Guild Wars 2

He said top 3 classes he likes, not actual top 3.

“Mesmer

Mesmers rely on illusions in order to accomplish their goals. They need illusions to accomplish some of their highest damage and control, and without the illusions, they become fairly fragile. They can deal with enemy boons better than most classes, but enemy conditions can often be a problem. They share some of the stealth and mobility that the Thief enjoys, but suffer from a low health pool if you get past all their tricks."

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Game-Update-Notes-December-14-2012/first#post1038293

From another thread but this would also explain the condition removal situation. It’s supposed to be a weakness that a mesmer has unless we choose to specialize in countering it. I don’t recall that many people complaining about it though.

There is also supposed to be a major trait overhaul for each class coming this month (At least 1 change to each trait line and as many kitten changes per line) and would ideally give each class more uniqueness. I think it’s better when there are too many good traits to pick from and you have to choose. Other classes tend to have less of this and they need more, not the other way around.

Edit: 5 changes =kittens!

Iavra.8510:

I don’t really like this…we already have blocks in Scepter #2 and Sword #4. Changing BF into another “reacting” ability, would take alot of the flow out of the shatter playstyle since you need your opponent to do something to actually do any damage. Confusion could already be easily outplayed by simply doing nothing.

Confusion doesn’t have a double tap activation for damage but the rest are fair points. What about a main hand dagger for a duelist style of combat =)

Pyroatheist.9031:

@DuckDuckBoom: The reason I call your changes op is simply because they are. Look at it this way.

Your change retains the original functionality of blurred frenzy. If you get hit while channeling, it turns into the normal blurred frenzy. That is unchanged.

However, it ALSO provides the ability to have a mobile 2 second invulnerability which has the potential to chain into the normal blurred frenzy.

You are effectively doubling the invulnerability uptime.

On top of that, you’re also giving a option to sacrifice invulnerability for large spike.

Blurred frenzy is already one of the best skills in the game. Your changes would double the invulnerability uptime and provide the option to turn it into massive spike. If you somehow think that people wouldn’t complain about this 3x as much, you’re completely off your rocker.

Disclaimer: None of this matters if the skill never gets nerfed! I don’t want it nerfed or changed. This is only a mental experiment for if Anet ever does change it and what would be a fair change.

4 Seconds would only happen with a skilled mesmer vs a noob. You also do no damage for those first 2 seconds. Example, the mesmer presses 2 and goes in the parry stance. You leave the mesmer alone for 2 seconds then no blurred frenzy happens. If the mesmer has you targeted and you spam your attacks, it will proc on your first hit so around 2.1-2.5 seconds of invulerable. The enemy can even do this with a ranged attack to waste the blurred frenzy. The mesmer needs to untarget the enemy, wait until 1.9 seconds into it and then have the enemy be dumb enough to attack the mesmer at 1.95 seconds for a 3.95 second blurr to actually happen. The back and forth between the choice of the mesmer and the choice of the enemy is why I think it’s “fair” for both sides. If the time needs to be toned down, fine. I’ve left the numbers blank otherwise so that balance can happen with raw power change. ALSO, if you channel for too long, the enemy will not be held down by swap making it easier to dodge out of.

When you shatter spike an enemy, they will be dazed by f3, held down by leap and then you need to double tap 2 to get your spike hit. Since the spike hit means no invulnerable, the enemies team can interrupt you. 1v1 the damage stays the same since the target will probably not be able to react. If they can, then you can tap it only once and wait. They will screw themselves over if they try to interrupt too early. Again, you and the enemy need to make choice and the better choice wins out.

All I’m trying to do is add a rock/paper/scissor element which gives the enemies a choice when you use this skill. I don’t want it nerfed or changed. This is only a mental experiment for if Anet ever does change it and what would be a fair change. If you think it’s too complicated and doesn’t belong in the game, I will point you to ranger GS 4 as a reference which functions in a very similar fashion.

For PvE, if you time the 2, it will act just as before. If you know you are safe and double tap, it will be an increase in DPS. Overall, a good change for PvE mesmers.

LordByron.8369:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Warriors don’t need nerfs in PvE, other classes and also mobs need buffs.

same things that saying warrior need a serious nerf ._.
Devs agrees with you…i don t get it….

When you say PvE, it sounds like you also mean dungeons so you are also sorta “being and egoist” thinking that all PvE is dungeons/fractals.

wich is the easiest PvE class?

Is mesmer strong in open pve and leveling?
How important is blurred frenzy for a lvl 30 mesmer?

This may answer your questions

Not the same. If mobs had weakness, healing and protection more often, this would increase the effective power of condition builds/ poison/ boon stripping/ interrupt classes in PvE. That way mesmer damage wouldn’t need to be brought up to warrior levels since we could counter these boons/conditions and do equal damage to a warrior even though the mesmer base damage would be lower.
I went glass cannon sword/sword/focus from lvl 10 on in PvE and I never had a problem anywhere. I know how important blurred frenzy is and I love it to the point that I got Bolt on my mesmer.

LordByron.8369:

that is why PvE mesmer need blurred frenzy invul.
…
Just fyi in PvE there is a huge difference between blocking and invulnerable.
Blocking get bypassed by so many stuff.

The only time I mentioned block was talking about a ranger skill and the other riposte skills. I never said blurred frenzy should not be invulnerable (blurr). Did you actually read my proposed changes?

If you believe it’s fine ok. Honestly, I believe it’s fine in it’s current state. My reason for posting this comes from worry about too much crying about it and the possibility of it getting nerfed since A-net seems to listen to the complainers. Therefore, I wanted to propose an idea that doesn’t suck!

LordByron.8369:

P.S. iLeap and blurred frenzy are the only reliable mesmer skills that can get around unblockable stuff and defiant stacks that are so common in pve.

LOL what? Neither of those deal with defiant stacks. An IP F3 is what deals with stacks of defiant. Sword 44, focus 44, gs 5 are what deals with defiant.

LordByron.8369:

Sincerely a pve player really tired of pvp eghoist

OP didn t even consider PvE and WWW they are just too focused on their little world.

What about Tomorrow devs started to apply the most deserved PvE balancing?
Like giving warrior a most deserved nerf?

Note also dev s guidelines for making PvE and pvp consistently similar.

First off, I said I would drop the subject but the subject seems to have changed a little.

