Having this mechanic is a step forward… But they are close to nothing, lets take a look:
Pistol: a 3s cripple projectile(20% chance to finisher combo), damage is 0, just like magic bullet.
Staff: You gain a wooping auto-attack when summoning the phantasm. Ah the amazing staff auto…
Torch: Pointblank 2burn for 3s. The only one that is somehow decent… (still probabily useless on pve condi mesmer since you want to keep pistol phantasm)
Still nothing for the most used phantasms ( focus/sword). I really hope Anet step up on that ones.
Increase sword aa chain speed by ~30% like they did with thief sword in January 26th (increasing attack points / decreasing aftercast delays).
Thief, war, rev swords aa chain takes ~1.8s to complete. Mesmer sword aa takes 2.5s.
At least we could use boon strip more often/faster ending this chain.. Maybe it could payoff to be in melee range with a light armor class smashing 1…
For me this would be far more insteresting than increasing damage… Cause raw damage is there, but like someone said, we dont have moddifiers to support it (and mods dont affect all our skills like phantasms)
Seems like they are going after boon share. I’m not surprised nor concerned.
The druid nerf Inc is nice to see tbh
About mesmer itself and depending on numbers/calculations/rest of the changes it can either:
-Change nothing and afterall 1 mesmer can still mantain quickness on 10 ppl in raids (cause ppl still thinks signet is a copy/paste or doubling times but they are not giving as much quickness as they think because of effect stacking limits)
-Make 2 mesmer mandatory making alacrity a more consistent and realistic thing narrowing dps classes and pushing rev out( thief out, hammer guard less appealing, ele/necro the only dpsers)
-Or push mesmer out cause after all calcs made, dps increase from mesmer boons for 4 other players + mesmer dps doesnt payoff and simply bringing another dps class (or dps+support like guard or rev) would be better dps overall.
(currently a mesmer pays off cause it buffs 9 ppl,…. but buffing 4 is quite less than half effectivness).
About druid, to extent of the other classes i mentioned, im worried the most. I really think right now that ranger/druid is the most healthy/balanced class at pve (yes gotl is a tad op but w/e). It have build diversity, power/healing/condi, several variants, a good amount of wep choices, a nice skill cap, a good balance between dps and support, dropping support makes it a appealing dps choice (for condi variant only, sadly), dropping dps brings enhanced support etc…
The only way for druid to get out of this trouble is for Anet to introduce new stats combinations, for example Condi/condi dura/healingpower or even a 4stat with same 3 as before + power or precision for druid to mantain its condi variant, because for now seems zealot will be the way to go.
And this druid nerf will only affect it in pve.. Cause in pvp its meta build (mender amulet) will get buffed. And its in pvp where druid might be considered problematic not pve.
Anet did great with guardian last patch (for pve). Opening new and viable/similarly effective builds (less dps but prot with hammer, or more dps but less support with sword/scepter torch, making it a matter of taste or party/content demandings.
They are doing the opposite with druid, god knows why…
Third, many of you have asked and we wanted to confirm: the next balance update will ship this month.
Fourth, AcademyGaming will be hosting the return of Tournament of Legends in early November. More information will be released on this soon, but the short of it is that anyone can sign up (first come, first served) and earn rewards such as legendary weapons, precursors, and legendary crafting mats. We wanted to let you know ahead of time so you can start creating your teams and such.
Ok thanks for letting us know ahead of time about that tournament. It is good so we can start creating teams etc. like said.
But you know what is also very important to know? yep, the other point i quoted. Balance changes… We need to know them, we need to test them, we need to let new meta settle. That takes time.. And the tournament is aprox. one month away.. And where’s the balance? Yep. Time is falling short…
What i meant was:
Under the effect of blur, you can take retaliation damage (plus the other things). With distortion, you wont.
Also dont mix up blur (the buff that grants evade) with blurred frenzy skill. Yes, blurred frenzy gives blur, but isnt blur that gives damage.. Just to be clear.
Again so many wrong comments in here… Just like buffs and boons on phantasms…
Blur = evade
Distortion = invulnerability.
Difference between the 2, other than capture point?
When you blurred frenzy (blur) vs a target with retal, you will take retal dmg. With distortion you wont get retal dmg.
Same with shock aura. With blur you will get stunned, you wont with distortion.
Same will happen with many other un-evadable effects (electric fence, unstable ground, slick shoes, DH f1 pull, etc ) but with distortion they will never happen…
Blur = evade frames. Same evade frames as any other skill with evade or same as dodging. It just gives you a fancy buff icon in your bar.
Phantasms are affected by might on mesmer since they inherit stats from mesmer.
Might on them have no effect. Only boons that have a % moddifier increase affects them when applied on them.
But %moddifiers on mesmer have no effects on phantasms.
Summary:
All stats related buffs/boons must be applied on mesmer to affect phantasms. They have no effect when applied to phantasms on their own.
(ex. might, banners, spotter, etc.)
%increase boons/buffs only when directly applied on phantams affect them. These applied on mesmer only, have no effect on phantasms. (ex. force/accuracy runes/sigils, GoTL, fury, quickness, alacrity, etc.)
All condition damage counts as coming from mesmer it self. Even if was a phantam attack that “applied” them. Phantasm only serve as a trigger.
(For duelist discipline/sharper images bleeds, keep in mind c.rate from phantasms since they are the trigger to proc bleeds, yet all other calcs, condi damage/duration, its mesmer related)
Its simple. Conditions that phantasms apply counts as mesmer conditions (and so inherit mesmer buffs/status/etc).
