Guild Wars 2

Swag Captain.5318:

Little unnecessary changes do irk me, do not get me wrong. But almost a decade of dealing with them has pretty much built up a lack of caring in the end. :P Sorry.

If you don’t care, then don’t dismiss those who do. Just move on and play.

Swag Captain.5318:

In no way did I say I’m a top player. BUT this isn’t my first rodeo and as with all MMOs, there are eternal truths.

You’ve just witnessed one of the big ones: If it is Exploitable, They Will Fix It Sooner or Later.

Also, as for the other comments.. I don’t PvP here mainly because I’m not a fan of rushdown tactics and can’t really do the fast-paced style it’s presented here. Last game I was reaaaally into the PvP scene was Shadowbane (mainly because you were forced to be). That might be a big part of it and I do understand how frustrating it is for you guys to lose a go-to skill, but you just need to learn to adapt.

Little unnecessary changes do irk me, do not get me wrong. But almost a decade of dealing with them has pretty much built up a lack of caring in the end. :P Sorry.

Eww, Shadowbane was, and ended a decade ago…

It was clear you were a RP PvE’r only.

It’s your ignorance that’s betrayed you. You’d of been better to have kept your words to yourself, or at the very least asked humbly to become informed.

Define your exploitable please.

lol

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it. This can also apply to using mechanics which do work in ways they were not intended to be used which, once again, give a significant edge over those who do not/cannot. Classic examples of former include the infamous Bottomless Box glitch from Dark Souls and the Power Island from Ultima 1 which gave you a weapon that was better than the one you were holding and could be used infinitely, resulting in a very low level character being able to steamroll most things. The latter include the BubbleHearthing Paladin from World Of Warcraft and the Slots-Pause cheat in Final Fantasy VI.

Swag Captain.5318:

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it. This can also apply to using mechanics which do work in ways they were not intended to be used which, once again, give a significant edge over those who do not/cannot. Classic examples of former include the infamous Bottomless Box glitch from Dark Souls and the Power Island from Ultima 1 which gave you a weapon that was better than the one you were holding and could be used infinitely, resulting in a very low level character being able to steamroll most things. The latter include the BubbleHearthing Paladin from World Of Warcraft and the Slots-Pause cheat in Final Fantasy VI.

Yeah, the problem is that this has been working as intended for almost 2 years. All of a sudden they come up and apparently it’s a ‘bug’ now. That’s not ok, particularly when the skill itself is still broken enormously, and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

aaaaaand mesmer swap is exploitable because?

Problem is this “exploit” wasn’t giving any unfair advantage as I can tell. It was a bandaid on a skill that is horribly broken.

Now it’s even more worthless.

It was exploitable because the Swap skill specifically states “Swap places with your Clone. Immobilize nearby foes.” If you have no clone (specifically one spawned by the initial Illusionary Leap skill) you can’t swap places with one. The fact that people were still able to after the clone was destroyed means this was a bug and therein could be exploited if utilized in certain ways, such as Blinking away from your immobile foes.

Swag Captain.5318:

It was exploitable because the Swap skill specifically states “Swap places with your Clone. Immobilize nearby foes.” If you have no clone (specifically one spawned by the initial Illusionary Leap skill) you can’t swap places with one. The fact that people were still able to after the clone was destroyed means this was a bug and therein could be exploited.

Honestly, you can repeat that all you want, but it doesn’t make it less false. Your perspective as having played a mesmer for just a couple of weeks is unfortunately shallow, and quite honestly you have no idea what you’re talking about.

Swag Captain.5318:

It was exploitable because the Swap skill specifically states “Swap places with your Clone. Immobilize nearby foes.” If you have no clone (specifically one spawned by the initial Illusionary Leap skill) you can’t swap places with one. The fact that people were still able to after the clone was destroyed means this was a bug and therein could be exploited.

Yes but the fact this skill rarely works when it SHOULD is more of a problem then what this “exploit” was.

Fay.2357:

… and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

Hyperbole!

Swag Captain.5318:

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it.

This is GW2. Lots and lots of things don’t really work as intended. I’m not sure how iLeap being a bad version of Infiltrator’s Strike was really an “exploit,” though.

At the end of the day, they took a flaky skill with poorly-documented functionality and made it terrible. It’s still flaky. Why, it’s actually flakier now, since you’re way more likely to hit Swap and go nowhere.

