Guild Wars 2

So, this has been on my mind for quite some time now. I’ve been playing mesmer ever since the very beginning and for the last month I’ve settled (like most mesmers that don’t like to rely on shatters) for a full phantasms build.

Still, there are two thing that continue to annoy me in our lovely, lovely profession more than anything else; More than our lame mantras, more than the unreliability of our confusion builds, more than the utter ineffectiveness of our blocks in PVP, more than the extremely imperfect trait tree for condition damage, more than our sad lack of swiftness and more than the total uselessness of our Grandmaster traits. And those two things are the Signet of Illusions and the Phantasmal Haste trait.

Reminder:
Signet of Illusions (skill): grants more health to illusions [passive] and recharges shatter skills [active]
Phantasmal Haste (trait): Phantasms recharge 20% faster | Trait X (needs 25 points in the Illusions tree)

The thing is:
A Phantasm build wants (needs) its phantasms to have more health and to recharge faster since all its power comes from them being alive. That’s the core part of the build: keeping phantasms alive and re-summoning them as fast as possible, thus the importance of these trait and skill.

But then if I want to get this skill and trait why does the game force me to invest in shattering (through the illusions tree) and in a skill with a shatter-focused effect when that’s the exact opposite of what this build is trying to accomplish?

If I shatter, my phantasms die and there goes my DPS, my regeneration and protection, my +defense, my +damage (and my +mobility if I actually cared for Compouding Celerity).
These two skill and trait are related to the core part of a phantasm build. This build is the one for which they seemed to be design for and the one they will be more effective on. So I don’t understand why would the game put them in a tree that’s totally unrelated to the mechanics of this build and in a skill with an active effect that the build simply will not use.
/cry of frustration/

Oh “But shattering is a core mechanic of any mesmer!” says arenanet. And my answer is: potato.

We all know that phantasm builds don’t shatter unless the apocalypse is about to come and we need diversion or an interrupt (and even then.. does it make sense to give up on our core source of DPS and protection/evasion?)

There are a lot of options for a mesmer (even if most of them don’t actually work effectively) and It’s ok if you don’t want to use a phantasm build. But Arenanet, don’t put phantasm essential skills and traits in the game that I simply cannot use while in a phantasm build. It’s pointless.

The only remotely intelligent explanation for this that I could come up with was that maybe it’s some kind of trolling. The game teasing us by showing us skills that we should be using but just cannot. Is that it?, The ultimate inner troll mesmer revenge?

And that’s it. Discuss

There are builds where warriors get benefits from not using their core mechanic, same goes for mesmers and there is no problem with that, not that phantasms have too long cooldowns and can’t be summoned after a shatter.

Balanced mesmer builds exist, and they are really good.

Keep in mind Protection on regen comes now with a 20-25 seconds cooldown making it useless.

I agree 100%.

If ANet wants to support the freedom of multiple viable builds why railroad us mesmers into shatter-centric builds. This doesn’t make sense to me.

I want to keep my phantasms for as long as possible. That being said, it does take a bit of time if I want multiples of the same phantasm out, so I often fill that time with fast spawning clones. This gives me some semblance of misdirection until I can get out more phantasms.

I think it would be pretty awesome if we had the ability to choose to shatter all of them (like it is now) or only shatter clones. That way we are still utilizing the mesmer’s shatter abilities which often provides some pretty good utility.

Another option is to allow us to shatter 1, 2, or all 3 illusions, with shatter priority going to the clones (when shattering only 1 or 2).

In the meantime we are stuck watching them be replaced for no additional benefit when we get our third phantasm out.

That’s my two copper.
-phoenix

I see phantasms in pvp as things that are meant to be killed (by the enemy.) With this perspective, I agree that traits that directly buff phantasms are fairly useless. However, if you give phantasms both high damage output (which they have) AND tankiness, then you start running into some balance problems.

When I’m running a semi-bunker build, I only bother to pick up the phan retal trait, since i know people like to focus/aoe em down. I kind of play a little metagame since I know people like you like to pump points into inspiration. Thus, when people see I’m not shattering left and right they start focusing my guys, thinking I must be one of those phantasm mesmers.

