Guild Wars 2

Further Details

Do we need one Spirit skill per weapon set?
Not necessarily. While all Mesmer weapon sets have a Phantasm skill, not all Guardian weapon sets have Symbol skills.

Will Spirits be killable?
Debatable. The fact that spirits have duration makes them less important to kill off compared to a Mesmer’s Phantasm. On the other hand, it would add another tactical element to make them killable.

Conclusion, and Implications for the Future
I understand that this change is not by any means minor.

First and foremost, the Spirit utilities will be removed. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but this will require additional work from the developers to create a new set of utilities to replace the loss of the Spirit utilities. I’m sure that the developers could even make more Spirits to summon, akin to the additional Phantasms that the Mesmers have, or have utilities that affect spirit skills. I view this as a positive, giving developers potential space to have more meaningful utilities.

Secondly, the developers need to decide which weapon skills will receive Spirit weapons, and how they will be balanced for PvE, WvW and PvP purposes. The introduction of Spirits to all three of these game modes, rather than only in dungeoneering, will certainly cause disruption.

I hope that this post will provoke meaningful ideas from the community and from the developers on how we can improve Ranger Spirits. I see potential in the concept of Spirits, but the current implementation seems too unreliable to make use of that potential. I also understand that I have limited knowledge in the Ranger end-game world, which is why I posted this here. Please feel free to criticize or revise my suggestions.

Example of Skills with Spirits (most of the numbers are grabbed from Into The Mists Calculator):

I want to illustrate how Spirits can be incorporated into the Weapon skills. Most examples add Spirits to existing skills, while some are completely new.

[Greatsword 4] Counterattack
Block and Summon a Stone Spirit beside you to counter an attack with crushing force.

• Damage: 480
• Cooldown: 15 seconds

Stone Spirit (6 seconds)
Grants Protection to all nearby allies, and cripples all nearby foes.

• Radius: 300
• Protection: 1s per pulse
• Cripple: 1s per pulse
• Pulse: 1 pulse per second

[Sword 2a] Storm Refuge
Strike your target, summon a Spirit of Storm behind you, and somersault towards the Storm Spirit.

• Damage: 235
• Distance: 135
• Cooldown: 8 seconds

Storm Spirit (6 seconds)
Grants Swiftness to all nearby allies, and shocks nearby foes.

• Radius: 300
• Swiftness: 1s per pulse
• Damage: 60
• Pulse: 1 pulse per second

[Sword 2b] Storm Strike
Leap back into the fight, striking your target with lightning.

• Damage: 336
• Distance: 600

[Longbow 3] Solar Shot
Shoot a sun-blessed arrow, blinding enemies on the path, and summoning a Sun Spirit at the target to burn foes.

• Damage: 317
• Range: 1200
• Combo Finisher: Projectile
• Cooldown: 12 seconds
• Blind: 3 seconds

Sun Spirit (6 seconds)

• Burns nearby foes.
• Burn: 2 seconds per pulse, 328 damage
• Pulse: 1 pulse per second
• Radius: 300

[Main Hand Axe 3]Winter’s Path
Throw a chilling axe so that it returns to you, and summoning a Frost Spirit at your target, applying vulnerability to nearby enemies.

• Damage: 435
• Cooldown: 15 seconds
• Range: 900
• Chill: 5 seconds
  Frost Spirit (6 seconds)
• Vulnerability: 1 second per pulse
• Pulse: 1 pulse per second

These skills are simply attaching the existing effects of the Spirits to the weapon skill. The numbers are purely there for clarity, not for balance.

Example of Spirit Traits
The increased reliability of Spirits allows for more spirit traits that can be placed in any trait line, not just Nature Magic! Some ideas:

• Nature’s Wrath: Grants additional area damage to Spirits.
• Unyielding Nature: Spirits grant Stability.
• Nature’s Rejuvenation: Spirits grant Regeneration to all allies.
• Nature’s Reach: Extends the range of Spirit’s pulse effects.
• Empowering Spirits: Spirits grant might to your pets per pulse.
• Spiritual Calling: Spirits last longer.
• (Grandmaster Trait) Nature’s Echo: Spirits mirror their effects on your pet.
• (Grandmaster Trait) Spiritual Amplification: Spirits are combo fields.

