Guild Wars 2

Zenith.7301:

Mak.2657:

Zenith.7301:

Mak.2657:

I think on some dungeon mobs encounters pretty easy to keep 3 phantasms up.

I don’t count CoF p1 as high end PvE.

Arah, fractal 50 are better examples. In Arah every boss has an aoe that instantly destroys them. In fractal 50 you got archdiviner on first floor IF his spinning projectiles are not hitting the phantasms. Svanir shaman maybe higher uptime, but he still kills your phantasms with autoattack swings. That’s about it.

Even at some Arah encounters possible to keep 3 phantasms up most time and soloing it. Final p1 boss e.g. For Lupi DE more pref cause reflect OP damage and his mechanics.
Or for example Lvl 50 Thaumanova Fractal Mesmer Solo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYfyggu8QRY&t=419

Lupi’s kick will destroy your phantasms. That Thaumanova solo is one of the betetr examples, but you also have to realize it was a solo, for example the ooze won’t hit anything that’s not melee range, and the endboss people stack melee while someone runs the bombs out.

But do Urban instead, different story. Same for Dredge or Volcanic fractal. Arah p2 endboss aoe will destroy phantasms, as will the 2nd boss in that path using the explosive barrel. In arah p2 even the phantasms don’t benefit from in phase status on final boss so they do 0 damage to the boss, making deceptive evasion betetr since you’re the only source of damage.

Rome.7124:

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

Ravenmoon.5318:

You know, I know how to dodge properly, but the hambow need to stunchain you once. And it has happened to me before, and it is not pleasent. 1 stunchain is all it takes to kill a thief

Wow, such OP. Nerf … thieves should go down after a single normal attack!!!!!!!11eleveone

Your argument is poorly supported. Before you cry about thieves status you should acknowledge the strength of S/D. S/D acrobatic thieves have the most accessibility to evades/dodges than any other builds in game, and many warrior hammer skills have the most obvious animations in game. So you really are just making yourself look bad by saying you get caught in stun chain and was unable to break out of it.

Back to mesmer, I want to re-emphasize mesmer’s role in boon stripping as Selya suggested. We all know that mesmer’s have the highest accessibility to boon strip, so why isn’t mesmer dominating celestial meta? Mesmers should be the nemesis for builds that heavily relied on boons, yet mesmers are rarely seen in teams. Maybe its because mesmer’s boon strip can’t match the speed of boon reapplication, or maybe the need to defensive peel far outweighs ways to make opponent vulnerable. Either way the state of celestial meta plus lack of mesmers shows that mesmer has become lackluster in fulfilling its role in boon stripping.

There are still a lot of underused mesmer traits, perhaps future updates can try to give them more purpose. A good example will be changing furious interruption to corrupt boons on interrupt; bountiful disillusion allows illusions to steal boon for mesmer when destroyed (with CD) etc.

great post

Now let’s try to stay on topic, this thread is about Mesmers, not warriors vs thieves.

Celestial meta ain’t pushing mesmers out, berzerker thieves are.

Well someone made a post earlier about roles. I think t the biggest issue is any role a mesmer might fill is better filled by another class. What role "should"mesmers fill? Most would say DPS roamer. What is keeping mesmers from filling this role? I say thieves. We could fight for changes to thieves, the only thing i would like to is consume plasma.

The real problem still is any role a mesmer “could” fill is filled 100x better by another class wirh none of the weaknesses inherent in the mesmer class.

Wait wat happened to necros? A bug in downed state?

Yes because you are already "attached " as it were to the guardian with binding blade the only way he cannot pull yiu is if you are invulnerable. So the old blurred frenzy you would have been fine.

Quadox.7834:

It actually would make sense in Illusions trait line, and inspiration is actually the more phantasm-focused traitline (15% dmg on phantasms and whatnot) But IC is so kitten important! If anything, maybe move confusion on shatter to somewhere else? Hard to say.

But that’s why I said remove IC entirely and just reduce cooldowns across the board.

Xyonon.3987:

No.

#quoteRossBiddle

Okay well, it was just something that popped into my head while working. Carry on then. Maybe move it to adept?

I just always see people saying that they feel kitten by being FORCED to take DE. So I was mulling around some possible solutions.

Turtle Dragon.9241:

Previously, I tried posting a thread asking for which skills/traits act differently on every profession, and got very few answers. On the other hand, it seems other classes have some skills that even do extra damage in sPvP such as Warrior’s Whirling Axe.

