Guild Wars 2

Slight necro, but I wanted to ask.. Since the recent patch, how has dealing with this burst felt? Same? Worse? Better?

Also.. The link should have Power Block but I can’t edit that on my phone. X.x

Reaallllyyyyy?

Really? I can’t even… Really?

• Eles didn’t get as many traits baseline and are still beastly.
• Engineer got an entirely new f5. Can I get an f5?
• Burning guards, anyone?

I understand wanting the warrior buffed, but to really count the number of traits a class got made baseline (most of which people don’t even notice) to use as a reference for nerfs/buffs is… Not a very strong argument.

I absolutely love how the wells are designed and animate with the clocks ticking down. I cant wait to see how far we can push them. Chaotic Interruption seems a must, so the first build I’m considering is

Dueling/Chaos/Chronomancy

I assume Dom/Dueling/Chrono shatter will be fairly easy to find, so I’ll be mostly looking for new ways to push lockdown and support. I’ve also been hoping that the Chronomancer tree could help with the resurgence of Phantasm mesmer, I had something in mind such as

Dueling/Illusions/Chrono

to try to super recharge my phantasms using persistence of memory + alacrity on shatter. Dueling is mostly for duelist’s discipline, I’m betting el pistolero phantasmo can be the most rapidly summoned phantasm. Dunno how it’ll go, but will be fun to try out.

As suggested, nay, demanded by NICENIKESHOE who’s up for some collaborative chronomancy this weekend?

• Would anyone be willing to test/record builds?
• Must get a 5 Chronomancer team going!
• Some duels VS the other elite specs.
• Some WvW videos would be great.
• Exploring the Verdant Brink (new PvE zone) is a must as well.
• Bullets are cool, and make you feel cool.

I’m actually considering trying to get a little Twitch going, though I’ve never done that before, but it seems worth it for our first taste of Chronomancer!

Huddi.8297:

You have a point. But is it worth a trait point then? I can’t think of any other traits that involve trade-offs. Usually they just give something, at no cost.

Well if its worth it depends on what you’re using it for, like any trait.

The heal Mirror gets dropped to a 12s heal with a 4s reflect. Blink gets turned into a 24 second 1200r port immune to most projectiles. You don’t have to use Mass Invis to take master of manipulation, and even when you do its still useful, you just have to use it more intelligently.

C3PO. Sold.

Welcome! Here’s some tips to get you going:

• All your shatters are instant and can be cast at anytime. Make a point to get into a habit of shattering often, and try to master your F4 (Distortion) first.

• Find a favorite weapon set. Every weapon has a build it can excel in.

• Domination/Dueling goes with everything. If you ever have a problem making a build, stick with that rule. Try not to add condition traits to a power build and vice versa.

• All your elites rock. All your skill trees rock, with Illusions kinda.. Not as great as the others.

• Rabid (condi) or Marauder (power) is the way to go in most pvp/www cases

• You’ll often hear “shatter” is the meta in pvp. While there is a meta shatter build, many builds can work and you SHOULD explore. So many builds offer completely unique play styles that you can often feel you’re almost re-learning the class.

And uh.. Try to indulge in that “having fun” thing as often as you can!

Well let’s look at our manipulations..

• Blink
• Mirror
• Arcane Thievery
• Illusion of Life
• Mass Invisibility

Only one of those is a stealth skill, and causes the Mirror effect. When is this a problem? When you’re trying to use Mass Invis to disengage/escape.. Not including the times it works to..

- Give yourself & team an advantage at the start of a fight
- Help secure a Rez/stomp
- Allow another teammate to escape.

Yeah, traited mass Invis has a trade off, and you have to be more thoughtful for when you use it, but it not being ideal in one scenario (escaping) hardly makes the entire trait unusable.

Derenek.8931:

Sometimes. Successful block is also counted as an I tereupt

I.. think not.

Firstly, lots of good info here, so thanks guys!

@Rym: I’ll definitely try it out man, much appreciated. I like the concept of support for any class, and preserving the dead/dying is an awesome concept IMO.

@Azure: I used to lurk these forums for a while, because I always found Necro an interesting class but I couldn’t ever find anything that would inspire me to play one. With the coming of reaper, I really wanted to get used to the mechanics of the class so that maybe I could finaalllyyy build something I enjoy. Necromancer didn’t appeal to me because of no actual uh.. in-game death manipulation but Reaper’s concept really grabbed me.

Unfortunately I was kind of rejected from the Necro guild for not maining Necro, and then to see so many necro mains advise against the class that the other forums have a running joke that “You can tell a necro main by how unhappy he is with his class.”