Fay.2357:

Swag Captain.5318:

It was exploitable because the Swap skill specifically states “Swap places with your Clone. Immobilize nearby foes.” If you have no clone (specifically one spawned by the initial Illusionary Leap skill) you can’t swap places with one. The fact that people were still able to after the clone was destroyed means this was a bug and therein could be exploited.

Honestly, you can repeat that all you want, but it doesn’t make it less false. Your perspective as having played a mesmer for just a couple of weeks is unfortunately shallow, and quite honestly you have no idea what you’re talking about.

+1

ASP.8093:

At the end of the day, they took a flaky skill with poorly-documented functionality and made it terrible. It’s still flaky. Why, it’s actually flakier now, since you’re way more likely to hit Swap and go nowhere.

But you got that 1 second of cripple. Actually, they should probably nerf that too.

ASP.8093:

Fay.2357:

… and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

Hyperbole!

Swag Captain.5318:

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it.

This is GW2. Lots and lots of things don’t really work as intended. I’m not sure how iLeap being a bad version of Infiltrator’s Strike was really an “exploit,” though.

At the end of the day, they took a flaky skill with poorly-documented functionality and made it terrible. It’s still flaky. Why, it’s actually flakier now, since you’re way more likely to hit Swap and go nowhere.

This is true. I’ve actually been using it to quickly swap targets before whatever I’m fighting goes down and sometimes the clone doesn’t even spawn, or worse nothing happen. Happened before the fix and seems to be happening more often after it so here’s hoping they get on that soon.

DaShi.1368:

ASP.8093:

At the end of the day, they took a flaky skill with poorly-documented functionality and made it terrible. It’s still flaky. Why, it’s actually flakier now, since you’re way more likely to hit Swap and go nowhere.

But you got that 1 second of cripple. Actually, they should probably nerf that too.

Yeah Mesmers shouldn’t be able to cripple at all, I mean like that would make them even more OP!

ASP.8093:

Fay.2357:

… and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

Hyperbole!

No it’s not.

Mesmer isn’t viable at high level tpvp, and hasn’t been for over a year.

Mesmer is only useful for portal/veil/null field in large group WvW. You can’t do damage, you can’t tag, why play?

Mesmer does lower damage than most other classes in PvE. We have (had?) good reflects, but much of our reflect ability is bound to the iWarden, which is the least functional skill in the entire game. On top of that, more and more bosses are becoming unreflectable, making our key role less and less needed.

That leaves open world PvE and WvW roaming. Open world PvE doesn’t count for anything, so that leaves WvW roaming. Roaming in anything but a PU condie build is generally a poor idea, as you’ll get gangbanged and killed, and PU power builds have received a massive nerf with this iLeap change.

So. Not hyperbole. Just reality. Lots of good reasons why I’m not playing this game anymore.

Wait. You think Phantasmal Warden is less useful than Phantasmal Mage? I’m really going to have to disagree with you there.

Swag Captain.5318:

Wait. You think Phantasmal Warden is less useful than Phantasmal Mage? I’m really going to have to disagree with you there.

I didn’t say least useful. I said least functional.

When you summon phantasmal mage, you know that it will work. It’s not going to do much, but it’ll do it.

When you summon phantasmal warden, flip a coin. If the coin lands heads, it does nothing and stares at the mob. If the coin lands tails, it probably still does nothing and stares at the mob.

Frankly I blame PU.

jk

But seriously I think there is a lot of misunderstanding of what mesmers actually need to do to gain proper momentum, making a already unreliable method of using our ONLY active immobilize even more unreliable (because stuns are easier to escape) seems justified in their eyes.

I personally find it super ironic that the class that requires the most set up has the most unreliable way of landing after the set up.

That’s how the Mage has been acting for me. If it spawns at all. Duelist is bugged but only when targeting anything that isn’t an enemy that can fight back. It also seems to take a second or two to start up its attack from time to time, but that might be lag on my end.

Fay.2357:

ASP.8093:

Fay.2357:

… and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

Hyperbole!

No it’s not.

Mesmer isn’t viable at high level tpvp, and hasn’t been for over a year.

Mesmer is only useful for portal/veil/null field in large group WvW. You can’t do damage, you can’t tag, why play?

Mesmer does lower damage than most other classes in PvE. We have (had?) good reflects, but much of our reflect ability is bound to the iWarden, which is the least functional skill in the entire game. On top of that, more and more bosses are becoming unreflectable, making our key role less and less needed.

