Guild Wars 2

Even if mob spawns are randomized and staggered all over the place, on my Engineer I can “reach out and touch” a mob with my grenades before anyone else can, as grenades have high AoE radius as well as range (1500 range + radius of the explosion).

No. The grenades have travel time. I guarantee iBerserker will win the race. Furthermore, Spatial Surge is pure instant.

But it still doesn’t solve the problem

There is a problem?

Last I checked Engineers get kittentomped in WvW because they don’t seem to really do anything useful in almost any situation. To me, that’s a problem.

Then again I’m not Chinese.

It has a much larger radius than you think and it can hit a near endless amount of targets. I get 2000 crits PER ILLUSION with this sucker.

Mind Wrack seems to hit up to 5 targets per; given that you have multiple Illusions out, they tend to hit different things. This is also why iBerserker is pretty useful — each of the 3 spin ticks can hit 5 different targets.

Sidenote: I crit for 2800 per with 3x+IP. Yeah, 11k MWs make me giggle.

In short, AoE on the Mesmer is phenomenal.

The topic centers on rapid AOE within 1.5 seconds. In this situation, Mesmer AOE is only mediocre, and primarily limited to iBerserker and IP Shatters.

Levetty.1279:

No what is stupid is thinking a game that has way more PvE content then PvP , all the marketing is based on PvE and they didn’t even show off PvP until right before the Betas started is a PvP mmo and they should balance it around tournaments. Just a little thought please.

I think you will find what is stupid is saying there is more PvE content than PvP, when PvP content is always far more replayable, so making a direct comparision is futile.

They were showing off PvP last year…

As for the rest I suggest you read some interviews with the devs and if you think a game with no real raids, that has virtually removed PvE gear progression in order to improve PvP, has launched with far more PvP content than most MMORPGs (the WvW zone alone makes efforts in most recent games look pathetic) and that has the stated intent of making the tPvP into an esport, is somehow a PvE focused game like Rift, LOTRO, etc then I suggest you actually try putting a little thought into it.

Levetty.1279:

Once again GETTING GOLD IN DE IS NOT THE PROBLEM. I would repeat that but since it has been repeated several times in each thread about this then I don’t think it will help. I have got Gold from running through an event doing nothing, if I hacked the game and gave myself a rabbit to play as I could get gold in DEs. The problem that the only way to get materials/coins at the rate you need to to not have to grind the game for 5 years is from tagging mobs in the Orr DEs. In them support doesn’t matter, the all mighty portal that everybody seems to think is the answer to all of Mesmers problems from damage to getting across maps doesn’t matter, noobs inability to fight us in PvP doesn’t matter. All that matters is aoe damage and Mesmers can’t do it fast enough to compete there and they are the only ones who can’t.

Then don’t make silly blanket claims that mesmers are useless at PvE, in general they are fine at PvE, they are fine in dungeons, fine in terms of getting gold in events, fine on boss events, the only thing they are not good at is tagging mobs in DE, but then that is a long way from being “useless in PvE”.

Levetty.1279:

You keep saying this is the Mesmer’s weakness so fair enough, how about we replace all the DEs in Orr with champions that you have to fight solo and have that as the only way to farm, when the other classes complain that they can’t do anything in Orr we can just reply with ‘Yeah but you have good AoE to get rid of all those trash mobs’ lets see if they accept that.

I do say the same, if I’m on my guardian, I have crappy ranged options, I go melee much of the time and have to work much harder than I do on my mesmer on things like dragon boss events that I could virtually put up three iMages and then fall asleep.

Same for my thief, having bascially 900 range (other than cluster bomb) makes things more difficult, especially in WvW, but then that is called balance, because thief is also the class that can get in and out of combat easier than any other.

You will be in for a very long wait if you think they are going to simply redo the mesmer mechanics to give a fast ramp up time and huge amounts of spammable AOE just for tagging in DE at the expense of their number one priority tPvP.

If anything get prepared for some sort of nerf, because mesmers are not exactly UP in PvP.

Ah, alright. 5 targets max for MW. Which still is good. 2800 crits are just beautious

Eh… I’m still confused as to why 1.5 and 3-4 seconds is a huge difference. What class can rack up over 11k damage in 1.5 seconds that isn’t melee?

It’s not about that. The situation is that there are 40 players dropping AOEs where the mobs spawn. They are using sustained GTAOEs so the AOEs are basically on the spot 24×7. You have about 1.0-2.5 seconds (depending on the DE and how many players of which classes) max to get any damage on the mob to get credit for $ and loot.

Creslin.1758:

Voodoo Tina”

OK I get the complaint people have. Really I do. But I don’t think they are making the right complaint.

The issue is that certain DE’s have so many players present the mobs did to AoE before the Mesmer can do anything. So they want all classes to have the same kind of AoE so everyone can do the same thing and its fair. But isn’t really the case that we can AoE just fine everywhere else? Not the same, but we definitely get the job done. Like someone said already, a part of the problem is that the spawn points are too predictable. If there weren’t so many mobs spawning from the same points, AoE would be less of a concern. Also, if mobs are scaling to the number of people present, they aren’t scaling properly. If mobs melt in 1 sec there’s really no challenge, so the mobs should get tougher to kill to keep it from being a silly grind fest. If mobs were lasting longer, this problem would disappear.

Yeah that’s how I understand the complaint as well. And I agree, if spawn points were less predictable, then ground target AoE spamming would be much less effective, and mesmers would have an easier time tagging things.

But to be honest, I really just don’t see this as a big problem. This complaint, like many others is just a “class whine” complaint. And those all boil down to “class X can do action Y better than I can! This is broken!”

But seriously, that is the way the game is SUPPOSED to be. I’ve said this before, but every class should not be equally good at every little thing. If mesmer was generally weak in PvE, then it would be a problem, but that is not the case.

