(edited by calavel.6249)
Cavalier trinkets are a popular choice if you’re feeling too squishy. They major in toughness and have the same +crit damage as zerker, but you lose a little power and all the precision. But with Hidden Killer you will always crit from stealth anyway.
Nice choice for a thief that goes deep in Shadow Arts.
http://s18.postimg.org/dafibvq7t/ws1.png
Heritage set with cultural T2 hat.
http://s15.postimg.org/y20y5x0kr/ws2.png
The rest of the cultural T2 set, no shoulders + transmuted starter mask (comedy).
Love the look and animations of Asura in general, but I think human has the best cosmetics for mesmer.
(edited by calavel.6249)
Regarding combos, mesmers have access to the unique Ethereal field, as well as a few Light curtains, usually found on guardians. Ethereal fields give either Chaos Armor or Confusion, depending on the type of finisher used. Light fields give Retaliation or condition removal.
Speaking of finishers, mesmers also have good access to finishers, but because many of them are activated by clones and not yourself, they can be a bit tricky to pull off.
Typical combos include iDuelist (pistol) in an ethereal field to stack confusion several times, iWarden (focus) on a light curtain to spam condition removal and iLeap (Sword) on a curtain to give retaliation to yourself as well as the clone.
Since you have to time the field to an illusion, the order of skill use is often reversed compared to other classes. You put down the clone first, then dump the field on top of it instead of dropping a field, then leaping through it or blasting inside it like most other classes do.
Torch is a very popular offhand and has a blast finisher, but it’s kinda buggy and hard to work with because it’s delayed.
I would probably swap the sword trait for something else, it’s only 2½ seconds on 2 skills (and 50 precision, yay).
I’m also not sure what you want the torch trait for except slightly faster stealth. One condition cleanse every 24s will rarely matter when that’s all you have. Still a decent trait though, but the offhand really brings nothing to the build except a little stealth. Pistol can stun to set up a shatter and duelist has much better damage than iMage in a power build (probably in any build).
Anyone know if Compounding Power offers more damage potential than Precise Wrack overall? 10% crit chance on one skill that is not exactly spammable always seemed weak to me.
Okay, tried something new today.
30/30/0/10/0.
Replaced focus trait with GS trait and added Harmonious Mantras (Dom XI). With Mender’s purity, this makes Power Return a very reasonable, spammable heal that removes 2 conditions every time. Toss Resolve in there as well and you have 6 double condition cleanses (half of them AoE) + 3x heal. And swift on the heal with centaur runes. That is really powerful when it comes to staying power, as well as skipping in and out of fights, with no need for weapon swap or using more than a few skills.
Biggest challenge was finding a good second mantra to justify slotting both an adept and a GM trait.
MoR is amazing with the right traits but the rest seem very lackluster.
MoP is a joke, it does about the same damage as Sword AA in slightly less time (because of CD, not activation time). It doesn’t even put a dent in a glass ele or thief.
Resolve is very good, but long recharge means it has limited use in some fights. Also, it might be overdoing it on condition removal when I have MP.
Stability is also good, but again, long recharge and very short duration.
Distraction SEEMS like a decent choice, but I’m not a fan of the CD on the active skill.
As far as I know, there is no soft or hard cap on any stats. You can go as high as gear/traits/food/boons will let you.
From your description the problem lies on stealth and not on PU.
The idea behind clones is for you to waste 1 or more seconds of your time searching for the real mesmer.
That’s the main reason why clones are similar to the mesmer.
I know how Illusions work, what they can and cannot do. I have played mesmer since launch. The problem lies with stealth to some degree, but clones + stealth becomes a much larger issue because clones react to targeting in exactly the same way as a player (i.e. when cycling targets you will target them as well). The only reliable way to target the mesmer is with click-targeting and that brings other problems. Proper target-calling and following is incredibly important if you are trying to play just a little bit organized in a group, and PU really messes with this like nothing else in the game.
The boonspam from PU is just icing on the cake and another reason the fight gets drawn out (lots of protection, regen).
I ran with the GS yesterday and that worked out quite well, having the option to switch range is often very useful. I have in fact thought about replacing Sw/F with GS, but I want to try playing around with the focus some more, especially find out if the utility it brings with warden reflect and the interrupt/pull is worth it in general.