That leaves open world PvE and WvW roaming. Open world PvE doesn’t count for anything, so that leaves WvW roaming. Roaming in anything but a PU condie build is generally a poor idea, as you’ll get gangbanged and killed, and PU power builds have received a massive nerf with this iLeap change.

So. Not hyperbole. Just reality. Lots of good reasons why I’m not playing this game anymore.

I’ve been on the edge of leaving for a while now this last round has done me in, I’ll now be seriously looking for an alternate MMO including Fay’s suggestion of Dragon Nest.

I’m really very unhappy.

And you think dead clone swap gives you advantage over others? How about other professions where immobilize doesn’t need such large choreograph and you only have one chance to dodge it? You can play word game if you want but in terms of balance I don’t see any advantage over it.

johnnyg.3186:

I’m really very unhappy.

Seconded. I can’t remember when I’ve been more disappointed with this game. This on top of a sobering string of really kittenty drops have soured my experience in GW2.

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

This is what it must feel like to be a Ranger

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

I second this. IMO, since we rely on Illusions for a vast majority of damage, I propose they raise the health significantly (Maybe 3/5 of the player’s for most and double that for Phantasmal Defender)

Swag Captain.5318:

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

I second this. IMO, since we rely on Illusions for a vast majority of damage, I propose they raise the health significantly (Maybe 3/5 of the player’s for most and double that for Phantasmal Defender)

But that won’t work because they would constantly get the “Mesmers are too OP” threads from those who are inexperienced fighting a mesmer. If you learn how to pick a mesmer out from their clones they can become quite easy to deal with. Sadly I think the only way to truly fix this class is to just cut out its dependence on AI based skills(clones/illusions).

Let’s have some fun in the Mists.

1. Equip GS + S/S or something similar. Take Deceptive Evasion like nearly everyone does.
2. Throw iZerker on a training dummy.
3. Throw iSwordsman on the training dummy.
4. Activate iLeap on the training dummy.
5. Pretend you’re under attack. Dodge, dodge!
6. Now try to Swap.
:/

1. Stand in front of the warrior dummy ^H^H^H^H NPC.
2. Activate iLeap targeting him.
3. Wait 1 second for the warrior NPC to swing his hammer. (Clone goes SPLAT!)
4. Now try to Swap.
:/

ASP.8093:

Let’s have some fun in the Mists.

1. Equip GS + S/S or something similar. Take Deceptive Evasion like nearly everyone does.
2. Throw iZerker on a training dummy.
3. Throw iSwordsman on the training dummy.
4. Activate iLeap on the training dummy.
5. Pretend you’re under attack. Dodge, dodge!
6. Now try to Swap.
:/

Oh man. I don’t even…

Hmm.. true true.. kitten ed if they do, kitten ed if they don’t. Although my main concern is still MH Pistols (I want it so bad ._.), a buff to the class that’s beneficial without being broken is what’s most important. Leveling a mesmer is a huge nightmare compared to the other classes mainly because of the low Self-Damage Output and having little to no control over your illusions and where they are/when they attack. It wouldn’t be so bad if each one had an autoattack they used before their big hit coolsdown (Phantasmal Duelist, for example, would unload upon spawning, just shoot for low-ish damage after, then unload after 6 seconds.) and if you could give simple orders like “On me!” (Stops attacking and follows), “RUSH EM!” (Melee run in and attack, ranged stops where they are and attacks), and “Disperse!” (Each goes to how they act now). I’d gladly take this over the Shatter mechanic.

To clarify, this idea is a heavily simplified version of the Mastermind from CoH which is what I view the Mesmer as.

Fay.2357:

ASP.8093:

Let’s have some fun in the Mists.

1. Equip GS + S/S or something similar. Take Deceptive Evasion like nearly everyone does.
2. Throw iZerker on a training dummy.
3. Throw iSwordsman on the training dummy.
4. Activate iLeap on the training dummy.
5. Pretend you’re under attack. Dodge, dodge!
6. Now try to Swap.
:/

Oh man. I don’t even…

Made it into a vid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy3mYzwKWdk&feature=youtu.be

Bugs on bugs on bugs on bugs.

Or how everyone else will claim, “working as intended, just don’t dodge”.

Our beloved class is so riddled with issues now its just disheartening .

For what it’s worth
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Mes-iLeap-change-conflicting-mechanics-vid

Ross Biddle.2367:

For what it’s worth
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Mes-iLeap-change-conflicting-mechanics-vid

Basically meaning if you’re dealing with 2 people and you’re wanting to focus one of them but have to dodge heavy attacks from the other twice before leaping iLeap is useless.

