Guild Wars 2

Question: Why take -condition duration food if you condition removal is strong enough to keep you alive? One or the other makes sense, but both seems a waste?

What about →
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQRAsa7dl0zKonQTgGbNJhpH923HHVhuTqgrLpQ37G-jUzAYtioRTLWGNJKQ5wioxWFDS1Nsl3optx0wAq4FVbuV0M5p2uDIEwiJA-w

Or →
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQRAsa7dl0zKonQTgGb9IhpH923HnUBXX6hu3duB-jUzAYtioRTLWGNJKQ5wioxWFDS1Nsl3optx0wAq4FVbuV0M5p2uDIEwiJA-w

Alternative: 30 in dueling could have deceptive evasion, only swap Chaos IV with V.

Could also run boon duration food for 90% boon duration. You’re going to be taking a lot of hits without stealth/blink outside of your distortions, so constant protection with constant high sources of retaliation are a good mix.

If I were to try make this work, keeping your heal and utils, here’s what I might try (taking all the above option into consideration)
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQRAsa7dl0zKonQTgGb9IhpHB33HnUBXX6hu39sB-jUzAYtioRTLWGNJKQ5wioxWFDS1Nsl3optx0wAq4FVbuV0M5p2uDIEwiJA-w

I used it here, 10s every 10s

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Build-Poisoned-Apples/first#post2484121

Altered build but still run it, at least 9s every 10s.

Rob.7624:

I’m in a league of my own.

Its called the Platinum Awesome League.
You’re all welcome to join me, once you have solo’d Stonemist of course.

In the Super Platinum Awesome League we use more guys to get the job done in a fraction of the time.

It’s just smarter gameplay.

Certain demographics of the playerbase are unhappy with the lack of grind in GW2. This will help alleviate that.

It is annoying though as, as always, the grinders with near unlimited time will be far ahead of the new par for the game.

Ruin.3461:

Dayra.7405:

@OP: Rofl, #4 vs #5 vs #7 and you cry that loud?
In a winner up looser down system you would play
vs Blackgate instead of TC, i.e. #3 vs #5 vs #7

Edit: Sorry for missunderstanding you, Naracion With a instead of an you would have made your humor more clear

Impossible. Blackgate and SoR can’t be separated.

I always thought BG was official SoR content.

Aneirin Cadwall.9126:

nearlight.3064:

With scepter auto, you can spam clone death…

…12 painfully-slow auto-attacks later… Cripple! Vulnerability! Rawr!

You’re doing it wrong.

arKRazor.8654:

On a more serious note I’m curious how much firsthand experience informs balances changes in WvW. The encounters you have as a roamer will probably skew your impressions of balance in different ways than they would for a character nestled in the heart of a zerg.

Thus why combat isnt balanced by WvW developers, and there are different methods to determine balance by the guys who do.

Harmonizer.4210:

arKRazor.8654:

Does anyone happen to know if any ANet have dabbled in roaming? I’d say something to the effect of “The day I see an ANet tag roaming, I’ll eat my hat,” but Devon will call me on it and arrange for it to happen.

I was leading Piken’s EB zerg during this odd Arenanet tag showing. Ofc we ganked them whenever possible, and corpsejumped.

They were Roaming for a while, until we ganked them a few times… then they joined Kodash zerg (they were on Kodash team) that kept hitting Durios in EB about 3-4 times.

The 3 of them were all warriors. 2 With GS 1 with Axe/Shield iirc. Seemed to be “tanky” builds, because they didn’t die too easily when I ran over them with 30-50 people. :P

Dunno if they were testing anything or just messing about. lol

Knowing a couple of Anet employees personally, I can confirm it’s almost certainly the latter ;D

itd only be anti zerg if its base duration multiplied by the number of targets. That sid it generates dumb gameplay. Instead of letting people get to thepvp fighting, people are now tangled up by a special condition. Also the commander wil always be hit. And people trickling on to the fight will only be faced with an opposing enemy zerg.