This guy proves why Moa should be fixed. He just admits that the skill is a I WIN button. He slots and uses it for an easy win whenever he feels like he is gonna have a good fight.
Yeah, because fighting a D/P stealth spammer is the very definition of a good fight, right?
While you may not like it and I understand the reasoning.
It’s a duel spec. Nothing more nothing less.
In saying that I expect it to be difficult to fight 1v1.
That’s simply not true. Target dropping becomes a progressively larger issue the more people depend on that target. If I target call a PU mesmer who is using lots of stealth, I can’t expect to hold that target for very long before he stealths. This is the same as a thief, no problem.
The real problem starts when the mesmer comes out of stealth, because there are 4 identical target and you have to find the right one. I’m not saying it’s hard but it can take a few seconds if you are pressured or you are in the middle of something else.
You don’t always notice them come out of stealth because you don’t know where it will happen and the clones don’t make it easier. Not because they’re doing damage but because you can’t tell without targeting if this is the mesmer or not (looking at food, karma buffs etc.) You can watch for movement patterns etc. but again, this all takes time and nobody has that time to waste in the middle of a fight.
This is frustrating because there is no obvious counter to this. It all depends on whether the mesmer is stupid/pressured enough to obviously reveal himself, like dodge rolling, jumping, strafing or other things clones can’t do.
I’m not saying 2-3 people who are dedicated can’t take down a PU mesmer, obviously not. But the whole fight becomes incredibly drawn-out and frustrating, and it usually feels like you win because the mesmer messed up and not because you somehow outsmarted or countered him.
The time spent balancing these could be better spent balancing/fixing skills that people actually use IMO.
If, for example, some skill randomly gets broken and everyone stops using it because of that, does that mean the time would be better spent elsewhere since fixing a skill nobody uses is a waste of time?
This skill has been useless since day one.
If it’s a racial then yes. Because racials are gimmicky/not for PvP. ANd PvP (WvW+SPvP) is obviously the main focus of end game, because it sure as hell is not raids or instances or anything like that.
Gap closing is the more interesting query. I remember someone once tried to argue that Blink should be replaced with rocket boots mechanics and functionality, and that it was far superior to blink as a utility. The thing about Blink though is that it can be cast while channeling. This includes the casting of phantasms, and while healing. This loads up a ton of possibilities for both chasing and opening.
Wow, really? I mean, rocket boots is a good skill but it doesn’t have half the potential of blink.
Because of target dropping. This is a problem with thieves, but thieves don’t spam clones on top of target dropping. Combined with the fact that PU gives almost as many stealth benefits as a stealth traited thief, the mesmer can slip in and out of stealth too easily and there is no reason for him to break stealth because that counteracts PU. I don’t think a single trait should offer huge rewards for spending as much of your game time in stealth as possible. It’s boring and it’s pointless.
TBH, interrupt feels a little pointless when so many skills are spammy, and some classes are almost immune (thief). There’s too much reliance on passive effects and spamming AA in general to make interrupt feel rewarding.
The biggest problem with thieves is that they can easily reset the fight and there’s not much you can do about it. You can’t spam AoE on your location to hit them, and hitting randomly into the air usually accomplishes nothing.
Foiling their backstab is not so much the problem, dagger AA with built-in poison is almost enough on its own to take down a light armor class if the thief is glassy. Your only hope is preventing them from entering stealth in the first place, or having enough sustain to heal up while they stealth and plan their next move. And remember, just because they enter stealth they are not immortal. If you managed to lock them down as they disappeared, try to hit the location where you last saw them. It works suprisingly often, and it’s hilarious when a thief pops out of stealth lying down.
Since you have MP, you might want to consider Mantra of Recovery. It would give you the same amount of condition cleanse (more, actually) with a much shorter CD as well as free up a utility slot. Less direct healing though.
I’ve been trying out the MoR/centaur thing and it works really well, especially combined with Mender’s Purity. I generally don’t need to worry about swiftness, and I can remove cripple/immob and replace it with swiftness almost whenever I want. Amazing tool for when someone tries to lock you down with condition CC.
The biggest problem so far is managing the charges in combat so I’m not stuck channeling when trying to chase. And of course I have rather low healing in general, but I really feel that MP makes a huge difference here.
