Guild Wars 2

Axe Warhorn Warrior here with dodge roll 100%uptime vigor swiftness condition purging based on raw damage pressure.

I think ill quit S PvP due to the large influx of unskilled Mesmers playing now that can beat me with little effort due to bug abuse from the survival based class.

I’m not entirely sure what the build everyone is using is but these mesmers I’m always fighting just run in circles beating the 1 button on their greatsword and only hitting Knockback and might. I could fight this, if it were not for the fact that every time they position swap or stealth it takes them 2-3 seconds to render on my screen and for that duration I was just bombed by their copies while i was forced to wait to see their position, and they spam 3 second invulnerability 3 times in the duration of a 30 second fight whenever i actually get up to them.
Yes thieves abuse the stealth bug as well but it is much more obvious where they are going to be than a mesmer running in circles at 1000 range.

Mesmers have turned into the Frost Mage of this game; They have been given so much utility, escape mechanics and decent control that just responding to a situation with 1 button stroke is all you need to win most fights, of course not to mention their health modifier IMO being way too high for a class with this much emphasis on survivability. This isnt a faceroll class but its way too freaking easy to play for how powerful it’s mechanics are by base

I lose to bad mesmers and i know they are bad because they take an eviscerate to the face without even attempting to dodge roll it. I’m forced to just flee from just about every mesmer fight because i cant catch up to them to do enough damage and they just button mash 1 and let their copies blow away my hp.
This just feels exactly like my paladin fighting a Frost Mage back in WoW where all the baddies had to do was hit whatever CD was up, hit blink if in trouble and run in circles button mashing Ice lance.

@OP – I feel you BUT… every build/class has its counterpart. So you cannot take a mesmer alone but this is not 1v1 tournament. Do not expect to take everyone down. Change builds, take a rifle etc. As Elementalist (using it for PvP) I also totally hate to take the rifle damage from behind… I feel like I am being squashed. Try it in my face… different story.

Mesmers need utility to survive. If this is nerfed they will be too easy to kill. Some Mesmers in GW1 were actually even more spikey.. 2 skills that cannot be cleansed were capable if draining your HP extremely fast. If there were hexes in GW2 it probably would make you quit.

The one thing I am sure of – whatever class and build you choose for PvP, there always will be another build to counter yours. There are also many Warrior newbie players dealing massive damage, also thieves… So your argument is not quite valid.

P.S. Visual lag is usually symptom for problems with graphics card resourses and also network lag – if it is lagging on certain animations it is the video card. I do not have any problems with my Radeon 5850 and it is by no means top notch.

Also, a good mesmer is the one you cannot catch or cannot bash to death.

Played 2-3 hr PvP. I find it easy against Warrior , thief. But not elementalist.

Azrael.1408:

@OP – I feel you BUT… every build/class has its counterpart. So you cannot take a mesmer alone but this is not 1v1 tournament. Do not expect to take everyone down. Change builds, take a rifle etc. As Elementalist (using it for PvP) I also totally hate to take the rifle damage from behind… I feel like I am being squashed. Try it in my face… different story.

Mesmers need utility to survive. If this is nerfed they will be too easy to kill. Some Mesmers in GW1 were actually even more spikey.. 2 skills that cannot be cleansed were capable if draining your HP extremely fast. If there were hexes in GW2 it probably would make you quit.

The one thing I am sure of – whatever class and build you choose for PvP, there always will be another build to counter yours. There are also many Warrior newbie players dealing massive damage, also thieves… So your argument is not quite valid.

P.S. Visual lag is usually symptom for problems with graphics card resourses and also network lag – if it is lagging on certain animations it is the video card. I do not have any problems with my Radeon 5850 and it is by no means top notch.

Also, a good mesmer is the one you cannot catch or cannot bash to death.

Feels that the mesmer is too strong against just about anything a Warrior can throw at them. Mesmer counters pretty much every warrior build ive seen or managed to make save for double sword flurry that bleeds themout fast but good mes always has a condition purge.

Mesmers have always been a pain for heavy melee oriented classes like Warriors and such but cannot advise on any counter tactics as I haven’t played warrior myself. I will suggest you to try a Mesmer in PvP and check what might be fa fault in yours or their tactics.

Greatsword mesmers depend on range and cannot block any attack with weapon skill (except for #5 skill) as long as they use this weapon.

If you’re getting beat down by clones it’s time for you to re-evaluate how much condition removal you have. Clones can’t hurt things on their own, only through a trait that gives them Bleed on crits. (Staff clones can apply conditions but you were talking specifically about greatsword users). The bleeds take awhile to stack and a single condition removal can wipe an entire stack.

Moreover, if the mesmser is built for condition damage, then the damage from the sword itself will be limited. If the sword hurts then the bleeds don’t matter as much. Since you’re already in heavy armor and since (based on the information you present) you’re good at dodging, I doubt the thing that’s hurting you is the direct damage.

