Guild Wars 2

does this mean power spike and power lock will also get changes eventually?
the changes could still be support themed as hardly anyone uses mantras for dps. I used it before for the additional aoe heals.

power spike could give 2 sec might per use.
power lock could give fury.
also, the stability from power break needs an additional 1 second added to it please.

edit: power lock

if it was me i’d delete all mantras and mantra related traits and give mesmers something for better mobility and aoe damage. i do not care or want to see mantras on mesmers. mesmers are supposed to confuse people so give them something like so instead of crappy mantras.

if butt was butt i’d buttlete all buttras and buttra relatebutt traits and but buttmers buttthing for butter buttbility and buttrea of buttfect buttmage.

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

if they add more charges to mantras, would that help?
right now its 2, 3 if traited, and making it 3 at the start would make people use them more. and also the 5 player limit on the buffed mantras suck, glamours are far better to use as a support utility than mantras still.

If they want Mantras to be viable, they need to rethink the chargeup mechanic. Back in the day, it was there to justify the instant cast abilities you get from the Mantra. Over time, more and more skills have become instant cast already (guardians sure as fluffy baby felines don’t need to charge up their meditations, for example). Mantras would excel if they overhauled how they accumulated charges. The simplest way, for example…

“Mantra skills are utilities with a unique recharge mechanism. Every fifteen seconds, the mantra skill will automatically gain one charge, up to a maximum of three.” Simple and elegant utilities with extremely useful functions. The recharge mechanism allows you to store them until you need them for spiking or spacing them out, making them tactically unique among utilities.

Change Restorative Mantras to heal in the area of your target (self for Concentration and Resolve, enemy for Pain and Distraction) and change Harmonious Mantras to something a bit more relevant to the Domination line, since most mantra buffs are in Dueling with a touch in Inspiration. Oh, and consider changing Mantra of Pain to “cripple and torment your foe”. Not saying it is necessary, but it would be a tad bit more mind-gamey than “do damage”.

They should put Harmonious Mantras in Adept… not kittening grandmaster, what they even thinking. 3 uses is soooooo omfg op that it needs 30 points——

jportell.2197:

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

I guess I’m the only person who never has any issue getting off mantra of resolve in PvP.

jportell.2197:

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

Yep, proc some Retaliation on yourself and start charging mantra. Works wonders

Shriketalon.1937:

If they want Mantras to be viable, they need to rethink the chargeup mechanic. Back in the day, it was there to justify the instant cast abilities you get from the Mantra. Over time, more and more skills have become instant cast already (guardians sure as fluffy baby felines don’t need to charge up their meditations, for example). Mantras would excel if they overhauled how they accumulated charges. The simplest way, for example…

“Mantra skills are utilities with a unique recharge mechanism. Every fifteen seconds, the mantra skill will automatically gain one charge, up to a maximum of three.” Simple and elegant utilities with extremely useful functions. The recharge mechanism allows you to store them until you need them for spiking or spacing them out, making them tactically unique among utilities.

This is interesting….

I never understood the point of a mantras. Normally a skill has its CD and 1sec or under activation time (for the most part at least). Why do mantras has long as kitten activation time AND long CD? and please don’t tell me its because they’re insta cast because there’s plenty of insta cast skills that are better than anything a mantra can offer and is on a much shorter CD. I feel like devs ran out of ideas and gave this garbage just to fill up X quantity of mesmer utilities needed to release the game.

jportell.2197:

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

I use the distraction mantra alot nowadays, and never have trouble charging it :P.

Heres a trait idea: change the mantra cooldown trait so it makes mantras cooldown when you used a charge.

For example, mantra of recovery has a 10s cooldown, 8 with mantra mastery.
Now, if you use a charge but save the past one for later, it will cooldown 50% (4seconds).
So if you wait 4 seconds, and then use your last charge, the mantra will only be on a 4 second cooldown!

But if you just use both charges without waiting, it would have like an 8 second cooldown.