While I agree that racial skills in general are pretty pathetic, we are talking about a lot of skills and a lot of them elite across races. The time spent balancing these could be better spent balancing/fixing skills that people actually use IMO. Weapon skill bugs/issues in particular should take precedence over everything else, but sadly this has not been the case so far.
No.
Not because Warrior Longbow has the biggest spammable AoE burn field in the entire game. Not because Pin Down is undodgeable. Not because of Hambow.
But because there is way too much easy mode AA in the game already. AA should not be your main source of damage or do half your build for you just by keeping in range of a target. Every class has a broken AA weapon, AA’s are wildly unbalanced between classes and too many of them have bonus effects that require you to do absolutely nothing except to be in range of a target. They need to tone down AA damage on the weapons that perform too well and leave the rest where they are now.
(edited by calavel.6249)
I have always thought eles should be immune to or lose a condition that matches the attunment they are in.
example
fire attunment, cant be set ablaze or swapping to removes burning.
water, cant be chilled
air, cant be crippled
earth, weaknessthis is just a quick example, but i think it would be an interesting trait possibility. even if you needed to go 5 to 15 deep into each element to get that ability.
Immunity to burning would be very powerful since burn is arguably one of the nastier conditions. Maybe as a major trait it would be balanced. Cripple immunity also seems very powerful but I’m all for the rest.
Idk what you’re talking about greatsword being defensive and useless in melee. The only skill affected by range is the auto attack. Mirror Blade is BETTER in melee because it’ll bounce 2 more times, dealing unblockable damage and give you 6 might. Mind Stab is a targeted damage+boon strip. iZerker will more reliably hit a target if they’re staying in melee and iWave is a melee range knockback. Where’s the defense? It’s a kittening awesome weapon.
Okay you’re right, the GS does actually do a reasonable amount of damage in melee… did they buff its AA? I haven’t used it in ages. I’m having trouble with MS because the AoE is so small. Target tends to be out of range when the skill actually hits. Only time it seems reliable is if the enemy is rooted or engaging me in melee (but that was your point I suppose). How reliable is iZerker on a runner? Isn’t he rather easy to see coming and dodge? Unblockable is nice though… also, will closing with the enemy not be a problem for the iZerker depending on range?
For Dom: If taking interrupts Mental Torment or Halting Strike. For bursting you’ll be using your mind wrack, otherwise if interupting Halting Strike will only add to your damage.
Shattered Concentration is a powerful trait but I personally feel its best place is in a structured tPvP arena. If you and your buddies are going to form some amazing group synergy, then by all means it might cover a base. Otherwise you might take something else. Having said that, I usually think of Domination in terms of using GS or Torch, and I take Torch cd for Master. Seeing as you don’t have those as an option, maybe you’re right on the money to take Shattered Concentration. OR, you could be freeing yourself up 10 points right there which could go into any of the other lines.
Taking a step back, perhaps you’re putting to much into boon stripping to counter runners. Most roamers, and those in a position to flee, aren’t going to be successful off swiftness. They’ll have runes, sigils, or traits that grant at least +25% movement speed, coupled with blinks, and mobility skills. So your enemy isnt swiftness. Stability, yes, protection maybe, but you can usually wait those two out (or you have arcane thievery). Boon stripping via shatters is going to pressure the sustain of people who want to hang around, more than counter those who’re looking to run away.
What I really want 20 Dom for is the minors and the +20% condi duration. Without the minors I can’t get those giant vuln stacks with Diversion, and magic bullet loses some of its potential as well. I suppose I could limit myself to 15 in Dom, but those 5 points aren’t going to be much use anywhere since I already have Dueling. I’ll probably stick to CD since there’s at least a chance that my target will be crippled when they decide to start running. Mental torment might be the best choice for the second trait since it’s a reasonably large passive DPS boost that I can use often and in different situations.
Focus on interrupt is something I would really like to play, but with no castbars, lots of almost instant-cast skills, dodging, dodgy animation etc., focusing too much of your build into interrupting seems potentially frustrating to me.
The whole point of going centaur/mantra is that it’s automatic.
I don’t have to use focus. I don’t have to constantly use the heal to get swiftness.
