Guild Wars 2

Isn’t this already how it works? If I take lethal damage while in Continuum Split, it almost always automatically ends and reverts me back to the original timeline, so to speak.

Exciton.8942:

I tested all power shatter build before season. Maybe I am exaggerating but to put in perspective, i think it is warrior level. Yeah, you can have some burst and contribute if you rotate well but you are outgunned by basically anything.

I dueled my friend’s necro many times with both my power and condie shatter spec(we are both average but were able to make into legend division with relative ease this season). The difference is night and day.

Personally I’ve had a lot more luck with power shatter. I don’t have as much experience with condition shatter, but from my experience it just felt lacklustre in teamfights and quite good in a 1v1 assuming your enemy doesn’t have decent condition removal.

I do think that in the right hands, condition Mesmer can be more potent, but personally I find power Shatter still quite good. It plays like a Thief with a lot of roaming and singling out enemies in teamfights, but comes with a lot more CC, survivability, and duelling potential. I also find that the interrupt playstyle with Power Block is far more suited to a more bursty build.

Of course, I’m in Ruby and I’m not an extremely active PvPer, so take all that with a grain of salt. I should also add that it’s rather difficult to play and has to work harder or take more risks to achieve the same reward that another class can receive much more easily. But I think it’s far from completely worthless. It has its merits.

Exciton.8942:

Don’t forget our power spec is completely trash now.

I can’t disagree that power Mesmer isn’t all too good right now, but I definitely don’t think it’s trash. It has potent burst if set up correctly and good ranged pressure. It’s all I play in PvP and I feel like I do quite well with it.

Mesmer has blocks, evades, invulnerability, repositioning, stealth, CC, interrupts, reflects, boon/condition stripping… the works. My point is, you have more than enough tools in your kit to survive on Berserker/Assassin, honestly. Yeah, it’ll be more difficult and unforgiving, but if you’re after easy gameplay then you shouldn’t be playing Mesmer in the first place :p.

I would recommend a mixture of Assassin’s and Berserker’s until you hit round ~65% critical chance. Condition Mesmer is quite underrated in PvE and runs a mixture of Rampager’s, Sinister’s, and Viper’s if I’m not mistaken, but I wouldn’t recommend it purely because it’s rather situational and doesn’t do all too well in open world.

For traits, the top three trait lines I use are Illusions – Dueling – Chronomancer, but all the trait lines are useful in some way or other. Domination is interchangeable with Dueling in phantasm builds (and I’d suggest using this instead of Chronomancer until you unlock the spec), Chaos is used for stealth and sometimes for boon-sharing builds, and Inspiration is used for reflects or added defence/condition removal. Deceptive Evasion in Dueling is a must for me in open world.

All Mesmer weapons are useful in certain situations, but on power Mesmer your main weapons will likely be Greatsword, Sword Main/Off-Hand, Shield (once you unlock Chronomancer), Focus, and maybe Torch if you need stealth. Pistol, Staff, and Scepter are typically condition Mesmer weapons.

If you need more detailed help or tips on how to stay alive, I’d be glad to help.

I actually think Mesmer is pretty excellent for solo open world. Where it lacks a little is fighting mobs with lots of health (some of the Nuhoch enemies in HoT are a little troublesome) since DPS over time isn’t too great, but otherwise I find it very strong.

I run a power build with Sword/Focus or Sword/Shield + Greatsword. Sword is definitely your best friend in open world, due to it having the highest DPS of power Mesmer, and having a pretty excellent low-cooldown blur. Greatsword has awesome burst and pretty good AoE. Best not to camp it since its DPS is rather low, but it is your best power DPS in ranged, for sure. Its AA is ideal at long range, and the rest of the abilities (#2 and #5 in particular) are better at close range.

For utilities, I take Well of Eternity, Well of Action, Well of Recall, Well of Camality, and Gravity Well (though you can swap one or two wells with other useful/situational utilities like Feedback, Mimic, Blink, Portal, etc). The wells are great AoE, and the alacrity/quickness helps a lot. If you take Runes of the Chronomancer (which I’d heavily recommend) and Seize the Moment, you’ll be getting very high quickness uptime, which feels awesome. Don’t bother using Signet of Inspiration in solo open world if you’re a Chronomancer by the way. The Time Marches On trait gives you more than enough speed. SoI is invaluable for its active, even as a Chronomancer, but it’s an active you’ll find very little use out of in open world.

