Guild Wars 2

Mesmer Trait Changes

I’ve been looking at the mesmer traits and realized we have some very weird traits. Although Anet rarely ever looks at these, I decided to pitch some ideas. This thread is inspired by Kybragas’ mesmer changes thread. Make sure to check that one out too. Let’s start.

Domination

Major Adept The Pledge
Torch skills remove conditions. Torch skills recharge faster while in stealth.

This trait replaces Rending Shatter. The Pledge seemed a bit weird on illusions and its also weird on Domination. But since it synergizes with PU, Domination offers more damage options than Illusions.

Major Master Furious Interruption change-
Gain quickness and fury when you interrupt a target.

Just quickness made this trait very underwhelming. With quickness and fury, mesmers could deal more damage and actually make more use of quickness.

Major Master Controller’s Dance
For every illusion you control, gain pulsing stacks of might (two every 4 seconds)

This trait replaces Shattered Concentration. This traitline is the damage oriented one. Unfortunately our class mechanic forces us to give up dps for burst. This allows the mesmer to keep the illusions up for more damage. This trait synergizes well with Imagined Burden. (Although that trait should get looked at.)

Major Grandmaster Mental Anguish change-
Shatter skills deal more damage. For each shattered illusion, gain a stacking damage bonus.
4% for each illusion
12 seconds total
Max 10 stacks

Now here’s where shattering may be a good idea. The original version of this trait was just pure burst, mainly for PvP but kinda useless for PvE. This trait can be a buff for PvP and PvE, encouraging you to shatter. This also forces you to choose between keeping your illusions or shattering them without too much dps loss.

Dueling

Minor Adept Critical Infusion
Gain vigor after dodging. (ICD 5 seconds)

The original version of this trait was weird. What does Vigor have anything to do with critical hits? At least with this change, vigor gets some use.

Major Adept Restorative Mantras
Heal allies around you whenever you finish preparing a mantra.

This trait was brought from Inspiration to Dueling. Dueling is the dedicated Mantra traitline so why not Restorative Mantras? This takes the heat off of Inspiration as the only survival line.

Minor Master Sharper Images
You and your Illusions have a chance to inflict bleeding on critical hits. Gain fury when you attack a foe below the health threshold.

This trait was changed. Master Fencer is a strange trait that doesn’t do much. There’s a warrior trait in Arms that does the same thing and more. So this boosts condi builds as well as granting fury for power builds.

Minor Grandmaster Collective Confusion
Deal increased damage to those that are confused. Attacking a foe that does not have confusion on them will inflict it.
10% increase

This trait replaces Master Fencer. Remember that awesome Confusion trait we never got? We will never get it. We probably won’t get any of these changes either but I can dream no? Anyway, this is a boost to power builds and a small boost to condi builds. Confusion has very little use in PvE so maybe with this change, confusion can be worth using for the damage boost.

Ineptitude moved from Illusions to Dueling grandmaster. This is to give BD more synergy without having to take another traitline.

Major Grandmaster Harmonious Mantras change- Mantras can be activated three times before needing to be channeled again. Mantra cast time is reduced.

The damage stacking bonus from the original trait was too unreliable because of mantra cast times. You would almost always lose the stacking bonus if you weren’t spamming Mantra of Pain. This trait change removes the dmg bonus and just reduces cast times.

Chaos

Major Adept Descent into Madness change
Lose a condition when you gain regeneration (icd 5 seconds)

Now this trait is to help out the Chaos line to give out a bit more defense and condi clear away from the Inspiration traitline. This synergizes with the minor adept trait as well as Illusionary Inspiration in the Inspiration line.
Major Grandmaster Bountiful Armor
When you have chaos armor, gain stability. For every second you have chaos armor on, gain random boons. Chaos armor duration increased.

Bountiful Disillusionment was a strange trait in Chaos where a trait like Illusionary Defense exists. Reduced damage for every illusion you have but then you have to shatter them for an effect? Instead, this trait change would benefit chaos armor and give it more use in both PvP and PvE. This trait would also affect allies.

Major Grandmaster Chaotic Interruption change- When you interrupt a foe, you immobilize them and gain might. Trade any conditions on you for your foe’s boons. (Max 3)

Here is another attempt at changing Chaos a bit to serve more defense needs. This serves as sort of like another Arcane Thievery. This takes some of the weight off from Inspiration as the only condi clear line Mesmers have.