Misguided.5139:

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Because of course it would be unusual for any particular poster in the mesmer forum to main a mesmer. The only sure way to tell, in fact, is if you find them defending the class!

Well, it could be worse. If you spend any time in the Necromancer forums, you will likely conclude the only way to identify a necro main is they complain about the class :P

Ah poor necros. It’s sad because it’s true.

so that made me shelf my Necro until the recent specialization patch made Blood Magic really awesome. But I’ve been struggling ever since and have very few Necros to reference to since its rare to find people playing any sort of support-focus build. x.x

So thanks again to everyone in this thread, given me a lot to think about and more inspiration to keep pushing forward with the class!

I am just happy the spotlight is finally tilting off of Mesmer.

Unfortunately there is too much flame/immaturity for that in hotm. However you can likely find RPers that also PvP (and RP in party chat).

Shoot me a whisper and I’ll try to introduce you to the few that I know.

Hey guys. I made a necro recently out of curiosity on Rym’s blood magic support build. The class seems cool but I feel really ineffective.

Its not the build or entirely my lack of skill, I just don’t see what exactly I’m doing that another class couldn’t do better? With the sole exception of healing/rezzing I feel rather.. Redundant.. I just can’t figure out anything Necro excels at that another class couldn’t do?

So I ask all of you.. When you play Necro in PvP what do you contribute to your team beyond damage? What role do you play?

Silverkey.2078:

I think with chronomancer, if they keep the concept of chronophantasm (they seemed hesitant) phantasm mesmer will be a thing in PvP. For now on, I think the phantasm interrupts may work (lockdown while phantasm destroy your opponent), but I haven’t tried it.

Chronophantasma is extremely exciting. If they’re afraid its too strong on-shatter then they should make it on-death. Either way it opens up potential for phantasm builds similar to how illsionary inspiration does for boonshare

Tealots.6095:

You’re not an iWarden fan here?

I love Warden, but couldn’t find a place for it here. Its a better PvE phantasm and I’ve mostly had success using it defensively.

(also, if I did take it I’d be taking it over offhand sword and I’m just way too biased for that)

messiah.1908:

nice gg

but why the hell were you running through fire fields – i was watching and say dont stomp it and boom 3 stacks of burning .
also treb or incoming dodge or share stability

if i am on pls pm (mesilu sion na acoount and pooff eu account) i will join with condi boon share . i think you need it to pressure the necro,ele,thief. 2v2 they won from what i saw

I tried somewhat to share stab, but didn’t keep it in mind. And I only ran through fire fields like.. twice! Haha, actually this build has spoiled me when it comes to conditions. I always feel as if I can run around without worrying about anything harming me too much. Good call though, will be more careful in the future.

And I will most definitely invite ya next time!

@Necrotize: I do have that on one recorded too.. but I have tons more vids to upload. x_x

Remember that corny thread I made about how Domination & Dueling goes with everything? Well this buildtakes that principle and uses it for Phantasm builds in a weird Phantasm/Interrupt combination. I was struggling to make good use of Phantasmal Disenchanter so I decided to go for Mantra of Distraction in it’s place. I found myself dealing more damage and surviving longer, but lacking any form of boonstrip/condi removal hurts.

PHANTASM IMPRESSIONS

• Swordsman my favorite phantasm and arguably the strongest. It attacks much quicker than the others and deals the most damage to boot. Though it evades when it attacks, it’s still quite vulnerable to AoE damage.

• Duelist at 1200r this phantasm is on of the safest to cast at distance despite doing less damage than Zerker and Swordsman. It also benefits from (traited) having the lowest cooldown of all phantasms as long as you can land a single interrupt during it’s recharge. I used to sleep on this phantasm’s effectiveness since it’s rapid shots are so evadeable (that wasn’t even a word until today) but it’s arguably more reliable than swordsman.

• Berzerker Spin to win! This phantasm is a monster of an assistant with a strong AoE attack that also cripples. Though it does less damage than swordsman, it is more likely to hit due to the wide range of it’s spin and the fact that it’s multiple hits. Personally, I hate the greatsword but absolutely looove this phantasm.

• Defender Defender is great when you have two of them.. assuming the fight isn’t any bigger than a 3 on 3. In largescale combat defender falls off, only halving the damage of a few attacks before dissipating. It has considerably higher HP than the other phantasms and it’s buff transfers damage from ALL nearby allies to itself, but for me it ended up being Persistence of Memory shatter fodder to lower cooldowns for other phantasms.

