For which game mode?
If pvp then either d/p or s/d; both have high skill ceiling and multiple uses for each spell. SB for off-set. (Inb4 d/d players start to spit poison, d/d is more of pure dps set and doesn’t teach how to use interrupts and combos well).
If pve: d/d, s/p, staff.
Yea, straight up PVE. I don’t PVP, or at least haven’t tried yet, who knows eh?
Thanks guys!
From what I have been told by Guildies who run it, and also what I have read here, I think so. Many claim it rocks. But hang for a bit and I am sure some of the top Thief people will respond with proper info!
Well, that are really nice power builds… but i was asking for the condi version of the thief.
Maybe I’m blind, but i can’t see one on that site. Just some dps numbers i will never achieve
Metabattle straight up best place for your Condi build or cruise these forums, bound to be several.
Aside from that others are sure to reply with some suggestions, always heaps of help here.
Chrono for pvp for sure is strong and Engi is really a lot of fun, once your fingers heal!
As mentioned, Necro is the top dog I reckon but Druid is also a very strong and somewhat desired Condi class that’s heaps fun and the mobs just melt in HoT.
Word of caution though, going full out serious Condi is/can be expensive so be prepared. Have fun!
just go s/p combo is 3 dodge 3 dodge 3 dodge win game XD
Lol, yea, it is pretty easy but fun as well. But I reckon I should get a tad more diversified in my playing of the class?
Ok, I would like to get really good with my Thief, having attacks and such be almost second nature sort of thing which will make me a more valuable player for say raids and such.
Currently I am running around with p/p, mostly cuz its pretty fun and the ranged aspect is handy. Once mobs get close I swap to staff.
Which brings the question…been reading on here about d/p and d/d and even s/p (which hit pretty hard as well with #3) but what is the best combo to use , this is PVE, in order for me to not suck?
Am I better off just trying them all so that at any given time I have options or is it best to focus on perfecting one set? Staff hits hard, no doubt, but can be a tad boring at times and its just fun using unload and seeing mobs melt.
Anyways, thanks as usual!
Stuff
your stuff
WOW!! Thanks for that! That’s the kind of info I was hoping for and you nailed it. Shame though really but now I know…time to put up the lil Chrono til something happens in a positive way.
Thanks again! Cheers!
Ok, been following this thread as I would really really like Mesmer to be viable as I do find the class different and fun.
What I keep seeing are mixed reactions. Some say they suck (PVE is me mind you) and others swear by them. I guess that’s how it is with any class, you have winners and losers.
But whats the end result? Fay, from what I gathered based on your posts and such you play/played Mesmer quite a bit but from comments you don’t any more? Or are your comments tongue in cheek and you all love the class to death?
I’m mixed in that I have found that I do at times do decent dps other times things just take forever to die and sure enough when I check the combat log (dps meter plz ANET?) I see that yea, I hit for like nothing many times. Should one focus on crit to get better damage or is it not worth it? Again, not 100% clear on how much our clones/phantoms etc. do to our dps on a whole.
Anyways, I shall keep the hope alive that the class does get some love and I will keep watching what you all have to say, it does help.
Thanks xyonon for posting this, and others as well. I also think engineers can fill a spot, in rare occasions I see it happening in one of my guilds and all seems ok. It’s just that other professions seem to be more favorite and engineers seem to be in last place for now, definitely in puggroups. Hoping to see more of you engineers in raids in the (near) future.
Yes, thanks heaps and I too want to see more Engi’s get the nod. I have been able to do VG and Escort but not without a fight for my class!
“Just makes sure you really know your rotation, so you won’t mess up and have noticable less dps than the alternatives. Most important for your dps: Never interrupt your bomb auto hit!”
Do we really have a rotation? Was always told its whats off CD but somehow never feels right.
Thanks for that! Why no Chrono though? She would get the traited speed buff if nothing else? And cool that your kid plays with you, love that!
My daughter plays it in PvE with staff + Sword/Sword with 90% offensive stats and it´s great.
