Guild Wars 2

Honestly this trait will be better with 2 or 3 stacks, compensated by lower duration. Afterall shatter skills are there to deliver spikes anyway.

I had dozens of run with this but found out torment won’t be your primary damager. Its a nice addition that can be a bit slow compare to standard shatter but interesting to have torment around.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fhAQNAW7al0npRtlpxTNcrNyqBdqlg6ssmgW6NktAA-T1RHABXobwE1f0d/BjU+BwFBQgnAgTKBJFAETjA-w

Mogar.9216:

Pyroathiest.4168:

2x energy sigils are absolutely worth it. I will not run any build designed for pvp purposes that doesn’t include 2x energy sigils unless it’s some sort of super specialized zerg build. Even if you don’t swap weapons frequently, it’s still incredibly important. Lets say that when you do swap weapons, you’re swapping because something just happened. Well, you probably want a dodge. With energy sigils, you have one. That’s pretty much the bottom line. Energy sigils give you dodges when you need it, and for that they’re absolutely invaluable.

you convinced me , I guess I’ll have to fork out 10g now

Mystic forge is your friend
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Courage
oh and don’t forget the black lion salvage kit, they’re your friend as well.

Do you have illusionary invigoration? If yes then don’t be afraid to pop distortion and diversion early (as intimidating as their cd be). Its one of the best trait for shatter mesmer and it can make a major difference to your battle. Pop distortion when you anticipated a deadly combo and can’t escape, not after you received it. Diversion provides lots of options because you can use it both offensively or defensively. If you have a thief that you can’t shake off or you get stun by warrior pop diversion to protect yourself. Same with blurred frenzy, it may sound like a waste to use it purely for evasion but it’ll buy you some time for other skills to cd.

There’s no clear rotation on using active defensive skills as you’ll be in situations where you have to adapt. However if used and timed correctly you’ll always have some skills to help you survive, be that blink, decoy, distortion, diversion, mass invis, blurred frenzy, illusionary wave, temperal curtain/void, or just healing etc.

As for attack combo I think it would be best for you to practice with someone, or even watching videos help a lot.

I don’t think thief is a good comparison…any form of shadow step + steal will catch up to your one time blink. But you’ll be able to escape guardian/necro/engi/mesmer/ranger much easier with that 300 range.

I’m probably worst than anyone here in shatter mesmer but I like the following rotations and want to share with people

Vortex(5)>Illusionary Mariner(3)>Feigned Surge(2)(2 again if too far)>dodge>F1. If all landed you’re looking at roughly 12-17k damage against full zerk in pvp. WvW might have better effect since you have larger crit damage, but you’re opponent may also have more toughness than pvp.

I usually then swap to trident and go Illusionary Whaler(4)>Spinning Revenge(3)>dodge to get 3 illusions out. With Siren’s Call(1) from you and 2 clones and sharper image from whaler you can quickly build up 10 bleed to sustain damage. Then Illusion of Drowning(5)>F1 if you’re patient enough, or F2 instantly for fast effect.

I should add a couple of tips as well.
- You cannot cap points in stealth or invulnerability like distortion.
- In Spirit Watch I don’t recommend you grab the orb, as all stealth skills and blink will cause your orb to drop. But if situation demands by all means go for it.
- Mesmers can blink up to treb location via a gap next to spawn point at the beginning of Battle of Khylo
- In Temple of the Silent Storm you won’t be able to commune in stealth or invulnerability
- Phase retreat and blink can get you to a leveled platforms, as long as you can reach those targets without jumping (there are still stairs leading to them but maybe far away to walk to)

My guess is chrysocola or coral, but don’t forget that all ascended trinkets are account bound as well now.

Torment shatter is hard and the effect is limited in ZvZ. But certainly useful in roaming. Problem with ZvZ is your clone/phantasm die immediately. If you summon your illusions among their zerg they’re either killed by zerg’s buffing AoE or CC train when the zerg is charging. If you summon your illusions and let them run into enemies for shatter…well they also died miserably. The only reliable way of confusion is glamour but following the nerf they’re useful in tagging but subpar in damaging. Some confusion/torment weapon skills may potentially build up reliable conditions on few opponents in zerg but they’re usually quickly cleansed (emphasis on the word potential).

Now that you mention it, I had a look at Osicat’s video and found out there’s such problem.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KRhGT6QsEQ
I saw a duel procs at 1:44 but they rarely happen together.

