Guild Wars 2

So as the title implies I’m brand new to Guild Wars 2. But more than that, this is the first MMO I’ve EVER played. This hasn’t been from lack of interest, but because I refused to pay $10-$15 a month for a game that my schedule only allows me to play for 2-5 hours a week. But then I heard about Guild Wars and solid review scores and no subscription fee won me over.

Going into this, I decided to try and stay away from forums/blogs about builds and strategies until I could form my own impressions. Maybe I would form some bad habits that would need to be broken, but at least when I DID start exploring the possibilities and tapping into the community I would know WHY people were saying what they were saying (or have a better idea, anyway). To that end, I picked the race/class that seemed thematically interesting (Silvari Mesmer) and headed out to explore Tyria.

Now—a few weeks and 20 levels later—I have decided that I have enough of a grasp of the basics that I can talk with some intelligence with the community and understand any help they provide. To that end, I finally get to my questions: what makes a good (PvE) Mesmer? Or more importantly, a good Guild Wars player generally? And what should I be doing NOW to help improve (both my skill as a player and goals I should be working towards for the character)?

So, based on observation and some party chat my understanding is that the majority of the damage that the Mesmer can deal is focused in their phantasms (and, notably, not clones). To that end, I have been running a Greatsword and Sword/Focus set with Feedback and Decoy (don’t know what to do with my brand new third skill slot yet—unlocked it just yesterday).

My general strategy has been to drop Feedback onto a ranged enemy (or the biggest, if none are ranged)> Mirror Blade> Mind Stab> Phantasmal Berserker, then switch weapons and use Temporal Curtain> Illusionary Leap x2>Phantasmal Warden. Blurred Frenzy, Mirror and decoy as needed defensively, switching to Greatsword when at range (usually after retreating as far as possible to heal up and letting the Phantasms draw some fire).

This SEEMS like a solid strategy to me but it seems much less efficient at dispatching enemies than what I have seen other higher level characters do in Heart Quests and Dynamic Events (considering the level scales down their level shouldn’t matter, right?). Am I missing something? I know I am probably missing some potential as I almost never shatter my illusions as I want them around to distract incase I have to retreat. Are other builds more ideal for lower-level PvE content? Or am I just not playing it right?

I will say that I realize that there will likely not be one “best” spec for a character, but I would like to know what people enjoy running and what is relatively newb friendly. I also want to note that I DID look around before posting and found several threads asking similar questions to mine, but decided to post a new one because A—my experience level with MMO’s may change some of your answers as I don’t have as much of a frame of reference and B—there seemed to be wildly different answers to similar questions across the threads as the game continues to be patched and balanced (Greatsword seems to be where the most contention comes in, though I am really enjoying it). Looking for a fresher perspective from active players.

the answer is to always experiment and try things differently

Feedback won’t help on non-ranged enemies, so better to hold onto it for when you need it.

Your strategy is good! Keep it up. Phantasms are a great source of damage, sword is the best melee damage (and best auto-attack you have), and greatsword is the best range weapon (in terms of damage). Greatsword usage is contentious in dungeons, but for open world leveling, I don’t think anyone will disagree that it’s useful.

Higher level characters get scaled down, but their traits do not— they’ll have all the +15% damage, +10% damage, +etc etc. stats that come every 5/10 levels still. That, and their gear is scaled down, but scaled down exotic level 80 zerker gear is still better than level 20 gear.

Mesmers are notorious for a somewhat tricky leveling process— people often will say that we don’t feel like we’re really dealing damage till level 60 or so, and that might be what’s happening for you. Just keep going, and every level gets better~

If you want some more resources, the best ones today are probably https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Lyssa-s-Grimoire-The-Mesmer-Handbook and https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Kai-s-Complete-PvE-Compendium/first#post2848334 . The latter in particular has a nice leveling guide for exactly the weapon combination that you’re using. You might find some suggestions and tweaks there that can tighten things up, but it sounds like you’re doing things right.

Good luck with leveling! Things will get better

Shatter in PvE is mostly used for burst damage (F1) or defense (F4) so you don’t have to worry about it. As your main damage is coming out of phantasms, you do not actually want to shatter too often.

I’m with maxinion, Kai’s leveling builds https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Kai-s-Complete-PvE-Compendium/first#post2848334 are awesome and work wonders. At lower levels, mesmers really don’t deal the greatest of damage (feeling more tanky than anything), but once you start getting some good phantasm/shatter traits, it gets much easier to kill things. Phantasms offer you the safest playstyle, and I highly recommend that you cut your teeth on Phantams before trying anything else. When leveling, you will want to use shatters only when the mob that the phantasms are attacking is close to death, and you want to burst it down (see Korusef’s post above).

