Guild Wars 2

Lol

Thanks, I was afraid of they.

Ok, so we were in cof, in the room where four stands at the braziers, while the fifth fights the boss in the next room.

Not I said boss. Because it was first time I’d been the one to go in there, & they told me to kill the boss. Not the key, the boss.

So, twice someone died & shield came up around key. After the second boss death, & figured out what was going on, killed the key box on third attempt.

Everyone else got the chest. Wouldn’t open for me.

Bug? I do something wrong?

So I know you can’t sell anything bought with tokens on the tp, but are they actually soulbound? I ask because I purchased a few runes with dungeon tokens, I have decided I no longer want.

I am NOT near my compute in game right now, so I can’t check. I didn’t know if I could try and sell it the old fashioned way, give it away, or if I’m just stuck with them.

you know, you are right. I don’t know what this immortal build is, but it sounds a lot like mine. the 9 percent damage reduction for illusions damage reduction, regeneration from phantasms, protection from regeneration, it cetera et cetera.

also have a full set of soldier Gear, etc

I should have realized that part of the problem was not having illusions out.

she also hit me with shatters very quickly, while still spinning out lots of clones, so some form of shatter cat build I guess

so I may have to use decoy when I see an attack coming so I can get my defensive chain going

I am currently running a bunker build, and it is pretty tough. the only people who were ever able to outlast me in pretty much any group I run in is a good guardian and I constantly get compliments of just how much of a beast my mesmer is.

so imagine my shock when a duel against another mesmer saw me lose roughly half my health almost before I knew it had happened.

now I am NOT saying I am the best pvp Player in the world. I win some, I lose some.

until now, my biggest problem had been thieves. but considering it how tough my build is, this message for took me down so fast it shocked me.

this mesmer even managed to chase me down through the EB jumping puzzle I was navigating through after she killed 1 of my teammates at the entrance, I had made it to halfway through the well when she caught up with me, and killed me yet again.

clearly she was a better player than I. I don’t have a problem with that, I’ve known for some time I’m basically in the middle of the spectrum.

what I want to know is, I had a thought that bunker and glass cannon bills would balance each other.

is this not the case? because while I have no problem losing it to someone that much better than me, I’m still scratching my head on howl she did that much damage that quickly when I am running such a tough build.

frankly, I wish I knew who she was so I could go study at her feet haha

so wait, you won 2/3 of the fights, and you are complaining that you need help fighting mesmers?

seems to me that he should be here asking advice, rather than you lol

I’m not talking about things you have to do, your daily, your monthly, those dungeons for your legendary.

it’s a day in your characters life in Guild Wars 2. you have absolutely nothing you have to do today. so what do you do just for fun, what is the single biggest thing you would enjoy in Guild Wars 2?

for me, it was exploring and discovering new things. like a haunted house in charr territory, the spirit of an evil human necromancer so powerful she could resist the command of the foefire, and started kidnapping charr cubs for

Or in wandering around in one of the shiverpeaks areas, & stumbled into a mini dungeon., me & another went to solving it.

Without using wiki.

Fact is, map completion actually kind of ruined that for me. I was rushing though to complete the map, a now u wonder what I missed?

Also, side note, I love wiki for learning things like how to make a legendary.. But hate how it’s almost become a crutch.

So i think I’m going to start exploring those regions again, stop & meet the locals, kill them & take their stuff, without rushing through like before.

What about you, what would you be doing if you didn’t have to be working towards a goal right now?

you know something? I enjoyed it. simple as that. I can’t tell you why, I just remember that I enjoyed it. in fact, I’ve been wanting to do it again.

well, since reading this, we did 3 or 4 runs on coe. and while it didn’t go perfectly, and we had a couple of wipes, they went much much better.

thanks for all the help and advice.

from what I understand, they are working on a plan to make legendary weapons account bound instead.

as such, a little patience and a few months, and you should be able to use it again

I have to say I find it interesting how I see you have some people saying the dungeon is easy and others saying it’s freaking hard

maybe this really is a bit of a l2p issue, and I am willing to learn. I need someone to show me the ropes haha

Strifey.7215:

Jzl.8715:

Morfedel.4165:

Strifey.7215:

In the process of re-recording my CoE paths since it is easier now. Uploaded P2 last night, will have the new P1 and 3 up soon, but the older videos on my page still apply to the alpha fight, it just takes longer since he has more health in those.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnRnK3qoYxk

But really, all you do is stand in melee range and time your dodges.

