Guild Wars 2

After reading through “What if DE (Deceptive Evasion: Dueling X) was built in?” I was reminded of a theory I had a while ago but sorta forgotten..

I do think the biggest thing holding us back is our over-reliance on Deceptive Evasion, but why is that exactly? What does DE do for us that makes it so valuable that nearly every build is incomplete?

It creates clones reliably of course!

DE is our hands-down best clone production tool because of how it easily and instantly creates a clone at the Mesmer’s position. IMO the biggest thing hampering our build diversity right now is the fact that we have so few ways outside of DE to keep a constant stream of clone production. Clones are necessary for our damage, our class mechanic, for our healing, and for just about everything involving Mesmer, yet outside of DE and a few weapon skills we have a heavy lack of ability to create clones. In order to have a reliable form of clone production it needs to:

- Be instant and not heavily tied to a cooldown
- Be reliable and not sundered by RNG
- Be accessible, preferably through traits/weapons rather than Utility.

I think our traits should compensate for this. Especially with a new traitline being introduced. But what if we had a clone production trait in every traitline? Some ideas of mine:

• Domination: Wastrel’s Punishment creates a clone when you interrupt a foe.
• Chaos 50% chance to create a clone whenever a clone is destroyed
• Inspiration Creates a clone whenever you remove a condition.
• Illusions Creates 2 clones when you charge a mantra.
• Chronomancy Create a clone at your position when you block an attack.

The traitlines may not exactly fit, but you get my drift. What do ya’ll think?

I’ll just quote myself from that there other thread, since it’s relevant here.

Kadj.6725:

I disagree with DE needing to be built into our class.

Instead, I think the solution could be additive; shift most of our grandmaster traits downward, and put DE and an entire line of new clone generation traits up on grandmaster in their place. Ideas:

Domination: Create a new clone when you use a Shatter skill.
Dueling: DE, -or- something new like “create a clone when you successfully block, evade, or otherwise negate an attack”.
Chaos: Create a clone when performing a combo.
Inspiration: In this concept, I would like to see DE moved down here.
Illusions: All clone-generating skills gain an additional clone.

This would likely result in more clone generation, but given that other grandmasters would be shifted down to master and some of these traits are more biased toward creating clones in riskier spots, I think we would have more interesting choices available without getting completely overpowered.

I think such a change is absolutely necessary. I don’t mind the (relatively) slow production of Phantasms, since their main purpose is to act as long-term damage sources; but yes, clone production should be modified to make DE more of an option instead of a “you must take this, for almost any Mesmer spec to work.”
Hell, Mesmer’s reliance on DE reminds me of Shadow Arts on Thief; namely that both options are (arguably) too well-loaded to the point where you’re effectively crippling yourself by not using ’em.

And, to any Devs what might be paying attention:

• “Necessary-for-basic-class-function” traits absolutely bite. It’s one thing to choose between two (or more) equally cool options. (Illusionary Persona versus current Maim, for example.) But, one should absolutely avoid creating trait sets that become “needed” for basic class functionality.

Some of these seem rather gimmicky, to be honest. Like they help when you don’t really need the help, but don’t do much when you’re hurting for clones. (E.g. clone-on-rupt: helps you chain Diversion into Mind Wrack, which is a big burst, but it might just do a fat load of nothing other times when you desperately need another clone — overall that’s en even more fragile, all-or-nothing approach to shatter; ditto clone-on-clone-death seems like it doesn’t really help if they just got melted by repeated AoE.)

Here’s an idea.

Stick this somewhere in Illusions, maybe major level:
Mirrored Form
Skills that create clones create an additional clone.

You have a lot of control over your clones because they come from you activating skills. The “flow” will be different compared to DE, but you can three-clone shatter off of just one weapon’s set worth of skills, or with Mirror Images by itself.

(The question is, would it be excessive with DE + this thing? Assuming DE still makes 1 clone per dodge, of course. My gut feeling is that shatter cooldowns would keep it mostly in check.)

I think Kadj’s idea for multiple different traits for upping your clone production is a good one; though I disagree on them needing to be Grandmaster traits.