You use Gravity Well and Focus #4 to group enemies together, and Continuum Split ideally with three illusions out so you have enough time to cast all your wells. The wells provide pretty great AoE, and you can do things like immobilise mobs inside them with Sword #3, cripple all the mobs with Greatsword #4, or facetank the mobs inside the wells with Shield #4 and Sword #2.

As for traits, I’d recommend Illusions – Dueling – Chronomancer, with something like 1-1-2 (or 2-1-2) in Illusions, 1-1-3 (or 1-2-3) in Dueling, and 3-3-2 in Chronomancer. Deceptive Evasion is super handy for open world. The clone generation is great for shatters. Make sure to shatter often. Feel free to take Inspiration if you need that extra defence (the Inspiration trait line and Harmonious Mantras go REALLY well together with the heal mantra). Inspiration is also handy with Focus for perma reflects whenever they’re useful. If you ever need stealth, taking Mass Invisibility, Mimic, Decoy, Torch, The Pledge (trait in Illusions), and Prismatic Understanding (Trait in Chaos) gives you stupidly high stealth uptime with alacrity.

Hope that helped.

Thanks a million for showcasing my music at the start! I was there watching the stream and just had the widest grin on my face.

I will definitely consider making more Guild Wars 2 arrangements in the future if time permits.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

@ Bolded: That’s the huge problem with the base class. Why? Portal, moa, veil, TW. Those skills are “so strong”, it’s “warranted” all the nerfs/weakness of the rest of the class. CS turbo charges these strong skills and a now a new round of “nerf mesmers!” has emerged.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-January-26-2016/first#post5957898
But it will be balanced around CS/chrono. Just look at the defensive trait nerfs. Do you think any of them were actually justified at all to base mesmer? For the most part, all those traits were considered weak and underused before chrono happened. They deserved buffs. Chrono happens and instead of only heavy nerfs to chrono, base mesmer traits are gutted. That’s on top of the alacrity and quickness/slow stomping nerfs. Chrono CS is the excuse/reason to nerf even those strong skills. So what are future elite specs left with? A weak base to build off of.

If they nerf the double TW etc with CS, we can demand reduced CD and/or increased duration on TW. Alternatively, ask for a pve/pvp split to bring back the 100% increase to PvE only. Less duration but strong effect is fine.

OK, I see your point, but don’t you think that’s a problem every class has? Every elite spec builds off of the base class, so every base class is vulnerable to nerfs due to their elite specs. In fact, in the very same patch notes that Mesmer got nerfed, other classes such as Elementalists saw nerfs to their base kit too. Oh, and those Mesmer nerfs in particular were largely targeted towards the bunker Mesmer build, which was so oppressive that it deserved nerfing. CS wasn’t necessarily what made bunker Mesmer so strong. Well of Precognition, alacrity, copious access to chaos armour from ethereal fields, and great res/stomp control is what made it strong.

I’m not saying I agree with how they handled the nerfs (especially how they gutted Well of Precognition, but that’s a story for another day), but those nerfs aren’t any indication that CS is an unhealthy part of the game. In fact, I’d argue that the fact that base Mesmer saw no nerfs on the same day Chronomancer was released is a stronger argument that CS isn’t affecting base Mesmer too heavily. Hell, aside from those nerfs that were clearly targeted towards bunker Mesmer, we haven’t even seen any other nerfs to base Mesmer… we even saw buffs.

Now, yes, I can’t deny that it has balance implications on all of Mesmer, but this brings me back to what I said at the start of this post – it is a problem that every class will run into. Reaper got a trait that added a damage component to chill, and that has balance implications on every application of chill on base Necromancer to say the least. Herald gets a +50% boon duration increase so that has balance implications on every application of any boon in the Revenant’s kit. Tempest gets new aura traits, so now every aura application on base Elementalist needs to be kept in check. And so on and so forth.

Granted, none of my examples have as much of an overarching impact on a base class as CS does, but don’t forget that CS has counterplay and is on a large cooldown. Like… sure, the confusion stacking on double Scepter #3 using CS is really strong, but you can always interrupt/CC the Mesmer to stop him from doing that, or break the rift object that spawns. That’s healthy counterplay right there.