• Disenchanter Sigh.. Disenchanter. When your projectile isn’t getting blocked/blinded/dodged/absorbed/reflected you’re actually quite awesome. This phantasm attacks extremely quickly and can make you nigh-immune to conditions in one-on-one fights. Unfortunately, like defender, it falls off considerably in group battles despite it’s incredibly great effect.

OVERALL IMPRESSIONS

So far my feelings are pretty mixed. Phantasm play has changed considerably and trying to play Phantasm the same way as pre-patch is a recipe for failure. I think that there is still potential for phantasm builds but I have not yet determined the answer to my question: Can this be a viable alternative to shatter/lockdown? Is this build effective and unique? It’s hard to say since the builds I’m playing currently are difficult to learn and will take some adjustment before I can really make any determinations.

I’m optimistic that there is something valuable here, though. The playstyle is still distinctly different from shatter/lockdown despite an increased focus on shattering in general and the damage is rather high. Damage alone isn’t enough, though, because then you’re simply competing for the same role as standard shatter. I’ll be continuing to explore phantasm builds throughout the coming month and recording my findings here, I’d love to hear from others who are doing similar testing.

Have you heard of the pet ranger build? How about the steal thief? No? What about the attunement ele? Deathshroud necro?

And yet, here we are with the “shatter” Mesmer.

PHANTASM BUILDS – EXTINCT?
Anet’s recent patch pushed Mesmer to shatter, attempting to blur what it means to have a “shatter” build by having every Mesmer build make use of shatters (the way they were supposed to in the first place). Yet it seems in that shift removed the ability to make a viable phantasm build, which historically often rejected the use of shattering at all. The thing is, Phantasm traits have always been spread through different traitlines and resulted in the ability to make phantasm builds that varied from one another.

But in this meta.. Can Phantasm still survive?

That’s what I wanted to find out with this newest venture. I’m very satisfied with the boonshare Mesmer’s turnout and that is my main build, but I’ve had this itch to tackle phantasms for the longest and see if we can’t come up with something that works. Here’s what I asked myself:

• What weapons would suit a phantasm build best?
• How could a phantasm build distinguish itself from shatter?
• What role would a phantasm Mesmer play on a team and can it be competitive?

And as I attempt to find satisfactory answers to these questions I intend on posting my results here.

PHANTASM GAMEPLAY
Phantasm gameplay in general is interesting post-patch. There is no getting around it. No matter what build you play, you have to learn to shatter. Our class mechanic is more integral than ever for any successful build, and phantasm builds are no different. Learning to shatter in a phantasm build is odd at first, but becomes natural.

PROTOTYPE BUILD #1: LYSSA’S BRIGADE

DUELING/ILLUSIONS/INSPIRATION
- Phantasmal fury, Fencers Finesse, Deceptive Evasion
- Persistence of Memory, Phantasmal Haste, Ineptitude
- Persisting Images, Restorative Illusions, Mental Defense
– Sword / Sword + Greatsword, Marauder Amulet

Man.. Naming these things is half the fun. This build is centered on quantity over quality and features four different phantasms. While I do so loathe the greatsword, I cannot deny that it is the most effective for high AoE damage. So I paired it with the Swordsman for strong single-target damage along with 2 utility phantasms.

PROS

• Persistence of Memory works well with four phantasms.
• Phantasmal Disenchanter wrecks stability elites.. but is hard to use.
• Can micromanage damage/boonstrip on multiple opponents.

CONS

• Damage is high but doesn’t match shatter bursts.
• Phantasmal Defender ended up shattered more often than not. (Though that could be badness on my part)
• Phantasms require excellent positioning.
• Difficult build; hard to balance shattering and phantasms

This was my first test on Phantasm builds and while the build is fun, it takes a lot to learn and manage. Positioning and team awareness are always important, but in a phantasm build they are crucial to being successful and effective. I always enjoy trying new builds because they encourage a form of play I’m not used to. Lockdown builds taught me to pay attention to animations and cast times, boonshare taught me to keep my positioning near allies and watch health/status bars, now phantasm is teaching me proper positioning and paying attention to multiple opponents at once.

