Guild Wars 2

Phantasms function as both a resource and a group utility ability in addition to just a simple attack.

Should the attack not connect if blinded, dodged, or blocked? SURE!, but the phantasms should still spawn to produce their secondary and tertiary effects.

Here is an observation on just how much of a double-standard is being applied with this capricious and profession-breaking change.

For every other class the attack still comes out.

If an Elementalist casts meteor storm and the opponent dodges, at least there’s still a fire field on the ground to use.

If a Thief uses steal and the opponent rolls, the Thief still ends up behind the opponent (In fact the Thief can steal regardless of any status effect on him).

If a Mesmer uses Warden and the opponent has Aegis, I hope you weren’t planning on it reflecting projectiles because now the attack won’t even appear.

In fact I can’t think of anything else that is like this. Does an Engineer’s turrets not spawn if he’s out of range? Does a Ranger not evade attacks with his third Greatsword attack if he’s blinded? Does a Mesmer not get his whirl combo finisher if he doesn’t have line of sight? Oh wait, he doesn’t because the attack doesn’t happen at all if the phantasm doesn’t come out.

No other class can have their attack “not happen” unless they are interrupted. Essentially rolling, blinding, aegis, evasion, ect… now all “interrupt” the Mesmer preventing them from even attacking with 20% of their attacks.

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks. There is not really a logical reason for them to ignore dodging. The ‘double-standard’ examples are apples to oranges — for example, if an opponent dodges when you cast Chaos Storm, the field is still on the ground.

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks. There is not really a logical reason for them to ignore dodging. The ‘double-standard’ examples are apples to oranges — for example, if an opponent dodges when you cast Chaos Storm, the field is still on the ground.

Yeah, makes no sense. Shouldn’t it be dodged then, and not spawn? Considering my AE Phantasms don’t spawn, either?

The above comparisons are NOT apples to oranges. Each of the attacks mentioned have secondary actions that have nothing to do with damage, and when they miss they still leave their combo fields and secondary group utility effects behind.

The example in the quote above is most prescient: The warden.

This thing does aoe damage. It should still spawn even if the one target you have out of many dodges it. It should still provide the feedback bubble to block/reflect projectiles even if it does no damage. It should still provide ammo for shatters even if its attack does not connect. (other phantasms leave regenration on party members if you have moderate investment in inspiration the entire support line depends upon phantasms actually spawning. Not doing damage, not connecting attacks, but simply spawning)

Phantasm being dodged is totally unacceptable, there was no need for that. I can understand MOA Morph being dodged but c’mon Phantasms there was no need for that. It was enough with no being able o summon them due to LOS. At least give us Phantasm haste 50% instead of 20% CD between attacks. Phantasms die too easy theres only like 3 that does decent good damage, they are restricted to one target only, their traits are all bugged, an their attacks are to slow. C’mon they are our only ways of DPS.

It’s not a double standard though. All you’ve done is list a bunch of attacks that aren’t completely shut down by dodging/mez effects. I can just as easily name a bunch of moves of other classes that are. I can just as easily name a bunch of abilities that mesmers have which still retain some functionality when you are dodged/mez’d.

If only it would just be an interrupt. Interrupts are so much nicer to us than the numerous ways of avoiding an attack.. or the buggy LoS. Now when I get interrupted while casting a Phantasm, I actually feel happy that it wasn’t just a dodge/block/blind that would have put me on the full cool down.

And yeah, chain blinding thieves… which other class can be denied so many of it’s class mechanics and traits by simply getting chain blinded? Does a thieve lose all initiative and the ability to stealth when blinded?.. does an Elementalist fail to change attunements, or a Guardian fail to activate his virtues or wards when blinded?.. then why Mesmers?

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks. There is not really a logical reason for them to ignore dodging. The ‘double-standard’ examples are apples to oranges — for example, if an opponent dodges when you cast Chaos Storm, the field is still on the ground.

Except that if you actually play the class, or take just a minute to examine what the class is supposed to be, you’d understand that phantasms were apparently designed not to be just a regular attack.

Mesmer “regular” attacks are weak. Very weak. Sword 2 is the ONLY exception to this. And for what it is, I’d argue it’s still a primarily defensive ability, but it works well both ways.

Phantasms ARE our damage. We can circumvent this with particular specs, but so can every other class. And this creates pigeon-holing our class into very specific builds.

