Guild Wars 2

It would be nice to see all the pvp exclusive amulet stats in pve/wvw.

I would certainly like to see Demolisher stats available for wvw.

The sigil of air nerf has been a bit annoying though.

lioka qiao.8734:

My character is a master ice sculptor. In 3 shots she can carve a perfect raven statue out of ice complete with wing contours, eyes, feathers without shattering it.

haha, yeah this made me laugh.

Popcorn ready, waiting for the whining to begin again. xD

But on a serious note it’s good to see mirror blade bounce returned.

OH YEAH, Mirror Images on 30s!

kitten , that has made my day.

And even then is that likely to solve shatter spam synergy for condi application in pvp? I doubt it.

But it is going to be unfortunate for say power builds using GS and wanting a second izerker attack after mind wrack…

BeepBoopBap.2840:

serj.8214:

BeepBoopBap.2840:

I don’t understand how wanderers or carrion amulets are bunker? Lol.

Easy, bunker is a class that can absorb dmg for some time and its doesnt mean that he\she should be a supp\heal build.

Well I guess a berserker double endure pain zerk stance warrior is a bunker then. Staff thief too?

I hate condition builds as much as the next guy but you guys are just being silly. Paladin scrapper has more defensive stats than the mesmer, warrior, or necro builds.

Agreed.

I can understand players not liking condi. But calling them bunkers now is inaccurate due to the amulets available – especially when looking at Carrion or Viper.

Only Rabid could be considered bunker, and then they melt anyway to incoming condis due to low health pool.

For example I am way more “bunker” playing Demolisher power mesmer than playing Viper condi/hybrid mesmer…

Chaos armour needs something going for it. Since they removed the blind it’s such a pathetic aura.

Nevermind staff 4 on a ridiculously long cooldown only to provide this aura.

As a side note, I’m more bunker playing GS power mesmer wth Demolisher amulet than when playing condi mesmer with Viper amulet…

It also deals better burst damage, has more survivability and has access to boon strip from Domination.

I would like to see Focus get a buff for pvp given it is totally supplanted by Shield since HoT.

Something like making the iWarden pulse Aegis to allies within it’s attack bubble while it attacks, and make Temporal Curtain give Quickness to allies/Slow on enemies that walk through it.

I’ll be happy if condi removal gets spread out a little from Inspiration.

Regarding chronos:

condi = yes
bunker = no.

Especially if you use Viper (I use Viper), which ends up more glassy than glass cannon power builds that tend to default to Demolisher or Marauder…

Justine.6351:

Curunen.8729:

Oops, sorry I thought I had replied to you Step! :o

My bad.

Yeah I have realised the same – it’s just nowhere near worthwhile because often just stripping a random regen or swiftness or something else useless and then the more important stab/resistance/protection just lingers on…

A shame.

Maybe put it on sword then. Where one boon strip randomly would be near useless, multiple potential strips wouldn’t be?

The other problem is in a Viper build it’s very difficult to get a full sword AA chain off without being at risk of taking significant damage due to being made of tissue paper.

I very much like this.

As you said, restrictions would have to be in place to prevent broken combinations, but overall it would lay a solid foundation for maximum diversity in stats for the future.

Oops, sorry I thought I had replied to you Step! :o

My bad.

Yeah I have realised the same – it’s just nowhere near worthwhile because often just stripping a random regen or swiftness or something else useless and then the more important stab/resistance/protection just lingers on…

A shame.

I agree, it would be good to have back.

The Grove, bottom level.

A good thief will still wreck you, so yes they do.

But now it’s a lot easier for any player to be a decent mesmer than it is to be a great thief.

Does anyone use this in pvp since it got cut down to 5s ICD? If yes, how effective do you find it?

I’m struggling to gauge how effective it is/isn’t when compared with Sigil of Doom.

Mainhand focus (along with a buff to offhand focus).

UKADAM.3910:

MAIN HAND FOCUS!!!!!
Which is a dps weapon like a dagger, punching like animations would be sick :P high damage and fast
Some of the focuses look like melee weapon any ways so there wouldn’t look stupid haha
But can you imagine it looking like a magical wolverine xD

I like you.

I like mixing viper with cele trinkets. As you said the power element is nice to have and does good direct damage together with condi providing sustained damage.

Sure the toughness/vitality is lower, but you die so fast in wvw anyway that I don’t think it makes much difference.

Healing power is a useless stat though.