Warriors don’t need nerfs in PvE, other classes and also mobs need buffs. When you say PvE, it sounds like you also mean dungeons so you are also sorta “being and egoist” thinking that all PvE is dungeons/fractals. I also PvE about 80% of the 1.5k hours I have on my mesmer and I did try to think of all modes of play. Since A-net is accepting that they need to split skills in-between PvE and PvP, the numbers will change which is why I left them blank. However, the functionality of skills will probably be the same.

Thank you Pyro for reading my post and calling it OP. I disagree but I said I would drop this. I just don’t get how a PvE only player is saying that my proposed idea is a nerf without seeing any actual numbers when someone else is calling it OP.

If leap is really the problem… then we should nerf bull’s rush instead of 100b? This is the first time I heard someone complain about our buggy leap…

Entropy.4732:

In the name of Grenth, noooooooooooooooo! A thousand times, no!!!! I’m sure you are well intentioned but leave my beloved blurred frenzy alone!! It’s a staple of my build. Plus, it requires no adjustment whatsoever. The fact that it roots you is enough of a restriction.

If you believe it’s fine ok. Honestly, I believe it’s fine in it’s current state. My reason for posting this comes from worry about too much crying about it and the possibility of it getting nerfed since A-net seems to listen to the complainers. Therefore, I wanted to propose an idea that doesn’t suck and also I sort of just wanted to see if we could get mesmers and complainers to agree to something. If after my 2nd post, no one likes it, I will drop the subject.

I also got 1 vote for overpowered. As for overpowered, is ranger gs 4 and the double tap overpowered? It’s 3 seconds of immune to damage if you don’t have a target.. If you riposte, its a knockback that does around 2.5k to the Chieftain in the mists. If you double tap it, its a ranged cripple for about 2k. This is on a 12 or 15 second cooldown with zerker amulet but beast masterish traits. This is on a weapon that makes you immune to damage around 1/3 the time of your auto attack, has swoop for great mobility and an interrupt. I don’t think it’s over powered but I do like the counter-counter play it has.

I tried not to propose hard numbers of what the damage should be but I did mention 2 and 2 seconds. This could maybe be toned down but I explained why the total of 4 seconds would likely not happen and if it did, it would happen against a noob that has a pretty fast auto attack sequence that kept spamming auto through the first 2 seconds then didn’t move out of the way of the blurred frenzy. If you use it as an “interrupt” to their attack instead of just spamming it, it would function exactly like the current blurred frenzy. If you want to use it purely for defense on the move, it’s a 2 second blurr that doesn’t root you. If used in a spike combo, you lose all defenses bonuses immediately since you will double tap it with your shatters and it would root you for maybe 1/2 a sec. This might even do less overall damage than the blurred frenzy but it would be a chunk instead of multiple hits. If you are trying to use it as a mix of immune to dmg then spike, you forgo the ability to swap and immoblize while rooting yourself so they can easily move out of the way. Perhaps I didn’t explain it well the first time, but I don’t think that is overpowered. It simply gives us more options and also has counter play.

Dsiclaimer: I love playing my mesmer and it is my main. I think my few posts in the forum show that. With that in mind, we’ve all seen posts about nerfing mesmers. Eventually, these posters throw out the phrase, “If we could somehow charge it without nerfing” but never give a solution. After playing some of my alts, I’ve come up with an idea for blurred frenzy that I would like to share/have critiqued.
So the skills that I’ve taken inspiration from:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Nine-Tailed_Strike
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Counterattack
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Illusionary_Riposte

All of these are ripostes but with variations/utility built in.When I use mesmer sword 4, it blocks the next attack but only does riposte damage if I’m within 600 range of the target. 9-tailed strike is a riposte attack that is basically a melee frenzy attack. Counter attack is the most interesting. With the ranger gs4, if you don’t have a target, it acts more like 3 seconds of blocking everything. The counter attack is a knockdown. Finally if you double tap it, it roots you and basically performs blade trail (warrior gs 4).

So, keeping with the active defense of a mesmer but also potentially adding more counter play, what if sword 2 for the mesmer became more like counter attack. Pressing sword 2 would go into a parry stance. If we don’t have a target, it would “blurr” us for 2 seconds and then end. The stance would not root the mesmer. If we have a target and the target hits us during the blur, blurred frenzy (Identical to what we currently have!) would happen. Double tap activation would be a flourish that does a spinning overhand chop spike to 1 enemy. It would maybe root you in place.

My reasons for proposing the idea: As a light armored class in melee, we need the active defense. A-net has been talking about nerfing AOE damage. This makes me a bit worried about Mind Wrack getting nerfed. I’m under the impression that A-net wants mesmer AOE to be relatively low so if the AOE nerf happens, I suspect that MW will get nerfed despite the fact that it is one of our few AOEs. However, this also means that single target damage needs to somehow go up to make it more viable in their idea of balance/choosing which skill to use at the right time. Finally, this would adress the complaints about not enough counter play.

Reason for these specific changes: The new skill gives us a full defensive mode, an offensive defense mode and a big single target spike mode. This would keep the defensive side of the skill just as good as before. (The cooldown would not happen until the skill is completely done. So 2 seconds of immune to damage every 10 seconds traited or up to 2 seconds blurr then 2 seconds blurred frenzy for 4 seconds every 12 seconds traited.) The full 4 seconds would be tricky to pull off since you need both to target the enemy in time and they need to attack you. The longer you wait, the more likely your enemy is to wise up. However, our spike potentially just got worst. An F3, followed by F1 would ensure that the enemy isn’t attacking us so it wouldn’t proc blurred frenzy. Therefore we need an active spike. Since this spike means that we are no longer immune to damage, someone could interrupt our big spike. However, with F3, that someone would probably have to be a team mate or the enemy would have to stun break then interrupt since they would still be held down by swap.

Thoughts?

I’m also on a mid tier server and retaliation isn’t that big of a deal for me. I can toss grenade barrage into a zerg and it “only” takes about 1/4 of my glass cannon engineer’s hp IF they have retaliation up on all targets. Thats 8 grenades x 5 aoe x retal damage. For my mesmer, I have sword auto attacks and shatters remove boons, so retaliation never sticks in a 1v1. You can also hold back for a bit and let your phants/clones go at them for a while.

When solo capping a camp, I really like the focus and end up running a sword/sword/focus set. Those duel pistol NPC thieves with blinding powder are my only problem and with focus 4 to ball them up and focus 5/ sword 2, I can take care of them rather quickly. Feedback is also great for them. Since you are a phantasm ish build that shatters, F3, gs5 (or focus 4), sword 4 are usually enough ways to interrupt heals and I’m not sure you need mantra of distraction. The focus along with runes of centaurs/air will also give you much needed swiftness to run away/ get somewhere.