Guardian:
Save Yourselves only works for 1/2 the duration
Selfless Daring only heals for 1/2 the amount
Retaliation does 33% less damage

Is Guardian the only class that gets heavily nerfed in sPvP?

No…. See mesmers. Same competitive build for 2.5 years now.

Selya.5039:

jportell.2197:

So an Idea i was mulling over was this. It isn’t a massive “buff” to mesmers as it were but an idea to open up more build diversity.

Way back when many moons ago, deceptive evasion was a minor trait in dueling. It was a 15 point (or 3 point now.)

I’m proposing changing that back. However, not in dueling. Make it the 3 point minor in illusions. Remove illusionist’s celerity all together and reduce illusion cooldowns across the board.

The point of this is not necessarily to buff mesmers (even tho I see it as such.), but to open up build diversity.

Ever since launch at the top level of play mesmers have had only one build. Just one. This has not changed since the launch of the game. If you look at almost any other class they have had a minimum of two truly competitive builds. Mesmer build diversity is by far the worst in the game. It has never seen anything besides shatter at the highest tier of play. The only change that has been seen build wise for mesmers that put them in a better spot, was the introduction of halting strike.

This would merely change the status quo from a compulsory 4 points in dueling compulsory for all builds except phantasms to a compulsory 3 points in illusions. While this would be a huge buff to shatter since shatter goes 6 points into illusions anyway, other builds, most prominently 4/4/6/0/0 interrupt builds, would suffer greatly since 3 points into illusions is inferior stat wise and adept trait choice wise compared with 4 points into dueling.

Imo, just change deceptive evasion to an adept trait in dueling (i.e. requires 2 points). Most pvp mesmers would go at least one point into dueling anyway for vigor on crit. Some people have suggested making deceptive evasion inherent to the class as a secondary profession mechanic. However, this would work only if you could turn the mechanic off whenever you want, as PVE mesmers do NOT want deceptive evasion.

That could also work. but even an interrupt mesmer that runs the 4/4/6/0/0 build may benefit from it. Because it would decrease the cooldown of diversion. But moving it to adept would also be something that would be amazing.

I’m just trying to throw something out there that will make mesmer viable at the top tier, and I think shatter is too limiting but everything else just doesn’t work as well as something else.

Making deceptive evasion a 3 point minor in illusions, and remove illusionist’s celerity reducing all illusion cooldowns across the board.

I say this because most builds I see running into illusions are forced to take DE. And Several builds that don’t take DE suffer from ridiculously long cooldowns of illusion summoning skill.

Edit: Really beat from work excuse the short post etc.

So an Idea i was mulling over was this. It isn’t a massive “buff” to mesmers as it were but an idea to open up more build diversity.

Way back when many moons ago, deceptive evasion was a minor trait in dueling. It was a 15 point (or 3 point now.)

I’m proposing changing that back. However, not in dueling. Make it the 3 point minor in illusions. Remove illusionist’s celerity all together and reduce illusion cooldowns across the board.

The point of this is not necessarily to buff mesmers (even tho I see it as such.), but to open up build diversity.

Ever since launch at the top level of play mesmers have had only one build. Just one. This has not changed since the launch of the game. If you look at almost any other class they have had a minimum of two truly competitive builds. Mesmer build diversity is by far the worst in the game. It has never seen anything besides shatter at the highest tier of play. The only change that has been seen build wise for mesmers that put them in a better spot, was the introduction of halting strike.

Sorel.4870:

jportell.2197:

Ring of warding is less a problem than slick shoes. Slick shoes all the engi has to do is throw nades at his feet and the only way out is teleports or stab. If you only have a stunbreak but it doesn’t give stab or a teleport you’re still shafted. Ring of warding is less of a problem because there is more risk involved, usually guards have to couple judges intervention with ring of warding for it to actually trap someone in it.

You can CC the engi or better yet immobilize him. Or you can pay better attention while fighting an engi so you can kite when he uses slick shoes, or just hold still and block/evade/invuln/CC if he uses slick shoes after an immobilize. Frankly, if Slick Shoes was that broken, you wouldn’t see so many engis with Elixir S/EG. Ring of Warding and Entangle are fine as well. I think players don’t like these skills because only a few professions really care about their positioning, so some who don’t play these are too lazy to adapt.

I actually play one of the professions where positioning is eveverythin . And the number of engis running slick shoes over EG and elixir S is actually quite a few.

