Guild Wars 2

Link in sig

Or you play a guard ;(

DEKeyzToChaos.7381:

maxinion.8396:

Iris Ng.9845:

Staff: Lava font -> Blast, Blast -> Trash dead.
Dagger: Flamewall -> Burning Speed (to the wall) -> Blast, blast, blast -> Trash dead.
Scepter: … hmmm, wait, let me summon my hammer.

Scepter: “Hmm, can I camp AA lazily without my team noticing so I don’t have to wastea cooldown on LH?”

Really, guys and gals. Really? I thought you knew better.

I’ll give you 2 damage numbers. The first is if you are at 0 might and are the only person stacking might, the second is if you start off at 25 might.

• Staff: Eruption – Lava font – Arc Brill – Arc Wave – Fireball x3: 54,000-67,000 dmg over 6.8 seconds (start casting at 1200 range, so it’s more like 5.5 seconds in melee)
• D/F: Burning speed – Earth – Arc Brill – Mag Wave – Arc Wave – Air – LW x3: 52,000-63,000 dmg over 5.25 seconds in melee
• Scepter-Focus: DT – Flamewall – Arc Wave – Phoenix – Earth – Arc Brill – Mag Wave – Water – Comet – Shatterstone – Air – Lightning Strike: 60,000-74,000 dmg over 6.35 seconds (starting at 900 range, it’s more like 5.8 sec in melee)
• Scepter-Dagger: DT – Ring of Fire – Arc Brill – Arc Wave – Phoenix – Fire Grab – Air – Lightning Strike – Ride the Lightning: 73,000 – 87,000 dmg over 5.9 seconds (5.3 sec in melee)

Other assumptions: Ascended zerk with scholar/night/force, SnS, potion, banners, fury (durr). 6-6-2-0-0 builds, no tempest defense shenanigans. NO vuln, EA, spotter, or fire signet. I was mid some other project when I saw these posts and just had to say something :/

D: sorry keyz!

I mean camp’ing AA after that rotation. There are some places where you have to fight a champ, but want to keep an icebow/LH for a slightly harder fight coming up, and the champ can sometimes survive the initial burst. This is mostly with pugs (let’s say on ACp1, on the gravelings after spider queen, and my conjures may be on cooldown or I want to not waste time waiting for the ice bow at the burrows).

Definitely always do the scepter rotation, everyone~ (And hell, I do it again if it’s long enough that the cooldowns on the burst have faded).

Dinks.2478:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Dinks.2478:

Yeah, she aims her pistol at you as she shoots instantly and then one shots you. Such an amazing tell!

I’m going to take a stab at being civil unlike you, and say it is possible that with lag or a poor internet connection it might look like an instant shot. That’s a possibility but for me, with an excellent internet connection on both my EU and NA accounts the time between the point and the shot is literally 2 seconds.

You count fast, unfortunately seconds are a universal standard so even if you count really fast instant (for the sake of practicality) is still instant and not 2 seconds.

With that said, they might as well remove agony as a mechanic because having a mechanic like AR is pointless when the bosses are so OP all of her attacks are one shots. No class has that many dodges and blocks and invulnerability.

ummm

it really is a huge tell. It’s long been standard practice for mesmers to use scepter/sword, stand at a distance, and block all the attacks. Literally no one in my parties ever downs on that attack (though they do down/take damage on the attacks that I can’t bait and block), because I’m always standing at range and blocking her. And I’m not even very good at reading tells!

It’s not an easy fight, but this part of it is not bad.

PS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfpkN_HV7fk#t=80 or so (1:20 or on the video) when she does the little jump and points to the right side of the room where someone is camping (you can tell there’s one person there on the minimap). She does a little hop and points, shoots out the projectile, gets blocked, and doesn’t actually shadowstep. You can also tell she’s about to do it because she’s standing completely still for quite some time after that little hop.

Iris Ng.9845:

Staff: Lava font -> Blast, Blast -> Trash dead.
Dagger: Flamewall -> Burning Speed (to the wall) -> Blast, blast, blast -> Trash dead.
Scepter: … hmmm, wait, let me summon my hammer.

Scepter: “Hmm, can I camp AA lazily without my team noticing so I don’t have to wastea cooldown on LH?”