Phantasms are, in my mind, supposed to be a hybrid of ability and pet, along with creating synergy with the class mechanic, shatter. Which means they need some sort of reliability in trade for being so disposable. I don’t mind if, according to your train of thought, they become “regular attacks” alone. But if that’s the case, then they should be immune to damage and have a finite duration. If you give me those two, then sure, blind / dodge/ whatever my phantasms to your heart’s delight.

edit I forgot, in addition our AE phantasms need to be ground-target instead of enemy target.

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks.

They sure do.

This should be posted in the suggestions forums too. The more devs hear about this issue the better.

clipnotdone.9634:

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks.

They sure do.

I laughed.
Then I cried.
It sums up everything wrong with this patch.

Warkupo.1025:

It’s not a double standard though. All you’ve done is list a bunch of attacks that aren’t completely shut down by dodging/mez effects. I can just as easily name a bunch of moves of other classes that are. I can just as easily name a bunch of abilities that mesmers have which still retain some functionality when you are dodged/mez’d.

Look at the inspiration tree.

Everything equivalent to what guardians bring in terms of symbols and wards are shackled to our phantasms.

Let’s see what would happen in the guardian forums if being blinded meant you couldn’t use a symbol or ward?

Did you know phantasmal defender, a phantasm that does nothing but sit and make you take less damage (it does not even attack!) is subject to this?

Let’s put all protection-generating abilities on cooldown when you get blinded.

They should buff the phantasms attacks if they expect the summon to be so conditional on physical defenses of the opponent.

Also, our Phantasms aren’t normal attacks (as shown above in the video).
Why should they be subject to things affecting normal attacks?

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks. There is not really a logical reason for them to ignore dodging. The ‘double-standard’ examples are apples to oranges —

Once a regular attack lands successfully, that’s it. With phantasms atm we can fail entirely when we cast, but even after that the enemy can still dodge/block/reflect/blind the phantasm.

Also, phantasms dont get regular attack bonuses from sigils and stuff.

It’s all double standard against the mesmer.

Carighan.6758:

Also, our Phantasms aren’t normal attacks (as shown above in the video).
Why should they be subject to things affecting normal attacks?

Considering the patchnotes, ANet thinks they are. They’re probably smoking pot all day since Obama won or something.

Iruwen.3164:

Considering the patchnotes, ANet thinks they are. They’re probably smoking pot all day since Obama won or something.

Well I know they think so, and given how some are doing a lot of single target damage, I can see where they come from.

The easiest way to permanently fix this is to – IMO – remove all damage from Clones/Phantasms, then rebalance our other attacks/moves accordingly to give us similar total damage.

Clones then become pure shatter-fodder and distraction-defence.
Phantasms become utility. Some already do this, others would apply mass-debuffs (Berserker would become a line-AE cripple only, probably make the cripple last 0,5s-1,0s longer), some others would just exist to spam combo finishers (Duelist would need it’s chance buffed back up to 100% in return for not doing damage, I would make Warlock cause Blast Finishers, and so on).

Then, the whole argument can be buried. They’d no longer be attacks, they’d be utility-summons.

The obstructed/outof rage whatsoever kitten is ofc a terrible bug.

BUT phantasms being dodged is totally fine to me. Mesmer was pretty ez to play before as far as effective skill chaining is concerned. From now on you have to pay attention to your enemy and his moves in order to make your attacks hit. That’s basically how it should be regardless of the specific effects (AE/ST).

A good Mesmer can still achieve quite some burst dmg and still maintain a good survivability. It’s just not that easy anymore which is totally fine to me.

If it had been like that since the beginning this thread wouldn’t even exist.

Zid.4196:

alanis.6094:

Mesmer phantasms work like regular attacks. There is not really a logical reason for them to ignore dodging. The ‘double-standard’ examples are apples to oranges —

Once a regular attack lands successfully, that’s it. With phantasms atm we can fail entirely when we cast, but even after that the enemy can still dodge/block/reflect/blind the phantasm.

Also, phantasms dont get regular attack bonuses from sigils and stuff.

It’s all double standard against the mesmer.

Don’t forget kill it also. Be like Ele casting a Meteor Shower and then have each meteor be hit by another AE and die before doing dmg. Or a necro well being able to be hit and killed in 1-2hits Imagine the uproar.

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

Amen Op. 123456678899

I agree with the OP as well.

They should JUST prevent beeing able to spawn a berserker in Wv3 accros a stronghold wall and THAT’s ALL.
Since that’s the only problem.

Give us back the ability to spawn fantasm like before this awfull update.

The mesmer is really so bad now…

E Tan.7385:

They should JUST prevent beeing able to spawn a berserker in Wv3 accros a stronghold wall and THAT’s ALL.
Since that’s the only problem.