Dumb (said in the nicest way possible)

Mix it up with some Knights and cavalier?

wootrick.4168:

Of course! T1 is pretty much 24/7 coverage, but if you weren’t looking to move there, SoS is the unofficial Aussie server, and we’d love to have you! In fact, I’m pretty positive our sea presence outnumbers our NA presence, or at least that’s what it feels like most days

This is ideally what we want. Rally up all the Australians on to one server, lock the door, and throw away the key. Not only are we bringing the community together, we’re paying homage to Australia’s heritage!

Love from New Zealand.

Rigel.3092:

Ross Biddle.2367:

RIOT’s definition of small team roaming synonymous with gank squad, and run away from anything actually challenging.

Though in all fairness your group setup is tight. Don’t presume to kitten with these guys if you haven’t got your kitten together.

They run away from anything actually challenging? LMAO, your smoking what? Most anyone one that roams in WvW will run at some point and living to fight another day is bad? Right.

Interesting you made such a claim and yet gave a caveat to your claim by giving an “in all fairness” mention. RIOT is one of the best roaming and/or small group guilds around and not one to be taken lightly, at all. They wreck crap all the time, despite assertions that they “run away from anything actually challenging”…..no doubt you and Red Cobra have been wrecked by them extensively to come here and make such derogatory mentions and assertions. lol. =.=

The caveat was to say, yes they’re a gank squad, but snaps for being a highly tuned, top of the game, collaborative masters at your ganking. Snaps for striving for the heights of what it is you do within this game and its mechanics. I admire that, I truly do.

As for “derogatory assertions”, RIOT are what RIOT are. No need for your to be insecure about that. Just accept it and get on with the game. It certainly doesn’t bother me that they’re there doing what they do.

Allies see the star, enemies do not, isnt it?

Either way, fixed.

Yes please.

An infusion with actual value to me.

RIOT’s definition of small team roaming synonymous with gank squad, and run away from anything actually challenging.

Though in all fairness your group setup is tight. Don’t presume to kitten with these guys if you haven’t got your kitten together.

Made this condi build a while back, had a lot of positive feedback (pm’s and such)

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Build-Poisoned-Apples/first#post2484121

Though you might try that setup with 20, 20, 30, 0, 0 instead of 20, 0, 30, 20, 0 to get the clone on dodge and sharper images, which are always solid trait choices.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQRAsf7dlwzKqHTzmGb9IipHBnvBckUUavWJF62FC-jUDBINJDrZQ00CLjm6IQ5QFRjtEMaVRBp6KsqbY6YER1mbKamcp2qDQIgFzBA-w

Something like this?

XelNigma.6315:

I just cant see the value in such a short lived stealth even to a group of people. You cant get very far and plenty of skills still hit you be they aoe or channelings.

Requiem is the only one to give an example of this ability being used to some effect. Maybe not 90sec worth of effect but still pretty good.
Maybe if what Nuka Cola said with a group of organized people to weave in and out of it to abuse the quick restealthing it MIGHT warrant the cooldown. Things on paper dont always go as planned once ingame.

Anyone willing to make a video where a group of people use Veil with devastating results?

Generally speaking it allows two important things. First it drops target. Second, a zerg can fake and alter direction. Misdirection can waste an enemyzergs cc’s and bomb.

Kryptic.7920:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Even if it had a 15s cd (traited), it’d hardly be abusable/op in a zerg situation. Veil is used during the initiation of combat, sometimes with a followup if a rally is needed. The thing is, the enemy will have access to the same thing. More veils will mean more interesting combat, and mesmers more willing to both take it, and use it.

Portal needs a reduction for the same reasons.

Imagine a fight, 40 on 40. Each side has ~5 mesmers. One side is more organized and daisy chains the veils. That side now has permanent, repeatably applied stealth for 40 people.

Skills like Veil and Portal have these long cool downs because under certain circumstances they can (and did) get abused to devastating effect.

Think about portals on a 40s cool down. The whole army you are fighting has constant teleports!

Do you know how hard it is to get a single mesmer in a zerg these days? Least of all one willing to play the veil meta? That said, if it happened you’d see a dramatic increase in stealth trap use.