Cotser.7015:

Lucas.9157:

Did the patch bring anything good?
Or just unskippable cutscenes?

What do you think?

I actually like the new content~ It’s fun to play through once if you care about the story at all. It’s much better than Season 1 stuff.

ThiBash.5634:

The main appeal for staff in PvE is Meteor Shower. It can deal humongeous damage to groups (and bosses) because of the large number of hits. And you get most of your cooldown while walking to the next group, resulting in greater MS uptime than you’d get on paper. Scepter and dagger don’t have anything that comes close.

Of course, when it comes to single target dps over longer fights, the story gets different.

It’s actually more of a function of how OP lava font is

Fuzzion.2504:

Oh My God.8423:

Neko.9021:

For PvE:

Fire Staff = Highest
Scepter + LH = Second Highest (mainly the Lightning Hammer)
MH Dagger = Third Highest

Scepter = Terrible after about 3 seconds of combat, but highest if the combat is shorter than that, strangely enough.

Oh, I thought dagger has the highest dps…

A1 does. For auto attacks. And that was zerker build

Only if all three projectiles hit. Most dagger builds in PvE actually use AA only from air attunement, partly for this reason.

Anyway Keyz’s post is basically the final verdict~

Assassins is great. Go for ranger runes, which are much better than ruby orbs, ASAP. Learn to dodge, and use sword 2 and sword 4 for evade/block. Maha gave you the link for builds.

If you really want the optimal playstyle, this is it. It’s harder, and relies on your ability to dodge, but it’s strongest at the end of the day.

Fhaeris.9237:

maxinion.8396:

Fhaeris.9237:

Hawkeyeryn.2475:

am also curious as to what the current metas are.
Thanks a ton!

1 guardian
3 wars
1 ele
all other professions are useless. That’s the current meta.

Lol nope. Any team with more than one warrior is doing it completely wrong in terms of “meta.” Not saying Mesmer should be on a real meta team (dps is a little low with a large ramp up time, and movement is slow), but actual meta composition is probably closer to 2 ele, 1 warr, 1 guard, and one wild card (which can be Mesmer depending on the path).

lol nope.

ok, i guess all the world-record holders in [SC], [rT], [DnT], and so on are wrong

thx for letting me know

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

I just grenaded them all in place.

There’s a difference between “dynamic” mobs and “annoying mobs who constantly run away.” I don’t think anyone really wants the latter despite what they say.

Isn’t that what the first implementation of the AI did, back in early beta, and everyone complained and so they changed it?

Fay.2357:

Expect nothing, it’s harder to be disappointed.

I’ve learned to expect new and interesting bugs/“fixes” with every patch. No way to be disappointed this way~

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Important stealth change: (or I missed it in the patch notes? Entirely possible!) It now tells you what you are going to pick up. Hooray! No more banners when I mean ice bow!

yayyyyyyyyy

intently.4502:

maxinion.8396:

intently.4502:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Most people go axe/mace since the extra vuln and knockdown are net DPS gains.

For open world roaming though, what do people do for swiftness?

Sword/warhorn (for leap on sword 2 and swiftness on wh 4)

So Sword/WH + GS? No axe? Isn’t that a big DPS loss?

DPS is “camp greatsword.” Swapping out of GS is a dps loss (this depends on the exact situation and the exact build, but it is often true).

pdavis.8031:

Tree.3916:

The on hit proc might has nothing to do with why people use strength runes at all. Can you please take the time to learn before you speculate on things or make pronouncements?

While it may not be used by the general population for the on proc might, but rather the power and the might duration, I still take it into account when discussing a might stacking build. And if its just for the power and might duration, why not hoelbrak, or fire? Its not uniformed speculation, just because YOU don’t feel that the on might proc has anything to do with it, doesn’t mean it’s not a valid concern.

Because it’s a combination of hoelbrak runes and flame legion: you get the +power, +damage%, and the might duration bonuses. This is why strength runes are useful. This is where the might is coming from. If you’re good, you’re not going to be getting hit anyway, so it’s really no loss.

rumors abound that the arah p1 corral for ooze is fixed

Clownmug.8357:

Berserker Mesmer is also sub-optimal compared to other classes in PvE. If that group didn’t know you were using condition gear could they really tell the difference?