You’re complaining that as long as the mesmer keeps you at range you’re going to lose, which is very probably true. In a ranged-heavy build they’ll probably win if you can’t close the gap. So quit focusing on the strengths and focus on the weaknesses. If you can get into melee range the effectiveness of the mesmser is going to drop sharply. They’ll be unable to do much of anything besides run for their lives (as opposed to other classes that can fight while applying CC or buffing nearby allies). Most mesmer defenses are selfish; they’re something that helps the mesmer and doesn’t help any of their allies.

Someone like you describe above is probably decked out with decoy (that’s how they leave a clone that you waste time attacking and appear a few seconds later), and signet of illusions (when they click it it refreshes the cooldown on shatters). I’ve noticed the mesmers I play with tend to always take Null Field and/or Feedback as one of their utilities. Unless they’re going for a mantra build it’s unlikely that they took Mantra of Restoration, so unless they’re Sylvari and really keen on the seed heal, they’ve taken Ether Feast as their heal. The elite is a bit of a wild card; invis gives them another escape, as does Morph, but both are on pretty long cooldowns. Time Warp is in high demand in group PvP stuff, but wouldn’t have too much impact on a 1 on 1 fight.

Assuming they’re not getting their distortion from a signet trait (1 sec of distortion when they use a signet) the only way they could get 3 distortions in 30 seconds would be using Distortion (the shatter) with three illusions up, then signet of illusions and another Distortion (need to have the illusions back to be useful though), and the onehanded sword #2 attack. So we know they’re using a sword/something as one weapon, and greatsword for their main set. Their offhand is a complete tossup; pistol would give them a high damage phantasm and a nice disabler, focus is the goto weapon for sieges and getting around, and a second sword could capitalize on the sword mastery trait and add another defensive option.

For this mesmer they’d be highly dependent on keeping their illusions available on short notice. They’ll spend time keeping you at a distance (greatsword’s attack deals higher damage the further away they are) and whenever you get close they’ll swap to running away as fast as possible. They’ll probably save their null field for cripple/frost effects so they can stay mobile. They’ll save clone till you get within a threatening distance. They’ll be relying on signet of illusions to add to the life of the clones so they can’t be burned right away, so it’s probably one of the last defenses they’ll use. They’ll save signet of illusions for when the other defenses aren’t available.

So, when the fight starts you’ll be at max range. This is because this sort of mesmer, when played well, will probably not bother to engage you UNLESS you’re already at max range. The clones will be an annoyance, but won’t really hurt you much. If the mesmer is wise he’s traited them so that when you kill them you’ll get crippled. If you get crippled he can keep you at range; if you don’t kill them he has them available to shatter for Distortion. The Phantasms can hurt you, but they’ll go down faster than a cheerleader on prom night if you get them as soon as they come out. Any time you run to close the distance the mesmer will run away; as long as he keeps you in his happy kill zone you’re going to lose.

This is called kiting. It’s extremely effective against classes that focus on melee.

You need to stop focusing on the strengths of a kiter, and instead focus on the weaknesses. First off this guy has pretty much nothing to support his allies. Just about all his skills help him and no one else. As you’re so fond of pointing out, all he has to do is keep you at bay and hit his #1GS attack and he’ll win. That’s because it’s pretty much all he’s GOT. He’s got his #1 attack and a set of utility skills all focused on keeping you at bay. He’s devoted all his characters strengths towards holding you at range and killing you there. That means he doesn’t have AoE that’s worthwhile. He doesn’t have support. He’s likely weak on self-healing. Once his defensive cooldowns are gone his bag of tricks is pretty much empty. His only real choices in a fight are “keep one enemy at range and hit him hard” or “run.” This character will add little to large group fights, and will probably be trying to flank the main battle to pick people off individually. If faced with any real pressure, and without defensive cooldown abilities, he’ll crumple like a paper towel in a few hits.

So, specific advice for you:
#1: don’t play his game. If you can’t close the distance on him and KEEP him in melee then don’t engage him at all. Otherwise you’re fighting a fight where he has the advantage AND you have a disadvantage. I’m not overly familiar with warriors, but from what I’ve seen of the players around me I believe you’ve got a short cooldown cripple on your rifle, and at least one “jump at the enemy” kinda skill. Use both to close that gap and force the mesmer to burn cooldowns. Your cripple is on a 10 sec cooldown; his cripple remover is on a 45sec cooldown. If you’ve got other options to root/slow/chill/cripple, take advantage of them to keep him from being able to run.
#2: try killing a clone to see what happens. If the clone cripples you then it’s probably a bad idea. If it doesn’t then you know he just wants to keep them around as a distraction and to shatter later. If he’s saving them for shatter, you can benefit by killing them.
#3: bring a friend. Some classes can do well against more than one character at once (guardians and engineers come to mind). This mesmer does not; he doesn’t have a reliable set of tools for handling more than one player at a time. A friend will let you close the gap, burn through his cooldowns and smack him down.
#4: for heaven’s sake, just run. Did you notice the one critical part of a successful kiting build that this guy lacks? He’s got no way to keep you from leaving whenever you want. He can only actually kill you if you let him keep you in his sweet spot. If you can’t close the gap and get to him (where he’s powerless) then just leave his range (which again leaves him powerless).

