Guild Wars 2

I don’t think the desert maps got a good run through because there was never an active season while they were out. I think we should have a new Season with the first week all Desert BL, but then active WvW players can ‘vote’ which borderland their servers have before the next match. You already have a system for detecting active players for bonus chests, now you just need an NPC that uses that data to cast a vote.

I know it’ll cause a little chaos with the Alpine buffs but you can change their scaling by how many of those BL maps are active. (1 Alpine controlling the complete buff could make for some intense battles, like I believe you always hoped there would be with those cannons and such being used!)

So I’ve been running a chill tank Necro build for a while now and have depended on this rune. As of the expansion it was changed from the invulnerable block of ice for 5 seconds to having frost aura for 5 seconds(took me a bit to figure out why I wasn’t icing). I can live with that… except… you left it at 20% health trigger and 90 second cooldown. With so many ‘one-shot’ builds out there if I’m down to 20% health I’m probably not going to live 5 seconds even with 10% damage reduction and chill. And I can only get this once every 90 seconds? Come on. If you’re going to change something that drastically remember to do your job and re-balance it please. I know 99% of the players are all blood thristy zerkers, but try to keep more tanky builds a little viable.

They all got rolled up, except restorative mantras into one and they added the toughness during channel as base. They are quite viable as I explained in your healer thread. The best part is that they are all instant case so you can literally keep using all of them while stunned, dazed, knocked down or whatever, including the healing skill.

I’ve played support Mesmer since pretty much release.

Mesmer is a decent support and healer if done right. Like a healer in any other game you look for who is most hurt and stick near them as you spam your mantras, especially Pain since the CD is pretty much nil. You don’t have the instant heal, but the constant heals help. Illusionary Inspiration giving your phantasms infinite Regen spamming is really nice too.

Staff is your best friend here, not only are you putting down a buff/debuff field but it tells your knowledgable allies that this is where you’ll be standing doing mantra spam heals. Mantra of Recovery is obviously the best heal in this build(you can even use while stunned or knocked around cause it’s an instant), though Well of Eternity can mark the healing ground for people seeking health like Chaos Storm.

Now there are a lot of other good options for your build. You can go strict Mantra, with Concentration to give Stability and Resolve to strip conditions. You can use Null Field/Feedback to Mark healing and stripping/reflecting safe zones. Signet of Inspirations to double up boons and share. Phantasmal Disenchanter is often overlooked but can be pretty effective and share that Regen without running around too much too. Illusion of Life is iffy especially if your with pugs. Veil, Decoy and Mass Invis can be good panic buttons or help you res in peace. Well of Precog can rescue an ally that didn’t escape a blow. Well of Recall is nice for slowing DPS and getting people’s heal skills back.

Inspiration is your number one trait tree obviously. Chaos is probably best for helping you stay alive to heal people. Chrono gives you access to the nice Shield and Chronophantasma, Split, Alicity and the nice movement speed buff mesmers were dying to have(literally). Otherwise, Domination is a possibility if you want to assist with interruptions and huge stacks of Vulnerability using Mantra of Distraction(Also great for Defiant Enemies). Oddly enough, I strongly suggest avoiding Dueling and the seemingly obvious Mantra trait. This slows down your healing rotation and really only helps on Mantra of Recovery and other then Evasive Mirror it’s just a pure DPS tree.

I’m still testing the new stuff, if your allies are a little less dependable you might try Mental Defense instead of Illusionary Inspiration and run Scepter/Shield(Sword if you don’t use Chronomancer) for the blocks giving you a Phantasmal Defender every 20 seconds(you have Celerity). During beta it didn’t seem to work with Chronophantasma but maybe they fixed that.

Pretty much any Mesmer Elite is good in it’s own ways, though obviously Signet of Humility won’t work on most bosses.

Sigil of Benevolence or Life(if your having trouble keeping yourself alive), Sigil of Water or Luck(If your boon sharing). Cleric’s Equipment(cause our damage conditions kinda suck). Rune of Mercy to get people off the floor, Monk/Water if boon sharing, Flock for hilarious birds.

Hope that helps, good luck!

What do you feel the Mesmer is currently lacking ATM? Please don’t use general terms like “damage” without elaborating for what game mode and why you feel this way.

Mesmer isn’t all that mesmerizing. When I started I liked that the clones added some confusion, the confusion got people to accidentally knock themselves out and I had a few risk/reward plays with good timing could turn a battle 1v1 or Zerg v Zerg. Most of that got nerfed. I like how Mesmer is more active in GW2 but I like the risk/reward play of GW1. I want people to lose because they weren’t paying attention to the current trick I am playing, not because I’m overly strong. I want people to face a Mesmer and have to change their mindset to “Ok, what do I have to avoid and how can I attack them”. Maybe more punishment for taking out a clone(like the exploding turrets engineer can get, not just a condition they can easily remove).

What game mode (PvP, WvW, PvE Open World/Dungeons) do you feel Mesmer currently excels in the most? Least?

Most? Dungeons with skippable content, lol. Though Mantra Healing is useful too.

Least? Everything else. PvP you can hardly win a 1v1, little sustain, can’t hold a point, portal and a tiny bit of mobility your only advantage (downed enemy flag still goes on you and not downed clone). WvW, pigeonholed to mass utilities or GTFO, no razzle, very little dazzle. PvE, I watch my friends take things out while Irun mantra to do interrupts and vuln and mantra healing so while I don’t kill we get downed less? I’m cool with this, but not really our strength.

Without reworking anything, what minor adjustments would you make to any of our weapons/utilities/traits to make them more viable?

Mimic – Revert to old… I had finally made a new viable reflect build for my WvW team.
Masterful Reflection – Seriously make this work with all distortions, like Triumphant Distortion.
Scepter – Bleed NPC’s they don’t tend to move
Maim the Disillusioned – Bleed NPC’s they don’t tend to move
Halting Strike – More Damage
Disruptor’s Sustainment – 7+ seconds, I should be able to recharge 2 Mantra to be useful.
I’d really love for Sword 2 to work with Master of Reflection since they probably want to avoid you already this won’t effect much.
Give Moa stability stacks and a long charge super damage AoE melee attack but remove other moves then Flee. Lower the cooldown.
Deceptive Evasion – change to Adept or make it a Minor trait, too many builds depend on this.
Unnerf confusion damage since they were shortened to maybe one PvE hit or only really going to hurt a PvP/WvW’er that doesn’t watch their bar.

