Guild Wars 2

If I want a tank I’d get my warrior. There’s plenty of good builds for Mesmer without resorting to tank gear for survival. I also think people too often look at a class as being by itself. But this game’s mechanics make teamwork an extremely strong and often under utilized aspect of the game. And while class “A” might destroy class “B” in a 1 v 1… those encounters are seldom. And if you know your own weakness, bring a friend to get your back. I have a buddy that rolls Engi and he’s built to kill thieves. He’s 1 v3’d thieves and won, so I bring him when I go on my Mesmer… I kill warriors and he kills thieves and we’re all good… 2 man roamer team.

Thanks good to know.

I disagree with Vince. While I think confusion in dungeons is an enormous waste of time… clones/ phant’s do a good bit of bleed dmg over longer fights. Depending on what your team composition is i.e. how many OTHER players are fighting you for bleed stacks, I’d consider running a Rampager set. It has the highest precision, allowing for the most bleed stacks, and more procs from any stat food / sigils you may be running (Sigil of Strength owns in this build, as it has no internal cooldown) I suggest running Omnomberry pie or ghosts for the lifesteal and precision for a bit more dps and survivability.

Rampager is also extremely easy to get, it can be crafted or purchased with dungeon tokens from AC, TA, and CoF which are some of the easiest farms out there. Also if you run a staff on swap, Chaos storm and the staff auto attack apply random conditions, which makes the condition dmg aspect of the Rampager set all the more appealing. If you need surviability you can work in a few pieces of Knights for the toughness, or use distortion shatter in your rotation. It’s a loss of dps but you can’t dps while dead.

You should get to gether with this guy and talk shop. I think you both got good ideas.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Forging-the-Ultimate-Support-Mesmer/first#post1384121

So I’ll be honest I didn’t read every post here… but my 2 cents is you can use clones and shatter if you time it right. As in… soon as you see a grub die… spam 3 clones and shatter. You CANNOT leave phant’s up in phase 1 or you’ll shaft your team. But if you play right, you should be able to do fine. I’ve done Lupi half dozen times on my FULL glass cannon GS using mesmer and I was fine. And yea… feedback is own-face in almost every exp path in Arah. It’s great on Lupi, it wrecks the spider boss, it one shots those eye turrets … Mesmer is OP in Arah… don’t let your here to short comings get you down brah, just be pro =P

@jportell see #10 can’t kill you if they can’t catch you…. and you can’t kill yourself if you aren’t attacking them.

P.S. I deliberately am not getting my world complete so that I don’t have the ’I’m over here you dunderhead!" star on my nameplate. I feel like this star should be OPTIONAL for all stealth capable classes. There should be a check-box in the achievements window or something.

1: mass invisibility is weak-sause compared to Timewarp even though the CD is shorter, the quickness + combo field makes anyone with projectile finish ROLL ppl in pvp (rangers + thieves). Doubly so for anyone running condition dmg. Additionally in pve mass invis is extremely limited in it’s utility.

2: Other classes give out regen. I think you’re focusing too hard on this aspect of the build. IF for some reason you were the ONLY person in your 5 man team that was giving regen, then I could mabye see your concern. But I can keep 100% uptime on AoE regen on my warrior using traits + banner of Discipline. Guardians can supply aoe regen as well (probably not 100% up-time tho).

3: Hammer Guardians, Necromancer, Engineers, and Warriors all (could if built for it) use blast finishers in their regular dps rotations. This could supplement uptime on chaos armor, retaliation and other boons. The Hammer Guard is probably the best source of this since the #2 is on a 4 second cool down. That’s 3 per timewarp if executed correctly, and more if you run feeback/null feild as well as chaos storm. The important thing to note is that blast finishing only executes on the most recently laid combo field, so if anyone drops a combo field on top of yours, it’s rendered null for performing any combos. This takes coordination in group (especially if you have an elementalist), but can have HUGE returns if done regularly and correctly.

4: I would suggest Null Field over Feedback for most situations. Reason being… other classes can, and do reflect projectiles. Not so with striping boons from a guardian that just popped “Save yourselves” or anyone running 6 set Lyssa runes. Also, if you trait for it, the speed boost on focus can block projectiles, not sure if this would work into your build well, but it exists and it would free up a utility slot for Null Field.

5: I can stack and keep about 17 stacks of might on the whole party on my guardian. And this is my regular non-support build. Also many warriors run “For Great Justice” on cool-down which gives AoE might + Fury. Guardians also can bring AoE stability to the table from 2 skills.

Bottom line… I like your build in theory, but I would tweak it and always run with a guardian and maybe a warrior. I feel it would be much more viable, and you could actually work in some dps maybe.

