Guild Wars 2

masskillerxploit.2165:

-meet Ferox Hemlock-

Well done
I like the dark look combined with the shiny purple eyes!

This sounds like fun

In-game name: Saplïng (I admit to not being very creative ^^)
Server: Ring Of Fire (EU)
Role: Scholar
Playing: PvE and PvP. Planning on venturing into wvw soon.

EDIT:
I guess Chaos Archangel in his below post is right in some of his points.
I have no idea what mistakes Menace have made in the past and in all honesty I don’t really care. I do however hope he in the future will give his own approach some extra thought.

Eldanesh.2390:

Osi told me about this thread and that there have been some requests for my build, so here it is.

Thanks for taking the time and posting this. Much appreciated!

Here are my two cents. Try to not take offense because this is not ment in an offensive way.

themenaceofseventhdimension.2075:

1. I have already said a bunch of times about how sorry I am for not handling my past threads from both community very well.

The question I have to ask you: Are you handling them better now?
People are not reacting to your old post, they are reacting to how you are handling the situation right now.
You may not realise it, but you come accross as very defensive.
Explain why you have chosen to spec the way you have, when people question the reasoning. Give your reasons without whacking people down when they give you exactly what you asked for.
Some people might agree with your choises and others will not, but that is how it should be. Not all feedback will be postive, not on this forum and not in real life.

themenaceofseventhdimension.2075:

Lol. What the heck you talking about???? It dont make no sense at all. This build has the qualities of 2 modes in one trait set man. What do i need to switch traits for and waste a bunch of money? this is probably most funny comment ever.

This is not handling it well.

themenaceofseventhdimension.2075:

7. Reason I reply back at some of your comments with harshness is because I only wanted feedback. But what you are giving me now and in my past threads are the same.(Sarcasm) So I dont know why the heck you expect me to be nice to you. You could have just like told me calmly without starting a Sarcasm riot.

Read above again. Exactly who started with the harsh comments?
You could have chosen to explain why. Instead you instantly went for an attack.

See what I am getting at?
When a lot of people react towards you in a way you don’t desire, then maybe it is time to examine your own approach.
Someone once said, that you are not saying what you think you are saying. You are saying what other people hear you are saying. (Or in this case read^^).

If you think you are being positive, but people hear it is as negative, then you can have all the right intentions in the world, it’s just not coming across

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Well 50 scraps… that will certainly keep the price high… $400 USD for a weapon skin…

I think it is too much. I get that A-net want to keep these skins somewhat rare, but:
If the drop was not radom I would see a point to it.
Spending money on a rng item is however not something I am going to do.

If I knew what I got, then maybe (eventhough 50 scraps is way out of my Price limit.)
The way it is implemented now, then no thanks.

It is a shame. Some of the skins I really like.
Some of the skins I would have paid for but not $400 USD + ^^

Osicat.4139:

Il ask my guildmate To post hes build in here. He do it better than I do.

That would be much appriciated.

Osicat.4139:

Glad you liked the synergy setup. Its extremly fun to play and it feels like you can drop armies of enemys if yo just play it correct and as a team.

/Osicat

Absolutely loved it. I think it is refreshing to see a spec developed specificly to gain the largest possible benefit from playing with another specified profession.

Malpractice.7850:

Ive been really interested in making a mesmer lately, its one of the few classes ive never tried >.< And i has a few questions!

1) How well can they tag things in a zerg? I ask this, becaus ei play on JQ, and I dont want to never get bags :p I understand the whole Veil/Portal thing. But we have quite a few mesmers, usually, and want to be able to get some damage/tags in!
1b) Which skills/builds do i go to do this?

2) Can they be tanky/in the front lines? if so how?

3) With no signet for movement speed, how do you keep up with a zerg?

I would recommend to look through Osicat’s guide.
I believe his mist build is highly mobile and his heavy build has high survivability.

Stof.9584:

Phantaram.1265:

I can say that if we were still going to pax I’d be all for balancing before the tournament. Other games use older patches for tournaments so they can continue balancing even during the tournaments. This game doesn’t have that and continued balancing is far more important than 10 players playing for 10k. This tournament isn’t even really the beginning as it isn’t community driven, it’s just a booster arena net has provided. The community will decide whether this game grows or not and right now the game is not good enough. When it is good enough the community will get behind it and we will have ourselves a supported competitive game.

So while not balancing in the tournament could have helped the teams have a fair game for 10k, I think the teams would realize that the game needs growth and the 7.5k or 2.5k their team will earn is not sustainable without a good enough game.

