Guild Wars 2

As an oceanic PvPer who averages around 200-250 ping you will find condition builds or bunkery specs easier and less reaction dependant.
I’n saying that if im 200 ping or under ill play thief/mesmer and while noticable still, the ping isn’t a huge issue

For me it’s always been Mesmer.

Special mention to engi and condi necro too.

Cynz.9437:

as much as i can’t stand mesmers atm i don’t think those suggestions are good
what needs to happen is:
- shatter blind shouldn’t go through evades/dodge
- confounding suggestions should only stun when you actually interrupt something and should have decent ICD
- possibly move CS to other trait line so it has to compete with other good traits so mesmers can’t have all good things in 1
- mantras shouldn’t recharge in background as fast (arguably)
- passive phantasm 15% buff needs to be a trait again
- PU may need some adjustments in numbers

Yes.
I’m a Mesmer main, and while I think Mesmer is over the top by a bit, it is also so close to balanced.
You get what it needs, to stop people nerfing the wrong places, this is exactly what isn’t so right with Mesmer atm (imo).
Just to clarify I think Mantras should still recharge in the background but will need a CD increase to go along with it now (particularly on heal mantra).
PU should be reverted to what it was pre patch, the reason it wasn’t taken was because of the other necessary traits. Now that some of those have moved or are baseline, PU is a viable option without having to give up too much. It didn’t need a buff to be taken.
Edit: I do disagree with an ICD increase on CS, so long as the stun is only on interrupt it will be ok.

From my experience thus far.
S+
Ele

S
Mesmer

A
Guard
Necro

B +
Thief
Warrior

C
Engi

C-
Ranger

I’m sorry but none of these ideas make any sense and do not address the probems with Mesmer atm, just random nerfs for the sske of nerfs.

Me and my mate duo’d it in 6 seconds from reaching the steps in a game yesterday. Def needs an hp boost.

I don’t play ele at a top level, but had no issues getting the standard builds up to an at least acceptable level.

As a long time Mesmer main there’s a couple of things I think need to be changed to sort the current Mesmers out, however the rest of your post, was absolutely hilariously inaccurate.

Warlock is the hardest hitting phantasm…. its just that… it never hits xD

Hello grouch, I do hope your looking at other classes as closely as Mesmer.
I also think a few things have been over the top (from all classes, not just Mesmer).
Take a little look at Prismatic Understanding and Confounding Suggestions. Please hit the problems where it exists, rather then nerfing everything around it while missing the core problems.

kdaddy.5431:

Every match i played if i faced a cele thief/mesmer i beat them. If they caught you with a big burst dmg the question becomes are you glass or bunker? If your glass you should go down since you got beat. I literally held a point for about 45 sec against a pure dps mesmer and a cele d/d ele. I hope you actually played with your runes and ammy before just saying there op.

On my zerker warrior i was able to kill glassy characters in 2-4 hits and i was also glass so when i got hit i went down fast too. Thats how its suppose to work.

Exactly what I’m saying. People are so certain thieves and Mesmers are OP is because they’ve tricked themselves into thinking they can only use a zerk amulet after the patch. I’ve also tested and been succesful with a bunker build post patch. (Far more succesful then during the cele meta)

Honestly for a first day release on a massive update like this the balance was actually pretty good. Sure there’s some work to do, and a few builds that they obviously didn’t think about that will need fixing, but all in all well done anet.
SOme classes are unplayable? That’s bullkitten. I’ve seen potential tourney level specs from every class so far. I think the biggest issue people are having is they haven’t clicked that zerker/rauder is far from the only viable amulet.

CruleD.7380:

One per Illusion Shattered.
3 Clones = 3 Conditions removed.

It’s one per shatter skill, not per illusion.

YourFriendMarvin.4127:

what is to come.

Bank Space. Thank god.

Trigr.6481:

Neptune.2570:

Honestly I never liked the sound of confusing combatants, why gut clone death and then implement an equally passive source of even more damaging condition application.
MTD getting gutted seems a bit senseless, even if it wasn’t my fav playstyle.

What you don’t seem to understand about it, is even IF you crit, it’s still a 1/3 chance of a stack of confusion still being applied. It’s not a broken trait.

I don’t think it’s broken, just against the play that the Dev’s were going for. In the removal of it there should have been other options, and that’s why I’m very against MTD getting gutted. Thats exactly the sort of condi application we should have.