Is there anything that would make you stop playing Mesmer? If you’ve stopped what would draw you back?

Breaking my last good crazy build, mantras, would kill mesmer and maybe GW2 for me. (Also thanks for the Mantra buffs)

What has damaged your faith in the devs? Is there any faith remaining? What would have to happen to earn back your trust? Again, please no general statements like “a lot of nerfs.”

Lazy dev’ing. Mimic was one of the really good oddball utilities with a risk/reward that made me feel like I was really Mesmerizing. Confusion damage nerfs(length is ok, it’s now a timing reward, I understand). Changing 1hSword distort to blur because I guess you were too lazy to proc Master of Reflections on it? My small hat tip to fixing sword clone mostly, torch phant mostly, Master of Reflection working with Blurred Inscriptions though so not all bad.

What is your one (reasonable) Mesmer wish?
More Risk/Reward abilities like Old Mimic, Scepter 2, Offhand Sword 4, Illusion of Life, Illusion of Vulnerability, Halting Strike, Confusing Enchantments, Power Block like the GW1 Mesmer. Or you could also give us more standard mobility stuff to make up for lack of quickness, other then learning how to port forward with Staff.

I use Scepter/Off-Hand Sword all the time even in PvE. It’s fine, sure torment does min damage unless you actually move/dodge all the time like I do(unless they are range attackers) but with Retaliatory Shield, Illusion of Vulnerability and Dazzling you can get a good stack of vulnerability and Retal going to met out some good power damage. Despite some mild improvement in Mesmer conditions I still find using the ‘condition’ weapons (Scepter and Staff) with Power more effective(Torch is our only good condition weapon and it is still a bit wanting). Have you tried it with Power stats?

Also the Blocks make clones and a quick hop away with someone(thing) that attacks fast, this is the fastest way to produce clones without wasting util slots.

I miss old mimic, I haven’t been able to run my reflect spec since it was changed. I was able to taunt zergs and stay alive long enough to run them into ambushes with it(and other moves). I even ran Guardian runes for a while to burn people while it blocked their melee spam as long as I got one projectile first and all that.

It was a great risk and reward utility, that really fits the Mesmer theme, forcing unthinking combo/multihit spammers to notice and back off a second or kill themselves. It wasn’t OP, against pure melee it was worthless, hell even several ele builds use streams and not projectiles and it doesn’t really hurt to have a counter to ranger cheapness. I’d love for it to come back, even if a seperate new unlockable utility.

Mimic might be an underused skill, but that is simply due to it’s complexity, not its usability or its power. The tooltip could be updated to show it’s full functionality like many of skills have been but it doesn’t need a change at all. Losing such a fun and opponent frustrating skill like this makes me sad. I will feel less a Mesmer and more a clown or mime trying to pretend their as good as you.

My friend turned me on to Vampire, those extra life steals and mist form have gotten me through a lot of interesting situations (Though I’ve had Mist Form interrupt my heal too which can be annoying if your dying from conditions, but overall still quite more positive then negative since they waste a bunch of cooldowns on mist).

So it seems the September patch will most likely ruin this build but I want people to check it out. This is basically a support build for keeping your team safe. Oddly you will run in the front lines trying to draw aggro while trying to keep reflect up 90% of the time.

Sadly with iWarden’s current kitten iness and this Mimic change it will be dead but I’ll share my fun while you can enjoy it. I really wish I got a good video of it in action before Warden got ruined.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fhQQNAW7dnsISra2nGGoBrbIR3QM5jOnM0IUdskBGA-TFTEABEqEsOdDQp8DONMAcEAE+CAQz+DHcQEYU9HDOgAMcgCa+BAEAABYn7MdWn15O35OP0hO0hO0h2O35O35O3ZpAGVYE-w

So there are a ton of interactions here I’ll try to explain them all.

Reflects:
Signet of Ether/Inspirations with Blurred Inscriptions and Master of Reflection (Panic Reflects, Ether is great because you are trying to survive so reflective distortion is nice and probably want another Warden)
Feedback and Medics Feedback (toss one on enemies and any time you see someone get down try to res them at least for a tick to get an additional bubble)
Mimic (Catch a projectile, even if it’s your own from staff and get 4 seconds of reflect)
Temporal Curtian/iWarden and Warden’s Feedback – these now reflect!
Summon D-Series Golem – I know not everyone is lucky enough to be an Asura, but if you are this bad boy can summon you two little feedbacks(if he survives long enough, the first where you summon him otherwise he can absorb targetting and max AoEs)

Random note on Precision for tutorial completeness, you’ll note most my build gives precision(crit % chance), this is because when you reflect the reflected projectile now uses your stats especially your crit chance, people easily spike themselves down hitting a reflect.

Buffing:
Signet of Inspirations – Your going to get a lot of buffs… share(and get another reflect)
Staff(traited) – pretty much every buff in the world
Traits – Phantasms give regen, regen gives you protection, scepter block gives retaliation, Mimic 4 seconds of blocking and if your annoying and their trying to focus you can max your retaliation(Then share it).
Allies – rune beside guardians and get all their buffs then spread them.
Runes – Healing and using your Elite gives/converts for buffs! (Not as good as it used to be)

TACTICS
Curtian and run in front of EVERYONE, if you are striking at another guild/zerg/party, quickly switch to staff, Chaos Storm do a 180 turn and phase retreat into them. Hopefully by now everyone has the pink glowing ball that is you targeted which you should be instantly taking one shot of staff auto attack at the closest target and hitting Mimic(hopefully a projectile or your staff shot will hit you before CC does) but now you should have a nice 4 second view of your team running in through your Chaos Storm while your pretty much invincible. Be sure to bring back your Chaos Armor when it fades, it won’t interrupt your Mimic.

After they have greatly hurt themselves trying to hit you, be sure you share your buffs and max retal with your passing friends and pick up any that have been knocked down for a quick bubble, if none down use Feedback for the bubble and flip weapons so you can summon a Warden, target someone in the back and give a few people some Confusing Images to deal with. Heal yourself and recast your Warden, be sure to Illusionary Counter and raise downed for bubbles whenever you can.

