Guild Wars 2

I would like to react on the confusion nerf in WvW.
I have a pure, 100% confusion build (mesmer) and it is already weak in sPvP, but still manageable because all damage is -30% to make the battles last longer, so -50% for confusion makes the build very hard to play but it works still.
Now confusion damage in WvW is also -50% but all other damage from other players stays at full strength. So the build has become totally useless in WvW fights.
All my traits/equipement/runes/sigils/… everything is done to boost confusion damage and still before it was only bad players who spammed skills without ever paying attention to conditions who fell like flies (thiefs and elementalists who just follow pre-written combinations and don’t ever adapt but just spam skills). 1 condition dissipation or just some strategic fighting and I would be killed anyway even with my confusion build.
So by halving the damage, unskilled players are rewarded and skilled players are punished, because it doesn’t make a difference anymore if you pay attention to what you do or not.
So in my opinion this nerf should be left out of the update (or make it -10% or -15% instead of -50%) and even in sPvP it might be -30% like all other damage instead of -50%.
PS: since the release I’ve seen less than 10 mesmers with a scepter in WvW and now the scepter has become a totally useless weapon

Yeap, They basically killed Condition Mesmer’s in PvP

Scepter is dead as a weapon.

Really the most over handed nerf i’ve seen in an MMO in a long time.

I wanted a nerf to confusion.

But I think 50% is far too big as a nerf.

I was expecting it to ether have an ICD or not proc on dodge abilities. Or even a 25% damage nerf would have been cool.

But 50% is way too high.

Because Anet doesn’t nerf builds/skills on a Professional level, They do it after months of crying from braindead button mashing morons who don’t have the IQ to realize they have a purple swirl on their bar and a fuzzy head.

That’s right, RIP Confusion Mesmers and Burst Thieves

The problem with confusion is not that bad players attack through it. But that good players have to stop attacking.

In an action MMO, skills that make you not attack should be few and far between. That is why there is no long duration crowd control in GW2.

Confusion should be at the level where it doesn’t totally kill someone who attacks through it. Instead, it should be a risk factor where someone has to decide to attack, burn condition removal or withdraw.

The only question now is where is that level.

Technically a necro could fear someone for at least 6 seconds by using 2 skills. How is that any different that confusion.

Thrumdi.9216:

The problem with confusion is not that bad players attack through it. But that good players have to stop attacking.

In an action MMO, skills that make you not attack should be few and far between. That is why there is no long duration crowd control in GW2.

Confusion should be at the level where it doesn’t totally kill someone who attacks through it. Instead, it should be a risk factor where someone has to decide to attack, burn condition removal or withdraw.

The only question now is where is that level.

I agree with that sentiment to a large degree, I’ve felt that confusion was supposed to be collateral damage, not the focal point of damage. Very similar to how Engineers benefit from confusion — it’s a nice addition to your already potent bleed, poison, and burn.

Unfortunately for the condition Mesmer, we’re encouraged to focus more on confusion, as our ability to apply the other conditions are nowhere near as efficient as the other classes. So, in the meantime, we see a large percentage of our damage output cut by 50%. Imagine the uproar from appropriately spec’d Necros, Rangers, Guardians, etc. if the patch notes said Bleed or Burn damage were halved.

There’s so many ways to dissipate a condition so it’s really easy to get rid of confusion, so if someone sacrifices all traits and equipment and everything to confusion it should be able to kill and not just a ‘risk factor’. That is the nice thing with a personal build, the possibility to focus on the thing you like most and still be able to kill and do everything you want.
But by killing confusion damage a condition mesmer does not exist anymore and the greatsword damage dealing mesmer will be the only mesmer build left in the game.
I just think it’s sad that ANet is pushing players in a direction and limiting advanced gameplay so much.

Extra: as is the same with the predefined stats on equipment. They are perfect for some builds and limiting others

I am baffled as to why Anet thinks its a good idea to reduce viable builds

Haldunius.7864:

I am baffled as to why Anet thinks its a good idea to reduce viable builds

If they make all the viable builds inviable, then all builds are viable! \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/

Ruprect.7260:

Technically a necro could fear someone for at least 6 seconds by using 2 skills. How is that any different that confusion.