You absolutely could. Mesmer DPS, especially in fractals against long-lasting bosses with no stacking, is very good.

And there are a thousand little ways to tell when a player is more likely not running a meta/berserker build.

This actually hurts a lot for PvE too. There were quite a few useful tricks you could play with sword 3 (and the clone dies very quickly in PvE as well, so we were always using it with the dead clone situation).

rip mes

also looking forward to the new bugs

All builds are viable. You can complete the content.

Not all builds are optimal, or even good. I personally think condition Mesmer is awful (we have very poor condition application that does meaningful damage). Some people, who are concerned about efficiency, are not going to be happy running with a condi Mesmer because of this.

If you want the optimal builds, check my sig. I’m not sure why you’re so concerned about re-gearing— you can always use your condi gear in wvw and it’s not so expensive to pick up a full berserker set from CoF tokens, and then buy ranger runes cheaply on the TP. Again, this only matters if you care about optimal. If you just want to yolo, go ahead and play condi— it’ll be slower, but that decision is up to you and your group.

Out of curiosity, why the staff mesmer? O.o

Nice run though, and congrats!

pdavis.8031:

Ok test results are in. Of course it was with the dps dummy in the mists so there is a bit of total damage output difference, but for stacking might with valk gear and eagle runes, I was able to give and maintain 18 stacks of might with spikes up to 20. With valk gear/strength runes, 21, with spikes up to 23. With zerk/strength 23 with frequent peak a to 25.

So it would appear that yes someone else was supplying might as well. However my guildie, with whom I tested this, brought up the point that in a group incidental might would be added to the group. Another wartior with FGJ, a guardian doing what guardians do, etc.

He also brought up that knights might be better than zerk. Because if you are supplying might to your party it would be better to be a bit more “tanky”. I would have to agree on that point. If tou are too glassy, you arent supplying might if you are downed pr jave to dodge more often. I’ll have to look into that though.

You’ll also get a lot more aggro and attention from mobs, potentially leading to more downs.

Purple Miku.7032:

maxinion.8396:

It’s not ZERK’s fault for realizing necro brings nothing useful to the table. They do decent dps and have moderate survivability and can provide a bit of blind and weakness— but there are other classes that are better at all of that.

Ranger, on the other hand, has unique bonuses like spotter and frost spirit. That makes them good.

Take a look also at what’s happening to Mesmer. Time warp is seen as less important, and guardians have enough reflects and other types of support. The only unique thing a Mesmer can do is portal. So for the most part, that’s the only reason to bring a Mesmer. I main a mes, so it sucks to realize that, but that’s just the way it is. I play ele and warrior in most dungeons instead.

Are you trying to shoo Sandy away?!

D:

it’s ok, sandy and i cry together

Congrats!

Jerus.4350:

maxinion.8396:

It’s not ZERK’s fault for realizing necro brings nothing useful to the table. They do decent dps and have moderate survivability and can provide a bit of blind and weakness— but there are other classes that are better at all of that.

Ranger, on the other hand, has unique bonuses like spotter and frost spirit. That makes them good.

Take a look also at what’s happening to Mesmer. Time warp is seen as less important, and guardians have enough reflects and other types of support. The only unique thing a Mesmer can do is portal. So for the most part, that’s the only reason to bring a Mesmer. I main a mes, so it sucks to realize that, but that’s just the way it is. I play ele and warrior in most dungeons instead.

Guard can provide quickness too XD

rip mes

but hey guards can’t do this!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fCfpKZ0_s8

It’s not ZERK’s fault for realizing necro brings nothing useful to the table. They do decent dps and have moderate survivability and can provide a bit of blind and weakness— but there are other classes that are better at all of that.

Ranger, on the other hand, has unique bonuses like spotter and frost spirit. That makes them good.

Take a look also at what’s happening to Mesmer. Time warp is seen as less important, and guardians have enough reflects and other types of support. The only unique thing a Mesmer can do is portal. So for the most part, that’s the only reason to bring a Mesmer. I main a mes, so it sucks to realize that, but that’s just the way it is. I play ele and warrior in most dungeons instead.

intently.4502:

Guanglai Kangyi.4318:

Most people go axe/mace since the extra vuln and knockdown are net DPS gains.