Flip back to Staff, summon an iWarlock if you want and start again.

If you find a zerg near the bottom of a cliff you feel comfortable jumping off of for min damage, feel free to switch to Decent into Madness trait and start the combo with a free Chaos Storm and Chaos Storm again before switching weapon sets.

In conclusion: This is officially the most hilariously stupid fun build I have ever played in a game. It doesn’t always work perfect. Sometimes I get CC’ed and I have to hope my Feedback and Chaos Armor can cover me tell I can do stuff again. But when it works well I’ve cause so much chaos and random damage my team just comes in a reaps all the weakened targets for fun and bags. Between this and my portal bombs during season it isn’t unusual for zergs to spot me or my team and just run away or avoid rather then deal with us again, even if their bigger. It’s even more hilarious if I’m currently just running solo to see a zerg run from you(It has happened a few times, though maybe they were saving something rather then taking out the lone mesmer in front of them).

Well I think this kills it for me… yet another stab to my reflect build. And how will you get retribution on block(Retaliatory Shield) now since I’m guessing 2 sources of block will be removed with the scepter change?

This just isn’t my Mesmer anymore. We are losing our uniqueness and being dumbed down into obscurity. Soon there won’t be anything mesmerizing about our class at all just another only 1 viable build kitten fest. I was looking at ArcheAge last week and said to myself, nope I still love my Mesmer despite the crippling bugs, I have faith, I was even thinking of going crazy and buying enough gems to get Zap.

You’ve nuked my Glamor build, your hampered and hamstringed my Mantra build and now your starting to drop more bomba on my alternate Reflect build. I just don’t know if I have the heart to care anymore. I’ll keep an eye on what actually happens but I’m pretty sure this will be a great excuse for a clean break from GW2 for me.

Meh, the only reason most of you think Mantras are weak is because you run straight zerker. If you run Knights or Clerics with Restorative Mantras and Protective Mantras you become pretty kittening annoying to down. That being said, they still needs a bit of love.

I’d love if Protective gave stability or even just stun break. I wouldn’t mind 2 3/4 second protection with reduced toughness.

Empowering to 5% would allow for a bit more build variety and make running zerker not as necessary.

Personally I find Mantra Mastery a waste, if it was 33% charge time I’d consider it or some mix of the two.

Pain shouldn’t be an AoE… it’s a wonderfully powerful long range spike damage and that would require weakening it. However I totally would be willing to weaken it if it did life stealing. And you can cycle it fast to do restorative spam for yourself and/or team.

Fay.2357:

Dracatis.1908:

Team (Max 20) portal bomber – have your team hide/buff as you run in with stealth/stability and release the chaos for an easy zerg bust.

This only works against bad players. Generally, if people even hear the portal song inside their zerg, the commander will instantly call for full aoe on the spot, and everyone coming through will just melt.

I still take down pretty high rated huge guild raids with portal bombs… however I’ll be the first to admit it takes a lot of practice and a little luck. (Also helps if your an Asura, I don’t know why but people seem to ignore the red named cute little thing suddenly in the middle of their zerg). Though Hammer/Necro spam zergs can be a bit annoying(I tend to run Null Field, Mantra of Stability and Staff to help negate some of the AoE when they figure out. You can’t do this without Voice Chat, people need to be bashing F and through the portal the instant you lay it.

Fay.2357:

Dracatis.1908:

Reflect Mesmer (Zerg or Small team) – 90% of zerglings only do range things… 90% of range is projectiles… Feedback, Warden’s Feedback, Medic’s Feedback, Masterful Reflection(Blurred Signets helps with it), Mirror(Or Signet of Ether with Blurred Signets). Basically with Staff and X/Focus you can make a zone of relative safety as you haunt the frontlines. You want high Crit but somewhat tanky gear with this to survive well. Also it might help if your a Norn or Charr (I jump around as an Asura when I have distortion/Mirror reflects going, but would probably be easier if I was just bigger).

This used to work amazingly. However, current zergs are more and more dominated by the hammertrain and ground target aoes. You’ll get some reflects here and there if you’re creative with your skills, but it’s not always effective at all.

Yea since the glamour debuffs it’s not AS good but still viable especially since signet reflect works now… if only they would fix Triumphant Distortion reflect. The key here is your only one part of the solution. Hammertrain requires people behind it doing DPS with a couple guardians spamming stability, your DPS can focus things down while you keep some of their DPS off and keep people up. There is no perfect solution… but if everyone plays their part…

Reflect o’ Mancer! That will force most classes to melee… which Necro should eat up pretty easy.

So there are 5 types of things you can do as a WvW mesmer.

Zerg – Viel/Null field/Sig of Inspitations/Mass Invis(or Time Warp) bot, use GS/Staff to AoE and buff.

Solo/Gank team PU – Hunt for people that look distracted or weak, stop people from flipping objectives, hide in an objective that is about to flip and portal people in. Flip supply camps if your good, flip guards and merc camps(then use them to flip supply camps) if you aren’t.

Team (Max 20) portal bomber – have your team hide/buff as you run in with stealth/stability and release the chaos for an easy zerg bust.

Golem Rush Mesmer – dedicated golem team which you port around and try to keep safe quickly ninja’ing buildings.

And last but not least, my favorite…

Reflect Mesmer (Zerg or Small team) – 90% of zerglings only do range things… 90% of range is projectiles… Feedback, Warden’s Feedback, Medic’s Feedback, Masterful Reflection(Blurred Signets helps with it), Mirror(Or Signet of Ether with Blurred Signets). Basically with Staff and X/Focus you can make a zone of relative safety as you haunt the frontlines. You want high Crit but somewhat tanky gear with this to survive well. Also it might help if your a Norn or Charr (I jump around as an Asura when I have distortion/Mirror reflects going, but would probably be easier if I was just bigger).

If you want to do awesome things, get in a good tank/buff/zerg busting team, portal bomb, sneak in and portal them into places being flipped, set a defensive spot(like the arch in the west supply) and reflect when a zerg attempts to fight you(I’ve beat zergs 3 times our size doing this).

I think Illusionary Persona should hide all facts that you are not a clone. All signets, mantras are hidden whenever you are in combat and any targeting on you is removed when a clone is made.