You naturally cleave out whoever gets hit by the purple crystal in part 2 and 3.

In path 1 you don’t even need to dodge the red circles because his only two attacks in melee range are the flame AoE and conal attack
In path 2 the only other attack you need to worry about is his flame AoE, which does minor direct damage so you just want to remove burning
In path 3 you just dodge the same red circles as path 2 but have the conal attack instead of the fire AoE.

Alpha is basically like Kholer, dodge one very obvious attack and everything else is easy. Just count 1-1thousand, 2-1thousand, then dodge.

like I said, we tried stacking on him. we still got wiped.

I’m not sure what the problem was. hi it was the last 1 to go down. the rest, maybe they didn’t have a good enough armor, but really, it was on path 1, his pbaoe fire and cone is what killed us.

Stacking is only worth while if you have enough group healing and condition removal. Even then you still avoid most of his attacks by spreading around him in path 1, or dodge the frontal cone and ground AoE.

In my videos, 4 of the 5 classes are in berserkers, included my mesmer in this specific video. The only group healing we have is from regeneration from the one guardian which is only up maybe 30% of the time. There is literally hardly any survivability gear/skills other then eating mixed berry/omnom pies. Yes there is condition removal, but if every class equips one group condition removal, it is more then enough for alpha who puts burning on you about once every 7-10 seconds.

Don’t give me that bs about group healing and survivability traits being the reason you can stack melee, and of course you want some condition removal which isn’t really hard to get when you are taking care of one condition every once in a while.

It’s really not that hard.

1. Stack Melee
2. Eat Food
3. Dodge big red circles by counting to 2
4. ???
5. Profit

Grats, you have just negated half of alphas attacks, have no problem dealing with the purple crystal, and if someone does go down you can quickly rez him before the next red circle chain. It’s not rocket science, all it requires is people to count to 2, hit a button, and use a small portion of their brain to equip useful skills.

Not to mention how many people I see who never eat food. The minor silver cost of food would probably save your group so much money in both repair costs and time you waste that could be used for making more money. If anyone complains about regen and isn’t eating pies, or complains about endurance and isn’t eating the stew for 40% endurance regen, then they have themselves to blame.

most people want to eat omnomberry bars, but you make a good point: there is more than 1 food you could use for a dungeon

Strifey.7215:

In the process of re-recording my CoE paths since it is easier now. Uploaded P2 last night, will have the new P1 and 3 up soon, but the older videos on my page still apply to the alpha fight, it just takes longer since he has more health in those.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnRnK3qoYxk

But really, all you do is stand in melee range and time your dodges.

You naturally cleave out whoever gets hit by the purple crystal in part 2 and 3.

In path 1 you don’t even need to dodge the red circles because his only two attacks in melee range are the flame AoE and conal attack
In path 2 the only other attack you need to worry about is his flame AoE, which does minor direct damage so you just want to remove burning
In path 3 you just dodge the same red circles as path 2 but have the conal attack instead of the fire AoE.

Alpha is basically like Kholer, dodge one very obvious attack and everything else is easy. Just count 1-1thousand, 2-1thousand, then dodge.

like I said, we tried stacking on him. we still got wiped.

I’m not sure what the problem was. hi it was the last 1 to go down. the rest, maybe they didn’t have a good enough armor, but really, it was on path 1, his pbaoe fire and cone is what killed us.

we did to try once to stack on him in melee range. he killed us with that Stoney spike cone of his .

okay, with that last group I don’t know who had tanky armor.

I did. Full exotic level 80 pvt with soldier stuff, etc. I know there are 2 that I didn’t. I’m not sure about the other two.

They did reduce his health, but his health isn’t the problem. Heck, I’ll even go so far as say how hard he hits isn’t rhe problem. The problem is there’s no breathing room to revive an ally during the fight.

if he hit less hard, or if a person trying to revive wasn’t being targeted every single time, then maybe it would be more forgivable.

okay, so I’m not the best player the game, nor am I the worst. I’m pretty average.

like many people, I’ve had a lot of problems with subject alpha. eventually though I got to the point that we could take him, although we had to do some rez rushing.

search the change self my group had significantly more difficulty. we knew that rezzing would be a problem, so we took revival skills.

it didn’t help. Most of us had exotic level 80 armor, and we were still getting 1 shotted, our revival skills got exhausted quickly, and reviving the old fashioned a mess it was almost impossible as every time we would start, we would get targeted by his aoes on top of the character reviving.

while we are willing to keep experimenting to find a good tactic, I am interested in hearing advice from people who have already solved this issue.

