Guild Wars 2

I agree with the aging thing.

Odd, I tested it on the Swordsman and Warlock, not the Duelist. I’ll have to test it tonight again I suppose.

Underwater combat in general needs a lookover for PvP, and I’m sure they are aware of it.

It’s been said they are working on that. I can’t imagine that isn’t far from their actual priority.

I’ve seen some extremely talented Ele players. Granted, most of them are absolute free kills. I think we need more then a month to decide whether the Ele profession needs to be buffed. Fixed so that everything is working is always a priority, but general across the board buffs…. it’s a little too soon.

The stats aren’t far-fetched. They are talking about the Knight’s Amulet, which is primarily Vitality and then has secondary stats of Power and Precision. Actually people overestimate the effect that critical chance has in general though, running Soldier’s Amulet actually allows you to preserve the majority of your damage (on all professions mind you, not just Mesmer) and gain a substantial amount of mitigation. I run Soldier’s when I do tPvP games, and Berserker’s for “noob slaughtering”.

The specific bug isn’t as bad as you mentioned it is. Fury overrides Retaliation, that is a bug that always occurs. It makes one of our minor traits worthless, which needs to be fixed, but a lot of classes have worthless minor traits that need to be fixed so I assume it will come in time. Regeneration does cause the Fury (or Retal) to not refresh itself, but seriously… the Phantasms don’t often live beyond 10 seconds and if they do the fight is massively in your favor anyway and you don’t need +20% Phantasm Crit. Does it need to be fixed? Yeah, but it’s not really that impactful right now.

Condition Spreaders typically pick Rabid Amulet, which has both Toughness and Conditon Damage. Precision comes alongside it to help with all the condition procs builds can have access too.

Support types have access to either Cleric’s or Shaman’s Amulets, which are Toughness, Healing Power, and either Condition Damage or Power. All builds need either Power or Condition Damage, or they’d be completely ineffective in combat. Everyone needs to do damage.

Your desire for Boon Duration and Condition Duration can be mostly made up for on the rune choices, and these amulets you proposed would be absolutely terrible.

GankSinatra.2653:

Lewis Burnell.2493:

I use Decoy which is why I tend never to take Mass Invisbility and my Mesmer sits with around 26,000HP and 55% crit chance.

oh my god ahahahaha

You guys dont even realise how ridiculous those stats are. Go get 55% kitten crit on any other light armor class and see what hp you have. And no, eles or necros dont get mass invis, 10 second cc, or kitten time warp on top of it with AI pumping brainless damage, invisibility, ports, and one of the best downed states.

Oh well. No way arena net will let this slide. Unless you guys actually expect 7 other classes to be brought up to mesmer instead of getting 1 class nerfed, lol.

Impressive response considering you don’t know what the Knight’s Amulet is. Go look it up, he’s not using the Berserker’s Amulet like everyone else.

On the topic of builds, I actually run 30/20/0/10/10. I don’t think 15% additional Phantasm damage is worth sacrificing 9% damage with 3 illusions out, nor the 5% damage on inactive targets, or the 100 Power. Our damage is just as important as the Phantasm damage, especially in team fights in which random AoE kills them after their first attack.

Most guildmates I’ve had that try out Memsers initially say they are overpowered, but after a day or two of playing they don’t consider that to be the case anymore. It’s like the feeling you get when you first play a Hundred Blades Frenzy Warrior and gib someone, it’s obviously overpowered! Until you realize intelligent players can counter it. Honestly my Engineer is stronger in tPvP then my Mesmer, and it has half the playtime.

Condi Evasion builds and Repeatable Stealth builds tend to work pretty well, if it’s versus a glass cannon Mesmer anyway. Haste doesn’t work too well, since Mesmers have a lot of anti-burst mechanics. The Shortbow in the standard Pistol Whip or Heartseeker builds is also extremely good at one or two shotting all the Phantasms with Trick Shot and Cluster Bomb. I assume you are also taking the Shortbow in the P/P setup as well? That would be the key.

As for the complaints about Phantasm damage, people seem to be on the high side of the numbers and always think that Phantasms crit. I was doing some averages on the light golem, and Duelist/Berserker/Swordsman all do around 3.1k per attack cycle, the Swordsman a little bit higher on average. Phantasms are probably one of the easiest attacks in the game to dodge anyway, seeing as you can see the Phantasm pop up. I hardly ever get hit when I’m on my Engi – and the bombs/grenades tend to kill the Phantasms beyond their first miss.

In general though, the best solution to countering a glass cannon Phantasm Mesmer is AoE damage and some tankiness built in preferably with Vigor and Protection.

I have hope that we will get Ranked Team 5v5 and Ranked Solo 5v5.

The exaggerations are crazy to say the least. At least we know the Mesmer class pisses people off in PvP, which is to be expected.

EasymodeX.4062:

This is not true. My 1v1 condition shatter build can take out a bunker guardian. Too much boon stripping, too many clones, too much stealth. And it’s not a spec “built” to kill guardians — it’s just a 1v1 spec. And hell, I can’t even play the spec properly yet.