You can’t burst yourself to death in 5 seconds because someone Feared you.

I dunno, I thought it was a strange change too. Confusion builds were really interesting, but I guess there was too much QQ about them.

They probably didn’t like it that Engineers still hate turrets after multiple huge buffs, so no Confusion spike for them now! Bad Engineers! Hit with Nerf Paddle!

Ruprect.7260:

Technically a necro could fear someone for at least 6 seconds by using 2 skills. How is that any different that confusion.

You really want to compare a necro’s ability to apply fear to a mesmer’s ability to apply confusion?

saiyr.3071:

Haldunius.7864:

I am baffled as to why Anet thinks its a good idea to reduce viable builds

If they make all the viable builds inviable, then all builds are viable! \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/

My first thought was “Touche Saiyr”. I like where you’re going. Since all things can be explained by a clip of Family Guy, I have included this link to a similar brainstorming session:

Zodiac.7413:

There’s so many ways to dissipate a condition so it’s really easy to get rid of confusion

Confusion is the last thing any condition removal gets rid of. Its very hard to get rid of it, not easy, especially if you dont have tons of condition removal. My guardian runs 3 shouts, shouts recharge 20% faster, shouts convert a condition to a boon, and shouts remove a condition. So thats 2 2 condition removers on a 25 second timer, and 1 2 remover on a 45 second timer, as well my F2 skill which removes 3 on a 1.5 minute timer, with another move that gives it back on a 1.5 min timer. Not only that, but I have traited to remove a condition every 10 seconds, and my heal also removes a condition every 10 seconds (unless I use it, its a signet) And I CANNOT remove confusion faster than a decent mesmer or engi can apply it. Mainly because all the other conditions they apply get removed first. I’m glad confusion got nerfed into the ground, its was a crap thing to die to, and theres no defense to it. What are you suppose to do? run away from them slowly (guardian runs fkin slow) while waiting for it to wear off repeatedly while they melee you down?

A mesmer can only apply 1 condition which is confusion and very rarely there’s extra bleed or something else according to the trait lines, so easy to get rid of it. Also if I want to continue to apply confusion that means I use scepter which does 0 damage with the auto-attack. So a few stacks of confusion is ignorable, it’s just the way we deal damage. For 10 stacks: yes, wait for just a few second till most stacks are gone and launch your attack then. It takes 30 seconds at least to apply a big amount of confusion again so if you block or dodge the big attack you have half a minute of free play.
The situation you talk of is the engineers that apply tons of conditions in just a few seconds (and 8 stacks of confusion!!!) so a condition build engineer can just tear you to pieces. But the reason behind this is just the fact that ANet wanted more people to play the engineer so they overbuffed them a bit.

Zodiac.7413:

A mesmer can only apply 1 condition

[citation needed]

wish.1027:

Zodiac.7413:

There’s so many ways to dissipate a condition so it’s really easy to get rid of confusion

Confusion is the last thing any condition removal gets rid of. Its very hard to get rid of it, not easy, especially if you dont have tons of condition removal. My guardian runs 3 shouts, shouts recharge 20% faster, shouts convert a condition to a boon, and shouts remove a condition. So thats 2 2 condition removers on a 25 second timer, and 1 2 remover on a 45 second timer, as well my F2 skill which removes 3 on a 1.5 minute timer, with another move that gives it back on a 1.5 min timer. Not only that, but I have traited to remove a condition every 10 seconds, and my heal also removes a condition every 10 seconds (unless I use it, its a signet) And I CANNOT remove confusion faster than a decent mesmer or engi can apply it. Mainly because all the other conditions they apply get removed first. I’m glad confusion got nerfed into the ground, its was a crap thing to die to, and theres no defense to it. What are you suppose to do? run away from them slowly (guardian runs fkin slow) while waiting for it to wear off repeatedly while they melee you down?

Can you provide some clear evidence that confusion is always the last condition removed? Because I frankly don’t believe that to be the case.