All that aside, so what? That’s a huge level of coordination to pull off, and it’s only manuvers.

What’d it’d really mean is that you could run more mesmers with fewer veils. Hell, you’d be free to run 2 with veil, and 2 with portal, the last with null field, and each mesmer could take some personal (keep me the kitten alive) utilities instead.

allindal.8406:

^^ so much this.

I, and perhaps, a few others, raged at a few guilds for scheduling GvG in wvw during primetime.

But scheduled wipes, and GvG’s will always be slower than PvE. Why? Because of the level of organisation required, and the fact that, for the individual player, he’ll be spending time dead and waiting for a res instead of activly farming mindless mobs.

You guys are wrong on so many levels.

DevonCarver.5370:

The mats will absolutely drop in WvW. In addition, generally speaking, we are putting a heavier emphasis on finding long-term solutions to redressing the reward imbalance between PvE and WvW. I can’t claim they will ever be 100% equal all the time, but we would like it to never be the case that you are choosing between playing WvW and getting good rewards. The two should be one in the same.

But what about the imbalance between classes due to combat mechanics and tagging?

A warrior in a zerg can spam 1 in a big battle and walk away with a tag for every enemy for his achievements, and maximum bags thereafter. A mesmer, or support/boon generating/healing build on the other hand might do his part to the success of the fight, but because he cant wade in and catch people on the edge of his hard hitting sword arc, he gets ignored.

Any chance of broadening the spectrum of tagging? 1hp’s worth of damage dealt, conditions applied, damage taken, etc etc?

If I could offer the OP one last thing to improve his gameplay (both as a mesmer, and in gaming for the future): read this-
http://www.sirlin.net/articles/playing-to-win-part-1.html

This is the one thing I see missing in Menaces life.

Even if it had a 15s cd (traited), it’d hardly be abusable/op in a zerg situation. Veil is used during the initiation of combat, sometimes with a followup if a rally is needed. The thing is, the enemy will have access to the same thing. More veils will mean more interesting combat, and mesmers more willing to both take it, and use it.

Portal needs a reduction for the same reasons.

Terrible thread up to this point. So lets look at the build.

I actually see what you’re trying to accomplish, but I don’t think it’s the best way to do it. I myself run a “hybrid” or balanced build which retains crit damage with high condition duration, and some but not extreme condition damage. I do shatter, but only for a burst at the right time. I have no points in Illusions.

Looking at your build I sympathies with everyone elses concern. You’ve got conditions, yes, but they’re not as good as they could be because of your shatter counterpart. You’ve got shatters, yes, but they’re not as good as they could be because of the trait lines and condition traits you’ve taken. Not taking IP for example means you’re chopping your shatter burst in half. Not taking 30 in Dueling and Duelists Discipline means you’re giving up great DPS and additional bleeds. Those are just a couple examples.

That said, looking at your numbers, and knowing what you’re up to with this build, I’m actually not so skeptical to say it’s a trash build. Here’s a vid of me of controlling two thieves with conditions, then looking for the opportunity to open with a still strong burst.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUYF5entkgE

Here’s some slight changes I might try (though not extensive) to your build.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgQQRAsa7flwzKqHTTkGbNJipCBHKFXH2RqQpV6Bvdh5GA-jEEBYLBErJy0CQ0HAEBhO5ZQrJQJsEMIVRRr8KsqaAqbY6XIqYo6YR2erIa1SBAxcA-w

Is the AA channeled? Do some testing.

At 1:40 you can see me using all the tricks Pyro and Osi talked about vs 2 hammer warriors, a guardian, an ele, and something else.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZ67u0xibjU

Clearly you’re all hacking and need to be perma-banned.

Either way, she deserved it.

Why have a minimum amount of damage dealt at all? So long as a player deals damage, lands a condition, or otherwise gets locked into combat that player should be considered tagged.

Why?