While this build is enjoyable, it’s still lacking a certain “oomph” (and lawd I just can not rock out with a greatsword) so I made some tweaks to come up with…

PROTOTYPE BUILD #2: PHANTASMAL CHAOS

(DOM/DUELING/ILLUSIONS)
Phantasmal Strength / Furious Interruption / Power Block
Duelists Discipline / Fencers Finesse / Deceptive Evasion
Persistence of Memory / Phantasmal Haste / Malicious Sorcery
Sword/Sword + Scepter/Pistol

Oh my lawd this build is so fun. I just wanted to get that out there before anything else, before talks of viability or effectiveness or roles… Scepter/Pistol with Furious Interruption & Duelistst’s Discipline is madly fun. Summon iSwordsman, Summon iDuelist, Magic Bullet interrupts! Quickness Confuse Ray! Trololol. It’s great.. Really, and even if you never run such a build, you should try that combination at least once in your Mesmery life.

PROS

• Ranged burst is hella strong
• Phantasms can easily take down an opponent without needing to shatter
• … But you can still shatter anyway!
• Scepter is strong with quickness + Malicious Sorcery

CONS

• Hard to defend yourself outside of Blink/Decoy
• Single target focused beyond shatters
• Very difficult build to use

VID
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzWaaZkFhDc

I agree with this.

Mesmer were in a similar position with Illusionary Persona (Shatter effects occur on the mesmer as well). While not every Mesmer grabbed the trait, it was the one trait that not only allowed you to efficiently use other on-shatter traits (heal on-shatter, blind on-shatter, ECT) and made shatter mesmer so much more viable than every other spec. Alternatively, nearly every Mesmer had to take Deceptive Evasion (clone on dodge) just to have a stable build.

Once it was made baseline, Mesmer build diversity skyrocketed (though, of course, meta builds will still be limited to 1 or 2) without breaking the class in any way. Since this was a trait nearly every Mesmer had to take anyway, the only difference is that now we have he opportunity to experiment with different lines without feeling like our builds are only half-complete.

TL;DR Warriors need an improvement, and if fast hands is already practically mandatory as it is, then making it baseline would only help the class’s diversity without overpowering it.

(Take this with a grain of salt. I barely play Warrior but I understand the struggle.)

(lets ignore the bug for now.. I’m just referring to the traits interaction with the scepter)

So I’ve been playing around with Malicious Sorcery in this new project I’m working on, and it feels… Good?

Not quite.

To be honest, it feels like how Scepter should be on average. The 15% increase helps make the weapon feel less clunky and awkward without adding all that much of a damage boost. In fact, it honestly doesn’t feel Grandmaster-worthy at all. It isn’t much better than Temporal Curtain or Duelists Discipline and Sword’s trait seems to offer a more significant damage boost.

So if this isn’t meant to improve all of our skills attack rate, then the trait doesn’t deserve a GM slot. Thoughts?

Ah man, you won’t find the most amazing high-level play here but you can easily see how much fun we had with this. Come join us on the weekends (and some weekdays) for our All-Mesmer romps

• Chaos
• Greasy (Cat Mage)
• Necrotize (Amphaser)
• Dark Falcon
• Pepsi (Huge Fat Norn)

What builds were yall runnin? I’m on my standard boonshare. Dueling/Chaos/Inspiration

Ty! As an update, this should be completed by tonight!

Edit: and by tonight.. I really mean tomorrow night.. Three days later z.x

So says the devs.. Annddd still no change. Really? Really tho?

You can’t possibly feel 2% is enough. Cuz its not, not even on paper.

Also, duelists discipline. Fix plz? Condi Mesmers everywhere are still sore over the 50% Maimed Nerf.

Currently when you click “log in” from the forums it takes you to the arenanet account page. For some reason, it doesn’t consider you logged into the forums even if you do log in there.

the only reason I can post this atm is because I was already logged in to the forums from my phone.

Wait.. Where’s the disaster?

The OP made it seem like the entire stream devolved into a flame war. It was literally one single “eff you” during a stomp that I actually had to rewind just to catch.

What’s the crime here? That the shout caster didn’t have profanity filter on? If one guy yelling out one single expletive during a tournament anyone can join constitutes as an “unprofessional disaster” then we may as well have no tournaments for any competition ever.

(And he made a joke on the current state of Ranger -while giving the ranger player props- that is in no way trash talk.)

Wow way to take what I said completely out of context. Lets try again…

20+ great traits. 2-3 unbalanced/bugged traits. That doesn’t equal “ruining” a class.

@BurrTheKing &To the people saying Robert broke/ruined/made bad changes to Mesmer, a little context…

• Mesmer got 30+ traits redone and reworked.

• Majority of those traits are fantastic.

• 2 traits are overtuned. (Confounding and PU) 1 is bugged (Blinding Dissipation)

Balance is difficult guys, he knocked it out the park with almost all of our traits and we don’t even know if the PU/Confounding change was his decision.

