Guild Wars 2

QoL changes.. hmm..

DE should be removed and made a permanent feature to dodges.

Wastrels Punishment needs a Buff 5% is still nothing for nearly full investment in a line.

Mantras converted to Stances would be lovely, insted of charging them you just insta-pop them and gain a passive effect, you can still use the charge mechanic while in the stance to get something else out of them. lead the back end with similar recharge rates maybe increase MoP idk..

Remove Mimic or make it useful in some compacity across all game modes, not just 1 or 2.

New weapon skills

new weapons

new utility skills

Fix bugs

Add in more active defense to the class beyond praying your clones absorb a hit and confuse someone or abusing stealth..

Decrease health per pulse on Ether Signet, decrease 3s per pulse to 1s to bring it in line with all other passive heals.

Remove on down or on rally traits, probably even the falling damage trait, replace these with something useful and give some kind of interesting options to the Chaos Minor tree.

Swap Veil and that thief Stealth utility with the huge radius, mostly just so thieves have to QQ but also find a use in wvw zerging.

Speed up Scepter Auto chain to be in line with other weapon AA chains in game (its one of the absolute slowest + projectile travel time)

Fix LoS issues with AT and Pistol and Scepter where in having an enemy run to kitten degree angle of where you are facing doesnt leave you with a full CD and no spell cast, instead force the toon modle to turn and fire away (obviously this probably shouldn’t work in 180 scenarios but currently if you aren’t moving the game will do this for you in any direction)

Fix the shadow step pathing issues for good on any terrain type.

Beef up GM traits that are lack luster, Furious interruption springs to mind almost instantly. 3s of haste is almost two GS AA chains or 1 stomp.. just blah..

Rethink Shatters and Clones as the class mechanic and allow for more depth and customization of build beyond Use F1-F4 or Never hit F1 through F4.

Rethink the over abundance of Clone related or reliant traits, more power to the player vs power to the player only when the RNG gods and perfect circumstances allow for it.

Theres more but i’m thirsty and Don’t feel up to typing it out.

I can add in what I find to be issues sometime tonight. At least the larger ones.

As for the Anet dev quote, I’m sorry to say I have learned from past experiences that it may not be entirely truthful or only truthful at the given moment that it has been posted. Things change rapidly and there are far more posts regarding Lacking Resources or No time or It’s not off the table or we’re looking into working on it.. etc.. that would seem to suggest the company only has 20 people in it at all that are capable of working on the game in a meaningful way.

ironicly EoTm didnt Kill WvW

stale “tactics” and often one sided or 3 hour stagnated sieges did that.

EoTM is more fun and often more varied because the points don’t matter. and when the points don’t matter people are jsut there to farm or screw around.

when people just farm or screw around they have more fun and arent stressed about numbers and timers.

when people just screw around you end up with smaller teams doing more things across the map that, ultimately don’t matter but give a sense of accomplishment when they cap 5 or 7 things while the zergs mash faces over 1 thing for 50 minutes.

Make WvW more like EoTM and you might get players in there again, drop the Srs Bsns GTFO Noob attitude adopted by the “hard core” and even I might be interested in spending gems to get to a server with a better WvW population.. i might even play WvW again.

Problem i find with the ranger buff is that the rest of the meta hasn’t moved to ranged.

You can build for reflects but that kinda leaves you boned against bunkers or melee classes who focus you.

this is more true in sPvP from my experiences, I don’t go into WvW hardly ever anymore.

true enough but that’s an argument for another thread. Games that prosper the most are often actually imabalnced but in a purposeful and balanced way. One class is on level with others but counters 1 or two while 1 or two others counter it in turn.. leading to a self perpetuated meta where in build 1 is popular so build 2 becomes popular to counter build 1 so build 1 dies off then build 2 is the most popular so build 3 is made to counter so build 2 dies off.. etc.. eventually a stale meta can occur if left along too long even in that environment tho.

People want imbalance but they also feel less cheated when its “fair”. where in someone decided to dedicate to countering me, i need to either change or wait till the meta moves forward and i can retake a similar place with the same build. Asking for massive OP imbalance doesn’t lead to a “fair” op. People would do better to remember that.

Today

Today, I’m Dissatisfied..

Disappointed.. and tired of waiting..

To be Fair LS2 is an improvement but it’s still so apparent to me that it destroys the ability of the dev team to work on the rest of the game. Content is so piece meal that it often feels that its coming at a snails pace. The core of this game is still so strong but the cracks are now painful to me. Yet there’s still potential in it.

But ultimately I’m Fed up. the latest Feature pack just feel like Confirmation for my worries.

Patches for problems we mentioned so long ago that feel misplaced this far into a games lifepsan. Often these types of changes come with a Full paid expansion in other games which makes them less traumatizing, as if to say “we’re sorry, we listened but we were working on all of this at the same time and this just seemed like the best time to roll it all out for everyone.” There was no cover to this for Gw2..

The latest Feature pack is ultimately the culmination of the CDI’s that were held last year along with a lot of other player feedback, but they came a year to late. The players are noticing the deeper issues with this game now and many of us might prefer that you focus your full attention to these rather than LS or Temp content or Cosmetic UI changes or changes to leveling that we asked for changes to, gave up waiting for and learned to deal with..