With harmonious mantras it recharged 33% per mantra instead of 50%.
So using 2 recovery mantra charges but keeping one, would cool it down go 2.67
seconds, i think.
Or using only one mantra will cool it down to 5.33 seconds.

jportell.2197:

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

Combine Mantras with traited Torch 4. Works wonders~ =)

Nuka Cola.8520:

if it was me i’d delete all mantras and mantra related traits and give mesmers something for better mobility and aoe damage. i do not care or want to see mantras on mesmers. mesmers are supposed to confuse people so give them something like so instead of crappy mantras.

^
this very much. please delete mantras and give us something that supports aoe dmg and is not ai based or dueling based.

MysticHLE.7160:

jportell.2197:

As long as mantras have that ridiculous ~3s cast time. They will not be viable in any pvp setting (sPvP/tPvP/WvW). All mantra casts are basically a hey come hit me now sign. FREE KILL COME GET YOUR FREE KILLS GET EM WHILE THEY ARE HOT! <Is what I feel like the mantra symbol is when we cast it. Just saying.

Combine Mantras with traited Torch 4. Works wonders~ =)

I’m talking a straight mantra build guys… like at least 2. in PvP you spend more time charging than fighting sometimes. Just a little too clunky. I can understand MOR for condi clear… But a straight mantra build… Is not very feasible higher up.

In my opinion mantra’s have great potential. Yes some drastic changes need to be made. Mantra’s need to be something special and unique and in there current state they need a re-vamp. Hope Anet makes some big changes to how the mantra skills are used, all of them.

What if…
…mantra of distraction and mantra of pain would changed to enemy-centered (up to 3 or 5 targets) aoe-daze /dmg-spells? They would be much more reliable for wvw, solve the problem with the lack of decent mesmer aoe-dmg and work great with the interrupt traits.
…mantra of resolve, concentration and maybe recovery would changed to player-centered aoe-spells?

This could be a little bit op, but they could adjust the cd or dmg etc. for the diffrent mantras.

I they want us to use mantra in group we need an access to combo through mantras spe :p

It really is the charge mechanic that keep holding mantras back. Way too easy to interrupt in competetive play, it just dont cut it. Also horrendous during WvW lag, since you need to pop your heal 3 times just to get one eqvivalent heal for other classes.

Making them self-charge over time would be awesome, sort of like a variant of the thief system.

if mantras change to be like a power up charge? like taping the skill once casts the ability outright but at a weak state. but if you hold the ability to charge power vastly improves the mantra.
like mantra of concentration, 2 sec stability on 5 allies on skill use, but if the skill is held and channeled it becomes 5 secs stability on allies in a radius.
Mantra of distraction dazes one target to dazing 3 in a chain ala pistol 5 skill.
Mantra of restoration heals 2.5 times more on full channel.
Mantra of pain becomes an aoe blast on the target.
Mantra of resolve removes 2 conditions from allies in a radius around the player.

But with this in plsce they also need to change the traits and put a cooldown after every cast.

Nuka Cola.8520:

if it was me i’d delete all mantras and mantra related traits and give mesmers something for better mobility and aoe damage. i do not care or want to see mantras on mesmers. mesmers are supposed to confuse people so give them something like so instead of crappy mantras.

Mantra of concentration is the best stun breaker we have for group WvW and restorative mantras is quite nice for support.

They can be better, for example I wouldn’t mind if mantra of pain was an AoE and if the charge cast was shortened to 2s…

Menaka.5092:

Nuka Cola.8520:

if it was me i’d delete all mantras and mantra related traits and give mesmers something for better mobility and aoe damage. i do not care or want to see mantras on mesmers. mesmers are supposed to confuse people so give them something like so instead of crappy mantras.

Mantra of concentration is the best stun breaker we have for group WvW and restorative mantras is quite nice for support.

They can be better, for example I wouldn’t mind if mantra of pain was an AoE and if the charge cast was shortened to 2s…

sorry but i would go with decoy or blink over that crappy mantra of concentration any day of the year in ALL situations, zerg or not.

Nuka Cola.8520:

Menaka.5092:

Nuka Cola.8520:

if it was me i’d delete all mantras and mantra related traits and give mesmers something for better mobility and aoe damage. i do not care or want to see mantras on mesmers. mesmers are supposed to confuse people so give them something like so instead of crappy mantras.