We’re all well aware of the tagging meta. Warriors, guardians, necros, and stronger aoe classes/builds tag really well (some more than others). By the simple act of showing up, and spamming auto attacks in many cases, wading into the fray with little regard for anything other than keeping stability up, and exercising blast finishers, the ability to tag, and out-tag some, is incredibly easy. Meanwhile another class or build who comes to the fight adding just as much importance via conditions, healing, or utility is not nearly as well recognized. Even though he took part, and is as important to the meta of combat as his direct damage counterparts.

Simple solution: Broaden the spectrum of what it means to tag. Make it easier, essentially, to include all.

Consider a battle, 30 v 30. Each side has a solid mix of classes and builds suited to the job at hand. For this example I’ll use some obvious extremes. So the warrior wades in, swinging his sword, tagging multiple different single target with each and every swing. That’s great, that’s what he’s good at. With ease, in the next few minutes that follow, he’s managed to hit and tag almost all of the enemy force (par for the course). At the other end of the spectrum you have the mesmer. Maybe he drops a glamor field, deals some aoe confusion procs, gets a couple hundred damage on a target from a chaos storm, drops a clone in the midst of a zerg which gets instantly killed dealing random conditions (such as vulnerability, or some piddly damage bleed), fires off an iWarden as folks are running by, catching only a single hits worth of damage . All things that often times aren’t even enough to tag an enemy (or simply not designed to), but still have their place in the game. What would be the result from broadening the tagging spectrum given this scenario?

The warrior will still do max tagging as always. Only now the mesmer will be playing the same game, and getting equally recognized for his involvement. Thus everybody wins.

Yes/No? Why/Why Not?

TyPin.9860:

I met today on my necromancer an engie massing Confusion on his targets and I challnged him for duels. He used condition duration and condition dmg food buffs, I used none. I am running myself a condition necromancer.

And I gave him back his confusion. He apperently didn’t expect that the first fight and died very quickly. The 2nd fight he was more cautios but I with almost no life lsot at the end of the fight. This was my 1st expereince with such a confusion build, I gues he used perplexity runes. It was quite simple to deal with him…

The first time that happened to me back before the confusion nerf (vs a necro), was the last. I picked up arcane thievery after that, I stacked the confusion on him, he flicked it back to me, so I passed it back to him.

In the video I posted above, the first stun the warrior got me on at the top of the stairs I passed the 9 stacks back to him. He promptly cleansed. Even with my arcane thievery traited I can’t do that anywhere near as often as he can apply.

One part build, one part play style.

With traited torch you get 1 remove for prestige, 1 for iMage, 1 from every iMage’s attack bounce thereafter (every 6 seconds).

I also run arcane thievery with 20% manipulation reduction.

On top of that, if you drop a temporal curtain on a iWarden you’ll get another cleanse.

With Arcane Thievery, you can also actively accept conditions, knowing you’ll transfer them back.

Osicat has a good vid showing him kiting a necro (though with a condition build). Though you may not have to live at maximum range, positioning and misdirection are everything.

ThaOwner.7560:

25k kills really isnt that much idk why you’re expecting gold from it. I’m approaching 100k and i dont feel like thats very special either

I love your signature. Warrior → Necro → Guardian.

1 Year playing Mesmer solidly in wvw every day. 22k or so.

Perspective.

~Fin.

MartyPartys.9187:

Please stop saying that there is nothing wrong with the mesmer and then show a duel or roaming video. We know that mesmers are good for duels/roaming, this is the wvw forum.

Thank you.

Unless the videos purpose is to show that there are roles for Mesmer in the WvW meta. Then you might just have a point.

XII.9401:

Man, Mesmers come a close second to thieves in crying for more when they got everything.

Guess Anet should have worked harder on making the mesmer class carry bad players more.

Your mistake would be asserting Mesmers get everything all at once. When the reality is whatever you take, you give up a whole lot more.

I went and made a vid from the vs perplexity side.

Xsorus.2507:

tetrodoxin.2134:

I think it’s pretty funny to hear people saying 3s of confusion would be completely useless, while almost all the Mesmer confusion only lasts for 3-4 seconds.

“Master of Misdirection”, hell yeah.

Its like none of you are understanding the concept that that most Mesmer confusions don’t require an Interrupt before hand.

