Guild Wars 2

You know, back before I started my Mesmer… everyone would tell you a few things:

1. Mesmers suck at PvE. Totally. Suckiest class ever for PvE. A pain in the kitten

2. Mesmers are really fun in PvP, because people will not know which one is the real you.

However, I decided to make a Mesmer anyway. So, let’s look at what we have now. Mesmers got nerfed (yes, nerfed; not buffed) quite a few times since then. Also, many if not most people can now easily tell who’s a clone and who’s the real you. And all of a sudden, people are whining that Mesmers are completely OP, for ridiculous reasons. Wtf?

Seriously; if you can’t beat a Mesmer just because it’s a Mesmer, then learn how to. Mesmers are NOT OP. You just don’t know how to beat them (and believe me; many people know how to do just that). If you lose vs a Mesmer because he’s just the better player… well, that happens. Try to improve your skills. And for f’s sake, don’t run around screaming “OP!!!!!!1!!1!!oneleven!!!!!”. That just makes you look like someone who’s either too stupid or too lazy to learn to fight Mesmers and/or improve his skills. Yes, Mesmers aren’t easy to beat if they’re played right. But now, that’s not a Mesmer-only thing. That counts for EVERY class. Heck; I’ve heard people say that Engineers are so fkin bad at PvP… but did you see the videos of that engineer fighting Osicat? Really awesome battles. How comes that “the most UP class ever” is having epic fights against the “most OP class ever”? Shouldn’t Osicat just have facerolled that guy easily? Seriously… ~sighs~

Wait… I didn’t even see a single one of those boxes. Ever. I thought they stay for the whole month, so I didn’t go and search them yesterday. Does that mean I’ll never get to even see them until next year?

If that’s true, I really hope someone has them on video.

Jackums.3496:

Have you ever played WvW?

Yes. Actually, quite a bit.

Jackums.3496:

Have you ever played a Necro?

I’m in the process of leveling one.

Jackums.3496:

Trying to stomp a downed enemy is often less effective than just using damage to finish them off

Maybe if you’re a power-build and can like 2- or 3-hit a downed player. Otherwise, stomping is always faster.

Jackums.3496:

Mesmer.

You might end up killing yourself, if you’re low on health.

Jackums.3496:

Trying to stomp an Ele is just pointless.

Smack him—>mistform—>smack again—>profit.
Begin stomp—>mistform—>stomp—>profit.

I don’t see any difference. Just that stomping is faster unless you’re a powerbuild (like I already said before).

Jackums.3496:

Regardless of all of this, tell me one other weapon in the game which has 4/5 literally useless skills against a downed enemy.

I’m sure that the staff has many other things where it shines… otherwise you wouldn’t use it.

Jackums.3496:

There are alternatives, such as switching weapons or wasting time trying to stomp. Irrelevant. There’s no reason the staff should become borderline useless against downed state enemies I’m not an idiot. I know there are other ways to finish an enemy. I’m saying we shouldn’t have to use them.

This sounds like you’re q.q-ing because you can’t just faceroll on your keyboard to finish a downed enemy in a 1vs1. Seriously; WHY would you refuse to switch weapons? You need to press only one key for it.

Jackums.3496:

Especially considering Necros are already fairly pathetic in 1v1.

I’m quite sure there are enough people here who would disagree with that.

Cygnus.6903:

Winds.3087:

Esplen.3940:

Because clearly getting a Sigil of Air on your armor is not worth 20 of a stat.

6000-7000 damage 6-rune is definitely worth dropping 20 of a stat, unless they nerfed it too.

Depends on your build for the damage to be significant.

For a conditon build, 6 runes of the centaur are better anyway. And 6 runes of air would still be better than 5 runes of air and one gem.

Jackums.3496:

The fact that they don’t trigger on downed enemies makes them completely useless in a 1v1, once your opponent is down. The Necro is already bad enough when it comes to dueling. I see no reason they shouldn’t trigger. It’s not like the Necro is the Ele or Mesmer.

Why the heck would you want to cast marks on a downed player anyway? ESPECIALLY in a 1vs1? Just stomp. Or use something else. You know, you’ve got an entire second weapon set. Or staff auto-attacks. But yeah… 1vs1… stomp.

Dog.1472:

I use 5 superior runes of air and a focus and I do not fall behind anyone. I really don’t think it’s that bad.

Why only five? o.o

I did three guild bounty training missions yesterday with the (small) guild I’m in. We were 5 people. The first target we got was Trillia Midwell. We found her fast, and killed her. Nothing happened. She respawned and we killed her again (still within the time limit) and nothing happened. After a while, we got the message that we failed. Obviously, we were like “Wtf?!?”. Anyway, we tried the next one and got Ander “Wildman” Westward. We found him, killed him and got the 3k influence as a reward. Nice! One of us had to leave after that, but we decided to start the third one anyway and got Sotzz the Scallywag. Sadly, we weren’t able to find him in time, as the map is huge and there are (according to the wiki) like 300 possible locations all over the map.