Ring of warding is less a problem than slick shoes. Slick shoes all the engi has to do is throw nades at his feet and the only way out is teleports or stab. If you only have a stunbreak but it doesn’t give stab or a teleport you’re still shafted. Ring of warding is less of a problem because there is more risk involved, usually guards have to couple judges intervention with ring of warding for it to actually trap someone in it.

Pyro’s post about the current state of mesmer is pretty accurate. The game has been out for so long that almost every build has been tested in most levels of PvP. Pretty much at the top end everything except shatter is found wanting in some respect.

Page bug. fix 15 chars

It was a fun match once we had everyone. Just goes to show how important it is to have a full team.

Edit: Dat portal stomp at 14:45.

DrDivine.5378:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Are you saying that if a shatter mes drops portal he suddenly becomes MORE viable? Who knew!

:D PLOT TWIST! D :

lel I always get people saying kitten kitten W/O PORTAL U HAV NU MOBILITY BRING PORTAL FOR TEAM MOBILITY

brings portal

nobody uses portal

Even in pugs/soloque. I find portal to be more useful than mantra of resolve. But that is mostly because I dedicated myself to being really good at using portal for

• stomps
• jukes
• ele resses
• Evacs
• and general mayhem

You know you’re using portal right when you get hate tells about speed hacking >.<

Mogar.9216:

somewhat off topic, remember a while back there was a patch that bugged out and chaos storm did like 10k damage per pulse? Me and my friend both had mesmers and we parked on the roof of a gate house in wvw and just jumped down on 15+ man zergs with the falling trait, it was freaking hilarious best 1/2 hr wvw ever .

That was the one time I always voted for khylo and would just run up to clock tower fall down on the point. And Insta kill everyone. It wasn’t chaos storm itself just the falling traited one.

Okay so any way to guarantee a stomp is considered cheap… So I’m going to just go through the several ways that classes can guarantee a stomp (and I mean every class except maybe necro.)

• Blind Stomping-Guards, thieves, (some necros and eles)
• Stab stomping- Warriors, eles, guards, necros w/ plague, rangers,
• Teleport stomping- This is used as a way to prevent interrupts. Thieves use shadow step/return stomping on classes that can interrupt.
• Body blocking- Mesmers with phase retreat then blink stomping. Rangers with pets.
• Portal stomping- Which is particularly funny when you get called out for hacking because of it.
• Invuln Stomping- Engis, mesmers, and eles are the only ones that can do it. Which isn’t really an issue anymore since most engis take slick shoes over elixir S, most eles take cleansing fire, and mesmers aren’t really taken anymore.

So you’re only real gripe being invuln stomping which isn’t really an issue anymore… Sooo yeah why does this thread exist?

#savethegolems

Trigr.6481:

jportell.2197:

Trigr.6481:

jportell.2197:

So I’ve been told by a few people that have done ESLs/AG etc. That mesmer just “can’t work” anymore. I know people are gonna bring Supcutie/Misha/Helseth etc into this argument about how amazing they are at mesmer and they are great in their team. The point is…

When asking people about forming a team they flat out tell me “play something else.” Not because I’m a bad mesmer, I know I’m not the greatest mesmer but I know that I am not complete garbo. They say it because they and others feel mesmer just doesn’t have anything of value to teams anymore In their opinion just bring two eles with FGS they will match the mobility, and have better sustain. I know that in the past mesmers were great, it took the team building around them, however they were able to contribute a ton to the team if it happened that way.

Now even mentioning the class (along with others I know.), is met with heavy resistance, and if you some how have two on your team. It’s just called out GG before the match even starts.

I’m just wondering why PvP players feel that mesmer can’t work. What should change to make it in the meta? Do the top players not even want mesmers in their teams anymore? What would it take to actually have people say “you play a mesmer cool we need one.” Instead of “Do you play anything else?” as soon as you are on a team.

Kind of a rant, Kind of a question. I know this is a class question in the pvp thread but this is specific to mesmers in PvP.

TLDR: Do you think mesmers need something to be on teams again? Are there others just as frustrated that the class they have spent so many hours trying to become perfected on is just brushed off on the class alone.

Don’t believe everything you hear.

Countless

Countless doesn’t mean imma stop playing mesmer. Just means its frustrating that that is how people feel about it right now.

True, I can understand where it can be frustrating. However the majority of people in this game are very narrow minded when it comes to what’s viable and what isn’t. Not to mention that the community itself is very miniscule. Believe it or not mesmer can work. However I feel it requires more of a specific comp as compared to other classes.