Inspiration
This trait line has the most changes.

Major Adept Persisting Images
Phantasms have increased health and attack more often.

This trait was combined with Phantasmal Haste. Retaliation is a strange boon to give a phantasm that dies relatively quickly. There’s almost no way to make retaliation useful for it. So remove that, and replace it with attack more often. The increased health will allow the phantasm to survive a bit longer to attack more.

Major Adept Inspired Phantasms
Phantasms heal allies when they attack.

This trait replaces Restorative Mantras. This offers a clear cut choice between three traits. Either more revive speed, dps, or healer. You can then build for any of these as you like. The healing amount should be moderate but I’m not very sure what the numbers should be.

Major Master Protected Phantasms
Phantasms gain blur when they attack. (All credit goes to Kybraga)
This one is a personal favorite from Kybraga’s mesmer change list. I decided not to change it and include it.

Major Master Persistence of Memory
Shattering a phantasm recharges all phantasms by a short amount.

This trait replaces Restorative Illusions. The obligatory shatter trait. Inspiration is the dedicated phantasm line so might as well include anything with phantasms.

Major Master Warden’s Feedback
Reflects deal extra damage. Crippling a foe also weakens them. Reduces recharge on focus weapon skills.

This trait is assuming Focus reflects is baseline (why aren’t they…?) Reflects deal extra damage may be op for PvP but I think the amount shouldn’t be too much. The second part synergizes well with focus, greatsword, sword, Imagined Burden and Master of Fragmentation.

Major Grandmaster Temporal Enchanter Change Glamour skills last longer. When you cast a glamour, allies near the glamour gain pulses of resistance and superspeed. Enemies are revealed and immobilized.

This trait opens up new build possibilities. Glamours are a strange set of skills with their own niche uses. This trait allows glamours some benefit for allies and a sort of trap for enemies. This trait could be deadly for thieves and scrappers as well as other mesmers.

Illusions

Major Adept Absorption
Clones periodically take conditions from you.

This trait replaces Persistence of Memory. Once again, this is an attempt to take some weight off of Inspiration. This trait only works for clones and not phantasms. To prevent it from being op, it should only be one condition and forces you to sacrifice your phantasms in a moment of need.

Major Adept Rending Shatter
Shatter skills also inflict vulnerability.

Rending shatter was brought to the dedicated Shatter line. This trait isn’t particularly good but it does something.

Major Master Shattered Concentration
Heal and lose conditions when you shatter. Shatter skills also remove a boon on hit.

This replaces Phantasmal Haste. Shattered concentration is now weak in the current boon meta in PvP. This trait is combined with Restorative Illusions to give it more use as well as take some condi clear away from Inspiration.

Major Grandmaster Deceptive Evasion
Create a clone when you dodge.
This trait is brought here from Dueling.

Major Grandmaster Malicious Sorcery
Increases attack speed and condition duration while wielding a scepter. Reduces recharge on scepter skills.

Hopefully, condition duration grants this trait a bit more usefulness than just attack speed. This may give Scepter more use.

Major Grandmaster Master of Fragmentation
Every time you shatter, gain stability. Your shatter skills are improved. (Mind Wrack gains a 10% critical chance and grants might to allies, Cry of Frustration gains cripple and grants vigor, Diversion is aoe and grants fury, Distortion reflects projectiles and grants regeneration, and Continuum Shift slows and grants resistance.)

This trait brings the most changes and for good reason. The original version of this trait is underwhelming but its the only trait worth taking atm. It is combined with BD to make it more attractive. Maybe too attractive?

Chronomancer

Major Grandmaster Lost Time
Gain a charge each time you block an attack. After enough charges, your next hit will slow and knockdown your foe. Shield skills recharge faster when you slow a foe.
4 charges for activation
1 ½ % recharge

Lost time was a bad trait that couldn’t compare with Chronophantasma or STM. Maybe with this trait, it becomes more attractive to slow enemies with the shield skill recharge.

Well that’s all I got. Any comments or recommendations are welcome! Don’t forget to check out Kybraga’s mesmer thread as well. Thanks. (Sorry about the long post but I have no idea how to do a spoiler thing :/)

As a mesmer main through and through i’d say most of these ideas make me smile, still it’s quite a wall of text so i need to read it again to get a clear picture but overall seems like it’s putting things is place and doesnt spread them around too much making the class much more powerfull.

