Guild Wars 2

A bunch of games today once again confirmed how incredibly flawed the pet system is. Me vs mesmer, I lock my pet onto him, and he spawns a bunch of clones and illusions. They hit me constantly for severe damage, I do my best to dodge and avoid them but they’re in my face all the time, all this while I’m trying to keep track of the real mesmer.

Meanwhile, my pet has yet to land even a single attack. This is despite me trying to cripple the real mesmer (too short duration) and my pet running faster thanks to signet of the hunt. It’s simply too easy to kite our pets for a player that know what (s)he’s doing. I can easily kite other rangers pets, but mesmers spammable “pets” it’s a lot harder to avoid.

That’s true. I witnessed millions of times when my stealthed jaguar just can’t land more than half of his deadly crits on the moving target. Even when the enemy does not see my pet he just moves randomly and my pet can do nothing. That is realy frustrating, when you have used all that long CD utilities and your stupid pet just messed it up.

I’ve heard some complaints about this recently so I concocted a build to counter them. I haven’t necessarily thoroughly tested this build to the Nth degree, but I’ve had some good success today versus mesmers, guardians, and necros in WvW and sPvP. I apologize that I don’t have a fancy video but I wouldn’t steer you guys wrong. I’m feeling alright about this build.

Mobility: Excellent
Durability: Good
Damage: Excellent

Attack: ~3200
Condition Damage: ~1000

It’s full carrion armor (can be obtained with tokens from CoF) with superior rune of the ogre; greatsword and shortbow; 20/0/20/30/0 (you can probably play with it to get 5 in BM for the swap quickness)

Marksmanship: Keen Edge / Piercing Arrows
Wilderness Survival: Expertise Training / Martial Mastery
Nature Magic: Strength of Spirit / Two Hand Training / Evasive Purity

Slot the utilties Healing Spring, Sharpening stone, Signet of the Hunt, and Quickening Zephyr and use the Entangle elite

Use cave spider and jungle spider; they act like “preparations” or “dipping your blade in venom”. I like them because they react instantly unless channeling a skill (which doesn’t happen too often)—you get a poison from one and a stun from the other (both proc on hit) and I’ll talk about how to properly use these attacks in a second.

**The main damage source is to stack bleeds on the opponent while hitting them hard with shortbow and greatsword’s Maul.

Gamplay:

For the most success you have to outsmart your opponent. That means when you play a mesmer, don’t be fooled by the clones. Be sure to time your poison before the opponent heals for -33% on their heal--this is very important, particularly against guardians. Be sure to utilize the greatsword’s counterattack as well. This is particularly useful against a thief’s attack out of stealth. Proper usage of Swoop and counterattack will often mean the difference between life and death.

After wearing them down and making them wipe your bleeds (have probably used QZ and Sharpening Stone by now), you are either winning outright or in a dead heat with your opponent. Now you use entangle. Immediately after the binds proc—and this is very key—you need to greatsword #5 Hilt Bash them and then use the spider’s stun to keep them locked into the binding roots, forcing them to take as much damage as possible before being able to cleanse the immobilize.

At this point you clean up, say GG, and salute your fallen opponent. At least that’s how it’s been going for me lately. Heck, I’ve even been using longbow with some success with this build in WvW.

Chopps, thats realy good that you posted your build here but I can’t see the connection beetween it and the topic. OP complained about poor melee pet ability to land a strike on a running enemy. Ranged pets are not important here – we are talking about melee pets.

Constantly and for severe damage? Always in your face? Are you sure you were fighting just one mesmer? Perhaps poor verbage? Sounds about as legit as having already seen ‘millions of times when my stealthed jaguar just can’t land more than half of his deadly crits on the moving target. Even when the enemy does not see my pet he just moves randomly and my pet can do nothing."

Skills and weapons are easy to swap out for a reason. Try throwing axes at a mesmer next time. If you aren’t using one to start with it should be pretty easy to get away from them long enough to swap. If you think that one build or weapon should dominate with no adjustments on the fly.. can’t help you there.

Axex are only an option. I use GS and SB and i don’t need any axes. Its a mechanic flaw that stupid pet can’t land a strike – I don’t need to use the weapon i don’t want just to overcome that flaw because other classes are not forced to do so. My pet MUST land his strikes, cause he is responsible for more than a half of my overall class damage. And if I could play without a pet and have full dps I would be very glad, but again Rangers are forced to utilize their pets. So if I have to live with my pet and share my damage with it please – I want it to hit targets which has no dodges but still avoid huge amounts of damage. Without any axes.