TL;DR-This is a character that is focused on a very specific activity: taking one person, keeping them at range and killing them quickly. It sucks agaisnt groups, can’t support his own group, dies quickly when caught, has no way to keep you IN range if you want to leave and will run away when defensive cooldowns are on cooldown. Whining about a kiter beating you while you let him kite you is kinda like an archer whining because the he couldn’t beat the fighter in melee. He’s a one-trick pony, and this is his one trick. He’ll suck at pretty much everything else, so use something else.

technosatyr.3784:

You need to stop focusing on the strengths of a kiter, and instead focus on the weaknesses. First off this guy has pretty much nothing to support his allies. Just about all his skills help him and no one else. As you’re so fond of pointing out, all he has to do is keep you at bay and hit his #1GS attack and he’ll win. That’s because it’s pretty much all he’s GOT. He’s got his #1 attack and a set of utility skills all focused on keeping you at bay. He’s devoted all his characters strengths towards holding you at range and killing you there. That means he doesn’t have AoE that’s worthwhile. He doesn’t have support. He’s likely weak on self-healing. Once his defensive cooldowns are gone his bag of tricks is pretty much empty. His only real choices in a fight are “keep one enemy at range and hit him hard” or “run.” This character will add little to large group fights, and will probably be trying to flank the main battle to pick people off individually. If faced with any real pressure, and without defensive cooldown abilities, he’ll crumple like a paper towel in a few hits.

So, specific advice for you:
#1: don’t play his game. If you can’t close the distance on him and KEEP him in melee then don’t engage him at all. Otherwise you’re fighting a fight where he has the advantage AND you have a disadvantage. I’m not overly familiar with warriors, but from what I’ve seen of the players around me I believe you’ve got a short cooldown cripple on your rifle, and at least one “jump at the enemy” kinda skill. Use both to close that gap and force the mesmer to burn cooldowns. Your cripple is on a 10 sec cooldown; his cripple remover is on a 45sec cooldown. If you’ve got other options to root/slow/chill/cripple, take advantage of them to keep him from being able to run.
#2: try killing a clone to see what happens. If the clone cripples you then it’s probably a bad idea. If it doesn’t then you know he just wants to keep them around as a distraction and to shatter later. If he’s saving them for shatter, you can benefit by killing them.
#3: bring a friend. Some classes can do well against more than one character at once (guardians and engineers come to mind). This mesmer does not; he doesn’t have a reliable set of tools for handling more than one player at a time. A friend will let you close the gap, burn through his cooldowns and smack him down.
#4: for heaven’s sake, just run. Did you notice the one critical part of a successful kiting build that this guy lacks? He’s got no way to keep you from leaving whenever you want. He can only actually kill you if you let him keep you in his sweet spot. If you can’t close the gap and get to him (where he’s powerless) then just leave his range (which again leaves him powerless).

TL;DR-This is a character that is focused on a very specific activity: taking one person, keeping them at range and killing them quickly. It sucks agaisnt groups, can’t support his own group, dies quickly when caught, has no way to keep you IN range if you want to leave and will run away when defensive cooldowns are on cooldown. Whining about a kiter beating you while you let him kite you is kinda like an archer whining because the he couldn’t beat the fighter in melee. He’s a one-trick pony, and this is his one trick. He’ll suck at pretty much everything else, so use something else.

Very imformative response, but i fail to do 2 things on your suggestions. I can chase after the mesmer all i want and dodge his punts and break his daze, ill never be crippled with warhorn #4 and both my warhorn traits turning conditions into boons, my healing removing 2 conditions and shouts removing totals of 4 conditions. The problem is that at the end of the day i can never catch up to him even at 100% movement speed because he has too much movement. I can immobilize on 10 sec CD and cripple him for 5 seconds but it doesnt stop him for long.

The second thing is that i cannot run away. Even deciding to run away with 16k hp left and stop trying to break his catapault, he stopped manning it and chased after me all the way to windmill before i couldnt stop tanking his greatsword Autos and clone bombing.

Im so tired of never being able to catch mesmers i just ignore them. Its a very sad fact but i usually just break or heavily damage catapaults instead of chasing them around like an idiot, or kill their teammates.

They are a 1 v 1 utility butt kitten class like the frost mage and I wouldnt be so mad if Spvp didnt force me to go 1 on 1 with people all the time, especially since i am warhorn/shouts.

I am sorry for the stupid question but where are your teammates at that time?

P.S. This profession is quite hard to deal with on 1v1 anyway.

Leaving Windmill to be lost to the enemy on their way to Zerg Clocktower

Funny thing is my teammates are never where i need them to be, always as far away as possible whenever i need support

“I lose to bad mesmers and i know they are bad because they take an eviscerate to the face without even attempting to dodge roll it. "

someone, somewhere, is saying “lol i beat bad warriors and i know their bad because i can facetank their eviscerate and not care.”

so far you’ve really only demonstrated that your one particular build (that apparently also lacks a weapon switch functionality, Mr. Warhorn) is incapable of taking on another specific mesmer build in a one on one scenario. do you really think this constitutes a major flaw in game design?