Give us back the ability to spawn fantasm like before this awfull update.

The mesmer is really so bad now…

I’m fine with them not being able to be summoned around corners etc. as well… but that’s with the los working properly… which it isn’t. A good compromise might be if they are around a corner/out of los that the phantoms are summoned next to us then run out quickly (like with Illusionary leap). This would make it more akin to the illusions in thieves guild in that case (which in NO case just doesn’t summon the thief phantoms).

Multi hitting phantoms not even being generated is ridiculousness though.

I can’t dodge/blind/block the first damage tick of any other multi-hitting skill from any other class and just have the rest of the attacks appear. Please apply this to all other classes so that this is the case or fix our phantoms.

They should never not spawn unless the target is invulnerable. When you’re blinded their first attack should miss. When target blocks, illusion’s first attack should be blocked… as it is now it makes no ****** sense.

Aberrant.6749:

E Tan.7385:

They should JUST prevent beeing able to spawn a berserker in Wv3 accros a stronghold wall and THAT’s ALL.
Since that’s the only problem.

Give us back the ability to spawn fantasm like before this awfull update.

The mesmer is really so bad now…

I’m fine with them not being able to be summoned around corners etc. as well… but that’s with the los working properly… which it isn’t. A good compromise might be if they are around a corner/out of los that the phantoms are summoned next to us then run out quickly (like with Illusionary leap). This would make it more akin to the illusions in thieves guild in that case (which in NO case just doesn’t summon the thief phantoms).

Multi hitting phantoms not even being generated is ridiculousness though.

I can’t dodge/blind/block the first damage tick of any other multi-hitting skill from any other class and just have the rest of the attacks appear. Please apply this to all other classes so that this is the case or fix our phantoms.

^ this
To my knowledge mesmer is the only class the becomes unable to use their skill completely if affected by a blind or the enemy dodges, blocks, or goes invuln….granted those skills if only a single attack are negated but they are still able to be used. A comparison would be if a elementalist used their meteor shower on a group of players, and the player they had targeted had a block up the entire group of players gets away scott free without taking damage, this absolutely makes no sense to me how anyone can justify these changes.

All I know the event today opening the island was very frustrating on my mesmer main. Not only was it near impossible to tag anything, but all the veteran mobs dodged and evaded so much that it was hard getting clones and stuff up. Mob would stop and by the time I cast it would be back to evading and my skill would go wasted. It made me wish I had brought an alt………

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

This is also just a WvW/PvP view. The mesmer can currently be considered broken in PvE.

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

of those 3 examples, 2 are single target skills. which don’t apply to the argument. as for dancing daggers, how long does it take to regen 4 initiative? longer than 15 seconds? 30 seconds?

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

It’s not the difficulty, it’s the penalty. Mesmers are penalised more. No other class loses their “class resource”(illusions) due to their skills not hitting. Mesmers do. Phantasms failing to summon due to a failed attack is like warriors losing a stack of their adrenaline everytime their attacks don’t hit.

Warkupo.1025:

Warkupo.1025:

Snip for brevity

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

Does the skill fail to activate in one of those conditions? No it does not is the answer, let us not also forget that our defensive abilities are tied to phantasm and illusion generation. Diversion and distortion only work when you have a illusion summoned, yes I realize that many mesmers take iPersona and deceptive evasion but now they are almost a requirement in order to be functional which pushes mesmer even further towards having to build for shatters. Losing build diversity is never a good thing and this “nerf” if you can call it that seems to be a knee jerk reaction to a very specific complaint in WvW primarily. I agree that players should not take damage or status effects from a skill that is blocked or negated in some fashion, hence if they block when say the izerker is whirling towards them they don’t take the hit of the first tick just like say a poison dart volley has the first tick blocked, but it does not prevent them from actually firing the skill. In the end though, with the exception of being out of range, there is no other class that in fact has their skill fail to activate due to these conditions. Phantasms quite simply are hybrid type of skills by design, since they are not only attacks but are summons as well, each phantasm behaves differently and what makes sense for one phantasm does not make sense to all phantasms. If the phantasm was only a single shot skill then yes failing to activate would make sense…but that is not how they operate they are persistent entities until they are shattered or destroyed in some other way. So yes, to be able to block the dmg of other persistent skills such as necro wells, or many other “hot spot” gtaoe skills you simply move out of the area dodge away from the circle but it does not prevent the player from actually dropping that gtaoe. This is why a sweeping change does not work here, because phantasms act a bit like a few different attack types, obviously they track like pets but in regards to dmg type i.e multi-hit vs single hit they vary greatly from phantasm to phantasm. All this aside I agree that if a target is currently out of LoS they should not be able to be summoned, I have no issue with that really (even though other gtaoe do not behave in this fashion they are only limited by range). Simply put there is not a simple fix that works for all the different variables and as it is now this simply does not work. PvE the situation is almost worse than in pvp but that is a whole other topic for another time.