Unfortunately with condition builds being so broken at the moment all this would create is more rage and toxicity.

Still +1 from me for the time put in this.

PS: Im only interested in power builds, condi is plain boring.

I do not think the mesmer serve other traits against condizioni.Tuttavia agree with your political move taken from one specialization to give a more pronounced way.
The stretch that cures by casting mantras is right that remains of inspiration for me.
Domination, Chaos and Dueling endorsements are adrift. There is a desperate need to fix them.
THE number of builds that were created for the mesmer at this time is small: no dps variable, a condition and a boon / support.
The mesmer suffers in the selection of skills and traits. Very little, too little variability.

So traits need to be considered for balance in 3 seperate ways. You need to look at the individual traits, the traits it shares a spot with, and then the traitline as a whole. I’ll start with individual traits.

Domination

The Pledge: This one is just moved, no comment.

Furious Interruption: Adding fury could make this more useful, but it would probably still be a little underwhelming. Definitely a step in the right direction though.

Controller’s Dance: This is interesting. With 3 illusions it would stack 6 might every 4 seconds, presumably allowing for a 0 boon duration full stack of about 12-15 might. Definitely a bonus for more sustained fights, but not too strong, I like it.

Mental Anguish: So I really like this trait, but I really don’t like replacing mental anguish with it. This trait encourages continual use of shatters to produce higher sustained damage while mental anguish is purely a raw burst trait. This trait should replace imagined burden instead, leaving mental anguish as it was. I also feel that the duration would be more balanced at 16 seconds, making it more feasible to maintain maximum stacks if you really focus on it.

Dueling

Critical Infusion: The vigor on crit mechanic is common to multiple traits across multiple classes. While you may not personally agree with it, it’s very obviously an Anet design decision. This shouldn’t be changed.

Restorative Mantras: Just a move, no comment.

Sharper Images: I can get behind this change. Giving the chance to both us and illusions gives the trait a bit more punch in more varied situations, and the fury synergizes well with it.

Collective Confusion: This is interesting. I don’t like the passive confusion application, there’s more than enough of that in this game already. The 10% damage boost on confused foes is consistent with other grandmaster traits on other classes though, and makes sense thematically for mesmer.

Ineptitude: Moved, no comments.

Harmonious Mantras: Yeah, this is probably a good change. I’m not sure how much more usable it would make mantras, but it would definitely be better than the current trait.

Chaos

Descent into Madness: This is basically the same as the elementalist trait cleansing water…which is a grandmaster major. Granted, this has an icd, but still. I think this would be more balanced with a tougher trigger, something like ‘Lose a condition when you have more than 4 boons on you, icd 5 seconds’. I’m also assuming this trait retains the fall damgae functionality.

Bountiful Armor: This is broken beyond belief. Chaos armor is incredibly easy to come by. A build not even focused on it can reliably pump out chaos armor once every 5-10 seconds, making this trait just incredibly overpowered. I think this would be balanced with simply the 2nd and 3rd effects, dumping the stab.

Chaotic Interruption: I really like this, this is a good change. Gives some nifty condition removal with a bit of punch all tied to a skillfull mechanic that is very mesmery.

Inspiration

Persisting Images: Yeah, this is probably worthwhile. Phantasms need a buff, and this turns a couple underwhelming traits into something more solid.

Inspired Phantasms: This is…honestly pretty meh. I can’t see a lot of builds wanting to use this. It basically ties in a support mechanic to a semi-uncontrollable trigger (phantasms attacking).

Protected Phantasms: Honestly I don’t think this would make much of a difference in many situations. The current protected phantasms provides distortion on summon, allowing the phantasm to get 1 attack off. After that, the phantasm will die. This trait wouldn’t fix that at all. The issue with phantasms isn’t them surviving their attacks, it’s them surviving everything else.

Persistence of Memory: Moved, no comment.

Warden’s Feedback: Adding weakness to cripple is interesting, not sure it belongs in the inspiration line though. I like the reflects deal extra damage mod, that’s more thematically appropriate.

Temporal Enchanter: This is a lot better. I think immobilizing enemies is a bit overbudget for this trait, but the rest is good.