Learn the Moa moves, I typically continue to fight as Moa(Peck and Claw). Sure it messes slightly with my attack rotation, but it’s basically a reset when you change back. If they caught me healing you also can get away pretty easily as a Moa(Screech[if time], Kick, Flee).

I wouldn’t mind if they added a little team heal to the Moa like Antitoxin Spray(FFT chocobo heal ), but then they’d have to extend the duration or reduce the cooldown.

Absconditus.6804:

Dracatis.1908:

Maybe it’s just me, but I just don’t see thematically a Mesmer using a pistol. I mean if your just going to shoot something in the face… why mesmerize them? Off-hand I see it as a last resort for sucking at Mesmer’ing.

What if I told you.. there was no weapons. That gun you see in my Mesmer’s hands. It’s not there. It’s me playing a trick on your mind. You think I have a gun, but it’s in fact just an illusion. That snake curling up near your feet.. that is real though. Us Mesmer’s can’t afford bullets anyways. Nobody takes us to dungeons anymore.

^This is the best argument and I secede the point.

The ’gentleman’s duel’ and ‘high noon’ aren’t duels so much as ‘I want to kill you but I don’t want people to get so mad over it’. Also ’gentleman’s duel’ didn’t automatically mean guns, fisticuffs and sabers were typically picked more typically because you wanted to prove you weren’t just someone that can afford a nice shirt but also physically dangerous if need be.

Fay.2357:

Dracatis.1908:

1. Maybe it’s just me, but I just don’t see thematically a Mesmer using a pistol. I mean if your just going to shoot something in the face… why mesmerize them? Off-hand I see it as a last resort for sucking at Mesmer’ing.

Lol. Offhand pistol you see as a last resort for sucking at mesmer, and you don’t see dual pistols being thematically appropriate for a dueling class? I’d love to hear an explanation for both of those.

I’m ex-military, you don’t ‘duel’ with guns, guns just flat out kill. There is no honor, no drama, no mesmering, no theatrical if it wounds unfatally it’s purely by luck and accident, it takes nearly no skill beyond common sense. And while duel welding is only dramatic in it’s overkillness in the same way Micheal Bay movies are dramatic, you are just stunned by the stupid excess. Try to imagine the Man in Black vs Inigo Montoya in Princess Bride with guns. It wouldn’t work, it isn’t theater. Mesmer is about leaving someone on the floor wondering what just happened, not ‘dur… I’m gonna shoot you tell you die from it!’

Typically for PvE event zerg I find Restorative Mantras/Empowering Mantras to work the best. The healing will keep zerk kitten s alive better, you can spam out Recovery, Pain or Distraction while rezzing when they do fall. If the enemy is condition spammy you ckittene Resolve to help counteract that for the people near you too(or Concentration if they do CC).

Staff is easily the most helpful. If you can get close Sword/Focus can be pretty nice for both DPS and absorbing hits. Otherwise I like Scepter/Sword for the blocks, swordsman can do good DPS while you are rezzing or charging mantras.

If their projectile happy (or your in WvW zergs) I find a reflect build to be the most helpful to win fights. Blurred Inscriptions/Masterful Reflection/Warden’s Feedback, Sword/Focus and Staff, Feedback, Signet of the Inspiration/Midnight, Mirror. A lot of zerg players use range and thus lots of projectiles if you can wade near the front of your zerg (especially if your Norn or Charr for the sig reflect) you can severely damage the opposing zerg with their own attacks.

1. Nope, one of the most viable beams in the game, don’t tempt them to make it a projectile.
2. Would be nice, though they’d have to drop the damage, so meh.
3. Maybe it’s just me, but I just don’t see thematically a Mesmer using a pistol. I mean if your just going to shoot something in the face… why mesmerize them? Off-hand I see it as a last resort for sucking at Mesmer’ing.

Summary: Fixing actual bugs would make me happy, this would not at all.

Navi.7142:

My mesmer is still my main.

^

I tried it in beta but since release I haven’t unlocked Pistol skills. It’s just not my style.

I typically beg off Veil, Time Warp and Null Field to other mesmers in WvW (Though I’m fine running Portal and/or Feedback).

I almost never use Blink. (I really should but it never feels right in a build)

I frequently panic hit 2 when someone is already rezzing me.

I don’t zerk outside occasionally in PvP. I prefer being harder to predict and down.

Man you love to debate yet seem unwilling to believe there is more then one way to win at this game Fay. The best thing about Mesmer(if most of the stuff wasn’t broken) is that we have have some of the biggest diversity of potientially viable builds. So to break your brain I’ll answer your points in reverse.

Fay.2357:

I can guarantee you that he’s never… blah blah blah

I can guarantee you as a good player with an open mind he probably has seen changes come and tried them out to see how they play out. While you can plainly disregard and think something doesn’t work, if someone says it is working for them, then it might be worth revisiting to see if it might work for you.

Fay.2357:

Signet of illusions is not worth it, because refreshing your shatter skills once every 90 seconds simply isn’t strong… I mean, go ahead and try playing without DE. You’ll fight someone with any cleave at all, and you’ll never be able to shatter.

A) ‘Worthless’ Signet of Illusions giving illusions health to survive cleave? And you only use the active when you need that defense or final spike damage. The CD becomes moot as you transverse the map.
B) Not all clones are melee (in fact most aren’t)
C) I rarely ever used DE, while I don’t have a ton of shatter spec experience, especially compared to Supcutie, I don’t feel I’ve been too hampered without it. Though I do more WvW then PvP and clones die too easy there.

Fay.2357:

…and if you run without stunbreakers, you die.

Duh, I wasn’t saying turn this into a full signet build and I wasn’t saying Inspirations or even Domination fit the build, just that their actives can be useful(just debating your point there not applied to the topic directly). I’m not even suggesting a change of build really. But if you read the .pdf Supcutie mentioned that sometimes it was useful to run Master of Reflections so I was simply curious if he ever took it out to the next level. There is no way you can lose Decoy in this build(Though without DE you might want Mirror Images instead, depending on Mass Invis for your stealth). I like how he uses Portal. Blink, personally for this switch up, this is what I’ve give up for a Signet.

