Guild Wars 2

Sebrent.3625:

Mesmer got knocked too for quickness … anyone notice anything to compensate for Time Warp (an elite!) getting a 50% nerf? Nope.

This constant lack of QA, the hush-hush policy ArenaNet has adopted, and apparent disconnect between the devs and the community is why I’m simply taking a break.

I’d rather go play in Firefall’s actual beta (completely different community policy there) than continue to play around in GW2.

Heck, we were promised there wouldn’t be a gear grind … I’m forced to do 10+ fractals, daily achievements, and/or guild missions if I want best-in-slot for back, accessory (x2), neck, and ring (x2).

Mesmer specific, but…
My clones still don’t show-offhand weapons.
Map completion star only shows up on the real Mesmer.

No or severely lacking QA …

… so I’m not a happy camper … even less so since I supported them with money for gems …

Yea, I agree.

Also, WildStar is coming out soon and seems to be doing some really interesting things with player housing.

TheYakuza.2137:

Dastion.3106:

TheYakuza.2137:

loseridoit.2756:

i think mesmer got a buff overall in this patch.

this is the first patch in which mesmer did not receive a huge nerf

What are you talking about? They were nerfed harder then any class in the history of this game so far.

…what? The only nerf we received was related to the quickness change – every quickness skill was affected, including the Guardian Elite.

The margin to the amount we got nerfed is far higher than any other class. Quickness was our elite skill on a 200 second cool down for 10 seconds. You are cutting a huge amount of the skill directly in half. At least give us something else, we aren’t even needed in dungeons anymore. CoF groups will be 5 man warriors because they got buffed.

Time Warp was easily the single most OP skill in the game from a PvE dungeon perspective.

However, even if it wasn’t, rangers rely on quickness more than any other class since they have it up so often from QZ and pet swaps. They were also already the least viable classes in dungeons before the patch and the net result is that their dps is lower with nothing to offset it. (and before you say it, the greatsword change was a joke since it’s a melee weapon that will now, MAYBE hit for as much damage as the short bow).

Also, a nerf to time warp is an indirect nerf to everyone else under the effect of time warp, so this doesn’t just hurt the mesmer.

Nice. However, after the quickness change, the best group is probably going to be a 5 warrior group, lol.

Zaon.4367:

I have all class at 80s.Before this patch my main was Ranger.
I need a suggestion, which class can i play for raise a WvW rank?

Mesmer, guardian, warrior, ele.

But if you needed to ask this, then what you probably need the most is to spend more time reading forums, profession guides, or doing something in game other than leveling.

emikochan.8504:

Quickness was way too strong. Durations will probably get tweaked going forward.

I agree with this. Personally, I’d rather see the dps loss from quickness going away offset other ways, such as by increasing the damage of a primary skill or something.

RebelYell.7132:

How was Time Warp OP? It has a ridiculously long downtime, as does anything in this game that does something cool.

It gave groups a huge boost in boss fights. The cooldown was long, but you only needed it for boss fights, so it doesn’t really matter. Also, stacked groups could often kill bosses before you would need another time warp anyways.

Eh, I don’t think this was as big as the change to the GS was. It’s only good for increasing confusion spam, which is pretty meh in PvE. In PvP, it’s a lot harder to get targets lined up and it’s very unlikely that you’ll have them lined up the whole time.

jazzllanna.1278:

So I was really excited reading that this could hit multiple targets now, however, it is near impossible to get it to hit more than 1 in pve. To have everything directly lined up is near impossible. I cannot see this really doing much at all I have tried a few times and they have to be in such a straight line that it really does not hit more than 1 target often. This may need to be looked at a bit more.. maybe just make it an automatic chain based on distance not placement.

As a former ranger who ran with piercing arrows, I can tell you that you need practice. It’s very possible to line up enemies this way.

Ryk.9174:

Spatial Surge skill : Now strikes up to two enemies that it passes through, in addition to the primary target.

the change doesnt affect clone attacks

Wow, this makes no sense…

did they think that mesmers would suddenly be OP if their clones, who can’t be manually repositioned could do piercing damage?

I have a feeling this was a result of programmers just not wanting to do the work to code this more than balance issues though, I guess.

Robert Hrouda.1327:

While it isn’t mentioned in the Ranger info area specifically, we also added owner Agony Resistance to pets.

Robert, talk to us! What the hell happened? What is the rational behind the changes in this patch?

Was ANet not aware of how much this quickness change would affect rangers?