For traits, Kai’s build offers some basic suggestions on what to use when. (My paraphrase of his work follows) Early on, you will want to consider what you already have (decoy for clone/stealth, feedback for reflects), but also consider a few extras. I recommend Blink for mobility/stun break, null field for condition removal, and that’s all I can think of atm. Again, Kai’s guides offer great advice on the “laziest” ways to level. I’m not implying that you are lazy, but Kai does such an excellent job of breaking it down for beginning mesmers, and (speaking from experience) it’s hard enough to keep track of 3 illusions + mobs + allies, you don’t need the headache of anything else

maxinion.8396:

Feedback won’t help on non-ranged enemies, so better to hold onto it for when you need it.

Your strategy is good! Keep it up. Phantasms are a great source of damage, sword is the best melee damage (and best auto-attack you have), and greatsword is the best range weapon (in terms of damage). Greatsword usage is contentious in dungeons, but for open world leveling, I don’t think anyone will disagree that it’s useful.

Higher level characters get scaled down, but their traits do not— they’ll have all the +15% damage, +10% damage, +etc etc. stats that come every 5/10 levels still. That, and their gear is scaled down, but scaled down exotic level 80 zerker gear is still better than level 20 gear.

Mesmers are notorious for a somewhat tricky leveling process— people often will say that we don’t feel like we’re really dealing damage till level 60 or so, and that might be what’s happening for you. Just keep going, and every level gets better~

If you want some more resources, the best ones today are probably https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Lyssa-s-Grimoire-The-Mesmer-Handbook and https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Kai-s-Complete-PvE-Compendium/first#post2848334 . The latter in particular has a nice leveling guide for exactly the weapon combination that you’re using. You might find some suggestions and tweaks there that can tighten things up, but it sounds like you’re doing things right.

Good luck with leveling! Things will get better

I’ll keep that in mind and check out those guides. I hadn’t thought about the gear/traits at all, actually, but that makes sense—I can understand why they were doing much better (beyond just experience). Thanks

Question though—for Feedback I was using it (even against enemies without range) to start fights in order to trigger the combo from Mirror Blade. Do you think it’s worth it for the combo considering it draws the attention of the enemy before Mirror Blade’s clone hits? I don’t really know how useful the confusion is—might be better to keep the enemy focused on the phantasms?

Uh, I feel honored. Thank you guys for promoting my guide. ^^

I would keep feedback on cooldown. It causes a lot of damage on ranged mobs, so it would be a waste if it was on cooldown for a combo. Half of the enemies out there are ranged ones anyway, give them back some of their own! ^^

kingsman.3179:

I’m with maxinion, Kai’s leveling builds https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-Kai-s-Complete-PvE-Compendium/first#post2848334 are awesome and work wonders. At lower levels, mesmers really don’t deal the greatest of damage (feeling more tanky than anything), but once you start getting some good phantasm/shatter traits, it gets much easier to kill things. Phantasms offer you the safest playstyle, and I highly recommend that you cut your teeth on Phantams before trying anything else. When leveling, you will want to use shatters only when the mob that the phantasms are attacking is close to death, and you want to burst it down (see Korusef’s post above).

For traits, Kai’s build offers some basic suggestions on what to use when. (My paraphrase of his work follows) Early on, you will want to consider what you already have (decoy for clone/stealth, feedback for reflects), but also consider a few extras. I recommend Blink for mobility/stun break, null field for condition removal, and that’s all I can think of atm. Again, Kai’s guides offer great advice on the “laziest” ways to level. I’m not implying that you are lazy, but Kai does such an excellent job of breaking it down for beginning mesmers, and (speaking from experience) it’s hard enough to keep track of 3 illusions + mobs + allies, you don’t need the headache of anything else

Yeah—I kept hearing that Shattering is super powerful but when I’ve played around with it it always seemed pretty weak. For the most part I was more successful—or at least I FELT more successful—leaving the summons stood up to attack.

As for the skills you suggested, I’ll check them out. I ended up slotting in Mirror Images as a defensive skill (stun break and give the enemy something else to focus on if I have to get out and heal) for now but I worry that unless I seriously micro manage it it might end up wiping some of my better phantasms when I cast it.