For example: if I’m running an on-clone-death build, I’d love to have an on-clone-death trait that gives me a clone as an on-clone-death … though I hate RNG so I’d personally prefer it just be every 2 clones prematurely killed spawns a new clone.

ASP.8093:

Some of these seem rather gimmicky, to be honest. Like they help when you don’t really need the help, but don’t do much when you’re hurting for clones. (E.g. clone-on-rupt: helps you chain Diversion into Mind Wrack, which is a big burst, but it might just do a fat load of nothing other times when you desperately need another clone — overall that’s en even more fragile, all-or-nothing approach to shatter; ditto clone-on-clone-death seems like it doesn’t really help if they just got melted by repeated AoE.)

Here’s an idea.

Stick this somewhere in Illusions, maybe major level:
Mirrored Form
Skills that create clones create an additional clone.

You have a lot of control over your clones because they come from you activating skills. The “flow” will be different compared to DE, but you can three-clone shatter off of just one weapon’s set worth of skills, or with Mirror Images by itself.

(The question is, would it be excessive with DE + this thing? Assuming DE still makes 1 clone per dodge, of course. My gut feeling is that shatter cooldowns would keep it mostly in check.)

This will come with a nerf to on clone death and clone buff traits, basically anything not shatter. I wish shatter mechanic wasn’t counter productive to other specs most of the times but mesmer is balanced around DE if it had and ICD mesmer would probably have clone generation in other areas.

If we got rid of Deceptive Evasion in favor of these other traits, I’d be happy. I’d prefer to just save my dodge rolls for saving my butt without having to fight the temptation to use it to summon another clone.

It can also sometimes be frustrating to summon a clone when you dodge roll … even though your build sometimes wants it.

As fun as these discussions are, they’re absolutely worthless (and arguably counterproductive). Anet balances with number tweaks, not with new skills. If we want to rally behind any change, it should be making DE an adept major. It might not be the perfect solution, but it’s a more realistic request of Anet.

Eh, one can argue any of the last run of “new” traits as “balancing with new skills,” cyyrix.
Although, I do see your overall point. As for DE being an adept major? Folk around these parts’ve been asking for that for how long, again?
Hell, if we’re going to beat our collective heads off the walls in here, why not go large?

Gonna pull out the best discussion on this subject I’ve ever seen on these forums:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Mesmer-Trait-Deceptive-Evasion-swap

There were a lot of solid ideas posted in that thread, the best of which is to make deceptive evasion default with a five second ICD.

The power of DE is because it is an “ON_DEMAND”, WHERE and WHEN clone generator. It gives mesmer’s complete control on clone generation. As long as DE is available, everything else will fall short.

And if you remove DE, then you better compensate for it big time!

You really want us to not rely on DE, then remove Mind Wreck from our shatters!!

Our shatters should have never been about damage. They should be about controlling the enemy. Remove Mind Wreck and buff our damage elsewhere.

ASP.8093:

Some of these seem rather gimmicky, to be honest. Like they help when you don’t really need the help, but don’t do much when you’re hurting for clones.

Having more options does not replace existing options. The whole point is to augment your skill rotations so you don’t have to blow absolutely every cooldown and every dodge just for a basic shatter combo.

The other point is to make clever and more careful play more rewarding. As a utility profession, we shouldn’t feel like dumping all of our cooldowns into a skill rotation/shatter combo is necessary; we should be able to hang on to all of our skills until they are completely necessary. These additional clone generation traits support the idea not by letting us throw clones at a problem until it dies, but giving us an incentive to know exactly what’s going on in combat.

Lastly, if you have two or more new clone generation traits available, you probably won’t miss DE as much as you think you would. Yeah, you’ll need to be more proactive in your defense and getaways, but for a start, you’ll have a completely different setup; you will also be dodging defensively rather than offensively(and wastefully).

It’s not about replacing current shatter; it’s about making other options more viable in absence of it.

Honestly, I’d rather deal with the status quo (Deceptive Evasion being a must-have for a lot of PvP builds) than adding ICDs and reworking this and that.

