Guild Wars 2

There’s a boss in CoE explorable that it’s very useful for. I can’t recall the name of th boss but it stands still and have three mobs that keep coming back and putting boons on him. When you get three disenchanters out, you can practically ignore the mobs. It may work the last boss in one of the HotW’s explorables because he has virtually the same setup. Problem is he moves around a lot and I think he uses a lot of aoes. It’s been a while since I’ve done it so I can’t remember.

For me, it’s not the nerf to confusion that’s the real issue. It’s the effects that nerf will have. It’s killing a build, dumbing down the game and promoting zerging. These are all things anet said they were against.

Psst! It’s called fuchsia!

One thing I do is run rampager gear. Every weapon we have will make some use out of power, precision and condition damage. Another thing you have to keep in mind is not to discount anything about a mesmer on face value alone. Almost everything has at least a duality. While a lot of people use focus for swiftness, few tend to remember that it can cripple too. When traited properly, it can do a LOT of projectile reflection! In many dungeons and CM specifically, that is invaluable.

A third aspect is sigils. Earth on a greatsword has a chance to proc bleed with every damage proc. That means 3 times per blast. With 57% crit chance and Sharper Images, I can keep 6 to 8 stacks of bleed from my and my illusions auto-attacking. Eventually I may try fire and air together just to see what kind of chaos they can bring.

Don’t discount the staff as a ranged only weapon. It actually works better in melee range. While one strike might be weak, the bounce will buff you and likely hit your target again. The clones do the same so that’s a lot of buffs and some decent condition damage, if you’re traited for it.

I agree with the others. If confusion is going to be nerfed that hard then I prefer to have a different condition for my F2 shatter.

Leuddian.3057:

Thanks for the Sigil of Night tip! Was going to get 2x sigil of the Night but I guess I’ll stick with a sigil of Fire + 1 Force/Night.

I hope you know that sigils don’t stack. If you have a main and offhand weapon with the same sigil, only one will trigger.

Aveneo.2068:

Next time they say ‘Portal pls’, you say ‘10s pls’.

Reminds me of my old WoW days where you gave Mages a tip for making you a portal.

This is what you do! Make them pay for your services. If they refuse, they have two good legs and better mobility powers than you to complete the jp on their own.

Then YOU can sit there drinking coke eating your mcdonalds and KFC slumped on the chair going: aren’t you guys here yet?

I’m starting to get my bearings and rationality back after sleeping on the issue. Well, it also helped to look at the elementalist forums and see how bad over-reaction to changes not even implemented yet can get. Seeing the ugly side of passionate gamers really forces you to look long and hard in the mirror and ask yourself some pretty tough questions.

I will encourage you to hang onto hope with me. You can’t forget that, along with the stealth nerfs, they have been stealth buffs that usually don’t stay in the limelight for long and thus, easily forgotten. There’s also a host of other changes that haven’t been mentioned in the lifestream. Some of them just might be good. There may even be some last minute changes in response to the monumental backlash the livestream caused.

Let’s wait until the patch releases and do some testing to see how things feel. I have my fingers crossed that these guys turn out to be mad geniuses and the overall effect of their rampant tinkerings does make the game better. It may even be possible that the new dungeon is so good, we overlook the nerfs or find new and interesting ways to use the powers we already have. It may even be like the Wintersday patch where I was having so much fun, I couldn’t be bothered to give a rotating rat’s rump about profession changes.

However, if we’re right and things are as bad as expected, feel free to rant all you want. I’ll probably join you and everyone else that decides to vent their frustration. I will also vote with my wallet. If they screw up this time, I won’t sink another cent into this game until they apologize and actually do what they said they were going to do: boost weaker builds until they are on par with the best ones. They can start with making support builds that outshine dps ones.

OMG! And I thought I made walls of text! O.o Remind me to go easier on people in the future.

Or be more entertaining…

I skimmed through about half was what you wrote and I think you’re only seeing part of the problem. There are other reasons crafting is as profitable as it is in other MMOs. One is that just about everything drops armor and weapons and those drops are extremely frequent. You can kill a centaur and get a blue, green or even yellow quality staff. With the change to meta event chests, you have lots of guaranteed yellows! Some people will salvage these for ectos but there are those like me whom the RNG gods have cursed since birth and will sell what they can’t use because it’s more profitable. This means there is a flood of unwanted weapons on the market that people are selling, just to get rid of them. If there is no demand for those items, and there really is little to no demand for anything lower than rare, then the prices will drop to reflect that. Yet there are people that will STILL put it on the market because it’s easier to dump it all in one place than to go through it and sell it.