Countless

Which is kind of my point. Most and (not all) other classes have builds that don’t require baby sitting or building an entire team around to make work. People aren’t a fan of mesmer in their team because they feel its going to force them to change their build/or class just to make sure that mesmer can stay alive long enough to do its job.

Ravenmoon.5318:

Kicast.1459:

Ravenmoon.5318:

Kicast.1459:

Thief have always needed and still need huge nerfs.
Highest mobility class must never be the hardcounter of anything.
Anet was not able to manage this in two years.
I don’t know if they are blind or if they just simply can’t due to awfull and broken initiative design.
Little tip for you anet…spammable skills must never be powerfull.

And the thief shouldn’t die in 2 crits but hey, it is what it is. If you can’t land 2 crits, that’s your fault. Live by the sword, die by the sword, lol

Yes it should…like other zerkers.
And thief is still one of the hardest class to down when well played.
But you are obviously not aware on what a good thief can do.

You clearly don’t know how immobilize works.

Agains’t s/d thief… Tell me how well immob works.

Ravenmoon.5318:

This thread is garbage, made by people who have only seen screenshots of thief and mesmer. A well placed eviscerate kills the thief (if they fail to dodge) so to be a good thief you have to be very observant.

I wonder though. If what you crybabies are claiming is true, and the thief is the “master race”, why don’t we see teams with 5 thieves? Since the thief can wreck any class, why bother playing anything else than a thief? Why is it so that a team with 2 or more thieves is at a disadvantage.

Godlike thief yo ….

I’ve seen teams of 5 power rangers completely obliterating Khylo from camp spots, teams of 5 turret engineers completely bunkering down every map. Have yet to see a team of 5 thieves in which they actually win.

You only need to spam your aoes to kill a thief. You don’t even need the bloody target which stealth prevents you from getting.

So hardcore….

Also you complain that thief runs only zerker and wrecks other zerkers. Well newsflash, the thief has NO OTHER viable set up. This is the only role thieves can play in the current meta. They suck at pretty much everything else. Pretty much the reason why you rarely see thieves in dungeon runs. Way too squishy to do kitten.

Dude. That’s not even the point of this thread.
Also yeah stealth prevents you from getting a target, so does blind. Guess what is required for at least one skill on every mesmer weapon? A target. Guess what thief can spam almost ad infinitum? Stealth and blind which prevent mesmer from even casting their most damaging skills.

Guess which is the only weapon mesmer can use that doesn’t require a target for its AA, Sword. Guess which weapon is one of the least used by shatter mesmers currently because they cannot survive in melee at all.

Yes I think the thief v mesmer match up needs looked at. No I don’t think one specific thing on thief needs nerfed. Yes I do think mesmer needs some form of buff at least in its ability to disengage from a fight/thief.

This isn’t so much a QQ thread as it is asking people why they think mesmer isn’t used as much in current conquest pvp compared to other classes, (yes I know necro and ranger are hurting they at least have more than one build that has seen high end play tho.) And if mesmer should receive something to make them more appealing to a team.

Seriously stop interjecting with random hyperbole.

Lol well I got 4 total I think because I did a diversion in the middle of the SR too. Anyways. yeah halting strike is hilarious.

Was against a team of with two thieves on foefire. (Not saying how good or bad they were because on shatter mes I just try to avoid thieves.)

Anyways one was low and SR’d on the WF ledge of Graveyard. I Mind stabbed/mind wracked that and got a flame blast off. So I guess he’s down, I continue the fight and throw up a quick self CoF, just to keep him from trying to res also heard the “I need help.” from his character.

The super funny part is this, the other thief comes up right as that one finally pops out of stealth and drops an SR on his buddy. I swap to staff and do a chaos storm right inside of the SR. It procs dazes on 3 pulses and then downs the other thief, then they both popped out of stealth just laying there waiting to die.

Lesson Learned… Chaos storm hurts Don’t try ressing inside of it >.<

Trigr.6481:

jportell.2197:

So I’ve been told by a few people that have done ESLs/AG etc. That mesmer just “can’t work” anymore. I know people are gonna bring Supcutie/Misha/Helseth etc into this argument about how amazing they are at mesmer and they are great in their team. The point is…

When asking people about forming a team they flat out tell me “play something else.” Not because I’m a bad mesmer, I know I’m not the greatest mesmer but I know that I am not complete garbo. They say it because they and others feel mesmer just doesn’t have anything of value to teams anymore In their opinion just bring two eles with FGS they will match the mobility, and have better sustain. I know that in the past mesmers were great, it took the team building around them, however they were able to contribute a ton to the team if it happened that way.