One thing I’ve found in WvW is adapting in the middle of battle can really swing it in your favor so I’m good at breaking combat and changing builds on the fly(despite the equipment page being more annoying at least traits is a little easier), even if I’m not the best fighter the change up gives me a big advantage in their confusion.

Fay.2357:

You can’t make good use of the phantasm refresh.

Wut? Well first, without DE your going to be shattering more phantasms after they attack and then you heal and get them back to hit again?

But really I just want to get Supcutie’s opinion and maybe a trial of it with skills far strong then I.

Fay.2357:

As in taking blurred inscriptions over deceptive evasion? No, that’s a horrid idea. For a shatter build functional at all, deceptive evasion is absolutely required. You need that guaranteed rapid source of clones for shatters. That’s not even going into other more objective reasons that it’s a bad trait. Signets for mesmer either have poor actives or aren’t something you want to burn for defense, so the trait just fails miserably in all sorts of ways.

So you wouldn’t burn the Signet of Ether for defense? Or Signet of Illusions to get your shatters back so you can use IP more and maybe a Distortion for 2 sets of invuln frames? Or Signet of Inspirations to share your buffs? Or Signet of Domination for that clutch heavy stun of a Guardian or Thief? I mean… I can see not using Midnight, that thing is worthless unless your running a Staff/Boon build with Signet of Inspirations and maybe a Boon Guardian but I’m starting to think you have an overwhelming fear of anything with a cast time/long CD Fay.

I mean especially with the Sword nerf we got, Deceptive Evasion can screw up your swap so maybe it’s time to branch out and try something new if you still like Sword… (Not that I think Supcutie would make the mistake of wasting a clone, but not everyone is as experienced at shatter builds…).

But I’m not talking to you Fay, I’m asking if Supcutie has tried it out of late especially since they fixed it for Master of Reflections(which they put as a potiential good trait to run).

Hey Supcutie, this is beyond awesome. I was looking at the part with the discussion on Ether Feast over Signet of the Ether and thinking on your build. I know clone on dodge is a great source, but maybe I’m a little too shatter happy since mine seem always on cooldown and these clones seem excessive(But I also only solo que and WvW so I know it’s quite different in tPvP).

Have you ever tried Blurred Inscriptions? With Signet of Ether, I found this heal followed by a distortion pretty clutch in several panic GTFO situations or wanting to get an uninterrupted phantasm off and if you also do Master of Reflections and maybe even Signet of Illusions you can have some good on command fight reset/delay(for when a teammate is rolling to you, want to get a Mass Invis off or whatnot) with potentially a starting advantage. Now I’m curious if those cancels would work with setting this trait off, I might have to test that.

Also voted for you and your teammate(and Hel). Do awesome and show them despite how much anet breaks us with their ‘fixes’, our mesmer players are great enough to make a name and place for ourselves.

600 range is stupidly short too, it would be nice if they gave it like 900 range so we have a decent non-blink method to catch up to a runner. I mean that IS the whole intended purpose of this skill, slow someone down so you can melee them and yet you had one simple job and you’ve failed me so spectacularly clone, now even more…

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I can think of quite a few other recent buffs/fixes.

- Empowering Mantras was previously bugged to be 2% per active instead of 4%. Now it’s properly 4%, i.e. twice the buff.
- Mantra of Concentration and Resolve are now AOE applications..
- Phantasmal Haste now works for Swordsmen.
- Phantasmal Wardens now follow the target properly.
- Illusionist’s Celerity is now a master trait rather than a grandmaster.
- The Prestige is now an actual stealth application rather than a crappy channel.
- Mind Spike now deals extra damage against boon-less targets.
- Signet of the Ether is one of the best heal skills in the game.

I’m sure there’s a bunch more but that’s what I’ve got off the top of my head. So yeah, nothing but nerfs, bad class.

Yay, Empowering Mantras is no longer in a tree with any other Mantra trait, surely we didn’t need the DPS! (Makes Mantra of Distraction better but makes Mantra builds a lot harder to get a decent build)

Yay, Mantra’s charge was lowered and those two are AoE so finally they are somewhat viable in a party(beyond Restorative Mantra’s tiny AoE heal). While I think their viable… it doesn’t seem many agree.

Yay, warden now follows but never attacks, no more depending on him as a small reflect shield and DPS against people too stupid to move!

Yay, swordsman our now best phantasm was made decent! Except they just killed the melee weapon you’d most likely use it with…

Yay, except they nerfed stealth at the same time they fixed it with Reveled and still doesn’t work with thief stealth(probably good things actually, but I wouldn’t call it a much a win for us)… And they nerfed the iMage’s confusion so it is so short it’s worthless even in PvP before finally fixing the AI… somewhat, so you’ll never use torch anyhow!

Yay, mind spike actually works making main hand sword more viable… except now it’s not thanks to this ‘fix’.

Signet of the Ether is wut? The passive heals less then warriors Healing Signet if you’ve managed to keep a clone alive longer then 1 tick. Oh wait but you get your phantasm back when you use and they’ll survive right? Except you don’t get the passive again for 35 seconds and by then they are probably dead. Don’t get me wrong, it is decent for a phantasm build but no where near any of the best heals.

I could go on with all their nerfs like our one good Elite, Time Warp… (If they’d just make it a Glamour I’d consider it again… maybe)

That teleport while clone dead was the only reason you you could run sword reliably in WvW. Now they robbed us of one of our best AoE’s… I thought they were trying to HELP our AoE’s according to that stupid livestream… This better be a ‘fix’ so they can do something much better next patch, we are down 3 weapons now unusable.

I love this game but I can’t even muster the enthusiasm to bother logging in because my poor mesmers quality of life is pretty much literally non-existant. We hardly have working trait lines, so our only viable use is ‘Oh you have a good utility for this we’ll temporarily take a drop in DPS for it then kick you once you aren’t useful, come pretend your having fun while we actually do’. Of course that is only in old content… you make sure our utility doesn’t work in new stuff(like reflect) so we aren’t even welcome in a lot of PvE parties.

But hey, thanks for fixing this REALLY important bug, I’m sure that person couldn’t have been doing anything more productive to getting the state of the game(and mesmers) into a better more stable, less dependent on berserker gear and our effortless kitten weapons GS/Staff, viable place.