I want to run this discussion here before posting to the CDI to avoid additional cluttering, and also get feedback from the Ranger Community first. I do not main a Ranger, but I have played rangers throughout the two years of GW2 and have remade my ranger twice (remade from 65, then remade from 40, he’s now level 16 to level with a friend).

My goal is to try to make Ranger Spirits more meaningful to the profession, instead of Rangers scorning the set of utility skills.

I’d like to begin by listing out my perceived issues with Spirits in general:

• Stationary, unless you take the trait
• Cannot control when the effect takes place
• Effects are uninspiring. The Spirit utilities seem like an AoE version of a Phantasm utility skill, except they do not have any synergy with existing Ranger’s class mechanics.
• The 3 traits (seriously, only 3!?) that affect Spirits are also uninspiring
• Can be targeted, nullifying the skill and its associated traits
• The fact that they are utility/healing skills means that the entire line of Spirits can be easily ignored

The inspiration for my changes comes from this quote by Holland.9351:

If the Ranger class it supposed to be a sustained damage class without burst nor area of effect, then its single target damage should be reliable. Ranger damage is very unreliable:

…

Ranger is horribly unreliable in dealing damage on a single target. So it can’t be considered a sustained-damage dealing class.

My proposition is to have the Spirits be bound to our Weapon skills.
This is to make Spirits akin to the skills of other professions: Phantasms for Mesmers, Symbols for Guardians, and Marks for Necromancers.

Weapon skills would simply summon a Spirit that lasts for a few seconds, pulsing its effects in an AoE. The location of where the Spirit is summoned depends on the weapon skill.

My reasons and inspirations for this change:

• Shorter cool down increases the frequency of the Spirits (increase reliability)
• Players have more control on when the effects occur (increase reliability)
• The increase in reliability will make the Spirit traits much more appealing
• The short lifetime of the Spirits allow ease in skill balancing
• The increased frequency in seeing Spirit abilities reinforces the spirituality of the Ranger
• The shorter lifetime of the Spirit means that the position of the Spirit is less important
• The effects of the utility skills are simple enough to be transferred to a weapon skill

But by far, the main reason I propose this change is because this gives potential for further development, in the form of new traits and better weapon skills. This will be reflected in my second post.

My suggestion that I’ve said on the forums before:

Make the projectiles of the attack chain hit nearly instantly. (Like bullets)
This will increase the speed of the chain to its intended cast time of 0.5, 0.5, 1 seconds (2 seconds total). Because of travelling time, the chain takes significantly more time to complete the chain, often twice or three times as much time.

The necromancer’s scepter chain takes about the same time (0.5, 0.5, 0.5), but because there is no projectile involved, the hits feel appropriate in damage (the curses hit for less damage than the mesmer’s ether bolts) due to its fast speed.

Make the bolt into something that rips through the air at a crazy speed. Maybe a wave, or an Ether Ripple through the air.

Foosnark.1784:

Crumbs.7643:

Honestly I feel that the main-hand pistol isn’t necessary, for a couple of reasons:

Reason 1: We already have a ranged power-based weapon, the Greatsword.

It’s a fantastic ranged weapon…

Yes, it is, but you may have noticed it doesn’t look or act anything at all like a pistol — some people want the aesthetics of a duelist here, not just another thing that goes pew. Also obviously, greatsword can’t be used with an offhand weapon.

Main-hand pistol necessary? No. Potentially very cool? Yes.

Crumbs.7643:

Reason 2: The Sceptre has the potential to be a hell of a wicked weapon…

And then you explain how all that requires is drastically fixing one skill and replacing another… that’s two out of three. Might as well say that mainhand pistol has the potential to be a wicked weapon.

As others have said, it’d be nice if Mesmers had an AOE tagging weapon. That could be a spray of magical somethingorother from a completely redesigned scepter… or it could be a hail of condition-carrying bullets from a pistol.

Mm, I don’t feel that the changes are that drastic. For skill 1, it’s a change of projectile type and speed, as opposed to writing a new skill which may do the same thing. As for DE tagging, I firmly believe that a change to the Greatsword’s Mind Stab would do the trick.

I mean, I get that it would be super awesome for a new weapon, but in terms of ease of developing modifications, wouldn’t it make sense to modify existing skills than implement a new weapon?