Many Players, fairly enough, will appreciate the changes and will learn to deal with the other problems the game faces while others will continue to just deal with the problems because they cannot find a better outlet for what they are looking for in a game..

Will I personally continue to play? Yes, but with limitations and deeply lowered expectations. While I understand that game development is never easy or fast, I also cannot understand the direction that has been taken for Gw2. I won’t highly recommend the game to others but will tell them the truth as a whole about it, and suggest they wait till Gw2 goes on Sale to pick up a copy if they choose. I will continue to attempt to criticize the game in so much of a civil manner as I can manage to when I am capable of putting my thoughts together in a meaningful way. I will also continue to aid fellow players locate and test bugs, learn builds, test builds, run dungeons, etc.. when I find the motivation to log onto the forums or Game..

Ultimately I don’t want to give up hope on this game, but you make it so kitten hard Anet.. you make it so hard..

TL;DR
No TLDR, go back to where you stopped and keep going.. <3

PS: Keep it civil if you choose to comment below, please and thank you in advance.

It’s been a very long road, or at least it seems it.

This is my thoughts on Gw2 which I’ve had to simmer on since the last Feature patch, which has also been the biggest push to write something like this. So in order, and feel free to insert your own feelings but keep it civil below.

Beta!

Gw2 Beta, the invitation I had been dieing for, for months on end. NDA agreements and Play testing, it was a blast and the community was great. I was so excited to see what Gw2 would become with even more development, there was a great base and core to the game that made going back to Gw1 very hard… I was hooked. This was the Closed Beta days…

Then the Announcement came, Gw2 to be released!

I was mixed on how I felt about this.. The beta was great but it still felt like it needed a lot more love to flesh it out into a true power house that could really alter the MMO scene.

Then came the Open Betas, great fun and it helped keep me playing the game I really wanted to play, It felt like Halo 1 or 3 all over again for me, but the game didn’t seem to be progressing fast enough to meet the deadline it now had, it didnt feel like it would hit shelves.

Launch

It was here, and while great, the game still very much felt like it hadnt left beta but maybe that couldn’t really be helped. It was an MMO after all and there was plenty of time for it to Grow and really flesh itself out in the years to come. Thats what all MMO’s do after all isn’kitten The core of the game was still pretty strong and the new concepts it had were interesting. I rushed a Guardian to 80 in just a week, I had to see everything and explore it all.

Later i found that Guardian just wasn’t working for me, WvW was turning into ranged combat and much of late end PvE was also ranged with many 1HKO attacks only being Melee.. i felt disadvantaged so i shelved my guardian for a Mesmer, hoping Anet would expand on the weapon sets and give my preferred class some ranged weapons.

During this time Halloween came for the first time ever! Clock Tower was buggy and I gave up on it but seeing all the potential to really bind communities with One Time Events and watching the world change for them was amazing!

Later the Karka arrived, Citizens! I tell you, I loved being a part of these events, 1 shot and it was over. being able to regale others of the epic battles was almost novel but it was still bonding, even if they were sad to have missed it. It wasn’t a perfect system but it was pretty good, it could have easily been retold through leveled down Instances after the fact so late comers could still have gotten a taste of it all.

My Mesmer was now level 80 and my guardian rarely touched, there was new content to do and Wintersday was here, lesser extent to the single live events, now extended to a Day or two but still re playable, all the festival content was well done and i really loved how things were working out for the game.

Then came Fractals and Ascended Gear… Honestly i was dissapointed, to learn of a new tier of armor and weapons and trinkets being added .. Gw has never been about Item Teirs and this was what I now consider the first step down a very long slope.. Fractals was still fun but the game was starting to grow stale.. WvW had devolved into Zerg vs Door or Zerg vs Zerg and tactics were loosing out, the cracks were showing in every game mode.. All the half finished or Rushed to launch features were showing their weakness..

Then came the Dry spell.. You probably know of it as LS 1, or Scarlet’s Legacy..

Living Story

At first, I was excited by the idea of a living story, changes to areas and new side stories to explore and follow. Flame and Frost on a 1 month turn over, this was the answer to 1 time events being so exclusive to so few players…

Flame and Frost was great, I really enjoyed it and it kept me interested in playing.. and then at the end of it.. it was gone…

Why had all of it vanished? all that dev time and work and world changes, null and void.. I was shocked.. Why take it away?

Then LS continued and I understood.. and was saddened deeply..

LS was an OK distraction for a time, but when the 2 week cycle took over I began to realize fully what it ment for the game.

Remember those weaknesses I mentioned earlier? They weren’t being touched, but almost entirely ignored now. While LS was a great distraction to many players to keep them from noticing this or that or bugs..

LS kept Anets focus on churning out Temporary Content whilst ignoring what was permanent, it chased away a lot of potential players and veterans alike as they either got fed up with waiting or found out they could not experience all these great things their friends had told them about.

Still I waited…

This Rune set was broken for a long time and only worked on rangers..

Anet had to fix it so it could work on Guardians, Eles, Necros and Mesmer and Thieves too…

not sure it works on Engineers or Warriors but do they need help these days dmg wise anyway?

skcamow.3527:

Check out this thread from a few days ago:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Sin-amu-Str-rune-new-meta-for-tPvP-Shatter/first#post4403076

I do think Assassin’s amulet could be a thing for power builds, especially if you’re able to stack (or receive) a steady stream of might to make up for the lost power of zerker amulet.