I just know that I once got the achievment for 300k by coincidence, when I was firing at some mob with a ballista in WvW. I didn’t see the damage-number, though; so I have no idea how much damage it dealt.

I almost never kill neutral mobs (unless it’s an accident or I have no other choice). Thus, I have no idea how much damage I could deal. On top of that, my main (still my only lvl 80 char) uses a condition-build.

darkace.8925:

Hopefully it’s the next town mini-game (Keg Brawl, Bar Brawl, Archery Range, etc).

I’m playing since the free trial with the Karka-event, and I’ve yet to find any of those. Actually, I’ve read “Keg Brawl” the first time when it became part of the dailies. I admit I didn’t bother yet to look it up in the wiki, though. Didn’t know there are minigames in this game (aside from Keg Brawl apparently).

Actually, I find it quite hilarious that some Necros act like the world is ending just because Epidemic requires LoS now. Aside from ground- (or self-)targetted skills, everything a Mesmer can do requires LoS. The reason for why “every class but Mesmer gets a LoS nerf” is, that Mesmers already got all those nerfs long ago. Yet, some furry members of our community keep calling Mesmer OP. We can learn three things from that: 1. Those LoS-“nerfs” are actually just introducing standards that already count for other classes for ages; 2. Those LoS-“nerfs” will not let the world end for anyone; and 3. There will always be some four-legged members of our community who think that something a Mesmer can do is OP, just because it’s a Mesmer who does it. Seriously… now it’s a Focus-skill that’s OP? SERIOUSLY?!?

Lol. Next time, someone will claim that the torch-phantasm is OP as hell.

P.S.: Talking about kitties without writing kitten! Censoring the censorship before even getting censored ftw!

So, what do you guys think of the karma infusion then? If you don’t farm dungeons and MF isn’t really worth it… would karma be a good choice?

Yes, they did a great job with fixing it.

I didn’t do much PvE yet, but judging from what I experienced in Lions Arch yesterday, I think they made it so that you now always see the nametags of players (and monsters too?), even if the actual character-sprite didn’t load yet. Really nice.

I find it a bit irritating that titles now always get shown below character names, though (in PvE that is).

Continue Coin? ~checks wiki~

Oh. So that’s what that new achievement-category is for. Why was that thing not mentioned anywhere? Not a single word in the patchnotes, and I also didn’t see anything else about it unless I saw this thread here. Putting in new content without telling people about it? o.o

What is this adventure box exactly? The wiki doesn’t tell much (yet).

Orikx.9671:

People use it to troll world chests all the time. Drop the portal somewhere nasty and then drop the portal on the chest after a world boss is killed.

They’ve fixed that with the january patch, so it should be impossible to do that now. Quote: “Loot interactions now take higher priority than mesmer portals.”

Orikx.9671:

Portal bombing is a thing of the past.

Wrong; it still gets used A LOT. Maybe it will get used a bit less once culling is fixed; but at least now, you can still see it very often.

Kazhiel.8194:

if I miss a dodge I can cure agony instantly between torch and cure condition on heal, and do high lvl fractals with no agony resistance. Those traits seem to cure ouchiest condition first which is definately agony lol

…just that agony can’t be removed/cured with any condition removal.

You guys do realize that this topic was created 2 months ago and was dead for around 2 months as well, until PunchaYoBuns necro-ed it (his first suggestion being Necro; now that kinda fits xD), right?

OP has probably already chosen his class a long time ago.

I admit I don’t get all of what you wrote down here; but to me, your calculations come to the conclusion that the staff does massively more DPS than the GS… though since you said you’ll stick to the GS, I think I really just didn’t get it.

Default critchance in full rabid gear is 47-48%. Your default critical hit strength would be 150% of a normal hit.

Soyboy.3548:

-snip-

I smell a troll. But because I’m a nice guy, I’ll feed him for once.

Soyboy.3548:

Don’t expect everyone to read every one of your 1000000000 posts on this forum Pyro. Just because you post the most doesn’t mean that your opinion is more important.

How’d you get that idea? If you are discussing something with someone, you are supposed to read what the other person has to say about it. Otherwise it’s not a discussion, but a player trying to discuss something and another player trolling. Nobody expects anyone to read what a person said in OTHER topics… but reading what a person said in a discussion you’re participating in is indeed expected, especially if you’re directly replying to that person. Got it now?

Soyboy.3548:

Not everyone has to make a pro/con list to use a weapon.

Yes, of course not. I mean, I could also insist on only using a spear underwater when I’m in a condition build. Screw that silly trident! It wouldn’t make much sense to do so, but hey! Who cares about pros and cons anyway?