It wouldnt be so bad if virtually every build i went up against functioned the same way, whisping away numerous times with bouts of 3 second invulnerability

I have a mesmer that I mostly leveled up with staff, because I LOVE staff. I moved to pistol because I play WvW and I need higher DPS and even in dungeons you’re too slow.

I’ve been playing WvW mostly and when I get into solo fights, which is quite often, I don’t feel there is any class I don’t have a decent chance against. I use blink, +illusion health, +invis, +group invis. I have just about every +illusion dmg ability. So while people are trying to attack me, I’m invising and cloning and my duelists are shooting them to pieces. I can block an attack, such as when a great sword tries to zap me.

An interesting build I found that mostly helps for PvE is that you can have regen around your phantasms. And another tactic where you get protection when you get regen. So if you bring up a phantasm, you can have nearly permanent protection and regen. I’ve tanked pretty elite stuff. A forever 33% dmg reduction is huge.

Roll a Mesmer and learn the class. You’ll have a much easier time dealing with them if you do.

To be honest, when someone is saying that the endless kite possibility and escape artist tricks of the mesmer are a bit over the tope, it’s rather pointless to note that you shouldn’t ‘play his game’ or just ‘ignore them’.

That is exactly my problem with mesmers atm, they aren’t exactly massively OP or instagibbing entire zergs, the problem is that you can’t really force them into a fight and you have to try way too hard to catch them out.

In gw1 the mesmer was also the troll and annoying PvP class, but it lacked in direct damage and other departments. It’s great that some of that spirit is carried over into gw2, I just feel like the mix is a bit too strong at the moment. The escape options feel nearly limetless. Even at level 2 I was trolling entire zergs with my mesmer in WvW.

Out of this whole topic I just find it funny you claim all he has to do is run around spamming #1, but all the things you describe him doing require him to do much more then that.. Clones don’t just appear from nothing, #1 skill doesn’t invis you, you can’t teleport with #1 skill and you most certainly don’t get invulnerability from the #1 GS skill.. Might also comes from the #2 skill, and knockback is the #5..

It sure sounds to me like he’s using every hotkey on his bar(with both his weapon sets) and is able to outplay you like that, while you run around relying on 1 trick (mr warhorn) that isn’t working and claim it’s game inbalance.

Honestly dank, I have a friend who was utterly bad at the game. He was playing a mesmer and searched the internet for builds. One of them was a build similar to this one, both builds were easy enough to make him a nigh unkillable nuissance/force in sPvP and WvW.

I’m not saying that mesmer is a faceroll class, but the popular PvP builds are certainly no brain surgery. But your comment implies that the OP only uses one skill on his hotbar and by extention every other player experiencing the same problems when fighting a mesmer. It’s rather insulting to assume mesmers are outplaying most of the player base by ‘using all the skills on their skill bars, while the others use only one’. Because trust me, every class I play requires me to use all my skills, I haven’t find a gimmicky 1-skill-to-rule-them-all build yet.

When my friend, who I know is bad at PvP (he even admits it), is doing those things without any effort while laughing himself to death on ts, it sure does feel like a gameplay issue to me not a l2p issue. It’s little risk and effort, high reward at the moment.

you can’t spam 3 second invulnerability. it’s a very long cooldown on shatter, and it requires a melee weapon secondary that’s useless for ranged if it’s the weapon skill.

The sound of it is you are actually playing SKILLED mesmers if they’re using so many varied abilities at just the right time to beat you.

It’s pretty difficult to get all that timed.

Just be glad they’re not playing thief or guardian. The skill they learned by playing such an overcomplicated class (mesmers) would translate into godhood if they used another, simpler class of equal pvp prowess.

dank.3680:

Out of this whole topic I just find it funny you claim all he has to do is run around spamming #1, but all the things you describe him doing require him to do much more then that.. Clones don’t just appear from nothing, #1 skill doesn’t invis you, you can’t teleport with #1 skill and you most certainly don’t get invulnerability from the #1 GS skill.. Might also comes from the #2 skill, and knockback is the #5..

It sure sounds to me like he’s using every hotkey on his bar(with both his weapon sets) and is able to outplay you like that, while you run around relying on 1 trick (mr warhorn) that isn’t working and claim it’s game inbalance.

and in the mean time, unlike many other professions, his stacking teleports like that renders him FAR more vulnerable to casters and condition spammers. It’s a an anti-melee build!

i lose to necros and condition thieves all the time. can’t beat em. everything else i destroy.

every class has its weaknesses.

Very imformative response, but i fail to do 2 things on your suggestions. I can chase after the mesmer all i want and dodge his punts and break his daze, ill never be crippled with warhorn #4 and both my warhorn traits turning conditions into boons, my healing removing 2 conditions and shouts removing totals of 4 conditions. The problem is that at the end of the day i can never catch up to him even at 100% movement speed because he has too much movement. I can immobilize on 10 sec CD and cripple him for 5 seconds but it doesnt stop him for long.

