Guild Wars 2

Preview feature, have you heard of it?

Also, dungeon forum new forum for fashion. Look at what you’ve done, Lilith and Iris!

dat high quality graphics in Ani’s view

Nice run! Definitely some room for improvement though, so it’ll be nice to see the time get better.

(perhaps ask a question or promote discussion in the OP so that it doesn’t get linksvilled)

Ran this for the first time last night. Got it in the first try with a semi-organized attempt (only one ele, and that was a noob). It’s not so bad, and is a nice change for the dungeon to have someone that hits hard but doesn’t have a Huge Sack of HP. If it wasn’t for the copy/paste fail, I’d have no complaints.

When you join generic PUG groups, no one really cares what you’re running. Go cleric guard if it makes you happy, but expect slow runs. The rest of the party will probably be doing something similar, so you won’t be dragging them down very often.

If you want to contribute to fast runs, full zerk is just about the only real way.

And a nice auto-attack with dagger (again, nothing like that on fire).

Dalanor.5387:

Guys, what do you think about completely new players after this patch?
No traits before lvl30, they even need to hunt them, because i bet they won’t be able to buy it with gold. They will become less desired. :/

The changes looks nice and exciting, i hope they will have some super awesome GM trait for necromancers.

It’ll be tougher, but hunting them is another activity to do, so that might keep them more interested in the game at low levels. The new system seems less confusing as well, and less prone to 14/14/14/14/14 type mistakes.

Wanze.8410:

New reward items have been added as well, for example the Ring of the Catacombs.

Ghostly spineguard too!

SallyStitches.4096:

maxinion.8396:

Warden is the only one bugged outright. I find it usually bugs when you have some sort of slope or obstacles around you (which is quite often). If you have completely flat ground then it will function fine.

Don’t forget about the Harpy fractal. You can be right up on the Harpy, and the iWarden still will just stand there. -_-

I think that’s because so many of the floors are sloped in the fractal… hard to tell sometimes because the entire structure is tilted!

But hooray for fixes!

You’re very welcome Rentlle, I’m glad it was useful for you~

Thankfully the featurepatch is going to let you swap traits without going to a trainer, so you’ll at least be able to get that done easily

Wrt to the build… try swapping to full zerker gear and run the same build for now. You’ll have a lot more toughness and vitality than a normal zerker build (because of all the Chaos), so it won’t be as squishy, and the gameplay will be much the same.

Keep in mind you are slowing down your team with this build— but that can be fine. If you’re running dungeons with friends and casual PUGs, then it doesn’t matter so much. Just promise me that you’ll use the sword auto-attack as much as you can, and won’t camp range with staff.

The button to instantly refund all traits, previously seen only in structured PvP areas, has become game-wide.

Oh man, dungeoning has become so much better. No excuses for not retraiting from bad WvW builds! This is going to increase our flexibility so much. Very cool change.

Xyonon.3987:

Maybe next patch the new meta becomes 0/30/0/20/20?

This is very possible, and it’ll be exciting to try it out and see if it’s better!

It’s also super easy to have just 2 mantras equipped at all times. Since the Mantra of Recovery is actually a great heal, there’s no reason not to use that. Additionally, there are basically no situations where one of Mantra of Resolve, Mantra of Concentration, or Mantra of Distraction is not one of the best utilities you should have equipped (as they are your best sources of condition cleanse/ stability + stun break/ defiant stripping respectively). Almost all situations can easily accommodate two of them, in fact.

Hell, I’d have to run the numbers to be sure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if even one mantra is enough to make 0/30 come out ahead over 10/20.

And this doesn’t even take into account feedback damage— the big hits on Ghost Eater, Lupi, Dredge Bombers, etc. with reflection is where you really get the big damage as a mesmer. The 10 in domination contributes 0 towards feedback damage, while the 30 in duelling gives you 100 precision, 10% crit damage, and 8-12% damage from empowering mantras. We’re talking about a little bit less than 20% increase in feedback damage— that is tremendous.

The Mexican Cookie.3690:

haviz.1340:

shimmerless.4560:

Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s the right direction but why HotW? Considering in addition the big fat ol’ sack of health at the end, does it really still warrant a CoF P1 reward…?