What happened to addressing the longbow and spirits?

I know you’re not in charge of balance, but can you please get SOMEONE from the company who knows what’s behind all this to open some communication? I mean, get Gaile Gray if you have to!

If you like trap ranger, check out necros.

If you like high (combat) mobility and want a class that is in a really solid spot, check out mesmer. However, if you try mesmer, just bear in mind that they’re kind of slow going leveling up until about level 40ish.

Time warp nerf makes sense. Mesmers are great additions to any dungeon without time warp, but time warp made them a staple of any relatively organized group anywhere in PvE.

Rangers probably got hit the hardest out of this change…which doesn’t make sense since they were in a lackluster position with dps anyways. The only offset to the nerf was a 1 second buff to QZ, which is only one of their sources of quickness.

A few of my thoughts from a PvE dungeon perspective:

Mesmers:
– Time warp nerfed, but that’s fair since it was OP to begin with.
– Escaped the shatter nerf. Mesmers rejoice
– Other buffs were nice.

Engineers:
– Changes should be interesting…not sure what to think of everything yet.
– Kit refinement nerf was rough, but I understand why they did it.
– Buffs to turrets look interesting, but I’m not sure if that’s enough to make them viable.

Rangers:
– Quickness nerf was a royal kick in the balls to this class since they rely so much on QZ and pet swap quickness to do dps.
– 1 second duration increase to QZ is a laughable attempt to offset the dps nerf.
– No buff to longbow that was discussed in the GW2 State of the Game
– Spirits are still a terrible option, which is sad. If rangers are going to hit like wet noodles, why not at least let them have a viable support build?

Warriors:
– Will still be rampaging beasts in PvE.
– Banners needed a buff?
– Will CoF P1 speed runs just be ran with 5 warrior now?

Leo G.4501:

The only people in a position to complain about the decrease to haste are those that used haste runes/sigils. TW is still a really powerful skill whereas before it was a stupidly powerful skill…there’s still not much reason to swap to anything other elite since they are so very situational.

Agreed. Mesmers also survived without having shatter nerfed, which is pretty huge.

pahldus.1678:

We didn’t get the talked about nerf to Shatter, however every other profession that has a quickness skill got a time duration increase except Time Warp. I call BS on that, because ours is an elite, and now just how useful will it be with the reduced ability speed from 100% to 50%.

Don’t be a brat. Time warp was OP and you know it.

And the “offset” doesn’t mean jack in most cases. Look at rangers: they got a 1 second increase on duration on Quickening Zephyr, which is only one of their sources of quickness. The quickness on pet swap got no offset either.

Dojo.1867:

Grimvar.9185:

Wow, the quickness nerf really hurts berserker ranger builds a lot. So all in all this patch has nerfed ranger dps when it is already in a bad state. Great, this is just wonderful way to keep beating an already subpar class into the ground even more Anet. 1 second duration added? That is nothing compared to the nerf of 50% speed this really really cripples the berserker build a lot.

GS buff is a joke nobody worth their weight in dungeons playing a ranger uses GS and AR being shared with the pet doesn’t change that the pet is still useless and dies to non-agony boss skills.

This such a bad joke.

GS is viable in dungeons. Maybe try it before you complain.

Also berserker gear with quickness is NOT our only viable dps build. Sick of those kids…

GS damage is nowhere near what a short bow or longbow damage build. ANet said that they wanted melee to do more dps than ranged, but they seemed to have forgotten this when it came to balancing rangers since ranged options are clearly superior.

So…unless you were using a greatsword before, your damage is now lower than before (since quickness is nerfed in half).

I mean, QZ lasts 1 second longer, but that hardly offsets the big reduction in speed and does nothing for quickness from pet swap. I understand why they nerfed quickness, but this hits the ranger class hard.

Also, no buff to longbow. I’m just glad I rerolled to mesmer and didn’t wait around for ranger buffs.

idari.4273:

all classes are good in their specific roles.

So, all classes are equal, everything’s cherry berry and sunshine? Somehow I’m skeptical.

Come on, I’m not asking people to categorize classes into “ZOMG OP! OP!” or “USELESS!!”, but rather I’d like to get a temperature of what works and why.

Even if a class may do one role better than another role, how useful do you think that role is in WvW?

Community,

I’m curious about what you think the best and worst classes are for WvW. Tell me now! Gogo!

edit, because apparently I need to make this explicit :

This is assuming equal skill and proper fulfillment of the role. Yes, of course, a person playing their class well can outperform someone of a stronger class who isn’t.