However, I’m specced with lots of cloaking (prismatic understanding got a huge buff recently imo) and the clone/illusion death traits; so I actually want people to kill my minions while I’m cloaked. This whittles them down, and probably annoys the hell out of them during the process.

tldr:
I like phantasm heavy mesmers because I like to mindgame people into thinking I am one.

Nobody forces you to play shatter, just because there is a mechanic that allows to shatter your illusions it doesn’t mean you HAVE to. Can’t be hard to understand.

Meh, sorry I still say that the shatter mechanic is the core of the class, not just the illusion tree…. It also appears that some of you are expecting our phantasms to act like pets; which they aren’t and I am glad… Clones and Phantasms are disposable utility skills that can be combined for greater effect…. I haven’t seen a build yet where keeping the slow weak phantasms out can out damage even the crappiest shatterer. I don’t even use the +20% damage to mind wrack and shattering still out dps’s stacked phantasms.

I think you’re looking for things to be sad about.

First off, it makes perfect sense for every single Mesmer to use shatters – at the right time. Your precious phantasms disappear no matter what once they have done their job. You may as well get some benefit from them before they do.

The active benefit of Signet of Illusions is of no importance in a phantasm build. Using the signet will make your phantasms easier to kill. Not something you want to do if you rely on them for everything, is it?

Phantasmal haste requires 20 points in Illusions. Typical for those 20 points, you’ll get Illusionists Celerity (required for phantasm build) for reduced illusion summoning recharge, Compounding Power for 9% damage buff when you have three illusions out (always, if you can help it), Illusionary Retribution which gives confusion on shatter, and Phantasmal Haste. Three traits that help your build, one that is mostly irrelevant.

You’re also going at least 10 deep into domination for Empowered Illusions. Why aren’t you complaining that you’re forced to pick up Illusion of Vulnerability along the way? It does nothing for your build either.

The trees aren’t designed with any one build (ie, yours) in mind. You’ll make compromises. The same is true of shatter builds, mantra builds, shutdown builds …. You get the point. You can’t focus a build 100% on any one thing, the game isn’t made that way.

my experience:

i use a phantasm/cond damage hybrid build, and lately i’ve taken a liking to the iWarden and as you probably know, this phantasm wont follow it’s target, so i’ve forced myself to use shatters and they have proven to be quite useful, BUT they are still quite far from being a “core” skill to me

so yeah, i think our F1-F4 skills are BAD, Shatters should be utility skills, i’ve played a warrior, a guardian, a ranger and a thief, and they all have usefull skills there, and are skills that can be used by ANY build you use… in comparison a condition mesmer will get little to none benefit from shatters except the utility of F3 and F4, and in PvP F2, a Phantasm mesmer will get little to none benefit from shatters, not even the utility from F3 and F4 can outweigh the loss of DPS

about the trait lanes, well I think they are pretty well designed, lets take a look:

Empowered Illusions: by getting this trait you get +100 power, which is good

Phantasmal Fury + Sharper Images: you get +150 Precision and +15% crit damage, also pretty good

Phantasmal Strenght + Persisting Images: you get +200 Vitality wich increase your HP AND your phantasms health (see the synergy here? Persisting Images says hi!) also a nice +200 healling power

Phantasmal Haste + Illusionist Celerity + Compounding Power: you get +200 Cond Damage (see the synergy here? Sharper Images says hi!) and that +20% shatter recharge, well that’s kitten xD

so yeah, while the las trait lane gives you some tools for a shatter build, it doesn’t mean you HAVE to use shatters, imagine we had trait lanes with specific traits for specific build completely apart, that would force everyone to pick the exact same traits for any given build, the good thing about traits right now is that you can pick whatever you think its good and it will probably work, the downside is that you will also get bonusses that you will never actually use, but that’s actually a really cheap price to pay

tl;dr: Shatters are kitten, shouldn’t be at our “F” slot, Trait lanes are well designed

korelg.7862:

my experience:
lately i’ve taken a liking to the iWarden and as you probably know, this phantasm wont follow it’s target,

Actually, I am starting to feel they are designed that way on purpose because of their whirl finisher, it would suck if they kept moving out of the fields you place on them to benefit from their combo field whirl finishers (which are sick btw)…. Additionally, the wardens do move, but only when the target has moved more than 900 away from the warden (out of the reach of any whirl finisher range I assume).