Thanks in advance!

DancingPenguins.9875:

Morfedel.4165:

helosie.4781:

Dungeons (Besides Arah) are difficult?

If you didn’t find CoE difficult, you would be the first I know to express this. Subject Alpha was a sheer kitten. Hopefully his health downgrade will make it more manageable.

There’s a whole thread on this. A lot of people DON’T find it difficult to dodge. In fact, once you realize how slow the circles are, you shouldn’t be hit by the circles if you aren’t imprisoned.

If you think Alpha is bad, I don’t know how you would do Lupi.

I’ve only done Alpha twice or three times; can almost never get a group together, heh

However, I did read about how the AoEs are actually pretty particular in whether the damage comes from the first or second ring based on the graphics, for instance, and another suggestion that you just go in and melee him, keeping you out of most of his AoEs.

But the point being, in game I’ve NEVER heard anyone say that Alpha was easy; maybe after I’ve fought him a few more times, I’ll agree with you, but who knows.

And I haven’t done any explorable Arah; again, can’t get anyone to do them with me.

Tell you what, I’ll offer you this concession: I haven’t found any dungeon hard that I had a chance to run several times and learn the tactic. And the last time we did CoE, after I read the tactics on his AoEs and understood better how they worked, we did great the first two battles, and a bad mishap ended it on the third, causing us to have to refight him.

But the second round of that third fight also went well.

On the other hand… we did res rush a few times. It will be… interesting… to see how it goes with the changes.

But what I’m saying is, I DID find him much more manageable after I came to understand his AoEs and how they worked. So maybe I will find him easy with a few more runs.

Slither Shade.4782:

Things like the thief’s shadow refuge (I wonder why its called a refuge? Lol no really that thing is awesome for reviving pwople in) will have more value. Warrior’s war banner revives 4 at once and ele’s signet which can revive 3 players at once as well. What other skills such as those do other classes have? Have some hope people.

Man I missed the great post right above me? Sorry. But as well warrior “endure pain” great for giving a quick revive while under attack and thief’s “smoke screen” great for reviving someone while under ranged attack.

Exactly. Several classes have revival skills that almost never get used. Now there’s a great reason to use them.

Sadly, not all of them are good. Like I said, the Mesmer’s Ilusion of Life is garbage unless fighting lots of weaker mobs. But many of them are really good, actually, and can make up for the loss of res rushing. Just need to craft the team and coordinate builds, as opposed to just take what you want beforehand.

Heck, the Mesmer does have a trait that gives him a feedback bubble while rezzing… that might be worthy against range-attack-centric bosses….

(side note: hm, does feedback stop AoE attacks? I’m thinking not, but I’ve never tested it….)

helosie.4781:

Dungeons (Besides Arah) are difficult?

If you didn’t find CoE difficult, you would be the first I know to express this. Subject Alpha was a sheer kitten. Hopefully his health downgrade will make it more manageable.

nelopp.6140:

Seriously, besides Arah I don’t think any bosses need to be res-rushed.

I don’t know, Subject Alpha was a Grade A kitten. I am hoping that his recently downgraded health will make up for the difference.

Glovebox.5724:

First thing you should do when a team mate is down and boss isn’t facing you is at least try to revive then, in dungeons ever player counts. If you let them die, you will.

The problem is that often it was faster for the player to res rush, as the other player would have to stop, not move, and revive, while possibly getting pounded on.

However, that being said, there are several excellent revival skills that almost never get used, and maybe now they will be; every class except thief has one, though the Mesmer’s is garbage, and two are elite.

Guardian: Signet of Mercy (also improves healing when passive, nice for a healing guardian)

Ranger: Search and Rescue
Ranger: Nature’s Renewal (Elite; revives all in its range, as well as cure conditions!!!!)

Elementalist: Glyph of Renewal (and boy, all attunements except air seem excellent with this!!!)

Necromancer: Signet of Undeath (revive up to three allies, and generate life force while in passive? Yes please!)

Engineer: Toss Elixir R (from the Elixir R skill; cures conditions and heals reviving allies; not sure how good this is, would need to see it in action)

Warrior: Battle Standard (revive all in range 600, plus grant stability, Fury, Might, Swiftness, and is a blast combo finisher? Yes indeed!)