Since most of your armor is at least somewhat defensive while you try to be super offensive with traits, I think you want a balanced build. Why not try the opposite though? I don’t think the last 10 trait points in domination/dueling are worth it since the minors suck for you and the grandmasters are not so great either. 100 power/10% crit damage/8% auto attack damage can be easily made up with zerker armor/trinkets and going 20 in chaos for example with give you 200 toughness and 33% less damage (protection) taken when a thief tries to gank you. That’s a lot better than the extra toughness/vit you lose when grabbing more zerker gear. Speaking of a backstabbing thief, runes of air/sword 4 and just 1 phantasm/shatter spells death for a thief.

Last thing, for Dragon bash, 5 taffy = basically an omnom pie. Life steal is effectively more vitality and they are super cheap! They only last 20 min instead of 30 though.

Daecollo.9578:

It lowers all outgoing damage, don’t be confused by “damage reduction.”

Its like this:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sigil_of_the_Night
It works on condition damage as well.

It also lowers the damage of retaliation as well, it lowers the damage of everything you do … except itself of course.

Except I think you’re wrong. I’ve never actually tested this but I will later tonight.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/Does-Sigil-of-Force-affect-condition-damage
With that in mind, if you somehow want to implement a different mechanic than what the game engine supports, I still think it would not fit the mesmer or fit with the current balance the devs are trying to achieve. As a passive trait, it turns 400 retaliation damage into (75% of 400)+300=600 for a +50% buff while making you even more tanky. A bunker mesmer doesn’t need a buff and mesmers are not about passive play like this.

Iavra.8510:

a well timed F2 would be enemies taking at least 1600+500 for a single hit or 1600+1500 for multi-hitters like the greatsword auto attack.

Stop attacking when you see purple borders on your screen and butterflies flying around the mesmer? This game is already dumbed down enough, there needs to be at least some sort of serious punishment for bad players and attack spammers.

/edit and btw: Besides, i’m actually sure Daecello doesn’t really wants any of his (her?) suggestions implemented the way they are posted. Warrior would be absolutely dominating if that would be the case

That is a huge increase to a boon and condition that have been recently nerfed AND it cant be stripped. Then 10% more damage reduction so you can take more hits?

I know to stop attacking when there are butterflies and purple everywhere but I think it would be better to make another QQ buff confusion thread than give a mesmer only trait that is a backdoor buff to confusion/retaliation builds that also makes you more tanky.

I do wish we had more butterflies in general though.

Balance says you shouldn’t be able to have both this and retaliation. It’s a bonus 300 damage to retaliation already doing 400 with P/V/T gear.

Also, why talk about retaliation when you can talk about condition builds and confusion. Most condition builds have high toughness and condition damage. Furthermore, clauses like “25% less out going damage” usually don’t affect conditions or our phantasm damage. So now, F2 could give aoe confusion for decent amounts, retaliation akittens base of 200 and this new trait with 300. Confusion would also be doing 200 per stack. Even in it’s nerfed state in wvw, a well timed F2 would be enemies taking at least 1600+500 for a single hit or 1600+1500 for multi-hitters like the greatsword auto attack.

That is a huge increase to a boon and condition that have been recently nerfed AND it cant be stripped. Then 10% more damage reduction so you can take more hits?

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Defining-the-glass-cannon-mesmer/first
This is about a PvE glass cannon but the traits are rather similar. Some of the math in there might help you determine if those are traits you really want. Also there are a lot of different roles in WvW. What sort of fights are you trying to pull off with this build?

Disclaimer: I don’t Wvw in zergs on high tier servers so this may fail completely. It’s also an incomplete idea.

Normally, I run a 20/20/0/0/30 with IP basically being mandatory but I was wondering if anyone has ever tried Imbued Diversion instead? With a 30/0/0/0/30 +10, you would be able to stack multiple AOE Dazes, Strip multiple boons AND stack 25 vulnerability in an AOE. 1/2 the dazes would turn into stuns. For any other build, I would say halting strike sucks but I’m not that experienced with Confounding Suggestions. Is there a chance that halting strike can proc twice with confounding causing daze/stun and can halting strike crit? 200 dmg x 2 × 3x crit damage in an aoe might make this trait actually powerful. Then you shatter 2 more times with signet of illusions and 10 in illusions.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQJAssEN0bqHJQ9A8Ag7keYaWf6SF4NA-j0wAECAKBYJtIasRBARA-w

Very incomplete build. sword 4/4 would be another line daze and you could potentially chain 3 F3s for a total of 9 aoe dazes +1 from the sword. I would think this would be a power/tanky build as you are running into a middle of a zerg. For PvE, the lots of daze/stun/vulnerability would also be decent for dungeons. Maybe chaos storm for more aoe dazes/vulernability.
Thoughts?
Edit: After a bit of testing, I don’t think halting strike crits and since its on an actual interrupt not any daze, it only procs once per F3. So halting strike still sucks. Saddly the aoe daze also seems to be smaller than melee range.
Hopefully these are two traits that get changed in the up coming balance patch.

When I say 119% I mean my builds does (your phantasm damage) x 1.19 not +119%. The reason I say 26% is false is that in comparison to my build, I have 16% more damage from mantras to your 12%. I could swap from ruby orbs to eagle but I don’t think this is worth it. The extra precision doesn’t matter since we both hit 100% crit chance. 4% less crit damage and 120 less power than ruby orbs. Also, most builds have some sort of more damage at less health. This means that if the boss takes 5 minutes to reach 50%, it usually takes less time (2-4 minutes) for him to go from 50% to 0%. So 5% below 50% is more like 1-2% more overall damage. Since this game doesn’t have enrage times, this is bad. I also have sigil of fire. For single targets, sigil of air is better. So between the various trade offs, you don’t do 26% MORE auto attack damage COMPARED my build. I don’t mean to say those buffs don’t exist but it’s only about 9% more auto attack damage.
Wastrel’s would be cheesy to count and with defiant stacks/dazes only lasting 1 second, it only matters maybe in PvP.
PS. To other mesmers in this thread you look like a troll. I mentioned this before but the reason I’m trying to give this much detailed advice is because I know you make decent necro guides and it worries me that those great necro guides are being placed right next to misleading mesmer guides. I’m glad you are understanding the alternatives. In most other games, your build would be the way to go. With GW2 and current fotm/dungeon design it’s not optimal. It isn’t optimal DPS. It isn’t optimal mesmer DPS. It doesn’t have any utility. You also insulted a lot of mesmers with a few comments in your video so some of us are responding rather harshly.