+1 Exactly!

It’s absurd we have to wait for balance because of a tournament that should be an advocate for this game.

But is that the reason?

Yes, they are not going to make sweeping changes to balance before PAX. That is not completely because of PAX.

So is PAX 99% of the reason or 2%?
Some transparency sure would be nice…

Awesome video as always Osi It is truly a pleasure to see you in action.
What spec did Idlescholar run with?

I mainly play with a thief friend of mine, so we might want to try this out.

Togur.9306:

kitten GUILD WARS 2 kitten ANET

Well that sure is a constructive post…..

Scyth.8520:

World of Warcraft 4 years game time cleared all content from Vanilla, BC, WOTK! High level farmer, PVPer, PvE, and Elite Raider! End Gamer Always been in the top 1000 to 500 in guild progression.

Funny :P
Being in top 1000 to 500 basicly means a rather casual player. I hope this is a troll post cus it honestly made me giggle ^^

Defektive.7283:

I’ll be updating the list this Saturday. All responses starting from the EU Pax qualifier will be used in the update.

Hmm – What happened to the update? :P

uhu – I can’t wait to see it ^^

Allie Murdock.8152:

2. What exactly is your definition of fun? Fun is subjective, no?

It is very subjective, yes.
I once knew a guy that loved to troll and make fun. He usually took it out on someone that he knew would not find it funny, in order to get a reaction.
Once the reaction came, he could then ridicule the poor soul along with his friends…. That was how they had ‘fun’.

There must be some definitions of fun that are more valid than others. If ‘fun’ is to be able to kill someone else with very little effort, then I am sure there are quite a few people having fun atm.
But is it the right kind of fun? I personally don’t think so, because you have to remember the receiving part as well.

Is it really fun to die to random spam? Or to be the one that does not have a counter?

My definition of “fun” is a game where every class can bring something and be competitive towards others. My definition of fun is when you can counter someone’s attack towards you and they can do the same.

Right now, I do feel the game took a step in the wrong direction. I find it to be more spammy than ever. As Helseth said in another rant: There is not any reward for a necromancer to use his marks wisely. They have the potential to be used that way, but there is no reason to. It is all about nuking someone down anyway.

- Why do we have to wait so long for the next balance patch?

- Why can’t minor adjustments be made along the way?

A bit more transparency would be very nice.… What do you think about it all? In which direction do you intend to move the game?

The only thing I have seen for mesmers as an example, is Jonathan Sharp saying:

You could make a case that Mesmers have a hard time in a hard condition meta, and I think a lot of people would agree with you. They have counters to conditions, but a lot of players don’t like to run those in standard Mesmer setups.

Huh – What? like???? We don’t like to run them? Do you really think that is what it is all about?

Sure, as a mesmer I can spec into traits that help me handle the massive amount of conditions and I can stealth my way out of a lot of bad situations. It is just too bad, that using the mechanics I have available to me, decaps the point.

As others have mentioned elsewhere: If there were other game modes that were not all about standing in a very small area then it would not be a problem to the same extend. However, we do not have another game mode.
But this is not just about mesmers. Every profession needs at least one build that can handle conquest but without ruining their build diversity elsewhere. They need to function in pve and wvw as well and it has to be fun.

You are right about that. Fun is the most important thing there is.
I find my stealth condition cleansing build rather fun and I would hate to loose it. But it is not cut out for conquest.

I must admit I never used that trick. I failed several times in the beginning and then I learned the ideal “in range” portal locations on each map.
If it is a “nerf” it wont be one I will ever notice.

I actually had the same problem as you. I leveled with a warrior friend of mine as well, and he just annihilated stuff.

The first character I made was a necromancer, but after reaching level 29, my friend went on vacation for a week. I decided to park the necromancer until he returned. I made a mesmer instead and after a day of play I realized that I had found my new main.

I leveled her to 31 while he was away.

After having experienced leveling on my own, I realized that I learned my profession much better that way. What we did afterwards was to level together most of the time, but to split up occasionally. We would be in the same zone but without questing together. It might sound odd, but I felt it was important for me in order to get the hang of my profession and see its potential, strengths and weaknesses.

When playing with a warrior there was literally no point in weapon swapping as stuff just fell over. When playing alone it became essential to do so.

I don’t know if that solution in any way will suit you though

Here are my 2 cents. It might be due to lack of experience as I main a mesmer. I do however “spy” on the necromancer forum since I have a necromancer alt closing in on lvl 80.