ddoi.9264:

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

It’s not the difficulty, it’s the penalty. Mesmers are penalised more. No other class loses their “class resource”(illusions) due to their skills not hitting. Mesmers do. Phantasms failing to summon due to a failed attack is like warriors losing a stack of their adrenaline everytime their attacks don’t hit.

Actually I believe thieves do lose initiative on failed attacks, but as far as I know if they use deathblossom lets say, the skill does not fail, it just simply gets blocked but other people around still would take damage. This is the crux of this argument is that phantasms are designed by anet as their own special little snowflakes that behave like a multitude of differing attack types. They are not gtaoe/pbaoe, some of them are single target, some are multi target but behave a bit like a single target for purposes of acquiring the target, they track like pets and persist like pets but yet are not considered pets( much like necro minions). Anet did need to address the los issue with regards to phantasms but the heavy handed approach simply does not work here, it’s like trying to perform brain surgery with a hammer.

ddoi.9264:

It’s not the difficulty, it’s the penalty. Mesmers are penalised more. No other class loses their “class resource”(illusions) due to their skills not hitting. Mesmers do. Phantasms failing to summon due to a failed attack is like warriors losing a stack of their adrenaline everytime their attacks don’t hit.

Blatantly false, and I’ve been over this argument a few times now; Other classes have plenty of abilities with secondary debuff/buff effects attached to them which do not activate if an enemy is proactively avoiding them. The examples I have listed are going to have to suffice; I’m really not interested in posting every single ability in the game that behaves this way because there are a lot of them.

That you can come up with micro-examples of abilities that do still retain some benefit when they are cast is not proof for why phantasms should get to ignore debuff effects entirely, especially when considering that mesmers have other abilities that behave in this fashion as well, and, again, I’ve listed a few of those as well.

I won’t be addressing this point again.

wads.5730:

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t agree with the statement that phantasms are the only source of reliable damage for the mesmer, but then, I usually run a shatter build so maybe my perception is painted to begin with. For sword/sword (my primary), I know that my auto-attack does some pretty good damage while simultaneously applying vulnerability to give me better damage and some team utility. Blurred Frenzy is obviously good, and I’d argue that Riptose is not far behind it, although its’ understandably harder to utilize. I even count Illusionary Leap as an attack, but, again, I’m a shatter build.

So that’s at least 3 abilities within my weapon-set alone that do damage, not including the Phantasmal Swordsmen. I don’t consider it unfair that people can dodge my phantasm from appearing. I consider that good planning on my opponent for recognizing one of my more deadly moves and responding to it accordingly. I know I’d consider it unfair if, as an opponent, I couldn’t respond to the phantasm at all.

It seems like the perspective is that if a phantasm only does some utility ability, it shouldn’t be able to be dodged. That makes the impression that utility skills to help you survive or debilitate the enemy aren’t as valuable as damage, and so they should get a free pass. I consider this false. A well placed stun, blind, or dodge is how you get a leg up in combat. It’s the primary response for “glass-cannon” builds. It’s not an insignificant thing, and other classes aren’t given a free pass to just use their buff/debuff/utility powers regardless of what the enemy is doing either. If someone dodges my Dancing Dagger, he is not crippled and can continue to kite me effectively. If someone ducks behind cover while I’m using Rapid Fire, my arrows do not pierce the geometry and hit him anyway. If they dodge my bolas I don’t get to immobolize them, and I can’t follow up with Hundred Blades as they’ll likely be able to move out of the way of that as well. I could name examples all day.

Phantasms are good (at least, when they’re working. Looking at you berserker), but they are not the entirety of our skillset, nor should they be immune to things that could stop them. That they got a special pass to ignore all control effects is special treatment. It is not a double-standard.