For open world roaming though, what do people do for swiftness?

Sword/warhorn (for leap on sword 2 and swiftness on wh 4)

Anyone ever seen 15 wardens bug out simultaneously?

Yup, happened last night in a 5-mesmer Arah P2. Awesome. Truly a beautiful, magical moment.

Fhaeris.9237:

Hawkeyeryn.2475:

am also curious as to what the current metas are.
Thanks a ton!

1 guardian
3 wars
1 ele
all other professions are useless. That’s the current meta.

Lol nope. Any team with more than one warrior is doing it completely wrong in terms of “meta.” Not saying Mesmer should be on a real meta team (dps is a little low with a large ramp up time, and movement is slow), but actual meta composition is probably closer to 2 ele, 1 warr, 1 guard, and one wild card (which can be Mesmer depending on the path).

frifox.5283:

Zerging down Alphard:
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fCfpKZ0_s8

Amazing.

Post the blooper too though, that’s even funnier.

Current dungeon/fractal meta available as a sticky at the top of the forum, or in my sig~

Basically, the meta is phantasm builds with sword + (focus/sword/pistol depending on the situation). No GS.

Also, spoj had the maximum DPS necro build sorted out long before Nemesis’s trash. We’ve always known the single-target DPS of necro is fine— it’s the support + cleave that is lacking from that class.

ASP.8093:

Definitely try out all the weapon as you level. It’s good to get a sense of their rhythm. And revisit Focus after level 60 so you can get the hang of Warden’s Feedback builds.

If you’re mainly a PvE player, you will absolutely want to learn Sword (MH and OH) and Focus. These are your bread-and-butter “meta build” tools. Cleaving with Sword autos is one of the best ways to fight multiple mobs. (For PvP, you basically want all the weapons. Staff, Greatsword, Sword, Focus, Torch, Pistol, and even sometimes Scepter.)

For EotM leveling, Staff and Greatsword are both pretty good for getting champion credit. You just have to put up the Warlock ASAP with staff. Focus will help you keep up with the group; you can also use it in the occasional ZvZ fight to pull some enemies around.

~

Clones don’t really do damage. They can spread conditions, though (staff clones or clones with the bleeding trait). That and you can shatter them, of course. Typical PvE DPS comes from phantasms and reflection. Reasonable DPS phantasms are Swordsman (offhand sword), Berzerker (greatsword), Duelist (offhand pistol), Warden (offhand focus), and Warlock (staff); the Torch and Scepter phants kinda suck.

Nice advice. There is no scepter phant though.

spoj.9672:

Im all for full wipe being your done. But i believe hard res should be allowed. It slows you down either way. and in some situations you may decide to finish with 4 rather than wasting time picking someone up.

And yeah if there is a full wipe, you should just move on unless the path is almost over. Noone cares about watching a casual run.

This is the best set of suggestions so far.

I won’t comment too much on wvw/pvp. Shatter builds like this are, in general, very viable and even quite good though.

It’s useless in PvE though. PvE requires two things: active support, and DPS. Active support means things which help everyone in your party survive— condition cleanse, boon rip, and most critically as a mesmer— reflections. You have none of these. DPS means using the weapons/skills/traits which provide the highest rate of damage- you protect your party by killing things faster. That means using phantasms for DPS (and the associated traits) and sword main hand— and again this build has neither. This build provides neither good active support, nor DPS.

Is it viable in PvE? Sure, anything is “viable,” and you’ll be able to complete the content (the game is old enough and easy enough for that). Is it good? Is it meta, or close to meta? Will you be helping your team kill things efficiently? Definitely not.

If you’d like to learn more about what the meta mesmer builds look like right now in dungeons/fractals, take a look at the link in my sig. Good luck~

ICEing.9237:

Are any vids up for watching? Missed it live

There will be soon! Keep watching Nike’s youtube and twitch channels.

S/D fresh air is terrible in PvE. Terrible. No one runs it.

Staff is highest, and s/f+ LH in some situations might be better.

Bingo~

Finals up now! SC vs REN!

