Guild Wars 2

Kicast.1459:

Can someone explain the shield 4 + jump thing…I really don’t get it…
If someone dodge the end of my shield 4 he will avoid my clone generation..but if I jump i generate it? why?
and if i jump and he does not evade then no clone ? why ?

Jumping at the end of shield 4 delays the execution of the skill momentarily. If your opponent has timed their dodge so that they would dodge the moment of the phantasm summon, jumping to delay the skill execution will cause their dodge to be too early, allowing the summon to succeed.

Well, there’s been a lot of discussion, so I thought I’d step in to correct these 3 massive lies that disappointed me.

Xyonon.3987:

We are lower in aoe dps than other professions, but the difference isn’t like in teams where we deal 10k and the full dps professions around 30k, we win compared to other professions in solo situations.

Since when do we win vs other classes in solo? Maybe if we’re soloing a champ that can’t be meleed, so we kite around with staff for an hour letting clones kill it, but literally all other situations our solo damage is just as miserable as our team damage.

Xyonon.3987:

If you have a condi set you even have top tier single target dps.

This is sort of a 2-for-1 special. Mesmer single target dps with a condie build is competitive, but it’s far from top tier, so that’s a lie. On top of that, reaching those levels requires 10-15 seconds of setup on a pure single target while simultaneously ruining any aoe damage we have.

Yeah, sounds like great fun to use in almost any content ever, which is why nobody ever uses it.

Xyonon.3987:

Then most professions can’t pull mobs together and cleave them right away.

I’m sort of confused as to why you would say this when it’s so hilariously wrong. Necro has a good pull on greatsword, guardian has greatsword yank, rev has offhand axe pull, ranger has offhand axe, and Elementalist has aoes that are bigger than our pulls, so it doesn’t even matter.

Are the Mesmer forums too whiny? Maybe, but this isn’t one of those cases, and trying to argue with blatant lies won’t get us anywhere.

Neural.1824:

Hesacon.8735:

Yes, the Arena #2 guild hall upgrade lets you do more or less whatever you want within the arena.

While I am adamantly against open world PvP/dueling/etc. in any form in the normal zones, this solution is only partially valid.

It should read as follows: “Yes, the Arena #2 guild hall upgrade lets you do more or less whatever you want within the arena, as long as you are not a Mesmer.”

(the old WvW bug where-in mesmer clones did not carry the world completion icon, allowing the main mesmer to easily be spotted, is present in the guild hall arenas).

Until Arenanet fixes this, it’s difficult to push the Arenas as a solution.

No skilled Mesmer has ever cared about this. There are 12 other ways to identify the real Mesmer nearly instantly, so the presence or lack of the world completion star has never mattered when fighting anyone even remotely competent.

Pretty much every class has a solid frontline build. Thieves a bit less so, though Venomshare is still strong. Rangers…well, we have a good Druid in my WvW guild, but I wouldn’t make a habit of bringing frontline rangers.

messiah.1908:

Xyonon.3987:

That’s basicly how you do the common quickness rotation. You don’t cast CS before the first skill, you cast it during the aftercast of Time Warp / Well of Recall, so you extrend the CS duration by the cast time duration of said skill.

The full double heal is neat though.

how you manage to do it as the cast time is 0.5 sec . when is the aftercast exactly?

After doing the quickness rotation enough times you sorta get a feel for it. Time warp has a pretty significant aftercast (maybe .25 seconds or so?), so you pop CS during that.

tobascodagama.2961:

If Fay is anything like me, Mesmer was the first character he clicked with enough to take to 80 and then he just never bothered to go back and redo map completion on the others.

Map completion can die in a fire. I started with mesmer, I finished on mesmer, I said NEVER AGAIN.

apharma.3741:

OriOri.8724:

tobascodagama.2961:

Ananeos.4587:

Just to prove my point, the latest Living Season episode featured a kill room where waves upon waves of normal mobs and then a boss that spawns infinite waves until you kill it. You had to defend yourself and the object. If you died you failed the achievement and you had to replay the entire episode all over again.

How are mesmers supposed to deal with this?

“Restart from checkpoint” spawns you back in the room with full health but doesn’t reset the boss mob’s HP. So that’s how I did it.

That said… This is far from the hardest fight in the game, but it’s a perfect case in point. They clearly expect players to focus the boss mob while cleaving the adds. But because our cleave sucks, we have to deal with adds that stack up faster than we can kill them, which quickly becomes overwhelming. And because our personal DPS sucks, we can’t kill the boss fast enough to avoid the adds stacking up on us, either. And because the adds and boss both drop persistent AoEs, dragging out the fight as long as we have to quickly leaves no room on the floor to stand.

