Guild Wars 2

Took a 3 month hiatus and I was wondering what the current meta is for Mesmer, have been hearing mixed on PU or a shatter build. Does anyone have any input on the meta and any decent builds for both that I could base my mes off of?

The new meta is shatter. But not any shatter – Staff + Greatsword shatter. It seemed odd at first to me but I really like the build. I made a guide for it which you can see in my signature. Make sure to read through it instead of just copying the build. It will help you understand the playstyle a lot more!
Have a wonderful rest of the day mate!
Much love,

Monns

Jurica.1742:

The new meta is shatter. But not any shatter – Staff + Greatsword shatter.

It’s mostly not meta, but trend coming from high tpvp

It’s still the new meta. The origin does not matter.

Pu is still seen quite a bit, of course shatter in general had been the go-to build for tpvp but pu still has quite a presence in spvp.

i spend 70% in PU/condition
and the other 30% in shatter. Is up to you depending the situation, this is the reason that we need build templates even if i have to pay 200 gems for build slot.

In PvP PU has a hard time taking and holding points due to stealth.

knackyknave.7469:

In PvP PU has a hard time taking and holding points due to stealth.

No it doesn’t. Refer to any of my recent posts and/or main guide for a more complete explanation.

Fay.2357:

knackyknave.7469:

In PvP PU has a hard time taking and holding points due to stealth.

No it doesn’t. Refer to any of my recent posts and/or main guide for a more complete explanation.

It does though against top tier teams. You will not be successful at ALL against top teams with PU – you will be nothing but a liability. It’s not meant for node taking or holding nodes , it’s meant for solo roaming, and it does fine in this department. Shatter is a huge bunker busting offensive team style spec but with portal play you can also make huge map coverage plays as well.

Pyro means this:

Fay.2357:

A PU condie build fills the role of light team-fight disruption and support with the aoe support conditions, but primarily is a point disruptor, taking advantage of an unguarded point to rapidly secure a decap, then force the enemy team to shift significant resources to push you out of the point.

A well played PU condie can maintain a fight against 2 or more people indefinitely with good play.

But there’s a problem with the “vs top teams”-argument… How many top teams are really out there? 10? And of those 10 most if not all of them put together specific classes with a specific strategy in mind.

Then consider how many people are really striving to become top players.. maybe 10-15% of people who play PvP? For everyone else playing PU shouldn’t be a problem if it’s utilized properly.

Then consider the fact that if just one of those top teams proved successful with a PU Mesmer -even if that Mesmer was used for a very specific strategy/purpose that likely couldn’t be replicated without that exact same teamcomp or one very similar- then suddenly PU would be considered “viable in top play.”

In the end, I think that most everyone can run a PU build effectively without being a “liability” to their team as long as they understand exactly what PU can do beyond “kill with condition damage/live through stealth”

When I say top tier, I mean it’s not viable against players who are ACTUALLY good at the game and know PU doesn’t work. They’ll outrotate you hardcore, this is why PU doesn’t work in top tier and why literally no mesmer runs it in top tier. Shatter is much more viable both in teams and solo play. In WvW though PU works beautifully, probably can be considered one of the top 3 specs for a roamer across all classes but it has no place in tPvP game mode doesn’t synergize with the sustain / slow break down / constant invis to get boons style of PU.

blitzkrieg.2451:

When I say top tier, I mean it’s not viable against players who are ACTUALLY good at the game and know PU doesn’t work.

Knowing how it works doesn’t mean you can effectively counter it.

blitzkrieg.2451:

They’ll outrotate you hardcore

And for this to happen, you must meet 2 requirements.

1. The enemy team must be organized and preferably on voiop
2. The enemy team must be skilled enough to pull off fast and efficient rotations.

These requirements definitionally exclude solo queue, so PU condies is effective at any level in solo queue.

These requirements also narrow down the number of teams that can effectively do this to about 5-8 in the entire game. 99% of people do not care about fighting these teams, and will not ever face these teams. In all other situations, PU condies is extremely effective.

Yes, but who cares about solo que? It’s a place to test builds and farm champ titles. 5-8 teams? Any team on coms with half a brain knows how to handle pu mesmer. It’s not effective in team play and there are much better classes that can hold a node and also provide team play. You can keep defending PU all you want, but there’s a reason why it’s never played in team pvp – it simply doesn’t work.

