Guild Wars 2

TooBz.3065:

Adding them up I got 1059 major points, 728 minor points, and 70 points in crit. Dividing 728 by 70, I determined to value each crit point as 10.4 points.

I think I have a few problems with your analysis. Each piece has it’s own stat to crit dmg ratio. I don’t think you can use a 10.4 ratio for everything.

Just looking at total stats (or “useful stats”) gained seems futile as it gets way too complicated. Also, with how power/precision/crit dmg are just basically “power”, I think it’s better to look at effective power loss and then look at what you gain. As per my previous post on this:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/New-Celestial-Armor-vs/first#post2450718
Basically, swapping from zerker to knights or celestial give the exact same power damage loss (about 9%) What it comes down to is do you prefer the toughness or the 4 other stats you get from celestial. With diminishing returns on stats and bonus condition damage in some builds, it can be viable.

I agree with you that ascended celestial trinkets are not worth it. With the announcement of an ascended weapons/armor tier of gear coming out though, I decided to not bother crafting celestial exotics and wait to see what the new stats look like.

By 6/6 I’m assuming you mean the rune bonus? Centaurs only has a 6/6 bonus on heals. I have not tried this with other runes like altruism.

Regarding xeph and his teammate going S/D and necro: I thought that S/D was simultaneously nerfed and became meta in the same patch because the necro was buffed and they complement each other well.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unsuspecting_Foe
This is a warrior trait that is poorly written. It apparently gives +50% crit chance vs stunned foes. On one of the more recent sotg, I remember a dev commenting on why the mesmer stun/the mentioned traits were being held back: basically, the warrior/mesmer combo was too strong in the beta.

The 2 recent buffs to the mesmer/buffs to warrior actually seem like the devs are trying to add a meta counter while also bringing back two “weak” professions.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sigil_of_Impact
Axe/Shield 30/10/0/0/30 warrior would be able to wreck opponents with 100% crit chance/max crit dmg in zerker gear and a 3.45 second stun while being sorta immune to conditions between the buffed stance/null field. The mesmer would probably have at least a 10/20/0/0/0 for traiting magic bullet/signet of domination. Maybe 30 dom. Otherwise, it would be rather open in traits.

Thoughts?

PS. I really think you guys are whining too much about not being top tier when we have been there for 90% of the games life. IF you are a top tier player like xeph, I would say you play to win which is why he swapped. If you aren’t that kind of top tier player, play what you want or change your mentality. PvP gives you access max everything besides skill.

One thing I noticed about a week ago with Runes of Centaurs is that Anet reverted the nerf to eternal potions. Like I’ll turn into my lightning elemental. Press 6 to go back to my normal form and I get AOE swiftness. Haven’t tried it with the most recent patch. It does seem odd that they would revert what they “fixed” a few months ago.

I’m not too huge on big wvw battles but I was thinking about feed back vs mimic. Feed back seems too obvious and mostly people know to step out of it. If a small group of mesmers ran with
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Masterful_Reflection
Distortion
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Signet_of_Illusions
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Blurred_Inscriptions
Mirror
Mimic
could this work as an anti zerg?
It has no target limit. Most people don’t/can’t recognize masterful reflection and it actually has a bit of an aoe to it.

That is unfortunate =/ Does it not proc phase 2 of mimic? or does it just not get an echo?

This may also be an answer for all the people asking for arcane echo in the new trait thread. It’s probably just too powerful and not meant for this game.

Levitas mentioned WoC but what about mirror blade? Probably a wvw thing but charge up mimic with mirror blade on an unlucky moa. Run around for a while. Double cast mirror blade on a poor soul. Traited, it will do 6 hits with 18 vulnerability and 12 might and 2 clones to shatter.

Instagib? Mirror blade could also help proc the blocks when your opponent is only doing melee/lasers.

If I recall correctly, you actually have to get hit by the attack that you are absorbing. So absorbing kill shot is a no. Channeled ranged attacks are better for guaranteed reflects but then you only echo 1 attack not the volley? Mirror blade seems perfect for getting around both of these caveats.

$60 you say?
http://www.gw2spidy.com/search/aether?recipes=0
Not sure about conversion but the lowest sells/highest buys are around 50/30 Gold right now for the aether weapons.
Anets been pretty fair with the recent rng boxes since they have given other ways of in game acquiring that are probobably cheaper. Like converting $60 to gold would do you better than the RNG boxes.

Rapier does sound cool but I actually don’t want it yet. The sword is a slashing weapon for the mesmer. Wouldn’t look right with a main hand rapier.

Hexxen.7216:

I don’t really mind that WAR got torment on their sword off hand (I have honestly never seen a sword off hand WAR before) but doesn’t it just feel wrong? Torment is a condition that is magic based. WAR can cause bleeds because pokey pokey will make anyone bleed but torment is magic. Like i said I don’t mind but I think they broke their lore a bit too much with that one.

Have you seen sword 4? It’s a giant sword sticking out of the forehead. I would find that rather… tormenting.

http://www.sirlin.net/ptw
I’ve enjoyed reading this. It’s written by a Pro street fighter player and game designer.
http://www.sirlin.net/ptw-book/what-should-be-banned.html
The what should be banned section sort of addresses your question but it mostly does focus on games that don’t get patched often like MMOs.

Most characters in that game cannot beat Akuma. I don’t mean it’s a tough match—I mean they cannot ever, ever, ever, ever win. Akuma is “broken” in that his air fireball move is something the game simply wasn’t designed to handle.