Edit- Example of weapon/utility swapping. If you are on your necro in AC exp p1 or p3 and you are fighting burrows, do you stick with your scepter or swap to a dagger/warhorn and bring flesh golem/well of power EVEN if you are a condintionmancer? This is why so many of us are confused at why you are bashing on mesmer builds that are much more organic and MUST change between fights.

Nemesis.8593:

Let’s assume i completely agree with you (i won’t give up on my build, i find it still valid), am i the only person bothered with the fact that mesmers according to what many have said… “must” bring utility, that is why they are taken for ?…
I just got here… but if that it’s true, then don’t mesmers want to be in some builds equivalent to warriors… as warriors would be equivalent to support elementalist in some builds.

When i first set my eyes on guild wars 2… i remember hearing “you don’t have to wait for a tank or a healer or a DPS, any class can take any role… you are not stuck into one role, but every class will perform that role in a different way”.

For the most part, you can bring any build you want but in high lvl group settings like FOTM, or even just single player, there are still optimal builds. They got rid of the trinity in its previous form but the roles are still there. It’s easier to have a guardian tank. Things are easier when you have a warriors dps or a mesmers support. The great thing about mesmers is that optimal DPS happens at the same time with support so why lock yourself into just 1 role when you can do 2 or 3. Other classes can pull this off but most dont do it as well or most pugs just dont.

Nemesis.8593:

Yes it is nice, i like it… what i wanted was to make the most glass cannon glass cannon… with the only support being acting as a debuffer by applying stacks of vulnerability while interrupting, which you do quite often because of pistol 5 and 3 mantra interrupts…. the extra vulnerability you bring to the party on top of the up to 26% extra damage from your greatsword… as well as the fact that you can attack at all times from 1200 range… makes my build a cannon, a glass cannon.
…
If you come and say that my extra DPS uptime from GS is not worth it compared to the reflect you bring to a group in a real scenario… then i demand more greatsword DPS… so you are faced with a real decision.
…
A few i saw before where “sometimes you do this… other times you do this…” i don’t, and i always preach against them. All the benefits in those builds together would overshadow any of my builds… but those benefits never truly come together, so you are stuck sucking and everything…

You are right, I forgot to mention the vulnerability… against 1 target when you do much better aoe damage. Also keep in mind that vulnerability lasts half the time on defiant targets so it isn’t as much gain as you might think. As for the 26% you have on the auto attack; this is false. I showed the numbers and it adds up to only 9% more damage vs singlet targets when you compare the builds. My auto attack actually does more against multiple targets because of the sigil of fire. Also, my intention with the glass cannon statement was to show that there are greater cannon builds and therefore you shouldn’t claim that your build defines the glass cannon. Phantasms in my proposed build do 119% more damage and phantasms make up the majority of your damage while only losing 9% damage against singlet targets. So all around, my builds dps defines a cannon more. Some of this is from traits/food and some of this is from understanding team synergy/the mesmer.

When it come to balance, every encounter is going to be slightly different and will favor different weapons/utilties/traits. That’s just how it works. If there was perfect “balance” according to you, there would only be one class with one build and no weapon swaps. The abilities with higher skill ceiling SHOULD be balanced to do more damage since you can also do NO damage with them if you use them incorrectly. So I would have to disagree with you that your build should be buffed. This is also why warriors are having problems in PvP balance. They are too simple so they need high dps but if they had any more dps they would be unbalanced since it is so easy to pull off their even more insane DPS.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Phantasmal_Haste
The swordsman doesn’t require phantasmal haste to attack at a rate of 3.2 seconds. The duelist on the other hand, attacks every 5.4 seconds. Since the swordsman leaps in and out and evades while leaping and leaps often, I’ve found he is less likely to die and overall, does more damage than the duelist. You also don’t run into the whole bleed problem. Now for more math with a TEAM in mind.
When I warrior uses FGJ or a medkit runes of altruism engineer buffs… or other classses doing their boon thing, I’d like to show you how much of a DPS increase for your whole party this is. My build for example relies on fury to get that 100% chance of phantasm crit so lets see how much damage I would lose without it.
(1+ 1(1.13+0.5)) = 2.63 crit modifier
(1+ .81(1.13+0.5)) = 2.32 crit modifier or I do 88% of the damage I could with fury. This is a huge drop in damage. This also applies to anyone that has trouble with fury uptime or getting any fury at all. With the power of Signet of Inspiration, you can double that fury uptime and make sure that your team doesn’t do 88% of their damage potential half the time. This is in comparison to 4% bonus on your auto attack and I consider this “the mesmer’s damage” even if the mesmer isn’t doing it directly. After all, most of our personal damage is from phantasms anyways. This is just fury though. Let’s look at might. Between a warrior and runes of altruism med kit or any heal, your party will get 6-10 stacks of might. That’s about 350 bonus power/condition damage that you can turn into 700 for your whole team. So base power of 3864+700 is a 118% increase for you and for your whole team. However this requires coordination or at least listening for the shout to use your signet. When you pull it off, it’s amazing dps for your whole group. Not to mention other boons the guardian might be giving you.
Some enemies also give themselves lots of boons or huge stacks (Jellyfish gets 25 might when he eats a person) so arcane thievery +signet of inspiration is 875 power/condition damage for your whole team for a bit. Again much better than the 8% cost on your auto attack.

I use a 20/20/0/0/30 zerker melee build and I do prefer this build but I hope I’ve managed to convince you that there are better cannon specs (10/30/0/25/5) than the one you presented. I haven’t convinced you that shatter is viable but that is mostly for another thread. An example: Dredge fractal. I use shattered concentration to constantly strip 4 stacks of boons in an aoe. This is really good since it gets rid of the protection boon that makes your whole team doe 33% less damage. Null field is an excellent option for the phantasm build but of course comes at the cost of 4% bonus to your auto attack. 33% for the whole team vs 4% for just your auto attack: the choice is obvious. Next, feedback is of course useful for this area as there are lots of those pests with rifles and reflecting that damage can add up. You then loose another 4% of your auto attack.
So for single player PvE, these mantras are great but once you start synergizing with your group and adjusting your abilities for the fights ahead, mantras are some of the worst utilities you can take because other ones, when used correctly will buff your teams damage or defense by upwards of 20-50%. You won’t see these numbers but they are happening and they are “your DPS”
If you swap these utilities in and out, the mantra trait becomes obsolete and the 25 minor in dueling sucks anyways. 10 more domination for shattered concentration/ gs trait/ signet cd becomes more viable. Or 5 more into inspiration/illusions for more glamour traits/ get that bonus auto attack damage etc.. You lose 10% crit damage but your party gains so much.