Dueling’s the trait line with 1200-range Blinks and Vigor-on-crit. It’s always gonna be a near-must-have in a lot of builds. I hate-hate-hate piling ICDs on everything, though.

To the argument of “this will never happen” I do understand that is a long shot, but we don’t need to add entirely new traits so much as remove/rework existing traits. Each line has some frivolous replaceable trait that could be scrapped to push the Mesmer into a better direction.

And if the traits seem gimmicky or not too great individually, that is part of the point. Were not looking to replace DE so much as to add more options and even multiple options of clone production. Being able to grab two or three of these traits in a build could eliminate the REQUIREMENT of taking DE.

Also contrary to popular beliefs the devs DO sometimes at some point read these forums, and us having a discussion on these types of things very well could inspire the same type of convo in the dev offices. If they can’t pinpoint what’s wrong with Mesmer then crying for random buffs isn’t as helpful as a focused discussion on what’s holding us back and how to get around it. This isn’t a wish list so much as an attempt -vague as it may be- at opening up our possibilities.

Remember, more specializations are on the way, and I don’t believe in sitting back complaining that everything in the future is gonna suck.

I don’t think new traits are that big of a stretch. I’ve seen plenty of new traits. Heck, Warrior didn’t always have Dogged March.

If you don’t ask and you just accept what you have, then you shouldn’t ever expect more.

If you continue to kindly ask for what you want, you might be heard.

I emphasize kindly because most of the time I see a class Dev post, they get digitally mauled on the forums which I’m sure gives them a strong feeling of “well screw doing that again” which is never good for relations between the players playing the class and the Dev(s) coding for it.

Yeah I’ve been thinking about this very same issue since the DE post as well, it’s of course been a recurring debate over this so it’s not exactly new, but it is certainly as valid a point as it’s always been.

Personally, I thought of this the other day. Really we have a trait already that was originally intended to be a Clone production trait (MI), but it falls woefully short of being a viable clone production tool due to the simple fact that the CD is way way too long.

It’s IMO mainly the kitten CD on Mirror Images that absolutely kills it as a viable form of Clone production. The solution would be to fix up MI to be the go-to tool for Shatter builds that it was (IMO) always intended to be.

My suggestions would be to simply cut the base CD of Mirror Images roughly in half to about 25s (20s with IC). This would simply make MI a more competitive utility skill overall. It would probably be enough to allow non-DE Shatter builds to be significantly more viable then they are now.

I also think the impact to Clone death or the usual Power Shatter builds would be quite minimal. Neither of these builds use MI now, they might choose to with this drastic CD reduction, but they would have to give up a strong/competitive utility they’re using now.

Maybe the “breaks stun” part of the skill would need to be removed, which wouldn’t be a big deal to me…especially if they fix that darn “distortion-like” effect that causes so many other bugs/issues.

And while I’m on a roll, the secondary effect of Triumphant Distortion absolutely MUST be a basic part of the class.

It’s just plain ridiculous to solve a fundamental design flaw of a professions primary combat mechanic by requiring a GM skill to make it function viably! This is worse then requiring DE for shatter by far IMO. If you acknowledge that illusions simply can not survive large-scale battles long enough to perform even one attack cycle, then for christs sake make the 1s Distortion on summon a normal part of the profession for ALL illusions!

It’s lazy —almost disdainful-- implementations like that, which make customers angry and distrustful of a company. “Oh the new GM trait TD kinda stinks? Guess what, we’ll just add that fix we have to make Phantasms actually remotely viable in WvW to it, then it’ll be a cool GM right!? Wow! We’re so smart! HUHUHUH!”

Chaos Archangel.5071:

To the argument of “this will never happen” I do understand that is a long shot, but we don’t need to add entirely new traits so much as remove/rework existing traits. Each line has some frivolous replaceable trait that could be scrapped to push the Mesmer into a better direction.

You want to replace an existing trait? With a new trait. That’s happened to a tiny handful of traits since launch (e.g., Dhuumfire). Your solution involves reworking 4-5 traits. It will never happen.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Also contrary to popular beliefs the devs DO sometimes at some point read these forums, and us having a discussion on these types of things very well could inspire the same type of convo in the dev offices.