I think necro’s are seen as OP for a few reasons. (Listed below in no particular order).

a) Lack of clear animations.
It’s rather hard to see which mark is being cast.

b) Conquest mode.
The fact that conquest mode encourage fighting in a rather small area, which makes it easier for the necromancer to transfer conditions from himself to others and to transfer conditions from others to others (Epidemic). To cover the entire area with marks etc.

c) Ranged nuke.
The fact that a necromancer can do an excellent nuke from pretty far away. In comparison a shatter mesmer needs to go close and get in harm’s way to land its full burst combo. (Just comparing to the class I know. Not saying no other class can do something similar.)

d) Condition damage.
The fact that there are no stats that effectively can reduce condition damage. You can spec into toughness to avoid physical damage, but when it comes to conditions: Either you play a class that can cleanse them, without sacrificing a lot, or you don’t. The way I see it, you are more at the mercy of the class design itself.

e) )synergy.
Necromancers synergize very well with some of the other strong classes atm. (Spirit ranger/engi).

Necro strikes me as weak in other areas though. Again, that might just be me being inexperienced. If I make a mistake on my mesmer or if I get pinned down, I often have a chance to make it out alive. If I get pinned down on my necromancer I tend to just die ^^

Thanks a lot for making this guide. You clearly put a lot of effort and time into it
My little alt necromancer is definitely going to try this out once she reaches lvl 80.

JonathanSharp.7094:

You could make a case that Mesmers have a hard time in a hard condition meta, and I think a lot of people would agree with you. They have counters to conditions, but a lot of players don’t like to run those in standard Mesmer setups.

The wording in this actually worries me a bit. The ‘like’ part.
I wonder if he honestly thinks, the only reason mesmers are struggling a bit is because we don’t ‘like’ to spec into condition cleansing traits, or don’t ‘like’ to run mantra/Null Field….

+1 to saVdoom from me. I think he sums it up pretty well.

yski.7642:

Well, give mesmers a +25% speed signet and necromancer a Blink clone and everyone’s happy?

Lol ^^
Not sure if necromancers need a buff in that direction atm. I haven’t tried pvp on mines yet.
Some sort of escape might be a fair trade if their damage was reduced. BUT! I have absolutely no clue what I am talking about when it comes to necromancers ^^

yski.7642:

I think the difference is in how we define mobility. You are talking about the average speed it takes to travel long distances. What I’m talking about is shorter distances, or in combat mobility if you prefer.

Think of it like this: you are alone in PvP of some kind, and suddenly 5 enemies jump out of nowhere, and you must somehow get away. Nothing a necromancer has really helps there, since practically everyone has access to swiftness, and it’s easy enough to slow you down while you’re trying to get away. All you can do is pop DS and take 5 seconds longer to take down.

Mesmers, on the other hand, have blinks and portals, rangers have leaps, warriors have faster than swiftness running skills…

Yes in combat we have awesome mobility. I am in no way disagreeing with you on that one. If we have staff and focus equipped, we are very hard to catch and in combat our mobility is superb.
However: Outside of combat we are slow. Sure, if we run focus we can get a speed boost and if we run staff and combine About Face with Phase Retreat (or find a friendly critter ^^) we can move forward a bit faster. We can also use Rune of Air.

I do however think (to some extend) the lack of speed is causing mesmers to use specific weapons and runes just to keep up with the rest.

yski.7642:

Mesmer has the worst mobility? Have you ever played a necromancer?

The fact you have an instant cast teleport and that ridiculously long range portal alone makes your mobility far superior to that of a necromancer.

This always makes me Wonder.
I mean necromancers do have Spectral Walk(30 seconds of swiftness) and Signet of the Locust (25% movement speed).
I am not saying they are optimal or anything like that, or even that they can be compared to a blink, but necromancers do have a way to increase their speed without taking specific runes or running specific weapons.
In all honesty, it is a pleasure leveling my necromancer. She can actually move with a decent speed, without me having to do anything for it to happen ^^

Conan.8046:

No decent mesmer ever use phant. defender ( exept bunkers tho thay are reare and the other phantasam will not do the same dem )

you enter the battle with 3 or 4 spirits
the mesmer must sumon them if you dont dodge it i did few games with spirit rangar its soooooo SOOOO easy to paly wen you swich to s/d if you do it properly you have like 6-7 eveds in the healing spring wich will give you back 80 % of your hp i did survive vs 2 ppl for 10 sec with 1k hp them my heal cd ran off and heal myself my back up came and we kill them this happens alot
you will destroy any illusion memser with condy long befor you die from berserker and duelest unles your a total bot and dont dodge it
like i said you dont control phantasams they have 1 attack
you control spirits they have 2 passive 1 active
if they kill your spirits you will sumon them again

