Guild Wars 2

as someone who has a mesmer as main and all asc zerk items i can tell you that the damage a mesmer can produce is far lower then other classes. i think this needs to change it is very hard for a mesmer to compete in high level fractals or dungeons with lets say a war or even necro.

If you mean phantasms are weak in PvE (Dungeons and Fractals) then okay maybe.

But saying mesmer damage is low is probably up there with one of the worst hyperbole on these forums.

sword mainhand damage isnt that bad, plus you can bring reflects and time warp.

Mesmer has Fair damage with Right Gear + Build + Time warp/feedback etc
No one really takes mesmer in pt for “Damage” anyway ^^ but utility’s are useful (thats my opinion)

Also necros have fair damage with D/F + D/WH (granted tho many run staff only ) xD

As someone who has fully kitted out a zerk mes as one of their secondary characters (main is a necro), I can say that – if actually used – they have quite a fair bit of damage.

My necro is also fully kitted in zerk, and she does nowhere near as much damage as my mes. You need to have a look at what you’re doing wrong. It’s not the class’ fault.

Also; if you’re going to claim something like this, I highly suggest actually posting numbers, builds, gear etc, because people aren’t going to take you seriously otherwise.

Mesmer damage is the lowest of all classes if players say they do good damage than its against training dummies. You’re lucky to even hit 5k with flurry in zerker.

ermm , This has to be a troll. I have all 8 classes and have ran or run now zerker on them all . Mesmer is by far one of the hardest hitting zerker classes there is . You are not doing it right . You also (unlike other zerker classes) have tons more survivability due to your weapon skills and utilities . I dont understand how you can say there damage is low , I can nuke you and 5-6 others in seconds np at all .

Bonedoctor.2796:

ermm , This has to be a troll. I have all 8 classes and have ran or run now zerker on them all . Mesmer is by far one of the hardest hitting zerker classes there is . You are not doing it right . You also (unlike other zerker classes) have tons more survivability due to your weapon skills and utilities . I dont understand how you can say there damage is low , I can nuke you and 5-6 others in seconds np at all .

And then what. Then you have cooldowns you can kill me in pvp sure but were not discussing pvp here. There is 60 seconds in a minute. Burst is not DPS.

I didnt say burst , you did . I can sustain that damage in pve too . I rarely use utilitys except to escape damage . I use only weapon skills for damage and I do tons of it lol . You just are not using the proper traits and weapons !

Extreme.8350:

Burst is not DPS.

I’m done here.

Ill give you a heads up . Try greatsword and sceptor / pistol . Trait for zerker phantasms and give them the extra health and watch them drop everything in sight with ease .

Mesmers damage isn’t the lowest of all classes…But it isnt that great.

Anet nerfed the increase from ranger runes from phantasms and minipets so theres a dps loss there. Also most of your phantasms will not stay up during an entire fight. Sure in AC you can say “OMG my warden was doing mad damage on that spider queen and didnt die once” but in other scenarios that wont happen. My phantasms die almost immediately at arch diviner, or at lupi. Alot of mesmers power from aa chain comes from having 3 phantasms up which is not easy to do. Also in short fights a mesmer has to create the phantasms which is already time lost.

The reason why mesmer is no longer in the meta is because its dps is worse than guardian and it has worse general utilities. The only times people use mesmer is for portals (at least in speedruns). I definitely think it needs a buff in pve since its harder and more interesting than guard.

edit: this came in after i posted

Bonedoctor.2796:

Ill give you a heads up . Try greatsword and sceptor / pistol . Trait for zerker phantasms and give them the extra health and watch them drop everything in sight with ease .

LOLOOLOL! top kek! now can we have serious discussion plz no more jokes

While I agree the dps is a bit of an odd things on Mer it sounds to me that you might need to try other tactics. Don’t forget their DPS comes from clones, phantasms and reflects that read differently than simply cleaving into a mob, not to mention that simply putting on zerk gear won’t make you awesomesause .
How about instead of pointing and laughing at OP you give them information ,okay ?