I’m of two minds on the lazy factor . On the one hand, I have pretty restricted gaming time so quicker leveling is good. On the other, I want to try and make the early levels/fights challenging in order to become a better player. Already I know I need to dodge and move way more than I do but as someone unused to keyboard/mouse gaming it feels really unintuitive compared to a gamepad. And I know I SHOULD shatter more than I do (certainly just before a kill if for no other reason than the fact that I am about to lose them anyway—may as well get some splash damage).

Smart choice on sylvari mesmer by the way, that’s the best class/race combo in the game, hands down.

So, something that needs to be kept in mind about mesmer is that it is incredibly trait dependent. You’ve heard that shatter is incredibly powerful, and it is, but only if you trait for it. Phantasms can be incredibly powerful, if you trait them. Mesmer can have high condition pressure and mobility…if you trait it.

Since you seem to be focusing more on phantasms, I’d advise you to use Signet of Illusions as your third skill slot. That allows your phantasms to be significantly more beefy.

You shouldn’t necessarily shatter more than you do…I personally use shatters incredibly rarely when running a phantasm build. The reason for this is I’ll often put my phantasms/clones on separate targets, allowing me to spread out my damage significantly more than any other class can. Shattering destroys all illusions though, and it’s very rare that all of my targets are about to die at the same time.

Now for some more general stuff.

Mesmer Damage
Phantasms can deal very high damage, and they are in fact the best sustained damage mesmer has, leading to the almost exclusive use of phantasm builds in PvE. The key traits for phantasms are domination III, dueling II, and inspiration 25 minor.

That being said, shatter can also pack a punch. Shatter is much more burst damage oriented, and therefor fits PvP much better than it does PvE (while phantasms can do both). Shatters are even more trait dependent than phantasms, requiring illusions XI to really do good damage, along with domination I.

Now, clones are more or less useless for normal power damage, excepting their role in shattering, but they can be used in condition damage builds. Sharper images, dueling 15, allows all illusions to bleed on crit, and your illusions inherit all of your basic stats except vitality. Additionally, since clones use your basic autoattack, staff and trident clones both apply damaging conditions, and sword clones will apply vulnerability AND strip boons.

Your general damage combo is pretty good. When you use temporal curtain (not sure if you already do) make sure you place it in a creative spot that allows you to group up all your enemies effectively. Keep in mind that you can use that detonation of it while casting other skills, so I’ll generally drop the curtain, start casting iWarden, and detonate the curtain mid-cast, before going into leap/swap+blurred frenzy.

As far as feedback goes, try to save it for when you actually need it. The combo finisher only applies confusion, and that really doesn’t do anything at all in PvE (a f ull list of combo finishers can be found here).

With regards to guides/help, there’s quite a few fantastic resources available to you.

• The official guild wars 2 wiki
  • Most of the technical information is available in it, if you look
• Comprehensive Mesmer Guide: Lyssa’s Handbook
• Fantastic Leveling Guide by Kai
• Official Mesmer Forum Guild
  • This is a community driven guild that is full of helpful people that can offer advice and suggestions

May I ask you if you are EU or NA? And are you maybe even german? I really respect somone that gives a nice picture of himself with the nice text. I can now know what you are looking for. So it probably would be easier ingame or even with teamspeak or something. I really enjoy your wall’o’text more than a simple “hi need dmg what build shall i go? solo”
greez

Hey Jon, reading the OP really took me back. In the MMO I played before this (Champions Online) I had pretty much posted the same thing. Quick question: Do you use the mouse to click some of your skills? It’s a very common thing for people new to MMOs to do (unless you come from some other CPU game like Starcraft. I, unfortunately, came from consoles and had to learn all this frustrating keyboard stuff) if so, it may help to keybind your 6, 7, 8, 9, 0 to something more like Shift+1, Shift+2, Shift+3, Shift+4, Shift+ 5.

Explore EVERYTHING! Try out WvW, try out PvP, don’t be afraid of dungeons. Never be afraid about being judged by anyone or that your performance is gonna drag anyone down. Especially don’t let that hold you back from exploring any and every bit of content that’s avaliable to you… And don’t be afraid to use sPvP (The Mists, Crossed-swords icon at top of your screen) to practice and experiment with builds. Even if you don’t go into an actual match, there’s a big playground where you can test all skill effects, weapon abilities, play around with your traits, ect with test dummies and enemy NPCs (fist symbol all the way north) you can screw with.