I guess I’d feel more inclined to introducing a new weapon if there is a clear role that weapon could fulfill. Aesthetics are nice, but I’m a firm believer in practicality first.

Honestly I feel that the main-hand pistol isn’t necessary, for a couple of reasons:

Reason 1: We already have a ranged power-based weapon, the Greatsword.

It’s a fantastic ranged weapon, allowing you to weave in and out from mid-range to long-range, and it has some fantastic AoE from Mirror Blade and the Berserker. In mid-range, your mirror blade gives you Might and you can utilize your pushback, and in long-range your Spatial Surge deals maximum damage. Of course there is a debate on the usefulness of Mind Stab, but asides from that, the weapon is very solid.

Reason 2: The Sceptre has the potential to be a hell of a wicked weapon.

If they made the skill 1 chain hit nearly instantly, the speed of the sceptre auto-attack makes up for the weaker damage. Because the chained skills are only used once the previous attack hits the target, the chain is actually much slower than it should be. By the way, the Mesmer’s sceptre chain is the only chain ability that has a projectile. I would love to see the sceptre bolts become something akin to Ether Tear, where the bolts rapidly travel through the air and rip their target, like the necromancer’s axe abilities.

As well, I’d like to see the Illusionary Counter skill to be changed. It doesn’t make sense to put it on a weapon that is going to remain ranged, and while the blind is very nice, the skill slot itself seems to be used very rarely. Blurred Frenzy on the Sword is an absolutely devastating skill that fits with the weapon from a tactical standpoint. I can’t see why Illusionary Counter be changed to a ranged attack that meshes well with the conditions the weapon’s other skills apply.

I could go on about the Sceptre, but I’ll reserve the suggestions for another thread.

Lewis Burnell.2493:

…
people are failing to combat the fundamentals of the profession.
…

You ask too much from these people.
Why bother to research and understand the gameplay, which could take hours of google-fu, when you can just make a post on the forums consisting of a word-salad with the same vocabulary as an illiterate Call of Duty player?

leleqera.8271:

…
the many clones that he creates is not the problem, but the damage does not match with the clones, it does op damage and op clones,
…

Have you considered killing the clones and/or phantasms?

You will find that the traits for mesmers are very powerful and have great impact on the playstyles of different builds. It is because of this reason that mesmers in the starting levels feel sluggish and weak. If you can tough out the initial levels to about 25 – 30, you should be able to start taking traits that have a huge impact on your abilities.

Jungle Stalker – Chairman Meow

Absolutely. I’m surprised that for all the times Arena Net has said they wanted people to naturally group together, it baffles me that the loot mechanics are still based on damage done. I’d love for the loot to be distributed at the very end, based on contribution, like the big chest after killing The Shatterer.

Definitely agree with Carighan and Easymode, but I’d like to go further.

Why not track these metrics:

• Number of conditions applied
• Number of condition stacks added
• Number of control effects given
• Number of boons stripped

and add them to the total damage? Given how many ways we engage with enemies, these metrics would be a great addition to marking targets for loot.

Yea, I did a quick search on the Wiki and saw that the Ether Clone chain is the only chain that involves ranged projectiles.

I wonder if we can change the scepter chain to shoot smaller beams a la Great sword, or launch purple waves, or remove the hit detection from the chain overall.

However, if they implement this, the next question is to balance the fact that we now create clones every 2 seconds. Frankly, I don’t care if they increase the cool down to 3 or 4 seconds to go through the whole chain, because as long as I can rely on a constant rhythm of clone generation, I can time my usage of other skills better.

For me, I still can’t get over the fact that the auto attack’s speed is not dependent on its internal cool down, but rather on travel time. I’ve been playing on other classes, and to my knowledge so far, I have yet to see another skill whose cooldown is limited by that factor. It definitely feels unintuitive to me.

I’m not sure how balanced it would be if this limitation was to be removed (The chain is 0.5 seconds, 0.5 seconds, 1 second, so it’s 2 seconds for a clone to poop out), but then it would definitely feel like a ranged weapon.

This is the main reason that when I start a new mesmer, I buy a sword right away.

Either way, it still means that there should be enough initiative leftover to execute a couple more abilities, and put the Assassin’s Signet to full use.

I just can’t believe the arguments people like Scarlac are giving to interpret this change as a nerf.

