Guild Wars 2

Pyroatheist.9031:

Westibone.3985:

I tried this in sPvP and it was ridiculous. Here is what I used:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW7cl4zyoHRTlGZ9IhZG9G5nZAdnjSx2zOA;TsAg2Crouxcj4G7Nubk3saYsxuBA

If you practice “twisting” your mantras, casting one while channeling another, you can achieve insane survivability. At first I used Illusionary Defender, Mantra of Pain, and Mantra of Concentration, but then I dropped Defender for Mantra of Distraction for extra trolling. I am not lying, I was tanking 3 and 4 people at a time with this. Not to mention, every time you heal you lose a condition, and you are getting regen (and protection) like a mother from the Dwayna runes. With Cry of Frustration giving you a pretty good retaliation uptime, it’s awesome. I would start with Scepter/Sword, get out the swordsman, use both blocks, Cry of Frustration, then go to staff and start chanting like a mofo.

I was very surprised at how fun this was. People could not understand how I was healing so much and wasn’t going down. You can lol at backstab thieves all day with this, as well.

Here’s my advice for your build. Ditch scepter/sword and pick up sword/focus. There are a few advantages here. This build is not designed to do high damage, but to be defensive and trolly. Sword 2 is infinitely more effective than scepter for blocking, and sword 3 is a DOUBLE leap combo, as well as a stunbreaker if you use the summon before the stun.

Untraited focus is already defensive and trolly, and if you trait it, it becomes even better. I highly recommend removing the 5 points from chaos and putting them into inspiration. With your current toughness, it only grants 50ish condition damage, which is useless. Putting another 5 points into inspiration allows you to pick up the focus trait, causing temporal curtain and the iwarden to reflect projectiles.

Additionally, you mentioned cry of frustration giving high uptime on retaliation. Well, you can change that to 100% uptime very easily by simply using your double leap combo from sword 3 on top of temporal curtain. Each leap combo grants ~6-7 seconds of retaliation, so thats 14 seconds instantly, followed by a 3 clones shatter for some more. Chaos storm will also grant retaliation.

This is great advice; thanks for this! your suggestions do seem more attractive, and I will definitely give this a shot. Into the Void is also an amazing way to potentially interrupt/knockdown their entire team, which is probably the most trolly thing you can possibly do. Love that move.

elegance.9368:

Hey guys,
i hope you can help me with my healing Mesmer. This is mostly for dungeons and as healing is not rewarded (right now) i’m planning to let my phantasms do the work and i heal. This is what i have in mind right now: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAR8dl4zyoHSTqGadJhpC9+MDm7c0CIVQ1lUg7bD;ToAgzCmouxcj4G7Nubk3M2Y/B

I’d love to get some feedback, thanks in advance :-)

After trying the condition based version I mentioned above, I starting looking at making a power/offensive version as well. I like what you have going there so far.

I might replace Mantra of Resolve with Mantra of Pain, simply because the cooldown on Mantra of Pain is so low and you can chain heal with that one if you want to. Null field with the lowered cooldown you have traited is already pretty good condition removal (and for the whole team). If you feel like you need more personal condition removal, you can always change the first Tier Major Trait in Inspiration to Mender’s Purity.

I might also use a Sigil of Accuracy in one of your weapons (at least until you get 25 stacks) to bolster your crit chance, which you have to sacrifice in this build to get your healing stat where it needs to be.

I tried this in sPvP and it was ridiculous. Here is what I used:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQNAW7cl4zyoHRTlGZ9IhZG9G5nZAdnjSx2zOA;TsAg2Crouxcj4G7Nubk3saYsxuBA

If you practice “twisting” your mantras, casting one while channeling another, you can achieve insane survivability. At first I used Illusionary Defender, Mantra of Pain, and Mantra of Concentration, but then I dropped Defender for Mantra of Distraction for extra trolling. I am not lying, I was tanking 3 and 4 people at a time with this. Not to mention, every time you heal you lose a condition, and you are getting regen (and protection) like a mother from the Dwayna runes. With Cry of Frustration giving you a pretty good retaliation uptime, it’s awesome. I would start with Scepter/Sword, get out the swordsman, use both blocks, Cry of Frustration, then go to staff and start chanting like a mofo.

I was very surprised at how fun this was. People could not understand how I was healing so much and wasn’t going down. You can lol at backstab thieves all day with this, as well.

That’s a good point., for WvW I could see this being very good. Certainly player preference factors in here. It might be great for dungeons, too. I don’t know, as I spend most of my time in sPvP/tPvP where I believe it is a serious problem. I admit I have a narrow focus sometimes. Now that I think about it, Phase Retreat was probably my favorite ability in the game. Now I am just sad, as when you get chaos armor from the combo field, you have to spend half it’s duration running back to your target. You will see a lot more greatswords in tPvP now, I can tell you that.

All I know is that it makes point defense a hell of a lot harder. in a 1v1, they will likely neutralize the point if you use it more than once. I guess maybe I play more aggressively, and it’s not often that I am running away.

Nretep.2564:

It’s a defensive skill, not a clone generator. Like Scepter’s #2. For a defensive skill it’s not meant to teleport towards your target by facing in the opposite direction. Imo the skill is mean to be an emergency escape (or retreat). Perfect for stunned, rooted or other situations where you just can’t walk. At the same time it’s a stun breaker.