Habib Loew.6239:

I’m aware you are all posting about public chat but I just wanted to post a reminder that commanders are never suppressed in squad chat.

Personally, I think the chat suppression is a bit too heavy handed, even for non-commander players.

Coin Flunk.3024:

Pretty much all i do in game is dungeons as i love running them. However, over the last month is has become apparent that groups consisting of 4 warrior’s and 1 mesmers for CoF path 1, are slowly taking over. I could quite easily form groups for path 1, but no-a-days i find i’m getting kicked out of a group because i’m not a warrior.

Even lfg.com is full of ‘’warrior/mesmer’s only please!’’

I have a group of friends to run dungeons with, but when there not online, i do find i struggle more finding a group due to the above.

It’s also causing alot of hassle in game, i see people having to prove they are DPS, if they arn’t, they get kicked. If they don’t link their armour/skills, they get kicked… I’ve timed a run with 4 warrior’s/mesmer, it takes 5-7 mins. A run with a pug takes 7-10 mins. Is 3 min’s really that vital?

This isn’t so much a rant, as more of a ’what’s happening to our community…’ post =)

I agree with other posters here that making your own group is the best solution for this (just make sure you tell others that you’re group is not warrior only when recruiting to save yourself dropping members).

However, there are those of us who run non-warrior exclusive groups and I don’t think they are really that uncommon.

I don’t blame people for wanting to run only warrior/mesmer groups because the difference in run time is substantial, but really I think this is just a symptom of warrior’s dps being so unbalanced in PvE.

Hmm, I’m not sure what difference it makes to have a dev play your class. I mean, Hrouda’s been playing a ranger, but that is still the worst class in the game for PvE and arguably mediocre for PvP.

fony.5102:

Starscream.6498:

If I’m not looking for a speedrun, I’m fine with anyone, I think each class brings it’s own contributions to a run.

With the exception of Rangers, though. Each run I ran with a Ranger they were just so terribly underwhelming. At first I thought it could be their build, but I found it hard to believe I would get these so many times in a row. I hate to discriminate against classes, but I always roll my eyes when a ranger joins a group. Can’t see what they bring into the party that someone else can’t, correct me if I’m wrong on this one.

you should know why unless this is your first MMO. pet classes lend to the worst play. you have to do the least learning in order to get by with them, so most do not learn their class at all by the time they hop into group content.

I don’t think that’s really the case with rangers since the highest dps builds with ranger are really just built on them using auto-attach for the most part anyway.

But to respond to the OP, for an ideal group, I would probably do this:

1) Guardian – Role: Anchor/tank/defensive support
2) Engineer – Condition damage and vulnerability stacking
3) Mesmer – Defensive and offensive support
4) 2x Warrior – Pure dps and might stacking

My perspective on the professions in terms of their dungeon usefulness is this:

Warriors – are so far ahead of any other class in terms of dps, that it’s hard not to take them.

Guardians – are great at bringing tons of defensive utility while still being able to output solid dps. They are also handy to have since they can easily stack a lot of armor to increase the chance that they get aggro.

Engineers – are my favorite class for condition damage dealers since they can stack so much vulnerability.

Necros – are also a decent condition class for when an eng isn’t available.

Elementalists – have a lot of heal-centric utility, but personally I think that damage prevention utility (protection, projectile reflection, etc.) is much more useful than healing in dungeons. However, they are still strong condition damage dealers.

Mesmers – are a staple of any good group for Time Warp alone, but their projectile reflecting and ability to group enemies for cleaving with focus pulling make them indispensable.

Rangers – are pretty much mediocre at best at anything they attempt. I have no problem taking a ranger in my group since they can get through anything just fine (when played right, of course), but I take rangers despite the fact that they play ranger, not because they play ranger.

In this thread: Stereotypes of people based upon the stereotyping they do.

The one person I know that actually thinks Ranger spirits are powerful is here to say that he thinks Eng turrets are powerful.

…somehow I’m not surprised.

Yes, I know this is a topic that’s been covered many times, but I think it’s time that this is brought to the attention of ANet again and here’s why:

Player Housing in WildStar – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YeQg_2X_68

Player housing has always been an appealing feature to MMO players as a place where people can just gather and hang out (look at GW1 as an example), but the lengths that Wildstar is taking this to is absolutely astounding.