Quadox.7834:

The reason i didn’t consider (2) was just because i don’t play skyhammer Of course you can use in that situation to survive, but you should not get yourself into those situations in the first place- the ideal way to use F5 is always with moa. If it was something like 40 (30?) second cooldown and no elite reset the uses would indeed be diverse and interesting. I really really want all these uses to be viable.

But… they are. Really – all those uses have achieved very real and successful results to me. Granted, most of them are WvW or PvE. I will concede that in PvP, yes, in most scenarios you’d want to cast your elite in CS, but to me that makes sense. The elites of every class are designed to be skills that make the biggest impact. Why wouldn’t you try to use them? If they make the elites unusable in CS, then they’ll just get replaced by some other powerful skill from a Mesmer’s kit as the “ideal skill to use”. Fact of the matter is, a total of six seconds isn’t much time, and you’ll want to use it wisely.

However, that shouldn’t stop you from using CS creatively. Sure, use it to double your elite, but why stop there? Why not use CS to follow up your elite with a double greatsword burst? Or maybe to cast Shield 5 twice in a teamfight for the AoE stun and the double cooldown refund? Or maybe to start a stomp, blink away, and then use CS to blink back and safely secure the stomp? A maximum of six seconds isn’t a lot of time, but it’s more than enough to cast your elite and leave you with plenty of time for some more dynamic/creative play.

Quadox.7834:

I’m sorry but none of these are good uses of CS. You should use it for 90- second cooldown on moa. The 8. is the only “good” thing out of these.

Come on now. Moa doesn’t have to always be tied to CS, simply because Moa isn’t a be-all and end-all ability that works in every situation. What would you have suggested I do in situation 1.) for example? Use Moa? I was alone; a Mesmer alone can’t kill a full-health Moa that knows how to dodge. I used CS to double my knockback and secure Stillness for my team. Also, I question why you consider 8.) a good way to use CS to avoid death, while in 2.) I use it to avoid death too, just in a different way.

Lastly, Moa isn’t even used outside PvP. A lot of the uses I mentioned are still completely viable in PvE and WvW. I’ve used the pseudo-Shadowstep in the Cliffside fractal to hit the seal and port back, an otherwise dangerous manoeuvre at high scales without CS. I’ve used triple blinks for mobility and quadra Well of Recall for out-of-combat alacrity. I’ve used perma stealth to solo certain fractals/dungeons. Etc.

Yes, doubling your elite or putting your elite on a 90s/72s-cooldown is a strong way to use CS, but that’s not the only way to use it. The sooner you start applying it to different uses, the sooner you’ll realise what a dynamic skill it can be.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

While elite specs have power creep across the board, which class do you think has it the worst when it comes to the elite spec being the reason to nerf the base class? While thieves can complain about S/D acro, that was one trait line. Bomb heals on engineer? maybe 1 GM trait. CS, as you said, means that any potential buff to base mesmer, besides our terrible auto attacks, has to be considered with CS in mind. Nothing else compares to that.

In the AMA initiated by Mo, they announced that an expansion is in the works and elite specs only come with expansions. Which classes future elite spec gets shafted because of the first elite spec that came out? Only Mesmer because the base has to be held in check to prevent CS making it OP.

I mean, I won’t disagree, CS makes balance a lot more difficult. However, let’s consider that CS is a max of six seconds – that fact alone already gives it counterplay. If you CC the Mesmer, break line of sight, blind, etc, then you can basically totally negate any effect CS has. You can also attack/cleave the rift to end it early.

Plus, very few Mesmer abilities actually have a huge impact when cast multiple times with CS. Nobody’s going to be up in arms because the Mesmer cast Mind Stab or Decoy twice. Of course, there are some exceptions to non-elite skills that do have a big impact, such as Signet of Domination’s pretty ludicrous 3-second stun, but they are outliers. I’m a firm believer that the main “offenders” when it comes to questionable balance with CS are the elites, and right now, I think most of Mesmer’s elites have decent counterplay, even with CS. The only exception to this is Moa, which is a ridiculous and extremely binary skill, and I wouldn’t oppose a nerf to it in return for a buff to other areas, so that Mesmers aren’t pigeon-holed into taking that skill.