Tips to kill a mesmer/ not die to a mesmer:

1: Do not travel alone… that’s asking to get jumped.
2: Try to be the jump-er not the jump-e, bursting a mesmer down before they can react is the method with the highest success rate.
3: Call target and coordinate with your team, yes you loose the cross hairs when they stealth, but more eyes makes less work.
4: Mesmer clones do NOT have boons / signets that the player does.
5: Mesmer clones do NOT dodge roll.
6: the REAL mesmer will not be cloudy … that’s a phantasm
7: STOP CASTING IF YOU GOT CONFUSION kitten (cure condition if you got it)
8: If the mesmer has a bubble on him… do not hit him (see #7)
9: if it’s a Greatsword mesmer.. go melee range he does less dmg. (or Line of sight)
10: If the fight starts getting away from you… RUN mesmers are EFFIN SLOW. Even with blink they won’t be able to catch most classes. (unless you can’t cure that cripple then you’re toast)

While we’re on the topic… how bout fixing the nomenclature on the tool-tips for Mantras, giving mesmer a 25% speed signet (currently the ONLY ranged class without one and that’s if you count thieves as a “ranged” class), fixing the bug in Ascalonian Catacombs Exp path 3 where (when in ghost form) you do NOT summon a clone while evading (yes it’s traited) making scepter a non mediocre weapon, and a myriad of other things that are broken on mesmers.

Honestly… I couldn’t give 2 jugs of liquid karma what happens to trident clones since everyone avoids underwater combat like the plague; but there’s defiantly a lot still wrong with this class.

There is an un-met need here. I agree 100 percent. Adding a Black Lion Chest loot for a field trait reset would be handy to, and I think it would even be a commonly purchased gem-store item, were it sold separately.

I have a GS build which allows me to run 89% crit chance and have 100% uptime on fury. So according to you, this build would be at least on par or better than MH Axe? And you would suggest axe for more mobile combat and or situations that require say an off hand shield or war-horn?

Nkrdbl.8160:

I’ve seen a lot of sPvP greatsword builds, but I feel mine is slightly different.

http://tinyurl.com/8crg6r5

I prefer 30 points into discipline for two reasons. First, the 100% chance to rally from a successful vengeance kill can be extremely helpful, and secondly having movement skills break immobilize is also another great trait to have.

From most of the greatsword builds I’ve seen out there, it seems most recommend using a 1h/shield as your secondary weapons. I can’t help but disagree. From my experience, I’ve had no problem killing players who use a shield instead of a ranged weapon. It boils down to personal preference however. I for one like to have ranged abilities and you just can’t beat the damage from the kill shot skill (so long as you use it at the right time, generally after you watch your enemy dodge twice!).

Of course I’m open to build criticism or suggestions, but for now I find that this build works quite well for me.

Edit: I changed my build, slightly.

Decided to take 10 points out of arms and move it to defense instead. I think this is a better choice.

I would disagree with your rune choice in the defense tree. Reason: your build does not apply any form of weakness, so the trait is useless to you, unless you run with a second player that applies weakness regularly, and even then it will fall off quickly and it’s not a very reliable increase in dps. I would advise a different rune, or removing the 10 points from Defense entirely, unless you’re going for the 15 slot passive.

This screenshot was taken form the Malrona encounter in the UP path of Twilight Arbor. I’m not exactly sure HOW I crit this high; I’ve had it happen before, but ONLY on this boss encounter. I know I had 25 stacks of Might, the boss had 25 stacks of Vuln, not sure what else, but it was frozen. I think my hundred blades read like 45k at the end, and right after that my auto atks were trucking for upwards of 8k. I’m thinking it was a bug, because I don’t hit that high even at level 80, and this boss fight scales you down to 55, but as far as records go, these are my numbers.

I agree that ALL those fixes would make the respective PvP modes much improved, but I still don’t feel like it would address the middle ground that an additional GvG system would. To break it down further, s-PvP is could be called a small, and GvG could be called a medium, and WvW could be called a large. I know many players love spending half a day conquering tower after tower in WvW, and yet others like the small 5-10 man S-PvP system where you get tight coordination. Personally I like my PvP in doses, so like say 2-3 hrs of good hard competition twice a week, leaves time for work, and dungeons and other stuff. Also I feel like a GvG system would be much more compelling for the sheer reason that players often find it a lot easier to have guild pride, than server pride, and would therefore be more likely to participate regularly, thereby keeping players that might otherwise loose touch with the game engrossed in the guild dynamic. Additionally, I know many players don’t like PvP because they’re not very confident and don’t want to mess up in an environment that would adversely affect large numbers of people. I think that if a GvG system were implemented it would give newer players a place to get a handle on basic PvP concepts without feeling like a burden to their WvW team, or getting yelled at by the die-hards in s-PvP. I think the result would actually be better WvW competition, and more s-PvP interest than is currently in place.