Every LS release seems to include at least one of these fights. They’re not “hard”, they’re just designed and built in a way that plays to all of Mesmer’s weaknesses. It’s cheap as hell, and I’m sick of it.

Sums up my experience with the fight. I went down twice (once during the monkey because I didn’t expect him to hit me for nearly as hard as he did, he downed me in one hit from ~80% hp, was just not expecting it). The earlier waves were easy, if tedious. They took a while but presented no real threat. The boss however, we just cannot kill the boss fast enough before the floor turns completely to lava. I got in one or two of those water orb things to clear it and it still wasn’t enough because of his spawns which just added more and more lava fonts everywhere. The time those are up needs to be seriously reduced, and the spawns in the boss phase should not be spawning their own lava fonts on top of the boss’. Its just a painful kittening instance to solo as a mesmer, let alone get the achievement

Oh you poor thing, he wasn’t meaning that, it’s something further on in the story.

Spoilers….

But yeah, that later fight would have been BRUTAL if I weren’t playing with Fay for it (the actual Fay).

Anyway, BnS is a bit outdated, I’m just too lazy to update my sig. I was playing vindictus for a while, but Path of Exile released a new expansion recently that I’ve been dedicating most of my playing time to. I play GW2 about 8 hours weekly: 4 hours PvE raiding and 4 hours WvW raiding.

In any case, as to your questions Joxer: I do love this class, and it’s basically the only thing I play. However, it has massive problems, as I don’t hold back my criticism or realistic assessments of it. Let me try to answer you directly.

Mesmer performance in instanced content is fantastic. We work extremely well in a party and are a valuable asset to any group, if you’re good. A bad chrono is bad, a decent chrono is bad, a great chrono is excellent.

Open world PvE is different. Overall, Mesmer performance in open world PvE is heavily dependent on whether or not you’re alone. Soloing as a Mesmer is a miserable experience, no ifs ands or buts. It is certainly very possible, but it sucks. Your damage is low, mobs squish your phantasms, multi target capabilities are close to non-existent. If you intend on doing open world content solo, play something else. End of story.

However, you can still be useful if you have a party. Chrono is a great buff slave in any aspect of the game, and your party will enjoy the quickness and alacrity you pump out for any elite mobs or bosses. On the other hand, your buffing ability is worthless for just normal clearing, so most of your play will be grouping up mobs with focus so that everyone else can kill them for you.

Even running with another person, I often want to play another class so that I can actually contribute the majority of the time in open world. The only thing stopping me really is that all my world completion is on Mesmer, so it would bug me if I don’t complete the new stuff there too. We’ll see how well that resolve holds in the future.

Actually, I see what he’s saying with the heal. I’ve never tried this, but it might work.

Same deal as moa. If the heal effect activates prior to the aftercast, you can cast heal, get healed, CS during the aftercast to effectively refresh it, then heal again. Normally, CS healing eats the initial heal but lets you benefit from 2 pulses of the well. This method might let you get 2 full heals. I’ll have to try it later.

UnitedChaos.8364:

Like everyone has said. You fail to understand: this is a stepping stone towards saved builds and it is useful to new players. End of discussion. It’s not moving towards removing trait lines, as your video suggests. Enjoy your salt.

Does the video actually suggest that? Goodness, I’m glad I didn’t waste my time watching that drivel.

Ananeos.4587:

Just to prove my point, the latest Living Season episode featured a kill room where waves upon waves of normal mobs and then a boss that spawns infinite waves until you kill it. You had to defend yourself and the object. If you died you failed the achievement and you had to replay the entire episode all over again.

How are mesmers supposed to deal with this?

I partied with a revenant.

apharma.3741:

To be honest mesmer does have one thing going for it, has the easiest and possibly highest lazy DPS on world bosses. Summon 3 warlocks and auto attack if traited Dom, duel and illusions for buffing phantasms to the max.

Ofc I wouldn’t say this is something to be encouraged though…

I mean, it’s better than anything else we can do…

Varezenem.2813:

butch.8136:

Dariya.9380:

Fay.2357:

zinkz.7045:

Fay.2357:

Mmmmmm yesssss I looooove me some good armchair developers. Please keep going, I can’t get enough of uninformed opinions and baseless statements!

If you worked in software engineering, etc to a decent level, then you would know what I am saying is correct, it is only people with no clue who think you can’t make certain statements about systems without having the code in front of you.

And we’re supposed to just take you at your word that you’ve worked in software development to a decent level? If you have, then so have I, and I say you’re wrong. Where does that leave us?

Inherently, implementing a “build template system” is really not hard. I’m a software engineer since 2004, take it as you will. However, there are a few theories on why ANet is unable to deliver:

1) Money-grab, by forcing players to purchase extra character slots.

