Guild Wars 2

There’s just lots of new players trying out Mesmer now and PU offers new players a very forgivable setup for learning the ropes of a conceptually complex class. Most people that stick with the class will probably “graduate” to dom/duel/insp for power or duel/insp/illus for condi when they realise that good positioning and wise use of base stealth durations are all you need to survive whilst offering far better active cleansing and support for your team.

I can confirm that Continuum Rift is immune to damage. It cannot be destroyed.

I get where the original Mesmer design perspective began, but it honestly feels a little outdated as, after 3 years we know how much of the player-player interactivity revolves around field and blast synergy. It’s the central, unique mechanic to group play which is the whole point of an MMO and it does feel rather odd depriving someone from this core mechanic based on class choice.

By adding even just one reliable blast finisher to Mesmer and Necromancer it will allow these two classes to participate in these core activities in a minor way.

Or they could just balance PU and fix The Pledge.

Until that happens I just use Sic ’Em! with its 2000 range to obliterate most PU Mesmers attempting to stealth away. Nothing quite as funny as watching someone use all their stealth skills during those 6 painful seconds. Always surprised by how little attention people pay to their skill bar.

Maybe it’s going to be called ‘Daredevil’ because the elite specialisation is the very definition of the term?

PU condi Mes is pretty ridiculous and yes it is by far the easiest 1vX build available in WvW roaming. But those “training wheels” have always provided some accessibility to the class that probably wouldn’t be there otherwise.

Generally it’s not a good idea to duel a PU condi Mesmer. You should have probably walked away at that point. You can very easily 1v4 a group with sub-par cleansing rotations on a condi PU build, so the odds of you winning against it in a 1v1 are very small indeed.

The only really OP thing with Chronomancer is how it perpetuates the horror that is PU with The Pledge. I was testing this with a guild mate and it was…not something I’d like to see in the game come HoT. I recommend that Anet nerf/fix PU and The Pledge before Chronomancer hits. It’s a bit of giggle remaining almost indefinitely invisible, but I don’t think it’s going to be fun for…anyone that encounters it. I’m aware that the game is almost exclusively balanced for sPvP (which is a shame because it’s the least original part of the game) and remaining in stealth for so long is hardly beneficial in sPvP, but it would be nice for the sanity of the WvW crowd in particular that this combination is expunged before it starts turning people away.

El Commi.3149:

Simonoly.4352:

How does a Mesmer “spam evades”? Like you’ve got Blurred Frenzy on MH sword every 9.5-12 seconds and then, well, you have 2 dodges like every other class. Or does “spam evade” just incorporate everything a Mesmer does – including utilising good positioning?

There’s also a shatter skills which grants distortion (evade)

I’m aware of that, but that’s an invulnerability skill and all classes except Thief and Necro have access to invulnerability in some form – I’m just struggling to see how anyone can claim Mesmer can evade spam when the number of weapon skills that grant an evade window is exactly one. I can evade spam on my Thief no problem (not recommended) and can evade 3 times with S/D Ranger if that’s considered spam, but Mesmer – nope.

So I guess by evade spam what is actually meant is " a short port (if wielding staff), a single blink, a single evade (if using MH sword) and a source of invulnerability". Most of Mesmer survivability is dependent on repositioning with stealth or simply good kiting with the aid of blink perhaps.

Mesmer is the king of stealth spam with PU. Let the evade spam title go to S/D Thieves and Rangers

How does a Mesmer “spam evades”? Like you’ve got Blurred Frenzy on MH sword every 9.5-12 seconds and then, well, you have 2 dodges like every other class. Or does “spam evade” just incorporate everything a Mesmer does – including utilising good positioning?

Watch out for that extra retaliation damage. Don’t forget to strip before you blast!

Don ’t forget about that increased range on steal.

Anyway, I think you’re over thinking things a little OP. Mesmer had the most traits made baseline because it was the most trait dependent class before specialisations were introduced. Lots of traits were condensed, removed and redesigned so the most trait dependent class was inevitably going to see the most old traits integrated. It’s as simple as that.

Yeah there’s very little point putting yourself through the labour of mantras for anything other than that initial 1 second stun with MoD and CS now. I used to love taking Mantra of Recovery with Mender’s Purity and Empowered Mantras, for that extra 2.5K heal and extra condi removal, but now you have to give up DE for that combination, so it’s better to just take Ether Feast with Restorative Illusions for basically the same amount of cleanse with a better burst heal and the continued joy of DE. Once CS is adjusted, Mantras will have no value.