Now even mentioning the class (along with others I know.), is met with heavy resistance, and if you some how have two on your team. It’s just called out GG before the match even starts.

I’m just wondering why PvP players feel that mesmer can’t work. What should change to make it in the meta? Do the top players not even want mesmers in their teams anymore? What would it take to actually have people say “you play a mesmer cool we need one.” Instead of “Do you play anything else?” as soon as you are on a team.

Kind of a rant, Kind of a question. I know this is a class question in the pvp thread but this is specific to mesmers in PvP.

TLDR: Do you think mesmers need something to be on teams again? Are there others just as frustrated that the class they have spent so many hours trying to become perfected on is just brushed off on the class alone.

Don’t believe everything you hear.

Countless

Countless doesn’t mean imma stop playing mesmer. Just means its frustrating that that is how people feel about it right now.

Honestly I have no clue how to do that. I’m a medical geek not a computer one >.< I know how to open the resource monitor but not sure how to check latency from there.

From the bug forums however the PvP forums are more active so here it goes.

Playing NA. In pvp matches I am getting terrible skill lag. I have time warner cable internet (using wifi in my house because its my only option.) No other games that require internet are giving me problems. My FPS is stable at 60. It’s massive skill lag. When I type /IP into the chat window the current IP Address I am using is
Ip Address (es): 64.25.38.248:0

Does anyone know what the ES means? Is it working off of a server outside of the US? I live in San Diego

Playing NA. In pvp matches I am getting terrible skill lag. I have time warner cable internet (using wifi in my house because its my only option.) No other games that require internet are giving me problems. My FPS is stable at 60. It’s massive skill lag. When I type /IP into the chat window the current IP Address I am using is

Ip Address (es): 64.25.38.248:0

Does anyone know what the ES means? Is it working off of a server outside of the US? I live in San Diego.

So people blowinf huge cooldowns in order to make sure you stay downed is Bad? The only class that can also truly prevent a stomp is eles. You’re also forgetting some other stomp mechanics IE portal stomps steal/infiltrators signet stomps, phase retreat+blink stomps and shadow step stomps.

Every clkittenes their downed state except maybe eles.

Downed state isnt necessarily meant to give you a fighting chance 1v1 more so to give ur team a chance to get to you and res you.

Wow thanks for the responses. I was expecting a bunch of l2p noob posts but this is great! So some ideas I was tossing around in my head specifically have to do with portal. Right now (and almost since release) portal was what kept mesmer hanging on. I remember it used to be a lower CD. Do you think lowering the CD would help give mesmers that buff in team mobility just by making it more consistent?

Or, what about making portal an elite skill? One of the bigger consensus I’m seeing in this thread is mesmers need better condi clear. Well everyone knows why its almost impossible for mesmers to bring condiclear. If portal was made an elite, leaving a skill open for mantra of resolve or null field. This wouldnt necessarily be a buff just a changing of skills (and you could remove moa when you make portal an elite for all I care.)

Like I said just some thoughts that may make the class more optimal without sending it over the top.

Ravenmoon.5318:

My god i swear some mesmer players are terribad. More balance to the fight vs thief? Seriously? Learn to freaking play. I don’t know how many times a mesmer has had me on the defensive (pretty much disengaging because death inbound).

As a thief, i still consider the mesmer one of the harder classes to fight against. So quit your whining, watch some LordHelseth vids and git gud.

I actually fare pretty well against most thieves. I still get wrecked when I am caught off guard the, you know the standard way most die to thieves.

It’s the desire of players to have mesmers on their team. Yes everyone would love to be on helseth/supcutie level. But really you are trying to justify keeping the class down based off TWO players doing decent against good teams with mesmer.

Really?

jayson.6512:

i think mesmer is fine giving them condition immunity will make the class a bit broken because they can blink away and stealth to recover if the fight is not on their side. maybe a small condition removal. like while you use your healing skill remove burning or poison.

That’s really all we want. Is something that removes damaging conditions on heal.

Realistically Do you think ANET will do anything to fix our role competition? I think one thing that should be looked at is BETTER condi clear.

If they try to buff mesmers sustain will it be effective? Or is the class so pidgeoned into thief food that its useless.