Fun fact: Confounding Suggestions as a trait isn’t overpowered on it’s own nor is it grandmaster-worthy. Without Mantra of Distraction, Confounding wouldn’t even be mentioned here. It’s the combination of both that is too much.

I, personally, love the overload mechanic. I won’t be using Warhorn much since I’m staff ele for life and I doubt the shouts (or rebound) will grab me but those overloads are dope.

You’re roaming WvW in your Mesmer/Chronomancer when suddenly an army of badkids rushes over the horizon coming straight for you. There’s 8 of them and 1 of you.

You glance behind you to check your escapes, make sure the terrain is in your favor with blink spots and line of sights ECT… You take a deep breath and get ready to dive in, when suddenly you notice you’re not the only one about to face this zerg.

Which of the elite specs would you want by your side in this scenario and why?

Embolism long time no see. And try casting Mirror under Master of Manipulation and then dodging. You can get a mean 6s reflect.

Still experimenting with Condi mes?

PvP/WvW

Need a build? Don’t wanna think too hard? Look no further than Domination/Dueling for a quick and effective build with little testing needed! What makes Dom/Dueling all the rage with these hipster millenial Mesmer? Well…

• Domination Line only has one bad choice: Rending Shatter. Every other trait can be made effective (with Confoudning/Shattered concentration/Power Block being the most obvious choice). Domination passives give a hefty damage boost through vulnerability manipulation

• Dueling Line offers a lot of awesome options, with Phantasmal Fury/Blinding Dissipation/Deceptive Evasion being totally in this season. If you’re going for the gunslinger vibe, Duelists Discipline is the pickles and the sause for anyone sporting a pistol.

• Want a super 1-shot burst? Grab a greatsword and go Dom/Dueling with the above-mentioned traits. Enemies crying and flipping craps about you and your OPness is totally in these days!

Grabbing Domination and Dueling may make you feel bland. I mean, who wants to walk outside and see someone else wearing the same outfit as them? Luckily for you, you can take this standard setup and add your own sense of style. (Preferably of the Chaos and Inspiration variety. Illusions line can be a bit… lacking without some creativity and skill.)

INSPIRATION

• Medic’s Feedback works wonders with Runes of Mercy for superfast rezzing.

• Restorative Illusions offers sustain to keep you alive longer than most other Dom/Dueling builds.

• Don’t underestimate Mental Defense! The defense it offers (plus some shatter fodder) can be the difference between you standing around showing off or dragging yourself off the stage in shame.

CHAOS

• Perma-protection possible with Chaotic Dampening and Null Field.

• Every single grandmaster is fantastic!

• Master of Manipulation works well with Evasive Mirror and the Mirror heal.

ILLUSIONS

• Go retro with a Phantasmal flow! Add a scepter and Phantasmal haste along with offhand Sword/Scepter. (Furious interruption loooves scepter+pistol)

• Condition Builds benefit from Ineptitude and Blinding Dissipation along with Maimed the disillusioned (Scepter attack speed trait is bugged and does not work)

• Shatter builds…. Master of Frag ain’t worth what you’d lose from Inspiration/Chaos

SAMPLE BUILDS/VIDS

… Incoming! (Feel free to post yours!)

TL;DR: For any Mesmer having trouble making a build with the new system. Start with Domination/Dueling as a strong base for experimenting and branch out from there. It helps to have a solid foundation before theorycrafting in order to compare and contrast your work with the established builds.

(I promise I’ll stop being a cornball after this)

So you got an event coming up, everyone is expecting you to bring your best but.. You’re at a loss What build to try on? Do you mix Dueling with Illusions or go with the Chaos/Inspiration style? Fear not, fashionistas, there is an easy solution to all your Mesmer build woes:

DOMINATION & DUELING GO WITH EVERYTHING

Now before you smugly turn your face to the side, flutter your mesmery lashes and go “pfft, yet another pvp thread” you may want to turn your face to the other side and take notice that this rule also applies for PvE and PvP. The redesigned Domination/Dueling line comes with everything a Mesmer need to be both stylish and effective on the battlefield, even if you’re not really sure what kind of look you’re going for.

PvE
In open-world PvE you can honestly make anything work. But to make it work -effectively- you’ll need a few key features. In dungeons/fractals things get a bit more specific, so what does Dom/Dueling offer the PvE Mesmer?