Also, don’t be afraid to PM anyone here who’s responded to you (and a few others around the boards) with questions or concerns whenever ya need. Really helpful bunch. I’ll post some parts of the Mesmer guide here that may help ya out… The full guide (as linked above) can be found in my signature.

This ever-evolving guide is dedicated to all those who would seek to learn and improve. To everyone who loves the Mesmer class and would play it despite any buffs or nerfs, and despite what anyone else says. And especially to the official Mesmer forums, a place that promotes testing new ideas; where there is practically always someone willing to take the time to help you improve; the people from all over the world that, in this Mesmer’s time of need, gave me more support than I could’ve ever imagined.
This guide is meant to have everything, from flavor text to important links, to help expand your knowledge about Mesmer. If you have any questions or have any information to add, please feel free to comment and if the answer isn’t already in the guide it will definitely be added.

The Mesmer is a psionic profession that specializes in manipulating Chaos magic to bend time and space to create various effects, from simple illusions and mind tricks to bending light to become invisible to manipulating the very flow of time. Mesmer utilize deception in the form of stealths, defense with teleports and distortions, and shape physical constructs that the opponents view as “clones” of the caster to do damage.
One thing I must stress is that this guide isn’t just my own creation. The information is gathered from various forum posts by those people who’ve taken the time to test and publish their findings for the good of all Mesmer everywhere. Instead of fishing through 100+ posts to find the information you want, you should be able to find it all compiled here.
You’re likely to read these following terms mentioned.

Shatter/Phantasm Build: Shatter and Phantasm aren’t specific builds as much as they are two distinct Mesmer playstyles. Shatter builds revolve around mass producing and shattering clones for damage. This playstyle tends to be a faster paced and melee-oriented with high risks and more immediate rewards.

Phantasm builds are more relaxed and focus on staying alive while your illusions beat down your opponent.

Proc – Proc basically means “to cause an effect.” For example: Signet of Inspiration procs a boon every 10 seconds.

Burst/Spike – A sudden chunk of high damage.

AoE Area of Effect – Something we Mesmer really lack beyond shatters, 2 Phantasms, and Chaos Storm. AoEs are the big red circle attacks that you’d do well to not stand in, but also can refer to beneficial effects that radiate to allies.

DPS Damage Per Second – Essentially how much damage something does.

RNG: Random Number Generator – Refers to anything that happens randomly, such as how Chaos Storm can proc 6 random conditions/boons.

CD : Cooldown – The time it takes for a skill to refresh after use.

Active/Passive : Active refers to something you manually use, “active defense” refers to teleports, stealths dodges, ect. to avoid damage while Passive is something that happens automatically, like how the Regeneration boon passively heals over time. Signets have both passive effects and active effects.

(i) Illusion: This refers to one of two of our class mechanics. Illusions either look exactly like the player (Clones) or like ghostly versions that wield separate weapons (Phantasms) and serve a number of functions, chief among them being our main source of damage either through their own unique attacks or by shattering them. Illusions inherit: Power, Precision, Condition Damage/Duration, Boon Duration, Critical Damage, Armor, and Healing Power. Illusions will benefit from the Mesmer’s Might stacks, as well as any effects that increase the above stats, such as Banner of Discipline or Spotter. They also are not affected by any equipped sigils.

• Clone: Looks exactly like you and copies your auto-attack. They do no real direct damage but can cause bleeding when they score a crit(with 15 points into Dueling). Though often shatter fodder, clones do have some utility. Sword clones can remove enemy boons and stack vulnerability & staff clones are great for condition builds. At Lvl80 clones have 4,096HP (2,304 in PvP/WvW)

• Phantasm: Looks like a ghost of you. Phantasms have their own unique attacks and perform a variety of secondary features. At level 80 Phantasms have 7,955HP (3,332 in PvP/WvW)

—Why Mesmerize? —
”We contribute class and style to what would otherwise be an unseemly brawl” –Iruthien on Mesmer in WvW zergs.

So you’ve decided to take up the robes of a Mesmer, eh? Maybe you were inspired by Gwen, Queen Jennah, or Dr. Franz Mesmer himself. Maybe you were in battle and got tired of Mesmer stomping you 1v1 with you having no idea what the eff just happened. Or maybe, perhaps, you’ve finally come to realize that Mesmer is easily one of the most fun classes in the entire game. In any event welcome to a profession of majesty, deception, ambiguous purple butterflies, and angry noobs.
What can Mesmer do that other classes can’t?