I also play a Necro, and I enjoy fighting confusion classes with him because I either put those stacks right back on them, or I eat them for a huge heal. And that’s using 3 abilities. I don’t have a guardian and know next to nothing about them, but I was always under the impression they were masterful condition cleansers when built for it.

I have 1 character, been playing mesmer since day 1. And except for the chaos storm the only significant condition a mesmer can apply is confusion.
Believe me, in 2 weeks there will be 0 mesmers in the game who actually buff condition damage on armor and jewels or in trait lines.

Probably be in 1 day. There is no purpose to it now and mantras are incredibly boring so I’m not doing that. Looks like I get to go back to the shatter build I basically started GW2 with. You know a game is being designed well if you can pick out the best build when you first start playing. Yay for class diversity.

Next, please remove banners from warriors, symbols from guardians, stealth from thieves, wells from necros, and attunements from elementalists. I should be able to kill every class using the exact same strategy.

I also play a Necro, and I enjoy fighting confusion classes with him because I either put those stacks right back on them, or I eat them for a huge heal. And that’s using 3 abilities. I don’t have a guardian and know next to nothing about them, but I was always under the impression they were masterful condition cleansers when built for it.[/quote]

Jup, I got killed quite some times like that:d
That’s the worst, I was strong, yes, but that’s because of playing 8 months with 1 build, but still it was not abused and as you said my build was easily countered by just some strategical play. It’s only the players who don’t like to think and just spam skills to do as much as damage as possible in as less time as possible that complained about confusion. Sadly enough those players are numerous and ANet wants to make the game more “accessible” by listening to their complaints.

Now you must spend money to buy gems to convert to gold to re-gear your re-specc’d Mesmer.
Anet 3
Player base 0

Good game Anet Good game!

Thrumdi.9216:

The problem with confusion is not that bad players attack through it. But that good players have to stop attacking.

In an action MMO, skills that make you not attack should be few and far between. That is why there is no long duration crowd control in GW2.

Confusion should be at the level where it doesn’t totally kill someone who attacks through it. Instead, it should be a risk factor where someone has to decide to attack, burn condition removal or withdraw.

The only question now is where is that level.

But this is precisely why it was good, decent players would stop attacking or cleanse to counter, decent Mesmer (in some cases Engi’s) would try and time their confusion if they wanted to down a skilled player. It meant you had to THINK about what you were doing and that is always good.

All this change did is buff bad players who don’t think and just mindlessly spam abilities, they are catering for zergs and casuals by continually dumbing this game down.

Mister Mustard.7203:

Can you provide some clear evidence that confusion is always the last condition removed? Because I frankly don’t believe that to be the case.

I also play a Necro

We can go to sPVP right now, guest to jade quarry, I’ll use save yourselves, you convert all my boons (which is all of them) to conditions, and I’ll remove them, and you watch when confusion gets removed. The only things that seem to be after confusion are cripple and chill honestly. But if you google it Im sure you can find an exact list of which conditions get removed in what order.

Loco.4561:

All this change did is buff bad players who don’t think and just mindlessly spam abilities, they are catering for zergs and casuals by continually dumbing this game down.

They made confusion fair, it’s still the most damaging condition there is even after the 50% nerf (check the thread with math about it)

The only other real option they had would of been to let players prioritize their condition removals the way they choose, which I could see being a major headache, since confusion is at the bottom of the list of things that get removed. There’s nothing worse than using 3 abilities to get rid of 7+ stacks of confusion and taking 6k+ damage.

Zodiac.7413:

A mesmer can only apply 1 condition which is confusion and very rarely there’s extra bleed or something else

I lol’d

wish.1027:

Mister Mustard.7203:

Can you provide some clear evidence that confusion is always the last condition removed? Because I frankly don’t believe that to be the case.

I also play a Necro

We can go to sPVP right now, guest to jade quarry, I’ll use save yourselves, you convert all my boons (which is all of them) to conditions, and I’ll remove them, and you watch when confusion gets removed. The only things that seem to be after confusion are cripple and chill honestly. But if you google it Im sure you can find an exact list of which conditions get removed in what order.