In PvE the name of the game is Phantasms, and Domination/Dueling comes with all the modifiers you need to have your phantasms both hitting hard and critting hard. Empowered Illusions along with Phantasmal Fury will allow you to shred through mobs with ease along with keeping some nice sustained damage on bosses. A smart, trendy Mesmer knows that they need all their accessories for any given occasion, and each Phantasm from Sword to Staff has a place. Open world boss with tons of condis? Let your Staff phantasm shine. Dungeon run with projectiles all over the place? No one says spin-to-win like iWarden (except, maybe, Zerker. But only on trash mobs)

These fabulous figments of your imagination aren’t all you have to offer though. The audience loves a vocal Mesmer and who doesn’t want to hear “Agony, Torment, Pain!” repeated a dozen times over and over again until they’re chanting it in their dreams? Give yourself a healthy 20% damage bonus with Mantra of Pain/Recovery and Harmonious Mantras. Sometimes enemies may not appreciate your style and sass, critcism can be harsh, add a little extra Concentration to the mix when needed.
Know what else is cool? Particle effects! Take your team on a tour through space-time with some clutch distortions during big boss battles. Grab the Inspiration line in all it’s unicorned glory, trait your Signets up in Domation, and grab Signet of Midnight. Now suddenly not only can you do damage, but you’ll have an instant team-wide distortion. (Note: The radius of the AoE distortion is small. Make sure norn and charr don’t smudge your outfit when they invade your personal space)

Link to ideal Dungeon PvE builds

• For Phantasm Builds Dom/Dueling/Illusions

• For support through teamwide Reflects and AoE Distortions rock out with Dom/Dueling/Inspiration

I just wanna point out that Robert wasn’t the only person solely responsible for balancing both classes. The other devs had hands in balance changes too, so it wasn’t like he was the only person who touched up on Mesmer and Necro.

The PU/confounding buff could’ve been any dev.

He did state that he was responsible for the more extreme changes (using Mimic as an example) and I’d assume he touched up on Inspiration too.

Phokus I wasn’t directing that specifically at you, but seeing what basically read as “you posted this here because you have no friends to show it to” was all I could take before becoming obnoxiously preachy.

What I meant is that different things are for different people. What you may see as trash someone else could find genuinely humorous. The forums are filled with people all over the world living under all different kinds of circumstances so, in my opinion, its pretentious to say what does and doesn’t deserve to posted.

OK, wow.

If you didn’t like the video, why go out of your way to right a paragraph just to put the man down. And then worse judge not only his game play but his personal character? Seriously.. What’s the point of posts like that other than to try and discourage a fellow Mesmer?

People very quickly forget the basic law of not being a hypocrite: Don’t say/do things you wouldn’t want done to yourself. The internet is no excuse to lack personal integrity.

… Anndd as a guilty truth, I must admit that the 6 minutes I watched of this made me want to do the same thing. I’ve seriously always wondered what my enemies thought of me while I played against them.

(Was that guy really from Texas? That cracked me up)

Both the vid and this thread are amusing. xD Both in a good and bad way. What a whirlwind of emotion

Really, dude?

“I don’t know what killed me… But nerf it plz!”

Fay.2357:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

And unless I’m doing something wrong on Ele, they don’t come close to our Fury stacking. It isn’t uncommon for us to hold on to 45+ seconds of fury just from normal play.

And I think I have one of our testing vids recorded where rylock managed over a minute of protection. Though the protection amounts I’m less certain of since I can barely bang out 30s, I’ve no idea how he pulled that.

Well, I got it pretty easily up to 58s of protection. I just traited glamours, took feedback, null field, sw/sw+ staff, traited sword, traited, staff, and took runes of the grove for protection uptime.

…but that means I’m taking an insane amount of stuff just to stack protection, when an ele could just spam down their bar to apply auras and protection to everything with no effort needed.

Yeah, but you didn’t (or don’t) have to do that in the first place. Sharing 20s of protection every 15 or so seconds is enough. If the Mesmer can manage Perma protection on their team through regular rotations then all the extra prot isn’t needed.

Now this is from a PvP perspective, and I haven’t yet tested the average numbers a regular boonshare rotation will provide, but with that much fury and protection while sharing nearly twice the amount of boons build/absorbed (including boons Mesmer have better access to like aegis/retaliation .. though retal barely counts.) what is the ele providing that Mesmer couldn’t? Mostly just might.

Ele provides Might, Fury, Protection, and Swiftness. Mesmer provides all of the above along with Aegis. Swiftness is easily stackable with Sigil of Speed and shared way beyond what Ele could ( I’ve been able to share two minutes per signet. Around 50-60 seconds is more common)

Imo where Tempest takes it is in the fact that they still provide ridic boon output in addition to everything else they do.

Fay.2357:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

To be honest… Iunno.