Only phantasm power damage is counted as phantasm attack.
Actually (core) condi ranger can top dps some of those classes you just mentioned. Its recent, but tests shows condi ranger can pump slightly better dps than condi engie (and having easier rotations). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjaVbrtqP3Y
(check video description for sylvari version screenshot for ze lulz)
So its a viable dps option, and i would say optimal in w1 bosses that dont move so much/the need of condi dmg.
I have yet to see a video of someone playing full berserker gear, with domi/duel/illu build and people around to buff the iSwordmen (because in raid situation your phantasms will also get might, quickness and area effect). Then the question of the DPS boost will be a thing.
You still dont know what are you talking about do you?… Phantasms dont get boosted by might on them, quickness have close to no effect on their dps since they dont auto-attack but their dps is tied to CDs… Oh well….
Even then, if their dps could break 20k dps… still misses another 15k to tie the most selfish dps class can pull off (theif) and would bring even less utility than thief with basilisk share for cc. And let alone the huge ramp up time and the single target factors… ye.. thief can 35k dps cleaving, not single target.
Right now, Mesmer is Meta in raid (look how 4-men VG requires one)
Dont you deceive yourself… Mesmer on 4 or 5-men VG isnt there cause their buffs/dps… If it wasnt distortion share for green circles you would rather see a hammer guard, rev, or another ele.
Are you talking about low fractals? cause there everything works and its recommended. On high lvl fractals? im not really sure. Boon thieves instability makes a pain to keep quickness uptime (since its tied to rather long cds, and not easy reapplied like ps might). Maybe for min-max top players? yes, for the everyday casual run? no. I would prefer another necro.
has some good solo builds (I don’t know for power but condi build is correct), has no issue for tons of open world activities (personal experience where I can better solo champs with mesmer than Ele)
Dont mix “the better solo build” with “good build”. Being it the better cause the way condi ticks/dps uptime works doesnt mean its a good build. Compare it with a necro or condi engie, heck even a burn guardian….
Open world activities? Portal.
And maybe your experience with mesmer is like summon 3 phantasms and ai ai ai run around 15mins until champ dies… Slacker relying no AI while you play defensive with the character… If you actualy could pre stack some might/fury with ele and actually using defensive skills/dodges for avoiding dmg instead of moving faster… You can even summon glyph of elementals pets and actually make AI tank for you…. Completly biased comment…
has always a place in the sPvP Meta
Yes, as long as portal and moa are a thing AND it has a semi-decent build not to be a liability.
I am not sure so many professions around are so much wanted then mesmer.
For dps just everything is more wanted and for support just the rest of the other support classes are more wanted. Thats why they stack druids and wars to make sure everyone have their buffs..
If a single mesmer cannot mantain at least 80% quickness uptime to ALL other 9 ppl it is automatically a failure. You would be better off with another dps class. Stacking mesmers doesnt worth. Alacrity doesnt make up for it. (this last paragraph is an aprox. quote from raid comps guide in a top PVE guild)
I can totally see that players want to have a super broken DPS spec because not being first hurts feelings
Its not a matter of being first or last. Look at ele current situation. Ele still King of dps charts. But since their rotations “feels bad” (i personally think its a matter of habit and ppl will eventually get used to the new cds/rotations) they are complaining. Just like playing mesmer feels bad in other pve content other than raids.
Having the very same raid build reaching ~18k dps by spot on buffs on sustained dps (aa, mods affecting phantasms, reduce dead traits on pve builds, increase low mods numbers, wep coefs/skill coefs, etc.) wouldnt break anything, mesmer would probabily still be last on dps, everyone would benefit from it, and the most important thing, it wouldnt feel baaad and a liability in most cases.
Mesmer have the least access to stats/mods on traits/skills.
Dom has 15% for phantasms, up to 12,5% vs vuln for mesmer.
Dueling has up to 150 ferocity or 3% mods on mantra use (just the ferocity buffs both phantasm and mesmer)
Illusion has up to 9% to mesmer only and 20% phantasm skill recharge.
But if we see why this lines are taken:
Dom is mainly taken for signet recharge trait with 1s distortion.
Dueling is not taken ever (except at some point for tanking since cd on sword#2)
Illusion is mainly taken beacuse f5 CD reduction.
Insp is mainly taken cause aditional signet cast and has distortion share access.
On Domination, no Grandmaster trait helps in pve metabuilds (be it support or dps).
Dueling line have a nice sequence of adep>master>grandmaster traits that bring something for pve but they dont makeup for the other lines/ numbers are rather low and tied to other things (fury on phatasms/utility slots/mantras)
Illusions GM also brings nothing for pve matters unless you are using a scepter for 20% cd redution (cause attack speed doesnt stack with quickness so it doesnt matter that much)
Inspiration adept brings nothing same for master trait unless you are with a focus.
Chaos is a boon/interrupt line. Boons are already covered, interrupts dont work on breakbars.
Even on Chrono line, in the master trait, you could have something better because when you aim for alacrity uptime, you account your party alacrity uptime and not exacly your own. So even if you are already at perma self alacrity but you cant do it for your allies, you will always summon an aditional avenger/bring well of recall.
Ye, everyclass have dead traits on their metabuilds… but a class like mesmer on pve with so many liabilities/flaws, cant afford that many dead traits.