Soyboy.3548:

Oh and while you were writing your paragraphs on this forum, I made $1000 today.

Congratulations. I think seeing that much money at once has made you unable to see that there’s no reason to start bashing people out of nowhere. Oh wait; you don’t need a reason. After all, you’re just trolling. Nevermind then. But please go troll other trolls instead of people trying to seriously discuss stuff. Thanks.

Edit: At least in this thread it looks like you bring up the postcount of people whenever someone doesn’t share your opinion about something. Is it possible that you’ve got some complexes there? I mean, the forum doesn’t even show any postcount.

Embolism.8106:

I find it slightly amusing that you deliberately avoid mentioning the word “Thief”, as though you are trying to obscure the fact that only one profession out of eight is actually potentially capable of what you describe, and therefore how situational your iDuelist “advantage” really is.

So, let’s say that torch and pistol are equal against any profession other than thief. Against a thief, the torch is inferior to the pistol. So, why should I chose an offhand which lets me deal better with 7 out of 8 professions if I can use one which is good against all eight of them?

Embolism.8106:

In any case, Thieves do not in any way require iDuelist to defeat with a condition build, I deal with them just fine without using any Phantasms. Confusion is the key, even in sPvP: their low HP means they can spam themselves down in an instant with a well-timed Confusion burst.

I think you are confusing a bad skillspamming thief with a thief who actually thinks while playing and is in stealth a lot. It’s hard to burst confusion on them, because it’s not that easy to actually hit them with a shatter (because they are in stealth most of the time). And if you do (I did a few times), you do that AFTER they attack out of stealth, so the only confusion damage they get is from using one skill to stealth again, which removes confusion and maybe also heals them. At this rate, you’ll end up losing the fight because you can’t heal enough to outheal all the damage you get from the thief, while the thief has less of a problem to outheal anything that you manage to throw at him. That’s why I figured I need to do more damage in a shorter timeframe. Kinda obvious, imo.

Embolism.8106:

Trying to compare it to Magic Bullet is apples and oranges.

Not if you compare the usefulness in specific situations.

Embolism.8106:

I might also add that Mesmer stealth is one of the best counters to Thief stealth.

You do realize that a Mesmer doesn’t even have half the stealth-uptime of a Thief, right? I’m not talking about a Thief who stealths one or two times during the entire fight, but about a Thief who stealths after every 1-2 hits.

Embolism.8106:

Yes, it is true that in condition builds iDuelist is stronger, but here’s the thing: it isn’t really that much stronger than a Staff Clone (which attacks more often and provides you with Might and Fury to fuel yours and all other Illusions’ damage), so the actual benefit you gain from maintaining iDuelist is not that high.

This might be true against opponents which stay visible and don’t cleanse 1-2 conditions every second. However, against a well-played stealth-build, the attacks of your staff-clones are just too slow. They might hit once each (maybe not even that), which would lead to 2-6 stacks of bleeding and maybe a second of burning in total. Two iDuelists on the other hand will (even with no power in your build) nearly instantly inflict around 2×700 direct damage (probably more) and around 4-6 bleeds each (8-12 both). If you time your ethereal combo-field right, you can add some confusion.

Staff clones make more sense if they can constantly hit your target, but if the target is permanently stealthed unless its attacking you, you need to apply as much damage as fast as possible, before it goes into stealth again (which will also remove conditions).

Since we seem to agree that iMage isn’t capable of doing so, I’ll throw in that The Prestige also doesn’t help you with that (Magic Bullet does, btw). Sure the burn is nice, but you need to be next to the target to apply it… and if your target is invisible most of the time, that’s only gonna happen if you’re lucky.

The only other option in a staff & torch setup would then be the iWarlock; but it only can crit once and the direct damage is also not nearly enough with no or low power in your build and no conditions on the target.

I can’t believe how ignorant some people can be. Of course it’s possible to beat thieves with a torch, but don’t expect to kill a skilled thief with it who uses a build with lots of stealth. Avoiding their CnD with The Prestige is something you can only do every 30 seconds. On the other hand, Magic Bullet has a cooldown of 25 seconds and lets you apply some damage while they can’t move. Just because they fail to apply a CnD every 30 seconds, they won’t run out of initiative. And then again, I’ve never questioned The Prestige. It’s the phantasm, which is almost completely useless for anything. The reasons for that were already explained well enough many times in this thread.

Also, even IF I’d just suck and you would be able to kill a skilled “perma-stealth” thief with a torch, it would still not change the fact that other weapon-choices are much more useful than the torch. Because with that other weapon, even I who apparently suck so much can kill this specific thief, while it needs a real kitten-pr0-torch-expert to kill him while using torch instead.