I don’t have much gold left in me to test out this combo but it’s certainly interesting to test out.

IE on clone doesn’t have terrain issue lol

ok let’s piece them together…

PU is a definite since there isn’t other way to get protection/regen/aegis on stealth. 6 traits gone.

Shatter heals means we also need grandmaster in inspiration. 6 traits gone and you’re left with 2 only.

You said shatter also apply confusion, which is true for cry of frustration only if not traited. At best about 3 confusion if all landed. If traited then all shatters can apply confusion, but that means he have minor adept trait on illusions, so 1 trait gone and 1 left if this is the case.

But with constant condition cleanse it means he have to slot mantra of resolve or trait for mender’s purity (with mantra of recovery) or both if he’s too careful. If he has mantra of resolve then his utility, being nullfield, decoy, mantra of resolve and mass invisibility, will be unable to sustain constant stealth in GS/Staff build.

There can be plenty of choices from the above restrictions, but either way I don’t think he’ll hit that hard. The x/x/6/6/x limits the potential on the rest of offensive traits. Could you at least give your class type and armor stats? Even if your opponent run full zerk he’ll find it hard to graze anyone who has decent toughness. I run almost full zerk shatter mesmer with 4/4/0/0/6 and I’m having trouble against PTV gears and high toughness opponents myself. Also whether you’re in WvW or PvP also help heaps.

If they’re playing condition then there are no burst damage unless you’re spamming skills with confusion on you. You should consider timing your attacks because PU condition rely on their opponent’s decisions to kill them.

Pyroathiest.4168:

I’m definitely thinking that the torment sigils just don’t match up to double energy. Other than that, looks pretty good.

I concur with you on this one. Kind of regret buying torment sigil since one stack per 5 seconds isn’t doing much by itself. Any suggestion on sigil choice that applies more reliable condition? I already have the energy sigils on me.

I have pretty much the same trait set myself for torment shatter. But with couple of changes that you may find useful:
I use rune of undead for direct condition damage, double sigil of speed for long duration swiftness in PvP. I swap IE with illusionary invigoration so I can pop diversion and distortion early if situation gone unexpected.

The rune of strength is certainly interesting, I’m going to try that out next time I enter PvP.

For PvE, condition is a bit slow. It has been an issue even for level 80 conditionmancer (condition necro), and mesmer has bigger problem due to random conditions. Power/precision is a solid choice. But if you want GS/staff mesmer can tag players in Edge of the Mist well, just need to stay on the back line of zergs.

This is kind of funny. I just crafted The Anomaly to fit my mesmer’s purple theme. But seeing how the iWarden bugs on me, TP’s 150g seems more tempting….thanks ANet for ruining my fashion sense!

Stun + immobilize does serve the purpose of “lockdown” though. Not all skills can address both condition and stun.

Doug Whisper.2465:

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Maybe they could make it so that Interrupts remove say 5 Initiative?

The longest cooldown on mesmer untraited weapon skill is 35 sec whereas the most costly weapon skill on theft is 7 initiatives. If this is an apple to apple comparison, a successful interrupt on thefts from mesmers with Power Lock traited should cost them 2 initiatives.

I play a thief and I can regen 2 initiative in 2 seconds. Any thief who traited Infusion of Shadow gain 2 initiative when they enter stealth. Kleptomaniac also grant them 2 initiatives when they steal. Both of these are Adept tiers and Infusion of Shadow is very common among thieves. Not to mention you won’t be able to interrupt their skill all the time, imo this isn’t a fair trade when we invested 6 into domination.

The iZerker I summoned died before it can attack large zerg, so that probably explain mesmer’s situation in ZvZ lol.

PvP power shatters are the same as power shatters in WvW, except you meet more players with berserker gear so it is easier to burst them down. Not so much against tanky ones because your crit damage is less than full zerk in WvW. A typical build would be 4/4/0/0/6, where your boon strip trait comes real handy in team fights. I like 2/4/0/2/6 post-patch because it gave me long vigor that I used to have before the patch, but I still go back to 4/4/0/0/6 from time to time. I use zerker trinket, superior rune of pack with double sigil of speed to run around the map with long duration swiftness. If I play 4/4/0/0/6 I use double energy, if 2/4/0/2/6 then I use double fire. Shatter build is suitable with all types of weapons so go with your choice.