If I interrupt you for 4 seconds, and a Confusion Lasts 4 seconds…That means by the time the interrupt is over and you can actually swing the confusion is already over thus never landing.

Its the reason the Warrior talent was increased in duration to 8 seconds in the past because Confusion never went off cause the people were CCed.

A stun can be broken with a stun breaker though. So your options are to wait the duration of the stun, in which case you’re going to take direct damage, or use a stun breaker (proccing confusion) then start using skills (proccing confusion if you didn’t use a condi cleanse, or if you don’t have any). The other option is to use nothing and jog away, which has it’s own obvious problems.

The problem therefor is in the mechanic. If a long duration is necessary due to the stun length, then don’t base the confusion stacks on interrupts. Find a mechanic that brings more balance. 5 stacks of confusion for 4s when confusion is applied every 12 seconds, for example.

I threw together a vid fighting a couple people who were using complexity runes. In the chaos that is WvW they were the best I came away with in a short amount of time. Not the be all and end all of what someone can do with complexity runes (I’d say there are stronger builds with more experienced players out there), but certainly shows the power from someone who’s mindful of confusion stacks.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

tetrodoxin.2134:

I think it’s pretty funny to hear people saying 3s of confusion would be completely useless, while almost all the Mesmer confusion only lasts for 3-4 seconds.

“Master of Misdirection”, hell yeah.

Yeah, that is one of the biggest criticisms of mesmer confusion and condition mesmers as a whole. Their confusion isn’t mean to be a form of damage but some kind of short duration attack deterrent.

Actually peripheral damage would be a better description.

I’d say a thief, but you’ll have more fun with mesmer.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Zindrix.1750:

Ross Biddle.2367:

More toughness will ensure they make it to their target. No point being full glass cannon if your burst is mitigated by clones dying.

Do clones share you attributes at all besides pwr/prec for damage? I thought they all had low HP and toughness on purpose. Either way, most of the reason they aren’t making it to their target in time is from CC and I feel like they’re just too slow for WvW sometimes.

All illusions share:

1. Toughness
2. Precision
3. Crit Power
4. Condition Damage
5. Condition Duration
6. Boon Duration
7. Power

Also keep in mind that your build can allow you to alter your play style. So with more toughness, where you might have been reluctant to get in close and personal with your enemies before, suddenly you can tank a lot more hits up close. So not only will your clones take those couple extra hits, you can also remain right next to your target to shatter point blank more often.

Back when I ran a shatter build, I’d spend my time rolling around and casting right in the middle of the enemy zerg. Why? Because it ensured my shatters would hit, and because I could.

Like all successful condition builds, everything comes down to amount of damage, and application.

So for mesmers, with our traits, skills, etc, there is a limit to what we can do in terms of application. In terms of damage, taking the one stat layout/rune setup means we lose something else.

The thing with perplexity runes is that, given certain classes and builds, you get A LOT of confusion application, while maintaining great condition damage, at the cost of very little. The duration is also very high on its base.

So confusion without perplexity runes has its limitations/drawbacks as a source of direct damage due to mechanical limitations. With perplexity runes those limitations are reduced, or bypassed entirely.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

selan.8354:

JonathanSharp.7094:

JonathanSharp
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.

which is not really the case as i really put everythig into condition cleansing and then was left with barely any dmg.
i prefer playing the mesmer without specing into phantasms as skills like glam, reflections, confusion and cc are way more fun. i dont care for mantras as they are not viable at all in their current state…but also not sure if they actually can be fixed.
so if they decide to head in a new direction either fix mantras, rework them or get rid of them

we have ONE Mantra to cleanse TWO conditions that is pathetic in a condition heavy meta, even before the skill has finished the 2 conditions you removed have been put back on you as well as stacks for everything else as well.

Then everything else we have are poorly executed, high cost traits – Shattered Conditions for example, not worthy of 30point trait and then we get things like thr Torch one that has a crappy Phantasm that will remove conditions if you are in range with a long cool down…

You would have to trait for EVERY condition removal, take Geomancy on both weapon sets, runes for condition removal and you MIGHT survive the initial burst, you wont survive the next as everything you had to remove the initial burst is now on cool down….