The phantasm really is what makes the torch a worse choice than other off-hands in most scenarios. As Pyroatheist already said, The Prestige is a nice skill, but it can’t outweigh the suckyness of the phantasm. So for the torch to be equal with other off-hands, they need to either buff the phantasm to make it worth using, or lower the cooldown of The Prestige to something like 10-15 seconds, because then it would outweigh the sucky phantasm. ^^

Carighan.6758:

I’d want 5-player-limited, 25s CD Portal.

Lol, that actually sounds kinda interesting; at least for solo-play. Portal-bombing would be the big loser, though. ^^

Vanillea.5764:

The only way to avoid this bug is to get access to Blasting Staff before you learn any of your staff skills. By doing so the green circle will have correct AoE indication. However, after taht you have to learn the staff skills one more time without Blasting Staff.

That’s pretty much impossible xD. You can’t learn the skills twice, unless you take another character. And I also don’t get why you would need to. ^^

@OP: Did you try to equip some other weapons and then change back to staff? Maybe it helps; who knows.

Star Ace.5207:

Saturn.6591:

I’m a condition mesmer, and while I’d love to use a torch, I can’t afford to use it because I actually NEED an useful weapon in that offhand. I use focus when in groups, and pistol when I’m alone. The pistol phantasm does more damage, does it faster, and does it reliable; and that on a shorter cooldown than the torch-phantasm. So why would I ever use a torch then? Now, if they would decrease the base cooldown of iMage by around 10 seconds and/or increase the duration of the retaliation it gives and/or increase its base-damage by a good amount… well, then I’d actually consider using a torch instead. I’d really love to.

But in your case, your phantasms deliver a substantial amount of your total damage, whereas the kind of condition Mesmer some of us seem to be running readily shatters them for more Confusion stacks as needed, and we depend more on the bleeds our clones provide rather than any direct damage our phantasms can dish out (it’s a nice bonus damage, but not essential.) In short, the Torch is not a “bad weapon” just because it’s No.5 Phantasm deals less direct damage than the Pistolier-it depends on your particular builds and playstyle (evidently enough, it does nothing for you, and that’s OK.)

The Torch is QUITE useful; it’s just not for you.

Even if you just use it for shattering, the pistol would be better because it has a much shorter cooldown. And with crits, it can also apply a nice stack of bleeds. One of the main reasons why I need a phantasm like the iDuelist, are thieves which are almost constantly in stealth. I’ve fought one of those a few times before I was using a pistol, and I didn’t stand a chance, simply because they would be in stealth almost all the time, and if I actually managed to put some conditions on them, they’d nearly instantly remove them during their normal rotation… meaning when they stealth next time, which happens once every few seconds. So the only thing I can do is to put something up that does damage as soon as they unstealth, and that’s the iDuelist in this case. Some nice direct-dmg (even if you don’t have any extra power in your build) and a couple of bleed-stacks. If you cast an ethereal field over it, add some stacks of confusion (with a bit of luck you could end up with more stacks than from the iMage). Depending on the build of the thief, it’s still going to be a long fight, but you might actually win. Now, same scenario with the torch. You cast an iMage on the thief (and you can do it less often than you can cast iDuelist) and then it shoots an orb at him, which he can dodge because it’s not nearly as fast as pistol shots and it’s a single shot. If he doesn’t dodge it and gets hit, he will get a tiny little bit of damage from it and 3 stacks of confusion along with me getting a bit of retaliation (if I’m in range, that is). If the thief hits you like that, he’ll get a bit of additional damage. IF he hits you like that. He might as well not. And again; good luck trying to shatter on a nearly perma-stealthed thief. Even if you actually hit him with a CoF, he will just cleanse the confusion again and again. IF you hit him. The second pistol-skill actually increases your chances of doing so, but the second torch-skill doesn’t.

tl;dr:

torch: if, and if not, and if then, maybe a little bit of damage with a quite long cooldown
pistol: some nice almost guaranteed damage on a reasonable cooldown

Oh, and in group-situations I’d prefer the focus over the torch as well. You can use the warden to shoot some confusing bolts, it does some damage too (and also adds bleeds with crits), and temporal curtain/into the void pretty much explain themself. You can also use it to cure conditions, without even needing to trait for it.

So, my statement is still the same. Unless they improve iMage, it simply doesn’t make much sense to use the torch. Which is a shame, because I’d prefer the torch style-wise over the pistol. Oh well.

Witchking.4380:

and they broke the skill completely, it doesn’t do blast finisher anymore.

They didn’t “break it completely”. The only thing that doesn’t work anymore is the blast-finisher. Otherwise, the skill works perfectly fine.

