Guild Wars 2

Hey all. It seems that nobody uses torch at all. I really enjoy the stealth that it offers as well as the phantasm it summons. Am I purely making myself weaker by using it with my sword instead of a pistol? Do you all see any reason to use the torch? I just love the idea of turning invisible then reappearing in a burst of flame. It has such panache!

Please share your thoughts on the torch.

I personally think the Pistol is the best off hand, great CC with ability 5 and you get the Pistol Phantoms out and they do some serious damage in dungeons i can have 3 all out just blasting away with it off cool down and ready to use again should 1 die

I think the Torch is decent but not the strongest weapon we have damage wise, guess the utility it offers is nice but i guess i just like going for CC/damage

Personally i find…

Pistol or Sword to be my favourite offhand for sPvP

Focus for WvW

Focus for Dungeons

Focus or Pistol for general PvE

Have not really found a use for the torch

the torch is pretty terrible in both PvP and PvE. The prestige is great as an escape tool, but Decoy does it better and doesn’t bring along a terrible phantasm at least. But it does have the potential to be a pretty decent sPvP weapon with 2 really easy changes

1) make The Prestige burn first, and blind at the end of the channel
2) make iMage attack faster and/or apply more stacks of confusion and retaliation.

Any other changes will only be a plus, but these two will at least make it functional.

I really hope the torch will be fixed ASAP. I’ve wanted to play a sword wielding mesmer that weaves in-and-out of stealth since the first BWE

The Prestige is fine, its the iMage that is terrible

Prestige is nice. It’s an extra stealth and it blind at the beginning. I could be careless about the burn afterward. Only thing I dislike is that we have to keep it channeling, but meh, not that big of a deal.

iMage is somewhat nice and bad. It just doesn’t do as much as other phantasms does.

I wish Torch was slightly better. I like the look of a torch and the light around you when you use one, but iMage is kinda a let down for me. I kinda wish we had a few skills available for each weapons and that we could choose what we want within the few ones(3 MH, 2 OH). Oh well.. :/

Torch works wonder in a defensive / condition build. I used scepter/torch + staff and u get 2 sources of retaliation + spam bleed/burn/confusion/blindness and whatnot.

I would just rush a spot with whatever number of ennemies, pop chaos storm tank a little, switch to scepter/torch stealth out, summon mage, run back in with new retaliation, spam more conditions / shatter clones for even more conditions, rinse/repeat.
But usually all were dead or 20% life in matter of couple seconds.

In a group fight, pop TW at the start and its ridiculous, all dead and stomped in less than 5 sec.

Now its a condition/retaliation build so it got weaknesses too. If your opponent is not doing damage / cleansing himself then you do no dmg too.

The mage is still quite awful, I only use it with the condition removal trait. Since I ALWAYS take decoy (mandatory utility IMO) having 2 invis’s is nice, the channel on torch is quite horrible though, since you can’t dodge away or can basically have your invis interupted.

The condition trait with torch actually makes iMage pretty good, you remove a condition on yourself when you summon then the iMage’s bounces to allies remove a condition. So he becomes a sort of mini-Disenchanter.

I always use torch. Blind can be used as an aoe block in a way when you go into stealth. The fire damage is aoe (children complain about no aoe, well this is aoe, and it does excellent damage). It is a BLAST FINISHER, ie you use with combo fields for aoe buffs (or by yourself, use with Feedback/Null Field so you don’t have to equip a staff). Staff only offers conditions and a damage phantasm. You don’t need skills 4 and 5 because you can create ethereal fields and get WAY MORE chaos armor using sword/torch and utility ethereal fields (leap/prestige). You also can do aoe retaliation if you use focus as your other offhand.

Last, the iMage actually does do significant damage. Confusion + retaliation = double whammy for people/mobs who attack a lot. It depends on how often you get hit and/or attacked while those are up (and retaliation is an aoe).

Traited, torch removes conditions, for making iMage another phantasmal disenchanter (exactly the same except not sure about whether it removes enemy boons though, I don’t think so).

Torch allows you to not equip decoy if you want stealth and not equip condition removals if you want as utility. This frees up other options.

If anything, the pistol should be nerfed such that it blinds first, dazes second, and stuns third. As of now, it is a bit over the top with Stun (one of the best crowd control options) and a powerful damage phantasm that doubles as a weak physical projectile chance combo finisher.

Unfortunately, you’re completely wrong about the iMage doing significant damage. Even assuming the absolute best case scenario, where the mob is attacking 1 time per second, its horrible. First off, if the mob attacks fast, and hits those attacks, you will be dead, and fast. Second of all, assuming the mob attacks 10 times in the length of that confusion, thats only goign to add up to something like 1500-2500 damage, at the absolute most. Compare that to a few rounds of unloads from the duelist, or a couple hits from the swordsman (my swordsman hits for around 2500-3000 each time). Every single other phantasm blows it out of the water in terms of damage and utility.

Out of curiosity, how many targets does the iMage’s attack jump over? 3?

Don’t forget that iMage also adds retaliation. I’ve been experimenting on a hybrid mesmer build that utilizes confusion/retaliation/blocking mechanics. Seeing people blow themselves up is hilarious.

I suspect that if the iMage can hit 3 targets, then it’s damage is sadly balance around having 3 Confusion / Retaliation active per hit, meaning you’d need an AE situations. Much like iDisenchanter seems balanced around hitting multiple friendlies.

I use the torch for certain encounters, It’s best used in a group of mobs rather than single target in which case the pistol is better. It’s also a good intro into a fight and also a good exit for when things get too heated. It increases your survivability at melee range in that way.

The phantasm is especially useful to make you less squishy. I think both the pistol/torch are at about equal footing it just depends on the encounter (In terms of PvE/Dungeons)