Guild Wars 2

Hello,
I know this thread may sound agressive or noobish, but a title has to be quite short, you got to be concise.
Actually, I would like to talk about this trait and argue the use of it.

I think that this trait has great potential but should be reworked. The problem, imo, is that the heal applies at the end of the cast. Which means that you have 3,5 sec to heal allies, and it requires to be without a mantra in fight (I mean it must not be prepared, so if you need it, you cannot use it).
Thus : long cast, requires you to be deprived of mantras.
In a nutshell : not very useful.
Furthermore, it just totally contradicts with other mantras traits : you would not bring Harmonious Mantras as you need to recharge them more often, it would be counterproductive.
You won’t bring Empowering Mantras either as it just contradicts too : either you have the bonus or you can heal, but not both.

So, basically, you cannot build a truly reliable mantra build.

My suggestion now :
Of course, as you expect, my suggestion is to have the heal on use of mantra and not after you charged them.
Good points :
- Synergises with Harmonious Mantras (yay more heal !)
- Synergises with Empowering Mantras (heal + moar power !!)
- Similar effect to Vigorous Shouts for Warriors
- Instant Heal, more often
- Provide benefit (stability, remove condition …) for mesmer + heal for group
- In a nutshell : possibility of viable mantra build —> encourage diversity

However, of course, if we leave it this way, this would be OP (at least in sPVP) with 2k6 heal
Suggestions of tuning down to balance :
- Reduce heal to 2k or 1k8 per use
- Can only trigger once every 5 sec on the same mantra (so that you don’t just spam the same mantra again and again)
- Move it to a grandmaster trait
- Others ?

I don’t have more ideas for the moment. I think the best option to balance is the reduce base heal. A hidden CD on proc for EVERY mantra would make it just as meh as it is now.
Waiting for your thoughts about it

2k would still be quite strong. Bringing 4 mantras would let you burst area heals for 8k – instant cast, useable while CCed, uninterruptible, on demand, and that’s in addition to the use of the mantras themselves. Going into a fight you would have a total of 12 heals stored up to use as you like – bring a few mesmers with this trait and a group becomes impossible to kill, or very nearly so. Compared to other professions it seems very out of balance.

I like mantras, and agree that trait isn’t as fun as it could be. I think some folks like it though. Still, making it in mantra use would be disgustingly good, unless the heal amount were much much lower than it is now.

You seem to forget something very important : many mantras = many heals yeah. But what’s next ? You have to channel again ALL the mantras, basically meaning you are useless during over 12 seconds, giving your opponents free time to destroy you. Not to say it prevents you from having other utilities such as the powerful blink.
But still, yeah, 2k may be a little too strong, 1k8 or 1k6 (minimum) would do it.
Less than 1k6 would be too bad I think.

Last suggestion is : move it to a grandmaster trait.

Useless for 12 seconds? Small price to pay for what amounts to 12 heals on little to no cooldown. Compare to the cooldown on ether feast.

You can use mantras while charging, and shatters. There are easy enough ways to cover yourself during recharge – distortion, diversion, MoD, mass invisibility.

If you’re not using mantas already it doesn’t seem that powerful, but to anyone who is used to them the abuse factor is obvious and obscene.

I have never used this ability, but it seems like it is aimed at rewarding someone who doesn’t prepare before a fight? Why the hell would it work at the end of a recharge? To assist in supporting if you have your mantras charged you are going to have to A) blow the mantras and wait for a cool down so you can recharge them and heal your allies, or Go into a fight without mantras charged, and not charge/use your utilities until someone needs assistance?? That doesn’t sound right to me.

You guys realise Mantra of Pain has an almost nonexistent cooldown, right?

There’s none of this holding a mantra back so you can charge it on demand… The damage of MoP is enough to roughly compensate for the time spent channeling MoP. So you should be spamming MoP all the time.

Restorative Mantras is fine. A greater heal amount and/or larger radius would be nice, but it’s fine.

Restorative Mantras is fine ? How could you explain that almost no mesmer use it then, while most warriors use Vigorous Shouts ?
So, mantra of pain has no CD, yeah sure. Still, you can already spam it the way it is but not other mantras …
What’s the point of coming into a combat with MoR or MoC non channeled ? Ho, here, take conditions/kd, you’re kittened because you wanted to heal your allies ?
I don’t see such a gameplay as intuitive …
Furthermore, I suggested some tweaks to make it balanced and none of you are commenting about them …

This actually sounds really nice. It would solve a lot of synergy/awkwardness problems associated with the trait.