The ONLY thing complained about here is that mesmers have trouble tagging mobs when their spawn point is being saturated with so much GTAoE that there is hardly any time to tag them. But that complaint is so ridiculously specific that it doesn’t mean anything.

It would be the same as an engineer complaining that Mesmers are better at pulling people off keep walls than they are so that needs to be fixed.

Pulling people off walls is great but its one small part of one part of WvWvW.

The DE Zerg is the only thing to do in the level 80 Zone and has to be done to get materials/coins for skins and legendaries. How can you think they compare?

If giving Mesmers more reliable AoE is so imbalancing that the game will break in two like you think it will then how about they fix the tagging mechanic so support and control can also give benefits. Or fix DE scaling so Veterens and Champs start appearing.

Like I said before nobody would be complaining about Mesmer AoE if Orr wasn’t just a mad DPS zerg.

EasymodeX.4062:

It’s not about that. The situation is that there are 40 players dropping AOEs where the mobs spawn. They are using sustained GTAOEs so the AOEs are basically on the spot 24×7. You have about 1.0-2.5 seconds (depending on the DE and how many players of which classes) max to get any damage on the mob to get credit for $ and loot.

I’ve been in Orr for about a week now and I’ve not seen this problem. Even with all the AoE’s, I still managed to get illusions and berseker up before shattering/switching to sword to use blurred frenzy for further AoE damage. By the end of it, I’m swimming in a sea of glowing Orrian corpses… that are dead. Like, really dead, not undead dead. :P

EDIT: If wanted, I could post a video later tonight that shows what I’m talking about.

it takes spaming key 1 on my Engineer and key 1 and 2(2) on my thief using her bow.

I can tag all mobs as they spawn with my engineer, takes a couple of seconds to tag all the mobs with my thief.

I am on one of the busiest servers, HoD, and I’ve seen how quickly mobs are wiped out. I’m afraid my Mesmer won’t stand a chance at tagging more than 10% each spawn with how long they take to set up.

And it will only get worse as more people hit 80 and have nothing left to do but farm Karma and mats in the same areas.

I’ve been in Orr for about a week now and I’ve not seen this problem.

Are you on a high pop server? It’s like this on JQ in most Orr DEs.

Sylosi.6503:

I think you will find what is stupid is saying there is more PvE content than PvP, when PvP content is always far more replayable, so making a direct comparision is futile.

They were showing off PvP last year…

As for the rest I suggest you read some interviews with the devs and if you think a game with no real raids, that has virtually removed PvE gear progression in order to improve PvP, has launched with far more PvP content than most MMORPGs (the WvW zone alone makes efforts in most recent games look pathetic) and that has the stated intent of making the tPvP into an esport, is somehow a PvE focused game like Rift, LOTRO, etc then I suggest you actually try putting a little thought into it.

Levetty.1279:

Once again GETTING GOLD IN DE IS NOT THE PROBLEM. I would repeat that but since it has been repeated several times in each thread about this then I don’t think it will help. I have got Gold from running through an event doing nothing, if I hacked the game and gave myself a rabbit to play as I could get gold in DEs. The problem that the only way to get materials/coins at the rate you need to to not have to grind the game for 5 years is from tagging mobs in the Orr DEs. In them support doesn’t matter, the all mighty portal that everybody seems to think is the answer to all of Mesmers problems from damage to getting across maps doesn’t matter, noobs inability to fight us in PvP doesn’t matter. All that matters is aoe damage and Mesmers can’t do it fast enough to compete there and they are the only ones who can’t.

Then don’t make silly blanket claims that mesmers are useless at PvE, in general they are fine at PvE, they are fine in dungeons, fine in terms of getting gold in events, fine on boss events, the only thing they are not good at is tagging mobs in DE, but then that is a long way from being “useless in PvE”.

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

They maybe better at certain things then other classes but in turn those classes can still actually do well in the areas that Mesmer are better. Don’t act like I want all the classes to be the same. I just want Mesmer to be able to get gear.

Sylosi.6503:

Levetty.1279:

You keep saying this is the Mesmer’s weakness so fair enough, how about we replace all the DEs in Orr with champions that you have to fight solo and have that as the only way to farm, when the other classes complain that they can’t do anything in Orr we can just reply with ‘Yeah but you have good AoE to get rid of all those trash mobs’ lets see if they accept that.

I do say the same, if I’m on my guardian, I have crappy ranged options, I go melee much of the time and have to work much harder than I do on my mesmer on things like dragon boss events that I could virtually put up three iMages and then fall asleep.

Same for my thief, having bascially 900 range (other than cluster bomb) makes things more difficult, especially in WvW, but then that is called balance, because thief is also the class that can get in and out of combat easier than any other.

You will be in for a very long wait if you think they are going to simply redo the mesmer mechanics to give a fast ramp up time and huge amounts of spammable AOE just for tagging in DE at the expense of their number one priority tPvP.

If anything get prepared for some sort of nerf, because mesmers are not exactly UP in PvP.

Well done on utterly missing my point.

Yes classes do somethings better then others but that isn’t a reason to keep Mesmer as the only class that can’t do anything in open world PvE once it has reached 80. We might be better at soloing champions but there are no rewards for soloing champions, everything is tied into this broken DE/tag mechanic, once again its the only way to get enough mats/coins without turning it into an epic grind(please read this sentence I am fed up of repeating it) so either that has to change or Mesmer has to be able to take part.

And if they focus their entire balancing on PvP then the game is going to fail hard. A lot of people play this for the PvE and will get fed up of that being messed up by PvP whining and will get fed up of one of the classes obviously not being designed for it and go to another game where the developers actually consider them. Also the Guild Wars PvP community doesn’t exactly have a reputation for being a good community, that is why PvP died in GW1.

Reading this post has made my head hurt. It seems like there is way more than an on topic argument. Members do have good AoE in a solo vs 4 or 5 or even higher in some cases battle, Personally I have taken 7 mobs solo easily if left to my own devices with enough room. I enjoy that aspect of the mesmer very much.