You may not think so and I use to think the same but, during City of Heroes (may it rest in peace) reign, I could easily buy good recipes of the market for dirt cheap prices. Then I’d sell those same recipes to npcs and make 50 to 400% profit. The same thing is happening in Guild Wars 2 except the game stops people from posting things at prices lower then what they could sell to npcs at. However, it doesn’t stop people from losing up to 15% because of the fees involved and I see MANY listing that will do just that.

Ugh! Wall of text already.

Here’s the second part, quick and dirty. People often craft to level crafting, which in turn, levels their character. That is more important then what they are actually creating so there is a surplus of unneeded stuff that they shove on the market. The law of supply and demand takes over.

All that being said, there are a few craftables that are profitable. Berzerker gear is usually one of them but the components for berzerker gear are usually worth more because they have a larger demand. For instance, not everyone wants a berzerker split armor helm but they will be interested in the berzerker insignia that makes it because it can be be used to create something they do want. See if you can find more trends like this.

We are told that the change is due to confusion not being newbie friendly. I can agree with that as not many other games have a similar mechanic. However, it would have been better for the game’s overall health to train newbies on how it worked. I would have loved to see MORE competent fighters and tactics, especially in WvW. Instead you’ll have more people whom just power through everything because there’s one less threat to make them stop and think.

Henrik.7560:

Theres more;
- the boulders of CoF Path 1.
- when an enemy is approaching for a 1v1, you plonk your first part down and then drag the enemy away and: if you win, you win. if you are gonna die, you can put the second part down and get away.
I agree, its not fair since you are EXPECTED to portal people when they ask, like in jumping puzzles your allies /sleep /sit on the ground drinking their coke and eating their mcdonalds, slumping on there chairs while they just have to press F and be like 90% up. Replace it with a nice dps AoE or a swiftness ability plz

They can’t hold a gun to your head and demand that you use portal. You CAN say no! It is your skill. If they don’t like it, play with people that won’t give you flak for playing the way you want to. It is a game afterall. If you’re not having fun, you’re not doing it right.

On the flipside, if you join a CoF speedrun, you are willingly accepting your role and all the responsibilities that come with it. It would be unethical to refuse to use portal when you have joined on the assumption that competing the dungeon as fast as possible is the ultimate goal.

Farming CoF so quickly is harming the financial aspect of the community because it’s pumping out gold way too fast. Any time a society rapidly increases the total amount of money, the worth of money drops and rapid inflation happens. You don’t have to take my world for it. Just read about Germany after WW2 and you’ll see how ugly things can get.

Here’s something for all you guys farming to consider. If no one was willing to pay 500 gold for a precursor, do you think people would still sell them at 500 gold?

My suggestion would be to set a price for how much you feel something is worth. When I say this I mean choose one that is as high as you are willing to spend and as low you are willing to sell. Once you find that Goldilocks zone, post a buy offer for whatever you want and, here’s the important part, bank the rest of your money! Do not put it into circulation and do your best to convince others to do the same!

If you truly want to be rich, learn patience. Yes, someone will outbid you but you will eventually have more money than that person and your bid will still be on the trading post. Eventually your bid will be the highest and, if someone else finds it reasonable, you will have what you want. You may even find the game more enjoyable when your bank account increases to the point where farming more gold doesn’t feel necessary.

Dude, have you seen pet AI? You WANT that?! One thing I love about being a mesmer is, when my clones don’t act right, I can blow them up! I’m sure there are many rangers that wish they had such an ability.

Actually I translated part of what Predator said. Now I will finish repeating him. It’s a minor quality of life issue. Yes, 8 months is a very long time but there is a very long list of things wrong with this game.

Runiir.6425:

Tey are shootign for the spvp to become an esport…one of the hard rules for esports is classes must be easily identifiable to spectators the moment you use any skill. Hence the color codes.

Mesmer will always be linked to pink and purple effects. If pink butterflies bug you though I would say you have larger issues to deal with first. (I personally find it hilarious when guys who find it “gay” or “feminine” die to a bunch of exploding pink butterflies around them…talk about emasculating for them).