I don’t expect GW2 to really ever have something as cool as this, but hopefully ANet will reconsider it’s prioritization of this issue and revisit the possibility of producing content like this.

The only thing that really diminishes from consecutive runs is the tokens that you get at the end.

I’d support the idea of a whip for sure.

Kimeni.2509:

TL;DR
I learned that class roles are a big deal for me, and most of my gaming enjoyment.
Sad day.

Class roles still exist, even if they aren’t as prevalent. If you haven’t yet, I suggest you try Guardian or Mesmer since they both have the most pronounced non-dps roles (if you want a class with a dps specific role, go with warrior). There may not be the same tanking mechanics in this game, but if you run with more armor than the rest of your group, aggro will favor you, which is something a lot of guardians aim for.

Personally, I’ve switched to playing mesmer from a ranger and one of the things I like best about it is having a unique role. In groups, I provide dps support with Time Warp and Signet of Inspiration to increase might on allies. I provide CC by using temporal curtain to group mobs into a small pack so that they get cleaved by melee and AoE. I provide mobility with portal, and I protect the group from projectiles with Feedback and traited Temporal Curtain.

There’s a lot more overlap of roles, but they still exist.

Oranisagu.3706:

for example, I still can’t blink past the rocks. whenever I try it I die because I have to concentrate on positioning my mouse for the targetting (insta-cast aoe is usually active). I’ll keep practicing but I think it’s just easier for me to run through the rocks instead of forcing myself to blink just because everybody else does it. (they should make a dungeon with a mad clock tower sequence in it, without portals. I’d love to hate it ^^).

Here are some tips that may help:
Drop portal entrance, then drop the swiftness curtain before the gate opens. Just before the gate opens, also hit auto-run and Blink so that you get the targetting recticle open. Once the gate opens, all you have to do is let your character run forward and click where you want to teleport to. Don’t get too worried about landing it at exact maximum distance, but just get it a bit ahead of you.

Changing your hotkeys may help as well. Personally, I have the click down of the mousewheel set to auto run and I bind blink to one of my mouse hotkeys on the side so that I can run, stop, and blink without interferring with turning or anything my left hand is doing.

But yea, in the end, practice makes perfect. =)

Daemon.4295:

Dahkeus.8243:

Daemon.4295:

Dahkeus.8243:

Terkov.4138:

It’s actually one of the best skills we have…

^ this.

Even if you don’t use it as a way to create distance, it’s great for:

1) Interrupting enemies using big skills *cough*hundred blades*cough*
2) Knocking people off of ledges
3) Preventing someone from stomping an ally

And that’s just in PvP.

If you’re just spamming in on cooldown as a desperate attempt to get a melee off of you, then you’re not using it right.

This. LB4 is an a great skill in WvW (and PvE), the only thing I’d trade it for would be a snare, like Warrior LB’s pin down.

Yea, I’m jealous of pin down, but point blank is the only knock back ability rangers have unless you count the one that is a counter attack on the greatsword.

And anyone that does jumping puzzles in WvW, knows how valuable a knock back is.

The knock back is great, but rapid fire is too easy to dodge and barrage is practically impossible to land on a human target. A pin would be essential and would really boost Longbow damage. Sure, against the golem in the mists I have no complaints, but you can only state that “longbow damage is really strong” (latest state-of-the-game interview) if you assume that all its attacks are landing. Sometimes I get the feeling that the devs don’t take actual combat mechanics into account enough when assessing weapons.

The longbow in general is overall inferior in a 1v1 PvP scenario to the short bow and is really better suited for large group PvP or PvE, so I’d rather see them make the change to crip shot on the short bow to make it immobilize as well. Not only would this play to the strengths of the short bow, but it would also make it easier to flank enemies for the extra damage/bleeding.

Daemon.4295:

Dahkeus.8243:

Terkov.4138:

It’s actually one of the best skills we have…

^ this.

Even if you don’t use it as a way to create distance, it’s great for:

1) Interrupting enemies using big skills *cough*hundred blades*cough*
2) Knocking people off of ledges
3) Preventing someone from stomping an ally

And that’s just in PvP.

If you’re just spamming in on cooldown as a desperate attempt to get a melee off of you, then you’re not using it right.

This. LB4 is an a great skill in WvW (and PvE), the only thing I’d trade it for would be a snare, like Warrior LB’s pin down.

Yea, I’m jealous of pin down, but point blank is the only knock back ability rangers have unless you count the one that is a counter attack on the greatsword.