Mesmer: Illusion of Life (revives all allies in a small are of effect; allies must kill something within 15 seconds or else go back down again; as such, unless you are fighting against lots of creatures that die easily, then this is the worst of the rez skills)

The point being with all this is, you can build a team where almost everyone has a res skill, and then not worry about having to rez rush – or rather, not worry about no longer being able to

As a mesmer myself, I’m not happy with my particular rez skill, as if it’s a boss fight without any minions to kill, my rez is garbage….

You know, between temporal curtain and blink, I have no problems keeping up with my zerg in wvw, none. And since I find other uses for both temporal curtain and blink IN combat, it’s fine with me.

However, I DO find something wrong with every class except one getting a perm. 25% speed buff. I don’t find I’m being left behind, but I HAVE to use two skills to keep up with someone using one skill, and that doesn’t seem quite right.

However, honestly, I’d rather see some of those classes debuffed rather than us getting buffed. For example, perhaps thief, elementalist while in air attunement might get 25%, while most of the rest get 10% and a couple at 0%.

A flat +25% across the board, minus one class, just seems conspicuous to me.

In WVW, however, using focus and blink, I have no problems at all… except for the stacking issue. Failing to get my speed buff from my focus even though I run across it perfectly… THAT irritates me.

So, for me, fix the swiftness stacking problem we have, and I’d probably be happy… I’d be happier if they debuffed a few classes down below 25%, but I’ll live with the stacking problem fixed.

I run a confusion / condition / shatter build, in WVW and PVE both, and I think it is just fine. In fact, it’s all I’ve been running for a month now.

Yeah, I’m going for 99% and see what happens then.

At this point, I don’t think anyone’s going to be convinced. I’ve been doing great with scepter, yet somehow I’m still wrong. Guess I’m imagining all those hours of gameplay with it. Regardless, I’m not being convinced.

And the naysayers have clearly made up their minds too.

guess i’ll just agree to disagree. Arguing with people whose minds are made up, including my own, is not only a waste of time but also tends to start engendering personal attacks as well, and I’m not interested in participating in that.

SuperSpicyCurry.2415:

Okay to the people saying you’re having success with the scepter, great. That doesn’t make it a good weapon. MH sword>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>scepter, with sword you get mobility, power, and defensive abilities (blurred frenzy is waaaay better than scepter #2) Illusionary leap is great and the 1 skill is faster and stronger than scepter 1. The scepter is trying to be some kitten power+condition hybrid and it’s inneffective. The only advantage scepter has over mh sword is range and that hardly matters because it’s auto-attack is so slow. And if you’re saying that scepter is better for shatter builds then that’s just dumb, for illusionary persona with MR to be useful you need to be in melee range and scepeter is ranged. Illusionary counter has the same CD as leap and you have to be hit to generate the clone also you don’t get an immobilize with scepter. You may enjoy playing with trash but the rest of us don’t.

I’ve been out of town, at work, don’t have time to respond to everything at this moment. But I had to respond to this.

I now see your ignorance. you’re assuming I’m running illusionary persona, then berating me for using a ranged weapon for a melee ability.

What foolishness. I don’t know why you assumed I’m running IP, but I’m not. Not a melee build, at all.

I’ll reply to the rest of this and other posts later, but just had to answer that immediately.

If I have success with scepter & you don’t, maybe the problem is not that the scepter is a bad weapon, but you are a poor player.

Seriously. Calling it bad, then coming out with comparisons like cleaning bathtubs with toothbrushes or cutting down trees with broken axes proves nothing , those are feeble analogies.

I use the scepter & have GREAT success with it. This would disprove your premise. If you can’t, then I suspect the problem isn’t with the scepter.

@steepledhat:

Don’t worry about what other people think. There are people who think mesmer is OP, and others that it’s unplayable.

That tells me it’s fairly balanced. So play it, enjoy it, and dust those who are criticizing you off your boot heels

KratosAngel.7289:

Anyone saying the scepter is good is either lying or doing it bad.

Wait, you’re seriously saying that anyone that’s having success with scepter us playing bad? That’s absolutely ridiculous. Of you’re playing good, you’re playing bad? Ll!

I play scepter as my primary weapon, staff offhand, great condition shatter. The scepter allows me to generate clones faster, to feed my shatter build. And that is why the scepter is a great weapon.

If you don’t need clones much, then yes at that point it’s inferior.

