Guild Wars 2

Love the new video with slo-mo, awesome stuff.

Haha, not bad at all!

Yeah if you have loads of passive condition removal (ie, runes/food/sigils), then good to focus on toughness over vitality.
Really depends how you play and deal with direct/condition damage.

Of course you could just run something glassy if you’re exceptionally skilled with active damage mitigation – I know I’m certainly not!

Got enough condition removal?
Solid numbers tbh, I like to shoot for ~2800 armour too, but does depend on build and abilities.

Ryuujin.8236:

If you need convincing of the superiority of Asura you’re clearly not cut out to be an Asura, it’s that simple bookah.

On that note OP, be prepared to delete all of those inferior characters once you create your asura.
;)

Some of the dialogue in the first part of the personal story (any choice of college or invention) is just pure genius. Puns and jokes that will make you laugh.

Male PC voice hits it perfectly – just the right tongue-in-cheek intonation which still comes across as meaningful and serious. Female voice is good, and my main character is a female asura, however the male voice is fantastic.

Animations are amazing all round – from dodging, jumping, idle, emotes…

Yeah fair point, it doesn’t always come out and that should definitely be fixed.

Although I would still like to see clone leap rather than blink to the target.

Yes it’s on the broken skills list; might sound strange, but more often than not I like it when this happens.

I see the skill more as a clone summon with free 5 second in combat (cqc, not long range) blink + immobilise even if you shatter the clone or overwrite it, which offers great and consistent positional advantage. Even better when you kill/overwrite the clone – the blink location is fixed compared to the clone hugging your opponent.

As long as you’re in range, the clone is summoned giving you the free blink. EDIT: most of the time… :p

What I’m saying is I’m not sure I support any change which makes the summoned clone blink to the target, because if your clone gets stuck on terrain it offers a bit of unpredictability – for example you can run at your target (or use normal blink), bait them to you then swap back to the clone – badly worded, but hopefully that makes sense.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Phantasmal Tyrannosaurus

..Too badazz, I know.
<snip>

This should be the name, regardless.

Defensive/Lazy hybrid/scavenger – 10(V)/25(IV, X)/20(III, X)/10(IV OR VI)/5
Sw/Sw + Staff

Inspiration IV in pvp for condition removal (Edit: and sigils of purity)
Swap in a GS if necessary (not optimal, but sometimes worth it).

Normal gear:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAscWlwzaqXUTmGbdJiJFEHydqA0hWApClWZG82FC-jkCBYLChIMRjCcIaUBgZPDZNBKilRFRjVvATfiIq2boIa1xAsE-w
Sigils of generosity only on mh sword and spear atm, still debating staff/trident sigils.
Swap mirror images for any other useful utility if necessary.

PvP: Celestrial amulet + berserker jewel (yeah I don’t like the useless 295 healing power or condition damage – would rather have ~400 more power, but the boost to the rest of the stats is good. Shame about the lack of pvp amulet choices… :/)

No you’re not going to see huge numbers and insane burst here, but survivability is reasonably solid, and you are well equipped to wear down your opponents.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but not feeling the focus any more – stationary iWarden doesn’t really fit my playstyle, and I DISLIKE ground targeted skills in general (blink and chaos storm I can make an exception for).

EDIT 12/06: currently in build redo due to realising the power of the fixed Prestige. Above build not in use – switched for S/T and PU, although most gear and traits are the same

Crossplay.2067:

<snip> At that point you are required to wear a flashy, unconventional, high fashion outfit with fuchsia somewhere in your color scheme.

:D
Only fuchsia, or any shade of purple/pink?

Would be nice to see some maps with no objectives at all – just pure team free for all.

Furious Interruption – by the name this trait should be badass, as well as it being number XII – I imagine the character wielding a GS, furiously using iWave with satisfying impact…
But 4s f fury on interrupt is nothing compared to many of the major duelling traits.

Retaliatory Demise – does anyone actually use this?

Chaotic revival – same as above?

Saelune.5316:

Asuran Cuteness is our strength! The humans will be too beguiled and not see our giant death laser as we take over Tyria…then the world!

Each one of us…

Each in a separate dimension.

Just watched the first one so far – I like it; very well put together, slowmotion and zoom to show detail, and clear guidance.

Already some great posts covering why it is the best ranged weapon.

However when it comes to any form of cqc or duelling, I’d prefer S/S or staff. GS just lacks solid defence/mobility at close range. You can use traited mimic with #2 for a makeshift block, but it is slow and clunky.

Also as you said, #3 is hard to land, #4 has issues and #2 is no longer guaranteed personal boon stacks with the elasticity problems.
You end up auto attacking a lot more than with any other weapon I’d say, interspersed with the odd mirror blade.

I’d rather play in the Brand than in Orr – The purple and crystals are more visually appealing, and branded enemies are much more fun than risen.

Only thing better about Orr is the impressive architecture and landscape structures.

I do agree that portal should be one of the elite skills.

But I like the channel on mass invis – it’s a very pretty skill to use. I do not want to see it made instant cast.

Carighan.6758:

Other races get a Phantasmal Asura summon, which in turn calls down the golem!