There is no removal order. Conditions are always cleansed on a last in, first out basis, meaning that the last condition to be applied to you will be the first to go.

wish.1027:

We can go to sPVP right now, guest to jade quarry, I’ll use save yourselves, you convert all my boons (which is all of them) to conditions, and I’ll remove them, and you watch when confusion gets removed. The only things that seem to be after confusion are cripple and chill honestly. But if you google it Im sure you can find an exact list of which conditions get removed in what order.

Well as I mentioned, there is maximum (very rarely even) 1 other condition than confusion on you so it won’t be a problem when you fight a mesmer or you just have to time your dissipation too. Anyway, there’s always people that agree with a change and since I killed about 2300 guys in WvW ANet probably got 2300 complaints about overpowered confusion damage and these players will all be happy. But in my opinion this nerf destroys any freedom we have to play with different builds, so I just wanted to let ANet know to reconsider this change.

wish.1027:

There’s nothing worse than using 3 abilities to get rid of 7+ stacks of confusion and taking 6k+ damage.

I think you haven’t quite understood how this dissipation works. Firstly, about confusion being removed last, I don’t think it’s true, I’m actually quite sure it’s not true.
Secondly. If you have 10 stacks of confusion, 1 dissipation removes ALL stacks. It’s 1 condition that’s removed, not 1 stack.

It’way too easy to make people happy nerfing an interesting indirect damage than forcing people to have a look on their own debuff and apply a cleanse… And don’t tell me u have no cleanse cause maybe your build doesn’t have such a good one but every profession can count on cleanse and Mesmers have no chance to reset fight such dd ele or lol nocd thieves they win or lose..so wtb cleanse were the hard way but anet always choose for the easy pug friendly way.. Now all go for arrowcarts and repair wall will be more worth than looking for a treb and destroy it. GG

Edit: a good remake was needed but this is too much

saiyr.3071:

Zodiac.7413:

A mesmer can only apply 1 condition

[citation needed]

Technically they can apply others, but they are ridiculous and don’t know any mesmers who use them as a way to dps. Maybe as a little extra damage but nothing serious.

Jup! It’s as I mentioned in the first post. In sPvP confusion does 20% less damage than other types of damage (both direct and indirect) which makes it hard to play a good confusion build but at least it’s feasible.
Now in WvW confusion does 50% less damage than all other types, so even the guards don’t worry about 10 stacks anymore and it takes me 2 minutes to take one down… Not mentioning running away from a ranger that only used his auto attack cause 8 stacks of confusion didn’t hurt him at all.

Zodiac.7413:

wish.1027:

There’s nothing worse than using 3 abilities to get rid of 7+ stacks of confusion and taking 6k+ damage.

I think you haven’t quite understood how this dissipation works. Firstly, about confusion being removed last, I don’t think it’s true, I’m actually quite sure it’s not true.
Secondly. If you have 10 stacks of confusion, 1 dissipation removes ALL stacks. It’s 1 condition that’s removed, not 1 stack.

I was referring to how good mesmers and engineers always put tons of conditions on you, and you take a lot of procs of confusion removing it all because confusion is always last to get removed.

NevirSayDie.6235:

There is no removal order. Conditions are always cleansed on a last in, first out basis, meaning that the last condition to be applied to you will be the first to go.

I dont believe that at all, as bleeding is always the first thing I see removed.

Read what gvauhn just wrote;) No tons of conditions from a mesmer;)
As for the engineer, I already said what’s wrong with them.

I think the wvwvw qq’ers have won this one. Anet has really showed their hand when it comes to balancing on this one.

RIP Confusion mesmers

gvaughn.4163:

I think the wvwvw qq’ers have won this one. Anet has really showed their hand when it comes to balancing on this one.

RIP Confusion mesmers

It’s revenge for all the people QQing about my thf, Im gonna get you all nerfed so Its good again.