No other class is prevented from actually using their skill if the target is under one of those status effects such as blocking, or invuln frame the dmg is negated for the player that actually blocked or dodged or used in invuln but everyone else who did not fall into that category that was in the area would still take a hit, as it stands now one player has the potential to completely shut down what little aoe capability the mesmer already has by denying the ability to even use the skill. No other class has this limitation

Out of hand I mentioned 3 abilities of other classes that are under that limitation. All classes have difficulty using their abilities when someone dodges them, or blind them, or stuns them, or what have you. I really don’t get where you’re coming up with the idea that mesmers are the only class that has to worry about status effects.

of those 3 examples, 2 are single target skills. which don’t apply to the argument. as for dancing daggers, how long does it take to regen 4 initiative? longer than 15 seconds? 30 seconds?

I could list dozens of other examples, but I won’t, because I’m not that interested in talking about this. I really don’t see why whether they are single target or not has anything to do with whether or not they should be dodged. I’m also not sure what sort of hi-jinks you are getting yourself into that you are being blinded/dodged/whatevered for 15 to 30 seconds, but I can tell you that if I am in that sort of debuffed agony with any other class I’m usually dead and on the floor by the end of it.

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

I’ve said it over and over again YOU DO NOT TAKE DAMAGE when we summon a phantasm. The phantasm has to attack. If you dodge the attack then fine I get it. If the actual summoning of a phantasm is considered an attack then I should also take retaliation and reflection dmg, but I don’t. You know why that is??? It’s not a kittening attack! I know anet is calling it an attack and so are the other people who couldn’t figure out that the person dodging and casting other abilities was the real mesmer. So an entire class had to get the everliving kitten nerfed out of them to cater to the bads. You can put kittens in the oven, but they’re not going to turn into biscuits just like you can call the summoning of phantasms an attack, but that doesn’t mean it’s an attack.

I really love the Mesmer and I want to play the class, but until this gets fixed I’m playing my alt.

Warkupo.1025:

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

Great, but my second-???? attacks still hit. Meanwhile I lose much much much more if I miss summoning.

Warkupo.1025:

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

I don’t believe that anyone is saying that the attack portion of the phantasm should not be able to be mitigated. This issue is not so cut and dry because it is pretty obvious that a persistent illusion is not the same type of attack as shooting a gun or swinging a sword. A phantasm is a bit like a gtaoe or high damage condition in that it’s damage is not directly related to the mesmer, closest example I could think of would be a thief using caltrops, once the caltrops are dropped the damage is fire and forget, and yet a thief is able to still drop them even if they are blocked, blinded, invulned or dodged, they are not kept from using the skill. They force a player to react “oh hey let me not stand here because of the stabby things on the ground.” Obviously phantasms like the berserker track their targets which means they are not directly like a gtaoe but they are a source of fire and forget damage which allows for the class to layer damage just like any other class can do with their fire and forget skills.

Mek.2947:

I’ve said it over and over again YOU DO NOT TAKE DAMAGE when we summon a phantasm. The phantasm has to attack. If you dodge the attack then fine I get it. If the actual summoning of a phantasm is considered an attack then I should also take retaliation and reflection dmg, but I don’t. You know why that is??? It’s not a kittening attack! I know anet is calling it an attack and so are the other people who couldn’t figure out that the person dodging and casting other abilities was the real mesmer. So an entire class had to get the everliving kitten nerfed out of them to cater to the bads. You can put kittens in the oven, but they’re not going to turn into biscuits just like you can call the summoning of phantasms an attack, but that doesn’t mean it’s an attack.

I really love the Mesmer and I want to play the class, but until this gets fixed I’m playing my alt.

My apologies, my phantasms usually hit things when i summon them, so I made the completely inane jump in logic that they where an attack. In fact, I usually depend on the Swordsman and Greatswordsman purely for damage, but you’re right, they aren’t really attacks because… kittens and biscuits, I suppose.

I’d like to point out that my chat filter is on. You’ve said kittens like, 12 times. I’m just pointing that out because you might not get my joke otherwise.

I’ve actually addressed this point already; Utility skills should not be immune to mitigation techniques just because they are mitigation skills. Doing so gives the impression that utility isn’t worth mitigating, which is really, really untrue. In fact, its’ the major reason the mesmers I’ve been talking to think their phantasms should be immune to utility; utility shuts down their phantasm. Thing is, that’s kind of the point of a utility skill; to get the upper-hand in combat. When and how you use them is the whole skill part of the game.

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

I don’t believe that anyone is saying that the attack portion of the phantasm should not be able to be mitigated. This issue is not so cut and dry because it is pretty obvious that a persistent illusion is not the same type of attack as shooting a gun or swinging a sword. A phantasm is a bit like a gtaoe or high damage condition in that it’s damage is not directly related to the mesmer, closest example I could think of would be a thief using caltrops, once the caltrops are dropped the damage is fire and forget, and yet a thief is able to still drop them even if they are blocked, blinded, invulned or dodged, they are not kept from using the skill. They force a player to react “oh hey let me not stand here because of the stabby things on the ground.” Obviously phantasms like the berserker track their targets which means they are not directly like a gtaoe but they are a source of fire and forget damage which allows for the class to layer damage just like any other class can do with their fire and forget skills.