So I’ve been told by a few people that have done ESLs/AG etc. That mesmer just “can’t work” anymore. I know people are gonna bring Supcutie/Misha/Helseth etc into this argument about how amazing they are at mesmer and they are great in their team. The point is…

When asking people about forming a team they flat out tell me “play something else.” Not because I’m a bad mesmer, I know I’m not the greatest mesmer but I know that I am not complete garbo. They say it because they and others feel mesmer just doesn’t have anything of value to teams anymore In their opinion just bring two eles with FGS they will match the mobility, and have better sustain. I know that in the past mesmers were great, it took the team building around them, however they were able to contribute a ton to the team if it happened that way.

Now even mentioning the class (along with others I know.), is met with heavy resistance, and if you some how have two on your team. It’s just called out GG before the match even starts.

I’m just wondering why PvP players feel that mesmer can’t work. What should change to make it in the meta? Do the top players not even want mesmers in their teams anymore? What would it take to actually have people say “you play a mesmer cool we need one.” Instead of “Do you play anything else?” as soon as you are on a team.

Kind of a rant, Kind of a question. I know this is a class question in the pvp thread but this is specific to mesmers in PvP.

TLDR: Do you think mesmers need something to be on teams again? Are there others just as frustrated that the class they have spent so many hours trying to become perfected on is just brushed off on the class alone.

Juba.8406:

lol

just make an Engineer, almost half dailies got Engineer.

No kitten that. kitten the entire class cheese mode. It’s either cheesy kitten turrets, stupid kitten celestial, or some kitten condi build. Screw engis.

brannigan.9831:

I would imagine the dailies are on set schedules. You might think that mesmers get the daily less then other classes but that is almost certainly not the case,

Yes it is the case.

Have a look http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Daily/Table

SlimChance.6593:

I don’t use it because it just doesn’t fit with my build. I’m surprised that some people feel that it’s a “requirement” for a Mesmer.

I could say the same about TimeWarp. For the life of me, I have no idea why more Mesmer’s don’t use it. It’s a game changer in sPvP!!

I need to put a video together of nothing but TimeWarp saves/wins and such.

Mesmerse don’t use timewarp as much because the cooldown is even more massive than portal, and IMO Mass invis has saved so many more fights (peeling for your team mates, surprised bursts etc.)

Archaon.9524:

Just disable ALL pve stuff in pvp…maybe we’re gonna get less ppl rushing svanir on start, dieing there and blaming team cause noone helped with boss…

and no…i’m not even joking, it really happens…

Its funny, how much people rage about that.

Archaon.9524:

Tao.5096:

Archaon.9524:

(Since good mesmers don’t run condition crap),

Good players play however they want and strive to success and have fun.

go tell that to noscoc….sure he had so much fun playing something not really suited to face orng comp…aside from terrible positioning and worthless +1s….

/salt

you can play whatever you want ofc, you can play condi mes, gs yolowar, condi thief or anything that comes to mind…

but if you are actually playing to win you can’t just play any kitten you want…you MUST play something that suits your team’s needs and the best you can possibly run on your class, otherwise you just gonna be a cripple for other 4 ppl….or do you really think that YOU having “fun” is worth making your team lose cause you’re playing bs specs?

So no…good players don’t play what they want, they play what their team NEEDS them to play in order to win, nothing more nothing less.

I’m gonna say yes and no to this. Most good teams have players that main a specific class. Granted most classes have more than one spec that “could be” viable. Mesmers don’t have this option for pvp really, so if the team needs something besides a shatter mes, the team is better off with another class.

Mrbig.8019:

What’s coming tomorrow ?

Things like thieves and mesmers porting to the ledges on keep, clocktower, the bridges on foefire etc is changing tomorrow.

Jasher.6580:

I play a Mesmer. I’m not in the Meta. Yes I’m salty.

HERE HERE! Stamps feet and bumps fist

alanis.6094:

jportell.2197:

skcamow.3527:

jportell.2197:

Levetty.1279:

As I constantly point out, anytime somebody tries to start a conversation about the weaknesses of the Mesmer class and the poor way in which the balance team have handled the class somebody always comes in to tell us stories about how they can take on entire enemy zergs or 1v1 thiefs with no traits.

Very tiring.

This right here, people keep saying how they have these amazing builds that are gonna be the meta, completely ignoring why mesmers are taken in the first place. People completely ignore that the only viable build mesmers have, is hard countered by well any thief build. They then point out how they have an amazing build that completely wrecks thieves. Well what does it do besides that? Does it match necros/engis condi pressure? Does it have the sustain of any of the other classes? How is it mobility wise? Does it even have portal? What about boon removal?

Then it’s clear that this amazing gonna be meta build is good for one thing, countering thieves, and nothing else.

Would absolutely love hearing about a build with zero traits that works vs thieves and takes on entire zergs.

