Guild Wars 2

Being in the higher tiers of WvW there is one thing you can always count on – your enemy will have higher numbers, and better coverage. I have played my Mesmer since release, but mostly as a small ops/roamer. Mesmer is great for those roles. Now, however, My guild has moved into more “zerg-busting” fights as our fielded numbers have increased as of late.

The first thing I noticed was my shatter build (20/20/0/0/30) has been rendered near useless when we take on zergs with numbers past the thirties. I switched over to running a phantasm build, hoping that with my higher toughness/vitality would allow for my phantasms to deal some decent damage. Again it seems that an iBerserker melts after one pass through the thick of things. I use warden’s feed back, and the feed back utility for this to get some damage in, but I feel as though my damage is still quite lacking compared to others.

What builds are other Mesmers using for these types of fights? How do you, as a Mesmer, dish out the damage when your clones die almost instantly rendering shatters useless? I thought about going back into the glamour build for these situations, although my concern is the amount of condition clearing in these large battles. (Even our Necromancers are switching to a power build because of this) My other option would be to become almost full support, or a mantra healing build.

Thanks

I’m kinda looking for a WvW build as well for zergs.
I used a phantasm build before but like you said they die within a second. Shatter build might be better but if they die coz of aoe before they explode it might not be that good either ( never used shatter build in wvw so I wouldn’t know for sure.)

I also started thinking about using a support build (I don’t like mantra healing though.)
And I’d love a confusion build for wvw but like you said, condition cleansing everywhere.

I’m kind of in need of a good wvw build as well. More leaning towards confusion/condition (glamour build?) or support.

A way to look at is as a Mesmer trying to zerg bust in WvW. Is what I like to call playing “zone”. I’m not sure if you are familiar with “american football” but you may have heard of “zone defense” (google it). In WvW you can do the same offensively. The current hammer train meta can be countered by kiting and flanking the head of the charge you have to apply the burst to the center (neck) of the charge in an effort to isolate the head after stability has dropped. This requires timing, patience and definitely coordination with your raid leader. You need to observe the enemy formation because Mesmers are about accurate application of our shatters when other professions have the aoe strength for precision.

Glamour Builds require high amount of coordination since the nerf… Depending on your weapons you need to practice how to best apply confusion at the most opportune times during a fight and testing builds that utilize glamours..

TL;DR
Zerging on a Mesmer requires some work. Build research and testing… I use a condition shatter with interrupts… flanking at midpoint between the heavies and squishies in an attempt to seperate the head from the body of a hammer train.

condition build, chaos storm into enemy mass and pick up your bags

@Revelations:

I understand the importance of Mesmer positioning and accuracy for the attack, and running my shatter build I tend hang back and wait to unleash my shatters on the back line elementalist trying to rain on our hammer train. Ironically, I find this much easier to do when going up against an organized zerg, but when we run into the PUG zerg I find it difficult to counter as everyone gets spread and it is much harder to pick off a target without my clones getting annihilated from random AOE spread haphazardly around.

I’ve been thinking about perhaps running a clone factory with “on clone death” traits, but once again. I find conditions to be near worthless in organized matches because of their coordination in condition removal.

What I am looking for is suggestions on builds/play styles. I am not a master of the class, by no means, but I understand the class quite well. Should I stick with my shatter spec and continue the precision assaults, or is there something else to allow for heavier AOE damage? I guess that is really what I’m trying to figure out. I would love to believe that someone out there knows a way to contribute more damage on top of the hammer train, but then again this is a bit out of the realm of what the Mesmer is capable of, as they really are more single target/small group based.

@Loki:

haha, I’ve done that one and its great as a tapper. I just feel a bit useless still in a damage output stand point.

EDIT: I was thinking about trying this build out (http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW7alwzipHWzoGb9IipHBHyJcoUcdWXJF22FC-jEyA4MBZaBM9JQ5wioxWGLiGrmBTjSEV7RKiWtUAMJNC-w) when I get home. The condition cleansing may just be more in my head than in practice. I just know from our group conditions do not phase us, as we have so much condition cleanse and all run melandru/lemongrass poultry.

I see you used chaotic interruption there and I can say from experience it’s very strong in WvW. Lately I’ve been testing a condition build (see chillruption in my signature) using that trait, mainly roaming but occasionally will roll with the zerg if I run into it. The focus pull is awesome if you can land it (use perplexity runes for the full interrupt effect). The power build is a lot of fun too if you can become adept at shattering your mirror blade clone for AoE interrupts via imbued diversion, or get in close enough for the GS #5 push (also chaos storm!). I’ve heard of many others adapt their own style from this idea and you look like you have a good start to a build there (though unsure of dazzling glamours since you only have veil, which you commonly won’t be tossing into the middle of a zerg).