I think the Mirror Blade nerf was fair bearing in mind the relative strength of Mesmer currently. I always felt it to be a little over the top before specialisations but it glided under the radar because Mesmer was generally pretty irrelevant in sPvP. It’s still a 1200 range unblockable projectile on an 8 second cooldown (lowest is less than 5 seconds with IC and IB). It’s still amazing.

Well it was nice knowing you Harmonious Mantras, but you’re just not worth the investment anymore.

This is really going to have very little impact on PvP (any mantra builds were already on the way out) but PvE Mesmer just took a 5% dps decrease.

Anet have now nerfed both direct damage and condi damage Mesmer (torment shatter, lower burn damage from staff clones) in PvE. I actually think torment shatter could have been pretty useful in PvE with some of the new mobs being introduced with HoT.

Mesmer is slowly entering the domain of Ranger and Necro in PvE now, especially as Guardians provide better quickness uptime. Better hope that Alacrity synergises well with…anything an Elementalist can do. More icebows!

Mesmer bug:

If traited for Mender’s Purity, whenever you use Power Return (Mantra of Recovery charge) it puts an uncharged Mantra of Resolve on full cooldown.

I can confirm this. If you have Mender’s Purity and use Power Return, an uncharged Mantra of Resolve will go on full cooldown.

Pretty nasty bug this one.

The following has been reset in the hero menu:

- Training
- Story Journal (all LS2 story achievements)
- The Silverwastes
- Dry Top
- Basic Collections
- Rare Collections
- Fashion Forward
- Troll’s Revenge

You cannot swap specialisations without repurchasing them with hero points.

I have access to all my skills, but the Training panel still allows me to repurchase them.

Edit: This has only happened with my Mesmer and Elementalist.

These aren’t realistic nerfs to Mesmer.

If a Mesmer loses stealth when it uses any skill in combat, this would be applied to stealth as a whole and therefore require quite a significant change in the way stealth works. Therefore it’s very unlikely that such a thing would ever happen. I’m happy to see some significant stealth changes, but I highly doubt they will ever come.

I don’t think anyone is struggling with dodging illusions that are running at them. One of the easiest things to dodge in the game right now is a bunch of illusions running at you from a distance. I think most people struggle with having a shatter done right on top of them at which point illusion running speed is irrelevant because the damage occurs within 0.5-1.5 seconds max. Anyway, Chronomancer is getting a trait that gives shattered clones super speed so yeah…

I don’t understand why Diversion shouldn’t remove stability. It’s a CC skill so should therefore protect the target from its effect by removing a stack of stability. Also, as far as I know, Diversion will only remove more than one stack of stability if the clones are staggered so each one hits individually (the daze does not stack). Even if you take Master of Fragmentation to make Diversion hit 5 targets instead of one, that’s 1 stack of stability per target. If a Mesmer manages to stagger Diversion in such a way that more than one target is hit with 3-4 subsequent dazes that removes all stacks of stability then the stars have aligned for that Mesmer, or that Mesmer is fighting PvE mobs/ stacked groups of AFK LB Rangers sitting in their Healing Springs.

Shattered Concentration will strip you of your stability anyway unless you’ve got it covered by other boons, so Diversion is the least of your worries.

Furious Interruption

Unfortunately competes with Shattered Concentration for PvP/WvW, but with the lowered ICD it’s not too bad now in PvE (have to go into domination to get the +phantasm damage). It’s not exactly difficult to interrupt mobs with say, sword/sword, so it’s a relatively reliable source of quickness to top up your sources from Feel my Wrath and Time Warp.

Power Block

With all the anger focusing on CS, the potency of power block seems to have gone under the radar a bit. The merged damage of halting strike is cool, but that increased 15 second penalty is so meaty and then the weakness. Oh the weakness! I usually end up choosing this for PvE over the other two Domination grandmasters as, well, it’s extra damage from a piercing counter blade on a stack of mobs. Being able to top up weakness sources on a mob stack is also useful I suppose.

Condi Mes is a bit weird right now. The removal of clone death and the lower damage of a single staff clone burn can feel quite significant at times, but your potential to confusion bomb has increased and confusion itself is very potent now with the change. Unfortunately Duellist’s Discipline and Malicious Sorcery are both bugged, so full potential of condi Mes post specialisations hasn’t really been met.

As for the build linked, I’d probably swap Malicious Sorcery for Ineptitude for more confusion stacking and Compounding Power for the The Pledge for extra cleansing and the crazy cooldown reduction of The Prestige with PU. Also might be worth taking Master of Manipulation so you can reduce CDs for all 3 manipulations you are using. Just be careful when using one of your manipulations into stealth – the reflects will reveal you.

Well that was adorable. I wanna trap James! He so trappable.