I agree, sceptre is fine

Moa is great 1v1, but not an I win. You can still act as a moa, even if those acts are not ideal. Time warp is often a far better alternative, and frankly, a thief with seemingly endless stealth because of culling issues seems far more frightening to me.

I’d rather face a mesmer than a thief any day.

I’ve never had a problem with orr. Seriously, I’m honestly befuddled at that “mesmers can’t farm orr” statement.

Maybe give each phantasm 0.25 seconds of aegis, so they can’t be one-shotted while still making them avoidable if the dev team seriously feels them too powerful.

While I’ve been arguing against the idea that mesmers are now broken, I do have problems with the idea with powers having multiple steps in stopping it cold.

The races don’t matter as far as effectiveness, the races were built so that no race excels over any other for any profession.

KirinDave.6451:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Today on SoR BL in WvW, before the game reset, our force went to the southern windmill to engage in duels with a guardian from BG. The guardian was very skilled with their class, and was running some insane tanky/toughness/vit/healing build with crazy boons and regens. Out of the numerous people who dueled him, none got him below 70% health, and 70% was rare. Most couldn’t scratch him, while he wore everybody down. Only a few players, three or four, could counter-tank him and had to call stalemate. They could go toe to toe (with a lot of effort) and stay up, but couldn’t deal any damage to him whatsoever. Then I entered with my mes. Using my CD confusion build (sceptre/torch for all you haters out there), I was taking him down to a slither of health where he had to, for the first time out of all the matches I watched, disengage and flee from me in order to survive. Yes it required effort and a fair amount of skill, but it showed he was vulnerable.

Unfortunately my daughter came in and started talking to me, I messed up my CD’s, and things went south in the end, but I know I made my point when the Guardian contacted me to compliment me on the fight.

In conclusion, I disagree that mesmers are weak compared to other classes. In any engagement there will be some way to outplay your opponent. You just have to find it, and play to win. The guardians you’ve encountered have obviously found what works against YOU (not your class, generally speaking).

Confusion builds are really strong in WvW, and under appreciated.

Amen! I’ve been running a shatter confusion build for ages, and it rocks. All these “mesmer is unplayable” whiners makes me laugh every time I melt my target to goo without missing a beat.

Mesmers are a ton of fun, but they have a lot of moving parts which can make them complicated to master.

the big issue will falls around their illusions. when working on a particular build, you need to decide whether illusions will play a major or minor role in your strategy. you can’t ignore them completely unless you want to make 2 of your skills minimum worthless.

In pve, illusions can distract your enemy, temporarily taking aggro off of others, although they don’t last very long individually. phantasm have the capacity of dealing it significant damage, although in their current state they are easily neutralized..

The shatter skills will let you blow them up for extra damage and effects.

a lot of their abilities are random. 3 of the 5 skills on staff generate random boons on allies or self and random conditions on foes. no direct ability to heal allies.

however, in support mode they can dish out a lot of boons. what is this translates to is a character who can be a potent but unreliable support character

many of their abilities dishes out boons and conditions at the same time, Plus serving of multiple roles.

for example, temporal curtain grants Swiftness to allies, cripples enemies, and for a few seconds can suck enemies through it, sort of like a knock back or pull depending on orientation of curtain and enemy.

you can use your illusions as simply a little weapon in your arsenal, or focus heavily on them. for example, it is possible to build a character who uses lots of mantras and only uses two illusions, nothing in traits for them, and just have them as a little extra.

or you can fill your bar with all kinds of illusions, trait them heavily. regardless, you will want to spend some time getting to know just how you’re illusions work, especially with the shatter skills

Aveneo.2068:

Morfedel.4165:

what makes you think they don’t have a test server? they do have a test server, 1 of my guild mates is a permanent invite on it. I have been very jealous of him.

This is not meant as an attack or demeaning gesture; but having a permanent invite and actually testing proposed changes (and providing feedback) are two distinctly different things

I participated in a closed beta (with NDA) of a Fallout New Vegas patch in the past which included a weapon rebalance. As a result, several weapons were rebalanced because we provided proper testing results and a sound reasoning on how those changes would affect the weapon in order to get the proper ‘feel’ for each (and having a direct line of communication with J.E. Sawyer didn’t hurt either)

So on behalf of us all, I sincerely hope your guildmate is actually testing and providing feedback and not treats his permanent invite as nothing more than a ‘bragging rights’ flyer without actually doing anything.

he was until 2 months ago. testing that is. I remember him saying that something happened out of his control and he hasn’t been back for a bit. in other words, he wasn’t just invited, he was participating until recently.

he also mentioned that he was almost ready to get back on, had been reading the alpha test emails and was pretty excited about what was coming. he just dreads doing the massive write ups required with with the testing.

by the way, he did actually prove his claims, but I can’t go into details on that. it was sufficient to make me a believer.