I’m a condition mesmer, and while I’d love to use a torch, I can’t afford to use it because I actually NEED an useful weapon in that offhand. I use focus when in groups, and pistol when I’m alone. The pistol phantasm does more damage, does it faster, and does it reliable; and that on a shorter cooldown than the torch-phantasm. So why would I ever use a torch then? Now, if they would decrease the base cooldown of iMage by around 10 seconds and/or increase the duration of the retaliation it gives and/or increase its base-damage by a good amount… well, then I’d actually consider using a torch instead. I’d really love to.

Well, there’s one build-type that has 3 clones up often, and that’s a condition build using staff clones. You actually don’t even need deceptive evasion for it, as you don’t shatter very often (you mostly shatter to finish mobs quickly when they are at low health, or if you can instantly recast your clones after shattering).

Mr. Prometheus gives an example of how such a build could look like in his second video, which is linked in his guide:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Guide-The-Comprehensive-Mesmer-Guide-all-Parts

For the build in his video, you would want to aim for Carrion-gear (Cond-dmg/power/vit). If you decide to invest in the Dueling-tree later, you can also switch to Rabid (Cond-dmg/precision/toughness) or use a mix of Rabid and Carrion.

SteepledHat.1345:

At least it seems that way. I use runes of air. Prepatch, if I used my heal while under temp. curtain’s speed effect the speed boon wouldn’t apply. Post patch, it stacks.

So yay!

Can anyone confirm it working with other skills?

This always worked. What didn’t (and still doesn’t) work, is to stack swiftness of temporal curtain with swiftess you already have.

Temp. Curtain —> RoA works
RoA —> Temp. Curtain doesn’t work

Apolyon.6937:

@Saturn, it plays a lot in The Grove (Sylvari main city), almos every time you watch a Vista. Instrumental version, though.

Hm, gonna check that out soon then. Thanks.

Hm well, they do talk a lot. Kinda impossible to just get their opinions on some things that interest you without watching the whole thing… which is between one and two hours each.

However, in one of the videos I’ve heard this song... searched it on youtube and found it’s from Guild Wars 2.

How comes I’ve never heard it before? Does the song even exist ingame (or anywhere game-related except (for some reason) on the soundtrack)? It’s amazing!

^^

morokris.8462:

My mistake, Warden still does whirl finisher. Berserker, on the other hand, does not.

Yeah, I just had to go to the mists and tested Warden. Well, I’m really glad it didn’t change. The tooltip doesn’t mention that it’s a finisher, though. No idea if that already was the case before. Hmmmhmm. Berserker doesn’t really need the finisher, but for the Warden it’s one of its main uses. So glad it’s still there. ^^

morokris.8462:

P. Berserker & P. Warden no longer do whirl finishers. No more cond build for me.
sigh

Wait; are you serious? If that’s true, I hope it’s a mistake and they fix it ASAP.

Seriously, that would be so so so very bad… especially for the Warden, as it would be a huge nerf for it.

Nicholaa.5472:

I was hoping they would fix the pistol trait bug… ya know the one that increases the range and reduces the cd’s of all pistol skills by 20%…. but actually increases the cd of the iduelest, and make’s it do less damage. :’(
Maybe next month : /

Quote from the patchnotes of january 28th:

“Duelist’s Discipline: This trait no longer reduces damage dealt by the Illusionary Duelist.”

Sounds like it was already fixed a month ago.

My Dead Characters.9517:

Saturn.6591:

What you’re saying is so… wrong, that I just had to log in and reply. Even if the chance to get the bleeding on a critical hit would be 100%, one second of one stack of bleeding would maybe add around 100 damage to this hit. If your opponent is invulnerable, the hit will not do anything and thus it can also not crit and you get no bleeding on it. Actually, as far as I know, you can not APPLY any conditions on someone who’s invulnerable (at least not with weapon-skills). Those conditions that are already in effect continue to tick, though. However, 1 second is going away almost instantly, so there will not be a single stack of bleeding from this trait while someone’s invulnerable.

sorry, but this is absolutly wrong, i must comment. conditions can be applied no matter what buff you have on, take a look at riteous indignation for one. people kill the supply camp lord with conditions while he has his buff up. if you can deal out a good bit of base dmg and still put on loads of conditions you can get them low enough and run away while conditions finish the job. in pvp conditions can down your opponetn while your down, so you can turn the tables and kil them! now tell me conditions arent good. i dare you.

1. I’ve never said conditions aren’t good. I just pointed out that direct damage benefits much more from precision than conditions do.

2. You’re wrong. Well, at least partwise. According to the wiki, the buff makes invulnerable, but I’m not sure if it’s the same kind of invulnerability that players can get. Also, " you can get them low enough and run away while conditions finish the job" is completely wrong. I come to think you’ve never actually capped a supply camp while the NPC had this buff. Even if 10! people attack the NPC together, he’d barely ever get more than 2-3 stacks of bleeding at once; simply because they get removed almost instantly. He does get damage, yes. But not a lot, unless you are like 20+ players attacking. And even if the NPC would be at 1/10 health, you could not just run away… he’d survive and eventually heal up to full health. There’s no way to get high stacks of any condition while the buff is active.

