Guild Wars 2

Im returning to the game and cant decide between the two mesmer seems a little weird to me so far with shattering your clones and all.
im looking to be useful in dungeons and WvW not sure what each bring to the table.
with ele i prefer to play with a staff

Both Mesmer and Ele are completely viable in Dungeons and WvW.

That being said, Mesmer is in a bit of a better position right now:

PvE
-Mesmer/Guardian reflects make endgame PvE content much easier and while they are not required, you will have a vastly easier time getting a group as a Mesmer.
-Unfortunately right now the support role (which is primarily the role of a Staff Ele) is not in a strong position for PvE. There are certainly viable builds for using a staff in PvE content and you will not necessarily be a burden to your group for using them, but the hard truth is that your group would be better off not having a Staff Ele.

WvW
-The differences here are much less defined. Staff Support Eles are very powerful in organized groups for WvW and almost every guild wants at least a few of them. For zergs a Support Ele is less useful but a Berserker Staff Ele is still quite powerful. And for solo roaming you will have a very difficult (though not impossible) time with a Staff Ele.
-Mesmer on the other hand can be very capable in organized groups, zergs, and small groups/solo roaming. Mesmers bring different things to the table from Ele (namely Veil, Portal, and Feedback) but they are still very much desired for WvW.

Ultimately the choice is yours. While Mesmers are currently a little bit better(1) than Elementalists, that could all change in future updates.

When I say “better” I mean better at many aspects of the game. There are still things that Eles can do better than Mesmers (namely fire/water combo fields, might/fury stacking and raw DPS with LH, AoE damage, etc). But overall a Mesmer tends to have a bit of an edge for gameplay as a whole.

Both are useful in dungeons.

Mes in necessary for pulls/reflects/TW/blink + portal hacks (though not for much longer. Gahd, anet fixed the harpy frac blink!)/disenchant (in very, very few instances). Don’t worry about shatters – in PvE, you’ll be stacking phantasms for higher damage, so you’ll rarely use them anyway.

Groups almost always take a mes in: all Arah, all CoE, CoF p1, SE p1/3, certain fractals.

Ele is necessary for might stacking and abusing Fiery Rush. The days of 4x war & 1x mes are over – there’s almost always a spot for an ele in speed runs these days (assuming you’re running S/D or S/F + LH – otherwise, you’re out of luck).

Groups almost always take an ele in: all CoE, AC p1/3.

In all the dungeon paths I haven’t listed as being favorable to either mes or ele (generally the ones where you don’t need reflects), groups usually prefer an ele for superior might stacking and damage over a mes.

Prism.5649:

Both Mesmer and Ele are completely viable in Dungeons and WvW.

That being said, Mesmer is in a bit of a better position right now:

PvE
-Mesmer/Guardian reflects make endgame PvE content much easier and while they are not required, you will have a vastly easier time getting a group as a Mesmer.
-Unfortunately right now the support role (which is primarily the role of a Staff Ele) is not in a strong position for PvE. There are certainly viable builds for using a staff in PvE content and you will not necessarily be a burden to your group for using them, but the hard truth is that your group would be better off not having a Staff Ele.

I disagree. There are certain dungeon paths where you’ll definitely want a mesmer, and ones where you’ll definitely want an ele (which I enumerated in my last post). For other paths, where neither are necessary, I’ve found that groups usually prefer me to run ele over mesmer since ele has superior damage and might stacking. It’s the dungeons where you don’t need reflects (around half of them) where this usually happens. *

*My mes is in 10/30/0/20/10 sword/focus + offhand swap to sword, and my ele is S/D / S/F + LH w/ 30/10/10/20/0 or 0/20/25/25/0, depending on how much I’ll need to dodge [metas for both classes]. I always make sure groups know this before they choose if I go ele, mes, war, guard, or thief. Although, most groups want me to go war, so this question of ele vs. mes is a moot point. The general opinion is that every group needs at least 2 wars in it – so you’d be best off making a war. lol

Both are about equally strong.