DesertRose.2031:

Crumbs.7643:

Let’s do quick napkin math here: You use Steal, then Cloak and Dagger, and then Backstab. That’s 6 initiative used. Unless you have done something else, you have 6 initiative leftover. With 6 initiative leftover, you can not only execute almost any move in your arsenal, but also switch to another weapon and play defensively.

Actually you have 9-10 Initiative left over because you use Cloak and Dagger before Steal and with [Kleptomaniac] you regain 3 Initiative and you may regain 1 Initiative while preparing your Backstab.

Ah forgive me. I don’t have a good idea of what the backstab build is, so I just wrote it for a generic case.

I’m sorry Scarlac, but I can’t buy into what your reasoning is.

What other class has to walk around and look for opportunity to execute most of their skills at once? None that I have played (not saying there aren’t)

Mesmers have to wait for the opportunity to execute our abilities, and when they do, they rush with all the skills in their weaponset, and then swap weapons to prepare another salvo of pressure. Dagger/Dagger Elementalists must execute all their skills within a small period of time, because they do not have the health pool nor do they have skills to mitigate damage.

Frankly, every top player needs to anticipate and wait for the right opportunity.
Now, you may claim that I have not addressed your argument of having to “execute at least half of your skills at one time” and “no skills to use”. I’ll address that later.

Well we all call thieves “GLASS” cannons. They arent meant for head to head. Take away the cannon? Take away the Glass then.

You are claiming that the change to Assassin’s Signet has killed the glass cannon. How does 50% upped to 75% spread across 5 attacks killed your glass cannon? You already say that you have “no skills to use”, which should mean that you have used more than 5 skills, which means you would have put all the buffs from the signet to use. I’m not even going to consider the possibility of not enough initiative, because Backstab and Steal do not cost initiative.

Now to your “no skills to use” argument. Let’s do quick napkin math here: You use Steal, then Cloak and Dagger, and then Backstab. That’s 6 initiative used. Unless you have done something else, you have 6 initiative leftover. With 6 initiative leftover, you can not only execute almost any move in your arsenal, but also switch to another weapon and play defensively.

The change increased the overall damage bonus. If you are bummed about your lucky ace becoming your lucky king, you need to take a good look at the rest of your hand and see why other thieves are taking that hand and turning it into a straight flush.

*edit: typo in first line.

It’s not an error. They do hit for 0.

The mesmer has two types of illusions: Clones and Phantasms.

Clones serve the role of deception and shatter fodder. They are able to withstand 1-2 hits, maybe 3 if you’re lucky or using the Signer of Illusions to beef them up. They act as protection to you and your phantasms. They do non-existent damage, if any.

Phantasms serve the role of dealing damage and shatter fodder. They are very fragile, and can die from a single AoE hit. Each phantasm does its attack, and then has a cool down period (at least 5 seconds) before initiating another attack. They are designed to deal good damage, and then be used in a shatter once the mesmer can replace them.

When you obtain an off-hand weapon, or a two-handed weapon, you will get access to Phantasm skills. In the mean time, if you are just using a sceptre and no off hand, you will have to deal damage through abilities and shattering your clones.

Yea, that should be an easy-to-fix issue for the developers for the French version of the game.

On the bright side, traits can be switched at any time, and there are plenty of useful traits in the Illusions tree, such as:

• Precise Wrack
• Master of Misdirection
• Compounding Power

Pick and choose what you like!

It seems so: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Masterful_Reflection

The effect gained from Blurred Frenzy is called Blur. I’m not sure what it is called in French, but it would be good to check the name of the effect. Because it is called different, it is not affected by the Masterful Reflection trait.

I believe he meant the skill “Blurred Frenzy”. They could have used another term in a different language.

He makes a good point: If Blurred Frenzy gives distortion, is it affected by the Masterful Reflection trait?

Hey Eliteseraph, I just made a fresh mesmer (he’s level 5 now) to get back to the feeling of starting a mesmer (I will also be using that character to make instructional tutorial videos I have in mind for the future), and I have a couple observations right off the bat:

1. I used a Sword and Pistol. The Sceptre does not have the versatility of damage output that the Sword has, so I immediately went and bought a sword. The pistol is from the starting quest reward.