Pyroatheist.9031:

The 10/30/0/25/5 build is a strong phantasm build that I use regularly (without mantras, because that’s silly)

He is responding well to big numbers so leave the mantras in the discussion for now. Once we begin the conversion, then we talk more about mantras =)

For duelist and focus reflects, go scepter/focus/pistol and turn your auto attack off or sword/focus/pistol and sit back with sword 2 for defense or be brave =)

More numbers because now I’m in a “number mood.”
These are your stats and (mine)
~ 3360 attack with phants at 3864 (3533 with phants at 4592)
81% *Critical strike chance (assuming you also have fury, this should be 100% for you and 120% for phant while my build is 81% and 101%)
*113%Critical strike damage (you have two exotics so 118 is actually the same)
~ 1839 Armor (The same but my build has more reflection/condition removal)
~ 16,169 Health (17582)
Auto attack multipliers 12% + average of 6% (16%)

So phantasm damage, my build wins hands down. Same crit chance and damage with more power. Specifically, (4592)/3360 x 100% = 119% more damage.
Let’s compare auto attack.
3360 with 18% bonus & 100% crit chance of 113% damage = (3360 × 1.18) x (1+1(1.13+0.5)= 10427.4
3533 with 16% bonus & 81% crit chance of 113% damage = (3533 × 1.16) x(1+ .81(1.13+0.5)) = 8197.6

These two numbers are unmodified by armor and will be much lower. However, I also have sigil of fire (The flame blast has a 1.0 damage coefficient and cannot critically hit.) This is a 30% chance of aoe on a 5 sec cd and the damage coefficient in this case is 4000 every ~6 seconds or once every 3 gs auto attacks. So on average, 8197.6+4000/3 (aoe) vs 10427.4. Assuming single target, 10427/(9530) x 100% = 109% more damage on your auto attacks.

SO 119% more damage from my phantasms while 109% more damage on your auto attack and phantasms are doing most of the damage. I’m also less squishy and bring more utility. Hands down, your build is not ultimate in cannon. Ultimate glass? sure but not cannon.

Nemesis.8593:

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Edit:

You realize you are telling me passive bonuses do nothing right ?…

The passive bonuses do not affect phantasms. Don’t trust me on that. Go to mists. Grab a steady weapon.Trait 0/30/0/0/10
Leave all traits blank. Look at your average/highest phantasm hit. Now try again with the mantra/illusion traits. See for yourself. Now also look at the auto attack to make sure the traits are working.

….

% damage passive bonus traits do not directly boost your stats so those passive bonuses do nothing since phantasms draw directly from your primary stats of power/crit chance/crit damage. The exceptions are Empowered Illusions & Phantasmal Strength since they explicitly say illusions/phantasm damage. You were testing the wrong thing. On a side note, if the mesmer has fury it increases the mesmer crit chance which stacks with the phantasm having fury for a total of 40% crit chance bonus to the phantasms.

Stop comparing other builds like pyros to your build. Of course a full zerker build is going to do more damage. Traits on the other hand are not always as straight forwards, especially for the mesmer. What you should be comparing is another full zerker build to your build. This is why I mentioned the proposed build. It’s YOUR build with 25 traits changed. So how about you adress the main portion of my previous post.

Since you insist on a link, I give you an even more optimized DPS while also bringing more utility with minimal swapping since that seems too painful for you.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAsdRl4zionRTlGaNJxZGQf5oFQqgqL9A35W2A-jwxAYLBRCCAZJiJvioxW4KiGruGT5SEVLFQEjBA-e

Since phantasms are doing most of you damage and they now do more damage and happen more often, this build will do more damage than yours. Also, more focus 4 for stacking enemies in balls so that your aoe will actually hit 5 targets. IF that isn’t an option, I’ve left the pistol trait in the build as well. There is a mantra heal that is decent so, why not grab that for 16% bonus to auto attacks instead of your builds 12%. This also means you get to remove conditions twice with your mantra heal instead of your sigil of generosity at random. Again, fury double stacks for phantasms and in a high level fotm group, someone in your group should be giving fury to everyone. Therefore, I’ve picked a few different different foods/sigils (bloodlust & fire) to boost power/crit damage rather than precision. Since this is about optimal DPS in high lvl fotm, these are valid changes and something you should consider in your build since 120% crit chance is the same as 100%. In the end, your phantasms will still have 100% crit chance while the build has 3533 power, 118% crit damage with 30% more phantasm damage (4592 effective attack) instead of 15% and some utility. To keep things simple, no traits or mantras need to change other than feedback on occasion. You can swap pistol/focus for what feels better for each fight. So out of the box, this modified build is better than yours.

However, you should be swapping your traits/utilities depending on each fight. By the time you get to fotm 10+ the fights don’t change. You know what the enemies do and should plan accordingly.

The reason I posted a simple 10/30/0/25/5 is that it is supposed to be your build modified. Just take 20 out of domination (200 less power) 5 less of illusions (average 6% less damage to your auto attack) and those 25 go into inspiration for 15% more phantasm damage. All dueling traits are the same for the sake of simplicity. The focus in inspiration is traited for. The other by default is for glamours. All armor and foods remain the same. You can look in my previous post for all the math of why it’s better. Stick with 3 mantras if you want as default. So same crit damage as your build. Just 200 power trade for 15% phantasm damage. Do you still need a build because it can’t get much simpler than this?

Balance is based on PvP. A phantasm build is good in 1v1 but doesn’t perform as well in team fights so overall, these builds are “balanced”.

With that in mind, some traits are just better than others and the game isn’t perfectly balanced.
Furthermore, there is also the idea with balance of high risk/high reward or high skill/high reward. Knowing when to reflect, knowing when to cast your p.warden, knowing how to focus pull will result in more overall damage. Being in melee will do more damage than sitting back.

Your build isn’t even new. Look for Lazy Kai’s mesmer build on the forum. It’s lazy…

Edit:

You realize you are telling me passive bonuses do nothing right ?…

The passive bonuses do not affect phantasms. Don’t trust me on that. Go to mists. Grab a steady weapon. Trait 0/30/0/0/10
Leave all traits blank. Look at your average/highest phantasm hit. Now try again with the mantra/illusion traits. See for yourself. Now also look at the auto attack to make sure the traits are working.