“Knowing how it works doesn’t mean you can effectively counter it.” -

Let me clear something up for you. PU is based around breaking down your enemy slowly while constantly invising to maintain boons to be able to tank with that very sustain. While this looks good on paper in regards to a node holder there’s things you need to know about node capping/conquest in general. Invising on a point constantly allows the person who you’re fighting to constantly , and in the end, neutralize the point. That means you’ve already lost the edge you were going for in the first place, holding the point.

Holding a node is based around not keeping it neutralized and holding it as long as you can. PU mesmer is basically the exact OPPOSITE of this. This is why engis are really good at holding nodes, they don’t need to constantly invis in order to achieve this, same with spirit ranger. They’re perfect candidates for the job you’re talking about exactly. On top of that, PU mesmer provides no team play support , it provides not NEARLY enough burst and it’s a very selfish build. It’s meant for dueling, but not on point dueling and it’s meant for roaming in WVW – it completely goes against the foundations of conquest. I’m not sure how much you fail to see that, but I hope this has cleared up some of the reasons why PU mesmer absolutely doesn’t work in conquest mode against mid to top tier teams. In solo que it barely works, although you would make a good cannon holder for skyhammer probably ^.^

All in all my point is to go back to your quote, good teams and good players know exactly what I’m telling you in this forum response. They’ll literally if it comes down to it, leave you sitting at that node and 1up team fights elsewhere and they’ll just double cap you (easily because even if you’re in the fight they’ll send a thief off to decap the point you were trying to hold and since you have no team offensive prowess they can afford to 5v4 while this occurs especially if its a thief, what this ends up doing is making it to where you have to make a choice of dropping out of the team fight at one of the other points to go cap your lost point because you can’t let points slip by, you’re already losing because of PU mesmer and you don’t even know it) if they have to because you provide literally nothing to a team fight and you’re simply a liability. The only thing you have at this point is providing portal plays for your teammates, which shatter mesmer can do and be 50x more effective in team fights (boon ripping, insane offensive burst, etc).

This is why shatter is a candidate much so over PU mesmer , the very playstyle is more friendly to conquest/team fighting as it brings bunker busting qualities with mind wrack dmg and boon removal. Now, you can also spec for this in a 4/4/6 pu build as well, but your shatters will do absolutely no damage and without 30 in illusions you won’t get the persona / recharge on shatter skills at 50% and you won’t have compounding 3% dmg to benefit your shatter skills. So you’re a shatter PU hybrid, you do no damage and still rely on constantly invising to survive and out-sustain your opponent, it would basically be a lost build with no full role.

Now, in regards to condi pu … Condi warrior does much better at applying consistent offensive condition dmg , engis are much better at applying consistent offensive condi dmg and spirit rangers apply better consistent offensive condition damage and they all have much better team support utility (warrior has banner and cc, engi has crate + cc , ranger has an aoe res and team boon generation), even then if their team has a staff ele + a bunker guardian, you’re absolutely useless anyway (which isn’t uncommon nowadays, it’s actually in quite alot of team comps now). Just much better classes handle this department if you’re looking for team condition dmg prowess.

All in all, PU Condi or Power is just complete garbage in team pvp. You can keep running it all you want as it’s your choice, but I’m here to tell you it’s not good and will only slide against idiots in solo que and/or hotjoins.

blitzkrieg.2451:

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Ok, so I actually read this, and it’s just a massive rant about PU conditions that completely ignores everything I’ve said about how you actually play it in a game. You’re just repeating the same tired talking points over and over in different ways. ‘But stealth, you can’t capture in stealth, and it’s slow, and it doesn’t bunker bust like shatter does. It’s total garbage and will never work’

Guess what. You’re wrong. You can use the stealth effectively when you have the option to and avoid it when you don’t. It’s not slow, it’s an incredibly strong on-point fighter contrary to the misinformation you’re spewing, and it absolutely does work at a high level in both solo and team queue.

If I bother PvPing, I use PU condie. I stay top 100-200 solo queue, so it obviously works there, and I stay top 200 team queue without even ever putting together a team, just solo queuing it in team queue. While it has never been used effectively in a large tournament before…it’s never been used at all in a tournament before, and as Chaos says, all it takes is 1 team using it and suddenly all you people writing books about how PU condie sucks will feel awfully foolish.

Solo que solo que solo que

Means nothing man, it’s 5 random players put together. I’m talking against teams, actual teams. PU is completely useless above solo que level , where pvping actually matters. You act like I didn’t lay out basic and logical reasons why the style of PU goes against the very nature of conquest mode.