If you are good at kiting, you can use this understanding to actually reposition your wardens, kite the move past 900, warden will reposition… profit

sinican.9250:

korelg.7862:

my experience:
lately i’ve taken a liking to the iWarden and as you probably know, this phantasm wont follow it’s target,

Actually, I am starting to feel they are designed that way on purpose because of their whirl finisher, it would suck if they kept moving out of the fields you place on them to benefit from their combo field whirl finishers (which are sick btw)…. Additionally, the wardens do move, but only when the target has moved more than 900 away from the warden (out of the reach of any whirl finisher range I assume).

If you are good at kiting, you can use this understanding to actually reposition your wardens, kite the move past 900, warden will reposition… profit

this is half true, the warden DOES move on certain scenarios, mainly when it gets LoS’d, but if you go out of range it will walk indeed but only to get in the 900 range, it wont go stand right next to the target… when it gets LoS’d it’ll get close, that’s the best posible scenario

AmateurGod.5403:

snip
Phantasmal Haste (trait): Phantasms recharge 20% faster | Trait X (needs 25 points in the Illusions tree)
snip

I believe that trait increases the Attack Speed of the phantasms. Not the skill cooldown for the mesmer. If you want improved casting time you’ll need 5pts only into the Illusions tree for Illusionists Celerity (20% for ALL illusion skills).

Vexor.3640:

AmateurGod.5403:

snip
Phantasmal Haste (trait): Phantasms recharge 20% faster | Trait X (needs 25 points in the Illusions tree)
snip

I believe that trait increases the Attack Speed of the phantasms. Not the skill cooldown for the mesmer. If you want improved casting time you’ll need 5pts only into the Illusions tree for Illusionists Celerity (20% for ALL illusion skills).

Which also stacks with weapon CD speed increase.

AmateurGod.5403:

We all know that phantasm builds don’t shatter unless the apocalypse is about to come

To be fair you actually should be shattering regardless of spec every time your target (or phantasms) is about to die, which is frequently with few exceptions like bosses and champion mobs.

The relationship between the shattering mechanic and someone who wants to play a phantasm spec is that you try avoid shattering but you must do so occasionally.

If you want to play phantasms you must develop a technique for avoiding confrontation/damage. This is so that you can at least setup your phantasms. You may also wish to continue doing this during a fight.

When the above techniques are on cooldown you will need to shatter your phantasms to produce distortion or daze. These are core mechanics, which mean your toolbox is designed knowing these are already accessible to you. You should expect to have to use them.

Increasing illusion health serves three purposes ( at least from a design theory perspective). One is to keep them alive longer in aoe. Not only phantasms but (for example) sword and staff clones so that they can keep applying conditions. The second function serves as steady retaliation damage. The third is keeping clones alive long enough to set up shatters with max effectiveness. This is all
probably more effective in pve (which I rarely do). It is not solely for a “phantasm specs”.

My most sucessful phantasm runs seem to come when using veil and decoy with mass invis as the elite. I don’t care much for it in tpvp as this type of spec struggles to kill before help arrives. I think your best bet is using scep/swd. You can summon , switch to scep/swd , summon, block-dmg, block-dmg, then disappear to evaluate your next move or heal. Knights amulet is best I think.

@VoodooTina
[ I think you’re looking for things to be sad about. ]

No, bb, I’m not looking for things to be sad about. What I’m doing is helping this game improve by questioning somethings that me and some other mesmer players think could be improved. Ever heard of constructive criticism? Ever heard of feedback and patch notes and tweaks?

[ First off, it makes perfect sense for every single Mesmer to use shatters – at the right time. Your precious phantasms disappear no matter what once they have done their job. You may as well get some benefit from them before they do. ]

First of all, just because it makes sense for me to shatter it doesn’t mean I should invest in traits and skills that focus on them if that’s not the core of my build. I never said I want shattering to be removed. If you read my post from beginning to end you’ll notice that I’m questioning one specific skill and one specific trait that are both forcefully connected with both phantasms and shattering. Get it?