• Portal: We can teleport up to 20 people at a time very large distances. And trust me, each non-Mesmer taking that portal is hating on us so hard for this skill alone.
• Reflects: Stay far out of melee-range and what will the enemy do? If not an obnoxiously telegraphed AoE then most likely, they’ll shoot you.We have more access to reflect abilities than any other class. Projectiles are one of the most common means of attack in the game, and we can turn that damage right back on our enemy.
  – Times and places to Reflect –
• Unparalleled Boon Sharing: Signet of Inspiration allows us to copy our boons onto allies, easily granting high might stacks when paired with certain classes. With Inspiration III, Chaos XII, a Staff, and Runes of Altruism we can share 8 of the 9 boons in the game on our own every minute.
• Useful Elites: Time Warp is amazing for boss battles, Mass Invisibility has plenty clever uses, and Moa Morph will always- A) Make someone smirk & Make someone rage.
• Confusion: Confusion causes damage for every time the opponent uses a skill. While some classes can sometimes inflict Confusion, it is primarily a Mesmer condition. Runes of Perplexity notwithstanding

COMBO FIELDS

ETHEREAL - Ethereal combo fields are almost exclusively provided by Mesmer and easy to provide. Whirl & Projectile Finishers launch Confusion bolts while Leap & Blast Finishers create Chaos Armor – Chaos Storm (Staff) / Null Field / Feedback

LIGHT –Light combo fields are usually applied by Guardians, but Mesmer can also provide rather frequently with a traited Focus. Whirl & Projectile Finishers launch bolts that remove conditions while Leap& Blast Finishers provide Retaliation. – Temporal Curtain(Focus) / Veil

THE BAD NEWS…

• Often reliant on Summons for damage: No matter what flavor of Mesmer you are, your illusions will be crucial to your success.
• Awkward condition removal: Mesmers are excellent at avoiding physical damage. Conditions…? Not so much. Unfortunately no matter what we choose, our source of condition removal will be unorthodox (with the exception of Null Field).
• Difficult leveling experience: Many people have a rough time leveling with Mesmer until they reach level 40 and can grab Deceptive Evasion.
• Slower than dirt: We have to try so ’effin hard to catch up with other classes, many of which have a passive movement speed increase. Not as frustrating of an issue if Mesmer is the only class you play.

What Kind of Mesmer Are You?—
Mesmer, being such a varied and creative class, can be played in all manner of different styles. Each playstyle is radically different and requires time to learn. One of the most common reasons people dismiss a build as “bad” is because they expect to be able to play it masterfully within the first few moments of picking it up. As a general rule:

-Phantasm – Easy to learn / More relaxed pace / Accessible for beginners.

-Shatter – Takes practice / Fast pace / Medium difficulty but high risk high reward with high skill cap.

-Condition – Easy to learn / Medium pace / Medium difficulty with high skill cap.

-Support – Takes practice / Pace varies by build / Medium difficulty with high skill
cap.

-Lockdown – Difficult to learn / Fast pace / High difficulty high skill cap.

- Fay’s List of Mesmer Builds/Guides -

• SHATTER Mesmer can inflict sudden high damaging AoE spikes in bursts by manually destroying their illusions for a variety of effects. Shatter builds tend to be active, fast-paced reflexive playstyles that are highly mobile, flashy and confusing. The typical Shatter build uses clones for both offense and defense, and thus needs to have a high rate of clone production. Deceptive Evasion (Dueling X) is perfect for this and practically essential for shatter builds, giving us the ability to spawn clones on dodge ( Protip: Orrian Truffle & Meat Stew increases our dodge rate.). Most shatter builds will also climb 30 points into Illusions both to reduce the cooldown on shatters and for Illusionary Persona, which both maximizes shatter damage and significantly increases the build’s defenses.
- Classic Shatter Build: 20/20/0/0/30
- Key Weapons: Sword
- Key Skills: Mirror Images, Blink, Decoy
- Key Traits: Deceptive Evasion (Dueling X) / Illusionary Persona (Illusions XI)
- Most Popular Shatter Build: Osicat’s Shattercat Series