The health loss on it kinda sucks but i’ve been using it to pretty easily destroy anything else that’s not full bunker cheeses as long as it doesn’t catch me mid fight. More so than I was with Zerker anyway.

are we talking actual sPvP / tPvP or WvW “PvP” for the PvP half.

PvE are you asking for dungeon builds or Open world solo builds or Zerg World Boss/event builds?

main problem with this thread is how quickly it went for semi reasonable/wish it could happen between players to omfgplzmakethisopandbrokensoitcandoallthethings when a dev posted.

this happens in almost any thread a dev posts in and its mostly because people arent putting critical thought behind what they think they want. If anet mega buffed and reworked MS to be an AoE/channeled/pulsing/Daze/boonstrip/high dmg/ imob inflicting/Blast finisher tomorrow, You’d think it was kittening amazing and perfect until another mesmer used it on you instead of you using it on everyone else. At that point you’d probably realize just how broken and unfair what you got/wanted was and would probably come back here to QQ and ask for a nerf.

Most people don’t think about fighting what they ask anet to make/change before they hit “post reply” and thats why these threads often fail to get a cohesive point across when there has been no set limitations for people to consider or create inside of.

bump as it’s done ish..

I’ll attempt to write better tomorrow if i get some time.

Why IP is better than MtD for Condition Shatter builds.

1 Synergy

MtD seems like an obvious winner here but lets look at it objectively. The main source for conditions on mesmers comes from Clones. More accurately, clones that stay alive or get recklessly murdered by aoe and cleave. Both Shatter traits don’t hold much Synergy with a condition build but …

IP holds more synergy by association. IP allows for higher confusion stacking which hurts spam classes with no cleanse more than torment can. IP also enables 0 clone shattering for moments when you really need that daze or Invuln to GTFO of a kitten storm.

IP basically helps to cover what building a Condition Shatter so heavily ends up missing out on which is self sustain and versatility.

2 Pressure

MtD looks like it’d be great for adding pressure or a final spike but let’s remember that Conditions will always be DoT, 1s per tick. Conditions are extremely hard to spike with unless you can apply a lot of them at once or can apply about 15 stacks of just one extremely rapidly.

look back up to #1, remember that most of your condition pressure isnt coming from you, but from your clones and all of it is on very low timers. Shattering these might mean 3 stacks of torment but it also means you need to rebuild momentum by producing more clones so they can start doing the heavy lifting again.

IP is more geared for damage spikes, which is something you will lack without bringing it to a shatter build. No, they wont be magnificent 7k bombs but having at least 1 mediocre spike is usually better than having none to finish someone off in a clutch moment.

Remember that IP can mean up to 4 hits, and even if those hits are only 500dmg that’s 2k in 2 to 3s that have to be dodged or blocked, freeing up new clones to more quickly stack their conditions. Mind you they may have dodged your MtD shatter but after a few of these many players quickly learn not to fear them and just burn a cleanse instead.

3 Vulnerability

I touched on this slightly above but I’ll do it again here. Picking between these traits opens you up to a downside on either hand.

MtD Shatters become a last minute or right moment type of idea with this trait in play, you may even find yourself hesitating to hit F4 just in case you might pull through without it, with MtD you cannot use your clones in a semi-combo of a 1-2 punch. Torment application becoming more important than actually forcing your foes to back down or panic and slip up. While an impending shatter with this trait can still do that, its often long into a fight when its already been decided who is going to win / die / run away. This trait mostly discourages the use of shatters than it does promote them.

IP doesn’t bring a lot of conditions to a condition fight, confusion is the best you’ll get but you can get a lot of it. Confusion is a lot more situational than Torment is but it can also be more effective on the right enemy at the right times. Take a bite out of a Heal or a Cleanse for example and its less work you have to do going further into the fight. IP also offers opportunities to burn a shatter when you are in a bad spot and need to do a little more damage or get off a heal. This can happen very quickly in 2v1 situations with aoe heavy classes.

4. Gear Options

Rabid or Carrion, most people will instantly tell you Full Rabid or Dire is the best option and for pure condition damage that’s mostly true. In a low end or roamtastic condition ruled field, this can be the completely wrong set to grab as well.

Toughness hinders direct DPS, it can help mitigate that 7k Thief burst to a 6.5K. Toughness does not, however, cancel out Condition Damage. Only high health can eat up conditions comfortably if you lack removals.

Both MtD and IP allow for you to bring either set pretty comfortably without seeing too much variation in play style. however IP will allow for more of a hybrid feel with carrion when it comes to shatter bursts.

Disagreements, arguments, etc, post them below.

eyesrutherford.1357:

Hello everyone. Midna here. Lol why does everyone say use greatsword #2 then #4?

Might

You should use greatsword 4 followed by 2 so you have a phantasm out for the #2 attack to bounce off of.

no, then the phantasm gets the might when its on CD and you wont get any benefit from this. Mirror blade will bounce off you and still hit the target a second time for move damage on the return if YOU have the might stacks.

Then you can use the #3 dodge then the third shatter ability for vulnerability followed by more clone putout and a mind wrack so you get the most bang for your buck.

save boon removal for when you need to cancel something important, no need to spam it for the damage. i wouldn’t waste F3 either just for vuln unless you already have whatever it is or whom ever it is on the ropes, its better served to screw up a rotation or a heal before you do your bigger bursts.

hope that helps you understand.

due to the ranger flare up, it’d be nice to have it back but in the long run no, i dont want it back.