Instead of thinking about how good the profession is right now (which changes every patch anyway) I would think about the general gameplay.

Ele means you have to press a lot of keys quite fast in order to combo your skills properly. You also have multiple ground-targeted AoEs which is really nice if you like that.

Mesmer has interesting combos too but the main aspect are illusions. Mesmers also have access to more interesting game mechanics like stealth, portal, etc.

In the end you should try both and see which one you like better. I would start with ele. If you don’t like switching attunements all the time ele is the wrong choice. Mesmer always has been fun for me (although ele is still my main).

I found when i played a ele before that i enjoyed it quite a bit i was fine with changing attunements all the time i did play d/d swapped to staff. i just prefer the staff for all the combo fields i was putting out in wvw and dungeons.
for mesmer i havnt gotten one very high level yet (ele is 38 mesmer is 10) im not in a guild or anything organized i hope to change that soon. but for the time being im just trying to level my guys up and hoping to have a fun role to fill.
When i was watching some livestreams of people doing wvw zerging it seemd like alot to focus on which i thought ele would fit there better with the ground targeting

For WvW staff is one of the best weapons in the game (at least for zerg fights). You have lots of combo fields, CC and extremely high ground-targeted AoE damage. Supporting also works although I think simply killing the enemy zerg is better/faster in most cases.

I also got a 66 guardian im contemplating on playing again. I dont really enjoy needing to respec for everything

Anierna.6918:

I disagree. There are certain dungeon paths where you’ll definitely want a mesmer, and ones where you’ll definitely want an ele (which I enumerated in my last post). For other paths, where neither are necessary, I’ve found that groups usually prefer me to run ele over mesmer since ele has superior damage and might stacking. It’s the dungeons where you don’t need reflects (around half of them) where this usually happens. *

*My mes is in 10/30/0/20/10 sword/focus + offhand swap to sword, and my ele is S/D / S/F + LH w/ 30/10/10/20/0 or 0/20/25/25/0, depending on how much I’ll need to dodge [metas for both classes]. I always make sure groups know this before they choose if I go ele, mes, war, guard, or thief. Although, most groups want me to go war, so this question of ele vs. mes is a moot point. The general opinion is that every group needs at least 2 wars in it – so you’d be best off making a war. lol

The OP was asking specifically about Staff Ele, not the more viable LH variants. I stand by what I said.

As an old staff ele main, let me tell you a about them;

Staff ele is probably one of the most enjoyable things you can do in the game, with that being said, while enjoyable you also have to take into considerations what they bring. In dungeons, FGS is probably the best boss melter in the game if it is one of thsoe bosses that can be stacked agaisnt a wall, other than that, a mesmer will be outdoing a ele any day, any way. Mesmers have lots of good points to their advantage to support which doesnt really need to be respecced as much as ele. For eles to be able to bring conditions cleansing for the team, you have to give up a lot of points in water (30) and the only way to cleanse conditions that doesnt require this has a 40 secs CD. Meanwhile mesmers have mantras and even clones for this which are even getting buffed.

Same goes with reflections. Mesmers have access to the most reflection in the game, coupled with one of the highest damage in the game and utility for the entire party such as invisibility for bypassing stuff, doubling buffs and group stability, makes mesmers the almost-universal-must-have-class in any team. While eles are pretty much restricted to AC and CoE for the most part.

Dont get me wrong, for pug dungeons both do fine, but for organized parties mesmers make up for an almost indispensable asset.

As for WvW, depends on what you want. Both got group utility, but different ones; eles go plenty of fields like water and fire. Water is amazing for blasting it at doors for the siege comrades, fire fields for might stacking before a fight, you can also put a fire or ice field in between your zerg and the enemy zerg and projectiles will burn and chill. Mesmers give veils and portals, can bypass bad parts of the game and can provide for ethereal fields which projectiles can use to give health back to its users. Eles can siege walls quite well, something mesmers cant do all that well. It all boils down to what you want to do.