I am so jealous of him I can’t stand it haha

TrevorEh.6915:

Morfedel.4165:

guys, cut it out with the melodramatics. mesmers need some fixing it, but they are neither broken nor unplayable. I have been playing mesmer since day 1, and while I would like them to fix a few things, I am still having a great deal of success with my character.

and seing the responses of some of the other players, I am NOT the only 1.

claims that the mesmer is now broken and unplayable is over exaggeration. otherwise myself and those other players would not be able to have success

Mmm k… “not broken”, but “needs fixing”. Got it.

I suspect you are intelligent enough that you know what I meant. so let’s not play churlish word games and address the meat of the situation.

fact is myself and some others are still having a successful game play with the mesmer, therefore the class is clearly playable. does it have issues that need to be addressed? absolutely!

but there is a big difference between issues that need to be addressed, and being unplayable.

you know, I agree that the mesmer needs some loving right now, but the class is far from broken and unplayable. I have been playing it non stop since day 1, and I am having plenty of success.

while these problems need to be addressed, the fact is there are a number of ways to play the mesmer, they don’t always rely on phantasms as their primary assault

again, I am NOT saying it is fine as is. just saying it isn’ unplayable.

that being said, it has been announced that was there attempted fix will roll through in 1 week. so why don’t we calm down and see what happens before continuing this rage storm?

guys, cut it out with the melodramatics. mesmers need some fixing it, but they are neither broken nor unplayable. I have been playing mesmer since day 1, and while I would like them to fix a few things, I am still having a great deal of success with my character.

and seing the responses of some of the other players, I am NOT the only 1.

claims that the mesmer is now broken and unplayable is over exaggeration. otherwise myself and those other players would not be able to have success

ImagoX.4718:

First of all, let me say… wow. What a great, no-nonsense and clear reply from JonPeters. Stuff like this is what we DREAM of over on the Ranger forums, let me tell ya.

Second, I’d like to re-iterate that this issue right here is EXACTLY why a pre-release Test Server is a really, really, REALLY good idea. Like Dixa above, I’ve played in MMOs and other online games for years, and I can say without reservation or the merest hesitation that games that utilized some form of pre-release Test Server were always, 100% of the time much more “fun” to play than those without. Why? Because the community in an MMO will always have players like the ones posting in here that are VERY committed to their class and wo are VERY observant and VERY sensitive to changes (unintended or otherwise). As a result, placing tweaks and changes on the Test Server ahead of time:

• Allows the devs a “safe” space where the only people playing are, by definition, more advanced and aware of changes than the general population
• As a result, unintended consequences are FAR more easily caught than when they are finally released to Production
• So can be more easily “tweaked” and immediately re-tested by the community, leading to faster iteration
• Which leads to a 2-fold reduction in player frustration: once because the highly-vocal types like the folks who are posting in here have a way to directly affect the game and its changes as well as secondly: because by definition what finally lands on Production is almost guaranteed to be “working as intended” due to direct user feedback, thereby not inflicting bad mechanics on the less-aware/more casual base.

All that said, WAY TO GO devs for the great feedback! Mesmers, you should feel privileged that you were here to see it.

what makes you think they don’t have a test server? they do have a test server, 1 of my guild mates is a permanent invite on it. I have been very jealous of him.

I get the impression that the most common concensus is that the thief IS OP, but only because of the culling issues, and once the culling is fixed, there shouldn’t be the same kinds of complaints.

Does that sound about right?

ErlendR.6107:

First of all gomen english.
All these opinions are valid ONLY from 1 THIEF point of view and in 1VS1 PVP in wvw (more exactly just my opinion :P)
So:

Morfedel.4165:

Morfedel.4165:

And then a guildie told me about a video showing a single thief taking out 25 people at once… haven’t seen it yet, but plan to look it up soon.

This made me chuckle quite a bit. If this actually exists (which it most likely does not), it would not be indicative of the power of the class…but rather the wholesale ineptitude of the other players he/she was facing.