I’d rather it be turned into the old mimic from Gw1 or at least be a Skill steal where you can randomly lock out an opponents skill (between 2-0) for 30s and gain the ability to use it once (echo). Might be OP but only OP when the RNG gods are in your favor.

hell just make it that and make it an elite skill, i’d use that over Moa or Mass bed wetting invisibility.

these builds are very middle ground, i’ve poked at them myself.

the problem with them is that mesmers have to commit to really kick things into gear, yes these builds work with a lot of special foods and other things but if your build can’t stand without food then its probably not a great build etc…

What Pyro gets at is that, while this build might be good at taking down the average run of the mill High Sustain Bunker Warrior, or might not have a ton of trouble with glassy builds, when it comes to the more skilled and meta abusive classes and players, these builds just don’t hold up.

you can look at the numbers all ya want but when a thief shows up with a ton of stealth and gives you only tiny windows to burst, you have 0 burst and will die.

when a bunker guard is holding a point you dont have enough raw damage to kill it before something or someone else shows up to remove you, they will make short work of your conditions and can basically ignore you.

When a Terror Necro gets the drop on you, torch for Condition clears wont be enough.

Mesmers, compaired to several of the other classes, cannot afford to go as a Jack of all Trades. Yes you’ll end up with counters this way but thats balance.

If you really want to go into a competitive scene against skilled players with this build then you’ll find yourself countered by any build that is not also a “hybrid” or rounded build.

yes, its playable, and its a good place to start when learning a Mesmer, but you’ll need to graduate to something else when you really find out what you like doing the best.

are you looking for a super EZmode cheese build? or just a build that will work the majority of the time.

Did some research whilst farting about in PvE last night, i think i pinned down the problem with the mantras, I’m no game dev but if i can guess at it here is the issue.

Mantras Drop the 3rd charge – Fixed a bug where mesmers could retain extra charges when Removing this trait. (patched this last update)

One of two things is happening.

The more likely imo, tho i could be wrong, is that any time you Swap maps, or move to a new area in PvE and are forced into a new down scaled level Your traits are reset to accommodate with your new stats, which are also reset. This is a system in place to ensure you don’t maintain a +600 bonus to something that should really only now be 450 or whatever…

The issue, whenever this back end check takes place, it is effectively removing and then replacing all your traits as they were previously.

What it means, every time this happens you will Lose a charge on your mantras as the game now effectively equates this back end recalc to you removing this trait for this trait. weird..

The only other instance i could think up is that Anet accidentally broke something and this trait now carries a Ninja ICD for how long you can carry 3 Charges before dropping it to 2.

Update: 99% sure its #1, any upscale or downscale removes a mantra charge 100% of the time, applies to Downed 100% of the time, haven’t tested this with Transformations or pick up weapons or bundles yet. Also haven’t tested it against Buffs from other classes (example would be toughness from the guardian trait).

Hope that helps

I’ll attempt a 62006 this weekend but I have noticed that I can nearly one shot some professions already. I know I destroyed several hotline join pu users along with most thieves and non bunker guards eles and rangers…. God so many rangers… Warriors are easier to deal with now but there’s no one shoting them unless I run warrior myself.. engi was iffy depending on build.. necros still swamped me if they hit me with a full condition burst….

I spose we should sit down and check all Mesmer traits and durations on conditions once again.. someone check the staff clone bleed and the Dd durations etc..

so far best success has been a 6/4/4/0/0 build bringing Halting strike, shattered (boons) and PB / Manipulations + DE / and / Dmg – per clone + BI /

Grabbed a Staff and a GS with ether feast + Blink + MoP + Mirror + whatever

Goal was to pressure the start of the fight and force interrupts to build might (didnt matter what got interrupted as long as it was 1 or two maybe three things)

Mid fight came the Diversion spike to stack Vuln + Chaos storm if it was up

If i could get 10 – 20s of Vuln it was time for Mirror + a clone and then F1

that usually ended the fight or atleast put them in full panic mode

looks good on paper, in practice you’d have to remember exactly which clones you summoned first or last or second while moving while they move and while you spawn more ontop of those and those that get destroyed out of order etc etc etc…

the problem with your second part to your theory is that Mesmers are bound to builds that are either Shatter, or Non Shatter. a Non shatter based build will always suffer from hitting an F skill even if its just 1 phantasm or clone that goes up in purple smoke.

Mesmers need a different class mechanic to really open up diversity imo, not a rework on shatters.

Mantra’s could have been a much better Class mechanic for us
F1 MoP – do damage, trait to add like confusion or something
F2 MoC – Condition cleanse – trait to add protection or whatever
F3 MoD – Same as F3 Now – trait to make it a stun or blah blah…
F4 MoS – Stability or invuln with Stability at the end.. blah blah..

Charge these up before the fight starts, use them wisely during the fight, if you have to recharge them in battle its a risk etc…

Anet should have tied Clone summons into Dual chains similar to the Necro/Engi/Ele counter parts, where the shatter is tied to that clone/phantasm

Phase Retreat – make a clone and SS backwards —> use --→ Phase somethingelseclever – shatter your clone causing cripple/bleed/vuln to nearby foes (takes the place of DD, opens up space for a new trait)

Ofc this would limit clone generation a bit and remove the need for DE or maybe change DE into something else like timed clone bombs.. idk..

