Guild Wars 2

I’m currently leveling my mesmer in PvE, and am trying to find what ways I can sustain myself in combat. My normal heals are pretty low so I’m finding I complete all my engagements as quickly as possible.

Just as a rule of thumb, Mesmers get their durability through avoiding damage before it hits you. Keep that in mind when you play- what decision is best for you to avoid as much damage as possible? Should you pop your stealth now, or kite for a bit first? Anyways though, some tips:

1. Are you using Ether Feast? With 3 illusions up, it has the highest raw healing outside of traited mantras (which I assume you aren’t running). Mirror has its uses, but you should use Ether Feast for general pve.

2. Decoy (and Mass Invisibility, though it has a much higher recharge) is a great tool for taking some pressure off yourself while you let your heals recharge.

3. You should be popping out as many clones/phantasms as you can. They draw aggro and eat hits for you while you can kite and reposition yourself. Deceptive Evasion is a fantastic trait to take towards this end.

4. Chaos Armor- gives you boons and gives enemies conditions (blind being an important one, as it causes another hit to miss). If you are using a mainhand sword or staff, you should try and have an etheral field (staff #5, null field, feedback, time warp) down so you can use a leap finisher. Using a leap finisher in an etheral field will give you chaos armor, so try to get it whenever possible.

5. Distortion and Blurred Frenzy are important tools- the invulnerability buys time for your heal to recharge, as well as any other defensive skills. Don’t be afraid to use them.

6. Never stop moving. Don’t make it easy for melee mobs to hit you, and give ranged mobs a chance to target your illusions rather than you.

The trick to playing mesmer is to stay mobile (it involves a lot of kiting and bouncing around from teleports) and try and prevent damage by never letting it hit you in the first place.

well,

for the 1., try healing mantra. Even untraited it gives you more heal per second.

3. try to initiate fights with illusions. With the GS, I prefer to initiate with long range #2 and then #4.

4. chaos armor sucks in PvE. you even said that mesmers live by not being damaged. CA triggers when being hit.

5. This shouldn’t be used while training your mesmer. You’ll learn to use them later on (80+). Don’t try to force the sword on yourself, if you don’t like it. But be sure to test it once in a while – especially after you’re fully equipped.

6. This is the most important one. !Keep your range! You can try putting blink in your skillslots and teleport away in tight sitations. It’s better than decoy or massInvis.