This is the important part = I set it on autocast and it will give me more than 10 secs of swiftness and cast again before my 33 percent swiftness is up.
That gives me a constant 33 percent swiftness to me and my allies. And it stacks.
Automatic. Easy.
Right… because the swiftness can proc on Power Return as well? I was considering MoR originally because you can use it to spam condition removal with MP. I’ll have to try and play some more with the curtain to find out if I can make it work for me without interrupt traits. Otherwise, this seems like to way to go, especially with the group swiftness.
Okay thanks, that looks really interesting.
Regarding interrupts and CI, how reliable is the interrupt on the curtain? I mean, you have to place it first, and then there is a small internal cooldown before you can pull. Seems like it would be really hard to time unless we are talking a 2s channel skill or something. I’m super tempted by CI, but I also don’t like being too dependent on interrupts. Too many classes have virtually no skills with more than 1s cast time and unless I can activate the interrupt instantly as a twitch reaction, I doubt I will be able to pull it off very often. Would mantra of distraction be a good utility if I pick up CI (interrupt, daze, vuln stacks)?
Also, the Dom traits… any advice? CD is a nice trait, but it’s completely out of my control and thus really more of a defensive/random annoyance trait. Shattered concentration seems a good trait to flesh out the boon hate, but I’m not sure if I can exploit it fully when chasing, since the clones will either never catch up or just die from random AoE/landscape mob AA before they do anything. Rending shatter seems pointless compared to the amount of vuln stacking potential in Diversion. Signet Mastery + Dom Signet could provide a welcome stun and now I’m really just grasping at straws…
Nullif. sigil. Viable? I’m thinking once again that boon hate is really a priority if you want to kill anything that likes to run and is good at it, but I don’t know if there are better choices. Could just go Acc/Force but that would be boring…
(edited by calavel.6249)
While GW2 dungeons has a huge amount of problems, I really feel this is a problem with player mentality more than anything. If you are running dungeons through LFG, then the name of the game is speedruns for gold/tokens and the dungeon is cof p1 (or 2,3 but probably not) because it’s quick and easy and cof tokens give zerker weapons and everyone loves zerker (especially for PvE). Playing dungeons for fun can be harsh and I find that it is sometimes almost frowned upon. Suggestions that y’know maybe this once we try to kill this boss in a non-exploity way or not skip this boss because hey, might still drop something or maybe even BE FUN, but this is almost always met with stony silence or a kick.
There seems to be a silent agreement that no one really likes to run dungeons, so it’s best to just do it the fastest way possible, because the rewards kinda sorta make it worth it.
I Insist on being weird/chatty in party chat when speedrunning through LFG because I can’t stand the let’s-just-get-this-over-with mentality with no one even acknowledging the presence of each other but just mindlessly repeating tasks in order to get the rewards and move on to something more fun.
If you are not running dungeons through LFG then I dunno, get better friends?
(edited by calavel.6249)
If you still disagree you disagree. That is all. No point in arguing further
Fair enough. I guess it all comes down to whether you think it’s fair that a condition can mess with a class mechanic (that doubles as swap). If it’s any consolation I would consider this a serious problem if we were talking about bleed or some other endlessly-spammable-by-most-classes condition. Since it’s chilled, I still think it’s mostly a necro/ele/weird spirit ranger vs. ele problem and not a large overall balance issue. And speaking of necros, everyone knows they are completely broken condition-wise. Can’t be long until something gets changed there.
Focus is a waste imo, you’re not gonna catch kitten without a greatsword. iZerker cripple is invaluable for slowing down an runner. With focus gone, can you move those 10 points from Insp to Chaos and reduce manip cd.
Really depends on the target. Unless I throw everything I can at + condi duration, any cripple you toss at a warrior slides right off because warriors looove dogged march+ 40% less condi duration food + melandru runes = never worry about cripple again. Acrobatics thieves (pistol trolls) laugh at cripple. But yeah, the GS has potential. I just think too many skills are defensive in nature and it is completely useless for dealing damage up close.
Have you considered Centaur Runes (very inexpensive) + Mantra of Recovery= 33 percent speed buff that is shared with anyone near me.
