Guild Wars 2

even the ele thought: “like a boss”

soooo many nice 5 stack confusion 5 sec skills :\
feeling a little bit sad as a confusion mesmer :P
I’m quite tempted to start a new wvw alt…..

all those videos show one thing: a player who gets more and more in sync with his ever evolving build.
watching one vid is fun but watching them all is awesome.
great stuff, keep it up!

love your posts about iMage, will help us getting it boosted <3

and the good old “it’s a matter of playstyle” comes to mind :P
I really wish I could make focus work for me but I can’t. I hate warden and curtain were not very helpfull during my fights. granted I have not traited for it.
on the other hand another cloak helps me a lot and the additional burning (~3.5k damage) is nice. aoe blind is helpful, too. iMage sucks.
but I can imagine a player that is fine with focus mechanics during fights can make great use of it.
(pvp)

Kelthien.8593:

But what with build! I would LOVE to run torch, but in every way it seems inferior in both pve and wvw to other options (curse you, focus!)

still running this build: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/66011-build-confusion-bomber-tpvp-conditionshatter/

for solo/up to 5man groups in wvw or in tpvp.
focus in backpack for 14 sec swiftnes out of battle.
build is nice to outlast enemies and spike them down.

of course abusing the bug is kind of fun but im still doing more dps on my staff :\
scepter/torch only for burst/escape.

but beta torch would more be like torch 0.8 or something :P

such a little change and my whole game experience during wvw changed a lot.
staff – scepter/torch feels soo much more fluent now, it is so much fun.

in the future I will never ever doom a patch before playing

other people enjoing torch at the moment?

ps.: could we just add 2 sec to the confusion duration of iMage or let condition duration affect clones/phantasm? would make torch as viable as staff/sword/gs/pistol imo <3

it seems you are running solo so perhaps try a non glamour confusion build.
with that build I usually start with confusing images on one scout hiding behind my iMage (to avoid blind shots etc) then i start running into the scouts (best they stand together) i dodgeroll creating a clone wait till every mob is near and f1. after that image + warlock + f2. after that dodgeroll and let them hit you while invul with f4. normally scouts are ~40%, guard ~50% and supervisor is damaged too. start kiting in close range (dodgeing only supervisor) and focus the scouts down with staff conditions + shatters. throw in a prestige now with supereasy 3k burn and you should take the camp in ~70-80secs

but as said that is with a 0, 20, 20, 0, 30 build. which is more suited for solo or really small groups :\

Eliyahu.1467:

This is absurd. You are absurd.

You complain about lack of choice. There are 9 different dailies to choose from.

And you’re completely missing a central goal of dailies which is to give you an incentive to visit content that you don’t usually visit.

If you can’t spend 5 minutes in Ascalon or in Norn territory that’s your problem. The vast majority of us like having a reason to go back to these zones and explore content that we haven’t seen in a while or might have missed when we were leveling.

It is not a question if I can or cannot spend five minutes in Ascalon but if I WANT that.
I don’t need reasons to travel to other maps because wvw map is enough fun for me. But now with the new dailys I’m in a disadvantage in that kitten gear treadmill in the long run.

does not matter if it takes 10 minutes to complete it if you travel around the world, those 10minutes would bore the hell out of me.
so that leaves me 2 options: ignore laurels and the gear treadmill or spend time doing stuff I hate.
great

Qhalel and HeliaXDemonN write it up very well.

Over the last few months I really got the feeling arenanet falters under the pressure from NC. Does not seem to me that they are able to develop their game the way the wanted.

sad mmo story +1 :\

can’t do dailys anymore.
im wvw/pvp player and the old dailys were annoying as hell but doable giving me the chance to get those kitten laurels to be on the same level as other players.
now with those choices (if they are the only ones) I won’t get laurels. I will not kill 40 mobs in ascalon and i’m done with fractals (getting those 2 rings was the LAST time in my life I do something I don’t want) and the other objectives are forcing me to play the game the way I don’t want to.
why not add objectives so that EVERYBODY can get dailys easily?
they said they want ascended items to be time-gated and adding 20 choices to do dailys would not alter that.