What build does she use and is it just open world/maps/metas etc.? Keen to see whats working for her so well.
One of the best, yea. Either power or condi both do great dps in PVE (I don’t PVP) and you bring the buffs as well so many want you along.
Solo its not so lonely as other classes as you have your trusty pets and can find more along the way!
So yea, jump in, give it a go and have fun.
Pugging raids: check the metabuilds on metabattle. Even if you don’t like it, it’s what most require for you to join. Viper’s sb a/t would do it. An even more popular build is healer druid.
Berserker(power) druid is a no go.Pve end-game and fractals: both power (berserker’s) and condi (viper’s) can do. I believe high tier fractals pug groups rather have condi over power.
Oh and I’m not at home, but there are numbers and graphics etc about the ranger/druid’s condi and power builds. What it comes down to is, in short fights power has the highest dmg, in longer fights condi wins.
Actually, and to my surprise the Power build is now rated higher than the Condi one, for raids. Not sure what has brought about this change because 5 months ago when I inquired I was told pretty much what has been said here in that Condi does tend to be a bit higher dps-wise.
But this kid is so over being Condi that I am going to give it a go and see what happens. Sounds fun and after all, that’s the goal!
Yea, I tend to do the same thing. Post all over the place and then forget what the heck it was I said and where, so I start again! Oh someone stop the madness please!!
I do have to say that since I hit 80 and geared out. My damage is subpar to my necro, druid, and my rev. But I still enjoy playing. I just had to come to the hard realization that I am there to spread boons, keep people hasted and alacrity up as much as possible.
But my damage, yeah its meh.
Yea, i’m likening it to a Bard class sadly. As you mentioned, fun as but just not a dps beast, which I am slowly getting used to. Actually am owning the mobs in Bloodstone pretty well which is where I thought I would struggle.
Time will tell……..lol, oh no I didn’t!
Last night pugging VG yet another example reared its ugly head. I accept invite and swap to Engi as condi was needed. We then spend almost 15 mins (well, the leader and folks) complaining that we don’t have Chrono buffs, How can we do this without Chrono buffs, etc.? I offer to come on my Chrono for said buffs, but not as tank as I have never tanked in this game. Reply…..“Oh no, we don’t want a Chrono if it cant tank”! Really? You just wasted almost 30 mins discussing how you will fail without said Chrono buffs but you only want them if they are wrapped up in a tank?
Just some odd thinking. The run also had a Condi Druid who kept saying that he cant do GC as condi and that his dps will suck, etc. Umm, same range as a Reaper last time I checked and they doing just fine.
Ah well, we got the kill so I guess that’s the main thing…lol.
If we got a dps spec that allowed us to frontline, like a quasi reaper, but put out less overall damage in group support would people be okay with that?
Very much so! Just like other classes you would have the options to spec more into a support role, if that was your thing. Not to reference WOW but Death knights are a good example. You could be a tank build and do decent dps as well but if you wanted you could go pure dps, Frost or Unholy, and still be looked at for raids and such.
I know Mesmers can do that but the argument is around the fact that our overall dps is just lacking. I have faith though and its still a fun as class to play!!
“This means if you’d add the dps the others do more because of the Chronomancer to it’s own dps, the Chronomancer is by far the highest party dps profession in the entire game.”
Now that I like hearing!! thanks heaps for that Xyonon and yea, I know who you are, no need to explain!
Also thanks for the other info, you have lifted my spirits in terms of what to play as I had decided to focus on Engi and Chrono as they are a lot of fun aside from just raids. Cheers mate!
(edited by Joxer.6024)
DPS is so low that no one wants you for your buffs as its “better” to bring a different class.
I don’t want to be rude or disrespectful but I stopped reading after this sentence. :|
Fair enough, no offence taken mate. Like I said, its what I have been hearing and yea, it gets old. But based on what some have said here its good to see that there actually is hope, I just need to get better at finding raid groups me thinks. That and pick a kitten toon and get good!