Most of dmg on AI(phantasms)
Huge ramp times
Phantasms are tied to a target. Target dies/phases/etc. you will have to ramp up again.
Single target damaging phantasms.
On top of having low access to moddifiers, mods dont affect phantasms (force, accuracy, trait mods) therefore only affects like 30% of mesmer total dps. (also applies the other way around. Phantasms increase traits dont affect mesmer , therefore not when accounting total dps increase is less in reality)
No stats buffs (power, precision, etc) that would buff all mesmer dps source.(personal+phantasms).
Mutual exclusive buffs (phantasm buffs for phantasm only, moddifiers for mesmer only) and also rather low.. topping 12,5% mod to mesmer and 15% to phantasms when everyother class have 20%+ multiple traits.
Low dmg coef. on weap skills.
Class specific main mechanic (shatters) are mutual exclusive to your biggest source of dmg, phantasms.
Wait until meta settles and then you can say for sure if other classes changes resulted in indirect buff to mesmer. Right now you cant say that.
You may be surprised… But other classes can also use other builds other than past metas known ones.
On top of my head i can say that if DHs got what it takes to be in the next meta, current mesmer will obviously be weaker.
Dont worry. To summarize it to you (since you dont know/play mesmer):
-Meta mesmer was nerfed (phantasm defender 50→33% dmg reduction).
-From “all” that buffs, you may only notice greatsword #2 extra bounce back and possible daze mantra reappearence.
-The rest of buffs wont, most likely, make it. They will stay unused skills.
Mantras long cast dont pay off for only 2 charges (maybe they do when traited that it is on Dueling line, unused, and competes with DE, the most obvious choice when choosing this line)
Utility phantasms still do too little on their own (dumb AI), and 1.5s cast time kills it.
AT main problem wasnt properly the CD but a condi clear skill that just removes your conditions when it hits the enemy, has a huge after-cast delay and randomly fails every now and then… a skill with good potential… but still nah….
So you see, nothing to worry about.. If the “old” power mesmer makes an appearence, it will just be food for DHs and Thiefs.
If a power-bruiser focusing on boons (cause new amulets) appears, it will be just food for necros.
Doesnt change the fact that warrior can buff 25 permanent and with ease within the same build. Bad warriors can still maintain 25 might. Bad mesmers cannot mantain even 30% of quickness uptime.
Warrior can still spill might to more ppl and if they take strength runes and golden dumplings/strenth sigil im sure they could could buff everyone.
Banners can also affect more than 5 ppl since it gives kitten buff and refreshes every 3 seconds. Also banner actually lasts 95s (+5s from buff = 100s buff). And it is commonly taken as a permanent in realistic dps benchmarks tests by all top guilds. You can place them smartly and cover all util area of a raid, even in highly movable raids. Same doesnt happen with last well pulse or even avengers on largeboxes like gorseval. (Same happens with EA 9s buff reapplied in a 3s interval.)
4- Chrono is not a great tank for its “tanking” abilities. It is just taken as a tank since it is optimal to be the mesmer doing the job because its dps is low anyway and since he doesnt sacrifice in its buffing its better than have a dedicated tank. Necro/thief tanking are so much better due to self-sustain.
There, i can also theorycraft. We need more pratical tests not theory.
I do think phantasm should get affected by modifiers long ago. I disagree that giving a dps increase to mesmer it should aim phantasms.. For all the reasons of how a phantasm works..
To the last post. Everyone can stay different yet balanced. No one seeks to be equal by all means. Its just a balanced game is so more healthy and enjoyable. At least for me. If you want to be a special snowflake (even if for all the wrong reasons), you can still portal ppl to the end of jumpingpuzzles. Kappa.
Yes i know, druid dps isnt good either. Yet it still have more utility variety and can pump slighty higher dpses (personal and party buffs). Even better than this, druid(and warrior) can play both power and condi variant within same role and as effective. Its a plus for some raids / higher fractals.
Yea, its funny… I highly inflated mesmer test and even being it a completly unrealistic scenario its roughly half of a warrior realistic scenario …
On a realistic scenario mesmer is half of a warrior in both personal dps and dps increase.
Then if we consider additional utility warrior in its cc rotation can do 1k+ damage on a breakbar in ~3s (for reference it is “just” half of VG breakbar).
Druid like you said bring heals and fury and i would add protection(that combined with heals contribute for scholar and dps uptime, a dead guy or healing cant dps) but still pulls/pushes, SnR resses, AoE breakstun, projectile handling (x2) and also a fair amount of cc with axe/lunar impact/pet ect.. specially if done by quickdraw triggers.
Again, its funny when we leave cheap math/assumptions aside and test in reality.
I bet if we ask anyone that didnt make this kind of tests, they would say mesmer dps increase buffs is somewhere at double of a warrior when in reality its the other way around (like someone already said in this topic).
Here it is a bit of golem testing. I used a freshair D/Wh ele to measure and medium hitbox golem with 4kk HP and 1400 thoughness.
Test 1: With all buffs i got a dps of 32 128.
Test 2: Removing mesmer buffs from Test1 i got a dps of 24 973.
Test 3: Removing druid buffs from Test1 i got a dps of 24 221.
Test 4: Removing warrior buffs from Test1 i got a dps of 21 369.