Dire is totally different as you will have negligible direct damage. With viper/cele I see some pretty nice crits with mind wrack.

For a moment I came in here and thought this was a real patch…

kitten , don’t scare me like that! :o

I’d be ecstatic if any generous player gifted me with the Daydreamer’s Finery outfit and Glittering Wings back skin.

Oh my goodness, I just logged in and noticed an extremely kind player and fellow mesmer who otherwise seems to have remained anonymous has gifted me the Glittering Wings back skin as a recognition for helpful posts in the mesmer forum – and there I thought I wasn’t contributing much helpful information!!! :o
I am stunned by your generosity – my little asura will be wearing these.

Cynz.9437:

Xanctus The Dragonslayer.2318:

Yep every kittening time, People ask for more nerfs on DH. U guys will never be satisfied unless the class is unplayable.

welcome to thief “my class” world~

;)

Unterkiefer.8372:

Condition shatter mesmer has a completely different playstyle than power shatter. Here is why:

Power mesmer:
- set up your 3 illusions so that they are placed near the enemy
- press f3 and f1 (refill illusions to 3 in between if necessary)
- dmg
- if target is dead stop here
- kite the target from range while waiting for cd
- repeat

Condition Mesmer:
- set up your 3 illusions so that they are placed near the enemy
- press f2, f3 and f1 (refill illusions to 3 in between if necessary)
- dmg
- if target is dead stop here
- kite the target from range while waiting for cd
- repeat

As you see its so different and boring to play.

Haha, so true.

Power shatter is no less “boring” than condi or hybrid shatter. It’s the same old burst around F1 combos repeated again and again and again. I used to be a diehard gs/s/t power shatter but it became so unbelievably boring…

Funnily enough I find hybrid shatter more fun to play now than pure power.

To give suggestions for that list:

iMage could be 25s (along with a functionality buff)
Staff 4 could be 20s (along with functionality buff)
Arcane Thievery should be 20s
Mirror Images could be 40s (matching with Decoy)

Neither power, condi nor hybrid builds take skill to apply and deal damage. Face it, dealing damage is easy in this game. Every build “spams” skills and has a ridiculous number of ways to deal damage.

Survival on the other hand… well the only difference depends on amulet stat choices.
For example Rabid and Wanderer do trade a significant amount of direct damage for toughness and kill slowly. The toughness is required for the time to kill an enemy.

For the record I’m playing Viper amulet on mesmer – all it takes is one sneeze to kill me.

I vastly prefer traited torch because I find it more fun than Shield. Torch allows more mind games and I like the fury proc from iMage. The additional cooldown reduction in stealth together with decoy and condi cleanse isn’t bad either. Shield is still too conventional as a blocking weapon although ToT is a nice skill.

Also for example you can unload a condi bomb on say a necro then hit prestige and kite, avoiding any counter transfer.

The big weakness of torch is reveal/anti stealth tools in wvw, but equally Shield can be penetrated with unblockables so neither is perfect in that regard.

I wish you could sell mats directly from storage rather than having to move them to your inventory first. That is really annoying…

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Side note: as a reoccurring joke in the game, my human male mesmer will proclaim that the reason why he learned to become a mesmer was because the illusionist magic college was filled full of hot ladies. This is based on an event in real life, wherein one of the visiting college students to our middle school was trying to inspire/advertise his program to us. He was in education, and while he lead with the generic slew of platitudes that the education program sells (sense of fulfillment, getting to work with the community, respect from your peers, yadda yadda), he did offer one strange tidbit: his chosen career path was a “total babefest”. One of his selling point for choosing a career in education is that there were hot women everywhere.

haha.

I work in education and wish if only that were true!

Shiyo.3578:

It’s a bad 6 piece(stupidly designed) and we already have a 3 page thread I started where everyone pretty much mutually agreed passive CC procs shouldn’t exist.

Absolutely.

The game would be much better off if all forms of passive cc and anti cc were removed, including anything from traits or runes.

I fully agree with you. Mesmer should be about weird unconventional control mechanics rather than simple dps or at the most a few pathetic interrupts.

To grind for the backpiece.

There is only one race – asura.

:p

(But I have played a charr ranger as an alt – I only play beast races in games that have them available)

Inb4 PU condi mesmer, but that’s wvw…

The thief and mesmer builds that require these utilities do so because neither are capable of facetanking damage in teamfights.

The only mesmer build that can facetank (what remains of bunker/support) doesn’t use these escape skills anyway, so the point is moot.

