Predicting Mesmer Ability Giveaway
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.
Doesn’t matter, Chrono will still be best at Quickness and Alacrity distribution.
“I’m not QQing here, I’m just speculating”
Um.. you’re entire post is QQ content.
One of the next elite specs will be able to maintain about 90% quickness uptime on targets and pull 2.5-3.5x as much personal DPS as chrono tank can, effectively pushing chronos out of raids altogether.
One of the next elite specs will get a portal
And I wouldn’t be surprised if its a different class that gets a double life feature in the next elite spec, even though its WM mesmers who feature that.
Let’s speculate what Mesmers will “steal” from other classes.
Introducing a brand new condition called torment to DS#5 for necromancers!
Introducing wells as a unique type of Necro utility.
Distracting strikes (confusion on interrupt for warrior) was a thing since beta.
Channeled blocks with shields for warrior and engi!
Passive 25% move speed traits and traits that reduce movement impairing condition duration on warrior.
Oh hey, look at mistrust… a trait added with the spec overhaul that also applies confusion on interrupt and now mesmers are better at torment than Necros while Mesmers also use wells.
Ventari rev has not removed Chrono in the slightest with this patch. I don’t think it was the right move (should have been gotl) but the idea of sharing abilities across elite specs with moderation isn’t a bad idea for balance.
Somebody should tell all the Revs that have come here to whine that this board belongs to thiefs.
- Thief gets something kinda similar to clones in a future elite spec.
They already do.
Somebody should tell all the Revs that have come here to whine that this board belongs to thiefs.
- Thief gets something kinda similar to clones in a future elite spec.
They already do.
Thief has ambush and thieves guild, but I mean an actual elite spec mechanic centered around generating thief doppelgangers.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.
Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
How?
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
How?
It wouldn’t.
If we wanted a personal DPS option at this point I would be ok with an inverse scaling personal damage modifier. It would start at +30% damage for our personal attacks and decrease by 10% for each phantasm we have summoned.
Is this balanced? No. Is it good design? No. Would it promote healthy gameplay? No. Would it be good for the class? No. But if the goal was personal damage this would at least get the job done.
- Necromancer gets confusion in their next elite spec at higher effectiveness than mesmer.
So, like Spiteful Spirit or Spoil Victor on necros in GW1? :P
- Thief gets something kinda similar to clones in a future elite spec.
Thieves having clones… well, as someone commented, there’s Ambush and Thieves’ Guild. From a lore and gameplay perspective, though, I’d actually welcome it, as an elite specialisation. Thief magic is already essentially a specialised branch of mesmer magic, and it would make sense from a lore perspective for some thieves to extend that to basic illusions. From a gameplay perspective… it’s pretty obvious that some elite specialisations are essentially filling the role of GW1-style secondary professions. A Thief/Mesmer elite spec seems like a reasonable basis for an elite specialisation – possibly more so than Guardian/Ranger.
- Guardian gets a sort of defensive version of phantasms in future elite spec.
That’s… pretty much what spirits weapons are. Particularly on release, where spirit weapons were consumed on using the command skill. :P
- Someone gets a portal.
People have speculated engineer portals since Scarlet was running around with technological portals. One thing that could make for a distinction is for engineer portals to require putting down some device (a portable gate or waypoint, say) that can be destroyed, meaning that if you see an engineer portal on or near a point, you can opt to destroy it first. So, while it has a similar functionality, it has more counterplay than mesmer portals do.
To those who think Scarlet hate means she’s succeeded as a villain:
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
as much as i would love a dps option for mesmers, if you really want to play dps you should roll a guardian.
if we have to play what we have we are amazing tankers that can do the job and share boons and other things without giving away anything since our dps is already trash to start with. if any other class want to tank same way we do they have to give away all the damage to get the job done.
that said i fail to see how giving quickness or alacrity or any other “mesmer unique” skill to other classes jepardize the position of mesmers in all game modes. i mean i believe the mesmer thing is the illusion casting, i don’t see any other class do that, if anything their pets are doing a better job than our illusions.
also wasn’t the gw2 advertize that said you can do anything with every class you chose to play? are you surprised now?