Honestly I never liked the sound of confusing combatants, why gut clone death and then implement an equally passive source of even more damaging condition application.
MTD getting gutted seems a bit senseless, even if it wasn’t my fav playstyle.

nearlight.3064:

Ha I remember this. Too bad necromancer downstate with death’s embrace and chill of death procs kinda outclassed the mesmer downstate build for a while.

Noway, The Necro downstate would melt on our downstates retal.
In all seriousness though, it’s nice to see how far the Mesmer class has come since this time. Robert G for President.

With tomorrows change of traits, and so many decent options being given for Mesmer survival, I’m afraid this super Mesmer Meta build has been nerfed into the ground. RIP.

Racist.

… I also thought this was a singing tourny xD

Which is exactly what I was saying…. But that still has nothing to do with condi classes being hardcountered out of the meta. That simply isn’t true, I think your misusing the phrase ‘hardcounter’.

Toxsa.2701:

Neptune.2570:

There is only two ‘hardcounters’ in this game.

Condi necro vs condi Engi and Thief vs Mes.

Everyone goes on about hardcounters, but really other matchups are just slight under handed and disadvantaged compared to the other two.

If condition spec isn’t hard-countered by shoutbow and celestial ele, they wouldn’t have be driven out of High Tier competitive scene completely, Basically there’re like 0 people playing pure condition spec in ToL 3. I remembered condition spec used to be claimed OP.

For the same reason pure bunker specs aren’t played anymore. Not because there hard countered, but because there obselete. Cele brings more to the table it isn’t worth bringing something with a tiny amount more condi pressure or sustain, when you can have it all one in with very little trade off and higher dps.

There is only two ‘hardcounters’ in this game.

Condi necro vs condi Engi and Thief vs Mes.

Everyone goes on about hardcounters, but really other matchups are just slight under handed and disadvantaged compared to the other two.

NeXeD.3042:

Neptune.2570:

Ok, I really didn’t want to get involved in the stupidity of this thread, but I’m gonna bite.
Not a single person claiming Mesmers are OP have given anything actually factual about Mesmers. Seriously? Have any of you ever played one? The only legit point without hyperbole’s and straight up lies to be mentioned is that Mesmers Moa from stealth has little counterplay, (that’s if you fail to see the mesmer stealthing or your team doesn’t keep track of it’s opponants glassiest dps dealer).
As for all the GS complaints. Your complaining GS has insane damage. No kitten. GS is a 100% offensive weapon. Every skill on it is about dps with little utility and no defense. A shatter mesmer who just swapped to GS is literally the easiest focus target in the game.

Your right, my bad mesmers are definitely just bad. They can’t lockdown from stealth and spike people for 10k. They can’t completely shutdown all transformations. They can’t teleport vertically, they can’t teleport there whole team to a point after they have stealthed to a point, they can’t proc air fire sigils from an insane range or use their gs as a range finder for enemies. They can’t go invincible every 10 seconds. my bad.

Where’s my hyperbole.

Here’s your hyperbole’s.
Lockdown from stealth is on a 45 sec cd and uses all your resources, all other cc’s are tied to damage. The animation is obvious. Clones Friggen charge at you, how is that without counterplay?
Spiking for 10k from stealth, technically possible, but you can still see mirror blade coming at your, or the clone appear for the immob swap combo. When a mesmer has 3 clones out and you miss the set up, yes, it’s possible to hit up to 10k bursts.
No, they can’t go invincible every 10 seconds. BF is an evade. which roots you in place, the mesmer is still ticking conditions and taking retal damage. Given the skill is tied to a melee weapon set. And mesmers can not fight in melee other then jumping in then out to safety again, 2, out of every 20 seconds, and that’s when traited, otherwise its every 24 seconds, is the most the mesmer can use this evade.

Also I never said Mesmers are bad >.>
Just saying the information and ‘facts’ in this thread are absolute bullkitten.

Ok, I really didn’t want to get involved in the stupidity of this thread, but I’m gonna bite.
Not a single person claiming Mesmers are OP have given anything actually factual about Mesmers. Seriously? Have any of you ever played one? The only legit point without hyperbole’s and straight up lies to be mentioned is that Mesmers Moa from stealth has little counterplay, (that’s if you fail to see the mesmer stealthing or your team doesn’t keep track of it’s opponants glassiest dps dealer).
As for all the GS complaints. Your complaining GS has insane damage. No kitten. GS is a 100% offensive weapon. Every skill on it is about dps with little utility and no defense. A shatter mesmer who just swapped to GS is literally the easiest focus target in the game.

One thing I struggle with is opening up a fight

Don’t always use the same old predictable openings, bait dodges by cancel casting mirror blade and leading with f2 shatter before your f1 spike, you don’t have to follow the same old cliche shatter rotations.