What exactly is he doing to be able to evade you like that? The only build I can think of that would allow me to 100% evade you in those circumstances would use 6x Runes of the Centaur + one of the short cd heals (Mirror 15s or the healing Mantra) + at least 20pts in Chaos for boon duration increase.

Otherwise, staff has Phase Retreat that can be traited down to ~6s, but it’s only 600 range. There’s Blink which is on 30s cd or 24s traited, at 900 range. There’s Portal which is ~20s duration on 60s cd.

Is he teleporting around a lot? Disappearing and reappearing elsewhere a lot? Or perma-swiftness? Or something else?

Fwiw, here’s a good annotated vid of a thief dueling a good GS/Staff mesmer. Maybe it will help.

Mesmers are fine, people just fear them :P

So those 2-3 seconds you just run around in circles not going for his illusions?

Nice.

All signs point to anti-melee build, brother. I do not use that same setup myself, but play an anti-melee build staff/sword in spvp with focus on mobility.

Condition builds on a decent player can wreck me.

Every build has its weakness, just like every other class.

PS- yes I always hated ice lance spam, but that’s WoW for you. That really is not comparable to this, though. I could say the same thing, that frost mages were the anti melee spec, but the way it became in the later (wrath+) game, it was incredibly strong verses anything at all. That is not the case with the Mesmer.

plasmacutter.2709:

you can’t spam 3 second invulnerability. it’s a very long cooldown on shatter, and it requires a melee weapon secondary that’s useless for ranged if it’s the weapon skill.

The sound of it is you are actually playing SKILLED mesmers if they’re using so many varied abilities at just the right time to beat you.

It’s pretty difficult to get all that timed.

Just be glad they’re not playing thief or guardian. The skill they learned by playing such an overcomplicated class (mesmers) would translate into godhood if they used another, simpler class of equal pvp prowess.

Why do people always assume that their class is the difficult one or their playstyle the one that is superior to others? I play/played all 3 classes mentioned (one of the great things about Guild Wars one and two) and all 3 classes are pretty equal in difficulty if you want to master them. Everyone can instagib lesser players with thief, everyone can survive long with a guardian and everyone can troll with the mesmer. That doesn’t make them good players. The problem is that if you master some of the other classes, it’s not nearly as effective as mastering the mesmer. There is no high skill, high reward for e.g thief or guardian. Most are forced into rather linear and gimmicky builds to be reasonably effective.

If a mesmer presses certain buttons at the right time, he wins 90% of the time. I can’t say that about most of the other classes. To me that IS a bit of a game imbalance. I hope they don’t nerf mesmer damage, that’s fine, but definatly the survivability and control they yield. Either that or they increase the build alternatives for other classes.

EDIT : one more thing, mesmer was my main in GW1, but it’s really not as subtle as it was there. It does remind me of WoW frost mages tbh, but with more escapes.

Pressing the right buttons in the right situation is almost always a win for any class. Its peoples’ fault that they use straightforward builds. For example, the majority of warriors use centric 100B builds (immobilize+100B is also just few buttons that work). This does not mean there are no other options. I have tried other builds that work well too.

I understand what you mean but mesmers here are all about control and utilities. Maybe it needs some more complexity added in some way but if you take away either control or survivability, the class will be useless.

Other classes need some more options for PvP so the build pool is increased.

But you cannot take away the strongest side of a class as it will break. It appears the above complaints go around the fact that mesmers are highly effective vs melee oriented characters.

Should I complain that my Elementalist can be few hitted from glass cannon thief if they catch me off-guard?
Warriors are meant to soak damage and deal such, they are not highly mobile class. Classes are different.

AND do not forget the PvP is team based, not 1v1. Pair with someone who can deal with those mesmers and you can take the rest. Discussing a class strengths in a vacuum and ideal conditions is just ridiculous.

P.S. Mesmers are tricky class with bag full of tricks that can be emptied quite fast if they do not play well. And we cannot compare with GW1 as back then they were much bigger nukers. Backfire (now confusion) can make you nuke yourself if you do not pay attention.

P.P.S. It appears that a lot of people playing a bulky characters are selfish and do not play as part of a team, which is more of a problem than class issues. This and that people always try to find the cookie-cutter. Then they complain when they get countered.

And I do not mean to offend anyone, just expressing my thoughts that the grass always look greener on the other side.

PvP balancing takes time and precise planning. I expect to have much more balanced PvP a year or so after release. Rushy decisions will lead to the opposite.

I tend to agree with most of what you said. And I don’t feel as it conflicts with anything I said. The difference is, a glass cannon backstab thief is very gimmicky and situational. Plus, every other thief build is rather underwhelming. Some classes have that one build which does well for the most part, but they all have glaring weaknesses. Mesmer lacks counters/weaknesses because other classes have a vast array of useless or less effective spells, which means they are stuck with a few cookie cutter builds.