However, there is a HUGE difference between being given time to set up and kill a bunch of mobs (which appear to have a severely different loot table) and trying to do enough damage in under a second to a group of mobs to get loot. In either case what we are talking about is max level play, melanin people are less spread out because progression is not an option anymore.

As an example, I recently hit 80 on my mesmer, my only max level character. I worked my way into Orr doing my story quest and have had a blast the whole way. I had been reading these posts and did not think it would be a problem for me to tag, as it had not been a problem up to this point. Then I got to my first zerged DE (Isle Of Janthir) and it was just under 10 minutes long with several waves of Risen. In those 10 minutes I got loot rights on about 5 mobs out of what seemed like 100s. Most of the loot I got was veterans. Meanwhile there was a pile of players standing there swinging away at nothing in a pile… but sure enough mobs would insta-die when they got to that pile, and they were invulnerable before that point. I tried Berserker to no avail mobs were dead before he could spin to win, tried shatter with mirror images, mind stack had too long of a cooldown and seemingly the mobs would die before clones got to them to shatter, and blurred frenzy might have worked for a couple of the mobs if you could time it exactly right, but its not spammable so you would hit the first few mobs but the duration limits the number.

Basically I think supper type spells, which IMO is what mesmer bring to the table in a group setting, are underrated and you get no credit for doing it. I lover the idea of boons causing loot to be gotten. The only problem I could see with it is that maybe Guardians could tag mobs this way with nothing but f1 – f3 buttons. But then again from what I see they only need 1 button as it is now. Or perhaps change the loot table on regular wandering mobs to be slightly more in sync with DE mobs if they’re not already.

I’m on Tarnished Coast, which is full more often than not.

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

Odd, the only problem here is in Orr, which is 1 zone. Also, WvW = PvP zones. 4 sPvP maps + 4 WvW zones >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> PvE.

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

Mesmers suffer in 100% map complete exploration, and in DE tagging (along with other classes).

That’s it.

If you perceive that trash is hard to solo, and that the Mesmer has a low build variety, that is purely your deficiency as a player. Don’t blame the class.

“Mesmer is bad because I can’t play it” speaks for itself. :P

EasymodeX.4062:

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

Odd, the only problem here is in Orr, which is 1 zone. Also, WvW = PvP zones. 4 sPvP maps + 4 WvW zones >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> PvE.

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

Mesmers suffer in 100% map complete exploration, and in DE tagging (along with other classes).

That’s it.

If you perceive that trash is hard to solo, and that the Mesmer has a low build variety, that is purely your deficiency as a player. Don’t blame the class.

WvWvW is PvE with worse mob AI don’t fool yourself. At best its a combination of PvE/PvP leaning on the PvE side more in terms of content/what builds and skills are effective and the need for gear.

I never said trash was hard, learn to read.

There is no variety. Spam out phantasm to do damage or spam out clones to do shatters. PvP adds confusion in the mix allowing us to mix it up a bit but we are too dependent on clones and phantasms for everything for any build to actually feel different in PvE (not to mention the most trait dependent class in the game).

Levetty.1279:

Sylosi.6503:

I think you will find what is stupid is saying there is more PvE content than PvP, when PvP content is always far more replayable, so making a direct comparision is futile.

They were showing off PvP last year…

As for the rest I suggest you read some interviews with the devs and if you think a game with no real raids, that has virtually removed PvE gear progression in order to improve PvP, has launched with far more PvP content than most MMORPGs (the WvW zone alone makes efforts in most recent games look pathetic) and that has the stated intent of making the tPvP into an esport, is somehow a PvE focused game like Rift, LOTRO, etc then I suggest you actually try putting a little thought into it.

Levetty.1279:

Once again GETTING GOLD IN DE IS NOT THE PROBLEM. I would repeat that but since it has been repeated several times in each thread about this then I don’t think it will help. I have got Gold from running through an event doing nothing, if I hacked the game and gave myself a rabbit to play as I could get gold in DEs. The problem that the only way to get materials/coins at the rate you need to to not have to grind the game for 5 years is from tagging mobs in the Orr DEs. In them support doesn’t matter, the all mighty portal that everybody seems to think is the answer to all of Mesmers problems from damage to getting across maps doesn’t matter, noobs inability to fight us in PvP doesn’t matter. All that matters is aoe damage and Mesmers can’t do it fast enough to compete there and they are the only ones who can’t.

Then don’t make silly blanket claims that mesmers are useless at PvE, in general they are fine at PvE, they are fine in dungeons, fine in terms of getting gold in events, fine on boss events, the only thing they are not good at is tagging mobs in DE, but then that is a long way from being “useless in PvE”.

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

They maybe better at certain things then other classes but in turn those classes can still actually do well in the areas that Mesmer are better. Don’t act like I want all the classes to be the same. I just want Mesmer to be able to get gear.

Okay, so you just want mesmer to be able to get gear. Fine, you can already do that. You can get gear through dungeons, WvW, or open PvE. I will grant that mesmer is not the BEST at tagging mobs in DEs, but you can definitely do it. No, you will not be as good as an engineer at doing it, but you can do it. You are seriously exaggerating when you say a mesmer can do nothing in open world PvE.

In the end, if you want to be a character that focuses on farming DEs for loot then make a flipping engineer. Kind of like how I wanted to be a character that had a lot of utility in WvW so I made a mesmer.

we should note that some of the people that are AOEing mobs to death before they spawn are bots.

We do not need to balance against bots, what mesmers need is some way to have a decent AOE that does not require a target so we can AOE tag mobs, or at least have mobs always spawn invulnerable for 2 seconds, run invulnerable to the staging point, then become vulnerable so mesmers can target something before it dies.

Levetty.1279:

WvWvW is PvE with worse mob AI don’t fool yourself.

