Guild Wars 2

Oh, so it doesn’t matter missing the first day as all the answers must be sent together at the end of the hunt?

Great, this looks like fun – strangely reminds me of the scavenger hunt in The Pearls of Lutra (Redwall novel). Maybe because of all the animal/animal like creatures in the game (skritt, charr, hylek, quaggan, etc). Just need more mice/squirrels/hares/otters and so on around!

Yeah I like them too, but I’m kind of addicted to Primitive pants as they’re the only "shorts’ style available for asura in light armour. Not keen on the skulls but the shorts/leaf skirt is cool.

Ascalonian pants are a plain set, and both Student and Country pants are also better than the majority of long dresses/robes.

But I agree it would be nice to see more simple leggins for light armour instead of all the dresses (kind of like medium armour trench coat syndrome…).

Smart idea OP, I’d take it over the current situation.

One hand sword would be very welcome.

I never liked Bolt and would like to see a cleaner more minimal practical sword skin, just very well made/refined with a nice aura/effects.

Blind can be unpredictable and cause enemies to miss your shield block for example. Also not enough sources of blind to make the confusion worthwile. But it is still a good survival trait against multiple enemies.

However MoF provides 10% crit chance to MW which brings it up to 44% (add fury from torch and you’re at 64%) which is nice for direct damage burst in addition to condi. But more importantly aoe F3 is too much of a quality of life benefit for me to let go of. Amazing for stomping/ressing with multiple enemies around.

Tbh you could take any of the three grandmaster Illusion traits – even Malicious Sorcery. They are all equally good in their own ways, although I feel Ineptitude benefits most when using Duelling and Blinding Dissipation.

I’d pay gold, laurels, badges of honour or any other suitable currency available through wvw or open world pve in order to buy fractal relics from other players for the ability to infuse rings/back item.

I have been experimenting with Sc/F, Sw/T and had some mixed results.

1v1 against a thief, Focus had big downsides where Shield is vastly superior. I was also using Feedback instead of Mirror Images and this was pathetic, whereas with MI I could have unloaded bigger burst. They ran away fwiw, but almost killed me too.

1v3 vs two Scrappers and a Chrono I lasted a surprisingly long time with careful use of focus pull and stealth. The cleansing sigils did prove their worth here. However again I feel had I had Shield I might have managed to win (nearly killed the Chrono but focus pull was pathetic against Scrappers and no reflect when untraited…). On that note the reveal from Stealth Gyro did cause me to waste Decoy which ultimately led to death.

Regarding Torch, it’s not just the stealth – prestige hits reasonably hard and applies good burn which is nice for condi burst.

Also the idea with the runes/food is that you should be able to wait a short moment before healing/removing conditions and let the fast ones drop off by themselves.

But yeah I am now using Sc/Sh, Sw/T and it is so much easier in outnumbered.

Regarding that build, I have since changed sigils of Doom to sigils of Cleansing which so far are proving to be very useful. I’m preparing myself for a possible RI nerf next balance patch. Sure you lose the poison, but for example when running/kiting it is nice to have on demand condi removal on weapon swap.

For reference (swap Sc/F for Greatsword or Staff or Sc/Sh or Sc/P):
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRArd8fl0nhy0YnawRNwtGLvG15PEEHHaAkTPX9wesLLA-T1xHAB8u/w8q/skyv5UCOu+HAeSBKfSFCAgAMfyn8JfyX+yX+G6QH6QH6Q77CdoDdoDtUA9tGA-w

The reason I don’t use pistol is when a fight becomes more than 1v2 it scales really badly and provides no defence.

I’m surprised you don’t like the mantra – it provides the most healing/time and condition removal with Restorative Mantras, even with the channel. But I think because I use Torch it is easier to cover the channel in stealth sometimes. You could go with another heal and change RM to Persisting Images for retal.

I also find shield very (yes I had to emphasise that) boring but it’s objectively our best offhand in every game mode.

Either it needs to be brought down to the level of other offhands or all other offhands need buffs including active phantasm cast component (of which other people have suggested better ideas in other threads so mine are just placeholders…).

Torch: Prestige is fine but iMage could be changed to aoe pulse. Add an active player effect on cast such as aoe chill burst (because mesmer) and cleanse a condition or something followed by iMage executing aoe burn and fury pulse to allies.

Focus: Curtain should change to destroy projectiles untraited. iWarden could pulse some buff to allies in the attack bubble radius while it attacks – eg protection. Active cast component could be aoe 1s reflect (ally support) or something else (better suggestions from other people in other threads).