So you are right, it’s less of a class problem and more of a game/other classes problem. But either they nerf the ‘bag of tricks’ of the mesmer, or they give other classes more ways to deal with it or give them more tricks of their own.

(On a sidenote, thief damage is getting nerfed and other parts buffed, I’m hoping for the best)

I think fixing the other classes and some skills/traits is the way to go. Nerfing utilities of a class will not fix broken or non-competitive stuff in other classes. Currently all classes need some fixing in one way or another.

Azrael.1408:

I think fixing the other classes and some skills/traits is the way to go. Nerfing utilities of a class will not fix broken or non-competitive stuff in other classes. Currently all classes need some fixing in one way or another.

True, but nerfing doesn’t mean breaking or eliminating. It’s perfectly possible to limit the amount of get out of jail cards on a mesmer without ruining the class. I still feel it’s a bit like this atm :

- Mesmer : Slight nerf on the abilities to escape
- Thief : Nerf backstab damage, but increase or buff other options
- Engineer and ranger need a slight (to major) buff and some aspects also need a complete overhaul.
- Guardian is fine and warrior could use a slight damage nerf but is fine overall.

Not too sure what’s up with elementalist since last update. Feels like they can survive pretty good atm.

I use to think that playing my mesmer required lots of skill — something I rationalized because there were very few mesmers, it was hard to play from lvl 1 to 30, etc.

Ever since rolling a GS+shatter mesmer I swear my play quality has dropped. Seriously it’s super easy in PvE and WvW. Open with GS4, GS2, dodge, auto, F1, dodge, GS2, auto, dodge, F1/F2, repeat…

Get a condition? mantra away two of them (and then another two if needed)
Need a breather? matra daze the foe.
Get CC’d? mantra away the CC and get stability for 2s.
Need another breather? mass invis, move, resume attack from a different angle

It’s not even hard anymore. I’m not even glass cannon with a stat distribution of: 2000 pwr, 1800 precision, 1300 toughness, 1250 vit.

It’s just easy. I swear there will be a DPS nerf to mesmer at some point. I just roll 1v1’s in WvW. The exception here is another GS+shatter mesmer which requires me to actually try (and usually comes down to who’s got the better gear).

Easiest builds to smash Mesmers are GS/Rifle (if you have the initiative) or Hammer / short Burst cycling (too much AOE and inherent CC/short range movement).

Axe is the most susceptible build to kiting.

Surprisingly, you get kited by a Mesmer using the strongest kite weapons (GS and Sword/x).

It’s just easy. I swear there will be a DPS nerf to mesmer at some point. I just roll 1v1’s in WvW. The exception here is another GS+shatter mesmer which requires me to actually try (and usually comes down to who’s got the better gear).

Nice Mantra build. It is pretty faceroll …

Until you get facerolled even hard by a backstab gimmick thief. Lawls.

“- Mesmer : Slight nerf on the abilities to escape” I laughed when read this. Mesmer does not have great abilities to escape. And you asked for a nerf on abilities to escape?

Can mesmer get away with a team of 10+ people zerging on his back? No. Mesmer can’t even get away against 2, 3 good players that can time their skills to combo lock down Mesmer. Multiple professions can get away from 2, 3 good players and Thief can get away even in the middle of 10+ people.

Mesmer has the slowest speed base. If Mesmer has to spec into speed/Invi build, he/she had to sacrificed a lot of good stats to have speed/invis build. And even with speed/invis build, Mesmer still can’t get away from group of people.

Wasabee.5031:

“- Mesmer : Slight nerf on the abilities to escape” I laughed when read this. Mesmer does not have great abilities to escape. And you asked for a nerf on abilities to escape?

Can mesmer get away with a team of 10+ people zerging on his back? No. Mesmer can’t even get away against 2, 3 good players that can time their skills to combo lock down Mesmer. Multiple professions can get away from 2, 3 good players and Thief can get away even in the middle of 10+ people.

Mesmer has the slowest speed base. If Mesmer has to spec into speed/Invi build, he/she had to sacrificed a lot of good stats to have speed/invis build. And even with speed/invis build, Mesmer still can’t get away from group of people.

I don’t know what kind of mesmer you are playing, but unless you are in a completly open space, you shouldn’t have a problem to kite people whatsoever. Maybe you can’t get away in a prolonged escape if you get caught, but that goes for any class. Thief only can do that with loads of initiative at his disposal.

It might be a tad different for me since I have low fps and seem to load people slower but also load slower myself on other people’s screen, but I’ve heard the same from people with better computers.

> these mesmers I’m always fighting just run in circles beating the 1 button on their greatsword

Hmm.

>only hitting Knockback

5 button.

>and might

2 button.

>I was just bombed by their copies

F1.

>they spam 3 second invulnerability 3 times in the duration of a 30 second fight

Either F4 or weaponswap to sword and 2.

Sounds to me like they’re using a ton of buttons! Not to mention that spamming as many shatters as you claim you were up against involves a ton of clone generation (dodging, phantasms, etc). Sounds like you got straight-up outplayed, sorry friend.