I guess that is an option, but I’m not really crazy about constantly having to channel and spam heals just in order to get swiftness. But I guess that is the fate of a mesmer in WvW.
How about the curtain pull? Does that have any sort of use in regards to crippling/pulling runners if you can get close enough? Remember, the main focus is preventing excessive running away tactics, stability+swiftness+regen spam, that kind of nonsense. I (usually) have others to help me spike.
Don’t say extra skills because we have already been over this, ele skills are generally inferior, with longer cooldowns and have to be comboed. Sadly this doesn’t only apply to weapon skills but it applies to utilities as well.
No, we have not been over this. You say ele skills have unusually long cooldowns, I say this isn’t true (apart from utilities). I’ll be more specific: Lots of ele weapon skills have short to average cooldowns compared to similar classes. The worst offenders are off-hand skills in general but there is nothing unusual about this. Mesmer and necro have long CD weapon skills as well (especially offhand), compare the skill lists. This is a feature of scholar classes, they are less spammy but each skill has greater potential when used right.
I really have no interest in PU or the Chaos line in general for this build, except for maybe Chaotic Interruption and the manipulation trait. PU has no offensive value and it doesn’t help you chase anything. This is meant to be a do or die build, get in there and finish them off before they can get away, and chase them if they run. Strip or eat their boons, spike them, be quick and mobile.
I know it sounds a little suicidal but it’s really fun in a group.
Focus is there for one main reason: On-demand swiftness. I don’t have 100+ gold to shell out for traveler runes or some nonsense and speed runes are too defensive. But I agree it might not be absolutely necessary to trait since I’m not really sure how I’m supposed to use iWarden offensively. I can see uses for him, but they don’t involve chasing.
Another benefit is being able to swift party members.
Maybe it’s just me but everyone and their mother these days seem to just run away at the first sight of an enemy. So I want something that can chase people down, lock them down and punish them for running away like little girls.
(edited by calavel.6249)
Ah now I understand what you’re saying.
Yes. At the start of a fight you have four sets of skills to work with. That’s true. But in order to attack and defend, you need one skill from several different attunements. And while it only takes a second to swap to water if you’ve just swapped to air, you won’t be able to get back to air for roughly 10 seconds. That’s a long time when you’re needing to pick and choose what skills to successfully fight with.
These are all valid points, but this is in my opinion what is meant by “managing attunements and skills carefully”. When you switch attunement, you need to have a plan, and you need to consider the fact that the plan may not be executed perfectly. But I’m sure you know this.
So. A set of Mesmer weapons have offensive and defensive skills. Right? Greatsword does, staff does, sword torch definitely does.
Ele doesn’t. Take d/d. Nothing in fire is defensive. Two skills in air are defensive. One skill in earth is defensive and 4 skills in water are defensive.
We’re locked out of most of our defensive skills once we leave water, and our best damaging skills are forfeited after we leave fire.
This isn’t to mention most of our skills that have real value are double the cooldown of a weapon skill on another class. And those skill cooldowns can be reduced on top of that.
You talk about swapping into a 100% defensive weapon set and then (if your timing is right and the situation allows it) swapping over to a 100% offensive set like it’s a bad thing. I really don’t get that. Being able to switch between defense and offense at the right time, negating spike damage then countering etc. is integral to any class.
I’m sorry but I think it is absurd that you are complaining that D/D has no balance because it “only” has 7 defense skills. 7 defensive skills on any other class is an entire weapon set with 2 AA’s and one skill to spare. I know not everything is available all the time, but this comes back to the careful attunement management argument again.
If every element on every weapon offered perfect balance between offense and defense, an experienced ele would be impossible to fight because you would never be able to catch them off guard or pressure them. They would simply swap attunement and have a fresh set of skills for both offense and defense whenever they would get pressured. It would make a mockery of the whole idea of skill cooldowns and careful application of skills.
Anyway, the cooldowns on ele weapon skills really aren’t that bad. They’re not much worse than other scholar classes, and you have a larger skill pool to make up for it.
Utility cooldown is the only place eles are really punished.
And I’m sorry if you felt offended but I was tiring of re-hashing the same argument over and over and getting met with no response apart from l2p. That’s not an argument.