May I also remind you that doing something like removing elite usage in CS will have huge implications on PvE, especially in the way of Time Warp. It’d be a massive nerf to quickness Chronomancers, which wouldn’t reflect well for their viability since so many classes benefit heavily from quickness.

Lastly, other elite specs aren’t in danger of being toned down in power due to Chronomancer. A future elite spec will have to replace Chronomancer’s trait line, so it won’t be balanced around CS.

Anyway, the point is, yes, balance will be difficult with Continuum Split around, but I think it’s absolutely worth it, and I also think that it’s not impossible to balance around CS while still keeping Mesmer respectably strong when it’s on cooldown. CS has counterplay, which already helps to keep it in check. On the bright side, it greatly rewards play-making, foresight, and pinpoint combos. That’s a healthy skill in my books.

Here are a couple of Mesmer/Chronomancer bugs I’ve come across. Most of these are easily reproducable, and I’ve attached video, GIF, or image proof to each one.

1.) Chronophantasma doesn’t work in areas with forced transformations (Thuamanova Fractal, Urban Battleground Fractal, some story missions / dungeons, etc). You shatter the phantasms but they don’t respawn again. This has been effective ever since these transformation changes took effect.

How to Reproduce: Go into any instance where you’re forced into a transformation in which you can still use your skills (Thaumanova Fractal, Urban Battleground Fractal, Ascalonian Catacombs, etc), and turn on Chronophantasma. Spawn some phantasms, shatter them, and watch how they don’t respawn.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/LO5H

2.) Tides of Time doesn’t refund 20 seconds of the cooldown when catching the returning wave twice using Continuum Split (CS). Note that this only seems to happen when the Mesmer has no illusions out AND ends Continuum Split early.

How to reproduce: See GIF below. Start by casting Tides of Time, then cast CS before Tides of Time goes on cooldown. Once you see Tides of Time on Cooldown, end CS early and immediately cast another Tides of Time. You’ll catch both returning waves but only the first will give you the 10-second refund.

GIF Proof: https://gfycat.com/WillingMerryGull

3.) Continuum Split’s rift object doesn’t always visually disappear.

How to Reproduce: I can’t quite reproduce this yet, but I think it seems to happen more during the Thaumanova Anomaly fight.

Image Proof: http://puu.sh/ngfld.jpg

4.) If you cast two Gravity Wells in such a way that the second well starts before the first ends, then they sort of override each other and a lot of the crowd control and damage ticks don’t successfully land on the enemy.

How to Reproduce: Cast Gravity Well, hit CS before Gravity Well goes on cooldown, hit CS again after Gravity Well goes on cooldown, immediately cast Gravity Well again before the first Gravity Well ends.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/JEUq

5.) The Phantasmal Haste trait (+20% phantasm attack frequency) doesn’t affect the Shield phantasm. Easily reproducable.

How to Reproduce: Cast a Shield phantasm (Shield skill #4) without Phantasmal Haste and time its attack frequency. It should be one attack every ~8 seconds. Then, try it with Phantasmal Haste. The attack frequency remains the same. In the below video you can see me cast the phantasm both with and without Phantasmal Haste (the main screen = with, the top-right overlay = without) and you can see how the attack rate is exactly the same.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/1h87

6.) If you receive lethal damage in Continuum Split, the intended behaviour seems to be that it will cast Continuum Shift and revert you out of CS automatically (see this video for proof). Sometimes, and I can’t for the life of me figure out how to reproduce this, it actually downs you within CS. The rift object that’s left by Continuum Split is literally right next to my downed body, but for some reason it didn’t automatically revert me back. I still haven’t figured out how to reproduce this and I have no proof.

How to Reproduce:

Video Proof:

7.) This is a weird one. Casting Mind Stab and waiting a split second before moving will root you in place until the animation is finished entirely. If you move right after you cast Mind Stab this isn’t an issue.

How to Reproduce: Stand still, cast Mind Stab (Greatsword #3), and pay attention to the yellow bar above your skill bar. Once it’s almost completely disappeared, try moving forward. You should be rooted in place. The video shows it happening to me – despite me hitting my “move” button only slightly after casting Mind Stab, my character only starts moving once the animation is complete.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/jYct

8.) Getting interrupted while casting Well of Precognition puts it on a full cooldown, unlike other skills where an interrupt puts the skill on a cooldown of a couple of seconds.