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- Thief gets something kinda similar to clones in a future elite spec.
Thieves having clones… well, as someone commented, there’s Ambush and Thieves’ Guild.
snips
Those 2 skills are exactly why I brought up the suggestion. I think it’s something Anet might like to expand on as an elite spec. Mesmers had Time warp before chronomancer and Necros had minions before the Rise shout was added with Reaper. So I think there’s precedent that Anet likes to expand on core class ideas with the elite specs.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
How?[/quote]
It wouldn’t.[/quote]
Yeah… I think what mesmer needs for DPS to compete is more of those flat % damage bonuses in traits. Ele has a lot of them. 10% to burning foes, 10% while attuned to fire, 10% while within 600 distance, etc. I think the only ones mesmer has are 15% phantasm damage (and they die a lot) and 10% mind wrack which is 1 skill…
mesmer has 3% increased damage adn condition damage for each illusion up.
deal more damage for each stack of vulnerability on your foe (don’t remember the %).
i believe these are the only two trait that increase personal dps.
there are some that of course increase illusion dps which sadly they don’t do dps, only phantasms do dps
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We also have harmonious mantras, which is 3% per stack. But damage modifiers on mesmers face 2 fundamental problems.
1 – They only affect us when most of our damage comes from our phantasms. So our modifiers don’t even affect the source of most of our damage
2 – 2 of the 3 we have depend on mechanics that go away. More damage per illusion is nice, until you wake up and realize that mesmer as a class is focused around shattering their illusions. So some of our best skills completely wipe out the damage boost we get. And those skills are both offensive and defensive in nature. For HM in particular, we only get 3 stacks per mantra, which means to get the most out of it our bar has to be loaded with mantras. No other class has to run 3 or 4 skills to get the most out of their stacking damage bonus, and HM isn’t even a permanent boost, but a very short temporary one.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
How?
It wouldn’t.
If there was a trait in Dueling that gave phantasms fury, alacrity and quickness whenever the mesmer received those buffs, ~38% more crits for dmg and sharper images (73%/53%). Quickness and alacrity would mean unloads…
1.6 second channel 6 second base cd. 5 second CD with ph.
~1.07 second channel and 3.76 CD with quickness and alacrity.
Ends up being about 30% more damage from duelists due to attack rate, 38% more crits. If phantasms also inherited mesmer% modifiers (scholar, seaweed, gotl etc), would be so happy.
Benchmarks don’t include bonus torment and bonus confusion. Given that DPS meters are showing that most tempest are just really bad at doing a decent rotation, It would be enough. Maybe not records but only about 30? ppl are setting those.
Given phantasms temporary nature, I actually think all boons and personal damage modifiers we get should be shared with them by default. A trait to give them alacrity whenever we got alacrity (or more generally, a trait that gave them any effect other than stealth when that effect was applied to us) would be a really nice addition though.
A few years ago mesmer used to have respectable dps but it relied on maintaining 3 iSwordsman and never using shatters. It worked because of the big % damage modifiers that affect only phantasms. But the devs didn’t like that and I remember them specifically saying they felt like mesmers “should” be shattering regularly. Around about the same time they nerfed a lot of the reflect cheese that was going on in dungeons, and the mesmer’s dps hasn’t been the same ever since.
If the devs still feel that way then they need to redesign mesmer. Our shatters are not strong enough to justify losing such a substantial portion of our sustained DPS. They just aren’t.
Quickness buffing is something that is very likely to be given to other professions.
Engineer sounds like a good candidate.Absolutely. Not that quickness was ever a “mesmer only” thing, it’s just that Anet seems to want quickness to be the only thing chrono is good for.
And that, to me, is the perfect reason to not give this level of quickness support to any other profession ever. At this point its all chrono is in PvE, a quickness and alacrity bot. Its not good at anything else, at least not good enough to where another class isn’t already better. So if another class gets even a portion of the quickness uptime that chrono does, chrono deserves some serious changes to make it better.
I am hoping next elite spec will let mesmer copy all her boons to her clones/phantasms. That might give mesmer a potential DPS option.
How?
It wouldn’t.
