Question about GS and Staff combination
Right now shatter mesmers mostly take GS/Staff or GS and S/T. Staff is used to stay max range and torch is used for stealth disengage. Both are good, just depends on your playstyle.
Zhang He Dusk, Mezviableplz
[PETP][AyB][BKB]
Mesmer-Thief-Guard
[PETP][AyB][BKB]
Mesmer-Thief-Guard
Ph put it well in a nutshell.
Here’s a longer response.
Staff is by far my favorite second weapon.
People also run GS/Sw/T, each has its pro’s and cons
Staff is better for 1v1s, gives you a lot more mobility via phase retreat (a ton of survivability once you learn the places you can phase retreat to get somewhere where it won’t be quick for you opponent to get to you), Chaos Storm helps you negate ressurections/stomps, great for putting onto downed bodies, choke points, on yourself when you’re getting attacked by something like a thief, onto enemy thief shadow refuge if you have iWave on CD or swap on CD.
Staff is more of a utility weapon but recenty it got buffed so that when you have iElasticity that your clones attacks bounce as well.
3 staff clones up on 1 target can do a lot of condi damage even in a power build, I’ve managed to stack 25 bleeds, perma burn and a few vulnerability on golems, but that probably won’t happen against players.
Sword/torch lacks in 1v1 but gives you an immobilize which is good for teamfights, it can setup really nice bursts with your thief. Blurred frenzy is good for an extra few second distortion, stealth is great for stealth engages, disengages as well as stealth burst. Prestige into immobilize → swap mirror blade mind wrack is a really powerful combo if you time it right so that mirror blade, mind wrack and the damage from prestige hit at the same time.
I personally think that GS is enough of a damage weapon as it is, that mesmer shouldn’t really go melee range much so that if possible the 2nd weapon should be ranged and more of a utility weapon so I pick staff as my favorite. I still enjoy sword torch occasionally though.
Both work, personal preference. I think that because of the role that mesmers fill in PvP as well as their positioning requirements that staff is over all better. In some cases though, sword torch will be better than staff.
I’d advise you to play both and swap from one to the other.
When do you swap?
If I run sword torch, it’s on any map that isn’t niflhel, I don’t like it on kyhlo either because they are big maps and while there may not be a lot of phase retreat spots on niflhel (there are on kyhlo, though on kyhlo you can use iLeap on the windows to get up there so sw/t is ok there actually) just phase retreating forward makes me faster which is something I really like on those maps. I also never run sw/t against comps that have a lot of AOE (engis, eles ect) because I don’t really want to get in their AOE and sitting off point digging my nose in sword torch is bad, staff has a few ranged options (autoattack is not to be underestimated)
Something I recently also learned: If the enemy team does a lot of damage (ie they have fresh air ele, thief, pew pew ranger ect), swap iElasticity for iInvigoration and then you can also get reflect on distortion instead of Compounding Power no matter which weapon set you’re running.
Pineapples rule
What game mode, pvp or wvw?
The shift is that sword and focus were severely neutered some time ago, iElasticity was fixed for staff clones, GS was improved with AA multihit, mind stab damage/radius increase, and iZerker fortunately working as intended. And then staff has the extra mobility from phase retreat – which is the most useful thing in any game mode.
Nevermind the sigil changes/buffs allowing for energy+on crit to be run together, making up for some of the weaknesses of GS+Staff (ie less damage avoidance).
So the fact is sword is weaker than it used to be, scepter has been forced further into condition land and so the GS+Staff has seen a rise in popularity.
Why do people hate on the focus so much? Yes I I know it was nerfed but it is still very easily one of the best offhands for mesmers.
Things the focus is great at:
1. Pulling people out of SR when they are trying to res/stomp
2. Pulling rangers off of their perch and ruining their day.
3. Warden->temporal curtain=cleansing bolts (some of the best condi cleanse a mesmer can get and helps me win 1v1’s agianst those pesky necros)
4. Warden blocks projectiles (rapid fire what?)
5. Lets not forget just how good the focus is for a bountiful interruption build. Even more so if you are fighting an MM or a ranger.
I can understand why people love torch, I love it myself (SAB King toads torch ftw!). However in a pvp environment if you are running S/X focus feels just too good to pass up.
Why do people hate on the focus so much? Yes I I know it was nerfed but it is still very easily one of the best offhands for mesmers.
Things the focus is great at:
1. Pulling people out of SR when they are trying to res/stomp
2. Pulling rangers off of their perch and ruining their day.
3. Warden->temporal curtain=cleansing bolts (some of the best condi cleanse a mesmer can get and helps me win 1v1’s agianst those pesky necros)
4. Warden blocks projectiles (rapid fire what?)
5. Lets not forget just how good the focus is for a bountiful interruption build. Even more so if you are fighting an MM or a ranger.I can understand why people love torch, I love it myself (SAB King toads torch ftw!). However in a pvp environment if you are running S/X focus feels just too good to pass up.
Oh I love focus – just not in a shatter build anymore where torch is personally a superior offhand for that purpose now (which was an assumption that this thread is about because of the weapons mentioned – when I may be mistaken and the OP is talking about any number of different builds).
In any other build, and traited, it’s still great despite lack of instant pull.
wvw staff + power build is a bad bad idea. In pvp staff rocks. imo the diff. is that damage stat get pushed so far in wvw the extra toughness from staff is somewhat useless but stealth is stealth so torch wins out.