Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

in Mesmer

Posted by: Sebrent.3625

Sebrent.3625

I was just thinking about maximizing clone generation independent of weapon skills and what came to mind was Chrono, Dueling, Inspiration.

Chrono can provide you with (of what we know)

  • Shatter creates a clone
  • Shattered phantasms are resummoned (once per Phantasm)
  • Alacrity

Dueling can provide you with:

  • Vigor on Crit (more dodges)
  • Blind on Shatter
  • Deceptive Evasion (clone on-dodge)

Inspiration can provide you with

  • Vigor on-shatter (more dodges)
  • Heal on-shatter
  • Condition Cleanse on-shatter
  • Regeneration from Phantasms (when summoned and in 3s intervals afterwards … if you haven’t shattered them yet).

My initial intuition is:

  • Some concern over the potential damage
  • Provides quite a bit of support for team as that Vigor/Regeneration/Heal/Cleanse/Blind per shatter will affect nearby allies
  • Provides some additional longevity to a shatter build given the Vigor/Heal/Cleanse/Blind per shatter
  • Should have perma-Vigor via the two Vigor traits.
  • I could see potentially dropping the blind in favor of reflect on-evasion.

I think the damage could be dealt with by going with a condition build. That would benefit more from the bleeding/confusion from crits anyways.

I could see swapping out heal-on-shatter for Focus trait if taking the Focus. If you decided to take Focus and Shield (Scepter and/or Sword MH obviously), you could provide quite a bit of anti-projectile cover for your allies as well as some additional CC as both of those OH weapons’ anti-projectile skill doubles as a CC.

I’m curious about the rest of the Chrono traits as I could potentially see Chaos as an alternative as the Protection from Chaos Armor, cooldown reduction for Staff, synergy with boons, etc. could work well. The loss would be no Alacrity for speeding up cooldowns (primarily shatters and illusion summons).

I’m just trying to theorycraft various options that have opened up to Mesmers with the current info.

Thoughts?

Christian. Husband. Father. Friend. Developer. Gamer.
Try your best to not make mistakes, but, when you do make mistakes, learn from them.
Better yourself.

(edited by Sebrent.3625)

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: Curunen.8729

Curunen.8729

Scepter/Focus + Sword/Shield and this might be a lot of fun – certainly have a stupid amount of projectile mitigation through weapons, utilities and traits (if you take evasive mirror over blinding dissipation – but obviously not sure how useful each will be yet).

And yes – the main concern as you’ve highlighted is damage output – not sure how it will work in this case – whether the shatters would be hard hitting enough (even if you go full zerker), or if the conditions would be damaging enough (given sword, focus and shield are not natural condition weapons and would be relying heavily on sharper images and confusing combatants).

But for control/support in small groups, it could be quite potent.

(edited by Curunen.8729)

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: CobraPolo.1723

CobraPolo.1723

Scepter/Focus + Sword/Shield has been on my mind since they announced the chrono. However staff keeps pecking me in the back of the head in which I think i’d part from a chrono build. Tough. will have to try both.

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: Sebrent.3625

Sebrent.3625

I just finished making a post about what people think they would run if they wanted to run both Focus and Shield in WvW … as soon as I finish posting the topic I see you both are here saying that you’d use this build with those weaponsets. Lol!

Way to bring it full circle for me today :-)

What are your thoughts on running this with Celestial?
Other stats?
Runes?
Sigils?

Currently, I’m thinking of just sticking with my Traveler runes for the 25% movespeed. Sure, I get some swiftness from the Focus, but it’s not 100% like other classes get with their traited swiftness applicators (<_<) and it’s nice to not be at +0% movespeed if/when someone removes your swiftness.

For sigils, I’m thinking that even with all that vigor that Energy would still be wonderful. Bonus endurance is always welcome on a Mesmer imo. Other than that, possibly doom in order to gain access to some poison for hindering other tanking builds’ sustain.

Christian. Husband. Father. Friend. Developer. Gamer.
Try your best to not make mistakes, but, when you do make mistakes, learn from them.
Better yourself.

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: CobraPolo.1723

CobraPolo.1723

If I don’t run sig of insp once It gets perma swift then i’m same page running my travellers. If i do run sig then i’ll prob go nightmare runes. Sigil similar, energy/doom. only thing i prob won’t do is celestial. Guess depends how “adjusted base stats” will affect celestial overall. As of now i think it will be weak again. If that’s the case i’ll prob go rabid/dire mix or full zerker. depending on scenario.

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: Sebrent.3625

Sebrent.3625

Makes sense. I’d probably go full Rabid though instead of dealing with Dire … just to get more crits for more bleed+confusion.

Christian. Husband. Father. Friend. Developer. Gamer.
Try your best to not make mistakes, but, when you do make mistakes, learn from them.
Better yourself.

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: Curunen.8729

Curunen.8729

Yeah that’s why as in the other topic I said I don’t think I would like to run with both focus and shield together – taking staff and focus means enough swiftness out of combat (I don’t care for 100%) and enough in combat (chaos armour and chaos storm as well as focus), taking focus and shield would push me to run traveler – but then the question again with focus and shield together is power or condition?

I think it might work best as a power shatter/interrupt variant – so chronomancy, inspiration (take shattered conditions) and domination (boon strip, CS, and likely PB), full zerker, blink decoy and MoD (don’t need condi removal because of shattered conditions and menders purity).
Actually that could be a very fun shatter/interrupt build, but naturally quite glassy – although the weapons would provide good defence as well as the inspiration traits.

Theorycraft: Shatter for Days

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Posted by: CobraPolo.1723

CobraPolo.1723

I think my initial setup will be scepter/torch + sword/shield with traveler zerk but i fell in the end i’ll be switching sword/shield for staff and going condi.