[ The active benefit of Signet of Illusions is of no importance in a phantasm build. Using the signet will make your phantasms easier to kill. Not something you want to do if you rely on them for everything, is it? ]

Do you even know what you’re talking about? The active effect recharges my shatter skills, how does that make my phantasms easier to kill? be serious or GTFO
What’s difficult in understanding that I might be interested in a skill that grants more 50% health to my phantasms?…

[ You’re also going at least 10 deep into domination for Empowered Illusions. Why aren’t you complaining that you’re forced to pick up Illusion of Vulnerability along the way? It does nothing for your build either. ]

I’m not complaining about that because the 2 best weapons for phantasms (pistol and GS) have both extremely useful interrupts. So it makes sense. And because I’m complaining about one trait that seems to be designed with a use in a phantasms build and not complaining about general trait lines. I am not allow to question things?

[ The trees aren’t designed with any one build (ie, yours) in mind. You’ll make compromises. The same is true of shatter builds, mantra builds, shutdown builds …. You get the point. You can’t focus a build 100% on any one thing, the game isn’t made that way.]

Well, I think they are. And if you use one second to think about it I’m sure you’ll come to the same conclusion. Or is it not that the inspiration tree kinda focus on phantams, the illusion tree on shattering, the chaos tree on condition damage, the dueling tree on mantras and the domination tree on shutdown? They clearly have specific focuses by their design, if that ends up working or not just means they aren’t very well balanced and organized.

@CrazyAce

[ If you don’t want to shatter your phantasms, you’re not playing your shatter build right. In a shatter build you summon your phantasms, let them attack, then shatter right after because most of them have long pauses between their attacks, especially the iDuelist.

GUESS WHAT? IT’S NOT A SHATTER BUILD, kitten. READ THE POST.

[ TL:DR… My point? QUIT WHINING AND LEARN TO PLAY YOUR CLASS.
Take ten minutes and read the trait line options before you go complaining about a core class mechanic that works as intended, and works well at that. ]

What? read the “trait lines”? What’s that? Is it in the game? Is that magic? And “Learn to play my class”? How? Like reading books and stuff? Can your mother maybe teach me, oh wise one since you know so much yourself? Maybe I’ll ask her directly next time she’s around.

If you sincerely believe that shattering is perfectly working as intended in such an extreme way that no one can even suggest that maybe they don’t want to shatter their phantasms all the time, then please understand that there are a lot of people that disagree with you that do know how to play the class in a very successful way. I also invite you to get to meet more mesmer players. Try making some friends, you know, you’ll see it’s fun.

TL:DR: Quit trying to bully people because you have no self esteem and are lost, you end up sounding like an annoying little kid (if you’re not already). And start reading other people’s posts before raging on them. Also, get a life.

[ The active benefit of Signet of Illusions is of no importance in a phantasm build. Using the signet will make your phantasms easier to kill. Not something you want to do if you rely on them for everything, is it? ]

Do you even know what you’re talking about? The active effect recharges my shatter skills, how does that make my phantasms easier to kill? be serious or GTFO
What’s difficult in understanding that I might be interested in a skill that grants more 50% health to my phantasms?…

Correct me if I’m wrong but if you activate the signet, your phantasm are supposed to lose the passive effect of the signet, which makes them easier to kill as they lose health. I have never tried it tbh so I don’t know how it actually behaves but it’s supposed to be like this.
A signet that make you not want to get the active effect is poorly designed imo. Activating a signet should always be a question of context and you should want to activate it when some situation arises. When playing a phantasm build, you almost never want to activate it as it’s quite rare you need your shatter skills cd resets (maybe for distorsion or diversion).
I’d rather have this signet active be something like your phantasm attack timer resets so that maybe if they are about to die, they can still lose half their hp but do one last attack and then you can shatter them. I’m sure there are other better options for an active but that’s the only one that came to my mind.

Well, if you ask me, Signet of Illusions’ passive and active effect are totally at odds. The passive effect supports a Legion build and the active effect supports a Shatter build. Kinda wonky.