2) Technical debt. Their code base is now one long spaghetti which is a nightmare to scale and maintain. I think it really shows with every new patch they push out and lack of QA, and their excuse for “limitations”.

I think it’s a bit of both.

“Not hard”… For a kittenty version?
It is complex depending on the scope. Anet likes to go for broad scope and high quality, for better or worse.

Money-grab? Just no.
Technical debt? Maybe

But for a dev with so much “experience” you do seem to be pretty ignorant.

And he is almost certainly underestimating the inherent complexity of a MMO code.

Indeed. One long spaghetti? Try a massive tangled ball with a thousand strands that gets added to every time they push a release to live.

If you’re blowing F5 for this, then you can just cast the heal skill normally within F5, pop out, and gain the healing from the aoe. No canceling needed.

If you have an experienced and good tank, wing 3 should be by far the easiest wing. Wing 2 terminates at Matthias, by far the hardest raid boss. Wing 1 doesn’t have any particularly hard bosses, but they’re all fairly challenging.

Wing 3 has two very easy encounters, keep construct is a rather straightforward fight, and Xera has almost 100% of the difficulty loaded on the tank, not the party.

Razor.9872:

Biklen.5490:

Fay.2357:

Biklen.5490:

I can’t agree with you bro…I have to say that in 2016 build templates in MMO’s have been around for many years now…That is pretty standard for MMO’s that have build diversity….

Most mmos have a drastically simpler setup for builds. Each class uses one weapon type, there are less bits and pieces to the full gear set, etc. GW2 has its own unique challenges for implementing this; they can’t just copy-paste code from WoW.

Biklen.5490:

This response proves that GW2 devs are just now learning the basics and to be quite honest I don’t think that is the case…Sorry

No, that’s not even remotely true. This simply shows that they’ve now prioritized build templates as an area of development. If you really think they’ve been working on this for 4 years, you’ve got another thing coming.

Biklen.5490:

We can make excuses all we want for them…But there is only one thing to say here…They should have never released this until they where ready for custom build saves.

And again you’re totally wrong. This is a technical demonstration of capability, which is a normal and standard thing to do for technology that is being developed. Think of it as a progress report. There is absolutely no industry that locks some engineers in a room for a year and says ‘come out when you’re done’. Progress reports and incremental development is how things are done. Your attitude of ‘but I want it all right now!’ is simply unrealistic and immature.

Fay,

Are you even serious atm? Copy and paste a code from WoW? Look understand your in the scene and want to protect it from collapse but these responses are very weak.

Only thing that is complex about GW2 is the combat system. That has nothing to do with the actual traits and how you can save them or edit them. You want to bring up WoW thats fine…But please understand that WoW did have saved builds back in 2008 even when the talent system was 3x more complex then our current one…

Also MMO’s have test servers to help with bugs and/or feedback from the rest of the community. If they where gonna introduce anything like this why not have an open test server that shows this in development…Adding stuff half kitten just makes the rest of the community loose faith in their game. I mean im sure the ESL players are used to testing and getting stuff leaked before the rest of the community gets them. But that doesnt mean it is the right way of doing this.

“But I want it all right now!”…I play/stream this game everyday 7 days a week. I’ve shown that my attitude is everything BUT that. When anet falls short and makes the wrong decisions it is in my right to call them out on it.

I think you are mistaking “mechanical complexity” for “implementation complexity.” The two are entirely different beasts. Sure, the layout of the build in-game is simple enough, but coding that in is likely not nearly as simple; it is entirely dependent on the old system structures and the devs assigned to work with them.

As for if doing this disappoints the community, I would argue not releasing anything is more disappointing than releasing a stepping-stone of something.

Yep, the only people disappointed by this are the ones that have no concept of progression and are unable to figure out how to wait or a feature.

Biklen.5490:

I can’t agree with you bro…I have to say that in 2016 build templates in MMO’s have been around for many years now…That is pretty standard for MMO’s that have build diversity….

Most mmos have a drastically simpler setup for builds. Each class uses one weapon type, there are less bits and pieces to the full gear set, etc. GW2 has its own unique challenges for implementing this; they can’t just copy-paste code from WoW.

Biklen.5490:

This response proves that GW2 devs are just now learning the basics and to be quite honest I don’t think that is the case…Sorry

No, that’s not even remotely true. This simply shows that they’ve now prioritized build templates as an area of development. If you really think they’ve been working on this for 4 years, you’ve got another thing coming.

Biklen.5490:

We can make excuses all we want for them…But there is only one thing to say here…They should have never released this until they where ready for custom build saves.