When looking at the boons, all ele boons tend to be rather short duration. Same could be said for Mesmer, but we can double-share.

Mesmer have better access to:

• protection (chaotic dampening)
• fury (dueling)

And… Crap. We lost vigor. Thing is that sharing the boons just ONCE every 30s wasn’t enough for us, and I dunno how well it will work for Ele. However..

In terms of pure support, Tempest seems to take it by far. The boons actually aren’t what caught my eye so much as the sheer amount of support that comes with practically EVERYTHING a tempest does.

I don’t think we have to worry about boonsharing from their war horn competing with us because honestly Tempest’s all-around support just blows every other class out the water.

However, when Chronomancer rolls around, offering the possibility of sharing boons four-six times over in addition to alacrity and slow and wells and all that, Mesmers may be able to share the support spotlight.

Possibilities, man… Possibilities.

You’re not really right about those boons. Our fury is 5s duration, while eles can stack tons and tons of it. As far as protection go, eles have a trait that gives them protection when applying auras, aaaaaaaand all of those shouts apply auras, plus weaponskills apply auras….so yeah.

You’re slacking pyro. You were supposed to tell me how I’m absolutely fundamentally irredeemably sanctimoniously unspeakably wrong and should feel terrible about myself at nights. =P

And unless I’m doing something wrong on Ele, they don’t come close to our Fury stacking. It isn’t uncommon for us to hold on to 45+ seconds of fury just from normal play.

And I think I have one of our testing vids recorded where rylock managed over a minute of protection. Though the protection amounts I’m less certain of since I can barely bang out 30s, I’ve no idea how he pulled that.

Edit: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sLvl5mVYB2Q example of fury stacking at 3:43. This isn’t uncommon either.

To be honest… Iunno.

When looking at the boons, all ele boons tend to be rather short duration. Same could be said for Mesmer, but we can double-share.

Mesmer have better access to:

• protection (chaotic dampening)
• fury (dueling)

And… Crap. We lost vigor. Thing is that sharing the boons just ONCE every 30s wasn’t enough for us, and I dunno how well it will work for Ele. However..

In terms of pure support, Tempest seems to take it by far. The boons actually aren’t what caught my eye so much as the sheer amount of support that comes with practically EVERYTHING a tempest does.

I don’t think we have to worry about boonsharing from their war horn competing with us because honestly Tempest’s all-around support just blows every other class out the water.

However, when Chronomancer rolls around, offering the possibility of sharing boons four-six times over in addition to alacrity and slow and wells and all that, Mesmers may be able to share the support spotlight.

Possibilities, man… Possibilities.

Fay.2357:

Well, from a PvE perspective…all of those traits are varying degrees of bad.

Evasive mirror conflicts with the sword trait, and you don’t really need more personal reflects in PvE, you need aoe reflects.

BD means you’re taking the chaos line and you’re shattering your phantasms just for some weak boons, it’s awful.

Restorative illusions means you’re again shattering your phantasms just for a bit of unnecessary healing and condition removal. It also conflicts with the focus trait.

If persistence of memory procced whenever a phantasm died, it might be awesome in PvE. As it is though, it’s useless since you’ll almost never shatter your phantasms.

I meant which traits are good in PvE but are underestimated you jerk!

tobascodagama.2961:

Fay.2357:

If persistence of memory procced whenever a phantasm died

Anet plz.

Yes! Plz!!

Photoloss.4817:

You’re missing the “PvP only” disclaimer…
.

True, but while my perspective comes from PvP, I’m curious to know all perspectives from all part of the game.

(Mine is a PvP perspective, however this thread is intended for all Mesmer opinions across all formats)

• Evasive Mirror – With Blinding Dissipation stealing the Dueling show, it’s easy to forget that we have another strong and interesting option in the Master tier. Evasive Mirror synergizes wonderfully with Master of Manipulation and/or Warden’s feedback to make you a ranger/engineer’s worst nightmare. (Shoutouts to Kentigem -Daniel Handler- for putting me on to this awesome trait)

• Persistence of Memory – 2 seconds doesn’t mean much right? Well when you take Mental Defense and/or trait your weapons, you start to see that it isn’t too difficult to get 4-6s cooldowns on phantasms every 10 seconds or so.

• Bountiful Disillusionment – The Chaos line really hit the jackpot when it comes to grandmaster traits. All three are wonderful, but Disillusionment tends to get overlooked in favor of PU or CI. BD is a powerful trait for many reasons, especially combined with the other BD: Blinding dissipation. On-demand stability should not be overlooked.