Geshque.1326:

Chopps, thats realy good that you posted your build here but I can’t see the connection beetween it and the topic. OP complained about poor melee pet ability to land a strike on a running enemy. Ranged pets are not important here – we are talking about melee pets.

Well, the object is to defeat mesmers, right? I presume this player doesn’t want a beastmaster build due to limitations in player’s ability to micro the pet? So I offered a build where pets are used for their utility. You can leave the pet on aggressive and let it take on clones or you can send it to the mesmer when you realize which is the real mesmer. But the main thing this build does is allow the player to focus on the mesmer without worry about the pet that’s giving trouble. Note that it’s important to rebind the F keys to something more reachable because you’ll be hitting them a lot.

Anyhow, the other thing I want to point out is that—at least it is my understanding—that professions are balanced around motion. All melee players will have trouble hitting a moving target. But pets have a bit more trouble, right? We can agree on that.

So what you do is utilize all the access rangers have to chill/cripple/immobilize and time your pet burst for the “slow down spell”. Maybe you’ll get them stuck in mud, or use chilly axe with increased chill duration. Or maybe you’ll cripple them automatically when they get down to low health and try to escape (marksmanship adept skill). You could use drakehound to howl and immobilize, swap to jaguar, stun them, and burst them down with QZ and Sick Em with a beastmaster build. Maybe you’ll hit them with frost trap or spike trap? Maybe you’ll load paralysis venom on your blade and Swoop to them, swap to jag for quickness and burst. Maybe you’ll slot 30% pet speed passive?

How come these options aren’t working for you? It’s my understanding that this is intended design and I don’t expect major changes any time soon.

Just to add to that: chill builds are very effective because you don’t need to spec for condition damage. Chill doesn’t hurt players directly, rather, it hurts indirectly by preventing them from recharging abilities or moving around.

Chopps, give me a break. You post a lot but nothing of what you posted is either new or of any use here, since nothing helps sorting out the main issue – my pet misses most of its attacks vs a moving mesmer, while his clones on the other hand have a far easier time damaging me. And don’t come here insinuating bad pet management plz.

OGDeadHead.8326:

Chopps, give me a break. You post a lot but nothing of what you posted is either new or of any use here, since nothing helps sorting out the main issue – my pet misses most of its attacks vs a moving mesmer, while his clones on the other hand have a far easier time damaging me. And don’t come here insinuating bad pet management plz.

Where did I accuse someone of poor pet management? I said that players are limited in what they can do with pets (a statement agreeing with you). I think you misread what I was saying.

Also, I did address pets missing moving targets. The idea is to slow the opponent down or increase the pet’s run speed. Versus mesmers, it is difficult because of all of the clones, I know. A good mesmer is formidable.

But assuming no major changes to pets are coming soon, your best option—for pet damage builds—is to cripple/chill/immobilize your opponent. I don’t understand why you refuse to try that and just assume ANET intentions with pets are exactly yours. Developers have said that pets are not fire and forget. I think you need to try my suggestions and come back and let us know your experience.

OP was wondering how to fight mesmers right? Well there’s no simple answer. Making pet AI such that it cannot be “outrun” or “circle strafed” isn’t an option, my man. You’re going to have to slow your opponent if you’re struggling with this issue.

For the record, I think the magnitude of this problem is overstated. Again, if you want a pet DPS build in pvp, you have to build it such that your pets can land their burst.

I don’t know why that means I’m being “mean” or accusing people of not being able to manage pets in battle.

What do your keybindings look like? Yes! That is relevant and important. Why? Mesmers will swap places with clones instantly, spawn new ones, cloak, and deploy many strategies making you constantly retarget. Good keybindings will improve your gameplay.

Edit: I got 74 badges in T1 last Saturday and killed dozens of yaks and soloing supply camps while roaming and defeating players from every profession; is that the most badges someone’s got? No. Did I lose battles? Yes, I was running conditions and lost primarily to mesmers and guardians. I point this out because with the build I used and my gameplay, the problem you reference was not an issue. You have to build to the strengths of your profession. For this one I was using a rabid build. But the carrion build I posted does direct damage, which is better against mesmers and guardians, I think. I coud be wrong! I love theorycrafting.

Also, when you fight a mesmer, watch out for confusion because you’ll hurt yourself. There’s lots of reasons someone could lose to a mesmer and I don’t think it’s fair to blame the pet. Take some responsibilty for the loss, admit that you can improve, and learn. Learn why mesmers work. What makes them tick? Now that you know that, think about what tools the ranger has to deal with it. For example, autoattack while you have confusion and you’re going to have a bad time. I’m not saying you do this I’m just pointing out the kinda of things someone misses when they tunnel in on trying to make a pet hit something it’s having a hard time hitting.

