Guild Wars 2

how much good will 5 second of retaliation do?

if this apply to character, then i would say hell of good. but for phantasm? are you serious

phantasm only attack once every 5~7 second, in the main time they just stand there as a easy prey.

in PVP- not much people ever care about attacking phantasm, just as not much people enjoy attacking necromancer’s pet.. even when they do, phantasm rarely fight back.. well maybe once.. if they are lucky

In PVE- Phantasm are not meant to hold agro, they do not get any agro when they first spawn, their damage is relative low and they are not clone. monster do attack them from time to time, but rarely in the first 5 second.

serious nerfing this trait to hell, making it totally worthless.. is this Arena net’s style of creating more diversity? instead of making other trait useful, you make all trait worthless..

While I agree that the nerf to Vengeful Images was unneeded (and is now largely useless since the Retaliation will likely expire before enemies really target the Phantasm), I disagree with your statement that Phantasms deal low damage. On my build, the bulk of my damage comes from my Phantasms (Phantasmal Duelist and Phantasmal Warlock, if you’re curious). They were actually quite sturdy between their Retaliation and Signet of Illusions, capable of surviving almost as long as Clones, although between their nerf to general health and loss of Retaliation, they’re a lot more fragile than before.

That seems to be what ANet is trying to go for with them, however; highly dangerous, but fragile targets that should be destroyed as a matter of importance, forcing players to choose between attacking the real Mesmer or taking time out to kill the Phantasms first.

Of course, the downside in PvE is that monsters target your Clones and Phantasms first over you as a general rule.

Zaxares.5419:

While I agree that the nerf to Vengeful Images was unneeded (and is now largely useless since the Retaliation will likely expire before enemies really target the Phantasm), I disagree with your statement that Phantasms deal low damage. On my build, the bulk of my damage comes from my Phantasms (Phantasmal Duelist and Phantasmal Warlock, if you’re curious). They were actually quite sturdy between their Retaliation and Signet of Illusions, capable of surviving almost as long as Clones, although between their nerf to general health and loss of Retaliation, they’re a lot more fragile than before.

That seems to be what ANet is trying to go for with them, however; highly dangerous, but fragile targets that should be destroyed as a matter of importance, forcing players to choose between attacking the real Mesmer or taking time out to kill the Phantasms first.

Of course, the downside in PvE is that monsters target your Clones and Phantasms first over you as a general rule.

when i say damage is low, i was comparing with mesmer player who summon them. if don’t see any how any mesmer will do less damage compare to their phantasm, even when they are fully trait toward phantasm.

and lower damage means less agro, phantasm are not good in holding agro.

decease.3215

if don’t see any how any mesmer will do less damage compare to their phantasm, even when they are fully trait toward phantasm.

I use Scepter/Pistol and Staff as my weapons on my Mesmer. Staff damage is decent (but still slow), but Scepter/Pistol is pathetic unless I’m up against an enemy that spams skills frequently. The bulk of my damage does indeed come from my Phantasms.

If you’re a Power-traited Mesmer wielding a Sword or Greatsword (as most Mesmers I see tend to be), of course your damage output is going to be way higher than your Phantasms.

Zaxares.5419:

decease.3215

if don’t see any how any mesmer will do less damage compare to their phantasm, even when they are fully trait toward phantasm.

I use Scepter/Pistol and Staff as my weapons on my Mesmer. Staff damage is decent (but still slow), but Scepter/Pistol is pathetic unless I’m up against an enemy that spams skills frequently. The bulk of my damage does indeed come from my Phantasms.

If you’re a Power-traited Mesmer wielding a Sword or Greatsword (as most Mesmers I see tend to be), of course your damage output is going to be way higher than your Phantasms.

the thing is you cannot use Scepter, if you want to go phantasm build. Scepter base attack summon a clone on third hit.. it will reduce your max phantasm number from 3 to 2…

you see to be using a hybrid build.. i am pure phantasm build.. but even then i deal way more damage then my phantasm.

p.s. Scepter isn’t really a viable weapon.. i mean.. yea 200 condition damage is good.. but you don’t get too much condition as a phantasm build.. if you are a shatter build it would be otherwise..

