Guild Wars 2

If it means losing Protection on Chaos Armour, no thanks. That one’s awesome.

I feel if it has Protection as well as 20% off it probably needs to be a GM trait.

Pollux.3247:

Maybe it would be a good idea to merge pDefender and pDisenchanter. Make it a new version with a 50% damage reduction and condition cleanse (not the boon removal) so it becomes a solid option for support.

I wouldn’t mind merging Decoy and Mirror Images too… I think we can have better options for our illusion utilities.

Eh, no. The boon stripping is the main reason to use iDisenchanter for me, not the very unreliable condition cleansing.

They’re fine as they are, they just need their cast times reduced (and iDefender should probably just give Protection instead of the really gimmicky damage sharing concept).

Devata.6589:

A timer is not but not really necessary. Your cool-down starts when you place the first portal, 60 sec later you must have placed the second portal. So you can use the cool-down as timer, when it hits 30 you lose the portal.

Yeeeaaaah… I get the feeling you haven’t actually used Portal before.

For the time being I’d be happy with just a timer. I don’t think direction is important (for the Mesmer at least), and when playing in a group you should ideally be communicating where your portal’s leading to. As for range, would be nice to have an indicator for that too but if it’s too difficult I don’t mind, it’s not as big an issue as time to me.

Just make it grant Blur to allies instead of Distortion.

It’s unblockable, so you can’t reflect, block or destroy it. Dodge, evade, invulnerability works.

If there will be we’ve already seen it anyway, so does it matter…?

Torenn.2598:

Racial skills don’t have associated toolbelt skills for Engineers.

Apart from Elites, they do.

kitten

Aye En Zero Zero Five

My guess is it could be considered 13375p34k for the hole where faecal matter comes out of, as spoken with a ??? accent.

EnRohbi.2187:

Remember when Phantasms could be cast without LoS?

I seem to remember only iZerker could do that.

Remember when conjuring a Phantasm cannot be negated by blind or dodge?

Reflection was our F4 before Distortion replaced it.

Sword 2 used to be Leap, the opposite of Illusionary Leap. People complained they were too similar, and in any case the “Clones are confusing” idea fell flat almost immediately.

Clones used to do significant damage, around 200 – 300. I had lots of fun chasing people with three Sword Clones during the Beta.

Chuck.8196:

Embolism.8106:

Might stacking is a big reason why PvE is all about stacking

Actually , stacking is about pulling numerous enemies into one area to easily dispose of them. It’s carried over from the first Guild Wars. Grab aggro, break LoS, watch them all come ball together, destroy. Pulls in the ranged enemies with the melee. people just assumed it was ONLY for FGS and might stacking.

Notice I said “big” reason, not “only” reason.

tobascodagama.2961:

A Mesmer that relies solely on hiding out in stealth for long periods is a trash Mesmer anyway. I’m actually looking forward to all this stealth detection, maybe all the PU FOTM Mesmers will move on.

Agreed.

I’m not saying PU is inherently bad or OP, but no one can deny that people have been jumping on the PU Mesmer bandwagon because of a perceived advantage.

roachsrealm.9284:

as neat as this would be, it brings up a few issues.

ele would no longer have a unique mechanic of sharing auras.
leaps apply auras, blasts apply fields. what aura would you get if you blasted a darkness field? poison?

I think there are certain skills that would benefit from your idea, but the skill would have to be a leap finisher that had an effect like a blast finisher. A leaping attack that effects PBAoE upon landing. Guardian GS 3, for example, blinds targets aoe upon landing iirc. This is a very short list of skills and would change all the mechanics of combo fields.

Not sure what you’re talking about. You already get Frost Aura from blasting Ice fields and Chaos Armour from Ethereal fields. Blasting Fire fields for Fire Aura is actually logical, and most fields Leap and Blast the same thing except Fire, Light and Lightning.

No, mainly because I don’t rely on stealth for defense.

Yeah GS had Phase Retreat, except it was called Feigned Escape or something. I think Staff also had a teleport but it was forward… can’t remember.

Pity this sort of “trivia” isn’t documented in the wiki.

Fun fact: a long time ago Staff 1 was called “Chaos Strike”, uses the current Chaos Armour icon and simply hits a target with a random condition/give yourself a random boon. No projectile, no beam, just point and bam. Back then Winds of Chaos was Staff 4.

They don’t matter and can’t be used in sPvP anyway.

Most racials are just nerfed versions of profession skills.

Arietta The Broken.1875:

Did Phalanx Str get nerfed or something?

One thing at a time!

Plus blasting Fire fields can be done by a lot of players/professions. With Raids and potentially other large-scale group content coming I think Blast + Fire is a more important concern.