The fault really lies with a major miscalculation by Anet. When designing the Mesmer for GW2, they wove confusion into the core of the class. It’s a part of almost everything. But that wasn’t enough. They conceived of the glam confusion build early on, you can see it in the traits. There are 8 traits that buff confusion / glam and very directly suggest the build. Because of this, many Mesmers took it in good faith that grinding gear for condition damage was what Anet wanted / expected / would protect. Plus it’s a fun build. So we all grinded and dug in and invested time, money, gold and faith in our Mesmers. Then, with very little warning, Anet gutted confusion. And beat down blinding befuddlement. If confusion wasn’t woven so deeply into our core class design, and if WvW wasn’t so popular, and if we had different traits that reinforced the idea of confusion as a “side effect” then we wouldn’t care. But as it stands now, many Mesmers feel led astray by the developers. If I was the team that had originally designed the Mesmer I’d be super mad right now.

Confusion was a very bad condition to begin with. Guild Wars 2 is action based, allowing people to dodge attacks. Because of this, mobs attacks are made slow and hard, so they are dodgeable. This however makes confusion a pointless condition since it relies on an enemy attack. This way confusion mesmers were forced out pve ompletely. Now, after this nerf, mesmers will hardly do any dmg in WvW, especially vs NPCs in there. I already did very low dmg vs mobs in WvW, but after this nerf I have serioius trouble even killing a sentry guard. They shouldve nerfed it as in spvp, by decreasing dmg by -20%

well the confusion/retal build i had going is extremely underpowered now, i could hardly even solo a dd ele just a while go even tho they got nerfed too.

Its still hard to believe that just at the beginning they felt that confusion was so underpowered in wvw/pve that they boosted it up 50%, and now they feel its so OP they reversed it back to it’s original state without going into the middle of 25%. The logic is just AMAZING.

Personally I would love to hear an explanation from Anet about their logic behind a nerf that will probably kill the WvW glam Mesmer. They’ve been oddly silent about all this.

wish.1027:

NevirSayDie.6235:

There is no removal order. Conditions are always cleansed on a last in, first out basis, meaning that the last condition to be applied to you will be the first to go.

I dont believe that at all, as bleeding is always the first thing I see removed.

I just went to sPVP, a thf did bleeding then vulnerability then poison to me. I hit an ability that removed 1 condition, and it was bleeding that was removed. Then he did poison > bleeding > vuln, and again, bleeding was removed first.

Is there any else you would like to add that is untrue?

It’s amazing, really. People still don’t understand that the reason confusion damage was increased in WvW in the first place was to balance it for the slower-hitting PvE MOBs. It was never intended to do that much damage against players but ANet handcuffed themselves by tying the PvE and WvW rulesets together.

Come to grips with that FACT and get over it.

PinCushion.7390:

Ruprect.7260:

Technically a necro could fear someone for at least 6 seconds by using 2 skills. How is that any different that confusion.

You can’t burst yourself to death in 5 seconds because someone Feared you.

I dunno, I thought it was a strange change too. Confusion builds were really interesting, but I guess there was too much QQ about them.

They probably didn’t like it that Engineers still hate turrets after multiple huge buffs, so no Confusion spike for them now! Bad Engineers! Hit with Nerf Paddle!

You are unable to attack for that time. People are complaining that you cannot attack while you have confusion, you cannot attack for longer if you are feared. How is that different. With confusion at least you could remove it, fear is a garaunteed 5-6 seconds of no attacking if traited and runed.

great an now i am forced to use the darn shatter dps builds!have to buy whole new set of gear, and refarm to get ascended gear!this is terrible!Seriously anet, why would u break 80 percent of the mesmer builds?

Originally I had wanted a confusion nerf, just to spite the mesmers who complained about thief burst, but build diversity makes WvW more entertaining. The game is not fun when each class only has one or two viable builds. Be careful what you wish for, I guess.

Edit:

have to buy whole new set of gear, and refarm to get ascended gear!

I agree with this person here. It makes my blood boil when developer actions make gear/items obsolete.

Ruprect.7260:

PinCushion.7390:

Ruprect.7260:

Technically a necro could fear someone for at least 6 seconds by using 2 skills. How is that any different that confusion.

