Guild Wars 2

I still believe anything any other class can do, Mesmer can be specialized for too.

With that in mind, I wanted to pull some heads together and see if we could produce a viable bunker for tournaments in PvP.. Heres what I had in mind.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsdWl4zionSzhGZ9IhpHBH5C/0Do78nXqQsB-TkAgzCmI2RtjbHzOSgsAN/A

0/10/30/30/0 Dueling: VI / Chaos: V, X, XI / Inspiration: IV, X, XII

Its all still a bit shakey. I wanna add Prismatic Understanding for the protection, but I’m not sold on how stealth could be viable for a bunker… unless you prepare it beforehand.

Also, with the current condition meta (which I believe will shift) I believe I’ll need more condition removal, perhaps iDisenchanter instead of Mantra of Resolve … But here’s my idea behind the build.

DEFENSE

• Protected Mantras = 400 toughness
• Chaos Armor
• Protection Runes
• iDefender(which should gain the toughness boost from protected Mantras), Mantra charges.
  *AoE Weakness on clone death (RNG)

OFFENSE
*Pfft. =[ Retaliation?

Still a bit shaky, but maybe some additional insight might help?

Another idea I had was Bunker/Support. Using stealth to charge [AoE] mantra heals and Signet of Inspiration for protection. Something like this…

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsdWl4zioHWTgGb9IhpHB33A/0Dm78pXqQsB-TgAgzCmIKSVkrITRyisFB

0/10/30/30/0 Dueling VI – Inspiration II, X, XI – Chaos V, VII, XII (Lyssa runes)

Which would premptively use stealth to grant large stacks of protection to teams, interrupts for large stacks of might, and mantra for large burst heals all while maintaining its tankiness. It looks promising in theory, but what do you guys think?

Hmm. How much Protection might we expect this to hand out? On average, obviously, since it’s random. I’m thinking if you get one Protection and one Regen to Membrane off of on a single veil, that would be about 9 secondsish?

I look at Cry of Frustration and long for it to come join the fun. Dang you 0/0/30/30/0! I feel like a shared out Retaliation plus a six stack of confusion would put someone in a bad mood. Without the power/c-dam to back it up, I guess it wouldn’t do that much, but that doesn’t seem to stop guardian bunkers from loading up on it like it’s the last of the Twinkies.

My personal experiences with iDisenchanter have been shaky. I’d be more comfortable with the on-demand removal of Mantra of Resolve, even if it is less overall removal. He doesn’t really seem to think about what he throws his bolts at. There’s also the torch route, since that would support PU, but that would demand a 20 point investment in Domination to make work.

You can’t use PU for a poper bunker role. You lose the point as you’re invisible.

We lose the point during blurred frenzy

Staff 2 often ports us off the point.

It is my humble opinion that a PU mesmer best serves his team as a boon-spreader and/or resource absorber. If PU is what you want to do you need to be able to win a fight 1v1 in a respectable amount of time. This way you maintain a high uptime of 2+ persons working on you and you alone while your squad secures the other points. This probably locks the PU mesmer into either a phantasm role (more survivability) or bleed role.

I have recently tried maxing out chaos armors using s/f and staff, shamans, and glamours and I was not able to survive enough.

I have done ok witb clerics, s/t and s/f, 20-0-20-30, defender/disenchanter/sig of ill and it did ok. Perhaps with tweaking it can be improved upon.

Its can be difficult as we are an active profession and its a tiny little point.

Going to assusme youre a mid-point bunker.

If youre he only one of your team in the circle, then going stealth will make the circle decap towards the other team. If there are others in melee range with you then stealth will work though, especially with the inspiration signet!

I think the disenchanter isnt very usefull when youre trying to bunker, the aoe spam will probably kill it after it attacked once :o.
Null field would be cool as condi removal, it would also remove boons from the enemy bunker. If it removes stability youd be able to knock him out and maybe cap the point too!

You can combo blasts wih engineers to keep perma chaos armor, not sure if its worth over ofher combos though. Haing alot of vhaos armor (including on illusions if your team is gone) would punish grenade engis and the like a lot though!

I never played bunker, but one thing i notice when i play with one is that thy also carry some control, like the shield push or the shorld push on res trait.
I would get downed somewhere in the circle, and the bunker would rush over and knock things away, even stealthed thieves. When the foe has stability im screwed though.
Your build can do the same, with a staff or focus, If you take null field you can even interupt people using stability.

On my shatter build i usually put chaos storms or temporal curtains just before i revive someone. It actually has lower cooldown and both are instant/lingering while we revive and wait to activate it compared to the guardian shield push.

Your null field also cleanses poison on downed allies! Guardians can do that too, though.