Narrrz.7532:

it would make a lot more sense, but it would make guards the only profession (i can think of) which are good at applying aoe might above a stack or three.

not that that’s strictly a bad thing, curbing might application would be a severe blow to the power creep that’s been happening.

Yeah, that’s my reasoning. Might stacking is a big reason why PvE is all about stacking, plus it trivialises group content and most other effects that apply Might.

Blast Finisher + Fire Field = AoE Fire Aura.

I think it’s more the fact that most people discount the Sceptre as a condi weapon, while people who play Condi Mes already use the Sceptre because they don’t have any other options.

In reality though the Sceptre is a hybrid weapon, equally effective in Power and condi builds. If more Mesmers understood this I think there’d be a greater push to fix/buff it.

After three years of iLeap being unreliable, I think it’s time to scrap the idea and just give Mesmers a normal Immobilising Leap that conjures a Clone on landing. There’s absolutely no reason not to Swap immediately given that with MH Sword you’d be doing kitten-all at range.

I can’t really play my Mesmer anymore. Chronomancer has spoiled me.

If damage is no longer transferred to the iDefender then it doesn’t matter if it dies in a second as long as it gets the initial application off.

In fact just simplify it to Protection… 5s of Protection to allies within 600 range when the iDefender attacks. And of course, reduce iDefender and iDisenchanter’s cast times from 1.5s to 1s.

On a related note, iAvenger’s Alacrity should be in a 600 radius too. I see no reason why you have to be in melee range of the target to get the buff. Keep the Slow in a 240 radius if that’s the issue.

What PvE really needs is a reason to Shatter Phantasms that doesn’t include the word “Chronomancy”.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Embolism.8106:

Fay.2357:

Embolism.8106:

All’s said and done though, the Mesmer isn’t meant to be tanky like the Scrapper’s obviously meant to be, so I don’t begrudge them for the Bulwark Drone.

This is really just another way of saying ‘I submit to the fact that engineers are simply being handed utilities that are literally mesmer utilities with buffs’.

If that’s how you want to take it, sure.

Personally if given the choice I’d still take iDefender over Bulwark Drone because the way it synergises with our traits and Shatters makes it very potent with the right (Chronomancy) build.

I would never, ever take iDefender over decoy, blink, and MoD for survivability. I’d also take a list of other utilities before it too.

I explained the basics of the “right” Chronomancy build that would benefit far more from iDefender both offensively and defensively in my next post.

For further clarification, it’s a build designed to punish enemies for attacking you, so you want to get hit; which makes defensive skills that helps you evade attacks (Blink, Decoy) somewhat counterproductive.

Mogar.9216:

really? what the kitten more do you want? mesmer is number 2 behind ele right now can’t get any better than we have it already.

“We”.

Nice try.

Fay.2357:

Arguing to literally take bulwark drone and put it on mesmer is ridiculous, to put it lightly. The point is that everything pDefender does…bulwark drone does it better. Yes, pDefender is an illusion, and this means that on mesmer, you can do illusiony things with it… but that contributes less than nothing to the issue that bulwark drone is simply better at doing what pDefender is supposed to do.

Hence my list which by the way mirrors what you said in your previous post:

Embolism.8106:

So unlike the iDefender, the Bulwark Gyro:
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1. Doesn’t have a long-kitten cast time.

2. Doesn’t require a target.

3. Doesn’t disappear when the target dies.

4. Doesn’t need to run into cleave range and attack to provide its effect.

5. Doesn’t take extra damage for no reason because Illusions that will die anyway get hit by cleaves/AoEs.

6. Doesn’t get destroyed whether you like it or not when you use your profession mechanic.

I’m simply explaining why iDefender being an Phantasm is, in my eyes, fitting compensation for its shortcomings compared to the Bulwark Gyro. That is not to say I wouldn’t want to see buffs for iDefender so it’s better on its own merits.

With Celerity, PoM, Phantasma, Alacrity, double iAvenger and Mental Defence, I can get a lot of Shattering done with high uptime for iDefender. Since I’m Shattering and reconjuring/Phantasma-ing iDefender a lot, its limited HP doesn’t matter.

Illusion of Defence is not tied to any particular iDefender so reconjured/Phantasma’d iDefenders inherit the scapegoating effect.

If iDefender is replaced by Bulwark Drone, sure it’s better by itself but it loses its synergistic place in my Chronomancy build.

I wouldn’t be opposed to removing Ether Clone and leave Illusionary Counter with Clone on Block + Clone on Counterspell. But I don’t think Ether Clone going away is on the table, and I like having more Phantasms: particularly condi ones.

Also, it’s a cunningly subtle suggestion to buff OH Sword as well.

Fay.2357:

Embolism.8106:

All’s said and done though, the Mesmer isn’t meant to be tanky like the Scrapper’s obviously meant to be, so I don’t begrudge them for the Bulwark Drone.

