Guild Wars 2

Greetings, fellow Mesmers. I figure it’s time to drop in a build edit of my own.

This is a build designed for explorers – people who want to traverse Tyria with a papery scholar class. The main concept is for a PvE soloists to rely on their army of illusions when they’re faced with a bigger threat. You can take down vets and champs, alone, instead of asking others to assist. It still gives nice damage with good survivability, relying on lockdown skills for defense. Instead of focusing on condition damage, this build focuses on heavy single-target damage. It’s versatile, and can be taken anywhere, from narrow caves to large open fields.

I made this build based on the one I currently used, but mine has a few differences from personal preference and taste.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgUQNAsaRnUEFQbCNK1gnjkwkief8zHiO5DuukCcvbA-jQDBYLERjEEA00YEBgUBJK7pIaslhFRjVXDT5aR1aXAGcJymTr2qDQKAbEGB-e

This play style may be a bit out of the norm for other mesmer builds (although shares similarity to phantasm and lockdown builds), so it may need some explaining:

What’s this build good for?

Exploring. PvE itself is easily doable with any build, but instead of just running from one point of map completion to the other, take some time to see everything in between. You’ll come across champs and vets, events, and the many nooks and crannies that are easily missed. Instead of just ignoring them and running off to the next point, go and see what’s beyond that hill!

With practice, you can take on more than one enemy. Champions and vets may not drop a lot of loot like dungeons, but you get the bragging rights of smiting the mighty creature in some faraway cave.

This build is designed to fight off the majority of encounters, given their varying techniques in combat. The trait setup should be versatile enough to accommodate whatever you come across, and only needing a change of skills for tougher champions.

It is not a perfect PvE soloist build (no build can be perfect) but I find it to be one that works well. It should not be treated as a solid build, as different situations will call for different skills and traits. But all you should need is a moment to kitten the situation, and then swap traits and utilities accordingly. What I’m presenting is the basic cornerstone, and I expect it to be tweaked. For example, instead of carrying Chaos IV, I opt it for Descent into Madness while out of combat. I explore a lot, and there are plenty of places where the fall damage reduction is worth the trait slot.

Why PTV armor?

I figure I’d get a lot of questioning looks for this, but in a nutshell:

Arikyali.5804:

I’d agree PTV might be unnecessary, but I feel running full zerker against deadly mobs will just come back to bite you. Another good option would be Valkyrie, but since I feel I do enough damage already, I opted out the crit for a slight boost in toughness.

Zerker is the favored PvE gear, but mobs die fast enough with soldier armor. You’ll have the defense to face any sudden surprises you’d encounter, or at least be able to pull back for the time being.

What else is this build good for?

I’ve found this build to be flexible for dungeons and WvW. The setup for strong single-target damage can really be a boon to the team. However, it may be best to change the utility skills to whatever is needed.

Pros:
1. Deals strong single target damage
2. Good survivability
3. Can quickly dispatch bothersome mobs before focusing on the main target.
4. Several ‘panic’ skills when the fight gets too much
5. Effective for fighting in small spaces and large areas.

Cons:
1. Lacks condition damage
2. Lacks strong AoE damage
3. Does not focus on Shatter
4. If condition removal is not spent wisely, multiple conditions can be deadly.
5. Fights against champs can be very long and drawn out (but they are doable).
6. When fighting multiple enemies, dodges are quickly used up.
7. No reliable source of stability

List of available Panic Skills:
1. Blurred Frenzy – evade
2. Magic Bullet – stun/daze/blind
3. Signet of Midnight – blind
4. Phantasmal Berzerker – cripple
5. Illusionary Wave – AoE knockback
6. Take Root – temporary invulnerability (This is a Sylvari skill, not a mesmer skill. It is what I carry, but can be replaced with other racial skills, or MI)
7. Distortion x4 – available from 3 signets and 1 shatter skill

Situational fights

Small narrow caves
Rely more on the sword/pistol, using the great sword for knockbacks. Sword 2 allows evasion during Crowd Control. I’d advise to be careful when fighting in a small area, as there’s less space to move around, and you’d be very tempted to stun the enemy with your pistol. However, the pistol’s bullet can bounce to another enemy and gain agro. If elite skills summon allies, make it so they have only one target.

Don’t run into a cave if you don’t know where the exit is. You’re more than likely going to trap yourself in a dead end with the aggro of a lot of monsters. Fight your way through. This build is designed to take down enemies one at a time with efficiency.

Movement will be limited, so you’ll likely be taking hits. You should survive with the lockdown skills, and you can always dodge into the enemy if you’re really stuck.

Solo one champ
Summon your phantasmal defender, and get your duelist/zerker phantasms out. You’ll be kiting the beasty, switching from greatsword to sword/pistol. The zerker will drop cripple at a steady rate, so you can just attack from the distance with the greatsword.

Switch to the sword for fast burst damage and stacking vulnerability, then pull out again. It really depends on what kind of champ you’re fighting, but I find the ones that give the most trouble, are the ones that have immobilize, or gap closers. Immobilize is easier to deal with – signet of midnight breaks stuns, and you can just CC the monster yourself. With gap closers, rely instead on your phantasms tanking, while using knockback to keep the champ far, far away from you.

Oh, and remember…defiance exists. so use your crowd control only on a needed basis, and rely on cripples and dodges instead. It’s best to keep your distance and kite while summoning phantasms. As long as you keep at least 2 illusions up (illusions, not just phantasms) you should be fine.

multiple mobs
Not too difficult – drop a phantasm or two on one, while you focus on another. By the time your phantasms are defeated, you can dispatch the remaining health yourself.