2. Even at low levels, I was able to handle groups of 3 to 4. I handled them as such:

• I made sure to group the monsters as close as I could, so that my Sword auto-attack would hit as many as possible
• I used my clone to divert damage away from me. At such a low level, I can expect the clone not to survive all of them, so I shattered the clone when I saw that its health was low.
• Because Blurred Frenzy (Sword attack 2) makes you temporarily invincible, I tried to use it after I shatter my clone, so that I still had protection.
• My phantasm I summoned immediately after I summoned my clone. With me and my clone in melee range, I almost guaranteed the safety of my phantasm.
• Trick Shot (Pistol skill 5) I used right after Blurred Frenzy, so that I could prevent damage just a bit longer.
• I liberally used Mind Wrack and Cry of Frustration for some extra damage, either as finishers, or to squeeze some last bit of performance out of my dying clones.

3. I don’t feel the need to micro-manage yet, but I do believe it is because of my weapon choice. The staff and greatsword, by nature of being ranged weapons, naturally will need to have some elements of playing keep-away.

4. It only occurred to me recently to put it in writing, as I have taken this concept to be for granted, but I must stress this point when learning about the mesmer class: Most, if not all, of our weapon abilities are multi-faceted in nature, meaning they can be used for specific purposes depending on each situation. I’ll quickly demonstrate:

Illusionary Leap (Sword skill 3) can be used in the following way:

• Make a clone beside you
• Gap closer to enemy
• Use as a leap finisher for an armor buff

I do believe that this is the most important thing to learn about the mesmer. All our abilities can be used in different situations for different effects.

I have yet to try out the other weapons, as I do have lots of experience with the Greatsword/Sword builds, but I will update this thread with information on Staff and the other off-hands when I get more time to play.

Yes, it is very important to summon your clone before you summon your phantasm, so that you let the clone tank for your phantasm. Your clone can take 1-2 hits, while your phantasms are fragile, and can be 1-shot.

You can take Signet of Illusions to make them beefier, but I felt that it is not needed if you pop a clone first, then the phantasm. I believe all the clone-generation weapon skills have a lower cool down than the weapon phantasm skills, so by default you will be having more clones than phantasms.

It’s absolutely OK for clones to die. That’s what they are for, asides from shatter fodder.

As you level up, I highly recommend to take Illusionist’s Celerity and then work towards the weapon specialization trait for your weapon set. Meanwhile, evaluate the weapons available to you, and stick with the ones you enjoy.

Have some faith! I’m sure with enough time, you can master the mesmer. And you are going in right direction, asking people for help.

Looking at Mr. Prometheus’ videos are a great start. I’d recommend Taugrim’s legion build, even for PvE.

At early levels, I recommend a Greatsword for ranged attack, and a Sword/Sword or Sword/Pistol alternate set to handle the monsters once they get to melee range. Because you don’t have the +40% recharge speed increase (Illusionist’s Celerity + Weapon Specialization) yet, weapon swapping will be almost mandatory. Start blasting from ranged with the Greatsword, and then swap to the melee weapon to finish mobs off.

Learn to summon illusions on different targets, so that they last longer, and don’t forget to shatter when they reach under 10% of their health.

Alternatively, you can go into WvW, and try different builds there. I leveled my mesmer 10 levels by playing a staff/sword focus setup, harassing the enemies with Chaos Storm, selecting people to pull back with Temporal Curtain → Into the Void, and then rooting them with the Sword’s Illusionary Leap → Leap.

Our class has a great learning curve because we have to keep assessing the battlefield, but learning the finesse of the mesmer certainly changes the outlook on how the game plays.

A couple of notes I’d like to mention about this class:

• Our class has a very potent repertoire of traits. That is the main reason why a lot of posters here say that the game gets better later on. (the most often referred to above level 40) The act of equipping one trait can transform your game from frustration to pure bliss.

• Our class deals with snap decisions more than any class. Our damage sources are the most diverse (Conditions, Direct damage, Illusions), and we wait until the right opportunity to inflict severe damage spikes to great effect.

• Positioning management is very important. We have the ability to weave in and out of melee. We have gap closers and gap openers.

• For quick movement in WvW, there is the Temporal Curtain ability from the Focus, as well as the utility skill Blink (1 skill point to unlock).