I’m sorry you can’t see it.

But do you honestly think top tier mesmers haven’t tried PU in top level play before? If it was successful, it would be used – that is how pvp in this game works and since it works in WvW roaming and dueling , that’s where you see it and no where else (Is it good in PvE? I don’t even know, lol). You act like PU is this mystery spec that has yet to be discovered in PvP… No it’s been tried numerous times and failed horribly because of how lackluster it is in conquest mode. It belongs in duel rooms and WvW roaming and that’s about it.

You have yet to play against top tier teams , ask Supcutie if PU works in top tier play. He would be the mesmer you’d want to ask. Don’t even have to worry about taking my word for it, just ask top tier pvp mesmers and they’ll reiterate the same things I’ve said.

blitzkrieg.2451:

Solo que solo que solo que

Means nothing man, it’s 5 random players put together. I’m talking against teams, actual teams. PU is completely useless above solo que level , where pvping actually matters. You act like I didn’t lay out basic and logical reasons why the style of PU goes against the very nature of conquest mode.

It’s becoming very obvious that you aren’t reading a word I write, so w/e.

blitzkrieg.2451:

You have yet to play against top tier teams , ask Supcutie if PU works in top tier play. He would be the mesmer you’d want to ask. Don’t even have to worry about taking my word for it, just ask top tier pvp mesmers and they’ll reiterate the same things I’ve said.

Supcutie is a good friend of mine, and we’ve discussed the topic of Mesmer in pvp quite extensively. His opinion, shared by most everyone else on NA as well as most in EU is that Mesmer itself does not work in top tier play.

I only play Mesmer. It’s the only class I actually enjoy. Therefor, I have 2 options:

1. Use what works best the majority of the time. This is PU conditions.
2. Not play. I’ve been exercising this one for the most part recently.

Fay.2357:

blitzkrieg.2451:

Solo que solo que solo que

Means nothing man, it’s 5 random players put together. I’m talking against teams, actual teams. PU is completely useless above solo que level , where pvping actually matters. You act like I didn’t lay out basic and logical reasons why the style of PU goes against the very nature of conquest mode.

It’s becoming very obvious that you aren’t reading a word I write, so w/e.

blitzkrieg.2451:

You have yet to play against top tier teams , ask Supcutie if PU works in top tier play. He would be the mesmer you’d want to ask. Don’t even have to worry about taking my word for it, just ask top tier pvp mesmers and they’ll reiterate the same things I’ve said.

Supcutie is a good friend of mine, and we’ve discussed the topic of Mesmer in pvp quite extensively. His opinion, shared by most everyone else on NA as well as most in EU is that Mesmer itself does not work in top tier play.

I only play Mesmer. It’s the only class I actually enjoy. Therefor, I have 2 options:

1. Use what works best the majority of the time. This is PU conditions.
2. Not play. I’ve been exercising this one for the most part recently.

Considering I was on AL and teamed with Supcutie extensively, I can assure you mesmer does work in top tier. He just used thief recently because Kpz asked him to. He will tell you flat out (as we’ve had this conversation when the PU build surfaced on the forums) that PU simply doesn’t work in conquest mode in top tier. It’s simple as that. I don’t know how you can keep arguing this, the very mechanics that make PU what it is go completely against the nature of both team and node fighting.

If you’re trying to say mesmer doesn’t work in top tier, I mean you can look at Lord Helseth (TCG, winners of EU tourney as well and would demolish any top tier NA team given to them to fight against) that mesmer does work in top tier, but it’s shatter. You will never , ever see Lord Helseth or Supcutie ever run PU because it’s detrimental to the flow of conquest. But you can keep driving off-topic and ignore what I keep telling you. Its alright.

Fay.2357:

Supcutie is a good friend of mine, and we’ve discussed the topic of Mesmer in pvp quite extensively. His opinion, shared by most everyone else on NA as well as most in EU is that Mesmer itself does not work in top tier play.

I only play Mesmer. It’s the only class I actually enjoy. Therefor, I have 2 options:

1. Use what works best the majority of the time. This is PU conditions.
2. Not play. I’ve been exercising this one for the most part recently.

I talked to SupCutie a few days, maybe a week ago and he told me that if he was to play mesmer, that his entire team composition would have to change meaning the rest of his team would play classes they are not familiar with.
This means that mesmer is viable, but you do have to build around it.

~Monns