Edit: Someone was faster.~~

Jackums.3496:

wintermute.4096:

travosaga.6089:

These stats work with a necro who will have the train that gives a 66% chance to apply a bleed on crit. It’s perfect actually. More chance to crit which means greater chance to apply additional bleeds which do more damage from the condition damage. I guess it depends on your class.

Well actually… That doesn’t even come close to what power builds get out of it, because condition builds lack something comparable to the crit damage stat.
That trait for example is 66% chance to proc, which only works if you actually crit, for 1 whole second of bleed. Given your average attack rate, that is almost unnoticable.
Power builds on the other hand, can get over 100% bonus damage of any given attack if they crit, no strings attached…

Direct damage doesn’t ignore armour, protection, and invulnerability.

There most certainly are strings attached.

What you’re saying is so… wrong, that I just had to log in and reply. Even if the chance to get the bleeding on a critical hit would be 100%, one second of one stack of bleeding would maybe add around 100 damage to this hit. If your opponent is invulnerable, the hit will not do anything and thus it can also not crit and you get no bleeding on it. Actually, as far as I know, you can not APPLY any conditions on someone who’s invulnerable (at least not with weapon-skills). Those conditions that are already in effect continue to tick, though. However, 1 second is going away almost instantly, so there will not be a single stack of bleeding from this trait while someone’s invulnerable.
Now let’s look at direct damage. Let’s say an attack does 1000 points of damage. If it crits, you get at least 1500 damage (more if you’ve got increased crit-dmg from traits, equip or runes).
That’s a 100% chance for 500 more damage vs a 66% chance for 100 more damage. Of course the direct damage is affected by protection, but it’s not like most mobs/players run around with perma-protection. Also, the chance for bleeding actually requires a specific trait, while the increased direct-damage doesn’t need a trait at all.

The other thing that’s influenced by precision are sigils that have a chance to proc on crit (the one for bleeding is actually much better than the necro minor trait or that ranger MAJOR trait). I’d say in terms of sigils, direct damage and condition damage builds benefit equally from precision; that’s why I didn’t use them in the example above. Except if… uhm… does someone know if the lightning strike from Sigil of Air and the fire blast from Sigil of Fire can crit as well? Because if they can, they would kinda double-benefit from precision.

Generally, I do think that for condition-builds, precision isn’t the way to go if you’re looking to increase your dps; except maybe for Mesmer (because of the “Sharper Images” trait). I assume Necros and Rangers would get a bigger dps-increase from carrion-gear than from rabid-gear. But obviously, damage is not the only thing that matters, so they may also decide to go for precision instead of power (thus, it makes perfect sense that condition damage gear with precision on it exists). But (yes, another “but”) that’s like… trade utility for damage, which isn’t the case for direct-damage builds.

I’m actually okay with that. Just wanted to point out that direct-damage builds usually benefit more from precision than condition builds.

(Off topic: If I could wish for a certain type of equipment, I’d wish for Power/Precision/Toughness (don’t tell me about Knights; I’m talking about power being the major stat)… or would that be considered overpowered o.o).

rhodoc.2381:

Tornado is classified as transform which does not exist such a class in the game. The classification is there so traits work them. So Devs once invented a class like transform and changed it to be something else maybe cantrip or else.

So why “transform” still exist? it has been 6 months.

My opinion is change it to be cantrip.

Wtf are you talking about? Are you saying all those skills don’t exist? Btw, they are called “transform” because they… yeah, because they transform stuff. I know; that’s easy to miss, so I don’t blame you.

Also, changing it into a cantrip would make it kinda OP.

Hm, I personally would like to use the Lyssa runes for their precision, and as an additional way of condition removal. But! I’m okay with the precision I already have, AND I got the centaur runes because I always felt like a snail in WvW. Seriously, I often fell behind when moving in groups, because everyone else has this permanent 25% movement speed increase and just I as a Mesmer have to rely on swiftness. It was so frustrating, thus I got myself centaur runes. Now I can have swiftness up permanently. It is also nice for the EB jumping puzzle, as it allows me to take a shortcut in the dark part. In addition, I don’t HAVE TO use a focus all the time in WvW. The 15% bleeding duration isn’t bad either, as it increases the bleeding from my staff by a second. All in all, I like the centaur runes more than Lyssa. Just sometimes, I feel a bit like “Mesmer… Lyssa… Mesmer… Lyssa… T_T”. ^^

Then again; being a human, I got to kill soooooooo many centaurs while leveling… that earned me centaur runes!

Gallrvaghn.4921:

Also scepters. Maybe adjusting the attack speed of these weapons so that it doesn’t stack a bajillion stack of confusion with infinite duration when 3 clones are up and attacking one target.