How to Reproduce: Try and get yourself interrupted as you cast Well of Precognition. My favourite place to do this is on the traps in the Cliffside Fractal. It should go on a 45-second cooldown.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/Qm6v

9.) The “Sluggish” Mistlock Instability in fractals 61 – 70 is supposed to increase the recharge on your abilities by 25% if you cast them while having a condition on you. For some seemingly unrelated reason, if you have a condition on you, the instability also stops the Mesmer skill Mimic from working.

How to Reproduce: Enter any fractal from difficulty scale 61 to scale 70, and allow yourself to get inflicted by a condition. Cast Mimic, followed by another skill, and note how it doesn’t recharge the cooldown of the skill so you can cast it again. In the video below I enter scale 67, allow myself to get crippled, and then cast Mimic with Blink, to no avail.

Video Proof: https://vid.me/jY6t

10.) The +33% daze duration from Rune of the Mesmer does not apply when you take the trait Confounding Suggestions. This works fine without the trait (can provide video proof of that), but with the trait, it doesn’t affect the stun at all.

How to Reproduce: Pop into PvP, take the Domination trait line with Confounding Suggestions, and take Rune of the Mesmer. The stun you inflict remains the same duration. See the below video where I compare with Rune of the Mesmer (main screen) and without (overlay).

Video Proof: https://vid.me/Rpl0

Please post here if you have any more Mesmer bugs and I’ll try and reproduce them as best as I can!

Am I the only one here who thinks CS is perfect as it is?

I like that, despite it being a complex skill, there are no weird exceptions or tradeoffs. It puts me in a new timeline, I can do whatever I want in that timeline, and when the time is up, it phases me back to the original timeline with everything how I left it, no questions asked, no elites excepted, etc.

To be honest, the suggestions offered in this thread are things I deeply hope ArenaNet don’t consider. I think CS is an extremely elegant and dynamic skill with a LOT of uses that aren’t even given credit for in this thread, and adding a whole bunch of exceptions or weird systems to somehow balance the shatter will ruin it in my opinion. Some things I’ve done with CS:

1.) Using the GS knockback twice to push someone in the Temple PvP area down into one of the holes near Stillness, allowing me to secure the buff. One knockback wasn’t enough, and I knew that, so I used CS to land two and get the enemy away from the buff without even needing to lay a finger on him in terms of damage.

2.) Hitting CS right before I see that I’m going to get knocked off from somewhere (Skyhammer in PvP is a good example), so that I’ll fall down and then just hit CS again to port myself back up.

3.) Duplicating Mimic, allowing me to cast three or even four of a single ability without even needing a single illusion out. Triple blinks, quadra feedback, etc.

4.) Leading from the above point, duplicating various stealth skills and Mimic using CS allows for near permanent stealth uptime.

5.) Using it as a makeshift Signet of the Ether, casting a phantasm once inside CS and then casting it again outside CS.

6.) Using it as a makeshift Shadowstep (CS + blink). Useful in PvE whenever you need to port somewhere, do something really quickly, and port back.

7.) Using it along with Portal, Mimic, and alacrity to maintain a portal between two locations almost indefinitely. Great in WvW.

8.) Popping CS in advance when I’m anticipating a burst to mitigate the damage.

And I can go on. These may seem like “on paper” applications that might not be as practical in a real scenario, but I can tell you from now that I am very often using CS for the above applications. If you’re using it just to double your elite or spam skills, then you are doing a disservice to the skill and to your own creativity.

What I will concede is that it’s absolutely true that CS has big implications on the balance decisions of the class. Whenever ArenaNet tweak something in Mesmer’s kit, they’re going to have to think about its interactions with CS. Personally, I am more than happy to suffer some balance consequences for the sake of keeping the skill as it is, because it’s a really awesome mechanic.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Holy cow. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this.

Man, I’m sitting here with tears in my eyes — such a sucker for good music, for “our” music, and for how you’ve so beautifully interpreted it, too!

Wow, I took way too long to notice this.

My day has been made. Thanks a million for the wonderful comments.

And thank you to all the other people who commented in this thread too!

lioka qiao.8734:

That was beautiful music. I’m kind of a sucker for orchestral stuff.

You and me both.

Thank you!