Sword: The only thing it has going for it is the low cooldowns. Shield totally outclasses it otherwise. Block could be changed to proc daze on block as well as counter. Swordsman could be changed to rapid multi hit (like spear phantasm underwater – more synergy with something like sharper images) and active cast could be player leap to enemy dealing damage (with option to “swap” back to initial position like infiltrator’s strike) after which phantasm spawns and leaps. Cooldowns can be increased appropriately.

Pistol: As has been said big downside is single target which is a pain with pve trash mobs and outnumbered wvw/pvp and magic bullet being neutralised by the amount of blocks/evades/anticc/etc out there. Also of note is how you can throw Tides of Time behind you when running in another direction but Magic Bullet requires player to be facing the target. Perhaps Tides of Time should be nerfed so as to only throw in the direction of the player character. If not then I’d say you should be allowed to fire magic bullet out of your kitten – it is a “magic” bullet kitten .
Regarding iDuelist – it’s shots could have a 20% chance to bounce to an additional target. Or each hit on a target could proc aoe damage around that target (very small aoe) as the bullets explode. The active cast component could involve the mesmer firing three shots all of which explode on target and deal aoe debuff such as vulnerability (ready for the duelist to follow up with its unload). I believe Pistol should be a 100% offensive weapon, it just needs some aoe component and quality of life to help it.

But currently unless you’re chipping away at a bullet sponge (world boss or instance boss) with millions of hp, Pistol sadly isn’t good enough.

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

Interrupt mesmer build only works in very niche occasions due to how much pulsing stability most HoT specs have and innate blocks/evades that most HoT skills have. So yeah you shine for 10s in a fight and other times you stand off point waiting for opponent’s stability to wear off.

Power shatter still works given enough practice (and outplay tbh given how predictable it can become), but there’re really very little reasons to bring interrupt mesmer despite its usefulness pre-HoT. I said this as a player that loves interrupt build and played it for more than a year. And no I’m not talking about lockdown build where you hit mantra to daze/stun without reading opponent movements just to set up bursts. I’m talking about the actual “interrupt” interrupt build.

Agreed.

Personally I’d happily trade our ability for burst damage for more complex control mechanics (denial, control, debuff, etc).

sephiroth.4217:

Curunen.8729:

Kuya.6495:

Curunen.8729:

Build diversity is very low at the moment.

?

Guardian: full trapper, medi trapper, marauder symbolic, mender symbolic.

Mesmer: power shatter, condi mes

Thf: d/d condi evade spammer, d/p power thf

War: condi war , power rifle, power gs

Rev: power shiro (invocation variant, retribution variant), condi mallyx

Engi: power scrapper, condi bomb engi

Speaking from mesmer perspective – there is only one playstyle – the most effective power/condi/hybrid is pure mindless shatter spam that uses chrono and shield in some way.

Deviate from that and you’ll be handicapping yourself. There are no intricacies or different playstyles – even things like interrupt or signet are merely “flavour” while the core of any build revolves around bombing with illusions.

But that’s the usual thing that elite specs have done and I find it a little boring.

You only handicap yourself until you learn the new play styles associated with the build. As with anything, practice makes you better.

But that’s the point – the playstyles for mesmer have all homogenised into the same thing.

I should have been more accurate with my statement:
- trait/skill variety (and thus build) is good.
- playstyle variety is awful because every build plays similarly.

I know it’s the class mechanic and baseline IP was welcome, but I’m bored of every build (core and elite) revolving around shattering. Sure phantasm builds used to be cheesy but at least they were sufficiently different in playstyle.

I hope the next elite spec deletes and replaces F1-F4 for totally different skills (I dunno, “Mirage” control skills or something) to change it up.

Every time is the last time but people still play.

I’d be (pleasantly) surprised to see any more than a few skill changes. In any case, best not to expect anything.

A giant badge of honour on the back?

But yeah I agree a wvw legendary backpiece would be nice.

Kuya.6495:

Curunen.8729:

Build diversity is very low at the moment.

?

Guardian: full trapper, medi trapper, marauder symbolic, mender symbolic.

Mesmer: power shatter, condi mes

Thf: d/d condi evade spammer, d/p power thf

War: condi war , power rifle, power gs

Rev: power shiro (invocation variant, retribution variant), condi mallyx

Engi: power scrapper, condi bomb engi

Speaking from mesmer perspective – there is only one playstyle – the most effective power/condi/hybrid is pure mindless shatter spam that uses chrono and shield in some way.

Deviate from that and you’ll be handicapping yourself. There are no intricacies or different playstyles – even things like interrupt or signet are merely “flavour” while the core of any build revolves around bombing with illusions.