And anyone that does jumping puzzles in WvW, knows how valuable a knock back is.

pahldus.1678:

Laugh all you want, here is my Norn mesmer. I just wanted a look that would be as unique as I could put together, and while it is not the taste of many here, I get plenty of comments and compliments on my unique fashion sense. These are my two different looks.

That’s actually pretty awesome. I like it!

Iruwen.3164:

Dahkeus.8243:

I do, however, think that a lot of people here take that for granted since they don’t see how a minor weakness in one part of the game is offset by being amazing in every other aspect

Because it is wrong. An advantage in combat or utility doesn’t have to be balanced by a disadvantage in mobility, other classes have to be balanced to be en par in these aspects if they’re not. Just like mesmers should be balanced to the same degree of out of combat movement speed. Especially since exactly nobody would be negatively affected by that change. Balancing means versatility at equal powers, not being partially broken to make up for a completely unrelated advantage.
And we’re far from being “amazing in every other aspect”, almost all classes have great and much needed abilities, except a few which are specifically broken, well known to be broken and being worked on (namely rangers). Mesmers can’t do everything and especially not at the same time, many people seem to forget that we heavily rely on how we’re traited, which makes the class really interesting but not as versatile within the limits of a single build. And we’re still “broken” in several aspects as well.

Outside of maybe Guardian, mesmer is the one class that everyone wants at least one of in every dungeon.

This is the same for WvW groups since Feedback, Time Warp, and Portal are godly in that setting.

sPvP is a bit more balanced for mesmers, but it’s also the most balanced aspect of the game in terms of class, but even then, mesmers are one of the top classes (feel free to check out the survey on GW2Guru regarding the weakest class. Mesmers are tied for last with Guardians: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/news/1077-community-highlight-of-guild-wars-2-pvp-survey/).

Mesmers are top of the line in EVERY aspect of the game, except maybe when it comes to travelling distances by foot, because in combat, our mobility is completely awesome. Even out of combat, it’s still not that far behind, especially when so much swiftness cast by other people is AoE.

Yea, it’s kind of a strange place. Did you find the hidden turkey room too?

Lert.6287:

Tbh, that part about ’’weakest’’ proffession shows who plays on which proffession. Seriously, warrior the weakest? Or engi weaker than ranger?
I could stand up for necro, they aren’t really good, tho decent condition burst.
I was expecting something fair and this…. this shows nothing.

It’s a PvP survey, even though they haven’t explicitly pointed that out as well as they should.

If this was about PvE, rangers would be dead last and warriors would be one of the first 3 best if not the best.

In PvP rangers are mediocre to bad for the most part, but trap rangers have become decent a decent niche in high end tPvP whereas warriors tend to be pretty bad unless they’re fighting someone who will stand still long enough to get hit by hundred blades.

ThiBash.5634:

Trollhammer.7439:

Fact: rangers are highly suboptimal for end game.
Fact: most people recognize the above statement as fact.

The first is an opinion. Thus the second is also wrong.

The first is more than just an opinion. It’s proveable by quantitively calculating the dps potential of a group using a ranger vs a group without one. Defense is irrelevant since end game content is cleared by members in full berserker gear (except maybe the guardian) who survive by using well timed dodges and killing bosses before they can do enough damage to wear down the group.

If you need to see proof of this, feel free to look at the dungeon runs posted by Strife depicting min/maxed groups of either 4x warrior and 1x mesmer or 3x warrior, 1x mesmer, 1x guardian.

And yes, the guardian can outdps the ranger while wearing gear that gives them enough armor to attract aggro and can produce more healing/boons/utility than a ranger can in a full dps build.

Also, yes, there are a ton of people that don’t recognize this as fact, but it’s a pretty safe bet to say that the majority ( > 50% ) of players understand this about rangers in dungeons, even if there aren’t any exact polls on this.

Terkov.4138:

It’s actually one of the best skills we have…

^ this.

Even if you don’t use it as a way to create distance, it’s great for:

1) Interrupting enemies using big skills *cough*hundred blades*cough*
2) Knocking people off of ledges
3) Preventing someone from stomping an ally

And that’s just in PvP.

If you’re just spamming in on cooldown as a desperate attempt to get a melee off of you, then you’re not using it right.

@Gaiawolf
I don’t assume that the people here are complaining because they think mesmers are underpowered or anything like that. I do, however, think that a lot of people here take that for granted since they don’t see how a minor weakness in one part of the game is offset by being amazing in every other aspect (well, except for dealing conditions).