Conclusion:
-If i added mesmer buffs to test2 i would increase my dps by ~28.65% (24 973 × 1.2865 = ~test1 result)
-If i added druid buffs to test3 i would increase my dps by ~32.65% (24 221 × 1.3265 = ~test1 result)
-If i added warrior buffs to test4 i would increase my dps by ~50.35% (21 369 × 1.5035 = ~test1 result)
Final considerations:
I choose fresh-air ele because its a class that gets affected by all kind of buffs (quickness, alacrity, power, precision, ferocity, condi damage, and both power and condi modifiers)
I used superior sharpening stones and 8% dmg while moving food.
On realistic scenarios perma alacrity, glyph of empowerment and 5GotL stacks is impossible decreasing even more the dps druid and chrono buffing would boost in reality. Yet for warrior it possible to mantain their buffs permanent and with ease, being it the only test as close as possible to reality.
So please, stop saying mesmer have low dps cause their huge dps increase buffs when warrior buffs gives much more dps increase while having 2xpersonal dps and additional utility.
ps: I wish i could made same tests when alacrity still was 66%… I doubt mesmer would buff an ele dps for warriors magnitude.. Yet alacrity was nerfed and mesmer dps still pittyfull…. Maybe cause it was a new addition and it was on haters spotlight and warrior thing is an old thing and everyone got used to it…. Oh well… #Becausemesmer.
In theory its all fine, but right now we have the others 2 “buffer” classes giving higher dps increase buffs and also having higher self dps.
Heck warrior buffs give ~ 20-30% more dps than chrono buffs and having almost 2x more personal dps.
Its so easy to confirm. Go golem tests with ele do the same rotation with raid wide buffs and then without each class buffs individually and check how much dps you lost doing it.
Then if you want, consider each “buffer” personal dps + additional utility + ease of buffing.
Its naive to go with math on paper when you can test on reality. Like saying current alacrity gives 25% dps and old one gave 66% dps increase like a dev said.
And sure its fine to kill sw mordrems and hot maps mobs bursting them with mesmer every ~12s BUT as long as they are normal ones. It doesnt take too much for them to upscale to veterans and then your burst wont work and the real pain starts… Sure mesmer’s great to min max raid comps. But i can safely say:
Mesmer is the most painful class for solo play like maps and story, no doubt.
So i question your reiteration, why not? The only answer i have is the all-time answer for many mesmer things: “Because mesmer…”.
I highly doubt we will receive any large damage buffs due to our incredibly party support with alacrity :/
I cant understand why it is so hard to see the need of a dps boost on mesmer.
Even if you consider perma alacrity+quickness:
warrior buffs > druid buffs > mesmer buffs (dps wise on a dps class).
The personal dps of the same builds follow the same pattern:
ps warrior dps> druid dps > mesmer dps
Again the same pattern applies with how easy this classes can mantain/reapply their buffs.
And if you consider the rest of utility the same classes can also bring in the very same builds:
- warrior brings tons of cc ( and can play condi variant if needed to condi bosses)
- druid brings tons of heal(translating in dps uptime or +10%dps to scholar users) and can still bring fury and protection(translating again in dps uptime) and can play condi variant if needed for condi bosses
- mesmer not really too much to add other than gimmick distortion share and boon copy with signet( that is irrelevant to other boons but quickness, i guess it can help on disorganized groups) and a bit of other utilities that all classes also bring.
Meta settled, builds experimented. Ideas start to come up. Let me hear your top 5 changes aiming mesmer skills for future balance patch. If you had to change something and only had 5 shots at it, what would it be. This is my top5:
Sword AA- Increased attackpoints / decreased delay aftercasts reducing the total chain time from 2.48s to 1.88s. Also bumped the first two skills from chain from 0.66 dmg coef. to 0.7
Gs#3 – Number of boons removed increased from 1 to 3.
Deceptive Evasion: additionally increase endurance regen (+50%) or increases vigor effectivness (duration/amount of endurance regen)
Signet of Inspiration (passive): instead of pusling random boons, boon duration increased 20%.
Arcane thievery: CD decreased to 30s. Aftercast delay is huge. Condi removal part on self should happen anyways and not dependent on target condition (if have target, if its in range, etc.)
About sword aa: mesmer sustained damage is bad. Also a light armor squishy target at melee range performing an autoattack should be better rewarded. Sword is the only melee weapon.
Gs#3: 12s CD and 1.0 dmg coeficient for a skill that roots you in place during the cast and only to remove 1 boon? Would help push power mesmer.
DE: A GM trait should have some more fuel added to it than a single clone that is already limited by 3 and by endurance regen and shatter cd. Also vigor/sigil of energy got sucessively nerfed. This trait took a heavy hit with those changes.
Signet Passive is just a way to to fix unreliable way to help in boon application and a lacking and totally random effect on self.
AT: Good potential skill, lacking in so many ways. Starting by it CD and then the unreliable way to remove condies, its prime effect i would say. I think condi removal should always happen. Only the offensive part (condi transfer/boon stealing) should be dependant of a target and its range/etc conditions.
The worst part is that removing Mercenary Amulet was more then enough and didn’t effect PvE at all.
Silly Levetty, it wouldn’t be a true Anet nerf if they didn’t overnerf the same thing multiple different ways in the same patch.
I still dunno how it feels with this change, but Anet goes all-in when nerfing mesmers.
Not only PoM got a 50% nerf but shield block got its raw CD increased up to 10s. Oh, and btw, PoM and alacrity wont have any effect in that time window.
I wonder if/when they decide to buff sword auto, they will increase its coeficient to 0.8 AND increase it attackspeed chain by ~30% (via casts and aftercasts) like thief sword right?…
It means more sustained dmg and also boon stripping more often. The Dream.