This topic is a great one. From my standpoint, mesmers need to focus less on AOE big numbers and more on what we bring to the team. For me in my WvW guild group, I run staff/GS, 20/0/20/0/30. The main zerg busting traits that I take is the 20 point Dom trait that strips boons on shatter (forget the name of it atm), and Imbued Diversions (30 point Illusions trait).

Mesmers are great at AOE boon ripping, and the way I open on a group is this:

Start with GS, spawn iZerker and Mirror blade clone in the middle of the group, immediately shatter and toss down a null field. Between the null field and the boon ripping shatter, more often than not I’ll end up stripping their stability, and that really hurts any organized group.

Swap to staff, toss down chaos storm. With perplexity runes, the interrupts from that can be troublesome for opponents.

After that, I auto attack with staff for a bit until I feel that the GS CDs are up, swap back, and rip more boons, preferably using an F3 shatter for more AOE interrupts.

While mesmers aren’t incredibly strong directly in large groups, we do have the ability to make a large contribution to the fight.

The only real zerg buster build is confusion-blind-glamour with focus reflection and the staff. Feedback, veil, nullfield and timewarp pretty much locks up your entire skill bar. All of them are important against zergs – the more organisation your own group have, the more critical they become. There are no ifs or buts here, you have no room for teleport or decoy or whatever.

The actual armor you have is less important but pumping everything possible into toughness and vitality is prefered. Condition vs power… Well condition is generally better since power sort of assumes crit chance, which in turn assume crit damage – way too much taken away from toughness/vitality. Direct damage is irrelevant – you are there for your utility.

Whether this is actually fun to play is up to each individual. It sort of demands a guild group that knows whakittens doing.

My mistake, Skcamow, I was honestly planning to use illusionary elasticity. That was a misclick on the dazzling glamours.

@ Dawdles:

I was thinking about switching our Mesmers over to the confusion-blind-glamour build you are talking about, because I agree of the wide-spread blinds generated – not so much the damage. A single Mesmer running the build seems a bit lackluster, however, with three or four it could cause quite a bit of damage mitigation via blinds.

When Zergs are 30+, it just starts to be a train of auto-attacking. (Skill Lag issues).
Also, you sometimes run into Zombie Trains where the larger zerg can self-rez enough to never really shrink.
I’ve been running a PVT build with Sword-Torch/Staff to chase and finish players that stray out of the group, with occasional dives through the zerg with chaos storm. (Thankfully the new Superior Rune of the Traveler came along).
My opinion is that staying alive to help in your group is equally important to killing opponents. But then, my little server of Kaineng is usually outnumbered 3-1.
I really like Dhampyr’s idea with GS/Staff, I’ll be giving it a go soon. Crippling people can create opportunities to finish players off as well.

If possible could someone link me to a glamour/confusion build for wvw?
I wanna see for myself how I like the traits/gear/weapons before I think about trying it.

Also would Dire gear be better for such build or should I stick with rabid?

Glenndevis, this is the build I’ve used in the past for glamours. Granted my gear was from before Dire and the other new gear came out.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW7dlwzCrXVTqGa9IxJFMf5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jEyA4MBZ6TgyhFRjtMWENWNDm6cR1aUAPSR0qlCgJpRA-w

Shtos Vant.4182:

When Zergs are 30+, it just starts to be a train of auto-attacking. (Skill Lag issues).
Also, you sometimes run into Zombie Trains where the larger zerg can self-rez enough to never really shrink.
I’ve been running a PVT build with Sword-Torch/Staff to chase and finish players that stray out of the group, with occasional dives through the zerg with chaos storm. (Thankfully the new Superior Rune of the Traveler came along).
My opinion is that staying alive to help in your group is equally important to killing opponents. But then, my little server of Kaineng is usually outnumbered 3-1.
I really like Dhampyr’s idea with GS/Staff, I’ll be giving it a go soon. Crippling people can create opportunities to finish players off as well.

First off, /cheer Kaineng! That’s where I started, back at the T8 dark days. LOL

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/BUILD-WvW-Condition-Havoc/first#post2800642

If you’re interested in the build I mentioned, I did a more in-depth write up at the above post. Would love any feedback/criticism!

Nihmindu.4298:

Glenndevis, this is the build I’ve used in the past for glamours. Granted my gear was from before Dire and the other new gear came out.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW7dlwzCrXVTqGa9IxJFMf5oecdrXdSKKNqB-jEyA4MBZ6TgyhFRjtMWENWNDm6cR1aUAPSR0qlCgJpRA-w

Thanks I really like the look that build. Sadly I barely ever played WvW before confusion got nerfed in wvw so I didn’t know about this build before.

