Guild Wars 2

I posted this on GW2G and here to broaden the amount of feedback, both from the closer community as well as the one in general.

So like a normal person, I was browsing the internet looking at funny pictures, because my time isn’t worth much. Came across a plethora of old jokes about the Zubat cave from Pokemon Red/Blue classic…you know the one. So anyways, I had a brief bit of childhood nostalgia, thinking about the ball-crushing frustration those bats and their confusion ailment caused, which somehow triggered the cogs in the GW2 section of my brain to turn. While confusion acts similar between the games, causing damage when an opponent tries to attack, you were sort of streamlined to use an ability to make the confusion usable in Pokemon. With GW2, that works wonders in sPvP and WvWvW, but of course in PvE, a whole different story comes to light.

Since monsters don’t utilize attacks other than auto-attack, you have to time it properly so that confusion is on the mob before hand, unless you’re running a clone factory build. So I began thinking about how to make it more effective without overpowering it in sPvP, so brace yourselves, my tinfoil hat is a bit tighter than normal so this might come out sounding crazy.

What if confusion caused the mob to be redirected to clones, it could theoretically increase mesmer control and survivability. The way it would work “in theory” is as confusion stacks, it causes the mob to have a chance to change it’s target on a random chance it’s attacked, scaling with the stacks and how many clones are present. Let’s say it goes by 2% per application, so 3 stacks means a 6% chance with a single clone, but three clones equates out to 18% chance. Now, you still have the chance to hijack the mob back, but considering it’s redirected to a clone, even for a few seconds would mean it’s not attacking you, or allies.

This would only apply to the clones and not phantasms, as clones appear more like the caster while the phantasms have the ethereal, ghostly purple-pink look, the illusions appear to look similar to the caster, hence the illusion. Also, giving more logic, because the mob becomes increasingly more confused, it has difficulty figuring out which one of those pesky [Insert Race/Gender Here] is the real one! Also, it’s balanced in sPvP (and yes, even WvWvW) considering the other player won’t be affected by this buff, since they have a working brain…well, some of the time.

The great part about this is that it would add a bit more flavor to builds, say you’ve dropped a couple of clones, and an iWarden, the combined dps from you and the clones would increase the survivability rate of the phantasm. Not to mention, you know the complaints how the mesmer’s scepter can’t really find that right niche in the profession’s repertoire? Did you forget that Confusing Images applies confusion, well, now it can be used as a control, and for more fun, slap a focus on that bad boy.

Like to know what you all think!

ether clone does not inflict confusion and never did. the clone’s attacks used to cause confusion during beta, but that is no longer the case

lupercaleb.6041:

ether clone does not inflict confusion and never did. the clone’s attacks used to cause confusion during beta, but that is no longer the case

Okay, I’ll edit that part as I didn’t know if it actually did as it implies, partly because I used the scepter during the beginning of the game until a sword dropped. Anything you’d like to add besides that though?

Interesting idea however I have some issues with it:
1. Mesmers aren’t the only class with Confusion so how would it interact with them?
2. It would render Cry of Frustration (confusion shatter) redundant. What’s the point of destroying your clones to add a condition that makes them more likely to attack clones.
Obviously if this was implemented CoF would be changed

I’d also want to clarify if Confusion still does damage on spell use.
If it doesn’t I don’t really like it.

Mikool.8037:

Interesting idea however I have some issues with it:
1. Mesmers aren’t the only class with Confusion so how would it interact with them?
2. It would render Cry of Frustration (confusion shatter) redundant. What’s the point of destroying your clones to add a condition that makes them more likely to attack clones.
Obviously if this was implemented CoF would be changed

I’d also want to clarify if Confusion still does damage on spell use.
If it doesn’t I don’t really like it.

Valid points, I’ll edit the main post tomorrow morning (dead tired from this week, be the first time I’ll sleep more than four hours tonight…hooray) to better describe my intention for the change.

1- I figured it would be a profession-specific benefit, consider it a glamour effect if you wish. Other professions can stack it along with the mesmer, increasing the effectiveness of the mesmer’s clone control, meaning additional synergy from other professions, so if an engineer is in a group with a mesmer, they could utilize the benefit of confusion to take the heat off themselves or party members; like dropping an iWarden in an elementist’s healing rain which spreads around the healing. It be a combo, but without the need for a primer and finisher. Though, to be honest, from 1-80 on my mesmer, I rarely saw anyone but a mesmer applying confusion. A few rare times I’ve seen others apply it, but like I said, rarely.

2. In a clone factory build, you could use CoF to stack more confusion to create a higher probability that the clones will be attacked, and when they die (if traited) will add more confusion. This would also cause the enemy to stack it in greater amounts, leading to confusion being easier to stack like bleeds and maintain the stack, so if and when they do use an ability, they take a nasty hit. On a clone factory build, or any shatter build, when MW is on cd, you’ll be using CoF as a means of dps anyways.

To be honest, I’d be logical to see this as a trait, so it’s not necessary for the player to have, but they can grab it if they so choose that route. You also have to take into account that if you want to use it as a control build, you’ll be grabbing confusion traits and utilizing abilities and shatters that cause confusion to benefit more from it. Bear in mind, that it’s not a guarantee that the enemy always attack the clones, which is why depending on how many stacks of confusion times the amount of clones on the battlefield will change the percentage of when they focus fire on the clones.

Let’s take the percentage down to a measly 1% for kicks. 1 confusion appliance will give 1% chance they will deviate to a clone, with 3 on the board, that’s 3% chance. Now let’s elevate that more, you attack, shatter them on contact immediately, stacking 3%, pop out 3 more clones and use confusion images on the scepter, meaning you have 6 applications from shattering them with CoF and trait to add 1 per clone upon death, and because you used confusing images, that’s another 3, so a total of 9%. With the 3 clones out, you have a 27% chance they enemy will deviate to one of your clones, each with a 9% chance per clone. It’ll escalate from there. If you could somehow manage to get max stack applied, you’d have a highly successful chance of deviating the enemy from you to your clones. In an event with allies using abilities all around, this would further aid you in creating a safety bubble in which the enemy will focus down something else.