principle you are right and it should be used reactionary, but there are many situations in the game that do need to be anticipated to counter that don’t have a obvious tell, or need to be utilized in motion. For example thief matchup, and this is which I take the bigger issue to, this gives them some level of control over your positioning.

Also with this change you could no longer use it as a safe poke if you have higher ground, which I think is pretty neat in it’s own right. Along with the defensive cover while getting distance.

As per your example however, as an attempt to pressure a necro I think it would be often stronger to have the hit put you out of their range, since the ebb and flow of offense and defense is often dependant on their shroud. (which is actually why I like “OneWhoSighs” phase retreat on 4, and tbh I feel like this is what they originally intended as per the original description referencing the mild port)

The other merit of the skill being “obvious” is that you can proc it to force others not to attack you to cover a cooldown since it does hit pretty hard, which although is arguably inferior usage after the alacrity nerf I believe is important consideration on chrono if you forgo the illusion line. But you lose a lot of the weight attached to this concept if it also means they get to control your positioning.

I don’t think it’s a terrible idea mind you, it also opens up burst options and can be used for misdirection plays, but I’m not as fond of it alone. Adding an evasion does make this sound a lot more appealing to me, but I can already hear the cries of “OP MESMER EVADE SPAM” now.

Uuni.3561:

As for the other suggestions I do agree there’s more that could be done with the sword. The 5th skill is about as boring as they come but I can’t come up with any ideas off the top of my head though that wouldn’t negatively affect the PvE DPS phantasm casting. As for the viability, well, all of the viable PvP offhands for mesmer are picked for survivability, to boost the weapon to viable status without making it too blocky or stealthy it should probably have some half-defensive mechanic like the block-blink I suggested on 5 as well. Maybe with evades? Who knows, it’s great to have some constructive discussion here on the forums though.

And yes it’s good people are talking about it, unfortunately it’s not the first time and it’s been years with little love. It’s a shame since one of the reasons I play mesmer was due to being able to dual whiled swords.

Just a thought on the viability since you brought up the stealth, what if perhaps it cloaked you for 2-4 seconds (high number maybe since you have to actively doge to cancel not actually sure if you can cancel it other ways since I’ve never tried or wanted to. ) between the hit at least then it would mean for a split second you couldn’t be targeted. This is an objectively weaker option than anyone has discussed, due to pre targeted and channeled skills still landing but it also keeps the (what I at least presume is the intended) delay, and rewards canceling the hit if you bail early, or keep preasure if you whiff after as long delay which is thematic in some ways to dual swords.