But fear not all pvers out there. Wanna tank? Bring your thief, change 1 trait and press #1. Top tier dps and ease of tanking right there.
I dont understand the shield change. What does it mean?
Means if you sucessfully block one attack with echo of memory the cooldown of this skill wont start until you use Dejavu or wait it 10s timmer window.
Also means if you traited presistance of memory, all shattered phantasms between echo of memory and dejavu wont have effect on shield block CD.
But when it affects, it will decrease cd by 1s instead of 2.
TLDR: Shield #4 skill CD went from 30s up to 40s. Also PoM wont affect it unless you wasted your second block/waited 10s. And when it affects it just reduces 1s of CD instead of 2.
In a old burst/ hit-n-run power +1 mesmer yes, the obvious choices to aim balance is domination/dueling.
Probabily in domination i would merge the first 2 minot traits and make shattered concentration the 3rd minor, giving a free slot to make a compeling major master trait. Also rending shatter, furious interruptions and imagined burden can not/ever compete with their other choices in their slot, they lack to be choice slot traits.
About dueling… I feel it lost popularity due to at first the nerf on vigor, and more recently the nerf on energy sigil that make its defining trait Deceptive Evasion lacking when ppl look at chronophantasma/Illusionary reversion combo or even Mental Defense in inspiration.
So in dueling i would probabily add passive endurance regen or x2 vigor effectivness in deceptive evasion.
Also the major adept traits offer nothing significant for power shatter mesmer… Probabily some trait that have synergy with on dodge/vigor that aim at cleansing/softing incoming damaging condies? And btw since we are in dueling, linking a whole condition aplication and traits (sharper images and dueslist discipline) to AI its inreliable… they should have something more to benefit mesmer at all times… Like bleeding duration increased or damage increased on bleeding foes on sharper images trait, duelist discipline is a a good trait, but pistol its not a good weapon. So fix pistol cause right now shield is a better and more versatile interrupt weapon on its #5, a more versatile and well-rounded #4 phantasm summoning skill, sword is a better choice for damaging phantasm and offers damage and mitigation/counter offensive via its block/counterblock/daze. Im not saying pistol phantasm is bad… But on a offensive off-hand weapon making 1 out of 2 of it skills to JUST summoning this phantasm is a bad skill and making a bad-bouncing no dmg cc on the other just kills it.
This would be changes without changing this too much and scrambling/moving traits arround to/from other trees.
To finish i still dream about an interrupt power mesmer…. A unique gameplay/role.. ( lets be serious, thief/revenant and even DH will always be better than regular shatter mesmer for roamer burst role).
A kind of bruiser with decent solo damage and sustain but excelling at “supporting” by lockdown/disable.
And interrupt could aid defensivly by disabling foes to give our allies under fire some space to breathe or aiding pure bursting classes with a timed lockdown to land their bombs on their targets.
But this build even suffers more than regular power mesmer… It have key traits spread arround many trees.. Vulnerability/damage/boon strip for stability/powerblock on domination
Fuel on dueling: blind/vigor/clone can have defensive or offensive purposes, a good thing and it fuel any shatter nuance.
Chaos have lockdown flavour traits and it feed utility skills.
Inspiration is pure defensive and condi cleanse needed to last longer in this condi/bruiser fiesta.
And chrono, even having just a interrupt synergy trait, its required to play with shield… the best off hand for a build like this… Its not quite at same offensive level as pistol but can bring defense/utility also really pays off. Its also required for gravity well, again, the only elite skill that fits on a build like this.
And ofc, chronoalso fixes many lacks on mesmer… superspeed clones to make range shatter actually have a chance to land, passive movement speed trait, alacrity that give a boost to most of skills (less good skills) to give them a fresh life with shorter CDs and access to quickness, again, give clunky and slow skills a fresh breeze with faster reactions (needed for right time skillfull interruptions – your cc interrupt skill must be faster cast and travel time than the enemy skill cast time to actually interrupt them).
It also suffers from a lack of good power based amulet.. Vigilant was a good choice… but got removed cause bunker meta… Something close to it but without that much thoughness could replace it?
Also giving a try to introduce those new HoT on interrupt sigils on pvp balancing them for it? New runes to cover lacks/boost interrupt builds?
To comment on OP: I feel you when dps already sucks and you have to sacrifice even more stat points going for thoughness in commander gear.
If only thougness was ferocity… Not like it would make all the difference but at least it wouldnt conflict with boss agro and we wouldnt feel bad wasting points on useless stats anyways… A piece with a thoughness infusion or a knight ring is enough.
And for tank/supporty boon duration stats combo we already have ministrels….
For the rest, i agree chrono is fine(ish, could use some polish/tweaking)… The real problems remain on core mesmer and its dps concept. Will be hard to make future elite spec with current mesmer like this, it need to be over-performing to balance the things out with the underperforming core.
3. Keep on to supporting party/squad cause soloing will be a struggle anyway.
Realisticly phantasms will never benefit from alacrity. Even solo on HotM golems u cant cover all phantasms with your well radius… Random spawns/ attacks range will always end up with one or other out of alacrity range. On pve content its impossible.
Also, quickness has no impact on their dps…. If they kept passive alacrity on them, thats another story… Dream on fellow mesmers.