Illusions

Adept Absorption: This is interesting, and I sorta like it. We’ll see how it stacks up with the rest of the traitline though.

Rending Shatter: Just moved, still meh, w/e.

Shattered Concentration: I’m not a fan of this change. This is some huge powercreep. Shattered concentration is a strong trait all by itself, there is no need to add in additional healing and condition removal. This trait would by itself make shatters insanely overbudget, along with essentially requiring illusions for any good shatter build. It’s way too strong, not at all appropriate.

Deceptive Evasion: Just moved, no comment.

Malicious Sorcery: Yeah, I think the small buff is appropriate to this trait.

Master of Fragmentation: I like the merging of these traits, it definitely makes master of fragmentation a trait to actually take for good reasons other than ‘the other 2 traits don’t fit my build’.

Chronomancer

Lost Time: Passive knockdowns? No, bad, terible. Passively procced CC should never ever exist. Leave it at the interesting shield cd modifier, no knockdown. Never passively apply cc.

Ok, so that’s the individual traits. Most of them are pretty solid changes. There’s a couple weak stinkers, and a couple unbelievably broken traits, but they’re generally solid. For this next bit I’ll be analysing the traits that share a spot. The stinkers I’ll leave the same, but the brokenly op ones I’ll be shaving down to a more reasonable level.

Domination

Adept Level
We’re looking at The Pledge, confounding suggestions, and empowered illusions. 1 phantasm trait, one lockdown trait, and one weapon utility trait. This a good balance, and each trait has a purpose in different environments.

Master Level
Furious interruption, Controller’s dance, and Blurred inscriptions. We’ve got 1 interrupt trait, one passive might generator, and one utility defense trait with signets. This is pretty reasonable. BI will be taken when people want that trait, just as it is now. Controller’s dance and FI will be a tossup in offensive builds, and probably will be interchangeable depending on how cc heavy you are. This is pretty balanced.

Grandmaster Level
Mental Anguish (unchanged), Power Block, The new damage buff on shatter trait. So replacing the garbage gs trait with the new idea we now have a nicely balanced grandmaster level. We have MA as the burst option, power block remains as the balanced lockdown/offensive option, and the new trait is the go-to option for PvE damage builds and probably more bruiser-style PvP/WvW builds that are built for sustained fights.

Dueling

So you’ve actually forgotten to remove an adept level trait here. Restorative mantras was added, nothing was removed. I’ll go ahead and analyze all 4 traits.

Adept Level
Restorative Mantras, Duelist’s Discipline, Desperate Decoy, Phantasmal Fury. What we’re looking at here is 1 supportive/defensive trait, 1 utility defensive trait, and 2 offensive traits, one primarily condition damage and the other potentially hybrid. This is pretty decent, no huge imbalances here. There’s also no obvious candidate for removal, so that needs to be addressed obviously.

Master Level
No changes.

Grandmaster Level
Ineptitude, Harmonious Mantras, Mistrust. We’ve got a bit of an odd overlap between ineptitude and mistrust. Both are traits oriented around applying confusion. This leaves dueling without a reasonable option for a power-based build to pick up. This puts it in a similar position to illusions or domination currently where there are really no good options for PvE builds. This isn’t a good thing, especially since the rest of the traitline has some solid offensive options. This definitely needs to be addressed.

Chaos

Adept Level
Descent into Madness, Illusionary Defense, Master of manipulation. Illusionary defense definitely ends up as the stinker in this trio, but outside of that this is still pretty fairly balanced. Master of Manips provides good general utility, ID is still okish defense, and DiM becomes a solid condition defense trait.

Master Level
No Changes

Grandmaster Level
Bountiful Armor (nerfed), Chaotic Interruption, Prismatic Understanding. These are ok, but not great. CI is good, and has its own niche. The issue is that PU and BA essentially overlap in both usage and effect. They’re both defensive traits that provide boons based on a trigger. This isn’t the worst thing in the world, but it makes this grandmaster selection a little boring. Basically it would end up as taking CI if you’re interrupts, BA if you’re not stealth, and PU if you’re stealth. Not a lot of real decisions there.