Since when have mesmers ever been built with tanking attacks in mind?

Such as it is with power/crit, so it is with condition application. You heal or cleanse through what catches you, otherwise the mesmer should never have been there in the first place to get hit.

1:45
Osicat demonstrates another example of how to simply outplay a necro as a mesmer in wvw

Terrahero.9358:

Xsorus.2507:

Confusion Damage in general isn’t super amazing, 8 Stacks is less then what I use to do with 3 stacks from Pain Inverter

It only becomes truly scary when you hit the upper stacks of 20+ and lets be honest, If you attack while you have 20+ stacks of Confusion on yourself, you kind of deserve to die.

Funny.

Little trip down memory lane. Confusion would stack at most 10 maybe 12 with some dedication. Confusion also wasnt nerfed by 50%, so the damage was double. So, 10-12 stacks then would equal 20-24 stacks now. Ofcourse confusion lasted a lot shorter as the confusion applying abilities are at most 5seconds, not 10seconds.

Ow i remember those days. Forums were filled with QQ about how confusion needed a nerf. People defended confusion saying

Xsorus.2507:

If you attack while you have stacks of Confusion on yourself, you kind of deserve to die.

well.. that… Still got nerfed. So why is this 20+ stacking suddenly A-OK? Its basicly the same crap as before (even worst as it lasts twice as long), only different professions are doing it, and now this damage is fine?

People saying this stuff is useless in zergs are also wrong. A warrior stomping around in an enemy zerg is causing a lot of interupts, and with no icd also a lot of stacks of confusion on a lot of people.

It’s worse than before for two reasons. Lasts longer, and is applied with far more frequency. Mesmers used to be able to get high stacks, but it required a ton of skills in a huge burst. The application could be mitigated in various ways too (dodge rolling through clone shatter).

As someone who set out to make a mesmer confusion build from the day of release, used right to the day of the nerf, this is grossly OP.

Good times

ukuni.8745:

Bura of Pacra.1589:

ukuni.8745:

Okay engineers and warriors use this best , thiefs come in 3rd, good mesmers should know how handy this rune is, I’ve got a buddy who plays an asura necro and he’s hualing kitten with it, I’ll talk my ranger mate into making a condition build with it, and when I get home I’m going to make a condition guardian (place your bets, who thinks I can doit) I believe some one has also said condition eles are viable with it now, so if no one sees this as game breaking then please go back to pve and stay out of PvP business

Just to clarify, do you like the rune, or do you want it nerfed to hell like half the people here?

I main an engineer and use the kitten out of it, i also made a video for it I’d link it but I’m on my phone but my youtube channel is ukuni99, I also made the first topic for nerfing it, I like it but it’s definitely over powered, I’d prefer to see it amplify confusion builds not be the staple point for every condition build which it is very quickly becoming

What would you think of 5 stacks of confusion every time you apply confusion, with an internal cooldown of 10 seconds (or whatever), instead of on interrupt?

skcamow.3527:

Piola.3782:

@Ross Biddle Nice vid, what’s your build?

Guessing this one:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Build-Poisoned-Apples

And yeah, nice job!

That’s a really hard hitting condi damage build, but not quite what I’m running now.

20, 20, 30, 0, 0 with manipulation traits and a focus on condi duration and conditions via clone death. Hybrid of crit damage and condition.

Alchemist.3692:

Ross Biddle.2367:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoarPwe3t1E

I don’t catch a lot of my zerg based stuff (heavy on the comp resources), but here’s a little example of using my mes for scouting. I can ghost a zerg all day to the point of them aggressively retaliating on me (without success), no speed issues, no needing to give up rune slots, or trait unnecessarily.

24s swiftness from focus (25s cd), untraited, no centaur runes, no heal spamming.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9alhVGq9rw

You cant see it in the vid but there’s a ton of soft cc’s and condi’s being applied via clone death. Again, not my best example but the mesmer is, imo, the ultimate sapping class. The role I play in WvW is “Advanced Scout”, running ahead of the zerg from point to point, and solo engaging the enemy right before the zerg arrives. Waste enemy cooldowns, break enemy formations, distraction and misdirection.