Totally agree.
Im a thief, i can tell i kill a lot and die a lot.
Im not a pro, just consider myself over the average.
OP is warrior, the only one, if the warrior player skill is average, i cant take him down in a 1vs1. Just spamin skills or with a greatsword i cant get close without receive a lot of dmg, with range weapon i cant do too much dmg, and he can escape from me, all this if he is a player over the average.
Mesmer 1vs1 is a tie for me, if the mesmer is a good player.
Elementalist is hard only against those who played well and have too much aoe with too much dmg. I saw just a couple of that kind.
Guardians i dont know …
Necros and Rangers need be buffed :S
Enginer is the one who need be buffed more than all :S:S:S

What kind of mesmer skills give you the most grief?

brandon.6735:

OP have you seen a skilled D/D ele lol what thief?

No, but I have a taste for blood, so Id like to see that lol

Luthias.9741:

Morfedel.4165:

And then a guildie told me about a video showing a single thief taking out 25 people at once… haven’t seen it yet, but plan to look it up soon.

This made me chuckle quite a bit. If this actually exists (which it most likely does not), it would not be indicative of the power of the class…but rather the wholesale ineptitude of the other players he/she was facing.

With that said, the Thief is a solid class. It has had some adjustments made to it since launch that should have been made, but seems to be in line with the other classes in the game at current. There are a few things that I have heard other players report about them that I personally haven’t encountered, but if they are legitimate claims (essentially taking advantage of the culling issue and being able to cap points in stealth)…those things should be fixed.

The forums are a terrible place to gauge relative class effectiveness because everyone else is overpowered and their class is kittened. The only class that I believe needs some downward tweaking currently is the Mesmer. Outside that, I think things are decent shape (always room for improvement though)

And you see, I play mesmer, and I cannot see us as being overpowered. Why, curiously, do you think that is a possibility?

@Uberlicious: Were you, yourself, playing a thief?

@Syeria: ok, I’m gonna have to search that term, but to show my ignorance for everyone to see… what is culling? As in for this game, I know the term out of game lol

Ok, so, I haven’t been on the forums much until this last week, and in the process of reading the reactions on my beloved mesmer’s nerfs, started wondering about the thief.

I’ve seen people in WVW express frustration, and then experienced it myself: several of us trying to take down a single thief, and he kept going back into stealth, coming out full health, while our health skills had only partially healed us and on CD, coming at us again and again, until we were all dead… and he was at full health.

And then a guildie told me about a video showing a single thief taking out 25 people at once… haven’t seen it yet, but plan to look it up soon.

One guildie playing a hammer warrior told me he never has a problem, running with endure pain and some other stuff, but even he can’t kill the thief; as soon as the thief realized he’s in trouble, he escapes without the warrior being able to stop him.

On the other hand, I’ve been told thief players believe they would be very unhappy with the accusations that they are OP.

So, what’s the story? Are they OP? My guild mates seem to think that there is some serious love for the thief going on with the developers that will prevent nerfs, but no class should be able to solo entire groups of other characters so easily.

I’m going to make two comments here, the first against the complaints, then the other supporting the complaints.

Allow me to explain:

First, I think SOME of the complaints here aren’t accurate, RE Mesmers being worthless. The reason being, I hadn’t noticed a problem.

Then I realized why.

See, I don’t even use GS most of the time. I use Scepter main hand, alternating stuff offhand, and Staff on the other weapon set. My entire build is centered around conditions and shattering.

I don’t lead off with a phantasm, except in rare circumstances. I either lead off with a clone, or flat out take the agro myself in PVE. I build up three clones and shatter, build them up again, shatter, while casting the occasional phantom mage to add more stacks of confusion over what i’ve already done, plus the phantom mage and chaos storm for even more condition damage.

So all these complaints are for a particular playstyle, one I have almost never really invested in.

What I’m saying is, this nerf has nerfed a particular playstyle, but not the entire class entirely.

Try different styles, like I am, and see how you do. Maybe you will find it unappealing, but it works for me just fine.

However….

Any ability that has several “moving parts,” ways to throw a clog into the gears and disrupt its use, has to be made more powerful to compensate. Or, alternatively, reduce those number of moving parts.

Otherwise, when you compare those abilities to those of other classes, they compare quite unfavorably.

The phantasms are a perfect example. If you can dodge the very creation of a phantasm, that’s one neutralization; neutralizing its attack through various means, another; flat out destroying it before you can act, yet another, etc etc.

Compare that to comparable abilities of other classes. Are theirs as easily neutralized? If not, are the phantasms at least powerful enough, combined with class mechanics like shatter, to make them worthwhile?