Uh, no. That’s the dumbest comment I’ve read all week, and I’ve read quite a few.

Edit: What server do you play on?

I never said trash was hard, learn to read.

You said it was [hard] to do efficiently. E.g. you are unable to kill mobs efficiently. If you were capable of doing so, you would. You’re not. It’s hard for you.

What?

There is no variety.

Variety … you mean like a Warrior variety of “swing weapon” or “swing weapon”?

Or Necro variety of “summon minionz” or “spam conditions”?

Wow … so much variety where the grass is greener.

Then I got to my first zerged DE (Isle Of Janthir) and it was just under 10 minutes long with several waves of Risen. In those 10 minutes I got loot rights on about 5 mobs out of what seemed like 100s. Most of the loot I got was veterans. Meanwhile there was a pile of players standing there swinging away at nothing in a pile… but sure enough mobs would insta-die when they got to that pile, and they were invulnerable before that point. I tried Berserker to no avail mobs were dead before he could spin to win, tried shatter with mirror images, mind stack had too long of a cooldown and seemingly the mobs would die before clones got to them to shatter, and blurred frenzy might have worked for a couple of the mobs if you could time it exactly right, but its not spammable so you would hit the first few mobs but the duration limits the number.

This is pretty much the situation I’ve been talking about this whole time. Which 90% of responders flat-out missed.

And it’s not like I blame you guys! If you’re not on a high pop (or heck, even VERY high pop) server, you probably have no kittenish clue what I’m even talking about. But for many of us (remember, very high pop server) this is daily reality.

Things like shatters, clone summoning, etc., don’t even enter into the equation because mobs are falling dead as they phase into the world, or as their invulnerability drops. That’s how much AoE is coming down at the focal point. In this scenario, Sword AoE is pretty much the only thing that works, but you’ll catch 1 spawn out of several.

Those of you who blame the bots, yes, quite a few ARE bots. I’ve seen some spam for hours and hours without moving. And there’s no way a human can do that since there’s no autocast on ground-target attacks. However, a lot of people aren’t bots. They just play classes with decent AoE.

And a quick comment about Engineer grenade travel time – you can have more than one set of grenades in the air at any one time. Typically I have 3 sets – 1 landing, 1 in the air, and one leaving my hands, at any given time. It is totally spammable and at least 1 AoE explosion per second happens at the spawn point. Most of the grenades also leave a little something behind – fire, poison, confusion, etc. It’s not just flat out damage. And though those aren’t precisely spammable, with the cooldown reduction trait they might as well be, at least that’s how the fire one feels.

And while I totally agree that in some ways our AoE is great – someone earlier said that bounces buff allies, etc. – it doesn’t help me as an individual get my share of loot. It just helps other people get theirs quicker. In a team effort, it’s very good. But in an anonymous zergfest spank-a-tron that is Orr DEs on high pop servers, being nice gets you nothing, or at least a fraction of what you could get with a “real” class. That CAN actually cast AoEs even if there’s no target present, and AoEs that do damage immediately and not next Friday after the sunset.

Sabbathius.1465:

Then I got to my first zerged DE (Isle Of Janthir) and it was just under 10 minutes long with several waves of Risen. In those 10 minutes I got loot rights on about 5 mobs out of what seemed like 100s. Most of the loot I got was veterans. Meanwhile there was a pile of players standing there swinging away at nothing in a pile… but sure enough mobs would insta-die when they got to that pile, and they were invulnerable before that point. I tried Berserker to no avail mobs were dead before he could spin to win, tried shatter with mirror images, mind stack had too long of a cooldown and seemingly the mobs would die before clones got to them to shatter, and blurred frenzy might have worked for a couple of the mobs if you could time it exactly right, but its not spammable so you would hit the first few mobs but the duration limits the number.

This is pretty much the situation I’ve been talking about this whole time. Which 90% of responders flat-out missed.

And it’s not like I blame you guys! If you’re not on a high pop (or heck, even VERY high pop) server, you probably have no kittenish clue what I’m even talking about. But for many of us (remember, very high pop server) this is daily reality.

Things like shatters, clone summoning, etc., don’t even enter into the equation because mobs are falling dead as they phase into the world, or as their invulnerability drops. That’s how much AoE is coming down at the focal point. In this scenario, Sword AoE is pretty much the only thing that works, but you’ll catch 1 spawn out of several.

Those of you who blame the bots, yes, quite a few ARE bots. I’ve seen some spam for hours and hours without moving. And there’s no way a human can do that since there’s no autocast on ground-target attacks. However, a lot of people aren’t bots. They just play classes with decent AoE.

And a quick comment about Engineer grenade travel time – you can have more than one set of grenades in the air at any one time. Typically I have 3 sets – 1 landing, 1 in the air, and one leaving my hands, at any given time. It is totally spammable and at least 1 AoE explosion per second happens at the spawn point. Most of the grenades also leave a little something behind – fire, poison, confusion, etc. It’s not just flat out damage. And though those aren’t precisely spammable, with the cooldown reduction trait they might as well be, at least that’s how the fire one feels.

And while I totally agree that in some ways our AoE is great – someone earlier said that bounces buff allies, etc. – it doesn’t help me as an individual get my share of loot. It just helps other people get theirs quicker. In a team effort, it’s very good. But in an anonymous zergfest spank-a-tron that is Orr DEs on high pop servers, being nice gets you nothing, or at least a fraction of what you could get with a “real” class. That CAN actually cast AoEs even if there’s no target present, and AoEs that do damage immediately and not next Friday after the sunset.

I don’t think anyone is missing that, we are acknowledging it, and saying that it’s not a class problem.

If you are on a server where these DEs are so zerged that MOBs die as soon as they spawn…then that sounds like a problem with DE scaling / spawn randomization, NOT mesmer class mechanics. In other words, the DE is not able to scale up appropriately to the huge zerg that is on it, causing this situation.