the good skill of torch was buffed while the crap one was unchanged……….. wierd but nice to have xD
mirror became interesting again I guess.
next time scepterbuff pelsae and I’m a happy mesmer

my experience as confusion bomber in wvw:

d/d : invul their burst while confusion bombing them normaly hits them quite hard. if not dead, activate chaos armor 1-2 secs after they stealthed and drop a chaos storm on top of you. you likely will get aegis messing up their next burst. furthermore they will get lots of conditions via chaos armor/storm. get some clones up for more conditions. switch to scepter and blcok if you like. start channeling confusion images when they start stealth animation. that normally leaves them with a good stack of confusion when they attack next.
next burst can be taken if they got confusion on them, killing them OR can be avoided with stealthing yourself via decoy/torch or with a nice daze from diversion. mess with them with blink/prestige/decoy.
not that hard of an encounter if not 90% of your skills are on cd :P

d/p:
chaos armor and stealth is your friend. if out of chaos armor try to time your stealths so that the thief unloads on your clones. or just use your clones as cover. clones survive their unloads quite a while so being totally invul because of self generated cover is nice. either they are a little bit ranged → good to hide behind clones OR they are quite close → good to confusion bomb them.
spam winds of chaos and bomb them and normally they will die. sometimes they will run. if youre getting killed by them you were very unlucky :>

iirc they only cleanse conditions 1 per 3sec while stealthed so winds of chaos+chaos armor+chaos storm+confusion usually allows for some good periods of bleeds/confusion.

Alchemist.3692:

grimmson.9154:

Alchemist.3692:

…
The calcuation is simple – if you take condition dmg at 2600 (which one of the mesmers in my guild has without the sigil of corruption or signet but it does include food + crystal) …

could you tell us how he reaches that condition damage? or is that with a ~15 stack of might?

my guess would be the guildy told him his condition damage while “shattered strentgh” was op. in those times 2600 condition damage would be very realistic with 80% uptime during fights.

currently 1900-2100 condition damage depending on gear without might but with 25 corruption is more realistic.

Alchemist.3692:

…
The calcuation is simple – if you take condition dmg at 2600 (which one of the mesmers in my guild has without the sigil of corruption or signet but it does include food + crystal) …

could you tell us how he reaches that condition damage? or is that with a ~15 stack of might?

I think an option to change enemy models size/colour/apperance is already worked on.
So if you want, every enemy is a red human male. or if you want they are all a pink little asura. Only in your view.
I switched from human to asura and it is a difference.
I don’t think anet will let the asura/charr imbalance stay the same. Just a question of time.

so scepter is ok-nice in direct damage builds, great. could we get a ok-nice condition weapon set besides staff? :\

scepter:
-autoattack gets 1sec confusion per hit, a 2sec confusion on attack 3 (but without clone generation and without longer cast time)
-counter applies 3 stack 4 sec confusion, generates clone if not hit.
-confusing images cast time reduced
-scepter clones attack slower but with 1 sec confusion
all improvements llive would be a little bit op I guess but one or two would be fine imo <3

torch:
prestige = target drop, not really usefull for mesmers eh?
iMage = crap

a buffed (condition)scepter and iMage would take my gw2 experience from great to awesome levels.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Alright, after a week of practice, I can happily say that I LOVE this build and tend to be very effective in fights.

However…

D/D Elementalists feel nearly impossible for me to deal with. Could anyone offer any advice on how a condition build handles them?

had some problems with d/d eles too until I asked in this thread:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/elementalist/Team-PZ-Ele-offering-help/first#post1250260

in short: a good timed daze in water attunement = dead d/d ele.
after that I realized how good f3 shatter is, in other fights as well.

iirc the wvw maps are as large as they can make them. bigger ones would only be possible with portal connections and that would be meh.
that was statet in one of the early wvw dev posts, I think.