Silent Avenger.6928:

Ross Biddle.2367:

For what it’s worth
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Mes-iLeap-change-conflicting-mechanics-vid

Basically meaning if you’re dealing with 2 people and you’re wanting to focus one of them but have to dodge heavy attacks from the other twice before leaping iLeap is useless.

There’s any number of things you could do. Even block with scepter 2 or OH sword 4, or accidentally produce a scepter 1 clone. You could even summon a third phantasm, either off a weapon or utility.

I think I’d be fine with the new functionality if they reduced the cooldown to, oh, about six seconds before trait reductions.
(Yes, I realize this would lead to a mountain of mesmer hate on the forums.)

Many of our skills have subtleties which aren’t explicitly stated on the tooltip, like the fact that Phase Retreat teleports you backward if you have no target, or that some clone spawning skills (Mirror Images, iRiposte, iCounter) warp you back to the point of clone spawn, or who a 0-clone Diversion targets, or what happens with clone spawns when you have no target, or all the weird rules behind where you can blink or phase retreat up a cliff or height.

It’s not explicitly stated what happens to Swap if you clone dies. Most of us assumed it was just another of those interesting unstated quirks and have come to rely on it since launch. Others have already already shown how useful it was and I’ll just add a +1 to all that and the rage at its removal. To just call something we’ve counted on since launch a bug and remove it without further explanation is baffling, especially for a skill which is already so dysfunctional. Very disappointing.

There’s another weird unstated quirk of iLeap which I haven’t seen mentioned yet. Although it has a cast time, whether or not it casts is determined by the conditions when you started the cast, not when the cast finishes, unlike all other spells. If you start the cast while out of range or LoS then finish while in range, the spell will fail, going on cd but spawning no clone. I think this is why many find it failing for no apparent reason. (The plus side is that while casting, you can dodge or run out of range or los and the clone will still spawn).

Ross Biddle.2367:

Fay.2357:

ASP.8093:

Let’s have some fun in the Mists.

1. Equip GS + S/S or something similar. Take Deceptive Evasion like nearly everyone does.
2. Throw iZerker on a training dummy.
3. Throw iSwordsman on the training dummy.
4. Activate iLeap on the training dummy.
5. Pretend you’re under attack. Dodge, dodge!
6. Now try to Swap.
:/

Oh man. I don’t even…

Made it into a vid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy3mYzwKWdk&feature=youtu.be

Bugs on bugs on bugs on bugs.

Not that this is any surprise. They fixed the bug. iLeap clone dies, you can’t swap. Broken as designed.

Unbelievably bad change for the Mesmer class. With this single change it removes so much counterplay that had made melee combat viable for the Mesmer under so many situations. This is coming from a Mesmer player that grew up on s/s+staff game play fighting outnumbered in both pve and wvw. That 2nd swap skill as a teleport, combo finisher, stun break….. this is an unbelievable big nerf for main hand sword. I’ve personally lost count of how many times that swap had saved me or allowed me to apply more pressure on the enemy….

Anet developers really has lost touch with reality.

This is the thing that bothers me, that skill was really useful in PvE. I used it all the time, because stupid bosses always 1 shot AOE all your clones anyway. I haven’t seen anyone complaining about this 1 skill. Whoever priorities their bug fixes hates mesmers. That’s pretty much it. This ‘nerf’ was pretty much out of no where.

Wow… just wow. Apparently, someone unlocked the 3rd sword skill, and decided it was terribly OP vs AoE spam, condi spam and zerker DPS bursts.

Seriously, that was the last thing that needed “fixing” in this terribly buggy and unreliable skill.

But once again, “bugs” which mesmers can benefit from should be rapidly “fixed”, while those who let 15 warden’s stop attacking, should not.

Linda Shors.5629:

There’s another weird unstated quirk of iLeap which I haven’t seen mentioned yet. Although it has a cast time, whether or not it casts is determined by the conditions when you started the cast, not when the cast finishes, unlike all other spells. If you start the cast while out of range or LoS then finish while in range, the spell will fail, going on cd but spawning no clone. I think this is why many find it failing for no apparent reason. (The plus side is that while casting, you can dodge or run out of range or los and the clone will still spawn).