Yes, devs browse the forums. The best way to inspire them to act is with realistic solutions. Remember the Mind Stab rework? The devs came to the forums and got several good ideas. What happened? They increased the skill’s radius.

I’m not faulting the devs or being negative about the future. I’m just acknowledging the existence of development constraints and advocating for realistic solutions.

Cyyrix I understand your POV completely, though I disagree.

Making DE into an adept is a great idea that would open up so much diversity, but that doesn’t mean we should be throwing away the possibility of more trait reworks. I think we should explore all options and possibilities. Look at…

Confounding Suggestions
Imbued Diversion
Chaotic/Bountiful/Furious Interruption
Prismatic Understanding
Menders Purity
Mirror of Anguish

All of these traits received a buff or rework in some way to boost their functionality. Skills like Bountiful, PU, Chaotic, Confounding, and Imbued even got secondary effects. Adding additional effects to lackluster traits is a possibility, so I’m asking the devs to give that treatment to more traits, but with clone-production in mind. None of our new grandmasters offered anything to help us create more illusions so I don’t think the devs even realize that this is the main problem.

Traits like “chaos storm on rezz” could easily be “create a clone when you grant chaos storm”

or “heal x health per clone shattered” into “create two clones when you use your healing skill” (MoRecovery anyone?)

However I will be the first to admit that dropping DE down to adept would be a huge, quick, and efficient step in opening our build diversity. In fact, I think the more threads that pop up with that suggestion the more the devs will seriously consider it.

@Chaos, just a suggestion – might be a good idea to compile the clone generation ideas from this thread and the one I linked above and place them in the OP for a concise list.

I agree better clone production would be a good thing. HOWEVER I cannot sign my name to any of the original suggestions except “Interupt = Clone (5sec CD)” because the burst potential would be imbalanced. We MUST not allow Deceptive Evasion + Illusionary Persona + New Clone Trait to be all chosen at once.

I say this as a commited Mesmer (played since launch of GW1 and GW2 – I have 4 Mesmers in GW2, had 3 in GW1) who is desperate to maintain game balance.

To be honest, I would like to see an overall reduction in mesmer cooldowns. I feel that the issue with clone production could be handled by giving the class a general 20% cooldown reduction across the board. From there with he stacking of other skills, it would become considerably easier to generate clones. Combine this with an alteration to scepter so that it spawns its clone directly beside you, and speed up the chain by 20% and we would be in a position where we should be able to without D E create a single clone every 3s. This when combined with something like Mirror Images now having a 27s cooldown rather than 36 with IC would make the entire class considerably more dynamic, and enable us to ignore entirely DE.

Honestly, I’m not sure I want my scepter clone to be spawned next to me.

There are multiple times where I want him parked right next to my target.

Sebrent.3625:

Honestly, I’m not sure I want my scepter clone to be spawned next to me.

There are multiple times where I want him parked right next to my target.

I would be of the opposite mind, mainly because with scepter clones I want them as far from the target as possible, to either allow me to get more up for a shatter or to keep them spamming torment.

Fair enough. Valid point

I’m usually spamming them because I want on-clone-death in my target’s face.

This can be nice in WvW where it’s difficult for a clone to run to shatter.

It can also work well in PvE as you can summon 2 phantasms and then every 3rd AA spawns a clone. If you already have 3 illusions, it kills the existing clone which triggers the on-clone-death effects … so you get extra conditions on your target.

Honestly I only do that if for some reason we really need those conditions (rare) … or I’m just screwing around.

It’s a no brainer. Every Master minor and Grandmaster minor should proc clones on ‘effect’. Mesmers shouldnt need to work to proc clones. We should constantly have 3 clones/phants up at all times so long as we’re engaged. Unless of course we shatter them, or they’re destroyed.

There is no reason why a Mesmer shouldnt have 3 clones up at all times while engaged in combat.

skcamow.3527:

@Chaos, just a suggestion – might be a good idea to compile the clone generation ideas from this thread and the one I linked above and place them in the OP for a concise list.

I will when I get a chance @ a CPU.