I made a Sylvari mesmer named Aint Ez Being Green, so her base skin color is green. However, with purple “hair” and glowing tattoos, this sorta limits what colors look ok. Also, when you have cultural armor, orchid dye just seems like a common sense choice. However, I’ve also thrown in pyre dye as well for a tropical flower exploding in butterflies look.
I also think most mesmers were drawn to the class because of the fluff first and that means they usually are ok with or drawn to the purple. It is also the color of royalty =)

How about this, lets modify the phantasm build so we can compare what you like “Ultimate Damage”. 10/30/0/25/5 to your build of 30/30/0/0/10. Phantasms aren’t affected by the 3% per illusion or the 4% per mantra. Again, watch your own videos. Even against a boss fight which is 5v1, you still don’t always have 3 illusions up most of the time. In the ascalonian fractal, you usually have 0-2. so realistically I will say AVERAGE of 6% bonus to your auto attack. Since we have still gone 30 into dueling, you can take the mantra 4% trait if you like.

So base attack with your build is 3360 with 6% average bonus auto attack damage and you don’t even use the sword half the time. Base attack with my presented build is 3160 without that 6% BUT with 15% more phantasm damage so the phantasms have 3634 attack. I’m ignoring mantra buffs because each of the builds have it.

So right here, this build already contests your build in the “ultimate damage” category but there’s more. You admit that maybe you should go focus instead of pistol for PvE. This is excellent news and shows your growth as a mesmer. So with a traited focus, there is of course reflects with 4 and 5 but lets ignore that for now. The traited p.warden is now happening 20% more often at a higher base attack than your builds p.warden. Furthermore, with a bit of practice/knowledge of how into the void works, you can start to consistently ball up enemies for your illusionary blenders so that their theoretical 5 targets actually happens. This also buffs your teams AOE DPS. So even with a hybrid between your build and pyro’s, I think it’s safe to say my proposed phantasm build is “MOAR ULTIMATE DEEPS” than yours.

Feedback will also recharge faster and with focus 4/5, you have basically 100% reflections uptime. Then bonus retaliation for when your phants die or regen/vitality is icing on the cake.

“Arrogant ?… i spend 30 minutes defining and argumenting each and every one of my decisions so i can discover and define a glass cannon build…”
30 minutes when some of us are at around 1000h + on our mesmers. Anyone can spend 30 minutes on a build. If you were qualified, you would never have picked halting strike. You failed at creating the ultimate DPS because you don’t even know what all of our traits are capable of.

My guild is casual friendly and I like teaching people so we don’t always have the ideal runs but they work out. I have a sorta set group that runs 30’s but some of us got burnt out on fractals. With that in mind, carrying a not so great group is a way of showing what your build is capable of. I tend to swap between my mes, thief (for the Dredge panel) and guardian but I would be willing to show case my mesmer for an entire run. I’m on NA.

Also, as other’s have stated, you make great Necro guides which is why I’ve been extra lengthy with my replies. Your choice of halting strike makes it pretty obvious that you aren’t super familiar with mesmers. If you were some random noob, I’d ignore this thread.

In regardes to the definition of glass cannon, I think maximizing your DPS as much as possible at the cost of defense is the best simple definition. The emphasis is still on maximizing DPS. The 25 inspiration minor comes at the cost of 10 less in domination and dueling. So 100 less power out of 3360 and 10% less crit dmg out of 113% is only losing 3% of your attack(base damage) and 9% of your crit damage for a base 15% increase in your phantasms. Since the mantra bonus also doesn’t affect phantasms, this trait in a defensive tree will actually increase your phantasm damage more than the offensive trees. This tree also means more reflecting from the focus or glamours which is more damage you are doing indirectly. So this build has the potential to do much more damage than your build while being slightly less glassy. This might not seem fair but the balance of it comes with skill/timing.

Nemesis.8593:

1. I wasn’t deceiving, i’ve made two math calculations… for real scenarios, one for single target and a separate one for AoE. I compared 3 illusions shattered with the two alive phantasms which you would get over a period of 10 seconds. You can shatter every 10 seconds, and you can summon two phantasms that attack once every 10 seconds… fair ?

I must have missed that part of the AOE calculations then. My bad. Watch your own video though. Video at 31:34 or 31:55. Your berserker never lives to get a second pass on the enemies so its DPS isn’t as high as you think. 40k berserker damage every 16 seconds is 2.5k DPS not 6666 dps that you claim. Since your video shows that he is going to die before he can attack again, use 4 &2 then SHATTER. You seem to be against shatter mesmers so much that you refuse to do it despite your video experience showing that you would be better of doing it. Also the greatsword phantasms is a bit buggy so the 40k is theoretical but usually will be lower. The GS trait would help since it would bring the phantasm CD to 12 seconds instead of 16.

Nemesis.8593:

2. I agree with you here… but playing in medium/melee range as a mesmer in high level fractals. Oh god… i’ve seen so many of those, it never turns out well… ever.
Stuff…. post was getting too opposite of 15 characters =)

Except I do mele in dredge fractals and although the highest I’ve done is 38, I do live through it. The focus pull to stack a group against a wall while also interupting the “gongs” is great. Then as a shatter mesmer, I have shattered concentration to rip protection and all the other boons off the mobs so my whole group doesn’t have their DPS reduced by 33%. 5 ppl not doing 33% less or 5 ppl doing 33% less damage while 1 of them does 12% more damage… I’m sorry you have bad experiences with mele shatter mesmers in fractals but that doesn’t make them invalid because other people can and do pull them off. Even when I swap to a GS, shatter to remove boons with your build would still be more of a benefit to your team than hoping your phantasm will live 6 seconds against the dredge grenades. It won’t.