Oh and this " (except condi engi since no one trusts a pug condi engi)." Is that just being funny or is there a truth to it? I ask as I have been said pugged Engi and from what I can tell I didn’t suck. Then again….. :P
“And in that light I want to make mesmer less sucky in PvE, which means changing traits and skills and increasing damage modifiers on our weapons.”
Amen to that! Lets hope someone looks!
Blizzard did this to some degree, and dumbed down raids to the point that any monkey with a keyboard could do them. I for one am having a hard time with raids in this game, and that’s a good thing. Yea, being able to ‘practice" tanking on Chrono would be ok but I agree with most in that it doesn’t warrant what we would lose from other areas of the game, i.e. some more class changes?!
Ok, posting this here as not sure where it should go as its not Mesmer specific but a general statement. Please move if needed.
Ok, ANET, can you please pick a direction? I mean no “holy trinity” or not. Currently it really sucks to be any class trying to raid I have found. Chrono, you tank or go home, period. DPS is so low that no one wants you for your buffs as its “better” to bring a different class. Druid, you better heal mate, or you do VG only as condi. Again, trinity anyone? Rev you are stuck spamming 1 maybe 2 skills if your keen, and then if cc fails god forbid its the Warriors fault.
Engi, nah, we want Reaper and Epi for life. Well guess what? I don’t run Epi enough to be good at it.
And that’s where my biggest issue is, and granted this is more me than the game I think, but I like to be really good at my class to be viable for raids and such. I HATE being carried, never have liked it and try to avoid even if its guildies. Just not my style, I would like to know my class well enough to be of use.
And typically one can get that good if you play it enough. As I mentioned elsewhere in these forums, I also want a toon that’s fun, and thus I can master. Mesmer seemed to fit that, was/is fun and very different from other MMO’s but don’t see the point if I am not going to tank. I have tried in this game and in spite of all my years as a tank in WOW,ESO,SWTOR it means jack when it comes to this game. Just so different a concept.
So, do I expect ANET to cater to me, of course not. Like I said, its a me thing and something I need to resolve as I really don’t want to go back to WOW, but its getting tempting due to the above.
I guess what I expect from this post is someone else’s insight into what I am experiencing. Have you had the same? How did you work it out or is there a fix or not? Just plug along in hopes something changes, say in Mesmer dps or something of the like?
Thanks for reading and sorry if it seems a rant. Sometimes good to ask the community that has been doing it longer for help instead of running around QQ’ing in game.
Cheers!
I know its highly unlikely that ANET will read this or actually do anything or care but why can’t they buff Chrono’s damage a bit?
I mean its a class that is unique to the game so you would think they would show it some extra love, but no.
It gets lumped into a support/tank role that not a lot of folks are keen to do. Be nice if the dps was bumped a bit to make bringing a Chrono to a raid for damage AND buffs instead of “Oh your Chrono, tank plz”!
But yea, I know I am talking to a wall but still sometimes nice just to vent…never know, someone might give a care?
One can hope….
THANKS heaps guys!! that’s exactly what I needed, great info from you all! Time now to go practice, practice, practice and then see how I go.
Cheers!
Well staff 1 is a really slow auto-attack (3/4 sec cast time) and it has low damage because of its bounce mechanic that theoretically allows it to hit the enemy multiple times. The problem with it is that it doesn’t bounce enough and prioritizes allies over enemies, which means your already low damage from your auto is usually cut in half or worse when anybody is nearby to receive a bounch.
Staff 2, phase retreat, is infinitely useful but does no damage on its own. Its a stunbreak that summons a clone that applies conditions, useful with staff 3 in theory, but then again you get more damage out of Staff 3 without using this clone in the first place.
Staff 3, phantasm that attacks, deals an extra 10% damage for each condition on the enemy. Useful, and really strong against world bosses and other mobs that have a ton of conditions, but still a really slow phantasm, and if you only have a few conditions on your enemy it won’t be doing much damage.