And again you’re totally wrong. This is a technical demonstration of capability, which is a normal and standard thing to do for technology that is being developed. Think of it as a progress report. There is absolutely no industry that locks some engineers in a room for a year and says ‘come out when you’re done’. Progress reports and incremental development is how things are done. Your attitude of ‘but I want it all right now!’ is simply unrealistic and immature.

kdaddy.5431:

Razor.9872:

Biklen.5490:

Razor.9872:

This is a stepping-stone to build templates. They will come in time.

Default builds were just added so new players could use the system and be more up-to-par than normal.

I understand what it is…But doesn’t mean i have to be happy with it

Would you prefer they held off default builds until build templates were completed?

How about they come out with build templates instead of default builds.

Its almost a joke, hey try our new default build, Anet will just have to recorde it to the next meta build after each broken patch update.

I have to agree with the video. You seem to be writing about the next step, well the next step for PvP many hoped for more build diversity and it isnt here.

If anet wants to dumb the game down sure fine its there game but it wont stop them from getting wrecked in unranked/ranked.

How about anet make build templates instead of dumb default builds, fix MM, make PvP seasons fun, create a better meta and some decent build diversity. I dont know maybe 2 quality builds for each class. I know its crazy but these are things that should be done and yes they should wait till its a finished product. I dont sell you half cooked food and you dont eat it.

Also im gonna post a pic, its a troll build and 3 of the 5 players im playing against were running meta builds. Please tell me how default builds implemented help anyone?

You’re completely missing the point of what this release is. This isn’t saying ‘look at this awesome new default build system we made!’

What this release is is them saying ‘look at the progress we’ve made towards build templates! We’ve made a quick and rough implementation of something so that you all can see what sort of tech we’re working with, and hopefully give us feedback on how you like the functionality.’

They’re not dumbing the game down, they’re not insulting anyone. They’re just excited that they’ve made some new tech, and wanted to share it with the live community to show that their PvP team isn’t just sitting in a corner thumbing their noses at the forum requests for templates.

zinkz.7045:

Fay.2357:

Mmmmmm yesssss I looooove me some good armchair developers. Please keep going, I can’t get enough of uninformed opinions and baseless statements!

If you worked in software engineering, etc to a decent level, then you would know what I am saying is correct, it is only people with no clue who think you can’t make certain statements about systems without having the code in front of you.

And we’re supposed to just take you at your word that you’ve worked in software development to a decent level? If you have, then so have I, and I say you’re wrong. Where does that leave us?

zinkz.7045:

Razor.9872:

zinkz.7045:

Razor.9872:

Yes dear, a build template system can be more or less complex depending on the structure of code with the game it is in. As for nature, I doubt you can find build templates in nature.

The way my post went right over your head is amusing.

The way you think your post went right over my head is amusing.

You see this bit – "Yes dear, a build template system can be more or less complex depending on the structure of code with the game it is in. " that is entirely incorrect, because of “a build template system is not complex in nature”, you don’t seem to understand what makes certain systems inherently complex and others not, what game it is in or the code of that game is irrelevant.

Mmmmmm yesssss I looooove me some good armchair developers. Please keep going, I can’t get enough of uninformed opinions and baseless statements!

Spartacus.3192:

Fay.2357:

It’s rather amusing how difficult incremental development is to grasp for some people.

“What do you mean you have to build a foundation before putting my house up?! I want it done now!”

Seriously…

Except you don’t move into the house when only the foundation is built. You move in when the whole house is done.

This premature release is pretty useless and to say it helps new players is insulting new players intelligence.

You don’t move in, but the contractor will take you for a spin around the property to inspect the progress.

That’s what this release is. It’s a quick spin around the foundation so that we can see they’ve been working on templates, they’ve made progress, and they’re close to a usable form. The ‘new player thing’ is just an excuse to upper management to release a semi-finished feature so that we can all see it sooner.

It’s rather amusing how difficult incremental development is to grasp for some people.

“What do you mean you have to build a foundation before putting my house up?! I want it done now!”

Seriously…

Ranael.6423:

The only time story instances took me forever to finish was when I played Chrono. The rest of the time the story instances were done in a comparable time as other characters. I won’t tell it is exactly the same time but it did not seem much longer. I even cleared solo the Chak nest for the achiev (this time I was playing condi), but it bugged because one chak was encased in the textures

You’re definitely playing the other classes wrong then. Every class other than Mesmer (with the possible exception of ranger) will clear through instances and such drastically faster due to much higher damage on skills, and sustained damage that isn’t tied to long cooldown and fragile phantasms.

Equip signet of inspiration. Tada! 50% uptime on swiftness!

Hotswap focus when moving. Tada! 100% uptime on swiftness combined with SoI!