Wasn’t HoTW1 overrun by certain automated entities?

this is probably the real reason

If the entities will learn to dodge to avoid the troll, I wonder if PUGs will.

… I can dream, right?

SorrowsEmbrace.8120:

I’d also throw in the pure damage 30/30/0/0/10 variant. I don’t think this would have been viable before the new heal, but with the ability to pump out wardens back to back, I think you can squeeze out enough absorbs for many situations. The grandmaster in the power line gives you one more mantra charge, which helps keep them up for the damage bonus. You can also trait signets which brings your heal down to 20 seconds and signet of inspiration to 36 seconds.

That’s a good one too.

++ to Pyro and Frifox.

This is a good template to go on. (Note that this one is 10/30/0/20/10, which is very similar to the 0/30 build but more effective in some situations). This shows you all the traits that you want. (Credit to gw2dungeons for the template)

The basic idea of gameplay is to maximize mantra utility on your skill bar to get +8-12% damage, while summoning warden + swordsman and then auto-attacking with sword in melee. Use reflects (focus 4 + warden + feedback) as appropriate.

The 10/20 build is fine for learning and if you hate mantras. But almost all speed-clear runners will be using 0/30 or 10/30, which are effective in maximizing the damage from your reflections (which is very often more important than personal and phantasm DPS).

Arah story is pretty much the worst part to the pretty terrible Personal Story. I think just about everyone can agree on that.

If you come at it from a “laugh at all this stupid kitten” perspective, it’s more enjoyable.

Warden is the only one bugged outright. I find it usually bugs when you have some sort of slope or obstacles around you (which is quite often). If you have completely flat ground then it will function fine.

Only ascended box I’ve gotten is from 19. I mostly run 29’s and some 30s.

@Chaos: I’m sorry about the attack— I mean no offense! It’s a really nice and creative build, and I could see it being very useful for WvW or PvP. I don’t have any expertise in those areas though, so I was just replying to the OP’s question about bringing this into dungeons.

Elaborating on one point you asked about: I do think that this build could sometimes deal negative DPS in dungeons, but only when running with a might stacking s+x LH elementalist. Two reasons for this. First, if you’re wearing cleric’s or magi’s, the warden does next to no damage compared to what a zerker wearing swordsman would do. You’re really down to very low percentage of damage that you’re capable off the bat. Though as you say, you can technically run in zerker, and then there is only the loss when auto-attacking with staff (which is still a loss, but not as large as the gear choice). Second: a good elementalist is going to lay down fire fields all day long and blast them all day long to provide 20+ stacks of might for the party. 20+ stacks for the entire party is a ~significant~ gain in DPS. As I understand, a large portion of the gameplay here is to lay down the chaos storm with staff 5 (and then share boons more with Signet of Inspiration, etc.). This is a rather long ethereal field. The elementalist is going to be prevented from might stacking when this happens. Either they don’t notice the eth field, lay down their field on top and blast, only to get the eth combo— 8 chaos armors for everyone, hooray— or they stop their rotation and wait for the eth field to end before dropping down their fire field and continuing. Either way, it’s a loss to party DPS, because the ele is stuck auto-attacking with scepter (which is very bad) or they waste their might stacking rotation.

Whenever I play my elementalist, there is nothing worse than a Guardian dropping unnecessary light fields or a Mesmer dropping Feedback on enemies that don’t use projectiles, or a necromancer dropping wells, or a staff Mesmer spamming 5 on top of me. Those sorts of situations really do contribute negative DPS.

@hendo: I think Chaos mostly means the support that you can provide in WvW with mesmer is quite good compared to the other classes. Things like frost spirit/spotter/banners are not as useful in zergs, so the mesmer might be able to pull ahead in those sorts of situations. Maybe.

AsteriskCGY.5931:

Well Fractals is a place that likes support, cause stuff there tend to kill faster than dungeons.

Not really. You want ~good~ support in Fractals— Aegis and Stability and protection, on a reliable basis. A guardian in full zerker can provide that. Weakness on enemies is a great bit of support in fractals— but warrior provides that reliably (or anyone with skale venom). And again, guard and warr can provide this support with no DPS loss.