But the fact of the matter is I don’t use it in the first place because my utilities are Decoy, Mirror Images, and Null Field. For my current build I’m one of the few Mesmers that doesn’t use Blink in PvE. I’ve never found that I need it. Maybe if it gave me Z-axis transversal I’d use it, but I find clone spamming to be more useful to me.

Signet of Illusion passive is also bugged. It can take up to 10s before the signet is applied to an illusion. By that time, the illusion is probably already dead.

I thought I was clear about signet of illusions. I’ll say it another way. The passive effect of an signet goes away when you activate the signet. The passive effect of signet of illusions is to buff your illusions HP. The moment you activate the signet the buff disappears, making your illusions easier to kill. This is what I mean when I say the active effect of the signet is irrelevant in a phantasm build. You will not want to use something that makes your phantasms weaker, so even if the signet were changed you would avoid activating it. I don’t think there’s any conflict between the active and passive effects. Phantasm builds work fine leaving it passive, balance builds are happy with both uses, and pure shatter build are mostly interested in the active effect.

To the separation of mechanics in trait trees, I simply think you’ve got the wrong idea. You say inspiration is about buffing phantasms? Vigorous Revelation and Shattered Comditions. Illusions is for shatters? Compounding Power and Phantasmal
Haste. Dueling for mantras? None of the minor traits are remotely related – you can easily have 30 points in it and completely ignore mantras – and many builds do. Domination is for shutdown? Bountiful, Furious, and Chaotic Interruption all disagree – two of those are Grandmaster traits NOT in Domination.

You see this as poor organization but I disagree. As I think most players would, if you think of the consequence of putting all related traits in the same tree. Every Mesmer with a similar play style would automatically make the same choices. Really no choice involved. Also, you would be limited to choosing three relevant traits instead of being able to pick them from different trees to get the combination that works for you.

If you look at builds other than your own you will see the “problem” with phantasm builds is a feature of every build. You can’t have everything you want and nothing you don’t. It’s not the way traits were set up, and expecting that sort of change to be made now is fruitless. It’s not this way by mistake, and completely changing the design now would bork everyone else’s build for them.

You can naturally question everything you want. You’re entitled to your opinion, but of course we are all entitled to agree or disagree with it. The forum is here for discussion, so you have to be prepared to hear everyone’s opinion, and we can’t all agree. It’s my opinion that you’re complaining about things that don’t suit you perfectly, but are best left as they are.

The Signet of Illusions design seems intended to supplement low points in the Illusions tree. Since most Phantasms don’t benefit much from the Illusion traits (outside of optional Major Traits) only the first 5 points, maybe 10 are required. It allows you to have a way to clear up your Daze/Distortion shatter if it is needed immediately as the CDs on those abilities are very long w/o points.

Phantasmal Haste then is then the flip side, it benefits a Shatter build more than a Phantasm build. After shattering two set of clones via MW/CoF you can summon Phantasms that will be able to attack twice in the time that those shatters are recharging, filling in the damage that you are lacking from your primary burst being on CD.

CrazyAce.3842:

Well, if you ask me, Signet of Illusions’ passive and active effect are totally at odds. The passive effect supports a Legion build and the active effect supports a Shatter build. Kinda wonky.

But the fact of the matter is I don’t use it in the first place because my utilities are Decoy, Mirror Images, and Null Field. For my current build I’m one of the few Mesmers that doesn’t use Blink in PvE. I’ve never found that I need it. Maybe if it gave me Z-axis transversal I’d use it, but I find clone spamming to be more useful to me.

Exactly. It’s a weird signet and that was one of the points of the post.

TBH I don’t understand why you’d use mirror images in a phantasm build. it works wonders with a staff condition build or with shattering but I don’t really see the point in a legion build.

I got decoy and nullfield as well and I don’t use blink either – it’s not good enough for speed and the camera angles in most fights end up kittening its true potential.

I used to put on the Phantasmal Disenchanter as my 3rd utility mainly for the membrane buff since he would stay away and wouldn’t die as often. Now I’m still testing.

Congrats on deciding to join the conversation as an adult.