Or you can also play interruption build, which has big role in PvP where you can root and interfere enemies with 4/4/6/0/0. Maybe 6/2/6/0/0 post-patch but thieves are immune to Power Block. Which is a problem as there are lots of thieves in PvP. Interruption build is quite versatile because you can combine that trait with shatter or phantasm gameplay. Again the weapon choices are diverse, though I recommend ones with stun/daze.

Or you can play phantasm build, though the build is quite diverse and I don’t know much myself. iSwordman and iDuelist are great against single player while iZerker target a whole lot of enemies. iWarden and iMage have their individual problems. iWarlock is quite situational and while it hits hard, it may not be a reliable damage dealer.

A thing to note though, PU is not recommended in PvP. You have great survival but you won’t be able to cap points. Best leave it to dueling or solo.

I run rune of pack with sigil of speed in pvp and never concern with lack of speed. In PvP it isn’t hard to me to tag a group of enemies and gain swiftness when anyone of them died. 26s of swiftness is definitely enough for me to run around to attack the next foe or escape, which will most likely combined with the on-hit effect for 13s more swiftness.

However, according to wiki this on-hit effect does NOT share with allies before the patch. I might need to do some confirmation on that after the patch since 10s fury is quite a delicious boon to share around.

This combination is even better in PvE since normal mobs died easily and you don’t really need swiftness against boss. However in WvW you probably don’t want to waste your energy on npcs and sometimes players are too far for you to proc continuous swiftness. So generally I run traveler in roaming and use whatever runes I feel like in zerging (since no rune has major impact in zergs lol).

PvE/dungeon has return to the way it was, DPS only. No conditions, no interrupts, no need to build for survival or healing, just faceroll it like a berserker. That’s actually a lot more boring than paper scissors rock.

I wish Power Block can wipe 10 initiatives from thieves, and not just making them immune to it. It is silly to think a Grand Master trait has no effect on a profession.

We gave them a month and they have yet to fix this…are we seriously looking at 2 more years? Or are they actually intent to fix this?

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Mesmer-s-Bugged-Skills-Still-Bugged/page/3

Raunchy.6891:

This is the build I used before the changes happened. It just needed a couple extra conditions to make it truly viable and this trait did that. I haven’t tried it since the patch because I’m still obsessed with power shatter atm, but if I ever switch to a condi build this would be my first choice.

@NICENIKESHOE
I think clone death traits are very complimentary to shatter builds actually, because you are never going to be able to shatter all your clones with none of them being destroyed 100% of the time. The only problem is that for power shatter you need specific traits for it to do good damage or for it to be useful in a group setting. With condition shatter it opens up options for clone death traits that can have a pretty big influence on fights.

Very true, time to do TA and buy some nightmare runes to fear people off

@OP
I noticed you have minor master trait in chaos. It’ll come helpful in group situations, but when solo your build don’t have much access to regeneration (other than 75% every 30s). I’d suggesting putting that in dueling to get more condition removal.

Raunchy.6891:

Just saying, the vigor and ferocity changes hit all classes not just us. Of course shatter mesmers feel it pretty good, but I’ve hardly had a problem bursting people in the past and I doubt this will be the difference. The whole point of them changing Critical Infusion was so that we wouldn’t have access to permanent uptime of vigor without really giving anything up for it stats wise. So switching Compounding Power and Vigorous Revelation would completely defeat the purpose of this nerf. There isn’t much you can really change about power shatter builds without making them more powerful than they should be. They still do good burst to squishy people, and mediocre burst to tanky ones. I’m not sure what else could be done to make us better without breaking something else.

The reason why I suggested this is for specific changes to shatter mesmers. It is great in bursting but hard to sustain damage compares to other builds. Especially when sustain damage become essential following ferocity. Each burst has a long gap of 11.5s and we’re usually down to one phantasm, few weapon skills and auto-attack to sustain it, leaving so much space for opponent to fully recover. Hardly an ideal situation when looking at other builds and professions. It is sad to see power shatter limited to squishy opponents just like us and hard to counter condition tanks and high regen opponents, both of which is quite frequent in WvW.