I find that quote amusing to the least as well. "Oh my build that just happens to be fully equipped at dealing with a typical bunker Guardian build… well it was just a 1v1 spec it wasn’t intended on dealing with a Guardian. But it can kill one, and that means it’s OP. " Of course boon stripping and condition damage is going to work against a build that is vulnerable to it.

EasymodeX, a lot of what you say is actually in my opinion valid. The way you put it though, it makes you very easy to dismiss as someone who pretends to play a Mesmer and iskitten off at losing to them.

The Mesmer has issues that need to be dealt with, yes. However when you basically claim the entire thing is broken and everything needs to be nerfed, it doesn’t get anyone anywhere.

Lumines.3916:

Sharper Images is possibly the best Bleed on Crit trait among all classes!

I’d agree with that, if condition duration ever applied to it.

AoE and Cleaves deal with Phantasm Mesmers. Shatter Mesmers aren’t much of an issue assuming you have the perception to notice an incoming shatter.

Condi-Dmg with Poison uptime is what deals with a Guardian. If Retaliation is a specific issue, then bring boon removal somewhere in your team composition.

Quit complaining that your glass cannon builds can’t beat everything and think a little. A team with an Ele and/or Engi for AoE alongside an Engi, Thief, Necro, and/or Ranger for condition damage with poison would do very well against these kinds of teams. In general, stop equipping the Berserker’s Amulet and complaining that you die a lot.

If someone after a stomp is gloating, just remind them how much you love them. Regardless of how entertaining it may or may not be to you, they are looking for a reaction of anger. Give them enjoyment, and they stop immediately. Heck judging off of the results I think it gets in their head and bugs them.

Eh, it’s often best not to stomp when you are on the verge of winning a 1v2. Interrupt and just DPS the ally down as they expose themselves. Poison on the downed target is a great way to slow the revive down too, since it counts as healing.

Distance and damage taken seem to be the primary factors alongside time. If you’ve taken any damage, your combat time is reset. If you are close to the source that created the damage on you, the timer seems to be excessively long. Basically, as long as you are cleansed of conditions that deal damage and you are significant amount of distance from your opponents you can get out of combat.

Arken.3725:

Funny how there’s still a mention about the Guardian full heal even though it’s impossible to get off now. Love it.

Guardians have plenty more access to stability. Adapt to the situation, don’t try and continue using it the same way you always have.

It’s probably not fully intended to make you invulnerable. PvP underwater needs a good design lookover again. Currently some professions are wildly imbalanced and of course, the downed state as you mentioned needs some fixes.

theonewhoknocks.8641:

I think overhead names of ranger pets, phantasms (not clones), necro pets, elementals, rock dogs and what else is out there should be removed and targeting hotkey shouldn’t target them at all (you could click if you want).

Oh and Engineer turrets. I always find myself dumping stuff on engineer turrets. “Yay I immobilized as stationary object”

I could agree with an option (or other hotkey) that would take players as a priority for targeting over pets. What people are having troubles with is targeting and it’s understandable.

I don’t really agree with the rest of the discussion though, these pets are integral to these classes. You can’t remove them without redesigning about half of the professions entirely.

It’s highly dependent on player skill. If you have a massive lead of skill over your opponents, it’s actually not hard to 2v1 or 3v1 in this game. It’s fairly common in open sPvP at the moment.

I love the downed state. Except when I play an Ele, that needs to be checked. The downed state metagame in tournament games is incredibly engaging and fulfilling. Just because you downed someone doesn’t mean squat unless you can secure the kill.

As the Engi is one of my three mains, I disagree with a lot of your initial points. Engineers have probably the most damaging AoE builds in the games with Bombs and Grenades. Their condition damage builds may not output the highest amount of bleeds, but they don’t need to since they absolutely overload their opponent with almost every kind of condition in the game. In terms of a ranged burst build, the Rifle with a Tool Belt setup is around the highest ranged burst in the game. Simply put, I think you are doing something wrong or have a serious case of the grass is greener on the other side syndrome.

Glass Cannon is probably better for dueling when you have more skill then your opponent, or for glory farming in open sPvP. Beyond that, it really isn’t all that great. In team fights, it means you have a lot of difficult in the downed state metagame, as exposing yourself for a stomp or revive can be very bad. As a point defender, obviously you can’t last that long. When paired with defensive support, there isn’t of a frame to defensively augment. Heck even with paired with offensive support you are in danger of being blown away by a burst combo when you lack cooldowns. (Read, what everyone complains about on these forums because shockingly, most people are glass cannon)

Simply put, I think glass cannon is best for glory farming in open sPvP and situationally in tPvP. For the most part though, competitively, it’s not really that ideal. Frankly the downed state alone is enough of a reason to justify not using glass cannon builds.