Mantra of concentration is the best stun breaker we have for group WvW and restorative mantras is quite nice for support.

They can be better, for example I wouldn’t mind if mantra of pain was an AoE and if the charge cast was shortened to 2s…

sorry but i would go with decoy or blink over that crappy mantra of concentration any day of the year in ALL situations, zerg or not.

yup decoy as stunbreaker is a life saver. makes u invis and breaks stuns.awesomenesss.

seems like they’re nerfing us again but trying to make it look like a buff imo. 30 points in domination…cause i want that extra mantra…so op…power spike! power spike! power spike! channeling mantra….power spike! power spike! power spike!

Shriketalon.1937:

“Mantra skills are utilities with a unique recharge mechanism. Every fifteen seconds, the mantra skill will automatically gain one charge, up to a maximum of three.” Simple and elegant utilities with extremely useful functions. The recharge mechanism allows you to store them until you need them for spiking or spacing them out, making them tactically unique among utilities.

This is an interesting idea. I agree the problem with Mantras is their recharge mechanic. Even a small change could make them much more attractive to use.

• All Mantras now have a 1.5 sec charge time; that’s a 45% decrease. (This makes it easier to recharge Mantras during battle, while still leaving the Mesmer vulnerable.)
• Add a new trait: “All Mantras automatically recharge when their cooldown ends,” or “When you recharge one Mantra, all Mantras off cooldown are recharged.”
• Add charges to some Mantras (Mantra of Distraction, Mantra of Pain). Reduce the cooldown of other Mantras (Why on earth does Mantra of Distraction have a 30 sec cooldown?).

the possible changes to mantras are not even close to be excited about tbh…

another dumped down “support” crap cahnge it will be.

if they really wanna push mantras they first should rely on their main strength which is

no support, just strengthen the mesmer itself. which means pure mantra build is destined to be a pure dps build imo.
no halfarsed stuff. at least if u decide not to go the halfarsed way for what reason ever.
as someone said, give back mantras 5% dmg for each readied one and maybe change the active part to more viable selfish ones for mesmers.

so my solution is
- increase dmg for full mantras ( dont use linear progression like its actually the case)
- increase damage for powerspike (its a joke atm)
- give one mantra a strong group support utilty
- cut that random crap from apply boon mantra
- 3 mantra charges are a joke for 30point trait. increase it or add a cd reduction for casting

asf

im off anyway useless effort here…

Finnway.2183:

• Add a new trait: "…[snip]… or “When you recharge one Mantra, all Mantras off cooldown are recharged.”

Now THIS would be awesome. It would promote Mantra-only builds quite a bit. Makes using Restorative Mantras difficult though…

If any of you ever played DAOC, i think mantra’s are supposed to be like there warlock class. Long channel instant class skills. The diference is, the warlock could charge several damaging spells at once. So he would charge up, and if he blew all his charges he would be defenseless,you might be dead, but he would be if you weren’t. Kind of a burst cast class.

To me if they increased the damage from power spike immensely, and maybe added a vulnerability to another of the mantra’s, this idea might work here as well.

I think mantras are borderline good right now. The Restorative Mantras trait is very nice for providing a decent (2600 HP) AoE Heal. It’s sort of like frosting for charging your mantras.

The +4% dmg per mantra is a rather impressive trait as well with +16% damage in a full-out mantra build — pretty wicked.

I think the charge-up time is rather awkward considering you also have a cooldown to deal with. I’d would vote to eliminate the charge all together since we already pay a penalty with the cooldown. The charge-up I think is to compensate for the fact we can use the skill twice (compared to other instant-cast skills which are single use).

I think there’s a balance issue with the GM trait that give +1 uses (for a total of three). I say dump this trait and just buff the mantras in general so they are 33% more effective for the two charges they have (heal is 33% better, condition removal is 3 instead of 2 conditions, etc.).

Anyway I think mantras have great potential — they just aren’t quite there yet.

I like mantras as they are (as seen with my new shutdown build) but any improvements to them would be welcome.