Apparently, you didn’t read the first post since it was I that posted that one.

The issue wasn’t about winning or loosing to a mesmer, the issue was that our pets miss most of their attacks, while mesmer “pets” hits with theirs. Reread first post, thank you.

I’ve played several hundreds if not thousands of pvp matches, and I know this is a very real issue with our pets.

I don’t know what my keybindings has to do with anything in this regard, but for the record yes I’ve setup a custom key/mousebind, as have most likely the majority of pvp players at least.

Nuff said. Clones just hit you if you don’t dodge. Pets don’t hit even if you don’t dodge. That’s the real problem.

You can do the troll build as well.
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You use wilderness training and Oakheart Salve in the survival tree , Natures protection and 33% regeneration duration in nature magic , and Natural healing , rending attacks and whatever else in the Beastmastery tree .

For gear you use Shaman gear , that is condition toughness and healing . As for the runes u use 4 superior runes of earth and 2 superior runes of water

Utilities are healing spring, signet of the wild , signet of the hunt , zephyr or LR , entangle

Weapons you use shortbow and axe+dagger or torch . Bleeding duration sigils on axe and shortbow , and smoldering sigil if torch .

With this build you are nearly unkillable with 3200 + armor , a lot of healing , and do obscene amount of condi damage . Plus your pet hits like a truck .

you can even go sword + torch instead of axe . It is an easy to do build without too much finesse , very effective

Maybe I missed smthing but I cat understand why are you all talking about yout builds if topic is about pets missing their targets?

Geshque.1326:

Maybe I missed smthing but I cat understand why are you all talking about yout builds if topic is about pets missing their targets?

Because “pets missing their targets” is something that is fixed. It is unchangeable. It is pointless to whine and cry about unchangeable things. Therefore, we post builds that counter mesmer and/or ideas for making your pet land hits more consistently. I’m sorry if this isn’t the answer you want.

No! You want me to come on here and say “ZOMG PETS ARE UBER BAD ONLY REASON I LOSE IS DUE TO PETS” and I’m not going to do that. That’s absurd. You and OP have to realize you aren’t getting magical pets that land every hit no matter what.

Edit: If you want to improve with ranger, don’t blame pets. Blame yourself for making the conscious choice to run a build you know doesn’t work. If you consistently lose to mesmers in wvw, for example, just outrun them until you can figure out how to take them on. I’m going to make an effort to investigate ranger v mesmer more this week to fond a “stopper” build for the most prevalent mesmer build. However, note that much of this is skill based. GW2 is made in such a way that two builds can be far from optimal yet the more skilled player still wins because of his or her superior knowledge of skills, when to evade, and what the other profession is trying to do to prevent them from winning.

So far I’ve learned that mesmers are generally slow. But they make up for that with the ability to control not only when you’re allowed to cast via the confusion condition, but also when to become invulerable—almost at will—to negate your burst. They control. They will create a clone, swap places with it, then create a decoy thus stealthing away while you fight their clone that ultimately shatters in your face or gives you confusion. They will repeatedly blind you (evasive purity becomes something to consider). These are some things to think about when fighting a mesmer.

Chokolata.1870:

You can do the troll build as well.
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You use wilderness training and Oakheart Salve in the survival tree , Natures protection and 33% regeneration duration in nature magic , and Natural healing , rending attacks and whatever else in the Beastmastery tree .

For gear you use Shaman gear , that is condition toughness and healing . As for the runes u use 4 superior runes of earth and 2 superior runes of water

Utilities are healing spring, signet of the wild , signet of the hunt , zephyr or LR , entangle

Weapons you use shortbow and axe+dagger or torch . Bleeding duration sigils on axe and shortbow , and smoldering sigil if torch .

With this build you are nearly unkillable with 3200 + armor , a lot of healing , and do obscene amount of condi damage . Plus your pet hits like a truck .

you can even go sword + torch instead of axe . It is an easy to do build without too much finesse , very effective

Thanks, that sounds like fun. I’ve been sitting on a full set of CM shaman gear for a month not knowing what to do with it.

Chopps.5047:

Geshque.1326:

Maybe I missed smthing but I cat understand why are you all talking about yout builds if topic is about pets missing their targets?

Because “pets missing their targets” is something that is fixed. It is unchangeable. It is pointless to whine and cry about unchangeable things. Therefore, we post builds that counter mesmer and/or ideas for making your pet land hits more consistently. I’m sorry if this isn’t the answer you want.