Likewise warriors are orange (I personally wish red for blood, giving that is all the warrior has, blood and muscle with no magic).
Guards are blue, necro’s green, thieves black, etc etc etc…

Sure it can be vanilla for pvp but I don’t think that random risen is going to complain if I fragged his kitten in an explosion of orange bats. Just saying.

There’s a band-aid fix though. Have one of them infused and it will count as a different ring.

I didn’t say it would be an easy or cheap fix.

Mentalhead.5721:

I have to say that I really dislike those skimpy armors. I really want to see full armors, even light armor on female characters. I don’t want to see a fashion show, or a skin fest, I want a real armor that covers most of the skin. Bit of skin here and there doesn’t bother me, and I think that we need to show less skin, especially on female characters.

I do want to see a fashion show as that was one of the things promised since the game was in development! I’m not so much for more skimpy armors as I am for more variations in general. I want my female heavy to wear a battle gown! I don’t care how ridiculous it looks to anyone else. I want it and I’m willing to pay good money for it!

Gummy.4278:

already said that here in this post

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Mount-and-speed-boost/first

yw

Yes you did mention it first. Come, join me in this pursuit!

I won’t lie. Half the reason I’m doing this is to troll the guys whom hate mounts. I’m a mesmer. Making you Cry with Frustration is what we do! There is an alternative purpose this time though!

In my mind I see them allowing a 40% movement increase. OP you say? Yes it is but that has a purpose as well. However, just to throw you guys a carrot, it comes with a price. You can’t use mounts in regular pvp arenas. Sorry guys but that place is all about balance. You can’t attack while on a mount and, if you are attacked, you fall off, stumble for 4 seconds and have 2 seconds of daze when you get back to your feet. Stumble will be a new, unique condition that you can’t use stun breaks to clear and it will be possible to fall off a cliff while rolling. It also causes a set amount of damage every second. Something small but noticeable. This gives using a mount in any volatile area a risk vs reward flavor. Sure you COULD get to that tower a bit faster than speed buffs but even a small ambush could wipe out a zerg!

“But Crossplay,” you say. Then I imagine you call me every derogatory term imaginable (and a few fantasy slurs, just to be “cute”) before adding, “Why flog this old, rotting pile of desire for something so small?”

To that I would pleasantly smile at your ignorance and plot your unfortunate, painful and flamboyant demise while draping my arm across your shoulders and gesture to all the rolling planes of Tyria.

I ask, “What do you see?”

Trees? Mountains? Rivers? Valleys? Lakes? Lots of barren lanes no longer used by those whom have hit 80? It doesn’t really matter what you say because, with one word, I will enlighten you on how well mesmers think outside the box!

“Racetracks!”

Want something friendly and focused on skill? Race within a town! Want a mario-kart-esque experience? Lots of zones for that and power loadouts can easily be given to mounts! Care for a more private experience? There’s a custom pvp arena for that! For a bit of flavor, there could even be an in-game system that allows spectators to place bets and calculate the odds based on the racer’s previous experiences.

Now all we need is are some outside sponsors willing to slap their logo on any blank inch of our mounts and a bunch of rednecks of which you can only understand the first word they say. Any takers?

For mesmers; birds, snowflakes, confetti, fireworks, puff of smoke, small nuclear explosion… Hell, I’d be all over bats during Halloween! I’d be willing to pay $5 for each theme or $20 for 5 of them. If they’re REALLY good and allow a lot of personal customizations, like choosing a specific effect per weapon and/or map location, I’d even go $10 per theme.

Just don’t pull a “random drop from black lion chest”. We really don’t need any more rng stuff.

I personally wish the Anomaly would float by my head and I could hold my 1hand sword with two hands. Maybe one day they will give us aesthetic choices for how we wield weapons.

I see no point in jumping to 80 either. Sometimes I would like to do it because leveling a new character is boring when you know a lot of the low level areas but all that combat is necessary to learn the ends and outs of the character.

Now, if you really want to get to 80 fast, you can buy $30 worth of gems, wait until gold conversion is favorable and get 28 to 35 gold. Then you can buy mats and craft your way halfway to 80. Cooking takes 1 to 3 gold and around 2000 karma. Jewelcrafting takes about 3 to 5 gold. Artificer…

well…

#

That has everything you need to know.

DeWolfe.2174:

And the person in the down position trying to fight for his life isn’t relevant?

