Guild Wars 2

Noob question, but I’m wondering what Mesmer survivability is supposed to be like in regular questing/PVE. I’m leveling one right now, but she doesn’t seem to have any great kiting or life regen or mitigation like blinds. Staff is okay, but nothing great. Is there any way to feel immortal with a Mesmer while leveling, or do they remain relatively fragile compared to other classes?

You can try to position yourself such that your clones will body block attacks for you, this works especially well at lower levels since they tend to be quite tough compared to mob attacks at that level. Just beware of cleaving or aoes.

Well, trash and low levels aren’t really the problem. I’m more worried about groups of vets, accidental over-pulls, tricky skill points, that kind of thing.

I’m also leveling a mesmer. level 19 right now. And all I Can say is never stop strafing if you’re using a ranged weapon like GS or Staff. Also try using mantras which have relatively short cooldowns. untraited. F3 and f4 Shatter skills are great survival tools if you get stunned or knocked down by a mob.

Mesmers have lots of teleports, invisibilities, crowd control and other defensive skills. For example, the typical GS / Sword + Offhand:

GS:

1. makes a clone
2. cripples
3. knocks back

Sword:

1. is one of the best defensive moves in the game
2. is cripples and immobilizes

Offhands:
Sword blocks and dazes
Pistol stuns, dazes and blinds
Torch blinds and turns you invisible
Focus cripples, pulls and gives Swiftness

You’d have 6 defensive skills just from weapon skills, in addition to the two defensive class abilities. So, I really don’t know how your mesmer “doesn’t seem to have any great kiting or life regen or mitigation like blinds”.

I just thought “WTF!? why would Chaos Archangel ask such a qeustion … oh … it’s not him :o” – - – :P

To be honest, at low levels the mesmer is weak compared to other classes. Mesmer power comes from it’s traits, wich require lv40 at least. Up to then, just overestimate yourself.

Surviablity skills are main hand sword 2, staff 2, offhand sword 4, scepter 2, pistol 5, even chaosstorm is kinda defensive. Aswell F3 and F4 as already mentioned. Keep in mind that you also got skills that reflect projectiles or teleport you to a safe place aswell invisibility.

Are you new to the class or new to the game btw? Aswell Meph

I’m not new to the game, just the class. That’s why I’m wondering what the “trick” is to basic survivability. All classes have some little trick or weapon combo that’s better than all the others.

Thanks for the replies, btw. When I said ‘no great kiting’ I meant the damage on staff and scepter isn’t so great and any adds in the area can be a pain. It’s not like the warrior or elementalist or thief who can kite all day while healing per second with signets and blasting AOEs.

So it looks like Mesmer’s main leveling survivabilty is in clones and counters and evasion? Guess I’ll have to get used to timing stuff, lol. I just wish it had some kind of health replenishing. Playing as a warrior spoils you…

timing positioning, i never do pve except make my lvl 80 i did it with full berserk h.shatter.. and dont remember any challenging time.. except there was a areana boss fight anyway i passed with berserk after minimum try.. why i am saying this timing positioning.. cuz they are npc non player chrachters so they do regular things.. for me accomplish the mission fastest.. so go squishy

Mesmers take a while to kill things but they’re probably one of the most survivable classes in the game.

As mesmer there are a few survivablity traits like “phantasms grant nearby allies permanently regeneration (refreshes after expired)” or “vigor on crit” wich are probably the best ones. Also in dominion there is a trait that causes aoe cribble when clones die. Awesome trait for players using all weapons (since mesmer really can make use of this where other classes just got often the weapon X is better than weapon Y situation).

Against overpulls in open world, act for example like using the focus 4 to pull them all together against a wall or something, 3 sword for clone charge, while it is on it’s way summon the warden (5) activate 3 again, dmg the mobs with cleave 1 and 2 while they are all rooted and you are invournable. After this you can try to stay melee or backoff switch to gs and do 2341112 switch. Just an example, every situation is different

Xyonon.3987:

As mesmer there are a few survivablity traits like “phantasms grant nearby allies permanently regeneration (refreshes after expired)” or “vigor on crit” wich are probably the best ones. Also in dominion there is a trait that causes aoe cribble when clones die. Awesome trait for players using all weapons (since mesmer really can make use of this where other classes just got often the weapon X is better than weapon Y situation).

Against overpulls in open world, act for example like using the focus 4 to pull them all together against a wall or something, 3 sword for clone charge, while it is on it’s way summon the warden (5) activate 3 again, dmg the mobs with cleave 1 and 2 while they are all rooted and you are invournable. After this you can try to stay melee or backoff switch to gs and do 2341112 switch. Just an example, every situation is different

Ah, thank you, that’s the stuff I was looking for. I like the sound of those traits.

This Link to the Mesmer Handbook may help. There’s a levelling section (and link to) from lazy kai’s guide.

Mesmer’s get better/easier to level past 40ish.

AgentofChaos.1539:

When I said ‘no great kiting’ I meant the damage on staff and scepter…

…and that’s your problem. Both staff and scepter are defensive weapons and scepter is awful outside of some specific builds where it’s sort okittend of viable. Try replacing scepter with anything else and see how that goes.

That being said, Mesmer’s defenses are so good I usually don’t need to kite and can just bash things in their faces.

My mesmer is level 22. PvE discussion here. Practice switching between your weapons during combat. I think this is very important and it improved my defense AND offense greatly.