I’m coming from the perspective that I believe in class balance for a solid game and I believe that part of that comes from not having 1 class that is the best at everything. Mesmers are already pretty kitten close to being in that place as it is.

Ratty.5176:

Daemon Hawk.9406:

Bri.8354:

In my opinion this can be achieved by decreasing the aggro pets draw while toughening up their health and damage reduction. This way the rangers pet could be very resilient without creating situations where they could hold the attention of and tank enemies.

In addition, a pet attacking should not make NPCs considered to be in combat. This way players cannot send in their pets alone to take down an enemy; a player needs to be fighting the NPC as well otherwise the NPC will gain health recovery.

This would break my game. I hate it when pets can’t hold aggro, and the idea of a mob getting to recover while I’m down but my pet is still attacking is awful. I see why someone would like your ideas, but I’d have to quit playing.

I think there is no reason why both sides can’t be satisfied here. Have an Agro value for each pet type, so maybe Moas and Birds have low Agro, Bears have high Agro. Therefore you can choose whether you want your pet to tank, or for you to have to kite.

This is already in play to some degree since aggro generally favors targets with higher armor.

RoyalPredator.9163:

If they:

• delete ranger class
• not balancing our problems
• stealing the ability to use Greatsword, sword, axe
• nerfing it even more
  We will STOP playing.

Nah, but this is already why I rerolled, lol.

To be honest though, even if they do buff rangers, I don’t know how often I’ll play mine since I’ve found that the Mesmer class is incredibly fun to play (once you get past the first 40 levels or so).

If this is really a big issue for you, feel free to actually try another class. Mesmers are by far one fo the best classes in the game both in PvP AND PvE. That’s not something almost any other class can say. Warriors are beasts on dungeon dps, but are lackluster in PvP. Thieves are great in PvP, but they’re squishier versions of warriors in PvE that can’t stack might nearly as well. Engineers arguable, but they run on a 1-shot wonder gimmick build for the most part in PvP and in PvE, they’re great at conditions, but still inferior to a group running with only a mesmer, warriors and maybe a guardian. Guardians are beasts, I won’t deny. Eles are great in PvP, but meh in PvE. Necros…can do conditions almost as well as Engineers? Rangers are subpar at everything (except maybe SPvP), although everyone suddenly thinks that trap builds in SPvP are OP because everyone forgot about them and now doesn’t know how to counter them.

If you’re really upset that you are so troubled because you don’t have 25% run speed that doesn’t stack with swiftness, then I personally invite you to reroll to anything else so that you can realize just how good you have it.

Mesmers are an amazing class, particularly at this point in the game. Sure, there may be a few things that would be nice to have, but there are already enough reasons for other ANet to consider bringing a nerf to the class as it is.

Xeph.4513:

Dastion.3106:

Gonna break this one up.

Xeph.4513:

I have mentioned it several times, and it has been on the pvp forums before;

I don’t follow your every post man. You only compared us to Thief’s in this discussion, so I was reasonably confused why I was being treated as if you had to repeat yourself to someone particularly dense.

regardless its not about side stepping it, its when a target is downed that cleave damage really shines and its very simple to target the downed enemy and move in any direction for the desired effect.

Again, you’re using broad generalizations of “it’s easy/op/etc” without any logical support. We learned this in elementary school, things at the center of a circle (the circle being your 900-1000 or so preferred radius) can more easily move a degree than things on the outter portion of a circle. If any enemy goes from standing directly in front of your target to 45 degrees from there (to the left or right of your target) they move only a few units while you would need to move over 1,000 units to compensate the new angle to hit both, possibly also requiring you to change targets. I don’t know about you, but my enemies are rarely stupid enough to stack or charge single file for me.

Also the problem isn’t with aiming the beam attack, since anyone running in the direction of the beam will be cleaved since its a constant attack.
Its far superior to projectile cleave, also we get the pierce for free whilst rangers and engineers need to trait for it.

Again, why are people charging straight down an obvious beam attack? It’s far from subtle, less so than an arrow or a bullet. In addition, while those attacks have the added bonus of piercing behind your intended target (allowing you to focus whomever you choose and still get the line of damage effect) this only effects those between you and your target. So unless you’re selecting targets for maximum AoE benefit (and thus not focus firing) it isn’t near as useful, and even then requires baby sitting. Oh, and Engineers get it for free as well.