Winning a 1+1+1+1+1 against 5 thieves last year. They just kept on appearing and dying in silly ways. Then a LB Ranger turned up and murdrered me silly.

I want to like this concept art I really do, but that right angle on her right wrist is giving me the heebies…

I like the idea of modifiers or “mutations” to the WvW system, but this seems a little too far really. Wouldn’t it have been better to create small changes to the systems every few weeks to keep it fresh? Maybe one week golems are 25% slower but do 25% extra damage? Apply this rule to different siege every fortnight or so – a positive mutation alongside a deleterious one. Just turbo charging golems to the point that all the systems of WvW are made completely redundant for a week just doesn’t seem the right way to take this.

I think I would have enjoyed the video more, if the Ranger had been able to channel the full length of her quickened Rapid Fire (which would probably kill the Mesmer) and then been burst down by the Mesmer off-screen. Then hopefully, that Mesmer would be burst down by a Thief, then that Thief by a dps Guardian, then that guardian by a Golem and so on until nothing is left but Rampaging Warriors.

Saiyan.1704:

I had no issues with Mesmers prepatch because they were more predictable, not because they were underpowered – as we all know – they were still great duelists.

A convo with a Mesmer:
How many condi cleanses do you have?
“A lot, for starters I get 1 cleanse per clone shatter, I can shatter 3 clones.”
When do you use Distortion?
When I feel a burst is coming on, if I want to guarantee a burst myself, stomp or want to cast >insert high channel time skill<"
I don’t know how to outplay you.
“Yea, me neither lol.”

Even the Mesmer couldn’t offer me suggestions :/
That said, I’m not going to call something overpowered when i’m not entirely sure what that something is.

That Mesmer wasn’t very helpful to you. Must be trying to guard Mesmer secrets ;-)

Restorative Illusions is one condi removed per shatter skill used, so if the Mesmer blew all his/her shatters quickly to remove conditions, they would only remove 4 condis – after that the Mesmer could remove 1 condi every 10-13 seconds as each shatter comes off cooldown. A decent condi burst during one of these intervals will destroy the Mesmer, However, the Mesmer will also be able to remove 2 condis on healing, so that’s something to bear in mind.

Distortion is indeed a very flexible skill but it’s still on a 50 second CD like Obsidian Flesh, so the Mesmer using it to cover a long channel, won’t have it available for burst mitigation etc.

It’s stealth bursts and instant cast stuns into a full burst that causes the most problems and counterplay issues. Although, it doesn’t feel too different from spiking someone with basilisk from stealth on my Thief, other than the fact that it’s AoE damage.

I think a few of the new things Mesmer received just need to be redistributed or changed slightly:

Reduce stealth duration of PU to +2 seconds. Replace Might with Resistance.
Make CS only convert daze to stun if it’s an interrupt.
Remove a bounce from Mirror Blade.
Reduce Phantasm damage by 10%. Increase Empowered Illusions to +25%.
Reduce Power Block CD penalty to 10 seconds again (why was this increased?)
Remove Weakness from Power Block and put it on Illusionary Riposte instead.
Make Blinding Dissipation dodgeable.
Make MtD apply 2 stacks for 3 seconds.
Make Chaotic Dampening -3.5% CD.

Blinding Dissipation and Confounding Suggestions could even have an ICD applied per foe like Ineptitude.

It’s more likely that they’re just going to reduce burning stacks on certain skills/traits.

Or, things might go a little crazy and Anet might begin adding stacks to skills/traits that are currently underperforming.

These days, anything’s possible.

I’m experiencing this with all manner of things. Illusionary Inspiration is super clunky because of this.

Choppy.4183:

Simonoly.4352:

I got one of my values mixed up with a meteor proc. It was actually just under 7K Reckless Dodge. It was quite the surprise. I had a good laugh about it.

Do you know if there were likely any additional status effects on you at the time?

I might write him in game or post your pic in the warrior forum (if it’s ok with you) because I’ll get maybe a 4.2k crit in full zerk, with a few damage modifiers, and about 10 might against a glass opponent.

Something’s not adding up with that damage. And, yes, it’s way too high and absolutely should be addressed unless it was a pretty unique set of circumstances.

Yeah go ahead. It was pretty funny, I’m sure people will find it entertaining. I didn’t have any vulnerability on me at the time as I had just entered the fight. The Warrior had vamp aura but that was listed as separate damage as you can see. Can’t remember any other buffs the Warrior may have had.

Choppy.4183:

Simonoly.4352:

I was on a mixture of zerk and knight’s at the time. Fully levelled. I have screenshots of all the scenarios I mentioned because they made me chuckle

Please post the screenshots and the warrior IGN if you have it. The damage calc doesn’t allow for Reckless Dodge to proc that high (even criting with 25 might and 25 vulnerability), so it may be a bug.