If there was a trait in Dueling that gave phantasms fury, alacrity and quickness whenever the mesmer received those buffs, ~38% more crits for dmg and sharper images (73%/53%). Quickness and alacrity would mean unloads…
1.6 second channel 6 second base cd. 5 second CD with ph.
~1.07 second channel and 3.76 CD with quickness and alacrity.
Ends up being about 30% more damage from duelists due to attack rate, 38% more crits. If phantasms also inherited mesmer% modifiers (scholar, seaweed, gotl etc), would be so happy.Benchmarks don’t include bonus torment and bonus confusion. Given that DPS meters are showing that most tempest are just really bad at doing a decent rotation, It would be enough. Maybe not records but only about 30? ppl are setting those.
Forgetting that there is already a trait in Dueling that gives phantasms fury so not sure why you are using that too buff up your numbers and still only getting it up to another class played badly.
What happens when the boss despawns and fills the place with adds that you need to kill to get the boss back.
The post prior to both of us mentioned the idea of a trait line/elite spec giving boons to phantasms to boost their DPS. You and Fay seem to think it wouldn’t fix anything. I disagree and was discussing a hypothetical trait that would share offensive boons to the phantasms. I’m not forgetting the Fury trait but it’s currently mutually exclusive with DD for more bleeds nor does it share alacrity/quickness.
I find it hilarious that you think condi mesmers has such low DPS that it doesn’t compete with DPS when they are “meta” for a few fights like Kairn and matthias. The point of my math is that giving alacrity, quickness and fury to phantasms in the condi mesmer build would boost them a ton. It would be enough to make them useful/possibly the best dps in more than just a few fights.
What happens when an Ele or guard has to face a boss with a small hit box? Their DPS goes down. What happens when bosses are mobile and don’t stand in aoe fields? Condi engineer and ranger dps go down. What happens to mesmer? You bring an aoe interrupt to proc mistrust. If you are talking about VG, torch 5, pistol 4, Sote, pistol 4.
Run a DPS meter and stop focusing on golem numbers. That’s not to say I’m am against buffing damage from the mesmer. I think the phantasms buffs are in the right direction and just need to be made stronger but there is a close to viable/optimal option depending on the fight and sharing a few boons to them would make it even better.
If the devs still feel that way then they need to redesign mesmer. Our shatters are not strong enough to justify losing such a substantial portion of our sustained DPS. They just aren’t.
I think that’s part of the idea behind Chronophantasma: it allows you to make use of shatters while still maintaining phantasm DPS (you can arrange it so that when you shatter a phantasm and it doesn’t come back, it’s recharged anyway and you resummon it).
Future elite specialisations might have different solutions.
To those who think Scarlet hate means she’s succeeded as a villain:
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
I find it hilarious that you think condi mesmers has such low DPS that it doesn’t compete with DPS when they are “meta” for a few fights like Kairn and matthias. The point of my math is that giving alacrity, quickness and fury to phantasms in the condi mesmer build would boost them a ton. It would be enough to make them useful/possibly the best dps in more than just a few fights.
You are the one who thinks that ths DPS is low, thats why you and people like you are stuck on this idea that giving phantasms boons would fix everything. What we are pointing out is that the mechanics of damage being tied to phantasms are the problem, that is why condi Mesmer is used for only a few raid fights out of the entire pve mode.
stop focusing on golem numbers
Considering thats one of the handful of places that Mesmer can actually pull off its dps build, I think its you that needs to stop focusing on them and go play the rest of the game.
(edited by Levetty.1279)
If the devs still feel that way then they need to redesign mesmer. Our shatters are not strong enough to justify losing such a substantial portion of our sustained DPS. They just aren’t.
I think that’s part of the idea behind Chronophantasma: it allows you to make use of shatters while still maintaining phantasm DPS (you can arrange it so that when you shatter a phantasm and it doesn’t come back, it’s recharged anyway and you resummon it).
Future elite specialisations might have different solutions.