Just an update. I misread the patch notes and thought it said Phantasms in PvE got their health DECREASED by 270%. It was actually INCREASED by 270%. Someone in the Mesmer forums crunched the numbers and came to the conclusion that Phantasms in PvE are tougher than before when traited and with SoI, while they are slightly weaker in PvP. That renders about half of my original post invalid. XD

And I guess if you look at it that way, I am running a hybrid build. My strategy is to open with some Clones (Mirror Image) to draw fire, summon Phantasmal Duelist, fight until I can summon a second Duelist, then swap to Staff, summon Phantasmal Warlock, then use those in combination with Winds of Chaos/Chaos Storm as my main damage dealers. (When they run low on health, shatter them all with Diversion, pop Mirror Image again, and repeat.)

Scepter is mainly used as a Clone-generating filler for situations where my Phantasms die too quickly and I need something to distract the enemy until they recharge.

Scepter has also had a stealth buff where it summons TWO Clones on the third attack, not one, meaning it’s the undisputed weapon of choice for someone who runs a Shatter build. This could be a bug though.

Zaxares.5419:

Just an update. I misread the patch notes and thought it said Phantasms in PvE got their health DECREASED by 270%. It was actually INCREASED by 270%. Someone in the Mesmer forums crunched the numbers and came to the conclusion that Phantasms in PvE are tougher than before when traited and with SoI, while they are slightly weaker in PvP. That renders about half of my original post invalid. XD

And I guess if you look at it that way, I am running a hybrid build. My strategy is to open with some Clones (Mirror Image) to draw fire, summon Phantasmal Duelist, fight until I can summon a second Duelist, then swap to Staff, summon Phantasmal Warlock, then use those in combination with Winds of Chaos/Chaos Storm as my main damage dealers. (When they run low on health, shatter them all with Diversion, pop Mirror Image again, and repeat.)

Scepter is mainly used as a Clone-generating filler for situations where my Phantasms die too quickly and I need something to distract the enemy until they recharge.

Scepter has also had a stealth buff where it summons TWO Clones on the third attack, not one, meaning it’s the undisputed weapon of choice for someone who runs a Shatter build. This could be a bug though.

it was increase.. but signet of illusion nerf from 200% bonus health to 50% bonus health..

plus even with 270% base health they still won’t survive one hit from most dungeon boss…

My question is where are the officials responses? What was the purpose of this patch…obviously not for balance. Was it a late April fools?

Arrow.3856:

My question is where are the officials responses? What was the purpose of this patch…obviously not for balance. Was it a late April fools?

well.. i personally believe that arena doing this to reduce their sever population.. we currently have too much people playing on most sever…

p.s. also they want to make this game lame, and trait useless.. so there be no superior build or build at all..

My question would be now that vengeful images is essentially useless, what exactly would you invest in that trait line for? Vengeful images along with regeneration were the only worthwhile traits in that tree for me, and I’m not too keen about dumping that many points just for the regeneration.

@ANet
Please increase the Retaliation duration to at least 10s, when you disable its refreshing. 5s is not acceptable.

I don’t know how it was for you, but Vengeful Images to me was a trait which is used in PvE and WvW. It’s not meant to add, rather, it’s an insurance.

Should my Phantasms stand in the AE fireworks, and should those deal damage so I lose the damage from my Phantasms, then in turn, they dealt some damage while going down at least.

And it still works for that. I think with the hugely improved Phantasm HP, this is not at all unexpected. Otherwise some bosses would take an absolutely absurd amount of damage while chipping away at my Phantasms which I can just respawn. Some breathing bosses come to mind already, who take thousands and thousands of damage in seconds from breathing onto 2-3 phantasms already.

Now that the Phantasms last longer, it’s no wonder the Retaliation lasts shorter. Still, it works as a safety net, so some damage is dealt either way.

I do think it’d be better at ~7-8 seconds, though.

It’s pretty obvious it was nerfed for balancing reasons. With the increase of phantasm HP, it would have made it completely OP, especially for a 5 points trait.
Not a nerf because of whiners, but a tweak due to a buff elsewhere, it’s just fine.

I don’t know about you, but my phantasms typically don’t draw aggro in under five seconds. Often, the aggro never leaves me unless I stop attacking or go into stealth. Changing the duration from infinite to five seconds changed the utility of the trait from great to useless. If the trait is going to be too powerful due to increased phantasm hitpoints, then replace it with something else entirely that’s interesting and contextual to the trait line. Instead they just nerfed the trait itself to where it just feels like a trait point tax with little to no utility.

Well yes, it can be a bit iffy now. But even before the change, it mostly procced from AE, because that was what killed my (fragile, Signet kicked in too late) Phantasms. And that generally happened within 5s of summoning, so…

I guess one interesting thing would be 3s Protection on summoning them?