The reason is that many believe the game to have much more variety without Old Sagat. Even if he is only second best in the game by some measure, he flat out beats half the characters in the game with little effort. Half the cast can barely even fight him, let alone beat him.

In these examples, the first one breaks the game by having no counter. That’s OP. It needs banning/nerfing.

The second one trivializes half the cast when he is in use but those trivialized characters can still compete with “better” characters. In gw2 terms, it kills diversity and is powerful but I wouldn’t consider it OP. Although it isn’t OP, balance changes should bring it in line for the sake of the game’s “health.”

Since you’re a mesmer, I’m assuming you are asking this question because your tired of constant QQ —> nerf problem. I don’t think any class in the game is or has been OP. Some abilities like the old blurred frenzy or RTL? Debatably OP but then you aren’t looking at the class as a whole. We’re definitely powerful though.

One more link on skill ceiling/floor
http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/balancing-for-skill
Basically the skill floor and ceiling can be independently OP or not which changes the perception of OP in various tiers of skill.

Rinzler.8072:

20/20/30/0/0 vs 0/20/20/0/30
Which would hit harder assuming all shats hit?

Dastion.3106:

IP is the most potent trait Mesmers have. If the choice is the two then you’d be foolish to choose Mental Torment, maybe if you’re somehow a power build that never gets in melee, but even then it would be hard to argue against IP’s benefits.

Perhaps I read too much into your intro post but I think calling Mental torment a foolish choice is an unfair comparison when comparing the two listed builds. At this point though, I think we agree on facts. RL issues may be bleeding into my posts though. Sorry if I offended. Just wanted to give a fair comparison.

Terrahero.9358:

Useless changes are useless.
Meanwhile:

-Warrior gets buffs and polish to skills to be allround better off.
-Thief gets moar Torment, and nothing done about perma-stealth crap.
-Ranger gets a bunch of really good changes, much needed sure.
-Necro’s getting buffed, because moar Deathshroud. And larger Marks!
-Mesmer gets two clear buffs.
-Guardian is getting buffs.

Engineer and Ele get kitten all. I was scrolling down the list and saw Ele and Engi and was like “ow, minor bug fixes.. holy crap these are guardian notes? And these are the Necro buffs!? And Mesmer? kitten me, its buffs all round!”

Necromancer:
Damage taken while in death shroud will now overflow to the necromancer’s health pool if the damage taken is greater than the remaining life force.
Greater Marks: This trait has been moved to the Master tier.
Terror: Reduced the damage by 17%. Fixed a bug so this trait now checks for the torment condition as well.

The “buffs” you are talking about are to compensate for those nerfs. The first one especially, is a huge nerf to necros. Before, 1% life force could “eat” a 20k eviscerate and the necro would be fine. Now the necro is brought down or close to death.

The wall of guardian text? Two buffs to a crappy trait/utility. Everything else is just text/animation corrections to all of the symbols so it just looks like a lot.

Just because there is a lot of text doesn’t mean its a buff. Or a buff to a good build. The grass is not greener over there.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Full zerker with 0 Domination has 2201 power. This is without food/sigil buffs.
20 Domination gives you ~9% increase in total damage for a total of 31% increase to all Mind Wracks. Furthermore, 15 domination lets you spike 15-18 vulnerability for a 15-18% damage increase when you use F3 prior to F1. It also comes with some nice utility with shattered concentration to potentially remove protection (33% less damage) and other boons.
…
Both of them are extremely useful. When comparing damage, they are relatively similar with the standard 3 clone shatter but depending on circumstances, both have their moments.

Both lines offer some really good utility/damage boosts. If you want to talk about might/cooldowns then you are going to need talk about the base damage increase, the ability to spike 18% more damage and the boon stripping for not doing 33% less.

I know IP is good. That’s why I’ve had it ever since my mesmer hit lvl 60. 20/20/0/0/30 is even better if you can pull it off. But he wants to spend at least 20 in chaos. You are ignoring the utility that 20 domination (and the extra 10 in chaos) can bring though while talking about the entire illusions trait line.

Dastion.3106:

TLDR: IP is a Grandmaster that affects all Shatters and Mental Torment is an Adept that affects one. Get IP.

If he had a 0/20/20/0/20 and was asking for where to put the last 10 points, yeah it’s that simple. That isn’t what he is asking though.

Dastion.3106:

Even if he’s shattering from range his Shatter damage will be less because he isn’t able to Shatter as often without the 30% shatter CD reduction.

30 Illusions is very difficult to top because it helps just about every build, unless you’re going for a build that revolves around the Grandmaster in another tree (Primatic Understanding).

Illusion CDR, Might, Extra Confusion, the amazing bonuses from IP – I wish our other trees were half so juicy.

“20/20/30/0/0 vs 0/20/20/0/30” Did no one read the OP? Of course a grandmaster illusion trait will be better than an adept trait (at least that is how it should work) but he wants to compare the damage of two different builds.

Hyung.6140:

Admittedly the rest of the classes got a tonne of changes – mostly buffs – but still, not being actively directly nerfed felt really good.

It’s the difference between getting a pay cut, and getting a pay rise that’s too small to cover inflation, but psychologically it’s a huge improvement.

\o/

Only the warrior/ranger/mesmers got buffed.

Necros actually got a huge nerf to death shroud with some help to compensate. The condition necros also got nerfed.

Ele/Thieves/Guards/Engineers basically just got text/animation corrections.

