Guild Wars 2

So the “Initial attacks” that were added to the phantasms a while back were less than stellar, and in most cases, a rotation of these attacks does not equal the sheer utility that would be offered if Phantasams persisted in any way. So I’m suggesting a simple more clear cut series of initial attacks that in my opinion not only streamlines the process, but also adds some much needed damage to many of the opening attacks.

In a nutshell, the concept is that the Mesmers themselves perform the initial attack, then follow up with an illusion that performs the same action on repeat.

Some examples:

Sword Off-hand: Leap and your target and damage them, then summon an illusion that attacks with a leaping strike.

Staff: Fire a bolt that deals extra damage for each unique condition on a target, then summon an Illusion whose attacks do the same.

Pistol Off-Hand: Unload 4 shots from your pistol onto a target than summon an illusion that unloads 2 pistols. (4 shots per pistol to make 8 shots)

Trident: Confuse your foe with illusionary harpoons than summon an Illusion with a harpoon gun to do the same.

These changes to phantasams give the class a powerspike (pun intended) to its weaker offensive options. The class would also become inherently more active, and it will also help solidify the “Deja vu” esk fighting style that the class is suppose to have.

I like these ideas the current pistol one is extremely underwhelming to me, I always felt like a slow moving bullet was so out of place, and cripple always seemed like more of a sword or greatsword thing than pistol for mesmers, I always thought if anything it should be a daze or stun, but id be totally cool with a mini unload.

Personally, I’d be happy if pistol 4 used the duelist’s attack when you summon the phantasm. Same for some of the other phantasms as well.

OriOri.8724:

Personally, I’d be happy if pistol 4 used the duelist’s attack when you summon the phantasm. Same for some of the other phantasms as well.

I would love for Pistol 4 to do this because then i’d have to drop everything and build Quip.

Yea. The phantasms I think it makes the most sense for are

• Pistol
• OH Sword (slightly modified, but a short evade frame would fit with sword overall, plus the leap would be a nice gap closer for MH sword as well)
• Staff. Gives us a decently damaging attack that we can personally cast on Staff, without needing a phantasm up to use it. A slight buff, but not much of one.

But I rather like the direction that they went with focus and torch phantasms. And I don’t care about underwater combat, so have nothing to say about those.

GS is the oddball for me, only reason I’m not sure is that a gap closer doesn’t make much sense on our ranged power weapon, and it would considerably cut down the range of the skill. Yet I also really don’t like the current attack we got for it, so perhaps just re-do it from the ground up again?

But either way, I do think that the duelist, warlock and swordsman should have their initial attacks changed to just be the same (or nearly identical) as the attack that those respective phantasms cast.

An intriguing idea.. it’d also have the added benefit of actually letting you know exactly what benefits your phantasm is providing… plus if your target dies right after the attack then it feels less wasteful since the attack actually has impact outside of the illusion summon.

Yea. Having actual attacks instead of just the summon is a great idea, but the actual implementation leaves a lot to be desired at the moment.

OriOri.8724:

• OH Sword (slightly modified, but a short evade frame would fit with sword overall, plus the leap would be a nice gap closer for MH sword as well)

It wouldn’t only be good as a gap closer but also as a small disengage, to then further space with sword 3, or a weapon switch to GS and a Illusionary Wave, followed up with a backdodge to then have a decent range to keep attacking with GS. Would really love to see this happen.

On the other side, I’m not sure if I’d like it if every phantasm attack would be used as the summon attack. I think the phantasm would kind of lose their identity. Atleast for me.

Takashiro.8701:

OriOri.8724:

• OH Sword (slightly modified, but a short evade frame would fit with sword overall, plus the leap would be a nice gap closer for MH sword as well)

It wouldn’t only be good as a gap closer but also as a small disengage, to then further space with sword 3, or a weapon switch to GS and a Illusionary Wave, followed up with a backdodge to then have a decent range to keep attacking with GS. Would really love to see this happen.

On the other side, I’m not sure if I’d like it if every phantasm attack would be used as the summon attack. I think the phantasm would kind of lose their identity. Atleast for me.

Honestly I’d only be concerned with Phantasmal Berserker and possibly Echo of Memory…

Phantasmal Berserker because the phantasm uses melee attacks while the greatsword is a ranged weapon for mesmers… a good solution, however, would be to have the initial attack whirl over to your target and then back to your original position, as opposed to only one direction.

Echo of Memory, because well.. the initial attack it has already is actually more beneficial… we’d be losing blocks in exchange for applying alacrity and slow without successfully summoning the phantasm… sorry but I’d rather keep the blocks on this one… let the phantasm handle the utility, and if my target dies right after I activate the skill, so be it… at least I can still block attacks from a secondary target, and with any luck the phantasm was summoned just long enough to apply its effect.