I don’t run this build but I have taken things from this post and it helped out with beefing up the dps rather a bit.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1bohri/mesmer_might_stacking_v20/

Wish I had more to share but I’v only been running Mer for 2 weeks now.

Nope , im talking both . They did nerf them but they are still more than viable . They take fine tuning and understanding there skill rotations . Your phantasm getting killed is part of that . I count on that due to the debuffs they put off on there deaths . That is actually a huge part of there dps many people are missing ( I think) . I feel like there still to strong and need another nerf but thats me apparently . I never ever even keep them up long enough to get killed , I pop them myself by restarting the rotations and pulling them back out again . Heck I brought my brothers back to this game by showing them how to play it . Now they can run any content and not feel like there useless . I am not trying to sound like an elitist , I just dont know what you guys arent doing , there dps is kinda like nonstop burst with 0 cd’s and mini tanks to keep threat off you and unlimited ways to escape death . There just an amazing class that is so powerful I get bored playing it now .

Mesmer DPS is a little low. While slightly out-dated i reference this spreadsheet.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bAcpwAdwB24CxK_Ziy8ygISUHCkQepLfRMh2_PtP52o/edit#gid=1883199869
Since mesmer have not had a damage increase it should be accurate for them. These would all be ideal situations and doesn’t account for when Phants die. The only time to take a Mesmer would be for using both Reflect and Portal in the 2-3 places its useful in dungeons. Pre Time Warp nerf we definitely had a place but now we are bottom tier imo.

Might be outdated but there are many classes with higher dps:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bAcpwAdwB24CxK_Ziy8ygISUHCkQepLfRMh2_PtP52o/edit#gid=1883199869
Of course Mesmers have other advantages. But they suck in situations were illusions die immediatly.

A real problem about Mesmers is the leveling experience because they really need traits to for damage.

The OP doesn’t make his case well, but there is a damage problem with Mesmer.

Mesmer only does good damage in very specific situations. I can assure you that they are the worst damage when it comes to killing trash. This makes them awful in open world.

I don’t see why a class that has absolutely insane amounts of conditions and mechanical tricks in pve and pvp has any right to pump out the same level of damage as other classes

rapthorne.7345:

I don’t see why a class that has absolutely insane amounts of conditions and mechanical tricks in pve and pvp has any right to pump out the same level of damage as other classes

Except every other class can also do this.

While reading here I remember why I normaly kick any mesmer in dungeons / fotm with less than 10k AP, and even those are most of the time just bad…

Mesmer dps is low. If you say you hit hard with mes, you either only play mes, play other classes wrong or you just play a different game.

If you want to get more damage, mantra of pain is a dps increase against 4-5 targets or when you are ranged. Just make sure to NEVER EVER break the sword aa. It’s also the best utility slot for short encounters, like pretty much always in dungeons.

This is why we need DPS meters in this game, so mentally handicapped people aren’t allowed to say mesmer DPS in practice is high. It’s terrible, and the biggest crime of lack of dps meters is that a bunch of pvp/wvw tryhards who blow someone up with a mindwrack think the damage is fine.

Weapon attacks offer reliable sustained damage.

Reflects and phantasms, in contrast, are very situational. (Note how they’re not used for sustained DPS in WvW/PvP.)

Shattering is purely burst damage. (Note how it’s basically not used at all in PvE.) On top of that, a “proper” shatter burst — one that’s not rather easily dodged — involves either precise timing or precise positioning.

A mesmer’s direct damage outside these situations is… kinda sad.

Probably also worth noting that you could significantly boost the power of our auto-attacks without actually powering up burst or reflect much.

Zenith.7301:

This is why we need DPS meters in this game, so mentally handicapped people aren’t allowed to say mesmer DPS in practice is high. It’s terrible, and the biggest crime of lack of dps meters is that a bunch of pvp/wvw tryhards who blow someone up with a mindwrack think the damage is fine.

We can already calculate DPS in PvE and it has been done numerous times by DnT and others.