If not, then these “balance adjustments” are treating the mesmer quite poorly.

I for one don’t see a LOT of trouble if you adjust how you manage them in pve, as I stated above… but I do see it a lot worse in WVW (I haven’t played enough sPVP to adequately comment). Even using illusions in WVW was often problematic due to the massive amounts of AOE damage flung around in zergs, they often never have a chance to survive anyway.

As such, I think I disagree that this is a powerful summons. Some moving part need to be removed, or something needs to be done to make the illusions a bit buffer.

For instance, perhaps grant them a single stack of aegis so one attack doesn’t destroy them before they attempt their first attack, or invulnerability until they make their first pass (meaning with the delay, you can still dodge them, etc, but not actually keep from them making their first attack), or stealth until they attack, or up their hitpoints….

The problem is, they need to have a chance to be able to unload at least one attack, especially with all the moving parts, whether by making them more survivable or faster on the draw… or just remove some moving parts.

or whatever. Fact is, I don’t think the issue with phantasms is as bad as most of the people here seem to think, as there are other play styles that work just fine without that dependence, but I DO think there are issues, and they should be addressed, and quickly please.

That being said, I’m very pleased to see a dev actually in here reading this. Thanks. I know how hard it is (I used to be a developer a long time ago, before switching into the medical field – was a junior programmer on the original XBOX’s NFL Fever, and that was just a junior position heh), so I know how much hard work it is.

I think that in so many games, no one ever knows if they are really being listened to, taken seriously, so seeing you in here was quite encouraging.

Now hurry up!!!! LOL!

As a side note, I should add that clones are a problem in various pvp arenas as well. There are so many ways to identify a clone from the real thing (checking to see who has buffs and not, watching damage output, watching how the player moves vs the others, or as a friend put it, just do an AOE and the real player is the one who doesn’t pop), where clones are supposed to be adding confusion and making it harder to spot the player…. it doesn’t seem to really do it’s job.

Hm, but this is about phantasms, not clones. Perhaps I should make a different thread about that….

alanis.6094:

Ryuujin.8236:

Maybe it’s time to try out warrior :p – or… any class for that matter I’ve always got bored before getting any alt over 40

Alternatively, we have other weapons.

Frankly, I’m a confusion based shatter spec (staff, scep, torch) and feel more powerful than I did a few months back.

I think there are also other video’s of players that don’t crutch on the GS.

Now I’m going to quote you for truth. Seriously, I always had people telling me go with GS, or with sword/X; I roll with Scepter/torch and staff just like you, full gear of runes pumping me with condition damage, etc.

My confusion damage is incredible. I was playing with a guardian who expressed surprise once I got my shatter (with All Shatters Inflict Confusion), phantasmal mage (confusion + retaliation), the scepter’s #3 skill, more retaliation from the confusing cry trait, etc.

The enemy attacked my guardian friend and just melted… and he was shocked!

Maybe GS needed nerfing, maybe it went too far, but frankly, I’m not having any problems whatsoever with my damage output using other choices.

My problems are of a different nature. In WVWVW its far too easy to identify me through my clones (one shot AOE all the clones at once, simply toggle to me looking for the buffs on me that aren’t on my clones, or heck, just watching how I move vs the others – if I actually want to “confuse” my enemy with which one is me, I have to stop moving, although I DID find a way to do it and keep at least a chance of not being noticed).

The other is that in WVWVW the players often run in zergs, and the illusions don’t have a hope of surviving with all the AOEs going off everywhere.

And don’t get me started on trying to duel a freakin thief, sigh….

So the class isn’t damaged… GS maybe, but not the entire class.

As it is, though, I may be respeccing to take advantage of “when clone/illusion dies”: effects….

PS – I’m not saying GS is fine as is; it may well need fixing. I’m just saying that this one thing doesn’t make the mesmer broken. I’ve been playing Mesmer since day 1, and enjoying the hell out of it.

There are other issues that stand out, and it does make me feel a bit substandard at times…. but not broken or unplayable, and my confusion damage output is just hellacious.

You know, I have no problems with the loot rate; it’s a common thing in all game design. Some people get lucky.

That being the case, I wonder if Magic Item Find Rate runes effect that? Meaning if you had +100% magic find on your stuff, would you have an increased chance of, say, getting a precursor?

Speaking of, there are other places where Precursors do drop… just very, VERY rarely