Personally, I don’t feel awkward at all on my mesmer, even during dynamic events.
I’d like to rebuke your arguments and critique your suggestions.

Argument 1: Illusions de-spawn on targets who die easily

Simply target your illusions on monsters who recently spawned, or have high health pools. Yes it takes more time. But it is achievable if you can react to the spawns first.

Argument 2: Shattering is worthless as it takes too long for illusions to run towards targets

It all depends on the positioning of your illusions, and the movement of the enemies.
In regular PvE or soloing, the mobs should be running to either you, or your illusions, so shatter them once I can see they are close enough for an immediate effect.

In Dynamic Events, the only thing that changes is the number of people participating, and the number of monsters increases. This means that the likelihood of a monster running towards your illusions will go down according to how many people there are. This is not an issue with melee illusions, but for stationary illusions, the distance can be quite large. That is why when I use my staff, I create my clones in mid-to-close range, and I do a rough estimate to time the shatter.

Suggestion: Separation of Phantasms and Clones from Shatters

I am against it, because of the existence of down time of the phantasms after their attacks. Yes, the shatters do less damage than a phantasm, but even on the phantasm with the lowest time between attacks (4.5 seconds), there is enough time to pop a shatter and re-summon the phantasm.

Instead, I’d argue that the paradigm of not shattering phantasms arises from how shatters transform due to the powerful traits for shattering.

For Example:
Mental Torment increases Mind Wrack damage by 20%. That’s an increase of 1.2x, and even though I don’t know what the exact formula for calculating the damage, I know that it turns Mind Wrack from an “eh, I’ll pop it to quickly finish off an enemy” to a skill that removes anywhere from 1/4 to 1/3 of an enemy’s health bar. I’d love to reduce the 20% to 10% or 15%, and transferring the difference into baseline, so that even if you don’t trait for Mind Wrack, it is still potent enough to consider using it often.

Now, to the issue of Dynamic Events and mob tagging:

I really don’t have a good answer. In Dynamic Events, I’m more than content in my role as a behind-the-scenes master of mob control, where I daze mobs before a big attack, or pop a time warp when we need a huge burst of damage, or removing a huge stack of burning with Null Field when we fought against the Flame Shaman, or surgically remove dangerous Plague Carriers before they hit the main party.

Of course, I don’t get as much loot, but often times my friends are more than happy to share their spoils with me, and the rewards of karma, gold, and experience are more than enough. That is my personality, and it is how I interpret the mesmer class to be: the bringer of surprises (pleasant surprises for my friends, horrific surprises for my enemies).

There is another great discussion on the Mesmer Forums about how loot should be given to those people who participate, but don’t take such an active role in dealing damage.

Again, I certainly do not feel awkward in fighting monsters in PvE.

You are hindering your own performance.

Let me make this very clear to you:
It is not the October 7th patch that is hindering your performance. Your play style and decisions are hindering your own performance by making that assumption.

You made an assumption that the most effective mesmers keep up 3 phantasms as much as possible.

I honestly do not know where you get that information from. Actually, I do know. I see a lot of people on these very forums proclaim that assumption. Some people even provide numbers in an attempt to prove the assumption is correct. I have two major points to show why it one of the most common errors among all mesmer players.

Debunking the Phantasm Army Playstyle

Skill Under-utilization

If you were to maintain 3 phantasms, the second you use an ability that summons a clone will overwrite a phantasm. That means you lock yourself out of a number of good skills.

On the GS you lose the high-damaging ability Mirror Blade, which not only summons a clone, but also grants you 3 stacks of Might every time the blade bounces back to you. And when I say high-damage, let’s compare numbers. In the Guild Wars 2 Wiki, the Berserker does base damage of 146 per hit. The Wiki’s Mirror Blade entry shows that the skill does 259 base damage per hit. On top of all that, it is a Projectile finisher.

On the sword, you lose the Illusionary Leap/Swap skill. You lose your gap-closer + 2 second immobilize, as well as two Leap Finishers.

If I really have to point out the significance of locking yourself out of those abilities, you definitely do not know how to play a mesmer.

Clone Underestimation

Every argument promoting the Phantasm Army playstyle involves several arguments dismissing the usefulness of clones. Clones do so little damage. Clones don’t last that long. Clones don’t distract the target well enough. Fair enough. But have you considered what kind of purpose they have?