No! You want me to come on here and say “ZOMG PETS ARE UBER BAD ONLY REASON I LOSE IS DUE TO PETS” and I’m not going to do that. That’s absurd. You and OP have to realize you aren’t getting magical pets that land every hit no matter what.

Pets missing targets was only partially fixed. There are still plenty of pet skills that have trouble hitting a moving target and ranged pets have slow projectiles that can make it difficult for them to hit their target.

The logic of the OP had nothing to do about how to fight mesmers; they were only mentioned to compare clones which the OP feels can reliably hit the target, to our pets which he feels doesn’t. Bringing up builds on how to fight them only distracts from the topic of this thread which was intended to be about pets being able to reliably hit targets, not about how to fight mesmers.

Right now pets are flawed, taking up a percentage of our damage while not being able to match the up-time of, or engage targets as well as, the players do. In order for pets to be balanced they must be near the level of players in their ability to both stay on and hit targets, which they are currently far from.

And this IS changeable, as much as you might not be willing to accept it. There are plenty of suggestions out there, especially on Robert Hrouda on pets in dungeons which has posts not only about pet survivability but also their reliability, and the developers are looking for solutions on this issue.

I will say that Mesmer sword clones have similar issues to Ranger pets.

What I think you’re mostly talking about is the ranged clones and the phantasms.

FYI:
Illusion = Mesmer Clone or Phantasm
Clone = Mesmer illusion that looks like the Mesmer and does negligible direct damage
Phantasm = Mesmer illusion that obviously isn’t the real mesmer and does good damage.

Mesmer clones work somewhat like pets in that they auto-attack like the Mesmer (though somewhat slower … bug?)

Phantasms attack once every 6 seconds … exception being the Warden.

This makes them work differently.

That being said, I think Ranger pets need improved AI. Simply using cripple/chill is not always sufficient even though it should be. Taking a trait to make your pet move 30% faster should making it reliably against non-swift foes, but it does not. Even a pet that gets in melee range of an enemy with the same move speed should be able to hit more reliably than they currently do. It’s not difficult to stick to a target in melee.

Geez, Bri, by “fixed” I meant “invariant” or “constant”. I didn’t mean re-implemented by ANET. And it’s only changeable in the sense that ANET is considering a rework of the mechanic. Right now, as the cliche goes, it is what it is so you must conform to how the pets behave.

Regarding your point about distracting the point of the post, no I’m not. This post clearly asks about defeating mesmers. If you want to start another QQ post about pets go ahead I won’t stop you. But that’s not going to help you beat any partiular profession. You will only beat yourself.

This is the reason why sword and/or trap builds, are the only viable options for Rangers playing PvP. The sword and traps snares foes, which in turn allows to pet to hit consistently. The greatsword, longbow, shortbow, and axe, can not effectively snare foes, meaning those weapons become useless on their own, because the pet can’t consistently hit a moving target.

So basically, if you want to play PvP with the Ranger; you have to use sword and/or several snare skills. There’s currently no way around it.

Chopps.5047:

Geez, Bri, by “fixed” I meant “invariant” or “constant”. I didn’t mean re-implemented by ANET. And it’s only changeable in the sense that ANET is considering a rework of the mechanic. Right now, as the cliche goes, it is what it is so you must conform to how the pets behave.

Regarding your point about distracting the point of the post, no I’m not. This post clearly asks about defeating mesmers. If you want to start another QQ post about pets go ahead I won’t stop you. But that’s not going to help you beat any partiular profession. You will only beat yourself.

Its funny how around here posting an analysis of mechanics is considered a “QQ post”. I was going to post an actual reply to your points but I will take no part in a community that has that kind of mentality. Sadly it seems to be spreading like wildfire around here.

Chopps.5047:

Geez, Bri, by “fixed” I meant “invariant” or “constant”. I didn’t mean re-implemented by ANET. And it’s only changeable in the sense that ANET is considering a rework of the mechanic. Right now, as the cliche goes, it is what it is so you must conform to how the pets behave.

Regarding your point about distracting the point of the post, no I’m not. This post clearly asks about defeating mesmers. If you want to start another QQ post about pets go ahead I won’t stop you. But that’s not going to help you beat any partiular profession. You will only beat yourself.

Seriously, I shouldn’t reply to your trolling anymore, but honestly – are you for real?!?

Chopps, the OP was about how the Mesmer’s illusions were not missing their attacks simply because he was moving while his Ranger pet was missing its attacks simply because the Mesmer was moving.