Mesmer burst damage is pretty high but the ramp up is kind of meh and requires hitting 4 Mind Wrack for optimal damage. Which can be hit or miss and as the above poster noted, requires good coordination.

Mesmer burst is as high as the dps of other classes … Yet if other classes burst … well x.x

pwahahahahhaha.. sorry.. mesmer joke..

Obtena.7952:

I can assure you that they are the worst damage when it comes to killing trash.

We can close this thread now, Obtena has assured us.

Bonedoctor.2796:

Nope , im talking both . They did nerf them but they are still more than viable . They take fine tuning and understanding there skill rotations . Your phantasm getting killed is part of that . I count on that due to the debuffs they put off on there deaths . That is actually a huge part of there dps many people are missing ( I think) . I feel like there still to strong and need another nerf but thats me apparently . I never ever even keep them up long enough to get killed , I pop them myself by restarting the rotations and pulling them back out again . Heck I brought my brothers back to this game by showing them how to play it . Now they can run any content and not feel like there useless . I am not trying to sound like an elitist , I just dont know what you guys arent doing , there dps is kinda like nonstop burst with 0 cd’s and mini tanks to keep threat off you and unlimited ways to escape death . There just an amazing class that is so powerful I get bored playing it now .

This entire paragraph says to me that you’ve never stepped foot inside a dungeon. Mini tanks that keep threat off you? Actually having phantasms that survive for their cds? This is open world rambling, not anything worthwhile.

Obtena.7952:

The OP doesn’t make his case well, but there is a damage problem with Mesmer.

Mesmer only does good damage in very specific situations. I can assure you that they are the worst damage when it comes to killing trash. This makes them awful in open world.

Engineer says hi

Slackoth.2108:

Obtena.7952:

The OP doesn’t make his case well, but there is a damage problem with Mesmer.

Mesmer only does good damage in very specific situations. I can assure you that they are the worst damage when it comes to killing trash. This makes them awful in open world.

Engineer says hi

Engineer with 1500 range spammable aoes, spammable pbaoes, spammable cone aoes, and multiple autoattack aoes? Right…

Slackoth.2108:

Obtena.7952:

The OP doesn’t make his case well, but there is a damage problem with Mesmer.

Mesmer only does good damage in very specific situations. I can assure you that they are the worst damage when it comes to killing trash. This makes them awful in open world.

Engineer says hi

According to Brazil from DnT, Engineer does really good dps in PvE, while providing Might and Vulnerability. But for that, you need to be really good at playing it, as you have quite a long rotation to follow for max-dps and stuff.

Well, professions need to stay different. Sure warrior has excellent dps, but I much prefer to play a burst mesmer build than a boring warrior in pvp and WvW. The big offenders here are the bosses doing crazy one-shot AoE damage. If Anet doesn’t change its way to design dungeons, mesmer is not likely to be really useful in the near future.

That being said, without even talking about phantasm life-span, there are some inequalities in damage that make no sense! Why is Spatial Surge one of the worst ranged AA in the game? They should compact the damage ticks and reduce the cast time.

Edit*** This post is referencing data I took solo in game quite a while ago. It does not account for group buffs and Might scaling.

Mesmer sustained ‘DPS’ is dependent on how many phantasms are on the board.

3 Phantasms = very good
2 Phantasms = slightly above average DPS
1 Phantasm = below average DPS
0 Phantasm = poor DPS

If you can average 2+ Phantasms you’re doing pretty good. I’ve done extensive testing across many classes and the only thing that significantly beats 3x phantasm is fire staff ele. I did not include Ice Bows in my testing. I’d consider Mesmer to have the ability to compete with top tier DPS dependent on Phantasms.

Just because you see big numbers on one attack doesn’t mean that some class/build necessarily has good sustained dps.

If they would just make Phantasms immune to aoe damage in PvE we’d be in a great spot.

Realistically everything pales in comparison to Ele with Icebows it seems like right now.

Not everyone can be a press-1-2-warrior.

Some people here clearly have no clue about profession dps.