I used to test it but came up with it’s neither of those; looks like you have to start close enough and end close enough, which is really inconsistent and annoying. I should retest it.

the thing that throws me off is the 34K health his warrior has. I wear Soldiers and stack Soldier crests and I can’t even get past 23K… what the hell?

This bug was known for a while, im surprised it took them this long to fix it, but yea, kitten needs to be fixed with the class in a positive manner too.

Come on Anet WTF is wrong with you.

I don’t care. I’ll say it now. The only reason I’m playing Guild Wars 2 and playing mesmer is the namesake.

I absolutely loved Guild Wars (1) and the gw1 Mesmer. When I heard mesmer was being released I was in tears of joy.

I can handle the pseudo thief mage archetype. Which the Mesmer was never really about…. But ok…

I can handle some bugs, and these are some horrific game breaking bugs (Warden… Still not fixed. Also it took them, what, 4 months to fix iZerker? Wtf…)

I can handle being nerfed, like the Blurred Frenzy double nerf

But this is just another nail in an already dead corpse. What do you want, Anet? Do you want the QQ tears of all Mesmers?

Please, out of mercy, delete this class.

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

No offense, but this was heavily abused by mesmers especially in PVP. Now, I’m not saying they don’t need to be buffed but abusing bugs like this was clearly not the skill’s intention by anet, it was not meant to be a teleport to avoid damage , anybody who thought that is not thinking clearly. Higher hp would help and i agree it needs it, but even the pathing of the skill itself is horridly buggy, it just needs to be re-worked entirely. It literally was never meant to be a way to avoid damage, it was meant to be a way to lock down your target, however since it was bugged, people abused it kitten and now are mad that it’s fixed.

blitzkrieg.2451:

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

No offense, but this was heavily abused by mesmers especially in PVP. Now, I’m not saying they don’t need to be buffed but abusing bugs like this was clearly not the skill’s intention by anet, it was not meant to be a teleport to avoid damage , anybody who thought that is not thinking clearly. Higher hp would help and i agree it needs it, but even the pathing of the skill itself is horridly buggy, it just needs to be re-worked entirely. There’s a plethora of other kitten anet could fix too with the class in it’s entirety.

Lol abused? It was a feature with a high skill cap for use. Abused my left testicle.

Fay.2357:

blitzkrieg.2451:

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

No offense, but this was heavily abused by mesmers especially in PVP. Now, I’m not saying they don’t need to be buffed but abusing bugs like this was clearly not the skill’s intention by anet, it was not meant to be a teleport to avoid damage , anybody who thought that is not thinking clearly. Higher hp would help and i agree it needs it, but even the pathing of the skill itself is horridly buggy, it just needs to be re-worked entirely. There’s a plethora of other kitten anet could fix too with the class in it’s entirety.

Lol abused? It was a feature with a high skill cap for use. Abused my left testicle.

A high skill cap? It was a BUGGED SKILL. What high skill cap are you referring to. It was a skill literally designed to immobilize your target into place to apply burst onto it. It was NEVER, EVER meant to be a consistent way to teleport away from damage and avoid burst, but since it was bugged it was used as such hence the fix. It is a nerf, but if people relied so much on a bugged skill then I don’t know what to say. It’s a nerf to people that heavily relied on a broken mechanic then I’m sorry , but that’s your loss. Now, moving onto positive fixes, make it’s pathing better, because right now when you use it , it’s wonky as kitten when you use on incline/decline areas and sometimes rubberbands when you leap. These need to be fixed please.

Lishtenbird.2814:

But once again, “bugs” which mesmers can benefit from should be rapidly “fixed”, while those who let 15 warden’s stop attacking, should not.

Well, to ANet “defense”, they didn’t fix it quickly. Unless 2 years count as quickly.
Not that it wasn’t a really really bad move anyway…

blitzkrieg.2451:

A high skill cap? It was a BUGGED SKILL. What high skill cap are you referring to. It was a skill literally designed to immobilize your target into place to apply burst onto it. It was NEVER, EVER meant to be a consistent way to teleport away from damage and avoid burst, but since it was bugged it was used as such hence the fix.

Good to know you work at ANet and have an insider’s insight on what’s working as intended, what’s bugged, and what the skill are intended to do.
For all of us normal folks, the tooltip described pretty well the function, and after two years it definitely looked like a feature.
While you are at it, could you take a look at the iMage? Its intended functionnality is obviously to “look stupid”, but it apparently bug and sometime inflict some confusion/retaliation xD