Again, utility skills of other classes are not inexplicably immune to mitigation techniques either. Its’ not really a disparity. That you can name a few examples of abilities which still have some functionality despite mitigation techniques is not hard evidence that Mesmers phantasms are the only ability that is treated this way. I can and have listed various examples to the contrary and blah blah blah blah:

Look, I’m at the point where I’m just repeating myself to new people joining the conversation that haven’t read the entirety of my responses, so I think I’m going to leave the discussion to the rest of you now unless some other interesting viewpoint comes up that isn’t something I’ve already addressed somewhere else. I simply can’t respond to everyone and I’m starting to get irritated in the attempt, which isn’t really fair to me or you.

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

I don’t believe that anyone is saying that the attack portion of the phantasm should not be able to be mitigated. This issue is not so cut and dry because it is pretty obvious that a persistent illusion is not the same type of attack as shooting a gun or swinging a sword. A phantasm is a bit like a gtaoe or high damage condition in that it’s damage is not directly related to the mesmer, closest example I could think of would be a thief using caltrops, once the caltrops are dropped the damage is fire and forget, and yet a thief is able to still drop them even if they are blocked, blinded, invulned or dodged, they are not kept from using the skill. They force a player to react “oh hey let me not stand here because of the stabby things on the ground.” Obviously phantasms like the berserker track their targets which means they are not directly like a gtaoe but they are a source of fire and forget damage which allows for the class to layer damage just like any other class can do with their fire and forget skills.

Again, utility skills of other classes are not inexplicably immune to mitigation techniques either. Its’ not really a disparity. That you can name a few examples of abilities which still have some functionality despite mitigation techniques is not hard evidence that Mesmers phantasms are the only ability that is treated this way. I can and have listed various examples to the contrary and blah blah blah blah:

Look, I’m at the point where I’m just repeating myself to new people joining the conversation that haven’t read the entirety of my responses, so I think I’m going to leave the discussion to the rest of you now unless some other interesting viewpoint comes up that isn’t something I’ve already addressed somewhere else. I simply can’t respond to everyone and I’m starting to get irritated in the attempt, which isn’t really fair to me or you.

You simply won’t respond to what I have been saying, I said clearly that the attacks themselves get mitigated yes, name me one persistent “hot spot” or fire and forget dmg source that fails to activate when blocked, blinded, dodged, or someone goes invuln. Those are entirely seperate issues from when you mentioned dancing dagger, obviously dancing dagger and caltrops do not work in the same fashion because they are different types of dmg sources. One being persistent fire and forget and one being a direct damage attack.

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

Reaver.9256:

All my abilities on my warrior continue if dodged/evaded etc Shouldn’t things like hundred blades stop as soon as a swing is dodged? My whirlwind still whirls like crazy if dodged/evaded…….

Your attacks are ineffectual if they are dodged. Now, so are phantasms. The discussion is about whether or not phantasms should be given a pardon to mitigation techniques based on their unique, or not so unique qualities.

I don’t believe that anyone is saying that the attack portion of the phantasm should not be able to be mitigated. This issue is not so cut and dry because it is pretty obvious that a persistent illusion is not the same type of attack as shooting a gun or swinging a sword. A phantasm is a bit like a gtaoe or high damage condition in that it’s damage is not directly related to the mesmer, closest example I could think of would be a thief using caltrops, once the caltrops are dropped the damage is fire and forget, and yet a thief is able to still drop them even if they are blocked, blinded, invulned or dodged, they are not kept from using the skill. They force a player to react “oh hey let me not stand here because of the stabby things on the ground.” Obviously phantasms like the berserker track their targets which means they are not directly like a gtaoe but they are a source of fire and forget damage which allows for the class to layer damage just like any other class can do with their fire and forget skills.

Again, utility skills of other classes are not inexplicably immune to mitigation techniques either. Its’ not really a disparity. That you can name a few examples of abilities which still have some functionality despite mitigation techniques is not hard evidence that Mesmers phantasms are the only ability that is treated this way. I can and have listed various examples to the contrary and blah blah blah blah:

Look, I’m at the point where I’m just repeating myself to new people joining the conversation that haven’t read the entirety of my responses, so I think I’m going to leave the discussion to the rest of you now unless some other interesting viewpoint comes up that isn’t something I’ve already addressed somewhere else. I simply can’t respond to everyone and I’m starting to get irritated in the attempt, which isn’t really fair to me or you.