Andwari.2978:

GuildWars2 plays 200 Jeahrs (?) after Guildwars1 dosent it? So i dont understand why all the Mesmers outside changed from a “Mind and Feeling manipulator” to an arcane and time illusionist.

I miss the attitute and the arrogance and all the things that the GW1 mesmer had.

Attitude and arrogance are gone because we don’t have 2 god complex monks to heal us while we support 2 line backers that do 20x the dmg a mesmer does. They added a lot more skill animations on purpose so you know what to dodge. Movement is super important now because dedicated healers no longer exist. Actually, as gw1 was, preventing damage (protection line) is always better than repairing damage (healing line).

Moving out of the (Feed [ Back ) Fire] zone is the new hex removal. (Conjure [Phantasm) Zerker] are now nightmare brought to life. Hex removal? Bash the nightmare till it’s gone. “Feeling manipulators” like empathy? Confusion/Retaliation with purple butterflies.

My gw1 mesmer had access to like 600 skills by the time I hit the 7 year old mark. Around 200 of those where hexes from 5 different classes. What was the visual distinction between them? A simple color change in a fraction of the tiny swirl around your enemy. Health bars had a purple down arrow regardless. I loved gw1 but I am so glad that those 400 useless skills without distinct animations are gone now.

Its not 250 years that changed anything. It’s a new game.

I have a set with rubies orbs, air and centaurs. I swap between them a lot. Air is some nice spike damage to counter thieves but can reveal you with unlucky timing.

IF you just want straight damage, I’m convinced that ruby orbs are the only way to go and are relatively cheap.

10% above 90% health is nice but how often are you actually above 90% health? and it doesn’t affect your phantasms. If you go shatter and sneak up on someone with an alpha strike, it could be worth it.

Eagle: 165 precision/8% crit dmg/ 5% below 50% enemy health
Ruby orbs: 120 power/84 preicison/12% crit dmg. The 120 power is already ~5% boost to base damage for most mesmers without a health restriction. 4% less crit chance but 4% more crit dmg. So much cheaper. Furthermore, in groups, a lot of traits benefit from enemies having less health so the last half of a fight lasts less then the first half.

Basically, ruby orbs for damage or runes for utility.

Most important thing about the mesmer is having many sets of awesome looking armor. Keep the runes for alpha strike lols. Start a collection.

Surbrus.6942:

Elric of Grans.7684:

The benefit does not increase with multiple clones, and the delay makes it too difficult to time effectively.

You can actually get extra dazes (at least for knocking off Defiant) if you stagger the distance of your illusions to their target. Alternatively have each of your illusions targeting a different enemy that are spread out, Diversion shatter and the clones will daze different targets. This example is generally much more effort than its worth though.

Staggering your clones for F3 is mostly for pvp/not defiant enemies. For bosses with stacks of defiant, you can still “interrupt” them despite the defiant stacks. Specifically, if they have 3 stacks of defiant and you 3 clone IP F3 them, you will “interrupt” the boss 3 times and then actually interrupt the boss 1 time since you got rid of 3 stacks. This can help a lot for bosses like alpha when your group screws up and you need to pull him but he has 4-5 defiant stacks. Just make sure to have the correct number of clones/IP.

If you have 5 in domination, this also means that you stack 3/6/9/12 stacks of vulnerability on the boss for a 5 sec base. 15 in Domination means that just applying daze will give 5 vulnerability (8 sec base) per daze. These two combined mean 8/16/24/ (25 is the max) stacks for 25% more damage for your whole party for 5 or so seconds (bosses are resistant to vulnerability). If you don’t interrupt but have 15 Dom, it still can get up to 20 stacks.

As Esplen said, I use F2 when I’m out of mindwrack. F2 mid dodge with clones on dodge and IP can still hit for up to 2300-4600 if you are timing your dodges correctly. If you know your illusions are going to die from cleaves/aoe then you might as well shatter them with something.

Yeah, I don’t think you should say “everyone” in s/tpvp uses staff when one of the highest ranking mesmers uses the GS. http://www.twitch.tv/hansawesome

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

1 Bounce of Winds of Chaos = 120damage
1 Tick of Spacial Surge (at closest range, thus lowest damage = 246Damage

Though WoC adds a condition and some times a Boom, Spacial Surge does more damage is faster and ticks 3 times. So its 246DamageX3 Vs 120Damge+ Condition and POSSIBLE boon based on position

The GS has 3 attacks with a 1.5 second channel. The staff auto attack has a 3/4 second animation but there is after cast/clones delay times for both. I’m pretty sure a 3 to 1 attack comparison is stretching the truth by a lot. Also, with IE, the staff is doing 120×2 dmg for the mesmer and also double chance of conditions while the GS gives none for the mesmer.
With proper positioning, you should be getting those boons from the bounces. So 20% more crit chance and bonus power/condition damage. Furthermore 1 second of burning is equivalent to 1 bleed that lasts 5 seconds. As others have covered, have a mix of conditions is much harder to get rid of than just bleeds.

So with that in mind, comparing the clones of each:
GS: 3 attacks with a 60% chance of bleed on each attack.