First of all you know the heal is only when you recharge it right?

Yea, this works well on a Phantasm build since you’ll keep regen on everyone almost constantly though your traits look more set for a shatter build(despite running defender?). Personally, for how you are wanting it I’d run it more like this:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fhAQNAW7cnsISlaWiGGoB3aIR3QM5hOnsVKUdskBGA-TlTDAB+oMAGVao7gAonmhnUChj6CH/AAKwM0S7P0lSHAOCADcBAUQJYK6AIFw3KjA-w

Basically use Mantra of Pain as a panic heal cycling(and spike damage), otherwise you are keeping 3 phantoms up and being a pester tank. You do more distortion(and thus reflect) this way and you can spread the buff love to others. Alternatively if you get in situations where you get knocked around a bunch or mass conditions you can sub in one or two of the other three Mantras on the signets and change the Blurred Inscription trait to Protective Mantras quite quickly(I’ve done this in combat before if I can get out of aggro). If you really love Sword/Focus better you can change Retaliatory Shield to Mantra Mastery for a very tiny faster Pain cycle or Deceptive Decoy for a GTFO panic… (Though if you keep it Mimic might be more helpful then Defender with more reflects and blocks)

Hmm… how about combine the two ideas.

Have a Mantra Form for 50 seconds(300 second CD, 5 second cast, counts as a Mantra)… like a Tai Chi/Monk stance which switches out your weapons for 5 already charged special Mantras. When you trigger one it then disables all the others but when you charge it instead charges the two beside it. This way you roll through the different ‘mantra stances’ but can reverse direction and it would utilize all the Mantra traits. Here is an idea for them in order 1-5:

Mantra of Agony(Upgraded Pain, charge after chants Resolve and new Universe mantra) – AoE(240 range) on target Normal Damage + Burn(2 sec) + Bleedx3(5 sec) + Confusionx3(7 sec) [Instant Cast, 1 second between cast, no CD, 3.5 second charge]

Mantra of Deception(Upgraded Resolve, charge after chants Pain and Distraction) – Up to 5 conditions in total from you and your closest allies(range 360) are transfered to your target. [Instant Cast, 1 second between cast, no CD, 3.5 second charge]

Mantra of Destiny(Upgraded Distraction, charge after chants Resolve and Concentration) – AoE on Target(240 range) 0.5 second Daze, Chill(5 sec) + Cripple(7 sec) + Tormentx5(7 sec) + Blind(7 sec) [Instant Cast, 1 second between cast, no CD, 3.5 second charge]

Mantra of Fate(Upgraded Concentration, charge after chants Pain and new Universe mantra) – Breaks Stun, Self AoE(600 range) Stability(1.5 sec), Poison(3 sec) + Immobilize(5 sec) + Vulnerability x 5(7 seconds) + Weakness(5 seconds) [Instant Cast, 1 second between cast, no CD, 3.5 second charge]

Mantra of the Universe – 500+ damage, 10% extra damage per condition on target + 1.5 second fear [Instant cast, 1 second CD between cast, 30 second CD, 3.5 second charge]

Also it would block any non-mantra utility from being activated while in the form and you can weapon swap to leave it early.

/drools
That would be pretty sweet.

Well, despite the two shatter traits I run it more like a phantasm build then a shatter one. When they switched up Empowering and Harmonious Mantra they really f-ed up my build. I just tend to shatter near the end of fights to do a Pain spike damage or when they about to get killed. I’ve been toying around with those two traits and got focused on getting more vulnerability, despite not using it as much. I guess Empowered Illusions and Crippling Dissipation might be a better two to use.

I still like my Protected Mantras though 600 toughness for 2 3/4 seconds is nothing to shrug at. Hmm… though if I gave it up I could go Chaos instead and get Bountiful Interruption and Illusionary Defense. Of course that is even less DPS…

I do agree that playing better is a key to success, but when you have events like Marionette and are stuck there swearing to yourself because your the only one left alive on your platform because the glassers missed their dodges… Sometimes you need to take one for the team and be the guy that heals everyone a little more, survives to pick up people that lagged or misdodged, tanky enough to run though an area people are having trouble with to port them through… I’m not perfect and I know my limitations and I choose to have fun getting others to succeed. Sure it takes us a few more seconds to down a boss but we won right?

And the bonus is I don’t have to switch my armor/build much for WvW.

Good number crunching frifox, I stand potientially corrected. Is that with iSwordsman I’m guessing? Unfortunately I missed if they said what weapons/build they were using so I didn’t assume that or reflect(despite that I love running reflect builds and think they are better WvW utility then Veil/Null)

Yes, frifox… and the OP, like me said that they do PvE and some WvW…

And having a separate armor set for just one mode or another is annoying and also it’s obvious that they want to change this meta with the crit damage nerfs so you might as well learn to not depend on pure DPS.

maxinion.8396:

Fay.2357:

Dracatis.1908:

Mantra/Interrupt Build

Knights/Cavalier’s with Runes of Vampirism

6/4/0/4/0 (Empowering/Protective/Restorative Mantras, Rending Shatter, Shattered Concentration, Retaliatory Shield, Mendor’s Purity)

Scepter/Sword and Staff(Yes, power build with mostly condition weapons lol, think outside the box)

Mantra of Recovery/Pain/Distraction, Phantasmal Defender and Summon D-Series Golem

You shouldn’t do this. That’s a horrid build to run in PvE. Shatter builds are just bad, they do far lower dps than phantasm builds. Retaliatory shield is 100% useless in PvE as well, and so is protected mantras.

but pyro, you’re not thinking outside the box!!11!!!

Sure, I’m not doing as much DPS… but since I rarely run solo(even when I do with Megaserver I end up with people a lot), overall DPS isn’t as big of a concern for me.

So I inflict a lot of vulnerabilty, I keep people up with cycling Mantra of Pain when I need to and help buff/protect with Chaos Storm and Defender and dazing…

The main thing is… I almost never go down. I keep my Bloodlust stacks and can wear out most champions to death by myself if I need to. I’ve probably used Waypoints quite a lot less then most anyone with my type of time in the game(always stuff to harvest and nothing scares me).