• PHANTASM Mesmer play more like minion masters. The Phantasm playstyle is more welcoming to newcomers of the game/class and as a result have gotten the reputation of “faceroll easymode” which in many cases … is true. Phantasms are devastatingly powerful 1v1 specs as the Mesmer merely has to focus on staying alive, via stealths, teleports, and other kind of defenses while their Phantasms hit hard, respawn quickly, and have large fountains of health. Phantasm specs are also preferred for dungeon runs.*
- Key Weapons: Greatsword, Offhand Sword/Pistol/Focus
- Key Traits: Empowered Illusions (Domination III), Phantasmal Fury (Dueling II), Phantasmal Haste (Illusions X), Persisting Images (Inspiration V) , (Inspiration 5, 15, 25)
- Key Skills: Phantasmal Defender/Disenchanter, Signet of Illusions
- Sample Phantasm Build: 10/30/0/30/0
- PvE Phantasm Build: Pyroathiest’s PvE Phantasm Build
- Dungeon Phantasm Build:Colesy’s Dungeon Phantasm Build

• CONDITION
Condition Mesmer have seen a rise in popularity recently and, to the ire of many Necromancer, have proven to be a devastating force to be reckoned with. Many condition Mesmer enjoy dancing in and out of stealth (and thus gaining high amounts of defensive boons like protection) while their clones release a plethora of debilitating conditions whenever an unfortunate nearby enemy destroys them. In addition to disease-filled illusions, Condition Mesmer use Confusion and Torment to great effect with the Scepter and shatters.
- Key Weapons: Staff, Scepter, Torch
- Key Traits: Sharper Images (Dueling 15), Deceptive Evasion (Dueling X), Debilitating Dissipation (Chaos V), Master of Misdirection (Illusions V)
- Key Skills: Signet of Domination
- Most Popular Condition Build – 20/20/30/0/0 – Blackwater Mesmer

• Support
10 points into the Inspiration line opens up a number of ways to add an aspect of ally support to a build. Not only do Mesmer have access to every boon in the game (6 of the 9 boons alone available to Staff), but we have the unique ability to copy any boons we have onto all nearby allies. (Video courtesy of Alissah.9281) This, combined with our ability to rapidly heal allies, cast group stealth, portal, and mitigate damage with dazes, pulls/pushes, solo stack up to 25 might, and reflects make Mesmer one of the best supportive classes along with Engineers, Guardian, and Elementalists. Mesmer support builds vary from heavy crowd control, boon support, heals, or a mix of all of the above and in most cases can be done without any major sacrifice to damage. While not ideal for dungeons, Mesmer support is being explored for PvP and has been proven effective in WvW for both small man and zergs. (Protip: Chocolate Omnomberry Creams grant 20% boon duration)
- Key Weapons: Staff, Focus
- Key Traits: Bountiful Interruption (Chaos VIII), Warden’s Feedback (Inspiration VIII), Restorative Mantras (Inspiration X), Vigorous Revelation (Inspiration III)
- Key Skills: Signet of Inspiration, Mantra of Resolve/Concentration, iDefender, iDisenchanter, Veil, Illusion of Life, Feedback, Null Field, Portal
- Sample Boonshare setup: Sword+Focus – Staff / 15 Inspiration & Chaos / 6x Runes of Altruism
- Sample Support Build: The Chaos Maestro
(List of Mesmer Support Builds)

• Lockdown
Lockdown Mesmer are all about control: limiting enemy movement, eliminating their boons, dazing/stunning, reflects and smothering them with debilitating conditions such as Weakness, Vulnerability, and much more. Lockdown is one of the more controversial, but least explored of Mesmer playstyles. While Lockdown finds little use in dungeons due to the Defiant buff on most bosses, it’s popularity is rising in PvP. Most control builds grab traits that grant bonuses when interrupting opponents, the most popular being Halting Strike (Domination II) which grants damage on interrupt, and Bountiful Interruption (Chaos VIII) which grants 5 stacks of might per opponent interrupted.
A thing of note about Lockdown builds; try to make sure whatever kind of Lockdown build you have can be strong on its own without interrupts. For example: Mind Crush does very good damage via Shatters and Phantasms, has good lockdown/control via chain-dazes, Weakness/Vuln on clone deaths, and Chaos Storm, can rapidly strip enemy boons and stack vulnerability, and has AoE condition removal. These traits alone make it a strong build, but the rewards for nailing interrupts (5x Might / 3x Vuln / Instant 2k+ damage on interrupt) makes it that much better.
AoE control options.: Staff, Focus, Superior Sigils of Hydromancy, and Imbued Diversion(Illusions XII)
- Key Skills: Mantra of Distraction, Signet of Domination, Null Field, Arcane Thievery
- Key Traits: Confounding Suggestions (Domination XII), Dazzling (Domination 15), Shattered Concentration (Domination VII), Bountiful Interruption (Chaos VIII)
- Sample Build: 10/0/30/0/30 skcamow’s Chillruption
- (List of Lockdown Builds)

Small tip. Equip a minor sigil of bloodlust on each of your weapons. The extra power really helps the Mesmer.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Smart choice on sylvari mesmer by the way, that’s the best class/race combo in the game, hands down.