First off: this game isn’t balanced around 1-1s.

If you’re going around trying to get into 1-1s as a warrior you’re doing it wrong. Wait until there’s multiple people fighting run in and 100 derps everyone around.

Learn how to engage before you complain. Hardly Anets fault that you don’t know how to play your class.

If you like a class— you figure out how to make it work. Not vice versa.

Nero.8623:

First off: this game isn’t balanced around 1-1s.

If you’re going around trying to get into 1-1s as a warrior you’re doing it wrong. Wait until there’s multiple people fighting run in and 100 derps everyone around.

Learn how to engage before you complain. Hardly Anets fault that you don’t know how to play your class.

If you like a class— you figure out how to make it work. Not vice versa.

Why do these posts always have to revert to a L2P kittening contest? I thought the OP was rather reserved with his judgement and asked for some opinions. I see a few people here actually discussing and arguing in a polite way. Either giving tips about how to handle the situation better or voicing their opinion on the state of mesmer. Yet one out of every few posts is as impolite and arrogant as yours.

Dear Alfred,

If you weren’t getting crippled, and you have a warhorn that’d give you at least 50% swiftness uptime, what specifically was keeping you from closing the distance with the mesmer? Mesmers don’t have too many options for generating swiftness (aside from things like runes which everyone has access to) and our only passive move speed increase only works when we’ve got illusions out (and caps at 9% instead of the 10% rogues and necros can get through their signets).

Again, I won’t claim to be a warrior expert and I have no experience playing as one, but I would think that the fight would go something like this:
1. He attacks you from range, probably catches you a little surprised, and can deal some damage while you react.
2. You move to attack him. If you use your leap here he’ll just knock you back and flee, so you shouldn’t use your leap. Instead use your swiftness to close the gap. Once you get out of the max range of the greatsword it’ll be doing a LOT less damage.
3. When you close fully he’ll sweep you to knock you back, that’s when you can use your leap to close the distance again.
4. You attack him. You’ve got an advantage with keeping swiftness up that he doesn’t have, and his knockback it out of comission. You don’t mention any teleporting so it doesn’t seem like he has that ready to go.
5. He uses an immunity skill. If it’s his 1H sword #2 ability, make sure to dodge out of the way and wait a second or two. He can’t move while doing it. If it’s his Distortion shatter just know that he’s used it up (it’s not like warriors don’t have their own invincible buttons). But during this time he shouldn’t be able to be harming you much. Point blank damage for GS is pathetic, and if he just blew his illusions for an escape then they’re not hitting you.
6. Since you’re keeping close to him his damage should still be low and you should be knocking the snot out of him; he’ll need to use another escape to try to create some distance. Watch to see if he blows a signet and uses Distortion again. It sounds like that may be causing some of your frustration. Keep in mind that Distortion burns all his illusions every time, and it takes time to get them back up. Those seconds that he’s resummoning are seconds you should be using to incapacitate him.
7. If he’s not teleporting, and you have better abilities for keeping swiftness on you and a cripple on him, and you counter his sweeps with your leaps, there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to, as the young people put it, “stick to him like white on rice.”

Obviously, that description of the fight isn’t happening. Where does the fight deviate from what I described?

Glancing at the wiki I noted the following warrior skills that should help you to prevent him from kiting you. How many of these are you taking along?:
GS#3 and #4
Hammer Special, #3 and #5
LB #5
Rifle #2
Axe Special, #3
Mace Special, #3, #5
1HSword Special, #2, #3
Shield #4
Warhorn #4
Bull’s Charge
Stomp
Throw Bolas
Fear Me
Dolyak Signet (stability would block his sweep)
Balanced Stance (stability again)
Frenzy
Signet of Rage

I think a lot of people here gave great responses (and lengthy ones at that), but the reason it devolves into “L2P” despite the OP being “reserved” in his post is because it sounds like an L2P issue. I don’t like saying that because it sounds kind of mean, but in this instance the OP really misclassified the issue. All the utility used against you and playing in that way requires a very active player, not someone mashing a single button.

In addition to the scenarios presented in this thread already, that mesmer fighting you clearly had a good understanding of the class and his/her traits and player habits. Mesmers can trait so that killing illusions causes cripple and that any shattering causes confusion and vulnerability to nearby enemies. I notice that people simply do not respond to confusion with the same urgency they respond to other conditions. So now you’re potentially crippled, with high stacks of vulnerability and confusion that’s probably being ignored and are essentially punching yourself in the face while trying to chase this guy down. You ended up fighting on his/her terms and lost. People here have given great insight on how to deal with these type of mesmers.

And BTW as to how you KNOW this person is bad because they took a hit to the face – when mesmers are traited to create clones on dodging, endurance becomes a DPS connected resource, not just a means to evade attacks. If I know that I have an invulnerability skill or a clone skill that I can use for breathing room to get a heal off and I know that I have the toughness and HP to take a hit, I’ll take the hit because by reserving endurance for “clone bomb” generation is a better expenditure of that resource. Just another quick mental calculation this apparent EZ mode class has to make…

Seriously, I wish they’d just remove PVP, the constant call to nerf mesmers, who ARE NOT OPed, is getting rediculous.