Giving the mesmer a spammable AoE to deal with it, would be like a band-aid solution. The mesmer is not what needs fixing, the DE scaling / spawn randomization issues are.

Also…if it really bothers you so much, a quick solution for you would be to just come to a lower pop server…we could use you lol.

Levetty.1279:

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

WvWvW is PvP and way to go on ignoring the replayability point.

Levetty.1279:

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

Mesmers are fine for exploration, for jumping puzzles portal is superb, for mob infested areas – run through stealth – drop agro, no need to fight mobs and is much quicker.

Levetty.1279:

Well done on utterly missing my point.

I didn’t miss your point, I just used different examples to illistrate different classes are strong / weak at different things in the game and that were someone to whine about their class, I’d tell them the same thing – you can’t be good at everything, it is called balance.

Levetty.1279:

Yes classes do somethings better then others but that isn’t a reason to keep Mesmer as the only class that can’t do anything in open world PvE once it has reached 80. We might be better at soloing champions but there are no rewards for soloing champions, everything is tied into this broken DE/tag mechanic, once again its the only way to get enough mats/coins without turning it into an epic grind(please read this sentence I am fed up of repeating it) so either that has to change or Mesmer has to be able to take part.

There is no epic grind, the only level of gear you need is exotic, which is a piece of cake compared to most games, if you want legendaries, tough, you don’t need them, there is no rush.

As for you repeating your sentence, if you didn’t try and tie it in with silly statements like “mesmers are useless in PvE” or were able to grasp that DE is just one small part of the game, then you wouldn’t need to repeat it.

Levetty.1279:

And if they focus their entire balancing on PvP then the game is going to fail hard. A lot of people play this for the PvE and will get fed up of that being messed up by PvP whining and will get fed up of one of the classes obviously not being designed for it and go to another game where the developers actually consider them. Also the Guild Wars PvP community doesn’t exactly have a reputation for being a good community, that is why PvP died in GW1.

There are plenty of MMORPGs (the vast majority in fact) where the devs put PvE first, GW2 is the other way round, get used to it, they want to make the tPvP an esport, balance will be fr mroe crucial there than anywhere else, that will take priority.

As for community, other than LOTRO pre-f2p and older games pre-wowkids, just about every MMORPG has a terrible reputation, so what’s new?

Creslin.1758:

Levetty.1279:

Sylosi.6503:

I think you will find what is stupid is saying there is more PvE content than PvP, when PvP content is always far more replayable, so making a direct comparision is futile.

They were showing off PvP last year…

As for the rest I suggest you read some interviews with the devs and if you think a game with no real raids, that has virtually removed PvE gear progression in order to improve PvP, has launched with far more PvP content than most MMORPGs (the WvW zone alone makes efforts in most recent games look pathetic) and that has the stated intent of making the tPvP into an esport, is somehow a PvE focused game like Rift, LOTRO, etc then I suggest you actually try putting a little thought into it.

Levetty.1279:

Once again GETTING GOLD IN DE IS NOT THE PROBLEM. I would repeat that but since it has been repeated several times in each thread about this then I don’t think it will help. I have got Gold from running through an event doing nothing, if I hacked the game and gave myself a rabbit to play as I could get gold in DEs. The problem that the only way to get materials/coins at the rate you need to to not have to grind the game for 5 years is from tagging mobs in the Orr DEs. In them support doesn’t matter, the all mighty portal that everybody seems to think is the answer to all of Mesmers problems from damage to getting across maps doesn’t matter, noobs inability to fight us in PvP doesn’t matter. All that matters is aoe damage and Mesmers can’t do it fast enough to compete there and they are the only ones who can’t.

Then don’t make silly blanket claims that mesmers are useless at PvE, in general they are fine at PvE, they are fine in dungeons, fine in terms of getting gold in events, fine on boss events, the only thing they are not good at is tagging mobs in DE, but then that is a long way from being “useless in PvE”.

Yeah sorry forgot that 3 maps spread over the whole of one mode is more content then the whole PvE, dungeons and WvWvW combined. k

Mesmers suffer in exploration, tagging in DEs, efficiently getting through trash in solo and quite frankly variety of our builds.

They maybe better at certain things then other classes but in turn those classes can still actually do well in the areas that Mesmer are better. Don’t act like I want all the classes to be the same. I just want Mesmer to be able to get gear.

Okay, so you just want mesmer to be able to get gear. Fine, you can already do that. You can get gear through dungeons, WvW, or open PvE. I will grant that mesmer is not the BEST at tagging mobs in DEs, but you can definitely do it. No, you will not be as good as an engineer at doing it, but you can do it. You are seriously exaggerating when you say a mesmer can do nothing in open world PvE.

In the end, if you want to be a character that focuses on farming DEs for loot then make a flipping engineer. Kind of like how I wanted to be a character that had a lot of utility in WvW so I made a mesmer.

No I want them to fix the tagging/DE mechanics so its not just a mass zerg through Orr but if they are not going to do that then the Mesmer has to change.

You can’t get all skins through Dungeons and you can’t get legendaries. If you want to talk about dungeons so much we will.

One of the few things that most class forums seem to be able to agree on is that Rangers are the worst class for dungeons between the Pet problems, the lackluster utility skills and relatively poor support options. On the other hand they are obviously the best class for general PvE and have some great options for WvWvW. So should Rangers just be left as they are, with some groups even beginning to refuse to let them in their dungeon party, just because they can do those other two alright or should Anet go through with their whole ‘all classes can do everything promise’ and give them those buffs? If you are smart you said they should get those buffs. Thus I see no problems with Mesmer getting these buffs if they are unwilling to change the tagging mechanic just because they can do well in WvWvW and dungeons.

Mesmers do well in WvW, dungeons, sPvP, tPvP, solo PvE, PS, DEs.