I like you Pyro, you think and focus well on what you are accomplishing(unlike this maxinion echo-clown, or should I say clone here?), but maybe you didn’t consider how I play PvE?

Yes, because opening utility slots for better options like more reflects/phantasmal defender has no effect on playing your class…

And converting their conditions into boons… isn’t countering how their trying to beat you… sure. Nor having your conditions last longer… (including non-damage ones).

I’ve found when you are already that high in crit chance you actually get a lot more from power… I suggest doing Bloodlust instead(and put it on your ‘weak’ weaponset like Staff). And if your doing a Phantasm build instead of force I’d go with one of the good on crit sigils(otherwise you aren’t getting as much from doing those crits)

Because screw your I just need to do more DPS meta rather then actually try to play a counter-class like it supposed to be. We don’t get a lot of boons easy(unless running Staff) and we have issues with getting rid of conditions without using up valuable utility slots. (Mender’s Purity being the only other easy non-utility way) The excessive boons are just a bonus. Also +Condition Duration which is good if you do all that vulnerability, cripple, immobilze, weapon swap poision…

Mantra/Interrupt Build

Knights/Cavalier’s with Runes of Vampirism

6/4/0/4/0 (Empowering/Protective/Restorative Mantras, Rending Shatter, Shattered Concentration, Retaliatory Shield, Mendor’s Purity)

Scepter/Sword and Staff(Yes, power build with mostly condition weapons lol, think outside the box)

Mantra of Recovery/Pain/Distraction, Phantasmal Defender and Summon D-Series Golem

As a ‘reflect build’(and one of the only people who ever even mention it exists) you want a crit based rune set (since reflected projectiles use your crit chance). Personally I run Lyssa when I do reflect which will also give you a boon when you heal and all boons/strip all conditions when you elite(The first being more useful in PvE especially if you use mantra or mirror heal, the second being quite helpful in WvW, especially if you run Mass Invis).

Oh, I can see what happened here as a dev. So when the shadows are summoned they are set to target the player and when they get close enough they use their ability to KO the player. Decoy(and trait) and Entangle have nifty code in them that says, when this ability happens, your target gets changed to the clone/root.

Oh look their at their target! I’ll hit and KO the player.

Edit: Oops sorry for the necro, was linked from another thread.

Sorry for so many posts but honestly I think the classes should follow a bit more logical and stereotypical basis with customization be at the players whim and willingness to sacrifice(maybe add negatives to each major traits?). Somewhere along the way I think you lost sight of balance with ‘check this out, I think this is cool’.

Warrior should be able to soak damage with the highest armor/hp, I don’t even mind healing signet to let them stay in a bit longer but like any good tank, without support they should be done.

Ranger should well be able to outrange anyone… it’s in their name.

Guardian should have the best healing like a cleric and buffs, but if you spike them they drop.

Elementalist should be a glass cannon with some escape abilities (not invulnerabilities)

Mesmer should be a counter-tactic class if they are set against something you depend on too much, you should lose. Otherwise they annoy you but you’ll probably win/chase them away.

Theif should pop in spike some damage, hope something dies and pop out. Stealth in general should be more like shadow refuge. If someone push/pulls/knocks you up, you should lose stealth(who can’t see a thrown body? Even if it’s true invis you’ll see/hear some impact) Or maybe give a faded or fast vision of them if they get hit. (And this is coming from a main Mesmer) Go play a Spy in TF2, something like that…

Necro has high hp and death shroud so we got basically a depleting tank, a delay tactic which works well for condition damage… except they don’t have the strongest condition burning much. Sure they’ll eventually go down in a prolonged fight… someday, but that is what teammates are for.

Engineer, should be full of surprises, not so much like Mesmer which should daze and confuse you and make you think hard, but can pull out a powerful flamethrower, turrets or bombs/grenades and force an opponent to fight differently to survive an encounter. In concept this works well, but it doesn’t seem to translate in game currently. Engineer rarely frightens/surprises me, when I rarely get to fight one I find a crate has fallen on my head so I have to back off a second then maybe if they are tossing grenades they might be more threatening/annoying then some other target… maybe. Probably not. Take Engineer from TF2 again, can hurt a bit if ignored, chase him down for an easyish kill unless you find his turret… then you might be the easyish kill. This should be the same but more flavor(MMO vs FPS, duh) but still the same defensability to an immobile spot. Maybe have turrets and mines have a cast time where you are immobile but are more powerful. A set engineer is something you want to avoid without help.

I hate to continue the bandwagon but the times I best a thief they stealth and I have to guess the way they escape… sometimes I do catch them if I’m lucky. I can’t, as a mesmer, catch a retreating warrior. At all, ever. My cripples don’t last, my iLeap will fail… twice, my blink might give me one extra hit, their stability/stun break ignores my Temporial Curtian pull and my stuns… (Dogged March… v.v)

Honestly, I know how much it doesn’t SOUND correct, but I think they might need less stability/stun break. Think about it, their the tankest class statwise so they can readily ‘ignore’ most damage… so their weakness should be not being able to ignore things that stop them. While, I don’t mind them being able to last the punishment and do decent DPS IF they build for it or escape IF they build for it or help their team IF they build for it, but they need to specialize to do any of those and they need a weakness they can’t so easily cover.

Also FYI, Healing Signet condition defense doesn’t ever expire, just sayin’ and most condition builds use movement imparing so Dogged March…

Mesmer

I really like what you’ve done for Mesmer for the most part, in GW1 I was ele/mesmer and the mesmer was just for one or two utility skills to round out my build. Now we are a pretty interesting and somewhat viable class but I see two main glaring issues. Our limited ‘spike’ damage requires fairly precise traiting. The biggest issue I have though is, as a mentally based thinking class, our counter-tactic play is pretty weak, in my opinion this is where our ‘spike’ damage should be.

Strength: Build Variety – There are several mostly viable builds which makes us somewhat hard to read before fighting us. Unfortunately good players can see Mantras and Sigils so they can guess at our builds some, but that should be our hard counter out-thinking us.

Weakness: Movement Speed. Honestly I don’t mind this weakness, while several people will try to bypass this with runes… it’s a game to me, can I outsmart my opponent and make it to safety if the battle turns against me despite them being quicker… I would like a ‘shatter’ bar skill that just makes your clones run away until they pop from distance for more distraction, but that is just me.