I got one of my values mixed up with a meteor proc. It was actually just under 7K Reckless Dodge. It was quite the surprise. I had a good laugh about it.

Sykper.6583:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Reckless_Dodge

Just outlining two things that make this story utterly unbelievable. I don’t even think full zerker with 25 stacks might could land a 7.4k Reckless Dodge, unless perhaps you were uplevel glass-cannon and I can’t consider that scenario likely or relevant.

I was on a mixture of zerk and knight’s at the time. Fully levelled. I have screenshots of all the scenarios I mentioned because they made me chuckle

Mesmer is just the ‘newest’ of the current threats right now and therefore most likely to cause an emotional response which translates to rage kittens on various fora. But really, they just need to branch out with their hate a bit…….like me!

In WvW I had a Warrior dodge roll by me last week and I ate a 7.4K Reckless Dodge from that. Then I dodged a bunch of stuff but got hit by one hammer auto-attack for 4.1K. That’s more than half my health from a dodge roll and an auto-attack. It all felt very pre-ferocity and I hated that this could happen.

I had to walk through the edge of an Ele Meteor Shower and was hit by two meteors for 6.9K and 7.5K. I hated that that could happen.

Ate a 13.5K backstab from a Thief that had stealth stacked around a corner somewhere distant. That was pretty hateful.

Having a Guardian do the same with Judge’s Intervention and Binding Blade as he teleports through a wall/floor on top of me also filled me with hate.

Then there was the Ranger that spiked me for 12.5K with a quickness Rapid fire at 1500 range. That brought up a lot of hate.

The only things I’m not finding much to hate on right now are Necros and Engis.

I must find something to hate about them. Any tips?

Phantasmal Warlock is such a sneaky little kitten at times.

1) Damage across all amulets
2) Burning stacking on Guardian, Ele and possibly Engineer
3) Confounding Suggestions and Prismatic Understanding on Mesmer
4) Bug fixes on all classes that will act as nerfs

That’s about it for now.

Condi Mesmer is absolutely awful in sPvP right now so you won’t be seeing any nerfs there.

It allows Mesmer to sort of persist at melee on point instead of being relegated to double ranged kiting, so I’d quite like for it to stay thanks.

In WvW right now and my ping is going to over 1200. My usual ping is around 20. Quite unplayable.

rchu.8945:

Arshay Duskbrow.1306:

The recharge is just too long. If we had more than THREE utility slots, sure. But I can’t justify taking it over something else. For me, spending a slot to do something twice isn’t as good as being able to do a completely different thing in most cases.

it’s good, but recharge time is way too long for me to have it on my bar.

Yeah I have to agree. It’s great for some PvE stuff, but the lengthy cooldown means it’t not really worth it over choosing another unique utility. I personally think that it should share the cooldown of the utility you are mimicking. So you could double blink every 30 seconds, but have only one more unique utility. I can only really justify it’s use for maybe double veils or portals at present.

Well I’ve spent a bit of time using PU in shatter, condi, interrupt AND phantasm builds and it honestly feels a bit ridiculous. Mass Invis becomes more powerful than Shadow Refuge with none of the risk as you can just use a 0 clone distortion to always cover most of the cast. Honestly, it just feels wrong in its current state. In my opinion, 100% extra stealth is just too much. Feels kind of bad for the game.

As clone death has but vanished and condition Mesmer generally being weaker with the exception of confusion spike builds, I think it would be better to revert PU to its first incarnation now. Protection, Aegis or Regeneration with an extra second of stealth.

Well I’ve been dishing out 10K heartseekers, 11K unloads, 7K Cluster bombs and 9K+ backstabs on my full glass Thief without any particularly notable might and/or vulnerability stacking. Need to try sword next

There’s very little point building for sustain at present because of the damage increase. Better to go full kitten and burst people down as quickly as you can.

No random condition? That’s not very chaotic.

There is a finesse to the new Mesmer specialisations that I have begun to really admire and I’d hate for that to be changed. As you are now locked into a traitline/specialisation each tier needs to have something relevant to the core playstyles of Mesmer (shatter, phantasm, interrupt – condition and support dapple in all three or somehow none – flaming hipsters) or more specifically, the theme of the specialisation itself. If I’m locked into the Domination line, the thematically dedicated interrupt line and want to play as an interrupt Mesmer, some of the finesse of the new system is lost if I have to pick up a phantasm or shatter trait along the way and have to miss out on an interrupt trait. I think this is exactly what the specialisations were trying to prevent.