I cant view the build link on mobile, so i assume youre using mantra of resolve, Veil, inspiration sig? If thats the case, id definitely swal it for nullfield for the sake of support :P.
Might aswell get glamour mastery dor nullfield + veil (just throwing out some random thoughts). Mantra of recovery is still the best self healig per second though.

That said, i sill believe, and i quote:

anything any other profession can do, Mesmer can be specialized for too.

Good point on phase retreat – it almost seems like a sin to not take the staff in a bunker build but sw/f and s/sw may not be too bad (dual blocks).

On the solo non-supporting bunker idea – assuming sw/f (retal from light field) and s/sw, I like the chaotic interruption choice. I run a build in pvp using that and it’s effective in disrupting enough to hold points for a short time. In that build though it’s spec’d more for power and not like a bunker. The extra cc you would get from that trait could be really helpful.

Also, I’m wondering if a constant heal and cleanse would stall long enough, though you would rarely if ever kill anyone (which is kind of the point with a bunker). How about swap the stability mantra for the condi-cleanse mantra and switch shattered conditions for restorative illusions? Surely you will be shattering some if phantasms are off CD, and especially if you get enough regen built up. So you have condi-cleanse with mender’s purity and the mantra. With restorative illusions, mantra heals (x3 in this case) the immense amount of regen from your phantasms, and interruption from focus F3, focus pulls and counter blade, I would think you’d be hard to take down. I personally would try to gear for more vitality as well.

While all of that sounds promising in theory, lack of skill CD’s would really, really hurt, but might be interesting to try out.

Anyone know if using mimic decaps a point? Maybe a 0/20/30/20/0 for a traited mimic. Will give you potentially a lot of retaliation and some awesome defense if it works. Will work well with the staff bounces too.

Since blurred decaps a point, maybe scepter/sword or scepter/focus instead for an extra block that doesn’t decap. Staff 2 isn’t for bunkering and you don’t have DE so clone spawning is problematic with your build and that could help.

If you want to stay 0/10/30/30/0, If you want to shatter, then vigor/condition cleanse on shatter will help more with defense. 9% crit isn’t going to proc vigor that often.

I’ve never really tried to bunker though so I have no idea if my advice means anything.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW8dl0zipXVTqGZ9IhJF923nUw8lj6R3z+3B-TsAA1CtICSFkLITQygsBNEZJyuAA

This is the mesmer bunker build I use when I pvp. Use chaos storm on the point, to keep yourself getting defensive boons, and maybe get rng interrupts (though your main interrupts come from temporal curtain and f3 shatter) for might. Hoelbrak runes give -condition duration, and between that and null field for when you fight a necro or engi, you should be fine against conditions. Very rarely do I end up needing null field when it’s not up. damage comes from might stacks from sigil of battle and bountiful interruption. Defense comes from boons and soldiers amulet. If you really get into trouble, moa morph to get one person out of the fight for a short time.

Lots of interesting feedback, thanks guys. Now I’m giving Glamours a closer look.

As far as Restorative Illusions goes, I really think it’d be a huge help for our survivability, but it practically demands iPersona (for the extra 932HP.. maybe even 1k with Cleric’s gear I gotta check) which means my clone production wouldn’t be too great.

But Restorative Illusions(Over 2440HP with 3 shatters) + Restorative Mantras(2700HP per charge) + Protected Mantras (extra 400 toughness when mantra charging) sounds like a really good foundation. Maybe mix in some glamours(and blind on glamour use) and we might be on to something.

The reason I like Veil for a build with Prismatic Understanding & Restorative Mantras is because it allows me to safely charge mantras in the middle of a fight – you can literally jump up and down on the invisibility strip while charging Mantras to stay stealthed for 6 seconds – which means each time I cast Veil, I can burst heal my team for over 5k and stack protection, hopefully, on them with a number of other boons. Combined with Bountiful Interruption, my team is getting burst healed, might stacks, and defensive buffs all at once… and stealth of course.

Also, I was thinking of using Mass Invis more preemptively rather than defensively. Going to a point with my team invis’d, then using Veil, (a total of 12 seconds of stealth. Should be atleast 15+ secs of protection)

@Craig: Seeing that build gave me the idea for blinding glamours. Blind, reflects, condition removal, along with focus and Chaos Storm could be enough defense if Restorative Mantras/Illusions can supply us with enough heals..

The matter of protection(runes, hopefully, if I don’t use PU) and stunbreaks(ugh.. Dat warrior) still gives worry though.

…Since Blurred Frenzy got changed to evades rather than invuln, does it still not cap a point? Cuz that’s rather dumb if so.