I think a better option for PvP would be to just give every class but mesmers an Iwin attack, obviously thats what it seems most want, not every class is well suited to beating every other class, and to attempt to balance a game like that would leave all classes bland and boring.

Its the same every game though, from EQ1 up to GW2, the enchanterish type class gets nerfed because the lesser skilled players who wont play them dont like that someone whos put time into learning a versatile class can beat them.

Maybe they could remove every class except warriors. oh wait that wouldnt work cause then we’d all call for them to nerf every build we didnt personally play.

I could fight this, if it were not for the fact that every time they position swap or stealth it takes them 2-3 seconds to render on my screen and for that duration I was just bombed by their copies while i was forced to wait to see their position, and they spam 3 second invulnerability 3 times in the duration of a 30 second fight whenever i actually get up to them.

This sounds like the main issue, the mesmer is essentially getting a lot of free stealth, that can easily mess up a fight…

voidwater.2064:

This sounds like the main issue, the mesmer is essentially getting a lot of free stealth, that can easily mess up a fight…

This is a issue with all stealth skills not just the mesmer’s

Magi.8643:

voidwater.2064:

This sounds like the main issue, the mesmer is essentially getting a lot of free stealth, that can easily mess up a fight…

This is a issue with all stealth skills not just the mesmer’s

Thieves and rangers are way more easy to detect because alot of their stealth is automatic and it will proc in melee range.

Mesmer stealth will go anywhere from melee to 1200 and you will have no idea where they will be in the 2-3 seconds they are rendering

Mesmers force people to think if they want to win. And most people don’t like to think expecting them to win. As a mesmer I encounter people who can’t touch me trying to find real me among copies and I also encounter people whom I can’t trick and who easilly spot me and kill. + there are really some counterbuilds who can easilly deal with mesmers.
A mesmer do all his best not to be caught by warrior because if he is caught without any escapes up, he’s dead. + ability to kite substitute lack of speed
And as for “OP” utilities – mesmer is one of few classes who has no dps utilities, so all of them are escape/stun break. Any class going for all surviability utilities can live long. The fact that they don’t do it is not a reason to nerf mesmer.
I will be probably ok if mesmer were weaken. But taking away a possibility to trick his enemy will ruin the conception of a class and should probably make Anet rename him “standard summoner”

aphoxi.4378:

I think a lot of people here gave great responses (and lengthy ones at that), but the reason it devolves into “L2P” despite the OP being “reserved” in his post is because it sounds like an L2P issue. I don’t like saying that because it sounds kind of mean, but in this instance the OP really misclassified the issue. All the utility used against you and playing in that way requires a very active player, not someone mashing a single button.

…..

Just another quick mental calculation this apparent EZ mode class has to make…

Which is why some of us were discussing it and we agreed that mesmer isn’t OP but that a lot of the other classes lack answers and diverse utility skills. But there you go again assuming that you and all mesmers are the only ones making those kind of calculations and skilled decision.

I have to do that with every class in every competitive game I’ve played, it’s the nature of a competitive game mode. The problem is that most classes seem more skill capped. You can’t get that much more out of it, even if you tried. Which means you can keep progressing with a mesmer up to a point where equally skilled players are limited by their class options. And it doesn’t help that a mesmer is a great class even in the hands of the average or bad player (atleast some builds are really user-friendly).

Some people obviously came from WoW, where classes go and battle on the forums. Guild Wars invites people to play more classes, which in turn should produce more objective and productive debates. Not just 10 replies telling the guy how he got outplayed and the mesmer had to use a lot of buttons, I think he got that by now. Instead try giving him more tips or tell him why you disagree with his assumption that he can’t kill the mesmer with his warrior (Which some people did nicely).

And again, I see no one calling out OP. The most extreme thing I’ve seen here is a call for a slight nerf, and you would have to be blind not to see that both mesmers and thieves are too much ahead of some other classes in PvP in certain departments atm. I played a mesmer and I found that past level 40 they are probably one of the strongest classes. They shouldn’t be nerfed hard, but they certainly need some tweaking. So all I see are people getting a bit too defensive over nothing. No one is saying you aren’t all awesome mesmers, but wouldn’t you atleast agree with this guy that even half decent mesmers are a pain to kill with most classes?

I’m a glasscannon (full berserker’s) build GS/Rifle or GS/Sword+Warhorn Warrior and i dont have any trouble with mesmers tbh. Yes they can run away/invis and its hard to chase them, but should they choose to fight me (and they usually do – warrior with 4 sigils is a lucrative target) and it is over for them in 5-15 sec and i rarely got to use 100b (its pretty much useless in WvW/sPvP anyway). What am i doing wrong (except for using both weapons and actually using sigils)? So its more of L2P your class issue as well as learn about weaknesses of other classes. Maybe i met only bad mesmers…