It could also mean anet couldn’t keep our damage and defense so kitten low with the class mechanic excuse as much as they currently do.

Thats what i would personally like to see happen with the mesmer.

If you don’t mind bringing two gear sets and running two different builds in wvw then there are a few builds you can swap between to move from solo or small team to zerg.

Pu and some mantra shatter builds mostly.

If that’s not your thing I’d roll a warrior or guard or ele to avoid getting caught with your pants down

Been poking at it since the patch but don’t have the time. Using either power block or that stun gm trait in domination with the assassin’s trinket, can you guys make a hard hitting but glassy control Mesmer.

Ci is not off the table either.

Not looking for condition damage here just huge spikes that isn’t a traditional shatter

I guess its ok if your team can compensate for your lack of Spike damage with thier own and you can consistently always have high pressure and sustain with your build.

if neither of those are the case, just go full glass direct damage shatter… that’s really our best option..

1v1 dueling on the only dueling class to see who is the best at only dueling…

not terribly interesting but might as well sign up anyway so i have something to do when i do sign in.

I don’t main just 1 build tho.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

It’s worth noting that temporal curtain lingers a bit after the pull is activated. This means that you can definitely use the curtain and ileap/Phase retreat off of where it last was to gain the new light aura. I’ve even been able to curtain pull, ileap, AND phase retreat to gain 7 second of light aura..

Dont worry Chaos, i’m certain anet will fix this bug next patch. Retal is too strong for mesmers to have and is too imposing for the new players that the rest of the september patch brought it…

But seriously, I’m just gonna call it now, this will get fixed

aight, heres what i found thus far.

Warden is much more at risk of what i’ll call “Missing the Window” bug.

This is, When a Phantasm has to move into its attack range, if it is still moving when its attack CD is up, it has about a 1-2s window where it can attack and then its attack will go back onto CD period.

Warden can end up moving through this window and then, not attacking until its next window shows up… which feels like forever.

Warden still has Target issues, 3 times, just kiting the Dummy profession test NPC’s around, Warden followed for a time before running towards one of the Other NPC’s (they were always Inert and out of combat, no other player interaction with them at the time) Warden usually only made it about half way to these before it remembered what it was supposed to be attacking…

few times Warden still ended up just not attacking ever either on summon or after a few attacks.

This was all tested with an Untraited focus and no Phantasm or clone related Traits taken.

My conclusion is that Warden is “better” but Anet still hasn’t figured out everything wrong with this Phantasm.

Also i’ll just Update the OP with what you all are finding.

Sorry had to run to work. Noticed this in PvP mostly

Warden spawns and must move into range means it may cause the never attack bug or it will miss a single attack

Target moves and warden later follows after summon and first attack was about a twenty-five chance of breaking and just staring at the foe

I’ll try more tonight when I’m off work

Edited 09/10

Warden (and all Phantasms) still do not attack summoned creatures

Warden seems to change targets without player input and will chase them (the wrong target) for a short period of time before returning to the correct Target.

Warden does not receive the intended bonus from Phantasmal Haste (yet again)

Warden can still completely Fail to ever attack (much more rare than pre-patch)

Warden can still bug and stop attacking after attacking previously (also very rare post-patch)

Will Edit and add as/if more info is found.

Adding FriFox’s findings on the Increased attack time on Warden, more info Here

this went off topic qiuckly…

We have no new builds, haven’t for months… just rehashes and tweaks on the Phantasm or Shatter ones.

Need to add one more.

I hate it when the “Big” Egotistic or i guess some people call them famous, Mesmer community Members completely derail a thread over a petty argument in which everyone comes out of it looking like more of an kitten and idiot than they did going in.

Thank you

Has anet admitted anything is wrong with their game… hmmm..

nope never

will they admit that Gw2 was pretty broken and flawed when Gw3 comes out? Without a doubt yes.

Will Anet stay afloat long enough to convince NCSoft to give them another 7 years to try and get it right? I’m not going to be surprised if the answer ends up as a no.

Liston.9708:

Tomorrow as part of the china release?

the April China release? totally…

Lemme break down for you why MtD itself isnt a great GM in a different way, since everyone else said the same thing as i did in different ways already.

Can it be effective yes, but only as a mid fight/end fight pressure.

Going Condition based generally means a lot less Power, so you wont be spiking and Conditions cannot Spike in the same way as direct damage.

Torment can hit kinda hard but in such tiny durations with limited stacking, you need a very special Boon to really make them count while they are up.

That Boon is Might.

Mesmers, more specifically Condition shatter/tanky mesmers have a lot less access to High amounts of Might.

You will need a lot of might to make the 4 to maybe 5 ticks of your Torment really hurt, and you will need them upon/during the application.

Best sources of might come from BI (6 max 5 garunteed on interrupt), 5 into Illusions (3 max) GS 2 (max of 6 even with IE) BI is the only one without a tiny duration limitation. You could also try AT or the New mimic (baring that it even works) to boost/steal your foes might as well.

you could also add in Runes and Sigils that grant might and you can fairly easily maintain about 10 to 12 maybe 15 stacks of might under the perfect circumstances.

in practice you might be able to keep 5 to 8 stacks up, your clones will often get cleaved or destroyed, you will get focused down easier due to a lack of invis even with higher armor/hp and without interrupts and huge spikes taking down High Sustain classes even 1v1 will be an uphill battle.