I tried illusionary persona last night tied to heal-on-shatter. It didn’t work out. More healing would be required. Perhaps if it was tied Into combo-ing across ethereal fields yoh could generate enough blind and protection to push it over but I don’t know yet.

Oh funny…that was your post chaos pffff. Sorry, working and just wanted to toss it out before I get caught up with wirk n kids again.

Basic outline: Daze + Mantra + Chaotic Interruption

Guardian and especially Engineer are so successful at holding point because of their sustained CC matched with a tanky build. We might be able to mimic this success to some point with GS push and Focus pull combined with a Daze build combined with Chaotic Interruption. This build would possibly include mantras with mantra heal and mantra 400 toughness on charge. Perhaps through sigils of hydromancy in there to further slow your opponent down and Runes of the Mesmer to increase your Daze duration. The objective would be to continually daze and lockdown your opponent. Your push and pull should be able to control who is in the circle as well. Another weapon combo that could work would be Sword/Sword + Scepter/Pistol. If you go with those wapons and have room left you might toss in the retaliation block trait and mimic.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

@Craig: Seeing that build gave me the idea for blinding glamours. Blind, reflects, condition removal, along with focus and Chaos Storm could be enough defense if Restorative Mantras/Illusions can supply us with enough heals..

I tried blinding glamours for a bit, however, I couldn’t quite figure out how the blind worked (I think it pulses, but I’m not sure how often, or anything), and I didn’t really notice the blinds that much. Extra bounce on staff auto attack means more boons for you and your team, which I found to be more helpful in the long run. However, my tests were very loose and it would need much further testing.
I also tried a healing mantra build with full clerics gear in WvW. I know it’s not the same, but while mantra heals bring much more survivability, it is very prone to interrupts (yes veil helps a bit, but there’s still plenty of aoe interrupts in the game) and deals much less damage. Comparatively, I’ve had more bunker success with this build than a mantra healing build, but that may just be my playstyle too. Again, this is all very loosely tested and would require much more in depth testing to know for sure which is better. I also don’t know how much the stats difference from WvW to tPvP would hurt the healing on mantras (I’ve never run mantras in PvP).
All in all, great ideas, and in theory it would work well, it just needs lots of testing in actually tournament play, to see if mantras would succumb to interrupts, or if veil would be enough to get your mantras charged. I would love if someone could test these things out, but right now I’m on the road to a legendary and am spending my non-farm time having fun in WvW and sPvP (we have to have a little fun right?)

Lots of good ideas. I’ll do some testing this weekend and see what I come up with. There’s definitely potential here, may just take some practice.

@DJtool: I had did a lot of tests with Restorative Illusions before, it works like this..

iPersona = 932

iPersona + 1Clone(1124) = 2056
iPersona + 2Clones(1316) = 2248
iPersona + 3Clones(1508) = 2440

Which means that shattering 1 clone with iPersona gives more healing than shattering 3 clones without.

If I can shatter 1 clone each time I charge my mantras, I’ll be getting 4.6k heals each Mantra charge (not including Regen). If I can utilize that 4.6k heal along with some good CC and defenses, I think we may just be on to something nerf-worthy… er, I mean viable.

Just throwing out other ideas – what if you dropped dueling altogether, 20 from chaos (go debilitating dissipation) 30 into Illusions for IP and to give the build a condition damage flavor, plus get the ultimate from restorative illusions? You’d have to have Mirror Images for stun breaks and staff clones. Granted you no longer have chaotic dampening and boon durations are lower, BUT now you have IC and all illusion CD’s are less.

You could keep signet of illusions or replace it with whatever is needed – iDisenchanter for more condition management and and boon stripping (HUGE), or even decoy for an extra clone. You can shatter the clones for RI, or let them kill them and you still get benefit from debilitating dissipation. Almost most importantly, 30 in illusions gives you quickest access to distortion. In this build you might want to swap sw/f for something else (maybe sc/sw for the blocks)? I threw melandru runes on for good measure – excellent condition/stun management and a huge toughness boost, seemed to fit well. I put it in an editor for reference:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNArdWl4zio3UzhGZ9IhpCB/0Do78nj6R3z+3B-TkAg2CrIMSZkzIjRSjsGN/A

Totally brainstorming here …

Well then that does sort if lock you into glamours for a first go-round doesn’t it. The blind trait in the illusions line is the only other defensive trait available outside of the one that refreshes your shatters at % 50 health. You have to hope that chaos armor is enough but at this point you just ran out if points to get a really good extension on protection duration. Could be the runes would have to make that up, if they can properly.