And would also love to hear about amazing builds claiming to be the next meta! The only builds I’ve seen talked about in this thread are those that perform pretty decent vs thieves. And those same builds weren’t touted to be the end all build for every situation.

The message is to simply adapt when you see a potential hard counter on the other team. When I see a thief, I’ll play one of those effective aforementioned builds and I’ll generally perform rather well. Conversely, if I see an engineer I’ll likely go shatter because the power damage is better vs the turret spam.

In the end you play to win after all. Adapting is the way to play to win.

Yes but the problem is every build that is built to hard counter thieves, and by hard counter I mean survive just enough of their burst to hope you get them down, sucks against any other build/class. Take the condi builds for instance, sure they are gonna wreck thieves. What about the other classes in the meta? How are you going to try and condi down a d/d cele ele with the absolute highest uptime on condi clear in the game. Or a shoutbow that comes in a close second? What about engineers that run a cele build that says “condis? Oh here have some nades.”

I can understand the want to build just so you can deal with thieves, but you lose all your effectiveness against any other class/build that is used.

MtD builds absolutely wreck Engi and Warrior meta builds in 1v1 situations (and 2v2s that don’t include double AoE cleaning professions), and do actually overwhelm D/D as well (though the latter takes a little longer).

Lockdown builds are able to fare very well vs the above professions as well; though they wouldn’t be able to hold/contest a point like MtD; though they do better in larger fights.

MTD still doesn’t do well against a good shoutbow that manages their cooldowns. And really all they have to do is stand still and use their warhorn/shouts.

The big problem with mesmer condition builds is they rely on stupid opponents (ones that run around spamming skills.)

Exedore.6320:

Saturn.6591:

Hold on; since when are grenades reflectable (as claimed by like, everyone in this thread)? o.o

Since beta.

Since grenades hit the ground with a small random variation and not a player directly, it’s hard to see them be reflected/absorbed unless you have an area reflect/absorb. Guardian Shield #5 is a good example to test against.

Bertrand.3057:

Yeah, let’s complain about 1 of 2 active unblockable Mesmer skills, never mind that the class meant to be about distracting opponents isn’t one of the 6 that have unblockable interrupts.

This is more about unblockable damage vs. unblockable utility. There are a lot of unblockable utilities which are fine because they aren’t doing significant instant damage.

Mirror blade only does significan’t instant damage if every single bounce connects.

Ross Biddle.2367:

It’s really really really simple and it has nothing to do with if you have a pre-built, competent, or utterly useless team. 90s cd.

So your average match is about 10 mins. If you used it immediately from the start and at every available interval, you’re looking at 10 total uses. And that doesnt take into account the added 60 second window between dropping and opening it. Given if you don’t use it, you get the 30s cd, but if you do its a full 90s before you can use it again.

It also has to be set up ahead of time. And what it is really? Massive team mobility. Super powerful in that regard, but that’s all it amounts to. It works well enough on a shatter mes because what else are you really doing? Duke in and out of fights dropping mass amounts of instant damage. However for all a shatter mes’s potency there’s plenty of things he can’t do in return (ideally your teams there though).

In it’s place I might make a rupt build and take MoD instead. That way instead of needing to portal out of a fight, or bring in allies, I can sit somewhere myself and handle the proverbial jandal.

I’d LOVE to have portal. But 90s on my little 3 slot bar?

:/

Yeah I think that the cd needs reduced… But I don’t know I guess I’ve gotten away with way too many awesome moves from portal. And honestly I don’t use it for myself to get out of a fight that often, more so to bail out teammates, or to do massive jukes on enemies. Also it is kinda fun to just pop a portal on a point you don’t own and sit in a 4v5 for the next minute because someone on the other team is dumb enough to sit and watch the portal to make sure you don’t decap the point.

xDudisx.5914:

Slick shoes drops the oil on the ground. Makes sense that you can’t block the ground. Is the same principle as frozen ground, static field, wells, etc….

Also it has a kitten cooldown compared with base 8s cooldown mirror blade (most mesmers have it on a 6.5s cd though).

Also keep in mind that in most team fights mirror blade doesn’t hit the same person every time. It usually bounces from one player to the other, Making it really do low damage to one person. In a standard shatter build one bounce is about 1.5k tops. It’s only gnarly if the mesmer risks his back side gets super close to you and does mirror blade, and honestly why are we complaining about anything on mesmer… I mean really, not like they are dominating everything in the meta.

