Guild Wars 2

Hi there, I’m a returning player who wants to complete the Arah set, and generally play a lot of dungeons (I love PvE). Last time the GS-phantasm build works quite well in dungeons, but recently I felt it was lackluster. So what would you guys say would be the best build for Arah runs?

The good old 0/30/0/25/15. Both weapon sets sword-based, since all the other weapons are junk.

Ok thanks a lot! I guess it’s the old dmg zerker build.

Boonstorm Mesmer is extremely powerful in any kind of dungeon setting.

Diego Vargas.3058:

Boonstorm Mesmer is extremely powerful in any kind of dungeon setting.

It’s strong support. Unfortunately, that kind of support is more or less useless in a good dungeon group.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Diego Vargas.3058:

Boonstorm Mesmer is extremely powerful in any kind of dungeon setting.

It’s strong support. Unfortunately, that kind of support is more or less useless in a good dungeon group.

Why would this build be useless? I make overpowered DPS classes even stronger.

Lets be serious here, mesmer isnt meant to be competitive DPS like certain classes. IMO the class has become a curiosity, something that relies on the person being better at guild wars 2 than their opponent. Eg. better hand eye co-ordination, better at situational awareness, better thinking on your feet. None of these traits are something you spec in, and I find is often used to cover up the many significant shortcomings of the class. It is odd that some of the better players gravitate to this class purely because it is so handicapped.

Point in case, most average players vs. an average mesmber can faceroll on their keyboard and win. It typically takes an excellent player to drive a mesmer around to overcome all the class shortcomings.

So anyhow, boonstorm for me is something that mesmer actually does very very well. This is the role ANet has forced me to play to add meaningful content to a dungeon party.

BTW the CDI thread is a bit of a joke .. what i have found is that while rangers have problems they are not so broken compared to mesmer that they deserve priority .. the outcry of ranger > mesmer is purely that way more people play ranger out of whatever intrinsic “coolness” they attach. I find that most of the gw2 playerbase find the notion of mesmer so broken to be abhorrent so they dont even try to use it. I have been in lots of groups and a bunch of guilds and every time its like “wow a mesmer (lol)” …

Diego Vargas.3058:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Diego Vargas.3058:

Boonstorm Mesmer is extremely powerful in any kind of dungeon setting.

It’s strong support. Unfortunately, that kind of support is more or less useless in a good dungeon group.

Why would this build be useless? I make overpowered DPS classes even stronger

How are you making them stronger? What mesmer can supply reliably in the form of boon support is protection, aegis, regen, vigor, swiftness, and retaliation. This seems like an awful lot at first glance.

Unfortunately, there’s 2 vital boons missing from that. Might and fury. The only 2 boons that are directly related to damage output. The 2 boons that matter more than all the other boons combined. Mesmer can’t supply them.

Now, mesmer does bring some things. Mesmer actually brings very strong damage in the form of phantasms if played properly. More importantly though, mesmer is able to bring the following things without losing damage. Mesmer brings strong aoe condition removal, rapid boon stripping, and most importantly high reflect uptime, and that last one is where massive mesmer dps comes from.

In an organized group, nobody cares if you’re applying protection and vigor and regen. None of that matters, because the only thing that matters is kill speed, and that is directly related to damage output. Players of a dungeon group are picked for what they can bring to the party in terms of damage. Supplemental dps is great, but that’s only valued if they bring damage.

Now, a full boon support mesmer brings incredible support capabilities. Unfortunately, it brings very little damage, and almost no damage support. It’s a strong build for WvW raiding or havok groups and such like that, but it has no place in a dungeon party.

Pyroatheist ftw, as usual. Such posts, wow.

In a dungeon group, everyone needs to pull their weight in DPS, and that includes the mesmer. If you manage to get two phantasms up with a 10/30/0/20/10 or 0/30/0/25/15 build, you’re doing good damage. In addition, you’re providing reflects up the wazoo, and time warp. Portal on occasion. Boon strip on demand. Condition clear. That’s your job.

Not even guardians are allowed to slack in DPS these days, so mesmers certainly shouldn’t either.

I must be an oddball since i still run full non-mantra phantasm builds, 10/20/0/25/15.

My main reflect damage comes from wardens and having both +15% ph dmd modifiers is great. Amazing in CM/SE when you reflect a bomber and your whole screen is filled with a million juicy crits.

frifox.5283:

I must be an oddball since i still run full non-mantra phantasm builds, 10/20/0/25/15.

My main reflect damage comes from wardens and having both +15% ph dmd modifiers is great. Amazing in CM/SE when you reflect a bomber and your whole screen is filled with a million juicy crits.

Also a fine build, but your feedback does 12% less damage— the difference in fights like Lupi will be large. You and your phants gain 4% damage, and a bit more flexibility on utilities.

If you want to stack prot and regen just roll a guardian. How does a mesmer even stack prot anyway?

Pyroatheist.9031:

In an organized group, nobody cares if you’re applying protection and vigor and regen.

With this wording, I tend to disagree. Those boons, especially protection, are valued, but only as long as you don’t sacrifice a significant amount of DPS for them. That’s where this boonstorm stuff completely fails – hammer guardians, on the other hand, are an example where the concept works. Perma-protection for the price of ~5 % DPS and a bit of condition removal? A rather good deal in many cases.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Unfortunately, there’s 2 vital boons missing from that. Might and fury. The only 2 boons that are directly related to damage output. The 2 boons that matter more than all the other boons combined. Mesmer can’t supply them.

Im not sure why you would say that, my build has 6x altruism runes with superior battle double swap for “consistent” might/fury generation. I also prefer mantra healing which has the fastest reuse and multiple proc points to trigger altruism.

On an opportunistic side I also have bountiful interruption / and mirror blade to generate extra stacks of might to pass around.

I have never been in a situation where I couldnt supply several stacks of might and a fury buff when signet of inspiration was up so I am not sure what you are basing that comment on.

The might and fury your build provides are pitiful compared to any ele. Not to forget that they’ll deal approximately four times your damage while maintaining 100 % fury and ~20 stacks might.