Staff: 1 attack with 80% chance to bleed AND 33% of a 7 second bleed and 33% chance of a “5 second bleed (burning).” or basically an 80% and 66% chance to bleed on each clone auto attack. This happens more often than the gs beam.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

I just feel its TO defensive some times, not got the same kind of burst (imo) then the GS and cant stack bleeds the as quickly or easily as the GS (again imo) For a condition weapon, it just doesnt feel very condition-ary

The warlock and chaos storm do some awesome power damage as well. Burning is basically 5 stacks of bleeds so it’s not a problem if your bleed stacks are lower. Just because you don’t see big number/stacks doesn’t mean it’s a pure defensive weapon. My zerker staff (with IE) crits for a total of 1200 per auto + conditions and that is about twice as often as the GS auto attack. For comparison the GS auto in my build crits for about 3k on average but only at 900+ range.
Basically 2.4k +conditions vs 3k at max range no conditions.

Full zerker with 0 Domination has 2201 power. This is without food/sigil buffs.
20 Domination gives you ~9% increase in total damage for a total of 31% increase to all Mind Wracks. Furthermore, 15 domination lets you spike 15-18 vulnerability for a 15-18% damage increase when you use F3 prior to F1. It also comes with some nice utility with shattered concentration to potentially remove protection (33% less damage) and other boons.

As Pryo mentioned, IP is a huge increase to damage when you don’t have max clones out. Furthermore, F2 does about 800 burst damage (+confusion) with zero clones for a nice bonus spike right after F1. Also, for going 30 illusions you get might on shatters and some bonus confusion on all shatters. F3 and F4 don’t require any clones for an instant interrupt or distortion. I cannot count the number of times F4 has saved my life when a huge AOE wrecks all of my clones. IP or 30 illusions means you get to shatter more often too. Edit: Also 20% more mirror images/decoy/all illusions.

Both of them are extremely useful. When comparing damage, they are relatively similar with the standard 3 clone shatter but depending on circumstances, both have their moments.

It is easy enough to test but I’m not home at the moment. Just get to +75%, auto attack something until burn procs. See if it does 1 or 2 burns.

Forgot to mention this sooner
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Koi_Cake
Super cheap and is statistically the same as pizza. It only lasts 20 minutes but its 52 copper each instead of 4 silver.

“Duration of conditions is rounded to nearest quarter of a second in skill tooltip’s list of effects (0s, ¼, ½, ¾ and 1s) and conditions which inflict damage over time (bleeding, burning and poison) only deal damage each full second.”
+77% burning rounds to 1.75 seconds of burn. This is only 1 tick of burning unless you are hoping for easier chain burns with clones/aa.
You need to reach +87.6% or basically +90% for a 1 second condition to be 2 ticks.

zexion.5842:

http://gw2.hazno.net/
The difference between 1000 and 1400 is 23 damage per bleed tick. Which isn’t amazing (for the amount of condition damage you have to invest) and is better off set by the amount of power or crit you can get.

First off, the difference is 20 not 23. Using the calculator you linked:
Condi DMG/Bleed Tick
0/43
400/63
800/83
1200/103
1600/123
Basically +20 per bleed tick for every +400 condition dmg. By your logic, any condition damage above zero isn’t amazing/worth it because zero condition damage gives 43 per tick and each +400 condi dmg only gives +20 bleed. Ideally, you have 25 stacks of might in a group, so “baseline” condition damage actually does 83 per tick.

Since this is a PvE build, nothing counters condition damage. (Well… strucutres and allies do but Bob covered that)
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Damage
Meanwhile, power damage is inversely proportional to enemy armor. Since armor depends heavily on the dungeon/fight, any “ideal mix” of power/condition ratio is crap because that “ideal” ratio compares apples to oranges.

If only arena net added a “blue” health bar that is highly resistant to power damage and protects the red health bar, then hybrids/condition builds would have their place in PvE. Then we could shoot red blue or green lasers at the elder dragons depending on vigil/order/priory we join >_>

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sigil

Sigils with cooldowns
All sigils that have a cooldown share the same cooldown timer; while the timer is active, no other sigil with a cooldown can trigger. For example, if you are using a Sigil of Fire (flame burst on critical) and a Sigil of Battle (might stacks on swap), you will have to wait after swapping weapons (Sigil of Battle activated) before the flame burst can trigger on critical.

Sigils will enter cooldown even if you do not gain any benefit. For example, a Sigil of Purity will trigger and enter the 10s cooldown even when the wearer has no conditions.
All things equal, the mainhand cooldown sigil will trigger before the offhand cooldown sigil.

Also, http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Condition_duration

Duration of conditions is rounded to nearest quarter of a second in skill tooltip’s list of effects (0s, ¼, ½, ¾ and 1s) and conditions which inflict damage over time (bleeding, burning and poison) only deal damage each full second. Condition duration from runes isn’t shown in the skill’s tooltip, but does correctly increase duration. Condition duration cannot be increased beyond 100%.

So 90% burning duration on the staff will give you 1.9 seconds = 2 ticks of burning.

the devils eye.9258:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Basically if you are a staff/pistol power phantasm/condition hybrid w/ phantasmal fury, I suspect this will do more overall damage than the prior stats.

whit the same build as us: you loose POWER, PRECISSION AND CRIT DMG, over a litle gain in condition dmg. (if you gain 240 more you only do around 20 dmg more per stack…)

+ pointless ranting

I should have been more clear with that sentence but seriously… My whole post is a comparison of zerker to the new exotic celestial armor and to ascended celestial accessories. With exotic celestial armor, you GAIN CRIT DMG compared to zerker. Of course, there is still a lose in power/crit chance. That is why I did the math. It’s about a 9% reduction in power dmg if you swap exotic armor from zerker to celestial. As per my first post, I don’t recommend the accessories.