I’m also really bad at using Distortion wisely

The more you play the more comfortable you’ll feel with it I guess, sometimes using it it pro-actively will pay off better then re-actively, particularly vs thieves/necros.

I also have issues with using Sword mainhand

I’ve always seen sword as more of a defensive/utility weapon then an offensive one.
S2 is just something your gonna have to get used to using defensively it gets stuck in your muscle memory as an evade. You can blink during s2 as well if you used it as a last second ‘oh kitten’ button.
S3 is great, once you learn it’s knack. You can cancel cast the clone animation allowing an instant swap/instant immob, it takes a bit of practice, but is far more reliable and cuts off a 1/4-1/2 second casting. if you don’t need the immob/swap don’t always use it, often it will instantly bait one dodge then leaves you with a free stunbreak for the next 5 seconds and a second chance at the immob which they will have to random dodhge to avoid.

Your tones changed pretty quickly :P
I think a chrono spec’d 6/0/6/0/0/6 would 100-0 a reaper 1v1, but how it performs in conquest mode is yet to be seen.

Thank you this is great advice!
As for the GS, it’s not those who camp it, I can still beat terrible players ofc :P
Perhaps my biggest issue was my failing to recognize when to disengage, especially seeing I know drawn out staff clones are able to wear down a guards defenses while I’m resetting. Thanks for the great advice man

Hi guys, I’ve just returned from a long hiatus and am in need of some pointers from medi guards.
While always a tough matchup, i never really had any real struggles vsing medi guards, but since i’ve come back I’ve been dominated by any decent one and need to know what i’m doing wrong.
The worst are the GS ones, but isn’t exclusive to them at all. Need pointers on what to dodge, how to predict when the JI burst is coming in, and the best opportunities to get my clone produting out as there getting cleaved far too easily atm.
Any advice is much appreciated

Agreed, awesome work to Robert and the team. Great vision.

Time Marches On – You move 25% faster. The duration of incoming movement-impairing conditions is reduced by 25%. (Cripple. Chilled, Immobilize)

Yussszszszzzsss get kittened panic strike!

I plan on coming back to the game again, care to help a buddy out and kick my kitten back into shape chaos?

I don’t think it’s mandatory, but certainly a big one to drop. I’m undecided if I’ll try chronoshatter without dueling or illusion yet. Dueling seems the obvious one, but blind on shatter is such a big kitten you to thieves i think it’ll be huge survival tool.

Dude, please give it a rest already.

Clone death wasn’t how anet intended the Mesmer class being played. I’m sure they didn’t expect a handful of mesmers to base there entire build and playstyle around the traits that it seems were an after thought of anets.

Condi clone death wasn’t a fun build to fight against, nor was it the type of balanced build that rewards skilled play. The only reason it existed as long as it did was because slow attrition based builds that camped in stealth the couldn’t kill fast or hold a point at all and offers 0 team support clearly isn’t going to be an issue in conquest, however if anet are going to explore other pvp game modes, the build needed to be hit hard.

Anyone who has a real understanding of Mesmer can see we are receiving a huge plethora of buffs, in the areas that we really needed them too, and that’s before I even start on how kitten the Chronomancer is looking!

Have you considered perhaps re-rolling to a MM?

DrDivine.5378:

With the recently announced balance changes, do you think mesmers will have the tools needed to combat thieves and still be relevant in team fights?

If we go on the what we know now, Panic strike will be a near sure death for Mesmers when it procs, however we have been given a plethora of new ways to avoid this and mitigate it. The natural counter will still exist, but the room for outplaying the thief will be increased. In saying this, the devs are still tweaking traits and numbers and I am not taking elite specialisations into account.

EremiteAngel.9765:

you guys talk until as if thieves totally own mesmers…i think its a matter of learning to play.

It is build dependent, but you have totally not experianced enough of the game if you disagree that S/D thief vs any Power Mesmer barring phantasm is the biggest hardcounter in this game. Not sure what build or where your experience has come from but this is a well known fact to anyone beyond novice level in PvP.

This is brilliant.

Warlord of Chaos.7845:

Honestly, that mind wrack trait needs to be GM at its current state, as it gives 50% damage increase to anyone that isn’t using a skill. So if you take confounding suggestions, you can mirror blade, blink, diversion or mantra, mind wrack and your target will probably have died. If my mind wracks do about 2.5k to the average person without mind wrack trait, with fragility and that trait, they will now do 4.1k (not including extra vuln from dazes and mirror blade), and combined with a 3 bounce mirror blade, that target is going to explode.