Mesmer has excellent access to swiftness now.

Ranael.6423:

I don’t get the impression that mesmer lacks in term of burst damage. I always go around with clone on dodge and double clone utility so I can spam my shatter with 3 illusions even before the mobs started to move towards me.

Oh boy, you can kill mobs effectively once every 30 seconds!

…somehow I remain unimpressed.

The one to Rule.2593:

1%

That’s awfully generous. I doubt 1% of the playerbase even has a single tonic. Hell, I doubt .01% has a single tonic…

CptAurellian.9537:

Dirame.8521:

How do you deal with large groups of enemies as a mesmer? Simple! Play condi. Condi hits everything in the area, you apply 2 conditions that the enemy will always take full damage from and you’re not dependent on a phantasm to do damage.

And by the time your condis have killed the enemies, all other classes with a power build have already killed the next two packs.

Or even other classes with condie builds that don’t rely on the 2 most worthless PvE conditions…

Xyonon.3987:

Chrono is perfectly fine in solo and pve open world. Our damage is as high as most other professions. Don’t get confused by full buffed numbers you see in parties like fotm or raids.

That’s…not even remotely true. Particularly in open world with multiple targets and such, our damage is miserable. Mobs will often pop our phantasms rapidly, our aoe is garbage, and our direct damage is awful…that’s why it’s still awful when fully buffed.

lmperdigao.2567:

My mistake then. I didn’t know.
Something else that bothered me on Discord and I forgot to mention is that there’s no whispers/C-coms, what is pretty important. Or does Discord also now have something similar to it?

It definitely has whispers, and you can make private channels/secondary servers for C-coms.

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

I remember the glorious days when you can proc fear with illusions, that’s what I call mesmerize

If I recall correctly you can also summon golem hoards with it? Been a while, or its just me and guildie joking back then?

Yeah, CoE gear.

Jayne.9251:

I can’t use TS, but I am constantly given scout of the week because I’m effective.

This means less than nothing. Scouting is easily the single role in WvW that VoIP adds absolutely nothing to. You scout, call it in team chat, done. There’s no need for VoIP.

VoIP becomes an enormous asset when communication is time-critical. Whether you see the scouting call now or 15 seconds from now doesn’t really matter at all. However, if you miss the commander calling a movement, 5 seconds later you’ll be dead and the rest of the Zerg will be going in a different direction.

While it’s possible to do large fights without VoIP, use of it provides an undeniable advantage in ease and rapidity of communication.

@Everyone talking about impaired hearing: Then just download the program and sit in the channel while (obviously) not listening to it. Hearing impairment doesn’t mean you can’t download and run the program. If being in the squad matters that much to you, it takes 2 minutes to get the program and set it up.

Ultimately though, having functioning VoIP communication is important for rapid and accurate communication in some situations. Quite honestly, I would not want include a deaf person in a raid I was driving because that would directly inhibit rapid and accurate communication. Does it suck for those people? Sure does, but that’s simply the reality of life with a disability; sometimes you’re not able to do everything.

The answer to your question is clear and obvious. Teamspeak usage was mandated by that commander. Anet does not, has never, and will never force people to play with others if they don’t want to. Therefor, that commander simply made the decision that they don’t want to play with you. The reasons for that decision don’t matter.

If you don’t like it, get a commander tag of your own and start your own group of zerglings without using teamspeak. It’s a simple solution.

Edit: As an aside, I’m at a loss as to any reasons you could have for being unable/unwilling to download, run, and listen on teamspeak short of your parents blocking VoIP programs on your router or something like that.

Kusa.6438:

This used to be the case, but then they nerfed it.
It’s been over a year. I remember phantasms triggering sigil of fire over and over… It was nice.

I have no memory of that whatsoever, so I’m pretty sure that was never a thing.

The only similar thing that used to occur was a bug having to do with runes (and maybe sigils?) that came baked into armor pieces. If you had a full set of TA armor, people would get feared by attacking your illusions. This was due to a bug where illusions inherited the baked-in runes of TA armor (nightmare runes) for some reason.

OriOri.8724:

NYRKKIPAULA.8051:

Also some things like shattered strength was a minor trait and it gave 2 stacks of might per shatter.
Your phantasms could not be obstructed and thus could be summoned on walls in wvw for example.

That would be extremely useful in WvW. Its always annoying when I’m in a small group trying to take a tower and someone is up on the walls and all of my attacks are just obstructed and I have to sit and wait for us to get through the wall/gate to actually attack back.

I’m not ashamed to say that by “useful” you actually mean “totally broken”. iZerkers summon on target. This means that literally any siege within 1200 range of an outside wall would be destroyed in short order by gs mesmers spamming phantasms on them. There are a very limited number of spots inside most towers that are not within 1200 range of an outside wall. It really sucked.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Fay.2357:

2.75s charge time, 1s cd between uses.