I dont even believe bug fixes will be made… They didnt acknowledge them in know issues tracker…. Chronophantasma not working in some maps, phantasmal haste not giving 20% to most phantasms and not working at all with shield phantasms, shield phantasm spawn/summoning can be evaded by enemy resulting in no phantasm, etc….
I just expect number tweaks, mostly nerfs, just cause… and also some indirect nerfs like happened last patch with mechaninc/sigils/runes/amulets/ whatever nerf/removed (energy sigil for power mesmer).
Since i brought energy sigil up, Deceptive Evasion could see a 50% passive increase in endurance regen splaped on it.
At least they could do QoL adittions to mesmer… for example illusion inspiration trait could have somekind of icon indicator (like other classes traits) when the signet of inspiration triggered from this trait is ready. But i doubt…
poor mesmers were so overnerfed that they are still stomping legend games while class-stacking and literally doing the same rotation for every situation over and over while being able to easily outrotate every class in game and have the only complete shutdown skill in game
its chronobunker all over again except that now they also can kill you much faster
condi thief versus 2 condi mesmer/2 necro… ye its bad. Your team lost cause of you, not cause enemy team had 2 mesmers. L2p. Mic drop.
2. Abolish God mode skills (top dmg+evade/block+movement+utility) that offer little to no counterplay and are way too forgiving: aka “noob cannons”; and instead promote skillfull play.
Examples: Scrapper hammer #3 #4 and #2 at some extent, Rev sword#3 and staff%5 are at top dmg level while being defensive and offering utility (cc, combos and/or boons/condis stacking) without no downsides and low cds. They should be like mesmer sword#2/thief pistol whip and warrior traited shield block at some extent.
3. Save matches, watch replay in spectator mode environment and in free camera (like hltv?). Good for some media/vids about pvp. Would help pushing up pvp esports and make more ppl know about it.
4. Revise some troublesome conditions and its max time stacks/ power (like recently with cripple): chill, weakness, poison… and some Boons like resistance protection retaliation
5: Rebalance/rework some fields/finisher combos boosting the lacking ones and nerfing the “too strong” ones.
Dreaming about a reality that will never happen can start as “fun” but with a “reality check” in each patch notes it will surely end in frustration. And frustration is the key word when playing mesmer.
To comment on you changes, many things you did there will just make bad and underpowered skills into possible-good-niche but underpowered skills
Also you mixed up too much necro identity into mesmer…
Dont get angry when ppl say its pointless… For you to be in forum posting possible changes instead online playing in the first place is a good indicative of how “happy” you are with current state.. Mesmer forum is full of topics like that… I posted some…
All the big things have happened (HoT, Chrono, June specialisation patch) but we’ve ended up back almost exactly in the same position before all of that.
Which make us worse overall than before since the floor of all other classes raised (powercreeped).. Its a disgrace… Any serious balance would make the haters qq again and further nerfs would strike hard again making mesmer worse everytime in this endless declining loop.
I already gave up in giving ideas and suggestions… At least for now.. Even balance dev(s) seem biased towards this class. Doubt anything will suddenty change it…
Again, all you guys are asking compensations for dmg nerf
Mirror blade didnt get any compensation whatsoever….. But they probabily can give you 5% attack speed on scepter… But for that they would probabily nerf block uptime etc etc etc… I would gladly accept dmg nerf and just that than they nerfing other important things and “pity buff” useless things.
In general, mesmer greatsword is a ranged weapon with 5 skills, which can’t be reflected or projectile blocked. Guardian longbow has 1 unblockable and 1 aoe attack, so this means 3 of 5 attacks of it are able to reflec.
Correction, only 2 skills not 3. Auto and trueshot. And are you seriously bringing up auto from gs? Pity dmg + only makes you eat 3x retaliation dmg Kappa. Dont forget the ease guardian have to get dmg mods to further increase the dmg.
Just compared 2 bursty or part of the burst skills.. Dont get all salty and turn on me.. You wouldnt switch guardian LB for mesmer GS ever… And if you got touched cause i pointed out same ppl defending ts (being it far more problematic) cried out loud nerfs for mesmer on its turn… I guess i can say my job is done. Peace.
It would definitively increase mesmer sustained dps + bonus boon removal. Since you pointed that they could also increase sword dmg coeficient from 0.66 to 0.8 (like thief)
it would help without threatening anything since mesmer lacks dmg moddifiers on their traits anyways..
But lets be serious… Straight buffs to mesmers? Wont happen. Mesmers just have pity buffs on useless stuff when something else and important is nerfed. For that kind of buff to happen we would mostlikely lose all the quickness for example.
Thats the way its done for mesmer.
Mirror Blade: same cast time, have half of projectile speed, have double the CD, each damage bounce is 25% of trueshot damage and many of you defending true shot complained about mesmer burst (resulting in this skill nerf by 1 bounce).
At close range mirror blade could hit the same target 3 times. Post nerf can hit 2 times only resulting in 1.4 dmg coeficient (2.1 before nerf) vs 2.5 from trueshot (can still pierce and hit more targets without loosing dmg, and this cannot happen with mirror blade).
Conclusion: mirror blade was nerfed, true shot not.
-You dont auto before the block ends ( summon just happen in the end)
-Have a target when begin blocking (same like when you turn off autotargeting and use decoy to skip it wont spawn a clone vs autotargeting)
-Same about other phantasms (invul targets/blind/on range/ LoS).
yup. in my core suggestions to mesmer (see signature) i suggested that. Normalize phantasms summoning times to 3/4s. They already have ranges/CD/attack animations rules to follow.