(edit)
That gave me an interesting idea for a Mesmer Elite:

Impersonator
Summon a phantasmal copy of your target, which can be yourself.
The copy uses the equipped weapon, utility and healing abilities and the class mechanics of the person copied, but never their elite ability. If an ability was on cooldown, the copy will start with the same cooldown on their ability.
Duration: No clue.
Numbers:: No clue, obviously not as strong as an actual player, but shouldn’t be too far behind either. Depends on duration and CD.

In short, 100Blades Phantasm

Oh yes!

That would be so weird – I think it should be unshatterable and excluded from the active illusion count.
And it should have retaliation, so whenever the enemy attacks it, they are in effect attacking (hurting) themselves.

Interesting survey, didn’t expect ele to be that high.

Mesmer – 80

Everything else I either got bored with and deleted, is for pvp only, or is <40 and only to get other Order armour/weapons.

Not as bad as everyone makes out in 1-40; just go out there and play – will make you better with the abilities.

Easy from 40-80 (apart from some encounters which are tough regardless of class – but then it’s pretty easy to avoid all that with blink/stealth/dodge…).

Dps might seem lackluster initially – you may need to put in more effort for a given outcome. But with time/traits/gear you can get respectable dps with plenty of utility.

The “sniffing the air” animation is adorable (when dual wielding).

^Yeah that is the best way.

You do lose some utility:
- for example “about turn” does not work so you’d have do that manually with the mouse.
- ground targeting is harder when zoomed far from your character, meaning you need to quickly toggle the crosshair off for a ground targeted ability at range, move the cursor to cast, then toggle it back on again.
- you have to toggle off/on for any npc dialogue interface.

Apart from that it is well worth the auto attack on left click, and no finger strain on the right mouse button… I wouldn’t play without it.

You’ve seen the light, congratulations!

^Well the thing is I’m perfectly happy with exotics as it is.

I would rather upgrade the tier of all gear together, so it’s easier to figure out stats. Odd I know, but I just prefer it that way – feels “neater” (yeah you might have guessed the aquabreather situation bothers me… )

As such laurels have no use for me at the moment, so just hoarding them in case they are used for purchasing further ascended gear.
If not I’ll just blow them on trinkets.

1. Save them to buy ascended trinkets now.
2. Hoard them (for when full ascended gear is released EDIT: just in case they can be bought with laurels).

I’m going with option 2.

I love the attack golem in pve, although have never considered using it in wvw because of the horrible cast time and as you said, making it’s mind up about what to drink before it starts attacking. :p

But I didn’t know it works with SoI and the defender! So I take it half of the damage the golem receives is routed to the defender similar to the player?

I guess if one can cope with mantras (which I’m horrible with) then the golem should be manageable too.

That necro looks amazing, good choice on getting the helm.

For me it’s all down to the underwater combat – it’s horrible on every other class (thief my god how boring…).

Ele gets close with the icy wall, lightning cage and other pretty effects, but nothing comes close to the mesmer trident with its beautiful auto attack, or the spear.

Every time I read this as “Salad Bowl”.

I’d rather not have a salad bowl for a GS. :p

This is a pretty cool idea, especially your suggestion for rewards.

Palu.3405:

The one thing I want is for the giant red arrow over my head to also appear over my clone for #2. I don’t have a giant arrow over my head when I’m fully up and alive, and this forces people to actually figure out which one is the real mesmer. Granted, that’s not that hard currently since one can look at boons/food/etc. However, when the real mesmer always appears second and with a giant arrow over its head, the ability’s purpose (to confuse the enemy) is completely defeated when playing against any competent player.

This is true as well.

The downed state does not need to be completely overhauled, only needs one or two small changes to make it more consistent/effective – mainly on #2:
- red downed arrow also over clone
- teleport away from target

In fact if the downed arrow showed over the clone, then maybe the random teleport would be better, because whoever’s trying to stomp you would know which direction you have ported in – unless you switched target before casting #2, thus controlling the direction.

Skill #3 is very powerful – the problem is because #2 does not afford you enough time to get to use it when against competent players.

Skill #1 is hard to change because it is great underwater, especially combined with the #2 clone.

Edit: silly formatting…

The only thing necessary is for #2 to teleport you away from your target, like phase retreat – not closer to danger as it does most of the time…

Xavi.6591:

Still like my Decoy idea best.

Passive: 25% Swiftness
Active: Gain stealth and summon an illusion to attack your foe.

Duration: 3 s
Breaks stun
Range: 1,200

I would argue this would have less negative impact on most Mesmer builds. Having Swiftness on Blink would suck because I would never want to blink while out of combat.

This. Now this is good.

I’m not too keen on the “blink signet”, because of the imbalance in manipulation and signet skills (5 to 3), and then having to trait for signet cooldown reduction which is in a horrible place.

But passive 25% on decoy is amazing, although it might need a longer cooldown because let’s face it, virtually everyone will use decoy if this happens.

Edit: on reflection it is overpowered.

Maybe the speed buff should just be a simple trait choice?

I agree it is the most straightforward method.

The only downside would be missing those times when for example a random aegis saves you from a sneak attack.

