Looking at the confusion damage another way: even halved it will do the same damage as equal stacks of burn with 1-2 skills used. Burn is the highest damage condition by far pound for pound and is balanced by the fact it scales in duration instead of intensity.
Getting into the numbers. All damages are base damages, confusion numbers are the new sPVP numbers. Burn does 325 base damage per stack per second. Bleed does 42.5 damage per stack per second. So 7-8 bleed stacks = 1 burn tick. Confusion does 65 damage per skill activation. So 5 stacks of confusion = 1 burn tick per skill activation. Poison does 84 damage per second but lowers healing by 33%.
Furthermore the condition scaling for each as is follows.
Burn = condition damage * 0.25.
Bleed = condition damage * 0.05
Confusion = condition damage * 0.075.
Poison = condition damage * 0.1
IE someone with 1000 condition damage would gain 250 damage per second on burn, 50 damage per second per stack on bleed, 75 damage per stack on confusion, and 100 damage per stack on poison. IE the new numbers would be Burn 575 per second, Bleed 92.5 per second per stack (6 stacks = 1 second burn), 140 damage per stack pet skill on confusion (4 stacks skill use = 1 second burn), and poison 184 damage per second.
Initially burn seems the clear winner in conditions, but you’ll noticed while other require stacks and have lower bases and scaling, they actually more than double their damage while burn gains less than 50%. Furthermore burn cannot stack more than that set amount per second and bleed and confusion can stack to 25.
So we can see that damage wise confusion in a clear winner assuming you can apply 4 – 5 stacks. Even more so if you consider that vs classes with instants or fast attacks confusion can activate more than once per second. But this assumes you can apply confusion in an aoe in just as effective of a fashion. But you can. Glamour mesmers can still apply around 4 stacks to multiple people, exceeding the 5 target AOE cap as well. This is on skills with other good usage as well as a traited blind.
But we have one last caveat, condition removal. People say so much about condition removal = lol confuse worthless. This is actually less true of confusion than it is of other conditions. Confusion faces condition removal and convert condition to boons skills. All other conditions face all of that PLUS a few class counters. List of known counters: Thief: Pain Response and Slowed Pulse, Ele: Stop Drop and Roll, Ranger: Oakheart Salve and Evasive Purity, Guardian: Inner Fire.
So if you look at the numbers, the counters, and the capabilities confusion is still superior to other conditions even post nerf. Confusion is also kinda nasty in the way it sneaks up on ya. Bleeding, burning, and poison put lots of numbers above your head and you quickly counter it if you have counters. It also typically takes several seconds to get alot of bleeding, poison, or burning on someone. If someone puts confusion on you though you typically take a couple skill activations before realizing it in a hectic fight. In doing that you’ve already done the full damage the other conditions would have done. They depend on constant reapplication, confusion does all it’s damage up front.
It was nerfed because it was needed. Confusion is still the best condition even after a 50% nerf lol.
So yes condition/glamor will still be viable considering you’re applying the equivalent of 6 stacks of bleed on a zerg while providing great support. This while bursting higher on single targets and small clusters of people and using your supportive weapon abilities.
Anyone else have their death count handy?