Let me reiterate: I know Shatter can be potent, but you’re allowing your opinion of shatter to be influenced by a build. The build does need to be tuned down, but that is true now, never mind changes to a specific weapon. A knee-jerk “it must be nerfed before you buff GS!” response is extremely premature. Don’t get me wrong, I fully expect some Shatter nerfs, but discussion of such should be done in a logical manner which takes various factors into account. Done properly, any nerf will affect only the top-end, as the low-end is rather pitiful.

Also, I’ll point out again that Karl obviously had something about Mesmers that he wanted to discuss but was told No by Jon. There are too many unknowns about what is in development to make knee jerk decisions.

Grandmaster Coated Bullets Pistol shots pierce. (Engineer Trait), they don’t get it for free sadly.
Anyways the fact that people need to keep a constant presence of mind in which direction the mesmer will be cleaving with his beam, in essence makes that too strong, it gives mesmers a huge dps increase when it was never needed in the first place.
There is infact no real reason to buff the GS auto attack, its simply a rather stupid buff, that in conjunction with shatters is simply too strong.
Also the request was never to nerf shatter damage, it was the fact that shatter has too much tied into it for a simple F1 click (Rips 3 boons, 3 confusion stacks, Vulnerability (if traited) and massive aoe damage) and thats just looking at one shatter.

Mind you a lot of people, are trying to say that mesmer is dead if shatters are nerfed, and I can assure you that is not the case, I think that most mesmers playing at high end have stopped using shatter; well at least I haven’t run shatter in competitive play for the last 2 months.
There are better alternatives.

Anyways simply said, mesmers don’t need this buff at all, the class just needs nerfs in the utility department, other than that its perfectly fine.

I agree with this, although I won’t really mind getting the buff. However, I do like the staff a lot and it’s already behind the GS in so many situations as it is, so it will be even harder to justify taking it after this.

Durzlla.6295:

Dahkeus.8243:

Durzlla.6295:

Destai.9603:

I realize we can add those conditions, but it doesn’t feel distinctly like a Ranger. Preparations feel like a distinct class mechanic; I doubt it’d be added but would be cool nonetheless.

We -had- preparations in Alpha, but they were moved to the Thief in forms of Venoms (man does this kitten me off…) the only one that we were left with was Sharpening Stones…

Personally, i think we -should- have preparations, i mean come on, that was -the- thing of rangers in GW1. That being said, i don’t think we’re going to be getting them which upsets me =(.

Yea, but a lot has changed. I mean, look at mesmers. In GW1, they were defined as being the shut down class, but since there are no unique debuffs, mana, or interrupt systems (outside of interrupting by CCing someone with something like a daze), they are incredibly different than they used to be.

While I was ok with preparations in GW1, they aren’t really at the top of my list of things I would like to see brought back. I miss being able to interrupt spell casting more than anything.

Yeah, not gonna lie the #1 thing I miss is my Crip Shot BM build =(, was what I was hoping longbow would be in GW2 but NOPE! Lets make it have like 0 mobility control…

As for mes in GW2 they still have A TON of ways to shut you down, so that’s not really gone, it’s just different. And they still have their mastery at Enchantment Removal/stealing except in GW2 it’s boons instead of enchantments.

@ Crip Shot: Yea, I agree that I miss this. I could see it coming back since we still pretty much have the ability on the short bow, but even if we weren’t limited by the cooldown, snares don’t matter much in the current meta since PvP maps (outside of WvW) are so small.

@ Mesmers: Yea, they are still a shut down class in some ways, but nowhere near what they were before and even in the ways where they are still a shut down class, they feel totally different than in GW1.

Dojo, great post! Thank you for this!

As for the buffs coming in the next patch, I really don’t expect to see anything that puts ranger melee dps anywhere close to what warrior dps is, but I’d be happy to at least see it high enough to make melee a viable choice for a dps focused build in PvE whereas right now you’re almost always better off going with the short bow.

Are we talking PvE?

If so, Berserkers, hands down, is the winner. If you run rampagers gear, you’ll be relying on conditions which is problematic for the following reasons:

1) You will only start seriously stacking bleeding when you are strafing enemies, which isn’t always possible in dungeons.

2) You will often find your mob bleed stack capped if you run with anyone else in your group using a condition build.

3) Your burning may not make a difference since something like a fire ele can keep 100% uptime on burning easily enough on their own, so additional burning time is lost when the mob dies.