While phantasm builds get buffed and PU build remained as powerful as before, it’s hard to uplevel shatter and encourage players to play it. Changing VR and CP will address shatter specifically and not ALL mesmers will get long time vigor. Plus this vigor is to be obtained by actively shattering and situations may demand us to hold off from that. Vigor nerf hits shatter mesmer harder than the rest of the professions because we use DE clones for both offensive and defensive play. You can argue that we use weapon skills instead but again this leaves us with limited sustain damage after the burst. Putting VR into illusions won’t make power shatter more powerful, all it does is return us to pre-patch with additional restriction. Regardless of the patch, shatter mesmer already give up sustain damage when doing burst, asking us to give up more is quite disheartening.

Of course I do not mean to say power shatter is no longer viable in WvW or PvP, as a matter of fact I never said such a thing. But given the recent changes power shatter has become harder to play while it is already a hard build pre-patch. Something needs to be done on power shatter or it’ll become more like a “pro-only” build.

I guess I played power shatter too often, but I often find clone death traits not compatible with shatter traits. Both have their merits but when it comes to damage its either shatter or clone death. Would love to test this out though, just need to get the nightmare runes.

For the sigil, doom is a good alternative to earth. Since we don’t lack bleeding and poison is useful in minimizing their sustainability.

OJ For Prez.8254:

Do you think it would be a good idea to put Sigil of Torment and Sigil of Intelligence on each set of weapons?

Not really, since sigil of torment has 5s CD and each illusion shatter count as one attack. You basically used up all 3 critical hits with just one torment proc.

I do think power shatter needs some help. With the vigor nerf and ferocity, power shatter mesmer is taking a lot of hits with no compensation. Perhaps move vigorous revelation from inspiration to illusions, since shatter works horrible in that trait line and there isn’t a must have major adept trait in illusions. Perhaps swap that to confounding power since confounding power can form better synergy with phantasm builds.

Build that I’m running atm, could anyone please improve it somehow? I’m running double torment sigil and double energy sigils, with harmonious mantra and mender’s purity to free up a condition cleansing utility slot for mirror images. And torment shatter in illusions GM of course.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vgAQNAW7al0npRtlpxTNcrNicqA0h6x1BeAQpH42FCAA-z0BBINCyk3w0HBKHqIas11FRjVXDTHjIqmUAQMNC-w

I’m also thinking about vigorous revelations to get perma vigor but I need to slot back mantra of resolve for it.

Oh My God.8423:

spearchuka.5972:

Oh My God.8423:

I play a shatter mesmer too. When I read about the change to Critical Infusion, I almost had an heart attack. Personally I think the shatter build was at the right place. Not sure if the change is necessary,

To be fair, 5 points was way too easy for near perma vigor. But shatter needs perma vigor like Miley Cyrus needs attention. Its almost as if the Devs forgot shatter was still a build (lol @ forgetting the fundamental mesmer build) and neglected to add in a way for mesmers to get reasonable access to vigor.

In a build already constrained in traits, asking mesmers to put 10 points into a line totally unrelated to shatter just to get the vigor they need is absurd. Its not a question of a trade off between that and stripping boons. I need to strip stability and protection, it isn’t debatable. Frankly I’d be much happier if they put Vigor in as the adept trait in Illusions, it would at least makes sense there.

Assuming CI is not going to change, how best to maintain a good vigor uptime? Or a good level of clones production? And is a good shatter template still: 20/20/0/0/30 (having not come around to the new system yet, sorry).

You could go 10/20/0/10/30 where you traited for vigorous revelation, which combine with CI will make up for the 10s CI cooldown. But frankly shatter mesmer can’t sacrifice more damage now.

You could also go for double energy sigil. Its like a mini-vigor.

I tried it today with full torment rune and sigil but 15 stacks is a bit hard to achieve. Could you give me some tip? A bit hard to generate 3 waves of shatter right now…

I am pretty new to mmos. Which is probably the reason as to why I felt that IE is a nice bonus, not really a major impact on current builds.

I don’t think it’ll make a major impact to current builds but I’m still look forward to it. Would be funny if someone find this overpowered and ask to nerf this “bug fix” though.

To me the new GM traits are like jack of all trades but excel at nothing (with power lock a bit more interesting), going deeper would be a bit off topic though. I do hope we got more glamour buff in the future though.

I wish echo is some sort of area damage, with animation that resembles the burst of light from the boss in hammer fractal. Would’ve been much cooler skill to have regardless of its use lol.

Anyway I like your mimic 3, but I thought mimic is more of a defensive skill. Maybe a clone that follows your every move? So when you walk left, it walk left, staying about 300 range from you. When you summon phantasm it also does the animation but no real effect. Could actually make that clone really distracting/mesmerizing but hey, clones die easily. Although with the current AI system it could be hard to generate such effect.