You manage to have 3 phantasms up once for a short period during the entire bloomhunger fight. If you have 3 phantasms out, you will over ride a phantasm with a clone. If you have 2 phants and a clone, a new clone will always replace the old clone. So only once during that bloomhunger fight would the scepter have been a decrease to your phantasm dps.
If you stand inside bloomhunger, the only attacks that can hit you are his agony attacks. His shockwave and melee attacks will always wiff. So use sword 2 & 4 (Does around 5-7k riposte in 1/2 a sec if you time it right and spawns a free shatter clone.) when he does his agony attacks. If most of your team is in mele and anyone is also using aegis or protection it gets even easier since you can quickly res anyone that makes a mistake while your teams buffs will actually affect your team since you are in range of each other. 1 or 2 ranged people for the adds is good though.
Phantasm summoning takes time away from your auto attacks. My point with #4 is that summoning a phantasm is sometimes a loss to your dps. The duelist when you are fighting 3 mobs is a drop in DPS compared to your sword 1/2.
With IP, dodging to create a clone and shattering mid dodge is bonus damage you dont have in your calculations. F2 for example crits around 800 in a zerker shatter build. If you clone dodge and F2 mid dodge thats a bonus 1600 aoe and with a single clone and IP does 4 stacks of confusion for about 1k DMG. Since you are dodging something painful, that 1k and bonus might will happen. Similar bonus damage happens with F1 and F3. F3 will also spike 25 stacks of vulnerability on a boss for 6 seconds every 30. Just because it’s bonus condition damage doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen for a zerker shatter mesmer or that it doesn’t count for the “cannon” DPS.

One last time, my shatter build also does phantasm damage. Your phantams build should also do shatter damage. Don’t always shatter immediatly after your phantasms attack but you need to learn when to shatter even those 8k heavy hitters. To completely ignore 1 or the other is a waste of important mesmers tools.

Mimic: We felt that this skill did not have enough counterplay. If your enemies type /dance fast enough, you will now dance with them for the remainder of this spell.

Also, the best PvE interrupter in the game is a thief with an off hand pistol for consistent interupts (Prevent all of ac p3 bosses attacks because the warmaster is a noob.) or a shatter mesmer with sword/sword/focus to be instantly shred through 5 boss defiant stacks with f3/ sword 4,4 and then position him against a wall with focus 4.

Your test of to shatter or not to shatter is missing a few things.
1) You are using gs 1 &2 with the gs phantasm build and weapon swapping AND power spike for the phantasm test. For the shatter test, you just shatter 3 clones without IP and dont attack with your sword at the same time/power spike. Your damage calculations also use a single target situation when shatters are meant to be AOE for mesmers so that shatter dps can be anywhere from 900 to 4500 dps . Seriously, this is about mesmers but try to be less deceiving with your math.

2) Also, for shatter builds, you can summon a sword phantasm then shatter it after its attack so you can still get phantasm damage bonuses in shatter builds. Likewise, if your target is about to die right after your phantasms attack, you should shatter your phantasms , since 9k bonus AOE damage is better than waiting 6 seconds for your phantasms to do nothing as your team moves on to a new target. Since you should be in melee for optimal damage, your clones don’t waste time running to your enemies.

3)I just tested this with a steady weapon in pvp, and 4% more dmg for each mantra doesn’t affect phantasm damage. It only buffs the mesmer’s attacks and shatters. Same goes for 3% more damage for each illusion. So your traits aren’t buffing your “main” source of damage.

4) Speaking of it, your main source of damage is your direct attacks which in PvE, full glass cannon mesmers can stay in melee most of the time and live. In your video, your sword hits for 1.6k on the first two swings and I’m guessing it would get to around 3k for the 3rd strike. That’s around 3k dps to 3 targets compared to your phantams 2k dps to usually 1 target.

5) Zerker grenade engineers can stack 25 stacks of vulnerability in an aoe at 1500 range while also poisoning/chilling and doing more damage than a great sword Mesmer. This engineer will also be bringing more utility to the team than your completely selfish damage build. A warrior NOT attacking but using FGJ and 2 DPS banners probably does comparable damage to your build. Bring mesmer utility or bring a warrior’s dps.

Your bloomhunger fight could be done much faster if everyone is in melee, specifically, inside him. I always melee him as a glass cannon shatter mesmer at fotm 28 and don’t have any problems with him. If you don’t stay in melee all the time, you might as well use the scepter with the pistol. Scepter 3 would hit for around 11k over 3 seconds (again, more dps than your phantasms) while your scepter auto attack will hit for around 2k. Your idea of waste and never doing any condition damage is silly. Pretend the confusion doesn’t exist and compare just the burst damage. Since you often don’t use the sword but swap to your pistol, mediocre damage is better than none.
Halting strike is a bonus 200 damage. The worst mesmer trait. The greatsword isn’t that great right now because of the problems with 2 and 4 not hitting consistently but if you insist, you would be better off having +50 power and 20% cd with a gs. This trait does stack with 5 in illusions for a 40% cd on 2 and 4.

On a tangent, my choice in runes has affected the number of armor sets I have more than the armor stats.
Runes of Air is a wvw/speed set with zerker/knights.
Ruby orbs on full zerker for max damage.
Centaurs on PVT gear for when all I want to do is run in circles (Svnair fractal) or max power dmg (Sharpening stones for yellow health bars)
Melandru+Food is an anti-condition set I’ve been thinking about making but haven’t actually.
Ascended trinkets are a bit more expensive though so I leave them all zerker.

Resorative mantras has a base heal of 2.6k. If you max out healing power I think it will be only 2.9k. That is not worth it. It would however bump your regeneration from phantasms to 300 health per second instead of the base 130. Runes of Water would give a bonus aoe heal around 1.3k.
So your heal mantra would aoe heal for 4.2k every 13 seconds and your mantra of pain would aoe heal 2.9k every 4 seconds while your regeneration is at 300 per sec. I think the constant mantra buffs might make mesmers the best healers in the game. If one day we return to the realm of torment and take 2k damage a second for just walking around, this build would theoretically be great… No such place exists yet so don’t do this.

During some fights, like Mossman, it is really nice to have 2 or 3 blocks for when he tries to “back stab” you. Scepter/sword/sword is great for that. Also as a shatter mes with IP, I try to stay in mele all the time. Scepter is a decent oh kitten psudeo-mele weapon to swap to with a block and it does more damage (Attacks faster) the closer you are to the target. If you need a few seconds to recoup and plan on swapping to sword as soon as possible, I think it might be more effective than a gs as you dont need to go to 900 range to start doing max gs dmg. I also often riposte for around 7k which is really nice. With that said, I still carry 2 swords, a scepter, gs, pistol, torch and staff with me at all times. They all have their uses but you shouldn’t plan on using the scepter as your main weapon.

Side note about confusion, you should never build for it in PvE but it can be some nice bonus damage. Even in full zerker gear, 30 in illusions with a few stacks of might means you can start hitting 2.5k confusion dmg with f2 or scepter 3. For a few bosses like subject alpha, this is great. His cast aoe on everyone acts kitten separate casts and you can easily get a “bonus” 15k damage from confusion on him. Again, that is while I’m full zerker. Still not worth it to build for confusion damage though.