Staff 4 and 5 are chaos armor and chaos storm respectively, both on 35 second cooldowns, and both only last 5 seconds (so really low uptime on both here). Chaos armor only gives the enemy a condition when they hit you, and aside from confusion its all non damaging conditions. Chaos storm is easy enough to move out of and only applies 1 condition a second. Again though only 1 actual damaging condition can be applied with chaos storm.
So staff realistically has 1 attack with a long cast time and a wonky mechanic that almost always cuts its dps in half or worse. The phantasm isn’t that great unless your foe isn’t moving/attacking it and has a ton of conditions. Skill 2 doesn’t really deal damage, its just clones applying conditions, if they stay alive long enough to do so. Staff 4 and 5 aren’t even guaranteed to do any damage.
Ah, thanks for that! Explains a lot! yea, didn’t take a look at the cd’s on each, those really suck. So now Fay’s comment about Staff 3 makes sense.
Btw, I saw a Chrono in TD run up and instantly pop 3 phantasms/clones and then just owned the mob! What the hell was that other than just great game play?
I ask becasuse I am learning and want to try to get as good as I can on this toon. I am a bit of a min/maxer and try to put up the best I can given I am old as and have slow fat fingers…lol.
Cheers!
“Press 3 to afk on world bosses.”
Lol, thanks for the info Fay!!
Also, do you have any videos?
And I’m going to ask what is probally a really stupid question but meh, here goes. What wrong with staff for Mesmer dps? By the looks of it the skills seem like they would be really good? Is it that overall it just doesn’t pump out enough sustained dps or that other weapons simply do more?
Just curious is all as on skills alone (the descriptions) one would think that they rock.
(edited by Joxer.6024)
Ok, don’t want a raid ready build, or WvW or PVP.
Just looking for a decent damage dealing build for open world PVE with some sustain thrown in if able.
Browsed the forums but I suck at searching so if one of you that know the class well could put up something that would be great, perhaps Fay or someone?
Chrono looks fun and I am keen to give it a go and have something to play outside of raids but not be a wet noodle.
Thanks!
That’s awesome! And yea, I too love the Condi build and love running it. But lately all the raids I have pugged (cuz as a Guild we kinda blow with raiding) I get griefed running condi Druid. As been mentioned MANY times here, the buffs are still there along with some extra healing, which shouldn’t be needed really, I’m talking I do VG, Escort,Gors…haven’t been brave enough to venture further!
But I shall play around with power side of things and see how it fairs and like you said, hopefully some others come along and offer up some tips. Cheers mate!
Thanks for that Jerus!!! Just what I needed.
I guess what I am asking is whats “best” the run dps-wise when not healing? Power as you mentioned since that’s what my gear has in it and I wont need to bother with any swaps. If I am the 2nd druid or just condi then I can swap the rest easy enough.
Ok, now time to make some Zealots gear I reckon!
How critical is getting Magi’s gear? I also run fractals and zealot’s seems to have enough healing while doing a lot more dmg. Question is: is that ‘lot more’ enough to give up healing power? Grace of the Land works either way, so I’d say ‘yes’. But I might be wrong.
Zealot’s is enough since most of the buffs to healing come from the healing % modifiers (Rice balls, Transference Sigil, Monk Runes, trait), and not from healing power.
Ok, that’s good to know! I was told to stack all the HP I can get but what you say with the foods and runes and such makes more sense and I can still do some decent dps perhaps.
So running A/T as offhand not really a good thing? I see you all mention Sword /X so will look into that.
Been practicing with the gear swap and yea, I see what you mean. Pretty easy to swap into a condi build even if I remember the traits. And like you said, you don’t change that many anyways.
Anyone have a solid build they can post? Easier than the metabattle when folks do that,better reference and all. Cheers guys, you have been a HUGE help!
Oh yea, one thing I wanted to ask and be clear on. Do I bother to run a “condi’ish” build as a healer with zealots and such or just use s/x like you all say? Not sure what to run when I am not raiding and healing, would still like to be able to dps a fly or two!