So, something that needs to be kept in mind about mesmer is that it is incredibly trait dependent. You’ve heard that shatter is incredibly powerful, and it is, but only if you trait for it. Phantasms can be incredibly powerful, if you trait them. Mesmer can have high condition pressure and mobility…if you trait it.

Since you seem to be focusing more on phantasms, I’d advise you to use Signet of Illusions as your third skill slot. That allows your phantasms to be significantly more beefy.

You shouldn’t necessarily shatter more than you do…I personally use shatters incredibly rarely when running a phantasm build. The reason for this is I’ll often put my phantasms/clones on separate targets, allowing me to spread out my damage significantly more than any other class can. Shattering destroys all illusions though, and it’s very rare that all of my targets are about to die at the same time.

Now for some more general stuff.

Mesmer Damage
Phantasms can deal very high damage, and they are in fact the best sustained damage mesmer has, leading to the almost exclusive use of phantasm builds in PvE. The key traits for phantasms are domination III, dueling II, and inspiration 25 minor.

That being said, shatter can also pack a punch. Shatter is much more burst damage oriented, and therefor fits PvP much better than it does PvE (while phantasms can do both). Shatters are even more trait dependent than phantasms, requiring illusions XI to really do good damage, along with domination I.

Now, clones are more or less useless for normal power damage, excepting their role in shattering, but they can be used in condition damage builds. Sharper images, dueling 15, allows all illusions to bleed on crit, and your illusions inherit all of your basic stats except vitality. Additionally, since clones use your basic autoattack, staff and trident clones both apply damaging conditions, and sword clones will apply vulnerability AND strip boons.

Your general damage combo is pretty good. When you use temporal curtain (not sure if you already do) make sure you place it in a creative spot that allows you to group up all your enemies effectively. Keep in mind that you can use that detonation of it while casting other skills, so I’ll generally drop the curtain, start casting iWarden, and detonate the curtain mid-cast, before going into leap/swap+blurred frenzy.

As far as feedback goes, try to save it for when you actually need it. The combo finisher only applies confusion, and that really doesn’t do anything at all in PvE (a f ull list of combo finishers can be found here).

With regards to guides/help, there’s quite a few fantastic resources available to you.

• The official guild wars 2 wiki
  • Most of the technical information is available in it, if you look
• Comprehensive Mesmer Guide: Lyssa’s Handbook
• Fantastic Leveling Guide by Kai
• Official Mesmer Forum Guild
  • This is a community driven guild that is full of helpful people that can offer advice and suggestions

Thanks for the suggestions. I am beginning to realize just how clutch the traits are. With only 10 trait point right now (currently all in Dueling) I haven’t really seen their potential in action yet.

I’ll try out Signet of Illusion as a more offensive (by way of the phantasms) option vs Mirror Images (at least how I was using it).

Xyonon.3987:

May I ask you if you are EU or NA? And are you maybe even german? I really respect somone that gives a nice picture of himself with the nice text. I can now know what you are looking for. So it probably would be easier ingame or even with teamspeak or something. I really enjoy your wall’o’text more than a simple “hi need dmg what build shall i go? solo”
greez

NA I’m afraid. And from my understanding GW2 does not allow cross-region guesting. Shame as I would have definitely taken you up on the offer

As for the long front end to the OP, I just felt like it was worth letting people know how little experience I was going in with.

Thanks for the offer

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Hey Jon, reading the OP really took me back. In the MMO I played before this (Champions Online) I had pretty much posted the same thing. Quick question: Do you use the mouse to click some of your skills? It’s a very common thing for people new to MMOs to do (unless you come from some other CPU game like Starcraft. I, unfortunately, came from consoles and had to learn all this frustrating keyboard stuff) if so, it may help to keybind your 6, 7, 8, 9, 0 to something more like Shift+1, Shift+2, Shift+3, Shift+4, Shift+ 5.