+20 dmg per stack when you can get easily get 15 (or the 25 that you claim) stacks of bleeds + torment is around 400-600 dps. Are you really going to tell me that 9% of your dps is greater than 400-600 dps? That means your mesmers are doing a minimun of 4,444k dps if not upwards of 7k dps. Then celestial also gives defensive stats.

Listing food buffs/sigils doesn’t make your build better. Listing those traits doesn’t make it better. I can use all of those but with celestial armor for a hybrid build. I also never mentioned this as a dungeons speed running guide. It was just meant to be a note since a lot of mesmers are trying out hybrid power/condition builds. Simply, the new armor seems like a good choice for those hybrid builds/weapons.

the devils eye.9258:

100% crit dmg, 60% crit change (that will make me do 100% more dmg over time)

False:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Critical_hit
Average damage = Base damage * ( 1 + Critical Chance * ( Critical Damage + 0.5) )
Average damage = Base damage * 1+.6(1+.5)
Average damage = Base damage * 1.9

You should really learn to do math well before critiquing other people.

Michal.4513:

So ill try also

Traits
-Shatter Delusion (Dom Major Trait)- Mind Wrack remove any condition target have, and convert each one to 5%more dmg ( in short, mostly its 50% buff dmg to shatter, in PvP 2% dmg per cond)

Transformation
Phantom Lord(60s)- Change yourself into Master of all Phantoms(25s) in this form all attributes are boosted by 50% and additonal All phantoms have 50% lower cd, take 50% less dmg, and deal additional 50% of dmg
(Phantom builds need kinda this)

So basically… troll condition builds in my party by making them even more useless.

Also make phantasms do 100% more dmg and be able to attack 50% more often for basically a 133% phantasm damage increase while they take 1/2 damage. This is with a 33% upkeep to what is considered a powerful build.

Yeah… phantasm builds totally need that kind of power >.<

If your bleed duration is an odd # x 10% then use sigil of agony.
If you swap weapons often enough, sigil of battle is a good choice.
Sigil of corruption or sigil of force/accuracy would be simple choices that work.

If you mostly rely on GS for bleeds, having sigil of doom on your scepter would be a good “finishing move.” Scepter 2 with poison & torment followed up with confusion and burning (torch?) will make condition removal that much harder.

If you have doom on your scepter, I would recommend a weapon swap sigil or a non cooldown sigil on the gs. The GS can easily proc Earth which means all of your sigils go on cd. This means swapping to scepter will likely not trigger the Doom. You might be better off with a 10% bleed sigil on the GS since your clones stack bleeds much better than you do. Keep in mind, the GS clone bleeds benefit most at 20/40/60/80/100% condition durations. The rest usually* do nothing, so corruption would be a good alternative to pair with a Scepter of Doom.

*Other durations only come into play when enemies have – condition duration but then your build/conditions are sort of being hard countered anyways.

If player fury stacked with p.fury and you have base of 60% crit chance, the phantasm should crit 100% of the time. I tested this and they don’t. Sigil of accuracy also does not increase phantasm crit chance. Just precision.

Kersic.6718:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Kersic.6718:

New condition, call it “Suppression”.
Think of it as Blind, except instead of making the next outgoing attack miss, it interrupts the next skill used.
Durations similar to Blind, stacks in duration.
(In looking at GW1 Mesmer skills, this condition could also be described as Clumsiness without the damage or AoE component, and would cleanse on the next skill used.)
All sorts of ways this condition would help Interrupt builds, in my opinion.

Instead of a new condition (they got rid of hexes since they wanted to minimize the number of conditions), what about a trait that does damage when blind is removed? Would not be able to stack the trait BUT we could time our blinds for that “active DPS interrupt” defense that seems to have a few core mesmer ideals while staying within the gw2 boundary of mechanics.

I don’t understand why you’d suggest “damage on blind removal” as an alternative to “interrupt next skill used”?

While I agree that your suggested trait may have value in a number of builds, it would not take advantage of any of the existing “on interrupt” traits that we already have.

Anet has already shown that they are open to implementing new conditions post-launch with Torment. My suggestion would be to make several new skills which cause Suppression, not to limit it to three skills in the game on three classes. They could even consider adding it to some of the existing RNG type skills that Mesmers and Engineers already have.

Honestly, I just think that it would be nice to have a more reliable method of interrupting.

“They got rid of hexes since they wanted to minimize the number of conditions.” Implementing a condition that is basically a hex from gw1 is going down a slippery road of stacking 20 conditions on an enemy while condition removals only remove 1 condition at a time. Giving necros 2 “new” conditions is part of what is making them “op” in the ability to overload people.
“Think of it as Blind, except” … you mentioned blind yourself.
This is why I recommend some modification to blind rather than a new condition. If that modification is an interrupt, sure.

Wolfield.9812:

Elite

Masters Echo

This skill becomes the next skill you use.

---

Two heals? Two Phantasms? Two Bubbles? Two Chaos Storms (that would sort out some aoe problems)

This would be an elite that would reward skill play and correct timing. It is something from guildwars 1, and i think it will fit right into guildwars 2.

Would it function like the gw1 echo or immediatly go on cd after the 2nd casting?
This would vastly change how OP it would be and what CD it would deserve. Being able to chain blurred frenzy for 20 seconds would get blurred frenzy and even heavier handed nerf. However, only 1 casting would mean the CD should be shorter? 90 seconds for 50% more feed backs? This seems tough to balance when we have skills with 6 second cooldowns and 90 second cooldowns with no mana bar to limit double spamming.