At the same time, the useful support that a mesmer provides— reflections and condition cleanse— are indeed very good in fractals. But again— it’s the useful variety, with no DPS loss, and not the healing + unreliable smorgasbord that the chaos build provides.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Lindbur.2537:

I want to transfer off SoR, but because all T1 servers are full… sigh

Sorry baby, we’re too good for you.

Jokes! ILY!

I’m actually somewhat surprised we are still full. I thought people would transfer off because of the free transfers…. but I guess not?

The free transfer servers aren’t particularly fun. Devona’s Rest or Kaineg? Yuck.

kyubi.3620:

Having fun with my minion master necro in fractals lvl 30+… its just lovely how easy the imbued shaman becomes with this many pet poking at his shield. Non meta run in fractals are so enjoyable i realy dont know how anyone can even have some form of fun constantly running metas but again i guess they just here for the business and dont care about fun in itself. Money becomes so useless once you got everything you want. Im just running fractals for the ascended rings and weapon now in case i can gear all my alts from it

NA isnt bad theres actualy very good player there.

Stop assuming you know what is fun for other people.

Dedicated support builds are always bad in dungeons. Sorry, that’s the end of the story.

To be effective, you need to DPS and support. Ele can do this well— 21 might stacks + full DPS = awesome. Guardian can do this well— aegis + stability + protection + full DPS = awesome. Anything that sacrifices a lot of DPS is bad, because at the end of the day, parties can survive merely by using active defenses (dodges, evades, blocks, etc).

The build you linked does no damage, and the support is not good for dungeons either— no might and no (consistent) aegis. Fury is better provided by ele or ranger. No one needs you to heal them in dungeons. They do need you to condition cleanse (that’s one of your jobs as mesmer), but you can do that with a full zerker DPS melee build by just slotting Mantra of Resolve and Null Field.

In fact, I would wager that this build ends up contributing negative DPS— if you’re constantly dropping Chaos Storm (which is the only way to get boons up, really) then I bet you’re going to ruin perfectly good fire fields that an elementalist or a guardian could drop, and will prevent your team from stacking might.

Note that support of this form isn’t bad in WvW. Dedicated support builds can be very useful there.

Edit: I’ll mention one more useful form of support you provide as a mesmer— reflections. That is the sort of active damage mitigation + DPS which is useful in dungeons.

IrisTheCasual.3742:

When you are teleported to her, she actually takes a big damage herself, and you can dodge the next bleed-melee attack. One thing Sandy didn’t mention is mesmer sword skill #3 can be used to block the shadowstep attack. I find it extremely cheesy =_=

Do you mean sword 4?

What’s cheesy about intelligently using active defenses?

Lindbur.2537:

Is Mai’s shadowstep shot dodgeable? If so, when should I dodge?

I’m not 100% sure it’s dodgeable, but it’s blockable. Do it right after she points (perhaps a half-second after she points).

One of the nice strategies I’ve picked up from [DnT] is to run around at distance with my mesmer with offhand sword equipped. I’m always furthest away, so she always shadowsteps to me, but I can always have my block on 4 up in time, and I can prevent her shadowstep.

Sublimatio.6981:

maxinion.8396:

Sublimatio.6981:

15 in Illusions is USELESS as you already have shortened cd on phantasms by sword trait and focus trait!!! when will people realize?

When will you realize the cooldown reduction stacks? Try it. For realz.

Omg. You are right, the tooltip is bugged and it doesn’t show the real cooldown when both traits are active…

:) Glad it worked for you. I didn’t even realize the tooltips were bugged as I haven’t looked at them in so long…

Note that 3-manning as level 80s would be possible, albeit rather difficult for people new to the game. 3-manning as level 40’s is going to be very difficult, especially since it seems you are still learning the class. Dungeons are meant for 5-man coordinated groups where people know the class (more or less)— they’re going to be hard if you don’t fit this criteria.

Sublimatio.6981:

15 in Illusions is USELESS as you already have shortened cd on phantasms by sword trait and focus trait!!! when will people realize?

When will you realize the cooldown reduction stacks? Try it. For realz.

Bistouri.6038:

Wow, look at that… it’s one of those really helpful and informative posts.