If it would make them be ran in a build? Probably not since for a utility slot they lack… Disenchanter is amazing in niche cases.. that bounce mechaninc kills it for most the rest.
Defender its HP/natural squishy nature in pvp just adds to the fact that a utility slot just for summon a phantasm sucks.
For a utility slot they have to make more than just summoning a phantasm that already lacks.. Or the phantasm is really strong (quite the oposite currently), or i think they will never make it.
Why has no one even mentioned portal? I’m honestly beginning to think you’re all Mesmer mains.
Let’s list the problems with shatter mesmer for people who are just tuning in.
1. Short CD 100-0 Burst
2. Decoy+Moa (guaranteed free kill) roughly every minute.
3. Portal (The most broken skill in GW2 Esports on a 40 second cooldown with Alacrity)
If you can’t see how broken this is, I’m just going to assume you’re here to troll. No other class can touch a good shatter mesmer. This is a fact.
I just dont agree with the “good shatter mesmer” part… Cmon.. everyone can faceroll the keyboard and have the same results… Its so braindead. Cmon are you trolling or what? “good shatter mesmers only” give me a break.
Yes mesmer shld be nerfed till they only have auto attack and nothing else. Free food. Lets nerf the mesmer to accomodate someone’s lack of skill. Moa already have a cast time and long cd and can be blocked, just make it uncastable.
Again… stealth + Moa.
Good luck blocking/dodging something that you can’t see.
Or you can daze into Moa.
If mesmers want to keep Moa that bad, then they should give up something else. Like stealth. Stealth is supposed to be for Thieves anyway. Why do mesmers even need it?
Dont forget that dazing also gives you quickness for 50% faster cast! Then just faceroll to win.
Humm interesting opinions in here, lets review the options given so far:
-Some says alacrity is fine its all other specs who needs nerfs (looking at balance patch seems Anet strong disagree). Lazy nerfs everywhere. Doubt they will nerf across the board.
-Other says alacrity 33% broke the balance its effect had in chrono since its design was made with 66% in mind and past nerfs(Flow of Time) already accounted that. With 33% nerf no compensation given. No personal 66% +shared 33%.(agreed on here but Anet had 2weeks feedback with this sugestion and no consideration was taken, so mostlikely will never happen)
-Chronobunker is mostly not a thing due to alacrity nerf but mainly via amulets/res/stomps/runes. If doubts still persisted, protection/resistance uptime were nerfed aswell as boon spam counters, lol.
-All agree alacrity sharing was the problem… So as i sugested i would gladly let it go for my own profession balance sake… My alacrity/chrono line would retain its balance and then we could fix important aspects of mesmer without hearing “but but you have a strong utility support to balance the things out” bs.
I don’t get why many people think alacrity is not working anymore. Alacrity is just fine.
I dont think alacrity its not working. I think it is a nice bonus still. Yet its being used as an excuse to perpetuate the mesmer on its state.. If devs forgot about all other mesmer problems in this balance patch and we can have both, alacrity sharing and mesmer current lacks fixed and working together, nice i will take it.
But i just think that wont happen if they keep alacrity to “fix” mesmer pseudo-dps.
The problem is the other options that compete with alacrity traits are even more lacking making alacrity traits a 2/3 choice. The only trait being taken or not is the well trait depending on how many wells we use.
in mind aswell with a previous sugestion i made about core mesmer.
^They are here! (click the link)
2- I wanna see a guardian with 5s quickness (or 10s with 100% boon duration) in a 45 second CD (cause dont have access to alacrity in my sugestion) cover permanent uptime, Keppo.
3- Again chronomancer shouldnt be the solution to mesmer lacks in personal dmg. Besides that i only changed Danger Time to a slight increase to make up for the powercreep other classes also got with elite specs.
4- Stop crying about it like little babies not offering a sugestion in return.
5- Alacrity sharing is what is crippling mesmer even more. Just look at last patch and take you conclusions. The balance patch. I would gladly let it go from sharing to personal only. Certainly, since they nerfed it like this, they wont increase it back and also increase the rest we need. But if we can have it both, better, i just doubt they will.
1- If you think quickness alone wouldnt make it i dont know what to say… 33% alacrity its not for sure. It is only a bonus. Most dps demanding “achievments” like gorseval no updraft were made with thief stacking, and guess what, alacrity have insignificant impact there. And a mesmer was there… for what? quickness.
2- Just from the changes i presented there you could get ~6k dps increase just from changing phantasms to sword only ( even if u wanted to keep shield for utility) and you could get danger time for +250 ferocity (~17% c. dmg increase for both mesmer/phantasms), you could free one utility slot for well of calamity for example for also a dps increase and sightly better quickness uptime with chrono runes. Better quickness means less boon duration dependant, means you can change you food for example. Dps increase. Examples. “Shatter” mesmer on pvp would also be sightly boosted since im accounting alacrity as 66% recharge rate and flow of time got boosted from 3/4s to 1s. Precog would be a decent stunbreak finishing with 1 dodge refund.
3- Those changes are not the only i presented. I said in begining i would have also the previous changes that i sugested in mind. And you cant fix mesmer sustained dps on chrono line only. Those just help to compensate the elites power creep. And i think is also wrong assuming the pseudo dps that mesmer brings via utility only to balance.
For example i didnt see any ele complaining that lost dps in raids because alacrity nerf and demanding compensations on their dps/skills.