I would like to see http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Arcane_Larceny brought back and put a new main hand dagger. Would have a nice spell thief vibe and would give us another melee weapon to play with. Unfortunately, this probably wouldn’t work on monsters BUT it could maybe give us something generic in PvE like the Thieve’s steal does. This would probably have a limit of only stealing #2-5 on players. Reactivation would cause an “illusionary replica” of the stolen skill then give it back to the player. Holding on to it would disable the enemies skill for however long it lasts (8 seconds?)

I want another true melee weapon for the mesmer.

Hypocondria got me thinking about fatal bounds from the dota warlock. Basically, some sort of shared pain in a glamours aoe. 10% of dmg done to enemies in the glamour would also hit all other enemies in the glamour.

Kersic.6718:

New condition, call it “Suppression”.
Think of it as Blind, except instead of making the next outgoing attack miss, it interrupts the next skill used.
Durations similar to Blind, stacks in duration.
(In looking at GW1 Mesmer skills, this condition could also be described as Clumsiness without the damage or AoE component, and would cleanse on the next skill used.)
All sorts of ways this condition would help Interrupt builds, in my opinion.

Instead of a new condition (they got rid of hexes since they wanted to minimize the number of conditions), what about a trait that does damage when blind is removed? Would not be able to stack the trait BUT we could time our blinds for that “active DPS interrupt” defense that seems to have a few core mesmer ideals while staying within the gw2 boundary of mechanics.

Pyroatheist.9031:

@castlemanic: Yes, I am completely ignoring the heritage of the GW1 mesmer’s abilities, and with good reason. As stated earlier, the GW1 mesmer was an absolutely and completely different class than the GW2 mesmer. People complain constantly about how the GW2 mesmer isn’t like the GW1 mesmer without seeming to realize that they are simply completely different classes. Mechanics like hypochondria and epidemic may have been mesmer skills in GW1, but they are necromancer skills in GW2, that’s simply how this game was developed.

While this may be mostly semantics, I disagree. It’s a different game not a different class. Mesmers used to not have sustained dps or heals and with the secondary class mechanic, you could borrow most skills from other classes in gw1. Since gw2 shifted the roles of the trinity around and got rid of the secondary class mechanic, every class is different in gw2 because they need to be self sufficient. I feel that the gw2 iteration/interpretation of the mesmer mostly stays true to the mesmer of gw1 but it’s obviously going to feel different.

With that said, epidemic should stay on the necro and it does feel right on the necro (both in flavor and gw2 design).
Hypochondria (excessive preoccupancy or worry about having a serious illness) this seems like a perfect way of taking all of the mesmer RNG aoe conditions and “worry” our enemy into “feeling” all of them. Balance wise, it might also be too much to have the necro have both of these abilities.

There is nothing wrong with drawing inspiration from the mesmer heritage. Just need to make sure it fits in the gw2 balance and game mechanics.

While the fall of Abaddon may be more interesting for the gw1 vets, the new players run around the reactor all the time to kill that fire ele and probably want to know more about that place. Saying one is 1k x more interesting is your personal assessment. Also, reduced WP costs may entice people a lot!
If the fractal turned the 5 party members into the 5 gods and you go on a margonite killing rampage…. That would be epic. Vote Evon!

Wethospu.6437:

Potion of Flame Legion Slaying? 10% more damage.

And sigil of smoldering for another 5% (assuming you are using force) or sigil of night.

Levitas.1953:

Weird, I still have to meet a mesmer without off hand.

Lol, you haven’t met my clones =)

On topic, I agree that bolt is both awesome as a skin (I have it and love it) and the sword is our best weapon. Minor problem is the noise. It doesn’t bother me but I know it bothers some people. If you go full condition, I could maybe understand not bringing the sword but after 1k hours on my mesmer, I feel naked if I don’t have at least 1 or 2 swords at all times.

keenlam.4753:

Levitas.1953:

@keenlam: Your logic is that you cant compare 2 weapons with 1 weapon. However, You can compare 5 skills with 3 weapon skills. The first thing invalidates the comparison, the second one does not. Im impressed.

Levitas, thanks for totally understood my point.
You simply just can’t compare these two weapons in any way. It’s like comparing apple to orange.

I was under the impression that he was “impressed” (sarcasm) with your logic since you clearly show that you are capable of comparing apples and oranges with the 5 skills out dps 3 skills logic.

Gs gives you 5 skills, that’s more than enough to outDps swords 3 skills. Especially when MH sword does not give you a phantasm. Sure you can argue that you can use an offhand, but thats 2 weapons against gs, which surely invalidates the comparison.

The comparison is of weapon sets/swaps. The GS is one swap/set that is 5 skills set in stone. The sword brings the versatility of sword/x and any sword mesmer will always have a phantasm with them. Apples and oranges would be sword main hand to feed back for utility. Weapon sets are apples to apples.

My mesmer is my main so I posted here
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/New-Celestial-Armor-vs/first#post2423395
but the number also work for engineers. Since my engineer used to be a hybrid grenadier, the numbers look nice for the new armor set. A lot nicer than the ascended jewerly. WIGZ mentioned this: celestial trinkets are a loss of crit dmg compared to zerker. Interestingly, celestial armor/weapons are a potential gain in crit dmg.