It’s not clear what you’re talking about, since PU builds are one of the most common WvW/PvP builds and they use 30 in Chaos.

Sure, you won’t see Chaos used in PvE because PvE is based on a minimal defense, maximum DPS strategy, and Chaos only offers defensive options.

4: Level Reset:
- Do not do a reset moving forward.

Hey, it’s something— an acknowledgement that they shouldn’t do it again. Some other nice points in the summary too, like emphasis that new lore shouldn’t impact gameplay (using unskippable cutscenes as an example of something to avoid).

Hooray~

Sanderinoa.8065:

maxinion.8396:

Spoj, didn’t Sandy use stealth several times in his Mai Trin solo without any reset? Or did it not reset because there was a dead body in the area? That’s the only situation where I’ve seen “the entire party stealth”— normally I’m the only one in my party doing it because I Am Bad and need the extra breathing room with Mai.

stealth resets them after a certain amount of time, mass invis is just enough for them not to reset. Its why you can see me not actually chaining my stealths, but instead taking breaks between them.

That’s super cute. I guess Order of Whispers Spy Kit also lasts the right amount of time, but an SR would cause a reset.

Thanks for the tip!

Spoj, didn’t Sandy use stealth several times in his Mai Trin solo without any reset? Or did it not reset because there was a dead body in the area? That’s the only situation where I’ve seen “the entire party stealth”— normally I’m the only one in my party doing it because I Am Bad and need the extra breathing room with Mai.

Right here btw: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQnG8p1JxT0#t=178

That’s what I meant by ‘casual runs.,’ so I think we are in agreement.

One tip: stealth prevents AoEs. Order of Whispers spy kits, for instance, can be very useful for getting some breathing room. Same with mass invis on Mesmer.

Spoj The Second.7680:

maxinion.8396:

Spoj The Second.7680:

Well i bet people cringe when they see me join an instance on my necro. I always have signet of locust slotted for running around vigil keep or w/e.

Shouldnt judge on movement signets when people first enter!

That’s just them cringing when they see a necro in general, Spoj.

dodge rolls away from retaliation

Knew it was coming. Was in deathshroud to absorb the blow.

Yeah, that attack was very well telegraphed.

A 6-9% bonus which applies to your feedback can be huge— keep in mind that in most places your biggest numbers are going to come from reflecting huge spikes (on Lupi, for example). Your primary job in dungeons as a mesmer is to nail these reflects and make the most of them, so the 10 in illusions is important for that. This is the same justification as dropping 30 into dueling to grab Empowering Mantras. There, the 8-12% gain doesn’t affect phants so it’s actually only a 4-6% increase in the normal DPS— but it is still absolutely worth it because of the increased damage from reflects.

I’m actually quite familiar with all of the traits in Inspiration, since I swap out focus in fights where I don’t need reflections or an AoE phant and use that slot for something like Restorative Mantras or Mender’s Purity. They’re both helpful, sure, but they’re not absolutely critical— they don’t improve DPS, and they don’t provide active damage mitigation. I certainly agree that playing with Mender’s Purity or Restorative Mantras is easier, as it gives you a little bit more wiggle room for mistakes.

I’m fine with saying that 30 in inspiration is a nice build for more casual runs or while you’re learning the class. But as hendo outlined in his post, the trade-off in damage vs. utility doesn’t quite cut it here for most people. Many meta builds have related builds which are more comfortable to play (Obal for example in his guardian guide highlights a few alternatives which can be easier to play than the meta), and I think that’s exactly where the 30 inspiration build sits.

You keep saying additional utility— but there really is none which is super useful at 30 inspiration. Longer living phantasms don’t live appreciably longer. Longer lasting feedback is not necessary for most situations if you time your feedback correctly. Restorative mantras or mender’s purity is not necessary. 6-9% damage, on the other hand, is always useful. It’s not a huge difference, but even 6% DPS is important.

Spoj The Second.7680:

Well i bet people cringe when they see me join an instance on my necro. I always have signet of locust slotted for running around vigil keep or w/e.

Shouldnt judge on movement signets when people first enter!

That’s just them cringing when they see a necro in general, Spoj.