It’s not the newest stuff here, but it’s still fairly accurate:
http://gw2dps.david-reess.de/

have fun with it

Xyonon.3987:

Some people here clearly have no clue about profession dps.

It’s not the newest stuff here, but it’s still fairly accurate:
http://gw2dps.david-reess.de/

have fun with it

That’s the first time I’ve seen this. Came back to the game not too long ago. How was it validated?

30 secs recorded clips. Is outdated tho. Is from some patches ago, before might nerf and ranger buff for instance.
Go to DnT forum for all the stuff.

So the data is coming from actual recorded game play?

yep.
I think DeKeyz did the maths, and then they test it and recorded on the mists
http://www.dtguilds.com/forum/m/6563292/viewthread/13987449-dps-estimates-for-each-professions-in-30s-battles

Ok then, I see some damage modifiers didn’t hit phantasms so I can see where the DPS discrepancy comes from as buffs are applied. In a vacuum, with no party buffs and three Phantasms Mesmer does well with my in game testing but I was not able to account for group play.

Bloodgruve.6038:

3 Phantasms = very good
2 Phantasms = slightly above average DPS
1 Phantasm = below average DPS
0 Phantasm = poor DPS

A good description.

The one issue is that it doesn’t take into account that most of our phantasms are single-target.

When the meta is “Stack and Kill”, Mesmer isn’t doing that great. Factor in that our only two phantasms that do AOE damage are Greatsword and Sword … and that Sword is our best DPS … and Greatsword dmg is low at close range (after Mirror Blade) … you’re stuck with either:

• One single-target phantasm as you do Sword+Focus/+X
• Sub-par AA dmg with Greatsword as you do Sword+Focus/Greatsword.

That being said … thankfully we have timewarp so the speed-run teams think we’re actually useful since we can increase their DPS by ~50%.

I’d rather say
3 phants = good
2 phants = acceptable
1 phant = low
0 phants = poor

Yet often 2 phants > 3 phants cuz sigil cast time is just too long. You deal more damage by phant swap phant aa (short encounter).

Lately I’ve gotten in a habit of exploiting ooc weapon swaps during phantasm casts. The process is, start with sword/sword + focus (or staff if you expect boss to have 4 or more unique condis) and:

- Be in Sw/F
- Start summoning Warden
- Equip Pistol while Warden cast is channeled (double-click Pistol in inventory)
- Summon Duelist
- Swap to Sw/Sw
- Summon Swordman

There ya go, you just summoned 3 phantasms in like 3 sec. Your dps is only 3.7% less than 2xSw + 1xDuelist but you actually reached your peak dps almost instantly and still have the signet of ether available to refresh both the swordsman and the duelist in case they die later on. Or, if you’re so good that your phantasms will stay alive – equip mantra heal for +4% personal dps and a convenient way to keep your scholar bonus up vs small hits.

Moral of the story – if you want to dish out competitive dps in the burst-y nature of the current dungeon meta, you have to exploit.

damage isnt the only problem. i just specced full mantra 66002 with the maximum crit i can get with an average equipment, exotics armor and weapons and ascended rings etc. and gs/scepterpistol (jsut for the sake of being a ranged mesmer)
if the tequatl fight is somehow an average test for average players for a long enough fight with lots of movement, dodge and jump escapes and on top of it condition cleaning, hp reg etc.
this spec shows somehow what is wrong. u are constantly out fight because you: rebuff mantras instead of fighting almost permanently (no difference if u have 3 mantraloads or jsut 2 tbh), rezz people here and there, recast your phantasms for “full damage” almost permanently and WALKING (comapred ot other classes speed) between the combatlocations.
you are dumped down to make a "kitten"load of damage or nothing, and i mean “kitten” not load.
its the constant feeling of hmm.. a guy waiting for his girl to get dressed up and makeup ready for the club, while others already have their drinks at the bar.

but anet has a solution for it!. just pickup the eles icebow!
sure, you can use better specs . or go melee weapons only. but this can´t be the status nor the solution for a profession, after more than 2 years tbh. just using a weaponsetup givne by teh classdesigners and…being subpar with damage (i usually dont care about the damage tbh) AND selfgimping mechanics during bossfights (i did all dungeons including arah -no speedruns no eploits no cheesing- and a few fractals before i quit the game for over a year).
anyway who cares^^. i just have a foible for weird classes (i played warlock and HoX before)

frifox.5283:

Lately I’ve gotten in a habit of exploiting ooc weapon swaps during phantasm casts.