Inspiration

Adept Level
Persisting Images, Inspired Phantasms, Medic’s Feedback. This is a decent level. The choice between PI and MF is relevant and interesting depending on how you’re playing the build. Inspired phantasms is a stinker as I mentioned before, but that doesn’t ruin the balance of this level, so that’s fine.

Master Level
Protected Phantasms, Persistence of Memory, Warden’s Feedback. While protected phantasms is still a stinker, I think this is still a solid level. You have the option between lower cooldowns on phantasms or boosting a particular phantasms along with your reflects. Relevant choices, and none are sticking out as overpowered.

Grandmaster Level
Temporal Enchanter, Illusionary Inspiration, Mental Defense. 3 unique traits for 3 different purposes of builds. This is a good and balanced level. None of the three are so strong that they eclipse the others, each trait has a different use and effect, and they’re all usable in their own ways.

Illusions

Adept Level
Absorption, Rending Shatter, Compounding Power. This is a solid traitline. Rending shatter is still a worthless stinker, but the choice between absorption and compounding power is interesting. You can either take an offensive trait or a solid defensive trait, but both rely on illusions to function.

Master Level
Shattered Concentration (without restorative illusions effect), Maim, Shattered strength. Shattered strength ends up being the stinker here. This is a bit of a more boring level, since you can’t replace maim with anything else in a condie build, so you’ll end up taking maim if condie, and shattered concentration otherwise. Other than that, it’s reasonable balanced as long kittentered concentration is as it currently is.

Grandmaster Level
Deceptive Evasion, Malicious Sorcery, Master of Fragmentation. This is a very solid level actually. DE is for high output shattering, MS gets you the hard condition damage boosts for scepter, and MoF actually provides relevant boosts to shatter utility. None of them are particularly overpowered, and they actually are all relevant choices in most build types.

Chronomancer
Lost time, StM, Chronophantasma. With the boost to lost time in terms of shield recharge, this potentially becomes valuable depending on how well your build pumps out slow, and how much recharge you can get onto the shield with it. It might still be slightly underpowered compared to StM or Chronophantasma, but it definitely would be a more relevant choice.

So that’s the different trait levels. For the most part they were solid, a couple were a bit boring, but none were totally broken in terms of one trait overpowering the others. The only 2 big issues were the 4 traits in dueling adept, and the bad choices in dueling grandmaster. Now we’ll look at the trait lines as a whole though, and see how each stacks up in overall utility and strength.

Domination

This traitline remains an offensive choice. The only defense it has comes from the The Pledge, and that’s extremely limited, so that’s ok. Other than that, it contains a lot of good choices for power-based and interrupt/lockdown builds. It has good options for sustained fighting, good options for burst, and solid options for PvE usability as well. Overall this is a very balanced traitline that has a wide variety of applications.

Dueling

Dueling is a reasonably balanced traitline. Most of the levels have an offensive option, a defensive option, and a utility option, with the lines between those sometimes blurring a little, which is ok. The defense it provides is mostly potent as an active application measure or very utility-focused, so it isn’t too overbearing. The main issue with this line is that it has the nice damage morsel of 10% boost vs confused foes in it, but no option for a PvE build in the grandmaster slot. This means it would still be taken for builds that are purely trying to do damage in PvE, but would feel really bad while doing so.

Chaos

This is a boon and defense focused traitline. Basically the only offensive option it has is Chaotic interruption, but that’s really a utility interrupt trait, not just raw offense. It’s overall fairly well balanced. You have a small option for condition cleansing in descent into madness, but it’s not too strong. CI becomes a very interesting capstone to interrupt builds, providing a lot more powerful sustain when performing well. The rest of the traitline is solidly built for a good boon defense, providing various options to accomplish that in different playstyles. Nothing screams to me that it would be broken, and nothing also seems to be totally unusable. Overall a good traitline, very decent.

Inspiration

Interestingly, this traitline now has no condition removal outside of the adept minor Mender’s Purity. Restorative illusions was such an overbearingly powerful trait that it sorta masked the fact that inspiration isn’t inherently strong for condition removal. Some method of condition removal definitely needs to be added here to account for that. This could be a good option for the Inspired Phantasms stinker. “Phantasms remove a condition from nearby allies when they attaack”. Now you’ve got an interesting trait that removes conditions, but it also shares a spot with the phantasm trait that boosts their survivability and attack rate, meaning you can’t take both and turbo-charge your phantasms.