I think going full glass cannon as soon as possible in PvE helped me a lot with leveling my mesmer. Once you go into a dungeon, you can grab a bit of tanky gear if you need it, but always try to go glass cannon while leveling. I think too many people try to trait their mesmers to be as tough as a warrior that they first leveled and then your damage tanks and you level slow.
Go sword/sword with 10 dueling and 5 illusions. That should help you learn the great active defense of a really squishy mesmer. 10 Domination for more damage to your shatters or phantasms. Focus off hand to run faster and have some projectile reflects.

I don’t know why I didn’t think of blurred frenzy, its my favorite ability in the game >.<

My bad, I guess I’ve only tested this for 100b and a few other abilities. If you try this with 100b or the ranger longbow skill, you will see that the damage is being added up.
Edit: Mesmer GS auto attack can also test this. Or just go into a low lvl zone. Have your warden attack a lvl 15 mob. Does it kill the mob instantly? Does the damage look like it is ramping up as the attacks continue? Then compare this to your sword auto attack.

hardloop von edgehoven.8512:

im just infront of puppets and my warden hits very often last hit over 4.
if this happens then the last 3 hits MINIMUM were around 3200 AVERAGE.
so count together:

4200 + 3800 + 3500 + 3000 = 14500 only for the last 4 hits
worst cycles end on 3600 and it happens wiht same average than maximum

at least 3 more hits are beyond 2000, so 20k is rounded DOWN.
just count the the lame rest together and i get my 20k in around 3-4secs.

so u say evry single hit is summed up from previous?

THen factor in crit damage amplifying 20k by 270%
Do you really think this is correct?
Again, just turn on your damage log and see how much the warden is actually doing per hit.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combat_log
You will see the warden doing 1k dmg 12 times for a total of 12k dmg NOT 1k then 2k then 3k… for a total of 78k dmg. (This is too ridiculous to be true. Sorta like how people think the last hit of 100b can actually do 40k in 1 hit)

Press the chat menu that lets you pick which types of chat you want to see. Turn on the damage log. Look at how much damage warden does. Or you can use logic. Does a warden doing 78k damage or a100b doing 200k dmg over a few seconds make sense for PvP? No one could survive that. It would down a tanky guardian and then kill him in 2 seconds.

Pyroatheist.9031:

In a full damage build, they could easily achieve 16k crits in that situation. 3 warlocks is an average of around 1.3 attacks per second at 16k per attack, giving you around 21k damage per second.

You should be dividing the 16k by 1.66 instead of multiplying by 1.3. That would give you 10k dps in a otherwise highly unlikely situation.

Sword 2, GS 1, p.Warden and other abilities like them show the sum of damage done over time. To test this, turn on your combat log:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combat_log
You will see the warden doing 1k dmg 12 times for a total of 12k dmg NOT 1k then 2k then 3k… for a total of 78k dmg. (This is too ridiculous to be true. Sorta like how people think the last hit of 100b can actually do 40k in 1 hit) Interestingly, the scepter 3 does not show a sum but instead shows 1.7k crits for each of the 5 attacks.

To answer the OP, I’ve found (I run full zerker) the sword pulls slightly ahead in damage against a single target. The scepter in mele, the gs at range and staff(600 or closer with illusionary elatistiy) actually are all very close in damage they can do. The big difference between them becomes the phantasm damage vs clone generation for shatters vs illusionary person for more mele damage. So the damage they can do depends on your build and also the enemies. If there is more than one target, sword pulls a head by a lot.

I run a standard glass cannon shatter build and I use all of them situationally. My standard set is usually sword main hand. I usually then swap between focus offhand to stack enemies in a nice ball and sword offhand for and 5-7k ripostes. Since I shatter often, the p.swordsman’s 3.2 sec cooldown on the leap attack is the only phantasm that every gets more than 1 attack off per summon. He can also be summoned every 12 seconds. The warden is some nice aoe and projectile protection while it lasts but if I see it’s health dropping, I will shatter it early.

Lastly, the scepter 2, OH sword 4 can be a huge dps spike if you time them right. The timing is key since you can either do 2 × 7k crits in 1/2 a sec or do no damage over 4 seconds.

Since WvW gives access to Rare Veggie Pizza (+40% condition duration) Tuning Crystals and PvE Confusion damage, I decided to try and maximize confusion damage and see how high I could go. I’m working on parts of the armor for this build so I cant fully test this. Here’s the build
10/5/25/0/30 I really love vigor so I put 5 points in dueling. The 10 in domination are for 10% longer conditions and 20% signet cooldown. I also took blind causes confusion.

So the combo would go: Torch5, Scepter3, (F3 if I want to daze) Mirror Images, then F2. With the exception of Scepter 3, this combo takes 1.5 seconds to pull off and could possibly get 14 stacks of confusion. Following up with Signet of Midnight and Torch 4 could add an additional 2 for 16 total. 12 of those stacks are AOE.

With food, sigil of corruption maxed, tuning crystals, 3 might stacks from shatter, and signet of domination, I am getting about 2700 condition damage. From there, I am getting 6.5k damage for 12 stacks and 8.6k for 16 stacks. The spike itself should do a bit of damage as well. This seems a bit too powerful since most builds would kill themselves with 2-4 autoattacks. Unless the condition removal doesn’t trigger confusion, that could also easily kill them. I would be using this build in small fights and I am imagining being surrounded by 5 people that all suddenly kill themselves in 4 seconds.

Furthermore, the duration would be a while. 10% from domination, 10% from runes of nightmare, 40% from food and 33% confusion. I’m not sure if the 33% confusion is additive or multiplicative like the necro scepter trait. If it was multiplicative; 3 and 5 second confusions would last twice as long.

When not using the spike, I added Sigil of Doom to both weapons as mesmer are lacking in consistant poison. WoC auto attack would add some nice burning and bleeds. This build does not have 15 in dueling though for crits to bleed for illusions. Other things about the build. I think Signet of Midnight and Domination usually don’t find there way in builds because most people see them as underpowered. However, the 10% boon duration with 25% from chaos gives an extra second on most boons from staff and traits. Midnight is an aoe blind and stunbreaker which also would give aoe confusion. The extra stun and condition damage is nice, but I’m worried about not having blink/decoy on my bar.

What do you guys think? Is it viable or is my math terribly off?
I also just realized there is also no reason not to throw a F1 in there too for 1 extra aoe stack.