Mesmer dps is bad, but 50% lower mesmer dps is even worse. If you bring a mesmer into a group, it’s your responsibility to minimize how much you weigh your team down. With melee sword and sword offhand (or pistol), the DPS is actually very much a contender, and will not weigh the team down much at all.

Yes, your primary responsibility is reflects and so on, but it’s everyone’s responsibility to DPS. And GS gives you no advantage over sword (it doesn’t help reflects), so it is not responsible to use it (unless the entire group decides to range or whatever).

Super fun. Lots of unexpected turns~

maha.7902:

http://i.imgur.com/4qgZTY9.jpg

gg anet

that is one fine looking mesmer in that screenshot

RemiRome.8495:

Silberfisch.3046:

Neko.9021:

[…] And yes, I’d like to know how to do without using Untraited Wardens.

May I inquire what is wrong with using untraited wardens?
Other than you need a mesmer for that and your group might not have one that is.

In case it gets patched in 2016 I guess.

don’t even joke about that

May as well. Thanks!

If you don’t mind doing 38 (not enough AR for higher), I’m happy to bring my mes for your NA run~

Fror.2163:

maxinion.8396:

Very few people do CM2 […], as they’re annoying and slow.

I disagree. CM2 is kind of being rediscovered by lots of people at the moment, and pugs are becoming better and better at this path. What was the nail on its coffin in the past is not a nuisance anymore, people can take barrels and drop them simultaneously now and the hallway of boredom with the cannons is skippable. The path in itself is rather long, yes, but slow? I don’t think so as there are energic fights and mechanics (but not both together). The only “boring” part is the boss that now people want to afk by bugging in the tree, but whatever, this boss is still meleeable with good condition removals timings.

Guess I’ll give it another shot!

ShakeyStorm.7180:

Guys, camping is so outdated now. Switch between Axe and GS to maximize Might and Adrenaline. Spam Axe 1 while waiting for GS 3,4,5.

did you even read the thread linked above

Many many thanks to CC Danicia

Very few people do CM2 and SE2, as they’re annoying and slow. Arah p4 is also very slow compared to the others. Few people do CoF3, so you might have a hard time finding people for it, but it’s not a bad path (just has a pug killer puzzle at the start).

Purple Miku.7032:

Camping GS is barely the best though. It’s only optimal if you’re able to maintain your rotation. If you aren’t for whatever reason, then it’s actually faster to swap to axe. Think of a situation in which you aren’t able to take advantage to whirlwind/rush. In this case, being on 6/5/0/0/3 and swapping to axe/x would be faster than just doing GS autoattacks in between 100b cd. Whirlwind is crucial in order for camping GS to be worthwhile.

Sure, if there are environmental concerns that keep you from using 3/5, or mobs you want to not aggro, etc., then GS camping is not worth it. But the optimal DPS on axe requires you to keep the auto-attack chain completed and using the 2/4 skills on cool-down properly, so it’s not completely trivial either. The difference between the old 6/5 fast hands and new 6/6 gs camp is very small— but it is flat out wrong to say “never camp GS” these days, as there are many situations where that is actually super viable and even marginally optimal.

jportell.2197:

intently.4502:

Thanks for the pointer!

My interpretation then is that Axe is superior to GS until you get Forceful Greatsword.

the faster axe auto attack is always better than gs just because it helps cleave mobs down faster… Never camp gs. Do 100 blades then whirlwhind into the wall then switch back to axe.

You’re a few months out of date. Camping GS is the new meta (spam all the skills).

frifox.5283:

Wethospu.6437:

frifox.5283:

Ascended Force is 0.22% better than Exotic Night.
Exotic Night is 2% better than Ascended Accuracy.
 
 
 
 

… at level 80

So what is your final answer when most night dungeons are NOT level 80?

Oh are you saying there are other dungeons beside CoE?? lol jk of couse

I can’t give a final answer just yet because I’m still not 100% sure how weapon strength scales with level compared to core stat scaling. I have seen signs of both linear and exponential scaling and even an “x” factor (had to read gw2 memory to get data that actually made sense) so until I figure it all out for sure, I’ll refrain from making any serious claims

frifox lives in coe, confirmed