I’d say around 1k heal (should vary with healing power) per use plus 1~2 sec cooldown(shared between all mantras) would be about right. You won’t be able to insta heal the party massively by casting up to 12 readied mantras at once, but you can still do some burst heal to a certain extent if you really want to build for it.
(btw, i’m thinking in pve perspective, so the numbers might be kinda broken in pvp :P)

The mechanics of charging mantras is terrible. Basically you are turning yourself into a healing turret

TBH, MoP with restorative mantra and full healing set in PVE is quite the lolz. I tried it out with full cleric set and was healing for 3k each cast of MoP. And given that MoP has no CD…you can become a fully fledged healing turret. Only wish the radius was slightly larger =(.

The last time I tested Restorative Mantra, it healed at the end of a charge, thus making it very hard to use for clutch moments. If it was changed to be at the end of an actual cast, then okay it would be useful, but I’d guess the heal number would end up reduced than the 2k I remember.

I use a mantra power/heal build where I use Mantra of pain to do damage while using my weapon attacks and between that I channel mantra of pain to heal. Overall I do more damage now than I did not using the mantra at all with the added benefit of healing when it’s needed.

I essentially can swap between healing machine to dps/control really easily. It’s almost like having three sets of weapons rather than 2 + utility. The mantras feel like a weapon in and of itself. Yet you can use both at the same time (can be quite a challenge!).

4x default heal, 1x mantra of pain every 5/6 seconds + bonus one if mantra of resolve runs out. That’s 6 heals that you can chain of each other, 3 of which affect party members also.

I use the 3x mantra trait for domination line so it balances the mantras usefulness with healing effectiveness now quite nicely with the reduced cast time.

30/20/0/20/0

I found that with the reduced cast time it’s actually viable and quite fun when you get the hang of it.

With good timing it has saved myself and my party members quite a fair few times. So no I don’t think it needs reworking other than a better explanation on the tooltip/wiki and maybe a better radius indicator, It can be tricky to guess.

It’s especially amazing with those few encounters where you can stack up, I would say you become on par with a guardian at that point in regards to pure healing power, if not more so when it comes to sustained healing (Great for WvW as well).

Reducing the healing is a bad idea you might as well return the long cast time then. The cast time also gives the enemy a chance to interrupt it to balance out the way mantras can be used no matter what. I think it makes sense. I also don’t think it should be moved to a grandmaster trait because mesmers are meant to be a versatile not super specialized in any one thing.

Don’t suggest nerfing a build when it’s finally a viable option…If they nerf it then they might as well get rid of mantras all together. Barely anyone was using such builds before the cast time reduction because it didn’t work.

Reducing the heal also doesn’t help. Keep in mind how vulnerable a mesmer is while casting a mantra. There needs to be some balance to make up for that. I think it’s perfect as it is at the moment.

That all said I think mantra builds are best used in dungeons and WvW, It wouldn’t really work as well in sPvP and perhaps that the whole idea behind it. sPvP is too fast paced, Mesmers need their mobility to 1v1 successfully. I find I struggle a lot more in WvW when I end up in a 1v1 situation when running a mantra build.

It’s good that they made a build that makes mesmers more useful in PvE, you have to remember our professions weakness has always been PvE/Dungeons in comparison to other professions or at least have always felt awkward within those settings with the majority of our utilities having PvP in mind.

Actually I think you’ve misread the whole thread.
The point was not to nerf it but to modify it.
The option to grant heal on use and not after channel would be a great buff, that’s why we had to provide ideas for slight compensation not to make it OP.
I think there were great ideas such as :
- Reduce heal between 1k and 1k8
- Mini CD of 2-3 sec for all mantras (not to spam as hell to get full health again)

It should be ok with both nerfs and this buff imo (see OP for reasons)

KratosAngel.7289:

Actually I think you’ve misread the whole thread.
The point was not to nerf it but to modify it.
The option to grant heal on use and not after channel would be a great buff, that’s why we had to provide ideas for slight compensation not to make it OP.
I think there were great ideas such as :
- Reduce heal between 1k and 1k8
- Mini CD of 2-3 sec for all mantras (not to spam as hell to get full health again)

It should be ok with both nerfs and this buff imo (see OP for reasons)

I see that as a nerf to be honest, It works quite nicely the way it is. Reducing heals and adding more CD would make using mantras awkward again like before with the longer cast time. It’s a big change to get used to using mantras from a mesmers usual playstyle and like you I struggled to get used to it initially but once I got the hang of it I quite enjoy it, just got to get used to the rhythm and timing of the different playstyle it also feels strange not being able to dodge as much as a Mesmer being normally so mobile, just gotta play smart.

The cast time actually can be quite useful. If you’re in ranged you can use the time to run to melee range to heal people there while casting the mantra so you don’t waste time since you would’ve had to run there anyway before swapping to melee and then casting another mantra while blinking to ranged if you’re taking damage healing yourself and anyone in ranged.

You can pop in and out of combat that way while casting mantras in between those times. You do end up feeling like you’re running after people a lot because no matter how many times I tell them they still run away from me at times rather than towards but yes the cast time gives people a chance to run towards you as well as they can see a heal incoming. People are starting to learn to see me as a healing turret