One class has to hit a button and the reaction is instant
Mesmers have to hit a button to create a resource and then hit and additional button to get a reaction
Low dps on Mesmers are tied to many things but chrono phantasma isn’t even related to the issue. The last patch added instant effects to some phantasm skills and they stated in the last AmA the other phantasm skills will be updated later down the line in the same fashion.
They also mentioned overhauls is something they’d like to do as well
The mesmer is a class of confusion and torment while also being a direct counter of slows and interrupts. Torment and confusion also double as the worst condi’s for pve as their pvp focused. Any Dps we gain is shared through shared buffs so were still at the botton since our increase is shared. Were taken along not for our lousy dps but for buffs and exploits.
The loudest roar right now for Mesmers is a selfish dps oriented build when it comes to solo pve were at the bottom of the 9 classes so I for one look forward to upcoming necessary changes to this class.
If the devs still feel that way then they need to redesign mesmer. Our shatters are not strong enough to justify losing such a substantial portion of our sustained DPS. They just aren’t.
I think that’s part of the idea behind Chronophantasma: it allows you to make use of shatters while still maintaining phantasm DPS (you can arrange it so that when you shatter a phantasm and it doesn’t come back, it’s recharged anyway and you resummon it).
Future elite specialisations might have different solutions.
This is a problem with core mesmer though, and should be fixed at the core mesmer level, not at the elite spec level.
As far as ability giveaways; We really only have one ability that is not at least partly replicated by another class.
That single ability is Continuum Split. I see ANET allowing some kind of double skill use on Engineer or Revenant in the near future.
Mesmerising Girl
(edited by Ithilwen.1529)
Ranger has a very watered down version of mimic with their quick draw trait, which itself (mimic I mean) is a very watered down version of CS. So yea, I can actually see another elite spec getting something similar to mimic at some point. But I’m not sure on any elite spec getting anything on the same level as CS
As far as ability giveaways; We really only have one ability that is not at least partly replicated by another class.
That single ability is Continuum Split. I see ANET allowing some kind of double skill use on Engineer or Revenant in the near future.
Some kind of double skill use…. well, if you see it like that, Mesmer actually “stole” it from Engineer. ^^
Kinetic Battery allowed Engineer to use a toolbelt skill twice before Mesmer got Chronomancer.
So, Chronomancer doesn’t have a single thing it can call it’s own.. That’s depressing. I will consider carefully before I buy the next expac.
Mesmerising Girl
So the latest balance patch they gave away yet another “mesmer unique” thing to another class. Was anyone honestly surprised? Do you really think they won’t give anything else away? My predictions for the future:
Warrior gets high uptime quickness on one of their banners in a balance patch.
Seem legit, but I think it’s unlikely, maybe this could come has a change to the banner skill “inspire” in order to reward active gameplay while holding banners.
Engineer gets alacrity on one of their elixirs in a balance patch.
Alacrity doesn’t fit engineer, I think it would be more something like replacing the knock down of slick shoes by a slow effect.
Elementalist gets alacrity in their next elite spec.
It’s possible, after all the first design of the tempest elite skill was pretty close.
Necromancer gets confusion in their next elite spec at higher effectiveness than mesmer.
I want to say that it’s possible but you could also say that mesmer have better torment than necromancer (while torment was initially sold has an exclusive condition for them). Most likely anet will stick to bleed for the necromancer and won’t step on the confusion’s landmine
Ranger gets something very similar to moa in a future elite spec.
They already have moa ^^, the moa skill have already been given away to the engineer.
Thief gets something kinda similar to clones in a future elite spec.
Very likely, I agree
Guardian gets a sort of defensive version of phantasms in future elite spec.
Spirit weapons are already in game and they do exactly that. It’s just that they don’t work that well. You talked about confusion previously, this could be a good match for guardian since they don’t have anything else than burn atm. Giving them confusion through an elite spec named inquisitor could be seen.
Someone gets a portal.
Engineer, necromancer and revenant are good candidate for that yes
No core profession should be balanced around an optional elite specialization.
So, Chronomancer doesn’t have a single thing it can call it’s own.. That’s depressing. I will consider carefully before I buy the next expac.