D/D ele’s and Stuper Hambow Warriors are softer counters to this type of build, and thieves are a very hard counter, they need to move much less than other classes thanks to soooo many teleport skills and Invis makes shattering a crap shoot.

This build can absolutely wreck newer players than jsut spam their keys and run around willy nilly, but any Mesmer build can down these people without a lot of effort.

As of current, using a MtD build, I got more damage and more pressure and mileage out of putting up 3 staff clones and just kiting / taking the focus fire while WoC ate through health with Burn and bleed using 3-6 torment +3-9 confusion from shatters as a Final push when my opponents start to run away to down them.

MtD basicly takes a Shatter set up, encourages you to gear it up with more health and armor and then run it like a Phantasm build, while discouraging you from using Phantasms (they only stack bleed).. I don’t recommend it unless its just for the Lulz and Trolling of Hotjoin.

Going to keep leveling my alts so i can try the other professions, probably try a Turret Engie after the patch or something. Might try a Spirit weapon guard or an MM Necro or something else from the Working classes.

Might goof around with a PB build some more or maybe a BI Condition shatter build and see how it fairs against the Hotjoin heros, Mostly its just a better move for my mental health to swap classes rather than wait another 2 years for a handful of buffs and bug fixes.

Playing around with MtD a lot and honestly a duration change ranges from Non-Buff to Laughable attempt to seem like a Buff. You’re still going to be better off with IP or PU or CI or one of the other worth while GM traits mesmers have..

MtD falls apart the moment you require the illusions to successfully shatter on a target. it then falls further when you only apply 1 stack of Torment per illusion that did shatter and wasnt dodged, blocked, you were blinded when it blew up, the foe was immune to conditions at that time, the foe was invulnerable at that time, the foe went invisible and your clones lost their target and just blew up half way there, etc…

The duration on MtD is really short pre patch, pretty much matches the Confusion stacks duration you apply from each shatter as well, after the patch it will be roughly 2 seconds longer than your confusion stack duration.. still not very long.

The stack intensity isn’t being altered, which is the biggest let down behind this GM trait. 1 stack per illusion means you can only stack up to 3 stacks per shatter. Max you might be able to stack on in a very short duration burst (and hope they ran out of cleanse or dont have a passive cleanse) is between 6 to 8. sounds like a crap ton and it can be a lot of damage but only if they’re running the entire time.

MtD and other Non PU mesmers also don’t fair as well doing Solo stuff. Groups are better with the lack of Stealth Cheese on your part and IE + staff will still take some time to stack bleeding and burning to really start hurting your target. It’s a slow wind up build that can very quickly lose momentum if your clones get wrecked or you shatter at the wrong time..

Coopziana.1802:

I don’t think it’s “refusal” I think it’s lack of manpower and time to make it happen. True they have their own agenda’s which aren’t exactly conducive to player needs, but I’d like to think that they would give us what we wanted if they could.

I guess it’s a case of “prioritising” where the game is concerned and right now I think they are more controlled with improving the game engine as it currently has many flaws which need to be assessed and fixed before they continue to expand the game causing more issues to fix. It’s a bit of a vicious circle really.

This made my day, haven’t laughed this hard at a post since i looked at the lore forum a few months ago. Nope, just nope, Anets only focus is LS which can sometimes lead to fixing old bugs but mostly it leads to hoping new and old gullible players into forgetting about all the issues the rest of the game has that haven’t been touched or even acknowledged since Scarlets epic LS1 began.

As for EoTM, it was a good idea tested to right way and made very well and then it took Anet Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too long to implement it… Many WvW players quit or moved servers or got fed up with the ques and focused on other parts of the game. When your epic new map and promised fix Touch down almost 8 months after you announce it, people aren’t going to be excited, they’re just going to be angry and wonder why it wasn’t implemented when it was needed.

Similarly, Anet could Announce an Expansion tomorrow and still end up losing 80% of its current player base because it would take them 4 to 7 years to make it… It might be the most awesome game ever but it’s still gonna kitten everyone off if its way too late to help/save the interest in the game you have now.

It’s obvious Anet can do things quickly, look at this feature patch for example, a lot of it looks like it was finished in mere weeks to months. When they arent squandering all their resources on this LS pipe dream, kitten can actually get done at Anet. This has become the true legacy of the LS as far as i can tell. A core game left half baked or in ruins for a cart and horse that have no road to travel upon.

Personally I dont want to see an expansion, I dont want to wait for it for 6 years while the Dev team is still forced to kitten on the LS and call it content.

Insted i want to see the studio return to its previous state, 1 MAYBE 2 LS teams putting out the personal instances / maps every month or so

Teams that focus just on fixing or adding new skills or weapons to classes, call this the core expansion team. Let them expand on the Core elements like traits and weapons and combat buffs/debuffs.. etc..

a WvW team that focuses on taking the ZvD content we have and actually attempts some balance in that mess, freshen the game mode etc..

a PvP team that works on new match types, new challenges, balances, new maps, new rewards and preferably everyone plays a different class competitively… the PvP team should be the core balance team but should probably report to the WvW/LS-PvE team regarding any changes to see how it might effect other aspects of the game.