There is a point where you must admit defeat. I main a mesmer and I HATE it when they stealth too because I can’t use #2 to deny the first spike. Still, I feel it’s fair. If they got me on the ground then there’s little I can do to stop them.

As an adapt mesmer, I feel like giggling while reading this post. Half of you guys have no idea what you are talking about.

First, most mesmers have one HUGE disadvantage: a lack of condition removal. I haven’t known many to have more than 2 removals. If you stack conditions on them, you will force them to play defensively and/or run away.

Second, NEVER try to pin down a mesmer! NEVER! You’ll only catch the bad ones. Any with half a brain cell will use one of the many evasion powers to get out of melee range. As noted above, there are a LOT of them! The list is even bigger than that. A mesmer traited with Illusionary Persona can hit F4 and be untouchable from 1 to 4 seconds.

Third, aoes are your friend! While mesmers can crank out a lot of clones in short order, those clones are ridiculously fragile! Aoes will clear them out just as fast if not faster than they are created.

Now for some more specific tips. Against shatter mesmers, you better dodge that first shatter like your life depended on it, because it literally does! It will almost ALWAYS be Mind Wrack and it can be traited to hurt like hell! Any mesmer dodge rolling without reason and otherwise spawning clones very quickly is very likely a shatter mesmer. Stay at range, let them come to you and then evade when they are close enough. Once they wiff, you have 5 to 15 seconds to pour on the pressure. Some will respawn clones quickly and try to shatter again within the 15 second range. They are likely using Cry of Frustration, which will place confusion on you. Sadly the next patch will take care of that threat. If you can keep up the pressure and keep a count of when to dodge a Mind Wrack shatter, you’ll be fine.

One nearly dead giveaway of Rabid mesmers is they will mainly use a staff. If you can’t burst them down in 3 seconds, expect a long war of attrition to follow. Don’t bother trying to get into melee range because they will teleport-dance all around you. Their mile high toughness makes raw damage laughable. They will try to melt you down with conditions so be sure to have some removals. Use aoes to keep the clone count low and rely on ranged, condition damage to defeat them. If you don’t have a ranged weapon or you can’t do enough condition damage, don’t even bother. Winning any other way is likely to be a very exhausting affair.

Phantasm mesmers are a good practice for learning when to dodge. Most of them hit hard but only once every 5 seconds or so. They are a bit tougher than clones but still easily dealt with. However, you could time your dodges to evade their attacks and focus on the mesmer. Just don’t let them get 3 out at once unless you’re a boss ad manuvering. It also helps to know that mesmers can’t spawn clones if they are blinded, have no line-of-sight to their target or said target is blocking. Use this to your advantage.

If the mesmer is using a 1hand sword, fight on uneven ground. That makes it nearly impossible to spawn the sword’s clone.

Be very VERY careful when you use killshot. Mesmers have a lot of reflection powers and killshot’s startup animation is quite obvious. I usually save a reflect just for the killshot.

Mesmers can’t stay invisible for more than 6 seconds, 5 if untraited. If they are running form you when they use it, bad ones will keep running straight ahead but good ones will turn 90 degrees and go for the nearest hiding spot. Gauge their performance and guess which they are likely to do.

Above all else, remember that a mesmer is a master of misdirection. Only horrible ones will try to take you head on. Great ones will mess with your head. For instance, I play a condition mesmer but I may act like a shatter mesmer at the beginning of the battle, using Cry of Frustration instead of Mind Wrack. This is to make people think my damage is front-loaded and make them sweat when they realize I do a lot more damage than they were expecting. If they ignore my clones and go straight for me, there’s always a Mind Wrack in my back pocket.

I’ll let you guys ponder on how to defeat that.

TactualRain.7109:

I’ve got a whole mess of alts, and I’d say Mesmer downed state is neither good nor bad; it’s situational. But I cry a tear of pain every time I play my Warrior and use Vengeance. In my life, that skill has not automatically killed me after killing my enemy: three times.

So, compared to that, Mesmers are OP, sure

That reminds me of the one time that I downed a warrior and he used vengeance right before I spiked him. I can’t even call what happened next a battle as I didn’t even attack him. I just dodged, blinked, evaded and waited until he keeled over.

Ahh, I love being a mesmer!

