Guild Wars 2

Inspired from this thread: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/The-Torment-Mesmer-Challenge/first#post4236495

I have been thinking of a way to make a non-PU build that capitalizes on Torment.
Here’s what I come up with
Link: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fhAQNAW7alknpMtlqxVNcrNitBZyLUCUHkfsySGghB-T1CXABqoDYAlBvoZQAlQMp+zdXEgHUCCgSkDUas3+DC+EAIFAETjA-w

The gear is a bit messy, as I’m still unsure whether I should go with hybrid dmg stats or full condi stats.

Main concept of the build:
Offense: maintain condi pressure (burn, bleed, confusion, torment) on Staff with Shatters until you can burst enemy down with Scepter/Pistol (torment, bleed).
Defense: keep Chaos Armor up as much as possible, Chaos Storm, high mobility with Blink and Staff #2, and Glamors. Utilize Blind to negate 1hit burst attack.

What do u guys think?

This is somewhat similar to the build I posted in Chaos’ challenge thread. I am by no means as experienced as a lot of people on this forum but I see a few issues:

1. Blinding Befuddlement is just bad. The ICD neuters the skill to near uselessness and it weighs down the build a lot. I really think something like the recharge shatters on health drop trait would be better. This also makes you call into question the blind on glamour trait you have. I would also consider switching that out with something.
2. If you want a lot of Chaos Armor uptime you may want to consider sword OH. The iSwordsman if summoned inside of an ethereal field will apply Chaos Armor to YOU as well as the phantasm. Right now your only source of Chaos Armor generation is actually Staff 4. Personally I have fallen in love with the Sc/Sw setup since using it in Pyro’s Phantasm build. The double block really makes you hard to bring down in a 1v1 scenario and greatly increases your chances in a 2v1.
3. The gear here is the hardest part. I am still struggling with it in my similar build, but I will point out one thing. Almost all of your runes/sigils play into Torment. That’s cool for the theme and Torment can be really heinous, but you are one condi cleanse skill away from neutering yourself. I would try to bring in other condis as well, like maybe some Doom sigils for Poison and such.

Looks interesting, and possibly pretty solid. I think it’d be really important to have atleast one sigil of doom in a build like this, poison is a really good condition to have access to. I made some slight alterations:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fhAQNAW7alknpMtlqxVNcrRitBZqLcqWg6gUlVWyAMMA-T1SHABppDQIlBupZIIlQLq+jTKB/RJiRKN0d/BAuIAB/EAIFAETjA-w

I don’t think the extra confusion from befuddlement is worth it over refreshing your shatters every minute especially when you gain might and apply a confusion/torment though shattering. Also while chaotic dampening is definitely a fine choice, I think you may get more mileage out of shaved glamours.

Aside from the obvious issues of including torment shatter in a build that I’ve gone over countless times already, the main problem here is the glamours.

Glamours are really group utility spells. When you try and shoehorn them into more of a dueling/ roaming build like this, it generally doesn’t work very well. The cooldowns are very long (especially since you don’t trait it), and the effects are fairly small (since a single person can just walk out of/around them).

You seem to mostly be taking them just to maximize your chaos armor uptime…but that leads to even more problems. Now you’re dropping them in a cycle that ignores the other stuff they do. If you drop null field for chaos armor, the next time an engie vomits on you, you’re going to be very sad. Feedback will have the same effect, and of course using them for blind also potential negates both chaos armor generation and normal utility.

Overall, glamours simply have cooldowns that are too long and effects that are too avoidable to use them in anything less than a ~10 person skirmish. I’d recommend trying to work in a bit of a different direction.

Gah. >_< WvW, right.. too much PvP in mind. What is your initial goal with the build?