You simply won’t respond to what I have been saying, I said clearly that the attacks themselves get mitigated yes, name me one persistent “hot spot” or fire and forget dmg source that fails to activate when blocked, blinded, dodged, or someone goes invuln. Those are entirely seperate issues from when you mentioned dancing dagger, obviously dancing dagger and caltrops do not work in the same fashion because they are different types of dmg sources. One being persistent fire and forget and one being a direct damage attack.

I haven’t named any because Phantasms do not operate as a “hotspot” AOE attack. They are single target attacks which require a source to activate. Every other attack like this functions similarly, and is similarly mitigated by blocking, blinding, and dodging.

Just so we’re clear, “hotspot” attacks are not a clear path to victory either, and they can be dodged, or even more simplistically briskly moved away from. This is what I was alluding too when I mentioned Hundred Blades; Its’ a very obvious attack that is very easy to mitigate. The fact that you can stand there attacking air isn’t some great advantage and the end result is the same; if I move out of the way of the attack, I mitigate it.

I will relent that I think Phantasmal Warden shouldn’t require a target to be created. The damage it does is so insignificant to the actual effect that it is created for. I wouldn’t be against having the damage capability of Phantasmal Warden removed and instead have it be changed to a “hotspot” summoned ability which then creates its’ bubble.

…Granted, that does require us to answer a question as to whether or not Phantasms are “real” or not. Summoning a Phantasm without any audience implies that you have… confused yourself into believing what is happening? I don’t know, I don’t really want to get into that.

Warkupo.1025:

ddoi.9264:

It’s not the difficulty, it’s the penalty. Mesmers are penalised more. No other class loses their “class resource”(illusions) due to their skills not hitting. Mesmers do. Phantasms failing to summon due to a failed attack is like warriors losing a stack of their adrenaline everytime their attacks don’t hit.

Blatantly false, and I’ve been over this argument a few times now; Other classes have plenty of abilities with secondary debuff/buff effects attached to them which do not activate if an enemy is proactively avoiding them. The examples I have listed are going to have to suffice; I’m really not interested in posting every single ability in the game that behaves this way because there are a lot of them.

That you can come up with micro-examples of abilities that do still retain some benefit when they are cast is not proof for why phantasms should get to ignore debuff effects entirely, especially when considering that mesmers have other abilities that behave in this fashion as well, and, again, I’ve listed a few of those as well.

I won’t be addressing this point again.

Phantasms do not ignore debuff effects entirely, and that’s not what we are asking for. Debuffs are already applied by the phantasm’s damage being negated. It is overly penalising to apply it AGAIN by denying the summon of the phantasm.

But I’ll give you the benefit of doubt, and lets say the damage and summoning of the phantasm is one and the same despite all the other skills that do not work this way, and that’s only one penalty the debuff applies.

Or is it.

Really, name other skills that if failed, outright deny the function of numerous skills tied to the class mechanic used thereafter.
If a memser has no illusions out and phantasm summoning fails, all shatter skills do nothing unless you have illusionary persona. There is no chance that they will perform any function.

Look at the example you gave. Warrior’s bola being dodged, so that it can’t use hundred blades thereafter incase the opponent simply avoids it. But nothing will actually stop the warrior from using hundred blades. It may be a bad decision, but it can be done, and the skill will perform its intended function. Bola being dodged or not has no bearing on what hundred blades will do. Hundred blades will not fail just because the bola was dodged. Your thief and ranger example follow the same result.

What you are using to make your point is skill synergies. Skills can work to benefit to each other, but they are essentially independant and perform their full intended function regardless of the sucess of any other skill. Phantasm skills don’t. The sucess of phantasm skills create consequences that do affect skills used thereafter. And not just three or four skills like shatters, but also several traits that bring buffs and utilities. All that from one debuff. Do you truely believe that is not overly penalising? Was the generation of phantasms whether it actually caused damage or not so game-breakingly overpowered that this change simply had to be made? Is that what non-mesmers were complaining so much about?

Illusion generation is so closely tied to the capabilities of mesmers that such a small change in its mechanic snowballs to affect scores of other skills and the overall effectiveness of mesmers as a whole. It is a sensitive issue and should have been given more consideration. It came as a slap in the face for many who rely on phantasms for damage, utilities, etc.