1. Staff 4 Chaos Armour buff and cooldown reduction. A 35 second cooldown for a pathetic aura on self is a shockingly bad skill.

2. Increase projectile speed on iWarlock, Staff AA and iMage.

3. Do the Sword AA buff you suggested in the OP.

4. Reduce cooldown of Mirror Images to maximum 40s base.

5. Reduce cooldown of Arcane Thievery to 20s.

Glamours in general are a weird collection of skills anyway. I’m not quite sure what they are meant to be thematically, especially now with us also having wells.

Only Manipulations could be seen as a more random assortment of skills.

It’s a bit… meh… unless running several glamours. But then you have to sacrifice stunbreaks or something else.

I dunno, it feels a bit mediocre for a grandmaster trait.

This’ll be good when I want to use Signet of Inspiration.

But otherwise I’ll probably leave the chatter on – I like hearing all those lines.

kermq.6258:

Why I dont see Taimi in the graphic, shes in the group to as mentioned but she didnt make it to it?

BTW i want to see Scruffy 2.0 in LS3

Yeah I looked around that picture many times, scanning for Taimi…

Bad form Anet, leaving out the most important and superior member of the group.

Shiren.9532:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

1) The biconics are not mary sue characters. May Sues are defined by a lack of flaws and how everything always goes their way.

It could be worse, but there is a bit of Mary Sue going on with the biconics, especially Kasmeer and Taimi.

While both of them are introduced as characters with some degree of challenge in their life or background, rarely does either actually face setbacks or have to deal with compromise or challenge as a result.

While Kasmeer is introduced as losing her status and class, she doesn’t look like a street urchin, she remains one of the most elegant characters in the game. She landed rather comfortably right away with a job and a home so we never see her truly struggle after losing her wealth and social status. Even a show like Two Broke Girls is a more realistic portrayal of the life of someone like Kasmeer who loses everything and is thrust into a lower class without the upbringing giving her the skills to handle that. We are told she lost her wealth and her security but all we ever see is a beautiful woman living comfortably in a world where that’s not a realistic outcome.

Secondary to this, or perhaps even worse, the only demonstration of her loss of social status is a random person doesn’t announce her with a title at a social function. We see she still has a relationship with Logan, Captain of the Seraph and the Queen’s partner, we see she has a relationship with Anise, and she even joins the royal escort in the World Summit that Kasmeer herself helped negotiate by writing a letter directly to the Pale Tree. The gravity of losing your social status and your class is completely lost when the reality is Kasmeer has privileged access to some of the most powerful people in Tyria but her background is supposed to suggest the opposite.

Why write that a character is an alcoholic if you’re never going to show that character struggle with their alcoholism? Kasmeer’s flaws are really faux flaws – superficially they make her sound interesting but throughout the story they are barely present. Which is more interesting – an alcoholic that tells you they are an alcoholic but never in the story does that present a challenge for them, or one that loses their family and job because they couldn’t control their drinking? Kasmeer is the former, it’s window dressing but it’s not her lived in reality.

With no field experience prior to her introduction, Kasmeer holds her next to seasoned fighters like Braham, Marjory and Rox, going as far as to surpass them during the season one finale with Mesmer Sue powers. She does this multiple times throughout the story, including being specifically summoned herself by some authority on mesmers because of how fantastic a mesmer she is.

It’s a similar theme across many of the biconics – Rox is the lowest class of charr but has privileged access to one of the highest ranking charr, Rytlock. She gets the honour of ambassador to Kryta for the Queen’s Jubilee and she’s trusted with important tasks such as taking on Scarlet. Even after disobeying orders, she retains privileged access and has more autonomy than most people would in a military culture like the charr. She isn’t stationed on watch duty, she doesn’t have to clean out the cow dung, she isn’t “shipped off to Siberia” as a punishment, she continues to be a part of the charr military hierarchy while working side by side with some of the most elite people in Tyria.

When bad things happen, the consequences are either superficial or short lived, or the bad things happen to people around them. Marjory’s sister’s death is a bad thing that happened to Belinda not Marjory, if Marjory had become an alcoholic in her grief, or a ruthless necromancer indiscriminately killing sylvari to take down Mordremoth – then she would have real flaws, all we see did was disappear for an episode and act slightly more suspicious of sylvari than everyone else.