The only time I really struggle is when there are multiple condition damage attacks. Against enemies like these, I highly advise to take it one enemy at a time. It’s very rare you’ll end up with a large group of enemies, unless you’re doing an event. If so, this is when I activate Take Root. It gives several seed pods (and distracting targets) that can keep aggro off me while I fight the adds.

Two vets
Same idea as multiple mobs, but with a lotta kiting. Pick one vet to go down first. You can either let yourself and your phantasms focus it, or focus it alone while your phantasms distract the other vet. Whichever you feel more comfortable.

Three vets
…I’ll get back to you when I manage to solo three vets at once. Hasn’t quite happened yet….

A few notes with using this build:
-Don’t shatter until the end, unless you really need it. Your phantasms are passing on regeneration while dealing damage.

-Drop the Phantasmal Defender on the biggest threat. It should be the last monster you’ll face, as you first focus on the adds. If you drop it on the monster you’re currently fighting, it’ll disappear once the monster is defeated.

-Use the sword to stack vulnerability. Your basic attacks, and the clone from illusionary leap, will speed up the kill.

-Keep the terrain in mind. This should be obvious, but terrain can make a big difference. The Greatsword deals more damage the further away targets are, and Illusionary Leap needs a connecting landscape. If you’re up on a ledge, you can send an illusion down with the greatsword, and dispatch enemies from a safe distance.

-Don’t panic when you get low on health. You can recover fairly quickly, or at least stall a fight long enough to do so. Keep an eye on the monster that has the lowest health, so that if you do go down, you can rally back up.

-If you notice, this build has no ‘on death’ illusion damage. Since it doesn’t focus on condition damage, I personally don’t find reason to give up the needed traits to enhance that.

- Keep a count on how many illusions you have. If one goes down, summon another to replace it. Number of illusions = survivability.

-You can initiate with clones first, then follow up with the needed phantasms. The clones you summoned will simply be replaced, or you can shatter them for extra effect. (Just be careful not to shatter the phantasms you need)

-Your phantasms can hurt monsters enough to get their aggro, giving you a few seconds to recover. They can generally last long enough to take a beating as well.

-You will find yourself using up dodges very quickly, since you lack reliable endurance regeneration. Just a fair warning to not rely on dodges while fighting multiple enemies. Save them for when you really need them.

Here’s the tweaked build in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ptokg7BsZ-4

Enjoy!

Hmm, your phantasms will be fairly weak (which is pretty much the PvE meta right now with 10/20/0/25/15 or 0/30/0/25/15) and shatter is not really an option either.

With soldier gear things will just not die fast enough for this to be reasonable build, at least imho. I for one would not try to craft a build around signets right now. There are simply better skills for open world to choose (blink, decoy, veil, feedback even).

Army? Lol, want a real mesmerizing army, party and roam with 5 mesmers……….seen it in WvW and they wreck havoc….almost reminds me of 4-5 minion necro’s running together….=.=

I do most of my PvE content solo, while I was levelling and now, after i’ve done my end game grinds like dungeon runs and stuff… i love seeking challenging situations. Whether it’s soloing swarms of 10+ or champs. However, I don’t run PTV. You don’t need PTV for PvE seriously. haha Most of my gear is zerker except for some toughness. You don’t need much to survive in PvE… if survival is an issue, just switch out a gs for staff. The best survivability comes from the standard sword/focus staff combo actually from experience. Champs will have defiant which makes pistol interrupts unreliable of course. If you want DPS on single targets just go sword/sword , sword/pistol as usual

I think you should go back to zerker gear at the very least. Mesmers have too much active defense, distance making options and stun breaks to ever need much survivability in PvE. Even in WvW zerker gear is actually fine til you’re running against multiple enemies. with some defensive traits/gear, you can take on outnumbered 1vX fights in WvW

Perhaps it would be best to show instead of just tell. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ptokg7BsZ-4 It’ll need some tweaking, but it was a fun fight.

This was my trial run, just to test the champion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ChpcRRSWB8 Nothing major.

@Kaiyanwan and takatsu: I’d agree PTV might be unnecessary, but I feel running full zerker against deadly mobs will just come back to bite you. Another good option would be Valkyrie, but since I feel I do enough damage already, I opted out the crit for a slight boost in toughness.

@Rigel: I don’t think you even understood what the build was meant for…did you even read past the title? Hah.

Arikyali.5804:

@Rigel: I don’t think you even understood what the build was meant for…did you even read past the title? Hah.

Oh, I read the post but given I play WvW and not lalaland PvE, I simply stated what I saw as truth in WvW: If you want a real mesmerizing army, get 4-5 mesmer together and watch them wreck havoc.

Rigel.3092:

Arikyali.5804:

@Rigel: I don’t think you even understood what the build was meant for…did you even read past the title? Hah.

Oh, I read the post but given I play WvW and not lalaland PvE, I simply stated what I saw as truth in WvW: If you want a real mesmerizing army, get 4-5 mesmer together and watch them wreck havoc.

WvW is even worse of a lalaland than PvE.
If you want to be efficient, follow the blue marker on the map and zerg everything to the ground. That’s to what it narrows down to. It is so easy and boring, that I can hardly stand it for longer than an hour.
Now you gonna tell me things about small groups and roaming, but hey, that is as rewarding as soloing champions in PvE.