If I dodge a necro pet’s attack… the pet doesn’t dissapear. They can still use their other attacks tied to that disposable pet. Thieves guild doesn’t just not appear if I dodge/blind/bock the thief at the time they are summoned. If I blind/block/dodge a turret’s first shot the turret doesn’t just explode.

If they changed those to how mesmer is now it would actually change their classes LESS than this has changed ours due to how very tied we are to our illusion generation.

Mesmers are now the ONLY class that has multi hitting attacks which can be totally countered with a simple single block/blind.

This is unacceptable.

Either apply this across the board to all classes or remove this change.

Warkupo.1025:

ShadowPuppet.3746:

Warkupo.1025:

I don’t believe that anyone is saying that the attack portion of the phantasm should not be able to be mitigated. This issue is not so cut and dry because it is pretty obvious that a persistent illusion is not the same type of attack as shooting a gun or swinging a sword. A phantasm is a bit like a gtaoe or high damage condition in that it’s damage is not directly related to the mesmer, closest example I could think of would be a thief using caltrops, once the caltrops are dropped the damage is fire and forget, and yet a thief is able to still drop them even if they are blocked, blinded, invulned or dodged, they are not kept from using the skill. They force a player to react “oh hey let me not stand here because of the stabby things on the ground.” Obviously phantasms like the berserker track their targets which means they are not directly like a gtaoe but they are a source of fire and forget damage which allows for the class to layer damage just like any other class can do with their fire and forget skills.

I haven’t named any because Phantasms do not operate as a “hotspot” AOE attack. They are single target attacks which require a source to activate. Every other attack like this functions similarly, and is similarly mitigated by blocking, blinding, and dodging.

Just so we’re clear, “hotspot” attacks are not a clear path to victory either, and they can be dodged, or even more simplistically briskly moved away from. This is what I was alluding too when I mentioned Hundred Blades; Its’ a very obvious attack that is very easy to mitigate. The fact that you can stand there attacking air isn’t some great advantage and the end result is the same; if I move out of the way of the attack, I mitigate it.

I will relent that I think Phantasmal Warden shouldn’t require a target to be created. The damage it does is so insignificant to the actual effect that it is created for. I wouldn’t be against having the damage capability of Phantasmal Warden removed and instead have it be changed to a “hotspot” summoned ability which then creates its’ bubble.

…Granted, that does require us to answer a question as to whether or not Phantasms are “real” or not. Summoning a Phantasm without any audience implies that you have… confused yourself into believing what is happening? I don’t know, I don’t really want to get into that.

Perhaps not a hot spot in their entirety in how they function but they are in that they persist on their own after summoned as a source of fire and forget damage. Of course this only applies to zerker and warden really as the other phantasms are single target attacks through and through. This I think is the biggest hang up about this issue is that specifically zerker is a huge portion of a mesmers aoe dmg for many many peoples builds. As such people like myself think of it as a true aoe attack and like any other attack that is aoe even if the person you have targeted has a block up the aoe still goes off and may hit other players or pve mobs near the target which simply does not happen now if you are unlucky. These changes do not affect me so much because I was already running a shatter build and was not reliant solely on phantasms for the majority of my damage, I feel sorry for those that do however especially after my experiences with it in wvw and the pve content update in lost shores today. Thank you for the discussion and keeping it civil, this is a touchy subject for many mesmers including myself, I think however we will most likely have to agree to disagree on how we view these changes.

The end issue ANet has been trying to target, but missing wide on, is the presence of multiple phantasms on the field.

People whine because they stupidly allow multiple phantasms to spawn in and remain up, and these phantasms persist and attack multiple times.

This produces inconsistent results with unreasonable upper-bounds for return on investment in the same way our shatters have unreasonable lower-bounds (zero).

Our utility skills should be made a secondary attack that casting a phantasm would “unlock” (like the pull on focus 4), but independent of the phantasm’s existence. Our group buffs should be similarly disconnected from phantasms.

After this, Our phantasms should only persist for the first attack, (immune to damage for the duration), then expire.

This would bring the actual function phantasms perform for mesmers into line with the way devs have treated it this patch without gutting our group utility or giving people more than one chance to dodge the same “attack”.

Hrm, I’d do it the opposite way around Plasma, remove the damage from Phantasms and have them purely as utility/finisher sources.

Carighan.6758:

Hrm, I’d do it the opposite way around Plasma, remove the damage from Phantasms and have them purely as utility/finisher sources.

That would work. We would, of course, need the damage expected from those phantasms moved into the main weapon skills. This is not something i’d be against, either.