-Give WvW points based on how long a position was held rather than when the clock resets. Currently GW2 rewards offense far more than defens
mentioned by Straegen in another thread
that and a really long time where points/minute increase like
1point/minute for first 15 minutes ……… 1,5 points for next 15 minutes …….. 20 points after 4hous defending and so on; so that defending something is a really good thing.

another nice add imo:
make borderlands meaningfull to eb. for example more objectives conquered in borderlands = more buffs in eb. make sm castle double/tripple points but almost not conquerable without good borderland buffs.

sm rewards:
with the above mentioned additions smc could spawn some drop bags for players at starting zones (even in borderlands) with random loot inside it every 15 or whatever minutes. but only when character is not afk and participates
furthermore those dropbags will get better the longer smc is conquered. with chances of dropping exotics or even ascended stuff after 24/42h defing smc.

just my 2c, it should be important/rewarding to attack/def smc, but borderlands should be important to conquer smc.

Bloody Zac.8960:

Straegen.2938:

…
2. Give WvW points based on how long a position was held rather than when the clock resets. Currently GW2 rewards offense far more than defense.
…

Number 2 is an absolutely excellent idea.

OMG! could someone with good lenguage and wisdom create another thread in suggestions and wvw subforums so that devs read this?
it would make wvw soo much more interesting. can’t believe this is not ingame yet

great another step to satisfy casuals?
I’m quite casual and imo those titles are good.
spvp titles are a joke.
add easier titles to wvw, add similar hard to get titles to spvp
→ everyone is happy

ps.: those garbage spvp titles are no titles at all. that dominator title from wvw will be an awesome title

100% agree, this clunky mechanic is the no1 reason why I don’t use feedback.
would it be ground target like all the other glamour skills (-portal kind of…) it would be in my skill list 100%.

PLEASE make it ground target <3

Chaos Archangel.5071:

…The problem I’m now having with shatters is knowing WHEN to shatter…

THIS

the whole really 100% everything this.

you literally have to read your opponents (the player), not the class/build. thats so kittening difficult! but it rewards you with instant (quite) deaths against everyone.
can’t say it for sure but this build has some freacking learning curve.

best fun in pvp (tpvp/wvw) I had since beta1. nothing better than purple clouds hugging that enemy
and those clouds are getting thicker and sicker the longer you play that build, I promise)

fun story: confusion mesmers are my hardest enemies right now :\
they suck!

if you do the 4*winds of chaos spamming, it does a good amount of damage in 1v1 situations but it gets less reliable in 1vsx situations because of random bounces and clones from DE not hitting the main target. try to summon clones with skills like mirror immage, these clones will hit the target and try to stay in melee range so that all of your bounces really hit the main target twice.

but I would try to get your damage up:
imo a full rabid geared mesmer with decoy/blink/staff has all the survivability it needs.
you even has sword 2 for more invuls. so why not trade some defense traits for offense ones?
examples:
chaos IV -> chaos V, more bleeds (it stacks 2-3 bleeds can’t remember and other very usefull conditions like weakness)
illusions III -> V, it really helps when you are working with confusion and you SHOULD working with it
chaos XII -> illusions XI, more shatters! you really should involve shatters in your combat. they are your burst and as osicat mentioned it helps a lot with killing someone.
being killed slowly by burn/bleed is good but gives time to react. a burst of confusion will drastically shorten the time to react.
also I would argue what trait gives more survivability. especially in spvp where a longer stealth often means harder time to cap/defend a point.
and don’t underestimate a daze or distortion on demand even without illusions out. can’t count the times I was saved because of instant distortion after being jumped by 2thieves or other sneaky stuff! or in 1vx situations a instant daze often results in a safe stomp

so in short:
trade some defensive traits for offensive ones and try to burst with cof. you should get a lot more damage, a lot.

oh nice one with daze while in water, never have done that! thanks for the great tips will try them

hi, I would love to hear some tips how to beat a d/d ele with conditions.
I play a confusion shatter mesmer (I know not so good tpvp) and dd eles give me the hardest time. their condition removal is insane, so any tips would be great.
especialy when to stack confusion.
furthermore are there any confusion mesmer in paids or are they considered garbage?

don’t really like to play a subpar build but they are so much fun and getting tips how to beat my nemesis would help me a lot!

thanks in advance

edit: oh well, wissed the thred “Tips for defeating DD Ele”……..
but another opinion would be great^^

yep gw2 has the most beautiful pve world imo. I don’t enjoy pve normally but running around in this world doing stuff was quite good times. it COULD be a blast with some mentioned additions.