Fortus.6175:

Staff ele is probably one of the most enjoyable things you can do in the game, with that being said, while enjoyable you also have to take into considerations what they bring. In dungeons, FGS is probably the best boss melter in the game if it is one of thsoe bosses that can be stacked agaisnt a wall, other than that, a mesmer will be outdoing a ele any day, any way. Mesmers have lots of good points to their advantage to support which doesnt really need to be respecced as much as ele.

Same goes with reflections. Mesmers have access to the most reflection in the game, coupled with one of the highest damage in the game and utility for the entire party such as invisibility for bypassing stuff, doubling buffs and group stability, makes mesmers the almost-universal-must-have-class in any team. While eles are pretty much restricted to AC and CoE for the most part.

What’s this guy smoking? He made several statements which are just flat-out wrong. I even addressed some of them in my previous two posts here. I’m going to assume he was just trolling, but on the off-chance he wasn’t and to safeguard against the chance that some gullible person will take him seriously, I’ll respond to his points.

Staff ele is probably one of the most enjoyable things you can do in the game
- No, playing staff ele in dungeons is possibly the most boring thing in this game. The meta is 30/20/10/10/0, sitting in Fire Atune the entire time, and spamming 1, 2, and 3. Plus 4 if you’re backed against a wall, and 5 if your target has a large hitbox. But that’s it. It is simply mind-numbingly monotonous. Plus you’re outputting lower damage AND stacking less might for your group than you would in a s/f or s/d + LH build, so this begs the question…. why are you even fooling around w/ staff?

a mesmer will be outdoing an ele any day
- No, maximum ele DPS is higher than maximum mesmer DPS, unless a mesmer stacks 3 phantasms and picks up an ele’s LH, and you factor in the damage that the phantasms do in addition to the mesmer’s damage. If the phantasms are just sitting there not attacking, meaning they’re just boosting the mesmer’s damage modifiers, ele will still do more damage. This assumes meta specs and all the many outside buffs. Even if you don’t include every single outside buff (eg. in normal speed runs, you don’t run a ranger for frost spirits and Spotter), ele DPS is still higher.

Mesmers have access to the most reflection in the game, coupled with one of the highest damage in the game
- Refer to the previous point. Mesmer is not even close to “one of the highest damage in the game,” except under very particular circumstances (eg. Feedback’ing Lupi, Malrona, etc). Ele and War DPS are undoubtedly higher (I’ve tested both), and there is a broad consensus that thief and guard DPS are also higher (which seems to be right, having played all 5 classes I mentioned, but I haven’t tested mes vs. thief/guard specifically).

Mesmers have lots of good points to their advantage to support which doesnt really need to be respecced as much as ele
- Neither mesmers nor ele’s need to be respec’d out of their respective meta’s for PvE. In WvW, all professions need to be respec’d, unless you’re going full-glass just as you would in PvE. Therefore, this is a moot point.

While eles are pretty much restricted to AC and CoE for the most part.
- Ele’s are most useful in AC and CoE due to being able to pull most bosses against walls for Fiery Rush (and the utility of icebow in AC), but ele’s are incredibly useful for might-stacking in any dungeon, as well as for very good damage. In “example dungeon X”, where you don’t need reflects and where you can’t pull enemies to the wall, most groups prefer a s/x LH ele over a mes (although, since you can push at least 1 boss/group of mobs against a wall in almost every dungeon path, or just Fiery Rush + blink/shadow step/lightning flash if there is no wall, it’s not a fair comparison. It means that ele will ALWAYS be better than mes in “example dungeon X”).

if being objective for large scaled numbered fights in wvw, mesmer is not better use than veil portal.. so 1 2 is enough.. in competitive groups.. eles are much more desirable for better effectiveness.. all classes can better effective than mesmer.. (eng, ranger dont know much of them)