This is really just another way of saying ‘I submit to the fact that engineers are simply being handed utilities that are literally mesmer utilities with buffs’.

If that’s how you want to take it, sure.

Personally if given the choice I’d still take iDefender over Bulwark Drone because the way it synergises with our traits and Shatters makes it very potent with the right (Chronomancy) build.

So unlike the iDefender, the Bulwark Gyro:
.

1. Doesn’t have a long-kitten cast time.

2. Doesn’t require a target.

3. Doesn’t disappear when the target dies.

4. Doesn’t need to run into cleave range and attack to provide its effect.

5. Doesn’t take extra damage for no reason because Illusions that will die anyway get hit by cleaves/AoEs.

6. Doesn’t get destroyed whether you like it or not when you use your profession mechanic.
.

On the other hand, the iDefender:
.

1. Is on a lower CD and has quite a few traits to improve the frequency at which it can be conjured.

2. Can potentially last longer than 15s (yeah right).

3. Adds some DPS (…..).
.

All’s said and done though, the Mesmer isn’t meant to be tanky like the Scrapper’s obviously meant to be, so I don’t begrudge them for the Bulwark Drone.

That said, would certainly be nice if iDefenders have more HP so they don’t fizzle the moment an AoE hits all your Illusions.

The Pledge is bugged, it’s currently giving 3x the CD reduction per tick than it should.

We’ve been asking for fixes for a while but they’re slow to come.

Well, Chrono allows you to mix Phants with Shatters, and there’s talks of Alacrity/Quickness sharing builds. There’s a few threads floating around, they aren’t hard to find (and I’m too lazy to link them ATM).

Dondagora.9645:

Huh, that’a cool idea though. Mesmer-Fire Elite Spec built around group support, “burning” away ailments with purple flame.

That steps on the Guardian’s toes a lot.

Where did you hear that from?

And seriously, I think you’re looking for an Elementalist. Mesmers have some fire skills in Torch and Staff but it’s not enough to make a build out of.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

momma squirts might all over you

Quoted for posterity.

Okay, so now to tack my real agenda to this topic. The Sceptre needs buffs. Not just fixes, buffs. I like the concept of a mid-range hybrid weapon, but it falls into the “jack of all trades, master of none” trap and being 50% of the Mesmer’s MH options this cannot be ignored. So onto my suggestions:

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ETHER BOLT

Projectile speed increased. Sceptre Clones use the full Ether Bolt chain with a modified version of Ether Clone that doesn’t conjure a Clone.
.

If fixing the “there’s a projectile in flight” aftercast issue isn’t possible then I’d settle with this. If it is possible then I’d still advocate this. Ether Bolt’s projectile is so slow you can outrun it. This is okay for Winds of Chaos as the Staff is really meant to be a close-ranged defensive weapon, but not for the Sceptre which is meant to be more mid-ranged offensive.

The second part of this suggestion is to improve the Sceptre’s condition pressure (which is currently really bad outside of bursts) as well as making Sceptre Clones more convincing: not that it really matters as Clones don’t fool anyone, but it’s the thought that counts!

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ILLUSIONARY COUNTER

No longer deals damage, inflict Torment, conjure a Clone or have a casting animation when Block is triggered. Now conjures a Phantasmal Tormentor on Block which fires a projectile that inflicts Torment on the target. Counterspell now also conjures a Phantasmal Tormentor on the first target it hits.
.

There are a few reasons for these suggestions. First, the casting animation for the counterattack following the Block leaves you open to further hits, which goes against the defensive nature of the skill. An instant, animationless counterattack might be too much however, hence my suggestion to offload it to a Phantasm à la Echo of Memory.

Now, this obviously creates a problem: the Sceptre becomes the only weapon to give you access to two Phantasms in a set. However, I believe this is fine because 1. the Sceptre is meant to have superior Illusion generation, yet between DE, IR and CP Ether Clone is basically negligible; and 2. it’s a condition damage-based Phantasm, and we don’t really have many of those that are good so stacking them won’t do much.

As for making Counterspell also conjure an Illusion, this is to maintain the usefulness of the skill if the Block doesn’t get procced, again à la Echo of Memory.

I’d also like to suggest making the same changes to Illusionary Riposte with Phantasmal Swordsman, and replace Sword 5 with a new skill. Just for consistency’s sake (and a buff of course).

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CONFUSING IMAGES

The beam now penetrates your target. radius of AoE around the beam increased.
.

The AoE nature of this skill is rarely apparent because 1. you need to target the furthest enemy to hit multiple enemies in a line and 2. the AoE “column” around the beam is extremely narrow, if you’re targeting a tall enemy it won’t hit short enemies no matter how perfectly they’re aligned.