Explore EVERYTHING! Try out WvW, try out PvP, don’t be afraid of dungeons. Never be afraid about being judged by anyone or that your performance is gonna drag anyone down. Especially don’t let that hold you back from exploring any and every bit of content that’s avaliable to you… And don’t be afraid to use sPvP (The Mists, Crossed-swords icon at top of your screen) to practice and experiment with builds. Even if you don’t go into an actual match, there’s a big playground where you can test all skill effects, weapon abilities, play around with your traits, ect with test dummies and enemy NPCs (fist symbol all the way north) you can screw with.

Also, don’t be afraid to PM anyone here who’s responded to you (and a few others around the boards) with questions or concerns whenever ya need. Really helpful bunch. I’ll post some parts of the Mesmer guide here that may help ya out… The full guide (as linked above) can be found in my signature.

Wow—thanks for the info! It’s going to take me a little while to digest, and dig into the guide, but that’s a great start. I can start to see why I haven’t been as efficient as I might have hoped.

As for the OP, I think it was important to let people know how little experience I was coming into this with. After all, pretending I’m less of a newb than I am isn’t going to help anyone

To answer your question—a bit of both. I am trying pretty hard to force myself to use the keys in order to get used to it but it doesn’t feel super intuitive. But then, neither does movement—I’ll just have to get used to it. That’s actually one of the reasons I have been trying to use Mind Stab in my opening volley: It’s a skill that I really need to be using from the 3 key or it takes twice as long to cast (because I have to place it).

I will try PvP eventually. WvW looks more interesting that sPvP to me right now but I’m sure I’ll try both. I am just generally a “campaign” and “co-op” player. Usually have a lot more fun with those aspects than the competitive mp so I am focusing on PvE for now. Definitely plan to do the Dungeons but I think I have only stumbled across one or two so far and the only one I really looked at had a level of 50-55, I think? The Nightmare Court one in Caledon Forest.

Anyway—I really appreciate the help. Looks like I have some reading to do!

JonofPDX.2068:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Hey Jon, reading the OP really took me back. In the MMO I played before this (Champions Online) I had pretty much posted the same thing. Quick question: Do you use the mouse to click some of your skills? It’s a very common thing for people new to MMOs to do (unless you come from some other CPU game like Starcraft. I, unfortunately, came from consoles and had to learn all this frustrating keyboard stuff) if so, it may help to keybind your 6, 7, 8, 9, 0 to something more like Shift+1, Shift+2, Shift+3, Shift+4, Shift+ 5.

Explore EVERYTHING! Try out WvW, try out PvP, don’t be afraid of dungeons. Never be afraid about being judged by anyone or that your performance is gonna drag anyone down. Especially don’t let that hold you back from exploring any and every bit of content that’s avaliable to you… And don’t be afraid to use sPvP (The Mists, Crossed-swords icon at top of your screen) to practice and experiment with builds. Even if you don’t go into an actual match, there’s a big playground where you can test all skill effects, weapon abilities, play around with your traits, ect with test dummies and enemy NPCs (fist symbol all the way north) you can screw with.

Also, don’t be afraid to PM anyone here who’s responded to you (and a few others around the boards) with questions or concerns whenever ya need. Really helpful bunch. I’ll post some parts of the Mesmer guide here that may help ya out… The full guide (as linked above) can be found in my signature.

Wow—thanks for the info! It’s going to take me a little while to digest, and dig into the guide, but that’s a great start. I can start to see why I haven’t been as efficient as I might have hoped.

As for the OP, I think it was important to let people know how little experience I was coming into this with. After all, pretending I’m less of a newb than I am isn’t going to help anyone

To answer your question—a bit of both. I am trying pretty hard to force myself to use the keys in order to get used to it but it doesn’t feel super intuitive. But then, neither does movement—I’ll just have to get used to it. That’s actually one of the reasons I have been trying to use Mind Stab in my opening volley: It’s a skill that I really need to be using from the 3 key or it takes twice as long to cast (because I have to place it).

I will try PvP eventually. WvW looks more interesting that sPvP to me right now but I’m sure I’ll try both. I am just generally a “campaign” and “co-op” player. Usually have a lot more fun with those aspects than the competitive mp so I am focusing on PvE for now. Definitely plan to do the Dungeons but I think I have only stumbled across one or two so far and the only one I really looked at had a level of 50-55, I think? The Nightmare Court one in Caledon Forest.

Anyway—I really appreciate the help. Looks like I have some reading to do!

You’ll be sent mails with a bit of story and placements of dungeons as you gain the appropriate levels.