Who cares if centaurs conquered the map or not? more impact on the map please!
furthermore really harsh boss monsters with random spawn rates would be so nice! anyone remember ragnarok 2? suddenly seeing that MVP boss monster rageing through the map? they were deadly and gave nice nice rewards.
remember those dragons in gw2? where standing afk spamming autoattack is sufficient to get the crap lootchest?
never have seen an enemy as big as those dragons that are sooo simple to defeat.

bring back the epicness into the world

it is sad but scepter is just crap in tpvp. it is impossible to land confusing images and the block is is very lacking with condition spec. autoattack I don’t even want to start….

in wvw it is a fun weapon but even there If im serious I go with sword :\

depending on target 16 bleeds, perma burn and a good amount of vulnerability is realistic. for example I kill dolyaks in wvw with mirror+dodge-> 3 clones+me = 14-18 bleeds, perma burn and ~10 vulnerability. that is reached when its hp hit about 50%.
if you generate your clones as fast as possible you could get more conditions with the help of chaos V.

standard confusion shatter build

doing fractals for the rings and I have to admit, imo confusion plain sucks in pve^^
sometimes a 20 stack confusion with ~6 sec duration is totally wasted, not triggered once.
I’m not very experienced with pve but perhaps it will get better when I know the pattern of all the enemies in fractals.
for example the boss in that snow fractal, when confused while he is summoning those ice shards he triggers confusion very fast. I managed to stack a 14 confusion just before he vanished on his floor to summon those ice shards and that was like 30-40k confusion damage. not THAT shabby.
don’t know if every enemy can be confused to that extend though

I don’t know… imo in a condition spec confusion is more than control. when timed you can and will burst someone down very quickly regardless of profession or build.
confusion is my core damage. burns and bleeds are good sustained damage.
if I manage to stack 10 bleed and perma burn (you need 2 clones and yourself) thats ~2200 dps + low direct damage lets round up to 3k dps. thats good but with some confusion they will hit themselfes with 3k damage 1-3 times a second. and if you are serious about confusionbursting they will hit themselves for about 3-6k.

it is a matter of playstyle but imo both damagesources can be considered “core” :P

this is not my vid and if owner wants to remove it I’ll do.
but is is a very nice wvw mesmer confusion video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=o3ORbmjDPuE

hopefully more of it is coming

imo torch.

focus 4 is good for moving around the map but in a 1vsx it is only good when with sword mainhand. warden is plain bad imo. even when summoned on a knocked back enemy it does lacking damage and if the enemy stays in warden you could have killed him with any other weapon.

on the other hand prestige is awesome. every stealth is a big + to any roaming build and it does good damage with a condition spec. you can use blink while channeling it so a guaranteed 2-3k aoe burning and a good surprise opener.
image is ok. not that good but ok. usually that is my first skill to use when I jump on somebody. 3 stacks of confusion + one illu to shatter :\ (could use a little buff imo^^)

edit: ah and don’t forget prestige is a blast finisher so combined with your fields you can spread the love of chaos armor to your buddies (or other nice stuff)

or try this: http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/66011-build-confusion-bomber-tpvp-conditionshatter/

made it to play exactly your scenario: 1-3 vs 3-15^^
having good times with it and can’t find a better (more fun for me) build to roam in wvw solo.

imo the confusion build you linked is very good in teamfights but is a little bit weaker solo.

if you have 3 clones and hit cof those 3 clones vanish from your clonecount and are walking confusion bombs. if you summon 3 new clones and mind wrack then they vanish from your clonecount and are walking HE bombs. if you mind wrack them before the confusion bombs shatter you got a 6 clone train on the field (3confusion, 3 mind wrack). when they hit the cof clones will apply cof stuff(little damage + 6 confusion stacks) and the mind wrack clones will do their stuff (3 confusion stacks + massive damage)

styx.7294:

Things I like
-With shattercat I haven’t won any 2v1 but with this I’ve been able to do 2v1 (even a couple 3v1 against some under level’ed folk).
-Hundred blades warriors just sort of go “poof”.
-I generally have felt favoured against other mesmers, even shatter ones.
-Yay toughness, I find I end the fight with more hit points than usual