Gw2 needs to grow Out from its center, Anet cant just keep trying to build a City on top of a Swamp and seem surprised when it keeps falling over.

Hmmm… things i hate to see mesmers do…

Play Hotjoin in sPvP, Only bring a meta build and a guildie who is also running a Mesmer with another Meta Build – Talk trash as if all 2v1’s you win are because they are bad.

Bring a Scepter and have 0 Condition Damage behind it.

Tell someone else that their build is Trash and Doesn’t/Won’t Work in PvE… everything works in PvE some things are just not Min/Maxed.

Mesmers who talk down to others who use different weapon sets. I run a Staff in PvE and I may not do 80k DPS but my teams in dungeons appreciate the boons and that i can ramp up to match DPS with damage and conditions..

Mesmers who are incapable of thinking outside of their own play “windows” or “boxes” and consider other things. Not everyone just logs on to go to WvW and run around all alone and hope to PvP with food and utilities, not everyone just wants to join a wvw zerg every day, not everyone has a guild they can do activities with, not everyone has played sPvP, etc…

Mesmers who Dismiss with L2P, more often than not it actually is a L2P issue but often what to learn is not clear. Do they need to learn how to manage their resources or just deal with the stupid hard counters of a thief or learn to deal with our classes bugs?

Mesmers who point to PU as a Training tool or training wheels, This build type is neither, its just the most popular build at this time. There are better builds and better situations out there to let newer players to learn how and when to use F1-4, what weapons to bring and use, and when to use them. etc… If someone asks you to teach them how to Drive a Nail into a board, you dont hand them Thor’s Hammer right off the bat and tell them Good luck.

Mesmers that only find class or self worth out of the ability to win a Duel. sPvP or WvW, doesn’t matter on this one, ya’ll are annoying.

I could think of more but i have stuff to do before work today x.x

Xaylin.1860:

There are no significant improvements for power PU builds unless you count IE for GS. I doubt this will be enough, though.

IE already works and has worked for the longest time on GS.. i have no idea why people dont already know this..

So no, you can’t count IE for GS on a PPU.

I’d like to point out that Mesmers, like rangers, are already severly limited in our build diversity based just on our class mechanic alone.

CLones + Phantasms

There are really only 2 types of Mesmers at the core and they both use similar if not exact play styles amongst all their sub-types.

Shatter Mesmers are one, you blow up your clones all the time.

Phantasm Mesmers are the Other, where you dont blow up your clones the majority of the time.

Traits and balancing aside, this is what ultimately cripples this professions longevity and build diversity in both the short and long run.

I would think this nerf hurts PPU much more than it does CPU, mainly because PPU needs PU for the defensive boons more than Conditions variants do.

4s of stealth with 1boon per s

5 boons to pick from

we aren’t sure at this time if anet has made all the boons equally random, or some more “equal” than others. testing will have to be done after the patch to see if everything is working correctly or not.

Basicly the nerf ends up meaning that everyone gets less defense and Anet thinks mesmers will Love more swiftness and that everyone loves might.

CPU will be a little less forgiving but still hearty enough to let even bad players skate by with some luck.

PPU will also be less forgiving which is bad because this was already the less forgiving of the two to begin with.

there’s now a chance you wont get regen or prot or aegis when you want/need it in a fight. so there is now a greater chance of that 20k Warrior GS connecting and destroying your face.

Brother Grimm.5176:

Just to brag (or maybe not?) a bit, Jim’s my son-in-law….

We’ve spoken at length about this issue and the OP is taking Jim’s concerns a bit out of context here.

• Jim’s rants are about single/MP games with gated PAID DLC (not MMO content with FREE DLC). The main concern still applies, but the complaint falls a bit short when you are not really PAYING for the non-content.
• The trend for AAA studios do this to make ADDED money. I fail to see how you can transpose this trend onto Anet (not a AAA studio by any means) when there is no direct financial gain to generate non-content (since they aren’t earning any additional profit).

Yes, it is a troubling trend that all the big publishers have adopted as the “norm” (and customer have allowed to become “accepted” but continuing to BUY it). However, Anet’s motivations and “rewards” for gravitating toward this method are simply not there.

If you want to call Anet’s “non-content” “lazy Development”, you have that right, but I do not see the correlation between what this feature pack offers and what Jim Sterling rails against…..

Is there a 1:1 direct exact correlation between the DLC/PreOrder/Exclusives marketing vs the Feature Patches and Gem shop, no not really but effectively it still applys just as well.

let me break it down for you.

Anet pads out content and makes it seem to feel more rewarding and easier to learn and complete.

Anet retains New players for longer

New Players may want to buy some pretty skins off the Gemshop and go spend real money, because they do not have the 87g to exchange for the 300 Gems the thing costs. (Anet is now making more money)

LS is not “Permanent” Content in the Traditional Sense of the word. New players joining that want to Follow or catch up with this story Via Personal instances (Note the rest of the world has already changed and they have already played through it just to unlock Traits) They will need to spend Gems.

Gems per Story piece mind you, each one being more of a set of notes than a self contained story or mini story arch. These are 200Gems a piece. With 4 current pieces that’s 800 Gems or 10$ USD.

Not that bad as of right now sure, 10$ doesnt seem so bad to spend if you’re new to the game and just killed Zhaitan and want more of the same, but you dont have the Gold pile needed to not spend money.