Heya! I’m a composer and a huge fan of Guild Wars 2 and its wonderful soundtrack. I thought it was about time I made a fan tribute, and after nearly 35 hours of work, I ended up with this fully-orchestrated, five-minute arrangement of the Tarir soundtrack, “The City of Gold”:

https://youtu.be/buXbpRKh1ts

Credit goes to Lena Chappelle, the original composer of the themes I arranged, namely these two. Keen-eared listeners might also pick up some nods to the original Guild Wars 2 pre-HoT soundtrack, composed by Jeremy Soule.

With this arrangement I wanted to tell the story of an initially peaceful Tarir getting invaded by Mordrem, followed by it eventually being retaken by the Exalted/the players, so you’ll hear a bunch of mood changes and arrangements of various themes in the soundtrack.

I used FL Studio 11 to compose this, with East/West and Spectrasonics libraries. Shoutout as well to the following two people for lending their talents to this piece:

Violin – Matt Macellaio: http://www.soundcloud.com/trikeair

Vocal – Ivana Stivala: http://www.soundcloud.com/alwiren

Thanks as well to all my friends for giving me a bunch of feedback and criticism along the way to help shape this track to what it is now.

I really hope you all enjoy it, and any kind of feedback would be greatly appreciated! It was a lot of work but I had a blast writing it, and it relieved me of a dry period of writer’s block I’ve been having for the past year haha. If this is received well then I would be totally up for writing more Guild Wars 2 arrangements in the future!

You can download a high-quality MP3 of this track from my SoundCloud page by the way :).

I’m happy to see that the team is accepting feedback!

I thought that the patch was on the whole positive. The Core Tyria gliding has to be my favourite new addition. I was hoping for that to be implemented since the very start, but never believed it would actually be implemented due to the work involved. I’m tremendously glad I was wrong.

I haven’t tried the new Shatterer, the Lunar event, etc, yet, but my main points of criticism are for the Chronomancer changes.

Most of what I’m saying has already been said. The alacrity nerf feels really significant and hurts the class a lot more than it should, in my opinion. The whole spec revolved around alacrity and a nerf to it meant a nerf to Chronomancer’s personal DPS, phantasm uptime, quickness uptime, shatter frequency, elite skill frequency, etc… Yes, alacrity was a huge factor for party DPS and I agree that it should’ve been toned down, but I think that alacrity applied to the Chronomancer himself should remain at 66% effectiveness. That way, Chronomancer’s party DPS increase will be directly targeted for the nerf (which was the reason for the nerf in the first place) without hurting any other areas.

My suggestion to implement it would be to put it in Flow of Time as an additional effect on top of the “alacrity on shatter” effect. I feel it’s important to put it in a minor trait over a major one, because if it’s put in a major one (like Improved Alacrity) then it would probably just overshadow the other two major traits in the same tier. Either way, as long as Chronomancers get their 66% alacrity back in some form, I will be happy.

Well of Precognition changes depress me. The pulsing Aegis goes against the theme of the well and of the whole class, and Aegis is far too unreliable for the well to find any use anymore, especially with the relatively huge cooldown of 45 seconds. I’m curious as to why this change was necessary. I get why preventing capture point contribution was an important change, but I just don’t understand this Aegis change. The only reason I can think of for the change is to ensure that Well of Precognition doesn’t skip mechanics like Vale Guardian’s green circles.

If the well was changed back to blur AND prevented capture point contribution then that would fix things, no?

Anyway, that’s all my criticism. As a whole the patch was great, and most of the balance changes look sensible. I hope that the Chronomancer changes I mentioned will at least be considered.

Please ArenaNet, revert this change. It gives me no reason to use the focus now, beyond reflects. What used to be my go-to PvE weapon is now something I’ll only use for one very specific purpose. I thought the functionality was perfect before. It was a little unreliable till you gott used to it, but I used to take pride in being able to figure out the best point to place my curtain to stack mobs together rather than scatter them further, as I’m sure many other mesmers did.

If this was the curtain’s intended functionality, then I guess I can’t argue with it, but I’d at least like a statement from the dev team on it. Just someone saying SOMETHING about what drove them to change the pull, and if they’re going to be making any more changes to it. Right now I feel entirely in the dark.