You can’t burst yourself to death in 5 seconds because someone Feared you.

I dunno, I thought it was a strange change too. Confusion builds were really interesting, but I guess there was too much QQ about them.

They probably didn’t like it that Engineers still hate turrets after multiple huge buffs, so no Confusion spike for them now! Bad Engineers! Hit with Nerf Paddle!

You are unable to attack for that time. People are complaining that you cannot attack while you have confusion, you cannot attack for longer if you are feared. How is that different. With confusion at least you could remove it, fear is a garaunteed 5-6 seconds of no attacking if traited and runed.

Stun break or stability both stop fear/knockdown/etc dead in their tracks, no matter how many of them get dumped on you. Confusion on the other hand is around the bottom of the list of conditions that get removed. Even as a heavy condition removing class… its very hard to get rid of it when a good mesmer or engineer applies it to you. Theyre worlds apart.

Guy’s Guy’s,

I played kinda mainly as condi mess and really it was to OP.

Thing is … kitten A-Net, simply took the cheapway out to nerf us. Whiles (not going to bore U with it) there were soooo many other decent ways to make it a decent built.

regrds.

Thing is.. now you have a class that has 5 traits for making glamours better.. and glamours are now sub-par. Can you guys change the glamour line to something useful now please?

I’m not changing what i do.. the glam mesmer was the only fun mesmer build for me in wvw, but now when i get in a 1 on 1 i can’t hold my own like i used to.

I’d say a 10-25% reduction would have been more reasonable and make it more obvious when you have confusion on your character.. maybe a flashing light or siren for the zerglings… obviously the big swirly numbers and the icon on your buffbar were just not enough. While yer at it don’t nerf the damage at all and make it not trigger on cleanses or dodges or even bunker defensives… would make fighting a glam mesmer take a bit of strategy, where as now all it takes is spamming skills since confusion no longer slows you down.

Thieves never die and can kill u in 1 sec … But hey, lets nerf mesmers.
Why?
I have both professions, i stop playin thief because is so trollin, is kind of:
“hey i can kill u, but u 10 can chase me and never will kill me”
Have u tried a thief vs thief? Is so kitten borin …
Anet, can i type “kitten”? … -.-

Plutonium.1308:

Thing is.. now you have a class that has 5 traits for making glamours better.. and glamours are now sub-par. Can you guys change the glamour line to something useful now please?

I’m not changing what i do.. the glam mesmer was the only fun mesmer build for me in wvw, but now when i get in a 1 on 1 i can’t hold my own like i used to.

I’d say a 10-25% reduction would have been more reasonable and make it more obvious when you have confusion on your character.. maybe a flashing light or siren for the zerglings… obviously the big swirly numbers and the icon on your buffbar were just not enough. While yer at it don’t nerf the damage at all and make it not trigger on cleanses or dodges or even bunker defensives… would make fighting a glam mesmer take a bit of strategy, where as now all it takes is spamming skills since confusion no longer slows you down.

Yes. This. If they are gonna nerf glam builds into extinction then they need to CHANGE those 8 glam traits to something else so we Mesmers have something to kitten work with! It basically means we’re 8 traits short of other classes now.

Time to remove confusion from the game. Doenst work in pve (see above) and people dont know how to deal with it. Even ‘experienced’ players kill themselves with auto attacks.

Oozo.7856:

It’s amazing, really. People still don’t understand that the reason confusion damage was increased in WvW in the first place was to balance it for the slower-hitting PvE MOBs. It was never intended to do that much damage against players but ANet handcuffed themselves by tying the PvE and WvW rulesets together.

Come to grips with that FACT and get over it.

If confusion is so amazing against other players (with the 50% reduction), why are confusion builds pretty much non existent in sPvP? And even with the 50% buff in PvE, confusion builds are still non existent there also. (I’m mainly talking about Mesmers here). I do think it was OP in WvW, but there were other options they could have taken instead of gutting it, and at the very least condition-based mesmers should have been compensated somehow.