Two phantasms that would MASSIVELY benefit from this are Illusionary Warlock and Illusionary Whaler… I’m sure we can all honestly say ANet was out right lazy with these two… all they did was make us cast our auto-attack… and for some reason that evades explanation, the attack is actually WEAKER on Illusionary Warlock than our actual auto-attack is…

I mean, the Phantasm Skill we have for greatsword already feels very similar to how the Berserker acts, the only difference is instead of us spinning, we throw a sword that spins there and comes back.

Durzlla.6295:

I mean, the Phantasm Skill we have for greatsword already feels very similar to how the Berserker acts, the only difference is instead of us spinning, we throw a sword that spins there and comes back.

and does damage that is hardly any better than having done nothing at all… we were told that these new attacks added to phantasm summons were to “improve mesmer sustain damage” but what improvement have they actually provided? with exception of like one or two skills they have done nothing to improve our sustain… for crying out loud they copy pasted our auto-attack on two of them, and proceeded to make the already weak attack even WEAKER on one of them…

If they really wanted to improve our sustain damage, then these attacks should at least be equal in damage to a single attack from the phantasm.

Takashiro.8701:

OriOri.8724:

• OH Sword (slightly modified, but a short evade frame would fit with sword overall, plus the leap would be a nice gap closer for MH sword as well)

It wouldn’t only be good as a gap closer but also as a small disengage, to then further space with sword 3, or a weapon switch to GS and a Illusionary Wave, followed up with a backdodge to then have a decent range to keep attacking with GS. Would really love to see this happen.

On the other side, I’m not sure if I’d like it if every phantasm attack would be used as the summon attack. I think the phantasm would kind of lose their identity. Atleast for me.

Oh I agree that not every phantasm should be given this treatment. But I think that Sword, Staff, and Pistol phnatasms would benefit from it, and it would also make sense, and it would also fit the theme of those weapons extremely well. Berserker, torch and focus would not be a great fit in my opinion (and I don’t really care about UW phantasms).

Panda.1967:

Durzlla.6295:

I mean, the Phantasm Skill we have for greatsword already feels very similar to how the Berserker acts, the only difference is instead of us spinning, we throw a sword that spins there and comes back.

and does damage that is hardly any better than having done nothing at all… we were told that these new attacks added to phantasm summons were to “improve mesmer sustain damage” but what improvement have they actually provided? with exception of like one or two skills they have done nothing to improve our sustain… for crying out loud they copy pasted our auto-attack on two of them, and proceeded to make the already weak attack even WEAKER on one of them…

If they really wanted to improve our sustain damage, then these attacks should at least be equal in damage to a single attack from the phantasm.

I never said the damage was fine, I said the skill animation/effect of summoning the berserker on greatsword kinda already fits with how the berserker acts, since OP was talking about making the phantasm summon skills work like the actual phantasm attack and then summon the phantasm.

OriOri.8724:

Takashiro.8701:

OriOri.8724:

• OH Sword (slightly modified, but a short evade frame would fit with sword overall, plus the leap would be a nice gap closer for MH sword as well)

It wouldn’t only be good as a gap closer but also as a small disengage, to then further space with sword 3, or a weapon switch to GS and a Illusionary Wave, followed up with a backdodge to then have a decent range to keep attacking with GS. Would really love to see this happen.

On the other side, I’m not sure if I’d like it if every phantasm attack would be used as the summon attack. I think the phantasm would kind of lose their identity. Atleast for me.

Oh I agree that not every phantasm should be given this treatment. But I think that Sword, Staff, and Pistol phnatasms would benefit from it, and it would also make sense, and it would also fit the theme of those weapons extremely well. Berserker, torch and focus would not be a great fit in my opinion (and I don’t really care about UW phantasms).

I fully agree that sword and pistol should more closely resemble their phantasm skill, staff I’m kinda unsure about, because I really like being able to throw out 3 autos with it, but would also really like being able to fire out a Warlock blast before summoning the Warlock…

Eh, the 3 autos are weak, don’t really have much pressure at all. But the warlocks attack does have a bit of pressure, especially if there are a lot of condis on the enemy. So it gives staff more pressure overall imo

OriOri.8724:

Eh, the 3 autos are weak, don’t really have much pressure at all. But the warlocks attack does have a bit of pressure, especially if there are a lot of condis on the enemy. So it gives staff more pressure overall imo

Not to mention the autoattack on phantasmal warlock is weaker than the actual autoattack… the only reason the skill is worth using over autoattack is because the phantasm itself does more damage.