I agree with the risk:reward ratio being out of wack. It feels like there’s too much incentive to go into a fight and do things that are supposed to be risky but really aren’t. It’s frustrating to see that 90% of my crowd control doesn’t work on professions like warriors since they very often have stability up. I’ve practically given up trying to burst a thief since thieves are simply too slippery. I’m tired of engineers running to a capture point and camping there with a bunch of turrets near them. Even I’m guilty – I’m sure thieves are tired of me using mesmer greatsword 5 to push them out of shadow refuge, or any downed opponent tired of me popping my distortion shatter to become invulnerable to any interrupts. All of this, coupled with the fact that each profession has access to two consecutive dodges, makes for a game that has too many “Plan B”s and an excessive abundance of counterplay.

My point is, I see people go into 1vX fights all the time since they have a million and one ways of disengaging if things go wrong. I see people finishing downed players in the middle of a 5v5 teamfight, simply by going into stealth/invulnerability or doing it while nobody’s looking. I see people capturing a point close to an enemy base and getting away with it 99% of the time if they get caught out. All of this should be considered very high-risk/high-reward things to do, but while they are generally high reward if they work out well, they have very little risk attached to them.

Comparing it to League, you need to employ a lot more strategy and resource management. What thieves have access to essentially 24/7 – stealth – comes in the form of a ~90s cooldown ultimate ability for the LoL champion Rengar, and it isn’t even instant stealth. It even warns enemies with an exclamation mark above their head if a stealthed Rengar is close by! What a lot of classes have frequent access to – stability – comes in the form of a ~100s cooldown ultimate ability for the champion Olaf, and it only lasts for six seconds. Invulnerabilty is another thing many classes have access to, and in League, Kayle has it as an ultimate ability and it only lasts for 3 seconds.

I’m just giving examples here to compare risk:reward ratio for two games which both have PvP. I feel that there just isn’t enough risk involved in Guild Wars due to how bloated every class’s kit is, whereas in a game like League every thing you do has a meaningful effect and meaningful risk. I am certainly not saying League is better than GW2, but I feel like it provides a more consistent and competitive PvP experience. Both PvP experiences have their own merits – I much prefer the pace of GW2’s PvP, for example, and the fact that I don’t have to play on the same map constantly if I want to do PvP (unlike in League), but at the same time I feel like GW2 PvP has a few quirks which aren’t present in some other PvP games.

Still, like I said in my previous post, for me it’s super fun regardless and while it might not be everyone’s cup of tea, it’s certainly worth a shot.

This community is insanely helpful ._.

Thanks a lot! I’ll look into those guides and PM you with any queries I have.

Also yeah I think I burst too obviously. My burst usually involves Sword 3 + Sword 3+ Sword 2 + Mirror Images + Shatter, or Pistol 5 + Pistol 4 + Sword 3 + Dodge + Sword 2 + Shatter. 99% of the time, while I’m doing my sword 2 (during which they should be immobilised), they just break out of it (especially thieves – seriously what is the point of landing any CC on them haha).

I don’t know exactly how to bait cooldowns so I can land a proper burst, since unlike other classes with bursty builds, my burst takes a bit of preparation and it’s easy to see it coming.

From a MOBA player to a MOBA player, I can tell you that this PvP is definitely a different experience. I’m still very very new to it, but I feel like it’s kind of bloated and cluttered.

Like, in League there are always particular moments where you can take advantage of your enemy’s weakness/cooldowns or any mistakes they make. In GW2 I find that these moments are a lot more rare. Like, I try and do my burst on someone and they pop some invulnerability/block mechanism. I try again, they dodge it. I try to stun/immobilise them first and try again, turns out they have stability on. I try again, they teleport/use a stun breaker. I try removing their buffs, they pop on a bunch of new ones, etc….

Well, maybe I’m exaggerating since it’s kind of impossible to have all that counterplay in just one build/skillset (and you’ve got to be pretty kitten experienced to manage your cooldowns and react so well anyway), plus with enough knowledge of your opposing class you can probably find openings in combat and learn cooldowns, but still, at least to a beginner it often feels like your enemy is an inexorable beast with an answer to every skill you throw at him/her.

Also, due to the fact that each class gets access to two dodges, a heal and roughly 14 other abilities (not counting the heal) at any one point, (some up to 24), there’s rarely a moment when you can exploit the fact that they’re on cooldowns and dish out a reliable combo.