Does any spec have anything to call it’s own? Reaper is chill focused, which is abundant on other classes. Berserker is a burn condi spec, and burn builds already exist on engi and guardian. Dragonhunter is a trapper spec, and ranger and thief are already trappers. etc. etc.
Once you exclude class mechanics (since all class mechanics are unique) no class has anything “unique.”
But if we use a more common sense definition of “unique” we can say the following things are unique to mesmers:
-Clones/phantasms. (thief does not have clones, Thieves guild is a minion summon closer to necro minions than clones, and no thieves guild does not copy the appearance of the player like clones do.)
-Portal
-Pink colored things
-A ranged greatsword.
-Mantras
-Csplit
-AoE Invul (distortion)
Also Necros want their Torment and Wells back.
- Necromancer gets confusion in their next elite spec at higher effectiveness than mesmer.
Necromancer can technically generate confusion by using a whirl finisher in Spectral Wall’s Ethereal field. (Why Spectral Wall is a Ethereal field is beyond anyone)
I highly doubt Necro (or anyone else) is going to get confusion access as a spec. There is no precedent for focusing a Espec around a previously-unavailable condi. Reaper uses chill but necro already had chill focused traits. Also confusion just doesn’t thematically work with Necro to begin with.
Sanity is for the weak minded.
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If torment was meant to be Necro exclusive then why was it added to Mesmer and Thief in the same patch it was introduced to the game?
One class has to hit a button and the reaction is instant
Mesmers have to hit a button to create a resource and then hit and additional button to get a reaction.
This isn’t really true, since phantasms usually deliver an attack soon after being summoned and clone summoning skills are usually coupled with some other effect (although, admittedly, that other effect doesn’t always contribute to DPS).
More importantly, though, is that really the problem? In most PvE situations, sustained DPS is sustained DPS. Doesn’t really matter how many steps there are in the rotation. Taking the appropriate chronomancer traits means that you can use shatters without having to rebuild your illusions from scratch. Play your cards right and this is an increase in your sustained DPS.
The question is… is it enough? While there are some people that would probably find a reason to demand buffs even if their profession was clearly the best at everything, it’s probably reasonable to say that it isn’t. Mesmers are still noticeably lacking when it comes to sustained DPS for PvE boss fights (unless they can abuse reflects), or to being able to quickly bring down packs of weaker creatures. Their damage mechanics are pretty much optimised for fighting players, making them weak in PvE scenarios that aren’t even trying to mimic those conditions, while other professions have mechanics more optimised towards PvE (staff ele I’m looking at you).
In the chronomancer’s case… my solution would be to give greater rewards for existing mechanics rather than to overhaul them. Buff Confusion and Torment in PvE. Buff Mind Wrack and Cry of Frustration in PvE so that they’re more impactful in situations that aren’t about spiking a PC down before they can get their heals off or otherwise reset.
Future elite specialisations, on the other hand, might overhaul the mechanics in other ways. There are probably limitations in how much of an overhaul can be made without conflicting with existing traits: like rangers and their pets, mesmers are probably always going to have clones and phantasms floating around. However, one could, for instance, imagine an elite specialisation that has the shatters replaced by a set of skills that trigger shatter-related traits, but do not consume your illusions – making a phantasm-based build stronger.
To those who think Scarlet hate means she’s succeeded as a villain:
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
If torment was meant to be Necro exclusive then why was it added to Mesmer and Thief in the same patch it was introduced to the game?
It wasn’t “meant”, it was sold out as an exclusive condition for necromancer. If I recall correctly, at that time, Anet had introduced dhummfire and nerfed it to the ground because it was a big mistake to introduce this trait but they didn’t want to admit it.
At the same time, since they had nerfed every other necromancer conditions before taking care of dhummfire, the result of the dummfire nerf had left the condimancer in a very sorry state. So they came up with Torment as a solution and the concept was something that the necromancer community received pretty well. I’m saying it again, they sold it as a necro thingy, however, when they released it… the necromancer just gained it on the newly created shroud 5 while mesmer and warrior obtain it as well. A lot of necromancer were pretty dejected by this and they were even more dejected when the era of the torment warrior happen (thanks god they nerfed it).