I really want to try it out now. I’m thinking about going with dire gear and perplexity runes though.

I love supporting a zerg and damaging an opponents zerg indirectly. Confusion is my fav condition by far.

Yeah, I find our zerg v zerg options to be particularly limited in the current meta, and our roles reduced to the following three options:

1. Rear-line dps w/ greatsword. Problem is that dps isn’t great, and we’re pretty much only good at picking off stragglers or those that stray from the hammer train.

2. Utility support. Constant supplier of veils, portals, null fields, chaos storms, feedback, reflects, etc.

3. Boon stripping, as discussed above, and vulnerability applying. Constant shattering with boon strip on shatter, combined with null field and glamours.

I’ve been trying to make interrupts work, but the problem is that the aoe cap hurts it mightily. I like using null field with either focus pull or staff/sword interrupts combined with Chaos XI (Chaotic Interruption), but again, the aoe cap and stability spam makes it so that this usually only interrupts a few within the zerg at a time.

The only good news is that if the hammer-train meta is toned down and zergs thinned accordingly, we’ll be significantly more effective.

Bunda.2691:

Yeah, I find our zerg v zerg options to be particularly limited in the current meta, and our roles reduced to the following three options:

1. Rear-line dps w/ greatsword. Problem is that dps isn’t great, and we’re pretty much only good at picking off stragglers or those that stray from the hammer train.

2. Utility support. Constant supplier of veils, portals, null fields, chaos storms, feedback, reflects, etc.

3. Boon stripping, as discussed above, and vulnerability applying. Constant shattering with boon strip on shatter, combined with null field and glamours.

I think you’re pretty much spot on here, but most other classes have similar pigeon hole problems. Take an ele, for example – their roles tend to be reduced to two; staff ele for fields, and DD ele as tertiary DPS of stragglers/outliers (I don’t have an ele so I may be mistaken, but these are the roles I’ve seen eles mostly fill). I’d be willing to bet that other classes face similar dilemmas.

Bottom line, I don’t think we’re unique with this problem of role limitations in ZvZ scenarios.

Dhampyr.2104:

Bunda.2691:

Yeah, I find our zerg v zerg options to be particularly limited in the current meta, and our roles reduced to the following three options:

1. Rear-line dps w/ greatsword. Problem is that dps isn’t great, and we’re pretty much only good at picking off stragglers or those that stray from the hammer train.

2. Utility support. Constant supplier of veils, portals, null fields, chaos storms, feedback, reflects, etc.

3. Boon stripping, as discussed above, and vulnerability applying. Constant shattering with boon strip on shatter, combined with null field and glamours.

I think you’re pretty much spot on here, but most other classes have similar pigeon hole problems. Take an ele, for example – their roles tend to be reduced to two; staff ele for fields, and DD ele as tertiary DPS of stragglers/outliers (I don’t have an ele so I may be mistaken, but these are the roles I’ve seen eles mostly fill). I’d be willing to bet that other classes face similar dilemmas.

Bottom line, I don’t think we’re unique with this problem of role limitations in ZvZ scenarios.

I guess when you say it that way it’s not so bad.

Anet is kind of caught in a catch-22 here (for which i don’t blame them). The AOE cap pretty much guarantees that melee remains the zerg’s most potent weapon, yet removing the cap would force all kinds of unknown changes (not to mention an increase in lag). This said, I’m still in favor of anything that breaks down the laggy 50+ man zergs. Small group combat remains the most fun aspect of the game, and in these battles, mesmer has plenty of utility.

I totaly agree that the glamour mesmer is the most effective in zerging and organized group fights, both for tagging enemy players, stripping boons and adding boons to other players (including yourself). Even though confusion was nerfed, it is still a very viable build that can put out a descent amount of damage, especially with the Runes of Perplexity. However with Veil, Nullfield, Feedback and Timewarp as a must, you sacrifice a lot of survivabilty.
If the commander doesn’t use Veil much I tend to switch it out with Blink.

I currently run this build: Glamour Mesmer

The key to survival here is having Chaos Armor up most of the time.

Bunda.2691:

1. Rear-line dps w/ greatsword. Problem is that dps isn’t great, and we’re pretty much only good at picking off stragglers or those that stray from the hammer train.