With that modification, Inspiration becomes a well-balanced traitline that has solid options for phantasm buffing, support, and condition removal that don’t individually stack up to become something super broken.

Illusions
Malcious sorcery suddenly becomes the odd one out in this traitline. Every single other trait here is built around illusions or shattering, and you’re left with this one odd scepter-boosting trait. This isn’t necessarily bad…it’s just sorta weird. Overall this feels like a pretty balanced traitline. You’ve got decent options for all shatter builds, whether condition damage, power, or just bruiser utility. Condition cleansing exists in usable form, but isn’t too overbearing that it makes this traitline a must-have. There aren’t any ways to stack up the traits to get a really broken effect, so this is a good traitline.

Chronomancer

Not much changed here, I don’t really feel the need to comment.

Conclusions, Closing Remarks

Overall I like the changes here, with the few exceptions that I noted. This rework would spread out our condition removal pretty reasonably across chaos, inspiration, and illusions. It would provide good PvE damage options, made some of the worse traits a more balanced, and provides meaningful choices for most builds in most lines, with the single exception of the dueling grandmaster slot. I’d strongly support a rework along these lines for our traits, so it’s a kitten shame that Anet doesn’t do this sort of thing.

Thank you very much for this detailed response Fay! I agree with you on pretty much everything and I’m glad you liked some of the traits. Unfortunately, you’re right that Anet never really considers looking at these which is a shame. I’ve been thinking about a good Dueling Grandmaster trait for PvE, but its much harder to actually create a trait that would fit there. I would propose maybe adding Phantasmal Fury in there with a specific effect added onto it but then we would have to remove one of the other traits which are useful for PvP.

I find most of these ideas so… well for lack of a better word, pedestrian. As I do with the original ones. Take Furious Interruptions, how is that interesting? How is that adding actual value to my gameplay, how is that making a difference? It isn’t, it’s a (minor) boost to damage, and just gives me effects already in the game.

How about this one instead?

Enraging Interruptions – Domination Grandmaster Trait
When you interrupt an enemy, that enemy gains a stack of Enraged. They will deal 5% more damage to you per stack, but also take 15% more damage from you, stacking. Lasts until combat ends, either of you gets downed, or you fail to deal any damage to that enemy for 8 seconds.
Maximum stacks: Unlimited
Duration: 8 seconds
Dealing damage refreshes duration
Interrupting increases effect

Side note: Hell, this would actually be really interesting in PvE boss fights, since it’d keep stacking, though you put yourself at more and more risk.

Carighan.6758:

I find most of these ideas so… well for lack of a better word, pedestrian. As I do with the original ones. Take Furious Interruptions, how is that interesting? How is that adding actual value to my gameplay, how is that making a difference? It isn’t, it’s a (minor) boost to damage, and just gives me effects already in the game.

How about this one instead?

Enraging Interruptions – Domination Grandmaster Trait
When you interrupt an enemy, that enemy gains a stack of Enraged. They will deal 5% more damage to you per stack, but also take 15% more damage from you, stacking. Lasts until combat ends, either of you gets downed, or you fail to deal any damage to that enemy for 8 seconds.
Maximum stacks: Unlimited
Duration: 8 seconds
Dealing damage refreshes duration
Interrupting increases effect

Side note: Hell, this would actually be really interesting in PvE boss fights, since it’d keep stacking, though you put yourself at more and more risk.

That sounds horribly dangerous to use in PvP. PvE bosses can’t be interrupted (as far as I know) so this trait wouldn’t work at all with bosses. Interrupting multiple enemies in PvP, say about 3 enemies, leaves 15% dmg increase for your enemy which they don’t need, and 45% dmg from the mesmer. Or WvW, say about 10 enemies for WvW (hypothetically) places a 50% damage increase (5% each one) for your enemyand 150% damage from the mesmer (15% each one). If those enemies focus you down, you’re pretty much done. These changes I proposed are all within Anet’s capacity. Introducing a new effect like Enraged introduces more power creep and Mesmers won’t be the only ones to get it. There’s little reason to take that trait over Power Block, Mental Anguish and the new trait I proposed. Its unnecessary risk for very little reward. Power Block deals damage, weakens and increases cooldowns making it much more valuable than an interrupt trait that puts you at risk.