Wait, what? Please show me how to do that with a scepter. As far as I know, scepter can only inflict 5 stacks of confusion every 18 seconds (15 seconds cooldown + 3 seconds casttime); provided that the target doesn’t get the idea to just dodge or interrupt your cast. I mean, you are probably refering to the trident like it was before the patch (I guess), but then you say “also scepters” and continue talking in plural. So again… how would you possibly do that with a scepter? If it would be possible, I’d actually use one, cause then it wouldn’t be completely useless anymore. ^^

Funky.4861:

^Saturn, maybe u mean they are real latin words? Pretty sure alate doesn’t mean anything to most brits

Yeah, they are derived from latin words just like many other english words. They are not known commonly, though… I found them while searching for a name for her. Alusia apparently is a medical term for illusions and the like, and Alate refers to something having wings… mostly insects (which I didn’t know; but I still like the name :P).

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/alate

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/alate?s=ts

I think the name fits her; being a noblewoman and all.

Human female, called Alusia Alate. I pronounce it uhm… german. But if you don’t know it, you can look it up in the dictionary; they are actually real english words, so it’s a talking name. In other words, it would mean something like “winged illusion”. That’s especially funny, because I’m wearing winged armor, with my staff having the skin from Caudecus Manor, and the Sword and Focus having the skin from the Seraph-weapons (human T3). This actually wasn’t planned when I’ve chosen the name, but they just happen to be the skins I like the most for this character. ^^

U all wrong; ther r no girlz on the intahwebz!!!!

:P

Well, actually there are. I’ve met quite a few of them haha. Though there’s only one girl I remember right now that I know she’s playing WvW.

Hmhmmm… what would interest me more is, if girls/women actually play male chars too. I mean it’s not a secret that many guys like to play female characters (me being one of them; I play female and male). But I don’t remember that I ever saw a girl with a male char.

So yeah, I’m making this topic because I just got my kitten handed to me multiple times in a row; in the obsidian sanctum jumping puzzle. This thief even won 2vs1 2 times in a row.

Basically, he would attack out of stealth and apply poison on me when attacking. I managed to apply 6 stacks of confusion on him a few times, but that didn’t bother him much, as he’d just go into stealth again and instantly remove it (cure conditons in stealth). He was always stealthed for most of the fight; I daresay he wasn’t visible for more than 1-2 seconds at once, even though that’s technically impossible because the revealed debuff is supposed to last 3 seconds. I simply could almost never target him, and if I did and actually managed to at least give him some confusion, he would just stealth anyway and remove it. I mean okay, I’m not fully exo-equipped yet, but still… he also didn’t do insane amounts of damage, “just” 1,5 – 3k every time he attacked. But together with being poisoned a lot (for some reason the poison actually did a bit of dmg as well), I couldn’t heal fast enough to make up for his dmg. I also couldn’t damage him, because 1. I couldn’t really attack him as he was almost perma-stealthed and 2. if I could get confusion on him, he removed it instantly without even trying.

So yeah, is there any way to counter this as a condition mesmer? I’m running with a mix of carrion and rabid gear; using staff and sword/torch for when I’m alone (thus, also in jumping puzzles) and staff and sword/focus while in bigger groups.

I always thought condition necros are the hardest to fight as a condition mesmer, but today I’ve learned that thiefs can be even worse.

Tiglie.5834:

For all the zerglings, you have no input on this discussion.

Because 90% of all fights in WvW happen to be 1vs1 or at least no more than 5vs5.

Tiglie.5834:

There is nothing you are going to do to avoid a 3 clone shatter of confusion stacks,

Dodge it. Or outrun it (yes, that happens to me more often than I wish it would; except when I’m standing quite close to the target).

Tiglie.5834:

it’s coming out of an invis with a roll to decoy bomb

That’s completely impossible, because:

1. You can only summon clones and illusions if you have a target. Thus, they can never attack out of stealth.
2. Dodges only can create clones if you’re already fighting, which is not the case if you approach the target while being invisible.

Tiglie.5834:

at which time you are stuck with your hand in your pocket, while their burst dps drops 1 or 2 people

Yes, because none of you 5 guys has any kind of condition removal ready. And obviously also, because all 5 of you were hugging eachother so closely while waiting for the enemy to appear, that all of you got hit by the shatter of all the clones.

Tiglie.5834:

it’s a guaranteed I-Win button in small group fights.

If that’s what you call an I-Win button, then the thief’s backstab-heartseeker or warrior’s 100blade are I-Win buttons as well. Actually, even more than confusion. Oh, and don’t forget about D/D-eles. They are an I-Win class. And the condition necros which can eat condition mesmers alive, are obviously the true gods in this game. Grenth looks like a wuss compared to them.