With quickness, 2.75s charge time is lowered to 1.83s charge time.

With alacrity, 1s cd between uses is lowered to .75s.

A full cycle is 1.83s charge followed by 2 .75s cooldowns for a total cycle time of 3.33 seconds.

What? (2.75/2)+(.75*2)=2.875 or 3.26 (with three charges) What am I missing?

Quickness doesn’t halve channel time. That would be 100% faster. It is 50% faster.

2.75s charge time, 1s cd between uses.

With quickness, 2.75s charge time is lowered to 1.83s charge time.

With alacrity, 1s cd between uses is lowered to .75s.

A full cycle is 1.83s charge followed by 2 .75s cooldowns for a total cycle time of 3.33 seconds.

Curunen.8729:

Also a serious problem with untraited curtain – it often does not block projectiles at all – I’ve had rangers rapid fire straight through the kitten thing.

If traited for reflect this bug is not present but if untraited quite often some projectiles tend to go straight through.

That’s because untraited curtain does not interact with projectiles at all…

Obtena.7952:

Anet did adjust the amount of damage all conditions did per stack per second at the same time they changed burning to stack in duration.

You’ve got it backwards. Burning was changed to stack intensity, not duration. Additionally, the damage from a single stack was lowered. At that time, every skill in the game that applied burning had their duration increased or stack size increased to keep their previous damage the same.

Every skill…except the mesmer ones, because we don’t matter apparently.

You’re not missing anything. They did the same thing with torch 4, only fixing that very recently. Just chalk one up for the balance team having no idea what they’re doing.

Napo.1230:

Fay.2357:

Magolith.9412:

Fay.2357:

Since basically nobody uses mantras, they figured it was easier to ignore it than actually fix it.

They weren’t wrong. I’ve seen maybe 3 complaints about this since HoT launched.

“Basically nobody”? I roam & small-group as a mesmer in WvW pretty much daily and I’ve seen quite a few other mesmers there that run mantras.

The # of complainers on the forums isn’t exactly the best metric to determine how many people use a skill type. Most players probably just accept the functionality for what it is. Complainers only really come out in numbers if something feels really broken.

Mantras are non-meta/suboptimal in:

All standard PvE builds
All standard PvP builds
Most standard WvW roaming builds
Most standard WvW group builds

Yeah, I’m sure you see some mesmers running around with a bar full of mantras, but to people that know the class, that’s essentially a big target over their head saying ‘inexperienced/bad player here , kill me first!’

A full bar of mantras yes not the best idea but 1 or 2 are sub optimal in pvp/wvw? Are you forgetting the Condi clear for the cancer or the interrupt that they provide to shatter mesmer damage?
Most mesmer I encounter have at least 1 unless they are the boon bot zerg type.

One mantra is a semi-common and reasonable choice; usually cleanse or daze. 2 mantras…that’s pushing it. More than 2 and you’ve gone off the deep end.

neptunechild.4831:

messiah.1908:

I miss gw1 mesmer with ability to fully control and punish the enemy
There is a power block build but with so many stability boons it isn’t effective as gw1 mesmer

They should made new elite that does dmg to player who is not pressing skills which force player to click and than you can interrupt more often

I miss my Power Block mesmer in gw1. It’s so effective against eles, just interrupt and spam wastrel’s demise & wastrel’s worry, wastrel’s demise & wastrel’s worry, wastrel’s demise & wastrel’s worry…

Granted, I know next to nothing about the actual mechanics of fighting in GW1, but you’re not describing something that sounds like interesting and varied gameplay…

Durzlla.6295:

Joxer.6024:

“The elite specs aren’t meant to be upgrades ( so says anet) they’re supposed to just be a way to make your character more unique/different from the base class/fit your style more or w/e. Whether or not they actually do that is debatable.”

But would anyone give you a nod if you didn’t run Chrono? Only class I have ever seen be “accepted” without Elite is Condi Engi but would be nice to see others as well. Bu then if you didn’t bring Chrono to the table what do you bring?

Ranger is also brought without Druid so long as you don’t need healing, having Druid in your traits literally ruins your damage potential.

If by “brought” you mean ‘well, we just spent 15 minutes on LFG trying to find another dps, I guess I can’t really turn down a ranger’ then sure. I would never bring a ranger in a dps role unless none of the better options were available (ele, thief, necro, guardian, engie) or I was explicitly not worried about group composition for whatever reason.

Seyiwaji.4082:

i was using all this methods long ago, even before his vid. This is not the problem.
I would like them to fix their game.
Using mechanic to try to overcome a bug is not something i like. Considering that those devs are called Professional.