Anyone got anything good to say about CC? It seems a little redundant if you have the focus, but I’m wondering how reliable it is and if there is some sort of range limit on it.
All I’m seeing from your sentences is that you don’t understand ele. I don’t understand what you’re saying about two seconds, but yes as it is, without chill, eles can get into a great groove with skill and practice. But add chill in, and it is a death sentence.
You have 4 attunements. When you swap away from an attunement, that attunement goes on a base 13s CD. You are now in a different attunement. Within the next 2 seconds, you will have two attunements ready to swap into, with a third (the original one) still being on cooldown. This is my point. This is why weapon swapping is NOT the same as attunement. The mehanics and benefits are similar, but they are not the same.
Oh, and you’re welcome to offer an actual counter-argument this time instead of being patronizing and claiming anyone that does not main ele is not entititled to an opinion on the class in the CLASS BALANCE forum.
Honestly, if even one of our long list of broken skills gets fixed anytime soon, I will consider it a huge victory.
By the way, have you noticed how often mesmer underwater weapons get mentioned in patch notes. I think perhaps we have some of the most well-balanced underwater weapons!
I’m sorry, what? Do you have any idea what you’re talking about? Only Warriors can achieve the 5s Sigil Time. Ele is in the same exact boat as everyone else. So no, there is no “main difference”.
Attunement Swap IS Weapon Swap. It Procs Sigils. It changes your weapon bar. And most importantly, should not be affected by Chill.
Sigils are a part of it, but it’s not my main beef with your attunement = weapon swap argument. Yes, ele has base 13s CD on THE PREVIOUS attunement when they swap. The 2 remaning attunements cooldown in less than 2 seconds, meaning eles can cycle through 20 different skills in a matter of less than 10 seconds, the time it takes most classes to recharge one swap.
Now does it make any sense to do this? No, of course not. Randomly cycling through a large skill pool and casting them at random accomplishes nothing. But the fact that eles can and should often cycle through attunements is the entire point of the class and is a very poweful tool compared to the fact that most other classes are – by design – limited to using 5 specific weapon skills most of the time and sometimes swapping into 5 other weapon skills to execute some spefific moves or perhaps try to switch range. The warrior is the main difference here, and I’d be happy to discuss why this is.
While eles obviously cannot always reliably access every one of their 20 available weapon skills, they almost always have the option of changing within seconds. No other class can do that, and while warriors can change faster (again, this only goes for your last attunement, not all of them), they are still limited to 10 skills like everyone else.
(edited by calavel.6249)
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Kick_
This is basically Savage Leap (Warrior mainhand sword #2). It (the warrior one) is arguably one of the best chaser skills in the game. It is a leap finisher. It has 600 range. It does not require a target. Most melee classes would kill for this skill.
The moa counterpart has 4s CD (Savage Leap has 8s), you can use it twice in the 10s you are moa’ed. The cast time is not great, should perhaps be reduced to 3/4 or 1/2. But for any class that was originally planning to close with the mesmer to attack in melee, this skill is really quite a powerful tool in the right hands.
The trick is to embrace the moa. :o
Please stop pretending Attunement is “just weapon swap for eles”. No other class can weapon swap between 20 different skills. No other class besides warrior can trigger any sort of effect on weapon swap. It’s F1-F4 skills and those skills are affected by chill. Should Engineer toolbelt skills also be immune to chill? No. And only necro has easy, reliable access to chill.
‘No other class beside warrior can trigger any sort of effect on weapon swap’
You don’t play very many classes, do you?
Yes, yes we went over that already. The point is that only warrior and ele can really exploit (not necessarily a bad word) weapon swapping because warriors can trait for 5s CD (4 with runes) and eles have more “weapon sets” available. Other classes, whether they can trait for swapping or not, are stuck at 10s, 9s with runes. This is the main difference, and the main point of my argument about weapon swapping being powerful and the fact that classifying Attunement as “just weapon swapping for eles” is false.
We can talk about warrior swap and why it is more “fair” or at least necessary if you want, but that really is a different discussion about a different class with different mechanics.
Honestly, I am not writing these things to put the ele class down or the people who main it. If anything, this discussion has inspired me to roll a new ele and learn it better this time. I liked the class pretty well, seemed complex but rewarding but since I like to WvW quite a lot of the time, I didn’t feel that playing the squishiest class in the game would be fun in the long run.