*dodge rolls away from retaliation*

Bearlin.7238:

I like 0/30/0/25/15 as well. The damage modifier to yourself (+12% dmg) is so much better than putting those 10 points into Domination. During speed runs, I find myself being able to summon maybe 2 phantasms max before the whatever we’re killing is dead.

Note that this is actually an argument for 10/30/0/20/10. If you only summon two phants, you never have a chance to use the reduced cooldown from Illusionist Celerity (since I’m assuming you summon warden and swordsman and then melee). The extra 10 in domination, instead of Celerity, gives another 4% DPS.

I personally run 0/30 as well, but keep in mind that it’s only useful if your fights take long enough to get out a third phant (so it’s much better in places like fractals, for example).

170 toughness is not a lot. A zerker is still going to die if he doesn’t have active mitigation. Someone in full PTV is still going to faceroll (while do zero damage) without it. I guess we’re just going to have to disagree that it “makes a big difference.”

Agreed that more than 1 warrior is also generally unnecessary, but as you say, casual speedruns happen and you can get some overlap.

Btw, for cliffside center seal you use blinds and reflects. See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=XBhu7PXMeR8#t=240

frifox.5283:

Carighan.6758:

Why? Adaptability. PH is also a damage increase

Once patch hits, expect a proper study on how much exactly PH improves dmg for each phantasm once again

This will be a very interesting study. Looking forward to the results!

Toughness is never good. Like hybrid says, don’t get hit.

Edit: for the sake of being slightly less hyperbolic, the title specifically says “speedruns.” Utilities which don’t provide DPS or active defense (aegis, blinds, reflects) are just inappropriate in speedruns, where just about every tool you have should be aimed towards dealing damage.

Rag.3258:

JJBigs.8456:

Never drop banner of defense as a warrior, even if all the other banners are taken by others.

Stopped reading there

That’s actually one of the better things there. Defense and Tactics banners are useless. Bring a might signet for more DPS instead.

Just Say No to 30 in inspiration. Take traits which actually increase damage instead.

I’m thinking 0/30/0/20/20. I’ll be trying this out at least.

Sanderinoa.8065:

maxinion.8396:

The meta builds used by DnT and rT and so on are 10/30/0/20/10 and 0/30/0/25/15 and occasionally 30/30/0/0/10. There are lots of opinions out there, but the folks doing record runs have a preferred setup, so keep that in mind.

Im still not completely sure about 30/30/0/0/10 or 25/30/0/0/15… though I admit I miss the triple mantra a lot with the second one.

I stand corrected on the no-focus option by the expert himself Thanks Sandy!

The meta builds used by DnT and rT and so on are 10/30/0/20/10 and 0/30/0/25/15 and occasionally 30/30/0/0/10. There are lots of opinions out there, but the folks doing record runs have a preferred setup, so keep that in mind.

Dub.1273:

Lindbur.2537:

Caught this guy in the act…

Just… why?

Check out that Combat Healer title. Pro healer cleric ftw.

Keep in mind party leader has to leave party for the instance to close. He can step outside the dungeon just fine to let you finish while he merches or something. It takes a special sort of rushing to leave party so quickly at the end if others are still grabbing.

It sounds like your experience is pretty par for the course, Annie. I’ve had runs before where I ask for zerker without a ping, and then see people stacking Life or Momentum. Maybe for AC it doesn’t matter and you can carry the bads, but for harder dungeons and Fractals I think it is absolutely fair to kick people and try again since you will be relying on them.

One additional thought is to make the rewards for gambits/instabilities scale according to popularity. Right now, there is no incentive to do hard/annoying instabilities other than the challenge. While the challenge is enough to motivate some, many others are completely ignored because there is literally no benefit to your experience for running them.

On the other hand, if there was an advertised 3g boost to the least-run instabilities, you might see more people actually running it. And when that becomes super common, you could adjust again and raise the bonus for another level. All of this could be automated, and eventually it would settle in an equilibrium where players get “enough” reward to justify doing the annoying instabilities.

Obviously you would need caps to keep things from getting out of hand (both too much or too little), but a system like this could be flexible and partly address the issues of rewards and less-run instabilities/gambits simultaneously.