Each time i see this https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/98802888-Known-Issue-Tracker
i want to vomit.

Yeah, I have to agree wholeheartedly here. While workarounds are useful, potentially necessary, and nice to have, what would be nicer to have is severe bugs being fixed in a timely manner.

I’ll see what I can do to get this recognized at a more relevant level; with luck they might fix it by 2018 instead of 2020.

Magolith.9412:

Fay.2357:

Since basically nobody uses mantras, they figured it was easier to ignore it than actually fix it.

They weren’t wrong. I’ve seen maybe 3 complaints about this since HoT launched.

“Basically nobody”? I roam & small-group as a mesmer in WvW pretty much daily and I’ve seen quite a few other mesmers there that run mantras.

The # of complainers on the forums isn’t exactly the best metric to determine how many people use a skill type. Most players probably just accept the functionality for what it is. Complainers only really come out in numbers if something feels really broken.

Mantras are non-meta/suboptimal in:

All standard PvE builds
All standard PvP builds
Most standard WvW roaming builds
Most standard WvW group builds

Yeah, I’m sure you see some mesmers running around with a bar full of mantras, but to people that know the class, that’s essentially a big target over their head saying ‘inexperienced/bad player here , kill me first!’

Because when they were coding CS, the spaghetti code made it difficult for them to figure out how to make mantras work with it. Since basically nobody uses mantras, they figured it was easier to ignore it than actually fix it.

They weren’t wrong. I’ve seen maybe 3 complaints about this since HoT launched.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Fay.2357:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Fay.2357:

Sure, but there are so many use scenarios that mantras just don’t end up working well in. Your example here is actually fantastic to illustrate that.

After a shatter burst is when you’ll have quickness and alacrity to help charge your mantra. However, after a shatter burst is also the exact time when the last thing you want is to sit there doing nothing for a few seconds, letting your opponent recover.

The clunkiness inherent to mantras is what makes them awful so much of the time, not necessarily the ability to charge them quickly. They’re a mechanic designed for quick fights that are resolved by the time the charges are expended…in a game where sustain and survival are the top priorities for PvP builds. The pacing enforced by mantras is simply at odds with the pacing that you actually encounter in PvP.

Usually you can make 1 mantra work well if it fits a specific role in your build. Mantra of resolve in an otherwise offensive build lacking cleanse options works because it’s something used as a supplemental utility, and you can recharge it after the fight has concluded. Mantra of distraction works in a highly offensive build or an interrupt build because then it’s either facilitating the rapid conclusion of a fight (through huge burst) or is simply one of multiple options for interrupts, making it non-essential to recharge mid-fight.

Taking more than one mantra starts to seriously disrupt your pacing. When you have that much of your build loaded into mantras, recharging them becomes important to keep your build functioning. This means that if you haven’t completely finished the fight by the time you’ve expended the charges, you need to either disengage or risk being punished for channeling them. As long as this pacing disruption remains inherent to mantras, they will remain unusable together outside of very niche builds and scenarios.

What if one were to use MoP as their auto? Perhaps in a healing build of sorts such as Fay’s Panacea build.

Then your friendly neighborhood thief would go to town headshotting you all game, getting free pulmonary impact procs from the interrupts, and generally making you get very acquainted with the respawn timer.

Edit: Or your friendly neighborhood interrupt mesmer would eat you, or your friendly neighborhood condie warrior would demonstrate just how many condies they can stack.

What if we have stability. I need a second opinion. Ask her yourself if she uses MoP nowadays.

Stability = stab mantra or BD.

Stab mantra means you have no stab when channeling that mantra, but it would give you a couple free channels at least. That could work to an extent, but eventually you’d run into trouble.

BD provides 1 stack of stability. That is not enough for this. 1 stack can be stripped by a single cc, followed by another cc for interrupt. 2 stacks of stab is the minimum to make this work, so you’d have to burn 2 shatters to charge every mantra; totally unsustainable.

Keep in mind that this is all to get a decidedly underwhelming effect. Mantra of pain damage when spam casted is…not good. The maximum healing output from it is negligible compared to the pressure that you see in fights these days, so that’s not really a big deal either. Yeah, you could probably make a build that could semi-reliably charge mantras for a while…but why? To what end would you do this?

Fay hasn’t played GW2 PvP in years btw. She abandoned mantras as a viable build-centric mechanic before that.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Fay.2357:

Sure, but there are so many use scenarios that mantras just don’t end up working well in. Your example here is actually fantastic to illustrate that.

After a shatter burst is when you’ll have quickness and alacrity to help charge your mantra. However, after a shatter burst is also the exact time when the last thing you want is to sit there doing nothing for a few seconds, letting your opponent recover.