Hell, not that I’m one to talk. I play as a mesmer and mesmers have pretty ridiculous things in their kit, such as the ability to be entirely invulnerable for up to 6 seconds (quadra distortion shatter + Sword 2), the ability to turn someone into a useless Moa for 10 seconds (I don’t even use it because of how cheap I think it is), and a bunch of disengages in the form of stealth, portals, blinks, knockback and clone swapping. It’s a case where rather than there being any weak classes, everyone’s overpowered to an extent, or at least that’s what it feels like to me.

Not to mention, some builds in the game are simply broken, such as a thief being able to pop in and out of stealth almost at will, giving him/her full control of the fight and the ability to disengage from the fight whenever s/he wants, or a warrior taking some insane bunker build that makes him unkillable in a 1v1, turning each fight into a 3-minute button-spam contest.

Because of all this, I think you might find the PvP a bit frustrating and inconsistent. HOWEVER, having said all that, I think it’s worth a try. Despite my issues with it, it’s really action-packed, and if you actually have a fair and close game with no people leaving and no broken mechanics, it’s fun, exciting and feels rewarding. Get past the early frustration of PvP and you might end up having a blast.

Thanks, really great tips. Ralkuth, do you think you can give me some tips on how to stack might with a mesmer? Do I use the Greatsword 2?

I did a 1v1 with a random warrior today and while he wasn’t hurting for much (despite me being on a pure glass cannon build) he was insanely tanky, and all he did was capture points before I could get to them with his superior mobility and have these really long duels with me while his captured points were increasing his score. I simply couldn’t kill him haha. He’d regenerate health at ridiculous amounts despite me being traited for damage, and if I ever had the chance to get him low, he’d start running away. I’d chase him and constantly try and chip at his health with Greatsword autos, but he’d regenerate it all and then turn back when he’s full health to fight me again.

I mean, I killed him twice, but I’m pretty sure it took like 3 minutes of fighting and chasing to do so, and meanwhile his captured points were winning him the game :p. I’m sure might-stacking would’ve come in handy so if there are any techniques to do this I’d love some guidance.

Thanks again!

Thanks for the really helpful replies everyone. Regarding rangers, I don’t know… I just get kited to infinity. They usually keep their distance and spam auto attacks at me while their pet basically acts as a nuisance and messes up my targeting. I noticed that sometimes the ranger would just disappear as well? Do they have access to stealth? I don’t know much about the class unfortunately.

Anyway thanks again for the help. I’ll definitely try looking up streams to get a better idea of what to do.

Hey, I can imagine threads like these are made constantly but I have a few specific questions so I thought that warranted me making a new thread myself. Otherwise sorry for wasting forum space! :p

Basically, I’m having a bit of trouble with Gw2 PvP. Sometimes I do alright, other times I feel entirely helpless as I get stomped left right and centre.

Here are some particular things I have problems with in PvP:
- Guardians/Warriors hurting me for insane amounts of damage while being extremely tanky and regenerating all the damage I do to them.
- Hammer users stunning and locking me down again and again and again, to the point where i use up all my dodges and stun breakers and just accept my fate.
- Thieves that come in out of nowhere and 3-shot me, or disappear into thin air when I manage to ambush them (usually only to come back after they’ve healed up and kill me anyway).
- Rangers winning pretty much every 1v1 I attempt against them.
- Most other classes being able to run away with a bunch of dashes if I gain the upper hand in a duel.
- Enemies always knowing who I am and who my clones are. Am I not being elusive/tricky enough or are they exploiting a counter-mechanic like targeting the real mesmer with Ctrl+T?
- Enemies dodging my burst or going invulnerable during it almost every single time I perform it (I’m on a shatter build right now).
- Starting games – am I the only one who has no idea what to do at the beginning of a new sPvP game? Do I go to the nearest capture point? Follow my team? Take a secondary objective?
- People leaving the team. It seems that whenever the enemy team has a decent score advantage, people keep leaving the team, forcing the game to get autobalanced after a while. I find it hard to win in an outnumbered situation, and while I know I can’t stop players from leaving if they deem the game to be unwinnable, I don’t quite know how to make the most of what I have and try and scrape the game back on its feet.

Anyway, does anyone have any tips for what I’ve mentioned above? Are there any other things you can mention to someone who has little idea what he’s doing in PvP? :p

Thanks for reading!