Yep, I’m amazed even for a second that people have cried nerf. What we have coming is huge. Massive buff to cc, dps and survivability all in one.

What? I’m over the moon about the Mesmer changes. Basically the entire illusion traitline has been added as a base mechanic and the traits reworked into much better versions. We’ve been given much more reliable ways to deal with thieves (Aoe, non targeted blinds will be kittening amazing), and were now open to use our profession mechanic to create a new plethora of potentially viable builds. Honestly all it did was buff high risk specs and replace the dull playstyle that some of the more passive builds with options to perform higher with a better skill cap. With the new traitline I’m expecting serious lockdown/rupt love too, something they’ve given in the already released traits for a start. My only worry is with the buffing of conditions on of our most obvious weakness will stand out moreso. Overall i’m failing to see how any mes main could be negative of the proposed changes.

The only thing we should be comparing is our current frustrations that hold our two classes back ^^, I feel Necro and Mesmer share a special similarity atm.
Sincerely, Mesmer main.

What builds are ‘hard’ depends on the tier and player, so I’ll say what I personally feel takes the most effort and awareness to make effective.

Shatter Mes
D/P executioner
Fresh Air Ele
Condi Necro

ronpierce.2760:

Neptune.2570:

1. Turret Engi
2. Condi Engi (Sorry Engi’s, but having bleed, burn, vuln, poison, torment proc from a single AA is kittening lame.)
3. LB Ranger
4. SA thief… Don’t have time for such tomfoolery.
5. Condi mes
6. SB/krait runes ranger.

For personal reasons, what are your thoughts on Carrion Axe/Dagger Sword/Torch (Scavenger) rangers? I feel the need to defend myself here because I feel like theres more to them than SB rangers. xD

Honestly fine, it’s just the shortbow I have a serious (maybe even unjustified) issue with. Animations seem so similar, so centered around its auto attack, single target slow ticking condi’s without the ability to bomb. It’s just so… bland…

1. Turret Engi
2. Condi Engi (Sorry Engi’s, but having bleed, burn, vuln, poison, torment proc from a single AA is kittening lame.)
3. LB Ranger
4. SA thief… Don’t have time for such tomfoolery.
5. Condi mes
6. SB/krait runes ranger.

Oslaf Beinir.5842:

Anything that is not Necromancer or Mesmer is good for you

This. Despite what people are saying thief would not be a good class to start learning mechanics and rotations on, so I’d cross that off the list too.

Now for serious input and conversation. Have not had the chance to play since the port changes but so far its sounding awesome. Is it true though Johnny that traited blink still goes on full CD if uneven terrain?

Ravenmoon.5318:

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

Zenith.7301:

Celestial meta ain’t pushing mesmers out, berzerker thieves are.

Funny I gave you this connotation. I’m saying mesmers are unable to affect celestial meta significantly, NOT celestial meta is pushing mesmer out.

That being said, the reason why I focused on boon strip before is exactly what many suggested here: mesmers’ DPS roamer role is easily filled by other class. Not necessary better filled, but easier. So any idea on what can be done about mesmer’s DPS roamer role other than providing better mesmer/thief matchup option? Also can anyone suggests specifically on what can be done to improve shatter mesmer/thief matchup?

Welp, a staff shatter mesmer almost had me in 1 shatter last night. I missed the tell and from full HP i went to ~100-200 hp.

The amount of oshicrap buttons i had to press under 2 seconds was too kitten high.

Still won, but had to restart the fight. The mesmer was silly enough to let it happen. So mesmers are perfectly fine in the dps aspect, its just some of you can’t play it right. That mesmer capped the point and earned around 20 points for his team by the time i restarted the fight and bursted him down and got lucky on sigils crit.

Lololol. A much more skilled player then I set up his long winding 3 clone shatter to which I royally kittened up and missed the tell and ate all the damage. Luckily, because I’m a thief, I reset the fight, came back and facerolled the mesmer due to hard counter. Due to the fact that said mesmer came close to killing me it is therefore conclusive that mesmer is fine and every mesmer just needs to L2p /raven mode.

Zenith.7301:

lighter.2708:

Zenith.7301:

It is adorable how just a few months back all the pvp hotshots were saying d/p thief was subpar, that s/d thief was just a mediocre class to bring. That berserker specs are dead and condi bunkers rule.