(edited by calavel.6249)
Really, there is a lot to be said about Illusions, both good and bad.
Hate or love them, they are definitely one of the weirder and more unique MMO mechanics I have encountered. It’s what keeps me coming back to the class because let’s face it, several of our utility skills are lackluster or gimmicky (some are also really good and fun/creative).
Illusions can be used to attack directly, apply conditions, confuse your enemy, be decoys that apply conditions when killed, shattered offensively, shattered defensively, shattered for conditions, shattered for condi removal, shattered for healing etc. Not all at once of course, and not all options are equally viable right now, but the potential is there.
The mehcanic can be annoying at times because it is complex and therefore vulnerable to bugginess. But learning how to use clones effectively, in whatever way you choose to use them, is integral to the class.
Mostly, I expect a thief will run, but that’s fine too. I just don’t want to go down, and if the thief DOESNT run, maybe this setup will beat him.
I’m not going to tell you how to play the game, so I’m not going to say that this statement is in some way wrong, because it really is subjective.
But (assuming we are talking about WvW) I simply don’t understand why people build to troll, or to end in a stalemate, or to be able to run away from 1v1 or 1v2 fights with neither side getting any kills and achieving nothing. Denying your opponent kills is pointless if you also don’t get a kill. If you are roaming simply to duel, at least build so you can reliably kill/stomp people. Fighting troll builds is pointless and annoying and running them is equally pointless.
But that’s just my opinion.
This is not mesmer criticism btw, it is equally horrible when a thief stealths and runs at the first sight of an enemy. Unless that person is a dedicated scout communicating with commanders he is just wasting his own time and everyone else’s.
I don’t have a problem with the clones, they can be buggy at times but they also have a lot more flexibility than most classes’ mechanics. I just miss the more reaction-based play of GW1. #2 has too much auto-attack power IMO. The worst part is that it is wildly unbalanced among classes and ranges, rewarding some classes and builds for AA spam and punishing others.
But I digress, carry on lamenting mantras. God knows they deserve it.
Fun Facts:
Hardly anybody runs full zerker in WvW
Shatter mesmer with a death wish. Also, while a power thief may not be full zerker, he’d better be kitten ed close if he wants to get any kills outside a zerg. If your backstab is not making people scramble for defensive skills, you’re doing something wrong IMO.
Fun fact: GW1 mantras were stances. Honestly couldn’t remember that until I checked the PvX wiki out of nostalgia. I miss hexes, and stances, and proper signets. And chain-interrupting monks.
sigh
I throw out the official Wiki links at you because these are facts and *facts are always more reliable than opinions.
A list of skills doesn’t tell you anything. It doesn’t tell you if those skills are often used or not, whether they are considered good by that class or not, whether they have synergy with traits/gear or not. That they are available in the game does not mean that they are a good choice. You could run a human character with all the racial prayer skills, but it would make no sense as there is no synergy with anything.
Well, in my opinion reliable chill is limited to necros and eles. I’ve yet to hear you address this other than flat out disagreeing and offering no arguments either way apart from a wiki link. Yes, it’s a very impressive list of ranger pet skills, but unless you get assaulted by an arctic zoo, it’s not going to be a real problem.
And may I repeat myself once again and state that weapon swapping in general is a huge deal and that 4 weapon sets instead of 2 is an even larger one? Is this also to be completely ignored in this discussion or is it simply that anything that messes with Attunement is OP and must be removed/nerfed? Because if that is the argument here, I might as well stop now.
Yet it shows there are other classes that has decent and reliable access to chill contradictory to what you claim.
Care about giving your comments on Anet justifying that Eles don’t have “weapon swap” because they have “Attunement Swap” as a substitute?
No, it shows eles and necros have reliable access to chill. Again, I don’t know if eles chilling eles is a problem or not, I don’t really see it mentioned specifically anywhere, only necro. The rest are either long cooldown skills, pet skills, random procs or skills no one uses outside gimmick builds. I know little about rangers so I don’t know if axe is commonly used, but I’ve never seen one
Regarding the A-net quote…
I really think it depends on how you read it. What you seem to get out of it is that Attunement is (among other things) a replacement for the weapon swapping mechanic of other classes. What I get out of it is that because eles have Attunement – which is arguably better than actual weapon swapping – you get punished by not having weapon swapping. Chill is part of that punishment, but of course there is always room for adjustment and as I mentioned earlier, I’m not a huge fan of the way chill works right now in general.