Is that english?
So it works like this
The ranger dodged and evades everything but the mesmer is a chump and gets caught all the time and owned.
The spirits have a 1 minute cooldown but he summons them right away after you kill them…right…
All his spirits are nice a bunched up for aoe and your phantasms all all over the place but its easier to destroy phantasm’s….right…
Ranger has evades but you know invisiblity, swap and blurred frenzy aren’t forms of avoidance right? Distortion too i suppose.

So basically grass is always greener.

I don’t really think you can compare a spirit ranger to a mesmer.
I also think you missed one of his points. He is saying phantasms can only be summoned when entering combat and when you have a target. The spirit ranger can have his spirits up before hand. Sure, spirits might take longer to summon, but you can start the fight at full strength.

Conan.8046:

So basically grass is always greener.

Lol. I defenitly see how the grass on the spirit rangers side of the fence is withering away atm :P

Aptofan.3172:

My strange insect Sylvari necro..

I really like him Good job!

Beautiful sunrise and Divinity’s Reach.

Tim.6810:

Why do people say “Shatter” is the only good Pvp build for a mesmer?

It is/was the best build for tpvp. Outside high end tpvp other builds do work, but for those coordinated team matches shatter just brought the most to the group.

Tim.6810:

Do I really have to follow internet builds just like everyone else to gain respect?

In all honesty. The noob caller is usually the worst player in the game ^^ I wouldn’t pay any attention to it if I were you. Play the spec that works for you and that you are having fun with. I don’t think any of us like being forced to play in one way and one way only.

Agreed. That would be a very nice feature to have added.

Thanks I really like your sylvari too, especially the contrast between the green and her own color. Maybe I will try adding some contrast color as well.

Osicat.4139:

Atm the ultimate class in this game would be if you could transform to a oak, root yourself for 5 mins, endure tons of dmg dont deal any yourself but instead fear and bounce ppl away from a mini area around you.

Osicat

LOL. Sad but not entirely untrue

tetrodoxin.2134:

This is pretty much the result of people talking “Mesmer is strong in PvP, doesn’t need buffs”. That’s just so wrong. Shatter Mesmer is strong. The rest is meh in PvP (mostly because of the only gametype atm).

I actually agree on this point and I think it might be one of the reasons mesmers can easily go from very strong to very weak with a few changes to other classes.

We have one build that has been viable for tpvp and it has been the same build for ages. Now that the shatter build has a strong counter due to beeing weak to both physical damage and conditions, we don’t have another build to turn to.

The build diversity for mesmers is just too narrow.

My little mesmer. One day she might even get fancy weapons to show off

Krayiss.4926:

The icon is larger than my asura…. No point of playing asura now they can see me!! lol

lol.
Well, arguably asura has many advantages from being small. Maybe too many? ^^
If a certain race has an advantage it’s wrong in the first place.
That the icon is bigger than your character is rather funny though ^^

Krayiss.4926:

Lets put GIANT ICONS over every skill so we all know whats going on.

Maybe not giant icons :P
Besides that then yes – excellent idea!
Being able to see what your opponent is casting and having a chance to counter it is a good idea

I had a simular experience.
When fighting Subject 7, I seemed to have the tornadoes from from Windcaller Kieldia present but invisible. This resulted in both me and Subject 7 constantly beeing knocked down and his oozes spawning outside the arena.

Besides that: Every once in a while you use a Queen’s Gauntlet Entrance Ticket to fight, but it never lets you enter. You cannot sign up again either as it claims that: “You’re already queued up for a fight.”
The only “fix” I have found for this is to relog, but that means loosing your turn and therefore waisting the previously spend Queen’s Gauntlet Entrance Ticket.

Hexxen.7216:

Don’t count on it. I have tried the final darkness lady 30times and 25 times have been glitched with either an extra freakn enemy like the first guy. or with left over attacks like tornados or fire from the asura. Hell i even had the bombs from the rifle guy once. I am done with it for a week until maybe the FPS gets better once people get sick of zerging under you or they patch the freakn glitches. Anet loves to put out temp content with massive glitches though so I am not holding my breath.