But that’s hardly a big deal, and on a positive note it would get rid of the constant “Go ahead, hit me!” and other dialogue that randomly triggers while you’re standing around out of combat – this is the main reason I don’t like using the signet.

EDIT: I have a different solution for SoI
- gives you 20s of swiftness on activation, along with the usual effect of boon sharing.
I feel 10s every 10s passive effect is a little too much (yes I appreciate how some other classes can also get effective “perma swiftness”.

I’m assuming it’s not clunky for an mmo – I wouldn’t know, I’ve never played an mmo before.

But it half-introduced elements for an action rpg, which for example makes me expect things like:
- crosshair and mouselook toggle
- left-click for auto attack
- right click for select target (seeing as there’s no need for zoom)
- shift+right click for lock or nearest target (just an example)

The lack of the above, the camera, the targeting system, the ground targeted abilities all take some time to get used to, and I’m still not entirely comfortable with them.

I think it would be useful if you specified the particular shoulder set you want for your character – I’m assuming you like one of the asymmetric sets but want to see a symmetric version of it?

Otherwise as has been said, plenty of “normal” ones to choose from.

None of them appeal to me.

Tbh I actually prefer some of the basic/plain skins.

Fair point, although some of them make sense if for example you have an asymmetric weapon set/stance, with a priority of attacking using the MH – you might want one arm free, with defence on the vulnerable side.

Nuka Cola.8520:

Of course i would like that, one of the reasons i don’t pvp much is the fact that i can’t run exactly what i want.

Yeah agreed.

Unless they increase the amulet/jewel combinations in pvp, I’d be interested in this too.

If it’s more pvp style maps, then perhaps as one poster said no broken armour?

Added screenshot to the OP as an example.

Such a system would also cater for there being more than 5 skills per weapon, if any more are added in the future.

Yeah I agree, this is much better.

nicknamenick.2437:

Curunen.8729:

It’s an elite on a 180s cooldown, has a windup animation, is single target and is easy to miss with.
It was necessary for the run to be reduced, otherwise it was essentially buffing the target allowing them to run away faster/further.

It’s fun to mess around with, but not as useful as mass invis or timewarp in a group.

180 issnt That long when You have a free kill on 10 sec..
Single target, its pvp so its most of the time 1vs1.
and easy to miss with? From a 1200 range? I dont get thakittens still OP, its the same as your keyboard gets disabled for 10 sec, or a stun from 10sec WITH anti stunbreaker..

Dodge, block, aegis, interrupt, blind… The cast roots the mesmer too.

Yes I agree in 1v1 it is good, just like the bog standard phantasm build – but then we all know 1v1 is unbalanced anyway.

Actually you know what – I agree, delete it and we can get a more useful elite!

What? No you can use staff as the backup/defensive weapon for GS just fine.

I would have advocated 20 points in illusions for elasticity before today’s patch, but not sure whether it is worth it at the moment – haven’t had the chance to test it personally yet.
Otherwise x/20/x/x/20 would have been good as a base
- then you can either pickup 30 in illusions and go with a standard shatter build
- can go with a suicide clone build (sticking 10 in domination and possibly 10 in chaos), although bear in mind it is harder to pull off with GS clones because of them staying at range
- I wouldn’t recommend a pure phantasm build with those two weapons – better to go hybrid, and maybe pick up one of the damage traits. As such I would never spend more than 10 points in inspiration with staff and GS, though YMMV.

It’s an elite on a 180s cooldown, has a windup animation, is single target and is easy to miss with.
It was necessary for the run to be reduced, otherwise it was essentially buffing the target allowing them to run away faster/further.

It’s fun to mess around with, but not as useful as mass invis or timewarp in a group.

No prob.

I run a very similar build now – 10/25/20/10/5, the only difference in traits being reduced blink cooldown in chaos instead of debilitating dissipation, and mender’s purity instead of compounding celerity.

Also if you take mirror images it’s a useful clone “detonator” for the cripple – works well with sword clones (in addition to usual shatter fodder and stun break).

In fact, I may as well just link it here for comparison: http://goo.gl/iWyny

My question would be do you really need mender’s purity?

Or even phantasmal healing – are you standing near phantasms much?

Personally I’d drop at least 5 from inspiration for illusion 5; Maybe drop another 5 so you could get compounding power (I take confusing combatants, but my build is not strictly pve oriented).

Noince.7364:

No, the poster got it wrong. Clones are NOW considered bounce-able targets.

Oh dear…

Does GS#2 bounce off it’s own clone when created then?
Considering that clone is in your target’s face, would it ever bounce back to you unless the clone died?

What?!?! Elasticity fixed, seriously? :o

I can’t test this till tomorrow, but if that’s true I’m going to retrait for it again.

Edit: Ah wait, maybe I’m misinterpreting – does it mean the illusions attack bounces on the player more times (for WoC), or back on the illusion?

If back on the illusion, then that’s pretty poor, especially for things like GS#2.

Hardest – engineer, without a doubt. Respect to all the good engineers out there.

Second hardest – I’d say actually warrior in pvp – needs very good situational awareness.

Main – mesmer – not the hardest but certainly has a high skillcap.