Kryptonite:
No counter-tactic that works well against Warriors. Warriors are too tanky, too mobile, recover too easily and can still output the DPS and have enough interrupts to counter most our own tactics. While I can 50/50 with a lot of skilled players of other classes, I can’t seem to dent a Warrior(Though probably because I don’t go full zerker like most, I prefer Knights)

Discussion: So as we finished beta it became obvious that our main counter-tactic was Confusion, a specialty that mainly our class could only get(with one or two in warrior and eng). Quickly we found out that this was quite overpowered against players and worse with the diversity of conditions it was hard to strip. So you nerfed it’s damage, ok. Then we found out that building for it we could get nearly 20 second long confusions making it still viable… so that got nerfed too. Unfortunately, most of our play was solely based on that being our DPS so we were forced to go the Power route. The problem is without confusion our counter-tactics is pretty much limited to a couple blocks, reflect(which I love we are the best class for it and build on it), a ton of traits based on interrupt when most of our interrupts are fairly random or hard to land(Staff 5, GS 5’s chargeup time… Sword 4, if you can get it off before you accidentally block and hit with a slow moving straight projectile is a good example, penetration is nice but rarely useful especially the small range and projectile hit size, Pistol 5 and Mantra of Distraction being the only decent ones, though Focus 4 could be good if it triggered them, Signet of Domination having too long a CD and condition damage when most the interrupt traits are power based).

Suggestions: As everyone has said before BUG FIXES are our biggest concern, nothing worse then trying to make a nifty attack or escape to realize nothing happened.

But honestly I’d love to see some tweaks to our class that focus us more to counter-tactic play. More damage to our blocks, easier ways to get longer retribution and protection, fixes on our distortion to work with Masterful Reflection (ie. Triumphant Distortion… would also love if Sword 2 got that reflection traited even if it’s only blur, do some Jedi-style countering). I would also love a trait that punishes for us evading their attack; we have several fairly lame blinds that only stop one attack(or the first swing of 1 attack) where we should be taking advantage of them missing in our theme.

Lastly, one decent counterplay we have the start of is boon stripping, but really it’s pretty weak especially compared to those that can CORRUPT boons. I’d like to see this increased because some depend too much on this which is a tactic we should be able to counter, even not fully spec-ed for it. Null Field should strip everything since that is all it does. I’d even love if it stripped other buffs that normally can’t be stripped while just when they are in the field (They get them back once outside). iDisenchanter and Sword 1 should do an additional one at a time. I’d even up Arcane Thievery again since that is ALL it does with a big CD(and the new meta seems to be big all condition/buff spam).

Lastly I’d love to see Signet of Midnight swapped active and passive (Passive: X% chance to blind when hit[10-20 second CD], Activate: Double all current boons on you. This would give some good counter-tactic play along with synergy with Signet of Inspirations and maybe make a Signet Build viable(might need a few more traits though).

I meant no offense Pyro, but the OP was which build is best running Celestial. While an answer of builds will be weaker with Celestial is good information(and true) it doesn’t really answer the OP. The question was ASSUME Celestial was a immutable constant and not going to change, which build would work best for it? Let the poster decide with the information if they are willing to not min/max by the limitations of good viable builds with their stat selection.

I like it actually, though then you stand the chance of the proc failing if THEY block/evade the next attack. But I’d be ok with this, especially if they upped it due to this change(and potential damage loss if the proc doesn’t hit).

Err… Well first of all you know the trick of leaving one of your main hands empty so you don’t need a extra sword right? (Though you may want one if you want a different sigil)

Anyhow that is completely a Power Melee Build so I suggest Knights that way you get toughness, power and precision. You can get a couple cavaliers also if you want to up your ferocity. When you get ascended put Power infusions in(unless you are wanting to do a reflect build then you might want Precision so your reflects crit more)

Best weapon? Off-Hand Sword :V

Best Weapon for new butterfly? Torch until you get decoy/mirror images, then Off-Hand Sword (Scepter or Sword are personal preference in my opinion, I like scepters block and clone gen, but Sword’s melee AoE and invinco frenzy are handy)

Second Best Weapon for new butterfly? Staff, mesmer is a rough start without traits. Yes, Staff is slow and defensive but you’ll survive a lot of tough situations with Staff.

Not recommended for PvE: GS, most mobs are melee meaning unless you target the archers in the back and position to hit the melees too your aren’t outputing hardly any damage and untraited is meh. Pistol, sure iDuelist can output some decent DPS and the cc shot will be hard to use effectively against mobs.

If you were working side-by-side with a Staff Guardian in PvE, that might be a good way to get your might stacks then if you run Signet of Inspirations you can double theirs back, plus more buffs if you are running Staff yourself. Don’t worry too much about ney sayers, especially if your sticking to PvE, have fun and think about how to best use that spread of stats. Make sure you use Sharpening Stones/Arcane Crystals/Maintence Oil to get the most out of the toughness/vitality(I suggest the stones if you have the weaponsmith)

Celestial is better for Engineer, Elementalist, Ranger or Warrior in my opinion.

That being said if you really want to run this you want a mainly Power style build otherwise your ‘wasting’ 3 stats worth of points(Power, Precision, Ferocity). If you want to take advantage of healing power I suggest using Restorative Mantras and 15 in Chaos so you get Illusionary Membrane.

After that you could go most any way, lock build(Domination, Since you could easily run Mantra of Distraction/Pain) is what I’d go with, but finishing Chaos for PU or hitting up Illusions for a Shatter build would work too.

Personally I’d suggest Staff and Sword/Torch to start. These will keep you alive and you can take anything down going back and forth between range and melee favoring whatever your enemy is bad at, use The Prestige to lose aggro for her for a few seconds if she gets low and send them your way.

Get Blink and Decoy to increase survivability. Get Mantra of Distration to start learning to watch enemies for when they are readying an attack so you can interrupt or dodge(the difference between a good player and dead frustrated one is learning to dodge). Get Mirror Images to learn how to best use your shatter skills.

I think honestly we have the most fun of a class, doing ridiculous stuff and getting away with it… but it’s a really rough start until you get some good trait. Read other people’s builds to see what traits you want to aim for after you get some practice with everything.