Previously we only had access to 5 ascended celestial trinkets. Comparison:
Celestial: 216 to all stats and 29% crit dmg (also MF but idc)
Zerker: 514 power, 341, precision, 39 crit dmg.
Other types: of 514, 341, 341.
I did some calculations for my build (typical GC shatter). About a 24% loss of power damage with a 216 to all stats.

I looked at the new exotic armor/weapons and found myself a bit surprised about the stat distribution. 2-handed celestial items, head, chest, legs have 1% MORE crit damage than zerker gear. The rest of the exotic celestial items have the same crit damage. This is very different to the jewerly crit dmg.

Difference between zerker/celestial armor sets. Lose 175 power, 84 precision. Gain 3 crit dmg. I lose about 9% power damage. For comparison, knights armor vs zerker armor is also about a 9% loss in power damage but 315 toughness. Celestial is 140 to 3 defensive stats and 140 to condition damage. Oils and what not will give 14 more of one stat due to more toughness/vit.

TLDR
Ascended trinkets: 24% less power dmg but 216 to all stats.
Exotic Armor: 9% less power dmg but 140 to all stats.
Exotic Armor has a much better trade off ratio.

Basically if you are a staff/pistol power phantasm/condition hybrid w/ phantasmal fury, I suspect this will do more overall damage than the prior stats.

The armor/weapons are account bound so if you want to be a hybrid, keep this in mind and start fusing!

Your missing the fact that it also used to never blind. Enemies cleaving through several chaos armor clones greatly increase that 33% blind proc.

Edit: Chaos armor from combo finishers also never procced protection or blind at all.

This is a GS bleed build thread? with a scepter/pistol? What other bleeds are you pulling off that are your main source of dmg? Geomancy sigil would mean you aren’t using the battle sigil you planned on and would not be a major source of dmg. I am not familier with the secret technique of GS, 1-handed Staff w/ Pistol. Debilitating Dissipation is also 5 seconds.

RE: numbers. It isn’t a problem. I simply listed the check points of condition duration that have a significant pay off for various conditions. I never stated what is ideal. IF you use the scepter/torch, 60% would be a bad choice since you benefit much more from 70 or 50%.
Go for 40, 60, 80 or 100% with the GS. Anything in between is usually a waste. The choice is yours but there are definitely optimal choices and less optimal choices.

Personally, I have armor and weapons from TA exp and koi cakes. Then 2 rabids from lyssa and also giver’s weapons. So I mix and match to reach the check points based off of traits/weapon choice. This will also be different for the two weapon sets that I am using. So GS might be 60 while the swap is 70 or 80.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

1 Bleed would last more then 11seconds(with 20 in dom) currently. reduce a bit by taking other runes , take up the Greatsword and see the bleeds ^^

11 seconds? Sharper images is a 5 second bleed and the highest that it is going is 10 seconds.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Condition_Duration
“The max cap is +100% duration.
Duration of conditions is rounded to nearest quarter of a second in skill tooltip’s list of effects (0s, ¼, ½, ¾ and 1s)”
I personally like 2 mad king/lyssa or 4 TA Runes/2 lyssa. Koi cakes and 20 domination to hit 80% for a 9 second bleed. 90% or 95% does nothing for our bleed dmg (although it can help counter melandru etc.) To get 100% bleed/conditions, you need some combo of 10 more in domination and/or 1 or 2 giver’s (1handed weapon) of agony. I don’t think giver’s two handed weapons are worth the loss of other stats.
For torment, confusion and burning, the “check points” can also be calculated:
Torment 8 second base:
I started at base of 40%(koi cake) but basically, 40,50,70,80,90,100% all give 1 second more. 60% doesn’t.
Burning/confusion with a base of 3: 40,70,100% let you hit 4,5,6 seconds.

Current set up: 20/20/0/0/30 with zerker gear and koi cake (super cheap 40% condition duration). My 3 gs clones (57% crit chance) can stack up to 18 bleeds on a vet giant. I did not attack/add any extra bleeds. Average seems to be about 14. With a mix of sigil of earth, rampagers gear (higher crit chance) and rabid and runes of + duration, you can probably get to 25 stacks of bleeds with 3 clones.

I don’t think the pistol is a good choice of offhand if 3 gs clones can do that. Diversifying your conditions would be better. If you don’t have much power/crit dmg, the clones might be a better bet. 8 attack volley then 5 second cd vs 3 attacks about every 3 seconds. The duelist is clearly better than a clone but I don’t know that it is good enough to not bring a torch instead for more burning/blasts.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Yes it does but Domination adds Condition duration, that little bit extra power and even more power when using the Greatsword plus without it Mirror Blade is 8seconds cool down, sure the 1.5seconds doesnt seem like a lot but every little helps and the trait reduces the cool down for all the skills which means faster iZerker as well.
…
Yeah this is interesting, i have been playing around with the GS/Staff combo, so i think this will be a consideration for the future. Though again i rarely like to Shatter

If you insist on not shattering, that is ok. Do the minor traits in domination help you at all though? Not if you dont shatter, bring a pistol etc..

So its 250 condition dmg + 20% cd on scepter 2, GS2/4, torch 5 and decoy. Also, another bounce.
OR 200 (250 w/ gs)power and 20% CD on gs 2-5 and 20% condition duration +5 traits.

What about 0/15/30/0/25? GS and Scepter/Torch. You can keep the PU invis spam.
OR 20/15/0/0/25 +10? Same weapons but even shorter GS CDs. NO PU invis spam but you can go more defensive on the equipment.