But that’s the usual thing that elite specs have done and I find it a little boring.

Yeah OP, you’re right and it is a shame.

The “meta” builds are high at the top of the food chain and any other build is a long way down below that such that it is a huge handicap to deviate from the norm.

Build diversity is very low at the moment.

Oh yeah I agree there’s so many ridiculous “swords” compared with relatively normal skins.

And also I really hate how most sword skins clip through the floor when stowed on asura – there’s only a few that don’t such as the timekeeper sword which is stowed higher on the hip. I won’t even bother with things like Infinite Light sadly because of this problem. Either all swords need to be shrunk a bit more when stowed on asura or they need to be positioned higher on the hip like the timekeeper sword.

I’m currently using Honour of Humanity for two reasons:
- it looks like a sword
- it’s short enough to not clip through the ground when stowed on my asura…

I love this idea and would definitely craft it.

(Infinity ball was my favourite personal story in any case).

Haha, yeah exactly what came to mind on seeing Aurene.

Generosity is not so good because it is not controllable – you don’t know when it will proc or what it will remove. Could be 10 stacks of bleed, could be 1 stack of vuln.

Ineptitude only loses some value since the removal of blind on chaos armour so the only effective way now is to take it with Blinding Dissipation otherwise there is a shortage of blinds.

As has been said – without RI and Mender’s Purity you are susceptible to counter condi burst.

It’s a stupid either/or situation – either you take Inspiration and have no problem dealing with conditions, or you don’t and you have big problems with incoming conditions…

The offensive benefits of Domimation, Duelling or even Chaos (which IMO is pretty weak at the moment) are at a big loss to sustain from Inspiration.

lol that’s a great read.

Some of the best shoulder armour skins are funnily enough the cheap skins you can get early in game.

But yeah it would be nice if you could also toggle them off on outfits.

What, is it shooting full sized unicorns now?

Sartharina.3542:

Curunen.8729:

Ariurotl.3718:

None of my characters use mace. Oh well.

Yeah

I mean it’s great to see a new legendary released, but so far with Shortbow, Axe and Mace I can’t use them on my mesmer. And I already had bifrost before nevermore was released and Hope only affects one skill…

Really hoping for a new legendary Sword or Torch next.

I’d rather see a new Focus. The current one is ridiculously forgettable.

Between the Anomaly, Priory artifact and Zenith focus I’m pretty satisfied with Foci at the moment, but can’t seem to find any Sword or Torch skin I truly like.

But yeah I wouldn’t say no to a new focus legendary (and mainhand focus for next mesmer elite spec!).

New challenge – play a “default” build all the way to legendary.

Ariurotl.3718:

None of my characters use mace. Oh well.

Yeah

I mean it’s great to see a new legendary released, but so far with Shortbow, Axe and Mace I can’t use them on my mesmer. And I already had bifrost before nevermore was released and Hope only affects one skill…

Really hoping for a new legendary Sword or Torch next.

ProtoGunner.4953:

There is another possibility. Since they can do whatever they want, we may kill Primordus during Season 3, I mean it’s really time to move on. There are 4 more dragons and after nearly 5 years only 2 are dead. With this pace (if they won’t change anything) we will be retired or six feet under

I’m going with this.

Primordus finished in LS3, Kralk in next expansion.

Healix.5819:

Curunen.8729:

Kamikazi.5380:

dw looks like legendary mace is on its way

Where did you find this?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/539buk/upcomming_stuff/

Hmm, I’m open to this.

A shame it is the mace though – I won’t be able to use it as a mesmer.

Kamikazi.5380:

dw looks like legendary mace is on its way

Where did you find this?

I’d change the trailblazer weapons to viper as well – otherwise loss of power/direct damage.

But sure, test it out if you have the gear and see how it goes.

I like many ideas here and agree all other phantasm skills should have an active effect.

The only problem I have is my main draw of Domination is boon strip and you can’t take it because of Blurred Inscriptions.

However the extra damage from all that vuln and MA is definitely good. I see you kept blink – was wondering if you’d go 5 signets but I don’t think I could ever play without blink.

And congratulations!

Ansau.7326:

Curunen.8729:

I believe staff is a pvp weapon – not a wvw weapon. It trivialises positioning in pvp maps, however in open field phase retreat isn’t so great, especially given the scary HoT builds that exist out there. Also your ability to chase is pathetic, and enemies will be able to run due to lower burst damage so you need to be able to chase and keep up pressure.

I have to disagree on this.

Staff is still a very good weapon for roaming. With perma protection, aegis and phase retreat kitting, it becomes gold against the power creep found in wvw.

