Guild Wars 2

Greetings all Commander Piccolo Sama here,

I have remained by in large quiet on the forums but I read through all 8 page of this thread and decided to speak up. I am a full on supporter of DH but I want to start by giving credit where credit is due. Firstly to BP for stepping their game up over the past few weeks and really bringing it to the table; secondly to DB for constantly providing a challenge and putting DH to the test each time you invade our lands. Any good leader shows respect to his enemy and I tip my turban (to those of you who get the reference) to you.

Now with all the posturing out of the way we (DH) face a number of very real issues. Three major ones; two of which are easily fixable and the third requires a bit more attention.

1) We are outnumbered on all fronts. Long term solution to this is building up guild involvement in WvW activity so that over the course of time we can build those numbers up to rival the competition. Short term solution; FIGHT HARDER. An old Chinese general once told his outnumbered troops “If you simply kill two more of them than there are us victory will be assured”. Hold yourself personally accountable. Can you survive a 3 on 1 or even 2 on 1 and come out on top or even make it out alive? If the answer is no then you need to train. Head to the Heart of Mists and fight multiple versions of the PVP npcs at once. Most people never take the time to train themselves to be a better fighter. They expect the person with the legendary or the “leet” pvpers to get the job done; this is why we fail 9 times out of 10 when we go toe to toe…I have seen 5 players route a group of 15. You fight so hard that you make the objective not even worth the attackers time. Never run; never quit. In the words of Col. Ratzcek from Starship Troopers “Everyone fights, no one quits; if you don’t do your job I will kill you myself.” When in WvW live like a warrior and die like a warrior.

2) We lack sufficient communication. Often times there are too many cooks (commanders) in the kitchen. Eat a slice of humble pie and turn your commander tag off if you see there are already 3 others on the map. For those active commanders constant communication is key. I have been far more successful when working in tandem with a great commander who provides constant feedback vs. the random commander who is just showing his tag for the heck of it. Also; keep in mind that there are real people behind avatars. Barking orders; and belittling folks is not the way to get the job done. Respect in an MMO (much like anything IRL) is given through results not who barks the loudest. Have fun while doing your job and others will be more inclined to want to follow your lead and they will in turn listen to orders when given.

3) We have alot of sour grapes on our server. This is the hard one. Because negativity is like a cancer and just when you think you get rid of it it creeps back up. The only way I see us fixing this is embracing guilds/individuals who decide to leave. Encourage them to do so; if they are unhappy where they are..leave. Better for them to go than stay and poison the community with negative rhetoric.

I am fully confident we as a server will turn things around for the better. I see it from people who log in every day and care enough to fight against odds that a greatly stacked against them. When our BL has a wait to log in even though we over 10K pts behind shows that people care enough to try; and that gives me hope.

See you all on the battlefield.

Syeria.4812:

The biggest problems with GW2 PvP right now are the expectations of players who just genuinely aren’t looking for this game.

Every single complaint by the OP is a style criticism. They’re not objective “this mechanic is bad” type complaints. They’re all subjective “I don’t like games that do this” type complaints. The same goes for most of the follow up comments. Essentially, they read like the complaints an RTS player might level at a first person shooter. To use a more specific, more pertinent example, they are the things a CoD player might say about Counter-Strike. They’re both competitive FPS games. But any big CoD fan is likely going to play CS and immediately cry “This game doesn’t have respawns, what a failure!” “There’s no iron sights, why would a game do something terrible like that?” So on and so forth. The CS players would complain the same way about CoD, because while the games are technically in the same genre (same sub-genre even!) they appeal to very different sets of people. The CoD players disliking CS’s combat doesn’t make either one bad, it just means they’re appealing to different audiences.

The last panel of this Penny-Arcade (possible NSFW language) pretty much sums up the complaints in this thread.

^ a million times this.

Xorus we are going to have to agree to disagree on how “great” huttball or SWTOR pvp is to be honest. Camping a point (conquest in most FPS) is a core component for that type of crowd who digs that style. Most folks hated Arathi Basin because it was the same concept..

Granted being “stable kitty” and guarding a point is not the highlight of a pvp match but it IS entirely necessary especially in a team based game. I think maybe if you broaden your gaming experience beyond the traditional MMO you will see that the conquest style of play in a game like GW works well. Check out Planetside 2 or even BF3..some times you gotta play D to ensure victory.

All of this really comes down to like I said a matter of personal preference it does not make it legitimately bad. Because like I said…it is not legitimately bad.

Now I WILL say GW2 spvp is repetitive. That is it’s downfall. If you don’t like the concept it presents you will REALLY dislike it because it shoves more of the same down your throat. For those of us who enjoy it….we play the hell out of it.

I gotta strongly disagree here. Being an avid MMO player since EQ and PVPing seriously since that time I will say I greatly enjoy the PVP aspect of GW2. That being said I can understand where many would not like it. But lets not confuse not liking something with that something being bad.

IMO it is pvp based much more on twitch reflex that more fans of FPS games will appreciate than MMO fans. You can be defeated in less than 3sec in this game if the right attack hits you at the right time. Because you have limited tools at your disposal it requires you to be much more reactive to your ever changing environment. Understanding what is in your peripheral and knowing how to use what you have to the best of your advantage. Tera was poised to reinvent MMO pvp with it’s active combat system but mmo players simply found it too foreign and had far more criticism than praise.