Dynnen.6405:

Lol, I just love the fact that people assume that if you get hit with a confusion tick you’re a bad player.

Getting damage from confusion doesn’t make you a bad player. Killing yourself 9 of 10 times while being confused surely does. Going to cry on the forum and demanding a nerf without doing some research first, makes you a lazy bad player. Ignoring the arguments and advice which nice people give you instead of actually trying to improve, makes you a troll.

Edit: I play WvW and I also sometimes jump into PvP. I don’t remember that I ever died while having confusion on me.

I simply cannot believe how utterly ignorant some people are.

1. You can COMPLETELY ignore confusion as long as you’re not low on health and don’t have more than 3 stacks on you. Unless you manage to spam 10 skills in 3 seconds, that is.

2. If you have more confusion on you, just remove it OR don’t use a skill for those few seconds. No, you will NOT die because you just run and don’t smash buttons. In fact, a conditon mesmer can NOT do enough damage to kill you in 5 seconds. So if you have 6 or even 8 stacks of confusion on you, just wait for that time and then smash the mesmer’s face to the ground.

3. If it’s Xvs1 and you die, it’s not really surprising. In fact, if you ARE surprised that you lose a Xvs1, then it’s probably YOU who’s being overpowered. Or you just happen to always encounter bad players.

4. If it’s XvsX, then it matters even less if one or two of the guys in a group don’t smash buttons for 3-5 seconds.

Seriously, whole classes are considered completely useless until someone finds out how they actually can be useful. Then this person posts his build and fancy videos of his best moments. More people begin playing this build, with more or less success. People get killed by them and they cry for nerfs. Then it gets nerfed and the class is again considered useless. In the meanwhile, someone found a good way to play that other useless class. People cry for nerfs again. Then the same with the next class, and so on. At some point, we’re back to the first class that was nerfed in my example. Someone will find a way to play it well (maybe even due to the other classes being nerfed in the meanwhile haha) and people will claim that it’s OP. In the end, the only difference between classes will be their name and skins. And even then I’m not sure if not someone would show up on the forum and cry because the 100dmg-autoattack killed his 1000HP-character faster than his own 100dmg-autoattack killed the other 1000HP-character; just because exactly during this epic fight the sun appeared from behind a cloud, shined through the window and made him sneeze; so for a second he couldn’t keep smashing the button like a madman. Nerf the sun please; it’s so OP!!1!!!one!!eleven!!!

Oozo.7856:

Not doing anything for 5 seconds is a death sentence in a 1v1 or 2v2. Of course things are more balanced in a (heh) zerg but that is not what is being discussed here.

The biggest damage a condition mesmer can do is with confusion, so you’ll likely not die in those 5 seconds (less, if you use a condition remove) of doing nothing. Thieves can burst you with 13k or more damage in a few seconds and it actually needs you to react fast and also time your dodge to avoid it. Confusion… just wait a brief moment before you attack again. Without confusion, condition mesmer would be nearly useless in WvW (in terms of being able to kill someone, that is).

Sure, nerf confusion. Also nerf class cannon thieves. Don’t forget eles, warriors, guardians, necros, engineers, rangers and of course mesmers in general. Oh, and especially nerf siege! Siege too powerful! It hurts!!!11!!oneleven!!!

-_-

Seriously. Confusion only lasts for 3 seconds. When I’m up against multiple people, they sometimes don’t even care about it. When it’s 1vs1, it sometimes helps and sometimes it doesn’t. Also, confusion is actually the only way for me as a condition mesmer to actually have a chance to at least get A FEW badges in WvW (the only other way is doing the jumping puzzle). Confusion in WvW overpowered? Lol. Never.

Leggend.7219:

Simple rotation of attunements:
Air-4-5-3-fire 3-4-1-5-Earth 4-2 or 5+blink on target-Water-3-2-4 (heal if needed)…

Little tip: Use water 2 as last skill while in water, because you can already change to the next element while casting it.

You know, I once saw like around half (or maybe a bit more) of knights of the coconut, and that was when I knew I have to stop because otherwise I would have to punch babies or something (not like I’d do such a thing; but it’s a saying I catched up from some american guy). Well, now my opinion about Monty Python got verified. It’s just utterly reta… ugh, I guess I shouldn’t write this word out here.

I will NEVER understand how people can like something that’s just… some guys doing totally random stuff that’s not even funny in any way, but instead makes them look stupid enough that you wonder how they can even remember to breath. Watching it makes me feel like my IQ just dropped by at least 50 points (and I still don’t consider it funny xD).

Meh. This wasn’t meant to offend anyone. I’m just trying to express my feelings towards Monty Python.

Also, I’m expressing my solidarity to those who feel similar like me and just got a bit frightened because there’s a thread full of Monty Python fanboys in this forum. ;P ^^