Guild Wars 2

Hi fellows mesmers,
I’d like some help to improve my build

This is the build that I’m currently running for WvW. It works quite well but I’m not satisfied.

For the roaming part I dislike the staff`phantasm the projectile is not fast enough. I would like to change the weapon, but have not find any better alternative. Also, I starting to think that phantasm health improving traits are a little overkill cause the high toughness.

On the other hand, as I have so much armor I can run into the zergs (I put feedback and glamour reduced cooldowns and pick greatsword instead of swords) but then my phantasms are kind of meh.

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/mesmer/?4.0|6.1i.h1|c.1i.h14.c.1i.h1|1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j|2v.0.2v.0.3v.0.2v.0.3v.0.ci.67|a3.a2.k3a.p45.5|0.0|0.3d.3l.34.3o|e

Any thought is very welcome.

PD: Yes, no swiftness, blink and staff and that’s it.

EDIT: Just to comment that sometimes, in zergs, I also pick warden’s feedback and focus instead of greatsword.

First, you can pick up an exotic cavalier backpiece from the Temple of Balthazar (Glorious Victory) for 42,000 karma.

The problem with swapping out the staff is that it’s your primary defensive weapon and you simply cannot replace the movement utility. However, you could consider sword (or scepter???) / pistol. Take 10 points from Chaos and add it to dueling for either blade training or duelist discipline. (Although with the blade training is probably better.) You still have 3000 armor which is very very high.

If you try to sword / pistol, don’t buy a second sword. If you leave the slot blank for the second main-hand weapon, the same sword will be used in both sets.

You could also get a kill stacking sigil for the pistol, either perception or bloodlust.

Like this…
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/mesmer/?4.0|c.1i.h1.a.1i.h8|c.1i.h1.c.1i.h14|1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j.1n.71j|2v.0.2v.0.3v.0.2v.0.3v.0.ci.67|a3.k24.a3.p45.5|0.0|0.3d.3l.34.3o|e

dont like staff for def? swap to sc/sw for 2 block. not many phantasm mesmer use staff in wvw
and i dont understand why u wear double sword and not take sword trait? u dont like blured ever 8 and block every 11?

@Ryn, First impression of build, good synergy, no conflicting traits. Wvwvw is focus os mobility + is wery important, focus as you say might be a winner. Staff fors sure is a winner. Pistol I generaly would avoud even if it has its big wins in many situation you in wvwv endup in to many situations where you better off with a focus or even a sword.

I understand why you took the fury istead of sword cd, as its a phantasm spec, cd on staff is there atleast and its a big life saver in wvwvw.

20% hp on phantasm is not overkill as you do wvwvw, if it was pve it wouuld be a different situation. More hp not only mean more uptime but also more retaliation dmg on enemys.

I would personaly change the sigil of air thu, its single target dmg is to unpredictable in wvwv, fight a pet class and you endup hit blood worms with your proc. A sigil of fire would be better but this is my oppinion.

Also I would think about change 1 of the 5% crit chance fora preci stacking untill you have 20+ stacks, then swap back to the 5%, this would give alot more crit chance.

/Osicat

btw no1 know wep sigil +5% chance work on phantoms.

@osi staff ofc is good wep and amazing def skills. but dort forget: staf is clone generator. sometime 1 clone disturb alot.
and about 20% hp. its still nice boost. and its insta, not like signet. i saw alot phantasms die from 1 hit without trait. ofc this is can be chnaged when u needm but nothing special in this trait tree if u not glamour and not use focus

Thanks you all,

@TooBz:
-I know, but in my server is always contested. I found a post where people is telling when is uncontested, so I espect to get it soon.
-Staff is my main source of mobility but also is how I get fury on myself (as my crit change is low). I’m afraid I cannot change it.
-I’ll get preci stacking for sure, thanks.

@Drongas:
-I don’t like staff for offense. My only reliable source of damage is sword phantasm. That’s my problem.
-I do like frenzy on 8 sec cooldown, but not instead of fury on my phantasm (remember: my true source of damage).

@Osi:
-I like sword over pistol. Problem with focus is that I end up with two unreliable phantasms as a main source of damage. In a zerg that’s no problem cause main source are the reflections and I can buff my team with staff, so that’s kind of an ok situation. But, althought I would love to have the utilites of focus when roaming, I would end up without any means of doing damage.
-Sigil of fire. I thought about that. Still not sure, but as air do more single target damage, my blur frenzy (my other source of damage) should be better with sigil of air (if picked the right target XD).

Use http://www.gw2state.com/temples.html. The site uses Gw2’s API to tell what’s open.

Also, I misunderstood. I thought you were looking for a staff replacement. I think the sword phantasm is as good as you are going to do, if you don’t want to replace the staff.

You understood correctly (sorry if my answer was not clear), I’m looking for a replacement, but looks like it is not possible.