Confounding Suggestions just needs a little shave like just about everything in the game right now (except burning, no idea what’s going to happen to that). Making it compete with Power Block would be rather odd and go against the logic of the specialisation design.

Absolutely everything is doing more damage right now. Mesmer just has a few new tricks that will be shaved down at some point because they are now too prevalent. It’s even worse in WvW. Hammer Warriors do 4-5K auto-attacks with almost 7K Reckless Dodges. It’s hilariously broken

• 1. It’s certainly less punishing than it used to be. There’s an actual reward for the Mesmer and a nice bit of punishment for your opponent for setting up strong bursts and other such trickery. Mesmer is far more rewarding. But, it is very different to pre-specilisation Mesmer so people really really do need time to get to know the new Mesmer.

• 2. All the new Grandmasters are fun to use except Malicious Sorecery (bugged, not a very interesting GM anyway) and Prismatic Understanding (too disruptive to the flow of gameplay, also boring).

• 3. Yes. I think the stealth duration should be +2 seconds of stealth and one of the random boons should be removed.

• 4. Yes and it’s so much more viable and fun. Interrupt Mesmer could force its way into sPvP regularly now. Confounding Suggestions however, is too strong and not a true interrupt trait in its current form. Someone mentioned above that it should only convert the daze to stun if the target is interrupted – much more balanced.

• 5. Yes, often. I will always have either Chaos or Inspiration in my build. Chaos is decent, but Inspiration offers some fascinating group support (distortion share).

• 6. I like the concept of them but Chaotic Dampening has been nerfed to a point where the CD functionality is almost completely superfluous compared to a flat 20% reduction. The Pledge is also in a similar state unless you have PU. The bleed stacks on pistol are bugged so I have ignored this trait. Overall, not a good start for conditional recharge.

• 7. Yes it’s the best it has ever been and quite fun to use now. However, the overly long 90 second CD makes it a bit of a chore to use especially as you are sacrificing a unique utility in order to cast another one twice. I would like Mimic to share the CD of the utility it is mimicking.

• 8. Not really using Time Warp at present. The Slow is negligible and Guardian offers far better quickness uptime for your group now. I expect it won’t see much use now because of this and the importance of Mass Invis.

• 9. Feel about the same really, although Mesmers using Confounding Suggestions and Prismatic Understanding make for a rather lopsided fight unless I too am using these traits. Condition Mesmers are more ignorable then they’ve ever been. The nerfs to Maim the Disillusioned and the lower singular burn tick damage from staff clones in conjunction with the removal of confusion from Phantasmal Mage has made condition Mesmers weak and very easy to kill, especially if you have the Inspiration traitline. Mesmer can stack some high confusion ticks, but that’s just one condition that is easily removed.

Duellist’s Discipline is bugged, so better to take Phantasmal Fury at present to up your bleed stacks from Sharper Images with pistol phantasm. Also consider taking Scepter instead of sword and taking Deceptive Evasion instead of Mistrust. Both will increase your dps (staff/scepter clones > 2 stacks of confusion).

I honestly thought condi Mesmer was quite poor with the new specialisation coupled with the maim nerf, but the confusion stacking of a full shatter + confusing Images is some truly……Mesmery confusion application. It has potential.

You should do a video of a fresh air ele Vs a burning Engineer, the madness is spread amongst others as you shall see. Possibly even a D/D Thief (less so).

It’s actually easier to tell when a Mesmer is going to burst from stealth because it’s usually accompanied by a phantasm summoning, clone movement, mirror blade, iLeap etc etc as Mesmer burst is multifaceted. I’m seeing plenty of s/t + GS Mesmers trying to burst me from stealth and it’s as predictable now as it was before the patch. I haven’t been burst down by a single Mesmer this week, but I have taken a few 11K backstabs out in WvW with no indication that they were coming as that damage is loaded into one single strike. Just stack stealth around a corner and then go wandering for squishes with your dagger

The only real issue with PU is that it allows Mesmer to reset too easily, just like a Thief. And just like a Thief I’m finding it a little too disruptive to the flow of combat

It annoys me that I didn’t know how much I wanted to see Trans people represented in video game until I saw this thread. Bravo Anet.

Mesmer: feels so much more relevant in WvW now. Use of mimic for multi ports and less reliance on DE and IP to be viable. Unique party support to boot. PU is silly, Confounding Suggestions needs an ICD increase.

Ranger: all the weapon swap traits are fantastic. Longbow with quickdraw is pretty hilarious. Troll Unguent is quite OP when traited, but with everyone doing so much damage at the moment it doesn’t really matter.