I could go on, but these seemingly Benevolent changes are a bit more Money driven in the longer run. What happens when LS3 and 4 are rolled out? Would you be comfortable paying 60 or 80 USD for all the pieces if you missed them? Would you feel duped if you discovered you just paid the same price as a full expansion but did not get what many would be to consider one (remember based off the current model you are only paying for personal story instances and a back piece, all the maps and skills and traits are “free”).

Gw2 is indeed slowly creeping towards a very similar chopped up and separated experience to the CoD/Halo/Assassins Creed bunch. It may just take Anet a few more years to get everything set up and ready. LS3 may require you to purchase a Map Pack with its episodes, who can really know? Its a slippery slope and I personally don’t trust Anet to not slide down it anymore.

Spanny.9256:

i’m actually quite excited for the upcoming patch, i’m not seeing a ton of enthusiasm at the moment from anybody else though??

……

what are the general thoughts on these specific changes and how we can use them to our full advantage?

You haven’t been a mesmer for very long have you?

My general Thoughts are that:
A. I will not get excited or hopeful for changes to make it into the game that are working, will not be altered to a poop state, nor require a hotfix 2 days later to have them “work as intended”.

B. I cannot plan to take advantage of any of these things because i do not know what will now become broken, what will arrive broken, what will be fixed, what wont be fixed, what will be buffed/nerfed, and what wont be buffed nerfed.

Anet can take me to their HQ and show me all the mesmer changes in the game fully working 100% of the time with now new bugs and Promise me that this is what is going into the game on September 9th, and I still wouldn’t believe it.

It does not have a toggle option..

walking does tho.

Not sure what the best title here would be but that’ll do i guess.

I wanted to take some time before bed to write this brief topic and bring a bit more depth to the discussion that no one’s really touching on yet.

Jim Sterling, thank god for him, has stated similar things before and i’ll apply them here.

Chopping up content, or, With holding Content, does not in turn, create content; merely a sense of content.

Triple A Publishers are growing very fond of this type of thing and it seems to have leaked into Gw2 as well.

Yes i understand that the primary aim of some of these updates is to aid “new players” which the game sorely needs to retain, but the side effects are also ill-disguised.

Chopping up and reducing Content by spacing it out over a greater time, in itself, is only creating an illusion of Content for newer players and veterans alike. Mashing up the UI falls into this boat too where in you can state this is “creating a new way for X to Y and then Z” but ultimately its not difficult to see whats happening.

Lets look back at the Wardrobe Content. Yes its neat to have all the armor skins i have unlocked and be able to swap through them, but i now have to use a Transmutation charge every time i do it… the place that got hit the hardest was PvP players.. Inadvertently, or perhaps completely purposefully, solely PvP players are now unable to swap out skins they unlocked for free, and if they love dress up, will run out of these charges. Not a big deal for most but it does end up putting a squeeze on some, either enough for them to Quit the game, or go spend money on Gems.

Lets look at the New Mini Changes, a feature asked for over and over at early post launch when many of the other issues of the game were not so glaringly obvious. Rolling out with how it is now, its secondary effect is to suck Mini’s out of rotation, making it harder for new players or new collectors to Complete a collection without going to buy gems. This is a bit underhanded and becomes even more so when you take into account the Limited Re-releases of prior Mini Pet Packs may end up being the only way to reintroduce mini’s back into the TP.

But i digress, The main focus for the topic is the Changes to Leveling. Better item drops to replace your other better item drops that still wont be on par with those at level 80. Traits are still screwed and pressed further back since April combined with the “scavanger hunt” aspect that is poorly put together and lacks focus and inspiration. Now Story, Rewards, and even basic Skills (Downed State) are being padded out to both ease new players into learning the game but, in all honesty, Lull them into somewhat of a false sense that there is/will be something much more later on. This is Non-Content.

Yes Anet, its great that you want to help new players, but if they can now more easily learn the game and complete it but doesn’t that also mean they will also more quickly and easily reach the end of your game? upon reaching “The End” of Gw2, what then will they find? Do you think you’ll retain them when they join the remained of the launch players who are hoping for something more substantial than a UI and Tutorial Update and a Balancing Patch more than twice a year? Will they be as content with only 1 or 2 new skills and traits every year or two?

I think its a Step in the right direction, but as is becoming consistent these days for me, as a player, its just not far enough.

reflects have been found to be “too frightening” for new players of Gw2, you will now have to wait till level 90 to unlock these. we feel this will let new players learn our combat system in a more friendly way while preventing veteran players from abusing said new players in sPvP.

Staff is a pretty basic staple for anything shatter, its got fast clones, defensive skills and party support covered.

Shatters provide your damage spikes anyway.

Sword was also always popular when used with staff, but the AA is kinda kittenty for PvP, its mostly been used for the imob + BF + shatter combo. a combo thats a bit harder to pull off now thanks to some nerf/bug fixes

GS + Staff is the other easy combo to go for, tho GS is less defensive.

Guys, this might sound crazy but, what if thieves actually just had to deal with CD’s on interrupted skills just like everyone else and for the same 10s duration?

no?

bad design to force players to think twice and maybe actually be scared of a Mesmer?

Mesmer’s need more hard counters than we already have?

ok.. carry on attempting to change how the entire thief profession works instead then.