Just to say, when anet say something is “exclusive” there is no reason to believe it since it’s been proven wrong many time in the past.
No core profession should be balanced around an optional elite specialization.
One class has to hit a button and the reaction is instant
Mesmers have to hit a button to create a resource and then hit and additional button to get a reaction.
This isn’t really true, since phantasms usually deliver an attack soon after being summoned and clone summoning skills are usually coupled with some other effect (although, admittedly, that other effect doesn’t always contribute to DPS).
More importantly, though, is that really the problem? In most PvE situations, sustained DPS is sustained DPS. Doesn’t really matter how many steps there are in the rotation. Taking the appropriate chronomancer traits means that you can use shatters without having to rebuild your illusions from scratch. Play your cards right and this is an increase in your sustained DPS.
The question is… is it enough? While there are some people that would probably find a reason to demand buffs even if their profession was clearly the best at everything, it’s probably reasonable to say that it isn’t. Mesmers are still noticeably lacking when it comes to sustained DPS for PvE boss fights (unless they can abuse reflects), or to being able to quickly bring down packs of weaker creatures. Their damage mechanics are pretty much optimised for fighting players, making them weak in PvE scenarios that aren’t even trying to mimic those conditions, while other professions have mechanics more optimised towards PvE (staff ele I’m looking at you).
In the chronomancer’s case… my solution would be to give greater rewards for existing mechanics rather than to overhaul them. Buff Confusion and Torment in PvE. Buff Mind Wrack and Cry of Frustration in PvE so that they’re more impactful in situations that aren’t about spiking a PC down before they can get their heals off or otherwise reset.
Future elite specialisations, on the other hand, might overhaul the mechanics in other ways. There are probably limitations in how much of an overhaul can be made without conflicting with existing traits: like rangers and their pets, mesmers are probably always going to have clones and phantasms floating around. However, one could, for instance, imagine an elite specialisation that has the shatters replaced by a set of skills that trigger shatter-related traits, but do not consume your illusions – making a phantasm-based build stronger.
They did add and instant ability to some of our phantasm skills. While stating they’ll add the same instant abilities to our other phantasm skills like GS and so forth when they figure out the proper ability to add to them. So yes it’s an issue and the devs are aware of the issue and working to address it. We have additional steps and thus are also the slowest class out of the gate chrono or no chrono we have to create a resource and protect that resource before taking action and aAnet is giving those resources an instant ability.
Heck check out this benchmark post regarding the last balance patch
They specifically stated that Necro wasn’t calculated in time of the post so there not on the list. However while some classes like Warrior appear multiple times showing their versatility while Mesmers appear only once and that’s our condi build. All other classes have builds above us were basically at the bottom minus some niche warrior builds but Warrior also has a couple builds above us too thus as a class we’re at the bottom. Our other builds don’t even register high enough while we are present under support alongside the Druid which has nothing to really do with damage.
The phantasm buff is an addition a raw dps increase the staff phantasm is launching three winds of chaos that it wasn’t doing prior and that’s a raw dps increase but even with that and additions we don’t hold up and increasing our raw dps seems to be the goal based on statements the devs have made such as reworking mantras and adding additions to our other phantasms.
We start slow and have to put in more effort than other classes to end up at the back of the pack. Some of the issues have to do with our illusions being tied to a single mob and having to be recast while other pets instantly switch. Over reliance on shatters leading to a low build diversity and some other things including out elites are group based with zero dmg and long Cd’s with the exclusion of time well which does do damage but with that long CC your torment and confusion tics aren’t doing much.
If torment was meant to be Necro exclusive then why was it added to Mesmer and Thief in the same patch it was introduced to the game?
It wasn’t “meant”, it was sold out as an exclusive condition for necromancer. If I recall correctly, at that time, Anet had introduced dhummfire and nerfed it to the ground because it was a big mistake to introduce this trait but they didn’t want to admit it.
At the same time, since they had nerfed every other necromancer conditions before taking care of dhummfire, the result of the dummfire nerf had left the condimancer in a very sorry state. So they came up with Torment as a solution and the concept was something that the necromancer community received pretty well. I’m saying it again, they sold it as a necro thingy, however, when they released it… the necromancer just gained it on the newly created shroud 5 while mesmer and warrior obtain it as well. A lot of necromancer were pretty dejected by this and they were even more dejected when the era of the torment warrior happen (thanks god they nerfed it).