This IMO isnt really an option. A guild group that truly want to be awesome doesnt have a backline

No seriously, its not needed nor is it required. Even when damage oriented, you can build up to 2000 toughness and still pack a punch with something like 30% crit chance/60% crit damage. Its far from a berserker, but in a zerg its enough and you’re much, much more resilient. You can easily run with the big boys. Remember that the backline is the #1 weakness of any zerg. It doesnt matter if its organized or random pugs, when it fail the group will generally fail – not because of lost dps, but because of lost manpower. Their abilities are better than their damage! You dont want all your Mesmers dead and suddenly stand without null fields, for example.

Its even more important for a glamour mesmer, since you always want to be on top of the commander in the very front of the line – inside your own etheral fields and ready to veil.

Hey what can I say, I play aggressivly :p

Chrhal.4983:

I totaly agree that the glamour mesmer is the most effective in zerging and organized group fights, both for tagging enemy players, stripping boons and adding boons to other players (including yourself). Even though confusion was nerfed, it is still a very viable build that can put out a descent amount of damage, especially with the Runes of Perplexity. However with Veil, Nullfield, Feedback and Timewarp as a must, you sacrifice a lot of survivabilty.
If the commander doesn’t use Veil much I tend to switch it out with Blink.

I currently run this build: Glamour Mesmer

The key to survival here is having Chaos Armor up most of the time.

May I ask why you aren’t using Dire armor & weapons?
Just wondering since the build doesn’t seem to take advantage of crits (dueling tree)

Also I’m trying to get the gear to try out a glamour build now but was thinking if people who use Perplexity runes aren’t better off with Imbued Diversions (Illusion XII trait) for interrupts for more stacks of confusion. (allthough it being limited to 5 enemies.)

It is an option, glenndevis. Another idea’s to drop 10 from Illusions (keep Dazzling Glamours, drop Blinding Befuddlement’s nerfed self …), add that 10 to Inspiration for Warden’s Feedback. That extra Reflection’ll help you and your group versus projectile-spammers.

As far as Glamour/Perplexity abuse, I’ve personally run a 20/0/30/0/20 setup, using Bountiful/Chaotic Interruption. It’s a bit more durable if I’m caught solo, but yes, your
Glamour timing does suffer somewhat.

glenndevis.8327:

Chrhal.4983:

I totaly agree that the glamour mesmer is the most effective in zerging and organized group fights, both for tagging enemy players, stripping boons and adding boons to other players (including yourself). Even though confusion was nerfed, it is still a very viable build that can put out a descent amount of damage, especially with the Runes of Perplexity. However with Veil, Nullfield, Feedback and Timewarp as a must, you sacrifice a lot of survivabilty.
If the commander doesn’t use Veil much I tend to switch it out with Blink.

I currently run this build: Glamour Mesmer

The key to survival here is having Chaos Armor up most of the time.

May I ask why you aren’t using Dire armor & weapons?
Just wondering since the build doesn’t seem to take advantage of crits (dueling tree)

Also I’m trying to get the gear to try out a glamour build now but was thinking if people who use Perplexity runes aren’t better off with Imbued Diversions (Illusion XII trait) for interrupts for more stacks of confusion. (allthough it being limited to 5 enemies.)

Surely Dire Armor would be great for this build, I just haven’t gotten a set yet

Imbued Diversions would also be an option however you would lose Dazzling Glamours, which is a key part of the build

Advent.6193:

It is an option, glenndevis. Another idea’s to drop 10 from Illusions (keep Dazzling Glamours, drop Blinding Befuddlement’s nerfed self …), add that 10 to Inspiration for Warden’s Feedback. That extra Reflection’ll help you and your group versus projectile-spammers.

As far as Glamour/Perplexity abuse, I’ve personally run a 20/0/30/0/20 setup, using Bountiful/Chaotic Interruption. It’s a bit more durable if I’m caught solo, but yes, your
Glamour timing does suffer somewhat.

Was thinking about dropping Temporal Enchanter for Warden’s Feedback since fights and zergs usually move and that extra second doesn’t really matter much in my opinion.

And how was Blinding Befuddlement nerfed exactly?

Also been thinking of finding ways to interrupt people other than staff #5, GS #5 and Diversion but couldn’t really find any.
Kinda sad how some other classes can take more advantage of the runes than mesmers can.

The ICD heavily punishes your potential stacks via Blind → Confusion chaining. You figure, we used to be able to plant an extra stack of Confu on any target effected by Dazzling Glamours. Now, not so much.

Ah might be better to go for Imbued diversions then anyway. Gotta try it out.

glenndevis.8327:

Ah might be better to go for Imbued diversions then anyway. Gotta try it out.