What Raunchy said, the devs made it clear that ferocity change will not affect PvP as they believe the crit damage in it is justified. So no change on current builds, but maybe more shatter condition and interrupt builds. As to which is viable to you, you have to check specific threads about these new traits.

Except sometimes no phantasm pop out when I used the skill, and that’s on WB in close range, not a dying mob. So you probably should expect this to happen.

You’ll lose about 30% crit damage, which is about 10% overall damage considering non-crits and 150% base crit damage.

I wouldn’t invest ascended zerker until I adjusted to the new damage output. It’ll be slightly higher than PvP crit damage so you could start from that.

Or you can go sword/torch + scepter/pistol, sword/pistol + staff, sword/torch + GS, sword/pistol + GS etc. We have lots of ways to summon illusions and whichever weapon suits your style is good. You can also swap weapon before you burst, so lots of variety in generating shatter folders while keeping a phantasm around for sustain afterward. For example if I play sword/pistol + GS, I can start the fight with GS 4 and 2. Swap to sword and ileap (3 illusions now), shatter F1. Mirror images and shatter F2 (optional), dodge roll away and use pistol 4 for duelist continuous attacks. Then close in for sword auto. Also with iPersona you don’t have to restrict yourself to 3 illusion shatter, sometimes 2 from a single weapon set would suffice.

It isn’t really a phantasm hybrid since you don’t have to trait towards phantasms. Sometimes in a typical 20/20/0/0/30 WvW build you trait for far-reaching manipulation (1200 range blink) instead of phantasmal fury (fury on phantasm), just to add escape factors. Or sometimes mental torment (20% mind wrack damage) and shattering concentration (shatter removes boon) are too valuable to swap with empowered illusion (15% illusion damage).

Looks like you’re going for power build due to favor for fast pace, in that case scepter may not be a viable choice in WvW/PvP. Its ok in PvE because AI monster don’t dodge, but players will dodge when illusions running towards them. Hence lots of WvW shatter mesmers use sword and usually shatter burst after immobilize foe with ileap. Plus blurred frenzy is one of your main burst damage source. With the incoming patch though, scepter and staff will be useful in condition shatter (torment). It may not be as fast paced as you wish but can be a good sustain.

Mind wrack is our main power burst, so you need to think of a way to sustain damage during the 11.5s cd. Often that can be summoning a phantasm from your second weapon set and keep it there, or use scepter 3. Or just use auto-attack….though both scepter and staff auto does a horrible job in power builds.

I believe someone suggested an improvement in the past: make it AoE and longer cd. Which is a great suggestion considering how little AoEs we have. The fact that power spike occupies a utility slot, takes a while to cast, single target only, and doesn’t deal any impressive damage really undermined its use.

I think we should have an AoE Moa skill. In that case I don’t mind shorter duration and cast time.

I don’t think this would change the “full zerk war/heavy only, pin gear” problems we have…but what the hell do I know
/shrug

Moa has very little team value. Players can kill you in >1v1 situation without moa. Even if mesmer is the outnumbered one, the non-morphed player can certainly cover morphed player for 10s. Running from a single mesmer isn’t too hard. I rather enjoy Moa skill and want to equip it all the time, but other elites are far more superior in zerg/team/solo situations.

I like your idea and I think implementing that can bring out a different build. Confusion/torment and interrupts is like punishing people when they act. It would be fun to punish people when they don’t act, like domination minor grandmaster (Wastrel’s Punishment), but in a different sense than just raw damage.

I find it fascinating that you’re serious about this. Try a mesmer and you’ll be fascinated as well.

Btw moa is cute.

Down the mesmer in moa form and say “in your face!”

msalakka.4653:

Temihal.8651:

Keeping it on mesmers, when don’t you want to have clones around?
Are you afraid of them aggroing or something like that?
Making them only in combat when you have a target wuold help?
I’m just curios.

They are completely unreliable. They aggro whatever they feel like. The very last thing I need when I’m trying to hide in a keep is clones standing around or aggroing guards.

DE clones go for the nearest foe, hence no real targeting and control.

If you pick up some clone death trait, those clones can still create certain degree of annoyance to melee players. Particularly if you stand close to clones.

Really depends on the type of warrior they played. For example if they play hambow warrior your phantasms can hardly survive to launch their second wave of attacks.