THe problem is that I would like to have two reliable phantasms-

I don’t know why, but I end up thinking that it is a bad build for roaming (good for tanking but without enough punch) and a ok reflection build when changed into zerg mode.

Thanks for the webpage! XD

As far as I know, Level 80 Exotic Cavalier (Toughness, Power, Critical Damage) weapons aren’t readily available, despite being an option in build editor websites.

You may want to consider going for Knight’s (Toughness, Power, Precision) weapons instead, since your critical chance is kind of low (28%.) You would maintain the same power and toughness while improving your chance to crit at a cost of critical damage. (Roughly 6% Critical Chance increase at the cost of 10% Critical Damage)

That said, if you’ve found a place to get Level 80 Exotic Cavalier weapons, I’d love to know where they came from!

Also, the Staff Phantasm (Illusionary Warlock) hits like a truck if you can manage to land an attack with it, especially if your target is saturated with conditions. In my experience, players don’t really target it or avoid it the same way they do Illusionary Swordsmen (Off-Hand Sword) because they don’t see them as much of a threat compared to the Swordie or the hugely telegraphed Illusionary Duelist (Pistol).

The trick is to actually get the attack to land though, since it is kinda slow and relatively easy to dodge. (Luckily, its attack is easy to mistake for a Clone’s Winds of Chaos!)

@Sinaya:
-Got my staff in fractals. My swords are berserker (I put it wrong in the builder, sorry).

By the way, I gonna try to take more benefit from phantasm’ retaliation (I will need a carefull position during the fights).

Ryn.6459:

@Sinaya:
-Got my staff in fractals. My swords are berserker (I put it wrong in the builder, sorry).

By the way, I gonna try to take more benefit from phantasm’ retaliation (I will need a carefull position during the fights).

Ah, lucky! Those Cavalier weapons are super rare.

Despite how uncommon it is to have a Cavalier weapon, I still might recommend swapping out for a Knight weapon, or at least something with Precision on it. (Berserker, Rampager, even Rabid…) At 28% Critical Chance, you’re missing out on a lot of potential damage, given that you currently have 74% Critical Damage bonus. (You’re missing out on that huge 2.24 multiplier 72% of the time!)

Even with Fury AND a full 250 Precision from 10 Stacks off of a Perception Sigil, you’d only be at 58% Critical Chance, which means you’re still missing out on Critical Hits on more than a third of your of your attacks, including damage dealt by Phantasms. (Remember that Fury on you and Fury on a Phantasm from the Phantasmal Fury trait do not stack)

On another subject, I personally think that Divinity Runes are overrated. Something more mobility-oriented like Rune of the Centaur or Air might be an offensive option, or possibly Melandru (Toughness) or Hoelbrak (Power) for Condition defense. Superior Rune of the Pack is a nice option too for concentrated power / precision, or potentially also Lyssa for Precision and some nice heal / elite use boons. (This is mostly personal preference though)

And then there’s always the Ruby Orb route if you’d really like to stack lots of offensive stats since the rest of your gear is quite defensively-oriented.

@Sinaya:
-You can add food on your maths, but guess I can drop toughness to increase precision. I have also some berserker ascended trinkets. I will play around. But I’mnot fooling myself, main source of damage are phantasm (they are at 50%crit chance and 75% crit damage).

-About divinity runes. If you don’t have a lot of toons, you end up with money to spend (as I don’t care about skins), they are expensive but that’s it.

-About mobility-runes. The more I play the more I have the feeling that we sacrifice too much to get swiftness out of combat. Actually I have a full berserker armor with centaur runes, and I think I will put rubies on it.

As a curiosity, I made this build after the bouncing nerf, cause I was very very close to rise a guardian. I wanted to get something similar to crit hammer/toughness build.

Focus is so, SO good…try dropping a curtain, then starting your Warden cast. About halfway through the cast, pop your curtain pull. If you get it right, the warden appears next to the knocked down opponent and proceeds to ninja-blender them. While the opponent is still down, iLeap—>Swap for the immobilize, then blurred frenzy. Lots of numbers, and with big phantasm damage the Warden is going to wreck face. Added bonus: Stand on top of the warden to ignore projectiles until you both finish with the murderfest (couple extra seconds after blurred frenzy).

Regarding staff replacement: Staff is great. It will absolutely save your life many times, and is amazing for zerg fights. GS is a good replacement for bigger numbers, but works better in smaller engagements imo (just tried it last night for the first time at 80). The phantasm can be dicey, but seems better than the staff one in most cases (barring lots of conditions on one target that needs to die fast).

@Kirec:
-And then you shatter! Yes! I do that in my shantasm build. I’m huge fan of focus. Actually this is the first build that I’m running without it.
-I had a lots of problems getting used to staff, so maybe that’s the reason I can’t make it work with focus.

@Sinaya: I have to check the numbers, but I’m thinking in drop domination to increase dueling, and to get a rampager staff. With that, I will be near 45% crit chance; question is whether my global damage will be better or not.