And now suddenly the thief, which hasn’t changed at all, is finally deemed the supreme berserker amulet class. Who knew, it’s fun to be saying this since beta and people dismissing you only to find out 2 years later that thieves are the very reason for the condi bunker outbreak since no class besides a berk guardian can run berserker amulet and not get farmed by thieves.

Like, why even bother being a berserker of any class but warrior or thief, the rest of the classes don’t have enough mobility and immunities to not die miserably compared to a thief who just needs to spam stealth and port up a ledge while his burst comes back up in less than 10 seconds unlike the scepter ele who needs to wait 30 seconds for arcane utilities, fire grab, and his lightning skills to align.

i don’t really know when exactly are you talking about, because from my experience, thief has always been part of the top teams, and thieves have never been subpar and mediocre.

Oh sure, but all it takes is reading some thread from prominent thief players a month back defending their precious class as just average while all the attention went to spirit rangers and elementalists and necros.

You are horribly missinformed. S/D thieves have been regarded as the apex predator of zerk builds for the last year and a half at least. Spirit rangers where being complained about last month? Wut? You mean 2 years ago.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Fay.2357:

Really, I’m interested in seeing the effect this change has on thieves. Mesmer already doesn’t exist in the meta, so that’s obviously not going to change. There’s a distinct possibility that this could make life incredibly difficult for thieves given smart positioning by rangers and such. It’ll be very interesting to see what happens.

The good news is that if Thieves do suffer, Mesmers get to step into the space. Only unlike thieves we have options that allow us to stick it out.

I really hope so, but I just can’t see it happening. GS wars would will take the thiefs roaming spot due to better mobility and with guards/mes/thief without reliable gap closers LB rangers would have to be the second choice roamer. At least thats what I can see being the most effective.

The only thing stupid about it is how the f2 skill ‘qs’ up so to speak. It should cancel current attacks and the pet should begin the attack animation immediatly on using f3

Rin.1046:

I am not that experienced with Mesmer in PvP, but I have seen some pretty strong mesmers dominating in matches.

They can be very effective and do contribute to the teams efforts. At the end of the day it all comes down to player skill. If these players that refuse mesmers have only ever experienced bad mesmers, then their opinion will be tainted. And as mesmer is one of those professions that takes more skill than other profs to play well, I’d say it is likely there are more bad mesmers out there than good ones. It doesn’t mean the profession is bad, just that it is harder to master.

I wish this was the case. I wish we could just show all those teams that they had only seen bad mesmers and then yay the good ones will be taken in teams and considered in tourney comps. But obviously, thats not the case and it’s rediculous to think that after almost 3 years that’s all thats wrong with mesmer. Sure it’s a hard to work class, but the points where you see it least are at high tier/tourney’s. The better you get at Mesmer, the less and less viable you are for the teams at your skill level. Great reward for a “hard to master” and “takes more skill” class… :l. After 3 years the top teams have seen good mesmers, used good mesmer, and know good mesmers dont bring anything to make em worth it anymore.

Ravenmoon.5318:

My god i swear some mesmer players are terribad. More balance to the fight vs thief? Seriously? Learn to freaking play. I don’t know how many times a mesmer has had me on the defensive (pretty much disengaging because death inbound).

As a thief, i still consider the mesmer one of the harder classes to fight against. So quit your whining, watch some LordHelseth vids and git gud.

The thing you have to understand is when your playing Mesmer at a level higher then yours, the imbalance becomes greater. In seriousness there is no excuse for a s/d thief to loose to a mes unless stealth ganked while already in combat.
Even so, your missing the point Johnny was trying to make. He’s mentioning how no teams will even take any Mesmer anymore, and request you re-roll to be accepted on a team. Helseth would be taken no matter what class he was playing, and has admitted he’s gimping his team somewhat staying on mes.

Saturn.6591:

Neptune.2570:

Also in a side thought. How kittening strong is LB rangers going to become :P

I know, right? Even with Rabid amulet; if you are fighting someone else and a Ranger walks up 1500 units away and Rapid Fire’s you, you’re usually dead. Other classes would take longer and/or would need to get close to you for the same thing.

Then again; most Rangers are toast if I can get close to them. But I often silently raged inside when they just snipe me down out of nowhere; before I even had a chance to actually see them. With Rabid amulet nonetheless. Not zerker. And on a really short cooldown. With 10-15 stacks of vulnerability.

I really need to continue leveling my Ranger. ;P

For sure, there a brutal class to +1. Now imagine there on the top of clocktower in khylo. You cant blink up to him, you gotta run on the narrow step through his LB. Thiefs/guards cant use there port gap closers. Essentially they would have 100% control of clock tower.