Some criticism
-Being a condition build, it is terrible against siege weapons. Boo.
-I can’t seem to win against condition thieves (regular thieves are no problem) – the sort of pistol thief that pops in and out of stealth. While they’re stealthed, the confusion does nothing and with only 1 AoE and no melee attack, you can’t do anything against them while they’re stealthed. Also all your auto-attacks are incredibly slow. I’m 0-3 against these guys (even when one started the fight with 10% health) and can’t think of anything. Maybe arcane thievery but since I never need that against anyone else I never have it
-Confusion.. is an interesting condition. It requires them to do things, so if someone is backing off after they get a bunch of confusion, the confusion is wasted. It’s useless against dolyaks or people who are just running away.
-With no air/centaur runes, prepare to just let some folk get away and if someone is determined to catch you and there’s no where to hide with your invisibility then they’re going to catch you
-Scepter autoattack is pretty weak for damage, it’s very sad

glad you have fun!

for the pros:
- yep, it is really good in small skirmishes up to 15 or 20 people. I have run this build for the last 2-3 months now and everything goes automatic^^. If I can keep my calm and IF I am not drunk 1vs6 is possible.
keep it going and the only real danger is overextending

for the cons:
- you can’t kill siege weapons on walls, but on the field you can kill the operator^^
- but to be honest, siegeing is not as funny as roaming! so who cares
if you want to siege, def your siege weapons or intercept reinforcements.
if you want to def, attack from the side and burn your cds, normally you can stir them up a bit or portal bomb their sieges. but as I said, sieging is not fun to me so you know best how to help your team

-condition thiefs (and good necros), yeah they are a pain. but not because they own condition mesmers but because the fight takes time. it is our ele vs ele. normally I don’t have much trouble against them. I don’t use cond removal. I use stealth as soon as I get 2-3 stacks of bleed. standing still and decoy and blink usually confuses the thief enough to waste one or more attacks on clones. then you have to move fast. do some damage, some confusion and stealth again (1-2 secs after thief stealthed) if your 3 stealths are gone use blink and phase retreat when neccessary after that disortion. after that the first stealth should be up again, rinse repeat. the thief should not be able to land many condition attacks on you, but you can get some confusion on him. but the fight will take some time as said :>

-moving speed:
hm sure I can’t keep up with an ele or thief but with focus swiftness (~14sec) + chaos storm + 1200 blink I can keep up quite good with my zerg.
chatching someone is a different story :\ I admit that this is the biggest drawback of this spec. but imo it is a small one. in a 1vs3 who cares about the last one running? the fight was good nonetheless
edit: oh and don’t forget to fight near water. mesmer is quite fast underwater
(and insanely strong too with condition spec)

-scepter: yeah it sucks. period. just using it for the lulz to get that rare ~20 confusion stack to see the 10k confusion cloud^^
imo if the scepter would apply a 5sec confusion on the second attack it would be fine.

sidenote: today I finally realized how important the best pizza is. with 40% cond duration bonus you get 7 sec bleeds (not 6 3/4 as with the cheap one)

Hurray \o/

point of view of a mesmer:
IMO
warriors: only dangerous ones are the ones hitting you from behind while all your skills are on cd. some need more time to die but seriously they are not that dangerous as many say. they become quite dangerous in a good team while others do the cc.
unfortunately good warriors are really hard to catch :\

guardians: 1vs1: one of the more dangerous profs. many tricks and not as easy to read as warriors.
xvsx: THE prof I watch out for. they have GREAT cc (not that garbage like root or stun) in form of knockbacks, pulls, “cages” and good damage, nasty, dangerous stuff.
if they are accompanied with other good damage dealers they are quite the force multiplier.
I often roam solo or in really small groups and would engage any enemy group 1:4 IF there are no guardians around :P (then more like 1:2)

so please play warrior!