It’s actually not a stun breaker. You can use it while stunned, etc., but the effect still lingers after you teleport. The problem was that this skill was useful in multiple ways. It was predictable, and if you WANTED to escape, you could use it and dodge roll back, or if you were playing more aggressively, it would still allow you to stay within the fight, ie. on the point. Now it just launches you a mile away from your opponent, and it’s dependent on THEIR position which in effect gives them some control over you. Not cool.

I had more time to play with this last night, and it’s borderline game-breaking for me. It has completely changed the staff for me. If someone in sitting in the middle of a point in tPvP, I can’t use it and stay on the point. That is a HUGE problem. I constantly used it to keep up 12 seconds of chaos armor using it in conjunction with Chaos Storm and Null Field. At this point, I can’t use it while fighting on a point. That is terrible in my opinion.

This makes me very sad. Unfortunately, I don’t expect it to be changed back, but it’s made the staff much less enjoyable to use. I normally don’t QQ about stuff like this, but it really does have serious negative ramifications in tournament play. I don’t know why they had to change the distance/direction….

My main gripe is that my opponent has an influence over where I will end up if I use this skill. I of course try to position myself appropriately, but I don’t like the fact that part of the power is taken out of my hands.

@ Brutality

Thanks for starting this thread. This is a great playstyle that I have really enjoyed as an alternative to the more common Guardian builds that are going around. I spend most of my time in sPvP/tPvP, and I am wondering where you make sacrifices stat-wise when playing in those modes. It seems that you can’t get more than about 2400 armor without sacrificing too much crit% chance. Is this where you take the hit? Do you use 2x Monk, 2x Water, 2x Hoelbrek and Empowering might? Or do you use something like Ranger runes to get your crit up? Thanks for any advice!

I totally agree. It has really disrupted gameplay from a point defense perspective. It now teleports you away from your target instead of straight back. The travel distance is noticeably farther, and it more often than not puts you off the point, allowing your opponent to neutralize it. Very frustrating, when trying to use this skill not for escape, but to activate chaos armor through Null Field or Chaos Storm. It really hindered me last night in tPvP by putting me too far away from the point.

I am really not liking the new mechanic. Due to the distance increase, it more often than not puts you off the point in PvP when you are fighting someone on it, allowing them to neutralize. For me, this skill was primarily used to activate chaos armor through Chaos Storm or Null Field, and it puts you too far away now. In a large group fight, it becomes very hard to tell where you are going to port to, whereas before, you always knew you were going to go straight back. I am trying to get used to it, but so far I don’t like it.

So, an update…. I tried this out last night and it was totally awesome. I just did some sPvP, to get a feel for things. I used the greatsword/staff with Illusionary Elasticity and the trait for might on shatter.

I would open with greatsword, use iBerserker, mirror blade, Illusory wave to blow them back, swap to staff, iWarlock, CoF, then iDefender and just go to town. I found the iDisenchanter to not be so effective due to the zerg environment (which will change of course in tPvP), so null field was a better choice there. I also used the Signet of Illusions to better keep the iDefender alive in the zerg.

The lasting power is unreal. You can totally lol at a thief who is trying to backstab you down, which is probably the most satisfying thing ever. No one could really do anything to me 1v1, and you even win against other bunker builds, since you are stacking might and putting confusion on them + your retaliation actually adds up to some decent offense. Especially since you are double-tapping them with the staff due to illusionary elasticity.

Really really fun build overall. Highly recommended.

I’ve always wished for it to be a couple seconds of poison instead of vulnerability. A short confusion could work as well. Could be over the top with 3 clones out spamming, though. Would have to see.

This is awesome. Every time I think I have mastered the class, I come across something sweet like this. I was onto something sort of like this yesterday, but I was using power/toughness, with Sword/focus, Scepter/Sword. I took retaliation on block and iDefender, but it didn’t really work out. I love staff and condition builds, so this is perfect.

The double bounce trait is probably my favorite trait ever, since it basically doubles the Staff’s damage potential. Using sigils of corruption, you can still get to great levels of condition damage while having the absolute maximum defense possible.

I will probably take Warden’s Feedback, just for lower cooldown on Temporal curtain and the awesome reflecting capabilities, which can totally troll people. A combo something like (starting from staff):

1) iWarlock
2) clone (Phase Retreat)
3)swap weapon,
4) either scepter #2 for block+clone or auto attack til clone pops
5) Cry of Frustration
6) iWarden (which will run around and cause a lot of trouble)
7) iDefender
9) iDesenchanter

Then you could swap back to staff and have 3 phantasms running around with retaliation. I would probably take the illusion health signet for sPvP and the boon sharing one for tPvP

Protection, iDefender, 3k+ toughness, auto condition removal from iDisenchanter…..so cool. That is about as close to being invincible as you can get

Thanks for the awesome idea!

While you are looking at this skill, it would be great if you

1) Reversed the order of effects: Burn upon stealthing, Blind upon reappearing. Why are you blinding them when you are stealthing anyway? Plus, you can actually use the blast finisher of the flame, since it’s instant.

2) Also, I don’t see why it’s necessary for this to be a channeled effect… feel free to take that away if you feel like it. Thanks!