The build holds its own in 1v1 (even v condi), and 1vX
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZ67u0xibjU

Mes v condi necro – standard results
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtYA8N-aZ-o

Learn2Mesmer.

You’re a clown at best.

First of all, temporal curtain gives 12s of swiftness… if you have 24s that means you’re running boon duration runes/food/accessories. I can get perma swiftness like that too, but that’s not the point. Again, it means you have to take runes you don’t want.

Second, you’re in a group fight with guardians and you’re talking about conditions not bothering you? If it did give you a hard time then thats where the real problem is.

Third, that necro was a baddie – and showing one video of a baddie doesn’t make a point.

Don’t tell ppl to L2P when you need to learn to understand the english language. Without traiting into swiftness either via traitlines, or boon duration there is no viable way for mesmers to have swiftness up. Out of combat running speed is around the same if not less than guardians. So l2p, because clearly you’ve never run by yourself and rely on a group to carry you. Try dueling some condition necros that have played for more than 3 weeks.

Boon duration is desirable, best runes to run imo as it buffs everything from damage to damage reduction, survive, healing, etc. Swftness is just an added bonus. So yes, i do take the runes I want as opposed to those who’re taking something they don’t want like centaur runes + heal skill spamming, or traiting to fill the gap.

I say all necro fights end the same way. I show any vid of any/all necros dying without them being able to land a kill. You dismiss the necro as therefor “a bad”. Despite evidence, and through ignorance, your prophecy is fulfilled.
I hear what you’re saying elsewhere about the general player base being casual, and unable to deal with the current condi necro meta, but given you’re talking to an actual experienced mesmer here, your argument just doesn’t apply. Know how to build, know hot to play, and necros are the least of your worries.

Finally for someone so concerned about understanding others, understanding the English language, and issues of forum/posting ignorance, you don’t seem to see (or be concerned by) your own bad arguments and name calling. Calling someone a “clown” for example is name calling, and offers nothing to the discussion other than to degrade someone unjustifiably. Claiming someone doesn’t understand the english language, and therefor doesn’t understand the game, the class, mechanics, or state of play is an Ad hominem attack. Instead of going after people personally, focus on the arguments proper. It does no strength to your arguments and only makes you look bad.

The statement “learntoMesmer” is a justifiable one in any case where, evidentually, knowledge, play style, and build are all factors that will alleviate the problem at hand. I’ve simply argued that this is in fact ay hand.

I don’t catch a lot of my zerg based stuff (heavy on the comp resources), but here’s a little example of using my mes for scouting. I can ghost a zerg all day to the point of them aggressively retaliating on me (without success), no speed issues, no needing to give up rune slots, or trait unnecessarily.

24s swiftness from focus (25s cd), untraited, no centaur runes, no heal spamming.

You cant see it in the vid but there’s a ton of soft cc’s and condi’s being applied via clone death. Again, not my best example but the mesmer is, imo, the ultimate sapping class. The role I play in WvW is “Advanced Scout”, running ahead of the zerg from point to point, and solo engaging the enemy right before the zerg arrives. Waste enemy cooldowns, break enemy formations, distraction and misdirection.

The build holds its own in 1v1 (even v condi), and 1vX
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZ67u0xibjU

Mes v condi necro – standard results
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtYA8N-aZ-o

Learn2Mesmer.

Kamahil.3271:

I mainly do PvE; so I guess I’m asking mainly if sword is useful for condition specs outside of the 2 skill

In full condition during PvE? No.

In a Hybrid build? The additional blurred frenzy damage is nothing to shake a stick at.

Here’s me using Scepter/focus, Sword/torch. This is not a full rabid build, though you could use full rabid.

I think this is full rabid Undead runes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNM4KMo-jEo
Or this with full boon duration runes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtYA8N-aZ-o

Oh, and let us not forget the importance of sword in a chase
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N78IbC9uO1U