Zarathustra.1458:

To be honest, I would like to see an overall reduction in mesmer cooldowns. I feel that the issue with clone production could be handled by giving the class a general 20% cooldown reduction across the board. From there with he stacking of other skills, it would become considerably easier to generate clones. Combine this with an alteration to scepter so that it spawns its clone directly beside you, and speed up the chain by 20% and we would be in a position where we should be able to without D E create a single clone every 3s. This when combined with something like Mirror Images now having a 27s cooldown rather than 36 with IC would make the entire class considerably more dynamic, and enable us to ignore entirely DE.

That’s an interesting idea, but I’m not sure if it’d work. What makes DE so good is the ability to spawn a clone at your own position instantly. Even with lowered cooldowns we’d be limited to having only this altered scepter spawn clones next to us, and only when we have time to use auto 3 inbetween our other skills. Even then we’d have no clone production when our weapon skills do go on cooldown, which makes us less effective in anything bigger than 1v1.

Moving DE to adept (which would open up tons of build diversity, but the devs may not be too open to that cuz “too strong”) or introducing more clone-generating traits would open up a lot more trait variety.

Yeah, I’m hoping for some more interesting clone generation traits with the expansion. For example:

There’s a warrior trait that causes them to not consume all 3 bars of adrenaline when using a burst skill. A mesmer version to help us not consume all our clones when shattering would be similarly in line.

The trait “+1 clone whenever you produce a clone” seems popular and I’d be in favor of it. This seems either Chaos or Illusions.

Another might be a “20% CD reduction to illusion skills” which could be in Inspiration, letting it stack with Illusions to give phantasms and clone skills a whopping 40% reduction to CD.

“Clone-on-Interrupt” seems a bit gimmicky, but if this stacks on the “+1 Clone” trait it’d be 2 clones every interrupt.

“Clone on shatter” would definitely be cool and fit into Illusions line.

One thing I’d like to recommend is “Phantasms don’t disappear on shatter,” which could create some strange build built around using phantasms as reusable shatter-fodder.

I’d be pleased if they simply made clones and phantasms take 80% less damage if they are not specifically targeted. The script for this already exists – I believe I saw enemies/structures (I forget which – I believe they were in the Living Story) with such a ‘defensive’ mechanic. This would not only make Mesmers more viable in PvP – Open up more builds, It would also allow us to contribute more to a group in PvE – without worrying about stupid instantgib mechanics. Such won’t happen though. Mesmers were and still are, an afterthought.

We need Ross. Please play the video during that short time when scepter spawned 2 clones. Was interesting. Might be enough plus with the speed of the scepter wouldn’t be op. Although it causes you to use a certain weapon.

denis.9487:

We need Ross. Please play the video during that short time when scepter spawned 2 clones. Was interesting. Might be enough plus with the speed of the scepter wouldn’t be op. Although it causes you to use a certain weapon.

Alternatively, scepter spawns a clone on the second AND third attack. Hell, it misses so much just have it spawn on all three. You’ll get roughly 1 an attack cycle anyway ;D

I know this is a discussion regarding our clone generation and how we rely on this to function. But I think we have other more fundamentally flawed designs within ourselves, than that of our perceived reliance on a Master trait through Deceptive Evasion.

In order to fix our clone reliance, from being that which is an requirement in most builds, to becoming a supplement to our profession’s core mechanic, I would much rather propose that Illusionary Persona is to be changed into becoming an inherent mechanic to the profession as a whole, no longer a trait. Illusionary Persona, allows our shatters to function, without clones present. As such, clones are far less a necessity, but more of a way to improve our core mechanic, the shatters. Any and all builds within the Mesmer profession has some use for shatters. Be that if you are focusing on using them as a main mechanic, or if you wish to use Phantasms and/or the death of your clones to work in your favor. Every single build will and can benefit from shattering.