Just FYI, this thread may interest you:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Build-Imbued-Diversion-in-WvW-Updated

Dhampyr.2104:

This topic is a great one. From my standpoint, mesmers need to focus less on AOE big numbers and more on what we bring to the team. For me in my WvW guild group, I run staff/GS, 20/0/20/0/30. The main zerg busting traits that I take is the 20 point Dom trait that strips boons on shatter (forget the name of it atm), and Imbued Diversions (30 point Illusions trait).

Mesmers are great at AOE boon ripping, and the way I open on a group is this:

Start with GS, spawn iZerker and Mirror blade clone in the middle of the group, immediately shatter and toss down a null field. Between the null field and the boon ripping shatter, more often than not I’ll end up stripping their stability, and that really hurts any organized group.

Swap to staff, toss down chaos storm. With perplexity runes, the interrupts from that can be troublesome for opponents.

After that, I auto attack with staff for a bit until I feel that the GS CDs are up, swap back, and rip more boons, preferably using an F3 shatter for more AOE interrupts.

While mesmers aren’t incredibly strong directly in large groups, we do have the ability to make a large contribution to the fight.

well yes if u like being support..but i dont like being support only! i find healer classes boring! i wanna be able to push with the zerg and do decent dmg, not standing in the backline and veil/tw/ nullfield the op kitten warriors/guardian trains!

seriously im tired of being a veilbot! i never played support classes or healers. and i never will. i refuse to! i dont mind supporting and getting decent dps or tagging with it, but simply being used for 3 utilities is not what i want. anet stated clearly that they dont want to have healers/dps/tank, but with the balance disaster called spvp, thats where we are heading.

i think the main problem is that a lot of our dps comes from ai! clones die too quick so our shatter aoe and all the good stuff that comes out of that(removing conditions, adding conditions and all that). also phantasms will maybe hit once if u are lucky, but are affected by cc and everything and retal will be a problem too. i went back to glam with perplexity. in still pretty weak with it, but at least i get a few lootbags for tagging.

when glamour was still strong, i had fun at least.now its a grind.
@ all commanders out there: u know what: walk your kitten golems yourself and no i wont bring veil or portal! im not your servant! (signed: veilbot on strike ;-) )

selan.8354:

well yes if u like being support..but i dont like being support only! i find healer classes boring! i wanna be able to push with the zerg and do decent dmg, not standing in the backline and veil/tw/ nullfield the op kitten warriors/guardian trains!

seriously im tired of being a veilbot! i never played support classes or healers. and i never will. i refuse to! i dont mind supporting and getting decent dps or tagging with it, but simply being used for 3 utilities is not what i want. anet stated clearly that they dont want to have healers/dps/tank, but with the balance disaster called spvp, thats where we are heading.

i think the main problem is that a lot of our dps comes from ai! clones die too quick so our shatter aoe and all the good stuff that comes out of that(removing conditions, adding conditions and all that). also phantasms will maybe hit once if u are lucky, but are affected by cc and everything and retal will be a problem too. i went back to glam with perplexity. in still pretty weak with it, but at least i get a few lootbags for tagging.

when glamour was still strong, i had fun at least.now its a grind.
@ all commanders out there: u know what: walk your kitten golems yourself and no i wont bring veil or portal! im not your servant! (signed: veilbot on strike ;-) )

Hmmmmm… what I got out of that is that you don’t want to do any of the things a mesmer is good at. In a ZvZ scenario, I want my group to win, and the things I bring to the fight (boon ripping, AOE confusion, interrupts, veil, etc) all make a huge difference in whether we win or lose. If you count success by big numbers and loot bags, I can definitely see your point. For me, I see success as being waist deep in the dead bodies of my opponents on the WvW battlefield, with my guild group alive – and the tools I bring to that fight definitely help us do exactly that.

I gave glam confusion in wvw, zvz a good try for nearly a month after confusion was nerfed and “fixed”. I failed to make it effective and rarely got bags. I swear, some fights we’d hit a medium size zerg, rout them, and I’d get zero bags. I’d see some numbers, but it was not very much. That said, I’m still interested, simply cuz I love glamour spells.

The future of Rune of Perplexity is uncertain as well and I’d rather our build need not depend on a rune type. I also like our projectile combo and it synergizes with this glamour theme. Perhaps go 20(III,VIII)/0/0/30(II,VII,IX)/20(V,VII) with Staff + Scepter/Torch. This should allow you some aoe projectiles to lay on additional confusion to what Confusing Enchantments already does. Push up your condition or confusion duration via runes and food and probably go Rabid for gear.

If you take Runes of Perplexity into account though, you would increase your chances of success imo. This build would then have to shift from leaning towards projectile combos to interrupts.

That’s not to say we aren’t still effective verse zergs as I’ve posted several times about.