Mesmers are underpar at Orr DEs, 100% map exploration.

I guess I’m just glad the Mesmer strengths match my playstyle 100%.

Btw, Rangers are weak in WvW. Last I checked they were weak in sPvP too. They need some buffs for several aspects of the class.

Edit: The #1 contribution of Rangers in WvW is their heal with provides a water field. I feel bad for them.

BUT THEY CAN RUN AROUND THE MAP FOR 100% COMPLETE REALLY FAST!

EasymodeX.4062:

Mesmers do well in WvW, dungeons, sPvP, tPvP, solo PvE, PS, DEs.

Mesmers are underpar at Orr DEs, 100% map exploration.

I guess I’m just glad the Mesmer strengths match my playstyle 100%.

Btw, Rangers are weak in WvW. Last I checked they were weak in sPvP too. They need some buffs for several aspects of the class.

Edit: The #1 contribution of Rangers in WvW is their heal with provides a water field. I feel bad for them.

BUT THEY CAN RUN AROUND THE MAP FOR 100% COMPLETE REALLY FAST!

7/10

I like how your subtle mix of small amounts of truth into your blatant lies meaning you have to spend a lot of time to really pick it apart and show everybody why you are wrong.

Much better then your usual Troll attempts.

Try playing a Ranger though because it falls apart with that bit.

Creslin.1758:

Giving the mesmer a spammable AoE to deal with it, would be like a band-aid solution. The mesmer is not what needs fixing, the DE scaling / spawn randomization issues are.

Also…if it really bothers you so much, a quick solution for you would be to just come to a lower pop server…we could use you lol.

I agree messing with mesmer’s playstyle and giving them a spammable AOE is probably not a good solution, but neither is having to go to another server just to compete (at least not long-term). What if I want to play with my guild?

What needs to hapkitten that DE’s, and the game in general, needs to start giving credit for assists. So if your bounce buffs an ally that kills a mob while your buff is active, you get XP and loot for the kill.

EDIT: OK, Anet. You are getting really ridiculous with your content filters. the end of happen + is, DOES NOT MEAN A PART OF MALE GENITALIA! If you going to screen content instead of giving us an option to turn it on/off, at least get the spelling right!

I’m not sure why this is still a problem now. Player swarms have died down to mostly inexperienced players thanks to the magic of DR, to the point where they couldn’t even finish the Temple of Balthazar on Stormbluff Isle because everyone waited in place to get revived instead of running back. :/

What needs to hapkitten that DE’s, and the game in general, needs to start giving credit for assists. So if your bounce buffs an ally that kills a mob while your buff is active, you get XP and loot for the kill.

This. Defintely. Mesmers don’t need better AOE just to tag DE mobs. But there should be what was intended from the beginning : giving credit to support. Oh so I put an ethereal field, which helped cause much confusion to kill that mob ? I should be awarded participation for helping causing so much damage. Bouncing buffs ? I helped these guys stay alive and/or kill stuff, I should be awarded as well.
That’s the real problem : stop the unfair “DPS or no loot/xp” policy in DE.

I hadn’t really noticed people complaining about lack of AoE tbh.

In PvP I use sword/(sword or pistol depending on mood) and staff. In PvE I use GS/Staff.

I trait 30 into illusions for shatter on self, and all bouncing attacks get extra bounce (same build for TPvP and PvE as well). Staff obviously has CS and between staff 1 and phantasms copied staff 1 there’s a ton of AoE bouncing around. My shatters are all AoE (and 4 of them because of myself as well). Sword 2 is melee range aoe, and with GS I get 2, 4 and 3 as aoe attacks as well.

There’s actually quite a bit of AoE in the mesmer class it’s just a bit different than “drop big colored circle on ground, watch kitten die” style aoe.

Sylosi.6503:

There are plenty of MMORPGs (the vast majority in fact) where the devs put PvE first, GW2 is the other way round, get used to it, they want to make the tPvP an esport, balance will be fr mroe crucial there than anywhere else, that will take priority.

JonPeters.5630:

I just wanted to write a quick post to address our overall balance philosophy. I see threads inside every single profession sub forum talking about how that profession is either overpowered, underpowered, or both. In the past we made balance updates fairly frequently. While we will continue to be responsive to serious issues, we also want to make sure that we let the basic meta-game stabilize before making too many changes.

If you see something that is really strong please try and find counters to it before assuming it is overpowered. We have put a lot of hours into the game already and there are still many things we are learning about the depth of the combat and the balance. There are also finally enough players consistently playing that we can actually gather metrics on skills and make some more informed decisions about what is too weak/strong.

Please don’t hesitate to point out builds that look like they could use some balance work. We are constantly striving to make Guild Wars 2 the most balanced game it can be and appreciate all of your feedback. Try to keep your feedback focused and specific so we can know the context of your issues. PvE, WvW, and sPvP balance are all equally important and we will address them all with the same amount of weight and thought. Remember, as well that when we want to make a change it takes time for us to decide what to do, how to do it, and then to test it and make sure that it isn’t going to create any unwanted results. Our hope is that our turnaround can be quick, but implore you to be patient, as well thought out changes will be better for the health of the game than knee-jerk reactions.

Thanks again for your feedback, your time, and your passion.

Jon

Am I mistaken, or does grouping together in a party sync drops for the whole party? So if anyone tags…it’s like everyone did? Maybe I’m imagining that.

Sabbathius.1465:

Mesmers have AoE. And they don’t. It depends on what you mean by AoE, and how meticulous you are with your definition.

For example, consider bounce attacks. Do they bounce? Yes. Up to 4 times, fully traited. Except they tend to prioritize friendlies. You can test it yourself. Pull 2 mobs. Toss GS #2, it’ll fly from you, to mob #1, then BACK to you, then back at mob #1 or mob #2, and then if traited back to you. But one thing never changes – if you are close enough, it’ll prioritize you over the second mob. Same goes for other friendlies. You’ll give them boons with your bounces, but you won’t damage the mobs. As such, this is not really AoE.