Those whom always look behind them will never see where they are going. I don’t judge races. I judge individuals. I’ll kitten-slap a flame legion char just as quickly as a separatist. I’ll pour one out for Tybalt every time I go drinking, kitten-slap every flaming effigy I met and make sure Adelbern always gets a shatter straight to his ghostly gonads!

I’ve been looking up statistics on how many males play female avatars. I haven’t found anything conclusive. The numbers vary from 25 to 50% of females being played by a males. There is one thing all sites confirmed though. The number of female gamers is growing exponentially.

I also ran into an oddity. During the beta, I played with a guy that started a guild in pre-release and invited me to it. We played with one other girl whom said she was a guy. When we were about to use voice-chat, she finally admitted to being female and stated that she lied because she didn’t want to be treated differently. I like to think I never treated her any differently but I may have subconsciously been slightly harder on her because she lied and I REALLY hate that.

As for the matter at hand, my toons usually have a C-cup. I’m a guy but certainly an odd one. I don’t care for breasts. Seriously. Even in real life, I only notice them if they are extremely huge or extremely jiggly. It took me 7 months before I noticed that my night elf’s breasts bounced when she ran. It took me 2 months for this game.

I was going to try it for wvw because I like legal trolling tactics and I haven’t tried a different build in a really long time. If this change goes through, I might stop playing the game until an expansion comes. I’m not going to leave a disgruntled thread or anything of the like. I’ll just silently close the game and give my ps3 and wii some love. I was already getting frustrated with the constant, heavy-handed nerfs, buffs that were more like fixing quality of life issues and how absolutely confounded I am about skill tooltips being left incorrect for so long.

I still have a pinch of hope left. I still like this game more than any other mmo out there but these “balances” have pushed me to the edge of my breaking point. Maybe they’ll swap the vulnerability from Winds of Chaos with poison. Maybe they’ll reduce the cooldown of portal in pve. Maybe they’ll stop adding cool weapon skins that you can only get from ridiculously low rng odds. Maybe they’ll make support builds more worthwhile. Maybe they’ll actually do something that will discourage zerging instead of encouraging it.

I’ll wait until the 30th, vehemently holding on to my hope.

I’m not sure about phase retreat but I do know a few blink tricks. For instance, if there are some bridges you can stand under and blink onto. The catwalks in the caves of CM explorable are a good example of this.

I’m not going to be as catty as Knatty but you have to agree that, if this change goes live, they have killed the glamour spec. I could understand if it was so powerful that over 50% of the mesmers ran it but there isn’t many. We all know the reason it isn’t overpowered is because it’s too easy to avoid the damage from confusion! In fact, the only people it really worked on are newbies whom don’t understand how it works or idiots whom ignore conditions. If they wanted to protect the newbies, a better way would be to give small amounts of confusion to a lot of minor enemies in pve so they could get use to it. The idiots still deserve to die.

Another vote for Tybalt. The sad thing is I know what’s going to happen to him so I refuse to play claw island stories. I also tip my hat for Countess Anise. If I could, my mesmer would have joined the Shining Blade.

Sadly, Vayne, it seems to be the people that whine the most are the ones that are heard.

Considering that they want to turn pvp into an e-sport, that’s a huge problem.

Nuka Cola.8520:

I wish mystic toilet was deleted and instead all those rare and good looking skins dropped in one mega dungeon. Yes, its still RNG but you know all those skins are in one dungeon and even if you don’t get what you want you could always sell it and make a lot of money or buy the one you wanted/. Making items in mystic toilet decrease the reason to do dungeons.

You know as well as I do that it’s meant to be a gold sink and it does a fine job at that. Plus I wouldn’t trust any weapon acquisition that involves to rng. Even after playing since the pre-release I may have had 7 exotics drop for me and most were in the last 2 months.

Now this mega dungeon idea… That could be interesting. Maybe a mixture between a rogue-like where maps are randomly generated and fractals where every floor gets harder and harder but the loot gets better.

knight.8926:

So they fix confusion but they don’t fix BACKSTAB? I see favoritism.

I heard they are nerfing an aspect of it but I’m not sure. I only use my thief to farm dynamic events so I didn’t pay much attention to the thief part.

You just stated another reason confusion isn’t over powered. Even with 12 or the full 25 stacks, it does nothing unless you do something. It’s one of the few things that makes players stop and think. To make matters worse, even that 12 stack won’t last long. And if it’s so easily purged by a zerg, why does it need to be nerfed?