You can also trait the pistol and untrait it so the icon gets swapped → duellist duellist swordsmen.

Works with any range / radius changing trait.

hardloop von edgehoven.8512:

damage isnt the only problem. i just specced full mantra 66002 with the maximum crit i can get with an average equipment, exotics armor and weapons and ascended rings etc. and gs/scepterpistol (jsut for the sake of being a ranged mesmer)
if the tequatl fight is somehow an average test for average players for a long enough fight with lots of movement, dodge and jump escapes and on top of it condition cleaning, hp reg etc.

I’d say that at tequatl you as a mesmer should not go full kitten – i mean full mantra – as your job is more the feedback of fingers than to try to outdps an ele on an uncrittable dragon.

frifox.5283:

Lately I’ve gotten in a habit of exploiting ooc weapon swaps during phantasm casts. The process is, start with sword/sword + focus (or staff if you expect boss to have 4 or more unique condis) and:

- Be in Sw/F
- Start summoning Warden
- Equip Pistol while Warden cast is channeled (double-click Pistol in inventory)
- Summon Duelist
- Swap to Sw
- Summon Swordman

There ya go, you just summoned 3 phantasms in like 3 sec. Your dps is only 3.7% less than 2xSw + 1xDuelist but you actually reached your peak dps almost instantly and still have the signet of ether available to refresh both the swordsman and the duelist in case they die later on. Or, if you’re so good that your phantasms will stay alive – equip mantra heal for +4% personal dps and a convenient way to keep your scholar bonus up vs small hits.

Moral of the story – if you want to dish out competitive dps in the burst-y nature of the current dungeon meta, you have to exploit.

I do that for stacking might on my ele and havent thought on do it on memser
…
I dont think anyone consider this and exploit on eles, so.why should.be and exploit onesmers? I also exploit the toss abilities on engi to prestack might, dont thinik is anexploit either

Why does the kittenfilter catch the word d_erp?

When I first got GW2 I read the descriptions of the classes and thought Mesmer sounded a lot of fun. I tried it out as my first character, didn’t even get to the champ oak (as it was back then) before thinking it was really weak when other players were massacring stuff. It got deleted.

I then tried other classes, ranger, engy, necro, guardian and ele. It was hard work but eventually I deleted all but ele and have learnt to use staff ele for over a year and run that or D/F but not often S/D or S/F. All I can say is when I finally got Mesmer to 80 and tried the high dps builds for them is that I was severely underwhelmed.

To me it feels like I’m playing a cut price guardian in PvE. In WvW it’s a lot more enjoyable due to the burst nature of shatter but…well, I have a thief which can wreck people a lot easier, safer and I don’t become mostly useless (or a veil bot) if 30 people show up.

I want to play Mesmer more but that mantra damage trait is awful to play with, especially comparing to other classes I play more of. I feel that other classes can put in half the effort and do better than a Mesmer and most of the problems with damage are simply that there’s either way too much cleave in the game or phantasms just don’t stay up long enough.

The only other class I feel is less useful in PvE is necro but even then they have pretty decent damage in that it doesn’t drop every time a boss does AoE and well of darkness.

Who cares about PVE o.o WVW and PVP ftw.

Sword #1 damage could be buffed. It is really weak and no incentive to stay in melee. To get a three hit combo to remove one boon is just nothing you would risk to take huge damage for. There’s also the option to just let the clones hit for the boon rip effect.

I’d like a trait (inspired by one of the revenant traits) to take less damage from enemies right next to you too. Range >130 ~175

Making melee mesmer a thing… would be awesome.