Fay.2357:

Because if I’m not in a coordinated team, it won’t get used. Just me using it isn’t enough to be worth having a 90 second cooldown ability on my bar that will have to take the slot of another important utility.

Do you announce it to your team? I soloque 80% of the time and as long as i say “hey take that portal” it gets used. Even had some nice vapor form evacs from eles that I didn’t even have to say anything to.

Exedore.6320:

Simonoly.4352:

Mirror Blade is probably unblockable to prevent reflect clone generation.

Then why isn’t scepter #1.3 unblockable? There have been numerous videos of the reflect in use.

Let’s just say of all the things that are unblockable mirror blade should be pretty far down there. Slick Shoes anyone?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unblockable

So I don’t want this to be a discussion about meta vs not meta or so on. This thread is going to be all about one skill Portal.

More specifically, the reasons people have for not taking it? Some feel it doesn’t bring enough to the team, others say it just doesn’t fit with their build, and some say it’s flat out useless.

That isn’t necessarily something I see here on the forum all that often, but the ones I see in game hardly ever run it, and I’m curious why? I can’t live without in on my bar anymore between the portal stomps, emergency team evacs from a point, and portal bombs, I find it so fun and very useful. So if you don’t take portal I’d like to know why, maybe I can use a different skill on my bar to better effect.

Exedore.6320:

The reflect mechanic is consistent. What’s changing is the size of the target. In order to reflect a projectile, the projectile has to hit the object that is reflecting. If it hits the ground first, it won’t get reflected. You can easily see this with Wall of Reflection and warrior longbow #3 or #F1. When you target the ground in front of the wall, the projectile can hit stuff behind it which is still in the radius; target behind the wall and it gets reflected. Warrior reflect skills have a small reflect area, so projectiles which hit around the target, like grenades, often don’t get reflected.

Agree on Mirror Blade. A high damage skill which can hit multiple times being unblockable is silly. Elementalist’s Phoenix shouldn’t be unblockable either.

Mirror blade has a very obvious cast, is very slow, and very easy to dodge. Not to mention in big team fights it is the only way mesmers get away with doing any AOE damage at all.

skcamow.3527:

jportell.2197:

Levetty.1279:

As I constantly point out, anytime somebody tries to start a conversation about the weaknesses of the Mesmer class and the poor way in which the balance team have handled the class somebody always comes in to tell us stories about how they can take on entire enemy zergs or 1v1 thiefs with no traits.

Very tiring.

This right here, people keep saying how they have these amazing builds that are gonna be the meta, completely ignoring why mesmers are taken in the first place. People completely ignore that the only viable build mesmers have, is hard countered by well any thief build. They then point out how they have an amazing build that completely wrecks thieves. Well what does it do besides that? Does it match necros/engis condi pressure? Does it have the sustain of any of the other classes? How is it mobility wise? Does it even have portal? What about boon removal?

Then it’s clear that this amazing gonna be meta build is good for one thing, countering thieves, and nothing else.

Would absolutely love hearing about a build with zero traits that works vs thieves and takes on entire zergs.

And would also love to hear about amazing builds claiming to be the next meta! The only builds I’ve seen talked about in this thread are those that perform pretty decent vs thieves. And those same builds weren’t touted to be the end all build for every situation.

The message is to simply adapt when you see a potential hard counter on the other team. When I see a thief, I’ll play one of those effective aforementioned builds and I’ll generally perform rather well. Conversely, if I see an engineer I’ll likely go shatter because the power damage is better vs the turret spam.

In the end you play to win after all. Adapting is the way to play to win.

Yes but the problem is every build that is built to hard counter thieves, and by hard counter I mean survive just enough of their burst to hope you get them down, sucks against any other build/class. Take the condi builds for instance, sure they are gonna wreck thieves. What about the other classes in the meta? How are you going to try and condi down a d/d cele ele with the absolute highest uptime on condi clear in the game. Or a shoutbow that comes in a close second? What about engineers that run a cele build that says “condis? Oh here have some nades.”

I can understand the want to build just so you can deal with thieves, but you lose all your effectiveness against any other class/build that is used.

Yeah that is the big problem, we have so many offhands (which can be great!), but our two main hands are arguably some of the worst in the game. Yes scepter CAN be great, but they have spent so much time trying (trying being the key word) to buff scepter and so much time gutting MH sword that most mesmers don’t even care about the off hands because we just run double ranged shatter. So unless we get a decent mainhand to go with shield which we should because some other classes are getting 5 new weapon skills, I doubt I’ll care enough to use it.