And yes, people won’t take feedback out of their build because some will have to respec their ENTIRE build. There is a decent glamor spec, sepecifically for wvw, that relies on stacking confusion. With this nerf, it’s highly likely that the build won’t be valid anymore. That has already happened in pvp.

Yes, it’s not the end of the world and the ones using it will either quit or try another build but that’s what scares me. Homogeny. The devs are supposed to be promoting MORE builds, not less!

Draygo.9473:

Uh

confusion is not an effective zerg burster, as it is affected by the aoe limit of 5..

Do we play the same game?

as an aside the mug->backstab combo is getting nerfed as well. So its not a good analogy.

I would argue that it is, or at least it is to those whom understand how it works. If you see an enemy glamor field, would you step in it? I wouldn’t because I know that could trigger confusion. Feedback is even better for zoning because people have to step out of it in order to use ranged attacks. The 5 man limit only effects up to 5 enemies in the field. When others step out, it can then affect another. That’s why turtleing in an aoe is more effective than scattering. And I feel the devs are promoting zerging because they have had to have seen these tactics by now and yet they keep nerfing things that dissuade it.

jazzllanna.1278:

Is the confusion and retaliation just for wvw? I would really like to be able to use a torch darn it! I hope that maybe that is being looked at with these changes so it is more useful.

The changes won’t effect pve. That being said, they have pretty much killed confusion builds in wvw. I’m starting to wonder if they really are against zerging as they keep nerfing everything that would break up zergs.

Waves fist at forums for deleting a highly detailed analysis that took 45 minutes to type

Here are the cliffnotes of my post.

• Yes there is a problem but berzerker favoritism is just a “effect”
• The problem has nothing to do with CoF or warriors
• Over 50% of the people that I’ve seen post their builds use berzerker
  – Even those that use multiple sets usually post berzerker first
  – This includes pvp and wvw builds
• Don’t take my word for it. Look through the profession forums for yourselves
• This game has roughly 16 major stat combinations
• With that many, berzerker should have 25% rep at most, not over half

With that said, game mechanics should be changed to favor other sets. Precision should increase the duration or stacks of conditions as well as heals and boons. Yes, there should be critical heals! Healing power should factor into how fast a player can revive another. Auras should last longer. This can get iffy with chaos armor but i see no problem in fire auras being twice as long.

Now, if you really want to screw with people, make more enemies immune to direct damage (earth elementals), while others are immune to critical damage (slimes). If you throw these in dungeons, you can easily lower the health of common mobs while still making things more interesting.

Leo G.4501:

kikittener.9578:

what the uking problem whit zerker? learn to play and leave the other use whatever they want. Jesus Christ why so many jelly?

What did the English language do to you that you’d butcher it so heinously?

Best reply ever! You have made my day!

zaxon.6819:

go into spvp where you are under pressure and force yourself to turn using the mouse durring fighhts. it will be frustrating at first but you should learn under the most tense situation so everything else is easy in comparison and you dont crumble if you get into a fight in wvw or w/e.

I would suggest doing ImagoX’s training before doing this. That would make it less frustrating. With that said, this is a must. Nothing will improve your skills more than trial by fire.

I run rampager gear with sharper images and sigils of earth. What everyone says is true. At most I can get 6 to 8 stacks of bleeding. There is a situation where I can sustain 25 stacks but that’s using 3 iWardens against an immobile and ranged enemy. However, it blends in well when fighting multiple enemies and spreading out the love of burning, cripple, confusion and vulnerability. It’s how I’m able to handle and kill so many mobs at once.

I will say that the Sigil if Generosity has one glaring flaw. It will trigger and go on cooldown even if you don’t have a condition. If that ever gets fixed, I could recommend it.

Devilsmack.5736:

So…

Focus: The Anomaly / Spirit Links
Scepter: Abyssal Scepter
GS: Vision of the Mists
Spear: Ignis Fatuus
Sword: Whisperblade

Am I missing something?

There are the pistols, Lyss and Llya. I personally can’t decide which I like more so, when we get mainhand pistols, I may go for both.

First, dirtyshame, I want to congratulate you for being able to take a critical look at mesmer powers and giving valid feedback on why you have formed an opinion. Even better, you have stated your reasoning in a very understandable and polite manner.

That being said, I disagree with you.

Let’s take a look at each power individually.