The flaws these characters possess hold little to no power in their lives, it’s just window dressing to give the appearance of a more compelling character. The characters themselves rub shoulders with important people, get to go on important missions, are successful at almost everything they do, and unlike Destiny’s Edge – they haven’t paid a price like the defeat against Kralkatorrik and death of Snaff. The idea itself isn’t bad, the execution just didn’t utilise it. Their flaws don’t weigh them down, they rarely challenge or obstruct them, they act as window dressing to make it seem like these people are exceptional because they accomplish things even with “flaws”. That’s why they come off as Mary Sue to many people.

Great post, well explained.

Anyway, given what we’ve got I went for “The Unbroken”.

I would have gone for “Taimi’s Troop” but it wasn’t available.

This might sound minor, but the entrance to a match on Capricorn was such a lot of fun for something so small – leaping off a ship into the water with the default gw2 pirate battle themed music starting up (don’t know the name of the track).

I miss that.

Shiyo.3578:

I just want CCing someone to be a conscious decision a player makes, not something that game automatically does for them.

I agree, especially when it comes to cc effects and conditions.

All passive cc and anti cc should be removed, whether from traits or runes or whatever.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I still want ANet to remove breathers as armor and just use them as skins — there’s never been any value to needing a 7th piece of armor and all sorts of downsides.

This so much.

It would be great if breather masks were simply skin changes of headgear that occurred automatically when entering and exiting water.

denis.9487:

apharma.3741:

Not too much to mention that others haven’t.

Some of my guild use hoelbrak runes, saffron bread and chrono to get -40% all condition duratio and -65% condition duration on soft CC. This lets them use either mantra of resolve or just kite and wait out conditions without being too stressed by them. They can run domination, duelling and chrono just fine and don’t have too much trouble with conditions.

I on the other hand run scholar runes so I choose to pick up the inspiration line instead of duelling and run a maintenance oil with some assassins armour for extra crit chance I lack by not having duelling. I run ether feast for the big heal and if I find conditions are a real problem I switch to mantra of restoration.

I take cleanse on shatter, sometimes I will trait glamour master and take null field if my group is more susceptible to conditions instead of mantra of distraction. If I am using 2 mantras I take restorative mantras otherwise just pick whichever adept you find you’ll get the most use from.

Oh and I pick life steal food because if gives you a bit more sustain in addition to the heals from inspiration.

Another big tip not mentioned yet is know what skills stack a lot of conditions and when players will use these. A lot of the time they can be evaded, blocked or interrupted so you don’t have to worry about conditions if they never get applied. Likewise learning when to cleanse is a good idea. Example being that necros mostly stack bleed and poison for damage, cleansing at 3-5 stacks is not a good idea, wait for them to build up higher then cleanse. Conditions are cleansed on a first in last out way so if 10 stacks of confusion were put on you, then 4 others, you’d have to cleanse the 4 before you hit the confusion. Sometimes waiting out some stacks to cleanse a higher and more lethal stack is needed.

The first part about runes and food is a moot point. Usually if running condition build then the food runes of the applicator will just negate yours. Thus still having to manage a condition build with 2k conditions ticking on you.

Even so, it’s enough that chill, immobilise and cripple barely stick to you so cleanse can be saved for other conditions.

Silberfederling.9302:

alchemyst.2165:

I love how people are just now calling broken now that thief is meta. Thief has literally the same amount of evades as it did when HoT came out, but nobody is crying until it’s meta.

Hello may i present to you: the warrior

Or condi mesmer tbh.

Open world – sure.
Instanced – damage is too low.

I find hybrid power/condi does a lot for staff damage, and the iWarlock can still crit big numbers given the amount of conditions you can lay on a target.

Whether playing power, condi or hybrid builds, you can use a combination of consumables, ie Melandru/Hoelbrak/Antitoxin runes with Saffron Bread/Poultry Soup/Sweet Bean Buns for passive duration reduction. In particular with Time Marches On it causes cripple/chill/immobilise to fall away very fast.

In addition to this Inspiration is of course the way to go, and also can trait Mantra Heal. If using Torch and Illusions then also trait torch. If you really want to be excessive then also take Mantra of Resolve.

x/Inspiration/Chrono is as solid for power as it is for condition or hybrid play. Yes it’s not going to provide the same offence as Domination+Duelling, but stat damage is high enough in wvw that it really doesn’t matter.

With all of the above I find I have good sustain against condi builds unless outnumbered.

Sure you sacrifice some damage if taking those foods/runes and Inspiration, but I value survival more than time to kill.