I like Phantasmal Defender utility. If the wiki can be believed, it soaks up damage that would otherwise hit me or my party members. Its low damage but it will tank damage for awhile.

Using multiple Phantasms seem to be an important component to damage dealing at this level (if not all levels?) . By swapping weapons in combat you can have 2 offensive phantasms up. In theory you could have up to 5 (or 6 an elite?) phantasm at once? I regularly have three up at once. To be clear: you can have all of your Clones AND several Phantasms up at once.

Stealth skills. I have at 3 of them available to me now, but I’ve only been using one of them so far (could use all 3 at once). Going into stealth will make the monster attack one of my illusions for a few seconds. This is useful if I need a few seconds more for Ether Feast (healing) to refresh.

I start with Scepter + Pistol for attacks while at range. The pistol phantasm seems very strong offensively. I get 2 Phantasms up right away. They tank for me while I let scepter attack 3 times to get my first Clone up, or do Scepter #3 for the good damage and Confusion (even more damage)

If pressed by 1 or 2 attackers not on my Phantams, then I can use Scepter #2 BLOCK to generate a Clone. If I am standing near 3 enemies at this point, I weapon swap to 1H sword and do #2. This will evade attacks and deal damage to 3 targets. Note that the #1 attack also “cleaves” into 3 nearby targets as well.

Because I am swapping weapons in combat I put a Minor Sigil of Doom on a weapon so my next attack causes Poison. Its free damage.

I like to Mind Wrack to cause AoE damage as my phantasms and clones shatter. If my survivability seems to be working I can afford to shatter my Phantasmal Defender & Pistol Defender and Clones and them put up the Phantasmal Swordsman from 1H sword. I can then generate 2 more Clones with Sword’s two abilities that generate clones (one also does a BLOCK) plus possibly a third (and 4th) clone depending on which Stun Break utility I have ready.

If I need more survivability then I will not shatter my illusions as often = I want all 3 phantasms up at once.

Winsom.2389:

I like Phantasmal Defender utility. If the wiki can be believed, it soaks up damage that would otherwise hit me or my party members. Its low damage but it will tank damage for awhile.

Phantasmal defender is very underrated and can be quite powerful. At 80 is has 20K HP and soak up 50% of damage taken (for an entire group of 5). If you are alone, that’s like having 30K HP on a berserker build. I highly recommend it in PvE. I usually have blink/defender/null field and its pretty decent in any combat situation. Veterans die without you taking much, if any, damage. Champions can be soloed. Groups of maybe up to 7-10 is manageable.

Though I must admit, I did die when 30 Risen spawned around me in cursed shore. kitten upscales and still no one else at that particular event O.o

Mesmers have tons of survivability. Blurred frenzy to burst even when being pressured by mobs, scepter and off-hand sword block to shrug off a hit and basically hit them back with a whole phantasm worth of damage, phase retreat, temporal curtain, reflect spam, phantasmal defender and there’s even that utility skill that absorbs a projectile and then blocks every other hit in its duration.

You’ll be able to solo champions because you can run around in circles and let your phantasms just carry your DPS (if the boss is quite melee unfriendly – to offer you examples, sanderinoa from rT solo’d Mossman at fractal 48 and the first archdiviner at fractal 80).

It gets easier after level 40 – once you unlock Deceptive Evasion (Dueling master trait – clone-on-dodge) your clone production goes through the roof; if you pair that with Crippling Dissipation (AoE cripple on clone death) you can perma-kite as many mobs as you want. Pair that with some reflection (Focus, Feedback, or both) and you’re almost unhittable in open-world stuff.

Wow, thanks so much for the responses. I gotta say, this subforum is incredibly helpful. Other subforums (coughwarriorcough) can be a little stuck up.

Winsom.2389:

By swapping weapons in combat you can have 2 offensive phantasms up. In theory you could have up to 5 (or 6 an elite?) phantasm at once? I regularly have three up at once. To be clear: you can have all of your Clones AND several Phantasms up at once.

I can then generate 2 more Clones with Sword’s two abilities that generate clones (one also does a BLOCK) plus possibly a third (and 4th) clone depending on which Stun Break utility I have ready.

I just returned to the game a couple weeks back and just got my mesmer to 80 and currently gearing him. I’m pretty sure you can only have a maximum of 3 clones/phantasms combined. No more than 3. If you summon more than 3, one of them will go poof.

Tip: When you summon a fourth clone, the first clone that you summoned will pop itself and it will trigger the ‘clone on death’ traits such as cripple, or applying a condition when traited for it.

Winsom.2389:

Using multiple Phantasms seem to be an important component to damage dealing at this level (if not all levels?) . By swapping weapons in combat you can have 2 offensive phantasms up. In theory you could have up to 5 (or 6 an elite?) phantasm at once? I regularly have three up at once. To be clear: you can have all of your Clones AND several Phantasms up at once.

Wait what?

By “up” do you mean ready to be casted or already summoned?

You can only have up to 3 illusions (clones or phantasms) summoned at any one time, in theory and out. Summoning more would instantly kill existing illusions, prioritizing clones before phantasms, and going through phantasms in the chronological order that they were summoned in.

There isn’t an elite phantasm (our 3 elites are Moa, Time Warp and Mass Invisibility).

Mesmer Has EXCELLENT survivability, but it isn’t in the form of standing there tanking damage as such. Its about utilizing the mesmer’s mobility, interrupts, , invis, blink, Blurred frenzy, you can kite and almost never get hit with a mesmer