(edited by Joxer.6024)
(edited by Joxer.6024)
I would say that full healing Druid is considered meta for pretty much all pugs / casual guild runs at this point. The more offensive power/condition variants are rated higher as they find much more effective usage in groups which are more experienced with the content and thus don’t need quite as much healing.
The Staff healer build on Metabattle looks pretty up to date.
As for tips for a full healing druid:
- Use Pink Moa instead of Electric Wyvern for CC/Utility, it’s now much better in nearly all cases.
- Stack as much outgoing healing % as you can (Rice balls, Sigil of Transference, Monk runes, Natural Mender). It’s much more effective at increasing your healing than the raw healing power stat.
- Try not to be tempted to roll double staff, instead be smart about when to heal and when to deal damage. Remember that one of your primary jobs is to buff allies with grace of the land.
- Healing is subgroup prioritised, so be mindful of your squad set up when running a full healer. For example a 4-4-2 squad with only one full healer will result in only 4 players recieving the vast majority of heals.
- You have a ton of CC available (Path of scars, Pink Moa, Lunar impact, Natural convergence). Always be mindful of breakbars such as sacrifice at Matthias.
- You can provide perma-protection to a group using stone spirit and the Nature’s Vengeance trait. This is great for Matthias.
- Be willing to switch up your build for each encounter, some fights are fairly healing intensive like Matthias while others feel like a walk in the park if the mechanics are being handled correctly (i.e Sloth).
Thanks for that! Was kinda wondering about the double Staff setup, hate the loss of a at least a little bit of dps. So what should I run, LB or SB or ??
Also thanks heaps for the tips, that’s what I need as the wife has told me that healing in this game is not like WOW and such in as you don’t target people like the tank, its mostly AOE healing? So game to give it a go and see how I fair. Dang shame game doesn’t allow for 2 builds to swap back and forth from as I don’t plan to run a heal build just doing Open world, meta events and the like, unless my dps can be decent then maybe.
Cheers guys!
I can only speak for myself, but I suspect there are many like me.
I’m a very casual player. Sitting on the edge of my seat and pushing just the right buttons is not my thing. As most know, a ranger may be the easiest to play when it comes general PVE.
Don’t get me wrong, I just don’t auto attack and let my pet do all the work. Then again….sometimes I do…..:) It just depends on my mood and situation. Again, I’m a casual player.
My theory is rangers attract people like me. We know were not the best as far as DPS but we usually stay alive. So its in our best interest to rez, and being casual and not always liked, we enjoy rezzing, especialy when you get a ty or thanks.
People like me just like to play the game, accumulate riches and get a thanks now and again.
AMEN!!! My feelings exactly! Game needs more like you that’s for sure. Good on ya mate!
“By the way, size is totally irrelevant when it comes to pet stats.”
And other things as well……
Ah,my bad…shoulda been more clear.
Yea, this would be a raid only build. Pretty much open world and all that I figure its not as an ideal setup what with people everywhere so doing your own thing and then maybe helping here and there is what is ok and yes, I do want to still kill things, lol!
Ok, going to step out into the unknown here. Have always been a tank or dps in the MMOs I have played (WOW,ESO,SWTOR,etc.) and was especially handy to have the wife play heals thus making us a great team.
But am looking to try and give healing a go as Druid here with Guild Wars and not sure were to start.
The wife has helped some and she has kinda pointed me down the path but I figured it may be a nice change from always just dps plus it might take away some of the grief I seem to be always getting (it has gotten better) from playing a Condi Druid, lol, one can hope!
Checking META the raid build they have they don’t even rate it at 100, any reason why? Isn’t that and Ele heals about all there is?
So, as the title suggests, hit me with your builds and any and all advice, tips, warnings you guys have when it comes to playing a healing Druid.
I have a geared Rev, War, Engi and Reaper so why not give this a go, might be fun and perhaps some raiding will come my way.
Thanks in advance and also huge thanks for all the replys and help on my previous posts! You guys really do help.