Conclusion: Mesmer would still keep its place in raids no doubt. Mesmer dps would be better than currently and all this bs about alacrity would go away and would serve no excuse not to balance the mesmer the way it should be because alacrity is a sensitive case. Also all identity of chronomancer is kept and just little changes were made (devs way of changing) rather than full reworks/traits remix. Dont want to be portal bot? Lets redistribute the weight between the utility to personal dps.. Rather than buffing utility and ignoring the rest.
I never said this, and don’t know how your pulled this idea out of my post. Right now, you can get perma alacrity on allies with wells and phantasms. Therefore, the main issue the devs want to change is how potent alacrity is. Anyone can say perma alacrity is really powerful. However, if that perma alacrity only reduced cool downs by a low amount like 10%, then it will be nearly completely useless. You are giving up all your dps so that you can give a buff to allies that is worse than many skills they can trait for.
What i tried to point was a scenario without alacrity sharing. You would bring more dps (not only because the changes i pointed out) but because you could bring better phantasms, better wells/utilities. Imagine alacrity as a personal buff, like fencer finesse. Do you think mesmer would loose it spot when perma quickness is a thing? Again, alacrity is not a thing dont account/compare with today, where it is a thing.
If you think removing alacrity given to allies with increase the build variety in pve, then I believe you are mistaken. You can still create a build that doesn’t give alacrity to allies if you want to. However, the problem is everyone finds those builds useless
You are again comparing the case where alacrity is a thing to others with alacrity is not a thing. Even if you deleted alacrity from the game chrono would still be taken because quickness. Dont compare dpses of classes with and without alacrity. Currently you are stuck with shield off-hand and at least 2/3 wells for alacrity share sake only!!… Removing alacrity share would free that spots. Rethink the possibilities.
On the other hand, I don’t know what you are thinking pvp wise either. A bunker chrono needs well of recall to lower the cool downs of its shield and other skills. This build would still remain dead with your changes.
Imagine chronobunker with chronophantasma and mental defense. Shattering only would fill alacrity needs with improved alacrity traited. Shield phantasm would provide defensive improvments, well of precog same, and you didnt rely on wells because alacrity only. You could still run wells on your utilities if you wanted and even trait them (my sugested change) for sightly lower cd and unique boon. It would obviously make chronobunker better than current state.. Not sure if enough to make it a thing since res/stomp nerfs + bunker amulets+ chaos armor+protection/resistance uptime.
Please, stop saying “shatter builds”. Shatter is mesmer class mechanic, not a build.
For the rest basically tried to say that if you still wanted to make perma alacrity a thing, you still could, with actually a noticable alacrity (66% rather than 33%)when building for it.
I also think alacrity is overstimated (outside chrono) the problem is devs think not. When they address alacrity and leave the rest of mesmer untouched is a good sign of it.
Crippling mesmer cause alacrity on others is overstimated… it is frustating.
About being rude: no hard feelings its all good, afterall we are having a discussion. You just could comment on other things than alacrity only. I personally think Alacrity sharing is the big cause of all this headaches to mesmers. Taking it away from other would only change dps overall of a raid party but it only make personal mesmer better not threatening any party composition since we have quickness. And the excuses(“alacrity is a big pseudo-dps boost, mes dps is fine cause this utility”, Alacrity is too powerfull cause rams/balistas on wvw, etc) to keep mesmer itself on the current state would be no more!. Actually alacrity have close to non dps increase to mesmer (since its dps comes from auto-attack+phantasms and alacrity will never be up on a phantasm with a raid environment). It only hits the only thing mesmer brings, utility.
Cause perma quickness and more personal dmg is a bad thing in pve right? And cause gutting chrono/mesmer cause alacrity being an issue with other classes skills is fine right?
Cause improving mesmer solo pve experience rather than party buff bot is also bad, right?
Cause 4s alacrity when u cs ( or 6s traited) of better alacrity (66%) doenst mean actually 6 or 9s of current alacrity. And also because keep shattering + ressumoning phantasms to close or perma keep alacrity on self and refreshing chronophantasma is not also a pve thing…
Or are you like nab revenant players that camped facets and sword auto only? Do you also summon and keep 3 phantasms and utility bot only? Or do you even shatter+refresh them? You know shatter? Your class mechanic?
Obviously i didnt thought about pve at all…
Yes alacrity share matter a lot when to take a chrono. But also is the thing that makes chrono “balanced” at its current miserable state. Never thought old alacrity was a problem. Even said it still lacked personal damage. Im sure perma 25might+banners+EA brings far dps increase than perma alacrity+quickness mesmer brought. And warrior dps is far superior. But the problem is devs thinks its a problem. And mesmer got nerfed, again.
And be serious, how can you replicate the amount of quickness a mesmer can bring with other class? You cant. Quickness will always make a chrono be diserable in raids.
Do you want me to elaborate more?
So this suggestion will be with current state in mind aswell with a previous suggestion i made about core mesmer.
Traits:
All Wells That Ends Well now reads: Grants a boon associated with your well when they end. Reduces well recharge.
Eternity grants 10s Regeneration.
Calamity grants 3 stacks Might for 8s.
Action grants 8s Fury
Recall grants 5s Alacrity
Precognition grants 5s Vigor
Gravity grants 5s Protection
Recharge 10%.
Danger Time: Gain increased ferocity while under the effects of Quickness. (+250). Gain additional critical-hit change against slowed enemies (10%)