That sounds promising

<3
Thanks a lot! Much appreciated.
Now if only I can get a fight without tornadoes ^^

I was attempting to fight Subject 7 tonight but meh, I only got one real try at it.

After my first try, the Ringmaster signed me up, announced it was my turn and then left me in never ending query.
I relogged, got into another overflow where the npc would let me in.

Unfortunately it seemed rather buggy. The tornados from Windcaller Kieldia was present but invisible so both I and Subject 7 was constantly knocked down. I managed to die to timeout. After 3 attempts with invisible tornadoes I got rather grumpy and decided to leave it for tomorrow.

I was wondering if anyone has any tips and tricks for this one?
In my one none buggy attempt, he seemed harsh and in case I get a none buggy attempt tomorrow I would like to come prepared

Thanks in advance.

Hi.
I’m not really a necromancer (well I am leveling one as an alt if that counts. ^^)
I was however watching Helseth’s stream a few days ago.
He was playing tournaments for fun on his necromancer and I believe he was running this build.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjMaF7xbub87JEoH9CuAiRKOmghSR5wOA-TsAAzCpI+S9l7LzXyvsfN+YJw+DA

(I have never tried to play necro in pvp, so I have no idea how difficult this build is to master or if there are other better options. At least it’s up to date.)

Lighter.5631:

this thread need to have a red icon. warrior is definitely the better class made by anet.

Animation wise they might be ^^
Besides that: I find myself agreeing with mr.Helseth. In a game without castbars it’s crucial that very clear visual animations are present.

LiebnirGWAccount.5698:

It does work, It only changes the main colour of my fabric which is pretty handy the way it’s set up, I just…I can’t explain it, I have actually been through all the dyes, but It’s more a case that I don’t know what’d go best with the flames. I was thinking a darker red but then everything blends into it. Heirloom has a nice amount of detail coverage whilst being dark, but it’s still a bit…Odd.

I know the feeling if it’s any comfort. I can spend hours trying to find the perfect blend and sometimes it ends up being very different from my original idea.

My little necromancer, working her way towards level 80.

Yes that’s true. But if the issue is finding a color that fits the other two (and it is for the main color I belive?), then it might still be an idea.

I guess if it was my character, I would try to have two of the colors somewhat close to one another colorwise and let the third color work as a contrast.
(As an example, midnight ice might look good along side a dark blue or green color and flare might look good next to pyre or molten.)

Just a thought. I would still preview first ^^

If I were you, I would go to the trading post and preview every single color until you find something that you like. That’s what I usually do anyway ^^

Treeline.3865:

redslion.9675:

Then I don’t care, as I wouldn’t care if someone made a Guys only guild.

It just seems stupid to me.XD

It is, but that’s up to her. She however comes off as incredibly arrogant since she had to * type out in fat text * how she doesn’t want flirting.. Guild recruitment.. Flirting.. Guild recruitment. What the cat.

Possibly it is was added because she just publicly announced her gender. As the previous replies in this post indicates: Many saw this as an attempt to draw attention.

Maybe she is trying to make sure that no one misunderstands the intention of her post.
It is a: “No I did not make this post because I’m secretly desiring male attention, I made the post for the reasons I stated.”

That’s what I read into it anyway. But like the rest of you I can only provide my own interpretation.

She is clearly a horrible person for wanting to make friends with other girls.
I can see the great injustice!
Let’s scare of all the female players, let’s tell them they are sexist if they enjoy each others company, do not seek out male friends or wish to flirt in game.

Actually, while we are at it: Implement this in real life as well. Let’s tell the girls that having female friends or prefering to socialise with other females are no longer allowed, because it’s sexist to not include the men!
Or tell your girlfriend to go flirt with the other men because it would really be unfair towards them if she did not

I just reached lvl 80 on my guardian.
To tell you the truth, I had some issues myself at first with the veteran/champion mobs.
However: The second I equipped a scepter, so I could fight the hard hitting mobs at a distance, leveling became very easy on a guardian.

Compared to how it was to level my mesmer, I can only say guardian in my opinion was much, much easier.
Scepter turned out to be my best friend combined with focus for Shield of Wrath.

GankSinatra.2653:

So? Just reroll the next overpowered class. Isnt that why you guys willingly play a scrublord mesmer to begin with?

Nope. As hard as it might be for you to accept, some of us actually like the profession for other reasons and would like to see it viable again in high end tournament play.
Ideally that should be true for any profession.

Aha. Thanks for clearing that up for me
Looks awesome!