Sword #3 is nice. But it’s melee range. You can’t move doing it. And while you can root ONE mob (with Sword #2 tapped twice), the other targets can just run past you if you don’t have 100% of the aggro. And then there’s the cooldown, 8-10 seconds? During which you are in melee range and more or less vulnerable, which is hardly ideal.

Then there’s shatters. Except A) it takes time to create illusions for them, and illusions need to travel from where they are to target to shatter. If primary target dies before they get there, it’s no shatter, no damage.

We have damage phantasms. But really only Berserker and Warden are true AoEs. Berserker’s path is unpredictable – sometimes he hits 1 mob, sometimes all. Warden doesn’t move, and dies incredibly easy to melee mobs. I’ve seen him get 1-shot before he can even visually appear more often than I care to admit in PvE. And he is of course stationary, and Focus #4 pull is not precise enough to guarantee good DPS out of him. And with the recent nerf/bugfix to his attack recharge, he’s lackluster at best.

Now, compare that to TRUE AoE classes. Like Engineer, for example. Well, with Grenade kit, you have 1500 range (not a typo, 1500), your basic attack #1 is spammable (no cooldown at all), and you throw 4 grenades. Aim anywhere. They WILL land where you tell them to, and do damage to whatever is there. You can miss with them, which is the only thing keeping the kit from being godmode. And then #2-5 you have your special grenades – DoTs, slow, etc.

Next, consider Mine Kit. Same principle, but no need to target. Again totally spammable. Does AoE damage. No way to avoid it, except not being close to the mine. With right traits, when you roll, you drop a free mine the way a traited mesmer drops a clone. Except it does good AoE damage all by itself, unlike the clone.

Then there’s the Flamethrower – drop a wall of FLAME that BURNS, just like we drop our Into the Void. Your #1 attack is short-medium range cone AoE, and is spammable. Similar goes for the Elixir Gun.

Then, take a look at Coated Bullets in Firearms tree. Description is short and sweet – “Pistol shots pierce”. Not that impressive, right? But what it does is make your pistol shots effectively AoE. Combine that with Explosive Shot, with blows up on impact, hitting anything nearby as well, and add piercing to that, and what you see is a HUGE wave of numbers from each autoattack.

And that’s not counting turrets, some of which are AoEs as well – like Thumper and Flame. They just sit there, happily, as as soon as anything gets close, it starts taking AoE damage. Fun. And unlike illusions, turrets don’t die just because your target did.

And all this is not even counting the toolbelt skills. Really beautiful things, like Grenade Barrage and Big Ol’ Bomb. Which reminds me, remember those annoying heart quests where you have to destroy objects, like centaur weapon racks? Yeah. Plop down a Big Ol’ Bomb near 3 of them, and watch what happens. Granted, both of those have long-ish 30 sec CDs…but hey, if you have a Tools trait, each time you pop one of those you also fire a bolt of friggin’ lightning that will jump 3 times! And it doesn’t go for friendlies like our bounce – it just kills enemies. You know, that thing that gives you XP/gold/etc? Yeah, that.

wow you just hit every single point that needed to be made about aoe mesmers, because i came from a engineer down to a mesmer. It is truly disappointing to farm events with mobs, because you can’t kill even 10% of the mob most of the time for loot/xp. when i was rocking my engineer i would kill/get xp/loot on 50% of mobs, so much loot. Example is in COF, i have 12 slot bags in all slots except gem slot, and when COF is closed for event, i almost fill up with inventory making me have to jump into wv3 to sell my stuff before jumping back to do dungeon. Mesmers have shatter true, but like he stated above they die if the target dies, making it 90% useless for mob event farming. any1 who has played a flamethower/grenade engineer knows this. those who try it and come back to the mesmer will be truly amazed at how little aoe damage your mesmer actually does.

Levetty.1279:

EasymodeX.4062:

Mesmers do well in WvW, dungeons, sPvP, tPvP, solo PvE, PS, DEs.

Mesmers are underpar at Orr DEs, 100% map exploration.

I guess I’m just glad the Mesmer strengths match my playstyle 100%.

Btw, Rangers are weak in WvW. Last I checked they were weak in sPvP too. They need some buffs for several aspects of the class.

Edit: The #1 contribution of Rangers in WvW is their heal with provides a water field. I feel bad for them.

BUT THEY CAN RUN AROUND THE MAP FOR 100% COMPLETE REALLY FAST!

7/10

I like how your subtle mix of small amounts of truth into your blatant lies meaning you have to spend a lot of time to really pick it apart and show everybody why you are wrong.

Much better then your usual Troll attempts.

Try playing a Ranger though because it falls apart with that bit.

i haven a 80 ranger and 80 mesmer. both in full 80 exotics (except weapons, 78 exotics there)

rangers lack in WvW, sPVP, tPVP and dungeons. barrage is their only respectable, targetable aoe. in order to make traps placeable (and the range is obscenely short..like 250) you have to give up either double trap duration or 20% cd on bow skills. rangers lack utility outside of healing spring

if you say ‘well they have spirits’, you have ZERO idea of wth you are talking about and need to play a ranger to 80 and take it into explorables with the same kind of glass cannon build you can with a mesmer.

tripling the radius of mind stab, increasing it’s damage by 20%, halving it’s cooldown and taking off the boon removal would on it’s own give us viable aoe tagging.

no it’s not guardian staff 1 or pistol engineer 1, but not all classes should have such a thing.

Roven Leafsong.8917:

Sylosi.6503:

There are plenty of MMORPGs (the vast majority in fact) where the devs put PvE first, GW2 is the other way round, get used to it, they want to make the tPvP an esport, balance will be fr mroe crucial there than anywhere else, that will take priority.