I guess my main beef is that as it stands, neither the WvW option nor the S-PvP option really appeal to me as time expenditures. WvW is too time intensive and has very little tangible reward, and S-PvP is too detached from the rest of the game. The PvE content is great… for what it is, but I’m like 3 exp paths away from my dungeon master, and I don’t want to finish it because then I know I will have nothing to do. I guess if 1000 hrs is what I get for a $60 game I can’t really say I didn’t get my money’s worth, but I’d rather keep playing GW2. I don’t like game hopping, especially in MMO’s, so I guess I’m just trying to help Anet help me like the game more. I could honestly do without a lot of the fluff events, like Wintersday, if it meant that the devs were gonna release some solid endgame content 1 or 2 months down the road. I’ve heard that February is gonna have some PvP/WvW balancing and patches so maybe that will fix some of my concerns, but I just thought that given some of the similarities between RO and GW2 in that there’s not really any gear progression, and they’re not gonna release patches raising the level cap like WoW does, that a similar PvP system could keep the game alive. I know from personal experience that the GvG competition in RO’s WoE kept that game alive waaaay longer than it would have otherwise lived, purely because the anticipation of the next staged fight kept the whole guild on it’s toes tweaking and perfecting their play-styles, gear and stat distributions, very similar to what I see already in GW2. And I mean if for no other reason, than the name of the franchise…. it’s not called World Wars 2 after all… that might be a little bit misleading…=o

WoE from RO was exactly what I was talking about but I feel like not very many people would get the reference, and I didn’t want to name drop.

I’d like to start off by saying that I really do enjoy this game, I appreciate all the hard work and creative genius it takes to keep the game going, and I really want it to continue to be a game I can look forward to playing. That being said, after about 1000 hours of game-play, I have started to run low on things I need/want to do. Lately it’s been the monotony of grinding for legendary components punctuated sporadically with dungeon runs for tokens I have no need for, because all 4 of my level 80 characters have everything they need. When I originally heard about GW2, it sounded very similar to a much older MMO game that I had played several years back, the endgame for which revolved around a Guild vs Guild system. I know some games have implemented GvG systems previously and failed, and I know that Arena Net is more intent on breaking the mold than conforming to past methodology, but speaking from personal experience, it was a lot easier to get excited for a victory when it was your guild that was dominating, rather than a server full of faceless binary entities. I feel that a GvG system would fill a nich that is not currently filled by either S-PvP, or WvWvW.
The GvG system in place in the old MMO I’m referencing, engaged the community, and was both a source of periodic intense competition, and one of learning, strategic teamwork and fun. Any and all of the guilds on a server were permitted to participate, the objective wast so capture and defend a fortified structure, not dissimilar from Stonemist, but with a more maze-like design. There where around 4-6 “castles” for lack of a better word on each GvG map. There were 4 maps, but only one map was open at a time. The GvG events ran at set times, usually 2 times a week for a period of about 1-2 hrs (for the sake of GW2 a 3-4 hr window may be more realistic). Guilds in control of a castle could upgrade it’s defenses, hire NPC guards (that did moderate dmg and CC), and at the end of the session, the guilds who were currently in control of the castles were locked in as the owners until that map came back up in the rotation. In between GvG sessions, members of a guild that had access to a castle, could access a dungeon/map that was unique to each GvG map, but shared by all the castles, AND was an active pvp zone (like WvWvW). in these “dungeons” (they weren’t instanced) were higher level mobs that dropped loot unique to that dungeon, and that wasn’t accessible any other way. The dungeon was also housed the equivalent of a world boss, which guilds would fight each other for the rights to it’s loot. Castles would also generate a daily loot chest accessible only to the guild leader, that mostly spawned upgrade items such as runes, sigils, crafting mats etc, but also had a chance to spawn very low drop rate components for what was the equivalent of legendary gear.
This system filled the bill for the intense coordinated pvp that many crave, while not requiring vast sessions of grinding making very little headway as is often the case in WvW. I can’t say for sure, but I think if the castles are semi instanced, that it would be pretty reasonable to say culling could be eliminated, affording more consistent game-play while better engaging the player, by bringing the conflict closer to home, giving them more political efficacy in the sense that “Yeah.. if I don’t go on my guardian to help my guild hold X position, we’ll get over run and loose Y” I think many players feel that WvW is too large scale, and that without mass voip it’s impossible to coordinate properly to take objectives. This solution may solve that issue, and I believe that it is more in keeping with the “Come and Go” atmosphere that has been setup in GW2.
This is my personal opinion, if anyone has constructive input please feel free to comment. I obviously do not expect Anet to coppy another MMO’s endgame, but I think the model is really engaging, and I felt that the reward mechanic was appealing, and not imbalanced. I don’t think it would be hard to expound on this frame work to produce a similar but much more engaging version that would fit better into GW2.

In the Durmond Priory quest “Containment”: I chose to use resources at the priory instead of recovering the original scabbard. After you successfully defend Gixx from the Grenth summoned mobs, he gives a cinematic dialog in which he mentions “Priory Anarchists” when the dialog script reads “Priory Archanists”. (I’m not 100% certain of this, as I wasn’t able to get a screen cap, not that it would have sound if I did, but I thought I should bring this to your attention in case I was correct.)

It just seamed funny that the head of the Durmond Priory would mispronounce one of it’s own ranks.