In open field, Phase retreat is still very valuable, not only you can run faster (camera back+#2+camera back), it also puts mesmer as a good escape profession (PR+blink is 2100 range forward your enemies, plus having PR at just 5s CD if played well).

And damage isn’t that low (of course AA, phantasm and chaos armor need rework). In condi builds clones can be deadly. In a power build Phase Retreat+MW becomes a nice unpredictable burst, and when the phantasm hits, it hits hard.

The thing is staff is a weapon that requires some build up to shine with boon stacking and chaos armor management, contrary to other weapons that are more straight forward.

Perma protection is only when traited though and Chaos isn’t as good as other trait lines right now.

I don’t rate chaos armour that good unless traited.

I find 2 and 5 are excellent in pvp – 2 for kiting using map terrain and 5 for stomp/res interrupt and self boons. But in wvw I find the aegis proc(s) on 5 doesn’t provide much for survival, and if being chased by a group I find that 2 does very little for survival. However as you say 2 is best used offensively for surprise burst and position and in this aspect it is fantastic.

AA is ok – shines best with hybrid stats, although when chasing enemies to kill I personally find it is not as good as having say an iZerker/mirrorblade/spatialsurge/mindstab available.

When iWarlock hits it’s great, when it misses it’s kitten. Also not great for chasing.

To clarify – all the above is from using hybrid stats and having Sword/Torch in the opposite set which has zero chase potential. So it is not possible to 100-0 (or even 100-10) in a burst therefore some form of chase must be available otherwise enemies can run. In pvp this isn’t an issue.

But sure I have seen people play very well with staff and I do enjoy playing it myself in wvw. However it has big weaknesses and does require the right build/stats and counterpart weapon set to function well.

(Edit – for the record I do love staff enough to have made bifrost, never made another legendary)

PadreNike.1803:

Curunen.8729:

Exactly as roamzero said, full cele isn’t a good idea without the ability to might stack (and you have to choose between MtD and Shattered Strength…). Your damage output will be very mediocre.

I personally use cele trinkets with viper weapons and armour (cele chestpiece). I have found it to work well while solo roaming or small group – the cele trinkets provide just enough stats to not be one shot and viper gives you the teeth to do damage.

Ty for the responses guys, mind sharing which weapos are you using for the viper build?

<s>Sure I’ve replied to your PM. Seems there’s a character limit that ate most of my message though</s>

EDIT: oh, oops – just realised you’re a different person! :o

I use Sword/Torch pretty much all the time and swap out the other weapon depending on mood. I like greatsword thanks to might stack and vuln stack on mirror blade – can get decent small F1 burst with subsequent condition ticks. Also enemies don’t seem to get it – they expect zerker damage when you burst in greatsword and the conditions seem to (really) confuse people.

I believe staff is a pvp weapon – not a wvw weapon. It trivialises positioning in pvp maps, however in open field phase retreat isn’t so great, especially given the scary HoT builds that exist out there. Also your ability to chase is pathetic, and enemies will be able to run due to lower burst damage so you need to be able to chase and keep up pressure.

I am currently testing Scepter/Focus + Sword/Torch but need to recraft my ascended Focus (had deleted it due to uselessness many months ago). So far it is proving to be decent – not amazing because focus untraited is bad compared with Shield, but it is a fun weapon combo.

Scepter/Shield is of course godly, but I dunno – just feels too defensive with all those blocks. I like going aggressive with greatsword or pulling enemies into shatter with Temporal Curtain.

Oh and Scepter/Pistol is also fun – first time I’ve truly enjoyed using Pistol. However it scales very badly as number of enemies increase so I rarely use this.

This is the great thing about hybrid stats – you can swap out weapons depending on mood and still be effective. The only set I always use is Sword/Torch. Everything else I rotate depending on mood. But never offhand sword – I don’t like offhand sword when using these stats.

I would like to see this happen.

Exactly as roamzero said, full cele isn’t a good idea without the ability to might stack (and you have to choose between MtD and Shattered Strength…). Your damage output will be very mediocre.

I personally use cele trinkets with viper weapons and armour (cele chestpiece). I have found it to work well while solo roaming or small group – the cele trinkets provide just enough stats to not be one shot and viper gives you the teeth to do damage.

Would be nice to have an elite spec with some kind of elite transform skill – “phantasm form”, where you turn yourself into some kind of nightmare.

The whole elite spec could then be focused around phantasm play.

I would say remove rally entirely – even if you kill an enemy while downed, you have to res yourself/be ressed by an ally.