An Illusionary Swordsman which deals that attack can only attack once about every 5 seconds. Assuming you dodged none of these, that would be 25 seconds worth of damage if he only cast one of them. If he brought out another after about 10 to 15 seconds, that damage would have accumulated in about 20 seconds. This damage occurred over a long time, and was very lucky because it looks like every hit crit.

If they are built with condition damage in mind, don’t use abilities when you have over 4 stacks of confusion. The duration on confusion is extremely short and spiked occcurances of confusion are rare, – Engi Bomb, Mesmer Shatter 2 w/ traits, and Mesmer Scepter 3. Stalling combat defensively for around 4 seconds is easy, or better yet as everyone else has noted just use your condition removal at this point.

When confusion isn’t stacked very high, then don’t even worry about it. It’s like having 1 to 6 bleeds that only last a few seconds, probably not worth the worry.

Not sure why we are arguing Dota vs. LoL, it’s like arguing whether you like to watch / play Baseball vs. Football. Both games have reflection mechanics anyway, and are considered competitive. Different games that cater to different interests. Besides half of your evidence on both sides is misleading.

Regardless, the way to counter Retaliation is to have a high amount of healing or remove the boon yourself. I’ve been experimenting with all the classes lately, and I can’t think of one that doesn’t have a way to trait or build to be effective against the boon.

What I really think the problem is the Guardian bunker builds that people are running into. I’m not saying the builds themselves are the problem, because I think they are counterable with poison condi-dmg builds. The problem is people don’t want to change their glass cannon builds to deal with the Guardian bunker builds (and other various bunker builds) and instead are asking ANet to fix the supposed problem.

Besides, confusion? Condition removal is easier to come by then confusion, and very few professions can put up confusion. None of them can keep up a meaningful amount of stacks for any decent duration of time.

Hybrid Damage with Grenades is so sick. The Chill and Poison uptime is crazy.

The timer is every 20 seconds, so :0 / :20 / :40 seconds on the clock.

As an aside, I love this post.

Keep the Downed state. It makes tournaments deliciously fun.

The only downstate that needs to be adjusted is the Ele, and I play Memser, Engineer, and Warrior. There are actually ways to stomp every #2 without delay, Thief and Mesmer are a fair bit obtuse in being able to do this though. With the Thief you need an instant cast teleport, and the Mesmer you need stealth with no other targets available. Not everyone has access to that, but then not everyone has Stability either.

As an Engineer and Warrior I have no troubles with Mesmers. I also play a Mesmer.

Half of this thread doesn’t seem to understand what a Mesmer can even do.

PokeyPenguin.6178:

Engi is pretty good, people just don’t fight them because there are simply less of us. Also our burst is limited and we are only ok 1v1, so the masses don’t realize they should be complaining about other things we can do that should probably be toned down.

I would like to see many of our kits and bugs fixed, but that is not limited to our class.

You should try out a Hybrid Grenade spec, so good. Plenty good in a team fight.

While I do think we need another one handed option, I’m not sure a condition damage ranged option is the way to go. Nor do I think ANet will give us a new weapon for quite some time.

The Guardian’s condi removal can be overloaded. As my Engineer I destroy bunker build Guardians with the sheer amount of Chill, Poison, and damage conditions.

I mean, I tend to agree that Guardians need to be toned down a little in this aspect, but it is possible to deal with them in the meantime.

Best way to deal with them is condi-dmg builds that have high poison uptime. Necro, Engineer, Ranger, and maybe a few others can do this very well.

I think they are both fine choices. I actually started with the Greatsword and moved to using the Staff as a backup to the Sword/Offhand use. To me the Greatsword is better for direclty dealing damage, chasing opponents, and pushing people off the point. The Staff is better for the defensive tools and team utility it can bring.

It comes down to Chaos Storm and Chaos Armor being extremely strong skills to have, and the damage the Warlock can makes up a bit for the damage loss you take by using it.

I would agree with the advice of not trying to stack stuns, invuln, and Chaos Storm together. Stack them in duration, not intensity, or in a chained fashion rather then all at once. Dealing maximum damage is only one of the priorities in dueling someone, remember that avoiding damage is probably more important.

At least you Inb4’d (did I do that right?) yourself with the correct answers on how to deal with it. Shield Block is another one that works pretty well.

While there may need to be some small adjustments needed for the most part this is a huge learn to play issue with the community. I still hear the complaints about Hundred Blades sometimes, but thankfully that has died off for the most part. It’s actually extremely easy to counter a Thief Power Burst build with any active mitigation, and the Phantasm Power Mesmer is extremely vulnerable to that same active mitigation combined with cleaves and AoEs to completely neuter damage output.

What I actually think pisses people off is that the Mesmer and Thief by nature is tricky and annoying to kill. They make you think, and I think a lot of people would rather just click all their cooldowns for free kills. A lot of people also don’t seem to realize as well that the downed state is rather important to combat, and when you do somehow manage to get bursted down your team should be able to pick you up. That doesn’t happen in pugs.

Honestly I love that the game is full of terrible Thieves and Mesmers, because they are easy to kill and deal with. Especially when I’m on my Engineer.