Just to say, when anet say something is “exclusive” there is no reason to believe it since it’s been proven wrong many time in the past.
Seems like a load of fanfiction and presumptions to me. They came up with a new condi, showed it off on Necro and then added it to a bunch of classes at once.
One class has to hit a button and the reaction is instant
Mesmers have to hit a button to create a resource and then hit and additional button to get a reaction.
This isn’t really true, since phantasms usually deliver an attack soon after being summoned and clone summoning skills are usually coupled with some other effect (although, admittedly, that other effect doesn’t always contribute to DPS).
More importantly, though, is that really the problem? In most PvE situations, sustained DPS is sustained DPS. Doesn’t really matter how many steps there are in the rotation. Taking the appropriate chronomancer traits means that you can use shatters without having to rebuild your illusions from scratch. Play your cards right and this is an increase in your sustained DPS.
The question is… is it enough? While there are some people that would probably find a reason to demand buffs even if their profession was clearly the best at everything, it’s probably reasonable to say that it isn’t. Mesmers are still noticeably lacking when it comes to sustained DPS for PvE boss fights (unless they can abuse reflects), or to being able to quickly bring down packs of weaker creatures. Their damage mechanics are pretty much optimised for fighting players, making them weak in PvE scenarios that aren’t even trying to mimic those conditions, while other professions have mechanics more optimised towards PvE (staff ele I’m looking at you).
In the chronomancer’s case… my solution would be to give greater rewards for existing mechanics rather than to overhaul them. Buff Confusion and Torment in PvE. Buff Mind Wrack and Cry of Frustration in PvE so that they’re more impactful in situations that aren’t about spiking a PC down before they can get their heals off or otherwise reset.
Future elite specialisations, on the other hand, might overhaul the mechanics in other ways. There are probably limitations in how much of an overhaul can be made without conflicting with existing traits: like rangers and their pets, mesmers are probably always going to have clones and phantasms floating around. However, one could, for instance, imagine an elite specialisation that has the shatters replaced by a set of skills that trigger shatter-related traits, but do not consume your illusions – making a phantasm-based build stronger.
The problem with this approach is that it ties us to chronomancer line to get sub-optimal sustained DPS in 95% of PvE situations, and its still the best we can get. This just needs to be addressed at the core mesmer level somehow. The new changes to phantasm skills are in the right direction at least, but they are too little to really change much.
The phantasm buff is an addition a raw dps increase the staff phantasm is launching three winds of chaos that it wasn’t doing prior and that’s a raw dps increase but even with that and additions we don’t hold up and increasing our raw dps seems to be the goal based on statements the devs have made such as reworking mantras and adding additions to our other phantasms.
That’s pretty much my point – the addition of another effect when a phantasm is summoned is basically a DPS boost when that effect is damage. If anything, it encourages shattering – if you’re going to resummon your phantasms anyway to get the instant effect, then you might as well shatter them first.
The problem isn’t in the mechanics themselves*, it’s that the numbers are such that you could do everything perfectly and still be at the back of the pack. There are various ways to solve this without fundamentally changing the profession’s character, however.
As a crude example, if ArenaNet made no mechanics changes but increased all mesmer damage by a factor of ten, then mesmers would have the highest DPS in the game (by a large margin, I think). Obviously, that would be lazy and broken, but it illustrates the case: being the lowest DPS is not a result of the mechanics, but the numbers. There are multiple ways of adjusting the numbers.
*The exception is, of course, when you have enemies that individually die so fast you never get the opportunity to get your illusions going. Chronomancer can deal with them with wells, but that is a problem I think they should make sure to address for core mesmer, otherwise they’ll need to re-address it with every new elite specialisation.
To those who think Scarlet hate means she’s succeeded as a villain:
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.
People don’t hate Scarlet like Game of Thrones fans hate Joffrey.
They hate her the way Star Wars fans hate Jar Jar Binks.