I’m not sure how difficult it would be to make the beam penetrate through your target, if that’s not possible then whatever. But the radius of the AoE column needs to be increased. And of course I’d suggest these same changes to all beam attacks that can hit multiple targets (e.g. Spatial Surge).

Yes, you read that right. The Sceptre’s weapon trait is actually DETRIMENTAL to the Sceptre!

Okay, not really; but the point still stands. There’s currently two issues with Malicious Sceptre and its interaction with the Sceptre itself (the Sceptre’s own issues notwithstanding):

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1. Ether Bolt’s projectile must hit the target before the next skill in the chain is available for casting. This means the further away you are from your target, the longer the aftercast for each attack, and this is not affected by Malicious Sceptre’s attack speed increase.

TL;DR: Ether Bolt’s DPS is increased by much less than 15% depending on your range to your target.
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2. Malicious Sorcery reduces the duration of Illusionary Counter.

.

So the result is Malicious Sceptre improves your DPS by much lower than 15% if you use the Sceptre at any range, and actually reduces the effectiveness of 33% of your Sceptre skills.

NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

So what’s the solution? Well the obvious one would be to remove the weird “there’s a projectile in flight” aftercast for Ether Bolt and make Malicious Sceptre not reduce the duration of blocking skills.

In the case of the former there might be compromises made because of Ether Clone, so perhaps it’s harder to fix than we’d imagine. For the latter, it should be an easy fix of just giving blocking skills a duration increase with MS to negate the speed bonus (if giving certain skills exceptions is technically challenging).

Chaoz.7941:

I would like to point out why can’t we reap the benefit of gs #1 hitting multiple times when we feel the agony of it hitting multiple times with retaliation and confusion? Can you put an icd of .25 sec delay on those then?

I like to point out I don’t mind the .25 sec icd, but i’m just annoyed we can only reap the negatives out of a kittenty #1 skill.

It doesn’t hit multiple times with Confusion, Confusion only procs on skill activation.

As for Retaliation, you’re a Mesmer. You have no issues stripping that Retaliation off.

Temporal Curtain needs to play nice with other sources of Swiftness. As it is if you already have some group Swiftness you can’t extend it with Temporal Curtain, which is stupid: it’s essentially wasted in any group. Plus since SoI doesn’t have an indicator on its ICD and Temporal Curtain requires you to place it then run across it, too often I’d put down Temporal Curtain and get Swiftness from SoI just before I cross it, essentially replacing its 12s Swiftness with SoI’s 5s.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

One of the reasons I’m looking forward to Chronomancer is so I don’t have to deal with Temporal Curtain and SoI ever again.

Scrapper makes me think of this guy.

As people have said, depends on what type of Condi Mesmer.

PU Condi Mesmer, Guardian will probably win. Inspiration Condi Mesmer (i.e. much less stealthy), Mesmer wins pretty easily.

Source: I play a lot of stealthless Inspiration Condi Mesmer.

In this case it’s not so much that Confusion/Torment wins over Burning, but the fact that Inspiration Mesmers are almost immune to condi builds that can only apply one condition with frequency.

Crazy idea for Healing Prism.

No longer heals allies. New effect: all healing you receive is also received by your illusions.

morrolan.9608:

People don’t understand internal cooldowns?

There’s an illusion counter to show you how many illusions you have, there’s no visible timer for ICDs.

Gav.1425:

Thanks, Geesus. We very well appreciate all the time that goes into all of this work on and off of the forums and especially the transparency in involving the players in feedback.

Robert Gee.9246:

• Illusionary Avenger: Increased damage of this phantasm by 20%. Fixed a bug which prevented this skill from displaying the benefit from Empowered Illusions. Increased alacrity given to 2 seconds per hit. This phantasm no longer shoots a bouncing projectile but instead initiates a melee attack that slows enemies and gives alacrity to allies within a 240 radius around the target.

This may be great for stacking PvE encounters, but the 240 radius sounds quite small to make a mark on PvP and other more mobile encounters. Maybe 360 radius would fix it?

Also, does Illusionists Celerity (Reduce recharge on illusion-summoning skills, -20%) and Phantasmal Haste (Phantasms attack more often, +20%.) now work on Illusionary Avengers? Illusionists Celerity was definitely not working in BWE1, but I don’t recall testing it in BWE2. Most weren’t running the Illusions trait line so there wasn’t a lot of noise about it on the forums.

They were both working in BWE2. It was even stated as a change before BWE2.

Robert Gee.9246:

Well of Recall now pulses despair and ends in happiness.

Awww.

Phloww.1048:

I wonder if A-net was aware that many mesmers are not using their main mechanics and thus, made chronomancer to see if it’ll convince us to shatter more than keeping phantasms alive. Hmmm……

This isn’t a novel observation. The issue is our core mechanics should not require us to specialise, they should be synergistic as they are.

Not all professions have viable builds with access to cleave.