Having a clone to shatter when needed without signet if illusions can be a chore. Especially on a point.

djtool.8372:

Well then that does sort if lock you into glamours for a first go-round doesn’t it. The blind trait in the illusions line is the only other defensive trait available outside of the one that refreshes your shatters at % 50 health. You have to hope that chaos armor is enough but at this point you just ran out if points to get a really good extension on protection duration. Could be the runes would have to make that up, if they can properly.

Having a clone to shatter when needed without signet if illusions can be a chore. Especially on a point.

Yep, in the build I posted, if you run out of shatters you’re pretty much dead since the protection uptime will be fairly low. I mentioned you could keep SoI – probably the best bet. I thought about Illusionary Invigoration instead of IE as well which would be yet another way to somewhat reliably access a fresh set of shatters. Of course you lose the condition damage source from IE, but illusionary invigoration may prove much more useful.

Just looking at that restorative illusions analysis. One clone + IP is just amazing heals.

The thing to remember about all that potential healing is that there is sooooooo much control involved that accomplishing the ideal heal process is not reliable. What typically happens is you are controlled and subjected to more damage than you can make up.

We are not blessed with much stability. What we have is blind and distortion (a little left with some evade now). It is good that we can heal sans timer (IP and heal on shatter) however it is not enough. Yes we can heal in 2.25 seconds but not more then is directed toward us during the wait.

giving this a shot right now in spvp for a bit to see how it pans out.

Bunker mesmer is a great concept and when played well the hardest bunker to kill. My personal favorite is the perma protection build through PU however the downside to it is it relies on PU. I am thinking of trying A little something more out along the lines of 0/20/20/30/0 without using the staff and taking something like mirror of anguish, (still need to double check the traits for it.) and then focusing on glamours especially nullfield taking temporal enchanter and glamour mastery. I feel like this would give us a very high uptime on condi clearing compared to what we recently have. I think the effective CD would be something around just about 24s. Which is pretty sweet.

djtool.8372:

giving this a shot right now in spvp for a bit to see how it pans out.

it works ok but is strained when 2 glass or 3 period are on you. certainly there is technique to learn (because we can’t have it easy right?) and mine wasn’t perfect. I spent more time staring at my bar then the screen for this one.

I went with:

- sw/sw and staff (no trait for focus so I questioned its use. the off-hand sword provides more illusions for shattering and its cooldowns are pretty low)
- two sigil of energy, one restoration (i’ll give hydromancy a go next time)
- 2 grove, 2 earth, 2 water (trying out upping protection uptime, melandru is next as its pretty standard)
- null field, cleansing mantra, defender I didn’t feel the extra chaos armor every 32 seconds with feedback was better than the cleansing and availability for a heal cast)

so this is all you have to do:

- manage your mantras
- reliably set up fields for chaos armor
- dodge but try to stay on point
- manage where you port to with staff ‘2’ and get back to point
- try to use your daze and distortion shatter intelligently
- and as I said in my other post….somehow stand on a point in the middle of a scrum and not be interrupted for 2.75 seconds.

I have bunkered with engy quite well and I can tell you its not even close to being as complicated. I’ll keep at it though. FOR SCIENCE!

@djtool, awesome – are you giving the 0/10/30/30/0 build a go (with a few tweaks sounds like)?

no. you can’kittens not valid because when you go invis you lose the point.

I’m doing 0-10-0-30-30 as chaos imagined. trying it now in soloq for a few

I threw out a 0/0/10/30/30 build above:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNArdWl4zio3UzhGZ9IhpCB/0Do78nj6R3z+3B-TkAg2CrIMSZkzIjRSjsGN/A

But reading above I think you said you had tried that last night and it didn’t work out?

I think Chaos’ original was 0/10/30/30/0 but no matter, I just hope something viable can be found …

perhaps if portal was taken? do the two spots count as individual glamours?

well the best ‘tank’ spec I’ve ever used…still is 20-0-20-20-0(10) with sw/t and (X)/focus while wearing a soldiers amulet, disenchanter/defender/sig of ill. I’m not saying its comparable to what others can do but it’s the best I’ve got for now. I was in an interesting protracted confrontation with one of the afforementioned spec’s but lost the point solely due to staff ‘2’.

its very hard to see acting as a true bunker being in the cards for Mesmer given how we operate. if we can do it it might have to be sans staff.

otherwise just lose the point using the PU trait and hope that you can accumulate enough of their resources to tip the scales in your teams favor elsewhere. when/if they show up to where you are hopefully you have enough buffs stacked to ensure victory.

could be Mesmer ends up this way with team comps anyways. If you can successfully tandem a buff-bot Mesmer with a condition/epidemic necro theoretically you just tipped the battle way into your favor. wish I tpvp’d to know if that’d work.