UnknownFreak.2805:

Got a stupid question for so experienced that I am, but shatter#3, daze, does it only give one second for 3+self shatter, cause then it’s pretty useless, if you have 3 clones up.

cause my confusion last longer than daze if I use shatter #3. And confusion last 3 sec

and do not forget that you can get domination minor 15, dazzling making f3 a very very powerful shatter. played a little with 20 in domination (dazzling+shattered concentration) and it was the most powerful burst I have ever achieved. now with might stacking and buffed dazzling it is a little bit insane :\
20+ might and 20+ vulnerability = 5k+ shatters / clone
and might stacks and vulnerability stacks empower all attacks, blurred frenzy and gs autoattack for example do absurd amounts of damage with those buffs….
and got a thief in your roaming gang? thief + target with 20-25 vuln stacks = profit

I’m sooo sad vulnerability does not improve condition damage taken T_T

hm I’m looking for a new condition build since the boarderline op 0 20 20 0 30 rabid confusion bomber gets a little bit boring :\
perhaps carrion is not as bad as i thought. less crits and less bleeds, but more damage with all attacks (shatters more powerfull, phantasms worth summoning again…)

BUT sinican, I really suggest to use pizzas over all other food with a condition build. the additional condition duration is way too good to pass.

I guessed so but was interested in his reply

sinican.9250:

Additionally, really only 120 damage bleeding tics with a condition build… umm i guess you lost about half your condition damage in crit/precision. Bleeds tix at 225+ a tic, poison at nearly 1k a tic, and burning upwards of 2k a tic. Sounds like you aren’t much conditions for a condition build :/

could you please elaborate on this?
I know in wvw crazy numbers are possible, but I’m running full cond build with rabid exotics and max cond damage I can achieve is about 3k but that with 25 sigil stack and 20 might stacks, I don’t really need to say that this is not the “normal” condition damage number.
and even with 3k cond damage I can’t reach those numbers.
If you could help me there it would be awesome

http://www.gw2spidy.com/

this is a site where you can find a trading post out of game. there you can also find the gem to gold transfer rate. so at the moment you would get ~11gold /10$.
ckeck what you need and what it costs (buy offer) and calculate

or you can take that gold to play the trading post, buy low sell high and that kind of stuff. but it is risky and could waste your 10$ ;P

don’t know you or what you are doing in rl, but imo if you can spend 50$ without noticing, skip that AWEFUL pve grinding crap, spend money, buy stuff, go wvw, have fun :>

or skip all that grind boring stuff and save your precious time and spend 20-40 $ to by gems and equip yourself with all you want. or pay 10$ and play the trading post for some days.
buying equip with rl money is not evil. and ask yourself: do you want to do stuff you hate for hours(days…weeks…) when you coud skip that with 1-2h of rl work?

I think that quote refers to the bugged f3→f1 shatter, not shattered strength (hopefully)

@delusion
imo you have to be clear about wvw or tpvp.
in wvw your build is fine, but I would change chaos 5 → 2 because you are very tanky and need some more dps. and perhaps illusions 5 → 6 but that is a matter of playstyle. I like 5 more
and imo runes: lyssa to undead. same reason, you need more dps. not cond duration or prec or buffs. undead runes give like 200 cond damage and you will notice that combined with confusion +33%.
in my wvw experience 2/3 kills come from confusion.

in tpvp it is another story. you don’t need 1200 blink, and definately no chaos storm when falling. illusion 6 is very important. normally you def a point so the enemy has to pressure you, no 33% longer confusion needed. but 50% shatter recharge is good for 2 distortions and interrupts. one to tank incoming burst and second to get a safe stomp or to prevent one or something similar. illu VII is very good too.
and try sword/torch. scepter is fail in tpvp imo. you need that 2 sec invul and the aoe root. torch is decent with the buffed mage.
sword also helps with mesmers because with the sword root you will be able to stack a lot more confusion and other conditions. I usually ignore the phantasms, just avoid their attacks and go straight for the mesmer. torch4 and decoy help to spot the mesmer but keep in mind that you won’t def the point while stealthened^^

that is just my opinion. have played this spec in tpvp since bwe3 and in wvw for 2 month.

you can search the tp with filters………. you should be able to find an exotic torch with cond damage, prec, toughness, I’m sure.

is damage everything? I think a crit/power build can do more dps additionally with a burst that is more reliable than a confusion burst. BUT
1. the damage is comparable
2. condition builds are WAY harder to take down.

imo condition damage is very viable in every situation.