Mind Blast has one huge, glaring issue: confusion. While it’s arguably useful in pve as any enemy that downed us is likely to keep attacking, they don’t attack fast enough for confusion to make much of a difference. Now if it could be traited to stack 3 with
each cast, I would be spamming the hell out of it, even if that didn’t speed up the attack. In any pvp setting, it means jack! If you get a mesmer or any player down, you’re more likely to go for the spike because it’s, faster, more epic and has bragging rights attached. Confusion won’t stop that from happening.

Deception, I will admit, is highly useful in pvp settings. Anyone trying to spike us will have to resort to counter measures ahead of time or essentially spike us twice. This has saved my life quite a few times but I don’t feel it’s overpowered for 2 reasons. First, it can be countered because it needs a target to work. Going invisible, blocking, losing line-of-sight and blind will stop it. Second, we can’t choose where we teleport to. In pve it might as well be named seppuku because it’s more likely to teleport us into a far more dangerous situation. I would say between 80 to 90% of the time, it teleported me right under the ballsack of whatever monster downed me. As for invisibility, it’s outright broken What always happens is I port, my clone uses Mind Blast attacks and I’m made visible again by game mechanics so I might get 3/4ths of a second of invisibility. Not once has it EVER saved me! This is why most Mesmers say this power is crap.

I will proudly admit that the iRogue hits like a mac truck but the balance is you can’t use it right away. Like others, I rarely get the chance to use it. Even when I do use it, it rarely makes a difference. Anything I haven’t been able to kill before it’s active has little chance of dying from it. In PvP settings, I’m usually able to get spiked, a second time because Deception has its awesome moments, before this power is anywhere near ready. Even if I do get it off, the best it can do is down the person after me, which won’t get me back on my feet. From then on it’s a war of attrition and because I went down first, I’m already losing. It could help in that situation but only if I stay alive long enough for it to attack again. The odds are still against me so I don’t see how it’s OP.

Now onto illusions. They are the mesmer mechanic. If I am able to spawn them before I go down and they’re not taken care of, why shouldn’t I use them? While they can make an impressive difference, it’s only when a mesmer is traited to take full advantage of them. My character is traited for them to give conditions on death. A shatter may take a decent bite out of anyone trying to spike me but it won’t stop a spike.

The only other mesmer skills that will stop a spike are shatters that use the Illusionary Persona trait. With it F3 will grant distortion which will have to be well-timed but will avoid a spike. F4 will daze and that can be highly useful in stopping a spike. So why do I feel this is still within balance? Because Illusionary Persona is a Grandmaster trait. For 30 points, it has to be this epic!

So, in my opinion, the mesmer downstate isn’t over powered. In fact I think Mindblast either needs more confusion stacks or an entirely new gimmick. Deception needs a target reticule to work and the shatters require a trait deep within a trait line. That seems pretty fair to me.

I’m not going to tell you what to do like most of the others here. I will simply try to explain to you why it can’t be done right now. Think about everything that’s tied to a character’s race. Every dialogue choice… Every customizable feature… Every skill… Every equipment choice… Every personal story conversation… We are talking of hundreds to thousands of constants that have to be changed into variables and then tested and retested to make sure, at the very least, they don’t cause the game to crash. My guess is it would take 3 to 15 months of work. It could easily be twice as much too as I’m still coming to terms with how ridiculously modular this game is.

Would you rather have a programmer do that or do you want them to focus on new stuff like new weapons, more useful elites and proper trait lines that encourage more diverse builds?

The devs have stated that they want to change a few meta events and dragons is on the top of that list. However, these changes would require new artwork, modeling and coding so it’s going to be a while.

Maybe it’s just your server or the specific time you wanted to grind. Most players do the events in primetime evening hours. Very few do so in the morning or late afternoon.

Time to play devil’s advocate.

As an amateur programmer, I can assure you that some bugs while seem “minor” are a pain and a half to find and fix. For example, imagine there was one risen in Orr that used the wrong weapon. In order to fix that, a programmer would have to go through EVERY SINGLE RISEN SPAWN in the Cursed Shore, Malchor’s Leap and Straits of Devastation until they found the right one and switched his weapon. In the time that would take, the same programmer could be fixing the missing effects on legendaries, correcting errors in skill tooltips, increasing the drop-rate of charged cores or adding new features to WvW.

Which would you prefer that programmer do?

I would call that a lot of availability. Hell, I didn’t even know you could get them with baubles.