To me, more so than when I am playing around on builds without Deceptive Evasion, I feel completely naked without my Illusionary Persona after having played with it for such a long time. It alone, allows you to get so many more tactical plays out of the Mesmer, which no other mechanic (alteration) does. Be that the 1 second of Distortion when in a pinch and without any clones present, allowing you to avoid that one huge burst coming in, an opener, to reflect that one skill you predict when paired with the Masterful Reflection trait. Or how it allows you to get that tiny bit more damage output through to your target(s), and far more reliably than clones are on their own at that. You can for that matter interrupt reliably with Diversion. And all of these things, has their relatively long CD’s to take into consideration. It’s a tactical choice to use a shatter before you have generated clones, but it opens up for using the core mechanic as such.

I don’t find it overpowered if we were to have it as an inherent mechanic, and that the Grand Master trait as-is gets replaced with something else. But I do find the mechanics of it to be so inherently useful, that I absolutely hate not having it. I hate fighting anything when I am not on my shatter build(s) that pretty much all use Illusionary Persona. We as the Mesmer lovers that we are, want more clones because we rely so heavily on them in our shatters, right? But why not look at it differently? Why not let us be our own shatters by default, in all and any of our builds? As I already mentioned, using a personal shatter is a tactical choice to make, and it’s not without its caveats either, as you are in effect using a less effective shatter by choice, placing it on its extensive recharge period.

I would absolutely love to branch out and use far more and varied builds, but again, without my ability to use my shatters defensively and/or offensively, without clones being a major deciding factor if I am able to do so or not, I feel more naked than I do without Deceptive Evasion. Make Illusionary Persona inherent as a mechanic, and you reduce the dependency on clones ever so slightly. Clones are then adding to a core mechanic, our shatters, a mechanic that is useful to every and all builds in some way, shape or form.

Deceptive Evasion indeed holds back Mesmers and overall build diversity. However, I’m not a big fan of introducing new traits like proposed by many here due to two main reasons.

First, I believe that the core issue is the too low baseline clone generation. Some tactical play moves aside this is the main reason for Deceptive Evasion being so dominant. New traits would certainly increase build diversity. But the baseline clone generation would remain too low. Additionally, Mesmers would probably still be forced to pick at least one of the proposed traits. It’s basically the same reason why I don’t like the suggestion of moving DE to the Adept tier. It virtually frees up trait points. But in the end it doesn’t change the necessisity of picking said trait(s).

Second, introducing more traits which generate clones is an exciting and intriguing idea. However, it could also cause major balancing issues. If the traits are placed at a Master tier level or lower clone generation could become way too high when more than one of those traits are picked. It might even limit build diversity since other currently popular traits might be cut from our set of consideration. With our current system the only way to limit access to those traits would be placing them at a GM level which – again – will limit build diversity.

I still favour incorporating DE into our class mechanic. ANet certainly does have the toolset for that. It’s probably more a question of the amount of work the change would take and if ANet is willing to alter a class mechanic to such an extent. My second choice would be increasing the access to clones through weapons. However, this could be pretty complicated to balance across all weapon sets.

Not to stray off too far from the topic, I remembered making a chart with the potential illusion generations a while back because I wanted a visual comparison. The numbers are based on Endurance regeneration and weapon skills per minute (excluding Sc#1, Signet of Ether, utilities and Sigil of Energy). I’m not 100% sure – and too lazy to recalculate – if I excluded weapon traits but the numbers are quite interesting regardless. Not sure if I ever came down to posting it.

Some numbers related to the charts as food for thoughts:

Assumption: No illusion dies before being shattered.

• You will need 25 illusions per minute to keep all your shatters on cooldown running 0 Illusions. 12 illusions are needed for F1. 6 illusions are needed for F2.
• There is no untraited weapon combination which exceeds 25 illusions per minute.
• You will need about 33 illusions per minute to keep all your shatters on cooldown when running 6 Illusions. About 16 illusions are needed for F1. About 8 illusions are needed for F2.
• There is no untraited weapon combination with 6 Illusions which exceeds 33 illusions per minute. Even with IC only 2 out of 8 combinations get remotely close.
• Assuming perma Vigor DE can potentially account for 29% to 41% of your total illusion generation (Sw+T/St being lowest, Sc+Sw/GS being highest).
• The Sigil of Energy adds about 6 clones per minute with DE which could boost it up to 38% to 51% of your total illusion generation.
• IC potentially accounts for 14% to 20% of your total illusion generation.