The clunkiness inherent to mantras is what makes them awful so much of the time, not necessarily the ability to charge them quickly. They’re a mechanic designed for quick fights that are resolved by the time the charges are expended…in a game where sustain and survival are the top priorities for PvP builds. The pacing enforced by mantras is simply at odds with the pacing that you actually encounter in PvP.

Usually you can make 1 mantra work well if it fits a specific role in your build. Mantra of resolve in an otherwise offensive build lacking cleanse options works because it’s something used as a supplemental utility, and you can recharge it after the fight has concluded. Mantra of distraction works in a highly offensive build or an interrupt build because then it’s either facilitating the rapid conclusion of a fight (through huge burst) or is simply one of multiple options for interrupts, making it non-essential to recharge mid-fight.

Taking more than one mantra starts to seriously disrupt your pacing. When you have that much of your build loaded into mantras, recharging them becomes important to keep your build functioning. This means that if you haven’t completely finished the fight by the time you’ve expended the charges, you need to either disengage or risk being punished for channeling them. As long as this pacing disruption remains inherent to mantras, they will remain unusable together outside of very niche builds and scenarios.

What if one were to use MoP as their auto? Perhaps in a healing build of sorts such as Fay’s Panacea build.

Then your friendly neighborhood thief would go to town headshotting you all game, getting free pulmonary impact procs from the interrupts, and generally making you get very acquainted with the respawn timer.

Edit: Or your friendly neighborhood interrupt mesmer would eat you, or your friendly neighborhood condie warrior would demonstrate just how many condies they can stack.

Sure, but there are so many use scenarios that mantras just don’t end up working well in. Your example here is actually fantastic to illustrate that.

After a shatter burst is when you’ll have quickness and alacrity to help charge your mantra. However, after a shatter burst is also the exact time when the last thing you want is to sit there doing nothing for a few seconds, letting your opponent recover.

The clunkiness inherent to mantras is what makes them awful so much of the time, not necessarily the ability to charge them quickly. They’re a mechanic designed for quick fights that are resolved by the time the charges are expended…in a game where sustain and survival are the top priorities for PvP builds. The pacing enforced by mantras is simply at odds with the pacing that you actually encounter in PvP.

Usually you can make 1 mantra work well if it fits a specific role in your build. Mantra of resolve in an otherwise offensive build lacking cleanse options works because it’s something used as a supplemental utility, and you can recharge it after the fight has concluded. Mantra of distraction works in a highly offensive build or an interrupt build because then it’s either facilitating the rapid conclusion of a fight (through huge burst) or is simply one of multiple options for interrupts, making it non-essential to recharge mid-fight.

Taking more than one mantra starts to seriously disrupt your pacing. When you have that much of your build loaded into mantras, recharging them becomes important to keep your build functioning. This means that if you haven’t completely finished the fight by the time you’ve expended the charges, you need to either disengage or risk being punished for channeling them. As long as this pacing disruption remains inherent to mantras, they will remain unusable together outside of very niche builds and scenarios.

While quickness is obviously helpful for charging mantras, alacrity is actually much less impactful, particularly for mantra of pain. While technically alacrity affects all skills nearly in the same way by reducing cooldowns, the way that skill is used affects how alacrity actually influences it.

In order to get full benefit out of alacrity with mantra of pain, you’ll be spending the vast majority of your time charging it, followed by immediate discharges and then charging again. This leaves rather little time to do anything but charge this mantra, and that’s simply not a viable way to play. On the other hand, if you let it sit off of cooldown while doing other things, alacrity does not benefit it at all.

Compare that to another skill such as chaos storm or tides of time. These skills have long cooldowns, so alacrity will continuously affect them for 20ish seconds after use. Then, these skills are often used shortly after becoming available, meaning that they have a very high amount of time spent recharging, getting maximum benefit from alacrity.

Anyway, I’m getting a little sidetracked. Point is that alacrity and quickness don’t really benefit mantras any more than the rest of our toolkit. Even with quickness, you end up very vulnerable when channeling mantras, and their effects are still generally underwhelming for the sacrifice necessary to use them. Mantras need actual buffs to be viable, not just indirect applications of mechanics.

tobascodagama.2961:

Rethink what? Apply what? If you have a point, make it. Don’t just say vague nonsense and hope we’ll be super impressed by your supreme intelligence.

We’ve played this song and dance before. He doesn’t have a point, he’s just trying to make wild accusations about things with the goal of getting Mesmer nerfed more. The funny thing is that this particular topic is about something that has an endless supply of real arguments against it (see: my posts) and he chooses a fictitious one.