(edited by calavel.6249)
Many classes can trait for lower weapon swapping, just as we can trait for lower swapping. But our swaps — still stuck at an incredibly long 9 seconds — aren’t even reduced by much. Sorry, swing and a miss there.
Elementalists are hit doubly hard for our access to extra skills, when our access ALREADY comes at a very, very high price.
You quite obviously do not play ele. 2/10 for effort.
Warrior is the only class that can trait for actual weapon swapping CD; they can reduce it to 5s. All other classes apart from eles and engineers are stuck at 10 base. Also, your “weapon swap” is not “stuck” at 9 seconds in the same way that other classes are stuck at 5 or 10 because you have 4 “weapons sets”. You are once again ignoring the fact that Attunement isn’t just weapon swapping and shouldn’t be treated in exactly the same way. Swapping is something that is highly restricted outside warriors, and for a good reason.
No, I don’t play an ele, but I played one enough to understand how its class mechanic works. Do you play other classes? Because you don’t seem to understand that weapon swapping is a huge deal, and that ele weapon swapping has unique benefits as well as problems.
Calavel you’re completely off base. They’re in the F1-4 skill slots, but they’re not considered skills.
This is proof because if so, reducing 20% in earth would reduce attunement swap earth. And since they’re not skills like our skill bar skills, they shouldn’t be affected by chill like our skill bar skills.
Should engie toolbelt skills get this change? No! They are real skills with real effects.
Should engie kits get this change? Yes! They are the only wep swapping mechanics they have as well.Like Ganathar said, every class can trait for effects on swap, and so can ele. Otherwise we get nothing just like everybody else.
Sorry, but I’m still not convinced. I see I was a bit too quick claiming that only warriors can trait for weapon swap effects, I forgot about engineers and thieves and had no idea rangers could trait for it.
But the fact that Attunement is both weapon swapping and class mechanic (traitable for 30% CD reduction like any class mechanic) obviously makes it different from regular weapon swapping. Saying Attunement should be subject to exactly the same effects and limitations as regular weapon swapping doesn’t seem right to me. It’s not exactly the same and it never will be.
And your statement about Necros being the only class to have easy reliable access to chill is false. It does not give justice that Elementalist is hard countered by one single condition.
All I see are necro skills, ele skills, a bunch of specific ranger pet skills, a ranger axe skill, Freeze Grenade and either random condition skills or skills that are never used. Oh, and a joke elite. Cute.
The only one that seem marginally reliable outside necros and eles is the ranger axe skill. Is eles getting chilled by eles a problem? Isn’t it sort of countered by the fact that they can both chill?
If it makes any difference, I think chilled is completely out of place in its current form. Messing with skill recharge is not an ele or a necro’s job, that’s what mesmers do (well, used to do).
I think they should rework confusion to be a timing-based non-spammable effect that increases skill recharge(s) if the target uses a skill whiled affected and add something different to chilled (15% heal penalty maybe? Fumble? I dunno).
(edited by calavel.6249)
You seem to really hate passive damage procs. That’s okay, but I think you’re ignoring the fact that it is also a choice (or at least supposed to be).
There are so many interesting sigils to choose from depending on what you want to do, and the fact that Superior Fire Sigils are so popular only tells me that most people can’t be bothered to look at their build and think about how different sigils could affect it, when they typically swap weapons and what sort of effect they want when doing that etc. It also tells me people like to zerg…
And what makes a passive damage proc so much worse than a flat damage boost? Why no hate for Sup Sigils of Force? Don’t they do exactly the same thing, just in a different way?
Mesmer scepter AA is so horribly broken it’s not even funny. Attack #3 is the real problem because the channel is so long that it is easily interrupted/clunky to use. What is supposed to offset this clunkiness (I assume) is that the clone created with attack #3 is supposed to start the chain on its own and make more clones for you… except it doesn’t. It’s just a basic clone that deals next to no damage and does nothing useful on its own.