JonPeters.5630:

I just wanted to write a quick post to address our overall balance philosophy. I see threads inside every single profession sub forum talking about how that profession is either overpowered, underpowered, or both. In the past we made balance updates fairly frequently. While we will continue to be responsive to serious issues, we also want to make sure that we let the basic meta-game stabilize before making too many changes.

If you see something that is really strong please try and find counters to it before assuming it is overpowered. We have put a lot of hours into the game already and there are still many things we are learning about the depth of the combat and the balance. There are also finally enough players consistently playing that we can actually gather metrics on skills and make some more informed decisions about what is too weak/strong.

Please don’t hesitate to point out builds that look like they could use some balance work. We are constantly striving to make Guild Wars 2 the most balanced game it can be and appreciate all of your feedback. Try to keep your feedback focused and specific so we can know the context of your issues. PvE, WvW, and sPvP balance are all equally important and we will address them all with the same amount of weight and thought. Remember, as well that when we want to make a change it takes time for us to decide what to do, how to do it, and then to test it and make sure that it isn’t going to create any unwanted results. Our hope is that our turnaround can be quick, but implore you to be patient, as well thought out changes will be better for the health of the game than knee-jerk reactions.

Thanks again for your feedback, your time, and your passion.

Jon

And devs in other games say the same, the reality is quite different (they priortise whatever is most important to their core customers / success of their game, usually PvE), if you think a game that is betting on becoming an e-sport is going to be put the balance of anything before that of the tPvP where balance matters most, then you are living in cloud cuckoo land.

lol at someone saying Mirror Blade potentially gives 12 stacks of might, then goes on to say Blurred Frenzy can hit 5 mobs.

If you’re getting 12 stacks of might, that means you hit 1 mob with Mirror Blade. All of this is moot when it comes to DE’s because by the time you do any of this, every spawned mob will be dead.

Sylosi.6503:

JonPeters.5630:

PvE, WvW, and sPvP balance are all equally important and we will address them all with the same amount of weight and thought.

And devs in other games say the same, the reality is quite different (they priortise whatever is most important to their core customers, usually PvE), if you think a game that is betting on becoming an e-sport is going to be put the balance of anything before that of the tPvP where balance matters most, then you are living in cloud cuckoo land.

I don’t mind if you disagree with ArenaNet’s stated position, I just don’t think you should pass off your personal opinion as anything else.

I think that’s particularly relevant when the developer has made statements that expressly indicate your opinion is wrong.

You certainly don’t gain much credibility by calling those who listen to ArenaNet and their stated goals for the game ‘living in cloud cuckoo land’. I guess if that’s true, I’m happy to continue to live in that wonderful and interesting ‘land’ alongside players of all stripes, no matter what aspect of the game they enjoy the most.

Roven Leafsong.8917:

You certainly don’t gain much credibility by calling those who listen to ArenaNet and their stated goals for the game ‘living in cloud cuckoo land’.

It’s called logic, that they want the game to become an e-sport is not personal opinion, they have stated that, that balance is more crucial to the success of tPvP than WvW or co-operative PvE should be pretty obvious, hence it should be pretty obvious which will get priority.

As for what Anet say, they aren’t any different from any other company, it is called public relations and what they say in public does not necessarily reflect the real situation, as the people who develop EVE rather infamously demonstrated.

And yes some of that is my opinion, though quite why I need to specifiy that is a mystery.

And of course if I am wrong then the guy I was orignially responding to has nothing to worry about and I am sure they will alter the basic premise of the class and reduce the ramp up time and boost AOE, just so he can farm events easier at teh expense of tPvP balance, because every class having equal AOE for farming DE is clearly on an equal footing with balancing tPvP, I mean it’s not like one of the key reasons WoW failed as an e-sport was lack of balance or anything…

Whether they want tPvP to become an e-sport is irrelevant. They will shift their efforts in balance and content development based on what their players do, and if you think the people that play tPvP are a majority, you’re only fooling yourself. Competitive pvp is a niche activity, no matter how much of a big deal they try to make out of it. Anet is better off expanding on their PvE content and WvW if they want to keep people interested in the game.

More on topic: yes mesmers have a harder time tagging things in Orr DEs and it sucks, but I think the solution is as simple as making the trash mob health scale up with the number of players a bit so that they don’t die so easily. If they stay alive for even 5 seconds, mesmers and other classes who have a harder time with tagging will be able to do so and get the loot they need.

Mesmer’s have crappy Aoe.
Ele’s have great Aoe
Mesmer’s have stealth
Ele’s have 20 weapon skills
Mesmer’s have clones
Warrior’s have banners
Mesmer’s have agro drops
Ranger’s have pets.

People want a magical thief/dueling class to also have great AOE?

The elementalist is that way> It has tons of AOE. /threadover

Godmoney.2048:

Mesmer’s have crappy Aoe.
Ele’s have great Aoe
Mesmer’s have stealth
Ele’s have 20 weapon skills
Mesmer’s have clones
Warrior’s have banners
Mesmer’s have agro drops
Ranger’s have pets.

People want a magical thief/dueling class to also have great AOE?

The elementalist is that way> It has tons of AOE. /threadover

No. Pay attention. Mesmers already have great AOE; it’s just slower than an ele or engi. People want all classes to be able to tag mobs in DE’s because that is where the progression is once you hit levels 70-80. Mesmers don’t need spammable AOE like an engineer or thief (this has been said multiple times throughout the thread and largely acknowledged), we need the DE tagging system to be updated to accommodate support and CC in the same way it does damage. Barring that, mesmer (and some other classes) would need their AOE options to act quicker, or mobs need to live longer in large DEs.

Hehe Mesmers have aoe… Mesmers have burst mesmers have stealth… mesmers have gapclosers we just dont have bannes, think thats al we dont have tbh.

have a look at my sPvP fights after 1st wvwvw fight. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btL7-ynAH9A&feature=youtu.be