• Restorative Illusions – Here is one of the staples of sustain in the Inspiration line. Restorative Illusions heals you per-clone-shattered and even 0-clone shatters can offer a decent chunk of life. But on-demand instant condition removal ONTOP of the heal? This is hands down one of the best traits for adding survivability to your Mesmer ontop of the passive benefits you gain just from traiting into Inspiration?

What say you? What other less popular traits do you think deserve some more spotlight?

Theres plenty of threads of people wetting themselves in anger/disappointment at Tempest. I’m just kind of curious.. is there anyone whos currently looking forward to the spec and coming up with ideas on how to incorporate it, whether overload shouts or warhorn?

Please guys.. no flames, no trolls, no tears. Just looking to see some sparks of creativity and ideas from those more insightful on Ele than I.

Updated with more vids, more to come tomorrow or later today!

This weekend I’d like to try and launch the:

• Mesmer/Thief dungeon runs with [Teef]

• 5-man Mesmer squad on Sunday.

In the following weekends I’ve had ideas for a..

• Mesmer rock band.

• Portal Puzzle Contest

• Jumping Puzzle Race

These ideas aren’t fully fleshed out yet, so anybody has anything to contribute would be appreciated (especially figuring out a portal game)

My favorite hobbit.. Let us do this!

Yes. Flavor of the Month 2-week Mesmers are strong, but not OP. Mostly because they don’t really know what they’re doing outside of their FoTM Bursts.

… Where is that dead horse .gif? I think I’ll need it for the future.

Edit: Yes! <3 Expiatus!

Which begs the question… Why not run zerk? Seems like it could work.

Edit: and.. Ninja’d. X.x zerk would increase your damage without taking away from your support. Seems like a win/win to me.

Jace al Thor.6745:

Overpowered vs underpowered are also risk vs reward.
Remember turret engi? Low risk, high reward and everyone that didn’t know how to rotate around them came to the forums to complain about how -OVERPOWERED- it was? Then it got nerfed into the ground and useless because of all the bads complaining.
Mesmer prepatch was high risk, high reward and only taken on a handful of top tier teams because it was -UNDERPOWERED-.
Now that’s it’s gotten a buff and some traits work too well, PU and CS, it’s all of a sudden low risk, high reward and overpowered. Does Mesmer have good sustain? Yes, it does for once. As does ele, warr, guard, etc.
look at the mantra shatter build that’s popular right now. It’s traited for that sustain. The “burst” comes less from shatters and more from landing interupts with MoD which is what the build is built around. It has high health due to marauders, multiple small heals, two ports( not counting portal) and possibly no stealths. Oh and one invuln.
So realisticly… Mantra Mesmer carries hard. And if you know what it’s capable of, count the mantra charges, and dodge the mirror blade it’s game over for that Mesmer.
The shatter build that everyone is running with PU has no condi clear and is very CC’able. Easiest way to fix it is shave the duration of PU. But same principal as above applies. Dodge the gs, cc the Mesmer and either condi or burst them.

And after that’s all said and done remember that not all mesmers are running such builds. A lot are running various boon share builds, non PU shatter, non CS lockdown etc and aren’t relying on traits that need work. But to say that the Mesmer class as a whole is low risk now? I have a hard time believing that.

Keep in mind that most of the devs are also pretty bad in PvP. =P So it may not be entirely because of baddies on the forums so much as it could also be baddies on the dev team.

And yeah, I agree. Mesmer as a whole isn’t OP or broken, only about 4-5 specific traits are. But I do understand why people who used to play shatter or lockdown are feeling so dissatisfied with the class.

Ross Biddle.2367:

You don’t have to play in a tournament, or play for money, to play competitively. If you wan’t to trot out the “play for fun” or in this case “play for thrills” argument, then Helseth and Abjured are also getting a thrill out of it, albiet a richer, more deeper, more meaningful thrill. Which then begs the question as to if you’re “in truth playing for the thrill”.

There is a place for “screwing around” within the framework of playing to win. But in the end it lends itself to playing to win.

Yeah, but I’m saying the definition of “playing for fun” often gets translated as “defying the meta with whatever bad build I’m using and making self-created rules/defenses for my pride for why I lost.” And that’s really unfair.

Besides, it’s the same coin. I could say “If you want to trot out the ‘play to win’ ideal, then technically everyone who isn’t a troll is playing to win.” Hell, any sport or any “game” the entire goal is trying to win. But just because I’m trying to win in chess doesn’t mean I’m going to start watching competitive chess matches or learning the best setups. That also doesn’t mean I’m not giving it my best.