When I play on my mesmer, my clones serve these following purposes:

• Shatter Fodder
• Non-Permanent Meat Shields to protect my phantasm
• Non-Permanent Meat Shields off me

If you ever noticed your phantasms getting 1-shot from a monster, a clone could have solved that for you.
If you ever noticed a large number of monsters going for your clothy behind, a clone could have solved that for you.
If you ever noticed your phantasms having a very long travel time for shattering, a clone could have solved that for you.

Clones don’t look good on paper. But we don’t play the game on paper, do we?
—————————————————————

That’s my rebuttal against those who use the 3 phantasm play style and complain about its effectiveness. There are more arguments, for sure, but they involve heavy theorycrafting and simulations which take a lot of time and effort, which I may look to program in the future. But these points should prove my point from before: you are hindering your own performance.

One more thing: The developers are not forcing you to play with shatters and clones. However, they designed the class with those mechanics in mind, and it is your choice not to follow their models.
If you think that using shatters and clones is “forcing” you into a certain build, you are wrong. You are wrong because you assume that skills not altered by traits are skills not worth using.

I suggest you do some research into how others play Greatsword/Sword+Sword mesmers. There are a couple of good guides out there, and one I can reccommend is Taugrim’s Greatsword/Sword+Pistol build, which has plenty of overlapping concepts.

It is late, and I grow weary of writing more. But I urge you to first learn the class as much as you can before you write to complain.

I’d argue for being in parties, Null Field is much more useful.

You can clear everyone’s conditions (I have used it during the Flame Shaman’s fight in Charr region to clear about 30 people of burning), and give an Ethereal Combo Field for everyone to use. (Confusing Projectiles + Chaos Armor)

Lordryux.9785:

wat about this signit of inspiration is tht a good one or no to get?

Actually, the tooltip isn’t as useful as you’d think.
It definitely was my first choice in the Beta Weekends, because the effect occurred out of combat, so I could always start a battle with at least one boon. They have made it so the effect only occurred during battle, which meant that the first boon came up after 10 seconds in battle.

Its active effect, however, I have seen it fantastically in groups to spread all boons.

Decoy is a great utility skill to pick up as it provides survivability and an extra clone.

I would also recommend Null Field, to get an extra Ethereal combo field, and great for getting rid of conditions on yourself.

It was definitely a breathtaking fight for the keep! Hoping there will be something as lively tonight as it was yesterday!

Archaeneoso.8461:

But an organized zerg vs and organized, ambush placed, artillary support, small unit, the small unit will lose under our current mechanics.

I am not saying things need to change, just that this is the reason that zergs work so well, and hence, why they will keep occuring.

You first need to properly define the term zerg first. That word, along with other words that are used way, way, way too often in PvP discussions, have lost all meaning, becoming cliches that people yell without thinking. Zerg. Skill. Fairness. Unbalanced. Organization. If you don’t present the context, those terms have no meaning.

I have known groups of 10 people continue to hold off a group of 25 players, because they formed a pincer formation and forced the enemy to attack with groups of 8 or less.

I have seen a group of 16 people split into two groups of 8 to fight a group of 12, meeting in the middle and forcing the enemy to fight a two-front battle.

I have seen lone scouts following enemy guerrilla forces, guiding a response team to intercept their location.

I have seen pairs of players acting a lures to drag a group of enemies across the shores into the range of artillery and reinforcements.

I have seen players trying to divide an assault group through the middle, only to realize their mistake as the group parted aside, then came back together into one group, obliterating any poor soul caught in between.

I have seen battles won simply because a group attacked by utilizing as many combos (fields+finishers) as possible to force the enemy to scatter, and then bunker and hold their positions.

It is too easy to lop a team’s composition, formation, movement, skill usage, and planning into a couple of loose terms. Don’t do it. Discussions and complaints about any group of players should involve proper evaluation of the events taken place in each battle. Discussions fuelled by gut reactions are never productive, and form the worst kind of threads: ones where nobody learns anything.

All the best wishes to Kaineng! I’m a WvWvW from Northern Shiverpeaks, and I’m absolutely impressed by how your server and Devona’s Rest repeatedly repel our large numbers! Loved those major tug-of-war fights for towers!