Those of you using SWTOR as a “balanced” mmo you are absolutely kidding yourselves. Need I even go into when Illum was 1st implemented? Grav-round and tracer missile spammers left unchecked for months until some what slightly rebalanced? Lets not get things twisted here people. Most MMOs have their pros and cons but to say PVP in GW2 is flat out bad is simply not an accurate statement.

I am not a huge fan of using a focus in PVE simply because one of the abilities is very “cosmetic” in terms of practical function. Warden is OK but temporal curtain really only has limited PVE use and not so great in combat when compared to other things. Later in the game when you are in Orr and fighting wall to wall risen kiting is not exactly the best way to go because EVERYthing there wants to kill you and you will bite off more than you can chew.

Your build is not terrible but if I can make a bit of a suggestion; Perhaps swap out 5 pts in Domination for another 5 pts in illusions to get might on shattering. Helps quite a bit.

Ross Biddle.2367:

GS love their range. Blink in real close, mirror image, spawn some clones, and shatter up some hefty confusion. Goodbye power/crit/glass build.

A sound strat if you were fighting anyone other than a mesmer. I think we can all agree we tend to be the smarter fighters in this game because our class is like driving a high performance sports car with stick shift. Those who master it end up really looking great, those who don’t will grind the gears.

We are very mindful of what stacks on us at what time. I have no problem stopping my attack for 6 seconds and letting confusion wear off.

Gotta say it is nice that the devs have been commenting so much on the mesmer forums lately. Shows that they are at least looking at our class under a microscope. I will remain optimistic.

Yea Mesmer might be the most latency/fps dependent profession in the game. Not impossible to be good with a “bad” computer but certainly a bigger challenge than some of the more direct professions.

I ran with a GS+staff shatter build for a bit but I went back to sword/pistol+staff.

I feel that for my in and out “ninja” playstyle it works well to run in do a 4 clone shatter blast them with blade flurry while your iDuelist is pelting from a distance. I did like the safety the GS provides by staying ranged but I found myself getting lazy and less reactive. IMO shatter builds are all about sticking and moving..and if you are at range when you shatter then you are missing out on 25% extra damage by not shattering on yourself at point blank (wow that sounds terrible when you read it aloud).

Although keep both weapons in your bag because they both are situationally useful. But I would more than likely suggest running around a sword/pistol focused build.
But if you really wanna roll GS try this : http://www.gw2db.com/skills/calc/mesmer#7|0|2681|4088|4090|4089|4514|20|1764|1744|0|20|2209|1815|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|30|2227|2311|1775|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|

It eliminates the self shatter and focuses on 9% dmg when you have 3 clones up..sounds crazy but you will have so many clones up in a shatter build you will almost always have at least 6% extra damage and too often you will be too far away to make use of the self shatter.

Because I wanted to make a bald, green, pointy eared fighter who can make multi-copies of himself and is named Piccolo….done and done.

Thanks for the feedback folks. I had a feeling most folks didn’t use it even if the idea sounds good on paper. (get it…tree people….paper!) slaps knee

So for all you fellow plant people out there I have a quick question. Do you use healing seed as your main heal ever or do you still stick with ether fest?

My thoughts are if I am running solo I would use Ether Feast but if I am in a roaming/zerg WvW group or sPVP I would use healing seed to provide more support. Thoughts? Experiences?

Oh wow. Didn’t know this! Looks like I won’t be going for 100% completion on my Mesmer until that is remedied.

OP: Sounds like you are not having much fun with your mesmer in general? If you WvW portal is the bee’s knees and makes you one of the most desired members of a zerg. Taking 20 in Dueling isn’t really mandatory as taking 30 in illusion for a shatter build. you COULD play a shatter build with out Duel X but like you said you hamper yourself.

And I agree with djtool. 20 in Dom for boon removal would be a very reasonable substitute for Duel 20

As of now with how phantasms work I would say Shatter trumps Phantasm. The delay gives a shatter build (assuming they use a sword/pistol) enough time to pop flurry and evade the damage from the initial phantasm attack then simply destroy it with a “self” shatter. The amount of pressure a good shatter mesmer can put on a phantasm mesmer will simply make the phantasms a non issue. Now if/when the phantasm delay gets fixed THEN we will have a legit discussion on the topic.

I have not run tests on this (and correct me if I am dead wrong) but from what I have seen once you take the trait for the clone buff (add bleed on crit/confusion etc etc) it does not matter which weapon you use, the clones will all have the same benefits. My leap clone will shatter and cause confusion and bleed on crit just like my GS clone will.

Where I see the difference in clones is spawn rate. GS is a better option IMO for clone generation because the n2 attack is greater DPS as well as clone generation with a near equivalent recharge to a n1 scepter strike.

Osicat’s Shattercat thread has a really good build for WvW. With the recent nerfs to phantasms this is one of the strongest builds we have currently and performs really well in several situations.

Mesmer is just fine soloing….this profession has the highest learning curve in the game so if you do not consider yourself an advanced player (i.e. knowing how to read NPC animations to evade, positioning tactics, using peripheral vision to not pull aggro etc etc.) you are going to have a much harder time with a mesmer soloing than you will with a more direct class.

Long story short; if you have great hand eye/twitch reflexes, a good latency, and situational awareness then Mesmer solos great. If not you see yourself downed more than you care to.