I just realized I was a bit dumb with those 10 spare points in my advice. They can also go 5 dueling (DE) 5 chaos (more condi dmg) or 5 illusions (IP). Keep in mind that 25 illusions also gives you 20% CD on torment if you keep the scepter.

Why would you HAVE to take the torch as an offhand? If you really want a gs condition build, I would actually go 0/15/20/0/25 with 10 points to spare. More specifically, 25 in illusions instead of 20 domination that you were contemplating.

The gs phantasms has a cripple already and I don’t think you need clones to cripple even more. 50 power and 20% cd on gs 3 & 5 aren not that great compared to cd on all illusions for your build.

Illusionary elasticity would give you an extra bounce (more might) on gs 2 (and staff 1. Does this work with torch 5 now?). The double CD traited staff 2 would give you that “range maker” that you were lacking on a 6 second cd. Shattered strength(3 might)/ 6 stacks of confusion on F2 would also give a bit of a finishing spike.

As for the last 10 traits, you mentioned Decoy but I don’t think that is enough to merit PU, especially if you don’t bring a traited torch (you weren’t going to trait that anyways?) 10 more in dueling is still an option, or 10 in Domination if you really want more cripples.

If you insist on the torch, I would actually use the torch 4 as a blast finisher in ethereal fields rather than a disengage stealth. Giving 3 clones chaos armor means aoe cleaves will have 4 × 33% chance to be blinded or confused or crippled =) so you need less defense because there is a very good chance of not getting hit a lot and spiking even more confusion.

If you can keep full regeneration on your team with the Signet + PU/Chaos Armor, there is no reason to bring phantasm regen. Again, I have not run this build so it might not be the case. It is worth a try. Sorry, but that seems like a really dumb requirement for a guild. Like I would of left that guild on day one with that amount of incompetence/restriction. It’s not even a strong heal with your build.

Rune of the Monk is from AC exp. 120 tokens per rune. All servers have access to the same trading post. You can also add 2 MAJOR runes of water/monk for another 10% boon duration for that 90%.

Thedenofsin.7340:

Mesmers are very difficult to level. This is because they are very reliant on Master and Grandmaster talents.

The recent nerf to Chaos Armor really hurts clones. That being said, Signet of Illusions gives your Illusions a bit more health, which is beneficial.

If you put phantasms out, you want to make sure you have the aggro. If you put clones out, you want them to get the aggro.

The recent change to chaos armor is a strict buff to clones. It is only a nerf to staff 4 which clones could never get. So using sword 3/3 through chaos fields gives double buffed chaos armor which now gives a chance of protection and blind (it didn’t before).

Going sword/sword early with 10 in dueling for sword mastery helps a lot for leveling. Your p.swordman evade leap attacks in and out which helps it live through cleave attacks. You will also have two active defenses on low cooldowns and and two clones on relatively low cooldowns. Vigor will help a lot as well. The focus is a nice speed buff and anti ranged phantasm.

I highly recommend going full zerker/precision while leveling in open world pve. It forces you to learn all of the active defense that mesmers have and you kill things a lot faster. At higher levels, you can try new builds.

Don’t worry about your clones dying, as long as only it gets hit and not you.

A few things:
YOu have 65% boon duration +40% might duration. This isn’t ideal. Try for 80% all boons and 20% more might or even 90% all boons.

I would think that chaos armor/PU would give enough regeneration that phantasm regen isn’t necessary. Leave your clones out rather than phantasms as you are speced more in conditions. Then maybe move 15 to dueling for bleeds/more clones?

I honestly think the scepter is now fine as a 2nd condition weapon. I also think it works as a secondary melee power weapon swap though.

Alissah.9281:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Alissah.9281:

fractals of the mists – harpy fractal
Having 10 or 20 inspiration aswell as a focus will be very usefull in this fractal, as most enemies you encounter use projectiles.
Cheers,
Alissah

Masterful reflection creates a bubble of reflection around you that can protect your team.
Also looks amazing =)

Yea it looks amazing indeed :P. How big is this reflective bubble? Ive only tested in solo pvp so far. It would be interesting to see it protect everyone for up to 12 seconds :O

I have not tested it that extensively since it has a limited radius/requires coordination and unlike feedback, most people have no idea what it does/have seen it before/notice a more subtle animation. I would guess it’s about the same size as the warden bubble (this is just based on the animation).

Body blocking is a lot trickier when your teammates has more room and are dodge/strafe happy . As a shatter mesmer that is normally in melee, I would consider this a supplement to my damage rather than actual team defense. Blurr/Distortion will body block regardless of if they might reflect as well. So I normally don’t bring this trait.

Since the harpy fractal is a vertical level with small platforms, your team, if in melee, stands in that bubble whether they know it or not. My understanding: since the AOE lightning balls hit the top of that AOE bubble before they hit the ground, it’s able to reflect the lightning back before it hits your team. So I would actually consider it 3 emergency “AOE interrupt reflects” rather than 12 seconds. I think this is very different than mirror/mimic which if I recall correctly, will not save your team since they are not AOE reflects.

[Quote]
Dungeons
Crucible of Eternity
In the explorable version, it’s no longer possible to use portals to bypass the turrets defending the advanced golem.
[/Quote]
Sword main hand and 3 clones auto attacking. Maybe destroy protection turret. Ignore the rest. I find it so sad that mesmers glitched this with portal when we have the tools to make this easy.