Invuln on downed certainly needs to go too.

And some outlier skills could be adjusted (function gyro, pet res).

And I like the idea of diminishing return of health every time you res/are ressed.

I don’t think any class in gw2 can be described as difficult to play – they’re all on the easy side compared with some other games. So if you want to play mesmer, just go for it. You’ll pick it up no problem.

That said, difficulty depends on game mode and build. We have one or two easy builds to play (ie PU condi in wvw) and one or two harder builds (ie, zerk power shatter without Inspiration).

lol, everyone’s lists are subjective.

A few songs I have on my playlist when playing mesmer – not for the lyrics but more for the sounds – makes me think of mesmer mechanics, shattering, burst damage, in combat mobility, damage avoidance and so on.

Mirror’s Edge – “Still Alive”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzmUde_EK5Y

Aldnoah Zero “aLIEz”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVaRSPaBlDc
English version (pretty good)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9G9CPZ8Zd7k

ODESZA – “Say my name”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdzI-191xhU

NoNoNo – “Like the Wind” (courtesy of one of Osicat’s videos – love this song, so fitting for mesmer)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yY6KLIx92q4

MJ – “Unbreakable”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXhRvUAIiYA

I usually have a load of other stuff including GITS soundtrack, Fairy Tail soundtrack (so many kitten awesome tunes and themes), new age stuff, classical, other video game soundtracks (ie, elder scrolls, deus ex, mass effect…), ambient music and a bunch of pop/etc (ie a whole load of MJ tunes on shuffle).

A few more:

GITS – “Dew”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLiWov6aAKc
“Access all areas”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1AYMNkfU1c
“Run Rabbit Junk”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l13RCQNUyI4

Hopefully that lot should put you in the mood to kick some kitten on mesmer. ;D

Fay.2357:

Curunen.8729:

Also a serious problem with untraited curtain – it often does not block projectiles at all – I’ve had rangers rapid fire straight through the kitten thing.

If traited for reflect this bug is not present but if untraited quite often some projectiles tend to go straight through.

That’s because untraited curtain does not interact with projectiles at all…

:o
I swear to the gods it destroyed them? kitten that’s crazy if not, can’t believe I never knew that – learn something new everyday.

Perhaps it’s because in the past every time I used focus in a build I’d stick some points in inspiration to trait it, and since the spec patch I’d forgo RI in favour of traiting WF. But recently is the first time picking it up without traiting…

kitten well then it’s in even more need of a buff to be useful in HoT powercreep.

Not to mention the number of times I curtain pull and see “immune” or whatever is really annoying. :/

Also a serious problem with untraited curtain – it often does not block projectiles at all – I’ve had rangers rapid fire straight through the kitten thing.

If traited for reflect this bug is not present but if untraited quite often some projectiles tend to go straight through.

I like jumping spiders. They’re very intelligent too.

OriOri.8724:

Personally I believe that wardens feedback needs to be made baseline, at the very least the CD reduction needs to be made baseline and it needs to move down to adept tier.

I’d take that – reflect being standard would further differentiate it from shield.

Really missing the reflect at the moment but it’s just not an option in pvp or wvw when compared with restorative illusions which is superior in all ways.

But then what could a focus trait provide that is unique if the reflect was baseline? Perhaps in the theme of support in inspiration there could be some beneficial effect pulsed to allies from the curtain and iwarden? Maybe boons or healing or something else?

Dyeing hair should certainly be in the hero Dye panel (including accessory colour) at free cost similar to dyeing all other equipment.

QQing.3089:

Curunen.8729:

Napo.1230:

Please not another Condi mes come to the dmg side

Come to the hybrid side, it’s even more fun.

Carrion op

Carrion? Nah, carrion sucks – only semi decent in pvp with scavenging runes because rabid and wanderer are both kitten poor at damage and Viper is too glassy vs decent players or if getting focused in teamfights.

Otherwise viper all the way.

Well tbh Viper with cele trinkets in wvw. Full Viper is just way too glassy for wvw; a bit of cele rounds out the stats nicely and provides a bit of survivability.

Benefit is I can also swap out any weapon depending on my mood because they all function with the stats – not pigeonholed into “power” weapons or “condi” weapons. I’ve even started to enjoy pistol recently.

You get decent F1 direct damage with gs 2 if you like, and the condis provide that added sustained dps (it is slower dps than pure condi).

Even better if you have an ally giving you some might or loading vuln on a target because it boosts both power and condi.

Napo.1230:

Please not another Condi mes come to the dmg side

Come to the hybrid side, it’s even more fun.

Asura master race. xD