4) The same issue occurs with poison.

5) Other classes, like engineers, can keep up better condition damage than us while also stacking vulnerability better than a ranger.

Even if you end up in a group where you don’t have a good engineer, necro, or ele capping out condition damage on boss fights, you’ll still end up doing better damage in berserker gear.

Why is berserker gear so powerful? In GW2, it’s very easy to stack a very high critical high percentage and it’s even possible to hit 100% crit with the right build/gear/boons/food buffs (for more information on this, see the thread about in in the PvE Ranger section of the GuildWars2Guru.com forums). Because of this, the critical damage bonus allows the player to scale very well with increased precision and can nearly translate to a straight damage increase. A critical attack-based build also brings additional advantages since there are so many traits/sigils that give benefits on critical hits.

@Misterdevious: That’s great and all, but even if we were the best healing class for dungeons, it wouldn’t matter since there’s not really any reason to bring a healing-focused player to a dungeon where you can dodge to avoid so much of the damage anyway.

Even then, a mesmer can bring more defensive support than a ranger in most cases by using projectile reflect anyways and they can do that with a damage build in full berserker gear.

Guardians are really the only class that make much sense to run as support since they can bring enough armor to attract enemy aggro and grant protective boons without needing to invest heavily in defensive traits.

I’m torn…

On one side, I know that there will always be content that will be farmed for gold and I am really happy that one of the best ways to do this right now is through a dungeon instead of mindlessly killing mobs over and over in open world.

However, it is disappointing that this heavily favors people that have a mesmer or warrior at level 80. If this was something that was viable with other classes as well, it really wouldn’t be an issue to me, but right now there are two main problems that prevent that from happening:

1) Warrior dps is so far beyond what any other class can do, it’s no wonder that many people won’t join a group for something like CoF unless it’s a 4 warrior 1 mesmer group. I’ve heard the argument of melee getting higher dps since it’s riskier to be in melee than in ranged, but melee for many other classes still isn’t close to warriors (rangers may be one of the best examples of this issue).

2) Dungeons right now, as a whole, generally encourage glass cannon builds since damage is often avoidable through dodges and unavoidable damage is so low that there’s not much reason to ever bring a person running a full support build.

Burnfall.9573:

As Mesmer, my Concern is, I feel Persecuted and Brutally targeted for being a Mesmer class. Nearly every patch that are released, we get Onslaught of Nerfs, and more Nerfs.
Why so harsh to us? When will you ever be Satisfied with us? How much more Pain must we Endure? When will the Torment End? Haven’t we Suffered enough?

Yes, at this rate, they may actually make mesmers – - GASP – - only slightly op!

In all seriousness (which is hard to return to after seeing a post like that), mesmers are in a very good place right now and I know a lot of people that have been playing only mesmer or one of the other 1st class professions in this game don’t really comprehend how much of a difference there is between classes.

I agree with the OP in that I do also hope that the new changes which are supposed to open up viable alternatives do need to be thoroughly tested since GW2 is, relatively, a very buggy game and a lot of the bugs don’t get fixed for a long time.

However, some of the criticism of the piercing on the GS has turned to bitter complaining over something that is a buff just because it’s not as much of a buff as people would like to think it is. As someone that’s predominantly played a ranger, I can assure you that being able to pierce with the auto attack of your highest dps ranged weapon is certainly a good thing.

Fever.9830:

I use my 20-20-0-25-5 build with full zerk equipment.

1; Pull (focus 4) the first two mobs to the wall on the right side behind the turret and use feedback on them to block the other turret.
2; Pull the boss to the wall with focus 4, timewarp and SoI. Alternate between sword autoattacks and sword 2. Shatter once the warden finishes its second whirl.
3; On the bridge (in middle of the bridge), target one of the flame turrets and use feedback. It’s not supposed to reach the turrets, but rather block the turret shots.
4; Switch to GS and kill the acolytes with your group while “hiding” downstairs when you’ve killed one or two.
5; Portal before the gate opens, use temp curtain once it does, and RUN to the left top. Dodge in the end, place portal exit.
6; On the boss, try keeping all your reflects up as much as possible. First feedback, then warden, then curtain right on the boss’ circle. You also timewarp and SoI once you have enough might stacks.

Rinse & repeat.

Only crappy thing is, you’ll only get time to “rest” while killing the acolytes.

Great tips, but I’d add porting the NPC to the gate at the start as well to cut downtime of the introduction stuff.